Consider that we don't over-use antibiotics because doing so results in strains of bacteria resistant to antibiotics. Vaccine-resistant covid could not have developed and become widespread without mass vaccinating people.
The vaccines were never 100% effective. Even 95% effective would not have been enough. Maybe if you instantly vaccinated every single person in the world at once, but probably not even then, not during a full pandemic.

We should never have done this mass vaccination program. Yes, it genuinely was a mistake. The lockdowns too.

The correct response to covid was:
1. Shut down travel to/from countries with full-blown outbreaks
2. Vaccinate and isolate the most at-risk population, the 95% of deaths; the elderly and infirm.
3. Get on with life

The news is trying to agitate and blame all the problems on those who didn't get vaccinated, but we all knew there were always going to be people who refuse vaccination. Basing your entire disease fighting program on the basis of getting (or forcing) everyone to be vaccinated was, and is, stupid.
Population wide vaccination was always a pipe dream and blaming everyone else for what was predictably going to happen is not going to engender any real appraise or respect.

Everything about how this pandemic was dealt with has been ass-backwards, top to bottom.

The electoral college exists to incentivize individual states to join and stay in the Union. Why would Nebraska be in a political union with California, if California dictates every law and regulation in Nebraska?

I can't say that it WILL happen, but there's a better chance of you suddenly finding your "United" states no longer very united the moment you decide to disenfranchise half the states by getting rid of the electoral college than otherwise. I guess if you see the "United States" less as 50 states working together and more as 1 Nation ruling over everyone from DC, it makes sense to abolish the EC, but it does fly entirely in the face of what the the foundation of your country was and you may need to fight another civil war to subjugate the states that decide they no longer agree with this union that they get less and less out of.

That's kind of the thing with how totalitarian dictatorships tend to go. You may mean well but I honestly think you are straight up brainwashed by talking heads on television and have lost sight of your own nations' history.

This isn't bad taste, because its not an accident that AP archive posted it with a vague title and Google put it on loudspeaker just prior to the launch of Crew-2.

At some point people have to realize some things are done with malicious intent and not simply incompetence.

This is going to be used to condition readers how to feel about a tweet like a new form of a laugh track for modern audiences.

The only reason Apple is "protecting" their customer's privacy is to monopolize the data for themselves. Why let other companies get your customers' information for free?

It's weird, but that's really the only reason Apple wants to protect your privacy - they own you. They own your data. If someone else wants your data they'd better step off, because that belongs to Apple and Apple isn't in the business of giving away their assets and resources for free.

Ironic that better privacy is going to come about due to corporations treating their customers like cattle they own.

They're only upset because they've realized they can't siphon that 40 million into their own little "charities" and "education funds" to skim 80% off the top for themselves.

Maybe, just maybe, Tesla's money is going to be spent on actual education; something the company - and other companies - will benefit from in the long run. The political grifters, well, they only have themselves to blame for eying up Tesla's donations like a personal meal ticket without making sure they were lubing up their own pockets with the cash before they voted on it.

What's a shame is that the political corruption involved in these sort of transactions is so banal and routine nobody even bats an eye at them anymore.

But what is it actually?

Social media are just outlets for the general public to express themselves.

This is just an elitist calling the general public idiots: "How dare you question my paid-for 'news'. My paid-for advertising. You idiots are supposed to listen and believe ME, about everything. I'm your master! You morons need to do and think what *I* say!"

That's all I hear when I read this schlock. He's upset the commoner "pleb" has a voice now. He's not the only one who's thinking this way. Seems there's a lot of people now who want nothing more than to muzzle everyone around them with a mask and shut them up permanently again, like it was before the internet.

"As the Americans learned so painfully in Earth's final century, free flow of information is the only safeguard against tyranny. The once-chained people whose leaders at last lose their grip on information flow will soon burst with freedom and vitality, but the free nation gradually constricting its grip on public discourse has begun its rapid slide into despotism. Beware of he who would deny you access to information, for in his heart he dreams himself your master."

It doesn't matter what authors think. The modern reality we live in is one where literally anyone can freely copy your work an infinite number of times once they have it. The answer to this isn't to form a gestapo that goes around doing no-knock raids and executing people for sharing copyrighted works.

It's for artists and creators - and most importantly the publishers - to wake the fuck up and realize that today doesn't operate under the same rules and conditions it did 50 years ago and THEY need to adapt to the changing reality around them. Copyright today is like having a law legislating what speed gravity is. Yeah, you can arrest people for falling too slow or fast all you want but it's fucking stupid and completely unenforceable. Just the same as we've seen with "copyright infringement".

At least some companies are beginning to realize that there isn't any use fighting it. Steam is a good example, they value-added with their platform to such a degree that people don't mind buying games on it instead of pirating. Kickstarter, patreon, and similar are also examples, where creators get funding either before working on a project, or for as long as they work on a project. Even bigger companies like EA, Ubisoft, etc. have realized that the money is really in microtransactions and DLC and the base game itself can be free without much impact on profit. Music, radio, and television likewise have all shifted over to streaming services.

All of the above are adaptations to a changing market where the reality is that people can and will copy your shit freely.

Unfortunately, we won't see actual legal changes until we're so far past the need for legal changes that it doesn't even matter if they change or not.

I don't understand your vitriol directed at Facebook.

This is basically a blacklist function for a chatroom. If you have a list that prevents people from swearing, well you have everything necessary to implement a ban on the word "unionize". The article paints a picture that Facebook designed this specifically about stopping unionization, rather than as an upsell. If this article had been about a media darling like Google rather than Facebook, it'd be something like "How Google's Chat Product Helps Stop White Supremacists" with examples in the article of the words "1488" and "heil hitler" being blacklisted, and instructing you why that's a good thing, just in case you didn't already know.

This "news" article is nothing but a hit piece against Facebook. Something we've been seeing incessently ever since it was revealed that Facebook didn't work to block and restrict Trump supporters leading up to the 2016 election the way every other social media company did.

It's not just companies filing fraudulent DMCA claims. Literally anyone can file takedown requests for ANY content, and hosting providers always take it down first, and figure out if it was a legal request or not later. I have seen a mod for a game get taken off every single file sharing platform on the planet because someone didn't like the content of the mod and took it upon themselves to file fraudulent DMCA requests with every file host. What do you do, countersue an internet troll who used someone else's contact information? Provide your own contact information and doxx yourself to them?

Everything about the DMCA is fucking broken because of these 'takedown first, ask questions later' implementations. It's abused not just by companies, but by individuals looking to harass others and censor content they don't like.

Why? That would be helping them sell more copies of the game and giving them free publicity and advertising.

Much better than providing a torrent would be ignoring the game entirely.

The only thing uncommon about this chain of events is the fact that it got out to the media. Likely a bought and paid hit piece - I've noticed more than a few targeting uber for whatever reason over the last couple years.

In any case, do not think for one second that businesses aren't doing this constantly. Paying off hackers a relative pittance is nothing compared to getting your data back and not having to tell your customers a data breach happened and avoiding fines, litigation, embarassment, and potential customer loss.

Out of sight, out of mind. The real trick was pulling the wool over the public's eyes so they think this is somehow unusual and not the very commonplace event it actually is. Put your data in the cloud? Lmao more like give your data away to hackers for free.

I miss when Slashdot was a tech site for nerds and posted news stories about tech.

So long guys; this isn't the place for me anymore.

Hey, I just want to comment on this, since it sort of seems to get ignored - the people being "doxxed" were the guy who punched Richard Spencer in the face, and the people involved with beating a Trump supporter unconscious (and/or killing him - apparently nobody knows if he survived) at the Berkeley riot.

I'm of course 100% certain that if an evil libertarian right win Nazi had viciously attacked someone, that Reddit would also be banning the left-leaning subreddits "doxxing" the men who had committed those crimes. There is no way Reddit, or Facebook, or Twitter would preferentially treat one side of the political party while using their control over their services as clout against a political party they oppose. Frankly, that'd almost be fascist, which isn't characteristic of the left-wing at all.

Am I the only one who feels like the stories regarding the election that filter onto slashdot have been pretty seriously biased and generally uncalled for?

Preferably I wouldn't see any campaign news here unless it's extremely specifically about tech, but it seems like anything with a hint of tech and related to the election is getting pasted to the front page regardless of the relevancy.

From the technology-but-really-election stories, to the pretty-much-clickbait stories; I'm getting sick of this site. I've been getting more and better tech related news from the fucking technology board on 4chan for christ's sake.

I can't trust these news sites anymore - I've even been hearing of shadowbans on slashdot in discussions outside this site - if I ever see proof of that, I'm done with this place. What the fuck is happening to our online media?