Slashdot Mirror

>Neither Microsoft or Sun are convicted felons.

Microsoft, the company, perhaps not. However, the largest shareholder (AFAIK), who has control of the company, Bill Gates, has reportedly driven without a license, and for some "unknown" reason, has a convict's mugshot (mostly used for people involved in criminal wrongdoings), taken at a police department. If I know my US law well enough, driving without a license is a criminal offense.

I think it would be next to impossible for a corporation to do something criminal unless that's their main intent, rather than their legally obliged intent to make money at all costs...

In this case "stealing" the biometric is simple. Aim a video camera at the subject. Unless we are now doing high-level topographical scans of all persons arrested, the only good data available would seem to be mug shots or stuff from surveillance cams. Hence your improvised mask example becomes very possible.

Not only Deckard was a replicant, Phillip K. Dick was a replicant. Why else would he be under surveillance by the FBI? There's no file for Deckard though ...

Now just how high is the percentage? How do we know that it's higher than the general population? My bullshit detector is going off here....

When the Tennessee Titans and St. Louis Rams take the field for Super Bowl XXXIV on Sunday, a wide receiver convicted of drug charges will line up against a convicted girlfriend-beating cornerback.

There will also be a convicted thief playing running back, a prostitute's john in the defensive backfield, a drunken driver on the field and a man convicted of negligent homicide patrolling at linebacker.

Note: This article ran in 2000, not 2001--it ran several days before Ray Lewis and his two friends "were involved" in killing two men.

The article then goes on to raise a provocative point: according to how they interpret the numbers, the fact that 21% of the players in last year's Super Bowl had criminal records meant that they had fewer cons than society as a whole. The article goes on to refer to compare "arrest rates" from several studies with the percentage of convicts on NFL teams--and draws the completely fallacious conclusion that NFL teams have fewer hoods than most 'hoods.

The article is wrong. The writer is comparing arrest rates with the percentage of players with criminal records. That's a false comparison--the arrest rate compares the total number of arrests with the population. If you have a small group of people getting arrested all the time, you'll see a high arrest rate.

(Example: a town of 500 people with 4 jerks. Each gets arrested for being drunk and disorderly every Friday and Saturday night of the year (taking two weekends off to go get arrested someplace else, just to keep the math simple). That's 400 arrests in the town, and 500 people--an 80% arrest rate. But the percentage of criminals in the town (assuming no other criminal activity) is actually less than 1%.)

The writer cites studies that compare the rate of criminal activity among NFL players with the rate of criminal activity in the community as a whole. Again, it is a poor comparison, for two reasons. First, any NFL player is well-to-do, by any standard--the league minimum salary is better than $80,000 per year. Second, it is no secret that the rules for the rich and famous are different than they are for the rest of us. There's no better example than Ray Lewis: two men publicly "diss" three men. All five meet up outside. The two men are murdered, and all kinds of evidence (including their blood) ends up in the limousine of the three attackers. Yet nobody is convicted of the crime--the most notable of the killers pleads to negligence, and the other two walk.

11 percent of the players in the 2000 Super Bowl had criminal records. According to Pros and Cons: The Criminals Who Play In the NFL 21% of NFL players in the 1996-97 season had been indicted or convicted of a felony. That's not the arrest rate, mind you--that's the percentage of players with felony rap sheets.

I am embarrassed too by this and another Canadian law.

Possession of child pornography is not a crime, a British Columbia judge has ruled.
CANADA COURT QUASHES CHILD-PORN LAW - Says Measure Violates Freedom of Expression

As far as the age of consent, in Canada its 14, as long as you don't have authority over the youngster, and don't have any kind of anal relations. It's 18 for all kinds of sexual relations. (source = ageofconsent.com)

Sections books
ask slashdot
features
radio

This page was generated by a Swarm of Psycho Chickens for justo (2858).

Slashdot Load Testing (Continues) Posted by CmdrTaco on Mon August 30, 02:13 PM EDT
from the ain't-this-fun? dept.
Fixed so far:

• Dropped http MaxClients down to 75
• increased mysql max_connections to to 250

( Read More... | 190 of 190 comments )

Help Test Our New Server! Posted by CmdrTaco on Mon August 30, 12:51 PM EDT
from the load-testing-is-cool dept.
So here it is: A mirror of Slashdot (as of a week or so ago). It exists now for testing: So feel free to post comments and help test the new load balancer. For the curious, the new system has 3 http machines (P2s) and one mysql box (a dual P2) with a load balancer trying to keep everyone all equally busy. And its about time: the old setup has been really stressed out trying to keep up with everyone. Anyway, don't get to attached to any of your comments here, when we're satisfied that the new setup is stable, I'm gonna mirror over Slashdot and make the final switcheroo.

( Read More... | 335 of 335 comments )

Interview: Mandrake Answers Posted by Roblimo on Fri August 20, 12:00 PM EDT
from the x-leads-to-enlightenment dept.
Monday a whole bunch of people had questions for Mandrake, one of the heavies behind Enlightenment. Slashdot Moderators picked the best ones. We forwarded them, unedited, to Mandrake on Tuesday. His (excellent) answers appear below.

( Read More... | 11562 bytes in body | 9 of 9 comments )

Geeks in the Space: The Attack of 5 Posted by Hemos on Thu August 19, 04:10 AM EDT
from the more-stuff-to-listen-to dept.
Well, we've done it again. Yes, Geeks in Space, Episode 5 has been released. In it, we lament the lack of good news, talk about anti-matter, and the hiring of hacks by companies. You can also become...educated in my long-term plan for the hostile takeover of a certain Redmond-based company.

( Read More... | 14 of 17 comments )

Apple announces Darwin 0.3 Posted by Hemos on Thu August 19, 12:24 AM EDT
from the more-to-download dept.
J. FoxGlov writes "Macintouch reports that v0.3 of Darwin, the open-source foundation for Mac OS X Server is available on Apple's Public Source site. Apple Developer Connection members can get it on CD for $29. Check Public Source for more about the Darwin SDK and the new Darwin. "

( Read More... | 67 of 68 comments )

Microsoft's New Audio Format Cracked Posted by Hemos on Wed August 18, 05:23 PM EDT
from the secure-this-buddy dept.
Barcode (JPB) was one of the first to send us the word from Wired that the new audio format Microsoft introduced (Two days ago), supposed to be a secure format (resricting playback) has already been cracked. Dimension Music first carried the news-and what a name the crack has *grin*.

( Read More... | 238 of 240 comments )

Find your Star Wars Twin Posted by Hemos on Wed August 18, 05:16 PM EDT
from the what-freud-really-wanted-to-do dept.
The_Monk writes "Ever wanted to know your Star Wars twin? Now this incredibly important information can be verified. It placed me the likes of Astro Mech Droids, 'Tarkin, and R2-D2. " Ahem-as the lost twin of Lando (extraversion), I have a Cloud City I'd like to sell someone. But I'm about as agreeable as Boba, always a bonus.

( Read More... | 94 of 94 comments )

Now Police Can 'See' Through Walls Posted by Roblimo on Wed August 18, 12:40 PM EDT
from the move-along-there's-nothing-to-see-here dept.
Bram writes "Just found an article about another way to invade privacy." He's talking about hand-held radar systems police can use to detect breathing, beating hearts or other motion through walls and other obstacles. Sounds like a declassified version of the Ground Support Radar [GSR] units we used years ago in the Army. I can see why police would want them, and I can also see why Bram considers them a privacy threat. Depends on how they're used, I suppose.

( Read More... | 205 of 205 comments )

FreeType posts patent warning Posted by Hemos on Wed August 18, 11:53 AM EDT
from the i-want-my-verdonna dept.
Anonymous Coward writes "According to the the FreeType web page, there have been some new concerns raised about Apple's patents on TrueType. I hope this doesn't affect the planned TrueType support in XF86 4. " It appears that they are still checking into the issue, but I'd really like TrueType support. A lot. Let's hope Apple responds nicely.

( Read More... | 202 of 206 comments )

Microsoft to "publish code" to Instant Messenger Posted by Hemos on Wed August 18, 09:49 AM EDT
from the want-more-market-share dept.
VFVTHUNTER writes "According to this article at cnet, MS, in an attempt to gain a share of AOL's Instant Messenger Service Market, announced today it is going to publish the protocol to its own messenger service. " It's important to note it's NOT the source code, just the protocol.

( Read More... | 192 of 192 comments )

natelinx

ai

bsi

cnn

smug

garden

taco hell

superbad

mod_perl

everything

space ghost

oostendorp.net

Be News

Unisys gif-lzw-license Model Changed

YMF724 Driver Patch

Guidelines for Sane Advocacy

BeNews Is Moving - Outages Planned

Audio Buzz "Fixes" Announced

Austin BUG Meeting This Wednesday

Wacom Driver Goes Open Source

3dsound Secrets Revealed

ACE Bot, Devastation for Quake2

Be.com Frontpage Layout Updated Get more Be...

Alta Vista Search Alta Vista

any language Chinese Czech Danish Dutch English Estonian Finnish French German Greek Hebrew Hungarian Icelandic Italian Japanese Korean Latvian Lithuanian Norwegian Polish Portuguese Romanian Russian Spanish Swedish

Q3Arena.com

Quake3 Launcher

Site Movement

New Carmack Worklog

NMS v3.0

NOP v2.1 Released

etc.

Game Name Builder v1.32

John Carmack Updated His .plan

Voice Actors Needed

KOTS Mod Needs Servers

More Ass Kicking Quake Action...

Dr. Dobb's TechNetCast

Open Source At Work

LIVE From LinuxWorld

What's Wrong with HTTP and Why It Doesn't Matter

Inside the BeOS

A Brief History of Unix and the Internet

Author of sendmail on open-source and early days of email

Linus Torvalds on State of Linux

Creator of Tcl/Tk: Open-Source Creates Commercial Opportunities

Inside the Netscape Gecko Open Source Browser Team More TechNetCast

Hollywood Bitchslap

Review: Bowfinger - 'Funniest Eddie Murphy movie in a decade. Steve Martin showed...'

Review: Mickey Blue-Eyes - 'Not as funny as it could have been'

Feature: Robert Towne - From Chinatown to Hollywood. More from Hollywood Bitchslap

Slashdot Poll Preferred Compression
zip
gzip
bzip
compress
arj
other
[ Results | Polls ]
Comments:383 | Votes:24104

Crazy Person

Lunch

The Funnies (?)

User Friendly

Red Meat

Dilbert

Sluggy Freelance

Bastich

Punc & Mark

Helen

Goats

Pokey the Penguin

Superosity

Kevin & Kell

Doonesbury

The Fifth Wave

Features The latest installment of Geeks in Space is up at The Sync. We talk about the Red Hat IPO, crazy naming schemes, and much more.

Perhaps you are seeking Jon Katz's series of articles related to recent events in Colorado. These articles include Voices from the Hellmouth, More Stories from the Hellmouth or The Price of Being Different,

With all the hype about the recent MindCraft Linux/NT benchmarks, you might be interested in reading ESR's Response to the Mindcraft Fiasco

For something different, try reading my little essay Thoughts from the Furnace about the internet, and flame.

Update: 05/03 01:48 by CT : Past Features

Mozilla.org

PerLDAP v1.4 Released

M9 Released

Mozilla BOF at O'Reilly OSS Convention

cvs-mirror.mozilla.org Is (no longer) Sick

Mozilla Birds-Of-A-Feather Session

Getting Involved

Blackwood

Bugathon Needs JavaScripters

News From The Front

M8 On The Wire

Mozilla for BeOS

Mozilla is Alive and Well

BugAThon 300

New Newsgroup Announcements

M7 Binaries Released

Slashdot

Load Test the New Slashdot Setup

Microwave T1 Service

Internet Tax Moratorium Over?

Feature: Is Open Source for Windows Less Important?

Interview: Ask Alan Cox

3rd State of the Perl Onion

LinuxPPC challenge rides again

Review: The First 20 Million is Always the Hardest

Star Office to become Open Source?

Palm Gameboy Emulator update & screens

Linuxnewbie.org

Your Hotmail Account Has Been Exposed

Securing The Home Linux System: Updated

Glibc2 Slackware is here!

Segfault.org: South Park Story

TWO New Slackware Mailing Lists More LinuxNewbie.org...

Freak Tech

Molecular-based logic gates

10 Gbps optical though air.

Magnetic spacecraft propulsion

Linuxdev.net

Interview with Borland Sr. Product Mgr

Gizmo3D v0.92 Released

CORBA 3 News

More On XHTML 1.0

Oracle Offer Linux Technology Track More LDN...

Wired Webmonkey

Webmonkey Guides

Cheap and Cool Photos

Hiring a Site Developer

Searching for Mr. Burrito

Introduction to Apache

Why Ask Why?

PHP/MySQL Tutorial

Wait for It More Webmonkey

Older Stuff

Wednesday August 18

Scientists create digital bug-life (131)

New Space Propulsion System Uses Sun's Magnetic Field (120)

Cassini visits Earth (175)

Descent 3 Linux Client (71)

Tuesday August 17

Playstation 2 Outperforms Everything? (240)

SIGGRAPH '99 OpenGL/Linux BOF Minutes (37)

Dell Belgium forced to install Windows only? (75)

Relativity Used to Devise New Form of Crypt (24)

Robots Battle to the Death! (124)

Will PPC Become the Preferred Linux Platform? (277)

IBMs 15 hour Laptop Batteries (72)

Feature: After the Red Hat IPO Ball is Over (236)

Feature:Obscurity as Security (194)

l0pht develops Sniffer Sniffer (101)

NASA collecting anti-matter with giant ballon (109)

CIA releases its own X-Files (111)

Packet Storm Security is back (36)

Monday August 16

Sun Claims MS Steals Vision (162)

Scientists Find Evidence of Black Holes Sucking (163)

MS Dirty Pool Against AOL? (204)
Older Articles
Yesterday's Edition

Weather24.com
(city, state or zip)

Don't kid yourself. Little is relevant, and nothing lasts forever. All trademarks and copyrights on this page are owned by their respective owners. Comments are owned by the Poster. The Rest © 1997-99 Andover.Net. [ home | awards | supporters | rob's homepage | contribute story | older articles | Andover.Net | advertising | past polls | about | faq ]

Raytheon wanted to find out which of its employees were badmouthing the company in public via AOL, so they sued "John Doe," which means they filed a lawsuit which said, essentially, "We don't know who we're suing just yet, but by Ghod we're suing somebody." With the civil suit filed all nice and pretty, they typed up some subpoenas demanding the identities of the John Does, and carried them over to AOL, who turned over the true names behind the aliases.

Here's the absolute best part: as soon as Raytheon knew who the employees in question were, they dropped the lawsuit. Then they either fired or disciplined all the employees involved.

This is called a tactical lawsuit: it's one where you don't give any sort of damn what the suit's own outcome may be; you file it just to make sure there's a lawsuit in place so you can do things you ordinarily wouldn't be allowed to do. Here's how it works, fable2112: Say for example that I hate you and decide to kick your ass. If I ask servtech who you are, they will promptly tell me to go to hell, which is as it should be. Since that approach won't work, I'm going to file a lawsuit: I sue John Doe for inducing mental distress in a SlashDot article. Nevermind the suit is complete crap. Nevermind it will never see trial--a lawsuit is a lawsuit, and I can use it to start issuing subpoenas. I send a subpoena to servtech, demanding your name and billing address. Are they going to tell me to go to hell? Of course not! I've got a subpoena--a court order!--demanding to know who you are. So instead of fighting it, they turn over your billing information. Now that I know where you live, I can drop the bogus lawsuit and cheerfully proceed with the asskicking I've decided you deserve.

Is any of this bothering you yet? Keep in mind that up to the actual asskicking, everything I did was completely legal. The great big question here, whether it's about AOL or any other ISP, is how much cooperation should they have given me? The obvious answer is "none." The legally viable answer is somewhat more nebulous.

Just something to contemplate.

Disclaimer: I don't actually want to kick your ass.

--