Think the FAA is so great for making a slight loosening of its ridiculous regulations on phones on planes? Think again: The Euros are making us look bad by getting way ahead of us, and allowing full use of LTE at any time.
Anonymous is trying to go to war with America. Cells must start coming out denouncing this behavior I believe, or be considered anti-American and a threat to liberty until proven otherwise. Can we please go back to barring anarchists from the country, and expelling those we find?
Then again, the dope fiends among them are giving us plenty of reason to arrest them as it is through gangs like Silk Road, so… maybe that’s redundant.
I know it’s likely that the courts will toss out Net Neutrality again, but it still makes me smile to read predictions like that.
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Rooting for injuries watch: Anonymous Australia takes on Anonymous Indonesia. And then Singapore is after their own Anonymous cell. The blackshirts will be rooted out wherever they are, around the world*.
Cognitive dissonance watch: Google paints themselves as the Hobbits against Sauron that the NSA is supposed to be, even as they try to simultaneously goad people onto Google+ via Youtube comments, and then broadcast Google+ information to Android users, opting you in by default. I’m sorry, but these hobbits aren’t being taken to Isengard. They’re ruling Isengard.
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The push continues for US firms to be able to release stats about what the US Government asks of them. I support this. I’m in favor of the NSA doing its job but oversight is important, too.
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I skipped Tech at Night on Friday because I was preparing for the Extra Life event. Saturday NSA listening in on foreigners using Google is part of their job, folks. So if the Germans or anyone else don’t like it, even if they get the traitor Edward Snowden to help them censor and regulate their own Internet, my answer to those nations who don’t like the NSA is still: “Come and take it.”
Though it’s still apparent that the ‘leaks’ coming out such as this about Pope Francis are being crafted (not chosen, crafted) to sound plausible, attempting to push our buttons and play to our prejudices. Snowden’s accusations and ‘documents’ surely include the best fabrications Snowden’s Russian paymasters’ money can buy.
Don’t forget, though: metadata is harmless to collect, as it involves collecting only that data which is already public.
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Tech at Night is coming when it’s plenty light out this afternoon, because I need to start getting some sleep in preparation for my 25 hour broadcast as part of the Extra Life children’s hospital charity event.
The FCC got two new commissioners this week, a good one in Michael O’Rielly, and a likely bad one in Tom Wheeler. This came only after Ted Cruz got the answers he was looking for. Then again, under Barack Obama that’s the best we could hope for.
It’s very rare that I agree with a gun grabber like Dianne Feinstein but come on, she’s annoying the right people by calling out Snowden as the traitor he is.
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Next time you wonder why there is such a push to pick winners and losers with regulation, remember that industries like broadcast TV don’t like to become buggy whip makers, so they have to go after firms like Aereo who innovate and threaten traditional revenue streams.
Which is why, as much as I do agree that there are a number of piecemeal copyright reforms we should make, I disagree that fixing radio regulation isn’t a good idea. We have a system in place now called ‘compulsory licensing’ which is designed to rig the marketplace. Getting to a free market is a valuable thing. Copyright is probably too strong, but this isn’t where we need to trim it back, at all.
Let’s walk and chew gum at the same time. Let’s take on targeted copyright reform as Derek Khanna suggests, while also deregulating radio/music licensing.
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I know, it’s two weeks in a row the Friday tech got pushed the the weekend. Sorry.
The war on Tor crime continues as the Silk Road arrests go on and on and on. Next up, find the killers for hire?
Oh look, Edward Snowden and the Glenns Greenwald are in cahoots again. Even as the new push is on to claim he gave no data to the Chinese and Russians. I guess he needs that cover to try to get asylum?
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How desperate do you have to be? The radicals at Public Knowledge are trying to take credit for Republican initiatives. To claim a lefty was the ‘thought leader’ behind phone unlocking is ridiculous. That was Derek Khanna. Even Washington Post says so.
AT&T is wishing for a modern FCC so that they can innovate with the IP revolution. Instead FCC is threatening the economy by stalling, and for the basest of reasons: to try a power grab.
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This is a really late Friday tech. Enjoy anyway.
There’s not a lot of government policy stuff going on right now in DC, thanks to the shutdown, but at least we’re spending money keeping the lights on all night at the FCC.
A cell of Anonymous anarchists tried to “pay back’ Hollywood for getting The Pirate Bay, but it is they who are paying the price. Ruining your life because you want to download free stuff on the Internet. Heh.
The fact is, it would be to our benefit to be able to listen in on Tor. Privacy is good, but anonymity is a tool of evil and of our enemies. Just ask yourself why there’s a push by traitor Ed Snowden and the Glenns Greenwald spy team to discredit Tor attacks. A good reason for them to do this is that they’re afraid and want us to get the government to stop trying.
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Again, I’m sympathetic to the idea behind the new California ban in ‘revenge porn’, but ultimately this isn’t going to work, and it’s just going to give a false sense of security to the recklessly promiscuous. Just like the ‘eraser button’ for minors California passed, it’s a dangerously ineffective idea.
Big news: even as some people try to build a new distributed secure chat network, the old distributed secure communications network is continuing to fall apart. Tor has not protected Silk Road, whose creator is going to jail. It will be interesting to see if Bitcoin’s price falls as a result of the end of a major Bitcoin hub of illegal activity.
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