Will get the criticisms out of the way first, because by and large this was a really well-made documentary.
It's minor, but wasn't sure why some interviewees were framed with so much headroom. Then again, Mr Robot did that and I never understood it there, and given that that was also concerned with themes of technology and surveillance, maybe there's some shared symbolism I'm not picking up on.
Some of the segments with the AI saying menacing things were a little cheesy, but overall brief at least.
There's also a sense that the documentary may cover a little too much in its 85-minute runtime. While I can admire its ambition in covering so many aspects of facial recognition software, its racial biases, algorithm discrimination, and so on, it does make for a documentary that jumps around a fair bit and not always smoothly... at least all the topics are interesting on their own.
But in the end, it covers important topics and presents compelling arguments about particular flaws and biases in technology. It does warn that this is something that if unchecked could become a serious problem, so I like the attempt to bring awareness to this issue before it completely spirals out of control.
It's well edited, features interesting interviewees and subjects, and ends on a little more hope than I was anticipating, which was a nice surprise. Overall, it's one of the better Netflix documentaries I've watched in a while.
It's minor, but wasn't sure why some interviewees were framed with so much headroom. Then again, Mr Robot did that and I never understood it there, and given that that was also concerned with themes of technology and surveillance, maybe there's some shared symbolism I'm not picking up on.
Some of the segments with the AI saying menacing things were a little cheesy, but overall brief at least.
There's also a sense that the documentary may cover a little too much in its 85-minute runtime. While I can admire its ambition in covering so many aspects of facial recognition software, its racial biases, algorithm discrimination, and so on, it does make for a documentary that jumps around a fair bit and not always smoothly... at least all the topics are interesting on their own.
But in the end, it covers important topics and presents compelling arguments about particular flaws and biases in technology. It does warn that this is something that if unchecked could become a serious problem, so I like the attempt to bring awareness to this issue before it completely spirals out of control.
It's well edited, features interesting interviewees and subjects, and ends on a little more hope than I was anticipating, which was a nice surprise. Overall, it's one of the better Netflix documentaries I've watched in a while.