The friendly guy smoking a pipe was merely ahead of his time. If we are flinging ourselves into an AI-driven total surveillance state we're all going to miss slack more than ever. Hopefully if anyone survives the AI-driven total surveillance state will eventually realize that with the degree of control it has it doesn't have to crack down on literally everything just because it can.
in the culture series iain banks paints an optimistic picture of an AI driven idealistic utopian post scarcity society where nothing is secret, from the AIs at least.
some of the ideas seem to be that in post scarcity many crimes become meaningless, and that the AIs keep your privacy.
