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In agreement to author Mark Tovey, “hypertrail” (2008, xxxii) is the moment in which there is too much dialogue between brand and consumer, user and technology, meaning that people leave a historical and digital trail behind when sharing or searching data in the Internet. “Hypertrail” is also the focus of our research presented in this chapter and throughout the whole book, as well. We are facing a new era of networking and smart devices where brands we engage to dialogue with are the ones that connect and keep in touch with us ― they track us and anticipate every move of ours, meaning this we cannot flee from the huge trail we leave behind on the networks, websites and apps. As Tovey speaks about, we rely on the hypertrail, we track the brands and in return, they track us. Besides, brands are aware that we use our smartphones as complete devices for all facts in our lives and that nowadays we are all synchronized. This day and age is what Lipovetsky & Serroy call “hypermodernity” (2013, 13). Furthermore, this is the modernity in which digital media is being used to push us further in technology, science, information and consumerism. Never before has the system known so much about ourselves. In addition, there is more up to it. Without previous instance, have we confessed so much detail about our lives and shopping habits as we do online by giving up our privacy in order to use digital systems. What defines the online media is that is often “hypertextual or hypermediated” (Miller, 2011, 25), meaning that the digital media are context-aware of us and they rely on crossing information about us, thus anticipating every move of ours. Some authors, such as Turkle, prefer to label this media as “narcissistic devices” because we use them as mirrors of our own personality. We shop online, too. Therefore, we are “in” without noticing we do many different things in a “virtual” space without thinking very much as we used to in the past. Events, concepts, facts and actions just happen all the time and we go with the flow. We use special smartphones as extensions of who we are, and of how we think and behave. Whenever we take selfies, we are objectified in representations (Leurs, 2015, 192). This occurs because we do not care about the kind of trail we leave behind ― algorithms digest all our photos and web searches. We came to build a hypertrail online independently we are or not aware of that.

Some authors believe that what is at stake is “these micro-politics of association” (Leurs, 2015, 200), since what counts now is to be connected, wherever and whenever we wish, multiplying the links between us: social media, brands, network and cloud, which shape us. This is also a time to notice a rather different kind of sociality. In spite of this, to be more connected to other people does not necessarily mean we are more truly connected as most of the times it is just one more connection. Nevertheless, the digital system, in which we leave behind our massive hypertrail, keeps favoring"hypersociality" (Ito apud Karaganis, 2007, 96) all the time. It is not about being really social to people, but about having the ability to engage them at any given time. In 1996, Engelbart proposed the concept of "groupware" (apud Tovey, 2008, 331). Once social media are technology-based systems, and there are people in the mix, it makes sense to speak of groupware, but now there is more than groups of people online ― there are whole cities, societies and countries. Hypersociality is also a phenomenon that emphasizes people’s lack of care about the kind of trail they leave behind, in other words, what is relevant for many people is to show up and live online. To add to this fact the shopping spree takes place as we learn from YouTubers and Influencers because we feel that somebody or something is leading us, is pointing directions to us online but we do not know exactly who is doing that, and finally, in the deep end there are the brands directing people’s lives. The fact there is such an "information continuum" that comes from way back before social media (but that now is boosted) is what keeps us all checked in place. Everybody is watching each other’s performance. This is a blend between consumer culture and surveillance culture. The hypertrail is a data-driven evidence that someone built, some kind of an architecture to receive, examine and profile our data. In Primo’s regard, "The younger generations use the platforms the same way you do: strategically. Their goal is to get their message out and stay relevant" (2014, para.7). Yet, the issue is that if everybody uses media in a strategic manner, then this is but a society of strategic media. Moreover, this is the reason why the hypertrail is so relevant for the brands that remain in charge. Actually, hypersociality is the core of change here ― we are measured by the people who are measured by us. Currently, we are not a product of our environment, it is precisely the opposite, it is our environment that is our product. In return, something else happens; we became this saturated Self, the type of person that produces too much hypertrail online. We rely on connection and consumerism and we are all focused on the politics of performance, something similar to a role-play online now, and brands are aware of these behaviors and help us shopping online for an identity. Brands are the new system we are into; they have become a conversation, an extension, a bridge we cross. Once, Gibson said, “The Walkman changed the way we understand cities” (2012, 13). So did the smartphone, the networks, and the social media, too. Yet, music is relevant because it matches the flows of this liquid society. Music became the soundtrack of our consumeristic lives the same way people want to live the dream. Moreover, music is everywhere. “This inevitable shift toward fluidity is now transforming almost every other aspect of society” (Kelly, 2016, LOC 973-5810). We cannot imagine how music, pop music mostly, is shaping society and helping this hypersociality to emerge with saturation. Whenever we put our headphones and we get to be isolated in our desks, we resemble pilots in their fighter jet cockpits (Turkle, 2015, 249). Little by little, we become isolated, but once we tune into our apps, we promote hypersociality. Brands are the doors we open, worlds we connect to as they favor the identities we shop for. In addition, there is always music as a background. As said before, people in front of their desks are like cockpit pilots, while people on the streets adore the “pleasures of musically encapsulated fast-forward urban motion” (Gibson, 2012, 14). Whether on the street or indoors we connect, we listen, we watch, we stream, we search, and we leave a hypertrail behind us, something similar to our digital footprint. The philosopher Gilles Deleuze once said that unlike the static war machine, “(…) nomads are motionless, and the nomadic adventure begins when they seek to stay in the same place by escaping the codes“ (2004, 260). As a mobile crowd, we are going along exactly like this, both indoors and outdoors ― we are the nomads escaping from the codes. Nevertheless, since we are leaving a hypertrail behind, are we truly escaping? Is there an escape route at all? In The Three Ecologies, Guattari argues that “Individuals are ‘captured’ by their environment, by ideas, tastes, models, ways of being, images that are constantly injected into them, and even by the refrains that go round and round in their heads” (Pindar & Sutton apud Guattari, 2000, Introduction, 8). This still holds true, especially in the current hypermodern, hypersocial and hyperconnected society we live in. We love searching for things and purchasing items that highlight our style. “Discoverability” is the item to keep in mind (Kelly, 2016, LOC 1080-5810), because we actually find things that made our journey into the digital media space. Music is really one of the products we consume and that benefits from the hyperdistribution. “Success no longer derives from mastering distribution. Distribution is nearly automatic; it is all streams. The Great Copy Machine in the Sky takes care of that” (Kelly, 2016, LOC 1080-5810). The main reason why music and films are so much hyperdistributed in streams around the world is because they respectively unleash the soundtracks and the visualtracks for the lifestyles we are supposed to consume. Brands and networks behind this masterplan uphold the role-playing that is at stake here. Out consumeristic behavior needs items to assemble the image we need for the role-play. We are what we buy, as well as what we look like. Bauman used to say that “The consumerist vocation ultimately rests on individual performances" (2011, 55). Moreover, such performances are precisely what we are leaving behind on the hypertrail. Brands and media are the architects of this space where the hypertrail is recorded forever and this recent reality transformed users into a new type of person, a new kind of consumers. These new consumers, these new citizens are the homo cypiens who have moved into the 21st century. They will reshape the world.

In agreement with the previous statements, it seems as if “Consumers are multichannel, with and without the Internet” (Fred J. Horowitz in Meyers & Gerstman, 2001, 40). It is common sense that sometimes we forget that online media is only a machine that never forgets us or what we do. What exactly is it we are suffering from? We are “victims of a post-industrial dilemma: over-choice" (Alvin Toffler apud Laermer & Simmons, 2008, 181). The problem now is that there is just too much of everything, all the time, wherever we are. Even when we are not buying anything we are want to buy something because we keep searching for items, for novelties and suddenly we stumble on something online. We are “prospective consumers" (Bauman, 2011, 11) for the reason we feel always in the mood to assemble our scenario. Out first contact with the hypertrail platforms is through screens:

“Screens surround us – they're on our desks, in our laps, in our pockets. They're in airports, on airplanes, in cabs, in grocery store aisles, and on gas pumps. We're entertained by them, informed by them, challenged by them, connected by them. We watch them, write on them, work on them and play on them” (Bond, 2012, 3).

Undoubtedly, the screens are our filter to reality and they act as a media device, for example laptops, smartphones and tablets. The screens we use frequently are portable which sets a great advantage of multitasking “(...) the mobile allows the user to be creator, programmer and broadcaster" (Alvarez-Monzoncillo, 2011, 77). We have reached a tipping point in which regardless of the hypertrail we leave behind, digital media allow us to be whoever we want to be. We have an intimate connection with these media. Svetlana Boym uses the expression “tactile intimacy” (2001, 47) and that is exactly why these media are so widespread. They are intimate media. For instance, Wheeler believes that “Our devices have become a second nature. Wherever we go, they go. (...) As smartphones and tablets get smarter, more interactive, and more intuitive, desks are being left behind" (2013, 70). Moreover, not only desks but also offices, office buildings, libraries, theaters and shopping malls because we do almost everything online. This is why the hypertrail is so politically important. Who controls our track record controls everything and everybody. We live in a “Post-Web“ world (Elias, 2013; and Anderson in Anderson, Wolff, 2010, 1). The new digital reality ensures we cannot go back to a world without control and hypertrails and we cannot reset a digital media-based society. In 2012, Google Insights’ Studies were already reporting, "We are a nation of multi‐screeners. Most of consumers' media time today is spent in front of a screen - computer, smartphone, tablet and TV" (2). From this point, the question we ask ourselves is how did all of this began? Michael Benedikt provides the answer as he mentions the way before when there were tablets and smartphones: "Cyberspace: the tablet become a page become a screens become a world, a virtual world. Everwhere and nowhere, a place where nothing is forgotten and yet everything changes" (Benedikt, [1991], 1 apud Bell, 2007, 16).

What is the biggest characteristic of this society beyond speed? It is for sure its multidimensional aspect. The fact that all reality is just a set of layers much like the individual’s mind, and media and brands know this as they strike in the strata, which, like Deleuze pointed out, “(…) are extremely mobile” (1987, 502). We have, we are, and we live in the strata. There is no such thing as a single global reality anymore due to the fall of the grand narrative during the postmodernity. In the aftermath of this, hypermodernity emerged, a time in which culture, media, brands and surveillance blend in. “’This is our paradox. When we are apart: hypervigilance. When we are together: inattention’” (Turkle, 2015, 160). Our default setting is now control, hence the hypertrail. We control some people’s hypertrail and they in turn control ours. “The mobile life" (Román et al, 2007, 2) we are living is based on a media-based “native continuum” (Gibson, 2014, 199-486, LOC 2830 de 6692). Any move or action we perform in one place is synchronized with the cloud and the networks. There is no escape, so our only alternative is speed. We are extremely agile in everything we do: “New media prowess is also associated with being future-savvy: while we may not know what the future will look like we can be confident it is digital” (Green, 2010, 137). Therefore, the answer remains the same to step up the ladder of further control and surveillance. If we are only user-consumers, and we are not stealing plotting terrorist attacks, there is just nothing to be worried about. We live, we consume, we do role-play and we perform an identity. Something does not come entirely from our mind but it is digested by our imagination. “That is why [we] say that the age we're in today is not an information age but an imagination age” (Ridley & Parsons, 2010). It is like Kerckhove highlights when he points out this imaginary production of ours that is but a “connective production”, (2010, LOC 120 de 397) meaning that our only production is to connect the dots. Meanwhile, the platforms of brands and media that connect us grow exponentially larger. We know that the major “three over-arching disciplines: platforms, marketing and execution (David Wood in De Waele, 2013, LOC 163-2059) are the basis of the system. The very same system that allows us to exist and display, search and show, consume and stream, post and tune in. We are totally hyperconnected. “Design. Story. Symphony. Empathy. Play. Meaning. These six senses increasingly will guide our lives and shape our world” (Pink, 2005, 68). What the author means by this is that concepts will be more and more relevant, along with narratives we follow, the empathy we develop towards people and the hypersociality. In the end, it is all but a game. Moreover, it has to mean something to us. Nowadays, we are fond of meaningful brands because these are the ones we are willing to connect us. However, we are just making a small mistake because we forget that we are taking brands as sign of the future. Yet, if brands are the future that means a corporate future, the kind of what science fiction dystopia have warned us about, some way "We have no future because our present is too volatile" (Gibson apud Hoepker, 2011, 230). Furthermore, volatility is a feature that indicates everything is futuristic, and it means tension, motion and suspense, too. One of the images of the future we have so much into is cyberspace ―“Cyberspace: it sounds like the future was supposed to be" (Bell, 2007, 2) so, it is important to stress that behind these words every visionary has been hiding over the last two decades. Kevin Kelly for example is sure we are in the age of “Protopia”. We are consuming prototypes, images of the future like Fred Polak proposed. Our concern with the pioneering images and concepts has led us to absorb the trends and discourses of today’s mediascape faster. We are so into future that cyberspace became a historical concept. Technology is disappearing between the information and us and all we have is User Experience (UX). Following this trend, we have to agree with Dave Burwick who thinks that it is all about “interfacing with the consumer” (apud Meyers & Gerstman, 2001, 117). These days the concept of interface is crucial as it rules out the bridge between user-consumer and a brand, person and a platform, individual and a corporation. So we are doing so many things on the platforms that our present is still too volatile. We are assimilating a media feature for our own. Kelly reminds us that “we’re stuck in the short now, a present without a generational perspective” (2016, LOC 228-5810). However, we have to add something to this fact: if we do not have a generational perspective it is due to the thirty year generation gap that had been narrowed to the two year cycle. Hence, we are not formatted anymore by the laws of anthropology or culture or sociology terms. Instead, we have absorbed the two year cycle that actually matches the information technology cycle. According to this, everything changes entirely in just two years, but there is more: now all generations are welcomed to the fold, because in this day and era everybody, regardless of their age, has access to the very same media. Nobody is left out.

Now, the future is branded. There is no “the” future or “a” future. There are only “futures”. Each brand follows, develops, promotes and sells its own vision of the time concept of “future”. Author Kelly says that “we will be endless newbies in the future simply trying to keep up” (2016, LOC 180-5810). As a matter of fact, it may even be true. But while we try to thrive and to keep up, we are actually doing something. We are “becoming”, and becoming what? We are becoming what the brands we follow have designed for ourselves. In Bauman’s perspective “Anticipating future trends based on past events becomes more and more riskier and, oftenly mistakingly (…). Liquid life is flow of restarts" (2007, 8). Thus, this fluidity is becoming mandatory. However, we have to keep in mind that even if the past is not anymore what sells the most when compared to the future, we have to say that everything we do online, and mostly on social media, is becoming past. The past is actually useful. It is not outdated. On the contrary, the old is the new “new”. One thing is certain, to be savvy will be one of the most important attributes for near future. We need survivors for this predatory environment in which future narratives are controlled by corporate brands. We need new heroes, people with new abilities. In Pink’s regard:

“The future belongs to a very different kind of person with a very different kind of mind—creators and empathizers, pattern recognizers, and meaning makers. These people—artists, inventors, designers, storytellers, caregivers, consolers, big picture thinkers—will now reap society’s richest rewards and share its greatest joys” (2005, 1).

This means that a revolution has been triggered in view of the fact that once were attributes of media personnel, such as being empathizers, pattern recognizers and meaning makers, now they are resources we all need. This assemble the armor we need to thrive in the new world. “We still have not left the era of the screen” (Manovich, 2001, 115), but the issue goes deeper than this. The problem is not the screen. It is the images. We should not forget that the new media image is something the user actively gets into (Idem, Ibidem, 183). Images have become addicting and engaging, and virtually they transmit dreamscapes, as well as they have become a tool for brands to connect with us. Peter Lunenfeld gives an answer to this by defending that “the computer is a dream device" (2011, xiv). It means that while everyone used the computer as a tool, it actually was an instrument, a reservoir for creatives and not just for accountants or office clerks. What gets weirder is that we are role-playing with all things computerized. “Over time, such performances of identity may feel like identity itself” (Turkle, 2011, 12) hence, the computer or any gadget like a smartphone is an evocative object of psychology. Moreover, the computers connected to network, social media and cloud “What was hidden in an individual’s mind became shared” (Manovich, 2001, 61). It is interesting to point out that the save icon has gradually being replaced by the share icon in most software and apps. In the book

La Bombe Informatique,

Paul Virilio (1999, 24) claims that there is the invention of a great optic of replacement or a work of art of a horizon of substitution. So, it is important to highlight this moment when we speak of the forgotten concept of the 90s : « hyper-reality » (Baudrillard, 1996, 64), though it stands attached to some degree to vertigo hyper-reality means that images have been leveled up to a new degree. We can understand it better if we look at what Bruce Sterling said on an interview (Bosch, 2012); he described design fiction as “not a kind of fiction [but] a kind of design. It tells worlds rather than stories”. Hyper-reality is this new regime of imagery that is part how the new world is built. It is not just fiction; it is world-design, too.