NSA leak and the post free internet age

Since the very beginning of the explosion of 1500 yrs+ of information available on the internet, I awaited this inevitable hour. The hour when this information would be managed to benefit the few at the expense of the many. I dont for a moment think someone without a high school diploma, making 200k/yr reading other peoples email would be a whistleblower leave his girl and run to China. China is the last place a freedom loving libertarian with top secret info would run to. IMO- China is an ally in keeping people away from intellectual freedom, not an ally of libertarians

Prediction- They will monetize information on the net and tax it. The free internet will be over. The cyberleaches on Facebook will have to pay to watch 'kittens bump into walls.' Those with the largest hard drives and the ability to scan it will be huge winners, the rest of us losers. Already the handwriting is on the wall, and those with valuable new information are closing their internet doors to guests. The excuse used will be that the rich have just got richer since the internet arrived at the expense of those gathering and analyzing the information. The petite bourgeoise class of the net will be their allies. The promised example used will be the Jeffersonian equivalent of land giveways during the colonial era that led to economic prosperity but as we know it will be information feudalism

Cheers! It was a wonderful while it lasted

1st...Snowden made 120k a year, he worked for a private company, he was not a government employee, also Hong Kong has one of the busiest airports in the world, many ocean going ships and local boats, plus it has overland highways. American dollars can get you anything there, with no questions asked...i'm not making excuses for the guy, what he did was illegal.....but compared to the disasterous destruction of intel and sources brought on by the Valerie Plame outing, the covert CIA operative who had a world wide organization of operatives, this is mostly embarrassing rather than destructive...do you really think terrorists haven't known for a long time about phone and internet spying?...these are not stupid people.

Originally posted by jimmyx
1st...Snowden made 120k a year, he worked for a private company, he was not a government employee, also Hong Kong has one of the busiest airports in the world, many ocean going ships and local boats, plus it has overland highways. American dollars can get you anything there, with no questions asked...i'm not making excuses for the guy, what he did was illegal.....but compared to the disasterous destruction of intel and sources brought on by the Valerie Plame outing, the covert CIA operative who had a world wide organization of operatives, this is mostly embarrassing rather than destructive...do you really think terrorists haven't known for a long time about phone and internet spying?...these are not stupid people.

I thought another benefit was to get terrorists changing their patterns.

imo- The NSA should check anybody on their watchlist that changed their pattern of usage since this story broke