(b) how difficult it is going to be to ballast it with enough ice to get back again.
Not sure I get it, why is that going to be necessary?
Either you have to deal with that, an interesting technical challenge, or you have to dump hundreds of tonnes of expensive helium.
Couldn't you just compress the helium you already have contained? i.e. transfer some helium to a compression chamber, compress into storable containers of high pressure, high density helium, repeat process.
I agree with you that the availability of free songs shifts the supply curve, but that's not really my point.
From what I understand (I could be wrong), their argument is that everyone who downloaded the song for free would have paid the full price for it if it wasn't available free. If you were to draw that, you get a flat demand curve, where the demand is the same at a price of $0 as at a price significantly greater than that. Surely the demand for music isn't price-insensitive.
For example, in our state, the civil conversion law allows for treble damages. Conversion being the civil equivalent of theft. If I "convert" $5000 of your cash, or a widget of yours worth $5000, should I just be required to pay you $5000?
You can see the problems with that - it basically turns everyone into a merchant of all their possessions. If you won't voluntarily give or sell me something of yours that I want, I can force a sale just by taking it.
So the law allows for treble damages, not just as pure out-of-pocket compensation, but as an additional deterrent.
Granted, but for the tort of conversion, as you said, there is the crime of theft... I'm not sure that we need much additional deterrence where there are criminal sanctions available.
It is a civil case and you should only be able to sue in a civil case for the following, money lost, time lost, litigation fees for having to take you to court. The purpose of civil cases are not to punish but to compensate.
I don't mean to nitpick, but in the U.S. civil court system at least, punitive damages are available under certain circumstances (and they are very often claimed, not as often awarded). But in this case, $750 doesn't necessarily even include punitive damages: because money lost includes "lost profits" (expectation damages in contracts, consequential damages in torts). If they can show, with preponderance of the evidence, that because you shared one song, 10 people who otherwise would have paid for it did not, you can be liable for those 10 lost sales.
One big flaw in their evidence is that (from what I understand) they argue that a song downloaded is a song that would otherwise have been purchased - which completely defies any basic principles of economics (price/demand curve).
I think we can all agree that $750/song or $1.5 trillion total sounds just absurd.
I agree with you that there are mechanisms in place that are intended to avoid double-taxation. My point though is that, despite these mechanisms, in practice (at least in my experience) you still end up paying more than the greater individual tax rate, i.e. more than you would pay if you were just declaring everything in one or the other of the two countries.
Speaking from experience, it's still a huge hassle. While I personally don't anyone who just ignores the law (although granted most of the people I know still work for U.S. companies) it makes your taxes so complicated that you pretty much can't file them without the help of a tax attorney.
Most importantly, you're still getting screwed because the country in which you reside (and work, presumably) still expects you to pay taxes, so in the end you're paying:
(local taxes) + (U.S. taxes) - (some exceptions meant to avoid double-taxation) = (still more than you would pay in either country if you were taxed only by that country)
When the other country you're living in is a European country with a very high tax rate (e.g. France, Sweden, etc.), you end up paying a lot more in taxes than you are getting in return benefits.
Just think of what this technology could do in the hands of Ford!
BRILLIANT! All Ford has to do is reverse the polarity.
That is, take the Pinto, and reverse its system so that it stores the energy, instead of releasing it (from the gasoline tank), every time it breaks.
To put it in Slashdot terms:
1. Take Pinto
2. Reverse polarity
3. ?
4. Profit
(admittedly, the "?" should really be next to the "reverse polarity"...)
Well, I'm fine with you leaving a country not to have to be subject to the rules of that country. But if you keep interfering with that country's business, e.g. by hacking computers in that country, there's a strong argument in favor of subjecting you to their rules.
Would it be reasonable for you to lob cars over the border into another country, and not expect that they try to stop you?
In most countries, lobbing cars across the border is probably illegal, but even if your country doesn't stop you, I'm pretty sure the country you're pestering would do something about it.
I was under the assumption that no scientific theory can be proven with 100% certainty. Are you simply holding religious views to a higher standard than you hold your own?
Well, that's "by definition" one aspect of a scientific theory. You're right, because a scientific theory is a formulation of a model that maps to past observations, it can only ever be disproved, and never proved, as we don't rule out the possibility of as-of-yet unobserved irregularities that would disprove it.
The flaw in your comment is that you are comparing religious views to scientific theories.
While it may never be "proved", a more important aspect of a scientific theory is that it can be used to make predictions. And those predictions, if right, can serve to support it (and also give it some scientific value).
Take for instance Newton's gravity: at the time of its formulations, it was vastly sufficient for its applications, and useful to calculate projectile trajectories, etc. Then we started noticing that it fell short for certain applications, and Einstein's theory of relativity became a more accurate model for many uses. Now everybody knows that Einstein's theory of relativity isn't "correct", as some observations show. However, it's still very useful.
The predictive ability of a scientific theory is as close to "proof" as you get. Religious views cannot, and should not be compared to scientific theories. If certain beliefs make you happy, you are free to hold them, but if you want your beliefs to have any weight in society (for instance, policy or otherwise), I think it's reasonable that you be expected to show their value and how they may be rationally justified.
Wait a minute, are you one of those who consider ID to be a scientific theory?
Except if you're a Verizon customer calling another Verizon customer, it's free.
And if you're calling from another carrier, they're the ones getting money from it (assuming no roaming). I don't know what the agreements between carriers are, but I would guess that in such a situation, Verizon gets little if any cash from your carrier.
It seems to me that Verizon doesn't stand to win much from this "tactic".
Back home I get 60 minutes a month, you might think thats crazy but it isn't really.
Not sure where "back home" is, but I assume it's somewhere where they don't charge your minutes for incoming calls (e.g. Europe).
Back when I lived in Europe, I got by with a very low plan because I could still accept calls without worrying about my bill. Here in the US, my minutes are counted whether I'm placing or receiving a call, and 60 minutes would be very limiting. (the minimum plan with my carrier is 400min/month)
Granted, 95% accuracy isn't amazing, especially in situations where you can't afford to make a mistake. This being said, I'm pretty sure that such a sophisticated device could easily implement some collision/stair avoidance (for instance).
I know I've tried putting my roomba on top of a table (or tried to make it go off the stairs), but it just stops when it gets to an edge. It also stops when its bumpers hit a wall, by the way. I don't know how much this wheelchair would cost, but I wouldn't be surprised if you could add the cost of a couple roombas without making a significant dent in the price.
But you know who's liable for that? Whoever actually put it online. Not the search engine that pointed you to it.
That's really funny you should say that because recently precedent was set at $80,000 per song for uploading and distributing it. Was the defendant the original uploader? Not even close.
That's really funny you should say that, because your example has nothing to do with TFS.
The point is that in the case you cited, the defendant actually was (allegedly) an uploader. Whether the original or not doesn't matter, she was making those files available for download, and they were being downloaded from her computer. And she could just as well have been sharing/uploading her own CDs, so whether she was the original uploader or not doesn't matter.
My understanding of this situation is that the video search engine doesn't actually serve the material, but links you to where you can download/watch it. This case is a lot more like Pirate Bay, where they provide "links" to the copyrighted material.
Slashdot Mirror
News at 11.
How do you know? It's only 5:30. Is that you, Kurzweil?
The technology is set to come out with Duke Nukem Forever.
(b) how difficult it is going to be to ballast it with enough ice to get back again.
Not sure I get it, why is that going to be necessary?
Either you have to deal with that, an interesting technical challenge, or you have to dump hundreds of tonnes of expensive helium.
Couldn't you just compress the helium you already have contained? i.e. transfer some helium to a compression chamber, compress into storable containers of high pressure, high density helium, repeat process.
I agree with you that the availability of free songs shifts the supply curve, but that's not really my point.
From what I understand (I could be wrong), their argument is that everyone who downloaded the song for free would have paid the full price for it if it wasn't available free. If you were to draw that, you get a flat demand curve, where the demand is the same at a price of $0 as at a price significantly greater than that. Surely the demand for music isn't price-insensitive.
For example, in our state, the civil conversion law allows for treble damages. Conversion being the civil equivalent of theft. If I "convert" $5000 of your cash, or a widget of yours worth $5000, should I just be required to pay you $5000? You can see the problems with that - it basically turns everyone into a merchant of all their possessions. If you won't voluntarily give or sell me something of yours that I want, I can force a sale just by taking it. So the law allows for treble damages, not just as pure out-of-pocket compensation, but as an additional deterrent.
Granted, but for the tort of conversion, as you said, there is the crime of theft... I'm not sure that we need much additional deterrence where there are criminal sanctions available.
It is a civil case and you should only be able to sue in a civil case for the following, money lost, time lost, litigation fees for having to take you to court. The purpose of civil cases are not to punish but to compensate.
I don't mean to nitpick, but in the U.S. civil court system at least, punitive damages are available under certain circumstances (and they are very often claimed, not as often awarded). But in this case, $750 doesn't necessarily even include punitive damages: because money lost includes "lost profits" (expectation damages in contracts, consequential damages in torts). If they can show, with preponderance of the evidence, that because you shared one song, 10 people who otherwise would have paid for it did not, you can be liable for those 10 lost sales.
One big flaw in their evidence is that (from what I understand) they argue that a song downloaded is a song that would otherwise have been purchased - which completely defies any basic principles of economics (price/demand curve).
I think we can all agree that $750/song or $1.5 trillion total sounds just absurd.
Apparently, this is what the Australian police has in mind for what happens after you click the button...
I agree with you that there are mechanisms in place that are intended to avoid double-taxation. My point though is that, despite these mechanisms, in practice (at least in my experience) you still end up paying more than the greater individual tax rate, i.e. more than you would pay if you were just declaring everything in one or the other of the two countries.
Speaking from experience, it's still a huge hassle. While I personally don't anyone who just ignores the law (although granted most of the people I know still work for U.S. companies) it makes your taxes so complicated that you pretty much can't file them without the help of a tax attorney.
Most importantly, you're still getting screwed because the country in which you reside (and work, presumably) still expects you to pay taxes, so in the end you're paying:
(local taxes) + (U.S. taxes) - (some exceptions meant to avoid double-taxation) = (still more than you would pay in either country if you were taxed only by that country)
When the other country you're living in is a European country with a very high tax rate (e.g. France, Sweden, etc.), you end up paying a lot more in taxes than you are getting in return benefits.
On the upside, for Microsoft employees, that means less money to spend on chairs. *ducks*
What doesn't surprise me at all is that non-native speakers don't get old American jokes. Which the GGP was, in case you weren't aware.
Wait, are you calling the (G)GGP an old American joke?
Just think of what this technology could do in the hands of Ford!
BRILLIANT! All Ford has to do is reverse the polarity.
That is, take the Pinto, and reverse its system so that it stores the energy, instead of releasing it (from the gasoline tank), every time it breaks.
To put it in Slashdot terms:
1. Take Pinto
2. Reverse polarity
3. ?
4. Profit
(admittedly, the "?" should really be next to the "reverse polarity"...)
Btw, we need more car analogies.
I would just coat my missile in mirrors.
Well, I'm fine with you leaving a country not to have to be subject to the rules of that country. But if you keep interfering with that country's business, e.g. by hacking computers in that country, there's a strong argument in favor of subjecting you to their rules.
Would it be reasonable for you to lob cars over the border into another country, and not expect that they try to stop you? In most countries, lobbing cars across the border is probably illegal, but even if your country doesn't stop you, I'm pretty sure the country you're pestering would do something about it.
Someone please fix my car analogy.
Flight mode. Very appropriately named, actually.
It would be, if it weren't named "airplane mode".
Elvis Presley isn't the King, he is the Lord!
I was under the assumption that no scientific theory can be proven with 100% certainty. Are you simply holding religious views to a higher standard than you hold your own?
Well, that's "by definition" one aspect of a scientific theory. You're right, because a scientific theory is a formulation of a model that maps to past observations, it can only ever be disproved, and never proved, as we don't rule out the possibility of as-of-yet unobserved irregularities that would disprove it.
The flaw in your comment is that you are comparing religious views to scientific theories.
While it may never be "proved", a more important aspect of a scientific theory is that it can be used to make predictions. And those predictions, if right, can serve to support it (and also give it some scientific value).
Take for instance Newton's gravity: at the time of its formulations, it was vastly sufficient for its applications, and useful to calculate projectile trajectories, etc. Then we started noticing that it fell short for certain applications, and Einstein's theory of relativity became a more accurate model for many uses. Now everybody knows that Einstein's theory of relativity isn't "correct", as some observations show. However, it's still very useful.
The predictive ability of a scientific theory is as close to "proof" as you get. Religious views cannot, and should not be compared to scientific theories. If certain beliefs make you happy, you are free to hold them, but if you want your beliefs to have any weight in society (for instance, policy or otherwise), I think it's reasonable that you be expected to show their value and how they may be rationally justified.
Wait a minute, are you one of those who consider ID to be a scientific theory?
I said "inherit" worth.
Yeah, you said it twice. I think you meant "inherent".
Except if you're a Verizon customer calling another Verizon customer, it's free.
And if you're calling from another carrier, they're the ones getting money from it (assuming no roaming). I don't know what the agreements between carriers are, but I would guess that in such a situation, Verizon gets little if any cash from your carrier.
It seems to me that Verizon doesn't stand to win much from this "tactic".
Back home I get 60 minutes a month, you might think thats crazy but it isn't really.
Not sure where "back home" is, but I assume it's somewhere where they don't charge your minutes for incoming calls (e.g. Europe).
Back when I lived in Europe, I got by with a very low plan because I could still accept calls without worrying about my bill. Here in the US, my minutes are counted whether I'm placing or receiving a call, and 60 minutes would be very limiting. (the minimum plan with my carrier is 400min/month)
Da Da Da Dum.
Three notes.
It's actually "Ba ba ba BOM!", and that's four notes.
And it's usually, "get off my lawn" ;)
There, ftfy.
Just put the fridge on the wheelchair, hook it to your brain. That way you can call it over every time you want a beer. (cue Soviet Russia joke)
Granted, 95% accuracy isn't amazing, especially in situations where you can't afford to make a mistake. This being said, I'm pretty sure that such a sophisticated device could easily implement some collision/stair avoidance (for instance).
I know I've tried putting my roomba on top of a table (or tried to make it go off the stairs), but it just stops when it gets to an edge. It also stops when its bumpers hit a wall, by the way. I don't know how much this wheelchair would cost, but I wouldn't be surprised if you could add the cost of a couple roombas without making a significant dent in the price.
But you know who's liable for that? Whoever actually put it online. Not the search engine that pointed you to it.
That's really funny you should say that because recently precedent was set at $80,000 per song for uploading and distributing it. Was the defendant the original uploader? Not even close.
That's really funny you should say that, because your example has nothing to do with TFS.
The point is that in the case you cited, the defendant actually was (allegedly) an uploader. Whether the original or not doesn't matter, she was making those files available for download, and they were being downloaded from her computer. And she could just as well have been sharing/uploading her own CDs, so whether she was the original uploader or not doesn't matter.
My understanding of this situation is that the video search engine doesn't actually serve the material, but links you to where you can download/watch it. This case is a lot more like Pirate Bay, where they provide "links" to the copyrighted material.