Sushi, Cell Phones, & Tracking Devices

Johnny-Oh and I had sushi yesterday with one of my co-workers. It was a nice hour of chat that would've been better with a pool table. Maybe next time. A little something odd about a part of our conversation...

I was attempting to explain a bit about this guy that voluntarily had a couple "chips" implanted in his hands. The guy uses one of them as a key to his home, among other things.
Well, it was ineluctible that the conversation turned toward tracking and the whole Big Brother thing. That's where it started to get odd.

We discussed the use of cell phones as tracking devices and how it was unavoidable, yet understandable. As a GIS (Business Concentration) major, I have endured many lectures and read too much about using cell phones for tracking, advertising, and location based services (LBS). So I've had this conversation before, but was less interested in the past (people generally talk too long).

"So..." When I got home, I noticed a news magazine on my recliner. The writers of the news mag are also the creators of some of the software I use. In this quarter's issue, ESRI's ArcNews has an interesting announcement about some new software for businesses to track their cell phones. ESRI has been working with Sprint to make their respective softwares work together. Sprint has a new set-up that allows subscribers to the Location Service find any (Sprint) cell phone in the U.S..

Of course, we all know that cell phone tracking is nothing new. I just thought it odd that our conversation and the article were so closely related, especially on the same day. But then, it could just be that I haven't had intelligent conversation with someone outside of my home in a while.

***Where's my tin-foil hat?***