think tank forum

Scary ....
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/28/washington/28privacy.html

this doesn't sound like it would be inherently bad, but with some of the ambiguities it sounds like are present right now, it's kind of scary, for the EU particularly.

It is inherently bad.

Sooner or later these privileges will be used for purposes which can not endure the light of day.

At the same time the advantages are minimal or nonexistent.

It's inherently horrible. And it's very sad that our leaders are this utterly inept. We're setting the stage for an obscene amount of pain and suffering for future generations and I am very depressed by news such as this. Along the same lines Obama supports the FISA act... pretty much confirming that no matter who gets elected america is fucked.

i was walking back from the why concert in soho and i saw this painted in huge letters on a building

ONE NATION UNDER CCTV

:D

I just mean that cooperation between the US and EU is not inherently bad. that's what this legislation is about, after all, not creating new privacy laws. the place where it may fail, according to the article, is in the ambiguity of some of the requirements and compromises that may be made toward the more lax laws of the US.

if they draw up strict and clear-cut requirements for sharing between governments, I don't see how this is worse than the current situation of no or inconsistent requirements and seemingly messy bureaucracy.

I understand where you guys are coming from, and I am just as adamantly against making it easier for governments to access my information, but this doesn't seem to change much except to make sharing between the US and the EU more efficient.

I want a pic of that, nestor!

it was dark and i was pretty far away, so the pic sucks. or at least i'm too inexperienced to make it good/don't have a tripod with me

post it anyway!

check my latest flickr set

still rules!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/herschell/2412494935/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-55954 … -CCTV.html

From http://blogs.zdnet.com/BTL/?p=9242

Viacom wanted video related data from YouTube’s logging database. That’s a toned down way to say that Viacom wanted login IDs, the time a user watched it, the IP address and the video identifier.
[...]
The judge ruled for Viacom and Google has to produce the user histories.

Fuckers, and not to mention this retarded judge ... Individual rights and privacy don't matter, big company's profits do ...
And what's even worse, is that this ruling could have been a lot worse...

did you even read that article? the judge denied like a billion insane request from Viacom and only allowed them to have the user histories. I'm not saying I agree with the decision—I'm honestly not sure where I stand—but this isn't like a historic blow to individual privacy or anything.

the ruling could have been a lot worse, but it wasn't. not by chance, but because the judge isn't in Viacom's pocket to the extent that you're making it seem.

and to play devil's advocate, what about intellectual property rights and copyright? I know that's a huge argument, and Viacom is most probably not someone deserving of anyone's defense, but these are legitimate concerns and issues to bring up.

basically, I'm just saying that the issue isn't so one-sided.

Caught spreading copyrighted content three times? You're banned from the internet, without the bothersome interference of a court of law of course...

And a government declares software unlawful? Then it's illegal, or maybe even worse, government can declare all programs unlawful by default, and allow only those that are certified ... What does this mean for projects like Firefox? OpenBSD? etc.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7492907.stm

Well it means projects like firefox, openbsd etc will be used to shut down major corporations.

DUH. they use more source code illegally than joe user does.