I find his nonchalant delivery quite jarring. I don't understand what's going through his head here.

Please stop being so condescending.

Counterpoint; why do city folk hold their police deparments in such low regard and scream for their defunding yet somehow hold the federal enforcement agencies in some do-no-wrong-holier-than-thou limelight?

But that didn’t stop them from thinking “we didn’t belong here”.

It’s the same reason NWA never wrote a song called “Fuck the FBI”…

I suppose I'm happy for you having the privilege to live such a sheltered life where you don't see any of this.

Yes, even the Postal Marshals.

When we say “defund the police”, it includes federal law enforcement.

As in, deeply offensive to some people.

edit: 2 downvotes? seriously? here's a source https://toofab.com/2020/06/19/white-cops-handed-a-dying-14-y...

This needs a citation. It's the sort of "common sense" all too often advanced by people with - frankly - racist or ethnonational agendas.

It's not a race issue when this is experienced in Africa/Japan/Sweden/Finland.

Calling new idea to you racist is racist. Most of the times the word racist is used it is used incorrectly and often in a racist way.

There's a straight line between that argument - which again, almost always gets through around with out any kind of citations or research support - and ethnic cleansing. It's directly attached to racist ideas. Similar to social darwinism, it's something that seems like relatively harmless common sense on the surface, but leads to horrific implications when followed to its logical conclusion.

You just argue that people shouldn't acknowledge it because doing so would lead to policies you think would be immoral.

I'm just not sure that this anti-truth stance is tenable or really worth it. What if we can acknowledge the facts and then... handle them in a non-evil way?

Or perhaps even use that knowledge to head off terrible outcomes that might otherwise happen? E.g. Lebanon-style ethnic civil wars.

I generally think that knowing the truth is useful and equips you to do good things. You just need a non-childish moral system to integrate it (too easy to feel moral if you just wish away the hard facts of the universe).

So when I asked ChatGPT

> Are countries with less racial diversity more likely to have a larger safety net”

because my GoogleFu was failing me, of course it gave me a non controversial generic answer.

But when I asked it for citations it gave me this

> A 2018 study published in the journal Social Science Research, which found that countries with more ethnically diverse populations tend to have less generous welfare states.

Which led me to this link

https://academic.oup.com/esr/article/37/1/89/5934740

> First, vignette experiments established a consistent and pervasive deservingness gap: welfare recipients belonging to the ethnic ingroup are more likely to be considered deserving of welfare support than the ethnic outgroup

In most countries that are ethnically diverse, that diversity was created through various forms of colonialism. Often with racial imperialism deeply ingrained in it. Which means those countries have long running strains of racist ideas and ideologies that forms the foundations of the ethnic "in group" and "out group".

Which is not to say that ethnic strife doesn't exist in non-colonial countries as well, but that this line of thinking and examination is a) extremely complex, b) inextricable from the history of the systems under examination, c) inextricable from deep histories of racist thought - often imposed by colonnial or imperialist powers, and d) similar to social darwinism in that it is often presented as common sense, but leads to some very dark places when taken, unexamined, to its logical conclusion.

You do raise a fair point

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-9477.2007...

From Wikipedia on the study:

Harvard professor of political science Robert D. Putnam conducted a nearly decade long study on how diversity affects social trust. He surveyed 26,200 people in 40 American communities, finding that when the data were adjusted for class, income and other factors, the more racially diverse a community is, the greater the loss of trust. People in diverse communities "don't trust the local mayor, they don't trust the local paper, they don't trust other people and they don't trust institutions," writes Putnam.

That said, there can both be problems and benefits of something, and in his research this is considered:

Putnam says, however, that "in the long run immigration and diversity are likely to have important cultural, economic, fiscal, and developmental benefits."

He asserted that his "extensive research and experience confirm the substantial benefits of diversity, including racial and ethnic diversity, to our society."

You're welcome to argue the absence of causation.

Even Atherton was more diverse back then.

Lives in Los Gatos: https://censusreporter.org/profiles/16000US0644112-los-gatos...

Are there any quantitative studies on this topic? It would be a stronger argument if a clear trend was observable over many countries.

I’d rather live in a diverse hellhole than some whitewashed “utopia”.

That's no longer the case and hasn't really been for a decade or two at least. Especially in Sweden.

Heightened social trust in people of one's own ethnicity isn't a fact of life, it's just racism. It's what causes PoC to be profiled by law enforcement, on average have worse outcomes for the same crimes in the justice system, etc.

I know that this isn't just the way humans are wired. I met so many people (including police) in my life that I would consider truly "colorblind" and treat everyone with respect, regardless of their ethnicity.

Different shared cultural values (as opposed to just differing race) is also not as much of a problem as some make it out to be. First, most cultures of people that are immigrating to the US (I can't speak for Europe, I'm not very in the loop) have values largely compatible with Western ones. Second, most immigrants will at least somewhat assimilate into the culture of their host country, especially after a generation or two. Note, this doesn't mean throwing away their native culture.

I'd also like to point out that Woz's America was definitely NOT homogenous.

It is a fact of life, it's natural and there's a clear evolutionary impetus for it. I would argue that this is how we are wired.

Of course we feel more comfortable among our own. You are far more at ease if you walk into a room to be surrounded by people just like you, rather than strangers from the other side of the world with their alien appearances, behaviours, and even smells! Who knows how the reptilian subconscious analyses this information - are we at war? conquered? lost? isolated? kidnapped?

In a more modern sense, we can more readily let out guard down among our own, knowing we share a common history, culture, humour, etc, while we must precariously navigate the invisible minefield of sensitivities in a more diverse group.

I think implicit in your comment is the assumption that people with different backgrounds are somehow defacto strangers. But what makes it all work on a university campus, imo, is that everyone has a purpose; there are no scary strangers because everyone's motivations are well-understood, since everyone on campus has a job to do. No one is really a stranger.

It doesn't matter if you are of a different color or gender, or that you come from a place I've never been to, or that you speak a language I've never heard, or that you eat food I've never tasted. My lizard brain doesn't kick in when I interact with you because you are just here to study and learn, or to help in that process.

As an example, I am a professor and I have a new colleague. He is from the other side of the world, he was born a decade before me, he eats food different from mine, he worships a different God than I do. But we get along just fine, and that's because despite all those differences, we still have more in common than not. And even if we didn't, we still have to rely on one another and work as a team to achieve a common goal.

Now if I go to India to do some work I will seek out some other Americans to befriend while there, perhaps naturally looking for people like me. But by this I mean other Americans whether Indian-American or otherwise -- I don't mean whites who literally look like me. Get it?

For example, a white American of Slavic descent is more comfortable in a room of non-white Americans who also smell of Budweiser than they would be in a room of Russians in Russia speaking Russian and smelling of vodka. Get it?

Is it? I reject this wholesale. Do you have evidence?

If you do, why have you set definitions of "otherness" at skin color? I feel quite comfortably "among my own" alongside basically any human, because they're humans just like me. Don't you?

Frankly that's arrogant and narrow-minded view; homogenous culture might cause less conflicts and problems when the culture itself is one promoting that in the first place

The U.S. is one of the higher-trust societies, socially, while also being extremely racially diverse.

It sounds like pro-social culture and your people being rich probably matter more than race, and Eastern Europe has a critical deficit in both of those. :p

The countries with lowest crime numbers in EU per capita are (ordered by crime rate increasing): Slovakia, Hungary, Estonia, Cyprus, Slovenia, Czechia, Poland, Bulgaria, Croatia, Lithuania, Romania.

All of them are socially pretty homogenous. Most of them escaped Soviet block. Some even escaped Soviet Union. On the other hand, look at the countries from the other side of chart (this time, rate decreasing): Belgium, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Germany.

As this data concerns only EU, there is no UK here, but as I remember, it had around 3x crime rate as the Republic of Ireland, which would put it on the tops of the EU list.

Of course, increased diversity might not be the only differentiator between the countries from the top of the list and those from the bottom, but I think it defeats your point (almost as if you were racist for having irrational fears against living in a post-soviet society, which aren't backed by numbers).

The degree of ethnic homogeneity did not increase during that time, if anything it slightly decreased (or significantly in some major cities).

One possible explanation is that people willing to engage in low level crime simply moved to richer western countries because well they were (and still are) richer... e.g. in Norway Lithuanians are the second largest group of people who are imprisoned (after local Norwegians). The situation is similar in some other Western European countries. I'm not an expert but if I wanted to rob/steal from people and businesses I'd probably do that in Norway, Germany, or Switzerland rather than Romania or Lithuania. The risk versus reward ratio seems much better there. Also there prisons are way nicer (especially in Norway).

I would say, that based on my experience on growing in Poland (I was born in 1998), the people become richer and suddenly everybody now seems to be minding own business. So after you fill some economic needs, the will to pick on people decreases. But that will is surely dependent on how much you trust others are think similar (and won't rob you).

Anyway, the parents' commenter point was > near perfect "ethnical cohesion", doesn't stop crime or increase trust in any way

I can't see why should it be true. Perhaps it doesn't stop crime completely, but perhaps it actually increases trust. Based on the argument above we can't know.

Why? Obviously the majority of those who emigrated did not do so with the intention to commit crimes. However some people did. The question is whether they are under/over represented in the emigrant population.

Another aspect is that high emigration generally results in better conditions for those who remain due to higher demand for labor. Which might also decrease crime due to lower unemployment/higher wages.

> Perhaps it doesn't stop crime completely, but perhaps it actually increases trust

According to https://ourworldindata.org/trust Eastern European countries have lower interpersonal trust compared to most Western European countries and especially Scandinavia.

Of course it's also a question of attitude. And people in different cultures might interpret the question differently and/or be predisposed to answer it in a certain way even. Then again being from the region myself I can't really say that people here trust others more than in WE, ussually it's the opposite especially outside of certain social groups.

Then again crime rates in Belarus for instance don't seem to be much higher than in Poland or Lithuania.

Now you need either a passport or a special Michigan drivers license. Last time I renewed in person after COVID I tried to get one. The lady behind the counter said you don't want one of those. I asked her why and she told me that I'd hold up the line behind me. Since I was renewing months after my license expired due to the office being closed at the beginning of COVID I didn't argue with her.

You can still cross EU borders with just a driving licence, or government issued ID where they have them.

(In practice the vast majority using planes and boats at least probably do take a passport, I always did from the UK, but in theory you don't need one, so if you weren't planning to go elsewhere you wouldn't even need to get a passport.)

For anybody unfamiliar with Europe, I just want to add that there aren't any checkpoints or border crossings, you just drive through or walk over. Half the time you won't even notice you're doing it. You're just supposed to have your ID on your person when you do.

Ireland (and previously the UK) is the only major exception to this, as it's part of the common travel area alongside the UK. In practice, this doesn't make a huge difference when you're an Irish or EU citizen (it does if you're a tourist who needs a different visa to visit), as it's an island, and airlines require a form of ID to board anyway. When travelling from Ireland to Schengen, I usually have a passport in my carry on luggage as a backup, and take my passport-card (similar to a national ID card) in my wallet.

i.e. that there should be no need to also carry your passport, unless intending to travel on outwith the EU?

However, when I'm traveling to somewhere that has a hotel safe, or somewhere secure enough to leave valuables, I'll bring the full passport booklet in my carry-on along with me, and leave it there when I go out. That way, in the unlikely event I should lose my wallet / passport card, I still have the full booklet to travel home on, rather than having to arrange emergency travel documents for the flight back.

I haven't needed it yet, but I don't see the harm in also taking it. It's not as if it takes up an obscene amount of space in my carry-on luggage, nor am I risking losing it by carrying it on my person at all times. It's purely there for peace of mind, and a backup in the very unlikely event I need it.

The above is only true in the Schengen zone. As soon as you cross the border to a non-Schengen country or you arrive from a non-Schengen country you will go through normal border control (with some exceptions). This includes multiple EU countries beside Ireland like Romania, Bulgaria or Cyprus. And many non-EU countries like Bosnia, Serbia, Monaco, Kosovo, Andorra, Ukraine, Turkey, Russia, etc.

(I'm exaggerating, but only slightly.. the irony is that I used to have data roaming included in Switzerland, but the network forced me to a new plan that doesn't have that because the old one was almost but not quite complying with EU roaming rules)

Nothing in EU is as simple, therefore it's not only a Schengen/non-Schengen thing. For example a border between North and "regular" Ireland isn't marked in any way, you just cross a brook or a field.

Or walk to the other side of the room. The border cuts through a number of houses and businesses as far as I'm aware.

Lost in translation I think. You could cross the border to Canada with just your state issued ID/drivers license as well back then.

What OP is saying is that it was even more lax than that. OP brought a piece of paper that is trivially forged, no photo on it, that basically just said in writing who they were with no additional ID needed.

> Lost in translation I think.

Yeah, perhaps. My surprise I suppose is because to me a birth certificate is something somewhat safely tucked away somewhere, extremely rarely required; frankly I don't know how much of a problem it would be to lose and try to replace (maybe not replacing it but fraud would be your greater concern?) but certainly not something generally carried around with you here. (At least, I'd be surprised to learn that's just me?)

I get what you’re getting at, but in Canada birth certificates from the 80s had a wallet sized version that had no more information than a drivers license, but it didn’t even have a photo on it. It was just a little pice of paper. I remember that’s very different from modern birth certificates.

I also crossed into the U.S. with my health card that only had my name on it and a number that is meaningless to the US boarder agency, also no photo.

Within Schengen you can get away with just a drivers license since there are no checks, but that doesn’t make it allowed.

Growing up in Detroit in the 80s (which some people don't realize is right on the border with Canada -- and that you travel south across a bridge to get to Canada! look it up) -- we generally didn't even bring our birth certificate. which may be a testament to our social class -- they could ask for a birth certificate if they thought you seemed "suspicious" (which i'm sure is racially coded), but for 90%+ of crossings, and 100% of our crossings, it was a two question interview without showing any paperwork at all. "What is your citizenship? What is your purpose of travel? OK, go through." No showing of ID at all -- not even a driver's license!

[And again, they could ask for ID -- a driver's license or birth certificate -- if they wanted. I am positive at least 9 out of 10 crossings they did not. I am indeed sure that the race and class appearance (and accent) of the crosser was significant].

We used to patriotically brag (in the time of the cold war and berlin wall) that this was how borders between two stable "free" countries, the US and Canada, could be, "the longest open border in the world".

It makes me really sad to think about how much we have gotten used to living in a security state, that does not need to be that way.

I mean, picture of a baby isn't exactly useful...

I wonder what would have happened?

I had a 22 caliber rifle when I was a tween. That wasn't uncommon because I lived in the country, and you pretty much needed such things to scare coyotes and wolves off the yard without hurting them. Obviously it can kill them, but you don't actually shoot them - you shoot close enough they understand the sound from your gun, and the sound on the ground right in front of them. Pretty effective.

It got jammed once, so I walked into town with it cocked open over my shoulder to get it fixed. They can't be fired when cocked open.

Nobody batted an eye. Not that people did that all the time, but everyone knew everyone, and easily figured the story would turn out more simple and mundane than the optics.

It was the early 80's and there was a lot less angst. And it was just a simple local hardware store that fixed it for me. By the 90's, that would never fly, and no hardware store would fix a kid's gun (or anyone's for that matter) in that very same town. By then you needed a Firearms Acquisition Cert, which no tween could possibly get.

I used to buy cigarettes for my mom, too. That was also legal back then.

The 80's was a sort of cross over period that way.

Showing fake IDs is harmless.

I've never tried to buy a ticket with false details though.

Do you have to show photo ID when filling up with gas within 100 miles of the border?

This is true regardless of whether or not non-criminals like Woz can.

A non-criminal using a fake ID is a victimless "crime", and as it is harmless, there is no moral issue with the performance of the act.

And at some early points when you did, it was more just like kind of informally showing you were the ticket-holder, not really about security. His "fake ID" saying he was a "laser inspector" is really just an employee ID for a very unsuccesful business he started, right? If they take an employee ID, what's the difference. it just... wasn't actually a big deal back then.

But yeah, in general... it's kind of painful to remember how much less we interacted with security checkpoints 30 years ago, and how much we've gotten used to living in a security state. The phrase "show me your papers" used to be a kind of shorthand for the idea that in a "fascist" state threatening law enforcement is always asking you for ID, but in "America" we can live our lives without interacting with such security apparatus. I doubt people think about it like that, as we live it now too, it's totally normalized.

that the reader may find it hard to believe that you didn't really have to show official ID to get on a plane, or that you could use a homemade employee ID... just demonstrates how normalized and forever-seeming the security state has become.

Although last I checked, you could actually still fly without ID, you need to fill out a form and get extra screening/pat down. Don't know if the "Real ID" stuff has changed that or what.

The requirement for a passport and appropriate visa on international flights departing from the UK is I think solely an airline requirement, as if you land in a country you don't have a right to immigrate to the airline gets fined. If you're flying privately it's a different matter.

Obviously you need a passport or other authority to travel when you get to the border of another country (Ireland being the obvious exception for the UK).

There is no harm in it. You may argue, "what if he was a terrorist!" But he wasn't. He caused no harm here.

As a minority, the police is scary. It only takes one bad apple for my life to take a turn for the worse. As it turns out, there is a non-negligible percentage of the population that hates my guts because of colour, so might as well be safe.

Police can be scary, regardless if their skin color matches yours or not. They have near absolute authority to do nearly anything, and you'll lose in a he said-he said court case. But good officers can also be a substantial positive impact on society.

Whilst police is scary in general, it is much more likely for me to have an issue with them than someone who is a middle aged white guy, dressed well etc. People tend to judge others based off of stereotypes, i.e. "which box does this one fit in", and I know that the options for me, on average, are not super lovely.

As such, this isn't an argument for or against police or officers. It is something that highlights the "abusable authority" and for some minorities how the police is more "willing" to do so, on average. Hell, we are at the point where standup comedians are joking as "police wouldn't shoot me, I am not black" since it is quite a widespread fact by now.

Most dare devils do it for the thrill, and don't really think past the moment. And many of the extreme negative examples end in prison or death or similar, regardless of race.

Well, maybe, ask people you know if they would dare do the same thing. You may then see that there is a difference in the way people respond to the police depending on the race.

Sorry but your own life experience and how you think about this incident really do not apply to others.

What level of stupidity does someone need to think that it is only "muh European people" that have "an innate curiosity and self confidence"?

Source: attended 100+ weddings as a photographer.

And if they had apprehended Woz he would probably had a lawyer to bail him out and smooth things over. So coming from these two directions the argument that fooling around was somehow traitorous behaviour towards his wife sounded really odd.

I think I was listening to a world-famous rock climber who had toned down their extreme sports adventures (toned down for them) because they didn’t want to die and leave their spouse and child without a father over the pursuit of a hobby. So it’s a maturity thing too.

I don’t think anything Woz has done is moderately dangerous. If they wanted to lock him up I’m sure he could call to a competent lawyer and state he is a respectable citizen who co-founded the friggin Apple.

Woz has an extremely long history of egging people of authority and I don’t think he’s ever been to court from those escapades (please correct me if I’m wrong).

I would hope we're not in such a world though.

Alligevel vedtager I en "Ghettopakke", der lovligt legaliserede at splitte migrantfamilier fra hinanden. I er lige så dårlige som resten af andre hvide mennesker, jeg har mødt.

[0] - https://euromedmonitor.org/en/article/4895/Denmark:-Ghetto-P...

[1] - https://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2020/10/un-human-rig...

Now, our discussion was about Woz's zany antics, but I still have to clarify some geographical things:

1. Western Europe[0] and nordics[1] are two disjoint sets of countries

2. Of 28M nordic people only roughly 1/5 is Danish. And, there is very little political cohesion between the countries, except by national parliaments copying established successfull schemes from each other when it suits them individually

Personally, I am a Finn and had to google translate the bit of Danish in your message - I don't really follow Danish politics but I don't think it's fair to think every Dane would support this bill. This is actually the first time I read about this.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_geoscheme_for_E...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nordic_countries

Idk, for some reason the idealization of "Nordics" (itself a highly contentious term - is Estonia nordic? is Greenland?) on internet forums gets annoying, because I can just tell it's white people (in reality Western European+American, not like Romanians, Bosnians, Turks, or Albanians got it better in Malmö) talking to other white people and just completely ignoring the very real elephant in the room.

Once again sorry about that but I think that offhand comment the GP made was the straw that broke the camel's back for me.

Nordic countries is a well defined collection https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nordic_countries - Greenland/Nuuk is part of them given it is a region of Denmark.

I don't think the racism can be helped short term - nordics have been isolated polities that only in past decades have had large flows of migrants from different cultures. (Well, apart from Sweden attempting to conquer Europe in the 17th century but it did not end well).

If it's any consolation nordic people can be quite xenophobic even toward each other so it's not as if they would be uniquely harsh towards specific ethnicity. Every non-native will be discriminated against pretty much equally, regardless of origin or complexion. They abhor anything unfamiliar regardless of complexion. The general narrative of historical racism in these areas is quite different as compared to more cosmopolitan western countries such as UK, France or US.

Law of Jante is a pretty good framework for understanding the nordic mindset (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_of_Jante) - the baseline response even towards in-group members that are different will be severe.

One can have a good lawyer but that lawyer cannot change the facts of the case.

So facts are unimportant or not a very big part of convictions?

His quote reads like a confession...

The main issue is that he's not at the Department of Defense HQ presenting his Department of Defiance ID, claiming to be with the government but intending to present the joke as an excuse if it fails. In this case he wasn't trying to claim to be government to get out of anything so it's pretty obvious that it's a joke.

> 18 U.S. Code § 1028 (4)knowingly possesses an identification document (other than one issued lawfully for the use of the possessor), authentication feature, or a false identification document, with the intent such document or feature be used to defraud the United States;

He wasn't using the fake part of the ID, just his real name, and it's obvious that it wouldn't have done him any good to do so because there's no legal exemption for laser safety officers. It's pretty obvious that there was intent, this was a conscious act, but also that there was not intent to defraud.

Defiance

People are frothing to frame this story with 2023 glasses and, to me, this reaction makes it all the more clear how today’s culture is so corrosive. Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe it’s not about privilege of rich white men. Maybe it’s about the rigid conformism that the tech industry has imbued in its people in this past decade. The screams of people glued to Anki preparing for leetcode interviews, not understanding why someone would dare challenge the status quo. Regardless, it’s a sign of the times.

I'm sure I when I first read this story, I thought it was hilarious. But since then, I've gained at least little bit of empathy. Think of this story from the perspective of the other people. Woz is being a total piece of shit, wasting their time being intentionally as suspicious as possible, just to waste their time and then pull off a "a-ha, this is actually some really obscure legal tender that I as a rich guy can afford to spend to have a cool story to tell about showing up a casino security guy".

I agree with the GP that this kind of thing should be celebrated on HN and we should encourage the next generation to continue hacking.

While people did debate the ethics of it, the hacking was admired because it was someone not in a position of power hacking an entity that was. It also illuminated a massive security risk which could now be fixed.

Something that drastically limits and can be used to oppress people like a nation-wide travel restriction should be public and require due cause. Not a mystical list where one day you realize "wow guess my life is fucked"

Now, Woz was obviously an amazing hacker back in the day and has a reputation of being a good person. So one would imagine there are stories that show him being really clever that are, you know, actually clever rather than just showing off an information asymmetry about trivia (re: these sheets of $2 bills). Where the punchline is something wholesome, rather than him humiliating strangers who have done literally nothing wrong.

Seems to be an opportunity if good faith predicts that they won't do him any serious wrong.

> But I had got a big point on him and I was quite satisfied in that

Like, I can sort of understand the humor value of giving away $2 bills as a tip since they're rare and some people don't know about it. But there is literally no value in baiting people as to whether this is legit money or counterfeit, except for Woz to feel superior to them. And it's not an isolated occurence! He clearly does this all the time, so often that he has multiple variants of the script.

This is not a story to celebrate. It is not challenging the status quo, it is not rebelling against authority, it is not a smart hack, or whatever y'all are describing it as. It is an ugly story of a man with a lot of wealth punching down, playing games using the little people as a prop purely for his own amusement, repeatedly, and then bragging about it.

The nasty act here, and possibly criminal, was the security guy calling the Secret Service and reporting on someone he knew wasn't actually guilty of anything.

> It is an ugly story ...

Of tedious security people inflating themselves by bothering normal people.

> it's not an isolated occurence! He clearly does this all the time

Thankfully, if these people go unchallenged then when they go off it's on a random unsuspecting person. He's prepared and can take it in stride.

The mistake was to engage with the SS agent without his lawyer. He pretty clearly wouldn't have been arrested but because he essentially volunteered for this fishing expedition they'll perform it.

Yes, trying to hurt somebody's ego would indeed be a pretty good example of humiliating them.

Look, if you think that the bound booklet of $2 bills is a fun gag, there's a humane and lighthearted way to do it. You use the bills as described, but if somebody seems even a bit uncomfortable with them you volunteer an explanation for what's going on. That way they actually have a cool story to tell. And the joke's on you, not them.

But that is not what Woz did. He intentionally made himself as suspicious as possible, in multiple ways, just to try to force people to investigate. It was all about showing his superiority over this sad loser working a 10-hour shift in a suit, who thought he knew a thing or two about counterfeit money. Well, he wasn't all that, and Woz sure showed him who the smartest guy in the room was.

> Thankfully, if these people go unchallenged then when they go off it's on a random unsuspecting person. He's prepared and can take it in stride.

No unsuspecting person would have this interaction in the first place. They would not have gone through the trouble of arranging for legit money to look counterfeit. That is not what normal people do. They would not have a script to follow to string people along, and carefully consider just what the optimal level of dodgy behavior would be. They would not waste others' time for their own amusement. Because that's not what people with even a pinch of empathy would do.

Put yourself into some work situation. I don't know, maybe you're a engineer given this is HN. And you get this bug report from a customer. It's really well written, has a screenshot showing the issue, and includes reproduction steps. You try to reproduce it, and can't. So you ask some questions from a customer, iterate a few times, add some logging statements and ask them to reproduce the problem. etc. And then finally the customer smugly says that there never was a bug. They photoshopped the screenshot, and made everything up. If you'd actually known how this program works, you'd have known that this bug could never exist. It's a hilarious gag, what a prankster! And you were paid for this work, no harm done, right?

No. Fuck that. I would be furious at having my time wasted like that. And this is what Woz did. Not just once, but probably dozens of times. That's just outright sociopathic behavior, and I cannot believe how many people here are defending it just because he is a member of your tribe.

If someone's ego is tweaked when they find they're wrong then perhaps that's a helpful thing to do.

> Look, if you think that the bound booklet of $2 bills is a fun gag, there's a humane and lighthearted way to do it. ... if somebody seems even a bit uncomfortable

They're for tips. If someone is uncomfortable they don't have to take them.

> It was all about showing his superiority over this sad loser working a 10-hour shift in a suit, who thought he knew a thing or two about counterfeit money. Well, he wasn't all that, and Woz sure showed him who the smartest guy in the room was.

That guy had already tested the bills and knew they were legit. If he was honestly curious how Woz got the bills he could have just asked. Instead he decided to fish around for anything he could try to rat out an innocent person for.

> No unsuspecting person would have this interaction in the first place.

But their cases would be identical from the PoV of the security guy. Some thing would "seem off" and the employee would follow them around or harass them over some legit thing that he didn't like and maybe even call the police about it.

If they think that some customers are playing games they might be a bit more on their toes and think about what they're doing, so as to not be caught in a prank. That will have a good impact on innocent people they interact with.

> [Scenario with fake bug report] then finally the customer smugly says that there never was a bug. ... made everything up. ... It's a hilarious gag, what a prankster!

That's nothing like this scenario. To try to correct it, Woz was happily using their app on his phone when an employee noticed what looked like an error. They stopped him and called him a hacker, tried to trick him into admissions, and when they finally reported and tracked down what he was doing it was just hitting back at the right time to avoid an interstitial, or whatever. The joke is that he was trying to say "it's fine" the whole time and everyone assumes he's a hacker so nobody listens, finally ending up with egg on their face when they wasted their own time.

> And you were paid for this work, no harm done, right?

Well, some to the company. I assume they'd say "maybe in the future, don't go wasting time pestering customers for something that we already knew didn't impact us." It's a teaching moment. It could save them from a lawsuit in the future if that guard thought he had the right to detain people.

> No. Fuck that. I would be furious at having my time wasted like that. And this is what Woz did. Not just once, but probably dozens of times. That's just outright sociopathic behavior,

You're overreacting. This is a perfect example of someone I'd feel needed to be pranked, because it sounds like you're ready to snap on anyone you think is mocking you and you're vastly more likely to do it to someone innocent than either a criminal or a prankster.

When it's the Secret Service, that's not "normal people", and their job is to figuratively or literally stomp anyone who doesn't sufficiently respect the immensely powerful people they insulate. Portraying them as regular Joe victim here is nonsense.

You know who's really wasting peoples time? Secret Service and a casino security guard because he tipped with legal tender that they haven't seen before, so they think he's some counterfeiter or something.

I'd fuck with authority who was too stupid to realize that $2 bills are very much legal tender.

Standard caveat of being a middle class white dude makes this easier.

Don't try to be too curious then, or you will be prosecuted.

I used to ride fast motorcycles. I know people who ran from the police for fun. Better camera tech in recent years means nobody gets away with that anymore. And when caught, your life grinds to a hault.

They key concept here is 'trickery', and how 'tricked' someone is on a spectrum. Society trusts our authorities to give their best efforts to keep our daily actions within the realm of 'the law'.

There is a spectrum of what one considers a 'joke'. If you tell an authority a dad joke, when they ask you a serious question, that is a fine place on the spectrum to joke with authorities. If you are giving them fake IDs to _trick_ them (and thus, trick society at large, who have delegated power to the authorities by vote etc...), that is not a good thing, to trick others you are living with, at the far end of the 'joke/trickery' spectrum.

Probably because the number of instances of people with real bombs has gone up. It’s not a joke any more because the real bomb isn’t the exception.

Can we stop being so obtuse and only look at the letter of the law and think about the actual practical real-life consequence as a measure of severity? This was a joke, and no harm was done.

Are you really advocating for a felony offence here?

This is the same line of thinking, just reversed, that people use to say "well it's not illegal" when someone does something super shitty that actually has awful consequences.

You can argue that 'well it was a joke!!' but if you were to joke around to your nearest FBI officer about how you have a bomb in your home and you're going to use it I imagine they wouldn't find it very funny.

Agreed! Joking about a bomb is a much more serious and very different situation than showing a joke ID (when you probably have your real ID in your pocket).

In your scenario, would you actually be ok or understanding if the "angry officer" made an example of you for this harmless joke? Or would you maybe protest that it was a bit disproportionate or unnecessary?

And finally, hearing people say "jokes are dangerous" in a serious manner makes me very sad for our society. The level of unconscious mass conformism seems to be growing fast, and historically that never leads to good outcomes.

Is there an ‘unless you’re Woz and it might be funny’ exception to that rule?

The fact is there is, and always has been, a ‘wealthy white guy’ exception to that rule and these kinds of shenanigans just draw attention to it.

A healthy society both has rule following and rule challenging. Sometimes there’s too much rule following, sometimes there’s too much chaos, and then things balance themselves out ideally.

If anyone says only one side is the right one, they are ideologically captured. It’s like saying only left or right is the right way to govern a country. It’s both and neither. We need this conflict within society to arrive at healthy decisions.

Get rid of one side at your peril.

Because police rely on technology committing a crime without your cellphone means you most likely will not get caught. We live in an age where wearing masks is acceptable. Where people let you steal from stores and where crime is ignored unless it's on twitter.

You can get away with so much more today.

Depends if you have something to lose. I suspect a lot of readers here are in the middle ground, where their net present value (including career/family/political/etc opportunities) is not high enough where they can afford to shield themselves without big sacrifices. But it is also not low enough to worth risking losing it all.

For example, they might be able to afford a house in a nice school district, daycare, saving for retirement, paying for healthcare, and taking care of elderly parents, but a job loss from one spouse could easily derail this train, and certainly legal expenses would.

This 'time machine' feature of ubiquitous surveillance is going to be a brave new world.

Well ngl, you sound like you could use less time on the internet yourself. This statement is just preposterous unless you spend hours of your life every day obsessing over twitter drama.

Amusing story tho.

No idea what kind of high profile business owners you know, but in my circle in Belgium, most are small business owners. In my experience, employees like to follow rules, business owners like to push their boundaries.

I agree that what you are talking about applies to scrappy startup types, the same people that eventually stop breaking the rules once they have enough power not to need to.

Please tell me you see that. Or at least, are not personally ultrawealthy yourself.

Right now you’d have to be worried they draw a gun and shoot you, or arrest you and jail you for life. Zero tolerance!

Maybe it's good if the industry has ceased having such a teenagery view of things. The article won't load for me, but it seems there was no meaningful protest against some illicit government abuse of authority here. Dude was just printing and using fake IDs because he could.

As a millennial who used to be much more simpatico with your way of thinking, I would say I've become very against it because it is exactly the sort of attitude that I have seen lead people to Trumpsim, anti-vaxxing, etc. It's just irresponsible and arrogant to think that authority/government = bad and that any sort of finger to the man is intrinsically worth celebrating.

But after thinking about it more -- and I'm in my mid-40s -- I think what it also reminds us of is that law enforcement actually used to be a lot more reasonable -- to be clear, this may probably only apply to white people who appear as if they are not poor. But I think maybe the police (whether local or national security) have actually maybe gotten a lot more intense in the past 30 years. Possibly actually more intense for everyone.

The risks of "messing with" security personel, at least for middle-class-appearing white guys, was very definitely a lot less back then.

No, it just use to be a lot less recorded…

And no minority with a sense of history would say that police have ever been “reasonable”

I'm curious if you are old enough to remember the 80s, although I'm not going to bet any precious precious donuts about it.

How state violence and repression was in the 80s isn't good enough, agreed. But things actually do change, get better and worse in different dimensions. If we insist that things have always been exactly as they are, then it seems fatalistic, they can't possibly change, this is the way it's always been and always will be. But things do change. If they were better in some ways 30 years ago, then this isn't inevitable.

Woz was a prankster, including against those in authority. Look up some of the pranks the MIT "hackers" pulled back in the day. Today, some of them would probably get you arrested on domestic terrorism charges. This is not an improvement, even if it's true that the police of course have always been brutal in some times and places, especially depending on social position of the victims. But nobody (I hope) is looking for equality of brutal discipline, equally oppressive to all.

And as it was revealed last week in Memphis, I don’t anymore breathe a sign of relief when I see a Black cop than when I see a White cop.

I don't think this jives with your comment that law enforcement use to be reasonable. I think this highlights unequal enforcement of the law, depending on who is considered undesirable.

Woz was not in custody and is therefore exaggerating about being Mirandized. He played a prank by giving his clown employee ID. It was in Casinoland where people had goofy job titles and this wouldn't have been so crazy. Nothing to see here.

That said, if he had been in actual trouble or has been committing forgery, the clown ID would have been a bad move.

Can still fly in USA without ID. The checkpoint "agents" have you sign a special form. Last summer I "Scotch" taped the crap out of the barcode and picture on my passport. Checkpoint person asked me why and I mumbled because the real answer was "to see what happens." She called supervisor and he quickly waved me through. May be different effect at immigration.

I love the story.

I'm not a lawyer, I have no idea how criminal law in the USA works, but why would this be a crime? He didn't fake a Department of Defence ID, he created an ID for a fictional Department of Defiance, it may look similar, it may appear as a "real" ID because it's not just a piece of paper, but it's about as real an ID as a gym membership card.

But they were convinced my goal was to go there to live. they tore my car apart, took everything out of luggage. They let me go but thought I was never coming back.

All I was doing was going to a Thanksgiving dinner in Scranton.

I think the easiest way to prosecute this would be under the "authentication features" section:

(1) the term “authentication feature” means any hologram, watermark, certification, symbol, code, image, sequence of numbers or letters, or other feature that either individually or in combination with another feature is used by the issuing authority on an identification document, document-making implement, or means of identification to determine if the document is counterfeit, altered, or otherwise falsified

If he had replicated any of those things, he committed a crime just by making the ID. Using the ID likely has additional penalties, but just making it is a felony by itself. It seems likely he did, because I think missing seals and watermarks (if those existed at the time) would stand out as obvious to a secret service agent or the TSA.

1: https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1028

(Also, falsely claiming a relationship with the military is downright dishonerable.)

Definitely taboo enough to get you chewed out, and almost enough to risk a physical altercation.

Someone asked me when I was in the Army and not thinking about why they asked I just said I wasn’t.

They almost started to chew me out until I mentioned it was given to me as part of an Army sponsored fundraiser.

It also makes me think of my uncle who is a very proud labor union member. He gets upset if anyone says anything disparaging about labor unions.

My point is, it sounds to me like people taking honor in being a member of an exclusive club, and they don't like it if other people do things to belittle their club membership, like by pretending to be a member.

I wonder if there is some psychological term for that behavior.

A civilian wearing an army T-shirt is not “stolen valor” in the sense that stolen valor is a crime, so this is, at best, equivocation.

While I believe (but I don’t feel like checking the UCMJ) there is a much more extensive crime (or set of crimes) relating to stolen valor within the military, the crime of stolen valor that it is possible for a civilian to commit consists of, and (outside of selling military decorations) only of, fraudulently claiming one of narrow set of awards with the intent to obtain money, property, or other tangible benefit, specifically: a Congressional Medal of Honor, a distinguished-service cross, a Navy cross, an Air Force cross, a silver star, a Purple Heart, a Combat Infantryman’s Badge, a Combat Action Badge, a Combat Medical Badge, a Combat Action Ribbon, a Combat Action Medal, or any replacement or duplicate medal for such medal as authorized by law. 18 USC Sec. 704.

Wearing a band shirt and an army shirt are not comparable at all. The default thought when someone sees someone wearing a military shirt is “oh they were in the military”. The thought when wearing a band shirt certainly wasn’t “oh they must be in the who”.

Again, no, not in a sense of “stolen valor” where “stolen valor is a crime” is true, it isn’t. You are still engaging in thebsame equivocation where you are trying make an argument grounded in “this behavior has a name which is also the name of a crime”, even though the behavior in question is not within the scope of the definition of the crime. Fraud is a crime (older than “stolen valor”, which is a novel 21st century crime in the US), pretending to have been in the military other than as part of a fraud scheme is not. (ISTR at least one state has proposed a more general ban on this, but even if it passed it would likely be struck down aa violating the First Amendment, just like the earlier and somewhat broader version of the Stolen Valor Act was.)

> Wearing a band shirt and an army shirt are not comparable at all.

To the extent that there is a defensible argument for this position, it doesn't involve invocations of non-germane criminal law.

I wasn't trying to make light of the service of military members. I agree that it is wrong to try to obtain fake respect.

I was just recounting two specific tales from my memory about people being defensive against others disrespecting their social circles. I find the behavior interesting ... maybe because I have never felt that way before about something.

When I mentioned psychology, my curiosity was in the context of behavior psychology (what is the word used to describe the behavior), not in the context of a mental illness.

Incidentally, I did like the band's music, I just didn't own any of their albums.

In the United States, the military has no authority over citizens. It's a foundational law. Exceptions can be made under temporary and unusual circumstances.

But everyone in the military is indoctrinated to believe that they are serving their country.

Some of them are shipped overseas. Some live in Virginia Beach. Some are physically endangered. Some sit behind a desk.

There are good and noble people who choose a life of service. Some of them are in the military. Some of them are food kitchen volunteers.

Not everyone in the military is noble, or serving their country. Any more than any other federal employee.

It's difficult to know the appropriate level of respect or honor to give to a random person displaying the paraphernalia of military service. "Thank you for your service" is free, and perhaps genuinely felt and received in some cases (but also vacuous at times).

I've worked with a lot of ex-military folks. And several members of my family are current or former members. I can't think of a single trait that is common to all of them.

Not physical fitness. Not leadership skills. Not honesty or honor or respectability. Not intelligence or grit or perseverance or fashion sense.

The median is probably higher than the average across the whole population. So there may be a correlation. Except fashion sense!

However this does not persuade me that there's a reason to differentially treat military vs random citizens in your example of a traffic stop. But I'm also not a cop!

I stopped reading here. Every military member swore an oath. They have no choice of duty, but they still swore the same oath to die for their country. Anybody attempting to minimize their sacrifices should remember things like Pearl Harbor, which killed all indiscriminately. And remember that desks fit in tents fit on ships and in tents, which are themselves in active war zones.

It feels good and honorable to say, just like defending a member of your family. That is a goal of the mythology, and it works! It's a hell of a drug.

I don't intend to criticize the military -- combat or non.

But the psychology of it is fascinating.

This seems like a psychological issue with some demanding they have given just as much, and are just as important, yet are too scared to pay the ultimate price.

Or how about the psychological issue that results in hatred towards the military? That one I witnessed personally and I find very interesting.

Additionally how many business owners are willing to die for their business?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carabinieri

It's a job, like any other job. People do it because they want to get paid and military worship is ridiculous.

They need a job and being a soldier is a job. A glorified one where words like bravery and valor are thrown around in the US to make people accept risking their life in a noble way.

And I realize that some people will actually be driven by these ideals and there are things like military families where this tradition is actually strong and it gives them purpose but for the average soldier, they just needed a job and the propaganda worked.

The sentiment for the military and first responders is that they either have already, or could at any moment, be called upon to put their health and life at risk on behalf of the rest of us citizens and allies - so that the rest of us can live a free and peaceful life in pursuit of happiness. The sentiment is one of sincere gratitude of the deepest variety.

I personally don't think the existence of this ID card mocking the DoD is anything but harmless fun. In fact, the freedom to make such content is a part of the freedom of speech the DoD works to protect. However, as much as I enjoy Woz, I agree that giving a false ID to someone a law enforcement agent who is simply trying to do their job, isn't smart or too funny, it's intentionally obfuscating a process and stealing time (tax payer dollars) from the agent trying to do their potentially deangerous job and prosecute true bad actors.

Law enforcement in the US is far from perfect, and trust me, there's a place and value to peaceful civil dissobedience. However, there's also a psychological and monetary cost. The costs of Woz's act seem very benign to me, but I can see how others could easily get spun-up about it - especially if your job is law enforcement.

American exceptionalism is a thing to believe in which satisfies all of the needs of a believer. It's part of the belief triad "god-family-country".

The military is an extension of the country. There is very little visible military presence in the US, and the military has no role in civilian affairs except in cases of temporary callup for natural disasters etc.

And yet it's a very big military, so everyone has some adjacency to present or historical members of the military.

In short, it's the perfect object of optimistic belief. The military is consistently the "most trusted" part of American society -- perhaps because all the things it does, it does elsewhere.

And for the most part, American foreign policy is pretty similar across political lines, so there's no inherent partisan rift, making it an easy and safe thing for everyone to agree on.

A foreigner might argue that that is a flimsy basis for belief. They might point to some tragic events visited upon the world by the US military. They might say that Normandy was a long time ago and it doesn't justify everything that's happened since then.

Many Americans would agree with that. But that's the outsider's view. First and foremost, internally, the military is a jobs program. And it's very very good at that! Tons of training and education, incredible amounts of commerce and technology, genuine personal development, and on the whole very little international malfeasance.

Americans are optimistic people.

My optimism died the second time Bush Jr. was elected, but I'm only 49.

Cost of the Bush Era wars will probably reach $2 Trillion due to long-term healthcare costs for veterans (on top of the bombs and MRAPs and M-16s, etc.).

One of the biggest financial coups in US history. Mission Accomplished indeed -- cuz that's what he was celebrating with that flight.

Search for the list of the richest counties in the US, and notice how many of them are in the Greater Washington DC area (VA & MD).

Enrolling into military is a choice and you know risks beforehand, there’s nothing about that choice that deserves worship-like cult status military has in US.

But psychologically, the drive to be a part of something important is very strong, especially in young men.

The military has a rich mythology that plays into, and perpetuates, this.

This is not bad or unhealthy! But it is also not inherently good. There are other groups which use the same tactics to recruit people for bad services. It very very much depends.

But like any source of low-cost energy, some of it is diverted into unproductive things!

This is true for most forces. All the US allies working in Iraq/Iran weren’t robots.

1. Although military people are paid, it's not enough to compensate the amount of time, health risks, and loss of normal rights and freedoms experienced by young people.

2. Are we better off or worse off if people think of service as just a job to pay the bills? I'm not naiive about this, but we want people to take it seriously, not treat it like a retail job at the mall.

3. A small number will ultimately die. I think you would be a foolish leader/government to give those people who died for you anything but respect if you hope for similar sacrifice in the future.

Showing a counterfeit driver’s license, passport etc. is obviously a crime. What he did was equivalent to showing your company issued ID. Would that be a crime?

Well, he was on a thin ice but nevertheless still within bounds of the law. He did not forge or fake the ID, it was a fictitious one like Disney World passport. The ID had his real name on it, no lies there. The $2 bills were legit as well. And mocking federal agent was not a crime.

Just like you'd be fucked if you tried to deposit dollars for the federal bank of amerigo, your fake country.

The US has streamlined this relative to other countries. You don't have to commit a crime, you just irritate a LEO and they find the crime for you.

  Under 18 U.S.C. § 1001, it's a felony crime to: make a “false statement” to an agent of the > federal government related to a federal matter.
  ...
  A “false statement” can be:
  a material omission.
  a material misrepresentation, or.
  using a fraudulent document.

In the event it got to court, any sane lawyer would advocate for a yes it was wrong, but there was no ill intent defense. Trying to split hairs about the difference between a “fake id” and merely a made-up ID would just be digging deeper into the hole.

When you’re pulled over for 70 in a 60, you own it, acknowledge the mistake, and hope that recognizance is enougn to get you off. You don’t create elaborate sophistries to “prove” that 70 is actually the same thing as 60, or that the signs that say 60 really mean 70. Nobody buys that kind of thing.

Please do not try this kind of thing in real life.

I think “novelty ID” may be more correct. Just like those novelty dollar bills that kind of look like real currency in some ways but still have significant distinctions.

https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/steve-jo...

Steve Jobs met his biological father accidentally at a restaurant.

Risky, but it doesn't sound like a forged government ID (driver's license, etc). It might have even had his actual name on it.

He got an obvious fake from a blond 6'2" guy. He gave it to our dark-haired 5'7" friend with a very different facial structure and told him to try it at several other bars in the area. Said friend got into every bar.