Let's assume, just assume, that Wikileaks has some more juicy tidbits it hasn't been sharing.
Now if they have a location that cannot be broken into physically, and if they have a satellite upload rig, HAM radio, or a similar guaranteed-broadcast failsafe, then there is no way short of abject violence (bombs or similar) to stop them from spreading the dirtiest secrets they have should any determined foe show up at their door and demand that they turn over servers.
Now, given time or the right equipment, an agency can get through even a nuclear bunker, but if they need time, the broadcast capability becomes a serious threat, and if they need equipment, there's most likely going to be... well, leaks that it's getting ready to be mobilized, and then we come to the time issue again. Setting things up to get into a hardened facility without tripping a safeguard like that is tricky.
I agree with the GP. From the dictionary definition:
1. to state that (something declared or believed to be true) is not true: to deny an accusation. 2. to refuse to agree or accede to: to deny a petition.
In particular, the second definition seems to flavor the word a lot; to deny something is in many senses to refuse to give in, which generally implies that they SHOULD be giving in, or that you BELIEVE that they should.
Would rebut be a better word?
–verb (used with object) 1. to refute by evidence or argument. 2. to oppose by contrary proof. –verb (used without object) 3. to provide some evidence or argument that refutes or opposes.
That's not to say that they have successfully rebutted the argument, but that that is their process and their goal.
Well, except that the UAV has to be spending fuel the whole time, is in danger of being shot down, and still has to be called in to get support. Of course, all opportunities come with problems.
I thought something similar--if nothing else, a detachable conversion of SOME kind seems like it has its uses. I don't know if having it be flying all the time is the right solution, but it's certainly an interesting one.
* There are lots of areas where landing or taking off is dangerous, or otherwise prohibited by terrain, such as rocky ground, forests, etc. In those circumstances, if you want to want to insert infantry, it will be a one-way trip, and they'll have to radio and then wait for extraction. They won't have a humvee, they won't have air support, they can only hoof it. Alternately, get close and land, then take existing roads or as much off-road that the vehicle can manage.
* There are lots of areas where aircraft can be spotted, on the other side of terrain you can't pass with a car, or on the other side of a checkpoint you can't cross without engaging. Get to the other side, land. You now are on the other side, and have a humvee, and you might have only been on the enemy's radar a few moments even if they were staring right at the display. Want to get back out? Find any road sufficient to take off, try to stay low, but make a beeline for the nearest friendly base, or whatever the mission planners suggested.
* Further, a LOT of ground defenses are predicated on the idea that it's really difficult to get on the other side of a boundary with the right equipment. Helicopters are air support, which makes them nimble, but the potential for them to be discovered (by radar, or by noise), and their vulnerability to fire due to altitude, can endanger them. Get somewhere that only friendlies or air forces can get to, and then become a ground force, and the enemy has less reason to suspect you're there. Bonus points if you can disguise the car and/or make it not easily recognized.
* If the enemy has air forces and no ground forces, you have ground forces, probably with sufficient camo to disguise you from air forces. If the enemy has ground forces and no air forces, you have air forces, probably with an engine that keeps you much more mobile than they are.
* In complicated terrain, sometimes you need an eye in the sky. Yes, they probably have enough predator drones for this now, but if these vehicles were standard, you'd have a bunch of air support and/or C&C that aren't operated remotely, and you'd have that pretty much everywhere you have vehicles.
* Depending on the design and weight, airplanes can go a lot faster than ground forces. They won't outrun jets, or light planes, or probably even a full military helicopter, but you can outrun ground forces.
* Pull into the local gas station to refuel! Or whatever the hell military people do in those sorts of situations. You don't have to find an airfield, nor even a field large enough to safely land a bunch of helicopters.
* Speaking of which, when time is of the essence, you can't beat hardware that's already there. If you need air support NOW, you may not be able to use it in 5 minutes.
Unless you're trying to say that there's no war going on and by rights we shouldn't be designing weapons; I'd agree with that. However, a 'flying humvee' has plenty of use when compared to a helicopter.
It's a thin line, but I'm pretty sure you're on the wrong side of it. All fiction and fantasy diverges from fact and history, and it's just quibbling with language to categorize them; I personally would divide it based on whether the setting, mechanics, and universe are real or not. If they're real, it's fiction; if it's not, it's fantasy.
James Bond, for example, is fiction; most of the locations depicted actually exists, and only the characters and situations are fantasy. It has unnatural elements--invisible cars, supermagnet watches, etc--but they're plot devices, not setting.
Star Trek has starships, alien races, warp drives, and so on as part of the setting, and even were you to suggest that those things were possible, you cannot go out and be in that universe. You can't build warp-enabled starships, or meet Klingons (conventions don't count). The things depicted only exist in the imagination.
Fantasy that tries to make the universe consistent, and in particular consistent with physics as the author understands them, is typically called "science fiction," probably because "science fantasy" makes you sound retarded. However, arguably, science fiction of that kind would be a subset of "fantasy," not light fiction.
I'm pretty sure their sample included some vampires. It's a lot easier to stake them when they're sitting down.
Presumably, the women were sitting with their legs crossed, so it was harder for them to stand up when they heard the assassin sneaking up from behind.
What if it was intentionally uploaded by the copyright holders themselves, or by those they authorized to do so?
...Quote:
In fact, some of the very clips that Viacom is suing us over were actually uploaded by Viacom itself.
Then they should be brought before the justice system on a some charge that could be anywhere between negligence and outright fraud, not merely once with a penalty, but continuously until they stop their practices.
The question isn't "How do we stop the RIAA, etc?" The question is, "What do we have to do to get the government, and in particular the justice system, to do its job even over the complaints of interested parties?"
We aren't supposed to control the RIAA. We didn't elect them, and they (as do other businesses) have ways of weaseling money out of nooks and crannies even if you try to boycott them. If the US government is failing to address fraud up to and probably including perjury in multibillion dollar companies, this is a problem. A properly functioning government wouldn't do this. It doesn't matter whether the company is stocked with criminals or why; the question is why they haven't been arrested. If they haven't broken any laws per se yet, give them rope and watch them hang themselves; they'll do it, you know they will.
Don't make excuses for the failure of your (and my) government. They have a job. They're not doing it. Now the criminals that should have been caught picking pockets years ago are trying to graduate to bigger crimes. Way to go.
It is also possible that you could have a device with an HD screen, but not the capability to watch HD movies.
Right, for example, it would be reeeeaaaally cheap if they gave you a screen with HD definition (and advertised as such) but the graphics chip couldn't churn that many pixels, or if the CPU+GPU choked on common codecs at those sizes. A single HD image != "HD screen for video."
"Everyone knows how to read a book" isn't quite accurate. Everyone knows how to read, maybe (I'll go ahead and assume literacy for college courses), but that's not the same as marathon reading, especially for a book that doesn't interest you.
Personally, I've had a longstanding difficulty reading academic texts, to the point where I could say "I don't know how to read academic texts;" specifically, I don't know how to memorize from texts, I don't know how to get through long tedious overly-verbose sections and paraphrase them succinctly, hell, sometimes I don't know how to get through a particularly bad paragraph and still know what the hell the author was talking about or, if it's really bad, I don't know how to get through a page without falling asleep. Even saying that that's because textbooks are badly written, some people are going to have similar problems reading literature; it doesn't mesh with the way they presently think, and it's going to be a challenge to get through it, even if they know how to get through it word by word and sentence by sentence.
Similarly, while people are going to be able to pick up WASD controls at the surface level, they may not be attracted to it deeply enough to keep them motivated through difficult or annoying parts of the game. Not because Portal isn't a good game, but because it doesn't mesh with them. And unfortunately, they can't just turn to the next chapter and hope the prof doesn't ask questions about the part they skipped.
Yes, you are the reason she had to hook up with that jock. She is sueing YOU for emotional traume and unsatisfied sexual desire of her self and her close female friends because YOU spend all that time on slashdot instead.
If she'd just sued me earlier, we could have hooked up and none of this would have happened. Sue the legal system for making it too hard to sue people!
I did the same. And since I was playing D&D a lot at the time, I called it a "Buttch attack"--you don't have to do any damage, just touch the target with your butt.
My roommate gave me funny looks over it, though. Moreso after he learned of the name.
To *knowingly* assert a copyright violation where none exists. Often they may think there is one, and only find out later that there isn't.
IANAL, but if they haven't done due diligence, they shouldn't be willing to go to court over it, nor send threatening letters / C&D, etc.
If there is a copyright violation, and if the people have a lawyer on staff or whatever, they can afford to wait a week or two to confirm it, or do whatever else it takes to find out. Copyright violation isn't murder; there is no dangerous situation if you don't handle it immediately. The stolen copyright is not going to decide it likes the second party better and leave forever. The situation in two months, much less two weeks, is likely to look pretty much the same.
A lot of people need to learn the phrase : "Common sense is not so common".
These day it could be considered a super power.
Funny how people don't hire super heroes. They're just expected to use their powers for good 'just because' and get nothing out of it but a grateful society.
And people wonder why these super powers don't arise very often.
I know you're being satirical, and this isn't pointed at you, but for anyone who's had this point of view, ever:
GO. TO. HELL.
Humans in general and kids specifically are learning creatures. Period, the end. Especially before they get to age 10 or so, but let's even move that up to 18, there's very little that they do that wasn't taught to them by someone. And pretty much as long as they are under their parents' care, they are still malleable, which is WHY they're under their parents' care in the first place. If they aren't being what you want them to be, the problem is YOU--or else it's someone else, and you just happen to be a big old "Not helping".
I don't know who told people that they have the right to punish, discard, or chemically modify children if they don't live up to the parents' expectations, but the child does not live FOR their parents. They do not exist in order to be part of their parents' life. They exist in hopes that they will have their own future. Abusing them, ignoring them, or putting their brain into a pill bottle and shaking it until it stops rattling does NOT give them a future.
It's not like I don't get it: that parents didn't, in most cases, sign a contract specifying that they would live for their kids' sake either. They're just grown up children themselves, and now they have another burden, in many cases one that they can barely handle even without a day job. However, there's one thing that I truly don't understand, and that's how you can see kids who are scared, or hurt, or miserable right in front of you, kids who are of your own flesh, kids you have seen every day since they were born, and blame it on them. What book is telling you to spit at them? What parenting guru, website, op ed, or news program?
How can you see kids kids starting down the path of hiding, and getting depressed, do nothing, and assume that it's a chemical problem? How can you see happy, energetic kids that stop being quite as grounded as others, and decide that you need to poke their brain with a stick?
Fuck. You.
They learn. They grow. If they spend a lot of time running around, find things that they like to do which are calmer. If they are depressed and sulking, find things they like to do which are engaging. Because they like to do it, they'll do those things on their own, when they want to. If you don't find something something the first time you try, try again. If they don't pick it up immediately, but you know they enjoyed it, leave the option open, always.
What you do in these scant few years of their childhood will impact them for a LONG time after you stop trying. You're not 10 years old anymore yourself; 10 years is no longer 100% of your life span, even if it still seems a daunting amount of time. You know how long, and how short, that time will seem. Spend a few years actually caring about your kid and it will reap rewards. Salt the grounds and nothing will grow.
And if you think that their lives and their problems are all about you, one more time, go to hell.
The OS I'm typing this on (which is on a Intel Core 2 laptop with 4GBytes of RAM) is taking up 6GBytes and has various development tools and libraries installed on it. The OS on my EeePC takes up 3GBytes.
Desktop OSes don't scale to laptops and netbooks very well. Fortunately, I believe, they're getting the hint, even if the people getting the hint are mostly Linux-based (and I can't even confirm that, not having looked at/for netbook versions of MS or Apple (haha) OSes); point is, some people have desktop OSes on a netbook and shouldn't, but not all of them are like that.
My tower's Win7 x64 takes up about 16GB just for c:\Windows. The XP that shipped with my netbook (an older Aspire One) has ravenously consumed so much disk space of its 8GB main drive that I was forced to manually move the documents folders to a SD card. However, I put two--count them two--netbook-oriented linux distros (Meego, Jolicloud) on an 8GB bootable thumbdrive and it (just that one thumbdrive) still has space to spare for small files and applications--enough that I connected it to my Dropbox (containing about 500M) even though I didn't need to. Both of them run faster and with fewer problems than XP. (I would make one of them the main OS, but it's technically my dad's netbook, and he wouldn't appreciate it.) The only caveat is that I don't have space on it for music or media, but it still has two card reader slots and a couple more USB ports...
The point is that an OS which is meant to be light will be light. When you take something that never had to worry about that, and try to stick it where it doesn't belong, well, it will work poorly if at all.
I'm aware of direct connect; my point was that when both parties are running their own XMPP servers, connecting them is trivial, including end-to-end encryption.
But you're right, a well-featured HTML plugin for libpurple would work instead of going that far.
I've had similar ideas (and haven't RTFA), but keep in mind how much can be done with web apps, AJAX, and html5, especially if you know that your personal webserver is on a relative high-speed line. Not just secure access to your mail and such, or streaming media, but if you securely stream to web applications running on your own box, which will also do whatever crazy geeky crap you can script into it on the backend, like giving you a list of your photos sorted by hair color or whatever.
Plus, I for one would love to have an IM client that splits out to all my existing IM endpoints, so if it were to come with its own XMPP server plus gateways, super-big plus. And hey! Add an html5 IM "client" in the same package and you're cooking with gas. One login for you, logs are always kept in the same place, and if you want to connect securely to someone else who also has their own server, all you need is an IP address, and then it's literally just the two of you.
If you have your own "cloud" in a way that is powerful, secure, and fast, "cloud computing" with thin clients (down to and including ChromeOS) becomes pretty darn reasonable.
Actually, has anyone made a window manager over HTML5 yet...?
Yes, it is called "Believing shit that isn't real."
Hey now, you're starting to sound like a kook there, saying people are crazy. Are you sure it isn't a resurgence of psychic energy that's going to bring about the end of the world in 2012? That would make more sense.
The problem here is that the FBI needs to get its authority from somewhere.
The FBI, being an executive agency, will do things. If they do something illegal, they will 1)not have the judicial branch to back them up (warrants, prisons, etc) and 2) they will (probably) face legal action themselves.
If they do something that does not need others' authority and does not invoke legal ramifications, for example holding someone in FBI-operated facilities temporarily (as opposed to jail cells), they may get away with it even if they shouldn't.
The FBI does not have the authority to make laws and thus it cannot be illegal to disclose the contents of an NSL unless Congress has specifically codified that authority into law. At that point, the Congress has in fact made a law restricting freedom of speech and hence is in violation of the 1st amendment.
True, very good point. Like I said, if you figure out which law that is, bring it up so that we can raise a fuss.
Alternatively, if the FBI has not been granted that authority by Congress, then it cannot be illegal to disclose the contents. Of course, being illegal and being something that could get you brought in for "questioning" are two different things...
...which is my point above about "whatever doesn't get them in trouble and doesn't involve someone who would ask questions e.g. the police"
I did SAY I was not a lawyer. You don't have to get on my case about THAT.
the notion that the lack of a law restraining the executive branch in a specific manner leaves the executive free to behave in violation of the constitution is laughable.
If people will believe it, whether or not it's the truth, it's serious, not laughable. And, I don't find it stupid. Laws are not merely a list of what's illegal, but also include a much wider set of guidelines, and it is those guidelines, along with any internal ones, which executive offices answer to. The constitution was meant to put absolute guidelines on the legislature with the idea that the legislature would then keep the executive on track.
First off, 4th amendment.
Doesn't mention congress specifically, where the 1st does, and that was the point I was making.
Secondly, the elastic clause: "To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof."
It's hard to understand what that's saying without knowing the context, as the syntax isn't standard, and seems to reference nouns or context outside of that quote. And again, unfortunately, I'm not a constitutional scholar.
This, along with the enormous body of legislative and case law between the founding of our country and the present, affords specific powers to the FBI and somewhat clear restrictions on their actions.
Yes, I mentioned that there were applicable laws, I just don't know what they are. In particular, I said, if there are particular laws or examples of case law that are at issue, bring those up instead of the 1st amendment.
Thirdly, use your brain: What good would a constitution be if it served as a subtractive set of only the things that the executive couldn't do?
Well I don't know the history of government, but in general, if I were starting an executive branch of government, I would charge them to do a job, then give them discretion to do that job--whichever job it is--within the limits of the law and with a few other caveats. Not knowing myself what would be necessary for all the different agencies, I would think that telling them too specifically what to do and what not to do would hamper them wherever I was wrong, or hamper my own authority if I'm wrong too often. Having done that, once the government is functioning, this list can be added to or subtracted from as we see what works and doesn't work, by the legislative branch--as a check on the power of the executive.
You should read Article II, Section 3, Clause 4. This clause regards the caring for the faithful execution of the law, and there's no part in there that says "when not oppressing people." The duties and restrictions of the executive are one and the same.
I don't believe I argued that they should't be bound by the law. I said that in particular in that case, the 1st amendment is not a law which applies to them, although your sibling's post suggests that the 14th amendment changes that. I didn't know that, although having heard that, it does change the situation somewhat.
Slashdot Mirror
Let's assume, just assume, that Wikileaks has some more juicy tidbits it hasn't been sharing.
Now if they have a location that cannot be broken into physically, and if they have a satellite upload rig, HAM radio, or a similar guaranteed-broadcast failsafe, then there is no way short of abject violence (bombs or similar) to stop them from spreading the dirtiest secrets they have should any determined foe show up at their door and demand that they turn over servers.
Now, given time or the right equipment, an agency can get through even a nuclear bunker, but if they need time, the broadcast capability becomes a serious threat, and if they need equipment, there's most likely going to be... well, leaks that it's getting ready to be mobilized, and then we come to the time issue again. Setting things up to get into a hardened facility without tripping a safeguard like that is tricky.
Or maybe not, but it's food for thought.
I agree with the GP. From the dictionary definition:
1. to state that (something declared or believed to be true) is not true: to deny an accusation.
2. to refuse to agree or accede to: to deny a petition.
In particular, the second definition seems to flavor the word a lot; to deny something is in many senses to refuse to give in, which generally implies that they SHOULD be giving in, or that you BELIEVE that they should.
Would rebut be a better word?
–verb (used with object)
1. to refute by evidence or argument.
2. to oppose by contrary proof.
–verb (used without object)
3. to provide some evidence or argument that refutes or opposes.
That's not to say that they have successfully rebutted the argument, but that that is their process and their goal.
It's more of a lossy compression.
Well, except that the UAV has to be spending fuel the whole time, is in danger of being shot down, and still has to be called in to get support. Of course, all opportunities come with problems.
I thought something similar--if nothing else, a detachable conversion of SOME kind seems like it has its uses. I don't know if having it be flying all the time is the right solution, but it's certainly an interesting one.
You have no sense of tactics whatsoever.
* There are lots of areas where landing or taking off is dangerous, or otherwise prohibited by terrain, such as rocky ground, forests, etc. In those circumstances, if you want to want to insert infantry, it will be a one-way trip, and they'll have to radio and then wait for extraction. They won't have a humvee, they won't have air support, they can only hoof it. Alternately, get close and land, then take existing roads or as much off-road that the vehicle can manage.
* There are lots of areas where aircraft can be spotted, on the other side of terrain you can't pass with a car, or on the other side of a checkpoint you can't cross without engaging. Get to the other side, land. You now are on the other side, and have a humvee, and you might have only been on the enemy's radar a few moments even if they were staring right at the display. Want to get back out? Find any road sufficient to take off, try to stay low, but make a beeline for the nearest friendly base, or whatever the mission planners suggested.
* Further, a LOT of ground defenses are predicated on the idea that it's really difficult to get on the other side of a boundary with the right equipment. Helicopters are air support, which makes them nimble, but the potential for them to be discovered (by radar, or by noise), and their vulnerability to fire due to altitude, can endanger them. Get somewhere that only friendlies or air forces can get to, and then become a ground force, and the enemy has less reason to suspect you're there. Bonus points if you can disguise the car and/or make it not easily recognized.
* If the enemy has air forces and no ground forces, you have ground forces, probably with sufficient camo to disguise you from air forces. If the enemy has ground forces and no air forces, you have air forces, probably with an engine that keeps you much more mobile than they are.
* In complicated terrain, sometimes you need an eye in the sky. Yes, they probably have enough predator drones for this now, but if these vehicles were standard, you'd have a bunch of air support and/or C&C that aren't operated remotely, and you'd have that pretty much everywhere you have vehicles.
* Depending on the design and weight, airplanes can go a lot faster than ground forces. They won't outrun jets, or light planes, or probably even a full military helicopter, but you can outrun ground forces.
* Pull into the local gas station to refuel! Or whatever the hell military people do in those sorts of situations. You don't have to find an airfield, nor even a field large enough to safely land a bunch of helicopters.
* Speaking of which, when time is of the essence, you can't beat hardware that's already there. If you need air support NOW, you may not be able to use it in 5 minutes.
Unless you're trying to say that there's no war going on and by rights we shouldn't be designing weapons; I'd agree with that. However, a 'flying humvee' has plenty of use when compared to a helicopter.
Better not use it for monitor cables, then.
It's a thin line, but I'm pretty sure you're on the wrong side of it. All fiction and fantasy diverges from fact and history, and it's just quibbling with language to categorize them; I personally would divide it based on whether the setting, mechanics, and universe are real or not. If they're real, it's fiction; if it's not, it's fantasy.
James Bond, for example, is fiction; most of the locations depicted actually exists, and only the characters and situations are fantasy. It has unnatural elements--invisible cars, supermagnet watches, etc--but they're plot devices, not setting.
Star Trek has starships, alien races, warp drives, and so on as part of the setting, and even were you to suggest that those things were possible, you cannot go out and be in that universe. You can't build warp-enabled starships, or meet Klingons (conventions don't count). The things depicted only exist in the imagination.
Fantasy that tries to make the universe consistent, and in particular consistent with physics as the author understands them, is typically called "science fiction," probably because "science fantasy" makes you sound retarded. However, arguably, science fiction of that kind would be a subset of "fantasy," not light fiction.
I'm pretty sure their sample included some vampires. It's a lot easier to stake them when they're sitting down.
Presumably, the women were sitting with their legs crossed, so it was harder for them to stand up when they heard the assassin sneaking up from behind.
What if it was intentionally uploaded by the copyright holders themselves, or by those they authorized to do so?
In fact, some of the very clips that Viacom is suing us over were actually uploaded by Viacom itself.
Then they should be brought before the justice system on a some charge that could be anywhere between negligence and outright fraud, not merely once with a penalty, but continuously until they stop their practices.
The question isn't "How do we stop the RIAA, etc?" The question is, "What do we have to do to get the government, and in particular the justice system, to do its job even over the complaints of interested parties?"
We aren't supposed to control the RIAA. We didn't elect them, and they (as do other businesses) have ways of weaseling money out of nooks and crannies even if you try to boycott them. If the US government is failing to address fraud up to and probably including perjury in multibillion dollar companies, this is a problem. A properly functioning government wouldn't do this. It doesn't matter whether the company is stocked with criminals or why; the question is why they haven't been arrested. If they haven't broken any laws per se yet, give them rope and watch them hang themselves; they'll do it, you know they will.
Don't make excuses for the failure of your (and my) government. They have a job. They're not doing it. Now the criminals that should have been caught picking pockets years ago are trying to graduate to bigger crimes. Way to go.
"Her"? How one determines the gender of pet rock??
Obviously you ask, asshole.
It is also possible that you could have a device with an HD screen, but not the capability to watch HD movies.
Right, for example, it would be reeeeaaaally cheap if they gave you a screen with HD definition (and advertised as such) but the graphics chip couldn't churn that many pixels, or if the CPU+GPU choked on common codecs at those sizes. A single HD image != "HD screen for video."
"Everyone knows how to read a book" isn't quite accurate. Everyone knows how to read, maybe (I'll go ahead and assume literacy for college courses), but that's not the same as marathon reading, especially for a book that doesn't interest you.
Personally, I've had a longstanding difficulty reading academic texts, to the point where I could say "I don't know how to read academic texts;" specifically, I don't know how to memorize from texts, I don't know how to get through long tedious overly-verbose sections and paraphrase them succinctly, hell, sometimes I don't know how to get through a particularly bad paragraph and still know what the hell the author was talking about or, if it's really bad, I don't know how to get through a page without falling asleep. Even saying that that's because textbooks are badly written, some people are going to have similar problems reading literature; it doesn't mesh with the way they presently think, and it's going to be a challenge to get through it, even if they know how to get through it word by word and sentence by sentence.
Similarly, while people are going to be able to pick up WASD controls at the surface level, they may not be attracted to it deeply enough to keep them motivated through difficult or annoying parts of the game. Not because Portal isn't a good game, but because it doesn't mesh with them. And unfortunately, they can't just turn to the next chapter and hope the prof doesn't ask questions about the part they skipped.
Yes, you are the reason she had to hook up with that jock. She is sueing YOU for emotional traume and unsatisfied sexual desire of her self and her close female friends because YOU spend all that time on slashdot instead.
If she'd just sued me earlier, we could have hooked up and none of this would have happened. Sue the legal system for making it too hard to sue people!
I did the same. And since I was playing D&D a lot at the time, I called it a "Buttch attack"--you don't have to do any damage, just touch the target with your butt.
My roommate gave me funny looks over it, though. Moreso after he learned of the name.
To *knowingly* assert a copyright violation where none exists. Often they may think there is one, and only find out later that there isn't.
IANAL, but if they haven't done due diligence, they shouldn't be willing to go to court over it, nor send threatening letters / C&D, etc.
If there is a copyright violation, and if the people have a lawyer on staff or whatever, they can afford to wait a week or two to confirm it, or do whatever else it takes to find out. Copyright violation isn't murder; there is no dangerous situation if you don't handle it immediately. The stolen copyright is not going to decide it likes the second party better and leave forever. The situation in two months, much less two weeks, is likely to look pretty much the same.
These day it could be considered a super power.
Funny how people don't hire super heroes. They're just expected to use their powers for good 'just because' and get nothing out of it but a grateful society.
And people wonder why these super powers don't arise very often.
I know you're being satirical, and this isn't pointed at you, but for anyone who's had this point of view, ever:
GO. TO. HELL.
Humans in general and kids specifically are learning creatures. Period, the end. Especially before they get to age 10 or so, but let's even move that up to 18, there's very little that they do that wasn't taught to them by someone. And pretty much as long as they are under their parents' care, they are still malleable, which is WHY they're under their parents' care in the first place. If they aren't being what you want them to be, the problem is YOU--or else it's someone else, and you just happen to be a big old "Not helping".
I don't know who told people that they have the right to punish, discard, or chemically modify children if they don't live up to the parents' expectations, but the child does not live FOR their parents. They do not exist in order to be part of their parents' life. They exist in hopes that they will have their own future. Abusing them, ignoring them, or putting their brain into a pill bottle and shaking it until it stops rattling does NOT give them a future.
It's not like I don't get it: that parents didn't, in most cases, sign a contract specifying that they would live for their kids' sake either. They're just grown up children themselves, and now they have another burden, in many cases one that they can barely handle even without a day job. However, there's one thing that I truly don't understand, and that's how you can see kids who are scared, or hurt, or miserable right in front of you, kids who are of your own flesh, kids you have seen every day since they were born, and blame it on them. What book is telling you to spit at them? What parenting guru, website, op ed, or news program?
How can you see kids kids starting down the path of hiding, and getting depressed, do nothing, and assume that it's a chemical problem? How can you see happy, energetic kids that stop being quite as grounded as others, and decide that you need to poke their brain with a stick?
Fuck. You.
They learn. They grow. If they spend a lot of time running around, find things that they like to do which are calmer. If they are depressed and sulking, find things they like to do which are engaging. Because they like to do it, they'll do those things on their own, when they want to. If you don't find something something the first time you try, try again. If they don't pick it up immediately, but you know they enjoyed it, leave the option open, always.
What you do in these scant few years of their childhood will impact them for a LONG time after you stop trying. You're not 10 years old anymore yourself; 10 years is no longer 100% of your life span, even if it still seems a daunting amount of time. You know how long, and how short, that time will seem. Spend a few years actually caring about your kid and it will reap rewards. Salt the grounds and nothing will grow.
And if you think that their lives and their problems are all about you, one more time, go to hell.
Desktop OSes don't scale to laptops and netbooks very well. Fortunately, I believe, they're getting the hint, even if the people getting the hint are mostly Linux-based (and I can't even confirm that, not having looked at/for netbook versions of MS or Apple (haha) OSes); point is, some people have desktop OSes on a netbook and shouldn't, but not all of them are like that.
My tower's Win7 x64 takes up about 16GB just for c:\Windows. The XP that shipped with my netbook (an older Aspire One) has ravenously consumed so much disk space of its 8GB main drive that I was forced to manually move the documents folders to a SD card. However, I put two--count them two--netbook-oriented linux distros (Meego, Jolicloud) on an 8GB bootable thumbdrive and it (just that one thumbdrive) still has space to spare for small files and applications--enough that I connected it to my Dropbox (containing about 500M) even though I didn't need to. Both of them run faster and with fewer problems than XP. (I would make one of them the main OS, but it's technically my dad's netbook, and he wouldn't appreciate it.) The only caveat is that I don't have space on it for music or media, but it still has two card reader slots and a couple more USB ports...
The point is that an OS which is meant to be light will be light. When you take something that never had to worry about that, and try to stick it where it doesn't belong, well, it will work poorly if at all.
I'm aware of direct connect; my point was that when both parties are running their own XMPP servers, connecting them is trivial, including end-to-end encryption.
But you're right, a well-featured HTML plugin for libpurple would work instead of going that far.
I've had similar ideas (and haven't RTFA), but keep in mind how much can be done with web apps, AJAX, and html5, especially if you know that your personal webserver is on a relative high-speed line. Not just secure access to your mail and such, or streaming media, but if you securely stream to web applications running on your own box, which will also do whatever crazy geeky crap you can script into it on the backend, like giving you a list of your photos sorted by hair color or whatever.
Plus, I for one would love to have an IM client that splits out to all my existing IM endpoints, so if it were to come with its own XMPP server plus gateways, super-big plus. And hey! Add an html5 IM "client" in the same package and you're cooking with gas. One login for you, logs are always kept in the same place, and if you want to connect securely to someone else who also has their own server, all you need is an IP address, and then it's literally just the two of you.
If you have your own "cloud" in a way that is powerful, secure, and fast, "cloud computing" with thin clients (down to and including ChromeOS) becomes pretty darn reasonable.
Actually, has anyone made a window manager over HTML5 yet...?
Yes, it is called "Believing shit that isn't real."
Hey now, you're starting to sound like a kook there, saying people are crazy. Are you sure it isn't a resurgence of psychic energy that's going to bring about the end of the world in 2012? That would make more sense.
Look at me, still posting when there's science to do...
When I read your posts, it makes me glad I'm not you.
The problem here is that the FBI needs to get its authority from somewhere.
The FBI, being an executive agency, will do things. If they do something illegal, they will 1)not have the judicial branch to back them up (warrants, prisons, etc) and 2) they will (probably) face legal action themselves.
If they do something that does not need others' authority and does not invoke legal ramifications, for example holding someone in FBI-operated facilities temporarily (as opposed to jail cells), they may get away with it even if they shouldn't.
The FBI does not have the authority to make laws and thus it cannot be illegal to disclose the contents of an NSL unless Congress has specifically codified that authority into law. At that point, the Congress has in fact made a law restricting freedom of speech and hence is in violation of the 1st amendment.
True, very good point. Like I said, if you figure out which law that is, bring it up so that we can raise a fuss.
Alternatively, if the FBI has not been granted that authority by Congress, then it cannot be illegal to disclose the contents. Of course, being illegal and being something that could get you brought in for "questioning" are two different things...
...which is my point above about "whatever doesn't get them in trouble and doesn't involve someone who would ask questions e.g. the police"
I did not know that, and that does change the situation somewhat, thank you.
I did SAY I was not a lawyer. You don't have to get on my case about THAT.
the notion that the lack of a law restraining the executive branch in a specific manner leaves the executive free to behave in violation of the constitution is laughable.
If people will believe it, whether or not it's the truth, it's serious, not laughable. And, I don't find it stupid. Laws are not merely a list of what's illegal, but also include a much wider set of guidelines, and it is those guidelines, along with any internal ones, which executive offices answer to. The constitution was meant to put absolute guidelines on the legislature with the idea that the legislature would then keep the executive on track.
First off, 4th amendment.
Doesn't mention congress specifically, where the 1st does, and that was the point I was making.
Secondly, the elastic clause:
"To make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the foregoing powers, and all other powers vested by this Constitution in the government of the United States, or in any department or officer thereof."
It's hard to understand what that's saying without knowing the context, as the syntax isn't standard, and seems to reference nouns or context outside of that quote. And again, unfortunately, I'm not a constitutional scholar.
This, along with the enormous body of legislative and case law between the founding of our country and the present, affords specific powers to the FBI and somewhat clear restrictions on their actions.
Yes, I mentioned that there were applicable laws, I just don't know what they are. In particular, I said, if there are particular laws or examples of case law that are at issue, bring those up instead of the 1st amendment.
Thirdly, use your brain:
What good would a constitution be if it served as a subtractive set of only the things that the executive couldn't do?
Well I don't know the history of government, but in general, if I were starting an executive branch of government, I would charge them to do a job, then give them discretion to do that job--whichever job it is--within the limits of the law and with a few other caveats. Not knowing myself what would be necessary for all the different agencies, I would think that telling them too specifically what to do and what not to do would hamper them wherever I was wrong, or hamper my own authority if I'm wrong too often. Having done that, once the government is functioning, this list can be added to or subtracted from as we see what works and doesn't work, by the legislative branch--as a check on the power of the executive.
You should read Article II, Section 3, Clause 4. This clause regards the caring for the faithful execution of the law, and there's no part in there that says "when not oppressing people." The duties and restrictions of the executive are one and the same.
I don't believe I argued that they should't be bound by the law. I said that in particular in that case, the 1st amendment is not a law which applies to them, although your sibling's post suggests that the 14th amendment changes that. I didn't know that, although having heard that, it does change the situation somewhat.