Tom’s Comments

• Jun 13th, 2013 @ 3:18pm

  You don't have anything to hide until you do

  on If You've Got Nothing To Hide, You've Actually Got Plenty To Hide
  The beauty of collecting exabytes of data about average citizens "just in case" is that if you, for whatever reason, decide to get into politics, public life, legal trouble or any other situation that suddenly makes details about your life valuable, there they are. It allows for amazingly accurate retroactive targeting to eliminate enemies. Maybe you think your government today has good intentions, but will you think the same in 20 years? If not, how do you get your personal information back?
• Apr 22nd, 2013 @ 8:22am

  Pragmatic for legal reasons for big tech companies

  on Somewhere Everywhere, Big Brother Is Smiling: Congress Sells Your Privacy For A Cool $84 Million
  Many of the big tech companies backing the bill have been sold on it as it is a legal "get out of jail free" card for any and all abuses of personal information that might otherwise be actionable.
  
  I would be surprised if there was even one general counsel at any tech company likely to be affected by CISPA recommending against the bill.
• Mar 18th, 2013 @ 6:51am

  Naming Problem

  on Maxis GM: Our Vision Is More Important Than Our Customers & Lots Of People Love Our Crappy DRM
  If they wanted to release a new game that substantially deviated from the form and function of previous editions, they should have given it a different name. By continuing to use the "SimCity" brand, they not only succeeded in driving big $ in presales, but also jacking up player expectations. Further, the tightening of the DRM screws, ignoring quality and playability for moment, made what you get for the big $ worth something less since they effectively destroyed any resale potential the game had. Take that, consumer.
• Mar 13th, 2013 @ 8:38am

  Re:

  on Maxis Insider: EA Lying About Needing Servers For Single Player SimCity
  I hate ironing, so I take my shirts to the dry cleaners.
• Mar 13th, 2013 @ 7:09am

  (untitled comment)

  on Maxis Insider: EA Lying About Needing Servers For Single Player SimCity
  Here are some ideas that might help EA:
  - Recognize playability and quality impacts the amount of both paid purchases and piracy for any game, but high quality causes paid purchases to increase at a faster rate.
  - Diminishing the playability and quality of your products in an attempt to reduce piracy usually results in a more dramatic impact on paid purchases.
  - DRM doesn't cause potential players to switch from being pirates to being paid purchasers.
  - Paying customers recognize and resent you for taking away important playability characteristics from the games they enjoy and will think twice before purchasing additional titles from you in the future.
  - An important segment of the buying public (i.e. the educated ones) recognize that you are placing more focus on manipulating market behaviors instead of building quality, playable games. The rest just think you are incompetent crooks who took their $60.
• Feb 8th, 2013 @ 11:18am

  There is no such thing as an "orphaned" work.

  on Amoeba Records Deals With Orphan Works By Pretending It Can Just Digitize & Sell Now, But Pay Later
  RIAA will claim ownership by default as the artists' advocate.
• Feb 7th, 2013 @ 10:40am

  Who, what and why?

  on Canadian Chamber Of Commerce Wants To Legalize Spyware Rootkits To Help Stop 'Illegal' Activity
  The really idiotic part of this is that the way it is written, anyone for any reason can install a rootkit and start collecting unspecified data. Sure, there is the BS about "suspicion", but that's a pretty low bar.
  
  The unwritten part is that the only ones permitted to do this legally will be the content monopolies and, of course, the government(s).
  
  Assuming this sees the light of day, I can't wait for clever citizens to figure out how to intercept, isolate and decrypt the data being collected and start publishing the embarrassing habits of government officials and industry executives.