Black (Box) Mirror
Whether we have free will or not is one of the most interesting philosophical issues of modern times. Charlie Brooker takes it on in this episode and breaks through the fourth wall of your computer screen and lets your clicks determine the narrative paths in the story through a database of scenes. This is clever self-reference, because by now everyone is aware of "the black box" as an abstraction, and now writers are using it as a metaphor for interactive fiction--which winks at the (more interesting) neuro-philosophical aspects.
These days, clicks can determine your own cybernetic (and real life) experience; you just don't know it's happening, yet you feel something is amiss. This is the case for anything that is beyond the Umwelt of our limited senses. As I was watching it (or "steering" it), I suspected Netflix was recording my clicks. Cleverness aside, I also wondered whether film watching, one of the last bastions of undistracted experiences was just ruined by this idea, or may be a new innovation in cinema, where storyboarding of feature films is social. But do we really need this insult to injury?
— 𝖉 𝖊 𝖑 𝖕 𝖍 (@b4byd3lph) December 28, 2018
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P.S. Interesting: "Something Went Wrong" with the above link.
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