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jducoeurNote to self: time to start figuring out my privacy policy vis a vis the government.
For the most part, privacy is going to be pretty clearly delineated in CommYou, same as in LJ: you say who can read your conversations, and I do my best to enforce those restrictions. But in the post-Patriot Act world, CommYou's relationship with the US government is potentially complicated, especially if I develop any real amount of international membership. Or, to put it more concretely: I need to figure out how I respond if the FBI shows up and demands access to somebody's private conversations.
With any luck, things will begin to get a little more rational after the election -- in particular, I have some hope that a Democratic president might at least put real teeth back into FISA oversight, so I can demand a clear court order and make that demand stick. But I probably have to assume that things have fundamentally changed enough that, even with the Republicans out of office, some of the climate of fear (and consequent governmental invasions of privacy) will continue.
Gah: really not stuff I want to be thinking about. And I probably have at least six months after launch before CommYou matters enough for the government to even notice its existence. But I need to be pondering this now, before it becomes A Problem, because the panic after getting a call from the FBI is *not* the time to be designing well-thought-out policy...
For the most part, privacy is going to be pretty clearly delineated in CommYou, same as in LJ: you say who can read your conversations, and I do my best to enforce those restrictions. But in the post-Patriot Act world, CommYou's relationship with the US government is potentially complicated, especially if I develop any real amount of international membership. Or, to put it more concretely: I need to figure out how I respond if the FBI shows up and demands access to somebody's private conversations.
With any luck, things will begin to get a little more rational after the election -- in particular, I have some hope that a Democratic president might at least put real teeth back into FISA oversight, so I can demand a clear court order and make that demand stick. But I probably have to assume that things have fundamentally changed enough that, even with the Republicans out of office, some of the climate of fear (and consequent governmental invasions of privacy) will continue.
Gah: really not stuff I want to be thinking about. And I probably have at least six months after launch before CommYou matters enough for the government to even notice its existence. But I need to be pondering this now, before it becomes A Problem, because the panic after getting a call from the FBI is *not* the time to be designing well-thought-out policy...