Replies

fp wrote:

>But we can limit how that data is used and misused. Ah, here we disagree. I don’t believe we can. You are much more optimistic than I am. That probably has to do with our origins.

No harm in trying.

GaryK

fp wrote:

Corporate state will do. I even used “Sillicon Valley state”, because that’s where all this stuff originates and has been allowed to expand without any limits.

Corpocracy? Corpigarchy? (I like that because of the “pig” in the middle.) I’m going to keep working on this. To succeed, a movement needs a catchy buzzword.

GaryK

fp wrote:

AFAIK that’s exactly what I have been arguing here (and have been edited as political). 1st, realize what’s at stake and where it’s going. 2nd, the solution is not configuring individual computers to avoid telemetry and data collection, but in the collective activity necessary. Unfortunately, collective action has an inherent weakness that is being exploited by the anti-democratic forces. I strongly recommend THE LOGIC OF COLLECTIVE ACTION by mancur Olson–a small great book that explains that weakness.

Just ordered it from Amazon, which has added that purchase to everything else Amazon already knows about me. I’m looking forward to reading it. Thanks for the recommendation.

Clearly, it’s not an easy thing to accomplish, possibly quixotic, but it is possible; it’s been done. Sometimes it takes a while (sometimes a long while). But I think we agree that one way it’s NOT going to happen is by having energy and brains siphoned off worrying about Windows telemetry.

GaryK

Sessh wrote:

Frightening indeed. But by “get worse” I am speaking specifically about data collection…

Oh, my bad. I think I’d even disagree with that. With new technology like Siri, Alexa and whatnot gaining more and more popularity, it will be like bugging your own house. I think there’s more privacy to lose in the home, but maybe I’m just deluding myself. Smart TV’s may have mics, but I believe they need internet access to transmit anything. Even using the car example, I can imagine there being data collecting devices in cars that monitor your location and current speed and the next thing you know, you’ve got a few speeding tickets coming in the mail. I think it can always get worse. We can’t imagine every scenario, but I’m sure someone else has not only imagined them, but has already started making it a reality. Nothing would surprise me anymore TBH. One thing I’m fairly sure of is it CAN get worse; a lot worse. Data collection and the use of said information both.

But Siri and Alexa are already here, and new products are already in the pipeline and about to roll out. To me what you’re describing is simply a difference in degree, not kind. They can already listen to you in your car; I just don’t know if they are doing that yet.

But here is where resistance is practical: We can’t stop them from collecting data or from inventing new ways to collect it. But we can limit how that data is used and misused. To me the real genius of the US Constitution, and this aspect of it has been a model for most non-religious constitution’s since, is that its intent is to proscribe, not prescribe, what government can do. In practical terms, it limits what men (now people but at that time men) can do in government’s name. The framers were cynics who hadn’t entirely lost their optimism. To paraphrase, they said, “No laws shall be made….” What they meant was that men (sorry, they were all men) couldn’t make this or that kind of law. They knew the history of religious persecutions and had seen first hand what men could do in the name of their God or their king, and they sought to prevent men in their new nation from doing those things. But they were working and thinking in a 1700s context, not a 2000s context. What we can do now, 300 years later, in the form of real (as opposed to symbolic) resistance is to foment a movement that seeks a kind of “big data” Constitution, one that limits how big data can be used, with a manifesto something like, “The purpose of the collection of data is to promote human welfare and happiness and individual liberty. Data shall not be used in this way and that way….” That’s what could make a better future.

Time spent thinking about and blocking Windows telemetry is time not spent thinking about and limiing actual misuse of data.

GaryK

Sessh wrote:

Well, we’re probably agreeing. It’s precisely because individual action is useless that I’m not willing to spend energy worrying about Microsoft telemetry.

Not one person, but one person can become many people and there is strength in numbers. While I do see what you’re saying and agree to a point, if everybody thought like that, there’d be no resistance at all which is even worse.

No, no–I’m on your side in that. I’m all for resistance and think it’s possible. It’s just that resistance in the form of stopping Windows telemetry is a silly waste of time.

GaryK

Sessh wrote:

Where we differ is that you seem to believe that it can get much worse, and I don’t. At this point it’s a lost cause. It’s like someone saying, “I will help stop climate change by taking shorter showers.”

I think it could get a lot worse. I’ll use self-driving cars as an example. Let’s say Facebook becomes what “Zuck” wants it to be and there is an AI that determines whether or not someone is a terrorist based on things they “like” and/or comments they make. Let’s say they’re out in their self-driving car and suddenly, a signal gets sent to it that causes the current destination to be abandoned, the doors to lock and a new destination right to the nearest police station is entered because they need to ask you some questions based on the Facebook AI saying you’re a terrorist. That’s just one example I can think of for “worse” and I’m sure there’s more. It could get a lot worse otherwise there’d be no point in these corporations to keep sinking their claws in deeper and deeper. It can always get worse and if people keep their heads in the sand, it will. It can change, but it would require a massive revolution of awareness and thought which would help people remember how to work together towards a common goal. As long as there is such disorganization and division among the 350 million people living in the US, no, nothing will change, but nothing lasts forever either.

Frightening indeed. But by “get worse” I am speaking specifically about data collection and people’s sense that their privacy is being eroded and that they’re fighting back against further erosion by blocking Windows telemetry. Makes me chuckle just to think about that. What I mean, precisely, is that blocking Windows (I keep wanting to put an apostrophe there) telemetry can and will make not one iota of difference in the grand loss-of-privacy scheme. If it makes someone feel better–like they’re fighting the good fight–fine. Pleasure yourself. But that’s all you’re doing. Privacy is dead. It lasted about five decades longer than ***.

As far as what use corporations/governments can–and will–make of all that data, yes, absolutely, as you say, the world in which we live can become a LOT worse. I’m so old I won’t be around to see it. That’s one reason I’m glad I don’t have children.

As a sidelight, we need a new word to describe the entity that will result from the ongoing merger of corporations and governments. “Corporment?” Not very elegant. How about “governation?”

GaryK

fp wrote:

Not really. I just want at least some people–those with some modicum of reasoning ability–to realize the reality, not to reverse it, because individual action is useless. As to good intentions, heh: Facebook fined $122 million for misleading EU over WhatsApp deal https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/05/facebook-fined-e110-million-for-misleading-eu-over-whatsapp-deal/ Not to mention that he sued 300 people in Hawaii to force them to buy their land for his estate and the mistreatment of all his neighbours in SF. One way to distract from this is to issue nice manifestos and build a hospital. Then you can do almost anything without loss of your “nice guy” aura. That’s what destroying education means. But check out the private schools these people send THEIR kids!!!!

Well, we’re probably agreeing. It’s precisely because individual action is useless that I’m not willing to spend energy worrying about Microsoft telemetry.

GaryK

fp wrote:

But you miss the point of telemetry: these are ways to get the plebos used to worse things. And to test limits. By the time you accept telemetry you have ensured worse.

Where we differ is that you seem to believe that it can get much worse, and I don’t. At this point it’s a lost cause. It’s like someone saying, “I will help stop climate change by taking shorter showers.”

GaryK

1 user thanked author for this post.

Sessh

fp wrote:

Well, there is a point at which the effectiveness of this method achieves the goal, it is shrewd to allow a modicum of free speech–otoh, it can be pointed out as evidence that nothing nefarious has happened, otoh it carries no risk because everybody now is clueless and considers the truth insanity. Check and mate. There may be something to your analysis, but I tend to think that just the unwillingness to go and fight abroad has much more explanatory power–they were questioning their military service, not intervention. I don’t think they had the background to judge the pros/cons of the intervention. The natural tendency of society is for power to concentrate, so freedom and democracy is an interlude between tyrannies when a tyranny self-destructs. There is no case in history of any society that could be deemed minimally democratic that did not succumb to tyranny after some period of time. There is an illusion/delusion that the US will not, but that’s all it is.

As to the first part–“they were questioning their military service, not intervention”–not so, at least where I was. They/we questioned both. Granted, these were not sophisticated analyses, but they/we were aware that the intervention was unwarranted. A lot of us were only 18 and still in, or just out of, high school, so sophisticated analyses would have been surprising, I think.

As to the second part, many of us realize that we’ve already succumbed. Many of us, though not a majority, even voted for it. Which left many others of us deeply disheartened.

I had some pro-Trump friends seriously justify their voting for Trump by saying (this is a direct quote), “The system needs shaking up. Besides, how much damage can he do in four years?’

How much damage has he done in four months?

GaryK

fp wrote:

Another must read: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/feb/19/mark-zuckerberg-says-change-world-he-sets-rules

Awesome. Thanks. I hadn’t seen that.

I have two immediate reactions:

1) The path to hell is paved with good intentions.

2) …and people here are worried about Windows telemetry.

This just illustrates my earlier point: Privacy is dead. Somewhere an entity has recorded everything I’ve done today (including typing this). That’s not going to stop. Our sole hope–and that hope is very close to no hope at all–is to control the use made of all this data. Privacy is gone–get over it–and most people happily exchanged it for a chocolate éclair. I insist that every person who objects to this first tell me if he/she has a Facebook account. (Which by the way I don’t.)

GaryK

fp wrote:

Ah, but you see, the reason they are clueless is a direct CONSEQUENCE of the intentional destruction of education!!! Eliminate education and you get clueless people — essential for fooling and distracting them from the fact that they are being manipulated, exploited and controlled. When I came to this country I quickly realized that the difference between it and the soviet block is not in objectives–for both it is control–but in method. Both eliminated intellectual development and used propaganda. The soviet system had unlimited violence at its disposal, so it did not care what you thought, only what you did: if you stepped out of line, you disappeared. So the propaganda was blatant, utterly absurd and nobody believed it. The US system was more limited in its use of force so it was critical that the propaganda were subtle and persuasive — not by chance are marketing and PR the pillars or US culture. For which reason knowledge, reason, independent, critical thinking–the purpose of true education–are the worst dangers and must be prevented at all cost, not less so than in USSR. So substitute it with preparation for the job market, coding and so on. Much more elegant and effective, which is why the USSR is gone and the US still stands.

A dark and chilling analysis, and I can’t see any vulnerabilities. Of course the reason we still have freedom of speech to say what you’ve just said is that those in power know that most people won’t understand it, so, practically speaking, it doesn’t matter if you say it.

To my mind it is no coincidence that the serious effort to undermine US public education began in the 1960s. A generation of young people, educated to think for themselves, questioned the way the government was structured. Those in power had a “**** ****! What have we done?” moment and began in earnest the process of dismantling what had become a pretty decent system. This effort has morphed into the “Charter School” movement–itself impossible to sell to a majority of voters who weren’t already stupefied–led by people who don’t want children exposed to “liberal” ideas.

Of course, the reasoning that leads to the conclusion that liberal ideas are problematic in a liberal democracy requires a good deal of confusion, but that’s a whole other discussion. I think Robert McNamara’s “The Fog of War” should be followed by a sequel, “The Fog of Education.”

GaryK

anonymous wrote:

@ gkarasik

But that’s precisely why right wingers want to destroy the education system–they hate and fear the very concept of “collective” and its ramifications, like unions.

No. The conservatives advocate for personal liberty, personal responsibility and the rule of Law as per the US Constitution’s guarantees to the citizens for their freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of the press, freedom to pursue happiness, aka “In God We Trust”, “good things follow good deeds”, “karma is a beeetch” or “you reap what you sow” or “do the crime do the time”.

1776 Declaration of Independence: We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. First Amendment I. Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

Conservatives are against the left-wingers’ nanny-state policies, liberal indoctrination in the education system and the giving of exorbitant pay to unionized workers in return for their votes. A traditional UAW low-skilled factory worker has to be paid about US$150,000 a year, inclusive of fringe benefits. That was why many US jobs were exported overseas, eg non-unionized factory workers in China only need to be paid about US$15,000 a year, inclusive of benefits. Power-crazy left-wingers are mostly pandering for votes by selling out America esp to the minorities, ie giving out all kinds of freebies and benefits in return for votes. The silent majority, esp individual White voters, have rejected the destructive left-wing policies by voting out the liberal Democrats in the Nov 2016 national election. Now, the liberal press are yelling blooody murder against the Trump administration, eg NYT, WaPo, NBC, CNN, etc. Similarly, a few liberal and left-wing posters here at askwoody are trying to impose nanny-state Group A policies and indoctrinate/brainwash Win 7/8.1 users, ie to toe the M$ line.

Funny stuff. Thanks.

GaryK

fp wrote:

Oh, please, you are the best example why they get away with that charade! It’s so **** easy. Don’t rell me: you voted Trump. As to your interpretation of our arguments — you’re not even wrong.

He’s being ironic. I appreciate his attempt at humor.

GaryK

fp wrote:

I am well aware of that side of EU and have often argued that is utterly undemocratic and serves the interests of the power elites that are responsible for it. But the point is that it may well be the case that Brexit only succeeded due a much more undemocratic scary process that is insidious and invisible. And it involves technology billionaires and data harvested from all over the place.

No doubt you are correct.

GaryK

fp wrote:

No, that was the thing that was exploited by alt-right data billionaires. Check out the link in my reply to you.

Certainly the anger in Britain had more than one cause, and the alt-right shamefully exploited that anger. One of the causes of that anger was EU intrusiveness. I know that anecdotally. I am an avid motorcyclist, and I hang out on a number of motorcycle-specific forums. Among motorcyclists, contempt for the EU is virulent. The EU have promulgated rule after rule after rule affecting the sound, speed, safety, and size of every aspect of motorcycling down to the smaller part. This is all well-meaning, but it has raised the cost of and lowered the pleasure of motorcycling, and it is unrelenting. Nor is motorcycling the only area of peoples; lives in which these endless rules have been promulgated. The cumulative impact among those already made prone to anger by their exaggerated sense of being badly used by the world has been significant, and it ultimately led to the self-scourging of the British worker that is Brexit. We can continue to argue–and I hope we do–which amorphous thing caused what amorphous other thing that then could be exploited by the alt-right and Russian-sponsored meddling, but I am convinced that EU intrusiveness was among those causes.

GaryK