Bullies

Tonight I was listening to a terrific song, and so I posted it to the Fediverse group !Listening, one of the first groups I joined on Identica in 2009. Way back then, I was told the proper netiquette when announcing the name of the song you are listening to is to link to the song. That way anyone who was curious can listen to the song as well.

I discovered Ranee Lee when I bought a couple of albums from her at the Uptown Waterloo Jazz Festival last year. She was amazing. Sadly, her music isn’t released under a free culture license, so when I went looking for a link my options were limited. I tried a few of the links that offered the song, but was unable to play it on any of them.

This might be because I use Free Software and so don’t have Adobe Flash installed, or maybe because I use NoScript, Ad Block and Ghostery for security. The only link I could get to play the song was the one on Amazon. I don’t link to sites that only give partial song previews, but this was the only website where the song would play. So I posted:

!Listening to Ranee Lee “When A Woman Loves A Man” http://ur1.ca/g05sq !amwriting !NaNo

I was surprised to find myself attacked for posting this. This is not the first time I have been attacked online by someone who I hadn’t realized was an enemy.

what was the attack?

I don’t understand why someone who claims to care about privacy would link to amazon.

It doesn’t look like much of an attack, does it? But that’s the point. It almost sounds reasonable.

Until you look at the language.

The phrase “someone who claims” implies that the claim is dishonest.

By taking a step further, saying “someone who claims to care about privacy” he passes judgement. This is a statement that I am lying about what I care about.

“I don’t understand why someone who claims to care about privacy would link to amazon” says that because I posted a link to amazon I must be lying about caring about privacy. It is an attack, all right.

What did I do wrong?

WWII war propaganda - quiet

Perhaps I shouldn’t have used a URL shortener.

Maybe I shouldn’t have posted at all?

But it isn’t as if I posted the link to the !Privacy group.

But it isn’t what I did at all, really.

On the basis of one link, he has cast aspersions on anything and everything I have said about privacy online. He also maligns my personal credibility.

What gives him the right to tell me what I care about?

He has no more right to decide what I care about than I have the right to decide what his favourite colour is, or what hand he writes with.  He is entitled to disagree with my choices but certainly doesn’t have the right to use them as the basis of an ad hominem attack.

Privacy is a huge issue, and trying to maintain privacy online is not an easy thing to do. We are assailed on all sides. Certainly amazon has issues, but pretty nearly every website on the Internet has issues.  Particularly now that the Snowden revelations have made it clear that the Internet is under surveillance 24/7

Everything we do on the Internet has a cost in privacy.

Even before we heard about Prism, someone I know refused to use the Internet at all, ever, because that was the only way to be sure to avoid Internet surveillance.  I know other people who use the Internet sparingly, but never in their own homes, just as I know people who post their most personal information on Facebook.

Adults get to decide for ourselves what we are comfortable doing.  We need to make informed choice: we make our own decisions about how we will live our lives.  In a free country, other adults don’t have the right to decide for us.

What gives him the right to decide that posting a link to amazon negates any concerns I  have about privacy?

I answered his ostensible question with a question:

How can you possibly care about privacy if you use the Internet?:

His answer was

If that’s your justification, then you shouldn’t take issue with anything related to privacy.

Why does he think I need to justify myself to him?

Even if I had made some horrific inadvertent privacy gaffe, it would not then deprive me of the right to “take issue with anything related to privacy.”

Poppycock.  Suggesting that is as illogical as saying if I loan someone my car, I can’t complain if they burn my house down.

I often have strong opinions, and I am not hesitant about voicing them.  One valuable thing I learned growing up in a large family is that discussion and argument can inform; I have been known to change my opinion when shown another side or proven wrong.  I have been told some men have trouble with women with opinions.  Over the years, there have been instances of people attacking me online. When this has happened in the past, I’ve tried to resolve things through discussion.  But sometimes that isn’t possible.

bullying

Ironically, not so long ago someone asked me if the person who attacked me just now was an Internet troll, and at the time I said no, we were just having a discussion. Apparently I was wrong.

Sometimes people just don’t like you. Nothing you say will change it. Nothing you do will make you friends.

And of course, sometimes people just attack you because.

There doesn’t have to be a reason.

He might be bullied because he’s too smart, or not smart enough, she might be bullied because she’s too tall or too short. That’s how bullying works.

The ostensible reason for bullying isn’t actually a reason, its an excuse. Rational arguments just bounce off when someone is determined to attack you.

Apparently it is very easy to bully people online. The consequences have been fairly horrific in some cases, but mostly it is comparatively mild — unless of course you are the person being bullied.

The fediverse is largely peopled by tech folks at this point.  Mostly men at present. Thinking back, I’ve probably had one or two of this type of attack a year. I’m wondering how many of the women that used to be regulars there have disappeared precisely because of this type of attack? A growing number of people I speak with on Twitter — mostly women — block the people who harass them, or “protect their tweets.”

If the bullies have a problem with women in general or me in particular, they don’t have to stick around in the places I frequent.  They can leave.

Dear Bullies:

If you don’t like me, send me a message and I’ll make sure to unsubscribe from your feed, and I certainly won’t go so far as to converse with you any more.

Because I am not going to change. I am not going anywhere.  I will continue my online activities, including posting to Fediverse groups I belong to, like Privacy and Listening. If you have a problem with this, go somewhere else.

Feel free to leave the groups I am in.  Start your own groups; I won’t join.

Sincerely,

Laurel

Help Stop Bullying

One of the best ways to stop bullying is to speak against it when you see it.

If you see someone being bullied, stick up for them.

If you don’t, they might not stick around.

And then your world will be that much smaller.


Image Credit:

The American government’s creative works, like the pictured War Propaganda Poster “Quiet” are released directly into the public domain.

My Open Letter to Sir Tim Berners-Lee and the World Wide Web Consortium

connectivity (cc by laurelruswurm)

Dear Sir Tim Berners-Lee and the World Wide Web Consortium:

Re: Keep DRM out of Web standards — Reject the Encrypted Media Extensions (EME) proposal

As a middle aged mother, I’ve been learning (and sharing what I’ve learned) about net neutrality, the importance of free software, free culture, nd an open Internet, ever since I began hand coding my own HTML web pages and participating on the Internet in 2009. As a creator from a creative family, as well as publishing my own content online, I run a blog for my eighty three year old father. I have come to consider myself a netizen.

One reason DRM is dangerous is that it can hide all manner of spyware and malware from users. Another is that most people don’t even know what it is, or if they do, how to recognize it. While governments have allowed large corporations and media conglomerates to cripple digital products with DRM, there is no requirement anywhere in the world to to inform customers or computer users of such application.

I have avoided DRM wherever possible, but even with the absurd extension of copyright laws, I have been certain that free culture will win out eventually. But that confidence presupposes a free market.

In Canada where I live, our new Copyright Act makes it illegal to circumvent DRM for any reason at all, even if the the circumvention is allowed under our “fair dealing” exemptions, or if the DRM is applied inappropriately. I consider the application of DRM to freely licensed or public domain creative works to be inappropriate.

This is a huge concern for me, both as a cultural consumer and as a self publishing author. Existing copyright law has prevented me from even seeing the finished production of one of my own works.

Independent creators and Internet users are already at a huge disadvantage, because the large media special interests have the wherewithal to successfully lobby governments around the world into maximizing copyright laws and the attendant copyright monopoly to their own great benefit, at our expense.

These large and powerful special interest groups have long had a seat at the W3C table. But where is there representation for Internet users?

Most of the public does not even know W3C exists, let alone how to comment on an issue such as this. Although I am passionately interested in the subject, until I read Harry Halpin’s Guardian article last week, I had no idea there was any way for Internet users or creators to express our dismay beyond signing the Defective By Design’s “Keep DRM out of Web standards — Reject the Encrypted Media Extensions (EME) proposal” Petition. But Mr. Halpin pretty much implies that petition wasn’t enough.

Although Canada has been a world leader in Internet adoption, most Canadians are still not online. For most of those who are, participation on Facebook signifies the height of technical prowess. Certainly most Canadians haven’t even heard of the Guardian, and so will not have even read the article.

Mr. Halpin essentially gave me the weekend to get the word out. This weekend Identi.ca, the social network of choice for a great many people who are aware of these issues, is undergoing a massive migration from a backend of StatusNet to pump.io software. Many users like myself have been consumed in setting up our own federated status net instances. As well, those of us with privacy concerns have been caught up in the NSA Prism news story. For myself, I’ve had two major family happenings this weekend in addition to those online issues.

Maybe a few people who understand the issue will have read the blog post I wrote, but a weekend is not much time. Especially considering that the special interests that want DRM written into the Web Standard have been at the table for so very much longer.

Until the W3C holds a widely publicized meaningful consultation process, that Free Software Petition must be given at least as much weight as the opinions of any other group of stakeholders. Perhaps more, since the inclusion of DRM in the standard panders to the direct benefit of a specific special interest lobby group. Internet Users are easily the largest group of stakeholders, and our exclusion from the process means that the W3C must look out for the public good.

Keeping even a whiff of DRM out of the Web Standard will not harm the corporate special interests who lobby so effectively for it. They can just continue on as they have been, locking their own content behind DRM. Allowing the DRM toehold EME provides will lead to DRM becoming the default.

DRM exists to break interoperability. If DRM is allowed into the W3C Standard, it will become the W3C Standard. If W3C supports this, it will sacrifice the free and open Internet, not just for us, but for generations to come.

Please don’t do this.

Regards,
Laurel L. Russwurm

Online Accessibility

When we talk about accessibility issues, it usually means accessibility for people with disabilities. The internet has tools like speech readers, that can make it accessible for the blind.  Subtitles or closed captioning can make online video accessible for the deaf.   I learned early in my blogging career that typing a description in the alt=”” field,  allows speech readers to tell visually impaired users what images I use.  It’s a little more work, but it’s worth it if I can make my contect accessible.

But there are other accessibility issues that have nothing to do with disability.

standards

Internet standards are still evolving, but the internet works, because at its heart, every web page uses a programming language called HTML.  Just as every email we receive should be readable, every website we visit should work, no matter what browser we are using, because the data is in HTML.

making html inaccessible

I just went to check out a website called C.A.C.P./A.C.C.P. Official website. Although I am using this particular site as an example, this is certainly not the first time I have been annoyed by a website that wants me to remake my computer to accommodate it.

I’m pleased to see this official Canadian Website is bilingual. But this is what I see:

Screen Capture of the CACP Intro Page with No-Script blocked video

security

A blue letter S with eyes and teeth of a snake is confined in the red circle with a diagonal line through that has come to symbolize the word “No”The large yellow square in the middle of the webpage indicates this is something NoScript has blocked. NoScript is a browser plug-in that prevents Javascript and Flash from running unless I grant it permission. Javascript allows files to execute, or run, on your computer. That’s one way people get viruses and spyware. NoScript blocks such “active” content, but if I choose to trust the source, I can decide to allow it with a mouse click.  The other thing I tend to avoid is Flash for a couple of reasons.

cost

Flash video consumes a fair bit of bandwidth; so if your internet use is capped, as many are these days, NoScript allows you to decide whether to display the flash ads or video on your computer.

freedom

For me the more compelling reason is that Flash is proprietary software, and as a free culture advocate I prefer my web content in free or open formats.

my choice

If I do want to see this video, I can choose to click on the letter f in the centre of the page and grant it permission. But this is my first time here. Why would I do that? I don’t know this site, or who runs it personally.  Is it really run by CACP?  Why should I trust it? Do I have a compelling reason to gamble my computer security?

Not hardly.

Then I look at the text displayed under the blocked video.

Our site is best viewed with Mozilla Firefox or Internet Explorer 7.0. To view and use this page and aspects on other pages Macromedia Flash Player is required.
To download this plugin visit www.macromedia.com.
© 2008 CACP/Ribbet Inc. If you have difficulty with the website contact the Webmaster

I should not have to use a particular browser to see a web page display properly.

Or worse, download specialty software to use it.

Instead of telling me that I have to use a particular browser, if the web designer was doing her job, the page should display properly on any browser.

If it’s a mess, I’m certainly not going to switch browsers to something one website tells me I must have.  If I had to do that for every website I visited, I might not have room for my own files on my computer.   Besides, I prefer to learn from those who know what they are doing, and try to avoid taking direction from those who don’t.

And of course, Macromedia Flash Player is proprietary software owned by www.macromedia.com, so that is hardly in keeping with my free software leanings.  The webmaster might have chosen an open format like OGG Theora or the new HTML5 instead.  But even if they choose to make their video available in such a closed format, if they want to make the site accessible, the web page shouldn’t be  broken, as this page is.

To make it work, at minimum there needs to be text providing a synopsis of what is in the video.  The best case scenario would also include the full text of the script along with any necessary written description of the visual content.

If they want to make it accessible, that is.

If they don’t want to make it accessible, if the sense of entitlement is such they believe they have the  right to dictate such things to vistors,  they can tell us that we must conform to their demands if we want to see the content.  Their way or the highway.

Of course, this is a little nicer than some, because there is a small “skip this intro” link in the top left corner of the screen.  This way I can skip over the content they can’t be bothered to make accessible.

Personally, I’d rather just skip it.