SiriusXM Protects Your Private Parts

You know those lines and lines of words in a size-7 font at the bottom of most websites?  Ever tried to listen to the end of commercials on the TV or radio when the announcer speeds through a bunch of gibberish like “something-something-something is prohibited….must-be-18-years-or-older-to-apply”?  Those, are privacy policies and copyright: no one reads them or listens to them, but everyone cares about them the instant he or she is worried about their personal information.  As an example, I researched and read through the Privacy Policy for SiriusXM Radio, and confirmed that the only times a listener’s information must be accessed by the radio are during contests/promotions/giveaways.  Regular listeners have nothing to worry about: the only time your personal information must be provided is when you call or text into the station.  And most likely, if you’re calling in to comment or try to win something, you’ll want them to send your concert tickets or vacation giveaway to the right address…! 

 > >   http://www.siriusxm.com/pdf/siriusxm_privacypolicy_eng.pdf

I've Got the Powaaaa!!......not?

            Over the last decade, technology and science has made voicing your opinions and thoughts to the world easier than ever before.  Websites like Blogger, social-networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, YouTube…the list goes on.  Phrases like “Breaking News!” and “Did you see that?” simply sound ridiculous when as soon as you’ve finished saying them, a few hundred thousand people probably broke the news first or saw it seconds before you.  With this never-ending galaxy of data we call the Internet, we can write, tweet, post, and blog whatever we want because of the First Amendment’s “Freedom of Speech” clause, right?  As people from the United Kingdom would learn, apparently there exists a grey area that is constantly watched carefully by the government, who feels that in the event of a threat to National Security, it has the power to remove or block any information on the World Wide Web.

            In 2011, British authorities ordered YouTube to remove 135 videos because of “a perceived threat to national security” (Halliday).  According to a story by The Guardian, YouTube reported a “71% rise in content removal requests from the UK government…and the request that almost 200 YouTube videos be taken down following complaints about privacy, security, or hate speech.”  This questionable move by the UK government affected almost 1500 users and accounts, leading users in the United States (myself included) to wonder if the US would ever consider following the lead of Egypt and completely shutting down access to the Internet, a clear threat to our right of free speech.  Robert Niles of the Online Journalism Review writes in his article about the topic that a proposed federal legislation would “allow the government to shut down parts of (or completely) the Internet in a ‘national emergency’.”  Called the “Internet Kill Switch,” controversy arose that this proposition would give the United States Government the authority to cut us off from the Internet like President Mubarak of Egypt.  A similar report stated that the President would only turn off access “where necessary” which could lead to granting him more power to censor the Internet as he chooses.  Maybe this is just me, but I feel as though the ability to create blogs and statuses and tweets implied that we now had an easier way to express our feelings, opinions, and beliefs to a large audience in a quicker amount of time: most of all, that we could utilize our right of free speech.  I like Obama, but he is not going to delete my Facebook because I chose to post “Obama looks like a camel lol” on a friend’s wall.  However, I stand by the proposed bill 100% if it means censoring the Internet ONLY in the event that a site or blog poses a true threat to the security of this country.

            In an interview at the 2011 Personal Democracy Forum Conference in New York City, Jillian York of the Electronic Frontier Foundation asserts that national security cannot become “a guise for censoring the Internet.”  York discusses Amazon’s ban of WikiLeaks, and how that may have opened a new can of worms that would lead to Internet censorship happening to anyone.  She, too, brings up the example of Egypt and how accounts and posts were deactivated and removed due to possible examples of “hate speech.”  The full 4-minute interview can be see here, but the first 90 seconds remain the most crucial to this topic.  As far as granting the government more power to censor the Internet, I stand by my aforementioned opinion that only in the event of censoring for the protection of the country would this idea come to fruition.  Oh, and to all the highly educated veteran officials of the Supreme Court, Congress, etc.: in case you didn’t know, once something is posted on the Internet, you have a zero percent chance at completely removing it forever.  Wanna bet your government salary on those odds?...

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2011/oct/25/google-youtube-national-security?CMP=twt_gu

http://nationalsecurityzone.org/site/test/

http://www.thenation.com/video/161353/jillian-c-york-using-national-security-concerns-hide-internet-censorship

A Trilli, A Trilli, A Trilli......15 Trilli

One of the most mind-blowing pieces of information out there on the Internet is the ever growing United States National Debt.  The fact that it is over 15 trillion dollars is not even the craziest part; statistically speaking, the debt goes up $100,000 every four seconds.  A petroleum engineer is lucky to make that much in a YEAR.  There are constantly updating counter clocks on the Internet that show the real time increase of the National Debt.  The counter refreshes so fast it is impossible to watch the last four digits rise from one to two to three…to zero.  For an up-to-the-millisecond debt counter, see the attached link or visit it here: : http://www.usdebtclock.org/

GPS: Good People Stalking....why?

From gesturing with hands and body movements, to drawing in the sand/dirt or on paper, to pointing on a map, to calling a friend and looking on the Internet…to GPS; the King of all options for directions.  Global Positioning Systems have grown increasingly popular since its invention in the 1990s.  Today, GPS can be bought as a separate device, or one can find it included in the dashboard of their car or as an application on their mobile device.

GPS is just another example of society’s ever-growing reliability on technology; however, like with any type of technology, there are quite a few negatives to combat the numerous positives.  In a New York Times article entitled “Personal Use of GPS Trackers Growing Fast,” the author warns that new compact GPS trackers have recently been used not as cartographic devices, but rather as a way to track spouses or the elderly against their will.  With society beginning to rely more and more on GPS technology for direction, where is the line drawn between acceptable and unacceptable usages of the device?  Can parents track their teen’s vehicle as they choose?  Can family members track their elder relatives for safety purposes?  Will agreeing to these and other positive usages with potentially beneficial outcomes open the wrong can of worms that causes worrisome wives to track their husbands under the suspicion of an affair?  While society should definitely embrace this revolutionary technology, there must be civility when and how these devices are used.  Scott McNealy, then-CEO of Sun Microsystems felt as though the end isn’t near, it has already passed: “You have zero privacy anyway.  Get over it.”  Mr. McNealy is incorrect.  Google’s former CEO Eric Schmidt correctly stated that “If you have something that you don’t want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place.”  This is the direction of attitude society needs to take; private information is no longer private once posted onto the Internet.

Personally, I feel that there are far more benefits than risks with GPS.  For example, as a Civil Engineer I look forward to learning how to use GPS technology on the job (http://www.asce.org/Product.aspx?id=12884907802).  Specific tasks such as surveying, positioning, and a number of other engineering situations are enhanced with the accuracy of GPS.  If and when society completely adapts to GPS technology in the workplace and out in the world, in my eyes the only “electronic stalkers” should be law enforcement and emergency responders.  Any other such usages can and should be viewed as criminal intent, and of course, unCiVil-ized.