Our Biggest Fight: Reclaiming Liberty, Humanity, and Dignity in the Digital Age By Frank H. McCourt, Jr. & Michael J. Casey (Crown, 224 pages, $18) For many Americans, it is almost impossible to imagine a world without the internet. It’s even harder to grasp the notion that the digital world we inherited is dangerous, yet changeable. Currently, the five largest internet companies have a market valuation larger than the GDP of any country except the U.S. and China. The digital barons of Big Tech have more information and control over our lives than any other group ever has before in human history. The question is no longer whether we can reclaim our digital sovereignty, but whether we have the courage to demand it. In their groundbreaking book, Our Biggest Fight: Reclaiming Liberty, Humanity, and Dignity in the Digital Age, Frank H. McCourt, Jr., and Michael J. Casey present their bold plan to recreate the internet so it reflects and upholds America’s most sacred values: dignity, property, privacy, free speech, and self-governance. McCourt is a billionaire businessman and philanthropist who founded and contributed more than $500 million to the Project Liberty Institute, the organization seeking to implement the plan outlined in the book. His co-author, Casey, is currently a chief content officer at CoinDesk and brings 18 years of experience in journalism at Dow Jones and the Wall Street Journal. The authors are inspired by historic calls to action such as Thomas Paine’s Common Sense. Readers will find that Project Liberty presents a bold and ambitious set of ideas to fundamentally reimagine our lives in the digital age. In short, Casey and McCourt aim to overhaul the internet in order to offer an alternative rooted in the principles enshrined in the U.S. Constitution. (READ MORE from Colin Agostisi: Biden Proposes Reforms to Overhaul the Supreme Court) Our personal data has become Big Tech’s most valuable asset. The authors believe Big Tech uses its monopoly over this data to dominate the market and force other businesses to fall in line, making the internet anti-competitive and ultimately anti-capitalist. In this era of “digital feudalism,” Big Tech is violating our privacy, unjustly stealing our personal data, and selling it to the highest bidder. When exposing the injustice of the current internet, the authors articulate a compelling moral and legal argument: digital data is an extension of our personhood. They explain how the “transformative new technology has given rise to a new class of rights” that are “hidden in plain sight,” yet violated by Big Tech. Our Digital World and DSNP At the beginning of Project Liberty, McCourt assembled a group of software engineers, asking them to rebuild the internet from scratch to protect our digital rights. They responded by creating the Decentralized Social Networking Protocol (DSNP) in July 2021. DSNP is an alternative form of internet that establishes a new set of rules for how social networks can work. Drawing a parallel to the 1996 Telecommunications Act, which gave users ownership of their phone numbers, the authors explain that DSNP would similarly grant users exclusive ownership of their personal data. Just as we can take our phone number with us when switching between different phone companies, DSNP would allow our data to be compatible and portable across all platforms and apps that operate on this new internet. Private companies will govern their platforms, but users get to choose which data, if any, they share with any company on this new internet. As a result, individuals or groups of users could leverage their data as a commodity, receiving compensation from organizations for its use. The authors believe DSNP will incentivize universally beneficial policies by ensuring companies who mismanage their platforms risk losing access to our data, their most valuable commodity. The DSNP will bring us into “a new era of self-governance for a human-centric internet,” they assert. DSNP is already in use for certain apps and websites, but it is still in early stages of development. There are ongoing efforts to refine the technology and prepare it for mainstream use. The authors express deep skepticism about the government’s ability to dismantle Big Tech, citing corruption, division, and intellectual shortcomings. They therefore believe that private innovation will be the best avenue for transforming the internet. McCourt and Casey maintain that government involvement will also be necessary, such as for offering a legal enforcement mechanism to protect our digital property. Reimagining Our Digital World This book dares to radically reimagine the digital world, but its practicality and the shrinking window for change are major concerns. The last chapter underscores the urgency of Project Liberty, warning that the development of generative AI could strengthen Big Tech’s grip on big data, making it near impossible to transition to another model of the internet. The authors also admit “the value of any social network comes from the size of its user base,” yet they gloss over the challenge of convincing billions to switch to a new platform. (READ MORE: Flirting With a Foreigner) Despite its potential shortcomings, this book is essential reading for anyone concerned with the future of our digital society. If Project Liberty can prepare DSNP for widespread use and convince companies and users to embrace this new internet, it will permanently reshape our world for the better. The question is no longer whether we can reclaim our digital sovereignty, but whether we have the courage to demand it. Project Liberty is not merely a plan; it is a manifesto for a digital revolution — one that challenges us to reconsider what the internet can and should be. Are we ready to seize it? The post Rescue Us From Our Digital Overlords appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

This is what Israel does to JOURNALISTS who are trying to report the truth about the bombing of civilian residential buildings. Shot in the back by a sniper. https://t.co/ridflTh5P4 — HealthRanger (@HealthRanger) August 19, 2024

from BANNED.VIDEO:  TRUTH LIVES on at https://sgtreport.tv/

Emergency! Tim Walz Is A Confirmed Communist Chinese Agent – Democrats Planning Violent Communist Takeover pic.twitter.com/W0yv484AQI — Alex Jones (@RealAlexJones) August 19, 2024

by Cristina Laila, The Gateway Pundit: The FBI earlier this week raided the home of Dimitri Simes, a Russian-born policy analyst who advised Trump in 2016. Dimitri Simes, who has been living and working in Russia since October 2022, said his Virginia home was raided because he spoke out against the Deep State and criticized […]

It’s not quite Sunday yet, but here’s your sermon one day in advance… If you need a dose of encouragement, I’ve got you covered. Plus, this is a really cool story! Is it only legend? Is it true? We’ll break it all down. First let’s start with the story. It’s only about 3 minutes long but it’s SO powerful. Listen to this Pastor tell it, I promise you’re going to be standing up cheering by the time he’s done! And a shoutout to my friend vDarkness for finding and posting this clip. Watch here: “CheckMate” “The devil’s laughing cuz the man has lost” Not so fast.. Listen to this messege & reminisce everything YOU’VE ALL endured these past few years For some of you, the past 20+ Years.Ridiculed, laughed at, treated like you’re stupid by the very people who are close… pic.twitter.com/lr4mkwegqm — DailyNoah.com (@DailyNoahNews) July 29, 2023 Charles Morris over at Haven Today gives us the obvious spiritual implications: Now think about the spiritual implications of this painting with me about what the grand master discovered. Repeatedly in Scripture, God assures his people that there is always a way of escaping situations that seem hopeless at the time. When the people of Judah were deported to Babylon because of their sinfulness, God revealed that a future day of release would come. Just as God provided water for the Israelites in the desert, he would also provide for them on their long trek homeward. A little boy in John 6 only had two fish and a few loaves of bread to feed thousands of people. It looked like checkmate, but our King had another move left! They collected 12 baskets of leftover food after the meal was served. In the Old Testament, Daniel was thrown into a den of hungry lions. It looked like checkmate, but our King had another move left and Daniel remained safe. In John 8, it looked like checkmate for a woman about to be killed by angry men with stones. But Jesus told the woman to go and not sin anymore. On Good Friday, the criminal next to Jesus on the cross thought it was the end, yet he still repented. So often in life, we consider the world to be a mess. With war, violence, a deadly pandemic, unemployment, struggling marriages, depression, isolation, and more … we can easily become disillusioned. People begin to feel lost. We look for direction but often end up on the wrong path. It looks like checkmate, but we need not fear—the game is not over. Now let’s dig into the obvious question….is the story real? Or perhaps said differently: is the chess board real and what was the position? I was curious myself so I dug in. And the short answer is it’s not entirely clear. But here’s one of the best breakdowns I could find, this is from Reddit: There is a strange book position which is associated with this painting, but it hasn’t a lot in common with the painting. Speaking truthfully, almost nothing. Also I found some other positions from people who actually were looking at this painting and they came with something closer, but always it was a completely losing position.   Book position Guess If you look at the painting it’s quite easy to say where the pieces are and which of them are pawns. But what are the other pieces is just a mystery, they look strange (the painting was made in the middle of 19th century). And I couldn’t find the chess pieces from this time that look similar. The whole story about Morphy sounds really interesting but not really like a story that you can believe in, but the more I was thinking on the position the more I was sure that there will be the answer. My first problem was to check almost every variation of pieces that could be there, and I also couldn’t find anything. It was whether a losing position or a completely losing position (mate in 2, mate in 4). but looking at what the other people came with, I tried to swap white king and the piece on D1 (my first guess was that king stands on D2). I think that this piece is rook, but I am not sure about this. So i swapped them, tried every possible variation again. Still nothing. I started losing hope but I decided to look at the thing I was sure about. The squares where the pieces are. For some reason from the very beginning I thought that the pieces are on D1 and D2. But take a closer look. At the piece on D2. Because of the quality of the picture you cant be sure, but I realised that I was possibly wrong all the time. Maybe the piece on D2 is actually on E2. I thought a little. And I think I came with the real position on the picture.   Actual position He lost any hope. His opponent has way more pieces. His position looks losing to him. Is it actually? There is just one move on the board that could save his position. Thinking that he lost everything he just cant see that he can still fight. He doesn’t see the obvious Qxd4, the only move that saves him. After Qxd4 and Kc8, the position is 0.00, but its hard to play and I think someone like Morphy would won this back in his time. I havent found a really high quality picture but that really seems like the answer. Share your thoughts about it, maybe provide some your ideas on the position and what the pieces are. Thanks for reading!

They just won't stop, will they?

The protesters are in Chicago, and there are tens of thousands of them. chanting for an Intifada. They support Gaza, abortion, and against Donald Trump ahead of the Democrat National Convention in Chicago on Sunday, August 18. A march organized by Bodies Outside of Unjust Laws: Coalition for Reproductive Justice & LGBTQ+ Liberation kicked off […] The post Let the Mostly Peaceful Chicago Protests Begin appeared first on www.independentsentinel.com.