Re:I am not handsome enough to be a lawyer
on
UK Report Slams EULAs
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· Score: 5, Insightful
And one more that you neglected:
The option to back out. By the time you have the EULA on your screen, you've already paid for the software. "Hell no" isn't a viable option; have you ever tried to return open software to a retail store?
It'd be kind of nice if instead of the usual "Republicans are evil" flamefest, we could treat this as what it is-- a guy who's genuinely annoyed with a bug he can't get resolution for from Apple.
Be interesting to see how quickly Apple coughs up a fix...
This isn't signficant from a technical perspective-- one off problems occur quite frequently.
What it is is a high visibility problem by someone with a huge soapbox to talk about them from. I'd be shocked if Apple's PR types didn't treat this one with kid gloves, and use it for the marketing opportunity that it has the potential of being...
Precisely. As long as their computer still does what THEY want when they want to do it, it couldn't POSSIBLY have problems! It's spewing out crap to other users? Not my problem, mate!
Most malware infections are fixed because it slows the box down to a crawl and degrades the user experience; if the malware authors can fix that, people will NEVER get their stuff fixed.
Unfortunately most people consider themselves to be FAR more knowledgeable than they are; aside from that it's a great plan. The problem with idiots is that nobody tends to self-identify as a part of that group...
That's not incompetence, that's by design. The RFC for 587 submission states that it requires the use of SMTP-AUTH, rendering it useless for most forms of spam-spewing malware; an incompetent ISP will filter it, not open it.
It works just fine if you apply some logic to it. If one user account starts spewing 5000 messages an hour, that's an abuse of the email system in one form or another and should probably be investigated or shut down.
This stuff works, but it's not always fire and forget...
It's not you being a grown-up, it's your idiot neighbors who click everything under the sun without regard to security. I think the solution is to block by default, and have a mechanism to open it up, as other posters have stated.
The problem with the BSA audit process is that it's not just the guilty that have to pay up; quite often you wind up with people who paid but can't provide the tremendous amount of documentation the BSA demands (invoices, COAs, purchase orders, etc).
So yes, it's entirely possible for a company to be totally legit and still fined.
What people are missing is that this guy was the systems administrator-- he was the gatekeeper, in a position of trust.
It's one thing to walk in off the street and steal a candy-bar, it's quite another for the guy behind the counter to take money out of the till. I think the sentence is appropriate for the breach of trust that the asshat committed...
I was just thinking about this today. I'd expect that this would be the case for a warranty drive repair, but when the customer bought a new drive? The old part should definitely remain the property of the customer...
The last time I checked he ESRB ratings aren't legally binding; hence a retailer can sell an M rated game to a four year old if they really wanted to... I realize people can be sued for almost anything, but still...
Plus I haven't yet heard of a good way to identify which country an email address terminates in. Spamming someone in Wisconsin with free proxy addresses is unwanted.
Our desktop folks (used interchangeably here with "idiots") recently purchased LANdesk, and they're quite pleased that it can reportedly manage linux/unix, and immediately asked to test it on my (BSD) desktop.
So supposedly it can, but damned if I'm going to let the monkeys screw with my BSD desktop...
I also work for a college, albeit on the Unix side.
Last I recall, we had Software Assurance or whatever they're calling their upgrade program. Long story short, we can install Vista on all 6000 of our machines. We don't actually run it on more than 100 right now, but we technically are licensed to do it, by virtue of our site license that we pay MS for every year.
I'm quite sure that they look at our licensing tier, say "They can go up to 10K machines on this license, so we'll mark them down as 10K Vista licenses sold."
It's easy as anything to play the numbers game, depending on what premises you accept.
Am I completely misinformed about this? I could have sworn that in order to have a patent suit succeed, you have to actively defend it as soon as you become aware of infringement-- in other words, you can't sit back, let a company build an empire on top of it, THEN sue for damages...
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And one more that you neglected:
The option to back out. By the time you have the EULA on your screen, you've already paid for the software. "Hell no" isn't a viable option; have you ever tried to return open software to a retail store?
Maybe "whether this has ever been discussed before on Slashdot" isn't what most of us want to see the conversation devolve into?
It'd be kind of nice if instead of the usual "Republicans are evil" flamefest, we could treat this as what it is-- a guy who's genuinely annoyed with a bug he can't get resolution for from Apple.
Be interesting to see how quickly Apple coughs up a fix...
This isn't signficant from a technical perspective-- one off problems occur quite frequently.
What it is is a high visibility problem by someone with a huge soapbox to talk about them from. I'd be shocked if Apple's PR types didn't treat this one with kid gloves, and use it for the marketing opportunity that it has the potential of being...
Precisely. As long as their computer still does what THEY want when they want to do it, it couldn't POSSIBLY have problems! It's spewing out crap to other users? Not my problem, mate!
Most malware infections are fixed because it slows the box down to a crawl and degrades the user experience; if the malware authors can fix that, people will NEVER get their stuff fixed.
Unfortunately most people consider themselves to be FAR more knowledgeable than they are; aside from that it's a great plan. The problem with idiots is that nobody tends to self-identify as a part of that group...
That's not incompetence, that's by design. The RFC for 587 submission states that it requires the use of SMTP-AUTH, rendering it useless for most forms of spam-spewing malware; an incompetent ISP will filter it, not open it.
It works just fine if you apply some logic to it. If one user account starts spewing 5000 messages an hour, that's an abuse of the email system in one form or another and should probably be investigated or shut down.
This stuff works, but it's not always fire and forget...
It's not you being a grown-up, it's your idiot neighbors who click everything under the sun without regard to security. I think the solution is to block by default, and have a mechanism to open it up, as other posters have stated.
You're thinking of the vaccine, not the treatment.
The site is down, so forgive me if this is in TFA, but can't we treat anthrax with common anti-bacterials?
In fact, http://www.cdc.gov/ncidod/dbmd/diseaseinfo/anthrax_g.htm#What%20is%20the%20treatment%20for%20anthrax confirms this.
So what's the huge deal about using Anthrax as a biological weapon? You'd be about as successful using the Black Plague...
The problem with the BSA audit process is that it's not just the guilty that have to pay up; quite often you wind up with people who paid but can't provide the tremendous amount of documentation the BSA demands (invoices, COAs, purchase orders, etc).
So yes, it's entirely possible for a company to be totally legit and still fined.
What people are missing is that this guy was the systems administrator-- he was the gatekeeper, in a position of trust.
It's one thing to walk in off the street and steal a candy-bar, it's quite another for the guy behind the counter to take money out of the till. I think the sentence is appropriate for the breach of trust that the asshat committed...
I was just thinking about this today. I'd expect that this would be the case for a warranty drive repair, but when the customer bought a new drive? The old part should definitely remain the property of the customer...
Oh man-- it's not every day I actually chortle at /. Well played, sir. Well played.
Firefox on Leopard didn't let me select the right mod! Commenting to remove.
I think he's largely a media/attention whore whose fifteen minutes are long past.
I strongly suspect we won't be seeing him as an "expert" on the news again...
Did he get disbarred yet?
The last time I checked he ESRB ratings aren't legally binding; hence a retailer can sell an M rated game to a four year old if they really wanted to... I realize people can be sued for almost anything, but still...
5xx rejections are permanent, "Give up now."
4xx rejections are temporary, "try again later."
Say what? There's a National Parks Passport, but that's not what you seem to think it is...
Spam is Unsolicited Bulk Email.
Unsolicited-- you didn't ask for it.
Bulk-- Multiple copies of the same thing.
Email -- Self explanatory.
Plus I haven't yet heard of a good way to identify which country an email address terminates in. Spamming someone in Wisconsin with free proxy addresses is unwanted.
Our desktop folks (used interchangeably here with "idiots") recently purchased LANdesk, and they're quite pleased that it can reportedly manage linux/unix, and immediately asked to test it on my (BSD) desktop.
So supposedly it can, but damned if I'm going to let the monkeys screw with my BSD desktop...
I also work for a college, albeit on the Unix side.
Last I recall, we had Software Assurance or whatever they're calling their upgrade program. Long story short, we can install Vista on all 6000 of our machines. We don't actually run it on more than 100 right now, but we technically are licensed to do it, by virtue of our site license that we pay MS for every year.
I'm quite sure that they look at our licensing tier, say "They can go up to 10K machines on this license, so we'll mark them down as 10K Vista licenses sold."
It's easy as anything to play the numbers game, depending on what premises you accept.
Am I completely misinformed about this? I could have sworn that in order to have a patent suit succeed, you have to actively defend it as soon as you become aware of infringement-- in other words, you can't sit back, let a company build an empire on top of it, THEN sue for damages...
The problem is, analysts don't look at technology so much as they do market-share. The unfortunate battle between techies and beancounters wages on...