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Comment Re:Isn't that the only way to beat it? (Score 3, Insightful) 309

This is a good point. I'm guessing every single one of the entries into these Turing test competitions since 'Eliza' has been an attempt by the programmer to trick the judges. Turing's goal, however, was that the AI itself would be doing the tricking. If the programmer is spending time thinking of how to manufacture bogus spelling errors so that they bot looks human, then I'm guessing Turing's response would be that this is missing the point.

Comment Re:secure by default (Score 1) 248

We knew this stuff was going on in the mid-90's.

No. We knew it was a possibility, but we didn't know what was actually going on and so the gov't and press could dismiss techies as paranoid. More importantly, no one was talking about it, which is the really good thing to come out of all this.

Comment misleading (Score 1) 462

The issue is that in California they have to sell a certain portion of their fleet with zero and low emissions. He is saying that in order to convince people to buy the zero or low emission vehicles in adequate proportion, they have had to subsidize the price by $14,000. He does not expect that they will "sell too many" â" they picked this price because it's the number they expect will sell exactly the right amount.

Comment 2nd SOMALGET country leaked by contractor resume (Score 1) 241

The 2nd SOMALGET country was first leaked by defense contractor resume. Hinted at, in any case. Defense Contractors put all the illegal shit they do in their resumes to get more jobs doing those things.

Christopher Soghoian's tweet on the subject.

Erica A's resume

Erica A spent December 2012 to October 2013 in Afghanistan, is an expert in "Somalget Retro GUI" and is available for hire immediately.

Comment Re:Useful Idiot (Score 1) 396

Late, I know, but read up:

The unredacted wikileaks were a security breach.

People with a conscience (sadly, not everyone has one) consider Bradley Manning's treatment to be torture. According to the article, the harsh conditions of his imprisonment were meant to persuade him into making statements to implicate wikileaks in organizing the leaks. The suicide threat shit is a result of them making it hard for Manning to live inside his own mind.

Comment Re:Useful Idiot (Score 1) 396

Torture is torture. If they're stripped naked and put into stress positions for hours, left without human contact for days, etc, then what difference does it make if they're in a military or civilian prison? Oh and they could have pushed for the death penalty, so for anything less, Manning should have been thanking them. If someone walks up and punches you in the face, you should thank them for not stabbing you. Also, Manning didn't leak anything to the public. As everyone else knows he gave them to wikileaks to sort through. They did redact information that could be damaging to individuals and refrained from leaking most of what they received. It was one of the few acts of 'journalism' we've seen in the media for years.

Comment Re:Useful Idiot (Score 1) 396

Please don't compare Manning to Snowden.

There's little in common between the two. Manning's subsequent torture and isolation, however, did not have intended consequence of deterring whistleblowing. Snowden, knowing now that he had no guarantee of personal safety for alerting Americans to the actions of their gov't, was forced to run into the arms of our 'enemies.' If we'd acted righteously and humanely in Manning's case, the Snowden leaks may have been handled more effectively.

I dunno why you think he has to spy on Americans to be a hypocrite. By doing propaganda for the Russians, he is affirming that sometimes you have to compromise your lesser values in order to protect greater ones.

Exactly. There's nothing hypocritical about that. It's a decision we all have to make from time to time.

If they *could* only use this to protect Americans, that'd be great. Unfortunately, there's nothing stopping them from spying on and manipulating journalists, other politicians, spying on elections, providing information to big business campaign donors to the disadvantage of competition, etc. It's important that citizens know the capabilities of their gov't so the right checks can be put into place.

Comment Re:Useful Idiot (Score 4, Interesting) 396

As I said elsewhere, this argument makes no sense. We've shown Americans how we deal with leakers by our handling of Bradley/Chelsea Manning. Snowden had no choice but to go to our enemies for asylum. He's an American. For him to be a hypocrite, he'd have to spy on americans. If he has to do propaganda for the Russians to survive, then who cares? It's the Russians' problem, not ours.

Comment Re:Useful Idiot (Score 2) 396

When considering public opinion on such matters, note that the majority of the country once believed Saddam Hussein caused 9/11, that the Vietnam War was legitimate, that slavery was okay, etc. Leaker of the pentagon papers Daniel Ellsburg was also considered a traitor in the 70's and underwent the same treatment as Snowden by the military/intelligence bureaus, but as time went on and the government propaganda machine moved on to other matters, he largely became regarded as a hero. That said, I'd be curious to hear his angle on your 'legitimate espionage' point.

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