As far as US persons are concerned, jeffbee is correct that the Snowden leaks are not compatible with the conspiratorial worldview represented by Enemy of the State or the X-Files. The Snowden docs showed things like if two people outside the US were discussing US politics and they mentioned Obama, then the name "Obama" would be redacted because he was a US person. The redaction of US personal info was not perfect but the situation was a very, very long way off from unchecked surveillance and assassination of US persons that was depicted in those films.
> Barton Gellman, a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist who led The Washington Post's coverage of Snowden's disclosures, summarized the leaks as follows:
> Taken together, the revelations have brought to light a global surveillance system that cast off many of its historical restraints after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Secret legal authorities empowered the NSA to sweep in the telephone, Internet and location records of whole populations.
It absolutely proved massive, unchecked surveillance. This has never been in dispute, what's your rationale that it didn't?
Please actually read what I wrote. You are responding to something that I did not write.
I did not claim that there wasn't "massive, unchecked surveillance". The specific claim that I made was that the conspiracy-theory films of the 1990s were based on the idea of unchecked surveillance of US citizens that was then used for purposes such as targeting and murder of US citizens in the United States.
There was nothing in the Snowden documents that suggested there were rogue operators going out and murdering Americans. In fact, when it came to Americans specifically, there was minimization, and attempts to abide by FISA, none of which ever featured in 1990s-era conspiracy films. I very specifically spoke about minimization as regards Americans, not globally.
Does Google still follow robots.txt? I think so. Should be easy to exclude Google Crawlers if that's what you're after. But of course everyone wants to profit off of Google's reach so excluding them won't work for most either.
We've had ~20+ years to come up with something better than copyright with nothing to show for. First it was the plebs ignoring copyrights, then it was the search engines and social networks and their knowledge graphs and now it's the billionaires and their AI companies that hoover up the web.
Modern buildings like hotels are built to withstand earthquakes of some magnitudes. Wouldn't count on that at a local construction site or a worn down house you might pass on the street.
That "worn down house" might be good until "upper 6". Beyond that it all depends on when it was built and the associated construction standards at the time.
By drowning the economy in crisises (energy costs, inflation, immigration, various climate taxes for industries, road tolls) while ramping up billions for military expenses. A stealthy way of shifting to a military industry. The Bundeswehr spent a lot of money on advertising over the last 6-7 years.
You are getting downvoted, but it is true that young people are getting a very rough deal, and a lot of the people in my circle are looking to emgirate. Friends from other countries and students (mostly know them through academia), are also not looking for long-term opportunities here anymore, which was different 15 years ago.
I would be far less annoyed with paying very high taxes and social contributions (around 50% of my income), if the services provided worked. But this just hasn't been the case for me. The healthcare system is close to breaking apart, and after moving to a new city 6 months ago I have been unable to find doctors willing to take me in. Childcare is constantly closing down due to staff shortages, buying a house is unrealistic unless both partners have good jobs or you inherit, and the jobs market is incredibly rigid and inflexible.
Every single one of these points are worse for young people then for older ones, and the only thing the government seems to get done is giving weapons training to young people and gifting pensioners 180b$/year extra.
Yes, the problem is the boomers who keep getting richer for no good reason, under the premise that they are entitled to massive pensions because they have been promised that much by politicians.
Of course, logically it makes no sense, since the whole point of a socialized system is to adjust the wealth of everybody depending on current situation (economic output).
But it was obviously a lie and our social democracy are deeply flawed because they allow anyone to vote regardless of stakes.
Sending young people to military service/war make for a nice distraction because meanwhile they don't get to think about taking the stuff of the elders by force.
I can only explain the downvotes by people who assume I'm somehow against immigrants since I used the term or who actually think that Germany is still worth living in. I have long given up on HN culture anyways.
It's not really locked down. You can toggle or enable some of the more activist-orientated features. The only limitation I'm aware of is that some apps requiring the strongest Play Integrity setting (ChatGPT, some banks, very few airline apps) just won't work on GrapheneOS.
You're also describing Germany and most of Europe will follow suit. Political elites wanting war will make it so that being against the government will be punishable by law. See UK, see Germany where posts on social media will get you visits by police.
Everything the media has been hammering Russia for is being setup right here in Europe.
Ukrainians had a choice as well which is why many of their men and women escaped and are now living in various European neighbouring countries instead of rotting in a ditch somewhere.
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