One of many reasons I don't have a cell phone.  I'm probably the least interesting person possible in terms of surveillance- ooh look, she just checked out a book on  water quality!  But it just feels damn unAmerican to put up with it. I'm ornery that way.

No cell phone.  If They want to put a leash on me, they'll damn well not make me pay for it!

No GPS.  No FastTrack, no Onstar, no navigator reporting position and trajectory... no car.  When they put GPS in sneakers, I'll go barefoot.

I simply don't trust my own government to not misuse data.  The feds can't avoid losing massive amounts of it, and I'm tired of being compromised because some idiot left a laptop in his car.

Only insecure authoritarians feel a need to know everything about everybody... so why should I enable control freaks?

I'm just trying to figure out why I got a cell phone call from 0000123456 twice...

the teleCONs would change their tune in a ny minute...we'd have a bill on the presidents desk before you could say enessay. [never happen]

dylan said it best: money doesn't talk, it swears...

lTMF'sA


the revolution will not be televised...

Just who in the fuck do we think we are?

changing life style is one way, but you better have the money on your hip, or a niche that allows you to be without most of the traps.

I'm going to get there again, and counting the days, a watched pot takes a long time to boil...

I'm seriously thinking about the ozarks this round...to stay..

peace be with you all...

wado

"what a wonderful world"- Louis Armstrong

The decision to use a cell phone is a decision to have the cellphone system track you 24/7 whenever the thing is turned on (which is likely all the time, unless you pull the batteries out).  If you are using GPS, (which you certainly should NOT be!) it is tracking you down to the yard of latitude and longitude.  

I don't think people really get GPS:  It means your cellphone company, the feds, and your local constable know not only when you visited and how long you spent at the lefty bookstore, but what shelves you perused (bombmaking? organic gardening?) and how long you conversed at the checkout counter.  None of this matters unless they take an interest in you, at which point you are totally screwed.  

I know we are nearly all American technophiles here, but I have to break to you some hard news:  

There are some technologies you CANNOT USE if you value either privacy or freedom (or perhaps life, as well).  The folks who run cellphone companies just aren't trustworthy:  You have no practical way of keeping them from selling your information to . . . anyone who will pay for it, not to mention anyone who can flash a badge.  

Legislation won't help much, certainly not against the government, nor even against the large corporations--who is going to enforce it?  You simply do not know what country you are living in if you think such a thing is remotely possible.  

You can, of course, store the batteries externally, and use the cell phone for the one thing that it is actually good for--emergency phone calls in a real emergency situation.  Except during the emergency itself, of course, the phone is off and empty and you take no calls.  

Sooner or later, of course, you will cave and start using the thing for "convenience."  And start compromising yourself and your friends.  

Sucker.  

The Fates are kind.

Of course, you must submit your fingerprints and bank info to the database collection and storage business, but what possible problem could that cause? It's all so, um, what's the word.....?  Convenient!