Who’s more valuable: the digital you or the physical you?
At first glance the answer to this may seem trivial. Of course the real you (and the real me) are far more valuable than the digital you (and the digital me).
But before we accept this answer let’s dive into it just a little deeper by establishing some simple definitions.
First what do I mean by the physical me? ( I’ll do my best to discuss me rather than you from here on out!)
Now this is not a post about metaphysics, ontology, or the definition of existence, so by “the physical me” I’m referring to that entity which talks, walks, and breaths – the one in I which my wife and my cat love (see above).
The definition of the digital me, although slightly more difficult to grasp, also is it meant to be a trick. By the digital me I’m referring to the small digital bits of information which represent me online and in my digital engagements.
So far so good.
However, the word valuable is significantly more difficult to understand in this context because it’s stem is the word value, and values are not absolute, they are relative.
Specifically, value is relative because it is based on the perspective of an external entity.
Consider the physical entities known as my wife and cat. Because they love me, they value the physical me much more than the digital me.
However the corporate entities such as Amazon, Apple, Facebook, and Google are not motivated by, nor can they experience, love.
Instead, as dictated within there shareholder agreement and structure, they are motivated by maximizing shareholder value and with such a motivation it’s fairly clear that they value the digital me much more then the physical me.
So what exactly is the digital me to these companies ?
The digital me, which Amazon has created from my information, and which they own, will likely be based on my prior Amazon purchases, my prior Amazon searches, my credit card information, my address, my ZIP Code, my Amazon Prime viewing history, my decision to use expedited shipping, and perhaps now, with the purchase of Whole Foods, what my favorite foods are.
The Apple digital me will also include my credit card information, and my address and my purchase history from the Apple Store. But it will also new things such as the apps the apps I purchase and the extent Ito which I engage with them, my physical movements as shown by my iPhone throughout the day, perhaps my search history on Safari and it also wouldn’t be a shocker, after taking quite a good look at all those photos on iCloud, many of my personal relationships – including the one with my cat!
Facebook and Google’s digital “me”s which they create from my data, although slightly different, will be equally complex (the extent to which they differ and the significance of this difference, and what it would me if combined at a higher level, such as a government – is quite interesting but probably best left for another post).
OK, it should be self-evident that for companies such as these their creation of digital me has immense value; However this value can increase markedly when you consider the ability of these companies to also understand and track the relationships I have with the digital you and 40 million other digital you’s. Effectively, by mapping my relationship with many other digital you’s, they can better target the digital me for whatever purposes they want.
So what, you may say.
Companies are trying to maximize profitability from their engagement with me now just as they did 50 years ago as they upwelled someone at a Ford dealership based on the quality of the shoes they were wearing. There’s nothing new with that.
True, but since this is a blog about health and healthcare, let’s relate the above discussion to what that means for you as a digital patient.
Now, undoubtedly you have the displeasure of going to a doctor’s office and sitting in the room with a physician and a computer. They merrily type away, not looking at you, as they create or modify your your own digital patient you, as reflected by your electronic health record (EHR).
This EHR digital you, over time, is going to contain vast quantities of “private” health information about physical you. (I put “private” in parentheses because in the digital world nothing is really private).
So, just like the corporate entities mentioned above ,who value the digital you more than the physical you, over time it can be expected that at least the organizational level ( and perhaps even the doctors level who need to devote significant cognitive resources to attend to the digital EHR you), your physical value will diminish in comparison to your digital value.
As bad as this sounds – and it is- can you imagine what will happen when the Amazons , Apples ,Facebook’s, and Googles of the world combine their digital version of me and you with our EHR digital version?
Here things start to get philosophically tricky.
Undoubtedly, when these companies combine these digital constructs of our selves they will gain new insights into both personal and population health.
It also wouldn’t surprise me if over time these companies will be able to extend the life of the physical you by two or three years. ( Of note, your digital you may outlive your physical you by a thousand years)
But ask yourself this: are you willing to dehumanize yourself to the point where you are simply just a corporately created, digital construct for the next 40 years so you can extend your life by two or three years at the endgame?
It probably depends on what you value.