The mundane, 5-point achievements (and most of what you get out of the 360 Arcade), I can agree with you on. But some of them do take a fair bit of work to get to, and in M$' implementation at least, you get to compare the ever-lengthening e-penis with your friends--the 'Hey, I did this/that/other thing, and you haven't yet' factor without having to have them there to prove you did, in fact, do it.
to answer your questions:
-the numbers are on a do not call list, so the companies haven't got the slightest right to call them, it's illegal in fact
In this scenario, yes; to be entirely honest, I'm not entirely sure--haven't looked yet--but I'm willing to place a bet that if an unused number is on the United States' Do Not Call list, it doesn't mean a whole lot because a subscriber did not request it, rendering that fact moot. Might be different in the UK, I don't live there, and in many facets their laws and trends are different from those in the US.
-it would be an opt-in for clients, but currently only active for unused numbers of the company (the ton of numbers they haven't assigned to a customer yet), and for the numbers of their own offices.
Read that part; but, once again, we get into the point of legal climate and interpretation in each country. What the UK might see as fair, the US might well not. Sadly, in the US, being opted-in unless you opt-out (say, sneaking a clause into a Terms of Use) isn't 100% out of line yet. As far as unused numbers go, see above; oh, and numbering resources are very tightly controlled in the US, there are likely few telcos that have that many unassigned numbers to create something anywhere near this scale, and still have numbers available in their NPAs/COCs to give to their subscribers--and if they're left unavailable strictly for this purpose, state regulators and/or NANPA might use that as grounds to refuse new COC allotments.
How well would a system like this go in the states? I'm sure some telemarketing firm here, if they got hit with something like this with any regularity, would get litigious and try to play the 'they're interfering with our ability to do business' card, and frankly, it might have half a prayer--especially if the conflict arose between dueling telcos.
I suppose, if used at the subscriber's election (opt-in strictly) on their live telephone line, it could have limited uses...but setting up 4 million lines strictly as honeypots, aside from the legality question...it would be tough to get a good distribution of numbers (across all area codes/prefixes owned by a given telco) given that a good number of NPAs are already tapped (returns and such allow SOME turnover, but not much).
Not sure how it works in the UK, but in the US...it'd be in court very quickly, and the company/ies would end up with a little slap on the wrist--quite obviously, a recording cannot give that sort of consent, and with half a brain one could make it painfully clear that what was being talked to is a recording--this would be one instance where consumer protections actually do some good, rather than allowing consumers to be as stupid as they (not their recordings) want to be and have the companies end up getting beat up for it.
This is incorrect. As it cost far, far more than $200 to bring the case, a damage award in that range would pretty much guarantee that prosecuting individuals can safely download music, disregarding copyright.
Yes, the court costs and attorney's fees raise the amount to bring a case. However, the available remedies should not inherently consider that as a basis for larger awards; the plaintiff is at liberty to bring suit, or not to; and in making that choice they should consider if the possible award will be sufficient when costs are considered. Sufficiently high damages by default (especially in this type of case where the damages are awarded per item) lead to a situation where the choice is more frequently to head to court--it's too lucrative, and may not reasonably reflect such costs. Overall, it's really not the way it should be, but then again. attorneys probably don't need to charge quite so much...but that's a talk for another day.
It is also important to note that in many civil cases, attorney's fees are not given to the victor either way; I'm not sure this is codified anywhere in law, or whether it's just precedent, but I find it difficult to think that Congress would work around that by inflating statutory damages with a piece of legislation. (Sidenote on this--Wikipedia mentions copyright cases as an exception, but I can't find the source nor reference in Thomas-Rasset or Tenenbaum that they were awarded).
Let's expand the idea...rotation, that would create force based on rotation, and where there's no external influence on me, presumably I would remain attached to the ground. However, when such force is exerted that would exceed the centripetal force of the Earth's rotation, I would fly free in whichever direction...
I think you just might have given an answer to a completely sarcastic question. And maybe made me realize why the law of gravity might exist in the first place...not sure, beer by this point has made my brain a bit fuzzy.
It's sad that I had to think this one through before I got it.
I'm not, by any means, Hawking or Einstein, but I'm not Larry the Cable Guy either (I fall somewhere toward the middle of the bell curve); no wonder it almost got banned.
I see the reason to have this sort of thing...but, I'm curious, why the Lorem ipsum bit so omnipresent in mockups, as opposed to everyone doing their own thing? I'm sure the same purpose could be served by many different pieces of text. Is it just a matter of copy/paste is so much easier? Is there something particular this does better than anything else someone could think up?
You can, in the same way that you've stolen money from the RIAA by downloading something for free, preventing them from making money off it. So it's not really stealing per se, but the RIAA would like to think of this sort of thing as being so.
That's certainly not how I read it. The executive is granted authority to make treaties with advice and consent of the Senate (Art. II, Sec. 2), however, this itself does not elevate it to the same level as the Constitution. The Judicial still has authority to make rulings on Treaties (Art III, Sec 2), which they can not do with an existing part of the Constitution (except to the extent that they are required to determine how another item may conflict with it); for example, the Supreme Court cannot decide that an Amendment duly ratifed is unconstitutional.
United States Constitution, Article III, Section 1:
The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish. The Judges, both of the supreme and inferior Courts, shall hold their Offices during good Behavior, and shall, at stated Times, receive for their Services a Compensation which shall not be diminished during their Continuance in Office.
And, United States Constitution, Article III, Section 2:
The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under their Authority; to all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls; to all Cases of admiralty and maritime Jurisdiction; to Controversies to which the United States shall be a Party; to Controversies between two or more States; between a State and Citizens of another State; between Citizens of different States; between Citizens of the same State claiming Lands under Grants of different States, and between a State, or the Citizens thereof, and foreign States, Citizens or Subjects.
The italicized bits are rather important. Section 1, creates SCOTUS, and gives Congress authority to create the lesser courts; Section 2 spells out what that authority is; the structure of the sentence is a little bit odd, but it is clear that their authority applies to laws enacted by Congress and deciding if they may conflict with the constitution. If they decide there is a conflict, the law cannot stand as written.
Wait...so you mean to tell me, the consumer is absolved of every bit of fault, and it lies with the carrier, by not opting to use (in this case) security options that are available to them? It's not as if they have no idea that the password to their voicemail exists, it's the second thing you have to enter when you first dial your voicemail to set it up. To put it another way, what you're insinuating is that the following is a valid chain of logic:
1: I set a password... 2: I'm never asked for my password... 3: ??? 4: It's their fault my voicemail got jacked!
It's not. Consumers bear as much responsibility for using their heads, thinking a little bit, rather than having legislators and lawyers shift the blame off of them for their ignorance. 'I wasn't told' shouldn't be an excuse for this sort of thing, or any clause you didn't bother to read in a contractual agreement or on the packaging, and so on--and this broadly speaking, not just a thing with phones (of any sort). The consumer bears responsibility for their ignorance, where it is willful.
While they might be more than willing to sell the data, you run into a few problems--objectivity and privacy, being the chief among them.
Simply put, to keep the data completely raw and untouched (which precludes any redaction of the data they collect) is probably going to include some subscriber data, even if only something like the serial number for their box. Depending on their collection routines, there might be more, there might possibly be nothing, it's hard to say. If anything like that exists, the privacymongers are going to cry foul.
If, however, they scrub the data of anything that could possibly identify the subscriber, the data has been modified, and loses objectivity; the data will have been manipulated in some manner, and who is to say that the significant portion of it--the viewership figures, in this case--haven't also been modified or massaged some way. And if the objectivity of the data is questionable, then it's capacity as a reliable figure is negligible, unless it can be independently corroborated.
In the end, even if Verizon shipped off this data, it would either have to bear some similarity to the Nielsens to be of any significance; if it's far off, we would need to see the same variance from everyone else (U-Verse, Dish, DirecTV, anyone who might be able to collect similar data) to legitimize it.
I'd venture to say there's enough left in the courts as far as going by the letter of the law that it will continue for quite some time, through various suits, appeals, and whatnot. The folks on the bench are there, ideally, to uphold the law, and unless the law has an obvious conflict with the Constitution--which, as far as I can recall, mentions naught about IP--it'd take Congressional action or SCOTUS making a decision on it.
Flawed though they may be, IP laws in the US are apparently the controlling factor in how these cases come about. Until these laws are changed or struck down, the enormous lawsuits will continue.
Looks like Cupertino might have giventhem a hand on that...not enough data yet to pull out the failboat, but it doesn't look promising...
As an aside, I will admit that the source above might not be the most objective; but I likely wouldn't link it if it were one person, one device, on each item so far...time will tell if we see other sites getting the same reports and all.
The judge has already ruled that the maximum they can get is $54,000. So the range of possible verdicts at the 3rd trial would be from 0 to $54,000.
But isn't that decision itself one that could be taken up on appeal should a 3rd trial reach verdict, and the judge in that case uses the prior as precedent? Granted, that would lead to quite another debacle altogether, and I shudder at the thought of it.
IANAL, but I wouldn't think so, this appointment would be more for the sake of judicial economy. The matter has been decided by the courts, the damages were reviewed by the courts and lowered, and still the sides (mostly the RIAA) disagree.
The options for the court are this, or another trial (which would bog down the docket for who knows how much longer, then appeal(s)...the cycle would continue). This allows the court's judgment to remain intact, and (ideally) allow the litigants to walk away happy--which will likely not be the case here--and the decision that matters for precedent is the $54,000 reduced award that was entered by the judge.
I'm not much into society working towards a common good,
So, you're stuck in the Cro-Magnon, every-man-for-himself era, and completely believe that everyone who ends up on hard times should just be left to rot? I call that being a selfish bastard myself. It's particularly amazing, given this attitude, that your offspring lived to their teens and twenties; from your statements so far, I'd figure you for the sort to let them figure it out after they left the teat.
especially when 1/2 or more of society are worthless shits anyway.
This, I have a hard time figuring out what kind of statistic makes this anywhere near a half-reasonable argument; I can't recall a time where unemployment got anywhere near 50%, or the homeless rate for that matter; and if you go by wages alone, that's not a matter of choice for most anyone who isn't a professional athlete, who can hold out for an extra few million a year. Minimum wage is minimum wage, and if an employer sticks to that as the entry wage regardless, the people are pretty well stuck. This is why labor unions exist, a group of people in a common trade working for the common good, so that people with their skillset don't become the aforementioned worthless shits. Taking the other extreme, the number of people who make significant advances in anything useful, that's been in the range of 0.001% of people, and certainly nowhere near 50% of all those even living now.
That business of society working towards a common good mostly means that hard working people are supporting lazy asses
You mean the undertaxed executives, directors, and the like, who directed needless layoffs to justify employing people in 3rd world countries (by their arguments, to support the people in those countries and the economies there, which by your arguments, is something that is un-Darwinian), or otherwise unjustifiably firing employees just to save a few bucks? Those are hard-working people? Or do you count corporations who rape their employees as people now, since the Supreme Court gave them pretty much the same leeway as you or I would in campaign contributions? Even so, they would be in the minority, and they significantly take advantage of tax breaks issued by the government; I would posit these as in the same class as single mothers taking advantage of tax breaks, who would probably fit in your class of the aforementioned worthless shits of this country, ultimately rendering that argument invalid.
This isn't to say that there aren't those taking advantage of the system; in fact, those that are make a pretty good argument for their inclusion in the species ongoing; they've adapted and survived. But the fact that those people exist does not, by any means, indicate that programs in support of (intentionally or otherwise) disenfranchised people is inherently wrong; and the unsupported figures you present in support of that argument are bigoted and wrong.
but Apple's true mastery is that of the user interface. The first big player that steps up with something competitive to Apple in that regard will have...
...an enormous lawsuit on their hands, because Apple have patented everything except your face. And Jobs is working on that, too.
Slashdot Mirror
The mundane, 5-point achievements (and most of what you get out of the 360 Arcade), I can agree with you on. But some of them do take a fair bit of work to get to, and in M$' implementation at least, you get to compare the ever-lengthening e-penis with your friends--the 'Hey, I did this/that/other thing, and you haven't yet' factor without having to have them there to prove you did, in fact, do it.
Yet.
to answer your questions: -the numbers are on a do not call list, so the companies haven't got the slightest right to call them, it's illegal in fact
In this scenario, yes; to be entirely honest, I'm not entirely sure--haven't looked yet--but I'm willing to place a bet that if an unused number is on the United States' Do Not Call list, it doesn't mean a whole lot because a subscriber did not request it, rendering that fact moot. Might be different in the UK, I don't live there, and in many facets their laws and trends are different from those in the US.
-it would be an opt-in for clients, but currently only active for unused numbers of the company (the ton of numbers they haven't assigned to a customer yet), and for the numbers of their own offices.
Read that part; but, once again, we get into the point of legal climate and interpretation in each country. What the UK might see as fair, the US might well not. Sadly, in the US, being opted-in unless you opt-out (say, sneaking a clause into a Terms of Use) isn't 100% out of line yet. As far as unused numbers go, see above; oh, and numbering resources are very tightly controlled in the US, there are likely few telcos that have that many unassigned numbers to create something anywhere near this scale, and still have numbers available in their NPAs/COCs to give to their subscribers--and if they're left unavailable strictly for this purpose, state regulators and/or NANPA might use that as grounds to refuse new COC allotments.
How well would a system like this go in the states? I'm sure some telemarketing firm here, if they got hit with something like this with any regularity, would get litigious and try to play the 'they're interfering with our ability to do business' card, and frankly, it might have half a prayer--especially if the conflict arose between dueling telcos.
I suppose, if used at the subscriber's election (opt-in strictly) on their live telephone line, it could have limited uses...but setting up 4 million lines strictly as honeypots, aside from the legality question...it would be tough to get a good distribution of numbers (across all area codes/prefixes owned by a given telco) given that a good number of NPAs are already tapped (returns and such allow SOME turnover, but not much).
Not sure how it works in the UK, but in the US...it'd be in court very quickly, and the company/ies would end up with a little slap on the wrist--quite obviously, a recording cannot give that sort of consent, and with half a brain one could make it painfully clear that what was being talked to is a recording--this would be one instance where consumer protections actually do some good, rather than allowing consumers to be as stupid as they (not their recordings) want to be and have the companies end up getting beat up for it.
This is incorrect. As it cost far, far more than $200 to bring the case, a damage award in that range would pretty much guarantee that prosecuting individuals can safely download music, disregarding copyright.
Yes, the court costs and attorney's fees raise the amount to bring a case. However, the available remedies should not inherently consider that as a basis for larger awards; the plaintiff is at liberty to bring suit, or not to; and in making that choice they should consider if the possible award will be sufficient when costs are considered. Sufficiently high damages by default (especially in this type of case where the damages are awarded per item) lead to a situation where the choice is more frequently to head to court--it's too lucrative, and may not reasonably reflect such costs. Overall, it's really not the way it should be, but then again. attorneys probably don't need to charge quite so much...but that's a talk for another day.
It is also important to note that in many civil cases, attorney's fees are not given to the victor either way; I'm not sure this is codified anywhere in law, or whether it's just precedent, but I find it difficult to think that Congress would work around that by inflating statutory damages with a piece of legislation. (Sidenote on this--Wikipedia mentions copyright cases as an exception, but I can't find the source nor reference in Thomas-Rasset or Tenenbaum that they were awarded).
Let's expand the idea...rotation, that would create force based on rotation, and where there's no external influence on me, presumably I would remain attached to the ground. However, when such force is exerted that would exceed the centripetal force of the Earth's rotation, I would fly free in whichever direction...
I think you just might have given an answer to a completely sarcastic question. And maybe made me realize why the law of gravity might exist in the first place...not sure, beer by this point has made my brain a bit fuzzy.
Gravity, that Law that keeps me form drifting out into space and into the sun?
Wait, if Gravity were gone, that wouldn't happen, because the sun couldn't pull me either.
What the hell would happen?
It's sad that I had to think this one through before I got it.
I'm not, by any means, Hawking or Einstein, but I'm not Larry the Cable Guy either (I fall somewhere toward the middle of the bell curve); no wonder it almost got banned.
I see the reason to have this sort of thing...but, I'm curious, why the Lorem ipsum bit so omnipresent in mockups, as opposed to everyone doing their own thing? I'm sure the same purpose could be served by many different pieces of text. Is it just a matter of copy/paste is so much easier? Is there something particular this does better than anything else someone could think up?
...braces for the -1, Offtopic
Well, that certainly illustrates the diversity of the word. -- Connor, 'The Boondock Saints' (1999)
...suing SCOTUS...is that even possible? How the hell would that work on the shitstorm of appeals?
You can, in the same way that you've stolen money from the RIAA by downloading something for free, preventing them from making money off it. So it's not really stealing per se, but the RIAA would like to think of this sort of thing as being so.
That's certainly not how I read it. The executive is granted authority to make treaties with advice and consent of the Senate (Art. II, Sec. 2), however, this itself does not elevate it to the same level as the Constitution. The Judicial still has authority to make rulings on Treaties (Art III, Sec 2), which they can not do with an existing part of the Constitution (except to the extent that they are required to determine how another item may conflict with it); for example, the Supreme Court cannot decide that an Amendment duly ratifed is unconstitutional.
The judicial Power of the United States, shall be vested in one supreme Court, and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish. The Judges, both of the supreme and inferior Courts, shall hold their Offices during good Behavior, and shall, at stated Times, receive for their Services a Compensation which shall not be diminished during their Continuance in Office.
And, United States Constitution, Article III, Section 2:
The judicial Power shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution, the Laws of the United States, and Treaties made, or which shall be made, under their Authority; to all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls; to all Cases of admiralty and maritime Jurisdiction; to Controversies to which the United States shall be a Party; to Controversies between two or more States; between a State and Citizens of another State; between Citizens of different States; between Citizens of the same State claiming Lands under Grants of different States, and between a State, or the Citizens thereof, and foreign States, Citizens or Subjects.
The italicized bits are rather important. Section 1, creates SCOTUS, and gives Congress authority to create the lesser courts; Section 2 spells out what that authority is; the structure of the sentence is a little bit odd, but it is clear that their authority applies to laws enacted by Congress and deciding if they may conflict with the constitution. If they decide there is a conflict, the law cannot stand as written.
Wait...so you mean to tell me, the consumer is absolved of every bit of fault, and it lies with the carrier, by not opting to use (in this case) security options that are available to them? It's not as if they have no idea that the password to their voicemail exists, it's the second thing you have to enter when you first dial your voicemail to set it up. To put it another way, what you're insinuating is that the following is a valid chain of logic:
1: I set a password...
2: I'm never asked for my password...
3: ???
4: It's their fault my voicemail got jacked!
It's not. Consumers bear as much responsibility for using their heads, thinking a little bit, rather than having legislators and lawyers shift the blame off of them for their ignorance. 'I wasn't told' shouldn't be an excuse for this sort of thing, or any clause you didn't bother to read in a contractual agreement or on the packaging, and so on--and this broadly speaking, not just a thing with phones (of any sort). The consumer bears responsibility for their ignorance, where it is willful.
Beat me to it by a good 6 hours. Lucky I ignored my reflexes when I saw the G...P.
While they might be more than willing to sell the data, you run into a few problems--objectivity and privacy, being the chief among them.
Simply put, to keep the data completely raw and untouched (which precludes any redaction of the data they collect) is probably going to include some subscriber data, even if only something like the serial number for their box. Depending on their collection routines, there might be more, there might possibly be nothing, it's hard to say. If anything like that exists, the privacymongers are going to cry foul.
If, however, they scrub the data of anything that could possibly identify the subscriber, the data has been modified, and loses objectivity; the data will have been manipulated in some manner, and who is to say that the significant portion of it--the viewership figures, in this case--haven't also been modified or massaged some way. And if the objectivity of the data is questionable, then it's capacity as a reliable figure is negligible, unless it can be independently corroborated.
In the end, even if Verizon shipped off this data, it would either have to bear some similarity to the Nielsens to be of any significance; if it's far off, we would need to see the same variance from everyone else (U-Verse, Dish, DirecTV, anyone who might be able to collect similar data) to legitimize it.
I'd venture to say there's enough left in the courts as far as going by the letter of the law that it will continue for quite some time, through various suits, appeals, and whatnot. The folks on the bench are there, ideally, to uphold the law, and unless the law has an obvious conflict with the Constitution--which, as far as I can recall, mentions naught about IP--it'd take Congressional action or SCOTUS making a decision on it.
Flawed though they may be, IP laws in the US are apparently the controlling factor in how these cases come about. Until these laws are changed or struck down, the enormous lawsuits will continue.
I sincerely hope android destroys the iphone.
Looks like Cupertino might have given them a hand on that...not enough data yet to pull out the failboat, but it doesn't look promising...
As an aside, I will admit that the source above might not be the most objective; but I likely wouldn't link it if it were one person, one device, on each item so far...time will tell if we see other sites getting the same reports and all.
The judge has already ruled that the maximum they can get is $54,000. So the range of possible verdicts at the 3rd trial would be from 0 to $54,000.
But isn't that decision itself one that could be taken up on appeal should a 3rd trial reach verdict, and the judge in that case uses the prior as precedent? Granted, that would lead to quite another debacle altogether, and I shudder at the thought of it.
IANAL, but I wouldn't think so, this appointment would be more for the sake of judicial economy. The matter has been decided by the courts, the damages were reviewed by the courts and lowered, and still the sides (mostly the RIAA) disagree.
The options for the court are this, or another trial (which would bog down the docket for who knows how much longer, then appeal(s)...the cycle would continue). This allows the court's judgment to remain intact, and (ideally) allow the litigants to walk away happy--which will likely not be the case here--and the decision that matters for precedent is the $54,000 reduced award that was entered by the judge.
I'm not much into society working towards a common good,
So, you're stuck in the Cro-Magnon, every-man-for-himself era, and completely believe that everyone who ends up on hard times should just be left to rot? I call that being a selfish bastard myself. It's particularly amazing, given this attitude, that your offspring lived to their teens and twenties; from your statements so far, I'd figure you for the sort to let them figure it out after they left the teat.
especially when 1/2 or more of society are worthless shits anyway.
This, I have a hard time figuring out what kind of statistic makes this anywhere near a half-reasonable argument; I can't recall a time where unemployment got anywhere near 50%, or the homeless rate for that matter; and if you go by wages alone, that's not a matter of choice for most anyone who isn't a professional athlete, who can hold out for an extra few million a year. Minimum wage is minimum wage, and if an employer sticks to that as the entry wage regardless, the people are pretty well stuck. This is why labor unions exist, a group of people in a common trade working for the common good, so that people with their skillset don't become the aforementioned worthless shits. Taking the other extreme, the number of people who make significant advances in anything useful, that's been in the range of 0.001% of people, and certainly nowhere near 50% of all those even living now.
That business of society working towards a common good mostly means that hard working people are supporting lazy asses
You mean the undertaxed executives, directors, and the like, who directed needless layoffs to justify employing people in 3rd world countries (by their arguments, to support the people in those countries and the economies there, which by your arguments, is something that is un-Darwinian), or otherwise unjustifiably firing employees just to save a few bucks? Those are hard-working people? Or do you count corporations who rape their employees as people now, since the Supreme Court gave them pretty much the same leeway as you or I would in campaign contributions? Even so, they would be in the minority, and they significantly take advantage of tax breaks issued by the government; I would posit these as in the same class as single mothers taking advantage of tax breaks, who would probably fit in your class of the aforementioned worthless shits of this country, ultimately rendering that argument invalid.
This isn't to say that there aren't those taking advantage of the system; in fact, those that are make a pretty good argument for their inclusion in the species ongoing; they've adapted and survived. But the fact that those people exist does not, by any means, indicate that programs in support of (intentionally or otherwise) disenfranchised people is inherently wrong; and the unsupported figures you present in support of that argument are bigoted and wrong.
but Apple's true mastery is that of the user interface. The first big player that steps up with something competitive to Apple in that regard will have...
...an enormous lawsuit on their hands, because Apple have patented everything except your face. And Jobs is working on that, too.