What I really researched was a less cult-ish side to things. Science fiction is where people can imagine incredible things that have to do with technology and science. Since there are such things as science and technology in the real world, it's easy for science fiction and reality to overlap. For instance, there are automatic doors, cell phones and handheld computers like PDA's and Crackberries. You don't really think about it too much since these things are a part of your everyday life, but a while ago such things were unheard of. They were merely a staple of science fiction futuristic devices that people only dreamed of existing. I looked into how real-life things were inspired by literature rather than the other way around. Literature is usually influenced by real life.

Since I don't want to go any further and risk boring Mrs. X with everything that was in my essay (because I'm sure she had enough of it the first time around) I'm going to get right into what I really had planned.

I'm sure that everyone knows how the computer is really important in most sci-fis, right? You know, like it takes over the world or something? Well, today, there is something like that, and that's the internet and privacy. I don't want to sound like some crazy person who wears tinfoil to stop the satellites from scanning my brain but the internet and the world of technology can be a scary place. I feel that it would be a good idea to inform you about it a bit, since it has something to do with my project and of course, everyone in this room.
Okay, I'm assuming that everyone knows about the World Wide Web. I'm sure you've all used it before, and if you haven't, I can't help but wonder if you're kind of crazy. Anyway, the internet is an amazing thing, isn't it? It can do just about anything, and can connect you to people all over the world. Of course, you knew that though, right? You know about all of these highly popular social networking sites like Facebook and Myspace and all that. Can I get a show of hands for people who have a Facebook account?

There's a few of you, I guess then, eh? Well, I'm hoping that you read the fine print when you were joining. Okay, seriously, who does that? Well. You should know that you can never fully delete your account, right? It's true. There's still a little profile for people to check out even after you try to get rid of it. It's basically permanent. Everything on the internet is permanent, from e-mails to text messages to pictures, it's all stored in servers and caches all over the place, and you'll never get rid of it.

Back to the whole Facebook thing. I have a quote here, from the Privacy Policy on Facebook that you might find interesting if you haven't read it.

"We may use information about you that we collect from other sources, including but not limited to newspapers and Internet sources such as blogs, instant messaging services, Facebook Platform developers and other users of Facebook, to supplement your profile." (Facebook Privacy Policy)

Scary. So, what they're saying is that they'll just plaster everything they find about you on your page. Sure, you might say, "oh, well it saves me the trouble". But, have you considered that you might not want some of that stuff on there, or this company looking into your business?

So, what this means is that you have your own personal company to research you, yay, how exciting. Well, have you thought about who else could be looking you up? I know that you all want to get jobs in the future, go to college or university, all kinds of respectable things like that, right? Who wouldn't? You see, there's a catch nowadays though. A big catch. Since whatever you put on the internet stays there, anyone with enough time on their hands can find you. Yeah, so guess what those employers and recruiters are doing---yup, they're browsing whatever you've got posted all over Facebook and Myspace, Livejournal, Youtube, whatever they can find with a search engine.

Now, imagine you're an employer or recruiter for a school. You have a promising looking future student or employee. You decide that it's probably a good idea to look them up. Hell, they put their e-mail address right on that application, why not? So, you go to Facebook and typing in that e-mail, hit search and pop! There's a photo of that kid with a beer in their hand, drunk as a skunk. Pop! There's an angry blog they wrote about their last employer. Pop! Oh, a video of them doing something really stupid. Well, that application is going in the discard pile. You don't have time for someone like that.

Do you see how easy it is for them to do that? Crazy easy. I hope you're taking notes like "erase incriminating photos..."

Okay, you've seen it from the side of the employer/ recruiter person, so how about from your POV. Say you have a Facebook page. Okay, scratch that, I know most of you have one so let's take a real good look at this. You have a Facebook page. On it you have all kinds of fun stuff like what school you go to, your interests and so forth. Nothing to bad there. Well, say to add things like photos, which is real easy to do. And you think, "Ha, well, that was so funny, let's put that up for everyone else to see." Let's pretend this picture is of you and your friends. Oh how nice. That's a good one. It makes you look like a regular well adjusted person. That would be a positive thing to the whole Facebook thing with the employer / recruiter thing. Now, imagine that you or maybe even one of your friends puts up a picture of you passed out or something equally embarrassing. You probably don't think about how that could affect your future. Your popularity, maybe, but you don't consider much else. That seemingly harmless upload could cost you a good job or acceptance from a school.

Okay, that's enough with that for now. I'm going to talk about the stuff I read before I forget to, because that would be bad. Alright, I read Next, Dune, 1984, Brave New World and some random articles from magazines like national geographic. They were all science fiction or related to it, so that right there ties into my topic. Next dealt mostly with the issues surrounding the integrity of a person and the right to their body. I'm talking about some of the worst violations of privacy here, like people owning parts of your genome kind of violations. That was kind of scary in a way, because it was all set in basically our times, so yay paranoia.

Dune was a different sort of book. It was a mix of historical/fantasy/sci-fi. Really, it ties in better with my essay than the whole privacy issue, which was mostly in Next and the other books.

Brave New World, which I seem to have misplaced, dealt with cloning and things much like Next, only in twisted kind of world where social classes are really enforced and people are required to do exactly what they've been programmed to do.

1984 was a really good book too, and it kind of had all of the issues between its two covers. The most interesting part of it wasn't necessarily the whole dictatorship, though that was strange and fascinating all in itself. The most relevant part of the book was the complete and total lack of privacy like in Next. You have heard of "Big Brother"? BB? Yeah, well you could think of him as some creepy control freak that has to know everything that you're doing at all times. And, that leads me up to my next little bit.

This poster here, the "Big Brother is Watching Yo", it's you but it's been cut off, can be twisted to fit into my little presentation. You see, it's not necessarily Big Brother who is watching, per say it's the fact that Google can see you. I know, I know, I'm going into that whole paranoia thing again, but it's for a good cause. Alright. I want another show of hands or two, ready?

How many people have used Google? You can probably keep your hands up for the rest of them too if you've got your hand up now.

How many people have Googled themselves?

How many people have used Google maps?

Alright, cool. So you know about the most popular search engine in the interweb. Great. So, since you've all used it, you know how simple it is to just type in a couple words and find a place then, right? Yeah I thought so. Well, I had this whole thing planned out that I was going to 411 someone in this class with Google. I was going to have their address, phone numbers, list of who lives with them, directions to their house and a satellite map. Then, I realized that that was way creepy and didn't really want to do it. So, instead, I took a couple seconds and took a screenshot of this building here. The school, yes. And this arrow here, it's should say you are here. However, the ink died so there's just this big red arrow. Anyway, you get the idea, right? Here we are right here.

Now, the pictures taken from the satellites like this one, only bigger, are kind of old. For instance, I have a picture of my house where it doesn't have the new garage on it. So they are old enough pictures. It is a handy little tool on the internet too. However, I don't know about anyone else, but do you find it kind of strange that Google can just go and take pictures of everywhere on the planet, stick it all together and present it to the world? I think that's quite the advancement, and a good boredom buster.

It can be used for good things to, you, like, I'm sure George Bush probably used to try to find out where Osama is. But in all seriousness, this kind of information at the fingertips of basically anyone who has an internet connection and a pulse is somewhat disturbing. I'm not saying that you should go and rip your internet out and toss your computer out the window. I'm just suggesting that you look at things with a critical eye. I know that most people, myself included, like to imagine that everything is oh so fine. But the fact of the matter is that technology is just growing and shows no signs of stopping whatsoever. We have to keep up with it or it will leave us rather ignorant to how things really work.