Algorithmic media shifted from forecasting tools to incubators of speculative sociality

Evidence

The striking popularity of astrology apps reveals a shift in the function of algorithmically powered media: from instruments of forecasting, prediction, and risk control to vehicles of collective uncertainty and incubators of the speculative sociality of our time. While they have little in common with the astrologists of the past, such platforms are part of a rapidly expanding assemblage of speculative technologies, which mediate the ways we imagine and experience contemporary finance capitalism. — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities, 207

Categorization

• DEFINE: This forwards the book’s core concept of speculative sociality as distinct from older prediction/risk functions.
• XREF: Builds the running definition of homo speculans the reader must explain, connecting image-sharing platforms to speculative imagination. — connects to: Algorithmic opacity itself generates speculation that drives platform engagement — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities: Living with…, 291; Even screen-bound algorithmic traders remain embedded in social ritual — Aris Komporozos-Athanasiou, Speculative Communities: Living With…, 277