Iranian of the Day

Iranian paranoia can be useful, I like that!

It all seems over the top then along comes an administration of someone like George Bush!

I think a few years ago, the phone companies were even trying to check the Iranian ethnicity of some of their Middle Eastern named customers. It could had been target marketing, or perhaps not!

George Orwell's plaque

//gatheredimages.com/pages/ICON/bigbrother.ht...

Dear ex programmer

You asked me:" Are you OK with having your privacy invaded? Or with having the privacy of your family members invaded?"

I won't tell you what THEY would say, but my answer would be, no, I am not OK  with that (I am far more on your side, than you think:-) )

Having said that, I am not OK with a lot of things, but there is nothing I can do about them. I am always photographed, without my permission (in parties and weddings and charity events!), ending up being tagged on Facebook,...etc. but unless they use my photo for commercial purposes, there is not much I could do to stop them( they tell me I could remove the tag, but who knows).

If the owner of a building has it under surveillance, I may choose not to go there. But if I do, I am going to try to avoid being caught in a compromising position.

If every teenager could be armed with a cellphone camera and shoot whatever he/she wants that is in plain view, so could anyone else, including law enforcement and private security agents. I just don't know how we can stop the practice.

The only place I could expect privacy, is in my own home, with shades closed.

It sucks, but that's what the world has come to.

Yours,

Ali P.

P.S. You also say,"You can bet your last dollar that the kinds of slobs that get hired to
monitor security cameras are using them to spy on people for their own
entertainment."

I used to be a security guard. I resent the 'slob' comment!(The rest is true , but the 'slob' comment really hurt!)  :-)

Mr. President, Madam hermaphrodite; please

Can't we get along?

Remember; we only followed our beloved King. First, he fled like a coward. 

Please read some unbiased history books.

The Pahlavis and all mullahs must disclose the source and the amount of their wealth.

Hossein!

" If it wasn't because of the Brits and their buddy US, we wouldn't be here!"

Wrong Hossein. We are here because WE brought this upon ourselves.

As long as there are happy fools around I guarantee there will be no democracy in Iran.

Did you like Shappi's father's poem. I love it :P

FR

Hadi Khorsandi on Green Movement

هادی خرسندی

"تن آدمی شريف است به جان آدميت"
نه همان نوار سبز است نشان آدميت

اگر آدمی به رنگ است و لباس و کله‌ی گچ
چه ميان مانکن ها و ميان آدميت

نه به پرچمی بده گير و نه رنگ را جدا کن
و بدان که رنگرنگست روان آدميت

تو نگو در اين شرايط همگان شوند يکسان
که به قالبی نگنجد همگان آدميت

تو که پشت هم بگوئی سخن از دموکراسی
مگذار چيره گردد خفقان آدميت

همه يکصدا وليکن مشو غافل از حقيقت
که هزار لهجه باشد به زبان آدميت

نه بگير خرده بر آن که به خود نبسته سبزی
نه هر آنکه بسته بنشان سر خوان آدميت

تو نه مبصر کلاسی و نه ناظم دبستان
تو نه ژاندارم سبزی نه آجان آدميت

چه خوشست سبز بودن به ميان جمع و جنبش
که گشاده سبزه‌زاريست جهان آدميت

BBC is bs

I am just saying

Rusta & Ali you need to be thankful for being alive!

Why don't start praying 5 times a day for being alive? What kind of a non-sense are you talking about? She should be thankful to the UK for making her family refugees? She should shut up and everyday thank the British who have done so much to us and our country?

If it wasn't because of the Brits and their buddy US, we wouldn't be here! She was one year old when she was came to the UK. She doesn't even remember Iran, and you want her to act as she just left yesterday? England is her adopted country and she has every god damn right to criticize it! That is the democray that the green movement is trying to achieve! Get it?

No wonder we have no democracy in Iran! People like you two who never understood the meaning of democracy! If she has to shut up, she might as well go back to Iran! Why don't you shut up and stop cricizing us for speaking our minds, now that you have achieved your ultimate goal of living in the west and kissing up their .....? Feel sorry for you! Go back to your RUSTA! You have a lot to learn!

BTW  Ali, what's up with the hat? are you hiding your bald had like most of us?  

By the way, Ali

You dodged the issue :)

It's a matter of invasion of privacy. Are you OK with having your privacy invaded? Or with having the privacy of your family members invaded?

EDIT: And yes, I'm talking about my hypotheticals not your best-case scenarios! Becuase my hypotheticals are not really hypotheticals at all. You can bet your last dollar that the kinds of slobs that get hired to monitor security cameras are using them to spy on people for their own entertainment. That's about the most boring job there could possibly be, and it doens't pay well either.

Well, Ali

"They" would be wrong. A CCTV camera that's pointed at an outdoor parking area can just as easily be pointed through somebody's 5th floor window across the street. That's called "voyeurism" and it's illegal when private citizens do it for their own thrills. But somehow it's OK when people do it in the name of security.

THEY, dear ex programmer Craig , would respond by stating:

"Dear ex programmer:

We have signs all over our building, indicating our practice of putting everyone in the area under our survaillance. Please take it as a fair notice. Additionally, we are a reputable company, in business to make money, by collecting rent. We could not- believe us- care less about your sexual adventures.

Our main goal is stopping criminal activity in our building, making it safe for our residents. The chances of one of our staff, or agents, shooting you and your wife lovemaking, and putting the clip on YouTube, is far less, than a teenager, with a cellphone camera, recording your every move, and showing it to all his friends, on his MySpace.

If you don't want to end up on Youtube, our advice would be, to refrain from lovemaking, to your wife or to yourself (!), in public areas, such as common areas of our building.

Yours,

Bob  "

yeah yeah yeah

Tell us how great it is after a minimum wage security guard uploads a video of you having sex with your wife to YouTube, and your friends at work start commenting about how hot she is. Or about how fat and ugly she is, for that matter. Or when a video of your daughter taking a shower or masturbating starts being circulated at school and destroys her life.

Oh, I know! People who don't have sex with their wives and who don't masturbate or take showers have nothing to worry about, right? :o

Ali P.

You nailed it, as usual! :)

fatollah jaan, THEY, will tell you:

" Dear Mr. Fatollah:

There seem to be some  shady characters, visiting you and some of your neighbors, who live in our building. While we cannot stop them from coming in, we'd like to let them know, that they are monitored.

In fact, in that burglary at 301 and that peeing in the garage incident last month, the individuals have been identified, and reported to the police. 

If you are one of the residents who don't steal others' properties, or can hold it, you have nothing to worry about.

Yours,

Bob Trump

god damn owner of the building ;-)  "

Ali P.

the private sector is doing the monitoring, the governments have outsourced the task! Now that's frightning, don't you think? The laws now allow every god damn owner of a building to monitor everything moving in and outside the building! Now this is actually nothing compared to what the intelli services are capable of!

That's the argument, they present:

"We still believe that you should enjoy your privacy, where you are entitled to it (i.e., your home). Once you are in a public place, you have no "reasonable expectation of privacy".

Anything you  do, if suspected to be unlawful, could come back to haunt you. The only difference, is that, your conduct used to be reported by snitches, police, or ordinary citizens, with all kinds of bias and agendas that warranted their testimony unreliable and suspecious.

Now, the cameras don't lie."

monitoring her citizens !

London has more cameras per square then any other European Capital! Unfortunately, I am pessimistic when it comes to monitoring people in "decent" democratic societies. Then again, everything else is relative! 

Savak didn't had the kind of power over its citizens the KGB, CIA, MI6 and so on had! May I remind you that even in Sweden the communists/Socialists on far left were also watched and monitored by their secared police! Communists and socialists, usually on far left were monitored in every European Capitals from Athen to Lisboa, Madrid to London and Paris to Stockholm. So please stop the Savak this and that ... I am glad neither Savak nor Savama has the kind of power! Yoy people talk about a periode when there was a cold war, what is their execuse today? 

-F 

Tell her, my Royal hermaphrodite; tell everybody...

We were watched all the times by SAVAK too; and then we became ungrateful too and, look what happened to us.

You see; my dear FR, some people never learn the simple rule:

If you are comfortable just shut up and make sure everyone else is muzzled up too.

Your logical skill is getting better and, better... 

The Pahlavis and all mullahs must disclose the source and the amount of their wealth.

Don't be ungrateful Shappi

Was it not for the same big brother state that you are now critisizing, whilst enjoying its comforts, you and your family would have been an extra record in Saeed Emami's resume.

How is that for a little quip? 

FR

That...

Is the main thing that drove me absolutely crazy when I visited London. Cameras in the elevators, cameras in the halls, cameras in the lobby, cameras at the pool, cameras in the gym... and that was just at the hotel! I was so paranoid about the cameras all over the place that I kept both sets of drapes drawn 24/7!

The other thing is the "smart cards" they use in Europe. My first programming job, one of the things I was working on was prototype smart card readers/writers. I think most people have no idea how much data they can fit onto one of those cards! And what kind of data it is! I wouldn't be at all comforatble with any random vendor having access to that kind of information about me every time I make a purchase! I'm really glad they are banned in the US.

You tell them sister

Sharp satire. She is getting better all the time.

Agha Payvand Salame maro beh Hajagha beresoon.