Ummm I don't think that is true - if they are operating without making a profit, i.e. as a charity, then they would be making no commercial gain. And yes as you've implicitly realized anyone with deep pockets could do it.
That's a reasonable response. I think you would find many PH.D.'s - at least in the sciences, I won't venture to comment on the arts or fine arts - are entirely theoretical which I hope you would agree are not DIY - at least not DIY in the colloquial sense as I understand it. On your assertion that there is no point if it isn't DIY let me say that if it had been a thesis E=MC**2 would not be DIY, but I hope you agree there would be a point to it.
building extremely expensive technology at a tiny fraction of the cost in your garage
That would depend entirely on why it is inexpensive compared to the traditional alternative - which is one reason why I made my comment relate to the accuracy of the article summary.
I agree the Ph.D. is supposed to be serious and original research. It is also supposed to contribute to our intellectual understanding of things in a significant way. Suppose there was a problem domain in which the best solution was so slow that the problem was, for all practical purposes, not solvable. Now someone comes up with a solution that makes getting an answer so fast that it becomes practical for many applications. That might be worth a Ph.D. and in part that would depend on how that new solution contributed to our deeper understanding of the original problem or some other problem of intellectual significance.
Is coming up with a better approximation algorithm for travelling salesman of the same intellectual calibre as developing a proof for PNP?
I would say no, and that the former would be a good Master's while the latter would obviously be a Ph.D. However the former could be a good Ph.D. if it also shed some light on the P, NP question or if it approximated the solution in a way fundamentally different than other approximations to the problem.
One thing I might look at in the research that this article concerns is whether it was of the "we found a completely different way to do this and demonstrated it using cheap components, and this new method can be developed into a commercial product equalling current commercial products but at a fraction of the cost" type or was it "we built something essentially the same as existing systems, or different only in minor ways, but we used cheap components to achieve the same end" (or even "and resources that are actually quite valuable but happened to be cheap/free to us because of our unique circumstances"). And does it advance our understanding of synthetic aperture radar in a fundamental and significant way? But IMHO only making something financially cheaper isn't in and of itself worth a Ph.D. Of course YMMV.
As the the Anonymous Cowards foaming at the mouth about "dissing" someone's work or demanding proof that I have done better or... clearly they have no understanding of the intellectual discourse expected in the Academy or of what entitles someone to critique something or to hold a dissenting opinion. I could be unkind but I'll refrain.
Maybe the dog was holding a concealed weapon. Mine does although his isn't a gun. Well... not one that shoots bullets. Well... not metal or plastic bullets anyway.
I live in Canada and except for the ski hills and other local mountains the only snow I see around here generally lasts for less than two weeks a year. That's why they were having such a bird about the Olympics a few months back and were actually trucking in snow from elsewhere.
Logically it would also encourage you to download as much stuff as possible in the shortest amount of time so that you maximized you chance of getting more than $5K worth of material before you were caught, leaving you ahead even if you were caught. Assuming there was $5K worth of stuff you actually wanted. And if a torrent site was providing its service with no prospect of commercial gain then would its penalty also be capped at $5K?
Is $5K written into the legislation or is that just a number that gets set by regulation, e.g. can be hiked up easily at any time? They slide a lot of stuff through the court of public opinion that way and then once it is passed...
True - in fact quite bizarrely my scholarship income was much higher than a postdoc would get - meaning graduating could lead to a salary drop if I stayed in academia. I left for other reasons but it has always struck me as one of the more obvious quirks of the system. I saw many friends in other science fields getting crappy post-docs making crappy money spending years as slaves for tenured faculty before they got a chance at a tenure track position.
Unfortunately it doesn't have Linux support for any of my three scanners. So to use it I'd either have to switch to Windows/MacOS or spend a lot of money to buy new scanners that it will support. Like much software its support for devices is very weak on Linux compared to the Windows/Mac support. It may be a great product but to me XSane is much much better because it actually supports the devices I have on the OS I have. YMMV.
It's worked with all the scanners I have tried (3 different multi-purpose devices) without any trouble. It may not be the best piece of software in the world but it works fairly well - what are you going to replace it with? Or should users just go without completely until there is scan software meeting your standards? I can tell that if there was no XSane or equivalent I would not be using Ubuntu on any of my machines (currently 5 running various flavours of Ubuntu).
I bet that when they start DDos'ing multi-billion dollar gambling organizations (you know who they are) the reprisals will be much swifter and much much more effective than anything the legal system could manage. And working behind multiple layers of indirection and jurisdictions etc. etc. will not save them.
They may or may not settle with you to avoid the cost of court. If they think settling with you will give rise to a large number of similar claims then they may litigate just to act as a deterrent to other possible claimants.
IANAL. The whole EULA thing brings to mind something in learned from a lawyer, which is the principle of contrapreferentum. This may only apply in Canada, and once again IANAL and I am not giving legal advice. The short version is this...
There was once a case between an insurance company and a man. The man had signed a contract with the company and the company was interpreting part of the contract in a way that was disadvantageous to the man. Essentially the court ruled that the contract was so difficult for a non-lawyer to understand that the man had been at an unfair disadvantage when signing it. So the court ruled that in order for justice to be balanced then in such a case where a contract is drawn up by one side with legal expertise and the other side is just "a little guy" then any ambiguity in the contract is to be interpreted to the benefit of the little guy.
AFAIK this applies to all contracts which I would think includes EULAs.
So no, the appellant's attorney isn't helping me out but almost any other "real" attorney in this state should have been able to have slam dunked this case... or at least they would have thought it was that easy not knowing what kind of person I am and what "evidence" I have (overwhelming). I also wouldn't have 1/10th of the stress if they were helping me out. (And less medical bills because of it too!)
This was a consequence in my case too - a huge amount of stress and real, perhaps permanent, damage to my health. I concluded that in some cases the real benefit of having a lawyer on your side is not their legal expertise but them being a buffer and reducing the stress you suffer.
I've been in a similar situation - launching a Supreme Court action against a much larger entity with much deeper pockets. At first I used a lawyer but after a while I realized that they didn't seem to know what they were doing - a big hint was that their comments tended to become self-contradictory over time. A second was that on occasion they would do things in such as way as to serve their own interest ahead of mine, e.g., rather than just saying they couldn't do the thing I asked for they did it in such as way as to provide no actual benefit to me - yes, this was my lawyer.
Eventually I just represented myself. For most of the process (years) the other side's lawyers had the attitudes you describe in 1(a) and 1(b). They would make outrageous claims about points of law - outrageous enough that I knew it was BS and would patiently describe why to them. They then moved on to statements that were just plain illogical and mixed in some threats. I patiently described to them why they were wrong and why their threats weren't credible, or (and this infuriated them) I would just invite them to carry out their threats. I think in part they were just trying to wear me out trying to sort through their BS but I'm a stubborn guy and reasonably bright (enough to read a law book anyhow) so I just kept sending it back. A couple of times they did things that I believed violated their professional ethics and I mentioned I might bring this up with the appropriate disciplinary body - that got their attention.
I think that the more I mowed down the lawyers'
straw men the more pissed off they were and they developed an emotional need to beat me - always a mistake imho. I think that their clients just couldn't believe that one untrained "little guy" could beat them and their "real lawyers". In the end they looked at their legal bills, realized I wasn't going to stop, knew all the actual evidence supported my claims, and so they surrendered. They paid a lot of money in legal costs - more than an order of magnitude greater than if they had just settled at the beginning of the action and several orders of magnitude more than if they had just settled before I started the action. Crazy stuff.
I think your comments about navigating the legal system and what that takes are spot on. You are probably right about the judge but afaik they are supposed to give some latitude or otherwise assist the unrepresented litigant (at least where I live) because their interest is supposed to be justice being done although sadly it is obvious not all judges are able and/or willing to follow that.
Anyhow good on you for sticking to your guns and going the distance and good luck with the rest of it!
This practice has apparently been going on for a very long time with dictionary publishers who would insert a few words that didn't exist so they could prove copying if others published their work. I think the same practice was followed with old fashioned paper encyclopaedias. I believe there is a specific word to describe these type of entries but I cant recall it off hand.
Slashdot Mirror
Any attention? Hmmm I guess blowing its head off wouldn't work then. Thanks for your "wisdom". :)
Ummm I don't think that is true - if they are operating without making a profit, i.e. as a charity, then they would be making no commercial gain. And yes as you've implicitly realized anyone with deep pockets could do it.
That's a reasonable response. I think you would find many PH.D.'s - at least in the sciences, I won't venture to comment on the arts or fine arts - are entirely theoretical which I hope you would agree are not DIY - at least not DIY in the colloquial sense as I understand it. On your assertion that there is no point if it isn't DIY let me say that if it had been a thesis E=MC**2 would not be DIY, but I hope you agree there would be a point to it.
That would depend entirely on why it is inexpensive compared to the traditional alternative - which is one reason why I made my comment relate to the accuracy of the article summary. I agree the Ph.D. is supposed to be serious and original research. It is also supposed to contribute to our intellectual understanding of things in a significant way. Suppose there was a problem domain in which the best solution was so slow that the problem was, for all practical purposes, not solvable. Now someone comes up with a solution that makes getting an answer so fast that it becomes practical for many applications. That might be worth a Ph.D. and in part that would depend on how that new solution contributed to our deeper understanding of the original problem or some other problem of intellectual significance.
Is coming up with a better approximation algorithm for travelling salesman of the same intellectual calibre as developing a proof for PNP?
I would say no, and that the former would be a good Master's while the latter would obviously be a Ph.D. However the former could be a good Ph.D. if it also shed some light on the P, NP question or if it approximated the solution in a way fundamentally different than other approximations to the problem.
One thing I might look at in the research that this article concerns is whether it was of the "we found a completely different way to do this and demonstrated it using cheap components, and this new method can be developed into a commercial product equalling current commercial products but at a fraction of the cost" type or was it "we built something essentially the same as existing systems, or different only in minor ways, but we used cheap components to achieve the same end" (or even "and resources that are actually quite valuable but happened to be cheap/free to us because of our unique circumstances"). And does it advance our understanding of synthetic aperture radar in a fundamental and significant way? But IMHO only making something financially cheaper isn't in and of itself worth a Ph.D. Of course YMMV.
As the the Anonymous Cowards foaming at the mouth about "dissing" someone's work or demanding proof that I have done better or... clearly they have no understanding of the intellectual discourse expected in the Academy or of what entitles someone to critique something or to hold a dissenting opinion. I could be unkind but I'll refrain.
Naahhh, giving them the bird isn't feeding them.
And why should one have to wait 6 months if you buy it with no contract?
Maybe the dog was holding a concealed weapon. Mine does although his isn't a gun. Well... not one that shoots bullets. Well... not metal or plastic bullets anyway.
Yeah and the other 70% want to split the country up, turn it into a Socialist paradise or would say anything to get elected.
I live in Canada and except for the ski hills and other local mountains the only snow I see around here generally lasts for less than two weeks a year. That's why they were having such a bird about the Olympics a few months back and were actually trucking in snow from elsewhere.
Logically it would also encourage you to download as much stuff as possible in the shortest amount of time so that you maximized you chance of getting more than $5K worth of material before you were caught, leaving you ahead even if you were caught. Assuming there was $5K worth of stuff you actually wanted. And if a torrent site was providing its service with no prospect of commercial gain then would its penalty also be capped at $5K? Is $5K written into the legislation or is that just a number that gets set by regulation, e.g. can be hiked up easily at any time? They slide a lot of stuff through the court of public opinion that way and then once it is passed...
I could tell you but during my prior advanced degree I developed a technique to avoid feeding trolls. Have a nice life.
DIY is great - but is it worth a Ph.D.? I don't think so. I hope the guy did something more fundamental than the summary might lead you to believe.
True - in fact quite bizarrely my scholarship income was much higher than a postdoc would get - meaning graduating could lead to a salary drop if I stayed in academia. I left for other reasons but it has always struck me as one of the more obvious quirks of the system. I saw many friends in other science fields getting crappy post-docs making crappy money spending years as slaves for tenured faculty before they got a chance at a tenure track position.
Unfortunately it doesn't have Linux support for any of my three scanners. So to use it I'd either have to switch to Windows/MacOS or spend a lot of money to buy new scanners that it will support. Like much software its support for devices is very weak on Linux compared to the Windows/Mac support. It may be a great product but to me XSane is much much better because it actually supports the devices I have on the OS I have. YMMV.
It's worked with all the scanners I have tried (3 different multi-purpose devices) without any trouble. It may not be the best piece of software in the world but it works fairly well - what are you going to replace it with? Or should users just go without completely until there is scan software meeting your standards? I can tell that if there was no XSane or equivalent I would not be using Ubuntu on any of my machines (currently 5 running various flavours of Ubuntu).
I bet that when they start DDos'ing multi-billion dollar gambling organizations (you know who they are) the reprisals will be much swifter and much much more effective than anything the legal system could manage. And working behind multiple layers of indirection and jurisdictions etc. etc. will not save them.
Universities and colleges exist to hand people a piece of paper letting them get a job.
;)
There, fixed that for you.
Her later actions make it appear she is unable to admit when she has made an error. Just the kind of person you don't want sitting on the bench.
They may or may not settle with you to avoid the cost of court. If they think settling with you will give rise to a large number of similar claims then they may litigate just to act as a deterrent to other possible claimants.
IANAL. The whole EULA thing brings to mind something in learned from a lawyer, which is the principle of contrapreferentum. This may only apply in Canada, and once again IANAL and I am not giving legal advice. The short version is this...
There was once a case between an insurance company and a man. The man had signed a contract with the company and the company was interpreting part of the contract in a way that was disadvantageous to the man. Essentially the court ruled that the contract was so difficult for a non-lawyer to understand that the man had been at an unfair disadvantage when signing it. So the court ruled that in order for justice to be balanced then in such a case where a contract is drawn up by one side with legal expertise and the other side is just "a little guy" then any ambiguity in the contract is to be interpreted to the benefit of the little guy.
AFAIK this applies to all contracts which I would think includes EULAs.
This was a consequence in my case too - a huge amount of stress and real, perhaps permanent, damage to my health. I concluded that in some cases the real benefit of having a lawyer on your side is not their legal expertise but them being a buffer and reducing the stress you suffer.
I've been in a similar situation - launching a Supreme Court action against a much larger entity with much deeper pockets. At first I used a lawyer but after a while I realized that they didn't seem to know what they were doing - a big hint was that their comments tended to become self-contradictory over time. A second was that on occasion they would do things in such as way as to serve their own interest ahead of mine, e.g., rather than just saying they couldn't do the thing I asked for they did it in such as way as to provide no actual benefit to me - yes, this was my lawyer.
Eventually I just represented myself. For most of the process (years) the other side's lawyers had the attitudes you describe in 1(a) and 1(b). They would make outrageous claims about points of law - outrageous enough that I knew it was BS and would patiently describe why to them. They then moved on to statements that were just plain illogical and mixed in some threats. I patiently described to them why they were wrong and why their threats weren't credible, or (and this infuriated them) I would just invite them to carry out their threats. I think in part they were just trying to wear me out trying to sort through their BS but I'm a stubborn guy and reasonably bright (enough to read a law book anyhow) so I just kept sending it back. A couple of times they did things that I believed violated their professional ethics and I mentioned I might bring this up with the appropriate disciplinary body - that got their attention.
I think that the more I mowed down the lawyers' straw men the more pissed off they were and they developed an emotional need to beat me - always a mistake imho. I think that their clients just couldn't believe that one untrained "little guy" could beat them and their "real lawyers". In the end they looked at their legal bills, realized I wasn't going to stop, knew all the actual evidence supported my claims, and so they surrendered. They paid a lot of money in legal costs - more than an order of magnitude greater than if they had just settled at the beginning of the action and several orders of magnitude more than if they had just settled before I started the action. Crazy stuff.
I think your comments about navigating the legal system and what that takes are spot on. You are probably right about the judge but afaik they are supposed to give some latitude or otherwise assist the unrepresented litigant (at least where I live) because their interest is supposed to be justice being done although sadly it is obvious not all judges are able and/or willing to follow that.
Anyhow good on you for sticking to your guns and going the distance and good luck with the rest of it!
From the EFF reports it appears that OkiData and Samsung are the only privacy protecting manufacturers (at least as of the time of the report). http://www.eff.org/pages/list-printers-which-do-or-do-not-display-tracking-dots
This practice has apparently been going on for a very long time with dictionary publishers who would insert a few words that didn't exist so they could prove copying if others published their work. I think the same practice was followed with old fashioned paper encyclopaedias. I believe there is a specific word to describe these type of entries but I cant recall it off hand.
I'm certainly willing to believe that you think you are right. :)
An interesting definition of "uppity".