This type of data analysis software has been around for years in the business and academic world. I tested a package from Lotus when I was a Computer/Technology columnist in the 1980s. What is new is that more data is easily available online, so that running a search can reach more data more quickly than before. The conspiracy freaks rant about Promis software as if it was unique. (just Google it for examples) It was not. I mentioned it in an article in the Columbia Journalism Review in 1993 as part of the conspiracy mania that can grip reporting on intelligence abuse.
http://www.cjr.org/year/93/3/spooky.asp
The threat to civil liberties is real. The conspiranoia is a waste of time.
Chip Berlet
-----Original Message-----
From: Eubulides [mailto:paraconsistent at comcast.net]
Sent: Thu 8/7/2003 11:55 PM
Cc:
Subject: Re: [lbo-talk] the matrix
----- Original Message -----
From: <dredmond at efn.org>
> Bingo. A former spook neck-deep in 1980s drug deals (can you say... Spawn of
> Contra?) claims to have The Greatest Software Ever Created, and the product is
> just so incredibly and innovative and mind-blowing that we're not allowed to see
> any actual code. [Insert Jon Stewart logo.] "Riiiiggght..."
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"Secrecy creates Rents." [Joseph Stiglitz]
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