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Handing Over the Keys
The new iPhone 5S features a futuristic entryway: a fingerprint scanner.
Apple has now successfully enabled us to rest our minds from remembering and typing one more password to access our phone or to make a purchase. Instead, all we need is ourselves and our trusty finger to press on the Home button on our phone. Just like that, everything is accessible. Surely it makes perfect sense since every single person’s fingerprint is different. In essence, it’s the perfect password.
It should be noted that Apple did not invent the fingerprint scanner, but this latest adaptation by the technology giant seems to be the best version for consumer purchase.
Initially, this technology seems like it could be the first spark of a fire for an infinite range of technologies to be invented/adapted in the future. For instance, just add “smart” to any device, car (not those), entertainment product, light switch, etc. Imagine the safety of owning an electric fireplace that is only operational by scanning the parent’s fingerprints…
The benefits seem clear, purposeful and cool.
And yet, it does feel a bit too personal. Our fingerprint is ideally unique. Our fingerprint is one of the undeniable differences we maintain against everybody else we come into contact with in our lives.
My fingerprint belongs to me and only me.
With this recent innovation, Apple is continuing the short-term and long-term discussion in society that is constantly dancing on the delicate line between cool convenience and privacy. After the recent revelations about the NSA, there should certainly be serious concern over the potential and/or likelihood of our fingerprints being turned over to security officials for who knows why. This skepticism is absolutely warranted (the last word seemed appropriate).
Is the fingerprint scanner a good idea?
It’s ultimately an issue of trust.
On the one hand, it’s an intriguingly cool technology seemingly built for the future. On the other hand, it also conjures up gentle thoughts of a world from the past…like around 1984.
Will you scan yourself?
Rage with the Machine
I was in a Japanese restaurant several months ago and they offered my guest and me standard laminated menus. Then, almost instantaneously, the waiter placed an iPad with a stand on the table that turned out to be a digital menu. We were scrolling, tapping and searching through all the pictures of the sushi they made. With sushi, in particular, this was a great tool to use when choosing the right platter. While the iPad was only at our table for a short period, it was a nice alternative to a purely text-based menu. The use of an iPad as a menu is a growing trend in restaurants these days. There is definitely a coolness factor to it.
While on vacation in California, my family and I stopped in the hot, yet luxurious, Palm Desert. After walking inside one of the many stores, I asked the salesperson if they carried a particular polo. Instead of turning around and searching the store, looking at a paper with its inventory or rushing to the backroom, she turned and grabbed an iPad and tapped-scrolled and typed her way to discovering they did not have it in-stock. It took all of ten seconds. Even without having the shirt available in the store, she was able to have a picture with an option to order the exact polo I was asking about. She was ready to place the order for me on the spot, if I was so inclined.
Wow. Now that’s customer service.
Like restaurants, there seem to be more and more iPads/tablets used for businesses, from retail to the local cupcake shop Tin in suburban Columbus, Ohio. The convenience works both ways, for customers as well as employees.
U.S. citizens have been increasingly encouraged to file their taxes online (ie-paperless). While doing work online is certainly faster and more efficient in some ways (I’ve participated in this practice as an fyi), we can all recall the story of when hackers got their digital hands on thousands of sensitive materials from The Pentagon. If hackers can find their way into The Pentagon…
However tempting this convenience appears (and it is), we do need to remain cognizant of the risks.
The point is that we tend to be trending towards, however slowly, a paperless society. There are positives, without question, but also definite negatives to this digital evolution. It reminded me of a short clip from a show about this very reality occurring with the Millennials, my generation.
Jimmy's Daily Planet 