What ever happened to "innocent until proven guilty"?
Seems these potential sellers were deemed to be treading on Microsoft's precious toes, without any sort of investigation other than finding the software up for auction. Why doesn't Microsoft buy it, and if it's illegal, throw the offender in jail. Bonus is that it gets the legitimate copies off the street so hapless Microsoft users have to buy from a store (more $$$), or steal a copy, or.. get something else that does the job as well or better.
Your arguement of adding past history won't add significant inaccuracy, doesn't ring true for me.
Any fact which adds bias to guilty but does not directly concern the current trial should be left out so that the jury can concentrate on facts (and falsities) presented during the trial.
Really comes down to impressions. Who will be more likely convicted of a crime (all other things being equal): One who dresses in a nice suit, and is clean shaven, or one who sports torn jeans, leather, uncombed hair, and a ratty looking beard. That's why lawers get their clients to get cleaned up and dressed nicely for court.
Justice needs to be blind to impressions, and see only the facts relating to the case at hand.
On DNA. Here we are talking about odds. The odds are 1 in 10,000,000,000 or something like that. Such odds do *not* preclude that two people can't have the same DNA. It means that they *can*. Unlikely, but it can happen.
True a penal colony was started in Australia, but the crimes of the forfathers have no bearing on the offspring (unless they take up the trade of the parents...)
Also the original inhabitants of Australia (as a whole) were not criminals. They are aboriginal.
I conceed that past history may show penchance for performing the act in question, but it really doesn't mean it's evidence.
Suppose for one year I drove drunk every Friday. Then for a year I went to AA meetings every Friday. Then someone got killed by a drunk driver on Friday. Did I do it?
You *must* look at the evidence. Hard cold evidence. History may or may not lead you to the right conclusion.
Sure rapists, drunks, killers may be repeat offenders, but it only shows that the person charged could do it, not that they did. Should we let murderers go if they it's a first offence. After all, every day of their life before the killing, they didn't kill anybody, thus, they have proven they couldn't do it. Bullarky! History is circumstancial. It's not proof.
"It seems to me that a defendant's past history is very relevant. If he's got multiple murder convictions, it probably is more likely that he did the one he's on trial for now."
What ever happened to paying your debt to society? Past record has no affect on the details of the current trial.
The *more likely* part of your statement is for the police to investigate, not for the jury to consider. The jury is concerned with the facts of *this* murder. Past history should not be entered as evidence (it's circumstantial, and could be misleading.)
"How much of the book buying budget of your local library is being diverted away now to the support of a bank of computers that provide 'free' internet access to the patrons? It's happening everywhere I look, and yes, in many cases it's forced on the libraries by outside advocates and laws."
Scary isn't it. Read "High-Tech Heritic" for shocking views taken by people in power. One lady working for a school board said something like: "Everyday without the Internet in the classroom is a day without quality education."
Didn't you use the library when doing research? Do kids now *need* the internet? The library provides much better quality of information than the Net does, even if it is a bit slower to get the latest news.
We still have a library in our town and our school.
A *lot* depends on the original contract on ownership of the final product (as done at the end of the contact). If the original contract had Company X owning the rights to the site, then they own any derived work from that work, even if implemented differently. Let's not confuse the underlying technologies with the 'look and feel' content.
I recall a case where a sculpter sued a photographer over a picture of a piece (a sculpture of some people on a bench.) The claim was that the photographer had photographed a sculpture and had sold prints of it (with no royalties to the original artist.) The original artist won. It was a copyrighted material, and thus could only be copied by the original artist. The photographs were enabled by re-using the original artwork, though the pictures actually contained no material other than 'the look' of the sculpture.
If the original work belonged to the contracted company, they have rights to it. If the contacted company signed over the rights then they have no leg to stand on.
Similer aspect with photograhers. They are contacted to take pictures (their artistic skill is used) for a company or people (the subject matter involved) who owns the negatives... When not outlined in the contract, this gets very sticky as both sides have good claim (my skill vs my image.)
There must be some reason for this company to feel they have rights to sue. It hinges on their contract for the work they supplied. If they were to keep control of the web site and maintain it then I can see how a reworking of their original work in violation of copyright law. Who was to be the 'owner' of the site? The builder, or the buyer? If it's the buyer ("build me my site") you're in the clear. If it's the buyer ("build me one of your sites") your work may have infringed on their rights. If the owner was not defined ("lets build a site") then welcome to court.
Slashdot Mirror
What ever happened to "innocent until proven guilty"?
Seems these potential sellers were deemed to be treading on Microsoft's precious toes, without any sort of investigation other than finding the software up for auction. Why doesn't Microsoft buy it, and if it's illegal, throw the offender in jail. Bonus is that it gets the legitimate copies off the street so hapless Microsoft users have to buy from a store (more $$$), or steal a copy, or.. get something else that does the job as well or better.
Interestingly, he made the cover (in a group photo), but not the text of the article.
Although Linux is mentioned in the article, the fact that the originator of Linux is a member of the company was not mentioned.
Your arguement of adding past history won't add significant inaccuracy, doesn't ring true for me.
Any fact which adds bias to guilty but does not directly concern the current trial should be left out so that the jury can concentrate on facts (and falsities) presented during the trial.
Really comes down to impressions. Who will be more likely convicted of a crime (all other things being equal): One who dresses in a nice suit, and is clean shaven, or one who sports torn jeans, leather, uncombed hair, and a ratty looking beard. That's why lawers get their clients to get cleaned up and dressed nicely for court.
Justice needs to be blind to impressions, and see only the facts relating to the case at hand.
On DNA. Here we are talking about odds. The odds are 1 in 10,000,000,000 or something like that. Such odds do *not* preclude that two people can't have the same DNA. It means that they *can*. Unlikely, but it can happen.
True a penal colony was started in Australia, but the crimes of the forfathers have no bearing on the offspring (unless they take up the trade of the parents...)
Also the original inhabitants of Australia (as a whole) were not criminals. They are aboriginal.
I conceed that past history may show penchance for performing the act in question, but it really doesn't mean it's evidence.
Suppose for one year I drove drunk every Friday. Then for a year I went to AA meetings every Friday.
Then someone got killed by a drunk driver on Friday. Did I do it?
You *must* look at the evidence. Hard cold evidence. History may or may not lead you to the right conclusion.
Sure rapists, drunks, killers may be repeat offenders, but it only shows that the person charged could do it, not that they did. Should we let murderers go if they it's a first offence. After all, every day of their life before the killing, they didn't kill anybody, thus, they have proven they couldn't do it. Bullarky! History is circumstancial. It's not proof.
"It seems to me that a defendant's past history is very relevant. If he's got multiple murder convictions, it probably is more likely that he did the one he's on trial for now."
What ever happened to paying your debt to society?
Past record has no affect on the details of the current trial.
The *more likely* part of your statement is for the police to investigate, not for the jury to consider. The jury is concerned with the facts of *this* murder. Past history should not be entered as evidence (it's circumstantial, and could be misleading.)
"How much of the book buying budget of your local library is being diverted away now to the support of a bank of computers that provide 'free' internet access to the patrons? It's happening everywhere I look, and yes, in many cases it's forced on the libraries by outside advocates and laws."
Scary isn't it. Read "High-Tech Heritic" for shocking views taken by people in power. One lady working for a school board said something like: "Everyday without the Internet in the classroom is a day without quality education."
"The kids can now do research, etc.."
Didn't you use the library when doing research? Do kids now *need* the internet? The library provides much better quality of information than the Net does, even if it is a bit slower to get the latest news.
We still have a library in our town and our school.
A *lot* depends on the original contract on ownership of the final product (as done at the end of the contact). If the original contract had Company X owning the rights to the site, then they own any derived work from that work, even if implemented differently. Let's not confuse the underlying technologies with the 'look and feel' content.
I recall a case where a sculpter sued a photographer over a picture of a piece (a sculpture of some people on a bench.) The claim was that the photographer had photographed a sculpture and had sold prints of it (with no royalties to the original artist.) The original artist won. It was a copyrighted material, and thus could only be copied by the original artist. The photographs were enabled by re-using the original artwork, though the pictures actually contained no material other than 'the look' of the sculpture.
If the original work belonged to the contracted company, they have rights to it. If the contacted company signed over the rights then they have no leg to stand on.
Similer aspect with photograhers. They are contacted to take pictures (their artistic skill is used) for a company or people (the subject matter involved) who owns the negatives... When not outlined in the contract, this gets very sticky as both sides have good claim (my skill vs my image.)
There must be some reason for this company to feel they have rights to sue. It hinges on their contract for the work they supplied. If they were to keep control of the web site and maintain it then I can see how a reworking of their original work in violation of copyright law. Who was to be the 'owner' of the site? The builder, or the buyer? If it's the buyer ("build me my site") you're in the clear. If it's the buyer ("build me one of your sites") your work may have infringed on their rights. If the owner was not defined ("lets build a site") then welcome to court.