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Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

blog.wikimedia.org

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Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#31

Post by avh02 »

Markoff wrote: post #19
justicezyx wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Come on, FB makes way more money on an user by building social echo chamber and ads... Wiki give user knowledge, probably one of the highest quality sources...

FB is not asking me for donations and FB pay to people working for them unlike Wikipedia parasiting on work of volunteers pretending to be non profit organization so 300 people can enjoy doing nothing for good salary

With FB you're the product, your data is milked and sold. Have fun with your "free" social network. What a poor example of what you consider the viable alternative.

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#32

Post by dom0 »

sametmax wrote: post #13
asher wrote: post #11

Seems like it's trendy to hate the NSA. It gets conflated with an anti-authoritarian mindset. I wish smart people would gain some perspective - I got some by reading Bamford's books and a new one by Fred Kaplan - Dark Territories, about NSAs painful move to cyber. Some key points: * All the great powers have NSA equivalents. Meaning they play offence and defense in crypto, RF, and cyber. We (USA) can impose restricti…

It's like saying peace is trendy and we should not try to go weaponless. That makes no sense. We all want peace. We all know that peace is not there yet and that without weapons the other countries would take advantage of it. Yet we all know that the weapon oriented society the US has become is a major issue. It's not contradictory, just being honest with yourself.

> We all want peace.

I don't think that's true, there are clearly many people bent on fueling conflicts and wars, both in- and outside the US.

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#33

Post by sametmax »

dom0 wrote: post #32
sametmax wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's like saying peace is trendy and we should not try to go weaponless. That makes no sense. We all want peace. We all know that peace is not there yet and that without weapons the other countries would take advantage of it. Yet we all know that the weapon oriented society the US has become is a major issue. It's not contradictory, just being honest with yourself.

> We all want peace. I don't think that's true, there are clearly many people bent on fueling conflicts and wars, both in- and outside the US.

*In HN.

I don't think many people on this forum are war lords.

Anyway "we all" is always false, and is just another form of "most people". You must be really lacking of ideas to nitpick on that.

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#35

Post by omginternets »

Markoff wrote: post #18
losteric wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Did you read that article? Their reserve of 1.5 years of operational funding seems prudent. That $MM donation stream is a pittance considering their scale - orders of magnitude larger than most VC-funded startups.

i read they have 300 employees who create zero content on Wikipedia which is created by volunteers for free

Wait until you hear about Linux...

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#36

Post by morsch »

asher wrote: post #11

Seems like it's trendy to hate the NSA. It gets conflated with an anti-authoritarian mindset. I wish smart people would gain some perspective - I got some by reading Bamford's books and a new one by Fred Kaplan - Dark Territories, about NSAs painful move to cyber. Some key points: * All the great powers have NSA equivalents. Meaning they play offence and defense in crypto, RF, and cyber. We (USA) can impose restricti…

Cyber? Really?!

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#37

Post by [deleted] »

KGIII wrote: post #16
Markoff wrote: post #3

what is there to surveil about wikimedia? aren't all articles public and even IP of non registered users? this seem like something to justify showing those donation requests in your face, despite Wikipedia drowning in money https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2015/12...

As a regular donor, I'd like to address your concerns. I gave them the donations. They are gifts. They can spend them on hookers and blow, I don't care. I donate because I appreciate their service. I appreciate it enough to where I'd kinda like them to be making mad loot. I will continue to donate. I don't give gifts with strings. Gifts with strings are payments. My donation was a gift. Hell, I don't even write it of…

[deleted]

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#38

Post by orf »

Markoff wrote: post #21
KGIII wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a regular donor, I'd like to address your concerns. I gave them the donations. They are gifts. They can spend them on hookers and blow, I don't care. I donate because I appreciate their service. I appreciate it enough to where I'd kinda like them to be making mad loot. I will continue to donate. I don't give gifts with strings. Gifts with strings are payments. My donation was a gift. Hell, I don't even write it of…

it seems you don't realize your donations have pretty much nothing to do with service you use, created by volunteers, running on software provided by volunteer i would not be surprised if you would just give money also to homeless for booze

You keep repeating the "by volunteer" line over and over again. They pay people to head the development of the wiki software, including paying developers and managing the project.

The same goes for them managing the huge portfolio of Wikipedia sites.

They run one of the most visited and iconic websites online today in a way that is totally unique at that level. If you want to run a smear campaign against them, in here of all places, you need to do better than "it's a community driven OSS site, and they accept donations!"

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#39

Post by jacquesm »

Markoff wrote: post #4
dmurawsky wrote: post #2

Great article, thanks for doing what you do ;)

you mean making huge profits from donations? https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2015/12...

I have a hard time choosing what's the best thing to come out of the internet: WikiPedia or the Khan Academy.

If you're so intent on smearing WikiPedia it would probably help you if you studied it for a bit before spouting off a bunch of nonsense in this thread. I get it: you don't like WikiPedia because they ask you for a donation. Note that you're under no obligation whatsoever to donate and that the content is yours for the taking.

As compared to say owning the Encyclopedia Britannica, which took on average a tree (or two) to print and was outdated the day you received it. On top of that it took up a huge shelf and cost as much as a car.

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#40

Post by freeflight »

asher wrote: post #11

Seems like it's trendy to hate the NSA. It gets conflated with an anti-authoritarian mindset. I wish smart people would gain some perspective - I got some by reading Bamford's books and a new one by Fred Kaplan - Dark Territories, about NSAs painful move to cyber. Some key points: * All the great powers have NSA equivalents. Meaning they play offence and defense in crypto, RF, and cyber. We (USA) can impose restricti…

This isn't meant as an attack on the OP, but I have a hard time taking anybody seriously who's using the word "cyber" in such an inflated way. Always reminds me of this:

https://twitter.com/sehnaoui/status/643972826802688000

I also think it's quite troublesome how this very real issue, IT security, is being misused to stage yet another "War on something" even if there isn't anything concrete to wage a war on. If there's such a thing as the MIC, it seems to have found a new business field with "cyber". IT security works on cooperation, even more so on international cooperation. It does not work when international players are constantly trying to shaft each other over by collecting 0-days, like this is some kind of war which has to be won by pummeling the opposition into submission with "cyber weapons".

In that regard agencies like the NSA, and their foreign equivalents, are doing everybody a giant disservice by making the problem worse, not better. We are already at a point where these government agencies tools are being sold to the highest private bidders: https://krypt3ia.wordpress.com/2017/06/22/shadow-brokers-scy...

As a fan of dystopian cyberpunk fiction, I'm not sure if I should geek out over this or just be depressed.

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