With the single exception of gun ownership, I can't think of any area of civil rights that is significantly worse in the UK than in the US. In fact, as a UK citizen living in the US, I would be inclined to argue the contrary, especially given the recent demise of habeas corpus in the US.
> This isn't lawful, is it? The American government cannot simply give up one of it's own citizens to a foreign country just because he or she committed a crime on the Net. Maybe it if matches an American law, sure, but not a foreign one.
The US expects other countries, such as the UK, to extradite people into the US without any evidence on charges that would never fly in UK courts. I don't like the sound of this Internet law, but the US is the last nation on earth that can complain about being asked to obey overseas laws -- you do the same thing quite freely to the rest of us.
Somehow I don't think that the free world --or even the non-free countries of the world, for that matter -- has much worry that the US military is going to ever do or be allowed to do something like that, do you?
Up until a few years ago, most people, even outside the US, would never have believed that a US government would set up extra-territorial prisons for the express purpose of evading its own law and constitution, or that a US vice-president would lobby vigorously against the banning of torture. The US has lost a lot of credibility in the last few years -- damn' right Europe needs an independent GPS system.
The place to teach "what's going on in the public square" is not science class. You want to teach Current Affairs -- teach Current Affairs, but don't call it science.
Technically, the US already issues patents only to the inventors as individuals. The catch is that if you are employed by a corporation your terms of employment will usually include a requirement that you assign all patent rights to the company. The compnay has to pay you for the assignment - it can be as little as one dollar - but most employed inventors have no choice in the matter.
As a Brit who is a long-term resident of the US, I am staggered by the number of people who seem to think that "my vote doesn't count" if they vote against what appears to be an overwhelming number on the other side (e.g. voting Bush in Massachusetts). Your vote does count, even if you are heavily outnumbered and this is why:
(1) It is always important to keep ideas alive. Even a minority party has a role to play in a democracy by raising questions that would otherwise go unasked. You are helping to maintain the viability of that minority.
(2) Over time, the political color of a place can change. Demographics, economics, whatever it is -- ten or twenty years from now, your lot may be in the ascendant, and this will be partly because you voted for them.
How do I know this? Twenty years ago, when I still lived in the UK, I was a poll watcher for the Liberal Party in a constituency (Brit equivalent of a precinct) where the Libs. ran a distant third to the Tories and Labour. Over time, the Liberals (now known as the Liberal Democrats) have emerged as a major third force in UK politics, and have been the only consistently pro-European party in Parliament. Take the long view -- it does make a difference.
PS Why is red the color of the Republican Party? I'm guessing they don't sing "The Red Flag" at their conventions.
A great deal depends on the type and size of company you're talking about. I am an owner of a small (5 person), privately held, scientific instruments company. The availability of FOSS, or FOSS-derived commercial packages, has very definitely helped us to grow and add jobs. To give just one example: our adoption of StarOffice for word processing and presentation software (a) has saved us several thousand dollars versus the equivalent Microsoft products, (b) gives me the perfect answer when the BSA calls up to "offer" us licensing deals (they seem to have given up on us now), and (c) means that our staff can work at home or on the road simply by downloading OpenOffice and using that. Now, I'm not saying that $XX saved using FOSS will translate directly into Y new jobs. But in a small company, any opportunity to cut costs and avoid time-wasting audits of software licenses makes it easier for us to make money and grow. In the long run, that means more, and better paying, jobs.
Well, technically, any sealed battery such as the lithium-ion that you probably have in your laptop, can be called a "bomb". In early lithium-ion cells it was possible to generate highly reactive lithium metal "dendrites" or needle-like structures if the charging cycle was not controlled correctly. These could puncture the the battery separator to create a short circuit, leading to heat, leading to a pressure build-up, and all this in the presence of highly volatile and flammable ether-like electrolytes... you get the picture. So, I don't necessarily think that a methanol fuel cell would be more dangerous than any other high-density method of storing energy. The real catch with fuel cells is that they are open systems (fuel and air in, exhaust out) as opposed to the sealed batteries we are used to. This could make them more hazardous, and it could certainly make them more difficult to get through airport security, as you point out.
I seriously doubt that batteries containing thionyl chloride will ever be available to the public. They were originally developed for the military and the inevitable joke was that if they failed as power sources, you could just throw them at the enemy (they have a tendency to blow up). Commercially available lithium batteries use manganese dioxide or iron sulfide as the cathode material (in primary batteries), while lithium-ion batteries use complex carbon materials.
...the targets need not be large companies with high-profile Websites. My small (5 person) company is just now recovering from a DDOS attack against the DNS server used by our ISP; as of yesterday evening, they were getting repeated hits from at least 15,000 zombies. Our email and our Website were completely inaccessible for about 24 hours, and many other DNS customers will have suffered similarly. Various changes in server IP address etc. seem to have fixed the problem for now. The advice from the DNS server people is to use at least two independent DNS services in future. It must hurt to have to tell customers, in effect, to do business with your competitors to ensure service.
Presumably the workers in question were not being paid by the hour. Generally speaking, salaried workers are paid so much per month to work for unspecified hours; if they have to stay late, they don't get any extra money.
...this is a Design Patent. This means that it offers protection to a very specific, usually decorative design. There are no text claims, just drawings. Design patents are often used for things like cellphone cases, as each manufacturer tries to lock up distinctive visual fefatures to differentiate otherwise similar items. They are also found in the food industry -- novelty shapes for pasta and breakfast cereal are often protected this way. So, realistically, this is not some huge, evil attempt to patent the very idea of a garbage can icon.
"..commercializable, practical inventions"? I don't see why you would look for that in this competition. Jerome Lemelson, the originator of the prize, never commercialized a practical invention in his life. He made his money largely by patenting concepts (which he seldom if ever reduced to practice), then shaking down subsequent inventors and developers for royalties. I suppose you could argue that he commercialized the "submarine patent", but that's about all...
A confused moviegoer, who had just seen "Psycho", is said to have asked him: "Mr Hitchcock, with all those weird goings-on at the Bates Motel, why didn't someone just call the Sheriff?"
To which Hitchcock replied: "Madam, if someone had called the Sheriff, there would have been no movie."
Can someone explain to a non-USian how it is possible to be at liberty one full month after being sentenced to prison time? Are the US prisons so full that convicts have to wait for spaces to open up? Or is this some kind of break for white collar types: "We know your schedule is busy, so why not take advantage of our convenient Slammer-when-it-suits-you Program"
No. The monomer ethylene glycol is in antifreeze and it is indeed poisonous. The polymer (i.e. many monomers combined into a macromolecule) known as polyethylene glycol is highly inert and has been used for years in a wide range of medical applications including timed-release drug delivery, without adverse effects.
Has your work on AI led you to any conclusions about the nature of human intelligence? Specifically, do you see any parallels between the way AI is being developed and possible mechanisms for the emergence of intelligence in humans and other animals?
Reminds me of the story about Bernard Shaw. Apparently, Shaw asked a woman who was sitting beside him at dinner whether she would be willing to sleep with him for a million pounds (Sterling, when it was still worth something). She thought about it for a moment, then replied that she probably would. "Would you do it for three shillings?" asked Shaw. "Of course not!" she replied "What kind of woman do you think I am?" "Madam," replied Shaw, "We have already established what kind of woman you are. Now we are merely haggling about the price."
Can somebody *please* find all of the Joseph Campbell books that Katz has been reading, and dispose of them? I'm not usually in favour of destroying books, but Campbell has rotted the brain of at least one previous journalist who got too close (*cough* Bill Moyers *cough*). Enough already!
Slashdot Mirror
With the single exception of gun ownership, I can't think of any area of civil rights that is significantly worse in the UK than in the US. In fact, as a UK citizen living in the US, I would be inclined to argue the contrary, especially given the recent demise of habeas corpus in the US.
> This isn't lawful, is it? The American government cannot simply give up one of it's own citizens to a foreign country just because he or she committed a crime on the Net. Maybe it if matches an American law, sure, but not a foreign one.
The US expects other countries, such as the UK, to extradite people into the US without any evidence on charges that would never fly in UK courts. I don't like the sound of this Internet law, but the US is the last nation on earth that can complain about being asked to obey overseas laws -- you do the same thing quite freely to the rest of us.
Somehow I don't think that the free world --or even the non-free countries of the world, for that matter -- has much worry that the US military is going to ever do or be allowed to do something like that, do you?
Up until a few years ago, most people, even outside the US, would never have believed that a US government would set up extra-territorial prisons for the express purpose of evading its own law and constitution, or that a US vice-president would lobby vigorously against the banning of torture. The US has lost a lot of credibility in the last few years -- damn' right Europe needs an independent GPS system.
The place to teach "what's going on in the public square" is not science class. You want to teach Current Affairs -- teach Current Affairs, but don't call it science.
Technically, the US already issues patents only to the inventors as individuals. The catch is that if you are employed by a corporation your terms of employment will usually include a requirement that you assign all patent rights to the company. The compnay has to pay you for the assignment - it can be as little as one dollar - but most employed inventors have no choice in the matter.
As a Brit who is a long-term resident of the US, I am staggered by the number of people who seem to think that "my vote doesn't count" if they vote against what appears to be an overwhelming number on the other side (e.g. voting Bush in Massachusetts). Your vote does count, even if you are heavily outnumbered and this is why:
(1) It is always important to keep ideas alive. Even a minority party has a role to play in a democracy by raising questions that would otherwise go unasked. You are helping to maintain the viability of that minority.
(2) Over time, the political color of a place can change. Demographics, economics, whatever it is -- ten or twenty years from now, your lot may be in the ascendant, and this will be partly because you voted for them.
How do I know this? Twenty years ago, when I still lived in the UK, I was a poll watcher for the Liberal Party in a constituency (Brit equivalent of a precinct) where the Libs. ran a distant third to the Tories and Labour. Over time, the Liberals (now known as the Liberal Democrats) have emerged as a major third force in UK politics, and have been the only consistently pro-European party in Parliament. Take the long view -- it does make a difference.
PS Why is red the color of the Republican Party? I'm guessing they don't sing "The Red Flag" at their conventions.
A great deal depends on the type and size of company you're talking about. I am an owner of a small (5 person), privately held, scientific instruments company. The availability of FOSS, or FOSS-derived commercial packages, has very definitely helped us to grow and add jobs. To give just one example: our adoption of StarOffice for word processing and presentation software (a) has saved us several thousand dollars versus the equivalent Microsoft products, (b) gives me the perfect answer when the BSA calls up to "offer" us licensing deals (they seem to have given up on us now), and (c) means that our staff can work at home or on the road simply by downloading OpenOffice and using that. Now, I'm not saying that $XX saved using FOSS will translate directly into Y new jobs. But in a small company, any opportunity to cut costs and avoid time-wasting audits of software licenses makes it easier for us to make money and grow. In the long run, that means more, and better paying, jobs.
Well, technically, any sealed battery such as the lithium-ion that you probably have in your laptop, can be called a "bomb". In early lithium-ion cells it was possible to generate highly reactive lithium metal "dendrites" or needle-like structures if the charging cycle was not controlled correctly. These could puncture the the battery separator to create a short circuit, leading to heat, leading to a pressure build-up, and all this in the presence of highly volatile and flammable ether-like electrolytes... you get the picture. So, I don't necessarily think that a methanol fuel cell would be more dangerous than any other high-density method of storing energy. The real catch with fuel cells is that they are open systems (fuel and air in, exhaust out) as opposed to the sealed batteries we are used to. This could make them more hazardous, and it could certainly make them more difficult to get through airport security, as you point out.
I seriously doubt that batteries containing thionyl chloride will ever be available to the public. They were originally developed for the military and the inevitable joke was that if they failed as power sources, you could just throw them at the enemy (they have a tendency to blow up). Commercially available lithium batteries use manganese dioxide or iron sulfide as the cathode material (in primary batteries), while lithium-ion batteries use complex carbon materials.
Thank you for the Mercy Corps. link; I just sent them a donation.
...the targets need not be large companies with high-profile Websites. My small (5 person) company is just now recovering from a DDOS attack against the DNS server used by our ISP; as of yesterday evening, they were getting repeated hits from at least 15,000 zombies. Our email and our Website were completely inaccessible for about 24 hours, and many other DNS customers will have suffered similarly. Various changes in server IP address etc. seem to have fixed the problem for now. The advice from the DNS server people is to use at least two independent DNS services in future. It must hurt to have to tell customers, in effect, to do business with your competitors to ensure service.
Seconded.
Presumably the workers in question were not being paid by the hour. Generally speaking, salaried workers are paid so much per month to work for unspecified hours; if they have to stay late, they don't get any extra money.
...this is a patent APPLICATION. The words "United States Patent Application" in the top left-hand corner really should have tipped you off.
...this is a Design Patent. This means that it offers protection to a very specific, usually decorative design. There are no text claims, just drawings. Design patents are often used for things like cellphone cases, as each manufacturer tries to lock up distinctive visual fefatures to differentiate otherwise similar items. They are also found in the food industry -- novelty shapes for pasta and breakfast cereal are often protected this way. So, realistically, this is not some huge, evil attempt to patent the very idea of a garbage can icon.
"..commercializable, practical inventions"? I don't see why you would look for that in this competition. Jerome Lemelson, the originator of the prize, never commercialized a practical invention in his life. He made his money largely by patenting concepts (which he seldom if ever reduced to practice), then shaking down subsequent inventors and developers for royalties. I suppose you could argue that he commercialized the "submarine patent", but that's about all...
Remember the wise words of Alfred Hitchcock.
A confused moviegoer, who had just seen "Psycho", is said to have asked him: "Mr Hitchcock, with all those weird goings-on at the Bates Motel, why didn't someone just call the Sheriff?"
To which Hitchcock replied: "Madam, if someone had called the Sheriff, there would have been no movie."
...it's the most intelligent comment I've seen on Slashdot since my last lot of mod points expired.
Maybe they prefer to highlight sports that are played in, and between, more than one country.
Can someone explain to a non-USian how it is possible to be at liberty one full month after being sentenced to prison time? Are the US prisons so full that convicts have to wait for spaces to open up? Or is this some kind of break for white collar types: "We know your schedule is busy, so why not take advantage of our convenient Slammer-when-it-suits-you Program"
I suppose that would be metaslashdotting...
No. The monomer ethylene glycol is in antifreeze and it is indeed poisonous. The polymer (i.e. many monomers combined into a macromolecule) known as polyethylene glycol is highly inert and has been used for years in a wide range of medical applications including timed-release drug delivery, without adverse effects.
Has your work on AI led you to any conclusions about the nature of human intelligence? Specifically, do you see any parallels between the way AI is being developed and possible mechanisms for the emergence of intelligence in humans and other animals?
Reminds me of the story about Bernard Shaw. Apparently, Shaw asked a woman who was sitting beside him at dinner whether she would be willing to sleep with him for a million pounds (Sterling, when it was still worth something). She thought about it for a moment, then replied that she probably would. "Would you do it for three shillings?" asked Shaw. "Of course not!" she replied "What kind of woman do you think I am?" "Madam," replied Shaw, "We have already established what kind of woman you are. Now we are merely haggling about the price."
Can somebody *please* find all of the Joseph Campbell books that Katz has been reading, and dispose of them? I'm not usually in favour of destroying books, but Campbell has rotted the brain of at least one previous journalist who got too close (*cough* Bill Moyers *cough*). Enough already!