FBI Target Puts His Life Online

After the FBI mistakenly targeted him as a terror suspect five years ago, art professor Hasan Elahi began recording his entire life online for the perusal of government agents or anyone else who wants to look in. "I've discovered that the best way to protect your privacy is to give it away," he says, grinning. "It's economics. I flood the market."

Come on...

[niceone]

You could at least try to slashdot the guy's site [trackingtransience.net], it is^H^Hwas kind of cool.

Re:Nice, clever, but still not right

[Fruit]

It's even worse in the Netherlands [www.nrc.nl] though (article in Dutch, unfortunately). Summary: privacy and other citizen rights continuously eroding and no one cares.

Re:Shouldn't we all stop fighting?

[Blondie-Wan]

I wonder why nobody has made it into a movie yet, seeing as the book was published as early as 1949(!).

It has been made into a movie - multiple times, in fact: a version in 1956 [imdb.com], a made-for-TV version in 1965 [imdb.com], a version actually released in 1984 [imdb.com], and yet another version currently in development, to come out in 2009 [imdb.com].

Re:Shouldn't we all stop fighting?

[Anonymous Coward]

They have made a film of it. Twice. Once in 1956, once in 1984.

Word has it that the CIA changed the ending of one of the films, the story I heard being that they thought it far too sinister that the system could beat Winston so completely. I'm not sure which film was changed, as I've not seen either. Here's an extract from an NYT piece on it:

The agency also changed the ending of the movie version of "1984," disregarding Orwell's specific instructions that the story not be altered. In the book, the protagonist, Winston Smith, is entirely defeated by the nightmarish totalitarian regime. In the very last line, Orwell writes of Winston, "He loved Big Brother." In the movie, Winston and his
lover, Julia, are gunned down after Winston defiantly shouts: "Down with Big Brother!"

Re:New religion

[jez9999]

I guess that information and technology was so slow at the time, that privacy was not given much thought.

It was; it's just that they didn't have audio/video recorders in those days...

Amendment IV
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

Re:Let me tell you a story

[Hoi Polloi]

As an example, J Edgar Hoover kept secret files on people who hadn't been accused of any crime, just "targets of interest". Some of those files have been open and they frequently are full of gossip and vendetta fueled informants. Just the fact that people in the government vaguely knew that the FBI was doing this was enough to stifle dissent or reform of the FBI.

Re:Come on...

[Moofie]

Do you understand why some people believe that ruining somebody else's country for our own convenience is a bit, well, unconscionable?

Re:Noise = good hiding place

[sootman]

TrackMeNot is the dumbest thing ever. [nomachetejuggling.com]

Re:Come on...

[Anonymous Coward]

Think about it, how likely is it Iraqi's are going to come to the United States and fight us here?

I think you are confused about the definition of "them". The people that say "fighting them over there" are talking about Al-Queda/Terrorists - not just random Iraqis. The people we are fighting over there are Al-Queda - they proudly proclaim it.