Hello Barbie, goodbye child privacy
BAREFOOT’S NEW BOOK
LET LE me tell you about a 59year-old ye woman who makes billions bi of dollars a year.
Her name is Barbie, and, af after years of being in the (to (toy) doghouse, she’s su suddenly cool again. Last we week, toy conglomerate M Mattel reported a 12 per cent ris rise in sales of the buxom bl blonde.
“Mattel is trying to lure cu customers back by recasting th the toy’s image to play up not on only the nostalgia but a newer notion: they’re beneficial to child development,” says the Washington Post.
Crikey. When I was a kid, all Barbie did was promote an unrealistic body image.
(Doctors have said that if Barbie were real she’d only have room for half a liver and a few inches of intestine. Yet apparently there is room for a much bigger brain.)
OK, so Mattel hasn’t upgraded her liver, intestines or brain … but they have added a touch of tech.
Enter Hello Barbie. Here’s how Mattel describes the latest round of plastic surgery they’ve performed on the world’s favourite rake-thin, FF-breasted doll: “The No. 1 thing girls have asked for, is to have a conversation with Barbie. Well, using wi-fi and speech recognition technology … now they can! Girls want to learn, tell stories and make friends … and for the first time Barbie recognises what girls are saying, and can respond!”
Uh-huh. Here’s what’s really happening: “A microphone records little girls’ private conversations,” says Susan Linn, from Campaign for a CommercialFree Childhood.
“It transmits those conversations to cloud servers where they are analysed by algorithms and are listened to by employees of Mattel and its technology partner, Toy Talk, and they are shared with unnamed third parties.” Creepy.
“Hello Barbie asks many questions that would elicit information about a child, her interests, and her family, which could be of great value to advertisers,” says Angela Campbell, director of communication at Georgetown Law School.
We need to protect our vulnerable little children from a conglomerate that is openly spying on them. They’re kids, for goodness’ sake!
Tread Your Own Path!