[OpenWireless Tech] A small question about tracking

[Brad Knowles]

On Nov 6, 2012, at 6:01 PM, Russell Senior <russell at personaltelco.net> wrote:

> My claim is that even the likelihood * cost is infinitesimal.  If you
> have hard numbers that contradict my claim, please cite them.

Irrelevant.  Perception is the key.  And we know that human perception of risk is flawed -- see <http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/how-risky-is-it-really/201008/the-psychology-risk-perception-are-we-doomed-because-we-get-risk->, among many others.

The simple fact that the cost is so high will drive most people to avoid any possibility of failure, no matter how remote the actual probability of that failure.


You fundamentally cannot solve this problem until you first solve the problem of perception of this issue.  This is not a technical problem, this is a human problem.

> Furthermore, instead of whimpering on the sidelines, actually
> participating and proudly and vocally helping making "open" the norm
> will mean increasingly that police can't get away with sloppy and
> destructive investigative work.

How many people are willing to be the Kent State victims who died or were wounded on May 4th, 1970?  How many people are willing to be the UC Davis students who were inappropriately pepper sprayed in the face on November 18th, 2011?

Feel free to put your money where your mouth is and actively go out and seek UC Davis or Kent State type experiences and then report back to us how well this works for you to encourage others to do the same.  We'll wait.

> The more "open" is marginalized by the nappy-wetters, the more police
> will assume an IP address equals a person and the more your theory
> becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy.

The more you challenge people to become "part of the solution and not part of the problem", but without focusing your attention first on solving the real underlying perception problem, the more empty your claims and the more pointless your arguments.

Instead, try focusing on solving first things first.


Or, at least acknowledging that there is a real perception problem here that needs to be addressed, even if the actual probability of happening is vanishingly small.

> As for the costs that might ultimately land on a tiny minority,
> perhaps we should all be giving money to EFF to create a legal defense
> fund for those that suffer from the negligence of dumb law
> enforcement.

That is actually a useful idea.

--
Brad Knowles <brad at shub-internet.org>
LinkedIn Profile: <http://tinyurl.com/y8kpxu>