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The Day We Fight Back

thedaywefightback.org

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Re: The Day We Fight Back

#171

Post by ivanca »

vinhboy wrote: post #128

People always ask, why can't the progressives make their own Tea Party -- If you read through the responses on this page you'll have your answer. So much doubt and skepticism about everything... It's funny all these people putting down "social networking", when most of us here work for companies who pay a shit ton of money to advertise and gain traction on "social networks". Then, on top of that, there are many of us…

Yeah, it's way easier to stand together when the members of a group just don't use their brain that much and don't doubt even the most stupid beliefs (e.g. Jesus was a white man) but here we doubt everything, and skepticism is good on an individual level but it's the worst social glue for a group.

Re: The Day We Fight Back

#172

Post by Create »

We begin therefore where they are determined not to end, with the question whether any form of democratic self-government, anywhere, is consistent with the kind of massive, pervasive, surveillance into which the Unites States government has led not only us but the world.

This should not actually be a complicated inquiry.

http://snowdenandthefuture.info/events.html

http://benjamin.sonntag.fr/Moglen-at-Re-Publica-Freedom-of-t...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Ciscosystemsrouteratcern....

Why would dead links help?

Re: The Day We Fight Back

#173

Post by cdoxsey »

Meh. I wasn't all that surprised by the NSA revelations. I think Snowden is a traitor and the US government (like any government) has legitimate reasons to spy on people.

The problem with this "movement" is that it fails to make an argument for its beliefs. It's just pure group-think.

> Today we face a different threat, one that undermines the Internet, and the notion that any of us live in a genuinely free society: mass surveillance.

An NSA data mining robot reading my facebook wall is no more a threat to my freedom than Google reading my gmail. The threat comes from the abuse of that information: that some politician (or Google employee) has it out for me and blackmails me (or something like that). Maybe I'll get upset when we have evidence of that happening a bunch.

And though many people don't believe it anymore, there is in fact a real threat on the other side of this: there are actual terrorists in the world who want to kill Americans.

Now here's something I can't figure out: the very people up in arms about the NSA spying on us think that it's a great idea for the government to know all the most intimate details of my life via a government-run single-payer healthcare system.

Uncle Sam reading my latest tweet seems a whole lot less intrusive on my freedom than him telling me I must go to the doctor, get insurance, quit smoking, lose some weight, not eat or drink certain kinds of foods...

Re: The Day We Fight Back

#174

Post by nathanb »

How in the world is this "fighting back"?

Did I just skim over a paragraph somewhere on the site? All I see are banners, social media buttons, and a mask to put over your profile picture.

Raising awareness is fine and good, but thanks to Ed Snowden (who fought back in a much more effective way than by changing his gravatar), we already know that the NSA are spying on everyone, everywhere.

They stuck a Ben Franklin quote on there. It's a good quote. But where are the public officials running on a pro-surveillance platform? Whose door should we beat down while carrying our torches and pitchforks? That battle is lost several times a second when we voluntarily step into the body scanner at the airport that both the TSA and the terrorists know doesn't catch everything.

I'm not ready to start a revolution. And I just don't feel like anything less than a revolution will do, at this point. The only thing I can do is leave -- and hope that my new home isn't doing the same thing or worse without having been caught yet.

But this sucks. I hate feeling powerless. So I guess I'm off to post some witty anti-NSA propaganda to my Facebook page!

Re: The Day We Fight Back

#176

Post by gpvos »

mcherm wrote: post #142
gaius wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without IP, what stops people incorporating GPL code in their closed source proprietary products? See you can't have your cake and eat it. Either you believe there is a thing called a license which travels with your product and binds the user as to how they can use it, or you don't, there isn't really any middle ground there. The alternative is "everything is public domain!" in which case, no GPL.

I would expect that nearly any supporter of the GPL would also support a change to the law that eliminated copyright restrictions on the use of code. The purpose of the GPL is not to prevent people from modifying and building on the code. The purpose... well, let me quote from http://www.gnu.org/licenses/quick-guide-gplv3.html : There are four freedoms that every user should have: the freedom to use the software for…

I would expect that nearly any supporter of the GPL would also support a change to the law that eliminated copyright restrictions on the use of code.

Only if distributing software without its source was also made illegal.

Re: The Day We Fight Back

#177

Post by throwaway092834 »

gaius wrote: post #115
vidarh wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason Aaron gets so much sympathy (EDIT: for what he did as well as for how he was treated) is that 1) a substantial portion of the JSTOR data is public domain , 2) a substantial portion of the rest is work funded with public money where it is controversial that it is only available under copyright. But even disregarding that, I don't get why you are baffled: The GPL is a hack intended to spread freedoms. Many w…

Without IP, what stops people incorporating GPL code in their closed source proprietary products? See you can't have your cake and eat it. Either you believe there is a thing called a license which travels with your product and binds the user as to how they can use it, or you don't, there isn't really any middle ground there. The alternative is "everything is public domain!" in which case, no GPL.

> The alternative is "everything is public domain!" in which case, no GPL.

There are many, myself included, who would be happy with this endgame. As long as no one can ever be prosecuted for creating a work, I am happy.

The GPL is needed because of the effects of copyright, not vice versa.

Re: The Day We Fight Back

#178

Post by dragonwriter »

gaius wrote: post #115
vidarh wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The reason Aaron gets so much sympathy (EDIT: for what he did as well as for how he was treated) is that 1) a substantial portion of the JSTOR data is public domain , 2) a substantial portion of the rest is work funded with public money where it is controversial that it is only available under copyright. But even disregarding that, I don't get why you are baffled: The GPL is a hack intended to spread freedoms. Many w…

Without IP, what stops people incorporating GPL code in their closed source proprietary products? See you can't have your cake and eat it. Either you believe there is a thing called a license which travels with your product and binds the user as to how they can use it, or you don't, there isn't really any middle ground there. The alternative is "everything is public domain!" in which case, no GPL.

> Without IP, what stops people incorporating GPL code in their closed source proprietary products?

Without IP, there can neither be GPL (which licenses IP rights) nor close source proprietary (which is another model of licensing IP rights).

Re: The Day We Fight Back

#179

Post by marcosdumay »

bambax wrote: post #166
marcosdumay wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Society is a bunch of people gathering togheter because they are happier that way. If everybody is your brother, you won't be any better living alone in a field. Yeah, other people always come with some kind of surveilance and disagreement, but that's a consequence, not the goal.

> Society is a bunch of people gathering together because they are happier that way. How is that? You're born in a given society (country) and usually you never change societies, so there's no choice involved.

You can move to some non-urbanized area, and just cut communications with anybody else. (Yes, you can not completely cut away because of taxes, but you can to a huge degree.)

Almost nobody likes that option.

Re: The Day We Fight Back

#180

Post by marcosdumay »

dragonwriter wrote: post #158
marcosdumay wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, is blackmail a kind of violence? (honest question)

Doesn't really matter, because as with violence (or “other forms of violence”, if you prefer), spying isn’t blackmail, even if it might be used to support blackmail.

Spying is as good a "threat of blackmail" as one can get.
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