OHAI, Dnia wtorek, 3 marca 2015 07:59:07 piszesz: > On Tue, 03 Mar 2015 01:45:40 -0800, rysiek <[email protected]> wrote: > > I cordially invite you to provide sufficient funding to all the > > freedom/privacy/human rights related initiatives that are > > government-funded > > today. > > I'm not sure that cordially inviting an individual to single handedly > replace the 'funding' provided by a violent organized criminal > organization that can extract funds from entire populations under the > threat of violence, and also 'print' their own goddamned money is really a > solid counter argument.
Well, provide any funds, at all, at least, then. > Is the funding of FLOSS privacy enabling software a problem? Yes. Glad we can agree here. > Does it therefore follow that lining up at the government's stolen money > slop trough until another solution can be devised is ever going to be a > good idea in the long run? I would argue 'No'. I would argue "that's not an easy answer". Depends on many variables, and boils down to: are we hacking the system to have our way, or are we being co- opted by the system. It's never black or white, so it depends on a given situation. > Look at the history and deviousness of government infiltration of 60's > counterculture groups that were deemed a threat to state power. Timothy > Leary an FBI snitch [1]. Richard Aoki, the man who helped arm the Black > Panthers, an FBI snitch. [2]. And yet he helped arm the Black Panthers. > Is it not reasonable to assume that these FLOSS privacy software projects > represent a direct threat to state power? Is it not reasonable to assume > that the state is therefore going to try and co-opt them? Of course. > Say by creating financial dependence via a seductive flow of stolen money, > among other tactics? Of course. Does it follow that the state necessarily will succeed in co-opting such projects? I would argue "no". The outcome is not so clear, and I do find the fact that these projects *are* funded and can continue to deliver the great tools they do deliver a rather positive one. Until I see evidence of co-option (like backdoors in code or binaries, etc), I will continue to be cautiously optimistic here. > Look at this recent Pando.com expose of the BBG (Broadcasting Board of > Governers) which recently started pouring money into these privacy > projects via the Open Technology Fund. [3]. These people are not on our > side. > > Also, regarding funding as a method of control. What did the U.S. federal > government do when certain states were balked at raising the drinking age > to 21? They threatened to cut their federal highway funds. Every state > ended up caving to this demand. That's just one high profile example. The question is not if the state can use such a tactic, but if those projects will bow down to such a tactic. Again, until I see such a situation, I will consider such funding an option, as long as there are no otehr options. I prefer good FLOSS that is funded by the state money than no FLOSS at all. > It's simply disheartening to see how gleefully some privacy activists > accept the tainted govt blood money and then look hard the other way. I'm sure you, my friend, have a steady cashflow that is in no way connected to blood money, and I congratulate you on that. Not all of us are so fortunate. As long as these privacy activists do not bow down and bend over -- and I have not seen evidence of that as far as several projects discussed on this list are concerned -- I don't see a huge problem. It *would* be better to have them funded in some other way, but it's still better to have them funded at all. > Never mind that the money was obtained by putting a metaphorical gun to > the head of every person it was taken from. Never mind what the ulterior > motives are of the organizations which are lavishing this stolen money > upon the software privacy projects. Never mind the dependence this is > going to create and the subsequent influence and control this is going to > buy. > > The means *are* the ends. And when the means are corrupted, so are the > ends. Cool. So let me ask you this: if you can either have (in large part) gov't- funded FLOSS privacy-protecting projects, or next to none of such projects, what do you choose? -- Pozdrawiam, Michał "rysiek" Woźniak Zmieniam klucz GPG :: http://rys.io/pl/147 GPG Key Transition :: http://rys.io/en/147
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