Transparency as the key ingredient to saving the enlightenment experiment: recent examples!

"The best weapon of a dictatorship is secrecy, but the best weapon of a democracy should be the weapon of openness."

                                - Niels Bohr 

Through my nonfiction book The Transparent Society, I wound up playing a niche role in our crucial ongoing debates over freedom, privacy and the Information Age. It's an odd niche - speaking up for the cleansing and liberating power of light in our fragile Enlightenment Experiment - but alas, with a few exceptions, this niche was and remains almost completely unoccupied. Even the great paladins of freedom at ACLU and the Electronic Frontier Foundation and well-meaning 'privacy commissions' in Europe prove clueless when it comes to fundamentals. Like:

 Transparency is not only the one effective way to defeat cheating and despotism by elites... it is also the only ultimate way to stymie bullying and loss of privacy among 8 billion human beings.

How is this principle so hard to grasp? Reciprocal Criticism Is The Only Known Antidote to Error - the most basic underpinning of everything we know and cherish from liberty and tolerance to competitive-creative arenas like markets, democracy, science, courts and sports. In fact every 'positive sum' system that we have relies upon it! Yet, that simple fact appears to be conceptually so counter-intuituve that it is almost-impossible to explain, after 25 years.

Alas, I've learned that whining about it won't be persuasive. So, let's switch to recent examples from the news.

== Encouraging news... though it will take a lot more than this ==

First, a victory for our hope of human survival and justice:  “A massive leak from one of the world’s biggest private banks, Credit Suisse, has exposed the hidden wealth of clients involved in torture, drug trafficking, money laundering, corruption and other serious crimes.”  

These things keep happening as I predicted in EARTH (1989) - that ever-more crimes and cheating would be revealed by whistle blowers… 

…and that it will never be enough to truly shred (with light) the worldwide networks of cheaters. Indeed, that danger to them is likely one reason the cheater-mafias all seem united now, in desperate moves to quash democracy and rule-of-law. And boy are they desperate, it seems!

There here are the mega yachts. OMG the Russian oligarch mega and giga-yachts being seized almost daily amid the rucxtions of war in Ukraine. The amount of former Soviet state wealth that supposedly belonged to the Russian People, that was expropriated (stolen) by many of the commissars who had been mere managers under the USSR, who spent their formative years reciting Leninist-egalitarian-socialist catechisms five times every day... 

For every spill like these, there are likely ten that the oligarchs just barely manage to quash, just in time, “phew,” through murder, blackmail, bribery etc. Like the Epstein Files, or the Deutsche Bank records, or David Pecker’s safe… or a myriad other potentially lethal-to-aristocracy revelations that explain why the distilled chant every night on Fox amounts to: “Don’t look! No one should look at us!”

And yes, the one thing that Joe Biden could do, to smash this worldwide mafia putsch, would be to appoint a truth commission to recommend clemency for blackmail victims who come forward!

== Others weirdly calling for transparency ==

One prominent, dour Jonah-of-Doom, Nick Bostrom, appeals for salvation-via-light in apocalyptic terms via his latest missive about existential threats: 

“How vulnerable is the world? - Sooner or later a technology capable of wiping out human civilisation might be invented. How far would we go to stop it?”   

His only solution, utter transparency to a degree I never recommended, via a total panopticon in which all potential extinction devices are discovered before they can be deployed! Because all is seen by all, all the time. A bit preferable over Orwell's top-down despotic surveillance. But under such a simplistic version of transparency, yes, privacy is extinct. So will be most forms of non-conformity.

(If I just sounded critical, let me add that I agree with him about most things! Except the pessimism part… oh and the incessant implication that “I invented all of these ideas!!”)

Yes, there really is only one path out of these messes - through the cleansing power of light. 

And yet, I am convinced it does not have to go full-panopticon! Not if a few social trends continue, as I have described elsewhere. Still at least Bostrom points in the right general direction.

 And the fact that so many elites reflexively oppose it means that they are far, far less-sapient than their hired sycophants flatter them into believing. 

== NOW can Johnny code? ==

Re: my 'classic' article "Why Johnny Can't Code", here's a 10th anniversary video look back at the Raspberry Pi by its creator, who nicely describes the BASIC PC era, similarly to my essay (but British) - exactly nailing the watershed when learning to code devolved into sifting eye candy. 

And now the top tech companies seem to be conspiring deliberately to keep kids lobotomized from digging in the guts of programming. Why on Earth would they perfectly act together in such a way that ruins their own seed corn supply of bright programmers? 

I used to ask that question a lot in speeches at Sili Valley corporations. Their response? To solve (very cheaply) the problem?

Naw, I am just invited to speak there less.

 

== Notes of hope? ==

New polls show that Facial Recognition is supported by a majority of Americans: “Zogby’s polling found that three-in-four residents in Massachusetts and Virginia see law enforcement use of facial recognition as appropriate and beneficial. A large majority of residents of both states supported its use for finding missing children, prosecuting sex offenders and traffickers, finding endangered adults, investigating criminal activity, apprehending and prosecuting violent offenders and drug traffickers, and identifying individuals on a terrorist watchlist at public events.”

And now, another data leak: Leakage of 1.2 Terabytes of footage taken by Dallas area police helicopters stirs privacy concerns.

Surprised? Well I reiterate. The solution is not - not! - to try - in utter futility - to ban such tech. 

Seriously? Name one time when that worked? Or when elites ever let themselves be blinded?

Robert Heinlein said the chief thing accomplished by such bans is to "make the spy bugs smaller." 

Think. 

The flaws in facial recognition (like racial bias) that folks complained about were FOUND and criticized and incrementally corrected precisely because the systems were visible to critics, not driven into dark shadows.

Criminy, why is the obvious so counter intuitive? Within five years Facial Recognition will be a phone app that you take for granted. So why choose such a technologically doomed hill to die upon? Pick your battles!

 We must fight against Orwellian dystopias in the only way that ever worked, by increasing flows of light, especially upon the mighty. Looking back at power. 

Stripping the mighty naked and telling them to get used to it.

== Self-promotion or just worthwhile? ==

A Parable About Openness: Some think that the first part of this posting (an excerpt from The Transparent Society) is among my best writing. A little fable about the ongoing battle for enlightenment.

== And Finally ==

An amazing anti-jaywalking PSA that’s both entertaining and shock-effective.

Also... XKCD almost perfectly captured a fact about so-called “UFO” so-called “sightings” that I’ve been making for 40 years. There are about a MILLION-x as many active cameras on Planet Earth than there were in the 1950s. Those poor alien teaser guys have to work harder every single year to keep their ships fuzzy! https://xkcd.com/2572/ 

(Aside: if you believe these UAP 'tictacs' are super-duper alien 'ships,' maybe you should look at this.)

Also a really good XKCD about texts you don’t want to see: https://xkcd.com/2544/

And another good one about viruses: https://xkcd.com/2535/

And poignant, about drones: https://xkcd.com/2499/

And some perspective: https://xkcd.com/2481/

Finally... one of the best capsule summaries of the ten top logical fallacies... though like Mel Brooks I think there oughta be 15!  (No provenance, alas, sorry.)

More steps toward an open world

Okay, in this midweek roundup let's take a break to veer toward an area of "expertise." At least somewhat pertaining to what's new in the world of transparency.... but first...

== A troubled world – and the superpower in decline ==

We have a president who is “in love” with one brutal communist dictator, “on very good terms” with another, and utterly obedient to a brutal dictator who claims to be an “ex” communist, though surrounded now by mafia-oligarchs who were all – every one – raised reciting Leninist catechisms.  And now…

North Korea has released pictures of a new submarine that it could potentially use to launch nuclear weapons. If that’s the case, the country may have gained a very dangerous, stealthy ability to threaten the US and its allies — all in defiance of President Donald Trump.

The fellow behind the hilariously revised Trumpian presidential seal sells merchandise! Bumper stickers etc.  

== The killings go on... ==

All over the world, after the recent New Zealand mass gunning of innocents, citizens and journalists and politicians have called for removing a common incentive for these crimes — the perpetrator’s satisfaction derived from infamy. Generally by not mentioning his name. For example, this editorial in the San Diego paper using black boxes of “redaction” against the NZ perp. Yes! Only… I’ve been trotting out the same proposal for how long? 25 years?

Moreover, I offer ways to do it well - in this posting: Deny Killers the Notoriety They Seek, as well as this older essay on Salon.

Alas, the same paper did not follow its own advice re: a later week's Poway shooter near San Diego.


== The most important man in America is determined to win infamy ==

Speaking of historical notoriety.... look up a fellow by name of Roger Taney, who goes down as one of the most despised and despicable names in American history. That clear judgment of posterity is not what Taney would have imagined, when he was named Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. But before he died – knowing that Lincoln was about to be re-elected by a landslide - he could see what ignominy and infamy would be his fate. 

How is Roger Taney pertinent today? We must spread word so that modern Americans know about a horrible man who ensured there would be no way out except violent convulsion. His name must percolate, till the present occupant of that same office hears it over and over again. 

What happened in phase 4 of the U.S. civil war will surely happen again, if our current phase 8 goes hot. Which it surely will, if the blatant cheats empowering the New Confederate Treason are left in place. The parallels are chilling, and they need be shown to John Roberts, who may be the one to decide if we can get past the current crisis through peaceful reform. That decision – and America’s destiny -- is largely in the hands of the man currently sitting in the same chair.

Passionate and mostly-right and well-delivered, this paean to liberal progressivism narrated by Alexandria Ocassio-Cortez is worth watching and sharing with young people to inspire them. Of course it also vastly oversimplifies and oozes with sanctimony, and would benefit a lot if she credited both science and earlier reformers, like those from whom she borrowed the “New Deal” slogan. But before you lay into me, have a look at my first sentence. My crits are aimed at making her more pragmatically successful.  We are allies. And she’s a firecracker.

== A bizarre version of my longstanding demand for “war” ==

Long ago, I posited that some honest and brave developing world president might get so fed up over the trillions stolen from such countries by corrupt elites, that he would use a sovereign power of generous potential — declaring war against Switzerland, the Caymans and every other place where robber elites stash their ill-gotten case. (In EARTH (1990) this was the root of the “Helvetian War.”) 

And why not? Thousands of innocent children die, each day, because of these titanically evil thefts.

Oh, it can be more a legalistic than violent “war,” but formal belligerence allows seizure of assets and some other very powerful tools. Originally, I imagined this being done by Aquino on behalf of the Philippines. What I never imagined is this satire of the same idea.

“Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte wants Canada to come get tons of trash that was wrongly sent to his country — and he's threatening extreme steps if Canada doesn't clean up the situation. "We'll declare war against them," Duterte said.” Duterte is probably doing it for bluster. But maybe also to discredit the whole approach, in case some true leader elsewhere ever ponders… hmmm…

Some of my earlier thoughts on using "war" to end legal travesties:

     Re: Panama Papers: Secret Bankers be Warned.

     Middle Classes Rise Up.

And see the concept updated in a chapter of Polemical Judo.

== Philosophy (and history) and slippery rocks ==

See a fascinating essay revealing the admiration with which Karl Marx wrote of Abraham Lincoln. It reaches many of the same conclusions I did, about how Lincoln’s election could never have happened had northern citizens not been radicalized by depredations by bands of rampaging southern irregular cavalry, from 1852-1860. 

“Marx insisted that secession had been prompted by the Southern elite’s political fears. They knew that power within the Union was shifting against them. The South was losing its tight grip on federal institutions because of the dynamism of the Northwest, a destination for many new immigrants. As the Northwest Territory matured into free states, the South found itself outnumbered; the North was loath to recognize any new slave states. The slaveholders had alienated Northerners by requiring them to arrest and return fugitive slaves and with relentless demand that northern cities suppress and shut down nearly all of their own newspapers. They knew they needed the wholehearted support of their fellow citizens if they were to defend their “peculiar institution,” yet could only think to run roughshod over them.

"Lincoln’s election was seen as a deadly threat because he owed Southerners nothing and had promised to oppose any expansion of slavery.”

Again, now a chapter in Polemical Judo.

== The biggest of many scams ==

An important exposé from The Atlantic: “The Stock-Buyback Swindle. American corporations are spending trillions of dollars to repurchase their own stock,enriching CEOs at the expense of everyone else.” 

This latest Supply Side “voodoo economics” scam was the worst one yet. They are always sales-pitched as ways to get the rich to invest in productive capacity ("supply") and R&D... and both always... always decline after each SS tax gift largesse to aristocracy. 

This latest one avoided any and all efforts to target the cuts toward capitalization or R&D, calling that "picking winners"... but it did specifically encourage stock buybacks (banned by the Greatest Generation), which profited the CEO caste and inflated asset bubbles at the cost of company health. 

The screaming smoking gun is the metric called “money velocity,” or how quickly dollars change hands. If MV is rapid, then each dollar is working hard and the economy hums for everyone, as when a construction worker gets paid, then buys a lawnmower, whose salesman pays a grocer, and…MV always goes up with infrastructure spending, which puts $ in the pockets of workers who immediately spend it. In contrast MV *shrinks* with every Supply Side sham. Every single time. Why? 

Because the rich generally don’t spend much. Nor do they (much) invest in R&D or building factories. Adam Smith saw all this (in simpler terms), denouncing the tendency of most (not all) aristocrats to 'invest' in passive ‘rent-seeking.’ Another blatant example today is the binge of multiple house-buying by well-off families, exacerbating the problems of first time home-buyers.

Stock buybacks especially do nothing for a company’s health but plenty for the stock price, which CEOs use to cash in their performance bonuses. Read on. You’ll realize why this whole scam was made illegal by the Greatest Generation… and why the oligarchy so wanted the Reagan-Bush era “reforms. 

Snowden, Sousveillance and Social T Cells

==Another look at Snowden==

Wired has a long form interview with Edward Snowden: The Most-Wanted Man in the World. A must-read... as far as it goes. Only keep ahold of your ability to parse complexities and contradictions, because my reflex is always to point out aspects that were never raised. I refuse to choose one "side's" purist reflex.  So should you.

Let's start by stepping waaaaaay back.  I speak elsewhere* in terms of social T Cells — preening bachelor males who (in every known society, across recorded time) are seen doing risky things to get noticed — it's darwinistically advantageous for a non-alpha male! Because it has (across millions of years) elevated some of these risk seekers to alpha status. To do this requires a kind of daring, prideful ego and a willingness to throw the dice. 

Many harmful men do this… but also heroes. Indeed, it was best parsed in a song: “Every hero was once… every villain was once… just a boy with a bad attitude!” — or so sings Meat Loaf (brilliantly)

 in Bad Attitude. 

And just to be clear, we all have known young women who also fit this pattern, throwing caution to the wind, tilting at a windmill or plunging ahead to explore some darkness. Their courage is even greater, in fact, because Darwin is not standing behind them, pushing.

Ah, but different societies have chosen to harness this very human tendency in varied ways.  Most filled the ranks of their armies and navies with these adventurers, and made sure there would be enough fighting or exploring or risky trading to keep them busy, far from the capital. (Perhaps ravaging some other nation's capital.) We cannot afford such waste, in a nuclear age. And yet, our Western Enlightenment (WE) society - and especially America - have engendered a strong mythology of ego, anti-conformity and individualism, amid a population in which most of these young folks are frightfully well-educated. A combination that any other culture would have deemed very dangerous.

Now why would we do such a thing?  Ponder it a bit. Then combine it with the relentless memes that pour across almost every Hollywood film or popular novel or song... Suspicion of Authority, reverence of eccentricity, individualism, fascination with diversity and the other...  Can you even count the number of recent YA films that scream contempt at conformity, calling it a fate worse than death? 

These messages are so pervasive that nearly all of us have absorbed the memes into our bones. They are so taken for granted that we no longer even notice the relentless propaganda for these values, and instead concoct a notion in our mind that we invented these things.

Combine all of that and you get something so perplexing and counter-intuitive that almost no one has noticed or commented on it -- that our society seems almost perfectly tuned to engender brash, eager critics who avidly zero in on anything they can possibly find to criticize about their own society! 

YOU -- in your avid political opinions and suspicions toward some conniving elite or another -- you exactly fit into this pattern.  Indeed I say that with utter confidence that it applies (whatever your simplistic position on the lobotomizing left-right axis) to nearly all of you reading these lines, right now. Half of you are convinced you are heroic resisters against an oppressive establishment that is supported by the other half.  And vice versa.

 To be clear, across the entire span of our species, this has never happened before -- for a society to preach: "you, our children, grow up eager to criticize your own tribe and all its elders!"  Name another example! It may never happen again.  It may have happened this time only by accident. There are many cultures around the planet who believe this meme-complex is insane.

 Or else, it is crazy... like a fox.

== Applying T Cell theory to Snowden ==

To be clear: we need these 'T Cells' as we rush into a technological future.  There are so many pitfalls, snake pits, quicksand pools, mine fields and failure modes, between us and Star Trek, that the only conceivable way that we can evade the killer errors is by unleashing millions of avid, immune-system "cells" to sniff and hunt down every possible mistake.  Even when they prove wrong -- or to be exaggerating -- the light they shine is cleansing.  

This is not a fault-free process. In many cases -- like anti-vaccination fetishism or cretinous climate denialism -- the result is very real harm.  But the price is worth it, because in some other cases, this pattern saves us. And the alternative tried in 99.9% of other societies -- top-down hierarchical control -- nearly always resulted in horrific statecraft and inevitably lethal blunders.

Which brings us to Edward Snowden.  Perhaps you can see now why I approve of him much more than I do Assange or Manning whose revelations - when you look closely - were mostly boring minutia that did not rise to the level of "whistle blowing." Snowden actually shook things up… though frankly -- if you can get past your purist reflexes -- it becomes clear that he is a very mixed deal. Possibly a Russian spy from the start, certainly an egomaniac without much sense of proportion.

Indeed, his revelations showed us very little that was actually illegal at the time...

...though he did us a  great service, by prompting us to re-examine what should be legal!  A conversation that I have pushed hard -- in The Transparent Society  and elsewhere -- for two decades.

In fact, I do not care much about Edward Snowden's two-bit, sophomoric rationalizations (unctuously presented to us in WIRED as sagacious wisdom) or his “big picture” perspectives, which tend toward the cartoony, simplistic, exaggerated and banal.

What I care about is civilization learning the right lesson from all this. Which is that SNOWDENS WILL HAPPEN!

They may often be individually obnoxious. But they are also - in general - the overall a sign of a healthy civilization that is creating enough whistle blowers and exposing itself to frequent doses of cleansing light. These T Cells are manifestly like a necessary, recurring fever — one that saves us from far worse illnesses.

1) The lesson to citizens is to find ways to encourage the T Cell phenomenon by supporting whistle-blowing protections... but at the same time not to get carried away in every individual case.  If a climate researcher is exposed fudging data, that does not discredit all of science; it chastens scientists to watch their peers. There are many bad cops, doing bad things opn the streets -- so enhance transparency with cameras... while remembering that the majority of decent cops will be our best allies against the bad ones.  And if the NSA has gone too far, remember that's what we asked them for, when we panicked, earlier.  So let's correct that Snowden-revealed error by cranking up supervision.  On the other hand, calling this country "North Korea" only torpedoes your credibility.

But there's another constituency that needs to understand the T Cell phenomenon.  They must learn this lesson well.

2) The lesson to bureaucrats and sincere civil servants and members of the Protector Caste is not: "how can we prevent the next Snowden?"  You can't.  The real lesson is: 

"How can we create so much trust that citizens will still work with us and let us do our jobs, even when (inevitably) our files leak some embarrassing things?"

Even better: 

"How can we encourage a worldwide secular trend toward openness, because that is the sole condition that would bring true Victory."

What’s key is to make society so robust and honest and trusted that it can deal with such fevers calmly, without institutional panic or reflexive vengeance, or turning millions against their own, freely elected institutions.  That is how to play to our strengths.  But it requires almost un-human levels of maturity.

== Offending everybody ==

Yes, I am  the best-worst example of all.  In my militant moderation and ornery contrarianism, I side with no sides!  No matter what your political stance, I have doubtless offended every last one of you at some point, in this missive. And I am about to do it, once more, by yet again pointing at middle ground.

In this case, Snowden cannot get off scot free — a true civil disobedience hero and follower of Gandhi would not expect to! If the issues really are as profound as he preens -- and if he truly did this out of love of country -- then the consequences to himself should be his last concern.

 On the other hand, I look at him as an example of intemperate adolescent courage… the kid who screams “you fools, can’t you see?” and spills a corporate filing cabinet onto the street. (We've all seen the movie plot, a zillion times.)  

If Snowden isn’t punished at all, there will be chaos. But “making an example of him” can also go way too far.  And if that happens -- (listen carefully, bureaucrats) -- then the system will lose, badly.

He needs to serve some time.  

But I want him out by Christmas, next year. All right, the year after that. Maybe one more, during which someone ghost-writes him a book.  And do not pity the rest of his life, preening on the talk show circuit. This is a brash T Cell who already has it made.  He'll be an alpha at parties for five decades.

Come on home, Eddie.  It's what King and Gandhi would have done.  And how you're treated will either prove my point... or show us flames on the horizon.

.

== Lagniappe: What Government knows vs What Government Does==

We should ask which is more important: what government knows, or what it might do to us? Intrinsically, you can never be certain what elites see or know. But actions can be observed and held accountable, by insisting that all watchers be supervised, answering top-down surveillance with "sousveillance," the habit of a brash citizenry monitoring from below. Only category three seeks this precious win-win: preserving both freedom and safety. See my article: Check NSA Surveillance with Citizen "Sousveillance."

Instead of railing against that fact that there will be more Edward Snowdens, let's revamp whistleblower laws, in order to encourage in-house correction of bureaucratic errors. This would also let us calibrate where future Snowdens fall in the wide range from traitor to hero.

Sousveillance isn't just a response to surveillance, it is the wellspring of freedom.

* T-cells in The Transparent Society

 "The vital thing to note... is that the new style-social immune system thrives on passion, and even large doses of overwrought ego, but that hatefulness and self-righteousness are less beneficial. Viewed over the long turn, they  are often early signs of metastasis by a promising T-cell. Its transformation from potential savior into a virulent kind of predatory parasite. That's probably all right. As long as we live in a relatively transparent society, other T-cells will often swarm in to neutralize the danger....Is it too much to hope that someday perhaps all the angry young men and women will finally see how valuable and integral they are to a society they claim to despise? Would we spend so much time, effort and money training them to be rebels, if that were not the case?"

Fight Back Against One-Way Surveillance!

… first a couple of transparency-related announcements.

THEWORLDPOST looks like a bold endeavor -- a joint effort of the Berggruen Institute and the Huffington Post -- to create a news and opinion site suitable for people who might actually influence events.  Launched at Davos… it contains in one of its inaugural issues my appraisal of the NSA Imbroglio and how to fix it: Check NSA Surveillance with Citizen Sous-veillance -- monitoring from below.

Specifically, I dissect the 46 proposals made by the Presidential Commission and divide them into three categories… those that are for show, those that set up decent procedures… and those that might actually work, helping us achieve the win-win of a positive sum outcome -- preserving both freedom and public safety.

The European magazine ran an op-ed in which I tried (for the upteenth time) to explain the difference between two methods of keeping freedom -- hiding from Big Brother… or holding Big Brother accountable. And I will keep trying to explain till it sinks in.

Do see the end of this missive for more links to media that are paying attention to what might work.

== More transparency insights ==

As Americans have grown increasingly comfortable with traditional surveillance cameras, a new, far more powerful generation is being quietly deployed that can track every vehicle and person across an area the size of a small city, for several hours at a time. Though these cameras can’t read license plates or see faces, they provide such a wealth of data that police, businesses, even private individuals can use them to help identify people and track their movements.

And the debate continues, with this fascinating Pew Poll result: A majority of Americans now believe total anonymity is a pipe dream, despite wishing it were otherwise.

An excellent TED Radio Hour on NPR discusses many parameters for "The End of Privacy," and refreshingly only includes one of the typical whiners demanding "don't look at me!" without offering any clue how that might happen.  Instead, most of the speakers addressed how we might surf this new wave as knowing, assertive citizens. Yay NPR.

Still, occasionally something practical comes along to help individuals assert a little power over their own lives… here's an Android App that warns when you're being watched.

Just remember that each pragmatic measure of concealment will be temporary!  For example: Through a Scanner Darkly:  NameTag is an app for Google Glass that offers a face scanner for encounters with strangers. When you snap a photo of a passerby -- the image is sent to the company’s database. When a match is located, the ID loads in front of your left eye -- personal data that might include the stranger's name, occupation, Facebook profile…and possible records in the national sex-offender registry.  Of course Google disowns any relationship and discourages face-recog.  But the world of EXISTENCE is on its way….

…at which point your best hope will not be to hide… but to detect and know who is staring at you.

And they will stare!  From a vantage of 10,000 feet, the US Army's experimental aerostat (unmanned blimp) will cast a vast radar net from Raleigh, N.C., to Boston and out to Lake Erie, with the goal of detecting cruise missiles or enemy aircraft so they could be intercepted before reaching the capital. Tested in Afghanistan and along the U.S. border with Mexico, these systems are becoming vastly more capable.  In this test, only radar and not cameras will aim Earthward.  But be ready for the future.  And hiding will not be an option.  Save your anger and militancy for what matters. Again… nothing will stop us from being looked at.  We need to demand ways to look back.

Ah...  Aerial surveillance ... at 1.8 gigapixel resolution.

== On the horizon ==

Bruce Schneier suggests that the coming "Internet of Things" will open upon a whole new world… universe… of places for clever hackers to get into our systems.  Why bother trying to penetrate our computers, when so much is in the cloud and in the back and forth that we send-receive?  Schneier suggests we’re in for a security disaster as hackers figure out that it’s easier to hack routers than computers.  Worse, routers are made cheaply, at low margins, by companies that have no inventive to made them interactively update their security… the way Apple or Dell or Microsoft set up your home computer to do.  "The result is hundreds of millions of devices that have been sitting on the Internet, unpatched and insecure, for the last five to ten years."

"And the Internet of Things will only make this problem worse, as the Internet — as well as our homes and bodies — becomes flooded with new embedded devices that will be equally poorly maintained and unpatchable."

A very good point.  Bruce is at his best doing this.  Pointing to new technologies or else a lazy trend and (when he stays practical, without arm waved generalities) saying we need to talk about this thing here.

Okay, this is going to change those Hollywood chase scenes. The European Union is secretly developing a "remote stopping" device to be fitted to all cars that would allow the police to disable vehicles at the flick of a switch from a control room. Urgh.  Oh no you don't!  Not till we get people of our own in the control rooms! (This innovation brought to you by those UFO aliens who want to stop us all from using vehicles to escape the zombie apocalypse.)

An interesting and refreshing "yes, but…" turning of a mirror on a tell-all tattle-tale.  Mind you, there are good reasons to wish the TSA would just go… improve a bit.  But always look at the messenger, as well.

== More Brin-snippets ==

This 10 minute podcast -- The Role of the Internet in the Future -- about Transparency and why the Internet Miracle happened -- is one of the best excerpts from an interview I gave a European television station during a recent conference in Lithuania on the digital future.

Another excerpt -- On Openness, Privacy and Surveillance -- explains the most difficult concept of the information age… yes… once more time hammering on what ought to be obvious. That we should stop whining about how much elites can see… and instead be militant about looking back at them. And yes, I suppose the number of times and places listed here -- where media have asked me to explain this -- may in itself be cause for optimism!  I hadn't thought of that, till now.  Perhaps, indeed, it's getting through.

And this one -- Technologies Making a Difference in the Future -- talks about technological advances that have expanded what human beings can see, know, and touch.

== World Don't-Look-At-Us Day ==

On Tuesday -- February 11 -- the Electronic Frontier Foundation will join thousands of other websites and organizations -- plus millions of individuals -- in an Internet-wide digital protest, demanding an end to mass surveillance: The Day We Fight Back. Visitors will be prompted to contact members of the U.S. Congress or sign a global petition opposing mass surveillance with a banner that can be inserted into any site.

Let me be clear where I stand on this: "The Day We Fight Back" is an important event in one (and only one) way… in that it will provide society's elites with a metric for how seriously the  public takes the matter of non-symmetric transparency… the kind that only shines down upon the people with surveillance. I urge you all to take part, sign petitions and all of that.  Better yet, fork over a few bucks! Join EFF and ACLU and other orgs who offer to amplify your voice through the democratizing and equalizing miracle of proxy power activism.

Nevertheless… I do feel compelled to add this.  A measure of general public displeasure is ALL that this event will accomplish, for one simple reason. Our most vocal defenders of privacy and liberty -- like EFF and the ACLU -- are perfectly right to declare that these precious things are under threat! But those defenders remain generally clueless about what measures - specifically - have a snowball's chance of making a difference. Which steps might offer any hope at all, or any possibility of helping to stave off Big Brother.

"Don't look at us!" That is the reflex response to surveillance -- not just by governments but also corporate, aristocratic, criminal, technological and foreign elites. And it's worthwhile joining in that shout, as a conversation-starter. But there is not one example from human history when whining ever worked.

There is another way -- emphasizing our power to see and supervise and watch the watchmen. Sousveillance is the answer to surveillance.  The EFF and ACLU should be part of shifting the specific, militant demand -- not to blind our professional Protector Caste (which cannot even conceivably work) but to apply fierce supervision, which might render their omniscience powerless to  actually harm us.

Alas, I must again lament: this concept has proved almost impossible to convey or teach. And so we are left with the sole solution on the table.  To complain… and to hope that the Powers will be nice. That they will listen and nod agreeably and promise to stop looking… just a little.  For a little while.

Again, please join us all on February 11, sign petitions… and join the Electronic Frontier Foundation. I may disagree about some tactics and roadmaps.  But the intensity of our desire for freedom must be made clear!