161–170 of 310 posts
A couple of years ago at a Linux conference in Germany I had a discussion with a Microsoft employee at their booth. At that time I was a 'hardcore' linux user with no trust in Microsoft at all. The discussion with the employee went like this: Me: "Hello. Could you tell me what Microsoft is doing at this Linux conference? I honestly want to know that." Him: "We are here to show how our products can work well together…
This is a financial disaster waiting to happen. Microsoft is oblivious if it is not doing something to divorce itself from the NSA. Apple, on the other hand, could have come out smelling like a rose, but following the death of Steve Jobs, who apparently refused to play ball with the NSA, it stupidly jumped on board to join the PRISM club. According to the Prism slides, it really looks so: "Dates when Prism collection…
"And can you just imagine how much more sales Apple would get now for not being on that list?" Barely any change at all, I'd bet. And not worth the legal hassle they could have been up against if it came to a knock-down, drag-out battle with the US Government over .
That's not the Steve Jobs I read about. Like him or not, he was a man of principle.
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What amazes me is that among those corporations with revenues in the tens of billions of dollars, not one of them challenged the constitutionality of the decision in court. Not one, not once. Not that it would be necessary in an obvious case like this, but each one of Microsoft/Skype, Google/Youtube, Apple and Facebook could easily have hired the nation's best and brightest one thousand lawyers at $1,000 an hour, ful…
Correction: Yahoo did fight, and lost. The details aren't all released, but here's a precis of what's public: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/06/yahoo-failed-fisa-f... It's possible that there's as-yet undisclosed legal action with some of the others; the secrecy around just about any proceeding in the FISC makes it very hard to tell.
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That reminds me of Putin a little bit. Even if you think some leader is an asshole, sometimes you need an asshole to stand up to an even bigger bully. I just imagine someone like former president Medvedev (and with no Putin in sight) would've offered Snowden to US government on a silver platter, just like France, Spain, Portugal and Italy tried to do (fortunately unsuccessfully). I remember I was very much against Pu…
Don't mistake a former KGB guy's taunting for a principled stance. Here's how Putin deals with whistleblowers: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Litvinenko_poisoning
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Steve Jobs went through a background check for a top-level security check in the 80s. I wonder if he ever received it? http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/06/steve-jobs-security... I find it hard to believe that the NSA didn't see one of the most valuable and popular companies in the world as a priority until 2012. I bet they were salivating as soon as the first iPhone launched.
With a public record as a LSD user, I wonder how they could have justified giving him clearance.
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If you think a company has behaved badly, why are you under any obligation to be fair to them? It might be extremely difficult to boycott every company involved, so why not choose one to make an example of? The idea that you must boycott all or none appears irrational.
A boycott is supposed to carry a sheen of justice, and this suggests at least a nod towards being fair.
It sounds very much as though it was the bullies who decided what was "fair" in this instance.
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What amazes me is that among those corporations with revenues in the tens of billions of dollars, not one of them challenged the constitutionality of the decision in court. Not one, not once. Not that it would be necessary in an obvious case like this, but each one of Microsoft/Skype, Google/Youtube, Apple and Facebook could easily have hired the nation's best and brightest one thousand lawyers at $1,000 an hour, ful…
Not in the wildest scenario would the US government have jailed the leaders of Apple, Google or Microsoft. That may be naive. Most people have skeletons in their closets. The government would use these to pressure those leaders to acquiesce. I suspect the most dangerous skeletons are ones which seem harmless to you, but cast in the proper light they can be used as a justification for punishment. E.g. Something which…
On one hand, the CEO of Qwest was convicted of insider trading, and he claims it was retaliation by the NSA because Qwest would not participate in warrantless wiretapping.
On the other hand, the federal government had a perfect excuse to prosecute Steve Jobs in 2006 with the options backdating scandal, but chose not to. Those would not have been baseless charges--Apple really did backdate those options. The government just concluded that Jobs was not personally culpable.
Free, open software and hardware are less likely to have secret 'back doors' installed or embedded in them because their innards are under constant public review by multiple eyes -- out in the open, not behind closed doors.
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Edit: added last sentence.