As illustrated by this comedy sketch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Government organizations like the NSA are playing a long game. If one generation is desensitized, the next will be uncaring as long as basic needs and a sense of freedom are preserved.

They are winning, and even if we form long-lived organizations to fight them on their terms they will undermine until those organizations are publicly ridiculed and useless. Individuals who speak up will be tarred as "activists", "protestors", and later "traitors". They have the upper hand and there's no way to get it back without an actual war, which no one wants.

They are winning.

This began a long time ago. In two generations they will have won.

My personal favourite: Terrorist: Volkswagen Commercial

I think in my 20s I just didn't know how to recognize burnout. Combined with the usual invincibility complex and with an image as a caffeine-fueled wunderkind to uphold, I ended up burnout incarnate.

Now, when I feel unproductive for a several days running, I know I need to take a week or two and just do something else. I'm a better coder for it, and a better person too.

Years ago I actually burnt out. I felt like I couldn't learn anymore. I kept sitting down in front of my editor and going through the motions, wondering where the inspiration was, never able to click into the zone, chasing focus, being unproductive.

I took three years away from code. I got married and started a family. I worked at a relative's construction company. At first I had to force myself not to think about tech. Then I found myself actually forgetting about it because I was doing other interesting stuff. Eventually I realized I needed some software to do something, so I sat down to build it and the old joy was back. Everything felt fresh again.

Recommend you take a break and do something completely different - for years if necessary. You only live once. You might come back to software, you might not. Do what's right for you. The programming world will still be here rediscovering old design patterns and handwaving about the latest development process fads if you choose to get back into it.

Woo hoo! So they lie and they're easy?

No. If more people disregarded rules, regulations and laws that do damage to free society as Snowden did, we would all be better off.

I'd say Snowden has reached one of the post-conventional levels on the Kohlberg scale.

If Snowden really were a "typical sysadmin", we'd all be better off.

Voting while holding your nose? Please. It's all about picking the right political brand so that you feel validated in your peer group. Americans want to be on the winning team and beat the "other guys".

If your choices are "crook" and "racist", your system needs breaking.

Stop disabling SELinux

From February 16 2008: Howard Chu of OpenLDAP: GnuTLS Considered Harmful

Incredible that GnuTLS is used anywhere at all. It's just mind boggling.

That and Lastpass encrypts/decrypts the password store on the client side. Only the encrypted database is ever sent over the wire. It's not perfect, but Lastpass has been great for me. Worth the $12/year. I don't know any of my passwords now except one, and my yubikey protects the Lastpass master password.

Private organizations can of course do whatever they like with their money.

With that said, this kind of sexist BS needs to stop. If it's wrong to act in a sexist manner towards females, its also wrong towards males.