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You have to love the internet sometimes. Someone who works construction (as he stated) can develop a fun investigatory hobby just via the internet. The he can s

by wpasc 6y ago

You have to love the internet sometimes. Someone who works construction (as he stated) can develop a fun investigatory hobby just via the internet. The he can sign his work with a silly name like bear__f##ker (which I'm guessing is a reference to the movie super troopers).

AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
On the other hand, it was people like this that once fingered the wrong person for the Boston Marathon bombing. It's all well and good as long as we remember not to put too much stock in it when it really matters.
- bgravinz 6y ago
  Once an entire government worth of people led the US into war that cost millions of lives over fake reports of nukes. It would be interesting to compare the damage caused by open, crowd-sourced investigative efforts against the damage caused of closed "authoritative" investigative efforts.
  - dimitrios1 6y ago
    Ha, if only they had the guts to be so specific! They just hid behind the blanket statement of "WMD"s and deflected any questions of specifics. Could have been nerve gas, could have been a biological agent. Everyone played their role (media and government) in deflecting attention away from the core issue that we were being bullshitted.
    - chordalkeyboard 6y ago
      > Everyone played their role (media and government) in deflecting attention away from the core issue that we were being bullshitted. That would never happen today.
  - matthewdgreen 6y ago
    I think it’s amusing that the takeaway from this episode is “the intelligence agencies screwed up” and not “the intelligence agencies found no evidence, and then were directly pressured by their political masters to construct evidence to justify a desired military outcome.”
    - artificialLimbs 6y ago
      If the people at the agency had integrity, they would have immediately brought these concerns up the chain or public.
      - mapmap 6y ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_C._Wilson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_C._Wilson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plame_affair https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plame_affair
        techer 6y ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Kelly_(weapons_expert) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Kelly_(weapons_expert)
        deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
        skissane 6y ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia%E2%80%93East_Timor_spying_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia%E2%80%93East_Timor_s... Australia and East Timor negotiated a treaty to divide up oil and gas in the sea between the two countries. Australia bugged the East Timorese government offices to get an unfair advantage in the negotiations. The East Timorese government found about this, and then sued Australia in the Permanent Court of Arbitration to have the treaty invalidated. An Australian intelligence agent (''Witness K''), who knew about the bugging, contacted East Timor's lawyer – Australian Bernard Collaery – offering to testify for East Timor. The Australian government responded by cancelling Witness K's passport to stop him from testifying, raiding the offices of East Timor's lawyer, and now both of them are on trial – in secret.
  - Razengan 6y ago
    > It would be interesting to compare the damage caused by open, crowd-sourced investigative efforts against the damage caused of closed "authoritative" investigative efforts. I hate that word “interesting” when used for things that are downright fucking despicable. Human history is rife with witch hunts. Perpetrated by communities against people living on the fringe of society or anyone they just didn’t like. Someone to blame for nothing in particular when they can’t find any other outlet for frustration. I guarantee you wouldn’t find it “interesting” if you were the target of oPeN cRoWdSoUrCeD iNvEsTiGaTiVe EfFoRtS.
    - emteycz 6y ago
      And you wouldn't like being the target of a governmental agency either. The question is which is worse and in what ways.
  - kristopolous 6y ago
    I bet a comparative study can be done. Some places have a history of vigilantes and lynch mobs and a banning of that practice for the authoritative form. I wouldn't actually be surprised if people actively debated this and did some analytical legwork when they were prevalent as some twisted justification for the practice
  - joe_the_user 6y ago
    It's clearly possible to be against jumping to conclusions with crowd sourced material and also being false claims by the government (especially given that in the case of the Iraq invasion we don't how much fraud or bad faith really went into it). Which is to say that measuring damage done by the Iraq invasion versus damage cause people falsely finger individuals for crimes is an exercise in fallacious analogy. The US isn't planning to crowd source their next invasion research question.
  - andy_ppp 6y ago
    I thought there was some convincing evidence of nuclear centrifuges being buried in the head scientists back garden by his genocidal sons? https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol48no4/bombs_in_garden.html https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intellig... I mean I quite like this summation by Christopher Hitchens about the Iraq war: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VABqrEiuP0I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VABqrEiuP0I
    - wrycoder 6y ago
      Read “The Bomb in my Garden” by Obeidi. As I recollect, he buried the plans for a centrifuge and some key parts.
      - acqq 6y ago
        If I read this correctly Obeidi hid that parts from Saddam, not for him, from the article above: “Had the secret cache been discovered by Saddam’s security elements, Obeidi and his family might have been eliminated.” And those were the leftovers from dismantling the stuff which was used before 1991, as far as I understand: definitely not a smoking gun, more the old rusty non-functional parts which Saddam didn’t know existed.
  - CGamesPlay 6y ago
    > war that cost millions of lives Not to show support for the invasion of Iraq, but it was a far cry from "millions of lives". https://www.iraqbodycount.org https://www.iraqbodycount.org
    - gokceozantoptas 6y ago
      I think the only cost is not the body count. One must look to the displaced populations, affects of the drop of GDP, etc. And how one thing led to another and in the end gave rise to (or at least provided the dirt to grow for) IS, etc.
  - colechristensen 6y ago
    It wasn’t over fake reports of nukes. The weapons reports were how it was justified for a while, it is quite doubtful that the war calculus relied on this for decision makers in any way more than as a coin to sell the war to the people.
- ACow_Adonis 6y ago
  As an analyst, something in me twitches involuntarily at your response. By people like this you mean redditors doing internet sleuthing? But redditors doing internet sleuthing could be anyone; from detectives, to judges, to professional analysts, to trolls, to pr firms, to fraudsters and framers. The evidence they use can be anything from high quality to low/ fraudulent. And then we have the fact that the alternative official systems also have incentives/disincentives and also get things wrong: imagine writing about police or courts "they once fingered the wrong person for crime X, so don't put too much stock in it when it really matters". if the Wikipedia article is anything to go by, the Boston bombing case was a bunch of internet people reacting on a rumour of similarity to descriptors/ images released by the authorities. whereas in this case, a smart fellow follows a systematic and logical system to come to a reasonable conclusion. I'd rather tell people to learn to judge evidence and the analytical thought that goes into making the conclusions. Of course, we mustn't entirely discount the possibility that all this is just some PR stunt and this guy is in on it :p But either way, I'd say the better message is to learn to be skeptical, think analytically, and judge things on the quality of the evidence and the thought process used to come to the conclusion. /soapbox
  - dvtrn 6y ago
    But redditors doing internet sleuthing could be anyone; from detectives, to judges, to professional analysts, to trolls, to pr firms, to fraudsters and framers. Am I out of line to thinking that at least some of the types of people listed in your hypothetical group of sleuths have some sense of professional ethics to not recklessly speculate on a public web community in terms of a manhunt as was the case in Boston?
    - ufmace 6y ago
      They probably do. Unfortunately, the mechanics of Reddit favor any random dope posting something that is exciting and sounds good over smart and careful people taking their time to make sure they get it right. And of course, "Hey guys I've got it, this is totally it!!!" goes up much faster than "I found something that might be interesting, let's check it out, but I'm not sure yet, so don't anybody go off half-cocked".
- darkerside 6y ago
  It's fine if it matters. What isn't fine it's if it's unverifiable.
- kordlessagain 6y ago
  > it was people like this that once fingered the wrong person And it's people like you who try to judge them equivalent in public view, when they clearly aren't.
- m463 6y ago
  Right, what if it was accepted as fact, but turns out the monolith was there for millennia and was only recently uncovered by a sandstorm?
donpott 6y ago
I feel the same way about the people who do OSINT, which is featured in HN every now and then. A fascinating world, to be sure!
noxer 6y ago
Imagine if these people would investigate voter fraud. No mainstream media would ever report that ;P
- encom 6y ago
  These kinds of people are investigating voter fraud.
anoncake 6y ago
Bear_Fucker, actually. I don't think # is even allowed in Reddit usernames.

by wpasc 6y ago

AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago

On the other hand, it was people like this that once fingered the wrong person for the Boston Marathon bombing. It's all well and good as long as we remember not to put too much stock in it when it really matters.

bgravinz 6y ago
Once an entire government worth of people led the US into war that cost millions of lives over fake reports of nukes. It would be interesting to compare the damage caused by open, crowd-sourced investigative efforts against the damage caused of closed "authoritative" investigative efforts.
- dimitrios1 6y ago
  Ha, if only they had the guts to be so specific! They just hid behind the blanket statement of "WMD"s and deflected any questions of specifics. Could have been nerve gas, could have been a biological agent. Everyone played their role (media and government) in deflecting attention away from the core issue that we were being bullshitted.
  - chordalkeyboard 6y ago
    > Everyone played their role (media and government) in deflecting attention away from the core issue that we were being bullshitted. That would never happen today.
- matthewdgreen 6y ago
  I think it’s amusing that the takeaway from this episode is “the intelligence agencies screwed up” and not “the intelligence agencies found no evidence, and then were directly pressured by their political masters to construct evidence to justify a desired military outcome.”
  - artificialLimbs 6y ago
    If the people at the agency had integrity, they would have immediately brought these concerns up the chain or public.
    - mapmap 6y ago
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_C._Wilson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_C._Wilson https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plame_affair https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plame_affair
      - techer 6y ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Kelly_(weapons_expert) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Kelly_(weapons_expert)
        deleted 6y ago
        [deleted]
        skissane 6y ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia%E2%80%93East_Timor_spying_scandal https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia%E2%80%93East_Timor_s... Australia and East Timor negotiated a treaty to divide up oil and gas in the sea between the two countries. Australia bugged the East Timorese government offices to get an unfair advantage in the negotiations. The East Timorese government found about this, and then sued Australia in the Permanent Court of Arbitration to have the treaty invalidated. An Australian intelligence agent (''Witness K''), who knew about the bugging, contacted East Timor's lawyer – Australian Bernard Collaery – offering to testify for East Timor. The Australian government responded by cancelling Witness K's passport to stop him from testifying, raiding the offices of East Timor's lawyer, and now both of them are on trial – in secret.
- Razengan 6y ago
  > It would be interesting to compare the damage caused by open, crowd-sourced investigative efforts against the damage caused of closed "authoritative" investigative efforts. I hate that word “interesting” when used for things that are downright fucking despicable. Human history is rife with witch hunts. Perpetrated by communities against people living on the fringe of society or anyone they just didn’t like. Someone to blame for nothing in particular when they can’t find any other outlet for frustration. I guarantee you wouldn’t find it “interesting” if you were the target of oPeN cRoWdSoUrCeD iNvEsTiGaTiVe EfFoRtS.
  - emteycz 6y ago
    And you wouldn't like being the target of a governmental agency either. The question is which is worse and in what ways.
- kristopolous 6y ago
  I bet a comparative study can be done. Some places have a history of vigilantes and lynch mobs and a banning of that practice for the authoritative form. I wouldn't actually be surprised if people actively debated this and did some analytical legwork when they were prevalent as some twisted justification for the practice
- joe_the_user 6y ago
  It's clearly possible to be against jumping to conclusions with crowd sourced material and also being false claims by the government (especially given that in the case of the Iraq invasion we don't how much fraud or bad faith really went into it). Which is to say that measuring damage done by the Iraq invasion versus damage cause people falsely finger individuals for crimes is an exercise in fallacious analogy. The US isn't planning to crowd source their next invasion research question.
- andy_ppp 6y ago
  I thought there was some convincing evidence of nuclear centrifuges being buried in the head scientists back garden by his genocidal sons? https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/csi-studies/studies/vol48no4/bombs_in_garden.html https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intellig... I mean I quite like this summation by Christopher Hitchens about the Iraq war: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VABqrEiuP0I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VABqrEiuP0I
  - wrycoder 6y ago
    Read “The Bomb in my Garden” by Obeidi. As I recollect, he buried the plans for a centrifuge and some key parts.
    - acqq 6y ago
      If I read this correctly Obeidi hid that parts from Saddam, not for him, from the article above: “Had the secret cache been discovered by Saddam’s security elements, Obeidi and his family might have been eliminated.” And those were the leftovers from dismantling the stuff which was used before 1991, as far as I understand: definitely not a smoking gun, more the old rusty non-functional parts which Saddam didn’t know existed.
- CGamesPlay 6y ago
  > war that cost millions of lives Not to show support for the invasion of Iraq, but it was a far cry from "millions of lives". https://www.iraqbodycount.org https://www.iraqbodycount.org
  - gokceozantoptas 6y ago
    I think the only cost is not the body count. One must look to the displaced populations, affects of the drop of GDP, etc. And how one thing led to another and in the end gave rise to (or at least provided the dirt to grow for) IS, etc.
- colechristensen 6y ago
  It wasn’t over fake reports of nukes. The weapons reports were how it was justified for a while, it is quite doubtful that the war calculus relied on this for decision makers in any way more than as a coin to sell the war to the people.
ACow_Adonis 6y ago
As an analyst, something in me twitches involuntarily at your response. By people like this you mean redditors doing internet sleuthing? But redditors doing internet sleuthing could be anyone; from detectives, to judges, to professional analysts, to trolls, to pr firms, to fraudsters and framers. The evidence they use can be anything from high quality to low/ fraudulent. And then we have the fact that the alternative official systems also have incentives/disincentives and also get things wrong: imagine writing about police or courts "they once fingered the wrong person for crime X, so don't put too much stock in it when it really matters". if the Wikipedia article is anything to go by, the Boston bombing case was a bunch of internet people reacting on a rumour of similarity to descriptors/ images released by the authorities. whereas in this case, a smart fellow follows a systematic and logical system to come to a reasonable conclusion. I'd rather tell people to learn to judge evidence and the analytical thought that goes into making the conclusions. Of course, we mustn't entirely discount the possibility that all this is just some PR stunt and this guy is in on it :p But either way, I'd say the better message is to learn to be skeptical, think analytically, and judge things on the quality of the evidence and the thought process used to come to the conclusion. /soapbox
- dvtrn 6y ago
  But redditors doing internet sleuthing could be anyone; from detectives, to judges, to professional analysts, to trolls, to pr firms, to fraudsters and framers. Am I out of line to thinking that at least some of the types of people listed in your hypothetical group of sleuths have some sense of professional ethics to not recklessly speculate on a public web community in terms of a manhunt as was the case in Boston?
  - ufmace 6y ago
    They probably do. Unfortunately, the mechanics of Reddit favor any random dope posting something that is exciting and sounds good over smart and careful people taking their time to make sure they get it right. And of course, "Hey guys I've got it, this is totally it!!!" goes up much faster than "I found something that might be interesting, let's check it out, but I'm not sure yet, so don't anybody go off half-cocked".
darkerside 6y ago
It's fine if it matters. What isn't fine it's if it's unverifiable.
kordlessagain 6y ago
> it was people like this that once fingered the wrong person And it's people like you who try to judge them equivalent in public view, when they clearly aren't.
m463 6y ago
Right, what if it was accepted as fact, but turns out the monolith was there for millennia and was only recently uncovered by a sandstorm?

donpott 6y ago

I feel the same way about the people who do OSINT, which is featured in HN every now and then. A fascinating world, to be sure!

noxer 6y ago

Imagine if these people would investigate voter fraud. No mainstream media would ever report that ;P

encom 6y ago
These kinds of people are investigating voter fraud.

anoncake 6y ago

Bear_Fucker, actually. I don't think # is even allowed in Reddit usernames.