[SWLUG] new website

[Neil Jones]

Pete Prior wrote:
> *Hovers hand over the Invoke Godwins Law button*
>   

Godwin's law comes about from flaming on usenet and basically says that 
people will get so wound up that they will compare their opponent to Hitler.
I wasn't doing this.

Firstly why people's behaviour changes when they are being logged. We 
are all sophisticated computer users.
We know about google I would hope. When you log things they are stored 
for ANYONE to look at.
This includes any wierdo  you encounter on line and we have even had one 
here.Do secret agents, faggotts a BBQ and Russian mail order brides ring 
a bell ?

A while ago a group of people including me were having trouble on a 
forum I belong to with a rather stupid know it all.
He was using a pseudonym as many people do on forums. We were discussing 
an area of science that
I have studied and he was getting hammered into the ground. He was 
getting nasty( and incidentally was an authoritarian
who consistently argued from tradition and authority They are easy 
targets  because this behaviour makes it easy to outsmart them as I will 
explain.)
I decided to look into him. Someone had used his first name on the forum 
it was a common one but from things he had boasted
about and the mention of his employer. I  now know his surname and where 
he lives. I even have access to a photograph
This is called jigsaw identification. Had I been vindictive I could have 
contacted his employers ( a public sector organisation where
his wages were paid by us taxpayers) and pointed out that he had made 
several thousand postings in the previous year and was
obviously doing no work.  I am sure we can all see other examples, 
potential employers checking things out . And this could be in ten years 
time
after an unexpected career change. AS sophisticated coimputer users we 
should know this, and it affects the way we behave.

Secondly my point about authoritarians. It isn't just the threat to 
democracy. It is that they are a pain in the rear end. I wasn't talking 
about  facists or nazis
just jobsworths who haven't got a clue. The tendency to follow tradition 
and authority is all to common and they  can regard people like US who 
do unusual
and clever things as a bit odd or even as dangerous..I was told once of 
an example in Italy where there had been a police raid over something 
political and not IT related in any way. It was reported that one 
additional suspicious thing was that they suspects had been using linux
Authoritarians ( who are quite common) don't tolerate diversity well 
and  do not cope with abstract ideas well. So there won't be many here 
then. :-) The most important thing is that research links 
authoritarianism with depressed intelligence scores. It is not sensible 
to give power to people with cognitive deficits.

I  dislike the surveillance cameras that we have in our streets and I am 
particularly aggrieved with the dunderheaded example of my local council.
It isn't enough that someone has to demonstrate that they PROBABLY have 
a cognitive deficit by wanting to  be authoritarian and monitor everyone.
I myself believe that George Orwell's 1984 was a warning not a 
blueprint! :-)  It is a number of things. Firstly it is not an effective 
use of money
It has been studied and they are poor at stopping crime. It is that they 
are proud of emulating Orwell's dystopia, even if only in  small way.
But to crown it all the incompetent onanists :-) can't even do the signs 
correctly. In a masterstroke they have decorated every lamppost in my 
little Welsh town.
with Welsh language signs that contain gibberish that looks as if it 
came out of a very bad  machine translator. (I have checked it doesn't 
match any of the ones I know.)  I don't expect them to speak the 
language. I do expect anyone who has received a secondary education to 
know you cannot just look things up in a dictionary. ( only Gawd knows 
which one they've used!)  In case you don't grasp my tone I am trying to 
be humorous about this and  am smiling writing it.

Here is an example on the Sgymraeg ( Scum Welsh) part of Flickr. The 
comments are in English.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/95685976@N00/3581613198/

If you don't believe me about authoritarians not grasping things there 
are some wonderful examples Take these about ASBOS being given or 
threatened to the mentally ill, the developmentally impaired and to  
someone who sufferers from a neurological disorder that makes them swear 
and shout without any voluntary control. These are all examples of 
people who do not conform to norms being penalised .

http://www.communitycare.co.uk/Articles/2005/06/30/49999/we-dont-need-asbos-but-we-do-need-help.html

On the point of  IRC and the website I think it is better to get the 
other stuff working first. We can add bells and whistles later.
Having seen the IRC channel I don't think a log would be very useful.


Neil