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Jack Thompson Buys Stock in GTA Parent Company
omega9 writes "You're not reading it wrong. From an artice posted as Joystiq, "Jack Thompson has purchased shares in Take-Two interactive - otherwise known as the publisher behind the Grand Theft Auto series of games. So has JT suddenly become a financial supporter of the company he's long campaigned against? Not a chance. JT has purchased stock in the company in order that he might attend Take-Two's shareholder meetings and face up to the company's CEO, Paul Eibeler.""
It's true that you can attend shareholder meetings and cast proxy votes if you own a share of stock, but any information released to shareholders by a publicly-traded company has to be made available to the public, usually by way of an SEC filing of some sort. You can listen to conference calls, get annual reports, etc., on-line too even if you're not a stockholder.
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I realize this is besides the point, but what the heck. For the record, MS Flight Simulator is absolutely nothing like flying a real airplane (at least the 172 isn't - I've never flown an airliner). The throttle settings are incorrect, the roll rate is wrong, the view is wrong, it doesn't behave or feel anything like the real thing. The idea that you could use MS Flight Simulator to learn to fly or to train to do anything is ludicrous. If you've used flight simulators before learning to fly you have a small advantage in that you know what the controls do in theory - that's it. I suppose you could figure out that the WTC was at the southern tip of Manhattan island using FS, but you could figure that out from any reasonably large scale map just as easily.
"As a shareholder, doesn't he have the responsibility to do what's best for the company?"
No, and I can prove it. I own some Google stock, now watch this: GOOGLE SUCKS!!! See, nothing happened. Seriously, it is the job of the employees and board of directors to do what's best for the company.
"...can Bill Gates buy up 49% of Red Hat and then deliberatly fuck up the company?"
Once you own more than 5% of a public company, you have to file your "intentions" with the SEC. Owning 49% of a company is far different than Jack Thompson buying a stock certificate from oneshare.com. 49% might get you a number of board seats, depending upon the company. In which case, the other shareholders would sue him for breach of fiduciary duty if he did bad things with the board seats.
Bill Clinton: Pimp we can believe in. - The Shirt!!!
It makes about as much sense as Greenpeace investing in, say, Dow Chemical or ExxonMobil.
But I have to hand it to him for the audacious originality of the idea.
Actually, it's quite common for people who oppose a company to buy shares in order to protest at their shareholder meetings. Infact, I know at least one case where Greenpeace have done this, they bought shares in Amoco to try and block oil drilling in Alaska. See this page for more info on that case.
While of course there are bound to be differences between a PC and the real thing, the fact is that if your controls are properly calibrated, you most certainly can make MSFS, including using the default aircraft, behave quite plausibly like the real thing. View? Did you even bother changing the view? It's adjustable in many ways in MSFS.
I know that students who come to me having a lot of "PC flying time" under their belt are in general quite well prepared compared to non-flight sim users. (Though the PC flyers often some bad habits, such as instrument fixation). More than that, however, is that once they start their training, I can tell them what to do in MSFS so that they can practice at home and be better prepared for their next lesson. Collectively, my students have saved thousands of dollars by doing this.
"Roll rate is wrong." - 100 hour wonder, stop with the hangar talk already, ok?
Not a board meeting. He'd be nothing more than a shareholder, and shareholders rarely get to actually do much at shareholder meetings other than *possibly* ask one question.
Though given this is Jack Thompson there's a good chance they won't let him speak at all.
This is wrong. There are laws that dictate rules for shareholders. For those that dont know here is a summary:
I will assume that the corporation is incorporated in Delaware. Why? Because the vast majority of corporations in the United States are incorporated in Delaware. Why? Because Delware has the most advanced Business Corporations Act in the world, and 80% of the state income comes from incorporating businesses.
Shareholders have rights. They should! They are investors. If the company fails, they lose their money. The corporation therefore owes them a duty. One of their rights is to vote for the board. Another is to submit proposals for the consideration by the board, or to be voted on by the shareholders. The corporation has to pay for the circulation of these proposals. If they fail to circulate a proposaal they can be sued for oppressing the shareholder. Shareholders also get an annual general meeting (AGM). At the AGM, any shareholder can speak on a topic of his or her choice. The corporation itself does not "let" anyone speak - if someone wants to speak, they get to for an alloted time. If they are not allowed, the corporation, again, can be sued for oppression of the shareholder.
The purchase of shares simply for the opportunity to speak occurs all the time. Environmental organizations are well known for doing this: they buy one share, and then speak at the AGM on the company's overseas practices, for example. There is a caveat to the shareholder intiated votes and proposals though : they must be business related. These groups have tried to sue companies for not circulating their proposals1, and they have failed because they are not entitled to circulate non-business matter related items.
That is all I have time to write for now. Any more questions I will be glad to answer.
-- "Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains." Jean Jacques Rousseau