Day: November 16, 2011

Stop Censorship

Stop Censorship:

Today, Congress holds hearings on the first American Internet censorship system as part of SOPA and the PROTECT IP Act. There are a lot of different ways to characterize these bills, but the thing that sticks out to me is that these even though these bills were designed to protect big copyright players—people I have no love for even though I make part of my living by making content—they go one step further and enable massive censorship tools, the kind of which would be valuable to any totalitarian government.

(watch on Vimeo)

We’ve already got enough of those tools, such as the Patriot Act, which have been abused to our detriment. We don’t need another one, no matter what the good excuse. Not to mention that protecting big copyright holders is a piss poor excuse. Make no mistake about it, these provisions do nothing to help the creative class. Instead, it puts sites like Vimeo and Flickr at risk. It puts FaceBook and YouTube at risk. It puts any blog at risk.

Learn more. Now. Act now. Quickly. Call your congressfolk. Don’t leave it to somebody else.

[Righteo. Done. Join!]
Source: James Duncan Davidson

Don’t ever learn how candy is made. (A comment to Matt Taibbi)

A comment to Matt Taibbi: If we are going to castigate Steve Jobs and every other consumer electronics company for this behavior, then just like drug addicts, we need to blame ourselves as much. We want our toys cheap, and if some brown or yellow kids have to suffer, well, what can you do? For every point you give Steve for Foxconn, we deserve at least a half point, if not more than a point. We, the american consumer demanded this stuff as cheaply as possible, and now that Apple and other companies are delivering, we suddenly get a case of the vapors about the ugly details? Don’t ever learn how candy is made.

[All design is about compromise. Some of those compromises can be ethical.]
Source: bynkii.com