Who is really watching us?

Unfortunately no, only caffeine.

 

Unfortunately, SGVrider may be more right than even he thinks. This may sound silly in some ways but, what industry has had the luck, if that's what one wants to call it, to write stories about the future that have ended up coming to past? People like Gene Roddenberry and other writers of books and movie scripts have consistently predicted the future because they were letting their imagination do the thinking. Sounds silly huh?
We already have companies like Google, SpaceX, owners like Bezos, Zuckerberg, and a few others that are already so wealthy that they're controlling much of societies evolution. We don't, and cannot, know where we're going from where we are today. In some ways it's exciting, and yet, scary as hell, especially for you younger guys. Old fuckers like me will only be able to sit on the edge of a cloud, look down and wonder how the hell you're going to deal with the changes.

 

I was a huge sci-fi reader back when Asimov and Farmer and Clarke were current writers.
Sci-fi writers have been startling correct in their predictions, as well as completely wrong.

 

I'm 31. The fact that you've been hearing it for a while and it hasn't completely come to fruition doesn't mean the people who said it were wrong. Sure you've heard it for 4 decades or more, but that's not much time even compared to the scale of our civilization's history. You're still thinking on a linear scale, when the progress of science in general and information technology in particular has been exponential for over a century. The writing has been on the wall for decades if anyone cared to extrapolate it out far enough. We're finally at a point where the "what is it all coming to" musings are becoming true. People were too optimistic in their timelines for many things, but I don't believe they were outright wrong. AI is coming, and biological immortality is coming. Maybe not tomorrow, or the day after, but quite possibly within our lifetimes. It may take another century or 2, but we will become indistinguishable from our technology and the human era will be over without us realizing it.

 

Just as google mines data and compiles metadata which it then sells to advertising and marketing firms to help businesses reach their target demographic our government compiles this data through their extensive surveillance network. The metadata is analyzed and used to manipulate the masses. That is the real danger of massive surveillance of the populace. It's not to catch bad guys, it's to manipulate the sheeple and recognize changing trends of societal behavior and use it to their advantage.

Anyone ever had their smartphone tell them how long it's gonna take you get home when you're leaving work? Google knows more about you than you think you know about you.

Even your keyboard inputs are recorded, the beeb website does this, a post is saved as a draft even if not posted.

Knowledge is power, the more data that is accrued, the more accurate a picture of an individual or demographic can be compiled.

Just as Hardee's buys info from Google to know when and where to advertise, the government compiles data to know what issues to put in front of people's faces and what to say to stir people up.

No one has nothing to hide, we all have everything to hide.

The excuse of surveillance to prevent terrorism or crime or whatever is pure bullshit playing on people's fears. Crime is big businesses to government, it is necessary to them to maintain their illusion of control.

On top of it all, we're duped into paying for it ourselves.

 

FTFY

 

Those bastages. All that wasted bacon.

 

Wasn't that due to trichinosis?

 

And nearly every bit of that information is compiled for one reason - to sell us more crap. In fact, "selling us more crap" is the primary engine for nearly every bit of media we experience. What happens when we can't afford to buy anymore crap? We're already overextended several times over. If we were collectively called on our debts, the world would stop turning and all of that data that's been collected would be worthless.

 

If 10% of our society boycotted certain services (health insurance, banks, credit cards for example) for a month shit would turn on its head and go haywire. Probably never would happen, but people buy so much stupid unnecessary crap a partial stop for a small amount of time would throw a huge wrench into the gears. The whole economy is based on debt and they have to keep up the incessant buying and spending to pay their own bills (they as in large coorporations, the government). It's a big house of cards.

 

So true, credit card debt in the US is on the order of a trillion dollars, so to with student loan debt. At least with mortgage debt there is a more semi-permanent object at the end. What good is that thousand dollar widget you bought last year that now sits in the basement? I guess the same thing can be said about that quarter million dollar education in sociology you got 10 years ago that you still owe $100k on.....Obviously I'm old school, I hate debt. It's a chain of bondage that so many willingly put themselves into then cry about.

 

So do I. Me wife and I went through a period in our 20's and early 30's living well above our means. I look back at it now and am disgusted by the amount of money wasted.

 

Yep. That is why today so much delicious pork is way overcooked although the problem has effectively been eliminated.

 

A lot of this was basically the Unabomber's manifesto. Sorry, I've been watching the Mini-series.