Who’s holding the remote control? [8/9]

SOCIETY —Exploring the dangers of blindly allowing personalised AI to shape our future

A blog series by Dr. Alex Bowyer and Iain Henderson

Welcome to the latest post in our “Who’s holding the remote control?” series.

The quiet cost of not playing along

Modern life runs on metrics. We rate drivers, restaurants, parcels, ourselves. Next, even your citizenship and participation could have a score.

In the name of efficiency and ‘growth’, public services are in the process of embracing AI-powered public services. Deals are being done in an opaque, intangible way.

We don’t know where that goes, because we are not being told. Will it be Personal AI, working FOR the citizen? Or personalised AI, doing things TO the citizen? (You can revisit Part 1 for a refresher on the difference).

For example, what if digital reputation and engagement become the gateway to healthcare, housing, or even basic permits — who really benefits? Let us introduce Daniel:

PART 8: SOCIETY

“I didn’t know I’d stopped being a good citizen.” — Daniel’s story

Daniel lives in Eastfield, a post-industrial town where community work once meant showing up, helping out, caring.

These days, it’s about tapping.

The new CivicDuty™ app awards points for approved behaviours:

✔ Reporting litter, potholes and graffiti

✔ Sharing official posts

✔ Posting upbeat messages with civic hashtags

✔ “Cheer” reactions on politicians livestreams

Daniel mostly ignored it — until the council rejected his planning application for a roof repair.

“Permit status: Insufficient Civic Participation Index™”

He called to complain. A chatbot offered helpful suggestions:

“Try attending a digital community quiz night!”

“Boost your Civic Vibes with a volunteer selfie!”

“React positively to three upcoming town hall posts to unlock bonus tokens.”

Daniel felt like the latest regulations were always changing. Most policy changes are now published via Transparent Policy Feed™, a glossy interface (complete with corporate endorsements) that lets you “react” to civic proposals.

Like, support, question. But no direct action. No councillor to talk to.

Daniel walks his street. Everything looks fine. No litter. No graffiti. No protest flyers. No shouting at councillors.

But also no energy. No involvement. Sterile. Like it was designed by a machine…. No messy, brilliant, annoying community.

The youth centre is now a branded mindfulness space.

Funded by a bank.

With no-one in it….

Who’s holding the remote control?

When community and society becomes a game, it becomes bland and ‘average’.

We should have systems that build strong, diverse societies with all their vagaries, not just obedience.

Personal AI can help deliver people access to the right services, at the right time, in the right place. That requires careful design, not simply hoovering up data and running metrics.

We hope you’ve enjoyed this week’s post in our “Who’s holding the remote control?” series. Each story explores a different fork in the road between AI that works on you, and AI that works for you.

If you missed the earlier parts, here’s some links:

• Part 1: Travel - “The Lure of Convenience”
• Part 2: Home - “Relax, Just Let Me Handle Things”
• Part 3: Social Life - “Now Entering a Pre-Approved Natural Moment”
• Part 4: Money - “When AI handles your money, who profits?”
• Part 5: Learning - “Smart Tools, Dull Minds”
• Part 6: Health and Wellbeing
• “Are We Still Well When We Don’t Choose It?”
• Part 7: Education
• “Productivity nudging or workforce control?”

In part 9, we have our overall series summary and thoughts on how best to make AI work FOR people.

You can view a list of all 9 articles in the series here.

Thanks for reading — please add your comments below!

Dr. Alex Bowyer (BlueSky) & Iain Henderson (BlueSky)