I read somewhere a professor was saying that when you retweet, or vote up articles, or any other of a dozen activities in which you're simply reacting mechanically that
you are no longer an individual but part of a hive mind. Sounded a little extreme, but I get his gist.
Years ago I worked on a warehousing system. Used to be that folks would get a list of stuff to pick, then go get that stuff, then get a new list. This became more and more automated. Soon the computer was talking to workers over wireless headsets, giving them step by step directions of where to go and what to do.
I imagine the next step, after "where do I go and what do I do?" will be people writing articles about how much more happy they are now that they have a clear purpose in life. How the system actually knows better at what makes them happy than they do themselves.
I liked the super-brain, immortal demigods sci-fi future much more than I do the borg one we're actually getting.
Hey kid! Get off my lawn! :)