TK-MAELSTRÖM

Caught up in the technological "whirlwind"...

An evocative and provocative title for a piece of electronic music whose melodic structure is similar to that of the original, it openly allows us to ask ourselves if we are losing too many neurons, if not our heads, our reason, our privacy or our private life, or even worse our freedom, in the crazy race for the latest innovation that is supposed to revolutionize our daily life!? Because the promises of exponential progress never cease to push back the limits of what is possible as much as they fuel the folly of a society that has become excessively techno-dependent! Arguing that it is for the happiness of all of us, the most fervent defenders of modern technology predict a bright, prosperous, assisted, ultra-connected, robotized, secure future... An attractive prospect for the supporters of a future where the slave machine and the "Cyber World" would be the norm, but a human, ecological, cultural and liberticidal disaster for those who envision it in the form of autonomy and "sobriety while doing as much as possible"! Two visions at the antipodes of a reality halfway between the progressive (scientific) utopia and that of billions of human beings for whom "access to better" remains a utopia in itself or not!

Also, if the enormous progress in health, access to basic resources, education, transport or communication has enabled us to acquire new tools at the same time as these tools have helped to advance knowledge, we should not put our ancestral cultural heritage too quickly, too early, into the closet. For we may always need them one day! Let us not lose sight of the fact that basic knowledge is that which enables us to survive in a hostile environment. Excelling in the use of telephone or laptop applications, in programming, or in statistical analysis can now be very useful, of course. However, survival reflexes are also and preferably those that do not depend directly on access to electrical power, computer networks and a broadband connection. Learning how to feed oneself in the event of food shortages, how to cope with multiple dangers... Knowing how to orient oneself in space, how to build a protective shelter in case of bad weather, how to take care of oneself in case of injury or illness are priorities in terms of survival. We who enjoy material comfort, running water, energy at the touch of a switch (and of a bill...), we who do not live in a zone of conflict, environmental disaster, shortage or epidemic, would be totally helpless if the world around us were to change overnight to "every man for himself!" For, even though a thorough knowledge of an internal combustion engine can clearly be useful today, finding clean drinking water or knowing how to plant an edible plant in a hyper-exchangeable environment and grow it to maturity is far more valuable to those for whom the destructive exploitation of oil deprives them of basic foodstuffs and destroys their environment. In other words, it is very appealing to believe that the "Civilization of Big Data" is the one that will contribute to the evolution of all humanity. However, "surviving without" is not just a (too) distant memory!

Of course, it is too simple to castigate in this way the forward march of progress when it is thanks to the spectacular advances of recent decades that humanity has reached an essential milestone in terms of both knowledge and consciousness. The photos of the Earth taken from the Moon during the Apollo missions will have created an "environmentalist" awareness! "The vastness of the Universe in the background has also brought us back to our modest condition as earthlings... Also, it is not so easy to look to the future with or without the immeasurable opportunities that technological advances facilitate. Nor would it be very coherent to reduce the advantages and disadvantages of modernity to a "binary" and manicheistic vision of a progress that will have at least allowed us to reach the twenty-first century without extinguishing our lineage! Moreover, it would certainly not be honest to shamelessly criticize modernity when we are all pure products of it! Let's not spit in the soup! We are very happy to taste it! However, we have to be constantly on our guard because the speed at which changes in our societies take place sometimes makes us lose the measure and reason we proudly boast about! Excess and unreason make us lose our heads. Arrogance and smugness make us lose our footing. Gullibility and greed blind us and take us away from common sense...

However, one thing is now becoming increasingly clear. Surreptitiously, digital technologies are increasingly inserting themselves between the lines of "free" services offered! Perverted by the financial windfall that personal data represent, the giants of this industry with an insatiable appetite have not waited for us to give our consent or not to make much more subtle use of it than it seems at first glance. So much so that the very obsolescence of mankind would already be pre-programmed!? This is at least one of the many questions raised by the convictions held by the new gurus of Silicon Valley! The world as we believe we know it and are still able to master it is already no longer the same as it was before Y2K! Since the famous bug did not occur, technoculture has taken precedence over the precautionary measures, caution and warnings that the episode of the "possible blackout..." had given rise to. At least three quarters of the planet now has access to a mobile phone, which itself tends to become an extension, an indispensable external support dedicated to the assistance (and infiltration, intrusion...) of the brain. We have already almost all forgotten the contact numbers that we enter mechanically into our databases. We frantically write messages in shortcuts with the help of proofreaders, so that we don't have to worry about syntax and grammar issues. So-called "intelligent" translators allow us to switch from one language to another without revealing too much about the semantic, etymological and cultural subtleties of the terms we use. We no longer think so much about how language and words can reflect the many "communicative" dimensions that a message can contain. The nuances have become almost obsolete, languages are themselves globalized. The whole planet is tending towards the practice of "Globish", this mixture of English passed in all sorts of ways during its expansion across the borders of countries of which it is, if not the only one, at least one of the languages used. In short, the fact remains that our propensity to make our lives easier also pushes us progressively towards (too much?) simplicity (simplification) in all areas. In this sense, some will claim that it is to free up space in our overloaded little brains, while others will assert that the complexity of the world having never been so great, it would be illusory for the "common man" to tie himself to the flagship of technological, cognitive and material progress. Hence, for the latter, the absolute necessity to move to an "improved version" of humanity through technology! Everyone will make up their own mind! Nevertheless, it is still essential to ask the question of the "price" that humanity will have to pay! It is not that all technological evolutions should be banned, but rather that, by dint of always "hastening" to apply and sell its latest discoveries on a large scale, humanity is faced with the facts of no longer being able to turn back as it has become so dependent on its most recent inventions in almost all sectors of activity. What is more, activities whose monetization has become the overriding objective!!!

Fortunately, a handful of us are still trying to think a little further than the tip of our own noses... No doubt we must also remember that it is still possible not to abdicate in the face of the dictates of the system in place. Alternative solutions exist and are developing. Every day new avenues are explored. Valuable initiatives are emerging all over the world. Knowledge is intertwined and interwoven. Research generates other research, which in turn leads to other research... By a "domino or snowball" effect, disciplines are mixed! Technology is also used for that: to develop creativity and critical thinking, to confront knowledge and unite it, but also to fight with its own tools the excesses it induces, to bypass the procedural flaws of a systemic functioning devoted to congestion, to prove that through it and with it solutions to any problem exist!

It is the technological advances of the end of the twentieth century that led me to explore this world, strange and fascinating at the same time, made up of "calculating machines" of a new kind that can produce synthetic "noises". Even back then, from my teenage bedroom, I was already exchanging with a lot of correspondents on all continents even before the Internet existed. Steve Jobs & Bill Gates were watching each other like dogs. The screens were still displaying large pixels, the colour palette had just passed the 64-colour mark! The data volumes did not exceed 700 kilobytes. The floppy disks had just replaced the magnetic tapes! Electronic music was still at the stage of "weirdness!" It was another time, as the saying goes! (LOL) Computers and electronics are now an integral part of our daily lives. Every aspect of our lives ends up being affected by this expansion of technology and its modus operandi, which is also a form, if not of exploitation, at least of "colonization" of our own modus vivendi... Let's remain somewhat vigilant! The use we make of it every day also shapes our own behaviour in return. At best, it helps us to optimize the tools we use. At worst, dependency sets in, abuse creates necessity... I know something about this because, having had access to it very early on, well before the standardization of protocol standards, I was able, at a very young age, to realize the consequences of a technological future under construction taking on the appearance of a "sprawling creature..." On the one hand, the creature in question created a bond and heralded a new societal dynamic. On the other hand, some already saw it as a creature that was about to devour its progenitors. Of course, it would not be very objective to reduce the current situation to a gloomy and pessimistic analysis based solely on technological modernity! Clearly, the takeover of the machines has not yet been fully implemented. However, even if the hidden face of the "Cyber World" has already inspired science fiction writers on many occasions, this does not take into account the fact that the innumerable contemporary media constantly flood our unconscious with representations of a society for whom "back-pedalling" would undeniably run counter to the forward march of evolution... The reasoned, reasonable, even "rationed" use of the digital web is hardly on the agenda. Quite the contrary! Reality and fiction end up coming closer together ostensibly. Are man and machine now close to their "melting point"? Isn't the "smartphone" already virtually connected to our biological brain? Of course, everything is always a question of point of view, design, interpretation, scale of magnitude, reference... But, we should not let ourselves be bewitched by the "technological sirens" without observing a minimum of precautions! Nor, in all lucidity, should we rely on the good faith displayed in front of the cameras by the super bosses of the Web, or even on the willingness of politicians to regulate things. First of all, because everyone would have too much to lose... And then, if you think about it, both sides are in fact already overwhelmed by events. Few people dare to admit it, but the "creature" seems to be increasingly "out of control"! This leaves doubt as to their ability to contain, if not ferocity, at least the eagerness of a humanity capable of the worst as well as the best "armed" with its "high tech" tools! What's more, if the initial project was sold as a disinterested act supposedly liberating, we should not lose sight of the origins and the seeds of the emergence of cybernetic technologies... To make a long story short, without falling into paranoia or any form of endorsement of conspiracy theories, perhaps it's important nto remember and constantly keep in mind that the very term "cybernetics" comes from the Greek "kubernetike" (κ υ ϐ ε ν η τ κ η) meaning "art of piloting, art of governing!" (kubernan, meaning to govern) To meditate at least for a few moments don't you think?

In the end, in spite of the content of my speech, and without seeing there only the "paradox assumed", a good twenty years later, it is again technology that allows me to get in touch with you! It is the advances in information technology that have made it easier for me to compose this title and the previous ones, to put it (them) online and to broadcast it (them). And if you listened to it (them), whether you liked it (them) or not, it is still thanks to the modernity of the tools we use every day now that you have started to read these few lines... A sound, a title, a few snippets of thoughts which, caught in the whirlwind of the networks, are shared and spread far beyond all expectations... So that's how it is, through a simple chain of action, that it is both possible to broadcast & exploit a form of mixing of genres whose only pretension is to federate around a musical project that cannot be restricted to being the sole fruit of an "experimental artistic" approach or to the sole dimension of the profitability of the work produced...