Security, privacy, and everyone

images-1Polls show a solid majority of Americans continue to support the ritual sacrifice of their personal call data on the altar of our never-ending war with Oceania—er, excuse me, terrorism—even after sordid revelations brought to light by whistleblower Edward J. Snowden.

InTheseTimes asserts “There’s something fatalistic about this bedrock support for the new police state” as stated in a story excerpted briefly below.

“Could it be less a show of stubborn loyalty to federal spookery than a sort of learned helplessness, bred in the fingertips of an American public long used to marketers hovering over their Facebook and Google accounts, tracking—and then desperately seeking to monetize—every keystroke they make?

“Summer moviegoers had a proof-text for this hunch. In The Internship, a Vince Vaughn-Owen Wilson buddy comedy, the Wedding Crashers duo play laid-off, middle-aged salesmen driven into a tour of duty as aspiring geeks at the grand, rainbow-hued Google campus in Mountain View, Calif. Hijinks ensue, as they try to adapt their old-dude people skills to the cool and clean rigors of profitable data transmission. Their younger colleagues are won over by their seedy charm, and our heroes see their pluck rewarded with jobs at the world’s coolest company.

“But what’s of real interest is the social background of the film. The Internship is an unrelieved study in the psychology of mass digital conformity—rendered far more insidious, of course, in the Google workplace’s absolute conviction that it detests all manner of conformity. Continue reading “Security, privacy, and everyone”

Egypt blocks YouTube

A Cairo court has ordered the government to block access to the video-sharing website YouTube for a month for carrying an anti-Islam film that caused deadly riots across the world, reports Al Jazeera.imgres-1

“Judge Hassouna Tawfiq ordered on Saturday Youtube’s suspension in the country over the film, which he described as “offensive to Islam and the Prophet (Muhammad)”. Tawfiq made the ruling in the Egyptian capital where the first protests against the film erupted last September before spreading to more than 20 countries, leading to the deaths of more than 50 people.

“YouTube’s parent company, Google, declined requests to remove the video from the website last year, but restricted access to it in certain countries, including Egypt, Libya and Indonesia, because it says the video broke laws in those countries. At the height of the protests in September, YouTube was ordered blocked in several countries, including Iran, Pakistan and Afghanistan, and Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah issued an order blocking all websites with access to the anti-Islam film in the kingdom. Continue reading “Egypt blocks YouTube”