New Voice to Skull Technology Freaks Out New Yorkers
December 26, 2007
New Voice to Skull Technology Freaks Out New Yorkers
Below you will find an interesting article that unveils to the world the use of voice to skull technology - i.e. the projection of voices into your head. Our natural reaction, depending on what kind of person you are, is either wow ain't it cool or holy hell what is going on?
When those of us with a slight view to history and technology look at it, it is anything but great or cool. This technology was developed in the 1960's (and misused by goverments against unsuspecting people for the past 50 years) and shown to the public by Nick Begich on the Wendy Mesley show on CBC some years ago - of course the video footage has disappeared down the memory hole since then. This technology was invented and used in the 1960's but kept from the public for the past 50 years (like many other technologies including cell phone technology). This sounds like standard operating procedure to me. The elitist powers that be have developed various technologies then give them to the public many decades later and only when the technologies serve their agenda.
OK. So the question becomes how does hearing voices in your head serve their agenda?
Well, do you have an iPod or other MP3 player? These devices are getting us used to hearing voices in our heads. Hmmm... I wonder why? Simply, it is a conditioning exercise to make us all familiar with hearing voices in our heads in preparation for "future" technologies where this is the norm. This could be mind controlled interactive game control consoles, communications with friends and family, or orders from your government.
Ultimately, this inevitabley leads to the body/brain chip, which initially will be presented as a benefit and heralded by its initial participants as completely amazing due to its convenience, its benefit to the sick and elderly, and amazing online social and sexual interactions. Unfortunately, the end game of the implantable microchip is in reality the end of free humanity. AI super computers, which already exist, will ultimately control the thoughts and minds of all those with implanted chips. After enough people are implanted, the rest can be forced and the switch will be thrown and all those implanted made subservient to the computer and the elite that control them.
As the National Science Foundation report in 2002 "Converging Technologies for Improving Human Performance" stated you could become part of the hive mind.
"If we can easily exchange large chunks of knowledge and are connected by high-bandwidth communication paths, the function and purpose served by individuals becomes unclear. Individuals have served to keep the gene pool stirred up and healthy via sexual reproduction, but this datahandling process would no longer necessarily be linked to individuals. With knowledge no longer encapsulated in individuals, the distinction between individuals and the entirety of humanity would blur. Think Vulcan mind-meld. We would perhaps become more of a hive mind — an enormous, single, intelligent entity."
You've been warned! Hmmm... I think I might be overusing that statement but I can't help myself.
After you read the article below, I'll talk about some of the spin in the article.
Hear Voices? It May Be an Ad
NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- New Yorker Alison Wilson was walking down Prince Street in SoHo last week when she heard a woman's voice right in her ear asking, "Who's there?
Who's there?" She looked around to find no one in her immediate surroundings.
Then the voice said, "It's not your imagination." No, he's not crazy: Our intrepid reporter Andrew Hampp ventures to SoHo to hear for himself the technology that has New Yorkers 'freaked out' and A&E buzzing. Indeed it isn't.
It's an ad for "Paranormal State," a ghost-themed series premiering on A&E this week.
The billboard uses technology manufactured by Holosonic that transmits an "audio spotlight" from a rooftop speaker so that the sound is contained within your cranium.
The technology, ideal for museums and libraries or environments that require a quiet atmosphere for isolated audio slideshows, has rarely been used on such a scale before.
For random passersby and residents who have to walk unwittingly through the area where the voice will penetrate their inner peace, it's another story. Ms. Wilson, a New York-based stylist, said she expected the voice inside her head to be some type of creative project but could see how others might perceive it differently, particularly on a late-night stroll home.
"I might be a little freaked out, and I wouldn't necessarily think it's coming from that billboard," she said. Less-intrusive approach? Joe Pompei, president and founder of Holosonics, said the creepy approach is key to drawing attention to A&E's show.
But, he noted, the technology was designed to avoid adding to noise pollution.
"If you really want to annoy a lot of people, a loudspeaker is the best way to do it," he said.
"If you set up a loudspeaker on the top of a building, everybody's going to hear that noise.
But if you're only directing that sound to a specific viewer, you're never going to hear a neighbor complaint from street vendors or pedestrians.
The whole idea is to spare other people." Holosonics has partnered with a cable network once before, when Court TV implemented the technology to promote its "Mystery Whisperer" in the mystery sections of select bookstores.
Mr. Pompei said the company also has tested retail deployments in grocery stores with Procter & Gamble and Kraft for customized audio messaging.
So a customer, for example, looking to buy laundry detergent could suddenly hear the sound of gurgling water and thus feel compelled to buy Tide as a result of the sonic experience. Mr. Pompei contends that the technology will take time for consumers to get used to, much like the lights on digital signage and illuminated billboards did when they were first used.
The website Gawker posted an item about the billboard last week with the headline "Schizophrenia is the new ad gimmick," and asked "How soon will it be until in addition to the do-not-call list, we'll have a 'do not beam commercial messages into my head' list?" "There's going to be a certain population sensitive to it.
But once people see what it does and hear for themselves, they'll see it's effective for getting attention," Mr. Pompei said. More disruptions A&E's $3 million to $5 million campaign for "Paranormal" includes other more disruptive elements than just the one audio ad in New York.
In Los Angeles, a mechanical face creeps out of a billboard as if it's coming toward the viewer, and then recedes.
In print, the marketing team persuaded two print players to surrender a full editorial page to their ads, flipping the gossip section in AM New York upside down and turning a page in this week's Parade into a checkerboard of ads for "Paranormal." It's not the network's first foray into supernatural marketing, having launched a successful viral campaign for "Mind Freak" star Criss Angel earlier this year that allowed users to trick their friends into thinking Mr. Angel was reading their mind via YouTube. "We all know what you need to do for one of these shows is get people talking about them," said Guy Slattery, A&E's exec VP-marketing.
"It shouldn't be pure informational advertising.
When we were talking about marketing the show, nearly everyone had a connection with a paranormal experience, and that was a surprise to us.
So we really tried to base the whole campaign on people's paranormal experiences." So was it a ghost or just an annoyed resident who stole the speaker from the SoHo billboard twice in one day last week?
Horizon Media, which helped place the billboard, had to find a new device that would prevent theft from its rooftop location.
Mr. Pompei only takes it as a compliment that someone would go to the trouble of stealing his technology, but hopes consumer acceptance comes with time.
"The sound isn't rattling your skull, it's not penetrating you, it's not doing anything nefarious at all.
It's just like having a flashlight vs. a light bulb," he said.
"Designed to avoid noise pollution." Excuse me but beaming noise into my head is noise pollution and moreover an invasion of privacy.
"But once people see what it does and hear for themselves, they'll see it's effective for getting attention." Oh, it's effective all right but where does it end? It ends with the 24/7 projection of marketing messages into your head to the exclusion of all else.
"The sound isn't rattling your skull, it's not penetrating you, it's not doing anything nefarious at all." Not penetrating or nefarious. Are you fucking kidding me? This is doublethink at its best. Forcing someone to listen to a marketing message against their will is nefarious and an invasion of privacy. They are out of their minds or at least they think we are so stupid and compliant we'll accept it as good and normal. I for one will not - will you?