tqk 's Techdirt Comments

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  • On the post: Purdue University Completely Freaks Out Because Bart Gellman's Speech Shows Classified Snowden Docs Already Seen By Millions

    tqk ( profile ), 08 Oct, 2015 @ 01:09pm

    chmod go-r $blah

    "... the video was ordered to be deleted instead of just blocking the piece of information in question."

    Yet this is a university. Did no-one even consider sequestering the information far locked away from public eyes while this tempest morphed into little more than a dewey, foggy morning mist? There's an IT/CS faculty at Purdue, isn't there, and no-one considered consulting them?

    It's bizarre watching this happening in the former home of the free, land of the brave.

  • On the post: Purdue University Completely Freaks Out Because Bart Gellman's Speech Shows Classified Snowden Docs Already Seen By Millions

    tqk ( profile ), 08 Oct, 2015 @ 12:56pm

    Re:

    And watch NSA employees/contractors get into major car accidents as they swerve to avoid their eyes from catching even a glimpse of that 'classified' information!

    I think a lot of things about advertising's ubiquity these days, but "terrorist attack" is seldom one of them. This is a great, "Go ahead, shoot the other foot now!" moment. Government functionaries appear to have been infected by the Suicide Squad propensities of "Life of Brian", or the Dodos in that cartoon about mastodons, lemurs, and sabretooth tigers. It'd be funny if they weren't armed to the teeth while doing it.

  • On the post: Matthew Keys Found Guilty Of Criminal 'Hacking' For Sharing News Company Login

    tqk ( profile ), 08 Oct, 2015 @ 04:05pm

    Ha, haa, ha, ha, haaa ...

    ... and the Matthew Keys verdict is just yet another reminder that Congress needs to do something.

    Sorry. I think it's pretty ludicrous to expect the US Congress to do anything useful nowadays; "useful" for "The People" at least. They consider their full time job grandstanding and raising campaign finance funding. "Governing" as their electors would hope them to do is the least of their considerations. They, along with most entities in power today (just as through most of the rest of our history), have no effective oversight.

    Our governments today are no better than the Roman Empire's, and every bit as compromisable by deep pocketed power hungry wannabe tyrants. We have what we have because they allow us to have it, as that's useful for them.

  • On the post: The Coming Collision Between EU Privacy Regulation And American Free Speech

    tqk ( profile ), 08 Oct, 2015 @ 02:34pm

    Just a nitpick: "... dangerous for the internet."

    Pretending that you can just focus on "privacy" without considering free expression or how the internet itself works is not only foolish and naive, but potentially dangerous for the internet.

    I don't much care about "dangerous for the internet." Yeah, it's a technological marvel and tres cool and all, but it's essentially a machine which leverages communications between humanity, and the latter I do care about.

    "Right to be forgotten" and "free speech" are not just internet related. Those concepts impact many more forms of intellectual commerce than those facilitated by computers and the net.

  • On the post: Court Says USTR Can Continue To Keep The Public From Seeing The Trade Agreements They'll Be Subjected To

    tqk ( profile ), 06 Oct, 2015 @ 06:42pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re: What does God need with a starship?

    (Rant Warning)

    I enjoy your rants.
    The trick is learning not to care about their wishes or demands."

    That's a little like trying to not care about the pack of wolves eyeballing you - while you're leaning up against a tree, weaponless and with a broken leg.

    I'm a fatalist. Everything that has ever lived, or will ever live, is going to die. It's just the other side of the coin that is life. I like to hope I take at least a couple of those wolves with me before I get eaten. Make 'em work for it. :-) Microbes will get us in the end anyway. Don't worry about the wolves. They're just doing what wolves do.

    Try "The Serene Invasion" by Eric Brown (from the library?). I've not finished reading it, but it seems an ideal SF solution to all our problems. Good read, but the editors could be better.

  • On the post: Cable Industry Still Proudly Thinks Cord Cutting Is A Media-Manufactured Crisis

    tqk ( profile ), 06 Oct, 2015 @ 06:20pm

    Re: Cord cutting will stun the industry-- just you watch

    Well, you might see them question why they pay $200+ a month (in the Bay Area) to Comcast for crappy content constantly interrupted by ads.

    I just go to a library and check out music CDs, DVD movies, and books. No ads (that a fast forward won't get past). I don't understand why cable TV continues to sell, other than inertia. They're relying on their customers to remain ignorant. How long can that last?

  • On the post: Homeland Security Detains Stockton Mayor, Forces Him To Hand Over His Passwords

    tqk ( profile ), 06 Oct, 2015 @ 05:59pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    The few bad apples are sensationalized by the media and social justice warriors to be the majority when it's simply not the case.

    The "few bad apples" get away with their crimes with the willing silence of the 95% good apples and strident cheering from the sidelines of the PBA.

    When good cops let those fuckers exist within their midst, they tarnish themselves! We're not doing this to them. They're doing this to themselves!

    Wake the fuck up.

  • On the post: Predictable: The Fragmented Media Will Give Us All Our Post-Oregon-Shooting Outrage Blankets

    tqk ( profile ), 06 Oct, 2015 @ 05:48pm

    Re: Consitutional protection.

    The detractors see (and misrepresent, and blow all out of proportion) what can be done with a gun by an aggressor. They ignore what a gun can do in defense of the innocent. They're perverted. Oh, and "Lies, damned lies, and statistics."

    I like to imagine a little old lady walking home at night after babysitting her grandchildren all day. Damned right she should have the right to pack a gun.

  • On the post: Homeland Security Detains Stockton Mayor, Forces Him To Hand Over His Passwords

    tqk ( profile ), 06 Oct, 2015 @ 05:38pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    Obviously I don't know you but spent the last 20 years dealing with people like you.

    I'm sorry you had to do that, assuming you did have to as opposed to choosing to do so. I hope you got some enjoyment from it.

    I've spent more than sixty years dealing with people like you: "There are none so blind as those who will not see." Coffee's brewing buddy. Wake up.

  • On the post: Homeland Security Detains Stockton Mayor, Forces Him To Hand Over His Passwords

    tqk ( profile ), 06 Oct, 2015 @ 05:18pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Actually...DHS has an *extremely* good reason - and justification - to do this...

    I'm thinking I just don't want to go to that country at all.

    It's all relative. Looking at your reply in email, I thought you were writing about the USA, not Mexico. I swore a decade ago in self-defense I'd never again set foot in the USA. No friggin' way! I loved Wyoming, Idaho, and Oregon. Now they're toxic militarized police-state wastelands to me.

    I wouldn't go to Mexico because of the Zetas. I wouldn't go to the USA because of TSA, CBP and DHS. Why bother when there's Costa Rica and Argentina, or Peru, or even Equador, ...?

  • On the post: Predictable: The Fragmented Media Will Give Us All Our Post-Oregon-Shooting Outrage Blankets

    tqk ( profile ), 05 Oct, 2015 @ 03:30pm

    Re: Ugh.

    One might make an argument that eliminating guns reduces violence in general ...

    Not a very good one. It seems not a weekend goes by that I'm not reading of knife fights in bars over the weekend in downtown Toronto. Eliminate guns and they'll resort to knives, baseball bats, their fists, ... There might be something to the argument for proscribing automatic weapons (to minimize the potential innocent bystanders) but even that's a bandaid solution. A determined killer will not be slowed by details like that. Marc Lepin used a rifle after all. How fast can you reload a rifle? The Columbine Kids had bombs they didn't find time to use.

  • On the post: Homeland Security Detains Stockton Mayor, Forces Him To Hand Over His Passwords

    tqk ( profile ), 05 Oct, 2015 @ 03:13pm

    Re: Re: Actually...DHS has an *extremely* good reason - and justification - to do this...

    All of the maids and staff in every hotel are full-fledged security experts ...

    This sounds extremely made up.

    You should read the recent write-up on Krebs on Security of his recent "vacation" in Mexico. You don't want to use ATMs in vacation hotspots in that country.

  • On the post: Homeland Security Detains Stockton Mayor, Forces Him To Hand Over His Passwords

    tqk ( profile ), 05 Oct, 2015 @ 03:08pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re:

    What were they investigating?

    The Chinese Connection. It's all the rage these days, doncha know? I'm waiting for the second part, The Russian Connection. Should be explosive. :-)

  • On the post: Homeland Security Detains Stockton Mayor, Forces Him To Hand Over His Passwords

    tqk ( profile ), 05 Oct, 2015 @ 03:03pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    Again just whining and stomping your feet without providing specific facts ...

    If I handed the password to my corporate supplied laptop to anyone, I'd be breaking a non-disclosure agreement I signed with my client. They'd sue me into bankruptcy, and rightfully so.

    If I let them have my password then let them take it from my sight, they could do any damned thing they pleased to it. This might include plugging in a previously infected USB key (cf. Stuxnet) or computer game CD (Sony).

    If this is too hard for you to understand or you're unfamiliar with what I'm suggesting, you've no business discussing this situation. You're missing years of advanced training in the subject to even start.

    Run along little boy.

  • On the post: Predictable: The Fragmented Media Will Give Us All Our Post-Oregon-Shooting Outrage Blankets

    tqk ( profile ), 05 Oct, 2015 @ 02:43pm

    Re:

    And of course this site which supposedly prides itself on 'information freedom' probably won't comment on the troubling fact that at least one major news outlet literally whitewashed the criminal ...

    That's possibly the dumbest thing I've read in a while. First, you expect omniscience. Second, you tar this site for not being omniscient.

    Was there any point to your ridiculous rant, or do you get paid for whatever you write? Sweet gig, if so. Any openings I could fill? I could use the money.

  • On the post: David Cameron & The Pig: Revenge Porn & The Right To Be Forgotten

    tqk ( profile ), 05 Oct, 2015 @ 02:30pm

    Re:

    Brilliant argument - we shan't do anything about revenge porn because - David Cameron.

    Well, you could consider not being dicks to your former partners, as in amicable breakup and mutual respect? I know, it's out of fashion but it has worked in the past.

  • On the post: Court Says USTR Can Continue To Keep The Public From Seeing The Trade Agreements They'll Be Subjected To

    tqk ( profile ), 05 Oct, 2015 @ 02:24pm

    Re: Re: What does God need with a starship?

    National Security is the Security of the Very Important People of a Nation ...

    The trick is learning not to care about their wishes or demands. Shrug it off, Atlas. :-) You don't owe them anything, and you can likely get along fine without whatever they're selling.
    Its a big job travelling through the universe collecting all that gold from all those worshipping worlds ...

    Assuming Gawd exists, he/she/it can make their own. He/She/It shouldn't need our help. If He/She/It does, then they're not Gawd. Strike me down now Gawd if I'm mistaken (yet I'm still here typing).

  • On the post: Homeland Security Detains Stockton Mayor, Forces Him To Hand Over His Passwords

    tqk ( profile ), 05 Oct, 2015 @ 01:44pm

    Re: Re:

    Why would a person in their right mind have such files on their laptop whilst traveling on business?

    Are you absolutely sure your software is robust, correctly configured, and up to date? Are you absolutely sure none of it's vulnerable to a zero-day exploit? Are you even knowledgeably trained enough to know?

    Most people are not trained in CS and IT, and even those who are can be vulnerable to zero-day exploits, depending on their vendors to protect them. We read stories all the time about anonymous cracking military and LEO sites, and Chinese and Korean crackers getting into what they shouldn't. Ie. Sony (a deep-pocketed, "vicious multinational" which should be able to afford great security), multiple times over years.

    Are you sure that machine you're typing on now is pristine clean? When was the last time you audited the tens (hundreds?) of things your web browser is reporting back to?

  • On the post: Predictable: The Fragmented Media Will Give Us All Our Post-Oregon-Shooting Outrage Blankets

    tqk ( profile ), 05 Oct, 2015 @ 01:23pm

    Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:

    Practicing at a shooting range falls a long way short of military or police training for situations like this.

    Considering police are shooting unarmed, fleeing civilians in the back or strangling them on camera these days, they're obviously not getting the training we need them to get, such as when to shoot or not shoot. I'd feel a lot safer around military these days (which is pretty wierd). I know what they think their job is. It seems police are a crapshoot. That recent mess in Waco pretty much sums it up to me.

  • On the post: Homeland Security Detains Stockton Mayor, Forces Him To Hand Over His Passwords

    tqk ( profile ), 04 Oct, 2015 @ 02:27pm

    Re:

    Burn your data to a CD/DVD and mail (or ship) it to your destination. Go to your intended destination with a blank, virgin installed hard drive.

    The USA is nuts.

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