1984
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You’re not just web surfing, you’re participating in an A/B test
Pretty much every time you log on to Facebook or use Google, you’re participating, as a subject, in an A/B test. Unknowingly. Without informed consent. This is how privacy and human rights are eroded, one click at a time. Worse yet, the folks who do this brag about it! Don’t believe me? Type “A/B testing Read more
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Even your doorbell is spying on you
In it’s unbridled quest for behavioral data, Google put microphones in its subsidiary Nest’s home security systems. Ostensibly for future upgrades. Without telling their customers. Who does PR for these guys? Jussie Smollett? Bonus: apparently Google was pushing privacy limits with Street View as well, sucking up local WiFi addresses. Tip from Stephen Green at Read more
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Amazon gets pushed back
Writing in The New Geography, Joel Kotkin gets close to one of the threats of commercial cyberfascism: Amazon’s grab at oligarchic power by siting a new headquarters. New York’s brush-off to Amazon was the right move, even if for a variety of wrong reasons. Like constructing sports stadiums with taxpayer money, the exploitation of the Read more
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The War Against Big Brother
Today I begin a series of posts of observations and comments about what I call cyber fascism, the harnessing of ubiquitous information technology to impose political, commercial, and social control over much of the developed and developing world. My first real inkling of the enormity of our situation came as I prepared material for a Read more
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“Security concerns”
But today there are reports that the British government has said that it will not offer asylum to Asia Bibi. The reason being “security concerns” — that weasel term now used by all officialdom whenever it needs one last reason to avoid doing the right thing. Thanks to Douglas Murray, writing in the National Review, Read more
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Portland’s Inconsolable Rage
Kevin Williamson remarks upon the poor sportsmanship of LGTBQQ* Portland Thorns soccer fans, and takes no prisoners: One can understand Portland’s inconsolable rage. It’s a second-rate Seattle, which makes it, by extension, a fourth-rate (22) San Francisco. Which is to say: Austin without the sunshine and higher education and tacos. I’d be angry if I Read more
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Cultural Appropriation for Me, Not for Thee
So some woke Chino-American gets his knickers in a twist because a Caucasian young lady wore a cheongsam as a prom dress. But somehow, I don’t think he had a problem with something like this: To me, women of color wearing Daisy Dukes is an especially un-woke cultural appropriation, since her TV brothers drove around Read more
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The Noble Lie loses its nobility
My workplace has a new President; based on his periodic pronouncements I’ve started calling him President Diversity. Notre Dame’s Professor Patrick Deneen calls this The Ignoble Lie: Meritocratic ideology disguises the ruling class’s own role in perpetuating inequality from itself, and even fosters a broader social ecology in which those who are not among the Read more
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Whether to ask the question invites an answer
The Justice Department and the Census Bureau are engaged in a kerfuffle over the 2020 Census. It’s all about a question of citizenship: “What country are you a citizen of?” With the inevitable congressional reapportionment that occurs based on the Census, this is a question that many states really don’t want to know the answer Read more
The Random Texan 