Dick Francis's sure thing

Fame can be fossilized for ever in an instant, but t'was ever thus. Dick Francis CBE, who has died in the Cayman Islands, is a pre-internet example of this phenomenon.

Mr Francis rode over 350 racehorse winners, held the title of champion jockey and, on retirement from the saddle, wrote 40-odd novels on racing intrigue (creating a new thriller genre in the process). But he will mostly be remembered for posterity for his spectacular failure to win the 1956 Grand National on Devon Loch, the Queen Mother's horse. He could never shake off this moment: riding a sure thing that lost.

The Virtual Revolution's latest episode dealt with issues of online privacy. It seems web users are currently happy that their browsing habits and personal details are collected in return for free access to websites like Google, so that advertising can be honed to individual's search behaviour. And social networking captures every message and photo ever posted -- for ever.

The danger of this is that no one knows whether personal data will always be in benign owners' hands. Dutch surveys of religious groupings in the 1920s fell into the lap of the Nazis during their occupation of the Netherlands during World War II, with disastrous consequences.

Where Devon Loch will always define Dick Francis, web browsing behaviour will come to define us. Facebook indiscretions (e.g. drunkenness and worse) are being given as much weight as CVs when considering candidates for jobs and for sacking staff: they may even give blackmail opportunities to shady future rights holders of embarrassing information.

This is the thought police of George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four by the back door: secret files are being kept on everyone.