Last month I read Little Brother by Cory Doctorow and really liked it. Liked it so much that I wrote a review of it for the upcoming issue of Canadian Bookseller Magazine. Little Brother is a YA novel dealing with issues close to Doctorow’s heart (and mine): increasing loss of privacy, surveillance in our society and a growing apathy toward giving away our most intimate life details in exchange for new shiny tech devices or web apps.
Recently, Doctorow spoke at the American Library Association’s Conference in a panel called: “Privacy: Is it time for a revolution.”
Doctorow eloquently explains his fears over where GPS enabled, tethered appliances like iPhones and RFID embedded items, like UK Tube passes are taking us as a society. He quotes Mitch Kapor when he says “Architecture is politics.” The technology network we are building now with GPS enabled smartphones, tell-all social networks and tethered appliances able to remove features after purchase is also evolving the political system that will come out of them.
The video is on BoingBoing, but you can watch it here:
These are the discussions that must be added to media literacy classes from elementary to high school and beyond.
