The power to direct the thinking or behavior of others, usually indirectly, is called influence. Authority, clout, credit, heft or leverage are some of its oblique synonyms. Originally, the word described ‘an influx or flowing matter’, some ethereal and unstoppable fluid affecting human destiny. To influence is to summon the moods and desires of others, and be able to program them.
The collapse of the global social media timelines has become apparent because it so closely reflects the fractures of geography, politics, and money that surround us. Instead of increasingly smooth and flat surfaces, we got rugged and hazardous terrain. Instead of a cosmopolitan globe, we got broken and patriotic supply chains. Instead of a networked public sphere, we got a billion private servers.
As software platforms and agents evolve, they cannot but compete with the realities and the illusions they are made to mimic. Retreating inward, folding on itself, the world provides a fragile and inconsistent model. Code flows with the strongest and the most influential current.