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Am I the only person that has a real big problem with software like this?

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wraith808:
Surveillance technologies beg to be abused. And if the Snowden revelations have shown anything about this technology, they've shown us that the temptation to 'abuse and extend' is apparently too great to resist. Especially when it comes to the people most entrusted not to abuse these capabilities.

Surveillance technology is a drug. And addiction, in the guise of "mission creep" (that clever euphemism for abuse and violation of trust) inevitably follows.
-40hz (October 08, 2013, 08:39 AM)
--- End quote ---

Power corrupts and such?

But that's given as a truism (as you did here), and I think it still hinges on something that hasn't been addressed as the difference between monitoring such as the NSA and outside forces and monitoring that some people are advocating here.

Respect vs. Disrespect
Interest vs. Self-Interest

If you respect the person, and have their interests at heart, then the corrupting influence won't come into play.  That comes into play when there is a measure of control rather than guidance needed.  At this point in my son's life, the only thing I do is ... nothing.  There's a GPS in his cell phone, but I've only accessed it once in the situation that I described- the first time he rode with someone else (also a minor) to a city about 1.5 hours away.  And that was just to make sure that he was in the area since he hadn't called and not hung up half-way there since the phone went straight to voicemail.  And we had a talk about it when he got home, and he knew that I'd used the GPS and why, and what he could do in the future to mitigate the circumstances.

This is down from having all sorts of things in place from internet filtering to keeping track of the games that he played and the videos and music he was exposed to and limiting his xbox and computer playtime and all sorts of things.  As he began to be able to make those choices, those things fell away.  Why?  Because he was getting older, and has the right to make those decisions and they won't interfere with our primary goal- to make sure that he is equipped to be able to assess and make his own choices, and deal with the consequences of those choices.

So I think that (like many other things) it's not the technology that's to blame.  It's the people.

(and it's sad that my joke fell flat on everyone!  especially considering that there are some firefly aficionados here.  And that firefly love of the themes should show where I come down on the fence in all reality...)

40hz:
I think that with the direction US society and politics has taken post-911, it clearly shows the notion that "power corrupts" can hardly be characterized as a truism anymore.

At least not with a straight face   8)

mouser:
please keep politics out of this thread.

wraith808:
please keep politics out of this thread.
-mouser (October 08, 2013, 11:00 AM)
--- End quote ---

And i think that's the point.  This thread is not about politics, nor about political abuses.  This software is not even intended as such.  But because of abuses by those in power, any uses of such things are conflated with the morass of political arguments about such issues.

Does this software (and others of its ilk) have potential for abuse?  Well, the answer to that is pretty obvious.  But does the existence of such software necessarily equate to it being abused in such a way in any given use case?  I don't think that's as clear, nor true.

40hz:
please keep politics out of this thread.
-mouser (October 08, 2013, 11:00 AM)
--- End quote ---

Whether by accident or (more likely) design, politics now permeates every facet of our lives. Even if we'd rather it didn't. I therefor think references to our political environment (since it factors so hugely into education, child rearing, privacy concerns, our legal environment, societal structure, and the pubic sense of morality, etc.) is unavoidable in a discussion like this one.

In light of that, I'll recuse myself from this discussion going forward.

Carry on! :Thmbsup:

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