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Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

digitalrightswatch.org.au

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Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#291

Post by animal_spirits »

bin_bash wrote: post #283
Aerroon wrote: post #225

I'm always kind of surprised by people who move to Australia. It's a country that has had an active policy of censorship on entertainment for a very long time - books, video games, movies. The fact that the populace is okay with such a policy would make me reconsider moving there. I've also read some really questionable things about policies regarding aboriginals in the northern territories. In 2007 the government 't…

Well to be fair the US bans alcohol for native eskimos in the Alaskan bush. EDIT: I guess in the 1980s the government allowed the villages to make their own decisions to be dry or not: https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/is-proh...

Interesting. I found this:

> ABSTRACT: When Alaska became a state in 1959, state laws removed control of alcohol regulation from the federal government and Native communities. In 1981, however, the state legislature changed alcohol laws to give residents broad powers to regulate how alcohol comes into their communities via a local option referendum. By mid-1999, 112 small communities had held 197 alcohol control elections under the state law. Sixty-nine percent of these elections added new restrictions on alcohol, while 13% removed restrictions previously imposed. The remaining 18% of elections did not receive a majority vote needed to change the existing status. Most communities passing local option restrictions chose to ban sale and importation. Although most of these elections occurred during the first eight years after the law was passed, elections continue to occur as the law evolves and as communities debate the merits of alcohol control. Although growing evidence suggests that the local option law may reduce adverse effects of alcohol abuse in Alaska Native communities, its most important contribution may be to restore to these communities a limited form of self-government.

[0] https://iseralaska.org/static/legacy_publication_links/Alcoh...

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#292

Post by cenophor »

Aerroon wrote: post #225

I'm always kind of surprised by people who move to Australia. It's a country that has had an active policy of censorship on entertainment for a very long time - books, video games, movies. The fact that the populace is okay with such a policy would make me reconsider moving there. I've also read some really questionable things about policies regarding aboriginals in the northern territories. In 2007 the government 't…

You can say the same things about a lot of things in many countries, someone can probably say the same about the one you live in.

I suspect the censorship that you talk about are not as black and white as you seem to be trying to project. It's easy to cherry-pick the things that you don't like to get your own view across.

Not really sure what you are trying to achieve here than to push your own personal viewpoints on things that you don't like? I mean, I could say something like "I'm always kind of surprised by people who want to move to the US because the lack of gun laws", and what does that achieve?

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#293

Post by mbg721 »

dane-pgp wrote: post #279
adventured wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What is the reality on the ground though? The reality on the ground is that all Western European nations have stricter voting laws / requirements than the US does and almost nobody on HN will dare to talk about that fact because it's inconvenient to the propaganda game. It's the sick joke of eg Major League Baseball moving the All-Star game from Georgia to protest new voting laws, shifting it to Colorado which alre…

> all Western European nations have stricter voting laws / requirements than the US does The UK* has never required voting ID for elections, and it is possible to walk into a local polling station and be given a ballot paper after just stating your name and address. Sadly that may no longer be the case for future elections, because the UK Conservative party has decided to introduce a voter ID requirement, modelled on…

So the first person in line to mumble "Johnson, Boris, 10 Downing St." gets his ballot? That can't be true in practice.

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#294

Post by systemvoltage »

alliao wrote: post #260
eunos wrote: post #220

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In short tech surveillance are both working and attractive. Regardless of CCP, Australia, US, FB, GOOGL, etc.

I don't know if you're being intentional, but one of these isn't like the rest. The reach and ambition of CCP though without much elegance is overwhelmingly overshadowing any efforts shown by others.

The machinery is already put in place in the US. All it takes is a switch to flip.

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#295

Post by rapind »

gregsq wrote: post #237
Nagyman wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can just submit a blank ballot. https://www.quora.com/As-voting-is-compulsory-in-Australia-a...

I don’t see this as anywhere near the same thing though. These so called ‘donkey votes’ are derided, and categorised as together with voting errors and other invalid voting forms. The right to withhold your vote is as fundamental as the right to withold your labour. Voter turnout is an important metric in its own right, and is observed tactically in, say, the UK. Compulsory voting simplifies competition, and destroys…

I highly doubt most non-voters are intentionally "witholding" their vote. I think it's more often just laziness or lack of access (voting during work day etc.).

It has to be incredibly more meaningful to have statistics on how many people intentionally said "screw you" with a vote for "ficus" or w/e.

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#296

Post by systemvoltage »

markdown wrote: post #241
c_o_n_v_e_x wrote: post #210

In the years before covid, as the sole American in a few 'strayan social circles, I'd receive sh*t for Americans protesting about their "rights" and how entitled they are. Now with Covid, Australian citizens can't leave or can't come in (without significant effort). I've seen a shift in thinking amongst my Australian friends and family. The Australians I know now see value in something like a bill of rights. Like in…

There isn't a bill of rights without exceptions, and a pandemic (public health) is always going to be one of those exceptions. It doesn't help at all during a pandemic.

The pandemic is forever. It will be 2040 and I guarantee you the Coronavirus will be here with various mutations.

For some reason people are not grasping the reality of how long this is going to last. Until we die, the masks are here to stay, the restrictions are here to stay.

Vaccine stocks are going to the moon because there is going to be a need for vaccines for many decades. We will be taking shots every year if not more frequently.

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#297

Post by layoric »

WalterBright wrote: post #186
layoric wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Born in AU so bias is to stay, which leads me to push more for political change required to try to address these problems. Most of your 10 years has been under a particularly bad (and honestly corrupt) federal gov. Country has a large state capture problem from largely mining companies but also other special interests that have lobbied and . Anything that might threaten those interests is being pretty heavily targete…

> compulsory voting This always seemed like madness to me. You can force someone to vote, but you cannot force them to vote responsibly. They may just vote "screw you" just for revenge. The right to vote includes the right to abstain from voting when one does not care. Forced voting sounds like a recipe for bad election results. I would expect the same from paying people to vote.

I strongly disagree. There is already informal voting (aka donkey vote), people who want to use their vote as a "screw you" have to choose between a number of candidates/parties, so who they are "screwing" is pretty hard to tell.

I actually think compulsory voting brings forward the importance of thinking about the consequences of voting, and voting for candidates that have the same values. Granted this can be manipulated (and is) with ads etc but getting people use to being involved I think is far better than making it optional and creating people that either never vote or a population that does when things are "bad" and an apathetic group when things are "good".

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#298

Post by cletus »

girvo wrote: post #277
BrissyCoder wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mostly agree with everything here but will point out that SE salaries have risen quite dramatically over the past 10 years in Aus. If you are a (genuinely) senior engineer you should be on $170k+. In a place like Brisbane (if you can handle the summers) that's a reasonably liveable salary. But yeah - I fear it's going to end up like the rest of the country fairly quickly... One of my major gripes is that education…

As another senior SE in Brisbane I can 100% back up what BrissyCoder here is saying. Its even more so right now, if you're up for contracting. $1000+ a day is common. Kind of nuts, but hey its been good for my wallet.

While that's an improvement and a welcome one, Sydney (and even Melbourne) seem to still be lagging in cost-of-living terms.

But, more importantly, Big Tech senior engineer total comp is rapidly pushing to $US500K+.

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#299

Post by cenophor »

siquick wrote: post #37

I've lived in Australia for 10 years and really considering my familys future in this country. We are sleep-walking towards a very average future. An undiversified export economy, out of control house prices, a job-market primarily focused on two cities, a government intent on selling all public assets, very limited political interest in positive climate policies. The latter is simply addressed with "technology will…

> It really feels sometimes that the only thing the average Australian cares about is the price of their property portfolio.

Maybe the sample average of the people you hang around is quite different from the population average.

The average Australian can't even afford to have a property portfolio, let alone caring about one.

Re: Australia’s new mass surveillance mandate

#300

Post by SilverRed »

alliao wrote: post #207

CCP is literally cancer on all citizens living in currently free democracy. They show that it's possible to keep a huge population under control with current tools and technology. Our politicians show public disdain, but fuck are they being seduced. And Australia is just stepping into it step by step while asking it's citizens to trust the government because they seem to be at odds with CCP publicly. As someone who l…

The difference is the CCP is more aligned with the best interests of the country (not so much as individuals but as a whole) while Australian politicians are only interested in their own profits and those of their friends.
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