What you are missing is that this gives the power not to the heirs of the deceased but to the executors of their will. This is generally someone chosen by the individual before they die. Of course, if you haven't done this then the court will apoint someone (usually a spouse, parent, child) to perform this function.
The guy was running a business buying, jailbreaking and then selling stolen cellphones. He wasn't even convicted of running a business on a technicality. He was arrested as part of a terrorism sting operation that was investigating people who were, at the very least, raising money for Hamas.
Yeah, except that the phones he was buying were stolen phones and the reason he was modifying them was so that the police would not be able to trace them (that is find out who had stolen them). As long as they were tied to the original carrier, it would be possible for the police to track them down if someone used them.
This is the point a lot of people here are missing. He was not jailbreaking the phones so that his customers could use them on whatever carrier they wanted. He was jailbreaking the phones so that he would not get caught selling stolen phones.
You're being dense. Nullification is the whole reason why we have an independent judicial branch.
There is nothing in the Constitution about judicial nullification. The idea that the Supreme Court gets to decide whether a law is constitutional or not was the result of a Supreme Court decision where they basically said that was their place. However, since the ruling was made while the Framers of the Constitution were still among those running the country, it does not seem that they found this to be an unreasonable reach. Of course at the time the understanding was that members of Congress would not vote for bills they believed to violate the Constitution and that Presidents would not sign such bills into law (since all such persons take an oath to uphold the Constitution). We now know that to not necessarily be the case since George W. Bush signed a bill into law that he explicitly said he expected the Supreme Court to overturn at least parts of.
The reason I replied to you was because you post read to me as saying that PETA was not hypocritical for preaching about animal rights "while euthanizing tens of thousands of pets every year". Here you are saying that PETA is hypocritical for preaching about animal rights and then running animal shelters (where they are explicitly taking owneership of animals).
I was merely pointing out that PETA was being hypocritical by euthanizing animals, I hadn't realized that you were saying that the hypocrisy actually happened when they accepted the animals into the shelter in the first place.
You were saying you would fight over your moral code, according to your understanding of what a moral code is that is like fighting over whether chocolate is better than vanilla.
Actually, the statement, "You should do X," carries with it the assumption that you will prefer the consequences of doing X to the consequences of not doing X. If the hypothetical god is like that portrayed by Judaism and Christianity such an opinion would also be a fact.
If there is no universal standard for a moral code, arguing over disagreements between your moral code and someone else's is like arguing over whether chocolate is better than vanilla.
If there is a god who created the universe, then he/she/it is the manufacturer, if he/she/it says that certain behaviors (moral code) are the way that human interaction works best then that moral code is fact, not opinion.
It used to be SOP to eat the dead in many cultures. There's still tribes where the custom is for the new chief to eat the heart of the old one when he dies. What's crazy about that?
There are several rather serious diseases that are only transmitted by eating the flesh of humans. You rarely hear of these diseases because they only appear among cannabalistic cultures of which there are few. However, I remember reading somewhere in the last 10 years about a culture that was confirmed to have certain cannabalistic traditions because of the occurence among them of one of those diseases. Up until that disease was diagnosed among them, it was believed that the references to that culture eating people in certain circumstances were just folklore, not actual behavior.
I'm not quite sure how euthanizing animals is any more consistent with PETA's proclaimed ideals than owning an animal. What gives PETA the right to decide that an animal should die? If they were consistent, they would just release the animals. By euthanizing the animals, they are acting as if they own them.
Actually, even if there was a god, his views on what is 'right' or 'wrong' would only be his opinion, not fact.
So, when your car manufacturer tells you that for best performance you should change the oil in your car on a regular basis, that is just their opinion, not fact? If you think your car will run just as well with no oil, there is no reason why you should put oil in it?
Basically, you believe that, even though there is nothing inherently superior in your moral code, you should fight and kill people to prevent them from fighting and killing people in ways that violate your moral code. I find such a moral code repugnant. You don't want to fight and kill people because your moral code is superior, but just because they don't follow your code. If there is no absolute moral code, there is no such thing as "right" or "wrong", there is just what I prefer. Arguing about whether it is ok to enslave someone is like arguing whether chocolate is better than vanilla.
I think that we should just use our supposedly intelligent minds (at this point, I'm doubting that though) to perfect in vitro meat [wikipedia.org] so that no animals will have to suffer that way any longer to get meat.
Please give me a reason for this. Why should I care? (BTW, I have reasons from my own belief system as to why I should care about animal suffering, however, most slashdotters who express your type of opinion reject my belief system and fail to replace it with one that gives any logically consistent reason as to why I should care about the suffering of others).
When someone says "rights should not be abridged", they are generally talking about Bill of Rights (first 10 Amendments to the U.S. Constitution) rights. I know of very few people who consider copyright to be a fundamental human right. Copyright is a good thing (if the term is of a reasonable length) because it encourages people to make creative works available to the public. I beleive that it is in society's best interest for any work published before 1980 to be in the public domain.
The Supreme Court can overturn laws, not parts of the Constitution (in this case you are referencing an Amendment, but nevertheless it is now part of the Constitution).
It is not just that some "new thing" happened, it is that the "new thing" means that the reason "innocence" is not a defense, according to the law, is no longer reasonable even though it was at the time the law was written.
You appear to have missed the fact that that quote comes from one of the Justices who wanted to hear the case. Which makes me think that he was saying that he has some doubts about the appropriateness of applying the law in this case.
Comcast is powerful enough (as a result of government granted monopolies in many communities in the early days of cable TV) that it is important to watch and make sure that the government is not giving them additional sweetheart deals. This does not appear to be such a case. It appears to be another company (Level 3) betting that they can get the government to force a change in the price structure in their market (after getting a major customer on the basis of charging that customer a lower price that only makes good business sense if they get that change).
You seem to be missing the fact that Facebook is using this to track me, someone who has never joined Facebook. This is the sort of thing that is the reason I have not joined Facebook.
The real kicker is that, as the lawyer on Techdirt mentions, there's no clear motive for this...
Apple's motive is clear, someone is making money off of people who are members of the cult of Apple and it isn't Apple. That is money they should be spending on Apple products. You say you've got an Ipod, Iphone, Ipad, Mac Air, MacBook and a Mac desktop, well if you still have money left buy a second one of one or more of those.
You start by making Comcast's argument, then you say that you want Level 3 to win this. Your post does not seem to make sense.
This situation seems to be one where Level 3 had a free peering relationship with Comcast, now Level 3 is increasing the amount of data that they will be sendng over Comcast's network. It is doing so by taking business from a company that had a deal to pay Comcast for that bandwidth. The situation is this: Netflix used to send a portion of its streaming over Akamai. Akamai paid Comcast a fee for the amount of data they sent over Comcast's network over and above the amount of data that Comcast sent over Akamai's network. It appears that Netflix switched to Level 3 because Level 3 offered Netflix data streaming at a lower price than Akamai. Now we discover that Level 3 doesn't pay anything to Comcast for its peering agreement. Comcast wants Level 3 to pay the same price that Akamai did for the increased data that Level 3 is going to start sending over Comcast's network.
I am not saying that Comcast is in the right in this situation. I am saying that this situation is complicated enough that it is not at all clear that Comcast is in the wrong and that we should wait for more information before we reach a conclusion.
You make a good point. Additionally, Netflix has just made a deal with Level 3 to take most of the traffic they used to do with Akamai and now do it with Level 3. Akamai already had a deal with Comcast where they paid an additional fee because they sent more traffic to Comcast than Comcast sent to them. It looks to me like Level 3 got the Netflix traffic by undercutting Akamai on price.
This is like a deal between Exxon and BP to deliver each others gasoline over their pipelines at no cost because they each use about the same amount of volume on the other's pipeline, now BP has agreed to deliver Shell's gas over the pipeline (including Exxon's) and Exxon saying "you have to pay something for that additional volume".
One of the things that plain soap emulsifies is the oils in the cell walls of bacteria, so yes, plain soap does actually kill some bacteria. However, the main point of washing is to carry the bacteria away from our bodies, not to kill the bacteria. The main problem with soap with antibacterial agents in it is that most of the bacteria on your skin is actually helpful.
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What you are missing is that this gives the power not to the heirs of the deceased but to the executors of their will. This is generally someone chosen by the individual before they die. Of course, if you haven't done this then the court will apoint someone (usually a spouse, parent, child) to perform this function.
This was a guy who was buying stolen cellphones, then jailbreaking them so that he could sell them to someone else.
The guy was running a business buying, jailbreaking and then selling stolen cellphones. He wasn't even convicted of running a business on a technicality. He was arrested as part of a terrorism sting operation that was investigating people who were, at the very least, raising money for Hamas.
Yeah, except that the phones he was buying were stolen phones and the reason he was modifying them was so that the police would not be able to trace them (that is find out who had stolen them). As long as they were tied to the original carrier, it would be possible for the police to track them down if someone used them.
This is the point a lot of people here are missing. He was not jailbreaking the phones so that his customers could use them on whatever carrier they wanted. He was jailbreaking the phones so that he would not get caught selling stolen phones.
You're being dense. Nullification is the whole reason why we have an independent judicial branch.
There is nothing in the Constitution about judicial nullification. The idea that the Supreme Court gets to decide whether a law is constitutional or not was the result of a Supreme Court decision where they basically said that was their place. However, since the ruling was made while the Framers of the Constitution were still among those running the country, it does not seem that they found this to be an unreasonable reach. Of course at the time the understanding was that members of Congress would not vote for bills they believed to violate the Constitution and that Presidents would not sign such bills into law (since all such persons take an oath to uphold the Constitution). We now know that to not necessarily be the case since George W. Bush signed a bill into law that he explicitly said he expected the Supreme Court to overturn at least parts of.
The reason I replied to you was because you post read to me as saying that PETA was not hypocritical for preaching about animal rights "while euthanizing tens of thousands of pets every year". Here you are saying that PETA is hypocritical for preaching about animal rights and then running animal shelters (where they are explicitly taking owneership of animals).
I was merely pointing out that PETA was being hypocritical by euthanizing animals, I hadn't realized that you were saying that the hypocrisy actually happened when they accepted the animals into the shelter in the first place.
You were saying you would fight over your moral code, according to your understanding of what a moral code is that is like fighting over whether chocolate is better than vanilla.
Actually, the statement, "You should do X," carries with it the assumption that you will prefer the consequences of doing X to the consequences of not doing X. If the hypothetical god is like that portrayed by Judaism and Christianity such an opinion would also be a fact.
If there is no universal standard for a moral code, arguing over disagreements between your moral code and someone else's is like arguing over whether chocolate is better than vanilla.
If there is a god who created the universe, then he/she/it is the manufacturer, if he/she/it says that certain behaviors (moral code) are the way that human interaction works best then that moral code is fact, not opinion.
It used to be SOP to eat the dead in many cultures. There's still tribes where the custom is for the new chief to eat the heart of the old one when he dies. What's crazy about that?
There are several rather serious diseases that are only transmitted by eating the flesh of humans. You rarely hear of these diseases because they only appear among cannabalistic cultures of which there are few. However, I remember reading somewhere in the last 10 years about a culture that was confirmed to have certain cannabalistic traditions because of the occurence among them of one of those diseases. Up until that disease was diagnosed among them, it was believed that the references to that culture eating people in certain circumstances were just folklore, not actual behavior.
I'm not quite sure how euthanizing animals is any more consistent with PETA's proclaimed ideals than owning an animal. What gives PETA the right to decide that an animal should die? If they were consistent, they would just release the animals. By euthanizing the animals, they are acting as if they own them.
Actually, even if there was a god, his views on what is 'right' or 'wrong' would only be his opinion, not fact.
So, when your car manufacturer tells you that for best performance you should change the oil in your car on a regular basis, that is just their opinion, not fact? If you think your car will run just as well with no oil, there is no reason why you should put oil in it?
Basically, you believe that, even though there is nothing inherently superior in your moral code, you should fight and kill people to prevent them from fighting and killing people in ways that violate your moral code. I find such a moral code repugnant. You don't want to fight and kill people because your moral code is superior, but just because they don't follow your code.
If there is no absolute moral code, there is no such thing as "right" or "wrong", there is just what I prefer. Arguing about whether it is ok to enslave someone is like arguing whether chocolate is better than vanilla.
I think that we should just use our supposedly intelligent minds (at this point, I'm doubting that though) to perfect in vitro meat [wikipedia.org] so that no animals will have to suffer that way any longer to get meat.
Please give me a reason for this. Why should I care? (BTW, I have reasons from my own belief system as to why I should care about animal suffering, however, most slashdotters who express your type of opinion reject my belief system and fail to replace it with one that gives any logically consistent reason as to why I should care about the suffering of others).
When someone says "rights should not be abridged", they are generally talking about Bill of Rights (first 10 Amendments to the U.S. Constitution) rights. I know of very few people who consider copyright to be a fundamental human right. Copyright is a good thing (if the term is of a reasonable length) because it encourages people to make creative works available to the public. I beleive that it is in society's best interest for any work published before 1980 to be in the public domain.
The Supreme Court can overturn laws, not parts of the Constitution (in this case you are referencing an Amendment, but nevertheless it is now part of the Constitution).
It is not just that some "new thing" happened, it is that the "new thing" means that the reason "innocence" is not a defense, according to the law, is no longer reasonable even though it was at the time the law was written.
You appear to have missed the fact that that quote comes from one of the Justices who wanted to hear the case. Which makes me think that he was saying that he has some doubts about the appropriateness of applying the law in this case.
Comcast is powerful enough (as a result of government granted monopolies in many communities in the early days of cable TV) that it is important to watch and make sure that the government is not giving them additional sweetheart deals. This does not appear to be such a case. It appears to be another company (Level 3) betting that they can get the government to force a change in the price structure in their market (after getting a major customer on the basis of charging that customer a lower price that only makes good business sense if they get that change).
You seem to be missing the fact that Facebook is using this to track me, someone who has never joined Facebook. This is the sort of thing that is the reason I have not joined Facebook.
The real kicker is that, as the lawyer on Techdirt mentions, there's no clear motive for this...
Apple's motive is clear, someone is making money off of people who are members of the cult of Apple and it isn't Apple. That is money they should be spending on Apple products. You say you've got an Ipod, Iphone, Ipad, Mac Air, MacBook and a Mac desktop, well if you still have money left buy a second one of one or more of those.
You start by making Comcast's argument, then you say that you want Level 3 to win this. Your post does not seem to make sense.
This situation seems to be one where Level 3 had a free peering relationship with Comcast, now Level 3 is increasing the amount of data that they will be sendng over Comcast's network. It is doing so by taking business from a company that had a deal to pay Comcast for that bandwidth. The situation is this: Netflix used to send a portion of its streaming over Akamai. Akamai paid Comcast a fee for the amount of data they sent over Comcast's network over and above the amount of data that Comcast sent over Akamai's network. It appears that Netflix switched to Level 3 because Level 3 offered Netflix data streaming at a lower price than Akamai. Now we discover that Level 3 doesn't pay anything to Comcast for its peering agreement. Comcast wants Level 3 to pay the same price that Akamai did for the increased data that Level 3 is going to start sending over Comcast's network.
I am not saying that Comcast is in the right in this situation. I am saying that this situation is complicated enough that it is not at all clear that Comcast is in the wrong and that we should wait for more information before we reach a conclusion.
You make a good point. Additionally, Netflix has just made a deal with Level 3 to take most of the traffic they used to do with Akamai and now do it with Level 3. Akamai already had a deal with Comcast where they paid an additional fee because they sent more traffic to Comcast than Comcast sent to them. It looks to me like Level 3 got the Netflix traffic by undercutting Akamai on price.
This is like a deal between Exxon and BP to deliver each others gasoline over their pipelines at no cost because they each use about the same amount of volume on the other's pipeline, now BP has agreed to deliver Shell's gas over the pipeline (including Exxon's) and Exxon saying "you have to pay something for that additional volume".
One of the things that plain soap emulsifies is the oils in the cell walls of bacteria, so yes, plain soap does actually kill some bacteria. However, the main point of washing is to carry the bacteria away from our bodies, not to kill the bacteria. The main problem with soap with antibacterial agents in it is that most of the bacteria on your skin is actually helpful.