Although there are folks like Ron Paul (who doesn't have a snowflake's chance in hell now for the Presidency) who are touted as "true conservatives", the Republicans who took the majority during Clinton's tenure are mostly the sort of people who think that once they're elected, the only people they should give their time and attention are the ones who give them the most money. I think there's a case to be made that the Republican party was hijacked by such sociopaths who don't care one whit about the people they represent. In essence, we now have a bunch of PHBs in office (because by and large Democrats are no better or even worse-- Howard Berman and Fritz Hollings, for example), who try to collect as much money or power as possible.
The worst ones, of course, are those who don't care if people disagree with them and don't care if they run their country's economy into the ground, only about some petty constitutional theory regarding the executive branch. If you really want to direct your ire someplace, start with Dick Cheney, David Addington, and John Yoo. Bush is little more than a willing patsy; these guys used him and bullied everyone else to forcibly "prove" the unitary executive theory that would wreck the balance of power that true patriots worked so hard to create. Cheney watched Nixon resign in disgrace, so he created King George IV to spite the Congress that rightfully wanted Nixon's head for abusing power.
Cheney, as Defense secretary, advised his father to ignore Congress, but Bush Sr. was smarter and actually listened to advisors who disagreed (rather than surround himself with yes-men and lawyers), so he deferred the decision to begin Operation Desert Shield/Storm to Congress. He also knew enough about Vietnam to realize that having a permanent peacekeeping force there in a country that can easily become hostile (which is very much unlike South Korea or MacArthur-era Japan) is a very bad idea-- which is why he left Saddam in power rather than completely obliterate him and leave a power vacuum.
As VP, he surrounded Bush and himself with both a crowd of lawyers who (no doubt under intense pressure from Addington) told them they could do anything, and a cloak of secrecy that Stalin would've been proud of. In the early days, some appointees, like Colin Powell and John Ashcroft, still had a brain and a conscience, so when they resisted Cheney, they were circumvented until they resigned in disgust, only to be replaced with men who are effectively puppets. The aforementioned lawyers rival Scientology in their zeal to make sure the POTUS gets his way in everything.
I'm sure the Bush administration has the hubris and cojones to think that they will be remembered as the greatest presidency in US history, but I'm sure that historians will remember them as the administration that destroyed many things that made the US great. The best result of their ill-conceived policies is that future politicians will look to them as an example to avoid. The worst possible resulting scenarios are the administration effectively taking a third term (then a fourth, etc.), or a future President using the precedents they set to establish a true dictatorship.
One in particular, that of the prosecution of associates of the 7th of July London bombers who travelled with them to London in advance to case targets, relies heavily on CCTV to link these people to the bombers, and will help obtain convictions (should that be what the jury decides).
If memory serves (heard it on NPR once), that's also the terrorist incident that has a small but vocal conspiracy theorist group claiming it's fake, going to such lengths as claiming the victims are in on it (some 9/11 conspiracy theorists do the same to 9/11 victims' families). Although governments are most likely responsible for abuses of power, those who abuse the victims don't help anyone but themselves.
Congress will go for it until they realize that the media industry is one of the biggest lobbying groups and contributors-- you can be sure that both cartels will turn up the lobbying if such a tax is introduced. I wouldn't be surprised if they inflate "losses from piracy", or raise the already outrageous prices on media, based on the amount of the IP tax in the very unlikely event that it passes. It would also be easy to convince small-fry IP producers (writers and small commercial software houses, among others) to put up a big stink about the tax increase as a threat to their livelihood.
The IP tax sounds like a great, elegant solution to a multibillion-dollar problem and threat, but we need to remember that the media industry didn't become so large by playing nice. There are ways of removing people from office using perceived scandal and FUD-- remember what happened to the guy who wanted Massachusetts to use open document formats and his proposal?
I'm no lawyer, but first of all they certainly won't be able to pay since the numbers are RIAA pulled out of the ass, "we lost this much" numbers and hence one or two orders of magnitude above any real figure.
If by "ass", you mean, "a market analyst and a lawyer looking for another summer home in Tahiti", you'd be correct. The analyst informs them of an earnings shortfall, and the lawyer tells them it's losses due to piracy rather than mismanagement and over-fleecing their artists.
If he's this emotionally invested in Microsoft R&D, and if he's willing to chase down everyone who disagrees, what makes you think he isn't working there already? The man says that people shouldn't give Apple all the credit (and rightly so), but he isn't willing to say the same for Microsoft.
And herein is the first lesson of the politician: Once you're in, all bets and promises are off. GW Bush did this, and his father was forced into breaking a very famous (and very foolish) promise; many politicians make big sweeping promises that they can or will never keep, because that's what gets them into a position where they can call the shots.
What the IOC should have done is look at the entire history of Communist China, especially how it treats dissidents, and told them, "Thanks for applying! Here are a few things you can work on before we can consider your application..." Instead, they followed the money, knowing that China's economy was going to explode, and wanted a piece of the action (they'll deny this publicly, of course, if a discussion on All Things Considered is any clue-- and the IOC representative then sounded sickeningly like a propaganda agent). In many ways they're like the ISO, and China like Microsoft; it's great when everyone plays by the rules, but one pigheaded bully can spoil it for everyone.
I would guess that they chucked him not because he was merely uncooperative ("I'm sorry, but I can't answer that"), but because he was hostile ("Which law enforcement agencies are you working with?").
I vote for the former. He's essentially a lobbyist now, and if he sways enough legislators, there will be even more costly regulation on the industry. Somehow, I don't think Take-Two is stupid or wealthy enough to play Andy Kaufmann with their business. It would be deliciously ironic and funny, but if it's true and their customers find out, no GTA game would be good enough to win them back.
If he had zero influence in the country, your advice would stand.
Instead, he's treated as a "video game expert" by the likes of Fox News and CBS, whose viewerships most likely outnumber Slashdot, Reddit, Gamepolitics, Digg, and the rest combined. Also, I'll wager that TV viewers are also more likely to call up their Congressperson demanding even more draconian controls over video games, because so many of the generation before Pong and the like are in retirement (hint: too much free time -> more stuff to complain about).
Now, if there were a champion for the video game industry willing to publicly counter every false point Thompson makes, your advice would still stand despite Thompson spouting his lies. Thankfully, we've got one for the recording industry, so who's going to be the NYCL that stands up to a charlatan, a coward, a liar, and a bully? Until we have one, I say post everything he does and let the world see who the greater fool is, a kid playing video games, or Jack Thompson.
1) You're modded insightful, but given his hypocrisy, I'll lay you 100-to-1 that he'll actually sue anyone who even tries. 1b) Even if fair's fair, you won't dismantle his campaign by stooping to his level. 2) I'm almost certain that because he's their father, they agree with his general opposition to violent games, and may even deny some of his conduct even happened—it's akin to politicians' kids and relatives.
Up until now, his actions have been that of a nutty lawyer on (at best) a misguided personal mission. Because he's controlled by his mission, he's allowed his actions to become on par with that of a "kitchen sink" political campaign. The only problem is, he's a rank amateur as a politician--there are things you don't do when you attack your opponent, and writing a harassing letter to the opponent's mother is probably considered stupid and pathetic.
The only thing this bozo's learned from Rovian politics is that as long as you declare yourself to be aligned with God, many on the political far right will give you a lot of leeway, and that means airtime on so-called conservative news sources.
I have to say, going into a den of lions like that and holding your own in an environment of scorn and ridicule takes serious guts. Dr. Hansen's argument was, essentially, "You don't agree with us, and you personally attack us when you say that the law rules us rather than the other way around." This, BTW, is the same type of "reasoning" that powers the numerous teams of lawyers in the current administration. It's chilling to see that the stewards of the law would rather rewrite the law in their own fashion.
Unfortunately, 80% of US citizens have no clue that emails are regularly backed up.
And since "I don't use traceable email" Cheney's really in charge over in DC, I wouldn't be surprised that after his experience in the Nixon White House, he pulled some plugs in the email archival system.
No, I don't mean CNN, NBC, or even the ones that a bit more out there like Huffington or even amateurs like Kos.
I mean comedians. Yes, The Daily Show and The Colbert Report are probably doing a better job covering political events, because the mainstream press won't bother with the stupid stuff the White House does, nor does the less conventional media, because it's more funny and sad than informative.
Lewis Black once got his loudest laughs based on his aneurysm joke that stems from a sentence that's nonsensical without its context. Now that this administration has seemingly tossed rationality, common sense, and sanity in the general direction of South America, his character probably doubled his blood pressure meds for destroying one of his funniest jokes at the time.
At the same time, Bush and buddies give him plenty of material to gleefully mock and angrily stew over at the same time, so it's all good. So far, there are no sedition laws... yet.
Fujitsu markets "Operation Manager" as part of their Systemwalker sysadmin product line, currently #3 behind the Microsoft product in a Google search for that phrase.
If YHOO goes down in flames for not taking Microsoft's offer, well, they deserve all the vitriol and litigation they're going to get.
Some companies base their decisions entirely on financial reasons, others take more risks. Unless you're a Yahoo board member or shareholder, you don't get any say in how they run the company.
Maybe you're not a MSFT shill, but your hobby is getting the better of you. Making a fuss over their earnings may be great on, say, fool.com, but here...?
I'm sure if they had the time, patience, and resources, they would. Microsoft is known primarily for Windows, Office, and Visual Studio, but they've got a shipyard's worth of individual programs and libraries, not to mention document templates and macros. Because some of their business customers don't bother to upgrade their software, they would have to toss in some older versions of Office and VS that are still at least in the maintenance phase. Testing the service pack against every possible combination of installed applications, including legacy versions, would cost them a fortune and then some. Since this is going to be a largely free distribution, I don't think the shareholders would like that one bit (not that they're terribly pleased about this turn of events for SP3).
Of course, if you're familiar with software and IT testing, this isn't how it works. You test against as many known inputs as you have the time and resources for, then the most likely scenarios, and hope the users don't trip over the errors you couldn't find in your schedule and budget. But testing against every compatible product you've ever developed? When you're the size of Microsoft?
I agree with your sentiment about color lasers, and I hope that the technology can improve them to the point where they can fit on the average desk/table without dominating the space.
Old-school HP cartridges, IMO, were expensive because they included the print head and related circuitry. In the days when inkjet heads clogged at the drop of a hat, this made a lot of sense; I remember the frustration in getting a consistent printout from an aging Epson printer, which would take forever to clear its heads. But now HP's "professional" Vivera inkjet design have separate tanks and print nozzles*, so I'd love to hear their excuse for overpricing their ink now.
* Someone figured out that you can just have easily detachable-- and therefore user-replaceable-- print nozzles if they get too crusty. Problem solved.
Slashdot Mirror
Although there are folks like Ron Paul (who doesn't have a snowflake's chance in hell now for the Presidency) who are touted as "true conservatives", the Republicans who took the majority during Clinton's tenure are mostly the sort of people who think that once they're elected, the only people they should give their time and attention are the ones who give them the most money. I think there's a case to be made that the Republican party was hijacked by such sociopaths who don't care one whit about the people they represent. In essence, we now have a bunch of PHBs in office (because by and large Democrats are no better or even worse-- Howard Berman and Fritz Hollings, for example), who try to collect as much money or power as possible.
The worst ones, of course, are those who don't care if people disagree with them and don't care if they run their country's economy into the ground, only about some petty constitutional theory regarding the executive branch. If you really want to direct your ire someplace, start with Dick Cheney, David Addington, and John Yoo. Bush is little more than a willing patsy; these guys used him and bullied everyone else to forcibly "prove" the unitary executive theory that would wreck the balance of power that true patriots worked so hard to create. Cheney watched Nixon resign in disgrace, so he created King George IV to spite the Congress that rightfully wanted Nixon's head for abusing power.
Cheney, as Defense secretary, advised his father to ignore Congress, but Bush Sr. was smarter and actually listened to advisors who disagreed (rather than surround himself with yes-men and lawyers), so he deferred the decision to begin Operation Desert Shield/Storm to Congress. He also knew enough about Vietnam to realize that having a permanent peacekeeping force there in a country that can easily become hostile (which is very much unlike South Korea or MacArthur-era Japan) is a very bad idea-- which is why he left Saddam in power rather than completely obliterate him and leave a power vacuum.
As VP, he surrounded Bush and himself with both a crowd of lawyers who (no doubt under intense pressure from Addington) told them they could do anything, and a cloak of secrecy that Stalin would've been proud of. In the early days, some appointees, like Colin Powell and John Ashcroft, still had a brain and a conscience, so when they resisted Cheney, they were circumvented until they resigned in disgust, only to be replaced with men who are effectively puppets. The aforementioned lawyers rival Scientology in their zeal to make sure the POTUS gets his way in everything.
I'm sure the Bush administration has the hubris and cojones to think that they will be remembered as the greatest presidency in US history, but I'm sure that historians will remember them as the administration that destroyed many things that made the US great. The best result of their ill-conceived policies is that future politicians will look to them as an example to avoid. The worst possible resulting scenarios are the administration effectively taking a third term (then a fourth, etc.), or a future President using the precedents they set to establish a true dictatorship.
If memory serves (heard it on NPR once), that's also the terrorist incident that has a small but vocal conspiracy theorist group claiming it's fake, going to such lengths as claiming the victims are in on it (some 9/11 conspiracy theorists do the same to 9/11 victims' families). Although governments are most likely responsible for abuses of power, those who abuse the victims don't help anyone but themselves.
While it's true that the lion's share of investors do it to get rich, don't discount the tiny minority that do because they think it's a great idea.
Of course, the former investor type call the latter "suckers"...
Devil's advocate:
Congress will go for it until they realize that the media industry is one of the biggest lobbying groups and contributors-- you can be sure that both cartels will turn up the lobbying if such a tax is introduced. I wouldn't be surprised if they inflate "losses from piracy", or raise the already outrageous prices on media, based on the amount of the IP tax in the very unlikely event that it passes. It would also be easy to convince small-fry IP producers (writers and small commercial software houses, among others) to put up a big stink about the tax increase as a threat to their livelihood.
The IP tax sounds like a great, elegant solution to a multibillion-dollar problem and threat, but we need to remember that the media industry didn't become so large by playing nice. There are ways of removing people from office using perceived scandal and FUD-- remember what happened to the guy who wanted Massachusetts to use open document formats and his proposal?
If by "ass", you mean, "a market analyst and a lawyer looking for another summer home in Tahiti", you'd be correct. The analyst informs them of an earnings shortfall, and the lawyer tells them it's losses due to piracy rather than mismanagement and over-fleecing their artists.
Atlantic counsel: "That's easy, (a) for both, of course! Why? Well," (pulls down diagram) "this is Chewbacca..."
If he's this emotionally invested in Microsoft R&D, and if he's willing to chase down everyone who disagrees, what makes you think he isn't working there already? The man says that people shouldn't give Apple all the credit (and rightly so), but he isn't willing to say the same for Microsoft.
And herein is the first lesson of the politician: Once you're in, all bets and promises are off. GW Bush did this, and his father was forced into breaking a very famous (and very foolish) promise; many politicians make big sweeping promises that they can or will never keep, because that's what gets them into a position where they can call the shots.
What the IOC should have done is look at the entire history of Communist China, especially how it treats dissidents, and told them, "Thanks for applying! Here are a few things you can work on before we can consider your application..." Instead, they followed the money, knowing that China's economy was going to explode, and wanted a piece of the action (they'll deny this publicly, of course, if a discussion on All Things Considered is any clue-- and the IOC representative then sounded sickeningly like a propaganda agent). In many ways they're like the ISO, and China like Microsoft; it's great when everyone plays by the rules, but one pigheaded bully can spoil it for everyone.
Must... resist... rickrolling...
No mention of the name MacGyver, but here's RDA without the mullet.
I would guess that they chucked him not because he was merely uncooperative ("I'm sorry, but I can't answer that"), but because he was hostile ("Which law enforcement agencies are you working with?").
I vote for the former. He's essentially a lobbyist now, and if he sways enough legislators, there will be even more costly regulation on the industry. Somehow, I don't think Take-Two is stupid or wealthy enough to play Andy Kaufmann with their business. It would be deliciously ironic and funny, but if it's true and their customers find out, no GTA game would be good enough to win them back.
If he had zero influence in the country, your advice would stand.
Instead, he's treated as a "video game expert" by the likes of Fox News and CBS, whose viewerships most likely outnumber Slashdot, Reddit, Gamepolitics, Digg, and the rest combined. Also, I'll wager that TV viewers are also more likely to call up their Congressperson demanding even more draconian controls over video games, because so many of the generation before Pong and the like are in retirement (hint: too much free time -> more stuff to complain about).
Now, if there were a champion for the video game industry willing to publicly counter every false point Thompson makes, your advice would still stand despite Thompson spouting his lies. Thankfully, we've got one for the recording industry, so who's going to be the NYCL that stands up to a charlatan, a coward, a liar, and a bully? Until we have one, I say post everything he does and let the world see who the greater fool is, a kid playing video games, or Jack Thompson.
Reminds you of the scene in Man on the Moon where DeVito's character tells Andy Kaufmann and the wrestler to stop messing with everyone's heads.
1) You're modded insightful, but given his hypocrisy, I'll lay you 100-to-1 that he'll actually sue anyone who even tries.
1b) Even if fair's fair, you won't dismantle his campaign by stooping to his level.
2) I'm almost certain that because he's their father, they agree with his general opposition to violent games, and may even deny some of his conduct even happened—it's akin to politicians' kids and relatives.
Up until now, his actions have been that of a nutty lawyer on (at best) a misguided personal mission. Because he's controlled by his mission, he's allowed his actions to become on par with that of a "kitchen sink" political campaign. The only problem is, he's a rank amateur as a politician--there are things you don't do when you attack your opponent, and writing a harassing letter to the opponent's mother is probably considered stupid and pathetic.
The only thing this bozo's learned from Rovian politics is that as long as you declare yourself to be aligned with God, many on the political far right will give you a lot of leeway, and that means airtime on so-called conservative news sources.
I have to say, going into a den of lions like that and holding your own in an environment of scorn and ridicule takes serious guts. Dr. Hansen's argument was, essentially, "You don't agree with us, and you personally attack us when you say that the law rules us rather than the other way around." This, BTW, is the same type of "reasoning" that powers the numerous teams of lawyers in the current administration. It's chilling to see that the stewards of the law would rather rewrite the law in their own fashion.
Unfortunately, the only "wisdom" many politicians know is in the form of money or power.
... and you're a "copy" of Warren Buffett.
Unfortunately, 80% of US citizens have no clue that emails are regularly backed up.
And since "I don't use traceable email" Cheney's really in charge over in DC, I wouldn't be surprised that after his experience in the Nixon White House, he pulled some plugs in the email archival system.
No, I don't mean CNN, NBC, or even the ones that a bit more out there like Huffington or even amateurs like Kos.
I mean comedians. Yes, The Daily Show and The Colbert Report are probably doing a better job covering political events, because the mainstream press won't bother with the stupid stuff the White House does, nor does the less conventional media, because it's more funny and sad than informative.
Lewis Black once got his loudest laughs based on his aneurysm joke that stems from a sentence that's nonsensical without its context. Now that this administration has seemingly tossed rationality, common sense, and sanity in the general direction of South America, his character probably doubled his blood pressure meds for destroying one of his funniest jokes at the time.
At the same time, Bush and buddies give him plenty of material to gleefully mock and angrily stew over at the same time, so it's all good. So far, there are no sedition laws... yet.
Fujitsu markets "Operation Manager" as part of their Systemwalker sysadmin product line, currently #3 behind the Microsoft product in a Google search for that phrase.
If YHOO goes down in flames for not taking Microsoft's offer, well, they deserve all the vitriol and litigation they're going to get.
Some companies base their decisions entirely on financial reasons, others take more risks. Unless you're a Yahoo board member or shareholder, you don't get any say in how they run the company.
Maybe you're not a MSFT shill, but your hobby is getting the better of you. Making a fuss over their earnings may be great on, say, fool.com, but here...?
I'm sure if they had the time, patience, and resources, they would. Microsoft is known primarily for Windows, Office, and Visual Studio, but they've got a shipyard's worth of individual programs and libraries, not to mention document templates and macros. Because some of their business customers don't bother to upgrade their software, they would have to toss in some older versions of Office and VS that are still at least in the maintenance phase. Testing the service pack against every possible combination of installed applications, including legacy versions, would cost them a fortune and then some. Since this is going to be a largely free distribution, I don't think the shareholders would like that one bit (not that they're terribly pleased about this turn of events for SP3).
Of course, if you're familiar with software and IT testing, this isn't how it works. You test against as many known inputs as you have the time and resources for, then the most likely scenarios, and hope the users don't trip over the errors you couldn't find in your schedule and budget. But testing against every compatible product you've ever developed? When you're the size of Microsoft?
I agree with your sentiment about color lasers, and I hope that the technology can improve them to the point where they can fit on the average desk/table without dominating the space.
(laserjet? can you say, kleenex or aspirin?)
Old-school HP cartridges, IMO, were expensive because they included the print head and related circuitry. In the days when inkjet heads clogged at the drop of a hat, this made a lot of sense; I remember the frustration in getting a consistent printout from an aging Epson printer, which would take forever to clear its heads. But now HP's "professional" Vivera inkjet design have separate tanks and print nozzles*, so I'd love to hear their excuse for overpricing their ink now.
* Someone figured out that you can just have easily detachable-- and therefore user-replaceable-- print nozzles if they get too crusty. Problem solved.