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· Score: 3, Informative
The essential goals of the WIPO and the WTO's TRIPS agreement have essentially the same goals: to standardize Intellectual Property Law across national borders. James Love, of the Consumer Project on Technology, has Pharm-policy mailing list readers a link to this joint press release of the WTO and the WIPO. This press release describes a new joint initiative regarding cooperation between these two corporation-friendly organizations. The initiative calls for a new push to help developing countries establish more monopolistic intellectual property infrastructures. Dr. Kamil Idris, Director General of the WIPO, states in the press release that intellectual property was a tool for technological advancement, economic growth and wealth creation for all nations, especially for least-developed countries. Does this joint initiative really take into account the economic needs of the people in less developed countries? Or does it simply add to the wealth of companies that monopolize information? What about economically comprimised people living in well-developed countries?
Michael Lane Thomas writes: Following Gartner's recommendation to seek alternatives to IIS only accomplishes what the industrial terrorists want.
WHAT?!! Are the terrorists fighting a IIS vs. Apache holy war? Michael Lane Thomas unjustified throws quotes around like the one above along with things like:
Did the Code Red worm exploit a flaw in the underlying technology or the flaw in human nature commonly known as procrastination?
I agree with drinkypoo, this is similar to the use of the DMCA by a company like ADOBE to cover up its own poor product security and pass it off to the Justice Department.
To pass a law (like the upcoming SSSCA or the DMCA) that takes the responsibility of corporate security in the hands of the government is yet another example of government policy that favors only corporate interests, at the expense of the basic civil rights of the general public...
I know everyone has read and knows something about these bills,
but here is a break down of what they mean in terms of things like computer crime and vandalism...
(a) Our Constitution gaurantees "due process" to all PERSONS, not all
CITIZENS, meaning that immigrants may also enjoy these rights. However,
under these acts, immigrants can be held on suspiscion of potential
crime (ridiculous!). The Senate Bill allows for indefinite jail time without
due process...
(b) These new laws broaden the definition of Terrorism to include things that
include vandilism, computer crime, and (un)civil disobedience. There already
exist laws that broadly define terrorism, and flying planes into buildings filled
with thousands of innocent people meets those requirements. Marching
in a demonstration is not terrorism, throwing a brick through a starbucks
window is vandalism and property damage not terrorism, and hacking a website
is not terrorism, (it is vandalism!). Also, under terrorism laws, people who harbor
terrorists, or give terrorists advice can also be tried as terrorists! If you stay on my
couch and then throw a brick at starbucks the next day, I am a terrorist.
If I post a security weakness in Microsoft web servers on my website to warn people,
and some kid uses the info to hack into someone's site, I am a terrorist!
(c) The laws give the FBI new powers to wiretap and read emails without
a warrant. They can also read e-mails and URLS. If I want to read news about
Bombs and Terrorists on google, and I type in "Bombs" and "Terrorists" into
the field, that is all the FBI needs to suspect me of crime and set up
a phone tap or a Carnivore search on me.
The FBI is supposed to only be able to know where an email comes from and
where it is going.
They are supposed to only read the "To:" and "From:" fields of the e-mails,
but how can you look at the header of an e-mail and not happen to glance
at the "Subject:" line? Basically, that is what is happening in these laws and
with Carnivore. ISP's have to install it on their servers.
It is like a black box, no one can monitor what the FBI is doing or reading!
THESE LAWS ARE UNECESSARY FOR COMBATING TERRORISM!
CURRENT LAWS ARE SUFFICIENT!
WHY IS THE FBI, CIA, AND JUSTICE DEPARTMENT DOING THIS?
I am one of those people - and there are probably way more of us than not - who (although it does eat up quite a bit of drive space) has both QT and GTK+ libraries and associated files on the computer. Although I always use GNOME (and i think KDE is a bit, well, ugly) I am happy that:
I am not forced into one window manager or desktop environment (yeah free software!
and that both GNOME and KDE have taskbar tabs that let you easily find the other's apps (set as default on many distro's - great for newbies...)
Rather than try to steal money from other worthy groups, why not lobby the right people to support your cause?
I don't exactly know what you mean by worthy...In fact, what exactly does NASA do that is so important? Do you have concrete examples? If NASA does research that just happens to improve, say, something like weather prediction, why don't we simply decide to fund only those types of scientific developments?
I don't buy the argument that the research by-products of Space Exploration justify the huge costs, that, I might remind you, are funded by public tax dollars. Is there some way we can spend less money on Space Shuttles, and more money on issues that directly affect the US public. (My assumption here is that Space Shuttle missions don't really affect our general population!)
By the way, if you think "sandwiches" are the way to combat hunger problems (sometimes they can be - food not bombs!), you should check out:
The UN World Food Program!
Actually, 5 billion could make a huge difference. The UN World Food Program estimates that: the whole of the world population's basic needs for food, drinking water, education and medical care could be covered by a levy of less than 4% on the accumulated wealth of the 225 largest fortunes. To satisfy all the world's sanitation and food requirements would cost only $13 billion, hardly as much as the people of the United States and the European Union spend each year on perfume.
Can you explain in more detail what this "political importance" was? In retrospect, can that expense really be justified? Is posturing, through NASA, rather than spending on social programs, the best way to have beaten the Soviets?
Couldn't these wonderful things have been invented without the use of a publicly funded space program? Note I said PUBLICLY FUNDED!
Why is the public's money being used to pay for items that end up making money for sporting equipment companies and the space pen people?
What are you talking about!?? I challenge you to name a single, publicly useful advance that NASA space exploration has produced that justifies the cost... Please don't say "Micro-gravity research!" or "Velcro".
You are right. What exactly does the Space Shuttle provide? I don't think this is a flame at all. There really needs to be debate about the utility of NASA spending.
Is there any way we can please spend money on health care, shelter, food distribution, and education?
The priveleged readers of/. should be willing to enter into debate about the utility of space program spending, as many in our country and world lack basic access to food and clean water!
NASA's next move should be to dissolve itself, so that we can use much of the money that goes into the space program for important things like universal health care and sustainable agriculture research.
Space program spending may be fun for Slashdotters to drool over, but ethically, NASA spending is hard to justify. Instead of dropping probes on the moon, why not have a freely available communications satellite network for cheap global phone/internet/whatever? WHy not spend money toward public good?
Just for the record, I don't smoke pot. The ACLU isn't a group of extreme nutters, some of the freedoms you take for granted were successfully fought for by the ACLU
For example:
1940's: They Fought Against Japanese Internment
1950's: They Fought Against Segregated Schools and Loyalty Oaths for US Citizens
1960's: Prominent in the Civil Rights Movement
1970's: Helped to Decriminalize Abortion
1980's: Fought to prevent Creationism to be taught in lieu of Evoloution
1990's: Fought to help Decriminalize being Gay or Lesbian in America
Are these issues that are put on by extreme nutters?
There is already legislation on the books that already allows for huge FBI powers... remember the 1996 anti-terrorism bill passed after WTC bombing number one? Why do the laws need to be expanded more? What really needs to be done is for the current manifestation of the FBI and the CIA to allow for better information sharing and collaboration. We don't need to increase monitoring of demonstrators and activists... they are doing what they are supposed to do when they have something to say. Terrorists don't
The FBI and the CIA could have collaborated to investigate some of the perpetrators before the WTC attacks... They dropped the ball. New digital monitoring of innocent people and reclassifying protesters and website crackers as terrorists will not stop murderous attacks like the one we've seen.
This is the first time I've ever done anything like this - I feel very strongy about this issue.
You should do it more... even if you don't feel really strongly about an issue. Democracy is an every day fight, not something you do every once in a while!
There is an chart at the ACLU that compares the differences between current law and the new laws that are trickling through the House and Senate.
I went to the San Francisco EFF event that discussed the scope of these bills. It was a great talk. I can't believe how broadly unconstitutional these new bills are!
Hey, I might agree that the NT security model, for example placing processes into a secure-space rather than running them in "root-space" might be very smart. However, I would also say that:
NT generally needs much patching and tweaking to become resonably secure. I mean, remember the famous telnet to port 139 (or whatever) and then crash the machine by sending 300 kb of data exploit? What the hell is that?
Many NT network applications (ummm... IIS?) have poorly implemented security features or designs. PC anywhere, Back Office, etc. These are actual programs that USDA NT admins use... and they are poorly implemented and have poor security!
Slashdot Mirror
The essential goals of the WIPO and the WTO's TRIPS agreement have essentially the same goals: to standardize Intellectual Property Law across national borders. James Love, of the Consumer Project on Technology, has Pharm-policy mailing list readers a link to this joint press release of the WTO and the WIPO. This press release describes a new joint initiative regarding cooperation between these two corporation-friendly organizations. The initiative calls for a new push to help developing countries establish more monopolistic intellectual property infrastructures. Dr. Kamil Idris, Director General of the WIPO, states in the press release that intellectual property was a tool for technological advancement, economic growth and wealth creation for all nations, especially for least-developed countries. Does this joint initiative really take into account the economic needs of the people in less developed countries? Or does it simply add to the wealth of companies that monopolize information? What about economically comprimised people living in well-developed countries?
Read the essay entitled The WTO and the WIPO Combine Forces to Privatize the World .
Yuo can send an anti-SSSCA e-mail to Fritz Hollings from here:
http://freeipx.org/display.php3?id=126
TAKE ACTION SOON! CONTACT YOUR SENATORS TO MAKE SURE THE SSSCA DOESN'T EVER PASS!!
FreeIPX
Wipeout
Center for the Public Domain
You know what, you're absolutely right... I had not considered this...!
GNUPG!!! 1024-bit encryption at least!
Michael Lane Thomas writes: Following Gartner's recommendation to seek alternatives to IIS only accomplishes what the industrial terrorists want.
WHAT?!! Are the terrorists fighting a IIS vs. Apache holy war? Michael Lane Thomas unjustified throws quotes around like the one above along with things like:
Did the Code Red worm exploit a flaw in the underlying technology or the flaw in human nature commonly known as procrastination?
It exploited a flaw in the TECHNOLOGY!!!!
I agree with drinkypoo, this is similar to the use of the DMCA by a company like ADOBE to cover up its own poor product security and pass it off to the Justice Department.
To pass a law (like the upcoming SSSCA or the DMCA) that takes the responsibility of corporate security in the hands of the government is yet another example of government policy that favors only corporate interests, at the expense of the basic civil rights of the general public...
Patriot ACT, USA ACT, ATA:
I know everyone has read and knows something about these bills, but here is a break down of what they mean in terms of things like computer crime and vandalism...
(a) Our Constitution gaurantees "due process" to all PERSONS, not all CITIZENS, meaning that immigrants may also enjoy these rights. However, under these acts, immigrants can be held on suspiscion of potential crime (ridiculous!). The Senate Bill allows for indefinite jail time without due process...
(b) These new laws broaden the definition of Terrorism to include things that include vandilism, computer crime, and (un)civil disobedience. There already exist laws that broadly define terrorism, and flying planes into buildings filled with thousands of innocent people meets those requirements. Marching in a demonstration is not terrorism, throwing a brick through a starbucks window is vandalism and property damage not terrorism, and hacking a website is not terrorism, (it is vandalism!). Also, under terrorism laws, people who harbor terrorists, or give terrorists advice can also be tried as terrorists! If you stay on my couch and then throw a brick at starbucks the next day, I am a terrorist. If I post a security weakness in Microsoft web servers on my website to warn people, and some kid uses the info to hack into someone's site, I am a terrorist!
(c) The laws give the FBI new powers to wiretap and read emails without a warrant. They can also read e-mails and URLS. If I want to read news about Bombs and Terrorists on google, and I type in "Bombs" and "Terrorists" into the field, that is all the FBI needs to suspect me of crime and set up a phone tap or a Carnivore search on me. The FBI is supposed to only be able to know where an email comes from and where it is going. They are supposed to only read the "To:" and "From:" fields of the e-mails, but how can you look at the header of an e-mail and not happen to glance at the "Subject:" line? Basically, that is what is happening in these laws and with Carnivore. ISP's have to install it on their servers. It is like a black box, no one can monitor what the FBI is doing or reading!
THESE LAWS ARE UNECESSARY FOR COMBATING TERRORISM! CURRENT LAWS ARE SUFFICIENT! WHY IS THE FBI, CIA, AND JUSTICE DEPARTMENT DOING THIS?
Resources:
Happy Birthday KDE, from a GNOME User...
I am one of those people - and there are probably way more of us than not - who (although it does eat up quite a bit of drive space) has both QT and GTK+ libraries and associated files on the computer. Although I always use GNOME (and i think KDE is a bit, well, ugly) I am happy that:
I choose:
Give to the poor
These cards might be voluntary until you need to buy a car, fly on a plane, or do anything useful in this world!!!!
Just like credit cards... You can't even rent a worthless movie or rent a car without a credit card!
Rather than try to steal money from other worthy groups, why not lobby the right people to support your cause?
I don't exactly know what you mean by worthy...In fact, what exactly does NASA do that is so important? Do you have concrete examples? If NASA does research that just happens to improve, say, something like weather prediction, why don't we simply decide to fund only those types of scientific developments?
I don't buy the argument that the research by-products of Space Exploration justify the huge costs, that, I might remind you, are funded by public tax dollars. Is there some way we can spend less money on Space Shuttles, and more money on issues that directly affect the US public. (My assumption here is that Space Shuttle missions don't really affect our general population!)
By the way, if you think "sandwiches" are the way to combat hunger problems (sometimes they can be - food not bombs!), you should check out:
The UN World Food Program!
Actually, 5 billion could make a huge difference. The UN World Food Program estimates that: the whole of the world population's basic needs for food, drinking water, education and medical care could be covered by a levy of less than 4% on the accumulated wealth of the 225 largest fortunes. To satisfy all the world's sanitation and food requirements would cost only $13 billion, hardly as much as the people of the United States and the European Union spend each year on perfume.
For more information on food supply and cost issues, try looking at:
Institute for Food and Development Policy
UN World Food Program
Can you explain in more detail what this "political importance" was? In retrospect, can that expense really be justified? Is posturing, through NASA, rather than spending on social programs, the best way to have beaten the Soviets?
Couldn't these wonderful things have been invented without the use of a publicly funded space program? Note I said PUBLICLY FUNDED! Why is the public's money being used to pay for items that end up making money for sporting equipment companies and the space pen people?
What are you talking about!?? I challenge you to name a single, publicly useful advance that NASA space exploration has produced that justifies the cost... Please don't say "Micro-gravity research!" or "Velcro".
You are right. What exactly does the Space Shuttle provide? I don't think this is a flame at all. There really needs to be debate about the utility of NASA spending.
Is there any way we can please spend money on health care, shelter, food distribution, and education?
The priveleged readers of /. should be willing to enter into debate about the utility of space program spending, as many in our country and world lack basic access to food and clean water!
NASA's next move should be to dissolve itself, so that we can use much of the money that goes into the space program for important things like universal health care and sustainable agriculture research.
Space program spending may be fun for Slashdotters to drool over, but ethically, NASA spending is hard to justify. Instead of dropping probes on the moon, why not have a freely available communications satellite network for cheap global phone/internet/whatever? WHy not spend money toward public good?
Umm, the "KDE desktop" is ugly and it looks like it has Apple IISE icons on it or something
Just for the record, I don't smoke pot. The ACLU isn't a group of extreme nutters, some of the freedoms you take for granted were successfully fought for by the ACLU
1940's: They Fought Against Japanese Internment
1950's: They Fought Against Segregated Schools and Loyalty Oaths for US Citizens
1960's: Prominent in the Civil Rights Movement
1970's: Helped to Decriminalize Abortion
1980's: Fought to prevent Creationism to be taught in lieu of Evoloution
1990's: Fought to help Decriminalize being Gay or Lesbian in America
Are these issues that are put on by extreme nutters?
Yay! Computer and information systems should be free and open! Free IPX congratulates all the winners!
There is already legislation on the books that already allows for huge FBI powers... remember the 1996 anti-terrorism bill passed after WTC bombing number one? Why do the laws need to be expanded more? What really needs to be done is for the current manifestation of the FBI and the CIA to allow for better information sharing and collaboration. We don't need to increase monitoring of demonstrators and activists... they are doing what they are supposed to do when they have something to say. Terrorists don't
The FBI and the CIA could have collaborated to investigate some of the perpetrators before the WTC attacks... They dropped the ball. New digital monitoring of innocent people and reclassifying protesters and website crackers as terrorists will not stop murderous attacks like the one we've seen.
This is the first time I've ever done anything like this - I feel very strongy about this issue.
You should do it more... even if you don't feel really strongly about an issue. Democracy is an every day fight, not something you do every once in a while!
There is an chart at the ACLU that compares the differences between current law and the new laws that are trickling through the House and Senate.
I went to the San Francisco EFF event that discussed the scope of these bills. It was a great talk. I can't believe how broadly unconstitutional these new bills are!
Hey, I might agree that the NT security model, for example placing processes into a secure-space rather than running them in "root-space" might be very smart. However, I would also say that:
NT generally needs much patching and tweaking to become resonably secure. I mean, remember the famous telnet to port 139 (or whatever) and then crash the machine by sending 300 kb of data exploit? What the hell is that?
Many NT network applications (ummm... IIS?) have poorly implemented security features or designs. PC anywhere, Back Office, etc. These are actual programs that USDA NT admins use... and they are poorly implemented and have poor security!