The End Of Privacy

   The End of Privacy

   In this century it appears the loss of anonymity will be more shocking than the loss of virginity.
   Two events that resulted in deaths, and both involve the Internet at least tangentially, signal the need for a reexamination of privacy.

   Is it even possible in a world with surveillance cameras wherever you turn?  Drones aren’t only used in Afghanistan.

In the Princeton suicide case of Tyler Clementi his predator had figured out how to set up a remote control viewing of his sex with an older gay man.

   Even though it never happened, and even though no video of the sexual encounter was ever posted, the mere appearance on Websites of the fact it happened led to Clementi jumping off the George Washington Bridge.

   This raises another issue. In any sexual harassment case it is difficult to determine what happened, and why. There will be exaggeration, which could result in a more extreme response than might otherwise have followed.
   Can a court handle cases like this. Did events in Clementi's prior life contribute to his decision to take his life?

   How can there be free speech if your right to swing ends where my iPhone begins.

Must everything be figurative, not literal.
   AFP reports a Frenchman is suiing Google for posting a photo of him peeing in his back yard on its Street View.
   This week a teen in Chardon, Ohio, allegedly killed three high school students after publishing a poem that included references to death on Facebook that could have been a warning of what was to come.

   The Christian Science Monitor reported T.J. Lane, the Chardon killer, attended an alternative school for students who are evaluated as a high risk for “substance abuse/chemical dependency, anger issues, mental health issues, truancy, delinquency, difficulties with attention/organization, and academic deficiencies,” according to the school's website. All are red flags that should have made the family weapon more difficult to obtain, says Jennie Lintz, acting executive director of The Center to Prevent Youth Violence in New York City, the Monitor reported.

   Lane had been accused of assaulting a family member in 2009. What does it take for authorities to act.

   As far back as the Columbine High School Massacre 12 years ago, a lifetime in the Web age, killers Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, issued threats on the Internet. And they were reported to area law officers.

   Families at the high school remain convinced police action could have prevented 13 deaths. Instead of investigating why no action was taken the Colorado state government has blocked release of information that may hold the answer.

   Had the Jefferson County Sheriff’s Office dragged the two boys into its headquarters for questioning the officers might have faced a court order insisting the threatening words were covered by the First Amendment.

   On the other extreme, Princeton student Dharun Ravi, is on trial for revealing to the university public and beyond electronically that his dormitory roommate was gay. Tyler Clementi jumped off the George Washington Bridge after learning of his betrayal, it has been reported.

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The author was the lead reporter for Associated Press on the Columbine Massacre, and ten years of events that followed. He also was working the night life support was turned off for Matthew Shepard in a Colorado hospital.

Internet TV

No, I am not talking about an Internet ready TV that requires an expensive wireless or HDMI cable connection. Nor the ability to have 3D or even some system that emulates the shaking of an earthquake or bomb blast.

Just make the bloody TV ready to go. Keyboard and mouse. All you need is a modem-router and an account.

There are so many workarounds now it is becoming silly.

For example, some devices can connect your TV to your cable TV box.

Apple TV offers splendid connections to Netflix, YouTube and others but will not surf the Web. Google has its version, much more expensive.

Apple only goes to certain sites.

When I brought this up with marketing reps several years ago they told me no one wanted a computer in their living room or entertainment room.

Wonder why alternatives such as iPads have done so well. Surely not everyone is reading it exclusively on trains, planes, and I certainly hope not while driving an automobile.

If they ever get this done (seems likely to happen this year actually) will there be a market for the HDMI cables.

And while we are at it, make sure it plugs right into your home theater complex.

Assange Russian TV Show

Wikileaks founder Julian Assange plans to host a show on Russian TV in March. The show will be taped in the United Kingdom so the long-running case of alleged sexual assault against Assange in Sweden would not necessarily interfere.
However, it wasn't clear how shows taped weeks in advance could be timely.

Ria Novosti, the official Russian news agency, confirmed plans for show.
It was an embarrassment for the U.S. media, coming on the same day that Reporters Without Borders lowered its ranking for press freedom from 20th to 47th.

Assange’s appeal of an extradition order is scheduled for a hearing in England’s high court on Feb. 1. The authencity of the allegations have has been challenged by Wikileaks and many others. Some consider it a U.S.-influenced attempt to discredit Wikileaks for the release of negative inform about the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Assange has been under house arrest in England for more than a year.

The show will have ten half-hour segments with many outside guests, the channel Russia Today said. It will be called “The World Tomorrow," the station said.

“Guests of the show’s host and creator Julian Assange will include politicians and revolutionaries; people, who in his opinion, will form tomorrow’s agenda,” the channel said.

“We are proud and delighted that our channel will premiere Julian Assange’s project because the RT channel has gained a worldwide audience that's disappointed by the mainstream and has become open to new angles, making this show fitting for the purpose” RT Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan said.

U.S. viewers likely would have to watch the show on the Internet or via satellite, barring a decision by commercial American television to pick it up.

Wikileaks said on its Web site that this is timely because some in the U.S. Congress were pushing legislation which would virtually shut down the free flow of information on the Web.

“Upheavals and revolutions in the Middle East have started an era of political change that is still unfolding," WikiLeaks stated on its website. "In the West, the deterioration of the rule of law has demonstrated the bankruptcy of once leading political institutions and ideologies. The Internet has never been so strong, or so much under attack.”

Internet on the Brink

Netizens of the World Wide Web had a shot fired across their bow Friday. At the very least they must realize there is a world out there.

India is one of the biggest Web users in the world.

And this shows Web may be in danger before the U.S. Congress even passes SOPA, if it does.

The Times of India reported Friday that an Indian court in Delhi called in all the powers, Google, Google, Youtube and 18 others to charge them with criminal conspiracy for “selling, publicly exhibiting and … (circulating) obscene, lascivious content,” The Times of India reported. They also were accused of promoting racial hatred and violence, as radio had done before them.

Google said because of the holiday no one was on duty to comment. 
Some are arguing that Hollywood, or perhaps Bollywood, are behind such restraints.

But there has been widespread use of the Internet to spread profanity. In the U.S. there have been several major cases in which coaches at all levels have used the Web to sexually harass or assault athlets.

Internet content has caused riots and death. It also has led to freedom for millions, and brought down dictators.

Google already lost a YouTube case in Italy for material it removed as soon as it learned it was present.
Freedom of speech in the U.S. excludes prior restraint. That means someone may not be stopped from saying, something but can be punished afterwards.

In essence that means the accountability must follow the act. On the other hand, providers can be held responsible for permitting it continues. Racketeeering laws, in the U.S., can be used in such circumstances.

Hockey Club Parents Trade Texts On Sex Allegations

Is this the future of sports for American youngsters. Parents of a private Boulder ice hockey club are trading text messages to see whether their children might have been sexually exploited online by a 23-year-old coach.

Gina Finney, whose son was one of those who may have been assaulted, told the Boulder Camera parents are trying to get as much information as possible by ex-coach Zachary Thomas Meints. He turned himself into police Thursday and was being held without bond on five charges.

Details of the incidents were in sealed arrest warrants used to seize a computer and a mobile phone, said police spokeswoman Kim Kobel.

She said 13 people who were witnesses and or victims were involved in the case.

“To hear something like this is happening is very disconcerting because of how it impacts our life,” said Finney.

The Penn State scandal, by no means the first time youth sports have involved misconduct, has shaken the nation. The Nittany Lions and longtime coach Joe Paterno were among the most respected group of college athletes in the nation.

Kobel said police were trying to determine whether there was any and if so how much physical contact. “We do believe  there are more victims. We are asking people to call the tip line or the police. If they have any information about any suspicious behavior, we’d like to know about that too.”

Boulder has long been regarded as one of the finest places to live in the nation. Back in the day, “Mork and Mindy” was based there.

The still unsolved murder of JonBenet Ramsey, wealthy parents, destroyed the city’s apparent virginity.

Yesterday a Boulder sheriff’s deputy was arrested and is being held on $100,000 bond in a separate online sexual exploitation case.

Will Life Be As Tender Without Irma On Call?

The late Jack Lemmon, the straight arrow rookie flic in one of the red light districts of Paris, asked the bartender why so many couples are going into the Hotel Casanova next door.

“I have a very definite idea. They’re making love,” which the cop, Nestor, denounces as vice.

He earns the retort from Moustache, the bartender, “petit bourgeoisie. It shows the kind of world we live in.

“Love is illegal but not hate. You can do that anytime, anywhere, to anyone.” Lovers must hide in the dark.

Irma La Douce was a hit as a musical on the stage in Paris and London before it was a film smash in the U.S.  Life Magazine called the musical "a French fairy tale for wicked grown-ups who want to believe in love.

"France has always been the artistic and fashionable center of the profession in the West. It also has been common for Frenchmen to have mistresses.

And when the disgraced head of the International Monetary Fund, Daniel Strauss-Kahn, resigned after being accused of raping a New York City hotel maid many prominent French leaders stood up to publicly defend him. 

Although he was able to escape prosecution, opinion quickly turned in France, egged on by American and French bloggers and other feminist leaders.

Combined with a series of alleged rapes and sexual harassment of world-famous politicians, athletes, gays and celebrities, around the world, one could sense too many of these incidents were happening to be mostly inspired by gold-diggers. The FBI of the U.S. has reported for decades that the vast majority of sexual assaults are for real. And most involve people who know each other, not someone jumping out from behind a tree.

An investigation of rape at the Air Force Academy came too late to result in much prosecutorial action, but it made clear the leadership had been mostly ignoring the problem.

But recent scandals in France and elsewhere around the world seem to harden. San Francisco and Canada have supporters for decriminalization.

This week the right and the left in French parliament passed a resolution condemning prostitution. It clearly was going to be met with strong resistance.

But this time, as in Sweden and some other countries, and U.S. states like Colorado, the proposal is to arrest “johns.” As the name implies most of the perpretrators will be males.

Assuming all the technical difficulties of proving money changed hands, it seems about as likely to succeed as Prohibition in the U.S. Most people just don’t care. They may not want to see them standing on street corners but overworked and understaffed police forces won’t make it a priority unless some public scene occurs. Such arrests will have to compete with the cases against political candidates for one.

Whether some of the more recent sex cases, such as Penn State, will make the entire subject sickening is unknown.

Much of the traffic has already moved to the Internet. While they are being pursued aggressively around the world, unless there are underage or slave-like prostitutes the appetite for nailing cyber sex artists also may not have the after-thirst for police agencies as rapes, murders and such.

So there will be the occasional big bust such as occurred in Polk County, Fla., where at least 60 were picked up in a sting.

A crackdown that seems likely on the Web will have to overcome opposition by those who support free speech. The record of law enforcement in the U.S. on abiding strictly by laws that guarantee free speech have a mixed history at the very best.

As far controlling the crime, if it is one, societies have had little success for the thousands of years it has existed. In America, at a certain level it is a violation of privacy.

It wasn’t until 2003 until the U.S. Supreme Court outlawed the remaining laws against sodomy. Clearly it was unlikely where could ever be a conviction without violating the defendants’ privacy.

Would judges be asked to personally review the activity, to determine whether it was legal, as portrayed in a Saturday Night Live skit.