Stop invading my privacy!


That's how I feel.

I would be majorly pissed if they took away my tweezers and nail scissors, but probably a lot of these things are really necessary. I know you are all going to jump on me, but I think one of the sole most important things for air travel safety is that all the flight attendants and pilots be instructed and be carrying a gun. Commercials should be made of this fact! Billboards in Time Square! Hell, I already have a slogan: "Don't pull the trigger on your friendly skies, WE will!"

ugh!! isn't it like us(the US) to go completely overboard and delve into everyone's privacy after an act that was committed by a group of people who left a trail of clues that no one was willing at that time to look at!!!
i find this frightening and my first thought is, will the people who you are able to put information together about be the ones who will commit these acts? as i said before, ugh!

i don't mean to be the first to jump on you but i think "gun toting" flight attendants and pilots will just make it more dangerous!

I think it could be the start of a very nasty road to the BigBrother syndrome in George Orwell's 1984. Not a good thing.

That is downright creepy. It makes me feel I'm living in a dictatorship or something very similar. I do agree that it is a complete invasion of a person's privacy.

(chanting) BB BB BB! I feel the same way Dino! The next thing you know they'll have us doing the 2 minute hate thing, only the picture they'll project won't be Emmanuel Goldstein, but Osama bin Laden.

If you've nothing to hide.......

Criticising something because you think it's a slippery slope is daft - it's like suggesting you never set foot on the slope for fear.

everyone has something to hide, if you read the article at length, it talks about them wanting to know what youre thinking. how is that not an invasion of privacy. or do you think that we should all know what everyone else is doing all the time, just to keep safe.

land records
car ownership
projected income
magazine subscriptions
telephone numbers
where you go to eat
iris scans
fingerprints
travel history
addresses for the past two decades
telephone numbers and former addresses of people who now occupy those residences
names, ages, addresses, telephone numbers and partial Social Security numbers of possible relatives
Some of the information was incomplete or, apparently, unrelated to the passenger

You could be put into the database without ever being an air traveler. If the person who moved into the house you just sold is high risk, and you also happen to frequent the same hangouts as terrorist groups, you could raise red flags?!

Let's say your travel history deviates from the norm. (I read somewhere that single women travelling alone raise suspicion but I'm not sure why. Let's say you are a single female, low income, (poverty level) but somehow are able to travel a lot. Is it anyone's business where you got the tickets, why and how you can travel so much when you don't get big paychecks, and what you do when you are on vacation for 6 whole months?

I don't like the idea that people can be scrutinized for differing from the norm. People in general like to be suspicious and play snoop/detective. It's an impulse for some people. I don't want people like that getting ahold of my travel history.

Ahem. That was in jest

>

Well written

I HAVE NOTHING TO HIDE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

oh good, i am glad............. because i thought, wow, she has really gone crazy!!!!

Kind of interesting. I have doubts whether it could really be used effectively. It sounds like it would require an ENORMOUS data base which would increase exponentially to the point of total meltdown*. It all sounds very well in theory, but I could see it resulting in very frequent and embarrassing incidents. I'm not worried about the "privacy" implications at all. I honestly don't think that they could make practical use of it.

*hyperbole

The whole idea of whether or not you have something to hide is part of the whole point, in my opinion. I may or may not have something to hide, and if I do have something to hide, whose business is it? If what I have to hide has absolutely nothing to do with terrorism or hijacking, it certainly isn't the airline's business what I might be hiding.

As opposed to how crazy she normally is

It seems pretty over-the-top.

Library records have become available to aid in tracking terrorists. By extension of that, tracking peoples video rentals and web page visits is open game. Neural nets can make simple business of seeing that people who enjoy train-crash videos and visit candy making and civil war sites are 90% likely to make frequent calls to registered gun owners. Those with certain traffic habits, as middle kids of large families, fired from certain career levels, with certain levels of debt are more likely to commit x crimes.
Will this sort of information affect college entrance, career placement, loans, etc. They already have profiling resources for employers.
There are companies working to have your cell phone know whethar you prefer macho imagery or cuddly animals and point out an alluring sponsored yogurt as you walk down the supermarket aisle.
One group is keeping track of the vibe of the web at each moment as a conceptual art project. Technology already exists to know what radios are tuned to as cars pass a freeway overpass. Soon digital billboards will know who is passing them at any second and choose an aspirin or hard liquor commercial depending on what sort of day which people have had.

Careful Kate - they could be watching us right now.! Let's run into a field and make mucky

lol lol lol, hmmmm, yes!

this is a very interesting bundle of facts, but i wonder what you, as an intellectual person, think of all of this?

what are you saying is well written, and what view are you taking by saying that you have nothing to hide?

you honestly dont think this is possible. with the current and upcoming technology? why doesnt the privacy issue bother you?

I'm not really saying it isn't possible. I'm saying that it would probably be too unwieldy to work the way they envision it. I would foresee too many false positives and perhaps false negatives. We're talking about a crapload of data here. We're also talking about a system operated by humans. Need I say more? Ever tried to sort out a billing problem with the phone company? Ever had dealings with the lads at the tax office?

I would only begin to be concerned about privacy issues if I thought there was a possibility that this system might actually work. Even then...there's enough information about me out there that I have no control over anyway. I'm not about to lose sleep over it.

both good points. i agree that the system would have many failings, but i think that is what scares me about it, so many poeple would have to go through unneeded scrutiny. and if a false positive did come up, as you said, dealing with the billing questions with the phone company, imagine what it would be like to go through something like that concerning your freedom!

I think it'll probably pick me up, my travel habits are unusual, although I don't buy tickets for four people sitting in different parts of the plane.

I'm concerned about it; I can see the benefits but the possibilities of abuse are, as usual, enormous.

I finally have to disagree with you about something!

Yes, I like the idea that if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear. However...

Private information can be abused in a lot of ways. The more information you compile in one place, the easier it is for the abuse.

I've been harassed by neighbors who didn't like me and have found out private information about me and used that to trick the city or state into hassling me.

Recently here in Cambridge (in the US ) an employee of a health club has been charged with identity theft; stealing people's private information, credit card numbers, social security numbers, and then selling them to other people to use, including some suspected terrorists.

I think the compilation of private information about individuals is fine in an environment where you can trust all aspects of the system and all the people who'll touch that information, but when is that ever going to happen?

shhhhhhhh be vewy vewy qwiet

You mean you've been watching and waiting for the chance? lol

I'm not convinced that the sort of private information collected by this system could be used against you particularly negatively. Of course it could if your government was willing to share a lot of information, but with very limited details being made available (like information about certain criminal convictions - not all) it could help.

Personally, I immediately related this question to an ongoing debate here in the UK over the introduction of ID cards. Some people seem to be terrified of being issued a card that would only have information about your name, age, gender, address, occupation and possibly criminal record on it. They call that an erosion of personal freedoms, which I don't understand at all. Most people have driver's licenses and national insurance numbercards, so why not a card which acts as effective ID? It would also help shops crack down on people under 16 buying cigarettes, and people under 18 buying alcohol, etc. But those that oppose it say that in the future, too much information will be on the cards - including DNA, etc. But why condemn what is proposed when it isn't a threat just because it could, potentially, develop into one?

And I feel the same about this issue. What is proposed isn't some huge file about immensely private stuff, it's just a file of information that is probably available anyway - it'd just take longer to find.

I'm confused about the privacy issue in America - I thought the whole frredom of information thing meant that very little was actually private?

???

actually it's more like I usually read your postings thinking: "That Biggles! It's amazing that we agree so much considering that we're such different people!"

I think the major issue with a National ID card is the idea that there's an identifier assigned to every individual and that that identifier can be used to corrollate information. Right now almost everyone has a social security number, and that number is often used to uniquely identify individuals and as semi-secret information, but it's a poorly held secret. It causes a lot of problems... with someone's social security number you can probably easily get a credit card issued in their name. You can get into a variety of private records that you probably shouldn't be getting into.

I think there is a spectrum of concerns about the National ID that ranges from "I'm not a number, I'm a free man" dehumanization concerns to (what I consider obscure) Biblical concerns to civil liberties information corrollation issues.

There's a decent archive of issues related to National ID cards at EPIC.

On the Freedom of Information Act - this is a specific law that requires the government, under certain circumstances, to disclose information it has collected. It doesn't apply to private citizens... it's basically a way to try to keep government agencies accountable for their activities.

The article was well written.

I have nothing to fear from the invasion of my privacy because I have nothing to hide.

I also have nothing to lose. Take my identity...
whatever....

It's complex, though I have back to the land sentiments, I'm not backwards in tech, for instance nuclear power is great, just put it on the moon and beam it down instead of creating a guaranteed problem two hundred years from now that we don't know how to solve yet.
I believe in honesty, i don't believe in making the rich richer, or the secretive more powerful.
Profiling is inevitable and has much potential public merit. A decade ago I was suggesting to libraries a new sort of search engine that would suggest to an admirer of Vonnegut and Orwell to try P.K.Dick, based on what other admirers of those authors liked. Companies like Amazon use the same idea now. Though I never read 'the transparent society', I believe he spells my ideas. There should be public accessible video surveillance with automated profiling analysis everywhere. Anytime a company put together a list or analysis, it should be public too with restrictions on fair use. Artificial Intelligence would no longer be an unfair advantage to mega-corporations. If coca-cola knows what neighborhoods want cane sugar instead of fructose syrup, so will some little shop with two brothers making herbal rootbeers. People won't be at discretionary risk for jail because of oral sex when it's apparent that nearly everyone would have to be arrested. There will be no closet meetings in which someone gets control of a subsidiary if they support a war. Informed popular vote can intercede everywhere. It would be like the fair credit reporting act, except we have free access to every organisation out there. Now AI & surveillance is a 'haves' and 'have nots' situation. I think it should be public right just like freedom of the press. Everyone gets to know what's up, and have a say in what to do about it, not just a privelaged few.

Let's just hope it isn't one of us!

i must say once again that i agree with you, but the its the transitional period between now and when it actually becomes something that we can all take advantage of that has me worried.

come on, who else did i say this to...we all have something to hide. you cant tell me that you wouldnt care if all of your neighbors new what your in home recreational habits are.

in all seriousness... I believe living in such a way that you have nothing to hide is a wonderful thing. But I also believe there are people out there ready to take advantage of that, and it's them that I'm more concerned about than evil Nazi governments gone bad or anything like that. I am amazed at both the level of goodness in some of mankind and the level of crapitude in others.

Give me an example of what "they" could do to a normal...small, insignificant workaday mother and homemaker like me?

Maybe I'm naive, but I really don't think that if someone got a bunch of personal or financial information about me, that they could do anything that would be upsetting to me. Annoying maybe...a pain to reconcile or set right, but nothing I couldn't handle.

Could they pose as me and commit crimes? (Would I then be arrested without actual physical evidence linking me to said activities?) Could they get into my bank accounts and steal all my money?(giggles...jokes on them) Could they ruin my good name?(uh...well that doesn't matter much to me)

The things I value in life are not tangible. They cannot be stolen. I refuse to worry about it. No matter what happened...no matter what someone attempted to do to me based on personal information about me that's on record, I'd still have what I value most...... A family that fills every day with joy, fantastic friends like you, and my memories of happy times.

Public opinion is molded all the time. Movies are combined with news stories combined with advertisements such that people might believe in any policy. I've heard some orators that can have me believing a position I'm 180º opposed to. There are techniques like creating false opposition (fruitcake protestors). It's a challenge in todays world to have an opinion that hasn't been manipulated, intentionally or not.

In home recreational habits?
As far as I know...There's nothing there I wouldn't mind revealed.
If they had a problem with my TiVo addiction or the fact that I sometimes run around naked after my shower or that I sleep with a girl every night....phooey on them.

How many people are doing things that 80,000 other people aren't also doing at the moment? Billions of people think no one should know they masturbate. That's hilarious.

you're not insignificant... you're as significant as any other human being.

a lot of what they can do is just a nuisance... but suppose you end up on a list, your name, your address, your phone number, your daughter's name, your partner's name, your Tivo viewing habits, your medical history, your voting preferences. You're an easy target for any nut case, freak, psycho or person who's having a bad day who happens to casually find out. You can be harassed on the telephone, mailed dead fish, have city inspectors sicced on you for obscure city codes that are rarely enforced, even ones you haven't violated but now you have to deal with convincing them that you haven't done anything wrong. You can be mailed anthrax. Your loved ones can be harassed as well.

I'm not saying you should live life in a bottle (or a closet). I don't believe that at all. I'm just saying you (the generic you) shouldn't make it easy for others to compile private information about you. You're lucky that you live in a progressive area of the US... I am too. Even the my town in New Hampshire is pretty progressive, let alone Cambridge.

I'm having a hard time thinking about this right now - I keep slipping into cross-burning and that's not the type of harassment I mean. I mean the checkout lady at the Walmart who shorts you on change because she can tell you're divorced and holds that against you, or the employment agency clerk who doesn't pass good jobs on to you because he doesn't like the church you go to, and you never even know that he knows it,or the insurance agent who refuses you insurance because he doesn't like the food you buy at the market.

I'm also not saying that I believe that everyone out there is that kind of petty, mean-spirited nasty little person. I know they're not; I know there are a lot of fine people out there. But there are some who aren't.

regardless of whether we disagree, I respect your opinion.

Thank you for the examples. I really couldn't come up with any myself and I really tried to think....What could someone do? to me?

I just thought of something in reference to your Walmart clerk/insurance agent example...

People already discriminate against other people anyway. In day to day life we make judgments based on what we "think" we can tell about others all the time. For example, A petty angry person need not even "know" or have seen a list of what you buy at the grocery store but just "think" you look/act/sound like the "banana hating type" and punish you by refusing to hire you..sell you a home...insurance....etc.

No matter how careful I am with my personal information, I can still be targeted, based on assumptions.

I enjoyed your list there.

I always get the sweetest interpersonal interactions, and I have a good idea they suspect I'm TG. I doubt they'd even care about my slug terrarium or honorary degree with the flat earth society.
.. however .. I have got the inspector treatment. It doesn't quite make up for the personalized pens promoters send celebrating 15 years of 'business'. CARE - central automated reporting enforcement. could you ask for a more 1984 name?

you just wanted ideas on how to torture you, didn't you???

yes, I agree, people discriminate against one another all the time... even if it's because the person discriminating is just having a bad day... I think the National ID card privacy people are trying to protect against organized discrimination or mechanized discrimination, which I didn't really manage to describe

I suspect that you probably come off very sweetly (though possibly a bit frenetic? ) in person and that's probably echoed back to you... hopefully threefold

But are we different people, Romkey? Are we different people?

I think I understand about freedom of information now, thanks

I can see that having databases with information could be a bad thing too, just not always.

there are certainly a lot of potential benefits to them as well

last time i checked i was just one person... i'll check again

im an avid masturbator

i guess if everybody actually knew, and i mean really actually knew what everybody else was doing then none of it would matter, but.....

how good that must feel, im gonna have to try not caring!

torture?
*giggles*

I do see where you are coming from about organized and mechanized discrimination, though.

It does feel good.

You can be targeted now, based on assumptions. If someone got ahold of some information about you, but not enough, they have more information to draw their own erroneous conclusions from. That one of the main things that bothers me about people knowing stuff about me. They can use it to assume things that aren't true.

Isn't this the kind of Big Brother crap the terrorists wanted us to succumb to???

I doubt they were that brilliant. They probably would have been glad to have the opposite. We did this to ourselves. I saw it coming instantly and did not like what I saw. Alas, they will probably laugh their heads off, the day we have to call sattelite central on our cell phone to report we are stepping out to check the mailbox.

Your idea that it would be good for everyone to be in on everything would cause some problems. There are plenty of times when secrets are good things, and fun. Everyone knowing anything that's going on would ruin surprises, guessing contests, practical jokes, among other things, wouldn't it?

i am envious

Sue and I had a long discussion in the car on the way to work today about...how much we want people to know and the whole privacy issue. We are polar opposites in our viewpoints on this.

One good point she came up with on the privacy issue that I had forgotten was based on an incident where a workman hired by our landlord came into our home to do some work. He walked around admiring our things and commenting on stuff we own. That was icky. He was...icky.

The first year of my spiritual awakening I had a serious problem with things like hide 'n seek games and secret presents. It forced me to seperate the worlds in which all is known and little is known. I had some new intense forms of joys that year, but for the most part I certainly did not have what I used to call fun. I had to go back to sleep for the most part to regain it, and even then I'm very close to knowing what all my presents are 'ah, not a stereoscope viewer, but glass stereoscope cards. ah, more exotic crystals.' That's not what the issue was though. I doubt I could ever explain being torn between worlds.

I don't understand why that was icky. Was it that described behavior, or the vibes?
You're envied.
It reminds me of a year or two ago when i felt like an invincible superhero, before I put my ego in check, changed philosophy, stood back from peoples karma, and lost purpose in maintaining a psychic level of connection with folks out there. I think now that working to pull people up was good for me, because it constantly meant I had to pull myself up first.
¥"Wings can kill you. Walk away cause you're breaking up the girl." I'm no longer sure what the difference between an imp and an angel is. I've discovered various new variants like awake death. I've cast doubt upon all I've been doing, yet it seems like I was doing better before. These days I'm 'trying', and 'trying' is not a good place when you are used to doing. (basically referring to having a magical perspective (like that line 'she was a fairy princess until it all went horribly wrong')). Perhaps I'm really suffering from mundane junk, like multiple personality management, relationships, productivity, economics, etc. Perhaps it's because I've spent years with the it's always going to be more intense and something I've never seen before, and now i'm merely getting along with an agenda. Perhaps it's because I'm continuing my education (which is the same thing i've been doing for 22 years now, only now i'm less transferable than I was a decade ago.) towards teaching instead of getting a home established. Cay just about calls me a sheep for using preexisting templates like language and the five senses.
Alas, you are the only person I've still got that I think can remotely understand what I'm trying to figure out (ok, i guess some folks share pieces of common issues.) Perhaps you have observations about what's changed in me.

I don't think we will ever come to a place where everyone is in on everything. Maybe we will have a lot less privacy, but we won't have ZERO privacy. I honestly don't think the technology is here that will enable anyone to read the contents of my notebook as it sits in a box under my desk.

*bursts out of romkey's stomach in a scene reminiscent of Alien"

I'd rather be Zeus to your Athena!

hey I'll pass along some useless knowledge... did you know that when they filmed the chest-bursting scene in Alien that most of the cast didn't know what was going to happen in the scene? Apparently their scripts had indicated that something horrific happens, but only John Hurt, Ridley Scott and the special effects guys knew for sure. Ridley Scott wanted to get the most authentic reactions from the cast that he could...

Maybe not, but the DoD already published it's intent to be able to read what your pen was writing (before you shelf the book) a couple years ago and monitor peoples shoes through wireless internet. Since that time ToysRUs has pens that come with wireless voicemail accounts, and they can track marathon runners through the streets of NY by things on the end of their shoelaces. GPS devices don't even use old fashioned triangulation (this angle plus that = this position), they use trilateration (this light speed signal got here this much faster than another). It's silly, but it does exist. ATM machines can identify people by their iris's from six feet away. A camera in a smoke detector could identify what you write. Funny, you picked the basic scene from 1984 about a journal.
Even if notes can't be read, it can be seen that they exist. A coo giving an unpublished note to a senator could become a crime. They do study the paintings that exist under famous paintings. More than a dozen years ago, sattelites could identify what car 'had' been in a parking lot by the heat pattern that had bounced from the sun off the license plate onto the pavement (a relative of mine created it). I bet software could be created that recreated your writing based on an audio recording.

I knew that.

Christmas in Alaska.
(((HUG)))

Ah yes, the obvious answer. I thought perhaps this was in another survey, knowing I'd understand the context anyhow.
Who I am has been torn apart and is up for redefinition, and until then I am neither here nor there, like the state I discovered my brother lives in.
Did you see my vacation photos in the post your pic survey? My server is down at the moment, alas.

I picked the journal because it's THE classic symbol of what is 'personal.' Maybe that's why Orwell put that scene in his book. I think there are some invasive technologies they just won't bother using on the average person. I don't think the government would really go through the money and effort to monitor everyone's homes through their smoke detectors. There are far far too many innocent and boring people for it to be worthwhile. It kind of bugs me that we have to register vehicles, much less be tracked in them. I kind of like to look at the bright side, though. The more paranoid scrutiny methods there are, the more ways there are to trick false positives for them. *snicker*

Too many boring people isn't an issue if it only costs a penny a day per household to monitor, compared to the cost of lives. Computers are cheap.
When a database knows what your favorite breakfast cereal packaging was as a kid, they can draw some conclusions.

I saw the one with you and your daughter!

My gosh, *I* don't even know what my favorite breakfast cereal packaging was. I don't think I had a favorite. What kind of conclusions could they draw from that?
Who is going to sit there and monitor these people? Computers may be cheap, but it takes manpower to put pieces together to focus on someone. What is going to pull up the red flag? The computer or a person? Who is going to decide what is suspicious?

It wouldn't even require language parsing, just word frequency and association for a computer to see that we are having some sort of conversation about surveillance. Back in the early 80's there was dispute over wether or not we should be selling our mid 60's phone equipment to 3rd world countries because it was capable of monitoring millions of phone calls for keywords, tracking phone trees, and flagging human listeners. It was feared that it could be misused under the direction of a dictator. During the Carter administration we had the problem that the soviets were monitoring about 8 million US phone calls per day. That was a long long time ago, in terms of software and hardware evolution. If technology doubles every 18 months as they say, then we should have roughly 35 million times the surveillance capability we had in the 60's.
Let's see, you probably didn't eat Quisp, as i imagine Zang, Romkey, and Bill were probably fond of. No, you probably had more raisin bran than cornflakes, possibly even chex or kix, but more name brands than generics, with some sweet grainy cereals like buckwheats, maybe some lucky charms or frosted flakes once in awhile, but almost never things like fruity pebbles. Breakfast cereal was far more common than oatmeal, granola, or cream of rice/wheat, the latter being your favorite of those three. You preferred alphabits over honeycombs (though they tasted identical), and both super-sugar-smacks and corn-pops over fruit-loops. Conclusion - clearly a rebel - could be easily be swayed to terrorism depending on her social affiliations. *proceed to cross-reference with psych profiles of friends and classmates*
Haven't you at least seen all those sites which ask a few questions about your taste in sports or candy, then hand you a personality archetype. Don't think that information got lost somewhere. I'm sure it's involved in the choice of junk mail background colors you get. You'll sell some cameras with kid pictures in the ads, and others with sports pics. Believe me, they make it their business to figure this stuff out.

So I can use an axe to climb out of your skull? lol

Poor rest-of-Alien-cast! Sounds like a pretty mean stunt to play.

You are partially right about the cereal, but not completely. I didn't eat buckwheats. I ate Frosted Flakes, corn flakes, Cheerios, Lucky Charms, Cocoa pebbles, Cocoa puffs, among some others I can't remember right now. I ate what my folks bought. We had oatmeal. I love oatmeal, Yummy. I was never into cream of wheat. I am more of an individualist than a rebel. I wasn't the least bit swayed by peer pressure in School. Barely even knew the feeling. Avoided people who use pressure tactics. Oh hey, I don't mind at all what businesses are doing with my info, trying to sway me into buying their stuff. I was in commercial art and radio/tv production. I can see through slick ads. I have different buying habits. I pick out stuff I want (not based on ads) and I don't impulse buy anything that I was never considering. I have particular reasons for wanting stuff, and different degrees that I want it. Ads don't affect me all that much. I'm too practical. It's the government surviellence that annoys me more, because of the profiling and funky conclusions drawn from it. I'm an exception to so many rules.

Then you probably don't have much to worry about. The gov't wouldn't do much different with the data I don't think, other than figure out who to sell a candidate with by an ecological platform.
I noticed my market sells seaweed cracker balls that taste like captain crunch peanut-butter and organic sodas in bottles reminiscent of aunt jemima. Of course you are aware that they strive for car brand loyalty 10 years before a kids ready to buy, and can target people using the favorite songs from our youth.
Do you feel you have more control over what companies do than the government? It seems to me they have more to do with our daily living, and the only checks 'n balances they have is competition and their success with the consumer. Do you think the gov't is more likely to bungle your profile than general foods and microsoft? Chances are that the same profile brokers supply both gov't and business.
I was thinking cocoa-puffs. I'm sure you swayed moms vote at the cereal aisle.
Speaking of railroaded ads, have you noticed how they do things like put up a movie about a kidnap, then have a news story about a kidnap, then speak about how computer profiling could prevent kidnapping, then run an ad for a company doing security profiling? A person on track with them three hours might end up in investing in the very sort of company they feared existing the day before.
I'm a different breed too. I have coca-cola parphernalia on the walls and cupboards, and will hula-hoop to a coke commercial (though I consider many of them evil), yet I buy generic soda.
So what slick concepts are you aware of?
I've noticed sitcom and movies scripts have product plugs woven in. Ads are often doubling as ads for something else like birth control. Synergism between content, news, and ads exists to push a viewpoint or create problem/solution. Abstract iconography to mold views without opportunity for intellectual complaint is used. Radio songs can embed text that when heard muffled becomes an ad for cigarettes or the lottery.
Even when there is nothing subliminal happening at all, people could miss that it's not just about getting you to buy a product, but reminding you to use it up so you'll need more.

Supposedly the opening scene of jaws was one in which the gal was actually getting mauled in the malfuctioning mechanical shark apparatus beneath the water.
I've noticed back when I was making stage props that if for instance I was making rotting flesh gloves for a zombie, I'd pick up a weird oozing skin rash on my hands. Since then, I try not to get involved in things I wouldn't want to actually happen. I wrote a really wild screenplay a dozen years ago, yet much of it has happened to me since.

I'm too aware of bright colors and music. Not only in ads, but in TV shows. I'm the kind of person that would find a show like The Chair 100 times better without the lights, suspenseful music and hype. It's sensory overload to me. If someone really wanted to sell me something, they would have to run a magazine ad with a well written article about the benefits, why it's so much better than anything else. They wouldn't use bright colors or pictures of cute kids to get my attention. I'm too aware of the hype. I did magazine layout in Career Center. You enlarge the picture of the product or put something noticable next to it. You put a pretty room around it. Make it look unrealistically appealing. I imagine what the product would look like in my own house. Nothing like the ad.

I feel I have more control over what companies can do to me than the government.

You're no fun.
I buy everything from the thrift store anyhow (or ebay (that's where I bought my car even)).
I've had no interest in watching the chair. What ideas or products are they selling?

I meant to say the chamber. Its a game show. they put someone in this capsule with extreme heat or cold, stuff poking their back, artificial quakes, etc, and the person is supposed to answer questions with all that going on. They aren't selling anything, they just use all these bright lights and music to keep people watching. That's no different then half the shows out there. The bold presentation of TV and ads kind of annoy me to the point I have a hard time watching. I guess the average person is drawn in by that. I'm drawn to things by pure interest. I would rather watch a local college course on an obscure channel with bad reception than a boldly presented, well put together attention seeking adrenaline show.

Because I'm no fun

Jay Leno was just joking (i see him about thrice a year) that they're using the ice-rink design to sell margueritas.
Haven't seen the chamber either. I find it hard to believe that a game show isn't advertising products. All the ones I have seen do, and i mean besides the official ads in the show.

Sometimes they mention a company in the questions, if that's what you mean.

Yeah, like who invented product x or what color did in come in first. Basic stuff.

I think it is evil. We have lost our freedom, our right to peace. We should have shut down our borders many years ago. Now the savages of the earth have come into our land, and damaged it forever. Very sad indeed. I blame the subversives in our government, and business for what has happened. We have the greatest foundation of government, but it's tenets have been twisted, and turned against us, but only because of higher courts intended misinterpretations.

do you think the subversives in the general population have something to do with this problem? letting those in power get away with what they do. i think the power is the corruptent (is that a word). a person who goes into politics with good intentions ends up a greedy bastard.