Little Brother is Out
I’ve been waiting to read Cory Doctorow’s new book, Little Brother, since I first heard him talk about it. He did a reading from it last year at SF in SF, a local Science Fiction salon (who are unable to provide an RSS feed for events…).
The official description of the book is:
Marcus, a.k.a “w1n5t0n,” is only seventeen years old, but he figures he already knows how the system works–and how to work the system. Smart, fast, and wise to the ways of the networked world, he has no trouble outwitting his high school’s intrusive but clumsy surveillance systems.
But his whole world changes when he and his friends find themselves caught in the aftermath of a major terrorist attack on San Francisco. In the wrong place at the wrong time, Marcus and his crew are apprehended by the Department of Homeland Security and whisked away to a secret prison where they’re mercilessly interrogated for days.
When the DHS finally releases them, Marcus discovers that his city has become a police state where every citizen is treated like a potential terrorist. He knows that no one will believe his story, which leaves him only one option: to take down the DHS himself.
The afterword is written by security guru Bruce Schneier. How cool is that?
Today is the official release day and, right on time, my Amazon pre-order slapped into my porch from my local mail dwarf. Check it out:
I put in a gratuitous pro-Tor picture of my personal laptop as well. (Tor plays a role in the book, as I recall.)
I recorded Cory’s reading last year, which is embedded below, if you are interested in hearing the excerpt from the book. There is a bit of an introduction from the SF in SF organizers and Cory starts at about 4 minutes and 55 seconds into the recording.
Microsoft Hands Cops Forensic Tools
Lucky day for users of Windows. It seems that Microsoft is handing tools to law enforcement around the world that gives quick and easy shortcuts to gather data from Windows machines for police forensics.
From the Seattle Times article today:
The COFEE, which stands for Computer Online Forensic Evidence Extractor, is a USB “thumb drive” that was quietly distributed to a handful of law-enforcement agencies last June. Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith described its use to the 350 law-enforcement experts attending a company conference Monday.
The device contains 150 commands that can dramatically cut the time it takes to gather digital evidence, which is becoming more important in real-world crime, as well as cybercrime. It can decrypt passwords and analyze a computer’s Internet activity, as well as data stored in the computer.
It also eliminates the need to seize a computer itself, which typically involves disconnecting from a network, turning off the power and potentially losing data. Instead, the investigator can scan for evidence on site.
More than 2,000 officers in 15 countries, including Poland, the Philippines, Germany, New Zealand and the United States, are using the device, which Microsoft provides free.
I wonder if Apple does something similar for OS X for police or maybe Mac users don’t commit crimes? If they do, they probably don’t tell everyone. :-) Another reason to use Linux, it seems.
On one hand, I understand the need for law enforcement to be able to gather evidence for criminal investigations. On the other hand, I find it extremely creepy that an operating system manufacturer (with a monopoly or near monopoly, effectively, as an operating system) is in bed with cops and developing tools internally for them. It isn’t like these could be abused by someone, right?
I also dislike this comment, especially, from Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith:
Smith compared the Internet of today to London and other Industrial Revolution cities in the early 1800s. As people flocked from small communities where everyone knew each other, an anonymity emerged in the cities and a rise in crime followed.
The social aspects of Web 2.0 are like “new digital cities,” Smith said. Publishers, interested in creating huge audiences to sell advertising, let people participate anonymously.
That’s allowing “criminals to infiltrate the community, become part of the conversation and persuade people to part with personal information,” Smith said.
The tying of anonymity on the net with criminality is hyperbole, as far as I’m concerned. I’m surprised he didn’t attempt to link it to “terrorists” either since that seems to be the method of making people more paranoid at the moment.
Sure, if you are anonymous, you can commit crimes and it is difficult to know who you are but the root of the problem is the criminal behavior, not the anonymity. I can be anonymous in my day to day life, walking around my city, and commit crimes. You don’t find people declaring that the problem is that the guy who mugged someone was anonymous but that he mugged someone. Otherwise, we’d all have our names emblazoned on our clothes or broadcast through RFID or somesuch.
The net has a long tradition of anonymity, which I think is actually essential to its well being and societal good. It has acted as a place where people can say things or think thoughts (or write thoughts, more importantly) without worry about the impact it will have on them by being associated with their name. Ask the Chinese bloggers if this is important…
California Institute of Integral Studies?
I have been focused on the Graduate Theological Union (GTU) as the main place to do my PhD. This is largely because Dr. Richard Payne is there and he is one of the few scholars in Japanese Buddhism of the esoteric sort (Shingon, in his case) in the United States.
There is another school in the area that has a PhD program that focuses on Buddhist Studies. That is the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS). They actually teach Pali, Sanskrit, Tibetan and Chinese there as well (and require at least one of these for the degree).
One of the things that I’ve been reevaluating is my idea for a dissertation topic. I’ve been batting around the idea of focusing more on the experience of Buddhists in America, especially esoteric Buddhists (which are largely Vajrayana practitioners). This is an area of focus for one of the main professors at CIIS. CIIS also costs an amazingly smaller amount that GTU (around $21,000 a year for PhD versus the $48,000 a year at GTU) and inducts in either Spring or Fall.
What this all means is that if I decided to go to CIIS and was accepted for an application in the next six months, I could start this coming January instead of eight or nine months later at GTU, and it would cost about half as much.
I am unsure about the intellectual or academic rigor of the CIIS program though. It is a small school and, like Naropa, in a way, comes from a background emerging from the mists of the 60s. It also has a fairly small academic staff, which gives less diversity for the work there. There are only four main professors in the “Asian and Comparative Studies” department. Additionally, part of the point of a PhD is who you study with and I would enjoy working with Dr. Payne at GTU. It is conceivable that I could get a good PhD and improve both my academic work and grounding in Buddhism working at CIIS as well. It is really hard to say.
The handbook for the program that I am looking at is available online as well for those interested in looking at it.
So, this leaves me with a bunch of questions but I also have friends who have either attended CIIS or have worked with academics from the school. If people have any thoughts on the school and its programs, I would love to hear them.
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