One artist is using a modified form of "graffiti" to protest the NSA. Early this morning in Berlin, self-proclaimed "guerrilla marketing expert" Oliver Bienkowski used a powerful projector mounted in a cargo van to light up the side of the US Embassy. The projection emblazoned the Embassy with a silly illustration of President Obama and a warning for all to see: "NSA in da House."
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Edward Snowden has called on supporters at the HOPE hacking conference to develop easy-to-use technologies to subvert government surveillance programs.
Mr Snowden, who addressed conference attendees on Saturday via video link from Moscow, said he intends to devote much of his time to promoting such technologies, including ones that allow people to communicate anonymously and encrypt their messages.
"You in this room, right now, have both the means and the capability to improve the future by encoding our rights into programs and protocols by which we rely every day," he told the New York City conference, known as Hackers on Planet Earth, or HOPE. "That is what a lot of my future work is going to be involved in."
The embassy of Saudi Arabia in the German capital has been decorated with an ISIS flag and labeled the "Daesh Bank" in a projection stunt performed by human rights activists in an effort to draw attention to the kingdom's purported links to terrorist organizations. Artist Oliver Bienkowski and the Pixel Helper collective performed the stunt to draw public attention to Saudi Arabia's egregiously bad human rights record and country's alleged support of extremist groups. [...] Another projection that lit up the walls of the embassy stated "10 years and 1000 slashes just for blogging #FREERAIF," referring to the blogger Raif Badawi who was imprisoned for criticizing Saudi clerics and appealing for a more liberal and secular society in his blog. He has already spent four years behind the bars.
Also at DW (video).
Previously: Anti-NSA Message Projected on US Embassy in Berlin
(Score: 4, Interesting) by BsAtHome on Monday July 21 2014, @02:25PM
The truth can hurt when it is projected onto the wall for all to see. It is time to project some sense into the policy.
I know, wishful thinking, but please let me be in my illusion that we can make a better world, please... Also, I think I just made "the list"; only 7e9 more members to go for proper registration.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Rivenaleem on Monday July 21 2014, @02:58PM
I'm sorry for such a cynical response, but if 4 children playing on a beach dead by missile attack or if a passenger aircraft of 300 people shot down by 'accident' does not prompt immediate and swift action by the international community, what can you expect the response be for someone invading people's privacy?
Nobody want's to do anything about Gaza or Crimea because it threatens the status quo (more importantly the oil and gas). The same is going to happen with the NSA. The NSA just got caught doing what all agencies do, the embarrassment is not what they do, just they left evidence of doing it.
All that will happen to the NSA is the same as will happen to Ukraine, condemnation and strong words, but no action.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Sir Garlon on Monday July 21 2014, @03:01PM
I can vividly remember a time when people thought the Berlin Wall would be there forever.
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
(Score: 2) by hubie on Monday July 21 2014, @04:36PM
The Berlin Wall coming down had much more to do with economics than any particular action, such as Reagan speeches or Springsteen concerts.
(Score: 1) by whathappenedtomonday on Monday July 21 2014, @06:59PM
... or David Hasselhoff's Looking for Freedom [theguardian.com], just for the record. Don't blame me if you click the vids in the article, you're old enough.
--
I hope I didn't brain my damage.
I hope I didn't brain my damage.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Phoenix666 on Monday July 21 2014, @06:49PM
That's the thing, and the Fall of the Berlin Wall is a great example. Many who let the drone of mass media wash over them in the background, listening with half an ear, miss the reality of the world and its trends, and think the world as it is at this moment is all the world we will ever know. But it's quite unstable now. There are multiple huge trends that are converging at the same time. Historians call them "tectonic forces" and they always lead to "ruptures," which the rest of us call revolutions. To name a couple such huge trends, we have climate change with all of its repercussions; the Information Revolution with all of its repercussions (we're still in the early days yet); distributed energy production via wind, solar, hydro, etc with all of its effects on the fossil fuel industries; and additive manufacturing and its consequences for global trade. There are many, many more. People who like to talk about the Singularity are sensing the same thing, that the rate of change is accelerating.
None of us can say exactly when the rupture will happen. Some would say it has already begun. Many are looking for the trigger moment. Some are preparing for likely scenarios. But in none of them can I personally see the NSA surviving for long. Those people will hang.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 21 2014, @09:20PM
In August, we we be marking the 100th year since one such trigger moment.
Assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria [wikipedia.org]
The thing about what followed is that it was just a different reallotment of wealth and power among those (Europeans mostly) who ALREADY had wealth and power.
Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
If you look at what happened after the Arab Spring, the biggest thing you'll notice is that the Egyptian military filled the void there and grabbed all the power.
With that force being commanded by crony capitalists who are also religious fundamentalists, things haven't gone anywhere near the way the people who took to the streets had hoped.
If you are waiting on TPTB to implement change, don't hold your breath; they're fat and happy with how things are now.
If you want change (without complete chaos), one place to start is in your workplace.
If your boss' political leaning is opposite yours, why are you putting money in his pocket so that he can support the opposition?
Stop working for The Man; form your own Worker Self-Directed Enterprise (a cooperative), [google.com] and work for yourself.
The movements that best affect change are bottom-up, not top-down.
Now, if you want to try political change, YOU HAVE TO GET INVOLVED.
It isn't enough to show up at the polls every 2 years.
You either have to form your own political party (a long, difficult path to change) or you have to alter the path of one of the existing parties.
(It's pretty much impossible to do either of those sitting at home.)
The folks who wanted Ron Paul to be President DID NOT SHOW UP in sufficient numbers at state Republican conventions; those who did attend en mass hijacked the proceedings and (illegally) marginalized the alternative candidate.
Suiting up and showing up is the way to get things done.
The Tea Party also demonstrated how to change the direction of a party with the way they hijacked the agenda of the Republicans.
(Too bad they turned out to be just another arm of Koch Industries [google.com] and weren't really about actual egalitarianism.)
The Progressive Democrats of America are another such effort. RIP, Tim Carpenter.
You're hard-pressed to hear them mentioned on lamestream media. Surprise!
Their inability to gain a higher profile reminds me of Will Rogers' quip:
"I'm not a member of an organized political party. I'm a Democrat."
-- gewg_
(Score: 2) by Sir Garlon on Monday July 21 2014, @09:30PM
I totally disagree with you about the impact of World War I. Just off the top of my head, the fall of the Ottoman Empire had a huge effect on the power structure of the Middle East. And, it's ironic you mention re-arranging wealth and power among the elite, when I consider the Russian Revolution to be a direct outcome of World War I.
As to being an agent of change, yeah, agree there -- Patrick Henry did not say "Give me liberty, or give me death!" so 200 years later his descendants could sit on their lazy, privileged asses and whine about how the system is too corrupt to change.
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday July 22 2014, @02:49AM
the Ottoman Empire
The pieces on the board were rearranged, but they were the same pieces as before.
Power changed hands, but the disempowered were still disempowered.
Folks that were struggling before were still struggling.
The average Abdul didn't notice any change in his day-to-day life.
a huge effect on the power structure of the Middle East
The rich elite were still in charge. Europeans this time in most places, as noted.
It took Ataturk to give Turkey a democracy, several years later.
the Russian Revolution
...replaced one murderous totalitarian regime with another.
Sergey may have been called "Comrade" after that, but the "former" serfs weren't doing noticeably better under forced collectivization.
Bottom-up gov't wasn't what was established.
a direct outcome of World War I
I won't concede that point, but I won't argue it either.
I will note that at that time, there had been over a century of monarchies being cast aside.
Those places then established democracies.
-- gewg_
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Buck Feta on Monday July 21 2014, @03:11PM
After spending between $5,000 and $20,000 [reuters.com] for every man, woman, and child in the US, to "free" Iraq, the rest of the world can "solve" it's own problems for a while. I'm sure they'd be a lot happier with us butting out as well.
- fractious political commentary goes here -
(Score: 3, Interesting) by isostatic on Monday July 21 2014, @03:26PM
If this was an attack on the Netherlands by the Ukraine (or Russia), they would be well within their rights to demand nato involvement under article 5. The U.S. is a member of nato, and is the only country to have invoked it and dragged the other 27 members into war, so to say it's "none of your concern" is a bit rich.
However as it was a Mayalsian airline, not a Dutch one, I don't think article 5 would be relevant. Had it been a KLM flight there would be a much stronger argument.
(Score: 2) by BsAtHome on Monday July 21 2014, @03:41PM
"...what can you expect the response be for someone invading people's privacy..."
Well, I did state it was wishful thinking and I asked you to leave me in that state. That should have been a good indicator that I am aware of the actual situation, wouldn't you think so too?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 21 2014, @05:02PM
> I'm sorry for such a cynical response, but if 4 children playing on a beach dead
> by missile attack or if a passenger aircraft of 300 people shot down by
> 'accident' does not prompt immediate and swift action by the international
> community, what can you expect the response be for someone invading people's
> privacy?
I expect that real life is not black and white, that these are wars of attrition. Every inch of progress looks like nothing until we finally get to the straw that breaks the camel's back and then it looks like it was inevitable.
(Score: 2) by Dunbal on Monday July 21 2014, @06:18PM
Doing nothing is much better than doing the wrong thing.
(Score: 1) by GoodBuddy on Monday July 21 2014, @10:50PM
Otter: Oh no. No, in this case, I think we have to go all out. I think that this situation absolutely requires a really futile and stupid gesture be done on somebody's part.
Bluto: And we're just the guys to do it.
(Score: 2) by dyingtolive on Monday July 21 2014, @03:01PM
The comments on that article appear decently chemically imbalanced.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 2) by DECbot on Monday July 21 2014, @03:45PM
Sorry, the cold meds are affecting the effectiveness of my morning coffee.
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 5, Insightful) by isostatic on Monday July 21 2014, @03:33PM
Last night Germany opened the first Salvo of a war with the US, with a concentrated beam of energy being fired at the American Embassy.
(Score: 3, Funny) by BsAtHome on Monday July 21 2014, @03:44PM
Black-ops never tolerate illumination. Battle of the photons vs absorbers to ensue.
(Score: 2) by isostatic on Monday July 21 2014, @04:02PM
They'll need some of this then: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/06/090630082647.htm [sciencedaily.com]
(Score: 2) by marcello_dl on Monday July 21 2014, @03:51PM
Leave those poor Germans alone. US is stealing all the tricks from their 1930s show, without giving 'em any credit. No wonder they are pissed.
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Monday July 21 2014, @03:50PM
It seems to be exceedingly difficult for people to speak or type the phonem 'th' or the letter 'r' at the end of words these days.
(Score: 2) by redneckmother on Monday July 21 2014, @05:40PM
As the Texican once (repeatedly?) said: "Yer prolly right".
Mas cerveza por favor.
(Score: 1) by CRCulver on Monday July 21 2014, @06:09PM
Yeah, and that new trend of leaving the finall -e off words ending in -eme pissess me off to no end too.
(Score: 2) by Geotti on Monday July 21 2014, @11:46PM
Yeah, and that new trend of leaving the finall -e off words ending in -eme pissess me off to no end too.
Maybe he's German(-speaking).
(Score: 2) by etherscythe on Tuesday July 22 2014, @10:33PM
Around some urban localities, it may be a subconscious compensation for those Brits who add sounds where they are not found in the written word. See (or more precisely, hear): "idea"
Ethcuse me while I remove the tongue from my cheek, ith interthering with my enunthiation.
"Fake News: anything reported outside of my own personally chosen echo chamber"
(Score: 4, Informative) by Lagg on Monday July 21 2014, @05:05PM
Anyone that has seen a single one of my comments knows that I don't care for the NSA. So the message, though stupidly written, is not what I have a problem with. Just remember that this guy's self-given title of "guerilla marketing expert" is another way of saying that he's a real life spammer and you'll see his projector ads whether you like it or not. He is proud of this as his twitter profile [twitter.com] proves. Don't give this guy too much of your attention or respect because he doesn't really deserve it and this is probably part of his self-promotion plan. This might sound cynical, maybe it is. But it's not unjustified as he has that projector for a reason and probably not just to spread hippy-speak (seriously, that's what some of it is. He projects "Make love not war" without any sense of parody or self-awareness). Just remember that you could see this guy projecting an ad for viagra on Big Ben the next day if he felt like it.
http://lagg.me [lagg.me] 🗿
(Score: 2, Interesting) by whathappenedtomonday on Monday July 21 2014, @08:04PM
Whoever he is, and I take your word here because I'm too lazy to do a search, and although I was pretty disappointed with the lame slogan he projected, we need more of this. Even if it is a mere publicity stunt, the audience it creates benefits the main cause: to disrupt the "nothing to see here, please move along" tactics of the powers that be; shine a light on what is supposed to be kept in the dark or, if it was revealed, you are not supposed to remember or even think about.
I remember seeing several other "projector projects", and, well, a quick search says this Bienkowski guy did something similar in 2013 projecting "United Stasi of America" [spiegel.de] (article in English). He might be a spammer and a publicity whore and far from what I'd consider a "Light Artist". I'd give this guy the benefit of the doubt though, because it is not necessarily the actual message that counts, but the effect, which I guess some might even call "artistic". (I wonder how I'd feel had I been there... .)
Bottom line: not everything a bad person does is necessarily bad.
I hope I didn't brain my damage.