Governments can, and do, do whatever they want. The guardrails of the "Rule of Law" have been removed. The Constitution is being violated on a daily basis and nothing is being done about it. The Rule of Law is something that is given lip service to while finding every way to ignore it.
At that point we might be looking at the implementation of the Great American Firewall, and the United States would no longer be a representative democracy.
The USA is already NOT a representative democracy. I am uncertain why you think it still is. When Citizens United was decided, representative democracy was condemned. We have seen the results.
If they were marketing the film to Netflix, they weren't planning on releasing it into theaters.
This would be a good time to point out that every political argument has two sides and two points of view.
I've seen the arguments for both sides of this issue, and have come to the conclusion that there is merit for both. People should really look at the specific charges being made, with examples, before coming to any conclusion.
Every time someone tries to rein in the news media, it's received by shouts of first amendment, freedom of speech, chilling effects, and so on; and yet, this leads to insane situations. Google most egregious US media failures in the last 10 years for a list of incidents, and note how many of these affected major political events such as a presidential election or national policy.
Should a journalist be able to walk into a church during service and interrupt the proceedings, and not be held accountable because he's a journalist? Should a major news outlet be able to report something without at least a cursory check to see if it's accurate? Should an interview answer be swapped with the answer from a different question?
I've come to the conclusion that knee-jerk framing is on purpose, everyone wants to get "ahead" of an issue, and if an erroneous/misleading/false statement is made they will simply say "oops... I made a mistake" and there's no repurcussions... except that the lie went out to the audience and a small percentage got outraged in the right direction, regardless of whether the statement is true or not.
A "straw-man" argument is where you put your opponent's viewpoint in the most absurd terms and then attack the absurdity. A "strong-man" argument is where you put your opponent's viewpoint in the strongest possible terms and then try to attack it.
Choose the "strong-man" argument here. Find out what the administration is complaining about, and see if you can fault their logic.
Americans are not free. Most are shackled to debt in hope of buying happiness, working jobs they don't want to. They work longer hours, have less holidays and earn less than many countries in the western world. Many Americans are poorly educated, obese and unwell, they suffer a variety of addictions drugs, alcohol, food, social media. They have no public healthcare provision, disregard for the environment and their lifespan is reducing. Half of Americans hate the other half, because they are led by the most selfish, greedy and ruthless who are respected like peasants respect a king, the other half are trying to protect themselves from the other half. Americans have been engaged in some kind of war somewhere since their country's formation and when not fighting overseas they often shoot each other, kids included.
Aside from all of that, USA is still the best. Ra ra ra! USA! USA! USA! (vomit)
You failed to mention the worst part: Rule of Law is a thing of the past.
Anyone who tells you they can see exactly where the road is heading a mile ahead is selling you something.
I can guarantee you that none of the big players will 'discover' strong AI within the next mile. The money is too infatuated with the current capabilities.
I'm glad the perpetrators went to prison
The executives received home confinement, NOT prison.
And I would argue that, in this case, the punishment was far too lenient, because if you think of the crime in this context, it really says that these people DID get away with it. They got a slap on the wrist. The company paid the bulk of the damages. And so, this settlement again signals that, yes, the privileged class is above the law, because even when the law finds them culpable, the penalty is nominal for them. It's a cost of doing business.
Yes, the punishment was far too lenient; however, it is more serious than you give it credit for. They lost some money directly and they have lost all future earning power except through investments. They will NEVER work anywhere again except maybe as a janitor. Of course, they are generally set for life barring major catastrophe, so yeah, the punishment was WAY to light.
How are these people not in prison?
They are. The summary states that seven former employees pled guilty to criminal charges. I know it's tradition not to RTFA, but you are supposed to at least RTFS.
Um, the executives mostly got home confinement, not prison. Prison was reserved for the lower level offenders. The only "real" penalties the executives received were fines; with the CEO paying 2 million while the lowest level executive paid $50k. I suspect I read a different article than you did as I kept with tradition and did not read the linked article.
I wonder how many more campaigns of harassment are ongoing, led by people who know how to conduct vehicle-based surveillance, or encouraged by ineffective or lazy policing.
If you exclude the government and collection agencies, 12,384 currently active. Most are small time (less than $10 million in assets of all parties).
Simply accusing someone of some unspecified crime isn't a right the state has to just bypass Constitutional protections, namely the 4th and 5th Amendments.
Apparently, they do have that right. They did it. Nobody stopped them. Nobody complained about it. They will do it again. They have actually arrested someone for not submitting.
Whether that right is written down or not, it is now established. Rule of Law is whatever whomever is in power wants it to be.
Had a look at the criminal complaint just to find out where the perpetrators had gone wrong.
Sending anonymous tweets and E-mails, they purchased pre-paid debit cards to send packages to their home, various harassment techniques such as ordering a pizza "pay on delivery" at 4:30 AM, and so on and so on... how on Earth did the NPD ever figure this out?
Turns out the perpetrators flew from California to Boston area (Natick) to put a GPS on the Steiners' car, which they couldn't do because it was kept in a locked garage, so they rented vehicles to surveil the Steiners, their license plates were noted and given to Natick Police Department (NPD), and the rental agency was contacted.
Once the eBay operatives were identified, they tried various misdirects and obfustication techniques, but NPD a) verified their statements, and so figured out they were lying, and b) contacted eBay directly, which had a security team respond in good faith, and the whole plan unravelled.
One, single mistake is all that stood between a long campaign of harassment and getting found out. One good local police department who took the trouble to look deeply into the problem and figure out the truth despite a torrent of misdirection and obfustication.
I wonder how many more campaigns of harassment are ongoing, led by people who know how to conduct vehicle-based surveillance, or encouraged by ineffective or lazy policing.
So while you're certainly free to continue being selfish and ignorant, and my guess is that you'll make that choice, you might want to pause for just a moment and consider that your approach inevitably results in the deaths of billions of people -- including yours, your family's, your friend's, etc. -- and that maybe it might be a better idea to consider the merits of embracing science and cooperation. There's no other way, sadly, because all of the things that could have been "other ways" are no longer viable options.
The people who think and act like they own 'us', the regular people, don't care how we act. They are going to do whatever it is they are going to without any regard to input from the rest of us. Go ahead and act selfish. It will not make a difference. Go ahead and try to conserve what we still have. It will not make any difference. The industries need to change, not the people. The people will go wherever they are led.
And as long as these people are around, nobody will mistake the US for a reliable partner
Nonsense. 1/3 of ANY population can be manipulated with propaganda to get whatever result is desired. The USA is not unique in this regard. This has nothing to do with the general population, rather, it has to do with intentional bad actors that have entirely subverted American Democracy. Laugh all you want, it has happened to other countries previously, with Germany being quite notable.
but ultimately the software feature is a good thing.
WTF is wrong with you?
Suburbia is where the developer bulldozes out the trees, then names the streets after them. -- Bill Vaughn
