Well, let's see. Most banks require an ID to open an account. Most check-cashers want an ID to cash a check. So, besides toting your social security card and your birth certificate around with you to prove your identity, it's more convenient to use a state issued ID. In this example, I used a driver's license as a quick example of a state issued identification card with a number, since ALL states use a unique number on these cards, be it a driver's license or a plain ID card.
I don't have anything against those without a driver's license, I just used the term for convenience. You're just being an asshole.
That's what I was thinking, but couldn't be sure being unfamiliar with Windows development environments. Honestly, I've only coded on Linux and Mac OS X. It's not that I have something against Windows, it's just I never had a reason to code on Windows. Maybe I might pick up a C# and and XNA book this weekend.
yeah, he/she must be new. I paid for a subscription, like an idiot, and this guy/gal comes in and registers and gets a lower user number than me without paying a dime. Damn you/.!
Out of curiosity, wouldn't the game just crash then considering that you'll be creating objects to respond to input methods that don't exist? I don't know C# nor am I familiar with XNA beyond knowing about both of them, so this is a legitimate question.
Hey, it's nice to read some good news about an evil empire every now and then. Who wants to constantly read: Android Good! iOS Bad! Maemo Good. Nokia Bad. Freshen up the room a bit; no one wants to smell Apple's farts and Google's belches every day. Furthermore, you're an AC. Man up and post with a user name.
Well, let's see. My wife has one account she uses personally, another account for her photo business, another account she manages for the four year old since he's apparently old enough to be exploited by Facebook's lack of privacy but not old enough to at least enjoy the exploitation himself, and two more other accounts she uses to spy on me and other women she doesn't trust. That's five right there. I only have one account, but then again, Facebook is just another email address for me. I personally don't get the whole "social" fad.
My same thoughts about the DOB too. Driver's license number I could understand, but SSN and DOB? Are they going to fill out a w-4 for them? Maybe a 1099-MISC.
Correct, not the legal definition of public domain, but how the worked can be used will essentially be the same meaning. If I created a work, registered that work to be copyrighted, then along comes Joe Somebody who takes my work and copies it, and I don't take reasonable action to protect my copyrighted work, then when it comes time to argue it in court, I'm not going to have much ground to stand on if I wait 20 years vs waiting 5. I may still own the copyright, but I'm going to find it damn hard to stop usage of it when I have precedent against me for not caring enough to take reasonable efforts to protect my IP. Reasonable effort is the key and it's not hard to establish because it's so broadly defined. Say I wait 20 years to take action because I couldn't afford an attorney, so I sent a letter every year asking Joe Somebody to stop; that's reasonable effort. If I sue Joe Somebody the day he copied my work for personal use, that's still reasonable (maybe even extreme) effort. But if I sit on my hands knowing about the infringement and do nothing for 20 years, then the courts and a jury will most likely believe that I simply didn't care enough to do anything about it, so I must not care who uses it. I may own a copyright, but it might as well be public domain.
And according to the books of their lower entities they are losing money. What they hide under is the guise that these subsidiaries are losing money, but their publicly traded parent company has their hands in more "profitable" areas so their profits are offset by the piracy. What Enron did was use SPEs, which are short term, to hide REAL debt and inflate their books, making it appear that the company was more profitable and valuable than it really was. What Hollywood does is the opposite, they offset their debts to long-lasting subsidiaries and send their profits up to the publicly traded company with the subsidiaries appearing to be broke. This way, when they hire actors, producers, musicians, or anyone else they want to screw over, they can claim that the subsidiary is independent and broke. They also use this disguise to cry to the Federal government about their lost revenues and profits, and how they need to destroy anything that's a disruptor to their business models; unfortunately, they legally have to or find themselves being sued by shareholders for failing a fiduciary duty of care.
Hollywood is taking a "we lose billions" approach to get sympathy by a government that hates to hear of a large corporation losing money, but could care less that the same organization isn't paying their artists, purposely, to the benefit of shareholders nor are they paying taxes at the publicly traded level. Furthermore, the amount of money they spend collectively on lawsuits and lobbying to rid the pirates is small relative to their overall profit.
". Anyone who signed paychecks could be held personally liable for those taxes"
Not true. Read up on fiduciary responsibilities.
"your salary should equal whatever it takes to zero out your profit and loss after paying all your bills and then they can't come after that"
Well, that's not a good idea either. Personal income is taxed higher than a dividend. There are much better ways to lower a corporate tax liability. Paying it all to yourself isn't a wise one. Furthermore, the IRS will catch something like that and you can bet you're going to be audited and fined. There are other options like passing forward losses from previous years, changing your depreciation structure, buy another company that's under water in debt and pass their debt as losses. I have a BBA and not a tax accountant, but there are several ways to avoid paying a tax that are better than simply increasing your salary. Furthermore, unless you have your organization setup as an S-Corp or a LLC, paying yourself the equal of the profit will be seen as paying yourself the dividend. Don't make the mistake and think the courts are naive and will let you pass because you placed the dividend at the top of the income statement instead of the bottom.
No, Verizon tends to have the better Android phones. I'm a T-Mobile customer too, but arguing that they have a better Android selection is far from the truth. Look how long it took to get a 1GHz without going through Google. Even then, they're terrible about getting updates out in time. Although, I'll admit they're at least better than AT&T when it comes to Android selection and Android feature truncating. It's going to be a sad day when I have to root an Android phone just to get side loading apps back, and you can guarantee that the next Nexus phone will probably go to Verizon.
Not always. If EA or whomever they bought the IP from failed to make reasonable efforts to protect their copyrights, then they can lose them. If these games existed for quite a while and EA or the original holder knew of them and did NOTHING to stop them, then it's possible that a judge could throw the works into public domain. A cease and desist is a great example of a "reasonable effort," but waiting until you come close to releasing another sequel or remake to protect said copyright, then it isn't hard to argue that you didn't care for it at all.
This won't work in America due to piercing of the corporate vail. Moving your assets to a holder won't protect them, and moving debt to subsidiaries won't work either, as you're committing fraud. This is the EXACT same thing Author Anderson helped Enron with. Enron moved their debt and losses to special purpose entities (SPE) to boost the parent companies earnings and balance sheets. As a result of such shenanigans, corporations got stuck with complying with the million dollar a year law called Sarbanes-Oxley. Granted most of the law applies to publicly traded companies, but if you're running games like this you're already publicly traded, or looking at an IPO, either way, you're going to run into SO pretty quick.
What about iPods and iPads? Comparing a phone to a dedicated gaming/entertainment device isn't a fair comparison. Furthermore, banning one from playing online vs banning one from making and receiving phone calls just because the device has unauthorized software is a way to quickly get the Feds on your ass. Playing online is a feature, not a requirement. For a phone to make a phone call isn't a feature, it's a requirement. But, to play debaters, let's look at your proposals:
"1: Reword all cellular carrier agreements where they will drop service and blacklist any devices suspected of being jailbroken (downloading stuff from Cydia repos for example.)"
Go ahead, drop service. Give me a REASON to drop my contract, especially if you're mistaken.
"2: Encrypt bootloaders, and have the baseband hand the keys to the OS. This is how Motorola does it, and so far, the trouble of cracking Moto's encrypted bootloaders have gotten modders to move elsewhere."
Ok, crack the encryption key and I've solved the problem. This is exactly what George did.
"3: Push software down to the iPhones periodically to search for jailbreaks. If devices are JB-ed, all Apple IDs connected with them would be banned. MS does with the XBoxes, Valve does this with VAC, etc."
Ok, disable the push then. It'll be like Windows Genuine Authentication that somehow always gets bypassed by pirates.
"4: Have the baseband software and processor (IIRC, the radio uses a separate processor than the main OS), act as a TPM. If the running OS isn't signed, put the device in DFU mode until a valid copy of the IPSW is put on."
Again, figure out the key and sign your own baked OS. Furthermore, ALL cell phones are required to at least make emergency calls. You preventing a device from doing that because it runs unauthorized software will find you in a jail cell for breaking a Federal statute.
"5: Ask cellular carriers to cough up IP records of anyone who bought programs through Cydia, cross reference the IMEIs, and when it comes for an iOS update, blacklist all IMEIs gathered which are suspected during the SHSH negotation process." (sic)
And have the full force of the US Government and/or State governments on your ass for violating privacy rights.
"6: Have a firmware eFuse counter that only allows for flashing higher versions (assuming they are not betas)."
Ok, then all OS updates will appear as Betas, or iOS 5 will be iOS 6, and so forth.
"7: Separate the iPhones into different models, each having different hardware protection, and when rev B is put out, anyone caught using rev A exploits is banned from cellular networked via IMEI, and their Apple IDs are banned."
Yeah, this hasn't worked for Sony and their PSPs, I'm sure it'll work for for Apple though. Furthermore, you disable a phone from making phone calls, then you're going to find some government entity on your ass, especially if you ban the device from the network and it can't make emergency calls anymore. Now you're breaking a Federal law, again, to protect your IP.
"8: Get with cellular carriers and lease iPhones the way Ma Bell used to lease telephones. This + a EULA would mean that jailbreaking would be against the law because it wouldn't be the owner's device."
Yeah, not in AT&T's best interest. You see, if they own the phone, then they're liable if it doesn't work properly, especially in an emergency situation, or when it breaks, when it runs out of battery life, when its dirty, etc. That's a lot of risk pooling you're attempting, something insurance companies are good at, not telephone companies. Furthermore, the last time AT&T tried this, they were broken up for breaking anti-trust laws. I doubt they would want that again, especially after all the work they've done to be put Ma Bell back together, just for the sake of Apple, a company that is now selling to their largest competitor.
You see, you're arguments are so far fetched that no one would waste their time pointing out your flaws in both security l
If I were on a jury panel, I could see the case about not knowing where the company is located. I'm sure most American's aren't aware that Sony is located in CA. I knew they had a studio in CA, but didn't know the entire American branch was there too. Furthermore, their LLC registration in California points to Delaware and that registration we can't see without paying a little extra to the Delaware Department of State. So are they a Californian company or a Delawarean company?
Ok, then someone with a BBA that has read a many Econ books and attended so many classes, passed so many exams, and actually knows something about Econ should be able to respond.
First, theoretical economics and real-world economics are different things. In fact, most macro and micro Econ classes for new business students focus on the theoretical part, but upper level and post graduate focus on the real world economics. The basics are always the same: people respond to incentives. So, let's put some real world incentives in front of you.
You pay a yearly tax on your net profit produced on your income statement, and usually property tax, depending on your incorporation state, on your non-liquid assets on your balance sheet. Here's the kicker, none of this affects your cash flow until it's time to pay out the following year. So, you're given two options: 1.) pay zero tax and provide a better return to your shareholders (or cash if you're retaining earnings) at the end of the year and borrow money at a high interest to pay for the higher cost of doing business in America throughout the year or 2.) outsource my work overseas and receive a lower cash outflow while lowering my liabilities and long-term debt, since my cost of doing business is a lot lower in places where I can dump my toxic waste in the river and tell the uneducated locals it's not harmful, instead of complying with pesky laws. Considering that cash flow is more important than the bottom line for the survival of a business, I think I'll take door number two.
This is where economic theory and practice diverge. Most intro Econ books assume the market will behave rationally, and this is NEVER the case.
Another example, you mentioned corporate headquarters being moved to the US and increasing payroll tax. You've never been offered stock options in your employment contract, I'm guessing. Here's the thing, I can take a lower paycheck and receive stock options that I can exercise at a later date and AVOID paying payroll taxes. Instead, any gain from exercising my options are CAPITAL GAINS, which are taxed at a LOWER tax rate than payroll taxes. This is how corporate headquarters think. The incentive is that I get a better performance out of my managers since a huge chunk of their pay is based on the stock's performance, and they get higher income that's taxed at a lower rate. Guess who's not getting these great options. Hint: all the engineers and workers underneath us that have so many limitations on their options (if they even get them) that it's not worth it to exercise them until retirement.
You see, the only real way to increase jobs and improve the economy, is by making the markets as competitive as possible. Remove barriers to entry, empower consumers, empower suppliers by building infrastructure alternatives. Lowering the tax rate to zero isn't going to help much. If you want to increase your tax revenues, keep the loopholes and add the option to pay a tax LOWER than the cost to reach a zero tax liability. It's not the best solution, but it's better than not collecting anything and applying the tax burden to the rest of working America.
So, if you want to have a business debate, let's have at it. If you want to debate particle physics, then I can't help you beyond a wikipedia search and my knowledge retained from EngineeringPhysics in college. And since you're quoting that these rational scientist and nerds that peruse/. pickup an Econ book, maybe you should pick one up about managerial economics and management in general. The Five Forces Model is a great place to start if you want to see what really puts pressure on a business.
Don't know. I didn't get into Star Trek until Voyager, and even then not until Jeri Ryan joined in, and the reinvigoration that was called Star Trek of 2010. Prior to that, Shatner was the Danny Crane. Hell, I just discovered Battlestar Galactica after Caprica ended, and I've never got into Star Wars (tried, but couldn't stomach it).
Guess I'm not part of the "us" crowd but I can at least understand why you guys have so much nostalgia for him and his character.
You mean a real iPad law suite. Last time I checked, the iOS API was proprietary to Apple, possibly under copyright and trade secrete IP laws. Although, an interpreter or emulator doesn't seem all much of an issue though.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, let's see. Most banks require an ID to open an account. Most check-cashers want an ID to cash a check. So, besides toting your social security card and your birth certificate around with you to prove your identity, it's more convenient to use a state issued ID. In this example, I used a driver's license as a quick example of a state issued identification card with a number, since ALL states use a unique number on these cards, be it a driver's license or a plain ID card.
I don't have anything against those without a driver's license, I just used the term for convenience. You're just being an asshole.
That's what I was thinking, but couldn't be sure being unfamiliar with Windows development environments. Honestly, I've only coded on Linux and Mac OS X. It's not that I have something against Windows, it's just I never had a reason to code on Windows. Maybe I might pick up a C# and and XNA book this weekend.
No joke is ever overused. Go ahead and let it rip!
yeah, he/she must be new. I paid for a subscription, like an idiot, and this guy/gal comes in and registers and gets a lower user number than me without paying a dime. Damn you /.!
Out of curiosity, wouldn't the game just crash then considering that you'll be creating objects to respond to input methods that don't exist? I don't know C# nor am I familiar with XNA beyond knowing about both of them, so this is a legitimate question.
Hey, it's nice to read some good news about an evil empire every now and then. Who wants to constantly read: Android Good! iOS Bad! Maemo Good. Nokia Bad. Freshen up the room a bit; no one wants to smell Apple's farts and Google's belches every day. Furthermore, you're an AC. Man up and post with a user name.
Here. You can read it again.
http://www.dak2000.com/
Well, let's see. My wife has one account she uses personally, another account for her photo business, another account she manages for the four year old since he's apparently old enough to be exploited by Facebook's lack of privacy but not old enough to at least enjoy the exploitation himself, and two more other accounts she uses to spy on me and other women she doesn't trust. That's five right there. I only have one account, but then again, Facebook is just another email address for me. I personally don't get the whole "social" fad.
Since when did intellectual property of other nations mean anything to the Chinese?
My same thoughts about the DOB too. Driver's license number I could understand, but SSN and DOB? Are they going to fill out a w-4 for them? Maybe a 1099-MISC.
Correct, not the legal definition of public domain, but how the worked can be used will essentially be the same meaning. If I created a work, registered that work to be copyrighted, then along comes Joe Somebody who takes my work and copies it, and I don't take reasonable action to protect my copyrighted work, then when it comes time to argue it in court, I'm not going to have much ground to stand on if I wait 20 years vs waiting 5. I may still own the copyright, but I'm going to find it damn hard to stop usage of it when I have precedent against me for not caring enough to take reasonable efforts to protect my IP. Reasonable effort is the key and it's not hard to establish because it's so broadly defined. Say I wait 20 years to take action because I couldn't afford an attorney, so I sent a letter every year asking Joe Somebody to stop; that's reasonable effort. If I sue Joe Somebody the day he copied my work for personal use, that's still reasonable (maybe even extreme) effort. But if I sit on my hands knowing about the infringement and do nothing for 20 years, then the courts and a jury will most likely believe that I simply didn't care enough to do anything about it, so I must not care who uses it. I may own a copyright, but it might as well be public domain.
And according to the books of their lower entities they are losing money. What they hide under is the guise that these subsidiaries are losing money, but their publicly traded parent company has their hands in more "profitable" areas so their profits are offset by the piracy. What Enron did was use SPEs, which are short term, to hide REAL debt and inflate their books, making it appear that the company was more profitable and valuable than it really was. What Hollywood does is the opposite, they offset their debts to long-lasting subsidiaries and send their profits up to the publicly traded company with the subsidiaries appearing to be broke. This way, when they hire actors, producers, musicians, or anyone else they want to screw over, they can claim that the subsidiary is independent and broke. They also use this disguise to cry to the Federal government about their lost revenues and profits, and how they need to destroy anything that's a disruptor to their business models; unfortunately, they legally have to or find themselves being sued by shareholders for failing a fiduciary duty of care.
Hollywood is taking a "we lose billions" approach to get sympathy by a government that hates to hear of a large corporation losing money, but could care less that the same organization isn't paying their artists, purposely, to the benefit of shareholders nor are they paying taxes at the publicly traded level. Furthermore, the amount of money they spend collectively on lawsuits and lobbying to rid the pirates is small relative to their overall profit.
To reply to your statement:
". Anyone who signed paychecks could be held personally liable for those taxes"
Not true. Read up on fiduciary responsibilities.
"your salary should equal whatever it takes to zero out your profit and loss after paying all your bills and then they can't come after that"
Well, that's not a good idea either. Personal income is taxed higher than a dividend. There are much better ways to lower a corporate tax liability. Paying it all to yourself isn't a wise one. Furthermore, the IRS will catch something like that and you can bet you're going to be audited and fined. There are other options like passing forward losses from previous years, changing your depreciation structure, buy another company that's under water in debt and pass their debt as losses. I have a BBA and not a tax accountant, but there are several ways to avoid paying a tax that are better than simply increasing your salary. Furthermore, unless you have your organization setup as an S-Corp or a LLC, paying yourself the equal of the profit will be seen as paying yourself the dividend. Don't make the mistake and think the courts are naive and will let you pass because you placed the dividend at the top of the income statement instead of the bottom.
veil, not vail..
Thank you. iOS isn't the best spell checker.
No, Verizon tends to have the better Android phones. I'm a T-Mobile customer too, but arguing that they have a better Android selection is far from the truth. Look how long it took to get a 1GHz without going through Google. Even then, they're terrible about getting updates out in time. Although, I'll admit they're at least better than AT&T when it comes to Android selection and Android feature truncating. It's going to be a sad day when I have to root an Android phone just to get side loading apps back, and you can guarantee that the next Nexus phone will probably go to Verizon.
Not always. If EA or whomever they bought the IP from failed to make reasonable efforts to protect their copyrights, then they can lose them. If these games existed for quite a while and EA or the original holder knew of them and did NOTHING to stop them, then it's possible that a judge could throw the works into public domain. A cease and desist is a great example of a "reasonable effort," but waiting until you come close to releasing another sequel or remake to protect said copyright, then it isn't hard to argue that you didn't care for it at all.
This won't work in America due to piercing of the corporate vail. Moving your assets to a holder won't protect them, and moving debt to subsidiaries won't work either, as you're committing fraud. This is the EXACT same thing Author Anderson helped Enron with. Enron moved their debt and losses to special purpose entities (SPE) to boost the parent companies earnings and balance sheets. As a result of such shenanigans, corporations got stuck with complying with the million dollar a year law called Sarbanes-Oxley. Granted most of the law applies to publicly traded companies, but if you're running games like this you're already publicly traded, or looking at an IPO, either way, you're going to run into SO pretty quick.
Sunlight "falls" from the sky every day...
Try telling that to Beijing!
What about iPods and iPads? Comparing a phone to a dedicated gaming/entertainment device isn't a fair comparison. Furthermore, banning one from playing online vs banning one from making and receiving phone calls just because the device has unauthorized software is a way to quickly get the Feds on your ass. Playing online is a feature, not a requirement. For a phone to make a phone call isn't a feature, it's a requirement. But, to play debaters, let's look at your proposals:
"1: Reword all cellular carrier agreements where they will drop service and blacklist any devices suspected of being jailbroken (downloading stuff from Cydia repos for example.)"
Go ahead, drop service. Give me a REASON to drop my contract, especially if you're mistaken.
"2: Encrypt bootloaders, and have the baseband hand the keys to the OS. This is how Motorola does it, and so far, the trouble of cracking Moto's encrypted bootloaders have gotten modders to move elsewhere."
Ok, crack the encryption key and I've solved the problem. This is exactly what George did.
"3: Push software down to the iPhones periodically to search for jailbreaks. If devices are JB-ed, all Apple IDs connected with them would be banned. MS does with the XBoxes, Valve does this with VAC, etc."
Ok, disable the push then. It'll be like Windows Genuine Authentication that somehow always gets bypassed by pirates.
"4: Have the baseband software and processor (IIRC, the radio uses a separate processor than the main OS), act as a TPM. If the running OS isn't signed, put the device in DFU mode until a valid copy of the IPSW is put on."
Again, figure out the key and sign your own baked OS. Furthermore, ALL cell phones are required to at least make emergency calls. You preventing a device from doing that because it runs unauthorized software will find you in a jail cell for breaking a Federal statute.
"5: Ask cellular carriers to cough up IP records of anyone who bought programs through Cydia, cross reference the IMEIs, and when it comes for an iOS update, blacklist all IMEIs gathered which are suspected during the SHSH negotation process." (sic)
And have the full force of the US Government and/or State governments on your ass for violating privacy rights.
"6: Have a firmware eFuse counter that only allows for flashing higher versions (assuming they are not betas)."
Ok, then all OS updates will appear as Betas, or iOS 5 will be iOS 6, and so forth.
"7: Separate the iPhones into different models, each having different hardware protection, and when rev B is put out, anyone caught using rev A exploits is banned from cellular networked via IMEI, and their Apple IDs are banned."
Yeah, this hasn't worked for Sony and their PSPs, I'm sure it'll work for for Apple though. Furthermore, you disable a phone from making phone calls, then you're going to find some government entity on your ass, especially if you ban the device from the network and it can't make emergency calls anymore. Now you're breaking a Federal law, again, to protect your IP.
"8: Get with cellular carriers and lease iPhones the way Ma Bell used to lease telephones. This + a EULA would mean that jailbreaking would be against the law because it wouldn't be the owner's device."
Yeah, not in AT&T's best interest. You see, if they own the phone, then they're liable if it doesn't work properly, especially in an emergency situation, or when it breaks, when it runs out of battery life, when its dirty, etc. That's a lot of risk pooling you're attempting, something insurance companies are good at, not telephone companies. Furthermore, the last time AT&T tried this, they were broken up for breaking anti-trust laws. I doubt they would want that again, especially after all the work they've done to be put Ma Bell back together, just for the sake of Apple, a company that is now selling to their largest competitor.
You see, you're arguments are so far fetched that no one would waste their time pointing out your flaws in both security l
If I were on a jury panel, I could see the case about not knowing where the company is located. I'm sure most American's aren't aware that Sony is located in CA. I knew they had a studio in CA, but didn't know the entire American branch was there too. Furthermore, their LLC registration in California points to Delaware and that registration we can't see without paying a little extra to the Delaware Department of State. So are they a Californian company or a Delawarean company?
Ok, then someone with a BBA that has read a many Econ books and attended so many classes, passed so many exams, and actually knows something about Econ should be able to respond.
First, theoretical economics and real-world economics are different things. In fact, most macro and micro Econ classes for new business students focus on the theoretical part, but upper level and post graduate focus on the real world economics. The basics are always the same: people respond to incentives. So, let's put some real world incentives in front of you.
You pay a yearly tax on your net profit produced on your income statement, and usually property tax, depending on your incorporation state, on your non-liquid assets on your balance sheet. Here's the kicker, none of this affects your cash flow until it's time to pay out the following year. So, you're given two options: 1.) pay zero tax and provide a better return to your shareholders (or cash if you're retaining earnings) at the end of the year and borrow money at a high interest to pay for the higher cost of doing business in America throughout the year or 2.) outsource my work overseas and receive a lower cash outflow while lowering my liabilities and long-term debt, since my cost of doing business is a lot lower in places where I can dump my toxic waste in the river and tell the uneducated locals it's not harmful, instead of complying with pesky laws. Considering that cash flow is more important than the bottom line for the survival of a business, I think I'll take door number two.
This is where economic theory and practice diverge. Most intro Econ books assume the market will behave rationally, and this is NEVER the case.
Another example, you mentioned corporate headquarters being moved to the US and increasing payroll tax. You've never been offered stock options in your employment contract, I'm guessing. Here's the thing, I can take a lower paycheck and receive stock options that I can exercise at a later date and AVOID paying payroll taxes. Instead, any gain from exercising my options are CAPITAL GAINS, which are taxed at a LOWER tax rate than payroll taxes. This is how corporate headquarters think. The incentive is that I get a better performance out of my managers since a huge chunk of their pay is based on the stock's performance, and they get higher income that's taxed at a lower rate. Guess who's not getting these great options. Hint: all the engineers and workers underneath us that have so many limitations on their options (if they even get them) that it's not worth it to exercise them until retirement.
You see, the only real way to increase jobs and improve the economy, is by making the markets as competitive as possible. Remove barriers to entry, empower consumers, empower suppliers by building infrastructure alternatives. Lowering the tax rate to zero isn't going to help much. If you want to increase your tax revenues, keep the loopholes and add the option to pay a tax LOWER than the cost to reach a zero tax liability. It's not the best solution, but it's better than not collecting anything and applying the tax burden to the rest of working America.
So, if you want to have a business debate, let's have at it. If you want to debate particle physics, then I can't help you beyond a wikipedia search and my knowledge retained from EngineeringPhysics in college. And since you're quoting that these rational scientist and nerds that peruse /. pickup an Econ book, maybe you should pick one up about managerial economics and management in general. The Five Forces Model is a great place to start if you want to see what really puts pressure on a business.
GM? I thought we owned them. Damn IPO snatched them up right from underneath us.
Don't know. I didn't get into Star Trek until Voyager, and even then not until Jeri Ryan joined in, and the reinvigoration that was called Star Trek of 2010. Prior to that, Shatner was the Danny Crane. Hell, I just discovered Battlestar Galactica after Caprica ended, and I've never got into Star Wars (tried, but couldn't stomach it).
Guess I'm not part of the "us" crowd but I can at least understand why you guys have so much nostalgia for him and his character.
Live long and prosper....he took that character way too seriously!
You mean a real iPad law suite. Last time I checked, the iOS API was proprietary to Apple, possibly under copyright and trade secrete IP laws. Although, an interpreter or emulator doesn't seem all much of an issue though.