A discriminatory process that sorts individuals on the basis of their estimated value or worth reaches into every aspect of individual life today. This process is referred to as the panoptic sort, the all-seeing eye of the difference machine that guides the global capitalist system. The panoptic sort is a kind of high-tech, cybernetic triage that…

Argues that advances in information technology, especially capacities to collect and combine data for marketing purposes, subvert protections of individual privacy and weaken the influence of the individual in democracy. (MS)

Through a review of two accelerating trends in the technology of producing and distributing information and entertainment, this paper argues that the promises of "the information economy" and the "television of abundance" bring not the emancipation of diversity and access, but the rapid disintegration of an already weakened…

A study was conducted to develop some understanding of how social experience might be related to public expectations of rights to privacy. A telephone questionnaire was developed which sought information about respondent knowledge, attitudes, and behavior regarding privacy and personal information. A national survey of adults over the age of 18…

Describes how communications and information technologies are being used to increase the reach and influence of bureaucratic surveillance, creating an increasing inequality between those who provide and those who gather personal information. Argues that the current legal system is hopelessly inadequate to the challenge of controlling the…