This is pretty standard courtroom stuff in the U.S., though - the prosecution can pretty much bring new charges, and ask to dismiss existing ones, any time they can talk a grand jury into making the new indictment. The only difference is that you'd essentially have to start a new trial, but all of the evidence from the old one would still be a matter of record. There is nothing unfair about this.
For those who are saying that they got the testimony, and then changed the charges: it's not like you get immunity for anything you say on the stand, right? If I am on trial for theft, and I happen to own up to a murder, you can bet that I'll be on trial for murder pretty soon too. If you broke the law in more ways than one (not that I can tell whether he did or not), don't admit it in court if you can avoid it. In the U.S., invoke the 5th Amendment.
The only issue would be if the law itself was changed following testimony; there would then be an ex post facto issue (although who knows how that works in Norway) that would seem to make the trial unfair. But just adding new charges because the defendent admitted to supposedly illegal behavior in open court is not unethical; the defendant and his counsel should know what the law is and have some idea of how to steer clear of other potential dangerous admissions during their defense on the first charge.
I wish Jon all the best - I think he should be considered innocent. But it doesn't help to make it seem like there's some vast legal conspiracy against him; the events so far have been accepted elements of justice systems worldwide for centuries.
Maybe morality is the wrong hook to hang this on, but there's definitely a flavor of "to thine own self be true". If you are a technology person, make decisions based on the best technology rather than on office politics. If your employer doesn't like it when you do your best to do your job, you may have to find another employer, but at least you didn't have to change who you were.
The definition of "illegal abortion" must vary, both within the U.S. and also versus the law in Australia. It would be interesting to see how extraditions based on this principle actually work in practice...
I dunno - the court said that of course the defense should only be required to be done once, but I think that's begging the question. If I am defamed in Australia, sue Dow Jones, and lose, what's to stop me (a Chinese dual citizen, for instance) from turning around and suing in China as well? After all, I could have been defamed in China when a Chinese person read the same article and decided that I was a scum-sucking burden on society (for instance). Do the Chinese courts really care that the defense has already been done once in Australia? Not likely. The courts of the world have no collective sense of double jeopardy, much less even for civil cases.
If libel is damage that is done by publishing, then it should be governed by the rules of where the publishing occurred, since that's where the damage was done. The publishing wasn't done on someone's screen in Australia any more than all of those naked women in your other browser window were really doing porn on the screen in Australia. The act itself occurred in the U.S., the damage was done in the U.S. (albeit to foreign persons) and that's where the prosecution should have to occur.
Really, I'd be a lot more worried about U.S. businesses contributing to local politician's campaigns, than I would be about direct U.S. government trade or military action. Buying politicians has always been the cheapest way to go within the USA; why should it be any different worldwide?
As far as businesses, don't they generally have to have some sort of charter to operate in a country? I know U.S.-based corporations have to be chartered to operate in the U.S.; don't foreign businesses as well? If the government in question was sufficiently unhappy, they could yank that businesses' charter to operate in the country in question.
In the state of Illinois, 13 people who didn't murder anybody have been released after having gone to death row. As long as the death penalty exists, not murdering anybody is not necessarily a sufficient defense.
Does it bother you that you can sell you car for scrap? It's essentially the same thing - the board (representing the shareholders) essentially own the company lock, stock, and barrel.
The company exists for the outside investor; that's the whole point. It's not like a bunch of people with money decided to erect management their own private fiefdom within which to while away the days. Liquid Audio existed at the bequest of the shareholders; if those shareholders have something better to do with their money, then it's entirely their right to liquidate the whole thing.
Probably what's killing them is the usual: making something that people don't want to buy. It's impressive that they've hung on this long; it's even more impressive that for once the shareholders aren't going to let a company continue to pine away and die like they usually do.
Now if only there was an easy way to remember "128.174.237.148", and automate doing lookups through it, we'd be all set. First one there gets to be the new root server:)
...or beaming free satellite TV signals to you, and expecting you not to decrypt them? I agree; it's a pretty stupid business model, that can only be salvaged by the application of some really stupid laws. The public has traded essential freedom to reverse engineer for limited gains in terms of more access to TV programming.
You can reverse engineer the access procedure for yourself as long as reverse engineering is legal in your jurisdiction; the DMCA (assuming it applies to you) only prohibits you from distributing the tool that you develop to circumvent the access procedure. So essentially all the data that you bought on the machine you bought is fair game for you to use. You just can't necessarily distribute it, which would normally be the case for the Windows OS that came on the drive anyway, or tell people how you managed to do it.
Assuming you manage to avoid agreeing to any enforceable EULAs, that is.
The study, at least as reported in CRN, appears to resort to some shady tactics in order to make the result appear more credible. For example:
they don't make it clear if it's a study or a survey, or what proportion of those two inputs went into the final numbers. For all we know it's more a popularity contest than anything.
predicting TCO based on only half of the reported sample period is scientifically suspect, to say the least. How many significant theorems from physics or chemistry would be different if we just extrapolated from the first half of our data?
such extrapolation avoids the issue that TCO is constantly changing throughout the period in question. They're assuming that TCO remains constant over time, which is incorrect. To get even close to the right extrapolation you'd have to see how Linux and Windows TCO has changed over the last five years, and then apply half of that correction to get the results from the remaining 2.5 years that aren't extrapolated.
It's fine if they want to have an estimate based on what they think will happen. But it's improper to refer to it as a study, or to use it for any real purpose; this is just a collection of other people's Wild-Ass-Guesses on how things would be in a couple years. Including projections into the future and then presenting the combination of past data plus future projection as current fact is utterly invalid.
The problem with the Lone Gunment was that they focused more on their dorky, fish-out-of-water antics than on their hacking and general cool activities. Sure, it's easy to make fun of super-focused geek-types, but that wasn't what made them popular on the X-Files in the first place.
Didn't the X-Files start on Fridays? I would have guessed it was one of Fox's best launching spots. Or at least it was before they became the NFL's whore...
John Doe has seemed to me to be a pretty clear retread of "Nowhere Man", a two-season Fox conspiracy-driven drama that ran close to when the X-Files first started hitting it big. Except that this nowhere man knows everything and kibitzes solving crimes, kind of like Monk.
I liked Firefly, but a lot of times I had trouble justifying why I liked it. It remains sort of a guilty pleasure to watch; in a sense it combined high and low sci-fi in appropriate quantities. I think the potential of it, moreso than some of the actualities of the show, are what kept me coming back. It really looked like a crew, and a world, where interesting things could happen.
Slashdot Mirror
This is pretty standard courtroom stuff in the U.S., though - the prosecution can pretty much bring new charges, and ask to dismiss existing ones, any time they can talk a grand jury into making the new indictment. The only difference is that you'd essentially have to start a new trial, but all of the evidence from the old one would still be a matter of record. There is nothing unfair about this.
For those who are saying that they got the testimony, and then changed the charges: it's not like you get immunity for anything you say on the stand, right? If I am on trial for theft, and I happen to own up to a murder, you can bet that I'll be on trial for murder pretty soon too. If you broke the law in more ways than one (not that I can tell whether he did or not), don't admit it in court if you can avoid it. In the U.S., invoke the 5th Amendment.
The only issue would be if the law itself was changed following testimony; there would then be an ex post facto issue (although who knows how that works in Norway) that would seem to make the trial unfair. But just adding new charges because the defendent admitted to supposedly illegal behavior in open court is not unethical; the defendant and his counsel should know what the law is and have some idea of how to steer clear of other potential dangerous admissions during their defense on the first charge.
I wish Jon all the best - I think he should be considered innocent. But it doesn't help to make it seem like there's some vast legal conspiracy against him; the events so far have been accepted elements of justice systems worldwide for centuries.
Maybe morality is the wrong hook to hang this on, but there's definitely a flavor of "to thine own self be true". If you are a technology person, make decisions based on the best technology rather than on office politics. If your employer doesn't like it when you do your best to do your job, you may have to find another employer, but at least you didn't have to change who you were.
"close enough" counts in horseshoes, hand grenades, and apparently maces too :)
The definition of "illegal abortion" must vary, both within the U.S. and also versus the law in Australia. It would be interesting to see how extraditions based on this principle actually work in practice...
I dunno - the court said that of course the defense should only be required to be done once, but I think that's begging the question. If I am defamed in Australia, sue Dow Jones, and lose, what's to stop me (a Chinese dual citizen, for instance) from turning around and suing in China as well? After all, I could have been defamed in China when a Chinese person read the same article and decided that I was a scum-sucking burden on society (for instance). Do the Chinese courts really care that the defense has already been done once in Australia? Not likely. The courts of the world have no collective sense of double jeopardy, much less even for civil cases.
If libel is damage that is done by publishing, then it should be governed by the rules of where the publishing occurred, since that's where the damage was done. The publishing wasn't done on someone's screen in Australia any more than all of those naked women in your other browser window were really doing porn on the screen in Australia. The act itself occurred in the U.S., the damage was done in the U.S. (albeit to foreign persons) and that's where the prosecution should have to occur.
Really, I'd be a lot more worried about U.S. businesses contributing to local politician's campaigns, than I would be about direct U.S. government trade or military action. Buying politicians has always been the cheapest way to go within the USA; why should it be any different worldwide?
As far as businesses, don't they generally have to have some sort of charter to operate in a country? I know U.S.-based corporations have to be chartered to operate in the U.S.; don't foreign businesses as well? If the government in question was sufficiently unhappy, they could yank that businesses' charter to operate in the country in question.
In the state of Illinois, 13 people who didn't murder anybody have been released after having gone to death row. As long as the death penalty exists, not murdering anybody is not necessarily a sufficient defense.
I'm surprised too - who would have thought massive entertainment interests would have a problem with TIA?
You sound like one of those damn atheists. Real Americans wouldn't question the War on Liberty^WTerror.
Does it bother you that you can sell you car for scrap? It's essentially the same thing - the board (representing the shareholders) essentially own the company lock, stock, and barrel.
The company exists for the outside investor; that's the whole point. It's not like a bunch of people with money decided to erect management their own private fiefdom within which to while away the days. Liquid Audio existed at the bequest of the shareholders; if those shareholders have something better to do with their money, then it's entirely their right to liquidate the whole thing.
Probably what's killing them is the usual: making something that people don't want to buy. It's impressive that they've hung on this long; it's even more impressive that for once the shareholders aren't going to let a company continue to pine away and die like they usually do.
I can just imagine Milquetoast the cockroach whispering in the ears of content and technology kingpins:
Use an insecure DRM solution. Nobody will know!
Sue everybody in sight. The public will love you!
Push for eternal copyrigh extensions. There won't be any backlash!
And then yodeling in Michael Eisner's nose :)
Now if only there was an easy way to remember "128.174.237.148", and automate doing lookups through it, we'd be all set. First one there gets to be the new root server :)
...or beaming free satellite TV signals to you, and expecting you not to decrypt them? I agree; it's a pretty stupid business model, that can only be salvaged by the application of some really stupid laws. The public has traded essential freedom to reverse engineer for limited gains in terms of more access to TV programming.
You can reverse engineer the access procedure for yourself as long as reverse engineering is legal in your jurisdiction; the DMCA (assuming it applies to you) only prohibits you from distributing the tool that you develop to circumvent the access procedure. So essentially all the data that you bought on the machine you bought is fair game for you to use. You just can't necessarily distribute it, which would normally be the case for the Windows OS that came on the drive anyway, or tell people how you managed to do it.
Assuming you manage to avoid agreeing to any enforceable EULAs, that is.
Lies, damned lies, and statistics...
The study, at least as reported in CRN, appears to resort to some shady tactics in order to make the result appear more credible. For example:
It's fine if they want to have an estimate based on what they think will happen. But it's improper to refer to it as a study, or to use it for any real purpose; this is just a collection of other people's Wild-Ass-Guesses on how things would be in a couple years. Including projections into the future and then presenting the combination of past data plus future projection as current fact is utterly invalid.
Except the moderation points are per post, not per user. You want to mod a troll? Find a post that's actually trolling.
The problem with the Lone Gunment was that they focused more on their dorky, fish-out-of-water antics than on their hacking and general cool activities. Sure, it's easy to make fun of super-focused geek-types, but that wasn't what made them popular on the X-Files in the first place.
Wow, somebody else that knows what happened to Thomas Veil. I was beginning to think I was the only person who had ever heard of that show.
Didn't the X-Files start on Fridays? I would have guessed it was one of Fox's best launching spots. Or at least it was before they became the NFL's whore...
John Doe has seemed to me to be a pretty clear retread of "Nowhere Man", a two-season Fox conspiracy-driven drama that ran close to when the X-Files first started hitting it big. Except that this nowhere man knows everything and kibitzes solving crimes, kind of like Monk.
I liked Firefly, but a lot of times I had trouble justifying why I liked it. It remains sort of a guilty pleasure to watch; in a sense it combined high and low sci-fi in appropriate quantities. I think the potential of it, moreso than some of the actualities of the show, are what kept me coming back. It really looked like a crew, and a world, where interesting things could happen.
Aaah! Recursion!
They appreciate what, cheesecake photo spreads and young-male oriented sports and technology? I definitely don't need a simulation game for that :)
I prefer non-interlaced (progressive) pictures myself, but to each his own :)