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Comment by gzavitz | Hacker News Reader

So you're cool with what the NSA is doing?

I don't think discussion here is particularly going to contribute to the voice of the public that would actually do something to change it.

Sorry for the fuzzy expression there, nothing better jumped to mind.

If you know of a place where a more informed and intelligent response is being crafted I'd like to know about it. The type of people who frequent HN are the same people who work in Silicon Valley and other high tech areas where much of this technology was created and promoted. Most regular folks I know don't know what to think about it and are waiting for leaders to come up with a rational and measured response that offers some push back.

In that context, I'm more pessimistic than that. I expect some push back against what I would certainly label overreach, but I don't expect any sort of long term memory or change to come of it.

I'm more optimistic because the norm for Americans through out history was for independence from government intrusions. The last decade has been an anomaly because of 9/11, when everyone decided to that safety trumped those concerns. The pendulum could very easily swing back the other way.

> I'm more optimistic because the norm for Americans through out history was for independence from government intrusions. The last decade has been an anomaly because of 9/11

Sure, just like the decade before that was an "anomaly" because of the threat of terrorism that became a concern with the first Gulf War made safety trump those concerns, and the 5 decades prior to that were an "anomaly" because of the threats associated, first, the second World War, and immediately following that Second Red Scare the Cold War, made safety trump those concerns.

And just a couple decades before that there was the "anomaly" produced by the First Red Scare. (The increasing intrusion of which, based on safety concerns, wasn't actually reversed when the immediate impetus faded, just as the vast majority of the increasing intrusion motivated by the Cold War, the First Gulf War, or 9/11 wasn't -- as well as some of that motivated by the Second World War, though some of the biggest intrusions motivated by the Second World War were, and you can probably view the continuation of the rest as a 'silent reenactment' motivated by the Cold War.)

Or, maybe the intrusion-ratcheting-upward thing isn't a temporary anomaly, but the norm.

Sure, these anomalies have occurred before after a major threat and in the shock over it, such as Japanese internment camps or the suspension of suspension of habeas corpus during the civil war, but the pendulum always swings back against govt over reach. You write as if the American Civil Liberties Union has done no good at all and it a hopeless cause.

> but the pendulum always swings back against govt over reach.

I don't think there is much evidence of that. Its true that over time some of the expansions of power are clawed back, but the overall trend isn't neutral with a pendulum swinging back and forth with a stationary midpoint of degree of government intrusion.

> You write as if the American Civil Liberties Union has done no good at all and it a hopeless cause.

The ACLU has certainly done some good, and I've never said anything about hopelessness (or even about what is desirable). What I've pointed to is the facts that call into question your presentation of a norm of non-intrusive government that is subject only to occasional "anomalies" followed by reversion to the pre-anomaly "normal" state.

Hope, in terms of realizing political objectives -- whether that's non-intrusive government or something else -- starts with recognizing the realities of the status quo, because without that, you can't tell what the problems are you need to address.

I wasn't speaking literally of a stationary midpoint. I'm speaking of the American character over history, which has been to throw off the shackles of Kings and oppressive religious control. I think that character is alive and well, although advances in technology may have finally have given those in control the upper hand. We may be waking up to that fact now. I'll concede that it may be too late for remedies, but as an optimist I don't think so. I think we'll be seeing a big uptick in interest in encryption, the TOR network, online personality obfuscation, etc... For a good example, look at how people are concerned about their health information and how HIPAA was born. Having worked in health care I can attest that organizations and the govt are dead serious about it, which those who wish to develop mobile medical apps are now discovering.

He probably just wants to read about development without 70% of the front page being about NSA stuff. I'm pretty new here, but as far as I know this isn't National Security News, it's Hacker News. Not wanting to see it on HN specifically doesn't mean you're okay with it. I know it's a big deal, but it's getting annoying to me too.

> as far as I know this isn't National Security News, it's Hacker News

For many of us, data information and national security stories inspired our early devops years. For example, The Cuckoo's Egg:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cuckoo's_Egg

This NSA story and all the discussions around its implications go to the heart of thinking around access to the world's information and how all humans relate to it, our work, and each other as global citizens.

I can think of nothing of more compelling interest than who has custody of our future, whether as info entrepreneurs, devops hackers, or "end users" growing up in this apprehensive new world.

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