Results tagged “michaeldirda”

Michael Dirda, in the New York Review of Books:

In contemporary America, as Jonathan Raban reminds us in Surveillance, any quest for anonymity—"to live obscurely" according to the Greek ideal for happiness—has grown increasingly difficult, if not impossible. And it's not only an Orwellian Big Brother who is watching. We track each other. We check out the backgrounds of friends, Saturday-night dates, and business associates; we data-mine and Google-search; when on line we worry about hackers, viruses, and identity theft. Schools and playgrounds are patrolled by guards, while spy cameras observe our children in the hallways and bathrooms. Only those who know the code can unlock the steel gates to our "planned communities." Amazon monitors our taste in books. Our cell phones take pictures and record conversations. People can't walk their dogs now without taking along their Blackberry or wearing their Bluetooth.

Raban's been interested in the democratization of surveillance for a while -- he has a list similar to Dirda's in an essay he wrote for The Guardian in 2006. He spoke about it on open Source in February.

Well, we're finished with World War Z, which means we'll finally have time to pick up Jonathan Raban's Surveillance and that some lucky souls at the library will move up a notch on the hold list. Surveillance, of course, is the first book in Seattlest's Book Club. If you haven't picked up your copy yet, don't forget to ask for the Seattlest Book Club discount at Santoro's Books in Greenwood and Bailey-Coy Books on...