tnixon@uunet.uu.net> (05/24/91)
I thought you all might find the attached editorial interesting, since
it discusses CLASS features from the perspective of a non-technie
journalist. Any typos are my fault.
If you wish to reply, Creative Loafing's fax number is +1-404-522-1532.
Toby
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(From "Creative Loafing", Atlanta's "alternative weekly" newspaper,
18 May 1991, pg. 23, "Creative Thinking" [editorials] section).
"BIG MA IS WATCHING"
by C. B. Hackworth (editor)
"Watson, come here; I want you."
-- Alexander Graham Bell, March 10, 1876
I'm not sure if anyone truly realizes it yet -- or maybe
nobody cares -- but after more than two centuries, the American way of
life is coming to an end.
Blame technology, greed and apathy.
In the beginning (and exactly when that was is very difficult
to pinpoint), the change was slow and subtle enough so as to be almost
undetectable. Now, however, it is proceeding with such astonishing
speed and open brazenness that the enormity of it all is too much to
grasp as anything other than science fiction or wild conspiracy
theory.
Believing that, and ignoring the truth, may provide a few more
nights of undisturbed sleep. But one morning in the very near future,
you will wake to find that the rights you thought you had aren't worth
the parchment they're written on.
Consider, just for example, the right to privacy.
We probably should have started to wonder about ourselves when
we decided that it was acceptable to have to pee into a cup in order
to earn a living. Or when we came to tolerate illegal searches and
seizures by law enforcement as an unfortunate but necessary step in
the war against drugs. Or when we began to let ourselves be
identified by Social Security number even when applying for a card to
rent videotapes at a Turtle's.
Currently, one of the greatest threats is hidden in plain
sight: the telephone.
An ever-increasing offering of new "services" by the phone
company has reduced the term "invasion of privacy" to something of an
oxymoron. Thanks to an insidious but brilliant marketing campaign
based on Hitler's "big lie" technique, the public accepts, without
question, Touchstar and other new options as _conveniences_, when, in
fact, they are the exact opposite.
Back when good old Alexander Graham Bell started working on
the idea of transmitting speech by electric waves, I somehow don't
think he had "Call Waiting" in mind.
While undoubtedly one of the rudest developments in the
history of mankind, "Call Waiting" is an innocuous annoyance, like
that stupid half-page of ads the {Atlanta Journal-Constitution} wraps
around the Sunday funnies. Not so some of the other Touchstar
services.
Take "Call Return," which enables you to punch in a star and
(appropriately enough) the number 69 in order to ring the telephone
from which the last call to you originated.
Most of the people who order this service are obsessive about
using it when somebody calls them and hangs up. They _never_ give up.
Say your pocket pager (read: electronic leash) goes off and
you don't recognize the number. You call it and immediately recognize
the voice on the other end of the line as your boss, who you suspect
almost certainly wants you to stop what you're doing and head straight
to the office, so you hang up. Or, maybe you want to leave a message
on your girlfriend's answering machine that you won't be able to keep
a date, but it turns out she's at home and you hang up because you
don't really want to _tell_ her.
You know these people have "Call Return" and it will be a
matter of seconds before the phone you just hung up starts to ring.
You lunge for your _own_ answering machine, to cut it off before your
greeting can be heard. Then, you take the receiver off the hook and
begin to panic, knowing that your boss or girlfriend is probably smart
enough to call _your_ number to see if it _just happens_ to be busy,
too.
OK, here's what you do, even though it's illegal:
Immediately use "Call Forward" to transfer all your calls to
some other number. When the person you've hung up on uses their "Call
Return," you'll hear a sort of half-ring, but they'll reach the other
party. (This works best if you forward the call to someone else they
know or a body shop selected at random from the Yellow Pages.) You
then cancel the "Call Forward," returning your service to normal while
your boss or girlfriend bless someone else out for hanging up on them.
That worked just fine until "Caller ID" came along.
Already available in the Atlanta area, "Caller ID" displays
the number of the telephone from which a call is originating. Hang up
on a boss or girlfriend with "Caller ID," and you're screwed. They
know it's you.
Worse, forget all about trying to call from a bar to tell your
wife that you're at the office working late -- or, heaven forbid, from
the apartment of some _other woman_.
And still worse, don't even _think_ of calling _anyone_ you
don't want to have your number. It makes no difference that you're
paying Southern Bell for an unlisted "private" number.
Presumably, the phone company will soon come out with yet
another new service to circumvent "Caller ID" by _preventing_ your
number from showing up on the little screen.
Then they'll develop something _else_ to counteract _that_.
It's a protection racket, when you get right down to it.
Southern Bell is playing both sides, catering both to those
who wish to intrude and those who wish to avoid intrusion.
The right to privacy? That's one option the phone company
isn't offering at _any_ price.kevin@gatech.edu> (05/28/91)
> The right to privacy? That's one option the phone company isn't > offering at _any_ price. Sure they do ... and at a bargain price! No phone == $0. If privacy is the essential element one desires, the mere ringing of the phone is an intrusion. Unless one has a severe medical problem, the phone is NONESSENTIAL, and is an intrusion by its very nature. No, this is not the same as saying that you don't have to take a drug test if you don't want the job. You DO need employment to live within the civilized community. Kevin Kleinfelter @ DBS, Inc (404) 239-2347 ...gatech!nanoVX!msa3b!kevin