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Petition to make unlocking phones legal again passes 100,000 signatures

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Re: Petition to make unlocking phones legal again passes 100,000 signatures

#161

Post by writtles »

zanny wrote: post #145
writtles wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, lets just go back to the days of hitting the streets with those paper petitions, and gathering signatures at bus stops and Phish concerts! Why get the internet involved in politics at all?

Because anonymous forums on the internet have proven for a decade sane discourse goes out the window due to the Internet Fuckwad Theorem. It is an entirely different dynamic to be in someones face and have to fear consequences beyond words from your behavior, and honestly, that is what almost any protest in history was for - to try to shake the boots of those who are gifted with power. An internet petition is just a…

After rereading your contribution, I realize you were agreeing. therefore, I had become for a moment the "Internet Fuckwad" you warned me of. Sorry. Dis acknowledge previous post. ... I've been drinking...

Re: Petition to make unlocking phones legal again passes 100,000 signatures

#162

Post by 1123581321 »

writtles wrote: post #161
zanny wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because anonymous forums on the internet have proven for a decade sane discourse goes out the window due to the Internet Fuckwad Theorem. It is an entirely different dynamic to be in someones face and have to fear consequences beyond words from your behavior, and honestly, that is what almost any protest in history was for - to try to shake the boots of those who are gifted with power. An internet petition is just a…

After rereading your contribution, I realize you were agreeing. therefore, I had become for a moment the "Internet Fuckwad" you warned me of. Sorry. Dis acknowledge previous post. ... I've been drinking...

You have been one your entire time on Hacker News. Please contribute, not argue.

Re: Petition to make unlocking phones legal again passes 100,000 signatures

#163

Post by icelancer »

gknoy wrote: post #97
prawks wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It appeases the throngs of slacktivists that run amok on the Internet, primarily. As has been stated elsewhere, the only real effect this can have is if it gains media traction. Which, given than there are celebrities and murders to report on, is always very unlikely in the US. If 100,000 people wrote personalized letters to their congressmen and women, it would likely have a much more substantial affect. The problem…

I wonder what it would take for the EFF to have, in addition to their "Email/Fax my senators now ..." button, a "Create a printable PDF" (or similar) link which would let me print out the letter, and mail it myself? The biggest thing keeping me from writing actual letters is the writing -- if I had a letter that I could just print, I'd be much more likely to find an envelope and stamp and put them to use. If there we…

They should go a step further - mail a physical letter for you with your printed signature on it (some HTML5 app that lets you draw your signature with the mouse). Charge you $1 via Stripe or some other mechanism to recover postage/labor.

Re: Petition to make unlocking phones legal again passes 100,000 signatures

#164

Post by devcpp »

rgbrenner wrote: post #151
jobu wrote: post #83

Fast forward to next week: "The White House announces a new threshold of 500,000 signatures before it will respond to online petitions." I was initially enthusiastic about these online petitions, but it doesn't seem like any of them have had an effect.

"but it doesn't seem like any of them have had an effect." 100,000 out of 300,000,000 people. What effect do you imagine it should have? If you really want to give these petitions some weight, they should raise the threshold to 150,000,000. And there should be some way of letting people without computers sign it too. Maybe we could have places where people come to sign the petition. But that sounds like a big underta…

You're thinking of referendums. A petition is a small number of people pissed about something that not everyone may be interested in. I'm sure my grandparents have never heard of Aaron Swartz and don't know what "jailbreaking" means, so it makes no sense to make them take a decision.

Re: Petition to make unlocking phones legal again passes 100,000 signatures

#165

Post by dylangs1030 »

anigbrowl wrote: post #127
nateabele wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I hate to be that guy, but the 'petition to end all petitions' comes to mind. Particularly the bits about 'politically safe non-answers' and 'channeling public activism into a cul-de-sac'. :-/

Yeah, I hate to be that guy There seems to be quite a crowd of you saying the same thing every time the subject of a petition comes up. Perhaps you could club together and have a support group.

Do you have a problem with the comment or the people?

It's just a gentle way to deliver constructive comments that are sensitive. You bring them down softly. There's no need to be especially cruel in delivering negative opinions, and this is a forum. Negative opinions are warranted; so long as they are at least valid, they need not be particularly liked.

Re: Petition to make unlocking phones legal again passes 100,000 signatures

#166

Post by nateabele »

markdown wrote: post #150
nateabele wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I hate to be that guy, but the 'petition to end all petitions' comes to mind. Particularly the bits about 'politically safe non-answers' and 'channeling public activism into a cul-de-sac'. :-/

> I hate to be that guy Then don't be. If you have nothing positive to contribute, don't.

You're right. Who needs realistic expectations?

Re: Petition to make unlocking phones legal again passes 100,000 signatures

#167

Post by rgbrenner »

devcpp wrote: post #164
rgbrenner wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"but it doesn't seem like any of them have had an effect." 100,000 out of 300,000,000 people. What effect do you imagine it should have? If you really want to give these petitions some weight, they should raise the threshold to 150,000,000. And there should be some way of letting people without computers sign it too. Maybe we could have places where people come to sign the petition. But that sounds like a big underta…

You're thinking of referendums. A petition is a small number of people pissed about something that not everyone may be interested in. I'm sure my grandparents have never heard of Aaron Swartz and don't know what "jailbreaking" means, so it makes no sense to make them take a decision.

my post was tongue-in-cheek...

We have elections. Demanding that a petition from 100,000 people override the results of an election is ridiculous. The administration is responding to the petitions with their position -- I think that's about all they have the right to expect.

Re: Petition to make unlocking phones legal again passes 100,000 signatures

#168

Post by xur17 »

frostmatthew wrote: post #144
bjustin wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Now come on, the reason they raised the bar from 25,000 to 100,000 is to keep up with the site's increasing popularity. They could have set the bar to 100,000 at the site's launch instead of 5,000, but no petitions would have reached the threshold. As for petitions actually having results, I imagine they are the weakest form of lobbying possible. The executive branch sees them and that is all.

Instead of setting a hard number (that requires adjustments) they should change it to responding to the top X petitions with the most signatures each month.

I disagree. Setting a hard number gives a threshold for people to fight for, and allows for a variable number of issues to make it to the top each month. It gives people a number to push for.

Re: Petition to make unlocking phones legal again passes 100,000 signatures

#169

Post by jdechko »

jlgreco wrote: post #140
superkarn wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't that why we have states?

Yes. Nevertheless, people in Florida are able to exert control over people in Alaska, and vice versa. That seems incredibly absurd to me, what do they share beyond a common language and currency? Even the distance between Portugal and Finland is only half of that, and the EU is rather different than the US Federal Government. If we all needed to band together to increase our military might in order to keep razing hoa…

I'm more inclined to believe that the Federal government needs to turn over more control to the individual states, and that congress is reaching too far over their boundaries.

Don't get me wrong, there are several things I think the government needs to do including managing the economy, maintaining military/ law enforcement just to name a few.

But then you have a congressional hearing about steroid use in baseball. We have government tell us what we can and can't do with our own property (cell phone unlocking, etc). And I think, is that what we pay these guys for? They can't even balance a budget because their scope is way too broad.

I agree that government needs to be downsized, just maybe in a different way.

Re: Petition to make unlocking phones legal again passes 100,000 signatures

#170

Post by anigbrowl »

dylangs1030 wrote: post #165
anigbrowl wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I hate to be that guy There seems to be quite a crowd of you saying the same thing every time the subject of a petition comes up. Perhaps you could club together and have a support group.

Do you have a problem with the comment or the people? It's just a gentle way to deliver constructive comments that are sensitive. You bring them down softly. There's no need to be especially cruel in delivering negative opinions, and this is a forum. Negative opinions are warranted; so long as they are at least valid, they need not be particularly liked.

I'm not convinced that the negative opinions are valid in this case. The petitions are an imperfect and newly implemented system, but the denunciations of them are sweeping, final, and tend to substitute speculation for fact when it comes to discussing the intent of the system architects. Most of the time, comments like the grandparent are little more than a reiteration of the poster's personal outlook.
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