Hakuna matata, guys! (Photo: flickr.com/jolieodell)

We're entering a new age of ubiquitous surveillance, when you can't even embark on a wild night out in Brooklyn without worrying about some Glasshole uploading your embarrassing antics to YouTube. It's enough to make you wonder whether maybe we ought to worry about what governments and corporations will do with the technical ability to track, oh, everything.

But do you know what Google chairman Eric Schmidt says to that? No worries, ya'll!

CNET reports that in a talk at NYU promoting his book The New Digital Age, he told the crowd:

"A world where everything is going to be tracked is 'highly unlikely to occur because people will be upset about it,' Schmidt said during an event with New York University Professor Nouriel Roubini and Jared Cohen, director of Google ideas.

'Governments won't allow it, and it will be bad business," he said. "In a competitive environment, businesses actually want their consumers to be happy.'"

If you say so, Mr. Schmidt!

(Photo: AndroidPolice)

Though current Google CEO Larry Page seems to be quite at home with his Google Glass, the company's former CEO, Eric Schmidt, is much more candid about the strangeness of having the Internet dance in your field of vision at all times. Speaking to Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, Mr. Schmidt admitted that talking to a face computer as if it's your best friend is "the weirdest thing." At least he's honest!

Mr. Schmidt also acknowledged that new etiquette will have to be established in order for Glass to enter the mainstream, since it's basically the creepshotters' ultimate weapon. "There are obviously places where Google Glasses are inappropriate," he said, according to Reuters.

We're pretty sure Mr. Schmidt won't be satisfied with Glass until Google can put his beloved BBM on it.

R u kidding me? (Photo: Livemint)

Google chairman Eric Schmidt spoke this morning at AllThingsD's D: Dive Into Mobile conference, touching on how much he loves Facebook Home and why Google's new gadgets will blow you away. But that doesn't mean it's all rainbows and Lisa Frank-style unicorns coming from the North Korean delegate.

When Business Insider reporter Steve Kovach asked Mr. Schmidt what would stop Google from removing Facebook Home from the Play store should it become immensely popular, Mr. Schmidt "didn’t seem happy with the question’s premise but responded tersely," according to VentureBeat. "It would be counter to our public statements, our religion,” he replied. “The answer is ‘no.’ We would not remove Facebook Home."

Fellow reporters immediately noticed Mr. Schmidt's sassy 'tude. "eric schmidt is sonning people left and right at this ATD conf," observered Gizmodo's Sam Biddle. ABC News tech editor Joanna Stern confirmed the diss. "Eric Schmidt getting a little testy with @stevekovach," she tweeted.

For his part, Mr. Kovach took the smackdown rather hard:

https://twitter.com/stevekovach/status/324166811551686658

https://twitter.com/stevekovach/status/324167035208740864

https://twitter.com/stevekovach/status/324172605655506944

https://twitter.com/stevekovach/status/324175937749012480

Stay strong, Steve-O.

Fly. (Photo: Prestige Yacht Auction)

So, how'd you do on your tax refund? Because we've just found the perfect way for you to seastead in style.

Behold the Lone Ranger, a salvage tug turned marine research vessel turned superyacht. Business Insider reports that the vessel, originally listed at $20 million, needs major work and so it'll be auctioned at the Antibes Yacht Show on April 20, as-is, for somewhere between €3 million and €10 million.

Oh, did we mention it used to belong to the Schmidt Ocean Institute, the marine research foundation run by none other than gallivanting Google chairman Eric Schmidt? 

The organization received the ship as a donation in 2009 and has used it for four "research cruises." (Here she is in action.) But now, the institute declares on its website, "the Lone Ranger begins a new chapter in her long and storied history as she is decommissioned from the scientific fleet of the Schmidt Ocean Institute to become a global expedition vessel once again."

In other words, it's ready to become your lavish, floating party palace/libertarian offshore paradise. The brochure trumpets:

"The yacht epitomises low key luxury, but most importantly offers the ideal platform for anyone wanting to explore the farthest flung corners of the world with their family."

There's an on-deck hottub and an indoor swimming pool.

Don't worry, though: As far as we can tell, Mr. Schmidt still has his own superyacht, the 195-foot Oasis.

Mr. Schmidt. (Photo: flickr.com/jolieodell)

Forget the red phone. The European competition commissioner and Eric Schmidt have a more modern means of communicating about maybe-maybe-not antitrust-violating business practices: SMS!

The New York Times reports that even as Joaquín Almunia hashes out a final settlement over the way Google handles its search and advertising businesses, he's received a new complaint from companies including Nokia and the perpetual whiners at Microsoft. They say Google uses Android "to promote its own products and services in a majority of smartphones sold to consumers."

But that doesn't mean the pair have to communicate solely through lawyers and strategic leaks to the press. Mr. Alumina is hip. He gets technology! (He even chatted with Sheryl Sandberg at Davos about "the relationship between the search activity and the social network’s activity, but they were general conversations,” he informed the Times).

And that's why he feels free just hittin' up Eric with a text. The Times reports:

Joaquín Almunia sometimes sends Eric E. Schmidt a text.

Like his predecessors, Mr. Almunia has the power to block mergers or fine companies billions of dollars. But where he differs is in how comfortable he is in communicating with executives across the table — or the ocean — to negotiate settlements that avoid long battles.

“I have an open phone line, or e-mail line, or SMS line at any moment,” Mr. Almunia said in an interview Monday.

Bet Mr. Schmidt has approximately 500 unanswered texts from Kim Jong-Un, who just wants to be pals.

(Photo: Talk Android)

Google has applied for a new patent that shows the company is thinking about programming Google Glass to be able to control objects like your garage door and your refrigerator. You'd simply look at your fridge door and superimposed controls would be reflected onto it, telling you you need milk. Uh, want? [Engadget]

This shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone who reads our rumor roundup, but turns out Google chairman Eric Schmidt does indeed prefer his BlackBerry over an Android phone. [The Guardian]

Now Google is building a smartwatch. How many watches can one human need? [The Verge]

If you want to commit cyberwar, you're going to need the manual. [AP]

Virtual currency like Bitcoin is getting money laundering rules that will hold providers accountable in a similar manner to money-order providers like Western Union. Sorry, Silk Road. [Wall Street Journal]

Mr. Schmidt. (Photo: flickr.com/jolieodell)

Lately corporate empty-nester Eric Schmidt has been on an impromptu world tour, beginning with his visit to North Korea and continuing this week with a trip to several Asian nations. (Good thing he's got $6 million in walking-around money!)

A visit to Myanmar has been confirmed, but first he's stopping off in India, which has a reputation for Internet censorship and spying. So Mr. Schmidt announced his arrival in the country with an op-ed in the Times of India, calling on the government to take a more cheerful outlook and set the Internet free:

"Now is the moment for India to decide what kind of internet it wants for them: an open internet that benefits all or a highly regulated one that inhibits innovation.

The past 10 years show that the safest economic, social and political bet is on openness. Where there is a free and open Web, where there is unbridled technological progress, where information can be disseminated and consumed freely, society flourishes."

He added, that the "most striking Indian internet innovations" will come from "Indians solving local problems," rattling off examples like the health site mDhil and the transportation company Redbus.

Whatever, Eric--we just hope you brought Sophie. We want someone who'll really dish.

(h/t The Next Web)

Mr. Schmidt. (Photo: flickr.com/jolieodell)

Sergey's got the futuristic glasses and Larry has the Lex Luther CEO swag, but it seems Google chairman Eric Schmidt wants to be the last of the gentleman adventurers. Returned from his North Korean jaunt for just a couple of months, reports suggest he'll soon be off again, this time to the nation formerly known as Burma.

The report comes from local news outlet The Irrawaddy, which credits "informed sources." Mr. Schmidt is due in that neck of the woods, anyway. The Next Web points out he's scheduled to attend a conference March 21 in New Delhi. Plus, such a trip would be in keeping with his visit to North Korea: For years the country was closed off, ruled by a military regime that kept a tight grip over communications. Restrictions have loosened up in the last couple of years, but it's still not exactly a technological utopia.

According to The Irrawaddy:

During the trip, Schmidt will meet with senior government officials, opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi and leading businessmen, the sources added.

Burma is one of the world’s least connected countries, with only around 1 percent of its people having access to the Internet.

However, the quasi-civilian government of President Thein Sein, who has ushered a series of political and economic reforms since coming to power two years ago, has made expanding the country’s IT networks a national priority.

Mr. Schmidt, is this some sort of cover campaign for Secretary of State? Or just a reminder that Google is practically a nation unto itself?

Totally a serious diplomat. (Photo: dennisrodman.com)

Dennis Rodman might want to be a bit more discriminating in his choice of friends. The former NBA star has only just returned from his visit to North Korea, where he forged a bond with tinpot dictator Kim Jong-Un that's already gotten him kicked out of a fancy hotel bar for refusing to shut the hell up about the Supreme Leader's awesomeness.

Now, in advance of a U.N. vote over whether to impose sanctions on the country for its recent nuclear test, North Korea is threatening to unleash a nuclear attack on the United States if the U.N. dares to impose new sanctions on the country.

The AP reports:

An unidentified spokesman for Pyongyang's Foreign Ministry said the North will exercise its right for "a preemptive nuclear attack to destroy the strongholds of the aggressors" because Washington is pushing to start a nuclear war against the North.

Man, we're all going to be really embarrassed if that brain-dead Red Dawn remake turns out to be prescient.

But before anyone dives under his desk and kisses his ass goodbye, it's worth noting that this belligerent Stalinist dictatorship almost certainly doesn't have the technology to put a sufficiently small warhead on a missile that can hit the U.S. Angry rhetoric is pretty much North Korea's number-one (and possibly only) export. We can't imagine the saber-rattling makes anyone on the West Coast feel too cozy, though.

Has Eric Schmidt ever been this thoroughly upstaged?

The good old days. (Photo: TopTenz.net)

One unexpected result of Eric Schmidt's bizarre mission to North Korea? The Google chairman has apparently paved the way for "basketball diplomacy" between our two nations. The AP reports that former Chicago Bulls player and Carmen Electra ex Dennis Rodman is visiting Pyongyang with a Vice documentary crew. Let's hope Vice remembers to scrub the metadata from any sensitive photos this time.