"To follow your analogy, the "perfectly good ramp" also has a *TOLL* added to it that people using stairs do not have to pay!"
No, that's not accurate. At best, there's a poll for both the stairs and the ramp, and the toll is higher for the ramp because the maintenance costs are higher and the ramp needs to be resurfaced more often.
I'm sure most people have seen buildings where there are many stairs, or a really long ramp, running the length of the building two or maybe even four times. You can take the ramp, but it's slower than taking the stairs because of the physical constraints imposed by having to travel so much further. It's more like that, and this is perfectly acceptable under the ADA.
"I also did not have total control over the content put in by the client. Since they frequently used an & standing alone, that made it a badly formed XML...."
Well, yeah. If it wasn't compliant XML, it is hardly surprising that the browsers refused to display the page when you claimed it was valid XML. That's what they are supposed to do.
Removing the XML claim, as you found, was perfectly appropriate.
I'd been avoiding getting a DVD player because the movie industry is treating their customers like crap, but if it will help bring about their downfall sooner, maybe I'll go get one now.
Nah, I don't believe their propoganda, and I'm entirely certain they are treating customers like crap, so I'll stick to my own personal boycott.
"I believe it passed unopposed. Leaving you three options:
spoil your vote
vote for someone other than the incumbent
don't even show up to vote"
A better option is to show up, vote, and actively obstain if you don't like any candidates for a particular office. There are probably other issues worth voting on any particular ballot, and the total number of votes is relevant (if underreported). As more people actively obstain, it will become easier to demonstrate the need and desire for a binding none-of-the-above option. Increasing voter turnout of people who understand technology would be a Good Thing.
This is hardly surprising, given the resources they waste sending out tins to people who don't want them. I already have DSL, and I received three of the tins today, all to the same address.
"If the place is small enough forcing them to comply could cause them to go out of business."
Let's see if I can articulate the points where we agree.
1. A private business shouldn't be forced out of business by these requirements, that would be unfair. This is why the cut-off point you mention exists.
2. The requirements are recognized to have at least a small detremental effect on business in most cases. If this weren't the case, the cut-off wouldn't be needed.
3. At least some businesses would rather not comply with these requirements (presumably because of the effect on their bottom line), and only do so because of the potential legal penalties.
Any disagreement on any of those points?
First, let's consider the 'death by a thousand cuts' arguement.
If point 1 says it isn't fair to force someone out of business for a single social good like wheelchair access does it follow that it is also unfair to force someone out of business by requiring them to comply with dozens or hundreds of seperate requirements, each for a social good?
Is it acceptable to raise so many requirements that the effective barriers to entry prevent people from starting businesses in the first place if each of those seperate requirements is for a social good, and each of them has a relatively small cost?
Obviously, if each of the requirements only takes effect once a business is a particular size, it is possible to start really small businesses without being subject to the requirements. Don't let that distract you. These questions are still important.
Next, let's consider peoples natural tendancies to avoid things they don't like.
Generally, people avoid pain, they avoid coercion, and they avoid situations where they are penalized for doing something they want to do. Sometimes they do what they want and attempt to avoid the penalities by keeping secret the fact that they've done something that they could be penalized for.
Almost all people act this way, almost all the time. It's perfectly natural, and it should come as no surprise that people in businesses want to avoid taxes and legal requirements like wheelchair access.
What isn't obvious (it's actually a bit counter-intuitive) is that coercing someone into doing something makes people avoid complying, even if they might have been inclinded to do it on their own in the absence of coercion. When someone is told they must do something, they generally won't want to, even if they would have done that very thing if they hadn't been coerced.
When we think about the overall effect of creating a requirement in order to create a social good (such as wheelchair access), it is worth considering the fact that some people to avoid satifying that social good who would have otherwise done so on their own, without the requirement.
The overall effect of the requirement then is that some number of people will be successfully forced to meet the requirement and some people will avoid doing so as a direct result of the existance of the requirement. If we wanted to measure the effect of the requirement, we would only count these two groups, as people not meeting the requirement who already wouldn't have done so and people meeting the requirement on their own even though they aren't required to do so don't count.
The group of people who would have met the requirement but don't because of the requirement is unmeasurable, and the overall result is potentially negative.
Given that there are a large set of requirements that kick in once a business is a particular size, and people seek to avoid things they are forced to do, businesses often seek to avoid reaching the particular size where the requirements keep in. People seek loopholes because they don't like coercion.
If requirements are based on number of employees, and business owners will seek to avoid unwanted requirements, there will be some (perhaps many) businesses who actively choose not to hire additional people as a direct result of the fact that this would force them to comply with additional requirements. To the extent that this occurs, the requirements have contributed to unemployment.
"Is it possible to demand prosecution for a crime? I suppose technically it isn't, but practically, it probably is. If you do something in front of a police station and tell them it's illegal, I don't think they can really resfuse to prosecute you."
This is one place the difference between criminal law and civil law is really important.
You'd have to convince them you were violating a criminal law, or they'd be able to ignore you if they didn't feel like doing the paperwork and research involved.
"So is TPJ saying they can't scrape up a combination of internal money, investors and advertiser commitments to get an additional $36k ??"
No, they are saying they need 3000 paying subscribers to make things work. Ad rates are based on subscriptions. Giving them 36K wouldn't help, that's not the point.
"I have asked said lawyer you are the one who I'm calling the bluff on."
Now I'm really confused. Just what do you think I've done that you can sue me for?
"Besides making a site
accessible basically means good coding practices and using standards which, I might add you should have done
in the first place."
You appear to be asusming that I'm in some way associated with Southwest. I'm not. I've been arguing that this potential case doesn't belong in the courts, and that Southwest, although they ought to fix their site, should not be required to do so, because that would be ethically indestinguisable from state sanctioned slavery.
"..., to force them to do what is perceived by their electorate as the right thing to do."
The governments primary role is to prevent people from harming one another, even when a majority agrees to harm a minority by making that harm 'legal' through legislation. That's why we have courts, and why courts are allowed to overturn legislation when it unfairly allows one group to harm another.
Having a poorly designed web page is really stupid, but it doesn't harm people.
Forcing one group to do unpaid labor on behalf of another group does do harm.
Would you rather live in a society where people are allowed to have bad web pages, or a society where slavery is legal again?
"If you don't have a problem with providing wheelchair ramps to help accessibility (which is probably far more
expensive than having your webmaster do a couple of days work), then you shouldn't have a problem with this."
I have a problem with forcing somenoe to do two days work without compensation, even if I personally think it's a really good idea.
If we say today 'two days work isn't all that much', then next year we will be saying 'two weeks work isn't all that much'. Once you accept that you can force someone else to do unpaid work on your behalf, you've crossed the line.
Can you provide a citation showing that the ADA applies to web sites of private businesses? Didn't think so.
"Besides, the sort of thing that you are asking for is a very simple thing to implement. For instance Alt tags for images."
This could be seen as a 'tip of the wedge' sort of issue. First alt tags. A couple more itterations and flash might be illegal. Not that I'd miss it.
"I've seen a lot of commercial sites that don't have the alt text."
Doesn't that suggest that this isn't really a trivial issue? Consider all the 'web developers' out there that use a web authoring tool and don't really know HTML. There's a large education issue involved here, plus many changes to many old pages.
And just how many blind web users planing their own flights do you suppose Southwest thinks there are anyway?
"Talk to a lawyer, I know one who could tell you that this is an open and shut case and Southwest won't win."
But you haven't actually ask that lawyer yet, right? And you're already 0 for 2 in that post by my count. Forgive me for doubting you.
"If every blind person in the US were to boycott SW it would not make a dent in SW's revinue."
Ah, but if a large number of blind people and friends of blind people, plus perhaps some friends of friends of blind people were to raise a stink about it, and to let Southwest know they were avoiding Southwest as a direct result, that would matter to Southwest.
You said: "Now while they shouldn't be allowed to sue small website (like my personal site, if they wanted), I see no problem with letting them sue large stores over their websites."
Then I ask: "Can you help me understand why you think it's okay for someone to require something of a large and successful organization that they cannot fairly require of a smaller organization."
And you said: "No. It's called 'trying to make the world a better and caring place'.
If you were an anarchist, then maybe you would have a good point.
You live in a democratic, capitalist society. And unless you are will to to change it, you have no point, You have accepted it, and you have to take the good with the bad."
I'm still confused. You seem to suggest that it would be okay to require a concession like fixing web pages from Southwest, but not okay to require the same concession from the independant bookstore on the corner.
Was that what you meant?
If so, how do you justify requiring something of Southwest that you wouldn't also require of every other private business?
"Because what you do with your private property often affects others. For example, there is a individual in D.C. shooting people. He is clearly using his private property (gun) in the manner he wants.Using your logic we shouldn't care that he is doing this."
What an idiot.
Obviously shooting someone harms other people. That person is actively damaging another person, and it is unquestionably wrong.
Failing to provide something another person wants doesn't even begin to be in the same class.
By you're twisted example, I'd be able to sue you for failing to give me your loaf of bread.
Here's a viewpoint that makes sense:
1. We should be able to act or fail to act so long as we don't cause harm to others or to their property.
2. We should not be forced to act in a way that provides another person with a boon at our own expense.
Southwest is already choosing to provide web pages, at their expense. Good for them. They should not be forced to incur additional expense just to satisfy a few potential customers.
Personally I think it would be a good business choice for them to make their pages more accessable, but I cannot agree that they should be forced to do so. I can't be certain it makes good business sense for them to fix the pages, but there is a more important issue.
The threat of a lawsuit is fundamentally about turning the coercive forces of government against Southwest in order to force Southwest to do what the plantiff asks. In this case, that request is effectively requiring Southwest to provide something to the plantiff which that plaintiff has no moral or ethical claim to.
Forcing Southwest to provide something to another when they don't want to do so is morally and ethically indistinguishable from any other form of coercion. The extent and severity is certainly different from theft, extortion, slavery, rape and murder, but the fundamental coercion is the same.
If Southwest doesn't want to fix their web pages, it is inapproriate for anyone to force them to do so by convincing the government to point guns at them.
"So, again what is he to do? Assuming this person had contacted Southwest's webmasters (which as I said they should have,) what would you do next? And don't say just not use there services."
Obviously Southwest ought to follow the HTML standards. We can probably most all agree with that. The question the lawsuit raises is "Should Southwest be legally required to do so?"
You said "following standards is not hard", but you also pointed out that web authoring tools produce content that doesn't follow the standards.
If Southwest doesn't have any Web Designers on staff (and really, they are in the business of providing transportation, not producing web pages), should they be required to hire someone to come in and fix all their web pages? This could potentially cost quite a bit of money, depending on the details (tools used, amount of dynamic content, scripts used to produce dynamic content).
When we consider the fact that Southwest has now had a negative PR hit for not already having accessable web pages, so their market of blind web users may have shrunk, how long might it take to recoup the costs of becoming compliant if another airline manages to spin this in such a way that bling web users avoid Southwest?
All of this goes into an assessment of Southwest's financial incentive to fix their pages. Personally I think it's obvious that they should fix the pages. Southwest's bean counters might disagree.
Suppose for a moment that the expenses involved are enormous, and Southwest can demonstrate that they could never hope to collect enough revenue to offset the expenses. Imagine for a moment that the costs were so high as that Southwest could demonstrate it would make more sense to simply stop having a web site altogether. Is it ethically reasonable to require that they maintain the web site and fix the accessability issues with the web pages when they already provide phone support?
This question is worth answering because a precident in the ADA's favor in this case could lead to some situation in which some other business is forced to comply when the costs associated outway the value of having a web site.
"Now while they shouldn't be allowed to sue small website (like my personal site, if they wanted), I see no problem with letting them sue large stores over their websites."
Perhaps I'm just a bit unclear on the concept. Can you help me understand why you think it's okay for someone to require something of a large and successful organization that they cannot fairly require of a smaller organization.
Is this sort of a 'price of success' thing?
I'd be really interested in hearing an explaination of the logic that supports placing a requirement on one group that cannot be fairly imposed on another group.
On the one hand, I think it's wrong to require that someone else go to extra work just to satisfy a minority interest when that minority interest could just avoid doing business with them. [1]
On the other hand, if this is successful, it might make people fix many of those sites that break when javascript is turned off, and I'd personally like that quite a bit.
[1] Don't get me wrong, I agree with the idea that certain public spaces must be accessable to handicapped people. In particular, I agree that handicapped people must be allowed reasonable access to all government buildings that the general public is allowed access to. What isn't so clear in my mind is that private businesses like restaurants should be required to comply with accessability laws. Personally I think it's certainly in their financial interest to do so, but I disagree with the idea of forcing them to comply by threat of law. In the same way, I don't agree with the idea that a private business like an airline should be forced to change web pages by threat of law. However, they do have what ammounts to a government granted oligopoly, so maybe that would be fair. Of course, that wouldn't be the logic used to justify it, so it would still spill over into places it wouldn't be justified. Sigh.
"Their stupid license isn't what's the problem. The problem is people who refuse to consider paying for their software. Not even an option to consider? Nobody on this whole topic has even brought up the actual number of dollars - no need to, because spending money is out of the question. You're willing to hamper your project because you're not willing to even consider paying money. "
The price isn't the main objection I'm hearing people raise, but even that may be a perfectly legitimate objection based on what the price is and how much someone who wants to participate in kernel development can spend. (Remember to consider developers in foreign contries before claiming that any particular price is affordable, no matter how small it may seem to you.)
The main objection people are raising is that the license appears to require that people pick sides in an ideological conflict that shouldn't exist. Either you use BitKeeper and you side with their imposed view of which other projects you may also work on, or you reject BitKeeper's restrictions and you don't get to participate in projects that require the use of BitKeeper in order to participate.
The ideal model (which people are upset with BitKeeper for breaking) is that you may participate in whichever set of projects you wish,
without artificial restrictions.
Consider a person you wants to contribute to the development of both Linux and CVS. Before this license change by BitKeeper, there were no obvious restictions on a persons ability to do this. With this new clause, such a person will have to give something up.
"So many people here are getting all upset because BitKeeper is not free."
I'm not at all upset by this change to BitKeeper, but I am even more sad than I was the last time
(months ago) that I heard anything about BitKeeper.
At that time I read the licence and determined I'd be unable (unwilling) to have anything to do with Linux kernel development for the forseeable future because accepting BitKeeper's license was effectively a cost of entry that I couldn't (wouldn't) pay.
This change comes as no surprise to me, but it is pointless to say 'saw that coming', as it doesn't help eleviate the burden others are stuck with.
What makes me really sad is that other people are being forced to decide which free projects they will continue to work on and which free projects they will have to stop working on, and these painful dicsisions are the direct result of what is likely to turn out to have been a bad financial choice on BitMover's part anyway.
"The government is, after all, representative of the people, not the few large corporations. "
Yeah, just keep telling yourself that, it's easier that way.
Re:Promoting progress through copyright extension
on
Eldred vs. Ashcroft
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
Sure seems like it, at first anyway.
My guess is that the legal viewpoint would be that if the extension to copyright occurs before the violation of that extended copyright, it isn't an ex post facto law, because the law existed before the violation of the law.
The real problem here is that <sarcasm>our representatives</sarcasm> are giving away something we value for free, presumably because they are being compensated for doing so by the industry to whom they are giving the gift of copyright extension.
The only surprise here is that heads aren't rolling yet.
The only reason people treat IT workers like this is because they get away with it. If you tolorate it you make the industry worse for all of us. Whatever you do, please understand that there are consequences that effect your peers.
The proper response to "These 8 hour days have to stop, we need to be working 15 hours a day and weekends, balls to the wall."
is "And how many hours on weekends? 15 on saturday and Sunday also? Lets see, that's 105 hours per week, right? Okay, I'm willing to consider your proposal, but there seems to be something missing. This is the point where you tell me what I get in exchange for working more than two and half times as many hours as you are currently paying me for."
First, any such agreement should have a strictly defined time frame.
Second, realize that you know they need you to work on the project, so you have a very strong bargaining position. You hold all the card. If they fire you for refusing the project fails and you can sue them. If they don't offer you a deal you like, you can keep working 40 hours a week and let them know that the project will succeed or fail based on the realism built into the project schedule. Tell them you're commited to helping insure the project succeeds, but you cannot give away your labor.
Point out that it is customary to pay time and half for hours beyond 40 and double or tripple time for hours beyond 60 or 80. Help them out with the math, show them exactly how much free labor they are asking you to perform using your base salary divided by 2000 as your hourly wage, and point out that you aren't even factoring in the extra portions they have to pay like social security tax, unemployment insurance, and any other employer paid items like health benifits if you have them.
Of course they will question your loyalty and do whatever they can think of to make you feel guilty, but remember that they are already treating you badly, using a scorched earth policy, and you will probably be discarded once the project is over anyway. More importantly, they have already demonstrated a failure to properly manage projects, and unless that is corrected the company will fail.
If they cannot offer you a cash bonus or overtime or a salary increase (effective immediately, remember you might not be there long) suggest paid time off afterwards, with at least a one-for-one comp time ratio (preferably time and a half, doube time, triple time).
If you think that the company will still be there in year and it is already publically traded you might accept some stocks in exchange for some portion of your labor, but you should get a good price on those stocks, at an equitable price based on the real value of your overtime work.
If none of those are an option, ask for a lean on some hardware they have and you'd like when their company folds. Make sure they really own the hardware and nobody else already has a lean.
I'm sure someone is going to ask me why I think my opinion matters, and how I can hold such an unrealistic viewpoint, so I'll go ahead and answer now.
I worked for a Fucked Company called Open Sales and then Zelerate which tried the same stunts. I was one of a group of programmers told to put in overtime, and I made a point of taking a hardline stance that was successful and wound up getting an agreement from management to pay comp-time for myself and the rest of the programming group.
This agreement was made after many email exchanges with upper management and several pointed questions and long distance phone calls (We were in Albuquerque, they were in CA). The agreement was made during a crunch time. If we had waited it would never have happened.
The rest of the programming team applauded my efforts, but they all thought it was a waste of time until I was successful.
After the crunch, when the deadline was met, we were all called into the office on Friday, Jan 5, 2001 so they could tell us what our next project would be. Instead, they announced that the entire office was being eliminated.
The severance packages included pay for three weeks plus each programmers accrued comp-time which in some cases was quite large.
Of course, the company folded several months later and anyone who had accepted stock options in lue of cash (not me) lost.
Slashdot Mirror
No, that's not accurate. At best, there's a poll for both the stairs and the ramp, and the toll is higher for the ramp because the maintenance costs are higher and the ramp needs to be resurfaced more often.
I'm sure most people have seen buildings where there are many stairs, or a really long ramp, running the length of the building two or maybe even four times. You can take the ramp, but it's slower than taking the stairs because of the physical constraints imposed by having to travel so much further. It's more like that, and this is perfectly acceptable under the ADA.
Well, yeah. If it wasn't compliant XML, it is hardly surprising that the browsers refused to display the page when you claimed it was valid XML. That's what they are supposed to do.
Removing the XML claim, as you found, was perfectly appropriate.
"Life is like a sewer. What you get out of it depends on what you put into it." -- Tom_Lehrer
Nah, I don't believe their propoganda, and I'm entirely certain they are treating customers like crap, so I'll stick to my own personal boycott.
A better option is to show up, vote, and actively obstain if you don't like any candidates for a particular office. There are probably other issues worth voting on any particular ballot, and the total number of votes is relevant (if underreported). As more people actively obstain, it will become easier to demonstrate the need and desire for a binding none-of-the-above option. Increasing voter turnout of people who understand technology would be a Good Thing.
This is hardly surprising, given the resources they waste sending out tins to people who don't want them. I already have DSL, and I received three of the tins today, all to the same address.
Let's see if I can articulate the points where we agree.
Any disagreement on any of those points?
First, let's consider the 'death by a thousand cuts' arguement.
If point 1 says it isn't fair to force someone out of business for a single social good like wheelchair access does it follow that it is also unfair to force someone out of business by requiring them to comply with dozens or hundreds of seperate requirements, each for a social good?
Is it acceptable to raise so many requirements that the effective barriers to entry prevent people from starting businesses in the first place if each of those seperate requirements is for a social good, and each of them has a relatively small cost?
Obviously, if each of the requirements only takes effect once a business is a particular size, it is possible to start really small businesses without being subject to the requirements. Don't let that distract you. These questions are still important.
Next, let's consider peoples natural tendancies to avoid things they don't like.
Generally, people avoid pain, they avoid coercion, and they avoid situations where they are penalized for doing something they want to do. Sometimes they do what they want and attempt to avoid the penalities by keeping secret the fact that they've done something that they could be penalized for.
Almost all people act this way, almost all the time. It's perfectly natural, and it should come as no surprise that people in businesses want to avoid taxes and legal requirements like wheelchair access.
What isn't obvious (it's actually a bit counter-intuitive) is that coercing someone into doing something makes people avoid complying, even if they might have been inclinded to do it on their own in the absence of coercion. When someone is told they must do something, they generally won't want to, even if they would have done that very thing if they hadn't been coerced.
When we think about the overall effect of creating a requirement in order to create a social good (such as wheelchair access), it is worth considering the fact that some people to avoid satifying that social good who would have otherwise done so on their own, without the requirement.
The overall effect of the requirement then is that some number of people will be successfully forced to meet the requirement and some people will avoid doing so as a direct result of the existance of the requirement. If we wanted to measure the effect of the requirement, we would only count these two groups, as people not meeting the requirement who already wouldn't have done so and people meeting the requirement on their own even though they aren't required to do so don't count. The group of people who would have met the requirement but don't because of the requirement is unmeasurable, and the overall result is potentially negative.
Given that there are a large set of requirements that kick in once a business is a particular size, and people seek to avoid things they are forced to do, businesses often seek to avoid reaching the particular size where the requirements keep in. People seek loopholes because they don't like coercion.
If requirements are based on number of employees, and business owners will seek to avoid unwanted requirements, there will be some (perhaps many) businesses who actively choose not to hire additional people as a direct result of the fact that this would force them to comply with additional requirements. To the extent that this occurs, the requirements have contributed to unemployment.
This is one place the difference between criminal law and civil law is really important.
You'd have to convince them you were violating a criminal law, or they'd be able to ignore you if they didn't feel like doing the paperwork and research involved.
No, they are saying they need 3000 paying subscribers to make things work. Ad rates are based on subscriptions. Giving them 36K wouldn't help, that's not the point.
Alright then, I was just confused by the 'calling your bluff' language. My mistake.
Now I'm really confused. Just what do you think I've done that you can sue me for?
"Besides making a site
accessible basically means good coding practices and using standards which, I might add you should have done
in the first place."
You appear to be asusming that I'm in some way associated with Southwest. I'm not. I've been arguing that this potential case doesn't belong in the courts, and that Southwest, although they ought to fix their site, should not be required to do so, because that would be ethically indestinguisable from state sanctioned slavery.
The governments primary role is to prevent people from harming one another, even when a majority agrees to harm a minority by making that harm 'legal' through legislation.
That's why we have courts, and why courts are allowed to overturn legislation when it unfairly allows one group to harm another.
Having a poorly designed web page is really stupid, but it doesn't harm people.
Forcing one group to do unpaid labor on behalf of another group does do harm.
Would you rather live in a society where people are allowed to have bad web pages, or a society where slavery is legal again?
expensive than having your webmaster do a couple of days work), then you shouldn't have a problem with this."
I have a problem with forcing somenoe to do two days work without compensation, even if I personally think it's a really good idea.
If we say today 'two days work isn't all that much', then next year we will be saying 'two weeks work isn't all that much'. Once you accept that you can force someone else to do unpaid work on your behalf, you've crossed the line.
Can you provide a citation showing that the ADA applies to web sites of private businesses? Didn't think so.
"Besides, the sort of thing that you are asking for is a very simple thing to implement. For instance Alt tags for images."
This could be seen as a 'tip of the wedge' sort of issue. First alt tags. A couple more itterations and flash might be illegal. Not that I'd miss it.
"I've seen a lot of commercial sites that don't have the alt text."
Doesn't that suggest that this isn't really a trivial issue? Consider all the 'web developers' out there that use a web authoring tool and don't really know HTML. There's a large education issue involved here, plus many changes to many old pages.
And just how many blind web users planing their own flights do you suppose Southwest thinks there are anyway?
"Talk to a lawyer, I know one who could tell you that this is an open and shut case and Southwest won't win."
But you haven't actually ask that lawyer yet, right? And you're already 0 for 2 in that post by my count. Forgive me for doubting you.
Ah, but if a large number of blind people and friends of blind people, plus perhaps some friends of friends of blind people were to raise a stink about it, and to let Southwest know they were avoiding Southwest as a direct result, that would matter to Southwest.
"Now while they shouldn't be allowed to sue small website (like my personal site, if they wanted), I see no problem with letting them sue large stores over their websites."
Then I ask:
"Can you help me understand why you think it's okay for someone to require something of a large and successful organization that they cannot fairly require of a smaller organization."
And you said:
"No. It's called 'trying to make the world a better and caring place'.
If you were an anarchist, then maybe you would have a good point.
You live in a democratic, capitalist society. And unless you are will to to change it, you have no point, You have accepted it, and you have to take the good with the bad."
I'm still confused. You seem to suggest that it would be okay to require a concession like fixing web pages from Southwest, but not okay to require the same concession from the independant bookstore on the corner.
Was that what you meant?
If so, how do you justify requiring something of Southwest that you wouldn't also require of every other private business?
What an idiot.
Obviously shooting someone harms other people. That person is actively damaging another person, and it is unquestionably wrong.
Failing to provide something another person wants doesn't even begin to be in the same class.
By you're twisted example, I'd be able to sue you for failing to give me your loaf of bread.
Here's a viewpoint that makes sense:
1. We should be able to act or fail to act so long as we don't cause harm to others or to their property.
2. We should not be forced to act in a way that provides another person with a boon at our own expense.
Southwest is already choosing to provide web pages, at their expense. Good for them. They should not be forced to incur additional expense just to satisfy a few potential customers.
Personally I think it would be a good business choice for them to make their pages more accessable, but I cannot agree that they should be forced to do so. I can't be certain it makes good business sense for them to fix the pages, but there is a more important issue.
The threat of a lawsuit is fundamentally about turning the coercive forces of government against Southwest in order to force Southwest to do what the plantiff asks. In this case, that request is effectively requiring Southwest to provide something to the plantiff which that plaintiff has no moral or ethical claim to.
Forcing Southwest to provide something to another when they don't want to do so is morally and ethically indistinguishable from any other form of coercion. The extent and severity is certainly different from theft, extortion, slavery, rape and murder, but the fundamental coercion is the same.
If Southwest doesn't want to fix their web pages, it is inapproriate for anyone to force them to do so by convincing the government to point guns at them.
Obviously Southwest ought to follow the HTML standards. We can probably most all agree with that. The question the lawsuit raises is "Should Southwest be legally required to do so?"
You said "following standards is not hard", but you also pointed out that web authoring tools produce content that doesn't follow the standards.
If Southwest doesn't have any Web Designers on staff (and really, they are in the business of providing transportation, not producing web pages), should they be required to hire someone to come in and fix all their web pages? This could potentially cost quite a bit of money, depending on the details (tools used, amount of dynamic content, scripts used to produce dynamic content).
When we consider the fact that Southwest has now had a negative PR hit for not already having accessable web pages, so their market of blind web users may have shrunk, how long might it take to recoup the costs of becoming compliant if another airline manages to spin this in such a way that bling web users avoid Southwest?
All of this goes into an assessment of Southwest's financial incentive to fix their pages. Personally I think it's obvious that they should fix the pages. Southwest's bean counters might disagree.
Suppose for a moment that the expenses involved are enormous, and Southwest can demonstrate that they could never hope to collect enough revenue to offset the expenses. Imagine for a moment that the costs were so high as that Southwest could demonstrate it would make more sense to simply stop having a web site altogether. Is it ethically reasonable to require that they maintain the web site and fix the accessability issues with the web pages when they already provide phone support?
This question is worth answering because a precident in the ADA's favor in this case could lead to some situation in which some other business is forced to comply when the costs associated outway the value of having a web site.
Perhaps I'm just a bit unclear on the concept. Can you help me understand why you think it's okay for someone to require something of a large and successful organization that they cannot fairly require of a smaller organization.
Is this sort of a 'price of success' thing?
I'd be really interested in hearing an explaination of the logic that supports placing a requirement on one group that cannot be fairly imposed on another group.
On the other hand, if this is successful, it might make people fix many of those sites that break when javascript is turned off, and I'd personally like that quite a bit.
[1] Don't get me wrong, I agree with the idea that certain public spaces must be accessable to handicapped people. In particular, I agree that handicapped people must be allowed reasonable access to all government buildings that the general public is allowed access to. What isn't so clear in my mind is that private businesses like restaurants should be required to comply with accessability laws. Personally I think it's certainly in their financial interest to do so, but I disagree with the idea of forcing them to comply by threat of law. In the same way, I don't agree with the idea that a private business like an airline should be forced to change web pages by threat of law. However, they do have what ammounts to a government granted oligopoly, so maybe that would be fair. Of course, that wouldn't be the logic used to justify it, so it would still spill over into places it wouldn't be justified. Sigh.
The price isn't the main objection I'm hearing people raise, but even that may be a perfectly legitimate objection based on what the price is and how much someone who wants to participate in kernel development can spend. (Remember to consider developers in foreign contries before claiming that any particular price is affordable, no matter how small it may seem to you.)
The main objection people are raising is that the license appears to require that people pick sides in an ideological conflict that shouldn't exist. Either you use BitKeeper and you side with their imposed view of which other projects you may also work on, or you reject BitKeeper's restrictions and you don't get to participate in projects that require the use of BitKeeper in order to participate.
The ideal model (which people are upset with BitKeeper for breaking) is that you may participate in whichever set of projects you wish, without artificial restrictions.
Consider a person you wants to contribute to the development of both Linux and CVS. Before this license change by BitKeeper, there were no obvious restictions on a persons ability to do this. With this new clause, such a person will have to give something up.
I'm not at all upset by this change to BitKeeper, but I am even more sad than I was the last time (months ago) that I heard anything about BitKeeper.
At that time I read the licence and determined I'd be unable (unwilling) to have anything to do with Linux kernel development for the forseeable future because accepting BitKeeper's license was effectively a cost of entry that I couldn't (wouldn't) pay.
This change comes as no surprise to me, but it is pointless to say 'saw that coming', as it doesn't help eleviate the burden others are stuck with.
What makes me really sad is that other people are being forced to decide which free projects they will continue to work on and which free projects they will have to stop working on, and these painful dicsisions are the direct result of what is likely to turn out to have been a bad financial choice on BitMover's part anyway.
So much needless suffering for so little benefit.
Yeah, just keep telling yourself that, it's easier that way.
My guess is that the legal viewpoint would be that if the extension to copyright occurs before the violation of that extended copyright, it isn't an ex post facto law, because the law existed before the violation of the law.
The real problem here is that <sarcasm>our representatives</sarcasm> are giving away something we value for free, presumably because they are being compensated for doing so by the industry to whom they are giving the gift of copyright extension.
The only surprise here is that heads aren't rolling yet.
The proper response to "These 8 hour days have to stop, we need to be working 15 hours a day and weekends, balls to the wall." is "And how many hours on weekends? 15 on saturday and Sunday also? Lets see, that's 105 hours per week, right? Okay, I'm willing to consider your proposal, but there seems to be something missing. This is the point where you tell me what I get in exchange for working more than two and half times as many hours as you are currently paying me for."
First, any such agreement should have a strictly defined time frame.
Second, realize that you know they need you to work on the project, so you have a very strong bargaining position. You hold all the card. If they fire you for refusing the project fails and you can sue them. If they don't offer you a deal you like, you can keep working 40 hours a week and let them know that the project will succeed or fail based on the realism built into the project schedule. Tell them you're commited to helping insure the project succeeds, but you cannot give away your labor.
Point out that it is customary to pay time and half for hours beyond 40 and double or tripple time for hours beyond 60 or 80. Help them out with the math, show them exactly how much free labor they are asking you to perform using your base salary divided by 2000 as your hourly wage, and point out that you aren't even factoring in the extra portions they have to pay like social security tax, unemployment insurance, and any other employer paid items like health benifits if you have them.
Of course they will question your loyalty and do whatever they can think of to make you feel guilty, but remember that they are already treating you badly, using a scorched earth policy, and you will probably be discarded once the project is over anyway. More importantly, they have already demonstrated a failure to properly manage projects, and unless that is corrected the company will fail.
If they cannot offer you a cash bonus or overtime or a salary increase (effective immediately, remember you might not be there long) suggest paid time off afterwards, with at least a one-for-one comp time ratio (preferably time and a half, doube time, triple time).
If you think that the company will still be there in year and it is already publically traded you might accept some stocks in exchange for some portion of your labor, but you should get a good price on those stocks, at an equitable price based on the real value of your overtime work.
If none of those are an option, ask for a lean on some hardware they have and you'd like when their company folds. Make sure they really own the hardware and nobody else already has a lean.
I'm sure someone is going to ask me why I think my opinion matters, and how I can hold such an unrealistic viewpoint, so I'll go ahead and answer now.
I worked for a Fucked Company called Open Sales and then Zelerate which tried the same stunts. I was one of a group of programmers told to put in overtime, and I made a point of taking a hardline stance that was successful and wound up getting an agreement from management to pay comp-time for myself and the rest of the programming group.
This agreement was made after many email exchanges with upper management and several pointed questions and long distance phone calls (We were in Albuquerque, they were in CA). The agreement was made during a crunch time. If we had waited it would never have happened.
The rest of the programming team applauded my efforts, but they all thought it was a waste of time until I was successful.
After the crunch, when the deadline was met, we were all called into the office on Friday, Jan 5, 2001 so they could tell us what our next project would be. Instead, they announced that the entire office was being eliminated.
The severance packages included pay for three weeks plus each programmers accrued comp-time which in some cases was quite large.
Of course, the company folded several months later and anyone who had accepted stock options in lue of cash (not me) lost.