Disqus - Latest Comments for Hilarious

Re: The coolest things about being a designer

Hilarious — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 10:22:24 -0000

After 10 years working on an agency, the only one I can truly relate to is number 8!
The furthest away from my own experience in number 2. While being a student that may be possible, but, if I work all night is because daylight didn't give enough time to do my job, and I do need to stay awake while the rest of the world is, as clients, colleagues do tend to work in daylight hours. If anything you lack sleep, and you work at clients pace - but that my experience, and doesn't mean i don't love my job!!

Re: Tom Robbins On Psychedelics | The Cosmic Tap

Hilarious — Tue, 11 Sep 2007 03:07:23 -0000

Thanks! He also said,

"The day I ingested 300 micrograms of pure Sandoz LSD was the most rewarding day of my life, the one day that I would not trade for any other. To try to explain why it was so transformative, so profound, it would take pages -- and even then would likely strike the uninitiated as flapdoodle. I'll just say this: On that fateful day, I experienced in a direct, first-hand, concrete and thoroughly rational way that 1) time really is relative, 2) every daisy in the field has an identity just as strong as my own and 3) what we smugly mistake for solid form in our 'realistic' world is actually some strange fluid dance of molecular wonder. How could knowledge like that, lucidly demonstrated, fail to alter a person's life? By the time I encountered LSD, I'd already been exposed to Surrealism, post-Einsteinian physics and Asian philosophies, so the effect the experience had on my writing is difficult to gauge. Certainly, the psychedelic experience left me less rigid -- emotionally, intellectually and spiritually. This flexibility has reinforced my disposition for detecting screwy humor and deep meaning -- often simultaneously -- in some rather unlikely sources."

Re: Herb Chambers complaint, commentary & update

Hilarious — Sun, 03 Feb 2008 19:59:35 -0000

Really gotta love how HC employees continue to blame the customers, above. Perhaps you did graduate from UNC, which says very little about UNC given your writing abilities.

Re: 2009/02/12/free-public-record-search/

Hilarious — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 14:38:00 -0000

Personally I find this troubling, and I smell sock puppets big time in this comment thread.

Damn right I have something to hide - it's called "my own f*cking business". I believe a basic tenet of our American value system suggests that nosy snoops should stay out of it and mind your own.

Those who are so eager to forsake privacy, why not post your tax records, your monthly pay stub, full medical records, your full sexual history, your kids' names/phone numbers/photos, your measurements, a naked photo of yourself and your spouse, ad infinitum? Yeah ridiculous concept, you say? Oh so you DO have some personal boundaries of privacy. And you DO have something to hide. Ignore that tingling sensation in your brain, it's just cognitive dissonance. Quick, put on some Hannity to make it go away.

Many of us - I would argue most people under 40 who use the Internet - are not as willing to give up our privacy for the sake of "safety" and "reducing crime". If it's "public information, this just makes it easier"... well then maybe our privacy laws should evolve as well.

waitwait don't tell me... my stance on this issue means I'm an ex-felon, right?
Let me guess... kiddie fiddler?

Re: 2009/02/12/free-public-record-search/

Hilarious — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 22:42:44 -0000

@xenia

Thanks for your opinion that you "think it's a cool tool"! Good to know.

On another note: if you are such a strong advocate of full disclosure and open information, why didn't you disclose that you are Xenia von Wedel, the PR/media contact for this product, that you work for Tarpin Communications, and that your can be reached on 310-821-6100 x116? Is it not sock puppetry because your post contained your first name?

@alisa:

If the future of the web is that the button right next to "Add Alisa as a friend" says "read thorough every mistake, misdemeanor, and online action that Alisa has ever committed in her life" then count me the hell out of that Scarlet Letter 2.0 fantasy. My personal belief is that blindly cheerleading all technological development is disingenuous. Ethics is not law, and law is not ethics.

Innovation has certainly defined American competitiveness. So I naturally feel lame getting all Grandpa Joe Up In Montana Saying Get Off My Porch And Leave Me Alone about this. Half of me applauds the developer for testing the boundaries... so long as it soon leads to a proper discussion about privacy that would ultimately grant some privacy. Perhaps some good will come of it, much like when hackers break into something secure to show that it's not. But at the same time... this is exactly the sort of thing that does well when marketed using fear.

Finally a few questions @Karel Baloun, developer of this application:

Regardless of what I imagine is 100% airtight legality of your efforts, your application will encourage a massive rise in the dispersion of information that many people (such as your own friends and family) consider personal and do not want others to see. Before it was relatively more difficult/expensive to get this information. As a result, many people probably consider the information to be personal and private, as it is "protected" by a level of inaccessibility that ensures it remains fairly well hidden from friends, family, employers, etc. For the sake of simplicity, let's say that I have no problem with a theoretical application that identifies felonies, but I have a problem with your application, which lists misdemeanors. Thsi would including public indecency charges, getting written up for smoking a joint, public nusiance charges, getting arrested at a rally, and a number of other things that some ex-fratboys might consider to be "dumb stuff I did in college that is fully behind me now that I'm in my 40s and have a family" but that will nonetheless be judged by relatively more prudish people as "OMG I can't do a business deal with this guy's company now."

1) Why do you believe this application is a net good for society?
2) Do you believe engineers are free of the responsibility for any negative impact their innovations may have on society, and that the free market or government regulation should sort out any resulting issues?
3) Do you believe that current privacy laws are perfect, or does your own notion of what should remain private and what should be public differ from the laws currently on the books?
4) I'd guess that you have at least one friends or family member who have done embarrassing things that they regret and have long since forgotten, and this significantly reduces the barrier for anyone to find out about it. Do you feel good about this, or neutral?
5) Certainly many people - regardless of whether we've got "anything to hide" - do not like this service because it significantly reduces the barriers to accessing such information. Do you care?
6) Aside from making money, do you have any loftier intentions in releasing this application?
7) Why does Arbor Ventures of Casper, WY - the investors behind this project - lack any sort of online footprint? What do they have to hide, to use a previous commenter's phrase?
8) Your application was slammed today with the big PR push so I couldn't get through to access the record on you. I did find your personal email address by googling you, and I got your wife's name on another free service. Are you fully comfortable with other people reducing the barriers to accessing such publicly-available data about yourself, your colleagues, and your family? If not, how do you justify doing so to me and to everyone I know?
10) Will you offer us the option to block access to our information on your application? If so, will this be free or will be be expected to pay for that?

Re: 2009/02/12/free-public-record-search/

Hilarious — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 14:16:46 -0000

@ alisa

I feel this application significantly reduces the barrier to obtaining information that many people consider to be personal, regretful, or private. I'm aware that the information is "ALREADY PUBLICLY AVAILABLE" and admit that itâ€™s technically inaccurate to say that such information is private. However this application significantly reduces barriers to accessing this information in a way that I believe to be a significant, material erosion of privacy, which I greatly resent. When I share information on Facebook, I am reducing my privacy at my own discretion. TrueScoop materially erodes our privacy, but without our consent.

Allow me to use a long, rambling metaphor to illustrate my points.

To me it feels like Karel has positioned a TrueScoop binoculars stand, aimed right at my bedroom window, and posted a big sign inviting anyone coming in and out of my apartment to "Use TrueScoop to check out what Aggressive Pacifist does in his bedroom that he wouldn't ever tell you about. This would be good information for you to know if you are interested in being his friend. Also, I've got 24/7/365 VHS tapes of everything he's been doing in there since he turned 18, and I've highlighted the nasty bits in case you're interested. Here's a list. By the way it's free."

In this case, the information everyone can access is public, and Karel is just making it easier. Your devil's advocacy argues "Your window IS ALREADY PUBLICLY OPEN ANYWAY, there's no law against what he's doing, anyone could walk by with their own binoculars and gaze in themselves". And I'm saying, yes I know, but the fact that no one really thinks to carry around binoculars to snoop at what I might be doing is itself a barrier - one that significantly contributes to the level of privacy that I enjoy. Karel pointing TrueScoop at my window and conducting PR to my friends to get everyone to check me out is an entirely legal but unwelcome erosion of all of the barriers - legal, practical, or whatever - that constitute the totality of my personal privacy.

To extend the metaphor excruciatingly further: if I had the ability to put up a big drape to shield my bedroom, then this wouldn't really be an issue. I'd still be annoyed at the existence of TrueScoop, and annoyed at all the TrueScoop stands Karel set up for the bedroom windows of all of us Americans. At least there would be comfortable barriers. But my landlord (the government) didn't put up a drape (adequate privacy of personal information), and I feel that Karel - although admiringly calling attention to this fact - is effectively exploiting this unfortunate situation.

So to answer your questions Alisa, I admit but resent the legality and the "but he's just making it easier"-ness of Karel's binocular stand. I actually do appreciate that it called attention to my lack of a drape, and now I want new legislation that forces my landlord to install that drape... or to provide a drape rod so I can hang up my own. Since my landlord's got bigger things to worry about right now besides my drape, clearly nothing's going to happen very quickly on that side, so in the meantime, all I can do is complain about the binocular stand, and wish that Karel would close his national chain of TrueScoop stands and focus on something else.

For me, my ability to go around the country peering through binoculars aimed at my friends'/family members'/colleagues'/neighbors' bedroom windows might be useful or interesting in certain situations. But I prefer a certain level of privacy, and prefer to let others have theirs. While other TrueScoop stands might provide me with a small but material benefit, this utility is offset by the massive, negative impact I feel from the TrueScoop aimed at my own window. As I strongly believe that most Americans would feel the same way, I believe that the net effect of this application is negative.

regarding the semantic web - yes I do champion linked data. But I believe there should be some boundaries. The government should protect our privacy to a certain level and allow no one but each individual person the right to maintain or erode it. An example, apropos of the previous topic: I believe that society is provided with a net benefit when a list of offenders of the worst sexual crimes is publicly available. I do not believe, however, that society is better off when a list of every misdemeanor we've all ever committed or every debt we currently owe is available. If someone streaked in public 20 years ago, and anyone can click instantly to see that he's got an indecent exposure charge on his record, that is going to materially affect his life and all of our lives in a negative way until he dies. Actually beyond that, I suppose: when we click through the profiles for his great-grandchildren, we'll just be a few clicks away from the misdemeanors that grandpappy committed 120 years ago.

Read this http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=200... and ask yourself: is society better off because this information is readily available? Obviously, I believe not. I think TrueScoop incrementally brings us closer to an unforgiving society, where there is no such thing as a past indiscretion.

Perhaps eventually the fourth amendment can provide a legal case for the establishment of proper online privacy laws.

Re: 2009/02/12/free-public-record-search/

Hilarious — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 15:10:21 -0000

fervent opinion + screwed startup = lots of time to post comments to the Internets today.

@Karel

Thank you for your response. I very much respect your openness and willingness to engage with someone who is being so pointedly critical of your project. Though I resent its availability, I believe that your application is a necessary milestone as we as a culture and a country stumble toward finding the right balance of privacy and openness, and I believe it pushes the dialogue forward, which is a positive thing. At the end of the day, we all just want what's best for the country.

"I havenâ€™t always been right about my choices, but I have a deep ethical philosophy that I take very seriously. I think this app is good because it makes public information more free."

I do not believe that making public information more free is unequivocally a positive thing. Take your first sentence for example: "I haven't always been right about your choices" is exactly what 'guy who got arrested for indecent exposure 30 years ago' would say about that misdemeanor on his record. He made a mistake, he hopefully corrected it and moved on, perhaps it's 30 years in his past, he's married now, that was a different life, etc. Again, this *is* public information right now, but the reality is that it's well "hidden" behind barriers that you've just eliminated. Your application serves this information to his friends, family, and colleagues on a silver platter, and does so without his consent. To me, this is a negative thing.

"Whether too much information is public, for example records of home ownership and everything else the government keeps, thatâ€™s another question. We should be able to lock that down better. Iâ€™d support laws that give citizens full control over that public information, including all of the credit/financial and medical information that exists about us over which we have incomplete control. But TrueScoop isnâ€™t making this information public, it is just letting everyone know it is public, and have equal and fair access to it."

A completely fair point. If we had adequate protection, I wouldn't be complaining.

"Whether smoking a joint should be illegal is complicated question, personally Iâ€™m for full legalization (and possibly regulation) of marijuna. Iâ€™d like to see victimless crimes in general not prosecuted. That doesnâ€™t mean that people need to hide from me whether they smoke anything, but they do need to take full responsibility for their choices. I think society would be better if we all chose not to do things weâ€™d like to hide. This app is one small step to a world where it is harder to hide things we do wrong. That doesnâ€™t mean people with criminal records are doomed; I believe in forgiveness."

I agree with you fully on all of those points. I am a smoker, and have a medical card that permits me to do so legally, and I think that the current laws are silly. However, regardless of my advocacy, the reality is that I do not proclaim to everyone I know that I smoke, because I know that their beliefs on the matter might cause them to unfairly (that is, in my opinion) judge me in a way that would affect our relationship in a significant way. Heaven forbid I get stopped by a cop for some reason and given a misdemeanor for possessing - there's a gray area and this is entirely possible. Now I've got a possession charge for the rest of my life, and although I take full responsibility for my own choices, I don't think it's right that when I apply for a job at WalMart when I'm 85 that this charge will show up on my record.

So this is something I hide that I think is not wrong but right, out of fear of discrimination. I wish I had enough resources and power in this world not to care if this was a private fact or not, but the reality is that I depend on others for employment, and their contrasting opinion or misunderstanding could likely result in a stigma that would negatively affect me. My point is that people have their own reasons for wanting privacy. But in the case that we've ever in our lives been prosecuted for these things we don't think should be crimes - now TrueScoop makes it harder for us to keep these things private, and therefore further makes unfair judgment much easier to receive.

Re: 2009/02/12/free-public-record-search/

Hilarious — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 15:36:05 -0000

@ alisa

"But to your point..this is not about the app itself, the issue is really around what is and is not
public data. If anything, this app brings to light just how public our lives
really are. The heart of the issue again is the data itself. Illuminating that data
is not in of itself unethicial."

I agree. But this app doesn't stop with illuminating that fact. Illuminating that fact would be to design this app in private and then share it with a bunch of privacy advocacy organizations, congressmen, lobbyists, etc, in order to draw attention to this and to warn them that technology shifts have resulted in the erosion of privacy. This app not only illuminates but by nature does damage to the level of privacy that I feel.

The difference here is perhaps how we define "privacy" and "public". I believe "public" means not just "possibly accessible by the public" but "probably" or "likely accessible by the public".

Another long, drawn out metaphor:

I have a 1 year old son. I am cooking stew on the stove. Although there is some risk that my son could be burned by the stew, I do not take refrain from cooking, because my son is really, really unlikely to get burned by it, due to his height and his inability to walk or sale walls. It's just so difficult for him to come into contact with hot fluid or flame that I don't think twice about it. A friend comes over to visit and without my consent attaches a TrueScoop brand baby escalator that goes from the floor to the top of the stove. And then xenia, who was just passing by, comes over to offer her personal opinion about how awesome the escalator is. Sorry, couldn't resist.

In a way, the stew was already hot, all he's done is illuminate the fact that my home is not really safe. Unfortunately, of course, my gas stove is busted, and the flame is constantly turned on. So now I've got a pretty difficult situation... I can't turn off the flame, and the escalator is bolted to the floor. So now I've got the additional burden of keeping a really, really close eye on my son, and hoping that I can guide him to not burn himself, and I've also been forced by my friend with having to bother my landlord to get over here and turn that thing off. But he never picks up.

Re: 2009/02/12/free-public-record-search/

Hilarious — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 15:52:40 -0000

@alisa

Actually I don't have anything on my record... not yet at least.

Maybe the real reason I don't like this is because I like to smoke up in Golden Gate park and now if I get a ticket for it, it'll be all over Facebook!

As far as that "much better place when everyone has a hyper sense of accountability"... oh HELL no. I have lived in a different country where culturally it is like that, just because everyone is let's say 2 degrees of separation rather than 6. kind of like a big small town. there is much less privacy, and anonymity is considerably scarce.

It does mean less of certain crimes - much less, actually - but it causes negative
externalities in other less obvious ways. People are on the mean much more stressed out. The Scarlet Letter syndrome persists... people feel justified in stigmatizing anyone who's done something wrong, and people who do something wrong tend to feel that they'll never be able to shake the stigma. The country's suicide rate is astronomically higher than ours.

So I agree with you, it would make people more accountable, and it might make
crime go down. But people make mistakes, and life is a learning process. A society like this where the stakes of committing errors (as defined by prevailing mainstream opinion) is significantly higher is, I believe, not a net positive thing. It just makes it harder for mistakes to be forgiven or forgotten, either by the person themselves or by the general public.

Re: Java People Must Be Stupid

Hilarious — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 13:09:00 -0000

...And ruby people must be assholes. As this blog entry proves way to well.

Re: Java People Must Be Stupid

Hilarious — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 14:35:00 -0000

Pat,

I read your whole blog entry, and I found it arrogant, and mean spirited. I can make 101 arguments why static type checking increases code maintainability, prevents runtime errors, makes code easier to write when dealing with unfamiliar libraries, and makes tools more useful. I don't know how many times I have had a problem show up in ruby at runtime that would have easily been caught by a good Java IDE as soon as the problem was created.

Calling people idiots, and stupid because they think static type checking is a good thing is just uncalled for. There are many very good arguments for static type checking.

Re: Java People Must Be Stupid

Hilarious — Mon, 22 Jan 2007 15:18:00 -0000

Dave,

If you are the Dave I think you probably are (Dave Thomas?) then thank you for contributing the whole two reasons you can think of for static type checking. However, we all know you are not exactly an objective source when it comes to the Ruby vs. Java debate. now are you.

I was naturally exagerating when I said 101 reasons. But I can come up with a lot of reasons, which I will try to list when I get off work.

Re: Video appears to show US troops ‘kidnapping’ protester

Hilarious — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 15:42:11 -0000

Looks like a kidnapping to me. I'd press charges

Re: Videos: G20 police break up assembly at University of Pittsburgh

Hilarious — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 13:38:22 -0000

Maybe I misread--did the main page headline say "riot police" disperse students or "police riot"?