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The City of Sun: Panopticon, Synopticon and Omniopticon – Big Brother and the

Giant with Thousand Eyes

Loss of liberty is inimical to all forms of literature... The fact is that certain themes cannot be celebrated in words,

and tyranny is one of them. No one ever wrote a good book in praise of the Inquisition.

George Orwell

What it was conventionalized as aparadigmaticviewoftheworldandofthepower,emergedasalogicalstructurethatknewitsmostsplendorous moment between the 15th and the20th centuries–whenagradualdominationofa

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verballogichappened,brilliantlycapturedbythephysicsasmechanics.

It iswhenthebookUniverse,defendedbyBacon,passes tobedescribedasaperfectclockmechanism.

Surely, one of the most curious andfascinatingworksthatillustratesuchphenomenon–speciallyregardingthesurveillance–isthebookCivitas Solis, orThe City of the Sun byTommasoCampanella,writtenin1602.

In it, Campanella shows the ideal city,wherepeaceandlovearesovereign,placemadeofmultiple circles, and directed by three chiefs.Thefirstone,thePower,dealswithsurveillance.Thesecond,theKnowledge,whichisinformation,obliges all arts, sciences and schools. The third,Love,commandshumanreproduction,establishingcriteriaofselectionlikethecoloroftheeyes,thestatureorthecolorofthehair,forexample.

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In the imaginary City of the Sun, nobodycan by owner of anything because, explainsCampanella, «the love for the publics thingincreasesaccordinglytothedegreeofrenouncetotheparticularinterest».Thus,nobodycanreceiveprivatefavors.

Music is permitted only to women and,sometimes, also to children. Workshops aredirected by oldmen andwomenwhopunish orcommandthepunishmentofwhorefusetoobey.Youngpeopleareobligedtoservethosewhoareolderthanfortyyears.Itisforbiddentomakeanynoiseinthemomentsdedicatedtomeals.

Doctorscommandcookersaboutwhattheycanornotprepare.Sexisonlypermittedtowomenolderthannineteenandtomenolderthantwenty-one.Sexual relationsofwhohadsurpassed limitageswhereregulatedbythechiefdoctor.

Even the names of the newborn weredetermined by the general director. All people,

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in this imaginary city, were obliged to regularlyconfess, being permanently controlled in theirthoughts.

TommasoCampanella’sdescriptionportraitsanidealcityasaprison!EverythingintheCity of the Sunisarchitectonicandpermanentlysubmittedtoacontinuousprocessofsurveillanceandcontrol.

Almost three hundred years after theintriguing work by Campanella, it would be thetime of Jeremy Bentham, through a collectionof letters written in 1787 in Russia to “a friendin England” – possibly inspired on his brother’sinvention–toestablishidealprinciplesofsocietybasedonpermanentsurveillance.

ItisaboutthecelebratedarchitectureprojectPanopticon,whichbecamefamousthroughMichelFoucault’sbookSurveiller et punir: Naissance de la prison,publishedin1975.

SimilaritiesbetweenCampanella’sidealcity

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and the Bentham’s ideal building, which wouldpermitanequallyidealsociety,areflagrant.

HoweverthePanopticonhavebeenalmostalways taken as a design for an ideal prison, itoriginallywasmuchmorethanthat.

In his proposal, Bentham names thePanopticon as the Inspection-House – anarchitecturalconceptapplicabletopenitentiaries,but also to social housing, industries, hospitals,hospicesandschoolsamongothers.

When referring to the Panopticom in hisfirstletter,Benthamsaysthatitis«anewmodeofobtainingpowerofmindovermind».

In the second letter, he gives a detaileddescriptionofthearchitectonicconcept,notonlyevidencingtherelationswithCampanella’scityasestablishing logical links with plane perspectivetechnique,makingeverythingcontrolledbylight:

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«The building is circular. The apartmentsof the prisoners occupy the circumference. Youmaycallthem,ifyouplease,thecells.Thesecellsaredivided fromoneanother, and theprisonersby thatmeans secluded fromall communicationwitheachother,bypartitionsintheformofradiiissuingfromthecircumferencetowardsthecenter,and extending asmany feet as shall be thoughtnecessary to form the largest dimension of thecell.Theapartmentoftheinspectoroccupiesthecenter;youmaycallit,ifyouplease,theinspector’s lodge. Itwill be convenient inmost, if not in allcases, to have a vacant space or area all round,between such center and such circumference.You may call it, if you please, the intermediateorannulararea.(…)Eachcellhasintheoutwardcircumference, awindow, largeenoughnotonlytolightthecellbut,throughthecell,toaffordlightenough to the correspondent part of the lodge.The innercircumferenceof thecell is formedbyanirongrating,solightasnottoscreenanypartofthecellfromtheinspector’sview».

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Each moment of the prisoner, studentof worker in an industry can be permanentlyfollowedbyaninspectorwho,butitsturn,cannotbecontrolled,orevensaw,bywhoisobserved.

In his fifth letter, Bentham says: «Theessence of it consists, then, in the centrality oftheinspector’ssituation,combinedwiththewell-knownandmosteffectualcontrivancesforseeing without being seen».

Inthenextletter,heisproudofhisproject:«…theapparentomnipresenceoftheinspector(ifdivines will allow me the expression) combinedwith the extreme facility of his real presence.(…) Another very important advantage… is thatthe servants or subordinates of every kind,will be under the same irresistible control withrespecttotheheadkeeperorinspector…Itisthiscircumstance that renders the influence of thisplan not less beneficial towhat is called liberty,thanthenecessarycoercion…».

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Bentham’sideasandwordsarethebaseofwhatwouldbepopularlyknownasfiscal terrorisminthetwentycentury.

The word Panopticon means “seeing all”.It indicates the ideaof controlon theactionsofmanypeoplebyafewones.

OneoftheaspectsofBentham’sPanopticonis thesolitude. In itsarchitecture,allaresolitaryandpermanentlycontolled.

Inacertainsense,thisconditionofsolitudeunder continuous surveillance illustrates one oftheaspectsofthecyberworldasitwasestablishedin the beginning of the 21st century: millions ofpeople more and more solitary, permanentlysurveyed by artificial intelligence systems in thecapture,identificationandtreatmentofdata.

Panopticon launches itself to the Greekmyth of Argus Panoptes, who saw everything,neverbeingseeing.Inoneofversionsofthemyth,

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Arguswouldhaveonlyoneeye,butomnipresent.Inanotherone,hewouldhavefoureyes,eachoneturnedtoacardinalpoint.Finally,hewouldbeabodycoveredbyeyes.

Panoptes–thatmeans“whoseeeverything”– was a giant with an extraordinary force thathad freed Arcadia from the terrible attacks of afurious bull.More than this, he finished to be akindofpoliceforcethatprotectedshepherdsandfarmers.

Hermes – Toth in the Ancient Egypt, godthatwouldhaveMercuryashiscorrespondentintheRomanworld–was themurderof thegiantArgusPanoptes.

It is importanttounderstandwhowasthemurderofPanoptesastocomprehendsomethingaboutitsmythicaldimension.

Thoth was the god of writing, of theliterature;theonewhomadepossibletheexistence

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ofallothergods,because ishimwhoallowstheemergenceofhistory.

Itisthehistory–whichintheGreekHermesmeansthefunctionofaguideofthought,ofpsyche–thateliminatesthemonsterwhoseeseverything,withoutbeingseen,overwhelmingdemonstrationofpower,ofcontrol.

ThewordArgoetymologicallymeans“bright”and“fast”.Whenweaskedourselvesaboutwhatwouldbe,inlogicalterms,thesensorialuniversesthatimplicateintheirveryfirstnaturetheabsolutecontrol,withoutpossibledefense,thepassageofinformationwithoutbarriers,theyarehearingandsmell.

We can close your eyes, not touch andnot eat. But there are no barriers in smell andhearing.Weenterinsideanenvironmentandfeel,inevitably,itsfragrancesanditssound.

Eachspacehasasound.

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Becauseofthis,hearingandsmellareveryfirstreferencesofpower,ofcontrol.

Thus, in non-visual cultures, stronglyacoustic, everything must be controlled at alltime.What emerges as the concept of freedomintheindependenceofdecisions,freeofcontrol,appearswiththeestablishmentofamorestronglyliteraryandhistoricalculture.

It is that culture what kills the giant ArgoPanoptes, but it is also it that succumbs to thesame monster that controls everything whenthesensorialpaletteischangedintheendofthetwentieth and beginning of the twentieth-firstcenturythroughvirtualmedia.

If Campanella depicts the City of the Sunas the perfect city in the form of a prison; it isBentham’sprisonwhataspires tobeeverything,toconditionandforgeaperfectsociety.

LikeArgo–andnotwithoutagoodreason–

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Bentham’sprisoniscalledPanopticonandappearsseven years after Luigi Galvani’s discovery thatelectricitycouldcontrolmusclemovement.Thirty-five years before, Benjamin Franklin had arguedthatlightwasaformofelectricityandinventedthelightbulb,knownaslightning rods,announcingthebeginningofwhatwouldbe an electronicworldtwohundredyearslater.Thatis,thehumanbeingcontrollingnatureinitsmodus operandi.

Inasense,Benthamwasprescient,inlogicalterms, aboutwhatwould be the end of the so-calledverbalimperialismand,therefore,hewasautopiainhistime.

Jeremy Bentham’s system was never putinto practice and ended up almost forgotten fornearlytwohundredyears–whenitwaspickedupbyFoucaultin1975,inthebeginningoftheglobaldigitalrevolution.

ToBentham’sPanopticonopposesSynopticon– a concept ellaborated in 1987 by Thomas

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Mathiesen, Norwegian sociologist, indicating asocietyofvoyeurs,where few controlmany, likewhathappenswithpublicfiguresandmedia.

Tothesetwoconcepts,wecouldaddanotherone:theomniopticon–whenmonitoringbecomesarticulated inside a framework operating bycoordination, incorporating both the panopticonandthesynopticoneffects,butalsothecontrolofeverybodybyeverybody.

It is exactly what we see in thehypercommunciation global networks real timestructures.

Messages are constantly captured bygovernment agents, especially in terms of fiscalterrorism;millionsofpeopleseekinginformationof any kind about their idols – being possibleeventoseewheretheylivethroughGoogle Earthor Google Maps, for example; and systems likeFaceBook or MySpace, but especially Twitter,establish a network for continuous exchange ofsuperficialinformation.

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In all these cases information is alwayssuperficial.

Theoldhierarchyofcontrol,aimingspecificgroups,begantobeextendedtoall–accordingtoalow powerlogic.

State espionage passed to recall, amongotherinformation,numbers,indicesoftransactionsor evidence of illicit enrichment – but neverknowingtheperson.Thisconditionhasmadethatgrosserrorsstartedtoberegularlycommittedinnameofanapparentbutfalseisonomy.

Espionage of the State against the personwentsofarastheFrenchgovernmentdeterminedin 2006, a price to pay for telecommunicationscompanies for each person being spied upon.Arguing that these prices would prevent theexplosionofcosts in telecommunicationservices–giventhehugeamountofbuggedout-Franceestablishedafreetradeofespionage.

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In China, most of the seventy thousand taxis inBeijingareequippedwithsurveillancesystemsandGPSlocators,allowingacontinuousandimmediateintelligencelocationofvehicles.

SincelongtimeithasbeenknownthattheMafia and other Italian criminal organizationsestablish an acoustic espionage strategy that, insome sense, is very similar to those performedby thegovernmentsof FranceandChinaamongothers.

ThePacific Northwest National Laboratoryannouncedthedevelopmentavisualizationsystemthatoperatesinashortwavespectrum,sothatitcan“see”throughfabrics,butnotmetal,plasticorskin. Thus, thisparticular camera caneasily takeoutvirtuallytheclothesofaperson,evenifheisfullycovered.

Withobviousutility in the identificationofplastic explosives, such equipmentmay result inmattersassimpleasknowingwhoadmitsornot

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tobestrippedbyapoliceofficer.

Butnow,theexpansionofspyingoncitizenswent far beyond the old division that existedbetweengangsandtheState,betweendemocraticand dictatorial regimes, or even betweenindividuals.

Inalltheseconditions,valuesandintimatestory of the person, which is strategicallytransformedintonumber,hasn’tgreatimportance.Thiserasingofpersonalhistoryisoneofthecentralelementsintheconceptknownas“crime”.

I met one case, for example, of a personwho received a heavy fine for speed excess inSwitzerland.Thepersondidnotliveinthecountry,butknewtherouteandknewtherewasafail inthesignaling–asoftenhappens,thoughrarelyinSwitzerland.Heknew that todealwith thefine,would be required to hire a lawyer and get intoa lawsuit that would cost much more than theexpensivefine.

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Anautomaticsensordetectedspeedexcess.Therewasnoconsiderationfortheperson,orforany conditionsof its action. The resulthasbeenautomatically notified and in fact, there was nopossibledefense–evenbecausethepersonwaslivinginanothercountry.

Complaintsaboutsensorsthatrecordwrongspeedsarenotuncommon,butitisnotpossibletoprove.Theonlyevidencethatauthoritiespresentisaphotographshowingthatthevehiclewasthere,butthereisnowaytoprovethattherereallywasaninfringement.

A low power blindly applied, operating inlowintensityandlargespectrum.

In May 2009, the BBC announced that«thousandsofAutomaticNumberPlateRecognitioncamerasarealreadyoperatingonBritain’sroads.PoliceforcesacrossEngland,WalesandScotlandwillsoonbeabletosharetheinformationonone

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central computer. Officers say it is a useful toolin fighting crime, but critics say the network issecretiveandunregulated».

That same story had a terrible historyexperienced by a resident of Brighton: «JohnCatt found himself on the wrong side of theANPR system. He regularly attends anti-wardemonstrationsoutsideafactory inBrighton,hishometown. It was at one of these protests thatSussexpoliceputa“marker”onhiscar.Thatmeanthewasaddedtoa“hotlist”.ThisisasystemmeantforcriminalsbutJohnCatthasnotbeenconvictedofanythingandonatriptoLondon,thepensionerfoundhimselfpulledoverbyananti-terrorunit.“Iwas threatenedunder theTerroristAct. I had toanswereveryquestiontheyputtome,andiftherewere any questions I would refuse to answer, Iwouldbearrested.Ithoughttomyself,whatkindofworldarewelivingin?”.SussexPolicedoesnottalkaboutthecase».

Low Power Society does not know theperson,butonly a statisticdata. Thus, in almost

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most cases, the transit police abandoned its oldeducationroleandstartedworkedpracticallyonlyforinvoicingwiththeaimofincreasingrevenues.In many cases, the police started to receive acommissiononthecollectedamounts–andthisalso passed to happen with good part of civilservants.

ApressnewsofJune2009clearlyillustratesthephenomenon:avanwasbadlyparkedunderan overpass in New York City. Repeatedly, forseveralweeks, officials of the trafficpolicefinedthe offender. But he was dead! For weeks, nopoliceofficerevennoticedthattherewasadeadpersoninsidethevehicle.ItwasGeorgeMorales,who died of a heart attack. Even with a strongodorofputrefyingbody,hewasonlydiscoveredwhenthecarwastowed.Forweeks,variouspoliceofficersthatwenttherehadasinglefunction:toraisemoneythroughfines.Forthem,thecitizen,themaninthecar,wasnotthemainobjective.

Justamonthearlier, inMay2009,theBBC

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denounced that therewas a surveillance systemandaDNAdatabase-thenwithgeneticinformationof nearly fivemillion people - controlled by theBritishauthorities.

SurveillancesystemsinBritainwerealreadyso developed and refined that they had evensmaller flying objects for capturing images andsound,knownasaerialrobotsordrones,remotelycontrolledbycomputers,«Unmannedsurveillancedroneswerefirstusedbythepolicein2008.Thedrones are lightweight weighing around 1.5kg,relativelyquietbeingbatterypowered,cancarrydifferentcamerasandareremotecontrolled.Theycanflyorhoverwhiletransmittingliveimagestoanoperatoronthegroundandcanoperateduringthedayoratnight.UnmannedaerialvehiclesorUAVscanbeusedformanydifferentactivitiessuchassearchingforfirearmsormissingpersons,roadtrafficaccidentsandsurveillanceaftera terroristattack. The police are already using drones foraerial surveillance in Merseyside, Essex andStaffordshire».

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In several countries, without peopleknowledge,andwithincreasingregularity,variousproducts, in addition to cars and even clothing,havebeenmanufacturedandmarketedwithRFIDRadio Frequency Identification chips. Sensors atdistancecandetectthosechips.

Interestingly, likewhat happenedwith thebeginning of the Internet,RFID technology grewoutofmilitaryuse. Itsuse is currently extendedeven tohospitals, embedded in small objects orbraceletswithpatient’sidentifiers.

For Phil Zimmermann, specialist on digitalsecurity and privacy, «whenwe create a systemwherepolicehasamucheasierwork,itwillbealimitwhereifitbecomestooeasyyoucanfallinapoliceState».

Butitisnotonlythepolice.Inthesummerof2009,afriendwholivesinNewYorkneededtosendasmallamountofmoneytohisson,whowasliving inChile.Hecalled thebankandrequested

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the transfer. An official from the bank started,then,theconventionalinterrogationaskinghisfullname,taxIDnumber,creditcardnumber,address,date of birth, place of birth, telephone number,mother’sname,aswellastheanswertoasecurityquestion previously established for the identityverification.Allthesedatawerekeptinthebank.Whenallquestionsweresatisfactorilyanswered,hewastransferredtoanotherperson,whoinitiatedanewinterrogatoryinordertovalidatethepreviousidentification.Thenthepersonaskedhimifhehadacar,whatkind,yearofmanufacture,whenitwaspurchased,itscolor,thestatethevehiclewas,itsregistrationnumber,themodelandhowmuchhepaid annually for its insurance! The same couldhavehappenedinrelationtohishouse,oranythingelse.Thebankand,ofcourse,itsemployees,hadaccesstoallthisinformation!

Chinawaspreparingtolaunchinthefirstyearsofthetwenty-firstcentury,anInternetnetworkfullycontrolled and kept under strict control by thegovernment, extending the espionage to other

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globalnetworks.

In 1998, astrophysicist and author DavidBrin,authorofThe Transparent Society,said:«Nomatter howmany laws are passed, it will provequiteimpossibletolegislateawaythesurveillancetoolsanddatabases.Theyareheretostay».

Theargumentthatthecontrolofinformationisademocracyconditionforthebenefitofallandthatissomethingfreeforpeopleofanysocialclassisfalse,becauseinapoliceStatefewcontroltheinformation on many and such situation alwaysgeneratedallsortsofabusesandcorruption.MustnotforgetthatthenaziregimemadeextensiveuseofIBMHollerithpunch-cardmachines,masteringthe information inorder tooversee, control andselectthosewhoshoulddie.

Inapostliteratureworldthereisnohistory–keyfactorofidentityfromtheRenaissancetothetwentieth century. Thus, under the bureaucraticpoint of view the constraints of ethical action

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seemtobeirrelevantand,inanapparentparadox,seemtobecomerelevantunderamoralpointofview–reversingtheoldconditionof the literarysocieties. Everything that concerns dominionsandterritories,materialorimmaterial,practicallydisappear;buteverythingwhatconcernssymbolicqualities – like “the poor”, “the refugees”, “therich”,“minorities”–passtobeintheforeground,withoutidentifyingtheprocessundertheaction.Whatremindsusthatthecontentofanewmediumisitspreviousone,inthiscaseliteraturetakenascontent,whilestronglysymboliccontingent.

The most impressive is that the processof control and surveillancepassed to be appliedby parents to children and teenagers, withoutallowingthattheymightgrowinanenvironmentoffreedom.

Monitors attached to children and infants,allowing parents to hear them at distances ofmore than one hundred fifty feet have becomecommonplace.Frombirth–onbehalfoftheirsafety

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–childrenpassedtobeconstantlymonitored.

Withthegrowthofchildren,parentspassedto use beeps, GPS location systems and mobilephonesinordertocontroltheirmovements.

In several amusement parks around theworld, has become common for parents to rentbracelets or location straps with GPS chips, tocontrol the children who were apparently free.The removalof surveillanceequipmentwasonlypossible with the use of special instruments. Infact,onbehalfoftheirsafety,childrenbegantobetreatedmuchlikeprisoners.

Oneof themostcontroversial instrumentsofcontrolwastheVeriChip,thefirstFDAFoodandDrugAdministrationapprovedhuman-implantableRFID radio-frequency identification microchip tobeimplantedinchildren.

And, paradoxically, as the geographerand environmentalist Cindi Katz says, «these

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technologiesalsorepresentthe“defense”againsttheabsenceoftheState»,inahyperStateworld!

Othersurveillanceandcontrolinstruments,suchaskitsforthecollectionandanalysisofhairsof children, looking for traces of illicit drug use,begantobefreelytraded.

Virtual surveillance programs controllingstepby stepallmovementsof the childrenwiththeir computerswere added towiretapping andlocationtechnologiesthroughmobilephones.

With those tools, parents started knowingwith precision all sites visited by their children,thetimeofeachvisit,thecontentofallexchangedmessages,allpasswords,telephoneconversations,identities of peoplewithwhom they talked andgeographical locations, turning children into realprisoners – in the name of their safety: peoplewhowillgrowupinsideakindofinformationalandvirtualconcentrationcamp,unabletounderstandwhattheconceptoffreedommeans!

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In the Synopticon universe, voyers haveaccesstoahugeamountofsuperficialinformationabouttheiridols–mostofwhichispre-fabricated,like kinds of avatars or “virtual masks” – onceagainrevealingliteratureasthecontentofanewmedium.

Sprout out all over the world, televisionreality show programs known as Big Brotherwere a curious phenomenon of sublimation ofthisphenomenon.There, a groupof strangers isobsessivelyobserved,asiftheywerefamousmoviestars.Theyenterintheprocessasmerestrangers,people watch them knowing that, in someway,theyaresimulacraofactorsandactresses,thoughinreallifescenes–whicharealsofake.Curiously,in several cases, they eventually become stars –butwithoutanyfunction,withoutanybackgroundorhistorybeyondhavingindiscreetlybeenseenbymillionsofotherpeople.

What happens with the emergence of aomniopticon is not only the incorporation of a

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panopticonprocess–throughmultiplesystemsofespionageonpeopleingeneral–andofasynopticonphenomenon,witha generalizedvoyeurism thatis responsible, for example, formost the designintelevisionprograms, journalismingeneralandthe politicalworld, but the intensive crossing ofvoyeurism,controlandnarcissismamongmassesofselfproclaimedcommonpeople.

Millions of web-cams were installed indiverse countries, broadcasting in real time themost intimate imagesof themostvariedtypeofpeople.

Suddenly, much of what before could bethetargetofespionagesurprisinglystartedtobegenerouslyofferedbymillionsofpeopleforwhomsecrecyandintimacyareirrelevantelements.

On the other hand, the commercializationofsmallvideocamerasandhighdefinitiondigitalphotographyatlowprices,ofteninstalledinmobilephones,enabledtheexpansionofimagesofpeople

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aroundtheworldwithouttheirconsent,andmostofthetimewithouttheirpriorknowledge.

Thankstothis,acountless,andsometimescontradictory, bureaucratic cast of laws self-proclaimeddefendersofimagerightsappeared.

Everything passed from the sphere of theobserveroftheart,tothatoflawsandrepression.ManyofthephotographsmadebythegreatHenriCartier-Bressonwouldnothavebeenpossible inthecontextofsuchintenserigorofbureaucraticofrulesandprohibitions.

In2003aroundfiftymilliondigitalcamerasweresoldintheworld.Overonehundredandfiftymillion cell phones with video and photographycamerasincorporatedweresoldinthenextyear.In July 2008 Sony celebrated a record of onehundredmillioncamerassoldsincethebeginningofitscommercialization.TwomonthslaterCanonbeatthesamerecord.Thatyear,aroundtheworld,overonehundredandfiftymilliondigitalcameras

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hadbeensold.

AccordingtothePicture Business Magazineof May 2009, only in the first four months ofthat year almost two hundred million mobilephones had been sold throughout theworld, ofwhich about 90% incorporated both video andphotographycameras.

Stillin2009,abouthalfofonehundredandtenmillionfamilieshadcamerasattachedtotheirmobile phones and they took a photo a day onaverage–meaningmorethanfivehundredmillionphotoseachmonth.

In 2007, Daniel J. Solove, a law professorat George Washington University Law School,launchedthebookThe Future of Reputation.Thebook begins with the story of a world famouseventthathappenedinthesubwayinSeoul,SouthKorea,in2005.Init,ayoungwomanbroughtadogthatdefecatedinthecarriage.Thepassengersnextaskedhertoclean.Sherefusedsimplysayingthat

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itwasnottheirbusiness.Someonephotographedthescene,usingamobilephone.Theimagewasquicklyplacedinapopularblog.

Don Park told the result of that incident:«Within hours, she was labeled gae-ttong-nyue– dog shit girl – and her pictures and parodieswere everywhere.Within days, her identity andherpastwererevealed.Requestsforinformationabout her parents and relatives started poppingupandpeoplestartedtorecognizeherbythedogandthebagshewascarryingaswellasherwatch,clearlyvisibleintheoriginalpicture.Allmentionsof privacy invasion were shouted down ... Thecommon excuse for the behavior of the peoplewasthatthegirldoesnotdeserveprivacy».

Here, the right is immediately transportedtoapublictrial–anditisimportantnevertoforgetthat the greatest tragedies of humankind werealwaysmadeonbehalfoflargemajorities.

HowardReingoldarguedthat«theshadow

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sideoftheempowermentthatcomeswithabillionandahalfpeoplebeingonlineisthesurveillanceaspect...Weusedtoworryaboutbigbrother-theState - but now of course it’s our neighbors, orpeopleonthesubway».

Oneofthepossiblescenariosasaresultoftheexpansionoftheimagescapturedbythousandsof millions of people around the world will bea radical change of the Napoleonic law, whichdesignated legal principles in many countries,mainly the Latin, establishing anenvironmentofunstableandvolatilejurisprudence.

When the trial is public, jurisprudencebecomesvolatile.Paradoxically,whenthishappens,reactionagainstchangegrows. Judgments in thepublicsquare,alloverhistory,havealwaysbeenthemostreactionary–Socratesisagoodexample.

Our concept of privacy, as well as thoserelated to copyright, are supported on the logicof the excluded middle, or third excluded,whichfundamentally is an Aristotelian principle. Even

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so, they are departments related to specificenvironments.IcandothingsinarestaurantthatIwould not do in a friend’s house, for example.AsIcanauthorizethepublicationofatextundercertainconditionsandnotunderotherones.Suchrelativity implicates a kindof territorial diagram,whichissomethingcharacteristicallyvisual.

But virtual systems set a new logicaluniverse, a new aesthetic, where the inclusionand convergence replace exclusion anddepartmentalization.

An essential issue presented by Solove isrelated to the question of memory: the entirestructureofLaw,notmatteritsnature,isbasedonthedurationofmemory,abiologicalcondition.Theestablishment of sentences, social reintegration,the criteria for the prescription – everything isdirectly related to the time we remember thefacts.

But in a universe where everything is

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recorded forever and remembered at everymoment, changing the biological nature of ourownmemories, the rootofwhatweunderstandby“Law”iscompromised.

Not only the foundation of Law, but alsoall human relations are changed. More thantolerance, understandingdraws theprinciples ofhumanrelations,andforthistohappenthedesignofmemory isvital.Theoldproverbaccording towhich truth is daughter of time illustrates thisphenomenon.

A world where there isn’t some kind ofoblivion is fertile ground for expansion of nanoconflicts.

DatapresentedinastudybytheConsumer Electronics AssociationtitledDigital Imaging: Focus on Sharingshowed,in2009,thatabout55%ofthedigitalphotostakenweresenttootherpeopleviaemailandmorethan40%wereplacedonline.

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In June2009,Photobucket, considered themost important website exclusively devoted tofree storage and distribution of digital images,withgreatimpactespeciallyforusersofcamerasinmobilephones,foundedin2003byAlexWelchandDarrenCrystalatFox Interactive Media,announcedtheyreceivedaboutfiftymillionvisitorspermonththroughout the world, with approximately eightbillion archived imageswith growthof around athousandnewimageseverytwoseconds.

In themain structureof thisphenomenonaretheso-calledsocial networks.

In2009,Facebook–createdfiveyearsbeforebyMarkZuckerberg,thenastudentatHarvard–announcedonitsfrontpagewhatwashiscentralgoal:«Givingpeoplethepowertoshareandmakethe worldmore open and connected». ThroughFacebook, quick updated information about apersoncouldbeseenbymillionsofpeople,whowould knowhabits and preferences of all kinds,alwaysdescribedbytheperson.

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Like Facebook, MySpace is a informationdatabase, often confidential and intimate, of agreatnumberofpeoplewhohappilyproclaimtheendofprivacy.

Privacyandavatar–theprojectionofanegoideal,amask...

InMay2009Facebook andMySpace wereconsideredthemostwidelyusedsocialnetworksdistributingdigitalphotos.

In 2006, MySpace already had over onehundred million members. At that time, theirgrowth was of almost two hundred and fiftythousandnewmembersperday.

Only inApril2009aboutonehundredandfifty million people had visited the three mostimportantsocialnetworks–certainlyanegligiblenumberconsideringitsthunderousgrowthrates.

Soon,peoplestartedbeingmoreandmore

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connected in networks, where what before wastaken as private and personal information wasnowtransformedintofreepubliccommunication.

InBrazilandIndiathesocialnetworkOrkut– created by Orkut Büyükkökten – was quitepopular,withmillionsofmembers. In JapanwasMixi –meaning“Imix”. InSouthKorea,Cyworldwasthemostimportantsocialnetwork,countinginthemiddleofthefirstdecadeofthetwenty-firstcentury,with92%of youngpeople agedaroundtwenty years and30%of the totalpopulation inthecountryasitsmembers!

Even social networks for dogs –Dogster –andcats–Catster–werecreated!

In June2009,Timemagazine –whichwasknown for keeping the covers to major worldfigures–hadanissuedevotedtothephenomenonTwitter, in a moment when the world was stillvigorously suffering the economic crisis thatseemed to announce a mutation at a planetary

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level.

Twitter only allows short messages of upto one hundred and forty characters, but has adynamic communication inversely proportionaltoitsinformationalsyntheticdesign–seemedtoconfirm the maxim according to which the lessinformationthebetterthecommunication.

Steven Johnson described, then, a casethat illustrates not only the success of Twitter,butalsohowanomniopticsocietyworks:«Earlierthis year I attended a daylong conference inManhattan devoted to education... about thefuture of schools. Twenty years ago, the ideasexchangedinthatconversationwouldhavebeenconfined to the minds of the participants. Tenyearsago,atranscriptmighthavebeenpublishedweeks or months later on the Web. Five yearsago,ahandfulofparticipantsmighthavebloggedabout their experiences after the fact. But thiseventwashappening in 2009, so trailing behindthe real-time, real-world conversation was an

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equally real-timeconversationonTwitter.At theoutset of the conference, our hosts announcedthatanyonewhowantedtopostlivecommentaryabout the event via Twitter should include theword#hackeduinhis140characters.Intheroom,a large display screen showed a running feedoftweets. (…) At first, all these tweets came frominside the roomandwerecreatedexclusivelybyconference participants tapping away on theirlaptopsorBlackBerrys.Butwithinhalfanhourorso,wordbegantoseepoutintotheTwitterspherethataninterestingconversationaboutthefutureofschoolswashappeningat#hackedu».

The conversation on Twitter did not endwith the end of the conference.Unlike the casewithothersocialnetworks,Twitterisnotespeciallysuitedtocomputers,butitsconcisedesignmakesitaperfecttoolformobilephonestoo–everythinginitisfastandimmediate.

In April 2009, an anti communist politicalrevoltinMoldovawasarticulatedthroughTwitter

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and the Chinese government began to exert allsortsofpressuresofcensorshiptopreventsimilareventsmayoccurinthecountry.

Ontheotherhand,inOctober2008,WiredmagazinepublishedanarticlequestioningwhetherTwittercouldpossiblybeusedasanidealtoolforplanningandconductingterroristattacks.

The experience Steven Johnson lived attheconferenceaboutthefutureoftheschool,inManhattan,passedtobeaconcreteplanetaryrealityforagrowingnumberofpeoplewhointentionallydistributes freely personal information, likethe choice of a dish in a restaurant or a simpleexperimenttowalkthestreetsofacity,alldoneinrealtime.

Whatapersoniswearingatthatmoment?Howisshefeeling?Whatisshelookingat?

Inasense,theinformationbecomestoworklikewhathappensintheacousticuniverse,where

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therearenobarriers,thatis,lowintensitypowerdistributedinlargespectrum.

In the early 1990s, the beginning of thepopularityofthecallerID–whichallowsthepersonwhoreceivesaphonecalltoknowwhatnumberiscalling–provokedalargenegativereactionofthepeople. They considered an intrusion into theiruniverseofprivacy.

Gradually, and especially after thewidespreaduseofmobilephones,thoseidentifiershave become commonplace and the protestssimplydisappeared.

Withtheknowledgeofthatsimplenumber,quicklyagiganticamountofinformationbecameaccessible. As explained by Marc Rotenberg,law professor at the Georgetown Universityand executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, the Caller ID is a mean ofobtaining personal information without priorconsentorknowledge.

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Many marketing companies, dedicated tothe sale of most varied products, started usinginformationfromtelephonecalls to identifynewmarketniches.

Not only phone calls but also cookieswithout the consent of the person being spiedupon,informationthroughtheuseofcreditcards,frequent customer cards, registration fitnesscenters,membershipprogramsoftradediscounts,magazine subscriptions and almost everythingthat characterizes the daily life of a person, hasbecomeacollectionoftruepoliceinterrogations,where large amounts of personal information –confidentialfewyearsbefore–begantocirculatefreely,andanalyzednotonlybyfiscalofficersbutalsobyvendorsofallkindsofproducts.

Everythingpassed tobecontrolled, a littleeverywhere, without knowledge of personalhistory, through a strongly omnioptic reality.

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For David Lyon, «the home, once a sacrosancthaven from ‘public’ life, increasingly finds itselfto be the site of surveillance. Governmentadministrationgainseasyaccesstodetailsofwholiveswithwhom,andthisaffectsvotingcapacityorwelfareentitlements,while commercial agenciesencounterfewobstaclestoanalyzingthefinancialstanding and consumer preferences of eachhouseholdinagivenstreet».

Power is control. Thus, all power impliesanasymmetry inknowledge.Whentherelationsofknowledgetendtosymmetry,power tends todisappear.

Whathappensintheomniopticrealityofthelowpowersocietyistheexpansionoflarge-scalestructure of micro-asymmetries of knowledge,givingrisetoanillusionofatendencytosymmetry,ofthestrengthenofthedemocraticspirit.

Thus, all political discourse in theestablishmentofnewsurveillancetoolsisbasedon

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theideasthattheywillservetoensuredemocracyandindividualrights.