Matt Randolph schreef: > Holly Bostick wrote: > >> Surfing the Internet is a lot like walking down the street. >> >> > > Do you think Jane and John Doe computer users know that? Do you think > they know that what they do in Word and Outlook is private, and what > they do in Internet Explorer is public? It's only the distance of an > inch on the computer screen between the icons. How could they possibly > know it makes a whole world of difference?
Don't get me started on how responsible I 'should' be in terms of protecting others from their own stupidity. I am, generally, not for it. You can't learn from your mistakes if you don't make them, and the lack of learning is what makes Jane and John Dingbat dingbats in the first place. Admittedly, there are some mistakes (the fatal kind), that you don't want people to make as a learning experience, but there is a reason that they say "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." And I think there is no way that we can stretch "cookies deposited on your computer by non-visited sites" to "something that could kill you". If John and Jane Dingbat don't have a clue, well, that's not so good. If they don't have a clue that they don't have a clue, well, that's hopeless. If they have a clue that they don't have a clue, but choose not to get a clue, then they need to protect themselves in their voluntary 'blind spot', and that's their responsibility, not mine. > >> You can see me. The fact of my existence is not private. >> >> Because you can physically see me, you know a lot of things about me >> already. >> ... >> All of this information is *personal*, but *not* "private", >> >> > > If you saw someone following you in the street, writing down your every > action, documenting what you bought and at which stores you bought it > at... If you saw someone recording public but personal information > about you as you went about your business in public, would you not call > the police? Not as a first resort, no. > What if someone was peering through the window of your home > yet did it while standing on the public right of way (the sidewalk)? I've actually lived in this situation (a ground floor flat with front windows on the street), so I know what I'd do. What I did... and what I would do in the previous situation is confront the person, and (in the first situation ask them what they were doing), and (if the reason was not acceptable) inform them that their behaviour was unacceptable and ask them to/demand that they cease and desist (or move along, as the case may be). If they then did not, that would be a reason to call the police. I would, most likely, close my curtains as well (but possibly not, if I wanted to monitor their activity while waiting for the police). > What if they had binoculars and a camera? Binoculars I probably can't do anything about/don't know anything about, since the fact that they are using them suggests that they're hiding from me (it's kinda stupid to stand right in front of my window and yet use binoculars to look into my open window). Same with a camera, but if for some reason somebody was standing right in front of my window taking pictures of the interior of my house, I would do the same (confront them and ask why), then likely demand the film before telling them to move along. I might even be induced to replace the unexposed film at my own cost, depending on the situation. > Have you given up all of your > rights to privacy in your home by opening your curtains? Sort of-- at least to all areas of your home visible through the window. It's called "plain sight". If you want privacy, the first line of defense is to prevent normal human senses from perceiving your activity. You wouldn't open up your curtains and then murder your spouse right in front of the open windows, and expect that there would be "no witnesses" because your right to privacy demands that *no one look* (or hear) your crime? Does your right to privacy supercede my right to turn my head and perceive my environment accurately while walking down the street? Think about disturbing the peace. You are in your house, having a party. A noisy party. I am in my house, trying to sleep. We are both on our private property, but your 'private' activity is perceptible to my senses on my 'private' property-- I can hear you. I then have a legitimate actionable complaint (because the noise you are making is clearly public, because I can perceive it, despite the fact that I am not in your private area). Therefore, the police will act on it, if I choose to call them (which is how I know it's a legitimate complaint in the public arena). > If you had any > sense you would call the police on anyone who did any of those things to > you because that is harassment and it is none of their goddamned > business. It is YOUR business and when all is said and done it is one > of the few things in this world that you truly have. But you don't. 'Everybody' (in your immediate environment) knows "your business" (or some aspects of it). If not by the space that you displace, by the space that you don't. Half the time, one's effort to keep a "secret" reveal that there is a secret to be kept, which just impells some proportion of the observant to want to know what that secret is. You or I are not wraiths. If the aforementioned butcher (who has owned his store for years) sees me walking down the street every two days, but I never come in the store, that butcher 'knows' that I have some regular business on the street, but (for whatever reason) no interest in meat (or his meat, at least). The fact that I'm a vegetarian (for this example) is personal, but it can never be private (although the reason I chose to become a vegetarian may be), because it is extremely difficult to completely conceal, from everyone I may encounter in even the most limited way (travel reservationist, airplane stewardess, neighbors, people I invite for dinner or who invite me for dinner or dates that take me out for dinner), that I avoid dead animal meat in any and all forms. We live in the world with others, and in such a case, what you *do* is very rarely private (because what you do is usually perceptible to someone, somewhere). Our notion of 'privacy' is an agreement that we've made with each other, because there are too many of us, and we are almost never alone, and the human animal does have a need for privacy/solitude (there have been experiments as to what happens when you overpopulate an environment, and generally it makes the animals a bit nuts). For example, the agreement that one doesn't look at the other people when on an elevator. It's stupid, but necessary, especially in urban environments. One is never alone, and solitude is the only way to ensure 'privacy', because if you take as read that others have the right to live (which may include perceiving your activity, whether or not they are actively trying to), their "right" to perceive their environment cannot help but conflict with your "right" to not be perceived within that environment. Assuming you have such a right (as opposed to a desire), which may or may not be the case. > > How are these business practices fundamentally any different? Are they > different somehow because these companies can conduct their surveillance > invisibly? Does that somehow make it excusable? If I see you walking down the street, but you don't see me looking at you, I have conducted my "surveilance" "invisibly". I mean, please. You say that "people" (individuals or businesses) don't or shouldn't have the "right" to perceive your existence if you don't specifically authorize them to. I may not like it, and I may want to keep the level of what they can perceive to a limit that I specify, but I do not think that the "right" to perceive one's environment is in and of itself a crime, if (or just because) that environment includes me. Don't the administrators of a website have "rights" to know about their 'private' area (with a public easement) as well? > >> These issues are indeed worthy of watching (business practices usually >> are), but honestly, don't we have higher-priority "privacy" and security >> issues on our plates? >> > > Do you plan to worry about spying by corporations later on, after they > have essentially created an easement through your personal business? The easement already exists, of necessity. Otherwise, the world (or at least the world of commerce) would come to a fairly sudden stop. Since we are under the impression that we want to preserve the world of commerce, we have to live with these inconsitencies. > What part of trying to preserve your fundamental right to privacy is not > vitally important right now? My fundamental right to privacy? About the only true privacy I have is that of my own thoughts, and so the vitally important action to preserve that would be preventing anyone from putting a chip in my head (or body), without my knowledge that would read said thoughts. I don't care if "you" know what I do. Because 'everybody' knows what I do anyway in large part (if only by seeing what I *don't* do). If I desire for some reason to not have anyone know what I do, I have to actively conceal what I do. But once I am put in that position, I'm out of the realm of my 'rights', and into the realm of setting my desires above the 'rights' of others. I desire to take your television, so I must conceal what I do because you have the 'right' to retain your television (supposedly."Personal property", and how it is designated are also agreements that we have made with each other, fairly recenty). I am well-known, but I desire not to be perceived (and therefore recognized and most likely interrupted in my business), so I must conceal my physical appearance so as not to be recognized, irrespective of your 'right' to perceive and know who is in your environment. I desire that the boss doesn't discover that I surf porn (or do other non-work related activity) on the company PC, so I must conceal the evidence of that, although the boss has the right to know what 'his' PC is being used for. I desire to entertain myself, or practice my artistic skills (photograpy, drawing, writing), or my specific observational skills (maybe I'm a cop aiming for promotion to detective, or a budding psychologist), so I actively observe people, and record my observations. I have the "right" to observe, and I also have the "right" to record my observations, and my observation does not interfere with whatever you may be doing in any way. But you apparently have the right to choose not to be observed (despite being in public or offering an 'easement' to the public, by opening your curtains, which allows me to observe you). So whose 'rights' win? It's a sad day when one (i.e., me) has to do a whole morality check before leaning over somebody's fence to smell a flower in the garden. I feel so bad about 'infringing on private property' that it almost overwhelms the pleasure of appreciating the beauty of the flower (which is, after all, why it was grown, so that its beauty could be appreciated). It's all a bit sick, if you ask me. Holly -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
