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- Hacker News
- Universities in many countries have traditionally been the place of political change and even revolution. Always the prime target of intelligence agencies.
From Palestinian flags to ultra conservative incels it's a hotbed of dissent even in tame countries.
by expedition32 - As context for this article presumably written for an audience of faculty, a few bits of historical MIT culture:
1. MIT prided itself on having minimal rules. Historically, they think rules are barriers to MIT people doing smart things.
2. MIT valued an open campus. Typical example was that at any time of night students could walk into an empty classroom to work on a problem or something.
3. There is a joke that it stands for "Military-Industrial Technology". There have been very close ties to US govt., more than most than most universities. Whatever goes on at a small set of partifcular universities will be seen by some to affect national security. This is in addition to, like other US research universities, suddenly feeling at the mercy of whatever US administration is controlling the purse strings.
4. Overall strong libertarian bent, of the student body and much of the faculty. This affects how you make non-engineering/science/financial/prestige arguments to this audience. (Excepted are administrative staff, more typically having the background of solid liberal arts educations.)
5. (This one is my own observation) MIT student body overall were less aware of societal and world issues, compared to students overall at the university I was at before. If you see demonstrations on certain issues, that might be originating with international students arriving on campus with concerns felt widely in their home countries, rather than the stereotypical general idealism of young college students.
(Aside: I'm surprised by the style of the article, if the audience is broad MIT faculty. The authors seem to be mostly from humanities pockets, so I wonder whether they bounced a draft off some engineering or science professors. Also, although the article might be implying that inhibiting protests is a motivation (not just an incidental effect) of the surveillance, I didn't see the article acknowledge the horrific recent mass-shooting on campus, which would be an obvious motivation. I'm personally highly skeptical of mass surveillance, and I think there are some profound questions for society, so I'd like to see engagement of the broader faculty.)
by neilv - Somehow this reminds me to think of Aaron Schwartz.by readenough
- by conartist6
- They must really love their security cameras to have decided to start decorating them. The bedazzled cameras are lovely to see. My inner 90's child can't wait to apply sparkly plastic rhinestone to their naked exteriors. What's next? Some fake braids and perhaps a troll doll or two?
Also have to commend whoever is in charge of acronyms for this project. I thought I was the most excessive acronym user, but now having read this article, I'm not!
by skyberrys - If you fail to read the article you might not realize it's being sarcastic.by fouc
- > Thankfully, the Sauronic array of electronic eyeballs can suppress that kind of rowdiness,
I don't think I've seen this descriptive adjective before, but it is brilliant.
MIT may need to establish an endowed chair for its department of Sauronical Engineering.
by musicale - There is an effectively unlimited supply of people willing to take sums of money to work on anti-human endeavors, so long as they and theirs are not the humans involved.by jcomp