Posted on 08/05/2010 11:04:40 PM PDT by glorgau
Eric Schmidt spoke at the Techonomy conference in Lake Tahoe today and dropped some serious rhetorical bombs. "There was 5 exabytes of information created between the dawn of civilization through 2003," Schmidt said, "but that much information is now created every 2 days, and the pace is increasing...People aren't ready for the technology revolution that's going to happen to them."
The Techonomy conference is a gathering of people from around the globe seeking to use technology to solve the world's big problems. Schmidt spoke there today and said that people need to get ready for major technology disruption, fast.
The bulk of what's contributing to this explosion of data, Schmidt says, is user generated content. From that content, far more prediction than we've seen today is possible and will be a factor in the future.
"If I look at enough of your messaging and your location, and use Artificial Intelligence," Schmidt said, "we can predict where you are going to go."
"Show us 14 photos of yourself and we can identify who you are. You think you don't have 14 photos of yourself on the internet? You've got Facebook photos! People will find it's very useful to have devices that remember what you want to do, because you forgot...But society isn't ready for questions that will be raised as result of user-generated content."
In addition to predicting personal behavior, diseases and other crises will become predictable as well, Schmidt said.
On the misuse of information for criminal or anti-social purposes:
"The only way to manage this is true transparency and no anonymity. In a world of asynchronous threats, it is too dangerous for there not to be some way to identify you. We need a [verified] name service for people. Governments will demand it."
How's that all sound to you? Realistic? Frightening? A combination of both?
The upside? "In our lifetimes," Schmidt says, "we'll go from a small number of people having access to information, to 5 billion people having all the world's knowledge in their native language." That is truly incredible.
But in a loss of privacy, in the hyper-proliferation of predictive technologies, is there a cost in terms of free will? Maybe not, but it certainly seems an appropriate subject of debate.
I would quit using Google immediately and use Startpage instead.
Anyone else see where this is going?
Maybe he will be shot before it is implemented.
That would be a scary thing to see if they could narrow you down to a handful of people at most, given they can tell what and where your ISP is today. Of course, they may also think the “you” who likes to cook and also likes motorcycles is two or more different people. And if you like sex on the screen, take heart that you are in a big, undifferentiated crowd. Google reports that it gets far more than its fair share of X-rated requests.
Until there is another “go-to” search service that the public agrees is as good as Google, Google will be able to steer the cyber public most anywhere it wants to.
It’s also pretty stupid, because any fool can slip an anonymous threat in the snail mail, and if he’s halfway clever about it and the coppers are as dull as average, he will get frustrated waiting for anybody to even think about him.
You advocate force against Big Brother? Doubleplusungood!;)
There’s already good word pattern identification being done at the University of Arizona. And the google tool Picasa (photo organizer) contains face recognition as standard.
What privacy?
At least 2 exabytes of that is actually “anti-information”, which destroys useful information on contact — leaving a net gain of only 1 exabyte of useful information produced daily. At least half of that information is required to sort out the bad from the good. We're now only less than a half-exabyte ahead each day. With more such progress, we'll be net destroyers of information in a few years.
Remind me Monday to sell a few shares of my Google stock.
I would settle for Eric remembering to take his daily Metamucil... :-)
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I work in IT and have for many years.
The only thing we need to be concerned with is GOVERNMENTS, really. They WILL use the “Technology Revolution” to invade privacy, tax, control, oppress, and enslave humanity in ways and to a degree that we cannot even imagine today.
They are already biting at the bit. They won’t be able to control themselves.
Like he said, they will know what your plans are just a few milliseconds after you do.
Well Duh,, but I don't message anybody or thing and I don't use google,, I use Ixquick....I don't facebook or chat, and there are zero pictures of myself on the internet.
This guy is full of himself.
It is all about power and control for the betterment of the state - not the individual.
Nope,, see post 14...
Who is that?? you??
This is such total horsecrap. How much of this "information" is high definition porn? While it is true that there is more scientific knowledge generated daily than ever before in history, this concept that all the raw computer "data" is actual information that is comparable to past information is juts pure pap.
>> Schmidt said, “we can predict where you are going to go.”
From NDS to this. Good grief - what has become of you?
You use phones, you’re in a gazillion databases to do with everything from purchased items to tax payments to car registration. you wander around airports where hooked-up cams see you, and you think you’re off the grid?
It is possible to be off the grid. But it takes a bit of effort.
Oh heck yes. We've all read posts like that on FR.
Well, I do have a cell, but the only person I talk to is the wife, and I have not been in an airport since before 9/11 and I use cash at wally world...
what grid?
“It is possible to be off the grid. But it takes a bit of effort.”
A “bit of effort” now, but in the future you won’t be able to get basic services, or even access to your own bank account without submitting to the “masters of the grid”.
The foundation is being put in place for your worst nightmares in this regard.
Will it happen? Probably. Is it certain? No, we could stop it if we cared enough.
The foundation has been coming in place for years, and I don't see anyone complaining. Use plastic in the checkout line? Buy anything with an rfid tag?
You probably cannot remove all these intrusions. You may be able to stop them from being used for totalitarian, police-state means. To get completely off the grid would mean to remove the grid, that is to say, war. CWII. And any outcome of that would be seriously unpredictable.
“The only thing we need to be concerned with is GOVERNMENTS, really. “
Govt and big companies, since they are deeply inner connected.
Once again, Herr Schmidt proves the old saying, "scratch a Liberal, find a Fascist". If Schmidt had been around in the 18'th century, I'm sure he would have deplored the anonymous publication of "Common Sense"; a truly "dangerous" bit of writing.
The explosion of information was predicted by the Prophets of long ago.
Schmidt oversaw the downfall of Novell. The company had (and still has) terrific technology, far and away superior to Microsoft (eDirectory vs Active Directory, GroupWise vs Exchange, OES vs Server 2008), but Novell under Schmidt couldn't have sold space heaters in Alaska! I used to be convinced that Microsoft was running Novell's marketing department. At one point, Novell OWNED corporate networking, and Schmidt's leadership was a big part of the loss of market share.
Mark
hehe. If you have the cell turned on, there's a load of cool applications which can see you wandering around on a map, in realtime. Some are used by government but civilian hackers were almost as fast off the mark (if I remember, the first civ stuff made possible with stolen gov info). That was a long time ago. No need for going near any cams, cellphone towers can do almost the same job.
I have found that the battery lasts much longer if you turn it off.... just FYI.....
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