This article suggests no lessons had been learned a year later.

Here's Snopes: http://www.snopes.com/risque/tattled/swire.asp

Two more, also apparently true:
http://www.snopes.com/risque/tattled/chung.asp
http://www.snopes.com/risque/tattled/luxton.asp

This would never have happened with snail mail.

The short story is called "For A Good Purpose" and according to this blog post it's available in English versions of Six Days and Other Tales.

I seem to have missed that one. Any chance that you recall the title, or what collection it's from?

No, I can't, and it's been bugging me all day that I can't. I read it in an European Studies paper at Vic Uni in 1995, along with short stories by…

Something might get viewed a million times in 24 hours if it's interesting enough for people to email and facebook it around. That's a hell of a lot of non-privacy.

Yes, I distinctly remember a chain email in the late 90s which consisted of some girl saying that she liked…

Shades of that Italo Calvino short story about the telephone network comming alive and connecting people based on what they say in private conversations.

I seem to have missed that one. Any chance that you recall the title, or what collection it's from?

But new technology does make things possible/easy that previously were not.

I was talking to someone about my age recently about how glad we were that Facebook, Twitter and ubiquitous digital cameras weren't around when we were at varsity, because it would have been completely disastrous.

Looking at the same…

What about this guy ? Almost 5.5 million hits and counting...like WTF ?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iy2TOdvr8QY

...apparently he's polarised the dubstep world with his halfstep wobbles over existing tunes and calling them remixes. They're a bit…

Something might get viewed a million times in 24 hours if it's interesting enough for people to email and facebook it around. That's a hell of a lot of non-privacy.

You only need to look at what happened with Kate's party over the weekend to see the differences in scale…

Gizmondo Facebook's Privacy Changes Get Scary

I liked the first comment:

they forgot 2021: Farmville becomes self aware and enslaves the human race

Shades of that Italo Calvino short story about the telephone network comming alive and connecting people based on what they say in private conversations.

It is best if we keep the law functioning the way it always did, sure. But new technology does make things possible/easy that previously were not.

Not just that, but the ability of things to go viral in cyberspace makes 50 years ago look like nothing.

Something might get viewed…

Yes, quite. And Tom seems dedicated enough to demand that no photos be taken when he's on the town. But should he have to?

I'm curious what his response is if anyone just says "Get stuffed. It's my camera." Does he leave? Or make a scene? Or act as if…

Was actually there for the lastest in the iPhone saga.

So the law makers do need to keep abreast of the practicalities of the present day, and the implications of technology during a time of massive technological change.

Yes, quite. And Tom seems dedicated enough to demand that no photos be taken when he's on the town. But should he…

Would 'BetterPrivacy' do anything?

I'm not sure.. I switched to Chrome a little while ago, to combat instability problems in Firefox (caused by Adobe Flash, I believe).

So running a google browser makes me part of the "privacy? who cares?" set, I guess..

"Currently, we estimate that your browser has…

There is nothing new here. To my mind these are social issues that should be of no interest to law makers, not technology or legal ones.

It is best if we keep the law functioning the way it always did, sure. But new technology does make things possible/easy that previously…

i.e. NZ is (possibly) the leading government for requesting data removal from Google, on a per capita basis.

Ah, thanks. I was writing fast this morning and didn't see the tables.

My guess would be that all or nearly all of those would relate to court suppression orders.

Edit: And,…

If you use Firefox, you can try SafeHistory to guard against it.

Could not be installed as not compatible with FF 3.6.4. Does that mean I'm more up to date than Stanford University? Well since the last update was in 2007, then yes, I think it does... ;-)

Would 'BetterPrivacy'…

HTML tables not supported, so:

Removal…

My yardstick is to ensure nothing appears there that I wouldn't want my mother reading.

My mother has oft remarked that she wishes I were a tad more interesting for this very reason.

I personally don't have a particularly iron fisted grip on my personal information online (other than my…

Perhaps I'm missing something.

Me too. My browser would generally seem unique on account of the IP address it connects from.

Interesting that someone could profile my browser, so changing IPs wouldn't hide it. But obviously, changing browsers would. Or workstations. Or any single one of the settings they profile…

Mediawatch sounded a cautionary note about the news media's use of social media for story leads.

This, and the associated reporting of Facebook messages, "Your Views" posts and tweets as news, is something that seems to be happening more and more. Do reporters not actually go and interview real people…

That is seriously awesome.

Perhaps I'm missing something. That's all pretty standard stuff (user agent string, supported plugins). Where's the page which tells me which pr0n sites I've been visiting?

In January, Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg declared the age of privacy to be over.
[...]
It's just not true. People, including the younger generation, still care about privacy. [...] They're not technically sophisticated about privacy and make mistakes all the time,…

Panopticlick's browser uniqueness test

Wow – big difference with script blocking on or off for that site.

Is this the right time to mention Panopticlick's browser uniqueness test?

Damn:

Your browser fingerprint appears to be unique among the 812,895 tested so far.

And this is Firefox on Ubuntu, which is the most common browser/OS combination I use...

EDIT: I lie – from now on I'm browsing exclusively…

Very smart – and worrying when combined with Facebook et al's continued pushes for web-wide identity

It is smart — and apparently that history-stealing attack has been known about for ten years. Browser makers have done nothing about it because they don't want to compromise usability.

If you use Firefox,…

Is this the right time to mention Panopticlick's browser uniqueness test?

Yes.

That is seriously awesome.

see if the link changes colour

Very smart – and worrying when combined with Facebook et al's continued pushes for web-wide identity

I'll try to summarise:

1. The web is really social these days. We are out there joining facebook groups, following people on twitter, joining livejournal communities, flickr groups, etc etc. The precise collection of groups…

It then offers several scenarios where the line is not so clear:

There is nothing new here. To my mind these are social issues that should be of no interest to law makers, not technology or legal ones.

It is up to you to protect your privacy as much as…