Yesterday I surrendered to the gods of the electronic world as I finally got a cellphone (now people can reach me where ever I may be, yikes!) and I registered with facebook where I will forever be eating plums (don't ask, this has to do with last night and it's a long story.)
Well it could be worse, I could have been a citizen of Shenzhen (aka Canton). From today's NYTimes:
Starting this month in a port neighborhood and then spreading across Shenzhen, a city of 12.4 million people, residency cards fitted with powerful computer chips programmed by the same company will be issued to most citizens.Data on the chip will include not just the citizen's name and address but also work history, educational background, religion, ethnicity, police record, medical insurance status and landlord's phone number. Even personal reproductive history will be included, for enforcement of China's controversial "one child" policy. Plans are being studied to add credit histories, subway travel payments and small purchases charged to the card.
And they say that technology is supose to make our life better ...
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Well, the great thing about that story is the American financing.
Sounds similar to the UK's forthcoming internal passport, er, sorry, "ID card".
The cell phone thing sucks. I still spend ages explaining to people that I don't own a cell phone that anyone can reach me anytime, but so I can call people even when I'm not at home or at work (e.g. a accident in the middle of nowhere) or take really important calls when necessary. Lots of luck with yours.
I kinda like the cell phone system, it's replaced my home-phone because as a grad student, I'm never home anyway. Also, they do have an "off" feature.
On the topic of microchips and social control, here's an interesting if under-noticed 'documentary'/conspiracy-film, well worth watching (skip to parts 2 and 3, available on the linked page):
http://video.google.ca/videoplay?docid=5547481422995115331&q=zeitgiest&…
Take home message: someday everyone's going to have to have one of those scary I.D. cards.
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Prepared to have your life sucked in by facebook! :)
You will learn to appreciate the cellphone.
I hate to say this, but once you start using that cell phone, you will never go back. I know this is horrible, but it really can be a life-saver.