What you should note in your case, though, is that the author IS right- once the battery is depleted, the gas engine kicks in and won't shut off until it's caught back up. Your usage allows it to catch back up.
No, the author is still exagerrating. It takes a very special kind of driving for the battery to discharge and the engine to kick in. It's possible; for example, get yourself into a traffic jam and go in EV mode for a couple of miles. Eventually the battery will enter the pink zone and the engine starts.
However even then the engine run can be very brief - about 3 minutes, perhaps. Once the battery is sufficiently charged (the color is blue) the engine stops again. I had such a mode a few times in dense, crawling traffic, and once when I was sitting in the powered car for a long time, listening to the radio and running A/C. The engine started every 15 minutes or so for a couple of minutes to replenish the energy. That energy has to come from somewhere.
Most people, though, as they drive every day, never encounter this mode. The light changes, you accelerate, and the engine not only moves the car, it also often charges the battery. As you slow down the battery is always getting charged. The car is doing it just fine.
With regard to going uphill, on some stretches of the road the car not only accelerates, it also charges the battery. It all depends on the position of the accelerator. You don't have to pay any attention to it, of course, unless you want to. Some Prius owners (techies) like to know what their cars are doing; other may be completely oblivious. The car is done right, and you don't need to worry about its well-being. Just watch the road.
That's not relevant because I don't just go up and down the hill. Most of my travel is where, you know, people live and work - and for most part they do that on flat pieces of land. My 43-45 mpg is the actual number that I see on the MFD every single day, I don't need any math to get to it.
the concept of TSA employees getting cancer from their foul and nefarious acts (y'know, getting a job they probably like less than you do because hey, it's better than starving on the streets)
Is this the excuse that the guards of concentration camps used?
In other words, how many other people one should be willing to hurt or kill to feed his family?
Or I can put it in another way. What is the minimum salary that can convert Mahatma Gandhi into someone like Carlos the Jackal? The pay of a hired assassin is pretty good, and if they want they can give it all to charities and feed many hungry children in Africa.
And once the batteries are depleted, the car can no longer shut down its gas engine...
I live high in the hills, and by the time I'm at home the battery is usually on its last couple of bars. This is normal and it has no ill effects. In fact, the battery still retains about half of its charge at that time.
The author is clearly avoiding the truth here. Any Prius owner knows that his claim has nothing to do with reality.
By the way, the climb uphill is usually at 15 mpg, but the descent is at 100 mpg, and the average efficiency is about 43-45 mpg. If I stay in the valley for a long time (say, a whole day of driving with a meter reset) the efficiency will be about 52 mpg. That's with a 2005 (Gen.2) Prius.
For me, though, one of major selling points of Prius is not just its efficiency but it's CVT. The ride in Prius is the smoothest I every encountered, which is not a surprise because it has no gearbox that would switch anything.
So I found myself wondering... why do some people love it so much?
I personally hate Firefly. I had a misfortune to see a few initial episodes, and that was that.
I personally know people who like ST, DS9, Babylon 5, but I don't know anyone (within my circle of acquaintances) who would be ecstatic or otherwise fond of Firefly.
I can't reliably tell today all the details that I disliked so much. But from what I recall, to be able to watch Firefly you have to like SciFi and westerns. Both. If you like only one of them then the show is not for you. I believe I even turned the T off when some kind of a folksy dance started. I have no use for SciFi with dances and dresses.
I'm sure the few episodes that I managed to see aren't enough to fully understand the show. However it's unwatchable to me, so I guess it will remain a mystery forever.
Personally, I'd prefer the drowsy types and the like to be evolutionary selected away.
A tired driver is likely tired because he was working long and hard. Selecting them away will leave you with people who do nothing and therefore are always driving in their top notch condition. Be careful what you wish for.
So if I get on the highway can I set my cruise control and take my hands off the wheel?
Sure you can, until the nearest construction zone or any other place where the markings on the road are misleading or invisible. Since you are likely to be sightseeing at that time, if not asleep, and not keeping your hands on the steering wheel, Thanatos is going to visit you shortly.
Yes, Apple's paying via royalties, but they're an established entity - you try to start an online MP3 store and get a distribution contract that's merely royalties based. No... you'd pay a lump sum payment.
Let's leave the goalposts in place. The original claim was about Apple, and my speculation was also about Apple.
Besides, anyone hoping to open an online store has to be "an established entity." Labels won't deal with private persons. However Theaetetus Corporation might have a good chance, as long as it presents a reasonable business proposition.
For example, imagine rental music on board of airplanes... all the iTMS songs for duration of the flight, only for a couple of dollars, complete with a rental WiFi iPod and a streaming server somewhere. How many people would gladly pay (esp. out of corporate pocket) for the privilege to rummage through terabytes of music? This offer would be complementary to iTMS, will not interfere with other services, will not result in loss of music... what's not to like about it?
You can download Poker Face for $1.29... How much did Apple pay for rights to distribute it? $1.29? Nope. Try hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Your math doesn't make sense. Let's say Apple pays exactly $100K for a right to distribute a song. ITMS has 1M songs. Therefore Apple had to pay about $100B for all these songs. However Apple has only $76B in cash, and it's market cap is $370B.
IMO, Apple paid nothing for the right to distribute songs. What Apple does is it shares the profits with IP owners - just as any brick-and-mortar music store does. Anything else would be implausible. A high lump sum payment would indicate that Apple buys some or all of the copyright, but IP owners would be fools to sell it for that little. This song probably earns them $100K per week (if not per day) from radio, TV and other commercial uses.
The [butyric acid] has also been used as a noxious, nausea-inducing repellent by anti-whaling protesters to disrupt Japanese whaling crews (link)
I don't know if they used any human waste; they are already using violence and chemical weapons, and that should be enough to hang them for crimes against humans.
It's a sad story all along. I don't believe whaling is necessary; however the SOBs from SSCS don't give me a choice - I will never support them. SSCS is also pushing Japan against the wall, and Japan is understandably pushing back. The original bone of contention - the whales - is being forgotten, replaced by "you broke my boat" and "you injured my sailors." SSCS are professional trolls of high seas.
[why] Is a "civil right organization" in Israel, telling a US company that it is violating US law?
It's a standard operating practice for civil rights organizations these days, all over the world. Sea Shepherds, for example, will catch you on sea and throw acid in your face if they think you are nasty.
"Mr. Popplers Penguins, Watch this incredible blockbuster now with FiOS On Demand!" (for $6). It's a running joke in my house how bad movies they advertise on those spots are.
My theory is that majority of PPV users don't care how good the movie is. The cable company earns more if it offers a cheap movie and 100 people watch it than if it offers an expensive movie and 150 people watch it.
So you invest $175,000 without making sure you'll get software updates?
Most of the CAM software has updates readily available. They are just not affordable. In best case you have to pay yearly tax^W maintenance fee for the right to upgrade. In other cases the vendor wants you to buy a whole new software (for tens of kilobucks per seat.) Some vendors may even want to upgrade the hardware as well (if the new software intentionally doesn't support the old hardware.)
So you'd be too quick to blame the machinist for not having the foresight to see in 20th century that IPv6 will be of use in 21st century. Machinists are like that, more focused on drills and mills. Besides, how much choice do you expect to see in the market of CNC laser cutters?
The only harm caused by backdating the copyright is reduction of your copyright term. I'm no lawyer, but no one could prove they were harmed by this
The very first question is "Why did you do it then?" Nobody does things for no reason. Everything that we willingly do is for a purpose. Doing an illegal thing (such as a lie in court) has to have a very good purpose.
In this case the answer is obvious. Backdating of the copyright prohibits the employer from arguing that you wrote this software during his employment. There is no other sane reason to do this.
Now, I have no idea if the employer's claims are of any value. If you signed a contract which says "Everything that I write belongs to the company" he may have a leg to stand on. If you are an hourly tech then most likely such a leg is absent. If you are a typical engineer... it often depends. But the very fact that you lied in court is going to hurt your credibility, perhaps tainting everything that you say.
The OP says he had lots of downtime and wrote this during that time.
The OP has it both ways. He says that he had downtime and he kept records of time. Then he says he wrote the thing "on personal equipment off company hours." I don't see how these two statements can be reconciled. You either do it at home - and then it's most likely yours - or you do it at work, while getting paid (then most likely the company owns it.) Was he in some weird way bringing his personal computer to work and then was staying at work beyond company hours? Such an important fact should be better explained. If that's what happened then, IMO, the primary criteria here is simple: were those "company's off hours" his off hours as well? Many people time-shift their presence at the office; but if you come to work by 2pm it doesn't mean that after everyone else leaves at 5pm you can start goofing off. I would go as far as saying that if he wrote the code at work it belongs to the company. Why: he had to be at work for a reason. Most likely reason is that it's his normal working hours and he'd be fired if he is not present. Other reasons may exist but the OP needs to have a damn good story here.
I have it expire after a month. Doing this means no one can use it after the date unless they change the system time
I don't know how the advice below may apply to you and your VB scripts, but it might be useful to the submitter. Compile the application and insert a simple piece of licensing code. Have it running over the Internet. The application sends a unique GUID (one per seat) to your server, and your server replies if it's OK to run or not. I built such things with proper crypto, but the OP doesn't need to try too hard - a simple checksum will do.
This means:
The OP wrote that software (since he is in control of its licensing.)
The OP licensed that software for use at his own workplace.
The software is useful.
More licenses are available if Ty Coon is willing to talk.
There is no need to sell the source. As one of earlier posters said, it will bitrot and die because nobody can maintain it without OP. This means that the whole code dies - the OP can't use it (because he sold it) and the company can't use it because it's not maintained.
Selling the binary with licenses and/or support is far more valuable to both sides of the debate. The boss knows what he is getting, and he has only a small licensing fee ($100/yr) to deal with, and he can terminate that service at any time. The OP can then focus on maintaining the software.
Some companies disallow duality in employee-company relationships. There may be rules that say whatever you develop or sell we will not buy because you are an interested party. There could be still ways to do it if your work is wildly different from what you are selling. Still, it's difficult to do. Far better to open a company and sell the software. OP's wife or his friend can be in charge, and the OP only does the work. I'm sure if you ask a lawyer he will find a reason why this is not kosher, but for all intents and purposes such a shield is good enough. As long as you don't use your influence at work unfairly you should be OK.
If the Sea Shepherds had the firepower needed to do something about the Somali pirates then this whole discussion would have been resolved years ago. One way or the other.
So why don't they have it? Blackwater had weapons, other private protection agencies ("private armies") have weapons, AQ has them...
A pair of snipers with M82A1 on a gyrostabilized platform aboard a ship can do a lot of damage to a dozen guys with AK-47s on a tiny boat. The sway of the pirate boat will not allow the pirates to shoot with any accuracy, and a sniper only needs a couple of inches of an opening in the armor plate. That, of course, doesn't preclude use of more advanced ship to ship weapons...
SSCS is harassing unarmed fishermen and in the end is hurting anti-whaling sentiments. That's because when people need to choose between saving a handful of whales vs. supporting a group of fanatical, homicidal psycho killers (aka SSCS:-) about 99% of the population gladly sacrifices the whales to get rid of the psychos. SSCS created a wrong wedge issue - SSCS is on the losing side by definition; nobody likes pirates, regardless of their motivation. SSCS is just a notch apart from acknowledged terrorists like The Red Brigades. You can say that both were working toward a noble goal, however they understood it. SSCS doesn't intentionally target people yet, though throwing bottles with acid toward people is not very friendly in my book. But if things continue as they are, shots will be eventually fired - and that will be the end of SSCS. No single activist group can wage a war against a powerful country and expect to win that war. SSCS members are still alive only because Japan hasn't used, so far, its right for self-defense - and that includes sending Navy ships along with whalers.
There's a narrow line between "endangered" and "not endangered".
If you look at Wikipedia you will see that the "narrow line" that you are talking about is actually quite wide. Perhaps the scientists who invented the classification were not all idiots?
It's a bit tough to find tales of life at sea 300 or more years ago, that don't include a lot of superstitious nonsense, but it seems to have been common for ships to be constantly trailed by dolphins, and whales were common sights. With each passing decade, there are fewer and fewer.
There are all kinds of causes that could explain such observations. For example, dolphins are afraid of propeller-driven ships because they know what the spinning screw can do to them. Or as another example, modern ships are taller and have fewer people on the deck to idly watch the sea and write about that in their diaries. But, of course, contamination of water is also a factor, and overfishing, and other human-caused effects.
It would be wrong to attribute decline of dolphin population to hunting them because they are not intentionally hunted (except by natives of a few islands including Japan.) I would say pollution of the sea and shortage of fish is a larger factor.
Sinking is not piracy. You have to try stealing something.
Sinking an unmanned ship is same as a theft of it where the thief destroys the loot. Any hostile act by Sea Shepherds should be treated as piracy; similarly, an attack on Sea Shepherds' drones would be also piracy (unless drones directly endanger someone) for the same reasons.
Drones themselves are not a concern. However once Sea Shepherd vigilantes show up to be judge, jury and the executioner they create a problem. I don't see much harm from limited harvest of non-endangered species. If there is harm, use UN to tell Japan to stop doing that. However no band of merry men may be allowed to go around, set their own laws and hurt people. If Sea Shepherds want to do something good they are welcome to Somalia coastal waters, there are plenty of evildoers and real people (unarmed sailors) that need protection. But no, SS doesn't believe that saving humans from pirates is a worthy goal. Instead they choose to protect sea cows from sea hunters. There are at least half a million Minke whales in Southern waters, and Japan catches about 2,000 of them, which is 0.4%.
Unions have been smashed, workers have seen their hours increased and their pay barely keep up with inflation, whilst the rich roll around in big piles of cash. This has left them with a crippled economy, soaring debts, and millions unemployed.
Even if we for a moment accept your description of the situation (which is wrong, by the way) it is still internally inconsistent.
For example, if workers are a dime a dozen, then why the capitalist doesn't hire more of them to make more product and sell more and be richer? You should have very low unemployment if the labor is nearly free. That's what was in USSR, for example.
In reality the USA has issues, but few of them are straight out of Der Kapital as you so graciously quoted.
The largest problem that the USA faces is its own riches. The country is so rich that it can't compete on the world market. A bag of bread will cost you $4; that price would buy you far more in 3rd world. But you, as a worker, are just as efficient as that African or Chinese worker. So you, an american worker, are too expensive, and here is your pink slip, and the door is right there.
Why did it happen this way? To begin with, the USA was industrialized for all the 20th century. It also remained afloat during the World War II. This helped the USA to become rich. Every family had not one car but several; nobody was hungry; the streets were paved with gold; traders made millions in a day; yuppies were making millions in a year. Life was good.
But all good things come to the end. US corporations realized that US workers are an unwelcome expense. They are too expensive because they live in the USA and have to pay US prices for everything. At the same time you could buy a whole factory, with workers, in a faraway land for a handful of glass beads. That's of course what happened.
Now the USA is a shell of a country. Few people that are still employed are doing something unique, something that nobody else can do. That would be Boeing and all the military-industrial sector. The rest has to compete with India and China.
That competition of course killed every industry that could be outsourced. Lots of people are unemployed. But since the US government can't just tell them to curl up and die, the government borrows money from abroad and distributes as welfare among those who are unemployed. Some say that about 50% of US population collects assistance from the government. That's where the debt plugs in. I don't borrow, and my neighbor doesn't borrow - we simply can't. It takes a government to borrow.
So what do you see here? You see very few labor opportunities left in the country, all caused by the competition. And what did you want when you mixed the rich USA and the cheap China? If labor is free to flow from A to B then the low wages should be free to flow from B to A. But that's illegal! Congress mandated that the minimum wage is something like $10/hr, and if your employer can't pay you that much he must fire you.
As you can see, there are many problems in this country, and perhaps Karl Marx could say one witty thing or another about all that. However he died a long time ago; his works may be a good historical reading, but in no way they predict the future. The USA's problems are all self-inflicted, and as things are they will not be resolved peacefully. In general terms, only the influx of Chinese cash prevents the US people from rioting or dying. They depend on that cash because they can't manufacture anything that could be sold on the international or domestic market.
assault rifles with silencers and armor piercing rounds
Those aren't compatible requirements. Silencer requires a heavy, slow (subsonic) bullet. An armor-piercing round requires all the speed you can get (E=mv^2)
regular hunting rifles. Both can be used for criminal purposes, but one is particularly well suited to those purposes
I don't know which one, though. If one gangster wants to kill another gangster, the best he can do it with is a hunting rifle - he can take the target out from half a mile and escape undetected. Taking an AK-47, coming close to the target and shooting a couple of magazines at him is not very wise. However it happens (even today, as I read.)
it is an obstacle that would need to be dealt with if the people behind bitcoin want it to actually gain acceptance.
Bitcoin has already gained acceptance in its unique market of untraceable, barely legal transactions. If Bitcoin starts making waves then this market is disrupted... and no other market shows up because I have no reason to pay in Bitcoin if I can pay in USD or any other established currency. Bitcoin is already all it can be.
There are still millions of people happily using XP, and with no intention of upgrading. It just isn't important to a lot of people.
Upgrade from XP to Vista or Win7 is often not possible technically or financially. This very laptop which I bought with Vista many years ago can't be trivially upgraded to Win7 - at least the Upgrade Advisor says so. Upgrade of a computer also isn't likely to make it faster or more useful. Features in Windows world are coming at snail's pace, and many of them offer only minor benefits (like Homegroups.) Microsoft wants money for upgrades, so I do nothing and suffer Vista, waiting for the laptop to die and thus make a decision for me.
Upgrade of a cell phone, on the other hand, is expected to come for free and not require any hardware updates (because they aren't possible.) Newer versions of the OS are likely to offer benefits that the user sees as important, since the thing is in heavy development. The need for updates of a cell phone OS is higher.
All my three Android devices never have problems connecting to any wifi, so yes, it seems to be a problem with your network or your individual Android device.
I have a Galaxy Tab, and I had that problem in first weeks after getting it. The WiFi connection went up and then down within 30 seconds. I tried everything and it wasn't working. Now it seems to work. I did try to use static IP addresses, but I don't remember if they had an effect or not. It's DHCP now.
The US auto industry is not uncompetitive because of their unions, but because of their lack of engineering quality and desirable designs.
And why is that? Isn't every worker on the conveyor trying to do better than everybody else, so that he rises above the crowd, gets better pay, and so on?
Or perhaps any such worker would quickly be given a hint - verbal, at first - that such behavior is not welcome in this here union shop?
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What you should note in your case, though, is that the author IS right- once the battery is depleted, the gas engine kicks in and won't shut off until it's caught back up. Your usage allows it to catch back up.
No, the author is still exagerrating. It takes a very special kind of driving for the battery to discharge and the engine to kick in. It's possible; for example, get yourself into a traffic jam and go in EV mode for a couple of miles. Eventually the battery will enter the pink zone and the engine starts.
However even then the engine run can be very brief - about 3 minutes, perhaps. Once the battery is sufficiently charged (the color is blue) the engine stops again. I had such a mode a few times in dense, crawling traffic, and once when I was sitting in the powered car for a long time, listening to the radio and running A/C. The engine started every 15 minutes or so for a couple of minutes to replenish the energy. That energy has to come from somewhere.
Most people, though, as they drive every day, never encounter this mode. The light changes, you accelerate, and the engine not only moves the car, it also often charges the battery. As you slow down the battery is always getting charged. The car is doing it just fine.
With regard to going uphill, on some stretches of the road the car not only accelerates, it also charges the battery. It all depends on the position of the accelerator. You don't have to pay any attention to it, of course, unless you want to. Some Prius owners (techies) like to know what their cars are doing; other may be completely oblivious. The car is done right, and you don't need to worry about its well-being. Just watch the road.
Lets try to verify that with some simple math.
That's not relevant because I don't just go up and down the hill. Most of my travel is where, you know, people live and work - and for most part they do that on flat pieces of land. My 43-45 mpg is the actual number that I see on the MFD every single day, I don't need any math to get to it.
the concept of TSA employees getting cancer from their foul and nefarious acts (y'know, getting a job they probably like less than you do because hey, it's better than starving on the streets)
Is this the excuse that the guards of concentration camps used?
In other words, how many other people one should be willing to hurt or kill to feed his family?
Or I can put it in another way. What is the minimum salary that can convert Mahatma Gandhi into someone like Carlos the Jackal? The pay of a hired assassin is pretty good, and if they want they can give it all to charities and feed many hungry children in Africa.
And once the batteries are depleted, the car can no longer shut down its gas engine...
I live high in the hills, and by the time I'm at home the battery is usually on its last couple of bars. This is normal and it has no ill effects. In fact, the battery still retains about half of its charge at that time.
The author is clearly avoiding the truth here. Any Prius owner knows that his claim has nothing to do with reality.
By the way, the climb uphill is usually at 15 mpg, but the descent is at 100 mpg, and the average efficiency is about 43-45 mpg. If I stay in the valley for a long time (say, a whole day of driving with a meter reset) the efficiency will be about 52 mpg. That's with a 2005 (Gen.2) Prius.
For me, though, one of major selling points of Prius is not just its efficiency but it's CVT. The ride in Prius is the smoothest I every encountered, which is not a surprise because it has no gearbox that would switch anything.
folksy dance is just a pretext for some girl to "marry" the protagonist
Thank you for confirming my suspicions.
So I found myself wondering... why do some people love it so much?
I personally hate Firefly. I had a misfortune to see a few initial episodes, and that was that.
I personally know people who like ST, DS9, Babylon 5, but I don't know anyone (within my circle of acquaintances) who would be ecstatic or otherwise fond of Firefly.
I can't reliably tell today all the details that I disliked so much. But from what I recall, to be able to watch Firefly you have to like SciFi and westerns. Both. If you like only one of them then the show is not for you. I believe I even turned the T off when some kind of a folksy dance started. I have no use for SciFi with dances and dresses.
I'm sure the few episodes that I managed to see aren't enough to fully understand the show. However it's unwatchable to me, so I guess it will remain a mystery forever.
Personally, I'd prefer the drowsy types and the like to be evolutionary selected away.
A tired driver is likely tired because he was working long and hard. Selecting them away will leave you with people who do nothing and therefore are always driving in their top notch condition. Be careful what you wish for.
So if I get on the highway can I set my cruise control and take my hands off the wheel?
Sure you can, until the nearest construction zone or any other place where the markings on the road are misleading or invisible. Since you are likely to be sightseeing at that time, if not asleep, and not keeping your hands on the steering wheel, Thanatos is going to visit you shortly.
Yes, Apple's paying via royalties, but they're an established entity - you try to start an online MP3 store and get a distribution contract that's merely royalties based. No... you'd pay a lump sum payment.
Let's leave the goalposts in place. The original claim was about Apple, and my speculation was also about Apple.
Besides, anyone hoping to open an online store has to be "an established entity." Labels won't deal with private persons. However Theaetetus Corporation might have a good chance, as long as it presents a reasonable business proposition.
For example, imagine rental music on board of airplanes... all the iTMS songs for duration of the flight, only for a couple of dollars, complete with a rental WiFi iPod and a streaming server somewhere. How many people would gladly pay (esp. out of corporate pocket) for the privilege to rummage through terabytes of music? This offer would be complementary to iTMS, will not interfere with other services, will not result in loss of music... what's not to like about it?
You can download Poker Face for $1.29... How much did Apple pay for rights to distribute it? $1.29? Nope. Try hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Your math doesn't make sense. Let's say Apple pays exactly $100K for a right to distribute a song. ITMS has 1M songs. Therefore Apple had to pay about $100B for all these songs. However Apple has only $76B in cash, and it's market cap is $370B.
IMO, Apple paid nothing for the right to distribute songs. What Apple does is it shares the profits with IP owners - just as any brick-and-mortar music store does. Anything else would be implausible. A high lump sum payment would indicate that Apple buys some or all of the copyright, but IP owners would be fools to sell it for that little. This song probably earns them $100K per week (if not per day) from radio, TV and other commercial uses.
The [butyric acid] has also been used as a noxious, nausea-inducing repellent by anti-whaling protesters to disrupt Japanese whaling crews (link)
I don't know if they used any human waste; they are already using violence and chemical weapons, and that should be enough to hang them for crimes against humans.
It's a sad story all along. I don't believe whaling is necessary; however the SOBs from SSCS don't give me a choice - I will never support them. SSCS is also pushing Japan against the wall, and Japan is understandably pushing back. The original bone of contention - the whales - is being forgotten, replaced by "you broke my boat" and "you injured my sailors." SSCS are professional trolls of high seas.
[why] Is a "civil right organization" in Israel, telling a US company that it is violating US law?
It's a standard operating practice for civil rights organizations these days, all over the world. Sea Shepherds, for example, will catch you on sea and throw acid in your face if they think you are nasty.
"Mr. Popplers Penguins, Watch this incredible blockbuster now with FiOS On Demand!" (for $6). It's a running joke in my house how bad movies they advertise on those spots are.
My theory is that majority of PPV users don't care how good the movie is. The cable company earns more if it offers a cheap movie and 100 people watch it than if it offers an expensive movie and 150 people watch it.
So you invest $175,000 without making sure you'll get software updates?
Most of the CAM software has updates readily available. They are just not affordable. In best case you have to pay yearly tax^W maintenance fee for the right to upgrade. In other cases the vendor wants you to buy a whole new software (for tens of kilobucks per seat.) Some vendors may even want to upgrade the hardware as well (if the new software intentionally doesn't support the old hardware.)
So you'd be too quick to blame the machinist for not having the foresight to see in 20th century that IPv6 will be of use in 21st century. Machinists are like that, more focused on drills and mills. Besides, how much choice do you expect to see in the market of CNC laser cutters?
like claiming that if I have an expensive enough metal detector I'll find the pirate treasure in my backyard.
However strange that may sound, this is true, as long as there is at least one pirate treasure anywhere on this planet. Some digging may be required.
The only harm caused by backdating the copyright is reduction of your copyright term. I'm no lawyer, but no one could prove they were harmed by this
The very first question is "Why did you do it then?" Nobody does things for no reason. Everything that we willingly do is for a purpose. Doing an illegal thing (such as a lie in court) has to have a very good purpose.
In this case the answer is obvious. Backdating of the copyright prohibits the employer from arguing that you wrote this software during his employment. There is no other sane reason to do this.
Now, I have no idea if the employer's claims are of any value. If you signed a contract which says "Everything that I write belongs to the company" he may have a leg to stand on. If you are an hourly tech then most likely such a leg is absent. If you are a typical engineer ... it often depends. But the very fact that you lied in court is going to hurt your credibility, perhaps tainting everything that you say.
The OP says he had lots of downtime and wrote this during that time.
The OP has it both ways. He says that he had downtime and he kept records of time. Then he says he wrote the thing "on personal equipment off company hours." I don't see how these two statements can be reconciled. You either do it at home - and then it's most likely yours - or you do it at work, while getting paid (then most likely the company owns it.) Was he in some weird way bringing his personal computer to work and then was staying at work beyond company hours? Such an important fact should be better explained. If that's what happened then, IMO, the primary criteria here is simple: were those "company's off hours" his off hours as well? Many people time-shift their presence at the office; but if you come to work by 2pm it doesn't mean that after everyone else leaves at 5pm you can start goofing off. I would go as far as saying that if he wrote the code at work it belongs to the company. Why: he had to be at work for a reason. Most likely reason is that it's his normal working hours and he'd be fired if he is not present. Other reasons may exist but the OP needs to have a damn good story here.
I have it expire after a month. Doing this means no one can use it after the date unless they change the system time
I don't know how the advice below may apply to you and your VB scripts, but it might be useful to the submitter. Compile the application and insert a simple piece of licensing code. Have it running over the Internet. The application sends a unique GUID (one per seat) to your server, and your server replies if it's OK to run or not. I built such things with proper crypto, but the OP doesn't need to try too hard - a simple checksum will do.
This means:
There is no need to sell the source. As one of earlier posters said, it will bitrot and die because nobody can maintain it without OP. This means that the whole code dies - the OP can't use it (because he sold it) and the company can't use it because it's not maintained.
Selling the binary with licenses and/or support is far more valuable to both sides of the debate. The boss knows what he is getting, and he has only a small licensing fee ($100/yr) to deal with, and he can terminate that service at any time. The OP can then focus on maintaining the software.
Some companies disallow duality in employee-company relationships. There may be rules that say whatever you develop or sell we will not buy because you are an interested party. There could be still ways to do it if your work is wildly different from what you are selling. Still, it's difficult to do. Far better to open a company and sell the software. OP's wife or his friend can be in charge, and the OP only does the work. I'm sure if you ask a lawyer he will find a reason why this is not kosher, but for all intents and purposes such a shield is good enough. As long as you don't use your influence at work unfairly you should be OK.
If the Sea Shepherds had the firepower needed to do something about the Somali pirates then this whole discussion would have been resolved years ago. One way or the other.
So why don't they have it? Blackwater had weapons, other private protection agencies ("private armies") have weapons, AQ has them...
A pair of snipers with M82A1 on a gyrostabilized platform aboard a ship can do a lot of damage to a dozen guys with AK-47s on a tiny boat. The sway of the pirate boat will not allow the pirates to shoot with any accuracy, and a sniper only needs a couple of inches of an opening in the armor plate. That, of course, doesn't preclude use of more advanced ship to ship weapons...
SSCS is harassing unarmed fishermen and in the end is hurting anti-whaling sentiments. That's because when people need to choose between saving a handful of whales vs. supporting a group of fanatical, homicidal psycho killers (aka SSCS :-) about 99% of the population gladly sacrifices the whales to get rid of the psychos. SSCS created a wrong wedge issue - SSCS is on the losing side by definition; nobody likes pirates, regardless of their motivation. SSCS is just a notch apart from acknowledged terrorists like The Red Brigades. You can say that both were working toward a noble goal, however they understood it. SSCS doesn't intentionally target people yet, though throwing bottles with acid toward people is not very friendly in my book. But if things continue as they are, shots will be eventually fired - and that will be the end of SSCS. No single activist group can wage a war against a powerful country and expect to win that war. SSCS members are still alive only because Japan hasn't used, so far, its right for self-defense - and that includes sending Navy ships along with whalers.
There's a narrow line between "endangered" and "not endangered".
If you look at Wikipedia you will see that the "narrow line" that you are talking about is actually quite wide. Perhaps the scientists who invented the classification were not all idiots?
Minke Whales are a LEAST CONCERN species, on par with rats.
It's a bit tough to find tales of life at sea 300 or more years ago, that don't include a lot of superstitious nonsense, but it seems to have been common for ships to be constantly trailed by dolphins, and whales were common sights. With each passing decade, there are fewer and fewer.
There are all kinds of causes that could explain such observations. For example, dolphins are afraid of propeller-driven ships because they know what the spinning screw can do to them. Or as another example, modern ships are taller and have fewer people on the deck to idly watch the sea and write about that in their diaries. But, of course, contamination of water is also a factor, and overfishing, and other human-caused effects.
It would be wrong to attribute decline of dolphin population to hunting them because they are not intentionally hunted (except by natives of a few islands including Japan.) I would say pollution of the sea and shortage of fish is a larger factor.
Sinking is not piracy. You have to try stealing something.
Sinking an unmanned ship is same as a theft of it where the thief destroys the loot. Any hostile act by Sea Shepherds should be treated as piracy; similarly, an attack on Sea Shepherds' drones would be also piracy (unless drones directly endanger someone) for the same reasons.
Drones themselves are not a concern. However once Sea Shepherd vigilantes show up to be judge, jury and the executioner they create a problem. I don't see much harm from limited harvest of non-endangered species. If there is harm, use UN to tell Japan to stop doing that. However no band of merry men may be allowed to go around, set their own laws and hurt people. If Sea Shepherds want to do something good they are welcome to Somalia coastal waters, there are plenty of evildoers and real people (unarmed sailors) that need protection. But no, SS doesn't believe that saving humans from pirates is a worthy goal. Instead they choose to protect sea cows from sea hunters. There are at least half a million Minke whales in Southern waters, and Japan catches about 2,000 of them, which is 0.4%.
Unions have been smashed, workers have seen their hours increased and their pay barely keep up with inflation, whilst the rich roll around in big piles of cash. This has left them with a crippled economy, soaring debts, and millions unemployed.
Even if we for a moment accept your description of the situation (which is wrong, by the way) it is still internally inconsistent.
For example, if workers are a dime a dozen, then why the capitalist doesn't hire more of them to make more product and sell more and be richer? You should have very low unemployment if the labor is nearly free. That's what was in USSR, for example.
In reality the USA has issues, but few of them are straight out of Der Kapital as you so graciously quoted.
The largest problem that the USA faces is its own riches. The country is so rich that it can't compete on the world market. A bag of bread will cost you $4; that price would buy you far more in 3rd world. But you, as a worker, are just as efficient as that African or Chinese worker. So you, an american worker, are too expensive, and here is your pink slip, and the door is right there.
Why did it happen this way? To begin with, the USA was industrialized for all the 20th century. It also remained afloat during the World War II. This helped the USA to become rich. Every family had not one car but several; nobody was hungry; the streets were paved with gold; traders made millions in a day; yuppies were making millions in a year. Life was good.
But all good things come to the end. US corporations realized that US workers are an unwelcome expense. They are too expensive because they live in the USA and have to pay US prices for everything. At the same time you could buy a whole factory, with workers, in a faraway land for a handful of glass beads. That's of course what happened.
Now the USA is a shell of a country. Few people that are still employed are doing something unique, something that nobody else can do. That would be Boeing and all the military-industrial sector. The rest has to compete with India and China.
That competition of course killed every industry that could be outsourced. Lots of people are unemployed. But since the US government can't just tell them to curl up and die, the government borrows money from abroad and distributes as welfare among those who are unemployed. Some say that about 50% of US population collects assistance from the government. That's where the debt plugs in. I don't borrow, and my neighbor doesn't borrow - we simply can't. It takes a government to borrow.
So what do you see here? You see very few labor opportunities left in the country, all caused by the competition. And what did you want when you mixed the rich USA and the cheap China? If labor is free to flow from A to B then the low wages should be free to flow from B to A. But that's illegal! Congress mandated that the minimum wage is something like $10/hr, and if your employer can't pay you that much he must fire you.
As you can see, there are many problems in this country, and perhaps Karl Marx could say one witty thing or another about all that. However he died a long time ago; his works may be a good historical reading, but in no way they predict the future. The USA's problems are all self-inflicted, and as things are they will not be resolved peacefully. In general terms, only the influx of Chinese cash prevents the US people from rioting or dying. They depend on that cash because they can't manufacture anything that could be sold on the international or domestic market.
assault rifles with silencers and armor piercing rounds
Those aren't compatible requirements. Silencer requires a heavy, slow (subsonic) bullet. An armor-piercing round requires all the speed you can get (E=mv^2)
regular hunting rifles. Both can be used for criminal purposes, but one is particularly well suited to those purposes
I don't know which one, though. If one gangster wants to kill another gangster, the best he can do it with is a hunting rifle - he can take the target out from half a mile and escape undetected. Taking an AK-47, coming close to the target and shooting a couple of magazines at him is not very wise. However it happens (even today, as I read.)
it is an obstacle that would need to be dealt with if the people behind bitcoin want it to actually gain acceptance.
Bitcoin has already gained acceptance in its unique market of untraceable, barely legal transactions. If Bitcoin starts making waves then this market is disrupted ... and no other market shows up because I have no reason to pay in Bitcoin if I can pay in USD or any other established currency. Bitcoin is already all it can be.
There are still millions of people happily using XP, and with no intention of upgrading. It just isn't important to a lot of people.
Upgrade from XP to Vista or Win7 is often not possible technically or financially. This very laptop which I bought with Vista many years ago can't be trivially upgraded to Win7 - at least the Upgrade Advisor says so. Upgrade of a computer also isn't likely to make it faster or more useful. Features in Windows world are coming at snail's pace, and many of them offer only minor benefits (like Homegroups.) Microsoft wants money for upgrades, so I do nothing and suffer Vista, waiting for the laptop to die and thus make a decision for me.
Upgrade of a cell phone, on the other hand, is expected to come for free and not require any hardware updates (because they aren't possible.) Newer versions of the OS are likely to offer benefits that the user sees as important, since the thing is in heavy development. The need for updates of a cell phone OS is higher.
All my three Android devices never have problems connecting to any wifi, so yes, it seems to be a problem with your network or your individual Android device.
I have a Galaxy Tab, and I had that problem in first weeks after getting it. The WiFi connection went up and then down within 30 seconds. I tried everything and it wasn't working. Now it seems to work. I did try to use static IP addresses, but I don't remember if they had an effect or not. It's DHCP now.
Perhaps I was "holding it wrong?"
The US auto industry is not uncompetitive because of their unions, but because of their lack of engineering quality and desirable designs.
And why is that? Isn't every worker on the conveyor trying to do better than everybody else, so that he rises above the crowd, gets better pay, and so on?
Or perhaps any such worker would quickly be given a hint - verbal, at first - that such behavior is not welcome in this here union shop?