At some point, we have to figure out how e-tailers can and should responsibly collect sales taxes. Amazon could be helping that process, instead of fighting it tooth and nail.
Not everyone agrees that Amazon has a responsibility to volunteer to pay taxes they don't legally have to:
Any one may so arrange his affairs that his taxes shall be as low as possible; he is not bound to choose that pattern which will best pay the Treasury; there is not even a patriotic duty to increase one's taxes. -- Judge Learned Hand, 1934
You also don't have the right to remain silent in the UK... Basically if the police asks you: "Did you do it?" and you remain silent, you might as well have said "Yes, I did it" - it will be taken as an admission.
This isn't true. They still have to prove that you committed the offence; the only issue is that if you later provide evidence that you didn't do it, the jury may consider the possibility that you didn't provide it immediately in order to give yourself time to fabricate it.
Back in 1981, I was programming for a company with a 64K CPM computer with a Hazeltine monitor. Life was great.
64K in 1981? Holy crap, that was the hotness!
Not especially. The basic model IBM PC, launched that year, had 64k expandable to 256. The Apple IIe had launched 2 years earlier with 48k. 64k was probably about average at the time for a proper micro (i.e. not a "home" computer).
However, I'd be more concerned about devs with *only*.NET on their CVs.
Well, sure. And I'd be particularly keen to ask them why they're applying for a job that isn't using.NET if that's all they can do... but that's not what TFA is talking about. He's saying that he's cautious about hiring a developer with *any*.NET experience. Which strikes me as extremely shortsighted. The best developers in the world work with everything they can get their hands on, just to try it.
This article is one of the stupidest things I've read in a while.
"Just press the right button and follow the beeping lights, and you can churn out flawless 1.6 oz burgers faster than anybody else on the planet. However, if you need to make a 1.7 oz burger, you simply can’t."
I assume by this, he means there's something you can't do in it, because all of the shit is built in.
Which is, of course, total bullshit. The.NET framework is just as capable as any other garbage-collected typesafe environment, so any complaints along these lines must also apply to Java, Python, Ruby, Perl or whatever. I can't see anyone posting this about people with Ruby experience, however...
Ohter WTFs from the article:
Microsoft very intentionally (and very successfully) created.NET to be as different as possible from everything else out there,
Which is obviously why they made its primary language a virtual clone of Java (except where they removed Java's design mistakes and added features that were missing from it, of course) and designed its runtime library to be similar to existing APIs that programmers might be familiar with.
This decision — or this mandate for incompatibility, perhaps — has produced countless ramifications. Small things, like using backslashes in file paths rather than forward slashes like any dignified OS.,
Err... that decision has nothing at all to do with.NET, it's been the standard on PC platforms since MS released DOS 2. They expect them to change such a longstanding design decision now? Besides, you *can* use forward slashes as directory separators in.NET if you want.
or using a left-handed coordinate system with DirectX instead of right-handed as was used since the dawn of computer graphics
Really? I've found little evidence of such a standard. Looking at a variety of packages throught this history of computer graphics, it looks like there's a roughly equal split between the two systems.
Big things, like obscuring the networking stack under so many countless layers of abstraction that it’s virtually impossible to even imagine what bytes are actually going over the wire
Excuse me? What is he even talking about here?.NET sockets work exactly like any other platform's sockets that I've ever used.
programming tools that generate a dozen complex files before you even write your first line of code
When I start a new VS project, I get the following files:
The top-level.sln file, describing the overall collection of libraries/programs to build in the project A.csproj file, describing the single initial program or library A.cs file for the main class If it's a GUI program, A.resx file for the resources.
I might choose (although it is by no means mandatory) to add a drag&drop designed form to the project before I start writing code. This will add a further two files (one for the data used by the drag&drop form designer, another for my code).
I don't see in what world 4 or 6 files equates to 12.
Papal Infallibility only applies to pronouncements made Ex Cathedra
Well, OK. But is the Catechism of the Catholic Church ex cathedra? It certainly seems to be, and contains the points that you originally disagreed with.
Consider, for example, Pius XII's words when declaring the Assumption of Mary as truth:
Hence if anyone, which God forbid, should dare willfully to deny or to call into doubt that which We have defined, let him know that he has fallen away completely from the divine and Catholic Faith.
Certainly sounds like no Catholic is allowed to disagree with him to me.
What about all the people who really, truly want to be cured of "gay?"
Let them be cured using a program that has undergone appropriate clinical trials and approved for use by an appropriate professional medical body, e.g. the AMA or APA.
Oh, wait, both of those bodies believe that any attempt to convert sexual orientation is likely to result in non-trivial harm to the patient, and have therefore not approved any such form of treatment.
We can't tolerate the idea of a gay man wanting to learn to be straight.
No, what we can't tolerate is the idea of gay men being told they're failures for not learning to be straight (which is something that at least most of them apparently cannot do) to the point where they develop severe depression and, in extreme cases, commit suicide.
Frankly, I don't see it as really hurting anybody. Yeah, it's misguided and dumb, but it's not necessarily hate speech.
Hate speech isn't the issue with this, AFAICT. The problem is, the app advocates a quack form of psychotherapy that is considered harmful by a number of important bodies, including the AMA. Yes, it does hurt people, leading to suicide in some cases, although it appears precise quantifications of how harmful it is are impossible to come by.
I'm standing on the sidelines of this one. I don't know whether this is speech that warrants defense or not: it will be directly harmful to some of those who hear it, and could perhaps lead to one or more of them killing themselves. As far as I'm concerned, this puts it in the class of speech that we at least need to be very wary of, and perhaps that we shouldn't be protecting at all. On the other hand, it is possible that some people may become happier as a result of it. Does this balance? I don't know.
What, they don't support revocation lists already?
Firefox, to take an example, supports offline revocation lists (i.e. imported from files) or Online Certificate Status Protocol for automatically verifying certificates. Both of these are optional, although OCSP is enabled by default for certificates that specify an OCSP server in their details. Comodo do use OCSP, so this should be dealt with automatically for most firefox users. However, some may have disabled OCSP, and for these a CRL must be installed to revoke the certificates. The easiest way to persuade people to do this is by pushing a patch that contains it.
Emulators will only get you so far. Emulators running on a typical PC don't have multitouch input, can't connect to the cellular network (except very rudimentary test features), and are somewhat slower than actual devices. Some things, you have to test on real hardware.
Because you're only comparing the high end premium brands, which are marketed as fashion accessories. Try having a look at prices on ebay, or in your local discount electronics store; you'll be quite surprised.
I'll see his $99 and raise you an $88 android tablet. Sure, it's crap, has a low-res resistive single touch screen, and a CPU that's actually somewhat less than half as powerful as the one you'd find in an iPad (despite it having more than 1/2 the clock rate: the iPad has an ARM Cortex which is a dual-issue CPU, whereas this cheap tablet has an ARM926 which only executes one instruction per cycle), but many people don't need these things. If you're not using it for typing, a resistive touch screen is fine (especially if you use a stylus, but fingers work OK too). Even typing is doable, although it takes a bit of getting used to.
Personally, I'm looking at getting a somewhat more expensive one. Still costs less than the article author's $200 laptop, but the only real shortcoming of this one is the screen. I'll live.
The way the article is written implies someone with the same name was removed by the police; in the USA, I am not sure it would be Libel. It might be it might not.
Interestingly, this was actually less likely to be considered libel in the UK than in the USA. The UK defamation law recognises a defense against libel, "unintentional defamation", which is allowed in cases of genuine mistake about the information disclosed (mistaken identity is the most commonly cited situation it is used in). This defence doesn't have a direct US counterpart. However, this defence requires the defendant to show that he took reasonable steps to avoid mistakes, which is probably where this case fell down (I guess without having read it).
Can you (or since you are unwilling, anyone else) point to where in the license the FSF position is codified in legal language
AIUI, the issue is with these sections of GPLv2:
3. You may copy and distribute the Program (or a work based on it, under Section 2) in object code or executable form under the terms of Sections 1 and 2 above [...] 6. Each time you redistribute the Program (or any work based on the Program), the recipient automatically receives a license from the original licensor to copy, distribute or modify the Program subject to these terms and conditions. You may not impose any further restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein.
As I understand the FSF's position, the App Store terms prevent somebody who has received an executable under section 3 from redistributing it further under section 3, and thus is a violation of section 6. Source doesn't enter into the situation, because it's all about section 3 distribution.
What do they think the 'Remember Me' checkbox is for!?
Erm... exactly what this is about. This legislation means that such checkboxes are mandatory, rather than just a good idea. And they have to default to unchecked.
I think that's exactly what America needs: more EU regulation. We'll just host their sites over here, because we don't have to comply with their stupid laws.
Doesn't matter where the site is hosted -- this is about data collection. Even if the site is hosted in the US, it would be illegal for an EU company to download the data from their US servers in order to perform any kind of analysis. If the site is designed in the EU, it would be illegal for the EU designers to set it up to track visitors without consent. If the site is designed in the US, it would be illegal for the EU owning company to request the US designers to set it up to track visitors without consent. Simply offshoring the hosting wouldn't help: you basically have to offshore your entire operation to get around this.
If, when I and my children lived in the UK, a teacher had tried to do this I would have sued s/his ass off.
Under what law?
Article 8, ECHR:
Article 8 – Right to respect for private and family life
1. Everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life, his home and his correspondence.
2. There shall be no interference by a public authority with the exercise of this right except such as is in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security, public safety or the economic well-being of the country, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.
Note that while (2) allows the government to legislate away parts of the right described, they have not done so for this situation, so it stands without exception in this case.
If something unexpected happens, you call the school and they notify the student.
What about while the student is on their way to or from school? You can't contact them like that then.
i use US History, pre 1999, as an example where this method worked and life moved on.
OTOH, lifestyles have changed to take advantage of modern technology, and to force people to go back puts a lot of pressure on parents for little benefit. If schools can't keep their students from using the phones during class, there's a worse problem than the fact that the students have the phones, and that should be dealt with as a priority.
It was the policy at my kids' (UK) schools that the the kids couldn't have their phones turned on during the school day, but most had them for the journeys to and from school.
Bingo. And this is the major difference between UK and US -- here in the UK it's common for kids to walk non-trivial distances to get to school without parental supervision. AIUI, in the US, subsidized bus transport means most kids don't have to walk anything like as far. If your kid is going to be unsupervised for long periods of time, it's convenient that they can have a phone in case of trouble. If they aren't, there's no real need for it, so banning them is probably the best plan.
You should provide a citation about the cameras because it's not true. The UK has 1 camera for every 14 citizens and we don't have anywhere near that many here.
You should follow your own advice and provide a citation yourself. And I'll proved a counter-citation just in case you dredge up one of the various tabloids who have reported the figure. The number was, essentially, made up. The average number of CCTV cameras in 211 business premises that are open to the public in two particularly high crime London streets was counted. This was multiplied by the number of businesses in London (note: not just those that are open to the public), and an arbitrary number added as a guess of the number of cameras not operated by such businesses (e.g. public transport cameras). The result was divided by the population of London and multiplied by the population of the country (note: the rest of the country has lower crime than London, so probably less CCTV). This is not a valid methodology.
I don't think anybody has performed a similar analysis in the US, but it's worth noting that Chicago's network of over 8,000 centrally-monitored CCTV cameras is of a similar size to London's (7,500 AIUI), despite London being about 3 times the size of Chicago. Yes, Chicago has the highest number of such cameras in any US city, but the point is that the comparison can be made in some places.
I'm no football expert, so correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't a huge part of the strategy the fact that it's so unexpected. Thus, if more people used it more people would expect it, so it'd be worth less, so less people would use it?
Probably. But unless the situation is chaotic (and I see nothing to indicate it would be) it would still settle to a point where it used more than t is today. Just not quite as much as today's numbers would suggest would be right.
Slashdot Mirror
I switched from /dev/random to /dev/urandom because I have to wiggle my mouse less often.
That's usually OK, but just remember there's no guarantee that /dev/urandom will contain the data you're looking for.
At some point, we have to figure out how e-tailers can and should responsibly collect sales taxes. Amazon could be helping that process, instead of fighting it tooth and nail.
Not everyone agrees that Amazon has a responsibility to volunteer to pay taxes they don't legally have to:
You also don't have the right to remain silent in the UK... Basically if the police asks you: "Did you do it?" and you remain silent, you might as well have said "Yes, I did it" - it will be taken as an admission.
This isn't true. They still have to prove that you committed the offence; the only issue is that if you later provide evidence that you didn't do it, the jury may consider the possibility that you didn't provide it immediately in order to give yourself time to fabricate it.
Back in 1981, I was programming for a company with a 64K CPM computer with a Hazeltine monitor. Life was great.
64K in 1981? Holy crap, that was the hotness!
Not especially. The basic model IBM PC, launched that year, had 64k expandable to 256. The Apple IIe had launched 2 years earlier with 48k. 64k was probably about average at the time for a proper micro (i.e. not a "home" computer).
However, I'd be more concerned about devs with *only* .NET on their CVs.
Well, sure. And I'd be particularly keen to ask them why they're applying for a job that isn't using .NET if that's all they can do... but that's not what TFA is talking about. He's saying that he's cautious about hiring a developer with *any* .NET experience. Which strikes me as extremely shortsighted. The best developers in the world work with everything they can get their hands on, just to try it.
This article is one of the stupidest things I've read in a while.
"Just press the right button and follow the beeping lights, and you can churn out flawless 1.6 oz burgers faster than anybody else on the planet. However, if you need to make a 1.7 oz burger, you simply can’t."
I assume by this, he means there's something you can't do in it, because all of the shit is built in.
Which is, of course, total bullshit. The .NET framework is just as capable as any other garbage-collected typesafe environment, so any complaints along these lines must also apply to Java, Python, Ruby, Perl or whatever. I can't see anyone posting this about people with Ruby experience, however...
Ohter WTFs from the article:
Microsoft very intentionally (and very successfully) created .NET to be as different as possible from everything else out there,
Which is obviously why they made its primary language a virtual clone of Java (except where they removed Java's design mistakes and added features that were missing from it, of course) and designed its runtime library to be similar to existing APIs that programmers might be familiar with.
This decision — or this mandate for incompatibility, perhaps — has produced countless ramifications. Small things, like using backslashes in file paths rather than forward slashes like any dignified OS.,
Err... that decision has nothing at all to do with .NET, it's been the standard on PC platforms since MS released DOS 2. They expect them to change such a longstanding design decision now? Besides, you *can* use forward slashes as directory separators in .NET if you want.
or using a left-handed coordinate system with DirectX instead of right-handed as was used since the dawn of computer graphics
Really? I've found little evidence of such a standard. Looking at a variety of packages throught this history of computer graphics, it looks like there's a roughly equal split between the two systems.
Big things, like obscuring the networking stack under so many countless layers of abstraction that it’s virtually impossible to even imagine what bytes are actually going over the wire
Excuse me? What is he even talking about here? .NET sockets work exactly like any other platform's sockets that I've ever used.
programming tools that generate a dozen complex files before you even write your first line of code
When I start a new VS project, I get the following files:
The top-level .sln file, describing the overall collection of libraries/programs to build in the project .csproj file, describing the single initial program or library .cs file for the main class .resx file for the resources.
A
A
If it's a GUI program, A
I might choose (although it is by no means mandatory) to add a drag&drop designed form to the project before I start writing code. This will add a further two files (one for the data used by the drag&drop form designer, another for my code).
I don't see in what world 4 or 6 files equates to 12.
Papal Infallibility only applies to pronouncements made Ex Cathedra
Well, OK. But is the Catechism of the Catholic Church ex cathedra? It certainly seems to be, and contains the points that you originally disagreed with.
You are allowed to disagree with the Pope
No you aren't! The Pope speaks for God, and everything (theological) he says is completely true.
Consider, for example, Pius XII's words when declaring the Assumption of Mary as truth:
Certainly sounds like no Catholic is allowed to disagree with him to me.
What about all the people who really, truly want to be cured of "gay?"
Let them be cured using a program that has undergone appropriate clinical trials and approved for use by an appropriate professional medical body, e.g. the AMA or APA.
Oh, wait, both of those bodies believe that any attempt to convert sexual orientation is likely to result in non-trivial harm to the patient, and have therefore not approved any such form of treatment.
We can't tolerate the idea of a gay man wanting to learn to be straight.
No, what we can't tolerate is the idea of gay men being told they're failures for not learning to be straight (which is something that at least most of them apparently cannot do) to the point where they develop severe depression and, in extreme cases, commit suicide.
Frankly, I don't see it as really hurting anybody. Yeah, it's misguided and dumb, but it's not necessarily hate speech.
Hate speech isn't the issue with this, AFAICT. The problem is, the app advocates a quack form of psychotherapy that is considered harmful by a number of important bodies, including the AMA. Yes, it does hurt people, leading to suicide in some cases, although it appears precise quantifications of how harmful it is are impossible to come by.
I'm standing on the sidelines of this one. I don't know whether this is speech that warrants defense or not: it will be directly harmful to some of those who hear it, and could perhaps lead to one or more of them killing themselves. As far as I'm concerned, this puts it in the class of speech that we at least need to be very wary of, and perhaps that we shouldn't be protecting at all. On the other hand, it is possible that some people may become happier as a result of it. Does this balance? I don't know.
What, they don't support revocation lists already?
Firefox, to take an example, supports offline revocation lists (i.e. imported from files) or Online Certificate Status Protocol for automatically verifying certificates. Both of these are optional, although OCSP is enabled by default for certificates that specify an OCSP server in their details. Comodo do use OCSP, so this should be dealt with automatically for most firefox users. However, some may have disabled OCSP, and for these a CRL must be installed to revoke the certificates. The easiest way to persuade people to do this is by pushing a patch that contains it.
Emulators will only get you so far. Emulators running on a typical PC don't have multitouch input, can't connect to the cellular network (except very rudimentary test features), and are somewhat slower than actual devices. Some things, you have to test on real hardware.
How can they be more expensive than a netbook ?
Because you're only comparing the high end premium brands, which are marketed as fashion accessories. Try having a look at prices on ebay, or in your local discount electronics store; you'll be quite surprised.
I'll see his $99 and raise you an $88 android tablet. Sure, it's crap, has a low-res resistive single touch screen, and a CPU that's actually somewhat less than half as powerful as the one you'd find in an iPad (despite it having more than 1/2 the clock rate: the iPad has an ARM Cortex which is a dual-issue CPU, whereas this cheap tablet has an ARM926 which only executes one instruction per cycle), but many people don't need these things. If you're not using it for typing, a resistive touch screen is fine (especially if you use a stylus, but fingers work OK too). Even typing is doable, although it takes a bit of getting used to.
Personally, I'm looking at getting a somewhat more expensive one. Still costs less than the article author's $200 laptop, but the only real shortcoming of this one is the screen. I'll live.
but, there's a reason why polygraphs aren't admissible in many places in court. It's vague and subjective in a lot of cases.
Not to mention unsupported by actual science, with strong criticism levelled at the methods of most studies that support their validity.
The judiciary is one of the three branches of government, you know.
In UK usage, "government" refers specifically to the prime minister and the ministers he appoints to specific roles.
The way the article is written implies someone with the same name was removed by the police; in the USA, I am not sure it would be Libel. It might be it might not.
Interestingly, this was actually less likely to be considered libel in the UK than in the USA. The UK defamation law recognises a defense against libel, "unintentional defamation", which is allowed in cases of genuine mistake about the information disclosed (mistaken identity is the most commonly cited situation it is used in). This defence doesn't have a direct US counterpart. However, this defence requires the defendant to show that he took reasonable steps to avoid mistakes, which is probably where this case fell down (I guess without having read it).
See, e.g. Sandford, Libel and Privacy, vol 2 page 10 onwards. IANAL, but I know how to do a faiurly convincing impersonation of one.
Can you (or since you are unwilling, anyone else) point to where in the license the FSF position is codified in legal language
AIUI, the issue is with these sections of GPLv2:
As I understand the FSF's position, the App Store terms prevent somebody who has received an executable under section 3 from redistributing it further under section 3, and thus is a violation of section 6. Source doesn't enter into the situation, because it's all about section 3 distribution.
What do they think the 'Remember Me' checkbox is for!?
Erm... exactly what this is about. This legislation means that such checkboxes are mandatory, rather than just a good idea. And they have to default to unchecked.
I think that's exactly what America needs: more EU regulation. We'll just host their sites over here, because we don't have to comply with their stupid laws.
Doesn't matter where the site is hosted -- this is about data collection. Even if the site is hosted in the US, it would be illegal for an EU company to download the data from their US servers in order to perform any kind of analysis. If the site is designed in the EU, it would be illegal for the EU designers to set it up to track visitors without consent. If the site is designed in the US, it would be illegal for the EU owning company to request the US designers to set it up to track visitors without consent. Simply offshoring the hosting wouldn't help: you basically have to offshore your entire operation to get around this.
If, when I and my children lived in the UK, a teacher had tried to do this I would have sued s/his ass off.
Under what law?
Article 8, ECHR:
Note that while (2) allows the government to legislate away parts of the right described, they have not done so for this situation, so it stands without exception in this case.
If something unexpected happens, you call the school and they notify the student.
What about while the student is on their way to or from school? You can't contact them like that then.
i use US History, pre 1999, as an example where this method worked and life moved on.
OTOH, lifestyles have changed to take advantage of modern technology, and to force people to go back puts a lot of pressure on parents for little benefit. If schools can't keep their students from using the phones during class, there's a worse problem than the fact that the students have the phones, and that should be dealt with as a priority.
It was the policy at my kids' (UK) schools that the the kids couldn't have their phones turned on during the school day, but most had them for the journeys to and from school.
Bingo. And this is the major difference between UK and US -- here in the UK it's common for kids to walk non-trivial distances to get to school without parental supervision. AIUI, in the US, subsidized bus transport means most kids don't have to walk anything like as far. If your kid is going to be unsupervised for long periods of time, it's convenient that they can have a phone in case of trouble. If they aren't, there's no real need for it, so banning them is probably the best plan.
You should provide a citation about the cameras because it's not true. The UK has 1 camera for every 14 citizens and we don't have anywhere near that many here.
You should follow your own advice and provide a citation yourself. And I'll proved a counter-citation just in case you dredge up one of the various tabloids who have reported the figure. The number was, essentially, made up. The average number of CCTV cameras in 211 business premises that are open to the public in two particularly high crime London streets was counted. This was multiplied by the number of businesses in London (note: not just those that are open to the public), and an arbitrary number added as a guess of the number of cameras not operated by such businesses (e.g. public transport cameras). The result was divided by the population of London and multiplied by the population of the country (note: the rest of the country has lower crime than London, so probably less CCTV). This is not a valid methodology.
I don't think anybody has performed a similar analysis in the US, but it's worth noting that Chicago's network of over 8,000 centrally-monitored CCTV cameras is of a similar size to London's (7,500 AIUI), despite London being about 3 times the size of Chicago. Yes, Chicago has the highest number of such cameras in any US city, but the point is that the comparison can be made in some places.
I'm no football expert, so correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't a huge part of the strategy the fact that it's so unexpected. Thus, if more people used it more people would expect it, so it'd be worth less, so less people would use it?
Probably. But unless the situation is chaotic (and I see nothing to indicate it would be) it would still settle to a point where it used more than t is today. Just not quite as much as today's numbers would suggest would be right.