Re: Alta Vista

J. Michael New (MICHAEL.NEW@NRC.CA)
Wed, 13 Mar 1996 10:21:42 -0500

Alexander Chislenko reveals:
>
> It's not quite like Big Brother - it doesn't punish you for things that
> it find out about you - it just leaves the punishment to others ;-)
>
> Also, if you do not want your pages catalogued by Alta Vista or any other
> spider, just indicate it in the "robots.txt" file.
> The biggest spiders are polite creatures, and they all respect the
> "robot exclusion protocol".
>
> Of course, there may be some Big Brother whose robots do not obey any
> protocols, and collect all information about you into the databases
> you do not see... In a democratic country (that is, one where the
> population controls such things) it may only be done by a private
> agency, and a private agency under democracy can't have much power.
> (Or am I missing something?)

You think the CIA doesn't have one of these?

Also, I agree that a private agency doesn't have much power on a
national scale, but one could have a lot of power over individuals
if used seditiously, i.e. the way the CIA might use it. Information
is power.

Mike

> -----------------------------------------------------------
> | Alexander Chislenko | sasha1@netcom.com | Cambridge, MA |
> | Home page: http://www.lucifer.com/~sasha/home.html |
> -----------------------------------------------------------
>

----------------------------- _/ /\/\ /\/ ----------------------------
J. Michael New Michael.New@NRC.Ca
Integrated Manufacturing Technologies Institute (613)991-4371
National Research Council of Canada home: (613)230-7783
"Star Trek transporter: the ultimate Cut and Paste"
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