You cannot just "scrap" or "take back the signing of" Human Rights legislation. It would cause a serious uproar by human rights groups worldwide, were something like that to be done in a major country like Britain. ------ I think they are trying to pass some crazy Home Office law that makes inspecting correspondence legal, and then "play dumb" with regards to whether it is actually LEGAL under International Law. -----
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which is INTERNATIONAL LAW, and which the UK is a signatory of, states it crystal clear in Article 12: "No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or CORRESPONDENCE, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks." ---------- URL here for those who want to check the validity of this claim: http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/index.shtml#a12 ------ So UK Home Office, how the hell are you going to explain to the UNITED NATIONS that your little mail-snooping project violates ARTICLE 12 of the UDHR? -------- If you were going to pull shit like this, why did your government sign and rattify the UDHR to begin with? Why can't you just leave your citizens alone, like other civilized countries. And, finally, have you learned nothing from George Orwell's '1984'? It was published back in 1949, so you have had OVER 60 YEARS to learn something from that brilliant, brilliant piece of work, which was written by someone who was your countryman no less, who was British.
------ I give up. The more I look at the UK from a privacy perspective, the more I feel that that particular country has really gone down the drain, and perhaps irreversibly so.
Get one of these ------ http://usa.asus.com/Eee/Eee_PC/Eee_PC_1001PX_Seashell/#overview ------- its cheap, light (1300 grams), 9 hour battery life. I have one that I use to write a 400 page book when I'm on the go. Its very usable. As for your Raspberry + Project idea... It will give you nothing but problems, problems, problems... ----
If he can get his custom "Swordfight Game Controller" off the ground then maybe others can step in with new types of game controllers, that may, in the long-term, revolutionize the currently rather boring, sequel-to-a-sequel type world of AAA game publishing. I hope that Stephenson does a good job with this. If he succeeds, then many other game-controller design projects could follow his, and the best of the crop will get funded the same way he did. =)
Because drones don't take any risk with themselves - no human pilot - but take BIG risks with the lives of people on the ground - collateral damage is very common in drone strikes - they are widely seen as a "Coward's Way of Fighting" in the countries in which they are used (Afghanistan, Pakistan et cetera). This in turn helps various "undesirable" organizations to recruit many new people, to fight the "Western Cowards killing our Countrymen with Aerial Toys". ----------> In short, drone strikes make the local population hate you, and help the enemy recruit new ground troops. That simply isn't a great formula to bet on over the long run...
Ok, so you work with the Israelis and Brits/Germans/French to sneak some viruses into the computers of Iran, Russia and China. You pop a couple of beers and celebrate as the targeted computer systems lockup or crumble.... --------> Two years later. Iran, Russia and China pull off a successful cyberattack against computers in the U.S., Israel, Britain, Germany, France. Now the "Allies" have to deal with computers that lockup, fuckup, or crumble. Of course, the "Allies" will regroup and launch another cyberattack against Iran, Russia, China. ----------- And so on and so forth... -----------> The NET GAIN from this back-and-forth is what exactly? NOTHING. Cyberwarfare should probably best be left alone. There is nothing to gain from it, and potentially much to LOOSE on all sides.
Giving gifts to others is something people have done for thousands of years. Doing the same thing electronically? No different, unless there is some ingenious new mechanism being used. -------- If that isn't the case, this patent is worth nothing, and will likely be overturned at the first opportunity.
Why would you want drones in the sky over civilian areas? Aren't police with cars good enough to keep the peace? Does there have to be a "EYE IN THE SKY" flying overhead for people to feel safe? ---------- I happen to think that this is more about making BIG Dollars for drone manufacturers, than anything law enforcement requirements related. -------- Or maybe America is keen on showing the world, once more, how NOT TO RUN a country? ------ Stupid, stupid, stupid this whole "Police Drones" business. Reminds me of the creepy spider ID bots in Minority Report.
You could just as easily argue that women who look at cute catpics and stupid youtube cats/dogs/makeup videos are also becoming "socially inept". Why is it always the "guy side" that is "doing it wrong"? --------------
One minute the U.S. is trying to pass internet surveillance legislation. The next it is Britain. Then Australia jumps on the bandwaggon. Now its Canada. ------- The people lobbying for this BS need to be fought decisively. Otherwise we can forget the "free" internet as we know it today.
...that large multinationals tend to "Mine the Harbour" when they patent things. What does that mean? It means that Big-Capital dont't patent "One Particular Approach to the Problem". They typically patent THE BEST & MOST EFFICIENT APPROACH TO SOLVING A PARTICULAR PROBLEM + THE 3 - 6 MOST LOGICAL WORKAROUNDS TO THE METHOD. So when you try to find a way around a particular "PATENTED BEST METHOD", you wind up slamming into a minefield of "PATENTED LOGICAL WORKAROUNDS TO THE BEST METHOD", which the patent owner doesn't even put to any use. Those patents are intended to MINE THE HARBOUR, so nobody else's ship can get in or out of the harbour without running into a PATENT MINE. ------ There are often workarounds to even those Patents. But finding them can involve a lot of costly R&D + time consuming TRIAL AND ERROR. And even then, your PATENT-CLEARING WORKAROUND TO PATENTED WORKAROUNDS may be a very unelegant, complex, slow or unreliable method. --------- If it's Hardware you are developing, your hardware may wind up costing 2 - 3 times what Sony, Nokia et cetera pay for their method. If its software you are developing, it may take 18 months instead of 8 months to deliver you software to market. ---------- Either way, "Mining the Harbour" typically causes you to jump through extra R&D hoops, spend extra money, take extra time, deliver to market slow/late, and deliver with a much slimmer potential profit-margin because of your increased cost. -------- Your solution, as a result, may stand no chance of competing with the solutions of the "PATENT-PREDATOR BIG BOYS", and may not be worth delivering to market in the first place. ------ In this case, healthy competition in the market fails, because there is NO GOOD/EFFICIENT ALTERNATIVE APPROACH to what the BIG BOYS have "mined" with pre-emptive patents.
We, the consumers, pay good money for the hardware in a smartphone, including the GPS geolocation capabilities. Then some government goons come along and say "Ha ha! We'll track your location using the GPS electronics in your phone!" ------- Same with Facebook. We, the users, make Facebook a great, big site with our data and our invested time. Then the government goons come along and say "Ha Ha! We'll find out everything we want about you by poaching your Facebook data!" ------ This particular decade has very much started on the wrong foot, with regards to personal privacy and somesuch. -------- How much worse can this all get? Will we be required by law to give up ALL PRIVATE DATA because the government likes to have it? -------- These laws and personal data tracking policies are just wrong.... wrong, wrong, wrong....
The UK does feel at many times like it is a test-laboratory of sorts for various Orwellian things. Ironic that it was in this very country that Eric Arthur Blair (aka "George Orwell") wrote 1984. ------- If the UK had somewhat better political parties, this stuff probably wouldn't be happening there. Both the Labour Party and the Tories in the UK are really into deploying surveillance-tech on ordinary people. So it doesn't matter who wins elections. Both sides are really into using this stuff on UK citizens....
Having the highest density of CCTV cameras anywhere in the world (London) isn't enough. Toying with biometrics (face-recognition specifically) at every opportunity isn't enough.Trying to pass national data retention laws that would log and store every little thing any UK person does on the internet in a data center for 24 months isn't enough. Trying to extradite Julian Assange to the United States on nebulous charges isn't enough. Putting anti-aircraft missiles (2012 Olympics) on the rooftops of London housing estates isn't enough. Putting a battleship on the river Thames (also 2012 Olympics) isn't enough. ---------- Now add to that list UK mobile/cellular phone operators randomly censoring websites you can('t) access on smartphones. --------- All of this and more makes me glad at times that I don't live in the UK. ------ What's wrong with the UK these days anyways? I used to think that Britain was the "cradle of democracy" with its televised Parliament debates, quality newspapers, speaker's corner and such. -------- What happend to you, UK? Why is all this negative stuff happening in the UK?
When Facebook exposes the private data of tens of millions of its users to the Internet, nothing happens. Nothing gets investigated. Nobody is held responsible. Nobody goes to jail, or somesuch. In fact, the market value of Facebook only goes up as a result of it exposing more and more data to its commercial partners and the internet at large. ----- Kickstarter accidentally leave a few WIP funding projects exposed to API users? Ooooh, that's so terrible! Ooooh, that's so wrong! ------- In the age of Facebook, which Julian Assange quite accurately called "the most abominable spying machine created in human history", a little slip-up like this shouldn't even make the news. -------- Kickstarter is a genuinely useful website. I hope it stays that way.
Someone I know visited Israel for 1 day on a business trip. He was detained and questioned by the Israelis for 4 - 5 hours there, for no particular reason. They accused him of having "hidden intentions in visiting Israel". Then they put his name on some kind of "suspect persons list" and let him go. Now, anytime he tries to board a plane anywhere in the world, he is asked to step aside for "special screening". -------- There is the crappy Israeli security model for you: Accuse someone of having random malicious intentions. Detain the person. Question the person. Then put the person on a special "suspect persons list", so that he/she gets harrassed by security at any airport he/she has to pass through from now on. ---------- Its a model that works for idiots only, really. And you are being blatantly racist in saying that you hope anyone vaguely middle-eastern looking should be searched thoroughly.
So anyone who looks even mildly Middleeastern can expect to be searched from head-to-toe and watched over by X number of security cameras while he/she moves through the airport. Then he/she will fly into an airport somewhere else in the world, where the exact same thing will occurr again. Special search because of your mildly Middleeastern looks, and cameras that follow you around the airport 24/7. --------- This is INSTITUTIONALIZED RACISM, not SECURITY. But by the time America figures this out, it will be too late. Every airport in the world with a little spare money will follow the American example eventually, and flying anywhere will turn into a truly Orwellian experience. -------- What good is safety, if the method that provides it is largely based on being SELECTIVELY RACIST against anyone with mildly Middleeastern looks?
You know, the excellent God-Game by Lionhead Studios where you have to create & educate a "Creature" to fight for your people and interests. The creature in B&W 2, though artificial, is probably about as smart as your average dog. Oh well. Happy studying...
From Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_cooling#1970s_awareness >>> The 1970 "Study of Critical Environmental Problems"[18] reported the possibility of warming from increased carbon dioxide, but no concerns about cooling, setting a lower bound on the beginning of interest in "global cooling". ------- So Global Warming is a phenomenon that the science community was aware of, as a theoretical possibility, as far back as 1970 (that's 42 years ago). ------ But it took several decades for prominent figures like Al Gore to go around popularizing the knowledge. ------ I'm glad Panetta has awoken to the danger. But you gotta admit that it took him and others a while to get to behind the conclusion that there is such a thing as "man-made climate change". ------ Some oil-producing countries like Saudi Arabia still bury their head in the ground about this and go around arguing that "There is no such thing as man-made global warming. Its nothing more than bad science." ---- All that's left to hope is that more people become educated about global warming, and join in the effort to do something about it.
The powers-that-be seem to have a set plan for the internet: To control everything that can be controlled, and to shut down/filter out anything that can't. It doesn't matter what the bill is called: SOPA. PIPA. CISPA. They could call it FIRECRACKER and it wouldn't matter. ---- They will keep coming back, and coming back, and coming back with the same control-the-internet-horseshit under a different name, until the desired deed is done: All user data surveilled & catalogued. All internet piracy rubbed out. All offending sites closed down. Maybe even a "War on Internet Conspiracy Theories" needs to be fought, so everyone winds up believing the - often terribly contrived - official accounts of the history we are currently living through, and the events that are shaping the world. ---- Perhaps the powers-that-be (PTB) had this plan for the Internet all along: Don't do anything to regulate it in the beginning, so it becomes a free space where anything goes, and one that grows fast and thrives. But once it has "matured" - with over say 3 Billion people online - that's when you want to regulate the fuck out of it, and turn it into something that doesn't question corporate and government, but rather bends over backwards to it. ---------- Take it from me, these powerful people follow a set agenda, and that agenda say "The Internet must be brought under control". What does it matter that CISPA passes or not. They will wait 3 months and push another bill with the same content through. ----------- It was nice knowing you, Free Internet. Too bad that future generations will never experience you, because the only Internet they know will be a bound, gagged, homogenized and filtered Internet. Farewell, old friend. You served humanity, and served it well. Too bad that the PTB don't want you to stay this way. And too bad that they are ignorant enough to want to destroy everything that made the internet useful and interesting.
This IPO will basically put a concrete dollar price on what having the "private data" of 800+ million human beings in your fist is worth. Of course the idiots who run Wall Street will value this "precious resource" at Billions of Dollars. That's the only thing the internet means to them: A way to track people, get at their most private data, to then mine that data to devise new ways of selling goods and services to them. ----------- It isn't Facebook that's being valued here. Its "US". The IPO will put a dollar price on what the private data of X million FB users is worth.-------- Someday Facebook will face a serious downturn just like AOL and Yahoo!, and maybe disappear from the internet landscape altogether. That day can't come soon enough considering that the only thing FB trades in is other people's privacy.
1) Set up a free online encyclopedia site like Wikipedia with many different subject headings 2) Require Harvard/MIT academics to fill in the information for each subject............. The entire world would benefit from a new resource like this...... As for "cheap online classes...... Again, setting up a Wikipedia-like learning site would benefit infinitely more people than a few online courses attended by a few thousand people at most.
Must... find... albino... assassin... religionfreak... and... send... him... after... whistleblowers... (Amen?) ------ But seriously, what a weird story this is. Isn't the Vatican supposed to be all about "The Truth Shall Set Thee Free" because, erm, Christian belief mandates it? So what is wrong with a little whistleblowing? Why is someone exposing the truth even a "whistleblower" in this particular case? Very strange story all around...
I'm wondering why it is that the old "Soviet Bloc" countries produce so many hackers/scammers/malware authors? Couldn't these people use their - considerable - coding skills to do something constructive? Like starting a software or IT services company? Or making small casual games for various platforms that are out there? Is there a lack of opportunities in Russia & neighbouring countries? A lack of angel investors or venture capital that could pay for small startups? Or is it a cultural thing that Russian hackers tend to do pretty negative things - like hacking & stealing credit card info - ? If you have the technical skill to create trojans or malware, surely there are other _useful_ things you can build with those skills? Like creating a competitor to Adobe Photoshop, or a watertight security system for banking transactions. ------- I really want to know: What is so attractive about creating trojans, malware & phishing scams with your tech skills. Surely these people wouldn't want their own systems compromised by malicious software? So why do it to others?
This is a _positive_ move. I think that there is going to be a time - say in the 2020s - where people look back at the DRM'd digital media of today and scratch their heads... "What were these people thinking, restricting digital media use like that? What did all that DRM'ing achieve?". Again, kudos to the publisher for not using DRM, and for setting a positive example for the rest of the publishing world to follow...
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You cannot just "scrap" or "take back the signing of" Human Rights legislation. It would cause a serious uproar by human rights groups worldwide, were something like that to be done in a major country like Britain. ------ I think they are trying to pass some crazy Home Office law that makes inspecting correspondence legal, and then "play dumb" with regards to whether it is actually LEGAL under International Law. -----
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which is INTERNATIONAL LAW, and which the UK is a signatory of, states it crystal clear in Article 12: "No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or CORRESPONDENCE, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks." ---------- URL here for those who want to check the validity of this claim: http://www.un.org/en/documents/udhr/index.shtml#a12 ------ So UK Home Office, how the hell are you going to explain to the UNITED NATIONS that your little mail-snooping project violates ARTICLE 12 of the UDHR? -------- If you were going to pull shit like this, why did your government sign and rattify the UDHR to begin with? Why can't you just leave your citizens alone, like other civilized countries. And, finally, have you learned nothing from George Orwell's '1984'? It was published back in 1949, so you have had OVER 60 YEARS to learn something from that brilliant, brilliant piece of work, which was written by someone who was your countryman no less, who was British. ------ I give up. The more I look at the UK from a privacy perspective, the more I feel that that particular country has really gone down the drain, and perhaps irreversibly so.
Get one of these ------ http://usa.asus.com/Eee/Eee_PC/Eee_PC_1001PX_Seashell/#overview ------- its cheap, light (1300 grams), 9 hour battery life. I have one that I use to write a 400 page book when I'm on the go. Its very usable. As for your Raspberry + Project idea... It will give you nothing but problems, problems, problems... ----
If he can get his custom "Swordfight Game Controller" off the ground then maybe others can step in with new types of game controllers, that may, in the long-term, revolutionize the currently rather boring, sequel-to-a-sequel type world of AAA game publishing. I hope that Stephenson does a good job with this. If he succeeds, then many other game-controller design projects could follow his, and the best of the crop will get funded the same way he did. =)
Because drones don't take any risk with themselves - no human pilot - but take BIG risks with the lives of people on the ground - collateral damage is very common in drone strikes - they are widely seen as a "Coward's Way of Fighting" in the countries in which they are used (Afghanistan, Pakistan et cetera). This in turn helps various "undesirable" organizations to recruit many new people, to fight the "Western Cowards killing our Countrymen with Aerial Toys". ----------> In short, drone strikes make the local population hate you, and help the enemy recruit new ground troops. That simply isn't a great formula to bet on over the long run...
Ok, so you work with the Israelis and Brits/Germans/French to sneak some viruses into the computers of Iran, Russia and China. You pop a couple of beers and celebrate as the targeted computer systems lockup or crumble.... --------> Two years later. Iran, Russia and China pull off a successful cyberattack against computers in the U.S., Israel, Britain, Germany, France. Now the "Allies" have to deal with computers that lockup, fuckup, or crumble. Of course, the "Allies" will regroup and launch another cyberattack against Iran, Russia, China. ----------- And so on and so forth... -----------> The NET GAIN from this back-and-forth is what exactly? NOTHING. Cyberwarfare should probably best be left alone. There is nothing to gain from it, and potentially much to LOOSE on all sides.
Giving gifts to others is something people have done for thousands of years. Doing the same thing electronically? No different, unless there is some ingenious new mechanism being used. -------- If that isn't the case, this patent is worth nothing, and will likely be overturned at the first opportunity.
Why would you want drones in the sky over civilian areas? Aren't police with cars good enough to keep the peace? Does there have to be a "EYE IN THE SKY" flying overhead for people to feel safe? ---------- I happen to think that this is more about making BIG Dollars for drone manufacturers, than anything law enforcement requirements related. -------- Or maybe America is keen on showing the world, once more, how NOT TO RUN a country? ------ Stupid, stupid, stupid this whole "Police Drones" business. Reminds me of the creepy spider ID bots in Minority Report.
You could just as easily argue that women who look at cute catpics and stupid youtube cats/dogs/makeup videos are also becoming "socially inept". Why is it always the "guy side" that is "doing it wrong"? --------------
One minute the U.S. is trying to pass internet surveillance legislation. The next it is Britain. Then Australia jumps on the bandwaggon. Now its Canada. ------- The people lobbying for this BS need to be fought decisively. Otherwise we can forget the "free" internet as we know it today.
...that large multinationals tend to "Mine the Harbour" when they patent things. What does that mean? It means that Big-Capital dont't patent "One Particular Approach to the Problem". They typically patent THE BEST & MOST EFFICIENT APPROACH TO SOLVING A PARTICULAR PROBLEM + THE 3 - 6 MOST LOGICAL WORKAROUNDS TO THE METHOD. So when you try to find a way around a particular "PATENTED BEST METHOD", you wind up slamming into a minefield of "PATENTED LOGICAL WORKAROUNDS TO THE BEST METHOD", which the patent owner doesn't even put to any use. Those patents are intended to MINE THE HARBOUR, so nobody else's ship can get in or out of the harbour without running into a PATENT MINE. ------ There are often workarounds to even those Patents. But finding them can involve a lot of costly R&D + time consuming TRIAL AND ERROR. And even then, your PATENT-CLEARING WORKAROUND TO PATENTED WORKAROUNDS may be a very unelegant, complex, slow or unreliable method. --------- If it's Hardware you are developing, your hardware may wind up costing 2 - 3 times what Sony, Nokia et cetera pay for their method. If its software you are developing, it may take 18 months instead of 8 months to deliver you software to market. ---------- Either way, "Mining the Harbour" typically causes you to jump through extra R&D hoops, spend extra money, take extra time, deliver to market slow/late, and deliver with a much slimmer potential profit-margin because of your increased cost. -------- Your solution, as a result, may stand no chance of competing with the solutions of the "PATENT-PREDATOR BIG BOYS", and may not be worth delivering to market in the first place. ------ In this case, healthy competition in the market fails, because there is NO GOOD/EFFICIENT ALTERNATIVE APPROACH to what the BIG BOYS have "mined" with pre-emptive patents.
We, the consumers, pay good money for the hardware in a smartphone, including the GPS geolocation capabilities. Then some government goons come along and say "Ha ha! We'll track your location using the GPS electronics in your phone!" ------- Same with Facebook. We, the users, make Facebook a great, big site with our data and our invested time. Then the government goons come along and say "Ha Ha! We'll find out everything we want about you by poaching your Facebook data!" ------ This particular decade has very much started on the wrong foot, with regards to personal privacy and somesuch. -------- How much worse can this all get? Will we be required by law to give up ALL PRIVATE DATA because the government likes to have it? -------- These laws and personal data tracking policies are just wrong.... wrong, wrong, wrong....
The UK does feel at many times like it is a test-laboratory of sorts for various Orwellian things. Ironic that it was in this very country that Eric Arthur Blair (aka "George Orwell") wrote 1984. ------- If the UK had somewhat better political parties, this stuff probably wouldn't be happening there. Both the Labour Party and the Tories in the UK are really into deploying surveillance-tech on ordinary people. So it doesn't matter who wins elections. Both sides are really into using this stuff on UK citizens....
Having the highest density of CCTV cameras anywhere in the world (London) isn't enough. Toying with biometrics (face-recognition specifically) at every opportunity isn't enough.Trying to pass national data retention laws that would log and store every little thing any UK person does on the internet in a data center for 24 months isn't enough. Trying to extradite Julian Assange to the United States on nebulous charges isn't enough. Putting anti-aircraft missiles (2012 Olympics) on the rooftops of London housing estates isn't enough. Putting a battleship on the river Thames (also 2012 Olympics) isn't enough. ---------- Now add to that list UK mobile/cellular phone operators randomly censoring websites you can('t) access on smartphones. --------- All of this and more makes me glad at times that I don't live in the UK. ------ What's wrong with the UK these days anyways? I used to think that Britain was the "cradle of democracy" with its televised Parliament debates, quality newspapers, speaker's corner and such. -------- What happend to you, UK? Why is all this negative stuff happening in the UK?
When Facebook exposes the private data of tens of millions of its users to the Internet, nothing happens. Nothing gets investigated. Nobody is held responsible. Nobody goes to jail, or somesuch. In fact, the market value of Facebook only goes up as a result of it exposing more and more data to its commercial partners and the internet at large. ----- Kickstarter accidentally leave a few WIP funding projects exposed to API users? Ooooh, that's so terrible! Ooooh, that's so wrong! ------- In the age of Facebook, which Julian Assange quite accurately called "the most abominable spying machine created in human history", a little slip-up like this shouldn't even make the news. -------- Kickstarter is a genuinely useful website. I hope it stays that way.
Someone I know visited Israel for 1 day on a business trip. He was detained and questioned by the Israelis for 4 - 5 hours there, for no particular reason. They accused him of having "hidden intentions in visiting Israel". Then they put his name on some kind of "suspect persons list" and let him go. Now, anytime he tries to board a plane anywhere in the world, he is asked to step aside for "special screening". -------- There is the crappy Israeli security model for you: Accuse someone of having random malicious intentions. Detain the person. Question the person. Then put the person on a special "suspect persons list", so that he/she gets harrassed by security at any airport he/she has to pass through from now on. ---------- Its a model that works for idiots only, really. And you are being blatantly racist in saying that you hope anyone vaguely middle-eastern looking should be searched thoroughly.
So anyone who looks even mildly Middleeastern can expect to be searched from head-to-toe and watched over by X number of security cameras while he/she moves through the airport. Then he/she will fly into an airport somewhere else in the world, where the exact same thing will occurr again. Special search because of your mildly Middleeastern looks, and cameras that follow you around the airport 24/7. --------- This is INSTITUTIONALIZED RACISM, not SECURITY. But by the time America figures this out, it will be too late. Every airport in the world with a little spare money will follow the American example eventually, and flying anywhere will turn into a truly Orwellian experience. -------- What good is safety, if the method that provides it is largely based on being SELECTIVELY RACIST against anyone with mildly Middleeastern looks?
You know, the excellent God-Game by Lionhead Studios where you have to create & educate a "Creature" to fight for your people and interests. The creature in B&W 2, though artificial, is probably about as smart as your average dog. Oh well. Happy studying...
From Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_cooling#1970s_awareness >>> The 1970 "Study of Critical Environmental Problems"[18] reported the possibility of warming from increased carbon dioxide, but no concerns about cooling, setting a lower bound on the beginning of interest in "global cooling". ------- So Global Warming is a phenomenon that the science community was aware of, as a theoretical possibility, as far back as 1970 (that's 42 years ago). ------ But it took several decades for prominent figures like Al Gore to go around popularizing the knowledge. ------ I'm glad Panetta has awoken to the danger. But you gotta admit that it took him and others a while to get to behind the conclusion that there is such a thing as "man-made climate change". ------ Some oil-producing countries like Saudi Arabia still bury their head in the ground about this and go around arguing that "There is no such thing as man-made global warming. Its nothing more than bad science." ---- All that's left to hope is that more people become educated about global warming, and join in the effort to do something about it.
The powers-that-be seem to have a set plan for the internet: To control everything that can be controlled, and to shut down/filter out anything that can't. It doesn't matter what the bill is called: SOPA. PIPA. CISPA. They could call it FIRECRACKER and it wouldn't matter. ---- They will keep coming back, and coming back, and coming back with the same control-the-internet-horseshit under a different name, until the desired deed is done: All user data surveilled & catalogued. All internet piracy rubbed out. All offending sites closed down. Maybe even a "War on Internet Conspiracy Theories" needs to be fought, so everyone winds up believing the - often terribly contrived - official accounts of the history we are currently living through, and the events that are shaping the world. ---- Perhaps the powers-that-be (PTB) had this plan for the Internet all along: Don't do anything to regulate it in the beginning, so it becomes a free space where anything goes, and one that grows fast and thrives. But once it has "matured" - with over say 3 Billion people online - that's when you want to regulate the fuck out of it, and turn it into something that doesn't question corporate and government, but rather bends over backwards to it. ---------- Take it from me, these powerful people follow a set agenda, and that agenda say "The Internet must be brought under control". What does it matter that CISPA passes or not. They will wait 3 months and push another bill with the same content through. ----------- It was nice knowing you, Free Internet. Too bad that future generations will never experience you, because the only Internet they know will be a bound, gagged, homogenized and filtered Internet. Farewell, old friend. You served humanity, and served it well. Too bad that the PTB don't want you to stay this way. And too bad that they are ignorant enough to want to destroy everything that made the internet useful and interesting.
This IPO will basically put a concrete dollar price on what having the "private data" of 800+ million human beings in your fist is worth. Of course the idiots who run Wall Street will value this "precious resource" at Billions of Dollars. That's the only thing the internet means to them: A way to track people, get at their most private data, to then mine that data to devise new ways of selling goods and services to them. ----------- It isn't Facebook that's being valued here. Its "US". The IPO will put a dollar price on what the private data of X million FB users is worth.-------- Someday Facebook will face a serious downturn just like AOL and Yahoo!, and maybe disappear from the internet landscape altogether. That day can't come soon enough considering that the only thing FB trades in is other people's privacy.
1) Set up a free online encyclopedia site like Wikipedia with many different subject headings 2) Require Harvard/MIT academics to fill in the information for each subject. ............ The entire world would benefit from a new resource like this...... As for "cheap online classes...... Again, setting up a Wikipedia-like learning site would benefit infinitely more people than a few online courses attended by a few thousand people at most.
Must... find... albino... assassin... religionfreak... and... send... him... after... whistleblowers... (Amen?) ------ But seriously, what a weird story this is. Isn't the Vatican supposed to be all about "The Truth Shall Set Thee Free" because, erm, Christian belief mandates it? So what is wrong with a little whistleblowing? Why is someone exposing the truth even a "whistleblower" in this particular case? Very strange story all around...
I'm wondering why it is that the old "Soviet Bloc" countries produce so many hackers/scammers/malware authors? Couldn't these people use their - considerable - coding skills to do something constructive? Like starting a software or IT services company? Or making small casual games for various platforms that are out there? Is there a lack of opportunities in Russia & neighbouring countries? A lack of angel investors or venture capital that could pay for small startups? Or is it a cultural thing that Russian hackers tend to do pretty negative things - like hacking & stealing credit card info - ? If you have the technical skill to create trojans or malware, surely there are other _useful_ things you can build with those skills? Like creating a competitor to Adobe Photoshop, or a watertight security system for banking transactions. ------- I really want to know: What is so attractive about creating trojans, malware & phishing scams with your tech skills. Surely these people wouldn't want their own systems compromised by malicious software? So why do it to others?
This is a _positive_ move. I think that there is going to be a time - say in the 2020s - where people look back at the DRM'd digital media of today and scratch their heads... "What were these people thinking, restricting digital media use like that? What did all that DRM'ing achieve?". Again, kudos to the publisher for not using DRM, and for setting a positive example for the rest of the publishing world to follow...