Privacy, which companies were once happy to claim was all about personal choice, is now primed to affect everyone around you even more than it already did. Meta and Google’s smart glasses can record anything the owner is looking at or use artificial intelligence to describe it. Apple’s* Audio Intelligence feature turns every Apple Watch into a transcription machine that records or summarizes your day. Amazon’s Bee devices take that a step further and can record and transcribe everything. Dozens of other…
The glasses really bothers me. Being able ot record anything you want in public spaces shouldn’t mean abuse like this.
The problem is much older than wearables. I can de-Google all I want, but my doctor uses Gmail.
Why isn’t this account marked as a bot?
it’s worse. im pretty sure theyre posing privacy as a fucking brand to get you to buy their merch.
Why should it be?
Because it is.
Dozens of other companies are introducing pendants, rings, and other products designed to record, transcribe, or summarize everything we say and do all day long
There was a Black Mirror episode about implants which could record full-time. Needless to say, if you’re familiar with the show, it didn’t turn out well.
As someone with ADHD, the concept of it - having essentially a second brain that helps you remember, prioritise information, work your calendar, todo list, reminders, etc. - is great.
The core issue is that companies think they can turn this into another data source while making you pay for it.
Precisely due to this, I’m working on a project that does away with the corporate control and allows one to use these products (for now focused on a handful of major brands and DIY solutions using more polished ESP32 based devices from e.g. Waveshare) without the corporate cloud: running either locally on your phone (AI processing somewhat limited), or on a self-hosted cloud with connectors for AI models and services.
without the corporate cloud
The only way we can assure ourselves that our devices aren’t under someone else’s control is for them to operate offline.
Putting our personal life’s infrastructure under the control of someone else (especially a for-profit corporation) will never end well for us.
Even in the rare instance when that corporate overlord doesn’t turn fully evil, there are dozens of examples of “smart” tech becoming bricks when the owners of the cloud server they rely on goes out of business, or simply decides to no longer support that product.
“You don’t need privacy. Nothing to hide, nothing to fear!” – My Reaganist family, about 1981
I bet they had curtains on their bedroom window.
🤮
Some people don’t care, some people try to fight it (you get broken down in the long run and they make you feel like you are the problem)…
They need more and more data to feed shareholders … It will get much worse before it becomes bette (hopefully one day). Now they want you ID, face, identification when spy cameras and spy glasses are ready for prime time… Poor Apple it’s voice only but have a lot of faces tho.
You can’t blame companies for lying when we are a liars too now… How many time you clicked on you I understood, I have read and accept… Without even reading… (It’s not you the problem, it’s the system)
