I have to admit - videos like this tend to scare me a little bit... While the advancement and spreading of technology is fascinating, it is also overwhelming.
I think this video was titled "The Machine is Us/ing Us" to convey to the audience how technology is learning from its users. Just like the video showed - every time that we (as users) enter new information on the computer or create links between documents, we are teaching the computer that certain items are related to other items. It then recognizes these patterns in future applications. An example is that your web browser keeps a list of frequently visited web sites, so that you can navigate to them by simply selecting from a drop-down list. Therefore, the machine is "using us" - we are providing the computer with the information of which documents/website/information is related to other documents/websites/information.
Because of all the "knowledge" that the computers are acquiring, we must rethink how and the amount we create these links. For someone just entering the workforce, the internet can be his worst enemy. Anything that was ever linked to that person's name remains in cyberspace - simply removing the link from one computer does not remove it from every computer. These connections can be extremely detrimental when interviewing with a potential employer. Almost all companies now do an online search of possible employees prior to hiring them (often through a Facebook or Myspace) - so if questionable pictures/stories are linked with their name, they are not hired.
These searches may occur even after a client is hired. Anything sent or passed through cyberspace (email, websites, blogs, etc.) remains there forever, and can be retrieved quickly through a simple search. While it may be speculation to say that "an elephant never forgets," it is truthful to say that the internet never forgets. Be knowledgeable of this and remember the next time you tag yourself in a photo album, or negatively criticize a co-worker/boss through an email - it may come back to haunt you!
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