Subpoenas are written by lawyers, not judges. Any recipient of a subpoena could motion a judge to quash the subpoena. Of course, Yahoo wouldn't be required to make such a motion for the user, but they should notify the user before replying to the subpoena, giving the user a chance to motion to quash the subpoena.
First, I wouldn't really say that Andover IPO money is 'great,' seeing as the ipo price was 18 dollars and it's been trading in about the 15-17 dollar range.
The current trading price has no relevance to how much money Andover got from the IPO. Andover got $18*(however many shares they sold in the IPO) and they get to keep that cash no matter what happens to Andover's market value.
I am not saying that Ralph should demand "all sorts of concessions" from nVidia; however, they are under a legal obligation to follow the License, whether Ralph chooses to enforce it or not.
That is simply not true. If they took only Ralph's code, they can do whatever they want with it as long as they have Ralph's blessing. The GPL is legally based on copyright, and there is no such thing as a copyright violation that occurs with the copyright holder's permission. By licensing his code under the GPL, Ralph did not give up his rights as the author to grant additional rights to use his code to whomever he wishes.
Re:Computers aren't better at chess
on
Solving Chess?
·
· Score: 1
It kind of pisses me of when people say that computers are better than humans at chess. Computers aren't better, they are different.
It kind of pisses me off when people say that cars are faster than humans. Cars aren't faster, they are different.
Good human players don't follow every path down, and they only look a few tuns deep into any path. They recognize similar board patterns to games in their knowledge and experience and extapolate likely outcomes from the similar positions.
Until we can program a computers to win at chess that doen't use this "brute force" method of finding the best move, I can't be truly impressed with the computer's ability. Right now they have just made computers fast enough to think far enough ahead to approximate recognizing patterns in the pieces.
Why should I be impressed that humans (including myself) can't coherently explain how we figure out what move to make?
Re:I don't understand the question.
on
Solving Chess?
·
· Score: 1
The major stumbling block is defining what a "mistake" is. After all, there are numerous points in a game where one might make an unorthodox move. I believe these are called gambits. A computer might rate one of these gambits as a mistake, when in fact it is the key to winning the game. Some of these gambits might even involve sacrificing a piece, which a computer might rate as a "mistake."
That's the whole point of solving the game. For chess to be considered solved, each branch would have to be examined all the way to the end of the game (or mathematically proved to be equivalent to a branch that had already been solved), no matter how stupid the move might look.
What's the most egregious way to flaunt the UCITA? Set up a big demonstration with 50 CDRWs and offer to burn anybody who wants a free copy of shrink-wrapped software? Any better ideas?
That's not a good way to protest UCITA, since you'd be violating copyright law even if UCITA hadn't passed. Traditionally, civil disobedience consists of doing some obviously benign act that became illegal as a result of the law you're protesting against.
Re:Before you condemn, RTFB
on
Fighting UCITA
·
· Score: 1
> Sounds like part of the GPL just got invalidated - one might argue that about "derivative works". Oops.
What the hell are you talking about? You took that quote out of context, and then proceeded to make a non sequitir anyway. Here's the full paragraph from the letter.
Many of those concerned about the bill believe it gives software vendors control over your files and data. Under our version of UCITA, your data is your property.
It's obvious from the context that Chairman Barve simply means to imply that the bill doesn't do anything crazy like give software companies rights to data you create using their products. The GPL also specifically states that the end user has full rights to works they create using GPL'd software.
This is a very different thing from derivative works, which are what you get when you take something someone else made and change it.
But for the best output bandwidth from the human, you have to get all 10 fingers involved. So a keyboard with *copious* function keys is much better than anything with a rodent.
You're wrong. There are undoubtedly millions of distinct actions one can perform with a mouse in less than a second. What it comes down to is mapping the set of mouse actions to the set of tasks one wants to be performed. With anything involving text processing it is impossible to do this in such a way that the user can remember how to do what they're trying to do (and still use most of the possible mouse actions in the mapping). With image manipulation, it's trivial to create such a mapping. The usefulness of the input device depends on the task at hand.
So while I think the power observations are very pertinent, I don't think they can be the basis of dismisal of the danger. I think you have to be able to say that the amount of heating your body might receive from several computers 24/7 is on the order of what you get anyway from the electrical system, or something like that. There must be some effect, but as long as it is below what you can measure it is probably below the level at which DNA repair will protect you from cancer.
Heating? The amount of heating you get by turning your thermostat up a few degrees has to be orders of magnitude greater than any heating caused by RF radiation.
According to the article, Hasbro didn't win the lawsuit, they reached an out-of-court settlement. That means that no precedent has been set. It's still very unfortunate for the particular people Hasbro settled with, but at least it doesn't mean that Hasbro's claims had any real legal basis.
the same people in this discussion, on the side of the GPL, are on the same side that believes that pirating music and software is part of their "free right", knowing full well that it violates copyrights and or agreements.
What's your point? Are you saying that because a subset of people who use the GPL don't agree with copyright law, Be shouldn't be held accountable for violating Bruce's copyright?
The DMCA does not outlaw reverse engineering. It outlaws bypassing a method that controls access to a copyrighted work, or distributing a tool to do that, without the authorization of the copyright holder. It happens that reverse engineering is usually not a defense against the DMCA, but you still need to committ the underlying violation.
For example, in the DeCSS case, if people had been charged for trade secret violations, reverse engineering would be a valid defense. It usually isn't a valid defense against DMCA violations, but reverse engineering isn't in and of itself a violation of the DMCA.
Since Be doesn't have some "copy"-protection scheme built into their libraries, the DMCA doesn't apply.
Who'd want that? Sure, voice recognition is nice, but the security is as bad as Windows 95. Anyone can just take over someone else's ship, without having to extort so much as a password from them.
dotTV Email Services may be terminated in whole or in part, effective immediately, by either dotTV or User at any time upon written notice, except as provided herein. Upon termination, User's right to use the dotTV Email Service immediately ceases, and dotTV is not obligated to forward any unread or unsent messages to User or any third party. dotTV shall not be liable to User or any third party for termination of the dotTV Email Service. In the case of a terminated paid dotTV Email Service ("Paid Service"), upon written request to dotTV, User shall receive at dotTV's option, either i) reimbursement of the pro-rata portion of the amount paid for the period remaining on User's account for the terminated Paid Service; or ii) credit for another Paid Service equivalent to the pro-rata portion of the amount paid for the period remaining on User's account for the terminated Paid Service. There shall be no reimbursement or credit if the dotTV Email Service is terminated due to User's violation of the terms of this Agreement. dotTV reserves the right to terminate User's e-mail address in the event that dotTV's rights to use certain domain names or e-mail addresses terminate or expire, in which case User shall receive a replacement dotTV e-mail address. In addition, dotTV retains the right, at dotTV's sole discretion, to terminate any and all parts of the dotTV Email Service provided to User, without refunding User for any annual fees paid but not yet accrued, if it determines that User has failed to comply with any of the terms of the Acceptable Use Policy. If DotTV determines that User has failed to comply with any of the terms in Section (a) above, of the Acceptable Use Policy, dotTV shall when appropriate, (1) facilitate criminal prosecution against such User by referring User's spamming activity to the appropriate legal authorities, and (2) bring a civil action against such User, who shall be liable to dotTV for any direct, indirect, special, incidental, or consequential damages incurred by dotTV as a result of User's spamming or other prohibited activity.
So, it looks like when they sell a domain corresponding to one of your e-mail addresses, you'll either be refunded your $1 on a pro-rated basis (snicker, snicker), or given a new e-mail address to last until the old one expires.
On the plus side, it seems like they take a hard-line stance against spamming.
US$10M, do the math, the US$1million basic yearly amount will either half the taxation of it?s citizens or allow some serious infrastructure improvement.
That's $1 million quarterly, not yearly. Actually, I suspect it's really $1.25 million quarterly, since otherwise it doesn't total to $50 million over 10 years. That's HALF their current GDP.
Looks like Mr. Allen sold off some of his stock *just* at the right time.
What are you talking about? According to the link you posted, his planned sales were on April 3 and 4. On March 31, MSFT closed at 104.125. On the next trading day, April 3, MSFT opened at 94.4375, and then fell another 3.5 points. On April 4, it fell about 2 points. I can't think of much worse possible timing.
What are you talking about? You can't be circumventing intellectual property protection unless there's intellectual property to be protected in the first place. Talk City doesn't hold copyright on the text of the chats taking place.
Of course, this idea falls apart a bit when you consider that their IRCd is actually Open Source (GPL), unless they made it from scratch, which is unlikely.
Just because it's GPL'd doesn't mandate the release of changes if they don't distribute a modified version, which shouldn't be a problem, seeing that it is, after all, a server.
Oh come on, look at the alternive. I'd pick Bush even if I wasn't a republican over "I invened the internet" Gore. If/.ers are against Bush, they simply won't go to the Polls.
Assuming, for the sake of argument, that you are correct, wouldn't/.ers be better off voting for third party candidates that not voting at all?
Slashdot Mirror
NU != Norway
NO == Norway
They're in the US. A cursory glance at www.shn.nu reveals that it's hosted by a web hosting company they own.
The problem itself could easily have been resolved with a robots.txt
eBay has a robots.txt, and it clearly prohibits bots from reading the listings.
Subpoenas are written by lawyers, not judges. Any recipient of a subpoena could motion a judge to quash the subpoena. Of course, Yahoo wouldn't be required to make such a motion for the user, but they should notify the user before replying to the subpoena, giving the user a chance to motion to quash the subpoena.
First, I wouldn't really say that Andover IPO money is 'great,' seeing as the ipo price was 18 dollars and it's been trading in about the 15-17 dollar range.
The current trading price has no relevance to how much money Andover got from the IPO. Andover got $18*(however many shares they sold in the IPO) and they get to keep that cash no matter what happens to Andover's market value.
I am not saying that Ralph should demand "all sorts of concessions" from nVidia; however, they are under a legal obligation to follow the License, whether Ralph chooses to enforce it or not.
That is simply not true. If they took only Ralph's code, they can do whatever they want with it as long as they have Ralph's blessing. The GPL is legally based on copyright, and there is no such thing as a copyright violation that occurs with the copyright holder's permission. By licensing his code under the GPL, Ralph did not give up his rights as the author to grant additional rights to use his code to whomever he wishes.
It kind of pisses me of when people say that computers are better than humans at chess. Computers aren't better, they are different.
It kind of pisses me off when people say that cars are faster than humans. Cars aren't faster, they are different.
Good human players don't follow every path down, and they only look a few tuns deep into any path. They recognize similar board patterns to games in their knowledge and experience and extapolate likely outcomes from the similar positions.
Until we can program a computers to win at chess that doen't use this "brute force" method of finding the best move, I can't be truly impressed with the computer's ability. Right now they have just made computers fast enough to think far enough ahead to approximate recognizing patterns in the pieces.
Why should I be impressed that humans (including myself) can't coherently explain how we figure out what move to make?
The major stumbling block is defining what a "mistake" is. After all, there are numerous points in a game where one might make an unorthodox move. I believe these are called gambits. A computer might rate one of these gambits as a mistake, when in fact it is the key to winning the game. Some of these gambits might even involve sacrificing a piece, which a computer might rate as a "mistake."
That's the whole point of solving the game. For chess to be considered solved, each branch would have to be examined all the way to the end of the game (or mathematically proved to be equivalent to a branch that had already been solved), no matter how stupid the move might look.
What's the most egregious way to flaunt the UCITA? Set up a big demonstration with 50 CDRWs and offer to burn anybody who wants a free copy of shrink-wrapped software? Any better ideas?
That's not a good way to protest UCITA, since you'd be violating copyright law even if UCITA hadn't passed. Traditionally, civil disobedience consists of doing some obviously benign act that became illegal as a result of the law you're protesting against.
> Sounds like part of the GPL just got invalidated - one might argue that about "derivative works". Oops.
What the hell are you talking about? You took that quote out of context, and then proceeded to make a non sequitir anyway. Here's the full paragraph from the letter.
Many of those concerned about the bill believe it gives software vendors control over your files and data. Under our version of UCITA, your data is your property.
It's obvious from the context that Chairman Barve simply means to imply that the bill doesn't do anything crazy like give software companies rights to data you create using their products. The GPL also specifically states that the end user has full rights to works they create using GPL'd software.
This is a very different thing from derivative works, which are what you get when you take something someone else made and change it.
Why can't I use the same spell-checker (yes, including the same custom dictionary) in my MUA that I use for word processing?
I guess because your software doesn't work with ispell :)
But for the best output bandwidth from the human, you have to get all 10 fingers involved. So a keyboard with *copious* function keys is much better than anything with a rodent.
You're wrong. There are undoubtedly millions of distinct actions one can perform with a mouse in less than a second. What it comes down to is mapping the set of mouse actions to the set of tasks one wants to be performed. With anything involving text processing it is impossible to do this in such a way that the user can remember how to do what they're trying to do (and still use most of the possible mouse actions in the mapping). With image manipulation, it's trivial to create such a mapping. The usefulness of the input device depends on the task at hand.
So while I think the power observations are very pertinent, I don't think they can be the basis of dismisal of the danger. I think you have to be able to say that the amount of heating your body might receive from several computers 24/7 is on the order of what you get anyway from the electrical system, or something like that. There must be some effect, but as long as it is below what you can measure it is probably below the level at which DNA repair will protect you from cancer.
Heating? The amount of heating you get by turning your thermostat up a few degrees has to be orders of magnitude greater than any heating caused by RF radiation.
According to the article, Hasbro didn't win the lawsuit, they reached an out-of-court settlement. That means that no precedent has been set. It's still very unfortunate for the particular people Hasbro settled with, but at least it doesn't mean that Hasbro's claims had any real legal basis.
I think $500 would have been more therapeutic :)
see junkbusters
Yeah, but it was encrypted as "!eineew a si snereP ecurB"
the same people in this discussion, on the side of the GPL, are on the same side that believes that pirating music and software is part of their "free right", knowing full well that it violates copyrights and or agreements.
What's your point? Are you saying that because a subset of people who use the GPL don't agree with copyright law, Be shouldn't be held accountable for violating Bruce's copyright?
The DMCA does not outlaw reverse engineering. It outlaws bypassing a method that controls access to a copyrighted work, or distributing a tool to do that, without the authorization of the copyright holder. It happens that reverse engineering is usually not a defense against the DMCA, but you still need to committ the underlying violation.
For example, in the DeCSS case, if people had been charged for trade secret violations, reverse engineering would be a valid defense. It usually isn't a valid defense against DMCA violations, but reverse engineering isn't in and of itself a violation of the DMCA.
Since Be doesn't have some "copy"-protection scheme built into their libraries, the DMCA doesn't apply.
release the source code for their Starships' OS
Who'd want that? Sure, voice recognition is nice, but the security is as bad as Windows 95. Anyone can just take over someone else's ship, without having to extort so much as a password from them.
Sorry, it looks like they're not that dumb.
From their policies page, emphasis mine:
TERMINATION
dotTV Email Services may be terminated in whole or in part, effective immediately, by either dotTV or User at any time upon written notice, except as provided herein. Upon termination, User's right to use the dotTV Email Service immediately ceases, and dotTV is not obligated to forward any unread or unsent messages to User or any third party. dotTV shall not be liable to User or any third party for termination of the dotTV Email Service. In the case of a terminated paid dotTV Email Service ("Paid Service"), upon written request to dotTV, User shall receive at dotTV's option, either i) reimbursement of the pro-rata portion of the amount paid for the period remaining on User's account for the terminated Paid Service; or ii) credit for another Paid Service equivalent to the pro-rata portion of the amount paid for the period remaining on User's account for the terminated Paid Service. There shall be no reimbursement or credit if the dotTV Email Service is terminated due to User's violation of the terms of this Agreement. dotTV reserves the right to terminate User's e-mail address in the event that dotTV's rights to use certain domain names or e-mail addresses terminate or expire, in which case User shall receive a replacement dotTV e-mail address. In addition, dotTV retains the right, at dotTV's sole discretion, to terminate any and all parts of the dotTV Email Service provided to User, without refunding User for any annual fees paid but not yet accrued, if it determines that User has failed to comply with any of the terms of the Acceptable Use Policy. If DotTV determines that User has failed to comply with any of the terms in Section (a) above, of the Acceptable Use Policy, dotTV shall when appropriate, (1) facilitate criminal prosecution against such User by referring User's spamming activity to the appropriate legal authorities, and (2) bring a civil action against such User, who shall be liable to dotTV for any direct, indirect, special, incidental, or consequential damages incurred by dotTV as a result of User's spamming or other prohibited activity.
So, it looks like when they sell a domain corresponding to one of your e-mail addresses, you'll either be refunded your $1 on a pro-rated basis (snicker, snicker), or given a new e-mail address to last until the old one expires.
On the plus side, it seems like they take a hard-line stance against spamming.
US$10M, do the math, the US$1million basic yearly amount will either half the taxation of it?s citizens or allow some serious infrastructure improvement.
That's $1 million quarterly, not yearly. Actually, I suspect it's really $1.25 million quarterly, since otherwise it doesn't total to $50 million over 10 years. That's HALF their current GDP.
Looks like Mr. Allen sold off some of his stock *just* at the right time.
What are you talking about? According to the link you posted, his planned sales were on April 3 and 4. On March 31, MSFT closed at 104.125. On the next trading day, April 3, MSFT opened at 94.4375, and then fell another 3.5 points. On April 4, it fell about 2 points. I can't think of much worse possible timing.
What are you talking about? You can't be circumventing intellectual property protection unless there's intellectual property to be protected in the first place. Talk City doesn't hold copyright on the text of the chats taking place.
Of course, this idea falls apart a bit when you consider that their IRCd is actually Open Source (GPL), unless they made it from scratch, which is unlikely.
Just because it's GPL'd doesn't mandate the release of changes if they don't distribute a modified version, which shouldn't be a problem, seeing that it is, after all, a server.
Oh come on, look at the alternive. I'd pick Bush even if I wasn't a republican over "I invened the internet" Gore. If /.ers are against Bush, they simply won't go to the Polls.
Assuming, for the sake of argument, that you are correct, wouldn't /.ers be better off voting for third party candidates that not voting at all?
www.debian.org = 198.186.203.20
((198 * 256 + 186) * 256) + 203) * 256 + 20 = 3334130452
That is, it's the unsigned 32-bit integer corresponding to the IP address.