Firefox has recently made attempts to protect users’ rights, most notably, in its efforts to disable cookies by default. These have been met by a predictable backlash from Advertising and Marketing (A&M) companies worldwide. Indeed, Mozilla are in the unique position of being a global community with a large browser market share (~20%) that actually have an interest in doing something about this. To quote the Mozilla Manifesto:

“Individuals’ security on the internet is fundamental and cannot be treated as optional” Principal 4, Mozilla Manifesto

I want to draw an interesting comparison between this and a problem highlighted in England in the early 19th century. At this time, child labor was common place in English factories. The parliament was attempting to legislate for the reduction of child working hours down to a maximum of 12 hours per day. The government ran into increasing difficulty in its attempts to control child labor and in enforcing any legislation that was in place. A factory inspector at the time had this to say: “Competition with other capitalists permits them [the factories/companies] no voluntary limitation of working-time for children” – ie. that the free market had created as a side effect the necessity to exploit workers in order to maintain competitiveness. Furthermore, until effective ways of enforcing legislation came about, there was no way to prevent this type of exploitation (except for the possibility of a workers revolt).

I see some striking similarities with the increasingly relevant debate on internet privacy. A&M companies, as a result of the free market, feel compelled to exploit and to immorally collate data on users. They feel they must do this in order to stay competitive with each other. The solution in 19th century England was to legislate and to enforce said legislation. However, the same solution cannot be applied to a vast distributed interconnect of computers like the internet. It has been proven time and time again that governmental legislation does not work effectively at controlling this medium – a centralised body cannot easily control a larger decentralised body.

So, what should be done? I strongly reject opinions that a peaceful middle-ground can be reached by discussion between A&M companies and users. I hope that I have sufficiently disproved this view with the above logic. I can see where these views come from – in fact the Mozilla Manifesto has them nicely enshrined (something I do strongly oppose):

“Commercial involvement in the development of the Internet brings many benefits; a balance between commercial goals and public benefit is critical.” Principal 9, Mozilla Manifesto

I argue that any wins on internet privacy will be claimed by users and not reached by compromises in discussion with A&M companies. Similarily again with the issues faced in 19th century England, there is no way to enforce practices that are agreed upon and also no way to agree these practices with all companies worldwide. All wins on internet privacy will be claimed by users and it is Mozillas duty (at least I think, principals 4 & 9 seem to me contradictory in this context) to help users in this effort.

How can this be done? In more technical terms, we cannot regulate the activity of privately owned web servers, but we can enforce client side restrictions much like what Firefox are trying to do with cookies. There is no amount of data that can be acceptably collated from users without their consent, but there may be a place for an opt-in system. There are projects which allow users to build a (locally stored) personal profile and to share parts of that data with people/marketers as they see fit. This idea is the only acceptable solution I have yet seen.

I am interested to hear other views on this, so if you have one feel free to comment.

For PGP encrypted mail using GPG, my public key can be downloaded here or from many popular key servers. Also my fingerprint is as follows:

CB06 EA4C 47AF 6ACD 6A79 5F70 8893 7C7A 1E9B 9E87

Two years ago, while travelling, myold domain conormacaoidh.com expired and was immediately snatched by a domain reselling company. Although I did have the option to purchase the domain off them, I thought it best not to profit a company who’s sole purpose is to cash in on others misfortunes. So, I decided to wait for a year. After a year, they renewed the domain. So, I waited another year. They renewed the domain again so I committed to start fresh with a new name.

This is the first in a range of pages I will be bringing online on this domain – conor.macaoidh.ie. I plan to eventually replace all of my online presence (linkedin, facebook, gmail etc) with this self-hosted site. I prefer to self-adminster and be really in control and responsible for the distribution of my own information and content.

Watch this space.

Installing Google Chrome for Linux. Yes and I know that it’s not available yet #

@blacknight any coupon codes for .com? I’m going to buy one tonight! in reply to blacknight #

@blacknight haha It’s ok, I just checked the price and their only €6! I thought they were something like €20 or €30!! in reply to blacknight #

Just bought http://www.conormacaoidh.com and I will be setting it up tonight hopefully. Can’t wait to get my new MU working #

My iKnights code is 199-248-630. I am going crazy for this thing so add me! #

#webme MU is brilliant! I am writing a shopping cart so that people can buy websites and have them set up at the click of a button! #

Sick of my bad graphics on Fedora. I am downloading OpenSuse. Then I will build a fedora sis video driver – in the long term #

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@brilliantthings wow you found me! great gig yesterday guys! If your ever looking for a support act #domaff are available! :L #

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@elliottkember what a cool idea with the excel thing! Oh and I love your website – JavaScript CRAZY!! #

I’m ripping – I missed the bus to Sligo!! Nooo #

Another one in the bag!! Yeah. I’m finished and I beat my target! I completed 10 websites in seven days. Now that’s crazy #

@elliottkember Why pay for an app? Open source all the way! in reply to elliottkember #

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Just listening to the new budget… God it’s not good.. Less money for everyone! #

Last night was the best night of my life! I still can’t believe that we won… the other bands were so good… #

@Out_Of_Step Epic it was! The sextons run a good party! Let me know when it happens again in reply to Out_Of_Step #

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YEEES!! I feel so stupid. After looking into fixing my laptops audio problems for a week I figured out that the volume was turned down!! #

Just finished a few website variants. I’m starting my new temporary job tomorrow! :L Bloody designer… better than nothing i suppose! #

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It’s brilliant just being able to surf the net and look at stuff instantly. I remember having to wait like five minutes for a page to load… Thank god that’s over. What to do now? No doubt that I’ll be bored of the Internet in a week. i think i’ll just set up all those things that I was deprived of during my phase of slow Internet.

World of Warcraft! I am going to leave it downloading tonight, there’s only another GB left of download! Can’t wait to get started with this game it’s just the €10 a month fee that’s putting me off slightly. I’ll just have to keep going on a 30 day trial! Google Reader is another one, read all my feeds from one place. Oh and I can now look at slashdot! Also I can get around to setting up my new recently acquired domain name; macaoidh.mp

Had a hell of a lot of bad experiences with BT down the line though. They have left a lasting impression anyway if that’s what they were trying to achieve! One phone operator actually told me that I was lying on the phone. It’s great to build up relationships with your ISPs!

I’m on the 1mb package at the moment which is fast but not very fast. Next month I will be upgrading to 3mb. Now that will be good. Now I better get back to staying up all night on the Internet.

This big step came about when I got sick of my crumy speeds using the 02 modem, which is very susceptible to the weather and that’s not been good lately! Anyway I had a long phone call with 02 and somehow managed to get rid of my 12 month contract with them three months in!

Then I went looking for a broadband provider. I opted for BT (Yes I know their british but their cheaper!). Unfortunately this bears another massive blow to me financially. I recently spent all of my money on an Oxegen ticket! woop woop! So I will have to figure out a way of earning €50 a month. Not a bother to me, don’t be suprised if you see me out begging on the streets though!

Our line has not been active for like 3 years so they have to send someone out to activate it (2-3weeks) then put the order for the broadband through (max 2weeks). But the main thing is i’m getting broadband and that kicks ass.