Personal privacy is a huge deal on the Internet these days, and having read all the various treatises on freedom of speech and civil liberties and chilling effects and having seen the technological advances being made, my advice to you is: get used to it.
You might as well. If you're all worked up about it and grumpy about it we'll just make fun of you whenever we see you on webcams, "caught on tape" newscasts and TV shows that start with "World's Funniest." We might even see you from space.
Google just released a new beta version of Google Earth, a program that combines satellite images of, well, everywhere, with Google's near-omniscient awareness of, well, everything. The result is that I can type in any address in the world and immediately get whooping vertigo as I zoom over the earth like a voyeuristic Superman and zip down to hover over your house or place of business. I sent snapshots to various friends around the world of their own houses over the weekend, some with plainly visible cars in the driveways and scattered junk in the backyards, just to mess with their minds.
Anybody read Brin's The Transparent Society? It bears directly on this, I know, but I have yet to order my copy, so I can't really discuss it intelligently.
Posted by Kwea (Member # 2199) on :
Noemon, that book looks great.
Posted by Noemon (Member # 1115) on :
It does, doesn't it? It's been on my list for a while now. Maybe I should just bite the bullet and get it.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
I;ve read a lot of his essays, but not the book itself. I love his Star Wars rants, though...
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
Great column, Chris. And, as the Girl With No Borders, a philosophy I endorse.