Heh. Yeah I'm aware of the semantic differences *but* that doesn't affect ownership of the IP...
WOTC bought TSR. TSR held pretty much all the IP for the D&D universe, including the DragonLance stuff.
Hasbro bought WOTC, then licensed back bits of the IP to BioWare to make NWN. Check out this bit from BioWare's Legal page:
http://www.bioware.com/legal/copyright.html
"[...]Neverwinter Nights, Forgotten Realms, the Forgotten Realms logo, Dungeons & Dragons logo, Dungeon Master, D&D, and the Wizards of the Coast logo are trademarks owned by Wizards of the Coast, Inc., a subsidiary of Hasbro, Inc. and are used by Infogrames Entertainment, S.A. under license. [...] All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners."
I quick check with WOTC reveals similar language that specifically mentions DragonLance as TradeMarked and copyrighted:
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=company/web si telegalnotice
So I stand by my initial statement. Hasbro owns the DragonLance IP. They did not license these modders to make this mod using the DragonLance names, locations, characters, etc, and so would be well within their rights to issue a C&D if they wanted to. Which is a shame, because the mod looks very cool.
This looks cool and all, but as I recall doesn't Hasbro own the D&D copyrights now? How long until their clueless-but-brutal legal department sends the Cease & Desist order?
You're right, of course. I forgot to put some smilies in my post.:)
Fencing, SCA, historical martial arts... they all have different takes on the same basic idea. Fencing is a very stylised, more competitive form of swordplay. SCA focuses more on just having fun and the social aspects. Medieval martial arts are more into the research and history. More like different varieties of apples, than apples and oranges.:)
I'm NAUI certified, myself. Learned Open Water off the coast of Rhode Island. Let me tell you, if you learn to dive in cold (45 - 55F) water with less than six foot of visibility, and enjoy it, then you'll have an absolute *blast* diving in the Keys, caribbean, or anywhere else with 65F+ water.
I got to watch PADI open water training dives in tropical waters, and I'm glad I was certified in New England. The level of training was much better, more thorough, than that particular PADI crew. I put a lot of it down to the extra margins of error 80F water and 100ft visibility affords.
Not quite - 'Commercial Advance' is being considered for exclusion, *not* 30 second skip. They're two different features.
I have ReplayTV 5000, and I don't use CA - it just doesn't work good enough to be useful. However, I use 30 sec skip all the time. Dropping 30 sec skip would be akin to removing the FF button.
Some crashes aren't the fault of the OS. Bad RAM, flaky disk controllers, CPU with floating-point errors (Intel, I'm looking at *you*. Again. *cough* Itanium *cough*)... all can take down an OS desite flawless code.
That said, some Enterprise-class *NIX (I'm specifically thinking of Solaris, but maybe AIX does this, too) can work around pretty much any hardware failure, given enough hardware to work with and attentive maintainence.
Obviously you need a slick PowerPoint presentation.:)
Seriously, though - I'd suggest he first determine demand. Distribute a questionaire to all the condos asking them if a) they currently have high-speed service b) if yes, how much do they pay, c) if no, would they be interested in it if the price is right? d) how much would they be willing to pay for an Association-run broadband service.
Gauge the market first. If the demand's there, you can use it as evidence to the Condo Board to support the plan. I think most folks would like to drop $10/mo or so off the cost of Cable/DSL for equivilent or better service, as well as adding value to their condos.
You could run the entire block off a low-end Cisco router, but are you budgeting for a Cisco service contract and / or a 'hot spare' router?
How about line monitoring and alerts? Backups / service contracts for your switches? Environmental systems to keep your equipment closet nice and frosty? Factored in the electrical costs of that to your business plan?
Who's going to support the system? What do you do if a switch craps out at 3am? Running a community ISP can be fun, but it's *less* fun if you've not thought of these things before you start.:)
We're moving offices this month, and are having to change our DS1/T1 provider (Boston metro area). None of our quotes for a dedicated T1 (local loop + ISP charge) is higher than $960. Verizon is offering us $765/mo on a 3 year commitment. Our previous carrier offered us service for local loop charge + $150/mo. Our DS1 costs have halved in the last three years.
Get a T1/DS1 service over DSL. Better QoS, better care from the Telco if something breaks. If you need more bandwidth, bond a pair of DS1 or get a fractional DS3.
As far as the law is concerned, your arguments are moot. The judge clearly thinks the VCR analogy is appropriate, and I agree with him.:)
The VCR analogy refers to the ability of an organisation to control the use of the device *after* it has been distributed to a customer, not what the VCR does, or how one can distribute infringing works more easily via a p2p network than with a physical tape.
If Sony went out of business today, all Sony VCRs would continue to work. Whereas in Napster's case, the shutting down of Napster's servers effectively killed the Napster network. Napster had control of their network, and so satisfied the legal requirements for contributory infringement.
However, as Grokster et al have no control over how their product is used after distribution, or the networks to which their product connects, they are not liable for contributory or vicarious infringement.
Dude, cut back on the ciggies and get a handle on those Credit cards. A good not-for-profit debt councillor should be able to take that $200/mo and make *real* inroads into your balances, not just paying the minimums.
Both of which make extensive use of OSS, and both of which make money.
I believe Yahoo finance uses MySQL as their DBMS, and of course both sites run on Apache on either BSD or GNU/Linux. I read a case study from Yahoo once that estimated they saved millions (like, $20M plus) through the use of OSS for their OS and web server choices.
Then, of course, there's Google... Either way, the trick is to point out that big, successful companies use OSS where appropriate to improve their bottom line.
Used to be they were a great place to shop for all your gaming needs, back in the late '80s. Now they're like the MS of games stores. This seems to be another attempt to control their product on the market.
They pretty much destroyed the excellent gaming mag "White Dwarf" by turning it into one big GW advert. They lost my business because of that, and now I don't buy their stuff and shop at indie games stores.
No offense, but your layman's estimate is just that: a layman's estimate.
My wife's a doctor with a strong background in immunology. She's worried about SARS, based on two suppositions:
1. It's about as transmissible as influenza. 2. It's about twice as fatal as influenza (3+% vs. 1.5%)
So far, the limited evidence suggests that both are true. The one ray of hope is that the disease appears to weaken as it moves away from patient zero (flu doesn't - it just mutates). Again, not quite enough evidence to go on, but if both these suppositions bear out, then you can expect SARS to easily kill more than three times the number of influenza cases, should it become endemic in the population like the rhinoviruses are.
That's 180,000 annual fatalities. Worried yet?
We're all hoping that SARS weakens as it moves from host to host. Otherwise we're *screwed*.
>> Bear in mind that the widespread use of an influenza vaccine reduces 'flu deaths considerably... > Where did you get THAT idea?
From my wife, who happens to be a doctor with a strong research background in immunology, and also from my own readings of the sixty gazillion issues of JAMA and NEJM lying around the house.
That's right - Influenza killed 63,730 people in the US in 1999, according to the CDC. Flu has a mortality rate of around 1.5%.
If you want to make a *very* rough extrapolation of the data, assuming that SARS is about as virulent and becomes as prevelent as influenza, you might expect it to kill *at least* 130,000 people in the US per year. Bear in mind that the widespread use of an influenza vaccine reduces 'flu deaths considerably... we don't yet have a vaccine for SARS.
That would conservatively put SARS as the third or fourth leading cause of death in the country (yes, above accidents and car crashes, too).
So yes, SARS is a point of concern, should it become endemic in the population.
The government should *require* more proof of unsuccessful local recruiting. At the moment, they just require a copy of the advert, and proof that it ran for five days or so in a local paper, and a note saying "...and no-one suitable applied".
While it would be wrong to have a government employee second-guessing an HR department, they could at least require that the jobs adverts be written and listed the same way as other, similar job adverts. Also require maybe the resumes of everyone who applied for the job, but didn't get it, along with a note from HR about why they were unsuitable. It's pretty obvious, looking through the wanted ads, to spot those written for a specific visa application.
It may not stop small-company abuse, but it would certainly but a damper on large companies abusing the system, as the local INS office would be wading through *thousands* of US citizen resumes, all for jobs with the same company, that apparently don't match a particular job position. Makes it a bit harder to claim that there's no-one out there for it.
But anyway, my point stands. If they just enforced the laws, it wouldn't be so bad.:)
Huh. That's weird. 'Cuz we had to file with the DoL for my H1B. Also for my green card, but we had to classify my H1 job according to DoL labor cert guidelines, too.
I'd argue that the H1 program should just be *enforced*. H1Bs, as written in law, *require* the visa holder to be paid prevailing wages, and *require* something called 'Labor Certification', which supposedly proves that there are no available native workers in the local market who can perform those functions.
Fees are paid by the hiring company that supposedly pay for enforcement. However, it's clear that the Dept of Labor (that handles the labor certification process) is woefully underfunded and unskilled, and that imigration lawyers can (legally!) game the system just by writing the applications in a certain way. DoL sees language they recognise, and rubber-stamps the application because they don't have the resources to check it out.
If the legislation was properly enforced, this would be a non-issue. The H1-B laws are actually pretty good.
Hate to burst your bubble, but it was probably just a dictionary attack done by spammers on MSN's email servers. The same thing happens on Hotmail.com, Yahoo etc. Your address was only 8 characters long, so it would be inside the range of characters spammers try : the send spam to *every* combination of letters and numbers up to a certain length.
In future, if you wish to avoid things like this, use a longer username. Or don't use a free email service.:)
Slashdot Mirror
Heh. Yeah I'm aware of the semantic differences *but* that doesn't affect ownership of the IP...
b si telegalnotice
WOTC bought TSR. TSR held pretty much all the IP for the D&D universe, including the DragonLance stuff.
Hasbro bought WOTC, then licensed back bits of the IP to BioWare to make NWN. Check out this bit from BioWare's Legal page:
http://www.bioware.com/legal/copyright.html
"[...]Neverwinter Nights, Forgotten Realms, the Forgotten Realms logo, Dungeons & Dragons logo, Dungeon Master, D&D, and the Wizards of the Coast logo are trademarks owned by Wizards of the Coast, Inc., a subsidiary of Hasbro, Inc. and are used by Infogrames Entertainment, S.A. under license. [...] All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners."
I quick check with WOTC reveals similar language that specifically mentions DragonLance as TradeMarked and copyrighted:
http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=company/we
So I stand by my initial statement. Hasbro owns the DragonLance IP. They did not license these modders to make this mod using the DragonLance names, locations, characters, etc, and so would be well within their rights to issue a C&D if they wanted to. Which is a shame, because the mod looks very cool.
This looks cool and all, but as I recall doesn't Hasbro own the D&D copyrights now? How long until their clueless-but-brutal legal department sends the Cease & Desist order?
You're right, of course. I forgot to put some smilies in my post. :)
:)
Fencing, SCA, historical martial arts... they all have different takes on the same basic idea. Fencing is a very stylised, more competitive form of swordplay. SCA focuses more on just having fun and the social aspects. Medieval martial arts are more into the research and history. More like different varieties of apples, than apples and oranges.
I'm NAUI certified, myself. Learned Open Water off the coast of Rhode Island. Let me tell you, if you learn to dive in cold (45 - 55F) water with less than six foot of visibility, and enjoy it, then you'll have an absolute *blast* diving in the Keys, caribbean, or anywhere else with 65F+ water.
I got to watch PADI open water training dives in tropical waters, and I'm glad I was certified in New England. The level of training was much better, more thorough, than that particular PADI crew. I put a lot of it down to the extra margins of error 80F water and 100ft visibility affords.
No offense to the fencers, but studying medieval or Elizabethean fighting is much more fun. And no, I'm not talking SCA here.
http://www.thehaca.com/
Learn how to swash and buckle! It's fun!
More specifically, with sources:
0 0. html
http://www.observer.co.uk/Print/0,3858,4691603,
The 'mobile germ warfare labs' were, in fact, hydrogen producers for artillery balloons. Sold to Iraq by the UK. Oops.
What's the betting this gets zero play time in the US media?
Not quite - 'Commercial Advance' is being considered for exclusion, *not* 30 second skip. They're two different features.
I have ReplayTV 5000, and I don't use CA - it just doesn't work good enough to be useful. However, I use 30 sec skip all the time. Dropping 30 sec skip would be akin to removing the FF button.
Some crashes aren't the fault of the OS. Bad RAM, flaky disk controllers, CPU with floating-point errors (Intel, I'm looking at *you*. Again. *cough* Itanium *cough*)... all can take down an OS desite flawless code.
That said, some Enterprise-class *NIX (I'm specifically thinking of Solaris, but maybe AIX does this, too) can work around pretty much any hardware failure, given enough hardware to work with and attentive maintainence.
Obviously you need a slick PowerPoint presentation. :)
Seriously, though - I'd suggest he first determine demand. Distribute a questionaire to all the condos asking them if
a) they currently have high-speed service
b) if yes, how much do they pay,
c) if no, would they be interested in it if the price is right?
d) how much would they be willing to pay for an Association-run broadband service.
Gauge the market first. If the demand's there, you can use it as evidence to the Condo Board to support the plan. I think most folks would like to drop $10/mo or so off the cost of Cable/DSL for equivilent or better service, as well as adding value to their condos.
What's your Outage / backup strategy?
:)
You could run the entire block off a low-end Cisco router, but are you budgeting for a Cisco service contract and / or a 'hot spare' router?
How about line monitoring and alerts? Backups / service contracts for your switches? Environmental systems to keep your equipment closet nice and frosty? Factored in the electrical costs of that to your business plan?
Who's going to support the system? What do you do if a switch craps out at 3am? Running a community ISP can be fun, but it's *less* fun if you've not thought of these things before you start.
We're moving offices this month, and are having to change our DS1/T1 provider (Boston metro area). None of our quotes for a dedicated T1 (local loop + ISP charge) is higher than $960. Verizon is offering us $765/mo on a 3 year commitment. Our previous carrier offered us service for local loop charge + $150/mo. Our DS1 costs have halved in the last three years.
Get a T1/DS1 service over DSL. Better QoS, better care from the Telco if something breaks. If you need more bandwidth, bond a pair of DS1 or get a fractional DS3.
As far as the law is concerned, your arguments are moot. The judge clearly thinks the VCR analogy is appropriate, and I agree with him. :)
The VCR analogy refers to the ability of an organisation to control the use of the device *after* it has been distributed to a customer, not what the VCR does, or how one can distribute infringing works more easily via a p2p network than with a physical tape.
If Sony went out of business today, all Sony VCRs would continue to work. Whereas in Napster's case, the shutting down of Napster's servers effectively killed the Napster network. Napster had control of their network, and so satisfied the legal requirements for contributory infringement.
However, as Grokster et al have no control over how their product is used after distribution, or the networks to which their product connects, they are not liable for contributory or vicarious infringement.
Dude, cut back on the ciggies and get a handle on those Credit cards. A good not-for-profit debt councillor should be able to take that $200/mo and make *real* inroads into your balances, not just paying the minimums.
Both of which make extensive use of OSS, and both of which make money.
I believe Yahoo finance uses MySQL as their DBMS, and of course both sites run on Apache on either BSD or GNU/Linux. I read a case study from Yahoo once that estimated they saved millions (like, $20M plus) through the use of OSS for their OS and web server choices.
Then, of course, there's Google... Either way, the trick is to point out that big, successful companies use OSS where appropriate to improve their bottom line.
Used to be they were a great place to shop for all your gaming needs, back in the late '80s. Now they're like the MS of games stores. This seems to be another attempt to control their product on the market.
They pretty much destroyed the excellent gaming mag "White Dwarf" by turning it into one big GW advert. They lost my business because of that, and now I don't buy their stuff and shop at indie games stores.
No offense, but your layman's estimate is just that: a layman's estimate.
My wife's a doctor with a strong background in immunology. She's worried about SARS, based on two suppositions:
1. It's about as transmissible as influenza.
2. It's about twice as fatal as influenza (3+% vs. 1.5%)
So far, the limited evidence suggests that both are true. The one ray of hope is that the disease appears to weaken as it moves away from patient zero (flu doesn't - it just mutates). Again, not quite enough evidence to go on, but if both these suppositions bear out, then you can expect SARS to easily kill more than three times the number of influenza cases, should it become endemic in the population like the rhinoviruses are.
That's 180,000 annual fatalities. Worried yet?
We're all hoping that SARS weakens as it moves from host to host. Otherwise we're *screwed*.
>> Bear in mind that the widespread use of an influenza vaccine reduces 'flu deaths considerably...
> Where did you get THAT idea?
From my wife, who happens to be a doctor with a strong research background in immunology, and also from my own readings of the sixty gazillion issues of JAMA and NEJM lying around the house.
Thanks for playing!
That's right - Influenza killed 63,730 people in the US in 1999, according to the CDC. Flu has a mortality rate of around 1.5%.
If you want to make a *very* rough extrapolation of the data, assuming that SARS is about as virulent and becomes as prevelent as influenza, you might expect it to kill *at least* 130,000 people in the US per year. Bear in mind that the widespread use of an influenza vaccine reduces 'flu deaths considerably... we don't yet have a vaccine for SARS.
That would conservatively put SARS as the third or fourth leading cause of death in the country (yes, above accidents and car crashes, too).
So yes, SARS is a point of concern, should it become endemic in the population.
...which killed upwards of 20 MILLION people, had a mortality rate of 3%.
SARS seems to be *at least* as transmissible as the 1918 flu was.
That's why.
Again; enforcement.
:)
The government should *require* more proof of unsuccessful local recruiting. At the moment, they just require a copy of the advert, and proof that it ran for five days or so in a local paper, and a note saying "...and no-one suitable applied".
While it would be wrong to have a government employee second-guessing an HR department, they could at least require that the jobs adverts be written and listed the same way as other, similar job adverts. Also require maybe the resumes of everyone who applied for the job, but didn't get it, along with a note from HR about why they were unsuitable. It's pretty obvious, looking through the wanted ads, to spot those written for a specific visa application.
It may not stop small-company abuse, but it would certainly but a damper on large companies abusing the system, as the local INS office would be wading through *thousands* of US citizen resumes, all for jobs with the same company, that apparently don't match a particular job position. Makes it a bit harder to claim that there's no-one out there for it.
But anyway, my point stands. If they just enforced the laws, it wouldn't be so bad.
Huh. That's weird. 'Cuz we had to file with the DoL for my H1B. Also for my green card, but we had to classify my H1 job according to DoL labor cert guidelines, too.
I'd argue that the H1 program should just be *enforced*. H1Bs, as written in law, *require* the visa holder to be paid prevailing wages, and *require* something called 'Labor Certification', which supposedly proves that there are no available native workers in the local market who can perform those functions.
Fees are paid by the hiring company that supposedly pay for enforcement. However, it's clear that the Dept of Labor (that handles the labor certification process) is woefully underfunded and unskilled, and that imigration lawyers can (legally!) game the system just by writing the applications in a certain way. DoL sees language they recognise, and rubber-stamps the application because they don't have the resources to check it out.
If the legislation was properly enforced, this would be a non-issue. The H1-B laws are actually pretty good.
If *all* the major peer-reviewed medical associations call it quackery, then it's Quackery with a capital "Q".
MCS/EI folks need good shrinks, not safe houses.
Exactly. It's quack science.
Anything from a peer-reviewed medical journal? Or is "the Man" keeping them down?
Hate to burst your bubble, but it was probably just a dictionary attack done by spammers on MSN's email servers. The same thing happens on Hotmail.com, Yahoo etc. Your address was only 8 characters long, so it would be inside the range of characters spammers try : the send spam to *every* combination of letters and numbers up to a certain length.
:)
In future, if you wish to avoid things like this, use a longer username. Or don't use a free email service.