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Remote Surveillance... Is Big Brother Watching Your Store?
November 9, 2007

In George Orwell's classic novel 1984, all of society is monitored via audio and video feed.  With video cameras now at traffic lights in many cities and cameras covering every angle of retail stores, how far are we from Orwell's prophetic vision?  

New Baby Products has reinstated the use of electronic surveillance as a means of loss prevention.  This system, however, has also been used to monitor the behavior of employees.  The cliché "When the cat is away, the mice will play" is certainly true.  What if, though, the cat or cats can view the mice at all times from anywhere in the world?  Does this promote productivity out of fear?  Heck yes it does!  It's brilliant!

The smart "mice" (I like this metaphor, obviously) will work harder and prove their worth while the less-than-smart "mice" will continue to play when the "cat" is away.  This makes it easy to weed out unproductive employees.  The system will pay for itself times over by reducing theft and increasing productivity.  Is it an invasion of privacy or too "big brother-ish?"  No way!  Not in my less-than-humble opinion.  The traffic lights are a different story...

Posted by Kelly Nelson on November 9, 2007 | Comments (0)