Technology as Tattletale

The New York Times is carrying an article noting the increasing presence of location-sensing technologies in our lives. It discusses several applications of the technology like tracking stolen cash from a bank, or making sure a teenage son follows the rules. The article also notes that these ultra-high resolution GPS trackers can allow freedom as much as restrict it: "Project Lifesaver, a nonprofit group in Chesapeake, Va., fits Alzheimer's patients and autistic children with radio frequency beacons disguised as bracelets, which help emergency responders find them if they are lost. Next spring the group will introduce new bracelets, created by Locator Systems, a British Columbia company, that combine radio signals with G.P.S. and cellular communications. That should allow caregivers to establish a zone where patients can safely wander, said Jim McIntosh, the company's chief executive. If patients wander off, emergency crews could receive more specific information."

Comments

Re:Sucks to be Young (sometimes)

[n dot l]

Meh. By then parents will be so busy doing their own stuff and generally neglecting their children that there won't be anyone to watch the monitors, so it all cancels out in the end.

Oh, wait, that already happened, you say?

Well then by all means tag the little bastards. And someone make me a device that yells "Get off my lawn!" whenever kids get close...I'm far too busy doing my own stuff and neglecting real life to be bothered...

</rant>

Why stop there?

[iminplaya]

Put on electric collars that zap you if you step "out of bounds". Easy to see where this will lead.

Re:"As much" is the key phrase

[CRCulver]

Saying that it can allow freedom *as much* as restricting it is only trying to put a good face on a device that has massive civil liberty concerns.

Since when do minors have a right to go somewhere their parent or guardian wishes them not to? I think this device has massive child-raising concerns, but your suggestion that parents cannot keep track of their children--whom they are ultimately responsible for--is silly.

Let's not use a wide brush here.....

[Stanislav_J]

Using this technology to keep alzheimer's victims from wandering off or hurting themseleves is about the least objectionable "tattletale" scenario I can think of. Going to the other end of the spectrum; say, routinely tracking a driver's movements in his own private car....ah, not so much. Technology itself is neutral, and while it can be used for the betterment of mankind, there will always be the temptation to expand a successful tracking technology for use in ever widening circles of privacy violations. That is why we need strong, sensible legislation to prevent abuses and draw boundries. Unfortunately, that requires strong, sensible politicians to make the law, and I don't think they're making any of those anymore.

Re:Let's not use a wide brush here.....

[Thrip]

Technology itself is neutral Thanks for wasting everyone's time by mindlessly quoting a cliche. Now go sit somewhere and think (if you remember how) about that for half and hour and then come back and tell us if you still believe it. A guillotine is not neutral. It has one purpose: public execution. A gasoline engine requires gasoline, with a set of results that may not have been predictable at the time of invention, but certainly are not "neutral."

True, the morality of something like a GPS is much harder to weigh than, say, a flamethrower. But that is a reason to be more careful, not less. We pretty much accept that when people develop a new piece of hardware, they have a responsibility to make sure it won't explode in your face (unless it's, you know, a face-exploder, which I'm sure someone is working on in God's great US of A). When your bank put's up a new web site, we all presume they have spent a lot of time making sure it's secure. It's about time we started holding technology companies just as responsible for thinking through privacy issues before releasing something.

If the mp3 player catches fire in your pants, it's broken and should not have been released. If the website lets hackers get your bank account number, it's broken and should not have been released. If the car tells dad you spent the night at your girlfriend's house instead of at boy scouts, or tells the department of homeland security you stopped by the mosque, it's broken and should not have been released.

Re:"As much" is the key phrase

[DaedalusHKX]

Think on it like this. When a whole generation grows up tagged like cattle, always submitting to the cops, never having shot or carried a gun or trained in any form of hand to hand combat (call it martial arts, call it PT, call it what you will), and never having exercised their own rights (which are now presumed "granted by government" anyways) what more do you need to enslave them?

The fence is like that which a dog learns of early in life inside the electric fence. Walk too far and BZZT. Eventually even if the power dies, that dog will NEVER test the limits again (unless he's one of those rare individuals that resist submission at all costs (dominant/alpha)).

I don't see this as being that useful, other than as a way to keep the cattle of mankind in line and teach them that "someone's always watching"... the great "eye in the sky" and all.

The upside is that there will be plenty who will exercise their freedom, and circumvent these technologies, and eventually leave this planet to the meek/cattle-people to live on. It is the only logical outcome. You cannot "save the world" because it includes the bovine-men alongside those who will not be cowed, and the bovines refuse to be saved... better to be hamburger for sure than to contest with the wild beasts for survival on the range. The only solution is to leave (if anyone suggests crushing the bovine-people in a genocidal armageddon, while fun to entertain in Quake 4 Enemy Territory, in real life, such an endeavor is doomed to fail, and in the unlikely event of success, the drain on the psyche would leave the victors in worse shape than the now nonexistent losers). And I would not be too surprised if the exodus I'm suggesting, has happened at least once before in the history of mankind.

Re:"As much" is the key phrase

[Thrip]

You know, if you're trying to make a reasonable argument, you should try not to lose all your credibility by suggesting that going to live somewhere on a different planet is "the only logical outcome." Just so you know, it's not even a remote possibility. You can gaze up at the sky all day, but come nightfall, you'll be herded back into the barn like the rest of us. Some of us ARE planning a stampede, and your escapist stargazing is not helping.