Such clauses should be made illegal, or at least made to apply equally to both sides regardless of the wording.
Note I'm not saying that they are illegal, but laws should be changed to make them such. I seem to recall that some (US) courts have indeed thrown out such clauses, but even if true I don't think that there has been a general consensus that they are unenforceable.
I'm not familiar with this particular case, but in the US it is common for such plans to be sold with a contract. This contract typically specifies rates and services which will apply over a two year period. Both of us are expected to adhere to that during the contract period, after which we are both free to continue or to stop as we prefer. But you don't get to just stop following the contract just because you changed your mind and don't like it anymore.
So the answer to your question is, they are obligated to maintain the service for the period that their contracts specify.
The alternative to causation is not only reverse causation. Correlation could be due to causation in either direction, but also due to a shared cause or even total coincidence.
For example, the building I live in is lined up north/south. Is this due to the Earth's magnetic field? No, it's because it's built on a north/south road.
I'm ashamed to say that I only noticed that problem after I posted the comment. But I agree that however accidental it is, it does line up nicely with what's currently happening.
Sorry, you're not allowed to create an unnecessary and disruptive large system and then pull the excuse that "large systems are hard!" when it fails badly.
If DHS created a program with a goal of kicking every single American citizen square in the nuts, and that program ended up being fraught with budget overruns, cases of mistaken identity, citizens getting kicked square in the nuts twice, some citizens not getting kicked square in the nuts at all, and people complained about the system, would you stand up and say "don't criticize them too much, large systems are hard"?
A sane person should say that TSA does a pointless job in a worthless manner, and this, not the fact that it's a "large system", is the root of the problem.
You know what else had never been observed before in the history of the world, or since? Large, fully fueled airliners crashing into skyscrapers. Skyscrapers heavily damaged by falling debris and then left to burn for hours and hours with no firefighting effort.
Big surprise: you try something new, and you get a new result.
Have you considered that maybe something happened to prompt all of these different people to get the story wrong in the same way? Like perhaps somebody in charge of the situation said something that could have been easily misinterpreted, or something happened visually which could have been misunderstood?
I'm not saying these did happen, but when a bunch of reporters all screw up in the same way the right response is to wonder what kind of common fuckup there was, not to suddenly conclude that there was a vast undiscovered conspiracy afoot.
How can you possibly believe that different people's statements about the same burning building are independent variables? The mind boggles, to be sure.
Did you also believe in that recent Bigfoot hoax? After all, it was reported in so many different places. And according to your logic, each report was mathematically independent of all the others. Why, given how many reports I saw, the probability of that Bigfoot being real must have been up near 99.99%!
They accomplish different things. A true cert tells you that when you're talking to xyzcorp.com that you're really talking to XYZ Corp. of Bumfuck, IA and that this information was verified within the last year. This notary system would simply tell you that the xyzcorp.com you're talking to is the "real" xyzcorp.com, and not some spoofed version. For example, this technique would work for an anonymously run site, but a normal SSL cert would not allow that.
Of course the fact that you don't have to cough up money to the signing authorities is nice too.
Yeah, sure. They "accidentally" reported the building's collapse... accidentally getting the building's name right, and accidentally mentioning its number, AND accidentally mentioning its location. Mere minutes before the building accidentally collapsed.
Yeah, a building that was part of the same complex as two that had already collapsed, that had been heavily damaged when those two had collapsed, and was on fire for many hours. I'm sure nobody at the BBC would have received any information on the names of the other WTC buildings, where they were, how heavily damaged they were, or that they were on fire. I'm sure that the only possible reason the BBC would have said that WTC7 collapsed was that some henchman told them to say so, not because it had been burning all day, because it was heavily damaged, or because the firefighters had decided that it was too dangerous to fight the fire and they would have to let it fall down.
... if you had read just about any of the rest of this thread, you would know that I am hardly "relying" on a single misreporting. That is just one thing among a great many.
This one thing makes your whole argument look stupid. It would be like me arguing that the moon landings really did happen the way people think they did, and among all the facts about how NASA employed thousands of people who wouldn't keep their mouths shut and the Russians would have exposed the fraud and so forth, I toss in this little tidbit: "Besides, if the moon landings had been faked, that would have made Richard Nixon a liar."
If you have good arguments, you should stick to those. This business of the BBC reporting the collapse early is at best stupid and at worst willfully deceptive.
Were you alive on 2001-09-11? Were you actually paying attention to the radio and TV that day? I ask because the one thing that stands out in my mind about media reporting on that day, more than anything else, was just how much they got wrong. Nobody knew how many planes had been hijacked. Nobody knew how many people were in the buildings. All sorts of wild stories were being presented on the air as fact. They got more things wrong than they got right on that day.
Jounalists essentially make a living at presenting incorrect facts and misinterpreting the correct ones. If your conspiracy theory hinges on "the BBC misreported something" then you're just an idiot.
That may well be the worst argument I've ever heard, and that's saying a lot.
The strength to weight ratio of Lego or Meccano is orders of magnitude greater than what you find in a skyscraper. You can't just slap together a six-inch model and "prove" anything about how the skyscraper will behave. Human intuition about how such large objects behave is quite simply wrong.
The WTC collapses severely damaged many surrounding buildings and spread debris over a several block radius. If these experts did such a shitty job you can bet they would all be searching for new careers.
Or why the BBC reported its fall 20 minutes before it actually fell.
Is that seriously the best argument you fuckheads can come up with? That a news organization got a fact wrong? Don't you morons remember "Dewey Defeats Truman"?
Can you name a single business function that isn't dependent upon Information Technology? We are the common thread that ties all business functions together.
You could say the same thing about marketing, legal, finance, and management. And unlike IT, those can't say that businesses got along just fine without them for thousands of years before they were invented.
Worse doesn't matter. Fact is that the "freedom" competition with the USSR did not spur the US Government to greater and greater heights of liberty as was claimed. Quite the opposite, in their zeal to defeat the Commie at all costs, they cracked down on freedom a lot.
I don't think that actually works. The worst abuses of freedom in US history happened during the Cold War, after all. Remember J. Edgar Hoover? COINTELPRO? McCarthy? Spying on civil rights activists?
The whole problem is that nobody is willing to take the long view. People in government are willing to do anything to defeat the enemy of the day, and damn what consequences it has afterwards.
Once again, what happened to the fiscal conservative arm of the republican party. Have they been totally consumed by the socially conservatives types who want the government to pay for all their pet faith based projects, like eliminating muslims, no matter what the cost.
Nah, they've all just converted! Turns out that small government, fiscal conservatism, and individual liberties are only good things when the other party is in power. When your own party is in power, you want expanded government, unlimited spending, and lots of laws.
I watched my father do this. During the Clinton years he was all about smaller government and spending less. Once Bush hit the White House, bang! Bush is great, and anything he does is also great.
Most followers of political parties don't think, they rationalize. They will find any reasons they need to support what their party does. If the situation changes, the reasons will change too.
The fact that nearly everything gets approved does not mean that the approval step does nothing. It could simply be that the FBI knows their judges so well that they know what the judges won't approve and don't even bother going to them. By taking this crucial filter out of the way, you open the gates for all sorts of cases which judges never see now because the FBI won't pursue them.
There's a huge difference between suspecting somebody and having enough evidence to justify a warrant. Policemen are notorious for deciding who's guilty first, and finding the evidence later. The FBI is just another group of police, and they are by no means immune to this effect.
The American government is built on checks and balances. Start removing them and you undermine the foundation of our entire system of government.
That whole Baroque Cycle thing is extremely strange. Some people really enjoy it and some people really don't, and I can't figure out what makes the difference.
I'm in the "really don't enjoy it" column. I'm a big Stephenson fan. I loved Snow Crash, The Diamond Age, Cryptonomicon, and even Zodiac. I even found a copy of The Big U, although I realized my mistake relatively quickly.
So of course when Quicksilver came out I got a copy immediately, hardcover, and started reading.
Well, it was a real slog. I finished it, but I wasn't real happy with it. I kind of gave up on the rest of the series.
Of course later on I read about how The Confusion was better, so I picked up a copy. Same story. Now I was really discouraged with the whole thing.
But the story had enough grip on me that I couldn't just let it go. So finally, not too long ago, I got a copy of The System of the World out of the library and set about finishing the series.
I got about halfway through that book before I decided that there was absolutely no way I was going to finish, I couldn't possibly care what happened to any of these people, and I was done.
And here we are today.
So I'm cautious about this whole Anathem thing. I really hope it's a return to form, but if it's anything like the Baroque Cycle then I'm going to let it go.
It would be fairly easy to put a policy in place that says actual human contact with the bank's customer must take place only for the first transfer to Nigeria. This would have minimal disruption while still preventing these scams.
In fact, I think this policy is a good idea for any transaction that falls greatly outside the normal patterns of a bank account. If I suddenly arrange for a large transfer of money from my checking account to some place in Uzbekistan, just for example, then I really think I should be getting a phone call from my bank asking if I really meant to do that before it goes through.
Slashdot Mirror
Such clauses should be made illegal, or at least made to apply equally to both sides regardless of the wording.
Note I'm not saying that they are illegal, but laws should be changed to make them such. I seem to recall that some (US) courts have indeed thrown out such clauses, but even if true I don't think that there has been a general consensus that they are unenforceable.
I'm not familiar with this particular case, but in the US it is common for such plans to be sold with a contract. This contract typically specifies rates and services which will apply over a two year period. Both of us are expected to adhere to that during the contract period, after which we are both free to continue or to stop as we prefer. But you don't get to just stop following the contract just because you changed your mind and don't like it anymore.
So the answer to your question is, they are obligated to maintain the service for the period that their contracts specify.
The alternative to causation is not only reverse causation. Correlation could be due to causation in either direction, but also due to a shared cause or even total coincidence.
For example, the building I live in is lined up north/south. Is this due to the Earth's magnetic field? No, it's because it's built on a north/south road.
I'm ashamed to say that I only noticed that problem after I posted the comment. But I agree that however accidental it is, it does line up nicely with what's currently happening.
Sorry, you're not allowed to create an unnecessary and disruptive large system and then pull the excuse that "large systems are hard!" when it fails badly.
If DHS created a program with a goal of kicking every single American citizen square in the nuts, and that program ended up being fraught with budget overruns, cases of mistaken identity, citizens getting kicked square in the nuts twice, some citizens not getting kicked square in the nuts at all, and people complained about the system, would you stand up and say "don't criticize them too much, large systems are hard"?
A sane person should say that TSA does a pointless job in a worthless manner, and this, not the fact that it's a "large system", is the root of the problem.
You know what else had never been observed before in the history of the world, or since? Large, fully fueled airliners crashing into skyscrapers. Skyscrapers heavily damaged by falling debris and then left to burn for hours and hours with no firefighting effort.
Big surprise: you try something new, and you get a new result.
Have you considered that maybe something happened to prompt all of these different people to get the story wrong in the same way? Like perhaps somebody in charge of the situation said something that could have been easily misinterpreted, or something happened visually which could have been misunderstood?
I'm not saying these did happen, but when a bunch of reporters all screw up in the same way the right response is to wonder what kind of common fuckup there was, not to suddenly conclude that there was a vast undiscovered conspiracy afoot.
How can you possibly believe that different people's statements about the same burning building are independent variables? The mind boggles, to be sure.
Did you also believe in that recent Bigfoot hoax? After all, it was reported in so many different places. And according to your logic, each report was mathematically independent of all the others. Why, given how many reports I saw, the probability of that Bigfoot being real must have been up near 99.99%!
They accomplish different things. A true cert tells you that when you're talking to xyzcorp.com that you're really talking to XYZ Corp. of Bumfuck, IA and that this information was verified within the last year. This notary system would simply tell you that the xyzcorp.com you're talking to is the "real" xyzcorp.com, and not some spoofed version. For example, this technique would work for an anonymously run site, but a normal SSL cert would not allow that.
Of course the fact that you don't have to cough up money to the signing authorities is nice too.
Oh my god, an English word has multiple meanings? Say it ain't so!
Yeah, sure. They "accidentally" reported the building's collapse... accidentally getting the building's name right, and accidentally mentioning its number, AND accidentally mentioning its location. Mere minutes before the building accidentally collapsed.
Yeah, a building that was part of the same complex as two that had already collapsed, that had been heavily damaged when those two had collapsed, and was on fire for many hours. I'm sure nobody at the BBC would have received any information on the names of the other WTC buildings, where they were, how heavily damaged they were, or that they were on fire. I'm sure that the only possible reason the BBC would have said that WTC7 collapsed was that some henchman told them to say so, not because it had been burning all day, because it was heavily damaged, or because the firefighters had decided that it was too dangerous to fight the fire and they would have to let it fall down.
... if you had read just about any of the rest of this thread, you would know that I am hardly "relying" on a single misreporting. That is just one thing among a great many.
This one thing makes your whole argument look stupid. It would be like me arguing that the moon landings really did happen the way people think they did, and among all the facts about how NASA employed thousands of people who wouldn't keep their mouths shut and the Russians would have exposed the fraud and so forth, I toss in this little tidbit: "Besides, if the moon landings had been faked, that would have made Richard Nixon a liar."
If you have good arguments, you should stick to those. This business of the BBC reporting the collapse early is at best stupid and at worst willfully deceptive.
Were you alive on 2001-09-11? Were you actually paying attention to the radio and TV that day? I ask because the one thing that stands out in my mind about media reporting on that day, more than anything else, was just how much they got wrong. Nobody knew how many planes had been hijacked. Nobody knew how many people were in the buildings. All sorts of wild stories were being presented on the air as fact. They got more things wrong than they got right on that day.
Jounalists essentially make a living at presenting incorrect facts and misinterpreting the correct ones. If your conspiracy theory hinges on "the BBC misreported something" then you're just an idiot.
That may well be the worst argument I've ever heard, and that's saying a lot.
The strength to weight ratio of Lego or Meccano is orders of magnitude greater than what you find in a skyscraper. You can't just slap together a six-inch model and "prove" anything about how the skyscraper will behave. Human intuition about how such large objects behave is quite simply wrong.
The WTC collapses severely damaged many surrounding buildings and spread debris over a several block radius. If these experts did such a shitty job you can bet they would all be searching for new careers.
Or why the BBC reported its fall 20 minutes before it actually fell.
Is that seriously the best argument you fuckheads can come up with? That a news organization got a fact wrong? Don't you morons remember "Dewey Defeats Truman"?
Can you name a single business function that isn't dependent upon Information Technology? We are the common thread that ties all business functions together.
You could say the same thing about marketing, legal, finance, and management. And unlike IT, those can't say that businesses got along just fine without them for thousands of years before they were invented.
Worse doesn't matter. Fact is that the "freedom" competition with the USSR did not spur the US Government to greater and greater heights of liberty as was claimed. Quite the opposite, in their zeal to defeat the Commie at all costs, they cracked down on freedom a lot.
We had that chance with the recent FISA vote. And the response from both of them was a big resounding "nothing whatsoever".
I don't think that actually works. The worst abuses of freedom in US history happened during the Cold War, after all. Remember J. Edgar Hoover? COINTELPRO? McCarthy? Spying on civil rights activists?
The whole problem is that nobody is willing to take the long view. People in government are willing to do anything to defeat the enemy of the day, and damn what consequences it has afterwards.
Once again, what happened to the fiscal conservative arm of the republican party. Have they been totally consumed by the socially conservatives types who want the government to pay for all their pet faith based projects, like eliminating muslims, no matter what the cost.
Nah, they've all just converted! Turns out that small government, fiscal conservatism, and individual liberties are only good things when the other party is in power. When your own party is in power, you want expanded government, unlimited spending, and lots of laws.
I watched my father do this. During the Clinton years he was all about smaller government and spending less. Once Bush hit the White House, bang! Bush is great, and anything he does is also great.
Most followers of political parties don't think, they rationalize. They will find any reasons they need to support what their party does. If the situation changes, the reasons will change too.
The fact that nearly everything gets approved does not mean that the approval step does nothing. It could simply be that the FBI knows their judges so well that they know what the judges won't approve and don't even bother going to them. By taking this crucial filter out of the way, you open the gates for all sorts of cases which judges never see now because the FBI won't pursue them.
There's a huge difference between suspecting somebody and having enough evidence to justify a warrant. Policemen are notorious for deciding who's guilty first, and finding the evidence later. The FBI is just another group of police, and they are by no means immune to this effect.
The American government is built on checks and balances. Start removing them and you undermine the foundation of our entire system of government.
That whole Baroque Cycle thing is extremely strange. Some people really enjoy it and some people really don't, and I can't figure out what makes the difference.
I'm in the "really don't enjoy it" column. I'm a big Stephenson fan. I loved Snow Crash, The Diamond Age, Cryptonomicon, and even Zodiac. I even found a copy of The Big U, although I realized my mistake relatively quickly.
So of course when Quicksilver came out I got a copy immediately, hardcover, and started reading.
Well, it was a real slog. I finished it, but I wasn't real happy with it. I kind of gave up on the rest of the series.
Of course later on I read about how The Confusion was better, so I picked up a copy. Same story. Now I was really discouraged with the whole thing.
But the story had enough grip on me that I couldn't just let it go. So finally, not too long ago, I got a copy of The System of the World out of the library and set about finishing the series.
I got about halfway through that book before I decided that there was absolutely no way I was going to finish, I couldn't possibly care what happened to any of these people, and I was done.
And here we are today.
So I'm cautious about this whole Anathem thing. I really hope it's a return to form, but if it's anything like the Baroque Cycle then I'm going to let it go.
Oh look, it's hay cutting season. You can get some more straw for those straw men!
No, I didn't forget anything. They don't bother me. Please don't try to put your words into my mouth.
It would be fairly easy to put a policy in place that says actual human contact with the bank's customer must take place only for the first transfer to Nigeria. This would have minimal disruption while still preventing these scams.
In fact, I think this policy is a good idea for any transaction that falls greatly outside the normal patterns of a bank account. If I suddenly arrange for a large transfer of money from my checking account to some place in Uzbekistan, just for example, then I really think I should be getting a phone call from my bank asking if I really meant to do that before it goes through.