Do you remember that before Snowden, the whole NSA thing was a tinfoil-hat worthy idea?
I don't think that was the case. Congress voted in the Patriot Act, which could be interpreted to authorize just such mass surveillance. The fact that there hasn't been much political blowback in the country at large indicates that most weren't that surprised (or bothered) by the idea of mass surveillance. Far from a 'tinfoil-hat worthy idea', the real problem is that it had become a commonly accepted fact even before it was verified by Snowden's revelations. I wish it had been tinfoil-hat worthy, then people would've cared a lot more when it was actually revealed.
The problem with the Snowden revelations is that it was public knowledge what was going on years before Snowden, but it was mostly rumors with little evidence. Meanwhile it started around 9/11 so anyone who pointed it out was shouted down by cowards and angry blowhards claiming there wasn't enough evidence.
Then Snowden comes with the evidence but by then people had already made up their minds before having the facts and everybody was tired of hearing about it. So the frog boils.
I remember hearing about echelon in the 90s - back then it was really tin hat stuff - but someone here in Australia was writing about a global surviellance system - not that anyone seemed to care
I don't think that was the case. Congress voted in the Patriot Act, which could be interpreted to authorize just such mass surveillance. The fact that there hasn't been much political blowback in the country at large indicates that most weren't that surprised (or bothered) by the idea of mass surveillance. Far from a 'tinfoil-hat worthy idea', the real problem is that it had become a commonly accepted fact even before it was verified by Snowden's revelations. I wish it had been tinfoil-hat worthy, then people would've cared a lot more when it was actually revealed.