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Companies Try To Cover-Up Move To Watch Consumers Via TV's
Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Minority Report will meet Orwell's telescreens if
telecommunications giants like Comcast and Microsoft have their way.
www.youtube. com/watch? v=nQbVD5hlddk
Comcast has denied that it is developing camera devices built in to
cable boxes that monitor consumers as they enter the room, despite the
fact that Vice-President Gerard Kunkel admitted to a journalist that
such a move would represent a "holy grail," and rival companies like
TiVo and Microsoft have already filed patents for similar technology.
A firestorm of controversy erupted last week after industry website
newteevee.com carried an article by Chris Albrecht which revealed that
Comcast was, "experimenting with different camera technologies built
into devices so it can know who's in your living room".
How did Albrecht know? Because Comcast's senior VP of user experience
Gerard Kunkel told him during the Digital Living Room conference held
in San Francisco.
"Perhaps I've seen Enemy of the State too many times, or perhaps I'm
just naive about the depths to which Comcast currently tracks my every
move," wrote Albrecht.
The idea being that if you turn on your cable box, it recognizes you
and pulls up shows already in your profile or makes recommendations.
If parents are watching TV with their children, for example, parental
controls could appear to block certain content from appearing on the
screen. Kunkel also said this type of monitoring is the "holy grail"
because it could help serve up specifically tailored ads. Yikes."
Readers responded to the article in droves and most were shocked by
the proposals.
"Orwell thought that cameras in the living room would imposed on us by
a fascist government. Fascism these days is dominated by corporate
power guised under a mantle of legitimacy. These systems of control
have been primarily put in place by willful consumption of consumer
goods," wrote one.
"This is not cool, this is not fun, this is not exciting. This is
invasive. They've been talking about this technology since the
inception of cable modems, and there's a certain amount of tracking in
place already. Cameras? Too much," stated another.
Comcast responded to the article by claiming the device was, "in no
way designed to – or capable of – monitoring your living room. These
technologies are designed to allow simple navigation on a television
set just as the Wii remote uses a camera to manage its much heralded
gesture-based interactivity. "
However, Albrecht shot back by pointing out that Kunkel told him the
device was explicitly being designed so as to monitor who was entering
the living room.
"After you granted me our initial video interview, you brought up the
topic of Comcast knowing who was in the living room in a conversation
between you, myself and another conference attendee," writes Albrecht.
"I actually left and came back to follow up on this point while you
were talking with that same attendee. At this point, you were aware
that I was a reporter and I took handwritten notes in front of you as
we talked to make sure I had an accurate accounting of what you were
saying," he added.
Tracking and databasing of consumer's TV viewing habits is nothing new
- for years cable box companies like TiVo have monitored behavior down
to the level of what parts of shows viewers rewind or fast forward -
an example being Janet Jackson's wardrobe malfunction during the 2003
Super Bowl half-time show.
Indeed, the monitoring of viewers for the purposes of Minority Report
style commercial assaults and viewer customization has been in the
works since at least early 2005.
In November 2005, TiVo applied for a patent allowing customization of
TV remotes and viewing preferences via an RFID chip the consumer would
attach to his or her body - which is just one step away from an
embedded microchip in the body.
Microsoft has also applied for a patent that would utilize, "a camera
sitting on top of a television set to detect the presence of viewers
and identifying them using facial-recognition software — or perhaps a
fingerprint scanner in a remote control," according to a report from
Multichannel News.
Similarly, corporations and eventually the government is planning to
use microphones in the computers of an estimated 150 million-plus
Internet active Americans to spy on their lifestyle choices and build
psychological profiles which will be used for surveillance, invasive
advertising and data mining.
In 2006, Google announced that they were developing a plan to use
in-built microphones to listen in on user's background noise, be it
television, music or radio - and then direct advertising at them based
on their preferences.
"The idea is to use the existing PC microphone to listen to whatever
is heard in the background, be it music, your phone going off or the
TV turned down. The PC then identifies it, using fingerprinting, and
then shows you relevant content, whether that's adverts or search
results, or a chat room on the subject," reported the Register.
Last year the New York Times reported on a venture by Pudding Media, a
new company founded by two former Israeli intelligence officers, to
offer its customers free Internet phone service in return for their
consent to have their conversations monitored for keywords upon which
targeted advertising is directed.
"A conversation about movies, for example, will elicit movie reviews
and ads for new films that the caller will see during the
conversation. Pudding Media is working on a way to e-mail the ads and
other content to the person on the other end of the call, or to show
it on that person's cellphone screen," according to the report.
If you think telesales calls and pop-ups ads are annoying, the new
wave of invasive advertising will not only saturate the senses with
24/7 vapid consumerism, but it will signal the death knell for the
assumption that privacy is a human right not to be infringed upon by
corporations or the state.
Orwell's telescreens and Minority Report style assaults on our senses
may not be born out of government coercion, but as a result of
consumers willfully enslaving themselves into this matrix - all for
the convenience of enhancing their consumption of programming via the
one-eyed brainwashing monster in the corner of the room.
www.infowars .com/?p=1044
Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Minority Report will meet Orwell's telescreens if
telecommunications giants like Comcast and Microsoft have their way.
www.youtube. com/watch? v=nQbVD5hlddk
Comcast has denied that it is developing camera devices built in to
cable boxes that monitor consumers as they enter the room, despite the
fact that Vice-President Gerard Kunkel admitted to a journalist that
such a move would represent a "holy grail," and rival companies like
TiVo and Microsoft have already filed patents for similar technology.
A firestorm of controversy erupted last week after industry website
newteevee.com carried an article by Chris Albrecht which revealed that
Comcast was, "experimenting with different camera technologies built
into devices so it can know who's in your living room".
How did Albrecht know? Because Comcast's senior VP of user experience
Gerard Kunkel told him during the Digital Living Room conference held
in San Francisco.
"Perhaps I've seen Enemy of the State too many times, or perhaps I'm
just naive about the depths to which Comcast currently tracks my every
move," wrote Albrecht.
The idea being that if you turn on your cable box, it recognizes you
and pulls up shows already in your profile or makes recommendations.
If parents are watching TV with their children, for example, parental
controls could appear to block certain content from appearing on the
screen. Kunkel also said this type of monitoring is the "holy grail"
because it could help serve up specifically tailored ads. Yikes."
Readers responded to the article in droves and most were shocked by
the proposals.
"Orwell thought that cameras in the living room would imposed on us by
a fascist government. Fascism these days is dominated by corporate
power guised under a mantle of legitimacy. These systems of control
have been primarily put in place by willful consumption of consumer
goods," wrote one.
"This is not cool, this is not fun, this is not exciting. This is
invasive. They've been talking about this technology since the
inception of cable modems, and there's a certain amount of tracking in
place already. Cameras? Too much," stated another.
Comcast responded to the article by claiming the device was, "in no
way designed to – or capable of – monitoring your living room. These
technologies are designed to allow simple navigation on a television
set just as the Wii remote uses a camera to manage its much heralded
gesture-based interactivity. "
However, Albrecht shot back by pointing out that Kunkel told him the
device was explicitly being designed so as to monitor who was entering
the living room.
"After you granted me our initial video interview, you brought up the
topic of Comcast knowing who was in the living room in a conversation
between you, myself and another conference attendee," writes Albrecht.
"I actually left and came back to follow up on this point while you
were talking with that same attendee. At this point, you were aware
that I was a reporter and I took handwritten notes in front of you as
we talked to make sure I had an accurate accounting of what you were
saying," he added.
Tracking and databasing of consumer's TV viewing habits is nothing new
- for years cable box companies like TiVo have monitored behavior down
to the level of what parts of shows viewers rewind or fast forward -
an example being Janet Jackson's wardrobe malfunction during the 2003
Super Bowl half-time show.
Indeed, the monitoring of viewers for the purposes of Minority Report
style commercial assaults and viewer customization has been in the
works since at least early 2005.
In November 2005, TiVo applied for a patent allowing customization of
TV remotes and viewing preferences via an RFID chip the consumer would
attach to his or her body - which is just one step away from an
embedded microchip in the body.
Microsoft has also applied for a patent that would utilize, "a camera
sitting on top of a television set to detect the presence of viewers
and identifying them using facial-recognition software — or perhaps a
fingerprint scanner in a remote control," according to a report from
Multichannel News.
Similarly, corporations and eventually the government is planning to
use microphones in the computers of an estimated 150 million-plus
Internet active Americans to spy on their lifestyle choices and build
psychological profiles which will be used for surveillance, invasive
advertising and data mining.
In 2006, Google announced that they were developing a plan to use
in-built microphones to listen in on user's background noise, be it
television, music or radio - and then direct advertising at them based
on their preferences.
"The idea is to use the existing PC microphone to listen to whatever
is heard in the background, be it music, your phone going off or the
TV turned down. The PC then identifies it, using fingerprinting, and
then shows you relevant content, whether that's adverts or search
results, or a chat room on the subject," reported the Register.
Last year the New York Times reported on a venture by Pudding Media, a
new company founded by two former Israeli intelligence officers, to
offer its customers free Internet phone service in return for their
consent to have their conversations monitored for keywords upon which
targeted advertising is directed.
"A conversation about movies, for example, will elicit movie reviews
and ads for new films that the caller will see during the
conversation. Pudding Media is working on a way to e-mail the ads and
other content to the person on the other end of the call, or to show
it on that person's cellphone screen," according to the report.
If you think telesales calls and pop-ups ads are annoying, the new
wave of invasive advertising will not only saturate the senses with
24/7 vapid consumerism, but it will signal the death knell for the
assumption that privacy is a human right not to be infringed upon by
corporations or the state.
Orwell's telescreens and Minority Report style assaults on our senses
may not be born out of government coercion, but as a result of
consumers willfully enslaving themselves into this matrix - all for
the convenience of enhancing their consumption of programming via the
one-eyed brainwashing monster in the corner of the room.
www.infowars .com/?p=1044
posted by:
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Oregon
|
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Re: here's lookin at ya
03/28I have read that people are plugging in usb cameras, leaving them plugged in, and think that they are safe when they aren't using them.... I asked my friends with mac's if they can "turn off" the little cameras on their lap tops, and they are like "huh?" Why would I do that... I think steve jobs is cool... He wouldn't spy on me.....
But someone else might....
Any camera plugged into the computer can see if hacked correctly...
Even a projector could be hacked to see with it's lense when not projecting.
TV plugged into a cable box can see when turned "off" and when turned on, the Ion spray that shoots out of it is a sort of spot light that can be viewed (like a shadow puppet show) from outside the house with the right camera....
The microphone on mac laptops can be listened through at any time....
Speakers can receive vibrations and transmitt signals when they aren't driving sound. This can be listened to if you know how...
As long as your cell phone is turned on it can listen. As well as the cameras on them. -
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Re: here's lookin at ya
03/28just anouther reason to kill your tv
and maybe go off the grid -
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Re: here's lookin at ya
03/30I'm starting to think... Let the bastards look at me, if I can look at them. I say: mandatory drug test for all government agents and leaders! And 24/7 camera options with only privacy for certain acts! Not, let's watch em even in the shiter!
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Re: here's lookin at ya
03/28even if your cell phone is turned off but still has the batteries in it can listen
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