False economy What’s in it for me? Understand what makes the

Surveillance capitalism is getting more 
granular in their data collection.
At this point, you may be thinking, sure, Google 
collects all sorts of data, but I don’t have 
anything to hide, so why should I care?
Well, even if you’re willing to live your life like an 
open book, if you’re a fan of democracy or free 
will, you should care. As we’ll see, collecting 
location and browsing habits on individuals is 
only one step in the process. 
The key message here is: Surveillance 
capitalism is getting more granular in their data 
collection.
Google’s ambitions are wide-ranging. The 
company would like to know everything about 
your past and current situation so that, rather 
than asking Google a question, Google would be 
able to “know what you want and tell you before 
you ask the question.” At least, this is how Hal 
Varian, Google’s chief economist, explained the 
company’s intentions.
This means getting down to granular detail about 
your wants and needs, as well as your emotional 
state. The field of emotional analytics, 
sometimes known as “affective computing,” has 
developed so that even the microexpressions on 
your face can be detected and instantly 
recognized as representing a specific emotional 
state. Of course, one image of your face can 
also reveal age, ethnicity, and gender.
One of the more advanced companies in this 
field is Realeyes, which boasts a data set of over 
5.5 million annotated frames of over 7,000 
subjects from around the world – all in an effort 
to build the world’s largest collection of 
expressions, emotions, and behavioral cues.
All of these factors represent a goldmine of data 
for advertisers. A market research report on the 
subject clearly states, “Knowing real-time 
emotional state can help businesses to sell their 
product and thereby increase revenue.” Or, as 
the Realeyes website puts it, “the more people 
feel, the more they spend.”
Body posture and gestures are also clues into 
what someone is doing and what they are 
feeling. This is why Google is developing 
digitally enhanced fabrics that can be turned into 
clothes and worn by people. This will bring a 
whole new level of granular behavioral data to 
Google’s constantly growing collection.
But if a person is active on social media, their 
personal posts and news feed can also be 
analyzed to offer an accurate prediction of how 
the person is feeling. And when advertisers and 
other surveillance capitalists know what you’re 
doing and feeling, they’ll know the perfect time to 
nudge you in the desired direction. 
But how can surveillance capitalists really modify 
someone’s behavior? We’ll take a closer look in 
the next blink. 

---