Bobby's section of the Final Exam

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Although there are many negative aspects associated with the Global Subject and the Global Gaze, there are also some extremely beneficial uses for the technology. A quick point brought to attention early on in the text is a case where a Korean plane was shot down by Russian military because the civilian filled plane crossed into Russian territory unknown to the pilot. After this tragedy, President Ronald Reagan allowed GPS tools to be utilized by non-military ventures to avoid another such incident. Because of this type of technology, a situational circumstance such as this one could be avoided. While this global gaze related technology worked well in such cases as this on a large scale, it also can work on a more localized level.

A very prominent example of global surveillance tools helping society are surveillance cameras (with prices starting as low as $40 it’s no surprise that they are being utilized: http://www.google.com/products/catalog?q=surveillance+cameras&um=1&ie=UTF-8&cid=8692273997468197511&ei=yZUGTfLuG8qFnAf3-6DlDQ&sa=X&oi=product_c), which are currently located in most stores, and even now in random outside areas. Many people see this as an invasion to privacy but in reality these technological devices (be it a camera or satellite) can offer unique opportunities to help out everyday life. A prime example would be in robberies. It is quite common that the video taken from a store could lend a hand to authorities in the apprehension of criminals such as bank robbers. A local example would be a Michigan woman from Lincoln Park being caught for five separate bank robberies (http://www.clickondetroit.com/news/24397145/detail.html) and caught primarily because of her footage captured on the global detection devices better known in this case as bank camera. Another such example was presented in Greenville, SC where police released video footage and captured the assailants because of public outreach (http://www.witn.com/home/headlines/101476644.html). These types of cases consistently occur and help utilize the positive benefits of global observation.

As with all forms of technology, the tools can present positive and negative benefits to society and everyday life. With the adaption of postmodernism, especially in media and entertainment, people are often likely to judge and cast a negative opinion onto emerging forms of advancements due to their possibility for negative associations, but often this is a harsh choice that should be reserved until fuller understanding of the true advantages can be presented. This is definitely the case with surveillance video and satellite imaging.

Fahad exam "Weather Satellites"

My example is weather satellite and I will be talking about its positive aspects for the whole society. The weather satellite is a type of satellite that is mainly used to monitor the weather and climate of the Earth.
There are two basic types of weather satellites. Satellites can be either polar orbiting, seeing the same swath of the Earth every 12 hours, or geostationary, floating over the same spot on Earth by orbiting over the equator while moving at the speed of the Earth's rotation.
These satellites, however, see more than clouds and cloud systems. City lights, fires, effects of pollution, sand and dust storms, snow cover, ice mapping, boundaries of ocean currents, energy flows, etc., and other types of environmental information are collected using weather satellites. Weather satellite images helped in monitoring the volcanic ash cloud from mountains from all different regions. Image satellite weather technology has been around a while. It has become very important to the great advances in weather forecasts. We can get planet temperatures, humidity pictures, cloud pictures and wind data from the satellite depictions. Weather can decide on what we do for the day. For example, if there is wet weather, we can stay indoors and read or play board games, or perhaps catch up with our old friends. When there is hot weather, we can go outside to play and enjoy the sunlight. People who fish for a living can find out valuable information about the temperature of the sea from measurements that satellites make.
Weather satellites are useful f or many reasons. Pollution whether it's nature-made or man-made can be pinpointed. The visual and infrared photos show effects of pollution from their respective areas over the entire earth. Aircraft and rocket pollution, as well as condensation trails, can also be spotted. Almost every summer, sand and dust from the Sahara Desert in Africa and other dust storms in Asia and mainland China are common and easy to spot and monitor, with the help of weather satellites.
In remote areas of the world with few local observers, fires could rage out of control for days or even weeks and consume millions of acres before authorities are alerted. Weather satellites can be a tremendous asset in such situations.
I feel that weather satellite technology relates to the concept of panopticism because satellites can be used for tacking places and people. Though the technology itself is nothing but a blessing for its users which helps those making decisions on weather related issues, but it also puts them on the surveillance.

Maegan Byer Final Exam

Negative Implications of Geolocating Technologies
Completed by Maegan Byer of GroupTooAlso




The example of the surveillance technologies that I am discussing are geolocation based services such as foursquare and other internet based phone applications that track an individual’s location and allow it to be publicly displayed. These technologies track the user’s specific location with an IP address and allow their whereabouts to be viewed by other people that are subscribed to the same service provider or have the same applications. This service is intended for people to be easily tracked by their friends and family without necessarily making contact with them.

The geolocation based services are invasive because they display an individual’s specific location. These services can be beneficial to parents that want to track their children and monitor their behavior. However, I feel these services can be more harmful than good because they decrease consumer privacy. The commercials that are created for these technologies try to encourage people to allow others to track them 24/7 for convenience. For example, in some of the Boost Mobile commercials, the actors appear as giant circle shaped people to represent the dots that you would see on your phone screen if you were tracking someone.

These geolocation technologies can be dangerous to the people using them because they make it easy for someone to watch their every move and even enable stalking. Other people are granted the ability to track your presence with this technology without your total consent.

Geolocation technology relates to the concept of panopticism because users are in a constant state of visibility. This increases the surveillance placed on people but disguises it as a fun application or feature of the phone or program. These locating services change our global gaze because it allows consumers to create a global presence and enhances our desire to do so. It allows us to continue to be aware of almost anything at almost any time. If we can track our loved ones and their specific location at any moment, there will be little left to what we don’t know about someone. Geolocating technologies challenge the unknown and are postmodern because the intense reality of being able to track someone has been turned into an expectation of society.

I feel that geolocating technologies may be beneficial to society as a whole in certain situations, but are dangerous to individual people that use them for unnecessary purposes. Instead of being portrayed as important technologies that hold incredible power they are portrayed as a fun gadget or neat feature to consumers.

Final Exam Examples

Cell Phones - Theresa

Geolocation Services - Maegan

Video Surveillance - Bobby

Satellite Weather - Fahad