Original story

StarBytes 8/2003

Eurovision winner trusts in satellite shepherd to locate children in virtual city

Helsinki, Finland

“Of course I have no doubts about allowing my kids out into the city alone. Why should I? There’s no danger of their getting lost, but I do worry a bit about the traffic”. Tanya Al-Fayed tosses her blonde hair and gives one of those winning smiles that wowed voters in this year’s Eurovision Song Contest. I’m virtually sold on this lady.

My visit to Helsinki was to interview Tanya on her career and her upcoming U.S. tour, but we spent much more time talking about her children and their adventures in the now world-famous “Virtual City”, which is of course also the title of her latest album and CD-ROM.

Tanya was eager to show me how it all works. On the wall of the living room in her attractive 2nd floor apartment is a large projector screen showing exactly the same landscape as can be seen through the bay windows. A neatly manicured garden is surrounded by a hawthorn hedge, and behind that is a street, and then a pretty yacht marina with boats, brightly-coloured marquees, and a wooden promenade.

“The virtual city tends to come up rather slowly on this system. The jetties over there aren’t yet quite right somehow, and the boats, well they can be almost anything. Still, they’ve got the weather fixed up so that it more or less corresponds to what’s going on outside, and oh yes, the most important thing is they now have the buses running on schedule…”

I wonder what on earth Tanya means, and then I see one of the blue buses in the Helsinki City Transport livery coming into view on the screen. I turn instinctively to the window, and - hey presto! - there it is, the same number and everything. When I later spoke over lunch with HCT Information Officer Kaisa Isopyörä she told me that the buses were already equipped with positioning devices several years ago, but that they were then only used for traffic census calculations.

My hostess directed the hand-held mouse pointer at the passing bus and suddenly the image on the screen changed. Now we were inside the bus, looking out. A cheerful female voice was telling us - in several languages and the English wasn’t too bad, either - that “…this part of Helsinki dates back all the way to the founding of the city in the mid-16th century…”. I had a sudden flash of those ghastly package tours to Spain, and the drive from the airport to the hotel. And then on we went, driving around the city while drinking our coffee on the leather sofa. The guide was babbling away nineteen to the dozen all the time. Tanya switched over to a wide-angle view from above, but we kept following the bus. By now we were miles away, right over the other side of town, when Tanya suddenly cried out: “Oh look, there they are! Can you see the kids?”, and pointed at two red dots walking side-by-side in the middle distance. A quick manoeuvre with the pointer, and we had zoomed in on the figures of a boy and a girl.

I was amazed at this, and I said so. Didn’t Tanya feel a bit insecure about letting her 9-year-old daughter and 7-year-old son out alone like that?

“No, not really. I’ve often followed from here when they go round the city from the PC in their room. Mari is so good at it - I’m sure she could orienteer her way to the doorstep of at least four relatives in under a minute, and little Pekka is just as fast as she is. It’s so much easier nowadays to find addresses, too, now that the bus company has put their positioning system in the public domain. The kids absolutely adore roaming around virtually.”

“But what if they go somewhere they ought not to?” I asked her. Another of those broad smiles from Tanya. “There’s really no danger of that. Before I let them go, I popped into their system and slipped GPS necklaces on them both. These new ones are pretty handy for mums and dads, because they not only have the positioning device, they also have a telephone in the same unit. The first ones we had were pretty ropey, because there was no way you could get at the kids to head them off, for instance if they started going places you weren’t happy with, like down to the virtual bordellos in the South Harbour, or heading towards the Casino with your smart card. Now I’m never too worried that my flock is going to stray.”

Tanya saw the children were heading for the funfair, and switched off. “Now”, I asked tentatively. “About those romance rumours of you and Rudy de Capriati. What’s the story?”

(Continued on p.94)

Toteuma-arvio 2026

Toteuma lyhyesti

  • Ilmiön toteuma: 5/5
  • Toteuma viiden vuoden tarkkuudella: kyllä; arviointi-ikkuna on 1998–2008
  • Toteuma väljemmällä aikahorisontilla: kyllä, erittäin vahvasti
  • Ilmiön ydin: lapsen sijaintia voidaan seurata satelliittipaikannuksen ja digitaalisen kartan avulla lähes reaaliajassa.

GPS-puhelimet, lasten paikantimet, älykellot ja perheiden sijainninjakopalvelut toteuttavat toiminnon suoraan. Samalla yksityisyys- ja turvallisuuskysymykset ovat nousseet juuri tarinan ennakoimalla tavalla.

Johtopäätös: ennuste toteutui vahvasti sekä toiminnon että ajoituksen osalta.