As you’re reading this, I am stealthily breaking through your firewall, sneaking through files containing your data and gathering as much as I can. At the same time, I am getting access to your (e-)behavioral data, tracking your behaviour across all online platforms. Are you surprised (and maybe alarmed)?

You shouldn’t be.

This has actually been going on for ages, just that I am not the one doing this. And no, there’s no escape unless you want to move down to an obscure jungle to live and have a cute little beast as a (tree)house mate. And you know what? Even then it will be very hard to escape technological invasion of your life. So let’s quit that thought and accept the fact that almost everyone is connected these days. When you’re online, behind every step you take are little bots or software tracking you, taking down your data and creating an e-version of you. This, is what’s called dark interactions.

“Smart” (meaning computerized) products producers make use of the results of these dark interactions either legally or illegally, to draw you in. Resultantly, they create opportunities for the obsolescence of unautomated products, hitting wells of revenues for themselves. Computers are everywhere now, everything is smart down to your pen and shoes. Like an extra sneaky cat, computers have quietly infused their existence into our lives such that imagining life without them is like imagining the orange man without his hair.

I remember reading about this in Dan Brown’s Origin (have you read it?); computers taking over the world. Immersing themselves into a symbiotic relationship with us such that we become driven by each other. We all now have an automated personal assistant aka our phones that we rely on to crank our hustle dial up. Just like Alan Turing predicted, computers have become our companions and many of us can’t do without them.

With the explosion of smart products in the market in the past ten years, the question is no longer what you need. Rather it’s a question of what you want, how you want it and when. Computers, computers everywhere but not enough sense to create utility. Thankfully now we have accounts like Internet of Shit to help us sieve through the load of bullshit that’s spun and thrown to us as “the next smart product” to have.

Let me quickly add this: As a brand strategist (and everything Digital marketing and communication related), you have to seek out as much data as you can to help you put out more value. Data A good place to start will be Google Trends. Click here to get more data insight gathering tools. This will help you respond in real time to your consumers’ perceived needs and wants. You won’t have content, content everywhere but no relevance or engagement.