if you subpoena the ISP, you'll [...] probably get the right party... if you subpoena the ISP to find the homeowner of record that an IP was assigned to, then even if that homeowner was not the infringer you were looking for, you could subpoena them and there would be a good chance they would know who the infringer was.
And if 4 people were home at the time the supposed infringement occurred and all of them had access to the computer, how are you supposed to figure out which of them did it? There's no "probably" about it; there's very little chance of you successfully proving who the downloader was. And even if they knew who had done it, in all likelihood that would make them a collaborator which would be justification to not reveal that to you.
You'd basically be on a fishing trip to try to bully them into ratting on whoever it was. And if they had guests who could have used the computer there's a good chance they'd have no idea who had done it, or quite possibly react to your bullying by finally pinning the blame falsely on one of the family members.
My real point was that the judge didn't make this argument, or any other good argument, to say why the car rental agency was not analogous to an ISP. He basically said, "It's not the same because if a car rental customer hits you, you could sue the car rental agency as well", without saying why there was a greater justification for including the rental car agency as a defendant, than for including the ISP as a defendant.
ISPs have special legal protections that make them non-liable for their users' actions.
No... a one-way mirror doesn't allow light to pass in only one direction. It passes, and reflects, light equally in either direction. The trick is to make it dark enough on one side that you can't see your own reflection, and bright enough on the other side that they can't see you because their reflection is too bright.
Mmm, yes, I volunteer to be the pizza-regulator who confiscates pizzas to make sure they're not used for anything illegal. I'll personally dispose of as much of it as I can.
No, fold it in half with the hot sides facing out. That way there's a limited amount of heat trapped inside it for it to move out; when the middle reaches absolute zero it simply can't continue moving heat across (actually, it'd undoubtedly be an asymptotic approach, but that's beside the point).
What you suggested would cause the inside to get hotter and hotter, making your backpack colder in the process. And even whatever magical material you used to make the hotpad has to have a melting point somewhere...
It's like killing the golden goose... and actually getting all the golden eggs at once!
Also, a lot of them make no sense whatsoever. What the hell are these supposed to mean? "Tuesday is the Wednesday of the rest of your life." "You are destined to become the commandant of the fighting men of the department of transportation."
Actually it's almost impossible to find material that isn't copyrighted (an author has an automatic copyright anytime they produce a creative work), so by non-copyrighted I really meant that the copyright had either expired or specifically allowed people to copy it.
the AC's point was that if they were distributing child porn that they would be liable
I amend my previous statement.
Original claim: Posting free/shareware doesn't make CNET liable for its use.
The strawman which Anonymous Coward knocked down so easily was more like this claim, however: Posting something never makes anyone liable for anything.
By "non-copyrighted" I mean to refer to material either whose copyright term has expired and has entered the public domain, or material whose "copyright" is specifically intended to give you the right to copy it. But either way, copying those materials would not be illegal, and the music and film industries want you to forget the existence of music and videos which are perfectly legal to copy.
But using Limewire to download music and videos is not illegal unless the music and videos are copyrighted. The music and film industries would like everyone to forget that non-copyrighted music and videos does exist...
Original position: You shouldn't be held liable for distributing something that has legal uses, such as Limewire. Strawman: You shouldn't be held liable for distributing anything; for instance child porn.
Person B disregards certain key points of X and instead presents the superficially similar position Y.
Key point: Limewire has legal uses; child porn is always illegal to create, possess, or even attempt to obtain. Ignore that point and suddenly distributing Limewire is like distributing child porn - oh noes! Clearly they must be held responsible.
Did they promote Limewire as a tool to violate copyrights? Or did they merely promote it as a tool to download music and videos?
The former is like touting your guns as a great way to take people's jewelry and get rid of obnoxious spouses. The latter is like proclaiming that your guns are really good at killing, and it's up to you to figure out that there are both legal and illegal times to kill.
Well obviously they can be used as a weapon, either in self-defense or in malice; but they can also be used to kill squirrels, rabbits, deer, and other wildlife. Thus, for safety reasons, there are laws on how old you must be to operate one and licenses you must obtain to legally do so. Operating one while under the influence of alcohol, of course, is highly illegal and carries harsh punishments. Furthermore, operating them outside of specifically designated areas is forbidden, except on private property which you own or have permission to operate them on, and special precaution must be taken to ensure the safety of people who enter or cross areas where they are being operated.
So what are these things am I talking about? Can you guess?
Hint: a certain politician (a democrat, I think... or was it a republican? I can't remember) either killed or maybe only injured (gosh, my memory is terrible today) someone - was it a man or a woman? - although apparently the incident was an accident (or was it?) and I don't think the politician, whoever he was, ever really faced any severe consequences. I also seem to remember something about a... river? or was it a forest? Oh well. Maybe somebody knows what I'm talking about and can remind me.
If the USB hub is independently powered, it would supply power through the slave ports, and you could probably power the computer via a second USB cable.
However I think an USB hub would qualify as a host device, since I believe it has to act as a secondary host to the USB devices connected to it. And to do that without an additional power source (some hubs have them, some don't), it would have to power itself from the USB connection to the primary host device (the computer).
One huge difference is that a rental car can only be driven by one person at a time, and the rental company usually has you sign paperwork agreeing that you won't let anyone else drive it, or specifically stating who besides yourself will be driving the vehicle.
An IP address can be used by scores of people simultaneously and to my knowledge ISPs don't require you to keep any particularly careful track of who uses your IP address (even if you secure the network, it'll certainly be used by any family members, and quite probably infrequently by friends/guests).
Not reasonably installable? Websites with buttons that say "Click to Jailbreak" could just as easily not ask for any confirmation before rooting your device, and could just as easily do something nasty rather than something you wanted.
That's why the security holes used to jailbreak devices tend to get patched pretty quickly, obviously. But still, you're assuming that they don't exist. Until they get patched, they do...
We don't know if anti-matter has gravity or anti-gravity. We will be able to test this soonish as 32(?) anti-hydrogen atoms existed for several seconds, just a few days ago.
If anti-gravity exists, it obviously has to be an attractive force between anti-matter particles. Whether anti-matter attracts normal matter or repels it may remain to be seen, but it's still safe to say that a universe made out of anti-matter would still behave pretty much the same as our universe, with the same observable laws of physics.
Funny thing... DOS never ran anything automatically. It didn't even have autorun, when you inserted a floppy, you had to manually type A: followed by the program you wanted to start.
Absolutely wrong. DOS auto-ran a floppy when it booted up, which meant all you had to do to write a virus for DOS was write a stub in machine-code (assembly language with no DOS interrupt calls - DOS hasn't loaded yet) that installed your malware and then launched DOS (or simulated the operating system not found message that DOS normally gave when a floppy was in the drive) and load it in the boot sector of the floppy disk. Of course the floppy had to actually be in the drive when they booted up, but people forgot to take out floppies at boot-time all the time.
Slashdot Mirror
if you subpoena the ISP, you'll [...] probably get the right party ... if you subpoena the ISP to find the homeowner of record that an IP was assigned to, then even if that homeowner was not the infringer you were looking for, you could subpoena them and there would be a good chance they would know who the infringer was.
And if 4 people were home at the time the supposed infringement occurred and all of them had access to the computer, how are you supposed to figure out which of them did it? There's no "probably" about it; there's very little chance of you successfully proving who the downloader was. And even if they knew who had done it, in all likelihood that would make them a collaborator which would be justification to not reveal that to you.
You'd basically be on a fishing trip to try to bully them into ratting on whoever it was. And if they had guests who could have used the computer there's a good chance they'd have no idea who had done it, or quite possibly react to your bullying by finally pinning the blame falsely on one of the family members.
My real point was that the judge didn't make this argument, or any other good argument, to say why the car rental agency was not analogous to an ISP. He basically said, "It's not the same because if a car rental customer hits you, you could sue the car rental agency as well", without saying why there was a greater justification for including the rental car agency as a defendant, than for including the ISP as a defendant.
ISPs have special legal protections that make them non-liable for their users' actions.
No... a one-way mirror doesn't allow light to pass in only one direction. It passes, and reflects, light equally in either direction. The trick is to make it dark enough on one side that you can't see your own reflection, and bright enough on the other side that they can't see you because their reflection is too bright.
If true, then quite possibly they may. Though CNET itself might be able to shield itself behind the fact that CNET != its editorial staff.
You mean kind of like what a laser does with photons?
Pff, they're everywhere... you just have to know one when you see it.
Mmm, yes, I volunteer to be the pizza-regulator who confiscates pizzas to make sure they're not used for anything illegal. I'll personally dispose of as much of it as I can.
No, fold it in half with the hot sides facing out. That way there's a limited amount of heat trapped inside it for it to move out; when the middle reaches absolute zero it simply can't continue moving heat across (actually, it'd undoubtedly be an asymptotic approach, but that's beside the point).
What you suggested would cause the inside to get hotter and hotter, making your backpack colder in the process. And even whatever magical material you used to make the hotpad has to have a melting point somewhere...
It's like killing the golden goose... and actually getting all the golden eggs at once!
Also, a lot of them make no sense whatsoever. What the hell are these supposed to mean?
"Tuesday is the Wednesday of the rest of your life."
"You are destined to become the commandant of the fighting men of the department of transportation."
How ever if a user wrote that in a comments section, then CNET still is liable for their users.
Absolutely not. That is why Slashdot has the disclaimer: "Comments owned by the poster."
Actually it's almost impossible to find material that isn't copyrighted (an author has an automatic copyright anytime they produce a creative work), so by non-copyrighted I really meant that the copyright had either expired or specifically allowed people to copy it.
the AC's point was that if they were distributing child porn that they would be liable
I amend my previous statement.
Original claim:
Posting free/shareware doesn't make CNET liable for its use.
The strawman which Anonymous Coward knocked down so easily was more like this claim, however:
Posting something never makes anyone liable for anything.
By "non-copyrighted" I mean to refer to material either whose copyright term has expired and has entered the public domain, or material whose "copyright" is specifically intended to give you the right to copy it. But either way, copying those materials would not be illegal, and the music and film industries want you to forget the existence of music and videos which are perfectly legal to copy.
*do exist.
But using Limewire to download music and videos is not illegal unless the music and videos are copyrighted. The music and film industries would like everyone to forget that non-copyrighted music and videos does exist...
He was misrepresenting the original position.
Original position: You shouldn't be held liable for distributing something that has legal uses, such as Limewire.
Strawman: You shouldn't be held liable for distributing anything; for instance child porn.
Person B disregards certain key points of X and instead presents the superficially similar position Y.
Key point: Limewire has legal uses; child porn is always illegal to create, possess, or even attempt to obtain. Ignore that point and suddenly distributing Limewire is like distributing child porn - oh noes! Clearly they must be held responsible.
Did they promote Limewire as a tool to violate copyrights? Or did they merely promote it as a tool to download music and videos?
The former is like touting your guns as a great way to take people's jewelry and get rid of obnoxious spouses. The latter is like proclaiming that your guns are really good at killing, and it's up to you to figure out that there are both legal and illegal times to kill.
Well obviously they can be used as a weapon, either in self-defense or in malice; but they can also be used to kill squirrels, rabbits, deer, and other wildlife. Thus, for safety reasons, there are laws on how old you must be to operate one and licenses you must obtain to legally do so. Operating one while under the influence of alcohol, of course, is highly illegal and carries harsh punishments. Furthermore, operating them outside of specifically designated areas is forbidden, except on private property which you own or have permission to operate them on, and special precaution must be taken to ensure the safety of people who enter or cross areas where they are being operated.
So what are these things am I talking about? Can you guess?
Hint: a certain politician (a democrat, I think... or was it a republican? I can't remember) either killed or maybe only injured (gosh, my memory is terrible today) someone - was it a man or a woman? - although apparently the incident was an accident (or was it?) and I don't think the politician, whoever he was, ever really faced any severe consequences. I also seem to remember something about a... river? or was it a forest? Oh well. Maybe somebody knows what I'm talking about and can remind me.
If the USB hub is independently powered, it would supply power through the slave ports, and you could probably power the computer via a second USB cable.
So all it's waiting for is the retina display and a neural interface...
A USB hard drive is not a host device.
However I think an USB hub would qualify as a host device, since I believe it has to act as a secondary host to the USB devices connected to it. And to do that without an additional power source (some hubs have them, some don't), it would have to power itself from the USB connection to the primary host device (the computer).
One huge difference is that a rental car can only be driven by one person at a time, and the rental company usually has you sign paperwork agreeing that you won't let anyone else drive it, or specifically stating who besides yourself will be driving the vehicle.
An IP address can be used by scores of people simultaneously and to my knowledge ISPs don't require you to keep any particularly careful track of who uses your IP address (even if you secure the network, it'll certainly be used by any family members, and quite probably infrequently by friends/guests).
At least it's not ROT-13 encoded like the wall of text at the bottom of the page.
(quoted following, since it periodically changes.)
N PBQR BS RGUVPNY ORUNIVBE SBE CNGVRAGF: 1. QB ABG RKCRPG LBHE QBPGBE GB FUNER LBHE QVFPBZSBEG. Vaibyirzrag jvgu gur cngvrag'f fhssrevat zvtug pnhfr uvz gb ybfr inyhnoyr fpvragvsvp bowrpgvivgl. 2. OR PURRESHY NG NYY GVZRF. Lbhe qbpgbe yrnqf n ohfl naq gelvat yvsr naq erdhverf nyy gur tragyrarff naq ernffhenapr ur pna trg. 3. GEL GB FHSSRE SEBZ GUR QVFRNFR SBE JUVPU LBH NER ORVAT GERNGRQ. Erzrzore gung lbhe qbpgbe unf n cebsrffvbany erchgngvba gb hcubyq. % N PBQR BS RGUVPNY ORUNIVBE SBE CNGVRAGF: 4. QB ABG PBZCYNVA VS GUR GERNGZRAG SNVYF GB OEVAT ERYVRS. Lbh zhfg oryvrir gung lbhe qbpgbe unf npuvrirq n qrrc vafvtug vagb gur gehr angher bs lbhe vyyarff, juvpu genafpraqf nal zrer creznarag qvfnovyvgl lbh znl unir rkcrevraprq. 5. ARIRE NFX LBHE QBPGBE GB RKCYNVA JUNG UR VF QBVAT BE JUL UR VF QBVAT VG. Vg vf cerfhzcghbhf gb nffhzr gung fhpu cebsbhaq znggref pbhyq or rkcynvarq va grezf gung lbh jbhyq haqrefgnaq. 6. FHOZVG GB ABIRY RKCREVZNAGNY GERNGZRAG ERNQVYL. Gubhtu gur fhetrel znl abg orarsvg lbh qverpgyl, gur erfhygvat erfrnepu cncre jvyy fheryl or bs jvqrfcernq vagrerfg. % N PBQR BS RGUVPNY ORUNIVBE SBE CNGVRAGF: 7. CNL LBHE ZRQVPNY OVYYF CEBZCGYL NAQ JVYYVATYL. Lbh fubhyq pbafvqre vg n cevivyrtr gb pbagevohgr, ubjrire zbqrfgyl, gb gur jryy-orvat bs culfvpvnaf naq bgure uhznavgnevnaf. 8. QB ABG FHSSRE SEBZ NVYZRAGF GUNG LBH PNAABG NSSBEQ. Vg vf furre neebtnapr gb pbagenpg vyyarffrf gung ner orlbaq lbhe zrnaf. 9. ARIRE ERIRNY NAL BS GUR FUBEGPBZVATF GUNG UNIR PBZR GB YVTUG VA GUR PBHEFR BS GERNGZRAG OL LBHE QBPGBE. Gur cngvrag-qbpgbe eryngvbafuvc vf n cevivyrtrq bar, naq lbh unir n fnperq qhgl gb cebgrpg uvz sebz rkcbfher. 10. ARIRE QVR JUVYR VA LBHE QBPGBE'F CERFRAPR BE HAQRE UVF QVERPG PNER. Guvf jvyy bayl pnhfr uvz arrqyrff vapbairavrapr naq rzoneenffzrag. % N qvfgenhtug cngvrag cubarq ure qbpgbe'f bssvpr. "Jnf vg gehr," gur jbzna vadhverq, "gung gur zrqvpngvba gur qbpgbe unq cerfpevorq jnf sbe gur erfg bs ure yvsr?" Fur jnf gbyq gung vg jnf. Gurer jnf whfg n zbzrag bs fvyrapr orsber gur jbzna cebprrqrq oeniryl ba. "Jryy, V'z jbaqrevat, gura, ubj frevbhf zl pbaqvgvba vf. Guvf cerfpevcgvba vf znexrq `AB ERSVYYF'". % N qbpgbe pnyyf uvf cngvrag gb tvir uvz gur erfhygf bs uvf grfgf. "V unir fbzr onq arjf," fnlf gur qbpgbe, "naq fbzr jbefr arjf." Gur onq arjf vf gung lbh bayl unir fvk jrrxf gb yvir." "Bu, ab," fnlf gur cngvrag. "Jung pbhyq cbffvoyl or jbefr guna gung?" "Jryy," gur qbpgbe ercyvrf, "V'ir orra gelvat gb ernpu lbh fvapr ynfg Zbaqnl." % N jbzna culfvpvna unf znqr gur fgngrzrag gung fzbxvat vf arvgure culfvpnyyl qrsrpgvir abe zbenyyl qrtenqvat, naq gung avpbgvar, rira jura vaqhytrq gb va rkprff, vf yrff unezshy guna rkprffvir crggvat." -- Cheqhr Rkcbarag, Wna 16, 1925 % N jbzna jrag vagb n ubfcvgny bar qnl gb tvir ovegu. Nsgrejneqf, gur qbpgbe pnzr gb ure naq fnvq, "V unir fbzr... bqq arjf sbe lbh." "Vf zl onol nyy evtug?" gur jbzna nakvbhfyl nfxrq. "Lrf, ur vf," gur qbpgbe ercyvrq, "ohg jr qba'g xabj ubj. Lbhe fba (jr nffhzr) jnf obea jvgu ab obql. Ur bayl unf n urnq." Jryy, gur qbpgbe jnf pbeerpg. Gur Urnq jnf nyvir naq jryy, gubhtu ab bar xarj ubj. Gur Urnq ghearq bhg gb or snveyl abezny, vtabevat uvf ynpx bs n obql, naq yvirq sbe fbzr gvzr nf glcvpny n yvsr nf pbhyq or rkcrpgrq haqre gur pvephzfgnaprf. Bar qnl, nobhg gjragl lrnef nsgre gur sngrshy ovegu, gur jbzna tbg n cubar pnyy sebz nabgure qbpgbe. Gur qbpgbe fnvq, "V unir erpragyl cresrpgrq na bcrengvba. Lbhe fba pna yvir n abezny yvsr abj: jr pna tensg n obql bagb uvf urnq!" Gur jbzna, cenpgvpnyyl jrrcvat jvgu wbl, gunaxrq gur qbpgbe naq uhat hc. Fur ena hc gur fgnvef fnlvat, "Wbuaal, Wbuaal, V unir n *jbaqreshy* fhecevfr sbe lbh!" "Bu ab," pevrq Gur Urnq, "abg nabgure UNG!" % Nsgre uvf yrtf unq orra oebxra va na nppvqrag, Ze. Zvyyre fhrq sbe qnzntrf, pynzvat gung ur jnf pevccyrq naq jbhyq unir gb fcraq gur erfg bs uvf yvsr va n jurrypunve. Nygubhtu gur vafhenapr-pbzcnal qbpgbe grfgvsvrq
Not reasonably installable? Websites with buttons that say "Click to Jailbreak" could just as easily not ask for any confirmation before rooting your device, and could just as easily do something nasty rather than something you wanted.
That's why the security holes used to jailbreak devices tend to get patched pretty quickly, obviously. But still, you're assuming that they don't exist. Until they get patched, they do...
We don't know if anti-matter has gravity or anti-gravity. We will be able to test this soonish as 32(?) anti-hydrogen atoms existed for several seconds, just a few days ago.
If anti-gravity exists, it obviously has to be an attractive force between anti-matter particles. Whether anti-matter attracts normal matter or repels it may remain to be seen, but it's still safe to say that a universe made out of anti-matter would still behave pretty much the same as our universe, with the same observable laws of physics.
Funny thing... DOS never ran anything automatically. It didn't even have autorun, when you inserted a floppy, you had to manually type A: followed by the program you wanted to start.
Absolutely wrong. DOS auto-ran a floppy when it booted up, which meant all you had to do to write a virus for DOS was write a stub in machine-code (assembly language with no DOS interrupt calls - DOS hasn't loaded yet) that installed your malware and then launched DOS (or simulated the operating system not found message that DOS normally gave when a floppy was in the drive) and load it in the boot sector of the floppy disk. Of course the floppy had to actually be in the drive when they booted up, but people forgot to take out floppies at boot-time all the time.