From: Steve Gibbons <steve@aztech.net>
Date: Wed, 10 Jan 1996 15:26:14 +0800
To: ecarp@netcom.com
Subject: Re: PRIVACY: Private traces in public places
Message-ID: <0099C274.0F297360.261@aztech.net>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


# > Governments or whoever, can do all they want to make their collection of 
# > dossiers bulge even bigger than they are. But, these dossiers are only 
# > data sets. Data isn't quite the same os information. Information isn't 
# > quite the same as knowledge. Knowledge isn't quite the same as 
# > understanding. And understanding the situation has not been, 
# > historically, enough to ensure that government (or whoever) decision 
# > makers make the "right" decision.
# > 
# > Let the internal security apparatchiks spin the bottle all they want. 
# > They couldn't keep Rome from falling, nor the Byzantine Empire, nor the 
# > Ottoman Sultanate. They couldn't keep the Third Reich in place for a 
# > thousand years. They couldn't keep the Soviet Union glued together by 
# > force nor dirty persuasion nor extortionate non-economics.

# The problem, as I see it, is that you can have too much information. 
# Information takes up room, takes up CPU cycles to process and store and
# retrieve, and the worst part is, it takes a human to evaluate it.  No
# computer in the world is going to be able to evaluate incoming humint for
# reliability.  That takes a human, and I suspect that it will be that way
# for quite some time.  The more information you gather, the worse the
# problem gets, until you have this massive database of information, all
# indexed and stuff, at your fingertips, but it's useless, because you can't
# tell whether it's real or BS or disinformation. 

It's how you classify things.  Raw data is raw data, and raw data is not the
same thing as information.  Until the disinformation gets filtered out, it can't
be classified as information, but falls into the raw-data category.

--
Steve@AZTech.Net