Wow, just took a quick read: that is a step in the right direction. Now I’ll have to decide if it has a place in my novel. I can’t wait to see it tested.
The flashback was perfect, and the fact that Stamper even says she would have had a problem with it as a teenager is a good allusion. Kind of like, well, if you hated it as a teenager, then why should it be any different as an adult?
Not to get off on a tangent, but regarding the tracking apps, both my kids have monitoring software on their phones. They know, and we don't restrict anything. It alerts us to things like conversations about suicide or if someone were to send them adult photos. It's not so much about leashing them as it is about protecting them. It's reactionary.
That doesn't replace active parenting, where we engage them in activities and conversations. Both are required.
I’m glad you picked up on this. I am using this scene to explore the idea that tech is not good or bad in itself, but in how it’s used. I’m of the belief that if tools like these are used in an atmosphere of open communication and trust, they can be liberating. And the opposite! One of the things I’ll hope to do in my revision is to see if there are other ways to pluck this particular string.
I bet you're familiar with Life360. It's come up in my class on "our complex relationships with technology" and it's pretty much uniformly hated by students (all first-years, BTW). The interactions that students have with their parents about Life360 are quite interesting, actually. Parent who think they're helping their young adult kids with Life360 are deluding themselves, I think. Many students in my classes choose to "have the conversation" with their parental units in the first year of college, and it's not just because of the topics in my seminar. I think it's a general thing.
Oh, I’m familiar with it alright: this scene was ripped right from my experience, with me sitting in Stamper’s seat watching a person deploy it on their high school age son. I found it pretty horrifying. But what a hypocrite I am: my wife and I use Apple’s “Find My” feature all the time, to figure out how soon the other will be home from something to plan a meal, that kind of thing. I’ve come to believe that we can use tech like this IF those involved can have open and honest conversations about trust and if there’s not a distorted power dynamic. What do you think?
Trust and fear. Those are the major drivers, I think, for the Life360 phenomenon. And trust and fear have long animated parental psyches ... and spouses. The question is: do technological "remedies" encourage trust, minimize fear? I think there is a cost, too, with the technological doodads in that we may surrender or at least downplay what were once central community values -- obligation and care -- to a technology of surveillance.
The secondary effects are maybe a bit more dramatic, but at least they're more palpable than community values. The comments drove me back to the "privacy" policy of Life360. Enlightening, and perhaps a bit oxymoronic, given that it's counched in terms of privacy. Families may think the app is a good way to keep tabs on each other (or, probably for parents to keeps tabs on kids). The company might think it's a really good way to hoover up data. See, especially, section 2 (https://support.life360.com/hc/en-us/articles/360043228154). Read all the bullets, and it is perhaps easiest to assume that everyone with the vaguest interest in data has your family's data. I rather cyncially chuckled when I saw, "We may also share your information with third parties in a form that does not reasonably identify you directly. These third parties may use the de-identified information for any purpose." Nice catch all! It's possible to jitter location data, but you may want to ask yourself whether anyone other than your family drivers, say, have driving destinations like yours? The RE-identification process -- incidentally not prohibited in the policy -- is trivial.\
I guess this is close to a rant. But surveillance is so much a part of the online app culture we are in that it is worth seriously thinking about.
Love the rant. Here we are, “highly developed” humans awash in technology (and legalisms to legitimate our misuse of technology), and yet we’re still driven by trust and fear ... “And so it goes,” as Vonnegut would say.
A step in the right direction. . .
=
NLRB General Counsel Issues Memo on Unlawful Electronic Surveillance and Automated Management Practices
https://www.nlrb.gov/news-outreach/news-story/nlrb-general-counsel-issues-memo-on-unlawful-electronic-surveillance-and
Wow, just took a quick read: that is a step in the right direction. Now I’ll have to decide if it has a place in my novel. I can’t wait to see it tested.
If implemented could also help workers form unions, bargain collectively etc. Big bucks will be spent in opposition. .
=
The flashback was perfect, and the fact that Stamper even says she would have had a problem with it as a teenager is a good allusion. Kind of like, well, if you hated it as a teenager, then why should it be any different as an adult?
Not to get off on a tangent, but regarding the tracking apps, both my kids have monitoring software on their phones. They know, and we don't restrict anything. It alerts us to things like conversations about suicide or if someone were to send them adult photos. It's not so much about leashing them as it is about protecting them. It's reactionary.
That doesn't replace active parenting, where we engage them in activities and conversations. Both are required.
I’m glad you picked up on this. I am using this scene to explore the idea that tech is not good or bad in itself, but in how it’s used. I’m of the belief that if tools like these are used in an atmosphere of open communication and trust, they can be liberating. And the opposite! One of the things I’ll hope to do in my revision is to see if there are other ways to pluck this particular string.
I bet you're familiar with Life360. It's come up in my class on "our complex relationships with technology" and it's pretty much uniformly hated by students (all first-years, BTW). The interactions that students have with their parents about Life360 are quite interesting, actually. Parent who think they're helping their young adult kids with Life360 are deluding themselves, I think. Many students in my classes choose to "have the conversation" with their parental units in the first year of college, and it's not just because of the topics in my seminar. I think it's a general thing.
Oh, I’m familiar with it alright: this scene was ripped right from my experience, with me sitting in Stamper’s seat watching a person deploy it on their high school age son. I found it pretty horrifying. But what a hypocrite I am: my wife and I use Apple’s “Find My” feature all the time, to figure out how soon the other will be home from something to plan a meal, that kind of thing. I’ve come to believe that we can use tech like this IF those involved can have open and honest conversations about trust and if there’s not a distorted power dynamic. What do you think?
Trust and fear. Those are the major drivers, I think, for the Life360 phenomenon. And trust and fear have long animated parental psyches ... and spouses. The question is: do technological "remedies" encourage trust, minimize fear? I think there is a cost, too, with the technological doodads in that we may surrender or at least downplay what were once central community values -- obligation and care -- to a technology of surveillance.
The secondary effects are maybe a bit more dramatic, but at least they're more palpable than community values. The comments drove me back to the "privacy" policy of Life360. Enlightening, and perhaps a bit oxymoronic, given that it's counched in terms of privacy. Families may think the app is a good way to keep tabs on each other (or, probably for parents to keeps tabs on kids). The company might think it's a really good way to hoover up data. See, especially, section 2 (https://support.life360.com/hc/en-us/articles/360043228154). Read all the bullets, and it is perhaps easiest to assume that everyone with the vaguest interest in data has your family's data. I rather cyncially chuckled when I saw, "We may also share your information with third parties in a form that does not reasonably identify you directly. These third parties may use the de-identified information for any purpose." Nice catch all! It's possible to jitter location data, but you may want to ask yourself whether anyone other than your family drivers, say, have driving destinations like yours? The RE-identification process -- incidentally not prohibited in the policy -- is trivial.\
I guess this is close to a rant. But surveillance is so much a part of the online app culture we are in that it is worth seriously thinking about.
Love the rant. Here we are, “highly developed” humans awash in technology (and legalisms to legitimate our misuse of technology), and yet we’re still driven by trust and fear ... “And so it goes,” as Vonnegut would say.