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He's probably talking about this interesting bit from the bill:

IN GENERAL
—An association of large online operators may register as a professional standards body by filing with the Commission an application for registration in such form as the Commission, by rule, may prescribe containing the rules of the association and such other information and documents as the Commission, by rule, may prescribe as necessary or appropriate in the public interest or for protecting the welfare of users of large online operators.

I found this here:

DUTIES OF LARGE ONLINE OPERATORS:
Any large online operator that engages in any form of behavioral or psychological research based on the activity or data of its users shall—

(1) disclose to its users on a routine basis, but not less than once each 90 days, any experiments or studies that user was subjected to or enrolled in with the purpose of promoting engagement or product conversion;

(2) disclose to the public on a routine basis, but not less than once each 90 days, any experiments or studies with the purposes of promoting engagement or product conversion being currently undertaken, or concluded since the prior disclosure;

(3) shall present the disclosures in paragraphs (1) and (2) in a manner that—
(A) is clear, conspicuous, context-appropriate, and easily accessible; and
(B) is not deceptively obscured;

(4) establish an Independent Review Board for any behavioral or psychological research, of any purpose, conducted on users or on the basis of user activity or data, which shall review and have authority to approve, require modification in, or disapprove all behavioral or psychological experiments or research; and

(5) ensure that any Independent Review Board established under paragraph (4) shall register with the Commission, including providing to the Commission

NSA probably now has access to the direct streams telecoms use to consolidate their billing and geolocatioon data, from taps on the underlying circuits. If it's encrypted then nudge nudge wink wink here's the key. So telecoms no longer need suffer the indignity and PR risk of transmitting the data.

NSA Warrantless Wiretapping is not just an invasion of privacy. They have actually claimed to Congress that they do NOT consider information intercepted and stored indefinitely... to be unlawful at all! Until or unless someone reads it. This subverts Freedom of Association too, since any future tyrant would have access to this cradle-to-grave data of our families and friends and (now! with super-cells!) movements.

To get up to speed quickly this whitepaper by Andrew Clement seems to cover all the bases. Look past the straw man 'Metadata Collection' within it for 'NSA splitter'. Or you might start as I did years ago with James Bamford's fascinating 1982 book Puzzle Palace. While most of it dwells on what is now history and goes on at length about NSA's Charter which explicitly forbid domestic intercepts, there was a single passage in this book that revealed something else. I will quote it because I believe Bamford intended it as a dire warning: "Another indication of NSA's "broadband sweeping of multi-circuited domestic telecommunications trunk lines," David L. Watters told the Senate Intelligence Committee [in 1978!] lies in the Agency's request for an amendment to the wiretap law that would permit NSA to engage in warrantless wiretapping "for the sole purpose of determining the capability of equipment" when such "test period shall be limited... to... ninety days." Continuing, he warned: "Let there be no misunderstanding here. There is only one category of wiretapping equipment or system which requires up to ninety days for test and adjustment, and that system is broadband electronic eavesdropping equipment, the vacuum-cleaner approach to intelligence gathering, the general search of microwave trunk lines. I make this assertion on the strength of actual experience in the electronic intelligence trade and on the strength of over twenty-five years' experience in the telecommunications profession. An ordinary, single-line wire tap requires only five minutes to adjust and test."

Sure this pre-Internet quote discusses microwave, which was the long-line 'broadband' of choice in those days... but NSA's intentions to dig in at places where American citizens speak with each other is clear. Since then, Thomas Drake, Bill Binney and Mark Klein have all come forward alleging domestic surveillance far exceeding 'telephone records'. Klein is of special note, for it is he who revealed the existence of secret Room 641A in the lawsuit Heptig vs AT&T that the Electronic Frontier Foundation took almost to the Supreme Court... who actually declined to hear the case on grounds that the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 protected AT&T from liability for involvement with any illegal activities. Sound normal? This was a law passed after the lawsuit was filed. In response to it, even. Oh.

That should make you a bit angry. We're not talking about telephone records here. We're talking about fiber splitting with drop-in access to the whole slurp. Which also contains voice these days. Any real despot who comes to power will discover that the United States is prepared to deliver real-time private communications and databases of activity for its citizens, cradle to grave, that had been collected with no 'probable cause' whatsoever.

Why the fuck would anyone want to build this thing

Before making any assumptions as you do, please read the law suit before going further.

He could have simply been taking his work home with him... could have. That he could do such a thing shows their poor security and ability to protect their own supposed trade secrets. He did it for over a year and not just before he left the company.

That would all depend on the contract he signed whether or not the company allowed him to work off site. I highly doubt that any sane company would allow that anyway. So this is not a reason.

Also why would he really want to demonstrate the poor security? If he really wanted that, he would have reported the flaw long ago. Why would he did the back up the whole library since he started working (from April 2017)? Well, 300,000 files+directories won't take a couple days to copy and back up, will they? Besides, it looks like you need to log into the company's network to do that. So I doubt you can to leave your computer connected and leave the company. It is too obvious. Furthermore, if you are going to argue that he might have done it but the company didn't mention about it, then the law suit wouldn't exist. Why? Because it doesn't make sense at all (you should know what I meant).

Even more evidence of his behavior, you should look at #32 in the law suit. Any one who can think critically should be able to make a time line and see something is way out of normal behavior. Just to give any who think the guy should be given a benefit of the doubt.

Legal matters around speech are often not clear cut.

Personally I am being sued in Massachusetts for statements that I made related to a fellow student back in 2011. The lawsuit was filed originally in 2014 and we are just wrapping up the second round of discovery (the Plaintiff is asking to extended discovery again).

The amended complaint can be found at:

https://www.scribd.com/documen...

The best that I can tell, my participation in the activities for the suit are that I referred to the Plaintiff as an "ass", "fool", "loon", and an "embarrassment" on a forum primarily dedicated to the students for the school we attended. Most of the Plaintiff's claims were dropped by the court a year or two ago, but I am still facing claims of defamation, violation of the Massachusetts Civil Rights Act, and intentional inflection of emotional distress.

It does not appear that the plaintiff actually has support for these claims, but that has not prevented this from costing me thousands of dollars in travel expenses (I live in a different state) and a tremendous amount of time.

I can understand the notion that people may want to control the narrative about themselves, but the courts likely have no useful role in all but extreme cases (figuring out where that line is and applying it properly may pose a significant challenge).

In his defense, it WAS only a matter of time.

Think of the intent this way...

You think of the intent that way, but as far as I can tell it's a story you've spun out of thin air. Where's your evidence for any of this?

Here's the letter from the board that initially accused him of violating the law. It clearly states the issue was that he kept using the title in communication with that same board, so clearly the people he contacted already knew he wasn't a PE.

https://www.scribd.com/documen...

You can find links to the rest here. It includes a letter of him writing that he is an "electronics engineer" from Sweden and states why his experience is relevant, but at no point states he's licensed. Show me in these documents where they confuse him for a PE at any point in the conversation.

https://motherboard.vice.com/e...

Oh-so-responsible Google (who call themselves "the Good Censor") is about to create a panopticon search engine for China. Yes, tell us about how Saudi Arabia is the problem here. Google has tons of experience censoring search results in English and is taking that expertise abroad.

Valid links to Google's 'GOOD CENSOR'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

https://www.scribd.com/documen...

Once Google starts up in China, it is only a matter of time before someone accuses Google of censoring US search results to please China

Google doesn't need to go to China to practice CENSORSHIP ON AMERICANS

https://www.scribd.com/documen...

Above is a leaked document from Google, with the title of "Good Censorship'.

It outlines what Google is ALREADY DOING, that is, Google is already playing their so-called 'Good Censorship' on all of us !!

Does anyone in China actually care about Google search?

It will be a much better exercise if you ask yourself THE SAME QUESTION, as Google *is* practicing CENSORSHIP ON AMERICANS, as we speak

Here is a leak document from Google - official document, with 'Good Censorship' as its title https://www.scribd.com/documen...

The fact that you can believe this sentence is... sad.

The fact that you're ignoring the evidence, including her own testimony, and the conclusions of an accomplished prosecutor with an expertise in sex crimes is pathetic:

Inconsistent:

"Dr. Ford has not offered a consistent account of when the alleged assault happened.

In a July 6 text to the Washington Post, she said it happened in the "mid 1980s."

In her July 30 letter to Senator Feinstein, she said it happened in the "early 80s."

Her August 7 statement to the polygrapher said that it happened one "high school summer in early 80's," but she crossed out the word "early" for reasons she did not explain.

A September 16 Washington Post article reported that Dr. Ford said it happened in the "summer of 1982."

Similarly, the September 16 article reported that notes from an individual therapy session in 2013 show her describing the assault as occurring in her "late teens." But she told the Post and the Committee that she was 15 when the assault allegedly occurred. She has not turned over her therapy records for the Committee to review."

Unsubstantiated:

"Dr. Ford has named three people other than Judge Kavanaugh who attended the party-- Mark Judge, Patrick "PJ" Smyth, and her lifelong friend Leland Keyser (nee Ingham). Dr. Ford testified to the Committee that another boy attended the party, but that she could not remember his name. No others have come forward.

All three named eyewitnesses have submitted statements to the Committee denying any memory of the party whatsoever. Most relevantly, in her first statement to the Committee, Ms. Keyser stated through counsel that, "[s]imply put, Ms. Keyser does not know Mr. Kavanaugh and she has no recollection of ever being at a party or gathering where he was present, with, or without, Dr. Ford." In a subsequent statement to the Committee through counsel, Ms. Keyser said that "the simple and unchangeable truth is that she is unable to corroborate [Dr. Ford's allegations] because she has no recollection of the incident in question." "

Lying about Flying:

"She maintains that she suffers from anxiety, claustrophobia, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

The date of the hearing was delayed because the Committee was informed that her symptoms prevent her from flying. But she agreed during her testimony that she flies "fairly frequently for [her] hobbies and ... work." She flies to the mid-Atlantic at least once a year to visit her family. She has flown to Hawaii, French Polynesia, and Costa Rica. She also flew to Washington, D.C. for the hearing."

Second, he was called out about his hypocrisy on his comments of sacrifice and the proposed Muslim ban.

So that's what his "attack" amounted to.

Feel free to disagree with their opinion, but their son served, and they have every right to talk about sacrifice and equal protection under the law.

Nobody denied them that right. And there is no "equal protection" or "right" for foreigners to be allowed entry into the United States.

No, first he lied about not knowing who he is. Then he attempted cover with a lie about a faulty earpiece.

Whatever. The "outrage" is that Trump's expected to loudly and immediately disavow Duke if asked about him. Any other answer results in a national media storm. Yet the same media will remain quiet when Obama, the Congressional Black Caucus, and DNC big wig Keith Ellison all seek the support of racist hate preacher Farrakhan, including when they take smiling photos with him.

> You can also, as amply demonstrated by yourself, falsely claim that any witnesses at all(let alone every one of them) refute and deny claims even as what they really said is that they don't remember any specific incidents

So why doesn't Ford's life long friend remember the party where her friend was almost raped, where she had to flee down a short, narrow stairwell, and where she had no way home, due to cell phones not existing yet?

âoeSimply put, Ms. Keyser does not know Mr. Kavanaugh and she has no recollection of ever being at a party or gathering where he was present, with, or without, Dr. Ford,â Howard Walsh, an attorney for Keyser, wrote.

Somehow, no one but Ford remembers this party at all. Somehow her friend didn't notice her missing from a gathering of 4-6 people (depending on when Ford was asked), despite her having to flee from two drunks and out the door. Ford did not know how she got to this party, who introduced her to the gathering, or how she got home.

Remember how she kept pushing for the dates that Kav's friend worked at the grocery store to pin things down? Pity it wasn't built until 1986, when Kav was no longer there. How did she meet Kav's friend there shortly after a party in 1982? Oh, and the second front door they went to counseling over? It was built in 2008 according to public records, not 2012, when they were fighting over it. It also doesn''t provide an escape route, just a second access for people who were renting the place. The notes don't mention Kav at all, either. The polygraph? I love how she changed the date on her account on the paper, doesn't know when it happened, or who paid for it.

The lady who questioned her goes into great detail as to why there's nothing to substantiate the account.

Oh, and the ice thing? Try reading the actual police report. I doubt it says what you think it does. But yes, feel free to regurgitate second-hand allegations without looking at primary sources, like the various property records, maps, etc. that show how her story keeps changing in response to people discovering it couldn't have happened the way it was remembered earlier. But yes, please tell me how speculation regarding various nonsense words that were more recently defined on Urban Dictionary (which also did not exist in 1982) is somehow "proof" of something, because you got caught in a lie when trying to attack a man who lives a life orderly enough to have calendars from 1982.

Can I get a recipe complete with required equipment list for the manufacture of LSD or methamphetamine off the internet too since all information is just so legal now?

Yes, you can. Or would you prefer detailed instructions direct from the U.S. government?

And if you'd like details of how to implement the described process safely on an industrial scale, watch Breaking Bad.

Can I get a recipe complete with required equipment list for the manufacture of LSD or methamphetamine off the internet too since all information is just so legal now?

Yes, you can. Or would you prefer detailed instructions direct from the U.S. government?

The preferred method is:

An alkali metal, preferably sodium, is oxidized with ferric nitrate in liquid ammonia to form the alkali metal amide, e.g. sodium amide. The dry acid H is added and after a few minutes the resulting alkali metal salt is mixed with the desired organic halogen compound R Hal. 2 to 10, preferably 3 to 5 atoms of alkali metal and 2 to mols, preferably 4 to 6 mols of the organic halogen compound are used per mol of acid.

The ammonia may be evaporated a few minutes after addition of the organic halogen compound. To isolate the compound I the reaction mixture is shaken between Water and ether and the aqueous phase filtered through a tale layer. The procedure which is then followed depends on the acid and the organic halogen compound used. The isolation of l-methyl-D-lysergic acid in pure, crystalline form is particularly simple, it being sufficient for the aqueous solution to be brought to a pH value of 4.5 to 5 with acetic acid. Otherwise, the aqueous solution may be evaporated to dryness and methanol poured over the dry residue, the inorganic salts and the small quantity of l-methyl-isolysergic acid present going into solution and the l-methyl-D-lysergic acid remaining undissolved.

HowStuffWorks provides another helpful description. Quick, call the police, because I've posted a mass of not-illegal information right here...

Owning something means that it belongs to you. You can sell it. You can keep the profits. You can gift it to someone else. You can do with it what you please. None of those are true with the Fed. There IS NO OWNER, no matter how much you want to claim there is.

Here is a list of the member banks of the fed (as of 2014). Every one of them is a 'shareholder' in the fed. I have no idea where this silly '12 shareholders' nonsense comes from

It wasn't for advertising, it was informative. "Go to the building that looks like this building, because this is an image of the building." They immediately removed the photo when the owner complained, showing good faith. They weren't profiting from the image, nor were they selling the image. The cropped image is not a sufficient replacement for the original image. And posting the photo on an obscure website that you'd only hit when looking for information about a film festival does not take away the copyright owner's ability to profit from the image. Similar to the concept that you can't copyright a photo of something that is ineligible for copyright, such as a photo of a public-domain painting; you can't copyright very much about a photo of a building. You can copyright composition (which was altered via cropping), camera settings, post-processing, things that make photography an art. But the defendant was deemed to solely be using the image for it's factual content, namely the appearance of a building. I could possibly see different judges reaching different rulings on the points, but this particular judgement is a reasonable one: what they were doing fell under fair use.

Some media outlets blew the story out of proportion, stating that if you find an image on the internet and you crop it, then it's fair use. And while that's potentially true, the ruling only applies to cases just like this one. So it's really no big deal.

I do suspect you're right about that story being why this EU decision was deemed worth writing about. Thanks for that!

The Tenth Amendment issue is only one of their arguments. Their argument in this regard is absurd though. The Federal government relaxed a regulation giving states and the people MORE, not LESS, power. Any state that wishes to do so can pass a law prohibiting the creation, distribution, receipt, import, export, or possession of 3D CAD/CAM plans for firearms within their borders. Of course, such a law would almost certainly be immediately contested in Federal court on First Amendment grounds -- and that challenge might result in the law being struck down.

The other main argument, which seems likely to be valid, is that the proper notification procedures were not followed before modifying the ITAR list. For example, from the lawsuit:

In addition, the Executive Branch must give notice to the International Relations Committee of the House of Representatives and to the Committee on Foreign Relations of the Senate at least 30 days in advance of removing an item from the USML. 22 U.S.C. 2778(f)(1). Such notification must be made in accordance with the procedures applicable to reprogramming notifications under section 634A(a) of the Foreign Assistance Act of 1961, 22 U.S.C. 2394-1.

This is, of course, easily remedied by the Administration by providing such notice and waiting 30 days before changing the list. That would render this argument moot. It's isn't looking good for the states in this suit -- but I don't think they really expect to win anyway -- it's just getting near election time and this is something to grandstand about.

(The Administration actually made the change "temporary" which is allowed under certain circumstance without the notice - but the lawsuit claims that this change doesn't meet the criteria for such changes).

Ruling's been written, just not yet published. DD has filed a suit in the West Texas Circuit court against the NJ and LA attornites. https://twitter.com/NewJerseyO... https://www.scribd.com/documen...

What a rude little reply. I assume you're talking about 'threats' to Earth from such missiles while the threat from asteroids is... God's will? I'll put more effort into mine than you did, just quote a relevant bit from my letter,

It is time for a global showdown between two major personality types of our time: those who are prepared to act quickly and decisively to mitigate this existential risk, and those who will oppose on many fronts... and it will be a showdown, for the opposition will attempt to 'quantify' the existential threat to a level where it could be passed over for this and the next generation, as has already happened, or dismissed altogether. They will call this 'logic, statistics and science' though it is none of those.

It is a mental disorder.
Great oratory is called for, stern resolve also.

People who think they have plenty of time find it easy to propose or oppose anything, and language is rich with rhetoric of delay. Deficits grow less than we had feared, progress is made on countless fronts, we are closer now than ever before, love is just around the corner. In our developed world there are as many people able to survive by talking about things as those doing things. To the modern civilized mind global cataclysm is safely ensconced in speculation, early history, sacred text and cinema. Liberal arts education focuses deeply on the 'tabloid disasters' of history, strictly human atrocities that we and our neighbors would never repeat. It's someone else's job to think about such things, even if no one does. Easy to assume we are in the middle-weave of some tapestry between a dim beginning and distant end.

Expect opposition to the idea that erstwhile enemies, even bitter enemies, should all come together to assemble a collective weapons platform that could -- through some mishap or menace -- send kinetic weapons down to places on Earth. A humorous cosmic irony, the ultimate Prisoner's Dilemma, that a whole species would knowingly seal its doom with its failure to trust one another as individuals.

There is NO way to debate this to any unified consensus in the end. Despite the greatest tenets of all world faiths... the human race is experiencing technical difficulties, please stand by. The language of distrust and paranoia has become far more subtle and intricate, more lucrative, more fun, than the language of trust and action.

It is my conviction then, that there can be no round table with talking sticks and common vote. One of the remaining superpowers must step forward to announce that it is committed to resolving this 'existential threat' for all of humanity... to begin immediately without debate. It shall be conducted transparently with assurance that others who come to agree such action is necessary, may join the effort.

That is where America comes in.
Apollo, showing that we could land on the Moon, was the first step.
Artemis, goddess of the hunt, is next. Let us hunt space rocks.

It is nice to see that the Obama-era plan has been fleshed out and in the current plan the real rubber-hits-the-road moment is,

3.4 Identify, assess the readiness of, estimate in the costs of, and propose development paths for key technologies required by NEO impact prevention concepts. This assessment should include the most mature in-space concepts --- kinetic impactors, nuclear devices, and gravity tractors for deflection, and nuclear devices for disruption -- as well as less mature NEO impact prevention methods. Technology assessments should consider contemporary work, including potential synergies with relevant private industry interests (e.g., asteroid mining). They should also consider NEO impact scenarios that may have received insufficient attention thus far (e.g., binary asteroids, high-speed comets). [Short term; NASA, NNSA, DoD]

Asteroid interception is where the goofiest ideas emerge to monopolize discussion and take debate away from practical ideas that would give us a chance of survival in all cases. When you interrupt geeks talking about their favorite solution, something like deploying solar sails to nudge asteroids, to point out their scenario is for an extremely narrow case and it would be irresponsible to pursue such an idea to the exclusion of more practical ones... they get all butthurt.

My own solution which I've broadcast to Trump and two NASA directors and others, is simple and direct. No nukes or exotic technology.

1. kinetic impactor rockets loaded with payloads of simple Lunar dirt
2. missile battery on Moon, manned, truly ready to launch at a moment's notice
3. hundreds, even thousands -- that can swarm to ensure multiplicity and mass
4. the result: best possible assurance of deflect/destroy for any existential threat

Anything less, or more, is a half solution or placebo fantasy to appease fanboys of exotic and impractical technology.

Interesting you have that impression, because the according to the Obama State Department, there was never a signed written agreement.

See their letter to Congress about it, specifically how the JCPOA "is not a treaty or an executive agreement, and is not a signed document".

Do you have a reference for what was the "written agreement signed by the US Secretary of State in his capacity as official government representative" you're talking about?

Russians and Arabs (amongst many others) have attempted to influence the voters in the US for many decades.

Over the decades, many American politicians have sought such external influences. At the height of the cold war, Democrat Senator Ted Kennedy sought the help of the Russian government in his attempt to defeat Reagan in the 1984 campaign. In 2016, Hillary Clinton not only used illegal aliens in her campaign (foreign influence, by definition) but she also funneled millions of dollars through the law firm Perkins Coie to the American journalist outfit Fusion GPS that hired Christopher Steele (a British spy, thus foreign influence) who in turn bought dirt from Russian spies which was then placed in a document (now referred to as "the Steele Dossier") that was used to start the whole Trump-Russia meme.

This foreign influence in our elections may well be disgusting, but it's hardly new. Hell, in Democrat-run states the politicians are working overtime to allow illegal aliens to actually cast votes. AFAIK nobody has found any evidence that Trump was working to allow Russian citizens to cast actual votes in the USA. There's currently still no evidence that anything in that Steele Dossier is true or that there was any Trump-Putin collusion at all.

Your inner bigot is showing! Since you're so terrified of media other than MSNBC/CNN, here's the letter plainly stating it has not been signed. But you'll probably ignore this as well, since it runs counter to your pre-conceived conclusions.

A closed mind is a wasted mind, you really should do better than bitch about the messenger. Sad.

The term "patent troll" typically describes a patentholder who is not actually practicing the patent but simply trying to monetize it.

Nikola has been actively developing its electric and hydrogen powered semi trucks for several years now and is targeting its first commercial sales next year. The complaint alleges that Tesla first tried to poach Nikola's chief design engineer, and then simply copied Nikola's patented design.

That doesn't strike me as being even close to a typical "patent troll" scenario.

Recently published research shows that google manipulated search results

Think critically for a minute, and compare 'Trump is' to 'Clinton is'. The top 3 results from Google: "is the 45", "is republican", and "is awesome". For Bing, "is an idiot", "is a racist", and "is impeached". Yahoo: "is a moron", "is awesome", and "is an idiot". So, has Google gone all Trumpy, and Bing is now resorting to evil political attacks? Of course not, but if you want to be consistent in your beliefs, you'll now start posting about Bing and how Bing is the anti-Trump search engine now and Google is pro-Trump. This is the same Internet "research" that Epstein, Mohr, and Martinez have done. I'm not speaking figuratively, this is literally the same research that they've done -- type "Clinton is" into the browser and see what comes back. This is not science. This is irrational claptrap, and it should neither be believed nor supported.

I can see how this will play out.

The big players (Google, Facebook, Twitter, et al.) should not determine what's acceptable speech, or attempt to enforce it.

That's the job of the government, there's lots of existing precedent to rely on, and there are clear avenues of appeal and change.

So here's what will happen: things will get really bad for awhile, then something will happen that breaks the dam. There will be a flood of calls to break up Google (in particular), and twitter and facebook and all the others.

Facebook's problem wasn't that they gave information to an outside party, it's that the party was associated with Trump that got them in trouble. Largely the same thing happened with Obama, and Facebook didn't care.

Recently published research shows that google manipulated search results to make Clinton seem more favorable to Trump. The research uses comparisons of search keys between Google, Bing, and Yahoo to make it's point, and is based on results published in PNAS. An excerpt:

overall, manipulating search suggestions can shift a 50/50 split among people who are undecided on an issue to a 90/10 split without people’s awareness and without leaving a paper trail for authorities to follow.

Google engages in unfair media manipulation at its worst, they are literally trying to sway the results of an election to a candidate they prefer. Facebook and Twitter are doing the same. Facebook does the same thing indirectly, by selling personal information to companies who themselves do the manipulation.

It was thought to be "the smart move" when the Obama campaign did it, and at the time no one realized that the same effect could be turned the other way.

The big players are right now laying the grounds for the upcoming election by eliminating certain opinions. Gun proponents explaining how to clean and care for their guns get their accounts locked, videos get demonetized, commentary gets shadow-banned... despite claims of "it was a mistake" and "it's our AI", the results have been largely one-sided.

I don't expect Facebook to be smart enough to notice what's happening (or Google or Twitter), so the most likely outcome is that this will come to a head with enormous public outcry over something in the future (possibly the upcoming US midterm elections), and the companies will be forceably broken down into smaller pieces or made to submit to regulation.

A pity, really. Facebook could probably get a lot of consumer good will by being the champions of human rights.

Instead, they seem hell-bent on forcing governments to step in with regulation.

Industry-wide blacklists, cash bonuses for condemning wrongthink, calls to summarily fire white men accused of bad behavior, calls for âunfair' (the exact word used) treatment of white men, openly booing the presence of white men, employees using company mailing lists to plot violent antifa actions" etc.

Once upon a time, not long ago, I was generally headed for Vermont and was prepared to encourage my children to settle there also. As a place of natural beauty it ranks highly with many other places, but in uncertain times I felt drawn there for another reason, one in keeping with my technical interests and survivalist tendency.

You see, I wanted to join the folks at Vermont Yankee. Vermont Yankee was the greatest jewel mankind had yet produced: a nuclear power plant connected by direct and exclusive feeder to a nearby hydro station with the capacity to black-start it. This duo (by happenstance) was our grid's most disaster resilient corner, a shining light of engineering. In any scenario without copious liquid hydrocarbons or gas infrastructure damaged beyond repair, these two would have lit an area sufficiently large to empower enough people to successfully defend the region -- for years -- and achieve stable governance. And that region would serve as a beacon of hope to surrounding areas during reconstruction.

But Vermont Yankee has been destroyed by corporate vandals and clueless politics. Now if the worst comes to pass in that area there will be only the ~35MW output of the Vernon Hydro plant. This is sufficient to support a totalitarian feudal barony right around the dam that quickly evolves into an item of tribal conquest with a 'shoot on sight' policy for outsiders. A great place to stay away from.

My June 2017 letter to Energy Secretary Perry was focused on the vulnerability of US natural gas. It is a great pain to state the obvious, but necessary because utility wind and solar has made faux-environmentalists into useful idiot 'crypto-advocates' of gas grid generation. We are on the cusp where a coordinated attack on the gas distribution network in a few places would trigger cascading grid failure, as distant gas plants operating directly from the pipelines drop offline and stay offline for days or weeks. This sentiment has since taken shape as the Trump Administration proposes ways to protect utilities able to stockpile 90 days of fuel on site, and encourages them to do so. It is plain common sense. It comes down to a simple question: Can you supply a compelling reason why the United States electric grid should fail completely within hours of a relatively simple attack?

This letter of mine has been in Donald Trump's possession since May 2, 2016 . If you read it you may discover why I considered Trump the only candidate worthy of such a message. In his pronouncement to pursue energy self-sufficiency in general and consider nuclear an essential part of the mix, there is hope. The others offer nothing but more years of bad road and an obscenely stupid fixation on base load irredeemables (wind and solar). Trump is literally the only one with the courage to stand up to the tripe.

Once upon a time, not long ago, I was generally headed for Vermont and was prepared to encourage my children to settle there also. As a place of natural beauty it ranks highly with many other places, but in uncertain times I felt drawn there for another reason, one in keeping with my technical interests and survivalist tendency.

You see, I wanted to join the folks at Vermont Yankee. Vermont Yankee was the greatest jewel mankind had yet produced: a nuclear power plant connected by direct and exclusive feeder to a nearby hydro station with the capacity to black-start it. This duo (by happenstance) was our grid's most disaster resilient corner, a shining light of engineering. In any scenario without copious liquid hydrocarbons or gas infrastructure damaged beyond repair, these two would have lit an area sufficiently large to empower enough people to successfully defend the region -- for years -- and achieve stable governance. And that region would serve as a beacon of hope to surrounding areas during reconstruction.

But Vermont Yankee has been destroyed by corporate vandals and clueless politics. Now if the worst comes to pass in that area there will be only the ~35MW output of the Vernon Hydro plant. This is sufficient to support a totalitarian feudal barony right around the dam that quickly evolves into an item of tribal conquest with a 'shoot on sight' policy for outsiders. A great place to stay away from.

My June 2017 letter to Energy Secretary Perry was focused on the vulnerability of US natural gas. It is a great pain to state the obvious, but necessary because utility wind and solar has made faux-environmentalists into useful idiot 'crypto-advocates' of gas grid generation. We are on the cusp where a coordinated attack on the gas distribution network in a few places would trigger cascading grid failure, as distant gas plants operating directly from the pipelines drop offline and stay offline for days or weeks. This sentiment has since taken shape as the Trump Administration proposes ways to protect utilities able to stockpile 90 days of fuel on site, and encourages them to do so. It is plain common sense. It comes down to a simple question: Can you supply a compelling reason why the United States electric grid should fail completely within hours of a relatively simple attack?

This letter of mine has been in Donald Trump's possession since May 2, 2016 . If you read it you may discover why I considered Trump the only candidate worthy of such a message. In his pronouncement to pursue energy self-sufficiency in general and consider nuclear an essential part of the mix, there is hope. The others offer nothing but more years of bad road and an obscenely stupid fixation on base load irredeemables (wind and solar). Trump is literally the only one with the courage to stand up to the tripe.

Well, I did find an NHTSA report from January of 2017 (after a previous fatality linked to Autopilot use). They found a 40% decrease in crashes among Tesla drivers after Autopilot Autosteer became available. Not super-definitive, but interesting.

5.4 Crash rates
. ODI analyzed mileage and airbag deployment data supplied by Tesla for all MY 2014 through 2016 Model S and 2016 Model X vehicles equipped with the Autopilot Technology Package, either installed in the vehicle when sold or through an OTA update, to calculate crash rates by miles travelled prior to (21) and after Autopilot installation. (22)
  Figure 11 shows the rates calculated by ODI for airbag deployment crashes in the subject Tesla vehicles before and after Autosteer installation. The data show that the Tesla vehicles crash rate dropped by almost 40 percent after Autosteer installation.

page 10 on:
https://www.scribd.com/documen...

Re: "Except one is extrapolation from direct measurement and the other is, in your words, a 'short leap of imagination' which I think is being very generous about how long a leap it is."

"Eighty-four distinct high-energy-density Z-pinch categories have been identified in petroglyphs, nearly all of which belong to the archaic [50] class. Only a small percentage of these petroglyphs, or petroglyph patterns, do not fall into any of these categories."

I've created a graphic here which I think reduces the confusion of this paper. It lays out the surprising correspondence between laboratory-generated plasma instabilities in high-intensity electric discharges and common abstract petroglyph forms.

"40% of petroglyph types can be accounted for."

Re: "I think if you read up a bit more about Gerald Pollack you'll see that the folks who are co-opting his work are other crackpots extrapolating from his book and work to make bizarre claims about magic water which he never made."

You made this up. I am talking about mainstream researchers. There is nothing at all bizarre about structured water. It has been extensively studied in the laboratory. It can be observed to accumulate at the top of a typical cup of water as a reaction to casting a very specific frequency of infrared light onto it. The experiment is not complicated. Since the structured and bulk water are actually two different molecular arrangements, they exhibit differing net charges. And if you actually hook up a resistor to these two different regions of your typical glass of water, you can actually measure an electric current. You might consider that you don't actually know what you are arguing against.

Re: "The problem isn't a lack of rigor in dismissing bizarre claims, it's a lack of rigor in the claims themselves."

This is a stunning display of irony -- for you've arrived at this conclusion without any actual process for learning or tracking the claims.

Re: "Lastly there is no such thing as 'settled science'."

By "settled science", I am referring to the idea that we can assume that some questions are settled, without any need to track them for vindications over time. It is clear from your own comments that settled science is very real.

Re: "The areas you cite (with the exception of Pollack) don't even bother to make predictions, they're just folks jumping up and down yammering 'acknowledge my theory, acknowledge my theory'."

Some of our most important ideas in the sciences today originated in just this manner, actually. And in fact, pet theories are actually quite common amongst even academics.

It's hard to find the list from the Reddit link, instead you should have linked to these, I think:

https://i.imgur.com/SHxla1R.jpg
https://www.scribd.com/doc/272297762/Donald-Trump-s-Financial-Disclosures

What the hell are you talking about? You can read the FCC's Feburary 26, 2015 net neutrality order here.

The lawsuit is quite interesting: https://www.scribd.com/documen...

It seems that Wilberg raised concerns about the hiring practices that his manager had introduced, along with other employees. For example, a black woman complained that she was only ever being asked to interview black candidates, which seems to be to make up a numerical requirement. If the claims here are to be believed then the hiring manager was incompetent and trying to cover it up with quotas.

Google's HR sanctioned the manager and put a stop to the quotas. That may well save them from the discrimination claims, because the fixed it when it was reported. However, at that point it gets weird.

Wilberg's manager was moved after HR decided that they had acted unreasonably and vindictively towards him. But the new manager apparently decided that she hated him from the moment they met, which the suit claims is because of the first manager's interference. If that is true then there could well be a wrongful dismissal claim in it.

Citation required. I see no link to the actual lawsuit, only The Verge's story about the lawsuit.

It's embedded in the Verge article. You have to scroll down about a page to see it... Which is interesting because you go on to quote a few phrases from TFA. Like you skimmed it so fast you didn't notice the huge embedded document or something...

Anyway, direct link: https://www.scribd.com/documen...

A defective door motor is not "damage" to the vehicle, it is a defect.

I was talking about the "lemon" designation. Is it a lemon under a state lemon law, or is it just that the factory staff noticed it's unreliable and called it a lemon.

Man, you really do skim stuff so fast you miss really important details. It's not like you were even trying to get FP, you just cam here to argue with me long after anyone really cares.

No, the charges give a clear statement of what the Russians intended:
To create divisiveness and mistrust of the political system.

They supported and opposed both sides in measure to their likelihood to win, all in order to produce chaos, distrust, and upset. And they have succeeded beyond all rational measure, because of one side that couldn't bear to admit that they lost.

Bill Clinton's campaign taking money from the Chinese was a crime, because it is illegal to accept donations from foreigners. Few charges were filed, though, because it was determined that accepting those donations was "accidental".

This indictment doesn't even suggest that the Trump campaign took money from Russia, even accidentally. It suggests that Facebook and Twitter took money from Russians pretending to be Americans, though, in order to promote Bernie, Trump, BLM, Muslims, and just about every controversy they could find.

captcha: chinked
WTF, /.?

The text of the injunction

https://www.scribd.com/documen...

is an interested read, including multiple screen captures and the discussion that follows is fascinating, alleging that they may be responsible for copyright violation

"In Fung, the Ninth Circuit analyzed Grokster and held that a defendant may be held liable for copyright infringement under Grokster ’s inducement theory where four elements are present: “(1) the distribution of a device or product [by the defendant], (2) acts of infringement [by third parties], (3) an object [of the defendant] of promoting [the device’s or product’s] use to infringe copyright, and (4) causation. Fung , 710 F.3d at 1032"

The #3 above may get them in.

Google pulled gab.ai from the Play store because gab.ai didn't have a censorship policy that Google approved of. So did Apple.

https://www.scribd.com/documen...

Apple pulled a product because they did not have a Google approved censorship policy?

That may not be what you meant, but that is what you stated.
English has grammar rules so it can be used for clear communication.Otherwise, gibberish results.

Google pulled gab.ai from the Play store because gab.ai didn't have a censorship policy that Google approved of. So did Apple.

https://www.scribd.com/documen...

Saying he was 'allowed to leave Sweden' is overstating things. He skipped the country on an unknown date with dozens of missed calls from the prosecutor saying they wanted to haul him in for arrest

http://www.scribd.com/doc/4946...

13. I have not heard from Mr Assange and do not know whether he had been told, by any source,that he was wanted for interrogation before he left Sweden. I do not know whether he was uncontactable from 21st - 29th September and if that was the case I do not know why. It would have been a reasonable assumption from the facts (albeit not necessarily an accurate one) thatMr Assange was deliberately avoiding interrogation in the period before he left Sweden. Some witnesses suggest that there were other reasons why he was out of contact. I have heard no evidence that he was readily contactable.

14. I am sure that constant attempts were made by the prosecuting authorities to arrange interrogation in the period 21 st - 30 th September, but those attempts failed. It appears likely(transcript p.107) that enquiries were made by the authorities independent of his lawyer. The authorities believed Mr Assange would be in Sweden to give a lecture in early October. They asked Mr Hurtig to be available on the evening of 6 th October. It appears that either the rumours were false, or Mr Assange changed his mind. In any event he was not apprehended or interrogated then.

15. Mr Hurtig said in his statement that it was astonishing that Ms Ny made no effort to interview his client. In fact this is untrue. He says he realised the mistake the night before giving evidence. He did correct the statement in his evidence in chief (transcript p.83 and p.97).However, this was very low key and not done in a way that I, at least, immediately grasped as significant. It was only in cross-examination that the extent of the mistake became clear. Mr Hurtig must have realised the significance of paragraph 13 of his proof when he submitted it. Ido not accept that this was a genuine mistake. It cannot have slipped his mind. For over a week he was attempting (he says without success) to contact a very important client about a very important matter. The statement was a deliberate attempt to mislead the court. It did in fact mislead Ms Brita Sundberg-Weitman and Mr Alhem . Had they been given the true facts then that would have changed their opinion on a key fact in a material way.

The fact that know one knows what date he left means he didn't go through a passport check at immigration - because if he had have done that he'd almost certainly been arrested given that the police had a warrant out for him. I.e. he used ignored all the calls telling him was wanted and left the country in such a way that he didn't talk to any immigration people.

He got away with it because of the rather lackadaisical approach the Swedes have towards the criminal justice system. In a normal country if the police want to arrest you they don't leave messages on your voicemail for 8 days saying "Umm it's the cops here. Please come in to be arrested", they kick your door down at 3am and haul you off to the clink.

But the Swedes don't realise that the genteel system they have won't work if they let in mad dog immigrants like Assange who don't respect it and follow its rules.

The same document also accuses his lawyer Bjorn Hurtig of misleading the court. Which caused Hurtig to be investigated in Sweden

https://www.upi.com/Assanges-S...

STOCKHOLM, Sweden, March 2 (UPI) -- The Swedish Bar Association said it was investigating WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange's lawyer after a British judge said the attorney misled the court.

In his ruling last week that Assange should be extradited to Sweden, District Judge Howard Riddle accused attorney Bjorn Hurtig of deliberately misleading the court,

I don't know how else you can interpret the statement - it literally says that it is "bias in recruitment, selection, promotion, development, and everyday workplace interaction *creates* inequality". It leaves zero room for "personal choices by free people".

As for a google specific reference, there are many in Damore's filing:

https://www.scribd.com/documen...

Search for "Bias Busting".

Just to illustrate that the other AC is not exaggerating about Google being a hostile workplace, I encourage everyone to read the indictment: https://www.scribd.com/document/368688363/James-Damore-vs-Google-Class-Action-Lawsuit#fullscreen It has lots of quotes, screenshots and other examples how things are handled inside Google. It's absolutely damning.

"IQ positively correlated with ratings of leader effectiveness...The ratings peaked at an IQ of around 120"

If two people have an IQ difference of more than 2 sigma (2 standard deviations, or about 30 IQ points), it becomes very difficult for them to communicate with each other effectively.

I would have this was pretty well-known and well accepted by now. TFA specifically looks at office workers of various types, so it's a good bet that the average worker will have an IQ in the 100-110 range. So a manager with an IQ of 120 is just enough smarter to do the job well, but not too smart to run into communications problems. A completely believable "sweet spot" for your typical office. But probably not for JPL or a construction site.

If you get beyond 2 sigmas: For anything more than small talk, the smart person feels like they have to "dumb down" everything they say, and even then it's hard to get across anything complex. Meanwhile the lower IQ person realizes that they're being "talked down to", that they are being seen as dumb, and they resent it.

If I can communicate effectively with a dog I can communicate effectively with a normal person. That sounds terrible but that is how I have learned to get by. Throw on the charisma, toss around the self deprecating humor, pick up a substance abuse problem, get into bodybuilding to work their filter system so their autopilot puts you in the right box, act like you do not understand their current conundrum and ask the right questions so that they answer their own questions, if anyone gets suspicious always be ready to redirect to how smart someone else in the room is.
Fail at this and you are a witch. They will hate you because they think you can read minds and see the future. They will hate you because you are cheating by "knowin' stuff". They will hate you because you have a concealed weapon you can use at any time. They will hate you because you will mess with how they have always seen themselves "But.. but.. me smart!".
If the people who hate you are responsible for your promotions.. guess what.

As for "JPL or a construction site.", you can find closeted smarties in every field*. IQ after a certain point doesn't have much to do with success. After you hit the tipping point it is all about drive.

*For example: Long ago (he is dead now) my cousin was the smartest person ever to enter the US Air force. The first time he took the test they told him he was cheating. The second time he took the test it was just him and an instructor in the room, they then told him again that he was cheating. The last time he took the test he was in his boxers and surrounded by MPs. After that they explained that he was the smartest by a good margin to ever try to get into the US Air Force and asked why someone like him would want to join the Air force. My cousin said "Because you will let me fly planes", they couldn't fault that argument and so they let him fly planes.
I found out this year that my dad did the same thing in ROTC in college though he only had to take his test once. Apparently my nerdy engineer father was in ROTC and knows how to field strip an M14. Who would have guessed? He refused the commander's begging him to join the Army "We need people like you!"(I suspect dad was in ROTC to avoid 'Nam).

"IQ positively correlated with ratings of leader effectiveness...The ratings peaked at an IQ of around 120"

If two people have an IQ difference of more than 2 sigma (2 standard deviations, or about 30 IQ points), it becomes very difficult for them to communicate with each other effectively.

I would have this was pretty well-known and well accepted by now. TFA specifically looks at office workers of various types, so it's a good bet that the average worker will have an IQ in the 100-110 range. So a manager with an IQ of 120 is just enough smarter to do the job well, but not too smart to run into communications problems. A completely believable "sweet spot" for your typical office. But probably not for JPL or a construction site.

If you get beyond 2 sigmas: For anything more than small talk, the smart person feels like they have to "dumb down" everything they say, and even then it's hard to get across anything complex. Meanwhile the lower IQ person realizes that they're being "talked down to", that they are being seen as dumb, and they resent it.

They won. I suppose you could argue that gerrymandering, voter suppression and our generally corrupt system let them win unfairly.

Honest question... for those thinking they only one because of gerrymandering or voter suppression... how would they be successful at such things if they hadn't won previously and been in a position to implement polices rules that they think benefit their own party?

Same Q can be asked about the Democrats... not 9 years ago there was talk of a permanent Democrat majority... which started to unfold come the 2010 election. During their time in power in different state or federal positions, they were not able to implement policies that they thought would benefit their own party? ... or were they just too honest and decent to do so? Or are they going about it from a different direction? https://www.scribd.com/documen...

Take a look at Exhibit B in the filing and judge for yourself: https://www.scribd.com/documen...

Quite a few of the posts are saying if you support Trump -- or even Republicans in general -- you are a Nazi and deserve everything that comes your way, from demotion and firing to fists in your face, complete with instructions how to punch.

Very simple, if you're not completely with us, you are a Nazi, and it's your damn fault.

Yes, but it's supposed to be done covertly and respectfully. This lawsuit puts on full display that this was not the case at Google.
https://www.scribd.com/documen...

If google had simply fired him for the essay, you'd be correct. The problem is the blatant discrimination shown at every level leading up to the firing. I sggest you read the lawsuit Bruce. Google is not going to win this.
https://www.scribd.com/documen...

Why don't you take a look at the the tone Google management and employees set, and then come back here and tell me they aren't going to lose this lawsuit.
https://www.scribd.com/documen...