I'd bet $100 to the contrary. Employers can barely get employees to wear business casual or cover their tattoos on most occasions.

Governments, on the other hand, will probably have an easier time, sadly.

The process will start in developing world countries, then spread to stigmatized groups in the West, such as pedophiles and those on social assistance. Employers will start making implants a condition of employment. Chipped individuals will get discounts and other privileges. Eventually, having a chip will be essential for everything from voting and driving to shopping and medical care.

That sounds very likely. He's predicting a combination of government and business pressure. Today's businesses get employees to take drug tests.

Where's the 'Duh' tag?

Boooooring. I want a cyborg arm!

And they will all be administered by an evil Jack Chick character going 'HAW! HAW!'

Uh huh.

And Kirk Cameron will play the main character.

Approves.

/"Good news, everyone! I've invented a device that when you read this post, you will hear it in your head in the sound of my voice!"

Fark, we couldn't even get RFID technology to work on merchandise, to keep inventory in our Home Depot stores. I wouldn't count on it happening anytime soon.

Will this happen before or after we're all forced to get bar code tattoos?

not a problem -0 wearing a fancyt tin-foil hat can scramble the RFID magic laser beams.

But will my tinfoil apparel keep them out from interfering with my brainwaves?! WILL IT?!!

Argh_Dammit: not a problem -0 wearing a fancyt tin-foil hat can scramble the RFID magic laser beams.

WHO TOLD YOU MY IDEA! *runs around screaming*

Well, I don't care.

If it will take a human lifetime, then I will be dead anyway.

Is this the mark of the Beast foretold in the book of Revelation?

If it happens it will start with parents having it done to their children 'to keep them safe' and that generation growing up with them. Not likely any time soon.

While agree the proliferation of cameras is scary, especially once the software exists to reliably identify who is doing what without human viewing, cops with helmet cams seems like a good idea.

Tom Selleck told me 16 years ago I'd be faxing from the beach.

ZAZ: Today's businesses get employees to take drug tests.

The thing I don't get is the employers running credit checks on employees. What the hell does that have to do with anything?

The thing I don't get is the employers running credit checks on employees. What the hell does that have to do with anything?

In general, bad credit and bad behavior are correlated. More specifically, people with bad credit may have more motive to steal.

http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/january2007/290107rockefellergoal.htm (new window)

ZAZ: More specifically, people with bad credit may have more motive to steal.

I have bad credit, but it's a carefully cultivated bad credit. I don't want anyone to give me credit because I don't want to go into debt. and keeping a few black marks on my credit rating keeps the credit card junk mail to a minimum. But I'm not going to steal from my employer.

Alacritous

I'm sure my credit score is awful too (mainly, no debt or credit). We should probably look for work with companies that think of us as people rather than numbers.

But I can believe in a correlation between credit score and job performance.

Alacritous: ZAZ: More specifically, people with bad credit may have more motive to steal.

I have bad credit, but it's a carefully cultivated bad credit. I don't want anyone to give me credit because I don't want to go into debt. and keeping a few black marks on my credit rating keeps the credit card junk mail to a minimum. But I'm not going to steal from my employer.


That's what opt-out lists are for. When I had worse credit than I do now, I was getting junk mail -- and soft inquiries -- out the ying-yang. After I opted-out a while ago, my junk mail became limited to local grocery inserts. My credit is a little better. The only bad part is that I will never receive those awesome little invitation-only offers other people receive... but I will try to live with it.

Bad marks are not cool. Particularly when they are false, but that goes without saying. Is it true you Euros who post here only have to worry about 'bad marks' for 2 years and inquiries for 1 year? instead of being like us Yanks and having to live with the biblical 7 year standard and companies who are re-age happy?

why embed them? Why not an RFID bracelet or just an RFID embedded ID card? I think the author of that article greatly underestimates how repulsed the general population would be at the idea of FORCED body modification.

GreekMaria: Is this the mark of the Beast foretold in the book of Revelation?

Yes. You should go meet Jesus early, he's going to get busy.

/can I have your stuff?

came for the Futurama reference, leaving satisfied.


/link is hot

I will cheerfully dig said chip out of my body and mount it inside of a wristwatch band.
I could then comply with the law, while being free to be anonymous any time I take the watch off.

ZAZ: The thing I don't get is the employers running credit checks on employees. What the hell does that have to do with anything?

In general, bad credit and bad behavior are correlated. More specifically, people with bad credit may have more motive to steal.

In Georgia, not so many employers run credit checks, but far more instead run criminal background checks. This I agree with more than a credit check, since bad credit and stupid decisions are better correlated than bad credit and bad behavior.
Bad behavior and more bad behavior, on the other hand, corellate a bit more often.

After having to get my fingerprints taken before the state would release a background check that was a condition of a job I was recently offered, I can definitely see this happening. Will this happen anytime soon? Probably not. Within 50 years? It just may.

PirateFreedom: If it happens it will start with parents having it done to their children 'to keep them safe' and that generation growing up with them. Not likely any time soon.

While agree the proliferation of cameras is scary, especially once the software exists to reliably identify who is doing what without human viewing, cops with helmet cams seems like a good idea.


Cops with helmet cams is great, as long as the cops don't find ways to disable the helmet cams when they're in the wrong. As for your first paragraph -- +1. If I could vote.

Does not approve.

In Georgia, not so many employers run credit checks, but far more instead run criminal background checks.

Access to criminal records -- really, access to the database listing records by name instead of case number -- varies from state to state. Georgia may be more generous to employers.

Power Skunk: ZAZ: The thing I don't get is the employers running credit checks on employees. What the hell does that have to do with anything?

In general, bad credit and bad behavior are correlated. More specifically, people with bad credit may have more motive to steal.

In Georgia, not so many employers run credit checks, but far more instead run criminal background checks. This I agree with more than a credit check, since bad credit and stupid decisions are better correlated than bad credit and bad behavior.
Bad behavior and more bad behavior, on the other hand, corellate a bit more often.

Speaking of criminal background checks.......... guess what on that one, too? It's a USAToday article, but

Study could ease concerns over hiring ex-offenders : "A study funded by the Justice Department concludes that over time accused robbers, burglars and batterers pose no greater risk to employers than job candidates in the general population.

In a review of 88,000 arrestees in New York state, Carnegie Mellon University investigators found, for example, that after about 7 1/2 years the "hazard rate" for an 18-year-old first-time arrestee for robbery declined to the same rate as an 18-year-old in the general population. For 18-year-olds arrested for aggravated assault, it took about four years to reduce the risk.

Hazard rates are calculated based on the time the suspect remains free from re-arrest. The calculation also accounts for the fact that risk of arrest generally declines with age."



Again, if you know how to work the system, you can be as bad as that pothead with a record or .. say (more seriously).. the young Charles Dutton .. but because you know how to work the system or can network to work the system, you will never have that record in the first place.

Anyway, I wonder what Bernie Madoff's criminal background looked like... or the background checks of all those people in those good jobs in lending, jobs which require perfect credit to be hired, jobs which led to all the toxic 'assets' we're buried under today? That's what I thought.

There comes a point where it's ok to give people second chances. Or a first.

Good, that way I can walk into Panera and they will automatically make the sandwich I always order.

ZAZ: The thing I don't get is the employers running credit checks on employees. What the hell does that have to do with anything?

In general, bad credit and bad behavior are correlated. More specifically, people with bad credit may have more motive to steal.

Next, companies won't hire people who have a family history of health problems. If someone has relatives with cancer or heart disease, they'll be more likely to steal to pay for medical treatment. Or they'll get sick themselves, costing the company labour lost and the insurance company that covers their health care will have to pay out. If you engage in activities that are deemed health risks, you may not be hired either. Smoke and drink more than a certain limit of drinks in a week deemed as health? Like to go paragliding and rock climbing? Sorry, you're too much of a risk. Like to randomly hook up with strangers? Yup, you could get a STD. Calculated as obese by the BMI? Sorry, you too.

They will separate the good people who make nice, productive workers from the bad people who might cut into the profits. Any person who is deemed a financial or security risk by the corporate world will be out in the cold, unemployable and uninsurable, a second class citizen.

He tried to buy food! He does not have the mark of the beast! The fool!



// needs more Jack Chick

tmroelke: Good, that way I can walk into Panera and they will automatically make the sandwich I always should order.

FTFY

PirateFreedom: If it happens it will start with parents having it done to their children 'to keep them safe' and that generation growing up with them. Not likely any time soon.

While agree the proliferation of cameras is scary, especially once the software exists to reliably identify who is doing what without human viewing, cops with helmet cams seems like a good idea.

I figure parents will be the reason we will turn to eugenics. If we can change or repair DNA than it will start with getting rid of genes that lead to cancer and diabetes. Than someone will want their son to be football star, ballarina, or the next Einstien and their genes will be tweeked invitro. Parents will make their kids perfect for two reasons one because they love the kids and want them to have advantages that they didn't or percieve they didn't and two to satisfy their own ego that if I have perfect children I must be perfect. How huch of your kids DNA can you change before they are really not your offspring?

ExperianScaresCthulhu

In some, or most or all, states ordinary employers do not have access to criminal history more than a few years old. A standard employment application I saw asks for felony convictions within the past seven years ("answering yes will not disqualify you"). So the system does agree with the principle that felons can be rehabilitated a bit over time.

That ancient conviction will still have bad consequences if you want a government-regulated job. And you can't get that good job seven years later after being forced to flip burgers for seven years, if you're even allowed to work a job with as much customer contact as food service. But in theory the system kind of agrees.

If I could reform the criminal justice system, the main principle would be no consequence of a crime would last more than 10-15 years after the crime itself, except if you've been executed you stay dead. This general principle implies limitations on lookback of criminal history reports, maximum sentences, and statutes of limitations.

Why come you got no chip?

clusterfrak: I figure parents will be the reason we will turn to eugenics. If we can change or repair DNA than it will start with getting rid of genes that lead to cancer and diabetes. Than someone will want their son to be football star, ballarina, or the next Einstien and their genes will be tweeked invitro. Parents will make their kids perfect for two reasons one because they love the kids and want them to have advantages that they didn't or percieve they didn't and two to satisfy their own ego that if I have perfect children I must be perfect. How huch of your kids DNA can you change before they are really not your offspring?

Well, people will learn real fast that tinkering with genetics almost always results in sterility. So I don't think the trend will last long.

You people are slipping:

And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.

Came for the "tinfoil hat" comments, leaving quite happy.


/seriously, quit wearing the tinfoil.
//go get a damn girlfriend.

Just so long as I'm not hired to start a hype riot at the local mall.

DrFGeek: Just so long as I'm not hired to start a hype riot at the local mall.

I wouldn't want a barcode that close to my eye... Anywhere else would be cool, but not where a slacker salesdroid could blind me by missing the barcode by an inch.

Friggin unscannables. Apes.. the lot of you.

GreekMaria 2009-07-05 10:38:04 AM
Is this the mark of the Beast foretold in the book of Revelation?"


// very close to it, the final model will be a nano device, thin as a human hair > 1/4" long. Inject-able by air-gun. lodged in the bone of hand or skull.

It makes so much sense for the govt, so handy, convenient, logical, no theft, tax evasion, no searching for criminals, a suspects worldly functions can be shutdown from a central location almost instantly.
walking in inhabited areas results in instant location awareness.

Unless a person has a -very powerful- inner resolve they will take the chip rather than give up driving licence, ability to buy & sell, vote or receive medical care, becoming an instant felon.

money & gold under mattress will be useless since it will be illegal to trade[buy/sell] with or own.
Nice rural Property? that can be seized with a couple of keystrokes.

Its an idea that would have given Julius Caesar a permanent erection.
it will become law first in the UK, then rest of EU.

The US & then the world will have profound economic and weather related troubles that will make recent events seem like the golden age of prosperity,

then the US will experience a massive civil rebellion, and finally citizens are castrated with mandatory chips and a rewritten constitution...
many millions will be killed over this.

LIVE FREE OR DIE
[Primitive mottoes like that will be purged from the govts of the US & other countries]

LIVE FREE....

it won't happen in the Land of the Free. because we are....Free. i guess, anyways.

er...i think so.

that's what they said on TV anyway.

I seriously, seriously doubt it. If it becomes common, it would not have to be made mandatory, in a generation it will be accepted.

I know I'd get one, along with a cell phone implant in the head. I'd really wish the implanted cellphone got made mandatory, because I HATE not being able to get ahold of people.