Free Republic

Big Brother has been outsourced. The police can find out where you are, where you’ve been, even where you’re going. All thanks to that handy little human tracking device in your pocket: your cellphone.  There are 331 million cellphone subscriptions—about 20 million more than there are residents—in the United States. Nearly 90 percent of adult Americans carry at least one phone. The phones communicate via a nationwide network of nearly 300,000 cell towers and 600,000 micro sites, which perform the same function as towers. When they are turned on, they ping these nodes once every seven seconds or so, registering...

Joan Brandl, 69, of New Cumberland, Pa., types on a computer keyboard during a recent SeniorNet computer class. (Photo by Christopher Millette) Certain Seniors Embrace High-Tech Gear BY MICHELE M. MELENDEZ   Tech-savvy senior Gene Gould, 77, listens to his iPod in the computer room of his Sterling, Va., home. (Photo by Dennis Drenner) Gene Gould owns a computer, cell phone, iPod, image scanner and digital camera. William Gothard doesn't. Gould is 77; Gothard is 74 -- close in age, but remote in their opinions of modern electronics. Several factors influence whether an older adult embraces or rejects newer...