Reading the comments, my fear is that the outrage people are feeling is being framed in the wrong context. If we don't get the proper handle on this, all that outrage is going to fall on deaf ears. The people who are at the root of this are going to sense that we don't understand what's going on and dismiss all protests as irrelevant.

This is certainly not an issue of "evil government" or "power hungry institutions". This is an issue that involves people. People that are just like you and me. In fact, the ones who are responsible for the monster that's been created ARE people with the same motivations and rational capacity as you and I.

"We have met the enemy, and he is us." - Pogo

We are almost all guilty of making personal, selfish, idealistic and altruistic choices with blinders on to the larger impact of our choices. We all have a frustrating capacity for focusing on small picture goals and ignoring the big picture results. How many of us work for industries that have horrible environmental and social impact? Do you ever take into account the contribution you make to those disasters? Or are you comfortable in the belief that one person, "you", making fried chicken isn't responsible for the agregious level of child obesity in your country? Or you satisfied that building servers for BP doesn't in any way make you culpable for the massive negative impact of the industry as a whole?

We want to frame the ills of our societies in terms of villains which we can name...and even put a face on. But in the large chain of decisions that must be made and actions that must be taken, there is almost never one individual with the power to change the course of events. If one is ever identified, that person is almost certainly a scape goat, selected by popular consent for the very purpose of putting a face to the atrocities.

Governments and corporations are collections of individuals with the same strengths, weaknesses and short sightedness that we all posses.

So this problem arises from a troubling mentality that's very common in all orginzations. The tendency to view our individual actions and contributions as discrete from the larger result of the group. A small minded focus on results over impact.

This issue needs to be addressed in those terms, the troubling realization that good people with good intentions lost sight of the bigger picture. Only then will our protests ring true to the people involved.

And understand what's being discussed here also. This is not about personal invasion of privacy. That's certainly not how the architects of this see it. This is not the local police wire tapping "you". This is about a massive collection of data that could never be utilized effectively in those terms. It's complete historical data that exists for the purpose of analyzing as a whole, to learn the patterns that signify the actions of people who would do you harm. It is at the point such patterns are identified that investigation at an individual level, within that data, would begin. Perhaps that's why the people who created and manage this system don't feel it's a threat to you. Because they have no interest in you and didn't design the system for you...assuming you're not a terrorist.

But the danger that WE know is real, that they've lost sight of, is a matter of degrees. What happens when the definition of "enemy" begins to slip? What happens when, over time, all dissent is viewed as disruptive to the security of the country?

That's the big picture and that's the danger. Make sure you're protesting the right thing, if you want to be heard.

Watching this after over 4 years, I remember how much I like it when Jon Stewart gets pissed off. I also remember that none of these fuckers are in jail, and how the main architects of the crisis were hired by the Obama Administration to fix it. Even business newspapers said they shouldn't be hired they should be in jail.

Fuck You is exactly the words we should base a movement on. Fuck You Rich Fucks!

Yeah, common knowledge among so-called "experts" on anything amounts to variations of true, false, and meaningless. Slaves in a conventional sense of the designation in ancient Egypt the architects and laborers may not have been-The monuments remaining are still a testament to the influence of Pharonic power over the skilled-trades and the coordination of efforts. SOMEONE made SOMEBODY build the things, eh?? Giza doesn't look like a volunteer, community-beautification project somewhere in Seattle....

I've been a visitor from near the beginning (and registered for nearly 4 years). I probably got here from a link sent to Bluesnews by Ant. Anyway I've been meaning to make this rant for a long time; I probably should have done it before 5.0, but c'est la vie. I mean it in the best possible way...

I have 8 power points and a rating of 6 stars.

I'm not confident in describing what either of those things are, or are for.

The faq is a tiny link hidden in the footer, when it would be better as a help link on the main menu.

The answers in the faq itself contain assumed knowledge and lack context.

The member privileges page is given much more prominence than the faq, in a Useful pages list. It tells you abilities that require a star level, but doesn't tell you what a star level is, how to get stars, or link to the faq.

The rest of the page reads like it was written by a programmer (probably because it was).

The faq needs to be given to someone who has never used Videosift, and ask them if they understand Videosift after reading it. They won't.

Obviously some people have persisted with it, that's why about 500 people have a Bronze star or more; but I don't think it does much to encourage new users.

I'll never be a user that submits a lot of videos; that's just not my behaviour here. I actually watch almost all my online videos here, so of course... they are already posted

I get that Videosift should be designed to encourage people to submit videos and help out but a system that is hidden away and takes more than a few minutes to understand isn't going to encourage many people no matter how well it's designed.

My suggestion would be to make everything discoverable in the UI itself. "Possible *Invocations" under this box shouldn't give me a list of random words, none of which that I can use anyway (and no indication that that is even the case).

Nor should I be given Power Points if there is no way to use them; it only serves to add to my confusion, and will frustrate other users who think they just got something interesting. In reality they've been given the opportunity to either frustrate or embarrass themselves with a few "User could not X because X is not privileged" messages from Siftbot. Again, this only discourages people from taking part.

I can't flag a post as spam, so why show me the link to do so? Same with downvotes on videos and comments. Inviting a user to read an error message isn't very encouraging at all; it makes Videosift feel like a minefield of punishment. I follow the Sift Lounge link out of curiosity, and again computer says no.

The bookmark and playlist buttons under a video should be words rather than obscure icons.

Showing me things I can actually do will make me feel more useful and encourage me to contribute more. Making those into buttons would be even better. Making those into buttons that tell me what they do and how it helps would be perfect.

This isn't coming from a point of stupidity. I'm a software architect that spent many years developing one of the world's largest community platforms - so I get this stuff.

Mostly I come here for the videos and the comments - I read a lot more than I post. Sifters are not unfriendly to new users, and unlike the train wreck of youtube, they provide their reasoning; so no matter how much you may disagree with someone you can still learn something.

However it feels like a local pub; a small community where everyone knows everyone (except you); and everyone is doing something (except you), and that's because the barrier to getting that community feel is just way too high.

Anyway, I'm done with my rant. To be more on topic; I don't think there is much danger to the Sift if I could declare a video *dead. It seems the sort of thing someone should be able to do as soon as they're out of probation.

For now, I'll just stick to my usual behaviour of watching the videos and reading the comments.

Exceptionally well done little video. We could spend all day arguing about which architects were worthy and which were not, but this isn't the internet, so we won't...

"Architect, Richard Gage" Or to put it another way "This fucking guy over here"

I have YET to see any compilation of data or study or inquiry submitted to any Architectural or Engineering school or organization of note. Did science just fly out the fucking window? Or do Truthers think that ALL Engineers and Architects are controlled by the government?

Until Truthers get their heads OUT OF THEIR ASSES and present scientific peer reviewed data and analysis to a group of experts for testing it's all bullshit. Anyone who's gone to school knows how this shit works. You have an endless amount of things that you can do besides saying "This doesn't work so Says Me!"

It's about what you can prove and duplicate, it's Science Bitches, It doesn't care how much money you have or your political affiliation.

Nature ain't care, she's a badass mother.

"In order for the perimeter, to fall perfectly and symmetrically (which it pretty much does at building seven), all of those columns (24 core columns) would have to be removed within a tenth of a second of each other...Fire cannot do that...a controlled demolition can."~Architect, Richard Gage, founder Architects & Engineers for 9/11 Truth

It's hardly accurate to discount Karl Rove as "an old man" like he's some rambling wacknut on a street-corner.

He's the architect of neo-conservatism, the poster child of the Bush era, and a man capable of organizing multiple Super PACs worth hundreds of millions of dollars of secret money.>> ^direpickle:

Occam's razor. Which is more likely?
1) An old man refuses to believe that the world is changing around him
2) An old man had secretly rigged a national election, but the only people that knew about it were a bunch of spunky 4channers, and somehow taking down a website took down the entire infrastructure that would've allowed an entirely different set of servers talk to one another.

oh this is just too rich.
irony must be lost on this fat fuck.
here we have the architect of a stolen presidential election and the mastermind behind GOP voter suppression crying like the bitch he is.
this man was so good at voter suppression that they STILL use his tactics.

and look at him now...fucking pathetic worm.sold his soul and now his sins have come to roost.

keep crying pasty man....

Obama compromised significantly on the final state of the Affordable Care Act. If he hadn't, we'd have had the single payer public option that would have actually forced real competition into a market dominated by private insurers colluding with each other to fix prices.

It wasn't a compromise, it is a trojan horse for the single payer system. The architect of Obamacare admitted that publicly:



The reason he changed it is because his plan was too radical even for a democratically controlled congress to vote for. Also, the original point is that he didn't negotiate with the republicans at all.

He's only the most polarizing president in history because he's the first black one. Were he a white guy named Steve Smith he'd be the most conservative democrat to ever hold office.

You think he's polarizing because everyone is racist? Do you seriously believe that? I think he is polarizing because he actively works to divide people across political, economic and racial lines. From his extensive class warfare rhetoric, to comments from his mouthpieces like "theyre gonna put y’all back in chains", Obama has worked supremely hard to divide the country.

Again I ask you, if your party holds the majority, and the minority simply refuses to compromise or meet with you on ANY issue, then what else can your party do?

I don't have a party; I'm an independent. And are you trying to tell me that President Obama tried to negotiate with the republicans and was holding out an olive branch to them in those first two years but they wouldn't listen so he had no choice but to act unilaterally? Do you also have a bridge you want to sell me?

>> ^qfan:

I guess my first question to Bill would be, who are you to tell people how to raise their children, if what they are doing is fine by the law?

Well, aside from being a well-respected science educator, he's also a private person and thus entitled to an opinion. The same way that religious people seem to think they should be able to tell other people not only how to raise their children, but what their children should be taught in science class.

Bill is entitled to his opinion, the religious are entitled to theirs and we are entitled to judge them for their opinions.

>> ^qfan:

The second question would be, do you have any proof that believing in creation always leads people not to think innovatively?
Wernher von Braun was a Biblical creationist and one of the original rocket scientists, even working [edit: chief architect] on the Saturn V which took the recently deceased Neil Armstrong to the moon.

If Von Braun had believed in a biblical theory of "intelligent falling" instead of gravity, his rockets wouldn't have gotten far. If he had actually studied the science, his conclusion might have been very different, but there's not a lot of call for evolutionary science when designing rockets, so he basically ignored an area of science that conflicted with his belief system because it didn't affect his work. You can be damn sure he benefited from the study of evolution though, given it's the backbone of a lot of medical research.

A common condescending view many evolutionists seem to be taking over creationists these days. I guess my first question to Bill would be, who are you to tell people how to raise their children, if what they are doing is fine by the law? The second question would be, do you have any proof that believing in creation always leads people not to think innovatively?

Wernher von Braun was a Biblical creationist and one of the original rocket scientists, even working [edit: chief architect] on the Saturn V which took the recently deceased Neil Armstrong to the moon. A single example and there are many others.

Seems like he might not be abiding by the empirical method.

He'll be just like you, yeah, your boy is just like youuu. ♫
>> ^lucky760:

I wake up at 5:45am and drive 24 (or sometimes 23) minutes to work. I'm always the first one in the office so I get to enjoy solitude and silence for a couple of hours.
I am a software architect and implement systems from bottom to top and from back-end to front. I sit in front of two computer screens for my entire work day before heading home.
There I spend the rest of the day with my wife and 1.5 children, then at about 10:00pm start working on my contract software projects. I recline with my laptop on my lap as I work until 1:00-3:00am depending on the night (and how hard Mr. Sandman is punching my eyes shut).
Creating software and seeing it in action is my passion and I love everything about it. The only difficult part of my work is not having enough time in the day for it now that I'm a parent (and Harry Chapin's "Cat's in the Cradle" starts looping in my head when I even consider working instead of spending time with my boy).

I wake up at 5:45am and drive 24 (or sometimes 23) minutes to work. I'm always the first one in the office so I get to enjoy solitude and silence for a couple of hours.

I am a software architect and implement systems from bottom to top and from back-end to front. I sit in front of two computer screens for my entire work day before heading home, usually at 2:30pm.

There I spend the rest of the day with my wife and 1.5 children, then put the boy in bed at 7:00pm, and at about 10:00pm start working on my contract software projects. I recline with my laptop on my lap as I work until 1:00-3:00am depending on the night (and how hard Mr. Sandman is punching my eyes shut).

Creating software and seeing it in action is my passion and I love everything about it. The only difficult part of my work is not having enough time in the day for it now that I'm a parent (and Harry Chapin's "Cat's in the Cradle" starts looping in my head when I even consider working instead of spending time with my boy).

>> ^kevingrr:

@Yogi
I'm sorry my fellow sifters advocate "offing" these guys. These guys work seven days a week and they work to make a profit - just like every other business.
J.P. Morgan Chase was the go to entity to take over Bear Stearns and Washington Mutual when they failed. Why? Chase was strong enough to bear the burden.
Regarding TARP money Chase never wanted it or needed it. Link
The Dodd Frank and Consumer Protection act is a poorly written gargantuan hydra of a bill. I know this because the small community bankers I know are saying they are not going to be able to stay afloat.
My companies president - someone who I know for a fact has voted as a democrat for over 40 years - told me yesterday he will vote against Obama in the upcoming election. Why? We work in real estate and the paperwork needed to finance a project has multiplied - and with it the number of lawyers and legal hours required - that is if we can get something financed period. Good for lawyers - bad for anyone who might want to work building a new shopping center(architects, tradesmen, engineers, etc) or working there in the future.
Make the rules simple, make them fair, and enforce them effectively.


Oh Yay! Another lying apologist Fuckhead.