Communications of the ACM

invasive of the girls’ privacy) but “Would have been even better if they’re people I know,” as Lucas says. “Next time I’m going to raise the bounty and limit the range more. It’s amazing what you can get, just by asking.” 25 Lucas anticipates that knowing the girls involved would make the video more satisfying. The invasion of private space is part of the pleasure.

Aaron and Lucas respond very differently to the license-plate request, not only because Aaron recognizes the plate number but because he has something personal at stake in the fulfillment of the request, and in its asking. Previously, the reader has seen Aaron wonder why he is being asked to fulfill this or that request, but never whether he should. Only when the request touches him personally does he realize the damage that might be done if it is fulfilled.

Aaron himself is later undermined (in a small way) by another Tilly Here-and-Now user, fulfilling another of his mother’s requests, when she discovers he has been cast in the school play. On the surface, this plot point lines up primarily with more typical concerns about privacy. Aaron, who had hoped to conceal the information about his being cast in the play, is the one who has been injured but, insofar as Aaron trusts his mother less, she is also damaged.

Information control and performance. The story repeatedly touches on the theme of people pretending to be who they are not, as signaled at the opening of the story, when the reader learns Aaron has been cast in a play. A play is a performance, but the “deception” is a matter of mutual consent; the audience knows it is watching actors, and in this sense the play does not represent a miscarriage of knowledge.

This non-deceptive deception dif-
fers from the way Aaron’s parents talk
to each other over dinner toward the
end of the story. Aaron knows by then
that his mother suspects his father of
cheating and he halfway suspects his
father as well, but they treat each oth-
er normally, as if nothing is wrong.
“He couldn’t hear anything different
in their tones. His mother acted like
she had never asked the question. His
father acted like he had nothing to
hide.” 25 Aaron’s mother, and possibly
his father as well, perform with an in-
tent to mislead. But whom are they mis-
leading—Aaron, each other, or both?

And when did the deception begin?

It is also worth raising the question of whether, and how, Aaron’s own actions qualify as misrepresentations, as in his desire to keep his role in the play a secret, and his own Tilly request, which is designed to distract Lucas from fulfilling his mother’s request.

Additional topics. Liu’s “ Here-and-Now” also raises issues of access control and information integration, or combining different possibly innocuous sources to complete more complex, thorough, and possibly invasive records. At one point, the reader’s perception shifts when Aaron recognizes his father’s license plate. How do the different ethical theories frame the possibility of deanonymization in the story, either deliberately or accidental? Discussing deanonymization can lead to further discussion of hacking and Wikileaks, trust and distrust in data scrubbing, as well as other directions.

Ethical description writing assignment. The purpose of this assignment is description. Addressing the points cited in the following paragraphs, describe Liu’s story in terms of one of the three major theories of ethics. (You will receive separate instructions telling you which theory to use.) Be sure to title your assignment “Here-and-Now: [name of ethical theory].”

Assigned theory. Using the concepts and worldview of your assigned theory, give a two-to-four sentence summary of the central ethical problem(s) in the story.

Ethical problems. What is at stake in the ethical problem(s) so described? That is, what possible goods could be gained or lost or what kinds of harm could occur or be prevented? Using the language of your theory, explain why these costs or benefits are significant.

Characters. What character(s) is/are in a position to take meaningful action with respect to the problem? What about their character or circumstances positions them to take such action?

Course of action. Choose one such
character from your answer. Using the
language and concepts of your assigned
theory, describe the course of action this
character takes in the story. Are there
other possible courses of action the sto-
ry suggests the character might have
this particular narrative provides an
exceptionally effective window onto
Liu’s slightly reimagined world, and
the discussion will likely be more fo-
cused and productive if you dedicate at
least 20 minutes to 30 minutes to dis-
cussing Aaron’s experiences and re-
flections before moving onto the more
general implications of the Tilly app.

As always, the best approach is a Socratic one, in which you guide your students toward discovering things for themselves. Here are some observations and details about the story. You can use them to ask “fishing” questions if you think your students are missing important details or to prompt them to reassess their view of the story if they have settled on a version that ignores such details.

Aaron. Aaron is interested in information about others. He likes claiming bounties and furnishing others with the information they want but also likes trying to figure out why it is that people want them. When Lucas baits him, saying, “I got something cool,” Aaron cannot help asking about it.

On the other hand, Aaron hates giving up information about himself to the people he knows. He does not want his mother to know about his part in the school play and will not tell Lucas how much money he earned. In the entire story, we learn of only one instance in which Aaron willingly shares information with another character, when he teaches his mother (before the beginning of the story) about Tilly Here-and-Now. By the end of the story, Aaron regrets having shared that information, since his mother is now using the app “against” him to learn things about him and about his father.

The individuality of knowledge. At several points in the story, both major and minor, the reader’s attention is directed to the ways information matters more to the people it touches directly. The story thus adds a new layer to frequently expressed concerns about privacy, focusing on the damage done to the character(s) whose information is known or made available. As the story explains, the person who knows can be just as affected or damaged by that knowledge as the subjects about whom it is known.