I'd pursue some form of extralegal remediation against that disgruntled former employee. And then follow it up with the same against the BSA lawyers. If the legal system doesn't protect the little guy, then nobody should be surprised when the little guy takes care of business without it.
I'm sure threatening to have the BSA's arms ripped out of their sockets because they're winning will go over great when they take you to court, Chewie.
Be prepared to sue that former employee, for all damages and costs your business incurred as a result of their allegation, If they made a frivolous/false claim that hurt your business, and you can show who it is...
If you can show that the claim is false, you should be able to subpoena the employee identity from the BSA>
Saruman was accounted among the very wise, and there are no politicians on the national stage I can think of whom I would truly call wise. Wisdom is rarely a trait of politicians.
Sauron would have had great charisma--so Obama is closer than the Republican candidates, though some would say less evil, because he is more charismatic.
McCain might have stood a chance, if not for Palin. I wonder how many democrats are secretly donating money to her, hoping she'll be prominent enough to cost GOP the 2012 election too?
No. Palin hurt him, but it was the economy that sealed the deal. The economy *collapsed*. We're weathering it fairly well, though it's still REALLY hard for a lot of people--but the fact is that almost everyone with any savings at all got a whole lot poorer one weekend a few months before the election, when the sub-prime crisis came to a head, BoA bought Merriyl, etc... Nobody in the country was buying anything for a while, and everybody was facing massive losses.
When people take that big of a hit, they do not vote for the status quo. McCain would have had a difficult, but possible, sell before that. After that happened, his presidential bid was over.
Yes, so who will pay you enough to make it worth your while in the first place? Without copyright or patent, the money available to the producer of a work is much smaller, so really expensive works, including many prescription drugs and blockbuster motion pictures, will not get made. A agree it's over-done, and there should be shorter copyright terms, but modern society will function better with copyright than without. (Patent included because it has the same issues.)
You are basically going with a purely Lockean earned-income approach. That's a legitimate philosophy, but there are cases where it isn't the best thing for society.
Coca Cola's recipe is a trade secret, and it would be patented if it weren't a trade secret. Copyright has nothing to do with it.
Cookery and Fashion Design (1) do not cost a hundred million to make a product, and (2) in the case of fashion, where you buy something is a huge status symbol. There's not the same need to incentivize new works.
Dude, look up the Polaris Project. Look up the State Department's Anti-Trafficking Reports. Talk to people working in the field.
Your skepticism is misplaced--but don't take my word for it. Read the stories. Make an informed judgment. In this case, he was describing an operation that, IIRC, he was personally observing. I did not mention less clear chains of authority to other egregious New York Examples (e.g. there were at least rumors among trafficked women in NY of a house in Brooklyn that the cops were running. One is quoted in a CATW report, but I didn't cite it because it was only a rumor.)
Good Journalists are, in a sense, also activists. That word isn't pejorative, because there are good activists and bad activists. A good journalist is an activist because they care about documenting abuses. They care about what they're reporting on. If you don't think he's credible, look at his books and check out his research.
The entire nature of human trafficking, and almost every story you read and every piece of research you do seems unbelievable at first, because it doesn't seem like we live in the same world. But it's real and terrible, and it's far more common than most people realize.
When you make a parody of something, think to yourself: "Would the average person (say, your own parents), having seen only the first 30 seconds of the parody, have any reason to suspect the parody was anything more than a parody?"
If the answer is yes, your parody isn't fair-usey enough. At least that will be the instructions that the judge gives the jury. Be it right or be it wrong, that's how it works.
I would pay to see that written in a jury instruction.:)
One would imagine this is in many ways more helpful than walking the beat in certain communities--someone who works in another community may get more familiarity with police where he lives this way, for example. Similarly, people who don't get in trouble with (and therefore know) the police will get to know them better, if it is done well.
The problem, of course, is that over-regulation of it will take away some of the openness of it, but it still could be a good thing.
Towns could also use social networking for feedback on town planning, etc...
The situation with fair use has always been bleak. It doesn't help that its an amorphous concepts--uncertainty in the law makes it hard to comply with and has a chilling effect on free speech.
The situation with copyright generally has gone from bad to worse. It used to be it was only a civil offense if a violation was non-commercial. Now it's a criminal violation if the infringement exceeds a certain dollar value--so quoting a song lyric on a medium-sized listserve is arguably enough to make you a felon.
I have the feeling if I had the cash that my employer pays Aetna for my insurance coverage, I could go select something else, I could probably get a better deal.
Wrong, unless you go buy very bad coverage. Most of the time, employer-based health insurance has serious advantages. First, the rates are much lower because there's a bigger risk pool (at least that's the theory--in reality, they are lower because it's a collective plan, which is related, but is also about bargaining power). An individual plan will cost MUCH more unless you have very strong state regulation.
Second, employers can generally deduct the cost of health insurance for employees, where as individuals cannot usually deduct the cost of health insurance. (With one or two exceptions--there is something if you are self-employed that lets you deduct a certain amount, I believe.)
There are also more complicated tax issues around deductions for medical costs generally, but that's a different tomato. Also for medical costs in certain managed care type facilities (complications that are really unfair to everyone else in certain situations involving the lack of imputed interest in certain arrangements, but that are politically unpopular to make remotely fair--effectively ways to make medical expenses deductible beyond those that are deductible for everyone else, because of the way the transaction is structured).
I can think offhand of human trafficking rings in the United States (Times Square...
If you're talking about Times Square in New York City, have you ever actually been to New York? About the only things they're "trafficking" in Times Square these days are Coca-Cola, Bvlgari watches, tickets to Broadway shows, and cheeseburgers at the Hard Rock Cafe.
I have, actually.
Victor Malarek documents an attempt by law enforcement to crack down on a trafficking ring operating in Times Square. Look him up.
Just because something isn't obvious to you when you walk through a place doesn't mean that it's not happening.
IBM was a business leader well before DOS. Hell, they put together the hardware for simultaneous translation at the Nuremberg Trials. (Disclaimer: I saw it in a movie.) Microsoft's growth is in a much shorter period of time.
Keep in mind that this does not just happen in China. I can think offhand of human trafficking rings in the United States (Times Square, San Diego, LA, Ohio, Florida, the DC-Maryland Corridor, New Jersey, and many other places), Europe (Germany, Britain, Italy, Albania, Moldova, to name a few), Asia (Russia, China, Korea, Tawain) and more.
In the United States, for example, several hundred thousand teens are at high risk of being trafficked each year.
'After it completes its existence, we will be forced to sink the ISS. It cannot be left in orbit, it's too complex, too heavy an object, and those blasted Americans on-board periodically broadcast Vogon poetry,' said deputy head of Roskosmos space agency Vitaly Davydov."
Between that and the pesky old Fourth Amendment rules against illegal search and seizure, the obvious answer would be 'No.'
The Fourth Amendment prohibits unreasonable search and seizure, and says warrants can only be issued on probable cause.
It says nothing about *illegal* searches. You can be illegally searched and still not have had your Fourth Amendment rights violated--that would just mean there's a legal protection more extensive than the Fourth Amendment limiting the government's right to search you. State law protecting the contents of your garbage from being rummaged through, for example.
Slashdot Mirror
I'd pursue some form of extralegal remediation against that disgruntled former employee. And then follow it up with the same against the BSA lawyers. If the legal system doesn't protect the little guy, then nobody should be surprised when the little guy takes care of business without it.
I'm sure threatening to have the BSA's arms ripped out of their sockets because they're winning will go over great when they take you to court, Chewie.
Be prepared to sue that former employee, for all damages and costs your business incurred as a result of their allegation, If they made a frivolous/false claim that hurt your business, and you can show who it is...
If you can show that the claim is false, you should be able to subpoena the employee identity from the BSA>
Why wouldn't you be able to anyway?
Saruman was accounted among the very wise, and there are no politicians on the national stage I can think of whom I would truly call wise. Wisdom is rarely a trait of politicians.
Sauron would have had great charisma--so Obama is closer than the Republican candidates, though some would say less evil, because he is more charismatic.
McCain might have stood a chance, if not for Palin. I wonder how many democrats are secretly donating money to her, hoping she'll be prominent enough to cost GOP the 2012 election too?
No. Palin hurt him, but it was the economy that sealed the deal. The economy *collapsed*. We're weathering it fairly well, though it's still REALLY hard for a lot of people--but the fact is that almost everyone with any savings at all got a whole lot poorer one weekend a few months before the election, when the sub-prime crisis came to a head, BoA bought Merriyl, etc... Nobody in the country was buying anything for a while, and everybody was facing massive losses.
When people take that big of a hit, they do not vote for the status quo. McCain would have had a difficult, but possible, sell before that. After that happened, his presidential bid was over.
Okay, fair point--maybe it would just be still secret with every ex-employee selling it to the next guy for a billion bucks.
My point was that copyright was irrelevant to the question, since if it were in an IP regime, patent would apply.
If we had respect for the concept of communication, we'd all be speaking dialects of Quenya
Obviously, that would impose no communicative or epistemological difficulties...
Dude. Don't mess with the goonies. Huck Fin I understand, but Goonies was classic geek kid television.
Well, it's a series of tubes...
Yes, so who will pay you enough to make it worth your while in the first place? Without copyright or patent, the money available to the producer of a work is much smaller, so really expensive works, including many prescription drugs and blockbuster motion pictures, will not get made. A agree it's over-done, and there should be shorter copyright terms, but modern society will function better with copyright than without. (Patent included because it has the same issues.)
You are basically going with a purely Lockean earned-income approach. That's a legitimate philosophy, but there are cases where it isn't the best thing for society.
Coca Cola's recipe is a trade secret, and it would be patented if it weren't a trade secret. Copyright has nothing to do with it.
Cookery and Fashion Design (1) do not cost a hundred million to make a product, and (2) in the case of fashion, where you buy something is a huge status symbol. There's not the same need to incentivize new works.
Dude, look up the Polaris Project. Look up the State Department's Anti-Trafficking Reports. Talk to people working in the field.
Your skepticism is misplaced--but don't take my word for it. Read the stories. Make an informed judgment. In this case, he was describing an operation that, IIRC, he was personally observing. I did not mention less clear chains of authority to other egregious New York Examples (e.g. there were at least rumors among trafficked women in NY of a house in Brooklyn that the cops were running. One is quoted in a CATW report, but I didn't cite it because it was only a rumor.)
Good Journalists are, in a sense, also activists. That word isn't pejorative, because there are good activists and bad activists. A good journalist is an activist because they care about documenting abuses. They care about what they're reporting on. If you don't think he's credible, look at his books and check out his research.
The entire nature of human trafficking, and almost every story you read and every piece of research you do seems unbelievable at first, because it doesn't seem like we live in the same world. But it's real and terrible, and it's far more common than most people realize.
When you make a parody of something, think to yourself: "Would the average person (say, your own parents), having seen only the first 30 seconds of the parody, have any reason to suspect the parody was anything more than a parody?"
If the answer is yes, your parody isn't fair-usey enough. At least that will be the instructions that the judge gives the jury. Be it right or be it wrong, that's how it works.
I would pay to see that written in a jury instruction. :)
"Is the defendant's work fair-usey enough?"
The situation with fair use has always been bleak. It doesn't help that its an amorphous concepts
... as shown by my polymorphic number disagreement and apostrophe-limited analysis... time to get some sleep. :)
One would imagine this is in many ways more helpful than walking the beat in certain communities--someone who works in another community may get more familiarity with police where he lives this way, for example. Similarly, people who don't get in trouble with (and therefore know) the police will get to know them better, if it is done well.
The problem, of course, is that over-regulation of it will take away some of the openness of it, but it still could be a good thing.
Towns could also use social networking for feedback on town planning, etc...
the situation with fair use has become bleak
The situation with fair use has always been bleak. It doesn't help that its an amorphous concepts--uncertainty in the law makes it hard to comply with and has a chilling effect on free speech.
The situation with copyright generally has gone from bad to worse. It used to be it was only a civil offense if a violation was non-commercial. Now it's a criminal violation if the infringement exceeds a certain dollar value--so quoting a song lyric on a medium-sized listserve is arguably enough to make you a felon.
I have the feeling if I had the cash that my employer pays Aetna for my insurance coverage, I could go select something else, I could probably get a better deal.
Wrong, unless you go buy very bad coverage. Most of the time, employer-based health insurance has serious advantages. First, the rates are much lower because there's a bigger risk pool (at least that's the theory--in reality, they are lower because it's a collective plan, which is related, but is also about bargaining power). An individual plan will cost MUCH more unless you have very strong state regulation.
Second, employers can generally deduct the cost of health insurance for employees, where as individuals cannot usually deduct the cost of health insurance. (With one or two exceptions--there is something if you are self-employed that lets you deduct a certain amount, I believe.)
There are also more complicated tax issues around deductions for medical costs generally, but that's a different tomato. Also for medical costs in certain managed care type facilities (complications that are really unfair to everyone else in certain situations involving the lack of imputed interest in certain arrangements, but that are politically unpopular to make remotely fair--effectively ways to make medical expenses deductible beyond those that are deductible for everyone else, because of the way the transaction is structured).
I can think offhand of human trafficking rings in the United States (Times Square...
If you're talking about Times Square in New York City, have you ever actually been to New York? About the only things they're "trafficking" in Times Square these days are Coca-Cola, Bvlgari watches, tickets to Broadway shows, and cheeseburgers at the Hard Rock Cafe.
I have, actually.
Victor Malarek documents an attempt by law enforcement to crack down on a trafficking ring operating in Times Square. Look him up.
Just because something isn't obvious to you when you walk through a place doesn't mean that it's not happening.
It's not Microsoft's fault that IBM put out the worst PCs at the highest prices...
Some of them were pretty nice. You could tell cause they were heavier.
(But they did cost more.)
MSFT Market Cap: 229.75B
IBM Market Cap: 215.70B
Seemed to work out pretty well for both of them.
IBM was a business leader well before DOS. Hell, they put together the hardware for simultaneous translation at the Nuremberg Trials. (Disclaimer: I saw it in a movie.) Microsoft's growth is in a much shorter period of time.
... the very first Earth Trojan asteroid,
Curse its sudden but inevitable betrayal.
Keep in mind that this does not just happen in China. I can think offhand of human trafficking rings in the United States (Times Square, San Diego, LA, Ohio, Florida, the DC-Maryland Corridor, New Jersey, and many other places), Europe (Germany, Britain, Italy, Albania, Moldova, to name a few), Asia (Russia, China, Korea, Tawain) and more.
In the United States, for example, several hundred thousand teens are at high risk of being trafficked each year.
See River of Innocents for a good primer on the subject.
'After it completes its existence, we will be forced to sink the ISS. It cannot be left in orbit, it's too complex, too heavy an object, and those blasted Americans on-board periodically broadcast Vogon poetry,' said deputy head of Roskosmos space agency Vitaly Davydov."
You can make a choice not to use a smart phone (or a cell phone, period) if you'd prefer.
Not easily--you need one for many jobs and they increase efficiency of communication and commerce.
Between that and the pesky old Fourth Amendment rules against illegal search and seizure, the obvious answer would be 'No.'
The Fourth Amendment prohibits unreasonable search and seizure, and says warrants can only be issued on probable cause.
It says nothing about *illegal* searches. You can be illegally searched and still not have had your Fourth Amendment rights violated--that would just mean there's a legal protection more extensive than the Fourth Amendment limiting the government's right to search you. State law protecting the contents of your garbage from being rummaged through, for example.
The ones that work take credit cards, these days.