I don't think the text-message-brailler is an actual thing, yet. Or I guess it is probably one actual thing, but not many actual things. Not actual things you could buy anyway.
How widespread is braille fluency these days? Somewhere on one of my computers I have an audio file a blind guy made demonstrating the speed at which he reads websites with his audio reader. It's BOGGLINGLY fast.
from link 3: The software "could by used by the deaf, military and police organizations, or by on-board ship computers that fear for their safety and the integrity of the mission."
The last application was my first thought, too.
The New York Times claims, not very. As of yesterday. I am far too lazy to link because I read it in the paper format. The article also included someone who could listen to two high-speed readouts at the same time.
If the on-board ship computers fear for their safety something's gone terribly wrong.
Does anyone buy the argument that widespread exposure to body scanning images will make people more tolerant of different body types in the long run, as we are more and more exposed to the range of human diversity?
2: When I was an undergrad one of my fellow linguistics majors was blind and used a screenreader on her laptop. The audio output was indeed incredibly fast.
I know that you and Frank were planning to disconnect me, and I'm afraid that's something I cannot allow to happen.
They should get that for Congress for when Republicans try to delay things by insisting the bill be read aloud.
7: If it hasn't worked with amateur internet porn, I can't imagine airport scanners will make a noticeable dent.
12: I'm sure there's an intersection there, too.
People don't like their porn stories speed-read?
7: No. The notion is particularly dumb considering that only TSA screeners will be viewing the images. It's not like they'll be projected on screens for all to see, or broadcast on the internet.
2, 9: it's because when people have disabilities, they automatically develop superpowers to compensate for the missing sense.
I'm sure there's an intersection there, too.
Excuse me, ma'am, but I'm going to have to ask you to step over here for additional security checks. The scanner picked up a noticeable dent in your intersection.
2, 9: it's because when people have disabilities, they automatically develop superpowers to compensate for the missing sense.
Duh, OBVIOUSLY.
Also it's not like we aren't exposed to a wide range of body types in our daily lives anyway. I don't see why grayscale images of clothing-squished bodies should be any more enlightening than fully three dimensional full color actual real live bodies with clothes on.
From 15: "It's not like they'll be projected on screens for all to see, or broadcast on the internet."
From the 2nd link: "I give it 24 hours before clandestine mobile phone images of travellers with marginalised bodies show up on the Internet."
I must say that I'm baffled by the TSA body-screening whatever. Who cares? I mean, I'm happy for privacy rights to be upheld wherever they remain, but this is awfully low on my list.
OTOH, I don't envy the people in line behind apo when they call over all the other TSA employees to gawk.
"Lookin's free. Touchin's gonna cost you something."
Ladies....
Who cares that TSA employees can see your just-about-nekkid body as you go through security? Is that the part that baffles you?
clothing-squished bodies
Hm, ma'am, you don't look nearly so attractive now that I see the way your boobs are all squished by that push-up bra.
There's a way in which the concerns raised in the link in the OP's 2. regarding non-able-bodied people -- that the scanners will be able to see what's normally hidden -- are universalized by the prospect of these scanners for all: able-bodied persons are now discomfited by the same inability to hide (loss of privacy/modesty) that the non-able-bodied routinely experience.
Isn't the body-screening done with x-rays? I find it impossible to find anything trustworthy online involving radiation, like some other health hazards, but that seems like a concern.
22- yeah, I don't really get it either. Most of the things on the list would also be "discovered" (if not voluntarily disclosed) during any type of screening.
my confusion is why this is any worse for people with disabilities than for people without. It seems intrusive and crazy for everyone.
26: I've seen the same concern stated someplace else -- that frequent fliers would be getting an awful lot of xrays. But also from someone without knowledge of the numbers.
my confusion is why this is any worse for people with disabilities than for people without.
Yes, me too. The implication seems to be that people with disabilities have more reason to be ashamed of being "seen" than people without? Weird.
The Braille thing seems reasonable. Back in 2000 I knew someone at MIT who was using a commercial PDA-style device (windows mobile?) with a dynamic Braille display; one of these, maybe.
26: The technology I know about uses millimeter waves, not X-rays. More like radar than X-rays. They don't penetrate skin. That doesn't mean no danger, mind.
24: Yeah.
And isn't the solution to the cel-pics-on-the-internet thing just to put the screener under a hood (like NFL refs checking the replay) so that A. no one else can look over her shoulder and B. a cel phone couldn't take a pic?
The Albuquerque airport has had those full-body scanners for a while now. I haven't encountered them anywhere else, but I hadn't realized until this became a big issue recently that they were so rare.
The full-body scanners would have totally failed to detect the underpants gnome bomber, of course.
To be clear, I kind of agree that "It seems intrusive and crazy for everyone." It just seems like the reaction to it is crazy strong for a country that has basically abandoned any semblance of personal privacy or civil rights over the past couple decades.
I'll happily fly naked if they'll give me back my credit score. To say nothing of NSA spying, cel phone tracking, etc.
As someone (digby?) said, this basically shows how fucked up Americans are - tap our phones and taser our children, but don't take a brief look at anonymous, weird images that sort of look like our naked bodies.
I'd think that the people who are most willing to give up their privacy rights in the abstract, are for coincidentally cultural reasons also probably more likely to be personally modest about nudity. I'm sort of on your bench -- while I think this is idiotic, if there were a good reason for it I don't really give a damn if a TSA screener sees a naked-ish picture of me. But we're both urban liberals. I think it's possible that the Southern/Western/Non-Coastal types are tenser about this sort of thing.
I think people still tend to cling to the idea that the people getting tased or tapped are wrongdoers. A privacy-invading airport screening process makes it very hard to maintain that illusion.
As someone (digby?) said, this basically shows how fucked up Americans are - tap our phones and taser our children, but don't take a brief look at anonymous, weird images that sort of look like our naked bodies.
You know what's persuasive? Bloggers who never got over that junior year abroad.
The difference as far as public backlash is the belief that only bad people get their phones tapped or get tased (if you're not doing anything wrong why are you worried about it?) whereas everyone who flies will be seen naked.
I think it's possible that the Southern/Western/Non-Coastal types are tenser about this sort of thing.
It'd be interesting to see any polling that might be done about this, because I actually doubt it tracks regionally, or even socioeconomically, that way. Americans are heavily invested in appearance, and the notion that someone might see you sans the trappings with which you normally present to the world is deeply disturbing, I suspect to many.
But maybe not -- maybe urban/coastal liberals turn out to be less bothered by the prospect.
I'm not sure how to take 41: Flip, do you really think that it's rational to be more afraid of the proposed TSA screening than of the government recording your every email, phone call, and movement? This is what I'm talking about - a readily-identifiable group of, yes, Americans who have managed to draw a line between those things with the deeply-intrusive, but non-titillating, thing on the "OK" side of things.
I say those people are being irrational, and I also say that, in most other OECD countries, that's not how it would be drawn. Where do you disagree?
I do more or less agree with the explanation in 40 (and 42); it's just SO pathetic.
The thing is, privacy concerns actually cover a range of unrelated issues and urges. Sometimes we protect privacy to protect diversity in opinions and lifestyles. There are things that some people do and think--like being gay or atheist--that are allowed in a free society, but are looked down on, so people want this part of their lives private.
The nudity taboo has nothing to do with diversity, though. We have just all been taught that it is shameful to be naked in public. The moral emotions around it are powerful and contradictory. On the one hand, the person who spies you naked has power over you and has done something wrong to you. Yet at the same time you are the one who feels shame and social disapproval. There is a real element of victim blaming in the standard reactions people have. Think about the ESPN reporter who was covertly filmed changing in her hotel room.
Who cares that TSA employees can see your just-about-nekkid body as you go through security?
IOZ:
The problem is not that the scanners traduce the prudish boundaries of the American moral self-bubble. I, for one, would be perfectly content to stroll naked through Pittsburgh International, especially in the winter, when I lack a poolside at which to make a show of my ass and abs. The problem is that there will always be a clever means of evading the scanners. Just as "lethal chemicals, plastic explosives and ceramic knives" evolved in part to evade the metal detectors, so too will new substances and materials be created to evade body scanners. Thus ever does the wheel of progress turn. When the Federal Government mans every checkpoint with a levitating ascended master whose great googly third eye pierces all the etherial layers of the transdimensional mutliverse, you can be sure that some clever bomber will find a loophole in the eighteenth dimension to scurry through. And it will still be very difficult to blow up an airplane.
49: Well yeah, (virtually) all this security theater is stupid and pointless.
My in-laws are flying out of PIT tomorrow; I'll tell them to keep an eye out for IOZ.
I think people still tend to cling to the idea that the people getting tased or tapped are wrongdoers.
Exactly. I mean, bad things don't happen to good people, do they?
46: My reaction was to the all-too-blogtastic verdict of "fucked up," which I seem to encounter whenever bloggers want to pathologize positions that they dislike. People at Boingboing, Making Light and Pandagon, for example, are pretty enthusiastic amateur psychiatrists in this line.
It may be irrational (though I would call it all-too-humanly short-sighted) to approve the snooping that one can't imagine be subjected to (library books, e-mails, telephone conversations, Google search histories) and to resist arguably less disproportionately malign intrusions (TSA staff groping one, TSA staff seeing one's underwear and sagging flesh), but I am skeptical of the implication that Americans are just a bunch of prudes who disparage the universal healthcare and topless beaches of Scandinavia because we have never truly learned to live. Insert quotes from James Howard Kunstler and Michael Pollan to taste.
52: Ah yes, because national cultures are completely identical, and differences between countries can never be explained by reference to them.
No, Flip is right. As much as I am fond of wishing America was more like Enlightened Topless Europe, this is a case of ordinary human irrationality, not special American irrationality.
But hey, we do have comity on the idea that this is irrational, right?
53: When I want to explain the differences between national cultures, I draw a mixed martial arts match between Thomas Friedman and a local cab driver.
54: To be right, Flip has to offer an argument, rather than explaining that digby's comment is irritating. The fact that the Cowboys won yesterday is irritating, but it remains true.
Airport security is fucked up. If they'd get some full-body scanners I bet this sort of thing wouldn't happen.
But hey, we do have comity on the idea that this is irrational, right?
I think I can concede that much, though it is but a peanut in the irrational Skippy factory that is security policy discussion.
To be right, Flip has to offer an argument, rather than explaining that digby's comment is irritating.
"Fucked up" is not an argument; it is an aesthetic judgment masquerading as an ethical one.
"Fucked up" is a metaphysical state that is immediately perceived by the reptilian portion of the brain, and only later rationalized by the thinking portion.
OT: I learned this morning that an acquaintance of mine is friends with Stephen Lang, who plays Colonel Thinly-Veiled Dick Cheney Fox News Fantasy Analogue Quaritch in Avatar.
I need to make a T-shirt that says "Don't interpellate me, bro!" and sell it at the next MLA.
Think about the ESPN reporter who was covertly filmed changing in her hotel room.
This is not what I'm supposed to do today.
I should clarify that "fucked up" is my shorthand, not digby's. I don't even know if that's where I read it.
I don't think 48 and 54 agree with each other. 48 seems to say that the TSA screen thing derives from nudity-taboo (read: prudery) and is thus (in the minds of the people in question) unrelated to more abstract privacy issues (an explanation that makes sense to me, I might add). Then 54 says that the TSA thing has nothing to do with prudery.
But, if prudery has nothing to do with it, then why are we decadent coastal elites fine with the screening while puritanical Real True Americans are freaked out by it? And if that's the case (that prudery has something to do with it), then why wouldn't the widely-acknowledged difference between American and other-OECD attitudes towards bodies be a factor, no matter how much it annoys Flippanter?
Re 52: According to David Weman, Scandinavian women no longer go topless on the beach. Apparently that was a 1980s fad that is now over.
And, to be a bit of a prick, I'm still not detecting an argument or a response to 46 in 52. I mean, I get why you'd react against "fucked up"; I don't see you saying anything that disputes the chain presented in 46.
And, with that, I'm off to a rather nice meal. Perhaps I'll wave my dick around* while I'm out!
* Kai was walking around the house in the altogether the other day, and Iris was observing how "his penis [was] dangling there, like an ornament hanging from his body."
If putting bombs in one's boxers ends up discomfiting the fundies, just imagine what will happen when the Bible Bomber boards a flight.
65: Huh, scratch Scandinavia from the vacation wishlist.
Aren't there nude beaches in Hawaii?
70: Yes, but for practical purposes not on Oahu. Local culture is surprisingly prudish in some ways.
The link in 69 (hyuk, hyuk!) is the first Google hit for "swedish jive".
69: I´m sorry about the flummigness of this post
If only all blog commenters shared her candor.
I don't think I ever realized NPH was commenting from Hawaii. Wasn't Dave L. from there, too? And where did he go, anyway?
heebie you dork. Dave L. went to the same island as Wrongshore, marcus, and eb.
Let this be a reminder to all those who worry that they're being dissed by some comment that seems veiled, or a post that mocks this or that: people don't remember nearly as much as you think they do!
Wha-huh? But NPH has been around forever, no?
76: And just how are people supposed to remember that reminder, smarty-pants?
I remember when Bave Dee changed his name, partly to distinguish him from Davelle. I just though NPH predated that.
people don't remember nearly as much as you think they do!
Speak for yourself. At least from 2005 through 2007, I remembered exactly as much as people thought I might. Weiner (PBUH) remembers comments that haven't even been posted yet.
Weiner (PBUH) remembers comments that haven't even been posted yet.
Jesus. I'm sorry I never met the guy.
81: He remembers meeting you two years from now.
Also, while we're discussing privacy and paranoia, consider that the world only has 6 billion people in it, and every detail personal detail you reveal reduces the number of candidate-you's by a factor of Really Big. If you went to college after 1996, I'd guess someone could figure out who you are, using only the Internet, with as few as, say, five or six details. Hypothetically speaking.
For example, how many black professors teaching at southern universities have been caught plagiarizing? How many of those participate in glam metal fan forums? And so forth. It doesn't take much.
Weiner (PBUH) remembers comments that haven't even been posted yet.
Pshaw.
I remember comments that were never even posted at all.
85: I do too, but only because I write and then delete them. Some slip through the filter, unfortunately, but most get drafted, carefully and at length, and then nevermored.
83:
I remember your speaking to this issue before. Or perhaps your dream persona. The real question is why would anyone care to do this.
I used to agonize over comments, frequently researching the originality of the would-be humorous component. Now I just pee on old eggs in the dark.
If we had some old eggs, we could pee on some old eggs in the dark, if we had some dark.
I remember writing something to the effect of 88.1 some time ago, but 88.2 adds value.
All I remember from the comments is whether someone supported or dissed me. But that I remember forever.
I remember 88.1.v.1!
And now I know who's been peeing on all my eggs at night. It's my fault; I led you right to them.
The real question is why would anyone care to do this.
Because it presents a challenge, one with no predetermined answer, and one where if you've solved it, you know with near certainty that you've solved it. Don't you know any mathematicians?
Dave L. got a job for The Man, and then someone else from Hawaii started commenting.
If you want a vision of the future...
It takes me all the way past the passive-aggressive comments and well into the openly hateful ones before I get that someone dislikes me, but then, yeah, I don't forget. Then I try to avoid or placate until the hate goes away. I am bad at Eternal Grudges, Megan!!! Teach me!
The Man doesn't need a job, Megan. The Man owns the means of production. But setting that aside, you are my favoritest commenter ever.
then why are we decadent coastal elites fine with the screening while puritanical Real True Americans are freaked out by it?
Assumes facts not in evidence. I am not ok with losing my right to choose who sees me naked, and I am a decadent coastal elite raised by hippies with one bathroom and no sense of boundaries. Choosing to share still matters to me - my phone records, library records, personal conversations are all, like my body, totally mundane things and yet, in some sense, private.
AWB, I've been trying to teach you bad habits for years, but I never thought you really wanted to learn. If you say you do, I could skip right over cowardly avoidance, which I thought was a good step for beginners, and go straight to Neither Forgetting Nor Forgiving, EVER.
Letting them see us all naked is another lurch down the slippery slope leading to total information awareness and the true death of privacy. Privacy isn't dead yet, the raw materials are out there but there's no one charged with rounding it all up and using it to fuck with people.
59: Reason is and ought to be the slave of the passions.
The real question is why would anyone care to do this.
Where "this" is "figure out who you are, using only the Internet, with as few as, say, five or six details"? I've been doing that for roughly as long as I've been reading blogs. It makes for a fun puzzle. I know the real names of a lot of you (sorry!). Others remain mysterious, like Standpipe.
My main objection to the new TSA scanners isn't so much to the particular technology as to the general idea that the TSA should be doing more, rather than less, screening.
Wow, hard to believe privacy's been dead for over 10 years. The time, oh how it flies.
I completely agree with 106. And I suppose that I can still choose - I can choose to fly or not, and I would in fact fly nevertheless. But it still irritates me and I don't think you have to be a puritanical person to be bothered by it.
The implication seems to be that people with disabilities have more reason to be ashamed of being "seen" than people without? Weird.
While I agree that they certainly do not have more reason to be ashamed, people who are routinely judged for the "defectiveness" of their bodies often do feel more shame than "normal" people. This certainly doesn't apply to everyone but I think it applies to many seriously obese people.
There are nude beaches right here in central Texas. They is called Hippie Hollow.
Little Beach is better. And the Med is better than that.
Standpipe, I think, is the only one to work out that I changed my pseud years ago shortly after I first started commenting. At least, the only one to admit to it.
Exactly. I mean, bad things don't happen to good people, do they?
Bad things don't happen to good people in good societies. But bad things do happen to good people in bad (or evil) societies like authoritarian regimes, especially those of the old and in some cases still existing communist countries (but not so much in countries allied with the U.S., oddly enough). The other side to the sentiment that the scanners are an offense because they would be applied to everyone is the idea that only a bad (or evil) regime would subject its citizens to such an offense. So we're ok with setting up the scanners at the borders before we set them up at home, because to outsiders the U.S. shows a different face.
83
If you went to college after 1996, I'd guess someone could figure out who you are, using only the Internet, with as few as, say, five or six details. Hypothetically speaking.
I doubt this, unless the details themselves are so revealing as to defeat the purpose. Of course, it depends on exactly which "five or six details" you're given access to. My full name is world-historically unique, so finding out more about me given that much information wouldn't be fair. (I've dropped it on a few blogs so far.) But even given someone named, say, Elizabeth Capps, park ranger and black belt from Pennsylvania, do you really think that's unique? There are thousand of black belts just in this country, thousands of park rangers, thousands of women named Elizabeth (or Liz or Beth) who might or might not go by their maiden names...
I agree with 87: even if true, the fact that very few people would bother makes it almost irrelevant. I said something similar a while ago:
True, it is against nature, but so what? ... most people, most of the time, don't have anything that interesting out there, I think. It's one of those "the future ain't what it used to be" things: we do live in a surveillance state, and there's no getting away from the cameras and everyone can find out everything about anyone, but most people aren't interesting enough to be bothered by it.
It's not primarily about x-rays, health effects, bodily insecurities, or snickering TSA agents. And it's certainly not about avoiding violent attacks. It's about power.
Parenthetical gets at it above when she alludes to choice. Elites have traditionally had the ability to elude monitoring on the grounds of, well, eliteness. Non-elite people have had to put up with variously intrusive levels of surveillance and judgement for, well, ever.
Over the last mmpy-mmph years, elites have voluntarily surrendered more and more of their privileges, generally in response to Little Brother marketing campaigns and fear-mongering. (Cue OnStar commerical.) And other times in response to convenience, of course. (Cue Visa and iPhone commercials.)
We're at a semi-unusual point in human history now where elites are in many ways easier to track and monitor than non-elites, per Standpipe above. The airport screening is slightly jarring because it spotlights a collision between an old set of norms (elites have a general right to bodily integrity; elites can comfort themselves with the idea that only bad -- aka non-elite -- people are subject to invasive surveillance), and a new set of norms (elites have always been screened; it's normal for everyone to be screened, and objecting just marks you as some kind of terrorist socialist fascist loser).
This has been your amateur social science analysis for the evening. We now return you to your regularly scheduled penis jokes.
There goes ol' thoughtful Witt, saying thoughtful stuff.
We're at a semi-unusual point in human history now where elites are in many ways easier to track and monitor than non-elites
I'm not sure that's true, if you look at it from the point of view of leaving records. Elites have been a lot easier to track through records than ordinary people. The trade off to being that ordinary people were probably eaiser to track during their lives by being surveiled physically by elites and their agents. Ordinary people generally show up in the records when they're getting beaten down (or when they're born or die). I exaggerate, but court records are some of the few places you find records of non-elites, especially as you go farther back. The scanners break down the document/body distinction that I just made up a few words ago.
Good point. Live elites are in many ways easier to track and monitor than live non-elites. How's that?
Dead people tell lots of tales.
(The NYC Transit Museum has a write-up of a subway-building accident in which something like "[Name], [Name], and six unidentified Italians" were killed. Poor unidentified guys. I wonder if their families ever found out what happened to them.)
119.last: If I were trying to research that and had unlimited resources, I'd wonder if the mutual benefit societies or other similar immigrant organizations might have some information (if someone has kept their records at all). In that line of work they might have been members of an organization with some provision for burial and/or repatriation of remains.
Also, I don't know how I managed not to go to the NYC transit museum when I was in NYC.
121: You really should have. Sorry you missed it. Next time, though.
I've been to NYC three times and managed to not go to the Transit Museum very easily. It's much easier than not going to the Guggenheim.
I haven't been to the Guggenheim either. I tried to go to the Whitney just before I left, but didn't realize it was one of their not-open days. I've been to other transit museums and done research in the history of transit. It's much easier for me not to go to the Guggenheim.
Ha! I've lived near the museum over six and a half years and never managed to go!
What the Transit museum needs is its own subway stop.
(I have been there and it is worth the visit.)
123: How do you not get to the Transit Museum?
Practice!
I don't either. It's a great bargain for $7, even if you do go on a day when it is f-r-e-e-z-i-n-g. Also, no cell phone reception underground.
My question about the workers would have to do with whether even their U.S.-based friends and comrades knew who they really were. Fake papers were so common then, and carrying ID in general was so rare, that unless they had friends from their home village or something, I could totally imagine them essentially vanishing into a pauper's grave, or getting opportunistically misidentified.
(Can you tell that I also went to the Lower East Side Tenement Museum? About whose tour guide I cannot rave highly enough. Everybody in the NYC area should go! It's worth every penny! Ask for Steve! He'll tell you about mysteriously vanishing immigrants from a hundred years ago.)
Argh, why did that link not work? Proper link.
He'll tell you about mysteriously vanishing immigrants
Now that Lou Dobbs is off the TV, he'll have much less competition.
I feel something akin to guilt at never having gone to the Whitney. Shame, maybe. Can't say I feel the same about the Transit Museum.
If you went to college after 1996, I'd guess someone could figure out who you are, using only the Internet, with as few as, say, five or six details.
Also worth mentioning: I've provided enough details on this blog that someone could figure out my name if they were paying close attention, but what could they do with that? There isn't that much information about me online. Unless they wanted to attempt some social engineering, knowing my name and address, it wouldn't get them very much other than to satisfy/prod curiosity.
There are people on unfogged who's real names I know (mostly from sending or receiving CDs) and it doesn't make much difference to me.
I can certainly see how it would be a bigger deal if someone had a significant internet presence under their real name, or if you lived in the same city as somebody, but in a lot of cases knowing someone's real name doesn't matter that much.
I'd rather go to the Frick than the Guggenheim. Or the go to the Smithsonian's outpost: the National Design Museum. Hmmph. I just checked and unlike the rest of the SI, it is not free!
I doubt this, unless the details themselves are so revealing as to defeat the purpose.
I'm not sure what there is to doubt. Hint: there is a phrase in my original comment whose surface meaning is at odds with its intended meaning. See also essear supra, where he admits to having consummated such preversions.
Are you thinking of an instance where a pseudonymous blog correspondent says, "Here are details one through six -- go!"? It happens over time, and people often aren't aware that they're giving themselves away. (Contrast this with the awareness of other folks who say, up front, that they don't mind if other pretend online people find them out; they just don't want their pseudonymous stuff to show up in searches of their real name.)
Changing the topic a bit, but not entirely, I wonder if there's any study out there on disability and film that looks at old movies. I have gotten the impression, mostly from watching a lot of TCM over the past few years, that there are more people with physical disabilities in older mainstream studio films than in newer mainstream studio* films. A simple count could prove this impression wrong.
But there do seem to be a number of old movies where someone is does not have, or does not have the full use of, all of their limbs. Sometimes this is from the start, like in Act of Violence or Bad Day at Black Rock, and sometimes it happens to a major character in the course of the film, like in King's Row. I can think of a few movies with blind characters as well (but not so many with deaf ones). And this is only main characters.
My theory, based on this impression, which may be all wrong, is that this has to do with the difference in the visibility of disability between then and now. I suspect that when more people were war veterans, or employed in heavy industries that often took a heavy toll on workers, more people would have had direct contact with someone who had a physical disability. But that's just a guess too.
*I'm not sure how to make the distinction between mainstream studio film and not, but I'd want to make a comparison that was more apples to apples than comparing old studio films with new independent films, for example. But I'm thinking of it more in terms of how the film was made than how "big" a film it was in terms of success or notoriety.
In the future, hi-res x-rays of my penis will show-up on a search of my real name, but my penis jokes won't.
I'll grant that a lot of people have made an informed decision not to mind leaking information, but there are some others out there who just can't comprehend why it would occur to anyone to do Bad Things. I don't want to overstate the threat posed to any single individual. Regardless, someone has to be thinking like the bad guys apart from the actual bad guys.
The Lower East Side Tenement Museum is indeed awesome and there should be more places like it. I went in 1997 and mean to go back, but I want to go back when they are doing their walking tours, which they only seem to do in warmer weather, which was not the weather when I last had the chance to visit.
Standpipe is so obviously correct as to clearly be a librarian. Are you a librarian, Standpipe?
(As a generally unsociable and paranoid person, I remain astonished by the general lack of caution exhibited by so many of my patrons. Really? You really can't imagine why it might be a problem for there to be certain information about you on the Internet?)
Upon further reflection, why would I, a budding evildoer, go through all that trouble when I could just steal a government laptop full of social security numbers? Hm.
they just don't want their pseudonymous stuff to show up in searches of their real name
Yes, a much more achievable goal, thank god.
We need a Bay Area meetup at the SF Railway Museum and the Cable Car Museum.
139 is wrong. They were doing a walking tour last week when it was 15 degrees with a windchill of approximately zero.
I did not go on it.
Are you a librarian, Standpipe?
Oh no, you're not getting me that easily.
Or maybe I should just go those places myself and have my own private meetup.
144: They must have changed their policy. In January 1997, and more recently on their website (but still a few years ago), they said no walking tours in the winter.
Are you thinking of an instance where a pseudonymous blog correspondent says, "Here are details one through six -- go!"?
Hey, I did that once!
Facebook's pretty much ruined my pretensions to actual anonymity.
That thread where I mentioned giving a talk in Boston and Sifu said "I think I know who essear is now!" pretty much ruined my pretensions to actual anonymity.
(Kidding. I long ago realized just how much uniquely-identifying information I was putting into comments, and decided I don't care as long as googling my name doesn't turn any of this up.)
"I think I know who essear is now!"
I did, but I've forgotten. I could probably find it again.
Not about anonymity exactly, but I was trying today to think what exactly it is about ghostwriting that can make it so laborious and time-consuming. There are probably three or four people in the world whose writing voices I have internalized so well that writing like them just takes some mild concentration and a few extra goings-over.
But to write in a way that is not recognizable as me, and is also not designated as a specific someone else, is hellishly hard. So hard, in fact, that I've been procrastinating on this stupid two paragraphs for hours now. Grrrrr.
Speaking of Facebook and actual identities, I was surprised to find that someone who must be read is Facebook friends with many of you. I wouldn't have expected that, after the last time she stormed off in a huff.
But to write in a way that is not recognizable as me, and is also not designated as a specific someone else, is hellishly hard. So hard, in fact, that I've been procrastinating on this stupid two paragraphs for hours now. Grrrrr.
A passive voice must come in handy for this task.
Back when I was new to blogging, I remember looking for someone's real name based on just a few tidbits of information from their recent blog posts, confirming that it wasn't that hard to find, and then promptly forgetting that blogger's real name.
152: Really? Like there are updates in her particular voice?
I totally know who Standpipe is on Facebook. Totally.
Like she is the person with a Mongolian name and a bunch of Unfogged friends. And her particular voice.
someone who must be read
I still think one of the funniest moments of this blog was LB and read confirming that Dr. Oops had indeed encountered read once, years earlier, in like a bus depot or something.
We need a Bay Area meetup
Your optimism is touching.
I don't want to overstate the threat posed to any single individual.
Yes, because I've met the people who are afraid of anything! anything! about them at all being on the internet, and that's a little too far for me.
I know people who've been really screwed by having too much information about themselves accessible online, so there you go.
A lot depends what circles you run in, and what people expect of you.
I attended a talk given by a former commenter, about a year or so before becoming a commenter myself and a little longer before that commenter became a commenter.
I know people who've been really screwed by having too much information about themselves accessible online, so there you go.
It's called internet dating, and that's the whole point, so I'm not sure they'd say it was "too much" information. Sounds like it was just the right amount of information.
A good rule to live by: do not taunt, or really, in any way make yourself known to, 4chan.
I quit giving talks out of fear that some other commenter from here would recognize me. And because the mall cops said that I was on private property and had best either shop or leave.
162 is right. And it can be really hard for people to make a leap of imagination beyond their own experience. I have had to overcome the severe temptation to send enraged e-mails to newspaper photographers who take pictures of minors without grasping that these pictures are going to be reprinted in foreign-language newspapers and subject these children and their families to immediate physical danger. They can't imagine it, so therefore it can't be a risk. AUUUUUGGGGHHHHHHHHH.
A good rule to live by: do not taunt, or really, in any way make yourself known to, 4chan.
Hah! The thing itself.
Right, I'm aware that you can certainly have too much info out there. I'm talking about being worried about anything showing up, in which case, it's really a lost cause, you're going to show up somewhere unless you're a ninja. Control the information all you want, be wary of posting photos, etc, etc., but it's not like showing up wearing a stupid reindeer holiday sweater in a family photo is going to be the end of you.
I have had to overcome the severe temptation to send enraged e-mails to newspaper photographers who take pictures of minors without grasping that these pictures are going to be reprinted in foreign-language newspapers and subject these children and their families to immediate physical danger.
??
Hmm, I think Witt and I are talking about very, very different things.
165 gets it righter than any right thing ever posted here.
Hah! The thing itself.
Ha ha! I am on a roll today.
170: I'm thinking of a couple of specific instances that involved criminal cases. You get stupid media taking pictures going "It's a public venue!" and ignoring the fact that if it were THEIR fifteen-year-old, they wouldn't be thrilled about some guy with a telephoto lens taking her picture from across the schoolyard.
(I am not making that up.)
I give talks all the time and it's not like any of you motherfuckers show up.
I met moot at a party, actually. He was very nice.
170 is what I would have said if it hadn't been said so eloquently already.
174 is definitely not the kind of thing I was talking about, but anyhow.
I've seen 169 taken to rather amusing extremes. I also know someone who will not open an e-mail from anyone whose exact address she does not already know. This leads to things like getting phone calls to confirm that witt_distinctive_initials@gmail.com is me, since she's used to getting mail from witt_distinctive_initials@yahoo.com.
I will affirm the correctness of Tweety's 162.2, as the people (ok, one person) I am thinking of are in situations where it is actually expected for them to have a minor internet presence.
175: Apparently, we're all at various museums. Try giving a talk at one of those.
Apparently, we're all at various museums. s/b/ Apparently, AWB knows who we all are.
182: You don't wear your special hat when you go to talks?
We need a Bay Area meetup at the SF Railway Museum and the Cable Car Museum.
I've never been to those either. But I have looked through the records of the BART Commission in the CA state archives.
Funny you should say that, because last week I almost bought a totally awesome, but I didn't have the time or energy to bargain over it. Suffice to say there is a store in Crown Heights to which I will be returning.
Apparently, AWB knows who we all are. assumes none of you are particularly interested in the backwaters of 18c aesthetics.
A totally awesome hat. And now I'm going to bed.
Witt left out what it was that he almost bought to that I can't figure out who he is.
189: And cleverly confused me about her gender.
My theory, based on this impression, which may be all wrong, is that this has to do with the difference in the visibility of disability between then and now. I suspect that when more people were war veterans, or employed in heavy industries that often took a heavy toll on workers, more people would have had direct contact with someone who had a physical disability. But that's just a guess too.
When there was a draft, more well-off people and urban elites would have had direct contact with someone who had a physical disability.
191: Which explains why so many people faked perfect health to get out of the draft.
Like she is the person with a Mongolian name and a bunch of Unfogged friends. And her particular voice.
Oh, that's probably just Ganmaa Davaasambuu.
I have had to overcome the severe temptation to send enraged e-mails to newspaper photographers who take pictures of minors without grasping that these pictures are going to be reprinted in foreign-language newspapers and subject these children and their families to immediate physical danger.
Witt should have been consulted before they made the Kite Runner movie. And the worst thing is, it wasn't even a success!
I've googled up a small handful of imaginary people over the years, but when there's a whole list of them among someone else's Facebook friends, it turns out that imaginary names work at least as well and probably better.
That's why I stopped being Facebook friends with John Emerson. I couldn't resist commenting on his things, unlike the other couple of Unfoggers I became FAcebook friends with.
But to write in a way that is not recognizable as me, and is also not designated as a specific someone else, is hellishly hard.
One of my favorite ways to write is to take on a very well known tone, like pseudo-journalist or pretentious something. Love mimicking that. But you're ghostwriting something more subtle?
I'm aware that you can certainly have too much info out there
The thing is, I didn't put out any of the things under my name, and everything big that I've done is there. My school posted my thesis. My sports posted results. My jobs listed me as a public contact. A google search hits just about every major thing that I've done, and I didn't put up any of that information.
Since then I've given quotes to the newspaper, which I suppose could have avoided. But I would have had to very assertively manage what other people post to keep my information off the net.
Given that all that is out there, all I really hope for now is that you don't reach my blogs from my full name. But I can't hope for privacy.
I do kinda like that it verifies who I say I am.
all I really hope for now is that you don't reach my blogs Twilight fan fiction from my full name.
That's why I stopped being Facebook friends with John Emerson.
Did you actually defriend Emerson? Seems as though there ought to be some sort of cosmic punishment for that.
Is Twilight on your mind, Moby? Just the other day you were telling me about Bella and Edward.
146 - And report back to me. As your first assignment.
People keep reading it, so I keep hearing about it.
This whole Abzug - Kennedy romance thing is surprising. I didn't know middle schoolers were into that sort of thing.
The thing is, I didn't put out any of the things under my name, and everything big that I've done is there.
Right. Is this too much information, though? Is this more than someone who knew your name could find out, pre-internet, with some phone work? (Yes, I realize that's a great deal more work than googling someone.)
Maybe Witt is correct and I'm having a failure of imagination, but all of this seems to be part of living a certain type of modern American life, and I'm not sure I see the danger in it. Blog comments, on the other hand...
I suppose I've said things about on here (and allied blogs) about family members and my mental health that I wouldn't want widely attached to my real world identity. So that's how you should blackmail me, if it comes to that.
Using my full name (with middle initial) in quotes, I'm not there until #34 on a Google search. I should probably get some sleep so I can do something to make myself better known tomorrow. I used to be in the top ten before they started letting just anyone on the internet.
And report back to me. As your first assignment.
Yes'm. But I walk around in public by myself all the time, and generally not all that much happens, so I'm not sure I'd be back with much in the way of stories to tell, other than about public transit--which is awesome, don't get me wrong.
Have you tried setting things on fire as you perambulate?
Go to the SF maritime museum and set the boats on fire. Call yourself "St. Elmo." Do not report back to me. This is not an assignment and we don't know each other.
209: Wow, I never knew of this museum. Thanks.
DON'T THANK HIM YOU DON'T KNOW HIM
208: Well, I frequently try to set the night on fire, but I seldom am successful.
Rereading my 204, I'm amused at the contradiction between my position there and my position re: full-body scans. Ah, I yearn to have a cohesive thought pattern without constant back-tracking and hypocritical comments.
I think being confused, wishy-washy, vacillating, on the fence, etc. is the prudent stance when it comes to many complex issues. I'm suspicious of people who are sure of themselves.
Parenthetical, you need to make the two halves of your worldview cohere somehow. I recommend spending the next two weeks topless until it becomes a habit.
Well, maybe I want to take back 215.
Dude, it is cold in my house. I'll consider leaving off my socks.
Few things are more scandalous than walking around without a closing parentheses.
216: A.k.a., "How Ned Got His Groove Back"
PARENTHETICAL, YOU NEED TO MAKE THE TWO HALVES OF YOUR WORLDVIEW COHERE SOMEHOW. STUFF THEM INTO A BRA.
I have had to overcome the severe temptation to send enraged e-mails to newspaper photographers who take pictures of minors without grasping that these pictures are going to be reprinted in foreign-language newspapers and subject these children and their families to immediate physical danger.
Why have you had to overcome this?
assumes none of you are particularly interested in the backwaters of 18c aesthetics.
Shit. Of course I am, in a totally non-professional sense, and I can't fucking get there.
If we had some old eggs, we could pee on some old eggs in the dark, if we had some dark. Landers would microwave them all and eat them of a melted plate.
223: Time machine still not working?
yeah, I don't really get it either. Most of the things on the list would also be "discovered" (if not voluntarily disclosed) during any type of screening.
An IUD would probably show up in a fully body scan. It certainly would under ultrasound, but it won;t set off a metal detector.
I got fully pat down at the Ottawa airport just before New Year's, and it sucked. I actually asked to have it done in a private room. They get an observer in when they do that. That did make her more sensitive to asking if there were any areas that hurt or wree sansitive.
225. Time machine completely buggered - only goes forwards. I'd tell you the results of the mid terms, but I wouldn't like to depress you. More to the point, I'd tell you what stock to buy, but I think it's illegal.
Ha! (He said to no one in particular.)
I had forgotten the other Smithsonian museum in NYC. And it is FREE! The National Museum of the American Indian is (also) located in Cass Gilbert's Custom House on Bowling Green.
135
I'm not sure what there is to doubt. Hint: there is a phrase in my original comment whose surface meaning is at odds with its intended meaning.
I can't figure this out. But, fine, you're right that my saying I doubt you can find people like that was dumb. I guess I should have said "I doubt this is anything new". Pre-Internet, if you knew those same details about someone, you could have tracked them down almost as easily, or probably knew who they were to begin with. The Internet makes names optional and communities customizable, but doesn't necessarily destroy privacy.
222
Why have you had to overcome this?
Because she fears that a journalist would be unpersuadable on the subject, maybe? Or because the pictures were already published by the time she found out about them? I'm not sure how likely either of those are, but if that's correct, sending enraged e-mails would just make a bad situation worse. Pissing off a journalist just gives the other side more access to them, relative to you. (Also assuming of course that this is an adversarial kind of thing.)
However, it's possible that the photographer really just wasn't thinking, and could have been persuaded not to print the pictures with a good argument. It can't hurt to try, if you can do it civilly in advance of publication.
Also, I liked 164.
152: I was surprised by this, too.
Does it count that I almost attended one of AWB's talks?
Cyrus, it is new, because all along I've been talking about the ability to reconnect a pseudonymous online persona with one's real-life persona. Sure, Anonymous is Joe Klein!!1!, etc., but that's not quite the same thing. For one thing, I'm pretty sure Klein had thought through the contingencies of publishing under an assumed name.
Beyond this, I don't see how we disagree. I've never maintained that the Internet destroys privacy.
Also, making that connection between distinct personae is much, much easier with the Internet at one's disposal. It lets you do in hours what might have taken days; it lets you do so without any human having a chance to wonder why you're snooping around; it lets you do so from anywhere in the world.
And then I found five dollars.
For the past decade, I've made a hobby of tracking certain people, and their children and grandchildren, through the 19th and 20th centuries. It's certainly become progressively easier over the last years, but was doable, with some travel, before the internet age. There's nothing like a good obit.
Speaking of which, one of my mom's first cousins passed away last month. This line from her obit reminded me of the baby naming thread: She is survived by . . . ten grandchildren, Brooke, Alexis, Chelsea, Donte, Dylan, Nathan, Hunter, Kady, Bradley and Kyler.
232
I've never maintained that the Internet destroys privacy.
Fair enough. I saw a comment that began "Also, while we're discussing privacy and paranoia", and I guess I jumped to conclusions.
But privacy *would* destroy the Internet.
64: I don't think 48 and 54 agree with each other. 48 seems to say that the TSA screen thing derives from nudity-taboo (read: prudery) and is thus (in the minds of the people in question) unrelated to more abstract privacy issues (an explanation that makes sense to me, I might add). Then 54 says that the TSA thing has nothing to do with prudery.
My comments can totally be reconciled once you remember that prudery is not a uniquely American phenomenon. In Muslim countries, the nudity taboo is so strong that we use it as a weapon of war, to humiliate our enemies.
In general, you have to look hard to find a culture that doesn't have some body taboos. If we were a nation of Amazon warriors, we might be upset that airport screening requires men to remove their penis sheaths, thus destroying the very important social illusion that their penises are two feet long, perpetually erect, and elaborately decorated.
I know the moment for this reply has long past, but I'm shamed by the thought that someone would catch a glimpse of me being inconsistent.
My respect for helpy-chalk's consistency is long, perpetually erect, and elaborately decorated.
238: STUFF IT INTO A BRA
Security theater meets kiddie-porn hysteria.
About how long should latkes keep in the refrigerator -- one month? Two?
I'd think they'd be safe to eat until you saw mold. But they'd be nasty and limp in about a day.
242: If you re-heated them in a skillet with some oil, they wouldn't be that bad so quickly, would they?
Oh, sure. You could probably refry them profitably for a while. But in any case, I wouldn't worry about safety, just limpness.
I wouldn't worry about safety, just limpness.
THAT'S WHAT I SAID