Modern gratis game cr…apps collect a wide range of data about their users and their users' friends and associates. Even nastier, they do it through ad networks that merge the data collected by various cr…apps and sites made by different companies.

They use this data to manipulate people to buy things, and hunt for "whales" who can be led to spend a lot of money. They also use a back door to manipulate the game play for specific players.

While the article describes gratis games, games that cost money can use the same tactics.

All this reinforces the point that proprietary software is software for suckers.

A lawsuit seeks to make the TSA change its policy of requiring some passengers to go through a scanner.

California confronts the question of how to manage its diminishing rainfall.

Global heating will make the US midwest hotter and interfere with rain.

The real solution, the efficient solution, is to cut back on CO₂ emissions so that the climate won't get more screwed.

Obama blames Congress for slowing the release of prisoners from Guantanamo, but he and his staff are primarily responsible for the delay.

"Guantanamo" has come to stand for "imprisonment without trial", but they are not the same. Obama talks about "closing Guantanamo prison" but his method of doing so is to move imprisonment without trial to the US mainland. That would make it even more unjust. We could hope that the Supreme Court would consider it more clearly unacceptable — but what if it did the opposite?

The US must end its imprisonment without trial. Every prisoner in Guantanamo deserves to get a real, fair trial or be freed.

Advances in recognition technology threaten to enable tracking people easily by cameras through recognizing their faces or irises.

There is no easy solution to this problem, but since it threatens oppression that can make democracy ineffective, it justifies the cost of a difficult solution.