wk 12 makeup- Research and Collaborative

Let's see if I can knock out both of these two in one go. I found out that Digg started out being a heavier tech oriented website that originally focused on the latest computer gadgets that were coming out. The founder Kevin Rose had started off as a host on a television show called Screen Savers for Tech TV, a channel dedicated to computer related topics. I believe that this explains its mostly male demographic. When first exploring Digg, I didn't know that it had gone through such tumultuous periods with the way the voting system initially worked. It began with what was called the Tyranny of the minority which really isn't as bad as it seems, but presented an oligarchy on how information and content was published to the front page. While social circles within the Digg community worked in promoting content on the internet, it also hindered the democratic way that stories made it to the front page, creating an editorial gate that was ruled by algorithms and a select few of highly motivated sumbitters

It also never really occurred to me to use Digg as a way to get people to visit other people's websites to promote advertising. I can see this as a great way in intertwining capitalist techniques to democratic processes while educating and entertaining.
To relate these stories together, I found out that Netscape is NOT dead and is currently trying to reconfigure it's objective from news portal to content aggregate similar in fashion to Digg and Reddit! However, unlike Digg, Netscape plans to capitalize on internet traffic and social circles by paying people to find content on the internet, submit it, and then share it with their friends. This is a list from oen of the articles that I use as a resource.

One of smaller thing but no less interesting things that I have found while researching my topic about surveillance and civil liberties is that past presidents have often times revoked certain civil liberties. Throughout history and times of hardship for our country, the federal government has impinged As a matter of fact, the United States has quite a record of policies
and practices that are clearly adverse to citizens’ civil rights and
liberties. Noteworthy examples include:
• The Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798, which made it illegal to publicly
criticize the government. Resident aliens could be summarily deported
by order of the president.
• Lincoln’s suspension of
habeas corpus
and other rights, allowing, in
one instance, the arrest of several Maryland legislators, to prevent them
from voting their sentiments. Furthermore, persons suspected of
“disloyal” practices were subjected to trial and punishment under
military rather than civilian law. Northern newspapers deemed
insufficiently sympathetic to the union cause were banned from the
mails, a significant form of censorship.
• Domestic surveillance and suppression of “seditious intent” by the
War Department in 1917.
• The 1918 Sedition Act. Much like its 1798 predecessor, just about
anything deemed critical of the government was subject to criminal
proceedings. Attorney General Palmer authorized a number of
“Palmer raids” culminating in the arrest and/or summary deportation
of thousands.
• Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s internment of Japanese Americans
during World War II, an act of rights-depriving racial discrimination.
• COINTELPRO, the FBI counter-intelligence program of the 1960s
and 1970s, primarily for the purpose of disrupting Community Party
activities in the United States. Civil rights groups and anti-Vietnam
War demonstrators, however, were featured targets. Agents employed
a variety of surveillance measures. Abuses prompted the Church
Committee hearings. (Stone 2004)

There are elements of my research that I have uncovered that have troubled me. There are numerous programs that are currently implace within the United States and Europe that facilitate the breach of our privacy. One of the older programs in place is called CALEA (Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act). This forced telecommunications companies to reconfigure their hardware so that law enforcement officials can tap into networks. As of this moment and as far as I know, law enforcement still needs a warrant to do any type of surveillance upon individual communications. Knowing that this technology exists however, I question the ease at which it can be abused.
Law enforcement and the government argue that they need these types of programs to better monitor criminal activity due to the incredibly fast rate that telecommunication technology is advancing. I'm beginning to understand the argument the author makes of his article when he said that this is only a supply-side approach. As shields says : The discussions assume the moral correctness of the supply-side approach, and conceptualize the problem as a technological one." Instead of handling source of the crime, they erode civil liberties to catch the crime.
There's many programs in place, and CALEA is one that has taken on an international scope.