Now Musk has made the risky decision, everyone will be able to move forward knowing their necks are not so exposed if the gamble doesn't work out.
Oh sure, until that gamble rolls craps, THEN you are done too.
If the boss is willing to ignore his direct reports, fire a bunch of them because he doesn't like what they tell him about cost and schedule, you don't feel better, you polish up your resume and start looking for another job. Unless the upper management was just garbage and everyone knew it, everybody knows what this means, regardless of how possible something is or isn't, you deliver, on time, or you are given your walking papers.
This is absolutely the crappiest way to motivate labor and foster team work. Mustk has unwittingly created a dog eat dog world with CYA "I told you so" documentation flying off the printers at all levels. Nobody will want to be left holding the bag and everybody will be setting up to blame the other guy in hopes of keeping his job. Team work be damned.
You see the real "solution" (if there actually is one) is well motivated teamwork. Getting everybody pulling the same direction at the same time on the stuff that matters most. That kind of culture doesn't get built on firing folks. You build such a culture using carrots, not sticks.
A 6 tuner TiVo with lifetime service and with Two additional Mini's runs about $1,500. That's a LOT of monthly service fees given I'm only paying $4/month for a Cable Card for my Windows 7, Windows Media Center setup.
Of course a new TiVo would likely be supported past 2020, does 4K and 6 tuners when I only get three. But it would take me 375 months to break even; which is 31 years for me. If you are paying say $30/month for the three cable boxes it's 50 months, or just over 4 years to break even, which might work out for some. I may switch to TiVo in 2020 once WMC goes dark, but until then, I'm sticking with my setup. Who knows, in 4 years we may all be streaming all the stuff I watch on cable anyway and I won't need any special hardware for that.
Yep, the weak link will be the display driving of your extra TV's, for which I use Xbox 360's. These things are cheap and still readily available on E-Bay, so as they die on me, I just replace them. This limits your resolution to 1080p, but I only have one TV that displays anything more.
I didn't know about converting WMC to another scheduling source.. I'll have to look into that. Thanks!
Or you can buy a kodi box for $40 which does fundamentally the same things.
So $40-80 retail feels a sensible price - or about 10 months rental. Yep, it's a rip-off.
Kodi doesn't play encrypted and protected content and requires a subscription to get the TV guide which runs about $10/month, which is why I don't use it. The only CableCard DVR setup you can have right now that works with protected content is Windows Media Center, or a TiVo setup. TiVo is way more expensive, starting at $200 for one TV and 3 tuners and going up from there, plus TiVo requires a monthly subscription fee of about $15, which pretty much defeats the purpose of avoiding paying the cable company the monthly fees. Windows Media Center is only going to offer protected content on Windows 7, which is slated to be dropped from Microsoft's support pretty soon, at which point I'm guessing the TV Listing service (which is free for now) will be discontinued.
I actually think the price isn't that far out of line for monthly service, though I believe they should just wrap the costs into the subscription fees for the first one, and charge for any more you need over that.
^I should have said manufacture cost, not wholesale.
Yep, which makes the wholesale cost about double that $70... Then the cable company adds to that, custom and licensed software which adds another $70 per unit so you are at $140 per unit. Add custom branding to the equipment, packing materials, user manuals, throw in a remote control and some cables and you can be wholesale $200 easy.. Which, you double to retail. So $400 is a fair retail price. Add profit to that and we are at $600, which seems to be the sweet spot for what they charge for these things if you don't return them.
I'm not saying it's right, but it's not that far out of line from other retail operations.
You have to add all the CableCard stuff to decrypt all those channels they chose to protect, license fees for the software and the customizations required for branding and marketing. So where the hardware may be as you say, the software and logistics of managing it all costs money too. Then there is the "free" install that you pay for too...
I suspect you may be a bit low on your cost estimate.
No one really knows but it's between $750 and $1200 per box.
I call BS on this.
If Apple can sell a 64GB Apple TV 4K for $199 and make a nice profit on it, there's no way it costs Spectrum $750 - $1200 per box.
Ummm... Actually..
The CableCard (tm) thingy runs about $500 retail and you need one of those in there to decode the cable video. So I'm guessing they are paying around $400 for the hardware in bulk and have to provide their own branded software on top of that. I'm *sure* they have a bunch of people who get paid license fees for the various off the shelf software components as well. Remember this thing does all sorts of things that the Apple TV doesn't try to but it does pretty much everything the AppleTV does. The QAM tuner decoding isn't on that AppleTV box, but the streaming part they share, then there is the encryption stuff that AppleTV doesn't do.
However, they pay way too much.
I use a network CableCard (tm) tuner that gets me 3 channels, then I use an old windows 7 box to run Media Center and Xbox 360's at each TV. I only get 1080p resolution, but for TV viewing that is plenty. I also get DVR ability with Media Center which is really nice. I will morn the passing of Windows 7 when it's finally cut lose by Microsoft and I will likely punt on Cable at that point anyway. My whole investment for 3 TV's is about $400, but it's been a couple of years since I purchased it all.
They are making scads of cash on these things and the price goes up because they need more and more revenue because the cord cutters are killing the top line.
Personally, I use only a cable card, which runs $4/month and get up to 3 channels of TV at a time. Still this is highway robbery, Cable Cards only cost a few hundred dollars and I know they have a pile of them just sitting there and they charge enough just for service to more than pay for this.
Ok.. If you want to be specific, we stopped manufacturing and using CFC's which where chiefly responsible for the ozone depletion. Good luck getting a can of R-12 for your 1970 Ford's air conditioner. Or, be prepared to pay though the nose for a pound of R-22, which cost me over $50 a pound last time I had to get some into the 20 year old AC system in my house.
Cars have moved to R-134a for a reason, R-22 used to be standard fare for your HVAC system, but we use R-412 now. We used to dump CFC's into all sorts of aerosol cans because it was not flammable, but now you get propane and other much more dangerous propellants, or more likely moved the product into pump sprayers. What's more, we have mandated the destruction of CFC's instead of just releasing them. Now it is required to capture used refrigerants and either re-use them, or destroy them.
We have reduced our CFC emissions enough to stop the ozone depletion, and projections are that it will return to near normal by 2075.
Hey, you do know that the ozone hole issue has been largely addressed right?
We stopped manufacturing and using the CFC's mostly responsible for this more than a decade ago and as they have been removed from aerosol cans and most industrial and HVAC use the ozone hole has stopped getting bigger and has been steadily recovering since about 2000.
They actually did more than cycling the power. They had the spacecraft in a pretty fast spin motion and cycled the power a few times. I liken it to shacking it while hitting the power button a few times.
Actually, they did this while shaking it too. They did the equivalent of smacking it on the side while flipping the power switch on and off a few times. A classic tech move in the repair shop.
Twitter is not a government entity. They can do what they damn well please. They don't have to obey the 1st Amendment. If he doesn't like it, he can quit using the service (don't we all wish)....
Yes, as a Trump supporter, I DO wish he'd lay off his tweeting, at least for the most part. Some of it has been helpful, but the bulk of it has been anything but helpful or appropriate in my view. But one must also acknowledge that the media's reaction to these tweets has been at least partly responsible for the whole three ring circus. Trump is obviously the ring master, but the media are running around as the clowns at his request.
However, It's fair to state that there IS sort of a social movement brewing that is pushing to force 1st amendment like rules onto popular social platforms, even those which are privately owned and operated. Personally, I'm a bit conflicted about this kind of regulation, because that's what this will need to be, a law. On one hand I clearly see the political bias imposed by these platforms as a bad thing, but on the other I clearly understand that the 1st amendment doesn't apply.
I guess that my preference would be for a "hands off" policy and leave things as they are. Let folks like Trump complain about how unfair the sites moderate based on political bias, just take the complaints with a grain of salt. As much as these platforms are PR shamed into trying to justify their bias, the net effect is the same as a regulation and a whole lot less complex and expensive to boot.
SO... Let Trump complain. I think he's correct, Twitter is biased. However, I'm not supportive of laws or regulations that try to enforce any political parity on social platforms. IF Trump's PR war on Twitter causes them to be less biased, great! I think it's a waste of his time, but I'm more concerned about his accomplishments and policies than his Twitter rants.
But your me too complaints are just overblown. I don't know anyone and have never then heard of anyone who had their career ruined simply for dating at work.
Really? Al Franken wasn't railroaded for a PICTURE, even though he didn't touch her and she didn't know about the joke? I think he was. It was sophomoric crude humor but it wasn't assault.
Then there is the whole Kavanaugh debacle, where, 30 years later, claims where being made, unsubstantiated claims, that nearly derailed the guys career...
#MeToo is a serious risk to young professionals. It's a good idea to protect yourself from such claims by being as circumspect and as far above reproach as you can. Society is taking a very dim view of this kind of thing. These days, just being in a situation where the abuse was possible, just the claim is enough, even if it was consensual at the time. He said, She said is slanted toward the "she said" side, proof is not necessarily required, at least not to ruin a reputation and a career.
#MeToo has the chilling effect of applying TODAY'S social perspectives to times and situations which where very different. I can only assume that this redefinition of what's "right and moral" will continue to morph over time. Who knows the behavior which is accepted today won't be prosecuted as crimes in the future. Best stay as clear of this kind of thing if you ask me. But hey, I'm nearing retirement, I have stuff to lose. If you are a young kid with nothing but a diploma and student loan debt you may not care right now.
Do what you wish. I'm just saying that in my view, the chances for a bad crash and burn are high and the chances of success are low, so like I advise not buying lottery tickets, I advise not to date people from work.
Personally, I've seen budding relationships at work and only one resulted in an enduring situation, and they where on totally different programs when it started. Every other relationship was a messy crash and burn and usually ended up having ugly consequences for the people involved and sometimes for the company too.
So, I advise extreme caution when dating folks from work and if I was mentoring you I'd tell you the same things. It's way too risky for you, your career and even your job. Given today's #MeToo obsession it's getting even more risky, regardless of if you think it's consensual or not. Such events can be dredged up decades later, cast in a questionable light and used to ruin reputations and careers on a whim. But if you want to take the risk, just remember you ignored my advice so don't come crying to me.
Well.. You can break the DRM by reverse engineering to do that. I'm not sure what "sketchy means" is though. I'm also not sure if you can SELL the reverse engineered hack to others for a profit either... You might be able to reverse engineer and bypass the DRM in order to sell repair parts... It's all kind of vague to me.
No, technically a patent violation claim can be made any time you make, use, sell, or offer to sell the product without the patent holder's permission (often in the form of an authorization or license).
True, but if you don't cause the patent holder any verifiable financial damages what can they sue you for? If you are just using it personally, from a device you built yourself, how does that damage them?
Technically, punitive damages are easily obtain in patent court thanks to Halo Electronics v. Pulse Electronics. I doubt it would happen, but legally speaking, it's a possibility.
And as I said above, punitive damages are for punishing egregious bad behavior. Using a patent for private use without a motive for profit is unlikely to draw a punitive damage award and for most of us, civil litigation is kind of pointless anyway. Civil judgments don't survive bankruptcy, they cannot take your retirement accounts, your primary home, your car and personal effects so all they can get is what you can basically lay your hands on or sell to raise cash. For most of us, that wouldn't cover the legal fees. There is no incentive to sue, if you cannot collect anything.
Well, you DON'T charge the president with anything while he's in office, you impeach them first. Also, Clinton was roundly condemned for this behavior by Republicans, while Democrats largely tried to ignore the whole thing, so for a president it boils down to politics, at lest in Clinton's case. Really, the #MeToo thing is just another political ploy anyway, but that's another debate.
Also, the difference with Clinton was by the time Monica could have made a claim, the whole thing was blown sky high in the political realm and Monica was desperately trying to get out of the public eye and daily news cycle. As it stands, she became a social pariah and laughing stock which ruined her hopes of a career, all at the hands of Clinton's inappropriate advances, and has said it made a wreak of her professional and private life. One can only hope she got a sizable settlement on the side for this. But that was the 90's this is 30 years later.
Now days, women (and even men) in such situations can and do make civil claims. The courts look dimly on the past social norms of women being seen as sex objects and not just employees. So sleeping with the secretary is no longer two adults just playing around, it's sexual harassment and a civil suit.
I never said it never works, I said it rarely works. My point about dating at work is the chances of having problems are high while the chances of success are low with heavy prices to be paid for failures. I'm just pointing this out and advising you avoid it. But if you want to make the mistake, best of luck.
Coercion is implicit when a there is a significant difference in the power or authority of the two parties, even when both parties claim the relationship is consensual.
I call bullshit. Citation please. We're not talking about statutory rape here.
NO citation necessary. IF the boss is trying to get a person who works for him to do something personal and not business related (sexual or otherwise) it is considered improper and subject to civil litigation. If it's a sexual favor being proffered for say a good review, retaining one's job or some such, epically if the "victim" is a woman, willing or not, you can bet her lawyer will have THEIR way with you and your company for allowing it.
I'm telling you, DON'T date where you work. Even as peer to peer. It's hardly ever a good idea and rarely works out well for anybody involved.
I have a nice 132 columns dot matrix printer right here, I'll let you rent it for the low, low cost of only USD$100000 per day! Shipping not included!
OK, but I'll have to pay you once I get a few pictures auctioned off OK? Oh, and will you take a check from a Nigerian prince, cash it and send me the change in cash?
Anytime a rich guy consumes something, money changes hands. It goes from his hands to somebody else's hand where it's more likely to be spent.
As such, conspicuous consumption doesn't bother me. Let them have their gold plated plumbing, fancy clothes, big house and fast cars so they spend that cash, keeping it flowing though other's hands, not just locked up in their bank accounts or stuffed in the mattresses. Their spending makes it easier for me to get my hands on some of their wealth.
You see, it's not about how much more they have, it's about how much I have or can ethically get. Am I better off if they spend theirs? Yep! So let them spend, encourage them to spend even and don't look down on them for it. Because their spending is really, if you look at it right, spreading the wealth around so I can get more.
No, technically a patent violation claim can be made any time you make, use, sell, or offer to sell the product without the patent holder's permission (often in the form of an authorization or license).
True, but if you don't cause the patent holder any verifiable financial damages what can they sue you for? If you are just using it personally, from a device you built yourself, how does that damage them? You didn't buy the device from a licensed manufacturer and denied them the royalties?
Civil law is pretty clear, actual damages is all you get to collect. Punitive damages are only for outrageous behavior, which if you where only using the patent for personal use, is unlikely to be considered outrageous.
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Now Musk has made the risky decision, everyone will be able to move forward knowing their necks are not so exposed if the gamble doesn't work out.
Oh sure, until that gamble rolls craps, THEN you are done too.
If the boss is willing to ignore his direct reports, fire a bunch of them because he doesn't like what they tell him about cost and schedule, you don't feel better, you polish up your resume and start looking for another job. Unless the upper management was just garbage and everyone knew it, everybody knows what this means, regardless of how possible something is or isn't, you deliver, on time, or you are given your walking papers.
This is absolutely the crappiest way to motivate labor and foster team work. Mustk has unwittingly created a dog eat dog world with CYA "I told you so" documentation flying off the printers at all levels. Nobody will want to be left holding the bag and everybody will be setting up to blame the other guy in hopes of keeping his job. Team work be damned.
You see the real "solution" (if there actually is one) is well motivated teamwork. Getting everybody pulling the same direction at the same time on the stuff that matters most. That kind of culture doesn't get built on firing folks. You build such a culture using carrots, not sticks.
A 6 tuner TiVo with lifetime service and with Two additional Mini's runs about $1,500. That's a LOT of monthly service fees given I'm only paying $4/month for a Cable Card for my Windows 7, Windows Media Center setup.
Of course a new TiVo would likely be supported past 2020, does 4K and 6 tuners when I only get three. But it would take me 375 months to break even; which is 31 years for me. If you are paying say $30/month for the three cable boxes it's 50 months, or just over 4 years to break even, which might work out for some. I may switch to TiVo in 2020 once WMC goes dark, but until then, I'm sticking with my setup. Who knows, in 4 years we may all be streaming all the stuff I watch on cable anyway and I won't need any special hardware for that.
Yep, the weak link will be the display driving of your extra TV's, for which I use Xbox 360's. These things are cheap and still readily available on E-Bay, so as they die on me, I just replace them. This limits your resolution to 1080p, but I only have one TV that displays anything more.
I didn't know about converting WMC to another scheduling source.. I'll have to look into that. Thanks!
Or you can buy a kodi box for $40 which does fundamentally the same things.
So $40-80 retail feels a sensible price - or about 10 months rental. Yep, it's a rip-off.
Kodi doesn't play encrypted and protected content and requires a subscription to get the TV guide which runs about $10/month, which is why I don't use it. The only CableCard DVR setup you can have right now that works with protected content is Windows Media Center, or a TiVo setup. TiVo is way more expensive, starting at $200 for one TV and 3 tuners and going up from there, plus TiVo requires a monthly subscription fee of about $15, which pretty much defeats the purpose of avoiding paying the cable company the monthly fees. Windows Media Center is only going to offer protected content on Windows 7, which is slated to be dropped from Microsoft's support pretty soon, at which point I'm guessing the TV Listing service (which is free for now) will be discontinued.
I actually think the price isn't that far out of line for monthly service, though I believe they should just wrap the costs into the subscription fees for the first one, and charge for any more you need over that.
^I should have said manufacture cost, not wholesale.
Yep, which makes the wholesale cost about double that $70... Then the cable company adds to that, custom and licensed software which adds another $70 per unit so you are at $140 per unit. Add custom branding to the equipment, packing materials, user manuals, throw in a remote control and some cables and you can be wholesale $200 easy.. Which, you double to retail. So $400 is a fair retail price. Add profit to that and we are at $600, which seems to be the sweet spot for what they charge for these things if you don't return them.
I'm not saying it's right, but it's not that far out of line from other retail operations.
You have to add all the CableCard stuff to decrypt all those channels they chose to protect, license fees for the software and the customizations required for branding and marketing. So where the hardware may be as you say, the software and logistics of managing it all costs money too. Then there is the "free" install that you pay for too...
I suspect you may be a bit low on your cost estimate.
No one really knows but it's between $750 and $1200 per box.
I call BS on this.
If Apple can sell a 64GB Apple TV 4K for $199 and make a nice profit on it, there's no way it costs Spectrum $750 - $1200 per box.
Ummm ... Actually..
The CableCard (tm) thingy runs about $500 retail and you need one of those in there to decode the cable video. So I'm guessing they are paying around $400 for the hardware in bulk and have to provide their own branded software on top of that. I'm *sure* they have a bunch of people who get paid license fees for the various off the shelf software components as well. Remember this thing does all sorts of things that the Apple TV doesn't try to but it does pretty much everything the AppleTV does. The QAM tuner decoding isn't on that AppleTV box, but the streaming part they share, then there is the encryption stuff that AppleTV doesn't do.
However, they pay way too much.
I use a network CableCard (tm) tuner that gets me 3 channels, then I use an old windows 7 box to run Media Center and Xbox 360's at each TV. I only get 1080p resolution, but for TV viewing that is plenty. I also get DVR ability with Media Center which is really nice. I will morn the passing of Windows 7 when it's finally cut lose by Microsoft and I will likely punt on Cable at that point anyway. My whole investment for 3 TV's is about $400, but it's been a couple of years since I purchased it all.
They are making scads of cash on these things and the price goes up because they need more and more revenue because the cord cutters are killing the top line.
Personally, I use only a cable card, which runs $4/month and get up to 3 channels of TV at a time. Still this is highway robbery, Cable Cards only cost a few hundred dollars and I know they have a pile of them just sitting there and they charge enough just for service to more than pay for this.
As if proving stop lights are often times green says we can be sure that brake lights on motorcycles are red.
Proving one theory though experimental evidence does not mean we have or can prove an unrelated theory too.
Ok.. If you want to be specific, we stopped manufacturing and using CFC's which where chiefly responsible for the ozone depletion. Good luck getting a can of R-12 for your 1970 Ford's air conditioner. Or, be prepared to pay though the nose for a pound of R-22, which cost me over $50 a pound last time I had to get some into the 20 year old AC system in my house.
Cars have moved to R-134a for a reason, R-22 used to be standard fare for your HVAC system, but we use R-412 now. We used to dump CFC's into all sorts of aerosol cans because it was not flammable, but now you get propane and other much more dangerous propellants, or more likely moved the product into pump sprayers. What's more, we have mandated the destruction of CFC's instead of just releasing them. Now it is required to capture used refrigerants and either re-use them, or destroy them.
We have reduced our CFC emissions enough to stop the ozone depletion, and projections are that it will return to near normal by 2075.
Hey, you do know that the ozone hole issue has been largely addressed right?
We stopped manufacturing and using the CFC's mostly responsible for this more than a decade ago and as they have been removed from aerosol cans and most industrial and HVAC use the ozone hole has stopped getting bigger and has been steadily recovering since about 2000.
Turning it off then back on again worked!
They actually did more than cycling the power. They had the spacecraft in a pretty fast spin motion and cycled the power a few times. I liken it to shacking it while hitting the power button a few times.
TLDR: NASA turned it off and back on.
Actually, they did this while shaking it too. They did the equivalent of smacking it on the side while flipping the power switch on and off a few times. A classic tech move in the repair shop.
Twitter is not a government entity. They can do what they damn well please. They don't have to obey the 1st Amendment. If he doesn't like it, he can quit using the service (don't we all wish)....
Yes, as a Trump supporter, I DO wish he'd lay off his tweeting, at least for the most part. Some of it has been helpful, but the bulk of it has been anything but helpful or appropriate in my view. But one must also acknowledge that the media's reaction to these tweets has been at least partly responsible for the whole three ring circus. Trump is obviously the ring master, but the media are running around as the clowns at his request.
However, It's fair to state that there IS sort of a social movement brewing that is pushing to force 1st amendment like rules onto popular social platforms, even those which are privately owned and operated. Personally, I'm a bit conflicted about this kind of regulation, because that's what this will need to be, a law. On one hand I clearly see the political bias imposed by these platforms as a bad thing, but on the other I clearly understand that the 1st amendment doesn't apply.
I guess that my preference would be for a "hands off" policy and leave things as they are. Let folks like Trump complain about how unfair the sites moderate based on political bias, just take the complaints with a grain of salt. As much as these platforms are PR shamed into trying to justify their bias, the net effect is the same as a regulation and a whole lot less complex and expensive to boot.
SO... Let Trump complain. I think he's correct, Twitter is biased. However, I'm not supportive of laws or regulations that try to enforce any political parity on social platforms. IF Trump's PR war on Twitter causes them to be less biased, great! I think it's a waste of his time, but I'm more concerned about his accomplishments and policies than his Twitter rants.
But your me too complaints are just overblown. I don't know anyone and have never then heard of anyone who had their career ruined simply for dating at work.
Really? Al Franken wasn't railroaded for a PICTURE, even though he didn't touch her and she didn't know about the joke? I think he was. It was sophomoric crude humor but it wasn't assault.
Then there is the whole Kavanaugh debacle, where, 30 years later, claims where being made, unsubstantiated claims, that nearly derailed the guys career...
#MeToo is a serious risk to young professionals. It's a good idea to protect yourself from such claims by being as circumspect and as far above reproach as you can. Society is taking a very dim view of this kind of thing. These days, just being in a situation where the abuse was possible, just the claim is enough, even if it was consensual at the time. He said, She said is slanted toward the "she said" side, proof is not necessarily required, at least not to ruin a reputation and a career.
#MeToo has the chilling effect of applying TODAY'S social perspectives to times and situations which where very different. I can only assume that this redefinition of what's "right and moral" will continue to morph over time. Who knows the behavior which is accepted today won't be prosecuted as crimes in the future. Best stay as clear of this kind of thing if you ask me. But hey, I'm nearing retirement, I have stuff to lose. If you are a young kid with nothing but a diploma and student loan debt you may not care right now.
Do what you wish. I'm just saying that in my view, the chances for a bad crash and burn are high and the chances of success are low, so like I advise not buying lottery tickets, I advise not to date people from work.
Personally, I've seen budding relationships at work and only one resulted in an enduring situation, and they where on totally different programs when it started. Every other relationship was a messy crash and burn and usually ended up having ugly consequences for the people involved and sometimes for the company too.
So, I advise extreme caution when dating folks from work and if I was mentoring you I'd tell you the same things. It's way too risky for you, your career and even your job. Given today's #MeToo obsession it's getting even more risky, regardless of if you think it's consensual or not. Such events can be dredged up decades later, cast in a questionable light and used to ruin reputations and careers on a whim. But if you want to take the risk, just remember you ignored my advice so don't come crying to me.
Well.. You can break the DRM by reverse engineering to do that. I'm not sure what "sketchy means" is though. I'm also not sure if you can SELL the reverse engineered hack to others for a profit either... You might be able to reverse engineer and bypass the DRM in order to sell repair parts... It's all kind of vague to me.
No, technically a patent violation claim can be made any time you make, use, sell, or offer to sell the product without the patent holder's permission (often in the form of an authorization or license).
True, but if you don't cause the patent holder any verifiable financial damages what can they sue you for? If you are just using it personally, from a device you built yourself, how does that damage them?
Technically, punitive damages are easily obtain in patent court thanks to Halo Electronics v. Pulse Electronics. I doubt it would happen, but legally speaking, it's a possibility.
And as I said above, punitive damages are for punishing egregious bad behavior. Using a patent for private use without a motive for profit is unlikely to draw a punitive damage award and for most of us, civil litigation is kind of pointless anyway. Civil judgments don't survive bankruptcy, they cannot take your retirement accounts, your primary home, your car and personal effects so all they can get is what you can basically lay your hands on or sell to raise cash. For most of us, that wouldn't cover the legal fees. There is no incentive to sue, if you cannot collect anything.
Well, you DON'T charge the president with anything while he's in office, you impeach them first. Also, Clinton was roundly condemned for this behavior by Republicans, while Democrats largely tried to ignore the whole thing, so for a president it boils down to politics, at lest in Clinton's case. Really, the #MeToo thing is just another political ploy anyway, but that's another debate.
Also, the difference with Clinton was by the time Monica could have made a claim, the whole thing was blown sky high in the political realm and Monica was desperately trying to get out of the public eye and daily news cycle. As it stands, she became a social pariah and laughing stock which ruined her hopes of a career, all at the hands of Clinton's inappropriate advances, and has said it made a wreak of her professional and private life. One can only hope she got a sizable settlement on the side for this. But that was the 90's this is 30 years later.
Now days, women (and even men) in such situations can and do make civil claims. The courts look dimly on the past social norms of women being seen as sex objects and not just employees. So sleeping with the secretary is no longer two adults just playing around, it's sexual harassment and a civil suit.
I never said it never works, I said it rarely works. My point about dating at work is the chances of having problems are high while the chances of success are low with heavy prices to be paid for failures. I'm just pointing this out and advising you avoid it. But if you want to make the mistake, best of luck.
Coercion is implicit when a there is a significant difference in the power or authority of the two parties, even when both parties claim the relationship is consensual.
I call bullshit. Citation please. We're not talking about statutory rape here.
NO citation necessary. IF the boss is trying to get a person who works for him to do something personal and not business related (sexual or otherwise) it is considered improper and subject to civil litigation. If it's a sexual favor being proffered for say a good review, retaining one's job or some such, epically if the "victim" is a woman, willing or not, you can bet her lawyer will have THEIR way with you and your company for allowing it.
I'm telling you, DON'T date where you work. Even as peer to peer. It's hardly ever a good idea and rarely works out well for anybody involved.
I have a nice 132 columns dot matrix printer right here, I'll let you rent it for the low, low cost of only USD$100000 per day! Shipping not included!
OK, but I'll have to pay you once I get a few pictures auctioned off OK? Oh, and will you take a check from a Nigerian prince, cash it and send me the change in cash?
I don't know about that.
Anytime a rich guy consumes something, money changes hands. It goes from his hands to somebody else's hand where it's more likely to be spent.
As such, conspicuous consumption doesn't bother me. Let them have their gold plated plumbing, fancy clothes, big house and fast cars so they spend that cash, keeping it flowing though other's hands, not just locked up in their bank accounts or stuffed in the mattresses. Their spending makes it easier for me to get my hands on some of their wealth.
You see, it's not about how much more they have, it's about how much I have or can ethically get. Am I better off if they spend theirs? Yep! So let them spend, encourage them to spend even and don't look down on them for it. Because their spending is really, if you look at it right, spreading the wealth around so I can get more.
I smell a rat...
Until the money actually changes hands and the picture is shipped, it wasn't sold, just bid on.
When it is, let me know because I have a pile of really nice and rare ASCII art to put up for sale...
By the way, anybody have an extra box of tractor feed paper and a line printer I could use for few days?
No, technically a patent violation claim can be made any time you make, use, sell, or offer to sell the product without the patent holder's permission (often in the form of an authorization or license).
True, but if you don't cause the patent holder any verifiable financial damages what can they sue you for? If you are just using it personally, from a device you built yourself, how does that damage them? You didn't buy the device from a licensed manufacturer and denied them the royalties?
Civil law is pretty clear, actual damages is all you get to collect. Punitive damages are only for outrageous behavior, which if you where only using the patent for personal use, is unlikely to be considered outrageous.