Making Rosa Parks get out of her seat was lame but not technically illegal. Her refusal was completely illegal and plenty of folks argued it was damaging.
I don't see why civil disobedience should cease to be civil disobedience just because it's on a computer.
I think its a good problem solving tactic to try to look for analogous situations and gain insight into our current dilemma in doing so.
I think a better analogy might be a sit in. If you occupy all the seats in a restaurant, I think it kind of qualifies as a meatspace DOS. I guess the difference is that in civil rights sit ins of the 60s, the people sitting in actually wanted service.
I guess the digital analogue would be a bunch of people requesting permission to donate to Wikileaks, rather than permission to load the page. It seems the subtle difference is that civil rights groups actually wanted the service that they deny to others, while anon wants a service different from the one they are denying to others.
I guess its up to individuals whether they think the difference is significant.
> Under a 1921 ordinance, 156 protesters were arrested for "hindering" a bus, including King. He was ordered to pay a $500 fine or serve 386 days in jail.
A boycott is only effective if the disgruntled group has enough population to affect the business of the target. There in lies the problem with a DDoS attack. It is not a symmetrical response. A small group of people could execute such an attack, while the majority of actual customers may not have an issue with their actions.
A small group of MC lawyers and executives also has say on whether you can use of the three largest payment methods on the planet to fund a group you sympathise with.
When it comes to oligopolies, the usual rule of corporations as private, independent entities that can do whatever they please, goes out the window.
Not that I approve of MC's actions, but I think they're perfectly in their right to deny service to WL. I don't think their excuse of "illegal actions" cuts it, because as it's been pointed out, the illegality of their actions is still in a very gray area. However, I think they should be able to sever ties with a customer and I cannot see what law would prevent them from doing so in this case. WL is not in any protected class (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_class).
I don't like that they've denied them service, but I believe it is and should be perfectly legal for them to do so. Can you explain why you think it should be illegal?
By arbitrarily accepting or rejecting clients, they essentially determine the existence or lack thereof of these organizations. In the same way that Google has suffered legal action for alleged manipulation of search results (though I must credit them for being very consistent in that regard), MasterCard should also be accountable as not just an actor in a market, but a gatekeeper.
A market that's guarded by a couple of monolithic entities with similar interests is not open, and without credit card transactions a lot of international business is essentially impossible. I believe that's too critical an issue to be left to the whims of corporations.
The situation would be very different if we had dozens of easily available credit card providers who would take our money with no hassles. Whether you consider that a failure of the states or the corporations is no the issue at hand. The problem is one of assigning too much power to aisngle entity.
Seeing as "Political Affiliation" isn't in that list of protected classes, does that mean that a private (i.e. non-government) corporation can legally say "I won't sell to you because you're a {Republican,Democrat,insert-your-party-here}"?
Bad credit and fraud are actually good reasons to deny a service, and fraud is, you know, an actual criminal offence that is easily demonstrable, unlike the arbitrary decision of the Department of State to not like an organization and whine about it to their corporate friends.
Actually if you read the updated story, the State Department didn't say anything to Paypal. It was Paypal's decision.
That said, Paypal is not making nearly enough on transaction fees to cover wasting a single minute of a lawyer's time. If there's even a chance of there being legal issues with an account holder, it's almost certainly in their business interest to end that account.
Don't be naive. Credit card companies have lobbies which operate in their interests and help pass legislation which favors their industry, much like other financial interests.
There doesn't even need to be explicit conversation between government officials and Visa/MasterCard for there to be a conspiracy; it's more of a matter of a gentleman's agreement to cover each other's backs.
And here's the HN comment comparing an anonymous DDoS attack to Rosa Parks physically and nonviolently resisting an unjust law. The reverse-Godwin, right on schedule.
Just because the issue of race is still emotionally charged doesn't mean there isn't an equivalence to freedom of information and protection of whistleblowers.
And let me add: if I'm going to get downvoted into the light greys, I'm proud that it's for mocking people who compare anonymous DDoS attackers to Rosa Parks.
You're not getting very downvoted. And you seem to be missing the point. It's not to compare the value of what's being done; this is clearly nowhere near fighting for rights. It's to compare the damage done to the company.
I don't see why civil disobedience should cease to be civil disobedience just because it's on a computer.