Leveraging Collaborative Synergies

July 13, 2013 by mrpikes

Something that struck me from the latest in a string of revelations about the US Government’s massive surveillance apparatus is that the internal NSA employee communications sound just like the rah-rah stuff I get at corporate after a successful software release.

“[T]his new capability will result in a much more complete and timely collection response.”

“This success is the result of the FBI working for many months with Microsoft to get this tasking and collection solution established.”

“[T]hese two activities underscore the point that Prism is a team sport!”

What they’re doing is definitely evil, but it’s evil with an inter-departmental softball league and Bagel Tuesdays.

And hats off to The Guardian and their collaboration with Mssr. Snowden. They remind me that an effective Fourth Estate still exists and that it is critical to the defense of our civil liberties.

And then there’s this daffy broad:

It turns out that a NTSB summer intern provided the names. Best “What I Did Last Summer” essay ever.

A Win for the Fourth Amendment. Meh.

January 23, 2012 by mrpikes

I’ve been yelling at the radio about this more loudly and more often recently, since the press coverage has increased in The Supremes’ current term.

The issue is whether or not it is constitutionally cool for law enforcement to attach a GPS device to a vehicle without a warrant and then surveil that vehicle indefinitely.

It seems like such a softball question. OF COURSE YOU NEED A FUCKING WARRANT! WHAT IN THE HELL IS THE MATTER WITH YOU?

And this is how my mornings with the radio have gone.

Radio Personality: …argued that no warrant would have been required to follow Antoine Jones using human beings.

Me: 24 HOURS A DAY? FOR A MONTH? HOW MUCH WOULD THAT HAVE COST? AND JUSTIFIED ON WHAT BASIS?

Radio Personality: …arguing that, in instances where law enforcement did not have the requisite probable cause to get a warrant, the GPS surveillance could be used to help obtain that probable cause.

Me: THE SURVEILLANCE IS TO GET THE PROBABLE CAUSE? WHAT THE FUCK? ARE WE LIVING IN RAND MCNALLY, WHERE THEY WEAR HATS ON THEIR FEET AND HAMBURGERS EAT PEOPLE?

Radio Personality: …Dreeben, representing the Department of Justice, cited Katz, the ruling that people have no reasonable expectation to privacy on public roadways.

Me: BUT DUDE, IT’S MY CAR! YOU CAN’T JUST START ATTACHING SHIT TO MY CAR! DO I HAVE NO REASONABLE EXPECTATION THAT YOU WILL NOT ATTACH STUFF TO MY PANTS BECAUSE I BROUGHT THEM WITH ME INTO PUBLIC?

Radio Personality: No.

And so on.

Today, The Supremes ruled unanimously that the installation of GPS devices did, in fact, require a warrant (full opinion, PDF). And they did so in basically the narrowest, most tepid way possible. Justice Scalia, representing the majority, basically said that the act of trespass that occurs in the device’s installation constitutes a “search,” which is why it falls afoul of the Fourth Amendment.

If this ruling were an erection, Scalia would be saying, “This has never happened to me, baby. I guess I shouldn’t have eaten that second piece of pie.”

Justice Alito, in more tumescent counterpoint, wrote:

The court’s reasoning largely disregards what is really important (the use of a GPS for the purpose of long-term tracking) and instead attaches great significance to something that most would view as relatively minor (attaching to the bottom of a car a small, light object that does not interfere in any way with the car’s operation).

And I could not agree with Justice Alito more. While law enforcement attaching stuff to my car pisses me off, the physical surveillance mechanism is the least problematic part of the practice. Alito continues:

“…physical intrusion is now unnecessary to many forms of surveillance. With increasing regularity, the Government will be capable of duplicating the monitoring undertaken in this case by enlisting factory- or owner-installed vehicle tracking devices or GPS-enabled smartphones.

Per Justice Scalia, though, spectacularly and willfully kicking the can down the road, “The present case does not require us to answer that question.”

Typo Eradication Advancement League

August 25, 2008 by mrpikes 6 Comments

Okay, so this kind of sucks. A fellow named Jeff Deck, founder of the Typo Eradication Advancement League (TEAL), quit his job at MIT and went with his friend Benjamin Herson on a cross-country journey to correct typos on public signage:

What started as a wacky, quixotic adventure, covered by NPR, the Chicago Tribune and others, went South, or, rather, Southwest, in a hurry. On March 28th, Jeff and Benjamin corrected typographical errors on a 60-year-old, hand-painted sign at the Grand Canyon National Park (corrections not depicted):

Christopher A. Smith, a National Park Service agent (so much more respectful than Cactus Fuzz or Tree Pig), stated in an affidavit that investigators discovered that Deck and Herson were responsible via Deck’s own blog, which chronicled their exploits. Deck and Herson pleaded guilty and were sentenced to a year’s probation, during which they are banned from entering national parks, or modifying public signs. They were also ordered to pay $3,035 to repair the sign.

Having a mild obsession with signage myself (previously, previously, previously), I salute Jeff and Benjamin’s philosophy and mission, but I wonder if they feel, in hindsight, that they crossed a line. Jeff’s blog is currently dark, only stating, “Statement on the signage of our National Parks and public lands to come,” but there is still a gallery depicting some of their accomplishments.

Whether or not one has a problem with what they did depends on how one determines the value of a thing. One might argue that the sign in question has intrinsic value as art, whereas a restaurant sign with movable letters does not. The woman who painted the sign was Mary Elizabeth Jane Colter, the architect of the Watch Tower that the sign describes.

One could also argue that certain typos make documents unique, such as is the case with the numerous typesetting errors that gave rise to some highly collectible (and amusing) editions of the Bible, or the typos in the United States Constitution.