Sure I read it. It doesn't say anything about their limiting the use to just these purposes. For all that they've said, they could still go ahead and sell a mailing list of the members. You've got to think like a lawyer about these things (unpleasant as that might be).
OK, offtopic, but all I can say is that I let a domain expire and never got such a letter, although the arrogance in it certainly sounds like them. I particularly like the "we are modifying your agreement...". How many 'agreements' have you made where one party can change terms midstream? Personally, I think that any attempt to carry out this 'agreement' would be a litigation-farm in a heartbeat, but hey, what do I know?
I'm going to recommend again that everyone sign up for ICANN's At-Large membership.
ICANN insists on having my name, address, and email. What they don't say is what they're going to do with this info. Will this be published somewhere so that every spamming cretin on the planet will be sending me stuff? Am I going to be subjected to endless lobbying emails from groups seeking to influence my vote? Am I going to end up on the mailing list for every computer catalog in existence? (Apparently my concerns aren't shared, since the signup database over there is croaking from overload.)
There's another problem with methanol: it's hydrophylic, so it will absorb moisture from the air, contaminating it. I'd be interested in hearing how Brazilians address this problem. Another thing about alternative fuels is that I don't know of any that have the energy density of gasoline, so you have these big, unwieldy containers to deal with if you want the same range. Not to mention, where am I going to get my liquid oxygen to refill my fuel-cell equipped car? By the way, the FBI is very interested in buyers of LOX and liquid hydrogen. It seems that they're quite useful to terrorist bombers (uh oh, Carnivore is gonna log that one!). Gasoline is a great example of what being 'first-mover' can get you: dominance due to the sheer magnitude of the investment in infrastructure that grows up.
The Internet Explorer vs Netscape issue is a good example of where we'd be in operating systems if MSFT wasn't dominant. I develop web pages, and the incompatibilities between browsers is what gives me the most headaches. And, I have to say, most of the genuine problems I have come from NS. I can have a page that conforms to standards and renders exquisitely in IE, and NS will turn it into pooch poop. If NS vanished from the face of the earth, I'd praise the day. I have no love for Gill Bates, but if MSFT wants to use its market share to carjack the standards, based on the superiority of their product it's ok with me.
Before you do this, I suggest asking some Laborites what they'd do. I'm willing to bet that they'd be even more restrictive of online content. Union-oriented political parties tend to want to wall off their countries from the outside world in order to protect their member's jobs.
The other side to the issue is that eBay has clearly tried to remove the user with no success. Is the government going to have any more luck?
Injunctive relief can be very effective, since one violation and wham! you're in jail. No trial, no delay (at least initially). It's being used against youth gang members for just this reason.
They're not asking "the government" to ban the guy, they're asking a federal judge. Probably because they're in one state and he's in another. And what they're seeking is probably injunctive relief. Legislative action at the federal level can't be directed against individuals, since the constitution forbids bills of attainder.
I thought I'd heard that as a measure against fraud, EBay was now requiring a credit card number in order to register? If that's so, how is this guy getting all of these accounts?
I recall that when I bought and started using NetObjects Fusion 5.0 that I immediately had problems with it. The software was buggy in key areas, crashed itself, crashed the system, etc. I went on the NOF user groups and NetObjects was being dragged over the coals by a dozen or more people who accused it of rushing out a horribly flawed product. Then I read a Computer Shopper review of NOF 5.0. Nada on the problems. Either the reviewer only used the most superficial features of the product for about 10 minutes, or he just decided not to mention that it had major difficulties. Maybe most product reviews are untrustworthy. The only place I can recall reading truely critical remarks is Maximum PC. Those guys don't seem to pull any punches.
Still, you do need to make sure you have compatible video cards.
Some manufacturers (matrox for example)are putting out cards that will drive multiple monitors from a single board. I think that makes the most sense. The thought of trying to persuade boards from different manufacturers to harmoniously coexist gives me acid flashbacks to the early days of the PC. Been there, done that, ain't goin' back.
I suppose it's mostly harmless, but I think the drafters of this law are wasting their time. Kids who want this game are going to get it, unless their parents are attentive. And if the parents are attentive and don't want their kid playing such games, then the law is unnecessary. I used to watch Superman as a kid, and some bunch of ninnies in the PTA came out with the opinion that it was harmful because it "blurred the line between fantasy and reality" whatever the hell that meant. My grandfather was given his first rifle at the age of 10. I think each generation has its bugaboos about what children are going to be harmed by, and I think this is just an example of an overreaction.
This is the government enabling me to raise my children. Now the choice to rent these games is back in the hands of the parents.
This was just step 1. Step 2 will be the government passing a law that says permitting a child to play a restricted game is prima facie evidence of child abuse. Child Protective Services will kick in your door, take your child, and raise it for you. (Ok, somewhat exaggerated. Maybe. But the ever-vigilant Nanny State does indeed think it knows better than you, so watch out.)
I've already heard (radio talk show) a bunch of folks saying what a great idea this is. I predict the movement to classify and restrict video games is about to emerge in the U.S. Nothing like demonizing something and launching a crusade to make yourself look good for the voters. Dylan and Klebold (the killers at Columbine High School) will be resurrected as examples of how evil video games can warp the tender psyches of the young.
Cool as it would be to have the biggest, baddest display on the block, I think it still makes more practical sense to have several smaller ones. (Besides, what could be cooler than an array of four flat panels arrayed in front of you? You can pretend you're ground control for the space shuttle.) Take a look at this website for some ideas, as well as this slashdot article.
I've been expecting this, since enemies of Napster, Gnutella, et al have explicitly announced their intentions to engage in these tactics. In fact, Gnutella has some users who have programmed clients to respond to search queries with a flood of "SPAM GNUTELLA"s, with html pages that autoforward to porn sites, with ads ("go to www.buymycrap.com"), as well those who make spoofs of genuine material. Freenet has said that they'll have a system in which users can give negative points to files that they deem not useful (Freenet hasn't said how it's going to prevent pseudo 'users' from illicitly downgrading genuine material, however. Ah well, the war goes on). I'm watching all this as an interesting experiment in whether Gresham's law (bad money drives out the good) will manifest itself.
I suspect that a voting system quickly is going to become mandatory to avoid a proliferation of bogus/damaged/spoof material.
If I were running an ISP, whatever server logs I did decide to keep, I wouldn't keep them long; I'd be too concerned about potential abuse by overzealous law enforcement or litigants to want to retain them. If you consult a tort lawyer today, you'll be told to get rid of your company's old email fairly rapidly so that it can't be used against you in court. I think that this would be a smart strategy for server logs as well.
Exactly my point. Since Republicans are all but shunned by the entertainment industry, they have nothing to lose by leaning on them, which is what Hatch is doing. If they were to wise up and grease a few more Republican palms, maybe they'd have smoother sailing. I doubt that it's ever going to happen, though. The entertainment industry types would rather blow their brains out than give money to a conservative. That's why I think the industry is unlikely to get much of its legislative agenda. I also think that Sen. Hatch and other members of Congress remember that they gave the industry an enormous gift when they modified the copyright laws a few years ago, extending rights many years into the future.
IIRC he was also a shit stirrer in the MS anti trust suit.
Yep. It couldn't have anything to do with Novell being located in his home state of Utah, could it? Nah.
Looks like the entertainment industry should have shifted their campaign contributions a little more to the Republicans than the Democrats. Seriously, I'm not generally in favor of more government intervention, but it's not necessarily bad to threaten to get involved to blast some recalcitrant group off of dead center. Hatch must be getting tired of hearing the RIAA, Metallica, and everyone else bitch and clog up the courts.
Why pass laws that aren't going to have an effect, or have little/no hope of serving there intended purpose?
I can answer that one: (1) to be seen as doing something, or (2) to satisfy some group of campaign donors. A politician can stand before the voters and say, "I sponsored a bill to end the scourge of [Online Gambling | Child Porn | Cotton in Aspirin Bottles | The Concern Of The Moment]. He can also tell some pressure group that he's done something about whatever the hell it is that puches their buttons. It's done all the time, and for just these cynical reasons. Of course, there are some zealots who actually believe in what they're pushing, but I think most of the politicos who vote for measures like these are just using it as window-dressing for election time, or so they can tell their campaign donors that they've done something for them.
What does the ISP have to do with illegal gambling? Nothing.
The government goes after the ISP because that's the easiest. It's the same principal as the RIAA going after Napster - the users are the ones breaking the law, but prosecuting hundreds of thousands of them is impossible. The ISP has a physical reality and financial assets, and most won't even put up a fight - it's much easier for them to capitulate to pressure and do whatever government wants than to engage in a costly fight, even if they're in the right. The tobacco and gun industries are good examples of what can happen to you if you get the wrong folks mad.
What is it with the american psyche that demands everything be banned?
I don't think the desire to codify every aspect of human behavior and have it controlled by the state is a particularly American inclination. In fact, I'd say we tend less toward this sort of thing than most other countries. And when some idiot manages to get a really horrendous piece of crap put into law, there's a reasonable chance that the Supreme Court will overturn it. Luckily, in this particular case, even if this bill were to become law and be upheld, technology makes it a futile effort. The government can no more keep a gambler away from an online casino than it can keep drugs out of the country.
The government just hates it when private citizens try to "muscle in" on their "turf" you know.
You know who is now trying to defend their 'turf' where gambling is concerned? American Indians (ok, Native Americans if you will, but I was born here too, so I qualify under that designation). California recently passed a ballot initiative to grant Indians the right to establish Vegas-style gambling casino in the state. And just today, I heard a radio commercial asking people to contact their congressbeing to combat the insidious eeeevil of internet gambling. A friend of mine in the advertising biz tells me the sponsoring group, with a nice name like "Concerned Citizens for Truth, Beauty, and the American Way" (sorry, I've now forgotten the real name, but it's equally saccarine) is backed by Indian casino interests. Guess they don't want the competition.
This is just another example of politicians commanding the tides to recede. Anonymizer/encryption services like ZeroKnowledge Systems Freedom make any attempts to bar access to certain sites futile. The hosting servers for the gambling sites are generally outside U.S. jurisdiction. Even if the U.S. were to pressure the hosting countries to block U.S. users, anonymous proxies operating outside the U.S. (Freedom is a specialized example of one of these) would make it impossible to know where their user is coming from. I suppose this sort of legislation is harmless, but it would be better if the authors of these bills devoted their time to real problems.
My point was that Hatch thinking anyone is going to rip off his tunes is ludicrous.
And by the way, I've run across some fairly obscure stuff on Napster. I don't think the music track from "The Battle of Britain" ranks high on the pop charts. It's all in catching the right moment in time when the one person on the planet who has that in their Napster folder logs on to the Napster server.
Slashdot Mirror
Sure I read it. It doesn't say anything about their limiting the use to just these purposes. For all that they've said, they could still go ahead and sell a mailing list of the members. You've got to think like a lawyer about these things (unpleasant as that might be).
OK, offtopic, but all I can say is that I let a domain expire and never got such a letter, although the arrogance in it certainly sounds like them. I particularly like the "we are modifying your agreement ...". How many 'agreements' have you made where one party can change terms midstream? Personally, I think that any attempt to carry out this 'agreement' would be a litigation-farm in a heartbeat, but hey, what do I know?
I'm going to recommend again that everyone sign up for ICANN's At-Large membership.
ICANN insists on having my name, address, and email. What they don't say is what they're going to do with this info. Will this be published somewhere so that every spamming cretin on the planet will be sending me stuff? Am I going to be subjected to endless lobbying emails from groups seeking to influence my vote? Am I going to end up on the mailing list for every computer catalog in existence? (Apparently my concerns aren't shared, since the signup database over there is croaking from overload.)
There's another problem with methanol: it's hydrophylic, so it will absorb moisture from the air, contaminating it. I'd be interested in hearing how Brazilians address this problem. Another thing about alternative fuels is that I don't know of any that have the energy density of gasoline, so you have these big, unwieldy containers to deal with if you want the same range. Not to mention, where am I going to get my liquid oxygen to refill my fuel-cell equipped car? By the way, the FBI is very interested in buyers of LOX and liquid hydrogen. It seems that they're quite useful to terrorist bombers (uh oh, Carnivore is gonna log that one!). Gasoline is a great example of what being 'first-mover' can get you: dominance due to the sheer magnitude of the investment in infrastructure that grows up.
The Internet Explorer vs Netscape issue is a good example of where we'd be in operating systems if MSFT wasn't dominant. I develop web pages, and the incompatibilities between browsers is what gives me the most headaches. And, I have to say, most of the genuine problems I have come from NS. I can have a page that conforms to standards and renders exquisitely in IE, and NS will turn it into pooch poop. If NS vanished from the face of the earth, I'd praise the day. I have no love for Gill Bates, but if MSFT wants to use its market share to carjack the standards, based on the superiority of their product it's ok with me.
Stupid govt. I'm voting Labor next time.
Before you do this, I suggest asking some Laborites what they'd do. I'm willing to bet that they'd be even more restrictive of online content. Union-oriented political parties tend to want to wall off their countries from the outside world in order to protect their member's jobs.
The other side to the issue is that eBay has clearly tried to remove the user with no success. Is the government going to have any more luck?
Injunctive relief can be very effective, since one violation and wham! you're in jail. No trial, no delay (at least initially). It's being used against youth gang members for just this reason.
They're not asking "the government" to ban the guy, they're asking a federal judge. Probably because they're in one state and he's in another. And what they're seeking is probably injunctive relief. Legislative action at the federal level can't be directed against individuals, since the constitution forbids bills of attainder.
I thought I'd heard that as a measure against fraud, EBay was now requiring a credit card number in order to register? If that's so, how is this guy getting all of these accounts?
I recall that when I bought and started using NetObjects Fusion 5.0 that I immediately had problems with it. The software was buggy in key areas, crashed itself, crashed the system, etc. I went on the NOF user groups and NetObjects was being dragged over the coals by a dozen or more people who accused it of rushing out a horribly flawed product. Then I read a Computer Shopper review of NOF 5.0. Nada on the problems. Either the reviewer only used the most superficial features of the product for about 10 minutes, or he just decided not to mention that it had major difficulties. Maybe most product reviews are untrustworthy. The only place I can recall reading truely critical remarks is Maximum PC. Those guys don't seem to pull any punches.
Still, you do need to make sure you have compatible video cards.
Some manufacturers (matrox for example)are putting out cards that will drive multiple monitors from a single board. I think that makes the most sense. The thought of trying to persuade boards from different manufacturers to harmoniously coexist gives me acid flashbacks to the early days of the PC. Been there, done that, ain't goin' back.
I suppose it's mostly harmless, but I think the drafters of this law are wasting their time. Kids who want this game are going to get it, unless their parents are attentive. And if the parents are attentive and don't want their kid playing such games, then the law is unnecessary. I used to watch Superman as a kid, and some bunch of ninnies in the PTA came out with the opinion that it was harmful because it "blurred the line between fantasy and reality" whatever the hell that meant. My grandfather was given his first rifle at the age of 10. I think each generation has its bugaboos about what children are going to be harmed by, and I think this is just an example of an overreaction.
This is the government enabling me to raise my children. Now the choice to rent these games is back in the hands of the parents.
This was just step 1. Step 2 will be the government passing a law that says permitting a child to play a restricted game is prima facie evidence of child abuse. Child Protective Services will kick in your door, take your child, and raise it for you. (Ok, somewhat exaggerated. Maybe. But the ever-vigilant Nanny State does indeed think it knows better than you, so watch out.)
I've already heard (radio talk show) a bunch of folks saying what a great idea this is. I predict the movement to classify and restrict video games is about to emerge in the U.S. Nothing like demonizing something and launching a crusade to make yourself look good for the voters. Dylan and Klebold (the killers at Columbine High School) will be resurrected as examples of how evil video games can warp the tender psyches of the young.
Cool as it would be to have the biggest, baddest display on the block, I think it still makes more practical sense to have several smaller ones. (Besides, what could be cooler than an array of four flat panels arrayed in front of you? You can pretend you're ground control for the space shuttle.) Take a look at this website for some ideas, as well as this slashdot article.
I've been expecting this, since enemies of Napster, Gnutella, et al have explicitly announced their intentions to engage in these tactics. In fact, Gnutella has some users who have programmed clients to respond to search queries with a flood of "SPAM GNUTELLA"s, with html pages that autoforward to porn sites, with ads ("go to www.buymycrap.com"), as well those who make spoofs of genuine material. Freenet has said that they'll have a system in which users can give negative points to files that they deem not useful (Freenet hasn't said how it's going to prevent pseudo 'users' from illicitly downgrading genuine material, however. Ah well, the war goes on). I'm watching all this as an interesting experiment in whether Gresham's law (bad money drives out the good) will manifest itself.
I suspect that a voting system quickly is going to become mandatory to avoid a proliferation of bogus/damaged/spoof material.
If I were running an ISP, whatever server logs I did decide to keep, I wouldn't keep them long; I'd be too concerned about potential abuse by overzealous law enforcement or litigants to want to retain them. If you consult a tort lawyer today, you'll be told to get rid of your company's old email fairly rapidly so that it can't be used against you in court. I think that this would be a smart strategy for server logs as well.
Orrin Hatch _is_ a republican.
Exactly my point. Since Republicans are all but shunned by the entertainment industry, they have nothing to lose by leaning on them, which is what Hatch is doing. If they were to wise up and grease a few more Republican palms, maybe they'd have smoother sailing. I doubt that it's ever going to happen, though. The entertainment industry types would rather blow their brains out than give money to a conservative. That's why I think the industry is unlikely to get much of its legislative agenda. I also think that Sen. Hatch and other members of Congress remember that they gave the industry an enormous gift when they modified the copyright laws a few years ago, extending rights many years into the future.
IIRC he was also a shit stirrer in the MS anti trust suit.
Yep. It couldn't have anything to do with Novell being located in his home state of Utah, could it? Nah.
Looks like the entertainment industry should have shifted their campaign contributions a little more to the Republicans than the Democrats. Seriously, I'm not generally in favor of more government intervention, but it's not necessarily bad to threaten to get involved to blast some recalcitrant group off of dead center. Hatch must be getting tired of hearing the RIAA, Metallica, and everyone else bitch and clog up the courts.
Why pass laws that aren't going to have an effect, or have little/no hope of serving there intended purpose?
I can answer that one: (1) to be seen as doing something, or (2) to satisfy some group of campaign donors. A politician can stand before the voters and say, "I sponsored a bill to end the scourge of [Online Gambling | Child Porn | Cotton in Aspirin Bottles | The Concern Of The Moment]. He can also tell some pressure group that he's done something about whatever the hell it is that puches their buttons. It's done all the time, and for just these cynical reasons. Of course, there are some zealots who actually believe in what they're pushing, but I think most of the politicos who vote for measures like these are just using it as window-dressing for election time, or so they can tell their campaign donors that they've done something for them.
What does the ISP have to do with illegal gambling? Nothing.
The government goes after the ISP because that's the easiest. It's the same principal as the RIAA going after Napster - the users are the ones breaking the law, but prosecuting hundreds of thousands of them is impossible. The ISP has a physical reality and financial assets, and most won't even put up a fight - it's much easier for them to capitulate to pressure and do whatever government wants than to engage in a costly fight, even if they're in the right. The tobacco and gun industries are good examples of what can happen to you if you get the wrong folks mad.
What is it with the american psyche that demands everything be banned?
I don't think the desire to codify every aspect of human behavior and have it controlled by the state is a particularly American inclination. In fact, I'd say we tend less toward this sort of thing than most other countries. And when some idiot manages to get a really horrendous piece of crap put into law, there's a reasonable chance that the Supreme Court will overturn it. Luckily, in this particular case, even if this bill were to become law and be upheld, technology makes it a futile effort. The government can no more keep a gambler away from an online casino than it can keep drugs out of the country.
The government just hates it when private citizens try to "muscle in" on their "turf" you know.
You know who is now trying to defend their 'turf' where gambling is concerned? American Indians (ok, Native Americans if you will, but I was born here too, so I qualify under that designation). California recently passed a ballot initiative to grant Indians the right to establish Vegas-style gambling casino in the state. And just today, I heard a radio commercial asking people to contact their congressbeing to combat the insidious eeeevil of internet gambling. A friend of mine in the advertising biz tells me the sponsoring group, with a nice name like "Concerned Citizens for Truth, Beauty, and the American Way" (sorry, I've now forgotten the real name, but it's equally saccarine) is backed by Indian casino interests. Guess they don't want the competition.
This is just another example of politicians commanding the tides to recede. Anonymizer/encryption services like ZeroKnowledge Systems Freedom make any attempts to bar access to certain sites futile. The hosting servers for the gambling sites are generally outside U.S. jurisdiction. Even if the U.S. were to pressure the hosting countries to block U.S. users, anonymous proxies operating outside the U.S. (Freedom is a specialized example of one of these) would make it impossible to know where their user is coming from. I suppose this sort of legislation is harmless, but it would be better if the authors of these bills devoted their time to real problems.
Only top 40 pop music is traded on Napster.
My point was that Hatch thinking anyone is going to rip off his tunes is ludicrous.
And by the way, I've run across some fairly obscure stuff on Napster. I don't think the music track from "The Battle of Britain" ranks high on the pop charts. It's all in catching the right moment in time when the one person on the planet who has that in their Napster folder logs on to the Napster server.