The Algorithm of Spring

11

"It starts small," he continued, drawing a lazy line through the condensation on his glass.

"Suggestions. Places to go. Clothes to wear. Little nudges to 'improve your experience.' Then it escalates. You start seeing it everywhere. The gallery assistant who changed careers overnight. The friend suddenly posting staged couple shots with captions that read like someone else wrote them."

Maya's fingers drummed the table, her expression unreadable.

He paused, eyes fixed on the liquid, as if trying to read something in it. 

"The way it nudged my sister... it was subtle. But now? Now it's telling her who to be."

Maya felt her jaw tighten. She didn't like how easily he'd drawn her in. "Why are you telling me this?"

Jun-ho's tone softened. "Because you're already in it. And someone needs to tell you the truth."

She searched his face for irony, for a trace of provocation—but the look in his eyes gave her pause.

"Think about it," he said, signalling the waitress. "You're an artist. You're supposed to see the shape of things before anyone else does."

Maya released her tight grip on her somaek glass, suddenly aware of her own body in the booth. The crowd had thinned. The lights had dimmed. The music shifted to something low and ambient, like the tail end of a party no one wanted to admit was ending.

Jun-ho stared at the bottom of his glass. "My sister," he said, as if the words had been waiting. 

"She used to light up every room. Fearless. Always questioning. She wanted to be a filmmaker. Documentaries." He paused. "I know people change, but..." He reached for the memory. "She used to carry this beat-up Super 8 camera everywhere. Said she liked how physical film was unpredictable—that you had to trust the roll. That it had character." He gave a faint smile. "That was her. Messy. Brilliant. Unpolished."

His voice cracked barely, just enough to notice. "And then... the app got her. It didn't just find her a match. It rewired her."

Maya's voice was quiet now. "What happened?"

Jun-ho's expression tightened. "HarmoniQ is what happened. She was a very early adopter. At first, it was simple. Gamification—profile tweaks, photo prompts. Then it started 'optimising' her matches."

Maya crossed her arms. "Maybe she just wanted to fit in."

Jun-ho's gaze sharpened. "You're missing it. The app doesn't reflect preferences—it shapes them, preying on insecurities with simple, stable solutions. Every login teaches it how to make you feel—inadequate." His voice dropped further. "That's not a bug. It's design."

Maya flinched. The image of Min-ji resurfaced: new filters, curated posts, her fixation on 'matchability'.

"Still sounds like every social media to me," Maya said, her certainty thinning. "How does it monetise hollowing people out? What's in it for them?"

"Data," Jun-ho said. "Control. The more predictable you are, the easier you are to steer. HarmoniQ is wired into everything—social platforms, online shopping, networking tools."

Maya exhaled, skeptical yet no longer dismissive. "You're saying it's... propaganda?"

"I'm saying it's infrastructure." His voice was calm, almost detached. "Soft influence. Nudges. You start to notice the patterns. It always pushes you toward the same things: family planning, career stability...the exact things you see on government billboards. Your choices are still yours. Technically. But they're—sculpted."

Maya thought of the ads. Her mother's offhand remarks. "You think... all of that's intentional?"

Jun-ho nodded once. "The app doesn't want to help you find someone," he said. "It wants to decide who you become."

She wanted to laugh it off—chalk it up to paranoia. But the patterns were there. The app's quiet persistence. Its uncanny timing. Tracking. Nudging. Reinforcing.

She shifted in her seat. "This is... a lot."

"I know," he said—now seeming completely sober. "But you're not alone, Maya."

Her shoulders loosened—slightly.

"Why tell me? Why now?"

Jun-ho gave a faint, almost apologetic smile. "Because people like us notice the cracks before they split wide open. And because... I can't pull this off alone."