Comments on: It is not the seller and so can’t be responsible

By: Harry Jones

Harry Jones — Sat, 07 Sep 2019 16:32:20 +0000

The externalities are always there, so that’s a wash. But having more options benefits those of us who see every externality as nothing more than another challenge to outwit.

My quarrel with libertarians is they have no sound strategy for achieving their goals. I say freedom begins with an autonomy mindset. Expand your sphere of control outward from a center that is your own conscious will. When it pushes against someone else’s sphere of control, embrace managed conflict.

Conflict is part of the structure of reality. It is the dynamism of nature. Civilized society is largely managed conflict.

Another beef I have with libertarians is this arbitrary distinction between big business and big government. Government is as government does, and the labels don’t change that. The balance of power is the only reality. Feel powerless? Don’t waste time whining about it. Instead, think about how you can maybe get yourself some more power. Because power is only a problem when it’s not yours.

By: CVLR

CVLR — Fri, 06 Sep 2019 14:59:14 +0000

I must confess: when I chance upon the words "there's nothing to stop anyone from...", the hairs on the back of my libertarian early warning system begin to bristle most emphatically. No man is an island; much of our lives are ruled not by our own perfect individual reason but by externalities gifted, or inflicted, upon us by others — our neighbors, our governors, our employers, our clients. It just isn't enough to say that, theoretically, I, personally, can "opt out" of such-and-such unpleasant and undesirable contrivance; to have any meaning, the choice must be explicitly, and individually, opt-in. It is as impossible to secure one's privacy in this age of surveillance capitalism as it is to: have a nice cityscape in a swamp of outsourcing and offshoring and addicts; to have a family in a moonscape of cads and sluts; enjoy high culture in a landscape of institutional satanic inversion. Most technologies centralize. Few decentralize, though those that do are often extraordinarily effective (e.g., the printing press and the rifle). Some decentralizing technologies may be suppressed.

By: Harry Jones

Harry Jones — Fri, 06 Sep 2019 13:54:16 +0000

Not at all. There’s nothing to stop anyone from stripping out the digital signatures, so long as he is willing to forfeit the privilege of claiming that his content is uncontestably genuine. This is currently the only option, but my scheme will add a second option: authenticated!

By: CVLR

CVLR — Fri, 06 Sep 2019 13:05:13 +0000

Harry Jones, this is one case in which the cure may very well be worse than the disease. For what is the world to be in which every computing device’s every action is uniquely signed and perfectly traceable... at the protocol layer? For there will be no opt-out: to the extent that society comes to depend on these enabling technologies, those who wish to live normally will be subject to the capture of the electronic traces of their lives. I would not be surprised if some intelligence services had not reverted to the use of typewriters and personal couriers. Battlestar Galactica.

By: Harry Jones

Harry Jones — Thu, 05 Sep 2019 20:20:29 +0000

Here’s my answer to the deepfake problem, and also the fake news problem: cryptographic signatures put in by the recording hardware.

The tricky part will be getting a unique key pair into every device in a way that it can’t be altered. We might have to settle for a unique key pair per chip run.

By: CVLR

CVLR — Wed, 04 Sep 2019 22:03:55 +0000

Expect to see a radical return to meatspace as a result of perfect-fidelity fake images, fake text, and fake products, beginning with the hipster segment and trickling down therefrom. There will be a tidal wave of legitimacy relocation. Everything on a screen will be regarded as real/fake, equally and simultaneously. And the failure of these apparently all-powerful Internet oligopolies to ensure authenticity on their platforms will have been their undoing.

Invest in the stock of public spaces near you.

By: Wilson

Wilson — Sun, 25 Aug 2019 13:11:08 +0000

Walmart is certainly not better, in my experience they don’t even guarantee delivery by 3rd party sellers, and good luck disputing a charge from Walmart on your credit card