
Apparently, tweeting police scanner data is a no-no. - steveklabnik
http://gothamist.com/2009/10/05/fbi_raids_queens_home_in_g20_protes.php
======
wheels
Not to be missed, from the comments there:

 _The irony is thick enough that I'm about to smear mustard on it, put it
between a couple slices of bread, and eat it for lunch. This is the exact same
type of criminalization of dissent that we condemn the Iranian regime for, and
rightly so. The State Department was happy to provide TOR bridges and proxies
and satellite technology for Iranian dissidents to avoid the crackdowns on
them, and allowed them to use Twitter in to express their views.

But here in the US? Nope, you're a criminal if you tell people where riot
police are marching. Unless this guy is guilty of something beyond what's
reported here, this is a travesty. With all the well-documented examples of
provocation, wrongful arrest, and police brutality the people need information
on what the police are doing. Lawful protesters must be allowed to voice their
dissent, or we become no better than the current and historical regimes to
which America was meant to be counterpoint._

------
javanix
I feel like I should point out that according to federal law, it is an illegal
use of a police scanner to "use information received to aid in the commission
of a crime, or disclose information received to other persons."

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scanner_(radio)#Legal_issues_in...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scanner_\(radio\)#Legal_issues_in_the_US)

There are ethical and legal considerations concerning whether or not the
protests were illegal, but I think as it stands now the defendant is very
close to being on illegal footing.

~~~
steveklabnik
From his "about" page:

Who We Are:

Tin Can Comms Collective is a collection of communication rebels seeking to
provide useful free tools for activists fighting the State and Capitalism. We
are an anarchist group that has come together to help with the communication
infrastructure for the the Anti-G-20 protests this September in Pittsburgh,
because: People and Information want to be Free!

~~~
javanix
What are you talking about?

I gave a link to Wikipedia (which lists the actual legal sources). I wasn't
passing judgement, just saying that what he did seems to be illegal if you
accept the fact that the protests were illegal.

~~~
steveklabnik
And I wasn't passing judgement on you. I figured that everyone hadn't seen his
site, and that his own declared intent would help provide context to if he was
aiding crime or not, since that's what he's being charged with.

------
steveklabnik
As someone who was basically live-blogging the protests via Twitter, I'll
admit that this story hits pretty close to home. I'm definatly still following
this guy on Twitter, and I re-tweeted several people who were tweeting scanner
information.

Kinda sucks. Public information is public, I'm interested to see how they plan
on proving the charges.

~~~
ubernostrum
"Public information is public, I'm interested to see how they plan on proving
the charges."

Well, I think they intend to prove that he was not merely making public
information public, but also directing people in how to evade arrest for what
was -- rightly or wrongly -- illegal behavior.

I should note here that I don't particularly care what people think about
whether it _should_ be illegal to continue protesting after the cops order you
to stop, all that matters in this case is that it _is_. I do, however, feel
obligated to point out that going to jail has always been a part of civil
disobedience, and people who refuse to face up to that strike me as a bit
cowardly.

~~~
anshulk
_I do, however, feel obligated to point out that going to jail has always been
a part of civil disobedience, and people who refuse to face up to that strike
me as a bit cowardly._

So all those Iranian protesters should have simply courted arrests? No. There
is a particular type of civil disobedience that requires not evading of
arrests. Then there are some whose explicit purpose is to fill up jails (jail
bharo andolans, literally "fill the jails protests" are an occasional feature
in civil disobedience in India, a relic from the British era). I do not agree
with your sentiment. I think you decide whether or not you court arrests based
on the goals of the movement and the perceived progress of that goal based on
doing so.

~~~
ubernostrum
I wasn't saying they should actively seek to be arrested. I was saying that
engaging in an illegal act -- even if you believe that act is justifiable and
that your actions will help to bring about the end of something you view as
evil -- carries a risk of arrest and jail time. People who aren't willing to
accept that shouldn't engage in such acts, because in the real world there
isn't always (and in fact often isn't) a happy ending.

------
DanielBMarkham
The article is slanted so heavily I had to turn my laptop at a 45-degree angle
just to read it.

Let's review: _political_ speech is protected speech in the United States.
That means speech about how government and the politicians work. That's
sacred.

Once you move away from purely political speech, you don't have an iron-clad
right any more. There are limits to what you can and cannot say.

I don't think you can make a case that this speech is purely political, even
though it involves political protest. So all the "I thought this could only
happen in X nation" comments are way off-base. Don't be manipulated by people
writing quasi news articles that have an agenda.

I'm sure the government has made the case to the judge that this type of
speech is enabling people to commit a crime. I have no idea if _that_ argument
is sound or not, IANAL, but I'm pretty certain that the free speech argument
here is bogus. He could have tweeted all day long about his political opinions
without a problem.

Having said all of that, as a libertarian I'm really concerned about
governments trying to control communication around protests. This should be an
instructive legal case for those people, like me, that don't understand where
the lines are currently drawn.

~~~
steveklabnik
People tend to see it as a free speech issue because he's simply re-sending
out public data. Each individual person could have just as easily listened in
on a scanner. It's a bit counter-intuitive.

The real issue is that scanner data isn't really public. You're allowed to
listen to it, but not if you intend to commit a crime.

~~~
tptacek
He's not being prosecuted for the speech, he's being prosecuted for the
action. You can say whatever you want. You can't intentionally help people
commit crimes.

~~~
steveklabnik
His actions were speech. I was trying to comment about people's intuitions,
not the legal definition.

You can say whatever you want, as long as what you're saying isn't helping
someone commit a crime.

------
dfranke
This is not the first story of this kind to come up on HN, and last time I
commented that I'm pretty sure there was a supreme court decision that
established that trying to forbid people from warning others about speed traps
over CB radio was a 1st amendment violation. I still can't track down the
case. Help, someone?

~~~
mattyb
All I can find is this:

<http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1493749>

which relates to headlight flashing and didn't involve any Supreme Court.

------
arfrank
It seems to me that they could have pretty easily hidden their location/who
was carrying out the tweets with a few changes to how they setup the whole
situation. That being said it was likely they were either being watched
beforehand or were at least on someones radar prior to G20.

------
BruceWilliams
I'd really like to know why they had a pound of liquid mercury. Samurai swords
I understand - who doesn't want a few of those? But a pound? Of mercury? (Come
to think of it, mercury is pretty heavy - how much volume is a pound?)

~~~
warfangle
33.48 cm3 or so at 20 degrees C - less than the size of a golfball:
[http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_the_volume_of_one_pound_of...](http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_the_volume_of_one_pound_of_mercury)

