Here's an idea: I think we should regard all personal data as copyrighted from the instant reduced to tangible form (our lives). We should then unleash Etoys-like lawyer-hellhounds on anyone who infringes.
I think these fears will be like Y2K -- peaking when the least is known, so that imagination (and charlatans) can run free, then dying out once reality asserts itself. People understand genetics even less than computers, allowing them to fear silly things under the guidance of hucksters like Jeremy "Repeal the Enlightenment" Rifkin.
Here's a conspiracy theory for you: a whole industry of techno-doomsayers has an incentive to paint lifesaving technologies as deadly in order to sell dumb books to gullible people. When their predictions of disaster don't materialize (are you reading this, Paul Ehrlich?) they get off scot-free. Yet thousands, even millions, may have died because technologies they criticized never got developed, or got developed late. Is this less evil than the depredations of those horrible Big Corporations? Phillip Morris is being sued for feathering its nest through lies and misrepresentations. Why should technology critics get a pass? How about liability for loosing toxic memes?
I read the book and it's excellent -- historically accurate and very evocative at the same time. It's particularly interesting at a time when current ideas of bravery and masculinity are so mixed up. The Spartans' thoughts on the subject seem quite cogent. If you really want to get into the subject matter, read it along with Stephen Ambrose's "Citizen Soldiers" and Dave Grossman's "On Killing." Then, for a laugh, read Susan Faludi's "Stiffed."
I just checked the WESTLAW periodicals database and found lots of mentions of leonardos di caprio and da vinci but nothing about this raid. That doesn't mean it's a hoax, but it doesn't inspire confidence.
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Here's an idea: I think we should regard all personal data as copyrighted from the instant reduced to tangible form (our lives). We should then unleash Etoys-like lawyer-hellhounds on anyone who infringes.
I think these fears will be like Y2K -- peaking when the least is known, so that imagination (and charlatans) can run free, then dying out once reality asserts itself. People understand genetics even less than computers, allowing them to fear silly things under the guidance of hucksters like Jeremy "Repeal the Enlightenment" Rifkin.
Here's a conspiracy theory for you: a whole industry of techno-doomsayers has an incentive to paint lifesaving technologies as deadly in order to sell dumb books to gullible people. When their predictions of disaster don't materialize (are you reading this, Paul Ehrlich?) they get off scot-free. Yet thousands, even millions, may have died because technologies they criticized never got developed, or got developed late. Is this less evil than the depredations of those horrible Big Corporations? Phillip Morris is being sued for feathering its nest through lies and misrepresentations. Why should technology critics get a pass? How about liability for loosing toxic memes?
I read the book and it's excellent -- historically accurate and very evocative at the same time. It's particularly interesting at a time when current ideas of bravery and masculinity are so mixed up. The Spartans' thoughts on the subject seem quite cogent. If you really want to get into the subject matter, read it along with Stephen Ambrose's "Citizen Soldiers" and Dave Grossman's "On Killing." Then, for a laugh, read Susan Faludi's "Stiffed."
I just checked the WESTLAW periodicals database and found lots of mentions of leonardos di caprio and da vinci but nothing about this raid. That doesn't mean it's a hoax, but it doesn't inspire confidence.