SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Valentina Zarya writes at Fortune Magazine that the top 2016 prediction for David Marcus,Facebook's vice president of messaging products, is the disappearance of the phone number and its replacement by applications like Facebook's Messenger. " You can make video and voice calls while at the same time not needing to know someone's phone number," writes Marcus. "You don't need to have a Facebook account to use Messenger anymore, and it's also a cross platform experience – so you can pick up where you left off whether you're on a desktop computer, a tablet, or your phone."
Jonah Berger, Wharton professor and author of "Contagious: Why Things Catch On" agrees. "For most of us, I think it's really hard to actually remember what someone's phone number actually is. We use our phones so often or we click on a button that has it. But if there was a test where you had to say, do you remember your best friends number or could you type in your best friend's number I think most of us would fail."
But not everyone agrees that Murcus' predictions are objective and disinterested. "It's all very well the company wanting to be the de facto Internet -- especially in places like India. But drier minds and eyes might wonder whether the wish to eradicate phone numbers has something to do with not everyone having yet given Facebook their phone numbers," says Chris Matyszczyk. "It may well be that phone numbers will disappear. Some, though, might wonder how making their disappearance a company theme squares with what Marcus claims is the ultimate goal: 'It's all about delight.' This one's easy. It's all about delighting Facebook."
(Score: 3, Insightful) by edIII on Friday January 15 2016, @01:20AM
I don't believe that is true though. Most people I deal with have an expectation of privacy using the Internet, more than they do with a phone. The general feeling is that law enforcement have the phones locked down, but that the Internet is too 'advanced' or 'technical' for the government to get a complete handle on.
Snowden has greatly changed the public perception of it, but I still don't believe that people have no expectations of privacy. Instead they've simply resigned themselves to the fact it can't be provided by the typical providers. The more sophisticated understand that this is true for two reasons; National Security interests and business interests, both of which do fantastic jobs at regulatory and political capture.
It's not insanity, but more than likely a sense of defeat combined with apathy. When not that, ignorant cowards who willingly trade away their freedom for security. Although, with that being said, how well are the privacy providers like Whisper or Silent Circle doing? Maybe the growth rate in that industry shows people do wish for an expectation of privacy at least.
What do we really know as citizens anyways?
A) We have a Constitution that allows for our privacy
B) We have a government that refuses to respect it ideologically.
C) We have a government that lies to us about monitoring us without due process, in violation of the aforementioned Constitution governing their actions.
D) We have a government, that when caught lying, punishes nobody guilty of massive transgressions against the citizenry via epic Constitutional violations.
E) We have a government, that after getting caught, apologizes to nobody, incurs zero accountability, and then vehemently argues for ever less civil rights so it can protect us.
F) Finally, we have a government moving beyond the due process of the past (Judicial checking Executive, the Legislative checking the Executive) and towards a new system in which due process occurs after and beyond the methods of surveillance. "Due process" is only required when reading from the system, and the Constitution does *not* apply to the routine operations of the system. Those operations being assumed to be without surveillance itself, and of suitably high security, that illicit readings from this massive information database are simply not possible. Regardless of the fact the government has had all of its military intelligence and assets raped by the Chinese (its over--the USA lost everything), and we can't even secure databases of government employees, much less citizens.
Yes. Everyone has gone insane, or apathetic, or misanthropic. I don't actually know a single person that believes the world will survive, or that we will survive each other anymore. It's pretty much a matter of when the USA implodes under the weight of its tyranny and fundamental inequity of its processes.
As a country couldn't "think" or "vote" ourselves out of a wet paper bag at this point, but then again, an awful lot of people are suffering the delusion that the political process is more or less intact, functional, and the preferred venue for political reform. Talk about wishful thinking :)
The answer I think is closer to the truth, is that the average American knows they live in a totalitarian state run by monied interests, but simply lives in a state of denial and false hope that it might change back. It's easier to find a sixpack, a bong, and a reality TV show to distract us from the fact that America died while we partying it up and enjoying our freedom.
Technically, lunchtime is at any moment. It's just a wave function.
(Score: 2) by digitalaudiorock on Saturday January 16 2016, @12:38AM
All good points. The real irony here is that this time around, the election actually is that reality TV show...sad stuff.