I think your HN card must now be turned in. If you don't think that Snowden has anything to do with technology -- then maybe you don't even know what the definition of technology is.
The media surrounding the U.S. government spying on its citizens illegally supersedes any intangible enforcement by means of loosely written guidelines by HN.
"If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity."