> The network would be anonymous, with no ads, no cookies, etc.
Let me see if I understand-- Google (dude's employer) was just going to gift internet to the entire city of San Francisco, starting with the poor, 100% free in perpetuity, and somehow promise to never use the data for any advertising purposes whatsoever?
Also-- at this moment my comment is the only one showing even mild skepticism wrt the veracity of this tweet. Good times.
NYC has the LinkNyc free wifi program. Guess who uses it the most? ..... the homeless, and the poor. (they replaced pay phones with it, and i have seen it being used always by the less than fortunate types).
Connecting to it is not great, but it is better than nothing. This would have helped the poorest people, yet SF turned it away without providing a substitute.
LinkNYC is run by Intersection (a merger of Control Group and Titan (who owned all of the MTA advertising)), which is owned by Sidewalk Labs. Those LinkNYC terminals also run huge display ads 24/7, specifically targeted at the people in range of seeing them.
Internally, the terminals are two Android devices.
Just to add to the sibling comment: LinkNYC absolutely benefits from this commercially. Those terminals are packed with sensors & cameras, and they collect MAC addresses, count pedestrians, etc. etc. etc.
Free WiFi in exchange for prime on-street real estate for your sensors turned out to be a superb deal for them.
They ended up doing this in Mountain View. It was actually truly anonymous (other than what the networking protocol needs - MAC address etc.): it was just an open wi-fi network that blanketed the whole city. You'd connect with your device, and it didn't ask you anything: no capport, no splash page.
Speeds were pretty slow, which is why I didn't use it as my default connection, and presumably why the program was eventually discontinued (the official reason was lack of usage). It also wouldn't surprise me if they ran into abuse issues (eg. people downloading torrents on it all the time to avoid the RIAA).
I don't know anything about the SF program, but I lived in Mountain View at the time (still do). They put one of the mesh nodes on a street lamp about 200 feet away from my house. I played around with using it as a backup for when the DSL was down, but I gave up because it required you to log in with a google account.
I don't recall it requiring a Google account, at least when I tried it. Perhaps they changed it over time. Back then you could just sign up for GMail accounts without giving over any useful personal information though.
I used a burner gmail account to try it out. It was slow enough the idea of creating new burner gmail accounts every time I wanted to use it was uninteresting.
IIRC, it was below 128kbit/s for me, though there was at least one mesh hop away from a node that had a directional antenna pointed towards 444 Castro. Perhaps it was faster if your local node happened to have a direct uplink to either 444 or the 'plex.
I honor your skepticism and relate to it at some level. But having been a beneficiary of the "Google/RailTel wifi"[0] in India, I can't help but think: "Meh, sometimes it just is free internet."
It was just... regular old internet. No gotchas that I faced.
Sacca said he eventually ran the same program in Mountain View.
> Google (dude's employer) was just going to gift internet to the entire city of San Francisco, starting with the poor, 100% free in perpetuity, and somehow promise to never use the data for any advertising purposes whatsoever?
So, this is easily verifiable that what he claims is true.
How is this different from any other internet provider? If the users go to google.com then they are giving their traffic to google. Google benefits when more people use the internet, period. AD free means people wanting to use the network wouldn’t have ads forced on them at the ISP level.
I’m sure other major metros supes would have no problems with freebies and would feel no pain from their campaign sponsors in competing interwebs markets.
That sounds a little like the "vote against it unless we promised to fund quarterly field trips" position mentioned in the tweets. Should the people have been denied internet because their moral superious were worried they might - shock horror - be advertised to one day?
Google makes money per internet user, and a lot of its money comes from intent-based keyword searches. Blanketing anywhere in more internet is a money-maker for Google.
Of course if they used Google or Gmail or Chrome Google would make more money. Doesn’t have to be linked to the Internet itself.
I think the [valid] criticism is around the reasons the politicians wouldn't vote to approve. If their reasoning was based on anti competitive and privacy issues, then i'd understand.
I'm not surprised. As far as I can tell, the only thing the San Francisco government wants is for poor people to leave so they can stop reducing property values. This is the same city council that deliberately plans to have half the housing units they actually need, after all. The entire city is one big real estate scam being foisted on tech companies, and people living in it just get in the way.
There's a distinction between the poor and the homeless. As much as they don't understand cost of living for the working class, they bend over backwards for the homeless, and needles and shit in streets doesn't exactly raise property values.
Are you talking about poor or homeless? I've seen the footage and if it's the same in real life(drugs, hordes of homeless) then residents would be glad too.
You assume the companies are the source of the shenanigans, which I disagree with. It seems counter productive for a tech company to want their worker's cost of living to be higher, as that just means they will cost more.
The reality is the companies create a large inelastic demand for living space, and the local government and property owners of exploit that for profit. If you just create adequate supply (build residential), or constrain demand (don't build office space), the problem doesn't happen.
They have the same general characteristics as the local NIMBY class, but I think I'd want to see more evidence that they are actually members of that class. It's a substantial accusation to make without evidence, especially since you purport to link that to tech companies being NIMBY by policy -- again, a claim I've not seen evidence for.
Only one half of the equation (new residential) is affected by NIMBY-ism. No new residential is fine, just don't build more office space then. That requires local governments not to endlessly expand spending though, so obviously impossible.
I really hope the employees who follow don’t vote like they did in CA. I’ve seen first hand the effect that had on politics in WA. I hope TX avoids the same fate.
Well they don't. If you look at polling from the last election, what is turning Texas blue is hispanics turning 18, what's keeping it red are people moving into Texas.
A WSJ reader letter welcomed a fleeing VC but stated, "I would only ask Mr. Lonsdale and his fellow economic migrants to carefully consider that they are arriving as refugees, not as missionaries."
> This is the same city council that deliberately plans to have half the housing units they actually need
Should cities be compelled to keep growing as long as there is demand? Are they not allowed to say "this much is enough - there are plenty other places to go"?
It's always been weird to me how the Bay Area has to deal with the same monopoly internet providers as everyone else in the country. Surely we have enough talent and capital here to provide free, high-speed internet for the entire area. I guess this is one explanation for why it hasn't happened yet.
I live in the middle of Gilroy (southern end of the Bay Area) and I'm eagerly awaiting my StarLink dish because local internet goes down so often that a beta satellite service is going to be better right off the bat.
And I live in town! Head east of the freeway, and the best you can get is rotting DSL or oversubscribed microwave relay. It's ridiculous.
Those companies are monopolies because they're effective at getting local governments to do what they want, having practiced in thousands of municipalities. In that way SF isn't much different.
In the US, providers typically negotiate exclusive long-term contracts with local government. The argument is that's the only way to make it profitable enough to invest in building out the infrastructure.
The only way around that is for localities to build out the backbone themselves and then request competitive bids, but the providers counter that strategy by lobbying state representatives to ban local Internet infra in the name of privatization or core competency.
One workaround for that would be what's done in old European cities where you can't dig or easily run wires/fiber: just build out a backbone for wireless infra, then let providers compete on last mile wifi/billing/service/price.
It’s a poorly run city with corrupt officials. I’ve talked to Uber drivers from South America who say SF essentially feels like their cities back home but with less violence.
Just leave and spend your tax money elsewhere. I did. And please, don't make the same political mistakes. What matters should be helping the kids, not the career of some corrupt council members who care more about drama than reality.
I remember when this happened. Over the years, telco fiber projects have been blocked by neighbors and city hall too. Often over odd things — The sidewalk boxes are ugly, or will get tagged, or will cause cancer.
Fiber is also supposed to go in when streets are repaved, but when I asked after mine was done, I was told nothing was trenched. The voters put up bond money for these repaves and it was poorly planned. RIP Mayor Lee, but that was under his watch.
The Sacca tweet is about something 15 years ago that I haven’t found any resources for.
So let’s discuss the actual situation that he is responding to. The $25mm donation towards summer school programs, that has been temporarily paused while they look into it. What exactly are they looking into? The fact that the donations are coming through an organization that is designated as a political lobbying group that can hide its donors, as opposed to a traditional charitable organization.
Is it really that much of a stretch to suggest that a donation from a group that has chosen to structure itself as a political lobbying group may be intended for political lobbying, and is unlike a charitable donation for a group that is setup as a charity?
At the very least pausing the donation while it’s investigated further seems reasonable.
You are a little too credulous about how politics works, especially in San Francisco. Choosing to delay a time-sensitive project (how long does it take to coordinate and execute a plan for summer programs for tens of thousands of kids?) is similar to cancelling it, but perhaps a little more shrewd and palatable.
While here, may I point you to a decade-long rezoning plan which was delayed by "6 months" for any project which hadn't paid out extortions to favored "community groups." Nine months later, the purported "equity analysis" which the delay was for has yet to materialize: https://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2020/07/21/hub....
It is a donation to the KIDS, not to the OFFICIALS of the
school district. Big difference.
The parents of the school district should be the ones deciding to send their kids/participate in it, not some corrupted bureaucrat throwing an ideological purity test/hissy fit.
"I haven’t found any resources for". -- are you a city official, or just spreading fud here and talking out of your arse....
we know that SF had a major corruption scandal just few years ago, with even the late Ed Lee being involved, and multiple people arrested.
What Sacca is telling seems completely believable given the backdrop of gross mismanagement, and corruption in the city. It is like those bannana republics that have hit oil, and yet keep grossly miss-managing the revenue/position that they are in.
Oh no, how could you throw a shade at the saint! The dude is the next Jesus, he want to donate money and evil politicians didn't allow it! How could you doubt that?!
Open up all meetings + forms of communications (telephone, email , meetings) to and from public officials and their cabinet members, and this would likely not happen.
We let politicians still operate in the shadows, despite being deep into information revolution. It would cost next to nothing to copy , reproduce, organize serially everything that is said and done by a public official in their official capacity.
Its time for people to wake up and realize we don't work so we can pay their salaries, but that they work for us.
I know this is well meaning, but it will almost certainly backfire. Senior leaders (public and private) need to be able to have confidential discussions where they acknowledge trade offs and negotiate deals: if everything was open and broadcast, you'd get a combination of constant nonstop grandstanding and highly aggressive opposition research that would look for snippets that look bad out of context.
There is clearly a trade-off here, but I don't see as clearly weighted in the same direction as you do.
What value is there in allowing politicians to keep their own statements of blatant self interest out of the public record?
I think that requiring politicians to make public their statements explaining their the decisions on behalf of their constituents would be and unalloyed public good.
> I think that requiring politicians to make public their statements explaining their the decisions on behalf of their constituents would be and unalloyed public good
Sure, this is fine, but that's very different from requiring all their interactions to be public. Put it this this: how often do you ever hear anything insightful or intelligent in a public congressional/senate hearing? It's always politicians trying to ask really stupid gotcha questions that will make them look good to the audience at home.
i think there is more opportunity than you thing for things to work out well, because the tide of transparency would lift all boats, just the same.
You attack someone, you better know you can be attacked.
I think this would work wonders to introduce principles into people that are anything but principled.
If you vote for someone that says he's for X, but then he actually secretly negotiating to drop X from the table, then what good was that campaign promise / vote ? Shouldn't it be necessary to know you were effectively defrauded ?
There's almost no instance where more transparency is a net loss to society. Politics is far and away one of least transparent undertakings. It is desperate for more transparency, not less
Afaik in Italy all public meetings are public, and streamed live online from volunteers (small municipalities) or national TV and radio (lower/higher house)
Almost all meetings and forms of communication ARE open to the public, with nearly unlimited public comment.
San Francisco’s problems are not caused by shadowy figures doing devious deeds in the dark.
They’re caused by rampant small-c conservatism: a constant drive to veto everything and anything. In the well meaning interest of allowing the public to participate, anything and everything can be stopped be very people.
Power should only be given to those who don't seek it out. I think "Songs of Distant Earth" had the right idea with random selection of the mayor or council. Just imagine if we picked from a pool of 500 randomly chosen citizens who are active in their community. Like if we required volunteer service before you could be a member of the possible pool. I would actually love to see this put into practice.
1) Introduce more volatity. For example, make a random chance your ambition will not be reached even if you do everything right: You run for X position, and either there's (a) a random chance that 2nd,3rd, or 4th place will win and (b) a random chance that your win will be swapped with another random position (say, winner of public advocate switches for winner of state assembly seat, etc). This would scare away big money from campaign politics.
2)Introduce Sacrifice. Cap lifetime earnings to scare away career politicians, and actually bring people who intend to sacrifice. If you win an election, you sign an agreement with the IRS that any lifetime earnings in excess of your avg earnings before being elected, will be taxed at 99% tax rate.
Watch those "speaking fees" dissappear overnight!
3) Introduce more turnover. Max 8 years as a publicly elected or appointed figure, and perhaps 16 on public payroll for anyone making X times of poverty income level. No one should be able to life in luxury, off the govt, forever.
Is there any government anywhere in the world, at any level down to an individual town, where this has ever been shown to work? If not, what expertise are you drawing from that has you making these assertions with such confidence?
I can't speak for California, but Illinois requires these things to be public (either automatically or via a FOIA request). Most state FOIAs work in the same way, but maybe with different sets of exceptions
Hmm...maybe it’s time to try some alternatives to democracy.
What if we chose councilors from a pool at random? To get into the pool, you’d have to take some training and pass a series of exams. Training consists of how to write laws, how to read data and adapt policy to data, communication, consensus building, etc. People serve short stints on the council as an act of service.
>Hmm...maybe it’s time to try some alternatives to democracy.
>What if we chose councilors from a pool at random?
"I am obliged to confess I should sooner live in a society governed by the first two thousand names in the Boston telephone directory than in a society governed by the two thousand faculty members of Harvard University."
that's not not-democracy. it's called sortition. sortition is considered by some to be a necessary part of democracy, and is even used by anarchists in some contexts. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sortition
> maybe it’s time to try some alternatives to democracy.
I've long maintained most people are too easily manipulated and pandered to, and have too poor of an understanding of policy to vote. It's too bad poll tests have a bad history in the US.
Manipulation of voters works best in low turnout elections. The more people vote, the harder it is to manipulate either the voters or the voting results.
That's a fair point. In a two party system, you drive turnout where you know you can benefit, pass enough broadly popular legislation to have a plausible bid for reelection, then ignore your constituents and do what your party and donors want.
None of this seems specific to a two-party system. You’re just caricaturing the democratic system in general, without offering constructive criticism or any alternative. You also haven’t addressed the point made by the comment you’re responding to.
San Francisco government is corrupt and incompetent. They’ve ruined a great city with toxic politics. Chesa Boudin has made the city completely lawless and dangerous.
The Progressive Era left a flaming dumpster fire of direct democracy levers that has has only increased government dysfunction in California rather than its intended goal of holding elected official more accountable.
What exactly will this recall prove? The justification for the recall on the website comes off as fatuous hearsay (and why is it also a JPEG?) without additional explanations.
I am extremely skeptical of the recall process providing any real value and think it has often been hijacked to serve dark influence interests preying on the frustrations of the public. The recall of Grey Davis was motivated and funded by Issa trying to get the governorship via a shortcut; I still remember him bawling at his press conference announcing he was stepping out of the race once Schwarzenegger announced his candidacy [1].
Nice try Chesa... you just opened this account to defend that guy that indirectly has led to the killing for 3 people, and the rape of a immigrant woman. People that he let go, just went back and created those crimes.
Also, his numbers of prosecution tells that he needs to go. Don't get elected if you can't are are not willing to do your job
The gist is that Chesa Boudin typically chooses not to prosecute many low-level crimes, such as drug possession.
That has led some situations where someone was arrested for a low-level crime, not prosecuted by the DA, set free, and later goes on to commit a larger, more violent crime.
It’s also worth noting that during the pandemic, crime in SF has shifted from shoplifting, to car and garage break-ins.
While overall crime has dropped, theses new forms of crime are experienced more viscerally by folks that live here.
Many people blame the DA for not “cracking down” on this type of crime. This gets into a lot of pointing fingers. The police fail to arrest people because they say the DA won’t prosecute. The DA says he won’t prosecute because the police won’t arrest people.
It’s not just low level crimes. There are dozens of criminals with dozens to hundreds of felonies that the DA just chooses to not prosecute. People who routinely commit assault and just aren’t prosecuted or brought to court. Property crime is not enforced at all and violent crime only enforced if you’re not homeless or “marginalized” in some way. The rule of law is selectively enforced. It’s miserable and dystopian.
> The DA says he won’t prosecute because the police won’t arrest people
He fired all the prosecutors when he won... Or takes the criminals side and says they were just having a bad day or pushes some phony solution that puts the offender back on the streets.
Your comment seems charged with a lot of pre-existing emotion and I get that this may not be very helpful, but I have yet to see significant evidence that it's "not just low level crimes".
Similarly, the DA's current enforcement rate is not significantly different than before: https://www.sfdistrictattorney.org/policy/da-stat/ In fact, it's higher than it was in 2014. And since crime overall has dropped dramatically, it's hard to say that the DA has lead to any significant lawlessness until after the pandemic.
That doesn't mean you're wrong, that your lived experience of crime is invalid, or that the DA isn't "bad" in some way. Nor does it mean that the DA's methods "work" or that they prevent crime rather than increasing it in the long run.
But I have yet to see evidence of any significant harms on the aggregate, only individual anecdotes.
Personally, it seems like the concern over the DA is a moral panic.
Then you’re not following the stories, multiple assaults and deaths have come after Boudin declined to charge the criminal for other violent crimes. Such as the hit and run driver who wasn’t prosecuted for other crimes:
> McAlister has a long rap sheet and has been arrested numerous times in San Francisco since April 10, 2020, when he finished a sentence for robbery.
>Boudin has a history of referring cases involving repeat offenders to parole instead of prosecuting.
Moral panic? As I pointed out, Boudin fired all the prosecutes when he won. The city is in shambles and no one could say it’s gotten better due to Boudin’s soft on crime strategy:
He’s basically inviting criminals to the city and giving them sanctuary while failing to protect the residents and tax payers. He’s a moron and needs to be held accountable. I support the recall and hope this scumbag is tossed out and leaves in disgrace.
Nothing gets done in San Francisco without the approval of six members of the board of supervisors. See, for example, the recent battle over (checks notes) whether to extend the contract of a ferris wheel in a park.
I don't know the story on that or if it's true, but the actual debate was entirely about "it's a park, not an amusement park" and whether birds might get confused by the wheel's illumination.
Regardless of your country when dealing with a government official always have a recording, at least audio, of said meeting. Then name and shame, make them lose election. Crying 15 years later is kinda pointless.
If true, this is scandalous. It seems a lot of folks accept these claims on face. Maybe it conforms with their pre-existing belief that politicians are corrupt and self-serving. Personally, I don’t find this uncorroborated testimony believable.
Let me see if I understand-- Google (dude's employer) was just going to gift internet to the entire city of San Francisco, starting with the poor, 100% free in perpetuity, and somehow promise to never use the data for any advertising purposes whatsoever?
Also-- at this moment my comment is the only one showing even mild skepticism wrt the veracity of this tweet. Good times.
Edit: clarification