Well, they don't have a category for trademarks. This was the closest I could find. Anyway, if they thought a different category would better suit it, why couldn't they change the category?
Correction:
You have to earn at least as much as you spend.
Money is to business what food is to humans.
If you consistently eat less that you use, you starve and die.
If you consistently eat more than you use, you get obese and have health problems.
The obese companies/organizations, the ones that are trying to overcome their size problems without cutting down on their intake relative to their output, are the ones that are causing a lot of our troubles.
How about preparing for the future now?
Use truly fully qualified names:
myname.country.planet.solar_system.galaxy.universe
myname.us.earth.sol.milky_way.universe
Also, every time a work is lent, a small royalty is generated.
Where does this come from? Are you trying to tell me that every time I check out a book at the library, for no charge whatsoever, the library pays a royalty to the publisher? I couldn't even begin to imagine the nightmare that would have been before computerized borrowing became common in libraries. And even with computers, there would be hundreds of different checks sent to all the various publishing companies around.
Are you trying to tell me that I'm going to get in trouble because I haven't been mailing a check to some publishing company every time I've lent one of my books out to a friend?
I don't recall seeing any such EULA printed in any of my books. In fact, I seem to recall some court case where the publishers attempted to control the price at which I, the consumer, could sell a book I had purchased. The publishers lost that case. Did I miss the case where they won the right to charge a royalty every time I lend out a book I have purchased?
No longer would the burden of criminal proof be on the prosecution; it would be the drivers'
responsibility, as plaintiffs to prove that they had been wronged (most speeding violators the cops get abdicate this right anyway by
signing off on the ticket and paying the fine instead of excercising their right to due process and contesting the ticket in court, but that's
another issue).
I was always under the impression that signing the ticket only acknowledges receipt of the ticket.
At least, that's what the one's I have received stated just above the signiature line.
As for contesting it in court, what are you going to contest? Unless the cop fails to show up, the judge has a witness that you were speeding.
You can then either:
Lie: "I was not!"
Tell the truth: "Yes, I was, but I don't think I deserve a ticket for it."
Plead the 5th: "I can't answer that on the grounds it may incriminate me."
Unless you truly believe the ticket was undeserved, contesting it is not worth the effort.
But I would submit the actions taken by ACME rental company goes to far. This seems less of an effort protect assests then
to make quick cash. When the rental company sells it's vechicles at the end of thier useful life as a rental, do they disclose
items like average speed or how many times and how often they bring the vehicle above 90? Somehow I doubt this. Do you
suppose they send monthly reports to their insurance provider stating 'Our fleet was brought over 90mph 393 times this past
month. We collected over $58,000. Please raise our rates accordingly'?
No. They tell the insurance company they are
pro-actively attempting to get their renters to
reduce their speeds. By doing this, they hope
to lower their insurance rates. They can tell
the insurance company the fleet was kept under
90 mph. Those annoying customers who keep
speeding, and who keep the insurance rates up,
get to pay a little extra to help offset the
higher rate they are causing the rental company
to get charged.
Why are they using GPS to measure speed?
Doesn't the car have a speedometer they
could hook up to? Use the speedometer to
check the speed, and the GPS to make note
of where the car is when it is speeding.
I don't know how they did it, but I can't
imagine using the GPS unit to monitor
speed when there is a nice, handy, mostly
accurate speedometer already in the car
to monitor the speed.
The interstate highway system was designed for safe driving at a consistent 75 mph.
Maybe so, but no matter the design, inside a large city this does not work. There's a reason why traffic usually flows at 10mph during rush hour: the speed people are driving is not safe for the traffic volume, and people have accidents, which stops up traffic.
Outside the cities, with long distances between entrance and exit ramps, the high speeds are generally not a problem.
Most speed limits are set artificially low to increase revenues from fines.
Inside cities, on city roads and even on the highways, I don't believe this. On major highways outside cities, this could be a reasonable argument, but I still don't think I would believe it without some pretty strong arguments.
Much as I hate to say this, I actually like
what the company is doing. the company is
not taking away people's rights. The company
is attempting to proctect itself from its
customers who are violating the law. The
company is providing incentive to its customers
to obey the law, and they can say they are making a reasonable attempt to reduce risks to their
vehicles.
Other than the "big brother" issues, I would
be happy to have the government use this to
identify and automatically ticket speeders on
the roads. If only we could guarantee that it
wouldn't be abused... Of course, if people
could learn to leave home five minutes earlier
and drive within the speed limits, there would
be no need for something like this at all,
and "big brother" would have to find some other
justification to use this technology if all
that is really wanted is to monitor people.
Stop paying your water bill and see how long it takes for the "free" water to stop flowing from your faucets. You're not paying for the water, but for the cleaning and delivery of the water.
Which kind of ties in to the journals desire to charge for online access. You're paying for the review and delivery, not necessarily for the content.
The question then becomes, how long would you be willing to pay full price for a particular bottle? If the bottle had a date six months old, would you still pay for it as if it were new? How about a year old? Five years?
The request was not that the journals be immediately available for free online. The request was that they be free within 6 months of publication. The journal can make its money selling the issues, and even charging for online access for a while. After six months, though, the articles should be freely available.
How easy is it to obtain a six-month old copy of a journal? Go to the library, find the issue in question, and photocopy the article. Does the publisher make any more money from this? Even a one-day old issue will not earn any additional money when used this way.
Sure, have the articles available online is much more convenient for the scientists. Let them pay for the convenience for the first six months of the article's life. Then, let them have it free from then on.
They use data to benefit people - through focused marketing. With information, they can give us the products we want.
The use data to benefit themselves. Through focused marketing, they try to convince us that we want and need things we really don't want or need. They certainly don't give us the products; they ocnvince us to pay for them.
Slightly off topic here, but did you know that when you move into the state of Texas and go to get a Texas drivers license, you have to turn in your out-of-state license? They take your picture and then give you a scrap of paper with your info on it. They tell you this is your temporary drivers license and that your real one will arrive in the mail in a few weeks. The temporary license does not have a photo on it, so:
you can not purchase alcohol anywhere
you can not write or cash a check anywhere
you can not use a credit card in the few stores that demand a photo ID
the police don't believe you when you show it to them
native Texans don't believe you when you show it to them
Mine took almost a full month to arrive. And this is all for a license to drive a car on the road. I would much rather have a federally issued ID and have the central database keep track of whether or not I have a license to drive from my state of residence. I don't see that it would be any easier or more difficult to correct any erroneous information that it already is with the state governments issuing the IDs.
There's a "good" side to each of the "bad" points you've made.
- - - -
Your employer wants to keep track of you, because they want to be warned if your personal life involves anything that might impair your ability to function at work. You show up one day and discover that an H.R. computer has decided that you should be fired because it is a matter of public record that you leave your house and go to a bar to socialize three nights per week, on average.
Monitor your bosses, all the way up to the CEO. Record them with the same type of behavior and sue the company for discrimination. Of course, if the company published a policy that clearly prohibited this behavior, what's your problem? You should have either stopped that behavior or found another employer.
- - - -
You meet a girl in a bar. She uses a handy freeware application on her Palm Pilot to snap your picture digitally and run a background check. She finds that you have brought 19 women home from bars in the last six months, never seeing any one of them for more than one night. She also finds that you have been seen entering a reproductive health clinic three times in the last year. She snubs you.
She learns about you before you screw up her life? It's her choice as to whether to trust you or not. Personally, I would try to get as much info as possible, too, if I was looking for something more than just a one-night stand.
- - - -
You run for public office, the news media runs a background check by data mining the video information that is public knowledge. They uncover that you used to attend meetings of a gay, lesbian and bisexual student union when you were in college. Your opponent attacks your sex life during the campaign.
Admit it. Tell the truth. Though it may take longer without the cameras, that kind of information will eventually come out. Covering things up only makes it look even worse.
- - - -
Thieves stake out your house simply by accessing public information and learning exactly who lives in your house. They run an automated monitoring system to wait until everybody that lives in your house is gone, and they break into your house while you are gone. They know exactly how much time they have to rob you, because they track you in realtime using public video information.
This is my favorite. Use the same type of monitoring system to detect an unplanned or unexpected entry into your house. Have it alert you or even automatically alert the police. Record their faces and cars. Monitor the police's response time. This actually sounds like a logical next step for the alarm/security companies to implement for their customers.
- - - -
An organized crime syndicate uses public monitoring information to track the location of law enforcement officers, allowing them to freely conduct crimes.
An organized police force uses public monitoring information to track the location of known crime syndicate members, allowing them to detect crimes as they happen.
- - - -
Law enforcement uses the above example as an excuse to increase the amount of undercover surveillance. Eventually society is governed by a faceless secret police.
This is a problem. However, the police can't be very secret or faceless when they are also subject to the public monitoring. They have much more opportunity to be secret and faceless when the public does not have access to the monitoring.
This is a level of intrusion is not possible without hiring a private detective in the 'real world' without the cameras. If we allow the cameras, then this sort of thing will be very easy for anybody with access to the information.
In other words, only the rich, those who can afford to hire a private detective, are allowed to do this? By this argument, I would vote for the cameras simply because they level the playing field.
Nor are any of these things being done by the State.
The state is not doing these things, but the state makes use of the private companies who collect the information. What is the difference between the state spying on you and the state purchasing the same information from a private individual/corporation who spied on you? By the letter of the law, I don't know. Morally, ethically, and by the spirit of the law, there is no difference at all.
If my government is taking my money from me to pay for the internet access in my library, that same government should not be telling my library what I am and am not allowed to see. Whether I choose to or not, my money is paying for it, and so I have the right to use it.
software authors could use individual nondisclosure agreements with users (properly agreed to before opening the
shrinkwrap, of course)
How about properly agreed to before the purchase? Many store will not accept the return of an opened software box, even if the software envelope is unopened, no matter that the license says to return it to the store if you don't agree.
they're comprised of people too stupid to avoid jury detail.
When I was summoned for jury duty, I made no effort to avoid it. I wanted to participate and see what it was like. Fortunately, I had the foresight to bring two books with me. I got through the first book and most of the second before one of the trials I got assigned to actualy happened, on the third day. I am not sure I would want to do that again, but only because of the two wasted days. Once I actually got into a trial, I really found it interesting.
I see nothing wrong with making any number of copies of a copyrighted material when the equipment and the media being used to make the copies have an extra charge already attached to recover the potential losses of my possibly doing such a thing. Each disk purchased with that fee attached is a disk that is okay to copy a copyrighted work onto.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, they don't have a category for trademarks. This was the closest I could find. Anyway, if they thought a different category would better suit it, why couldn't they change the category?
Edward Burr
2001-07-27 00:53:54 Star Wars vs. a medical tool (science,patents) (rejected)
Edward Burr
Correction: You have to earn at least as much as you spend.
Money is to business what food is to humans. If you consistently eat less that you use, you starve and die. If you consistently eat more than you use, you get obese and have health problems. The obese companies/organizations, the ones that are trying to overcome their size problems without cutting down on their intake relative to their output, are the ones that are causing a lot of our troubles.
Edward Burr
How about preparing for the future now? Use truly fully qualified names: myname.country.planet.solar_system.galaxy.universe
myname.us.earth.sol.milky_way.universe
Edward Burr
Where does this come from? Are you trying to tell me that every time I check out a book at the library, for no charge whatsoever, the library pays a royalty to the publisher? I couldn't even begin to imagine the nightmare that would have been before computerized borrowing became common in libraries. And even with computers, there would be hundreds of different checks sent to all the various publishing companies around.
Are you trying to tell me that I'm going to get in trouble because I haven't been mailing a check to some publishing company every time I've lent one of my books out to a friend?
I don't recall seeing any such EULA printed in any of my books. In fact, I seem to recall some court case where the publishers attempted to control the price at which I, the consumer, could sell a book I had purchased. The publishers lost that case. Did I miss the case where they won the right to charge a royalty every time I lend out a book I have purchased?
Edward Burr
I was always under the impression that signing the ticket only acknowledges receipt of the ticket. At least, that's what the one's I have received stated just above the signiature line.
As for contesting it in court, what are you going to contest? Unless the cop fails to show up, the judge has a witness that you were speeding. You can then either:
- Lie: "I was not!"
- Tell the truth: "Yes, I was, but I don't think I deserve a ticket for it."
- Plead the 5th: "I can't answer that on the grounds it may incriminate me."
Unless you truly believe the ticket was undeserved, contesting it is not worth the effort.Edward Burr
No. They tell the insurance company they are pro-actively attempting to get their renters to reduce their speeds. By doing this, they hope to lower their insurance rates. They can tell the insurance company the fleet was kept under 90 mph. Those annoying customers who keep speeding, and who keep the insurance rates up, get to pay a little extra to help offset the higher rate they are causing the rental company to get charged.
Edward Burr
Why are they using GPS to measure speed? Doesn't the car have a speedometer they could hook up to? Use the speedometer to check the speed, and the GPS to make note of where the car is when it is speeding. I don't know how they did it, but I can't imagine using the GPS unit to monitor speed when there is a nice, handy, mostly accurate speedometer already in the car to monitor the speed.
Edward Burr
Maybe so, but no matter the design, inside a large city this does not work. There's a reason why traffic usually flows at 10mph during rush hour: the speed people are driving is not safe for the traffic volume, and people have accidents, which stops up traffic.
Outside the cities, with long distances between entrance and exit ramps, the high speeds are generally not a problem.
Most speed limits are set artificially low to increase revenues from fines.
Inside cities, on city roads and even on the highways, I don't believe this. On major highways outside cities, this could be a reasonable argument, but I still don't think I would believe it without some pretty strong arguments.
Edward Burr
Other than the "big brother" issues, I would be happy to have the government use this to identify and automatically ticket speeders on the roads. If only we could guarantee that it wouldn't be abused... Of course, if people could learn to leave home five minutes earlier and drive within the speed limits, there would be no need for something like this at all, and "big brother" would have to find some other justification to use this technology if all that is really wanted is to monitor people.
Edward Burr
Which kind of ties in to the journals desire to charge for online access. You're paying for the review and delivery, not necessarily for the content.
The question then becomes, how long would you be willing to pay full price for a particular bottle? If the bottle had a date six months old, would you still pay for it as if it were new? How about a year old? Five years?
Edward Burr
How easy is it to obtain a six-month old copy of a journal? Go to the library, find the issue in question, and photocopy the article. Does the publisher make any more money from this? Even a one-day old issue will not earn any additional money when used this way.
Sure, have the articles available online is much more convenient for the scientists. Let them pay for the convenience for the first six months of the article's life. Then, let them have it free from then on.
Edward Burr
I don't mind them having my personal info to send me reminders. I do mind them selling that info to others who have no business having that info.
Edward Burr
The use data to benefit themselves. Through focused marketing, they try to convince us that we want and need things we really don't want or need. They certainly don't give us the products; they ocnvince us to pay for them.
Edward Burr
- you can not purchase alcohol anywhere
- you can not write or cash a check anywhere
- you can not use a credit card in the few stores that demand a photo ID
- the police don't believe you when you show it to them
- native Texans don't believe you when you show it to them
Mine took almost a full month to arrive. And this is all for a license to drive a car on the road. I would much rather have a federally issued ID and have the central database keep track of whether or not I have a license to drive from my state of residence. I don't see that it would be any easier or more difficult to correct any erroneous information that it already is with the state governments issuing the IDs.Edward Burr
- - - -
Monitor your bosses, all the way up to the CEO. Record them with the same type of behavior and sue the company for discrimination. Of course, if the company published a policy that clearly prohibited this behavior, what's your problem? You should have either stopped that behavior or found another employer.- - - -
She learns about you before you screw up her life? It's her choice as to whether to trust you or not. Personally, I would try to get as much info as possible, too, if I was looking for something more than just a one-night stand.- - - -
Admit it. Tell the truth. Though it may take longer without the cameras, that kind of information will eventually come out. Covering things up only makes it look even worse.- - - -
This is my favorite. Use the same type of monitoring system to detect an unplanned or unexpected entry into your house. Have it alert you or even automatically alert the police. Record their faces and cars. Monitor the police's response time. This actually sounds like a logical next step for the alarm/security companies to implement for their customers.- - - -
An organized police force uses public monitoring information to track the location of known crime syndicate members, allowing them to detect crimes as they happen.- - - -
This is a problem. However, the police can't be very secret or faceless when they are also subject to the public monitoring. They have much more opportunity to be secret and faceless when the public does not have access to the monitoring.Edward Burr
In other words, only the rich, those who can afford to hire a private detective, are allowed to do this? By this argument, I would vote for the cameras simply because they level the playing field.
Edward Burr
The state is not doing these things, but the state makes use of the private companies who collect the information. What is the difference between the state spying on you and the state purchasing the same information from a private individual/corporation who spied on you? By the letter of the law, I don't know. Morally, ethically, and by the spirit of the law, there is no difference at all.
Edward Burr
If you look a little closer, the paper said "Apollo 11". Apollo 13 is the one that didn't get to land.
Edward Burr
If my government is taking my money from me to pay for the internet access in my library, that same government should not be telling my library what I am and am not allowed to see. Whether I choose to or not, my money is paying for it, and so I have the right to use it.
Edward Burr
UNIX's "x" flag does not determine whether a file is executable or not. It only determines whether you have permission to attempt to execute it.
Edward Burr
How about properly agreed to before the purchase? Many store will not accept the return of an opened software box, even if the software envelope is unopened, no matter that the license says to return it to the store if you don't agree.
Edward Burr
When I was summoned for jury duty, I made no effort to avoid it. I wanted to participate and see what it was like. Fortunately, I had the foresight to bring two books with me. I got through the first book and most of the second before one of the trials I got assigned to actualy happened, on the third day. I am not sure I would want to do that again, but only because of the two wasted days. Once I actually got into a trial, I really found it interesting.
Edward Burr
The right to profit is part of the American spirit. It is the guarantee to profit that is not.
Edward Burr
I see nothing wrong with making any number of copies of a copyrighted material when the equipment and the media being used to make the copies have an extra charge already attached to recover the potential losses of my possibly doing such a thing. Each disk purchased with that fee attached is a disk that is okay to copy a copyrighted work onto.
Edward Burr