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US Government Announces National Day of Civic Hacking
An anonymous reader writes "Yesterday in a post at the White House website, the U.S. government announced that June 1-2 would be the National Day of Civic Hacking. 'Civic Hacking Day is an opportunity for software developers, technologists, and entrepreneurs to unleash their can-do American spirit by collaboratively harnessing publicly-released data and code to create innovative solutions for problems that affect Americans.' It will be a joint project with Random Hacks of Kindness, Code for America. Activities are being planned in many cities across the country, and you can also sign up to host your own event. It's nice to see the government use the word 'hacking' in a positive way, since most uses of the term these days involve malicious activity."
And here I thought it was about hacking Honda Civics.. enough people do that you'd think there'd be a holiday for it already.
Color me surprised. Or maybe code me surprised. I thought the term 'hacker' was forever lost, stained by the media beyond redemption.
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
"Liberate data that can inform better problem solving in every community."
I propose we make a script that downloads all the research journals that we can, then makes massive online library of them that anyone can access. Oh wait. That doesn't end well.
And now that Aaron Swartz is gone, this is a wonderful way to identify the next targets...
This national hacking day promises to be more well received then the first national hacking day held in Sierra Leon.
Be careful out there. This isn't a true call to hacking, it is a call for free labor.
Slashdot's rate-of-post filter: Preventing you from posting too many great ideas at once.
I've apparently entered the bizarro universe.
First hack!
This isn't a true call to hacking, it is a call for free labor.
I don't mind donating my labor for free sometimes if it makes the world a better place.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain !!
Perhaps I'll buy someone a spare battery for their smartphone.
...And the US government has made the world a better place recently?
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
I truly believe in the 'pay it forward', random acts of kindness ideology. When I see someone obviously having difficulty somehow, I many times do stop and ask them if I can help. It usually doesn't cost me up anything but a little of my time, and it helps me feel better about myself afterwards. How coders can apply this to 'hacking' though, how can they do that?
Itsatrap.jpg
Yes. I like roads.
Take these wholesome "hacking" deeds and weaponize it for the good of mankind.
That must be where you put your tablet or smart phone on top of your Honda Civic and post to slashdot how you hacked it into a really cool tablet holder.
Roads are predominantly state projects. And though you might claim the feds help fund them, it's only because the feds confiscate via the income tax then give it back for compliance with federal initiatives.
Slashdot's rate-of-post filter: Preventing you from posting too many great ideas at once.
Why am I reminded of this Dilbert?
Great minds think alike; fools seldom differ.
target acquired
mount -sw /AngelinaJolieCoveredInSweetYams
You might want to consider this in the same light as a donation to The United Way in that a sizable chunk of your donation might be kept by the US government and might support organizations having policies with which you do not completely agree.
Better to donate your money, time, and labor directly to those organizations you wish to support.
Who is the government? Ideally it's ALL US!
Don't confuse criticism of politican decisions as throwing the baby out with the bathwater. The alternative is much much worse. Just look at Greece, nice leaders, huh? Discontent breeds the WORST of leaders, so beware.
June 1. is my birthday.... Dunnowhattothinkofthat.
Religous speak to God. Insane are spoken to by God. When all shut up, one can finally hear Shostakovich in peace
Prime example of dissonance in government. One hand calls for massive recruitment for "cyber-defense" and tries to exploit the good/curious nature of most hackers/crackers, while the other hand squeezes the life out of the same people whose curiosity led them to do legally-ambiguous (but generally morally right) things.
Well, hackers aren't dumb people. This shit won't fly for very long..... Is what I want to say, but the same thing has been done to various fields of academia for a couple decades now.
Then I will have to make sure that my hatchet has been sharpened, before this day of hacking.
sudo make me a sandwich
Since much of this academic work is subsidized with public funding, let's put some servers somewhere at MIT so we can download and mirror it.
Ideally, its none of us!
What happens in a democracy, not just the US, but in ANY democracy (or republic) is that the masses will inevitably push for higher taxes and more welfare and raid the treasury for their own personal gain. Since democracy at its essence is a popularity contest, the politicians will push for higher and higher taxes and more welfare. When productivity is punished, productive people will go elsewhere (see France) when productive people go elsewhere, the country goes into a decline (such as the Roman Empire/USSR) and eventually collapses.
I am responsible only for the actions and decisions I make. Not my neighbor's, not the government's, but mine and mine alone.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
I suppose I expect too much from my government in openly allowing hacking on one day without repercussions so long as it harms nobody. After all, it only has access to my national identity and tax records.
I have been a captive in America my entire life. Everybody and everything uses customary units instead of metric.
Perhaps because the south would be an even bigger shithole otherwise?
It isn't those kids' faults they were born there and they're fellow citizens. I support the redistribution of taxes from the feds.
What is a 'can-do American spirit'?
"I support the redistribution of taxes from the feds."
Isn't that cute. Do you think the feds have magic money trees? I mean we all understand that they can print the stuff, but let me ask you this; do you know why they tax you every year? Have you any clue whatsoever?
Thats only one side of the story.
Me: "Hey, come hack on this app with us!"
Someone's Mom: "It's ok dear, it's Civic hacking. The good kind"
Perhaps because the south would be an even bigger shithole otherwise?
Wait, is that even possible?
I couldn't find a location on either Random Hacks of Kindness or Code for America that notes if my city is participating. If it's there, I couldn't find it in a few seconds. I would suggest making that more prominent.
That's a ridiculous oversimplification of what happened to both the Roman Empire and the USSR.
is the announcement of "Federal Prosecutor's Day", promising a target-rich environment and said announcement signing off with "happy hunting".
"Now - I truly KNOW this post will no doubt be downmodded, because Advertisers do NOT want this type of information getting out en-masse to enlighten users - they bought out Ghostery, crippled Adblock, but TRY THAT with a local hosts file (good luck!) especially one a user builds himself!" - by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 23, @03:39PM (#42673207)
See my subject-line above after reading that from the post I replied to (mine)...
* :)
APK
P.S.=> Trolls - they're ALL THE SAME, but using effete unjustifiable downmods takes the cake (as there is no disproving the points I stated in my last post, is there? Evidently not!)...
... apk
You must be new here*
* here = message boards on the Internet
Probably less than 0.1% of the cost of developing a new fighter jet that people like you aren't complaining about.
if they're OK by this.
How terribly insensitive and how clueless can the whitehouse be?
http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/13/01/aarons-law/267247/#
The DOJ is just trolling for people to slap an indictment on for violating the DMCA.
Well, there's the space program.
Oh, wait, that's being wound down, isn't it.
AKA give us cool apps for free, nothnx
KERNEL PANIC -SIGFAULT AT ADDRESS #51A54D07
They use the term "hacking" when they mean "coding". They use the term "Day" when they mean "weekend". They hope to have an event in a city in "all 50 states and territories". Someone is bad at geography, math, grammar, or a mix of the 3.
Why, oh why, didn't I take the Blue Pill?
What part of the word "redistribution" do you not understand.
Like, harness public data to make a map that shows homes of registered gun owners or concealed-carry permit holders?
Might as well change it to: here = all informal conversation
You can buy stacks of textbooks on any subject. Many stacks on the political and economic histories of the Roman Empire and USSR.
Real conversation necessarily deals in simplifications, or we'd never have discussion. Here, more than most forums, we tend to ignore that and go off on long, unproductive, pedantic rants. It's rarely helpful.
Ideally, it's all lizards.
May Peace Prevail On Earth
Emphasis on the recently.
Don't know about you, but they haven't fixed the roads around here in a while.
"And though you might claim the feds help fund them..."
That is not merely something that one *might* claim; that is something that one can state as a fact. One could also state as fact that the federal government does this in a lot of other areas. And I, like the other AC, also like roads as well as schools and hospitals and the myriad other things that state's rely on federal funding in order to build and maintain.
To address your point that the federal government can only provide that funding by "confiscat[ion] via the income tax"*, if the federal government didn't collect taxes and then appropriate them to the states then how do you think roads and schools and hospitals would be built? The states would still need to tax in order to build and maintain the public infrastructure on which we all rely and from which we all benefit.
*That's very clever, "confiscate", you must be really proud of yourself for that one. Thumbs up.
I like roads too. The issue is what value are you getting for your money. I am very pleased if I get a great meal for $10. I expect the meal to be great if I pay $100. They build the roads argument makes sense if the government is only spending on building roads. I am sure that the federal government spending on road is not even a meaningful part of the federal budget. The question is are you getting the best value for your money? Would a smaller government give a greater value for the money? How about a larger government? What services/level of services does the government have to provide? This is not an all or nothing proposition.
HACK THE PLANET!
And yet - the reddit kid hung himself over being prosecuted for what he would have called civic hacking.
... nobody tell Carmen Ortiz!
It's the drunken approach congress, the executive and the judiciary take to unconstitutional legislation.
I've fallen off your lawn, and I can't get up.
I would have thought, the even more paranoid, be careful out there, it's a trap would be even more relevant. FBI we need a list of all hackers, so we can decide which ones are the anarchistic criminals.
Chaos - everything, everywhere, everywhen
I figure they are gonna steal the good ideas. You know, the ones they can get money for. I bet you wouldn't get a civil response if you showed them what their real problem is. Their inability to secure their low level infrastructure.
What happens in a democracy, not just the US, but in ANY democracy (or republic) is that the masses will inevitably push for higher taxes and more welfare and raid the treasury for their own personal gain. Since democracy at its essence is a popularity contest, the politicians will push for higher and higher taxes and more welfare.
People have been saying this for a long time, it's why democracy was often limited to land owners, historically. In the US, basically the franchise has extended to all males since its inception, and the U.S. is hardly the most commie country in the world. But of course, it's hard to refute a proposition that simply states something is inevitable, since, after all, only a finite period has passed without it having any obvious evidence to support it.
When productivity is punished, productive people will go elsewhere (see France) when productive people go elsewhere, the country goes into a decline (such as the Roman Empire/USSR) and eventually collapses.
It's a free country, if people want to go, they can go. It's hard to be productive in an anarchy, so I'm not entirely sure how paying taxes constitutes punishment for being productive.
Out of curiousity, exactly where did the fucking Romans migrate to? Gaul? Fucking Britannia? Egypt, because of the great wages on the construction jobs?
Of course there was some migration out of the USSR, but not as much as your making it out to be, since they weren't really allowed to leave. Economic theories are debatable, the advisability of not nuking yourself is undisputed.
I am responsible only for the actions and decisions I make. Not my neighbor's, not the government's, but mine and mine alone.
So you seriously are an anarchist? I was just kind of tossing that out there earlier. Well, whether you're "responsible" for your neighbors actions or not, if your neighbor sticks a gun to your head and pulls the trigger you're going to be dead. If he has the choice through certain death through starvation, or possible death from the penal system for blowing your head off to take your stuff, he's going to blow your head off. Shit happens without regard to whether or not anybody is "responsible" for it.
Anyhow, it's a free country. If you don't like it, you can leave. That's a much better deal than anyone got from the Soviets.
Not to mention a timely distraction from the Swartz case/suicide. Especially with gems like encouraging citizens to "unleash their can-do American spirit" in the form of what amounts to a 35-year prison sentence if you rub someone the wrong way.
"Evidently judging from comments here, something that used to happen in America's past." - by turkeyfish (950384) on Wednesday January 23, @06:23PM (#42675099)
Still happening: depends on the American -> http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=3403483&cid=42673207
*:)
(See subject-line above...)
APK
P.S.=> There you go - Anyone can be out there doing it, & in my case, it was for years for practice (ala "sharpen the sword" & on programming topics other than what I did for a livelyhood in information systems DB work) - came in handy early on especially in my career, as it gave interviewers something to use & see my work quality with. It paid in other ways, literally, with some of my work ending up in commercially sold code too later.
I "held onto" that app circa 2004-2012, because it CAN adversely affect advertisers &/or websites, but what "did the trick" on my finally letting it out to the general public? Was the MASSIVE "explosion" of malware out there from 2005 onwards mostly! That was what "tipped the scale" for me on releasing it...
Thus - I had to put it out there & largely on the suggestions of pals & testers who used it first (since it kept them from being infested + sped up their websurfing by a LONG shot & far more - it's like getting your mileage boosted + a free turbo-charger & armored car online in essence (by way of analogy))..
... apk
enough said
The USA... making the world a better place... Good joke!
The government wants computer experts to work for free?
Yeah, "hacker" is way too ambiguous.
"Cracker" was used for a while to mean "malicious hacker", but has its own ambiguity since it's used as a sort-of black person's "N-word" for a white person. (whatever happened to "Ofay", by the way?)
I'd suggest "jacker", from "jack in to a network in order to hi-jack it".
And by analogy to Tim Leary's "Turn on, tune in, drop out" - "Jack in, jack out, jack off"
Actually, I'd claim that roads are predominantly construction projects completed by private enterprises which the city, state and federal governments fund through taxation.
"Republic" just means they don't have a "king". It doesn't mean the people are represented. It's just a coinsodence of language that the two words seem similar.
You know how we usually get in a huff about a topic and everyone galvanizes along two sides and it's a big sort of debate thing? Yeah, back in the day, one of those issues was whether or not we should have a king or we should have a republic.
But anyway, no, your argument isn't coming from the right angle. You can't say the masses will always want more taxes. That's crazy. Who wants to pay more taxes? No, they want other people to pay more taxes. Especially when there's inequality and unfair advantage. So you should argue that, in a democracy, collective Peter will vote to tax/enslave/repress selective Paul. Of course, historically, democracies have been pretty good when it comes to the civil rights of minorities.... Eventually... I don't see how that's neccesarily part of a democratic system, but there's probably some sociological factors at play.
I am responsible only for the actions and decisions I make. Not my neighbor's, not the government's, but mine and mine alone.
And that's what separates a individualistic libertarian and the people who understand they live in and depend upon a socity. Bitch as much as you want, but you live in a democracy. Ultimately, YOU, in some small percentage, are the person in charge of all the laws and all the government. Don't like the shitty laws? Hate taxes and what it buys you? Do your civic duty, get political, and rally your neighbors to change it. Because we're all responsible for this. Together.
I wonder what kind of cyber activities of their own our govt is planning on engaging in?
Might be a good cover or distraction for it.
They've gotten good at distracting us...
Either that or they are just scoping out who knows their coding and whatnot- as some other posters have already suggested.
"Thank you so much, Sir White Hat :-)" - by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday January 23, @08:12PM (#42676171)
I like this BETTER though - "I am the Green Lantern of Sector 2814", & part of the "Green Lantern Corps" online, per MalwareBytes -> http://hosts-file.net/?s=Download who feature my ware there...
* :)
(They're a bunch of guys, who like myself, volunteer their time & efforts... vs. scumbags online, like malware makers & the like!)
APK
P.S.=> "Onwards, & UPWARDS..."
... apk