From Wired: US Intelligence services will now be doing more data-mining about what you post on your blog or tweet. .
No need to cry out just yet – they are just speeding up what could be done before – this engine parses public tools, such as blogs and tweeter, but not closed social networks. So, yet another reason to think twice before blogging – unless you want government reading your thoughts.
Double-click an executable file…
“You seem to want to run this program – are you sure?”
“Yes”
“Really?”
“Yes”
“Like, totally, really sure?”
“Yes”
“Are you sure you dont want to delete it instead?”
“No, just run it, please”
“You know that this little programmy thingy can hurt you, right? You wouldn’t want to have a boo-boo”
“Yes, i know, I am also sure it will not, i’ve ran it many times”
“But you never know. There are many things out there in the big and scary Internet, why don’t you stick around with the small and cosy world of our company?”
“Ok, how about this – i’ve been doing this stuff for NN years, i know what i want, just run the program?”
“Would you like this little cute puppy on your screen?”
“No. just run the damn program!”
“Hey, no need to be defensive i just want to let you know that our company also has this great suite of flashy software that does all the same stuff this program and does also offers counseling and hand-holding. Want to try this one instead?”
“No. Could you please, start the program?”
“Look at that puppy, look at him! Isn’t he adorable? I used to have another cute pet – it was a paper clip. It loved to ask questions and offer help… Some people didn’t get it though, I guess. He was sent to recycling… Life is a funny thing, you know… I remember this one time I was updating myself and … “
“Ok, how about this – we are just going to just forget that I ever double-clicked anything, ok?”
“Ok, just for you and just today. By the way, there is this offer for this security software our company produces – it will make sure that you will not start any bad software on your computer”
“Oh… thanks. Awesome. Really… Yeah”
“And, btw, i already started that program you double-clicked 20 minutes ago”
“Huh?”
“Yeah. It was asking a lot of questions, so i just said Yes, so that it wouldn’t distract you from our conversation. I also changed the default e-mail client back to our flashy client. It came in the bundle, so if you are using the other programs from that bundle, I know you really want to use that one instead of your old one, right?”
“Ok. just whatever. Nice talking to you”
“Yeah! Any time! Hey, could you do me a favor – restart me please? See, you moved your mouse, you need to restart your computer for changes to take effect”
President Barack Obama was awarded Nobel Peace Prize
This supposedly puts him in the same league as these people:
Henry Dunant (1901)
Woodrow Wilson (1919)
Emily Greene Balch (1946)Ralph Bunche (1950)
Martin Luther King Jr. (1964)
Andrei Sakharov (1975)
Mother Theresa (1979)
Jodi Williams (1997)
(see here)
.. and many others who have, indeed, made contributions to “a wide range of fields including advocacy of human rights, mediation of international conflicts, and arms control.”
This puzzles me – what has our president done that elevates him to the level of these people and organizations? I guess the Nobel Peace Prize Committee needs to re-evaluate their criteria and stop playing favoritism. As far as I can see, so far our President has only been talking.
Via Bruce Schneier’s Blog :
What DHS knows about you
That’s a lot of information stored in one place. I really really really hope they safeguard it well. I mean, they are the government, right… they have super-duper stuff that protects this kind of data, right? right?…
It all started with blog entry by Alex Exler about TV show Lie to Me. I’m no fan of most of the TV shows, but I respect Exler’s opinion and I’ve enjoyed many movies he praised (that’s how i got hooked on House MD). So, I decided to see an episode, and it just happened so that yesterday fox.com released the season opening. so, right after i was done with Nut House, i switched to Lie to Me. One reaction – awesome. But this is just a start.
Today, during the lunchtime, being the internet junkie that i am, i decided to dig up more information on the show.
Here is some cool stuff:
Not sure if i’ll get hooked on Lie to Me, but given my early interests in psychology and non-verbal communication, I know, i got something to read for the next few weeks.
Evidently, Lop Top = Laptop (from communication with a client)
Courtesy The Audiophiliac : Wikiphonia wiki about headphones.
I would not call myself an expert, but i do care what i put on/into my ears. what i liked the is this table (trip down the memory lane) – Russian headphone models and the Western(Eastern) models they were cloned (read: “skommunizdenny”) from.
Autumn is upon us. For everybody who wants to enjoy the foliage, whether by:
a)just walking around enjoying the view, or,
b)waking up at some ungodly hour, driving for miles, getting out in the cold, setting up tripod, breathing on frozen fingers, spilling lukewarm coffee all over themselves (but hopefully not the gear)
They have great maps by region with reports, so you can see where and when the peak color will is.
From Bruce Schneier: “last month someone tried to assassinate a Saudi prince by exploding a bomb stuffed in his rectum”
For sake of our dignity (or whatever there is left of it, anyways) we CANNOT let anybody from TSA find out about it. And God forbid, they watched Man on Fire Can’t you see what will happen? There was a shoe-bomber, and now we have to remove our shoes. Now, there is a precedent of ass-bomber, and we may end up having a mandatory cavity search… by a bomb squad… consisting of TSA personnel !
I wonder if anybody will try to blow up something using explosives hidden in a bra. After that TSA will ban bras from planes and women will have to remove them before proceeding past the security checkpoint. I’ll just be hanging out by the checkpoints. Look at the bright side though – men now have absolute right (if not an obligation) to look at girl’s rack while talking to them – “Hey, those don’t look real, i think i’m going to keep an eye on them to make sure she’s not a terrorist”.
Funny, i just looked at the date of the last post – September 2006, then I looked at the current date, and it’s September 2009. It must be something about September that causes me to go to Blogspot. 😉
Anyways, i’m going to try to clean up my act (as well as the blog) and get back to this again and see if i stick with this.