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CA City Mulls Evading the Law On Red-Light Cameras
TechDirt is running a piece on Corona, CA, where officials are considering ignoring a California law that authorizes red-light cameras — cutting the state and the county out of their portion of the take — in order to increase the city's revenue. The story was first reported a week ago. The majority of tickets are being (automatically) issued for "California stops" before a right turn on red, which studies have shown rarely contribute to an accident. TechDirt notes the apparent unconstitutionality of what Corona proposes to do: "The problem here is that Corona is shredding the Sixth Amendment of the US Constitution, the right to a trial by jury. By reclassifying a moving violation... to an administrative violation... Corona is doing something really nefarious. In order to appeal an administrative citation you have to admit guilt, pay the full fine, and then apply for a hearing in front of an administrative official, not a judge in a court. The city could simply deny all hearings for administrative violations or schedule them far out in advance knowing full well that they have your money, which you had to pay before you could appeal."
3 "New Architechture" operating systems.
Microsoft is getting more like the old Xerox and IBM every day.
Xerox PARC: Create industry changing new technology that we hear about but never see. Never release.
IBM of the 1980's: Fat, lethargic, bureaucracy driven.
Microsoft right now: Both.
I'm still waiting for Cairo.
--
BMO
...but still can't handle modern web standards.
Say what you want about Microsoft, but their research division does a hell of a lot of genuine innovation.
This is an important problem area for future software systems, great that alternative approaches are being looked at. More power to them.
.: Max Romantschuk
"...specifically for multicore environments."
Mr.Gates, this is what we expected from Windows 7.
Microsoft is far to big to change direction. They are a marketing company trying to wring every last penny out of windows and related tools. They have never been a technology company and trying to change now will do nothing but burn vast sums of money. Windows is obsolete and they know they have to replace it but they will never be able to come up with anything better.
They could develop new and better OS's at a fraction of their current research costs by simply giving cash to universities to do the work and keeping their hands off the projects. Sadly they can't think like that.
Because... even OSX can't protect you from stupid. There's not a pill you can take.. or a book you can read.
Just wait till major linux distros start including one, if that market share ever perks up above the uber-geek demographic.
MS Research is like a research university for all intents and purposes; they basically have academic latitude. Of course by the time the product reaches market it will be made, um..."better".
93rd rule of Slashdot: No matter how obvious my sarcasm is, my comment will be taken seriously by someone.
MS Research is like a research university for all intents and purposes; they basically have academic latitude. Of course by the time the product reaches market it will be made, um..."better".
That's exactly it. MS Research is very much like a university except that their projects rarely make it out into the public in any meaningful and open way.
I'm not begrudging MS keeping their projects to themselves, just pointing out that there is a fairly key distinction to be made here.
That's hardly fair. Safari's new javascript engine was called Squirrelfish for example (before they renamed it Nitro). Squirrelfish, Barrelfish - not a big difference if you ask me.
Apple is considered cooler because they actually release new tech instead of just bragging about it and then quietly ditching it two years later.
For example while Microsoft make a big song and dance about their new theorectical OS with efficient multicore support that they may release one day, Apple built Grand Central Dispatch into Snow Leopard and are now selling it.
In less than a year there will be several actual shipping Mac apps using this technology, probably around about the same time that Microsoft quietly drop Barrelfish and move onto something else that looks shiny.
I've seen an ATW at work in the late 80s. My Archimedes could calculate a mandlebrot set in about 30 seconds, a PC needed several minutes for that. The ATW could zoom in and out mandlebrots _in real time_ and one fly through them like through a 3D-world, I was really stunned when I saw that.
The IBM-PC may have been a turd in comparison, but it was a turd that cost a tenth of the price while still doing most of what people needed a computer to do. So, it was a cost-efficient turd. That meant that companies could afford to computerize much more of their workforce, sooner, and that more families could get a computer, earlier. And I don't think that's sad at all.
If you don't know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.
Just be glad they aren't outsourcing them to Digg.
Scientists point out problems, engineers fix them
altslashdot.org: The future of slashdot.
The "exception" is that they are pretending that this is not a fine for a crime, but instead is a fee for a non-crime interaction with the govt. You don't need a jury trial to tell you that [any non-criminal interaction with the DMV or court clerk or registrar] is going to have a fee attached to it. They are trying to put this "fee" for keeping your driver's license after a violation in the same category as the fee for getting your driver's license in the first place.
The lack of a moving violation has an advantage for the motorist. Here in Illinois, red-light tickets do not affect your driving record or insurance rates.
As a bicyclist in a city where red lights mean "four more cars!", I was happy to see the red light cameras arrive. Even after getting a ticket as a driver. The on-line video of my violation was educational - it looked like an audition for "Cops". I'm a lot more careful now.
The overuse of stop signs in southern California is unbelievable. Even on streets that one would naturally expect to flow through there are many 3- and 4-way stops. Having grown up with Australian traffic infrastructure and driven extensively in Europe the multitude of unnecessary stops in California is maddening -- not to mention environmentally unfriendly and inefficient. It may be ego but by sheer numbers of rolling stops being done here the title is not undeserved.
"where officials are considering ignoring a California law that authorizes red-light cameras -- cutting the state and the county out of their portion of the take -- in order to increase the city's revenue."
If this doesn't convince you that it's NOT "all about safety" then I don't know what will...
"I bow to no man" - Riddick
You're right!
What we need to do is surround the building and remind this town's legislators who gave them their job. This bullshit red-light ticketing without a trial needs to end.
Then once that's done, we'll surround the headquarters of RIAA and shoot anyone who tries to leave the building. (Or until the police show up.)
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall