Tilly Here And Now: A Narrative Analysis
The science-fiction article authored by Ken Liu [1] paints the picture of a future where people can use an app to offer bounties to have a simple task completed by a stranger. While this story may be funny and seem very unrealistic right now, there is certainly a possibility that this could become a reality in the not too distant future.
The fictional application featured in the article, “Tilly Here-and-Now”, allows random people to submit requests to have something done for a bounty.
These requests will be pushed to all app users within a half mile of the target of the request. Sample information from some of these requests can be seen below in Table 1. This app has an interesting premise. On the surface, this app can be used for innocent …show more content…
tasks like seeing what food is on special at the local grocery store. However, the story also points out that this can be used for more nefarious tasks such as voyeurism or uncovering suspected
infidelity.
While these tasks could be reasonably accomplished without the app, it provides incentives to regular people to do things they might not have done if there was no monetary incentive. The story also touches on the potential motivations of the company behind the app, Centillion. Apparently,
Centillion has already deep-crawled every database, scanned all the books, mapped roads, and parsed videos and podcasts (this company is likely meant to be the equivalent of Google). Gaining all this information about what people are looking for in their everyday lives likely helps them market ads and charge companies for them. Another element of the story worth noting is the picture used (Figure 1). It is possible that this image is intended to be the Tilly application icon. It could also just be an image that suggests that a simple application could virtually turn people into robots who will do whatever is asked to get some quick money. Either way, it is an evocative image. With the way the application is presented in the story, it seems like it could be implemented with the technology that is currently available. It would likely be a simple matter to create an app which lists available …show more content…
“bounties” near you which have a reward price and expiration timer. It would be more challenging to implement an algorithm which could determine if the submissions by people who are attempting to claim the bounty meet the request.
Although it is possible that it could just defer that decision to the requesting user.
If this app was available now, I do not think I would use it. The story touches on this a bit, but often people will do almost anything for money. I do not like the idea of doing random things for random people on the internet just for a few extra bucks. Also, it is quite likely that the real people who profit from this app are the people who made it and the people they sell the information gained from the app to. I tend to avoid using services whose main purpose is to gather information about its user-base and sell that data to other companies. On the other hand, it could be a good way to earn some spare money. I do not expect that most of the posted opportunities would be worth much money, though. Considering the success of Pokemon
Go from last summer, I can imagine how quickly the posted opportunities would vanish.
With the advancement of technology over the last few years, there has been more concern about the ethics of some of the things AI can do, and this app would likely fall under the same scrutiny. On face value, the app is ethical because it simply allows people to post “jobs” and asks for someone to do them. However, it is not unlikely that someone may ask for people
to do something which may not be ethical. One example is the voyeurism which was mentioned in the story. The people who were the subjects of that picture could contact law enforcement when they found out someone essentially sold a picture of them kissing. If the app keeps both parties anonymous, it would be challenging to sue them for damages. This could be especially important for cases which would be demonstrably illegal. For instance, someone could ask for a person to rob someone or something. This would be unethical both for the requester and the person who fulfills the request.
This short story by Ken Liu presents an application which people could use to request that someone complete a small job for them for money. While the app could be used for benign purposes such as those presented in Table
1, there is also the possibility for nefarious acts to be committed. If this type of app was created, it would likely need a number of legal checks-and-balances to make sure only legal requests are being made. If illegal requests were made and/or committed, there would need to be ways to track the responsible parties.
The fictional application featured in the article, “Tilly Here-and-Now”, allows random people to submit requests to have something done for a bounty.
These requests will be pushed to all app users within a half mile of the target of the request. Sample information from some of these requests can be seen below in Table 1. This app has an interesting premise. On the surface, this app can be used for innocent …show more content…
tasks like seeing what food is on special at the local grocery store. However, the story also points out that this can be used for more nefarious tasks such as voyeurism or uncovering suspected
infidelity.
While these tasks could be reasonably accomplished without the app, it provides incentives to regular people to do things they might not have done if there was no monetary incentive. The story also touches on the potential motivations of the company behind the app, Centillion. Apparently,
Centillion has already deep-crawled every database, scanned all the books, mapped roads, and parsed videos and podcasts (this company is likely meant to be the equivalent of Google). Gaining all this information about what people are looking for in their everyday lives likely helps them market ads and charge companies for them. Another element of the story worth noting is the picture used (Figure 1). It is possible that this image is intended to be the Tilly application icon. It could also just be an image that suggests that a simple application could virtually turn people into robots who will do whatever is asked to get some quick money. Either way, it is an evocative image. With the way the application is presented in the story, it seems like it could be implemented with the technology that is currently available. It would likely be a simple matter to create an app which lists available …show more content…
“bounties” near you which have a reward price and expiration timer. It would be more challenging to implement an algorithm which could determine if the submissions by people who are attempting to claim the bounty meet the request.
Although it is possible that it could just defer that decision to the requesting user.
If this app was available now, I do not think I would use it. The story touches on this a bit, but often people will do almost anything for money. I do not like the idea of doing random things for random people on the internet just for a few extra bucks. Also, it is quite likely that the real people who profit from this app are the people who made it and the people they sell the information gained from the app to. I tend to avoid using services whose main purpose is to gather information about its user-base and sell that data to other companies. On the other hand, it could be a good way to earn some spare money. I do not expect that most of the posted opportunities would be worth much money, though. Considering the success of Pokemon
Go from last summer, I can imagine how quickly the posted opportunities would vanish.
With the advancement of technology over the last few years, there has been more concern about the ethics of some of the things AI can do, and this app would likely fall under the same scrutiny. On face value, the app is ethical because it simply allows people to post “jobs” and asks for someone to do them. However, it is not unlikely that someone may ask for people
to do something which may not be ethical. One example is the voyeurism which was mentioned in the story. The people who were the subjects of that picture could contact law enforcement when they found out someone essentially sold a picture of them kissing. If the app keeps both parties anonymous, it would be challenging to sue them for damages. This could be especially important for cases which would be demonstrably illegal. For instance, someone could ask for a person to rob someone or something. This would be unethical both for the requester and the person who fulfills the request.
This short story by Ken Liu presents an application which people could use to request that someone complete a small job for them for money. While the app could be used for benign purposes such as those presented in Table
1, there is also the possibility for nefarious acts to be committed. If this type of app was created, it would likely need a number of legal checks-and-balances to make sure only legal requests are being made. If illegal requests were made and/or committed, there would need to be ways to track the responsible parties.