WikiPedia explains human computation as,

… a computer science technique in which a computational process performs its function by outsourcing certain steps to humans (Kosorukoff, 2001). This approach leverages differences in abilities and alternative costs between humans and computer agents to achieve symbiotic human-computer interaction.

More plainly, human computation is a system that uses human decision making where questions require more or higher reasoning than any computer program can accomplish efficiently. Efficiency is the operative concept here. It’s possible to write programs of infinite complexity that make strategic decisions based on vast amounts of statistical data; but our species hasn’t completely mastered the physical hardware to do this. If-then logic is extremely powerful as applied to reason, but in the programming sense, only when supplemented by scores of data.

The human memory still holds a lot of data that isn’t available online–or that hasn’t yet been entered into a database, at least. We think of companies like Google compulsively hoarding and processing tons of data, but the human brain still holds more and processes more information than this organization could fathom. Facial recognition is a perfect example of this because, while a video camera can record you and a computer can store this data, all that is collected is the series of images making up the video. You can’t, for instance, query a JPG to know the manufacture of the shirt on the news anchor.

In 20th century video surveillance,  the software didn’t yet know who the person was on camera. It still took a human to answer this question because we could do it faster. The relationships and associations human beings connect to bits of data, and the manners we employ to retrieve or “remember” these data are inherently efficient. We’re teaching the internet how to be like this, too.

Cheaper hardware, more advanced programming methodologies, and more efficient database systems are making it possible for our species to record data about physical space that hasn’t before been logged. Take for instance Facebook’s photo tagging and the similar service now offered by flikr. How far off are we from our homes knowing that it’s us at the door? How long before Facebook’s upload tool automatically recognizes everyone in a photo?

Man is God.

He is everywhere, he is anybody, he knows everything.

This is the Prometeus new world.

All started with the Media Revolution, with Internet, at the end of the last century.

Everything related to the old media vanished: Gutenberg, the copyright, the radio, the television, the publicity.

The old world reacts: more restrictions for the copyright, new laws against non authorized copies. Napster, the music peer to peer company is sued.

At the same time, free internet radio appears; TIVO, the internet television, allows to avoid publicity; the Wall Street Journal goes on line; Google launches Google news.

Millions of people read daily the biggest on line newspaper. Ohmynews written by thousands of journalists; Flickr becomes the biggest repository in the history of photos, YouTube for movies.

The power of the masses.

A new figure emerges: the prosumer, a producer and a consumer of information. Anyone can be a prosumer.

The news channels become available on Internet.

The blogs become more influential than the old media.

The newspapers are released for free.

Wikipedia is the most complete encyclopedia ever.

In 2007 Life magazine closes.

The NYT sells its television and declares that the future is digital. BBC follows.

In the main cities of the world people are connected for free.

At the corners of the streets totems print pages from blogs and digital magazines.

The virtual worlds are common places on the Internet for millions of people.

A person can have multiple on line identities.

Second Life launches the vocal avatar.

The old media fight back.

A tax is added on any screen; newspapers, radios and televisions are financed by the State; illegal download from the web is punished with years of jail.

Around 2011 the tipping point is reached: the publicity investments are done on the Net. The electronic paper is a mass product: anyone can read anything on plastic paper.

In 2015 newspapers and broadcasting television disappear, digital terrestrial is abandoned, the radio goes on the Internet.

The media arena is less and less populated. Only the Tyrannosaurus Rex survives. The Net includes and unifies all the content. Google buys Microsoft. Amazon buys Yahoo! and become the world universal content

leaders with BBC, CNN and CCTV.

The concept of static information – books, articles, images – changes and is transformed into knowledge flow.

The publicity is chosen by the content creators, by the authors and becomes information, comparison, experience.

In 2020 Lawrence Lessig, the author of ‘Free Culture’, is the new US Secretary of Justice and declares the copyright illegal.

Devices that replicate the five senses are available in the virtual worlds. The reality could be replicated in Second Life.

Any one has an Agav (agent-avatar) that finds information, people, places in the virtual worlds.

In 2022 Google launches Prometeus, the Agav standard interface.

Amazon creates Place, a company that replicates reality. You can be on Mars, at the battle of Waterloo, at the Super Bowl as a person. It’s real.

In 2027 Second Life evolves into Spirit. People become who they want.

And share the memory. The experiences. The feelings. Memory selling becomes a normal trading.

In 2050 Prometeus buys Place and Spirit. Virtual life is the biggest market on the planet. Prometeus finances all the space missions to find new worlds for its customers: the terrestrial avatar.

Experience is the new reality.

Voice: Philip K. Dick Avatar.
Date: 6th April 2051