Comment by kcplate

Comment by kcplate 5 days ago

> Until that moment, the general sentiment about the government and the internet is that they are too incompetent to do anything about it

In 2008 I worked with a retired NSA guy who had retired from the agency 5 years prior. He refused to have a cellphone. He refused to have a home ISP. Did not have cable tv, Just OTA. He would only use the internet as needed for the work we were doing and would not use it for anything else (news, etc). He eventually moved to the mountains to live off grid. He left the agency ten years before Snowden disclosed anything.

An example like that in my life and here I sit making comments on the internet.

ifwinterco 5 days ago

I question the wisdom of that path though. Like yes the government can probably read a lot of your stuff easily, and all of it if they really want to. But why does that mean you have to live like a medieval hermit in a hut in the mountains?

I have opinions but at the end of the day I'd rather live within the system with everything it has to offer me, even knowing how fake a lot of it is. Living in remote huts is just not that interesting

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kakacik 4 days ago

Maybe he wanted that regardless (remote hut life), and this was just a final push for change. I can see myself, under different circumstances (no family) to enjoy such life and hardships (and simplicity) it brings, at least for some time.
If NSA employs primarily some high functioning people on spectrum or similar types, which often don't work well in societies with tons of strangers, then moving off is also not the worst idea if one has enough skills and good equipment to not make it into constant hellish survival.

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- kcplate 4 days ago
  
  > Maybe he wanted that regardless (remote hut life), and this was just a final push for change
  Perhaps. Like I said in the other comment, his motivations for that living choice may have been unrelated to his government work, but it did fit a pattern of choices. I am pretty sure his other choices of specific technology avoidance was related to his government work. No specific conversation but other colleagues and I noticed comments (mainly about cellular and internet avoidance) over the time we worked together in the vein of “I just don’t think it’s a good idea”.
  
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kcplate 4 days ago

I can’t speak to his reasoning and he made no explanation as to why he chose that living choice path to me, but I just view it as another choice he made to disconnect. Circumstantially with the rest, it would not surprise me if it was related to his time with the government, but it could be unrelated in motive, but related in result.

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bradlys 5 days ago

Sounds like a guy who doesn’t enjoy the internet or cellphones. Shit, my grandparents never owned a computer, paid for internet, had cable tv, etc.

Are they suspicious of the government? No, just poor and uninterested.

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