Accept Fear but Do Not Submit

This is good stuff. It's a clip from G4TV about the Great Firewall of China. Xeni Jardin is a real-life cyberpunk chick. I found this video by way of BoingBoing, which Xeni coedits. The story fascinates me because it encompasses both technology and revolt. I support any person's or people's drive to greater self-determination. I really cannot comprehend what makes Person A want to kill Person B for not wanting to be subjected to Person A. Fuck that shit. Why don't more people see how messed up that is? Why do we allow our governments to behave this way? Fear? What else could it be?

I'm reminded of V for Vendetta.

God bless alliteration!

I am not wholly sympathetic with the Tibetan cause. I can't help seeing shadowy figures from the US government skulking in the background. I'm not a fan of theocracies, even a Buddhist one. And I can't trust what I see:

Question everything. Do not blindly accept what They tell you.

Support Wikileaks

A post at Slashdot tipped me off to this awesome article from The Guardian, Whistle while you work.

A secretive Swiss bank landed an apparently novel censorship blow against the internet this week. Anyone who tried to call up wikileaks.org, a global website devoted to publicising leaked documents, found themselves frustrated. The site simply wasn't there any more.

You don't think the US censors the internet? Think again. We're on lockdown every bit as much as supposedly repressive countries like China and Iran.

Since wikileaks.org doesn't work in the US at this time, The Guardian was kind enough to provide us with the IP number of the site so you can bypass the hamstrung nameservers, Wikileaks. The concept behind Wikileaks gives me shivers in a good way...

an open-source, democratic intelligence agency

Verizon courts privacy advocates

I'm a customer of AT&T and while I can't really complain about my personal experience with them, I can't really say much that's positive, either. AT&T has participated in some customer surveillance shenanigans, though, and they seem to be willing to be compliant with government efforts to snoop on people.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation has filed legal briefs and evidence against AT&T, claiming they are diverting Internet traffic to the NSA for widespread secret surveillance and possibly breaking federal wiretapping laws and the Fourth Amendment. [SecurityFocus]

It's not just AT&T, though. It seems that most companies involved with data flow are looking at ways to snoop on their customer's activities. Well, Thomas J. Tauke, executive vice president for public affairs at Verizon, is breathing some refreshing ideas into the discussion:

“We generally are reluctant to get into the business of examining content that flows across our networks and taking some action as a result of that content,” he said.

Amen, brother!

Preach on!

“We don’t want to solve any network congestion issues by restricting the flow of certain kinds of traffic,” he said.

Read the complete article from the New York Times: Verizon Rejects Hollywood’s Call to Aid Piracy Fight. [by way of Gizmodo]