Not only that but that one is one of the more annoying cliches. People ignorant about a topic who try to pass themselves off as being smart just look like dumbasses, and turning it into a cliche is even worse.
What it says is that the government cannot pass a law abridging the right of free speech. It doesn't block lawsuits, but there's no law that says the government can stop you from making your posting.
Fortunately, if the lawsuit is stupid, it will either get thrown out or the plaintiff will lose.
Except that the Do Not Call laws actually work, and states can enact their own. I'm in St. Louis, and our Attorney General has been very proactive in going after companies who conveniently ignore the law. He went after one of the Miss Cleo hotlines and told the press that "she should have seen this coming", for instance.
One of the places that kept calling, back when I had a land-line (which was on the list), got fined rather heftily. Serves 'em right.
Now I have a cellphone that's on the national and state lists (due to number portability they don't have a way to check if it's cell or landline, at least not easily) and I'm triply protected against junk phone calls and I never get any telemarketers -- or if I do (I occasionally get hangups that don't leave a message) they get the "You have reached the Sprint voice mailbox of..." that tells them right away that they need to hang up quick or be subject to fine.
Except there's this little thing in the way called "term limits". Thankfully. This cretin is going to be out on his ass in 2008 and there's not a damn thing he can do about it.
We shouldn't try to shut anyone down without a warrant -- look at the current flap that's going on because the government is illegally spying on people without getting a warrant first -- but we should have investigators who do actually use the power of search and seizure warrants to seize equipment from companies that use it to send spam. Or, if it's a shared server, use court orders (combined with hefty fines for contempt) to force the ISP to remove the spammer's setup from the box(es).
It's legal to modify your vehicle because it is now legally your property, and the manufacturer has no say in what you do with it, including using aftermarket add-ons (better choice, often lower prices) other than what the maker offers. However, this is subject to rules stating that you have to follow the local vehicle code.
For example, I'm a VW Golf owner. Hella manufacturers aftermarket taillamps that look better than the ones they supply to VW (same maker, yup); some are variations on the stock red theme with some clear bits, and have built-in reflectors as required by vehicle code in many places. Some are the same product but are in different colors (blue, green, smoked) and include a pair of red reflectors along with a diagram showing where to mount them on the rear bumper.
It is legal to either purchase the red/clear ones, or the other-colored ones and install the reflectors on the bumper, but it is not legal to install the colored ones without the reflectors because you then violate the vehicle code and it is not legal to operate a vehicle on public roads that doesn't conform to the code.
But this fact doesn't in itself make it illegal to mod your car.
(Note: I see people with illegal taillights all the time; sadly, the cops don't seem to care... all people need to do to conform is use adhesive-back red reflectors, but they can't even be bothered to spend the few bucks required for the basic stuff. sigh. My own Golf is modded but still has all of the safety devices it came with along with all reflectors and lights).
Uhm... there already are laws against pirating software and reselling it. Why do we need to invoke the DMCA here? We don't, unless we're making it illegal to resell modified items, which makes every single "I'm selling my modded vehicle" classified-ad post illegal on the VW/Audi/BMW/Volvo/kitchen-sink family of sites I frequent, along with the site of the local VW club. But guess what... they're not illegal, so it's DMCA FUD.
The real story is that these people were violating laws against selling pirated software.
It is important because it means that the manufacturer doesn't have any control with what you do with it after you buy it. You bought it; you can smash it with a hammer if you want or you can open it up and smash just part of it if you want or you can add something to it. It's yours; they have no say.
However, what a lot of people are missing here is that these people were putting illegal software on the boxes. That's the problem, not the fact that they were changing their own property, as they saw fit, and reselling it -- which IS allowed by the law. I can buy a computer, refinish the case in another color, and resell it, and the original manufacturer can't stop me from doing that.
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Another peer editing his own bio in violation of the guidelines users are expected to follow. And like it or not, there's more attention on him because he's the site's founder.
Google thinks it's the Light Side
on
Google Zeitgeist '05
·
· Score: 1, Insightful
"As a company that tries to do no evil, we were quite pleased to see that [the force] outdraws [the dark side] in search queries."
So when will we see them admit that people are searching for [block banner ads] when they annoy people with graphical Google Ads?
And why the @*^!! is the browser useragent info and platform info still missing? "Do no evil"? I think it was wrong to pull that info out of the results. C'mon guys! Put it back!
When Google knows, or should, that users don't like graphical ads because they usually get in the way of what they're there to look at (i.e. a news story) and flash and blink and bounce and whatnot, a lot of the time, to further annoy the user, then yeah, that's evil... because it's making use of something Google knows (or should) that readers don't like. If their research tells them otherwise, their researchers are incompetent.
Site owners aren't in the business of dictating what users do. Site owners simply provide a starting point with a site design that customers can tweak through the use of browser preferences, extensions, and modifications to the way pages are displayed. It's a web designer's job to accomodate the customer, since it's the customer that has control, not the designer.
I guess that's a foreign concept to media that are used to spoon-feeding us everything from a silver platter and being in total control. Guess what. The world has changed. The customer/reader has the control now.
Don't like it? Not our fault; your site's broken. Fix it.
Good luck getting people to come back to your site when it doesn't work because you were idiotic enough to knowingly design it to break with common browser configurations. If people stop looking at your ads, it's your own fault because they said "Hey, the web designer who made this was a fucking moron, goodbye" and left.
(And I'm not from SomethingAwful -- I've heard bad things about their userbase, such as they actively pick on people who have hobbies/interests that they think are beneath them, instead of shutting up and respecting others -- or LL -- what's LL?)
I just happen to like birds, particularly birds of prey, and the "oh really?" owl thing cracks me up.
You do realize that many university/college campuses at least here in the US are largely liberal? Universities do a lot of thinking, collectively -- that's what they do. I think your sig would be best applied to "party-line reciting morons" since they always let other people do all the thinking for them -- no matter which party they claim to be affiliated with.
Freeloaders aren't exactly a good thing either. Why should I expose myself to marketing BS just to get you an ipod that you're too cheap to buy for yourself? That's just selfish. Like too many people these days. Not giving a damn about others is responsible for a lot of our ills. Or have you not noticed that other countries don't like us anymore?
I personally don't care what they are and aren't sharing, and the nature of what they are and aren't sharing. Is it relevant to the discussion? No, it is not. Does it unfairly characterise people because you have no idea what they're doing and you have no grounds for your baseless accusation? Yes, it does.
Oh, and by the way, EVERYTHING is copyrighted unless it's specifically disclaimed as not being under copyright, so not even that statement of yours is a fair one to make.
File a lawsuit. They hacked your computer and caused damage and lost time. They should be compensating you for their illegal actions. Say, a shiny new top of the line computer sounds nice, eh? Plus punitive damages?
Which is not needed for fair use. Libraries allow reproduction for research purposes and it's up to the reader to govern themselves. I can walk down to the library downstairs, pull one of the medical journals off the shelf, and copy a pile of articles from it, in their entirety. I am allowed to do that because I am using them for research. Other than a notice posted describing the restrictions under which copying can be done, there's no one looking over my shoulder telling me what not to do. It's my own responsibility to police my actions, not anyone else's. A library organization, website, etc., merely provides the information.
Or is the RIAA gestapo going to invade libraries next?
Slashdot Mirror
Not only that but that one is one of the more annoying cliches. People ignorant about a topic who try to pass themselves off as being smart just look like dumbasses, and turning it into a cliche is even worse.
Uh... the extension doesn't exist. No download links anywhere.
What it says is that the government cannot pass a law abridging the right of free speech. It doesn't block lawsuits, but there's no law that says the government can stop you from making your posting.
Fortunately, if the lawsuit is stupid, it will either get thrown out or the plaintiff will lose.
... so what's the deal with Sony and SCO at the moment?
Except that the Do Not Call laws actually work, and states can enact their own. I'm in St. Louis, and our Attorney General has been very proactive in going after companies who conveniently ignore the law. He went after one of the Miss Cleo hotlines and told the press that "she should have seen this coming", for instance.
One of the places that kept calling, back when I had a land-line (which was on the list), got fined rather heftily. Serves 'em right.
Now I have a cellphone that's on the national and state lists (due to number portability they don't have a way to check if it's cell or landline, at least not easily) and I'm triply protected against junk phone calls and I never get any telemarketers -- or if I do (I occasionally get hangups that don't leave a message) they get the "You have reached the Sprint voice mailbox of..." that tells them right away that they need to hang up quick or be subject to fine.
Except there's this little thing in the way called "term limits". Thankfully. This cretin is going to be out on his ass in 2008 and there's not a damn thing he can do about it.
We shouldn't try to shut anyone down without a warrant -- look at the current flap that's going on because the government is illegally spying on people without getting a warrant first -- but we should have investigators who do actually use the power of search and seizure warrants to seize equipment from companies that use it to send spam. Or, if it's a shared server, use court orders (combined with hefty fines for contempt) to force the ISP to remove the spammer's setup from the box(es).
It's legal to modify your vehicle because it is now legally your property, and the manufacturer has no say in what you do with it, including using aftermarket add-ons (better choice, often lower prices) other than what the maker offers. However, this is subject to rules stating that you have to follow the local vehicle code.
For example, I'm a VW Golf owner. Hella manufacturers aftermarket taillamps that look better than the ones they supply to VW (same maker, yup); some are variations on the stock red theme with some clear bits, and have built-in reflectors as required by vehicle code in many places. Some are the same product but are in different colors (blue, green, smoked) and include a pair of red reflectors along with a diagram showing where to mount them on the rear bumper.
It is legal to either purchase the red/clear ones, or the other-colored ones and install the reflectors on the bumper, but it is not legal to install the colored ones without the reflectors because you then violate the vehicle code and it is not legal to operate a vehicle on public roads that doesn't conform to the code.
But this fact doesn't in itself make it illegal to mod your car.
(Note: I see people with illegal taillights all the time; sadly, the cops don't seem to care... all people need to do to conform is use adhesive-back red reflectors, but they can't even be bothered to spend the few bucks required for the basic stuff. sigh. My own Golf is modded but still has all of the safety devices it came with along with all reflectors and lights).
Uhm ... there already are laws against pirating software and reselling it. Why do we need to invoke the DMCA here? We don't, unless we're making it illegal to resell modified items, which makes every single "I'm selling my modded vehicle" classified-ad post illegal on the VW/Audi/BMW/Volvo/kitchen-sink family of sites I frequent, along with the site of the local VW club. But guess what ... they're not illegal, so it's DMCA FUD.
The real story is that these people were violating laws against selling pirated software.
It is important because it means that the manufacturer doesn't have any control with what you do with it after you buy it. You bought it; you can smash it with a hammer if you want or you can open it up and smash just part of it if you want or you can add something to it. It's yours; they have no say.
However, what a lot of people are missing here is that these people were putting illegal software on the boxes. That's the problem, not the fact that they were changing their own property, as they saw fit, and reselling it -- which IS allowed by the law. I can buy a computer, refinish the case in another color, and resell it, and the original manufacturer can't stop me from doing that.
Stupid editing strikes again.
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InformationWeek | Software Piracy | Trio Charged With Modifying Xboxes To Pirate Video Games | December 19, 2005
Another peer editing his own bio in violation of the guidelines users are expected to follow. And like it or not, there's more attention on him because he's the site's founder.
"As a company that tries to do no evil, we were quite pleased to see that [the force] outdraws [the dark side] in search queries."
So when will we see them admit that people are searching for [block banner ads] when they annoy people with graphical Google Ads?
And why the @*^!! is the browser useragent info and platform info still missing? "Do no evil"? I think it was wrong to pull that info out of the results. C'mon guys! Put it back!
You just cost some advertiser a shitload of money.
You're in the wrong place if you expect any sympathy for someone shoehorning more advertisements in front of people in an annoying way.
When Google knows, or should, that users don't like graphical ads because they usually get in the way of what they're there to look at (i.e. a news story) and flash and blink and bounce and whatnot, a lot of the time, to further annoy the user, then yeah, that's evil ... because it's making use of something Google knows (or should) that readers don't like. If their research tells them otherwise, their researchers are incompetent.
Navigation elements are not banners.
Site owners aren't in the business of dictating what users do. Site owners simply provide a starting point with a site design that customers can tweak through the use of browser preferences, extensions, and modifications to the way pages are displayed. It's a web designer's job to accomodate the customer, since it's the customer that has control, not the designer.
I guess that's a foreign concept to media that are used to spoon-feeding us everything from a silver platter and being in total control. Guess what. The world has changed. The customer/reader has the control now.
Don't like it? Not our fault; your site's broken. Fix it.
Good luck getting people to come back to your site when it doesn't work because you were idiotic enough to knowingly design it to break with common browser configurations. If people stop looking at your ads, it's your own fault because they said "Hey, the web designer who made this was a fucking moron, goodbye" and left.
YA RLY.
(And I'm not from SomethingAwful -- I've heard bad things about their userbase, such as they actively pick on people who have hobbies/interests that they think are beneath them, instead of shutting up and respecting others -- or LL -- what's LL?)
I just happen to like birds, particularly birds of prey, and the "oh really?" owl thing cracks me up.
You do realize that many university/college campuses at least here in the US are largely liberal? Universities do a lot of thinking, collectively -- that's what they do. I think your sig would be best applied to "party-line reciting morons" since they always let other people do all the thinking for them -- no matter which party they claim to be affiliated with.
Freeloaders aren't exactly a good thing either. Why should I expose myself to marketing BS just to get you an ipod that you're too cheap to buy for yourself? That's just selfish. Like too many people these days. Not giving a damn about others is responsible for a lot of our ills. Or have you not noticed that other countries don't like us anymore?
Pot. Kettle. Black.
I personally don't care what they are and aren't sharing, and the nature of what they are and aren't sharing. Is it relevant to the discussion? No, it is not. Does it unfairly characterise people because you have no idea what they're doing and you have no grounds for your baseless accusation? Yes, it does.
Oh, and by the way, EVERYTHING is copyrighted unless it's specifically disclaimed as not being under copyright, so not even that statement of yours is a fair one to make.
Theft: The act or an instance of stealing; larceny.
Larceny: The unlawful taking and removing of another's personal property with the intent of permanently depriving the owner; theft.
And you can't deprive anyone of anything if the item isn't tangible.
But continuing on this argument is stupid once I have to quote definitions, so I'm outta here.
File a lawsuit. They hacked your computer and caused damage and lost time. They should be compensating you for their illegal actions. Say, a shiny new top of the line computer sounds nice, eh? Plus punitive damages?
I know you were being a wiseass, but I'm going to call your stupidity anyway.
What the hell? Are we going to start suing people as we fail to realize that sites change over time? Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh.
Use a fucking search engine, dirtbag.
Which is not needed for fair use. Libraries allow reproduction for research purposes and it's up to the reader to govern themselves. I can walk down to the library downstairs, pull one of the medical journals off the shelf, and copy a pile of articles from it, in their entirety. I am allowed to do that because I am using them for research. Other than a notice posted describing the restrictions under which copying can be done, there's no one looking over my shoulder telling me what not to do. It's my own responsibility to police my actions, not anyone else's. A library organization, website, etc., merely provides the information.
Or is the RIAA gestapo going to invade libraries next?