Our devices are too good
at remembering the things our brains used to handle.
EXPERT OPINION BY HOWARD TULLMAN, GENERAL MANAGING PARTNER, G2T3V
AND CHICAGO HIGH TECH INVESTORS @HOWARDTULLMAN1
OCT 8, 2024
I honestly don’t know whether this is
physiologically correct or not – or whether this whole situation is just a
product of my advanced age – but I’m convinced that memory is a muscle.
And that, if you don’t make specific efforts to exercise it regularly,
you will lose more and more of the capacity as you age. Call it a “use it or
lose it” proposition and we’re all on the wrong side of the equation.
And, in the interests of full
disclosure, this is also not a pitch for Prevagen or whatever other
non-prescription remedies are being peddled non-stop on your tube these days. I
have to admit that I find myself watching these particular ads more closely and
that I’m relieved that whoever is writing these ads decided to give the
jellyfish a break and stop claiming that the magical and curative ingredient
has been extracted from these poor little creatures to further serve mankind.
Feel free to Google “apoaequorin” if my reference is a little obtuse. Or maybe
it’s just your poor memory.
Speaking of ad folk, does it seem that
in any given hour of tube viewing, you are likely to see the exact same half
dozen ads over and over – sometimes run back-to-back – in interruptive bursts
that seem longer and longer all the time. Do they think that we won’t remember
seeing the same ads before or – perish the thought – are they convinced that
we’ll only remember the ad content if they consistently and repeatedly beat us
over the head with the same junk?
As a longtime technologist, I also
feel that we can’t really blame our computers and phones or the tech community
for the fact that we no longer feel even the slightest obligation to remember
phone numbers, addresses, directions or tons of other formerly essential
information, which we used to carry around in our heads. We even used to brag
about that capability. It’s a much more sensitive subject when the matter
relates to birthdays and anniversaries – especially of family members and
relatives.
But to be honest, most of those dates
are also long gone and, but for Facebook reminders and email notifications,
would be regularly forgotten. In a fit of poignant honesty, coupled with a
devious wink or glance, the new Apple Intelligence ads offer repeated
suggestions that when you are stuck for a memory or a name to go with an
approaching face, your iPhone and Siri will quickly rise to the rescue.
Whatever did we do before to fill these gaps?
Also allow me a moment to whine about
the streaming strategy that sucks us in with an introductory free two-fer (two
episodes of a new show or series made available, initially) and then asking us
to patiently wait and then tune in once a week for the next month or two to see
subsequent episodes. Apart from the complexity of trying to track what day the
next installment of seven or eight different programs will be released, who
honestly even remembers what happened “previously,” notwithstanding the 30-second
recap that precedes each show?
Kudos to the Apple TV show, Bad Monkey, starring Vince Vaughn, where the opening
weekly recap is offered grudgingly by a tongue-in-cheek narrator who admits
that he hates doing it. And it’s still next to impossible to follow the
multiple storylines. I find myself longing for the clarity and consistency of
the hundreds of Law and Order episodes, where
you could reliably count on the Dick Wolf formula with the firm knowledge and
reassurance that virtually every show would be wrapped up in a nice bow by the
end of the hour.
Lest you believe that these concerns
are uncommon, I have a simple and familiar experiment you can use to see where
you stand on this (possibly) age-related memory spectrum. Almost all of us have
now been exposed to some mobile or desktop security system or two-factor
authentication requirement that sends a numeric code to your phone and requires
you to enter the code (ranging from six to eight digits) into some digital form
in order to allow access to financial accounts and the like.
Typically, the texted code (which is
time-bound) does you the “favor” of quickly disappearing so that you are
required to remember it and then return to some other screen and enter it
there. My own limit seems to be six digits and even then, I have to mentally
break the number into two, three-digit parts to be sure I have it. There
is zero chance without writing it down that I will ever again remember any
eight-digit code the banks seem to increasingly favor. If you haven’t already
experienced this phenomenon yourself, write down a few larger random number
sequences and try it.
The only good news is that the newer
smart phones will automatically retain the texted code for you and autofill it
into the appropriate place once you return to the prior location. Considering
that this is their doing in the first place, it’s the very least they can
do for us.
And please don’t get me started on the
indecipherable buses and stoplights in Captcha quizzes or the very sad irony
that we humans now regularly need to prove to the computers that we are real.
It’s not something I’m likely to forget any time soon.
