Voice from the Ether

Weird? Scary? Okay, let's just go with weird. Scary, not so much. Irritating, definitely.

As I was meandering through my on-line writing group, reading and enjoying what has been written in the past few days, a voice pops up and starts yammering at me about Arm&Hammar laundry detergent. Now, that's not unusual--or wouldn't have been had I been using IE8, since IE8 had started allowing all sorts of pop-ups to adjust themselves to my browsing choices (yeah, I clicked on the "block popups" and it doesn't always work these days...).  With voice feeds. So, I switched to Chrome--and no more annoying pop-ups at all! Chrome is (was?) working well. Until this morning. A few minutes ago, to be exact.

The voice, all chirpy and nice, starts talking about cleaning aids. I look down at my toolbar and taskbar and there is nothing open that is not supposed to be there. No pop-up taking up valuable desktop real estate. I check the tabs across Chrome, nothing extra there. There is no visual to match the voice that is yammering away. Then it stops. Hmmmm....strange. Then it chirps out "Hey! Have you gotten any coupons yet?" Every few seconds. Annoying. Weird. I turned off my speakers, end of problem. Speakers off for five minutes. I turned them back on, thinking the voice in the machine would have given up. Not so. Immediately "Hey! Have you gotten any coupons yet?" blares out, followed quickly by: "Looking for solutions? We've got more!" Now I'm ticked!

This is *MY* space! I paid for this computer. I pay for the right to access the Internet. I pay for the electricity to keep it all humming. I'll be damned if I will ever pay to buy products that show up, unannounced, in my life. I did not invite this chirpy female voice to high jack my air-, brain-, or any other-space I might occupy at any given moment. I have my writing group tab open, I have my gmail account tab open. There is nothing else going on or open on my computer except for non-connected programs like PageFour and OpenOffice. Is one of them the culprit? I don't think so. Has Chrome decided to allow pop-up voices rather than pop-up visuals into the mix? If so, I will be shopping elsewhere for a browser. One that does not allow for such a blatant invasion of my privacy.

The thought crosses my mind: How am I ever going to be able to listen to music on my computer again? The thing is, if I am on the Internet doing research for one of my WIPs, I might like to have on Celtic Drums, or some country tunes, or heavy metal--depending on what I am researching for. I've had the experience of having my music going and clicking on something I wanted to listen to on-line. I figured one would cancel out the other, see? Nope. Didn't work that way. I got to hear them both. Not an easy feat to separate out the noise from the news. So, does this mean I won't be able to enjoy my music while I'm on the Internet without having to listen to whatever is hammering away at me to buy this or that? It has been fifteen minutes, I've turned my speakers back on again--sound check--and she's still at it. It isn't right. It is another insidious evil perpetrated by the mega-industrial complexes vying for our cash, our laundry, and our lives. Invasion of my privacy is not an acceptable way to get me to buy into your product line. You have just lost a once valued customer. Although, now that I think about it, it could be a little on the scary side. They, meaning corporations, already track our spending through our bank cards, credit cards, and any other means they can. Now they want our private minutes, too? There are so many other, more important things going on in the world. And while those things are going on, while our attention is drawn away for a moment, advertisers and corporations creep into our veins. It's just wrong.