Feds and M$

     http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/businesstechnology/134438173_passport18.html

 

:-/

Damn that's creepy.

 

Creepy it is...

 

Excuse me, sensitive data stored by MS.........  

 

This whole business of dot net and passport is nothing but bad news for consumers.
How did we ever get to the point where M$ is ramming this kind of stuff down our throats and the people just keep buyining into it.
It's frustrating enough that a person can't do anything about crooked politicians, lousey health care systems, and all the other crap we have to put up with. Now we can't even dictate how we prefer to use our computers and TVs, and to top it all off, the Government is going to take advantage of M$s heavy handed tactics to invade our privacy even more.
I don't know who's more to blame here. M$s efforts to rule the world, or the people not putting up a fight and saying NO, I won't buy that.
The people have turned into sheeple.

 

Well, I said it before and I'll say it again - a good while back M$ was charged with and stone-cold guilty of numerous anti-trust violations.

Slid right out of it, didn't they?

What does M$ have to offer the government?

Information (and access to people's computers [via WindowsUpdate]  ), and plenty of it! Government quieted down right quick when they got access to all that, didn't they?

So of course the government is willing to 'consider' using .net and Passport to help their partner M$ out (by giving it the US Government seal of approval indirectly) with a program that everyone with an ounce of sense has rejected out of hand.

A lot of us use the OS, but how many of us use Passport? Or Microsoft.net? Or Messenger?

I sure don't - and I'd seriously suggest that anyone who is find alternatives- quickly.

Only by people finding/using alternatives to the M$ machine (and thus making the alternatives viable competitors via their use), can M$'s march toward having a stranglehold on the entire Internet and the people who use it be hindered.

Will that happen? I doubt it. I can't remember the movie's title but it was one of those futuristic ones where the 'outlaws' were the ones who knew how to work around the master system (which controlled everything in the society). It's what we're actually rapidly approaching.

(P.S. - The 'outlaws' were hunted down and exterminated tirelessly). Pete

 

Well, apparently others see the true nature of the M$ beast clearly also. Hopefully the chains will hold. I'm hoping we can defang it, and put it in a strong cage through the courts.

 

Incredibly disturbing news indeed. I have a hotmail accoutn which means I have a "passport" thing.. or something like thta.. but I didn't use my real name...

Then again, that's not the point here. YOU hafta sign up to use your computer you bought because it has XP?

Now there is no question... When my tax return gets here and I build the clone dream machine, it will run 98se. FFS!

 

        think about this a moment.....a major ceo for M$ steps down.......then a major "ceo" for the government steps down.....then just a couple of months later....the former ceo from M$ goes to work for the government.......an the former ceo from the government goes to work for M$........duh!       " mommie....mommie"  I fell off the back of the turnip truck today.....hit my head an now I am super-stupid.!

                         snowman

 

         the posts by Spy1 and Root  caused me to put the thinking hat on.....


        I haven't been using computers all that long..certainly not as long as most people at this forum...an looking back now I have to laugh because I didn't even know how to turn a computer on.

       but time has passed as it always does....an with the help of many....an countless hours on my own..I have reached a point of some understanding of computers.

       an yet...I know people who have been using computers for years an they have absolutely no awearness of the tracking that is going on ....an they don't even seem to care.

      recently when I went in person to a certain un-name ip to report that one of it's customers was trying to hack my computer.......I was actually threaten with legal action by the ip if I would dare take any action to defend my computer from the hacker.....

      at this point I don't honest believe that the public at-large even cares any more...many times I've been told by someone, "I'm just one person...an can't do anything."     or...."I don't understand computers...just use them."

      now, snowman have water for brians so it can't be all that hard to learn about computers if a snowman can do it.      LOL

      Freedom...use it..or lose it.     somehow I don't find that statement all that complicated to understand.

      if I can prevent just one spy from gathering information from my computer today.......thats one success..     if ten other people do the same thats ten successful preventions...etc..etc..etc.  

      to echo Root......how did the situation ever reach this point?    

                                snowman