White House Petition Against CISPA Gets Over The 100,000 Signature Threshold

from the good-sign dept

Wed, Mar 13th 2013 12:20am — Mike Masnick

Yet another White House petition has made it over the 100,000 signature mark, which is necessary to get a response. This one is asking the White House not to support CISPA, arguing that the terms are too broad, and the possibility of abuse is simply too high. To date, the White House has actually been rather cool on CISPA, preferring an approach that actually does include some privacy protections (but, also one that has a few more mandates for companies). Just last week, DHS boss Janet Napolitano gave a speech in which she suggested that CISPA did not do enough to protect privacy -- and made it even more clear during Q&A, in which she said of CISPA:

"There were no privacy protections built within it and it resided almost all of the cyber information monitoring responsibilities within the NSA, which of course is part of the military."

Of course, some of this is a turf battle. CISPA gives more power to the Defense Department (which the NSA is a part of). The approach favored by the White House gives more power to Homeland Security.

Either way, this would make it easy for the White House to quickly come out in support of the petition, but still say that "something needs to be done" on cybersecurity -- but exactly what that is still fairly murky. There have been a number of rumors that CISPA supporters have been "negotiating" with the White House, and that could mean tradeoffs that allow a bad bill to get through. This is something that needs to be watched carefully.

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Filed Under: cispa, petition, privacy, signatures

44 Comments

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Alana (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 12:06am

Sadly, this won't accomplish anything.
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 1:12am

I notice there were two sets of initials/cities that each reappared twice. Makes me wonder if there is cheating going on, or a bug somewhere.
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Anonymous Howard (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 2:03am

SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
Sorry for the caps..

Here's the deal:
Collapse all replies to a reported comment into the hidden comment, so it won't take up useful screen space, which is IMHO the trolls only goal:
To use up the first 2/3 of the comment space by posting shitty arguments and provoking replies from all the troll-feeders on TD, drawing attention from useful comments.
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Zakida Paul (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 2:28am

Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
One problem.

As has been pointed out to this suggestion before, some of the most insightful comments come as replies to trollish comments. We wouldn't want to lose those.

Ironically, the trolls don't seem to even realise that they are spawning interesting and insightful conversation from their idiocy.
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Mike Masnick (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 2:32am

Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
There is a feedback link in the footer of the page, which would be much more appropriate for this kind of comment.

However, we are constantly working on ways to improve the comments, so stay tuned.
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rorybaust (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 3:08am

pesky people
oh no , not another question to be answered, think the bar is just to be raised again , its pesky when people start taking things seriously and at our word.
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Ninja (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 3:16am

Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
Agreed. But an optional way to do it could satisfy some people and if there are any comments marked insightful the hidden link could display a faded out icon.

Also, some replies are simply too damn funny ;)
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Anonymous Howard (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 3:18am

Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
Sorry, only checked the top of the page : ]

@Zakida Paul
No comments are 'censored' anyway - to my knowledge - on TD, so no lost insightful comments. Anybody who want to take a shoot at the red herring in the barrel can have his shoot. It's just less distracting
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out_of_the_blue, 13 Mar 2013 @ 3:27am

'Splain me this non sequitur:
"from the good-sign dept" ... "could mean tradeoffs that allow a bad bill to get through".

Take a loopy tour of Techdirt.com! You always end up at same place!
http://techdirt.com/
Where the fanboys troll the site with vulgar ad hom, and call anyone disagreeing "trolls"!
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Ninja (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 3:28am

Re: pesky people
The more you raise the bar the more impact the ones that meet the threshold will have. Maybe it's a good thing they rise it again?
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Ninja (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 3:31am

Well, considering this is aimed at the Executive branch I wonder what real impact it may have in the lawmakers. Maybe it'll trigger some yellow lights and make the bill slightly more toxic politically speaking. I'd say it's one positive score for activism but we need to mount up the pressure.
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out_of_the_blue, 13 Mar 2013 @ 3:47am

Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
@"Zakida Paul ... Ironically, the trolls don't seem to even realise that they are spawning interesting and insightful conversation from their idiocy."

Techdirt's fanboy-trolls definitely don't grasp that:
a) their notions are those of a small number of nettish weenies intent on getting something for nothing.
b) that they've nothing substantive and on topic, so they can only try to get inventive with ad hom.
c) blocking of comments is censorship of ideas, though fanboys claim they vigorously support free speech; obviously that's defined as "so long as agrees with me"
d) the frequent "reporting" and blocking of perfectly normal opinions is one of the major clues as to how petty are the fanboys here, how they don't wish to even know that contrary opinions exist
e) Techdirt fanboys have a lower tolerance for dissent than any other site I've seen. As numbers of commenters are low, it appears that the threshold for blocking is quite low too.
f) an easy and obvious way to defeat the blocking is simply by copy-and-paste as often as necessary
g) with Noscript and cdn.techdirt.com hosted out I don't even have to click to see the "blocked" comments
h) even if you succeed in running off dissenters, still doesn't make your notions workable
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out_of_the_blue, 13 Mar 2013 @ 4:00am

Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
@ "Ninja: Also, some replies are simply too damn funny ;)"

Oh, I see: you're here for the lulz, not substance.

Just state your opinion on the topic, fanboys, if you have any, and allow others to do the same.

Ad hom should always be out of place. The few new readers dropping don't relish your vile remarks, nor are convinced by them.

This scheming to suppress opinion is HIGHLY indicative of your true ability and nature.
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Zakida Paul (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 4:05am

Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
I think you need to get laid.
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snidely (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 4:32am

Prices go up...
In future news, the White House announces that they have raised the minimum number of signatures for their online petition to 310 million.
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 4:57am

Re: Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
And you are here for...?
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 5:07am

Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
Let me feed the troll a bit.

Carnegie Mellon University: Gone in 60 Seconds: The Impact of the Megaupload Shutdown on Movie Sales
https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2229349

Brett Danaher & Michael D. Smith.

See there go read that crappy study, with a lot of assumptions about how you must look at the net effect while ignoring the true total net effect.

They also like to use the word "harmful" instead of trying to be objective which probably means those 2 stooges have a bias towards pro-copyright views just like you and are trying to put numbers on it.

The thing is they never ask the right questions.
They go on and on how you must look at the whole(net) to find the right answer and look at just a set of data to claim piracy is harmful to the "industry", I never saw other questions and data included like "How enforcement affects society", "What are the benefits and side effects of granting a monopoly to so many people", what is the net effect of a granted monopoly on society?

Only then somebody should claim that we should use more "enforcement" to deal with "piracy".

But you are not here to debate anything, you are here just to troll, so have a nice day.
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 5:11am

Re: Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
BTW those 2 are also the same guys that sold themselves earlier in 2012 to create just another study demonstrating how bad piracy is.

From 2012:
New industry research shows piracy harms film and TV content sales
http://if.com.au/2012/10/02/article/SFDFWGUWDI.html
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Anonymous Howard (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 5:11am

Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
I know you'll ignore me, but let's give it a shot
You defeat your own argument

c) blocking of comments is censorship of ideas, though fanboys claim they vigorously support free speech; obviously that's defined as "so long as agrees with me"
f) an easy and obvious way to defeat the blocking is simply by copy-and-paste as often as necessary
g) with Noscript and cdn.techdirt.com hosted out I don't even have to click to see the "blocked" comments

So it's censorship, but you're so fuckin' awesome that you can defeat it easily. Yeah, move along..

d) the frequent "reporting" and blocking of perfectly normal opinions is one of the major clues as to how petty are the fanboys here, how they don't wish to even know that contrary opinions exist

Again, you say that blocking (or 'censoring') can be easily circumvented, yet still insisting on we don't even want to know about you 'perfectly normal opinions'.

Tell me, trollboy, how many of your puke disappeared permanently from the site?

I understand that it'd hurt your job experience if you couldn't spam 2-3 provocative comments on every sensitive story to take up the first ten pages of the comments section with the replies.
That's the point of my suggestion, you thick skinned mollusk, to fuck up your attempts at derailing meaningful conversation with your bleating
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 5:26am

Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
My solution.

Divorce the data from the presentation.

Tag the posts and let custom CSS files for anybody to view the thing the way they want it to.

So maybe people smegging stop asking for that smegging smeg.

I for example have to read the source to read the hidden files since I am not enabling Javascript, that is fine, I don't complain since the day that it really bother me, I can write a piece of Javascript to go through all the "flagged" comments and mark them "show", but I do understand that some people are never satisfied and want to do it their own way, that is fine too, so the answer is provide the data and let other do the layouting using their own custom CSS in their own browser, than people can choose to open the page with all flagged comments collapsed or all answers to a comment flagged collapsed or see everything.
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 5:29am

Re: Prices go up...
Suddenly they will realize that 400 million people is more than the total population of the country and may decide to do something about it.
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 5:46am

Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
http://www.instructables.com/id/Cardboard-Electric-Guitar/

Go build your own guitar and become famous blue, then we can talk.
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gnudist, 13 Mar 2013 @ 5:49am

Re:
IF so, then that just means we push harder. Rights and Freedom aren't free, they must be vigorously fought for and defended.

Both by means of militaries defending free countries and via the political realm.
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 5:58am

Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
Goddamn you suck at trolling.
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Master Rod (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 6:31am

Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
Hmm, and when does an idiot or troll know his comment is insightful?
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Master Rod (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 6:38am

Re: Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
Gaawwwd No! He probably talks his way though it. Rats, now look what you've done!? You have trivialized this important conversation.

Dear Tech Dirt. We really need to keep this conversation at a conversational level with some intellect. It needs to stay on topic. For those trolling I won't mention any names Paul, But yes, delete all these superfluous rants, for they can go to AOL and vent there.
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Master Rod (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 6:43am

Re: Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
Please, please, please, do not feed the mullusks.....Get back on topic..
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 7:09am

100,000 sigs, (probably many multiples), out of a populations of 300 million, now that will make them sit up and pay attention !!!! ....... NOT...
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 7:11am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
funny that you are not on topic either !!!! Rod ..
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 7:20am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
And your rants are so, so on-topic.

Drown yourself in a toilet.
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 7:22am

Re:
And your one ungrammatical response will make them sit up and pay attention.
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Gwiz (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 7:27am

Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
Collapse all replies to a reported comment into the hidden comment,....

I disagree completely with this approach for two main reasons:

1) Some of the best, most informative debates I have seen here have been in threads started by a comment that were hidden.

2) The best answer to speech one doesn't agree with is to counter with your own speech. If you collapse the complete thread you also remove the counter arguments contained in the replies.

Just my 2�.
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 7:32am

Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
Totally agree with you sir. Are you sure you aren't my sock puppet?
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 7:54am

Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
Try going to the Thrichordist site (or almost any other "pro copyright", site for that matter), where your comments are 'held for moderation' indefinitely if they disagree even in the slightest with the authors. The ones that are let through are the most poorly informed ones, whose points can be easily picked apart.

At least here, you are given a chance, and despite the "censorship", people still have no trouble answering to you. Funny form of censorship, that.
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Anonymous Howard (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 7:59am

Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
first of all, anyone who want to feed the troll can click on his comment, just as now.

2) The best answer to speech one doesn't agree with is to counter with your own speech. If you collapse the complete thread you also remove the counter arguments contained in the replies.

You assume it is possible to counter a troll. It's like mud-wrestling with the pig: you get dirty and he enjoys it.
Did you see ootb, bob or the others write a meaningful reply to any counter-argument beside of spewing idiotic nonsense and namecalling? I didn't, but maybe it's just me.

Their point is to - IMHO - divert the discussion to arguments with them.
People read so many comments, and if they have to scroll through ten pages of troll-whacking they hopefully miss the real opinions. That's how trolling and shilling works, and it works perfectly because people just can't leave that idiotic comment alone.
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Gwiz (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 8:12am

Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
I guess it comes down to how you define a troll really. I wouldn't classify most of the comments that get hidden as trolling myself.

Even if someone is purposely trying to incite emotions or whatnot, aren't they still entitled to their opinion? The responsibility of free speech also means you have to accept someone else's right to their speech, doesn't it?
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Anonymous Howard (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 8:40am

Re: Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
we agree that there are commenters worth arguing with, but then again, why are they get reported?

IMHO reporting should serve as a reporting tool for trollish or other disruptive behavior, not different opinions.

I'm talking about this kind of shit:
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20130304/02212922184/global-free-internet-act-introduced-con gress.shtml
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Ninja (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 9:33am

Re: Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
Chill out pal. There can be a whole lot of substance in the lulz. You probably can't fathom any substance within humorous comments or articles in your black and white world but they are there in shades of gray (and damned be I had this image of the guy from the book sodomizing you and lol'd).

You see, you may have forgotten but I already expressed agreement with you. At the time you weren't acting completely like an asshole as you are doing for the past few weeks. If you provide comments with citations (when needed), evidence, good argumentation I'll even switch sides and defend your point if I find what you presented enough to justify such. But no, you are the one that provides no substance at all, resorts to petty attacks and snarky remarks.

And regardless of what you think there's no censorship anywhere in this site. Your comments are all there to read. I just had to click the pink link to see your idiotic reply to my comment. The fact that your comment is hidden is because the community by large thinks you are an arsehole. Congratulations ;)

This scheming to suppress opinion is HIGHLY indicative of your true ability and nature.

Amusing because I never clicked the report button ;)
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Ninja (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 9:35am

Re: Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
NO ZAKIDA.

He would eventually procreate and this is not in the best interests of humanity.
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Chosen Reject (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 10:03am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
Whatever fanboy, didn't you listen to him? He said stop with the ad hom, fanboy. You fanboys can't seem to get it through that you're just here for the lulz. You should stop posting ad hom attacks. Your reply was vile. And ad homs should just be stopped. In fact, your reply was just a scheming to suppress his opinion, so get your ad hom out of this place.
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Ninja (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 10:07am

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
+funny.

Well done dear sir!
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Chosen Reject (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 10:12am

Re: Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
When it gets the little light bulb symbol. But that's not what is being discussed. It's that they're comments spark a discussion that can be insightful. For example, bob made some asinine comment about THE COMMONS ARE DYING and I replied (sarcastically) mentioning some famous people who lived without copyright. There was a bit of an insightful discussion there, but even if there hadn't been, just in replying to him, I did some research to know more about the history of copyrights on music publishing and found that the first monopolies on music publishing were on who could publish music (meaning copyrights went to the publisher, not the musician). Boy, not much has changed.
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Anonymous Coward, 13 Mar 2013 @ 2:59pm

Re: Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
I use noscript and sometimes I am unable to click and see a blocked comment unless I enable scripts. Maybe that's what he meant to say. I changed my noscript settings though so that it won't give me as many problems and I think it works better now.
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Divide by Zero (profile), 13 Mar 2013 @ 5:20pm

Re: Re: Re: SUGGESTION TO TECHDIRT STAFF
fanboy. FANBOY. FANBOY

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. Also, some of us are not boys.

Bet that blew your mind, huh?
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