Google's newest application, My Location, uses cell signals to locate user's locations. If indeed the medium is the message, what does this innovation have to say about privacy and the individual in an interconnected world?
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Here's an in-depth look at Google's new service, Latitude: http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&taxonomyName=mobile_and_wireless&articleId=9127621&taxonomyId=15&intsrc=kc_feat
ReplyDeleteAlso, this piece on GPS/geolocation was in this month's wired:
http://www.wired.com/gadgets/wireless/magazine/17-02/lp_10coolapps
Eventually, mobile-based geolocation won't be any different than having a microchip implant, but it probably won't be as big a privacy issue as some other coming trends. Long distance iris/face scanning tech will be soon be advanced enough to serve the same purpose, and will be able to capture everybody - not just those who choose to activate the location services on their GPS-enabled mobile device.
But where will a database of faces and/or irises come from?
http://www.wired.com/politics/law/news/2001/02/41571
http://www.epassportphoto.com/Blog/?year=2008&month=2
http://fcw.com/Articles/2008/12/19/DHS-to-expand-US-VISIT-biometric-collection.aspx
As of now, Canadian and Mexican tourists don't have to submit to iris and fingerprint scanning when entering the U.S., but everybody else does. This is changing soon, though.
Unfortunately, there isn't really any more privacy in an interconnected world as far as I can see (unless you want to deliberately pepper the trail or drop out).
The NSA has been compiling social networking data in the U.S. since 2006. They don't need to do it illegally when people volunteer their entire personal histories to the gods of facebook, myspace, etc. Google your name with quotation marks around it and you'll see how much information about you is already available online (who your friends are, where you work, where you went to school, what your religious/political affiliations are).
Erm, this is going to sound incredibly naff but I'm completely late on the course blog bandwagon and the invitation has expired so...I'll just be posting via comment.
ReplyDeleteAnyways, I just wanted to quip in about this: http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2009/03/new-in-labs-undo-send.html
It isn't anything technologically or even academically profound, really, but I just thought it was an interesting reminder of how permanent communications are on the Internet. While it's true that verbal speech is also non-retractable--the old adage that words are comparable to bullets comes to mind--this is especially the case on the virtual plane.
The 5 second limit of the undo button makes it not so much as a groundbreaking feature as a BIC, but it does raise interesting questions about is such a thing as an unfettered 'undo' button even desirable to begin with and would it yet again alter the way we think about communication? Technologically speaking, a permanent 'undo' button would be near impossible to put to practice--unless it's only on a superficial level--so I daresay these questions are merely theoretical in nature.
But I must confess, I'm posting this mostly to participate in some sort of a discussion since I've contributed at a rather dismal level in class this term, truth be told!