Privacy and Shame and Fame

Walking over the Scottish Highlands with a Cambridge Professor and discussing the commoditisation of shame.  How within our own generation, what was once only whispered about – say bankruptcy – is now a legislated process.  How what was once kept private is now widely disseminated, as for example pornography as it swept the world wide web.  

That was a decade ago and with hindsight, it was the perfect location to discuss privacy and shame as there could be few more isolated places.  And how in our debate we underestimated the scale to which the commoditisation of both would grow.  

Selective leaking of “sex videos”  to enhance fame and therefore potentially the ability to generate greater wealth.  Fame was within our generation really only attached to people of great accomplishment.  Now it is a destination in and of itself, and the selling of shame to obtain that fame is rarely given a second thought. 

It seems that everything has a price, its just getting less and less as our shame threshold falls. 

However even if we are not of the "selling our shame for fame" demographic, we are giving for nothing our personal and private information to the ubiquitous large corporations for their financial benefit. 

Evan back then though, research shows that privacy was still coveted and wars were being fought in the media.  One of the most cited quotes is by Anna Borzi in a paper published by Privacy International (2002), in which she states “Privacy is over. There are already more things being recorded, coded and monitored than we can poke a stick at. If anybody seriously believes privacy can still be protected they are seriously deluded. That battle has been fought and lost."

And of those that still value privacy, a small amount of angst sits in the back of our conscience, to surface every now and then with a prickle of apprehension, a rise in the blood pressure, and follicle contraction.  Yes anxiety!

And it happens when you read articles like this in an Australian newspaper.  The sheer scale of personal data captured by the oligopolies on the internet, and available to anybody (just about) but certainly all even quasi law enforcement agencies.  

And now we know for sure that Smartphone apps, for example, provide details of your text messages, your calls, and track your location.  Face recognition, is another being practised in many parts of the world, and once in the official system it is available everywhere and to just about anyone.  

And despite the promises to keep your data confidential by officials, we don’t need to go far to find that your information is available to anyone for a price.  News of the World and police data anyone?  Or how about organisations who expressly sell their services in collecting data – such as this horror story.  Wikileaks is about to leak a mother load of emails about one such company.  It appears that they have sources in many high level official sites around the world that provide them with information – for cash or favours.  The report is an excellent read. 

We all know about the ubiquitous CCTV in the UK.  And of course we provide our own private data free of charge to MySpace and Facebook, amongst others.  Yet at the same time that the privacy of the 99% is being commoditised for the wealth of large corporations, governments around the world are hiding more and more data.  

Sex videos, falling out of clubs, clothes so sexualised they shouldn’t be allowed out whilst at home they probably wear flannies to bed;  shame for fame for cash.  There is infinite amounts of the stuff.  And it will continue to debase its value every time we cross another threshold.  

And as of midnight tonight Google’s new privacy policy becomes live.  They already know everything about you, but now they can sell it at the portfolio level for even greater revenue.  

It will soon be the case that if you DO NOT have a massive electronic profile then you will be considered suspicious.