Slashdot Mirror

"As of February 2010, the Library has collected almost 160 terabytes of data." http://www.loc.gov/webarchiving/faq.html

Apple is not preventing, nor can they legally prevent, developers from developing apps for their own iPhones or other people's iPhones. This is why there are many apps available for so called "jailbroken" iPhones.

Actually they have been trying to do just that. It is Apple's stance that jail-breaking a phone is a violation of the DMCA (which it almost certainly is). According to Apple's view you would be committing a Federal crime by jail-breaking a phone you owned. The scarry part about the DMCA is that you most likely ARE committing a Federal crime when you jail-break your phone.

When the EFF tried to add in an exemption to the DMCA, Apple opposed the motion. You can read more in PC Worlds article. Or simply Google it:

http://www.pcworld.com/article/159532/apple_files_opposition_to_dmca_exemption_for_jailbreaking.html

While you really need to read the full text of the DMCA to fully appreciate what is going on. You can find the full text here:

http://w2.eff.org/IP/DMCA/hr2281_dmca_law_19981020_pl105-304.html

Or here:

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c105:H.R.2281.ENR:

This issue can pretty much be summed up by the first paragraph of section 1201:

`Sec. 1201. Circumvention of copyright protection systems `(a) VIOLATIONS REGARDING CIRCUMVENTION OF TECHNOLOGICAL MEASURES- (1)(A) No person shall circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title. The prohibition contained in the preceding sentence shall take effect at the end of the 2-year period beginning on the date of the enactment of this chapter.

The only defense in this situation would be fair use:

`(c) OTHER RIGHTS, ETC., NOT AFFECTED- (1) Nothing in this section shall affect rights, remedies, limitations, or defenses to copyright infringement, including fair use, under this title.

However you have to do all of the work your self:

`(b) ADDITIONAL VIOLATIONS- (1) No person shall manufacture, import, offer to the public, provide, or otherwise traffic in any technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof, that--

Now these are only excerpts. You really NEED to read the entire statute to understand what is going on. The thing is massive. In my opinion it is written in such a away as to be terrible for the average product owner.

First, it was Kay Bailey Hutchison (no "n" in Hutchison). Second, the bill can be found here, on THOMAS. Although the text of the bill isn't up yet, the introducing language is up. It's bill S. 3068, if anyone cares.

Third, this is not a good idea. If there was ever a time to grow our spaceflight industry it's now, at the inflection point. Saying that it will lose us space is just silly: who do they think we will contract with after Soyuz? Arianne? This is exactly how you win space, by spurring private sector investment in space transportation for its own purposes. Rocketry is mature enough for the start-ups, so get NASA to do things others cannot: major spaceflight research. Look at what Bigelow is doing with inflatable modules and is planning on doing going forward. If we can get such major tech in the hands of industry and provide a guaranteed market, I think we're well on our way to owning spaceflight.

Can you convert that into a more familiar unit, like Library of Congresses?

You know the Library of Congresses is a pretty reliable machine. Does anybody know what its downtime is?

The downtime for the Library of Congress is 4:30 pm - 8:30 am, Monday - Friday, and all day Sunday. That translates into an uptime of about 28.6%. If you take the Secret Service 68% as uptime, then it would be 2.4 Library of Congresses.

Google news is no substitute for a good newspaper. First, a good newspaper should do the aggregation for you, and so should duplicate what google's doing. Second, a *good* newspaper should provide a balanced, fact checked commentary on the news events.

Yeah, but you've gotta consider that we don't have, and have never had, very many *good* newspapers. Dig into some of the old archives. A good start might be at the Library of Congress. You'll be appalled by the quality of much of the reporting. (Others might contribute links to similar archives elsewhere.)

It has gotten worse in the past couple of decades. People blame the Internet for the crappy mainstream-media (MSM) news coverage, but the recent decline predates the public outing of the Internet. Much of the real reason, at least here in the US, was the political ending of enforcement of the anti-monopoly laws. This gave us the rampant buyout/merger process, which left most metro areas with only one newspaper, or sometimes two with a single owner. This allowed most newspapers to save on "costs" by cutting back on expensive things like fact checking and editing.

Then, when they woke up to the existence of the Internet, their response wasn't to restore the previous "added value", but rather to spend more on PR to try to persuade people that something of value was being lost. But most of the value had already been thrown away, or in many cases had never been there.

So go dig out all those archived newspapers and read them with a critical eye on "quality", whatever that means to you. In most cases, you'll be disappointed, and realize that we really haven't lost much.

A more practical approach might be to just say goodbye to the newspaper industry, and focus on how that (mostly imaginary) "value" can be provided online. You might observe that we sorta have the start of it. Among the zillions of blogs, there are some that do a reasonable jobs of fact checking. And, of course, their primary activity is aggregation, as we see here with slashdot, but most of them do more than that. Slashdot's comment and moderations system is an interesting example of something that is obviously far from perfect, but better than anything that a hard-copy newspaper could ever have provided. In particular, we see lots of fact checking here, provided free by readers at very little cost to the site's owners within hours of a story's appearance.

Maybe with a few more decades experimenting, we can come up with a "news" system that's better than what the newspapers gave us. And nobody will object if some of the old news publishers are part of it. They just have to understand that the game has changed, and they no longer have the ability to monopolize a market.

Wish I could post this logged in but I've already modded.

Yes, they do have video footage from 1906.

Here.

I think it will be important in 5 years to say: We've got a climate model that's made correct predictions for the last five years, so you should trust that model as a good guide to the future.

They've made plenty of predictions. They're just always wrong. The IPCC was established in 1989 and published its first assessment report in 1990. In that report, they predicted an increase of 1.3 to 2.3 degrees C. That didn't materialize and in 1997, the IPCC had their asses handed to them in front of congress:

However, it was apparent that when the first so-called consensus was imposed upon the issue of global warming by the First Scientific Assessment of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC, such an equilibrium had not been reached.

That report in 1990 stated, `When the latest atmospheric models are run with the present concentrations of greenhouse gases, their simulation of climate is generally realistic on large scales.'

The suite of climate models extant at that time predicted that the globe's mean temperature should have risen by then between 1.3 and 2.3 degrees Celsius. Slightly revised versions of these models provided the technical background for the Framework Convention on Climate Change, signed in 1992.

The observed warming since the late 19th Century has only been 0.5 degrees Celsius, or less than one-third of the predicted value. Critics argued, as I did before this committee, that there would have to be a dramatic reduction in the forecast of future warming in order to reconcile the facts and the hypotheses.

By 1995, in its second full assessment of climate change, the IPCC admitted the validity of the critics' position: `When increases in greenhouse gases only are taken into account, most climate models produce a greater mean warming than has been observed to date, unless a lower climate sensitivity to the greenhouse effect is used. There is growing evidences that increases in sulfate aerosols are partially counteracting the warming due to increases in greenhouse gases.'

Let me translate this statement. It means either it is not going to warm up as much as we said it would or something is hiding the warming. I predict that every attempt will be made to demonstrate the latter before admitting that the former is true.

So, the IPCC went back to the drawing board and returned with Mann's infamous Hockey stick graph. They declared DOOM. End of the world. Humanity was fucked. They extrapolated from 1998 temperatures (an unusually hot year) that climate change was 'for real' this time and was about to run out of control. When the skeptics got their hands on his computer model, they found that entering random data produced hockey stick graphs too. Oops.

So, uh, yeah, they've got egg on their face with that one. Nevermind that their prediction was wrong, again. Temperatures peaked in 1998 and haven't been that high since. In fact, it doesn't take a lot of searching to find examples of where their model predictions do not match reality.

In spite of all this, there are still people out there who believe in the IPCC. They cannot explain how this planet managed to have an ice age with atmospheric CO2 levels around 4200ppm during the Carboniferous period. They cannot account for three gigatons of CO2 that simply vanishes right out from under their noses each year. But hey, there's a consensus. The IPCC says so. So "the debate is over."

Nevermind Hansen's faked data. Nevermind the

More elementally, they hold that the United States was founded by devout Christians ...

True.

... and according to biblical precepts.

False. The founding fathers (especially Thomas Jefferson) read so much philosophy and ethics that The Christian Bible was one of a hundred sources. One could easily argue that the nation was founded on principles of the League of Five Nations as much as anything else. Yes, the founding fathers most likely borrowed from heathen savages that populated a land where everyone went to hell before the Europeans got here.

If the people in the article think the founding fathers didn't intend for a separation of church and state, let's visit what documentation we have from them:

Gentlemen

The affectionate sentiments of esteem and approbation which you are so good as to express towards me, on behalf of the Danbury Baptist association, give me the highest satisfaction. my duties dictate a faithful and zealous pursuit of the interests of my constituents, & in proportion as they are persuaded of my fidelity to those duties, the discharge of them becomes more and more pleasing.

Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between Man & his God, that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legitimate powers of government reach actions only, & not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should "make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between Church & State. Adhering to this expression of the supreme will of the nation in behalf of the rights of conscience, I shall see with sincere satisfaction the progress of those sentiments which tend to restore to man all his natural rights, convinced he has no natural right in opposition to his social duties.

I reciprocate your kind prayers for the protection & blessing of the common father and creator of man, and tender you for yourselves & your religious association, assurances of my high respect & esteem.

Th Jefferson
Jan. 1. 1802.

All men and women are created equal. Everyone has a right to practice what religion they so choose. So keep your religious crap out of our public schools.

I give you H.R. 676, a bill which would provide simple, single-payer health care to all legal residents of the United States, but keeps getting buried by Congress in favour of their massive, complex "health reform" bill that ironically does far less for the people. This bill would actually make the US health care system better than that of most Canadian provinces, since it covers things like dental and prescription medication.

It has been shown several times that single-payer care costs far, far less in the long run, and allows you to keep everything you have now, minus the insurance company that wants profit over your own health. Unfortunately, it seems that the right wing has successfully equated the term "single payer" with socialism or communism (OMG THE REDS, RUN AWAY!), so I doubt we'll see anything this sane in the next ten years.

How is this better than the physical book?

Because Haiti's literacy rate is somewhere around 50% to 65%. A bulky device everyone can use is better than a nice compact book that between 1/2 and 1/3rd can't use.

The whole trial smells of planned incompetence. As if someone wants a legal precedence on the books. You dont go into court arguing that the law is wrong, the courts dont address those concerns, government does. The court is only interested in enforcing laws on the books it seems to me. But im not a lawer so I dont really know shit about the process.

Slept your way through Social Studies, Government, and History classes did you? No matter, now that you have access to the internet I suggest you start here.

SONNY BONO COPYRIGHT TERM EXTENSION ACT (House of Representatives - October 07, 1998)

(should this search expire go to SONNY BONO COPYRIGHT TERM EXTENSION ACT (House of Representatives - October 07, 1998) and look for page 9951)

"...Actually, Sonny wanted the term of copyright protection to last forever. I am informed by staff that such a change would violate the Constitution. I invite all of you to work with me to strengthen our copyright laws in all of the ways available to us. As you know, there is also Jack Valenti's proposal for term to last forever less one day. Perhaps the Committee may look at that next Congress..."

Forever minus one day. Look for it around 2022-2023...r

SONNY BONO COPYRIGHT TERM EXTENSION ACT (House of Representatives - October 07, 1998)

(should this search expire go to SONNY BONO COPYRIGHT TERM EXTENSION ACT (House of Representatives - October 07, 1998) and look for page 9951)

"...Actually, Sonny wanted the term of copyright protection to last forever. I am informed by staff that such a change would violate the Constitution. I invite all of you to work with me to strengthen our copyright laws in all of the ways available to us. As you know, there is also Jack Valenti's proposal for term to last forever less one day. Perhaps the Committee may look at that next Congress..."

Forever minus one day. Look for it around 2022-2023...r

how many of these is that?

The link you posted doesn't work when followed directly. What people must do is:

Go to http://thomas.loc.gov. The bill, HR3962: Affordable Health Care for America Act, should be clearly linked in the homepage, but if it isn't just search for bill number HR3962. From there, follow the link "Text of Legislation". That takes you to the table of contents, where getting to Title III, Subsection C, Section 347 is straightforward.

Undocumented aliens are explicitly prohibited from benefiting from any subsidized health insurance programs created in this bill.

Please see: Title III, Subsection C, Section 347

SEC. 347. NO FEDERAL PAYMENT FOR UNDOCUMENTED ALIENS.

"Nothing in this subtitle shall allow Federal payments for affordability credits on behalf of individuals who are not lawfully present in the United States."

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:H.R.3962:

Um.. Maybe on your printer, using the straight text.

But the way the house actually formatted it, which is, I presume, their standard typesetting and therefore makes "page count" a relevant measure for comparing bills' length, it is indeed 1990 pages. Her is a link which has a link to the 5 MB pdf version.

1. http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/107xx/doc10710/hr3962Dingell_mgr_amendment_update.pdf, pg. 1.

2. http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?c111:1:./temp/~c111j3JbX9:e330194:,SEC. 347. NO FEDERAL PAYMENT FOR UNDOCUMENTED ALIENS.

It was an amendment to a bill. My apologies for not making that clearer:

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d111:SP2588:

Um, no, that's another program. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Car_Allowance_Rebate_System [wikipedia.org] or CARS. THATS cash for clunkers.

Yes, please read that link. Scroll down to section 'legislative history', fourth paragraph. Notice this is Betty Sutton's bill. She got it passed on HR2454 on May 19th. Here's John Dingell congratulating her about "Fleet Modernization/Cash for Clunkers". Check that previous link I sent you to her website - as of May 21st, it was pulled as an amendment and offered as its own bill, HR 2640, which was re-introduced as HR 2751, which Wikipedia verifies as the CARS program. Go ahead and compare the bills, there are some minor changes (always are if the bill number changes), but it's the same bill.

The full title of HR2751, aka CARS aka C4C, is: To accelerate motor fuel savings nationwide and provide incentives to registered owners of high polluting automobiles to replace such automobiles with new fuel efficient and less polluting automobiles.

But please, feel free to check out the offical site and show me where it says businesses are eligible for the rebate: http://www.cars.gov/ [cars.gov]

Who ever said anything about businesses?

If you've been curious, why have you wanted until now to search?

Eh? I'm well aware of the issues, I was giving you some links since you couldn't find the first hit on Google.

But let me do some searching for you and point you to an article thats NOT three months old already: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aQcFan9QMe0k [bloomberg.com]

Do you understand that article? It says that the booked revenue in GDP was inflated due to the Cash for Clunkers sales. It does not refute the source I showed you that the auto manufacturers were ramping up production to back-fill inventory due to C4C, which was counter to your claim. Manufacturing activity would not be booked as GDP revenue.

For months now, some RIAA-influenced Congressmen have been working on a crazily overbroad P2P regulation bill, H.R. 1319: The Informed P2P User Act. It just passed out of committee last month.

I would expect Congressmen to be falling all over each other to bring this to a vote now. After all, it's they're no longer just doing it for the RIAA/MPAA "campaign contributions." Now, it's personal.

'Insurance companies aren't the "wrong hands."'

The US Congress (for example) begs to differ:

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d110:HR00493:@@@L&summ2=m&

Within the next decade, whole genome sequencing, which has already come down in price from several billion to $50,000 USD, is almost certainly going to become affordable enough to be used a a routine diagnostic procedure, enabling true personalised medicine (a '$1000 genome' is widely predicted). Do you think that filing your genome with an insurance company is placing it in the 'right hands'?

'"pre-existing conditions" are only a problem because, for some reason, insurance isn't structured such that the insurer you had at the time of diagnosis is responsible for that condition and its complications from then on.'

I believe 'for some reason' here translates as 'because it might reduce profits'.

'So there needs to be an option to have continuous coverage from the time of conception.'

You mean like this?:

http://www.nhs.uk/NHSEngland/aboutnhs/Pages/About.aspx

http://thomas.loc.gov/ Read anything you want. You don't need the president's permission to read bills before they become law. Though, unlike your representatives, you're not bound by due diligence to do so.

You have obviously have not heard of THOMAS. I know its popular to blame Obama for everything, especially things he has nothing to do with, but get your fucking facts straight. It makes you look like less of an idiot.

Well, I can only suggest searching Thomas for it. Good luck, it's not easy to search by date. If you don't know which Congress passed it, you'll need to check several Congresses...

Squatter, or just extreme slacker?

When I first reached out to google for the definition of squatter, I got a bit confused as to where the illegality lay[gr.?]. The definition of squatter hereseems to express two types, those with legal, and illegal. When I switched the search to cybersquatter, I then understood more about where the laws start, (though seems a amendment may be needed) here in the United States, Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act passed in 1999, an amendment to the Trademark Act 1946 also known as the Lanham Act.

Where am I going with this? How does one determine good faith? How do you differentiate between a person who might struggle to get it up (specially if a deadline looms overhead, further if that deadline is tightened) and one who is squatting maliciously, awaiting a time when they can resell the slot to someone else who has developed the application, put in the sweat, time, thought, tears, hours, etc...
To end with a wee bit of entertainment amidst all this legal jumbo-gumbo, figured I might throw a little head-nod to J.R. Bob "Dobbs" (not MS's failed project). Slacking is an artform, a religion, one that many take quite seriously. So much so they used it in the naming of a Linux distro. Slacker? Or Ill-memes willful disconsolation?

His ownership of that particular copyright is showing up in the U.S. Copyright Office online search, so there's no excuse for MySpace not knowing who owns it.

It is most definitely about MySpace. It doesn't matter what Warner claims (even if it was illegal and they could be sued for theft), MySpace has the duty to investigate the claim of copyright. It's not even that hard! Go to the U. S. Copyright Office Search Page and type in "Collins Edwyn" and the sixth link to return is "Girl Like You". If I can find it in 2 minutes, how long should it take MySpace?

If any one cares, this idea is one of the key things that Ted Nelson (you know, the guy who invented the word "hypertext"), wanted from his Xanadu system. He was really interested in tools to assist in inter-comparison of multiple versions of text. In fact, he apparently wanted tools that are a little more complex than the usual version control front-end, for example, he liked the idea of letting a writer organize some thoughts in three different ways, then pick which version seems best without risking losing an important point in one of the other versions.

But yeah, it would seem to be a rather useful public service for someone to take the publicly available info about pending legislation, and just load it all into a mediawiki site, or some such, so that people can easily browse through the history of the changes. Just to pick an example at random, there are four versions of this bill in the THOMAS database: H.R.3221, and that page provides links to all of the versions, without any obvious way of comparing them.

By the way, there's an awful lot of interesting stuff out there apparently dying in committee, just waiting for some bright young political blogger to pick up on them:

S.J.RES.4:

Title: A joint resolution proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States to abolish the electoral college and to provide for the direct popular election of the President and Vice President of the United States. Sponsor: Sen Nelson, Bill [FL] (introduced 1/8/2009) Cosponsors (None) Related Bills: H.J.RES.9 Latest Major Action: 1/8/2009 Referred to Senate committee. Status: Read twice and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary.

S.48

Title: A bill to amend the Help America Vote Act of 2002 to require new voting systems to provide a voter-verified permanent record, to develop better accessible voting machines for individuals with disabilities, and for other purposes. Sponsor: Sen Ensign, John [NV] (introduced 1/6/2009) Cosponsors (None) Latest Major Action: 1/6/2009 Referred to Senate committee. Status: Read twice and referred to the Committee on Rules and Administration.

If any one cares, this idea is one of the key things that Ted Nelson (you know, the guy who invented the word "hypertext"), wanted from his Xanadu system. He was really interested in tools to assist in inter-comparison of multiple versions of text. In fact, he apparently wanted tools that are a little more complex than the usual version control front-end, for example, he liked the idea of letting a writer organize some thoughts in three different ways, then pick which version seems best without risking losing an important point in one of the other versions.

But yeah, it would seem to be a rather useful public service for someone to take the publicly available info about pending legislation, and just load it all into a mediawiki site, or some such, so that people can easily browse through the history of the changes. Just to pick an example at random, there are four versions of this bill in the THOMAS database: H.R.3221, and that page provides links to all of the versions, without any obvious way of comparing them.

By the way, there's an awful lot of interesting stuff out there apparently dying in committee, just waiting for some bright young political blogger to pick up on them:

S.J.RES.4:

Title: A joint resolution proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States to abolish the electoral college and to provide for the direct popular election of the President and Vice President of the United States. Sponsor: Sen Nelson, Bill [FL] (introduced 1/8/2009) Cosponsors (None) Related Bills: H.J.RES.9 Latest Major Action: 1/8/2009 Referred to Senate committee. Status: Read twice and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary.

S.48

Title: A bill to amend the Help America Vote Act of 2002 to require new voting systems to provide a voter-verified permanent record, to develop better accessible voting machines for individuals with disabilities, and for other purposes. Sponsor: Sen Ensign, John [NV] (introduced 1/6/2009) Cosponsors (None) Latest Major Action: 1/6/2009 Referred to Senate committee. Status: Read twice and referred to the Committee on Rules and Administration.

If any one cares, this idea is one of the key things that Ted Nelson (you know, the guy who invented the word "hypertext"), wanted from his Xanadu system. He was really interested in tools to assist in inter-comparison of multiple versions of text. In fact, he apparently wanted tools that are a little more complex than the usual version control front-end, for example, he liked the idea of letting a writer organize some thoughts in three different ways, then pick which version seems best without risking losing an important point in one of the other versions.

But yeah, it would seem to be a rather useful public service for someone to take the publicly available info about pending legislation, and just load it all into a mediawiki site, or some such, so that people can easily browse through the history of the changes. Just to pick an example at random, there are four versions of this bill in the THOMAS database: H.R.3221, and that page provides links to all of the versions, without any obvious way of comparing them.

By the way, there's an awful lot of interesting stuff out there apparently dying in committee, just waiting for some bright young political blogger to pick up on them:

S.J.RES.4:

Title: A joint resolution proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States to abolish the electoral college and to provide for the direct popular election of the President and Vice President of the United States. Sponsor: Sen Nelson, Bill [FL] (introduced 1/8/2009) Cosponsors (None) Related Bills: H.J.RES.9 Latest Major Action: 1/8/2009 Referred to Senate committee. Status: Read twice and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary.

S.48

Title: A bill to amend the Help America Vote Act of 2002 to require new voting systems to provide a voter-verified permanent record, to develop better accessible voting machines for individuals with disabilities, and for other purposes. Sponsor: Sen Ensign, John [NV] (introduced 1/6/2009) Cosponsors (None) Latest Major Action: 1/6/2009 Referred to Senate committee. Status: Read twice and referred to the Committee on Rules and Administration.

Congress doesn't want us to know what the bills say

Oh, please. Other versions are available too. Wikipedia is one starting point for pointers and summaries.

Aren't you bothered that most in Congress don't read the bill before they sign it

Citation needed.

In any case, Linus doesn't read every line of code that goes through his mailbox, either. It *might* be technically possible, if he did it too quickly to understand it well, and didn't spend any time on anything else, but it would be a stupid use of his time. Instead, he delegates work to maintainers and is able to focus on particular areas that need it.

Want code to be better reviewed? Great, work on that, but don't get sidelined by a narrow focus on whether everyone's eyes passed over each word of some bill.

I think you're missing the point.

Here is an example of bill.

Go to section 3.

You will see that the bill is actually a diff on previous laws.

To read the law modified by this bill, you need to get the text of the laws referenced by this bill.

Hence the idea of using a version control system, to be able to read side-by-side the law before and after the bill.

First, it is important to note that I was not referring to infringement; I was talking about legitimate interest in commercially licensing the use of the name, voice or other personal aspect (likeness) of a deceased person, and the financial implications of any agreed upon legal use for the decedent's estate.

Second, not every asset mentioned in my post was meant to be classified specifically as IP (although many people use the terms "intellectual property," "intellectual work," or "intangible asset" interchangeably, despite the distinctions between these categories). The ability to control the use of one's name and likeness is part of a person's right of publicity. This is state-determined right that is an intangible asset, but, yes, distinctly different from (though related to) the copyright and trademark categories of IP. Intellectual property is a subset of the overarching class of intangible assets, so there is a broad range of monetizable intangible assets that factor into estate planning in terms of value or taxation that are not strictly classified as IP. Here is a good explanation of the relationship of one's right to privacy and rights of publicity to copyright, and here is a good case study on the estate of Marilyn Monroe that shows the interplay of these issues. As you can see from that case study, these post-mortem rights can be of significant value to the estate of the decedent.

(If you are interested in taxation issues, one one of my previous posts in this thread links to some good search results on that topic.)

For those who want to protest, Representative Blumenauer's phone number is (503) 231-2300. Anyone can protest, but this is Blumenauer's district.

More about the bill: H.R. 3311.

Blog coverage: OpenCongress.

More coverage: H.R. 3311 is an oxymoron.

Most albums released this year won't sell many copies in 2014.

Yes, things get discontinued. For example, Apple discontinues Mac mini models once they fall below roughly $600. But among the albums that are not discontinued, the price generally doesn't go down.

Only a very few bands will still be selling their 10-year-old albums in 2019

But they don't sell cheaper. In fact, the price of a new Beatles CD is probably higher than the price of the same Beatles LP the day it came out. Compare new copies to new copies issued later, not new copies to used copies.

You could look at it another way: how much does a loaf of bread cost now compared to how much a loaf of bread cost 45 years ago when the Beatles were a new band? In at least the United States, the Royalty Board adjusts the standard royalty for some compulsory copyright licenses based on the Consumer Price Index, which in turn is based on the price of bread. I see no reason that this cost-of-living adjustment philosophy would differ noticeably in other countries.

First off, the fourth amendment border search exemption does not include correspondence, and only applies to people or cargo coming into the country, which was the reason for my pretzel logic comment.

Actually, yes it does. The courts deem customs officials may also search "any trunk or envelope, wherever found," in which they have "reasonable cause to suspect"9 there is merchandise imported contrary to law. The U.S. Supreme Court has interpreted "any trunk or envelope" to include all international mail entering the United States. (Ramsey, 431 U.S. 606)

I call BS. I think you pulled that out of your ass. Specifically established exceptions to the 4th amendment did not enter into law until the Rehnquist court. Please cite specifically any other legislation or rulings that establish exceptions. I'm thinking you can't.

What is it with you and your inane lack of ability to do the slightest bit of searching for historically correct information. Now listen to me carefully, it's not hard to do a google search and you should at least attempt to find out if you are wrong before showing the world that you are.

FYI, the word regulated is the inflected form of regulate.

The phrase isn't regulate or regulated. It's "well regulated" (and you can add militia to it too), it's a prefatory clause, and it has the meaning I said. It's explained competently in the DC Heller case. I suggest you spend a few minute reading it before charging at windmills again.

When it comes to the DC gun case, Justice Stephens pretty much tore the ruling opinion apart with his dissenting opinion. Remember, this was a contested ruling. The right wing activists won 5-4.

Actually, no he didn't. I suggest you actually read it all, including all the references and citations. Justice SCALIA,addressed Justice Stephens dissent and actually supported his rejection of those arguments with citations not only in law, but state constitutions, english laws, and understood dictionaries as well as literature at the time the amendment was created. He even compared Justice Stephens' dissent with other provisions in the constitution which specifically mention a right held by the people and pointed to the absurdity of the clause if it were interpreted the same way. This isn't a left right political decision and it isn't some activist decision. You have been wrong about almost everything else and you are wrong here too. Again, read the fucking decision- all of it.

At the very least, no matter how much you say you think you know about civics and the law, I'm going to take a supreme court justices word over yours every time.

And Justice SCALIA, addressed those words competently and even showed how incompetent that analysis is when compared to other constitutional provisions and matters of law. Like I said, read the entire fucking opinion.

The bottom line is that Obama's only significant action as president concerning gun control up to now was to expand your rights.

He didn't do it of his own free will, and his past is competently indicative of his future. Or are you going to claim he was a liar until now that you somehow find one instance that he was pushed into politically advantageous?

Just ask you, you'll tell me, huh? What a laugh. You accuse ME of not paying attention that's a laugh and a half. Here is the video you linked to:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D9X2V

Yes, if when you say "boss", you mean "US Senate", where this bill was introduced.

In any case, supporting that sentiment that elected officials of opposing parties are not significantly distinguishable, note that this bill in its original form was a bipartisan bill, as one of the co-sponsors, Sen Snowe, Olympia J. [ME], is a member of the GOP.

Olympia Snowe is a Republican in name only (RINO). It's easier to get her to sign on to a Democrat bill than a Republican one.

Yes, if when you say "boss", you mean "US Senate", where this bill was introduced.

In any case, supporting that sentiment that elected officials of opposing parties are not significantly distinguishable, note that this bill in its original form was a bipartisan bill, as one of the co-sponsors, Sen Snowe, Olympia J. [ME], is a member of the GOP.

Yes, that Olympia Snowe who voted with the Republican Party slightly less often then Arlen Specter did when he was a Republican.

Yes, if when you say "boss", you mean "US Senate", where this bill was introduced.

In any case, supporting that sentiment that elected officials of opposing parties are not significantly distinguishable, note that this bill in its original form was a bipartisan bill, as one of the co-sponsors, Sen Snowe, Olympia J. [ME], is a member of the GOP.

They're not showing any probable cause, either. Routine searches with no grounds for suspicion are unreasonable, QED.

My understanding is that Customs doesn't need any suspicion to search anything crossing the border.
They can even open any in/outbound international mail.
Can you provide any citations that say Customs is not allowed to search [anything] at the border?

I believe the limit is that they are not allowed to conduct invasive procedures (shoving a finger up your ass, exploratory surgery) without a warrant.
Oh, and diplomats.

Good news? The government isn't going to enforce net neutrality because they care about your freedom. They're simply eliminating the competition.

Go read the Cybersecurity Act of 2009. Wow.

In 1998, Congress made identity theft a federal crime when it enacted the Identity Theft and Assumption Deterrence Act (Identity Theft Act).5 The act made it a criminal offense for a person to "knowingly transfer, possess, or use without lawful authority," another person's means of identification "with the intent to commit, or to aid or abet, or in connection with, any unlawful activity that constitutes a violation of federal law, or that constitutes a felony under any applicable state or local law." Under the act, a name or SSN is considered a "means of identification," and a number of cases have been prosecuted under this law.

Now, with that, I would seek a lawyer who would take this case (maybe even some high profile lawyer or a member of the EFF) and clearly outline the above in a written letter with your signature informing them that they are in violation of the "Identity Theft and Assumption Deterrence Act (Identity Theft Act)" and if they do not remove your Social Security Numbers, you will take legal action. If your case is solid enough, you might be able to really stick it to DirectTV for storing personal private data "without lawful authority" as they do not have the written consent of every customer.

Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act is a safe harbor provision for providers of an interactive computer service. The DMCA does not even contain a Section 230.

The DMCA safe harbour provision is Section 512

Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act is a safe harbor provision for providers of an interactive computer service. The DMCA does not even contain a Section 230.

House Resolution 1020 is a bill that will address this kind of forceful arbitration. However, the bill is currently in committee and if people do not get the members of this committee to move this resolution to a floor vote, then this is all pretty moot. Please take a look at the members of the House Committee on the Judiciary. If one of the members is your Representative, write them. Otherwise this thing will most surely die in committee since this is not the most pressing matter on the public's mind.

If your Representative is not listed as a member of the House Committee on the Judiciary but you live in the same state as a member of the House Committee on the Judiciary. Write your Representative to urge the member to move the bill to the floor, so that your Representative can get a chance to help you out. Usually, members of the same state know each other pretty well and talk to each other about broad topics that affect the state as a whole.

If you live in a state that has no members on the committee. Check to see if your Representative or a Representative from your state co-sponsored the bill. If so, make your case using that point; if not, write your Representative asking why they did not co-sponsor the bill and make your point about how not having legal recourse affects you and your community in general.

Always remember one big point when you write your Representative...Always make sure you make it entirely clear what it is you expect your Representative to do, and make sure it is within their power to do so. If you just tell them about HR 1020 and that they should support it, then all you are going to get back as a reply is, 'their sorry but it must make it out of committee before they can do anything about it, but if it does make it to the floor they'll be sure to consider it carefully. Yours truly, Rep. Blah Blah Blah (X-Your state).'

(According to their about page)

Which means that the reader holds only 0.0000109375 LoC. ...just so you have a value that you can relate to something.

No new legislation is needed. Just get the courts involved.

Exactly. This act is already illegal. It is called typo-squatting.

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c106:S.1255.IS:=
Specifically, see section 3, (2)(a), and probably (2)(b) as well.

Now we just need as many people as we can get, whom have a domain name which is trademarked, to press charges against comcast under this law for your own domain.

`(i) an award of statutory damages in the amount of--

      `(I) not less than $1,000 or more than $100,000 per trademark per identifier, as the court considers just; or
      `(II) if the court finds that the registration or use of the registered trademark as an identifier was willful, not less than $3,000 or more than $300,000 per trademark per identifier, as the court considers just; and
      `(ii) full costs and reasonable attorney's fees.

Chances are since the main purpose of this change is for ad revenue, and not a willful infringement, only line (I) will apply.
Additionally, you probably can't get the 'bad faith' additions applied, unless you can somehow prove the ads served on their 'page not found' fake-page happen to be ads for your competition.

But a minimum of $1000 plus attorney fee's is pretty decent if you have nothing better to do...

Let's say you're standing in a library with 20 shelves in front of you and thousands of books. You could take a picture and you'd immediately know where the book you're looking for is.'

I can't believe it's taken so long to come up with a solution to for finding books in libraries. Maybe they can even find a way to extend this to allow online searches for books.

Interesting...Why would McCain cosponsor the amendment?