Alan De Smet's Bookmarks - Evil

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• + - We're quickly moving toward a culture that believes "if it's making money, it's ethical." The rights of big business are surpassing those granted to human beings.
• + - "...capitalism, having defeated communism, now seems about to do the same to democracy." - Ian Frazier, "On the Rez."
• Copyright - Copyright was created to promote the arts, not to give corporations effortless profit for a lifetime, not to give corporations a choke chain on people's access to their culture.
• DMCA
• Censorship in action - "why I don't publish my HDCP results"
• Music Sharing - While the RIAA warns that the sky is falling, actual musians aren't so sure.
• Courtney Love does the math - Transcript of a Courtney Love speech where she discusses how the recording industry financially rapes artists.
• The Internet Debacle - An Alternative View - Long time singer-songwriter Janis Ian's thoughts on music downloading and the RIAA.
• A Love Song for Napster - Jaron Lanier's thought experiment on where the road goes if Napster is shut down.
• Embrace file-sharing, or die
• Let the Stories Go - Editorial by Lawrence Lessig on the moral wrong of extending Gone With the Wind's copyright by 39 years.
• Christians and the Copyright Law - The conflicts between being a good christian and enforcing copyright.
• Library System Terrorizes Publishing Industry - Tom the Dancing Bug comic from Salon.com
• What's Wrong With Content Protection - Good summary of the problems.
• Reevaluating Copyright - Interesting paper by Richard Stallman on the need to reconsider copyright's purpose and how it should be managed today.
• The Right to Read - A warning of the risks of letting copyright get out of control.
• Software Copy Protection - Bruce Schneier's discussion on why software copy protection systems are doomed.
• Is a Stitch Online a Crime? - This is where the road of copyright can lead. Calling cross-stitching grandmother's "pirates."
• LawMeme Guide to Spider-Man and Star Wars Bootlegs
• On Software "Piracy", Lies, BSA, Microsoft, Rocks, and Hard Penguins
• Copyright Crusader - On the unethical extension of US copyrights by 20 years, stealing our heritage from us. From the Boston Glove
• Privacy - Privacy and anonymity are necessary for free speech and other human rights.
• FBI Databases Used for Stock Fraud - Why you should fear the government having too much information.
• Database Nation
• The Eroded Self - Good New York Times article on the dangers of losing privacy.
• freedOm - Software to protect privacy on the internet, sadly, no Linux version yet.
• Patents - Incompetent leadership in the US Patent office and abuse by corporation have turned our patent system into a tool for large companies to abuse individuals and small companies with.
• Stuart Cheshire on Software Patents
• Basic Patent Law for Programmers
• Licensing - You don't own your software. You license it. You have less rights that you do to a book, video, or car you purchase.
• UCITA - The UCITA would make the terms you "license" software under even more onerous.
• Why You Should Oppose UCITA
• ALA Washington Office - American Library Association, information on UTICA
• The UCITA Car
• CPT's UCITA Page - Good coverage of the dangers the UCITA creates
• UCITA Summary information - Information from InfoWorld
• Fire, Work With Me - Satirical look at defending the rights of fire creators.
• Shrinkwrap Licenses: Threat or Menace
• Bad Software
• Copyrant - Licensing on software is moving us back to the days of company stores, where we don't own anything and owe it all to a corporation.
• Lawyers - Maybe the majority of lawyers are ethical individuals trying to serve mankind. But the lawyers who view the justicial system as a way to acquire money and power ruin it.
• What License - Are lawyers licensed by the state? (I'm suspicious of this one, it needs more investigating.)
• Fixing it.
• Be Informed
• Reality Cracking - Hacking reality from Fravia.org
• Adbusters Culture Jammers
• Ain't Nobody's Business If You Do - On the questionable policy of making consenual activities crimes
• Echelon Watch - Details on Echelon, in which the US government spies on European countries for profit.
• Against Intellectual Property
• Why the world needs reverse engineers
• Domain Name Rights Coalition
• RTMark - Social deconstruction
• NYC Teacher of the Year Speech - Speech by John Taylor Gatto, accepting the New York City Teacher of the Year Award on January 31, 1990.
• Don't trust the government
• Japanese-American Internment Camps
• Military Reveals Testing Of Nerve Agents in Md.
• Pentagon details biowar testing here
• LSD and the CIA
• Rain-making link to killer floods
• Canadian in passport fiasco - US customs destroyed a Canadian's passport and deported her to India.
• Concern grows for deported Canadian - US customs deports another Canadian, this time to Syria.
• Man arrested for 'peace' T-shirt
• Is This the America I Love?
• Radioactive patients set off subway alarms - The war on terror catches innocent chemotherapy patients, but no terrorists.
• Jeb Bush's secret weapon - How Jeb Bush maintains power in Florida: illegal voter purges of primarily black voters. Is your name similar to a convicted felon in a different state? You lose your right to vote with no chance to appeal.
• A post-9/11 American nightmare - If the US government incorrectly identifies you as a terrorist, you can have your business destroyed and be denied access to your own money to buy groceries. All without being formally charged with anything. Nine months later when they realize you're innocent, well, oops, I guess you can try to pick up the wreck we made of your life, but we're not going to help.
• Forgotten History - A bit uneven, but contains many good points on how the US has treated the rest of the world like crap.
• FEAR - Forfeiture Endangers American Rights
• Economist: The drug war
• Person Paper on Purity in Language - An insightful paper on the problems with gender specific language.
• Patriotism and Cosmopolitanism, Martha Nussbaum - The dangers of unchecked patriotism and a plea for reason.
• George W. Bush: Deserter - George W. Bush went AWOL from the National Guard for a year. For most people, that makes them guilty of desertion. For the priveledged son of his wealthy father, it makes him eligible to be President of the United States. This man sickens me.
• Finally, the Truth About Bush's Military Service Record
• GW Bush Went AWOL
• You can't just walk away
• Why Microsoft's Stock Options Scare Me - Why does Microsoft pay no Federal income taxes?