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It's not about whether I trust Google's intentions. So long as Google is an American company, or more precisely so long as its headquarters exist in *any* country, there's a danger that the government of said country can bully them into giving up all the information they have on anybody.

I haven't had mod points since December (despite two years and 1204 comments).

But if I did have mod points, mine would go to the parent.

So should yours.

Putting all your eggs in one basket, as the cliche notes, is bad policy.

Putting all your information in the hands of one company invites extensive profiling of you.

It may even be that Google respects your privacy;
it may even be that GW Bush is voted out of office and Ashcroft (slighty NSFW) with him, and contrary to any realistic possibility, the Democratic Party gets rid of Howard Berman is defeated in the Democratic Primary and Fritz Hollings retires and the DMCA is repealed and no future Herbert Hoover ever leads the FBI into another COINTELPRO;
and it may even be that lions lie down with lambs and meat packers lie down with cows.

But even in such a perfect world, it would take one disgruntled Google employee or one corporate spy or one hacker to make all your data public.

The question isn't "is Google trustworthy"; the question is, given that you backup your data for the day your hard drive inevitably dies, given that you use an UPS because you know that even the best power company has blackouts, why you rush to put all your data in any one set of hands?

Electronic Frontier Foundation, The Digital Speech Project and Public Knowledge (to which I found a link on GNU website recently) are certainly worth visiting, not to mention our good friend Google. The problem is that while we all know that the so called "HDTV broadcast flag" [eff.org] makes exactly as much sense as the Security Flag from RFC 3514, this is not always the case with the average drunk Joe "General Public" Sixpack, who ironically is in fact the most important target we all should make sure those papers are carefully read and understood by, because he represents the target audience of Businessweek, not Slashdot.

Well, it appears this would be a place to do it. I sure wish the fsf.org site where easier to navigate and actually updated regularly. I'd love to know what they think and I'd be more encouraged to donate if I knew they where going to take action.

Bowers had offered to work with Baystate in the late '80s, but the company had rejected his offers [...] Baystate also pressured CAD software company Cadkey not to distribute Bowers' product, and later, Baystate purchased Cadkey and shut Bowers out of the market [...]

This sounds familiar; Find your biggest competitor, buy out their potential investors & then 'borrow' their technology. I do feel sorry for Bowers in all this! He mortgaged his house 10 years ago to fund the marketing of his software & he still hasn't received a dime from Baystate.

Meeker noted that Baystate had reproduced a handful of errors in Bowers program

Yup, that's a problem. It's hard to rationalize something like that... then again, judges aren't always tech savvy & they have been convinced that software DVD decoders must digitally copy a DVD in order to play it, thereby making DVD playback on a PC illegal. I'm sure Baystate's lawyers tried to argue that in making a 'similar' GUI to Bower's program, they ran into the same bugs by accident - or by design - or something else just as ludicrous.

Don't get me wrong, I'm all for capitalism; But decompiling your competitor's software is not the same as merely using ideas that seem to work well for your competitor.

I think everyone is missing a fundamental point here: The dam that is technological content protection or access control can be easily burst... as shown by this case (especially if any infringing technology shows up) and the DeCSS case. The development of DeCSS allowed content to be copied by the end-user (even if poorly) and, once the program was out, there was no going back... In this light, it doesn't seem that hard to imagine the entertainment industry advocating draconian legislation like the DMCA, CBDTPA, and the Berman Bill. Yikes...

This is all part of the Berman Bill.

This bill is not new news (see Wired article) and was introduced so late in the session of the 107th Congressthat it has no chance of passing (introduced on Oct 10 with only 6 working days left). Basically, it is a feel good measure for chest-thumping politicians with no real expectation of the bills passage. Neither Kyl or Wyden are up for re-election this year but opposing "repressive regimes" and supporting the "free world" always makes good sound bites.

If you based "repressive" on the laws passed, we would qualify... CIPA (Child Internet Protection Act - 106th H.R.4577 - law 106-554), COPA (Child Online Protection Act - 105th H.R.4328 - law 105-277), CPPA (The Child Pornography Protection Act - 104th H.R.3610 - law 104-208), CDA (Communications Decency Act - 104th S.652 - law 104-104), USA PATRIOT (Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism - 107th H.R.3162 - law 107-056),

You can go look at the Center for Democracy and Technology legislative reports and the Electronic Frontier Foundation Action Center and the proliferation of groups like the Center for Digital Democracy, Digital Speech Project, Privacy Rights Clearinghouse to understand that these are not isolated examples.

With elections coming up (US) I wanted to poll the my candidates on where they stand regarding issues I care a lot
about (e.g. the DMCA,
CBDTPA, etc). This is not only time consuming when done
individually, but also tends to result in vague replies: For example Adam
Smith, (yes, that congressman, featured on Slashdot recently here and here) would not explicitly state whether he
supports or opposes Rep. Boucher's legislation on Digital Media Consumers' Rights (Although with the recent events coming to light about him
it seems to matter less). What I would like to know if there is a web site, where I can find out who the
slashdot-type community (i.e. EFF, DigitalSpeech, etc.) endorses (or opposes) in each race. It would be even
nicer if this would go down to the sate level.

With elections coming up (US) I wanted to poll the my candidates on where they stand regarding issues I care a lot
about (e.g. the DMCA,
CBDTPA, etc). This is not only time consuming when done
individually, but also tends to result in vague replies: For example Adam
Smith, (yes, that congressman, featured on Slashdot recently here and here) would not explicitly state whether he
supports or opposes Rep. Boucher's legislation on Digital Media Consumers' Rights (Although with the recent events coming to light about him
it seems to matter less). What I would like to know if there is a web site, where I can find out who the
slashdot-type community (i.e. EFF, DigitalSpeech, etc.) endorses (or opposes) in each race. It would be even
nicer if this would go down to the sate level.

With elections coming up (US) I wanted to poll the my candidates on where they stand regarding issues I care a lot
about (e.g. the DMCA,
CBDTPA, etc). This is not only time consuming when done
individually, but also tends to result in vague replies: For example Adam
Smith, (yes, that congressman, featured on Slashdot recently here and here) would not explicitly state whether he
supports or opposes Rep. Boucher's legislation on Digital Media Consumers' Rights (Although with the recent events coming to light about him
it seems to matter less). What I would like to know if there is a web site, where I can find out who the
slashdot-type community (i.e. EFF, DigitalSpeech, etc.) endorses (or opposes) in each race. It would be even
nicer if this would go down to the sate level.

With elections coming up (US) I wanted to poll the my candidates on where they $
about (e.g. the DMCA,
CBDTPA, etc). This is n$
individually, but also tends to result in vague replies: For example , (yes, that congressman, featured on Slashdot recently $
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supports or opposes Rep. Boucher's $
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it seems to matter less). What I would like to know if there is a web site, whe$
slashdot-type community (i.e. EFF, DigitalSpeech, etc.) endorses (or oppos$
nicer if this would go down to the sate level.

With elections coming up (US) I wanted to poll the my candidates on where they $
about (e.g. the DMCA,
CBDTPA, etc). This is n$
individually, but also tends to result in vague replies: For example , (yes, that congressman, featured on Slashdot recently $
href="http://slashdot.org/articles/02/10/24/233 120 7.shtml?tid=167">here and$
href="http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/ 10/23/ 1320238&tid=117">here) wo$
supports or opposes Rep. Boucher's $
href="http://www.house.gov/boucher/docs/dmcraha ndo ut.htm">Digital Media Consume$
href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-d yn/article s/A10655-2002Oct24.html">rece$
it seems to matter less). What I would like to know if there is a web site, whe$
slashdot-type community (i.e. EFF, DigitalSpeech, etc.) endorses (or oppos$
nicer if this would go down to the sate level.

With elections coming up (US) I wanted to poll the my candidates on where they $
about (e.g. the DMCA,
CBDTPA, etc). This is n$
individually, but also tends to result in vague replies: For example , (yes, that congressman, featured on Slashdot recently $
href="http://slashdot.org/articles/02/10/24/233 120 7.shtml?tid=167">here and$
href="http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/ 10/23/ 1320238&tid=117">here) wo$
supports or opposes Rep. Boucher's $
href="http://www.house.gov/boucher/docs/dmcraha ndo ut.htm">Digital Media Consume$
href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-d yn/article s/A10655-2002Oct24.html">rece$
it seems to matter less). What I would like to know if there is a web site, whe$
slashdot-type community (i.e. EFF, DigitalSpeech, etc.) endorses (or oppos$
nicer if this would go down to the sate level.

In another note, here's an interesting rebuttal to the Declan article.

Also, know the Digital Speech Project. Best not reinventing any wheels.

What the tech community needs is a united front on the issues. Sure, there's the EFF, DigitalConsumer.org, anti-dmca.org, digitalspeech.org, publicknowledge.org, etc. etc. etc - all with varying degrees of influence, completeness, and scope. It really seems like a big duplication of effort.

Whether you like them or not, we could learn a lot from the National Rifle Association. The NRA has their "protecting our freedoms" issues, and they've managed to unite a group of fairly individualist people for a common goal. Legislators do not defy the NRA lightly in Congress, while they routinely screw over the tech industry. We need a solid lobby like the NRA to watch over our interests in Washington.

Dear Representative ________________:

I understand that on Tuesday 23 April, representatives from the
Recording Industry Association of America asked the Appropriations
Committee for additional funding to prosecute copyright-related crimes.
I feel that copyright disputes ought to be the realm of civil law, not
criminal law, and that is not appropriate for my tax dollars to support
the recording studios' disputes. Therefore, I urge you to resist this
industry request to subsidize their work.

Sincerely yours,

________________

BLAKE7: They walk into a trap and everyone dies

LORD OF THE RINGS: Frodo's finger gets chopped off by his best friend to save him from it's control. Middle earth is saved.

ANDOMIDA STRAIN: Rain water creates conditions which kill the virus

WAR OF THE WORLDS: A earth virus kills them

ID4: A computer virus kills them

3 DAYS OF THE CONDOR: It is all about protecting the cost of oil

SNEAKERS: Too many secrets

WARGAMES: Only winning move is not to play

GHOSTBUSTERS: Crossing the streams kills the "god"

DEEP SPACE 9: Cisco dies

PAY IT FORWARD: The kid dies

SIXTH SENSE: The main character is dies at the beginning

WINNIE THE POOH: Tigger does get his bouncies back

CLOSE IN COUNTER OF THE THIRD KIND: The notes of the song tells the drop off point for everyone that has been "abducted" by the aliens

E.T.: makes it home

E.T. 2000: makes it home again

ALICE IN WONDERLAND: Alice makes it home

M.A.S.H.: Hawkeye makes it home CASTAWAY: makes it home

NOT WITHOUT MY DAUGHTER: The daughter makes it home

QUANTIUM LEAP: does not make it home

THE GREAT ESCAPE: no one makes it home

2001: Everyone dies except David who becomes a star-child. No one makes it back to Earth.

GODZILLA: is pregnant!

FAIL SAFE: New York gets nuked

STAR TREK 2: Spock dies

STAR TREK 5: William Shatner is not god (or a director) after all

RAIDER OF THE LOST ARC: The Natzi's faces all melt in fear of the ghosts/power coming from the arc

MATRIX 1: Neo is the one. Agents can be rewritten by /dev/null

THE BIBLE: Jesus comes back, everyone gets judged

BOOK OF MORMON: Jesus comes back but the living have been bapatized for the dead so judgement can be skipped

LAWRENCE OF ARBIA: Your legs fall asleep

CBDTPA: In the end, the law does get passed and computers are legally considered to be nothing more than over-glorified televisions. GNU/Linux is considered to be non-compliant with the CBDTPA requirements and is therefore illegal

Ack! My site's been slashdotted.

I'm the new activist at the FSF. I want to come speak at your school or for your community group, G/LUG, any group of sympathetic people. Tonight I'm speaking at Loyola University of Chicago. I'll help you get a campus group up and running. I'll provide news and ideas for your existing activist group. Time is of the essence, since the SSSCA is being pushed inexorably towards being voted on in the Senate.

When it gets back up, the website is http://digitalspeech.org; you can put yourself on the activists' mailing list, or you can just email me.

Let's get together and get our freedom back!

J