The first barrier is the economic loss rule. If the contract damages are higher than the tort (negligence) damages, there is a defense to tort. In English, there's no lawsuit unless the bug costs you more than buying your copy of Windows cost you.
I am a law student who's just finished first-year contract and tort (in Australia), and I have no idea how you came up with this one. AFAIK, the consideration you paid for a contract is not relevant when assessing whether the other party is liable for breaching or negligently performing their obligations; if they wrong you, they pay your loss. Perhaps, as I have alluded, this is a jurisdictional thing? I would appreciate a clarification.
Hang on...
on
Binary Watch
·
· Score: 1, Interesting
Is that display little-endian or big-endian? Or will you be able to change endian mode? Or buy a separate model for each, maybe?
The "ex post facto" protection means that you cannot be prosecuted for actions that are now illegal but were legal when you did them. "ex post facto" only applies to the passage of new laws, not to a judicial reinterpretation of an existing law.
You are correct. Judicial interpreation doesn't change the law, it merely clarifies what the law actually is (at least, that's the theory:)). This allows the court to formulate a precedent and apply it "retroactively" to the pre-existing facts of the case in which the precedent was formulated.
You can certainly use a new precedent to launch an action or appeal in a case that pre-dates the precedent, but whether you can do so usually depends on limitation of actions statues, which put deadlines on the time by which you have to file suit.
According to my (inexpert) reading, the court applied what I call the "duck test" to the transaction that took place between Adobe and Softman: If it looks like a sale and walks like a sale and quacks like a sale then, no matter how persistently and shrilly you call it a "license," it's a sale, because that's the behavior you engaged in.
After a brief scan of the judgment, I would have to disagree. The court based its decision on the fact that the EULA is just that, an End User License Agreement: an agreement between the end user and Adobe, not between SoftMan and Adobe. SoftMan is not a party to that agreement, and therefore cannot be bound by its terms (which are the actual instruments imposing the resale restrictions). To say otherwise would mean that third parties are bound by contracts they didn't have a say in negotiating, meaning you could impose any arbitrary obligation on someone simply by including it in a contract you entered into with someone else. Which is completely unfair.
If Adobe included a term in its contract of sale with SoftMan to the effect that SoftMan couldn't unbundle, then it would be a different matter; now it's a question of whether that term is enforceable or is unenforceable as an unreasonable covenant in restraint of trade, along with a few other things.
IIRC, the first time this modulated RF interference was used to create music utilized the services of a PDP-7. (Was there such a machine? It was a PDP-something, at any rate.) There was a demonstration using an Altair at a homebrew meeting, although I think it played something like "Greensleeves". Definitely not The Beatles, tho'.
BTW, if you want to find out about probably the first ever attempt to make music with a computer (although it didn't utilize this technique), check out the music of CSIRAC.
In common law countries (UK, US, Canada, Australia, NZ, etc) parties can be excluded from liability in negligence as part of a contract/legally binding agreement, but that doesn't apply to a third party, and also won't apply in cases of spectacularly gross negligence, IIRC.
That to which I referred can be used both for attack and defense, depending upon your circumstances. Perhaps I should have expressed myself more fully. Regardless, I don't see why Lutris can't revoke rights they have given gratuitously (again, it depends on the circumstances). But copyright/IP aren't areas of law with which I am fully familiar.
Common sense says they don't.
Common sense doesn't count for squat in court. What is your argument in law?:/
If someone tells you something in a form that can be verified somehow, and you base decisions on that in good faith, then there it's not as easy for the company to balk out as it might like to think.
IAALS (I Am A Law Student)...I'm not so sure. Since nobody paid for the download, and nor did they enter into a formal "will code for distribution rights" agreement, there's no contract here, so you can't get Lutris for breach. As far as I can tell, you're referring to the idea of equitable estoppel, but the tests for that to apply are fairly difficult to pass (generally, Lutris's action in reneging would have to be "unconscionable", plus a pre-existing contract, but hey, you and I probably live in different jurisdictions), and I'm not sure this situation passes those tests. It's possible that companies who use InstantDB as a vital part of their operations would get out of paying the distribution fee.
Great to see someone pull together some pretty weasily threads, in the real world these folks would be scum. If someone could list the names of the folks on these threads that were in the weasel dept I'd appreciate that for future reference, you never know where they will turn up again, these scum have a nasty tendency to jump the ships they sink.
As others have pointed out, the doctrine of precedent applies in all common law countries (and in a few other legal system).
We aren't hoping to set a precedent, we're trying to get a particular law ruled as being unconstitutional, i.e. it was beyond the power of Congress to make such law, so they shouldn't have made it in the first place. If we also set a favourable precedent on how the US Constitution is interpreted w/ regard to digital rights law, then that's an added bonus. At any rate, Congress will think twice before passing such draconian laws again (at least for digital righs issues, they might still try something stupid in some other area down the line).
Finally, if you want an example of a legal system that doesn't have a doctrine of precedent, try French civil law. Litigation in France can be a nightmare (especially the appeals process), and people have figured out that, hey, if judges just make up the law on a case-by-case basis, then the law is subjective and incoherent, and that's not good. Thus, we're beginning to see the adoption of a de facto doctrine of precedent in France.
The whole definition of warp speed is totally screwed, and people have come up with all sorts of explanations for a whole raft of inconsistencies (including: why the Enterprise-D can sail off to the far reaches of the Beta quadrant in a single episode, but it takes Voyager decades to get home using conventional warp; also, why the Federation is so damn big when it seems warp drive is so damn slow). The prevailing theory to reconcile these problems is the "warp highway" theoy, which basically says that there are jetstream-like regions of space that greatly increase your speed for the same energy output if you travel through them. See the Daystrom Technical Institute for more.
Yeah, so I have a lot of time on my hands (but not as much as the guy who made that site;p).
Actually the warp scale must be logrithmic, like the Richter Scale (where a 5.0 quake is 10 times as powerful as a 4.0 quake) - the captain's father mentioned that the Warp 5 engine would be 1,000 times faster than the previous.
The old Cochrane-style warp scale is supposed to be cubic: v/c = w^3 (where v is velocity, c the speed of light and w the warp factor). They "accuratized" the scale for TNG time, though (see the Daystrom Technical Institute for more.
My own personal theory regarding the disappearing, reappearing Klingon forehead ridges is that it's some kind of ritual mutilation that became fashionable circa the 23rd century (think: circumcision with power tools) but in the "present time" (i.e. the 24th century) is considered disgusting and repulsive, hence Worf's embarrassment in that DS9 tribbles 'n' time travel episode.
See, the children were in elementary school, which is a higher education than the journalist had..."Early estimates suggested 75,000 tons of energy had been released during the minute of jumping."
Y'know, maybe those kids who thought the Earth would shatter aren't so stupid after all, if they relied on that figure. After all, they might have assumed that the idiot journo in question was talking about the mass-equivalent of the energy released, plugged it into e=mc^2, and got...well, a pretty respectable bignum.
I really recommend that you do sit down with Haskell. IMO, the judges were correct in naming it language of choice for "discriminating hackers". It has:
clean, simple syntax (parentheses are used only to override default infix operator precedences, nothing more), including excellent list construction and comprehension;
a strong object-oriented type system which ensures that the vast majority of coding errors result in a type error (although it can take a little while to get used to Haskell's type system);
lazy evaluation of expressions: only the parts of your program needed to produce a result are evaluated, which allows you to write programs that left to run would produce infinite computations (e.g. programs to calculate the Fibonnaci series or the sequence of primes) and only evaluate them for the subset of data you need; and
partially applied (or curried) functions: you really need to see these in practice, particularly in conjunction with the standard list-processing functions (e.g. map, scan, and fold) to understand their true power (the ability to create lists of partially-applied functions is very cool, although I have no idea how such things might be used).
With regard to your qualms about lack of use, I understand Ericsson have created their own functional language for in-house use (the name escapes me). Arguably, since we've all got oodles of processor power to spare, there's no reason not to use functional languages in the general applications sector, given their greater reliability.
If you want more info on Haskell, check out the official website (especially the Ode to Haskell on the humour page, which should give you an idea as to the language's feature set;)). There you will find interpreters, compilers and other tools for a variety of platforms (incl. Windows and Linux) as well as complete documentation.
If you were in that position, your lawyer would most likely suggest (and you would accept) that if you can be quietly get let off with time served and a small fine that you accept it. If my lawyer were to suggest, 'we're going to fight this until your bitter end', then I'll be asking for new representation.
Remember that if he does plead, he'll end up with a criminal record, which comes with its own set of headaches. He'll almost certainly never be allowed back in the US (not that he would necessarily want to, but the nature of his employment may require it) and he may face other travel restrictions in other countries. If it were a purely civil matter, then things would be different.
To my mind, the more important leaders of the OS/Free movement are the leaders of headline projects. Linus Torvalds is the most obvious, but people like Miguel de Icaza are also important. It's these guys who actually provide a focus and a vision for the abundant supply of open source labour that would otherwise go to waste. They provide actual goals and actual directions for the community to follow, which results in getting something done. The philosophers like Stallman are important (and I realize they've contributed significantly on the practical side), but the ultimate goal of OSS is to produce software that people like and use, not write treatises. That's how we'll achieve Total World Domination.
To those who wish the community to go in a certain direction I would say: do what Torvalds and ESR (and the Mono guys) did (albeit somewhat unintentionally in Torvalds' case). Create the beginnings of a project that embodies your ideas and put it up for your peers to assess and maybe contribute to. And be prepared to take on the administrative duties (filtering, reviewing and applying patches mainly) that go with keeping the project going. It doesn't matter if it sucks or not, that's for others to decide. If it sucks, no one will contribute and the project will go nowhere, no harm done.
Some interesting implications
on
Share The Pi!
·
· Score: 2
Before his untimely death, Alan Turing did a lot of work on a new theoretical machine capable of transcending the limits of conventional Turing machines. The new machine (the so-called O-machine), would be a Turing machine connected to an "oracle", which would store some irrational quantity that would be able to do things like solve the Halting Problem, since it would contain an infinite amount of information (including overy possible program that could be created). At least, that's as much as I can remember (no links, sorry).
Who knows, maybe pi would suffice for such an oracle?
Back in school, when a CS assignment was due, the entire network would grind to a halt as everyone was compiling their assignments on the server. Now I could have everyone else charged for hindering my work!
Except, of course, that such hindrance wouldn't be intentional (and I know the issues surrounding the determination of intent). Yes, every word in the (amazingly short) Bill does count.
Personally, I'd think that learning a new OS would be worth the cost of a book (which I note is out of print - does that mean a new edition is on the way?), but if you're too cheap to buy a book, well, here's a pretty decent guide to getting started with GNU/Linux.
Personally, I think that anything that makes the transition road easier for the masses (who don't have to use Linux, who aren't under any legal obligation to be technically proficient, and who are currently quite content in their Windows world, if only because they don't know any better) is a Very Good Thing. Remember, it's up to us to prove our case to the layperson, they aren't obliged to immediately see the light and become Bourne Again users just on the say-so of some geek who says, "Linux is 1337".
As the article points out, it would be difficult (though not yet proved impossible) for a pathogen to develop resistance to these things. Traditional antibiotics attack only one aspect of a cell's function: the synthesis of peptidoglycan (a substance used to reinforce the cell wall, without it the wall weakens and bursts) is a favourite, and these are relatively easy to work around through minor modification to the affected pathway. Not only that, but our antibioitics are derived from compounds already present in nature (e.g. penicillin), and tests on old bacterial samples show that the resistance genes predate our use of antibiotics. The bugs already had a defence ready to roll.
With these things, not only do they represent a "blanket attack" on pathogenic organisms, they are a completely novel form of attack for which bacteria are yet to even begin developing a defence. This should put the bugs on the backfoot in the pharmaceutical arms race for some time, if not forever.
As far as time limits are concerned, may I suggest Mercury. It's a functional/logical hybrid that's somewhat unorthodox for VHLLs in that it's a compile-only rather than interpreted-only or interpreted/compiled. Its designers claim that it can get similar performances to programs of similar functionality written in C, alhtough I haven't seen any benching, and I'll believe it when I see it.:)
Anyone think perl might be the language of choice?:)
No, because Perl isn't a functional language. *sigh*.
Re:optical detection sounds hard
on
Optical SETI
·
· Score: 2
...but wouldn't we have to depend on the fact that the other civilization know that we are right here, and that we are able to pick up their signals?
Or at least hope they take the time and effort to flash every star system within, say, a 50 light-year radius. But this strikes me as a specific example of a more general problem: our SETI efforts are directed towards detection rather than transmission; we seem to be doing a lot more listening than talking. If the aliens take the same attitude, then it's obvious no-one will ever contact anyone else.
Of course, a lot more effort is necessary for detection than for transmission, but AFAIK there aren't any transmissions going out specifically related to contact (our own EM noise probably doesn't count, simply because it doesn't have the oomph to travel interstellar distances). Are there any major efforts underway to ensure continuous transmission of "Hi there!" messages from good ol' Mother Terra?
Slashdot Mirror
I am a law student who's just finished first-year contract and tort (in Australia), and I have no idea how you came up with this one. AFAIK, the consideration you paid for a contract is not relevant when assessing whether the other party is liable for breaching or negligently performing their obligations; if they wrong you, they pay your loss. Perhaps, as I have alluded, this is a jurisdictional thing? I would appreciate a clarification.
Is that display little-endian or big-endian? Or will you be able to change endian mode? Or buy a separate model for each, maybe?
At least, it is if Microsoft is prosecuted for releasing Outlook in the first place. :)
You are correct. Judicial interpreation doesn't change the law, it merely clarifies what the law actually is (at least, that's the theory :)). This allows the court to formulate a precedent and apply it "retroactively" to the pre-existing facts of the case in which the precedent was formulated.
You can certainly use a new precedent to launch an action or appeal in a case that pre-dates the precedent, but whether you can do so usually depends on limitation of actions statues, which put deadlines on the time by which you have to file suit.
After a brief scan of the judgment, I would have to disagree. The court based its decision on the fact that the EULA is just that, an End User License Agreement: an agreement between the end user and Adobe, not between SoftMan and Adobe. SoftMan is not a party to that agreement, and therefore cannot be bound by its terms (which are the actual instruments imposing the resale restrictions). To say otherwise would mean that third parties are bound by contracts they didn't have a say in negotiating, meaning you could impose any arbitrary obligation on someone simply by including it in a contract you entered into with someone else. Which is completely unfair.
If Adobe included a term in its contract of sale with SoftMan to the effect that SoftMan couldn't unbundle, then it would be a different matter; now it's a question of whether that term is enforceable or is unenforceable as an unreasonable covenant in restraint of trade, along with a few other things.
IIRC, the first time this modulated RF interference was used to create music utilized the services of a PDP-7. (Was there such a machine? It was a PDP-something, at any rate.) There was a demonstration using an Altair at a homebrew meeting, although I think it played something like "Greensleeves". Definitely not The Beatles, tho'.
BTW, if you want to find out about probably the first ever attempt to make music with a computer (although it didn't utilize this technique), check out the music of CSIRAC.
In common law countries (UK, US, Canada, Australia, NZ, etc) parties can be excluded from liability in negligence as part of a contract/legally binding agreement, but that doesn't apply to a third party, and also won't apply in cases of spectacularly gross negligence, IIRC.
Now that's not very tight code, is it? Instead, try:
if(!installDrive->hasEnoughSpace())
installDrive->formatRecklessly();
return startInstall(installDrive);
A much superior algorithm for nuking innocent users' hard drives, I'm sure you'll agree.
That to which I referred can be used both for attack and defense, depending upon your circumstances. Perhaps I should have expressed myself more fully. Regardless, I don't see why Lutris can't revoke rights they have given gratuitously (again, it depends on the circumstances). But copyright/IP aren't areas of law with which I am fully familiar.
Common sense says they don't.
Common sense doesn't count for squat in court. What is your argument in law? :/
IAALS (I Am A Law Student)...I'm not so sure. Since nobody paid for the download, and nor did they enter into a formal "will code for distribution rights" agreement, there's no contract here, so you can't get Lutris for breach. As far as I can tell, you're referring to the idea of equitable estoppel, but the tests for that to apply are fairly difficult to pass (generally, Lutris's action in reneging would have to be "unconscionable", plus a pre-existing contract, but hey, you and I probably live in different jurisdictions), and I'm not sure this situation passes those tests. It's possible that companies who use InstantDB as a vital part of their operations would get out of paying the distribution fee.
Agreed, although I prefer the term "leech".
Two points:
Finally, if you want an example of a legal system that doesn't have a doctrine of precedent, try French civil law. Litigation in France can be a nightmare (especially the appeals process), and people have figured out that, hey, if judges just make up the law on a case-by-case basis, then the law is subjective and incoherent, and that's not good. Thus, we're beginning to see the adoption of a de facto doctrine of precedent in France.
Yeah, so I have a lot of time on my hands (but not as much as the guy who made that site ;p).
The old Cochrane-style warp scale is supposed to be cubic: v/c = w^3 (where v is velocity, c the speed of light and w the warp factor). They "accuratized" the scale for TNG time, though (see the Daystrom Technical Institute for more.
My own personal theory regarding the disappearing, reappearing Klingon forehead ridges is that it's some kind of ritual mutilation that became fashionable circa the 23rd century (think: circumcision with power tools) but in the "present time" (i.e. the 24th century) is considered disgusting and repulsive, hence Worf's embarrassment in that DS9 tribbles 'n' time travel episode.
Y'know, maybe those kids who thought the Earth would shatter aren't so stupid after all, if they relied on that figure. After all, they might have assumed that the idiot journo in question was talking about the mass-equivalent of the energy released, plugged it into e=mc^2, and got...well, a pretty respectable bignum.
I really recommend that you do sit down with Haskell. IMO, the judges were correct in naming it language of choice for "discriminating hackers". It has:
With regard to your qualms about lack of use, I understand Ericsson have created their own functional language for in-house use (the name escapes me). Arguably, since we've all got oodles of processor power to spare, there's no reason not to use functional languages in the general applications sector, given their greater reliability.
If you want more info on Haskell, check out the official website (especially the Ode to Haskell on the humour page, which should give you an idea as to the language's feature set ;)). There you will find interpreters, compilers and other tools for a variety of platforms (incl. Windows and Linux) as well as complete documentation.
Remember that if he does plead, he'll end up with a criminal record, which comes with its own set of headaches. He'll almost certainly never be allowed back in the US (not that he would necessarily want to, but the nature of his employment may require it) and he may face other travel restrictions in other countries. If it were a purely civil matter, then things would be different.
To my mind, the more important leaders of the OS/Free movement are the leaders of headline projects. Linus Torvalds is the most obvious, but people like Miguel de Icaza are also important. It's these guys who actually provide a focus and a vision for the abundant supply of open source labour that would otherwise go to waste. They provide actual goals and actual directions for the community to follow, which results in getting something done. The philosophers like Stallman are important (and I realize they've contributed significantly on the practical side), but the ultimate goal of OSS is to produce software that people like and use, not write treatises. That's how we'll achieve Total World Domination.
To those who wish the community to go in a certain direction I would say: do what Torvalds and ESR (and the Mono guys) did (albeit somewhat unintentionally in Torvalds' case). Create the beginnings of a project that embodies your ideas and put it up for your peers to assess and maybe contribute to. And be prepared to take on the administrative duties (filtering, reviewing and applying patches mainly) that go with keeping the project going. It doesn't matter if it sucks or not, that's for others to decide. If it sucks, no one will contribute and the project will go nowhere, no harm done.
Before his untimely death, Alan Turing did a lot of work on a new theoretical machine capable of transcending the limits of conventional Turing machines. The new machine (the so-called O-machine), would be a Turing machine connected to an "oracle", which would store some irrational quantity that would be able to do things like solve the Halting Problem, since it would contain an infinite amount of information (including overy possible program that could be created). At least, that's as much as I can remember (no links, sorry).
Who knows, maybe pi would suffice for such an oracle?
Except, of course, that such hindrance wouldn't be intentional (and I know the issues surrounding the determination of intent). Yes, every word in the (amazingly short) Bill does count.
I tried a crack at it, but my solution resulted in a huge reliance on the courts.
Totally unlike current IP laws, which result in a huge abuse of the courts.
BTW, what was your solution? I'm sure we'd all love to hear it.
Personally, I think that anything that makes the transition road easier for the masses (who don't have to use Linux, who aren't under any legal obligation to be technically proficient, and who are currently quite content in their Windows world, if only because they don't know any better) is a Very Good Thing. Remember, it's up to us to prove our case to the layperson, they aren't obliged to immediately see the light and become Bourne Again users just on the say-so of some geek who says, "Linux is 1337".
As the article points out, it would be difficult (though not yet proved impossible) for a pathogen to develop resistance to these things. Traditional antibiotics attack only one aspect of a cell's function: the synthesis of peptidoglycan (a substance used to reinforce the cell wall, without it the wall weakens and bursts) is a favourite, and these are relatively easy to work around through minor modification to the affected pathway. Not only that, but our antibioitics are derived from compounds already present in nature (e.g. penicillin), and tests on old bacterial samples show that the resistance genes predate our use of antibiotics. The bugs already had a defence ready to roll.
With these things, not only do they represent a "blanket attack" on pathogenic organisms, they are a completely novel form of attack for which bacteria are yet to even begin developing a defence. This should put the bugs on the backfoot in the pharmaceutical arms race for some time, if not forever.
As far as time limits are concerned, may I suggest Mercury. It's a functional/logical hybrid that's somewhat unorthodox for VHLLs in that it's a compile-only rather than interpreted-only or interpreted/compiled. Its designers claim that it can get similar performances to programs of similar functionality written in C, alhtough I haven't seen any benching, and I'll believe it when I see it. :)
Anyone think perl might be the language of choice? :)
No, because Perl isn't a functional language. *sigh*.
Or at least hope they take the time and effort to flash every star system within, say, a 50 light-year radius. But this strikes me as a specific example of a more general problem: our SETI efforts are directed towards detection rather than transmission; we seem to be doing a lot more listening than talking. If the aliens take the same attitude, then it's obvious no-one will ever contact anyone else.
Of course, a lot more effort is necessary for detection than for transmission, but AFAIK there aren't any transmissions going out specifically related to contact (our own EM noise probably doesn't count, simply because it doesn't have the oomph to travel interstellar distances). Are there any major efforts underway to ensure continuous transmission of "Hi there!" messages from good ol' Mother Terra?