"I don't recall reading that any of the 9/11 hijackers used fake IDs to get onto the airplanes."
What hijackers? What planes? Steel core building don't do that. The whole thing was a scam, and the media were complicit with the perpetrators from the start. Don't blindly point at the so-called eyewitnesses and video evidence. Go watch "September Clues" and think about everything that has been based upon the convenient story of 19 hijackers, some commercial airliners that were not scheduled to fly that day, buildings that violated the laws of physics, a lengthy government coverup, and a wall-to-wall psy-op to drill it into people's minds as solidly as Winston Smith's aversion to rats. The objective was fear, and this is just one of the results.
That use of the word 'who' wraps up the whole problem. Corporations are only persons for the purposes that suit them. Their officers can be prosecuted for crimes, but the corporation itself is not being sentenced to death or to life (they are immortal) imprisonment for murder, nor are they sentenced to shorter terms for lesser crimes. But imagine if they were. What would things be like if corporations could have their charters revoked for murder, or put under extreme restrictions for a period of corporate imprisonment.
I've written a series of short stories (10 so far) about this. The sequence about corporate imprisonment starts in a story called "Full Circle", which begins like this...
Edward Reese, 62 and a tad too well-fed, wrinkled his nose at the smell of the badly cleaned kitchenette in the motel room he'd just checked into. He didn't even want to think about what might be living in the mattresses. "Well," he grumbled, "at least I won't have to sleep in this dump."
He glanced at the ancient clock-radio on the night stand. Five-thirteen. About right for a five o'clock meeting, except that there had been nobody to walk in on. Re-aiming the bulky remote laying on the room's small table, he switched on the TV news, and sat down to wait. He hated waiting for anyone, especially people he considered beneath his station.
"...in the pending grand theft case against lodging and food-services conglomerate, Fremont-Wayfarer. The Honorable Wilfred Clary, who had presided over the murder trial of the now-defunct Consolidated Communications Corporation, has been assigned to the case. According to our legal analyst, the precedent set in the Supreme Court's SandHill Realty decision, which granted..."
There was a knock at the door. Reese turned off the news.
The official description may be that they are defensive, that they are only for jamming the guidance systems of enemy missiles, but they are weapons nonetheless. Once the public has swallowed the innocuous cover story, they can install much more capable systems on commercial aircraft. Any aircraft with weapons installed by the 'Defense" Department is military by nature, regardless of whether it carries civilian passengers. Those passengers will serve as human shields to cow others from shooting down these planes.
Any nation that allows US commercial aircraft into their airspace has suddenly agreed to letting the US military overfly their countries. Aircraft can be flown by remote control, including commercial aircraft with weapons. This is an extremely dangerous precedent. If another nation tried this, the US government would refuse them entry. Other nations are likely to respond the same way.
Think of it as closing the US borders by coercing other nations to do it for us.
They could also force the issue by setting up situations guaranteed to make people nervous. According to reports, at boingboing and elsewhere, TSA folk have already taken up the practice of stopping a swath of travelers for no reason after they have been past the checkpoint, and keeping them still and silent for twenty minutes.
I've referenced a short story on my blog before about the possible outcome of this, and I'll do it again. The story is called "Incident on Concourse B", and it starts like this:
+ + + Lendon Forrester, clattering bags of jumbled canned goods, ran up the steps and opened the door. "Did I miss it?"
"No," Frannie Jurdens called from the kitchen. "They're still in a holding pattern." She capped the jug she'd been filling, and placed it beside the others on the counter.
Len glanced at the reporter on the living room TV in passing. "...the ticket counter behind me, air travel in our city has ground to a halt. This same 'ghost-town' scenario is being played out at airports across the country, in the wake of this morning's thwarted terrorist attack in Cincinnati."
Frannie looked up as he entered. "I don't know, Len. The media's crawling with rumors." + + +
Find out for yourself. The rings are a recorded analog message, and Iapetus is the stylus. All we need to do is fabricate the mounting bracket, install the 'needle', and hook up an amp...
Microsoft is all about increasing revenues. If they've saturated the market to their satisfaction, or have begun to lose traction with one class of product, such as Office apps, they move on to another. I'd translate Chairman Bill's comments to mean that he smells money in collaboration software. SharePoint is just one way to dredge that channel. Watch for others.
* * *
The latest story in my series about a company imprisoned for theft addresses the sham called a financial system. Read "Bank Shot" here:
"Why isn't this organization, which has clearly committed a criminal act, in jail?"
Because you can only put people in jail, not organizations. Even though corporations have usurped some of the rights of personhood, they do not have to bear the risks, and if they're careful, they never die.
But what if they could be jailed? What if they could even be executed for murder? I'm a writer, so I decided to find out, by running a little thought experiment in the form of short stories. The series (there are 8 stories so far) starts with a tale called "Logical Conclusion", which begins like this...
===== Would you just look at all these lawyers. The glare from all that dental work is worse than the TV lights I've been staring into lately. I'm glad I remembered my sunglasses. Lawyers. You'd think this case was going to set off a litigation frenzy the way they're swarming.
I just hope none of them gets a good look at me. I swear, if one more photographer wants a copy of my face, I'll take his in trade. It's gotten so bad lately that I've even started to avoid looking at mirrors. ===== The whole thing is located here: http://klurgsheld.wordpress.com/2007/08/30/short-story-logical-conclusion/
The stories have a convenient forward link at the end, so it's easy to track through it if you want. Of course, if you want to know what happens after the most recent one, "Unvarnished Siding", you'll have to check back once in a while. I'll be adding the ninth installment this weekend.
Having personal things, physical ones, in the area where you work humanizes it. Despite the reasons given by management for this, or the rationalizations given by the affected workers for accepting it, implementing it will still have the same chilling effect on the thoughts and actions of those living or working in the sterile environment. What surrounds you, affects you, and reinforces whatever characteristics you express through it. So the workforce will be that much less in touch with their own guiding principles. If you are most at ease, and therefore most empowered, when you are surrounded with reminders of certain people, places or ideas, then while you are in this intentionally rootless environment, you will be less at ease, less empowered, and thereby easier to control.
I've been in IT since 1972. I've worked in bull-pens and cubes. I've worked in the employer's space, and in my own. The environment in which you spend your time affects your behavior. The difference is that those in power are now aware of this.
In any group that is structured around leaders and rules, such as businesses, armies and to some extent, political parties, it is important to be able to exert control over those not in charge. Regardless of why this is being done, whether to save space or money, or whatever other explanation is offered, the psychological effects are the same. Knowing this can help to limit the effects, but that is only true for those who are conscious of these subtle power games. The rest of the workers slip ever-so-slowly into the mind-set of drones.
Think of it like that frog, being turned into Borg so slowly that it doesn't even notice.
But small changes can also be used to make big changes, if you know what you're doing. Introducing a new idea, a meme that infects one person after another, can also change the world. Like what happened in a story on my blog called "Business Decision"...
* * * Evan studied the portly man standing in front of the curved dais for a moment before answering.
Jason Sweeney had attended Council meetings before, a silent but imposing presence brooding in the far corner. A curious glance was enough to influence the more convivial constituents in the room, causing them to stay well away lest they become enamored of whatever unsavory business had paid for the custom woven fabrics of his business suit, and led him to wear such uncomfortable-looking shoes. But something was different today. Something had driven him to exchange the shadows at the edge of the room for a brightly lit moment at the center of attention. * * *
What you've described is more powerful than you might think, but there's an even more effective way to implement it. The idea was already used very effectively with a different kind of tech. I've been writing a series of stories about a group exploring ways to improve governance. The most recent one addressed this issue, as a demonstration of a challenge laid down in an earlier story. The tale is called "Vocal Threat", and it starts like this...
* * *
Searching for patterns in the ocean of Internet traffic flowing through the agency's peering point snooper wasn't Craig's idea of a good time, but at least it was better than sitting through yet another of Mr. Kulya's endless lectures. The life of a spook trainee, he mused, was much like that of a newbie in many other fields. The fact that his drudgery involved violating the privacy of unsuspecting citizens, rather than simply being responsible for their lives, as a medical intern would be, or their livelihood, had he been a law clerk, left a sour taste in his soul. Still, there were compensations.
"You okay, Craig?" a woman's voice said close to his left ear. "You've been staring at that IP registration for about three minutes now."
He blinked self-consciously and roused himself. "Oh. Hi, Kelly. I guess I was daydreaming."
She pulled up a chair. "About what?" After glancing at the screen, she added, "Did you just catch Congressman Fox in something?"
Slashdot Mirror
"I don't recall reading that any of the 9/11 hijackers used fake IDs to get onto the airplanes."
What hijackers? What planes? Steel core building don't do that. The whole thing was a scam, and the media were complicit with the perpetrators from the start. Don't blindly point at the so-called eyewitnesses and video evidence. Go watch "September Clues" and think about everything that has been based upon the convenient story of 19 hijackers, some commercial airliners that were not scheduled to fly that day, buildings that violated the laws of physics, a lengthy government coverup, and a wall-to-wall psy-op to drill it into people's minds as solidly as Winston Smith's aversion to rats. The objective was fear, and this is just one of the results.
That use of the word 'who' wraps up the whole problem. Corporations are only persons for the purposes that suit them. Their officers can be prosecuted for crimes, but the corporation itself is not being sentenced to death or to life (they are immortal) imprisonment for murder, nor are they sentenced to shorter terms for lesser crimes. But imagine if they were. What would things be like if corporations could have their charters revoked for murder, or put under extreme restrictions for a period of corporate imprisonment.
I've written a series of short stories (10 so far) about this. The sequence about corporate imprisonment starts in a story called "Full Circle", which begins like this...
Edward Reese, 62 and a tad too well-fed, wrinkled his nose at the smell of the badly cleaned kitchenette in the motel room he'd just checked into. He didn't even want to think about what might be living in the mattresses. "Well," he grumbled, "at least I won't have to sleep in this dump."
He glanced at the ancient clock-radio on the night stand. Five-thirteen. About right for a five o'clock meeting, except that there had been nobody to walk in on. Re-aiming the bulky remote laying on the room's small table, he switched on the TV news, and sat down to wait. He hated waiting for anyone, especially people he considered beneath his station.
"...in the pending grand theft case against lodging and food-services conglomerate, Fremont-Wayfarer. The Honorable Wilfred Clary, who had presided over the murder trial of the now-defunct Consolidated Communications Corporation, has been assigned to the case. According to our legal analyst, the precedent set in the Supreme Court's SandHill Realty decision, which granted..."
There was a knock at the door. Reese turned off the news.
You can read the whole thing here:
http://klurgsheld.wordpress.com/2007/09/01/short-story-full-circle/
Poke around the site. There's all kinds of stories out there now.
P. Orin Zack
The official description may be that they are defensive, that they are only for jamming the guidance systems of enemy missiles, but they are weapons nonetheless. Once the public has swallowed the innocuous cover story, they can install much more capable systems on commercial aircraft. Any aircraft with weapons installed by the 'Defense" Department is military by nature, regardless of whether it carries civilian passengers. Those passengers will serve as human shields to cow others from shooting down these planes.
Any nation that allows US commercial aircraft into their airspace has suddenly agreed to letting the US military overfly their countries. Aircraft can be flown by remote control, including commercial aircraft with weapons. This is an extremely dangerous precedent. If another nation tried this, the US government would refuse them entry. Other nations are likely to respond the same way.
Think of it as closing the US borders by coercing other nations to do it for us.
They could also force the issue by setting up situations guaranteed to make people nervous. According to reports, at boingboing and elsewhere, TSA folk have already taken up the practice of stopping a swath of travelers for no reason after they have been past the checkpoint, and keeping them still and silent for twenty minutes.
I've referenced a short story on my blog before about the possible outcome of this, and I'll do it again. The story is called "Incident on Concourse B", and it starts like this:
+ + +
Lendon Forrester, clattering bags of jumbled canned goods, ran up the steps and opened the door. "Did I miss it?"
"No," Frannie Jurdens called from the kitchen. "They're still in a holding pattern." She capped the jug she'd been filling, and placed it beside the others on the counter.
Len glanced at the reporter on the living room TV in passing. "...the ticket counter behind me, air travel in our city has ground to a halt. This same 'ghost-town' scenario is being played out at airports across the country, in the wake of this morning's thwarted terrorist attack in Cincinnati."
Frannie looked up as he entered. "I don't know, Len. The media's crawling with rumors."
+ + +
Read the story at http://klurgsheld.wordpress.com/2007/09/05/short-story-incident-on-concourse-b/
P. Orin Zack
Find out for yourself. The rings are a recorded analog message, and Iapetus is the stylus. All we need to do is fabricate the mounting bracket, install the 'needle', and hook up an amp...
* * *
The latest story in my series about a company imprisoned for theft addresses the sham called a financial system. Read "Bank Shot" here:
http://klurgsheld.wordpress.com/2007/12/12/short-story-bank-shot/
"Why isn't this organization, which has clearly committed a criminal act, in jail?"
Because you can only put people in jail, not organizations. Even though corporations have usurped some of the rights of personhood, they do not have to bear the risks, and if they're careful, they never die.
But what if they could be jailed? What if they could even be executed for murder? I'm a writer, so I decided to find out, by running a little thought experiment in the form of short stories. The series (there are 8 stories so far) starts with a tale called "Logical Conclusion", which begins like this...
=====
Would you just look at all these lawyers. The glare from all that dental work is worse than the TV lights I've been staring into lately. I'm glad I remembered my sunglasses. Lawyers. You'd think this case was going to set off a litigation frenzy the way they're swarming.
I just hope none of them gets a good look at me. I swear, if one more photographer wants a copy of my face, I'll take his in trade. It's gotten so bad lately that I've even started to avoid looking at mirrors.
=====
The whole thing is located here:
http://klurgsheld.wordpress.com/2007/08/30/short-story-logical-conclusion/
The stories have a convenient forward link at the end, so it's easy to track through it if you want. Of course, if you want to know what happens after the most recent one, "Unvarnished Siding", you'll have to check back once in a while. I'll be adding the ninth installment this weekend.
Having personal things, physical ones, in the area where you work humanizes it. Despite the reasons given by management for this, or the rationalizations given by the affected workers for accepting it, implementing it will still have the same chilling effect on the thoughts and actions of those living or working in the sterile environment. What surrounds you, affects you, and reinforces whatever characteristics you express through it. So the workforce will be that much less in touch with their own guiding principles. If you are most at ease, and therefore most empowered, when you are surrounded with reminders of certain people, places or ideas, then while you are in this intentionally rootless environment, you will be less at ease, less empowered, and thereby easier to control.
I've been in IT since 1972. I've worked in bull-pens and cubes. I've worked in the employer's space, and in my own. The environment in which you spend your time affects your behavior. The difference is that those in power are now aware of this.
In any group that is structured around leaders and rules, such as businesses, armies and to some extent, political parties, it is important to be able to exert control over those not in charge. Regardless of why this is being done, whether to save space or money, or whatever other explanation is offered, the psychological effects are the same. Knowing this can help to limit the effects, but that is only true for those who are conscious of these subtle power games. The rest of the workers slip ever-so-slowly into the mind-set of drones.
Think of it like that frog, being turned into Borg so slowly that it doesn't even notice.
But small changes can also be used to make big changes, if you know what you're doing. Introducing a new idea, a meme that infects one person after another, can also change the world. Like what happened in a story on my blog called "Business Decision"...
* * *
Evan studied the portly man standing in front of the curved dais for a moment before answering.
Jason Sweeney had attended Council meetings before, a silent but imposing presence brooding in the far corner. A curious glance was enough to influence the more convivial constituents in the room, causing them to stay well away lest they become enamored of whatever unsavory business had paid for the custom woven fabrics of his business suit, and led him to wear such uncomfortable-looking shoes. But something was different today. Something had driven him to exchange the shadows at the edge of the room for a brightly lit moment at the center of attention.
* * *
The whole story is here
http://klurgsheld.wordpress.com/2007/06/14/short-story-business-decision/
* * *
Searching for patterns in the ocean of Internet traffic flowing through the agency's peering point snooper wasn't Craig's idea of a good time, but at least it was better than sitting through yet another of Mr. Kulya's endless lectures. The life of a spook trainee, he mused, was much like that of a newbie in many other fields. The fact that his drudgery involved violating the privacy of unsuspecting citizens, rather than simply being responsible for their lives, as a medical intern would be, or their livelihood, had he been a law clerk, left a sour taste in his soul. Still, there were compensations.
"You okay, Craig?" a woman's voice said close to his left ear. "You've been staring at that IP registration for about three minutes now."
He blinked self-consciously and roused himself. "Oh. Hi, Kelly. I guess I was daydreaming."
She pulled up a chair. "About what?" After glancing at the screen, she added, "Did you just catch Congressman Fox in something?"
* * *
You can read the whole story here:
http://klurgsheld.wordpress.com/2007/11/13/short-story-vocal-threat/
The sequence began with "Motivation", which is here:
http://klurgsheld.wordpress.com/2007/07/27/short-story-motivation/