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Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

blog.wikimedia.org

41–50 of 117 posts

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#41
post #30
post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

Speaking as a Wikipedia "volunteer" (or rather "editor"), I think it is in fact a very good idea that the Foundation takes no editorial responsibilities (except reacting to legal challenges via so-called "office actions"). It means that editors don't have to worry about legal, sysadmin, PR, etc.; and conversely WMF is not directly responsible for Wikipedia content. Believe me, it would be silly for WMF to be involved…

You forgot to mention that a lot of editing work on wikipedia is done by bots (there is no clear way to decide how to pay for that). What is your opinion on Wikia and the deletionist culture that is rampant on wikipedia?

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#42
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…

NB! Cyber Warning:

Please, you Sir,

no one knows what the heck you're talking about

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#43
post #16
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…

You can be sure that you will have to give them more if they start spending it on hookers because they would lose donors faster than they can come up with threatening banners.

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#45
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, but only the addressing as far as I know.

The Stasi was able to read all mail of targets (and they had many) fifty years ago. Practically all mail crossing the border was read, which again was a lot. I'd assume addresses are scraped anyway, since they are digitized for routing already, and targeted mail being opened without leaving marks (an art existing for hundreds of years).

I wouldn't be surprised if it's possible to read mail while still sealed in an envelope. Wouldn't a sufficiently bright light and OCR be sufficient to read the average single page folded in thirds?

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#46
post #31
post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

learn to read, I was just responding to someone who mentioned FB, never said anything about being alternative to wikipedia, you are writing to wrong person

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#47
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 ther…

Like it or not the "cyber" is now the term that is used

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#48
post #38
post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 her…

the issue is, the site itself they could run with 10% of current employees and they would have funds to run it for years without threatening donation banners each year

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#49
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…

> Seems like it's trendy to hate the NSA.

Yes, that tends to happen when the NSA abuses its power to illegally spy on its own citizens for its own gain and profit, and also when it tends to compromise security of networks in 99% of the cases for its own surveillance benefits.

Re: Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA

#50
post #19

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

Does FB pay people who create content there? Afaik they don't.

I'm that sense I prefer YouTube that at least shares ad revenue with creators.

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