Public vs. Private

A bright line? Hell, there isn't even a faded dotted line between what's supposedly private/personal and what is public.

And we have done it to ourselves.

We have allowed the purveyors of commerce on the internet to follow us around now for years. They know every page you have ever been to, what you looked at and for how long and how many times you have returned out of either interest or obsession.

"How come these Weight Control Ads keep showing up, even when I am looking at beach rentals?"

A few days ago a friend from Texas sent me a picture from Goggle Maps of the street view of my building.

The NYTimes just reminded this morning of that cartoon from ten years ago where the dog is typing on the computer and saying to another "On the Internet no one knows you are a dog." No more, Fido. We even know what kind of kibble gives you gas.

And please ask any budding artist today how he intends to protect his musical creations from theft, you'll get a shrug because this society has decided that the idea of ownership rights disappeared with the idea that you had any kind of private life.

There's more, but I have to go now.

Joe(we haven't a clue yet as to what we have done.)Nation

lol Well... ok. I agree. But what I meant was for yourself - what about you personally? What is "private" vs. what is "public" for YOU? For example, is the amount of your annual personal income "private"? What about the amount you may have paid for your home? Or you annual tax liability?

I wouldn't share any of those financials voluntarily, but interestingly enough, I get to see all that and more concerning anyone who is either a prospective purchaser/shareholder or lessee in our building in my capacity as president of the co-op board. We also do a fairly informal face to face interview with the applicants. "What do you like to do for fun?" "Do you have any hobbies?" Who's your favorite band?" (those are mostly about noise prevention.)

I am still a little embarrassed at how much we ask people to expose to us..

Physical property versus Information
This discussion is focussed on information as opposed to physical property. The identification of rightful ownership of information is different from that of physical property.



Should? The government "should' be kept out of everything unless you authorize it to meddle in your affairs.


Easy: by keeping his creations to himself.
I certainly do not think that any artist has a right to force all tax-payers to support his legal claims of "theft" in a court of law.

I believe a better description would be that "society" -- whoever that is -- has stopped trying to protect things which physically can not be protected.



The question is technically invalid.
Information is "public" if other people know it. Similarly, information is "private" if you do not share it.



I presume it is safe to say that you are not forcing people to disclose information.