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Google Businesses Canada

You Can't Fight City Hall. But Maybe You Can Fight Google. (nytimes.com) 35

Posted by msmash from the good-fights dept.
Faced with an array of opponents for its sensor-laden city of tomorrow in Toronto, a Google sibling has drastically dialed back plans. The critics now want the tech giant to quit altogether. From a report: The announcement was big enough for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to fly down to Toronto and deliver. A corporate sibling of Google had been selected to transform a largely abandoned port area in Toronto into an innovative, sensor-laden, tech-centric city of tomorrow. But almost from the time of its unveiling, the project -- which combined environmentally advanced construction with a plan for sensors to track residents' movements and actions -- was hit by formidable opposition. Critics cast it as a recipe for a surveillance-driven, corporate-controlled urban dystopia and objected to turning over public spaces to one of the world's wealthiest companies.

Now, nearly two and a half years later, the opponents have shown that even if you can't fight city hall, you can take on Google and succeed. After admitting that it had underestimated privacy worries with its original plan, the Google sibling, Sidewalk Labs, has retreated. A couple of weeks ago, it unveiled details of a much watered-down plan along with new privacy protections. But some critics remain unconvinced. Waterfront Toronto, a government agency, will announce in May if the project will proceed.

"This thing has blown up on them," said one of the plan's leading critics, Jim Balsillie, who as a co-chief executive of Research in Motion helped make the BlackBerry the world's first successful smartphone and himself into one of Canada's biggest names in tech. "I smoked them out. They were playing us like a bunch of colonial supplicants and suckers." The story of how Toronto walked back the Google plan is in part a tale of locals taking on a big company. But it also reflects a growing pushback around the world against big tech that has accelerated since Sidewalk Labs unveiled its proposal.
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You Can't Fight City Hall. But Maybe You Can Fight Google. More

You Can't Fight City Hall. But Maybe You Can Fight Google.

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  • First good news I've heard so far (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ddtmm ( 549094 ) on Wednesday March 11, 2020 @09:54AM (#59817972)
    Living about 1km from the proposed Sidewalk Labs project, I can honestly say this is the best news I've heard so far. I'd really like to see how many kickbacks and bribes went down to get this project started. I still can't believe taxpayer money would be used against us help fund a surveillance project. It's about time people woke up and started pushing back.

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by Evtim ( 1022085 )

      You silly! Think of the children/environment/health/progress!

      If we track people we can customize health and other types of insurance policies and save enormous amount of money for the corpora...sorry for the tax payer by denying coverage for anyone who does not drink water and eat grass 24/7! Think about it - no longer will the smokers, the reckless drivers, the fat, the ones with genetic predispositions, the stupid humans who live close to a coal plants (learn to code and move, redneck!), extreme sports en

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by lgw ( 121541 )

      The whole thing sounded exactly like New Detroit. I'm sure the robotic police force was just around the corner.

    • I'd really like to see how many kickbacks and bribes went down to get this project started.

      None. Just a bunch of promises about "jobs." If kickbacks and bribes had been involved, it wouldn't have been cancelled.

  • I don't believe in a "city hall" and I certainly don't agree nor did I never consent to be governed, by anyone at anytime, under any condition whatsoever.

    • Everyone knows the "social contact" is a big lie. However many people think it a wholesome lie with which to delude impressionable youth. Much line Santa Claus.

    • I don't believe in a "city hall" and I certainly don't agree nor did I never consent to be governed, by anyone at anytime, under any condition whatsoever.

      Yeah, way to take intensive surveillance and turn the only alternative to anarchy, sovereign citizen.

    • And you can go on thinking that because of the boons the statists have provided you.

    • ....he said, posting from his completely deserted an undeveloped beachhead somewhere on the Mosquito Coast.

      Oh, wait. You say you haven't chosen to remove yourself from your local sphere of local, state and federal government? Congratulations. You have, are, and will continue to consent to be governed.

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Why is it that great things like:

    "...environmentally advanced construction..."

    Is ALWAYS coupled with utter shit like:

    "...with a plan for sensors to track residents' movements and actions..."

    Of course it's a rhetorical question. Greed is always the most obvious answer and Google will eventually win the citizens over by buying their true intentions deeper and deeper into the EULA nobody reads, but it's still annoying as hell that everything is offered in exchange for your privacy.

    Shit gets old.

    • "Why is it"

      'Cuz Big Brother Google is "green" just because it's fashionable. Whereas they invade everyone's privacy because they are goddamned Nazis to the last man.

      • "Why is it"

        'Cuz Big Brother Google is "green" just because it's fashionable. Whereas they invade everyone's privacy because they are goddamned Nazis to the last man.

        It's hardly an "invasion" when citizens willingly trade their digital soul for a free price tag.

        Ignorance has welcomed that "Nazi" mentality with open arms.

  • a surveillance-driven, corporate-controlled ... dystopia

    Seems like we are already there, the sensors are just carried in everyone's pocket and people voluntarily sell-out their family and friends to save a few bucks on data services.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by sinij ( 911942 )
      The key difference is that it is still possible to no carry sensors, but it is not possible in Google's surveillance city as they are integrated into infrastructure.

      • The key difference is that it is still possible to no carry sensors, but it is not possible in Google's surveillance city as they are integrated into infrastructure.

        You really believe not carrying "sensors" is going to make a difference, don't you?

        20 years ago if you chose to walk into a crowded space and be the one who refuses to carry a smartphone or any other common "surveillance" tech on your person, you would feel a bit comfortable knowing that there was a decent amount of people around you that also still respected privacy.

        Today, I'll bet you couldn't get more than 15 feet away from a microphone and/or camera lens in any crowded space.

        If you think any kind of ant

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by sinij ( 911942 )
          Fortunately tech to defeat face recognition and to spoof cell modem fingerprinting techniques already exists.

    • Yup. Freedom and democracy already lost. Welcome to the Brave New World, citizen. Papers please!

  • Privacy commissioner (Score:4, Interesting)

    by sinij ( 911942 ) on Wednesday March 11, 2020 @10:40AM (#59818076)
    This is only possible because Canada takes privacy marginally more seriously than US. There is Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada [priv.gc.ca] and they have some limited powers. If Toronto was in US, Google would have likely succeeded.
  • It isn't about if you are recorded it is about how the data is stored. Almost everyone walks around with a tracking device that must give off your location so that you can receive incoming data. There are cameras all around us. We have mandated back up cameras on almost all new vehicles, there has been wide spread CCTV for 40 years. We are now tracked constantly and recorded almost the entire time we are in public. I want laws about what can be stored, where it is stored, when it can be used, copied, v

  • Google had been selected to transform a largely abandoned port area in Toronto into an innovative, sensor-laden, tech-centric city of tomorrow. But almost from the time of its unveiling, the project -- which combined environmentally advanced construction with a plan for sensors to track residents' movements and actions -- was hit by formidable opposition. Critics cast it as a recipe for a surveillance-driven, corporate-controlled urban dystopia and objected to turning over public spaces to one of the world's wealthiest companies

    And people still wonder why I call Google a privacy rapist [urbandictionary.com].

  • Actually, it is much easier to fight city hall than google, at least in the US. I've fought city hall and won, without spending any money, or other people's money. That's because city hall has elected officials, and they generally want to be re-elected. In many cases, they actually want to do what's right, not just right for their financial benefactors. Of course, the larger the city, the less it's likely you can successfully fight city hall, which is why bigger is not better, and certainly worse for d

  • Any fears that exist regarding surveillance or dystopian societies isn't where the Public's focus should be. They should be following the money to watch which individuals are benefitting monetarily from this. The precedent that has been set over and over is that once the companies collect and store this data, it will be inevitably 'leaked' or sold to the highest bidder. No oversight. No security. No accountability.

    These are your real enemies.

  • If some of us want to live under the constant watch of sensors (perhaps because we believe privacy is merely awaiting execution) then why is that your problem? If you don't like the idea of all those sensors then don't buy a house in that area or get a job there.

    Yes, if all the employers or housing facilities started demanding you accept sensors it would be different but why can't some people live in sensor land and others not?

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