Person Finder: Boston Marathon Explosions • Hacker News Board

Re: Person Finder: Boston Marathon Explosions

#31

Post by throwawaay » Tue, Apr 16, 2013, 3:13 AM UTC

sukuriant wrote: post #18

I wonder what the ramifications are for this functionality with regard to people that are in the Witness Protection Program. I suppose that might just be another thing our civil servants will be considering when they're protecting their witnesses.

Batshit insane.

What kind of implications could this tool possibly have for witness protection? It returns data that was explicitly entered in connection with a specific disaster, and you can only search by name. Someone who's in hiding isn't going to give out their original identity, so how exactly do you propose to use this to track them?

Did you even click through to see what this thing really does, or did you actually just assume that "Person Finder" must be some kind of magical privacy-violating anal probe and rush to type out the first paranoid, nonsensical and idiotic thing to run through your head and click post as a knee-jerk reaction?

Re: Person Finder: Boston Marathon Explosions

#32

Post by patrickaljord » Tue, Apr 16, 2013, 8:20 AM UTC

nnutter wrote: post #15

toomuchtodo wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or let Google do it. Google can scale much faster than the Red Cross can outsource it.

Until Google decides to close it a few years from now in order to focus on what matters.

Are you seriously taking advantage of this tragedy to bash Google for shutting down Reader? Wow, and I thought the Reader drama couldn't get any lower.

Re: Person Finder: Boston Marathon Explosions

#33

Post by a_c_s » Tue, Apr 16, 2013, 2:11 PM UTC

patrickaljord wrote: post #32

nnutter wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Until Google decides to close it a few years from now in order to focus on what matters.

Are you seriously taking advantage of this tragedy to bash Google for shutting down Reader? Wow, and I thought the Reader drama couldn't get any lower.

Reader isn't the first project Google (or Google.org) lost interest in or shut down. For me the big eye-opener was their "Project 10 to the 100": they got 150,000 entries for where to focus philanthropic funds, waited a few years with no updates and then donated a total of $10 million to 5 organizations.

Kudos for donating money, but they announced a big contest, got tons of input and made this seem like a big focus, and then when that toy wasn't fun to play with anymore they ignored it for a few years until somebody remembered they had money to give away.

Re: Person Finder: Boston Marathon Explosions

#34

Post by sukuriant » Wed, Apr 17, 2013, 5:46 PM UTC

throwawaay wrote: post #31

sukuriant wrote: post #18

I wonder what the ramifications are for this functionality with regard to people that are in the Witness Protection Program. I suppose that might just be another thing our civil servants will be considering when they're protecting their witnesses.

Batshit insane. What kind of implications could this tool possibly have for witness protection? It returns data that was explicitly entered in connection with a specific disaster, and you can only search by name. Someone who's in hiding isn't going to give out their original identity, so how exactly do you propose to use this to track them? Did you even click through to see what this thing really does, or did you act…

Wooow. I was just curious. I wasn't intending to throw FUD around or anything of the sort. I didn't think it was privacy violating. I think it's great, in fact. Calm down :)