Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by cmn32480 on Saturday July 23 2016, @08:19AM   Printer-friendly
from the camera+GPS=knowing-most-everything dept.

This data-mining game is what they call totalitarianism is how Oliver Stone described Pokémon Go at Comic Con. Earlier in the month Al Franken also expressed some concern asking the creator of the game about privacy, data sharing, and account access.

More from Stone:

They're data-mining every person in this room for information as to what you're buying, what you like, and above all, your behaviour. Pokémon Go kicks into that. But this is everywhere. It's what some people call surveillance capitalism. It's the newest stage. It's not for profit in the beginning, but it becomes for profit in the end.

It manipulates your behaviour. It has happened already quite a bit on the Internet, but you'll see it everywhere—you'll see a new form of, frankly, a robot society, where they will know how you want to behave and they will make the mockup that matches how you behave and feed you. It's what they call totalitarianism.

Personally I gave up my smart phone more than two years ago because I did not want a spy machine in my pocket; I've never played Pokémon Go but it seemed like a great way for the game creators to get people to run around and point the players camera at what ever they want, obtain other location based data, or focus players into businesses that pay for the privilege. Perhaps I just need to adjust my tinfoil hat but what do the 'lentils think? Is Stone just trying to plug his new movie or is this a legitimate concern?


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 2) by gringer on Saturday July 23 2016, @11:09AM

    by gringer (962) on Saturday July 23 2016, @11:09AM (#379009)

    I don't have much of an issue with Niantic, because they're pretty obvious in what they're doing, and how they're making money off the game. Previously with Ingress, businesses would pay Niantic to get their business added as a point of interest. With Pokemon Go, Niantic don't even need to wait for a request in order to get businesses to pay money, because businesses can purchase lures or incense sticks themselves.

    I like the idea of advertising businesses by getting people to actually go there prior to being exposed to the products. That encourages foot traffic and word-of-mouth advertising, which is super-effective in terms of money spent versus income gained. It also gives people the opportunity to easily avoid particular places because of moral reasons (or other more rational reasons).

    Just wait until Niantic introduce surge pricing for lures in highly-trafficked areas.

    --
    Ask me about Sequencing DNA in front of Linus Torvalds [youtube.com]
    Starting Score:    1  point
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   2  
  • (Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 23 2016, @11:40AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 23 2016, @11:40AM (#379018)

    Implicit in your comment is that niantic has only one way of making money, and that it is totally up-front about it.

    I think that's a completely naive view. Profiling people is a multi-billion dollar industry, why would they leave money on the table?