ethorad 's Techdirt Comments

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  • On the post: Companies Developing Crowd Analysis Programs To Detect 'Abnormalities' In Behavior And Match Faces Against Giant Databases

    ethorad ( profile ), 05 Dec, 2013 @ 12:29am

    The primary objective is ... combating terrorism and other criminal activities, such as human trafficking, child pornography, detection of dangerous situations (e.g. robberies) and the use of dangerous objects (e.g. knives or guns) in public spaces

    OK, I'll give you that cameras, or people, watching could spot things like robberies, mugging, weapons. By watching behaviour it's possible to spot unusual activity such as people about to commit suicide, or presumably someone being kidnapped or trafficked.

    However "child pornography ... in public spaces". Really? Is there much child pornography going on in public spaces? I doubt there's that much going on in the public internet (probably mostly on private networks), so I really doubt there's much going on in railway stations, plazas, etc around the world.

    Yet another "but think of the children!"

  • On the post: NSA Gave Employees Ridiculous 'Talking Points' To Spread Among Friends And Family Over The Holidays

    ethorad ( profile ), 03 Dec, 2013 @ 06:35am

    Re:

    More like Gestapo / Stasi I think. Weren't the SS more of a combat unit?

  • On the post: South Korean Politicians Want Video Games Placed Alongside Drugs And Alcohol In Legislation For Addiction

    ethorad ( profile ), 03 Dec, 2013 @ 05:09am

    Re:

    IANAD (I'm not a doctor)

    It seems that there's two core addictions:
    - physical addiction. Caused by an external chemical which forces the body to crave more. Drugs, nicotine, etc.
    - psychological addiction. Caused by the body's response to something (eg releasing endorphins during exercise) which can cause addiction to whatever triggers that response

    Just as there's lots of drugs which can be addictive, there are lots of different actions which can end up being addictive if the person in question goes to extremes. as an example you get people addicted to exercise, shopping, committing crimes (eg kleptomaniacs), gamblers, and of course people who spend too long on certain leisure activities - TV, games, etc.

    To the extent that an obsession with something impacts your ability to live a balanced life then some form of counselling would be useful. However as long as your obsession doesn't involve criminal behaviour (eg kleptomania), or causes wider problems (eg violent drunks) I don't see it as being a problem for the state.

    But then as an AC above commented, another addiction seems to be creating legislation - and politicians have it bad.

  • On the post: Appeals Court To Explore If A Site With 'Dirt' In The URL Loses All Liability Protections For User Comments

    ethorad ( profile ), 14 Nov, 2013 @ 12:20am

    Re:

    Is that legal advice? ;)

  • On the post: Appeals Court To Explore If A Site With 'Dirt' In The URL Loses All Liability Protections For User Comments

    ethorad ( profile ), 14 Nov, 2013 @ 12:17am

    Re: Re:

    Capone or the government?

    Po-tay-to, Po-tah-to

  • On the post: Silk Road Employee Who Dread Pirate Roberts Tried To Kill Comes Forward

    ethorad ( profile ), 08 Nov, 2013 @ 12:28pm

    Hollywood imagination

    "more fascinating than anything Hollywood could make up"

    Well, with all the sequels and adaptations that Hollywood pumps out, the only thing they actually make up are financial accounts - and those are pretty dry reading.

  • On the post: DailyDirt: Parenting With Technology

    ethorad ( profile ), 05 Nov, 2013 @ 11:03pm

    Actually I'd rather touch an iPad from a kid who hasn't been potty trained. At that stage, someone else is changing their nappy and dealing with "stuff", so their hands will be pretty clean.

    Early stages of potty training however ... hmmm ...

  • On the post: Another Big Loss For Team Prenda, As Their Bills Keep Adding Up

    ethorad ( profile ), 05 Nov, 2013 @ 11:02pm

    So many buses!

    Where are team prenda getting all these buses?? There's never a bus when I need one, what's their trick?

  • On the post: UK Officials Argue That David Miranda Was, In Fact, A Terrorist

    ethorad ( profile ), 04 Nov, 2013 @ 06:12am

    Re: It's worse than that...

    Not just reporters etc, even senior judges and peers have been known to spend months collecting material the disclosure of which is intended to influence government. Some examples include Lord Hutton, Sir John Chilcott, Lord Justice Leveson and Lord Saville of Newdigate

    Note the last is unrelated to the recently deceased Saville of nudey-gate ...

  • On the post: Getting Fired 101, The Ohio Teacher's Edition: Go Full Racist On Facebook

    ethorad ( profile ), 04 Nov, 2013 @ 05:50am

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Pot / kettle?

    Been doing some reading on causes of the American Civil War over the weekend. I?m a bit of a history nut, but so far have really focused on European and Far Eastern history ? not much of North American history. I?ve always thought that the cause of the ACW was more nuanced that just slavery/anti-slavery ? ie including things like economic differences, state v federal power etc, in particular as slavery didn't seem to confined to just the Confederate states. While there?s never really a simple reason for wars to start (WWI wasn?t really started by Archduke Ferdinanz being shot, the war was coming and would have found another trigger if that hadn?t happened) it does seem that slavery (and hence racism) underpinned a lot of the conflict between the Confederate and the Union states.

    I?m aware that history is written by the victors and nobody is going to write that the losing side was right but hey we won ? however I don?t think that?s having a big impact on this.

    Anyway, tl;dr: The original comment isn?t as much hyperbole as I originally thought, and my comment was poorly worded in an attempt to make my point. Apologies for any offence. And thanks for prompting some additional reading! Am off to buy some ACW books to read over Christmas.

    PS Just noticed you have the same underlying username as Tim, hence referring to you in the third person in my response above.

    PPS You may have nothing without bad language, but at least you have that! :)

  • On the post: Getting Fired 101, The Ohio Teacher's Edition: Go Full Racist On Facebook

    ethorad ( profile ), 01 Nov, 2013 @ 10:32am

    Re: Re: Pot / kettle?

    I did say "veering towards" - I understand that the Confederate states is not a race, any more than a religion is a race. To clarify - Tim was not being racist, but was being prejudicial towards a group of people with a shared cultural background.

    As a group of people defined by their birthright the group "people who were born in a particular place" and "people who were born with a particular skin colour" are the similar in that there is no personal choice and both can be singled out and tarred.

    I was merely pointing out that he was generalising by linking Confederate to racist. By making such a broad comment, he was tarring an entire group of people with a negative trait. If he was to imply that all of a certain race had a negative trait, it would be racist - hence my comment that applying a negative trait to all of a certain group, defined by where they lived rather than any particular active choice, is being just as prejudicial as someone who applies negative traits to everyone of a certain race (or religion for that matter).

    Oh, and there's no need for bad language or personal insults.

  • On the post: Getting Fired 101, The Ohio Teacher's Edition: Go Full Racist On Facebook

    ethorad ( profile ), 01 Nov, 2013 @ 06:08am

    Pot / kettle?

    Strikes me that Tim is veering towards racism here. To quote: "it's time for a fun little Confederate rant"

    Given the rest of the article, he's clearly using "Confederate" in a derogatory manner to mean racist. In addition the event happened in Ohio, which to the best of my knowledge wasn't even in the Confederate States (although I confess I don't know where David Spondike comes from)

    Maybe Tim is using the "C-word" to shock, or emphasize his point - but then that's an excuse that our Ohioan teacher could also use.

  • On the post: IsoHunt Shuts Down Early To Stop Archive Team From Recording Important Historical Information

    ethorad ( profile ), 22 Oct, 2013 @ 09:07am

    metadata?

    Why do they want the metadata? It's useless and doesn't tell you anything - unless you want to look for terrorists of course.

  • On the post: China's New Censorship Plan: Three Years In Prison If You Get 500 Retweets Of A 'Harmful' Post

    ethorad ( profile ), 18 Sep, 2013 @ 02:01am

    "For example, it would be simple for people to band together to view or retweet dodgy posts from someone they wanted sent to prison"

    Only if the retweeters wanted to risk getting 500 retweets themselves. (Or were based outside China I guess)

  • On the post: More NSA Spying Fallout: Brazilian President Snubs Obama Invitation, May Trigger Internet Balkanization

    ethorad ( profile ), 18 Sep, 2013 @ 01:58am

    too late!

    "it could encourage repressive governments to seek greater technical control over the Internet to crush free expression"

    As opposed to the opressive government with current technical control over the Internet using that to crush free expression?

    Better the devil you voted for than one beholden to someone else!

  • On the post: NYC Tracking E-ZPass Tags All Over The City, Without Telling Drivers

    ethorad ( profile ), 13 Sep, 2013 @ 07:55am

    Re:

    Even easier - turn it off.

    It seems the device is battery powered (source: wikipedia), so presumably it would be a fairly easy hack to fit a switch to the device. If I recall correctly from the last time I was in the US they're often stuck on the inside of windscreens so drivers should be able to operate a switch without taking their eyes off the road.

  • On the post: When Twitter Promotions Go Wrong: IL Pizzeria Offers Food For Flashing

    ethorad ( profile ), 13 Sep, 2013 @ 12:59am

    How sexist

    Ladies only? I demand my free pizza for flashing my man-boobs!

    Or more likely, I demand free pizza or else I'll flash my man-boobs ...

  • On the post: Court Says You Can Be Liable For Merely Sending A Text Message To Someone Who's Driving

    ethorad ( profile ), 30 Aug, 2013 @ 09:19am

    Re: Following this to its logical conclusion

    You missed one:

    e) writing a letter to someone who can drive

    After all, as with a text, if they decide to read your correspondence while driving it could cause a crash

  • On the post: Author Of UK's Terrorism Act Says It Was Never Meant For Situations Like David Miranda

    ethorad ( profile ), 27 Aug, 2013 @ 09:28am

    Not just journalists should be worried

    Miranda seems to have been guilty of:
    - possessing information which could help terrorism
    - and that this information was stolen

    I've discounted the second point, as if someone has information which could help terrorism it presumably doesn't matter if it has been stolen. Otherwise you would be suggesting that it's OK to help terrorists as long as you didn't steal stuff.

    On the first point, the list of information which could help terrorism is massively broad, including:
    - maps showing government buildings
    - sitting schedules for parliament
    - chemistry textbooks

    So I wouldn't advise anyone with high school chemistry to travel. Particularly not if they know that No 10 Downing Street is the Prime Minister's residence, or that parliament sits at Westminster. Probably best if those terrorists report at their nearest prison immediately!

    Anyway, got to go turn myself in now, was nice knowing you all.

  • On the post: Another 'Internet Threat' Results In Six Months In Jail And A Five-Year Ban From Social Media

    ethorad ( profile ), 21 Aug, 2013 @ 07:31am

    terroristic?

    What's a terroristic threat, and how does it differ from a terrorist threat?

    I guess in the same way as "burglarize" differs from "burgle" - ie not at all, apart from the pointless addition of some letters for an unknown reason.

    Just why??

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