>> That's why Stanford graduates are expected to rise above the average and achieve beyond the norm.
Yea. How many average people could boast that their administration was able to take the most powerful country in the world in good financial position and reduce it to the current state of the US in just 8 years.
Apple releases improved UI which was actually developed several years before. When asked why they were waiting they replied, "We felt it would be safer not to release it until now"
One step that would go a long way to securing information is limiting how many different places store sensitive info. Most of the information businesses collect is for their benefit, not to verify your identity. It's collected and sold, or used for harassing (marketing) to you. It also should not ba able to be shared between each company they call a 'partner'. This should go for any type of information, not just financial.
Additionally, it would help if not so much was public record. If you purchase a house, there's no reason the amount you payed and your mailing address should be made public. There is no reason ever for a company to need you mother's maiden name.
Many people don't know all the other information that is kept and sold about them. For instance, many places that ask for security questions about your dog, car, or lineage sell your responses. Experian also collects information about you that is not disclosed when your order a credit report like average monthly purchases and what percentage and categories your purchases fall. The document of available information about you just from that company was about 1/2 inch thick.
It's also not good that if you have your oil changed at most service places they sell that information about you. When I had my car totaled by fault of the other driver, his insurance company tried to use the "missing" records of oil changes to devalue what my vehicle was worth. It was good that I keep records when I change my oil other wise I would have had a lot harder time getting them to cover what it was worth.
All said and done, I'd be happy if companies had to PROVE a NEED, not a use for, and information the store or inure heavy penalties.
Gmail sounds on the surface like a good idea. However, there are a critical items why I'll never use it beyond a disposable email account.
First of all, what about when you have a problem. Have you ever tried to get help from Google. Their customer service is non-existent. If you follow their 'contact us' links it funnels you into an FAQ. If you do find the form to contact them (like finding an exit in a casino), you're lucky to get a reply (They openly state they will ignore any correspondence that might be in their FAQ) it's just a form email answering some other question. It may take several iterations (each taking a day or two) of explaining that they didn't answer your question. That's on the off hand chance you can finally get to someone.
If it would cause you problems to have an interruption to your email, you might want to consider this.
Second, Google uses information from your email 'for your benefit' so they can advertise more effectively. What other ways might they decide to leverage it? The idea of Google having access to all of a companies email sounds like a stage for problems.
Third, depending on how international you are, what if some foreign government or other entity, requests your emails? We hear about some public cases, but the probability is good that there are a lot more we don't hear about.
Fourth, take it out of context for a moment. Google's better UI aside, what if the company was Yahoo or AOL?
Some of the requirements passed as part of the Real-ID ACT around 2005 'anti-terrorism' law are :
states required to run license applications through a federal database
states will have to retain digital images for 10 years
Real ID demands that all driver's licenses or ID cards have pictures that can be read by facial-recognition technology.
Granted Bush hasn't yet publicly requested put up all the cameras, but what's to stop the next step of just requiring government access to all private security feeds, or maybe just promising funding for cities that make their cameras directly accessible. For our benefit of course.
Shortly ofter the announcement that a mind reading cap might be possible, the bush administration announces it's intent to mandate that everyone now wear baseball caps. When ask why, they remarked that it was for your benefit, to make you feel happier, like you were at a baseball game, for your benefit. The administration stated that it will boost productivity just like the change daylight savings, for your benefit.
You could even configure a Windows box and a Linux box to look similar, but they are not, and shouldn't be.
Having standards is good when implemented well. They should not limit what people want to do with stuff an any way, and should only serve to help interoperability.
Standards should also not discourage development of non-standard ways of doing things. For instance. Standard keyboard layout is good. Forcing every interface to a computer to be the exact same, and a keyboard... bad.
Standard method of fixing a windows box being to switch to Linux, good. Forcing all XP users to move to Vista... bad.
Common method of selecting which interface to use... good. Forcing the use of only one user interface onto many computers with huge variety of purposes and priorities.... BAD.
warning for dangerous persons, based on sex offender registration, FBI most wanted, etc. Any of the above information can be shared or held private as desired by the user. So sex offenders, FBI's most wanted, and dangerous persons can not share their info?? Who decides who is dangerous? Some consider free thinks dangerous? Some might even call them 'Evil People'.
Oh... it's only some people that have a choice. So as long as you don't disagree with the administrators of the technology they won't infringe on your rights.
What guardian angel is going to protect us from Bush, Bill, Google, and friends.
Google being this ingrained is not good. Is the wireless data going to become like Gmail or Google web accelerator where they read/analyze your private information to more effectively inundate you with advertising? I really hope that when/if it truely becomes illegal for carriers to tamper with the data that it also becomes illegal for them to access it as well.
We're always looking for ways to work with carriers, device manufacturers, software providers, and others to help you get the information and content you need, whenever and wherever you need it. Unfortunately, too often these companies decide they know what I NEED better than I do. The more centralized this becomes, the more difficult it is to circumvent when you don't want what they say you NEED.
Even though I am constantly disappointed with what Google has become with regard to it's policies, in this case, I can't fault them.
It's correct that it would have made a stronger point for Google to say it's raw or nothing. It's also easy to sit back with wallet firmly secured and say that THEY should be making that point. I'll bet many of the people faulting Google still purchase products that are in some part made in China or some other country that has similar practices.
In all reality, it is ludicrous to think investors trying to make money , not a point, would vote for something that might keep their for profit corporation from capitalizing on access to an upcoming super power. It's possible, maybe even likely, that China will eventually become larger profit center for Google than the US.
It seems like most comments want there to only be one or the other. Personally, there are some advantages to electronic readers, especially as the technology improves and DRM hopefully decreases. I like the ability to get some books quickly w/o having to go to a bookstore or wait for it to arrive in the mail.
On the other hand, I stare at a screen all day and find it a nice break when I read stuff on paper. I also prefer marking and making notes on many things I read. Even when they make a good interface for that, I'll probably still like paper.
One more thing I like about dead trees. My memory recall is very position/image oriented. I'm not sure why, but I recall details much better from books than online documents. This doesn't matter for reading stories for entertainment, but is very important for technical reading.
Unfortunately, the same parents that don't manage their spawn now probably wouldn't even do that. There might be one or two parents that currently are too laze to manage the children but could muster enough energy to push the locater button.
Cell phones with GPS (mandated for our benefit) could also be used to help find missing people, like those terrorists. Terrorists that speak out against the government, or a political party, or anyone claiming to be law enforcement.
Aside from all the obvious issues already discussed on the previous thread, can Verisign be held accountable if any royalty paying users of SiteFinder are sued for copyright infringement issues? Or maybe conspiracy or collusion?
If this is a precedent, it could greatly affect Google and the like. Just image if every company could require their name or portions of it be negative keywords for their competitors... for free.
We would then get more company squatters forming companies just to grab the right to require negative keywords for their competitors. Kleenex might form 'Bathroom tissue, LLC', 'Toilet Paper, Inc.' to provide them more exclusive online marketing.
Our language is already becoming diluted with terms, imagine if every company had exclusive right to the group of sounds that make up the words in their name.
That being said, I'm still not in favor of what Google's advertising profit model has become.
If Google responds with "We're sorry your are unhappy with our list of your company, we will of course remove all references/links to your company from our listings. And BTW, for now on the results listing your competitors were not matched by using your trademark, but rather by data about what links people clicked on in the past after searching for a specific string."
Personally, I do think it is wrong to bombard someone searching for a JohnWidget with SallyImitation Ads. Phrased another way, "If you don't want to lose customers, you'll pay us to display your ads instead." There are a lot of examples of this same pattern. Like when the phone company charges you extra to not list and distribute you number to all the telemarketers. Like if you don't pay your "protection" money... Well you get the point.
It's not a copyright issue, but rather one of principal. It has become an all too common, and too frequently accepted practice to push people away from what they wanted based on revenue (under the guise of 'for their benefit').
Businesses aren't to blame. The herds of mindless drones that not only don't think for themselves, but accept this tactic are to blame. That's why businesses do it, because it works. Consider this the next time you try to get a drink at a drive-thru and have to repeat that you only want a drink five times while they try to sell you their entire menu.
FOIA has some exclusions, but it doesn't matter because HIPAA is a joke.
For example: I used to be a full time preventer of natural select (firefighter/paramedic) working for a city government. Under the FOIA they were supposed to release out information excluding a few tidbits like SSN, medical screening, etc. However, it was only applied when it benefited the city. If a reported wanted to inspect an employee's file, if the reporter was a city friendly one, they wouldn't remove or blank out any personal information. However, if the reporter was touching on a sensitive area or had a past of irritating the city, they would use the exclusions to delay and only release partial information. Whenever it served a purpose, HIPAA was used as a loophole around the FOIA
As for HIPAA, naturally, when someone would call for an ambulance, we would obtain personal medical information and their SSN (SSN was required to be collected by the state for statistics, whole different issue). This information was documented on a medical report which was stored, passed to the receiving hospital, and reported to the state. Name, address, age, medical issue, and what treatment you received was also documented in a journal.
Originally, when HIPAA went into effect, the attorneys determined that we didn't need to comply because according the the definitions in HIPAA, we were not health care workers. Later on they determined that even though we didn't NEED to comply, that they could cut down on requests for reports if we blocked out some of the more interesting section before releasing them. The legitimacy and ethicalness of releasing some of this info was brought up numerous times only to have FOIA used as the justification. Since HIPAA allows sensitive information to be released if it is needed to conduct your service, FOIA becomes a huge loophole.
So, when it's all said and done, if someone (maybe not even you) called an ambulance for you, it could then be public information if you had a drug problem, AIDS complications, attempted suicide, needed extricated from a goat, as well as your name, age, and address. This was documented in the journal which was public and never censored. BTW , If you weren't cooperative by answering everything we needed you HAD to go into the hospital (an additional issue).
On a separate note, the papers used to publish every call including the persons name, address, and problem.
Slashdot Mirror
>> That's why Stanford graduates are expected to rise above the average and achieve beyond the norm.
Yea. How many average people could boast that their administration was able to take the most powerful country in the world in good financial position and reduce it to the current state of the US in just 8 years.
I certainly couldn't have done that.
How long until Google vaporizes everyone Earth? I don't know, but I'll bet Bush beats them to it.
While we're at throw in some of the many other items compliments of the current US administration.
Apple releases improved UI which was actually developed several years before. When asked why they were waiting they replied, "We felt it would be safer not to release it until now"
A little bleach in the gene pool would go a long way
One step that would go a long way to securing information is limiting how many different places store sensitive info. Most of the information businesses collect is for their benefit, not to verify your identity. It's collected and sold, or used for harassing (marketing) to you. It also should not ba able to be shared between each company they call a 'partner'. This should go for any type of information, not just financial.
Additionally, it would help if not so much was public record. If you purchase a house, there's no reason the amount you payed and your mailing address should be made public. There is no reason ever for a company to need you mother's maiden name.
Many people don't know all the other information that is kept and sold about them. For instance, many places that ask for security questions about your dog, car, or lineage sell your responses. Experian also collects information about you that is not disclosed when your order a credit report like average monthly purchases and what percentage and categories your purchases fall. The document of available information about you just from that company was about 1/2 inch thick.
It's also not good that if you have your oil changed at most service places they sell that information about you. When I had my car totaled by fault of the other driver, his insurance company tried to use the "missing" records of oil changes to devalue what my vehicle was worth. It was good that I keep records when I change my oil other wise I would have had a lot harder time getting them to cover what it was worth.
All said and done, I'd be happy if companies had to PROVE a NEED, not a use for, and information the store or inure heavy penalties.
Call me a skeptic, but I don't see how having my email address embedded in a ticket would keep out troublemakers.
Maybe they feel there's a correlation between someone who doesn't want to share personal information and troublemaker.
Gmail sounds on the surface like a good idea. However, there are a critical items why I'll never use it beyond a disposable email account.
First of all, what about when you have a problem. Have you ever tried to get help from Google. Their customer service is non-existent. If you follow their 'contact us' links it funnels you into an FAQ. If you do find the form to contact them (like finding an exit in a casino), you're lucky to get a reply (They openly state they will ignore any correspondence that might be in their FAQ) it's just a form email answering some other question. It may take several iterations (each taking a day or two) of explaining that they didn't answer your question. That's on the off hand chance you can finally get to someone.
If it would cause you problems to have an interruption to your email, you might want to consider this.
Second, Google uses information from your email 'for your benefit' so they can advertise more effectively. What other ways might they decide to leverage it? The idea of Google having access to all of a companies email sounds like a stage for problems.
Third, depending on how international you are, what if some foreign government or other entity, requests your emails? We hear about some public cases, but the probability is good that there are a lot more we don't hear about.
Fourth, take it out of context for a moment. Google's better UI aside, what if the company was Yahoo or AOL?
Some of the requirements passed as part of the Real-ID ACT around 2005 'anti-terrorism' law are :
states required to run license applications through a federal database
states will have to retain digital images for 10 years
Real ID demands that all driver's licenses or ID cards have pictures that can be read by facial-recognition technology.
Granted Bush hasn't yet publicly requested put up all the cameras, but what's to stop the next step of just requiring government access to all private security feeds, or maybe just promising funding for cities that make their cameras directly accessible. For our benefit of course.
Shortly ofter the announcement that a mind reading cap might be possible, the bush administration announces it's intent to mandate that everyone now wear baseball caps. When ask why, they remarked that it was for your benefit, to make you feel happier, like you were at a baseball game, for your benefit. The administration stated that it will boost productivity just like the change daylight savings, for your benefit.
You could even configure a Windows box and a Linux box to look similar, but they are not, and shouldn't be.
Having standards is good when implemented well. They should not limit what people want to do with stuff an any way, and should only serve to help interoperability.
Standards should also not discourage development of non-standard ways of doing things. For instance. Standard keyboard layout is good. Forcing every interface to a computer to be the exact same, and a keyboard... bad.
Standard method of fixing a windows box being to switch to Linux, good. Forcing all XP users to move to Vista... bad.
Common method of selecting which interface to use... good. Forcing the use of only one user interface onto many computers with huge variety of purposes and priorities.... BAD.
warning for dangerous persons, based on sex offender registration, FBI most wanted, etc. Any of the above information can be shared or held private as desired by the user. So sex offenders, FBI's most wanted, and dangerous persons can not share their info?? Who decides who is dangerous? Some consider free thinks dangerous? Some might even call them 'Evil People'.
Oh... it's only some people that have a choice. So as long as you don't disagree with the administrators of the technology they won't infringe on your rights.
What guardian angel is going to protect us from Bush, Bill, Google, and friends.
"somebody did something stupid", maybe.
Someone thinking they can get away with blocking stuff that helps competitors, more likely.
Microsoft using their size and market share to underhandedly block/undermine competing products, most likely.
Even though I am constantly disappointed with what Google has become with regard to it's policies, in this case, I can't fault them.
It's correct that it would have made a stronger point for Google to say it's raw or nothing. It's also easy to sit back with wallet firmly secured and say that THEY should be making that point. I'll bet many of the people faulting Google still purchase products that are in some part made in China or some other country that has similar practices.
In all reality, it is ludicrous to think investors trying to make money , not a point, would vote for something that might keep their for profit corporation from capitalizing on access to an upcoming super power. It's possible, maybe even likely, that China will eventually become larger profit center for Google than the US.
It seems like most comments want there to only be one or the other. Personally, there are some advantages to electronic readers, especially as the technology improves and DRM hopefully decreases. I like the ability to get some books quickly w/o having to go to a bookstore or wait for it to arrive in the mail.
On the other hand, I stare at a screen all day and find it a nice break when I read stuff on paper. I also prefer marking and making notes on many things I read. Even when they make a good interface for that, I'll probably still like paper.
One more thing I like about dead trees. My memory recall is very position/image oriented. I'm not sure why, but I recall details much better from books than online documents. This doesn't matter for reading stories for entertainment, but is very important for technical reading.
I think Paris Hilton had a tape stolen too.
Unfortunately, the same parents that don't manage their spawn now probably wouldn't even do that. There might be one or two parents that currently are too laze to manage the children but could muster enough energy to push the locater button.
would also help find the occasional kid.
Cell phones with GPS (mandated for our benefit) could also be used to help find missing people, like those terrorists. Terrorists that speak out against the government, or a political party, or anyone claiming to be law enforcement.
Aside from all the obvious issues already discussed on the previous thread, can Verisign be held accountable if any royalty paying users of SiteFinder are sued for copyright infringement issues? Or maybe conspiracy or collusion?
If this is a precedent, it could greatly affect Google and the like. Just image if every company could require their name or portions of it be negative keywords for their competitors... for free.
We would then get more company squatters forming companies just to grab the right to require negative keywords for their competitors. Kleenex might form 'Bathroom tissue, LLC', 'Toilet Paper, Inc.' to provide them more exclusive online marketing.
Our language is already becoming diluted with terms, imagine if every company had exclusive right to the group of sounds that make up the words in their name.
That being said, I'm still not in favor of what Google's advertising profit model has become.
If Google responds with "We're sorry your are unhappy with our list of your company, we will of course remove all references/links to your company from our listings. And BTW, for now on the results listing your competitors were not matched by using your trademark, but rather by data about what links people clicked on in the past after searching for a specific string."
Personally, I do think it is wrong to bombard someone searching for a JohnWidget with SallyImitation Ads. Phrased another way, "If you don't want to lose customers, you'll pay us to display your ads instead." There are a lot of examples of this same pattern. Like when the phone company charges you extra to not list and distribute you number to all the telemarketers. Like if you don't pay your "protection" money... Well you get the point.
It's not a copyright issue, but rather one of principal. It has become an all too common, and too frequently accepted practice to push people away from what they wanted based on revenue (under the guise of 'for their benefit').
Businesses aren't to blame. The herds of mindless drones that not only don't think for themselves, but accept this tactic are to blame. That's why businesses do it, because it works. Consider this the next time you try to get a drink at a drive-thru and have to repeat that you only want a drink five times while they try to sell you their entire menu.
FOIA has some exclusions, but it doesn't matter because HIPAA is a joke.
For example:
I used to be a full time preventer of natural select (firefighter/paramedic) working for a city government. Under the FOIA they were supposed to release out information excluding a few tidbits like SSN, medical screening, etc. However, it was only applied when it benefited the city. If a reported wanted to inspect an employee's file, if the reporter was a city friendly one, they wouldn't remove or blank out any personal information. However, if the reporter was touching on a sensitive area or had a past of irritating the city, they would use the exclusions to delay and only release partial information. Whenever it served a purpose, HIPAA was used as a loophole around the FOIA
As for HIPAA, naturally, when someone would call for an ambulance, we would obtain personal medical information and their SSN (SSN was required to be collected by the state for statistics, whole different issue). This information was documented on a medical report which was stored, passed to the receiving hospital, and reported to the state. Name, address, age, medical issue, and what treatment you received was also documented in a journal.
Originally, when HIPAA went into effect, the attorneys determined that we didn't need to comply because according the the definitions in HIPAA, we were not health care workers. Later on they determined that even though we didn't NEED to comply, that they could cut down on requests for reports if we blocked out some of the more interesting section before releasing them. The legitimacy and ethicalness of releasing some of this info was brought up numerous times only to have FOIA used as the justification. Since HIPAA allows sensitive information to be released if it is needed to conduct your service, FOIA becomes a huge loophole.
So, when it's all said and done, if someone (maybe not even you) called an ambulance for you, it could then be public information if you had a drug problem, AIDS complications, attempted suicide, needed extricated from a goat, as well as your name, age, and address. This was documented in the journal which was public and never censored. BTW , If you weren't cooperative by answering everything we needed you HAD to go into the hospital (an additional issue).
On a separate note, the papers used to publish every call including the persons name, address, and problem.
That must make California the land of the Book People.
I also find it ironic that Oregon, the only state where euthanasia is legal, wants to keep a 17yo from reading about sex.