On March 10, 2008 the Wall Street Journal had a long piece here detailing the growth of the National Security Agency's capacity to sweep up electronic data on people in the USA without a warrant in order to search for suspicious patterns.  About five years ago Congress shut down the FBI's Carnivore "black program" for intelligence-gathering.  But the data-sifting operation didn't vanish.  The National Security Agency, which once could do only foreign surveillance, built the system instead.

Happy 2nd birthday, Street Prophets!  We have a gift: a gift from our community, and to our community: a draft of our very own FAQ collection!  Currently, we use the dailyKOS FAQ,  which is adequate.  However it is old (written long before the advent of  AJAX), fails to adequately explain our commenting system, and it doesn't really fit our community's personality.  I've edited up a compilation here, addressing every question except "What kind of an idiot wrote this?"  (Clue: See my profile.)  But here it is!  This marks a start towards a true community document.

Have you ever had an idea that wouldn't let you go?  I've had an insight growing in my heart for a while now.  Now that it has finally matured, I'm scared of it.  The idea is TOO BIG.  You see, I got to wondering "Why would God even bother with creating this universe?"  Just wondering, that was OK.  But I got scared when I got an answer.  Who am I to have a big idea about an important idea like this?  But it just makes too much sense for me to ignore it.  I admit I have been strongly influenced by Baha'i writings, and for all I know you may find sections word-for-word in here.  However, I can guarantee this is purely an original tapestry of thoughts I have woven  in this diary.  I am the one you will have to string up for this.  So here it is, with no further elaboration:

I am in the process of compiling our own personal Street Prophets FAQ.  This site represents our community.  "Who are we?" is one question that must be addressed in our FAQ.  Pastor Dan has already provided a good explanation, reachable through the "About" link on the front page.  That text absolutely needs to go there.  But everyone here has his or her own vision of who we are.

I have my own idea.  Yet I'm pretty strongly a Christian.  And I do not want to slant who we are against folks who believe otherwise.  So here's my concept:  I'll go ahead and say who I think we are.  And then I'll throw the question open.  Please post your comments below and tell me how you see this community.  Let's generate a true Community overview:  Who are we?

Updated by Wolfie : Go see my diary Prophecy Street Tech Shop wherein we'll attempt to solve Richard's problem.

This is a technology issue, which I'd normally just skip.  Forgive me folks, but I'm an old techno-geek who believes that if I'm having persistent problems with the SP site, then it's likely that others are also having the same problem.  Since the problem I've been experiencing has prevented my full participation in the SP community, I felt it was worth my while to call attention to it.  If you can stand techno talk, read on past the break.