It would also be a shame if a company spent millions of dollars developing a revolutionary material only to have the rest of the world use it for free and the research company not get reimbursed and as a result never create anything else again.
If only everybody were altruistic in their motives. Then maybe the patent holder would license his/her material to your friend for a reasonable fee, and they'd both be happy. I think this is how it's SUPPOSED to work...
Hey, didn't Jackie Chan make a movie about that Sun/IBM trademark meeting? No wait, that was a Chinese restaurant, not a Sun Microsystems boardroom. And hey, it was a triad, not IBM. And come to think of it Jackie Chan doesn't show up in the Forbes article and kick IBM ass.
Why were you being underpaid anyways? Your employer was obviously willing to pay you more. If you're "worth" more to your employer, there should be a way to substantiate this without having to get another job offer. My advice to anybody else would be to get salary information off dice.com or wherever, and go talk to your boss. Arrange a meeting, and professionally go over the subject of your salary. State that you enjoy your job and want to stay (hopefully that's true otherwise you should be doing something about that as well) but you are worth more $$ and here's why. State that you want to be a loyal employee but it's difficult when you're being underpaid.
This way you'll likely get your raise if you work for a Good Company. Either that or you'll get a reason you (more or less) trust for why you can't get one, and hopefully they'll try to help you out in some other way - stock / private office / whatever. Or you'll get some lame excuse and if you didn't realize it before you'll know now that your company is just interested in using you and throwing you out. THEN it's time to start entertaining other offers. And at that point, I'd say once you have an offer, DO NOT accept any counter offer. You could use a counter-offer to raise your other offer, though...
Back when I used to be an employee, I realized that I had to look at my career as my own company. I was president of my own company, and had to do what was right for that company (i.e. myself). We're all "free agents" whether we're employees, contractors, whatever. You may think your employer has loyalty to you but all that means is that they'll regret laying you off when times get tough. But they'll still do it.
Reminds me of a neato but completely impractical (for the moment) business idea I had a few years ago. Once you have plasma-tv walls or something, you can pretty much be anywhere you want. I'm obviously far from the only person to have thought of this, but wouldn't it be great, instead of having an alarm clock, to wake up to sunrise in the Gobi desert on your ceiling and all 4 walls? Just place cameras in remote places (assuming there are any left by then) and for $29.95 per month people can "be" wherever they want in their own room.
That, and I keep hoping They invent the teleporter soon...
Could be - I've never been inside a bank's server room. Keep in mind though that these servers are being administered (and hosted?) by IBM. This whole thread started with discussing how to keep CC information secure so I guess I was going back to that.
In the end, my point about the uzis was a little tongue in cheek to just say that if anybody really wants your data, they'll find a way to get it. If the reward justifies the hassle and risk to somebody, they'll do it.
I haven't been into any large hosting facilities since the September 11 deal, but before then I NEVER saw an armed guard in any of the facilities I went to. Not to say they aren't at some, but never were at Verio, level3, etc. Or I didn't see them...
Anyways, it's really just a risk =? reward equation. If myself and one or two others had automatic weapons and explosives and really wanted something, I don't think a smart card reader would really stop us...
Yes you would definitely freeze all the accounts. But think of the ramifications of that:
- Your CC processing company gets pissed at you for causing them hassles. Your risk/annoyance factor goes up, and likely so does your processing fee
- The CC companies have to reissue credit cards to, say, 100,000 of their cardmembers. Or deal with it somehow.
- You lose MAJOR credibility with anybody who hears about it. If this story makes it to the press, it would make you look Very Very Bad. Customers place a very high importance on the security and privacy of their data, ESPECIALLY their credit card information. Not everybody, but most people.
Sure, if 100,000 credit card numbers are stolen the credit card companies and police will be able to cross-reference them VERY quickly to your store (hmm, where have all these people shopped in the last couple years?) but that still won't help YOU.
All it takes is a couple people with Uzis. Then you pull the server off the rack and walk out the door. As with anything else in this world, it really depends on how badly you want something and what you're willing to do to get it.
I do agree with you about the problems about relying on another company to look after your security. Even though you may hire IBM or whoever to look after your systems, it still remains your responsibility.
This DOES perform useful functions. For instance, I'm planning on putting one of my computers beside my TV anyways, Real Soon Now. I can use it as a very expensive Playstation, for instance;-). Soon maybe I could use it as an expensive tivo too...and of course a file/web/ftp/whatever server as well.
OK it's been a while since I've used my engineering degree, but... IIRC titanium has a lower modulus of elasticity than (most) steels. This means it is more "bendy". HOWEVER, it also has a MUCH higher plastic deformation limit, which means you can bend it a lot farther than most steels and it would bend right back. So for instance if you make a knife out of titanium you'd probably be able to bend it right around but it would spring right back when you were done (no plastic deformation, only elastic).
SO, yes your mountain bike frame is more bendy than an aluminum or chromoly one. That is why very few manufacturers make titanium full suspensioin frames, but they're great for hardtails. I read an article once about how some custom TI framebuilder took one of his frames and bent the thing around, to the horror of the article's author, only to see it spring right back. Do that to an aluminum frame and you'd just crack it, but it would be a lot harder to bend in the first place (speaking generally).
The fact that you used to compete in mountain biking doesn't mean you know anything about materials. Heck, I compete AND have a degree in Civil Engineering and I hardly know what I'm talking about.
Wow, I just opened my browser and this is what I see at the top. I was just going to eBay to check their policies because some guy is trying to charge me $20 shipping (& "handling") for a $2 phone headset. Like an idiot I trusted his feedback rating of ~250 and didn't ask what shipping was.
The auction just said "shipping via UPS ground". So the moral of the story is, always get everything in writing BEFOREHAND.
For those of you who have never lived in or visited sub-Saharan Africa and who didn't bother reading the article, the tsetse fly is not "just" a "fly". A bite from a tsetse fly means that there is a high probability that you WILL contract sleeping sickness. This illness is called sleeping sickness because it KILLS you. As the article says, 80% of people who contract "sleeping" sickness end up dying. While wild animals are generally immune to the bite of a tsetse fly, horses and cattle aren't. This means that vast areas of the continent that might otherwise be used for agriculture to sustain human life are off limits, although humans still live there.
Tsetse flies do not like to fly long distances (maybe > a couple hundred metres) out in the open, in the wind. This means that one of the main ways of preventing their spread right now is to cut wide swaths through the forest at the edge of tsetse fly areas in order to attempt to keep them from the rest of the region. Then they place police/military checkpoints at the roads in these areas to look through your car and spray it. Of course, with the economy of most countries in this area, they're maybe not doing this any more as it's been a few years since I've been there. Anyways, for those of you concerned with the biodiversity of the region and the delicate balance of nature, you can chew on the ramifications of mowing down hundreds/thousands of acres of land for no other reason.
Anyways, these flies aren't just pests. They carry a deadly disease for which, as far as I know, there is no cure. I'm not a biologist (IANAB) and I can't say whether this is a "good" or "bad" idea, but these are just some facts to think about.
Well the good news is that you can learn from this to always get everything in writing first, and always read the fine print...
Seriously though, are you SURE that it says ALL your code (intellectual property) belongs to them? If so, wow that's pretty draconian. If you're willing to lose $5k to get rid of the stipulation, then maybe you'd also be willing to go find a lawyer (BTW IANAL). They'll probably either tell you a) that it's unenforcable in court unless your company can prove that you've been reusing proprietary knowledge from work, or work computers, software, etc., or b) they'll draw up a proposal for a different agreement and help you try to get your company to change their policy for you.
I don't know where you work but at most places this kind of crap is general gobbledygook they make everybody sign and you'd probably be able to work there anyways if you'd just initialled beside it and crossed it out (they'd probably not even notice), or you work at a small company where they'll probably work with you anyways if you have "special needs" and can provide them piece of mind.
Just some thoughts, if you're serious about getting out of your situation.
In later news, The Niels Bohr family have commented that while they can be sure the bulk of the documents remain at the Niels Bohr Archive, the location of documents relating to Mr. Bohr's meeting with Heisenberg cannot be verified, as the documents do not seem to be in plain view at the moment.
With my current moderator status I was going to give this comment a clearly undeserved "fruitalicious" but then I wouldn't have been able to post to explain that it was just a joke...
Slashdot Mirror
It would also be a shame if a company spent millions of dollars developing a revolutionary material only to have the rest of the world use it for free and the research company not get reimbursed and as a result never create anything else again.
If only everybody were altruistic in their motives. Then maybe the patent holder would license his/her material to your friend for a reasonable fee, and they'd both be happy. I think this is how it's SUPPOSED to work...
Hey, didn't Jackie Chan make a movie about that Sun/IBM trademark meeting? No wait, that was a Chinese restaurant, not a Sun Microsystems boardroom. And hey, it was a triad, not IBM. And come to think of it Jackie Chan doesn't show up in the Forbes article and kick IBM ass.
Pity though.
Why were you being underpaid anyways? Your employer was obviously willing to pay you more. If you're "worth" more to your employer, there should be a way to substantiate this without having to get another job offer. My advice to anybody else would be to get salary information off dice.com or wherever, and go talk to your boss. Arrange a meeting, and professionally go over the subject of your salary. State that you enjoy your job and want to stay (hopefully that's true otherwise you should be doing something about that as well) but you are worth more $$ and here's why. State that you want to be a loyal employee but it's difficult when you're being underpaid.
This way you'll likely get your raise if you work for a Good Company. Either that or you'll get a reason you (more or less) trust for why you can't get one, and hopefully they'll try to help you out in some other way - stock / private office / whatever. Or you'll get some lame excuse and if you didn't realize it before you'll know now that your company is just interested in using you and throwing you out. THEN it's time to start entertaining other offers. And at that point, I'd say once you have an offer, DO NOT accept any counter offer. You could use a counter-offer to raise your other offer, though...
Back when I used to be an employee, I realized that I had to look at my career as my own company. I was president of my own company, and had to do what was right for that company (i.e. myself). We're all "free agents" whether we're employees, contractors, whatever. You may think your employer has loyalty to you but all that means is that they'll regret laying you off when times get tough. But they'll still do it.
Ver-tel-swoop:
n. pl. vertelswoopen
- The dive of the Mongolian metropolitan wattle bird (vertelus mongolius) as it attacks toupee wearing gentlemen (or ladies)
- The surprise removal of an unsuspecting person's toupee
[Hindi moribund, from Cherokee bagel. See weiner]Does that make this word official now?
Reminds me of a neato but completely impractical (for the moment) business idea I had a few years ago. Once you have plasma-tv walls or something, you can pretty much be anywhere you want. I'm obviously far from the only person to have thought of this, but wouldn't it be great, instead of having an alarm clock, to wake up to sunrise in the Gobi desert on your ceiling and all 4 walls? Just place cameras in remote places (assuming there are any left by then) and for $29.95 per month people can "be" wherever they want in their own room.
That, and I keep hoping They invent the teleporter soon...
Could be - I've never been inside a bank's server room. Keep in mind though that these servers are being administered (and hosted?) by IBM. This whole thread started with discussing how to keep CC information secure so I guess I was going back to that.
In the end, my point about the uzis was a little tongue in cheek to just say that if anybody really wants your data, they'll find a way to get it. If the reward justifies the hassle and risk to somebody, they'll do it.
I haven't been into any large hosting facilities since the September 11 deal, but before then I NEVER saw an armed guard in any of the facilities I went to. Not to say they aren't at some, but never were at Verio, level3, etc. Or I didn't see them...
Anyways, it's really just a risk =? reward equation. If myself and one or two others had automatic weapons and explosives and really wanted something, I don't think a smart card reader would really stop us...
Yes you would definitely freeze all the accounts. But think of the ramifications of that:
- Your CC processing company gets pissed at you for causing them hassles. Your risk/annoyance factor goes up, and likely so does your processing fee
- The CC companies have to reissue credit cards to, say, 100,000 of their cardmembers. Or deal with it somehow.
- You lose MAJOR credibility with anybody who hears about it. If this story makes it to the press, it would make you look Very Very Bad. Customers place a very high importance on the security and privacy of their data, ESPECIALLY their credit card information. Not everybody, but most people.
Sure, if 100,000 credit card numbers are stolen the credit card companies and police will be able to cross-reference them VERY quickly to your store (hmm, where have all these people shopped in the last couple years?) but that still won't help YOU.
All it takes is a couple people with Uzis. Then you pull the server off the rack and walk out the door. As with anything else in this world, it really depends on how badly you want something and what you're willing to do to get it. I do agree with you about the problems about relying on another company to look after your security. Even though you may hire IBM or whoever to look after your systems, it still remains your responsibility.
I didn't know fonts required that much bandwidth, anyways...
This DOES perform useful functions. For instance, I'm planning on putting one of my computers beside my TV anyways, Real Soon Now. I can use it as a very expensive Playstation, for instance ;-). Soon maybe I could use it as an expensive tivo too...and of course a file/web/ftp/whatever server as well.
I don't know how much it costs for a day of blowjobs, but I can tell you they cost up to $0.21 each here
OK it's been a while since I've used my engineering degree, but... IIRC titanium has a lower modulus of elasticity than (most) steels. This means it is more "bendy". HOWEVER, it also has a MUCH higher plastic deformation limit, which means you can bend it a lot farther than most steels and it would bend right back. So for instance if you make a knife out of titanium you'd probably be able to bend it right around but it would spring right back when you were done (no plastic deformation, only elastic). SO, yes your mountain bike frame is more bendy than an aluminum or chromoly one. That is why very few manufacturers make titanium full suspensioin frames, but they're great for hardtails. I read an article once about how some custom TI framebuilder took one of his frames and bent the thing around, to the horror of the article's author, only to see it spring right back. Do that to an aluminum frame and you'd just crack it, but it would be a lot harder to bend in the first place (speaking generally). The fact that you used to compete in mountain biking doesn't mean you know anything about materials. Heck, I compete AND have a degree in Civil Engineering and I hardly know what I'm talking about.
*blush* I was going to write IANAB(iologist) but I suppose that was plain... Come to /., learn something new every day.
I might also point out that a rat is a rodent, not a mammal. The poster commented that all MAMMAL clones possible so far are female.
Wow, I just opened my browser and this is what I see at the top. I was just going to eBay to check their policies because some guy is trying to charge me $20 shipping (& "handling") for a $2 phone headset. Like an idiot I trusted his feedback rating of ~250 and didn't ask what shipping was.
The auction just said "shipping via UPS ground". So the moral of the story is, always get everything in writing BEFOREHAND.
Have to go see if he's "allowed" to do that...
For those of you who have never lived in or visited sub-Saharan Africa and who didn't bother reading the article, the tsetse fly is not "just" a "fly". A bite from a tsetse fly means that there is a high probability that you WILL contract sleeping sickness. This illness is called sleeping sickness because it KILLS you. As the article says, 80% of people who contract "sleeping" sickness end up dying. While wild animals are generally immune to the bite of a tsetse fly, horses and cattle aren't. This means that vast areas of the continent that might otherwise be used for agriculture to sustain human life are off limits, although humans still live there.
Tsetse flies do not like to fly long distances (maybe > a couple hundred metres) out in the open, in the wind. This means that one of the main ways of preventing their spread right now is to cut wide swaths through the forest at the edge of tsetse fly areas in order to attempt to keep them from the rest of the region. Then they place police/military checkpoints at the roads in these areas to look through your car and spray it. Of course, with the economy of most countries in this area, they're maybe not doing this any more as it's been a few years since I've been there. Anyways, for those of you concerned with the biodiversity of the region and the delicate balance of nature, you can chew on the ramifications of mowing down hundreds/thousands of acres of land for no other reason.
Anyways, these flies aren't just pests. They carry a deadly disease for which, as far as I know, there is no cure. I'm not a biologist (IANAB) and I can't say whether this is a "good" or "bad" idea, but these are just some facts to think about.
Well the good news is that you can learn from this to always get everything in writing first, and always read the fine print...
Seriously though, are you SURE that it says ALL your code (intellectual property) belongs to them? If so, wow that's pretty draconian. If you're willing to lose $5k to get rid of the stipulation, then maybe you'd also be willing to go find a lawyer (BTW IANAL). They'll probably either tell you a) that it's unenforcable in court unless your company can prove that you've been reusing proprietary knowledge from work, or work computers, software, etc., or b) they'll draw up a proposal for a different agreement and help you try to get your company to change their policy for you.
I don't know where you work but at most places this kind of crap is general gobbledygook they make everybody sign and you'd probably be able to work there anyways if you'd just initialled beside it and crossed it out (they'd probably not even notice), or you work at a small company where they'll probably work with you anyways if you have "special needs" and can provide them piece of mind.
Just some thoughts, if you're serious about getting out of your situation.
In later news, The Niels Bohr family have commented that while they can be sure the bulk of the documents remain at the Niels Bohr Archive, the location of documents relating to Mr. Bohr's meeting with Heisenberg cannot be verified, as the documents do not seem to be in plain view at the moment.
According to Nokia's site, the Nokia Rooftop is NOT 802.11b.
FYI
I guess you don't remember the old luggables from the '80s...
With my current moderator status I was going to give this comment a clearly undeserved "fruitalicious" but then I wouldn't have been able to post to explain that it was just a joke...
For USD220 per hour, you can bet that Larry will have his consultants doing anything people will pay them for.
Not only that, but kernel 2.5.3 of WHAT???
;-)
and I'LL call you and threaten your life, if that's what you're into...