I'd rather watch most movies at home than in the theater. If there were copies available for purchase at the same time the movie came out in the theater, there is zero chance people would refrain from making and distributing free copies. It would be very tempting to just download a free copy rather than pay for the official copy or see it in a theater.
You're right. I actually mentioned it because it was on my mind after discussing the merits of iPhone vs Android at work. It's one of the things I appreciate after switching from iOS to Android.
You're quite right. The good news that instead of only the elite knowing how to read and write as was normal a century ago, now most people can communicate with the written word. The number of interesting things to read and the number of people capable of appreciating it now compared to just a few generations ago is amazing when you stop to think about it. Maybe only one in ten thousand is a great writer, but not that percentage is taken from a hugely larger portion of the population. Likewise with coding, perhaps only one in ten thousand will be a coder with impact, but if that is taken from 318 million instead of 2 million, that's a big impact.
I can't disagree with your observations, but I do have a positive perspective to add. Imagine that you wanted a way to measure wireless signal strength as you deployed your first wireless network in 1997. You'd need to buy special equipment where today, you just download an app. The 1997 person might want a calculator at the gas pump, requiring planning ahead to have the right equipment, but today you can just pull out your phone to use the built-in app.
Today the average end user doesn't buy a newspaper, consumer reviews magazine, music player, tape recorder, map or a camera. Few drive to the book store or the bank. Anyone can buy household goods while they wait in line at the DMV and catch up with family and friends across the world during their lunch break.
Today the average consumer solves thousands of needs by just knowing there is probably a bit of programming to be added to the ubiquitous pocket computer. It's probably not fair to refer to the end consumer's actions as coding or even programming, but the average consumer today changes what that pocket computer is capable of every day without even thinking about how it works.
1) Each website will inevitably have its own API that is incompatible with every other similar service. With service APIs, no one will bother with standardization on anything but the base protocol, because no generic standard satisfies any individual service's full functionality.
That's pretty much a description of how web pages worked just fifteen years ago. Nobody misses the days when most websites were designed for IE or Netscape and you couldn't make a website that worked well in both without taking quite a few special behaviors into account. Today, Microsoft is pushing Edge, Chrome has a significant market share, and Firefox's trailblazing changes made it normal for a browser to use tabs and block pop-ups by default. Not only has standard behavior improved for the better, the industry leaders are all trying to adhere to standards.
Your instant messaging providers would still be incompatible with each other, for instance, because company A wants a whiteboard mode and company B wants custom emoticons.
Recognizing that is the state of things doesn't mean it will stay that way forever. Consider how many websites have realized that managing their own authentication process is a bad idea. There are still plenty of problems, but it is becoming normal to use an inter-operable system. Right now trapping people into a single messaging system is a business model, but I don't think it will stay that way.
2) Because it's easier/cheaper/faster, everything will depend on some company being in business and providing their service. If somebody makes a service that does text-to-speech extraordinarily well, for instance, and does it as an online API call instead of locally on the device, then if that company goes out of business the service dies with them and everything that depended on their particular text-to-speech engine would stop working.
Unless it's an open source service, then five more will spring up in it's place. If that text-to-speech service is widely desired, an open source version is guaranteed to spring up eventually.
Wait a moment... aren't these types of problems happening today? Business as usual then. Carry on.
Business as usual is widely panned, but we already live in a world where business as usual has radically changed in just a couple decades. I carry a computer in my pocket that is massively more powerful than I could have predicted twenty years ago. Yesterday I talked to it and got an answer. When I was a kid, I couldn't have gotten that answer without a trip to the library and possibly weeks of waiting for the library to get the book exchanged from another geographically distant library.
Business as usual for the average person is change, not measured in generations or even decades, but measured in months.
main { if broke {fix(it);return fixed && call main } add value; update or upgrade; procrastinate(stuff); do consumerstuff { //* call retirement(savings) #function not written yet *// support(economy); } until money < minimum; call main; } until robots; //* call use_retirement(savings) #function not written yet *// //* fix pseudo_code to make sense *//
function create_awesome_money_generator(ideas) {//* function unused, more ideas and talent needed before function functions *// write awesomeThing1(ideas); create Microsoft2(); create Apple2(); takeover FaceBook(); admit(Satoshi Nakamoto); }
Microsoft is using its own version of P2P that is much like bittorrent, but apparently not actually bittorent. I am quite interested in learning more about it, but all I've been able to find so far is that it is likely based on Avalanche.
The first time I used the bittorrent protocol, I used it to get a copy of Debian. I'd never heard of it before, but I read up on it and was impressed how potentially useful it could be. Software updates were the obvious first thing that sprang to my mind (as I work with a program that gets a lot of updates, all from a host that was more or less flat lining every time the updates came out.) When I found out people were using it for copyright infringement, I was shocked since, by it's nature, the protocol shares the IPs of everyone sharing the file.
I recalled there was some company that was using it for software updates so I googled for it, and not only found that, but some other rather significant users of bittorrent protocol:
Blizzard Entertainment uses its own BitTorrent client to download World of Warcraft, Starcraft II, and Diablo III.
Facebook and Twitter both use BitTorrent internally to move files around.
The Internet Archive recommends people use BitTorrent to download its content, as it’s the fastest method and allows the non-profit organization to save on bandwidth costs.
Linux ISO distribution, as I first discovered it, is a big use.
The UK government released several large data sets showing how public money was being spent.
Then there's NASA, and BitTorrent Sync and all the legal music and videos Bittorrent Inc puts out. P2P file sharing just makes sense for so many things, I'm still surprised people associate it with copyright infringement. I think the real key to understanding that association is all the media coverage of the *AA battles against Napster, Limewire, Mopheus and The Pirate Bay. I suspect there would be a lot less infringement if the public wasn't constantly hearing news about how people are getting content without paying.
What I find most newsworthy is that Microsoft is using P2P to distribute updates now. Maybe the makers of the software I work with will finally get the hint.
You jest, but it would be a reasonable deflection to say "we've looked into it and our research revealed that most copyright infringement of music and movies is done by users of Windows, while the users of our software account for a much lower percentage of infringments."*
Most pirated movies and music are being used on Windows and isn't that where the real problem is?
Isn't there a major game system that uses the bittorrent protocol for updates? Even Microsoft is using peer-to-peer technology to deliver updates now.
* - I don't actually know that Windows is used for infringements more often than the Bittorrent program, but with all the different bittorrent protocol clients out there and Microsoft's desktop majority, I feel safe making that assumption.
If you're on public land, you don't get an expectation of privacy.
I've often heard this repeated, but is it actually true?
Suppose I'm in a public space (say, a park) having a quiet conversation with someone, and keeping track of passersby: If someone walks up we stop talking.
Does this mean that someone (from the government) with a parabolic mic can eavesdrop on my conversations without a warrant?
Yes. That's exactly what it means (in the US) because that's the line the courts have upheld. There are some exceptions, based on state and local laws, but that's the federal law.
The argument is that it's only what a policeman would hear if he walked up and listened, but in that case we would stop talking.
Who made that argument? I haven't read the arguments in the cases argued before the SCOTUS, but I'd be very surprised if you can point to that argument in the court records. In fact, I suspect the problem is that you didn't realize that "Expectation of privacy" is a legal term used in discussing the fourth amendment to the US Constitution.
I have every expectation of privacy if I take steps to ensure that privacy: looking around to make sure no one can see me, for instance. Does this mean that the police can video-tape the sidewalk from the window of any office building without a warrant?
"I didn't think the cops would see me smoking crack" is not a legitimate argument in a court case. By contrast, "it was illegal for the cops to take the steps they did to get this evidence" is a legitimate argument.
I also note that there's no expectation of privacy *in your home* if you don't have the drapes closed. The implication is that we don't have an expectation of privacy *anywhere*, except in our homes and only if we're concealed.
The implication is that if the cops can see you do it without trespassing, then it can be used as evidence.
Does that sound like a free country?
Yes! What, you think prohibiting stuff makes people more free?
If you're on public land, you don't get an expectation of privacy.
In any event, we shouldn't be mindlessly repeating that meme as if it's the "law of the land". The more you say it, it only makes more people believe it.
Instead, we should be mindlessly repeating things things that sway public perception in a better direction.
Maybe repeating anything mindlessly is a bad idea. Maybe read about what expectation of privacy is here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... so you don't have to come across as mindless.
Good point. I was planning on making the opposite one, but you're absolutely right about what real AI is versus what apparent AI is.
I think both sides have valid points, and which is correct depends on the basic question of what we want from AI. If we want to interact with a system that understands us and does what we want, then just reacting the way a person would, regardless of the reasons for how it does it, is sufficient. However, if we want to have a system that does something which humans are capable of and computers currently aren't, then it isn't sufficient until a computer can do things that aren't predictable simply by understanding the programming.
It's different because you can be called to court and/or have your property confiscated if you don't pay for municipal broadband and not even Comcast can do that.
I'm in favor of municipal broadband, and in one of the places where the state decided not to allow it, so I have strong feelings about the stupidity and blatant disregard for the good of the public that has been evidenced by my so called representatives.
Despite my preferences and irritation the difference between government and private enterprise is blindingly obvious.
Can Comcast representatives arrest you?
Can Verizon seize your property if you don't want to pay for their service?
The idea that
the government entity receives no unfair treatment and has to play by the same rules as every other company
has no basis in reality. Government has rights to force you to do things and private enterprise doesn't. That's what government is.
Many times I've given a ride to someone I didn't know. Sometimes, it has been somewhere I wasn't planning to go. I've been the kind of person who doesn't ask for anything in return, but I don't think it would have been immoral (or against the law.) If I had, should I have been legally obligated to get the same insurance as a taxi company?
I suspect the reasonable difference between doing something for someone as a favor to be repaid, and doing something as a job, would be "obligation."
If I agreed to do transport because it was my job is obviously a taxi service. Compare that to agreeing to take someone somewhere with reasonable payment. There is a difference between being acting as a taxi service and being a reasonable guy. The question I have is: Does an Uber driver have an obligation or are they agreeing without obligation to do something?
A taxi is in service when they are in a company car and obligated to take work, while an Uber driver doesn't share that obligation.
That's a significant difference... but maybe I'm wrong about the difference between an Uber driver and a taxi driver. I'm interested if you have documentation you can cite to show they have the same obligations?
Claiming "I'm not a taxi company" while providing exactly the same services as one is disingenuous at best, and outright fraud at worst.
Do they?
I've never used Uber, and I don't have all the necessary information to make the call myself. Do taxi's have an obligation to provide a service without putting themselves "on the job" and Uber drivers have an obligation to provide service or is it only when they decide to take a job?
I suspect the problem that KS is struggling with is that taxi drivers are obligated to do things while they're in service (pick up someone) that Uber drivers aren't (they don't have to take fares.)
If there is a difference between the obligations of an Uber driver and a taxi driver, then it is reasonable to expect them to be subject to different laws, but if they have the same obligations, then it is fair to expect them to be subject to the same laws.
Does an Uber driver logging in to an app have the same obligations as a taxi driver? That's the key issue and I really am looking forward to a well documented answer.
Continuing your tradition of replying to yourself with another thought: Does logging into Uber's driver app mean you're at work?
Requiring commercial insurance when you're driving a stranger for money makes sense, but I believe Uber already does that. Requiring commercial insurance when you log into an app isn't something that affects anyone but Uber. After commenting I realized the key idea here is obligation. Until I clock in at work, I don't have an obligation to work. It is reasonable that I should abide by work rules and laws concerning my work when I have an obligation to be working. When I have no obligation to be working, then it is reasonable that I don't have a legal obligation to do extra things required when I am working.
Help me out here: Does an Uber driver have an obligation to do work when they log into the app? I think it's reasonable to require commercial insurance when obligated to do work. Do Uber drivers have that obligation when they log into the App and does Kansas' new law recognize the difference between an Uber driver who isn't obligated to do work and one who does?
Thanks for giving me the feeling I'm not alone in wanting to identify my governmental philosophy as libertarian but finding the general portrayal of that term distasteful.
I'm a hacker and I'm a libertarian but I'm not okay with engaging in illegal activities and I'm not okay with anarchy. By the common interpretation, if I call myself a hacker then I'm saying I'm doing something illegal and if I call myself a libertarian then I'm saying I'm against all government and law. I don't really care about the words themselves, but I do wish there were simple words to say I exercise my legally protected freedom to use the things I own to accomplish things they weren't designed for, and I believe the role of government should be to protect freedom, particularly where freedom of individuals is conflict. (I can commit murder without consequence is freedom that conflicts with the freedom of my neighbor [who has it coming] to live and make [irritating] choices.)
The role of government in my view, is to protect the public from choices people make that inhibit the freedom to pursue life, liberty and happiness. The role of law in my view, is to make it possible to identify instances where the individual cannot be permitted freedom to make choices that will keep others from having freedom.
I think that if I were seated with the founding fathers at a table where we all had a chance to speak, they'd agree with my simple ideas and dismiss my contributions as so basic as to not warrant further discussion. If I could then spend a couple hours describing the outcomes of their decisions (and actually convince them that the future I come from is real,) then I think they would feel both proud and dismayed.
After discussing the issue KS is dealing with, I think they'd say that the idea of correcting the law so that it is applicable to everyone is noble, but the idea that people are responsible for actions that fail to directly involve participating is one that should be carefully and very specifically limited.
Logging into an app doesn't mean you're working unless it comes with an obligation to do specific work.
I really like the choice of analogy. I've never used Uber and don't expect to anytime soon, but I'm torn between wanting people to act responsibly (have reasonable insurance) and wanting to see stupid bureaucratic laws (you're commercial because that prevents competition) improved to be understandable and reasonable.
I believe there are a lot of US citizens like me who engage in and abstain from behaviors because it is critical to our employment while we're not actively doing the work we're paid to do. I went to bed early last night because I needed to in order to perform well at my job, got up early today, and I bathed, and I stayed sober, and I drove to work and I took an elevator and I logged into my computer but only then did I start to be considered "doing my job" even though everything leading up to that point was necessary to perform my work. Up until I logged into my computer at my job, I don't think my employer would assume any liability for anything happening to me. It is at that point which I would consider myself at work and I think the law would consider me at work. If I were a chef, I don't think the definition would change at all.
Uber drivers are apparently considered to be at work by this law even before they get to the point when they're actually doing the thing they get paid to do, unlike my situation where I'm not at work until I'm actually prepared to begin doing the thing I get paid to do. That strikes me as unfair.
Sticking to the chef analogy, lets say I'm a freelance private chef, which I think is a pretty good parallel. The expectation I'd have for my job is that I'd get paid starting at the time when I arrive at my destination and am ready to begin cooking. That leaves out the drive to the location, the shopping and planning prior and any semblance of sobriety I felt obligated to maintain. Apparently if I work in Kansas as a freelance private chef, however, I'm on the hook for being on the job from the moment I open my email to see if I have any jobs today.
No job works like that. Cab drivers are on the job when they get in the company vehicle and turn on the dispatch radio, but Uber drivers aren't in a company vehicle and logging into the app is the equivalent of me checking my email.
I grok the problem Kansas is trying to resolve: Kansas requires specific things in order to participate in a market in order to keep the public safe and Uber is not participating in that market in the expected manner and so didn't expect to have to follow the rules that didn't seem to affect the parts of the market they weren't participating in. When you have a situation where the laws don't fit the behavior and you think the laws should be applicable, it is absolutely correct to modify the laws.
So I'm happy to see Kansas taking the approach they have to a problem of legal loopholes by closing the loopholes. At the same time, I'm concerned that in the process, they're also eroding the freedom to engage in commerce without an unreasonable legal burden. If the same thing happened to freelance chefs, they'd go from being able to provide a reasonable service at a reasonable price to being out of business with no gain to the public.
If an Uber driver isn't actively doing something they're paid to do, why are they forced by legislation to do something nobody else logging into an app is forced to do?
I honestly believe that the answer to my question is: This is to use the law to create an artificially high barrier to participating in this type of activity in order to protect the status quo at the cost of the public good. I'm interested to see any better explanations.
In this scenario, you have a public key and a private key embedded, you identify yourself with the public key and the validating system encrypts something with that public key, then passes you the result which you can then decrypt only by using your private key.
Ergo: "pass on a piece of information describing yourself to another party without that party having to know that information already to validate it" and also prohibiting the possibility of a replay.
The key to PKI is that you can encrypt something for me that you cannot decrypt but I can.
Slashdot Mirror
I'd rather watch most movies at home than in the theater. If there were copies available for purchase at the same time the movie came out in the theater, there is zero chance people would refrain from making and distributing free copies. It would be very tempting to just download a free copy rather than pay for the official copy or see it in a theater.
You're right. I actually mentioned it because it was on my mind after discussing the merits of iPhone vs Android at work. It's one of the things I appreciate after switching from iOS to Android.
You're quite right. The good news that instead of only the elite knowing how to read and write as was normal a century ago, now most people can communicate with the written word. The number of interesting things to read and the number of people capable of appreciating it now compared to just a few generations ago is amazing when you stop to think about it. Maybe only one in ten thousand is a great writer, but not that percentage is taken from a hugely larger portion of the population. Likewise with coding, perhaps only one in ten thousand will be a coder with impact, but if that is taken from 318 million instead of 2 million, that's a big impact.
I can't disagree with your observations, but I do have a positive perspective to add. Imagine that you wanted a way to measure wireless signal strength as you deployed your first wireless network in 1997. You'd need to buy special equipment where today, you just download an app. The 1997 person might want a calculator at the gas pump, requiring planning ahead to have the right equipment, but today you can just pull out your phone to use the built-in app.
Today the average end user doesn't buy a newspaper, consumer reviews magazine, music player, tape recorder, map or a camera. Few drive to the book store or the bank. Anyone can buy household goods while they wait in line at the DMV and catch up with family and friends across the world during their lunch break.
Today the average consumer solves thousands of needs by just knowing there is probably a bit of programming to be added to the ubiquitous pocket computer. It's probably not fair to refer to the end consumer's actions as coding or even programming, but the average consumer today changes what that pocket computer is capable of every day without even thinking about how it works.
1) Each website will inevitably have its own API that is incompatible with every other similar service. With service APIs, no one will bother with standardization on anything but the base protocol, because no generic standard satisfies any individual service's full functionality.
That's pretty much a description of how web pages worked just fifteen years ago. Nobody misses the days when most websites were designed for IE or Netscape and you couldn't make a website that worked well in both without taking quite a few special behaviors into account. Today, Microsoft is pushing Edge, Chrome has a significant market share, and Firefox's trailblazing changes made it normal for a browser to use tabs and block pop-ups by default. Not only has standard behavior improved for the better, the industry leaders are all trying to adhere to standards.
Your instant messaging providers would still be incompatible with each other, for instance, because company A wants a whiteboard mode and company B wants custom emoticons.
Recognizing that is the state of things doesn't mean it will stay that way forever. Consider how many websites have realized that managing their own authentication process is a bad idea. There are still plenty of problems, but it is becoming normal to use an inter-operable system. Right now trapping people into a single messaging system is a business model, but I don't think it will stay that way.
2) Because it's easier/cheaper/faster, everything will depend on some company being in business and providing their service. If somebody makes a service that does text-to-speech extraordinarily well, for instance, and does it as an online API call instead of locally on the device, then if that company goes out of business the service dies with them and everything that depended on their particular text-to-speech engine would stop working.
Unless it's an open source service, then five more will spring up in it's place. If that text-to-speech service is widely desired, an open source version is guaranteed to spring up eventually.
Wait a moment... aren't these types of problems happening today? Business as usual then. Carry on.
Business as usual is widely panned, but we already live in a world where business as usual has radically changed in just a couple decades. I carry a computer in my pocket that is massively more powerful than I could have predicted twenty years ago. Yesterday I talked to it and got an answer. When I was a kid, I couldn't have gotten that answer without a trip to the library and possibly weeks of waiting for the library to get the book exchanged from another geographically distant library.
Business as usual for the average person is change, not measured in generations or even decades, but measured in months.
main {
//* call retirement(savings) #function not written yet *//
//* function unused, more ideas and talent needed before function functions *//
if broke {fix(it);return fixed && call main }
add value;
update or upgrade;
procrastinate(stuff);
do consumerstuff {
support(economy);
} until money < minimum;
call main;
} until robots;
//* call use_retirement(savings) #function not written yet *//
//* fix pseudo_code to make sense *//
function create_awesome_money_generator(ideas)
{
write awesomeThing1(ideas);
create Microsoft2();
create Apple2();
takeover FaceBook();
admit(Satoshi Nakamoto);
}
For people like us, who actually click on information about what the EULA means and what privacy we can expect and what we can't, I agree with you.
99.9% of people don't care enough to even read a summary of the EULA or privacy concerns.
The average internet user may care, but the average internet user doesn't care enough to even read about the issue.
Microsoft is using its own version of P2P that is much like bittorrent, but apparently not actually bittorent. I am quite interested in learning more about it, but all I've been able to find so far is that it is likely based on Avalanche.
The first time I used the bittorrent protocol, I used it to get a copy of Debian. I'd never heard of it before, but I read up on it and was impressed how potentially useful it could be. Software updates were the obvious first thing that sprang to my mind (as I work with a program that gets a lot of updates, all from a host that was more or less flat lining every time the updates came out.) When I found out people were using it for copyright infringement, I was shocked since, by it's nature, the protocol shares the IPs of everyone sharing the file.
I recalled there was some company that was using it for software updates so I googled for it, and not only found that, but some other rather significant users of bittorrent protocol:
Then there's NASA, and BitTorrent Sync and all the legal music and videos Bittorrent Inc puts out. P2P file sharing just makes sense for so many things, I'm still surprised people associate it with copyright infringement. I think the real key to understanding that association is all the media coverage of the *AA battles against Napster, Limewire, Mopheus and The Pirate Bay. I suspect there would be a lot less infringement if the public wasn't constantly hearing news about how people are getting content without paying.
What I find most newsworthy is that Microsoft is using P2P to distribute updates now. Maybe the makers of the software I work with will finally get the hint.
You jest, but it would be a reasonable deflection to say "we've looked into it and our research revealed that most copyright infringement of music and movies is done by users of Windows, while the users of our software account for a much lower percentage of infringments."*
Most pirated movies and music are being used on Windows and isn't that where the real problem is?
Isn't there a major game system that uses the bittorrent protocol for updates? Even Microsoft is using peer-to-peer technology to deliver updates now.
* - I don't actually know that Windows is used for infringements more often than the Bittorrent program, but with all the different bittorrent protocol clients out there and Microsoft's desktop majority, I feel safe making that assumption.
I think you underestimate the complexity of modern encryption and hashing algorithms.
If you're on public land, you don't get an expectation of privacy.
I've often heard this repeated, but is it actually true?
Suppose I'm in a public space (say, a park) having a quiet conversation with someone, and keeping track of passersby: If someone walks up we stop talking.
Does this mean that someone (from the government) with a parabolic mic can eavesdrop on my conversations without a warrant?
Yes. That's exactly what it means (in the US) because that's the line the courts have upheld. There are some exceptions, based on state and local laws, but that's the federal law.
The argument is that it's only what a policeman would hear if he walked up and listened, but in that case we would stop talking.
Who made that argument? I haven't read the arguments in the cases argued before the SCOTUS, but I'd be very surprised if you can point to that argument in the court records. In fact, I suspect the problem is that you didn't realize that "Expectation of privacy" is a legal term used in discussing the fourth amendment to the US Constitution.
I have every expectation of privacy if I take steps to ensure that privacy: looking around to make sure no one can see me, for instance. Does this mean that the police can video-tape the sidewalk from the window of any office building without a warrant?
"I didn't think the cops would see me smoking crack" is not a legitimate argument in a court case. By contrast, "it was illegal for the cops to take the steps they did to get this evidence" is a legitimate argument.
I also note that there's no expectation of privacy *in your home* if you don't have the drapes closed. The implication is that we don't have an expectation of privacy *anywhere*, except in our homes and only if we're concealed.
The implication is that if the cops can see you do it without trespassing, then it can be used as evidence.
Does that sound like a free country?
Yes! What, you think prohibiting stuff makes people more free?
If you're on public land, you don't get an expectation of privacy.
In any event, we shouldn't be mindlessly repeating that meme as if it's the "law of the land". The more you say it, it only makes more people believe it.
Instead, we should be mindlessly repeating things things that sway public perception in a better direction.
Maybe repeating anything mindlessly is a bad idea. Maybe read about what expectation of privacy is here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... so you don't have to come across as mindless.
Good point. I was planning on making the opposite one, but you're absolutely right about what real AI is versus what apparent AI is.
I think both sides have valid points, and which is correct depends on the basic question of what we want from AI. If we want to interact with a system that understands us and does what we want, then just reacting the way a person would, regardless of the reasons for how it does it, is sufficient. However, if we want to have a system that does something which humans are capable of and computers currently aren't, then it isn't sufficient until a computer can do things that aren't predictable simply by understanding the programming.
Wow. Yeah, I think you just shattered my rose tinted glasses.
It's different because you can be called to court and/or have your property confiscated if you don't pay for municipal broadband and not even Comcast can do that.
I'm in favor of municipal broadband, and in one of the places where the state decided not to allow it, so I have strong feelings about the stupidity and blatant disregard for the good of the public that has been evidenced by my so called representatives.
Despite my preferences and irritation the difference between government and private enterprise is blindingly obvious.
The idea that
has no basis in reality. Government has rights to force you to do things and private enterprise doesn't. That's what government is.
Many times I've given a ride to someone I didn't know. Sometimes, it has been somewhere I wasn't planning to go. I've been the kind of person who doesn't ask for anything in return, but I don't think it would have been immoral (or against the law.) If I had, should I have been legally obligated to get the same insurance as a taxi company?
I suspect the reasonable difference between doing something for someone as a favor to be repaid, and doing something as a job, would be "obligation."
If I agreed to do transport because it was my job is obviously a taxi service. Compare that to agreeing to take someone somewhere with reasonable payment. There is a difference between being acting as a taxi service and being a reasonable guy. The question I have is: Does an Uber driver have an obligation or are they agreeing without obligation to do something?
Do they though?
A taxi is in service when they are in a company car and obligated to take work, while an Uber driver doesn't share that obligation.
That's a significant difference... but maybe I'm wrong about the difference between an Uber driver and a taxi driver. I'm interested if you have documentation you can cite to show they have the same obligations?
Do they?
I've never used Uber, and I don't have all the necessary information to make the call myself. Do taxi's have an obligation to provide a service without putting themselves "on the job" and Uber drivers have an obligation to provide service or is it only when they decide to take a job?
I suspect the problem that KS is struggling with is that taxi drivers are obligated to do things while they're in service (pick up someone) that Uber drivers aren't (they don't have to take fares.)
If there is a difference between the obligations of an Uber driver and a taxi driver, then it is reasonable to expect them to be subject to different laws, but if they have the same obligations, then it is fair to expect them to be subject to the same laws.
Does an Uber driver logging in to an app have the same obligations as a taxi driver? That's the key issue and I really am looking forward to a well documented answer.
Continuing your tradition of replying to yourself with another thought: Does logging into Uber's driver app mean you're at work?
Requiring commercial insurance when you're driving a stranger for money makes sense, but I believe Uber already does that. Requiring commercial insurance when you log into an app isn't something that affects anyone but Uber. After commenting I realized the key idea here is obligation. Until I clock in at work, I don't have an obligation to work. It is reasonable that I should abide by work rules and laws concerning my work when I have an obligation to be working. When I have no obligation to be working, then it is reasonable that I don't have a legal obligation to do extra things required when I am working.
Help me out here: Does an Uber driver have an obligation to do work when they log into the app? I think it's reasonable to require commercial insurance when obligated to do work. Do Uber drivers have that obligation when they log into the App and does Kansas' new law recognize the difference between an Uber driver who isn't obligated to do work and one who does?
Thanks for giving me the feeling I'm not alone in wanting to identify my governmental philosophy as libertarian but finding the general portrayal of that term distasteful.
I'm a hacker and I'm a libertarian but I'm not okay with engaging in illegal activities and I'm not okay with anarchy. By the common interpretation, if I call myself a hacker then I'm saying I'm doing something illegal and if I call myself a libertarian then I'm saying I'm against all government and law. I don't really care about the words themselves, but I do wish there were simple words to say I exercise my legally protected freedom to use the things I own to accomplish things they weren't designed for, and I believe the role of government should be to protect freedom, particularly where freedom of individuals is conflict. (I can commit murder without consequence is freedom that conflicts with the freedom of my neighbor [who has it coming] to live and make [irritating] choices.)
The role of government in my view, is to protect the public from choices people make that inhibit the freedom to pursue life, liberty and happiness. The role of law in my view, is to make it possible to identify instances where the individual cannot be permitted freedom to make choices that will keep others from having freedom.
I think that if I were seated with the founding fathers at a table where we all had a chance to speak, they'd agree with my simple ideas and dismiss my contributions as so basic as to not warrant further discussion. If I could then spend a couple hours describing the outcomes of their decisions (and actually convince them that the future I come from is real,) then I think they would feel both proud and dismayed.
After discussing the issue KS is dealing with, I think they'd say that the idea of correcting the law so that it is applicable to everyone is noble, but the idea that people are responsible for actions that fail to directly involve participating is one that should be carefully and very specifically limited.
Logging into an app doesn't mean you're working unless it comes with an obligation to do specific work.
I really like the choice of analogy. I've never used Uber and don't expect to anytime soon, but I'm torn between wanting people to act responsibly (have reasonable insurance) and wanting to see stupid bureaucratic laws (you're commercial because that prevents competition) improved to be understandable and reasonable.
I believe there are a lot of US citizens like me who engage in and abstain from behaviors because it is critical to our employment while we're not actively doing the work we're paid to do. I went to bed early last night because I needed to in order to perform well at my job, got up early today, and I bathed, and I stayed sober, and I drove to work and I took an elevator and I logged into my computer but only then did I start to be considered "doing my job" even though everything leading up to that point was necessary to perform my work. Up until I logged into my computer at my job, I don't think my employer would assume any liability for anything happening to me. It is at that point which I would consider myself at work and I think the law would consider me at work. If I were a chef, I don't think the definition would change at all.
Uber drivers are apparently considered to be at work by this law even before they get to the point when they're actually doing the thing they get paid to do, unlike my situation where I'm not at work until I'm actually prepared to begin doing the thing I get paid to do. That strikes me as unfair.
Sticking to the chef analogy, lets say I'm a freelance private chef, which I think is a pretty good parallel. The expectation I'd have for my job is that I'd get paid starting at the time when I arrive at my destination and am ready to begin cooking. That leaves out the drive to the location, the shopping and planning prior and any semblance of sobriety I felt obligated to maintain. Apparently if I work in Kansas as a freelance private chef, however, I'm on the hook for being on the job from the moment I open my email to see if I have any jobs today.
No job works like that. Cab drivers are on the job when they get in the company vehicle and turn on the dispatch radio, but Uber drivers aren't in a company vehicle and logging into the app is the equivalent of me checking my email.
I grok the problem Kansas is trying to resolve: Kansas requires specific things in order to participate in a market in order to keep the public safe and Uber is not participating in that market in the expected manner and so didn't expect to have to follow the rules that didn't seem to affect the parts of the market they weren't participating in. When you have a situation where the laws don't fit the behavior and you think the laws should be applicable, it is absolutely correct to modify the laws.
So I'm happy to see Kansas taking the approach they have to a problem of legal loopholes by closing the loopholes. At the same time, I'm concerned that in the process, they're also eroding the freedom to engage in commerce without an unreasonable legal burden. If the same thing happened to freelance chefs, they'd go from being able to provide a reasonable service at a reasonable price to being out of business with no gain to the public.
If an Uber driver isn't actively doing something they're paid to do, why are they forced by legislation to do something nobody else logging into an app is forced to do?
I honestly believe that the answer to my question is: This is to use the law to create an artificially high barrier to participating in this type of activity in order to protect the status quo at the cost of the public good. I'm interested to see any better explanations.
Yup. Mod parent up.
So?
In this scenario, you have a public key and a private key embedded, you identify yourself with the public key and the validating system encrypts something with that public key, then passes you the result which you can then decrypt only by using your private key.
Ergo: "pass on a piece of information describing yourself to another party without that party having to know that information already to validate it" and also prohibiting the possibility of a replay.
The key to PKI is that you can encrypt something for me that you cannot decrypt but I can.
PKI means Person A can confirm Person B is confirmed without knowing Person B's secret.
I feel like this is a reference I should recognize but I don't. Anyone care to enlighten me?