First Look Media launch, Glenn Greenwald's new website

people choose to search the web adn email each other, they don't consent to the fact that alot of their behavior will be tracked. "..choice therefore consent.." doesn't fit in here.

 

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The second is that because Bush, or whoever the president was, got voted, people choose to have the NSA collect their data. People did not choose to have their data collected like the NSA do. And what's worse, the people who voted for it (senate/congress), didn't even know what they voted for. Or how the NSA, and agencies like them, would interpret the laws which allowed them to do certain programs. Lines have been crossed, even without consent of congress/senate. Let alone the voters.

that's a bunch of baseless assumptions: how does nsa collect data exactly ? what lines were crossed ? people who voted for bush didn't know of his ideas about on war on terror and surveillance ? there's just much more information about political stuff in the press than of how corporations work and the technicalities of internet search engines.

 

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And is voting for a president some kind of informed consent for the collecting of data? Is that really your argument? Seeing you're a sociologist, what would you expect when a referendum is being held about the NSA programs? Would people vote YAY or NAY?

it's informed consent for the whole package of what president promises.

regarding referendum: 50% is automatic, republican nay because obama. and obama voters: depends on the question obviously, if you let someone like greenwald frame it (as it happens now) of course there would be alot of nays, but given more sensible explanations there might be still kneejerk reaction like "but our freedoms and constitutions" but most will be alright with it.

 

(btw, i'm not a sociologist yet, i still haven't finished my thesis.)

2000

• George W. Bush/Dick Cheney ® – 50,460,110 (47.9%) and 271 electoral votes (30 states carried)

2004

• George W. Bush/Dick Cheney ® (inc.) – 62,040,610 (50.7%) and 286 electoral votes (31 states carried)

 

It's not like most people actually liked the guy.. he lost popular vote when he first went into office. Second term was over by .7%.

  On 3/16/2014 at 6:55 PM, eugene said:

people choose to search the web adn email each other, they don't consent to the fact that alot of their behavior will be tracked. "..choice therefore consent.." doesn't fit in here.

 

People choose their elected representatives, they don't consent to those representatives creating programs that could be used against them.

eugene is more or less compson with different issues

  On 3/17/2014 at 4:47 PM, chenGOD said:

 

  On 3/16/2014 at 6:55 PM, eugene said:

people choose to search the web adn email each other, they don't consent to the fact that alot of their behavior will be tracked. "..choice therefore consent.." doesn't fit in here.

People choose their elected representatives, they don't consent to those representatives creating programs that could be used against them.

 

people choose what those representatives offer, with bush it was pretty obvious where it'll lead. besides, what programs are used against americans ?

 

Newsflash: Everyone Realizes They've Been An Idiot All Along, Votes Eugene For New Joyrex, Carries Eugene Around On Chair

  On 3/17/2014 at 5:48 PM, eugene said:

 

  On 3/17/2014 at 4:47 PM, chenGOD said:

 

  On 3/16/2014 at 6:55 PM, eugene said:

people choose to search the web adn email each other, they don't consent to the fact that alot of their behavior will be tracked. "..choice therefore consent.." doesn't fit in here.

People choose their elected representatives, they don't consent to those representatives creating programs that could be used against them.

 

people choose what those representatives offer, with bush it was pretty obvious where it'll lead. besides, what programs are used against americans ?

 

 

 

Gitmo, NSA surveillance programs (even if not on a wide scale as far as we know), the Patriot Act (parts of which were found to be unconstitutional), etc. You're presumably asking for widespread abuse of the legal system against American citizens, the war on drugs is clearly a policy/program that has been used against Americans.

 

If it is obvious what representatives offer (and I would argue it is clearly not, as politicians will often pander to gain votes), then what google et al. offer is equally clear, their terms of service are very easily available.

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The National Security Agency has built a surveillance system capable of recording “100 percent” of a foreign country’s telephone calls, enabling the agency to rewind and review conversations as long as a month after they take place, according to people with direct knowledge of the effort and documents supplied by former contractor Edward Snowden.

 

A senior manager for the program compares it to a time machine — one that can replay the voices from any call without requiring that a person be identified in advance for surveillance.

 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/nsa-surveillance-program-reaches-into-the-past-to-retrieve-replay-phone-calls/2014/03/18/226d2646-ade9-11e3-a49e-76adc9210f19_story.html

yeah but the entire 100% are all terrorists or people who are suspected of doing criminal activity, you would have to be a bat-shit paranoiac conspiracy theorist to think otherwise

  On 3/19/2014 at 3:43 AM, John Ehrlichman said:

yeah but the entire 100% are all terrorists or people who are suspected of doing criminal activity, you would have to be a bat-shit paranoiac conspiracy theorist to think otherwise

 

lol

I don't know whether to be upset, or impressed. This is some next-level surveillance shit. It's reports like that which confirm to me I am in fact living in the future our parents only dreamed of.

 

And for the record: I in no way helped a friend grow his first weed plant a few years ago. Nope.

Edited March 19, 2014 by fiznuthian

If I worked for the NSA I would be fapping so often my dick would fall off.

it's always been weird for me to think of the sexual implications this would have an american population, judging from my own experience as a paranoiac, after I jerked off in front of my computer webcam the other week (not doing some kind of webshow, i just mean looking at hardcore pornography) I immediately felt some kind of shame I've never experienced, that I just had been watched jerking off by a super sexually repressed D.C. pale WASP in a shitty (but nice looking) suit. I mean I can't be the only one who feels a slight chilling effect while masturbating right? This actually sounds like a joke but im being dead serious

ps: visit DC sometime to understand what I'm talking about, it literally seems like the Washington DC elite come from a very small gene pool, where very often the pale young man in a suit will resemble a not very attractive JCrew model who resembles a young baby-fat on face Karl Rove, i shit you not, this is real. Of all the people I want to have watch me handle my penis, this type of person is absolutely at the bottom of the list.

Edited March 19, 2014 by John Ehrlichman

Nah, man. I get it. Why do you think my webcams are covered? I don't feel guilty about it though. I'm sex positive.

 

Conversely though I like the idea of everyone's kinks being exposed. If we all saw the variety and depth of sexuality of everyone else I think it would alter perspectives and create a more honest society. Sexuality is a huge part of people. It's one of everyone's top priorities. For a long time, it was sort of painted as having one acceptable form of sexuality, and all other were a perversion. As it becomes more clear that people's tastes are much broader I think it lends to better understanding and healthier relationships on a larger scale.

 

It's like when I see these dudes posting nudes of girls on 4chan and linking their facebook profile I kind of wish we all would just post our nudes online so this type of exploitation would cease to exist.

  On 3/19/2014 at 4:03 AM, AdieuErsatzEnnui said:

Nah, man. I get it. Why do you think my webcams are covered? I don't feel guilty about it though. I'm sex positive.

 

Conversely though I like the idea of everyone's kinks being exposed. If we all saw the variety and depth of sexuality of everyone else I think it would alter perspectives and create a more honest society. Sexuality is a huge part of people. It's one of everyone's top priorities. For a long time, it was sort of painted as having one acceptable form of sexuality, and all other were a perversion. As it becomes more clear that people's tastes are much broader I think it lends to better understanding and healthier relationships on a larger scale.

 

It's like when I see these dudes posting nudes of girls on 4chan and linking their facebook profile I kind of wish we all would just post our nudes online so this type of exploitation would cease to exist.

i agree with this in theory, Im a very sex positive person but what about people who are still discovering their own kinks or coming to grips with their own sexual identity? Knowing that even the mere possibility exists that the government could be listening in or watching them live out this sexual expression in private could cause that person to not experiment or explore as much, in essence stifling one of the most pure forms of human expression. It's actually quite disturbing when you take it all the way to this level, Glenn Greenwald talked about privacy being the bastion for dissent and creativity but he didn't mention sexual expression as being a completely linked to the idea of having actual privacy

Yeah, that makes sense. I definitely consider that my google searches could end up being used against me in some way which doesn't make me happy. Personally, I just accept it, but obviously the spying needs to stop.

 

edit: I also see sexual expression/experimentation as a form of creativity.

Edited March 19, 2014 by AdieuErsatzEnnui

yeah in this case i'm specifically talking about the JTRIG QHCQ UK spying scandal just revealed where it was shown that they actually collected thousands of intimate sexual acts in the form of video and still photographs of completely innocent bystanders in a massive intrusive spying grid. As far as I'm concerned this is easily revolution sparking activity on behalf of the UK government

edit: and just for the record, I agree with you in the sense that being a very extroverted totally confident non self conscious person about your entire 'private' life would be an ideal way to combat this type of government behavior, but i'd say a very small percentage of any population is actually like this by default.

Edited March 19, 2014 by John Ehrlichman

Everyone should go fuck in front of parliament in protest.

  On 3/13/2014 at 10:38 PM, azatoth said:

Just biking in to say that the NSA/CIA/alphabetsoupagency gathering massive amounts of data is a really bad way of finding and stopping terrorist plots. Sure, they might get wind of something but it gets lost in the noise. The movement from HUMINT to SIGINT in the intelligence community is bad. Gathering data is just so much easier than having actual feet on the ground doing actual spy work.

 

this is a good point that I hadn't even thought about.

 

  On 3/16/2014 at 3:58 PM, marf said:

someone here is related to abby martin right?

 

no. nope. absolutely not. I don't even know where you got this preposterous idea.

  On 3/19/2014 at 4:46 AM, usagi said:

 

  On 3/13/2014 at 10:38 PM, azatoth said:

Just biking in to say that the NSA/CIA/alphabetsoupagency gathering massive amounts of data is a really bad way of finding and stopping terrorist plots. Sure, they might get wind of something but it gets lost in the noise. The movement from HUMINT to SIGINT in the intelligence community is bad. Gathering data is just so much easier than having actual feet on the ground doing actual spy work.

 

this is a good point that I hadn't even thought about.

 

Why though? This is kind of similar to arguing that a human pilot is better than an AI pilot. I can think of all kinds of reasons why (meta)data based intelligence is way better than old fashioned spy work. Which is a straw argument, btw. Because they complement each other.

  On 3/19/2014 at 6:20 AM, goDel said:

 

  On 3/19/2014 at 4:46 AM, usagi said:

 

  On 3/13/2014 at 10:38 PM, azatoth said:

Just biking in to say that the NSA/CIA/alphabetsoupagency gathering massive amounts of data is a really bad way of finding and stopping terrorist plots. Sure, they might get wind of something but it gets lost in the noise. The movement from HUMINT to SIGINT in the intelligence community is bad. Gathering data is just so much easier than having actual feet on the ground doing actual spy work.

this is a good point that I hadn't even thought about.

Why though? This is kind of similar to arguing that a human pilot is better than an AI pilot. I can think of all kinds of reasons why (meta)data based intelligence is way better than old fashioned spy work. Which is a straw argument, btw. Because they complement each other.

 

 

which they are?

 

sigint might give clear insight into things that are difficult to determine via humint (patterns, etc) but as aza said, the volumes are massive.

 

skilled agents on the ground developing targeted intel for you seems like one way of getting around the whole mass-surveillance debate mess.

Computers/algorithms don't really care for massive volumes. It's a typical human trait to be overwhelmed by too much data/noise. Often, noisy data can actually improve search algorithms, because the produced generalizations tend to be more robust.

 

Just like a human pilot. Humans are inherently limited to the amount of data they can process, the span of attention, rational reasoning, speed, etc. The idea that human pilots are better than AI is pure romanticism, imo. I had this discussion with some marine once who made a similar argument. He argued computers being not nearly as smart as people in the context of combat. I argued he should play unreal tournament gold edition against AI with all AI settings to max (precision, response time, etc). Without AI actually being very intelligent, it outwits human players already in terms of speed and accuracy. Read: its already impossible for humans to play against maxed AI in some game which was released in the nineties.

 

The impact of human intelligence is overrated, imo. It's an understandable bias though. Being human and all. The point is, that apart from intelligence, humans have so many limitations computers don't have, that many tasks should be done by computers. Driving a car and flying a plane would be excellent examples of tasks being done by computers in the near future. Tasks where lots of info should be considered in a short time, and where simple if then rules suffice (yes, i think driving cars and flying planes can be reduced to a set of if then rules, or equivalent). They just feel complicated to us simple humans because of our limitations. But without these limitations, you wouldn't need much intelligence, ironically.

Edited March 19, 2014 by goDel

there a few ridiculous points in your post that I can't be bothered to address.

 

*moves like bernie out of thread*

Thanks, mr passive aggressive.

  On 3/19/2014 at 3:55 AM, John Ehrlichman said:

it's always been weird for me to think of the sexual implications this would have an american population, judging from my own experience as a paranoiac, after I jerked off in front of my computer webcam the other week (not doing some kind of webshow, i just mean looking at hardcore pornography) I immediately felt some kind of shame I've never experienced, that I just had been watched jerking off by a super sexually repressed D.C. pale WASP in a shitty (but nice looking) suit. I mean I can't be the only one who feels a slight chilling effect while masturbating right? This actually sounds like a joke but im being dead serious.

I'm also interested in how all of this will modify/curtail (or accelerate/exaggerate?) our behaviours. I've been thinking particularly in terms of how we lay plans. I don't mean terror plots. I mean like calendar our work and business development or creative concepts for albums, etc.. because it would seem in this environment, where you can't trust the privacy of networks, the more you flesh out ideas that you want to come to fruition at a future time, the more likely it is that you will be beaten to the punch and thwarted (particularly where profit is concerned).

 

Do we then adapt to this and rely more upon our intuition by improvising in spontaneous modes where we step directly from initial ideas to outcomes? Are we about to enter the Internet Jazz Age?

Edited March 19, 2014 by webby

  On 3/19/2014 at 10:34 AM, webby said:

because it would seem in this environment, where you can't trust the privacy of networks, the more you flesh out ideas that you want to come to fruition at a future time, the more likely it is that you will be beaten to the punch and thwarted (particularly where profit is concerned).

Do we then adapt to this and rely more upon our intuition by improvising in spontaneous modes where we step directly from initial ideas to outcomes? Are we about to enter the Internet Jazz Age?

 

very good points, we know the NSA has used their tools to gain big corporations advantages in other countries, but what if an NSA employee hears a good idea in a brainstorming session and decides to steal it from just a regular dude?

but you're talking about the chilling effect in relation to this kind of activity