BART transit system shuts off wireless connections

[Rageaholic]

Here's an article

This has got a lot of people outraged, with some going as far to compare it to egypt.

A few points.

*It's only for the subway system, where as egypt was the whole country. It's not like they can't communicate anywhere else.

*The people behind the protest are protesting police brutality after a man was shot and killed by cops there. However, they have also hacked BART's webpage and posted personal information of 2000 people online.

*The main arguement I hear for this is that the wireless is a service and BART is under no obligation to provide it. Therefore it's not unconstitutional.

Normally I'm for the rights of the people and all that, but without knowing the validity of the police brutality claims, I think this is a huge overreaction.

[jackfaire]

I don't live there but after reading that whole article I am pissed off.

One hacking anyone taking my information from them and posting it publicly is not the fault of the organization that had my data but the hackers.

Two a protest would not have hurt the organization being protested but the many people having to explain "sorry boss didn't know there would be a protest making me late for work wait fired? Well shit"

The people that use tactics like this have the "We are awesome and they are lame" and are little better than whiny teenagers who can't seem to think of any better way of addressing their concerns other than pissing all over everyone else's day.

It's like the people that didn't like the "No smoking" rule implemented at bus stops that started smoking more around bus stops to get back at "The Man". Of course not caring that plenty of us were cheering and didn't want to smell it.

[Andara Bledin]

The issue with the BART system is that there are some major allegations of racism that has led to at least one death at the hands of their officers, who are still on active duty.

It's just a lot past the whole "no smoking at bus stops" analogy.

^-.-^

[HYHYBT]

I don't know about the merits of the cause for protesting, and protesting in subway stations, tunnels, whatever sounds like a terrible idea no matter the cause... but that changes not at all that shutting off phone and internet as they did is also wrong. So it's only the subway, not a whole country.... so what? The same act for the same reason is OK if the area involved is smaller? I agree fully with the park analogy in the article: they don't have to provide it at all, but if they do, they cannot (or at least ought not) shut it down based on what may be said.

[jackfaire]

The issue with the BART system is that there are some major allegations of racism that has led to at least one death at the hands of their officers, who are still on active duty.
^-.-^

Oh my bad I guess they should make me miss work and get fired for not showing up. You know cuz that will show those BART people.

My point wasn't that the two are similar my point is that any protest like that has little to no affect on the organization and any sympathy for the cause goes out the window when your method of drawing attention to it is screwing people over.

Why not protest at the offices of BART you know bug the people whose lives you want to make difficult and stay out of my shit. Write editorials, start collections for the families hell legitimately draw attention to the situation.

When your protest only victimizes the innocent and doesn't even affect those your upset with then all your going to do is make people less likely to listen to you.

I think the situation they want to protest is messed up. I think that anytime something like that happens it's messed up. But making my day worse isn't the way to get me to be on your side.

[jackfaire]

but that changes not at all that shutting off phone and internet as they did is also wrong.

Actually they never said they jammed everyone's personal signals. What they did was shut off the wireless nodes they owned. Just the internet access they provided. If people had their own internet access they would be fine. As well as their own phones.

What was done in Egypt was shut down the internet. Period no internet. There they merely shut down the government access point.

[siead_lietrathua]

Actually they never said they jammed everyone's personal signals. What they did was shut off the wireless nodes they owned. Just the internet access they provided. If people had their own internet access they would be fine. As well as their own phones.

this is how i read it as well. it would be like protesting, say, a hotel that decided to discontinue it's wifi. it's a business providing a non-essential service it decided to discontinue, and is in no way a rights violation. i dont remember reading "Free Wifi" in any human rights charter.

[jackfaire]

The BART is a government agency and if it is understood that it was voted on for part of their tax dollars to fund these nodes then they would have a case for a lawsuit.

[Rageaholic]

Actually they never said they jammed everyone's personal signals. What they did was shut off the wireless nodes they owned. Just the internet access they provided. If people had their own internet access they would be fine. As well as their own phones.

What was done in Egypt was shut down the internet. Period no internet. There they merely shut down the government access point.

That's why I think people are overreacting to this. It may be a dick move, but it's hardly unconstitutional. Especially given that there are so many other options available.

I think the real dicks are the protesters and the anonymous group for posting the personal information of so many people, violating their right to privacy. Much more important than the right to use wifi in a subway.

[Gravekeeper]

Disrupting people's daily routine is the absolute worst possible thing you could do for your cause. I have never understood why anyone thinks it will help them. The moment you inconvience the general public is the moment they turn on you like rabid wolves. You will not get a shred of fucking sympathy. Period. Especially if you're disrupting a core system like transit.

The postal strike up here got them no sympathy whatsoever. Years and years ago when transit went on strike here in Vancouver the city turned on them so fast it wasn't funny. Because they cost everyone time, money and frustration. It draws attention to your cause allright, but its negative attention. You come off as a bunch of selfish dickholes.

I'm sympathetic up until you cause me to take an extra hour to get to work. Then you can go fuck yourself with a dead raccoon. If you're having trouble with it, I'll bring a stick and a chair you can bend over. -.-

[Andara Bledin]

I'm sympathetic up until you cause me to take an extra hour to get to work. Then you can go fuck yourself with a dead raccoon. If you're having trouble with it, I'll bring a stick and a chair you can bend over. -.-

While I understand and even agree with your position on this matter, sometimes the only way to get the public to even notice that there's a problem is to bring the system to a grinding halt.

So may people take so much of what goes on around them for granted that they never notice the flaws or problems until someone else forces them to.

If the public, in general, were less apathetic about damn near everything, protest groups wouldn't end up resorting to this kind of tactic.

I'm not sure a protest of that nature would have been useful, but then, I'm also not sure a protest of this nature was even going to happen. Since the measure taken was so easy to contravene, I'm thinking that the thing they were trying to avoid was never going to happen in the first place.

^-.-^

[LexiaFira]

I lived in Berkeley for about 6 or 7 months and have a friend that still lives there.
BART was something that intrigued me and was fun to ride as it mimicked Dallas, Texas' DART transportation system if only by railway.

However I agree that loss of cell phone use is NOT the end of the world and at possible - yes POSSIBLE - worst a minor inconvenience. Heaven forbid we as people not be glued to the precious electronic device while using city provided transportation system that frankly should be given full attention. And by this I mean I rode BART enough times that I felt I needed to give my full attention when boarding and un-boarding and duration of the ride as weird and semi-dangerous or loopy people would get on. Enough people for the city to feel the need to send transit police to patrol or ride the BART now and then.

And from what I was told this suspension or block of cell phone service was a reaction due to a rumor of a protest be it to a different one.
So how does that justify the retaliation of posting personal info? OMG they took our cell phone functions lets get them where they live!! Seriously?

[HYHYBT]

If we're taking about underground, then yes, shutting down their system *is* essentially equivalent to shutting down the entire internet, so far as anyone down there is concerned.

[mikoyan29]

Oh my bad I guess they should make me miss work and get fired for not showing up. You know cuz that will show those BART people.

My point wasn't that the two are similar my point is that any protest like that has little to no affect on the organization and any sympathy for the cause goes out the window when your method of drawing attention to it is screwing people over.

Why not protest at the offices of BART you know bug the people whose lives you want to make difficult and stay out of my shit. Write editorials, start collections for the families hell legitimately draw attention to the situation.

When your protest only victimizes the innocent and doesn't even affect those your upset with then all your going to do is make people less likely to listen to you.

I think the situation they want to protest is messed up. I think that anytime something like that happens it's messed up. But making my day worse isn't the way to get me to be on your side.

Because they learned at the feet of their children who thought it was okay to protest the Vietnam War by spitting on the soldiers that fought there....

[daleduke17]

Fucking whiners. BART did not stifle the people from protesting. You can still schedule protests from other access points or what is included with your data plan from your provider.

Boo fucking hoo you might be ten minutes without coverage. Your tweet can wait.