[ExI] Privacy vs the future

[samantha]

What exactly does privacy mean as technology advances? Today we have in 
the palm of our hands the ability to record full video and transmit it 
pretty much anywhere in the world.  As technology advances the ability 
to record in excellent fidelity anything/everything we witness will 
certainly increase.  If many of our fundamental dreams are achieved the 
ability to do so will increasingly be an internalized part of our person 
- inside the skin.

For this to happen the notion that it is legitimate to forbid the 
recording of any interaction with anyone becomes problematic.    Such 
would effective forbid an enhanced individual such as many of us will 
likely soon be from using parts of his her sensory capabilities and 
parts of his her brain and memory.  It would effectively be handicapping 
the individual[s] involved from acting in their full normal capacity. 
  Imagine how useful it would be to be able to perfectly remember that 
part of that talk or lecture germane to a current activity.  Imagine 
what it would be like to never forget anything except on purpose. 
 Imagine what it would be like to share something of importance with 
another without being limited to a mere poorly remembered word picture 
summation.

Yet this ability does have far reaching consequences.   Much that we 
think we have secured by obscurity or lack of records will no longer be 
so.  This has both good effects and potentially bad effects.  It is at 
the least highly disruptive.  

As the technology advances each of us is also under much more continuous 
surveillance (in the true top down sense) by the authorities.  In some 
nations and cities there are literally enough cameras and microphones to 
record what everyone does outside their home and much of what they say. 
 There is a move in Britain and in the Netherlands to make all speech in 
all public places fair game for surveillance by authorities.   This 
obviously has potentially huge possibilities for oppression and other 
governmental abuse.   At the least it must be balanced by sousveillance, 
observation and recording from the bottom up.  

How must we ourselves change as these capabilities come online?  How 
must our legal structures change to avoid punishing or the threat of 
punishing everyone for the inevitable infractions of the impenetrable 
web of regulations and laws that exist today?  At the very least the 
state must stop punishing people for any and all behavior that does not 
harm another or amount to the initiation of force.  Else the massive 
inevitable surveillance capability is very problematic indeed.
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