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This is probably the very reason they're shutting it down. I doubt there's any good argument for doing so from a cost-saving perspective.
This is one more way citizens...err...terrorists can freely communicate.
When I was in university the commerce (e.g. business) students signed a petition to abolish arts and humanities studies, since they're a waste of time, money and there's no profit to be made from studying such things.
Perhaps, if we were to generalize, we could say on the one hand you have a group of people whose tendency is to not do anything unless it financially benefits them in some way and to impose their viewpoints and beliefs on others. On the other hand you have a completely different group that tends to like doing and learning things just because they can, values privacy and prefers not to impose their values and beliefs on others.
I think what this represents is further erosion and lowering of the standards of evidence. It also represents injustice, it's a perfectly unjust and unfair law, it's criminal and immoral.
The US is moving beyond innocent until proven guilty, and beyond the need for evidence, and becoming a country where mere suspicion or allegation is enough to land you in a world of trouble.
We already know there's no way to prove beyond a doubt, without catching someone in the act, that they are downloading copyrighted material. If all you have are logs, you've got no real evidence.
I have my own horror story of a similar nature, this one with Bell and Bell Sympatico High Speed (a Canadian thing).
Pre-Move: Bell has a "helpful" e-Move link on their website, you simply go to the page, login, fill out the info, state when you want to move, you're done. I opted to call the phone number on the page, just to be sure. Rep was extremely polite and helpful, asked when I wanted the service switched, assured me that was all there was to it.
Day of Move: No switch. No internet.
Move+1: Called them. Three transfers later was bumped to "Business Services" for some reason, which was a call center in India. Woman could barely speak English, line quality was atrocious, staticky - this was to be the case every time. Her computer was saying I was still at the old address, she tried to place a move order but got an error. Said to call back next day.
Move+2: Called back. Same error, said to call back next day.
Move+3: Same error, decided to call residential services just in case to make sure they had moved my phone line. They said their records showed me as connected at my new address, moreover they had sent someone over to physically reconnect me.
Move+4: Business Services again, same error, bounced around by the reps. Told them what residential services had said.
By the way, side note, everyone in India seemed to contradict each other in what they said they saw in my records, they were either lying, couldn't read, or their records are a royal mess. Also, it may be their culture, or their training, but they always try to make it seem as if its your fault, as if they'd done everything they could and you were wasting their time. There are some serious attitude problems over there.
Move+5: Decided to call tech support instead,. Explained the problem. Tech support transferred me to High Speed services. Went through the motions of "is your modem blinking", "is your line under 10 feet long", etc. Call kept getting escalated, they started seeing that things should be working but weren't. Eventually someone found the tech that had gone out had left notes saying the wiring was FUBAR'd. Said they would send another tech. Made appointment, had to wait all day.
Move+6: Nobody came. Around this time I noticed I had no dial tone (I know, I know, but I use the line solely for data...). Called residential support again. Found they had indeed sent someone on moving day, but had NOT hooked up the line due to complications. The Bell rep tried to sell me line insurance! Started telling him why that was so wrong but he transferred me in mid-spiel (goddamned fucker). Made appointment for them to come and finish the job. Would have to wait for them all day.
Move+7: Waited all day, nobody came. Called Bell, they said they had sent someone - only thing was, it couldn't have been true because they sent them around the same time I was busy making the appointment for them to come. Made another appointment, again had to wait for them all day.
Move+8: Two guys showed up, said they had a hard time finding my line outside the building, it was such a mess of old phone wiring. Took them an hour to install a whole new physical line. Line showed a signal, but no internet. They said to wait until next day to see if it came up.
Move+9: It didn't. Called High Speed, I explained that when they sent the tech earlier there was actually no physical line, it was only just created, so could they please another. Made appointment, had to wait all day again.
Move+10: Nobody came or so much as knocked on my door, but internet came back up.
Long story short, I think we're headed for a world where corporations will need bunkers.
If you're right and "terrorist" == "wanted felon" then you Americans are in deep shit.
I suspect you're somewhat right, though. I suspect people are being added by virtue of their "suspicious" beliefs or their participation in civic protests. There have been many stories on Slashdot about how police databases are not equipped to handle protesters or political speech - since they're set up only to record crimes, so police have been incorrectly designating civilians as "terrorists."
David Hall was probably someone arrested in a protest somewhere, or who gave a political speech the authorities didn't agree with.
First, you assume that parents love children. "When you learn love, that you have for a child, you will understand. Maybe." Are YOU fucking high? You've obviously not known very many parents. Try visiting your local Children's Aid sometime - and not only is that only the tip of the iceberg, those kids are the lucky ones who escaped.
I know very few parents who I'd say are worthy of having or raising children.
Your own comments about Lojacking your children perfectly illustrates the predominant view that children are to be considered the personal property of parents, much like furniture or laptops, and to do with was they see fit - much like whether you prefer expresso over ice or straight and undiluted.
No, they don't get a choice? Why, because they live under your roof and eat your food, therefore they do as you say? Because if it weren't for you, they'd be nothing? They owe their very existence to you and should be grateful? Yeah, that's the viewpoint which usually lends itself well to beating the kids "because you love them and only have their best interests at heart".
That's the view that says the ends justify any means - and which has given us history's worst atrocities. I bet you actually AGREE with the complete obliteration of privacy rights and would support a police state.
It does not follow that just because you're a parent that you really love your children. Hell, parents bugger and molest their own children. They pimp their children. They get their children hooked on their own drugs. Most children are just mini-slaves used to keep the house clean, no better than vacuum cleaners. Or used to stroke their parents egos - their need to feel powerful.
Often a complete stranger, any stranger, even one who has never had children, would make a better parent than the actual parents.
I'm not convinced he was an illegal immigrant. The article says he was re-arrested on unrelated immigration charges. Without knowing the details it could be almost anything - not dotting his i's, crossing his t's, not knowing he had to fill out form 21242c when he first applied, not volunteering that he had an appendectomy back in 1998, maybe he reported his eye colour as blue when in fact they're more gray than blue...
Based on years of experience, I never accept creative people of any kind as clients. That means, no writers, painters, performers, photographers, etc. - they are unteachable and surprisingly close-minded. Give me an inquiring, curious and engaqed business person any day.
That's a pretty ignorant statement. What you actually mean is "I can't or won't work with people who think differently than myself".
Think about it - creativity wouldn't be creativity if it didn't involve the use of the imagination and looking at things in new or different ways. Moreover, think about this - creativity is not limited to artistic types like writers, painters, photographers, etc., it can also be found in business types, engineers, scientists, and so on.
It does seem as if you don't want to work with the sorts of people who'll want beautiful sites with meaningful content that appeals to their particular target audience, possibly even fashionable or trendy sites, using the latest fads - or *gasp* perhaps something radically different from what everyone else is doing. If you're limiting yourself only to business folks then that suggests you only do business sites, which tend to be plain, straightforward, no fancy bells and whistles, etc.
It IS easier to work with the latter kind of site. You're just lazy. For most of the projects I work on, I would never hire you based on such a limited portfolio.
If I was that consultant my first question would have been how to transfer that data securely - but maybe that's because I know what I'm doing. Therefore, I'd be totally allergic to giving that data to this consultant, regardless of any non-disclosure agreement.
In a democracy government contracts are supposed to be transparent. Given that it's your tax dollar, you are entitled to see how it is being spent. I agree with an earlier poster that this is a way of gradually leading people to expect less transparency from government. It's purely anti-democratic. Truly dark forces have taken over the government these days.
Ok, so you're a soldier, you've recently acquired digital porn - what do you do with it? Where do you go to jerkoff? And more importantly, where do you go with a laptop? This is puzzling me.
One thing that baffles me about this Free Tibet protest is why Buddhist monks even care. That they're out there violently protesting goes against everything I understand about Buddhism. What happened to non-attachment? Non-violence? The eightfold path?
The sight of orange-clad monks rioting truly and utterly amazes me. I guess people can't be consistent with their own beliefs.
Television commercials are spam. Radio commercials are spam. Any kind of commercial is spam. Any kind of product or service promotion is spam.
All packaging should be black or white, with labels that only describe the content and nothing else. This includes your milk cartons, your cereal boxes, etc. It shall be forbidden to know where your product came from, lest you develop a preference.
SERP's are spam, organic or not. How DARE you promote your product or service to people who are expressly engaged in the process of looking for it.
Internet marketing is spam, you say? Then Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, etc. and just about every business with a web presence is guilty of spamming.
Yes, these people were engaged in spamming, but no - netiher marketing nor internet marketing equals spamming, for crissakes.
I've been saying for a while now that it's only a matter of time before the term "criminal" was used interchangeably with "terrorist".
Historically, certain forms of government have successfully employed this trick - you just need a massively stupid population and that's certainly what we've got here. The difference, I guess, is that historically certain unnamed governments have invaded other countries on false pretenses and set out to rule the world...oh, wait...
I'm not sure why, of all the tidbits it could have quoted, the poster quoted the bit about people thinking the government is more secretive. Maybe doing this generates discussion.
But for those too lazy to RTFA, this quote from the Salon article has greater thrust towards the conclusion:
The same poll also found that 77% of Americans believe that "the federal government opened mail and monitored phone calls of people in the U.S. without first getting permission from a federal judge," and 64% believe "that the federal government has opened mail or monitored telephone conversations involving members of the news media." Only a small minority (20%) believe that the Federal Government is "Very Open" or "Somewhat Open."
And:
From a December, 2005 CNN poll, days after the NSA scandal was first disclosed:
Nearly two-thirds said they are not willing to sacrifice civil liberties to prevent terrorism, as compared to 49 percent saying so in 2002.
So he Times article cites no polls whatsoever, it's just someone talking out of their ass. The Salon article quotes a poll that shows the opposite conclusions.
And to those who say polls/surveys are inaccurate, I say it's better than talking out of your ass.
What makes this so horrible is the fact that SWAT teams fuck up far too often. It wouldn't be nearly so bad if all these cases of mistaken take-downs were done by true professionals, rather than beefy gung ho mercenary wannabes with shrunken balls, shit for brains, itchy trigger fingers and a system that looks the other way when there are unfortunate results from this combination. Had these mistaken take-downs been conducted more professionally then people wouldn't fear them as much as they do now.
Also, doesn't it seem like SWAT teams are used far too often for stuff regular cops should be doing? It's so prevalent now that it's almost redefining police work.
The US government/military (same thing, really) has used up all trust with me. I don't believe ANYTHING they say. I'm not drawing any conclusions whatsoever, just taking all official and unofficial propaganda in with a grain of salt. There are plenty of possibilities, everything is so far gone into wag the dog mode we'll probably never know the truth.
Congratulations on your perceived success, go ahead and cheer, but after all that has gone before, especially recently, the cheerleaders simply look like jingoistic idiots to me.
"A man who has had his dinner is no revolutionary."
Apparently, as long as YOU'RE happy and enjoying yourself, you'll do nothing. You're part of the reason it's happening in the first place because, well, as long as it's not happening to you everything is just fine and you won't complain. In fact, quite the opposite? You dutifully pipe up saying you're proud of your country and what it's become?
Geez, that reminds me of another quote:
"There are none so blind as those who will not see."
I sometimes think most Americans want a police state and not only fully realize where things are going but they embrace it. So it's the frog jumping into the boiling water.
Most Germans at the time wanted a police state too, they were thrilled with all the uniforms, marching, rallies, etc. The you-know-who's where popular on account of their platform of Homeland Security and anti-terrorism.
The dream was soured by the revelations of the death camps (not to mention discovering their own fallibility).
The government has learned all the lessons from the era and continues to refine and improve.
Slashdot Mirror
Violated her privacy? Last time I checked she was American. She has none and should not expect any.
Yeah, I agree 100% and miss it too. *sigh* Those were the good old days.
This is probably the very reason they're shutting it down. I doubt there's any good argument for doing so from a cost-saving perspective.
This is one more way citizens...err...terrorists can freely communicate.
When I was in university the commerce (e.g. business) students signed a petition to abolish arts and humanities studies, since they're a waste of time, money and there's no profit to be made from studying such things.
Perhaps, if we were to generalize, we could say on the one hand you have a group of people whose tendency is to not do anything unless it financially benefits them in some way and to impose their viewpoints and beliefs on others. On the other hand you have a completely different group that tends to like doing and learning things just because they can, values privacy and prefers not to impose their values and beliefs on others.
If true, it's no wonder they don't get along.
I think what this represents is further erosion and lowering of the standards of evidence. It also represents injustice, it's a perfectly unjust and unfair law, it's criminal and immoral.
The US is moving beyond innocent until proven guilty, and beyond the need for evidence, and becoming a country where mere suspicion or allegation is enough to land you in a world of trouble.
We already know there's no way to prove beyond a doubt, without catching someone in the act, that they are downloading copyrighted material. If all you have are logs, you've got no real evidence.
Who are these people who come up with shit like this, what motivates them?
Adrian Stoica deserves to be shat upon as someone with no morals or principles who has sold out to the military industrial complex.
I have my own horror story of a similar nature, this one with Bell and Bell Sympatico High Speed (a Canadian thing).
Pre-Move: Bell has a "helpful" e-Move link on their website, you simply go to the page, login, fill out the info, state when you want to move, you're done. I opted to call the phone number on the page, just to be sure. Rep was extremely polite and helpful, asked when I wanted the service switched, assured me that was all there was to it.
Day of Move: No switch. No internet.
Move+1: Called them. Three transfers later was bumped to "Business Services" for some reason, which was a call center in India. Woman could barely speak English, line quality was atrocious, staticky - this was to be the case every time. Her computer was saying I was still at the old address, she tried to place a move order but got an error. Said to call back next day.
Move+2: Called back. Same error, said to call back next day.
Move+3: Same error, decided to call residential services just in case to make sure they had moved my phone line. They said their records showed me as connected at my new address, moreover they had sent someone over to physically reconnect me.
Move+4: Business Services again, same error, bounced around by the reps. Told them what residential services had said.
By the way, side note, everyone in India seemed to contradict each other in what they said they saw in my records, they were either lying, couldn't read, or their records are a royal mess. Also, it may be their culture, or their training, but they always try to make it seem as if its your fault, as if they'd done everything they could and you were wasting their time. There are some serious attitude problems over there.
Move+5: Decided to call tech support instead,. Explained the problem. Tech support transferred me to High Speed services. Went through the motions of "is your modem blinking", "is your line under 10 feet long", etc. Call kept getting escalated, they started seeing that things should be working but weren't. Eventually someone found the tech that had gone out had left notes saying the wiring was FUBAR'd. Said they would send another tech. Made appointment, had to wait all day.
Move+6: Nobody came. Around this time I noticed I had no dial tone (I know, I know, but I use the line solely for data...). Called residential support again. Found they had indeed sent someone on moving day, but had NOT hooked up the line due to complications. The Bell rep tried to sell me line insurance! Started telling him why that was so wrong but he transferred me in mid-spiel (goddamned fucker). Made appointment for them to come and finish the job. Would have to wait for them all day.
Move+7: Waited all day, nobody came. Called Bell, they said they had sent someone - only thing was, it couldn't have been true because they sent them around the same time I was busy making the appointment for them to come. Made another appointment, again had to wait for them all day.
Move+8: Two guys showed up, said they had a hard time finding my line outside the building, it was such a mess of old phone wiring. Took them an hour to install a whole new physical line. Line showed a signal, but no internet. They said to wait until next day to see if it came up.
Move+9: It didn't. Called High Speed, I explained that when they sent the tech earlier there was actually no physical line, it was only just created, so could they please another. Made appointment, had to wait all day again.
Move+10: Nobody came or so much as knocked on my door, but internet came back up.
Long story short, I think we're headed for a world where corporations will need bunkers.
If you're right and "terrorist" == "wanted felon" then you Americans are in deep shit.
I suspect you're somewhat right, though. I suspect people are being added by virtue of their "suspicious" beliefs or their participation in civic protests. There have been many stories on Slashdot about how police databases are not equipped to handle protesters or political speech - since they're set up only to record crimes, so police have been incorrectly designating civilians as "terrorists."
David Hall was probably someone arrested in a protest somewhere, or who gave a political speech the authorities didn't agree with.
First, you assume that parents love children. "When you learn love, that you have for a child, you will understand. Maybe." Are YOU fucking high? You've obviously not known very many parents. Try visiting your local Children's Aid sometime - and not only is that only the tip of the iceberg, those kids are the lucky ones who escaped.
I know very few parents who I'd say are worthy of having or raising children.
Your own comments about Lojacking your children perfectly illustrates the predominant view that children are to be considered the personal property of parents, much like furniture or laptops, and to do with was they see fit - much like whether you prefer expresso over ice or straight and undiluted.
No, they don't get a choice? Why, because they live under your roof and eat your food, therefore they do as you say? Because if it weren't for you, they'd be nothing? They owe their very existence to you and should be grateful? Yeah, that's the viewpoint which usually lends itself well to beating the kids "because you love them and only have their best interests at heart".
That's the view that says the ends justify any means - and which has given us history's worst atrocities. I bet you actually AGREE with the complete obliteration of privacy rights and would support a police state.
It does not follow that just because you're a parent that you really love your children. Hell, parents bugger and molest their own children. They pimp their children. They get their children hooked on their own drugs. Most children are just mini-slaves used to keep the house clean, no better than vacuum cleaners. Or used to stroke their parents egos - their need to feel powerful.
Often a complete stranger, any stranger, even one who has never had children, would make a better parent than the actual parents.
I have a tat that says "FTW". So there.
I'm not convinced he was an illegal immigrant. The article says he was re-arrested on unrelated immigration charges. Without knowing the details it could be almost anything - not dotting his i's, crossing his t's, not knowing he had to fill out form 21242c when he first applied, not volunteering that he had an appendectomy back in 1998, maybe he reported his eye colour as blue when in fact they're more gray than blue...
I smell bullshit trumped up charges.
That's a pretty ignorant statement. What you actually mean is "I can't or won't work with people who think differently than myself".
Think about it - creativity wouldn't be creativity if it didn't involve the use of the imagination and looking at things in new or different ways. Moreover, think about this - creativity is not limited to artistic types like writers, painters, photographers, etc., it can also be found in business types, engineers, scientists, and so on.
It does seem as if you don't want to work with the sorts of people who'll want beautiful sites with meaningful content that appeals to their particular target audience, possibly even fashionable or trendy sites, using the latest fads - or *gasp* perhaps something radically different from what everyone else is doing. If you're limiting yourself only to business folks then that suggests you only do business sites, which tend to be plain, straightforward, no fancy bells and whistles, etc.
It IS easier to work with the latter kind of site. You're just lazy. For most of the projects I work on, I would never hire you based on such a limited portfolio.
If I was that consultant my first question would have been how to transfer that data securely - but maybe that's because I know what I'm doing. Therefore, I'd be totally allergic to giving that data to this consultant, regardless of any non-disclosure agreement.
In a democracy government contracts are supposed to be transparent. Given that it's your tax dollar, you are entitled to see how it is being spent. I agree with an earlier poster that this is a way of gradually leading people to expect less transparency from government. It's purely anti-democratic. Truly dark forces have taken over the government these days.
Ok, so you're a soldier, you've recently acquired digital porn - what do you do with it? Where do you go to jerkoff? And more importantly, where do you go with a laptop? This is puzzling me.
One thing that baffles me about this Free Tibet protest is why Buddhist monks even care. That they're out there violently protesting goes against everything I understand about Buddhism. What happened to non-attachment? Non-violence? The eightfold path?
The sight of orange-clad monks rioting truly and utterly amazes me. I guess people can't be consistent with their own beliefs.
Television commercials are spam. Radio commercials are spam. Any kind of commercial is spam. Any kind of product or service promotion is spam.
All packaging should be black or white, with labels that only describe the content and nothing else. This includes your milk cartons, your cereal boxes, etc. It shall be forbidden to know where your product came from, lest you develop a preference.
SERP's are spam, organic or not. How DARE you promote your product or service to people who are expressly engaged in the process of looking for it.
Internet marketing is spam, you say? Then Google, Yahoo, Microsoft, etc. and just about every business with a web presence is guilty of spamming.
Yes, these people were engaged in spamming, but no - netiher marketing nor internet marketing equals spamming, for crissakes.
I've been saying for a while now that it's only a matter of time before the term "criminal" was used interchangeably with "terrorist".
Historically, certain forms of government have successfully employed this trick - you just need a massively stupid population and that's certainly what we've got here. The difference, I guess, is that historically certain unnamed governments have invaded other countries on false pretenses and set out to rule the world...oh, wait...
Were these nose cones bright orange with reflective markers?
Look, this is your mom we're talking about here. She just doesn't want to see you go blind.
I'm not sure why, of all the tidbits it could have quoted, the poster quoted the bit about people thinking the government is more secretive. Maybe doing this generates discussion.
But for those too lazy to RTFA, this quote from the Salon article has greater thrust towards the conclusion:
And:So he Times article cites no polls whatsoever, it's just someone talking out of their ass. The Salon article quotes a poll that shows the opposite conclusions.
And to those who say polls/surveys are inaccurate, I say it's better than talking out of your ass.
What makes this so horrible is the fact that SWAT teams fuck up far too often. It wouldn't be nearly so bad if all these cases of mistaken take-downs were done by true professionals, rather than beefy gung ho mercenary wannabes with shrunken balls, shit for brains, itchy trigger fingers and a system that looks the other way when there are unfortunate results from this combination. Had these mistaken take-downs been conducted more professionally then people wouldn't fear them as much as they do now. Also, doesn't it seem like SWAT teams are used far too often for stuff regular cops should be doing? It's so prevalent now that it's almost redefining police work.
The US government/military (same thing, really) has used up all trust with me. I don't believe ANYTHING they say. I'm not drawing any conclusions whatsoever, just taking all official and unofficial propaganda in with a grain of salt. There are plenty of possibilities, everything is so far gone into wag the dog mode we'll probably never know the truth.
Congratulations on your perceived success, go ahead and cheer, but after all that has gone before, especially recently, the cheerleaders simply look like jingoistic idiots to me.
You remind me of an old quote:
"A man who has had his dinner is no revolutionary."
Apparently, as long as YOU'RE happy and enjoying yourself, you'll do nothing. You're part of the reason it's happening in the first place because, well, as long as it's not happening to you everything is just fine and you won't complain. In fact, quite the opposite? You dutifully pipe up saying you're proud of your country and what it's become?
Geez, that reminds me of another quote:
"There are none so blind as those who will not see."
I sometimes think most Americans want a police state and not only fully realize where things are going but they embrace it. So it's the frog jumping into the boiling water. Most Germans at the time wanted a police state too, they were thrilled with all the uniforms, marching, rallies, etc. The you-know-who's where popular on account of their platform of Homeland Security and anti-terrorism. The dream was soured by the revelations of the death camps (not to mention discovering their own fallibility). The government has learned all the lessons from the era and continues to refine and improve.