Live data from Hacker News

Viral Video About Body Scanners

blog.tsa.gov

41–50 of 204 posts

Re: Viral Video About Body Scanners

#43
post #8

There is something chillingly unconvincing about their attempts at informality. Big Brother jokey is a lot more frightening than Big Brother bureaucratic or Big Brother bombastic. Too bad this insight wasn't available to Orwell or he could have made 1984 even scarier.

The tone is a little similar to GlaDOS in the portal games. "Friendly sinister". I don't believe the dismissive message, either.

I cannot imagine a scenario where the TSA becomes 'popular' now; where the populace as a whole gets respect back for them. I half expect the US government to perform a rebranding exercise within the next 5 years and hope that a change in the letterheads and badges resets the clock on an ever-more resentful populace.

Re: Viral Video About Body Scanners

#44
Not that I'm condoning the machines, and perhaps I'm missing something, but...

Couldn't this "vulnerability" be fixed if they took two scans? Take one of front/back (current approach) and then ask the person to turn 90 degrees and take another scan? to see the sides?

Re: Viral Video About Body Scanners

#45
Stand back people, TSA Blog Team is on the case!

More seriously, these jokers let terrorists waltz on board planes (e.g. The Shoebomber) and only the passengers, treated like criminals by TSA, stop them.

Time to send the rentacops back to the mall.

Re: Viral Video About Body Scanners

#46

Not that I'm condoning the machines, and perhaps I'm missing something, but... Couldn't this "vulnerability" be fixed if they took two scans? Take one of front/back (current approach) and then ask the person to turn 90 degrees and take another scan? to see the sides?

Yes it could.

The problem with that is, that it a) doubles the amount of time needed to scan one person and b) doubles the duration of exposure to radiation.

therefore, we'd be better of with metal detectors. Aside from that, the TSA would have to explain, that body scanners are useless without scanning twice and we therefore need to expose you to the double amount of radiation...

Re: Viral Video About Body Scanners

#47
2 days ago, from a BusinessWeek article about the author of the blog post:

“I call it the corny dad approach. I’m basically the Bob Saget of blogging,” the 41-year-old tells Bloomberg Businessweek. “This isn’t really the most exciting subject, so I thought I should inject some personality into it.” Three years removed from working the security lines himself—he used to train TSA officers at the Cincinnati airport—Blogger Bob has clearly gained some perspective on the experience. [1]

Whether or not entertainment has a place in government blogging is an argument for another day, but I think we can all agree that under no circumstances should this type of blog post ever be allowed as an official government response.

[1] http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-03-05/why-cant-the...

Re: Viral Video About Body Scanners

#49
post #40
post #8

There is something chillingly unconvincing about their attempts at informality. Big Brother jokey is a lot more frightening than Big Brother bureaucratic or Big Brother bombastic. Too bad this insight wasn't available to Orwell or he could have made 1984 even scarier.

Sometimes I wonder if we would be better off if 1984 and the like had never been written. It feels like people have been using them as a how-to manual.

The idea of a dystopian state was already old in 1949 (when the book was first published).

Wikipedia lists literature back to 1835, though I think ancient Romans would have been able to write awesome dystopian literature: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_dystopian_literature

Post reply on HN