Crabby Blogging Lady

“Whoopsie!” says Google. “OOpsie!” “We didn’t know!” “A mistake!”

Thus says the Mighty G. Google Says It Mistakenly Collected Data on Web Usage

Google Inc. said an internal investigation has discovered that the roving vans the company uses to create its online mapping services were mistakenly collecting data about websites people were visiting over wireless networks.

…Google had previously said it was collecting the location of Wi-Fi hot spots from its StreetView vehicles, but not the information being transmitted over those networks by users.

“It’s now clear that we have been mistakenly collecting samples of payload data from open (i.e. non-password-protected) Wi-Fi networks, even though we never used that data in any Google products,” wrote Mr. Eustace. “We are profoundly sorry for this error and are determined to learn all the lessons we can from our mistake.”

Well, I got my laugh for the day! They are “profoundly sorry.” Uh huh.

So while Google was roaming your area, snapping photos of your property and neighborhood, they were also harvesting data about every wireless network (home AND corporate) and the MAC addresses (that’s the identification number of your computer) of them. … so if you were sending email, Google harvested the data. If you were watching videos or getting auto insurance reviews and sending out your personal data, Google knows.

Google says they didn’t pick up secured networks or encrypted websites (rrrright).

I can’t believe the crap in the news story, though. It’s “now clear” that Google has been “mistakenly collecting” data?! Uh HUH. They didn’t know! They were ignorant! They have an excuse!

But they’ve been doing this since 2007!!!!! And they weren’t harvesting USER data “previously”; but all of a sudden, they now “mistakenly” are.

Google said it has been collecting and keeping the data since around 2007. At that time, the team building the software to gather the location of Wi-Fi hot spots mistakenly included some experimental software that sampled all categories of publicly broadcast Wi-Fi data.

“It is another example of the how the company hasn’t effectively grappled with the massive amount of information it collects,” said Jeffrey Chester, executive director of the Center for Digital Democracy.

“How the company hasn’t effectively grappled with the massive amount of information”?! I’d say the people haven’t effectively grappled with the massive amount of CONTROL these people are getting over our lives!

Oh, and the kicker? Google PROMISES that they haven’t used ANY of this information for ANY Google products. So… what DID they and what ARE they using the data for?

Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrright……

*grrroooooooooaaaaannnn*

US Treasury Web sites hacked, serving malware

Three Web sites belonging to the U.S. Department of the Treasury have been hacked to attack visitors with malicious software, security vendor AVG says.

AVG researcher Roger Thompson discovered the issue Monday on three Web domains associated with the home page of the U.S. Bureau of Engraving and Printing. As of late Monday, all three Web sites were still actively serving malicious software and the Bureau of Engraving and Printing Web site should be avoided until it’s clear that they’ve been cleaned up, Thompson said in an interview via instant message.

Although the Treasury Department could not be reached for comment, IT staff there appear to be aware of the problem. On Tuesday morning, all three sites had apparently been taken offline and were returning a “page not found” error.

Please. PLEASE. I don’t hate the government. The government just BEGS to be despised. WHAT a bunch of nincompoop idiots! Not only was this super-duper secure website hacked, but the malware REMAINED on the sites because the nincompoops couldn’t get it off! (Or didn’t want to get it off… after so many times, ya gotta wonder if they do this stuff on purpose?!).

NIN

COM

POOPS

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Good video. It’s Ron Paul’s take on the catastrophe that the Washingtonians are creating for us.

You know, I have a question about this kind of stuff–of seeing Ron Paul get on news programs EVERYWHERE as news stations breathlessly ask his opinion about the latest idiotic drivel from the government:

WHERE THE H*LL WERE THESE PEOPLE DURING THE 2009 ELECTIONS?!? Why are they all suddenly SOOOOOO interested in what Ron Paul thinks about things? Why didn’t they vote for him back then?! We could have avoided all this crap and be free people if they had heeded Paul back then!

Anyway, while Nancy Pelosi is “creating jobs” by hiring scads more chefs, waiters, staffers, and stocking her cushy office with modern furniture, we Americans are awaiting the Gestapo to invade our homes, kill our leaders, and convert us to socialism. Cuz did you hear what Paul said? Did anyone hear it?

Any time a government tries to give you a service or something of substance, they have to steal it from somebody else. So the whole process is immoral, because it’s based on government theft. That’s why they’re hiring 16,000 more new IRS agents, because they have to steal more money.

OK OK I know I have had an avalanche of posts about politics. I promise I’ll stop (soon). It’s all just so upsetting. We can’t drift back into our mediocre lives while these knuckleheads enslave us under our noses. We must keep the angry fires burning!

But I’ll write some happy crabby posts in the near future. As soon as I get this crap out of my system.

I’m always hearing how moms and pops and grandmas and grandpas are constantly audited by the nasty brutes, the IRS. Why don’t they clean their own house, huh?

Federal Employees Owe Billions in Back Taxes

Working for Uncle Sam comes with some great perks, like job stability, posh benefits packages, and in many cases, average salaries that are higher than what the same job pays in the private sector.

That’s why Republican Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, is irked that nearly 100,000 civilian federal employees owe the IRS $962 million in back taxes. He thinks they should pay up or be fired.

Chaffetz has introduced a bill that calls for the federal government to “ferret out” civilian employees who have “seriously delinquent tax debt” and prevent the hiring of other tax delinquents.

More than 3 percent of the 2.8 million federal civilian employees owed the Treasury unpaid federal income taxes in 2008, according to the IRS. If you include retirees and military service members, the numbers go from nearly 100,000 up to 276,000 current or former workers who owe $3 billion in taxes.

“If you get to the point where the government is putting a lien on their property and they’ve exhausted their appeals… the right thing to do is fire them as a federal worker,” said Chaffetz. “If you’re going to take federal tax dollars, you should be paying your federal taxes.”

Well, I won’t even get INTO the Constitutionality of the income tax on wages… but here’s the buddy system at its worst. Not only do government employees (and there are more and more of them as government creates more “jobs”!) get eye-popping, mind-boggling perks, high salaries, paid expenses and taxpayer-funded jets and Orlando vacations, they can break their own laws and still kep their fancy jobs!

I’m too tired to be enraged. I think my rage is starting to consume me….

Wow, just… wow. And nothing happens…..

Well, at the insistence of Don E. Chute (he used CAPS AND EVERYTHING!), I took the Nolan Chart Quiz. I think I had taken this a year ago, maybe. I see that my views haven’t changed one bit, thank you very much.

I am NOT a Libertarian, however. I hate it when quizzes marginalize you into a colorful section on a graph.  I do not believe that we should legalize (or encourage) pornography, pot-smoking, “escort” services, polygamy, and blaspheming activities. I think society has every right to ban these activities as unwholesome to a nation and society. (By the way, I am an American history scholar who has read and studied the Constitution and the writings of the Founding Fathers, and they believed the same thing!).

ANYWAY. So the Nolan Chart says I’m a Libertarian. When I’m not.

What I am is a Federalist, for lack of a better word. Read The Federalist Papers: that’s what I believe. I believe in a federal government for the purpose of unification, and defense, and world trade. AND THAT’S IT.

Everything else– all powers not given to the federal government by the Constitution nor prohibited by the States, are GIVEN TO WE THE PEOPLE.

Oh gee, that has a familiar ring to it. *gasp* Could this possibly be the Tenth Amendment?! Why, yes, boys and girls, it IS!

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Well, the next question to be asked is: Do we still retain the original form of representative government given to use by the founders?

And boys and girls– we do not. The last straw that broke the camel’s back was the Patriot Act. Sorry, we no longer have a Constitutional republic. What a shell game. We can’t do anything anymore without the federal government breathing down our necks: get a job, cash a check, use our transportation, make a phone call, have a baby.

But even before that blasted “Act,” something else radically altered our form of government 100 years previously; it was when the Progressive idjits in government CHANGED state representation to have senators elected by popular vote instead of state legislatures. This occurred in 1913 (gee, the same year as the Federal Reserve Act and Income Tax– those Progressives SURE were busy, weren’t they?). Hello, there was a REASON that the Founders included the state legislatures the way they did– to make sure that the larger states (which had higher population and more urban centers which are the renowned bastions of wicked sinners) did not control the entire federation. It was called the New Jersey Plan, written by William Paterson. You see, back THEN, the states cared about equal representation.

Since the Progressive tyrants have eliminated that check and balance, our nation is basically controlled by the big (liberal) states: Florida, New York, California, and Texas. Even though all the states still retain two senators per state, the state legislatures themselves have lost their representation in the federation, therefore allowing the federal government to usurp power more readily (in such things as education, eminent domain, mandated and/or unfunded social programs, government-funded home insurance quotes, blah blah, etc).

So that was really the beginning of the end, 1913.

Back to the Nolan Chart. Those quizzes are meaningless. I think they have good intentions, but they are meaningless because the people who REALLY know what American government is all about are going to be marginalized, as I was. These quizzes don’t truly represent the original intent of our form of government. Why are we tut-tutting about health care and Social Security?! The larger issue is that the federal government has totally usurped power. Why isn’t that part of the discussion? Why aren’t we spending our time defending the Constitution and Bill of Rights, instead of bickering over government HMOs and Granny’s pension and whether the government can allow teenagers to kill off their unborn babies?

Politics always gets me worked up. Good gravy. I feel so much better. I haven’t had a rant like this in, gee, three or four days! Thanks, Don.

Patricia of Communication Exchange brought up an extremely interesting issue; it concerns a psychology study– “cyberpsychology” to be exact– that performed a content analysis on MySpace blogs (which, according to the authors of the study, are no different than other blogs and bloggers on the Internet (I’m not sure I agree with that, however).

CyberPsychology & Behavior
Blog Function Revisited: A Content Analysis of MySpace Blogs

Abstract

The present study concerns the content of MySpace blogs and whether it differs from the blog style found on sites specifically designed for blogging. A content analysis of MySpace blogs was conducted to investigate trends in purpose, format, and style and to compare these across sex and age categories. Most blogs were written in a positive tone, and the main motivations for blogging appeared to be writing a diary and as an emotional outlet. Findings also indicate that while there were no significant sex differences, blog purpose and style differed across age groups; for example, bloggers over 50 were more likely to use the blog as an emotional outlet with a negative tone. Bloggers between 18 and 29 predominantly used a semiformal language style, whereas bloggers over 30 were equally as likely to use a semiformal or formal style. Results suggest that MySpace blogs are not dissimilar from other forms of blogging because they provide an important outlet for emotion and self-expression.

The study is brief, only five pages long (with one page of references). I did not read it thoroughly, but I did skim over it. The general consensus among the study group is that blogging is, by far, an emotional outlet. Patricia, in her usual perceptive manner, brought up some good points and food for thought:

One of the most fascinating findings was that older bloggers (those over 50) tended to have a negative tone to their blogs.

This finding runs contrary to everything I experience each day in the blogging community. As an over-50 blogger myself (and I think one with a fairly positive tone), I try to visit many other older bloggers. On the whole, I find us a remarkably positive group. Of course, there are a few exceptions (e. g., Crotchety Old Man Yells at Cars, Crabby Blogging Lady). These exceptions, I think, occur because these senior bloggers use a negative style in a humorous way to foster an image of a curmudgeon. In real life, they are nothing like their on-screen personae.

Patricia asked for input from her readers. So here’s mine.

Firstly, I am not in the “over 50″ group. I am in my early 40s. I appear older perhaps because I have more traditional values (and a heck of a lot more common sense) than my younger peers.

Secondly, I have several other blogs besides this one, and I can say that perhaps two out of the dozen I manage are emotional outlets. This blog is where I rant, and I have another where I share my personal life (to a degree)… the other 10+ blogs are informational or political blogs. I did not see these types of blogs addressed in the study.

Thirdly, I wonder of the study is accurate when they opine that MySpace blogs are much like all the other blogs out there. I have found this to be exactly the opposite.
I have seen my share of “emotional outlet” blogs, but I don’t see a great deal of them. I’ve seen a few MySpace blogs, and I seriously doubt MySpace blogs are a great deal like other blogs.

I’ve been blogging, on and off, for almost ten years now. Blogs that are emotional outlets are in the majority, but my experience has shown that they are not THE majority. I have seen a large share of informative blogs, political blogs, blogs as a creative outlet (such as, showcasing Etsy wares), and for activist causes (tree-huggers, etc). I believe of all the blogs, most are political or informative. Mine are more entertainment/informative. Just as Patricia said, “senior bloggers use a negative style in a humorous way to foster an image of a curmudgeon.” True. It’s all about having fun. :D

Finally, I think older people have more to complain about. They’ve been around longer, and the world is going to hell in a handbasket. Sure, sure, you can say that about ANY generation, but this age in which we live is going downhill fast. Not only do we have the eternal forces of slavery, tyranny, propaganda, and apathy, but it’s broadcast around the world in “real time” over and over and over again. And technology, while convenient, exacerbates the angst with the means to control the masses by Big Brother. No wonder we’re negative, perhaps more negative than any other era in time, ever. ?? All the while, the younger populace is consumed with the latest gadget, promo keychains, iPhone app, or whatever, not caring about anything except their own microscopic personal world!

That’s my two cents, from the non-senior Crabby Blogging Lady.