Wanted - Sublim Filter (Like Phishing Filter, Spam Filter)

By: Sanjay Agrawal
Submitted: 2007-01-17 16:41:50
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Background

Take a look around you. The unscrupulous are getting increasingly desperate. They know that you are no longer taken in by their gimmicks and their impassioned arguments to buy whatever it is that they want to sell: whether wares or ideology or both. You find their screaming banners and blinking fonts and flashing colors oh-so-boring. Their stunts and dare-devilry have an ephemeral effect, and after the titters die down, you move on. They have tried to puff up their package with attractive add-ons, such as buy this and get that free, take this and here's the bonus ... but you stifle your yawn and click away.

They are now even planning to beam their ads across the face of the moon, but they know it will create only a minor blip in their sales chart, which will plateau out sooner than you say 'd?j? vu'. You have become so jaded with all that 24 by 7 advertising, that you simply don't care.

What are they to do? How do they meet their sales targets? How do they spread their ideology to the masses? How do they get your votes without wearing out their hands with continuous waving and shaking?

Ah. Wait a minute. Here is this subliminality thingy.

How It Can Work

Just visualize these different scenarios.

You surf across to a favorite online store that stocks games. There's this "Free To Try, X$ To Buy" offer, and you click on it. The software downloads, and you begin to play. The ambient music is so enchanting, so soft, so soothing. You are riveted to those beautiful sights and sceneries shimmering in the background, and your attention is focused on playing the game.

There is a subtle noise in the ambience. But it is intermittent, and fades away as soon as you hear it. Must be the sound of crickets or birds, to enhance the background effect, you think, and ignore it. And then you decide you want to buy it! Now, now.

You enjoy the moments you spend at porn sites. Most of them have simple peekaboo doors that swing open briefly for a sample of the wares inside. While you are busy savoring the, uh, delights that you get to see, you notice something flickering in the background. Must be monitor pixels getting excited, you conclude, and don't allow them to distract you any further from your visual, uh, delights. And then you want to extend your experience further, and plain-vanilla peekaboos won't do! Now, now.

You have opted-in for receiving share market emails from your friendly stock-broking site. The Ezines you receive are loaded with tips on all kinds of scrip where you can make a killing in the short term. You suddenly feel the urge to buy one of them, specially the one whose advertisement is tucked in one corner of the newsletter. You reach out for the phone, to call up your broker. Or better still, you click on that ad, and process your buy decision. Buy using all the money in the bank! Now, now.

Let's take it to a more personal level. You receive an email from a friend, who is perhaps trying to woo you. It’s a greeting card from one of those freebie sites. As you click on the view button, and as the card begins to unfold and the music begins to play, an urge begins to well up in you to pick up the phone and reciprocate your feelings of love. Now, now.

Beneath The Bonnet

Gone are the days when there used to be an amusing tug-of-war between the group of social psychologists on one hand, rubbishing claims of the impact of subliminal messages on human subconscious, and the group of pop-literature writers, who would see sex images in innocent crumbs of biscuits and bread and bottles of wine. Research work on subliminality has exploded over the past few years, and scientists are now trying to figure out the neural pathways that are wired differently for the subthreshold mind.

At the same time, newer inventions are being patented with the explicit purpose of subliminally reaching out to the mind. These inventions are a double-edged sword really. Use them right, and they can be the most effective self-development tools ever to fall in the hands of man. But, abuse them, and they have the potential to vent harm in ways unimaginable to mankind.

Makes you sit up, eh? :)

There was a recent storm over a crude attempt by spammers to insert frames with "BUY!" messages beneath an ordinary text on small-cap stock; and present the frames as a composite animated GIF in their spam-mail. (Interested readers may wish to go through my article here.) Compared to the sophisticated finesse with which things can be done nowadays, this attempt appears thoroughly juvenile.

One research patent that bears mention here was filed in January 2003 by Hendricus Loos, a scientist from California (USP # 6,506,148 (January 14, 2003)). According to this paper, it is possible to hire a Visual Basic programmer and get them to use the GetTickCount() API function to generate image pulses on the computer screen that have a frequency equal to 0.5Hz. (Another magic number is 2.4Hz.) This frequency physiologically affects any human being sitting at normal viewing distance from the computer. This happens because the cutaneous (read near-the-skin) nerves have a natural resonant frequency around this value. The same effect is obtained on a TV (CRT or LCD), whether the signal is coming from a broadcast or a video tape or a DVD.

The sensory resonance thus obtained is transduced to the brain, and the result is that the parasympathetic nerve network is activated. One immediate outcome is that the upper eyelid tends to droop (ptosis); you achieve a state similar to drowsiness; and this is a sure-shot sign that your brain has entered a state of receptivity. Receptivity to what? Oh, buy my this ... buy my that ... vote for me ... align with mah ideology ... gimme money ... blah blah blah.

The "best" thing is, the subliminal messages that follow - in audio or video form - will not be captured by your conscious, since you are in a different state of mind anyway, so when you return to full alertness, you won't realize what happened.

Used positively, however, the same electrical neurostimulation may be used with varying degrees of success to "for anesthesia, induction of relaxation and sleep, as well as for the treatment of pain, intractable epilepsy, behavioral disorders, movement disorders, and cardiac arrhythmia." (This is from another patent, here.)

What Can Be Done - Well, Get A Sublim Filter!

Well, somebody has to invent a Sublim Filter! In the case of a computer, this filter has to be a software (to begin with) that has all the properties of Anti-virus, anti-spam, anti-phishing programs; plus, it will detect and suppress any attempts at subliminal messaging at both the audio as well as the visual level.

The swath of Sublim Filter industry will be wider than that of mundane phishing / spam detectors, of course. You will need a sublim filter on your mobiles / cells, CD players, DVD players, TVs. Who knows which dark force comes from where? Which means the market goes beyond softwares, and enters the domain of electronic gadgets. Sony, Samsung, are you reading this? Ah, another billion-dollar opportunity stares!

Final Word

Am I being sensationalist, in raising this bogie of negative subliminal messaging? My attention was actually drawn to this issue by the concern raised by a user in a forum, about a free game from a popular games website for kids. After downloading it, I too experienced the same muffled audio subliminal message that the forum poster was worried about. I dug further, and discovered the faint stirrings of a macabre world opening up. This is an attempt to understand this world. It is better to be cautious, as wise people are wont to say.

I sincerely look forward to the first version of the sublim filter hitting the market.

Article source: Expert Articles