12-22-11 / On the Subject of Web-Social Privacy

This is a slice of a Google+ comment thread that I "weighed in on".  It originated from an article complaining about services such as Last.FM and other content streaming services that are all-too-happy to post what your watching/listening to on Facebook and social utilities as such.  I was a little long-winded in my response, but that's because for too long the conversation on the subject has been 99% one-sided.  I seem to hear the same thing over and over again
 "I like Z.  But it freaks me out to know that everybody else can easily see that I listen to Z, despite that fact that I have a Z bumper sticker on my car.  And also, sometimes this service will stream Y even though I don't even like like Y!  It takes me forever to delete every post related to me listening to Y.  If someone were to find out I listen to Z on the net, or that Y was ever, EVER streamed to my computer... well, it'd be the end of the world!!!"

Here is the article that was posted on G+: The trouble with scrobbles (scobbles?)


I believe that I make a valid point here and even if you don't agree with me, it's a point of view that should be at least acknowledged.  So here is one of my responses (yes, this was one big, long winded response from me defending my position) to the conversation:  


I guess what I'm trying to say is my stance on online privacy is that of Eric Schmidt- "If you don't want people knowing what you're doing online, than don't do it"  It wasn't so long ago that we didn't have services like Last.FM and the world still turned.  It's a luxury that isn't necessary, so if you don't like how it works, don't use it. 
Sometimes I get yelled at for taking a picture of someone drinking at the bar or something like that, whether it be because of family or that could prohibit them from getting an unforeseen job in the future.  To me, these people simply want to keep secrets weather it be of doing something very normal such as drinking at a bar or something very unusual like listening to classical music.


While everybody is screaming Big Brother, I prefer to take an optimistic view.  What if more and more people began to say "Yes, that was me listening to Wagner, mom.  I don't even like Wagner but it just came on.  Please stop calling me about stuff like this, I'll see you on Thanksgiving".  Or maybe people start asking themselves 'Gee, this company might have a problem with me drinking at a bar on New Years... wait, what sort of company is this?  What I do after work has nothing to do with my skills at being a computer programmer (or whatever)"  It'd be great if instead us all trying to burrow down deeper in order to hide ourselves, what if -WHAT IF- we used this to make the profiles stalkers more accepting with who people actually are?
"Smith!  What's the deal with this candidate?  Look, I found a picture of him 6 years ago at Mardi Gras and LOOK- there is a topless woman near him!"
"Well boss, he has more than 10 years experience in the field and the only other person that is as qualified is a guy who only has 3 pictures of himself playing with puppies on Facebook... kinda weird, right?... and also that's you in the background giving beads to that young lady"
"Oh yeah!  Ha, I forgot that Mardi Gras is awesome and that I go every year myself"

Sun-Ra on Wheels

You can make certain assumptions about people based what sort of car they have.  General assumptions, like if they have a BMW without any rust or dents then they probably are not broke.  It's not so much a car thing, it's more of a vehicular thing.  How a person gets around in indicative of what type of things they are getting around to.  A guy riding a tractor, for example, is probably a farmer, or at lest works on a farm... or at lest is a tweeker, steeling chemicals to make meth from a farm and is slowly getting away.  

Many different people ride bikes, in cosmopolitan areas, anyhow.  If you see someone on a bike in a rural area, odds are they have some sort of personal fitness goal they wish to meet or maintain.  The the city, you could use it simply because it is easier to find parking at the shops around town, the exercise, maybe even strictly out of necessity.  

Amongst all the cyclists in the city, you can tell who the crazies are.  Not just the ones who can't afford a car or caught a DUI,  not just the one's living out of shelters, but the crazy hobos.  That's not to say that if you are a hobo that you are crazy, or even that'd you'd have to be crazy to ride your bike in unfavorable weather conditions.  But there are those who slowly ride by you in a hail storm.  Their bike only movies marginally quicker than walking speed but the rider is peddling feverishly.  Not only is he forever stuck in a low gear but also his knees jut out and are never extended totally strait because the seat is also way too low.  Many time's this guy will shout things at traffic, either real or imagined.  Sometimes he will carry a simply carting a sign that reads "SATURN or BUST".

Out these guys, the fraction of these crazy hobos that are like the top 1% craziest of the crazies, are the ones that I pick up in my truck.  Most the time I'm not heading all the way to Saturn, but I'm willing to help them get that much closer. 

12-12-11

So, I guess Blogger can now be linked up to your G+ profile and Blogger posts will automatically be posted to G+... a feature I have wanted sense G+ first came out.  COOL!  This is just a test to see if it works OK

Plan B (not from outer space)

Feminism is a tricky word to get around.  If there is something that is exclusive to the female anatomy and/or condition and you are not 100% for the woman to have 100% control over said thing than you are anti-feminist, even if gender roles play no part in your opinion making.

Case-in-point: Plan B.  As a staunch Catholic, the only "Plans" I agree with are those that come from outer space and are of 9 or higher (because it involves the resurrection of the end... and His kingdom will have no end).  Plan B is counter to all this because 1) it is not numerical and B)it dose not bring life from the dead but actually quite the opposite.

I understand things like abortions exist, I understand the string of logic that feminists fallow to conclude that things like abortion are somehow a good thing.  To me, it dose't matter if abortion is legal or illegal, it's just something that you shouldn't do, kinda like the death penalty.

What bothered me the most over the news of the Plan B trying to get over-the-counter status isn't so much the life-preventing moral dilemma- the Plan B pill is simply abhorish- but it's the fact that this is simply a way for big pharmacy to make more money.

Whatever reasoning there is behind creating the Plan B pill, this reason is not extended by having it over-the-counter.  Pills that go over-the-counter sell more.  The reason behind the makers of this pill wanting it to be over-the-counter is the same reasoning why, to an extent, stores put candy bars at the check out isle- sales.

Giving 15 year-old girls an option to terminate a fetus with a pill that is readily available to girls 17 and older dose not empower that 15 year old girl any more, on a practical level.  At 15 I was able to obtain alcohol, and I didn't even "need it", I'm sure is more than possible for a girl to get the Plan B pill- heaven forbid she should have to ask her mom or sister or friend for help obtaining it.  If you're under 15 than and need a Plan B pill than you either made a series of bad decisions or having to drive to the CVS on the other side of town so you older friend can buy you one is the LEST of your problems.

Hearing talking points by feminists of why it should be over-the-counter ("what if the pharmacy is closed?" Oh, well you have 3 days to use it, I'm so terribly sorry that if you loose legs should cause you a second inconvenient trip to the store the next day) lead me to believe the feminism, much like any other subculture, can be co-opted by big business and molded for their own purposes- money, not women's rights.

Feminists that support Plan B being over-the-counter, not only do you have the right to abortions but you also, almost completely, have access to the Plan B pill.  If you should always choose to take an absolutist view on these things... than you are no better than the evangelicals that you loath.  And just as the republican party exploits them, big pharmacy exploits you on this issue.

11-23-11

It seems like the past tense of glow should be glew.... just sayin is all...

Flowers in North Korea

Walking into downtown from my house there are a few empty lots.  One lot used to be a car lot- altho I don't ever remember it being in business.  I don't know what used to be in the lot next to it but they are both bare to the ground- no pavement or anything, just a wide, long flat of dirt and gravel.


Today it's cloudy.  There is one omnipresent cloud that hangs over the city.  It is like a huge warship that's slowly floating by and there's nothing you can do to stop it or hurry it up.  It spans over the downtown skyline, my side of town, the south side of town, everywhere.  Walking under it I feel confident that it won't rain, just as I am confident that it will not shine sun.  I wish it was sunny today, but at least it's raining.  The cloud might block the sun, but at least it's keeping the storm clouds from the other side of Lake Michigan out.


Today is Sunday.  Things are slow and I rarely see a car pass by on one of the many streets that surround the vacant lots.  It's quiet too, if I stop I can only hear the sound of machinery being used very far away.  When I walk I can only hear my feet move the lot's gravel under me.


Things are slow today, most of the store fronts downtown will be closed.  The skyline is high and impressive looking from a distance, standing in a wide-open lot.  It's also very drag looking, surrounded by the grey cloud.


Most of sidewalk around the lots is broken with large cracks.  The sidewalk is only marginally more stable then the gravel.  I stop and listen again.  It's some kinda of machinery,  I don't know what, but it's a motor of some sort.


I feel like I'm in North Korea.  I'm heading downtown, already full aware that most the shops will be closed and that, aside for some hobos collecting cans, it will be a ghost town.  I am Winston Smith, a secret dissident.  The dark, powerful looking showcase skyline is just a hallow concrete shell, and yet I knowingly walk towards it anyway just so I can secretly write my thoughts down on paper somewhere.  An M80 fire ant crawling under the vast machine-cloud apparatus.


In North Korea, at lest they have flowers.  They know full well how grey and dull it is, so they use flowers alot to make up for the fact.


There's a guy about a block away that is riding an old rickity bicycle, hauling a bag of cans.  Dose he know that I am a thought criminal?  He would turn me in at the drop of a hat to collect his reward of an extra soup ration.

There might not be many flowers, but at lest the weather will change soon.

10-29-11

Here's to the cute arab-ish looking girl who served me coffee this morning. Everyday's a gift.