] Profiling has two very dangerous failure modes. The first
] one is obvious. Profiling's intent is to divide people
] into two categories: people who may be evildoers and need
] to be screened more carefully, and people who are less
] likely to be evildoers and can be screened less
] carefully.
]
] But any such system will create a third, and very
] dangerous, category: evildoers who don't fit the profile.
] Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh, Washington-area
] sniper John Allen Muhammed and many of the Sept. 11
] terrorists had no previous links to terrorism. The
] Unabomber taught mathematics at UC Berkeley. The
] Palestinians have demonstrated that they can recruit
] suicide bombers with no previous record of anti-Israeli
] activities. Even the Sept. 11 hijackers went out of their
] way to establish a normal-looking profile; frequent-flier
] numbers, a history of first-class travel and so on.
] Evildoers can also engage in identity theft, and steal
] the identity -- and profile -- of an honest person.
] Profiling can result in less security by giving certain
] people an easy way to skirt security.

Bruce Schneier, trying to spread the clue around.

How We Are Fighting the War on Terrorism / IDs and the illusion of security

Decius wrote:
] While everyone is freaking out about their Tivos, Jeremy
] mentioned a much more serious issue. The fact is that TV only
] shows you popular culture. There are limited circumstances
] where surveillance of TV watching habits would really be
] problematic politically. TV is the soma. The Internet, on the
] other hand, makes your local library look tame. Google knows
] everything that you've thought about seriously in past 5
] years. And what Google knows, the police know.
]
] If they don't need permission or notification to pull your
] records from the library, how long before they can do the same
] with your Google records?

The linking of records cannot be prevented. The development of IT, if let run unrestrained, allows for total tracking of everything. Nanotech can turn us all into grey goo. At points fire probably caused a few people to get seriously hurt.. People will tell you its bad to play with all of the aforementioned.

I'm taking the same line as I did in the Patriot Act renewal thread. The powers of being able to link together certain records will exist, if by the capabilities of technology alone, and our challenge is figure out how we want this to work. That includes where we enforce certain "firewalls" and limitations.

There is much missing policy. This is because we have just as much missing philosophy. The technology is warping our ideas on privacy, its mutating our threats, and its giving us new capabilities. The only thing I am sure of, is that the only way to do good is to lead in the right direction.

Your TiVo tracks you, Google tracks you, your Easypass tracks you, your mass transit card(s) track you, your grocery card tracks you, your credit card tracks you, your atm card tracks you, and your computer owns you. Everything tracks you. You help it just by using it. Given a desire or requirement, it could all be linked.

If anyone still has ideas that its even possible to maintain some kind of "total privacy", they are living in a dreamland. Your various tokens and connections will compromise themselves, without you realizing it. If you have a Safeway card you went out of the way to register as "Customer" (as I have), its got compromised the first time you used your atm/credit card to buy something with it (as I most certainly have). If you sit on Friendster/Orkut/etc and just respond to requests, at least a chunk of your social network will come to you all by itself. Just wait till bill scanners can track serial numbers.. Look at your blog, and embrace the grey goo that is your privacy. There is no escape!

This must be embraced, there is no turning back. It can be used to empower or oppress. I vote for empower, and that's why I work on systems like MemeStreams and get so concerned about Patriot Act like issues. I think that just like every other advance that has been disruptive, this one just ne... [ Read More (0.3k in body) ]

RE: Google Privacy Policy

] I wanted to wait 'til today's polls opened to post
] this, because I wanted it to be a post-mortem and not a
] vivisection. What follows is a long musing on the Dean
] campaign's use of internet tools, but it has a short
] thesis: the hard thing to explain is not how the Dean
] campaign blew such a huge lead, but rather why we ever
] thought that lead actually existed. Dean's campaign
] didn't just fail, it dissolved on contact with reality.

Clay Shirky on the failures of the Dean campaign.

Many-to-Many: Exiting Deanspace

Robert S. McNamara is an almost universally a vilified character. He served under General Curtis LeMay, and helped plan and support the carpet bombing and burning of Japan. He was the first non-Ford family president of Ford. He served as the Secretary of Defense under two presidents, Kennedy and Johnson. He was JFK's right hand man during the Cuban Missile Crisis. He ran the Vietnam war. He was the president of the World Bank. There is simply no way you can have done that much, and not be vilified.

In this documentary by Errol Morris, he attempts to share some of the lessons of his life, and does so in a completely non-apologetic or remorseful way. Unlike a Michael Moore movie, this stays focused on McNamara and what he wants to share.

At this time, more then any other, this is a very important film. I was familiar with much of what this movie covered, but hearing it from the perspective of McNamara was extremely interesting. I found myself admiring the man. There is a side to him that is not seen, through the mistakes of Vietnam and the horror of the burning of Tokyo, that can be seen through this documentary.

Some of the most important lessons can be learned from someone who has failed, and McNamara does not seem to have any illusions about the places where there were failures, both on his part and others. His telling of the Cuban Missile Crisis shows the elements of human nature at play. His analysis of Vietnam is sobering and clear. And while completely unremorseful for the burning of Japan, his lessons clearly resonate to the horror of the situation.

There are many questions he refuses to answer outright, in particular about Vietnam. As he explains, he is "damned if he does and damned if he doesn't", and he would rather be "damned if he doesn't". However, there is plenty of room to read between the lines.

IMDb: The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons from the Life of Robert S. McNamara (2003)

] Pork Roll is a true New Jersey sophisticated flavor trend
] that can only be described as savory, distinctive,
] extraordinary, & delicate in comparison to ham, sausage
] or bacon... there is no other taste like it! Now others
] can experience the taste sensation that we here in New
] Jersey have known about for years! For breakfast, lunch,
] dinner or even as a snack... you decide!

I am Pork Roll deprived in San Francisco!

Hmm.. Pork Roll.. Cheese.. Kaiser bun..

Once I'm past the beginning of the month lack of cash, I'm going to order one off the 3lb rolls, go into this one breakfast place by where I live, and make them aware of this wonderful meat's existence. Pork Roll MUST make it to the west coast.

I can't take it any longer!

Pork Roll - New Jersey's Best Kept Secret

I really, really, really, really wish that I could get pork roll in San Francisco.

I think about this every day. Every single time I am in the Safeway by my house, I check the section of the store these would be in. I walk over to it with my fingers crossed. I know I'm never going find them there.. [cry]

Pork Roll - Jersey Taylor Ham

] TiVo boxes download scheduling information over phone
] lines each night. They also upload a record of what was
] watched, recorded and skipped.
]
] TiVo says it does not identify individual viewers but
] will customize the report to track, for example, viewing
] habits of Silicon Valley subscribers during the Super
] Bowl, the finale of American Idol or the Academy Awards.

This makes me slightly uncomfortable.. Mostly, because they said for the longest time that the TiVo did not upload _any_ information about what a customer views. I don't think my TiVo ever told me it was doing different. I wonder when this changed, or will change, and if I wasn't paying attention to the news would I have known about it.

] ``Privacy is an addressable concern,'' he said. ``Theoretically,
] TiVo knows a huge amount of information about an individual.
] But they've sworn not to use it except in aggregate and are
] adamant about sticking to that pledge,'' said Bernoff, who
] does not have a business relationship with TiVo. ``As long
] as TiVo stays and business and maintains that pledge, I don't
] think it's a problem.''

This particular issue has come up before in relation to MemeStreams.. At what point does data which is private, become data which is statistical? A few individuals data collected, in my opinion, does not go over the threshold enough. A TiVo in a shared household for instance.. All the TiVo's in a region, I don't see a problem with. All the TiVo's total, I don't see a problem with. That is very useful information.

I agree with TiVo that this is a addressable situation. There _is_ a middle ground. We collect a fair amount of information about the surfing habits of users on MemeStreams. However, this data is either used directly by the users (it powers the Reputation Agent), or we boil it down for the purposes of statistical info. Our privacy policy explicitly says we keep that information as private as we are capable of keeping it, and we do. We don't peek around people's private data. We view ourselves as entrusted to protect it. We don't sell people's private data, nor would we ever.

Currently, our statistical info is only used for the graphing stuff. That will change, but we are committed to protecting users privacy rights, and giving them access to information that is theirs.

Personally, I don't like the idea of selling the aggregate information, specifically selling exclusive access to the information. Its the users' information, it was collected and derived from them, so they should be able to see/use it. Otherwise, they should be reimbursed.

That leaves room for different service levels, and a business model to wrap it in. Advertisers are going to want the data faster, easier to access, and in close to real-time as possible so they can adjust their schedules and strategies. Personally, I just be interested in the "Google Zeitgeist"/"Billboard" style monthly view.

Mercury News | TiVo to sell data on viewing habits of subscribers

] He says he witnessed chemical experiments being carried
] out on political prisoners in specially constructed gas
] chambers.
]
] "How did you feel when you saw the children die?", I
] asked.
]
] His answer shocked me.
]
] "I had no sympathy at all because I was taught to think
] that they were all enemies of our country and that all
] our country's problems were their fault. So I felt they
] deserved to die."

Just a(nother) little reminder about this place called North Korea, which continues to produce a stream of stories like this..

They sell weapons to people we don't like, likely have a way more extensive WMD program then Iraq ever did, they threaten our allies by launching missiles over them, and their human rights practices make China look like a typical High School.

BBC NEWS | North Korea, Within prison walls

I'm still loving every minute of this.. This is like the technology super bowl! Let me translate this to unix geek..

] For Spirit, part of the cure has been deleting thousands of
] files from the rover's flash memory -- a type of rewritable
] electronic memory that retains information even when power
] is off. Many of the deleted files were left over from the seven
] -month flight from Florida to Mars. Onboard software was
] having difficulty managing the flash memory, triggering
] Spirit's computer to reset itself about once an hour.

Cleaning out a directory with too many files ... ON MARS!!

] Two days after the problem arose, engineers began using a
] temporary workaround of sending commands every day to put
] Spirit into an operations mode that avoided use of flash
] memory. Now, however, the computer is stable even when
] operating in the normal mode, which uses the flash
] memory.

Single user mode ... ON MARS!!!

] "To be safe, we want to reformat the flash and start
] again with a clean slate," Adler said. That reformatting
] is planned for Monday. It will erase everything stored in
] the flash file system and install a clean version of the
] flight software.

PXE/bootp Automated Installs ... ON MARS!!!!

Alright guys, now just keep the webcam working... ON MARS!!!

Update: Looking at the press images section right now is a great reminder that we got way more then a webcam over there. Hot damn. Once these things start really moving around, I'll break out the RC car jokes!

Shout with me . . . ON MARS!!

* Item 1. Installation of 4-way stop sign - Chestnut and Powell Streets
* Item 9 Amending Fire Code to require self-contained breathing replenishment systems in high rise building
* Item 4. Traffic Regulations
* Item 5. Parking Regulations
* Items 4 & 5. Traffic Regulations & Parking Regulations
* Item 7. Parking Regulations
* Item 8. Traffic Regulations
* Item 10, Use of ramped taxi medallion in a spare taxicab sedan when ramped taxi is out of service

They posted the video from the hearing I mentioned earlier. I've been able to pull out all the images I need, with the exception of one traffic map that covers the Height/Octavia area that remains missing. Hey, that's not shabby for working completely from open source. I should get a chance to do a write up in the next few days. In the meantime, you can watch this and play "Rattle Spotting"..

SFGTV: January 26, 2004 - Land Use Committee Hearing