We need to abolish IP Laws (aka "Imaginary Property" aka "Illogical Property" aka "Incongruent Property" aka "Invalidates Property Laws"—the other term is a big lie, don't repeat it). Not "reform". Not "compromise". Abolish. If 2020 taught me anything, it's that society can come close to the brink pretty quickly. I thought there was an inevitable trend toward freedom, but recently think it's perilous. We need ideas t…
> If 2020 taught me anything, it's that society can come close to the brink pretty quickly. I thought there was an inevitable trend toward freedom, but recently think it's perilous. We need ideas to flow to create a more distributed, less unequal, world, and we need it now. We need to unshackle the people. This seems like an odd claim, as society as a whole was able to weather the pandemic overall in incredible comfo…
Neofeudalism and the Digital Manor
241–250 of 255 posts
Re: Neofeudalism and the Digital Manor
#242Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not that I'm a spy. It's that I want to protect myself digitally as much as possible, despite being forced to interface with the internet by large institutions. We can go back and time and argue about the lack of security just four decades ago (George Hayduke[1] had a series of books on how to exfiltrate info in the 60's & 70's through social engineering). However, here we are: in a virtual world that is simulta…
> protect myself digitally as much as possible From whom? Understanding the threat model is incredibly important to understanding how and what to defend against. It sounds like you're just chucking "security ideas" over the fence in the hopes that one might protect you. Protection against cyber criminals and other net denizens? You're probably overkill and also not helpful in some circumstances. Tor is generally for…
> It sounds like you're just chucking "security ideas" over the fence in the hopes that one might protect you.
Precisely my point!
You describe a situation where "buyer beware" means staying up to date with the latest netsec and tech rags. That is simply unfeasible for the vast majority of people, including me.
But you know what: I can't get simjacked anymore because I read about that. I have stronger passwords because of hard tokens, because I read about that.
What next 50 things do I need to read about to stay "safe", and what even IS "safe"?
This is nontrivial and our identities literally depend on it. The fall-off costs are astonishingly high.
Re: Neofeudalism and the Digital Manor
#243Earlier quoted context omitted.
This confuses me; the core of HTML is relatively unchanged since its inception and static HTML is fairly secure. PDF is notoriously complex and has had many security issues associated with it as a result. Regardless, if it's content you're producing I'm imagining it can be done securely with either format?
PDF/A is a reduced subset of PDF, optimised for archival storage. A compliant PDF/A reader has a greatly reduced attack surface compared to a full PDF format reader.
Any recommended readers?
Re: Neofeudalism and the Digital Manor
#244We need to abolish IP Laws (aka "Imaginary Property" aka "Illogical Property" aka "Incongruent Property" aka "Invalidates Property Laws"—the other term is a big lie, don't repeat it). Not "reform". Not "compromise". Abolish. If 2020 taught me anything, it's that society can come close to the brink pretty quickly. I thought there was an inevitable trend toward freedom, but recently think it's perilous. We need ideas t…
I am genuinely interested in understanding how we could have innovation in a world where a creator is not entitled to benefits from their invention. Including any monetary benefits if they so choose.
Who is the "creator"? If it is someone who composed a song or wrote a book, that word makes sense; without them the song or book would not exist. (Ironically, copyrights for songs are often not owned by the people who composed them, because contracts with publishers often require selling the copyright to them. At the end, you may be forbidden to sing your own song without paying.)
But in patents, sometimes it is just a person who noticed that existing technologies X and Y could be used together, and filed the patent first. If not them, someone else would have noticed it somewhat later. Even worse, someone else may get the idea independently a few weeks later... and then be sued for using it. Actually, if you invent something, it is always risky to use it, because you can never be sure whether someone else didn't patent it before you. (Did you do an expensive research of existing patents? Maybe you used a wrong keyword.) (By the way, patents also sometimes do not belong to people who had the idea.)
Re: Neofeudalism and the Digital Manor
#245Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've talked to a thousand people like this and generally they seem immune to logical conversations. If you are in the 1% who gets a nice fat check thanks to IP laws, hurray for you. I've been there too, it's a nice comfortable life. You can promote the Big Lie all you want, but any smart honest person will figure out eventually that IP is evil from every angle.
> I've talked to a thousand people like this and generally they seem immune to logical conversations. Are you talking about me? Which part of my posts is not "logical"? > If you are in the 1% who gets a nice fat check thanks to IP laws, hurray for you. I'm not. Some people are able to hold opinions that don't directly benefit them. Inconceivable, right? > You can promote the Big Lie all you want, but any smart honest…
It is an argument. IP is evil/suboptimal from every angle. What happens when debating people who repeat tired tropes of “a musician won’t get paid” or “we won’t have new medicines” or “copying is stealing” is that you can never satisfy them because they aren’t discussing in good faith. They provide 3 angles, you refute those 3; they provide 3 more; you refute those; et cetera. There is no angle to support IP unless you are in the 1% and support it for selfish interests in maintaining the status quo, or you take the autocratic angle that it is important for a government to have more control over its people. Those are interesting debates to have, but discussing the logic and data about how IP is unjust and bad economics is not, because generally people just regurgitate “the Big Lie”, and it’s a waste of time talking to them. There’s plenty out there refuting any point in favor of IP, and simply thinking from first principles is a fast and simple way to arrive at the truth.
I do apologize for me jumping on you there and assuming bad faith, it’s just that most folks who raise similar points to you are coming from that, but wasn’t fair of me to assume the worst from you. I like your point about holding opinions that go against your own self-interest (being against IP has personally cost me a fortune), and I encourage you to delve more into this issue.
Re: Neofeudalism and the Digital Manor
#246Earlier quoted context omitted.
But the public signing key, that's already installed via presumably verified initial media is already there, so unless their private key is compromised, which would be a bigger deal ....
> installed via presumably verified initial media This is not a universally correct assumption. How does this chain of trust bootstrap for a first time (or stand alone) user who downloads Ubuntu from a non-Ubuntu system? If I've got MITM, I can change both the ISO (with the totally-not-verified public key) as well as the gpg sig to match using a private key I know (and gave you the public key to).
Fortunately, the ISOs themselves are served over https:
https://ubuntu.com/download/desktop
links to https://ubuntu.com/download/desktop/thank-you/?version=20.10...
Re: Neofeudalism and the Digital Manor
#247Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think the concern is more about man-in-the-middle attacks. Even then, though, doesn't apt verify the hashes of downloaded packages?
How do you trust distribution if you also have mirrors all across the globe (that are not Cononical's machines)?
Signatures generated with trusted keys.
Re: Neofeudalism and the Digital Manor
#248Earlier quoted context omitted.
Discussions like the current one make me wish we had huge but relatively affordable space habitats [1]. People with a radical idea for restructuring society [2] could pool their resources, build/buy a space habitat, and prove that their way is superior to the status quo (or fail miserably, or something inbetween) [3]. This way, empirical evidence could be collected, and radical ideas could be tested and adopted if th…
This is a good point and we do indeed have it in a way: countries that have allowed piracy to flourish have seen a big boom in economic activity over the past 2 decades (China being the most notable example).
Absolutely. The fact that China almost completely disregards IP and shows no signs of "innovation" slowing down disproves the notion that you need government backed monopolies on inventions in order to encourage innovation.
Re: Neofeudalism and the Digital Manor
#249Earlier quoted context omitted.
>What really puzzles me about Apple fans and it's userbase is that they do not care. They simply do not care at all what's being done to them. I am Apple user and I care a lot for my self and my privacy. Thats why I will not support this company with my money. Some people are aware, but unfortunately we run a business in which Mac OS as software platform is superior. Little Snitch is installed in all my Apple compute…
> we run a business in which Mac OS as software platform is superior Out of curiosity, what business is that? Music? Video editing?
Graphic/ UI design plus audio and video production. Affinity/ Sketch/ Final Cut / Resolve / Fusion / Logic.
Re: Neofeudalism and the Digital Manor
#250Earlier quoted context omitted.
They might struggle to sell licenses to their ideas, given that license is merely permission to perform a trivial task they are equally prepared to perform sans license, they could always benefit by selling their creative labor as work on the market.
That would mean that artists were only able to make money if they are working directly for someone else. That doesn't seem fair.
> That would mean that artists were only able to make money if they are working directly for someone else.
Nonsense, they can sell their own artwork too.