Only the most broad definition of "contract" can include the body of US law
Why? What is different between a contract between myself and microsoft that I only acknowledge by installing the OS, or a contract between MS and the Gov that they acknowledge by incoprporating within this country? Surely with Bill's dad being a high-priced lawyer, he realized there were legal/contractual implications to incorporation, didn't he?
What's the difference? You seem to be drawing an arbitrary line between government and business that doesn't exist. You're not viewing the world objectively, but rather in an arbitrary manner where "government" is some collective bad entity and "business" is some collective good agency. There's no difference -- they both engage in contracts with customers, and are subject in turn to the demands those customers place on them.
It was not the least bit voluntary
Why not? they didn't have to make a company. No one held a gun to bill and paul's heads and told them "make a software company or we'll kill you". they made a company becauser they wanted to, and the did it in the US because they percieved they would be most successful here.
Contrary to your assertion, they can *not* go off and start their own country
Why not? And more importantly, so what? The free market doesn't say that your favored option is available, only that you have *some* options.
And all the existing countries have the same problems, so they don't have much of a choice.
again, so what? the free maket has said that only those countries are available. If MS doesn't like the available choices, too bad. It sounds a lot like the situation they're being criticized for -- not offering choice? You think 2 or 3 OS choices are enough for consumers, but 150 countries aren't enough for businesses? How is this any different? i don't like the terms of the MS user license, but I don't have a CHOICE other than using a different OS.
Why is it wrong for governments to not offer CHOICE but it's right for businesses?
Ayn rand moved from russia to the US at the beginning of her career because she decided the terms of being a citizen here were better than the terms of being a citizen in Russia. was she wrong? Did she not really have a choice? She sure acted like she did!
One aspect of a contract is that it should be clearly defined and should spell out specifically which actions are and are not allowed. I suggest you look at the history of antitrust law.
I suggest that you have little experience with contracts. Laws and legal systems and indeed the entire civil branch of the judicial system exist almost exclusively to determine which interpretation of a contract is correct. Even the most clearly spelled out contract is ambiguous. There is no such thing as a contract that is impossible to misinterpret or misapply under the proper circumstances.
Antitrust law is no more or less vague than any of the contracts MS has with it's OEM's.
That's my problem with antitrust law: that it is not a good law, nor is it a good "contract."
Then maybe Microsoft shouldn't have signed on. if Bill had decided dealing with complex contract terms was too much hassle he could have gone into used car sales. he obviously thought it was worth the trouble.
Because I think that laws should be based on broad moral principles, and in this case I think that antitrust law is immoral.
Well, what do you think laws are based on currently? random collections of letters skimmed off the top of alpha-bits?
laws ARE ways of establishing collective "moral" judgements of what is right and wrong, but in a way that lets everyone know clearly what's right and wrong.
I believe reason dictates that people take responsibility for their actions -- Microsoft was aware of the antitrust laws (as well as the rules of court) and has broken both of them. i believe it would be not only immoral but immature of them to believe that actions do not have consequences (especially when specific actions have attracted attention before).
if you (or MS) want to change the law, that's fine -- but as near as I can tell Microsoft is going against everything Ayn Rand stood for. Bill gates entered into a legal agreement (a contract) with the state of washington and the government of the united states when he incorporated microsoft years ago. Due to the beneficial terms of that agreement, MS has flourished by taking advantage of those governments' ability to HELP him do business. Now that MS has violated terms of that contract by breaking "laws", MS is unwilling to accept the contract terms stipulating that "breaking laws" has a penalty.
What you don't seem to realize is that Adam Smith was quite correct in describing government as a "social contract" -- it is no different than any other contract that you enter into. if you don't like it, don't sign it. Nothing is keeping Bill and MS in the USA other than his desire to profit off the terms of the contract he has with the government.
What is moral about breaking a contract? MS is capable of acting within the contract it agreed to -- namely the US laws regarding commerce and the regulation of corporate entities. If it doesn't like these contract terms, MS can make a contract with a different country, or start their own. Isn't this what self-determination and reason are all about? Ayn Rand states clearly that we are NOT products of outside forces -- MS is not a passive victim in this play, it is merely seeing the culmination of the consequences for it's actions under the terms of it's self-determinged contractual agreement.
Rand says clearly "You can't eat your cake and have it, too." -- What Microsoft wants is all the benefits of operating within it's contract with the US government but none of the disadvantages. I fail to see that this is moral, rational, or even logical.
Even today, if MS wanted to be rid of these consequences, they could dissolve the corporation and leave the US. But they don't want to -- they want to reap the benefits of their contract with the US government.
And as a by-the-by, why is it that the same people who think that big government is inherently evil think that big business is inherently good? Could it be that maybe, just maybe, any sort of large organization is bound to abuse its power, whether a government or a corporation?
Why, as a devout Randian I must protest your inaccurate statement. We believe firmly that only reason can justify belief, and reason tells us that every business in history has been nothing but good!
"It's about whether the high-tech industry will be driven by competition on the merits or by lawyers in smoke-filled rooms"
i find this statement funny -- most people tend to think businesses are run by businessmen in smoke-filled rooms. I'm not sure where the issue of tobacco use intersects that of morality, but I'll try to channel ayn rand tonight to find out.
"If Microsoft loses this case, it will open the doors for any successful tech company to be assaulted by its lesser competitors for being "anticompetitive" and "predatory.""
That's a lovely red herring, are you having it for dinner? What's on trial are MS's actions, and you are correct that if any other monopoly so flagrantly abuses it's monopoly power, it's likely that antitrust lawsa will be invoked.
you know, antitrust laws have been on the books for about a century now, and in that time the US has come to be the financial juggernaut of the world.
While I realize that tech companies love to believe they are doing something oh-so-different than the rest of the companies on the planet, the fact remains that the use of antitrust laws as a crying towel doesn't seem to have stopped production or innovation in any other industry, why should it do so in computers?
"The success of our industry is largely due to the absense of government meddling"
i find that statement preposterous -- the entire industry was made possible by "government meddling". Antitrust action against IBM made silicon valley possible by breaking the connection between hardware and software (and service, to an extent). But i suspect you live in the world where Microsoft was the beginning of computing and things before that were irrelevent...
"The moral issue is: is it right to punish Microsoft for using its well-earned influence in one market to promote its product in another market? How is this anything but a moral issue?"
How is it anything but a legal issue? The laws in this country prohibit it, the morals vary from town to town (and person to person).
judge jackson stated QUITE CLEARLY that there was some question as to whether Apple should be considered (or that the market was defined too narrowly) and he stated QUITE CLEARLY that EVEN IF APPLE WAS PART OF THE MARKET (in other words, even if he had defined the market exactly as you chide him for not defining it), his conclusions of fact would have been no different.
And you're right, Intel is not mentioned in anti-trust acts. But even not limiting it to Intel, just saying "desktop OS" winds up with the same legal findings...
As I've said elsewhere, this is a common antitrust trick:
So I suppose you've worked or studied a large number of antitrust cases to come to this conclusion? Your decades of legal study & courtroom experience outweight those of the judge, who has presumably seen such "tricks" before? I suspect that in an adversarial justice system, the attorneys on both side generally use the law to their favor in such "tricks".
I recall that MS got the "special master" removed from the case early on due to a similar "trick" but it didn't seem to help their case much. regardless of this "antitrust trick", the judge stated quite clearly in the findings of fact that the concusions reached would have been NO DIFFERENT had Apple been considered part of the relevent market. So i really wish folks would stop whining about apple being an alternative -- feel free to edit your version to include Apple in the relevent market and, as the judge stated, It'll have the same acts and conclusions...
Well, generally settling a case is done to save the time and expense of a trial. I don't see that it's "blackmail" (unless I misunderstand your use of that word) to offer a break, or to take a break, in penalty in return for saving everyone the trouble of court.
The vast, VAST majority of legal suits in this country never go to court, and are settled out of court because both sides (whether private individuals or government entities) recognize the finite assets anyone has to fight with (and I don't just mean money here, time is also a finite asset, as well as people).
This isn't blackmail, it's common sense -- "we all know the evidence will convict him, so we'll settle for a lesser punishment and we'll save taxpayers the time and effort of prosecuting".
Personally I doubt the DOJ would approve a settlement that didn't have significant teeth (they learned their lesson from the consent decree -- that's why they stopped fighting it and came back with a full-press antitrust suit).
I'd prefer to see it go all the way to the end, that way you're guaranteed that the findings of fact are entered in the record. It doen't even matter what the penalty is -- the real penalty will be that Caldera and everyone else MS has screwed can use the FOF against them in their own suits. Once labeled a monopoly as legal fact, MS will find buying companies and ripping off technologies a lot trickier.
That, or someone who's still too young/naive to realize Ayn Rand and the Scientologists don't really have the secrets to happiness locked in a trunk in the basement...
I can't believe that no one is getting upset about this -- if microsoft was doing this you'd all be shitting your pants!
I find it absolutely unbelieveable that RealNetworks has the gall to send information that ISN'T authorized (this is NOT the checkbox for sending your registration information) wihtout any notification or ability to opt out whatsoever.
There is a BIIIIIG difference between sending an email address and constantly tracking what a person is doing. this software tells RealNetworks how many audio files you have on your system, how frequently you listen to them, etc, etc -- this is not some innocent marketing crap!
This is nothing like watching people's online activity, where you know your packets are being sent all over for anyone to grab. This is you, sitting at your personal computer that you paid for, providing Real with all the information they could ever dream of without them ever telling you about it. This is spying, and I sure as hell hope someone DOES sue the idiots as the attorney in the article suggested miught be possible.
Re:Hard science fiction is soft
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Darwin's Radio
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· Score: 1
You haven't read the book -- your issues are answered in a scientifically plausible way.
POSSIBLE SPOILER
Parents won't be similar to their children -- that's the whole idea of a virus changing the human species. But maybe they will be given adaptations so that they can interact with their "different" children better.
And yes, if it's a speciation event, then a neanderthal could give birth to a homo sapien -- that doesn't mean the dead homo sapien is the end of ALL homo sapiens -- that's the whole point of the book (evolution isn't an "accident" that only happens in isolated incidents).
Re:any geeks out there who don't read SF?
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Pasquale's Angel
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· Score: 1
My family devours sci-fi as if paper grew on trees, but for some reason I never caught the bug. I read almost exclusively non-fiction, but generally a lot of psychology, forensics, biography, etc.
I still read sci-fi occassionally, but no more than any other fiction. I'd rather read 19th century french lit (for some reason it grabs me)...
I hear this advice all the time, and I can assure you it is completely untrue -- mailing yourself something does nothing to prove when it was created and has NO legal basis whatsoever.
What would prevent you from mailing yourself an unsealed envelope, getting it postmarked, and putting a great idea in the envelope 3 years later?
seriously, legal advice from rumors is a bad way to start a business...
While I don't think anyone will doubt that the/. effect (I can't bring myself to call it the "Slashdot Interval") on the Jane's article will probably be very beneficial (we haven't seen the final article, yet!), I don't know that this kind of open, public peer review would be as beneficial in every situation.
For example, Katz suggests posting stories online for fact checking and feedback of people involved in the topics. That's fine for topics involving verifiable factual issues, or highly technical discussion within a community like/., where the self-selection makes it difficult to "pretend" like you know what you're talking about due to the large amount of peer-review.
But, as Katz suggests, an article on the Pentagon or defense department would probably NOT see as much benefit. You'll see a much greater attempt to ballot-stuff if they're looking for employees to comment, or trying to get a general sense of what's going on. These type of discussions can only be skewed by allowing a self-selecting group to have a significant amount of input.
Granted, that's not to say this is inherently a bad idea -- after all, our own governmental elections are self-selecting, and we're very used to seeing the results skewed in favor of whatever self-selecting group "gets out the vote", since only 50% of the public (at most) votes in any given election.
But journalism isn't supposed to be a democracy, where whoever votes early and often gets to influence the final outcome of the story. I'd hate to see the next Watergate overlooked because the CREEP managed to get enough people to post misleading comments and "facts" that are unverifiable until the whole story comes out a decade or three later.
I'm also concerened about the potential INCREASE in the number of errors that would be propogated through this method. If it was standard practice to post stories with the expectation that mistakes would be corrected later, we'd have serious trouble trying to establish a clear historical record of facts. Most drafts are lost to history for good reason -- they're wrong, poorly edited, and in general unsuitable for public view. This method would make drafts enter the electronic archives of the world with an alarming frequency, and it would be up to the researcher or reader to determine after the fact if the story was later "updated" with correct information. Remember this is a decentralized system of information, so having it updated on CNN.com doesn't mean the cached copy of the "wrong" version isn't going to wind up somewhere it shouldn't be.
Keep in mind that a lot of those Washington folks get online with Erols, so it's not that much of a bragging right (g).
If only Bell Atlantic would get off their monopoly asses and get some DSL to the east coast, then the DC corridor could have something to brag about...
And you're correct that there's a lot of weird stuff like that. there's only so much shifting of legal responsibility VISA can do, though. You can't sign away your rights, as many people are fond of pointing out, so the most they could do is try to intimidate customers with the contract they signed.
But ultimately this isn't the big deal everyone makes it out to be -- these are exactly the costs that plague any money-lending group (no more online than in the real world). you know some percentage of your loans are going to be bad or default or whatever, but the increase in efficiency offered by automatic processing usually more than makes up the difference...
In all likelyhood, VISA will simply charge-back the gambling group. if the gambling group wants to keep their ability to process VISA cards in the future they'll live with it (and operating e-commerce means taking credit cards or going out of business, so I suspect they'd like to keep the account).
That's how it works, and why VISA and MC are generally able to write off things like this without a big hassle. i've gotten charge-backs for all sorts of things, from malicious retailers who deliberately tried to screw me to people who just send the wrong item. One call to your credit card company will usually have the merchant screaming "uncle".
the net result of this will not be a "chilling effect on the growing online economy" but the gambling group taking more care to ensure they're dealing with legal gamblers -- just remember that at the end of the day, the house ALWAYS wins:)...
Of course VISA can regulate the use of the card -- they're the ones loaning you money. it's their money, and if they decide one day that you won't be able to charge anything at Sears, then you better have another card in your pocket if you want to buy something at Sears.
And if you want to buy something that's illegal, VISA better have a check in the system to not authorize the purchase, since they know they won't be able to collect. this is not new, or specific to E-commerce, it's long-standing law that contracts in which one party is engaging in illegal activity have no binding. That's why a hooker can't take a john to court if he doesn't pay (but you'll probably visit the ER sometime soon)...
VISA and MC have always had to accept that a certain amount of their charges would be written off, and they've always had to deal with holding the bag when illegal things occur through their streamlined channels. they've consciously made the decision that they'd rather lose a little money to bad transactions than be less efficient by checking each one.
For example, if a bank sends a VISA card to a 12-year old and the kid goes around buying stuff, VISA is gonna get stuck paying the bill because they "approved" the charges when they were made, and only later discovered that they had screwed up in the issuing process. Why should it be different if they're "approving" charges for things that aren't legal?
But it's not impossible for VISA to police this. They approve the transaction automatically through their computer system rather than be inefficient and do it over the phone like it used to be done. if they want to be more efficient, then they have to pay the price for letting more bad approvals happen.
Since the approvals are done automatically through a computer, why can't the computer have certain vendors (like gun stores, gambling outfits, etc) automatically check against the purchaser's locality and thus the governing laws (much like they currently do for sales taxes or shipping charges).
We can all agree she's pretty spineless to not take responsibility for her actions, BUT, VISA similarly has to take responsibility for making illegal loans. they can't put everything to run automatically on a computer and then plead "we didn't know it happened!"
I have to agree -- i think all this "monte carlo simulation" will prove is that the factors taken into consideration will show themselves quite clearly when calculated a billion times against themselves.
Start with the assumption that deforestation will remove X amount of oxygen from the atmosphere? Guess what -- our results showed that, in 75% of the simulations done where deforestation continued at current rates, it resulted in X amount of oxygen being removed from the air, so we better stop deforestation quickly!
Slashdot Mirror
Damn! Everyone's really punchy this morning!
I guess it's better than flaming each other, but it's odd we'd all come to the LCD discussion for our kicks this week!...
Whoa! I think your sarcasm meter is defective!
Or i'm being too subtle for my own good...
Only the most broad definition of "contract" can include the body of US law
Why? What is different between a contract between myself and microsoft that I only acknowledge by installing the OS, or a contract between MS and the Gov that they acknowledge by incoprporating within this country? Surely with Bill's dad being a high-priced lawyer, he realized there were legal/contractual implications to incorporation, didn't he?
What's the difference? You seem to be drawing an arbitrary line between government and business that doesn't exist. You're not viewing the world objectively, but rather in an arbitrary manner where "government" is some collective bad entity and "business" is some collective good agency. There's no difference -- they both engage in contracts with customers, and are subject in turn to the demands those customers place on them.
It was not the least bit voluntary
Why not? they didn't have to make a company. No one held a gun to bill and paul's heads and told them "make a software company or we'll kill you". they made a company becauser they wanted to, and the did it in the US because they percieved they would be most successful here.
Contrary to your assertion, they can *not* go off and start their own country
Why not? And more importantly, so what? The free market doesn't say that your favored option is available, only that you have *some* options.
And all the existing countries have the same problems, so they don't have much of a choice.
again, so what? the free maket has said that only those countries are available. If MS doesn't like the available choices, too bad. It sounds a lot like the situation they're being criticized for -- not offering choice? You think 2 or 3 OS choices are enough for consumers, but 150 countries aren't enough for businesses? How is this any different? i don't like the terms of the MS user license, but I don't have a CHOICE other than using a different OS.
Why is it wrong for governments to not offer CHOICE but it's right for businesses?
Ayn rand moved from russia to the US at the beginning of her career because she decided the terms of being a citizen here were better than the terms of being a citizen in Russia. was she wrong? Did she not really have a choice? She sure acted like she did!
One aspect of a contract is that it should be clearly defined and should spell out specifically which actions are and are not allowed. I suggest you look at the history of antitrust law.
I suggest that you have little experience with contracts. Laws and legal systems and indeed the entire civil branch of the judicial system exist almost exclusively to determine which interpretation of a contract is correct. Even the most clearly spelled out contract is ambiguous. There is no such thing as a contract that is impossible to misinterpret or misapply under the proper circumstances.
Antitrust law is no more or less vague than any of the contracts MS has with it's OEM's.
That's my problem with antitrust law: that it is not a good law, nor is it a good "contract."
Then maybe Microsoft shouldn't have signed on. if Bill had decided dealing with complex contract terms was too much hassle he could have gone into used car sales. he obviously thought it was worth the trouble.
Because I think that laws should be based on broad moral principles, and in this case I think that antitrust law is immoral.
Well, what do you think laws are based on currently? random collections of letters skimmed off the top of alpha-bits?
laws ARE ways of establishing collective "moral" judgements of what is right and wrong, but in a way that lets everyone know clearly what's right and wrong.
I believe reason dictates that people take responsibility for their actions -- Microsoft was aware of the antitrust laws (as well as the rules of court) and has broken both of them. i believe it would be not only immoral but immature of them to believe that actions do not have consequences (especially when specific actions have attracted attention before).
if you (or MS) want to change the law, that's fine -- but as near as I can tell Microsoft is going against everything Ayn Rand stood for. Bill gates entered into a legal agreement (a contract) with the state of washington and the government of the united states when he incorporated microsoft years ago. Due to the beneficial terms of that agreement, MS has flourished by taking advantage of those governments' ability to HELP him do business. Now that MS has violated terms of that contract by breaking "laws", MS is unwilling to accept the contract terms stipulating that "breaking laws" has a penalty.
What you don't seem to realize is that Adam Smith was quite correct in describing government as a "social contract" -- it is no different than any other contract that you enter into. if you don't like it, don't sign it. Nothing is keeping Bill and MS in the USA other than his desire to profit off the terms of the contract he has with the government.
What is moral about breaking a contract? MS is capable of acting within the contract it agreed to -- namely the US laws regarding commerce and the regulation of corporate entities. If it doesn't like these contract terms, MS can make a contract with a different country, or start their own. Isn't this what self-determination and reason are all about? Ayn Rand states clearly that we are NOT products of outside forces -- MS is not a passive victim in this play, it is merely seeing the culmination of the consequences for it's actions under the terms of it's self-determinged contractual agreement.
Rand says clearly "You can't eat your cake and have it, too." -- What Microsoft wants is all the benefits of operating within it's contract with the US government but none of the disadvantages. I fail to see that this is moral, rational, or even logical.
Even today, if MS wanted to be rid of these consequences, they could dissolve the corporation and leave the US. But they don't want to -- they want to reap the benefits of their contract with the US government.
nathaniel
Well, maybe if MS let OEMs (or *gasp* - customers!) decide which browser to install the issue of downloading wouldn't have to come up.
And as a by-the-by, why is it that the same people who think that big government is inherently evil think that big business is inherently good? Could it be that maybe, just maybe, any sort of large organization is bound to abuse its power, whether a government or a corporation?
Why, as a devout Randian I must protest your inaccurate statement. We believe firmly that only reason can justify belief, and reason tells us that every business in history has been nothing but good!
"It's about whether the high-tech industry will be driven by competition on the merits or by lawyers in smoke-filled rooms"
i find this statement funny -- most people tend to think businesses are run by businessmen in smoke-filled rooms. I'm not sure where the issue of tobacco use intersects that of morality, but I'll try to channel ayn rand tonight to find out.
"If Microsoft loses this case, it will open the doors for any successful tech company to be assaulted by its lesser competitors for being "anticompetitive" and "predatory.""
That's a lovely red herring, are you having it for dinner? What's on trial are MS's actions, and you are correct that if any other monopoly so flagrantly abuses it's monopoly power, it's likely that antitrust lawsa will be invoked.
you know, antitrust laws have been on the books for about a century now, and in that time the US has come to be the financial juggernaut of the world.
While I realize that tech companies love to believe they are doing something oh-so-different than the rest of the companies on the planet, the fact remains that the use of antitrust laws as a crying towel doesn't seem to have stopped production or innovation in any other industry, why should it do so in computers?
"The success of our industry is largely due to the absense of government meddling"
i find that statement preposterous -- the entire industry was made possible by "government meddling". Antitrust action against IBM made silicon valley possible by breaking the connection between hardware and software (and service, to an extent). But i suspect you live in the world where Microsoft was the beginning of computing and things before that were irrelevent...
"The moral issue is: is it right to punish Microsoft for using its well-earned influence in one market to promote its product in another market? How is this anything but a moral issue?"
How is it anything but a legal issue? The laws in this country prohibit it, the morals vary from town to town (and person to person).
judge jackson stated QUITE CLEARLY that there was some question as to whether Apple should be considered (or that the market was defined too narrowly) and he stated QUITE CLEARLY that EVEN IF APPLE WAS PART OF THE MARKET (in other words, even if he had defined the market exactly as you chide him for not defining it), his conclusions of fact would have been no different.
And you're right, Intel is not mentioned in anti-trust acts. But even not limiting it to Intel, just saying "desktop OS" winds up with the same legal findings...
As I've said elsewhere, this is a common antitrust trick:
So I suppose you've worked or studied a large number of antitrust cases to come to this conclusion? Your decades of legal study & courtroom experience outweight those of the judge, who has presumably seen such "tricks" before? I suspect that in an adversarial justice system, the attorneys on both side generally use the law to their favor in such "tricks".
I recall that MS got the "special master" removed from the case early on due to a similar "trick" but it didn't seem to help their case much. regardless of this "antitrust trick", the judge stated quite clearly in the findings of fact that the concusions reached would have been NO DIFFERENT had Apple been considered part of the relevent market. So i really wish folks would stop whining about apple being an alternative -- feel free to edit your version to include Apple in the relevent market and, as the judge stated, It'll have the same acts and conclusions...
Well, generally settling a case is done to save the time and expense of a trial. I don't see that it's "blackmail" (unless I misunderstand your use of that word) to offer a break, or to take a break, in penalty in return for saving everyone the trouble of court.
The vast, VAST majority of legal suits in this country never go to court, and are settled out of court because both sides (whether private individuals or government entities) recognize the finite assets anyone has to fight with (and I don't just mean money here, time is also a finite asset, as well as people).
This isn't blackmail, it's common sense -- "we all know the evidence will convict him, so we'll settle for a lesser punishment and we'll save taxpayers the time and effort of prosecuting".
Personally I doubt the DOJ would approve a settlement that didn't have significant teeth (they learned their lesson from the consent decree -- that's why they stopped fighting it and came back with a full-press antitrust suit).
I'd prefer to see it go all the way to the end, that way you're guaranteed that the findings of fact are entered in the record. It doen't even matter what the penalty is -- the real penalty will be that Caldera and everyone else MS has screwed can use the FOF against them in their own suits. Once labeled a monopoly as legal fact, MS will find buying companies and ripping off technologies a lot trickier.
Sniff...I smell astroturf!
That, or someone who's still too young/naive to realize Ayn Rand and the Scientologists don't really have the secrets to happiness locked in a trunk in the basement...
I can't believe that no one is getting upset about this -- if microsoft was doing this you'd all be shitting your pants!
I find it absolutely unbelieveable that RealNetworks has the gall to send information that ISN'T authorized (this is NOT the checkbox for sending your registration information) wihtout any notification or ability to opt out whatsoever.
There is a BIIIIIG difference between sending an email address and constantly tracking what a person is doing. this software tells RealNetworks how many audio files you have on your system, how frequently you listen to them, etc, etc -- this is not some innocent marketing crap!
This is nothing like watching people's online activity, where you know your packets are being sent all over for anyone to grab. This is you, sitting at your personal computer that you paid for, providing Real with all the information they could ever dream of without them ever telling you about it. This is spying, and I sure as hell hope someone DOES sue the idiots as the attorney in the article suggested miught be possible.
Man caused the virus that changed man.
You haven't read the book -- your issues are answered in a scientifically plausible way.
POSSIBLE SPOILER
Parents won't be similar to their children -- that's the whole idea of a virus changing the human species. But maybe they will be given adaptations so that they can interact with their "different" children better.
And yes, if it's a speciation event, then a neanderthal could give birth to a homo sapien -- that doesn't mean the dead homo sapien is the end of ALL homo sapiens -- that's the whole point of the book (evolution isn't an "accident" that only happens in isolated incidents).
My family devours sci-fi as if paper grew on trees, but for some reason I never caught the bug. I read almost exclusively non-fiction, but generally a lot of psychology, forensics, biography, etc.
I still read sci-fi occassionally, but no more than any other fiction. I'd rather read 19th century french lit (for some reason it grabs me)...
I hear this advice all the time, and I can assure you it is completely untrue -- mailing yourself something does nothing to prove when it was created and has NO legal basis whatsoever.
What would prevent you from mailing yourself an unsealed envelope, getting it postmarked, and putting a great idea in the envelope 3 years later?
seriously, legal advice from rumors is a bad way to start a business...
While I don't think anyone will doubt that the /. effect (I can't bring myself to call it the "Slashdot Interval") on the Jane's article will probably be very beneficial (we haven't seen the final article, yet!), I don't know that this kind of open, public peer review would be as beneficial in every situation.
/., where the self-selection makes it difficult to "pretend" like you know what you're talking about due to the large amount of peer-review.
For example, Katz suggests posting stories online for fact checking and feedback of people involved in the topics. That's fine for topics involving verifiable factual issues, or highly technical discussion within a community like
But, as Katz suggests, an article on the Pentagon or defense department would probably NOT see as much benefit. You'll see a much greater attempt to ballot-stuff if they're looking for employees to comment, or trying to get a general sense of what's going on. These type of discussions can only be skewed by allowing a self-selecting group to have a significant amount of input.
Granted, that's not to say this is inherently a bad idea -- after all, our own governmental elections are self-selecting, and we're very used to seeing the results skewed in favor of whatever self-selecting group "gets out the vote", since only 50% of the public (at most) votes in any given election.
But journalism isn't supposed to be a democracy, where whoever votes early and often gets to influence the final outcome of the story. I'd hate to see the next Watergate overlooked because the CREEP managed to get enough people to post misleading comments and "facts" that are unverifiable until the whole story comes out a decade or three later.
I'm also concerened about the potential INCREASE in the number of errors that would be propogated through this method. If it was standard practice to post stories with the expectation that mistakes would be corrected later, we'd have serious trouble trying to establish a clear historical record of facts. Most drafts are lost to history for good reason -- they're wrong, poorly edited, and in general unsuitable for public view. This method would make drafts enter the electronic archives of the world with an alarming frequency, and it would be up to the researcher or reader to determine after the fact if the story was later "updated" with correct information. Remember this is a decentralized system of information, so having it updated on CNN.com doesn't mean the cached copy of the "wrong" version isn't going to wind up somewhere it shouldn't be.
Keep in mind that a lot of those Washington folks get online with Erols, so it's not that much of a bragging right (g).
If only Bell Atlantic would get off their monopoly asses and get some DSL to the east coast, then the DC corridor could have something to brag about...
And you're correct that there's a lot of weird stuff like that. there's only so much shifting of legal responsibility VISA can do, though. You can't sign away your rights, as many people are fond of pointing out, so the most they could do is try to intimidate customers with the contract they signed.
But ultimately this isn't the big deal everyone makes it out to be -- these are exactly the costs that plague any money-lending group (no more online than in the real world). you know some percentage of your loans are going to be bad or default or whatever, but the increase in efficiency offered by automatic processing usually more than makes up the difference...
In all likelyhood, VISA will simply charge-back the gambling group. if the gambling group wants to keep their ability to process VISA cards in the future they'll live with it (and operating e-commerce means taking credit cards or going out of business, so I suspect they'd like to keep the account).
:)...
That's how it works, and why VISA and MC are generally able to write off things like this without a big hassle. i've gotten charge-backs for all sorts of things, from malicious retailers who deliberately tried to screw me to people who just send the wrong item. One call to your credit card company will usually have the merchant screaming "uncle".
the net result of this will not be a "chilling effect on the growing online economy" but the gambling group taking more care to ensure they're dealing with legal gamblers -- just remember that at the end of the day, the house ALWAYS wins
Of course VISA can regulate the use of the card -- they're the ones loaning you money. it's their money, and if they decide one day that you won't be able to charge anything at Sears, then you better have another card in your pocket if you want to buy something at Sears.
And if you want to buy something that's illegal, VISA better have a check in the system to not authorize the purchase, since they know they won't be able to collect. this is not new, or specific to E-commerce, it's long-standing law that contracts in which one party is engaging in illegal activity have no binding. That's why a hooker can't take a john to court if he doesn't pay (but you'll probably visit the ER sometime soon)...
VISA and MC have always had to accept that a certain amount of their charges would be written off, and they've always had to deal with holding the bag when illegal things occur through their streamlined channels. they've consciously made the decision that they'd rather lose a little money to bad transactions than be less efficient by checking each one.
For example, if a bank sends a VISA card to a 12-year old and the kid goes around buying stuff, VISA is gonna get stuck paying the bill because they "approved" the charges when they were made, and only later discovered that they had screwed up in the issuing process. Why should it be different if they're "approving" charges for things that aren't legal?
But it's not impossible for VISA to police this. They approve the transaction automatically through their computer system rather than be inefficient and do it over the phone like it used to be done. if they want to be more efficient, then they have to pay the price for letting more bad approvals happen.
Since the approvals are done automatically through a computer, why can't the computer have certain vendors (like gun stores, gambling outfits, etc) automatically check against the purchaser's locality and thus the governing laws (much like they currently do for sales taxes or shipping charges).
We can all agree she's pretty spineless to not take responsibility for her actions, BUT, VISA similarly has to take responsibility for making illegal loans. they can't put everything to run automatically on a computer and then plead "we didn't know it happened!"
I have to agree -- i think all this "monte carlo simulation" will prove is that the factors taken into consideration will show themselves quite clearly when calculated a billion times against themselves.
Start with the assumption that deforestation will remove X amount of oxygen from the atmosphere? Guess what -- our results showed that, in 75% of the simulations done where deforestation continued at current rates, it resulted in X amount of oxygen being removed from the air, so we better stop deforestation quickly!