Revelations from documents released by Edward Snowden continue to paint an astonishing — and disturbing — picture of the extent of government surveillance of the internet and cellular technologies. From vacuuming up millions of text messages, to installing secret radio transmitters in hundreds of thousands of laptops, the activities of the National Security Agency sound like the kind of thing once the realm of those wearing tin foil hats. Now, what was once crazy is now documented. So, what to do? Is there any way to retain even a modicum of control of your online life? Jon Ippolito is a professor of new media at the University of Maine. Ippolito invents ways to build and sustain networks, a fact that often makes him unpopular with media monopolists, bureaucrats, and other apologists for hierarchic culture. Ippolito works with the Variable Media Network to devise new preservation paradigms to rescue digital culture from obsolescence, with the Open Art Network to promote open architectures for media art, and with the Interarchive working group to find net-native ways to connect online scholarship. He joined Monday Buzz host Brian Standing on February 3rd.