From: John Calvin (mercurial@disinfo.net)
Date: Sat May 06 2000 - 19:32:50 MDT
John Grigg Wrote:
>I have to admit this pursuit by Mike Lorrey to find out >all he can about Michael Powers(Zero) is getting kind of >surrealistic.
Imagine how much easier it would be for mike to find these things out if a transparent society were real.
zero wrote:
>You recognize that: "Keeping what you do in public a >secret will be almost
>impossible." That in essence is all I have been >saying. The only
>surveillance outside of this which I would not have a >problem with is that
>surveillance which is necessary to keep you from doing >me harm with
>impunity. For instance, if you are a powerful >government official, you
>should essentially live in fish bowl. Virtually all >your communications
>should be a matter of public record. Similarly, if you >happen to have
>possession of a "near-anything" device which you could >use to turn my
>neighborhood into gray goo, I believe there should be >some means of
>determing exactly what you do with it, even if you only >use it in the
>privacy of your home.
>There's no need to worry. If I'm in charge, your >bedrooms are still safe.
So my bedroom is safe, what of it. If surveilance is available right up to my front door you can still figure out who I am taking into my bedroom and frankly it is simply no one elses business but mine and the other consenting adult.
Zero made the claim earlier that it wasn't safe to publish personal information on the web, such as address etc. Yet the transparent society would be doing the equivalent of just that. Even if the Surveilance only extends to my front door that still leaves a lot of room for people (and even criminals) to figure out intimate details of my personal habits. Which not only are none of anyone elses business, but potentialy harmful to me if others find out. Assuming that the Tranparent society would also help to prosecute a criminal who had harmed me or someone else, it might not be able to do so in time to help the victim. It seems reasonable to believe that there are stalkers or other criminals out there who, once they have committed a crime do not particularly care if they get caught. I just don't feel that the loss of privacy is worth it for that reason. As well the desire for privacy is not always about the desire to hide some illegal act, but simply to have something of ones own without comment or pe
rsecution from the general public. It is my own business how much time I spend playing Ultima On-line for example, and nobody else needs to have that information, not the government, not my neighbours, not corporate marketing, no one.
John Calvin <---- hoping the above makes sense.
_____________________________________________________________
Email your boss can't read - sign up for free disinfo.net email
at http://www.disinfo.com, your gateway to the underground
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Fri Nov 01 2002 - 15:28:28 MST