Privacy is theft! Dave Eggers' big-screen takedown of Google and Facebook emerges The Circle, Dave Eggers' novel about a society dominated by an omniscient, cult-like Silicon Valley internet company, has been given the big-screen treatment, with the trailer emerging this week. The movie's promo site has a witty parody of the "onboarding" process for a web platform – enjoy the unreadable EULA as it flashes …
Well, certainly that may be how this fictional story characterises it, however that's a rather disingenuous jab at the principle of open access to knowledge, since real world movements that advocate such freedom (e.g. the Free Software Foundation) are quite clearly talking about that which is published, not that which is private.
Anything which is not published has no bearing on The Commons, since it was never public knowledge to begin with, and you can't really claim to be limited by a lack of access to something you don't even know exists (even if such information might actually turn out to be useful).
The true essence of open access to knowledge is (literally) academic. It's about collaboration, scientific progress and education, not freeloading, spying and spamvertising.
Naturally the monopolistic "IP" fraternity may see things differently, since their objective is greed, not progress.
"And I would have said its a cylinder because I live in a 3D world."
Fascinating. I'm in a Barbie world therefore I would have to say its plastic and probably fantastic.
That said I'm not actually a Barbie girl, I just commute here I therefore bring zero credibility to this theory.
So... Apple, then?
Not quite. Here's a little slip of the veil of confidentiality by an application developer.
So far, Apple's the only one who has NOT started to profile its users in the creepiest way possible.
A Google search for "the circle" or "we are the circle" currently doesn't return http://wearethecircle.com/. There are "high quality psychic mediums" in the results, though. Bing is even worse, however - at least Google returns a couple of Wikipedia hits, so I assume the site is just too recent to have been noticed, or highly ranked.
Or even the BBC's 2008 "The Last Enemy" which had Cumberbatch trying to escape the Total Information Awareness database.
But the first one I fondly remember watching was the "IT Thriller" in the eighties, Bird of Prey, with the late great Richard "uncle monty" Griffiths ... http://www.theregister.co.uk/2012/11/07/monitor_bird_of_prey_retrospective/
BC's 2008 "The Last Enemy" which had Cumberbatch
That movie resulted in an interesting dialogue in our family.
SWMBO, horrfied: "Just how real is this..."
Me: Much more real than you think. It was prophetic (as it came out before latest revelations), we found out it to be not far from a documentary.
SWMBO: "I take back every single instance of calling you paranoid".
It will be interesting to give her this one to watch...
By visiting the site, you do grant the Circle the right to interfere with the operation or use of your sites through any means or device including, but not limited to, spamming, hacking, uploading computer viruses or time bombs, or any other means.
In applicable states, your family members, including children three (3) years of age and older may be confiscated for failure to comply
Trust us, we're not breaking antitrust laws.
Users may also have their citizenship revoked for failure to comply with the aforementioned community guidelines. If it happens, we'll know.
And Oh, the Irony: <!-- GOOGLE ANALYTICS TAG -->
And Oh, the Irony: <!-- GOOGLE ANALYTICS TAG -->
The Privacy statement has in addition to cookies, Flash Cookies, Web Beacons, and "We may associate your IP address with the PII you provide."
Though for once, the Privacy Policy (4,550 words) and the Terms of Service (7,008 words) are readable and not squashed into a tiny letterbox as seen on Youtube.
I read a good portion of the book, the corp is a mash-up of the big G and the big F … the corp does both search and social. G+ uses circles. It may be a coincidence that the new Apple HQ is toroidal.
Eggers is a superb writer, this isn't your average sci-fi dystopian schlock. Here's a review of it by Margaret Atwood in the New York Review of Books.
There are very few authors that both write decent prose and do sci-fi. Orwell, Atwood, Vonnegut, Gibson, spring to mind immediately. Eggers I'd count among their numbers after The Circle.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
