Revealed: the capitalist network that runs the world http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21228354.500-revealed–the-capitalist-network-that-runs-the-world.html & http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/1107/1107.5728v2.pdf
Tagged: Transparency RSS Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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mazsa
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mazsa
Policing the Police: Apps That Let You Spy on the Cops http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/06/policing-the-police-the-apps-that-let-you-spy-on-the-cops/240916/
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mazsa
“[...] Bradley Manning, directly and indirectly, has probably done more for freedom than any single human being in years.
His exposure of war crimes by U.S. forces in Iraq, and his exposure of how the sausage of U.S. foreign policy is made, benefit freedom in their own right insofar as they undermine — to whatever extent — the global and domestic credibility of the United States government.
But more importantly, the cables Manning leaked — which were published on Wikileaks — played a central role in triggering the so-called Twitter revolution that started in Tunisia, spread to Egypt and much of the Middle East, and is now striking Qaddafi with hurricane-force winds of freedom. Among the cables which Wikileaks published were detailed descriptions of the Tunisian regime’s corruption, which galvanized local dissident groups into launching the movement that overthrew the government. [...]” http://c4ss.org/content/6386
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mazsa
A Nobel Peace Prize for Julian Assange? Please! He’s a fence for stolen goods. Transparency has its place. But nations, like individuals and private organizations, need to conduct their business with varying degrees of confidence. Look at #Egypt at the moment, where American, Egyptian, and other officials are conducting delicate negotiations in the context of a potentially explosive situation. Only the most naive would expect those to be fully transparent.
Roger Pilon-
admin
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mazsa
Technology Neutral IT Procurement Decisions: U.S. Chief Information Officer Vivek Kundra, Administrator for Federal Procurement Policy Dan Gordon and U.S. Intellectual Property Enforcement Cordinator Victoria Espinel issued a statement to Senior Procurement Executives and Chief Information Officers reminding them to select IT based on appropriate criteriawhile analyzing available alternatives including proprietary, open source and mixed source technologies. Click to enlarge.
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mazsa
Kill Bill for Microsoft: Putin Orders Russian Government Move to Free Software
http://opendotdotdot.blogspot.com/2010/12/putin-orders-russian-move-to-gnulinux.html
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mazsa
That’s the real issue, that’s the big modern problem; national governments and global computer networks don’t mix any more. It’s like trying to eat a very private birthday cake while also distributing it. That scheme is just not working. And that failure has a face now, and that’s Julian Assange. [...] Everybody wants everybody else’s national government to leak. Every state wants to see the diplomatic cables of every other state. It will bend heaven and earth to get them. It’s just, that sacred activity is not supposed to be privatized, or, worse yet, made into the no-profit, shareable, have-at-it fodder for a network society, as if global diplomacy were so many mp3s. Now the US State Department has walked down the thorny road to hell that was first paved by the music industry. Rock and roll, baby.
Bruce Sterling -
mazsa
Which are your favorite Wikileaks-keywords?
Write them here anonymously: http://pad.telecomix.org/kulcsszavak
and/or set up an alert to monitor them: http://cablesearch.org/?page_id=17 (Number of cables:
1477 Still to go in Wikileaks 99%) -
mazsa
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mazsa
Why the U.S. Has Launched a New Financial World War — and How the Rest of the World Will Fight Back http://www.alternet.org/economy/148481/why_the_u.s._has_launched_a_new_financial_world_war_–_and_how_the_rest_of_the_world_will_fight_back_?page=entire
What do you think?
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admin
Senate Candidate Bets Congress $100 Million That the U.S. Government Cannot Run out of Money http://moslereconomics.com/2010/10/22/press-release-3/
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mazsa
The Zen of Open Data, by Chris McDowall
“Open is better than closed.
Transparent is better than opaque.
Simple is better than complex.
Accessible is better than inaccessible.
Sharing is better than hoarding.
Linked is more useful than isolated.
Fine grained is preferable to aggregated.
(Although there are legitimate privacy and security limitations.)
Optimise for machine readability — they can translate for humans.
Barriers prevent worthwhile things from happening.
“Flawed, but out there” is a million times better than “perfect, but unattainable”.
Opening data up to thousands of eyes makes the data better.
Iterate in response to demand.
There is no one true feed for all eternity — people need to maintain this stuff.”http://sciblogs.co.nz/seeing-data/2010/10/12/the-zen-of-open-data/
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mazsa
“US Trade Representative Ron Kirk, whose office negotiated the US side of the deal, issued a statement this morning about the “tremendous progress in the fight against counterfeiting and piracy,” but the real story here is the tremendous climbdown by US negotiators, who have largely failed in their attempts to push the Digital Millenium Copyright Act (DMCA) onto the rest of the world.” http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/news/2010/10/near-final-acta-text-arrives-big-failure-for-us.ars
Original as of 2 Oct: http://www.ustr.gov/webfm_send/2338
Compare versions: http://euwiki.org/ACTA/diffs
http://www.michaelgeist.ca/content/view/5352/125/
Cf: http://theunitedpersons.org/blog/tag/ACTA
Mexico:
“it’s not clear exactly how much say the Mexican Senate has here. While the resolution claims that it needs to ratify any such agreements, I don’t know if that’s the case.” Comment: “Actually means a lot, even though is non-binding it was adopted by all every single senator and the final say on international treaties is on the Senate. The President can ratify if he wishes ACTA, but the Senate needs to approve it. And they are not very willing to.” http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101005/17320811304/mexican-senate-unanimously-votes-to-remove-mexico-from-acta-negotations.shtmlOriginal:
Spanish: http://www.senado.gob.mx/index.php?ver=sp&mn=2&sm=2&id=5264&lg=61
Translation: http://translate.google.com/translate?u=http://www.senado.gob.mx/index.php%3Fver%3Dsp%26mn%3D2%26sm%3D2%26id%3D5264%26lg%3D61&hl=en&langpair=autoCf: http://yro.slashdot.org/story/10/10/06/2321203/Mexican-Senate-Votes-To-Drop-Out-of-ACTA
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mazsa
> We just reached the 369 signatures of Members of the European Parliament
> required for WD12 to be adopted!!!
>
> Completion of WD12 shows that alltogether we can weight in making the
> European Parliament take care of our fundamental freedoms. With WD12,
> the European Parliament rejects both the un-democratic process of ACTA
> – -whatever the final content of the agreement will be- and its content,
> harmful for fundamental freedoms.
>
> WD12 is a strong political signal sent by the EP to the Commission that
> ACTA is not tolerable as a way of bypassing democratic process; that
> legislation related to Internet, freedom of speech and privacy cannot be
> traded off in secrecy and under full influence of entertainment industry
> lobbies. Whatever the content of the final agreement, ACTA will remain
> an illegitimate circumvention of democracy and should be opposed as such.
>
> Let’s hope that WD12 announces the “consent” vote that the EP will have
> to take in order to accept or reject ACTA when it is finalized. Then
> again, citizens will need to act to make sure that their Internet and
> their fundamental freedoms are properly defended, by a full rejection of
> ACTA.
>
>
> Thanks to everyone who participated in that great effort!
[On Tue, Sep 07, 2010 at 05:10:47PM +0200, Jérémie ZIMMERMANN - La Quadrature du Net wrote]Cf. http://www.laquadrature.net/en/european-parliament-vs-acta-rejection-is-the-only-option
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mazsa
“ACTA: Partial transparency isn’t legitimacy – The release of the public draft of ACTA [ http://trade.ec.europa.eu/doclib/docs/2010/april/tradoc_146029.pdf ] is a milestone in the long opposition to this illegitimate agreement, which aims at tackling trademark, copyright and patent infringements. Now, citizens, NGOs and parliaments all around the world must continue to act together to expose ACTA and its dangers. This whole policy laundering is incompatible with democracy and the ideals of preserving fundamental rights, Internet, public health and innovation at large. [...]
Today’s release of the text does not legitimize the content of ACTA, as transparency is no excuse for political laundering and the circumvention of democratic processes.”
http://www.laquadrature.net/en/acta-partial-transparency-isnt-legitimacy
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mazsa
Hacking Business Models: “This weekend, Monty and I got together for a different kind of hacking session.
“Instead of developing software, we were working on developing a set of rough principles and rules for running a Free Software/Open Source business. We both have a good amount of experience working with various FLOSS projects (like Mozilla, MySQL, PHP, etc.) and FLOSS companies (like eZ Systems, Mozilla, MySQL, Zend, etc.) and hope that we can put this experience to good use. [...]
“Purpose
* Create a sustainable business model that can be adopted and adapted by others.
* Create a fair and democratic company that is owned by the workers.
* Have long-term, trustworthy and meaningful relationships with our staff and customers.“Principles
* Egalitarian: The belief that all people should be treated equally. This includes equality, non-discrimination and inclusivity.
* Sustainable: We have a long-term view on our business. We watch our profits & spend wisely, we take care of each other, we support the things we depend on.
* Transparent: We communicate in an honest and genuine way. Any information or process that can be made open, will be made open.
* Fun: Create a workplace where people can have fun and want to work.
* Agile: Be flexible, receptive & adaptive, especially when dealing with staff and customers.“Methods
“Concrete tools for helping us live according to our principles, including:
* Consensus-based decision making.
* Corporate transparency – any information or process that can be made open, should be made open.
* Licensing that helps benefit our company, our staff, our customers, our partners and society at large.
* Profit-sharing with staff, contributors and worthy causes.
* Don’t try to change people. Focus on getting the best from their strengths. Develop ways to work around their weaknesses.
* Prefer to work with people who share our values.
* Work against patents and other legislation that harms individual rights.“Monty’s amendments
- Subscribe to the Open Source philosophy and support the Open Source community.
- Be a virtual company, networking with others.
- The company or its individual business units should not grow until they are
unmanagable by the chosen methods. If this happens, then the company needs to
be split up or re-organized into largely independent business units.“Default Employee Rules: [...]”
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mazsa
“[...] relatively minor changes in the social environment can induce major changes in decision making because these minor changes can change the perceived appropriateness of a situation. One variable that has been shown to make such a difference is whether the decision maker sees herself as an individual or as a part of a group.
“[...] people tend to cooperate with other members of their own group (however minimally it is constructed) and defect when interacting with members of other groups, even when group membership is determined on an explicitly random basis.
“When people act as individuals who are interacting with other individuals, they are far more cooperative than when they form groups that interact with other groups. [...] people will make self-sacrificial choices when the benefits go to members of their own group, but not when the benefits go to members of an out-group. In both situations people are functioning as group members. Thus, the discontinuity found is not just between individual behaviour versus group behaviour, but rather a function of the type of group identification that can be achieved.
“[...] whether give-away choices led to the distribution of 12 dollars to the other participants in one’s own room or to comparable participants in the other room. [...] When participants were not allowed to talk to each other, it didn’t matter whether the bonus for giving away the money went to one’s own group or to the group in the other room. Approximately 38% of the participants gave the money away; when, however, they could talk, there was a striking difference. Approximately 79% of them gave away the money when it went to those in their own room with whom they were communicating, but only about 30% when the money went to people in the other room.
“Even though the groups are randomly constructed, subjects have a vigorous tendency to support their own groups, to the detriment to both the other group and ultimately themselves and their own group members. [We are] observing the initiation of a war in miniature. When group members are able to discuss the problem, they reinforce the belief that they are all committed to helping the group, and that they possess the solidarity necessary for their group to predominate. At the same time they believe that at least some of the members of the other group (whom they cannot observe) will be sufficiently “weak” so that they will not support their own in-group. Psychological characteristics of self-sacrifice and com- mitment are believed to exist to a much greater extent in people observed than in people unobserved — even though both observed and unobserved people are drawn randomly from the exact same population.
“Is it possible that in a two group situation the juxtaposition of groups can lead to cooperative behaviour for the in-group that does not simultaneously hurt the out-group? The answer is yes. [...] When all subjects in the 14-person group, at one point or other, made either a conditional or unconditional commitment, 84% subsequently gave away the 21 dollars. However, when at least one person made no such commitment — either by outright refusal or by saying nothing — the rate of giving away the 21 dollars was only 58%. That was a striking difference. Even more striking, however, was the finding that in those groups that did not achieve the “solidarity” of all making a commitment at one point or other, there was absolutely no relationship at the individual level between having made such a commitment and giving the 21 dollars away, or between hearing the number of others who had made such a commitment at giving the 21 dollars away which after division implied that there was no correlation across groups between the number of people who made the commitment and the number who gave the 21 dollars away. [...] The empirical finding was that commitments were functional in the presence of unanimity, but not otherwise. [...] promises and commitments are binding only in the presence of reciprocal promises and commitments. Perhaps the participants [...] are treating the entire remainder of the group as equivalent to a single person who must reciprocate if promises are to be kept. Failure on the part of a few people to do so could then become functionally equivalent to shilly-shallying about a commitment on the part of a single individual.
“Of course, correlation does not imply causation. So it could be that the apparent effectiveness of the commit- ments simply re ̄ ected the unanimity, or it could be that such commitments are only functional given unanimity [...] The current research does not provide an answer to these questions.
“From an applied perspective the implication about group identity is clear. It can be a two-edged sword in achieving cooperation. When it is clearly a parochial matter (as in wars between two countries [...]), it can encourage local cooperation and global defection. However, when a superordinate group identity can be achieved, it can lead to cooperation between groups, at least in thepresence of personal commitments. It may, thus, not have been a coincidence that [...] United States foreign policy became noticeably more aggressive in South America after the invention of the telegraph, where negotiators could establish an instant link back to Washington — a link that may well have reinforced the identity as a representative of the United States, rather than as a member of a group of people trying to negotiate a solution to a difficult problem. Nor is the agreement achieved in the early Salt Talks between the US and the USSR negotiators during their famous “walk in the woods” surprising in light of these findings. When the two negotiators were together without any cues about their identities as representatives of the United States or the Soviet Union, they actually reached a solution (a solution that was promptly vetoed by the central authority of both sides). If we wish negotiators to be cooperative, we must do whatever we can to enhance their identity as negotiators dealing with a particular problem, rather than their identity of a representative or a particular group that is in conflict with another group. To hope, in contrast, for a super- superordinate identity as a “human being” is just too optimistic.”
Dawes-Messick,2000 -
mazsa
“European Parliament resolution on the transparency and state of play of the ACTA negotiations
[663 in favour, 13 against, 16 abstentions]The European Parliament,
[...]
1. Points out that since 1 December 2009 the Commission has had a legal obligation to inform Parliament immediately and fully at all stages of international negotiations;
2. Expresses its concern over the lack of a transparent process in the conduct of the ACTA negotiations, a state of affairs at odds with the letter and spirit of the TFEU; is deeply concerned that no legal base was established before the start of the ACTA negotiations and that parliamentary approval for the negotiating mandate was not sought;
3. Calls on the Commission and the Council to grant public and parliamentary access to ACTA negotiation texts and summaries, in accordance with the Treaty and with Regulation 1049/2001 of 30 May 2001 regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents;
4. Calls on the Commission and the Council to engage proactively with ACTA negotiation partners to rule out any further negotiations which are confidential as a matter of course and to inform Parliament fully and in a timely manner about its initiatives in this regard; expects the Commission to make proposals prior to the next negotiation round in New Zealand in April 2010, to demand that the issue of transparency is put on the agenda of that meeting and to refer the outcome of the negotiation round to Parliament immediately following its conclusion;
5. Stresses that, unless Parliament is immediately and fully informed at all stages of the negotiations, it reserves its right to take suitable action, including bringing a case before the Court of Justice in order to safeguard its prerogatives;
6. Calls on the Commission to conduct an impact assessment of the implementation of ACTA with regard to fundamental rights and data protection, ongoing EU efforts to harmonise IPR enforcement measures, and e-commerce, prior to any EU agreement on a consolidated ACTA treaty text, and to consult with Parliament in a timely manner about the results of the assessment;
7. Welcomes affirmations by the Commission that any ACTA agreement will be limited to the enforcement of existing IPRs, with no prejudice for the development of substantive IP law in the European Union;
8. Calls on the Commission to continue the negotiations on ACTA in order to improve the effectiveness of the IPR enforcement system against counterfeiting;
9. Urges the Commission to ensure that the enforcement of ACTA provisions – especially those on copyright enforcement procedures in the digital environment – are fully in line with the acquis communautaire; demands that no personal searches will be conducted at EU borders and requests full clarification of any clauses that would allow for warrantless searches and confiscation of information storage devices such as laptops, cell phones and MP3 players by border and customs authorities;
10. Considers that in order to respect fundamental rights, such as the right to freedom of expression and the right to privacy, while fully observing the principle of subsidiarity, the proposed agreement should not make it possible for any so-called ‘three-strikes’ procedures to be imposed, in full accordance with Parliament’s decision on Article 1.1b in the (amending) Directive 2009/140/EC calling for the insertion of a new paragraph 3(a) in Article 1 of Directive 2002/21/EC on the matter of the ‘three strikes’ policy;
11. Emphasises that privacy and data protection are core values of the European Union, recognised in Article 8 ECHR and Articles 7 and 8 of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights, which must be respected in all the policies and rules adopted by the EU pursuant to Article 16 of the TFEU;
12. Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Council, the Commission and the governments and parliaments of the states party to the ACTA negotiations.”
Background: http://www.laquadrature.net/en/acta-a-global-threat-to-freedoms-open-letter via http://nyissz.hu/blog/acta-a-global-threat-to-freedoms-open-letter/
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“The legislative initiative outlined here is intended to make Iceland an attractive environment for the registration and operation of international press organizations, new media start-ups, human rights groups and internet data centers. It promises to strengthen our democracy through the power of transparency and to promote the nation’s international standing and economy.” http://immi.is/?l=en&p=proposal (via stef)-
mazsa
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“BRUSSELS—Europe’s executive commission Wednesday recommended opening membership talks with Iceland that could lead to the country joining the bloc as soon as 2012 or 2013.” http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704240004575085281895384778.html
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admin is discussing. 
http://news.slashdot.org/story/11/02/02/187258/WikiLeaks-Nominated-For-2011-Nobel-Peace-Prize