big brother blogspot

so, as i was saying, an age ago, this dude called jeremy bentham designed the perfect prison. along came michel foucault, and immediately realised how pertintent the panopticon was to present society. how the kind of insidious, subtle, objectifying control (his words, not mine) of the census, the register, the cctv camera, are much more effective, optimal and efficient than the guillotine of 18th century france, to maintain the usefulness of a population, even as it grew in multiplicity and complexity. knowledge - power is the key.

now i must figure out a way of examining control, in terms of knowledge gathering for reinforcing power, in sites of public interaction. how to do? count number of vantage points from which you think you can be seen? count the traces you leave of yourself, electronically, as you go about your daily business? measure the degree of freedom you feel to do private acts in public places? (is this ethnography, or just panga-taking? me in my hoodie and with my hip-flask, invading broadgate arena...)

i also must figure out a way of keeping my procrastinatory tendencies at a threshold where my utility is maximised. 2 hours of watching computer-tv leading to (hypothetically) 500 words is good. 2 days of refusing to call people for interviews leading to one blog post is not good. sigh.

i need a Panopticon, a possibly unseen, directed gaze upon me... the feeling of someone watching and judging me all the time. it can be in the form of classroom, a presentation, a seminar or a quasi-sensible friend (who at this point is selfishly indulging in mxxrxxxnxxl practices, while i'm wild and free and useless).

naukri number one is getting interesting. the brits keep asking me to edit their english. also to supervise translations from spanish, french and german into the queen's own tongue. which reminds me: distractions are good in certain respects. there's the slight possibility of a german distracting me from the greek.