Monday, August 04, 2014

Eating Chips is More Dangerous Than You Think!


One easy way to lose weight is to cut chips and sweets from your diet, or at least limit yourself to a reasonable helping rather than scarfing down an entire family-sized bag of Doritos or Fritos. But are there other perils in eating chips beyond the cholesterol, calories and fat content? Apparently there are, as researchers at MIT have used video to actually discern what people are saying near a bag of chips (WP). How, you might ask? Using a high-speed camera that takes 2,000 to 6,000 frames per second (a movie uses 24), it can capture the micro-vibrations made in that bag and then use a complex algorithm to translate those indentations into discernible words. The technology is not perfect yet, and there are certainly easier ways to capture sound, like using high-powered mic equipment or just shoving a bug under the table, or even in the bag itself, but this provides yet another way for Big Brother to spy our every move and word. And “all that and a bag of chips,” certainly takes on a new meaning now (Urban Dictionary), capturing the sense that privacy is a bygone dream of a forgotten past and that little remains outside the purview of the panopticon or synopticon today! But screw it; I still like my not-quite-potato-chip Pringles!

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