It sorta works, actually... I had to call Verizon support once, and they had one of those voice-recognition systems, where they ask you a bucnh of questions and you're supposed to speak the answer and then they try to figure out how to route the call. I started speaking gibberish, and I was connected to an operator within seconds.
Microsoft: has government protection from competition though the intellectual property laws. One Microsoft is plenty, I can't imagine we'd be any better off with two. But even in the absence of commercial alternatives, we have Linux, MySQL, etc, which is fine by me. The point of an economy is to produce goods and services, not to produce profits.
Oil companies: They simply don't have high profit margins; commodities like oil generally provide small margins. Even OPEC can't maintain price discipline within the cartel longer than a couple of months. Oil is profiatble by virtue of volume and predictable demand.
The reason people are stuck in sucky HMO's is because the coverage is tied to their jobs by the tax code, which is perverted. HMO's are guaranteed a certain amount of business, it's hard for unsatisfied customers to leave, and so they suck. Problem is, the last guy who tried to fix it did so by proposing a national HMO that had no competition. Oh, well, maybe next time. Hard to imagine any politician could come up with a worse system than the one we have, but they continue to do just that.
A much more interesting illustration is the one in which a shoe company makes shoes overseas for pennies, and then sells them here, with a jock endorsing them, for mucho dollars. But it turns out that there's competition to sign those jocks to the endorsement deals, so if Nike offers too little, then Reebok offers a little more. If Nike saves a few pennies by moving the plant from one Asian country to another, then the long-term savings probably won't accrue to Nike or to consumers, but to the jocks who subsequently sign endorsement deals.
I should have noted earlier that I also agree that it's hogwash to suggest that trade creates jobs. It does, however, lead to lower-cost goods, which benefits the lowest earners.
Unfortunately, the person who lost his $20K job knows he lost his job, and the 2 million people who subsequently saved a dime on their shower flip-flops don't even notice the savings individually. But when we tried protectionisom with autos in the 70's, the point was made much more clearly. At the time, import quoatas meant that it cost $4K to buy a $3K Toyota. The alternative was to buy a $3500 Chevy, which at the time were a pieces of shit. And average-income folks got pissed. Yeah, workers were happy in Detroit. But only in Detroit.
Wealth, on a national level, is determined not by what you have, but what you can produce.
We could redistribute every penny of current American wealth equally around the globe, and within a short period of time, the same order would redevlop, the same nations would be prosperous and the same nations would be poor. The Soviet Union had an incredible stash of natural resources, and a very educated and capable population, but they were piss-poor because they insisted on taking five dollars' worth of materials and labor and using them to produce two-dollar shoes.
It's perhaps justifiable to ban trade with a country on moral grounds. I'm personally somewhat conflicted on it... it worked well and advanced reform in South Africa; but in Cuba and Iraq, it just seems to have punished the people and had no effect on the dictators.
But you seem to suggest that the reason to avoid trade with India or China is that they're too poor. What's the morality of that?
Fact is, if a company's costs go down, then their prices go down, whether they like it or not. The reason is simple... a big profit margin is an open invitation to competition. If one company's are reduced, then their competitiors' are reduced, too.
That said, there are any number of politcal tactics a company can use to insulate themselves from that competition, to benefit unfairly, and to maintain some of that extra profit. Ironically, many of those actions are taken in the name of "protecting jobs." What they're really doing is protecting companies from offshore competition.
And it should be noted that while free trade doesn't create or destroy jobs, it does cause some displacement. For conservatives & libertarians, that often doesn't register, since the people displaced eventually end up in other jobs with equal earning potential... unfortunately, it's not a 1-for-1 replacement; some will do better and some will do worse.
Statistcally, there's no permanent loss of jobs or prosperity (otherwise, there would be no jobs left in America by now). But there is a social cost that doesn't show up in a good economic analysis.
More to the point... American dollars go to India, and there are only two things that can happen:
1. They spend the money on American goods
2. They just keep the money
Case 1 is a wash, and Case 2 (which never happens), would be wonderful... we could just keep printing dollar bills and never have to work. Unfortunately, when we import goods or services, the other countries want something in return.
America is prosperous largely because it's a huge free-trade zone. Imagine if people in Massachusetts complained about imports of cars from Michigan, and passed a law that said you had to buy a car made in Massachusetts, so that jobs wouldn't be lost to low-cost labor in Michigan. Or suppose Massachusetts insisted that Michigan adopt all of Massachusetts' labor laws. Would the people in Michigan want that? Would the people in Massachusetts want to drive cars designed in Brockton?
Or another example... suppose a state complained about all the computers "imported" from California or Texas, and insisted that any computers in be made and designed in the home state. Who would be hurt by that? People who can't afford expensive computers, that's who. It doesn't happen, nobody even suggests it, because it's freaking brain-dead stupid.
Some states make certain products, other states make others. Free trade among states reduces income inequality among states, and allows us to be peaceful neighbors.
The responsibility is clearly specified in the Tenth Ammendment: "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to grandstanding politicians."
Yeah, you read stories of abductions and kidnappings all the time, and you say, "Oh, that's sick or depraved or evil," and you go about your business. But when I saw that video, of an actual kidnapping taking place, it really gave me pause, made me realize how utterly inhuman someone has to be to walk up to a schoolgirl and drag her away by the arm. Consider if that camera hadn't been there, we still wouldn't know what happened, and people would be speculating that she was a runaway, or maybe making fun of her fat mother's tears.
The camera didn't prevent that crime, but it probably prevented several subsequent ones.
I just got tired of supplying the fake data every time I had to do an install, especially after they stopped accepting "webmaster@real.com".
Seriously, it doesn't seem to be a major privacy issue, just the annoyance of being continually marketed to for something you know you don't want to buy. And I'll confess, I actually bought the commercial version of their current player. But even after you pay them, they come back for more; there's always some damned popup in the system tray telling you that you want a Gold pass.
Also annoying... the only "fix" suggested by Real is to download and install an update... which means we get to go through the excercise of finding the hidden checkboxes all over again.
BTW, people whose politics are to the right of Pol Pot might be offended by Glaser's generous support of several of the most extreme and ghoulishly anti-human animal rights groups. They don't simply campaign on mainstream issues like fur coats, protection of endangered species, or animal cruelty. www.progressproject.org indulges writers who advocate such things as outlawing all use of animals for food, or allowing them legal standing to file lawsuits.
Compassion for animals is cool, but this is an anti-human philosophy taken to the extreme, and it's is on a par with the philosophies of all the worst villains in history. I'm frankly ashamed that Glaser got 20 bucks of my money, but that was a choice I made. But I thought long and hard before I bought.
>>GPS and Mapping related materials are exempt from the law
Hmmm, well, I'll have an interesting conversation with a cop when they pull me over. What I do is run the laptop with a GPS and DeLorme's maps. No, I don't "use" it while driving, it just remains open to the map with my position plotted on it.
Like any printed map, it's safe to glance at briefly (safer, in fact). And like any paper map, you can get in trouble if you start reading too closely. I don't adjust it while driving, it just sits there, usually closed after dark.
Just for the record, I've logged over 30K miles with this setup without so much as having to stop suddenly. By comparison, as a teenager I once rear-ended somebody while reading a paper map in a parking lot.
Despite the fact I'm basically a liberty-oriented free-market-loving sort of person, I've never described myself as a Libertarian, and this article is a good illustartion of why. Basically, he says, "do nothing, solve the damned problem yourself." Which is what we're currently doing, and it's why we're all so pissed off by spam.
Seems that most folks I know who call themselves libertarians fall for this sort of shallow thinking... they're basically non-violent anarchists. But the State can play a helpful role, without resorting to stupid "I just outlawed spam, vote for me next week," nonsense.
For example, the state can make it illegal to forge headers or use non-existent return addresses. It could require all UCE to be sent from a server registered or traceable to the sender. It could formally codify the SMTP protocol, and specify what constitutes fraudulent use of it.
Of course, such measures *by themselves* won't do anything to stop spam, but they can enable ISPs to manage it more effectively. Perhaps they're insufficient, perhaps others have better suggestions, but it highlights the proper role of the state, which is to establish a structure in which people can deal with one another in good faith. It does this by outlawing (if not preventing) fraud and deceptive advertising, by recognizing contracts, and other similar measures.
Too many people, though, call themselves Libertarians without having fully thought out what the state's role should be (hint: provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare...).
Y'know, the ironic thing is, telnet *is* more secure, as long as you don't connect to it.
Seriously, between SSH and OpenSSL, I'm getting real tired of patching every week or two. I manage a few Windows, several Linux, and a couple of Sun systems, and "panic patches" on OpenSSH/OpenSSL have far outnumbered any Windows problems. Not that I like Windows better or anything, but this is getting really, really ridiculous.
At this point, *nix security is better only in that I can strip it down more easily, but Microsoft does seem to be winning the QC battle now. The last three patches on my public Windows servers have been to OpenSSH/OpenSSL. Maybe I should just replace them with Front Page Extensions, they seem to have fewer security problems nowadays.
Go ahead, burn me at the stake as a heretic. That's just my experience.
Well, there's really no such thing as an illegal monopoly. To be sure, it's illegal in some circumstances to employ a monopoly position to impede competition.
But in this case, Adobe's actions actually weaken their market position, by giving users an incentive to switch to a product that doesn't use activation. Obviously, they feel the increased revenue gained by reducing piracy will compensate for the loss of potential customers.
Yeah, that's an especially serious issue for Photojournalists, who are mostly self-employed (read: not exactly dripping dollars) and who need to use a laptop as well as a desktop. On the other hand, I doubt Adobe is ignorant of this, and suspect they have a policy that wasn't stated in the FAQ.
I have a friend who was doing some marketing consulting for Adobe, and about a year and a half ago, she mentioned that Adobe was really wrestling with the activation issue. She said they were aware of just how much people dislike it... on the other hand, they've been getting burned so badly on copying that they were (at the time) considering it.
The thing about product activation is that it tends to be effective only when you have a product for which there's no practical substitute. Photoshop users aren't going to suddenly switch to Corel Draw, just as Windows users weren't driven to Linux by activation. On the other hand, Intuit had to drop it because it simply drove people to Tax Cut or other alternatives.
Prior art? Maybe, but why admit to it? I mean, I undertsand that suing Microsoft could be worth a bundle to a small company. Still, the idea that Microsoft got ideas for Office features from you... I mean, is that something you really want people to know about?
>> 730 billion per year. Slight exaggeration? I thought so.
More likely an understatement. Again, we're talking about the combined *budgets* of all the biotech and pharmaceutical companies. not their profits, which may be 10% or so of revenues, but the budgets themselves. Payroll, equipment, etc. I'll admit I haven't given much thought to the exact numbers.... but any way you slice it, it far exceeds what is spent on defense.
Just a hot button issue for me, when somebody says that America doesn't spend enough on x, y, or z. Usually it's propaganda from the beaureaucracy.
By such reasoning, one could argue that America hardly spends any money on cars.
>> Instead we spend more on a "war on terror" in a year than has been spent in the entire history of cancer research.
Not even remotely true, unless you only count the money spent by the federal government. There are billions spent every day on cancer research by companies big and small, dwarfing what is spent chasing terrorists.
It's like that year at the Oscars when all those wealthy actors stood up and complained that the US doesn't spend enough on the arts.
Anyway, read the Preamble.... "in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity"
No mention of curing cancer, or PBS documentaries, or midnight basketball, or time off from work to take your dog to the vet. Those things are all reasonable, but they're not the primary responsibility of government.
Note, too, the difference in wording: "PROVIDE for the common defense, PROMOTE the general welfare."
Even so, it looks to me as if they'll run afoul of the prohibition against state regulation of interstate commerce.
If stopping spam were as easy as signing a bill that makes it illegal, it would have happened a long time ago. Didn't work for drugs, won't work for spam. Doesn't even work for murder when you get right down to it.
But it makes for a nice political fiction, and probably some income for some lawyers. Spam will not stop on January 1. It will not stop a year later, or a year after that, reagrdless of how many laws we sign. Gray Davis will blame somebody else, maybe the federal government, maybe his neighboring states. At best, it will just move the problem overseas.
Likewise, I'll reiterate my prediction that the tough law that people celebrate today will be used to harass non-spammers in the future.
It's fascinating that this site, with so many articles under the YRO heading, is so utterly blind to the notion that maybe maybe giving the government jurisdiction over what gets transmitted over the Internet is a bad idea. To sell off your rights for a clean inbox isn't even a good deal.
Sure, everybody says, "I'm not compromising my rights, because I'm not a spammer."
Perhaps next year, some politician will have people saying, "I'm not signing away my rights, because I'm not a porngrapher."
And later, "I'm not signing away my rights, because I don't publish information on illegal drugs."
If you believe in freedom, you have to believe in it for everybody, even the shitheads. If you sell it off for a little convenience, you'll eventually find yourself on the losing side of an battle that's much more important than a clean inbox.
More to the point... the state of California has no jurisdiction to prosecute spammers who are not in California. Think about it... they can't arrest people in other states or other countries, can't seize property that's out of state. So I'd expect this will do absolutely NOTHING to stop most spam.
A more likely outcome is that some teenager is going to misconfigure a server someday, and some crank is gonna have him arrested for it. And if the kid works for a company with $$$$, look out.
It might help Gray Davis stay in office by giving him an issue to trumpet for the next two weeks, but that's about it. And yet he wonders why people call him insincere.
Slashdot Mirror
It sorta works, actually... I had to call Verizon support once, and they had one of those voice-recognition systems, where they ask you a bucnh of questions and you're supposed to speak the answer and then they try to figure out how to route the call. I started speaking gibberish, and I was connected to an operator within seconds.
Microsoft: has government protection from competition though the intellectual property laws. One Microsoft is plenty, I can't imagine we'd be any better off with two. But even in the absence of commercial alternatives, we have Linux, MySQL, etc, which is fine by me. The point of an economy is to produce goods and services, not to produce profits.
Oil companies: They simply don't have high profit margins; commodities like oil generally provide small margins. Even OPEC can't maintain price discipline within the cartel longer than a couple of months. Oil is profiatble by virtue of volume and predictable demand.
The reason people are stuck in sucky HMO's is because the coverage is tied to their jobs by the tax code, which is perverted. HMO's are guaranteed a certain amount of business, it's hard for unsatisfied customers to leave, and so they suck. Problem is, the last guy who tried to fix it did so by proposing a national HMO that had no competition. Oh, well, maybe next time. Hard to imagine any politician could come up with a worse system than the one we have, but they continue to do just that.
A much more interesting illustration is the one in which a shoe company makes shoes overseas for pennies, and then sells them here, with a jock endorsing them, for mucho dollars. But it turns out that there's competition to sign those jocks to the endorsement deals, so if Nike offers too little, then Reebok offers a little more. If Nike saves a few pennies by moving the plant from one Asian country to another, then the long-term savings probably won't accrue to Nike or to consumers, but to the jocks who subsequently sign endorsement deals.
I should have noted earlier that I also agree that it's hogwash to suggest that trade creates jobs. It does, however, lead to lower-cost goods, which benefits the lowest earners.
Unfortunately, the person who lost his $20K job knows he lost his job, and the 2 million people who subsequently saved a dime on their shower flip-flops don't even notice the savings individually. But when we tried protectionisom with autos in the 70's, the point was made much more clearly. At the time, import quoatas meant that it cost $4K to buy a $3K Toyota. The alternative was to buy a $3500 Chevy, which at the time were a pieces of shit. And average-income folks got pissed. Yeah, workers were happy in Detroit. But only in Detroit.
Wealth, on a national level, is determined not by what you have, but what you can produce.
We could redistribute every penny of current American wealth equally around the globe, and within a short period of time, the same order would redevlop, the same nations would be prosperous and the same nations would be poor. The Soviet Union had an incredible stash of natural resources, and a very educated and capable population, but they were piss-poor because they insisted on taking five dollars' worth of materials and labor and using them to produce two-dollar shoes.
It's perhaps justifiable to ban trade with a country on moral grounds. I'm personally somewhat conflicted on it... it worked well and advanced reform in South Africa; but in Cuba and Iraq, it just seems to have punished the people and had no effect on the dictators.
But you seem to suggest that the reason to avoid trade with India or China is that they're too poor. What's the morality of that?
Fact is, if a company's costs go down, then their prices go down, whether they like it or not. The reason is simple... a big profit margin is an open invitation to competition. If one company's are reduced, then their competitiors' are reduced, too.
That said, there are any number of politcal tactics a company can use to insulate themselves from that competition, to benefit unfairly, and to maintain some of that extra profit. Ironically, many of those actions are taken in the name of "protecting jobs." What they're really doing is protecting companies from offshore competition.
And it should be noted that while free trade doesn't create or destroy jobs, it does cause some displacement. For conservatives & libertarians, that often doesn't register, since the people displaced eventually end up in other jobs with equal earning potential... unfortunately, it's not a 1-for-1 replacement; some will do better and some will do worse.
Statistcally, there's no permanent loss of jobs or prosperity (otherwise, there would be no jobs left in America by now). But there is a social cost that doesn't show up in a good economic analysis.
More to the point... American dollars go to India, and there are only two things that can happen:
1. They spend the money on American goods
2. They just keep the money
Case 1 is a wash, and Case 2 (which never happens), would be wonderful... we could just keep printing dollar bills and never have to work. Unfortunately, when we import goods or services, the other countries want something in return.
America is prosperous largely because it's a huge free-trade zone. Imagine if people in Massachusetts complained about imports of cars from Michigan, and passed a law that said you had to buy a car made in Massachusetts, so that jobs wouldn't be lost to low-cost labor in Michigan. Or suppose Massachusetts insisted that Michigan adopt all of Massachusetts' labor laws. Would the people in Michigan want that? Would the people in Massachusetts want to drive cars designed in Brockton?
Or another example... suppose a state complained about all the computers "imported" from California or Texas, and insisted that any computers in be made and designed in the home state. Who would be hurt by that? People who can't afford expensive computers, that's who. It doesn't happen, nobody even suggests it, because it's freaking brain-dead stupid.
Some states make certain products, other states make others. Free trade among states reduces income inequality among states, and allows us to be peaceful neighbors.
The responsibility is clearly specified in the Tenth Ammendment: "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to grandstanding politicians."
Yeah, you read stories of abductions and kidnappings all the time, and you say, "Oh, that's sick or depraved or evil," and you go about your business. But when I saw that video, of an actual kidnapping taking place, it really gave me pause, made me realize how utterly inhuman someone has to be to walk up to a schoolgirl and drag her away by the arm. Consider if that camera hadn't been there, we still wouldn't know what happened, and people would be speculating that she was a runaway, or maybe making fun of her fat mother's tears.
The camera didn't prevent that crime, but it probably prevented several subsequent ones.
I just got tired of supplying the fake data every time I had to do an install, especially after they stopped accepting "webmaster@real.com".
Seriously, it doesn't seem to be a major privacy issue, just the annoyance of being continually marketed to for something you know you don't want to buy. And I'll confess, I actually bought the commercial version of their current player. But even after you pay them, they come back for more; there's always some damned popup in the system tray telling you that you want a Gold pass.
Also annoying... the only "fix" suggested by Real is to download and install an update... which means we get to go through the excercise of finding the hidden checkboxes all over again.
BTW, people whose politics are to the right of Pol Pot might be offended by Glaser's generous support of several of the most extreme and ghoulishly anti-human animal rights groups. They don't simply campaign on mainstream issues like fur coats, protection of endangered species, or animal cruelty. www.progressproject.org indulges writers who advocate such things as outlawing all use of animals for food, or allowing them legal standing to file lawsuits.
Compassion for animals is cool, but this is an anti-human philosophy taken to the extreme, and it's is on a par with the philosophies of all the worst villains in history. I'm frankly ashamed that Glaser got 20 bucks of my money, but that was a choice I made. But I thought long and hard before I bought.
Better than that, they could simply bury a clause in the EULA, "user agrees not to use this software to violate human rights..."
Done.
I dunno, I think rumors are as valid a news source as Reuters or the BBC. In my experience, the accuracy rate seems to be about the same.
>>GPS and Mapping related materials are exempt from the law
Hmmm, well, I'll have an interesting conversation with a cop when they pull me over. What I do is run the laptop with a GPS and DeLorme's maps. No, I don't "use" it while driving, it just remains open to the map with my position plotted on it.
Like any printed map, it's safe to glance at briefly (safer, in fact). And like any paper map, you can get in trouble if you start reading too closely. I don't adjust it while driving, it just sits there, usually closed after dark.
Just for the record, I've logged over 30K miles with this setup without so much as having to stop suddenly. By comparison, as a teenager I once rear-ended somebody while reading a paper map in a parking lot.
More to the point, some apes would sue us because we're a "derivative work".
Oh, wait, that's already happened.
Yeah, right, California - low taxes. Good grief.
My first impression when I moved there was that I missed the low taxes in Massachusetts. Something I NEVER thought I'd say.
California spends like a drunken sailor. They believe, like you, that "taxation is the basis for a stable society."
As a result, the California government is broke, the private economy is a shambles.
Despite the fact I'm basically a liberty-oriented free-market-loving sort of person, I've never described myself as a Libertarian, and this article is a good illustartion of why. Basically, he says, "do nothing, solve the damned problem yourself." Which is what we're currently doing, and it's why we're all so pissed off by spam.
Seems that most folks I know who call themselves libertarians fall for this sort of shallow thinking... they're basically non-violent anarchists. But the State can play a helpful role, without resorting to stupid "I just outlawed spam, vote for me next week," nonsense.
For example, the state can make it illegal to forge headers or use non-existent return addresses. It could require all UCE to be sent from a server registered or traceable to the sender. It could formally codify the SMTP protocol, and specify what constitutes fraudulent use of it.
Of course, such measures *by themselves* won't do anything to stop spam, but they can enable ISPs to manage it more effectively. Perhaps they're insufficient, perhaps others have better suggestions, but it highlights the proper role of the state, which is to establish a structure in which people can deal with one another in good faith. It does this by outlawing (if not preventing) fraud and deceptive advertising, by recognizing contracts, and other similar measures.
Too many people, though, call themselves Libertarians without having fully thought out what the state's role should be (hint: provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare...).
Y'know, the ironic thing is, telnet *is* more secure, as long as you don't connect to it.
Seriously, between SSH and OpenSSL, I'm getting real tired of patching every week or two. I manage a few Windows, several Linux, and a couple of Sun systems, and "panic patches" on OpenSSH/OpenSSL have far outnumbered any Windows problems. Not that I like Windows better or anything, but this is getting really, really ridiculous.
At this point, *nix security is better only in that I can strip it down more easily, but Microsoft does seem to be winning the QC battle now. The last three patches on my public Windows servers have been to OpenSSH/OpenSSL. Maybe I should just replace them with Front Page Extensions, they seem to have fewer security problems nowadays.
Go ahead, burn me at the stake as a heretic. That's just my experience.
I want: /.://
Well, there's really no such thing as an illegal monopoly. To be sure, it's illegal in some circumstances to employ a monopoly position to impede competition.
But in this case, Adobe's actions actually weaken their market position, by giving users an incentive to switch to a product that doesn't use activation. Obviously, they feel the increased revenue gained by reducing piracy will compensate for the loss of potential customers.
Yeah, that's an especially serious issue for Photojournalists, who are mostly self-employed (read: not exactly dripping dollars) and who need to use a laptop as well as a desktop. On the other hand, I doubt Adobe is ignorant of this, and suspect they have a policy that wasn't stated in the FAQ.
I have a friend who was doing some marketing consulting for Adobe, and about a year and a half ago, she mentioned that Adobe was really wrestling with the activation issue. She said they were aware of just how much people dislike it... on the other hand, they've been getting burned so badly on copying that they were (at the time) considering it.
The thing about product activation is that it tends to be effective only when you have a product for which there's no practical substitute. Photoshop users aren't going to suddenly switch to Corel Draw, just as Windows users weren't driven to Linux by activation. On the other hand, Intuit had to drop it because it simply drove people to Tax Cut or other alternatives.
Prior art? Maybe, but why admit to it? I mean, I undertsand that suing Microsoft could be worth a bundle to a small company. Still, the idea that Microsoft got ideas for Office features from you... I mean, is that something you really want people to know about?
>> 730 billion per year. Slight exaggeration? I thought so.
More likely an understatement. Again, we're talking about the combined *budgets* of all the biotech and pharmaceutical companies. not their profits, which may be 10% or so of revenues, but the budgets themselves. Payroll, equipment, etc. I'll admit I haven't given much thought to the exact numbers.... but any way you slice it, it far exceeds what is spent on defense.
Just a hot button issue for me, when somebody says that America doesn't spend enough on x, y, or z. Usually it's propaganda from the beaureaucracy.
By such reasoning, one could argue that America hardly spends any money on cars.
>> Instead we spend more on a "war on terror" in a year than has been spent in the entire history of cancer research.
Not even remotely true, unless you only count the money spent by the federal government. There are billions spent every day on cancer research by companies big and small, dwarfing what is spent chasing terrorists.
It's like that year at the Oscars when all those wealthy actors stood up and complained that the US doesn't spend enough on the arts.
Anyway, read the Preamble.... "in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity"
No mention of curing cancer, or PBS documentaries, or midnight basketball, or time off from work to take your dog to the vet. Those things are all reasonable, but they're not the primary responsibility of government.
Note, too, the difference in wording: "PROVIDE for the common defense, PROMOTE the general welfare."
Even so, it looks to me as if they'll run afoul of the prohibition against state regulation of interstate commerce.
If stopping spam were as easy as signing a bill that makes it illegal, it would have happened a long time ago. Didn't work for drugs, won't work for spam. Doesn't even work for murder when you get right down to it.
But it makes for a nice political fiction, and probably some income for some lawyers. Spam will not stop on January 1. It will not stop a year later, or a year after that, reagrdless of how many laws we sign. Gray Davis will blame somebody else, maybe the federal government, maybe his neighboring states. At best, it will just move the problem overseas.
Likewise, I'll reiterate my prediction that the tough law that people celebrate today will be used to harass non-spammers in the future.
It's fascinating that this site, with so many articles under the YRO heading, is so utterly blind to the notion that maybe maybe giving the government jurisdiction over what gets transmitted over the Internet is a bad idea. To sell off your rights for a clean inbox isn't even a good deal.
Sure, everybody says, "I'm not compromising my rights, because I'm not a spammer."
Perhaps next year, some politician will have people saying, "I'm not signing away my rights, because I'm not a porngrapher."
And later, "I'm not signing away my rights, because I don't publish information on illegal drugs."
If you believe in freedom, you have to believe in it for everybody, even the shitheads. If you sell it off for a little convenience, you'll eventually find yourself on the losing side of an battle that's much more important than a clean inbox.
More to the point... the state of California has no jurisdiction to prosecute spammers who are not in California. Think about it... they can't arrest people in other states or other countries, can't seize property that's out of state. So I'd expect this will do absolutely NOTHING to stop most spam.
A more likely outcome is that some teenager is going to misconfigure a server someday, and some crank is gonna have him arrested for it. And if the kid works for a company with $$$$, look out.
It might help Gray Davis stay in office by giving him an issue to trumpet for the next two weeks, but that's about it. And yet he wonders why people call him insincere.