At that point, she terminated the account and signed up with an alternate provider, Carter said.
The old account, however, was kept open under suspension without her knowledge, she said, and e-mail continued to pile up.
This is about the fact that the account was kept open when it should have been terminated. If the ISP had actually bounced the messages, the senders would have contacted her by other means. It isn't about untimely delivery. It's about accepting messages that they should not have. The late delivery is incidental. Say she had never received the e-mail. If she had called the Discovery Channel and found out that they had e-mailed her and never got a bounce, then she could have sued just as well.
I never said it was damaging to the victims or their families (though it could be, I really don't know). But it is sometimes unpleasant, maybe even embarassing, for the families, and many would rather detailed descriptions of how their loved ones were hacked up not appear in national media. But even if it was damaging in some way, that has not been a reason to keep it out of print.
This is not a problem limited to video games. In any creative industry (maybe an oxymoron), there is the problem of creating something with mass appeal. You have to make it original enough to stand out, yet not so unusual as to put people off. There is additional creative tension from the artists, who are usually not particularly thrilled with just re-hashing the same stuff for commercial gain, yet they need to make it appealing enough to the masses to obtain the backing to make the work.
This process occurs in movies, TV, books, music, theatre, and, of course, video games. There are surprises both ways. The Blair Witch Project was a movie that was not expected to be successful, but was hugely so and has changed the movie industry. Citizen Kane was an important film (often considered the greatest American film) but a commercial failure. Yet Orson Welles was given unprecedented freedom from the studio to make the picture, not because they respected him as an artist, but because they thought he would make them a fortune.
Sometimes the alchemy of commercial appeal and artistic daring produces a wonder. Sometimes they fight, and the result achieves neither ver well. But there is no formula -- there can't be, because every work changes the landscape, and the bigger the work, the bigger the change. And of course, originality and formulaic are opposites.
I don't think owership of mail isn't so simple. I could lend you a music CD or book and deliver it by mail, but mailing the object in and of itself does not transfer ownership. I agree, it could never be the property of FedEx (Non-governmental snail ISP).
I don't see how this has anything to do with the case at hand. There is no dispute whether the sender or recipient is the owner of the message. And we're not talking about some merchandise, but a message. If you send a letter to someone, then they own that letter. I think ownership of mail in the form of messages is that simple. Bringing packages and such into this discussion doesn't have any place, nor does the subject of if the sender still owns the contents of a package. The question is whether the ISP or the recipient owns e-mail.
Also, your entire discussion of time seems to be out of place here. This wasn't a question of time -- she's not suing because the mail was late, but because they refused to deliver it. Nobody's talking about a guarantee of timely delivery.
I don't think the facts support the idea that the ISP read the email and decided to hold it for ransom as you seem to imply.
I implied nothing of the sort. The parent poster was talking about interference with mail delivery being a federal crime. I was continuing the subject regarding and presenting a hypothetical case.
This may come back to the question "whose property is the e-mail?" If it's the recipient's property, then the ISP probably has no right to interfere with the delivery of it. However, if it is the property of the ISP, then it is possible that they can do whatever they want with it.
I would argue that electronic communications are the property of their intended recipient and that by accepting these transmissions from a sender, an ISP is legally obligated to reasonably attempt delivery or notify the sender that they were unable to.
Because e-mail is different from mail in the sense that the Post Office is a government agency (and so delivering mail a government activity), this probably would not be a criminal offense, but a civil one. Maybe if the circumstances warranted extortion charges -- I read your e-mail, find something valuable to you in it, and say, I want $50,000 before I will give you this information.
Often rape victims are reluctant to come forward, yet their name has to become public information if they want to see their rapist convicted. And news media love to provide pictures and information about victims of grisly murders.
The only exception that is normally made is when the victim is a child. AFAIK, it's pretty much accepted that you can't make victims of these crimes a secret (and still prosecute the offenders), no matter how much people would want such a thing.
So is this saying that hacking is even more humiliating, more personally damaging, more vicious than rape or murder (or any number of other violent and cruel acts) -- so much so that we have to shield its victims from any public knowledge of their being victims? Or maybe are we saying that corporations get whatever they want from our justice system? (*cough* Microsoft penalty judgement *cough*)
Cut to Homer entering "The Vast Waistband", a clothing store.
Homer: I'm looking for something loose and billowy, something comfortable for my first day of work.
Salesman: Work, huh? Let me guess. Computer programmer, computer magazine columnist, something with computers?
Homer: Well, I use a computer.
Salesman: [quietly, to self] Yeah, what's the connection? Must be the non-stop sitting and snacking. [more audibly] Well, sir, many of our clients find pants confining, so we offer a range of alternatives for the ample gentleman: ponchos, muumuus, capes, jumpsuits, unisheets, muslim body rolls, academic and judicial robes --
Homer: I don't want to look like a weirdo. I'll just go with a muumuu.
Every time she tried to type her ruling against Microsoft, Clippy kept popping up with "It looks like you are trying to type an unfavorable ruling. Do you want some help?" When she clicked no, wouldn't you know it, one of those darn crashes would happen!
Seems like it would be much easier to just take a decent digital camcorder and fly down the coast at a moderate rate of speed. Better continuous coverage, much much faster, and if the real purpose IS to look for breakwaters or illegal rockpiles, certainly a digital camcorder image would work for that.
I wonder if there isn't some other motive here, requiring high-res images.
Bingo. An NTSC mini-DV camera gives you 720x480 resolution. Not only that, but you'd be amazed at how hard it is to make out detail in a still image from a video signal. And a 29.97 frames/sec video feed doesn't give you much of a benefit - maybe if you were flying overhead in a SR-71. In a helicopter, 1 frame/sec would be overkill. You'd be much better at 1 frame/sec with 30x the resolution.
Secondly, there's almost no reason for any web designers to know DHTML because they should be making web sites easily accessible and easy to navigate, of course with content and information, instead of worrying about making a graphic float and fly around the screen.
DHTML, properly used, can improve usability. DHTML can provide some really handy menu features and the ability to show/hide/change/highlight information can be very effective. The MSDN library does a good job with this stuff, while not overdoing it.
Yes, DHTML can be abused and will be by marketing types (Flash is even more abused). But that doesn't mean that DHTML is not useful. The problem with using DHTML is that it is not very cross-browser friendly. As you said, though, there is only one real browser - IE. I wouldn't go that far, but in a corporate intranet, where you control the browser version, DHTML is great for creating web-based apps with a lot of functionality. And you don't have much need for ads there.
I can see the survey now -- it'll sound like those trivia questions Jay Leno asks random people on the street...
Q: Do you believe you are entitled to fair use of copyrighted works as provided under US copyright law?
42% What the hell is fair use?
27% Ernest Hemingway
18% Uh, are you guys with Elimidate?
7% Da na na na-na - HEY!
4% You know, I always fast forward through the FBI warning, so I really can't say
2% Yes
Hmm...is there a conflict of interest? I mean, the justices are deciding the fate of a copyright extension that will ensure that Clarence Thomas III will be able to afford a Yale Law education (otherwise he might have to go to--Vassar).
"Their philosophy appears to be that if innocent businesses and individuals on the periphery of spam-house blocklists are affected, then those innocents will have no other choice but to pressure their upstream provider to remove the spammers from their blocks, thereby solving the spam problem bit by a bit. Draconian, yes. Effective? Sure."
Absolutely. Without pitting customers of ISPs against each other, i.e., the legitimate ones against the spammers, the ISPs will be happy to serve both. I'd suggest that if an ISP allows any spamming, block it -- wholesale. Either you have an agressive policy against SPAM or you lose your privilege to send mail to my servers. Your customers don't like it? Tough. Make your network spam-unfriendly.
The last thing the ISPs want is for their regular customers to be aware that they are allowing spammers to use their network. It's kind of like the phone company selling caller ID block to telemarketers and caller ID and privacy manager to residential customers. If the spam blacklists cause users to confront the reality that their ISP is knowingly hosting spammers or not bothering to monitor people sending out 10e+06 emails at a time, then they might just demand that their ISP get out of the spam business. Because unlike (most) telcos, ISPs don't have monopolies, and customers can switch.
"top record-label executives agreed in a trade association meeting a few weeks ago that they would move toward preparing suits that would focus on individuals who supply the biggest amounts of music, as well as so-called "supernodes," or people who provide the centralized directories that enable online music-sharing."
For those of you who aren't going to read the article, the RIAA is not going to try to sue everyone. They have 2 goals in mind, I suspect: 1) Find someone who is sharing 100,000 files with a T-3 connection and use this person to demonize everyone who shares music over p2p. The RIAA is suffering from a bit of an image problem, and I think they want to try to make it good guys vs. bad guys, so they have to find a bad enough guy. 2) Scare anyone who considers sharing files into wondering if they are above the magic threshold that will bring a suit.
I suppose the theory is that if you stop the people who are sharing the music, then there will be nothing for anyone to download. Kinda like the drug war -- bust all the dealers, then the users will have nowhere to go.
I don't think this will work, as my guess is that most people who download music also share it. It isn't centralized enough that you can take out a few super-sharers and suddenly everything dries up.
Yes, America is held captive to money and power and corporations. But you know what? So is every other nation on earth that has ever existed! Only in America do politicians go to jail for taking bribes. Only in America do they lose their job for having affairs.
The point is that, though the system is corrupt here, it's worse everywhere else, and has been worse. Think about it. 2600, a bunch described as hackers, vandals, criminals, terrorists, up against Ford Motor Company, which probably has bought thousands of politicians and other officials over the years. Anywhere else, the trial would be a foregone conclusion. 2600 would have been summarily ordered to stop whatever Ford didn't want them doing and that would have been it.
The dealers are waging a FUD war in order to cast the independent mechanics much in the same light as Microsoft would open-source:
Fud #1:
"From a business standpoint, it's diluting our franchise" to make the codes public, he said. "A franchise becomes meaningless."
I'm not even sure what that means, but it sounds scary. We can't have meaningless franchises! The whole system will break down, and then who'll fix your car, huh?
Fud #2:
William Abraham, executive vice president of the Greater Metropolitan Automobile Dealers Association of Minnesota, said that manufacturers "want it to be repaired right the first time. . . . All things being equal, they'd rather have you repair them at a dealership because they know they can get the job done right."
Translation: independent mechanics are scam artists who will leave your car in worse shape than they found it. We can't have them using our codes, that would be like endorsing them to ruin your car and rip you off. And you don't want that, do you? Never mind, of course, that dealer mechanics work on a pay system where the less time they spend fixing your car, the more money they make, and the least profitable jobs go to the worst mechanics. Now that's a system you can endorse!
Fud #3:
Lambert, of the car dealers association, said there is no evidence that independent repair shops are being driven out of business, and he said that consumers enjoy "a wealth of options." He said that no products are more regulated than automobiles, adding that manufacturers must be concerned with safety equipment, recalls and warranties.
There's two in here. 1) These codes are hurting independents? Prove it! Sure pal, right after I prove global warming when Antartica becomes a beach resort. Stall long enough, and there won't be any independent mechanics around to raise a fuss. 2) We're regulated, so you can be sure the government is making sure the system is fair. Oh, please. See US vs. Microsoft.
Fud #3:
They have a right, I think, to restrict who has access to all of that technology," he said. "Otherwise, they're left with people they don't have any relationship with working on vehicles that they're still responsible for."
Of course the manufacturers don't have a relationship with the independent mechanics -- the manufacturers deliberately refused to establish one to keep you away from them! If they started sharing the codes, then they would have a relationship, now wouldn't they? And you know what? I have a better relationship with my mechanic than with the dealer! But apparently that relationship isn't important (or maybe it is, that's why the dealers are trying to break it).
Fud #3:
"The old garage mechanic is gone," he said. "In fact, the term 'mechanic' is gone. They're called technicians now. These people have to be very intelligent people. They're working on computers, and it's a high-tech industry.
Of course, the guy from the dealer association said that customers have lots of "options", and that there's no evidence the mechanics are in trouble. Now, having assuaged our concern for the little guy, this other dude says that they don't even exist anymore anyhow. Pay no attention to that shop that says "Main St. Auto Repair" down the block. He's just a gorilla in overalls that couldn't possibly understand how to read a number from a screen, and look it up in a book that says, "water pump is failing." That's way too sophistamacated for a dumb schmoe like that. Forget that he has twenty years of experience and the dealer guy is some kid fresh out of a technical school (see Unix admins vs. MSCEs).
How many times have you heard someone ask, "when your Linux server breaks, who are you gonna call?"
...then they would just close the book, and that's it. Poof! Call MiniTrue: XP Embedded OS doesn't exist, XP Embedded OS never existed. But being open-source, anyone who thinks that Red Hat made a mistake and is abandoning a viable product has the right and the ability to take that source code and make it work.
So don't bitch about it unless you also want to admit that you don't have the ability or the inclination to do anything about it.
The Freedom of Information Act is a helpful tool here, but the trick is enforcement, i.e., making the information needed to have effective oversight available. The watchers should be any citizens who decide to watch (and a vigilant press, if such a thing exists anymore). There should be a fairly short life span on the classified status of this information. Once it is declassified, it can be obtained via the Freedom of Information Act.
However, things often remain classified for decades for no good reason, which basically removes any incentive to not do embarassing things from government officials who will be long gone by the time their misdeeds are public knowledge. We need to close that gap so that a politician could actually be hurt within his career/lifetime by conducting activities that are wrong. In thirty years, all of Echelon's dirty laundry will start coming out, and it'll be like all the stuff that came out about J. Edgar Hoover's FBI.
If there is anything I think would be a real solution, it would be to force the government to minimize the amount of information that is kept classified after its usefulness is over. Say, five years after a document is created, it automatically expires into unclassified information unless it is specifically requested to stay classified.
The price of governing a free people (free in theory) is a limited ability to keep secrets from those you are governing. We should hold the US government to an even higher standard of accountability than it is currently held.
Slashdot Mirror
At that point, she terminated the account and signed up with an alternate provider, Carter said.
The old account, however, was kept open under suspension without her knowledge, she said, and e-mail continued to pile up.
This is about the fact that the account was kept open when it should have been terminated. If the ISP had actually bounced the messages, the senders would have contacted her by other means. It isn't about untimely delivery. It's about accepting messages that they should not have. The late delivery is incidental. Say she had never received the e-mail. If she had called the Discovery Channel and found out that they had e-mailed her and never got a bounce, then she could have sued just as well.
I never said it was damaging to the victims or their families (though it could be, I really don't know). But it is sometimes unpleasant, maybe even embarassing, for the families, and many would rather detailed descriptions of how their loved ones were hacked up not appear in national media. But even if it was damaging in some way, that has not been a reason to keep it out of print.
This process occurs in movies, TV, books, music, theatre, and, of course, video games. There are surprises both ways. The Blair Witch Project was a movie that was not expected to be successful, but was hugely so and has changed the movie industry. Citizen Kane was an important film (often considered the greatest American film) but a commercial failure. Yet Orson Welles was given unprecedented freedom from the studio to make the picture, not because they respected him as an artist, but because they thought he would make them a fortune.
Sometimes the alchemy of commercial appeal and artistic daring produces a wonder. Sometimes they fight, and the result achieves neither ver well. But there is no formula -- there can't be, because every work changes the landscape, and the bigger the work, the bigger the change. And of course, originality and formulaic are opposites.
I don't see how this has anything to do with the case at hand. There is no dispute whether the sender or recipient is the owner of the message. And we're not talking about some merchandise, but a message. If you send a letter to someone, then they own that letter. I think ownership of mail in the form of messages is that simple. Bringing packages and such into this discussion doesn't have any place, nor does the subject of if the sender still owns the contents of a package. The question is whether the ISP or the recipient owns e-mail.
Also, your entire discussion of time seems to be out of place here. This wasn't a question of time -- she's not suing because the mail was late, but because they refused to deliver it. Nobody's talking about a guarantee of timely delivery.
I don't think the facts support the idea that the ISP read the email and decided to hold it for ransom as you seem to imply.
I implied nothing of the sort. The parent poster was talking about interference with mail delivery being a federal crime. I was continuing the subject regarding and presenting a hypothetical case.
I would argue that electronic communications are the property of their intended recipient and that by accepting these transmissions from a sender, an ISP is legally obligated to reasonably attempt delivery or notify the sender that they were unable to.
Because e-mail is different from mail in the sense that the Post Office is a government agency (and so delivering mail a government activity), this probably would not be a criminal offense, but a civil one. Maybe if the circumstances warranted extortion charges -- I read your e-mail, find something valuable to you in it, and say, I want $50,000 before I will give you this information.
So is this saying that hacking is even more humiliating, more personally damaging, more vicious than rape or murder (or any number of other violent and cruel acts) -- so much so that we have to shield its victims from any public knowledge of their being victims? Or maybe are we saying that corporations get whatever they want from our justice system? (*cough* Microsoft penalty judgement *cough*)
Homer: I'm looking for something loose and billowy, something comfortable for my first day of work.
Salesman: Work, huh? Let me guess. Computer programmer, computer magazine columnist, something with computers?
Homer: Well, I use a computer.
Salesman: [quietly, to self] Yeah, what's the connection? Must be the non-stop sitting and snacking. [more audibly] Well, sir, many of our clients find pants confining, so we offer a range of alternatives for the ample gentleman: ponchos, muumuus, capes, jumpsuits, unisheets, muslim body rolls, academic and judicial robes --
Homer: I don't want to look like a weirdo. I'll just go with a muumuu.
You better hope she is. Brings that whole monopoly thing home, you know?
Well, if she rules in favor of MS, then you'll know she just gave up and let lil' Clippy have his way. :(
Every time she tried to type her ruling against Microsoft, Clippy kept popping up with "It looks like you are trying to type an unfavorable ruling. Do you want some help?" When she clicked no, wouldn't you know it, one of those darn crashes would happen!
I wonder if there isn't some other motive here, requiring high-res images.
Bingo. An NTSC mini-DV camera gives you 720x480 resolution. Not only that, but you'd be amazed at how hard it is to make out detail in a still image from a video signal. And a 29.97 frames/sec video feed doesn't give you much of a benefit - maybe if you were flying overhead in a SR-71. In a helicopter, 1 frame/sec would be overkill. You'd be much better at 1 frame/sec with 30x the resolution.
...I have a lot of Word documents with macro viruses. Will these run properly on SuSe?
DHTML, properly used, can improve usability. DHTML can provide some really handy menu features and the ability to show/hide/change/highlight information can be very effective. The MSDN library does a good job with this stuff, while not overdoing it.
Yes, DHTML can be abused and will be by marketing types (Flash is even more abused). But that doesn't mean that DHTML is not useful. The problem with using DHTML is that it is not very cross-browser friendly. As you said, though, there is only one real browser - IE. I wouldn't go that far, but in a corporate intranet, where you control the browser version, DHTML is great for creating web-based apps with a lot of functionality. And you don't have much need for ads there.
They gave him the TLD .bye
Q: Do you believe you are entitled to fair use of copyrighted works as provided under US copyright law?
42% What the hell is fair use?
27% Ernest Hemingway
18% Uh, are you guys with Elimidate?
7% Da na na na-na - HEY!
4% You know, I always fast forward through the FBI warning, so I really can't say
2% Yes
How about "Linux XP" -- eXtended Procrastination
Hmm...is there a conflict of interest? I mean, the justices are deciding the fate of a copyright extension that will ensure that Clarence Thomas III will be able to afford a Yale Law education (otherwise he might have to go to--Vassar).
For the love of God, somone please read the fucking article.
Absolutely. Without pitting customers of ISPs against each other, i.e., the legitimate ones against the spammers, the ISPs will be happy to serve both. I'd suggest that if an ISP allows any spamming, block it -- wholesale. Either you have an agressive policy against SPAM or you lose your privilege to send mail to my servers. Your customers don't like it? Tough. Make your network spam-unfriendly.
The last thing the ISPs want is for their regular customers to be aware that they are allowing spammers to use their network. It's kind of like the phone company selling caller ID block to telemarketers and caller ID and privacy manager to residential customers. If the spam blacklists cause users to confront the reality that their ISP is knowingly hosting spammers or not bothering to monitor people sending out 10e+06 emails at a time, then they might just demand that their ISP get out of the spam business. Because unlike (most) telcos, ISPs don't have monopolies, and customers can switch.
4) ???
5) Profit
For those of you who aren't going to read the article, the RIAA is not going to try to sue everyone. They have 2 goals in mind, I suspect:
1) Find someone who is sharing 100,000 files with a T-3 connection and use this person to demonize everyone who shares music over p2p. The RIAA is suffering from a bit of an image problem, and I think they want to try to make it good guys vs. bad guys, so they have to find a bad enough guy.
2) Scare anyone who considers sharing files into wondering if they are above the magic threshold that will bring a suit.
I suppose the theory is that if you stop the people who are sharing the music, then there will be nothing for anyone to download. Kinda like the drug war -- bust all the dealers, then the users will have nowhere to go.
I don't think this will work, as my guess is that most people who download music also share it. It isn't centralized enough that you can take out a few super-sharers and suddenly everything dries up.
The point is that, though the system is corrupt here, it's worse everywhere else, and has been worse. Think about it. 2600, a bunch described as hackers, vandals, criminals, terrorists, up against Ford Motor Company, which probably has bought thousands of politicians and other officials over the years. Anywhere else, the trial would be a foregone conclusion. 2600 would have been summarily ordered to stop whatever Ford didn't want them doing and that would have been it.
Fud #1:
"From a business standpoint, it's diluting our franchise" to make the codes public, he said. "A franchise becomes meaningless."
I'm not even sure what that means, but it sounds scary. We can't have meaningless franchises! The whole system will break down, and then who'll fix your car, huh?
Fud #2:
William Abraham, executive vice president of the Greater Metropolitan Automobile Dealers Association of Minnesota, said that manufacturers "want it to be repaired right the first time. . . . All things being equal, they'd rather have you repair them at a dealership because they know they can get the job done right."
Translation: independent mechanics are scam artists who will leave your car in worse shape than they found it. We can't have them using our codes, that would be like endorsing them to ruin your car and rip you off. And you don't want that, do you? Never mind, of course, that dealer mechanics work on a pay system where the less time they spend fixing your car, the more money they make, and the least profitable jobs go to the worst mechanics. Now that's a system you can endorse!
Fud #3:
Lambert, of the car dealers association, said there is no evidence that independent repair shops are being driven out of business, and he said that consumers enjoy "a wealth of options." He said that no products are more regulated than automobiles, adding that manufacturers must be concerned with safety equipment, recalls and warranties.
There's two in here. 1) These codes are hurting independents? Prove it! Sure pal, right after I prove global warming when Antartica becomes a beach resort. Stall long enough, and there won't be any independent mechanics around to raise a fuss. 2) We're regulated, so you can be sure the government is making sure the system is fair. Oh, please. See US vs. Microsoft.
Fud #3:
They have a right, I think, to restrict who has access to all of that technology," he said. "Otherwise, they're left with people they don't have any relationship with working on vehicles that they're still responsible for."
Of course the manufacturers don't have a relationship with the independent mechanics -- the manufacturers deliberately refused to establish one to keep you away from them! If they started sharing the codes, then they would have a relationship, now wouldn't they? And you know what? I have a better relationship with my mechanic than with the dealer! But apparently that relationship isn't important (or maybe it is, that's why the dealers are trying to break it).
Fud #3:
"The old garage mechanic is gone," he said. "In fact, the term 'mechanic' is gone. They're called technicians now. These people have to be very intelligent people. They're working on computers, and it's a high-tech industry.
Of course, the guy from the dealer association said that customers have lots of "options", and that there's no evidence the mechanics are in trouble. Now, having assuaged our concern for the little guy, this other dude says that they don't even exist anymore anyhow. Pay no attention to that shop that says "Main St. Auto Repair" down the block. He's just a gorilla in overalls that couldn't possibly understand how to read a number from a screen, and look it up in a book that says, "water pump is failing." That's way too sophistamacated for a dumb schmoe like that. Forget that he has twenty years of experience and the dealer guy is some kid fresh out of a technical school (see Unix admins vs. MSCEs).
How many times have you heard someone ask, "when your Linux server breaks, who are you gonna call?"
FUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFU DFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDF UDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUD FUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFUDFU
So don't bitch about it unless you also want to admit that you don't have the ability or the inclination to do anything about it.
However, things often remain classified for decades for no good reason, which basically removes any incentive to not do embarassing things from government officials who will be long gone by the time their misdeeds are public knowledge. We need to close that gap so that a politician could actually be hurt within his career/lifetime by conducting activities that are wrong. In thirty years, all of Echelon's dirty laundry will start coming out, and it'll be like all the stuff that came out about J. Edgar Hoover's FBI.
If there is anything I think would be a real solution, it would be to force the government to minimize the amount of information that is kept classified after its usefulness is over. Say, five years after a document is created, it automatically expires into unclassified information unless it is specifically requested to stay classified.
The price of governing a free people (free in theory) is a limited ability to keep secrets from those you are governing. We should hold the US government to an even higher standard of accountability than it is currently held.