You keep saying "NPOV" as though it's a magical remedy, but your original call was to use Wikipedia to "undermine his decision". How is that goal neutral in any way, regardless of the language used?
Of course the complaint was made by the plaintiff, and it includes the evidence the plaintiff has already gathered. Yes, that's intentionally what forms the basis for the court to decide whether it's reasonable to disrupt the defendant's life while more evidence is gathered.
I worked recently for a financial company doing algorithmic trading. Here's how it worked:
Every morning at 7 AM, Master.xlsx would run an "UpdateOrders" macro to check for the prior day's events, and possibly change some green circles to red. Whenever an account under that system needed to sell something, the red circles would go first. Once each year, new green circles were added and red ones were eliminated.
11.5740741 microhertz is indeed high frequency, compared to something like 413 nanohertz.
By that logic, the Democrats in the Senate were voted in specifically to keep ACA around... and the House Democrats who passed it the first time were specifically voted in to pass it! And next term, they'll be voted in specifically to push again, and the term after that as well.
I suppose all of the other things Congress does just sort of fade away compared to single-issue fanaticism.
Advocating doing something isn't evidence for having actually done something
Nobody's saying it is. It does strongly suggest that given the chance, you will do something, though. That's the concern here, that the defendant would either wipe his hard disk or publish his ex-employer's proprietary information. On multiple occasions in the past, he'd released internal company information after being advised not to, and violated written contracts with the company. The main factor in having the restraining order approved with no advance notice is that his website said that he'd be releasing source code to his own product "soon".
They must have some evidence of a crime, yes.
Nope. As you note later, they need "probable cause". That's not actual evidence, and it's not nearly the high burden of proof you seem to think it is. In this case, the court does have evidence that the defendant had an unauthorized copy of the source code previously, and the defendant has promised to release his own source code "soon". If what he releases is actually his ex-employer's code, that harm would be irreparable. That's plenty of reasonable cause.
Suspicion isn't enough for a search warrant
But suspicion, probable cause, and a pressing time limit are.
...back in the 90s, when 'cyber crime' was in its infancy... The computers weren't returned until over two years later...
Things have changed in the past 15 years. In this case, his hard disk is to be immediately turned over to the court, and returned when the court deems it appropriate after further litigation. Meanwhile, there is no restraint on the defendant to prevent using other computers.
It means his computer, his primary method of income has now been locked up, along with all kinds of collateral damage -- his entire digital life, including copies of resumes, bank records, pictures, etc., are all now inaccessible to him.
As security against the inconvenience, Battelle is also required to deposit $25,000 with the court, plus more if the court approves the defendant's requests.
...then there will still be modification times on the fragments, archived backup copies, and system event logs (which often include references to filenames). It's amazing how rarely people check error logs.
Deleted files would indeed be more difficult to validate. That's why the court granted the ex parte decision, providing the defendant no notice, and therefore minimal opportunity to delete the evidence.
As a citizen I have an obligation to call attention to poor legal decisions
You also have an obligation to follow the rule of law, not starting riots and calling for slander every time a judge decides against you. It's pretty obvious you have no qualification to know what a "poor legal decision" actually is.
Yes, I misread the title of the court. Idaho's state judges can be voted out, but federal judges are appointed. I guess you'll have to stick to the normal appeals process.
I did read the entire decision, and just did again. Here's a few passages that stand out:
This makes it likely that defendant Thuen will delete material on the hard drive of his computer that could be relevant to this case.
"In my experience it is very common for such individuals to simply delete the data when they are confronted with an investigation, rather than admit wrongdoing...My investigation has revealed that Thuen has (or had) an unauthorized copy of executable Sophia code on his home computer..."
Thus,the Court finds a likelihood of irreparable harm
At most, defendants could claim that an injunction might harm their business. But the hardship suffered by Battelle will be greater if defendants are not enjoined from infringing or misappropriating Battelle’s copyrighted work.
The Court is persuaded to issue a restraining order without notice based on defendants’ statements that they will release Visdom “shortly” as an open-source product.
Note that last one. The key to the whole decision is not the "hacker" term, but rather that Thuen outright said they'll release the source soon. The whole decision is a pretty straightforward judgement against a suspect who can easily subvert the legal process.
I guess I'm dealing with a first-class pedant here.
In the malaria example, I felt is was unnecessary to say that what you feel is that eradication of malaria as a disease. Vaccine research is a vital part of that effort, so to destroy lab samples before the job is done is akin to shooting oneself in the foot.
Yes, eschewing copyright gives us certain abilities, but that serves little purpose. To make decompilation more difficult, cautious vendors will turn to obfuscation, encryption, and compression techniques. Abandonware can be assured perpetual commercial value by including (equally obfuscated) time locks - gotta buy that latest version to have anything.
The main aspect of RMS's open-source religion is that freedom is a choice. Forcing short copyright (though not necessarily shorter) terms on an author is no more free than forcing long terms on the rest of us. There must be a balance between the rights of the public and the rights of the individual, and the ability to choose a license gives us the ability to pick where on that scale we wish to be.
In the same way my advocacy of and interest in international culture implies intent...
As a previous post said, "It's more like if you claimed to be a professional killer and later claimed you kill deer." I know reading TFA is terribly out of fashion, but I recommend it. His advocacy included repeatedly pushing employers to open-source their product. That's what showed intent, not his website.
And was there evidence......And yet no proof......They need to prove he's in possession of stolen property first...
So let me get this straight... before an investigation, the investigators must already have their proof? What exactly do you think the point of the investigation is?
The judge agreed that there was a significant risk of irreversible harm if the defendant kept his computer during the investigation, so it's been seized. Big deal. It can be checked in a few days, and should be returned, if not, then it's time for a countersuit.
While we're at it, how about a good ol'-fashioned lynch mob? Maybe we should warm up some tar and pull that old sack of feathers out of the attic?
What the fuck makes you think you have any right to "undermine his decision"? Are you an appeals judge yourself, fully informed of the details of the case? Are you even in his jurisdiction?
Vote him out, and vote in a different, more savvy judge next time.
No, but the defendant's repeated advocacy of open source implies intent to publish source code. The lawsuit is alleging that the defendant stole source code from his prior employer for the purpose of open-sourcing it as his own product.
Since the defendant clearly has intent to open-source his product, and if it were indeed stolen source it would immediately cause irreparable harm, and the defendant's own statement shows he has the skill to cause such harm quickly (well within the usual timeframes of the court process), an immediately-executed warrant is reasonable.
A more appropriate analogy is to be a hypocrite for pushing a law requiring all known malaria to be destroyed, including the samples used for vaccine work.
Copyright is the legal framework for a person who creates something to have some degree of control over it. With no copyright, it's completely legal to take any work and do anything with it. With copyright laws, it's still possible to do anything with anything, but you have to have the author's permission. That's where licenses come in. The license allows a particular use, such as redistribution, and it may place limits (actually exceptions to the permission it's granting) on that use, such as requiring that the source code be available with the binaries.
Without copyright laws, anyone could compile open-source software into a closed-source product, with no restriction. Since the redistributor has default permission to do anything (thanks to the lack of copyright), the GPL never comes into play, so it can't require that the software stays open-source.
This inextricable dependency is why it's silly to promote the GPL while arguing entirely against copyright. If you really want the anyone-does-anything environment that copyright law prevents, promote the BSD license, not GPL. The BSD license boils down to "do whatever you want, but don't sue us".
Debian requires commercial use permission by their choice. The main repository is stuff that is properly licensed for use anywhere, including commercial uses, so that's why -NC is not suitable for inclusion. The GPL (which represents RMS's views fairly well) explicitly allows commercial use, by allowing any price for the software.
As I recall, there was fairly recently a court case establishing that GPL software is always commercial, in that there is "economic gain" in distributing it, even if the gain is not monetary (fame for the author, features for a distributor, etc). The CC license makes a point of specifying that the disallowed commercial uses are monetary or advantageous in nature.
As for RMS's views on copyright itself, I also recall an interview where he rightly lambasts the anti-copyright GPL-loving folks as hypocrites. The GPL is itself a license agreement, and it carries no validity without copyright law behind it.
[citations needed] and all, but it's well past my bedtime. Fading memories will have to do.
Ah, but they do own it. See, when you signed that loan agreement, or contracted for utilities, or had that background check for that job, you signed an agreement that your Social Security Number could be given to a "third party" for the fulfillment of the credit or background check, and that the third party could then use it according to its own policies. Those policies you never saw but agreed to anyway likely remove all restriction on what can be done with your SSN.
No. GPLv3 mainly protects against software patents, where the -NC option prohibits commercial use.
With the -NC option, someone can still hold a patent on an aspect of the software. Anyone, even non-profit and non-commercial entities, would then need separate permission to use the software (and redistribute it).
The GPLv3 includes that extra permission, but doesn't have the restriction on commercial use. It's completely legal to take GPLv3 software and redistribute it for profit, and not have to worry (much) about patents.
I've recently started going through the "extra" half-life games again, namely Blue Shift. The low-poly graphics are pretty distracting now. I've been spoiled.
I think that should say "cannot be distributed by entities that require commercial-use permission, like Debian." Debian has very strict rules on what it will redistribute, not because it must have those rules, but because it chooses to.
The -NC option prevents anyone from taking The Dark Mod's assets and publishing them in a commercial game. This annoys some pure-freedom-loving folks (like the Debian project and RMS) because they feel it's important that information be free for anyone to use in any way. On the other hand, for the "it's my work, so it's my choice" crowd, the -NC option ensures that nobody can copy their work and make a profit.
Debian's choice is theirs to make, as is any other distributor's, and has nothing to do with The Dark Mod. There's no reason to put such pointless slant in a summary.
So to avoid locking our data into a Windows-only proprietary format, we'll lock it into a Windows-centric Microsoft-owned cloud? Oh yeah, that's going to work much better.
Of course, let's do nothing unless it's perfect. If a few million people suffer or die in the meantime, at least we can look on and say we weren't flawed.
Oh, good. Now we've clarified it to the precision of a "handful". I have pretty steady hands. I can probably stack up a good dozen phones or more before considering my hands "full". Of course, if we consider the use of tape or a sufficiently-large basket, I could fit a significant amount of the currently-available phones, and we can then just call them all "fastest".
...But also reconfigure all your software (as stored compiled on the disk) to work around the changed opcodes, and don't forget to also change any compressed executables and checksums. Then have your new operations interact directly with hardware you also designed, and do this all this work on a molecular scale, with no instruction manual.
40km is still only about 25 miles, which is well within that single horse's range. Interestingly enough, such a race already exists, and though it is usually won by a horse, humans have won before - and would likely win more often if the horse's maintenance times were counted in addition to the actual travel time.
Spurred on by this discussion*, I looked around a bit more, and I found an interesting article considering how humans can eventually outrun most other animals, complete with references.
Slashdot Mirror
Lovely ad hominem. Mind if we get back on topic?
You keep saying "NPOV" as though it's a magical remedy, but your original call was to use Wikipedia to "undermine his decision". How is that goal neutral in any way, regardless of the language used?
Of course the complaint was made by the plaintiff, and it includes the evidence the plaintiff has already gathered. Yes, that's intentionally what forms the basis for the court to decide whether it's reasonable to disrupt the defendant's life while more evidence is gathered.
And milli- is the same as micro-.
I worked recently for a financial company doing algorithmic trading. Here's how it worked:
Every morning at 7 AM, Master.xlsx would run an "UpdateOrders" macro to check for the prior day's events, and possibly change some green circles to red. Whenever an account under that system needed to sell something, the red circles would go first. Once each year, new green circles were added and red ones were eliminated.
11.5740741 microhertz is indeed high frequency, compared to something like 413 nanohertz.
By that logic, the Democrats in the Senate were voted in specifically to keep ACA around... and the House Democrats who passed it the first time were specifically voted in to pass it! And next term, they'll be voted in specifically to push again, and the term after that as well.
I suppose all of the other things Congress does just sort of fade away compared to single-issue fanaticism.
Advocating doing something isn't evidence for having actually done something
Nobody's saying it is. It does strongly suggest that given the chance, you will do something, though. That's the concern here, that the defendant would either wipe his hard disk or publish his ex-employer's proprietary information. On multiple occasions in the past, he'd released internal company information after being advised not to, and violated written contracts with the company. The main factor in having the restraining order approved with no advance notice is that his website said that he'd be releasing source code to his own product "soon".
They must have some evidence of a crime, yes.
Nope. As you note later, they need "probable cause". That's not actual evidence, and it's not nearly the high burden of proof you seem to think it is. In this case, the court does have evidence that the defendant had an unauthorized copy of the source code previously, and the defendant has promised to release his own source code "soon". If what he releases is actually his ex-employer's code, that harm would be irreparable. That's plenty of reasonable cause.
Suspicion isn't enough for a search warrant
But suspicion, probable cause, and a pressing time limit are.
...back in the 90s, when 'cyber crime' was in its infancy ... The computers weren't returned until over two years later...
Things have changed in the past 15 years. In this case, his hard disk is to be immediately turned over to the court, and returned when the court deems it appropriate after further litigation. Meanwhile, there is no restraint on the defendant to prevent using other computers.
It means his computer, his primary method of income has now been locked up, along with all kinds of collateral damage -- his entire digital life, including copies of resumes, bank records, pictures, etc., are all now inaccessible to him.
As security against the inconvenience, Battelle is also required to deposit $25,000 with the court, plus more if the court approves the defendant's requests.
...then there will still be modification times on the fragments, archived backup copies, and system event logs (which often include references to filenames). It's amazing how rarely people check error logs.
Deleted files would indeed be more difficult to validate. That's why the court granted the ex parte decision, providing the defendant no notice, and therefore minimal opportunity to delete the evidence.
As a citizen I have an obligation to call attention to poor legal decisions
You also have an obligation to follow the rule of law, not starting riots and calling for slander every time a judge decides against you. It's pretty obvious you have no qualification to know what a "poor legal decision" actually is.
Yes, I misread the title of the court. Idaho's state judges can be voted out, but federal judges are appointed. I guess you'll have to stick to the normal appeals process.
I did read the entire decision, and just did again. Here's a few passages that stand out:
This makes it likely that defendant Thuen will delete material on the hard drive of his computer that could be relevant to this case.
"In my experience it is very common for such individuals to simply delete the data when they are confronted with an investigation, rather than admit wrongdoing...My investigation has revealed that Thuen has (or had) an unauthorized copy of executable Sophia code on his home computer..."
Thus,the Court finds a likelihood of irreparable harm
At most, defendants could claim that an injunction might harm their business. But the hardship suffered by Battelle will be greater if defendants are not enjoined from infringing or misappropriating Battelle’s copyrighted work.
The Court is persuaded to issue a restraining order without notice based on defendants’ statements that they will release Visdom “shortly” as an open-source product.
Note that last one. The key to the whole decision is not the "hacker" term, but rather that Thuen outright said they'll release the source soon. The whole decision is a pretty straightforward judgement against a suspect who can easily subvert the legal process.
If only actions could perhaps be marked with the time they occurred... some kind of log file or timestamp...
I guess I'm dealing with a first-class pedant here.
In the malaria example, I felt is was unnecessary to say that what you feel is that eradication of malaria as a disease. Vaccine research is a vital part of that effort, so to destroy lab samples before the job is done is akin to shooting oneself in the foot.
Yes, eschewing copyright gives us certain abilities, but that serves little purpose. To make decompilation more difficult, cautious vendors will turn to obfuscation, encryption, and compression techniques. Abandonware can be assured perpetual commercial value by including (equally obfuscated) time locks - gotta buy that latest version to have anything.
The main aspect of RMS's open-source religion is that freedom is a choice. Forcing short copyright (though not necessarily shorter) terms on an author is no more free than forcing long terms on the rest of us. There must be a balance between the rights of the public and the rights of the individual, and the ability to choose a license gives us the ability to pick where on that scale we wish to be.
I take it you're not particularly clear on what "rampant" means.
In the same way my advocacy of and interest in international culture implies intent...
As a previous post said, "It's more like if you claimed to be a professional killer and later claimed you kill deer." I know reading TFA is terribly out of fashion, but I recommend it. His advocacy included repeatedly pushing employers to open-source their product. That's what showed intent, not his website.
And was there evidence... ...And yet no proof... ...They need to prove he's in possession of stolen property first...
So let me get this straight... before an investigation, the investigators must already have their proof? What exactly do you think the point of the investigation is?
The judge agreed that there was a significant risk of irreversible harm if the defendant kept his computer during the investigation, so it's been seized. Big deal. It can be checked in a few days, and should be returned, if not, then it's time for a countersuit.
While we're at it, how about a good ol'-fashioned lynch mob? Maybe we should warm up some tar and pull that old sack of feathers out of the attic?
What the fuck makes you think you have any right to "undermine his decision"? Are you an appeals judge yourself, fully informed of the details of the case? Are you even in his jurisdiction?
Vote him out, and vote in a different, more savvy judge next time.
No, but the defendant's repeated advocacy of open source implies intent to publish source code. The lawsuit is alleging that the defendant stole source code from his prior employer for the purpose of open-sourcing it as his own product.
Since the defendant clearly has intent to open-source his product, and if it were indeed stolen source it would immediately cause irreparable harm, and the defendant's own statement shows he has the skill to cause such harm quickly (well within the usual timeframes of the court process), an immediately-executed warrant is reasonable.
A more appropriate analogy is to be a hypocrite for pushing a law requiring all known malaria to be destroyed, including the samples used for vaccine work.
Copyright is the legal framework for a person who creates something to have some degree of control over it. With no copyright, it's completely legal to take any work and do anything with it. With copyright laws, it's still possible to do anything with anything, but you have to have the author's permission. That's where licenses come in. The license allows a particular use, such as redistribution, and it may place limits (actually exceptions to the permission it's granting) on that use, such as requiring that the source code be available with the binaries.
Without copyright laws, anyone could compile open-source software into a closed-source product, with no restriction. Since the redistributor has default permission to do anything (thanks to the lack of copyright), the GPL never comes into play, so it can't require that the software stays open-source.
This inextricable dependency is why it's silly to promote the GPL while arguing entirely against copyright. If you really want the anyone-does-anything environment that copyright law prevents, promote the BSD license, not GPL. The BSD license boils down to "do whatever you want, but don't sue us".
...but those aren't my assumptions, either.
Debian requires commercial use permission by their choice. The main repository is stuff that is properly licensed for use anywhere, including commercial uses, so that's why -NC is not suitable for inclusion. The GPL (which represents RMS's views fairly well) explicitly allows commercial use, by allowing any price for the software.
As I recall, there was fairly recently a court case establishing that GPL software is always commercial, in that there is "economic gain" in distributing it, even if the gain is not monetary (fame for the author, features for a distributor, etc). The CC license makes a point of specifying that the disallowed commercial uses are monetary or advantageous in nature.
As for RMS's views on copyright itself, I also recall an interview where he rightly lambasts the anti-copyright GPL-loving folks as hypocrites. The GPL is itself a license agreement, and it carries no validity without copyright law behind it.
[citations needed] and all, but it's well past my bedtime. Fading memories will have to do.
Ah, but they do own it. See, when you signed that loan agreement, or contracted for utilities, or had that background check for that job, you signed an agreement that your Social Security Number could be given to a "third party" for the fulfillment of the credit or background check, and that the third party could then use it according to its own policies. Those policies you never saw but agreed to anyway likely remove all restriction on what can be done with your SSN.
No. GPLv3 mainly protects against software patents, where the -NC option prohibits commercial use.
With the -NC option, someone can still hold a patent on an aspect of the software. Anyone, even non-profit and non-commercial entities, would then need separate permission to use the software (and redistribute it).
The GPLv3 includes that extra permission, but doesn't have the restriction on commercial use. It's completely legal to take GPLv3 software and redistribute it for profit, and not have to worry (much) about patents.
I've recently started going through the "extra" half-life games again, namely Blue Shift. The low-poly graphics are pretty distracting now. I've been spoiled.
cannot be distributed by even Debian
I think that should say "cannot be distributed by entities that require commercial-use permission, like Debian." Debian has very strict rules on what it will redistribute, not because it must have those rules, but because it chooses to.
The -NC option prevents anyone from taking The Dark Mod's assets and publishing them in a commercial game. This annoys some pure-freedom-loving folks (like the Debian project and RMS) because they feel it's important that information be free for anyone to use in any way. On the other hand, for the "it's my work, so it's my choice" crowd, the -NC option ensures that nobody can copy their work and make a profit.
Debian's choice is theirs to make, as is any other distributor's, and has nothing to do with The Dark Mod. There's no reason to put such pointless slant in a summary.
So to avoid locking our data into a Windows-only proprietary format, we'll lock it into a Windows-centric Microsoft-owned cloud? Oh yeah, that's going to work much better.
Of course, let's do nothing unless it's perfect. If a few million people suffer or die in the meantime, at least we can look on and say we weren't flawed.
ultra low power processor...more battery life
We need to get away from the spec chasing.
By which you mean "stop chasing this particular spec and go back to chasing the spec I care about".
Oh, good. Now we've clarified it to the precision of a "handful". I have pretty steady hands. I can probably stack up a good dozen phones or more before considering my hands "full". Of course, if we consider the use of tape or a sufficiently-large basket, I could fit a significant amount of the currently-available phones, and we can then just call them all "fastest".
...But also reconfigure all your software (as stored compiled on the disk) to work around the changed opcodes, and don't forget to also change any compressed executables and checksums. Then have your new operations interact directly with hardware you also designed, and do this all this work on a molecular scale, with no instruction manual.
That's Slashdot-worthy.
40km is still only about 25 miles, which is well within that single horse's range. Interestingly enough, such a race already exists, and though it is usually won by a horse, humans have won before - and would likely win more often if the horse's maintenance times were counted in addition to the actual travel time.
Spurred on by this discussion*, I looked around a bit more, and I found an interesting article considering how humans can eventually outrun most other animals, complete with references.
* Pun intended. I'm terrible.