Using R44 And A PowerBook To Bust Illegal Seawalls

Sylvestre writes "Ken Adelman, founder of TGV and Network Alchemy, is using a digital camera, helicopter, and a Power Book to take a high resolution photograph every 500 feet down the California coast. The goal? Busting people putting up illegal sea walls. The catch so far? One golf course covered the beach with boulders. Also of note: the website has 44 gigs of photos so far, runs on solar power, and is Microsoft Free. Best use of technology I've seen all month!"

Comments

Why the need of seawall?

[Goalie_Ca]

They shouldn't be developping right along the coast anyways. It would be nice to have a large buffer zone.

Re:Why the need of seawall?

[Cyno01]

yeah, so not too much is lost when callifornia drops into the ocean

what a resource

[theCat]

That must have some value in general as a geophysical survey. 500 foot resolution would be expen$ive to get if you were to pay for it on contract!

Why illegal?

[dsanfte]

Question... why would making a "sea wall" be illegal?

Re:Why illegal?

[SirKron]

Sea walls are illegal if it can obstruct the natural sea life from living its life. Example: frogs cannot get from the water to the land to multiply and be fruitful.

Re:Why illegal?

[dsanfte]

Ah, thank you.

Re:Why illegal?

[Suppafly]

Yes, but wouldn't the added benefit of not having your entire property slide into the ocean give you a legitimate claim against the frogs?

Re:Why illegal?

[SirKron]

It is really funny, the Department of Natural Resources usually care more about how the land "used to" look versus what it "could" look like. Erosion is natural and would happen anyways. In fact, erosion helps sealife get on shore. Retaining walls are good for man, period.

Re:Why illegal?

[El]

Because beaches are public property. Erecting a wall in the middle of the freeway might improve your property too (cut down on that damn traffic noise!) but that's also illegal.

Re:Why illegal?

[nomadic]

It's not just your property though. That seawall may prevent erosion on your golf course, but the guy who lives down the coast a little might experience greater erosion because of it.

Re:Why illegal?

[ender81b]

No you would be the one stupid enough to *buy* property about to slide into the sea you deserve what you get. If you buy beachfront property and need a sea wall you shouldn't be buying it in the the first place or *shock* you should've built your house on a different location. There are other solutions to building a sea wall btw, that is just the cheapest. Also, people

Seriously, this is crap. The beach is the most dynamic enviroment the earth has to offer, and one of the most vital to organism reproducing. I could care less about your 400,000$ beachfront house that is going to be rubble the next time a hurricane/el nino/mudslide comes around anyways. Repeat after me - never build that close to a beach.

Bah, sorry for the rant it has been a long day. I took a oceanography class last semester from a really good professor who drilled into us how dumb beachfront building really is.

Re:Why illegal?

[JonWan]

Heh... not in California, besides I always thought that if you bought property in an erosion zone you deserve what you get. Your million dollar house falls into the ocean, tough you're the idiot that built it on a cliff.

Re:Why illegal?

[dubl-u]

Yes, but wouldn't the added benefit of not having your entire property slide into the ocean give you a legitimate claim against the frogs?

The no-seawall stuff isn't just for the little froggies, although destroying a public resource (the ecosystem) for private gain is generally a no-no. Other reasons include

• California requires public access to the coast; some seawalls impede that, often intentionally
• seawalls on one property can increase erosion on nearby properties
• stopping erosion means that beaches aren't replenished, destroying them

So turn it around: Why would being dumb enough to build on an eroding piece of land give you a legitimate claim to build a seawall?

Re:Why illegal?

[Brendan Byrd]

Yeah and it "could" look like a completely grey planet, covered in buildings and streets. Urban development is cool and all, but sometimes it gets in the way of stuff like....ummm...breathing and the temperature of the planet (ie: global warming). You have to maintain a healthy balance, which is clearly on the wrong side of technology right now. Mostly anything the DoNR does to promote how the land "used to" look is a good thing.

Re:Why illegal?

[tbmaddux]

All seawalls should be illegal, because they destroy beaches. The landowner is tossing rocks or concrete into the ocean to save his property at the expense of the public's property (the beach). Seawalls erode beaches by burying them under rubble (placement loss), reflecting waves and causing the sand to move offshore (active loss) and by simply being there as the shoreline retreats towards them (passive loss). Read works by Orrin Pilkey, or visit The Surfrider Foundation for more information.

Many states have banned seawalls altogether. Washington is one example. In California, seawall construction is limited by the Coastal Act (passed in 1976) but not banned, and there are major loopholes, including language to protect "existing structures" which can be creatively interpreted to include a structure that did not exist yesterday but exists today. More and more of California's coastline is being buried under seawalls, including "temporary" "emergency" piles of rock that are never removed because the Commission doesn't have a police force to patrol the beaches. What little monitoring there is, is done entirely by volunteers, and kudos to them if they've gotten access to a helicopter to keep our beaches from vanishing!

Re:Why illegal?

[!splut]

Frogs do not live in saltwater. No frog larvae (tadpoles) are able to survive in salt water. A very small minority of frogs are able to tolerate brackish water as adults (Bufo marinus, the infamous caine toad, is one such animal), but no adult frogs live in seawater either.

I'm sure you're right about why sea walls are illegal, but if the legislation is limited to points along the coast, then your specific example is incorrect. Destruction of the habitat of shorebirds or the nesting sties of seaturtles would be a better example.

Re:Why illegal?

[endoboy]

it's a "community property" issue....

as a general rule, seawalls cause more damage overall (say within a 1 mile radius) than they prevent locally. In general, the benefit that accrues to your personal beach comes at the expense of the next guy down the line...

it becomes an escalation thing--your seawall pushes the damage over to your neighbor, who is then forced to build a seawall, which pushes the damages down to the next guy. If carried to the extreme, you get a line of seawalls instead of a coast--something the army corp of engineers has learned to its dismay in more than one location....

This happens because the currents that are important for beach building move laterally to the beach, carrying sand along. A sea wall interupts that current for the builders benefit, but to the overall detriment of the system

Re:Why illegal?

[endoboy]

If I could get a beachfront house in CA for $400k I'd jump on it it a second.... time to recalibrate your real-estate-o-meter--the correct # probably has an additional zero

Re:Why illegal?

[ender81b]

Wow. Figures how much I know, just a hick country boy from nebraska =).

Re:Why illegal?

[dubl-u]

That reminds me of the reason they blocked building a bypass route near my area. An environmental group said a bunch of frogs would be killed because of it.

Well, that's just great. Instead we have 20 minute idle times and the city's smog is so bad it kills many asthmatics per year.

Won't someone think of the poor people.

Has it occurred to you that maybe all those people shouldn't have moved to a place with crappy transportation infrastructure? Or that if driving their cars kills asthmatics, maybe the solution is to pollute less rather than destroying more (publicly owned, pollution-cleaning) ecosystem?

More to the point, in the long term, adding more suburban freeway capacity doesn't solve anything. In the studies I've looked at, commuters don't drive less after capacity is added, they just drive farther. They do this mainly by moving yet farther out from the cities where they work.

As far as I can tell, the people are doing a great job of thinking of themselves already. Which is sort of the problem, isn't it?

Re:Why illegal?

[jerryasher]

I couldn't make the boulders out well in the newspaper's photograph, so here is the medium size image of the Ritz Carlton Half Moon Bay , the beachfront, and the boulders taken from the website.

It is identified as: N37 26.03 W122 26.84 Image 6133 Mon Sep 30 16:05:57 2002

Re:Why illegal?

[Andy Social]

Part of the Coastal Conservation Act, from 1974 I believe. Basically states that the coast from Santa Barbara to San Francisco shall not be developed beyond certain very minimal allowable actions.

Makes the coast between SB and SF not look like the port of San Pedro, which is a Good Thing.

Re:Why illegal?

[SirKron]

True, my experience is with inland waterways. Building retaining walls is illegal on most waterways and lakes and here in Wisconsin the little frogs are the reason.

Re:Why illegal?

[Gorobei]

Because sand often travels *along* coastlines. If I build a sea-wall, I protect my bit of sand, and the beach down-stream erodes. This forces my downstream neighbor to sea-wall his beach, and so on. Pretty soon everyone has a sea-wall, a strange curved beach, crappy water circulation, and diminished tidal wildlife.

Sometimes you just got to accept that some shorelines erode, and banning all seawalls will reduce the overall erosion rate and protect the shoreline (in terms of clean sand, healthy ecosystem.) Yes, you must accept the shore will erode at a slow rate, but that is just nature at work... the only way to halt it is to build a seamless concrete fortification down the entire coast, which rather defeats the purpose.

Re:Why illegal?

[jafac]

$400,000 beach house? Where? All the beach houses I'm familliar with around here (pretty much anywhere in CA) start in the low $2 millions.

Re:Why illegal?

[be-fan]

You know, you just made my day a bit better. Make's me happy to know that there are people around how know stuff. Thanks for teaching me something new. It's little moments like this that keep me coming back to Slashdot :)

Re:Why illegal?

[shepd]

>Or are you just being hypocritical in your criticism?

Actually, I'm being sarcastic. Or, I was being sarcastic. Right now I'm being serious.

Sorry for misleading you.

Re:Why illegal?

[plague3106]

If you don't wnat your house to slide into the ocean, don't build that close to the ocean!

I have no sympahy for those that lose thier house to a flood when they live in a known flood plain.

The other problem with your attitude is that eventually we'll be the only living things left if we act like that...which would utimatly lead to our own demise.

Re:Why illegal?

[1010011010]

I agree, environmental protection is -- or should be -- a property-rights issue. In your example, the damaged party would be able to seek remedy before the law against the person who caused the destruction of his property.

Re:Why illegal?

[shepd]

Okay, let me lay it all out for you.

The current mass transportation system in this city is pretty much out of the 1920's. The city I'm talking about is Kitchener-Waterloo, Ontario, Canada (the place with the university Microsoft would pretty much like to buy out).

From what I've been told by people who have to use the thing, it takes a bus two hours to do what a car can do in 15 minutes. There is no subway, and buses rarely go between anything but the twin cities. Trains are a total no-go unless your destination is hours away. The buses are so bad it actually takes a good 20 minute walk to get to the new, much touted, and horridly expensive RIM park from the closest drop off point.

The last suggestion to "fix" the mass transportation system was to block off a lane of traffic down the main street (which is already at a standstill) and put a streetcar down it, between multiple cities, which would run every 10 minutes at a cost of 1/3 billion (yes, billion) dollars. Now, this train will reach about 5% of the city, and about 1% of the population, thereby making it completely useless as a transportation system. Blocking off the main route even further exasparates the already horrible traffic problems.

So, with a city council so stupid with transportation that the Mayor was almost caught DWI, there will never be a proper mass transit system.

What's your solution? I think a bypass route makes a lot more sense.

>They do this mainly by moving yet farther out from the cities where they work

Well, that's a _good_ thing. A higher population spread will spread the pollution. In a country like Canada where about 5% of the land makes something like 95% of the pollution, this is exactly what's needed. We could be cleaner than Japan if everyone spread out.

So, what's your solution in this case, where mass transit is a no go?

Re:Why illegal?

[plierhead]

Rant is right. The issue of seawalls is a little more complex than you make out.

You say never build that close to a beach. The thing is, cliffs and foreshores move over time. It may happen gradually, or there may be a huge slip that moves the coast inwards by many yards overnight. So when you say "don't build that close to a beach", how not close is not close enough ? Where I live the same discussion is going on. The council discourages building seawalls. Trouble is, theres only one line of houses, then the public road. What happens when the houses are gone and the road comes under threat ? In some parts of the UK the land is disappearing at the rate of up to 5 metres per year.

Sure, developers who want to create huge unnatural structures that play havoc with the natural wave and current patterns should get a hard time. But its a bit too simplistic to just say "never build near the sea".

Re:Why illegal?

[loraksus]

you're a fucking vegan, aren't you? Stop using my fucking air

Re:Why illegal?

[Peyna]

Basically building a seawall might protect YOUR beach, but the next guy down the coast is going to have even more energy now eroding his beach. Much like a dam, they are done to improve the environment on one side of something for the benefit of one person without regard to much else. The Colorado river used to be a heck of a lot cooler and more powerful, and even flooded like the Mississippi and Nile before we stopped it up. Natural processes work themselves out and human solutions only seak to temporarily make life easier for us.

Re:Why illegal?

[sean23007]

Exactly. And whoever was responsible for putting the salt in that water that is obviously intended only for killing frog larvae will be severely punished. You know who you are.

Re:Why illegal?

[dubl-u]

Well, that's a _good_ thing. A higher population spread will spread the pollution. In a country like Canada where about 5% of the land makes something like 95% of the pollution, this is exactly what's needed. We could be cleaner than Japan if everyone spread out.

At the cost of vast ecosystem destruction and large increases in resource consumption. Every envirogeek I know feels that if people are going to pollute, they should do it in cities, where at least the damage is contained.

And note that Japan, noted for its cleanness, is very dense. They learned how to be clean because of the density. Perhaps we could learn from that.

So, what's your solution in this case, where mass transit is a no go?

Mass transit is a no-go because people made decisions that caused it to end up that way. The question is whether to notice the problem and move to correct it or to continue to use government money to subsidize more bad decisions. There is no easy solution, but some solutions pay off in the long term as well as the short.

Personally, I make sure to live near where I work, and I moved to an urban center that invests in public transport. These days I don't even own a car; I just check them out when I need them. Compared to the typical commuter, I save a lot of time and money, and consume far less of our shared environmental resources than most.

In the long term, we need to charge people properly for the use of shared resources. Road pricing, pollution taxes, and carbon taxes would help the problem a lot. If you give people something for free, they'll just run it into the ground. Thus, your 20 minute wait in traffic and your asthma deaths. The full change we need will take decades, of course, but that's no excuse for not starting now.

Re:Why illegal?

[ender81b]

I agree, I just meant the general statement to be the special morons who put there house sitting right on the dunes, about 5 meters from the high tide mark. That is building too close to the beahc.

Re:Why illegal?

[WickerChap]

Many states have banned seawalls altogether. Washington is one example

I had also read somewhere that Kansas has banned sea walls too!

Re:Why illegal?

[caveat]

oh, you don't even know the half of it - i live in the "world famous resort paradise" of The Hamptons, and some people out here want to sue the town for not adequately blocking the winter storms from pounding the beach, and they put up blatantly openly illegal sewalls, cuz as roy scheider put it, "if the town won't save my house i will".
i find it the supreme peak of arrogance - these people are living on the North Atlantc, in the WINTER, and they have the balls to complain that the town isn't stopping the ocean, and thinking they can do it themselves. serves them right, if you ask me. and the beach houses here start at about 4mil...go up to the far side of forty million...love watching them slide into the drink :)

Re:Why illegal?

[SerpentMage]

Being a UofW graduate, the problem of KW is KW itself. I have lived since University in Europe and seeing public transportation in action I have to say I like it.

Subways cost big bucks, trains cost big bucks, street cars cost big bucks. But guess what they work! I live just outside of Zurich and whenever I can I park just outside of Zurich and take the Tram into town. They have large parking lots outside of the city which are free and people use them to travel to the city. Actually in Europe having super parking lots outside of major cities is a common practice. It works and that is what KW should do.

Driving in a city sucks! You get nowhere quick and you are constantly on the clutch, brake and gas pedals.

Spreading out the population is a useless idea because what you get is a lot of traffic everywhere and you move nowhere quick. Case in point TO. Driving in TO sucks because TO starts in Oshawa and ends in Hamilton!

Re:Why illegal?

[JohnFluxx]

"organism reproducing"

I knew it! I kept telling my gf they were better by the beach.. oh uh wait

Re:Why illegal?

[1st1]

So, again SlashDot is too late with a story - all the salt water frogs have already been killed ;-)

Re:Why illegal?

[argel]

$400,000 beach house?

That would be the outhouse.

Re:Why illegal?

[t]

uh, move the road. What're you going to do otherwise? Take the liability everytime there's a surge or storm and the waves end up on the road? If you try to fight the sea you will lose. Thinking otherwise is pure arrogance.

Re:Why illegal?

[Ozymandias_KoK]

People don't live in seawater either, but they still like going to the beach. :D

Re:Why illegal?

[shepd]

You are quite right about a decent transport system being so important. After being in England, coming back here is always a drag when I see that there's no way to get to certain places without having to drive.

If the system here is ever fixed, I might actually be able to use it (the closest bus that stops near me is a 4 hour walk away!).

I'd like to use the bus, but as a former KW resident, you know that doing that here is impossible until it is fixed.

I'm not a transport expert, so I can't do much. But hopefully one day someone with a clue will get in as mayor. Preferrably before that 1/3 billion is spent (that could do SO MUCH to fix transit than build a streetcar track!).

Re:Why illegal?

[cramped bowels]

And the damaged party in this case is the owner of the beach - IOW - the public through the State of Callifornia.

Re:Why illegal?

[1010011010]

I do not know the specifics, but if there's been damage to public lands, I hope there will be a "People vs." appearing on a docket somewhere. Too ofter public lands are poorly cared for, more poorly than private lands (whose owners care to protect them).

Re:Why illegal?

[rtechie]

I agree, environmental protection is -- or should be -- a property-rights issue. In your example, the damaged party would be able to seek remedy before the law against the person who caused the destruction of his property.

But often, the damage is not to another property owner but to the environmen itself. What, are the seagulls going to sue for not being able to nest?

I'm as Libertarian as the next guy, but I realize that the environment is fundamentally a public resource. And as the government is the instrument of the public it's entirely appropriate that the enivronment is managed by the government.

Re:Why illegal?

[rtechie]

That reminds me of the reason they blocked building a bypass route near my area. An environmental group said a bunch of frogs would be killed because of it.

Well, that's just great. Instead we have 20 minute idle times and the city's smog is so bad it kills many asthmatics per year.

And you're blaming the environmental groups? The traffic is caused by a lack of public transportation, or more precisely, a lack of people like you using it. Do you commute by car? If so, you're part of the fucking problem. And talk to Toyota, GM, etc. about the smog. They are the ones deliberately exploiting a loophole in CAFE emission standards so the can sell gas-guzzling, and smog-producing, SUVs and trucks. And I'm sure that the oil companies will be responsive to your complaints. However, you CAN buy a hybtid or electric car now. Do you own and use one? If not, you're part of the fucking problem.

Hippies, _especially_ stupid hippies piss me off so much. I hope they get what's coming to them. If they like frogs and wildlife so freakin' much, go live in the forest! Go away and live there forever! We'll make forest reserves _just for you_ if you'll go away forever.

I wish I could, but people like you are ruining the forests too.

Re:Why illegal?

[shepd]

>And you're blaming the environmental groups?

For being morons and giving a totally pathetic reason to block building a road, yes -- yes, I am blaming them for that.

>The traffic is caused by a lack of public transportation

Yup.

>or more precisely, a lack of people like you using it.

You try to convince a township (let me repeat: TOWN, not city) to get a metropolis to drive busses into a hamlet (yes, HAMLET) to pick up one or two people a week.

You aren't going to be successful.

>Do you commute by car?

Yup.

>If so, you're part of the fucking problem.

No, you're part of the fucking problem because people like you never come up with solutions that work with people like me.

>And talk to Toyota, GM, etc. about the smog. They are the ones deliberately exploiting a loophole in CAFE emission standards so the can sell gas-guzzling, and smog-producing, SUVs and trucks.

Neither of which I own.

>However, you CAN buy a hybtid or electric car now. Do you own and use one?

No. You see, there's this little problem:

This is FUCKING CANADA. It gets below FUCKING 0. My car has to start. And it has to be able to drive FUCKING 60 MINUTES without a recharge because I don't live right inside that FUCKING CITY.

>If not, you're part of the fucking problem.

Again, people like YOU are the FUCKING PROBLEM because people like you only come up with solutions that work for big fucking cities.

Note: Not everyone wants to, or can live in a big fucking city. Some of us have hobbies that prevent us living in a big fucking city. You try building potato cannons, putting up 3 DSS dishes, a 10 ft. C-Band dish, a 40 ft. TV tower and a microwave antenna and just see how fucking quick the city tells you to move.

>I wish I could, but people like you are ruining the forests too.

I have news for ya... I'm out in the country which means I'm surrounded by the damn forest! There's enough that nobody here cares!

Argh! Freakin' city slickers go on that hippies list too now... damn. I have city slicker friends. Oh well.

Anyways, I just added you to my foes list too, because, just like you, I don't want to talk to people who won't ever come up with a solution that works for me. And running busses isn't going to since it'll just cause the same amount of pollution, and electric cars just don't drive far enough to work. Think of something else... something better...

Goodbye, and hopefully, goodbye forever, unless you come up with an idea that works for me.

One more thing: Christ, you have a bad attitude. And then you probably wonder why greenies get such a bad name from people like me. It's because people like you are such ASSHOLES.

Re:Why illegal?

[rtechie]

You try to convince a township (let me repeat: TOWN, not city) to get a metropolis to drive busses into a hamlet (yes, HAMLET) to pick up one or two people a week.

Well, do you have a job (like farming) that requires a rural setting? Presumably not, since you commute to the city. The solution is simple: Move to the city. The problem is people like you who insist on living in suburbia or the fucking sticks. Or how about trains? Here in California there are plenty of trains that run out to the sticks.

This is FUCKING CANADA. It gets below FUCKING 0. My car has to start. And it has to be able to drive FUCKING 60 MINUTES without a recharge because I don't live right inside that FUCKING CITY.

Do you know off the top of your head how hybrid cars perform in cold weather? I don't, but I haven't heard any horror stories. I know the Prius has a longer range than a gas-only car.

And I'm not in Canada. The article is about California, the state in which I reside and the state that I'm talking about. I don't know enough about your local situation to comment intelligently about it. For example, I don't know if trains are feasable or desirable.

I do know that suburban-style living and the desire for suburban-style living is the root cause of many of these problems.

Note: Not everyone wants to, or can live in a big fucking city. Some of us have hobbies that prevent us living in a big fucking city. You try building potato cannons, putting up 3 DSS dishes, a 10 ft. C-Band dish, a 40 ft. TV tower and a microwave antenna and just see how fucking quick the city tells you to move.

Yup, and without all that shit life just ain't worth living is it? I used to love getting away for a week in the National Parks up in the High Sierras. Sure it was a 5 hour drive from the bay area, but it was worth it to enjoy a while outside of civilization. Now fucks like you have decided to move up there year-round, mostly fucking yuppies who can't handle the 'din' of the city so they want to fuck up the mountains with Wal-marts and strip malls.

And yes I have a bad attitude, and no, I'm not a greenie. I'm just irritated with people like you who want to blame everyone else but yourself and still bitch about the pollution and the traffic. Wake up, your lifestyle is part of the problem. If you don't want to change anything in YOUR life stop whining and suck up the smog.

Re:Why illegal?

[rtechie]

Basically, a hybrid car is only half a solution. If it's going to use gas, it's a little pointless -- I already own an economy car, and when I looked at the prius it's only going "save" the environment (ok, my pocket book) about another 20% - 30% (and most of that only during the city part of the drive). It's something, but in the end it's just nothing, even if everyone saved 20% the effect isn't going to be that spectacular.

It's 20% of your gasoline budget, it's 20% less smog on the road. And remember that hybrid cars won't necessarily be replacing just economy cars, they'll be replacing older gas guzzlers as well. Frankly, i think a 20% savings *IS* relavent in the big picture.

So, just a minute, you're telling me I should live an undereducated and sub-par lifestyle because my desire to become more educated in satellite receiving technology is harming the environment in a roundabout way?

Potato cannons and giant 40ft. tv towers, two of the things you mentioned, don't strike me as hallmarks of an "intelligent lifestyle". *I* live in a city and I have DSS (don't need threee dishes I have a quad lnb) and I used to have an 8ft C band dish on the roof. I'm assuming you need the 40ft mast for reception, which wouldn't even be an issue if you weren't out in the sticks.

That seems mighty unfair. I think I would ask everyone to stop buying/making/working on computers too, since these encourage factories to use all those horrible chemicals that do far more damage to the environment than my car's tailpipe, not to mention the electricity required to power today's mean machines. Everyone should be using a C64. Now there's a machine you could power with a battery.

Actually, most of the pollution in the computer industry actually takes place in other nations, like China. I'm not interested in Chinese quality of live, I'm interested in my own. And computers (for the most part) aren't poisoning my air, land, and water which is what gasoline vehicles do.

Three, I actually don't care if you enjoy time away from civilization. In fact, in contrast to you suggesting we suburbanites have "fucked up" your wal-mart free atmosphere, I would say we've improved it. Nothing like a convenient convenience store, IMHO.

Like I said, people who can't appreciate wilderness areas for what they are are part of the problem.

I don't care if you're on my "side" or not. I'm not going to change your mind. Will my few words on /. convince you to abandon the time, effort, and money you've spent towards your current lifestyle? Unlikely. The best solution is to lobby for legislative action, and eventually, lawsuits.

I bitch and blame about the pollution and traffic because there _are_ ways to easily solve these problems _and_ keep everyone happy. In fact, I bitch the most because so few people seem to understand all it takes is to properly co-ordinate a public transport system, and it'll be used. Instead I hear unhelpful whines like "Destroy the economy by selling all your suburban homes and live in Arcologies in the city", or "Don't make another road, you'll squash some frogs." Now, if frogs were in any danger of becoming rare, I might agree. But they just aren't! And that road is required to increase the efficiency of traffic, and therefore the efficiency of public transport.

If you read into what you're sating you'll realize that these issues ARE complicated. So you add a bypass road, and you manage to do it without messing up the environment too bad. Then what? INEVITABLY it will become just as clogged with traffic as the existing roads. You can't build your way of of the problem with roads, look at the Bay Area where I live. It's turned into LA. Eventually, ALL metro area will look like LA. Is that what you want?

No, people implementing poorly thought out solutions, and listening to people who would rather us all walk to work from inside some kind of inhuman arcology, is the problem, since that just isn't going to happen. People will die of smog before you can force them to be jailed up like that. [And force/jail are the right words, since few people would willingly live there.]

I would argue that your attitude it part of the problem. What is so bad about urban living (we're not talking coffins or archologies here, we're talking about an apartment) that you'd rather DIE than live there? I've done it. I live in suburbia now, but I'd rather live in the city. Everything is closer so you don't have to drive 20 minutes to get ANYWHERE (like it is in Silicon Valley). You can actually shop day to day if you want to. You can use public transportation, or god forbid, bicycles.

And what about the major urban issue, CRIME? You live in Canada where urban crime is practically non-existent. It exists in the USA, but it's greatly exaggerated.

Re:Why illegal?

[shepd]

>It's 20% of your gasoline budget, it's 20% less smog on the road. And remember that hybrid cars won't necessarily be replacing just economy cars, they'll be replacing older gas guzzlers as well. Frankly, i think a 20% savings *IS* relavent in the big picture.

Yes, but the cars are relatively unproven, and having experienced a long-lasting Toyota Corolla before, I didn't want to take the risk for such a small margin.

>The best solution is to lobby for legislative action, and eventually, lawsuits.

Yeah, but the problem is for every action, there's an unequal and opposite reaction (witness Alberta, a province heavy on natural resource use, acting like a chicken with it's head cut off over the Kyoto protocol).

>Potato cannons and giant 40ft. tv towers, two of the things you mentioned, don't strike me as hallmarks of an "intelligent lifestyle". *I* live in a city and I have DSS (don't need threee dishes I have a quad lnb) and I used to have an 8ft C band dish on the roof. I'm assuming you need the 40ft mast for reception, which wouldn't even be an issue if you weren't out in the sticks.

Okay, okay. Here's the problem which you (fortunately) don't experience in the US. In Canada, broadcast media is censured for non-Canadian content. I'm a bit less xenophobic than your average Canadian, so a 40 ft. TV tower, C-band dish, and those 3 DSS dishes ('till they outlawed those) get me non-Canadian TV.

Not to mention you have no hope of playing in the fun-but-pointless DXing game without a TV tower of some sort.

Without the 40 ft. tower, I can get pretty much all the locals on rabbit ears. But I just don't enjoy that type of xenophobic education. I know it's hard to believe Canada censures like that, so here's a few ways it's done. Oh, and swearing is so illegal the CRTC can, will, and has kicked people off the air for it, and fined stations for it. I won't even go into how the CRTC is accused of stealing C-Band dishes from Canadians that want a choice, or (shudder) how they told a local Nazi (yes, I do hate him... but saying that should have put me in jail, no? Fun how the laws are just one way) his website will be dismantled and destroyed should he choose to operate it in Canada. (I will make a journal entry about this one day... the world really needs to know broadcasting in Canada is goverened by a gestappo).

As a techno radio DJ I can assure you it's true, it seriously pisses me off that I can't play good music since I have to spend my time looking for (in general, really poor and unavailable, but there are gems) "canadian" techno. My 2 hour show basically shrunk to a 1 hour show + 1 hour weekly Canadian repeat once the station told me to follow the rules "or else".

Besides, while you seem to think it isn't "intelligence", this extra learning has provided me with a handsome second income (until mid-way through this year) installing satellites for people. I guess it's on to modchips now... At least I can use my soldering skills again!

>Eventually, ALL metro area will look like LA. Is that what you want?

YES! Again, what's good for the goose isn't always good for the gander. Mennonites designed this town, causing main streets to meet up to three times. I'd go for straight roads _any_ day.

>What is so bad about urban living (we're not talking coffins or archologies here, we're talking about an apartment) that you'd rather DIE than live there?

Simple. Like I've said, I won't be force fed Canadian content. Not to mention I simply enjoy being able to do my hobbies.

What would you think if someone decided to take away everything you enjoy to save some trees and told you to live in a box? Would you feel that being forced in that manner is no different that being put in jail? There's a lot of people who'd rather die than be put in prison for the rest of their life.

>You live in Canada where urban crime is practically non-existent.

No, it's very much here. The difference is the "fear factor" is lower because you can trust no one will be pulling a gun on you (please, I don't need to talk about guns again......) so people walk about ignoring it. Which, to a certain degree is unfortunate, since it makes them easy targets. But, then again, minus the guns they usually don't die. Which, again, means the crime doesn't make the front page, yada yada yada.

Anyways, time for me to stop my "gassing" on this. ;-)

it it just me?

[porn*!]

It's great that the site runs on solar, but when you're flying a helicopter up and down the coast you're hardly looking to improve the environment.

"at least he's not using a 747!"

Maybe he should look into an ultralight.

Re:it it just me?

[buffy]

Oh come on, who moderated this down as a troll? Please mod up!

Damn..

[unicron]

I'm assuming any golf course that has "field of boulders" as a hazard is pretty damn hardcore.

Re:Damn..

[EverDense]

Yeah, and thats a big "Water Hazard" as well.

Re:Damn..

[GreyWolf3000]

Does your penis size stack up?

Yes.

Terraserver?

[Flamesplash]

Why not use the Terraserver? should be high enough resolution, I can even find my apartment on the thing. It is MS though, if that happens to not be you thing.

Re:Terraserver?

[levl289]

take a look a the dates of the terraserver photos.

Re:Terraserver?

[levl289]

adapted.

Adapted to suit my own personal opinions about American culture. Don't agree? Argue the point about American culture, not the adaptation of a quote. Jesus.

Re:Terraserver?

[Quixote]

(adapted from Ghandi)

Not to be anal so early in the morning, but thats Gandhi.

obligatory simpsons quote

[Anonymous Coward]

Solar Power! when will they learn.

Easy.

[DAldredge]

Just buy all the property from those that currently own it.

Re:Easy.

[SubtleNuance]

except that those who own that property didnt 'pay' for it completely - the community has decided it now has a much greater intrinsic value, as habitat / access for nature.

the property owners didnt pay for the privilage to destroy nature did they?

MicrosoftFree.com's hearts in the right place....

[mgpeter]

But what the heck are they doing using Microsoft FrontPage 4.0 as the HTML editor ???

If you talk the talk, please walk the walk

Oooookay..

[NanoGator]

"Also of note: the website has 44 gigs of photos so far, runs on solar power, and is Microsoft Free."

Err. Why does that sound like one of the Cosby kids trying to conince their dad that he should buy them a computer? I mean, who cares if it has 44 gigs of photos? None of us are going to download that many. Who cares if it runs on solar power? We're not paying for it. And who cares if it's MS free? We wouldn't know the difference if they were using MS for anything.

I wouldn't normally make a point of it, but the way they presented those last bits of detail suggests to me they were trying really really hard to make sure Slashdot posts this story.

I dunno, maybe I missed the point and each of those details was uber-important to understanding what this guy is doing. Sure.

Re:Oooookay..

[Twirlip of the Mists]

I mean, who cares if it has 44 gigs of photos? None of us are going to download that many. Who cares if it runs on solar power? We're not paying for it. And who cares if it's MS free? We wouldn't know the difference if they were using MS for anything.

Are you new to Slashdot? The submitted used mystical incantations to make sure his story got accepted. "Solar power," "44 gigs of photos," and "Microsoft Free" (note the miscapitalization) do the trick every time.

Re:Oooookay..

[NanoGator]

"Are you new to Slashdot? The submitted used mystical incantations to make sure his story got accepted. "Solar power," "44 gigs of photos," and "Microsoft Free" (note the miscapitalization) do the trick every time. "

Heh. I think it's funny that a moderator (or two) thought our comments were likely to start a flame war. Yeah, mod us down as 'flamebait' so that people won't see it and get really mad.

Re:Oooookay..

[Twirlip of the Mists]

Actually, mine was a Troll. But I also got a Funny, so it all cancels out in the end.

Powered by the sun

[AskedRelic]

Lets see, their counter is around 15k right now.
GIve it an hour, lets see if we can hit 30k.

Lets hope their sun power can survive slashdot!

Incidentally, about TGV

[drinkypoo]

TGV was really goddamned cool. They were purchased by Cisco a few years ago and it all went to hell. They used to have catered lunches every Friday (I attended several of them) and every time I went it was from somewhere else that was good.

Anyway I didn't know the place myself well enough to actually know who was responsible for any of the cool shit, but TGV used to make network software for VAXen. I logged into a pub ftp that used their ftpd once, it was a joy because it made it look like Unix.

In any case TGV made the fastest TCP stack for Windows 3.1. It didn't make much of a difference when it came to doing PPP or SLIP over a modem because modems were max 28.8k in those days and they were real modems with buffered FIFOs and whatnot. But if you were using 10mbps ethernet or better then the TGV stack was dramatically faster than trumpet's. They also made a fast TCP stack for Windows 95 etc, but Cisco didn't do anything with it and by the time they were ready to do anything with TGV they had crushed the place's spirit, failed to open reqs for needed personnel, etc. Some of the engineers went to Cisco, and some of them went elsewhere. I'm not sure if the Santa Cruz office is still there or not. The person who was the director of the site at the time I quit from that office (As a Cisco employee) was a plant from Cisco, and not technical at all at that point. (She supposedly wrote some code at some point, IIRC.)

TGV is the birthplace of the Mainframe Mouse. It was made of ~0.75" acrylic, and contained a normal-scale mouse attached to a bowling ball. You sat on it and gripped the handlebars... well you get the idea.

TGV used to be the groovy kind of place that needed a soldering iron even though they were a software developer. Hold your hat over your heart when you remember the last time you saw a shop like that last.

I hate people like this

[antis0c]

Sure its one thing to report something you casually spot, but to run around like some kind of environmental super-hero, without reguards for peoples privacy .. come on seriously. Maybe that golf course has a permit? Now you're going around badmouthing them when they've obtained legal means to build that wall. Asshole.

Re:I hate people like this

[1010011010]

Busybodies are all basically the same -- annoying fucks who think they know better than you do.

Re:I hate people like this

[theBrownfury]

I'm not completely disagreeing with you but ownership of private property does not automatically exempt the owner from societal and environmental obligations.

I did not get a chance to read the page before it was /.ed, but I do know a lot of beaches in California need to be preserved for wildlife conservation issues.

Also environmentalist are much more self-aware of the image they present to the rest of the world than most people give them credit for. As it is the viewpoint they represent is not often popular not to mention inconvenient for most people. If you made these comments without reading the page first, boy...I don't even know where to begin.

Re:I hate people like this

[dubl-u]

Did you even read the article?

The beach was a public beach. Putting boulders on a public beach does not exactly cry out for privacy protection. And according to the California Costal Commission, the agency that grants the permits, the golf course didn't have a permit.

Re:I hate people like this

[jacobjyu]

Nowhere in the article did it ever say that he was "badmouthing" them, he is merely documenting the coastline, if their wall is legal, that is fine, no one gets pissed off. Yes, maybe it is a bit hyperbolic to take pictures of the entire coastline, but there are no laws against it, and he is making a good documentation of the coastline for us to appreciate, no harm done to you.

Re:I hate people like this

[Dynedain]

actually...he wasn't doing anything specific about the golf course.

The Sierra Club was already filing a court case about the golf course, and they used this guy's database of imagery as irrefutable proof as to what the golf course was doing so that they wouldn't have to fly their own helicopter out there

Re:What

[nomadic]

Yeah, it is great. You can't own part of the ocean, I don't care what the hell you think you bought. If people can't obey the laws, then leave the damn country, don't whine and snivel about "property rights"; they didn't have the right to do what they did, and they know it.

Only a week old.

[T-Kir]

Although it is only a week old, the site already has received more than 5,000 hits.

Was the article accepted to be put on slashdot just to up those number of hits a bit more??

which would take up about 99 CD-ROMS' worth of computer memory

Hmm, I hope they don't send the archives using 99 CD's worth... we all know what an environmentally friendly company AOL is with their set of coasters. ;)

Re:Only a week old.

[Ian Peon]

Maybe they would have had more hits if they'd have gotten a better picture of the nudist beach.

Great place, was there for the 4th.

ooh.

[MacGyver_vs_Murdoch]

i can see my house from here...

"from the what's-wrong-with-seawalls dept."

[3-State Bit]

What's wrong with seawalls?

WHAT'S WRONG WITH SEAWALLS???

I am shocked and outraged that you would show such an utter lack of consideration, Taco.[1]

Well if you don't know why seawalls are bad by now (and ones that are ILLEGAL too, I might add), I sure as hell won't be the one to tell you.

Humph.

[1] Yes, all editors are taco.

Re:"from the what's-wrong-with-seawalls dept."

[thelexx]

[1] Yes, all editors are taco.

Except Nachman, he's a double-beef burrito supreme.

Re:"from the what's-wrong-with-seawalls dept."

[IIRCAFAIKIANAL]

And CowboyNeal is a baja chicken chalupa. Yummy!

We should call him CmdrChalupa.

Oh, and I wanna be Steve.

Thanks.

I'd love to see the "panoramic" from THOSE shots

[Goldenhawk]

It would be way cool to have a panoramic photo of the entire California coastline (or at least a significant chunk of it) from stitching all those photos together. Set it up as a movie, perhaps, offering a sort of virtual fly-by of the coastline.

burden of proof

[oh]

``My concern when the Sierra Club is going to become vigilantes with these photographs is that there be some fairness to people,'' he said. ``People should not have to prove they are not criminals.''

If I have photos proving you did something illegal, then the burden of proof is still on me as the accuser. Its just I already have proof.

Re:burden of proof

[Dun Malg]

If I have photos proving you did something illegal, then the burden of proof is still on me as the accuser. Its just I already have proof.

Inaccurate comparison. It should read:
"If I have photos indicating that you have done something that could be illegal under certain circumstances, I have no proof of illegal activity."

my house!

[gol64738]

holy crap, you can see my house!

Re:my house!

[MCZapf]

Yeah, but look how close it is to the beach! It's just a quick dash across the highway.

Re:my house!

[isorox]

And how many computers did you say you have? Next time you post that you are going away for the weekend....

Re:my house!

[bellings]

OK, so it's illegal to build a private sea wall. But, your house is at the bottom of a cliff, on a very wide beach, facing the ocean. And, between your house and the ocean, the state of California has built a:

• a road
• a railroad bed,
• a divided highway,
• a natural gas pipeline, and
• a seawall.

Sweet. At least there's no hypocrisy there.

Re:my house!

[Spy Hunter]

Why, oh why did they build a FREEWAY on the beach!??!?!? The stupidity here is palpable. Forget seawalls, we should be mad about freeways on the beach!

Re:my house!

[Peyna]

Or people could just not be stupid and build their houses in more sensible places instead of in a spot where it is likely to be destroyed anyway! Here's a list of stupid places to build your house for the uniformed:

Very near an unprotected ocean coast
On a barrier island
On mud near a fault line where major earthquakes occur (i.e. most of CA and/or St. Louis)
At the bottom of a hill
On sand or mud

etc., etc., etc. I really feel no pity for anyone who is stupid enough to build their house in one of those places!

Re:my house!

[CableModemSniper]

Dude. I jsut compiled your sig. That is cooool.

Re:my house!

[forii]

Sweet! Not too far from my home town

Re:my house!

[forii]

The pictures don't really give a sense of height, which may be confusing. The rocks on the beach are actually quite tall, the freeway is probably a good 20 feet above sea level at that point, and the houses/railroad/etc. are much higher. This part of California doesn't really get big sea surges (except during winter storms, and they come from the northwest), so it isn't a problem even for the road.

Actually, a bigger problem here are landslides. What you call a "cliff" is actually a mountain, and in wet (el nino) years the mountains tend to "erode" a little faster. In the picture (easier seen in the big picture) you can see a landslide that took out a bunch of houses here a few years ago. Notice how a chunk of the hill has slid into town. I hope it wasn't where the poster lived!

Re:my house!

[Mark of THE CITY]

I wouldn't want to live there; look at that BIG landslide behind you. :(

Re:my house!

[Mark of THE CITY]

I used to bicycle past there, going from Oxnard to Santa Barbara. Behind the houses is a steep, unstable (look at the landslides) ridge, with more of the same inland. There's no place else for the freeway, or the railroad.

Before the freeway there used to be a wooden causeway through this area , and before that a long, slow, mountain route some miles back of the beach.

Re:my house!

[rtechie]

a road
a railroad bed,
a divided highway,
a natural gas pipeline, and
a seawall.

That's because the seawall is protecting the railroad, the highway, and the natural gas piplie which are all public resources used by millions of people. I drive on that scenic highway all the time (I THINK I know where this is).

It's not some rich fuck who is destroying the enviroment just so he can put his $10,000,000 house 50ft. closer to the beach.

/. effect

[Wonko the Sane]

Although it is only a week old, the site already has received more than 5,000 hits

I don't think these people have ever heard of the slashdot effect :)

Brilliant use of tech

[gmhowell]

Yes, it's much better to deny people the right to build a seawall, and then spend billions on beach reclamation projects. Sheeeeerrrrr Genius (said in Wile E. Coyote voice)

A better use would be to take the computer and beat in the skull of the head of the Army Corps of Engineers and the greenie-weenie's he serves.

Re:Brilliant use of tech

[chemmathguy]

And I quote:

"A better use would be to take the computer and beat in the skull of the head of the Army Corps of Engineers and the greenie-weenie's he serves."

I certainly hope that you're being sarcastic for two reasons:
1.) Contrary to popular belief, not everyone who does environmental research is a tree-hugging activist. In fact, most true environmental surveys (including those done by the Army Corps of Engineers on seawalls, I have read most of them) are actually despised by "greenie-weenies" unless the facts can be malformed into some perverse statement. At the last environmental lab I worked at, an unnamed radical "environmental" group refused further funding to us because our papers were not "open-ended enough for *****(name of "environmentalist" group) to publish their own favorable interpertations of" (Actual Quote). Working in environmental labs suck for those who are slightly interested in that field of work.

2.) Slamming the head of a greenie-weenie who mutilates your data into a GC-MS's door is a lot more gratifying than hitting him in the head with a computer.

Re:Brilliant use of tech

[dubl-u]

Yes, it's much better to deny people the right to build a seawall, and then spend billions on beach reclamation projects. Sheeeeerrrrr Genius (said in Wile E. Coyote voice)

This is wrong twice over:

1. The coast is a public resource. A private landowner who was dumb enough to build on eroding land doesn't have any right to build a seawall, anymore than a guy who lives next to a public park has a right to put in a vegetable garden.
2. Putting up seawalls will require you to have beach reclamation projects. Beaches are the result of erosion; if you stop erosion, the existing sand gets washed away.

Re:Brilliant use of tech

[Erik K. Veland]

3. Wile E. Coyote never talked. (Unless you count signs)

Meanwhile...

[CySurflex]

Meanwhile, in an attempt to one-up Ken's website californiacoastline.org, photographer J. Smiley has published a new web site: jennascoastline.org in which he promises to photograph every 500mm of Jenna Jameson's body. Environmentalists hope they can use this new data to finally settle the "are those real" debate.

Re:Meanwhile...

[blowhole]

I visited that site once but all the webpages were stuck together...

They they'd have a permit on file

[Planesdragon]

The step for advocacy againsg illegal acts is:

1: Identify act
2: Confirm act is illegal
3: Publicice act as illegal.

One does not skip step 2, unless one wants to get slapped with a nasty slander / libel suit. (IANAL,BIWIWO)

Re:They they'd have a permit on file

[norton_I]

It doesn't look like he is claiming anyone in particuar is doing anything illegal. He is taking photographs of publically visible shoreline, which can be used by people who suspect someone has an illegal seawall. Presumably the person who sues the landowner will first verify that they don't have a permit.

Also, this could be used to showcase the prevelence of such seawalls for the purposes of crafting new legislation, if you believe they are being detrimental to marine life and/or other beachfront property owners.

Re:What

[idfrsr]

Well if what you do on the property you own, happens to have drastic effects on property you don't own, are you implying that you can still do whatever you want?

Maybe one day you'll get a neighbor who dumps his sewer waste into his backyward. No problem its his, he can do whatever he wants with it. But its too bad when that run off gets into your basement, eh?

tough shit I guess...

Ehh

[Hex4def6]

"runs on solar power"
Must be cloudy over there, eh?

Microsoft free?

[Anonymous Coward]

did anyone check the meta info on the microsoftfree.com website?
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=windows-1252">
<meta name="GENERATOR" content="Microsoft FrontPage 4.0">
<meta name="ProgId" content="FrontPage.Editor.Document">

Don't make me laugh

[Maskirovka]

44 gigs of images has nothing on some socially impared guys I know.

Re:Don't make me laugh

[Istealmymusic]

Sir, you might want to re-read the title of your comment again. "Don't make me laugh" has a subtle Freudian slip.

Re:Dirty, dirty...

[D iz a n k Meister]

Yeah!! Like grow weed and smoke weed and stuff

Re:What

[TheOnlyCoolTim]

If my neighbor wants to keep sewer waste in his backyard, fine with me.

But if the runoff gets into my basement, he's putting sewer waste in my backyard, which I would have a problem with.

Tim

Why not just use a digital camcorder?

[Goldenhawk]

After thinking about my post above... Seems like it would be much easier to just take a decent digital camcorder and fly down the coast at a moderate rate of speed. Better continuous coverage, much much faster, and if the real purpose IS to look for breakwaters or illegal rockpiles, certainly a digital camcorder image would work for that.

I wonder if there isn't some other motive here, requiring high-res images.

(Like getting free publicity on Slashdot for using exclusively non-MS technology for a cool task, perhaps.....? Naaaaahhhh....)

Re:Why not just use a digital camcorder?

[Dirtside]

Translation of the parent:

After thinking about my post above... Seems like it would be much easier to just take a decent digital camcorder and fly down the coast at a moderate rate of speed. Better continuous coverage, much much faster, and if the real purpose IS to look for breakwaters or illegal rockpiles, certainly a digital camcorder image would work for that.

1. He could have done this project in a less geeky way.

I wonder if there isn't some other motive here, requiring high-res images.

2. ???

(Like getting free publicity on Slashdot for using exclusively non-MS technology for a cool task, perhaps.....? Naaaaahhhh....)

3. Profit!

Re:Why not just use a digital camcorder?

[FearUncertaintyDoubt]

Seems like it would be much easier to just take a decent digital camcorder and fly down the coast at a moderate rate of speed. Better continuous coverage, much much faster, and if the real purpose IS to look for breakwaters or illegal rockpiles, certainly a digital camcorder image would work for that.

I wonder if there isn't some other motive here, requiring high-res images.

Bingo. An NTSC mini-DV camera gives you 720x480 resolution. Not only that, but you'd be amazed at how hard it is to make out detail in a still image from a video signal. And a 29.97 frames/sec video feed doesn't give you much of a benefit - maybe if you were flying overhead in a SR-71. In a helicopter, 1 frame/sec would be overkill. You'd be much better at 1 frame/sec with 30x the resolution.

Re:Why not just use a digital camcorder?

[plover]

I wonder if there isn't some other motive here, requiring high-res images.

(I assume you're making a nude beach reference kind of joke.)

These are very high res images. That resolution is required to see the individual boulders. The only way he could get similar resolution from a DV camcorder would be to fly fast, about 30 feet from shore and maybe fifteen feet up. Very problematic legally -- not only would he be occasionally endangering sailboats, surfers, etc., but he'd also be spooking marine mammals. FEDERALLY PROTECTED marine mammals.

Even so, he'd be missing two vital pieces that he's now collecting.

• Underwater damage. His photographs are detailed enough to see the sand beneath the water. Much of the damage caused by seawalls is in the retreat of that sand. The photos are evidence that the sand was there on Sept 30th, 2002, but a seawall went in some time after that and now there's no sand left.
• Visual context, such as which golf course or homeowner has the seawall next to their land.

A random photo with a lat/lon notation is one thing to explain to a judge or jury, but a photo of yesterday's sandy beach followed by a photo of a today's seawall and ugly rockpile is much more effective when both show the defendant's mansion.

Sunnyvale

[pruneau]

Their photovoltaic system was done in Sunnyvale, Calif !!!

Slayer help us, there must be something vampiric going one. Watch it, you'll be the next to be sacrified !!!

Re:Sunnyvale

[pruneau]

Yeah, I know mod this down -1: Lame/Troll/Redundant/Overrated

Re:Sunnyvale

[pruneau]

Ooops, but this is not brak./, damned tabbed browsing

Big stupid grin

Re:What

[nomadic]

This isn't vigilanteism. Is he breaking the law? Is he walking in with a jackhjammer and breaking the seawalls? He's simply taking pictures. It's the equivalent of a citizen's watch group.

Doh! I get it! It's okay to be a vigilante for lefty causes! For instance, Eco-terrorism is okay!

This terrorizes you? You feel terror while visiting this website? Timid little guy, aren't you.

This hardly has anything to do with privacy.

[ApharmdB]

It's the coastline after all. The guy isn't breaking into buildings or anything. What he is doing is similar to a very successful group called the Riverkeepers. This group patrols the Hudson river and watches for people dumping illegally. They are the major reason that the Hudson is no longer the utter cesspool it used to be. The government has neither the resources nor the inclination to enforce its environmental laws and so it is up to citizens to do so.

Re:This hardly has anything to do with privacy.

[1010011010]

The government has neither the resources nor the inclination to enforce its environmental laws and so it is up to citizens to do so.

This is always true, essentially. The only enforceable laws in a free society are the ones that the people want to obey anyway.

Re:This hardly has anything to do with privacy.

[Fat Casper]

This is always true, essentially. The only enforceable laws in a free society are the ones that the people want to obey anyway.

You mean like drug laws and speed limits? If we wanted to obey them, there wouldn't be any need for the laws in the first place. The only enforceable laws in a free society are the ones that people make sure are enforced. Like here.

Re:This hardly has anything to do with privacy.

[1010011010]

People speed all the time. Generally, motorists see the speed limit signs as advisory, rather than actual legal limits. The current drug laws, like alcohol prohibition laws before them, are broken routinely and on a large scale. North Carolina's largest cash crop is marijuana.

Pretty low-tech

[betis70]

He is leaning out the side of a helicopter taking these photos? How about mounting this on the bottom of the copter in a rattle-free housing and having the photos taken automatically at specfic time intervals.

This is like a Barney Rubble story of aerial photography.

Re:Pretty low-tech

[alannon]

What would be the point? It would get done any faster and you need two people to do the job in any case, since one person flies and one person either takes the photographs or has to monitor the camera that's taking the photographs automatically. I would think this way he would get better images.

Re:Pretty low-tech

[ethereal]

Wait, strapping a camera to the airframe requires FAA approval, but leaning way out the window with your camera doesn't? That's about even odds on which will fall on a pedestrian first :)

Re:What

[1010011010]

Uh, no.

What good does this really do?

[jsimon12]

I have to agree with the attorney in the article? I think this is going a little to far. What good does this really do? Who are they actually protecting? And whose rights are they violating? Whats next the Sierra Club lowering cameras into my back yard to make sure I am not using too much fertilizer or pesticide on my lawn? Or PETA to make sure I am not doing anything they disagree with (which includes pretty much EVERYTHING, including owning any pet). Where do we draw the line? Can I use sonar or radar to make sure people aren't storing excess paint or motor oil in their garages?

These people shouldn't be hailed as heros, they haven't really done anything other then invade the privacy of land owners.

Re:What good does this really do?

[JimmytheGeek]

Lots of other folks have posted the explanation - beaches in CA are PUBLIC property. Nobody owns them except CA citizens. Someone builds a rock wall in a public park, it's vandalism. They do something that accelerates erosion or otherwise degrades the environment, IN A PUBLIC PARK, they should get their heads handed to them.

Re:What good does this really do?

[NBarnes]

I have no sympathy at all for your position. As far as I can tell, you're arguing in favor for landowners to be able to do whatever they want, even in open violation of state and federal environmental laws, on their own property.

Adelman is doing _nothing_ that's even questionable. He's not going onto the property, he invades nothing. He is simply documenting violations and letting the California Costal Commission take it from there. Calling him a 'vigiliante' is simple hyperbole and nothing more.

You ask what good this really does. The article itself answers this question, going into some detail on how the C^3 is making use of these efforts. If you believe that California's coastline is a public resource that a few (very wealthy) developers shouldn't be allowed to despoil to make themselves even wealthier, then you shouldn't have any problem with this.

Re:What good does this really do?

[dubl-u]

What good does this really do? Who are they actually protecting?

In Cali, the coast belongs to all of us. Ergo, they're protecting all of us.

These people shouldn't be hailed as heros, they haven't really done anything other then invade the privacy of land owners.

Taking pictures of a city from the air is not an invasion of privacy in this country. And suggesting that taking pictures of public land is somehow an invasion of privacy is just bizarre.

Re:What good does this really do?

[JoeBuck]

What you're missing is that a coastal landowner does not own the beach, so if he damages the beach, he is damaging someone else's property.

Re:What good does this really do?

[bizitch]

No no .... you've got it all wrong here

Property is theft, man - These people are evil!

How dare they actually "do" something with that terra ferma.

Rock On! ... Woodstock!

Re:What good does this really do?

[fatboy]

I have no sympathy at all for your position. As far as I can tell, you're arguing in favor for landowners to be able to do whatever they want, even in open violation of state and federal environmental laws, on their own property.

Wonder how many people who agree with this logic smoke dope?

Be sure you fully understand that comment before you mod me as flamebait.

Re:What good does this really do?

[NBarnes]

It's not an entirely unreasonable sentiment. However, I do see a _major_ difference between private victimless lawbreaking in the home by private individuals and systematic lawbreaking by large companies that has active and serious consequences for the public environment, done for profit.

Re:What good does this really do?

[fatboy]

It's not an entirely unreasonable sentiment. However, I do see a _major_ difference between private victimless lawbreaking in the home by private individuals and systematic lawbreaking by large companies that has active and serious consequences for the public environment, done for profit.

How many people have been killed because the person driving the car/train/plane was high? How many people are dead because of illegal seawalls? Please put things into perspective.

Re:I'd love to see the "panoramic" from THOSE shot

[theCat]

Yeah, I was thinking the same thing. With the GPS data handy (and plotting a best-fit to the chopper path to get the viewing angle) it should be easy to calculate the paralax and foreshortening from frame-to-frame, and there is quite a bit you'll notice; coastal features like cliff faces look different from different frames. Still, the morphing that would be required might not be too bad. And if one were to save the intermediate sequences...why...you could sail along the coast in real-time, following the chopper path as it must have been at the time.

I wonder if some render farm could crunch on this pro bono? Of course, you'd need a couple terabytes more storage...

Golf?!

[LittleLebowskiUrbanA]

I can't think of bigger waste of land and resources than a golf cource. Drive through Palm Springs CA and you'll see what I mean. Imagine how much water is wasted just so people can play a GAME. Not a sport. I'm not much for development but houses would be better than empty land set aside for golfers. Anybody who stops the golfing industry is on the side of Good and Light in my book.

Re:Golf?!

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't think of bigger waste of land and resources than a bowling alley. Drive through LittleLebowskiUrbanA Fuckville and you'll see what I mean. Imagine how many trees are wasted just so people can play a GAME. Not a sport. I'm not much for development but houses would be better than empty land set aside for bowlers. Anybody who stops the bowling industry is on the side of Good and Light in my book.

Re:What

[TheOnlyCoolTim]

Give me a good reason. Tell me why this golf course mentioned in the article shouldn't be able to dump a big fugly pile of boulders on their beach.

Here's a better picture, and if you click on it you will get this HUGE picture that I won't link to directly for fear of slashdotting.

http://www.californiacoastline.org/cgi-bin/image .c gi?image=6133&mode=sequential&flags=0

Seems to me they wanted to put some boulders there to keep their golf course from washing away into the sea, maybe. But it doesn't look nice, so let's get all liberal and tell them they can't keep their golf course above water.

Tim

hmmmm

[the_other_one]

I like the idea of converting to solar power especially in Ontario.

The size of solar array that I would need is only about four times larger than my property in downtown Toronto.

However, if I stack the panels four high I believe I can fit them all in.

Re:hmmmm

[NateTech]

And there's not a solar panel on the planet made yet that will recover the energy used to CREATE the panel in its expected lifetime, even if illuminated constantly.

Solar panels are an excellent tool, but they do NOT produce less waste, because they're hideously inefficient to create in the first place.

--

Re:MicrosoftFree.com's hearts in the right place..

[quantaman]

I don't know but when i read
No Microsoft products were used in creating this web site.
My first thought when I read this was the disclaimer
No animals were harmed in the making of this film that always appears at the bottom of movie credits.

Clicky Link

[TheOnlyCoolTim]

http://www.californiacoastline.org/cgi-bin/image.c gi?image=6133&mode=sequential&flags=0

Sorry I forgot to put A tags in the first one.

Tim

Maybe you should look into some facts

[Sacarino]

Um

Perhaps you ought to look into fuel consumption for a R44 before you go spouting off.

If you were to look at the R44 Spec Sheet you'll see that the standard fuel capacity is 30.6 US gal. with a max range of 400 miles.

A little simple math shows us that 400/30.6 is equal to what kids? That's right, 13.07 mpg. Now, let's take a look at the gas economy on your SUV..... hmm... Comparible, is it?

Re:Maybe you should look into some facts

[porn*!]

fair enough on fuel consumption. What about emissions? Materials used in manufacturing and upkeep?

btw - don't own a SUV or any other type of car.

thanks for educating me though - seriously

Re:Maybe you should look into some facts

[Moridineas]

What's the avg SUV mpg? I thought it was more like 17 or 18mpg (city) and like 21/22 highway?

Re:Maybe you should look into some facts

[Anonymous Coward]

> What's the avg SUV mpg? I thought it was more like 17 or 18mpg (city) and like 21/22 highway?

Maybe, but not when being driven along the beach and over seawalls. ;-)

Re:Maybe you should look into some facts

[dougmc]

That assumes that he's flying at cruising speed for the entire tank of gas -- which he probably isn't doing. If he was, he'd want a small plane instead of a helicopter (cheaper, more efficient.) Still, that's awfully fuel efficient for a helicopter ...

As for ultralights, they often use inefficient engines that pollute even more than a full sized car (like lawn-mower engines, which release all kinds of ozone for some reason. And most two-cycle (and some smaller four-cycle) engines spew oil out with their exhaust (but then again, the oil isn't that bad, especially if it's castor oil.))

You know what would REALLY make this `News for Nerds'? If he could somehow power the helicopter with solar power (and no, harvesting the solar power contained in petroleum products doesn't count :)

People have made solar powered airplanes, and solar powered R/C model planes can be bought online, but a helicopter would be even more challenging. :)

(you could use a solar panel to charge the battery of your electric R/C helicopter, but that's not the same ...)

Re:Maybe you should look into some facts

[clarkc3]

some of the small ones get mileage like that, but the larger ones tend to be pretty poor. Chevy is still using the 454 in some of their new trucks/suv's - and I know my friend who had one of those engines only got 9-10 city and maybe 13 highway

Re:Maybe you should look into some facts

[LWATCDR]

There is nothing wrong with an SUV of a R44, if you use them when they are needed. If you have to take a crew of say 8 guys and a bunch of gear up a mountain you need an SUV. If you want to take pictures of the coast you need a helicopter or a light plane.
What you do not need is a big honking SUV to take on person to work on a freeway! Just as it is a waste to fly a R44 to get some milk from the store.

So...

[L0rdJedi]

He has 4 electric cars, runs his server on solar power, and then flies around in a GAS POWERED helicopter?! What the heck kind of environmentalist wacko is he?! Doesn't anyone think he should be using something more "environmentally friendly"?

Re:Where ?

[pheph]

http://www.microsoftfree.com:

and I quote:

<meta name="GENERATOR" content="Microsoft FrontPage 4.0"> <meta name="ProgId" content="FrontPage.Editor.Document">

Re:MicrosoftFree.com's hearts in the right place..

[rgmoore]

I'm more worried by how badly out of date that website is. Anything that's trying to convince me to run Mandrake 6.1 needs a bit of updating.

Re:What

[nomadic]

Seems to me they wanted to put some boulders there to keep their golf course from washing away into the sea, maybe. But it doesn't look nice, so let's get all liberal and tell them they can't keep their golf course above water.

It's illegal. They probably knew it was illegal. Why the hell should the environment take a backseat to some Californian developer making money?

Re:What

[MORTAR_COMBAT!]

Tell me why this golf course mentioned in the article shouldn't be able to dump a big fugly pile of boulders on their beach.

Because the beach is public property. You can't go into a city park and dump a big fugly pile of boulders there, either.

This is a bad thing

[AntiBasic]

And you wonder why people get mad at the Eco-Nazi's? Just flying around turning people into the government for breaking their leftist laws. Gee, As long as the eye-in-sky uses technology to violate my privacy its a good thing.

Re:This is a bad thing

[AntiBasic]

Yeah, go back to reading your communist manifesto. You seem to think that every rich person is inherently evil. Gee, I bet you're in favor of putting up all those cameras in "public places" too huh?

It's been done before!

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess it's easier if you are the department of ecology.

http://apps.ecy.wa.gov/shorephotos/index.html

I'm having fun with my helo, call me greenie

[HuguesT]

Jeez man I can't believe this story.

Here's a kind of vigilante guy in his helo taking pictures of properties down the coast looking for bad guys buidling walls along the beach (is this a real problem?, yeah, real criminals these guys are! scum of the earth!).

How many tons of CO2 is he releasing in the atmosphere doing that? But wait, it's alright! he's using a solar-powered PC and he is running Linux.

That makes it all OK. Guys, I'm leaving slashdot, goodbye.

Re:I'm having fun with my helo, call me greenie

[Zebbers]

i hope you leave, your ignorance is burning a hole in my skull.

Re:What

[DAldredge]

Have you seen the enviromental regs in CA? They go on for 1000's of pages. How is a normal person going to understand those.

Also of note

[tweakt]

Also of note: the website has 44 gigs of photos so far, runs on solar power, and is Microsoft Free.

add to that:
"...and is SLASHDOTTED to hell and back."

Re:why sea walls

[dextr0us]

i was very confused for a moment, i thought it was actually in the water. I was thinking to my self, self? why would you want one in the water. now i'm am sufficiently less confused.

thanks.

This was actually Useful!

[Pathwalker]

For the past few months, I've been trying to figure out where I was when I took this picture.
It's been bugging me since I got back from vacation this summer.

Using this site, I was able to match it in a few minutes!

Now I just need to figure out the name of that park...

Frogs (slightly OT, but still about "environment")

[Dr.Dubious DDQ]

[...] they blocked building a bypass route near my area. An environmental group said a bunch of frogs would be killed because of it.

They should have used an effective and inexpensive method, like building a tunnel for the frogs...

(I have GOT to get back to California to get a picture of an advertisement billboard they've got out there, before they wake up and take it down. In keeping with the "frog" theme, they have a giant fluorescent frog posing on a series of billboards with the text of the advertisement. One of them says Davis is "Green and Safe and Nuclear Free"....with a GIANT GLOWING FROG standing next to the words. Too funny...)

Re:What

[Jeremy Erwin]

The beaches-- or to be precise, land that is submerged at high tide, belongs to the people. Not to any private entity. This legal tradition dates from the time of Justinian. If people want to congregate on beaches, ajoining private property, that's their business.

Now here's a golf course acting in a manner that happens to deny public usage of that beach.

As for "protecting the golf course from erosion", I'd say that building a golf course in that location, in such a manner that "erosion control" necessitated the ruination of a beach, was a pretty dumb business decision.

In other news...

[sw155kn1f3]

NASA, is using a digital camera, satellite, and a Power Books to take a high resolution photographs every 500 feet down the California coast. The goal? Busting people putting up illegal sea walls. The catch so far? One golf course covered the beach with boulders. Also of note: the satellite has 44 TBytes of photos so far, runs on solar power, and is Microsoft Free. Best use of technology I've seen all month!"

Re:Frogs (slightly OT, but still about "environmen

[haystor]

If building a tunnel underneath is not possible, may I suggest they build a frog-a-pult.

You just know you have to google to see if such a things exists...

WTF??

[jericho4.0]

To all the people who posted to this story with 'fucking vigilanties','screw the hippies' and the like.

Go visit some place where industrial development has existed without enviromental concerns. Like China, the ex-U.S.S.R, or East Germany. Is that what you want to live in? I don't think so.

If you want to piss in your bathtub, go ahead, but if I catch you pissing in _our_ bathtub.....

Re:WTF??

[TheOnlyCoolTim]

Ah, you mean all those places which were or are ruled by Communists. I would place a guess that most of use who are saying "screw the hippies" are rather against Communism. You lose.

Tim

Re:WTF??

[ethereal]

So if the Hudson river were privately owned, it would probably be in great shape right now, rather than being full of PCBs.

The real problem is: how do you preserve the environment on public land that is surrounded by private landowners? The communist answer is not to have private landowners, the democratic system (so far) seems to be environmental legislation in the public good. If you have complete private ownership of public spaces like the beach, your society loses more than it gains. You end up with a lot of very well-preserved private playgrounds. And we haven't even thought about what happens when a private property owner doesn't care about the environmental value of their property, or when the property owner downstream of them doesn't have the funds to sue them for whatever pollution they turned out.

hmmm...

[shirameroix]

*Note to self* No nekkid monkey-business on the beach when helicopters are nearby...

Re:Dirty, dirty...

[chemmathguy]

Well, since the state owns nearly all of the beachfront in CA, putting up a seawall wouldn't be letting all of the people (in CA) "do whatever the fuck they want with their own damn property".

Re:What

[rodgerd]

If you're enough of a fuckwit to build a golf course where it's unsustainable, you deserve what you get.

Especially when the golf course owner's cure is to cause massive destruction to public property and the private property of others.

Perhaps you should learn something about the topic you're speaking to. Then you'd look like less of a complete moron.

Re:What

[TheOnlyCoolTim]

You are the only one who seems to have a valid point so far. Do you have any legal reference for the land submerged at high tide belonging to the people? I'd be interested in reading about this. Would they be out of trouble if they removed all the rocks that were not submerged at high tide?

As for having a problem with dumping the rocks on what is considered public land and denying public usage, I would bet that, practically, no one in the public even wants to use that beach. They may not even be able to get to it without swimming in from a ship or trespassing on private land. So morally I still see little problem with dumping rocks on the beach, but you do seem to have a legal argument that is sensible.

Whether or not it was smart to build a course there seems irrelevant.

Tim

Re:What

[/dev/trash]

How is putting up rocks on a peice of property you own, suddenly make you own the ocean?

Re:What

[TheOnlyCoolTim]

You have entirely too much respect for the law. Saying "It's illegal" with no justification for the existence of that law is basically "Why?" "BECAUSE I SAID SO!" which is what parents use to justify the existence of rules to three year old children who are incapable of understanding the reasons for rules.

Tim

Re:What

[dubl-u]

Give me a good reason. Tell me why this golf course mentioned in the article shouldn't be able to dump a big fugly pile of boulders on their beach.

If it were their beach and theirs alone, you might have a point. It's a public beach.

Moreover, even if it were private, their creation of a seawall changes erosion patterns in the area, harming the property of other people. Your right to do as you please on your property ends when it harms your neighbors.

Microsoft free = MacOS 9.2 in this case

[geekee]

I'll take Windows95 over MacOS 9.2 for stability performance etc. I don't see how the Microsoft free jab applies here anyway since Apple is as bad as MS if not worse with their business practices.

Re:Microsoft free = MacOS 9.2 in this case

[adb]

Apple is the weaker of the two. Two roughly equal bad guys who fight among themselves => a much better situation than one bad guy who has time to focus on crushing the little guys.

Well..

[BrookHarty]

He is donating the photos -- which would take up about 99 CD-ROMS' worth of computer memory -- to environmental groups.

Time to use DVD-R blanks.

filthy rich

[alpha_primate]

damn this guy must be filthy rich flying around in helicopters with 4 electric cars and that giant solar array. I wonder what he is going to charge for royalties on his coastlin picture.

4 electric cars and a helicopter

[geekee]

I find it amusing that this environmentalist has 4 electric cars to save the environment, but then owns a helicoptor, which probably burns more fuel in a day than a normal car burns in a year.

Re:4 electric cars and a helicopter

[modemboy]

Uhh, it gets good gas milage, as per this post, so STFU.
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=43800&t hreshol d=1&commentsort=0&tid=126&mode=thread&pid=4570115# 4570312

Re:4 electric cars and a helicopter

[norton_I]

Helecopters, and especially planes are not nearly as inefficient as people seem to think. Someone posted here that the helecopter he is flying gets about 13 mpg. It isn't going to break any records, but not a terrible fuel hog. But more to the point, there aren't much in the way of better options for a helecopter, while electric and hybrid cars are much better than conventional cars, and biomass powered mass transit is better still.

If you are a sensible environmentalist (which many are not) the right thing to do is start with the cheapest things that give the biggest gain. Auto emissions are a much bigger problem than helecopter emissions, and one that it is a much better use of time and research funds to improve.

Re:What

[rgmoore]

Because it's not their beach. Beaches in California (up to the mean high tide mark) are public property. They don't have the right to dump those boulders on public property, or in a way that would damage public property (at least without a permit). In California, they aren't legally allowed to deny beach access, either, again because the beach is public property.

Why not build islands off the coast

[MichaelPenne]

for folks to live on?

Better habitat for wildlife, more places for people to live, less erosion of the actual coast, etc.

Of course, it won't be so good for the surfers and the folks who paid lots of money to live right on the edge, but for the rest of us (animals & plants included) it would be very nice to have lots of places to live on the coastal shelf.

It's not just my crazy idea: Dutch planners eye a new frontier: the raging North Sea

"A square yard of land reclaimed from the North Sea costs about 260 guilders, or about $130. The same size patch of mainland can cost more than triple that."

Re:Why not build islands off the coast

[El]

When asked why they go through the trouble of reclaiming the sea, the Dutch are said to answer: "We had two choices for expansion: invade Germany or reclaim land from the sea. We took one look at the Germans and decided taking on the sea was much easier" or words to that effect.

Re:Why not build islands off the coast

[Anonymous Coward]

There is a little bit more to this: we could also invade Belgium, to the south, but that would leave us with France as a direct neighbour. Most of us prefer to have Belgium as a buffer zone...

For the rest, it is all true ;-)

Re:Why not build islands off the coast

[Sri Lumpa]

The same goes both way:

We (France) left some french speaking folks in Belgium to sort out all these free-thinking potheads* while they (Holland) left some dutch speaking folks in Belgium to avoid having to smell non-pasteurised milk based French cheese.

*We also kept Belgium as an open backdoor for our German neighbour to come in when the front door (the maginot line) is locked.

Re:What

[/dev/trash]

Why is he simply taking pictures? To make otehr people take up action. What action? Trespassing most likely and vandalism, probably.

Huh?

[jsimon12]

The article talks about seawalls, more then likely built to protect the property owners land from erosion, not building brick walls in the middle of a sand box. Sure the public owns the beaches, but don't the property owners have some rights too? They have paid millions of dollars for thar land next to the beach, don't they deserve to keep it for a while before the ocean reclaims it? Also these are the same people putting millions if not billions into the local economy. Sure it might suck to not have a little bit of beach access or that spot with the killer waves, but I think it would suck worse if they didn't build and your county didn't have enough money to by books for kids or repair the roads. Envionmentalism has its place, but without large buissnesses tax dollars things would suck.

Also read the article closely about the land developer ho put bolders on the beach, it says he just needed a permit, he may or may not get one, but more then likely he will and the bolders will stay, just more tax dollars I guess. Go envionmentalist, help the goverment collect more tax dollars.

If your house was next to a park, and the lake in the park flooded every year wouldn't you want some protection? Or what if you lived on the beach and your land was washing into the sea? Shouldn't you be allowed to put up some sort of seawall?

Re:Huh?

[mindstrm]

Yes, they have rights.
Building seawalls on public beaches is not one of them.
Building a wall to protect their property, they can probably do that on their own land.
buildling walls to protect "their" piece of beach is illegal.

Furthermore, if they want to do something to "protect their land" as you put it, they can do it legally, through the proper authorities, and they can look at such things BEFORE sinking tons of money into a house on the beach.

Your land isn't washing into the sea; the beach is nor your land.

Re:Huh?

[norton_I]

Sure the public owns the beaches, but don't the property owners have some rights too? They have paid millions of dollars for thar land next to the beach, don't they deserve to keep it for a while before the ocean reclaims it?

In a word, no. If you paid millions of dollars for land you know is eroding, you are dumb. That does not give you the right to vandalize public property.

If your house was next to a park, and the lake in the park flooded every year wouldn't you want some protection?

No. If you build your house in a flood plane, you do not have the right to build a wall that diverts water into a nearby park, just because it is public property, and not owned by a billionare. In fact, you usually can't even build such a wall on your own land, much less on the park.

One thing America needs to learn badly is that just because you paid millions of dollars for something doesn't give you any special rights.

Re:Huh?

[jsimon12]

Your land isn't washing into the sea; the beach is nor your land.

First the beach washes away, then your land washes away (seen it first hand in Charleston SC).

they can do it legally, through the proper authorities

Have you seen what sort of paperwork is required to do anything in California? I heard someone say that the reason one of the small islands next to the Golden Gate bridge will never be developed is because it would require something like 40-80 years worth of beuracry and hearings with all the differnt boards and groups and government bodies who have their fingers in the tax/envionmental/governmental/etc pie. I don't think doing it illegally is the way to do things I am mearly pointing out the viewpoint of the developer (that is might have been near impossible to get it done with the correct paperwork).

My problem is most envionmentalists only see the small picture (the spotted owl, the grey monkey or whatever), not the big picture, a steel mill would really help the economy of this town, this golf course will employee several hundred, or the only way Manuel can feed his family is to cut and burn the land for farming. They complain, but they rarely offer solutions, they simply stir the pot, maybe they are truely after fame? I don't know, I am simply saying some stuff gets a little outta hand with these envionmentalists and no one steps back to look at the big picture (can you say wrongful harassement of people who have built see walls legally, watch I can guarentee that will happen).

Re:Huh?

[JimmytheGeek]

I have heard some property rights enthusiasts also carping about personal responsibility. You may not have the two tastes.

You build in a flood plain/slide zone/beach? Your problem. The laws have been in place for DECADES. You don't get to flout them because you made a stupid purchase. Especially when changing local currents (as a seawall will do) will affect the beach around you.

I don't think the rich should have a different relationship with the law. This is naive, of course. But America is supposed to treat citizens alike.

Re:Huh?

[mindstrm]

But it hasn't happened, that you know of.
You are saying these people are bad for watching a public resource to make sure people aren't illegally using it?

Guess what... in some places, so many feet above the high water mark is public property. That means that if the beach erodes, your land becomes public property.

These people were AWARE of these laws and regulations BEFORE they bought their property... it's like buying a house knowing a skyscraper is being build right where your nice view is, then suing them for blocking the view.

Or buying land across from a farm, and then bitching when the guy builds a big silo.

yes, some environmentalists take it too far... but all too often, joe average doesn't think far enough. What good is that steel mill if it's going to, say, destroy the water supply for the whole county in 10 years time?

Re:What

[Cloud 9]

Uh, no.

That was probably the most rational argument I've ever seen here. You wouldn't happen to be another of those "My word is God" types, would you?

Building on the Beach

[Anonymous Coward]

I could care less about your 400,000$ beachfront house that is going to be rubble the next time a hurricane/el nino/mudslide comes around anyways. Repeat after me - never build that close to a beach.

What gets me about this is how old (and obvious) this advice really is.

Whatever one's religious beliefs, it's generally agreed that Jesus know how to make a point. In Matthew 7:24-27, he tells a story about a foolish builder who builds his house on sand. His audience would have laughed about that.

Two thousand years later, people with degrees in architecture and engineering build houses (and even gigantic hotels) out on the beach, and then try to get the government to spend tax money on beach replenishment when the ocean comes to take away their buildings.

People who put up seawalls should have to pay to remove them, and people who build on sand shouldn't get one penny of my tax money for beach replenishment. Building on sand is so obviously stupid that anyone who does it doesn't deserve any help from anybody.

Re:Building on the Beach

[Fat Casper]

Two thousand years later, people with degrees in architecture and engineering build houses (and even gigantic hotels) out on the beach...

They are hired to do it by pointy haired customers. If geeks only did what was Right and Good- no, scratch that. If geeks only did things that made sense, there would be no Microsoft.

...and then try to get the government to spend tax money on beach replenishment when the ocean comes to take away their buildings.

The people rich enough to build like that are used to having laws custom made for them. They all have to live somewhere, so there aren't many ideological differences among the very rich about whether or not the little taxpayers ought to bail them out.

Re:What

[dubl-u]

Check out the California Costal Commission, including their page on Legal and Legislative Information and the list of their permanent responsibilities

Rocks are bad!

[zoid.com]

We should ban all rocks. I can't believe people have rocks on their land. I think everone with rocks shoud be arrested!

Yeah, solar power is good,

[Mr. Pibb]

But can it survive a slashdotting?

Re:Yeah, solar power is good,

[zoid.com]

Maybe he is using that gasoline powered helicopter engine as a power backup...

Re:What

[1010011010]

You feel terror while visiting this website? Timid little guy, aren't you.

You must be talking about his ad hominem reply. Or possibly your ad hominem reply. Or maybe both.

Re:Microsoft free = MacOS 9.2 in this case [OT]

[geekee]

"Really? Win95 had that awful bug where it couldn't stay up for more than 40 days due to an issue with a tick counter rolling over and crashing the box. Nobody noticed this for years, yet Mac OS 9 while not the fastest of webservers has shown decent stability according to Netcraft."

I couldn't even surf the web on a mac for an hour without crashing the machine when running MacOS 9. That's a lot shorter than 40 days. MacOS 9 had no memory protection, no real memory management, no preemptive multitasking, etc. It was a nightamre having to use those machines.

"I don't see how the Microsoft free jab applies here anyway since Apple is as bad as MS if not worse with their business practices."

Remember all those companies that used to make Apple clones? Apple refused to sell them MacOS for a reasonable price after Jobs took over, effectively putting them out of business. Also, a company called Exponential came out with a PowerPC chip for Macs. Apple didn't want it, but the clone makers did. Apple, however, refused to let the clone makers modify the bios to boot MacOS with the new PowerPC chip. Exponential went out of business shortly thereafter (Apple also breached their own contract with Exponential, as well).

more likely

[mindstrm]

they are illegal because the beach is considered public property. You can't own the beach. You are not allowed to block public access to a stretch of beach (ie: building a wall from ocean to your official property to prevent someone from strolling down the beach.

Re:more likely

[corey_lawson]

...except when the beach is part of a military base...

The beaches on North Island that are part of the North Island NAS and Coronado NAB, and the beaches that are part of Camp Pendleton, are not publicly accessible...

Slashdot EffECT

[Akumapwr]

"Although it is only a week old, the site already has received more than 5,000 hits. Photographs featured on it recently became evidence in one dispute in Half Moon Bay." More than 5,000 hits? Boy these news sites are sure out of date. =)

easy way to get around this..

[NotAnotherReboot]

..everyone knows that these guys will just start using tranparent aluminum, after all, Scotty did give us the plans for it.

Re:MicrosoftFree.com's hearts in the right place..

[nelsonal]

They actually have a cadre of people who ensure that animals are not harmed in the making of those motion pictures. I think almost all US pictures carry that disclaimer, but I don't pay enough attention to the indies to know for sure. It began after several horses died in the making of some old westerns. Following that one of the big animal organizations, not PETA, but more like the kennel club, began a movement to greatly reduce animal risks in movies. Hollywood is pretty careful in bee scenes because there are pretty well defined rules about what endangerment can take place before you don't get to use the tag line.

Re:What

[1010011010]

There ought to be a law against people who say, "there ought to be a law!"

Should have a prize...

[marko123]

For the first person or group of people to make a sign big enough to appear on the photos. "HI MUM!"

"off toptic" insurance

[ubugly2]

this is the one thing that bugs me is all the idiots that build on a likely place that is going to get damaged from proven natural causes in the past and then collect insurance on thier lack of planning,sure they do pay more in premiums but it still raises the premiums on people that live in a more stable area to cover the cost of these morons...

Microsoft-free?

[Rui del-Negro]

I find it rather amusing (in a sad way) that some people are "proud of not using any Microsoft products" (which are made by well-fed and well-paid programmers) but don't have any problems with using, wearing or even advertising "Nike products", for example (which are made by exploited workers - often children - in 3rd world countries).

It seems to me that some people confuse morality with fashion.

Being "Microsoft-free" should not be an end in itself, or something to brag about. There are plenty of good (positive) reasons to use other operating systems and open-source software; you shouldn't use them simply to be "Microsoft-free", that's an insult to the developers.

RMN
~~~

Re:Microsoft-free?

[Avlimator]

The post I am replying to has been moderated as Offtopic. It is difficult to understand why it could be considered Offtopic.

The article submission states "Also of note: the website has 44 gigs of photos so far, runs on solar power, and is Microsoft Free."

The article poster made the specific point that the website is "Microsoft Free". They obviously felt that this was an important and relevant comment regarding the article we all (or many; or some; or a few) decided to read before posting our own comments. Therefore it is perfectly legitimate and on-topic to comment on the original summary.

Re:What

[1010011010]

People who build in flood zones will eventually have to pay "the stupid tax," unless they can try to get the their fellow citizens to pay the stupid tax for them, via FEMA or some other scam. Too often, the latter is the case.

Why seawall bad? Basic physics

[Anonymous Coward]

Good on this guy. If the government won't pull their finger out it is the obligation of the citizens.

Seen a lot of comments here about why seawalls are bad and the only explanations given are legals ones. Not suprising given most people here are americans.
The reason is one of basic physics, the legal arguments have to take second place.Unless you think you can legislate against nature. Please ignore this if you think you have a right to destroy other people property and public property and the general environment to protect your own interests.

If there is a rock, a wall, a washed up spare tyre, anything that is a hard object on the beach, then when the water hits it during normal wave action, the wave will retreat back to sea at a higher speed because it's energy hasn't been absorbed. Normal beaches (with sand) absorb the wave impact. If the water is going faster, it removes sand as it returns to the ocean and thus erodes the beach, much faster than natural movements. Even a small hard object on a beach can show this, one season I saw the tire I mentioned above, a tractor tyre, chop a gully about 0.5m deep and about 6-7m wide, just from wave action on this one small object. A wall will destroy the beach.

Remember beaches ARE NOT FIXED in the earth, they rise, fall and move around on a seasonal basis. Beach nourishment is not to replace sand that is lost, but to re-build the natural shoke absorbing action of an already eroded one.

Sydney residents please visit http://www.realsurf.com/nowall/ and please think about supporting this cause, we know what private interests have f**ked up in the states through ignorance and greed, lets not let it happen at home.

phil

Re:Why seawall bad? Basic physics

[FourString]

I'm glad to see an informed post about how seawalls accelerate coastal erosion, but wish you'd lose the anti-American rhetoric.

The reason you saw so many posts discussing seawalls in legal terms, instead of evaluating them according to some larger moral critera, is that the article spoke of "illegal" sea walls, and one of the earliest posts to get some activity was entitled "Why Illegal?".

The first mention of the issue in your own post, once you got the America-bashing out of the way, spoke of personal property, public property, and the general environment - in that order. I'd like to point out that some of the first discussion in the "Why Illegal?" thread brought up marine frogs. Perhaps that wasn't very well-informed, but it tells me that the /. readers here were thinking of environmental concerns first, then legal ones.

You don't get it.....

[jsimon12]

Sure, maybe they shouldn't build there, but if they didn't and the land just sat fallow the city/county would not get tax money (property, buissness whatever) and hence would not be able to do as much. Societies where everything if owned by the people (or government) are called socialist/communist states, and so far we have proven that it just doesn't work. So unless you really enjoy living under the rule of big brother maybe you should quite down and realize that capitalism works and most everything else doesn't. If you don't like big buissess move to a country without it (like Chad or Cambodia or how about China, I hear the "people" own everything there).

Re:You don't get it.....

[levl289]

Societies where everything if owned by the people (or government) are called socialist/communist states, and so far we have proven that it just doesn't work.

um no, you're wrong.

Maybe you flunked Government, but a society where everything is owned by the people would indicate a capitalistic government, while one where it's owned by the government is the communistic one.
Learn to spell, and age a few years before you regurgitate catch words that are popular with The Cool People.

Re:You don't get it.....

[kindbud]

If you don't like big buissess move to a country without it (like Chad or Cambodia or how about China, I hear the "people" own everything there).

In a word: NO. I'm staying here and will help turn the US into a communist country because I love my country, and I love seeing your face turn red and beaches are more important than money. And I am doing it because I can. If you don't like that, YOU FUCKING MOVE.

Cthulhu

[eGabriel]

If I was foolish enough to live within 100 miles of an ocean, I wouldn't feel safe unless there was at least some sort of wall between me and Cthulhu.

You WILL build that seawall and it WILL wash away

[Infonaut]

Actually, if your property is threatened, building a sea wall will not prevent it from being washed away. In fact, it may actually speed its demise. Even people who aren't card-carrying, tree-hugging Sierra Club douchebags can see that. ;-)

Re:What

[norton_I]

It is illlegal because it damages public property. The don't own the beach, and even if they did, they don't own the section of beach a mile down the line whose erosion will be increased by this.

Solar powered web site?

[Skapare]

Solar powered web site? No wonder I can't get any response ... it's night time.

Clarification

[a044587]

Just wanted to clarify one issue in this topic. In the U.S. the coastline is public property up to the high tide line, and while you do not have the right to loiter on anywhere inland past that--you are allowed to trespass to get to an ajoining property

Re:No, I WILL build that close to the beach

[Jeff DeMaagd]

You won't necessarily win your case. I _think_ Cali has had a pretty decent track record of having their eco-laws upheld, even in Federal courts, against the "big three" auto makers.

Also, the point is, you don't build on property that you know is _constantly_ shifting. Sadly, beach front owners don't seem to understand that, and somehow they also expect the government to bail them out of the problems they dig themselves into.

Beach front building is just one example of people vainly frittering away natural resources.

It's the Ritz-Carleton Hotel in Half Moon Bay

[Animats]

The boulders were dumped on the beach by the Ritz-Carleton Hotel in Half Moon Bay. It's a gonzo golf-oriented hotel in a rural area. Take a look at their site, which shows the spot where they wrecked the beach! That's state property at the bottom of the cliff, not theirs. And they actually put a picture of the damage on their own web site.

If this project hadn't been approved by the voters thirty years ago, before the California Coastal Commission was created, it wouldn't have been allowed. It was built during the excesses of the dot-com boom; it might yet go bust.

AOL Coasters.

[Grendel Drago]

Wouldn't it be sweet if they mailed them on CD-RWs? I could always use some extra CD-RWs, even if they all said "AOL IS MY ASS-MASTER" on them. They get advertising, I get free media. Everyone wins!

--grendel drago

Not quite like Jesus described

[bill_mcgonigle]

Two thousand years later, people with degrees in architecture and engineering build houses (and even gigantic hotels) out on the beach, and then try to get the government to spend tax money on beach replenishment when the ocean comes to take away their buildings.

Technically speaking, they don't build the houses on the beach, they build them on piers which are supposed to be sunk to bedrock, so it's effectively building on bedrock, stability-wise. Of course if Ma Nature wants to leave that house standing on piers, I agree with your governmental policy issues.

IANAL,BIWIWO

[Jerf]

"I am not a lawyer, but I wish I was one ?"

Please leave immediately.

(For the humor impaired, ;-). Plus I'm hoping that there's another interpretation that I don't see...)

Re:IANAL,BIWIWO

[Planesdragon]

Please leave immediately.

(For the humor impaired, ;-). Plus I'm hoping that there's another interpretation that I don't see...)

No, that's it. I'm a secretary currently, so being a lawyer is better in just about every way possible.

Plus, I could do all sorts of neat things that I can't do now--like make money, or tell folks on /., what a license means in a real "legal opinion."

If I ever do happen to pass the bar, I promise not to become unconcionable scum.

Re:IANAL,BIWIWO

[Jerf]

Plus, I could do all sorts of neat things that I can't do now--like make money...

*chuckle* I like that one.

If I ever do happen to pass the bar, I promise not to become unconcionable scum.

OK, but we're going to hold you to that. ;-)

Actually, I wish you good luck. We need more good people being lawyers.

Re:I'd love to see the "panoramic" from THOSE shot

[bobetov]

Um, can anyone say "camcorder"?

:-)

Whoa!

[offpath3]

When I first read the headline, I thought that they were actually blowing up illegal seawalls remotely and I was like "Damn, that's some cool shit!" Oh, they're busting the people making the walls. That's just not as cool.

DOS

[oniony]

Solar power? Hmm, denial of service with some towels.

Seems a little ironic

[PhotoGuy]

A couple of things I don't get about the story:

In the dispute with the hotel, couldn't (shouldn't?) the government simply take photos of the boulders on the beach themselves for evidence? I could see if the photos were taken over time, and showed the differences, but this sounds like just one current point in time the photos were taken. Sounds like it's just slightly more convenient to use his photo taken from the water. Hardly as sensational as it sounds.

Secondly, this guy owns four electric cars, but also flies a helicopter? I would guess that the amount of helicopter fuel burned, and air and sound pollution produced in a short outing would *far* outweigh most people's gas usage for a month. Just seems a little out of kilter. (Of course, I'm assuming it's not an *electric* helicopter :-)

New Luxury homes on freshly cooled lava flows!

[Alsee]

Building on the beach is like building on a freshly cooled lava flow. Only build as close to a volcanoe as you're willing to accept the risks.

If the coast is erroding at 2 feet per year and you'd kinda like your house to still be around in 50 years then you'd better add a minimum of 100 feet to all your figures.

As for buildings, homes, and roads that are threatened, it's not like it is exactly a sudden or unexpected event. Everyone involved has YEARS to to make other arrangements.

-

Re:I'd love to see the "panoramic" from THOSE shot

[Quixote]

Yes, it would be cool. But a flyby at the current scale would be ugly.

Whips out a used envelope for "back-of-the-envelope" calculations
Lessee... He takes a picture every 500 feet. Thats 10.5 pictures per mile. A movie plays at about 30 frames/sec. If each picture is a frame in the flyby, you're looking at a speed of 3 miles/second, or about Mach 14.57 (it is at sea level).

Conclusion: the flyby will pretty much be a blur.

Good link.

[Orclover]

Wish i had mod points. Interesting web page.

Re:What

[OAB]

The 'Other People' you refer to are the State, you know, the people who get elected.

Transparent aluminum is not a sci-fi material

[kindbud]

You know, there is nothing special about transparent aluminum. It has been known to mankind for thousands of years. Its optical properties make it desirable for many applications from lasers to astronomy. Its hardness makes it desirable for many more. It is one of the most chemically inert materials known, which makes it popular in medical and chemical fields. With some impurities, its beauty and color makes it popular in jewelry.

What the hell am I talking about? Sapphire. Sapphire is nothing more than crystals of aluminum oxide, a.k.a. Corundum (with Chromium impurities, it turns red and is called Ruby). It is a material that occurs naturally, and it has also has been synthetically manufactured by 21st century humans for decades.

You've all been completely fooled by a stupid Star Trek writer. Nowhere in the film did they mention that the "transparent aluminum" was in metallic form. Psych!

Typical nonsensical garbage?

[nanojath]

Sigh... okay, one more rant.

The sad thing is that I think the mods of troll and flamebait are not probably accurate. I find it far more likely that you actually believe the garbage you're spewing. So let's dissect this pablum one point at a time.

Sure the public owns the beaches, but don't the property owners have some rights too? They have paid millions of dollars for thar land next to the beach, don't they deserve to keep it for a while before the ocean reclaims it?

Basically what you're saying is that incredibly wealthy people have a right to destroy public property because they paid a lot for their houses. You're an idiot. Nobody has a right to break the law. I don't have a right to drive 150 on the interstate just because I'm rich enough to buy an Italian sports car. If they want the law changed, being filthy rich they have much, much more access to the political system than most people do. If they can't change it through process then, like the rest of us, they have to obey the law or pay the consequences.

Also these are the same people putting millions if not billions into the local economy... Envionmentalism has its place, but without large buissnesses tax dollars things would suck.

God, no matter how many times I hear it it still makes me laugh. Thank God for the wealthy, they're saving America. Are YOU rich, man, or are you just a dumb little brain-washed pawn?

"The $150 billion for corporate subsidies and tax benefits eclipses the annual budget deficit of $130 billion. It's more than the $145 billion paid out annually for the core programs of the social welfare state: Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC), student aid, housing, food and nutrition, and all direct public assistance (excluding Social Security and medical care). After World War II, the nation's tax bill was roughly split between corporations and individuals. But after years of changes in the federal tax code and international economy, the corporate share of taxes has declined to a fourth the amount individuals pay, according to the US Office of Management and Budget." --Boston Globe series on Corporate Welfare July 7-9 1996.

And don't get me started about the taxes wealthy individuals pay. Yeah, they pay a lot of taxes... because they are so insanely wealthy. Don't slap one of your canned conservative jives on me as to how the rich are propping up the tax system and paying such unfair income taxes I'll just nip you in the bud by pointing out the obvious realities tha anyone that isn't a stupid little shill for wealthy fucks knows, that these analyses are garbage because one, they don't consider payroll taxes - the top 1 percent of the population pays only 4.2 percent of the payroll taxes, whereas average Americans pay 7.65 percent on their earned income - and two, it is precisely the concentration of income at the top that leads to an increase in the percentage of income tax, which is what has occurred in recent years. The top 1 percent of the population has experienced extraordinary after-tax income gains that vastly exceed the gains in after-tax income of the rest of the population. These people are wealthier than ever.

This is to say nothing of Wealthy transnational tax evaders... military waste and fraud, Social Security tax inequities,
accelerated depreciation, lower taxes on capital gains, The S&L Bailout ($32 billion/year for 30 years!), homeowners' tax breaks, agribusiness subsidies, tax-free municipal bonds, media handouts, excessive government pensions, insurance loopholes, nuclear subsidies, aviation subsidies, business meals and entertainment, mining subsidies, oil and gas tax breaks, export subsidies, synfuel tax credits, timber subsidies, and ozone tax exemptions... by some estimates being taken by the rich for a total of almost $470 billion in wealthfare each year. The bottom line is that the tiny skim of people at the top have done better and better, gotten wealthier and wealthier - while the wealth of EVERYONE else has stagnated or worse decreased.

Go envionmentalist, help the goverment collect more tax dollars.

Weren't you just saying how things would "suck" if businesses didn't pay taxes? Why the fuck should some coastal golf course in California, a sinkhole of wealth if I ever saw one, be allowed to evade permit fees, even assuming that is all they need to keep their boulder pile, which the article does not say, just that applying for a permit is ONE of the legalities this fucking adjacent to the Ritz-Carlton Half-Moon Bay golf course failed to follow. Thank god the poor harrassed golf-course developers have pansies like you to defend them from the oddball dot-com millionaire with a helicopter and a digital camera.

If your house was next to a park, and the lake in the park flooded every year wouldn't you want some protection?

If you build your house next to a park that floods every year you're an idiot. These rich assholes know damn good and well that they are buying property that is eroding, and that the laws of their state prevent them from a cheap-ass ecology-destroying stop-gap, and they do it anyway, in plain sight from a public vantage point, and you're squeaking about how this guy is violating their privacy?!! Yeah, get that one on the refferendum, how dare we violate the rights of the exceptionally wealthy to privately break the law in view of public beaches? Please have yourself sterilized immediately.

Re:What

[/dev/trash]

uh huh.
I'd hope so but have you ever seen the eco-rights people climb a tree to keep it from being cut down? Why would they not try the same tactics with a sea wall? ( knocking it down in this case)

(OT) Talking Wile E. Coyote

[Dr.Dubious DDQ]

Wile E. Coyote never talked. (Unless you count signs)

I can think of at least 3 cartoons where he spoke out loud, and I believe there were one or two others.

I know at least two of them were were relatively recent (i.e. post-Dr.Seuss cartoon) Chuck Jones cartoons, There was at least one that I believe was a Charles M. Jones (same person, but pre-Dr.Seuss style), and I think at least one Robert McKimson...

Uh, yes, I've watched a few cartoons in my time. What of it? When I was a child, like many people, I promised myself that when I got older, I'd watch cartoons whenever I wanted. If I can't even keep a solemn promise I made to MYSELF, how could anyone ELSE ever trust me?...

Re:(OT) Talking Wile E. Coyote

[Erik K. Veland]

Yes. But of all the Roadrunner-comics he spoke only thrice? And he says something in a Wile E. Coyote-voice? Now THAT'S a private accosiation!

Re:Microsoft free = MacOS 9.2 in this case [OT]

[MoneyT]

So Apple refused to licence out a product to other people in order to protect their bottom line, and then refused to modify their product so that it would work with a competitor's product. So where is the illegal move? Seriously, as much as it sucks to not be able to get a cheap mac clone anymore, Apple didn't do anything illegal. Unlike M$, every time Apple modifies and licences their software out to other platforms, they have one less sale on their books. The clone's were cutting Apple's bottom line. Therefore the clones had to go.

Re:What

[nomadic]

Alright, I apologize if I went overboard a little, but I hope you can understand my irritation at comparing aerial photography to "eco-terrorism", and characterizing any sense of environmental responsibility as radical leftism.

Re:Microsoft free = MacOS 9.2 in this case [OT]

[geekee]

I'm not saying what they did should illegal, although it probably is according to the Sherman antitrust legislation. I'm saying that when MS does these types of things, everyone complains about monopolistic practices. Yet Apple protects their monopoly in the same manner, and everyone's fine with it. People should at least be consistent in their arguements.

Re:What

[1010011010]

characterizing any sense of environmental responsibility as radical leftism

I wouldn't, and do not, think of "environmental responsibility" as "radical leftism." I do, however, I characterize "environmentalism" as "radical leftism." It's mainly because "environmentalism" as a term has been hijacked, and now is more or less means "social statism" and "anti-capitalism" with "do it for the baby seals" as the excuse.

Environmental responsibility is a good thing, and as I mentioned in a previous post, it should be handled as a property-rights issue. I can't dump oil in your driveway or living room without getting sued -- same goes for dumping in a river that runs over my land.

Re:What

[nomadic]

But the property rights crowd also tends to not believe anything they do on their land is destructive anywhere else. If you dump toxic waste in your backyard, and I get sick because of it, all you'll say is I "can't prove causality". Look at the global warming or DDT debate.

Re:Microsoft free = MacOS 9.2 in this case [OT]

[MoneyT]

People didn't have the problem with M$ doing what Apple does because M$ didn't. The problems that were lodged against M$ involved bundling (and making it impossible to remove) applications from the system and bullying OEMs to prevent competitor distribution (read the BeOS lawsuit writeup [warning PDF]).

Also, people don't nessesarily have to be consistant. Things should be judged on a case by case basis. It slows down judgements sure, but not all cases that look similar are the same.

Re:What

[1010011010]

Well, you do have to show damages. It does happen. Erin Brockovich did it. There's lots of examples. It's better to require demonstration of damages than to simply allow claims of "I think he hurt me" to result in claims.

I'm not sure what you're alluding to in terms of "the global warming or DDT debate."

Re:What

[nomadic]

I'm not sure what you're alluding to in terms of "the global warming or DDT debate."

"Human industry is causing global warming."
"You can't prove that."
"Here's a bunch of scientific evidence."
"But it doesn't prove it 100%."
"Look at all these scientists saying that human industry is causing global warming."
"They're biased."
"Look at all the strange weather patterns lately."
"Coincidence."
"The arctic ice cap is almost completely melted away."
"Coincidence."

And so on.

Re:What

[1010011010]

Well, there seems to be as many researchers saying "don't know," as there are saying, "shutter the factories." The whole global warming "debate" seems to be hysterical, and I do not trust the motives of many of the players in it.

I personally think that we should get away from burning oil (making plastics from it is fine), and use non-oil sources of energy. Coal, solar, others. Why coal and not oil? I think that oil will turn out to be a natural by-product of planet formation. There has never been any DNA found in oil, and wells seem to replinish themselves. Coal, however, is definitely carbon taken from the atmosphere by plants -- coal comes with DNA and fossilized (incompletly carbonized) plants in it. By burning coal, we're not adding _new_ CO2 to the air. By burning oil, I suspect that we are adding new carbon. I think it's okay to do things with oil other than burn it, such as making plastics from it, because it's not adding carbon to the atmosphere.

There's some evidence that global warming, regardless of causes, will actually trigger the next ice age, and we'll need _even more_ CO2 in the air to come back out of it. The Earth is currently somewhat low on CO2, historically speaking.

Besides, I have a hard time believing the "computer model predictions" of climate researchers who -- with wreck-the-economy certainty -- can say that global warming is real, the ocean will rise by 3.54 inches, etc., but with those same or similar computer models, still cannot predict either local or global weather accurately for more than a low number of hours into the future. Those "computer models" can do only one thing -- give the answer that was built into their assumptions. 42.

There is evidence that early European colonies died out because of extreme and persistant drought in North America, and that the average local temperatures were, in fact, higher be a degree or so back then. They apparently figured this out from studying cross-sections of trees alive at that time.

I'm not a "the hypothesis that human actions are causing global warming, and that's bad, cannot possibly be right" kind of guy. But I'm not convinced with the research to date, and I deeply distruct the motives of a lot of the "global warming activists." I'm not just a yahoo reading "Discover," either -- I hold degrees in Biochemistry and Chemistry. I know the scientific method when I see it.

Re:What

[cramped bowels]

Reporting a *crime* is terrorism ?

Re:What

[cramped bowels]

Tim, you are so ignorant of scientific and legal realities that I'd be laughing if I weren't crying over the ignorance of folks like you.

Re:What

[cramped bowels]

And then there is the damage to adjacent properties to consider, beach usage not withstanding. As for legal references, do a google on "Public Trust Doctrine" Here's a start : http://www.spur.org/pubtrust.html - check the direction of your lips before shooting off your mouth.

Re:What

[cramped bowels]

In much the same way as you seem to be "incapable of understanding the reasons for rules" .

Re:MicrosoftFree.com's hearts in the right place..

[ethereal]

But actually that makes it a more valid protest - that person obviously was an Adobe customer, and now they're calling for a boycott. That's a lot stronger statement than me, a non-Adobe customer, calling for a boycott. The boycott doesn't hurt me, but it possibly would hurt the "Boycott Adobe" site owner. In a sense they were putting their money where their mouths were.

Re:What

[nomadic]

There's my point. If the toxic waste in my yard is causing you serious health complications, I can just deny that there's conclusive proof. I don't need to get scientists on my side, I just need to get the politicians. Who makes the decision as to what constitutes an environmental danger? You've said the scientists don't convince you.

Re:What

[rtechie]

Well, there seems to be as many researchers saying "don't know," as there are saying, "shutter the factories." The whole global warming "debate" seems to be hysterical, and I do not trust the motives of many of the players in it.

Look into it. Professional environmental scientists are pretty much unanimous on global warming.

Using R44 And A PowerBook To Bust Illegal Seawalls | Preferences | Top | 357 comments | Search Discussion
Threshold: -1: 357 comments 0: 269 comments 1: 251 comments 2: 147 comments 3: 47 comments 4: 25 comments 5: 14 comments Flat Nested No Comments Threaded Oldest First Newest First Highest Scores First Oldest First (Ignore Threads) Newest First (Ignore Threads) Save:
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
Re:What (Score:2)
by nomadic (nomadicworld&hotmail,com) on Thursday October 31, @05:41PM (#4575675)
(User #141991 Info | http://nomadic.simspace.net/ | Last Journal: Saturday February 23, @05:53AM)
I'm not sure what you're alluding to in terms of "the global warming or DDT debate."

"Human industry is causing global warming."
"You can't prove that."
"Here's a bunch of scientific evidence."
"But it doesn't prove it 100%."
"Look at all these scientists saying that human industry is causing global warming."
"They're biased."
"Look at all the strange weather patterns lately."
"Coincidence."
"The arctic ice cap is almost completely melted away."
"Coincidence."

And so on.
--
"We are all lying in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."--Oscar Wilde
[ Reply to This | Parent ]

Re:What by nomadic (Score:2)

Re:What (Score:3)
by 1010011010 on Thursday October 31, @06:10PM (#4575825)
(User #53039 Info | http://www.xsltfilter.com/ | Last Journal: Saturday August 17, @05:27PM)

Well, there seems to be as many researchers saying "don't know," as there are saying, "shutter the factories." The whole global warming "debate" seems to be hysterical, and I do not trust the motives of many of the players in it.

I personally think that we should get away from burning oil (making plastics from it is fine), and use non-oil sources of energy. Coal, solar, others. Why coal and not oil? I think that oil will turn out to be a natural by-product of planet formation. There has never been any DNA found in oil, and wells seem to replinish themselves. Coal, however, is definitely carbon taken from the atmosphere by plants -- coal comes with DNA and fossilized (incompletly carbonized) plants in it. By burning coal, we're not adding _new_ CO2 to the air. By burning oil, I suspect that we are adding new carbon. I think it's okay to do things with oil other than burn it, such as making plastics from it, because it's not adding carbon to the atmosphere.

Oil wells/coal deposits don't "replenish themselves". The can and do run out. Look at Texas. Coal and oil are very similar chemically, it's difficult to belive that one is organic and the other isn't. While there are a few dissenters, it is widely believed that most of Earth's coal and oil was formed from thick layers of vegetation produced during the Jurrasic period, etc. The Earth was different back then, the atmosphere was more oxygen-rich and consequently the was much more plant life and it was much denser (Think about it, what did all those huge plant-eating dinosaurs eat?).

It also takes many millions of years to form coal and oil for plant matter. Any we exreact is EFFECTIVELY gone forever because it would take us millions of years, and massive environmental change, to produce more.

Right now, I best bet for energy is nuclear. There is a lot more uranium ore than there is oil resources, and more importantly, refined uranion is a much more concentrated form of energy so we need less of it to begin with. Yes, there is a "waste problem" but it's easily managed through fuel rod recycling and breeder reactors. Trivia: Coal fired plants actually produce more radiation than nuclear power plants.

There's some evidence that global warming, regardless of causes, will actually trigger the next ice age, and we'll need _even more_ CO2 in the air to come back out of it. The Earth is currently somewhat low on CO2, historically speaking.

Do you have any sources on this? Again, environmental scientis are pretty much in lockstep on global warming.

I'm not a "the hypothesis that human actions are causing global warming, and that's bad, cannot possibly be right" kind of guy. But I'm not convinced with the research to date, and I deeply distruct the motives of a lot of the "global warming activists." I'm not just a yahoo reading "Discover," either -- I hold degrees in Biochemistry and Chemistry. I know the scientific method when I see it.

If you're not a professional in the field, then you're not qualified. A lot NON-specialists like chemists, statisticians, economists, etc. have critized global warming. But for the most part, they haven't done the work and don't know what they're talking about.

And even if you're NOT a big fan of global warming there are plenty of OTHER reasons to follow the environmental scientists reccomendations. Coal and oil cause smog and other pollution which have serious health risks to humans. Why not switch to a combination of nuclear for power plants, and perhaps grain alcohol for vehicles? Or possibly fuel cells. Dependence on foreign oil has caused the US political and security problems, like 9/11.

It will cost a bit of money, but frankly it wouldn't be too expensive and there really isn't a good reason NOT to do it except the greed of American oil companies and auto manufactures who don't want ot rock the boat. Fuck them. We don't have any responsibility to protect them and their profits.

Last Post!

[alpg]

I argue very well. Ask any of my remaining friends. I can win an argument on
any topic, against any opponent. People know this, and steer clear of me at
parties. Often, as a sign of their great respect, they don't even invite me.
-- Dave Barry

- this post brought to you by the Automated Last Post Generator...