You're missing the point. There's a lot you can find out about someone by google or other methods. But the media has a responsibility not to report these things unless they are relevant to the story and will not cause harm to the persons involved. Imagine if you were wrongly accused of a crime, say, child molestation or something equally heinous, and you read this story in your local paper:
Donald Smith of 123 Street Ln., Townsville has been questioned by police in connection with an alleged child molestation. He did not return calls placed to his home number, 555-1234, yesterday. We tried to reach him at his home, which was appraised at $350,000 in 1999, but he did not answer. There were no security system stickers on his front door or windows, and he did not appear to have a guard dog. A beige 2004 Lexus SUV with liscence plate number XYZ12345 was parked in his driveway. He has consistently voted Republican and is not an organ donor."
Guess what, none of the information in that fictional article is private. There are many other things that are not secret of private, but which you might not want published, such as where you go after work, what you buy at the grocery store, and where your children go to school. It's not likely that you would see an article like that in a paper, but the media sometimes do print personal information of public figures for the purpose of intimidation. It's not so much to intimidate the person in question, as it is to appear to their readers that they're "tough".
"I've driven a number of vehicles, and there are a number that I wouldn't drive past 55-65 in on any road."
How is the police officer to determine if the car you were driving at 85 mph is safe to drive at that speed? Do you really want it to be up to a cop to decide? Do you really think "but I was driving a well maintained car with good tires" is a good legal defense? You have a point that 85 mph is not an unreasonable speed for all cats, but it's too difficult in practice to determine the safe speed for each car. And then there's the issue of your speed relative to the other cars. While it may not be dangerous to drive in moderate traffic at 85 if everyone else is going that speed, if certainly is dangerous if everyone is going 55-60 mph. If you feel that you're one of the chosen few who should be able to weave in and out of traffic at 20+ mph over the limit, then you should expect to get a few speeding tickets (or worse).
"The ethical considerations of such testing, covert and illicit or not, are profound for those of us working in the IT industry."
What about those of us not working in the IT industry? Is genetic testing by employers not an important issue for everyone? I don't see any reason to assume that this practice will stop at testing for predisposition for carpal tunnel syndrome.
Am I the only one who sees this demo with no lighting whatsoever? Objects are solid black and the parts of them that are below the horizon are invisible unless they are in my line of sight with the road. Is this really the way the demo is supposed to look. I'm not complaining that this demo doesn't push the envelope in realtime graphics, but if this were a game, it would be almost unplayable.
Yahoo! has never said, AFAIK, how it ranks pages, but Google does it better.
What is that sentence supposed to mean? First you say that Yahoo! hasn't disclosed its exact algorithm for ranking pages. Well, guess what, Google hasn't either. Next you say Google, whose ranking algorithm is just as secret, "does it better". Sounds like bias to me.
Slashdot Mirror
You're missing the point. There's a lot you can find out about someone by google or other methods. But the media has a responsibility not to report these things unless they are relevant to the story and will not cause harm to the persons involved. Imagine if you were wrongly accused of a crime, say, child molestation or something equally heinous, and you read this story in your local paper:
Donald Smith of 123 Street Ln., Townsville has been questioned by police in connection with an alleged child molestation. He did not return calls placed to his home number, 555-1234, yesterday. We tried to reach him at his home, which was appraised at $350,000 in 1999, but he did not answer. There were no security system stickers on his front door or windows, and he did not appear to have a guard dog. A beige 2004 Lexus SUV with liscence plate number XYZ12345 was parked in his driveway. He has consistently voted Republican and is not an organ donor."
Guess what, none of the information in that fictional article is private. There are many other things that are not secret of private, but which you might not want published, such as where you go after work, what you buy at the grocery store, and where your children go to school. It's not likely that you would see an article like that in a paper, but the media sometimes do print personal information of public figures for the purpose of intimidation. It's not so much to intimidate the person in question, as it is to appear to their readers that they're "tough".
"I've driven a number of vehicles, and there are a number that I wouldn't drive past 55-65 in on any road."
How is the police officer to determine if the car you were driving at 85 mph is safe to drive at that speed? Do you really want it to be up to a cop to decide? Do you really think "but I was driving a well maintained car with good tires" is a good legal defense? You have a point that 85 mph is not an unreasonable speed for all cats, but it's too difficult in practice to determine the safe speed for each car. And then there's the issue of your speed relative to the other cars. While it may not be dangerous to drive in moderate traffic at 85 if everyone else is going that speed, if certainly is dangerous if everyone is going 55-60 mph. If you feel that you're one of the chosen few who should be able to weave in and out of traffic at 20+ mph over the limit, then you should expect to get a few speeding tickets (or worse).
"...I'm sure there are people who would find the comparisons between an overly-strict computer and a group that baked people in ovens offensive."
I'm being totally pedantic here, but the ovens were used for the cremation of corpses, a practice that is common all over the world.
Can we change the blurb to read: "Now there's one less reason for your friends to not switch to Gentoo!"
No, let's not split infinitives.
"The ethical considerations of such testing, covert and illicit or not, are profound for those of us working in the IT industry."
What about those of us not working in the IT industry? Is genetic testing by employers not an important issue for everyone? I don't see any reason to assume that this practice will stop at testing for predisposition for carpal tunnel syndrome.
Am I the only one who sees this demo with no lighting whatsoever? Objects are solid black and the parts of them that are below the horizon are invisible unless they are in my line of sight with the road. Is this really the way the demo is supposed to look. I'm not complaining that this demo doesn't push the envelope in realtime graphics, but if this were a game, it would be almost unplayable.
Yahoo! has never said, AFAIK, how it ranks pages, but Google does it better. What is that sentence supposed to mean? First you say that Yahoo! hasn't disclosed its exact algorithm for ranking pages. Well, guess what, Google hasn't either. Next you say Google, whose ranking algorithm is just as secret, "does it better". Sounds like bias to me.