Snowpockolyps II - Electric Broom Boogaloo!
20:46 PM 01/20/2012
So home safe and sound right now. Had the quarterly meeting of the place I'm working at today at a restaurant and it took me about 30 minutes to go a distance that usually takes me about 5 - 10 maximum.
And...I locked my keys in my car...while it was running...at the restaurant...in front of my co-workers...and my wife had to come and unlock it for me.
Fortunately she works on the same road I do and she was able to stop by on her way out from the office. I owe her one for that...but not too big a one.
Don't let up...SOPA/PIPA will be back...
Watched a good chunk of the internet get blacked out in protest the other day and that was a really really good thing. Big companies and small artists alike put forth the effort to black out their websites and put up notices informing people about how bad this legislation is. I am ashamed to admit that I was remiss in this one as I did nothing. (I have no excuse. "I was working." doesn't cut it because a lot of artists that make a living with their websites did it and if it cost them something of their daily income then I could have spared some of my time.)
Unfortunately while this is a nice temporary setback for the individuals funding SOPA/PIPA there is no way this is the end. They'll do like they have done in the past and slip it into a bill for funding faith based schools run by orphan nuns or something and it'll pass at 2 am with very little dissenting vote from those not paid millions of dollars by vested interests. (Side note: If so much of this lobbying money is being thrown around why isn't the nation debt being paid down??)
And then we'll be stuck with another bad law.
Because here's the thing - the US legal system is currently constructed so that it's very easy to make laws but very hard to get them removed. The best reason I can fathom for this is that the legal system has obviously grown over time to fit the needs of those using it as a career platform. So the more laws they can make that benefit themselves and the harder they are to remove then the safer their lives as lawmakers are. (That leads, best as I can tell, to a society of elite lawmakers/kings with a silent class of servants that do not step out of line for fear of breaking an unknown law.)
So...obviously...the time to fight these things is when they first get created. We need a public service that...
1) Watches the government as they create proposals.
2) Translate those proposals into common language.
3) Does automatic alerts of these laws to a network APP for phones or tablets or TVs or indeed anything networked. Perhaps by category.
The problem with this system is that it's spammable. You could in theory create a billion tiny proposals that mean nothing and flood the system hiding the real proposals for laws that you want to create.
Then you'd have to make the public service bigger. Which would introduce more errors into the translation of those proposals to common language. Or put the entire service at risk of infiltration or even being bought off.
As usual there are no easy answers.
But...BUT...if you _could_ make that system fairly secure...AND...people didn't get lazier about their governemnt than they already are...it woud be a good way to keep some of the legal stuff in check.
Maybe.
But honestly I think the best thing that people can do is just pay attention. Don't let them pull things over on you. You're smarter than that.
"People are dumb, panicky, and you know it!" is only a phrase from a movie. I have faith in people. They can do a lot.
You. You can do a lot.
Cross-posted from Dreamwidth ( http://nimitzbrood.dreamwidth.org/253294.html ) but feel free to comment here as well.
So home safe and sound right now. Had the quarterly meeting of the place I'm working at today at a restaurant and it took me about 30 minutes to go a distance that usually takes me about 5 - 10 maximum.
And...I locked my keys in my car...while it was running...at the restaurant...in front of my co-workers...and my wife had to come and unlock it for me.
Fortunately she works on the same road I do and she was able to stop by on her way out from the office. I owe her one for that...but not too big a one.
Don't let up...SOPA/PIPA will be back...
Watched a good chunk of the internet get blacked out in protest the other day and that was a really really good thing. Big companies and small artists alike put forth the effort to black out their websites and put up notices informing people about how bad this legislation is. I am ashamed to admit that I was remiss in this one as I did nothing. (I have no excuse. "I was working." doesn't cut it because a lot of artists that make a living with their websites did it and if it cost them something of their daily income then I could have spared some of my time.)
Unfortunately while this is a nice temporary setback for the individuals funding SOPA/PIPA there is no way this is the end. They'll do like they have done in the past and slip it into a bill for funding faith based schools run by orphan nuns or something and it'll pass at 2 am with very little dissenting vote from those not paid millions of dollars by vested interests. (Side note: If so much of this lobbying money is being thrown around why isn't the nation debt being paid down??)
And then we'll be stuck with another bad law.
Because here's the thing - the US legal system is currently constructed so that it's very easy to make laws but very hard to get them removed. The best reason I can fathom for this is that the legal system has obviously grown over time to fit the needs of those using it as a career platform. So the more laws they can make that benefit themselves and the harder they are to remove then the safer their lives as lawmakers are. (That leads, best as I can tell, to a society of elite lawmakers/kings with a silent class of servants that do not step out of line for fear of breaking an unknown law.)
So...obviously...the time to fight these things is when they first get created. We need a public service that...
1) Watches the government as they create proposals.
2) Translate those proposals into common language.
3) Does automatic alerts of these laws to a network APP for phones or tablets or TVs or indeed anything networked. Perhaps by category.
The problem with this system is that it's spammable. You could in theory create a billion tiny proposals that mean nothing and flood the system hiding the real proposals for laws that you want to create.
Then you'd have to make the public service bigger. Which would introduce more errors into the translation of those proposals to common language. Or put the entire service at risk of infiltration or even being bought off.
As usual there are no easy answers.
But...BUT...if you _could_ make that system fairly secure...AND...people didn't get lazier about their governemnt than they already are...it woud be a good way to keep some of the legal stuff in check.
Maybe.
But honestly I think the best thing that people can do is just pay attention. Don't let them pull things over on you. You're smarter than that.
"People are dumb, panicky, and you know it!" is only a phrase from a movie. I have faith in people. They can do a lot.
You. You can do a lot.
Cross-posted from Dreamwidth ( http://nimitzbrood.dreamwidth.org/253294.html ) but feel free to comment here as well.