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Egypt Coming Back On the 'net
An anonymous reader wrote in with the good news that after 5 days of blackout, "Egypt is coming back on-line. Some sites that didn't used to be available and are now back include two telcos: Vodafone Egypt and Etisalat Egypt. Guess that we can't have those IPv4 addresses back after all then."
"Guess that we can't have those IPv4 address back after all then."
Okay, that was good.
Viable Slashdot alternatives: https://pipedot.org/ and http://soylentnews.org/
I'll hold off cheering until AFTER they install a democ government.
but for some reason, I suspect it will be a muslim-based one. in which case, we are now WORSE off.
change - for change sake - does not always get us what we were hoping for.
I'll hold off cheering until I see WHO is going to run that country.
--
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
I'll hold off cheering until AFTER they install a democ government.
but for some reason, I suspect it will be a muslim-based one. in which case, we are now WORSE off.
change - for change sake - does not always get us what we were hoping for.
I'll hold off cheering until I see WHO is going to run that country.
I am cheering this event and only this event thankyouverymuch.
Home of The Suki Series
Access to the internet and other forms of communication are one of our arms we have in defense of our liberties. The internet should therefore fall under the protection of the 2nd Amendment. Resist the kill-switch!
Prove anything by multiplying Huge Number times Tiny Number
It doesn't take much of a conspiracy theorist to see what's probably happening here: first make a speech to the people talking a lot about stability and warning of chaos, then bring the net back up, send in paid thugs - confirmed as poiice in plain clothes - to attack the protesters, letting the world see the 'chaos the protests have caused' Mubarack: certified asshole, but a smart one.
Meep.
Well if Vodafone Egypt is anything like Vodafone Australia, the distinction between the network being 'on' or 'off' will be difficult to spot! :P
I imagine that Egypt's ISPs tried cutting over to IPv6-only infrastructure. This is all just a coincidence, nothing to do with the protests. I'm glad they've rolled back to IPv4 though, we can't be depriving people of access to Twitter and Facebook.
Internet is back up after Mubarak knew his deceiving speech will create a divide among the youth. No they'll give them the internet back to fight and spread fear. A massacre is currently taking place in egypt and bullets are being fired and the army has withdrawn its troops to allow the secret police to attack the few that will stand their ground. Democracy lost and the whole world is watching its slow death.
they only brought back the internet to make people go home without internet,more people joined the protests because they had nothing better to do anyway now,people are urging others to join the protests via social networking sites I don't think the Egyptian government can do anything about these protests really,other than stepping down,that is
What are eGyptians without Internet? Gyptians! ;)
To be fair, Benjamin Franklin didn't know about the internet.
http://www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com/english.aljazeera.net
Not looking good on the live stream: Plain clothes government paid thugs are attacking the demonstrating Egyptian public, trying to make them all go home.
Al Jazeera media network is by far the best coverage, but unfortunately it is more or less censored in the US apart from the above live stream (Censored in the same way that Paypal/Visa/MCard "censored" wikileaks, that is).
http://stat.ripe.net/egypt
Build your own energy sources from scratch. http://otherpower.com/
An orderly transitional government, to setup fair and open elections, would likely lead to more debate of the issues, and a government reflecting the people, which are mixed, secular and religious. If it turns messy and confrontational, more emotional and less rational, radical groups get better chances, be they right, left, military, religious, corporate or whatever.
Build your own energy sources from scratch. http://otherpower.com/
I subscribe to the "Fun Security" mailing list where one member posted the following:
They got cut off, then they got systematically removed from mailing lists?
Good security is based upon reality and common sense. Common sense is a function of having common knowledge.
It does take ages to re-aim the pyramids to pick up signal again. They also take a good while to reboot.
But he was a Newspaper man. Had he lived in today's world, he would have been publishing Blogs and News articles online, and objected to the concept that he is not allowed to do so. Internet == freedom of the press. And speech.
No government has a right to stick a muzzle in your mouth & prevent you from exercising your Nature-given right to express yourself (or share the thoughts running through your brain).
Information wants to be expensive AND wants to be free. So you have Value vs. Cheap distribution fighting each other.
Anyone else having trouble reaching english.aljazeera.net in the U.S.? It stopped coming up for me yesterday, and is going on 24 hours since I've been able to access it. I don't see anything in the news about why it might be down. Just wondering if anyone else is having problems.
Yes, it is "unofficially" censored in the US - that is, censored due to political pressure in the same way that Paypal/Amazon/Visa/Mastercard/BOA were "encouraged" by the administration to censor Wikileaks. At least they have not bombed their offices (yet) as Bush Jr wanted.
I'll hold off cheering until AFTER they install a democ government.
but for some reason, I suspect it will be a muslim-based one. in which case, we are now WORSE off.
change - for change sake - does not always get us what we were hoping for.
I'll hold off cheering until I see WHO is going to run that country.
Assuming you are not from Egypt...
Why would that be worse for you? Why is this about what you are looking for? Shouldn't it be about want Egyptians want?
If you deny those people the right to live under a government of their choosing, which may not be a western Liberal Democracy (which is what you really mean), you've created a whole new problem.
It's on America's tortured brow, That Mickey Mouse has grown up a cow
I'm sure they appreciate a link on ./ so everyone here can check that their hosts are reachable.
Dude... it's not about you.
If you mod me down the terrorists will have won
You can check the progress on Google's Transparency Report: http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/traffic/?r=EG&l=WEBSEARCH&csd=1288218432558&ced=1296644400000
So... if I fall off a building, I should not worry about the impact and cheer the fact that I am flying?
Right. Given what we actually know about B. Franklin. The only thing we can say for sure is that he would be into hookers and blow.
Am I off here, or should that have been: "Some sites that were previously unavailable..."?
Grammar Nazis, help me out here....
Loading...
Now that this finally happened, I think it's time we give them a helping hand: the least that we, the /. crowd, can do is donate some bandwidth to the Tor network by adding relay/bridge nodes and for those who can afford it exit nodes, too. This way we offer them a safer way to communicate among themselves and with the rest of the world.
For those yet unfamiliar with Tor, you can find out more here: Tor Project
You think Franklin would be In Favor of shutting-down the internet, having women's breasts & men's penises fondled at airports, and other anti-freedom measures that make people feel like Slaves instead of free human beings?
If so, you know nothing of the man.
All it requires is some READING (old concept but still valid) to realize where Franklin stood on these issues - "Anybody who would give us *essential* liberty for *temporary* security, deserve neither." He was also the one who went to Britain to broker a peace, had insults hurled at him by the parliament, and came back and said, "Revolt," in order to regain the British Rights that had been taken-away from the colonists. i.e. He loved liberty so much, he advised civil war.
Information wants to be expensive AND wants to be free. So you have Value vs. Cheap distribution fighting each other.
Well, you would be falling... likely not flying. So yes, if falling excites you, then run with it... no need to worry about the inevitable, it will be quick and rather painless anyways.
Assuming the building, or the height at which you began falling is tall enough that it would kill you... if you are sort of falling/stumbling down the side of a pyramid, it would probably be a good idea to attempt to prevent yourself from falling further, since there's the possibility you will live, but not be happy that you did if you just "go with the flow" in that case.
Their 'president' of 29 years stepped down & now they get their Internet back? On the surface at least it looks like a victory for the lower classes, but I can't imagine that happening in this day and age. Maybe the businesses were just losing too much money on not having internet.
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
Well worrying won't stop gravity, so what do you really have to lose?
Apparently wizard is not a legitimate career path, so I chose programmer instead.
Why would a muslim-based one be worse than the current dictator based one or our christian-based one? The muslims in Egypt are very moderate compared to others in that region. The whole muslim world wants to be more moderate, that's one of the reason you see the young uprising in those regions that and it's unemployment and poverty rates since you could say extremism and poverty seems to be closely linked. The current favorite if Egypt will have it's government prematurely ended is a liberal muslim a lot like Ron Paul a couple of years ago (Republican yet liberal).
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
Fondled != frisked.
(Also, you forgot a "think of the children". Every rant like yours needs a "think of the children" to be truly effective.)
Shouldn't it be about want Egyptians want?
Egyptians are probably going to get what they want, or at least what they want at the instant of transition. That doesn't mean it won't be bad for us, them, and the rest of the world as well. I haven't read up on the Iranian revolution, but superficially the protests in Egypt seem similar- they're not really about anything, except the removal of Mubarak; a large proportion of the population is Muslim; and there's no obvious candidate to fill the leadership vacuum.
It's easy to imagine Egypt voting for a new government not unlike Iran's, and that's the last thing anybody needs- including the Egyptians.
Romani are originally from India
confused yet?
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Okay, first off why is a "Muslim" government necessarily a bad one?
Second, why can a "Muslim" government inherently not be Democratic?
Third, how is the rest of the world worse off if Egyptians choose a Muslim government for their country?
I mean...it really doesn't affect me and my life much at this point. Hope they work it out over there in Egypt, but not really a concern for most people in their daily lives.
On positive aspect of all this...the Egyptian riots did knock the Charlie Sheen story off the headlines...I guess that is worth something.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
I'm not sure what you're talking about as far as the US censoring Al Jazeera, I live in the US and both the site and the satellite channel work just fine.
Wow..mind telling me which church you went to that actually spouted this kind of dogma?
I mean, sure, they do like to convert people, but I've never seen or heard of a christian church that wanted to do everything you said. On the other hand...I HAVE heard the muslims say they wanted to do much of that. I've yet to hear any christians say they wanted to kill any non-believers and have the church rule the world....
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
Please post some graphs of BGP route advertisements as the Eqyptian AS's come back online
If the world isn't beating a path to your door you're doing something wrong.
While I understand the importance of the internet today...I would still have a hard time defining it as an essential liberty?!?!
It is an aid...a luxury, and make communication easier, but so did the telephone in its day, yet, I don't regard that as an essential liberty either.
I guess I don't see technology as an essential liberty. Sure, if they are available, they are an aid to defending and re-acquiring your essential liberties...but I don't consider them liberties in and of themselves.
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
The last thing you want is the pervy TSA thinking of the children while they grope people in the airports.
Why are people so foolish that they think they don't have the right to free speech? (Or travel, or privacy in their homes, et cetera.)
People do have a right to free speech (I'm assuming you were going towards US constitutional rights). However, they may not have a right to using the medium. Things don't construct and maintain themselves magically. You need manpower, which converts to money, to do it. If you want the Internet, you A) pay a private company for your usage of the medium, or B) pay a public company (aka government) to give access to the Internet.
You're welcome to go ahead and dig trenches connecting cities, states, and countries.
Eventually, whether I agree with it or not, I believe Internet companies are going to be regulated and managed like the essentials: electricity, gas, and water.
I'd say they should elect a new pharaoh, but the whole thing would probably just turn into a big pyramid scheme.
I grew up in a christian fundamentalist church. And that is what they preached (except the wealthy part, the guy who got 10% of several hundred peoples income kept that on the down low). This is far, far more common than you think. A lot of these groups don't preach the hardcore stuff publicly or use euphemisms and innuendo to set a tone without explicitly calling for the inquisition to start burning heretics at the stake. But its there, you just have to know what to look for.
Shouldn't it be about want Egyptians want?
Only so long as they want a democratic form of governance. Statistically speaking, there is a very clear causation that democracy translates to peace and prosperity with the likelihood of war being dramatically reduced - especially with another democratic government.
So basically, factually, statistically speaking, its better for the Egyptian people and the rest of the world if they have some form of a democratic government. Period.
And as the middle east's long history proves, any other form of government is well established to create instability and stomp of human rights. So regardless of what they want, everyone is worse off if they don't get a democracy.
You seem to forget that not everyone's opinion is of equal weight. The simple fact is, if they want anything short of a democracy or republic, its because they are ignorant and brain washed. History is full of tales of the ignorant and brainwashed getting what they wished for only to find out they and the rest of the world will suffer for their stupidity and ignorance, arrogance. Unfortunately, that's the basic tale of the whole of the middle east as well as many other parts of the world.
Sometimes when you're completely ignorant, you have no clue as to what you need. And what you want, frequently has absolutely nothing to do with what you need.
Besides, the global population has very clearly spoken. Anyone who isn't brainwashed, absolutely prefers some form of governance which allows for a voice of the people; which largely means a democracy or republic. Likewise, those who tend to not like that form of governance are almost universally brainwashed with some form of theocracy.
So yes, regardless of what they want - I absolutely hope they are plagued with the burdens of freedom, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, which can almost only be provided by democracy or a republic.
See this very recent coverage of the effective US cable and satellite carriers blackout of Al Jazeera, apart from "a handful of homes in the United States". (Your obviously one of the lucky few - care to name who your provider is?)
Historically this blackout has been due to pressure from the US Government on cable providers. From Washington Embraces Al Jazeera linked earlier:
"On April 11 senior [US] military spokesperson Mark Kimmitt declared, “The stations that are showing Americans intentionally killing women and children are not legitimate news sources. That is propaganda, and that is lies.” On April 15 Donald Rumsfeld echoed those remarks in distinctly undiplomatic terms, calling Al Jazeera’s reporting “vicious, inaccurate and inexcusable. It’s disgraceful what that station is doing.” It was the very next day, according to the Daily Mirror, that Bush told Blair of his plan. “He made clear he wanted to bomb al-Jazeera in Qatar and elsewhere,” a source told the Mirror. “There’s no doubt what Bush wanted to do"
Well, I guess their LAN party is over now.
Yes, these protests are absolutely incredible. And from those Americans who have a clue what's actually going on in Cairo, Alexandria, Suez, etc, you're seeing a lot of support for the protesters. Unfortunately, a lot of Americans don't have a clue what's actually going on, and many that do are getting nothing but misinformation about who the protesters are and what they want.
There are a few major reasons for that:
1. For far too many Americans, "Arab", "Muslim", "terrorist", and "scary guy" are basically indistinguishable concepts. For instance, those that find Barack Obama scary because he doesn't look like they do will say he's a Muslim, even though he's never said anything remotely similar to "There's no god but Allah and Mohammed is his prophet." So the idea that Muslims could be doing something good in the world runs straight into cognitive dissonance.
2. The US government has close ties to the Israeli government, and the Israeli government is very scared that whatever comes after Mubarak won't be so keen on adhering to the Camp David Accords. As a result, the messages Americans have been getting from their government has been lukewarm at best about the protests.
3. Establishment media outlets have mostly followed the Obama administration's lead. Many reports are taking advantage of my first point to state that these were organized by the Muslim Brotherhood (despite plenty of evidence to the contrary), and are describing "chaos" and "looting" more than "protests".
4. Some have memories of the Iranian Revolution in 1979, and fear that what Egypt is going through will lead to the same result.
A lot of Americans are ignoring their government, their media sources, and their fears, and supporting the protesters.
Salaam.
I am officially gone from
In case you havn't noticed Mubarak didn't need any special law or a big red button to shut off internat access state-wide, just a few well placed phone calls to the the major ISPs.
I wonder if that could ever happen here in the 'civilized' west (in London they chirurgically shut off mobile comunication during the student riots, remember?) and what counter measures would we have.
Could we use the good old phone network to cohordinate? How many of you still remember their home phone number? you mother's? your friends'? How many public phones are there in your city?
So I started investigating the current status of mesh wireless network. There is a significant number of people walking around with a wifi enabled linux phone nowdays, are they enough to build an on-the-fly mesh network? We already have some of the software stack available (http://www.olsr.org/?q=node/30), what seems to be missing is a simple user interface and a messaging system.
And then then what about pratical issues: battery life, interferencies... We should really be experimenting with this stuff now. It may prove to be quite a useful resource in other emergencies too.
but for some reason, I suspect it will be a muslim-based one. in which case, we are now WORSE off.
Assuming your not Egyptian; who cares if WE are worse off? Its their country, they should be able to pick their own damn government, no matter how much we dislike it. Our government is, in a way, a Christian based one, something about 90% of our population being Christian. Much of the world would probably doesn't like this.
Reading about this revolution, and the parties involved, no one comes off as a Muslim extremist. Reading what the Muslim Brotherhood (who last I checked wasn't that much involved in the current issue) wants... none of it is terribly "extremist". As long as they get some flavor of actual democracy, and toss out their corrupt dictator I don't much care what happens there. I'd be happy for them no matter what, as long as a Taliban type theocracy/tyranny doesn't erupt (which doesn't seem terribly likely in this case).
America's desires mean jack shit to the rest of the world. As an American I'm perfectly okay with this, we don't give a rat's ass what the rest of the world thinks about us, so why the hell should anyone care what we think about them?
A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. -edward abbey
Some of them, on the other hand, want to bring about the second coming of Jesus, and thus the end of the world. Meaning death and damnation to billions of people.
Sure, they are killing people now, but its the thought that counts.
A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. -edward abbey
the guy who got 10% of several hundred peoples income kept that on the down low
Probably less than 1% unless your church met in alleys or parks and had no charitable giving programs. There are a lot of legitimate expenditures whenever you get a lot of people together on a regular basis on land that their group owns, to sing songs that they probably have to pay performance licensing fees for.
Also, Jesus didn't teach "Death to the Pharasees!" or "Death to the Pagans!". The closest he got was telling his followers to buy swords before he was crucified (a caution that they'll need to defend themselves, not attack others).
its there, you just have to know what to look for.
It's not there at all, and my guess is you're reading your own beliefs into their comments.
You think Franklin would be In Favor of [..] having women's breasts & men's penises fondled
You're talking about Benjamin Franklin, right? Founding father? Notorious lecher?
One site that stayed up through all this was the Library of Alexandria, which, among other things, hosts a copy of the Internet Archive. They now have photos up of their supporters surrounding the Library to protect it.
They stayed up because they have a direct connection to the 10Gb/s FLAG, the Fiber Optic Around the Globe link. That has a cable landing at Alexandria, and the Library is tied in there, without going through a local ISP.
Extremists will be extremists wherever you go.
As an Atheist living in one of the most right-wing Bible thumping states in the US, I have not been cast out or stoned or burned at the stake for my heresy lately, so I still feel pretty safe (at least in that sense) living here. I am not sure it would be the same if I chose to move to one of the more fundamentalist parts of the Middle East.
Opinions may vary, but at least from what I understand, the idea of separation of church and state holds a little stronger here than there.
You're probably just trolling anyways, though.
>>>Fondled != frisked.
Multiple passengers have been fondled, with the Brownshirt SA sticking their hands down men's pants or up women's blouses. One woman, who is filing a lawsuit, had her breast exposed and groped. Later an SA agent commented, "You have nice ones - wish I had been the one touching you."
Information wants to be expensive AND wants to be free. So you have Value vs. Cheap distribution fighting each other.
As atheists, You and I are mostly physically safe, for now.
If things keep going the way they are, the US could be as bad of an oppressive theocracy as the worst parts of the middle east within our lifetime.
While I understand the importance of the internet today...I would still have a hard time defining it as an essential liberty?!?!
It is an aid...a luxury, and make communication easier, but so did the telephone in its day, yet, I don't regard that as an essential liberty either.
Maybe it should be...then everyone can get internet to their homes as a government subsidy. Just sayin. :P
You might as well! It's not like worry is going to generate any lift.
I suspect it will be a muslim-based one. in which case, we are now WORSE off.
We will be worse off? I am sorry to burst your bubble but it is not about us, it is about the Egyptians. We (I assume you are from the US) were doing fine before this all happened, Egyptians were getting tortured and murdered by the police on a routine basis, not to mention living in poverty for the most part. I don't think they care what it means for us, and I don't blame them for not caring. It was the US that supported the current government so they will probably be glad that the end of torture and murder for them means a small difference in the pockets of the richest westerners.
I also don't see what religion has to do with it, it is a muslim country, the current government is predominantly muslim, the population is predominantly muslim. The fact that you would even imagine the possibility of a non muslim government betrays embarrassing ignorance on your part. Perhaps you would prefer they all convert to catholicism and pledge allegiance to the pope. I suppose you think that would result in a wonderful new peace loving democracy and profits for all patriotic Americans. Sometimes I am ashamed for even reading this website.
Franklin was a sufficiently successful ladies' man that he never needed to purchase their affections. Blow maybe, but not hookers.
"They redundantly repeated themselves over and over again incessantly without end ad infinitum" -- ibid.
Okay, first off why is a "Muslim" government necessarily a bad one?
Because all theocracies are implicitly corrupt and evil, and a muslim one would also be disciminatory.
Second, why can a "Muslim" government inherently not be Democratic?
Because it's a theocracy.
Third, how is the rest of the world worse off if Egyptians choose a Muslim government for their country?
Because Islamic theocracies cause trouble. See Afghanistan and Iran.
Note that it's possible to have a democratic government whose members happen to be Muslim. That's not the same as a Muslim government.
Funny - I hear religious people say the same thing. "If things keep going the way they are..."
Maybe your both, i don't know, a little paranoid? Yes there's people that want to join the church and state again. There's also people that want to ban allowing all religions. And there's a third group that believes that jam will evolve into a higher life form and wipe us all out.
Stop living in fear of the boogyman and get on with your life already. Yesh.
How is what I am saying "hate filled retoric"? It isn't hate filled rhetoric to call an evil, corrupt and two faced person/group/system evil corrupt and two faced. It is called being honest. I have not said one hateful thing, not made one personal attack.
And what is this "other team" am I batting for? Rationality? Awareness? Freedom? Justice? Good? DAMN RIGHT I AM.
I have an ethical responsibility to speak out against irrationality, evil, corruption, deception and hate when I see it. I may not be able to defeat them, but I will make damn sure that everyone sees them for what they really are. You can cry and spit and scream about how horrible I am for confronting your bullshit all you want. I will not be silent. I will not submit. I will not relent. It won't change my defiance, my righteous indignation.
"All it takes for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing." – Edmund Burke
Just how many sock puppet accounts do you have commodore64_love? Are you (the new) Westlake?
I am not talking about what Jesus taught. I am talking about what christian fundamentalists teach. I was an insider, I was one of them. I know first hand how evil, corrupt and two faced they are. If you are a "compassionate christian" you likely have no idea what is happening on the other side of your faith, both through inexperience and willful ignorance.
I am a Christian fundamentalist. The point of fundamentalism is getting back to the fundamentals of Christianity, i.e. what Jesus taught. Fundamentalist churches are a lot more extreme in their forgiveness, charity, and outreach than more established churches. They're also less structured, so you can end up with a church hiring the wrong preacher more often (maybe what happened at your church).
Any large enough group of people will have politics, cliques, mob mentality and an us versus them attitude towards outsiders. These attitudes are by no means the exclusive property of religious groups.
It sucks that you were on the receiving end of it.