Last Night a Door Guy Saved My Life (to a third party database)

Okay it was over a week ago really, but I think I can be afforded some poetic license for the sake of an Indeep reference.

The Internets Celebrities had been invited by Checkmate co-star Ben Popken to attend the first Consumerist meetup, show some of our videos and talk to the crowd. The event was indeed a “great success” as we definitely won over some new fans that night.

Meanwhile, just outside the private room, Botanica bar was crawling with attractive marketing folk peddling their wares. It was an interesting juxtaposition: the flirtatious drink-fueled stealth marketing versus the educated and empowered consumer mission of Consumerist and its parent company.

While enjoying our free Consumerist drinks, Dallas and I were approached by a pretty young lady in a short skirt bearing coupons for free Jameson and Gingers. Like any good brand representative, she laughed generously at our bad jokes. As we watched her walk away, Dallas wondered aloud just how far she would go to win people over to Jameson’s. To really make us change our whiskey brand, she should have no problem taking bar patrons into the bathroom. That’s marketing 3.0 right there. We hurriedly drank our free Consumerist drinks so that we could move on to our sexier free drinks.

Once the Consumerist crowd had dispersed, a bald tattooed man entered the meetup room with an offering of free Zippo lighters. His black polo shirt with the Camel logo was one size too tight. I’m not a smoker but a free Zippo sounded cool.

“What’s the catch?” I asked.

“No catch. You get a free Zippo and a bunch of coupons for cigarettes mailed to your house.”

I imagined my two kids looking through a pile of mail by the front door and seeing big shiny postcards with cartoon camels offering cheap smokes. I passed.

Someone in our party took him up on the bargain. Zippo Guy took her driver’s license and quickly scanned it with a handheld device before offering her the lighter and her license back.

Dallas was interested and pulled out his driver’s license but wanted the guy to pony up two Zippo’s. No can do. Dallas pressed at him, telling Zippo guy that he needed to realize that he made his own rules and had the power to make it happen. Zippo guy was getting a little frustrated because Dallas was slowing his whole flow down. He wouldn’t budge but let on that there was a girl in the room outside doing the same thing so Dallas could get a second Zippo from her.

“I don’t want one from her. I want you to realize you have the power to do it.”

Finally Dallas accepted that he wasn’t going to help Zippo Guy ascend to a higher form of consciousness so he never-minded the fellow, refusing to even take one lighter as a sign of his disgust.

“It wasn’t about the Zippo. I just wanted him to realize he could take ownership of his own happiness.”

Pretty soon we were on our way to the next spot, Piano’s where an MC named Shad from out of Toronto was performing. I had posted a fan-made video for a Shad song the week before, serendipity and Google Alerts had Shad’s manager reaching out about this NYC show that happened to be on the same night that we were already booked to be in the neighborhood.

I hadn’t been back at Piano’s since our Sit Down Stand-Up Showcase two years earlier. It was already time for Shad to be on when we got there and I was wondering if I was going to be able to get all four of us in on my guest list spot so I was in a hurry to move past the ID check at the front-door. I handed the guy my driver’s license and before I realized what was about to happen he slid it into the slot of a hand-held ID scanner just like the one the Zippo guy had at the previous establishment. He looked down at the screen and waved me in.

I may not have given this a second thought except for all the conversation at Botanica.

“Wait a minute. What’s that for?”

“Oh nothing, you’ll be getting coupons from a big tobacco company in the mail,” he said with a smirk.

Working as a web developer you get familiar with all the infringements on privacy that sleazy marketers use these days. This bar needed a privacy policy or a posted terms of service. Needed to ask me before they took that info.

“Uh,” I blurted, “I want to opt out!”

He laughed and waved his fingertips around just above the device in his hand as if he was performing sorcery.

I considered asking for a manager but I didn’t want to miss the show (Shad did a really nice set by the way) or slow things down for the rest of our group (it was Cas’ birthday and all), so I kept it moving.

It was kind of eating away at me though. Was Piano’s really sinking so low as to sell its customers data? I called the bar the next day and spoke to a manager. He assured me that the door guy was just kidding and the device is only used to make sure it’s not a fake ID. Fucking sarcastic door guy. Piano’s is basically a hipster bar so I should have had my irony shields up.

Nevertheless it’s still unsettling even if my info isn’t going directly to Big Tobacco. Because where is it going? What happens to that data and why are we so unconcerned with our loss of privacy at the hands of technology that serves no clear benefit except to keep tabs on us.

Some company now owns my identity data just because I visited a bar and that’s not even made clear before the guy takes a half second to stick your card in a machine. And when you’re buzzed and in a rush and out having a good time, the last thing you’re going to do is stop and think about this. Now even if Piano’s doesn’t have a deal with marketers, maybe this company that powers the scanner does. Or maybe the next company who buys that company will change their mind about what the data is for. Maybe they’ll just make like the telcos and turn things over to the government.

Hell, maybe they’re just keeping it. Who knows how secure their systems are for the legion of identity thieves that may or may not be employed within the company.

You can tell me I’m being paranoid but it seems to me we live in a world where pretty girls flirt with you so you’ll get the whiskey they’re hawking and the door guy can’t even give you a straight answer when you have a legitimate concern about your privacy. So how are we all so comfortable giving this data over to whomever? At least the Zippo guy is up front and you come out of the deal with a Zippo.

Last week, O’Reilly ran a series on the paradoxes of the Internet Age and the third one stated “never before have we handed so much personal information over in exchange for so little in return.” This is clearly visible at a bar near you and the era of anonymous drinking may be drawing to a close.

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