If you really think that the Indian wars of the 19th century demonstrate that the present Chinese and U.S governments are equivalent, I can't help you. I'll take lessons from you about Tibet when you learn how to spell Nez Perce.
No, it isn't. It is presently illegal under the Posse Comitatus Act, a federal law enacted by Congress in the late 19th century. Also, a recent law permits the military to provide material and logistical support to law enforcement in certain circumstances. In any event, the military wasn't at Kent State, rather, the Ohio National Guard was, and any governor can call out the state's NG to assist in law enforcement. And what this has to do with whether the killings at Kent State were "accidental" is beyond me.
It was surely "accidental" in the sense that no person in authority ever said, "Hey, let's go out and kill a couple of college students, including a couple of non-protestors." (Compare, e.g., Tianamen Square.)
While I don't want to stir the fire too much, the statistics concerning unauthorized wiretaps, which have similar restrictions, led me to believe that policing agencies need to a grip on what they already have before they start working through more.
While I don't mean to quash anyone's healthy paranoia, I am not aware of statistics (as opposed to anecdotes) indicating that unauthorized wiretaps are in widespread use. (Indeed, I would imagine such stastics would be pretty hard to come by. What would you do -- call up FBI agents and police departments and ask if they've got any illegal taps going?) Carnivore may be a bad idea even if unauthorized taps are unusual, but that doesn't justify fearmongering.
Also, with reference to Iran, the numerous posts suggesting use of the "Solitaire" cipher fail to take into account that simple possession of a deck of playing cards is not always and everywhere a good idea.
"Jenkins, come look at this interesting Slashdot story. I'm going to need you to go out and hire a whole bunch of these, um... er... stenographers. We've got some, you say? Hot damn! Now we're cooking with gas!"
So the accidental killing of a college student 30 years ago equates to the situation in Tibet?
Any reasonable person will concede that there indeed have been instances where those in authority in various governmental agencies in the United States have intentionally punished speakers for their viewpoints. One could say that about any Western democracy. But your suggestion that these incidents -- which have been isolated and each subject to heavy public scrutiny -- mean that there are no differences between such countries and China demonstrates only your inability to make meaningful moral distinctions.
Yep, it's true that some areas of Unix are very weak, like printer drivers, but that's more a reflection of the culture: Unix isn't used on office desktops much.
How dare you deride this poster for his ignorance. For god's sake, in order to find out these facts, he would have had to click the link and read the New York Times story. Did you ever stop to think that some people can't afford to be clicking around all the time like you do because they can't afford to pay the modem tax? And did you realize that the New York Times sometimes uses long words that people who attended underfunded public schools wouldn't know? No, you didn't, mister smart guy. You didn't stop to think at all.
Let this be a lesson to all of you who would criticize someone for posting a comment based on nothing more than ignorance. It's ignorance, all right, but it's a purer and better kind of ignorance than you city folk with your book-larnin' will ever know or understand.
The phrase You are welcome to Windows NT just seems nonsensical.
Perhaps it signals that it's time to rejuvenate that rumor that Microsoft is going to freely license its OS.
Generic Katz Criticism (GPLed, feel free to use)
on
Frankenstein Time
·
· Score: 2
I would like to complain about Jon Katz. As I have noted several times in connection with every single one of the last hundred stories posted by Jon Katz, it is irritating to have to read the same nonsense again and again. Also Katz's writing is prolix, redundant, too long and excessively verbose. Finally, he is arrogant and condescending, which the rest of you would realize if you were as smart as me. Also, he failed to mention several obvious points (unless he mentioned them at some point after the first fifty words, when I gave up reading because I am much too busy to read any farther). As for all you people who question whether I am too stupid to simply skip stories by Jon Katz in the future, I won't dignify your inquiry with a response, because the answer is obvious.
Brian Walker, a toy inventor with no college degree and almost no flight experience, plans to blast himself into space next summer in a rocket he is building in his backyard.
In the United States, where a person or entity violates a provision of a particularly complex statute, usually there are only sanctions for noncompliance if the person "willfully" violated the law (i.e., knowingly), and there is often an "advice of counsel" defense (i.e., I'm not liable because I went to my lawyer in good faith and he told me this was OK).
(Of course, even if you aren't sanctioned, you do have to comply once your violation is pointed out to you.)
I'm not a lawyer, but it stands to reason that unless they specifically hold some sort of leagal claim to "PETA.org" they shouldn't automatically have rights to it.
PETA's legal claim to the use of the "PETA" mark is established both by trademark statutes and by PETA's expense of significant effort and resources to identify that mark with its organization.
The test for whether the trademark is infringed is not whether the arguably-infringing mark is bitwise-identical but rather (IIRC) whether an average consumer would be confused. I think there's no doubt that a typical person who knew of the existence of PETA would expect that "peta.org" would be a PETA site. I expect your modified hypothetical title of my "Harry Potter" example would also cause confusion. (Compare the Lampoon parody titles "Bored of the Rings" and "Doon," which anyone even slightly familiar with the originals would recognize as parodies, and so there would be no confusion.)
Impersonation is the (some say) greatest form of flattery...
I would like to pay you a high compliment. Please send me your SSN, credit card numbers, color copies of various photo IDs, a recording of your voice and the home phone numbers of your boss/thesis adviser and significant other.
Shouldn't web sites be ruled the same as parody in other forms of media, such as movies and songs?
They are. But that's a copyright issue, not a trademark issue. Doughney's free to do a PETA parody page -- he just can't put it under "peta.org," where people would reasonably expect to find the actual PETA site. Similarly, I could write a "Harry Potter" parody, but I can't title it "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone," because that would clearly confuse people looking for the actual book. In short, there's no free speech right to misappropriate someone's trademark.(*)
(* Just to clarify a repeated misunderstanding before it inevitably appears again, it is not a misappropriation of someone's trademark to say or write the trademarked word, phrase, or logo. It is misappropriation to use that trademark to divert people who want to deal with the actual individual or entity that uses the name. If you read this and persist in posting something along the lines of "So does this mean I can't use the letters I, B and M in my domain name?" you are a pinhead.)
On what basis do you claim that corporations are "exempt from most criminal law"? There is an entire section of the Federal Sentencing Guidelines that addresses sentencing of corporations and other institutional defendants under the federal criminal code. Nor am I aware that any state exempts corporations from its criminal laws.
Unless you're registering a copyright on something extremely unusual(*), you probably don't need an attorney to register a copyright in the United States. Go to the Copyright Office's web site, download the form, fill it out, write a check, lick the stamp, find a mailbox. The end.
(* By "unusual," I mean having an unusual form -- something other than ordinary text, recorded music, works of art, etc.)
Still seems like a massive waste of time. Plus it's unfair to people who can't wait on line all night (e.g., people with certain kinds of disabilities, parents).
Hear, hear. This camera is monstrously huge. In the same price range, Fuji makes a camera only moderately larger than a Canon Elph with better resolution and which takes the tiny SmartMedia cards. Are the cards slightly more expensive then I'd like? Sure. Is the transfer speed of the camera's built-in connection fast enough to make the $30 SmartMedia PC Card unnecessary? No. But you throw it into a coat pocket and completely forget it's there; I use mine (the prior model) all the time. I really can't even imagine why I'd want something like this Sony.
I'd agree, but I'd also note that this principle has its limits: witness the disastrous Gates deposition. It's important that the witness walk a line between not volunteering information and outright stonewalling.
A complete prick? This is slightly acrimonious, but not nasty or unprofessional. It is what you should expect from serious hardcore lawyers. They don't get into screaming fights, but neither do they hold hands and sing "Kumbayah."
To the contrary: the entire point of a deposition is to determine what the witness does or does not know. In any event, why do you think Mr. Garbus should have known the answers to these questions before he asked them?
Mr. Gold would likely not make all these objections at trial, but if he does not make them now, he cannot make them at trial. The witness will answer the question notwithstanding the objection unless Mr. Gold specifically instructs the witness not to answer the question. There is nothing unusual or unprofessional about Mr. Gold's conduct in this regard.
Slashdot Mirror
If you really think that the Indian wars of the 19th century demonstrate that the present Chinese and U.S governments are equivalent, I can't help you. I'll take lessons from you about Tibet when you learn how to spell Nez Perce.
No, it isn't. It is presently illegal under the Posse Comitatus Act, a federal law enacted by Congress in the late 19th century. Also, a recent law permits the military to provide material and logistical support to law enforcement in certain circumstances. In any event, the military wasn't at Kent State, rather, the Ohio National Guard was, and any governor can call out the state's NG to assist in law enforcement. And what this has to do with whether the killings at Kent State were "accidental" is beyond me.
It was surely "accidental" in the sense that no person in authority ever said, "Hey, let's go out and kill a couple of college students, including a couple of non-protestors." (Compare, e.g., Tianamen Square.)
While I don't mean to quash anyone's healthy paranoia, I am not aware of statistics (as opposed to anecdotes) indicating that unauthorized wiretaps are in widespread use. (Indeed, I would imagine such stastics would be pretty hard to come by. What would you do -- call up FBI agents and police departments and ask if they've got any illegal taps going?) Carnivore may be a bad idea even if unauthorized taps are unusual, but that doesn't justify fearmongering.
Also, with reference to Iran, the numerous posts suggesting use of the "Solitaire" cipher fail to take into account that simple possession of a deck of playing cards is not always and everywhere a good idea.
"Jenkins, come look at this interesting Slashdot story. I'm going to need you to go out and hire a whole bunch of these, um ... er ... stenographers. We've got some, you say? Hot damn! Now we're cooking with gas!"
Any reasonable person will concede that there indeed have been instances where those in authority in various governmental agencies in the United States have intentionally punished speakers for their viewpoints. One could say that about any Western democracy. But your suggestion that these incidents -- which have been isolated and each subject to heavy public scrutiny -- mean that there are no differences between such countries and China demonstrates only your inability to make meaningful moral distinctions.
invert(cause, effect);
How dare you deride this poster for his ignorance. For god's sake, in order to find out these facts, he would have had to click the link and read the New York Times story. Did you ever stop to think that some people can't afford to be clicking around all the time like you do because they can't afford to pay the modem tax? And did you realize that the New York Times sometimes uses long words that people who attended underfunded public schools wouldn't know? No, you didn't, mister smart guy. You didn't stop to think at all.
Let this be a lesson to all of you who would criticize someone for posting a comment based on nothing more than ignorance. It's ignorance, all right, but it's a purer and better kind of ignorance than you city folk with your book-larnin' will ever know or understand.
Perhaps it signals that it's time to rejuvenate that rumor that Microsoft is going to freely license its OS.
I would like to complain about Jon Katz. As I have noted several times in connection with every single one of the last hundred stories posted by Jon Katz, it is irritating to have to read the same nonsense again and again. Also Katz's writing is prolix, redundant, too long and excessively verbose. Finally, he is arrogant and condescending, which the rest of you would realize if you were as smart as me. Also, he failed to mention several obvious points (unless he mentioned them at some point after the first fifty words, when I gave up reading because I am much too busy to read any farther). As for all you people who question whether I am too stupid to simply skip stories by Jon Katz in the future, I won't dignify your inquiry with a response, because the answer is obvious.
Correction: For "space", read "smithereens".
(Of course, even if you aren't sanctioned, you do have to comply once your violation is pointed out to you.)
PETA's legal claim to the use of the "PETA" mark is established both by trademark statutes and by PETA's expense of significant effort and resources to identify that mark with its organization.
The test for whether the trademark is infringed is not whether the arguably-infringing mark is bitwise-identical but rather (IIRC) whether an average consumer would be confused. I think there's no doubt that a typical person who knew of the existence of PETA would expect that "peta.org" would be a PETA site. I expect your modified hypothetical title of my "Harry Potter" example would also cause confusion. (Compare the Lampoon parody titles "Bored of the Rings" and "Doon," which anyone even slightly familiar with the originals would recognize as parodies, and so there would be no confusion.)
I would like to pay you a high compliment. Please send me your SSN, credit card numbers, color copies of various photo IDs, a recording of your voice and the home phone numbers of your boss/thesis adviser and significant other.
They are. But that's a copyright issue, not a trademark issue. Doughney's free to do a PETA parody page -- he just can't put it under "peta.org," where people would reasonably expect to find the actual PETA site. Similarly, I could write a "Harry Potter" parody, but I can't title it "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone," because that would clearly confuse people looking for the actual book. In short, there's no free speech right to misappropriate someone's trademark.(*)
(* Just to clarify a repeated misunderstanding before it inevitably appears again, it is not a misappropriation of someone's trademark to say or write the trademarked word, phrase, or logo. It is misappropriation to use that trademark to divert people who want to deal with the actual individual or entity that uses the name. If you read this and persist in posting something along the lines of "So does this mean I can't use the letters I, B and M in my domain name?" you are a pinhead.)
On what basis do you claim that corporations are "exempt from most criminal law"? There is an entire section of the Federal Sentencing Guidelines that addresses sentencing of corporations and other institutional defendants under the federal criminal code. Nor am I aware that any state exempts corporations from its criminal laws.
(* By "unusual," I mean having an unusual form -- something other than ordinary text, recorded music, works of art, etc.)
Still seems like a massive waste of time. Plus it's unfair to people who can't wait on line all night (e.g., people with certain kinds of disabilities, parents).
Hear, hear. This camera is monstrously huge. In the same price range, Fuji makes a camera only moderately larger than a Canon Elph with better resolution and which takes the tiny SmartMedia cards. Are the cards slightly more expensive then I'd like? Sure. Is the transfer speed of the camera's built-in connection fast enough to make the $30 SmartMedia PC Card unnecessary? No. But you throw it into a coat pocket and completely forget it's there; I use mine (the prior model) all the time. I really can't even imagine why I'd want something like this Sony.
I'd agree, but I'd also note that this principle has its limits: witness the disastrous Gates deposition. It's important that the witness walk a line between not volunteering information and outright stonewalling.
A complete prick? This is slightly acrimonious, but not nasty or unprofessional. It is what you should expect from serious hardcore lawyers. They don't get into screaming fights, but neither do they hold hands and sing "Kumbayah."
I suggest skipping ahead to page 87, line 15, and starting from there. You won't miss much.
To the contrary: the entire point of a deposition is to determine what the witness does or does not know. In any event, why do you think Mr. Garbus should have known the answers to these questions before he asked them?
Mr. Gold would likely not make all these objections at trial, but if he does not make them now, he cannot make them at trial. The witness will answer the question notwithstanding the objection unless Mr. Gold specifically instructs the witness not to answer the question. There is nothing unusual or unprofessional about Mr. Gold's conduct in this regard.