Internet disrupted in Pakistan amid arrest of former PM Imran Khan • Hacker News Board

Re: Internet disrupted in Pakistan amid arrest of former PM Imran Khan

#291

Post by [deleted] » Wed, May 10, 2023, 9:30 AM UTC

theK wrote: post #237

usernew wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you suggest is impossible, because you are attacking a wrench on the head problem with a coding solution. You can always get a dish and connect to your choice of orbital provider, if your ISP - which is regulated - is blocked. The problem is, guys with guns will come to your door, beat you with a wrench, and put you in jail. Now if we solve for the real issue - lack of freedom because of a ruling class, the tech…

As a EU citizen I’m a bit offended, how do EU citizens have no freedom of speech?

[deleted]

Re: Internet disrupted in Pakistan amid arrest of former PM Imran Khan

#292

Post by [deleted] » Wed, May 10, 2023, 9:32 AM UTC

theK wrote: post #237

usernew wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you suggest is impossible, because you are attacking a wrench on the head problem with a coding solution. You can always get a dish and connect to your choice of orbital provider, if your ISP - which is regulated - is blocked. The problem is, guys with guns will come to your door, beat you with a wrench, and put you in jail. Now if we solve for the real issue - lack of freedom because of a ruling class, the tech…

As a EU citizen I’m a bit offended, how do EU citizens have no freedom of speech?

[deleted]

Re: Internet disrupted in Pakistan amid arrest of former PM Imran Khan

#293

Post by [deleted] » Wed, May 10, 2023, 9:33 AM UTC

theK wrote: post #237

usernew wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you suggest is impossible, because you are attacking a wrench on the head problem with a coding solution. You can always get a dish and connect to your choice of orbital provider, if your ISP - which is regulated - is blocked. The problem is, guys with guns will come to your door, beat you with a wrench, and put you in jail. Now if we solve for the real issue - lack of freedom because of a ruling class, the tech…

As a EU citizen I’m a bit offended, how do EU citizens have no freedom of speech?

[deleted]

Re: Internet disrupted in Pakistan amid arrest of former PM Imran Khan

#294

Post by Mvandenbergh » Wed, May 10, 2023, 9:39 AM UTC

usernew wrote: post #157

skeaker wrote: post #6

I would like to believe there is a future where blocking access to the internet is unilaterally impossible. Major powers being able to pull the rug on what has become a foundation of modern society like this is too scary of a thing to allow. What could the answer be? Satellite-powered relays and DIY-able user devices to talk to them?

What you suggest is impossible, because you are attacking a wrench on the head problem with a coding solution. You can always get a dish and connect to your choice of orbital provider, if your ISP - which is regulated - is blocked. The problem is, guys with guns will come to your door, beat you with a wrench, and put you in jail. Now if we solve for the real issue - lack of freedom because of a ruling class, the tech…

There are no "EU citizens" only citizens of EU member countries. None of those countries have freedom of speech as expansive as Americans but Americans in practice also don't have absolute freedom of speech.

1) Certain speech such as "shouting fire in a crowded theatre" has long been considered illegal.

2) The US has much more expansive laws about "conspiracy to..." which make it illegal to have certain conversations.

Oh, those don't count? Not real speech. Sure, why not.

3) Most people will experience very real economic consequences for a very wide range of speech. We're not all yeoman farmers entirely independent of paid employment.

That presumably doesn't count because only governments can restrict liberties? Well, have it your way but I would regard losing my job due to speech as a pretty severe restriction on my liberty.

Re: Internet disrupted in Pakistan amid arrest of former PM Imran Khan

#295

Post by tibbydudeza » Wed, May 10, 2023, 9:54 AM UTC

varjag wrote: post #287

csomar wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not clear how many died in TSquare but it's a few thousands at most. That's very far from the hundred of millions of people China has. A counter example is the CCP backing down from the Covid restrictions under popular pressure. If enough people put pressure, the government will react. > Dictators will massacre their own people You have to be reminded that the government (and the army) are themselves made of the…

> It's not clear how many died in TSquare but it's a few thousands at most. That's very far from the hundred of millions of people China has. Mao did kill off millions in the Great Leap, with no dissent.

Afaik it was not "planned" unlike Stalin and Beria's NKVD - Mao ordered crows killed to increase crop yields not thinking about the consequences of remove a predator from an ecosystem because the smart folks were either ignorant or afraid of going to a re-education camp.

Mass starvation.

Re: Internet disrupted in Pakistan amid arrest of former PM Imran Khan

#296

Post by varjag » Wed, May 10, 2023, 10:01 AM UTC

tibbydudeza wrote: post #295

varjag wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's not clear how many died in TSquare but it's a few thousands at most. That's very far from the hundred of millions of people China has. Mao did kill off millions in the Great Leap, with no dissent.

Afaik it was not "planned" unlike Stalin and Beria's NKVD - Mao ordered crows killed to increase crop yields not thinking about the consequences of remove a predator from an ecosystem because the smart folks were either ignorant or afraid of going to a re-education camp. Mass starvation.

Mao killed people for mistakes far less than that, didn't he.

Re: Internet disrupted in Pakistan amid arrest of former PM Imran Khan

#297

Post by patrakov » Wed, May 10, 2023, 10:15 AM UTC

throwaway2037 wrote: post #193

csomar wrote: post #179

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The problem is, guys with guns will come to your door, beat you with a wrench, and put you in jail. This is hyperbole. A dictator might have the tools to shut off a couple of dissident. But if you have a large portion of the population running these dishes, it's game over. > Most people are bootlickers. Most people want the type of power structure that ends up with the internet blocked. They don't want freedom - th…

A significant portion of Mainland Chinese Internet users have access to a VPN. They can read the whole Internet. It's been that way for about 10 years. Why isn't it "game over" yet for the Chinese Communist Party? How about Myanmar or Cambodia, which have much less sophisticated national Internet firewalls? Still going dictator-strong.

That's only on paper. During anniversaries of various politically important events, access to the foreign segment of the Internet is slowed down, infected with packet loss, and disrupted in other ways so that VPNs become practically unusable. This obviously affects not only VPNs, but other kinds of traffic.

Source: I worked for a company that had an office in China, and was responsible for maintaining the Chinese servers. In that case, I had to troubleshoot multi-hour MySQL replication lags. Solved by switching the TCP implementation to BBR, because it is resistant to packet loss.

Re: Internet disrupted in Pakistan amid arrest of former PM Imran Khan

#298

Post by komadori » Wed, May 10, 2023, 10:15 AM UTC

Mvandenbergh wrote: post #294

usernew wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you suggest is impossible, because you are attacking a wrench on the head problem with a coding solution. You can always get a dish and connect to your choice of orbital provider, if your ISP - which is regulated - is blocked. The problem is, guys with guns will come to your door, beat you with a wrench, and put you in jail. Now if we solve for the real issue - lack of freedom because of a ruling class, the tech…

There are no "EU citizens" only citizens of EU member countries. None of those countries have freedom of speech as expansive as Americans but Americans in practice also don't have absolute freedom of speech. 1) Certain speech such as "shouting fire in a crowded theatre" has long been considered illegal. 2) The US has much more expansive laws about "conspiracy to..." which make it illegal to have certain conversations…

EU citizenship was established by the Treaty on European Union [1] in 1992. While EU citizenship is different and additional to national citizenship, it does exist in law.

[1] https://eur-lex.europa.eu/resource.html?uri=cellar:2bf140bf-...

Re: Internet disrupted in Pakistan amid arrest of former PM Imran Khan

#299

Post by bakuninsbart » Wed, May 10, 2023, 10:24 AM UTC

theK wrote: post #237

usernew wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What you suggest is impossible, because you are attacking a wrench on the head problem with a coding solution. You can always get a dish and connect to your choice of orbital provider, if your ISP - which is regulated - is blocked. The problem is, guys with guns will come to your door, beat you with a wrench, and put you in jail. Now if we solve for the real issue - lack of freedom because of a ruling class, the tech…

As a EU citizen I’m a bit offended, how do EU citizens have no freedom of speech?

Varies from country to country. Here in Germany we have substantially stricter laws against hate speech for example. Even more egregious, we have pretty strict laws against insults as well, which do get abused by people in power. For example, not too long ago someone got his house raided by police for calling the state interior minister a dick on twitter.

These kinds of laws are only possible because we have less strict and explicit rights to free speech in our constitution than the us.

Re: Internet disrupted in Pakistan amid arrest of former PM Imran Khan

#300

Post by phtrivier » Wed, May 10, 2023, 10:27 AM UTC

fyrn_ wrote: post #266

phtrivier wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> EU citizens have no freedom of speech I was thinking exactly that the other day, while watching a TV show on national publicly funded television, where a variety of pundits where discussing the first year of the present term of the ruling president, and the on-set comedian summed up the situation : "the panel and the country is split in two : those that don't like the ruler, and those who hate him". The youngest pa…

The problem with it is that you only have free speech until someone higher in the power structure decides whatever you're saying is insulting. Free speech in the US is actually limited in some ways, for example speech is only protected from abridgement by the government, something that's becoming more relevant by the day as social media platforms gain more and more sway over the public discourse.

Well, someone "higher in the power structure" has to decides what your saying is insulting _and_ put in place the means to actually punish you for that.

Speech, like pretty much every other freedom, is restricted by laws. And, we do have a pretty decent level of separation of powers as far as "putting people in jail" is concerned; so, to put you in jail for a long time, the "insult" has to be recognized by lawmaker, judges and governement.

(The situation is more troublesome for "putting you in jail for a few hours after a demonstration". But the forerunner for "repression" on this front at the moment in Europe, is, ironically enough... the UK [1]. So, good for them that they're not under "EU tyranny" anymore, I guess ?)

Europe has a troubled history on this front (we had certain issues for letting certain people "freely" explain why certain religious minorities had to be "dealt" with). So some countries passed some laws barring some discourse about race, slaverly, discrimination, etc... that would be protected by free speech laws in other countries.

(And, contrary to one pervasive piece of "free speech", there is not yet a "global goverment" enacting the same laws everywhere. Go figure.)

As for free speech on social media platform, that's a different topic. But my very personnal opinion to think that "insulting people while protected by putting the blame on twitter" is not a fundamental right. Open a blog, become a "publisher" under "freedom of the press" laws dating back to the late 1800s. Then, bear the consequences of your speech. (Neither is twitter's right to earn money from publishing insults while claiming they're not a publisher.) But, just my 2c, and I agree to disagree.

[1]: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/may/08/labour-urge...