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Yes, yes they do.

It was just last month I was reading about it. Again.

Or is it that they only want this access for themselves and you're a tairist if you don't think the FBI should have all access to all your activities and communications.

Around 2005 there was a struggle against software patents in the EU. The only democratically elected EU institution, the European Parliament, said "no, we don't want it" and the Commission (a group of 27 or so people) says "yes, you have to want it". And unfortunately this is a very common pattern.

The ACTA case is particularly striking now with one person who is quite incapable of grasping the nature of copying intangible goods has this much power.

Gucht: "But for me there is no moral difference between taking something that is not yours in the physical world and doing so in the virtual world."

For me there is a huge difference! And if the most powerful person in the EU dealing with this matter doesn't see that it's time for him to move on. We live in a world where theoretically anyone could have access to all music, movies and books ever created. I feel we're morally obliged to make this happen. If that breaks a couple of business models, so be it, time for new business models. And time for new politicians. #votepirate.

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120620/03552119398/business-model-failure-is-not-moral-issue.shtml

Of course they consider it theft. Surprised yet?

If they vote in secret, it won't make much of a difference what they are willing to state publicly - depending on if this is more than a rumor or not:
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120616/02302019360/acta-not-dead-yet-supporters-make-final-push-eu-approval-may-seek-secret-ballot.shtml

But that company's lawyers can and do reproduce, to the detriment of all humanity:

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20110330/04055413695/monsanto-sued-organic-farmers-who-dont-want-to-be-accused-patent-infringement.shtml

http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/05/monsanto200805

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/04/26/eveningnews/main4048288.shtml

As described here:

The market for these devices is old and stale, dominated by a few key players who have cushy exclusive deals with doctors that allow them to charge exorbitant prices (averaging around $3000), but a year-old startup called Embrace Hearing is beginning to shake things up by selling $300+ hearing aids directly to consumers. They discovered that 75% of Americans who qualify for hearing devices don't actually use one, and the number one cited reason is high price.

A few notes: 1) This is not the only way she can communicate, simply the cheapest $299 + iPad). The first paragraph of the article says that much. Later on it does mention that the iPad app is the only one the girl took to right away.

The parents tried several much more expensive alternatives (including devices by the plaintiffs), but they were all too heavy or too difficult for an illiterate four-year-old to operate. They're not just going for the cheapest option

Create plants with sterile seeds, so Monsanto can then grab all of the farmer's money? Sue farmer's whose fields are next to Monsanto seed fields, alongside the blowing winds, and get the courts and government's to side with them against small farmers?

So which is it, are they sterile or spreading everywhere? Second, this is publicly funded research. As in, not Monsanto. The only antiquated ideas I see here are placing superstition & conspiracies over science in the name of politics & anti-corporatism.

It's both. Most GMO seeds are NOT currently sterile and Monsanto has successfully pursued litigation where a non-Monsanto crop has been contaminated with genes from a Monsanto GMO crop grown nearby. Monsanto owns a patent on those genes and courts ruled that this is a violation of Monsanto's patents, even if the contamination is accidental. Monsanto also holds patents on "terminator" technology that will allow some seeds to be sterile in the future, so that Monsanto no longer needs to sue any of their customers who illegally save seeds from this year's crop for planting next year.

Senator Hatch, is that you?

Nobody using FBI_SURVEILLANCE_VAN around here? :-)

I'd like to see this feature rolled out in every country

Google already does, but right now other countries aren't cutting connections containing "bad words", so they didn't feel the need to tell you in advance.

The continuing problem with the DMCA is the unwillingness to enforce penalties on people or companies who fraudulently submit takedown notices over things that aren't infringing (see today's related Techdirt story).

If you submit a takedown notice, and you sign or check a box saying "I swear under penalty of perjury", and you're wrong, then where are all the perjury charges?

You are right on the money here. Too many (most paid to do so) are using DMCA and DRM to censor speech. Its pathetic. Shame you posted Anonymously and got rated down...probably for that alone.

I don't have the link in front of me or I would post it, but when I read about how many are using Youtube's DMCA / DRM complaint button to censor speech and getting rewarded with Google with Free Adsense ads (which have a value), a light bulb went off. I finally understood why someone who wants to suppress information, beyond the simple censorship issue, they are rewarded for doing so.

I remember a person who posted their original content, no video from anyone else, no music at all, but he was talking about things that obviously someone else wished to censor. And they succeeded to censor him for 24 - 72 hours, when his message would have had the most impact news wise, which was obviously the censors intent. By the time Google reinstated the Video, its impact had been minimized, the censoring entity had won, without fear of repercussions. It would be a no-brainer to imagine people doing this immediately before a big vote and/or election to suppress the truth.

Given the scenario above, why is one person who wrongly accused another of violation of DCMA/DRM, allowed to do so again, and again and again?

Does the provider, in this example, not have a responsibility to the community to prevent this abuse?

I know my usage of Youtube dramatically decreased after this event, went from a daily/nightly user to a few times a month....just killed the community, the channel for me. Any historical/news list that pointed to that video is now damaged, their is a hole in it, where the video use to be...and if the poster re-posts the video, more time is wasted recreating a link that should never have been removed to begin with, pathetic. Even worse if someone has hundreds of videos, posted over multiple years, removed.

If you are not going to fine them, than at least suspend their account, let them defend their lie and when they can't, log THEIR IP address for future reference. When that IP next issues a DCMA takedown notice, first have a real person verify the complaint is legitimate or at least let the person who posted the video respond BEFORE taking down more of their content after they have been previously wrongly accused. The AC was correct, the system will remained flawed until the system thwarts, prevent and punishes those that would use DCMA / DRM as club against FREE SPEECH.

Privacy is the killer app, the site/social network app should be configured from day one with the customer in mind, not politicians, corporations or advertisers. Ultimately they shoot themselves in the foot by ignoring their community and putting money first.

Hint to companies, bring in and build the community, the advertisers will follow. Don't be afraid to tell them (advertisers, politicians and Corpers) to take a hike when they make unreasonable demands....especially if they attempt to censor speech and violate privacy. That is not forgivable. Never was. How DARE they, whoever they are.

linky

Boston pays 170k for illegal arrest

There are numerous others. Now these aren't direct actions against the officers, but you can bet that in Boston they got some refresher training with it costing the city over $170k.

The continuing problem with the DMCA is the unwillingness to enforce penalties on people or companies who fraudulently submit takedown notices over things that aren't infringing (see today's related Techdirt story).

If you submit a takedown notice, and you sign or check a box saying "I swear under penalty of perjury", and you're wrong, then where are all the perjury charges?

Strange that MS doesn't remove from Bing the same links it asks Google to take out.

No, they just realize that nobody uses Bing :) They send the takedown to Google first since that will do more good.

Strange that MS doesn't remove from Bing the same links it asks Google to take out.

What are you implying? Next thing you'll claim Fox News only attacks liberals? You'd think everyone had an agenda.

As the article says, there are now dedicated companies who chase copyright issues.

Yes, and doesn't that strike you as just plain sick?

It's interesting how many of these requests are received, but I couldn't easily find out how many of them were declined. Does anyone have a link to this information?

I did not RTFA, but I did read this, which seemed a good overall review of the features. It looks like a very nice thing for Google to put out.

That said, I'll stick with Ixquick, thanks.

Strange that MS doesn't remove from Bing the same links it asks Google to take out.

Dear Mr. Lowery,

The Internet is so, so sorry if you are having a harder time because it exists. However, in general, it seems that it is easier for many other musicians because it exists.

Details can be found at the Techdirt article where you prove, in your reply posts, that you're an idiot, in either your business skills, your public relation skills, or both.

Oh so sincerely,
The Internet

In Germany, you are legally obligated to secure your wifi. There's a reason why the Pirate Party is receiving many votes in the state elections. If you're in Germany, a lot of YouTube videos (most of them are legit) are blocked because of GEMA (the German RIAA). I've heard that some bands aren't even allowed to post their OWN music on YouTube because GEMA won't allow this. My guess is that the old East German Stasi was just renamed to GEMA.

GEMA has achieved in Germany, what the MAFIAA could only dream of. A legally protected monopoly. Artists, Youtube Uploaders (even if its just background noise) and anyone else, needs to prove their innocence, or else pay up to GEMA.

In Germany, you are legally obligated to secure your wifi. There's a reason why the Pirate Party is receiving many votes in the state elections. If you're in Germany, a lot of YouTube videos (most of them are legit) are blocked because of GEMA (the German RIAA). I've heard that some bands aren't even allowed to post their OWN music on YouTube because GEMA won't allow this. My guess is that the old East German Stasi was just renamed to GEMA.

So $5-$7 for a DVD movie, $15-$16 for TV series is not good value? How low does it and have to be? Zero?

Some movies are that cheap. Not on Blu-ray though. Not new releases. For a medium that is trivially cheap to make, it's ridiculous to pay $25 or more for a movie when it costs maybe a dollar from factory to store. Given how wealthy the entertainment industry is, I have little incentive to give them more. Yes, I buy movies and go to the theater. But I do it infrequently. We might visit the theater twice a year and buy two Blu-rays per year. Other than that if I see a cheap DVD somewhere (and I don't care about the lack of HD quality) I'll pick one up. But given the effort required, I don't put much time into it.

Call me old-fashioned, but I still like the physical media. I like that I don't need a cloud that might disappear like a fart in the wind. I pay money, I get a physical disc. Yet I still have to be lectured about not copying illegally after I paid money.

The worst part about the FBI warnings is that the FBI prioritizes copyright over missing person cases. How about you spend less time ruining movie night and more time saving lives?

Operating systems, internet file systems, chat/presence, search engines... they are all platforms.

But they aren't the same kind of platform. An operating system provides a wide diversity of things to developers: Filesystem access, threads and locking primitives, networking support, a GUI framework, etc. Things that get ingrained deep down in the fine details of a piece of software. And Windows does all of those things using very different APIs than any other operating system.

Facebook doesn't have that level of breadth. User authentication is a single thing that can easily be cordoned off and made modular, so that you can support multiple authentication methods -- which is generally what your users will want anyway, because in many cases people don't want their "real name" associated with every single thing they do on the internet.

Notice that I'm not saying that Facebook is useless. You can use their APIs if they're useful (though again, you risk pissing off your users who don't want separate aspects of their lives correlated like that). But they're nothing special. The platform isn't what provides the value, it's the users. And the users can move to a different platform very quickly under the right circumstances.

There are really only two ways for Facebook to avoid this. The first is by being The Best Social Platform, permanently, and never letting anyone else offer anything they don't. Which is fine so long as they can keep it up, but it isn't really their strong suit; it took Google implementing circles to get them to do something similar even though the idea is totally obvious and incredibly useful. Which leaves the other alternative, going Full Evil and trying to be Microsoft, creating a bunch of proprietary standards that only work with Facebook, intentionally coding malformed implementations of open standards, etc. But I find it hard to believe that would work in the long term: Look at where it has gotten Microsoft. Still huge, but slowly dying and with everyone hating them and cheering their demise. And at the same time, because of Microsoft, everyone is now wary of New Microsofts and not having this happen to them by foolishly embracing non-standard proprietary technologies. More than that, it's questionable whether Facebook has enough market power to get away with it -- if they start locking everything down and pissing people off, I imagine Google+ would be happy for the new converts.

You have the same odds of being killed on an airplane by a terrorist as you do being killed by cancer from a body scanning device (1 in 30 million):

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120405/04390118385/tsa-security-theater-described-one-simple-infographic.shtml

my favorite part is that slashdot (and wired) picks this up five months after it was news. much more thorough (and timely) article at techdirt: http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111208/08225217010/breaking-news-feds-falsely-censor-popular-blog-over-year-deny-all-due-process-hide-all-details.shtml

YOU should have submitted it earlier. I think that is how this site works.

my favorite part is that slashdot (and wired) picks this up five months after it was news. much more thorough (and timely) article at techdirt: http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20111208/08225217010/breaking-news-feds-falsely-censor-popular-blog-over-year-deny-all-due-process-hide-all-details.shtml

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120405/04390118385/tsa-security-theater-described-one-simple-infographic.shtml

The probability of death from an air travel based terrorist attack is 1 in 30 million. I think the airline insurance carriers are going to be just fine with the risks.

Music lobby group, the BPI, welcomed the move, saying music creators 'deserve to be paid for their work just like everyone else'

Then maybe there should be some laws against the record labels which don't even pay the artists shit?

and calling for those who use The Pirate Bay to illegally download content to 'explore the many digital music services operating ethically and legally in the UK.'"

I invite those slimy pigs to make a legal and ethical living themselves.

"Basically this means CISPA can no longer be called a cybersecurity bill at all. The government would be able to search information it collects under CISPA for the purposes of investigating American citizens with complete immunity from all privacy protections as long as they can claim someone committed a "cybersecurity crime". Basically it says the 4th Amendment does not apply online, at all. Moreover, the government could do whatever it wants with the data as long as it can claim that someone was in danger of bodily harm, or that children were somehow threatenedâ"again, notwithstanding absolutely any other law that would normally limit the government's power."
http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120426/14505718671/insanity-cispa-just-got-way-worse-then-passed-rushed-vote.shtml

Confusing France and Nazi Germany is just fucking dumb.

You reckon?

You mean a group of organisations which don't shy away of using lies to see the law passed is better in your eyes, eh? After all, SS was equally a "protection squad"... even if the subject of protection was not quite the interest of the part of the German society that preferred democracy and freedom of expression... Besides, you know?, shit will happen when the things are rushed by organisations showing little respect for due process.

completely cut off the flow of money to the entertainment industry

There's no need to cut off the flow completely - just reduce it sufficiently.

Doing that is simple. Here's the plan: It's not as tough as you believe.

I wonder just why so many people here seem to believe they are entitled to enjoy free content (in this case music videos).

I find it more interesting that GEMA's filters tend to block legitimate publishers on youtube more often, like VEVO. Also, are you not familiar with other cases such as these?

Unless you get extradited for posting links to infringing material. http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120313/10132918091/uk-govt-agrees-to-extradite-richard-odwyer-to-us-linking-to-possibly-infringing-stuff.shtml

And if they are willing to extradite for acting like google, I see no reason why a person wont get extradited for this either. Except, of course, that some game I have never heard of is not nearly as interesting as media copyright.

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120418/04260518542/farks-drew-curtis-explains-how-to-beat-patent-troll-live-to-tell-tale.shtml

Yep. Let's add to this another stunner:

Darth Vader Not Getting Paid, Because Return Of The Jedi Still Isn't Profitable. Nevermind that, adjusting for inflation, Return of the jedi was the film with the 15th highest gross to date.

But hey, You know, if it's not making a profit, then you don't have to pay anyone their share.

But that is what the US government does: http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101028/04265511631/nasa-once-again-auctioning-off-patents-your-tax-dollars-paid-for.shtml

Recording artists from major labels now put their songs on youtube for free and still sell copies. Why they are still getting bent out of shape over file sharing is beyond me.

They're not. The middle-men, i.e., the RIAA, is the one getting bent out of shape.

The internet has basically eroded their hold on distribution and they're fucking pissed off about it. The whole "stealing from artists" line is just propaganda, the RIAA has been fucking stealing from artists since it's inception. Here's a suit from just a few years ago that, using their own calculations when going after individual copyright-infringers, found $6 BILLION in damages due to piracy by the CRIA (the Canadian wing of the RIAA). They later settled for $45 million, less than 1% of the original damages.

And then there's their latest legal arguments. In their case against Redigi, the RIAA argued that an MP3 downloaded from the internet was not owned, it was licensed, and therefore First Sale Doctrine did not apply. That's nothing new; we've heard that argument a billion times. The funny part is, while that case with Redigi was being argued, the RIAA was being sued for not paying disco group Sister Sledge their contracted royalties. See, they were contracted to receive a small percentage of "sales" revenue, and a higher percentage of "licensing" revenue. The RIAA, in a fit of irony it seems, argued that the music they sell online isn't licensed, it's sold, and thus, the group was not due the higher percentage of royalties for their online music 'sales'.

So, according to the RIAA, music sold online is both licensed and sold, depending on whichever argument justifies their thievery in open court.

Anyone defending these fucking assholes should have their head examined.

Also no-one needs TPB to distribute their personally created music.. Even if your band can't afford the miniscule hosting fees you can just host the torrent file; the whole point of bittorrent is it doesn't need sites like TPB.

Nobody needs anything in this world but food, clothing, shelter, and medical care. The point is, people use The Pirate Bay to distribute legitimately, the number of hits that it gets (according to Alexa, the 206th most visited site in the world) make it worthwhile to put things there for distribution.

Just because you'd rather throw the baby out with the bathwater doesn't mean the rest of us want to. You don't think the RIAA would cream their jeans if they could just stop all music sharing on the internet, legit or not? You don't think they would abuse their power if given the chance? Come on. They themselves have gotten busted for the same shit.

The idea that the MPAA and the RIAA are heading these efforts is really just a distraction. Total revenues of the entire global music industry is somewhere around $30 billion. The total movie industry revenue is higher, at about $87 billion. It's a lot of money, but look at what these bills are doing in detail. Every single one is also designed to limit the consumer market for generic medications and especially to limit (that is, abolish) the ability of US consumers to obtain prescription drugs from non-US sources.

Pfizer, a single pharmaceutical company, made $68 billion in revenue by themselves in 2006. They made almost $11 billion in a single year on Lipitor, one of their best sellers. Just the top 3 pharmaceutical companies made twice the revenue of the entire music and movie industries combined.

So it's not as big a deal to the mainstream that kids on their parents computers get blocked from downloading the latest from Lady Gaga or obtaining pirate copies of the Hunger Games before it hits DVD. What they don't realize is that these efforts will also greatly benefit the drug industry to the detriment of the American public and the total cost of health care.

The drug companies are about to lose major revenues due to expiring patents on their biggest money-makers. And without new drugs coming out, they want to protect that revenue. Their efforts include not only blocking sales from non-US retailers and tightening the regulatory screws on generic, but in fact are attempting to ban the sales of as many generic drugs as they can. Working with the FDA as their proxy, they have recently managed to ban hundreds of generic drugs from the market, many of which have been sold for decades. They have also gotten tri-care to eliminate a number of generics from their approved medications, requiring patients to use much more expensive brand-name medications instead.

If people knew what the real result that these bills would have, in terms of medications and drug costs, you would see a lot more outrage. That's why they keep claiming it's about music and movie piracy. In fact it's about IP in general, including drug company patents, and that's where the big money pushing for this stuff is really coming from.

Not according to Monsanto. You can't use the genes (seeds) even if they blew into your farm.

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20091214/0856327337.shtml

Your linked article says nothing about "You can't use the genes (seeds) even if they blew into your farm"

I found several links referring to organic farmers suing Monsanto fearing that genetically modified pollen may contaminate organic crops, but nothing about Monsanto suing farmers who saved seed from a non-Monsanto crop that had been contaminated by a nearby Monsanto grown one.

Not disagreeing with you. I've just read that several times with no legitimate links to back it up.

Not according to Monsanto. You can't use the genes (seeds) even if they blew into your farm.

http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20091214/0856327337.shtml

Yeah, it's probably a lot more biased than it needs to be.

Thanks, sometimes I wonder if anyone ever notices my efforts.

But as for hating patent trolIs, are there many people who actually like them? Obviously some lawyers because it keeps them employed, but other than that?

Well, that's a tough question. I would imagine that they like themselves but not other patent trolls but I can't be sure if they hate themselves. Perhaps we should investigate if the rate of suicide is higher in patent trolls? On a more serious note, there is one odd person that likes patents: nationalists. Whether you be a member of the US government or just a good ole fashion rah rah USA nutjob, there is a growing intellectual war between the United States and China. Sure, other countries like Japan get a lot of patents but patent trolls translate to "innovation" when it comes to number of patents and, let's face it, it's patent trolls that file for the most patents without actually building anything or licensing anything. I guess you could argue that they hurt the economy when small businesses get blindsided by these lawsuits but they always target the deepest coffers which usually seem to be happy to cough up and settle out of court. I can't think of anyone else really that benefits from this -- even the courtrooms in East Texas are clogged with shitty patent cases while trying to take care of real problems among the local people.

And is there anyone who tries to make a case that they are somehow beneficial to society? (serious questions BTW. I've never heard any argument in support of this practice)

Well, your question could be answered by This American Life's Episode 441 but there's a key problem. First, in that podcast, Intellectual Ventures argues that they help inventors protect their IP by suing the shit out of everyone that tries to implement anything remotely like the patents in question. And they also claim that they constantly license patents to people without involving a painful legal battle. However, as the TAL team asks for a happy license customer, IV can only give them one name of someone whose patent they license. And, gosh darn it, wouldn't you know it, as they tried to contact this individual it turned out that Intellectual Ventures was going around suing people and gathering out of court settlements in the name of that patent without the right to. And IV's response to this? Us normal people don't know what the hell we're talking about.

So there you go, sorry for the bias in my submission and this post but, well, when it warrants it I'm not afraid to call horseshit horseshit.

Cell is published by Elsevier which has been in the news recently because of a boycott

You mean, which has been in the news because it is one big fucking scam. When you publish with Elsevier, you publish with EVIL.

...is that they are effectively a form of electronic currency for the internet. In itself that wouldn't represent a problem, but when Paypal's currency ceases to be neutral, such as it was in the whole Smashwords debacle it loses its value to most people because unlike the physical form it is not legal tender in all circumstances. Money needs to be neutral for it to work properly. Paypal has shown time and time again their willingness to muck about with what is considered legal tender with their currency so it is not a good option for people.

Worse yet, considering it is highly apparent that Paypal was lying about the Credit Card companies pressuring it (given how they were so easily able to flipflop on the issue) this means their currency is not an honest one and cannot be relied on to retain value. While personally I have used Paypal in the past I and never had any trouble, I have also been careful to limit my interactions with them and actively sought alternatives where ever possible. As time goes on and the kinds of incidents like the Smashwords one continue to add up it only increases my resistance to using Paypal where ever I can avoid it.

I imagine others feel the same...

...is that they are effectively a form of electronic currency for the internet. In itself that wouldn't represent a problem, but when Paypal's currency ceases to be neutral, such as it was in the whole Smashwords debacle it loses its value to most people because unlike the physical form it is not legal tender in all circumstances. Money needs to be neutral for it to work properly. Paypal has shown time and time again their willingness to muck about with what is considered legal tender with their currency so it is not a good option for people.

Worse yet, considering it is highly apparent that Paypal was lying about the Credit Card companies pressuring it (given how they were so easily able to flipflop on the issue) this means their currency is not an honest one and cannot be relied on to retain value. While personally I have used Paypal in the past I and never had any trouble, I have also been careful to limit my interactions with them and actively sought alternatives where ever possible. As time goes on and the kinds of incidents like the Smashwords one continue to add up it only increases my resistance to using Paypal where ever I can avoid it.

I imagine others feel the same...

Here are the top two ways the RIAA continued to post profits despite rampant piracy:

1 - Massive staff layoffs, I've seen the _floors_ of empty cubicles and offices at Sony/BMG's New York offices, one building of many.
2 - Massive cuts in artist royalties, aka the 360 deal. Where labels used to only take a (large) percentage of retail album/single sales, they now take large percentage of everything from publishing to endorsements to merchandising to ringtones.

In short, everybody in the music industry is suffering except the RIAA executives. There is a finite amount of effective music promotions that can be done, and the RIAA owns them, all of them. There are only so many appearances on TV shows, awards shows, major tours, only so much radio listenership, etc etc. Making a good career of music requires access to that level of promotions to some degree. The more you promote piracy, the bigger a cut labels take to provide access, and the harder you make it for musicians, not the label executives.

So you keep on saying how RIAA profits prove piracy doesn't hurt anyone, and I'll keep playing gigs for the same rate musicians got in the 1970's. Nothing to see here. Move along.

So in other words you redefine business review sites as social?

Google's own reviews are "social" - you have to have a Google account to add one, and Google has access to all your Google-collected "social" data when evaluating the value of your review. Twitter links fed into Google ratings for a while, although Google seems to have stopped doing that for competitive reasons.

There are forms of social spamming that get spammers into your "circles". Check out "JET Google+ Circles Adder", which creates about 250,000 Google profiles a day per computer and sends out friend requests. If you're getting friend requests from 20something women you've never heard of, that's probably JetBots. Or one of their competitors that does the same thing using outsourcing to low-wage countries, like BuyCircles Followers. There's a whole industry out there spamming Google and Facebook.

This makes one wonder how big those social networks really are. If one computer can create 250,000 fake accounts in one day, tens of millions, and perhaps hundreds of millions, of "users" must be fake. That happened to Craiglist years ago.

1: Denver - Firstly, that's an arrest, not a conviction (even the press statement notes he is innocent), secondly, he wasn't planning any terrorist attacks in the US, and was stopped trying to leave the country to go back to Uzbekistan (or Pakistan).

2: Baltimore - this is another of those wonderful cases where the FBI creates a terrorist attack and then swoops in at the last minute, with great fanfare, to 'save' the day. There was never any risk of a terrorist attack, unless the FBI created it.

3: Washington Field - that's not a terrorist; that's a random nutter who decided it would be a good idea to shoot at some military buildings from his car, and filmed it. No indication of any political motivation etc.

4: Tampa - similar to 2, also still just charges, no actual proof. Just because someone wants to try to blow up a building, that doesn't mean there's the slightest chance they could do so.

5: Baltimore - apparently this guy tried to go to Somalia to join an Islamic group there, his 'material support' appears to have been something like $700.

6: Seattle - similar to 2 again (no actual risk, due to law enforcement providing weapons etc.), but otherwise, I'll give you that one.

7: San Diego - similar to 5, but she successfully sent $1,450 to them (the Somali-based Islamic group).

So, while four of those seem to be terrorists (assuming accusations to be true), and two tried to support terrorists, one doesn't seem to have been. Secondly, three of those (the three actually planning attacks in the US) were caught in sting operations, with law enforcement actively involved in their plots, providing equipment etc.. Thirdly, only one of those seems to have caused any damage (the non-terrorist), and that was possibly due to the ease of acquiring firearms in the US (which I won't get into). Fourthly, only 2 of those terrorists seem to have been in any position to actually carry out an attack, and were only stopped by law enforcement actions.

However, the most important point: None of these was stopped, identified, limited or hindered in any way by the TSA. Most seem to have been picked up through informants, i.e. real human intelligence-gathering, rather than the security theatre that people above (and below) are complaining about.

Also, that's (for the most part) taking the FBI's press releases at face value. Because, of course, they're going to be impartial.

I'm sure these guys would love to hire your firm.