Privacy & Data Protection

Frank Grimes

Originally posted by ecksor
I am looking for a balance. I have even presented a compromise on more than one occasion that doesn't prohibit people from posting images and addresses the concerns of the original poster.

I don't think it's possible to do that (wrt. the concerns of the OP), no matter where those sigs. are hosted, if someone doesn't understand what's going on with them it's not going to be possible to compromise imo.
Either there not allowed at all, or else them are and anyone with objections can turn off sigs or just live with it.

amp

Originally posted by ecksor

Don't give me crap about not being willing to achieve a balance. How about you come up with an alternative compromise?

I already have:

Originally posted by amp

You can put people who's sigs offend you on ignore.
You can turn off the ability to see sigs.
You can choose not to come to boards.ie.

Three ways to address tinkys concerns. It also gives him/her the responsiblity of managing who sees his/her ip, and takes away the hassle and resources of having to require that sig images be stored on boards itself. How many users have external images in their sigs? How many have yet to configure their boards webspace. In short how much hassle would it be to implement this compromise of yours?

Personally I worry if every muppet who comes in here with some worthless complaint that nobody else seems to give a crap about is taken seriously.

I value my jokes, they make me laugh, sometimes they make others laugh. Just because something is funny doesn't mean it deserves to be deleted. I don't see you deleting anybody elses attempts at humour.

P.s. I can't help thinking Tinky's a troll.

ecksor

Originally posted by Frank_Grimes
I don't think it's possible to do that (wrt. the concerns of the OP), no matter where those sigs. are hosted, if someone doesn't understand what's going on with them it's not going to be possible to compromise imo.

Anybody who chooses to visit boards.ie sends all the aforementioned information to us. The issue is that it is being shared with others that have nothing to do with boards.ie

If any/all images are hosted by boards.ie, then this issue goes away.

ecksor

Originally posted by amp
Three ways to address tinkys concerns. It also gives him/her the responsiblity of managing who sees his/her ip, and takes away the hassle and resources of having to require that sig images be stored on boards itself.

Ok, so you are advocating that anybody who is concerned (this assumes that they understand the risks) should reduce the functionality available to them on boards.

I would rather that people can leave all images on while visiting boards, and not have to worry about such things.

In short how much hassle would it be to implement this compromise of yours?

I have a fair idea of the problems involved with it. No doubt it would be myself putting in the time and effort to overcome them to implement this, so I think I'm justified in saying that this isn't a valid argument for you.

Personally I worry if every muppet who comes in here with some worthless complaint that nobody else seems to give a crap about is taken seriously.

Duly noted.

amp

Originally posted by ecksor

If any/all images are hosted by boards.ie, then this issue goes away.

You want any/all images stored on boards.ie? Fair enough, you got me, good one ecksor. Nice troll. I guess I had that one coming

jerk

i think amp should go away.
-nice earring-

ecksor

Originally posted by amp
You want any/all images stored on boards.ie? Fair enough, you got me, good one ecksor. Nice troll. I guess I had that one coming

I thought I had made that clear from the beginning.

jerk

It was fairly crystal to be honest, you would have to be a complete imbecile to have missed the point, wouldn't you amp?

ecksor

Bye bye jerk.

amp

Originally posted by ecksor
Ok, so you are advocating that anybody who is concerned (this assumes that they understand the risks) should reduce the functionality available to them on boards.

You're not trolling?

You going to give me the 100 megs I have on IOL on boards? Times that by 9000 or so. Not every boards user will use it, but they could potentially use it. I presume you'll be shutting down Pixie Mix too then?

I'm beginning to doubt that this issue has nothing to do with Tinky at all, you've previously highlighted your concern with this and I think you're just using tinkys complaint to push through yet another draconian measure.

This is fucking insane.

P.s. Hi Fisty!

ecksor

Originally posted by amp
You going to give me the 100 megs I have on IOL on boards? Times that by 9000 or so. Not every boards user will use it, but they could potentially use it. I presume you'll be shutting down Pixie Mix too then?

I don't know where you get your presumptions from. Or your figures for that matter. Suffice to say that diskspace isn't the main concern.

I'm beginning to doubt that this issue has nothing to do with Tinky at all,

Er, ok, you're finally up to speed here.

you've previously highlighted your concern with this and I think you're just using tinkys complaint to push through yet another draconian measure.

Tinky raised the issue again, and I answered his query and pointed him to the previous thread. It's not like I had magically changed my opinion. I don't know where you thought this was some great effort on my part purely to stand up for Tinky.

Why is this draconian or insane? One way, you get to post images in threads and in signatures. The other way, you get to post images in threads and in signatures. Possible restrictions might come in the form of quotas, I'll grant you, but I think we should encourage people to serve post less bulky images anyway for the sake of users' download times.

MarcusGarvey

Originally posted by amp


You going to give me the 100 megs I have on IOL on boards? [/B]

Have you linked to all of that 100megs in posts on boards.ie ?

The safest method would I guess be hosting on boards but that might take up too much diskspace/bandwidth.

How about trusting certain websites like homepages.eircom.net and various other Irish isps ? Can you trust them ?

Talliesin

Originally posted by tinky
Talliesin: It's executing on sharkman's computer and producing an image file which is being displayed on YOUR computer because YOU permit it.

Well okay then, I'm arrogant and stupid, but now modestly seeking enlightenment - what is happening pray tell?

ecksor

Originally posted by MarcusGarvey
How about trusting certain websites like homepages.eircom.net and various other Irish isps ? Can you trust them ?

Yay, a useful suggestion! I hadn't thought of that, but it sounds reasonable.

amp

Originally posted by ecksor

Why is this draconian or insane? One way, you get to post images in threads and in signatures. The other way, you get to post images in threads and in signatures. Possible restrictions might come in the form of quotas, I'll grant you, but I think we should encourage people to serve post less bulky images anyway for the sake of users' download times.

What about all the pictures I and all the other people have hosted externally and linked from boards in the past? You going to take care of all of them?

Diskspace isn't the main concern, but quotas maybe implemented.

Ah whatever, I'm tired of this ****. It's a losing battle anyway. You beat me on the view ip thing and your bound to win on this one too. More restrictions and sacrafices in the name of user privacy. User Privacy is king! The only people you can trust with your ip and email address is ecksor!

Here's a question for you ecskor: Have ever looked up a users e-mail address in the database and used that to unsolicitly contact them via say em... MSN?

Sorry, stupid question, Mr Privacy, you'd never do that. It must be me that's insane

ecksor

Originally posted by amp
Here's a question for you ecskor: Have ever looked up a users e-mail address in the database and used that to unsolicitly contact them via say em... MSN?

Sorry, stupid question, Mr Privacy, you'd never do that. It must be me that's insane

I don't think I've ever done that. Do you have a specific allegation to make?

amp

Good good ecksor. Glad to see you're a man of principle. Almost angelic in nature

Anyway back on topic:

Most users don't give a crap.
Most users don't have sharkmans sig.
Your solution affects all users. It will cause major inconvience to people like me who create and post pictures to boards. I do not want to have to reorganise my pictures. I have built a large structured setup on my IOL webspace and duplicating this would be a very large pain in the arse.

The few users that do give a crap can use one of my three suggestions. If they're that concerned let them take action. Give them the responsibilty.
Once again you're treating users on boards like sheep and presume to think you know what's best for them by making global changes to boards.

Any chance of you seeing the light on this one at all. Or are we going to be stuck in stubborn ecksor mode for the rest of the thread?

Or is it going to be a case of cue DeVore with the dancing lawyer excuse

"Yes your honour, Admiral_Ackbar.jpg trapped my ip address"

ecksor

amp, I think you've covered most of that previously here. Did you read MarcusGarvey's post by any chance? This is not something we've decided to do, so your indignant hopping up and down is even more tiring than usual.

I'll thank you not to pull vague statistics or implications of improper behaviour on my part out of your ass in future unless you have something to back them up.

Otherwise, I've been advised to stop bothering to argue with you, and I'm going to take that advice.

amp

Yeah well your overeactions get tiring too. Hopefully I'll have regained energy for the next "security crisis" to envelop boards. My statistics are as I said "potential" statistics and are far more likely imo than this "breach of privacy". Also I made no allegations so I don't know what exactly you want me to pull out of my ass.

I'm glad it's not going to be implemented, I'll hop no more. I'll start hopping again if it is going to be implemented, though.

Lastly, this boards is titled "Feedback/Suggestions", if you don't like my feedback then I humbly suggest that you either don't read it or ban me. I don't argue with you because I don't like you. I argue with you because sometimes I think you're wrong and you have the power to change boards completely.

DeVore

Eh, noone... not me Regi, ecksor, vex or even the inscrutible Cloud has the ability to change Boards completely. They'd get ****ed out of it by the other admins who arent short on giving their opinions believe me. I've been voted down before, trust me.

As it happens I *personally* dont think the security concerns warrant any restriction on the linking of images. I'm fully opposed to it and I've made that clear. Its unworkable, achieves very very little and affects everyone badly.

We've been through this one before... ecksor disagrees and thats his perogative and he's entitled to argue with you as much as you argue with him (and/or me) but its a community site and the admins decide and during that decision there is OFTEN consultation here (frequently when we cant think of a good solution or when we are divided on a specific idea).

The only reason I would ban such images in sigs is to stop the FUCKING DRIVING PAIN I get in my head when I have to read idiocy like "It's executing on sharkman's computer and producing an image file which is being displayed on YOUR computer because YOU permit it. "

DeV.

amp

Eh, noone... not me Regi, ecksor, vex or even the inscrutible Cloud has the ability to change Boards completely. They'd get ****ed out of it by the other admins who arent short on giving their opinions believe me. I've been voted down before, trust me.

My apologies, bad choice of wording. It was not my intention to suggest ecksor ran boards.ie alone. I was merely highlighting the fact that he is an Admin and therefore his opinion counts more than mine (and rightly so, I'm a muppet )

ZENER

Any sign of an outcome here ? Or are we closing the thread and keeping the status quo ?

Tinky

ecksor

I don't think there was any suggestion of the status quo being abandoned. Sorry.

Further suggestions and compromises, or other things we can do to addresss the concerns are appreciated.

Perhaps we should have a config option that doesn't show images from non-trusted domains.

seamus

Originally posted by ecksor
Perhaps we should have a config option that doesn't show images from non-trusted domains.

Mozilla Firebird allows you to specify exactly what servers you trust to serve you images. If they don't want certain images, they take the responsibilty for not downloading them.

IMO, boards needs only to do what is necessary for its own protection, legally etc. As I have said before, in my opinion users are responsible for their own security on the internet. Boards.ie is only one site. Once they leave boards, suddenly any new security measures put in place are lost, and the big, bad internet has control again. Why bother adding useless features just to appease some mouthy malcontents?

If people don't want their IP address to be available, tell them to put their computer back in the box, return it to the manufacturer, and then wrap themselves in bubblewrap so they'll be safe.

This entire thread is lunacy imo.

ecksor

Well, not everyone runs Mozilla unfortunately. Also, even if you normally would like to get images from a certain host, you might not trust them to monitor which threads you read on boards, what you post, what your IP is etc etc. If you don't care, then cool. But others might, and they can have good reason too. Go take a look at some of the stuff that people post on PI, and then tell me that boards doesn't have an obligation towards user privacy.

Users should take responsibility for their own actions and security on the Internet, but that doesn't absolve boards.ie of some responsibilities. To take the most obvious example, you give us an e-mail address, and we sure as hell don't share that one around. We're trusted to give that information a reasonable level of care, and we try to live up to that.

However, not every user does take responsibility. Not every user is empowered to do this. Not every user even appreciates that some image is coming from somewhere unexpected, or just how bad their default browser setup is with regards to leaking information.

Let's take a pathological example. Suppose that someone sets up their computer and decides that the only website they will ever visit is boards.ie, which is run by those 5 guys that you know or kinda know or know by reputation and you figure "Hey, they wouldn't screw me over". Sure, people post up stuff that might be offensive, or disagreeable or that might make you angry, but we moderate the really obnoxious stuff, and beyond that it wouldn't be much of a discussion forum facility if people didn't have the right to express controversial opinions. But, if we're serving off-site content, we can't vouch for what people are doing with the information they get via that channel. If we let a professional ad-serving monster privacy-invading company serve our banner ads, then I think people would be concerned about that. But when people are concerned about arbitrary users having the same ability, then the complaint is ridiculed.

[EDIT]That may be an unrealistic extreme, but the point is that people aren't just browsing one webserver when they visit boards, they're browsing several unless they know how to prevent this from occuring. Not everyone has a firewall that can stop this leakage, or knows how to configure it to do so.[/EDIT]

What covers us legally doesn't enter into this. I'm trying to do the right thing by standing up for the user here. I think some people ridicule me for that, but let them. This is a real issue. I don't just think this, I know this.

What really boggles my mind is that I come up with a compromise that involves some work for me, doesn't affect the people who don't care, and protects the user who does care, and people still object!! Like, wtf!

seamus

Originally posted by ecksor
We're trusted to give that information a reasonable level of care, and we try to live up to that.

........


What covers us legally doesn't enter into this. I'm trying to do the right thing by standing up for the user here. I think some people ridicule me for that, but let them. This is a real issue. I don't just think this, I know this.

I wholly accept that and would agree entirely with you. But such services are just that, services. Boards.ie is not obliged to do more than legally necessary. Standing up for users' rights is one of the things that makes boards great in my mind, but there's users' rights and users' wants, and the line is sometimes blurred. Refusing pop-ups and limiting image sizes are things that the majority of boards users want, and I would also take them as rights. Privacy rights are also important, such as not revealing more about a poster than they want, but it's not up to boards to attempt to protect users from the fundamental nature of internet privacy.

What really boggles my mind is that I come up with a compromise that involves some work for me, doesn't affect the people who don't care, and protects the user who does care, and people still object!! Like, wtf!

Sorry, my post does sound like a bit of a tirade. Your suggestion is perfect. I have no problem with it being implemented.
I just think a line needs to be drawn somewhere. If you try to respond to every ill-informed and paranoid critique with a reasonable and 'keep everyone happy' solution, you'll not only be creating more work for yourself, but some people will never be happy with any solution.

amp

So your defending a very small minority of users who care at the expense of a far bigger minority who care about the disruption of the way they post pictures.

Tbh I don't think you'd be fully happy about users privacy until the entire internet is hosted on boards.ie.

But keep seeing the monsters ecksor. Keep fighting for the common user. As you can see they've flooded this public channel in support of your brave cause. :rolleyes:

ecksor

Seamus, I don't, can't, and have no intention of trying to respond to every little user request that comes along. I happen to think that this one is important and valid though.

amp, how does the last scheme I suggested disrupt the way you post images? Why shouldn't I fight for the common user?

I never claimed to be doing this for the majority of users.

MarcusGarvey

Not the right quote I was looking for but slightly on topic:

"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." --Ben Franklin

Its the little guy that you must protect. The majority in a lot of cases are well represented but you have to represent the minority in some cases even if the majority is not voicing an opinion. What is right is right.

Thats the reason why proportional representation is good. It allows for all groups to get representation.

And Amp as Ecksor has said a few times now, his solution means no disruption to anyone except himself.

If a minority of people are always ignored is that fair ? If they are represented and the majority are not disruptived then whats the problem ?

amp

You want all images hosted on boards. I take it this means that I would have to upload them to boards.ie myself. I currently upload my images to IOL. I choose where to host my images. You want to take that choice away. I have 100 megabytes of space available to me on IOL which I could potentially use to post pictures. You have said that there is a possiblity of quota's being put in place. If that quota is lower than 100 megs then I see that as a restriction on my ability to contribute to boards.ie.

Personally I prefer that you do not have access to my pictures. I like the fact that you cannot manage my ftp storage on IOL or elsewhere. I object to being told where I can upload my pictures to.

If you're not claiming to do this the for the majority of users, you must be claiming to do it for "the user who does care". You support his concerns yet you do not support my concerns. Is that users opinion more important than mine? Is there some users who you give preferential treatment to?

What makes my mind boggle is that that user could very easily protect him/herself from your concern simply by putting a user on ignore. One click on a button below their post and problem solved. If they don't want to risk that user from seeing their ip address at all they can choose to turn off all signatures.

Now, the above comes with a price. The user then cannot see signatures and in your terms that is a loss of user functionality. But surely that's a small price to pay to stop the disruption a far larger minority would have to pay for one persons ignorance and paranioa?

A bit nerdy, but to quote Spock: The needs of the many outweigh the need of the few.

Besides, I thought you had already been advised not to bother arguing with me anymore?