some thoughts on – the fourth
Happy Holday!
I have been working on some stuff for Client X today – hopefully I will be
able to stave off starvation for a little longer ๐ ASP and Access 2000 stuff,
some SQL thrown in. Nothing to challenging.
While I am here, I wanted to mention
a story that has me feeling physically ill in a way. What in the world has
happened to the concept of freedom in this country lately? It is particularly
upsetting that on the fourth of July this sort of thing should come to my
attention.
The paranoia level in this country is rising – and that is simply making it
easier and easier for us to allow our freedoms and protections to be taken away.
So what if this guy writes some disturbing stuff in his private
diary.
Hell, in my mind so what if he publishes it on the internet.
hell, for all I care he can take the time to learn Poser or Photoshop and put
out images depicting him raping anyone he damn well pleases. However, he can’t
do that at the moment unless he wants to go to jail.
Because even wholly
virtual depictions of illegal things seem to be illegal these days. In other
words, it doesn’t matter if you commited a crime or not – only that you thought
about it.
I do not, and never will, support the concept of
thoughtcrime. Ever.
If this man actually rapes or kidnaps someone, toss his ass in the darkest
hole you can fine. But as long as he is simply expressing ideas then leave him
the hell alone!
If it is a felony to write about something even if you don’t show it to
anyone, then it is effectively illegal to think about something and that is just
insane.
You don’t think big brother is coming? They can arrest you for what you
think, they want to
watch you all the time and they will do it all in the name of fighting a
boogeyman so upsetting that you won’t dare challenge their power grab.
Fight this stupidity, help the
Electronic Frontier Foundation
they are a great group of folks doing great work. Help the
NCSF, even though
some of their ideas are deeply flawed – I am not a big fan of "hate crime"
legislation.
Anyway – this is getting pretty freaky out there. Ah well… enough of that
for now.
My next big axe to grind is with
Microsoft :). I
ordered the Windows XP preview and dammit I haven’t gotten my ‘golden email’
with the download information yet. They are sending it our randomly so that
their servers can handle the load of all the folks downloading 600+ meg CD-ROM
images.
I understand, but I WANT IT NOW!
For a diversion, go read
this.