Re:Data aggregation (Score 1)

I was wondering if I was the only one that immediately thought of this angle. I'm shocked at the lack of discussion about the privacy and human rights implications of this. I just about fell out of my chair watching that video. My concern is that once you combine all that data with facial recognition software, we've got a cat out of the bag. Combine that with the proliferation of public-facing security cameras, flickr, the general mass of photographic data on the web and enough processing power and you've got candy every government wants. I'm sure that countries like North Korea and China could find one. Insert Orwell reference here. I'm not sure I'd completely agree with your point about the TIA and Photosynth being the same thing. Giving up my privacy to the public or the government makes me nervous, but if I had to pick my poison I'd take the public variety. If it's public at least there's some kind of passive or active sign-off. At least we garner some benefit from it. Maybe it's exactly the same but one smells nicer. But don't listen to me. I'm feeling a little defeatist about privacy these days, like maybe the battle's already over. When it comes to our right to privacy in this country, it always boils down to what is "a reasonable expectation of privacy". that concept only tangentially relates, but still, we're collectively guilty of lowering the bar on that one. We've been trading it for things like blogs, myspace and flickr for years with very little resistance. A modern Louisiana Purchase, if you ask me.