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Airtags are explicitly not meant to track people. Apple goes out of their way to ensure them and their accessory partners do not advertise them being on a person regardless of age or relation to the airtag owner.

But that's the thing with technology, isn't it? New tech comes out, companies do the right thing, but the freedom of the technology itself enables bad actors to abuse or repurpose the technology. For example: With advancements in robotic technology, Boston Dynamics' policy to blacklist anyone who puts a gun on their dog does nothing when chinese companies are already selling it as a feature.

You have to note that AirTags are not new. Tile has been around for a while and, if you live in a city, there was a high likelihood someone also has a tile and would be a beacon for your tile's pings, and Tile makes no attempt at preventing human tracking. This isn't a tech being normalized, it already is normalized and has been for a decade. Just as you can be a proponent of advancements in robotics technology while being against their use in war, you can be against anyone recommending 24/7 tracking of humans.

> Airtags are explicitly not meant to track people. Apple goes out of their way

The amount of Apple apologism in this site makes me think sometimes. They "went out of their way" by releasing a dumb Android app which everyone should have to install and know it exists as a band-aid after their technology has been shown to be used to harm and abuse people. They know airtags can be used for crime and don't care.

> They know airtags can be used for crime and don't care.

So can iPhones. Or Androids. Or ski masks, lock picks, tape. Should we stop selling useful items when they can be abused? Apple did way more to stop the abuse of AirTags than the competition and I don't see anyone complaining about Tile. Almost any tool can be abused or used to hurt someone. Stop trying to shift the blame from the perpetrator to the tool being used.

Also: funny how the US doesn't ban guns even though they were literally invented to kill people but now fight about AirTags.

> Should we stop selling useful items when they can be abused?

No. My points above are:

1: people go out of their way to excuse Apple of any wrongoding, part of it is because of the "cult", part of it because Apple is very good at PR and painting themselves always in a good light

2: Apple has, as usual, done the bare minimum to arginate the problem and hand-waved at it.-

Likewise some people go out of their way to disparage Apple because they belong to the anti-“cult”. Comment histories can be damning…

Maybe adding something useful to the conversation by recommending a possible solution to the problem that Apple could implement to alleviate the problems would be more constructive?

Here let me start such a conversation: Apple could spearhead a standard to make their trackers communicate with surrounding devices and allow blocking to occur if someone doesn’t want to be tracked. But on the flip side the blocker is then recorded by a central authority to prevent bad actors from stealing and blocking tracking.

> Maybe adding something useful to the conversation by recommending a possible solution to the problem that Apple could implement to alleviate the problems would be more constructive?

My solution is: stop buying devices made to violate their users' privacy. Good job on investigating my thoughts digging up my very public comment section, though. I am impressed.

> My solution is: stop buying devices made to violate their users' privacy.

This thought process doesn't flow with me. Do you really thing some product manager at one point said "these airtags will allow complete tracking of our minions and their children, and we'll showcase them tracking other things to trick them into buying the product"?

This kind of snide, egotistical drivel is not why I come to this site.

I highly suggest you reflect on how you relate to other people; it would likely do you some good in your personal and professional lives.

In all honesty, what you do suggest is irrelevant to me.

Then why offer your opinions?

And yet GPS trackers people can slap on cars have been a thing for over 2 decades. My point in the second paragraph is that regardless of how good or bad the safeguards the big company implements are, someone will be able to either abuse it or repurpose/reimplement the technology to perform malicious acts.

> Airtags are explicitly not meant to track people. Apple goes out of their way to ensure them and their accessory partners do not advertise them being on a person regardless of age or relation to the airtag owner.

In this same spirit, gun ads don't have intruders being arbitrated in the ads. Why would Apple display people being tracked?

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I have never seen an ad for a gun of any kind. Off topic I know. But I didn't realise that until now. Do Americans have ads for guns anywhere? I've never seen it

You'll see advertisements for guns and ammo on what we call 'billboards' on the road (it's an advertisement on a flat surface about 30ft long I'd estimate, and maybe 10ft high. usually along the highways). We also get these ads in the marketing flyers you get in the mail, or see them in magazine print ads.

Gun ownership here is a bit more of a formalized process, so in general if you're clear to purchase one we'll trust you with a firearm, with few exceptions. The background check has a finite window after which it fails open, then if there is a rejection after the fact, an agency will show up to collect the firearm.

I could buy a shotgun while shopping for grocery items in the same store [0]. Also, the place up the road that sells fishing bait and hats and things also sells pistols, rifles, bows, hunting supplies etc. If you ask to hold one they just hand it to you, unloaded with a trigger lock or zip tie through the action of course.

[0] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h193H4LP5os

Just online and possibly on interstate billboards, in my experience.

You're comparing the advertisement strategies of a TRACKING device with a weapon capable of killing a human... I do not think it is a good idea to make a false equivalency between the two.

Airtags will get you killed without needing a gun.

> it already is normalized and has been for a decade

In use isn't the same as normalised.

How will the school even know if she has a phone, as long as she keeps it turned off and hidden? She should just keep taking it anyway regardless of the bullshit policy and simply not use it at school.

Some schools in the US have metal detectors. Not sure about the UK.

Some do, to detect knives - but I don’t think it’s widespread and certainly not outside high schools.

Fuck air tags? That's your take away? Fuck the school for stalking your child.

not the OP, but i think the OP meant the school told OP to put airtags on the child rather than the school themselves doing it, the sentence leans towards your interpretation though.

> My eldest kid is in the final year of UK junior school so finally cut lose to walk to and from school as is culturally acceptable here

OT, even more, my youngest kid (aged 6) just started the first year of [primary] school, so is happily walking to and from school as is culturally acceptable here(!!)

It would be so easy to end up thinking that tracking all kids solves loads of problems, but I firmly believe it really, really doesn't. <expletive> to your child's school! They should be ashamed of themselves.

So take the air tag off, or put it in a faraday bag.

He meant the school suggested putting an air tag on the kid rather than giving them a phone. The school isn't tracking the kid.

Oh, well, that's different.

> irregardless

Sorry to nitpick, but you can just say regardless.

If you really like nitpicks: you can also just say irregardless.

https://www.npr.org/2020/07/07/887649010/regardless-of-what-...

A dictionary lists all the words people use. It does not curate the words people should use. Therefore, a words presence in a dictionary is not proof of anything other than the word has been used before.

Whether people “should” use a particular word is your subjective aesthetic judgment.

The purpose of language is to communicate. Adding words which mean exactly the same thing as existing (shorter) words consumes cognitive resources without enhancing the language's ability to communicate. Therefore, objectively, people shouldn't use them.

One might say such word choices are ungood.

So you’re categorically against the existence of synonyms?

There are very few true synonyms. Most have some cases where you'd want to use one or the other.

You use hard words to say simple thing. This cost a lot of mind power. Why?

"Sometimes words, you no need use but need need for talk talk."

There are prescriptive and descriptive schools of linguistics, with one trying to gently nudge/direct/drive/correct the use of a language, while the other concentrates on documenting it as it happens in the wild.

> There are prescriptive and descriptive schools of linguistics

That’s not true. There are no “prescriptivists” whatsoever in the modern science of linguistics.

Interesting to hear! What happened to those guys?

What guys? Did they ever exist? Can you name a prominent “prescriptivist linguist”?

I’m pretty sure there was never a “prescriptivist school” of linguistics, or if there was it was never mainstream. There have been prescriptive grammarians of course but AFAIK they never called themselves “linguists”.

This is definitely my ignorance showing, so you'll have to bear with me, but what is the difference between grammarian and linguist?

I did find a linguistics course note which does seem to indicate that such a debate existed, even if in the past: https://www.ling.upenn.edu/courses/ling001/prescription.html

I have no idea what your point is here. Which, I guess, proves mine.

Is it subjective in this case? There is a logic to how this word is constructed: regard-less means without regard. Irregardless violates that logic: ir-regard-less, not without regard?

It’s true that you can’t logically predict the meaning of “irregardless” from its smaller components.

However, that’s true of virtually all words. Ones where the etymology makes the meaning obvious are the exception.

Human languages aren’t math or programming languages; you can’t apply the same kind of logic to them.

Meh, you can say whatever the hell you want.

If English actually had language police, I'd press charges against everyone who enters a conversation with "I mean, ..." or "So, ...". [0]

But that's only in my little fantasy world :) In the real world, there's no agreed-upon arbiter of "acceptable" English.

[0] And the "rule" about omitting final punctuation, in sentences that end with a quote, is stupid and I won't write that way. Now get off my lawn!!!

> If English actually had language police, I'd press charges against everyone who enters a conversation with "I mean, ..." or "So, ..."

What about starting a conversation with "Meh" ?

> What about starting a conversation with "Meh" ?

Oh dear.

> you can also just say irregardless.[1]

Please stop using that word.

[1] https://www.etymonline.com/word/irregardless

Notice that while “etymonline” may not like it, serious dictionaries like OED give its meaning without any value judgments.

Because scientists who study language seriously understand that trying to stem the tide of random language change is futile and pointless.

Lexicographers are neither linguists nor philologists, and any among the latter two worth their salt will tell you that "irregardless" is an erroneous and contradictory word, and further point out that whomever the neologist was that originally coined it made the mistake of double negative, such that "irregardless" must mean "with regard" as opposed to "regardless," and, as such, is superfluous.

If enough people use a word, it’s a word. Many words were formed as mistakes, “apron” and “tornado” for example.

Dictionaries follow how people are actually speaking, not the other way around.

> If enough people use a word, it’s a word.

Whether or not it is a word is not at issue. Any group of letters forms a word. "Hsyxff" is a word I just made up. The point is "irregardless" is an incorrect word, and no matter how many say wrong is right, it can never change the fact that wrong is still wrong.

> Many words were formed as mistakes, “apron” and “tornado” for example.

These words are not self-contradictory, nor were they formed "as mistakes."

> Dictionaries follow how people are actually speaking, not the other way around.

Dictionaries do not specify which words are spoken, they merely list words in alphabetical order along with their definitions. Dictionaries contain many words that are no longer spoken, such as overmorrow, lunting and groak, counter-examples that prove your assertion wrong.

In order for something to be recognized as a word, it needs to have meaning and be understood by more than 1 person. For brevity's sake, when I said "it's a word", I really meant "it's a word that's used and recognized by a large subset of people, large enough that lexicographers at dictionaries have taken notice".

"Irregardless" is not incorrect if enough people start using it that way. That's simply how languages work. You can have an opinion on specific words, but you cannot -assert- that using them is "incorrect". It's your opinion, not fact. Everyone also understands people when they use irregardless.

"These words are not self-contradictory, nor were they formed "as mistakes.""

Apron was originally "napron". It formed this spelling from people misunderstanding "a napron" as "an apron". Tornado should be tronado, because it comes from spanish tronada. Regardless (or irregardless? :)), the English language has many, many such words. My point is English already has so many words that are "mistakes", so arguing about "irregardless" doesn't make sense. No language used by humans is without illogical things.

"[Dictionaries] merely list words in alphabetical order along with their definitions"

Yes. They have criteria for when a -new- word becomes used enough that it enters the public lexicon, or an existing word gains a new usage. Like "literally" and "irregardless". You can't say it's wrong anymore when enough people are using it that way.

You are simply wrong, at least about linguists.

You are wrong on both accounts.

Please cite any mainstream linguist who agrees with your take.

   When a word is nonstandard it means it is “not conforming in pronunciation, grammatical construction, idiom, or word choice to the usage generally characteristic of educated native speakers of a language."[0]

[0] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/irregardless

You proved my point. That says it doesn’t correspond to the usage of a particular social group (educated people), which is a scientific statement. It doesn’t say it’s “wrong”, which is a value judgment.

Obviously, linguists don’t dispute the existence of more or less prestigious varieties of languages.

Thanks, really! I appreciate it.. makes for a far better rant when the spelling/grammar is on point.

As you’ve expressed interest… it seems to me that the nonsense word irregardless (which has become so prevalent as to have a understandable folk sense) arose as a portmanteau of irrespective and regardless. Both are useful words to know.

Perhaps the extent to which one cares about the nonsensical composition of the word irregardless speaks to the same latent disposition that drive preferences among type systems.

Whether “it works but is wrong” is nonsensical is debatable. My grandfather had a llama who duck typed his sexual partners. He was not, in a Darwinian sense, a successful animal but was beloved for his easy going disposition.

Anyway, word are fun.

why is the school monitoring how kids commute and using airtags? it's not airtags fault, it's your orwellian government. this is such a dumb take i can't even.

airtags alert people when they are on someone's person that they are not registered to, on iPhone and Android.

kids commute on the train in japan, germany and other places, this is absurd.

The government was not involved in the patents anecdote.

All schools are government schools because the government license them and will shut them down if they do not comply.

So the UK doesn't have private schools which can set whatever house rules they want unless they're challenged in court about them?

Yeah true story bro.

Umm...? Walk to school by themselves? How old was your eldest, again?

Final year of UK junior school is ten years old. By eleven, I was taking the train to another town for school. With a few other children, but no adults.

I think the acceptability of this stuff comes down to the area you live in.

Yep, where I am this is completely acceptable also, although not as common as it should be... Often because of judgemental people like you scaring off parents. Children are more capable than they are given credit for in many (mostly US) circles. It also seems that global news has distorted adults' risk calculations... Statistically the biggest risk to my children right now is probably obesity... Which I offset by making sure they have some freedom to roam outside of the car.

I walked myself to school at age 5. By 10 as in the GP comment, I had a fairly long walk up a hill. By 15 I walked 4.4 miles to school some days, most days I caught a bus. In retrospect biking would have been better. What about you?

Sorry, what? Phones are tracked too. Maybe your solution is a watch, but still kinda expensive.

Lost my 2yo a couple of times and each time thinking to resurrect an airtag that currently tracks junk drawer. Feel wrong and I don’t think it would work on someone who changes clothes 5 times a day.

The fact you lost your child is the basis of your argument against me, beggars belief.. a phone is not by default a device to track a kid an air tag is.. my kid is 10 and yours is 2... waaaay different situation.

Edit: I lost my kid plenty of times as well.. they love to run off don't they.

I think it was just perspective. I don't see where they directly disagree with you based on their anecdote