Libraries don't need to depend on a public interest to justify registering people. They just need to get their books back. In addition, a lending library does not have to be "free". A library can quite easily charge a subscription fee, in which case registration would be identicalto membership.
The same applies to online sites that require registration. They have no public interest to bear in mind. They are private enterprises which are on the web to further their own interests.
No one is compelled to use these sites, and no one is compelled to register. The power to deal with this issue is in the hands of the people complaining about registration. If enough people avoid these sites, they will alter their entry requirements.
In the meantime, this appears to me to be a case of a minority trying to foster legislation to adcance their own speical interest.
If these sites charged a subscription fee, your concerns about spam and privacy would persist, but I suspect most of the complaints would go silent.
Are you saying that the FBI shouldn't be allowed to monitor criminal conversations because you're afraid a few non-criminals might be monitored? Are you will to give criminals complete freedom to conspire in secret?
>> ...a lot of laws are made on a more or less ad-hoc basis
Where? Last I heard they were made in the legislatures.
>> Something happens, ie the WTC-bombing, and politicians throw up one or more new laws.
And, your problem is...? Legislatures creating law in response to events. Imagine that.
>> The governement in Orwell's 1984...
There was no Orwell's 1984. It's a novel.
Governments have always had the right, and the ability, to monitor people. That's what the police power is about. Technology makes it easier to do, but the fundamental right has been there all along. In a democracy, people can replace the politicians who made laws they don't like. Personally, I don't feel any loss of privacy or other threat from any of these developments. If the government wants to spend money watching me, fine, that won't affect my behavior.
As for Linux and patents, well, patents are civil, not criminal , issues, so the worst that can happen is a bunch of lawsuits. Even then, if some people have knowingly inserted patented code or algorithnms in their Linux code, they deserve what's coming, especially for abusing the trust of the Linux community. Regardless of any individual's position on software patents, it is foolish to ignore reality.
Silly argument. No right, including a right to privacy, extends to criminal behavior. If you conspire to commit a crime, you can hide behind a right to privacy.
E.g., you have a right to free speech. However, libel and slander are crimes. Your right to speak freely will not protect you from charges of libel or slander.
E.g., we have a right to assemble. If that assembly becomes a mob, we have committed a crime.
>>"you can't enforce a law against allowing criminals to hide behind cryptography without outlawing cryptography, do you support outlawing cryptography."
Don't believe I said anything like that. I said use of cryptography doesn't confer a right to privacy. If the FBI has reason to seek a tap on a conversation, they do not give up that right because the parties to the converstation encrypt their dialogue.
I don't believe it is necessary to outlaw cryptographic software to achieve this. It does mean that the FBI needs the means to break encryptions. This can be done technically or by mandating the vendors of cryptographic tools provide the FBI with the means to break their encryption. Could this be reliably enforced outside the U.S.? No, but that's no reason not to enforce it where we can. Opposing such a law because it would "enrich" people in other countries is rather lack opposing a law banning trafficking in slaves because it will only shift the profits from the trade offshore.
It is a deliberately absurd statement to highlight the equal absurdity of the post it answers.
This isn't about technology. Freedom to use a technology -- cryptography in this case -- does not extend to using it to commit crimes. To continue the baseball analogy, you're free to use a bat however you wish, but that freedom won't protect you if you use it to murder someone.
Use of cryptography does not confer a right to hide criminal conversations from legal authorities. Nothing confers a right to keep criminal conversations private.
You don't enforce a law against cryptography. You enforce a law against conspiracy by not allowing criminals to hide behind cryptography. If that means cryptography is less cryptic, so be it.
>>"How do you design the protocol such that the FBI can decrypt it but the voyeur down the hall can't?"
I don't know, nor do I care. The same logic might be applied to baseball bats: How do you design a baseball bat that can't be used by a murderer to bash in someone's skull? A silly question, obviously. It isn't the technology, it's the behavior that's the issue.
Yes, but use of it does not confer a right to privacy. It simply means you want to hide your information from everyone except the recipient. E.g., your encrypted email is no more private than your unencrypted email. It is just more difficult to read.
"Morally right" is a cultural variable. In a democracy, it is the law that counts, not an individual's moral beliefs. If that individual holds to a belief that runs counter to the law, then that individual must expect to bear the cost of violating the law. No law-abiding nation can excuse criminality simply because the criminal asserts he or she believes the criminal behavior is moral.
Cryptography doesn't confer a right to privacy. It is analagous to hiding.
Would you argue that the FBI should not be allowed to look for criminals who are hiding? Who use coded messages? If not, why would you assert that the use of cryprography to hide a message means the FBI has no right to see that message?
I know this will upset the/. gang, but I have no problem with the FBI being able to monitor conversation between criminals.
As the cliche goes, if you're not a criminal, you have nothing to worry about. If you're paranoid, I'd guess you shut up anytime a cop comes within hearing distance.
Do we have a right to privacy? Sure. Do we have a right to keep criminal conversations private? No. Is this subject to abuse? Sure. Will we be abused by criminals who conspire in private? Of course.
Given the choice between giving criminals the freedom to conspire in private or the ability of the FBI to wiretap criminals, I've no problem opting for the former.
In any case, the net is a public place. Nothing there is private.
Only in the perverse little world of Slashdot could pandering "editors" (I use the term reluctantly because to connect Slashdot with journalism slanders that profession) label registration as a rights issue.
No one has a right to read anything posted on the web unless the poster wants you to read it. If they want to control, or identify, or count, or sell to, their readers, that's their right.
You wanna borrow a book from your public library? Well, first you need to sign up with the library. When are we gonna see Slashdot leading the charge against that particular windmill?
Bitchin' and moanin' from Slashdot weenies because the NYT wants them to login merits contempt.
I take your point, but is it still true that only the stable release gets security updates? And is there still a note on the Debian site specifically warning people away from testing and unstable?
Great, but in the world I live in, unstable means "not stable". As a user, I don't care if API's and dependencies change, so long as the software that's on my machine works.
Unless you send reporters out to cover stories and write original reports, you are not creating news. Your aggregator would not work unless someone else was creating and writing the news.
If some people like aggregators, fine. I don't. As for "highlighting the differences", I haven't seen any aggregator yet than can tell me "ABC reports this story in this way, but XYZ reports it this way, and here's why." I don't believe that can be done without human intervention. (Running a diff on the copy would be pointless.)
The bottom line is you seem to think aggregators bring a degree of fairness to a world full of biased and unfair media sources. I don't, because aggregators can only point to copy written by someone else. If a story is unfair, it remains unfair after an aggregator points to it. The pseudo-random selection of aggregators, therefore, provides only an illusion of fairness.
I'm using Munjoy Linux, a very good unstable derivative, on my desktop.
But, here's the question: if "Unstable" is so stable, why is it called "unstable"? Why isn't it called "Desktop"? Why isn't "Stable" called "Mission Critical Server"?
The continuing use of the label "Unstable" obviously does not accord with a reality in which almost every other distribution uses the same software rather reliably.
1. So, you are arguing that when CNN carries a CNN story in preference to a FOX story, that is a paid placement and an unethical act? You would have me believe that a news site giving preference to content produced by its own employeess is wrong. That's absurd.
2. What wool? What eyes? What are you talking about? It's an MSNBC site. The fact that it uses an aggregator doesn't commit it to selecting stories at random. I expect it to favor it's own amterial. What's your problem?
3. I am not defending MS. Nor did I say that the story selection on the MSNBC site won't impact the consumer. I'm a consumer. I don't expect Google, MSNBC or any other news source to bring me all the news in a perfectly objective and unbiased manner. That's impossible and, frankly, undesirable. I know that there are reasons why a story is given preference on Google and on MSNBC, and that other reports are available elsewhere.
4. Maybe MSNBC stories are "no more relevant"than Googles. Maybe not. Depends on your definition of relevant. Both sites are pretty useless to me, because random selection is not equal to fiar selection.
Frankly, I've lost track of what it is you're trying to say. It sounds like you're arguing that the MS site is acting unethically by giving preference to its own stories. If so, I think that's a ludicrous position. You accuse me of defeding this alleged unethical behavior, when all I've done is point to the behavior.
News does not pop into existence in a vacuum. All news is created and reported by someone with a point of view, ither interests, pressures, and a deadline. If news consumers don't understand that and make an effort to comprehend the influences working on their chosen news providers, they are naive. By definition, software aggregators create and report no news. An aggregators selection might appear to be random, but random doesn't mean fair, and random certainly doesn't mean intelligent, useful, or comprehensive.
Slashdot Mirror
Libraries don't need to depend on a public interest to justify registering people. They just need to get their books back. In addition, a lending library does not have to be "free". A library can quite easily charge a subscription fee, in which case registration would be identicalto membership.
The same applies to online sites that require registration. They have no public interest to bear in mind. They are private enterprises which are on the web to further their own interests.
No one is compelled to use these sites, and no one is compelled to register. The power to deal with this issue is in the hands of the people complaining about registration. If enough people avoid these sites, they will alter their entry requirements.
In the meantime, this appears to me to be a case of a minority trying to foster legislation to adcance their own speical interest.
If these sites charged a subscription fee, your concerns about spam and privacy would persist, but I suspect most of the complaints would go silent.
Presumably, you are either an engineer or a wannabe engineer. Both are inclined to confuse facts with truth.
The original post cited Orwell's 1984 as it it had been real. It is a work of fiction.
I have to say, then, that you're a fool, and a dangerous fool.
And, what grade are you in? Come back when you grow up.
Are you saying that the FBI shouldn't be allowed to monitor criminal conversations because you're afraid a few non-criminals might be monitored? Are you will to give criminals complete freedom to conspire in secret?
>> ...a lot of laws are made on a more or less ad-hoc basis
Where? Last I heard they were made in the legislatures.
>> Something happens, ie the WTC-bombing, and politicians throw up one or more new laws.
And, your problem is...? Legislatures creating law in response to events. Imagine that.
>> The governement in Orwell's 1984...
There was no Orwell's 1984. It's a novel.
Governments have always had the right, and the ability, to monitor people. That's what the police power is about. Technology makes it easier to do, but the fundamental right has been there all along. In a democracy, people can replace the politicians who made laws they don't like. Personally, I don't feel any loss of privacy or other threat from any of these developments. If the government wants to spend money watching me, fine, that won't affect my behavior.
As for Linux and patents, well, patents are civil, not criminal , issues, so the worst that can happen is a bunch of lawsuits. Even then, if some people have knowingly inserted patented code or algorithnms in their Linux code, they deserve what's coming, especially for abusing the trust of the Linux community. Regardless of any individual's position on software patents, it is foolish to ignore reality.
>>" Viewing a web page is obviously quite different.
Which means...what? That registration is some kind of venal sin? Other than Slashdot paranoia, what's fueling this nutty opposition to reigstration?
Education by fiction or bad movies. You're doing well.
No one has explained just how any of this would actually affect my privacy.
You're obviously an ideologue immune to logic. Try avoiding talk radio.
Silly argument. No right, including a right to privacy, extends to criminal behavior. If you conspire to commit a crime, you can hide behind a right to privacy.
E.g., you have a right to free speech. However, libel and slander are crimes. Your right to speak freely will not protect you from charges of libel or slander.
E.g., we have a right to assemble. If that assembly becomes a mob, we have committed a crime.
So, no, rights are not absolute.
>>"... zero semantic content..."
Get an "A" in that class?
>>"you can't enforce a law against allowing criminals to hide behind cryptography without outlawing cryptography, do you support outlawing cryptography."
Don't believe I said anything like that. I said use of cryptography doesn't confer a right to privacy. If the FBI has reason to seek a tap on a conversation, they do not give up that right because the parties to the converstation encrypt their dialogue.
I don't believe it is necessary to outlaw cryptographic software to achieve this. It does mean that the FBI needs the means to break encryptions. This can be done technically or by mandating the vendors of cryptographic tools provide the FBI with the means to break their encryption. Could this be reliably enforced outside the U.S.? No, but that's no reason not to enforce it where we can. Opposing such a law because it would "enrich" people in other countries is rather lack opposing a law banning trafficking in slaves because it will only shift the profits from the trade offshore.
What if, what if, what if. So many what if's...what if you built a scarecrow and then took it apart?
I guess we better do away with all laws 'cause you never know: What if somone in the future abuses one of them?
It is a deliberately absurd statement to highlight the equal absurdity of the post it answers.
This isn't about technology. Freedom to use a technology -- cryptography in this case -- does not extend to using it to commit crimes. To continue the baseball analogy, you're free to use a bat however you wish, but that freedom won't protect you if you use it to murder someone.
Use of cryptography does not confer a right to hide criminal conversations from legal authorities. Nothing confers a right to keep criminal conversations private.
You don't enforce a law against cryptography. You enforce a law against conspiracy by not allowing criminals to hide behind cryptography. If that means cryptography is less cryptic, so be it.
>>"How do you design the protocol such that the FBI can decrypt it but the voyeur down the hall can't?"
I don't know, nor do I care. The same logic might be applied to baseball bats: How do you design a baseball bat that can't be used by a murderer to bash in someone's skull? A silly question, obviously. It isn't the technology, it's the behavior that's the issue.
>>"Encryption is a vital tool of a free market."
Yes, but use of it does not confer a right to privacy. It simply means you want to hide your information from everyone except the recipient. E.g., your encrypted email is no more private than your unencrypted email. It is just more difficult to read.
"Morally right" is a cultural variable. In a democracy, it is the law that counts, not an individual's moral beliefs. If that individual holds to a belief that runs counter to the law, then that individual must expect to bear the cost of violating the law. No law-abiding nation can excuse criminality simply because the criminal asserts he or she believes the criminal behavior is moral.
Cryptography doesn't confer a right to privacy. It is analagous to hiding.
Would you argue that the FBI should not be allowed to look for criminals who are hiding? Who use coded messages? If not, why would you assert that the use of cryprography to hide a message means the FBI has no right to see that message?
I know this will upset the /. gang, but I have no problem with the FBI being able to monitor conversation between criminals.
As the cliche goes, if you're not a criminal, you have nothing to worry about. If you're paranoid, I'd guess you shut up anytime a cop comes within hearing distance.
Do we have a right to privacy? Sure. Do we have a right to keep criminal conversations private? No. Is this subject to abuse? Sure. Will we be abused by criminals who conspire in private? Of course.
Given the choice between giving criminals the freedom to conspire in private or the ability of the FBI to wiretap criminals, I've no problem opting for the former.
In any case, the net is a public place. Nothing there is private.
Only in the perverse little world of Slashdot could pandering "editors" (I use the term reluctantly because to connect Slashdot with journalism slanders that profession) label registration as a rights issue.
No one has a right to read anything posted on the web unless the poster wants you to read it. If they want to control, or identify, or count, or sell to, their readers, that's their right.
You wanna borrow a book from your public library? Well, first you need to sign up with the library. When are we gonna see Slashdot leading the charge against that particular windmill?
Bitchin' and moanin' from Slashdot weenies because the NYT wants them to login merits contempt.
I take your point, but is it still true that only the stable release gets security updates? And is there still a note on the Debian site specifically warning people away from testing and unstable?
Great, but in the world I live in, unstable means "not stable". As a user, I don't care if API's and dependencies change, so long as the software that's on my machine works.
Meta-news? What's that?
Unless you send reporters out to cover stories and write original reports, you are not creating news. Your aggregator would not work unless someone else was creating and writing the news.
If some people like aggregators, fine. I don't. As for "highlighting the differences", I haven't seen any aggregator yet than can tell me "ABC reports this story in this way, but XYZ reports it this way, and here's why." I don't believe that can be done without human intervention. (Running a diff on the copy would be pointless.)
The bottom line is you seem to think aggregators bring a degree of fairness to a world full of biased and unfair media sources. I don't, because aggregators can only point to copy written by someone else. If a story is unfair, it remains unfair after an aggregator points to it. The pseudo-random selection of aggregators, therefore, provides only an illusion of fairness.
Yes and no.
I'm using Munjoy Linux, a very good unstable derivative, on my desktop.
But, here's the question: if "Unstable" is so stable, why is it called "unstable"? Why isn't it called "Desktop"? Why isn't "Stable" called "Mission Critical Server"?
The continuing use of the label "Unstable" obviously does not accord with a reality in which almost every other distribution uses the same software rather reliably.
1. So, you are arguing that when CNN carries a CNN story in preference to a FOX story, that is a paid placement and an unethical act? You would have me believe that a news site giving preference to content produced by its own employeess is wrong. That's absurd.
2. What wool? What eyes? What are you talking about? It's an MSNBC site. The fact that it uses an aggregator doesn't commit it to selecting stories at random. I expect it to favor it's own amterial. What's your problem?
3. I am not defending MS. Nor did I say that the story selection on the MSNBC site won't impact the consumer. I'm a consumer. I don't expect Google, MSNBC or any other news source to bring me all the news in a perfectly objective and unbiased manner. That's impossible and, frankly, undesirable. I know that there are reasons why a story is given preference on Google and on MSNBC, and that other reports are available elsewhere.
4. Maybe MSNBC stories are "no more relevant"than Googles. Maybe not. Depends on your definition of relevant. Both sites are pretty useless to me, because random selection is not equal to fiar selection.
Frankly, I've lost track of what it is you're trying to say. It sounds like you're arguing that the MS site is acting unethically by giving preference to its own stories. If so, I think that's a ludicrous position. You accuse me of defeding this alleged unethical behavior, when all I've done is point to the behavior.
News does not pop into existence in a vacuum. All news is created and reported by someone with a point of view, ither interests, pressures, and a deadline. If news consumers don't understand that and make an effort to comprehend the influences working on their chosen news providers, they are naive. By definition, software aggregators create and report no news. An aggregators selection might appear to be random, but random doesn't mean fair, and random certainly doesn't mean intelligent, useful, or comprehensive.