Big Brother, version 43.0

[geoviki]

I haven't seen much online discussion about the Bush administration subpoena for internet search records from Yahoo, MSN, and Google, which only Google is fighting (the other two caved rather easily). Justice Dept. lawyers will use this info, ostensibly, to concoct internet anti-porn laws that won't be struck down by the courts (unlike all their last efforts). I just read a terrific article on the deeper issue: why are these companies keeping records tying each IP to each search in the first place?

Keeping Secrets - by Tim Wu, professor at Columbia Law School.

It all goes back to this basic point: How free you are corresponds exactly to how free you think you are. And Americans today feel great freedom to tell their deepest secrets; secrets they won't share with their spouses or priests, to their computers. The Luddites were right—our closest confidants today are robots.

Comments

[idlerat.livejournal.com]

The question of "perceived privacy" on the Internet is an interesting one, which I've thought about quite a bit. Even when people know that others are reading them (e.g. members of an active circle of LJ friends), they will say things online that they'd be inhibited about saying anywhere else.

One possible line of comparison might be the analyst's couch, where you are supposed to be less inhibited because you can't actually *see* the person you're talking to. But "uninhibited" is one thing in analysis, quite another in other types of interaction where more inhibition might be desirable :).

Hi, BTW (*waves*)

I am thinking of running away from Yahoo. Not only are they reporting to the feds, I can't get my yahoo mail at work.

[geoviki.livejournal.com]

And hi back! This is so ...synchronous...because I was just thinking about you this morning while brushing my teeth. Er, no connection. Just hadn't seen a post from you in a while.

I thought the article hit on a lot of great angles. People do use the internet to bare their souls. But an internet search goes even beyond that - it's done with the presumption of privacy in that you know you are not interacting with anyone human. If I have to Google my assignment for merry_smutmas, for example, because I don't know the exact practice being asked for, I don't want Bush to necessarily know that. Oh, no - I've said too much....

[idlerat.livejournal.com]

Perhaps you thought of me while brushing my teeth because I am a roDENT. :)

Did you happen to see the clip of that guy asking Bush if he'd seen Brokeback Mountain? It was really good. Maybe it would be good for him to see your searches.

[geoviki.livejournal.com]

I didn't see the clip itself, but a description said it was an "uncomfortable moment" for the Shrub.