The "the right to govern our own communities as an element of the right to community and local self-government" is a can of worms that will cause major issues for any large companies or companies that work in many jurisdictions.
If every jurisdiction was allowed to make laws abut everything then the country would become a patchwork of sometime conflicting statutes. No company that works nation wide could deal with it.
Local self government has its limits. Should a local government be able to ban hazardous goods shipments(they can go around)? Should they be able to ban trucks built before 2005 for emission reasons? Think of the issues for a long haul trucker. At every state, county and municipal border he would have to check it see if he could take his load in the current truck through.
This whole issue seems to forget that DC is not a separate country. Everyone votes for representatives that go to DC. If you want a law that is controlled by the federal government changed the lobby your federal representative.
Why should artistic works have a limit on their ability to provide income to the artist? Just because it is reproducible does not mean it should be of no value. There are great photographers such as Ansel Adams whose books sell quite well today. Why should someone be able to copy his works and make money from them?
technically you are correct though if one allows a copyright items to be used it is much more difficult to get a good judgment when you want one. The question a copyright holder does not want to answer in a court of law is "You didn't sue him; why are you suing me? Why are you discriminating against me". The holder may win the case but the award will probably be much lower.
USB should have done this. I'm always needing to plug in a USB connector under a table or somewhere it's too dark. Also, as I get older, my eyes don't focus close in as well as they used to. USB also shouldn't be the same width as an RJ45.
I solved that problem by having a 4 port USB hub on my desk. No more crouching.
One major point you missed; the photographer was never asked, on bended knee or not, for permission to use the photograph.
Another reasonable explanation is self preservation. A photographer makes his living by selling photographs and rights to photographs. If a photographer does not defend those rights by lawsuits then those rights go away. Photographs do not become public domain just because they are published.
In my opinion this is a specially clear cut case. Using a slightly modified version of a well known album cover without permission to sell an album of similar music is clearly not fair use. This is where the issue comes in and law suits occur. Opinions differ and only courts decide who is right. Sure they licensed the songs but they didn't license the cover art.
All lawsuits start with a threat of maximum damages as per statutes. It is the beginning bargaining position. The fact that it was settled for $32.5K means that the lawyer got most of it and very little went to the photographer.
Anecdotal blanket statements like this are invalid. Autism, and I have it, is a spectrum disorder. It effects different people in different ways. Just because your brother, and probably a few more autistic kids, can not handle the bracelet does not mean that thousands of other autistic children won't wear it. The fact that some autistic children will not tolerate it does not men it should not be tried.
To all the "they'll take it off', "it will fail", "Autistics won't wear it", etc get a grip. No single solution will work with all people all the time but throwing a system that can protect 90% of the people wearing it is a good thing. Just because it is not perfect does not mean it should not be done.
Equating theft of trade secrets to software piracy is invalid. Theft of trade secrets is not someone making a copy of a product and using it. It is much closer to a company stealing a Gold release of a game, cutting DVDs and selling them before the game is released. Even/.ers would agree that is a criminal offence.
It is not about a "stupid plastic case", it is about the tens, if not hundreds of thousands, of dollars profit that the thieves will make instead of Apple. It is the same as if the thieves stole cash from Apple (or any company for that matter). It's not a game; theft of information costs companies millions, if not billions, each year. The fact that Apple was involved probably made it a story. Anything the happens with Apple in China gets reported very well. I doubt very much that this is the only case of trade secret theft that has garnered prison time in China.
Lets replace Apple secrets with your car.
And if it's an issue where you want to keep your car until you get rid of it, then it should be up to you to protect your car, the government or law should not interfere; should you fail to keep your car then you should have only yourself to blame.
How about a bank with cash?
if it's an issue where a bank wants to keep cash, then it should be up to the bank to protect the cash, the government or law should not interfere; should the bank fail to keep the cash they should have only themselves to blame.
By stealing the information and making covers the thieves deprived Apple and anyone who legitimately paid for the trade secrets of income. The thieves could sell their covers for less and therefore have a competitive advantage. It is the same as stealing your car or cash from a bank; theft is theft be it information or hard goods.
How is punishment for theft of trade secrets oppression? How is theft of a trade secret any different from theft of manufactured goods? Money went into creating those trade secrets. Trade secrets have a monetary value and are bought and sold every day. Should car theft be handled in civil court? Theft is still theft be it information or goods. Why should attempts be exempt from the law? Even if an attempt failed the intent to commit the act was still there. No one should get off the hook because they are a poor thief; they are still a thief.
Take this scenario. Company A spends money researching to create trade secrets for a new product. Company B steals those secrets and, due to $0 R&D costs, sells the item for less than company A. Company A never recoups the R&D costs and loses money on the project. Do you think that will help bring new products to market? Do you think company B should be convicted of a crime just the same as as they would if they stole product coming off an assembly line? I sure do.
Chapter 90 is Protection of Trade Secrets 1831 is "economic espionage" because it is by or on the behest of a foreign government. There is military espionage, political espionage and economic espionage with the key component being the involvement of a foreign government. 1832 is "theft of trade secrets" by companies and or individuals and is not called espionage. They are separate sections dealing with separate crimes.
The lack of limit of the fine for individuals under 1832 is probably an oversight and would therefore be decided by a judge or jury governed by past fines due to common law. Corporate limits are more so that overzealous juries do not get out of hand. Juries can identify more with a person than they can with a corporation and therefore go easier on people.
Eighteen months for stealing thousands of dollars worth of information so someone can make tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars in profit is not overkill in my book at all. Apple is probably selling the specs for the case to manufacturers of covers. This one decided to steal the information rather than buy it.
Security is a concern with many small reactors. It would take quite a few of them to generate sufficient energy and ever one would be a target for terrorism. All it would take is a small bomb to cripple the coolant and/or crack the containment and you have a major disaster.
I am actually for nuclear energy but on a larger scale where the risk and security is more concentrated.
X-ray radiation? Haha. If we'd had your Luddite attitude throughout all of our history, we'd still be living in caves. Take your anti-intellectualism and shove it.
First I am not a Luddite. I embrace all new technology and so not sabotage it. Second, I am not an anti-intellectualist. I am a pro-usefulness. When we can afford it we should do "pure research"; now is not the time.
I think what confuses me the most is that much of the research being done today will not bear fruit for decades if not centuries. That research can be done later. Ion drives, climatology satellites, solar observatories, GPS satellites; all excellent works. Sending a spacecraft to take pictures of Pluto? Not useful. I would rather have a working electricity grid on earth today than a few high resolution pictures of Pluto. But electricity is not a sexy as Pluto.
Sorry but most of the NASA missions on that list will have no effect on the day-to-day life of people on earth. Knowledge for the sake of knowledge is not all that high on my priority list. Birth of the cosmos, water on Mars, xray radiation, etc. will not improve the quality of life here on earth. How about we deal with things here on earth before we spend money on the universe. Sure there are a few projects dealing with climatology that are important but most of them are cool but of no practical purpose.
The article should really look a bit into why container ships are loaded the way they are. The article contends, with no fact to support this contention, that one of the issue is that heavy containers that are loaded high on the sip are a major cause of the issue. Their solution is to load heavy containers first. Lets look into what would be required to do this feat.
1a. Every time a container come it it would be sorted by size so that the large one would be easily accessed first.
Issues:
containers come in one at a time over quite a long period of time. what happens if many light ones come after all the heavy ones? The heavy ones get burried. 1b. Alternately, sort the containers before they are loaded.
This would require more space and handling each container at least one additional time.
Lets assume that all the heavy containers are in the bottom of the ship. The article neglects the fact that container ships usually make more than one offloading stop. They are currently loaded so that the containers can be unloaded at each stop while still maintaining the balance of the ship. If the heavy containers are at the bottom, it would require unloading containers above the heavy containers, unloading the heavy containers and re-loading the light containers. This takes time and space.
Every minute a container ship is tied up at a dock costs money. The sorting and excess loading/unloading take time. Most ports are also very crowded and do not have the space required to do the sorting of containers to make sure heavy containers are loaded lower. There is also a limited number of berths for container ships. The longer a ship is in port means fewer ships can be loaded and unloaded by that port.
One final point, everything breaks. Even light containers go overboard. A perfect example is the container full of tires. Compared to shipments such as metals, tires are relatively light but a container full of them still went overboard. Given rough enough water even an empty container can break loose.
Here are some of the parameters that container loading software uses to place containers on a ship.
the weight of each container being handled
which port each container will be unloaded at
if the container is refrigerated, and needs to be plugged in during the voyage
if the container’s contents are hazardous, as these could be potentially explosive if placed next to a refrigerated container
advising Customs of the ship’s arrival and reporting the cargo on board
the order in which the containers will be loaded and unloaded. A lot of science goes into the efficient loading and unloading of containers; sorting by weight is taken into account but not the overriding consideration.
Except for steel railings, the shippers do everything you have mentioned. The reason for no railing is that the containers themselves are the structure and they are stacked far above the hull of the ship.
The issue is that they didn't read the law before filing a suit. The only protection an unregistered trademark has in if the new user is passing their products off as being made by the original holder. Since all advertisement where Apple uses the iCloud mark they also use their Apple mark this is not happening. The are going to lose in court and the lawyer who recommended they sue will get paid as usual.
As long as Apple is not attempting to "pass off" their services as coming from iCloud Communications there is not a problem. The only protection an unregistered trademark as is against misrepresenting the source of the product or service. Apple is not doing that.
Check the court filing document. iCloud Communications is not claiming they have registered the mark anywhere. They are claiming that it is theirs because they use it.
I guess iCloud Communications should be introduced to the USPTO. I did a quick search on the trademark iCloud and came up with 12 filed by Apple and one owned by Xcerion AB CORPORATION SWEDEN (registered in 2010). If you want to protect a trademark then register it.
The important aspect about the library is that it is a walled garden. Anything that comes into a library is catalogues and sorted into sections. There is a specific, generally accepted criteria that defines what is children's literature. Anything that is not categorized does not get in. This classification process does not exist on the internet; nor should it. The contents of the internet is too dynamic to be able to keep such a classification accurate or up to date.
The other issue is that children do not just use the kid lit area. They use reference, history, crafts, etc. In fact they can go all over the library.
Another hit to the comparison is that there is no erotica section in most libraries though it defiantly exists on the internet.
The bottom line is that a library is a pretty 'safe' place for a child to wander around unsupervised and look at books; the internet is not;and never will be.
Slashdot Mirror
The "the right to govern our own communities as an element of the right to community and local self-government" is a can of worms that will cause major issues for any large companies or companies that work in many jurisdictions.
Here is a site with many state laws that have been struck down due to their effect on interstate trade. http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/conlaw/statecommerce.htm
If every jurisdiction was allowed to make laws abut everything then the country would become a patchwork of sometime conflicting statutes. No company that works nation wide could deal with it.
Local self government has its limits. Should a local government be able to ban hazardous goods shipments(they can go around)? Should they be able to ban trucks built before 2005 for emission reasons? Think of the issues for a long haul trucker. At every state, county and municipal border he would have to check it see if he could take his load in the current truck through.
This whole issue seems to forget that DC is not a separate country. Everyone votes for representatives that go to DC. If you want a law that is controlled by the federal government changed the lobby your federal representative.
Why should artistic works have a limit on their ability to provide income to the artist? Just because it is reproducible does not mean it should be of no value. There are great photographers such as Ansel Adams whose books sell quite well today. Why should someone be able to copy his works and make money from them?
technically you are correct though if one allows a copyright items to be used it is much more difficult to get a good judgment when you want one. The question a copyright holder does not want to answer in a court of law is "You didn't sue him; why are you suing me? Why are you discriminating against me". The holder may win the case but the award will probably be much lower.
USB should have done this. I'm always needing to plug in a USB connector under a table or somewhere it's too dark. Also, as I get older, my eyes don't focus close in as well as they used to. USB also shouldn't be the same width as an RJ45.
I solved that problem by having a 4 port USB hub on my desk. No more crouching.
One major point you missed; the photographer was never asked, on bended knee or not, for permission to use the photograph.
Another reasonable explanation is self preservation. A photographer makes his living by selling photographs and rights to photographs. If a photographer does not defend those rights by lawsuits then those rights go away. Photographs do not become public domain just because they are published.
In my opinion this is a specially clear cut case. Using a slightly modified version of a well known album cover without permission to sell an album of similar music is clearly not fair use. This is where the issue comes in and law suits occur. Opinions differ and only courts decide who is right. Sure they licensed the songs but they didn't license the cover art.
All lawsuits start with a threat of maximum damages as per statutes. It is the beginning bargaining position. The fact that it was settled for $32.5K means that the lawyer got most of it and very little went to the photographer.
Anecdotal blanket statements like this are invalid. Autism, and I have it, is a spectrum disorder. It effects different people in different ways. Just because your brother, and probably a few more autistic kids, can not handle the bracelet does not mean that thousands of other autistic children won't wear it. The fact that some autistic children will not tolerate it does not men it should not be tried.
To all the "they'll take it off', "it will fail", "Autistics won't wear it", etc get a grip. No single solution will work with all people all the time but throwing a system that can protect 90% of the people wearing it is a good thing. Just because it is not perfect does not mean it should not be done.
China does.
Equating theft of trade secrets to software piracy is invalid. Theft of trade secrets is not someone making a copy of a product and using it. It is much closer to a company stealing a Gold release of a game, cutting DVDs and selling them before the game is released. Even /.ers would agree that is a criminal offence.
It is not about a "stupid plastic case", it is about the tens, if not hundreds of thousands, of dollars profit that the thieves will make instead of Apple. It is the same as if the thieves stole cash from Apple (or any company for that matter). It's not a game; theft of information costs companies millions, if not billions, each year. The fact that Apple was involved probably made it a story. Anything the happens with Apple in China gets reported very well. I doubt very much that this is the only case of trade secret theft that has garnered prison time in China.
Lets replace Apple secrets with your car.
And if it's an issue where you want to keep your car until you get rid of it, then it should be up to you to protect your car, the government or law should not interfere; should you fail to keep your car then you should have only yourself to blame.
How about a bank with cash?
if it's an issue where a bank wants to keep cash, then it should be up to the bank to protect the cash, the government or law should not interfere; should the bank fail to keep the cash they should have only themselves to blame.
By stealing the information and making covers the thieves deprived Apple and anyone who legitimately paid for the trade secrets of income. The thieves could sell their covers for less and therefore have a competitive advantage. It is the same as stealing your car or cash from a bank; theft is theft be it information or hard goods.
How is punishment for theft of trade secrets oppression? How is theft of a trade secret any different from theft of manufactured goods? Money went into creating those trade secrets. Trade secrets have a monetary value and are bought and sold every day. Should car theft be handled in civil court? Theft is still theft be it information or goods. Why should attempts be exempt from the law? Even if an attempt failed the intent to commit the act was still there. No one should get off the hook because they are a poor thief; they are still a thief.
Take this scenario. Company A spends money researching to create trade secrets for a new product. Company B steals those secrets and, due to $0 R&D costs, sells the item for less than company A. Company A never recoups the R&D costs and loses money on the project. Do you think that will help bring new products to market? Do you think company B should be convicted of a crime just the same as as they would if they stole product coming off an assembly line? I sure do.
Chapter 90 is Protection of Trade Secrets 1831 is "economic espionage" because it is by or on the behest of a foreign government. There is military espionage, political espionage and economic espionage with the key component being the involvement of a foreign government. 1832 is "theft of trade secrets" by companies and or individuals and is not called espionage. They are separate sections dealing with separate crimes.
The lack of limit of the fine for individuals under 1832 is probably an oversight and would therefore be decided by a judge or jury governed by past fines due to common law. Corporate limits are more so that overzealous juries do not get out of hand. Juries can identify more with a person than they can with a corporation and therefore go easier on people.
Eighteen months for stealing thousands of dollars worth of information so someone can make tens if not hundreds of thousands of dollars in profit is not overkill in my book at all. Apple is probably selling the specs for the case to manufacturers of covers. This one decided to steal the information rather than buy it.
What would you have suggested as a sentence?
Security is a concern with many small reactors. It would take quite a few of them to generate sufficient energy and ever one would be a target for terrorism. All it would take is a small bomb to cripple the coolant and/or crack the containment and you have a major disaster.
I am actually for nuclear energy but on a larger scale where the risk and security is more concentrated.
X-ray radiation? Haha. If we'd had your Luddite attitude throughout all of our history, we'd still be living in caves. Take your anti-intellectualism and shove it.
First I am not a Luddite. I embrace all new technology and so not sabotage it. Second, I am not an anti-intellectualist. I am a pro-usefulness. When we can afford it we should do "pure research"; now is not the time.
I think what confuses me the most is that much of the research being done today will not bear fruit for decades if not centuries. That research can be done later. Ion drives, climatology satellites, solar observatories, GPS satellites; all excellent works. Sending a spacecraft to take pictures of Pluto? Not useful. I would rather have a working electricity grid on earth today than a few high resolution pictures of Pluto. But electricity is not a sexy as Pluto.
Sorry but most of the NASA missions on that list will have no effect on the day-to-day life of people on earth. Knowledge for the sake of knowledge is not all that high on my priority list. Birth of the cosmos, water on Mars, xray radiation, etc. will not improve the quality of life here on earth. How about we deal with things here on earth before we spend money on the universe. Sure there are a few projects dealing with climatology that are important but most of them are cool but of no practical purpose.
The article should really look a bit into why container ships are loaded the way they are. The article contends, with no fact to support this contention, that one of the issue is that heavy containers that are loaded high on the sip are a major cause of the issue. Their solution is to load heavy containers first. Lets look into what would be required to do this feat.
1a. Every time a container come it it would be sorted by size so that the large one would be easily accessed first.
Issues:
containers come in one at a time over quite a long period of time. what happens if many light ones come after all the heavy ones? The heavy ones get burried.
1b. Alternately, sort the containers before they are loaded.
This would require more space and handling each container at least one additional time.
Lets assume that all the heavy containers are in the bottom of the ship. The article neglects the fact that container ships usually make more than one offloading stop. They are currently loaded so that the containers can be unloaded at each stop while still maintaining the balance of the ship. If the heavy containers are at the bottom, it would require unloading containers above the heavy containers, unloading the heavy containers and re-loading the light containers. This takes time and space.
Every minute a container ship is tied up at a dock costs money. The sorting and excess loading/unloading take time. Most ports are also very crowded and do not have the space required to do the sorting of containers to make sure heavy containers are loaded lower. There is also a limited number of berths for container ships. The longer a ship is in port means fewer ships can be loaded and unloaded by that port.
One final point, everything breaks. Even light containers go overboard. A perfect example is the container full of tires. Compared to shipments such as metals, tires are relatively light but a container full of them still went overboard. Given rough enough water even an empty container can break loose.
Here are some of the parameters that container loading software uses to place containers on a ship.
the weight of each container being handled
which port each container will be unloaded at
if the container is refrigerated, and needs to be plugged in during the voyage
if the container’s contents are hazardous, as these could be potentially explosive if placed next to a refrigerated container
advising Customs of the ship’s arrival and reporting the cargo on board
the order in which the containers will be loaded and unloaded.
A lot of science goes into the efficient loading and unloading of containers; sorting by weight is taken into account but not the overriding consideration.
Except for steel railings, the shippers do everything you have mentioned. The reason for no railing is that the containers themselves are the structure and they are stacked far above the hull of the ship.
Here is the tie down that goes between the containers http://www.tandemloc.com/0_securing/S_AD54000A.asp
Here is a picture of the lashing used http://www.flickr.com/photos/blueship/137784714/
The issue is that they didn't read the law before filing a suit. The only protection an unregistered trademark has in if the new user is passing their products off as being made by the original holder. Since all advertisement where Apple uses the iCloud mark they also use their Apple mark this is not happening. The are going to lose in court and the lawyer who recommended they sue will get paid as usual.
As long as Apple is not attempting to "pass off" their services as coming from iCloud Communications there is not a problem. The only protection an unregistered trademark as is against misrepresenting the source of the product or service. Apple is not doing that.
Check the court filing document. iCloud Communications is not claiming they have registered the mark anywhere. They are claiming that it is theirs because they use it.
If that was true then there would be no reason to register a trademark.
sorry, I meant Apple has 11 applications
The only currently registered trademark is this one. http://tess2.uspto.gov/bin/showfield?f=doc&state=4007:67i706.2.13
It seems that iCloud Communications did not register the trademark.
Apple has 100 applications in to the USPTO right now for iCloud
I guess iCloud Communications should be introduced to the USPTO. I did a quick search on the trademark iCloud and came up with 12 filed by Apple and one owned by Xcerion AB CORPORATION SWEDEN (registered in 2010). If you want to protect a trademark then register it.
The important aspect about the library is that it is a walled garden. Anything that comes into a library is catalogues and sorted into sections. There is a specific, generally accepted criteria that defines what is children's literature. Anything that is not categorized does not get in. This classification process does not exist on the internet; nor should it. The contents of the internet is too dynamic to be able to keep such a classification accurate or up to date.
The other issue is that children do not just use the kid lit area. They use reference, history, crafts, etc. In fact they can go all over the library.
Another hit to the comparison is that there is no erotica section in most libraries though it defiantly exists on the internet.
The bottom line is that a library is a pretty 'safe' place for a child to wander around unsupervised and look at books; the internet is not;and never will be.