All these comments and requests for "blasphemy" etc, somehow remind me of "Fahrenheit 451" - I'm afraid, because of all these demands, we're really on the wrong track and move towards the world described in Fahrenheit 451...
I doubt that there are anyone in our current government here in Germany with any sense at all: talking about shooting down planes, collecting internet usage data, introducing "stop-signs" in order to "prevent" child pornography, banning violent games, heck they even briefly discussed banning "Gotcha".
No, seriously, I lost the believe that there is any one person in politics in Germany with any sense at all. They are all "... a bunch of jerks to be put... " - to paraphrase Douglas Adams (rip).
Back in 1988/89, while I was working for a small HW/SW company in Berlin, I inherited code from four different "groups" of people:
1. From one external developer who was supposed to write some embedded stuff in C:
He delivered the code and went on holidays to the caribbean (I am not exaggerating). Imagine, this was the time without email and mobile phones. Actually, I didn't inherit it directly but a colleague. And someone else had given the contract to that external person without asking us.
Anyway, we had to install it on a mission-critical power amplifying thingy (I don't know what it was, I'm a software guy). It just didn't work... Then my colleague, who didn't know C, asked me if I could have a look at the code because he didn't really understand it (he was an assembler coder only). The code looked like this:
#define BEGIN {
#define END }
#define THEN {
#define IF if
#define WHILE while
#define FOR for
#define FUNCTION
#define PROCEDURE void
#define REAL float
FUNCTION DOSOMETHING (REAL in, INT out)
BEGIN
FOR (...) BEGIN
END
IF (...) THEN
ELSE
END
END
--- I started crying
2. It was from a physicist who worked there as programmer for a while and left. He developed in Turbo Pascal.
The code was really nicely structured, he had written a really nice guide how to structure and write code. It was readably without any comment - perfect.
The one thing... it was the most inefficient code I had ever seen and it used some tricks of Turbo Pascal 3, which drove me really crazy when I tried to bring it forward to TP4/TP5 (was it OVLs? I dunno anymore)
3. Two external guys developed another piece of software as a new module for (2) above. They insisted that they should use Turbo-C. I don't know who said "yes", but after a while I received their code to integrate it as a separate module (actually separate exe) to our package.
Integration was no problem, it worked, everything was fine. Except when a client asked for some changes. I had to dive into the code and try doing some changes... Well,
--- I started crying again.
4. The last example was actually an operating system we developed for a small self-developed computer based on C-64 (it was for QS-systems for car manufacturers; this piece of hardware had built-in analogue and digital measurement-device inputs and so on). The code was beautiful, it was fast, efficient and
I really loved that "OS"... the drawback?? He was such a genius that he became an alcoholic and had to leave the company and we couldn't continue developing the stuff anymore...
Throughout my 27 years of computing, the worst thing that happened to me was inheriting software from various different sources at the same time. But other than that, all the other stuff I can only say: "Been there, done that" (yes, even punch-cards, PDP/11s, Vixens... ahm, VAXens, etc. -- no, no magnetic cylinders)
You're right.
I am also living in Germany, but the problem is that it's really difficult to do anything against these things.
I tried to be politically active, and even joined a party. But since I have a fulltime job, I don't have as much as time for political activism as I would like to and as others have. There are so many going-to-become-professional-politicians in those parties with really enough time (some of them have fulltime jobs, but in civil service or such, where they have enough time for politics), that you don't really get the slightest chance to get to the upper levels of the party.
You have to invest so much time that it's really nearly impossible to have a fulltime job and become a politician, who has the people's interest in his mind first and foremost.
In order to get to the top, you have to become a "Political Man", a Homo Politicus. You have to brown-nose, become a real a**hole to get there... And I decided that the price is not worth paying for changing a system which most people seem to accept as "well, good enough" and about which most people don't even give a shit...
And provided you reach the top, you have either become one of "them" or you can't really change anything because there are so many particular-interests, you have to keep brown-nosing so much, do horse-trading, tit-for-tat, that you really lose contact with the people...
Sorry for the rant, but saying "change the system" is easy, doing so is not. And as you said: Since most of the people don't care as long as they get something to eat and some entertainment (Panem et Circenses), they are happy and they don't want to change the system.
My suggestion? Try changing your "small world environment", i.e. help your friends, neighbours and relatives in circumventing such censorships, help them express their anger and inacceptance of the system and help them start to think...
Vor diesem Hintergrund machte jüngst die Kinderschutzorganisation Carechild ein aufschlussreiches Experiment. Sie verwendete dazu 20 Adressen aus der im Netz aufgetauchten dÃnischen Sperrliste. 17 der Seiten waren in den USA gehostet, jeweils eine in den Niederlanden, Südkorea und England. Carechild schrieb an die Abuse-Mail-Adressen der Hostingprovider und bat um Entfernung der Inhalte. Das Ergebnis: acht US-amerikanische Provider haben die Domains innerhalb der ersten drei Stunden nach Versand der Mitteilung abgeschaltet. Innerhalb eines Tages waren 16 Adressen nicht mehr erreichbar, bei drei Websites teilte der jeweilige Provider laut Carechild glaubhaft mit, dass die Inhalte nach augenscheinlicher Prüfung keine Gesetze verletzen oder der Betreiber für die abgebildeten Personen entsprechende Altersnachweise vorlegen konnte.
Short sumary: The child proteciton organization Carechild did an interesting experiment: They used 20 of the entries from the Danish blocklist. 17 of those URLs were in the US, one each in Netherlands, South Korea, and UK. They contacted the hosters via the abuse-mail adresses and asked them to close down those child porn sites. Eight of the US hosters closed the sites within three hours of contact, 16 of the sites were closed within one day. Three sites were reported (truthfully) by hosters (after checking) to not contain child porn and not against any laws.
My question now is: If Childcare can do it, why not the mighty BKA (FBI of Germany)? I thought closing down might be more effective than trying to block them, which won't work anyway...
*sigh* - politicians really drive me crazy...
Stellar rays prove fibbing never pays. Embezzlement is another matter.
