[Shakes his head in disgust.] Hackers, it's time for me to hack the discussion. You and your first world problems have NO IDEA how to fight for freedom. This is the wimpy way to protest whatever it is you are protesting. Unlike most people who post here, I have actually lived under a dictatorial regime that ruled a territory that later had a peaceful transition to democracy and legally protected civil rights. Anonymous or whatever the name of the latest Western hacktivist group is going about things all wrong.
If you really want to learn about effective popular action to bring about more freedom, point your Web browser to the Albert Einstein Institute publications
and choose your language for titles like From Dictatorship to Democracy and The Role of Power in Nonviolent Struggle and others. Note that the main author of these publications has consulted with freedom movements all over the world and has had notable success in the Philippines, Thailand, Burma, and other countries, and is credited with much of the mobilization of the two-year-old Arab Spring movement.
Going after the United States Sentencing Commission website is beyond stupid. The federal sentencing guidelines were a helpful reform. Before they were adopted, on the example of Minnesota's sentencing guidelines, federal sentences were just about wholly indeterminate, making each judge could make up his or her own law of sentencing at trial. The Minnesota reform, which was the example for the federal reform, set up guidelines based on a "severity score" of the offense--so that for the first time legislative statutes from many different decades were compared as to the actual social harm resulting from each offense, based on community standards as of the time of the reform--and on a "criminal history score" of the offender, so that prison time was reserved only for the most dangerous repeat offenders. (Minnesota imprisons fewer convicted criminals than most states of the United States, being much like Scandinavia in this regard. Minnesota spends more dollars per prisoner but fewer dollars per taxpayer on its prison system than almost any other state.)
I know actual freedom fighters, that is publishers of opposition magazines and organizers of nonviolent protests, from Taiwan. Some of them experienced hard prison time while in the struggle for freedom, with family break up and ill health and the other consequences of imprisonment. But today they can look at a much freer country in their homeland than they grew up in. The biggest problem with website-defacing movements is their cowardice (no one in Anonymous seems courageous enough to go to prison) and lack of perspective (they complain about first world problems that they mischaracterize as important problems for the common people). It's time for the discussion on Hacker News to grow up and make more room for the real freedom fighters.
>The biggest problem with website-defacing movements is their cowardice (no one in Anonymous seems courageous enough to go to prison) and lack of perspective (they complain about first world problems that they mischaracterize as important problems for the common people).
I think you're missing the point, here. I like what's going on in the majority of your post -- there is a lot we can learn from other successful reform movements, but the problem here isn't "cowardice". Quite the contrary, if you can find a way to disseminate your message without being harmed or incarcerated, more power to you.
The problem is that skiddie stuff like website defacements make the movement look stupid and the activists look like common criminals. It doesn't convert anyone to your side when you hack a website like the USSC. Okay, maybe a handful of teenagers are impressed, but the majority of the country is taken aback. And the important point: anyone who is impressed by this was already on our side.
If you're reading this and disagreeing, imagine for a second that the USSC had been defaced not by Anonymous but by, say, eco-terrorists a la Edward Abbey. Sure, a card-carrying member of PETA might be happy to see such a thing, but you and I aren't likely to be converted to the cause.
One of the most important things in any sort of public debate -- even though it might seem unfair -- is the way the debate is framed. Actions like this help the government frame the debate as "order v. chaos", which is exactly the way it works best for them. If you want to win the hearts and minds of the people, focus more on exposing injustice and corruption, and less on banging that drum.
In principle I agree with what you say. In practice however I am skeptical. In my calm and rational mind, I could not possible see how defacing of a government website could affect anyone or bring more supporters to Anonymous. On that same state of mind, i would also not see how commercials could ever work, or how scandals/negative news could sometimes increase support for a political party.
Thus, my mind tells me (based on previous knowledge) that hacks like this could very well increase support for Anonymous. Maybe that is because they get noticed (branding), and thus the number of supporters increase. Maybe people in their busy lives rationalize that if someone managed to break a government website like USSC, then those people means business and are serious enough to stop and get listen to. If then newspapers make a big deal out it, people will rationalize further and consider it to be important.
I too hope however that they do publish their data about injustice and corruption. Maybe the drum beating is important to first create some hype about it, but in the end, it's the data that interests me. But I do see how the actions of defacing the site could be valuable for bringing justice and change, just by the act of creating noise.
We aren't very rational, when it comes down to it, because rational people have trouble making decisions. Political issues are hard to visualize or experiment with - they seem to be distant from daily life - so most people, in a "natural" state, will lack strong opinions on any given issue.
Thus, "coaching" comes into play - people rely on things they've been told to guide them, whether or not it was correct information. Most of these political tactics act as a way to both inform people and influence them. This can be "good" when the tactic is something that adds a healthy structure and process to governance - for example, the concepts of civil liberties had to be both invented and then propagandized in order for people to comprehend their value and demand their existence. People living in tyranny weren't necessarily _happy_, but they didn't know of a better option, and couldn't hope to convince others around them.
Of course, it's a "bad" practice in that when speaking of single issues, the same influencing tactics tend to form an unbalanced opinion, by removing some concerns and inflating others into bogeymen. But it's by far the cheapest way to build support for an issue, so it remains the way things are done.
In any case, concrete action is usually the very last step, and almost an afterthought, in the long cycle of debate typical to political processes.
He's probably referring to situations where a person loses their ability to access their intuition in making decisions, even very simple ones like what to eat for lunch.
The result is gridlock in the brain. The patient cannot, literally, decide if next Wednesday at 3pm is an okay time to have their next appointment with a therapist.
The takeaway is that conscious "rationality" alone in humans is clearly insufficient for them to make most decisions. Instead, they act, for the most part, on intuition and feelings, guided (we hope) by rational feedback to the correct for the deficiencies in those two "dominant" modes of thinking and decision making.
You make it sound as though the goal should be to go to prison, or to become a martyr for your cause. I suppose you think suicide bombers are effective freedom fighters as well?
I'm reminded of an old quote, which I think is attributed to General Patton: The goal is not to die for your country, the goal is to make the other guy die for his country.
IOW, you're not out there intentionally trying to sacrifice yourself and take yourself out of the game. That would be silly.
Look, I'm not saying that what Anonymous did was right in any objective sense, but it is what they did, and it's real easy for us to play "monday morning quarterback" and sit here and criticize. At least they did something, which is more than most of us can claim. And, yes, members (or purported member) of Anonymous have gone to jail for their activities.
Thanks for the aeinstein.org link. One thing: "no one in Anonymous seems courageous enough to go prison" - What use is it to go to prison? Maybe you will get some article produced about you generation some attention, but it really doesn't seem helpful. Courageous, I agree, but is it rational? Recently I read about a small protest in mainland China about an instance of media censorship. A bunch of people singed there names on some document complaining about it, and Chinese man who was speaking to some journalists got thrown into a van and taken away. It would not surprise me if some of those people who signed their names will end up getting attacked, so anonymity is beneficial here.
This was not a protest in rural China where corrupt local communist party officials are going to come and disappear you.
This was an attack on a US Federal Government website. Whoever defaced the site might get prosecuted for their endeavor, but the only purpose for anonymity here is for the instigators to avoid official reprisal and prosecution (.e.g to get away with it).
Nobody in the US is going to persecute you because you think academic articles should be free (they'll largely just ignore you).
"Nobody in the US is going to persecute you because you think academic articles should be free (they'll largely just ignore you)."
What good is the belief without the ability ("freedom") to act on it? Aaron acted on it, which was arguably a more effective form of protest, and he paid a high price too, even if one doesn't attribute the suicide to his persecution (ehem, sorry, "prosecution")...
"Whoever defaced the site might get prosecuted for their endeavor, but the only purpose for anonymity here is for the instigators to avoid official reprisal and prosecution (.e.g to get away with it)."
If I am reading your correctly, it sounds like you're saying the person defacing the site should volunteer his or herself for jail (albeit as an act of protest). That hardly makes sense in the best of scenarios let alone in the context of the CFAA. No sit-in protester wants to be pepper-sprayed and hauled downtown, nor would I hold it against them. Suggestion boxes are anonymous for a reason too. (Mind you, one doesn't see many of those these days; almost as if noone wants to know when something's wrong.)
Well, i was responding to the notion that there is nobility in this particular use of the shield of anonymity.
I just happen to disagree that this is a noble use of anonymity.
And, yeah, if you're going to break the law in an act of intentional protest, yeah, i hope they have the strength of conviction to own up to what it is that they're doing. Otherwise it is sort of a cowardly act of opportunity.
The thing that distinguishes aaron swartz's case is that every one thinks it is insane that he was being threatened with jail time, and it isn't reasonable for him, or anyone else (save for the prosecutors) to consider 35 years in prison a proportional response for his circumstances and actions.
Attacking government websites solely for the purpose of defacing them, out of protest or not, is moving out of the grey area that aaron swartz was operating in (this information is supposed to be public anyway, and he had a means to scrape them), into intentional vandalism (even if you think they are a legit cause).
Anonymity in such a circumstance, again, is just a shield for people who are breaking the law. I'm not saying anonymity is a bad thing, or that we shouldn't have it, but imo, this is more an abuse of anonymity than a use.
P.S. Aaron Swartz is a lamentable and reprehensible aberration, but it is an aberration. Larry Lessig certainly agrees with Swartz's objectives (just not the means). Nobody is leading a crusade against Lessig, or trying to murder, injure or incarcerate him for what he believes, or the actions he takes to further his aims. That's persecution. Abortion providers are persecuted. Information activists are not persecuted.
"just a shield for people who are breaking the law."
I would (naturally) call someone who disagrees with me, and acts on it, "abusive" too (or opportunistic, for example) even if he or she thought they were acting morally; moral arguements are hollow when the morality is what's being argued over. I'm not exactly disagreeing with you, just trying to say that moral judgement might be moot (except to one's self of course).
That said, we do seem to disagree on the definition of persecution. I do think people who believe in free access to knowledge, and who act on those moral principals, including pursuing transparency and accountability, are "persecuted"... Case(s) in point: Bradley Manning, Assange, and every other whistle-blower in history. I've said it elsewhere too, but to repeat myself: it does not feel like a safe time to develop network software, and even simple things that geeks do can easily be considered threatening or criminal. No, we're not talking holocaust or even abortionist-level persecution, but geeks still get treated differently. Ex: the very real possibility of 35 years for a nonviolent, technically simple, and arguably moral, scripted download indicates how discriminating IT laws are. As others have noted, murderers get less in most states. (15 to 25 years, typically, before time off for good behavior.) It didn't happen to me personally, but it's still pretty close to home and I guess I'm just not as convinced it's an aberration.
I suspect that I'm not making myself clear enough.
I don't disagree with you that computer crimes are prosecuted in a crazy way and that it's unclear that the legal community has a technical proficiency adequate to make the sorts of fine grained judgements necessary to identify "good guys" from "bad guys" (and all of the myriad shades of grey) so they tend just to throw the book at people. This is less a persecution than it is a lack of understanding imo.
Regardless of all of that, what I am saying is that the sort of crime that Aaron Swartz was accused of is not the same sort of crime that defacing a government website is.
As a consequence the nature of the protest that Aaron Swartz engaged in versus whoever has hit this particular site are materially different.
So when people say that Aaron Swartz was persecuted, I am sympathetic, but I genuinely think that things got crazy out of hand and under other circumstances would not have (which is why MIT's role in this is one worth identifying and engaging with).
On the other hand, if someone were to say that going after the guys who hit the ussc.gov site is persecution? That's not persecution. That's going after someone who's trying to commit a crime and actual inconvenience (however negligible it is) to others.
"This is less a persecution than it is a lack of understanding imo."
The same could be said of the sentiment that AIDs is "God's way of punishing homosexuals"... The people "throwing the book" at geeks are coming from the same place, as you have said (lack of understanding), IMHO as the Westboro Baptist's who I would consider "persecutive" of homosexuals.
"I am saying is that the sort of crime that Aaron Swartz was accused of is not the same sort of crime that defacing a government website is."
"if someone were to say that going after the guys who hit the ussc.gov site is persecution? That's not persecution."
I felt that way a few years ago watching the start of the hactivism stuff, and I would have said it was pretty cut-and-dry vandalism then. Today I find it harder to view this as strictly vandalism in light of the larger developing context, only the most recent of which is Aaron Swartz killing himself (to name, sadly, even only the latest suicide); Aaron's case in particular stands out to me as walking the line between vandalism, copyright infringement, and information/civil rights activism, blurring the distinction (to me at least). The lack of understanding, as you put it, touches all these categories and when I compare the mandatory minimums in the CFAA to the lack of interest in banking and financial crimes, for example, it feels a lot like persecution, even if it's also (in part) vandalism.
I'm not trying to be argumentative, just following my train of thought all the way to the station...
"Sometimes a law is just on its face and unjust in its application. For instance, I have been arrested on a charge of parading without a permit. Now, there is nothing wrong in having an ordinance which requires a permit for a parade. But such an ordinance becomes unjust when it is used to maintain segregation and to deny citizens the First-Amendment privilege of peaceful assembly and protest.
I hope you are able to see the distinction I am trying to point out. In no sense do I advocate evading or defying the law, as would the rabid segregationist. That would lead to anarchy. One who breaks an unjust law must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is unjust, and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality expressing the highest respect for law."
Referring to the Russian revolutionary period of 1905-1917, it becomes clear that provocation inspires hardline response on both sides. Each time one side does something aggressive to the other side, it is used as justification for the next, even more aggressive, counteraction. It is a pendulum that does not naturally dampen except without some kind of definite change.
So I expect see another Operation Sundevil beginning to play out, as the DoJ sees itself under attack and gains whatever authorizations to go after Anon hackers. This will doubtlessly inspire some level of strikeback, and etc etc etc.
Personally, I don't believe Anon's style of DDoS/hacktivism really resonates with the non-tech public. Anarchism is not a dance that most people like to dance to. I would suggest that uncovering clear evidence of corruption and crime, then bringing it to light via the New York Times/Guardian/etc (i.e., respected news sources) would have a much more profound impact on the general public. You have to understand the system to effect change on it. You have to understand the nature of the broad crowd and, yes, pander to what they will be energized by.
Phrased this way: No one "outside" cares about the GPL allowing rights to muck about with your computer code, it's all lawyer eggheadery. But if you frame that in a "repair" sense, it is obvious, of course you should be able to hire someone to fix your software. It's all about framing it to make it relevant to the audience. So it goes with political movements.
Many would argue that in Russia tsars secret police did not not go nearly far enough. Except for those actually killed people they treated revolutionaries trying to overthrow the regime very mildly. There is really no reason why people like Lenin, Stalin and most of the bolsheviks should have survived. In Putin's russia they would all be rotting in prison LONG ago, with big chunk being dead from accidents.
> Going after the United States Sentencing Commission website is beyond stupid. The federal sentencing guidelines were a helpful reform.
This is somewhat true. Sentencing guidelines spell out suggested sentences within, and almost always far under, the maximum sentences allowed by law (although judges are free to ignore them and impose statutory maximum sentences). A more appropriate target for them would have been the place where the maximum sentences are specified, since those are the big problem. The site also happens to belong to the body responsible for setting those maximums: http://uscode.house.gov (the criminal code is title 18 - http://uscode.house.gov/download/title_18.shtml ).
This is not a suggestion that anyone undertake any illegal activity - it is just an observation that it would have been a better target. I'm certain that an actual suggestion of that nature would yield significant prison time under these very sentencing laws.
Activists scratching their own itches aren't misguided. They are shipping.
Neither is anonymity cowardice. The DOJ won't treat those they catch as pranksters or respect their convictions of conscience. And other interests may not care how problems are solved. just that they are.
Face and big money are at stake. And all sides are serious adults
"Fail fast" is not really helpful when you have decades of experience to bring to the table. Humanity already has the knowledge we need to operate an effective popular action. No A/B testing necessary.
> You and your first world problems have NO IDEA how to fight for freedom.
Why do you think "Freedom" is what they care about? They have decided what rules the rest of us are to live by, better just to get out of the way before the doxx you or take other vengeful retribution on you...
TO start: I am not saying what they did is right, but I am saying you do not have a right to call it "Cowardice".
>The biggest problem with website-defacing movements is their cowardice (no one in Anonymous seems courageous enough to go to prison)
There is no right or wrong way to fight for freedom. IT is a fight a fight is a war. There are very few rules in war.
Many actual freedom fighters have died in places like Bhutan, Burma, etc. This does not make them superior fighters, this diminishes the power to the cause (because they perish and are hard to replace), prolongs the struggle.
I am sure you have seen more than most people and work hard and I am not saying you didn't do this or accusing you of anything because I do not know you enough, but your short essay needs to be more tactile in certain locations specially in this context.
You call upon Hacker News to grow up but must of your statements in your piece are childish:
>I know actual freedom fighters, that is publishers of opposition magazines and organizers of nonviolent protests, from Taiwan
>If you really want to learn about effective popular action to bring about more freedom, point your Web browser to the Albert Einstein Institute publications
>You and your first world problems have NO IDEA how to fight for freedom
>The biggest problem with website-defacing movements is their cowardice
WHY? Because staying in prison is not a tough guy thing. Doesn't make you smarter or an "Actual freedom fighter". It inhibits you to fight. I am focusing on the concept of a fight as you realize, a struggle, a battle...
You cannot know when it will manifest, when it will ignite and when it will finish. There are stages of undetermined amounts. Not to mention collateral damage. So if you think there is a "fight" here from the beginning, which, by your essay you seem to think so, please analyze what a fight is. A fight, battle or whatever you may label it, does not go through an essay out of some institute. It has strategical value and may come in handy at some point, but it is not a doctrine and going by it will actually put you at an disadvantage. So I suggest before calling people coward and claiming you know "Actual Freedom" fighters and starting your comment with a childish statement that literally translates to "you don't know what you are doing, I am the real deal", I suggest you read on Sun Tzu, The Prince, On guerrilla warfare. If you think there is a fight for freedom going on because what they do may serve a purpose that depends on the length, importance and tactical situation in the fight. Yes these are strategy books and maybe you will claim you are a peaceful activist and don't need these which is fine, but, make no mistake if there is a fight - there will only be one winner.
>There is no right or wrong way to fight for freedom.
There are two wrong ways to fight for freedom (or any noble cause): (1). to fight unjustly and (2). to fight ineffectively. Starting a fight is not without a cost to a side that loses the fight, that cost may be in lives, money or emotional energy. To fight ineffectively for a noble cause is to fight unjustly since you hurt your chances of winning, to fight unjustly but effectively for a noble cause turns a noble cause into an unjust cause.
>IT is a fight a fight is a war.
Not all fights are wars, nor are all wars fights (for examples wars have been fought to pump up nationalism or to test a doctrine with neither side actually engaging in real fighting. If you read 'The Prince' much of the wars between the cities of Italy are not fights).
>There are very few rules in war.
The appeal to a war mentality you are making is an appeal to as you say "few rules". This is both untrue in that most wars are fought within a large number of rules and limited in scope, most wars are not absolute wars, and absolute wars tend to consume the original causes for the war. Absolute wars are wars for the sake of war rather than wars for the sake of principal. To advocate a war mentality for the purpose of arguing that few rules apply is completely self-defeating since such a war destroys the original purpose you are attempting to achieve.
>make no mistake if there is a fight - there will only be one winner.
This is certainly not true, you can have all losers, all winners or any combination thereof. Who wins in a absolute nuclear war? Maybe invertebrates, maybe not.
Do not take this post as defense of the earlier poster.
> You and your first world problems have NO IDEA how to fight for freedom.
Flaunting your experience living in a totalitarian regime to scold those first world kids might not be as convincing, than, say, if you just skipped that part.
Someone else can always trump that "well, my family members were tortured" so "don't tell me about your experience".
> If you really want to learn about effective popular action to bring about more freedom, point your Web browser to the Albert Einstein Institute publications
Those are good resources and it is good to point them out. However the situation and the initial conditions in each country are different. What works in Burma might not work in US.
> ... before they were adopted, on the example of Minnesota's sentencing guidelines, federal sentences were just about wholly indeterminate,
Ok so how do you explain what happened and how downloads of scientific articles can result in threatening someone with 35+ years in prison. Isn't this exactly the area to attack, just because it was random before now it is predictably horrible. I would take the randomness again. At least then someone can point to the judge and say, this judge is out of control, they are responsible, they are ruining lives and wasting tax dollars.
Now they have a list of minimum requirements and they can all point their finger too everyone dismisses the accusations with "But I am just a part of the system".
The goal is not necessarily to remove the sentencing guidelines but to make them sane. You assume it the goal is to remove them.
> I know actual freedom fighters, that is publishers of opposition magazines and organizers of nonviolent protests, from Taiwan.
Again, Taiwan is not US. By comparing the two you are also implicitly lowering the standard and expectation for US. The assumption being "US is just like Burma and Taiwan, what works there should be applied here". I think first we should examine that assumption. Pretty scary. Here is a country that managed to convince most of the its population and those from other countries that it is qualitatively superior. Founded on unbiased justice, representative democracy, everyone has a right to happiness. There is freedom to prosper. And now we are left comparing it to Burma. That is interesting.
Absolute comparisons are good to conduct (when possible). We are still better than North Korea or Eritrea. So we are looking good there. But there is also a relative comparison -- between the image a country projects of itself (via propaganda, or what most people expect from it) and its reality. There is also comparison between the countries at roughly the same level of development (comparing Burma to Taiwan) but then also comparing US with say Norway.
In this case the most important is comparing US to the image most expect from US. Here the situation is not pretty.
Also, I don't necessarily agree with attacking websites, but I don't necessarily disagree it. If it reveals corruption, good, make those servers burn. We don't know what it will reveal, so I can't say if this is effective or desirable.
You watched that video and found it be credible? You are the fodder for their tomfoolery. Now I have nothing against pranks, but there is a legitimate cause here. Scientific papers from public funding should be freely available. Superhero gibberish, while entertaining, will not help.
I didn't find it credible but I believe it inspiring (for many).
> Superhero gibberish, while entertaining, will not help.
Superman, Batman, etc... No country loves them some super hero stuff better than Americans. I don't think anyone including the authors this this video to be a documentary, it is a piece of propaganda, a call to action. Do they expect the govt. to realistically accept their conditions and conduct an overnight reform of DOJ? I am guessing not.
If you really want to learn about effective popular action to bring about more freedom, point your Web browser to the Albert Einstein Institute publications
http://www.aeinstein.org/organizationsde07.html
and choose your language for titles like From Dictatorship to Democracy and The Role of Power in Nonviolent Struggle and others. Note that the main author of these publications has consulted with freedom movements all over the world and has had notable success in the Philippines, Thailand, Burma, and other countries, and is credited with much of the mobilization of the two-year-old Arab Spring movement.
Going after the United States Sentencing Commission website is beyond stupid. The federal sentencing guidelines were a helpful reform. Before they were adopted, on the example of Minnesota's sentencing guidelines, federal sentences were just about wholly indeterminate, making each judge could make up his or her own law of sentencing at trial. The Minnesota reform, which was the example for the federal reform, set up guidelines based on a "severity score" of the offense--so that for the first time legislative statutes from many different decades were compared as to the actual social harm resulting from each offense, based on community standards as of the time of the reform--and on a "criminal history score" of the offender, so that prison time was reserved only for the most dangerous repeat offenders. (Minnesota imprisons fewer convicted criminals than most states of the United States, being much like Scandinavia in this regard. Minnesota spends more dollars per prisoner but fewer dollars per taxpayer on its prison system than almost any other state.)
I know actual freedom fighters, that is publishers of opposition magazines and organizers of nonviolent protests, from Taiwan. Some of them experienced hard prison time while in the struggle for freedom, with family break up and ill health and the other consequences of imprisonment. But today they can look at a much freer country in their homeland than they grew up in. The biggest problem with website-defacing movements is their cowardice (no one in Anonymous seems courageous enough to go to prison) and lack of perspective (they complain about first world problems that they mischaracterize as important problems for the common people). It's time for the discussion on Hacker News to grow up and make more room for the real freedom fighters.