ID Tech May Mean an End to Anonymous Drinking

Anonymous Howard writes "If you visit a lot of bars and restaurants, you've likely crossed paths with driver's license scanners — machines that supposedly verify that your license is valid. In actuality, many of these scanners are designed to record your license information in addition to verifying them, and those that authenticate against a remote database are creating a record of when and where you buy alcohol. Not only that, but they're not even particularly effective — the bar code on your license uses an open, documented standard and can be rewritten to change your age or picture. Collecting our driver's license information is one thing, but collecting data about our personal drinking habits is not only a violation of, according to the ACLU representative quoted in the article, privacy and civil liberties, but this 'drinking record' could also create problems for people in civil and criminal lawsuits as proof of alcohol purchases in DUI cases or evidence of alcoholism in divorce lawsuits."

Comments

Frosty Piss, now checking for ID

[Anonymous Coward]

Due to mounting pressure, purchases of all Frosty Piss, including steaming mug varieties, are now subject to mandatory ID recording. Our apologies for the inconvenience and we hope you enjoy your beverage.

t has to be said up front

[pilgrim23]

Let me be the firth to shay that I welcome our (Hic!).... waitaminute...what was I shaying?

And impact employment and insurance?

[plopez]

With this information employers could decide not to hire you if they felt you drank too much, in their opinion, or at all. Companies owned by fundamentalist christians, mormans or even muslims may decide to do this.

Additionally, insurance companies could drop you if they found out, for exaple, you were out drinking 3 nights a week.

If this info gets out it could have a huge impact on people.

Re:And impact employment and insurance?

[Pojut]

Companies owned by fundamentalist christians, mormans or even muslims may decide to do this.

Which is silly, considering alcoholic drinks were first conceived by holy men...

Re:And impact employment and insurance?

[Kadin2048]

You couldn't even tell if you cross-referenced with credit card information. One mixed drink might cost the same as two beers or four sodas, so anyone looking to use that info wouldn't be able to prove that the individual who went to the bar actually drank.

They wouldn't know if they cross-referenced it with the information in the credit card company's database. But there's the information at the other end -- at the bar -- that they could easily get, if they have access to the information in the card scanner already.

Most upscale bars use electronic register systems for tracking tabs and ringing up bills; these show all the items that you've ordered, and then if you pay by credit card they have that as well. So it would just be a matter of going into the bar's computer and finding the bill associated with a certain credit card number (here's hoping they're only storing the last four digits...) and you've got that person's order for the evening.

Also, I'm not sure it's a safe assumption that the credit card company only gets the bottom-line data. On my American Express statements, there's sometimes fairly granular data available. In some cases food, drinks/bar, and tips are broken out separately. So obviously the restaurant's system is passing that data up to Amex when it runs the transaction. I haven't seen this on anything except Amex, but it proves the capability exists and is being utilized. (They also print the ticket or confirmation number of rail and plane tickets that you buy with your card, right on your statement, and sometimes the order number of some online stores as well.)

Re:And impact employment and insurance?

[UbuntuDupe]

Additionally, insurance companies could drop you if they found out, for exaple, you were out drinking 3 nights a week.

Yeah, man, I hate when they accurately judge my risk of an accident and prevent me from leeching off of safe drivers.[1]

[1] Assuming frequent drinkers really are more dangerous as per actuarial tables, which may or may not be true.

Re:And impact employment and insurance?

[Pojut]

I should have been more specific, I meant wine.

From Wikipedia:

The discovery of late Stone Age beer jugs has established the fact that intentionally fermented beverages existed at least as early as the Neolithic period (cir. 10,000 BC), and it has been suggested that beer may have preceded bread as a staple; wine clearly appeared as a finished product in Egyptian pictographs around 4,000 BC[1]

Brewing dates from the beginning of civilization in ancient Egypt and alcoholic beverages were very important in that country. Symbolic of this is the fact that while many gods were local or familial, Osiris, was worshiped throughout the entire country. The Egyptians believed that this important god invented beer, a beverage that was considered a necessity of life; it was brewed in the home "on an everyday basis."[1]

Both beer and wine were deified and offered to gods. Cellars and winepresses even had a god whose hieroglyph was a winepress. The ancient Egyptians made at least seventeen varieties of beer and at least 24 varieties of wine. Alcoholic beverages were used for pleasure, nutrition, medicine, ritual, remuneration and funerary purposes. The latter involved storing the beverages in tombs of the deceased for their use in the after-life.[1]

Main Article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_alcohol#Ancient_period

And yes, the article cites its sources.

Re:And impact employment and insurance?

[Pojut]

That's because weed wasn't legal when they made alcohol illegal ;-)

Really, if you look at the effects that it has on people, combined with the uses of each product (other than drinking, alcoholic beverages don't really have much of any other use...whereas marijuana/hemp has THOUSANDS of uses) it would have made more sense to keep marijuana legal than to keep alcohol legal...

http://norml.org/

Do your part in helping to end the prohibition of Marijuana and industrial hemp.

Re:And impact employment and insurance?

[causality]

So? What's wrong with that? Why shouldn't a company be able to decide such a thing? Should "Bob's Morman Supply" not be able to say something like that? Would about "Bob's Office Supply"?

It may be illegal now (the ACLU would certainly argue for that), but I don't see why a company shouldn't be able to do that.

Allowing corporations to control your lifestyle while away from work is very dangerous. Regarding alcohol, the only legitimate concern of a company I work for is that I am sober when I show up for work and remain sober while I am on the clock. This is the time that they pay for, and they have a right (within limits of course) to determine what I do or don't do during that time. What I do in my private, off-time that they are not paying for is absolutely none of their business. Trying to monitor what I do during my private time away from work is nothing but an invasion of privacy that should never be tolerated for any reason. I honestly can't understand why there is even a discussion about this; it's patently obvious.

This is all fine with me. I can understand why many people wouldn't want this, and I wouldn't push it. But if we keep records to make it easier to convict drunk drivers or people who aren't supposed to be drinking (like perhaps because of some prior conviction where that was made a condition of probation). Those are both fine for me.

Law enforcement is not supposed to be easy. One description I have heard of fascism is when the desire for efficiency of law enforcement outweighs any concern about civil rights. Judges (or whomever) may set a nearly-unenforcable condition for a probation if they choose to do so -- that is not my problem. It certainly does not give them or anyone else the right to invade my privacy for the sake of making their job easier.

Also, this will do nothing or next to nothing to stop drunk drivers. So this database can confirm that someone was at a bar and had an alcoholic beverage. It will not confirm whether they drove to the bar, walked to the bar, took a cab, or had a designated driver. So if a crime is committed, this will tell you even less than what could be learned by old-fashioned policework, i.e. interviewing witnesses.

I wish there were just one politician with the balls to be honest and say "yeah, I could say that this is for your safety or to help make the world a better place, but really we just want to invade your privacy so that we can have a society increasingly under central control." They are too cowardly to be so honest and it's fitting that they are elected by people too cowardly to value freedom more than security.

Re:And impact employment and insurance?

[Reality Master 201]

1) a great argument for national, single payer healthcare like in most of the rest of the non-3rd world.

2) What the fuck are you talking about? If I'm an alcoholic, my company doesn't have any responsibility to pay for my treatment, except as it regards medical costs (see point one).

As for the final toss of line, "Those of us who have nothing to hide, have nothing to worry about", fuck you.

I've also got nothing to hide, and I still don't want my boss poking around in my private life. If you're ok with it, fine; don't foist your willingness to drop your pants for your boss on the rest of us. It's assholes like you that enable totalitarian governments.

Re:And impact employment and insurance?

[eli pabst]

Yeah, man, I hate when they accurately judge my risk of an accident and prevent me from leeching off of safe drivers. I have a professor who buys a crap load of beer for an informal journal club group, but doesn't drink any himself. Should his premiums go up simply because of some number in a database that makes him look like a heavy drinker? How about we base premiums on a more accurate predictor like the number of drunk driving accidents he's actually been in, rather than extrapolating based on an assumption of an assumption.

Target for Some Civil Disobedience

[hardburn]

I'm of legal drinking age already and I haven't yet seen one of these machines in my area. But if I ever do, I'd like to have a false bar graph taped on the back of my license. Who will be the first to make a web site to generate these at will? And how long until that web site is labeled a terrorist act?

Re:Target for Some Civil Disobedience

[Otter]

But if I ever do, I'd like to have a false bar graph taped on the back of my license. Who will be the first to make a web site to generate these at will? And how long until that web site is labeled a terrorist act?

I don't follow your logic: not only do you not get your Manhattan, you get your ass tossed in jail for as long as it takes them to figure out that you really do have a valid ID. And they're liable to charge you for tampering anyway.

Yeah, that's really sticking it to Dick Cheney! Fight The Power!

Re:Target for Some Civil Disobedience

[DragonWriter]

That is not civil disobedience; it's breaking the law.

Civil disobedience is nonviolent refusal to comply with a law or command of government, either because the law or command itself is perceived as unjust or because or because the government issuing the law or command is viewed as illegitimate independent of the merit of the particular law or command.

So "That is not civil disobedience; its's breaking the law" reveals a deep misunderstanding of the entire concept of civil disobedience. That's not saying one could not argue that the form of disobedience suggested is a poorly chosen and/or ineffective method of civil disobedience.

Re:Target for Some Civil Disobedience

[garcia]

No, what needs to happen is a little education of the public and then vote with your feet. I still will not enter a store because they use ID scanners. I have absolutely no problem driving out of my way to an Apple Valley liquor store to buy beer because they don't scan. I still tell them, every time, that I'm there because they protect my privacy.

Lakeville Liquors just built a new facility less than a half mile from my house. I walk by it daily and am proud that it joins the ranks of Starbucks as an establishment that I will never step foot in.

In addition, I have used a high powered earth magnet on my ID's magnetic stripe rendering it useless in any scanner including the cops (who asked me to get a new ID because it was "worn out"), the smoke shop (for cigars), or anywhere else that feels the need to scan ID.

If enough people realized what those machines did (I make sure to tell everyone around me when I see one being used before walking out) then businesses would stop using them because less people would enter the store. Sadly I'm dreaming about that because no one cares.

Re:Target for Some Civil Disobedience

[0xdeadbeef]

That is not civil disobedience; it's breaking the law.

Just what do you think civil disobedience is, then? Writing a strongly worded letter to your senator?

The most effective way of avoiding a "tyranny of the majority" situation is to make it clear that enforcing an unjust law will be more trouble than not having it in the first place.

Re:Target for Some Civil Disobedience

[parcel]

Sorry, but you're completely mistaken. A law being unjust is not justification for breaking. Tell that to Ms. Parks.

Re:Target for Some Civil Disobedience

[DragonWriter]

Sorry, but you're completely mistaken.

Sorry, but, no, I'm not.

A law being unjust is not justification for breaking.

You are welcome to your opinion of what justifies breaking a law; that's completely irrelevant to the point on which you claimed I was mistaken.

Civil disobedience is refusing to comply with a command of government (including, but not limited to, a law) as a way of protesting the injustice of either the command/law, or the claim to authority of the government issuing the command/law. Whether civil disobedience is justified, either in general or in any specific case, is a matter of opinion, and irrelevant to the discussion of what civil disobedience is.

My stance is the one used in the Civil Rights movement, by Gandhi, etc.

No, its not. Neither Gandhi nor the Civil Rights Movement took the stance that the injustice of law cannot justify breaking them; both, to the contrary, to the position that the illegitimacy of law (either because of the illegitimacy of the authority issuing it, in the case of Gandhi's anti-colonial movement, or because of the injustice of its content, in the case of Civil Rights Movement) could justify breaking it in certain, non-violent ways.

Take it up with any PoliSci professor and you'll see that I'm right.

Unlikely. At least, none of the ones I interacted in the course of getting a Bachelor's degree in the field ever had your rather unique views on those movements. Perhaps you should consider, though, some more direct source material, like Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "Letter from Birmingham Jail":

You express a great deal of anxiety over our willingness to break laws. [...] The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a more responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that "an unjust law is no law at all."

The act proposed upthread may fail to be proper "civil disobedience" because it isn't open defiance of the law with acceptance of the consequences, but it certainly doesn't fail because it is breaking the law. If it wasn't breaking the law, civil disobedience would instead be called "civil obedience".

That's why

[dreamchaser]

That's why I just keep a still running and do all of my drinking alone in the dark. I even use a tin cup to match my hat.

Re:That's why

[Flarg!]

Waiting? Who said anything about waiting? We drain those cans the old-fashioned way, the way my grandaddy did before he went blind and died of liver failure!

Easy workaround

[wiggles]

This is easy to work around -- just mark the bar code with a sharpie. The machine won't be able to read it, and they'll be forced to check your ID the old fashioned way.

Re:Huh?

[eli pabst]

But websites using tracking cookies have little way of correlating your particular cookie with who you actually are unless you provide them with that info by choice. At the very most they can track an IP address, which in the era of dynamic IPs and TOR is largely useless unless you have access to ISP records. Here they have a nice little database including name, soc, and home address. Why would they even need to collect anything like that in the first place? Smacks of big brother to me.

They should make the database public

[elrous0]

My fraternity brothers are all married and I STILL NEED DRINKING BUDDIES!!!

Re:rights vs records vs privacy

[Lendrick]

The database should require warrants and be overseen by a provacy advocate group as well as some seriously paranoid geeks for security. But the data should be there if required to prove innocence or guilt. That's all well and good if we could ensure that it would be used in only this way, but the sad reality is that a system like this will almost certainly be abused. The minimal benefit a system like this may provide isn't worth the risk of abuse.

Re:Huh?

[Mr. Underbridge]

A good majority of websites also do that, and who knows what they are doing with the data?

Really? Web sites track my behavior and correlate it with my name, address, date of birth, and (last I checked in some states) my social security number?

Doesn't sound too kosher to me.

DUI?

[moosesocks]

Wouldn't the driver's BAC be the "smoking gun" in most DUI cases?

The evidence of an alcohol purchase isn't going to be remotely sufficient to convict without a BAC test, and the presence of a BAC test alone should be more than sufficient to produce a conviction. I honestly don't see where the purhcahse record could hypothetically fit into the equation.

If there's an argument for or against ID scanning, this isn't it. Even from the cops' perspective, this isn't even going to help them 'nab the bad guys' any more than they're already equipped to do.

Papers, please?

Re:DUI?

[carpe_noctem]

I'm an American expat living in Germany. One of the things that has been interesting to me here is the difference of how prohibited goods like alcohol and cigarettes are treated in terms of minors.

I must say, I always get screwed when I come back to America to visit and try to go to a bar or buy beer, because I have completely gotten used to not having to bring an ID with me, even though I am clearly over 18/21. The annoyance of this, and the fact that the establishments are only enforcing the rules out of fear that I'm an undercover cop, add to the ridiculousness of the rules.

In Germany, you only have to be 16 to buy alcohol. There is talk of raising this (and the cigarette age) up to 18, but frankly, it won't make much of a difference given the easy access to either substance. The really [i]nice[/i] thing about this is that you are therefore of drinking age before you are able to drive. Thus, by the time that kids learn how to drive, they've already learned how to hold their liquor, and are less likely to make a stupid mistake like getting behind the wheel.

I used to live in Indiana for five years, where the drinking age is of course 21. The number of drunk driving accidents I witnessed or heard about via people that caused them was substantially higher than in a place where alcohol is proudly sold every day and hour of the week (if you know where to get it), at gas stations (heh), movie theaters (which really rocks btw), and supermarkets (and none of that 3.2% crap, either). There is an obvious conclusion to all of this -- people like to drink, and they're going to do it anyways, includng kids. It's better to create an atmosphere where people learn how to handle this responsibility, and are encouraged to enjoy it without risking the lives of others.

That's why I only drink at seedy bars

[p5linux]

Don't go to those 'high tech' places. Go to the real gin joint down the street. Besides once you are a regular at a place they don't card you. I went to a place that rhymes with Drasy Conky on rte 110 in amityville, NY that had one of those machines. Next thing I know I'm getting all these advertisments for night clubs and bars sent to my home. Then my wife starts asking me all these questions about where I'm going. not cool.

That's all well and good...

[carpe_noctem]

...but it won't stop me from taking 20$ from the kids standing behind the liquor store to buy them a case of PBR.

God bless their little, slightly drunk, souls.

No need for police to ask if you drank tonight.

[xC0000005]

Officer:"License and registration, please."
BEEP
"I see you had three martinis, two shots and bought a bloody mary for the dishwater blonde who dumped you to go to the park with the accountant."
You: "It tells you all that on my license?"
Officer: "No, I gave them a ticket for having sex in public while being ugly a few minutes ago. Now, step out of the car and put your hands behind your back."

In Soviet Russia

[EllisDees]

Err, no, in Ohio actually. Around here there are a few bars that have taken to scanning the magnetic strip in our drivers license. Lucky for me, I have a few of those super strong neodymium magnets and have completely negated said magnetic strip.

They usually give up after about 15 swipes.

Re:rights vs records vs privacy

[Kadin2048]

That's pretty ridiculous. You could make the same argument about any data. Just think: if we put a GPS receiver and a radio transponder in everyone's car, we could compile all sorts of interesting data! We'd be able to tell if someone was speeding or driving aggressively, if they commit a hit-and-run, if they're cheating on their spouses ... heck, we could even get rid of all those traffic helicopters. Does anyone think that's not a really fucking terrible idea? It would be an unbelievable mass invasion of privacy.

Lots of information has the potential to be useful. That's not enough, by itself, to invalidate the very serious privacy concerns.

Anytime you start collecting information in advance, "just in case," you're fundamentally doing something wrong. You're treating innocent, honest people like criminals in order to make life marginally easier for the cops. If that's what people in law enforcement say they need to succeed, then we need to fire them and get some more innovative law enforcement, and give them better resources -- not twist our society around backwards in order to make their jobs easier.

I remember hearing in 2002 about this

[davidsyes]

On the radio the discussion was about east coast bars swiping information, lying to the patrons and telling them it was for security reasons, to prevent re-entry of banned or troublesome former-patrons.

(Me here forward:)

The thing was, they were promptly selling this information to other parties who reprocessed it as thank you offers, happy birthday offers, coupons, ads etc with extreme precision because these companies had ALL the necessary information to reduce the cost of marketing these people. It also gave these marketers a way of upping the price/cost of information these marketers wanted.

Later, when I moved to Oregon for a year, I saw the cashier at a convenience store actually SWIPING the card of someone buying alcohol and I think cigarettes (it's been a while, so it could be the reverse or the checking of purchase of both...).

That turned me off. I don't recall buying alcohol myself at that mart. What I think is stupid is swiping the ID of someone who obviously is well above 25 or 30, and doesn't appear to be wearing spy or makeup-artist appliances.

I guess then that people with passports (I don't know if stores will try to scan these and if they can't then decline/refuse the sale) can present them instead of their driver's license.

Somebody needs to come up with a two-or-three-part license/age-verification/right-to-vote device/card so that for clubbing and purchases not involving checks or credit, only NAME AND AGE/DOB appear.

Then, for big-ticket items, the second part (matching) has to be presented to provide ADDRESS (Current and maybe 5 previous or 5-10 years of previous addresses based on reconciled IRS & quarterly payroll records for working/retired adults).

The THIRD part would be for retirement/pre-retirement benefits/public assistance receipt and cash-out of stocks/purchase of property and so on, that don't need to be passed on to anyone except government/law enforcement.

Maybe I've blurred some areas, but I'm ALL FOR saying "SCREW YOU" to clubs, bars, and any place scraping information they have NO business obtaining, possessing or reselling. If they want to ban patrons, then use imagery/facial recognition equipment at the point of ejection or to replay tapes of a confused situation/melee.

Anyone reading headlines about bar bouncers participating in assaulting or stalking of patrons can easily see how this 2-3-part identification deprives nosy bar or shop employees from gleaning residency information on cash-only patrons. It could possibly even work for police identification situations when the police stop is a graduated information determination: First: verify the detainee is NOT who your on the lookout for. If name is STILL too close a match, ask the detainee to produce part two.

Same could work for other scenarios. Use your imagination.

Re:Huh?

[Mysticalfruit]

The bigger issue is that it's not hard to tie all of this data together to get a picture of a persons live, less their privacy. Lets just say the RIAA pumps an extra million bucks into some senators reelection fund and manages to get a bill passed that makes it a crime to purchase more than 500 pieces of recordable media a year (without some sort of license).

It would be very easy for the government to subpoena the records of all the major chain stores and very quickly have a list of people who broke this law. They could even write it into the law that it's retroactive to some date. Or how about people who also have netflix accounts and own a DVD writer and have purchased DVD-R media in the last year... Even if it's not a technical "crime" they could probably sue you in civil court with a "Pay us 5k and we'll go away" shake down game.

Re:rights vs records vs privacy

[masdog]

The problem is that this system will only be able to prove that you were in the bar, not that you were actually drinking.

Re:rights vs records vs privacy

[Hatta]

I'm all for personal privacy but I really can't see the loss of this sort of privacy outweighing the benifits of getting drunk drivers kept in jail or having a factual record for divorce hearings.

Whoawhoawhoa there. Divorce hearings? You think it's a good idea for your entire drinking history to be brought up in a divorce hearing? That sounds to me like the most abusive application possible for this data.

Thank MADD and those like them

[MikeRT]

Groups like MADD are the modern day puritans. They're not content with just protecting basic public order, but rectifying perceived personality flaws by using the state to remake society. MADD and those like them have never met a restriction on drinkers' rights they didn't find too onerous, short of the way that Sharia tends to punish drinkers.

I hate being reminded of the damage that alcoholics do as part of some stupid scheme to further erode basic rights. I grew up with an alcoholic father. Don't fucking remind me. There are only times I've nearly punched a girl in the face was when I had a proto-MADD member who didn't grow up in such a household piously get in my face saying that I didn't know what I was talking about WRT alcoholism and family life.

Re:Thank MADD and those like them

[jdjbuffalo]

MADD has most certainly gotten out of hand. Their founder, Candy Leightner, has stated as much on numerous occasions. The group has been cooped by prohibitionists.

I really wish we could find a way to disband them or at least minimize their pull with State and Federal governments. They makeup stats by including calling it a drunk driving accident if a designated sober driver is driving his/her drunk friends home. Same goes for if you hit a drunk pedestrian. And if you look at the real stats they state that lowering the BAC below .10 has effect on the number of drunk accidents. Their whole movement is predicated on pushing the laws as far as they can to give them a reason to exist and get more money.

I rewrote the magstripe on my license

[imuffin]

After a liquor store scanned my license without even asking my permission, I got ahold of a magstripe writer and deleted the data on my license's magstripe and wrote over it with my credit card. Now when I go out I can use the same card to get past the bouncer and pay the tab. Sometimes they look at me funny when I present my license for payment, but when they run the card the transaction is always approved.

Re:God dammit

[cayenne8]

"I once attempted to buy a twelve-pack at a gas station in Rochester, NY. At the time, my license had a magnetic strip and not a barcode (I do not live in New York), and they wouldn't sell the beer to me because they couldn't scan it with their reader. Luckily, I was with a friend who had a NY license."

Ok...I was guessing this was more of a northeastern type thing. I get the feeling they're really MUCH more hung up on drinking laws up there. You mention having two drinks and driving home up there, and people I talk to get their panties all in a wad. Much more relaxed down here in the SE...hell, we even have drive through daquiri shops here where I live, and until 4-5 years ago I think it was, we didn't even have an open container law here.

Anyway, I've noticed over the years that the NE is much more uptight about liquor laws than in the SE. I'm not sure how bad it is out west, but, I hear it is pretty bad out there too.

This is illegal in Washington State

[WillAffleckUW]

By law, retaining and using this information is a felony.

So, while some national chains may think this is a great idea, they'd better start getting themselves fitted for orange jumpsuits, IMHO.

Re:God dammit

[Architect_sasyr]

You mention having two drinks and driving home up there, and people I talk to get their panties all in a wad

There's a fairly standard joke out here in Australia about you Americans and your drink (actually there is heaps of them) let me relate two:

"If I drank this much in America I would be an alcoholic, in Australia I'm a fucking legend"
"What do a fisherman in a boat and American beer have in common? They're both close to water"

So I'm almost completely off topic, but just wanting to point that out.

Re:Not dictate your actions, just not associate wi

[Zonk (troll)]

That's right, they shouldn't dictate to you what you do when you're not at work. On the other hand, should you be able to force them to hire you, regardless? This brings into play both freedom of association and property rights. So do you think it's fine to not hire someone because they're Christian, Jewish, Atheist, etc? IMHO, if someone is qualified for the job and keeps their personal and business lives separate, there shouldn't be an issue. If I wanted to smoke (I don't, btw, never have and never will) after a stressful day, that's my business. Not the employers. If the company doesn't want their employees smoking on the premises, near the premises, in uniform, etc, I feel that's completely acceptable.

If I don't want to hire you because you smoke, tough cookies. Can I be forced to associate with you like that? Can I be forced to use my property (ie: my business) that way? I'm not saying employers have to be forced to hire smokers. I dislike laws like that. I have zero issues with the employer not allowing smoking during work hours. The issue I have is employer restricting what people do in their own time.

If someone doesn't smoke at work, doesn't preach at people, does their job, shows up on time, acts professional, etc, it should be none of the employer's business.

Re:God dammit

[PitaBred]

I've always heard it as "What does having sex in a canoe have in common with Bud Light? They're both fucking close to water"

Re:Legality of obscuring the barcode?

[TubeSteak]

Yes yes, very few of you are lawyers, but I'm wondering what the legality of removing/obscuring the barcode so that it no longer scans. Technically, you're tampering with an official ID card. Realistically, no one is going to prosecute you for 'defacing' the barcode on your license since there is no intent to commit fraud.

If you want to see what's on your barcode, check this site out:
http://www.turbulence.org/Works/swipe/barcode.html

Keep in mind that the 2D barcodes have a fair bit of redundancy. You can check the results of your handywork using a scanner and the aforementioned website.

Re:God dammit

[biovoid]

Mod parent up. I'm an Aussie and I've had some truly outstanding, world-class US beers. The craft-beer industry over there is exploding and, quite frankly, one of the most exciting things to happen to the beer industry world-wide in centuries.

Re:God dammit

[biovoid]

Fosters? No one in Australia drinks Fosters. It's just cat's piss that we export to the rest of the world. I'm not sure if we even bother to make it fizzy first.