Poetry and the Algorithm

We still use the phrase “Big Tech” in some contexts—it has a righteous, trust-busting ring to it—but down off the soapbox, we’re more likely to gesture toward the algorithm. This usage is less of a structural protest, more of a vibe check: with a shrug, or a shiver of weirdness, we acknowledge that the line between digital life and daily life has become porous. Specifically, when we point to the algorithm, whether re: social media, advertising, or surveillance, we’re making a claim about relative agency, and how in control we feel over our own actions. If I complain over breakfast about sleeping poorly, then encounter a video about sleep hygiene, then am fed an ad for a mattress, then buy melatonin gummies, might the weirdness be worth the payoff? If a doomscroll loop nudges me toward radical political positions, which I then parrot on Reddit, am I really the one responsible when I get put, automatically, on a watchlist? Take these vibes far enough, and we end up with a rather novel idea of the self, in which individuality works as a wrapper for a certain statistical profile.