Geometric Allegory

🛑⏳

In 2015, I had a brief exchange with a customer service bot from a company called emaze. At the time, I was frustrated—humiliated, really—because their software malfunctioned during a live demo for an audience of thirty students. My presentation, ironically, was about the importance of technology. Instead of showcasing innovation, I found myself improvising for an hour.

I immediately contacted the company.

Here’s how the chat unfolded:

——-

Convergence Bot from 2015

Chat started on 2015-01-07 08:23 PM UTC

(08:23:46 PM) *** Visitor 44676321 joined the chat ***

(08:23:46 PM) Visitor 44676321: How often does your system have bugs? This morning I was humiliated because I was going to demo your product for a group of 30, and nobody could even sign up. Ironically, my presentation was about the importance of using technology, and I was forced to “wing it” for an hour. Again, how often does this happen?

(08:23:50 PM) *** Paul joined the chat ***

(08:24:22 PM) Paul: Hi,

Thank you for your patience and we apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.

(08:24:55 PM) William: Is there an email where I can write to somebody about this?

(08:26:29 PM) Paul: We apologize for the inconvenience. I have taken down your emaze username. I will now transfer that information to our emaze specialist, Liam, who will get back to you within 24 hours via email regarding your issue.

(08:26:45 PM) William: Thank you.

(08:26:54 PM) Paul: You’re welcome!

(08:27:01 PM) Paul: Please let us know if there is anything else we can do to help.

(08:33:56 PM) *** William left the chat ***

——

That was the end of it—at least, that’s what I thought. I never heard back from anyone. Time moved on, and I forgot the incident entirely.

Then, earlier this month—nearly nine years later—a bot replied to to me.

At first, I was struck by how strange it was. Why now? What triggered this delayed response? But as I thought more about it, the experience became somewhat concerning.

In the realm of digital communications, nothing is forgotten. Somewhere, buried in a server, my unresolved complaint lingered, waiting for the moment when it would be unearthed by some algorithm. The bot’s 2024 response had no concept of the time elapsed.

———

Bot’s Response from 2024

Tal: 7:24 AM

Friday, Jul 5 2024 UTC

Hi William,

Thank you for your patience and we apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused. Can you please explain more about where in the sign-up process your audience was getting stuck? Were they able to enter email and password? Did the software not process this and just keep loading? Did you receive any error messages?

Thanks in advance for the information as we would love to prevent this from happening again.

Sincerely,

Liam

emaze Customer Support

For answers to more emaze questions check out:

http://www.emaze.com/support/

Friday, Jul 5 2024 UTC 

Convergence Bot:2:35 PM

#TKT-128030 Chat with William has been closed.

——-

What strikes me most isn’t the content of the response, but rather the implications of its existence. We’re at a point where bots are scouring old communications and trying to resolve issues, but might they also be capable of digitally profiling us by connecting the dots across years of correspondence?

Once all of the data is collected, connected, and made searchable, what will they do?

Perhaps the bots are becoming scribes—silent witnesses to our lives, recording every interaction, every thought we dare to type into a keyboard.