The terrorists have won Indeed. But who are the terrorists? I know who I'm afraid of, and it's not some long-bearded renal failure patient wasting away in a desert cave on the other side of the planet.
Or it could be the requests were sufficiently vague that the telcos thought they were submitting the right amount of information. It's one thing to be worried about the Feds doing what they do. What has me worried is that so much (all) of our private information is accessible by telcos, many of which are owned by foreign interests. Whose country is it anyway?
True, they [rights] aren't religious in nature. Therefore they are arbitrary in nature, because we (humans) made them up as part of our description of everything, either as a reflection of our religious beliefs or by consensus. They are nonetheless up for debate and are conditional, not least because not everyone believes in them.
Morally, your only obligation is to respect other people's rights.
Morality depends on which religion you follow and most religions impose more than just one moral obligation and again they don't refer to people's rights (although it's easy to describe them beceause they are implicit). Legally one could say your only obligation is to respect other people's rights, oh and that of plants, animals, rocks, parking spaces and, as it happens, corporations. Morality and law are different, but of course anyone with morals would hope they were the same.
I'm really not saying anything radical if you think about it. Just labouring the point of the original poster having a problem with corporations and people having rights before the court at the same time. I'm just pointing out the confusion people have between what is legal (go and campaign about it) and moral (for which we can be justifiably emotional).
So, that corporations have rights granted by the state I understand, but to speak of them as tho they are on the same level as a human being and inalienable rights does baffle my mind and sicken my stomach.
But in law, no right is inalienable really. I mean, look at killing, for example. It's off the statue books in many countries (death penalty), but they don't have any problem with their armies killing people, and the law upholds this. So much for inalienable! Is a right infringed upon every time a person dies? That's the point I'm making. Rights are used for law, where you have to describe what a legal entity is entitled to and what it can and can't do. It's no big deal if a person or a company or a family or a business or a nation have rights in law. It doesn't have any reflection on the inherent status of a human life. It's when insurance companies, airliners, PR companies etc. set a dollar value on a human life that my stomach begins to churn.
The internet is quite a disruptive technology, and it necessitates a complete realignment of parts of the law to address the way things are. Rather, the truth is quite a disruptive instrument and the enemy of deceptive corporations like banks. That's why wikileaks was attacked.
Corporations are not people. Therefore, corporations do not have rights. In law, corporations have rights (as a tool of defining injustices). Morally, neither corporations nor people have rights, but obligations. Eg: not to steal, to help the vulnerable of society, etc. Rights are implicit but not absolute, despite what the U.N. charter says, rights have always been merely a human construct and as such are not part of any religious code and traditionally not considered part of the natural order.
Why do spacecraft have to be sterile? Well we wouldn't want to send one off to go and mate with a stray, produce hundreds spacecraftlets and thus cause an irreversible imbalance to eco-space, you insensitive clod!
Why should it be just one person? I can think of hundreds, nay, thousands of people who I think would be worthy of being sent to Mars, never to return!
NEWS FLASH: EVERY wireline and wireless carrier has facility like this between their central offices and Quantico, Virginia. I can tell you for an absolute fact that a medium-sized cable company operating in the Rocky Mountain region has similar facilities between their main office and the FBI Academy, because I helped install it. Pretty much every internet carrier in the western world is compromised in a similar manner. It's like padlocks on lockers. It keeps honest people out but anyone who is planning to commit a crime or some act of rebellion (err.. terra) will always be taking this into consideration.
Dude... so that means that all that time I spent masturbating is worth an actual monetary amount? Depends on your skill level and if you're worth looking at and if someone is prepared to pay to look at you (or buy your semen sample). Yep, it's not automatically worth something, and some things aren't even worth zero. But seriously, if you recorded yourself and kept it in your drawer for yourself and your wife and the thing got leaked (pardon the pun), surely you should be able to claim it was stolen. Or if you wrote a book about your masturbating adventures, surely you would want to be the one who gets paid for having written it, at least for the first book selling season, or until your second edition came out or whatever.
Ideas cannot be owned - 99% of them are not original, chances are that ANY idea that you've had... has occurred to at least ONE other person in the past.
There is more to this than an idea. If someone is creating a work which took them, say, 100 hours, then what is it worth? 100 hours of work multiplied by the skill level of the person, I would say.
If a work took 100 hours per person and 100 people, then it's an expensive work. The company/individual is entitled to make a reasonable benefit from this work (royalties), such as pay their expenses and pay a reasonable wage for it.
My point is, an idea can be owned in the sense that an idea should be protected (by royalties) so the person who came up with it and made a business model out of it can do some business with it. If you came up with some great piece of software and dedicated your entire time to it, you should reasonably expect to make a living out of it, at least for a time.
But not all ideas are the same and I do think it's a good place for government to regulate this process, such as set time and size limits for copyright infringement actions (and patents, although that is another question), adjusted to the cost of production of the work. A movie is good for the cinema season, perhaps. After that it should be free. A software copyright should be good for a couple of years, maybe, after which it should be free. It's shameful and wrong if a company such as Microsoft can make a squillion dollars and use its money further to block innovation, purely because it has copyright over its aged and out-dated works.
Or Nancy Pelosi, or Harry Reid, or Hillary Clinton, or Barack Obama, etc. But the point is that those people all have constituencies for whom they speak, and they can do it all day long without fear of being jailed for what they say. That isn't a question of whether Iran's president is or isn't good on foreign policies or his domestic economy... we're talking about a regime that sees fit to shut down the internet during elections.
When I was at elementary school I used to believe what you wrote. But if you have ever been involved in political process and government, you'll see that the bulk of government activity has nothing to do with which political power is in place / who was elected / what they say on TV. And in contrast to what you say, our western politicians do have to be extremely careful about what they say and are chosen for their skill in double-speak and their moral flexibility.
Every thing you wrote could be used in the context of the U.S. with its powerful oligarchic media, private enterprise driven government and questionable political process.
Every government, as far as I can see, lies to its people and does whatever it can get away with to stay in power.
There are words in the U.S. you can't use. 'Pizza' might not be one, but I can think of many others. If it was seriously advised to the U.S. government (by its various agencies) that the internet should be shut down during election time, then I reckon you'd actually be seeing this happen on your own doorstep.
But of course, shame on Iran for slowing down the Internet. Shame on anybody who blocks communications, in my opinion. Shame on censorship and the censors!>/p>
As far as I recall, the US have the ability to add in snooping technology to underwater cables without such a distraction. Plus they can do it in much deeper water than was the case. You make a good point. This was done on the cheap, which is not how the U.S. military likes to do business.
Many fervently believed the cable "cuts" were a prelude to war; still others insisted they were part of a plot to prevent the opening of the Iranian Oil Bourse.
That's because the opening of the Iranian Oil Bourse is considered a threat to the U.S. economy (and despite what you say it still is considered a threat). But for the time being it is ineffectual because Iran is under new sanctions and so can't do any large scale oil trading anyway, as far as I'm aware.
But you're right. Conspiracy theories are just theories and so far most of the theories about Iran haven't materialized. Most of them are completely off, but sometimes they are scarily accurate.
The initial (boring) theory will always stand - that the cutting of undersea cables had more to do with wiretapping than blacking out communications.
Or even just take the step of making it an opt-IN rather than an opt-OUT service. That alone would make it far less suspicious looking. It costs less money for the government to 'watch' people who don't filter their internet than to screen the entire population. Big Brother is a miser.
If BDSM is not your piece of cake, fine, but do not put it at the same level as killing people because you simply do not understand it.
Reminds me of the muppet show, where Gonzo the Great is doing something eg: smashing a woman to bits with a sledge hammer screaming, "Art!" *smash* "Art!" *smash* "Art!"
Not that BDSM involves sledge hammers, or puppets, mind you.
You can't get ADSL everywhere, so nextg is a viable alternative. There's a lot of politics behind the unavailability of ADSL (mostly ADSL2 which has longer range) around teh country. It doesn't have to be this way.
It's really a matter of publicizing the weakness to the point where manufacturers and network providers are forced to do something about it. Average people generally don't care about issues like this until they're really an issue.
Well, as you rightly say, most people don't matter in the grand scheme of things. At least that's how it can appear. But in oppressive countries, it's the occasional person in the occasional 'situation' where this stuff really matters, including (and especially) government interception. From that point of view, everybody matters, because if there are no trees (you and me), then there is no forest for fugitives to hide in. Never use a mobile phone, a land-phone, an unencrypted internet connection, etc. for anything that really matters. Same goes for the old fashioned things like avoiding public places and whatever else.
Everybody should use as much encryption as they can manage - it's cheap insurance. If you want to make a difference without taking risks, that's the way to go. It means others who are braver and more able than ourselves can go on carrying on their work saving society, blowing whistles and so forth without getting their carotids slashed.
Any encryption that is not complete from point of origin to target is meaningless (if you're trying to hide your communications).
My experience... at lease here in Australia... is that Mobile broadband works very well (remember much of our country is unpopulated desert).
Additionally, there are pretty terrible contracts for mobile broadband (telstra is asking for 24 months last time i checked), so early adopters are once again subsidising later (smarter) takers. Rental properties can easily get ADSL connected without the landlord needing to know about it, because no modifications need to be done on the property.
Mobile broadband, in my opinion, is something that only makes sense if you need it for your business. When it comes to personal/recreational use, such as on holiday or something to check emails and whatever, it might be easier to plug (or bluetooth) your laptop into your 3G mobile and surf the net that way, or just check into a hotel or cafe with wifi. That's what I have done up until now and, basically, it doesn't cost me $500+ extra per year to do it, in contrast to the mobile broadband.
I suspect the demand for mobile broadband in Australia has not been as big as was hoped. Actually I am still at a bit of a loss why they are rolling it out when the alternatives are so cheap and so adequate at this point. It doesn't make financial and practical sense to me unless it's a tax deductible thing and you are making money from it in excess of the cost of ownership.
Imagine being able to listen in on your whole appartment building's conversations. Mental note: If I ever decide to have an affair, I'd better make sure I don't use a GSM phone.
Slashdot Mirror
Even bigger WTF is that this article has been tagged 'iran'
Morality depends on which religion you follow and most religions impose more than just one moral obligation and again they don't refer to people's rights (although it's easy to describe them beceause they are implicit). Legally one could say your only obligation is to respect other people's rights, oh and that of plants, animals, rocks, parking spaces and, as it happens, corporations. Morality and law are different, but of course anyone with morals would hope they were the same.
I'm really not saying anything radical if you think about it. Just labouring the point of the original poster having a problem with corporations and people having rights before the court at the same time. I'm just pointing out the confusion people have between what is legal (go and campaign about it) and moral (for which we can be justifiably emotional).
But in law, no right is inalienable really. I mean, look at killing, for example. It's off the statue books in many countries (death penalty), but they don't have any problem with their armies killing people, and the law upholds this. So much for inalienable! Is a right infringed upon every time a person dies? That's the point I'm making. Rights are used for law, where you have to describe what a legal entity is entitled to and what it can and can't do. It's no big deal if a person or a company or a family or a business or a nation have rights in law. It doesn't have any reflection on the inherent status of a human life. It's when insurance companies, airliners, PR companies etc. set a dollar value on a human life that my stomach begins to churn.
Why should it be just one person? I can think of hundreds, nay, thousands of people who I think would be worthy of being sent to Mars, never to return!
There is more to this than an idea. If someone is creating a work which took them, say, 100 hours, then what is it worth? 100 hours of work multiplied by the skill level of the person, I would say.
If a work took 100 hours per person and 100 people, then it's an expensive work. The company/individual is entitled to make a reasonable benefit from this work (royalties), such as pay their expenses and pay a reasonable wage for it.
My point is, an idea can be owned in the sense that an idea should be protected (by royalties) so the person who came up with it and made a business model out of it can do some business with it. If you came up with some great piece of software and dedicated your entire time to it, you should reasonably expect to make a living out of it, at least for a time.
But not all ideas are the same and I do think it's a good place for government to regulate this process, such as set time and size limits for copyright infringement actions (and patents, although that is another question), adjusted to the cost of production of the work. A movie is good for the cinema season, perhaps. After that it should be free. A software copyright should be good for a couple of years, maybe, after which it should be free. It's shameful and wrong if a company such as Microsoft can make a squillion dollars and use its money further to block innovation, purely because it has copyright over its aged and out-dated works.
When I was at elementary school I used to believe what you wrote. But if you have ever been involved in political process and government, you'll see that the bulk of government activity has nothing to do with which political power is in place / who was elected / what they say on TV. And in contrast to what you say, our western politicians do have to be extremely careful about what they say and are chosen for their skill in double-speak and their moral flexibility.
Every thing you wrote could be used in the context of the U.S. with its powerful oligarchic media, private enterprise driven government and questionable political process.
Every government, as far as I can see, lies to its people and does whatever it can get away with to stay in power.
There are words in the U.S. you can't use. 'Pizza' might not be one, but I can think of many others. If it was seriously advised to the U.S. government (by its various agencies) that the internet should be shut down during election time, then I reckon you'd actually be seeing this happen on your own doorstep.
But of course, shame on Iran for slowing down the Internet. Shame on anybody who blocks communications, in my opinion. Shame on censorship and the censors!>/p>
That's because the opening of the Iranian Oil Bourse is considered a threat to the U.S. economy (and despite what you say it still is considered a threat). But for the time being it is ineffectual because Iran is under new sanctions and so can't do any large scale oil trading anyway, as far as I'm aware.
But you're right. Conspiracy theories are just theories and so far most of the theories about Iran haven't materialized. Most of them are completely off, but sometimes they are scarily accurate.
The initial (boring) theory will always stand - that the cutting of undersea cables had more to do with wiretapping than blacking out communications.
Reminds me of the muppet show, where Gonzo the Great is doing something eg: smashing a woman to bits with a sledge hammer screaming, "Art!" *smash* "Art!" *smash* "Art!"
Not that BDSM involves sledge hammers, or puppets, mind you.
Well, as you rightly say, most people don't matter in the grand scheme of things. At least that's how it can appear. But in oppressive countries, it's the occasional person in the occasional 'situation' where this stuff really matters, including (and especially) government interception. From that point of view, everybody matters, because if there are no trees (you and me), then there is no forest for fugitives to hide in. Never use a mobile phone, a land-phone, an unencrypted internet connection, etc. for anything that really matters. Same goes for the old fashioned things like avoiding public places and whatever else.
Everybody should use as much encryption as they can manage - it's cheap insurance. If you want to make a difference without taking risks, that's the way to go. It means others who are braver and more able than ourselves can go on carrying on their work saving society, blowing whistles and so forth without getting their carotids slashed.
Any encryption that is not complete from point of origin to target is meaningless (if you're trying to hide your communications).
Additionally, there are pretty terrible contracts for mobile broadband (telstra is asking for 24 months last time i checked), so early adopters are once again subsidising later (smarter) takers. Rental properties can easily get ADSL connected without the landlord needing to know about it, because no modifications need to be done on the property.
Mobile broadband, in my opinion, is something that only makes sense if you need it for your business. When it comes to personal/recreational use, such as on holiday or something to check emails and whatever, it might be easier to plug (or bluetooth) your laptop into your 3G mobile and surf the net that way, or just check into a hotel or cafe with wifi. That's what I have done up until now and, basically, it doesn't cost me $500+ extra per year to do it, in contrast to the mobile broadband.
I suspect the demand for mobile broadband in Australia has not been as big as was hoped. Actually I am still at a bit of a loss why they are rolling it out when the alternatives are so cheap and so adequate at this point. It doesn't make financial and practical sense to me unless it's a tax deductible thing and you are making money from it in excess of the cost of ownership.
CDMA is being shut down in Australia, so that should save a few people's hides, so to speak.