Saintless

I just got this email from Pete Ashdown:

I will be joining Congressman Chris Cannon to discuss his proposal for
nationwide free wireless Internet tonight at 8:00 PM on KSL Nightside.
KSL is broadcast in Utah on 102.7FM and 1160AM.

http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=3118044

Google has introduced 2-way Calendar Sync!

Hopefully some of the hair I’ve pulled out will grow back now.

Now I can access my calendar at home or on my laptop, on Google Calendar or in Outlook. When I add an event to the Outlook calendar on my laptop, Google Calendar Sync syncs it to my Google Calendar — and since I also have Google Calendar Sync running on my desktop, the event then syncs from Google Calendar to Outlook calendar on my desktop. All of my calendar views are always up to date, and I can choose whichever one I want to use.

My only complaint is…why in the hell couldn’t they do this when the Obama Campaign was in full-swing here in Utah for the primary? Ah, well. I still love Google.

Representative Brad Daw is yet another elected official who doesn’t have a clue about technology. Hey, that’s ok by me. As long as said official is willing to get the advice of people who do have a clue. Daw, however, is not. He wants to shut down open wireless, such as Pete Ashdown’s service through Xmission. Check out what Pete has to say.

I haven’t yet read the text of this bill, but the most obvious thing to me is that if a kid has a laptop and is being left alone to use it, and the parents haven’t put filters or protective software on it, there’s a pretty bad parenting issue going on.

Oh, and what about companies where open wireless is a necessity?

There are a lot of reasons why this is a bad idea. I think this may become my pet project for a while (secondary to the Obama campaign, which has precious little time left [see Update]).

I asked Pete what we, as citizens, should and could do about this. For starters, call AND write to Rep. Daw. Secondly, join the UTPoliTech list and watch for news. If I have time before showdown on this bill, I’ll be trying to organize as many of us as find this important, to actively work against it. Please do join that list, or if you don’t want to (it’s low-volume), let me know directly, and I’ll try to keep you informed of any action taken.

[Update] By “precious little time left” in reference to the Obama campaign, I just mean that the primary race is almost over, and that is my entire scope of view for the presidential race right now. And with Utah (and 22 other states) having their primaries on February 5, there really isn’t much time left! And the heaviest part of my involvement with the campaign will be over, and things will go back to “normal”, whatever that is, so I’ll have more time to pick up a new pet project.

According to CNET, the House passed a bill saying that anyone offering an open wireless connection must report illegal images – including “obscene” cartoons and drawings, with fines of up to $300,000.

Apparently, it was rushed through, and passed 409 to 2. It’s reported to have been modified substantially from the original legislation, and is not available for public review. It’s never had a hearing or a committee vote.

According to the CNET article:

This is what the SAFE Act requires: Anyone providing an “electronic communication service” or “remote computing service” to the public who learns about the transmission or storage of information about certain illegal activities or an illegal image must (a) register their name, mailing address, phone number, and fax number with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s “CyberTipline” and (b) “make a report” to the CyberTipline that (c) must include any information about the person or Internet address behind the suspect activity and (d) the illegal images themselves.

Hello? They’re already required to report child porn. So, why the sneaky, rushed passing of this bill?

I’m as against the exploitation of children as anyone else. Personally, I wish they’d castrate offenders. And then maybe put them in front of a firing squad. Or send them to Gitmo.

But, the people that just rushed this through have no clue what this means to the businesses, and apparently don’t care about the privacy implications. They jumped on it because they want to protect children, but they don’t know what they’re doing. They didn’t examine it to see if it would actually do anything to protect children.

Of course, Pete Ashdown was running for Senate, and we have yet to see how the Senate will handle this. But, if the Senate does the same thing the House did, it’s rather scary. If Pete was in office, he’d have the knowledge to stand up and make sure the bill gets examined before becoming law. Can you imagine Hatch’s reaction? Maybe he’d have to add an amendment that says when the images are found, a device is transmitted via the airwaves and downloaded onto the person’s hard drive, and then assembled via nanobots to then reach out of the computer and slap the offender. Or something equally as stupid.

Normally, I think that age and wisdom can be valuable assets in our lawmakers. But, if they are going to be reactionary in making laws about something they don’t understand I think that they are not wise, but simply old.

Senator Obama spoke at Google earlier this week, just after unveiling his technology plan. This was the Senator’s second trip to Google, and it seemed to make quite the impression on the Googlers in attendance. You can read what the Director of Public Policy and Government Affairs for Google, Andrew McLaughlin’s, had to say in his blog. Here’s video of the “fireside chat”, or you can also watch the entire speech on Mr. McLaughlin’s blog.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B1MGi12RspA&rel=1&border=0]

Interestingly, I also found this list of Technology Leaders who endorse the Senator. I’ve emphasized some of the ones I find the most interesting/important.

Stuart Benjamin, Professor of Law, Duke University
Robert Blackwell, Founder and CEO, Electronic Knowledge Interchange Consulting
Joseph Farrell, Professor of Economics, University of California, Berkeley; Chief Economist, Federal Communications Commission (1996-97); Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Economics (chief economist), Antitrust Division, U.S. Department of Justice (2000-02)
Lloyd Frink, President and Co-Founder, Zillow
Julius Genachowski, Co-Founder and Managing Director, Rock Creek Ventures; former Chief of Business Operations & General Counsel, IAC/InterActiveCorp; former Chief Counsel to FCC Chairman Reed Hundt
Don Gips, Executive Vice President, Corporate Development, Level 3 Communications; former Chief Domestic Policy Advisor to Vice President Gore
Rob Glaser, Founder and CEO, Real Networks
Mark Gorenberg, Managing Director, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners
Nick Hanauer, Partner, Second Avenue Partners; Founder, aQuantive
Adam Hanft, Founder and CEO, Hanft Unlimited
Reed Hundt, Former Chairman, Federal Communications Commission (1993-97)
Mitch Kapor, President, Kapor Enterprises; Founder, Lotus Development Corp.
Jed Katz, Managing Director, DFJ Gotham Ventures
Michael Katz, Professor, NYU and UC Berkeley; former Chief Economist, FCC; former Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Economics (chief economist), Antitrust Division, U.S. Department of Justice
William Kennard, Former Chairman, Federal Communications Commission (1997-2001)
Deborah Lathen, President, Lathen Consulting; former Chief, Cable Bureau, FCC
Steve Lerner, Managing Partner, Blue Hill Group
Lawrence Lessig, Professor of Law, Stanford University
Blair Levin, Managing Director, Stifel Nicholas; former Chief of Staff, FCC
Andrew McLaughlin, Director, Global Public Policy and Government Affairs, Google
Ted Meisel, Elevation Partners
Jon Miller, Former Chairman and CEO, American Online, Inc.
Glenn Neland, Retired Senior Vice President, Dell
Robert Nelsen, Managing Director and Co-Founder, ARCH Venture Partners
Craig Newmark, Founder, Craigslist
Beth Noveck, Professor of Law, New York Law School
Chamath Palihapitiya, Executive Vice President, Product and Operations, Facebook
Deven Parekh, Partner, Insight Venture Partners
Sunil Paul, Founding Partner, Spring Ventures; Co-Founder, Brightmail
John Place, Retired General Counsel, Yahoo!, Inc.
Jeff Pulver, Founder, pulver.com
Arti Rai, Professor of Law, Duke University
John Roos, CEO, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati
Alec Ross, Senior Vice President, One Economy
Kim Scott, AdSense Director of Online Sales and Operations, Google
Carl Shapiro, Professor of Business Strategy, UC Berkeley; Deputy Assistant Attorney General for Economics (chief economist), Antitrust Division, U.S. Department of Justice (1995-96)
Howard Shelanski, Professor of Law, UC Berkeley; former Chief Economist, FCC
Steven Spinner, Executive, Danoo
Phil Weiser, Professor of Law and Telecommunications, University of Colorado
Kevin Werbach, Asst. Professor of Legal Studies and Business Ethics, The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania
Tom Wheeler, Managing Director, Core Capital Partners
Tim Wu, Professor of Law, Columbia University
Ed Zander, CEO, Motorola

Of course, I’m not a “Technology Leader”, but I do work as a software developer, so I am involned in technology – and I endorse him! Do you?

No, that headline is not sci-fi, or misleading.

We’re not used to thinking of them this way. But many advanced military weapons are essentially robotic — picking targets out automatically, slewing into position, and waiting only for a human to pull the trigger. Most of the time. Once in a while, though, these machines start firing mysteriously on their own. The South African National Defence Force “is probing whether a software glitch led to an antiaircraft cannon malfunction that killed nine soldiers and seriously injured 14 others during a shooting exercise on Friday.”

Essentially, they were using live ammo for a training exercise, and the cannon didn’t fire when it should have. Shortly thereafter, it began firing uncontrollably.

I really wonder how far mankind will go before deciding there should be limits to everything?

Update: Here’s a video of a similar incident a few years back:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u7poF0M7H5M&rel=1&border=0]
Warning: Turn your sound down, the first second or so is obnoxiously loud

Noah Shachtman has some interesting commentary about the video over at Wired.