I guess I'll never know, either. I've never understood why there are so many trucks on the road. If you need a truck to do truck-things, I can understand that. But most of the ones I see aren't hauling a damned thing. Those trucks are obnoxious and dangerous to everyone else on the road, I'd love to see most of them gone.
True. And oddly enough, I manage to hear bicycles in operation just fine (even around blind turns) even though they lack engine noises. This is one of the reasons why I think the "engine noise is a safety issue" argument is a bit bogus.
But you agree that you want to hear it. So then, tell me specifically what is wrong with adjusting that sound to make it more pleasing to the customer?
Because that sound is being inflicted on everyone around the car, not just the customer.
So the auto manufacturers have been intentionally making their cars annoying to the people who don't own those cars? Screw them. I want cars and trucks to be as close to silent as possible. Cars already create far too much noise pollution. Perhaps auto manufacturers to just pipe the sounds inside the car for those owners who desire that, while leaving the rest of us in a more peaceful world?
I saying that it is technically feasible for a competent engineer. I'm not commenting on the contractor's ability to do it.
The ultimate blame falls on governmental policy, not the contractors, though. It is the government who decides what the acceptance criteria are, not the people the government hires. It is the government who approves or disallows the use of third party services, not the people the government hires.
Yes, I understand. I'm just saying that definition of PII is a worthless definition, so it doesn't matter at all. When a company says things like they don't store or share any PII, they're saying nothing that is of any actual value to me. because the definition of PII is too narrow to be meaningful in a privacy or security sense.
IANAL, but I am generally familiar with HIPPA. This is probably not a HIPPA violation because the HIPPA rules only apply to specific sorts of businesses, and the healthcare.gov site is not one of them. For instance, I could share any medical details I had on you as much as I want without violating HIPPA laws.
It sounds like you're using the ad industry's definition of "PII". That definition is ludicrous. The bulk of information that can be used to identify me personally falls outside of the standard definition of "PII", and so the term "PII" is pretty much devoid of meaning.
There is zero evidence that this data is being used for advertising purposes - the article makes a lot of speculation. For example:
I disagree. The evidence is that the data is being sent to them. Nothing more needs to be proven. There is no -- as in zero -- legitimate reason for the site to be doing this. All performance analysis they need can be done in-house.
For example, IBM does both - but they also do pretty good data analysis. Would you rather it goes to some 3rd-world country for analysis (because you can be pretty sure it will be sold)?
I honestly don't see any difference between the two scenarios. I have no reason to think that domestic ad companies are any more trustworthy than 3rd world country companies (and I have several reasons to think that they're not). I'm pretty sure it will be sold either way.
Ahh, I understand. You'd also have to not be an AT&T user. Best bet is to actually test for header injection first, since we don't really know all the carriers that do this. Particularly with the small carriers, since they are just reselling service from the major carriers.
There are only three possible explanations for this: the two phones were using different carriers, or they were being tested in different geographical locations, or the cell carrier itself is making the distinction for some weird reason. The header injection itself is totally unrelated to the phone, the operating system, or what the software on the phone does.
My definition of "tiny" is "under 5,000 people". I live in a state that has no city that is as large as 3 million people. But perhaps there are more than the usual number of electronics hobbyists in my state.
I assume this is due ot a "no track" setting at the browser application level.
The browser has nothing to do with this at all, and there's nothing a browser (or any other software you can run on the phone) can do about it short of using a VPN.
When you did your tests on the Android phone, are you quite certain that you weren't using the WiFi connection? The tracking header is only inserted into traffic that goes over the cell network.
I wonder if we could fuck with this services though by creating a Mozilla addon that inserts this header and fills it with some random garbage on each request. If enough people used it maybe we could DOS their database by filling it with UUID seen only once?
No, that wouldn't work. The header is inserted well after the request leaves your phone. If you insert the header yourself first, it will just get overwritten once you've sent it.
I know this is meant to be a joke, but closing Radio Shack means there is no longer any place you can just run out and grab a specific capacitor or DB9 connector or whatever.
I have never lived in a larger-than-tiny town that didn't have at least one independent electronic supply store within driving range. I haven't set foot in a Radio Shack in years, but I am always totally able to run out and grab components at the last minute.
peer pressue...have you tried to have a social life these days without a stupid FB profile?
Yes, I have, and have found no problems whatsoever doing so. My social life is rich and full and completely Facebook-free. I've never had a date react to my lack of Facebook in a negative way.
I am hoping my hardest hope that my employer won't use this. Right now we're forced to use the thoroughly horrendous Jive app for internal social media "needs", and I fear that Facebook's offering might be better. I fear this because the awfulness of Jive is currently an excellent excuse to avoid using it at all. Replacing it with something less awful might make it more difficult to avoid.
Where only a small percentage of people are making money. Most do not.
Saying the app store and its execution weren't a great revolution shows that you are totally ignorant of how software was made and sold only a few years ago. Small developers for software really didn't exist. Nobody pays for shareware, and making a living as a small dev was basically impossible.
I have decades of experience doing that, and all I can say is that you're dramatically overstating things. Small software developers were, until the last ten years or so, the most common type of developer. They made money. Not everyone, of course, but percentage-wise I think they did better than developers who exclusive use Apple store.
The app store basically recreated the hobby developer market, period, and brought it to a level of mainstream that was never attained by normal PCs.
That's just silly, unless you're talking just about hobbyist Apple developers. The hobby developer market seemed to be largely unaffected by the Apple store. The parts of the hobby sphere that are the most vibrant and growing have nothing to do with iPhone development.
Where is the source code to this EFF app? I don't see it. This means they are not adhering.
This means they are not adhering to what, exactly? I don't think the EFF claimed this was an open sourced app, and I know that the EFF doesn't think that open source is the only legitimate license to develop apps under.
They can't complain about Apple, then NOT release a Windows phone app and not release a Blackberry app and then do an Android app and then NOT release the source code to that and then complain about Apple.
Why not? I'm not seeing the problem there.
I am as big of a fan of the EFF as the next guy, but it is pointless to single out Apple's walled garden when most of the Android mobile carriers install crapware you can't uninstall
.
Something which has nothing to do with Android and everything to do with the agreements between cellphone manufacturers and carriers.
That isn't freedom and arguably less than the typical Apple experience.
I disagree. With the iPhone, I am only allowed to install and use software that Apple says that I can, in ways that Apple says that I can. Android has no such limitation. That's a far more massive infringement on my freedom than not being able to uninstall a piece of crapware.
Web apps don't count, have never counted, and never will count. That's why Apple deigned to allow people to write real apps -- something they adamantly did not want to allow when the iPhone was first released.
in the app store of one of the most breakout popular devices in the history of the entire world, it would thus make it possible for a significant number of additional people to help the EFF achieve the goals aimed at with this particular app.
True as far as it goes. But, firstly, iOS isn't the most popular platform, so choosing not to develop for it isn't automatically a terrible decision. If I were the EFF, I would do the same thing. Nobody should ever accept contractual terms they find objectionable, and especially not if their objection is that the terms are counter to the primary goals of the organization. Staying true to your ethics, particularly for an organization like the EFF, is critically important.
they clearly feel that they are therefore obligated to prevent anyone who owns an Apple device from using their app.
That's a massive distortion. They aren't preventing iPhone users from using their app. They would love to be able to develop one for the iPhone. They are simply electing not to enter into a contractual agreement that they object to. I think it's unfair to paint this as some kind of malicious act against iPhone users. Nobody is ever obligated to enter into contracts.
I'm not saying the ends justify the means—far from it.
It sure sounds like you are. You are, in effect, saying that the EFF is somehow morally obligated to make a deal with the devil because that would let them reach a sizable minority of people.
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I guess I'll never know, either. I've never understood why there are so many trucks on the road. If you need a truck to do truck-things, I can understand that. But most of the ones I see aren't hauling a damned thing. Those trucks are obnoxious and dangerous to everyone else on the road, I'd love to see most of them gone.
True. And oddly enough, I manage to hear bicycles in operation just fine (even around blind turns) even though they lack engine noises. This is one of the reasons why I think the "engine noise is a safety issue" argument is a bit bogus.
But you agree that you want to hear it. So then, tell me specifically what is wrong with adjusting that sound to make it more pleasing to the customer?
Because that sound is being inflicted on everyone around the car, not just the customer.
So the auto manufacturers have been intentionally making their cars annoying to the people who don't own those cars? Screw them. I want cars and trucks to be as close to silent as possible. Cars already create far too much noise pollution. Perhaps auto manufacturers to just pipe the sounds inside the car for those owners who desire that, while leaving the rest of us in a more peaceful world?
I saying that it is technically feasible for a competent engineer. I'm not commenting on the contractor's ability to do it.
The ultimate blame falls on governmental policy, not the contractors, though. It is the government who decides what the acceptance criteria are, not the people the government hires. It is the government who approves or disallows the use of third party services, not the people the government hires.
Yes, I understand. I'm just saying that definition of PII is a worthless definition, so it doesn't matter at all. When a company says things like they don't store or share any PII, they're saying nothing that is of any actual value to me. because the definition of PII is too narrow to be meaningful in a privacy or security sense.
IANAL, but I am generally familiar with HIPPA. This is probably not a HIPPA violation because the HIPPA rules only apply to specific sorts of businesses, and the healthcare.gov site is not one of them. For instance, I could share any medical details I had on you as much as I want without violating HIPPA laws.
It sounds like you're using the ad industry's definition of "PII". That definition is ludicrous. The bulk of information that can be used to identify me personally falls outside of the standard definition of "PII", and so the term "PII" is pretty much devoid of meaning.
There is zero evidence that this data is being used for advertising purposes - the article makes a lot of speculation. For example:
I disagree. The evidence is that the data is being sent to them. Nothing more needs to be proven. There is no -- as in zero -- legitimate reason for the site to be doing this. All performance analysis they need can be done in-house.
For example, IBM does both - but they also do pretty good data analysis. Would you rather it goes to some 3rd-world country for analysis (because you can be pretty sure it will be sold)?
I honestly don't see any difference between the two scenarios. I have no reason to think that domestic ad companies are any more trustworthy than 3rd world country companies (and I have several reasons to think that they're not). I'm pretty sure it will be sold either way.
Ahh, I understand. You'd also have to not be an AT&T user. Best bet is to actually test for header injection first, since we don't really know all the carriers that do this. Particularly with the small carriers, since they are just reselling service from the major carriers.
There are only three possible explanations for this: the two phones were using different carriers, or they were being tested in different geographical locations, or the cell carrier itself is making the distinction for some weird reason. The header injection itself is totally unrelated to the phone, the operating system, or what the software on the phone does.
My definition of "tiny" is "under 5,000 people". I live in a state that has no city that is as large as 3 million people. But perhaps there are more than the usual number of electronics hobbyists in my state.
I assume this is due ot a "no track" setting at the browser application level.
The browser has nothing to do with this at all, and there's nothing a browser (or any other software you can run on the phone) can do about it short of using a VPN.
When you did your tests on the Android phone, are you quite certain that you weren't using the WiFi connection? The tracking header is only inserted into traffic that goes over the cell network.
I wonder if we could fuck with this services though by creating a Mozilla addon that inserts this header and fills it with some random garbage on each request. If enough people used it maybe we could DOS their database by filling it with UUID seen only once?
No, that wouldn't work. The header is inserted well after the request leaves your phone. If you insert the header yourself first, it will just get overwritten once you've sent it.
I know this is meant to be a joke, but closing Radio Shack means there is no longer any place you can just run out and grab a specific capacitor or DB9 connector or whatever.
I have never lived in a larger-than-tiny town that didn't have at least one independent electronic supply store within driving range. I haven't set foot in a Radio Shack in years, but I am always totally able to run out and grab components at the last minute.
Meh. Radio Shack actually died decades ago, once they decided to stop being an actual parts supply store. All of my sadness passed way back then.
You don't have an real electronic supply stores in your area? My sympathies...
I am, actually.
Doesn't everybody?
Fortunately, no.
peer pressue...have you tried to have a social life these days without a stupid FB profile?
Yes, I have, and have found no problems whatsoever doing so. My social life is rich and full and completely Facebook-free. I've never had a date react to my lack of Facebook in a negative way.
I am hoping my hardest hope that my employer won't use this. Right now we're forced to use the thoroughly horrendous Jive app for internal social media "needs", and I fear that Facebook's offering might be better. I fear this because the awfulness of Jive is currently an excellent excuse to avoid using it at all. Replacing it with something less awful might make it more difficult to avoid.
It's a labor camp where people are making money.
Where only a small percentage of people are making money. Most do not.
Saying the app store and its execution weren't a great revolution shows that you are totally ignorant of how software was made and sold only a few years ago. Small developers for software really didn't exist. Nobody pays for shareware, and making a living as a small dev was basically impossible.
I have decades of experience doing that, and all I can say is that you're dramatically overstating things. Small software developers were, until the last ten years or so, the most common type of developer. They made money. Not everyone, of course, but percentage-wise I think they did better than developers who exclusive use Apple store.
The app store basically recreated the hobby developer market, period, and brought it to a level of mainstream that was never attained by normal PCs.
That's just silly, unless you're talking just about hobbyist Apple developers. The hobby developer market seemed to be largely unaffected by the Apple store. The parts of the hobby sphere that are the most vibrant and growing have nothing to do with iPhone development.
Where is the source code to this EFF app? I don't see it. This means they are not adhering.
This means they are not adhering to what, exactly? I don't think the EFF claimed this was an open sourced app, and I know that the EFF doesn't think that open source is the only legitimate license to develop apps under.
They can't complain about Apple, then NOT release a Windows phone app and not release a Blackberry app and then do an Android app and then NOT release the source code to that and then complain about Apple.
Why not? I'm not seeing the problem there.
I am as big of a fan of the EFF as the next guy, but it is pointless to single out Apple's walled garden when most of the Android mobile carriers install crapware you can't uninstall
.
Something which has nothing to do with Android and everything to do with the agreements between cellphone manufacturers and carriers.
That isn't freedom and arguably less than the typical Apple experience.
I disagree. With the iPhone, I am only allowed to install and use software that Apple says that I can, in ways that Apple says that I can. Android has no such limitation. That's a far more massive infringement on my freedom than not being able to uninstall a piece of crapware.
Web apps don't count, have never counted, and never will count. That's why Apple deigned to allow people to write real apps -- something they adamantly did not want to allow when the iPhone was first released.
in the app store of one of the most breakout popular devices in the history of the entire world, it would thus make it possible for a significant number of additional people to help the EFF achieve the goals aimed at with this particular app.
True as far as it goes. But, firstly, iOS isn't the most popular platform, so choosing not to develop for it isn't automatically a terrible decision. If I were the EFF, I would do the same thing. Nobody should ever accept contractual terms they find objectionable, and especially not if their objection is that the terms are counter to the primary goals of the organization. Staying true to your ethics, particularly for an organization like the EFF, is critically important.
they clearly feel that they are therefore obligated to prevent anyone who owns an Apple device from using their app.
That's a massive distortion. They aren't preventing iPhone users from using their app. They would love to be able to develop one for the iPhone. They are simply electing not to enter into a contractual agreement that they object to. I think it's unfair to paint this as some kind of malicious act against iPhone users. Nobody is ever obligated to enter into contracts.
I'm not saying the ends justify the means—far from it.
It sure sounds like you are. You are, in effect, saying that the EFF is somehow morally obligated to make a deal with the devil because that would let them reach a sizable minority of people.