Transforming NYC's Payphones into a 'Personalized Propaganda Engine' • Hacker News Board

Re: Transforming NYC's Payphones into a 'Personalized Propaganda Engine'

#111

Post by morgante » Thu, Jul 14, 2016, 12:32 AM UTC

aub3bhat wrote: post #51

kbenson wrote: post #39

As he spoke, the screens shifted and a new message appeared: "If You See Something, Say Something. Be Suspicious of Anything Unattended." Okay, that's kind of creepy. [Google] actually went so far last year as to shit-can its own "Don't be evil" admonition to its employees in favor of "Obey the law" No, they didn't[1]. Alphabet has a slightly more formal code of conduct[2], and it's not simply "Obey the law", it's "f…

"If You See Something, Say Something. Be Suspicious of Anything Unattended." How is it creepy? Have you ever visited New York, its announced every 15 minutes or so on subways. This might even be something that city officials explicitly required.

It being prevalent in NYC doesn't make it any less creepy.

Honestly, the constant terrorism fear-mongering is one of my least favorite things about the city. A few horrible tragedies are apparently enough to turn a city into being fearful of strangers and "anything unattended" for years.

In 99.999999% of cases, that unattended lunch box is just a lunch box that someone forgot. All this fear-mongering does is further aggravate human's inability to reason about low probability events.

Re: Transforming NYC's Payphones into a 'Personalized Propaganda Engine'

#112

Post by bogomipz » Thu, Jul 14, 2016, 1:24 AM UTC

bogomipz wrote: post #97

'That LinkNYC is, ultimately, underwritten by Google should tell you a lot about why New York got so very lucky as to receive an unprecedentedly fast network of citywide public Wi-Fi — for "free."' Except that none of this is free. Google gets all of the data collected by these kiosks and the ad revenue. Why was this allowed without any public say in the matter? The very public whose data was bought will also be sold…

There is a really disturbing trend on HN whereby expressing anything negative about Google, gets down voted.

I've actually spent a fair amount of time around these kiosks as theres one a few blocks from me. I've actually observed it its environment, as part of the urban scenery and I've interacted with it a bunch. I think my comment has merit.

Re: Transforming NYC's Payphones into a 'Personalized Propaganda Engine'

#113

Post by jolux » Thu, Jul 14, 2016, 6:01 AM UTC

morgante wrote: post #110

jolux wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah but is this something anybody asked for? The signal is always so great in NYC I never even want WiFi. This just seems like a largely pointless intrusion in service of selling more and more targeted ads.

Not everyone can afford (large) data plans. Look at some of the other comments in this thread for anecdotes of people enjoying the free access. Also, your experience with service definitely doesn't match my own. There might always be a signal, but it's not always very fast...

Well this is in comparison to my home in rural Vermont where the signal is always very spotty. I realize people enjoy it but ultimately this was not voted on and thus saying "you asked for it therefore you must deal with the compromise" is a bit shitty. I think I'd enjoy it too if I didn't know the tradeoff, and even then gigabit WiFi would be pretty cool. However Google are not doing this out of the goodness of their hearts, if they were they would not put ads on it. Of course then the taxpayers would have to foot the bill, which would be severely unjust considering the undemocratic nature of this product's implementation in NYC.

Re: Transforming NYC's Payphones into a 'Personalized Propaganda Engine'

#114

Post by Neeek » Thu, Jul 14, 2016, 7:05 AM UTC

davidf18 wrote: post #103

400 mbs/200 mbs data rates in Manhattan on the Mac laptop where I've tried it. The iPhone 6s+ with the security cert. is about 185 mbs/195 mbs. Not bad for free.

I pay 120 AUD a month for 35Mb/s down and a 1GB cap here in Brisbane, Australia :c

Re: Transforming NYC's Payphones into a 'Personalized Propaganda Engine'

#115

Post by hueving » Thu, Jul 14, 2016, 10:42 AM UTC

morgante wrote: post #76

hueving wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Targeted ads are worthless if they aren't targeted based on correct data. Google would lose massive amounts of advertising if they didn't heavily base it on user data. As an advertiser, Google's ability to target users based on user data is very important to me, so your analogy with Nobel prizes at University misses the mark by a mile. If Google doesn't let me target users in a region with a specific interest, then I…

> Targeted ads are worthless if they aren't targeted based on correct data. A university without well-respected and celebrated faculty is similarly "worthless." In fact, the gap in price between community colleges and prestigious universities might even be greater than the gap between targeted ads and non-targeted ads. > As an advertiser, Google's ability to target users based on user data is very important to me, so…

>A university without well-respected and celebrated faculty is similarly "worthless".

Not even close. As an undergrad you are getting ripped off if you choose a research university. As a student the product you are getting is an education, which has little to do with research quality.

Targeted ads depend entirely on accurate user data, so the analogy is a bit brain dead.

>There's a reason that college admissions brochures love to tout the number of Nobel prizes

Yes, to attract chumps. Anyone who does the minimum amount of research or thinking will quickly discover that nobel prize winners are approximately useless to undergraduate educations. Nobel prizes are the gold plating to the hdmi cables of education.

Re: Transforming NYC's Payphones into a 'Personalized Propaganda Engine'

#116

Post by morgante » Thu, Jul 14, 2016, 11:24 AM UTC

hueving wrote: post #115

morgante wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Targeted ads are worthless if they aren't targeted based on correct data. A university without well-respected and celebrated faculty is similarly "worthless." In fact, the gap in price between community colleges and prestigious universities might even be greater than the gap between targeted ads and non-targeted ads. > As an advertiser, Google's ability to target users based on user data is very important to me, so…

>A university without well-respected and celebrated faculty is similarly "worthless". Not even close. As an undergrad you are getting ripped off if you choose a research university. As a student the product you are getting is an education, which has little to do with research quality. Targeted ads depend entirely on accurate user data, so the analogy is a bit brain dead. >There's a reason that college admissions broc…

Your argument has devolved to insults. Goodbye.

Calling consumers "chumps" doesn't change the fact of their choices.

Re: Transforming NYC's Payphones into a 'Personalized Propaganda Engine'

#117

Post by inanutshellus » Thu, Jul 14, 2016, 1:07 PM UTC

throwanem wrote: post #67

inanutshellus wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I infer from this you're saying "crap in one hand, wish in the other and see which fills up first"?

That's an unduly reductive take. A more accurate way to put it would be that, regardless of what should be the case, it's necessary to cope with what is.

It's pretty impressive to be reductive against a post with no words!

In all seriousness, it's a perfectly legitimate--albeit crass--interpretation, given the expressed intent (none). GGP says "these things ought to be true". Then there's a reply with a bare link saying, effectively, "is" statements are true, "ought" statements are fantasy/desire/normative. The rest of any kind of interpretation requires more context and intent.

Re: Transforming NYC's Payphones into a 'Personalized Propaganda Engine'

#118

Post by davidf18 » Thu, Jul 14, 2016, 1:22 PM UTC

Neeek wrote: post #114

davidf18 wrote: post #103

400 mbs/200 mbs data rates in Manhattan on the Mac laptop where I've tried it. The iPhone 6s+ with the security cert. is about 185 mbs/195 mbs. Not bad for free.

I pay 120 AUD a month for 35Mb/s down and a 1GB cap here in Brisbane, Australia :c

Well, may the (Google) force be with you in your future.

Re: Transforming NYC's Payphones into a 'Personalized Propaganda Engine'

#119

Post by ucaetano » Fri, Jul 15, 2016, 6:40 PM UTC

jolux wrote: post #109

ucaetano wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"If you want a voice, you have to make compromises." "If you want free wifi, you have to make compromises."

Yes and who wanted free WiFi exactly? Bill DeBlasio?

Apparently everyone who's using it.

Re: Transforming NYC's Payphones into a 'Personalized Propaganda Engine'

#120

Post by jolux » Sat, Jul 16, 2016, 12:42 AM UTC

ucaetano wrote: post #119

jolux wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes and who wanted free WiFi exactly? Bill DeBlasio?

Apparently everyone who's using it.

Yes and if you gave everyone a free sandwich they'd probably eat it too, but if you do that you can't then say "but you asked for a free sandwich" when you reveal that you actually captured everyone's personal details for advertising purposes.