WikiLeaks - Pushing the Boundaries of Freedom of Speech

I've generally been pretty cautious about censorship in general.  I think that diverse opinions are integral in an democratic society.

I'm a little concerned with WikiLeaks though.  From what I've seen, their posting of military documents puts lives at risk and I'm just not convinced that freedom of speech should exist to this extent.  From what I've gathered, not only are military plans that are supposed to be highly classified being disclosed (potentially putting servicemen at risk) but I also have read that some of the documents name individuals in Afghanistan who have supplied information about the Taliban, and the Taliban can now use this information in retaliation.

All that having been said, one of the biggest problems of the Net is that even if it deemed that Wikileaks doesn't have the right to publish this information, how on earth can this be enforced?  I'd be very interested in talking to someone with experience in this area of law, but I wonder if an American resident publishes information through an ISP in a "neutral country", are the individuals liable or are they governed by the laws of the country where the ISP exists?

Blog Stats

Recently, Blogger.com has introduced traffic stats for their blogs. As a relatively small and likely rarely read blog, I find it interesting that there is some "international" traffic to TecHumanity. It's nice to dream and imagine that traffic is going to reach a "tipping point".

Aside from the US (Portland - is that you? lol) and Canada, I show some (minimal) traffic from Denmark, Russia, Ukraine, South Korea and Latvia of all places but they could just be spiders or bots. If these are real people, then drop by and introduce yourselves :)

FAIL - 101

Working away right now...I move my mouse, but the mouse pointer on my screen isn't working...Damn! My computer's frozen! Hmm - maybe my mouse is out of batteries (cordless).

No - wait. I've been sliding my cellphone on my desk, not my mouse. Never mind lol

An Interesting Dilemma

Stephen Hawking went on record as saying that the human race needs to abandon Earth and expand to other planets to ensure their contued existence. That's all fine and dandy, but the thought just occured to me. How on earth (as a saying, not literally!) can we have the infrastructure of technology on a new planet? Think of the logistics of this. I originally half in jest thought of there being no Internet access on NewEarth, but think of the ramifications of society having to revert to a technologically stunted environment.

I ponder how long it would take to get an infrastructure in place to support the technology that we're used to.

But then again, the thought of having a technologically immature society isn't all together unappealing.

...and in Today's SPAM

I can choose to:
- get breast implants
- join an art school
- get a free travel kit when I join the American Association of Retired Person, despite the fact that I am neither American nor Retired
- hire a local contractor to paint
or
- become a social worker.

I just LOVE spam and how it enriches my life.

I think that I'll go with the art school!

Social Networking

I have enough of a problem with Twitter and this constant need to see and broadcast the minutia of one's lives, but I guess whatever floats your boat.  It seems odd, and way too much (spoken as ex-Tweeter).

Next, came Four-Square.  For the un-initiated, you go to your smartphone and you "check in" when you're at some geographic location (i.e. "hey, I'm at Burger King at  Yonge and Dundas!").  I guess the general concept is that you can see if any of your four-square network is in the same geographical location so that you can hook-up.  Umm - not always such a good idea.  I'm waiting for the "criminal element" to tap into this and say "hmm, John can't be at two places at once, so if he's four-squared THERE - he can't be at home" sort of thing.

Next, we have an app called GetGlue where you broadcast and announce what you're watching on the tube or reading or listening too.  I don't know - I suppose a bit harmless I guess, but doesn't this almost fall into the TMI category?

What's next?  Broadcasting announcements of bodily functions?  Well - actually...I did see an app on the iTunes store for this purpose, so you can see who else is ummm, shall we delicately say "indisposed and sitting on the throne".

Don't get it - and I don't know that I WANT to get it.

The Facebook Behemoth

I was just on the elevator a few moments ago.  One of those VDT had a quick story about how Google was in talks with "others" to put together a social network to compete with Facebook.

My first thought - wow - talk about going after THE de facto standard of social networks!  Facebook recently announced that they now have 500 million member.  Firstly, this is a dubious number at best.  How many of those are accounts that are deleted, but not REALLY deleted (by the way, Facebook accounts can be physically deleted instead of being made inactive - I've deleted mine).  That not-withstanding, that is one WHACK of a lot of users.  I have to imagine that this would fall under the "this is an uphill climb" scenario.

I would suppose that if there was any one that could put forth a challenge to Facebook it would be Google and their mystery colloborators.

I am going to very interested to follow this.  I'm fascinated to see exactly how Google & friends propose to steal market share.