Near the end of the movie the father's cell phone rang and he answered it and spoke for about five minutes. "Shhh" from several people all around him went ignored. BTW they spoke only Spanish and this was in South Florida.
That is simply unacceptable regardless of their language of choice. The last time this happened in a theater I was in, I went over to the idiot, interrupted their cell phone conversation, told them quietly if they didn't stop talking over the movie that I'd get the management, and didn't leave until they hung up. Sure, she was pissed at me, but it made the rest of the movie bearable (well, as bearable as About A Boy could have been.)
For crying out loud, some people are just going to be boarish assholes unless someone calls them on it. Don't let them spoil the whole movie for everyone else.
I totally agree with his analysis of the problem, but unless some critical mass of lawbreakers were to be reached (chances being somewhere between fat and slim) you'd get the same result...
I wonder if we haven't already reached the critical mass of lawbreakers. Honestly, how many of the infringers on the various P2P networks can the court system handle? If everyone sharing illegally on Kazaa, eDonkey, Usenet, IRC, etc... were "brought to justice" tommorrow, the court system would be so clogged that Texas wouldn't have anyone to execute.
What's happening now is just like speed limit enforcement. The authorities go after the blantant infringers hoping to show the badge enough that the less blatant infringer curtial their activities. Cringely is actually a bit behind in his anaylsis. We don't need to get more people to infringe more often, we just need to turn those who are infringing into activists.
Ms. Brecker once handed in a midterm exam riddled with instant-messaging shorthand. "I had an hour to write an essay on Romeo and Juliet," she said. "I just wanted to finish before my time was up. I was writing fast and carelessly. I spelled `you' `u.' " She got a C.
I immediately thought of my AP English teacher who would have given a "C" just for using "you" in an essay on "Romeo and Juliet." One of her big sticking points was including outside elements to an essay, in other words, don't say "In this essay I will..." or "when you read the..." It weakens your writing style.
While I still have nightmares about red inked "PV" (passive voice) all over my writing, her anal retentiveness made me a better writer. (This post notwithstanding.)
Then again, when your leading (the first major) company based on one of the hottest business ideas in history (internet based auctions).....what wouldn't you do to get the ball rolling (faster)?
So you'd steal a business-to-business buisness model patent to create a user-to-user facilitation service? The patent, as noted by several others here, isn't really all that novel. It wouldn't surprise me that the two were developed independently. Though similar, the problem areas that both solutions solve are different. Read the guy's 1995 patent. It involved linking consignment shops together with bar code scanners to create a centralized database. eBay links individual users together to create a centralized database. In the patent, the database serves the consignment shops, at eBay, eBay IS the consignment shop.
Not a huge difference, but a big enough one to possibly protect eBay. Given the difference in problem area (auction service for consignment shops vs. individual driven auctions,) the slight novelity of the solution, solution development schedules, and the fact that the guy's business model failed before he started licensing out, I'd lean towards believing that eBay may not be entirely in the wrong here. Sure they were negotiating the license the patent, but that doesn't automatically mean that they were infringing.
In other words, eBay knew about the patent and had read it and knew they wanted to licence it. Then they went ahead and used the technique anyway without completing the negotiation.
Interesting interpretation. What gives you the idea that eBay used his patent to create their business model? Who the hell looks through patent applications to derive their business models?
To me, it sounds like eBay created their auction site indepentently of this guy's patent, realized five years down the line that there was a patent that might cover their business model, and decided to see if they could buy it to avoid any patent problems.
Furthermore, IANAL but it seems to me that this guys patents either don't apply to eBay's business model or have serious timing problems. His patent #5,845,265 specifically refers to consignment shops and bar code scanners, neither of which is in eBay business process (consignment shops may be users on eBay, but the patent is specifically to connect consignment shops.) At least #6,085,176 and #6,202,051 seem to be on topic, but then again, one wasn't filed until February 19, 1999 and the other on March 8, 1999, I think eBay had prior art at that point.
Not that I'm a huge eBay defender, but I don't see where this evil corp. Most companies try to avoid trouble like this and wouldn't go find a patent and base a business around it without securing the patent first.
I know it's off-topic, but Confederated Products was one of the funniest, least predictable, and believable plot twists I've seen in years.
My strategy for telemarketers
on
Disconnecting
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· Score: 1
...when I'm talking on the phone, I'm like one step removed from pathological liar...I suggest ppl take this route w/ telemarketers."
My Strategy:
Telemarketer: "We want to sell you a subscription for the newspaper!"
Me: "I don't pay my bills."
Tends to get them off the phone pretty quick, although it upsets my wife. I think she thinks that the telemarketers hook up into the credit reporting firms and that I'm going to damage our credit.
Toby Maguire was great in The Cider House Rules. He's just a solid actor.
Maguire is so wooden, he makes Keanu look like Olivier. I was actually interested in the Spider-Man movie until I heard he was in it. The only reason he didn't kill Cider House Rules was because his character was supposed to be an emotionless retard. He was typecast. It's like when Dennie Miller gets cast as a wisecracking pedantic smartass, it works because he is one. (FWIW, I love Dennis Miller.)
I'd say that I haven't seen acting as bad as Maguire's since Jake "Yipee" Lloyd, but I honestly can't say that Toby is any better.
Note: I am NOT a regular reader of the Christian Science Monitor.
That's too bad, you should be. The CSM is highly regarded non-partisan, non-denominational, very independent paper. It is one of the few sources of quality international news in the US (aside from the internet.) While I won't go so far as to say that it is completely unbiased, it certainly is one of the least biased news sources I know of, and their coverage is usually well-balanced. For more info about the paper, check their About the Monitor page. If nothing else, the page is indicative of how independent of the church is the paper.
I'm Sure I Know The Answer...but did there happen to be anyone testifying in the interests of The People to provide a counterpoint to Rosen?
There's a great story in former California Senator H.L. Richardson's book What Makes You Think We Read the Bills? on just that subject. After a hearing attended by only industry representatives, Richardson and another senator were talking about the issue the hearing was about. Both preferred an option that the industry type were against, but the other senator said to Richardson, completely serious, that it was too bad there weren't any representatives for the people at the hearing. That should make you either laugh or cry, if not, you might want to re-read the Constitution, or remember the the goverment is to be "of the people, by the people, for the people."
I'm a pretty regular book buyer, and had recently gotten on a sci-fi/fantasy kick (fueled mostly by revisiting my youth via alt.binaries.e-book.) Tired of e-book copies of books my mom still has stored away, I went out and bought some of the other books I found online that looked interesting. I read just the introduction of "The Color of Magic" before I bought the first two installments of Prachett's Discworld series. I thought about also getting a Harlan Ellison book.
But then I saw how much of an ass he was. Sure, posting his work online without permission is wrong, but his overreaction is worse. His statements are arrogant and ignorant. Online posting is more like borrowing from a library than stealing a book sale. Online posting provides a valuable archival function (think Project Gutenberg.) The morons who stock up all of his works are like the warez kiddiez who have the entire Adobe suite, but don't know how to use any of it. Assholes do not get my money. I don't care if his writing is proven to cure cancer, this jerk (who might have gotten my money if I liked something I sampled online) will never see a dime from me. Nor will I read any of works, in print, online, electronically, or otherwise.
Harlan Ellison's fight against sharing generates the same response from me as Metallica's, complete and total rejection. I give my money, attention, and affection to artists, not money grubbing whores.
In an SUV vs normal car collision, the SUV driver would be better off, yes...By driving an SUV, you increase the chance of killing the other party in a collision.
So your argument is that we should all be equally vulnerable? If you decide to get a convertible, do we all have to get one too so our odds of dying are the same? Because you choose to drive tin can, my wife, my infant child, and I should be forced to drive a deathtrap like you? Don't like the odds? There's nothing preventing you from buying a semi-truck, I hardly ever see those drivers die in a crash.
So they start doing dumb things like using the phone, reading the newspaper, shaving, and generally not paying attention to traffic while driving.
When was the last time you actually drove? People in every type of car does that crap. Idiot drivers are everywhere, you just notice the SUVs because they're bigger. A makeup applying Honda Civic driver can cause an accident as easily as a cell phone using Ford Excessive driver can. In an environment where an accident can come at you from every direction, I'll choose to drive something as close to a tank as I can get, thank you very much.
Unfortunately, many of these signs are posted on private property by the supporters of the candidate, which makes illegal to remove.
Not that it stops me.
Which makes you a world class jerk. The homeowners are exercising their free speech rights and particpating the democratic process. Your silencing them and making it more expensive for a person to run for office.
Furthermore, candidates get notoriously paranoid when their yard signs start disappearing. Even though it happens to every candidate, every cycle, candidates think it must be their opposition that is plotting huge sign theft rings. It's usually jerks like you or kids looking for random destruction. It's never a big surprise when the candidate wants to go negative after the first big wave of sign thefts.
If only we could get people [tear down] the signs all the damn politicians put up around election time.
Speaking as someone who works professionally on political campaigns, I can attest to the fact that there are already enough people doing that, thank you very much. And with signs running $1.50-$5/ea, it quickly becomes a serious issue when I drive by and see 75-80 signs tossed into the river as a joke (or worse, as a malicious attack from the opposition.)
Most decent politicians don't resort to putting their signs up illegally, just like legitimate businesses don't either. If you do see a candidate's signs in the right of way, don't vote for the jerk. But if you're complaining about signs in people's yards, cope and deal, it could be worse. Instead of political yard signs, the homeowners could have put in an 8ft nativity scene made with giant garden gnomes.
Exactly. What's there to say that Shawn Woolley wasn't addicted to Twinkies and ate them minutes before his suicide? Should Hostess get sued?
People get addicted to all sorts of things, alcohol, drugs, sex, muppets, driving fast, NetHack, shoes, power, EverCrack, shiny gadgets, Julio Iglesias. You name it, someone's addicted to it, and there probably a newsgroup or web site devoted to it. Maybe, just maybe, the party responsible for this guy's suicide is the one who pulled the friggin' trigger?
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It's an adaptation, that's why...
on
LoTR Takes 4 Oscars
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· Score: 5, Insightful
Don't know why that was changed (do I not remember the movie correctly?)....Now, admittedly, they had to edit for length. I'm not sure what else I would have left out instead.
They're called "adaptations" for a reason. It's impossible to condense 300+ page into 2 hours. There's a reason that Stephen King's short stories make for better movies than his books. Movies, for all their splendor, are about small events, short snippets of time. It's those reasons that I'm about as mad at Jackson for his LOTR changes as I am at Howard for his Beautiful Mind changes - that is, not at all. Their changes capture the essence of the book while keeping it viewable in one sitting.
A movie has a host of criteria to be concerned about, as does a book. But those criteria have very little overlap between movies and books. A book can spend a chapter on Nash's bi-sexuality without losing focus, but for a movie to properly handle it would require too much time and distract from the focus of the movie (Nash's illness and recovery through force of will and the love of his wife.) Even such an integral fact such as Nash's divorce and re-marrage districts from the focus. Picking any one facet, scene, or even sub-plot of a book to judge a movie to set yourself up for disappointment.
Books can ponder the nuances of their story, but movies must have tunnel-vision like focus. That's to be expected, they are different media. If you want long winding passages that have questionable relevance to the final plot, read the book. If you want amazing visual to help with your questionable imagination, watch the movie. And if you want bad graphics and questionable interface, play the game.
Or let's stick with out doorman checking your ID. Suppose when he did, he took out a book and started writing down everything on it. How many people would demand their ID back and complain to managment that it was none of the doorman's damn business
As I mentioned elsewhere, I would. I don't care how hot the chicks inside are, how cheap the beer is, how great the music is, or how big the bouncers are, I'd need a damn good reason to let someone take down all my personal information.
And what would I do? First, I'd rip my DL back, then I'd ask to see the manager for an explaination. If that explaination didn't give a good reason for needing that info, just to be an ass, I'd probably ask to see all of the bar employee's DL's, then I'd walk out (bitching about the neo-Nazi management), write a letter to the editor of the local paper, and call my government represetatives at all levels (city, county, state, and federal.) I would certainly complain to whoever approves their liquor license.
For Christ's sake, all I want to do is give the bar my money for some fermented barley. If one bar won't do that without invading my privacy, I'll go to one that won't. I'm still the customer in this situation, someone can make money by making me happy.
"It's the same information as the front of the license," said Frank Mandelbaum, chairman and chief executive of Intelli- Check, a manufacturer of license-scanning equipment based in Woodbury, N.Y. "If I were to go into a bar and they had a photocopier, they could photocopy the license or they could write it down. They are not giving us any information that violates privacy."
If I went to a bar that tried to photocopy my driver's license, I'd damn sure turn around and go elsewhere. By making the privacy invasion so subtle, they've muted reasonable objections.
Before I started using the POP3 service, I left a lot of emails on Yahoo!'s server. Since then, I rarely have more than a few kB stored on there. When I'm forced to go back to non-POP3, I'll go back to leaving crap on their server.
How does the cost/benefit work here? I would think that it'd be cheaper for them to handle a POP3 connection from me once every day or so than for them to store 10 megs of my crap and process 5-10 web accesses a day, but hey, I could wrong. But what if everyone does that?
In the end, this is like GeoCities charging for FTP uploading, now to upload for free, you have to put up with their crappy File Manager uploader mutation. Why is it that they're charging for services that should be cheaper for them to provide? Convenience.
For both the forwarding and POP3 services, you have to agree to get spammed by Yahoo! It's not that bad, it's infrequent enough that I haven't had to set up a filter against it. It's easier to just hit delete once a week.
Obviously hurtful compliance with the DMCA could possibly speed its demise more than ignoring it outright.
I thought about that too, but then who's a judge going to side with? Google with their free speech and $1 to de-list or MegaCorp, Inc. with free enterprises and $42,000,000,000 for lost sales? Further, I think it's a questionable legal strategy to cave to the de-listers in hopes that it'll generate public support in the end. It's like believing the lie that "the lurkers support me!"
I feel sorry for Google, now that they've opened the door to de-list pages. I can see all sorts of targets of criticism claiming the DMCA to cow Google into removing results. Think of all the added work Google will have to do to comply with all those requests.
FORD EXEC: This site is critical of our new Ford Excessive SUV, DMCA it out of you're listings!
GOOGLE: Oh...O-OK...sure... (Butter's voice)
BLIZZARD LAWYER: This site has a program to allow our games to be used on a LAN! DMCA it out of your database!
GOOGLE: Oh...O-OK...sure...
BILL G.: This review says bad things about our SQL server. Fire the DMCA at it Google!
GOOGLE: Oh...O-OK...sure...
DUBYA: Our military plans are protected by the DMCA. Google, nuke this site that criticizes them!
GOOGLE: Oh...O-OK...sure...
Maybe if they had stood up for their own free speech rights they wouldn't have opened the barn door like this. As much as I like Google, part of me wants to see the floodgates open and the de-listers come swarming in. Maybe someone will realize that occasionally, you do have to stand up for your rights.
I'm a moderation tester. And yes, I was testing to see how many moderators read the actualy story content before rating comments.
Bad me...punish me. Unfortunately, the story was/.ed. But the comment was insightful... Why does everyone have to be such an ass and try to prove/. wrong? It's a web site, you want to test moderation? How about testing how to get a life?
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For crying out loud, some people are just going to be boarish assholes unless someone calls them on it. Don't let them spoil the whole movie for everyone else.
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What's happening now is just like speed limit enforcement. The authorities go after the blantant infringers hoping to show the badge enough that the less blatant infringer curtial their activities. Cringely is actually a bit behind in his anaylsis. We don't need to get more people to infringe more often, we just need to turn those who are infringing into activists.
-sk
While I still have nightmares about red inked "PV" (passive voice) all over my writing, her anal retentiveness made me a better writer. (This post notwithstanding.)
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Not a huge difference, but a big enough one to possibly protect eBay. Given the difference in problem area (auction service for consignment shops vs. individual driven auctions,) the slight novelity of the solution, solution development schedules, and the fact that the guy's business model failed before he started licensing out, I'd lean towards believing that eBay may not be entirely in the wrong here. Sure they were negotiating the license the patent, but that doesn't automatically mean that they were infringing.
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To me, it sounds like eBay created their auction site indepentently of this guy's patent, realized five years down the line that there was a patent that might cover their business model, and decided to see if they could buy it to avoid any patent problems.
Furthermore, IANAL but it seems to me that this guys patents either don't apply to eBay's business model or have serious timing problems. His patent #5,845,265 specifically refers to consignment shops and bar code scanners, neither of which is in eBay business process (consignment shops may be users on eBay, but the patent is specifically to connect consignment shops.) At least #6,085,176 and #6,202,051 seem to be on topic, but then again, one wasn't filed until February 19, 1999 and the other on March 8, 1999, I think eBay had prior art at that point.
Not that I'm a huge eBay defender, but I don't see where this evil corp. Most companies try to avoid trouble like this and wouldn't go find a patent and base a business around it without securing the patent first.
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I know it's off-topic, but Confederated Products was one of the funniest, least predictable, and believable plot twists I've seen in years.
Telemarketer: "We want to sell you a subscription for the newspaper!"
Me: "I don't pay my bills."
Tends to get them off the phone pretty quick, although it upsets my wife. I think she thinks that the telemarketers hook up into the credit reporting firms and that I'm going to damage our credit.
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I'd say that I haven't seen acting as bad as Maguire's since Jake "Yipee" Lloyd, but I honestly can't say that Toby is any better.
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The short answer, snowpuppy?
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I'm a pretty regular book buyer, and had recently gotten on a sci-fi/fantasy kick (fueled mostly by revisiting my youth via alt.binaries.e-book.) Tired of e-book copies of books my mom still has stored away, I went out and bought some of the other books I found online that looked interesting. I read just the introduction of "The Color of Magic" before I bought the first two installments of Prachett's Discworld series. I thought about also getting a Harlan Ellison book.
But then I saw how much of an ass he was. Sure, posting his work online without permission is wrong, but his overreaction is worse. His statements are arrogant and ignorant. Online posting is more like borrowing from a library than stealing a book sale. Online posting provides a valuable archival function (think Project Gutenberg.) The morons who stock up all of his works are like the warez kiddiez who have the entire Adobe suite, but don't know how to use any of it. Assholes do not get my money. I don't care if his writing is proven to cure cancer, this jerk (who might have gotten my money if I liked something I sampled online) will never see a dime from me. Nor will I read any of works, in print, online, electronically, or otherwise.
Harlan Ellison's fight against sharing generates the same response from me as Metallica's, complete and total rejection. I give my money, attention, and affection to artists, not money grubbing whores.
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Furthermore, candidates get notoriously paranoid when their yard signs start disappearing. Even though it happens to every candidate, every cycle, candidates think it must be their opposition that is plotting huge sign theft rings. It's usually jerks like you or kids looking for random destruction. It's never a big surprise when the candidate wants to go negative after the first big wave of sign thefts.
-sk
Most decent politicians don't resort to putting their signs up illegally, just like legitimate businesses don't either. If you do see a candidate's signs in the right of way, don't vote for the jerk. But if you're complaining about signs in people's yards, cope and deal, it could be worse. Instead of political yard signs, the homeowners could have put in an 8ft nativity scene made with giant garden gnomes.
-sk
People get addicted to all sorts of things, alcohol, drugs, sex, muppets, driving fast, NetHack, shoes, power, EverCrack, shiny gadgets, Julio Iglesias. You name it, someone's addicted to it, and there probably a newsgroup or web site devoted to it. Maybe, just maybe, the party responsible for this guy's suicide is the one who pulled the friggin' trigger?
-sk
A movie has a host of criteria to be concerned about, as does a book. But those criteria have very little overlap between movies and books. A book can spend a chapter on Nash's bi-sexuality without losing focus, but for a movie to properly handle it would require too much time and distract from the focus of the movie (Nash's illness and recovery through force of will and the love of his wife.) Even such an integral fact such as Nash's divorce and re-marrage districts from the focus. Picking any one facet, scene, or even sub-plot of a book to judge a movie to set yourself up for disappointment.
Books can ponder the nuances of their story, but movies must have tunnel-vision like focus. That's to be expected, they are different media. If you want long winding passages that have questionable relevance to the final plot, read the book. If you want amazing visual to help with your questionable imagination, watch the movie. And if you want bad graphics and questionable interface, play the game.
-sk
And what would I do? First, I'd rip my DL back, then I'd ask to see the manager for an explaination. If that explaination didn't give a good reason for needing that info, just to be an ass, I'd probably ask to see all of the bar employee's DL's, then I'd walk out (bitching about the neo-Nazi management), write a letter to the editor of the local paper, and call my government represetatives at all levels (city, county, state, and federal.) I would certainly complain to whoever approves their liquor license.
For Christ's sake, all I want to do is give the bar my money for some fermented barley. If one bar won't do that without invading my privacy, I'll go to one that won't. I'm still the customer in this situation, someone can make money by making me happy.
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How does the cost/benefit work here? I would think that it'd be cheaper for them to handle a POP3 connection from me once every day or so than for them to store 10 megs of my crap and process 5-10 web accesses a day, but hey, I could wrong. But what if everyone does that?
In the end, this is like GeoCities charging for FTP uploading, now to upload for free, you have to put up with their crappy File Manager uploader mutation. Why is it that they're charging for services that should be cheaper for them to provide? Convenience.
-sk
For both the forwarding and POP3 services, you have to agree to get spammed by Yahoo! It's not that bad, it's infrequent enough that I haven't had to set up a filter against it. It's easier to just hit delete once a week.
I thought about that too, but then who's a judge going to side with? Google with their free speech and $1 to de-list or MegaCorp, Inc. with free enterprises and $42,000,000,000 for lost sales? Further, I think it's a questionable legal strategy to cave to the de-listers in hopes that it'll generate public support in the end. It's like believing the lie that "the lurkers support me!"
-sk
FORD EXEC: This site is critical of our new Ford Excessive SUV, DMCA it out of you're listings!
GOOGLE: Oh...O-OK...sure... (Butter's voice)
BLIZZARD LAWYER: This site has a program to allow our games to be used on a LAN! DMCA it out of your database!
GOOGLE: Oh...O-OK...sure...
BILL G.: This review says bad things about our SQL server. Fire the DMCA at it Google!
GOOGLE: Oh...O-OK...sure...
DUBYA: Our military plans are protected by the DMCA. Google, nuke this site that criticizes them!
GOOGLE: Oh...O-OK...sure...
Maybe if they had stood up for their own free speech rights they wouldn't have opened the barn door like this. As much as I like Google, part of me wants to see the floodgates open and the de-listers come swarming in. Maybe someone will realize that occasionally, you do have to stand up for your rights.
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Bad me...punish me. Unfortunately, the story was /.ed. But the comment was insightful... Why does everyone have to be such an ass and try to prove /. wrong? It's a web site, you want to test moderation? How about testing how to get a life?
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