The only time the service doesn't work is in an unestablished industry with 0 competitors. In every other industry if you look long term giving things out for free makes exponentially more.
But where there's no credible service alternative--for example, writing fiction--then giving it away doesn't help you.
You are absolutely incorrect about medical patents. If it weren't for medical patents, my cousin would have been able to release a cure for a form of HIV she discovered about 5 years back. 5 years! But what happened? A similar modification by a big company has been patented, and they did it merely by patenting every possible variant of the string she used.
First of all I'm sure your cousin built upon decades of patentable work when figuring out her cure. Secondly, when it comes to stuff like that IP law isn't a complete bar, there are political and legal recourses as well. Look at how Brazil strongarmed AIDS drug manufacturers, or at the Doha Declaration, where the WTO basically acknowledged a public health exception for IP laws where developing countries are involved. Tell her to send a letter to the Brazillian minister of health, or to any number of AIDS advocacy groups, letting them know the cure exists.
Lets look at other industries. If cars were given away through promotions (which happens all the time), do you think it might draw up more buzz for the companies?
But giving away cars isn't the main business model; it couldn't be.
This is also why well trained and good customer service policies make or break a company. Think of Dell's customer service and how people hates them for that.
Dell is one of the largest, most successful PC manufacturers in the world. Obviously their poor technical support didn't break them.
He's not wrong, and the pirates know that. There are a few excuses that are legitimate (lost/broken CDs) and some that are semilegitimate (abandonware), but most pirating is just people wanting something for free.
You're basically advocating the service as opposed to selling position that a lot of people on slashdot have been advocating in the software sector for years. While it may work for you I don't think it can work on a universal level. Why would someone hire you to ghost write a book if they can't get any profit from the actual sale of that book? As for the medicine patent thing, you are completely and utterly wrong if you think that absent either patent protection or intense government funding will produce new medicines. They cost way too much to bring about, and that "government intervention" you complain about it basically "make sure the drug companies do their job testing the medicine before they release it."
Ok, that hoodie makes sense until this part: "This imprint on this garment is machine-made, therefore no signature is required." What on earth does that mean? Is this some weird German legal requirement?
There is no general federal common law. Erie Railroad Co. v. Tompkins
You're reading Erie too broadly. There's no "general" federal common law, but there are several special areas where federal common law does exist, for example in admiralty. Where a federal question is involved and no statutory standard is presented, a federal court can craft a federal common law solution. Check out Clearfield Trust Co. v. United States, 318 U.S. 363 (1943). You can also check out the much shorter Kamen v. Kemper Financial Services, Inc. 500 US 90 (1991), where the Court explicitly states when and how federal common law is invoked/created.
If he tried Congress would pull itself out of his stupor, and 8 of the 9 supreme court justices would take their side. And the anti-war marches on washington would be dwarfed by the mobs surrounding the White House if he actually tried pulling it. Honestly, part of me hopes he tries so he'll be made an example of for later presidents.
You've hit it pretty much on the head, though depending on the state you're in different things count as "voidable" by minors, and not all are necessarily for necessities.
They can put whatever they want in their employment contract and their lawyers can try to scare you into believing that they can sue you and enforce it in court but it is really nothing more than a bluff on the part of the employer to prevent spineless and ignorant former employees from "violating the agreement". They are hoping that they can scare people into giving up their rights.
By the way, I don't know how it's done elsewhere, but I know in my state the court will generally only enforce a non-compete if the other side is completely blameless in the termination. If you quit your job because your employer wasn't paying you overtime like he was supposed to, or violating a law, or sexually harassing you, or whatever, it's a good defense.
Damn... what's the point of having a technology sufficiently far advanced that you can conduct a remote-control war if the button-pushing still results in some kind of scarring, albeit emotional?
The point could end up being "don't kill anyone unless you absolutely have to, because the cost is too high otherwise." Which would be a very good point to learn I think.
And the two ("at-will" and "right-to-work") are not mutually exclusive. Right-to-work laws are usually related union membership. However, Virginia also has a law [state.va.us]that forbids employers from trying to prevent former employees from seeking employment elsewhere. You'd have to ask a lawyer how that relates to non-competes.
Laws involving the validity or lack thereof of non-competes don't really have too much to do with at-will laws or employment laws in general; they're basically just saying as a matter of contract law, non-compete agreements are either illegal or limited (depending on the state). It doesn't regulate the employment relationship, it regulates what legal remedies an employer can take after the employment relationship ends.
Give it a few years once we're all working as cashiers for Wal-Mart, and that will probably be literally true.
Nah, we won't ALL be working for Wal-Mart; only most of us. The rich keep getting richer, and eventually we'll return to a nice, traditional society where a tiny fraction of the population controls the vast majority of the wealth, and those of us who aren't lucky enough to be minimum-wage retail or food service workers will have to live on government handouts grudgingly allowed by the ruling class in order to head off riots.
Is Tufts in a jurisdiction that recognizes a cause of action against third parties for spoliation of evidence? I know in Florida they could be possibly liable before their offer to the RIAA to preserve upon notice (and almost certainly liable after they made the offer).
Interesting. This is more a comment on the case rather than a reply but as reprehensible and unethical as his actions were, I don't think he broke any laws with his disclosure. Did any of his victims include a privacy notice along with their email replies to his CL ad? If this person was transmitting a copyrighted picture, do they have expressed consent? I'm pretty sure JF's actions fall under fair use as he was publicly displaying the victim's pictures under the guise of a "sociological case study". That said I'm surprised that with as many people he hurt that no one's taken matters into their own hands.
A lot of states have created causes of action under a general invasion of privacy tort, which is related to old-fashioned defamation actions (although truth isn't necessarily a defense in invasion of privacy).
From the article: "He [State Controller Chiang] disputes Schwarzenegger's legal interpretation of a 2003 California Supreme Court decision," Chiang is the State Controller, not an attorney.
Actually he is an attorney.
It's not his job to give legal interpretation on Supreme Court decisions. His job is to execute the orders of states executive branch, Gov. Schwarzenegger.
Where did you get that idea? He's an elected official, not an appointee, and his job is to safeguard the state's finances, not be a flunky for Schwarzenegger.
It sounds like the Controller is letting his personal beliefs interfere with his professional responsibilities. That's a quick route to unemployment.
But if a non-lawyer can find this information after about two minutes of searching, why didn't Blueport's attorneys find it?
The Federal Torts Claim Act doesn't apply here; there's a specific US statute, 28 USC 1498 that deals specifically with bringing copyright infringement cases against the government, and that was at issue here. Blueport's attorneys are quite familiar with the FTCA, as they mention it in their appeal, but only used FTCA cases as analogies.
Could some lawyer please enlighten us as to why sovereign immunity of a government agency seems to only apply in some cases?
Sovereign immunity applies unless the Federal government or state has waived it. They've actually waived it, either implicitly or explicitly, in a few situations, for example the Federal Tort Claims Act and Section 1983 civil rights lawsuits. Funny thing is that private actors can generally bring copyright infringement claims against the United States under 28 USC s 1498, but with certain exceptions that apparently apply here.
I'm no lawyer, but I read that as, "We're the government, we can't be sued except when we want to be sued and even then we'll define the conditions of the jurisdiction in which our lawsuit will take place as it suits us," (so to speak).
That's exactly it, and it's been done that way for hundreds of years. Sovereign immunity is built into the Anglo-American legal system. If you have a dispute with your government, your recourse is usually to resort to voting.
Microsoft's error in not predicting the potential market size for small, low cost systems running a full featured OS, is to everyone else's advantage and we will all progress because of it.
MS is terrible at predicting computing trends; hell, they failed to predict the INTERNET. However, they usually manage to come up from behind and eventually dominate the market. Look at how Windows CE eventually beat Palm.
Slashdot Mirror
The only time the service doesn't work is in an unestablished industry with 0 competitors. In every other industry if you look long term giving things out for free makes exponentially more.
But where there's no credible service alternative--for example, writing fiction--then giving it away doesn't help you.
You are absolutely incorrect about medical patents. If it weren't for medical patents, my cousin would have been able to release a cure for a form of HIV she discovered about 5 years back. 5 years! But what happened? A similar modification by a big company has been patented, and they did it merely by patenting every possible variant of the string she used.
First of all I'm sure your cousin built upon decades of patentable work when figuring out her cure. Secondly, when it comes to stuff like that IP law isn't a complete bar, there are political and legal recourses as well. Look at how Brazil strongarmed AIDS drug manufacturers, or at the Doha Declaration, where the WTO basically acknowledged a public health exception for IP laws where developing countries are involved. Tell her to send a letter to the Brazillian minister of health, or to any number of AIDS advocacy groups, letting them know the cure exists.
Lets look at other industries. If cars were given away through promotions (which happens all the time), do you think it might draw up more buzz for the companies?
But giving away cars isn't the main business model; it couldn't be.
This is also why well trained and good customer service policies make or break a company. Think of Dell's customer service and how people hates them for that.
Dell is one of the largest, most successful PC manufacturers in the world. Obviously their poor technical support didn't break them.
He's not wrong, and the pirates know that. There are a few excuses that are legitimate (lost/broken CDs) and some that are semilegitimate (abandonware), but most pirating is just people wanting something for free.
You're basically advocating the service as opposed to selling position that a lot of people on slashdot have been advocating in the software sector for years. While it may work for you I don't think it can work on a universal level. Why would someone hire you to ghost write a book if they can't get any profit from the actual sale of that book? As for the medicine patent thing, you are completely and utterly wrong if you think that absent either patent protection or intense government funding will produce new medicines. They cost way too much to bring about, and that "government intervention" you complain about it basically "make sure the drug companies do their job testing the medicine before they release it."
Ok, that hoodie makes sense until this part: "This imprint on this garment is machine-made, therefore no signature is required." What on earth does that mean? Is this some weird German legal requirement?
It's encouraging that these same people are global warming sceptics. From their FAQs:
Yes, all you global warming skeptics are in fine company.
There is no general federal common law. Erie Railroad Co. v. Tompkins
You're reading Erie too broadly. There's no "general" federal common law, but there are several special areas where federal common law does exist, for example in admiralty. Where a federal question is involved and no statutory standard is presented, a federal court can craft a federal common law solution. Check out Clearfield Trust Co. v. United States, 318 U.S. 363 (1943). You can also check out the much shorter Kamen v. Kemper Financial Services, Inc. 500 US 90 (1991), where the Court explicitly states when and how federal common law is invoked/created.
You miss one important point: There is no federal common law.
Of course there is. The issue here probably wouldn't fall under federal common law, but there are plenty of things that do.
If he tried Congress would pull itself out of his stupor, and 8 of the 9 supreme court justices would take their side. And the anti-war marches on washington would be dwarfed by the mobs surrounding the White House if he actually tried pulling it. Honestly, part of me hopes he tries so he'll be made an example of for later presidents.
You've hit it pretty much on the head, though depending on the state you're in different things count as "voidable" by minors, and not all are necessarily for necessities.
They can put whatever they want in their employment contract and their lawyers can try to scare you into believing that they can sue you and enforce it in court but it is really nothing more than a bluff on the part of the employer to prevent spineless and ignorant former employees from "violating the agreement". They are hoping that they can scare people into giving up their rights.
By the way, I don't know how it's done elsewhere, but I know in my state the court will generally only enforce a non-compete if the other side is completely blameless in the termination. If you quit your job because your employer wasn't paying you overtime like he was supposed to, or violating a law, or sexually harassing you, or whatever, it's a good defense.
Damn... what's the point of having a technology sufficiently far advanced that you can conduct a remote-control war if the button-pushing still results in some kind of scarring, albeit emotional?
The point could end up being "don't kill anyone unless you absolutely have to, because the cost is too high otherwise." Which would be a very good point to learn I think.
And the two ("at-will" and "right-to-work") are not mutually exclusive. Right-to-work laws are usually related union membership. However, Virginia also has a law [state.va.us]that forbids employers from trying to prevent former employees from seeking employment elsewhere. You'd have to ask a lawyer how that relates to non-competes.
Laws involving the validity or lack thereof of non-competes don't really have too much to do with at-will laws or employment laws in general; they're basically just saying as a matter of contract law, non-compete agreements are either illegal or limited (depending on the state). It doesn't regulate the employment relationship, it regulates what legal remedies an employer can take after the employment relationship ends.
but if he claims a national state of emergency he isn't required to relinquish power to the next elected
There is no law that allows him to stay in office, whether a national state of emergency exists or not.
Give it a few years once we're all working as cashiers for Wal-Mart, and that will probably be literally true.
Nah, we won't ALL be working for Wal-Mart; only most of us. The rich keep getting richer, and eventually we'll return to a nice, traditional society where a tiny fraction of the population controls the vast majority of the wealth, and those of us who aren't lucky enough to be minimum-wage retail or food service workers will have to live on government handouts grudgingly allowed by the ruling class in order to head off riots.
True enough. If anyone ever remembers the old IBM PC ads with the Charlie Chaplin-look alike vs. the later PS/2 It! ads...
Why go so far back? I mean, just look at Apple.
Honestly I can't criticize, that sounds like something I would do.
That's what I want to know. Why?
Is Tufts in a jurisdiction that recognizes a cause of action against third parties for spoliation of evidence? I know in Florida they could be possibly liable before their offer to the RIAA to preserve upon notice (and almost certainly liable after they made the offer).
Abandonment in ny for a year (this includes refusal of sex)
That was my favorite factoid to learn in studying for the NY bar exam. Though technically it's "unreasonable" refusal of sex.
Interesting. This is more a comment on the case rather than a reply but as reprehensible and unethical as his actions were, I don't think he broke any laws with his disclosure. Did any of his victims include a privacy notice along with their email replies to his CL ad? If this person was transmitting a copyrighted picture, do they have expressed consent? I'm pretty sure JF's actions fall under fair use as he was publicly displaying the victim's pictures under the guise of a "sociological case study". That said I'm surprised that with as many people he hurt that no one's taken matters into their own hands.
A lot of states have created causes of action under a general invasion of privacy tort, which is related to old-fashioned defamation actions (although truth isn't necessarily a defense in invasion of privacy).
From the article: "He [State Controller Chiang] disputes Schwarzenegger's legal interpretation of a 2003 California Supreme Court decision," Chiang is the State Controller, not an attorney.
Actually he is an attorney.
It's not his job to give legal interpretation on Supreme Court decisions. His job is to execute the orders of states executive branch, Gov. Schwarzenegger.
Where did you get that idea? He's an elected official, not an appointee, and his job is to safeguard the state's finances, not be a flunky for Schwarzenegger.
It sounds like the Controller is letting his personal beliefs interfere with his professional responsibilities. That's a quick route to unemployment.
That's for the voters to decide.
But if a non-lawyer can find this information after about two minutes of searching, why didn't Blueport's attorneys find it?
The Federal Torts Claim Act doesn't apply here; there's a specific US statute, 28 USC 1498 that deals specifically with bringing copyright infringement cases against the government, and that was at issue here. Blueport's attorneys are quite familiar with the FTCA, as they mention it in their appeal, but only used FTCA cases as analogies.
Could some lawyer please enlighten us as to why sovereign immunity of a government agency seems to only apply in some cases?
Sovereign immunity applies unless the Federal government or state has waived it. They've actually waived it, either implicitly or explicitly, in a few situations, for example the Federal Tort Claims Act and Section 1983 civil rights lawsuits. Funny thing is that private actors can generally bring copyright infringement claims against the United States under 28 USC s 1498, but with certain exceptions that apparently apply here.
I'm no lawyer, but I read that as, "We're the government, we can't be sued except when we want to be sued and even then we'll define the conditions of the jurisdiction in which our lawsuit will take place as it suits us," (so to speak).
That's exactly it, and it's been done that way for hundreds of years. Sovereign immunity is built into the Anglo-American legal system. If you have a dispute with your government, your recourse is usually to resort to voting.
Microsoft's error in not predicting the potential market size for small, low cost systems running a full featured OS, is to everyone else's advantage and we will all progress because of it.
MS is terrible at predicting computing trends; hell, they failed to predict the INTERNET. However, they usually manage to come up from behind and eventually dominate the market. Look at how Windows CE eventually beat Palm.
This seems much more like a resurrection of the concept behind the Segway
Resurrection=outright theft of the idea.
Oh, yeah, might as well be the first one to reply to my post:
OMGITSNOTTHEFTAHHINTELLECTUALPROPERTYISNTTHEFT!!!!!