Ebay may not have banner ads, but they do have "Featured Auctions". These auctions appear above other auction items when browsing ebay's web site. Featured auctions are valuable to sellers only if buyers are finding the auctions at ebay's web site. If 3rd party search services become the prevalent way of finding auctions on ebay, featured auctions ahve little or no value. I think this is what ebay is trying to prevent.
I dont think we are offering a 'competing' service because, as an arm of the I.T. division of a state-run university, I think we are by definition non-profit.
What you are saying is that you are not competing merely because you are a branch of the government and you don't plan to make a profit. This is irrelevant. Your service could cause The Weather Channel to lose eyeballs, and that would be the problem, from TWC's point of view.
I don't understand how you can make a service out of providing public domain information. It's simple. You obtain PD info and you sell it. It' skind of like making a service of providing GPL software. There have been cases of business being charged with fraud for charging $$$ for a single piece of PD paper, but if I collect lots of info from lots of sources, it would conceivably be cheaper to buy the aggregate from me than to get it all yourself.
I'm guessing that ebay served Bidder's Edge with a cease-and-desist order of some kind. After all, even if my web page is publicly available, if I explicitly tell you NOT to access my server, then you have no legal right to do so.
After serving such an order to Bidder's Edge (who of course responded with "UP YOURS!"), ebay would have the legal basis for cracking/computer trespass charges.
I've used ebay, and I've used Bidder's Edge, and I don't believe this is necessarily an assumptions on the matter.
- Ebay has a database of its auction information - Ebay dynamically creates web pages to reflect searches that users perform - The information in Ebay's database is copyrighted by Ebay - indexing and distributing a portion of a copyrighted database is illegal unless you have the permission of the copyright holder
Bidder's Edge clearly does a search of ebay's databse, probably by using the public interface ebay has provided. They are not merely providing a link to static pages; they are searching a copyrighted database and then providing its users with the results. They are doing this for profit (note the banner ads). I think that ebay has a pretty good basis for a lawsuit.
However, I can't see how Bidder's Edge would be guilty of cracking or trespass. If I provide a public interface to my database, it's hardly trespass if someone uses it. I wonder if they had ordered Bidder's Edge to cease and desist before filing this lawsuit, explicitly denying them from accessing ebay. If so, then I think it's an open and shut case.
And the moral of the story - all you guys out there who have written a script to display/. headlines on your web page are going to be in BIG trouble...
I know a few states, at least, have anti-UCE emails. However, it shouldn't be a nation or world wide thing. Suing is the correct path of action,
A good lawsuit, appealed a couple of times, is as effective in creating law as legislation. The big difference is that if you don't like the law, you can't fire the people who made it.
Its annoying, but I still don't feel happy about seeing lawsuits like this. I'm happy to see spammers pay, but how far could this go? On the one hand, you abhor spam and desire that spammers spend eternity in the innermost circle of hell. On the other hand, you're not sure you want them sued. What gives? Currently, suits such as this are our ONLY redress against spammers, since in most states, spam is neither a criminal nor a civil offense. The only leverage anyone has against spammers is to sue them as hard and as long as possible. In general, only corporations have the legal resources to do this. While I would prefer to see other solutions in the long term, in the short term, I see no way around these law suits except to let spam continue unabated. These lawsuits also establish a trend in the court systems (I don't want to say precedent, since they're not necessarily precedents). As long as the court system is finding that spam is bad, spammers can't tell Congress and state legislatures "We've been doing this for years, there's never been any indication that it's bad or wrong, and now you're taking our business away from us." Trust me, they will use this argument if they can.
If it takes 99% of the effort to replicate somebody's work than it does in the first place
The problem is that it often takes much LESS efort to replicate someone's results than to be the first to do it. Since Edison's name is being bandied about, let's consider the famous example of his light bulb.
Inspiration: "Hey! Let's heat a filament until it glows!" Perspiration: Edison tried hundreds of materials for the filament until he found one that worked.
Someone else could have immediately started where he left off. The thing about perspiration in invention is that you are usually figuring out what works and what doesn't. Once YOU have figure out what works, someone else doesn't need to go to that much effort to figure out for themselves what works.
I may even be able to distribute my patch or the instructions to accomplish it so that people can do the same to their legally owned copies. Good point. The lawyers may disagree (and the courts may even back them up), but I've always felt that a patch was not a derivative work. If it is, then I'd argue that framing a picture for someone constitutes a creating derivative work.
With 600 comments already in queue, I doubt anyone will see this, btu oh well...
1. The time to ask "Should we create life?" is not when the capability is at hand. The time to ask this question was about fifty years ago. If the answer is "No," the you avoid the research that can make it possible. Now it's too late to really consider the question. If something can be done, it will.
2. While this is an interesting advance, it is an expected and not very revolutionary one. Consider the following headline: "Carpenters learn to assemble prefab homes." That's what this seems to amount to. Scientists have identified already existing gense that control existing life. When they can engineer never-before-seen genes adn create life from those, I'll be a lot more impressed. That's be the headline that reads "Carpenters plant seed; grow homes in less than a day."
I really can't see how the GPL would fail. Perhaps you could point out something I'm missing.
i write a piece of code. Under US copyright law, I have TOTAL control over it. Even if I grant you the right to copy, compile, and distribute my code, you have zero right to modify my code or write new code based on my code. The GPL does not infringe on your right to modify my code or use my code in your code, because you have NO right to do this unless I say so.
What the GPL does is to say that, under certain conditions, I will grant you permission to modify my code or write code based on it. If you create a derivative work based on my code, and I say "No, you must take my code out of your code," then on what basis would you argue that you can use my code?
...an exact copy of a CD you have already. There is NO POSSIBLE PURPOSE for this device except for making copies and then distributing them illegally
Gotta disagree with this. I own a car. I listen to CDs in my car. I have children. Children+CDs in my car = sticky or scratched CDs. I have every right to make copies of my CDs, leaving the silver originals in their jewel case on a bookshelf and listen to the gold ones in my car. If I want to spend the money for a machine that does this specifically, that's my business.
A cousin of mine recorded some music for his church and made several hundred CDs using the CDR in his computer. This was a royal pain, to say the least.
It's about the RIAA maintaining a monopoly; it's about elitism This I've got to agree with. Why can large companies get away with making tools to make copies of music? Because they can afford lawyers who will argue in court that their companies' products all have legitimate uses. The RIAA's tactics in this case are nothing less than bullying - picking on the little guy who can't fight back.
The code in question was not GPLed. Therefore the point is moot.
That much was obvious from everyone else's comments; this was more a personal diatribe on the primary feature of the GPL. I really don't understand why people would consider its "viral" nature a failure of the license - it's the purpose of the license.
Suppose I license my source code to you (and anyone else who wants it) on the condition that any works you derive from my source code are licensed back to me (and anyone else who wants it). Suppose further that you actually DO produce code based on mine. I think I (and anyone else who wanted to) would have every legal right to use your code.
Specifically, if you produce code based on my GPL'd code, then I think I'd have a real solid legal basis for assuming that what you produce is GPL'd, regardless of what license you try to put on it. If you tried to fight it, I think you'd rapidly find yourself in MASSIVE hot water over your technical, legal violation of my "intellectual property rights," since you used my code in violation of my license. If you didn't want to share your code, you shouldn't have used mine.
In this instance, if it were Sun (or some other big set of pockets) that did this, I'd definitely go for the big tamale - damages, treble damages, punitive damages, and criminal charges (despite what many think, willful violation of copyrights can be treated as criminal matters).
If the defendant refused to do so, claiming to have forgotten the key, and the prosecution later played its dummied-plaintext trump card, she would be put in the position of...admitting to perjury.
I don't think there'd be any problem getting around the perjury bit that you suggest. On Monday, I say "I do not recall the key at this time." I'm lying, of course, but unless you're telepathic, you can't prove it. On Tuesday, as a result of the situation you described, I say "I remember now...the key is 123ABC."
If accused of perjury, all I have to say is "It's as I said. On Monday, I couldn't remember. On Tuesday, I could." Only a telepath could tell any different.
{tongue in cheek} I am SO disappointed - i expected to see some REAL hacker tips - this is a bunch of script kiddie mumbo jumbo. KIDS - download the/. source and reverse engineer what's not up to date; then you'll be a TRUE hacker. {/tongue in cheek}
A few years ago, Hoechst-Marion-Rousell bought or merged with a firm in the town I live in . Suddenly, there were billboards everywhere saying things like "My daughter works for Herkst Marion Roo-sell." I'm not sure why they wanted to train the populace in pronouncing their name correctly, but I was amused.
I recently worked for a company that did contract work for them, and I found out that internally they called themselves "HMR."
Think of the difference between 16-bit color and 24-bit color on your monitor
Except that the 44.1kHz/16bit sampling is at the edge of human perception, while 65,000 colors is far below the limit of human perception. I think a more apt comparison is 24-bit color vs 32-bit color. Sure, you can't really see the difference between a picture rendered at 32 bits and one rendered at 24 bits, but the extra 8 bits make all the difference in the world if you are scanning - a little extra room for maneuver. Sampling right at the edge of human perception means that small artifacts of the sampling process will be perceptible. Sampling orders of magnitude beyond the limit of human perception means that small sampling artifacts will likewise be beyod the limit of human perception.
I thought judges only granted preliminary injunctions only if they believe the trial will show it's justified. What is the standard that a plaintiff must meet in order to persuade a judge to grant a preliminary injuction? In a patent dispute, is it enough to merely hold a patent and to say "See, his looks like mine!"? Or does it go deeper than that?
No, he's not. Stop thinking like a lawyer, and think like an ordinary person (ie, someone who has no stomach for lies in the legal system). B&N had something (the use of a particular piece of code); a judge took it away. What you seem to be saying is that B&N may be innocent of wrongdoing, but that it's OK to take something away from them. If B&N did nothing wrong, then they should lose nothing.
I don't think it would hurt that much. How much it hurts would depend largely on how long the trial goes on.
And consider this - suppose Amazon's claim is found to be utterly without merit. Suppose further that B&N lost only $1 over this deal. Would that make this injunction right? If you think so, then would you mind if I enjoined the government to take $1 away from you and everyone else in the country for my benefit?
I feel that's the crux of the matter. Since Amazon and B&N are competitors, a loss for B&N is a gain for Amazon. Granted, it's not a zero-sum gain; a $1 loss for B&N is not a $1 gain for Amazon, but I don't like the idea of the courts being used as a tool to harm competitors.
you CANNOT tightent up a win anything box so that noone can mess with it and vandalize it. you can do this with Linux/X
I can lock up a DOS/Win 3.1 box tighter than a drum. Lock out the F5/F8 keys using SWITCHES in CONFIG.SYS (I think - check MS-DOS help for CONFIG.SYS commands - it's in there). Put WIN in AUTOEXEC.BAT. In SYSTEM.INI, set SHELL=the custom app that the user sees. You're not running Program Mangler, which is what most people thought of as Windows, but you are running Windows. Win 95 is slightly harder but also very doable (ie I've done it but can't remember what exact steps to take off the top of my head).
This, of course, does not address issues of stability or anything like that. I think you're right overall; I just had to take issue with that one statement.
Employers would have to correct injury-causing workplace conditions...
Sounds good to me. Perhaps you disagree - perhaps employers should NOT have to correct "injury-causing workplace conditions"? This has nothing to do with employees who are unfit and everything to do with keeping employees safe.
Why in the world would you want to continue a job as a typist when you have CTS? Because you can't afford any time between jobs. Because you have bills you need to pay. Because you have kids to feed. If you'd ever been in this situation, you'd understand. If you never have, then consider yourself lucky. Not everyone can afford to find a new job. Not everyone has the requisite skills for finding a better job. And no employer should be permitted to cause injury to epmloyees through negligence.
This is not just about typists, you know. A friend of mine worked in tech support for a major OEM (think spots). She developed carpal tunnel syndrome. Although the IS department had a number of "ergonomic" keyboards and mice in stock, the management wouldn't authorize their use. I was told that if they let some people have them, then everyone would want them. She was in pain whenever she had to type. I should point out that this didn't happen until a year after she had started working there. It is not unreasonable to believe that her work has a contributing factor to her injury.
I have no problem with saying that if a potential employee can't do the job, for whatever reason, then an employer shouldn't have to change the job description to suit the employee. But if workplace conditions have been demonstrated to cause injury, then I am definitely in favor of requiring the employer to make changes.
Probably because the initial question was about Linux. If this was an automotive site and someone asked "How do I drop the transmission on my Chevy?" I would consider a response of "Buy a Ford." to be potential flamebait.
Note also that the post that created this thread was moderated up to 3 as Insightful.
just remember those cases of people losing the ability to write because they used this strange input mechanism of the PDAs
I know exactly what you mean - there was an article on slashdot that talked about it. Perhaps you missed the bit that explained that it was satire. NO ONE actually lost their ability to write. The article's author made it up. It was humor.
OK, maybe you're being funny, too, but I just got to work on Monday morning and am still humor-impaired...
Slashdot Mirror
Ebay may not have banner ads, but they do have "Featured Auctions". These auctions appear above other auction items when browsing ebay's web site. Featured auctions are valuable to sellers only if buyers are finding the auctions at ebay's web site. If 3rd party search services become the prevalent way of finding auctions on ebay, featured auctions ahve little or no value. I think this is what ebay is trying to prevent.
I dont think we are offering a 'competing' service because, as an arm of the I.T. division of a state-run university, I think we are by definition non-profit.
What you are saying is that you are not competing merely because you are a branch of the government and you don't plan to make a profit. This is irrelevant. Your service could cause The Weather Channel to lose eyeballs, and that would be the problem, from TWC's point of view.
I don't understand how you can make a service out of providing public domain information.
It's simple. You obtain PD info and you sell it. It' skind of like making a service of providing GPL software. There have been cases of business being charged with fraud for charging $$$ for a single piece of PD paper, but if I collect lots of info from lots of sources, it would conceivably be cheaper to buy the aggregate from me than to get it all yourself.
I'm guessing that ebay served Bidder's Edge with a cease-and-desist order of some kind. After all, even if my web page is publicly available, if I explicitly tell you NOT to access my server, then you have no legal right to do so.
After serving such an order to Bidder's Edge (who of course responded with "UP YOURS!"), ebay would have the legal basis for cracking/computer trespass charges.
Of course, I am not a lawyer...
I've used ebay, and I've used Bidder's Edge, and I don't believe this is necessarily an assumptions on the matter.
/. headlines on your web page are going to be in BIG trouble...
- Ebay has a database of its auction information
- Ebay dynamically creates web pages to reflect searches that users perform
- The information in Ebay's database is copyrighted by Ebay
- indexing and distributing a portion of a copyrighted database is illegal unless you have the permission of the copyright holder
Bidder's Edge clearly does a search of ebay's databse, probably by using the public interface ebay has provided. They are not merely providing a link to static pages; they are searching a copyrighted database and then providing its users with the results. They are doing this for profit (note the banner ads). I think that ebay has a pretty good basis for a lawsuit.
However, I can't see how Bidder's Edge would be guilty of cracking or trespass. If I provide a public interface to my database, it's hardly trespass if someone uses it. I wonder if they had ordered Bidder's Edge to cease and desist before filing this lawsuit, explicitly denying them from accessing ebay. If so, then I think it's an open and shut case.
And the moral of the story - all you guys out there who have written a script to display
I know a few states, at least, have anti-UCE emails. However, it shouldn't be a nation or world wide thing. Suing is the correct path of action,
A good lawsuit, appealed a couple of times, is as effective in creating law as legislation. The big difference is that if you don't like the law, you can't fire the people who made it.
Its annoying, but I still don't feel happy about seeing lawsuits like this. I'm happy to see spammers pay, but how far could this go? On the one hand, you abhor spam and desire that spammers spend eternity in the innermost circle of hell. On the other hand, you're not sure you want them sued. What gives? Currently, suits such as this are our ONLY redress against spammers, since in most states, spam is neither a criminal nor a civil offense. The only leverage anyone has against spammers is to sue them as hard and as long as possible. In general, only corporations have the legal resources to do this. While I would prefer to see other solutions in the long term, in the short term, I see no way around these law suits except to let spam continue unabated. These lawsuits also establish a trend in the court systems (I don't want to say precedent, since they're not necessarily precedents). As long as the court system is finding that spam is bad, spammers can't tell Congress and state legislatures "We've been doing this for years, there's never been any indication that it's bad or wrong, and now you're taking our business away from us." Trust me, they will use this argument if they can.
If it takes 99% of the effort to replicate somebody's work than it does in the first place
The problem is that it often takes much LESS efort to replicate someone's results than to be the first to do it. Since Edison's name is being bandied about, let's consider the famous example of his light bulb.
Inspiration: "Hey! Let's heat a filament until it glows!"
Perspiration: Edison tried hundreds of materials for the filament until he found one that worked.
Someone else could have immediately started where he left off. The thing about perspiration in invention is that you are usually figuring out what works and what doesn't. Once YOU have figure out what works, someone else doesn't need to go to that much effort to figure out for themselves what works.
I may even be able to distribute my patch or the instructions to accomplish it so that people can do the same to their legally owned copies.
Good point. The lawyers may disagree (and the courts may even back them up), but I've always felt that a patch was not a derivative work. If it is, then I'd argue that framing a picture for someone constitutes a creating derivative work.
With 600 comments already in queue, I doubt anyone will see this, btu oh well...
1. The time to ask "Should we create life?" is not when the capability is at hand. The time to ask this question was about fifty years ago. If the answer is "No," the you avoid the research that can make it possible. Now it's too late to really consider the question. If something can be done, it will.
2. While this is an interesting advance, it is an expected and not very revolutionary one. Consider the following headline: "Carpenters learn to assemble prefab homes." That's what this seems to amount to. Scientists have identified already existing gense that control existing life. When they can engineer never-before-seen genes adn create life from those, I'll be a lot more impressed. That's be the headline that reads "Carpenters plant seed; grow homes in less than a day."
I really can't see how the GPL would fail. Perhaps you could point out something I'm missing.
i write a piece of code. Under US copyright law, I have TOTAL control over it. Even if I grant you the right to copy, compile, and distribute my code, you have zero right to modify my code or write new code based on my code. The GPL does not infringe on your right to modify my code or use my code in your code, because you have NO right to do this unless I say so.
What the GPL does is to say that, under certain conditions, I will grant you permission to modify my code or write code based on it. If you create a derivative work based on my code, and I say "No, you must take my code out of your code," then on what basis would you argue that you can use my code?
...an exact copy of a CD you have already. There is NO POSSIBLE PURPOSE for this device except for making copies and then distributing them illegally
Gotta disagree with this. I own a car. I listen to CDs in my car. I have children. Children+CDs in my car = sticky or scratched CDs. I have every right to make copies of my CDs, leaving the silver originals in their jewel case on a bookshelf and listen to the gold ones in my car. If I want to spend the money for a machine that does this specifically, that's my business.
A cousin of mine recorded some music for his church and made several hundred CDs using the CDR in his computer. This was a royal pain, to say the least.
It's about the RIAA maintaining a monopoly; it's about elitism
This I've got to agree with. Why can large companies get away with making tools to make copies of music? Because they can afford lawyers who will argue in court that their companies' products all have legitimate uses. The RIAA's tactics in this case are nothing less than bullying - picking on the little guy who can't fight back.
The code in question was not GPLed. Therefore the point is moot.
That much was obvious from everyone else's comments; this was more a personal diatribe on the primary feature of the GPL. I really don't understand why people would consider its "viral" nature a failure of the license - it's the purpose of the license.
Suppose I license my source code to you (and anyone else who wants it) on the condition that any works you derive from my source code are licensed back to me (and anyone else who wants it). Suppose further that you actually DO produce code based on mine. I think I (and anyone else who wanted to) would have every legal right to use your code.
Specifically, if you produce code based on my GPL'd code, then I think I'd have a real solid legal basis for assuming that what you produce is GPL'd, regardless of what license you try to put on it. If you tried to fight it, I think you'd rapidly find yourself in MASSIVE hot water over your technical, legal violation of my "intellectual property rights," since you used my code in violation of my license. If you didn't want to share your code, you shouldn't have used mine.
In this instance, if it were Sun (or some other big set of pockets) that did this, I'd definitely go for the big tamale - damages, treble damages, punitive damages, and criminal charges (despite what many think, willful violation of copyrights can be treated as criminal matters).
If the defendant refused to do so, claiming to have forgotten the key, and the prosecution later played its dummied-plaintext trump card, she would be put in the position of...admitting to perjury.
I don't think there'd be any problem getting around the perjury bit that you suggest. On Monday, I say "I do not recall the key at this time." I'm lying, of course, but unless you're telepathic, you can't prove it. On Tuesday, as a result of the situation you described, I say "I remember now...the key is 123ABC."
If accused of perjury, all I have to say is "It's as I said. On Monday, I couldn't remember. On Tuesday, I could." Only a telepath could tell any different.
{tongue in cheek} /. source and reverse engineer what's not up to date; then you'll be a TRUE hacker.
I am SO disappointed - i expected to see some REAL hacker tips - this is a bunch of script kiddie mumbo jumbo. KIDS - download the
{/tongue in cheek}
A few years ago, Hoechst-Marion-Rousell bought or merged with a firm in the town I live in . Suddenly, there were billboards everywhere saying things like "My daughter works for Herkst Marion Roo-sell." I'm not sure why they wanted to train the populace in pronouncing their name correctly, but I was amused.
I recently worked for a company that did contract work for them, and I found out that internally they called themselves "HMR."
from the Top Ten comments to the "Hey, I just poured hot grits...".
The "hot grits" comments are witless and juvenile. I laugh every time I read one, indulging my witless, juvenile side
Think of the difference between 16-bit color and 24-bit color on your monitor
Except that the 44.1kHz/16bit sampling is at the edge of human perception, while 65,000 colors is far below the limit of human perception. I think a more apt comparison is 24-bit color vs 32-bit color. Sure, you can't really see the difference between a picture rendered at 32 bits and one rendered at 24 bits, but the extra 8 bits make all the difference in the world if you are scanning - a little extra room for maneuver. Sampling right at the edge of human perception means that small artifacts of the sampling process will be perceptible. Sampling orders of magnitude beyond the limit of human perception means that small sampling artifacts will likewise be beyod the limit of human perception.
Some questions...
I thought judges only granted preliminary injunctions only if they believe the trial will show it's justified. What is the standard that a plaintiff must meet in order to persuade a judge to grant a preliminary injuction? In a patent dispute, is it enough to merely hold a patent and to say "See, his looks like mine!"? Or does it go deeper than that?
No, you are WRONG
No, he's not. Stop thinking like a lawyer, and think like an ordinary person (ie, someone who has no stomach for lies in the legal system). B&N had something (the use of a particular piece of code); a judge took it away. What you seem to be saying is that B&N may be innocent of wrongdoing, but that it's OK to take something away from them. If B&N did nothing wrong, then they should lose nothing.
I don't think it would hurt that much.
How much it hurts would depend largely on how long the trial goes on.
And consider this - suppose Amazon's claim is found to be utterly without merit. Suppose further that B&N lost only $1 over this deal. Would that make this injunction right? If you think so, then would you mind if I enjoined the government to take $1 away from you and everyone else in the country for my benefit?
I feel that's the crux of the matter. Since Amazon and B&N are competitors, a loss for B&N is a gain for Amazon. Granted, it's not a zero-sum gain; a $1 loss for B&N is not a $1 gain for Amazon, but I don't like the idea of the courts being used as a tool to harm competitors.
you CANNOT tightent up a win anything box so that noone can mess with it and vandalize it. you can do this with Linux/X
I can lock up a DOS/Win 3.1 box tighter than a drum. Lock out the F5/F8 keys using SWITCHES in CONFIG.SYS (I think - check MS-DOS help for CONFIG.SYS commands - it's in there). Put WIN in AUTOEXEC.BAT. In SYSTEM.INI, set SHELL=the custom app that the user sees. You're not running Program Mangler, which is what most people thought of as Windows, but you are running Windows. Win 95 is slightly harder but also very doable (ie I've done it but can't remember what exact steps to take off the top of my head).
This, of course, does not address issues of stability or anything like that. I think you're right overall; I just had to take issue with that one statement.
From the first sentence of the article...
Employers would have to correct injury-causing workplace conditions...
Sounds good to me. Perhaps you disagree - perhaps employers should NOT have to correct "injury-causing workplace conditions"? This has nothing to do with employees who are unfit and everything to do with keeping employees safe.
Why in the world would you want to continue a job as a typist when you have CTS?
Because you can't afford any time between jobs. Because you have bills you need to pay. Because you have kids to feed. If you'd ever been in this situation, you'd understand. If you never have, then consider yourself lucky. Not everyone can afford to find a new job. Not everyone has the requisite skills for finding a better job. And no employer should be permitted to cause injury to epmloyees through negligence.
This is not just about typists, you know. A friend of mine worked in tech support for a major OEM (think spots). She developed carpal tunnel syndrome. Although the IS department had a number of "ergonomic" keyboards and mice in stock, the management wouldn't authorize their use. I was told that if they let some people have them, then everyone would want them. She was in pain whenever she had to type. I should point out that this didn't happen until a year after she had started working there. It is not unreasonable to believe that her work has a contributing factor to her injury.
I have no problem with saying that if a potential employee can't do the job, for whatever reason, then an employer shouldn't have to change the job description to suit the employee. But if workplace conditions have been demonstrated to cause injury, then I am definitely in favor of requiring the employer to make changes.
Probably because the initial question was about Linux. If this was an automotive site and someone asked "How do I drop the transmission on my Chevy?" I would consider a response of "Buy a Ford." to be potential flamebait.
Note also that the post that created this thread was moderated up to 3 as Insightful.
just remember those cases of people losing the ability to write because they used this strange input mechanism of the PDAs
I know exactly what you mean - there was an article on slashdot that talked about it. Perhaps you missed the bit that explained that it was satire. NO ONE actually lost their ability to write. The article's author made it up. It was humor.
OK, maybe you're being funny, too, but I just got to work on Monday morning and am still humor-impaired...