The Flood and theAlgorithmick Ark, Part III: the 3rd Letter

This is a continuation of the previous two blogs in which turning on the computer is discussed by way of a manual typewriter.

I type in the third letter of the password. The third letter. It sounds ominous like opening the seals of the apocalypse. It is a vowel but I won't tell you which one because then you would be that much closer to discovering my password and that password would open too much of my life. You would be able to read my emails and check the history of every cite I have peered into, and what should that reveal? What would my secret life show, if anything at all? Forays into pornography? Looking up how to make meth? Contact with the forces of darkness at hellandsatan.com, or does he have his own domain like satan@hell.hell? There are some, I am sure,w who would give Satan a web site, but not God. Satan is ever the handmaiden of technology and his evil plan is to ensnare us in his technological demise. After all, the first craftsman was Tubal-cain, the descendant of Cain, the first murder. What else needs be said to prove the satanic source of technological advancement. (Music came by way of Jubal, Tubal-cain's brother, but we need not go there.) No one is mentioned as inventing writing.

The computer screen has gone to sleep. One touch on the pad and I wake it up, a gentle touch like that to awaken an infant, a caress. Why don't we call swiping the screen caressing the screen? Why take a word that  carries the undertow of stealth and stealing. Why "swipe" unless something nefarious is going on? Words betray their intent if you listen closely enough. Words have their own lives and meanings so that when used loosely, more is given than the speaker intended. Swipe. Look at it. What is stolen and who is the sneak-thief, the cunning and underhanded thief who smiles and walks away with your wallet, leaving you thankful you have been stolen from? Swipe. I swipe card through the reader at the grocery store and the details of all my purchases have been stolen and stored away. Swipe. The computer knows everything you do. The internet, with its mawing chasm for information, its infinite storage systems knows all about you in ways that would have made the Stasi, the East German Secret Police marvel at how readily we give ourselves over to surveillance. Orwell's Big Brother had to use coercion and torture in a secret room. But not us. We embrace and love Big Brother without thinking. We sign up for membership to gather our "points." That's the magic word now: "points." Join and win "points." Win, as if you had entered a challenging contest, a test of strength or skill and you win; you best them all. You get the gold medal. Get more points by going online and filling in their survey. The marketing department tracks every motion we make, and we, in all innocence, go along not realizing we've not won but lost. Everything known about us is available to the highest bidder.