"Please don't get hung up on the specific example I gave. It was only an example of a more general point: because we now have much easier abilities to store, search and corrolate large numbers of small facts, and to make the results widely and instantly available with little cost, allowing the collection of any small fact about an individual may contribute to a much more severe loss of privacy than it ever could before those technologies existed.
Street View is just one case, in that for example if I know your address there is now a good chance I can quickly and anonymously find out your vehicle and registration details, because that outdoor photography has been systematically collected, is now searchable on-line, and is now available to the entire world."
Since you put it THAT way, I grant you that this specific example might represent something different. It may be true that mass access to what was commonly thought of as "public" information -- when aggregated -- could endanger privacy in ways that were not before. I can see that.
"On the other hand, someone standing there with a video recording device requires only that in handling your card you momentarily expose both sides of it to reveal the numbers required to make an on-line payment. Someone who could follow you around with a recording device could probably collect many other relevant details for security checks based on address and the like as well."
So what? This brings up the point I made before: the fact that it is theoretically possible does not make it okay or condoned by society. This is a perfect example. In my state, just such activity falls under "surveillance" laws and is already illegal.
"That only sounds far-fetched because the effort for someone to do this when they have to be physically present for an extended period of time is prohibitive and the risk of being detected is quite high. There is a natural limit that contains the damage any one rogue individual can cause in both scale and number of victims."
No, it sounds farfetched because anybody here caught doing it would spend time in a state prison. Of course again I mean the US, my particular state. It may well be different elsewhere. I do understand that.
"On the other hand, today we have public safety CCTV cameras watching you as you go around the city. Here in the UK, we have a scary number of CCTV cameras watching you just about any other time these days, too, with very little regulation of how the footage is stored or used."
Yes, especially there, by my understanding, and in a few other places. Fortunately so far we have not been so inundated with intrusive cameras, though they have been increasing somewhat. I have personally tried to help resist this trend, using statistics from places like London as examples, which should warn us not to follow the same path.
Please don't misunderstand me. I do agree that our privacy is being assaulted, from many directions. But at least here in the United States, the problem has resulted from the deliberate relaxation of laws that already existed, rather than a lack of them to begin with. And I have no love for the politicians who sold us out.
Slip of the keyboard in the first part caused a formatting error. That part should have read:
"I would argue exactly the opposite: the changes enabled by modern technology mean we have not just a quantitative but a qualitative difference in the impact of small but no-longer-isolated observations."
But you have already made that argument, or close enough. Repeating it does not make it more valid.
But you have already made that argument, or close enough. Repeating it does not make it more valid.
"This does raise new fundamentally questions about what practical actions are consistent with any given moral position on privacy."
I disagree completely. What "fundamentally new questions"? If you would be more specific, I could probably show you that those questions really aren't new, at all.
"For one thing, not everywhere has the same rules about that. Please don't project your local legal system onto the rest of the world. Of all things, privacy is surely one of the most variable between jurisdictions in terms of legal protections."
Okay, I apologize for assuming you were talking about the United States. But if that's a problem, then you are guilty of the same thing: talking about issues that only exist in your part of the world, wherever that is.
"For another thing, I think there is again a qualitative difference between appearing on a magazine cover, which is a relatively rare event and is by its nature a very public observation usually made by well-established professional media organisations, and the kind of back office data-mining operations that let anonymous observers look up all kinds of information about all kinds of subjects without the subjects even knowing."
Whatever you might think about it, my point was that (here in the US anyway), there need be no new LEGAL issues raised. They both involve pictures taken in public of (I was presuming) everyday people, and displaying them to audiences of millions. Where is there any kind of legal difference between them? Both rest on a desire (or not) for privacy. I fail to see how showing a picture to millions of people on the internet is very different from showing a picture to millions of people on a magazine cover or on TV. And yes, we have laws to cover that. I really don't see how you think this is somehow "new". There have been not just still cameras but video cameras in public settings now for well over 100 years. You honestly think that issues of this kind haven't come up in the courts before???
"Perhaps, but at least I understand that copyright and privacy have absolutely nothing to do with each other, aside from both being in conflict with absolute freedom of expression. It is strange that someone so keen to appeal to century-old court decisions apparently does not..."
I only used copyright as an example of a similar issue. I was not equating copyright with privacy, although I suppose I can see how you might have thought that was what I meant. But no; it was only intended as another -- different -- example of how a great many people mistakenly think that modern fights over issues are somehow "new". On the contrary, I repeat: most of these issues have been hashed out not just once, but many times, in the courts over the past century or two. It would benefit a lot of people to pick up some history books from time to time. With the internet now here and well established, it is easier now then ever before to look things up.
"Maybe not necessary, but as it has always been implemented, SMTP, IMAP, POP and otherwise, it is stored on each server while they wait to copy it to the next server, and it is stored for a long time on the receiving server waiting for the final (usually human) recipient to acknowledge receipt and request deletion - I have always set my clients to automatically delete received messages after 15 days, during which time, I assume that my ISP is backing the, almost always unencrypted, e-mail up on their disaster recovery system."
But this is transient storage, just as the mail bin is, in my example. There is nothing about recording copies that is "inherent" in this technology. The kind of recording you are talking about requires a copy, such as in a database somewhere. None of the technologies we are talking about require copies in order to operate.
"... during which time, I assume that my ISP is backing the, almost always unencrypted, e-mail up on their disaster recovery system."
Depends on your ISP, but probably not. Besides, if you are using an email account that is given to you by your ISP, you're kind of asking for trouble, aren't you?
"Know anybody who uses digital signatures or PGP in regular e-mail conversations? I know exactly one, a geek celebrity who presumably doesn't want people making up quotes attributed to him."
That's a straw-man argument. Let's remember what my post was about: somebody said that "recording" was "inherent" in the technology, and I pointed out that it wasn't. Your statement about the RFC changes that not one bit. The fact that I might leave my door unlocked does not mean that burglary is "inherent" in door locks. The fact that my emails may not be secure does not mean that somebody else has the right to copy them. Paper email is not "secure" in that sense either; yet people expect it to get from one end to the other without somebody reading it.
"Old school telephone lines could be, and were regularly, tapped, with and without warrants..."
That still doesn't mean that tapping is "inherent" in the technology. On the contrary... somebody has to either get a warrant or break the law to install a tap. Again, there is nothing "inherent" there. And that's what I was saying when I mentioned common carriers. If the FCC could classify ISPs as common carriers under Part II, (as they have long wanted to do but Big Cable lobbied congress), then interception of your email would be covered by the same kind of laws as tapping your telephone. Big win.
"E-mail needs to grow up, I use G-mail because it serves my needs, and my needs do not include private e-mail conversation."
Back to what I was saying before: so what? You have a right to expect your communications to NOT be copied by third parties. Just like you have historically had a right to have a private telephone conversation without third parties tapping in. The fact that it's theoretically possible does NOT make it okay. You are giving me the impression that you are just throwing your hands up in the air and saying "F*k it, they're bigger than me, so I give up." Pardon me if I don't follow your example.
"Your privacy will get respected when you start standing up for it..."
Precisely my point. But you haven't been giving the impression that you're standing up. Rather, that you're giving in.
The problem with your argument is that you are making the classic mistake of thinking that ANY of these things are new issues. They are not. Not even close.
"Anything seen is seen by one private individual, not a vasty corporation with potentially a global audience.
Even if we accept as reasonable an individual taking a photograph in a public place that potentially diminishes someone else's privacy, perhaps because the latter person wasn't the subject of the photo and appeared in the background only coincidentally, such photos are still typically only for private, personal use, not being collected by a commercial entity that exists only to exploit anything it can for profit."
And how is this different from take a public picture of somebody, then putting it on the cover of a national magazine? See, we already had rules about that, and they cover situations like this just fine.
Similar things can be said about the rest of this. There really isn't anything new here, and if you think there is, then you don't know your history very well. Many of the very same copyright issues that are being slammed around right now, for example, were hashed out in public and in court -- some real knock-down, dragouts as they say -- well over 100 years ago. People keep saying that things are different now, but if they read the actual court decisions from back then, they just might change their minds.
I think you missed the point though. The markup language is indeed called html. But CSS and JavaScript are not, strictly speaking, part of that markup language. Html consists of tags, and CSS and JavaScript are tools that DO THINGS to enhance and modify those tags... they are not part of those tags.
In a similar vein, I can have a collection of numbers instead of tags, and load them into spreadsheet software to make them look pretty and perform functions on them... but to say the spreadsheet program is "part of" those numbers would be foolish.
"All digital communication is inherently recorded, so in some twisted sense it's more like dumpster diving and less like wiretapping to snoop in e-mail."
Not at all. First, it isn't "inherently recorded", any more than your snail mail is "inherently copied" when it is put in a bin at the post office. It is quite possible to relay things like email, and even put them in temporary storage, waiting for the email client to pick them up, without "recording" them in any other sense. When my email client gets my mail, it is deleted from anywhere else.
Now, having said that, you are your own worst enemy if you use the IMAP email protocol, rather than the older POP3, because IMAP inherently does put your email in control of the server, and by default keeps copies of the emails on the server, even those that are "deleted". You can change those settings, but most people don't.
To sum it up: there is no real sense in which electronic communications are "inherently recorded" by any middleman, at all, any more than a telephone conversation, unless you count temporary storage, which should be set up as just that... temporary, and wiped when a file is deleted.
"Similarly for GPS tracking, that's just like old-school tailing a car, but cheaper and more clandestine - what's not to like?"
And this is yet another false argument. GPS tracking is, indeed, inherently worse and more intrusive than an "old-school tail", in several ways. Thankfully the courts, unlike you, have recognized this fact.
The rules don't need to be rewritten at all. In fact they continued to work fine, right up until people started messing with them just before the turn of the century, giving "authorities" more control. THAT is the problem here, not the technologies.
None of the basic issues have changed. Emails need be no different from telephone conversations. Nor internet sessions. ISPs could (and should) operate like common carriers, such as the old-school telephone companies. That would solve much, right there. Many of these privacy issues would disappear overnight.
The problem with this argument is that many people who use these technologies do not understand how they work, and may not realize what they are exposing.
Is that their own problem? I suppose. One way to look at it is "evolution in action"... the unaware will be preyed upon. But I think there is a place in society for protecting the innocent from active predators, which are what these companies really are.
I am not an advocate of laws that are intended to protect us from ourselves. But to protect people from others who actively seek to intrude and invade? Sure, no problem.
The picture of the comment you link to is actually a defense of freedom, not a defense of "child pornography". The writer was denouncing censorship; he was not advocating anything.
Sorry, but you don't get to turn it around and say the author stated something that in fact he did not.
"Often an HTML5 project employs more technology than just HTML, and the label has come to include the use of CSS3 and JavaScript as well."
No, it hasn't. HTML5 is HTML5, CSS is CSS, and JavaScript is JavaScript.
As a comparison, programming in Rails today includes knowledge of Ruby, JavaScript, CoffeeScript, CSS, and SCSS, and even more... yet nobody confuses any of those with Rails.
Just as nobody I know has confused CSS or JavaScript with HTML5.
"Fuck design patents. I was talking about innovation in general. You can't change the definition of a common word just because it's used in a slightly different context. No, "design patents" aren't a special enough category to get their own special use of the word "innovation", sorry."
I'll make this short and sweet, since you seem to have had some serious trouble understanding the point:
YOU horned in on a conversation that was already about design patents, and brought up the irrelevant subject of "innovation". Innovation is a great topic, certainly. But it has no place in a conversation that was about design patents.
Your remarks were off-topic.
Is that simple enough for you?
I am not even going to bother responding to the rest, which is full of errors anyway.
You didn't have to. You were directly replying to a comment about design patents. And your comment was just plain wrong. In the context of design patents.
If you were talking about something else, why were you replying to a comment about design patents? You certainly did not indicate that you were talking about anything else.
"I think all patents are evil and should be abolished or severely limited."
Then go live in a country where most people feel that way. Like China, or Soviet Russia before they became more "capitalist". Most Americans who know their history disagree, because they understand how important a GOOD patent system is to innovation.
I'm not claiming that our current system is particularly good; too many corporations and politicians have conspired over the years to mess it up. But the fact that a messed up system is bad is not an indication that a good system (such as we used to have) is in any way a bad thing. You don't, for example, look at a badly designed or broken down car and conclude that all cars are therefore bad. Nor should we judge the idea of patents on our current, broken system.
"This act doesn't mean one should have the exclusive right to use that idea for free."
Like I said: then go to a country where they don't have such a system. But before you do, I'll let you in on a little secret: those countries don't innovate very much. Instead, they base their economy on stealing the ideas of others -- for free. As a consequence, they are always behind the curve when it comes to technology. Again, the former Soviet Union was a classic example. Modern China is still a good example. The vast majority of things they manufacture were invented and designed elsewhere. They aren't very good at your much-vaunted "innovation". And the reason is simple: it doesn't reward them. There is nothing to be gained by it.
The exceptions (and there are some) in China are those corporations that have [a] originally grown to a large size by manufacturing goods of foreign design (i.e., invented in designed in countries that have patent and copyright laws), and [b] now can make their own designs, but they can only operate internationally because those exceptional companies now honor foreign "intellectual property" laws, even when their country doesn't.
The point being: anybody who tries to use information from the P2P network to sue them for copyright infringement, would be admitting to being AT LEAST an accessory to a felony, and possibly guilty of a felony themselves. Saying that they got the information from someone else won't wash: they are still actively participating in felonious activity.
Let's see how far they get trying to sue people for civil infractions like filesharing, when in order to do so, they have to commit a felony.
"I catch said ISPs inspecting my business packets and I'll fucking sue their ass into oblivion for attempted espionage."
Good for you. And I mean that sincerely. We could use a lot more people with that kind of attitude. We should not just sit idly by and let these companies get away with what amounts to corporate rape.
I had an idea along this line. It might need some refinement. But here it is: A very slightly modified P2P filesharing network, that simply includes some kind of network ID in the packet stream. Then make a public (frequent, easily seen) declaration that is shown in all P2P clients for that network, something like this:
Any traffic on this network using this ID is making use of OUR proprietary network. We acknowlede the reality that copyright content owners have done a great deal of damage to the freedoms of citizens. To prevent further intrusions and violations of privacy, we declare the following:
ANYONE who accesses this network for the purpose of monitoring, observing, or logging the activity of other users of this network is specifically denied access. Anyone who uses information gleaned from this network in order to attempt to determine, punish, or act against other users of this network, or gather and use ANY information about them, in any way, shall be guilty of unauthorized access to a computer network as defined in 18 USC 1030 and similar laws, which is a felony carrying a penalty of up to 10 years in Federal prison. Such parties, when identified, will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
Don't make the common mistake of presuming that what a battery of corporate lawyers put in their "contract" is the same as "legally valid". They are often not even close to the same things. They put in their contract what they want you to believe, and what they hope they can convince a judge of if it comes to that. But it almost never comes to that (thanks to our current generation of American Sheep), so they get away with it.
"That's why another part of the contract undoubtedly says that you may cancel at any time if you disagree with the changes. "
You are arguing against yourself. This is just another indication that it isn't a real contract! It fails the single biggest requirement for a contract: informed consent. In order to have a valid agreement, you have to be informed of the terms of the agreement before you can be said to have "agreed". After-the-fact consent is not even close to the same thing.
It also fails another big test for the presence of a valid contract: negotiability. Regardless of whether you decide to agree after-the-fact, the terms are still being stipulated in a completely one-sided manner, which as I explained earlier is pretty much the definition of a "contract of adhesion".
"As for your claim of coercion based on practical issues of limited alternate providers, courts have consistently found that limited (or inferior) choices are not the same as having no choice. This was one of the grounds for dismissing suits against no-fly lists -- you can just take a train!"
So what's your point? I already clearly explained that my argument holds for people who don't have a reasonable choice about their internet providers. Like in my town, for instance. There is only one high-speed broadband company, other than satellite service, which is in a different category.
"I was following you, until you omitted this part:
'By continuing to use our services after such a change in contract terms, you agree with said changes. You agree that you will be responsible for informing yourself of changes. The current contract can be viewed at any time by visiting this web page.'"
I have never in my life seen such a clause in a contract. Definitely never one that claimed I had to "inform myself" of any changes.
Don't misunderstand; I'm not claiming such a thing doesn't exist. But I haven't seen one.
However, "continued usage as implied consent" is self-contradictory. It strongly implies that there simply is no contract... I am merely using their service from month-to-month on whatever the terms happen to be that month. That isn't a contract at all; it's a declaration that there isn't one.
"Even if it doesn't explicitly say they can monitor and take actions to "protect the integrity of their network" like most all do, they left a clause in where they can change the terms at any time."
To the extent that they have such a clause, it's not a contract!
Let me clarify that: generally speaking, especially in my area, where we have one of the major cable companies but no real competition, the contract in the first place is very one-sides, with the big powerful cable company on one side, and the consumer (who has few choices) on the other. Combine that with the fact that it's a "boiler-plate" contract -- that is to say, there is no real opportunity for negotiation -- and what you end up with is what the courts call a "contract of adhesion". Contracts of adhesions are WEAK contracts, and sometimes courts will not honor them at all.
The reason for this is really the whole historic foundation of contract law, which goes back to common law beginning far earlier than this country even existed. Some things about contract law must be kept in mind. First, a contract is a VOLUNTARY agreement between 2 or more parties. Voluntary means without coercion, and it implies that you can negotiate your terms. After all, if the other party is stipulating all of the terms then it's not really very voluntary on your part, is it? It's "take it or leave it". Which is somewhat coercive, especially if you don't have other choices.
The second big issue to keep in mind is that in order to have an agreement at all, you have to know what you are agreeing to IN ADVANCE. Otherwise you can't really be agreeing to it, can you? Informed consent is an essential part of a contract.
So pardon all the theory. We know that in recent years many courts have tended to be corporate ass-kissers. Nevertheless, technically at least, a contract can't really say "we reserve the right to change the terms of this contract". Because then there is no informed consent, and to the extent there is no informed consent, there is no contract.
I am well aware that as a practical matter, some judges might honor such a contract (the assholes!). On the other hand, some would not. But if they tried to do it to me in this case, they'd have a fight on their hands.
... this means they will be MONITORING your traffic. Possibly including deep packet inspection and worse.
Pardon me, but even if I'm not doing a damned thing wrong, I don't want or need my ISP to be monitoring my activity, any more than I would want a phone company listening to my telephone calls.
I find the idea ethically and morally repugnant, and, for that matter, on thin ice legally.
I should also point out that my cable contract contains none of these provisions. Maybe it's fine for new accounts, but I will hold them to my existing contract.
"This just in: Companies in a recessionary economy are cheap.
Guys, seriously. Nobody wants to spend money on an employee they aren't likely to have around in a year or two anyway; and even if they did, it's easier just to phone HR and say 'Hey, I need a dozen people with xyzzy skill.' 'derp derp derp' 'Okay then! I'll see them on monday.'
I fail to see how this got labeled "insightful". We know WHY they do it. The question is: "Is it smart to do this?" And in the majority of cases, the answer is: "No".
Of course there are some companies -- either small companies on a low budget or larger companies that have fallen on hard times and are struggling for capital -- that have little choice.
BUT... the majority of the companies who are doing this are companies that have fallen into the post-60s-or-so pattern of valuing short-term profits over investment in the future. Which we KNOW -- have known for at least a century and probably a lot more -- is bad strategy in the long term.
Companies that do not invest in and support their employees, even in bad times, are the companies that are not around very long.
There is even less justification for this in IT, since companies involved in IT (software, hardware, design, consulting, and other companies with an interest in IT or a large IT infrastructure) have generally done much better than others through this recession.
"The idea of the company taking care of you died in about, er... the 1950s. Deal with it."
You mean just before the U.S. economy started to go REALLY downhill? Yep. You think the reasons aren't known?
Slashdot Mirror
"Please don't get hung up on the specific example I gave. It was only an example of a more general point: because we now have much easier abilities to store, search and corrolate large numbers of small facts, and to make the results widely and instantly available with little cost, allowing the collection of any small fact about an individual may contribute to a much more severe loss of privacy than it ever could before those technologies existed.
Street View is just one case, in that for example if I know your address there is now a good chance I can quickly and anonymously find out your vehicle and registration details, because that outdoor photography has been systematically collected, is now searchable on-line, and is now available to the entire world."
Since you put it THAT way, I grant you that this specific example might represent something different. It may be true that mass access to what was commonly thought of as "public" information -- when aggregated -- could endanger privacy in ways that were not before. I can see that.
"On the other hand, someone standing there with a video recording device requires only that in handling your card you momentarily expose both sides of it to reveal the numbers required to make an on-line payment. Someone who could follow you around with a recording device could probably collect many other relevant details for security checks based on address and the like as well."
So what? This brings up the point I made before: the fact that it is theoretically possible does not make it okay or condoned by society. This is a perfect example. In my state, just such activity falls under "surveillance" laws and is already illegal.
"That only sounds far-fetched because the effort for someone to do this when they have to be physically present for an extended period of time is prohibitive and the risk of being detected is quite high. There is a natural limit that contains the damage any one rogue individual can cause in both scale and number of victims."
No, it sounds farfetched because anybody here caught doing it would spend time in a state prison. Of course again I mean the US, my particular state. It may well be different elsewhere. I do understand that.
"On the other hand, today we have public safety CCTV cameras watching you as you go around the city. Here in the UK, we have a scary number of CCTV cameras watching you just about any other time these days, too, with very little regulation of how the footage is stored or used."
Yes, especially there, by my understanding, and in a few other places. Fortunately so far we have not been so inundated with intrusive cameras, though they have been increasing somewhat. I have personally tried to help resist this trend, using statistics from places like London as examples, which should warn us not to follow the same path.
Please don't misunderstand me. I do agree that our privacy is being assaulted, from many directions. But at least here in the United States, the problem has resulted from the deliberate relaxation of laws that already existed, rather than a lack of them to begin with. And I have no love for the politicians who sold us out.
I use the new ROT26... it's twice as secure!
"I would argue exactly the opposite: the changes enabled by modern technology mean we have not just a quantitative but a qualitative difference in the impact of small but no-longer-isolated observations."
But you have already made that argument, or close enough. Repeating it does not make it more valid.
But you have already made that argument, or close enough. Repeating it does not make it more valid.
"This does raise new fundamentally questions about what practical actions are consistent with any given moral position on privacy."
I disagree completely. What "fundamentally new questions"? If you would be more specific, I could probably show you that those questions really aren't new, at all.
"For one thing, not everywhere has the same rules about that. Please don't project your local legal system onto the rest of the world. Of all things, privacy is surely one of the most variable between jurisdictions in terms of legal protections."
Okay, I apologize for assuming you were talking about the United States. But if that's a problem, then you are guilty of the same thing: talking about issues that only exist in your part of the world, wherever that is.
"For another thing, I think there is again a qualitative difference between appearing on a magazine cover, which is a relatively rare event and is by its nature a very public observation usually made by well-established professional media organisations, and the kind of back office data-mining operations that let anonymous observers look up all kinds of information about all kinds of subjects without the subjects even knowing."
Whatever you might think about it, my point was that (here in the US anyway), there need be no new LEGAL issues raised. They both involve pictures taken in public of (I was presuming) everyday people, and displaying them to audiences of millions. Where is there any kind of legal difference between them? Both rest on a desire (or not) for privacy. I fail to see how showing a picture to millions of people on the internet is very different from showing a picture to millions of people on a magazine cover or on TV. And yes, we have laws to cover that. I really don't see how you think this is somehow "new". There have been not just still cameras but video cameras in public settings now for well over 100 years. You honestly think that issues of this kind haven't come up in the courts before???
"Perhaps, but at least I understand that copyright and privacy have absolutely nothing to do with each other, aside from both being in conflict with absolute freedom of expression. It is strange that someone so keen to appeal to century-old court decisions apparently does not..."
I only used copyright as an example of a similar issue. I was not equating copyright with privacy, although I suppose I can see how you might have thought that was what I meant. But no; it was only intended as another -- different -- example of how a great many people mistakenly think that modern fights over issues are somehow "new". On the contrary, I repeat: most of these issues have been hashed out not just once, but many times, in the courts over the past century or two. It would benefit a lot of people to pick up some history books from time to time. With the internet now here and well established, it is easier now then ever before to look things up.
"Maybe not necessary, but as it has always been implemented, SMTP, IMAP, POP and otherwise, it is stored on each server while they wait to copy it to the next server, and it is stored for a long time on the receiving server waiting for the final (usually human) recipient to acknowledge receipt and request deletion - I have always set my clients to automatically delete received messages after 15 days, during which time, I assume that my ISP is backing the, almost always unencrypted, e-mail up on their disaster recovery system."
But this is transient storage, just as the mail bin is, in my example. There is nothing about recording copies that is "inherent" in this technology. The kind of recording you are talking about requires a copy, such as in a database somewhere. None of the technologies we are talking about require copies in order to operate.
"... during which time, I assume that my ISP is backing the, almost always unencrypted, e-mail up on their disaster recovery system."
Depends on your ISP, but probably not. Besides, if you are using an email account that is given to you by your ISP, you're kind of asking for trouble, aren't you?
"Know anybody who uses digital signatures or PGP in regular e-mail conversations? I know exactly one, a geek celebrity who presumably doesn't want people making up quotes attributed to him."
That's a straw-man argument. Let's remember what my post was about: somebody said that "recording" was "inherent" in the technology, and I pointed out that it wasn't. Your statement about the RFC changes that not one bit. The fact that I might leave my door unlocked does not mean that burglary is "inherent" in door locks. The fact that my emails may not be secure does not mean that somebody else has the right to copy them. Paper email is not "secure" in that sense either; yet people expect it to get from one end to the other without somebody reading it.
"Old school telephone lines could be, and were regularly, tapped, with and without warrants..."
That still doesn't mean that tapping is "inherent" in the technology. On the contrary... somebody has to either get a warrant or break the law to install a tap. Again, there is nothing "inherent" there. And that's what I was saying when I mentioned common carriers. If the FCC could classify ISPs as common carriers under Part II, (as they have long wanted to do but Big Cable lobbied congress), then interception of your email would be covered by the same kind of laws as tapping your telephone. Big win.
"E-mail needs to grow up, I use G-mail because it serves my needs, and my needs do not include private e-mail conversation."
Back to what I was saying before: so what? You have a right to expect your communications to NOT be copied by third parties. Just like you have historically had a right to have a private telephone conversation without third parties tapping in. The fact that it's theoretically possible does NOT make it okay. You are giving me the impression that you are just throwing your hands up in the air and saying "F*k it, they're bigger than me, so I give up." Pardon me if I don't follow your example.
"Your privacy will get respected when you start standing up for it..."
Precisely my point. But you haven't been giving the impression that you're standing up. Rather, that you're giving in.
There is nothing "inherent" about the NSA. It could disappear tomorrow. And frankly I think we would all be better off if it did.
"Anything seen is seen by one private individual, not a vasty corporation with potentially a global audience.
Even if we accept as reasonable an individual taking a photograph in a public place that potentially diminishes someone else's privacy, perhaps because the latter person wasn't the subject of the photo and appeared in the background only coincidentally, such photos are still typically only for private, personal use, not being collected by a commercial entity that exists only to exploit anything it can for profit."
And how is this different from take a public picture of somebody, then putting it on the cover of a national magazine? See, we already had rules about that, and they cover situations like this just fine.
Similar things can be said about the rest of this. There really isn't anything new here, and if you think there is, then you don't know your history very well. Many of the very same copyright issues that are being slammed around right now, for example, were hashed out in public and in court -- some real knock-down, dragouts as they say -- well over 100 years ago. People keep saying that things are different now, but if they read the actual court decisions from back then, they just might change their minds.
When put that way, I can agree with it.
I think you missed the point though. The markup language is indeed called html. But CSS and JavaScript are not, strictly speaking, part of that markup language. Html consists of tags, and CSS and JavaScript are tools that DO THINGS to enhance and modify those tags... they are not part of those tags.
In a similar vein, I can have a collection of numbers instead of tags, and load them into spreadsheet software to make them look pretty and perform functions on them... but to say the spreadsheet program is "part of" those numbers would be foolish.
"All digital communication is inherently recorded, so in some twisted sense it's more like dumpster diving and less like wiretapping to snoop in e-mail."
Not at all. First, it isn't "inherently recorded", any more than your snail mail is "inherently copied" when it is put in a bin at the post office. It is quite possible to relay things like email, and even put them in temporary storage, waiting for the email client to pick them up, without "recording" them in any other sense. When my email client gets my mail, it is deleted from anywhere else.
Now, having said that, you are your own worst enemy if you use the IMAP email protocol, rather than the older POP3, because IMAP inherently does put your email in control of the server, and by default keeps copies of the emails on the server, even those that are "deleted". You can change those settings, but most people don't.
To sum it up: there is no real sense in which electronic communications are "inherently recorded" by any middleman, at all, any more than a telephone conversation, unless you count temporary storage, which should be set up as just that... temporary, and wiped when a file is deleted.
"Similarly for GPS tracking, that's just like old-school tailing a car, but cheaper and more clandestine - what's not to like?"
And this is yet another false argument. GPS tracking is, indeed, inherently worse and more intrusive than an "old-school tail", in several ways. Thankfully the courts, unlike you, have recognized this fact.
The rules don't need to be rewritten at all. In fact they continued to work fine, right up until people started messing with them just before the turn of the century, giving "authorities" more control. THAT is the problem here, not the technologies.
None of the basic issues have changed. Emails need be no different from telephone conversations. Nor internet sessions. ISPs could (and should) operate like common carriers, such as the old-school telephone companies. That would solve much, right there. Many of these privacy issues would disappear overnight.
The problem with this argument is that many people who use these technologies do not understand how they work, and may not realize what they are exposing.
Is that their own problem? I suppose. One way to look at it is "evolution in action"... the unaware will be preyed upon. But I think there is a place in society for protecting the innocent from active predators, which are what these companies really are.
I am not an advocate of laws that are intended to protect us from ourselves. But to protect people from others who actively seek to intrude and invade? Sure, no problem.
The picture of the comment you link to is actually a defense of freedom, not a defense of "child pornography". The writer was denouncing censorship; he was not advocating anything.
Sorry, but you don't get to turn it around and say the author stated something that in fact he did not.
The article actually reaches a conclusion that is far different from what the intro would imply.
"Often an HTML5 project employs more technology than just HTML, and the label has come to include the use of CSS3 and JavaScript as well."
No, it hasn't. HTML5 is HTML5, CSS is CSS, and JavaScript is JavaScript.
As a comparison, programming in Rails today includes knowledge of Ruby, JavaScript, CoffeeScript, CSS, and SCSS, and even more... yet nobody confuses any of those with Rails.
Just as nobody I know has confused CSS or JavaScript with HTML5.
"Fuck design patents. I was talking about innovation in general. You can't change the definition of a common word just because it's used in a slightly different context. No, "design patents" aren't a special enough category to get their own special use of the word "innovation", sorry."
I'll make this short and sweet, since you seem to have had some serious trouble understanding the point:
YOU horned in on a conversation that was already about design patents, and brought up the irrelevant subject of "innovation". Innovation is a great topic, certainly. But it has no place in a conversation that was about design patents.
Your remarks were off-topic.
Is that simple enough for you?
I am not even going to bother responding to the rest, which is full of errors anyway.
"I didn't say anything about patents."
You didn't have to. You were directly replying to a comment about design patents. And your comment was just plain wrong. In the context of design patents.
If you were talking about something else, why were you replying to a comment about design patents? You certainly did not indicate that you were talking about anything else.
"I think all patents are evil and should be abolished or severely limited."
Then go live in a country where most people feel that way. Like China, or Soviet Russia before they became more "capitalist". Most Americans who know their history disagree, because they understand how important a GOOD patent system is to innovation.
I'm not claiming that our current system is particularly good; too many corporations and politicians have conspired over the years to mess it up. But the fact that a messed up system is bad is not an indication that a good system (such as we used to have) is in any way a bad thing. You don't, for example, look at a badly designed or broken down car and conclude that all cars are therefore bad. Nor should we judge the idea of patents on our current, broken system.
"This act doesn't mean one should have the exclusive right to use that idea for free."
Like I said: then go to a country where they don't have such a system. But before you do, I'll let you in on a little secret: those countries don't innovate very much. Instead, they base their economy on stealing the ideas of others -- for free. As a consequence, they are always behind the curve when it comes to technology. Again, the former Soviet Union was a classic example. Modern China is still a good example. The vast majority of things they manufacture were invented and designed elsewhere. They aren't very good at your much-vaunted "innovation". And the reason is simple: it doesn't reward them. There is nothing to be gained by it.
The exceptions (and there are some) in China are those corporations that have [a] originally grown to a large size by manufacturing goods of foreign design (i.e., invented in designed in countries that have patent and copyright laws), and [b] now can make their own designs, but they can only operate internationally because those exceptional companies now honor foreign "intellectual property" laws, even when their country doesn't.
The point being: anybody who tries to use information from the P2P network to sue them for copyright infringement, would be admitting to being AT LEAST an accessory to a felony, and possibly guilty of a felony themselves. Saying that they got the information from someone else won't wash: they are still actively participating in felonious activity.
Let's see how far they get trying to sue people for civil infractions like filesharing, when in order to do so, they have to commit a felony.
"I catch said ISPs inspecting my business packets and I'll fucking sue their ass into oblivion for attempted espionage."
Good for you. And I mean that sincerely. We could use a lot more people with that kind of attitude. We should not just sit idly by and let these companies get away with what amounts to corporate rape.
I had an idea along this line. It might need some refinement. But here it is: A very slightly modified P2P filesharing network, that simply includes some kind of network ID in the packet stream. Then make a public (frequent, easily seen) declaration that is shown in all P2P clients for that network, something like this:
Any traffic on this network using this ID is making use of OUR proprietary network. We acknowlede the reality that copyright content owners have done a great deal of damage to the freedoms of citizens. To prevent further intrusions and violations of privacy, we declare the following:
ANYONE who accesses this network for the purpose of monitoring, observing, or logging the activity of other users of this network is specifically denied access. Anyone who uses information gleaned from this network in order to attempt to determine, punish, or act against other users of this network, or gather and use ANY information about them, in any way, shall be guilty of unauthorized access to a computer network as defined in 18 USC 1030 and similar laws, which is a felony carrying a penalty of up to 10 years in Federal prison. Such parties, when identified, will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
To maybe clarify what I mean:
Don't make the common mistake of presuming that what a battery of corporate lawyers put in their "contract" is the same as "legally valid". They are often not even close to the same things. They put in their contract what they want you to believe, and what they hope they can convince a judge of if it comes to that. But it almost never comes to that (thanks to our current generation of American Sheep), so they get away with it.
"That's why another part of the contract undoubtedly says that you may cancel at any time if you disagree with the changes. "
You are arguing against yourself. This is just another indication that it isn't a real contract! It fails the single biggest requirement for a contract: informed consent. In order to have a valid agreement, you have to be informed of the terms of the agreement before you can be said to have "agreed". After-the-fact consent is not even close to the same thing.
It also fails another big test for the presence of a valid contract: negotiability. Regardless of whether you decide to agree after-the-fact, the terms are still being stipulated in a completely one-sided manner, which as I explained earlier is pretty much the definition of a "contract of adhesion".
"As for your claim of coercion based on practical issues of limited alternate providers, courts have consistently found that limited (or inferior) choices are not the same as having no choice. This was one of the grounds for dismissing suits against no-fly lists -- you can just take a train!"
So what's your point? I already clearly explained that my argument holds for people who don't have a reasonable choice about their internet providers. Like in my town, for instance. There is only one high-speed broadband company, other than satellite service, which is in a different category.
"I was following you, until you omitted this part:
'By continuing to use our services after such a change in contract terms, you agree with said changes. You agree that you will be responsible for informing yourself of changes. The current contract can be viewed at any time by visiting this web page.'"
I have never in my life seen such a clause in a contract. Definitely never one that claimed I had to "inform myself" of any changes.
Don't misunderstand; I'm not claiming such a thing doesn't exist. But I haven't seen one.
However, "continued usage as implied consent" is self-contradictory. It strongly implies that there simply is no contract... I am merely using their service from month-to-month on whatever the terms happen to be that month. That isn't a contract at all; it's a declaration that there isn't one.
See my reply to Nurb432.
"Even if it doesn't explicitly say they can monitor and take actions to "protect the integrity of their network" like most all do, they left a clause in where they can change the terms at any time."
To the extent that they have such a clause, it's not a contract!
Let me clarify that: generally speaking, especially in my area, where we have one of the major cable companies but no real competition, the contract in the first place is very one-sides, with the big powerful cable company on one side, and the consumer (who has few choices) on the other. Combine that with the fact that it's a "boiler-plate" contract -- that is to say, there is no real opportunity for negotiation -- and what you end up with is what the courts call a "contract of adhesion". Contracts of adhesions are WEAK contracts, and sometimes courts will not honor them at all.
The reason for this is really the whole historic foundation of contract law, which goes back to common law beginning far earlier than this country even existed. Some things about contract law must be kept in mind. First, a contract is a VOLUNTARY agreement between 2 or more parties. Voluntary means without coercion, and it implies that you can negotiate your terms. After all, if the other party is stipulating all of the terms then it's not really very voluntary on your part, is it? It's "take it or leave it". Which is somewhat coercive, especially if you don't have other choices.
The second big issue to keep in mind is that in order to have an agreement at all, you have to know what you are agreeing to IN ADVANCE. Otherwise you can't really be agreeing to it, can you? Informed consent is an essential part of a contract.
So pardon all the theory. We know that in recent years many courts have tended to be corporate ass-kissers. Nevertheless, technically at least, a contract can't really say "we reserve the right to change the terms of this contract". Because then there is no informed consent, and to the extent there is no informed consent, there is no contract.
I am well aware that as a practical matter, some judges might honor such a contract (the assholes!). On the other hand, some would not. But if they tried to do it to me in this case, they'd have a fight on their hands.
... this means they will be MONITORING your traffic. Possibly including deep packet inspection and worse.
Pardon me, but even if I'm not doing a damned thing wrong, I don't want or need my ISP to be monitoring my activity, any more than I would want a phone company listening to my telephone calls.
I find the idea ethically and morally repugnant, and, for that matter, on thin ice legally.
I should also point out that my cable contract contains none of these provisions. Maybe it's fine for new accounts, but I will hold them to my existing contract.
"This just in: Companies in a recessionary economy are cheap.
Guys, seriously. Nobody wants to spend money on an employee they aren't likely to have around in a year or two anyway; and even if they did, it's easier just to phone HR and say 'Hey, I need a dozen people with xyzzy skill.' 'derp derp derp' 'Okay then! I'll see them on monday.'
I fail to see how this got labeled "insightful". We know WHY they do it. The question is: "Is it smart to do this?" And in the majority of cases, the answer is: "No".
Of course there are some companies -- either small companies on a low budget or larger companies that have fallen on hard times and are struggling for capital -- that have little choice.
BUT... the majority of the companies who are doing this are companies that have fallen into the post-60s-or-so pattern of valuing short-term profits over investment in the future. Which we KNOW -- have known for at least a century and probably a lot more -- is bad strategy in the long term.
Companies that do not invest in and support their employees, even in bad times, are the companies that are not around very long.
There is even less justification for this in IT, since companies involved in IT (software, hardware, design, consulting, and other companies with an interest in IT or a large IT infrastructure) have generally done much better than others through this recession.
"The idea of the company taking care of you died in about, er... the 1950s. Deal with it."
You mean just before the U.S. economy started to go REALLY downhill? Yep. You think the reasons aren't known?