Exactly. The "glass doors on all hotels" metaphor isn't quite correct. It's more like the local police demanding a hotel install hidden cameras in every single hotel room, always recording, with the feed piped directly to police HQ. Rather than police ask a hotel to help them set up a single temporary camera for a single user/room, they are simply bypassing the locked doors and solid walls designed for users privacy.
In this case, They are demanding not that Lavabit occasionally turn over suspects email data when asked, they are asking for a permanent back door to look into anyone's comms without anyone knowing, even the hosting company. That is wrong on every level (spying on everyone regardless of suspicion, lack of informing a third party such as the hosting company, no process).
It's been drilled into us enough times that if we do anything heroic or out of the ordinary, we can be found liable for just about anything. Someone drowning in the river? Jump in and save them? City sues you for swimming in a public water-way. Help police subdue a fleeing criminal? Arrested for "interfering with police business."
What's to say the civilian wouldn't have a case against us for assault? Very VERY basically police can get away with subduing since they need to do it for their jobs, but even then people have been known to try suing anyway after being arrested and fighting back during, say, a drug bust. We as a random hero citizen would have NO protections at all, and the police have told us way too often that vigilantism is NOT to be supported.
Amusingly, I was able to avoid the redirect by simply stopping the page load before it loaded completely and was able to browse a - to me - fully functional website. Unfortunately I wasn't fast enough on the button the second page when I clicked a random link and got redirected and...
Discovered that not only does it redirect, but it also deletes your "last visited" page so you can't simply go "back" one page and try again. Can I sue them under the CFAA for "hacking" my web browser?
Huh, you remember those websites in popularity a while back that would run a bot against you in a chat program, and it was supposed to pretend it was good enough to hold up a conversation? (Do you like ice cream? *SUBJECT ICE CREAM. QUERY PERSONAL LIKE. REPLY AFFIRM/NEG RANDOM YES/NO* Why yes, I do like ICE CREAM).
That second peer article sounds like someone's attempt to make an AI that would pump out a series of loosely connected sentences that talk without really talking, and see if they can get it past overwhelmed peer-review journalist interns. He did, and is now trying to keep up the ruse as long as he can before he has to break down, laugh, and admit it was just another Sokal affair.
Hah, I'd noticed that in the article when I read it too. So, I hardly know anything in particular I can do differently to not be monitored by the NSA (I have nothing to hide, but plenty to be uncomfortable about), but then they just come out and proudly proclaim they intercepted a very SPECIFIC email exchange? This close to the actual "attack"? If the attack is "imminent", then doesn't it mean they just need to fire another email to the guys in Yemen saying "holy shit guys, the US government just told the NY times that they are reading these emails. Go to plan B!" and suddenly we have NO idea what is going on.
I think I have a FANTASTIC idea on how to reduce data streaming use: STOP REQUIRING DATA PLANS FOR SMART PHONES. If you require data plans, then people such as me that never planned to use it will.... USE THE DATA PLAN. They will then add to your traffic, which you yourself are complaining you are running out of. And I am forced to pay out the ass for a service I didn't want in the first place, and only had to get since I changed my phone from one where texting involved using a phone dial pad to an iphone's touch-screen (much faster natural typing).
That is exactly what I was thinking as I read this article. With all these regulations and slow security checkpoints, it's reasonable to think that there are now more people crammed into a small confined area BEFORE security (such as the line for security) that would be a prime spot for an explosion. It could cause more human life damage than a single plane falling, isn't currently preventable, and would shut that airport down for months.
Guess we need to have pre-security to get into airports now. But wait, what if we have someone intend to attack the massed people at THAT security point? Then I guess we just need another security checkpoint before that for THAT security point, and another for that, and another for that, and...
Oh shit, why not just install cameras in all our heads and monitor what we do all the time? Then they can DEFINATELY keep us all safe!
That list is already 6 entries too large for my tastes
Don't forget the massively increased use of drones for targeted killings in sovereign nations, assassination kill list, and the fact that Americans can be and are put on previously said list.
Whether you all agree with the severity of legitimacy of these scandals (most of the ones regarding Benghazi in particular I think are absurd), the fact is that this list is already too large already. In fact, we should be pointing at and laughing at every single allegation on the list as another "whitewater-gate" scandal. Instead, we are either forced to defend them (in the cases of some people suddenly demonizing Snowden and praising the NSA spying efforts) or just staying passive about it (such as the Manning trial (a horrible miscarriage of justice).
Now, I've always been willing to claim I'd rather have more "terrorism" a we've had in the past than all of the surveillance, protection, security, and safety we've gained since 9/11. And to find out that we've had even less freedom than I thought we did in the discovery of these secret programs just tells me we're even further over my limit.
But I always have to take a step back and wonder if I am so willing to ask his because it would never happen. Utah is not exactly a major target, aside from a fairly major military base or two, but those are miles away, so only extremely major attacks would affect me.
I an be generous all I want if it won't happen, I suppose. Won't make it any braver.
And yet they were only caught because they robbed a store, which got reported, stole a car, in which the owner escaped their custody, and the survivor hid out in a boat, in which a vigilant CIVILIAN alerted the police to traces of blood.
So not only did a city-wide police crack down not catch these guys, but the NSA surveillance net didn't stop this (which was in place for 6 years) nor did it help in finding them before they were caught on their own.
But I feel safer already! Keep taking away my freedoms, government!
Prenda is screwed either way. They either admit that IP addresses are not identifiable information and get all their cases thrown out of court across the country for that admission, or admit they ARE and lose all their cases due to it being a honey pot operation.
As scary a number 5 million may seem, they make a lot more than that just operating there. If they were to pull out, they would lose a lot more than that just to protest a small amount. Unless they could get a lot more removed, or some were recurring, it wouldn't be worth it.
It's worth calling attention to it, and publicizing it, but actually doing something about such a paltry sum isn't worth doing.
Re: Re: This is a real mania with you 14-year-olds, isn't it?
The more I read OOTB's posts, the more I think he is just fanatically playing devil's advocate. I can't think of a single post here that he hasn't taken the complete opposite stance on for anything. And there are a few posts on techdirt that I haven't agreed with, either on the severity of the issue, or the actual issue itself.
OOTB, however, consistently yells at us that we are all "sheeple" ignorant to the common sense ideas in our society as if HE is the one in the right / majority of the country and knows it.
Well, it's good exercise. Gets us to learn how to argue against the common stupid statements we are likely to hear regarding these stories in the coming days.
I think I've already figured out how to game the system. See, the Kinect won't be able to tell whether you are watching the commercial or not, just if you are watching the TV or not, right? So what's to keep me from turning it on, unplugging the HDMI cable, and playing something else, such as oh I don't know a PS4? I can play video games all day, and as far as the Kinect will think, is that I am so engrossed in the commercials I am staring at the screen so fixedly. All while holding some strange device.
Earn rewards, watch no commercials.
But then, you are still being watched by Big Brother. Hope it's all worth it. And you paid 600+ (likely, and power usage) for the privilege of doing so.
Yeah, those were all a part of my original rant, all summed up as the fact that we are just losing ownership of our own products we are buying.
I'd like to point to PCs as a bastion of freedom, but then I realize that my gaming library is still locked down to an account irrevocably tied to a single company. If they were to go out of business or to feel that I broke some arbitrary rule, I could lose well over thousands of dollars worth of video games, all because it is controlled online, electronically.
On the post: Lavabit Case Shows Why We Need Tech Literate Judges
Re: Still not the right arguments or points
In this case, They are demanding not that Lavabit occasionally turn over suspects email data when asked, they are asking for a permanent back door to look into anyone's comms without anyone knowing, even the hosting company. That is wrong on every level (spying on everyone regardless of suspicion, lack of informing a third party such as the hosting company, no process).
On the post: Newspaper Editor: If The Gov't Tells Me Publishing NSA Secrets Is Not In The Public Interest, Who Am I To Disbelieve Them?
Uh, this guy wants his cake and to eat it too. I WANT CIVIL LIBERTIES! BUT I ALSO RECOGNIZE THAT I NEED TO BE SECURE, SO SCREW CIVIL LIBERTIES!
On the post: Philly Transit Police Chief Shocked That No One Came To The Assistance Of A Cop Being Assaulted By A Suspect
What's to say the civilian wouldn't have a case against us for assault? Very VERY basically police can get away with subduing since they need to do it for their jobs, but even then people have been known to try suing anyway after being arrested and fighting back during, say, a drug bust. We as a random hero citizen would have NO protections at all, and the police have told us way too often that vigilantism is NOT to be supported.
On the post: The Government Can't Even Figure Out How To Shut Down Its Websites In A Reasonable Way
Discovered that not only does it redirect, but it also deletes your "last visited" page so you can't simply go "back" one page and try again. Can I sue them under the CFAA for "hacking" my web browser?
On the post: DailyDirt: Mistakes In Science Publishing
That second peer article sounds like someone's attempt to make an AI that would pump out a series of loosely connected sentences that talk without really talking, and see if they can get it past overwhelmed peer-review journalist interns. He did, and is now trying to keep up the ruse as long as he can before he has to break down, laugh, and admit it was just another Sokal affair.
On the post: The NSA Leaks Put Our 'Methods' At Risk, But Bragging About Monitoring Al Qaeda Emails Doesn't?
But Snowden put us all in danger. Uh huh.
On the post: Making Mobile Video Streaming Better By Operating In The 'Unused Spectrum' Of Copyright Law
win-win for both of us.
On the post: TSA's Instagram Account Full Of Confiscated Weapons Photos Only Looks Like 'Safety'
Re: Re:
Guess we need to have pre-security to get into airports now. But wait, what if we have someone intend to attack the massed people at THAT security point? Then I guess we just need another security checkpoint before that for THAT security point, and another for that, and another for that, and...
Oh shit, why not just install cameras in all our heads and monitor what we do all the time? Then they can DEFINATELY keep us all safe!
On the post: NSA Now Revealing A Lot More About What It Does Than Snowden Leaks Did; So Is That Harming America?
That list is already 6 entries too large for my tastes
Whether you all agree with the severity of legitimacy of these scandals (most of the ones regarding Benghazi in particular I think are absurd), the fact is that this list is already too large already. In fact, we should be pointing at and laughing at every single allegation on the list as another "whitewater-gate" scandal. Instead, we are either forced to defend them (in the cases of some people suddenly demonizing Snowden and praising the NSA spying efforts) or just staying passive about it (such as the Manning trial (a horrible miscarriage of justice).
On the post: Trading Lives For Freedom Is The American Way
But I always have to take a step back and wonder if I am so willing to ask his because it would never happen. Utah is not exactly a major target, aside from a fairly major military base or two, but those are miles away, so only extremely major attacks would affect me.
I an be generous all I want if it won't happen, I suppose. Won't make it any braver.
On the post: Study: Gamers Better, Faster At Interpreting Visual Input
On the post: Dick Cheney's Crystal Ball Says That NSA Surveillance Could Have Stopped 9/11
Re:
So not only did a city-wide police crack down not catch these guys, but the NSA surveillance net didn't stop this (which was in place for 6 years) nor did it help in finding them before they were caught on their own.
But I feel safer already! Keep taking away my freedoms, government!
On the post: Irony Alert: John Steele Denies Uploading Anything Ever Despite Growing IP Evidence
Hmm....
On the post: France Tells Apple To Pay Giant 'You Must Be A Pirate' Tax On iPads
Re: Re:
It's worth calling attention to it, and publicizing it, but actually doing something about such a paltry sum isn't worth doing.
On the post: France Tells Apple To Pay Giant 'You Must Be A Pirate' Tax On iPads
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
On the post: France Tells Apple To Pay Giant 'You Must Be A Pirate' Tax On iPads
On the post: Researcher Tries To Connect Violence And Video Games During Murder Trial; Gets Destroyed During Cross Examination
Re: Re: This is a real mania with you 14-year-olds, isn't it?
OOTB, however, consistently yells at us that we are all "sheeple" ignorant to the common sense ideas in our society as if HE is the one in the right / majority of the country and knows it.
Well, it's good exercise. Gets us to learn how to argue against the common stupid statements we are likely to hear regarding these stories in the coming days.
On the post: Microsoft's Great Patent Application: Xbox Achievements For Watching Advertising
Gaming the system
Earn rewards, watch no commercials.
But then, you are still being watched by Big Brother. Hope it's all worth it. And you paid 600+ (likely, and power usage) for the privilege of doing so.
On the post: Reports Of Xbox One's Handling Of Used Games Mobilizes Playstation Fans
Re: Not quite right...
On the post: Xbox One Release: Tons Of Questions, Very Few Answers
I'd like to point to PCs as a bastion of freedom, but then I realize that my gaming library is still locked down to an account irrevocably tied to a single company. If they were to go out of business or to feel that I broke some arbitrary rule, I could lose well over thousands of dollars worth of video games, all because it is controlled online, electronically.
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