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User: rbollinger

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Comments · 49

  1. Re:As I and many others pointed out yesterday on Amazon's Cloud Player: We Don't Need a License · · Score: 1

    The decision for this case was written in 2000, and I believe that the concept of digital media has significantly changed since then. One of the primary points made by the Judge was that making digital copies of music purchased on CD was not covered by fair use, and that the Record Company maintains the right to licence digital copies of their work. Fast-forwarding to 2011, most users of the service would be uploading digital copies of their music instead of 'copying' from CD. As long as the user has rights to a digital copy that can be transfered to several devices (e.g. DRM free digital copies), then I think the service should be legitimate. Amazon could probably protect itself with some terms of service language making that a condition of use.

    The Legal Decision:
    http://www.law.uh.edu/faculty/cjoyce/copyright/release10/UGM.html

  2. Re:Enjoy. on US House Subcommittee Votes To Kill Net Neutrality · · Score: 1

    First off in response to the person that responded to your post I'm a independent not a Republican, now as for facts:
    So what if the President's top contributors only added up at $14m, add up the list of McCain's 'Top Contributors' and the number is much smaller. It really doesn't have any bearing on my argument. Instead lets look at some other statistics from that same webpage:

    Agribusiness:
    M: $3,289,774
    O: $2,265,258

    Communications/Electronics:
    M: $4,607,216
    O: $25,487,934

    Construction:
    M: $5,496,922
    O: $5,465,083

    Defense:
    M: $694,148
    O: $1,034,697

    Energy & Natural Resources:
    M: $4,090,435
    O: $2,782,904

    Finance, Insurance & Real Estate:
    M: $29,005,313
    O: $39,663,073

    Health:
    M: $7,409,123
    O: $19,507,812

    Lawyers & Lobbyists:
    M: $11,153,996
    O: $43,755,917

    Transportation:
    M: $2,690,078
    O: $1,672,242

    Misc Business:
    M: $16,052,729
    O: $37,006,524

    Labor:
    M: $34,500
    O: $534,711

    Ideological/Single-Issue:
    M: $10,093,442
    O: $23,521,118

    Other:
    M: $37,739,674
    O: $82,250,231

    From this list you'll notice a few industries contributing significantly more to McCain than to President Obama. Most noticeably Energy (read Oil). Transportation, and Agriculture. However Finance, Communications, Health, Labor, and 'Misc' Business were all heavily backing the President. Clearly both Candidates were heavily supported by "Big Business." And I would tend to say the President was more so than Senator McCain.

  3. Re:Enjoy. on US House Subcommittee Votes To Kill Net Neutrality · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Take a quick look at the campaign finances of President Obama and see if you can still make this comment with a straight face. He raised more than three times as much money as Senator McCain in 2008, including rather large contributions from: Goldman Sachs, Microsoft, Google, Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Time Warner, General Electric, Morgan Stanley, and IBM. Granted I wouldn't call some of these new companies the 'Old Guard' but there are plenty on that list that fit the bill.

    Source: http://www.opensecrets.org/pres08/contrib.php?cycle=2008&cid=n00009638

  4. Re:And by the way, have we peaked ? on William Shatner Wakes Up Crew for Final Discovery Mission · · Score: 1

    True irony would be if the above post was made from a mobile device.

  5. Re:Military Law != Civilian Law on Bradley Manning Charged With Aiding the Enemy · · Score: 1

    I can't agree with you that he would have been 'covering up' or 'protecting' the crimes of his government. He actively sought out this information because he had a grudge against his command. If he had instead observed his leadership commit war crimes or give illegal orders and he reported on those events I would call him a whistle blower and support him. All he did was try to get 'revenge' on the Military in general.

  6. Re:No rule of law in America on Army Psy Ops Units Targeted American Senators · · Score: 1
    These are the nefarious tactics of the PsyOps I know. Certainly not anything that could be compared to:

    "t's no different than if a soldier pointed his rifle at a visiting politician and said, "Senator, vote for the new defense appropriations bill or I'll blow your head off."

    Thank you for an actually informative post.

  7. Re:Hatch Act? on Army Psy Ops Units Targeted American Senators · · Score: 1

    Technically the Hatch act doesn't apply to these Soldiers either. Based on the link above, they follow DoDD 1344.10 instead, which basically says you can't force your subordinates to vote for something, and you can't officially endorse a candidate in your role as an Officer. Either way id doesn't apply to whats going on in the article.

  8. Re:No rule of law in America on Army Psy Ops Units Targeted American Senators · · Score: 1

    Yes I did read the whole article? Would you care to point out which broken law you are referring to and which other 'Psy-Ops' techniques are forcing our Senators to vote a specific way? In the article, they only refer to getting background information on the Senators and adjusting their presentations. The article implies that they are doing something more nefarious but in reality there is nothing else added to the article to back up this claim.

  9. Re:No rule of law in America on Army Psy Ops Units Targeted American Senators · · Score: 1

    What Crime? Basically they were asked to look up voting records of the visiting senators and help adjust the General's presentations to make increasing troops and funding appear as the best course of action. This is no different than anything a business would do before going into negotiations, and definitely no different that what the media outlets do. Also, there is two sides to every story, so is the Married man sensationalizing orders from his boss because he was caught cheating, or is the General digging up dirt his subordinate because he was caught... doing his job?

  10. Re:It's your own fault for purchasing Sony on Sony's Official Statement Regarding PS3 Hacking · · Score: 1

    Yes because we all used Game Genies with our Nintendo Entertainment Systems hooked up to ARPANET through a 2400bps modem. It's exactly equivalent.

  11. Re:Because on Wikileaks' Assange Begins Extradition Battle · · Score: 1

    MUCH better speech-reading skills.

    Fixed it.

  12. Re:Enjoy paying more on An Open Letter To PC Makers: Ditch Bloatware, Now! · · Score: 2

    Lots of 'Get Linux' or 'Get OS X' responses. But Windows doesn't mean that you have to have bloatware. Build your computer yourself, buy from a manufacturer that doens't include bloatware (you'll be supporting small business to boot!), or buy the cheap big brand computer and wipe the drive/reinstall the OS.

  13. Economics on An Open Letter To PC Makers: Ditch Bloatware, Now! · · Score: 1

    People hate bloatware, but computer companies love money. If a software company gives them money to provide bloatware pre-installed, then of course they are going to take the money. Small computer companies usually don't have as much bloatware because they don't provide the same audience as the big computer companies do, but they also can't match the prices of the big companies. So the choice is really up to you, pay more for a small company that matches your ideology, or pay less for the big companies with bloatware. Or you could always buy the cheaper computer, wipe it, and install a new OS on it.

  14. Re:"Sport" mode on Volkswagen Unveils 313 MPG XL1, Slates Production For 2013 · · Score: 1

    Consider this:

    A Yamaha GS500 has a 47hp engine at 439lbs (9:1 Weight to HP ratio). It pulls a 0-60 in around 5.7 seconds.
    (Point: Light vehicles need less HP)

    The Honda Civic EX has a 140hp engine 2820lbs (20:1 Weight to HP ratio). It pulls a 0-6 in around 9.6 seconds.
    (Point: notice how acceleration scales with this ratio)

    This car is 838lbs fully fueled with a 39hp engine (21:1 Weight to HP ratio).
    (Point: The Honda Civic is no sports car but its not terrible either. This new car is not going to be screaming fast, but that 39hp is gonna go much further than you'd expect with such a light vehicle.)

  15. Re:Pathetic on Aerospace Engineer Named Lego Czar · · Score: 1

    I wouldn't call it pathetic without first seeing his contract. For all we know he could be getting $37,500 to work minimal hours from home.

  16. Re:Due Process on WikiLeaks Gives $15k To Bradley Manning Defense · · Score: 1

    I read the Salon article. Nowhere in the article does Mr. Greenwald discuss his sources. Well almost nowhere, he mentions David House's visits and observations of Manning's deteriorating conditions, but thats it. Shouldn't he spend more time quoting his sources for Manning's living conditions than he does quoting sources about how harmful solitary confinement is to a person? Did Mr. Greenwald observe these conditions first hand? Where these conditions reported by PFC Manning's lawyer? Are these conditions based on what PFC Manning has told visitors? The article is also completely inconsistent. It says he has been in 23hour-per-day solitary confinement "since the beginning of his detention" but also says that David House befriended Manning after his detention. Mr. Greenwald's article reads more like a high school essay about the inhumanity of solitary confinement than a legitimate news piece.

  17. Re:Huh? on WikiLeaks Gives $15k To Bradley Manning Defense · · Score: 1

    Thats a nice idealization of it, but nowhere near true.
    1) If he realized he had been lied to when he got there. Why didn't he provide testimony to the wrong-doings he witnessed. Why would he instead download thousands of documents (many that contain no examples of wrong-doing) and provide that information to an outside party without reviewing any of it himself. I would not classify him as a whistle-blower.
    2) Bradley Manning enlisted in the military in 2007, long after many in the United States had decided that the War was based on a lie and the same year as the Troop Surge. Yes he knew what he was getting into when he signed on for Military Service.

  18. Re:I can see this as a problem... on WikiLeaks Gives $15k To Bradley Manning Defense · · Score: 1

    You do realize that even though he was a Private First Class his job was 'Intelligence Analyst' and that SECRET is the lowest level of classified documents?

  19. Re:Well on Some WikiLeaks Contributions To Public Discourse · · Score: 1

    -10 worst analogy ever.

    How many people have been assassinated because they burned an American Flag? And I mean for that one specific act?
    - See Theo Van Gogh
    How many people have been forced to change their identity because of threats after burning an American Flag?
    - See Molly Norris
    How many people have been targeted for mass murder, just because one person in their country burned an American Flag?
    - See 2010 Stockholm Bombing

    Yes I get angry when I see people burn the American Flag. But I would NEVER commit any of the acts above because someone burned and American Flag.

  20. Mod Parent Up Please! on The Right's War On Net Neutrality · · Score: 4, Informative

    People here don't seem to understand, Rush isn't fighting the concept of Net Neutrality, he's fighting what the FCC is doing right now! Just because the regulations being pushed by the FCC are called Net Neutrality, doesn't mean that they are. Either Slashdotters have an extremely short memory about what the FCC has been doing in the past month, or you all hate Rush so much that you'll defend 'fake net neutrality' just so you don't have to agree with him. Hell I don't like Rush but he may be right this time. Remember both the Left and Right are in the pocket of big business.

  21. Is that a Solar Panel in your pocket? on Solar Panels For Your Pants · · Score: 1

    Or are you just happy to be green?

  22. Re:Why hasn't it been done before? on Ford To Offer Fuel-Saving 'Start-Stop' System · · Score: 1

    Yes and we all know how huge Honda had to make the Insight to hold it's battery.

  23. Re:I can see it now... on Julian Assange's Online Dating Profile Leaked · · Score: 1

    I'd hate to see that, a politician taking what a journalist says out of context.

  24. Re:Democrats loved the Pentagon Papers on Compiling the WikiLeaks Fallout · · Score: 1

    This would be imposing your ideals on another sovreign leader. Its great that you think the U.S. Government should be as open and upfront as possible. But the King of another Country can be as secretive as he pleases.