220.
Dear Ed,
May this 4th of July provide an appropriate atmosphere to reach you per this open message.
As soon as I watched your interview via The Guardian site a few weeks ago, I thought (and tweeted correspondingly) that you would appear -in looks and reasoning- to be one of those highly qualified US hatters I confronted when I studied in West Germany during the eighties and mostly when I worked at Siemens telecom-equipment headquarters in Munich during the early nineties.
Your altruistic motivation may be comprehensible if you feel (as I do) uncomfortable with the corrupt wheelings & dealings of the Obama administration.
However, you surely understand that since the advanced communication & information technologies no longer serve exclusively military purposes as they did when they were first developed, users in general are prone to become surveilled by some private or public entity.
It is also quasi a platitude that a state-of-the-art architecture for worldwide surveillance was put in place right after the 2nd world war by the Echelon network.
Reflecting again on my years in Germany, I felt and soon knew that every piece of communication (oral, written and electronic) I evacuated as an insignificant electronics engineering student (on a scholarship) was being tapped and registered by the German intelligence apparatus, which turned into life endangering for me once they confirmed that I was a staunched pro American and therefore critic of the deep seated anti Americanism en vogue among German powerful elites.
In synthesis, what I call the instant inter-connectivity on a global basis GOD is helping Humanity to achieve, will allow us all to know the Truth on every level and in every sector. Along the way, some societies like the USA will be more able to surveil on a more sophisticated way but people will prefer to be tapped by a pluralistic democracy than by a totalitarian regime or some church (bear in mind the inquisition for a moment).
On the long run, of course -thanks to you, Bradley, Julian and others- every effort to do it secretly will become exposed making the losing of privacy, in every form, just an acceptable price to reach a World free of frontiers, free of corruption and able to overcome the hurdles impeding itself to turn into a Paradise for everyone.
Wishing you and the US authorities a common ground to bring your case to a peaceful arrangement, receive warm regards from a drizzling yet still charming Lima,
O1
pablo@omonte.org
