the Panopticon gets that little bit closer
Telstra's Whereis Everyone service is bound to raise a few eyebrows. It's great if you want to locate a few friends and they are happy for you to be able to locate where they are at anytime but..... what about any privacy concerns? Are you happy to be located anywhere anytime? The press and commentators, as usual, is going to town on some of the more alarmist uses. We have very little privacy left in our lives - some would argue that it disappeared some time ago. Anyway, here's another example of technology with the potential for intruding further into our lives. Telstra has some great sales pitches - its certainly nice to be able to know your kids are on their way home or how you can find your misplaced phone (is it really that accurate?) but are we becoming immune or blase to these invasions of privacy? If we know we are being monitored so closely will that affect our behaviour in any way (as in Jeremy Bentham's Panopticon) or are we simply past caring?
Wikipedia also has an interesting modern definition of the Panopticon. I had a rant about this previously after reading "John Twelve Hawk's" "The Traveller" (must have a look to see if the sequel is out yet). Anyway, if you are interested in this type of technology from legal/policy/social perspectives, you might like to go along to UNSW's free one day seminar 'You are where you've been - technological threats to your location privacy' on 23rd July. Just don't forget to turn your (Telstra) phone off before you go ;).
