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New Phone Allows Bosses To Snoop On Staff
tad001 writes "The Japanese phone giant KDDI has developed a way to track users' movements in fine detail. It works by analyzing the movement of accelerometers, found in many handsets. Activities such as walking, climbing stairs, or even cleaning can be identified, the researchers say. The company plans to sell the service to clients such as managers, foremen, and employment agencies."
My boss just came into my office and told me to get the hell off of Slashdot and get back to work!
See my journal for slashdot ID's by year. Mine created in 2005. http://slashdot.org/journal/289875/slashdot-ids-by-year
While this sounds like a great idea, it's going to be quietly retired after someone manages to match up the boss's "cleaning" activities with those of anyone else in the company.
"Wow, look how perfectly these accelerations overlay!"
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8559683.stm is a link to the article, rather than just the BBC
The accelerometer clearly shows me working when this one fell too. I suppose you will have to assign me another one. Well, I'm a team player sir, you can just get me a cheap phone for work use since I seem to be so hard on them.
Think of 2 stepper motors hooked up with USB and a small gyroscope cradle for the phone. Lego mindstorms should have something that will fit the bill.
"Sir, employee 3392 is doing barrel rolls again!"
...
I am SO swinging that phone from the rooftop... Let them figure that one out! Or tossing it across the road to a friend on the other side. Yes boss, as a matter of fact I can fly!
Browsing at +1 - no ACs, I ignore their posts. So refreshing!
The Pennsylvania school district announces that they plan to end their controversial laptop policy and give harmless cell phones to their students to make up for spying on them.
Troll is not a replacement for I disagree.
Track that you nosey idiots. Unless they're going to stipulate that all employees must WEAR their phones.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
If my boss wants to buy this phone, great. They've just given me a big neon flashing sign warning me that they're a control freak. I can now either move to a different department or start looking for a new job.
I'd rather have obvious signs I can't miss that my boss likes to create a hostile work environment, rather than subtle signs I might miss at first. The more blatant they are, the better.
Hell if you're going to treat us like livestock, just go all out! How about microchips and ear tags! Maybe the company logo branded on your body.
If I had a boss that tried to make his workers use something like this, I'd quit my job.
At the moment you can buy a horrifically expensive option board for some radios that does exactly this. That way you can tell if the HT that is supposed to be clipped to your security guard's belt as he walks around your bonded warehouse has suddenly gone horizontal. Another application is in shopping centres where it's pretty handy to be able to track where cleaners and security guards are - and have been in the past. Why? Nosiness? Spying? No.
Mouth-breathing Chav Scum: "ZOMG I SLIPPED AND FELL OVER ON THAT DROPPED ICE CREAM CONE THERE! THAT SHOULD HAVE BEEN CLEARED UP STRAIGHT AWAY! I'M GONNA SUUUUUUUUEEE!!!"
You: "Well, let's see, the cleaner went past there three minutes ago, so it can't have been like that for long."
MBCS: "But... But... Butt..."
or alternatively:
You: "Right, who's doing the guard tour, oh it's Wee Wullie. That's funny, he's been standing at the same bit for a couple of minutes now, moving around quite a lot though. Wonder if everything's okay?"
<clicky on CCTV console>
You: "Aha, righty. Let's send Big Davie down to give him some 'assistance' there..."
Attach to a drill and give it a spin. Tell them you had a bit of trouble on your way in to work. Let them rack their brains figuring out what happened.
No, that's all right, we'll just deduct the replacement cost from your pay. That will help teach you to be more responsible with company property.
Demagnetizing the accelerometer..... I'm not entirely sure you understand how these things work. Seriously, there's no magnets involved here.
-1 disagree is not a modifier for a reason. -1 troll, flaimbait, redundant, overrated are NOT acceptable substitutes.
Being a boss is easy, there are only two kind of employees. Lazy ones, who will slack of any chance they get and perform at best at a level just above firing, and good employees who take pride in their job.
It will cost a fortune to turn a lazy one into a good one. It will save you money to turn a good one into a lazy one, in the short term. It is easy, just keep cutting benefits, breaks, perks and up the work load while micro-managing them to hell.
But most managers/bosses feel they need to earn their keep by showing they are making the people work the hardest. If you spend the money of those kind of managers and their bag of tricks on salary, you would be able to hire the absolute best and have people fighting to stay with your company. Go ahead, offer a cleaner 50% above average wage. No problems filling vacancies, no need to watch their every move and you get motivated employees who got a reason not to exchange you the moment they a chance. Because even cleaning staff builds up a lot of knowledge you can't easily replace with the Xth temp because your turn-over rate is 100%.
By all means, you go tech to try to manage those who can only earn the lowest wages, I pay a bit more and get the cream. In the end, I know who is more efficient.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Attach it to a long string and throw it out of the window of a very tall building sometimes. After you got them curious, leave a spiderman costume on the floor of your cubicle and when your boss walks by quickly kick it under the desk.
Negative moral value of force outweighs the positive value of good intentions.
With a name like "clarkkent09" i'm surprised you didn't at least pick a DC superhero to use for that joke, but it was hilarious nonetheless. Too bad I don't have mod points.
As a Brit working for an American company, all I can say is that all my boss cares about is that he has a pretty graph at the end of each week, month & quarter that shows me and his other guys are utilised as highly as possible and making money for the company.
He's a decent American bloke but constantly stressed out by the managers above him and I wouldn't do his job for all the tea in China (or coffee in Starbucks). Plus he doesn't have either the time or inclination to check up on me any more than he does currently (once a week at most).
If you do work for a company that has managers needing to do this level of granular "surveillance" of staff then it's time to get another job - because if they're going to those depths then they're probably going to get rid of you anyway....
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
OK, I guess we're all against the potentially creepy applications of this.
But could there be useful ones? Most people carry cell phones, could this be used to monitor people with known history of health problems, such as heart disease, or the elderly?
If my cell phone detected that I'd just had a stroke, or that one of my parents had just had a fall, and was unconscious at the bottom of a staircase, and informed the emergency services, then that would be the kind of intrusion that I could accept.
...to patent my new design for the "Feline Cellphone Backpack"!
Imagine this is your boss's office as he tracks you on his computer screen:
"Okay, so he's just gone out through his kitchen door... he's climbing the fence into his neighbour's garden... now he's squatting down in their rose bed???"
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
Then why did you hire them.