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(Wiki Article #2: Alphabet Soup: SOPA, PIPA, CISPA)
(Wiki Article #2: Alphabet Soup: SOPA, PIPA, CISPA)
 
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'''Definetions:'''
 
'''Definetions:'''
  
:;Anonymous: Anonymous are an international group of online activist “hacktivists”, who coordinate attacks on certain government, religious and corporate websites.  They identify themselves with anonymous aliases and preform collaborative hacking “operations” on various censoring organizations trying to impose anti-cyber-surveillance and anti-cyber-censorship ideas. Ever since 2003, they were responsible for attacks such as the 4chan raids, Project Chanology, and the various operations concerning the Arab Spring and Occupy Wall Street in 2011.  
+
:;Anonymous: Anonymous are an international group of online activists “hacktivists”, who coordinate attacks on certain government, religious and corporate websites.  They identify themselves with anonymous aliases and preform collaborative hacking “operations” on various censoring organizations trying to impose anti-cyber-surveillance and anti-cyber-censorship ideas. Ever since 2003, they were responsible for attacks such as the 4chan raids, Project Chanology, and the various operations concerning the Arab Spring and Occupy Wall Street movements in 2011.(Anonymous, 2013)
 
   
 
   
:;PIPA: PIPA, Protect IP Act, is a bill introduced on May 12 2011 to fight the growing wave of international online piracy. It came as a rewrite of the 2010 COICA but with rather controversial and strict proposal. It basically gives the US Department of Justice and copyright holders the right to seek and then shutdown international websites that carry any American copyrighted material. The Act says that an "information location tool shall take technically feasible and reasonable measures, as expeditiously as possible, to remove or disable access to the Internet site associated with the domain name set forth in the order". In addition, it must delete all hyperlinks to the offending "Internet site". This of course quickly made people argue that the Act will hinder the innovation, freedom of speech, and Internet integrity.  
+
:;PIPA: PIPA, Protect IP Act, is a bill introduced on May 12 2011 to fight the growing wave of international online piracy. It came as a rewrite of the 2010 COICA but with a rather controversial and strict proposal. It basically gives the US Department of Justice and copyright holders the right to seek and then shutdown international websites that carry any American copyrighted material. The Act says that an "information location tool shall take technically feasible and reasonable measures, as expeditiously as possible, to remove or disable access to the Internet site associated with the domain name set forth in the order". In addition, it must delete all hyperlinks to the offending 'Internet site'(PROTECT IP Act, 2013). This, of course, quickly made people argue that the Act will hinder innovation, freedom of speech, and internet integrity.  
  
:;SOPA: SOPA, Stop Online Piracy Act, is a bill introduced on October 26 2011 as a sister bill to PIPA that purposes more restrictions on copyright infringement. SOPA now targets local domains that contain links to and/or content from international domains that have copyrighted material. This includes sites such as search engines, blogs, wikis, and even social media websites. It is supposed to protect domestic intellectual property and content creators’ rights against theft, but it also heavily opposes freedom of speech and online privacy. It gives a larger capacity for the government to censor such sites and organizations.  
+
:;SOPA: SOPA, Stop Online Piracy Act, is a bill introduced on October 26 2011 as a sister bill to PIPA that purposes more restrictions on copyright infringement. SOPA now targets local domains that contain links to and/or content from international domains that have copyrighted material. This includes sites such as search engines, blogs, wikis, and even social media websites. It is supposed to protect domestic intellectual property and content creators’ rights against theft, but people argue that it also heavily opposes freedom of speech and online privacy. It gives a larger capacity for the government to censor such sites and organizations.(Stop Online Piracy Act, 2013)
  
 
'''How Groups of Hackers Relate to Movements to Protect Online Privacy'''
 
'''How Groups of Hackers Relate to Movements to Protect Online Privacy'''
  
The issues that hacktivist groups, mainly Anonymous, concern themselves into are more oriented towards breaking down the autocratic systems that organizations try to impose on the internet. Whether this was censoring certain material or legislating specific local laws to the internet, they try to attack these organizations and destroy them entirely. This of course relates directly to the movements to protect online privacy. A group like Anonymous is a group of people who grew up in this globalized world of the internet and feel that they are in danger once someone tries to impose restrictions to the web. The value their freedom and privacy and do all they can to oppose losing it. The same can be said when talking about WikiLeaks, where people like Julian Assange are fighting the government for no reason other than simply protecting their online freedom that they grew up into.  
+
The issues that hacktivist groups, mainly Anonymous, concern themselves into are more oriented towards breaking down the autocratic systems that organizations try to impose on the internet. Whether this was censoring certain material or legislating specific local laws to the internet; they try to attack these organizations and destroy them entirely. This of course relates directly to the movements to protect online privacy by advocating for the freedom of the internet. A group like Anonymous is a group of people who grew up in this globalized world of the internet and feel alarmed once someone tries to impose restrictions to the web. They value their freedom and privacy and try and do all they can to oppose losing it. The same can be said when talking about people like Julian Assange, founder of Wikileaks, where they are fighting the government mainly to protect the online freedom that they grew up into.  
  
On the other hand, what these groups of people having in common is that they represent the global scope of the issue. A direct example to the international angle of the issue would be the case of Kim Dotcom with Megaupload. This case exemplifies the efforts the US tries to impose to control the internet abroad.  
+
The other thing that unites these people in common is that they represent the global scope of the issue where both the hackers and the online-privacy movements fight through international borders. A direct example to the international angle of the issue would be the case of Kim Dotcom with Megaupload. This case exemplifies the efforts the US tried to impose to control the internet abroad.  
  
 
'''Edward Snowden'''
 
'''Edward Snowden'''
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The recent events involving Edward Snowden publicly revealing the secrets of PRISM exposes and, at the same time, sums up the whole debate between online privacy activists and the government. In my opinion, there are two main things to take out of these events:  
 
The recent events involving Edward Snowden publicly revealing the secrets of PRISM exposes and, at the same time, sums up the whole debate between online privacy activists and the government. In my opinion, there are two main things to take out of these events:  
  
:The government works under the table.  
+
*The government is working from behind.  
The whole secrecy surrounding PRISM and how it legally functions proves that the people in charge of SOPA, PIPA, and CISPA won’t stop there to control one’s privacy. Instead, it proves that the issue is much deeper than just passing bills but rather it is something that has already been approved and something that is really happening. This, in my opinion, highlights the government’s determined stand on the issue and that it doesn’t care about online privacy as long as it is needed to achieve something else.
+
The whole secrecy surrounding PRISM and how it was legally approved by a secret court proves that the people in charge of SOPA, PIPA, and CISPA will not stop there to control one’s privacy; instead, it is something that has already been approved and something that is really happening. This, in my opinion, highlights the government’s determined stand on the issue and that it does not care about online privacy as long as it is in the need to achieve something else.  
 
+
:The public’s international reaction.
+
The PRISM case caught so much momentum worldwide; it reminded me of the reaction WikiLeaks got. This case proved that the issue wasn’t just about American citizens’ privacy, but rather a global one. We saw reactions from the British parliament that exposed even more they broad scope of the issue. The media attention also played a major role where differences in how the issue was dealt with domestically and internationally over the news, proves that global depth of the issue. The same is seen with the protests that were spurred.
+
  
 +
*The public’s international reaction.
 +
The PRISM case caught so much momentum worldwide; it reminded me of the reaction WikiLeaks got. This case proved that the issue wasn't just about American citizens’ privacy, but rather a global one. We saw reactions from the British parliament that really exposed how global the issue was. The media attention also played a major role where differences over the news domestically and internationally in how the issue was dealt with highlights that global depth of the issue. The same is seen with the protests that were spurred.
  
  
 
'''Works Cited:'''
 
'''Works Cited:'''
 +
 +
Havey, Jason (2012) A technical examination of SOPA and PROTECT IP[http://blog.reddit.com/2012/01/technical-examination-of-sopa-and.html]
 +
 +
Norton, Quinn (2012) 2011: The Year Anonymous Took On Cops, Dictators and Existential Dread[http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/01/anonymous-dicators-existential-dread/all/1]
 +
 +
Zetter, Kim (2013) Reddit Cofounder Calls on Google’s Larry Page to Oppose CISPA[http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2013/04/reddit-opposes-cispa/]
 +
 +
Sottek, T.C. (2013) The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act: CISPA explained[http://www.theverge.com/2012/4/27/2976718/cyber-intelligence-sharing-and-protection-act-cispa-hr-3523]
 +
 +
"Anonymous (group)" Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 22 June 2013. Web. 27 June 2013[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anonymous_(group)]
 +
 +
"PROTECT IP Act" Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 8 May 2013. Web. 27 June 2013[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PROTECT_IP_Act]
 +
 +
"Stop Online Piracy Act" Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 22 June 2013. Web. 27 June 2013[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stop_Online_Piracy_Act]

Latest revision as of 10:27, 27 June 2013

Wiki Article #1: Simulating Detroit:A City with Cars and Crime but no Races

Simulating Detroit:A City with Cars and Crime but no Races

Brief Summary:

SimCity (later named Micropolis) is a city-building simulation video game, first released on October 3, 1989, and designed by the famous game developer Will Wright. SimCity was the first product of the video game company Maxis, which has since been ported into various personal computers and game consoles, and generated several sequels including SimCity 2000 in 1993, SimCity 3000 in 1999, SimCity 4 in 2003, SimCity DS, SimCity Societies in 2007, and SimCity in 2013. Until the release of The Sims in 2000, the SimCity series was the best-selling line of computer games made by Maxis.

On January 10, 2008, after EA owned the rights of Maxis, the SimCity source code was released by EA under the free software GPL 3 license with the original working title – Micropolis (Wright’s original name for his city simulation). The objective of the game is to build and design a city that can maintain a certain scenario set up for that specific city. In this case, of Detroit 1973, the scenario was that crime and depressed industry wrecked the city. The mayor needs to reduce crime and reorganize the city to better develop.


Main Argument:

The author, Mark Sample, started this article by first introducing the reason Detroit was so famous and the real motivation behind SimCity Detroit 1973. He introduced Detroit as the motor capital of the world and argued that its importance lies in the huge automotive industry it has. He then goes and introduces the game itself and how when it was released, in the late 80s, it was the closest (of all the other scenarios) to real life simulation. The author then to introduce his main part of the argument by talking about the 1967 Detroit riot and how that was reflected into the game. The riots were caused mainly by racial problems Detroit was facing in those years; however, back then, nothing was mentioned about the automotive greatness of Detroit and how the city was living by its industry to overcome those problems. On the other hand, SimCity was based entirely on the automotive industry and the theme was that if the industry is not in good condition, crime rises. “Not race problems. Crime.” as described by Sample.

Sample is arguing that SimCity was intentionally avoiding the racial problems Detroit was facing by blaming the problems on just crime. He goes on to explain, “the riots in my 1974 version of [SimCity] Detroit are virtually whitewashed. They are riots in the abstract. There are no people involved. Only algorithmically-determined mobs.” This shows how SimCity was precisely built to avoid certain issues and rather concentrate on the gaming side of SimCity as Will Wright himself explains when asked about this: “I just kind of optimized [the game] for game play.”

Social and Cultural aspects
Sample clearly wants to question why SimCity did not take into perspective the main social issue of the time and why avoiding it was better than discussing it. He takes his argument to an even broader perspective by asking what do contexts of any simulation game really represent.
Political aspect
The author did not really discuss any political aspect of the game even though this topic seems like one that would definitely have a political angle to it. He mentioned how in the 1967 riots the national guard were called and their impact on the situation; however, he did not discuss the impact such political situations had on the game itself.
Comments’ debate
The main theme in the comments, which really ties into my own point of view, is if such topics were indeed explicitly discussed in simulation games more problems would be generated consequently. Computer simulation can never really present the issue with fairness to all sides of the issue. Another aspect of the situation was that throughout that time period the main theme of urban politics all over the US was to in fact turn “race” into “crime” and avoid the problem altogether. As Rob Macdougall explains in a comment: “I continue to suspect such conflations/evasions/oversimplifications are basic, indeed essential to historical simulations – they’re not just flaws of this or that game, they are the whole point of simulation in the first place.”

I believe that given the atmosphere of the time the game was introduced, it was the perfect way to deal with such an issue by preserving the simulation world to be the ‘ideal’ world and not fall into the mistakes caused by such a sensitive issue.


Works Cited:

Sample, Mark. "Simulating Detroit:A City with Cars and Crime but no Races" Play The Past RSS. Play The Past, 14 Feb. 2012. Web. 04 June 2013.[1]

"SimCity (1989 video game)." Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 22 April 2013. Web. 04 June 2013[2]



Wiki Article #2: Alphabet Soup: SOPA, PIPA, CISPA

Definetions:

Anonymous
Anonymous are an international group of online activists “hacktivists”, who coordinate attacks on certain government, religious and corporate websites. They identify themselves with anonymous aliases and preform collaborative hacking “operations” on various censoring organizations trying to impose anti-cyber-surveillance and anti-cyber-censorship ideas. Ever since 2003, they were responsible for attacks such as the 4chan raids, Project Chanology, and the various operations concerning the Arab Spring and Occupy Wall Street movements in 2011.(Anonymous, 2013)
PIPA
PIPA, Protect IP Act, is a bill introduced on May 12 2011 to fight the growing wave of international online piracy. It came as a rewrite of the 2010 COICA but with a rather controversial and strict proposal. It basically gives the US Department of Justice and copyright holders the right to seek and then shutdown international websites that carry any American copyrighted material. The Act says that an "information location tool shall take technically feasible and reasonable measures, as expeditiously as possible, to remove or disable access to the Internet site associated with the domain name set forth in the order". In addition, it must delete all hyperlinks to the offending 'Internet site'(PROTECT IP Act, 2013). This, of course, quickly made people argue that the Act will hinder innovation, freedom of speech, and internet integrity.
SOPA
SOPA, Stop Online Piracy Act, is a bill introduced on October 26 2011 as a sister bill to PIPA that purposes more restrictions on copyright infringement. SOPA now targets local domains that contain links to and/or content from international domains that have copyrighted material. This includes sites such as search engines, blogs, wikis, and even social media websites. It is supposed to protect domestic intellectual property and content creators’ rights against theft, but people argue that it also heavily opposes freedom of speech and online privacy. It gives a larger capacity for the government to censor such sites and organizations.(Stop Online Piracy Act, 2013)

How Groups of Hackers Relate to Movements to Protect Online Privacy

The issues that hacktivist groups, mainly Anonymous, concern themselves into are more oriented towards breaking down the autocratic systems that organizations try to impose on the internet. Whether this was censoring certain material or legislating specific local laws to the internet; they try to attack these organizations and destroy them entirely. This of course relates directly to the movements to protect online privacy by advocating for the freedom of the internet. A group like Anonymous is a group of people who grew up in this globalized world of the internet and feel alarmed once someone tries to impose restrictions to the web. They value their freedom and privacy and try and do all they can to oppose losing it. The same can be said when talking about people like Julian Assange, founder of Wikileaks, where they are fighting the government mainly to protect the online freedom that they grew up into.

The other thing that unites these people in common is that they represent the global scope of the issue where both the hackers and the online-privacy movements fight through international borders. A direct example to the international angle of the issue would be the case of Kim Dotcom with Megaupload. This case exemplifies the efforts the US tried to impose to control the internet abroad.

Edward Snowden

The recent events involving Edward Snowden publicly revealing the secrets of PRISM exposes and, at the same time, sums up the whole debate between online privacy activists and the government. In my opinion, there are two main things to take out of these events:

  • The government is working from behind.

The whole secrecy surrounding PRISM and how it was legally approved by a secret court proves that the people in charge of SOPA, PIPA, and CISPA will not stop there to control one’s privacy; instead, it is something that has already been approved and something that is really happening. This, in my opinion, highlights the government’s determined stand on the issue and that it does not care about online privacy as long as it is in the need to achieve something else.

  • The public’s international reaction.

The PRISM case caught so much momentum worldwide; it reminded me of the reaction WikiLeaks got. This case proved that the issue wasn't just about American citizens’ privacy, but rather a global one. We saw reactions from the British parliament that really exposed how global the issue was. The media attention also played a major role where differences over the news domestically and internationally in how the issue was dealt with highlights that global depth of the issue. The same is seen with the protests that were spurred.


Works Cited:

Havey, Jason (2012) A technical examination of SOPA and PROTECT IP[3]

Norton, Quinn (2012) 2011: The Year Anonymous Took On Cops, Dictators and Existential Dread[4]

Zetter, Kim (2013) Reddit Cofounder Calls on Google’s Larry Page to Oppose CISPA[5]

Sottek, T.C. (2013) The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act: CISPA explained[6]

"Anonymous (group)" Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 22 June 2013. Web. 27 June 2013[7]

"PROTECT IP Act" Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 8 May 2013. Web. 27 June 2013[8]

"Stop Online Piracy Act" Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, 22 June 2013. Web. 27 June 2013[9]