Slashdot Mirror

Can you even copyright a sculpture? I thought it was just for written works, picture and code.

Sculptural works are afforded similar status under U.S. copyright law (which applies to anybody taking photographs on Illinois soil) to paintings. In fact, 17 USC 102's list of copyrightable subject matter lumps "pictorial, graphic, and sculptural works" together.

The US Supreme Court came to a different conclusion in Dowling vs. United States.

From the decision :

Since the statutorily defined property rights of a copyright holder have a character distinct from the possessory interest of the owner of simple "goods, wares, [or] merchandise," interference with copyright does not easily equate with theft, conversion, or fraud. The infringer of a copyright does not assume physical control over the copyright nor wholly deprive its owner of its use. Infringement implicates a more complex set of property interests than does run-of-the-mill theft, conversion, or fraud.

This case has nothing at all to do with the Internet or e-mail. But don't take my word for it, listen to Justice Stevens. "The question on which we granted certiorari is narrow: 'Whether the Fourth Amendment requires reasonable, articulable suspicion to justify using a drug-detection dog to sniff a vehicle during a legitimate traffic stop.'" Illinois v. Roy I. Caballes, No. 03-923, slip op. at 2 (U.S. Jan. 24, 2005) (citation omitted). The Court says that official conduct that does not compromise any legitimate privacy interest is not a 'search' for the purposes of the Fourth Amendment, and that possession of contraband is not a legitimate interest. Id.

The Supreme Court is specifically talking about drugs when they say 'contraband'. The Court cites U.S. v. Jacobsen, 466 U.S. 109 (1984), which involved someone who mailed cocaine via private courier. The package was damaged en route, and the supervisor and office manager opened it up as part of the routine insurance process. Id. at 111. They found white powder inside, and called the Feds who determined it was coke. Id. at 111-12. They looked at the address on the package, went there, and arrested the people waiting for their drugs. Id. at 112.

The discussion is nowhere near the Internet or email. Now that we're not panicked, the Court points out that even some searches of contraband are illegal. It cites another case in which it held that using infrared imaging to search a house for pot plants is unlawful. Kyllo v. U.S., 533 U.S. 27 (2001).

The entire opinion is less than five pages long, and really quite straightforward. Justice Souter, on the other hand, spends eight pages to say that even the accidental detection of drugs by dogs should be an unlawful search. Caballes, slip op. at 1 (Souter, J., dissenting). His main reason, stated right up front: drug-sniffing dogs are fallible. Id. In a footnote, he cites Kyllo to explain that the government can't use a tool to get information on things for which they would otherwise require physical intrusion. Id. at 4 (footnote 3).

Justice Ginsburg's dissent, which Justice Souter joins, is nine pages. She worries about, among other things, police walking through parking lots and down sidewalks with drug-sniffing dogs, conducting sweeps without prior suspicion of guilt. Caballes, slip op. at 6 (Ginsburg, J., dissenting).

While the opinion is a fascinating study on the balance between our desire to catch crooks and our desire for personal privacy, it has absolutely nothing to do with the Internet or email.

This case has nothing at all to do with the Internet or e-mail. But don't take my word for it, listen to Justice Stevens. "The question on which we granted certiorari is narrow: 'Whether the Fourth Amendment requires reasonable, articulable suspicion to justify using a drug-detection dog to sniff a vehicle during a legitimate traffic stop.'" Illinois v. Roy I. Caballes, No. 03-923, slip op. at 2 (U.S. Jan. 24, 2005) (citation omitted). The Court says that official conduct that does not compromise any legitimate privacy interest is not a 'search' for the purposes of the Fourth Amendment, and that possession of contraband is not a legitimate interest. Id.

The Supreme Court is specifically talking about drugs when they say 'contraband'. The Court cites U.S. v. Jacobsen, 466 U.S. 109 (1984), which involved someone who mailed cocaine via private courier. The package was damaged en route, and the supervisor and office manager opened it up as part of the routine insurance process. Id. at 111. They found white powder inside, and called the Feds who determined it was coke. Id. at 111-12. They looked at the address on the package, went there, and arrested the people waiting for their drugs. Id. at 112.

The discussion is nowhere near the Internet or email. Now that we're not panicked, the Court points out that even some searches of contraband are illegal. It cites another case in which it held that using infrared imaging to search a house for pot plants is unlawful. Kyllo v. U.S., 533 U.S. 27 (2001).

The entire opinion is less than five pages long, and really quite straightforward. Justice Souter, on the other hand, spends eight pages to say that even the accidental detection of drugs by dogs should be an unlawful search. Caballes, slip op. at 1 (Souter, J., dissenting). His main reason, stated right up front: drug-sniffing dogs are fallible. Id. In a footnote, he cites Kyllo to explain that the government can't use a tool to get information on things for which they would otherwise require physical intrusion. Id. at 4 (footnote 3).

Justice Ginsburg's dissent, which Justice Souter joins, is nine pages. She worries about, among other things, police walking through parking lots and down sidewalks with drug-sniffing dogs, conducting sweeps without prior suspicion of guilt. Caballes, slip op. at 6 (Ginsburg, J., dissenting).

While the opinion is a fascinating study on the balance between our desire to catch crooks and our desire for personal privacy, it has absolutely nothing to do with the Internet or email.

Recording with a VCR is offsetting in time something which you have otherwise legally acquired (the cable company or TV station is a licensed distribtor of the content). Directly from Sony/Betamax: "Any individual may reproduce a copyrighted work for a 'fair use'; the copyright owner does not possess the exclusive right to such a use"... and later "there is no likelihood that time-shifting would cause nonminimal harm to the potential market for, or the value of, respondents' copyrighted works"

Downloading from a P2P network is a copy from another person who is NOT legally distributing the work. It is not fair use, because it involves sharing a full copyrighted work between individuals (some P2P architectures not withstanding) and also may cause nonminimal hard to the potential market for a work (because of the 'free' acquisition, you wouldn't buy a DVD or watch TV and 'pay' via watching advertisements or paying the cable company.)

Here's a link.

Apparently there was no request to search the trunk from the first officer. The second one "just showed up" and conducted the dog search.

I find the argument that "the dog will only find illegal material, so it's OK" to be totally specious. There could be a small fragment of drug in the trunk from a previous owner or carwash attendant. There could be cash in the trunk, which often carries drug residue. It's also possible the dog could simply make a mistake. Considering that the likely outcome if the dog alerts is a time-consuming and destructive search of the entire vehicle, the fact that it could well happen with nothing illegal going on should be sufficient to prohibit this kind of fishing expedition.

Apparently not, in the United Police States of America. The mind boggles.

We have no "probable cause" here and a full search of the car and its occupants would have been pretty much routine should the officers wish so. I have been strip searched myself from a drug dog taking a (not unreasonable though fruitless in that case) interest in me while on a coach at the French/Swiss border.

You didn't find a *strip search* to be unreasonable?!? Especially one that came up empty? You are remarkably tolerant.

Marijuana posession is so prevalent here that the govt. made it no longer a mandatory criminal offence because it became a burden on the police force to process those caught in possession when investigating other criminal offences.

Where is "here"? I'm curious.

Regardless, this wasn't just possession. There was sufficient quantity for it to be trafficing, which resulted in a 12 year prison sentence and $250,000+ fine.

Any of those three articles gets into the actual legal issues raised better than TFA, probably because they can't make money by flimflamming you.

What you're describing is the bank's right of set-off, which I understand most financial institutions claim--it's buried somewhere in the fine print of your account agreement. (Actually, I'm not as familiar with U.S. banking law; is set-off just assumed?) This has been around for a long time; it didn't show up with the invention of computers. (See for example the 1913 case American National Bank of Nashville v. Miller, which refers to this right). They can, at their option, draw upon your other accounts to fulfill unsatisfied debts.

I expected them to bounce the check, or have a human examine it and recognize that the written amount of the check was a tenth of the amount indicated by the MICR.

They may well have believed they were doing you a favour. Rather than bouncing your check and embarrassing you in front of your creditors, they let it through because of your generally good credit behaviour. As for hand rechecking the amounts, someone already saw the physical check once and goofed. It was a human being that misread the amount of your check, not a computer. The electronic bits--the MICR routing to your account and so forth--worked properly. Even if your bank instead waited for all checks to arrive at the local branch for processing, you can still have the clerk who makes a typo/calculating error/other mistake, and you get the added bonus of waiting two weeks for checks to clear.

Banks made numerical errors long before electronic computers. The boardgame Monopoly was first sold in 1935, and it has a "Bank error in your favor" card for a reason.

I just happened across this commentary that claims "automatic copyright" isn't so automatic.

The primary case law concerning what is and is not patentable was set forth in 1980's SCOTUS decision in Diamond v. Chakrabarty. The court ruled that "n choosing such expansive terms as "manufacture" and "composition of matter," modified by the comprehensive "any," Congress contemplated that the patent laws should be given wide scope, and the relevant legislative history also supports a broad construction. While laws of nature, physical phenomena, and abstract ideas are not patentable, respondent's claim is not to a hitherto unknown natural phenomenon, but to a nonnaturally occurring manufacture or composition of matter - a product of human ingenuity "having a distinctive name, character [and] use." Believe it or not, this is actually a compromise, because the respondent had actually argued the case based on a 1952 congressional memo (pertaining to the 1952 patent recodification) that "include anything under the sun that is made by man" is patentable.

>Do you even know the purpose of felony vs. misdemeanor?

A felony is typically a crime that ends up with the person in prison for a year or longer. A misdemeanor usually ends up with a year or less. More info here.

>such as rape, murder

No. Felonies also include identification theft, burglery, computer crimes, etc. Nice use of the hot-button strawman tactic though.

That said, if the state chooses to try him as a minor, that is their perogative, but the assumption that felonies only involve rape or murder and the like is false and the idea that computer crimes should never reach the level of felony is ridiculous and there are already felony computer crime punishments which is a good idea as society shifts from property based to information based.

>>. What the fuck is wrong with people like you?

Perhaps you should ask yourself that question before you go off with misleading statements.

nonsense analogies made by people who really, really want to believe that [criminal copyright infringement is] less of a crime than it is are kind of meaningless.

Where did I imply that criminal copyright infringement is not a crime? I made an analogy from criminal copyright infringement, which is a crime, to criminal trespass, which is also a crime. But I also maintain that copying a copyrighted work is not always copyright infringement. Given that you're familiar with the numbering of the United States Code, see 17 USC 107 through 122. An example of a fair use covered under section 107 is parody, and this often requires copying part of the target into the parodic work. See Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music and Suntrust v. Houghton Mifflin .

And what happens when the copyright on a work under "trusted" DRM expires, which is due to start happening again in another decade and a half?

nonsense analogies made by people who really, really want to believe that [criminal copyright infringement is] less of a crime than it is are kind of meaningless.

Where did I imply that criminal copyright infringement is not a crime? I made an analogy from criminal copyright infringement, which is a crime, to criminal trespass, which is also a crime. But I also maintain that copying a copyrighted work is not always copyright infringement. Given that you're familiar with the numbering of the United States Code, see 17 USC 107 through 122. An example of a fair use covered under section 107 is parody, and this often requires copying part of the target into the parodic work. See Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music and Suntrust v. Houghton Mifflin .

And what happens when the copyright on a work under "trusted" DRM expires, which is due to start happening again in another decade and a half?

You can thank the Supreme Court for that. Schools were allowed newspaper censorship as a result of a 1985 case concerning a newspaper wanting to publish an article about teen pregnancy. The case is Hazelwood v. Kuhlmeier. Some more info can be found here.

A license is a contract granting permission to do something

Nonsense. For the umpteenth time, this is how Iraq was a problem for us: Read the Senate resolution that spelled out justification for the war. Keep in mind this resolution passed 77-23.

Remember that Saddam Hussein never surrendered, never sued for peace after the first Gulf War. There was a cease fire in effect, which Hussein violated many times by (mostly by shooting at coalition aircraft). And don't bring up the tired "UN didn't authorize it" argument - The UN failed to act because certain Security Council memebers had cozied up to Hussein after the first Gulf War.

As far as the US supporting tyrants in the past, that is true, and the goal was to stop Soviet expansionism. George Bush is the first president to repudiate that kind of thinking (Clinton had 8 years to do it and failed. Remember Madeleine Albright toasting Kim Jung Il?) and move to the strategy of encouraging democracy instead of supporting dictators who agreed to protect our interests...we could have cozied up to Hussein like the French and Russians did. It would have been easy to do that, but it would not solve the problem.

Being a former Republican, I figured out the communist/Islamunist connection fairly quickly. Actually if anything, they aren't fascist or communist, but theocrats. Communists, generally, are scared of religion. Fascists parade religion around like a crown, but generally base the laws of the land on corporate worship, not religious worship. Religious laws in a fascist society seem more to quell the would be theocrats and keep them in lockstep with the party.

Again, you are sticking words in my mouth. I didn't say it was from the top down in my posts. But, ok, you asked for it. Our esteemed executive defines torture as:

"...physical torture 'must be equivalent in intensity to the pain accompanying serious physical injury, such as organ failure, impairment of bodily function, or even death.'"

So, according to our executive, basically anything short of being drawn and quartered, disembowled, and killed, is legal. So raping is fine. Beating the living crap out of people is fine (as long as they don't die). Breaking bones, mutilating flesh, and removing parts of the body, so as long as they do not result in "impairment of bodily function" is fine.

So, you are right about one thing, although I never said you where wrong: Murdering prisoners is not officially sanctioned. Well, at least publically, I'm not privy to classified info and it's hard to prove an absolute negative in this case.

The memo in question

Oh, and yes, the military has shown a great interest in investigating what has been going on. However, the civilian leadership has shown more of an interest in making sure it is harder for investigations to find evidence.

"This in contrast of course to the Insurgents/Terrorists who advertise daily that they will kill, mutilate, rape, and execute any and all civilians they can get their hands on."

I also never said the "insurgents" wheren't killing/executing people. In fact, I acknowledged it in the previous post when you implied I was either excusing or ignoring their crimes the first time.

Those rebels/guerrillas do kill and execute civilians, as well as military personel, and government officials. I doubt it's as indescriminate as you insinuate. And now it's my turn, please post some proof that they have been raping people. I haven't seen proof of mutilation outside of the act of murder or post-mortem, but I wouldn't doubt it since mutilation is a big part of the criminal punishment system of many of the countries over there, like Saudi Arabia.

Missouri has banned video games in their prisons. http://news.corporate.findlaw.com/ap_stories/high_ tech/1700/1-24-2005/20050124163019_19.html/

But to get back on topic, the weather service may have an obligation by its previous arrangement with commercial purveyors of this information, not to present the general public with anything other than the raw data that the taxpayers have paid for. But we are free to take that information and provide it in a usable format to the public free of charge and without advertising if we wish. If commercial weather information purveyors want exclusive access to it, then let them fund it instead of the taxpayers. It may well be that this is a type of scientific research that would be better served by the private sector.

But to get back on topic, the weather service may have an obligation by its previous arrangement with commercial purveyors of this information, not to present the general public with anything other than the raw data that the taxpayers have paid for. But we are free to take that information and provide it in a usable format to the public free of charge and without advertising if we wish. If commercial weather information purveyors want exclusive access to it, then let them fund it instead of the taxpayers. It may well be that this is a type of scientific research that would be better served by the private sector.

You're thinking of hop-on... they've been making vaporware and press releases for years, and it seems like the only phones they've been selling have been non-disposable. But the at this year's CES, they showed their new disposable phone without a screen, but still no price point. I don't know if I should hold my breath again this year...

A microprocessor is logic

No, a microprocessor is not logic.
To the extent you are reffering to an invention teaching about a novel and non-obvious physical object and harnessing the forces of nature in a novel and non-obvious way then you have a patent.

However I don't think that is what you are referring to. I think what you are reffering to generally FAILS to qualify for patents at all. Even the idiot lower courts that routinely rule in favor of software patents reject the patentability of what you are referring to. What you are refering to is actually integrated circuit topography. This is covered by sui generis coverage under copyright law. NOT patents. To any extent that processors resemble "logic" they are more accurately described as having copyright-type protection. I'll admit I only have a passing familiarity with this sui generis protection, but I'd wager you've never even heard of it. You are the one who has no idea what you are taking about.

Wrong again. You apparently don't know what "novelty" means

I'm the one citing Supreme Cort rulings, you're the one doing nothing but tossing insults. You apparently didn't bother looking up the referrence, so were it is explicitly:

Whether the algorithm was in fact known or unknown at the time of the claimed invention, as one of the "basic tools of scientific and technological work," it is treated as though it were a familiar part of the prior art.

Software, in the absence of any novel and non-obvious physical object or any novel and non-obvious physical process, is nothing but a purely mathematical formula. It is treated as a familiar part of the prior art.

Addition is not an invention and is not patentable. Calculus is not an invention and is not patentable. The pythagorean formula is not an invention and is not patentable. And while the mathematical formula for a given peice of software is long and complex, it is still not an invention and is not patentable.

Any court ruling otherwise is not only stupid for violating the mental steps doctrine, but they are in direct violation of standing Supreme Court law.

software on a machine-readable medium is patentable

The US patent office certainly issues them, and lower courts have at times upheld them (actually I think there was a recent signifigant appellate strikedown/change in media patentability), but upholding any such patent is clearly in violation of the Supreme Court rulings. The problem is that the Supreme Court is busy and can only review a tiny fraction of cases. Patents are a fairly un-sexy area of law and such cases are rarely taken up. But even in the face of such a busy court, it is absolutely appaling that they have not addressed the feild in the last TWENTY FOUR YEARS. And with that neglect, the lower courts have absolutely run amuck in violation of Supreme Court rulings.

Give it up. Or at least include an actual claim or argument in your next post. Something more than an unfounded insult that I don't know what I'm talking about.

-

The Supreme Court has already ruled that obscenity isn't protected by the First Amendment. It doesn't reverse "everything" but changes things in that federal jurisdiction.

And, no, it won't be bigger than Roe vs. Wade. It's clear you don't understand how contentious that issue is. They're expecting a large turnout in DC to protest its anniversary. I can't think of any other decisions which have annual protests.

First, my background. I am an Evangelical Christian, as well as a future law student. I vote Republican more often than Democrat (not particularly liking either party), but am also a financial supporter of the EFF.

Now that we've gotten that out of the way, I fully expect this decision to be appealled. Remember, this decision is coming out of a district court, which is subject to review by Appeals and the Supremes. Specifically, I would argue that this case interprets Lawrence v. Texas too broadly, that Lawrence dealt with liberty concerns of regulating homosexual behavior vs. heterosexual behavior, and that this instant case incorrectly applies those liberty concerns to regulation of sexual obscenity regardless of "actor" orientation.

When it comes to sexual obscenity in general, there is more to consider than simply individual liberty. There is a undeniable cost to society from the dissemination of sexually obscene material, although I will be the first to admit the difficulty of quantifying that cost.

It is that cost that must be balanced against the demands of personal liberty.

I think it also important to bring up the still-binding 1973 case Miller v. California . That Supreme Court case held that sexually obscene material was NOT Speech, and as thus could be regulated by the several States.

The Miller Test for obscenity was that something is obscene if it "[A] appeals to the prurient [lustful] interest in sex; [B] portrays, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by the applicable state law; and, [C] taken as a whole, does not have serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value [the SLAPS test]." (Bracketed text is my own.)

It should be noted that Miller applied to regulation by the several States, whereas this instant case deals with federal regulation. How and why different rules apply to the federal vs. the state government is beyond my current level of skill to discuss adaquetely and in-depth.

Personally, do I believe pornography should be banned? No. But I do believe that some level of regulation is warranted, and that the benefits of that regulation must be balanced against the cost to personal liberty.

- Neil Wehneman

P.S. I have previously posted additional thoughts on how pornography regulation is and is not justified based on specific secular criteria in an older Slashdot story.

First, my background. I am an Evangelical Christian, as well as a future law student. I vote Republican more often than Democrat (not particularly liking either party), but am also a financial supporter of the EFF.

Now that we've gotten that out of the way, I fully expect this decision to be appealled. Remember, this decision is coming out of a district court, which is subject to review by Appeals and the Supremes. Specifically, I would argue that this case interprets Lawrence v. Texas too broadly, that Lawrence dealt with liberty concerns of regulating homosexual behavior vs. heterosexual behavior, and that this instant case incorrectly applies those liberty concerns to regulation of sexual obscenity regardless of "actor" orientation.

When it comes to sexual obscenity in general, there is more to consider than simply individual liberty. There is a undeniable cost to society from the dissemination of sexually obscene material, although I will be the first to admit the difficulty of quantifying that cost.

It is that cost that must be balanced against the demands of personal liberty.

I think it also important to bring up the still-binding 1973 case Miller v. California . That Supreme Court case held that sexually obscene material was NOT Speech, and as thus could be regulated by the several States.

The Miller Test for obscenity was that something is obscene if it "[A] appeals to the prurient [lustful] interest in sex; [B] portrays, in a patently offensive way, sexual conduct specifically defined by the applicable state law; and, [C] taken as a whole, does not have serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value [the SLAPS test]." (Bracketed text is my own.)

It should be noted that Miller applied to regulation by the several States, whereas this instant case deals with federal regulation. How and why different rules apply to the federal vs. the state government is beyond my current level of skill to discuss adaquetely and in-depth.

Personally, do I believe pornography should be banned? No. But I do believe that some level of regulation is warranted, and that the benefits of that regulation must be balanced against the cost to personal liberty.

- Neil Wehneman

P.S. I have previously posted additional thoughts on how pornography regulation is and is not justified based on specific secular criteria in an older Slashdot story.

Nor would you need to ammend the constitution to abolish copyrights.

Some have claimed that the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment ("nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation") prohibits abolishing or abridging copyrights in existing works or patents in existing inventions unless the federal government buys the copyrights or patents at market price and PDs them. James v. Campbell, 104 U.S. 356 (1881).

By right of law you now have the right to *use* the product.

Oh really? I see two separate offer-acceptance-consideration sequences here. The first one occurs when you walk in the store and pay for a box, a manual, and a shiny disc. However, the "goods" do not necessarily include the right to use the software, as the software may be encrypted on the disc, and in order to lawfully decrypt someone else's copyrighted work in the United States, you need a second contract.

1. Offer: You accept to use this product under even more limited ciscumstances than those given to you by law

U.S. copyright law, 17 USC 1201, gives the copyright owner the right to control use of a product after the sale. I could see how a publisher of a computer program could argue that the installer qualifies as "a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title" because the installer, "in the ordinary course of its operation, requires the application of information, or a process or a treatment, with the authority of the copyright owner, to gain access to the" computer program being installed. The copyright owner is willing to grant such authority only on the condition that you accept the second contract, the EULA.

2. Accpetance: Well, if you don't accept then your product doesn't work, you can't return it and are left with something unusable.

Except a California court ruled that you can return it.

3. Consideration: For agreeing to the terms and conditions what do you receive? NOTHING!

You receive the right to use the software, which you didn't have before under the DMCA.

See http://www.copyright.gov/title17/92chap5.html#506
Criminal Offenses, and http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/ts_search.pl ?title=18&sec=2319 ,
for figures

It's a question of judicial interpretation - if tomatoes are vegetables and a pony with a feather pillow on its back is a small bird then it's entirely possible that a judge will apply the old "legislative intent" rule and tell you to stuff off with your hair-splitting, as "identical" in this context clearly means identical in terms of the perceivable results of viewing/using the file as intended - or more to the point, in terms of the application of copyright to the file in question.

Judges are often only stupid when they want to be. And lets not forget who owns the US Supreme Court...

IANAL... yet

The betamax decision was for a device that makes analog copies of data on a magnetic tape, NOT a physical device designed to cause an explosion.

So don't try to apply the betamax decision to bombs to illustrate how it shouldn't apply to P2P software. P2P is somewhat relevant to betamax, bombs are not.

The exact phrase the opinion used was "admits of singificant non-infringing use"

Where'd you find that quote??? The real exact phrase is as follows:

"In summary, the record and findings of the District Court lead us to two conclusions. First, Sony demonstrated a significant likelihood that substantial numbers of copyright holders who license their works for broadcast on free television would not object to having their broadcasts time- shifted by private viewers. And second, respondents failed to demonstrate that time-shifting would cause any likelihood of nonminimal harm to the potential market for, or the value of, their copyrighted works. The Betamax is, therefore, capable of substantial noninfringing uses. Sony's sale of such equipment to the general public does not constitute contributory infringement of respondents' copyrights."

Interpret that as you like.

Um, Osama got away with his attack in spite of any spying we were doing on him because when the president was notified of the threat he did nothing. Bush ignoring the August 6, 2001 Daily Briefing (more than a month before the attack) is one of the most ghastly mistakes in American history.

Anyways, postulating that threats make secrets necessary is just fearmongering. It also doesn't explain why Dick Cheney still refuses to release the energy task force records. Nor does it account for the long list of information Bush is withholding from the American electorate.

Actually, abortion was pretty much legal up until the second half of the 19th century. I was surprised to find this out, but I am pretty sure I can trust the legal historians of the U.S. Supreme Court. They mention this history in Roe v. Wade.

Every time this comes up the trolls sneak out of the woodwork to say that "copyright infringement isn't stealing because they still have the original!".

If anybody is trolling, it's the people who repeatedly assert that copyright infringement is stealing, even though the dictionary, the law, the courts, and damn near everybody on Slashdot disagree with them.

Let's sum this up quickly. To steal something you have to take something. Copying something is not taking something as the original remains in place. Furthermore, the legislation in the USA and the UK that defines the crime of theft does not include anything about copyright infringement. And, to top it all off, the Supreme Court of the USA ruled that copyright infringement is not theft twenty years ago.

It follows that interference with copyright does not easily equate with theft, conversion, or fraud. The Copyright Act even employs a separate term of art to define one who misappropriates a copyright... The infringer invades a statutorily defined province guaranteed to the copyright holder alone. But he does not assume physical control over the copyright; nor does he wholly deprive its owner of its use. While one may colloquially link infringement with some general notion of wrongful [473 U.S. 207, 218] appropriation, infringement plainly implicates a more complex set of property interests than does run-of-the-mill theft, conversion, or fraud.

Dowling vs USA, 1985

You don't think there is such a thing as intellectual property at all? [...] Playing semantics on the words "steal" and "property" is no excuse for doing something you know is wrong.

Another typical troll tactic. Just because somebody understands the difference between copyright infringement and theft, it doesn't mean that they a) don't think intellectual property exists, or b) that copyright infringement is not wrong.

The trolls that keep telling people copyright infringement is theft don't have a leg to stand on.

The rights guaranteed under the 2nd amendment are not your rights, they are the rights of a militia

Wrong.

" 'Professional journalist' shall mean one who, for gain or livelihood, is engaged in gathering, preparing, collecting, writing, editing, filming, taping or photographing of news intended for a newspaper, magazine, news agency, press association or wire service or other professional medium or agency which has as one of its regular functions the processing and researching of news intended for dissemination to the public; such person shall be someone performing said function either as a regular employee or as one otherwise professionally affiliated for gain or livelihood with such medium of communication." New York State Consolidated Laws, Article 7, Section 79-h (a)(6)

Wrong. " 'Professional journalist' shall mean one who, for gain or livelihood, is engaged in gathering, preparing, collecting, writing, editing, filming, taping or photographing of news intended for a newspaper, magazine, news agency, press association or wire service or other professional medium or agency which has as one of its regular functions the processing and researching of news intended for dissemination to the public; such person shall be someone performing said function either as a regular employee or as one otherwise professionally affiliated for gain or livelihood with such medium of communication." NY State Consolidated Laws, Art. 7, Sec. 79-h (a)(6)

Reading the article leads to references to court cases that led to this decision... U.S. v. Knotts and then in U.S. v. Karo established that police don't need court approval to track suspects through a crude radio beeper.

In 1999, the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals invoked that logic when deciding that federal agents did not need a court order to slap a GPS tracker on a truck owned by a man suspected of growing marijuana. "In placing the electronic devices on the undercarriage of the Toyota 4Runner, the officers did not pry into a hidden or enclosed area, the court ruled, saying the bug did not violate the Fourth Amendment's prohibition against unreasonable searches and seizures."

Do I need to point out that the 9th circuit is one of the more liberal and hence anti-"The Man" courts? Now the Washington Supreme court disagrees, but who wins in a case like this? Probably the Fed.

jason

Yes. Look up shield laws and Branzburg v. Hayes http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?c ourt=us&vol=408&invol=665 In many cases, reporters must disclose sources to use their evidence as court testimony, but some states have shield laws to protect against disclosure.

Evidently, YANAL. If you've any aspiration of becoming one, and especially if you have any intention of pontificating sensibly on privacy issues like the one being discussed here, you'll have to learn a heck of a lot of stuff that you seem not to get at the moment. Off the top of my head, one good place to look would be Larry Lessig's Code. Pay particular attention to the discussion of Olmstead v. United States and especially Katz v. United States, which overruled Olmstead and AFAIK remains legal precedent to this day.

Maybe then you'll have something even remotely sensible to say, about either the Fourth Amendment or anything else.

-HJ

Evidently, YANAL. If you've any aspiration of becoming one, and especially if you have any intention of pontificating sensibly on privacy issues like the one being discussed here, you'll have to learn a heck of a lot of stuff that you seem not to get at the moment. Off the top of my head, one good place to look would be Larry Lessig's Code. Pay particular attention to the discussion of Olmstead v. United States and especially Katz v. United States, which overruled Olmstead and AFAIK remains legal precedent to this day.

Maybe then you'll have something even remotely sensible to say, about either the Fourth Amendment or anything else.

-HJ

Security Alert on Microsoft Internet Explorer (from "SunTrust" support@suntrust.com)

I'd stop right there, as SunTrust tried to sue the publisher of The Wind Done Gone.

Conviction? For a breach of civil law?

Civil law my foot.

But besides, even without 17 USC 506, doesn't the point remain valid after s/conviction/finding of liability/? Let's try that again:

Or by "Napster", did Nom du Keyboard mean something that a law student wouldn't dare touch for fear of getting a finding of liability for copyright infringement on his permanent record?

Although the FLSA purports to authorize private actions against States in their own courts, the trial court dismissed the suit on the ground of sovereign immunity. The Maine Supreme Judicial Court affirmed ... The States' immunity from private suit in their own courts is beyond congressional power to abrogate by Article I legislation.

Although the FLSA purports to authorize private actions against States in their own courts, the trial court dismissed the suit on the ground of sovereign immunity. The Maine Supreme Judicial Court affirmed ... The States' immunity from private suit in their own courts is beyond congressional power to abrogate by Article I legislation.

Federal authorities Tuesday used the Patriot Act to charge a man with pointing a laser beam at an airplane overhead and temporarily blinding the pilot and co-pilot.

The chartered jet was flying at about 3,000 feet when the pilot and co-pilot saw a green laser beam strike the windshield three times, according to court documents filed Tuesday. The flash blinded the two temporarily, but they were later able to land the plane safely. After the helicopter crew also reported seeing laser beams, FBI agents canvassed Banach's neighborhood.

Please explain how you temporarily blind someone with a laser without having the light hit anyones eyes?

How do you see laser beams as the helicopter crew did, without light hitting someones eye? Some new fangled physics of photons you care to share with us?

"We need to send a clear message to the public that there is no harmless mischief when it comes to airplanes," said Christopher Christie, the U.S. attorney for New Jersey.

• This is a crime, and one which should be considered serious. It is not a crime which compares to the sort for which people spend 25 years in prison. This is a simple matter of applying the wrong laws to the criminal, and violates the criminal's rights under the 8th amendment, IMHO. This is backed up on FindLaw where the annotation suggests:

  English history which led to the inclusion of a predecessor provision in the Bill of Rights of 1689 indicates additional concern with arbitrary and disproportionate punishments.

  IANAL, but the idea of trying to hold a man to an anti-terrorism law with a 25 year prison-term for painting an airplane with a laser seems to me to be a clear-cut example of disproportionate, which is sad because it gives this guy (who deserves at LEAST a serious fine, if not some amount of prison time), a legitimate reason to get off, though possibly only through appeal.
  
• The quote from the U.S. attorney above is clearly wrong. There certainly is "harmless mischief when it comes to airplanes", but this isn't it. When you endanger the safety of passengers on an airplane or turn the airplane into a danger to others, that is not harmless mischief. When you don't, then it is harmless by definition. I know, for example, that hobbiest and non-commercial pilots are being brought under increasing restrictions and scrutiny for no particular reason of safety these days (restricting airspace around major cities was an unfortunate, but reasonable precaution, and there it should have stayed).
  
• Such an over-reaction serves to muddy an important issue: lasers (especially those that are more powerful than the garden-variety pointers) are not toys, and people who (ab)use them as such should expect to face law enforcement.
  

11417. (a) For the purposes of this article, the following terms have the following meanings:
(1) "Weapon of mass destruction" includes chemical warfare agents, weaponized biological or biologic warfare agents, restricted biological agents, nuclear agents, radiological agents, or the intentional release of industrial agents as a weapon, or an aircraft, vessel, or vehicle, as described in Section 34500 of the Vehicle Code, which is used as a destructive weapon.
(2) "Chemical Warfare Agents" includes, but is not limited to, the following weaponized agents, or any analog of these agents:
(A) Nerve agents, including Tabun (GA), Sarin (GB), Soman (GD), GF, and VX.

Honestly, I really don't want to come across as a member of the lunatic fringe who expects the President to announce the finding of a large cache of nukes and biologicals any moment now!, so please don't take it that way. However, for someone to state that "no WMDs were found in Iraq" they have to have chosen their definitions of "no" and "WMDs". I mainly wanted to point out that by a strict interpretation of "no", and a common definition of "WMDs", that statement is false.

Side rant: I was particularly cheesed by that pre-election report that "proved" that Republicans are unintelligent because a large percentage of them believed that there were WMDs. Frankly, I think I could have made a fact-based defense of either position, but one of the answers would have placed me in the pollster's "uninformed mouth-breather" category while the other would not. It seemed like a flashback to those IQ tests that ask whether the next number in the series "3 5 7" is "9" or "11"; one is the next odd number and one is the next prime number, but only one of the answers gives you credit for rational analysis.

Corporations are also taxed using different rules as opposed to individuals, and usually wind up paying higher rates (in theory) than individuals (although this varies according to the structure of the corporation.) As individuals do, they also find ways to minimize their tax burdens.

Ultimately, a corporation is responsible to its shareholders (owners). Governments can and do seize assets of corporations involved in illegal activity, and can shut them down.

And of course, corporations were originally created to shield their owners (shareholders) from legal liability beyond their investment in the corporation.

If you're looking for an external stimulus, try here.

Looks like someone's been pumping up Infinium's stock using fraudulant junk faxes.

It is the court that will impose sactions, at the request of the MPAA. For example, in CA, "when the duty to preserve evidence is violated, courts may impose appropriate sanctions for spoliation ranging from an adverse inference jury instruction to entry of judgment."