Sometimes technology is just creepy.
Take the game "Animal Crossing," for example. The writer of the Game Girl Advance blog wrote a couple months back about how strange it was that the animals in the game all remembered her ex-boyfriend.
They would ask about his character and reminisce about his letter-writing skills. Even when she created a new town, one of the animals from her old town moved in, carting along her ex's old letters.
How strange, to think virtual people in a video game will remember you. But we leave digital footprints all the time, leaving information about ourselves all over the place.
It's everywhere, and anyone can look at it.
I was never one of those people who worried about being watched by Big Brother. But the digital revolution has given more and more regular people an opportunity to investigate the people around them - without much effort.
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Curious about somebody before you go on a date with him? Just Google his name.
Want to know what your kids are up to online? Just install some tracking software.
Curious about what Web sites your significant other is visiting? Take a look in his or her Web browser's history file.
Forget the government - you're more likely to be investigated by someone who knows you.
A story in Thursday's USA Today tells the story of a man who installed spyware to see what his kids were doing on the family computer. He found out what they were up to - downloading music, the cause of his computer woes. He also discovered that his wife was having an online affair.
Tools such as computer-monitoring software and surveillance cameras are available to anyone with Internet access. You can even track people with global positioning system devices bought online or in specialty stores.
While it's easier than ever to get dirt on someone, the availability of spy devices is increasingly blurring the line between trust and distrust.
A man in Colorado was arrested this year for tracking his wife through a GPS device placed in her car.
Parents can even track their kids through certain GPS-enabled cell phones.
Who else remembers going into your room in middle school and closing the door so your mom wouldn't hear you talk to your friends on the phone? And being worried she would listen in on the other line?
While you had a shot back in the day of catching your parents eavesdropping on you, kids today may never know if their mom is keeping track of what they say to their friends.
Parents can track their kids' e-mails and instant messages. And unlike in the dinosaur days of telephones, kids can't even peek around the corner to see if their parents are indeed monitoring their conversation.
Privacy is hard to come by these days. And it's more than just a little bit disturbing.
In a way, the ease of digital snooping is what makes it creepier than the idea of Big Brother. The idea of government officials digging around in my life is alarming, but not as worrisome as knowing that someone I know is the one doing the snooping.
We all have a certain trust in each other. We know which friends we can gossip with and which ones will blab.
We assume that if we tell someone something about ourselves, that person will take us at face value. We don't assume they will verify it with a Google search.
But at the same time, we all want to know things about each other.
I admit, I know what a couple of my ex-boyfriends have been up to, thanks to Google.
But I don't necessarily like to think about how they probably know what I'm doing, too. It's not quite as creepy as your ex living on in a video game, but it's enough to raise some goosepimples.
