In 10 years...

snowbear · Jan 7, 2015

This is my favorite part:

Connected to the cloud so it's always getting smarter

pgriz · Jan 7, 2015

Of course, the moment it's connected to the cloud, it's another opportunity to appropriate our personal information and habits to feed "big data" and have an even better way of selling stuff we don't need to us. I've worked on a project where homes were instrumented to record temperature, humidity, and various other operational statistics to build up a profile of the home's energy efficiency. If that kind of information is shared, then third parties now know the habits of the household to an uncomfortable (at least to me) level of detail. When coupled with other homes, this creates a database of performance that can help improve the quality of installed infrastructure (that's the positive view) or become one more highly-intrusive infringement of our privacy (the negative view).

This kind of device, having the ability to respond to any of our requests, also has the ability to log and track our activities. Do I really want some external entity to know everything about my daily life and habits? As it is, the tracking mechanisms built into the web browsers, social media sites, and smart phone apps allow a very detailed profile to be built up on each of us, and this technology can ramp up the peeling back of any kind of privacy to an even greater degree.

KenC · Jan 7, 2015

I'm with the skeptical and unconnected on this one. I don't like having conversations with inanimate objects, which always used to be grounds for suspicion and rightly so. It's not that hard to keep track of everything without surrendering all of your private information. There are reasons that companies are eager to sign people up for all sorts of monitoring and control systems.

snerd · Jan 7, 2015

Our "privacy" has long since disappeared. And there is "nothing" anyone can do about it. Heck, most people couldn't care less about it! They listen to our every call, read our every e-mail, take endless pics of us in public and know our every move through cell phones and even the driving habits tracker that some allow Progressive Insurance to install in their car! No, it's only going to get worse. There is no one to stand up against it anymore. We just sigh, and accept that it's inevitable. A huge majority of people say that if you've nothing to hide, you've nothing to fear. All is lost in the privacy debate.

Designer · Jan 7, 2015

While I agree that it seems hopeless, I think it is our right and duty to resist.

KenC · Jan 7, 2015

I agree that most of it is gone, most people don't care and there's not much to be done, but when someone comes around and asks for access to some of the remaining bits I'll still say no.

limr · Jan 7, 2015

It's taken a bit longer than Orwell predicted, but Big Brother's control is being secured a little bit more every day.

runnah · Jan 7, 2015

snerd said:
Our "privacy" has long since disappeared. And there is "nothing" anyone can do about it. Heck, most people couldn't care less about it! They listen to our every call, read our every e-mail, take endless pics of us in public and know our every move through cell phones and even the driving habits tracker that some allow Progressive Insurance to install in their car! No, it's only going to get worse. There is no one to stand up against it anymore. We just sigh, and accept that it's inevitable. A huge majority of people say that if you've nothing to hide, you've nothing to fear. All is lost in the privacy debate.

Right but short of naked photos most people are extremely boring. I have a hard time caring about what my friends and family post on social media let along complete strangers.

Want privacy? Be boring.

limr · Jan 7, 2015

Ah, but who gets to define what "boring" is? One day, I'm just a boring, mousy nerd, reading because I like to learn things. But then the agency that monitors library book loans decides that my borrowing "Mein Kampf," a few language books on Arabic or Farsi, and a book on home chemistry means that I'm up to some politically subversive terrorist activity. In reality, I'm a person who likes to read, learn languages, and cook up some home film developers, but monitoring systems may be programmed with triggers to alert authorities, and who programs those triggers? How many innocent, boring activities will be seen as triggers in the eyes of those in charge?

runnah · Jan 7, 2015

limr said:
who programs those triggers?

The illuminati.

I've said too much!

bribrius · Jan 7, 2015

not really into it. sounds neat but i would be happy not to lose power four times or so a year. Far as privacy, i don't like intrusions but at the same time my life is about as exciting as watching paint dry. I pity anyone or any thing tracking me.

KenC · Jan 7, 2015

bribrius said:
I pity anyone or any thing tracking me.

I know what you mean. In some movies/tv the federal agents who have done something wrong are punished by having to monitor wiretaps. Anyone monitoring me would have been punished severely.

bribrius · Jan 7, 2015

limr said:
It's taken a bit longer than Orwell predicted, but Big Brother's control is being secured a little bit more every day.

look at the bright side. Perhaps the greatest thing about tech is that it is truly a castles in the air fake and vulnerable thing. If anything it is mans attempt to hide itself from nature but the next hurricane pretty much reminds us what a joke our tech is. No matter how high tech they get i cant seem to keep my cellphone from having dead spots and i learned the hard way on trying to drive through the river here with the vehicles on board computer under the driver seat. i got locked out of one of our cars a month ago when the security system got confused. No body has ever tried to steal it the only one the security system prevented from driving it was me, the actual owner. wicked high tech we are. (not really we are just idiots with stupid tech ideas). There is a philosophy on complex systems i studied once. Basically the more complex a system becomes the more prone it is to failure and vulnerability. At the point of peak complexity it not only becomes counter productive but self destructive. Like a house of cards. And since every piece of that system is usually reliant on another it goes down like a house of cards. why the survivalists avoid tech like the plague unless it is solar power with redundant simple systems. so there are limits to tech.