We don't know who operate and are responsible for the GFW. There's a lot of info at Wikipedia: Internet censorship in the People's Republic of China. Yeah, it's Wikipedia. Maybe it's a CIA misinformation page. Then again, a lot of it may be true. You live in China, you can verify it better than I.
The GFW works just like the Babylonian Lottery of Jorge L. Borges (at least for me). I had never heard of that story before. Quite an interesting perspective:) The Wikipedia article talks about some of that:
"Internet censorship in the PRC has been called "a panopticon that encourages self-censorship through the perception that users are being watched".[7] The enforcement (or threat of enforcement) of censorship creates a chilling effect where individuals and businesses willingly censor their own communications to avoid legal and economic repercussions."
they are guilty of having a 'silicon valley pre-bubble' attitude. Well there's no doubt. They are awash in billions from a single, well focused product and are spending that money quite speculatively. So far they are a one-trick pony, and they seem to think if they just hire enough bright people and buy enough "web 2.0" companies they'll come out on top, because essentially that's how they made their initial fortune -- starting with bright people and cashing in on the early Internet boom.
Their interview questions suck, but it probably stems more from the company's early days than some sinister plot to keep out older engineers. Early on they were all about data structures and algorithms. Now they are huge and I chalk it up to the initial culture that they haven't broadened their interview process. The people in at Google passed the interview process, so the company as a whole is self-selected to continue it.
ps: Using capitals would make your posts easier to read.
There are plenty of examples of people being prosecuted for lying about being communists. 'Are you now or have you ever been a member of the communist party' was a standard question for military and government service. That's a separate question than being allowed to advocate communism as part of free speech. I ask again, do you have a specific example where merely being an advocate of communism was held in violation of the law? All examples I know about have to do with violent overthrow of the government. It would be perfectly legal to vote communism in, and it is perfectly legal to advocate for that.
Communism is such a tarnished idea that the only people who still argue for it are over-educated, moral relativists. You keep on trying to pin a label on me as part of an ad hominen attack. I am not advocating communism, but merely arguing that the 1st amendment protects those who advocate it, which is how this whole argument got started.
What I actually said... I fail to see how what you actually said is any different than my characterization of what you said. I noticed you chopped the "and communism" part of my quote, which you quite clearly said was not protected as part of the 1st amendment. You also quite clearly stated before that speech that advocates the removal of our rights, such as the right of free speech, is not protected. Can you find a single example where advocating, via legal means, for a different system of government, such as communism, has been considered illegal?
Originally I was just going to call you a moron. It's easy to fall into the trap of calling people names when you disagree with them. The ideas are contentious, debated about in the Supreme Court, and changed over time.
Communism in practice has been used to enslave billions Not every person under communism feels enslaved, and it is easy to point out the ills of capitalist society. This is all shallow rhetoric, and a true discussion of communism vs capitalism would be much more in depth, but then you need free speech to do so.
deny those billions the rights we enjoy, such as, free speech But you don't even understand the free speech rights you have, and you yourself advocate against some of them. Should you be locked up because your ideas are dangerous?
I don't think at any point in the history of this country has it been illegal to argue against free speech or for communism. Court cases have been over more specific actions, such as advocating for people to dodge the draft, or for violent overthrow of the government. Could you cite one example otherwise?
I'm not spinning, I'm untangling the knots the popular news spun into it. By describing it as a "long-winded question" you are adding your own spin. There's more to it than that, and you know it. He was using the mic for a screechy, political rant, and refused to step down. It appears to me security determined he was disrupting the proceedings and wanted to escort him out, as they would any protestor disrupting a meeting.
Could they have been a little less hasty, and given the guy a chance to walk off on his own after they cut the mic? Probably, but it's a heat of the moment situation, instigated by Meyer and further fueled by Meyer when he refused to be escorted out.
Please, name an event in that history, don't just parrot the party-line. Well, I'm just going by what I read in various Google News stories. Maybe there was a vast conspiracy to smear him, but what I read said on his own website he had videos of stunts that he had pulled before. But, I'll go look this up now... Ok, this looks one of the articles that stuck out in my mind:
"Meyer, a senior telecommunications major from the Fort Lauderdale suburb of Weston, has a Web site featuring several homemade videos. In one, he stands in a street with a sign that says "Harry Dies" after the latest Harry Potter book was released. In another, he acts like a drunk in a bar while trying to pick up a man dressed in drag."
Is this a boldfaced lie, and do you have evidence to back it up?
It means you are a hypocrite, sociopath, communist, muslim, am I getting warm or should I go on. With all the name McCarthy-style name calling I thought you were jesting for a second, but I think you're serious. No, I'm none of those things. I firmly believe in the ideals our country was founded on.
Mao said we would sell them the rope that they would use to hang us. Your argument is that speaking out against free speech is such a dangerous idea that we need to lock up people and prevent them from such speech. This is the exact same argument used by oppressive governments. Free speech but don't criticize free speech? And you call me a hypocrite?
Free speech allows for people to speak their minds and decide for themselves what ideas are worthy. That some idea is beyond criticism is completely antithetical to the idea of free speech.
If someone was a communist or monarchist, and they want the US to become a communist state or a monarchy, then their speech does not enjoy the protections of the 1st ammendment. That's so wrong. You can argue for a communist or monarchist government all you want, and be protected under the 1st amendment. Advocating violent overthrow is another thing.
A reasonable person would consider that speech intended to remove the constitution and bill of rights should not be afforded the protections contained in the constitution and bill of rights. No, an illogical person would conclude that. What does it mean to have free speech if you can't use free speech to argue against it?
Furthermore, it was a political rally - since when is asking a long-winded question cause to be hauled off and "quieted down?" Don't spin the story. He went on a screechy rant. The mic was open for pointed questions, not long political diatribes. He could have asked his questions without doing that, but he wanted to make a scene, as evidenced by his history and his intention to make sure it was taped.
And big fucking deal, he got tazed. For somebody resisting arrest that's mild.
From what I hear, countries such as China are preventing sanctions. Do sanctions help, anyways? In places like Iraq and North Korea the people bore the brunt, while the rulers don't share any of the pain.
I think its unlikely we will see an equivalent housing boom again. Unless banks and mortgage lenders don't learn from their mistakes. This is said after every boom and bust, and during the next boom they say "this time is different because..." I remember the Savings and Loans scandal from the 1980s. This current debacle is looking awfully familiar.
however his attitude is the same one that will condone censorship when it does happen - think hate speech laws. Nice straw man you built up there. He's pointing out that a remark may be unintentionally racist, and probably best avoided, not calling for censorship or promoting hate speech laws. Whether the particular word "gyp" warrants his remark is debatable, but I find nothing wrong about the basic premise. I've seen similar debates over other words, like people who shorten Japanese as "Jap" without being aware of it's history.
The reason I have high ground is simply that he is a whiny sad excuse for a human being, quick to call for censorship of stuff he does not like. And there you are knocking down that straw man, again charging him with censorship after you just said "the charge of censorship was too much".
And finally, I don't understand why you called me decent and honorable while at the same time attacking my idea I was being facetious.
Firefox may be open source, but they get tens of millions in revenue from Google. The best you can do is code an extension, but the built-in feature will remain giving up info to Google.
Dictionary reference:"13. Slang. decent, honorable, or dependable: That's very white of you."
But punny jokes aside: I find the idea that you have the high ground ridiculous. Somebody complains about what somebody else said. You label that censorship, and complain that they shouldn't say that. Isn't the hypocrisy obvious?
This charge of "censorship" is too much. When the government forbids you from saying something that is censorship at its worst. Just expressing an opinion about what somebody else says is not censorship. "you shouldn't say that" vs "you can't say that by law".
you have to understand your memory management model and how it interacts with your application. If you don't, you'll have problems with all three. There is no panacea. The thing is, you can write real, garbage collected applications and not once think about memory management, and have it "just work". That's a huge savings in brain cycles.
Sure, that's not always the case, and when it does fail you have understand memory management. But it's a lot easier to focus on the failures than worrying about allocation all the time.
In short, when you sign for this shit, you are as good as recorded for any and all uses the corporate crooks can think of today or will think of tommorrow. And of course, all the arguments you made can be applied to GMail as well. Google really crossed a line when they decided to use email content as a source of advertising information.
If there is one bright side, maybe all this in-your-face "we know what you're saying" will promote the common use of public-key technology. Then again, it probably won't.
I'm glad the editors fixed the summary, but it would have been nice if they'd made some note to that effect, instead of confusing even more people. Which is exactly the reason that Slashdot doesn't allow you to edit your posts, and why the Slashdot editors usually provide some "Update:" instead of directly editing the summary.
Bad Slashdot editors! Follow your established principles.
There are ways of shaping traffic without discriminating about services, for example giving priority in the queues to the customers that have been using the least traffic in the last 5 minuites or so. That's a nice idea, and seems pretty fair. Certainly better than "you're over your usage limit, bye!"
Slashdot Mirror
"Internet censorship in the PRC has been called "a panopticon that encourages self-censorship through the perception that users are being watched".[7] The enforcement (or threat of enforcement) of censorship creates a chilling effect where individuals and businesses willingly censor their own communications to avoid legal and economic repercussions."
Their interview questions suck, but it probably stems more from the company's early days than some sinister plot to keep out older engineers. Early on they were all about data structures and algorithms. Now they are huge and I chalk it up to the initial culture that they haven't broadened their interview process. The people in at Google passed the interview process, so the company as a whole is self-selected to continue it.
ps: Using capitals would make your posts easier to read.
Dey terka jerb!
I read your post and all I perceive is fog. Could you name a concrete position skepticism has taken as an example?
I don't think at any point in the history of this country has it been illegal to argue against free speech or for communism. Court cases have been over more specific actions, such as advocating for people to dodge the draft, or for violent overthrow of the government. Could you cite one example otherwise?
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/200032/family_guy_in_germany/
Could they have been a little less hasty, and given the guy a chance to walk off on his own after they cut the mic? Probably, but it's a heat of the moment situation, instigated by Meyer and further fueled by Meyer when he refused to be escorted out. Please, name an event in that history, don't just parrot the party-line. Well, I'm just going by what I read in various Google News stories. Maybe there was a vast conspiracy to smear him, but what I read said on his own website he had videos of stunts that he had pulled before. But, I'll go look this up now... Ok, this looks one of the articles that stuck out in my mind:
http://www.local10.com/news/14138122/detail.html?rss=mia&psp=news:
"Meyer, a senior telecommunications major from the Fort Lauderdale suburb of Weston, has a Web site featuring several homemade videos. In one, he stands in a street with a sign that says "Harry Dies" after the latest Harry Potter book was released. In another, he acts like a drunk in a bar while trying to pick up a man dressed in drag."
Is this a boldfaced lie, and do you have evidence to back it up?
Free speech allows for people to speak their minds and decide for themselves what ideas are worthy. That some idea is beyond criticism is completely antithetical to the idea of free speech.
And big fucking deal, he got tazed. For somebody resisting arrest that's mild.
Firefox may be open source, but they get tens of millions in revenue from Google. The best you can do is code an extension, but the built-in feature will remain giving up info to Google.
I'm not a fan of Colbert's show, but that clip is awesome. Thanks for the link :)
I'm using "white" here as a racially charged pun:
Dictionary reference:"13. Slang. decent, honorable, or dependable: That's very white of you."
But punny jokes aside: I find the idea that you have the high ground ridiculous. Somebody complains about what somebody else said. You label that censorship, and complain that they shouldn't say that. Isn't the hypocrisy obvious?
This charge of "censorship" is too much. When the government forbids you from saying something that is censorship at its worst. Just expressing an opinion about what somebody else says is not censorship. "you shouldn't say that" vs "you can't say that by law".
This whole argument is a tar baby.
Sure, that's not always the case, and when it does fail you have understand memory management. But it's a lot easier to focus on the failures than worrying about allocation all the time.
If there is one bright side, maybe all this in-your-face "we know what you're saying" will promote the common use of public-key technology. Then again, it probably won't.
Bad Slashdot editors! Follow your established principles.