Every time a website censors users, someone trots this out on slashdot. Maybe some of us believe corporations shouldn't have the right to deny services based on political, religious, etc beliefs? Not saying I agree with the software project at all, or github's handling of it. Simply saying "they own it so they can do what they want" is a dangerous argument, especially when so much of the web is managed by private companies.
Just because you haven't seen it, doesn't mean it isn't there. (http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2010/jan/14/google-praised-human-rights-activists as one example). Another might be their investments in green tech (http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/13/11/16/1655232/googles-wind-solar-power-investments-top-1b). Positive press for the company is out there.
As for the feature itself - Google has an easy PR move here. "The feature was released early without sufficient testing, however we are actively looking at ways to protect user privacy". Instant win.
Why does it bug you when a company gets crap for being abusive? They also get praise for when the fight the good fight, and criticism for when they are on the wrong side of things. That strikes me as a good thing.
Seeing a lot of comments espousing the sentiment that we already know the answer, so this won't help. They each claim a different answer. Which one is having the most impact? Is it a combination? Is there something out there we are using that is doing damage we don't yet see? Are any proposed ideas problematic?
The fact is - more research always helps - so long as it is not taken as an excuse for inaction when known issues are present. Glad to see work is being done to further understand the problem, and I hope the diverse reasons cited in the comments for this article are taken seriously and addressed before it is too late.
What can we do? Pressure the FCC to take stronger action. Pressure our representatives to give the FCC more power to take stronger action in situations like this. Create a public database of companies and apps that are known to spy on users, and attack their bottom line.
Comments like this should not be modded up. The article is about the recently delayed approval of a book, and the fact that Texas is continuing to elect anti-science fundamentalists to this board. That said it also looks like there was a step forward - more approval and less watering down. All of these items are newsworthy.
But even if none of the information was new, the situation is ongoing. An ongoing struggle to dampen scientific education within the US is most certainly news for Nerds.
That is the question I'd like to start with. Because I'd answer yes it is. I don't want my identity stolen, my economic future decided by whether my boss sees a photo a friend of a friend of mine posted 5 years ago to a social networking site I didn't join, or my emails to my ex-girlfriend read by anyone other than me or her. So if it is worth protecting, then when we realize "how can you protect your privacy" is really broken up into subdomains, and for many of those the answer is "right now you cannot", we have motivation to then ask "how can we change that?".
I love how you are posting as an AC. The Koch Brothers are trying to do the same thing, and when they spin themselves as nonpartisan, that helps obscure their role. They are so proud of their massive influence in American politics, they go to great lengths to hide it. They aren't fooling anyone.
Not all laws are equal. A law limiting how much toxic waste a company can dump near your drinking water is different than one stopping companies from selling you an extra super size soda.
Some of the laws you really hate come from people saying "there ought to be a law", corporations saying "we'll pay you to make it weak", and politicians saying "deal".
Questions like this - that reduce increased health care coverage to raw money out - miss all of the points. It misses the ethical importance of health care access. It misses the increased productivity of increased health. And as we move closer to universal health care - the career mobility and flexibility possible when you no longer need to depend on a particular job for health care access. ObamaCare is an investment in our economic future, and a small step in the right direction.
"What kind of computer should I get?" I will only be advising Linux mint for those people where Linux is a good fit; that is those people who surf the web, send gmails, watch YouTube, and type the occasional document.
I use linux to write software, play games on steam, lightly edit videos with kdenlive, record voice overs with audacity, and create posters with gimp. Linux doesn't have everything down perfectly, but it is a wonderful system for more than just web browsing and document editing. It's biggest flaw is uneven hardware support, but that is getting better every day.
Well this is an interesting thing to think about. In some cases it could be near impossible to prove, but it isn't hard to imagine a scenario in which it is easy to prove. You sext your sig other, you break up over text, they upload the photo. You can trace when the photo first appeared online, and compare it to the original sext and the breakup text. Once you've established a sext was uploaded (anonymously at that) after a breakup, fitting it into this law sounds workable for a good prosecutor. But someone sufficiently careful covering their tracks might still be able to get away with it, of course, but that's true of any crime.
Yeah, can't imagine the government sticking its nose into something like an ex posting naked photos of you publicly with the intent to shame you. What's strange is this isn't already against the law. Or that you seem baffled by the idea of intent figuring into the law. Wow.
If you depend on your internet connection to do you job, can you sacrifice your connection? What if most of the people who live in your area are ok with a censored web, because most people just don't care. Do you think voting with your wallet will have any impact?
No one is claiming *all* men are like this, but some are - and it is a problem. Victim blaming and closing your eyes won't help solve a very real problem (http://www.marieclaire.com/career-money/jobs/geeks-attack). This is not an isolated problem - its an indicative incident and a teaching moment. Let's not waste it by jamming our fingers in our ears and humming angrily. Let's listen.
Of course it is a French thing. Those thin scientists at the French Institute Alliance Française have come up with a way to make Americans thin... But to what end?!
Didn't take long for the Anonymous "don't believe the scientists" comments to start filtering in, did it? How about, given the scientific consensus (http://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus), I'm pretty skeptical of the motivations and accuracy of a denier.
I can speak only for myself and most of my friends, and we are happy to criticize Obama for making the same mistakes Bush made, sometimes far far worse (as in how he handles whistleblowers). I have encountered far too many progressives who do exactly what your describe, and it is saddening and frustrating as hell. That being said, my points about Obama (he is not a progressive, he is very much a moderate Democrat), and reality (progressives don't deny reality itself, even if some do refuse to face it) still stand. Also, you'll find a number of "serious people" like journalists, centrists (Republican and Democrat) and folks from the corporate world still support the President. Jokes on the rest of the country, I guess, when Republicans try to put an insane, detached from reality conservative forth, and the Democrats vomit up Hillary rather than a progressive candidate.
"Move along. Nothing to see here" is even more condescending when its patently false. The whole story, not just that one incident, is one of a company in trouble and its inability to effectively navigate the downward spiral.
Slashdot Mirror
Every time a website censors users, someone trots this out on slashdot. Maybe some of us believe corporations shouldn't have the right to deny services based on political, religious, etc beliefs? Not saying I agree with the software project at all, or github's handling of it. Simply saying "they own it so they can do what they want" is a dangerous argument, especially when so much of the web is managed by private companies.
Just because you haven't seen it, doesn't mean it isn't there. (http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2010/jan/14/google-praised-human-rights-activists as one example). Another might be their investments in green tech (http://hardware.slashdot.org/story/13/11/16/1655232/googles-wind-solar-power-investments-top-1b). Positive press for the company is out there.
As for the feature itself - Google has an easy PR move here. "The feature was released early without sufficient testing, however we are actively looking at ways to protect user privacy". Instant win.
Why does it bug you when a company gets crap for being abusive? They also get praise for when the fight the good fight, and criticism for when they are on the wrong side of things. That strikes me as a good thing.
Seeing a lot of comments espousing the sentiment that we already know the answer, so this won't help. They each claim a different answer. Which one is having the most impact? Is it a combination? Is there something out there we are using that is doing damage we don't yet see? Are any proposed ideas problematic?
The fact is - more research always helps - so long as it is not taken as an excuse for inaction when known issues are present. Glad to see work is being done to further understand the problem, and I hope the diverse reasons cited in the comments for this article are taken seriously and addressed before it is too late.
What can we do? Pressure the FCC to take stronger action. Pressure our representatives to give the FCC more power to take stronger action in situations like this. Create a public database of companies and apps that are known to spy on users, and attack their bottom line.
Comments like this should not be modded up. The article is about the recently delayed approval of a book, and the fact that Texas is continuing to elect anti-science fundamentalists to this board. That said it also looks like there was a step forward - more approval and less watering down. All of these items are newsworthy.
But even if none of the information was new, the situation is ongoing. An ongoing struggle to dampen scientific education within the US is most certainly news for Nerds.
That is the question I'd like to start with. Because I'd answer yes it is. I don't want my identity stolen, my economic future decided by whether my boss sees a photo a friend of a friend of mine posted 5 years ago to a social networking site I didn't join, or my emails to my ex-girlfriend read by anyone other than me or her. So if it is worth protecting, then when we realize "how can you protect your privacy" is really broken up into subdomains, and for many of those the answer is "right now you cannot", we have motivation to then ask "how can we change that?".
What happens between 2013 and 2015 to make government interrogation not an issue? ::pulls seat closer, grabs popcorn::
I love how you are posting as an AC. The Koch Brothers are trying to do the same thing, and when they spin themselves as nonpartisan, that helps obscure their role. They are so proud of their massive influence in American politics, they go to great lengths to hide it. They aren't fooling anyone.
Not all laws are equal. A law limiting how much toxic waste a company can dump near your drinking water is different than one stopping companies from selling you an extra super size soda.
Some of the laws you really hate come from people saying "there ought to be a law", corporations saying "we'll pay you to make it weak", and politicians saying "deal".
Questions like this - that reduce increased health care coverage to raw money out - miss all of the points. It misses the ethical importance of health care access. It misses the increased productivity of increased health. And as we move closer to universal health care - the career mobility and flexibility possible when you no longer need to depend on a particular job for health care access. ObamaCare is an investment in our economic future, and a small step in the right direction.
I use linux to write software, play games on steam, lightly edit videos with kdenlive, record voice overs with audacity, and create posters with gimp. Linux doesn't have everything down perfectly, but it is a wonderful system for more than just web browsing and document editing. It's biggest flaw is uneven hardware support, but that is getting better every day.
Well this is an interesting thing to think about. In some cases it could be near impossible to prove, but it isn't hard to imagine a scenario in which it is easy to prove. You sext your sig other, you break up over text, they upload the photo. You can trace when the photo first appeared online, and compare it to the original sext and the breakup text. Once you've established a sext was uploaded (anonymously at that) after a breakup, fitting it into this law sounds workable for a good prosecutor. But someone sufficiently careful covering their tracks might still be able to get away with it, of course, but that's true of any crime.
Yeah, can't imagine the government sticking its nose into something like an ex posting naked photos of you publicly with the intent to shame you. What's strange is this isn't already against the law. Or that you seem baffled by the idea of intent figuring into the law. Wow.
Exactly, I want to see a source. It would be especially neat to see the political leanings of the free software vs open source communities (and overlap of course): http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-for-freedom.html
If you depend on your internet connection to do you job, can you sacrifice your connection? What if most of the people who live in your area are ok with a censored web, because most people just don't care. Do you think voting with your wallet will have any impact?
No one is claiming *all* men are like this, but some are - and it is a problem. Victim blaming and closing your eyes won't help solve a very real problem (http://www.marieclaire.com/career-money/jobs/geeks-attack). This is not an isolated problem - its an indicative incident and a teaching moment. Let's not waste it by jamming our fingers in our ears and humming angrily. Let's listen.
Incorrect - it is an issue: http://www.gmanetwork.com/news/story/314896/lifestyle/healthandwellness/fda-second-hand-smoke-from-e-cigarettes-may-be-harmful-to-your-health
Tony Stark was able to build it in a cave! With a BOX OF SCRAPS!!
Exactly this. Should be modded Funny. Or sad, depending on how your own day is going. Definitely not insightful.
Of course it is a French thing. Those thin scientists at the French Institute Alliance Française have come up with a way to make Americans thin... But to what end?!
Didn't take long for the Anonymous "don't believe the scientists" comments to start filtering in, did it? How about, given the scientific consensus (http://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus), I'm pretty skeptical of the motivations and accuracy of a denier.
I can speak only for myself and most of my friends, and we are happy to criticize Obama for making the same mistakes Bush made, sometimes far far worse (as in how he handles whistleblowers). I have encountered far too many progressives who do exactly what your describe, and it is saddening and frustrating as hell. That being said, my points about Obama (he is not a progressive, he is very much a moderate Democrat), and reality (progressives don't deny reality itself, even if some do refuse to face it) still stand. Also, you'll find a number of "serious people" like journalists, centrists (Republican and Democrat) and folks from the corporate world still support the President. Jokes on the rest of the country, I guess, when Republicans try to put an insane, detached from reality conservative forth, and the Democrats vomit up Hillary rather than a progressive candidate.
Care to back ANY of that up about progressives and reality? Obama is not a progressive. Look at the policies he supports. Look at reality.
"Move along. Nothing to see here" is even more condescending when its patently false. The whole story, not just that one incident, is one of a company in trouble and its inability to effectively navigate the downward spiral.