Virtual Emotions

Kurzweil discussed the ideas of nanotechnology and molding ourselves with machines. The future, perhaps, involves us being like cyborgs, part human and part machine. This already sort of exists as we replace certain body parts with machines, such as limbs or pacemakers. However, a recent Japenese invention has created a machine that emulates kissing. Before, machines have been about aiding our bodies, but this is perhaps one of the first steps to using machines to please us emotionally.

The machine allows a person in one place to have their emulation of kissing transformed to another machine at another place. Kind of like the idea of the virtual workplace, you are experiencing another person without actually being together. This could easily be manipulated, as the article says, to fantasies where people are kissing someone like a celebrity (perhaps celebrities selling their “kissing” style). This explores the ethics of removing emotion from the physical.
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Twitter

A recent political event that has been covered extensively in the US media is the death of Osama Bin Laden. The event, which took place last week, became a national event that was announced by the president during a special speech. However, even before the president gave his speech, the event had been live-tweeted on Twitter by Sohaib Athar, a Twitter user in Abbottabad, where Osama was found. Unbeknownst to Athar, he tweeted about the capture of Osama when remarking about some sort of event going on near his home.

What this relates to is the idea of net neutrality, especially in terms of the freedom social networks provide. Athar was able to comment on the event happening in his town because of the freedom that the Internet allows for every person to have a profile on Twitter and the ability to post on it. People were able to understand this event in the way people in the town did thanks to the freedom Twitter allows. Twitter allowed Athar a voice, which has led to him having 104,589 followers and coverage on the national media. Without the freedom of the Internet, this likely would have never been possible.
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Net neutrality

This article talks about net neutrality and how if we continue to use net neutrality, the infrastructure would remain “dumb” because every website would have the same delivery rate; this means that no website would get more high speed internet for their website over other websites. If net neutrality were to be abolished, websites would get more privilege over other websites if they pay a certain fee for the high broadband internet service. There is not a bill the supports or does not support net neutrality in the United States, instead there are guideline rules that telecommunication services have to follow. These guidelines restrict certain websites having more privilege over others. Also, the internet is an important topic because the internet has always been open to everyone, which means that everyone has the same kind of access to the same content. Net neutrality has been receiving a lot more debate in the political world and Obama has campaigned for net neutrality while he was running for presidency, and he also still promotes and fights for net neutrality.

Panopticon

This article discusses the possibility that internet users may become more monitiored while they are online. This would mean that not only is their email being monitored, but their chat rooms, news posts, networks online, and possibly many other online activities would be monitored as well. The reasons that a panopticon is because there has been more need for security, especially since there is content on the internet such as pornography, how to make a bomb, hackers, viruses, and so on.
Having a panopticon on the internet might decrease undesirable behavior on the internet because internet users would not know if they were being watched or not. Not knowing if you are being watched would decrease undesirable behavior because the individuals using the undesirable websites, or doing undesirable things while on the internet, would know that there is a possibility that they would be caught doing the things they should not be doing, resulting in getting them in trouble.
Today, our actions are being tracked on the internet because information is being gathered through our internet searches. This is creating a daily me internet because the ads that will then pop up on the website that you are currently looking at will be similar to the information that you are searching for. This can be turned off to a certain extent by turning off your cookies in your web browser. Some websites will not allow you to use their website if you do not have your cookies on because they gather information from you to give to marketers.

Obama = Steve Jobs

“Is the distribution and dissemination of ideas sufficient to foster and create a social revolution?” “The Internet is nothing more than binary code”

Although the author of this article clearly understands that the Internet is important, he may be kicking himself today as he (and many, many others), were downright wrong as they underestimated in their predictions of what the internet was capable of. But besides the outdated techno information from this article, the principals remain the same, and it gives us a transformation identity that shows what we as people and users want to use the internet for.

“The ultimate corporate goal may be to develop a cultural structure that assists producers of products to know what consumers want before the consumers even know. When private groups take control of public institutions, individual constitutional rights no longer apply”

The important thing to note here is that the private institutions have taken control of the internet completely, and were able to do this because of the way they were able to convince the users. Facebook has convinced us that it is cool to have more friends, in turn addicting us to the site and giving us a base that we didn’t even know we needed- but everyone else is doing it. They are able to use all of our information and violate privacy because they simply don’t have any rules against it- we let them, but we didn’t really KNOW we let them. An article from Advertising Age explains some of the tricky practices that go on behind the scenes, that make us users think certain things are cool, or the new ‘trend,’ even though it’s skewed. http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-14565085/ALL-HAIL-OUR-DIGITAL-OVERLORDS.html When dealing with the new mobile apps, there is only one government overlord that owns the rights to everyones souls (aka their iphone)- Apple. An quote from Apple states, "Apps must comply with all local laws and may not put an individual or targeted group in harm's way," This sounds an awful lot like a governing rule, and it is. Any company or individual that wants to put out an app- must go through Apple. This structure seems to have taken over the government since this article. Although the government has some control, for example, Obama’s new internet governing law that was proposed in 2010- http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,2022653,00.html Although this attempts to control the internet, it doesn’t hold a dime to the rest of the marketplace that is owned and controlled by Google, Apple, Facebook, Yahoo and other e-giants

Facebook Privacy

In the last ten years the internet has progressed from a little-known entity of the military to a growing world cultural phenomenon. With the use of the world wide web, people are able to connect, share, and have open communication with friends. One website that reveals personal information is facebook. Recently facebook changed their hypertext transport protocol from https:// to http://. This small change means that the webpage is no longer as secure and is more open with sharing information between clients and the servers. Facebook doesn't want to promote privacy settings or 'opt out' options because of the advertising money through a more unsecured network.
The S in the https stands for secure. When this appears in the browser link the website is no longer able to other people 'ease-drop' on your computers communication with the website. If you fill out any forms or submit any information about yourself on a non https:// webpage other people can be watching and collecting data allowing your information to be sent out anywhere on the internet. The main thing to remember about https:// websites is to never enter your credit card numbers or social security number on an unsecured site.
Commercial Privacy Bill of Rights are currently working on online privacy protection along with friends and people looking out for others by posting alerts. The well circulated facebook post began in February and got copied and pasted all over the net:
'While on facebook, look at your URL address; if you see http: instead of https: then you dont have a secure session and you can be hacked. Go to Account, Account Settings, Account Security and click change. Check at least the first setting, FB defaults to the non-secure setting.'

Big Brother or Big Sister?

The New Panopticon is interesting in that the author argued that there was a shift between the government monitoring individuals to the private sector monitoring individuals. I think that whoever, private or public, monitors someone elses information is spying on them in violation of the SPIRIT of the Right to Privacy. There was no way our fore-fathers could have known that such abuses would take place, so it is up to our generation to rectify this. Perhaps it is time for a constitutional convention.

What is really interesting to me about this is that Osama Bin Laden did not have the Internet or phone service hooked up to his Pakistani hideout. It is pretty obvious to me that he knew that are ways in which we are monitored everyday and by taking himself back into a time before the Internet he forced a surveillance industry that is based largely on technology to go back in time with him. Of course he hid with the Pakistani's help, but nonetheless I think the lack of the Internet and a phone helped him hide.

Power is going to be abused. In the 21st century they monitor our phones, our computers, and basically everything about us. The only way to escape it is to live somewhere remote literally disconnected from it all, but are those that do this hiding from something or are they just not wanting to be apart of the digital era?

There was obviously a mix here. http://news.yahoo.com/s/livescience/20110502/sc_livescience/hitechsurveillanceplusoldfashionedintelligenceworkfoundosamabinladen

Watching and Being Watched

The idea of the panopticon is exceedingly applicable in understanding the Internet and the relationship that the Internet has with our culture. A panopticon establishes social order because people are not positive whether or not they are being watched. In order to prevent embarrassment or reprimanding, people behave in the desired manner. As a society, we contemporarily view the Internet as a place of freedom, a place where we are not being watched. This, however, is not really the truth. More and more we, as a society, have helped the Internet evolve into a place where we are constantly being watched.
Early in the mass consumption of the Internet, many remember experiences of using screen names as our identity. There was nothing that necessarily identified that screen name to an offline identity. More commonly, however, we have evolved into creating an online identity that mirrors our actual self in some manner. Facebook, for example, uses a person’s actual name. Twitter allows for screen names but often has a person’s actual name below the screen name. As a group, we enjoy being able to identify the real life person behind the screen name. We encourage this sort of behavior. There can be many reasons, perhaps we just prefer to have a way to construct a reality of ourselves as we see fit. However, it does create an easy way for companies (especially social networking companies where we freely deliver information about ourselves) to watch us. This is the modern panopticon, we are being watched because we want to be watched.

Invasion of Privacy?

For the past 10 years, we have been worried about terrorist attacks and the age of the Internet has been up for debate if we should monitor emails and other private sectors to find those plotting against us. Not only this but other things that need to be monitored like pornography, hate groups, viruses, hackers, and other things that we are concerned about on the world wide web. “According to Miller, (1996) the FBI is using a program called Carnivore to randomly monitor all email. Carnivore could eventually be modified to allow individuals to monitor chat conversations, news posts, and peer-to-peer networks online.” They do this monitoring program by looking for keywords in the emails. Emails should be protected by our right to privacy, but the law passed in 1994 says that emails stored in the computer do not follow this. The military does have programs that are trained to find a terrorist threat within the Internet. Many people are against this kind of invasion of privacy. “According to the ACLU ‘to accept the FBI’s arguments in favor of Carnivore is to reject that core premise of the Fourth Amendment by giving the FBI carte blanche access to the communications of innocent people”’ Jeremy Benetham invented the Panopticon model to monitor cities, prisons and other types of dangerous areas. Is the Internet turning into this?

New Panopticism

New panopticism has been functioning in our society and can be seen through all new and emerging technologies, starting with email monitoring, and the increasing prevalence of technologies that also monitor us. A recent news item that has been a popular topic and one that can be seen in direct relation to panopticism is the realization and the finding that apple has been tracking every move that people have been making since June and making it somewhat easily available to find. I don't think it should be a surprise to anyone that apple and the iphone has been doing this, because all cellphones track where you are and through pinging get your information, but those are supposedly sent to towers and information centers that are supposed to keep that information private. Although I feel that all people are tracked and that if the government wants to, they can find that information through laws within the Patriot Act and other more controlling legislation, I feel that apple could possibly be storing this information in hopes of shaping business models through downloadable applications in which our information is sold and given to companies that we buy into by our digital button pressing agreements, and without reading the 32+ page privacy policies apple and some other software makers have. I realize that many applications currently are made just to advertise and to further track you, because why would applications ask you if they can use your current location? I am scared for more information to come out about these monitoring technologies, but I realize that cellphone technology and the use of the internet could be partially invented and marketed to better keep tabs on and track much of society.

Apple has recently "fixed" their bug and in a recent statement said "Apple is not tracking the location of your iPhone," the Apple said last month in its first response to privacy questions raised by the two researchers. "Apple has never done so and has no plans to ever do so." I don't really buy that this is true, because all apple would have had to say is that they are using the information in regards with their mobile me application which allows users to gps and track where there phone is if it is ever lost or stolen. In this regard they have to be tracking the location of your iphone and the fact that they are denying this makes me worrisome. Sometimes I wonder if it would be better and would make me less paranoid to live off the grid without use of technology, but I realize that this is nearly impossible in this day and age and would seem completely crazy to most.

Corporate Ambitions for an Online Panopticon

Tom Brignall discusses the economic and social dangers of the privatization of the Internet in his piece, The New Panopticon. Many of his concerns stem from many service providers such as America Online conglomerating into much larger corporations. This, he argues, lessens competition and gives more control to the select few. “When private groups take control of public institutions,” he writes, “individual constitutional rights no longer apply.” This is certainly true, as we have seen in the case of cable television. In that instance Rupert Murdoch has seized control of a considerable share of the entirety of the news spectrum. It is then possible for the elite members of society to institute their ideologies on the greater community. If this were to become the case with internet there would be a much greater watchdog presence, as companies and service providers aim to learn as much about their customers behaviors as possible. That is exactly what Brignall argues, and the argument holds weight. The Internet, he argues, is in danger of becoming a new age panopticon, where service providers could theoretically monitor all behaviors of their customers in order to protect them but also to sell to them. Brignall’s final thesis is that if the government drops federal funding toward the Internet and allows for privatization, it will become a marketing machine with no sense of ethical responsibility. All privacy will be lost and our online behaviors will reflect a corporate mission. In fact just last month the House of Representatives approved a bill that would overturn Net Neutrality. If such a measure were enforced the Internet would change as we know it and would reflect the fear that Mr. Brignall and several others have expressed.

Posted by: Mike Anderson

Why does Apple keep tabs on its users?

The panopticon is a concept that was first introduced to me back in high school in an English class when we read 1984 and how it was used on the citizens to monitor their behavior. It sounded like a really effective tool to make sure citizens never forgot that Big Brother was constantly watching their every move. The article about the The New Panopticon being used in relation to the Internet is an interesting idea. The thought of the Internet and people monitoring its use is something that I do not much think about, but the fact is that technology today constantly is being used to watch our every move especially when it has to do with media. Recently, there has been a fuss about the Apple iPhone tracking users, and the GPS function being put to good use in keeping tabs on where its users are going throughout their daily lives. It is hard to wrap my head around what exactly this could mean for us going forward. This article laid out the groundwork and details in a way that is easy to understand and answers common questions that people might have after learning about this news. Steve Jobs mentions that their is potential for hackers to infiltrate the Apple software and use this encrypted information for malicious reasons.

I think that this software is inherently good for most people including myself. I like being able to use the GPS function in relation to Google maps in order to find directions to places I seek to go. Obviously, bad scenarios can come into play, nothing is 100% fail safe. But, the advantages far outweigh the disadvantages in my opinion. In the big picture sense of it, this will not affect me very much at all. I feel that if The Wire was still around, this issue might be used as a plot device in trying to bust criminals in the seedy streets of Baltimore. Hopefully, it would not be as easy as one of the drug dealers forgetting to turn off the location services on his iTouch, but it is certainly something that first comes to mind if implemented into the season narrative.

Isn't Corporational Control over Internet Better?

In Tom Bergmall III’s article about the New Panopticon, the author has predicted that a free Internet culture will in fact result in increased censorship-- “as experts for what is morally correct will be the chairs of companies who stand to profit from regulation of information.” I cannot deny that Internet in U.S. is completely censorship-free, however Bergmall’s prediction seems to fit more into what has happened in non-democratic societies than to democratic polity. In his essay, privatized Internet service is described as a threat to individual user’s privacy and freedom, because corporations will exercise the “New Ponopticon” over users they serve. In my opinion, corporation-controlled Internet, though exposes its user to data collection and excessive marketing information, is still more liberating than government-controlled information system and thus fits better in a democratic society, since that while corporations are driven by profits, government is driven by power maintenance. The “government” I am referring to here is a totalitarian government (like China).

Taking Facebook as an example, while it has been concerned and criticized because of its increasingly commercial orientation, Facebook in the U.S. still serves as a free speech platform. In China, however, the basic function of Facebook (free expression) is even questioned because the government considers online discourses as a crucial source of resistance. The most recent news suggests that Facebook’s evasion to China will comply with its strict censorship, which proves my point. According to the news, “When Facebook users outside China connect with users inside China, sources said they will need to click through a warning that any material visible to Chinese users may also be visible to the Chinese government.” This open claim ironically tells how closed and monitored the Internet is for Chinese users. While I don't support corporation utilizing Internet to collect personal information, the government-owned Internet service is clearly more coercive. 

The Internet Panopticon: A Breach of Privacy

The Panopticon, as proposed by Jeremy Bentham, is an effective prison model and neighborhood control that reinforces social control. In essence, it works by forming the belief that one is under constant inspection at any given time. Bentham’s theory is applied in journal article “The New Panopticon,” to make the argument that the panopticon is inherently similar to the Internet; however, a defining difference is that the Internet has no physical structure or permanent location. The article further argues that the Internet is used as a tool for governing bodies, such as corporations, to capture information of users. The flow of information online has led to the opportunity for corporations to collect details on consumers and maximize their profits.

Until recently, many network users were unaware of the tracking and surveillance of their information and location by network providers and corporations. There have been a number of lawsuits against corporations that claim tracking users information violates one’s privacy. This idea of violation of privacy by the panopticon model of the Internet to collect user data is also mentioned in the article. In recent news, Google faces a $50 million lawsuit over its Android location tracking. Clearly, many people were unhappy to discover that their information was being collected and used without them being aware of it. I would like to make my own argument that the difference with the Internet panopticon model is that it does not truly exist if the user is unaware of their tracking. It would be more accurate to apply a panopticon model, one where a user monitors his/her behavior because of the belief they are being watched, to the Verizon’s tracking model. Verizon’s plan to put location tracking warning stickers on their phones I argue follows a more traditional method of applying the panopticon model since the users are aware of their surveillance. Either way, it can be said that our privacy will decrease in the interactive digital word.

Net Neutrality and Municipal Governance

"The New Network Neutrality: Criteria for Internet Freedom" has proposed ten facets of a net neutrality info-structure criteria. One of the facets that I am particular interested in is that the business model of implementing net neutrality should also be “neutral” too. Municipalities, non-profits, public-private partnerships, as well as private corporations should all be allowed to compete for such service. In fact, as the author has pointed out, lack of competition over information transmission service providers can severely slow the development of affordable technologies, while in a democratic society that celebrates information freedom, it is a part of the providers’ social responsibility to make advancements and provide citizens with easy and affordable information access. Therefore, the vision of introducing players of different kind may be a good solution to corporation-monopolized networking service. City government and non-profit organization can be the optimum choice for Net Neutrality implementation because they are not driven by profits, and on a local basis it is not as likely to result in monopoly as the state government.

On the other hand, we should not forget the big ambitious municipalities had about becoming the single provider of Wi-Fi services in city areas. This has resulted in failure due to the great investment and risk whatever the infrastructure builder was carried on. Additionally, in a recent blog post from Joel Shurkin, it seems that not only the business model didn’t work out, but also some natures of the Wi-Fi technology do not permit such big installations. Same with the net neutrality issue, a question for municipalities to remember is the technological plausibility.

Net Neutrality and Media Conglomerates

Meinrath and Pickard’s article discusses an important issue that surrounds mobile society: net neutrality. Net neutrality is the fair treatment of all internet content in that it will move at the same speed over the network. Internet providers can’t favor certain internet information over others. In the United States, the FCC sets guidelines banning cable television and internet service providers from inhibiting user’s access to competitors or certain websites. In late December of 2010, the FCC approved plan to regulate the internet with a ruling that would prevent provider service companies from blocking or slowing broadband services to competitor websites. However, opponents of net neutrality feel that these recent regulations of the internet are a prediction of possible future regulations, such as shutting down sites similar to WikiLeaks.

Meinrath and Pickard continue to point out that network neutrality does not solve the existing telecommunications problems such as media conglomerization and the lack of diverse ownership. The authors continue to advocate for more competition and different perspectives within the broadband market. This topic reminds me of the ad-supported cable industry, also referred to as basic cable. The ad-supported cable networks industry is evolving as media conglomerates and new advancements are changing the traditional methods of programming distribution. The ad-supported cable industry mainly consists of several major companies owning a large percentage of the basic cable networks. Walt Disney, Time Warner, General Electric, Viacom, and News Corporation are some of the major players in the basic cable industry. This type of media outlet is also encountering problems concerning a lack of competition, diversity, and few large mega-media corporations, leaving little room for smaller companies to thrive.

Limiting Net Neutrality Influences the Digital Divide

In the article 'The New Network Neutrality: Criteria for Internet Freedom' by Meinrath and Pickard, the growing concern for net neutrality is examined. They begin by explaining net neutrality as, "The non-discriminatory interconnectedness among data communication networks that allows users to access the content, and run the services, applications, and devices of their choice." Basically, net neutrality does not give some companies or users privileges over others. A recent fear is that the government will not allow the FCC to regulate net neutrality. In fact, a bill was just passed in the House of Representatives that would end the FCC's ability to ensure net neutrality and if this bill is passed then net neutrality will end. The implications would be huge and the whole way our internet works would be a thing of the past. One way the internet would change would be that the companies who provide internet service would start offering it in tiers, similar to the way our cell phone plans work. A higher plan would mean more/better service and more access. It would also mean higher costs for the consumer. I believe this would widen the digital divide. The digital divide is the divide between those who have access to the internet and technology and those who do not. If only a certain group can afford to spend the money to have more access and better access to the internet then they are going to have more opportunities to engage in a democratic society. Net neutrality is important in a democratic society so we all have the same opportunities.

Media Conglomerates

The article about the 'new net neutrality' got me thinking about current events going on in the world. Last week the 'birther' issue was the topic of interest from every major news publication, but as on last night, the shift has changed to the killing of bin Laden.
The net, that is treated as a reliable source to many people, is often forgotten for what it actually is. The net is controlled by mega media magnates with a global interest in mind. The net used to its advantage the fact that this issue was gaining popularity and spun every storyline imaginable about the President and his birth certificate. One option for this is the the FCC licensees have been warned that damage to the President will be hard for their personal license and ability to make a profit in marketing and advertising.
Because of this it seems that the media has now merged into a uniformed system to protect Obama, especially after his praise for the recent killing of al qaeda leader.
After examining all of this, the bottom line is to question what the news and media conglomerates are telling us. It is wondering what we aren't being told when citizens are too busy worrying about whether or not a birth certificate is legitimate or not.