http://www.seomoz.org/blog/24-hours-without-privacy
Now imagine… that the people who collect and disperse this information are not doing so to maximise profits, but to monitor, predict, and influence… your behavior?
I had a conversation last week with an old friend about who was taking over the world. He’s convinced it’s the chinese, I’m convinced it’s google.
Yay… google has made a big public deal about not sharing user information with government agencies… but has Facebook? Have any of the other web giants out there who monitor your thoughts (yes, your thoughts… what do you think your notes/taglines are?) and then push them through an algorythm to make all kinds of determinations about who/what you are?
I’ve been playing with transparency and a complete lack of privacy for a few years now. There isn’t a single aspect of my life that hasn’t been put through a public debate of some form or another. What I’ve discovered is that it makes me MORE powerful when I have nothing to hide…. but then of course, begs the question, what do I do with the privacy of others.
Although I’m not terribly guarded about my own privacy, I guard that of others with copious jealousy (by the same token, I’ll be the first to violate it too).
They say that knowledge is power. Now…knowledge, and information are not the same thing. Knowledge is what we derive when we put information through a coginitive process (realization). Google stores (has physical posession of, and all the rights and privileges that come with that position) the most knowledge and information on the planet. A goldmine.
What happens when it fully realizes this? Who can possibly stop a corporate entitity, with no governing powers in the physical world… from taking over the metaphysical frontier that is the internet… it is too vast to police…. no matter how hard you try… legislation will never find its way onto the internet …