tag: Les Miserables

April 01 2011

A heartless society and the number system: The dangers of name matching as seen in Victor Hugo's Les Misérables (2)

Last time, we discussed how combining the internet with a widely used numbering system (generic identifier) could lead to a situation where "everyone is Inspector Javert," potentially resulting in a "heartless society." This time, in addition to that, we will explain the threat posed by combining another internet characteristic, "fragmented information," with "generic identifiers," again using "Les Misérables." (This section was first published in...)

April 13 2010

identity

A heartless society and the number system: The dangers of name matching as seen in Victor Hugo's "Les Misérables"

Humans are forgetful creatures. This leads to forgiveness. People act on this premise. But the Internet does not forget. People who do not forget, like Inspector Javert in "Les Misérables," are called heartless, and the damage they cause is called heartless. The careless introduction and use of identifiers, such as "universal immutable numbers," on the Internet will turn anyone on the Internet into a Javert. And what emerges is a "heartless society."

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