I was going to post this but you beat me to it. I already use this method, somewhat, for anything that supports 2-factor auth. Weak and/or easy to remember password accompanied by a code generated from my private key.

Anyone looking to change the paradigm needs to remember there's only 3 ways to secure things: something you know, something you are, and something you have. With that in mind what you've suggested is the most user friendly and secure way to go about it.

The only other suggestion I would have is a paradigm shift to passphrases instead of short passwords. But I can hardly take credit for that idea.

No true revolution can be held up by a single man. We'd all have to be leaders.

That being said, privacy violations will never spawn a revolution. The average person is motivated by short term conveniences, not long term ideals. Keep the population fed, busy, and entertained and you should be able to get away with anything.

While it suits your irrational argument to argue the law in black and white terms, you have to know that the law is far from that.

If a criminal breaks into your house, assaults you, you shoot him, and he happens to die, we don't call that murder and give you a more lenient sentence because you were defending yourself. We call that self defence.

Equally so, technically what Snowden did "broke the law". But that's a pretty obtuse way to look at it considering the greater good he achieved by demonstrating that our own government is, and has been, breaking the law.

What he did was in defence of our nation. He has more courage and character in his nail clippings than you have in your whole body. Now turn off Fox news and develop your own opinion.

future features include "single sign on" via retina scan using your Facebook account. This will help us strategically align corporate offerings right into your eyeball based on our patented technology that tracks each and every movement, interest, and desire of you and your friends.

Seriously, the Facebook acquisition already ruined any potential this product might have had.

Even though a lot of those things you listed aren't free (Chrome data mining, IE requires a windows license), I will submit that it's not entirely accurate that nothing is free. Charity is certainly free.

Regardless, I was making a generalization. And every person should live day-to-day based on the assumption that nothing is free. Then we can go back to having an informed, intelligent, and responsible society that doesn't require babysitting via regulation in every aspect of their lives. I don't really appreciate the prevailing mentality that whenever there's even a minor issue in society, we regulate it away. Regulation creates bureaucracy, and trust me, in the long run you don't want more government bureaucracy.

Nothing is free. If Google has to explain that to you, you might have a hard time with the rest of your life.

The sky is blue.

whoooosh

Now I can flame them for abandoning their perfectly secure old sync method in favor of a "simpler" but much less secure username and password scheme.

To their credit, the move was widely praised on "tech sites"(1) as a welcome change.

(1): "tech sites" - Websites created or managed by hipsters with iPads that know what a partition is and wear NERD t-shirts. They also reformat their mom's computer from time to time. See: slashdot, arstechnica

Currently doing my part to slashdot the site. As of 10AM PST it is down.

My god this shit needs to stop. Affirmative action is just as ridiculous and hypocritical today as it was the day it was suggested. There is nothing to see here - Yahoo has a female CEO for crying out loud.

Your sarcasm is concerning. You should be far less eager to support that level of restrictive control.

I don't mean to offend, so let me first apologize if I do. But, I really don't like this defeatist attitude. We, the people, are supposed to have the power. Not the corporations, and certainly not the government. Through a combination of giving up, being apathetic, and being ignorant we are, day by day, forming our society to be well suited to a despot.

One of the main benefits of a capitalist society is that the real authority is money. Even though the government has carte blanche to print money whenever they want, the populace as a whole will still always have the power just by our sheer numbers. We have the purchasing power and we all need to start voting with our dollars.

I certainly don't have all the answers but here are some great places to start:

1) Stop supporting the cloud. The cloud does not benefit you. Say no to shit like Office 365, Google drive, and Chrome OS. Don't willingly make your life dependent on online services that care nothing for your privacy.

2) Don't support Apple, Google, or the new Microsoft. These companies all have a culture that values controlling the consumer and locking them into walled gardens. Say no to it, despite the minor conveniences they may provide. Buy an international phone and run Cyanogen mod. Use duck duck go. Granted it will be more difficult, but there are way around using these industry titans. If you have to choose one, stay away from Apple. They are, by far, the worst.

3) Bring your support back to local companies. If you're a sysadmin, programmer, or even just a regular consumer, outsource your infrastructure locally. Get a local VPS and put everything there. Stay away from the big guys.

4) Don't buy Cisco, Linksys, or anything American. The American companies, whether their fault or not, have proven to be the worst offenders as far as selling out to their government. Punish the American economy by spending your dollars elsewhere.

5) Get rid of Facebook, Twitter, WhatsApp, Google+, and any other software that insists on centralized control and exploitation of it's user base. If you can't get rid of social media, for the love of god don't use your social media accounts as your single sign on provider. If a website or service demands an account, get a throw-away email address and never give them your true identity. If they only support SSO from social media, refuse to use that website.

We can do it. There's no more new land to run to, colonize, and wipe the slate clean. Running and giving up is no longer an option. We have to stand and fight.

Leave the touch screen computer people to their delusions. Did you know they are completely replacing workstations and laptops any day now?

My thoughts exactly. Piracy is extremely easy on the DS. It's so easy you basically just need to know how to purchase a special cartridge and copy files to a micro sd card.

The DS' success can be attributed to their unique IP, the low price, or the high build quality, but personally I think all these features break down to one thing: kids. DS was/is the platform for kids aged 4-14. You'd be hard pressed to find a kid in this age bracket that doesn't own one. The device is cheap, the games are cheap, you can beat the shit out of the thing and it wont break. It has novelty features like a 3D screen, a wide variety of exclusive titles that directly appeal to kids, and easy to configure parental controls. It's the dream platform for kids... and for parents to buy for their kids. You know... so their not bothering you asking you questions or breaking your things.