An excerpt from the article http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,43186,00.html " SAN JOSE, California -- Viewing the future through the eyes of IBM scientists at the Almaden Research Center is both awesome and unnerving. Imagine living in a world with sensors inserted everywhere, including sunglasses, so any time you meet new people their names appear before your eyes. If you're blind their names could be whispered to you through earplugs, thanks to voice-enabling software. Even if you don't speak the same language as the people you encounter, you'll have their words translated for you in real time. No one would remain anonymous -- you'd know the name of anyone you encountered in the world. To the chagrin of privacy-minded people, crossing that fine line into someone else's space is part of IBM's job -- especially in the field of pervasive computing. " and "The scenario of everyone in the world knowing each other's names would be possible if everyone's face were scanned into a database. Then a camera with gaze-tracking technology -- which IBM calls the "Vision Pad Identifier" -- would identify the face and display the name of the person in a device, such as sunglasses. IBM showed off the technology, or what exactly would appear in the sunglasses, with a photograph of actress Alyssa Milano and her name displayed. Another photograph showed a police officer wearing headgear with a camera. To demonstrate how the camera would adjust itself to identify a person or object, a robot named Pong noisily adjusted his ping-pong eyes to gaze at someone in the room. " and finally "IBM expects the technology to be available to the public in a couple of years." They really try to put a happy spin on it, but you can guess where this technology is headed. The Transparent Society is right around the corner. Nerd From Hell
