Chips everywhere

It's still a test, but computer chips stuck in buildings and corner posts in Tokyo's Ginza won't stop talking to you, as evident in my participation in a recent demonstration. The chips are an upgrade of the more common RFID chips in widespread use, which are more like barcodes to identify products. The chips from Professor Sakamura of TRON fame relay information that can be updated on servers. He denies they will be used for "Big Brother" monitoring of human individuals. But that would seem one obvious potential use. Another link to my story.