Tag: Technology

Technology Doesn’t Cause Stupidity

People cause stupidity. Apparently thanks to GPS, cell phones, and other such gadgets people have been acting dumber when venturing into national parks. This is a cause of concern for the National Park Service but also a slight irritation to Charles Darwin’s ghost who has to deal with all this stupidity:

The national parks’ history is full of examples of misguided visitors petting bears, putting children on buffaloes for photos and dipping into geysers despite signs warning of scalding temperatures.

But today, as an ever more wired and interconnected public visits the parks in rising numbers — July was a record month for visitors at Yellowstone — rangers say that technology often figures into such mishaps.

People with cell phones call rangers from mountaintops to request refreshments or a guide; in Jackson Hole, Wyo., one lost hiker even asked for hot chocolate.

I have a solution for this little issue. If anybody uses their cell phone to call a park ranger in the hopes of getting a beverage delivered to them I say the rangers oblige by launching a barrage of artillery onto the caller’s location. Of course this will require buying artillery for the park rangers but I’m willing to donate money to a good cause.

“Because of having that electronic device, people have an expectation that they can do something stupid and be rescued,” said Jackie Skaggs, spokeswoman for Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming.

“Every once in a while we get a call from someone who has gone to the top of a peak, the weather has turned and they are confused about how to get down and they want someone to personally escort them,” Skaggs said. “The answer is that you are up there for the night.”

Damn right make them sit it out. Stupidity is meaningless without lessons being learned and people generally don’t learn when they get bailed out. Of course the rangers aren’t be Luddites:

The service acknowledges that the new technologies have benefits as well. They can and do save lives when calls come from people who really are in trouble.

Technology is a tool and like any tool can be used to enhance good and bad. Many people use it stupidly and end up driving into a lake because their GPS told them to. These people should be removed from the gene pool as soon as possible so I feel even in the hands of the stupid a GPS is ultimately being used for good.

Remember Those Big Powerful Lobbyists

In the last post I mentioned one of the biggest arguments presented at last night’s event was the only way to stop lobbyists was to allow the government to regulate net neutrality. Guess what? The RIAA, one of the largest lobbyist holders in Washington, is jockeying to make net neutrality laws include filtering and the ability to spy on customer. Who called that one? That’s right I did.

This is why I don’t want government involved with the Internet in any way, shape, or form. Any company large enough can buy them and get whatever the Hell they want passed into law. At least with the ISPs in control (which I’ve mentioned is still going to fuck us over) I have the option of not paying for their service. An additional benefit is any deals groups such as the RIAA want to make will have to be done with each ISP separately. Did I mention that these deals won’t be law and thus ISPs will be free to not make those deals? Oh I didn’t? Well I did now.

One Mighty Circle Jerk

Last night I made a major error in judgment. I attended the Save the Internet rally. In my defense I attended it not because I thought I’d agree with what was being presented (that went out the door the second I heard Al Franken was going to be speaking) but because I thought it would be a good forum for debate. My error in judgment was forgetting to fact that “progressive” liberals don’t like debate and thus do everything they can to squash it.

My dumbass detector went off the second I entered the room. I arrived late but two of my friends were there early and happened to save me a seat. The first thing my friend told me upon my sitting down was “this is a liberal’s wet dream.” That’s one Hell of a comment as this friend is a self-professed communist (not a socialist or democrat but he is an honest-to-goodness communist). When a self-professed communist says an event is a liberal circle jerk you know you’re going to lose braincells just by being there.

One of the constant things being parroted by the speakers was the fact telecommunications companies have a powerful lobby in Washington. This was being brought up as a danger because the lobbies would use their might to coerce government into allowing major ISPs to filter and throttle Internet access as they see fit. I may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer (as evident by me going to this event) but I still can’t figure out the “logic” they were using. In essence the speakers were saying the only way to prevent powerful lobbyists from using government to ruin our Internet was to… make government regulate our Internet. Wow my brain hurts just from remembering that.

That wasn’t all. After some time they brought out a Latino woman to speak. Unlike most “progressive” liberals I’m not obsessed with the race of another person, it’s irrelevant to me so I didn’t realize this would be significant. Shortly into her speech she bring up a statistic saying only a low percentage (she had an actual number that I’ve forgotten) of Latinos in this country have Internet connectivity and the FCC must do something to correct this. What does the percentage of people connected to the Internet have to do with net neutrality? Your guess is as good as mine really. Frankly I think they wanted to play the race card so badly that they were willing to bring somebody on stage to make an entirely different argument just to bring race into the game. Democrats playing the race card always confuses me since traditionally it’s been the Republican Party (whom I hate equally) that’s supported civil rights for minorities. Hell the slaves were freed by a republican. Either way they love the race card and play it whenever possible.

I’m not sure at exactly what time it was but during the speeches Al Franken excused himself from the event. He made a mention that some of his family members were in town so he wanted to go see them. According to his Wikipedia page (I know not an authoritative source, I don’t care) he resides in Minneapolis so it would seem likely his family would be in town. I’m not going to knock the guy because it could very well be they were family members from out of town but either way he ducked out before any dissent (in other words the public) could speak. That’s usually his method of operating so I wasn’t surprised.

Alas the night moved forward. A panel of speakers were brought out whom simply parroted the ongoing theme of the night. This was more bullshit that really added nothing. Finally came the point where people were able to speak. I didn’t realize this but the only way you were allowed to speak was to sign up and receive a number. One of my friends had a number which he gave to me (apparently I’m more entertaining since I don’t care if I piss off an entire auditorium of people). Before anybody was allowed to speak ground rules were being set which was fine by me. Let me rephrase that it was fine by me until one of the ground rules established was not being able to ask anybody on stage questions. This is why “progressive” liberal events piss me off, they don’t want debates they want obedience. Their motto should be “shut up slave.”

The number I had was 53 and each speaker was allowed up to two minutes to speak. This meant in a worst case scenario I’d have to wait 106 minutes before I could go up and make a statement. Two thing occurred to me at this point; what I was planning on doing was asking the FCC chairman a question and probably wasn’t going to have the chance to speak anyways. Only people with numbers one through 40 were asked to come up which is generally a good way of saying everybody else isn’t going to get time. My group and I stayed there for a short while to see what the statements were going to be and left once we realized that everybody was going to use their entire two minutes.

The first, second, and third speakers took half their time rattling of their credentials (at least it seemed like half their time). After they rattled off why they felt themselves to be so great they would make a statement about how the Internet can’t survive without the government regulating it. Needless to say we left after the third speaker opened her mouth, there was just no point in being there.

After that we went and grabbed a couple of beers hoping to numb the brain damage caused by being there. Seriously I’ve never seen such a circle jerk in my life.

New Assault Knife

Holy shit! Check out this dangerous and terrible knife! Obviously it’s far sharper than any hunting knife needs to be. The only thing this knife is good for is kill people! People simply don’t need a knife this sharp. We need to ban it now!

See how stupid that sounds? Well it sounds equally dumb when that is said about firearms. Seriously though that blade in the video is sharp, I want one.

A Fool and His Money

You know what they say, a fool and his money are quickly departed. Take this example for instance. It’s an application that alerts you when there are lightening lightning strikes in your area and it only costs $5.99!

Of course the article also brings up the fact a whole 58 people are killed (on average) every year by lightening lightning. The population of the United States is 307,006,550 according to Google meaning .0000188921051% of the population of the United States are killed each year (on average) by lightening lightning.

With a risk that tiny who the Hell is going to buy a shitty $5.99 app?

EDIT 2010-08-18 22:02: Proof reading is important just remember that. And no matter how many times you use the closely spelled but completely incorrect word it doesn’t make it right. Thanks for pointing it out Linoge.

More Stupid Laws

Representative Edward J. Markey has brought forth the 21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act. It was just passed by the House and is on its way to the Senate.

The bill, apparently, is an attempt to force technology companies to make web sites and devices accessible to the blind. Of course it’s a rather long bill to simply accomplish that so I’m guessing there are some other hidden surprises are buried in that bill.

I have a problem with this type of legislation (if that surprises you I’m guessing this is your first time visiting my site, welcome). Back in college I had a professor who was Hell bent of forcing all her students to create accessible web sites (she was the instructor for a couple web development classes). Sure that’s fine and all until you realize one major problem, you handicap your capabilities by doing this.

This site you’re reading right now is mostly text. I post very few images or other media here. Even with something as simple as text this site probably isn’t accessible to any screen reader on the planet. Why is that? Because I use WordPress. WordPress, like almost every other content management system on the planet, throws a lot of extra junk into a website. Need proof? Look at the source code of the page you’re viewing right now.

Screen readers also can’t interface with well when a page uses scripting, which almost all pages do (as I know because I use NoScript to block most of it). Scripting is needed for a lot of things including active content (think Google Maps). You just can’t get around it when you’re making dynamic web pages (OK you can but it’s a development nightmare and requires all active work be done server side thus requires far more hardware to run the same site). And that’s just web pages.

Devices are a whole different world. I’ve mentioned the whining over Amazon’s Kindle not being accessible (which they fixed when it was brought to their attention I might add). In the case of the Kindle that is a device that can be made accessible pretty easily because it only works with text. Tell me how can you make a touch-screen based phone such as the Evo 4G, iPhone, or Palm Pre accessible to a blind person? There isn’t technology available at an affordable price that can create a braille touch screen. Combine that with the fact that since there are no physical controls on many new phones there is no way to “feel” your way around the interface even if it reads everything to you. Amazon did prove if it’s practical to make a device accessible to disabled individuals it will be done. Otherwise it can’t be done because our world is regulated by reality which most politicians don’t understand.

The bottom line is people with disabilities have special needs. I’m sorry to say but these people need devices that are specially made for them. It’s a fact of life that when a minority of people exist that have needs different than the large majority not every device can be crafted around that minority. Doing so would slow our technological progress to a crawl or make everything so bloody expensive nobody could afford them. Just imagine how expensive automobiles would be today if they had to be accessible to the blind. Yes it would have to drive itself which would require a ton of on board sensors, computers, and other pricey equipment. Needless to say it’s not practical by any means so the blind simply aren’t allowed to drive.

You can call me an insensitive asshole for stating this but that doesn’t make it any less true. I simply am a big enough asshole that I don’t care what people think of me and thus am willing to state the blatantly obvious.

The RIAA and Logic, It’s Like the Brady Campaign and Logic

Apparently the RIAA is lobbying for the mandatory inclusion of FM receivers in all mobile devices. I can’t for the life of me follow whatever passes for logic with these people. How can you justify making a law to mandate the inclusion of FM receivers in mobile devices? Seriously what’s your justification? Please tell me because I my head hurts just trying to figured it out.

Is it to get people to listen to the radio? That probably isn’t going to work and I’ll tell you why. My Evo 4G has an integrated FM receiver (it wasn’t mandated by law but HTC figured if they’re going to throw in the kitchen sink then why not an FM receiver). I assume it works because everything else on the device does but I’ve not actually tried it. In fact I haven’t listened to an FM radio station since… shortly after I graduated high school I believe. That’s about the time I discovered FM transmitters that plug into iPods.

Now with my Evo I have an amazing data connection with Pandora and Last.fm. If I want to listen to a radio station I just punch up one of those two streaming services and listen to a station that doesn’t have advertisements and plays music I like (or at least attempts to). I pair that up with my Motorola T505 which connects to my Evo via Bluetooth and transmits the music I’m playing over a selected FM band. This means while I’m driving around I have my Pandora or Last.fm radio station playing music over my FM radio. Oh and it doubles as a hands free calling device to boot.

Sorry RIAA you’re business model is dead and buried. You can’t salvage it at this point and frankly nobody likes listening to the radio anymore because they play more ads than content. After all you can lobby for a law which forces every mobile device to have an included FM receiver but you can’t force anybody to utilize it.

Freedom of Speech so Long as It’s My Speech

I found an editorial over at Engadget that just makes me shake my head and weep for liberty. Apparently one writer there is shocked, SHOCKED I tell you that he was able to find Nazi themed applications on the Android Market. Hell he’s not only shocked he’s pissed off and demands censorship rights now!

Here’s the thing the Android Market is pretty open. There aren’t many restrictions in place unlike Apple’s iTunes Store. This means you are far more free to post what you want. Combine the fact you have an open platform and a freedom of speech in this country and you’re going to get things on there you don’t like. Of course the first thing a “progressive” liberal will want is censorship. I, on the other hand, want no censorship and instead realize that the price of the first amendment is having to encounter things I don’t like.

Let us look through some of the writer’s statements:

And here’s where we have to take a hard look at what censorship really means, and what kind of role it can (and clearly should) play in the new frontier of app marketplaces on mobile devices (and elsewhere). Let’s be clear about this right off the bat — an app store isn’t the internet. It’s not a free-for-all, it’s not an open venue where any type of wares might be hawked.

Actually it is exactly all of those things if the company running it chooses it to be. If Google wants to let anything into the Android Market then they can do that.

The whole point of these app portals is to provide a controlled service to your users that has guidelines and rules that make getting software onto your phone relatively easy and safe. Whether or not you have stringent policies for what you’ll accept (Apple), or few (Google), no one should pretend that this isn’t a siloed service that must have rails to operate.

No the whole point of an application store is to have a central place where store customers can easily find applications to run on their platform. This in turn is used to make it easy for those running said platform to find useful tools which encourages them to purchase that platform in the first place.

So the question becomes: what are your limits? If you say absolutely no censorship, does it apply to hate-speak?

Yes. The definition of absolutely no censorship is exactly that; absolutely no fucking censorship. In case the writer is unaware here is the dictionary definition of absolutely:

completely and without qualification; used informally as intensifiers; “an absolutely magnificent painting”; “a perfectly idiotic idea”; “you’re perfectly right”; “utterly miserable”; “you can be dead sure of my innocence”; “was dead tired”; “dead right”

I guess that word doesn’t mean what he thinks it means.

If you say yes to porn, does it mean yes to Hitler themes that appear when you search for seemingly unrelated terms? Does being open mean accepting everything? Or do we have to set some reasonable limits for what we will and won’t tolerate?

This man is obviously a “progressive” liberal. Why do I say that? Because he wants to set some “reasonable” limits on a right. Now since Google runs the Android Market they are free to do as they please include censor things but it appears they aren’t doing so. Personally I’m quite happy about this fact because it means, for now, Google is respecting my right to free speech on their platform store. But unlike the writer of this article I realize that freedom of speech means in turn for my right to say what I want other people get the same right. I don’t get a say in what other people say.

Think of it this way: app stores are kind of like privately owned bookstores.

Yup and with any privately owned store the owner can chose to respect patrons’ rights or not.

The owner of the bookstore doesn’t have to carry the art book of nudes or the pro-Nazi thesis.

But they can if they chose to.

In most situations, it doesn’t have to carry everything because there are plenty of other places to get those books.

Not if the writer had his way there wouldn’t be.

That concept is especially true for Android — users can sideload any applications they want onto their devices. No one is going to tell you that you can’t install a Nazi theme on your phone, but we’re pretty sure that Google shouldn’t make it so easy, and it shouldn’t subject a large portion of its users to content that rightfully deserves to sit on the fringes, not in the center.

Google isn’t making “it so easy.” They are simply providing a service where developers can upload their applications without having to worry about being blocked by arbitrary rules.

So ultimately, what’s the answer?

Shut the fuck up and let Google run their store as they please. If you don’t like it get an iPhone and be happy with Apple’s censorship.

But the part that’s confusing is the part that’s essentially a lie — that keeping certain pieces of content out of systems like the App Store or the Android Market equates to censorship… because it doesn’t.

Fuck back to the dictionary:

the practice of officially examining books, movies, etc., and suppressing unacceptable parts : details of the visit were subject to military censorship.

Once again that word doesn’t mean what the writer thinks it means. Removing things you find objectionable or unacceptable is the very definition of censorship. The writer is a stupid little prat. I wouldn’t be so mad if he wasn’t lying and using misinformation. If he simply stated that he was offended and wanted the applications removed that would be one thing. But going on a tirade about how these applications should be removed and doing so isn’t actually censorship is twisting the meaning of words to build popular support for his crusade.

Look I despise Nazism as much as most people but that doesn’t mean I have the right to censor them. I also despise the Ku Klux Klan, Black Panthers, RIAA, MPAA, The Brady Campaign, Mayors Against Illegal Guns, SCIU and a long slew of other organizations. Do I want them silenced? No. They have a right to spew their bullshit as much as I have a right to spew mine. If any of those organizations made an application for the Android Market I wouldn’t demand a take down, I’d thank Google for allowing the first amendment on their store.

Sadly if this article gains any traction I know Google will most likely remove all the offending applications. Anyways I want to close out by saying fuck the author or this article for using standard “progressive” liberal tactics to justify his desire to only censor things he doesn’t approve of.

It’s Not an Anti-Jailbreaking Patch

I don’t get the iPhone and anti-iPhone communities. Seriously what the fuck do either of these groups of zealots think? Oh that’s right they don’t. One side is rabidly for the iPhone and can find no ill-will in anything Apple does. The other side of the fence has the rabid dogs that can find no good in the iPhone. Personally I’m between the two (with a gun so I don’t get bitten of course) as I’m logical enough to find both pros and cons to the platform (although my main problem is with Apple’s draconian practices I fully admit it’s a very nice device).

Recently an exploit was found that allowed people to jailbreak their phone via visiting a website. A day or two ago Apple finally released a patch that fixed that vulnerability and now the anti-iPhone zealots are claiming they only patched it to stop jailbreaking. That’s bull shit.

The reason they patched it is because of how the vulnerability allowed jailbreaking. Due to a flaw in the PDF reading software included with the iPhone malicious code was able to elevate to root privileges. One on hand this allowed jailbreak. There is of course the other hand which is the vulnerability allowed the running on any arbitrary code as a root user. That means a root kit could be uploaded and installed onto an iPhone by just getting the user to visit a web page.

I’m all for jailbreaking and believe if you buy a device you can do whatever you want with it. I also think Apple are complete assholes for how restrictive they are with the phone (but it is their device and they can make it however they want, I just won’t buy it in this case). But this hole they’re fixing is a major security issue and needs to be fixed. Ironically if you went to the jailbreak website and jailbroke your phone there was a patch already available to correct the vulnerability but could only be installed via jailbreaking. Now that’s irony you just can’t buy!

The EFF’s Review of Verizon and Google’s Net Neutrality Proposal

The EFF has released their review of Verizon and Google’s recent Net Neutrality regulation framework. They have made many good points and I must say I agree with much of the review. I’m glad to see they are concerned about using government regulation as well:

Efforts to protect net neutrality that involve government regulation have always faced one fundamental obstacle: the substantial danger that the regulators will cause more harm than good for the Internet. The worst case scenario would be that, in allowing the FCC to regulate the Internet, we open the door for big business, Hollywood and the indecency police to exert even more influence on the Net than they do now.

Being their in the communist block country of California this mention of potential regulatory abuse shows me that they aren’t going to run to government blindly. The biggest concern the EFF has is the mention in the proposal of “unlawful traffic.” This is a point that has been eating at me in the proposal as well, they mention a difference between “lawful” and “unlawful” traffic but never define that difference. If you’re going to propose a framework for future legislation by Odin you should define all of your terms precisely.

It’s a good and concise read to click the link and read the material.