IF costs come down it has nothing to do with competition created by use of electronic tags. It comes down because of supply and demand.

I walk through my local shopping mall and I don't see shoe stores cutting costs NOW - with just bar codes and the like. Why will they do it later when everything is tagged electronically? Answer... they won't.

It is nice to think they will cut costs and pass savings on - in theory. But then the whole exercise was for nought as they passed it all on and are no better off than before it all began (bar the few bucks they save by getting rid of a couple of staff).

This arguement also assumes people buy based on price and price alone.

Not the case. Can't recall who said it, at this point in time, but it goes something along the lines of, "people WANT to pay more, if only you will give them a reason to." My experience proves this statement is true. (Rolex, Mercs, Rangies, etc.)

Look at the stockmarket... supply and demand.

Price of CD Players when they first came out. Supply and demand brought the prices down... not some mythical competition between Walmart and KMart.

Go into J&B HiFi and have a look at their bargain basement bin... CHEAP DVDs... they have too many of one kind and no-one wants to buy them (over supply with little demand) so the price comes down. Electronic tags or not.

Lets also remember... your examples are based on some people having tags and some not having tags.

Whereas in reality... everything will have tags because of The Network Effect. The same effect which forces almost all companies to upgrade their OS and applicable software - Word, Excel, etc. Because if they don't, then new price lists and manifests created on the new software can't be read.

I don't stop shopping at a certain clothes store because they have electronic tags which prevent me from walking out the door and stealing the item. Then again... those tags are basic tags... not ID TAGS and they are physically removed at the point of sale.

As for the clerk finding out info if they are a peadophile... the difference between what Cornell mentioned and your example is one of choice...

In your case... you have willingly given those details - for whatever reason. In Cornell's example... walking into the store saw your details taken WITHOUT YOUR PERMISSION.

We may give up some of our privacy in exchange for certain rights... to drive, to fly to another country, etc. But this new technology TAKES our privacy away WITHOUT permission... and all we get is nothing extra - we still shop as normal.

BTW... The price of Gilette shavers in my supermarket has not come down. They are just as high as ever - if not higher.

Which raises another element... don't mistake the brief price rises followed by discounts, designed to make you think you are getting a discount.

And lets takes this another step forward... someone walks past your wheelie bin with a reader and scans all the packaging while they do it. They will know WHAT you bought, when you bought it, where you bought it, etc.

There is a big to-do about software which tracks your online movements without permission. But you don't seem too concerned about this. And this is far worse!

I think, however, that we'll just have to agree to disagree on this one.

By the way... there are places online where for something like $50 per month you can access all kinds of govt databases and find out all kinds of stuff. This is REAL and it is NOW. So the sicko could in reality find out your details very fast because of the availability of these databases.

Jeez, a few years ago we were all priveleged to see just how much info was available based soley on a number plate. That was on another board.

Anyone with the spare money can access all that info too. So it is not far fetched.

Michael Ross