Open Source Homeland

Economic incentives spread across a wide set of specialized workers.

Swissotel Housekeepers Paid to Bust Smokers
Instead of letting smokers run wild with abandon, the 632-room property has begun paying its housekeeping staff to rat offenders out. If a housekeeper enters your room to do her daily clean up and suspects you’ve been sucking down cancer sticks, you get fined. She gets $10.

 In These Times gets their back up over this, but I have zero issue with it. Sharing relevant information in common sense ways keeps us safer. Just because there is potential for abuse doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try it.

FDNY Spies — In These Times
In New York City, the Department of Homeland Security is training New York City firefighters to assist in gathering intelligence information during routine inspections and emergencies.

In November, the Associated Press reported that in New York, Homeland Security was testing a program called the Fire Service Intelligence Enterprise FSIE to help identify “material or behavior that may indicate terrorist activities.”

Fact Sheet: U.S. Department of Homeland Security Announces 6.8 Percent Increase in Fiscal Year 2009 Budget Request

Snip:

Total funding of $2.2 billion will support FEMA’s state and local assistance programs, which prepares state and local governments to prevent or respond to threats or incidents of terrorism and other catastrophic events.

Would love to be at this:

DIY Survival: Projects for the Apocalypse: ETech 2008 — OReilly Conferences, 03/03/2008 - 03/06/2008, San Diego, CA

Whether it’s a red button, volcano, avian bird flu, meteor, cosmic superhighway or economic collapse, this lecture will give you the information you need to make things that will help you survive. Bre Pettis will present a broad array of projects both handmade and over-the-top that will be practical and humorous.

These alerts are by far the fastest, best-written information ever delivered in an emergency shooting situation in the United States.

NIU - Northern Illinois University