I avoided Twitter as long as humanly possible, but of course one can only hold off on participating in the tech trends for so long without turning into some kind of geek prude.  It started just about a month ago when I was bored on a train ride out to D.C… and there it was… Twitter.

I created my profile and eased into the whole process of pushing out itty-bits of chars to define the otherwise frenetic moments of a working day.  Trends, projects and articles whiz by in twitter time and suddenly one is propelled into a world of conversations that, as it turns out, the entire world is listening in on.

Recently the library of congress announced they would “archive” every tweet that passed through the twitter gates, an archive of our global manic need to be heard (or read as it were) – which makes being a part of Twitter feel like impending immortality!

Big Brother Is Reading!

On a more sinister note, I recently felt the true power of  ”The Twitter” as I innocently complained about my Time Warner Cable service and it’s shoddy delivery.  Instantly a “Tweet” came my way from Time Warner Cable:

@nicomclane Both of these issues may be related to signal interference. Would you like me to take a look at your equipment? ^BP

Not for nothing, I was impressed that they are in fact “tuning in” to what end users are saying about their service/products… and then it happened again!  I had started playing the ole’ FourSquare game and “Checked In” to a PCRichards on a working shop trip and next thing I know, I get a Tweet from PCRichards:

@NicoMcLane Thanks for checking in! Were you able to find what you were looking for?

In and of itself, if Twitter does nothing more than act as an agent of  Global eavesdropping, one can only hope it leads to better service, instant solutions and a brighter future!  Of course this means one must be much more careful about what we “Tweet”, in a strange way it is reassuring to know someone is always listening… and again, it tells us Big Brother is Reading!

Here is a new device out of Japan that is touted to aggregate your life-force into a database for easy “tacking” and overall “betterment” of your existence – everything and anything that is designed to help you do things better by tracking your every move is really designed to keep you in-line and sell you stuff!

The Polaris phone/robot is a three-part system that incorporates your phone, your television, and the robotic sphere seen above. The sphere contains speakers for the phone’s music, and wheels that roll the sphere to the closest power source to charge the phone. The sphere’s dock also links up with your television to display the detailed data about your life and behavior that the phone records.

So, NebuAd was shut down for doing this behind the ISP firewall, if you can get people to bring this cute little guy into their homes, you have the ultimate opt in.  I suppose it’s a great gimmick for homeland security to track you!

Isn’t it possible for little brother to hook himself up to charge and at the same time TRANSMIT all your data to his LEADER over power lines???  Or does that only happen on the SyFy channel?

Sources:

http://k-tai.impress.co.jp/img/ktw/docs/314/341/photogallery/polaris20.jpg.html

http://www.popsci.com/gear-amp-gadgets/article/2009-09/polaris-phone-tracks-user-behavior-charges-self