Yes, they are. I would consider a phone that has longer battery life to be safer.
How long is long enough for you then? Emergencies generally can't be predicted, so unless your battery life is "infinite", it's just as possible that you'll desperately need your phone 5 minutes after you take it from the charger as it is that you'll need it 12 hours after its last charge....
Really? I must have missed that clause when I read the bill. Could you point out the part that says that other peoples sex-lives are your business for me?
Wrong. It affects his contractual agreements. He promotes himself as a role model. I'm not sure if you realize this, but I'm not a big fan of celebrity. However much of our society is and it affects everything we do, including electing a junior senator who never ran anything bigger than a community organization to President of the USA. But hey, what do I know.
Ah, and that's why he's being sued by all of his sponsors for breach of contract. Oh wait, no he isn't. I'm unaware of any celebrity who signs away their right to have a personal life to their sponsors. But don't let little facts like that get in the way of your making stuff up. As for Obama, he doesn't seem to be doing all that badly, no matter how badly the right hopes he fails at everything. Oh, wait, you're not right wing either. Much like you chose a religious name and espouse Christian values but aren't religious, you spout right wing talk-show host nonsense but aren't actually right-wing, right?
I'm a libertarian, so I believe that people should rule themselves, while I also realize that some people can't or won't rule themselves (basis for the thread). Some people are social paths and just don't care, other people are just assholes who stay just this side of what is "legal". The only solution is that we need people who can punch the asshole in the face (like the asshole in Walmart who only has a limited vocabulary that he uses the F-Bomb as noun, verb, adverb and a proper name. Asshole, needs to be punched in the nose.
Quite the deep thinker, aren't you. If you don't like the way someone acts, just punch 'em out. Mentally ill (the basis of this thread)? Punch 'em in the face, that'll teach 'em to stop being all crazy. Bad language? Punch 'em, that'll fix 'em. Guess what, "just this side of legal" is still legal, but assaulting people for things you don't like is illegal. Therefore, you're a scumbag criminal, and they're your innocent victim. Congratulations.
Oh, you're one of those guys. Nobody is wrong unless they upset your view of the world. All views are equal as long as they are compatible with yours. Got it.
How exactly do you "upset my view of the world"? Live any way you want, but keep your nose out of my business. I'll do the same for you. So far though you've suggested again and again that you're nosey and like to tell other people how to live. You appear to feel that you have a right to not be offended (example: " the asshole in Walmart who only has a limited vocabulary that he uses the F-Bomb as noun, verb, adverb and a proper name"), and that's a right that just plain old doesn't exist.
It all depends on what you call mental illness doesn't it? Is being Gay a mental illness? If it is, can it be cured? If by it not being curable becomes accepted part of society it becomes "normalized" does that make it not a mental illness?
In what way do you suppose that being bipolar, or schizophrenic, or suffering from paranoid delusions are going to be "normalized"? Homosexuality being classified as a mental illness is an embarrassment to the field of psychiatry. Psychiatry was used to classify an unpopular group as "mentally ill", when it's generally agreed that classification wasn't motivated by any concern for the mental health of homosexuals, but rather social and political pressure to demonize a group of people.
The easy fix for people like this is to lock them up so that they cannot harm the rest of society. However that is frowned upon by people because it is "mean" or whatever and that we should tolerate them mingling in with the rest of society. The fix is easy, if we only had the will do
Twinkie defense of diminished capacity for cold blooded murder. Reduced to "voluntary manslaughter" is a joke itself.
You don't get it. The murders had nothing to do with junk-food. It was never claimed that they did. The junk-food link is that White underwent a sudden, sharp personality change, and going from being a health-nut to a junk-food fanatic was a symptom of his condition, not the cause. I'll say that last part again for you, it was never claimed by the defense that Twinkies made him do it. If you want to treat people with mental illness the same as you do everyone else, good for you, but it's generally accepted that the mentally ill are not behaving rationally, and can't be held to the same standard as someone who isn't mentally ill.
RE: Katrina stealing... the problem is deeper than just looting, because the looting is the symptom. However, what I was talking about was the excuses being made.
Okay, so you don't have an answer to what I said, so you'll just move the target. Cool.
RE Tiger Woods: I'm sorry, it does affect me. Because he is a high profile personality, it is on the news. Because he crashed his car, after an alleged assault or because he was under the influence or whatever (it doesn't matter which one of the possible "whys"), because of and as a result of his "personal indiscretions". It affects large number of people who held him up as a "role model" (not me, because I don't see athletes as role models).
Bullshit. His personal life has no bearing on your life unless you choose to let it. The car-crash and assault are incidental and have legal remedies. As for being a role model, it's not his problem that people are stupid enough to let their kids believe that a stranger is a good role model because he's good at hitting a little ball with a bent stick.
However, if he was able to keep his escapades quiet and out of the public, then I would agree. The moment it becomes public, and involves public safety officials (police, ambulance or whatever), it matters.
I agree there. But the problem is the reckless driving, or assault or whatever, not the stupid girlfriends. Would you like to outlaw the superbowl because certain people get drunk and drive after watching it? Of course not, same thing. Again, Tiger can screw who he likes. It's nobodies business but his and his family's.
As for you not giving a shit who sleeps with who, Can I tell that to your wife / SO? Oh, I'm sure you give a shit about who sleeps with yours and if you don't, you should, a least on health reasons alone. I'm sure your SO cares about who you sleep with, and if they don't, they should for the same reason I gave you.
Why are you so fascinated with other people's sex-lives? Maybe we have an open relationship, maybe we just trust each other, maybe we're wild swingers who spend our nights attending orgies. It's not your concern. You can tell your wife she's not allowed to sleep with anyone but you, or you can tell her you think she should start a career as a hooker for all I care. Why? Because your relationship is none of my business.
Good for you. I don't follow your rules because I'm bigger, stronger and more powerful than you. Now what? Call me all the names in the book you want, and I'll shoot you for "dissing me", because I value honor more than life. Why is my view wrong and yours right? Oh because you're more "sophisticated" and "enlightened" than me? That is disrespectful and you deserve to die. Bang you're dead. See how well your "I don't like to cause pain" helps you there?
Which proves what? That happens regardless of what type of government you have, and whether it's founded on Judeo/Christian values. I don't see your point. If you're going to just go with criminal be
Don't murder Don't steal Be nice to each other Don't fuck other peoples wives Take responsibility for your own actions (repentance).
Then again, perhaps those are basic HUMAN values. The same basic premises were present in non-Judeo/Christian cultures. Humans are equipped with a strong sense of empathy, which ends up causing most of us to avoid causing pain to others intentionally. OTOH, the book that those "Judeo/Christian values" also set up rules for when it's okay to stone people for adultery or working on the sabbath (you know, murder them), and for owning and selling slaves. Christians don't do those things anymore though because "those are outdated and outmolded by our more progressive rules".
You can murder, if you're abused as a child or ate too many twinkies.
Yeah, the "Twinkie Defense" is fun to talk about, but it's also wrong. Dan White pleaded "Diminished Capacity" due to clinical depression. He also didn't get off scott-free, he was convicted of voluntary manslaughter.
You can steal, because a hurricane hit your city (and you're poor, oppressed minority)
It depends on what you're talking about. Is taking food from a flooded grocery store when you have no other choice looting, and should you be prosecuted for it? I say no, but then again, I guess I lack the "Christian Values" that say people should starve because the store owner was forced to stay away (ironically due to an "act of god"). Or, are you talking about people who took liquor or televisions, because those folks were prosecuted when they could be found.
And lets not stop fucking each other's wives, because hell we all want to be Tiger Woods YEAH!!!
Why do you care what Tiger Woods does as far as his personal life goes? It's not your business, and although it's distasteful, it's not illegal. Once again, if you want to follow that particular "Christian Value" go for it, but personally I don't give a shit who sleeps with who. Guess I've got better things to do than read the tabloids.
Yes, I've seen these same (or similar) arguments to these very things, making excuses for unconscionable behavior.
Yeah, and guess what, I can give examples of murders and violence done by those who claim they were following their "Christian Values" too. Abortion doctors have been shot and blown up, homosexuals beaten to death, and not too long ago a group of "Christian Soldiers" conspired (and luckily failed) to murder police officers to start the "Holy War". TV Evangelists scam their "flocks", Catholic Priests can't keep their hands off the altar boys, and prominent "Conservative Christians" seem to keep getting caught with their pants down with people other than their wives (sometimes male, sometimes female). As an aside, what do Dan White, and a number of the Katrina looters have in common? They're Christians (although I assume you'll say they're not REALLY Christians).
And without any basis for any standards of conduct, religious or otherwise, we're left to the whims of the masses and the tyranny of the majority.
As opposed to the tyranny of a small group who interprets the "word of god" based on a collection of writings left behind by a group of bronze-age goat-herders? I'd prefer a more rational basis for my standards of conduct thanks.
My question is, who's standards should we follow? And why? I can make a logic case against any standard you come up with.
Really? Okay, lets play. I don't murder people because I'd rather not be murdered and I don't inflict pain on others because I'm not an inhuman monster who enjoys the suffering of others. I don't steal because, once again, I don't enjoy being stolen from and therefore I don't want to inflict that suffering on someone e
Unless you're talking about actual pathological narcissism, which is pretty damn rare, being overly narcissistic is only negative personality trait. I wouldn't put it in the same class of actual mental problems as paranoid schizophrenia or chronic depression, which you aren't going to "cure" by refusing to put up with people who have it. A true sociopath is not going to suddenly stop being a sociopath because we rebuke them. If anything, that's probably more likely to make them behave even more anti-socially, not less.
I get the idea that with your mention of morals and bemoaning of the rejection of "Christian Nazi Ethics" that your real problem is that there should be more good ole fashioned Christian virtue around, but since I'm not a Christian, I'm not likely to agree. Keep your religious proclivities for yourself, I don't want or need them, and I'm not going to buy the idea that a supernatural being is the cure for mental disorders.
Er, putting aside the fact that nearly everything in your post is pure nonsense, the claim is that the girl was burned by the price-gun, and then later developed PTSD and Tourette's. Unless you're trying to say that this burn was caused by the power of suggestion, this girl by all rights should go up in a poof of smoke every time she encounters sunlight, seeing as how the sun puts out a little more energy than your average LED. Assuming she's not a regular Slashdot reader, that's probably something that happens to her on a fairly regular basis.
But in my experience, mental problem are far easier fixed than most people think
I'm gonna guess your "experience" largely consists of talking about things you don't really understand. I've been around plenty of people with mental problems, and no, there are generally no easy fixes for them.
Reality is irrelevant for fixing such a problem. What counts is if that person believes it in her inner model, and if it makes her life bad from that point of view.
Unless of course they're making the story up, and trying to cash in on it. Since the claim involves a physical injury that seems to be impossible to be caused as they claim it was, that's not an unreasonable suspicion.
Wow, where are you people coming up with this nonsense?
Lori Drew was not made an example of
Irrelevant. The cases are nothing alike. In the case of Megan Meier, Drew and her employee played a seriously sick head-game with a kid, but didn't overtly threaten or harass her. That's why there was no solid charge to make against her. Not the case here.
and neither will these nine kids. They will get off. Because today there is pretty much nothing that can be done.
Wrong. They harassed her both physically and in writing, and it would appear that comments they posted were defamatory. They are not being charged with "Making someone commit suicide", they're being charged with criminal harassment, stalking, civil rights violations, assault, and in the case of the two boys, statutory rape. This isn't some nebulous set of charges that may or may not stick, they're pretty specific.
Online has no consequences today.
See my other post in this thread, and try one of the things I suggest there. Then let me know how it was all just laughed off as an internet prank.
So someone creates a Facebook page that purports to be yours and has nothing but pictures of your head on various butch shemale bodies there... and maybe some really hot diaries about what a great time you had with the gangbang at the gay bar. Do you think there is anything on the planet that will get that taken down?
Really? Because Facebook has policies in place to remove defamatory material, and once a John Doe lawsuit for defamation has been initiated, a court order can be obtained to get your name from them. Sure, maybe you created the account with a fake name, but it's funny how clever folks who "can't possibly be traced" on the internet get found when someone is motivated to find them.
I know that it would be a really nice day when this gets passed around the office. Wait until someone edits some really gross snuff story to make it in the first person with your name featured as the main character, and puts it on "your" page.
Yeah, you pretty much just went out of your way to run afoul of libel laws. From the EFF:
What is defamation?
Generally, defamation is a false and unprivileged statement of fact that is harmful to someone's reputation, and published "with fault," meaning as a result of negligence or malice. State laws often define defamation in specific ways. Libel is a written defamation; slander is a spoken defamation.
Sounds pretty much like what you described. False, unprivileged, harmful to reputation, and malicious. Of course, since it's online, it has no consequences according to you, but those of us who actually visit reality once in a while know that just ain't true.
It amazes me how many people think that appending the phrase "on the internet" fundamentally changes things. Patenting a store "on the internet" is silly, it's still a store. Harassing someone "on the internet" is still harassment, and libel "on the internet" is still libel.
The internet is a free place. ANYTHING GOES. There are NO crimes on the internet.
Exactly. That's exactly why you won't have a single problem going to your local police department's web site, and leaving a message saying you intend to blow up the building. Hey, it's "on the internet", fair game. And if you go to Obama's Facebook page and say you intend to shoot him at his next public appearance, there's no way on earth that you should expect the Secret Service to show up at your door because what you did was just "on the internet", where there's no laws. And maybe, just for fun, you could pick out some girl at random, and start leaving her messages that you're going to rape her, and that you know where she lives. No problem there for you, because you're "on the internet" and ANYTHING GOES.
Go ahead. Try any one of those things. Let us know how it works out for you, but hurry.....after you're sentenced you may not have internet access anymore.
They sent me one after I complained about poor reception on my Pre and started mentioning that my friend's iPhone worked fine at my house, and that maybe I should look into getting one of those. They shifted me to the customer retention department, who said they'd be happy to give me a femtocell repeater, which works pretty well. YMMV though, I've been a Sprint customer for over 10 years, so I'm not sure how much my "long-term" status played in my favour.....
For anyone who cares, the Pre's reception really was crappy (got it the day it came out), but after a few software and PRL updates it's been pretty comparable (or better) than other Sprint phones I've had.
What about virtual companies and telecommuters were the notion of "illegal worker" doesn't really exist.
How do you figure that? Your "virtual company", which I take to mean a company running out of your basement, is subject to the same labor laws as any other company in your area. The fact you slapped the word "virtual" in front of something doesn't mean you are therefore completely unregulated and free to make up/ignore any rules you want...... A telecommuter may not actually travel to the office, but they're still required to pay taxes and you're still required to follow employment related laws when hiring/employing them.
If you want to get a taste of what multi-tasking on a smartphone hardware spec device would be, install Windows 95 on a 600 MHz Pentium III with 128 MB of RAM and a 8 GB hard drive.
Yeah, you could do that, but it'd probably be easier to just go to Best Buy and try a WebOS or Android phone. Oddly though, multitasking seems to work just fine on those, so I guess that wouldn't really help in proving your point....
I think that analogy is flawed. If your car is stolen, and used to rob a bank, of course you're not charged with being an accessory to the crime. If your car is vandalized though, say someone smashes your headlights out, and you then go out for a ride, you absolutely will get a ticket for a safety violation. You didn't break out the headlights yourself, and if they catch the guy that did it he'll be charged with the vandalism, but in the meantime you have a responsibility to fix that damage before you take that car back out onto public roads again.
If a fine were levied against a user, it's not because they DDOSd Citi Bank, it's because they're operating a machine that's "unsafe", and capable of causing further damage or infection to other systems....
That said, turing_m's comment above about being given a warning first and being fined only if the user doesn't do anything about it makes perfect sense, and would probably work nicely in this kind of situation.
Interesting, I didn't know that. If that's true, then it's really a case of history repeating itself, since behind Palm's new incarnation, the WebOS devices, are some of the iPhone guys....
Why is it if you drive a car that's unsafe to operate and something happens, nobody thinks twice about the fact that it's the owner's responsibility and when they are hit with a fine everyone just nods, but if it's a computer that's in poor condition (ie: infected), it's an issue that the community must bear to clean up. I realize that not everyone is technically adept and able maintain their machines adequately themselves, but I don't want to pay for them. They can hire someone to maintain their machines for them, much like most people do for their cars now, and perhaps the fine could be waved or reduced if they prove that they were current on their maintenance and somehow still got hit. Hell, it'd be a potentially decent revenue stream for repair-shops and even ISPs that want to offer some kind of maintenance package.
Of course, the problem here is that people don't feel they should pay for anything to do with a computer other than the price-tag they see when they go to BestBuy. They'll scream blue-murder if they're told that they actually have a responsibility, both financially and in how they operate their machine. Most people want to treat a computer the way they do their microwave oven, buy it, and if it breaks, replace it, but never, ever have to spend any time or money on maintenance.
HTC, a company that has been producing touchscreen smartphones and PDAs for about as long as Apple has been making ipods
Because Palm has been making those things since long before there was any such thing as an iPod, or even an HTC for that matter. Some of the patents may be kinda dusty by now, but Palm probably has some things on paper that wouldn't thrill Apple to death if it turned into a patent pissing-match....
I think you're mistaking a stereotype for reality. I know tons of MacBook users, and not a single one of them sits " in coffee shops for hours with your Apple devices wearing black turtlenecks and sipping over-priced latte's.". Most of them don't see themselves as "young, cool, hip, media loving yuppy[s]". The fact is, there are a lot of people who prefer OSX, or the iPhone to the alternatives. This doesn't mean they've been brainwashed by the reality distortion field, it just means that, for whatever reason, they *like* those products. Yes, Apple does a lot of marketing. Considering the behemoth from Redmond's entrenched status, they'd be about as well known as Ubuntu to the general public if they didn't. That doesn't mean that the machines aren't well thought out though. If they weren't, all the advertising in the world wouldn't move them off the store shelves.
At one time I remember loving the fact that Mac OS X and other Apple products were becoming more popular. "Anything to give me a commercial alternative to Microsoft" I thought. Now - truthfully I prefer Microsoft to Apple.
I can understand picking a more open device over the iPhone/iPod (I prefer the Pre myself), but I don't see what OSX has to do with this. There's no OSX App Store that you're locked into, your choices of what to install on your MacBook are just as open as they are with a Toshiba Satellite (or whatever Windows machine you want to compare to).
Exactly. I don't blame the school for wanting to equip the MacBooks with Undercover, it really does seem like a decent program to help recover a stolen machine, but I think they went about it all wrong. The school should have set something up where the students or their parents are the account-holder, so if the machine goes missing they can work with the school to try to recover it, but nobody else can just turn it on "for fun" (or whatever other excuse they want to use for turning it on).
Oh it's definitely possible that they *could* do that, although it'd probably be more obvious on a MacBook because of the camera's indicator LED. IIRC, the LED isn't software controlled, it's activated by the camera itself and can't be turned off without modifying the hardware. I can see not noticing that LED going off once in a while for still pictures, but if they were streaming video from it, I would think it'd be noticeable since it'd be on the whole time.
I dunno about that. From the descriptions I've been hearing they may have been running "Undercover" (or something similar) on these machines. One of the things Undercover does after being activated is take a still picture every 6 minutes which I think it emails to the registered owner of the machine.
I have never seen the need for it on a phone device.
Yeah, I'm probably just being completely unreasonable, wanting to listen to my XM radio app, while reading an ebook, using the FaceBook app, or browsing websites with my Touch. I should thank Apple for helping me learn the discipline to pick one time-waster at a time and stick with it. Unfortunately my Pre is reinforcing those bad habits with its needless multitasking.....damn you Palm!
If you watched Californication, Mia's (who stole the transcript from Hank) press tour was fully paid by the publishing agency, so yes, publishers do cover the press tour costs.
I missed that one, I think I was watching The Stand, in which the Superflu wipes out 99.4% of the world population, which means that you're probably dead, and I should be choosing between Boulder and Vegas about now....
You claim there's scientific data supporting male circumcision. It's not as clear-cut (no pun intended) as you make out.
It's exactly as clear-cut as I say. There is scientific data supporting the beneficial effects of the procedure. You may not find those effects to be worth any risk involved, but that doesn't change the fact that the data is there.
Slashdot Mirror
How long is long enough for you then? Emergencies generally can't be predicted, so unless your battery life is "infinite", it's just as possible that you'll desperately need your phone 5 minutes after you take it from the charger as it is that you'll need it 12 hours after its last charge....
And for those who aren't interested in that highbrow space stuff, go take a look at these pics of Natalie Portman, naked, petrified and covered in hot grits!
Really? I must have missed that clause when I read the bill. Could you point out the part that says that other peoples sex-lives are your business for me?
Ah, and that's why he's being sued by all of his sponsors for breach of contract. Oh wait, no he isn't. I'm unaware of any celebrity who signs away their right to have a personal life to their sponsors. But don't let little facts like that get in the way of your making stuff up. As for Obama, he doesn't seem to be doing all that badly, no matter how badly the right hopes he fails at everything. Oh, wait, you're not right wing either. Much like you chose a religious name and espouse Christian values but aren't religious, you spout right wing talk-show host nonsense but aren't actually right-wing, right?
Quite the deep thinker, aren't you. If you don't like the way someone acts, just punch 'em out. Mentally ill (the basis of this thread)? Punch 'em in the face, that'll teach 'em to stop being all crazy. Bad language? Punch 'em, that'll fix 'em. Guess what, "just this side of legal" is still legal, but assaulting people for things you don't like is illegal. Therefore, you're a scumbag criminal, and they're your innocent victim. Congratulations.
How exactly do you "upset my view of the world"? Live any way you want, but keep your nose out of my business. I'll do the same for you. So far though you've suggested again and again that you're nosey and like to tell other people how to live. You appear to feel that you have a right to not be offended (example: " the asshole in Walmart who only has a limited vocabulary that he uses the F-Bomb as noun, verb, adverb and a proper name"), and that's a right that just plain old doesn't exist.
In what way do you suppose that being bipolar, or schizophrenic, or suffering from paranoid delusions are going to be "normalized"? Homosexuality being classified as a mental illness is an embarrassment to the field of psychiatry. Psychiatry was used to classify an unpopular group as "mentally ill", when it's generally agreed that classification wasn't motivated by any concern for the mental health of homosexuals, but rather social and political pressure to demonize a group of people.
Wow,just wow.
okay.
You don't get it. The murders had nothing to do with junk-food. It was never claimed that they did. The junk-food link is that White underwent a sudden, sharp personality change, and going from being a health-nut to a junk-food fanatic was a symptom of his condition, not the cause. I'll say that last part again for you, it was never claimed by the defense that Twinkies made him do it. If you want to treat people with mental illness the same as you do everyone else, good for you, but it's generally accepted that the mentally ill are not behaving rationally, and can't be held to the same standard as someone who isn't mentally ill.
Okay, so you don't have an answer to what I said, so you'll just move the target. Cool.
Bullshit. His personal life has no bearing on your life unless you choose to let it. The car-crash and assault are incidental and have legal remedies. As for being a role model, it's not his problem that people are stupid enough to let their kids believe that a stranger is a good role model because he's good at hitting a little ball with a bent stick.
I agree there. But the problem is the reckless driving, or assault or whatever, not the stupid girlfriends. Would you like to outlaw the superbowl because certain people get drunk and drive after watching it? Of course not, same thing. Again, Tiger can screw who he likes. It's nobodies business but his and his family's.
Why are you so fascinated with other people's sex-lives? Maybe we have an open relationship, maybe we just trust each other, maybe we're wild swingers who spend our nights attending orgies. It's not your concern. You can tell your wife she's not allowed to sleep with anyone but you, or you can tell her you think she should start a career as a hooker for all I care. Why? Because your relationship is none of my business.
Which proves what? That happens regardless of what type of government you have, and whether it's founded on Judeo/Christian values. I don't see your point. If you're going to just go with criminal be
Then again, perhaps those are basic HUMAN values. The same basic premises were present in non-Judeo/Christian cultures. Humans are equipped with a strong sense of empathy, which ends up causing most of us to avoid causing pain to others intentionally. OTOH, the book that those "Judeo/Christian values" also set up rules for when it's okay to stone people for adultery or working on the sabbath (you know, murder them), and for owning and selling slaves. Christians don't do those things anymore though because "those are outdated and outmolded by our more progressive rules".
Yeah, the "Twinkie Defense" is fun to talk about, but it's also wrong. Dan White pleaded "Diminished Capacity" due to clinical depression. He also didn't get off scott-free, he was convicted of voluntary manslaughter.
It depends on what you're talking about. Is taking food from a flooded grocery store when you have no other choice looting, and should you be prosecuted for it? I say no, but then again, I guess I lack the "Christian Values" that say people should starve because the store owner was forced to stay away (ironically due to an "act of god"). Or, are you talking about people who took liquor or televisions, because those folks were prosecuted when they could be found.
Why do you care what Tiger Woods does as far as his personal life goes? It's not your business, and although it's distasteful, it's not illegal. Once again, if you want to follow that particular "Christian Value" go for it, but personally I don't give a shit who sleeps with who. Guess I've got better things to do than read the tabloids.
Yeah, and guess what, I can give examples of murders and violence done by those who claim they were following their "Christian Values" too. Abortion doctors have been shot and blown up, homosexuals beaten to death, and not too long ago a group of "Christian Soldiers" conspired (and luckily failed) to murder police officers to start the "Holy War". TV Evangelists scam their "flocks", Catholic Priests can't keep their hands off the altar boys, and prominent "Conservative Christians" seem to keep getting caught with their pants down with people other than their wives (sometimes male, sometimes female). As an aside, what do Dan White, and a number of the Katrina looters have in common? They're Christians (although I assume you'll say they're not REALLY Christians).
As opposed to the tyranny of a small group who interprets the "word of god" based on a collection of writings left behind by a group of bronze-age goat-herders? I'd prefer a more rational basis for my standards of conduct thanks.
Really? Okay, lets play.
I don't murder people because I'd rather not be murdered and I don't inflict pain on others because I'm not an inhuman monster who enjoys the suffering of others.
I don't steal because, once again, I don't enjoy being stolen from and therefore I don't want to inflict that suffering on someone e
Unless you're talking about actual pathological narcissism, which is pretty damn rare, being overly narcissistic is only negative personality trait. I wouldn't put it in the same class of actual mental problems as paranoid schizophrenia or chronic depression, which you aren't going to "cure" by refusing to put up with people who have it. A true sociopath is not going to suddenly stop being a sociopath because we rebuke them. If anything, that's probably more likely to make them behave even more anti-socially, not less.
I get the idea that with your mention of morals and bemoaning of the rejection of "Christian Nazi Ethics" that your real problem is that there should be more good ole fashioned Christian virtue around, but since I'm not a Christian, I'm not likely to agree. Keep your religious proclivities for yourself, I don't want or need them, and I'm not going to buy the idea that a supernatural being is the cure for mental disorders.
Er, putting aside the fact that nearly everything in your post is pure nonsense, the claim is that the girl was burned by the price-gun, and then later developed PTSD and Tourette's. Unless you're trying to say that this burn was caused by the power of suggestion, this girl by all rights should go up in a poof of smoke every time she encounters sunlight, seeing as how the sun puts out a little more energy than your average LED. Assuming she's not a regular Slashdot reader, that's probably something that happens to her on a fairly regular basis.
I'm gonna guess your "experience" largely consists of talking about things you don't really understand. I've been around plenty of people with mental problems, and no, there are generally no easy fixes for them.
Unless of course they're making the story up, and trying to cash in on it. Since the claim involves a physical injury that seems to be impossible to be caused as they claim it was, that's not an unreasonable suspicion.
Wow, where are you people coming up with this nonsense?
Irrelevant. The cases are nothing alike. In the case of Megan Meier, Drew and her employee played a seriously sick head-game with a kid, but didn't overtly threaten or harass her. That's why there was no solid charge to make against her. Not the case here.
Wrong. They harassed her both physically and in writing, and it would appear that comments they posted were defamatory. They are not being charged with "Making someone commit suicide", they're being charged with criminal harassment, stalking, civil rights violations, assault, and in the case of the two boys, statutory rape. This isn't some nebulous set of charges that may or may not stick, they're pretty specific.
See my other post in this thread, and try one of the things I suggest there. Then let me know how it was all just laughed off as an internet prank.
Really? Because Facebook has policies in place to remove defamatory material, and once a John Doe lawsuit for defamation has been initiated, a court order can be obtained to get your name from them. Sure, maybe you created the account with a fake name, but it's funny how clever folks who "can't possibly be traced" on the internet get found when someone is motivated to find them.
Yeah, you pretty much just went out of your way to run afoul of libel laws. From the EFF:
What is defamation?
Generally, defamation is a false and unprivileged statement of fact that is harmful to someone's reputation, and published "with fault," meaning as a result of negligence or malice. State laws often define defamation in specific ways. Libel is a written defamation; slander is a spoken defamation.
Sounds pretty much like what you described. False, unprivileged, harmful to reputation, and malicious. Of course, since it's online, it has no consequences according to you, but those of us who actually visit reality once in a while know that just ain't true.
It amazes me how many people think that appending the phrase "on the internet" fundamentally changes things. Patenting a store "on the internet" is silly, it's still a store. Harassing someone "on the internet" is still harassment, and libel "on the internet" is still libel.
Exactly. That's exactly why you won't have a single problem going to your local police department's web site, and leaving a message saying you intend to blow up the building. Hey, it's "on the internet", fair game. And if you go to Obama's Facebook page and say you intend to shoot him at his next public appearance, there's no way on earth that you should expect the Secret Service to show up at your door because what you did was just "on the internet", where there's no laws. And maybe, just for fun, you could pick out some girl at random, and start leaving her messages that you're going to rape her, and that you know where she lives. No problem there for you, because you're "on the internet" and ANYTHING GOES.
Go ahead. Try any one of those things. Let us know how it works out for you, but hurry.....after you're sentenced you may not have internet access anymore.
They sent me one after I complained about poor reception on my Pre and started mentioning that my friend's iPhone worked fine at my house, and that maybe I should look into getting one of those. They shifted me to the customer retention department, who said they'd be happy to give me a femtocell repeater, which works pretty well. YMMV though, I've been a Sprint customer for over 10 years, so I'm not sure how much my "long-term" status played in my favour.....
For anyone who cares, the Pre's reception really was crappy (got it the day it came out), but after a few software and PRL updates it's been pretty comparable (or better) than other Sprint phones I've had.
/me throws a Coleco Adam on table.
Call.
How do you figure that? Your "virtual company", which I take to mean a company running out of your basement, is subject to the same labor laws as any other company in your area. The fact you slapped the word "virtual" in front of something doesn't mean you are therefore completely unregulated and free to make up/ignore any rules you want......
A telecommuter may not actually travel to the office, but they're still required to pay taxes and you're still required to follow employment related laws when hiring/employing them.
Yeah, you could do that, but it'd probably be easier to just go to Best Buy and try a WebOS or Android phone. Oddly though, multitasking seems to work just fine on those, so I guess that wouldn't really help in proving your point....
I think that analogy is flawed. If your car is stolen, and used to rob a bank, of course you're not charged with being an accessory to the crime. If your car is vandalized though, say someone smashes your headlights out, and you then go out for a ride, you absolutely will get a ticket for a safety violation. You didn't break out the headlights yourself, and if they catch the guy that did it he'll be charged with the vandalism, but in the meantime you have a responsibility to fix that damage before you take that car back out onto public roads again.
If a fine were levied against a user, it's not because they DDOSd Citi Bank, it's because they're operating a machine that's "unsafe", and capable of causing further damage or infection to other systems....
That said, turing_m's comment above about being given a warning first and being fined only if the user doesn't do anything about it makes perfect sense, and would probably work nicely in this kind of situation.
Interesting, I didn't know that. If that's true, then it's really a case of history repeating itself, since behind Palm's new incarnation, the WebOS devices, are some of the iPhone guys....
Why is it if you drive a car that's unsafe to operate and something happens, nobody thinks twice about the fact that it's the owner's responsibility and when they are hit with a fine everyone just nods, but if it's a computer that's in poor condition (ie: infected), it's an issue that the community must bear to clean up. I realize that not everyone is technically adept and able maintain their machines adequately themselves, but I don't want to pay for them. They can hire someone to maintain their machines for them, much like most people do for their cars now, and perhaps the fine could be waved or reduced if they prove that they were current on their maintenance and somehow still got hit. Hell, it'd be a potentially decent revenue stream for repair-shops and even ISPs that want to offer some kind of maintenance package.
Of course, the problem here is that people don't feel they should pay for anything to do with a computer other than the price-tag they see when they go to BestBuy. They'll scream blue-murder if they're told that they actually have a responsibility, both financially and in how they operate their machine. Most people want to treat a computer the way they do their microwave oven, buy it, and if it breaks, replace it, but never, ever have to spend any time or money on maintenance.
Because Palm has been making those things since long before there was any such thing as an iPod, or even an HTC for that matter. Some of the patents may be kinda dusty by now, but Palm probably has some things on paper that wouldn't thrill Apple to death if it turned into a patent pissing-match....
I think you're mistaking a stereotype for reality. I know tons of MacBook users, and not a single one of them sits " in coffee shops for hours with your Apple devices wearing black turtlenecks and sipping over-priced latte's.". Most of them don't see themselves as "young, cool, hip, media loving yuppy[s]". The fact is, there are a lot of people who prefer OSX, or the iPhone to the alternatives. This doesn't mean they've been brainwashed by the reality distortion field, it just means that, for whatever reason, they *like* those products. Yes, Apple does a lot of marketing. Considering the behemoth from Redmond's entrenched status, they'd be about as well known as Ubuntu to the general public if they didn't. That doesn't mean that the machines aren't well thought out though. If they weren't, all the advertising in the world wouldn't move them off the store shelves.
I can understand picking a more open device over the iPhone/iPod (I prefer the Pre myself), but I don't see what OSX has to do with this. There's no OSX App Store that you're locked into, your choices of what to install on your MacBook are just as open as they are with a Toshiba Satellite (or whatever Windows machine you want to compare to).
Exactly. I don't blame the school for wanting to equip the MacBooks with Undercover, it really does seem like a decent program to help recover a stolen machine, but I think they went about it all wrong. The school should have set something up where the students or their parents are the account-holder, so if the machine goes missing they can work with the school to try to recover it, but nobody else can just turn it on "for fun" (or whatever other excuse they want to use for turning it on).
Oh it's definitely possible that they *could* do that, although it'd probably be more obvious on a MacBook because of the camera's indicator LED. IIRC, the LED isn't software controlled, it's activated by the camera itself and can't be turned off without modifying the hardware. I can see not noticing that LED going off once in a while for still pictures, but if they were streaming video from it, I would think it'd be noticeable since it'd be on the whole time.
I dunno about that. From the descriptions I've been hearing they may have been running "Undercover" (or something similar) on these machines. One of the things Undercover does after being activated is take a still picture every 6 minutes which I think it emails to the registered owner of the machine.
I wish I had mod points. I'm glad I don't though, because I'd really be torn between "Funny" and "Insightful"......
Yeah, I'm probably just being completely unreasonable, wanting to listen to my XM radio app, while reading an ebook, using the FaceBook app, or browsing websites with my Touch. I should thank Apple for helping me learn the discipline to pick one time-waster at a time and stick with it. Unfortunately my Pre is reinforcing those bad habits with its needless multitasking.....damn you Palm!
I missed that one, I think I was watching The Stand, in which the Superflu wipes out 99.4% of the world population, which means that you're probably dead, and I should be choosing between Boulder and Vegas about now....
It's exactly as clear-cut as I say. There is scientific data supporting the beneficial effects of the procedure. You may not find those effects to be worth any risk involved, but that doesn't change the fact that the data is there.