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The 21st Century Bid to Become Immortal

There are three knowns in this world: we’re born, we live, and we die, but some tech extremists are trying to add a fourth known after we die.

The incredible evolution of technology has meant that, in the not-too-distant future, we’ll have the capabilities of living forever.

In 100 years, the four knowns in this world might look like this: we’re born, we live, we die, and then we become immortal.

There are already thousands of studies on cryogenics to preserve the human body once it’s dead, but the physical body is just a small part of what makes us human. The biggest part of what makes us “us” is our brains; a mass of an organ that’s built up of networks and neurons from our experiences.

Back in 1994, a feature article in Wired magazine highlighted the subculture of Extropians, a group of people in California who wholeheartedly believed in transcendence. Followers of the movement strived to become “more than human” and saw a future where human brains as well as bodies could be downloaded and preserved.

This was in 1994, so you can only imagine how much more advanced this theory is now. It’s advanced so much, in fact, that it’s no longer just a theory.

Eventually (and we’re talking as soon as sometime within the next century), there will be the technology available to copy every single bit of data that makes us “us” and upload it to a computer. When it’s there it can be studied, picked apart and, perhaps most disturbingly, downloaded.

If you’ve seen the San Junipero episode of Black Mirror, you might have an inkling into what this could look like. Throughout the surprisingly optimistic episode, we see Yorkie and Kelly exploring the fun-loving town of San Junipero, only to find out at the end that they are actually elderly women who are prescribed visits to the virtual town once a week via a digital headset.

The episode left a lot of viewers with a warm, happy feeling, but would it really all be sunshine and unicorns?

Or, perhaps the better question to ask is, what’s the point?

Why would we need to upload ourselves into a virtual reality and create an entirely new world when we have a backlog of our own memories and experiences to draw from?

Are they not enough?

This is where the obsession with becoming immortal comes in.

It’s not enough for us to be born, live, and die anymore – well, not for a lot of people. Instead we’re always wanting more; one lifetime isn’t enough.

Why Are We Obsessed with Being Immortal?

At some point in the past, our ancestors began to question our existence. Whether it was millions of years ago or thousands is unknown; all we know is that there was a time when a human like us considered why we were put on this planet.

And this thought pattern continues today. We need to know that there’s a purpose for us here in this world otherwise, really, what’s the point? It’s the reason we go to work, build families, and do stuff we love. We’re on a mammoth quest to live meaningful lives to answer the ever-present question of why we’re here.

We do the things we do in the hope that we are more than just our biological parts; more than just a sack of meat sleepwalking through the eighty years we’ve been given.

This is where the fascination with immortality comes in.

Our bodies are just a vessel, but our brains – those ugly lumps of gray matter – are us, and the thought of us not being around forever is an incredibly difficult pill to swallow.

So, Why Not Live Forever?

Startup Nectome has reached into the pit of the human soul and tapped right into this desire for more.

Founded by a pair of MIT AI researchers, the company plans to offer a commercial way for “everyday people” to preserve their brains using a process called aldehyde-stabilised cryopreservation.

Essentially, the brain is turned into glass and the data that’s captured is stored on what can only be described as a very advanced cloud system.

So far, so good.

Except there’s one catch: in order to have your brain preserved in this way, you have to die. For the upload to be successful, the process has to be carried out right at the moment of death. Or, rather, the upload process has to be the cause of death.

The “patient” has to have the natural blood flow to their brain replaced with the embalming chemicals that preserve the brain and its neuronal structures.

It’s the ultimate way of saying “I want to live forever so I’m going to die now.”

Nectome’s aim is for the uploaded brain data to be used later on as part of a computer simulation – much like in San Junipero. The chemical solution used is able to preserve body parts for thousands of years so that, one day when the technology is available, scientists will be able to scan the frozen brains and upload them to a computer system where they can live out their new reality.

Someone – though not an entirely human “someone” – somewhere will be able to retrieve your memories and your experiences.

Which begs the question: are Nectome’s customers dying to preserve themselves or further advance transhumanism and the technology involved with it?

Let’s go back to what makes us “us” for a moment. We’re a combination of our brains, body, voice, experiences, and everything else in between. By simply uploading one part of that – the brain – are we really capturing us? Is our brain in someone else’s body, whether that’s a computer system or a real-life body of flesh, still us?

For now, Nectome is working with terminal patients in California under the state’s End of Life Option Act, but who knows how far this trend will spread in the future.

Even today, thousands and millions of years after we first questioned our existence, we’re still fighting for meaning and the answer to why we were put on this earth.

But, with the leaps and bounds technology has made since then – and since Wired magazine’s feature on Extropians – we’re now closer than ever to becoming immortal.

Nectome is, without a doubt, one of the most controversial startups to come out of the US in the past few decades, but we could argue that it’s simply tapping into a want, a desire, and an obsession that humans have.

So let’s leave it at this: Nectome might just be giving the people what they want, or it might be a high-tech religion preying on people’s fear of death and their obsession with living forever.

You Don’t Own Your Data… Here’s Who Does

Do you own your photos?

How many photos will you upload to an online service this year? How many have you uploaded in the past?

Because of smartphones, a camera is always handy when we need it. All of the photos and videos that we take have to be stored somewhere, and increasingly the cloud is where we look for a solution to this problem.

But, when you upload your photos to the cloud, did you consider the fact that you may be giving your photos to someone else to store on their computer? Who will have access to them? More importantly, who owns those pictures?

Data ownership is a complex subject with few clear answers. You created the photo, but once you put it on someone else’s computer, is it still yours?

What rights do we have?

The rights that we retain to our data all boils down to what is in the terms and conditions of the service that we are using. Every service provider has an End User License Agreement, or EULA, of some sort. It could be called Terms of Use, or Terms of Service, or Terms and Conditions, or a Privacy Policy, or they may all be lumped together, or the documents may be separate but incorporated by reference.

There are a ton of service providers out there. Reviewing all of them is impossible. So let’s take a look at some of the biggest data storage providers out there. Chances are that you have something personal stored on one of their servers anyway.

The terms.

One company outlines the rights that you have to your content in their Terms of Service.

The terms start out by stating: You keep ownership of intellectual property rights held in that material. What is yours is yours.

Awesome, right? My stuff is still my stuff. Thank you very much!

Okay, let’s keep reading…

When you upload, store, or do other stuff with files using our Services,

Yup, my pictures are uploaded and stored through their services, so I guess my pictures qualify.

You grant us a worldwide license to use your material at our discretion.

Wait, what? First of all, what is a worldwide license? A license is a right that you grant in your property to do something. A license can be limited in time and geographic scope, among other things. So, I’m giving them a license to do stuff to my stuff anywhere in the world. I’m sure they will modify those terms when space travel becomes a reality.

So, what can they do with my stuff? Sounds like they can do a lot. The license is to use your material at our discretion. That’s pretty broad. I guess the easier question to answer is what can’t they do? I think they pretty much covered it.

The rights granted are intended to be used in the management, operation, and promotion of our Services.

Thanks for limiting your rights in the license that I gave you for my uploaded stuff.

This license continues in perpetuity.

So they can do what they want to my stuff forever? That’s a long time!

Some of our Services may provide methods to access and remove material that you have uploaded.

Some, not all? Looks like additional research might be necessary. How many services does this provider have anyway? It is a lot, but don’t worry, they are always developing new ones.

What does all this mean for you?

So, what does all this mean for the average consumer? I mean, you don’t have a way to negotiate with the big guys, right? They provide a free service, after all, and they are a big corporation trying to make a buck.

What it means is that your stuff really isn’t yours anymore when you store it using some services. With some freely provided services, a consumer essentially has no rights. A company can say “take it or leave it”. You are free to use the service, but you must agree to their terms and conditions. It would be nice if you could keep all of the rights to your data, but that just isn’t possible.

What can you do? If you want to keep all of the rights to your data and still use a freely available service, you’re going to have to choose your service provider more carefully. There are services out there that don’t make you upload a file to someone else’s server. You can use one of those. You can also transfer your photos via USB connection. Or just don’t take any photos. If you don’t take any photos, you don’t have to worry about losing them or giving them away.

Too Many Cloud Companies…Too Few Good Ones

So. . .just how many cloud companies are there?

Since the advent of the smartphone (thanks Apple) cloud companies are popping up on every virtual corner, much like Starbucks did early on.

In my quest to see just how many cloud companies there are, I figured I’d start with a simple Google search.  Right?  I mean Google is the best for this type of thing!

So, I proceeded to type “cloud companies” in a google search bar. 133,000,000 results in just 0.47 seconds.  Yep…I’m that guy.  I broke Google  (sorry Google!).

Ok, so that didn’t really work.

So I moved on to the Google Play store and navigated to apps.  There, I typed in “cloud” and immediately got over 200 apps flooding my screen.  I’m not entirely sure how many apps over 200 because I simply stopped counting.

Ok. . .clearly this approach isn’t working.  So how do we determine just how many cloud companies there are? And moreover, does anyone really care?

Definitely more than 3

At this point, I’ve decided to take the “Owl and the Tootsie Pop” approach (if you’re my age, you’ve seen that commercial) and just saying who cares?

Because in the end, we don’t really care about the number of companies, what we care about is what they can do for us!

As consumers, we all have our “lists” of things we seek in pretty much every aspect of our digital shopping.  My cloud list is relatively short and focuses on (1) ease of use (2) availability of my stuff (3) keeping my stuff safe and (4) being able to share and stream my stuff.

While most of these things seem relatively simple, this is where the list of cloud companies starts to get smaller.  Let’s take a brief look at these four aspects.

The cloud SHOULD be easy…so why isn’t it?

Ease of use is a key for all of us.

How many times have you gone to your app store and downloaded an app that seemed to suit your needs, only to find that you simply have neither the time nor the energy to figure out exactly how to use it?

Or, how many times have you wanted to share some photos with your grandmother and you wind up being her tech-support guru because she’s literally lost as to how to access the files you shared.

You’re not alone.  This happens to all of us.

I’m pretty much a classic tech-nerd (sans the tape on my glasses) and even I get frustrated with some of the choices out there.

Where is that file again?

And what about the availability of our files and images?

This one gets a bit tricky too because it isn’t always as simple as creating a cloud account or installing an app.

Does your app require you to upload all of your files to a single point of storage in the cloud?  Do you need to put everything on an external NAS device connected to your router at home?

Availability is mandatory for all of us, yet, achieving it can sometimes be laborious.

I mean sure, at first you tell yourself “it’ll be great to put all my files in one place, so I may as well just break down and do it”.  But soon you’re back to your old ways and you’ve got files all over the place, spread across every device you own.

Once again, you’re not alone.  I’m notoriously bad at organizing my digital life.

I have some “special” pictures…if you catch my drift

So what about keeping our stuff safe?

I’m not a snapchat or Facebook sort of guy (cause I’m in the witness protection program) but If I was, I’d want to know that I can maintain ownership and control over my images.

Let’s say you’re out taking pictures and you capture some amazing photo of a sunrise or stars reflecting off a lake.  All your friends and followers are suddenly enamored with your photographic prowess and you suddenly become a bit concerned about your ownership of your content.

Again, you’re not alone.

That’s why you see companies watermark their images all the time.  So protection of our digital content is an important aspect of our personal cloud.

If sharing is caring, then I’m a very caring person

And finally, what about the ability to share and stream?

These are hallmarks of social media.  Without the ability to share your files, the very aspect of social goes right out the window.

The ability to get those pictures to grandma safely and simply is just as important as sharing your favorite song with your best friend.

And let’s not forget the frustration of being the tech-support guru for the friends and family you share with.

Quality over quantity

Ok. . .so what’s the point of all this?

It’s simple really.  We’ll never ever know how many cloud companies are out there because as soon as we count them all, more will pop up.

But what we do know is what we need.

Make your own list of priorities for your digital lives as I did above.  Pick and choose the aspects that are important to you and you’ll find that you can quickly eliminate a great deal of companies with just a few simple searches.

And don’t forget to read the user comments in the app stores.  These folks are just like you and me.  They’re seeking something that can help them solve a need, so there’s a good chance that they’ll share something you’re also interested in.

And above all, stay safe.

Make sure you take a little time to vet the companies you choose to share your precious digital lives with.  This is your stuff, not theirs.  Make certain you get to maintain your rights to it!

The Future of Digital Storage

As we rush out to the store to grab the latest and greatest smartphones and bask in the glory that is our never ending thirst for all things media, a thought occurs . . . ”where are we going to store all of this stuff?”

I mean, sure, we proudly flex the muscle of our portable devices, capable of producing 12 megapixel images or shooting full motion video and effortlessly streaming it to our 4k-capable retina display . . . but where is all this data going to be kept?

A cursory glance at the storage market tells us that any portable devices with any real storage capacity come at a premium.  Ok, we get that, so we begin to seek other avenues to store our wealth of media that will still give us instant access.

Naturally cloud storage is the first and most viable option. So we immediately enter our email address, create a quick password, and hop onto the internet to store our digital world.  Initially it’s great!  We can get our stuff from anywhere, and many of the services give us a couple of GBs of space in the cloud for free . . . but at what cost?

The cost equation for the storage of your digital world comes down to “ease of access” versus “control of content”.  Anyone who has read the terms and conditions of the typical cloud companies can tell you that you’re virtually giving up all license and all control of your content once you enter it into a public server.

The cost of your “free 5 GB account” is that your content is no longer in your direct control. Sadly, the only real alternative seems to be spending a significant amount of up-front cash on devices that have more built-in storage, or going to the store and buying one of those cloud boxes that you put on your desk at home and try to configure for remote access.  It’s clunky and costly, but it’s safer.  So how do you decide?

The plot thickens when you realize that every smartphone that is introduced is capable of generating even larger files, videos, images, and media content, yet the storage spaces on these devices continue to remain the same.

So what can be done to enable us to take advantage of all the powerful features of our smart devices without giving up ownership and control of our digital content?

Technology will continue its furious pace towards integration of content and expansion of storage components.  How will that future look and who will win that race? Smart money says that the folks developing smartphone, laptop, and tablet technology will continue to lead.  Why? The answer is simple really.  These devices are not meant to be kept forever.

Look at the typical release cycle for new smartphones and tablets.  Just when you get comfortable with your new device, a bigger-better-faster-smarter alternative hits the market.

And how long do you typically keep your tech devices?  1 year?  2 years? Longer?  Are you the type that has to be on the train to the latest-and-greatest device available? Or are you still carrying around your series one Motorola flip phone?  Don’t worry, there is no wrong answer. But, the fact remains that technology will continue to steamroll ahead whether we’re ready for the “next big thing” or not.

So where does that leave us with our original question about storage and ownership of our content? Will storage manufacturers be able to keep up with the ever-growing needs of the social media networks?

What will the online cloud providers do when they see a market where people still want privacy and control over their digital lives?  Will companies like Amazon and Google own your content in an endless sea of server farms? Or will your network evolve into one that you and you alone control?

As it stands today, we’ve got far more questions than we have answers.  Once thing is certain in all of this commotion . . . technology won’t stop, so keep your eyes on the horizon and together we’ll see how the innovators answer these growing concerns.

Keeping Up in Court

It’s the day before the big hearing.  The Motion was perfect; Opposition just ok – no surprises, and your Reply crushed it.  This is the second time you will be arguing your Summary Judgment Motion.  A Rule 56(f) Opposition carried the day six months ago; but it’s more than ripe this time around.

You sit down to download all three pleadings to your iPad; with exhibits they total about a foot-thick of paper.  But, in PDF format, the files are too big for the storage left on the device.  To make matters worse, you wanted to download a few other things for the hearing as well – their Opposition from the last hearing (since it makes a few arguments that help you this time around), the latest round of discovery responses (a perfect Interrogatory answer from their CIO exists), and a bunch of photos of your client’s product and their infringing product that your expert just testified to at his deposition last week.

The next two hours are spent deciding if you really need all the exhibits to the pleadings, what else you really need, and considering what you could take off your iPad.  WASTED TIME and ADDED STRESS.   As if you need either of those on the day before the hearing.  Finally, you decide to leave the Opposition exhibits and the new expert photos off the download, and remove a few unrelated things from the iPad and off you go.

Let’s take the worst-case scenario, and play it out.  During argument opposing counsel brings up a document from her exhibits – that you did not think was important enough to address in your outline – and it’s not on your iPad.  She also talks for a while about your expert’s deposition and two of his photos – which you don’t have either.

As prepared and articulate as you may be, you simply cannot address the nuances of her arguments on those three pieces of evidence since they are not right in front of you.  Motion DENIED.

I understand that in this hypothetical you could have hand-carried the documents to court.  But the point is, even when we carry twelve inches of material to court and/or download all the related pleadings, every now-and-then a question is asked or argument made related to a document we just did not have.  Sure, sometimes the judge will give us more time to address the evidence, but would it not be better to just have access to your entire case file – no matter how big?

This scenario happened to me a few times in my 18 years of litigation.  Sure, there was more than one time where I simply forgot to grab part of the file on the way to court.  But far more often, opposing counsel would bring up something completely unrelated to the issue, or from a prior hearing or long-ago completed discovery.  Every now and then, a judge would ask for something very specific or something silly like a date of service on Interrogatory packet #3.  In these instances the ability to access all your documents can be the difference between winning or losing your case. It’s important for any attorney to do their research on finding the best file management tools to ensure they have the important information on hand at all times.