
“Person of Interest”: The TV Show That Predicted Edward Snowden (2014) - Deinos
http://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/person-of-interest-the-tv-show-that-predicted-edward-snowden
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SocksCanClose
Let us now pause, and write in praise of POI. Not for any political reason
(Snowden, et. al.), but because the writers have created genuine science
fiction. I can't recall who said it -- perhaps one of the greats (ACC, PKD) --
but good scifi takes the world as it is, and changes one very small thing (in
this case: genuine AI). Such a pleasure to watch. I know, I know, many folks
on HN will point out technical shortcomings, but as someone who has straddled
these many worlds (natsec, digital security, privacy), I see them reflected
here in a glorious alternative universe that is thought provoking, entrancing,
mesmerizing.

~~~
EFruit
>Such a pleasure to watch. I know, I know, many folks on HN will point out
technical shortcomings

After you get past the first season, (if you accept the premise of an
omniscient, digitally omnipotent artificial superintelligence that oversees
the world), there are really very few technical errors.

In the first season, your standard crime-drama tech mistakes apply (malformed
IP addresses, someone invading a computer system with a DDoS, randomly placed
PCB overlays, etc.)

As the show progressed in to its second and third seasons, I was surprised to
see the protagonists' computers sporting GNOME taskbars.

EDIT: There are its fair share of minor discrepancies in various things like
shell syntax and code formatting (like using Greek symbols in C code), but the
point I was trying to make is that PoI's accuracy was overall very impressive.
This impressiveness is amplified when compared with a series like CSI: Cyber,
a show which does a far worse job of writing believable technobabble and
designing realistic UIs, despite such things being arguably more critical to
CSI: Cyber.

~~~
dTal
Heh, I would hope that we crack Unicode in C before we crack omniscient,
digitally omnipotent artificial superintelligences, or I despair for the
world.

------
jacquesm
The prediction component of the machine is not currently on the radar or even
the real problem. That's 'minority report' grade stuff and doesn't need to be
explained or given wider distribution.

What _is_ the problem is that given this mountain of data and a dollop of
selective enforcement could mean the end of democracy as we currently know it.
It doesn't have to happen overnight, it doesn't have to happen everywhere. But
it might be enough to tip the balance in favor of a world that we'd all
recognize as something to avoid. And how to illustrate this without pointing
to horrors past and without seeming to be undue alarmist is becoming harder
and harder.

Having 'nothing to hide' is the mantra by which many people make their
decisions and cast their support, and programs like 'earnest voice' are
seeding the crowds with distracting talking points.

[http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-
ope...](http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-operation-
social-networks)

~~~
SocksCanClose
yes of course -- and i don't mean this facetiously, but "that's why they call
it science fiction".

as for your second point -- i'm not sure it's not happening right now.

~~~
jacquesm
> as for your second point -- i'm not sure it's not happening right now.

That's both the curse and the beauty of it. As the perpetrators of such a
scheme you could totally get away with it and we'd all be as oblivious about
it as could be.

Johnny has ambitions to go and make some real and unfortunate changes, let's
give him a really well paying job and shower him with toys until he's
distracted to the point of giving up his ambitions. Manipulation works better
the more subtle it is and the longer before a certain course of action the
smaller the deviation from the path to avoid the course of action entirely.

~~~
SocksCanClose
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_construction](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parallel_construction)

------
stevetrewick
I got bored around halfway through season 1 and stopped watching it. Picked up
Season 2 on Netflix and binged the rest after that. It ramps from standard
'randos form unlikely crime fighting team[0]' with a dystopian twist through
'vast surveillance state conspiracy' to 'post AI FOOM WTF?' quickly and at
times quite profoundly.

I got much the same feeling from later eps as I did watching Ex Machina :
"Yes, this is fiction and highly speculative fiction at that but holy fuck,
for once someone has actually bothered to do some research on the technology
and the philosophical implications"

So if like me you dropped this, be sure to pick it back up, you won't be
disappointed.

[0] And thus we can be sure that real life is not like TV because if it were
nearly everyone in the US would be part of an unlikely and seemingly
mismatched but somehow highly successful crime (including monsters) fighting
team.

~~~
ilamparithi
I did the exact thing. The first season episodes were so predictable and
boring like a Dan Brown plot. I couldn't make myself to watch the second
season. May be I should give it another try.

------
muddi900
The show also evolved very naturally; from a decent crime procedural to a
Batman pastiche to neo-Cyberpunk to exploring Transhumanism.

------
rubberstamp
Waiting for next season like forever. Hope its not shelved. I was hooked after
the pilot. Its a welcome break from the recurring theme that we see in most
series now a days. Given our current corrupt and power hungry world situation
with disregard for ethics in many government agencies everywhere, this is more
or less accurate on what the situation might become, given an AI is in the
mix.

------
mirimir
Maybe he watched it ;)

He did plan, and took considerable risks to get the access that he needed.
That is what's so bloody impressive.

~~~
bcook
Every interview with Snowden, as a pseudo-clinical paranoia-level security
nerd, I tried to critique his security decisions, but I was surprised to see
that he really did think through every decision he made. _That_ is what
impressed me.

A generally impressive human, in many ways.

~~~
jacquesm
If Snowden had been less clever or resourceful he'd be stuck in solitary
confinement right now instead of giving interviews. Playing chicken with the
mightiest organizations on the planet and getting away with it is extremely
impressive and in many ways it shows the dangers to powerful organizations
like these: individuals, acting on impulse or because of convictions.

And that's precisely why all that data collection is so scary, such
individuals will be shunted onto dead-end tracks _long_ before they even
realize they are such individuals in the future.

~~~
bcook
Indeed, we have seen well-meaning but overly impulsive whistle-blowers like
Bradley Manning get utterly ruined by their "mistakes".

~~~
projct
Chelsea Manning.

~~~
bcook
No offense intended. I (poorly) chose the more common name with regard to the
incident I referred to. I was speaking more of the situation rather than the
person.

------
propogandist
it's called conditioning

