Questions: What services will a government a thousand miles away offer my business in return for the taxes they are attempting to collect? Will California send Road repair crews out of state to fix the roads near my business? Will New York send funds out of state to pay for Teachers in the school district where my business is located?
If the taxpayers that actually who actually live in areas that need funds for roads and schools don't care enough to pay for them, then why should I care if they have substandard schools and pothole filled roads?
If a group of people think so little of me that they are willing to tax me without providing any benifit to me in return, why should I care what they have to do without?
The desire to tax the internet is being driven by deadbeats who don't want to pay for local services they are unwilling to do without, and by sleezy politicans who are pandering to those deadbeats.
Copying songs isn't the subject of the music industry law suits. Distrubiting copyrighted material by allowing others to make a coppies of material that you are offering is.
Maine is the first state law that comes up under a google for "theft of services" http://janus.state.me.us/legis/statutes/17-A/title17-Asec357.html
1. A person is guilty of theft if:
1.
A. The person obtains services by deception, threat, force or any other means designed to avoid the due payment for the services that the person knows are available only for compensation. Violation of this paragraph is a Class E crime; or [2001, c. 383, 42 (new); 156 (aff).]
B. The person violates paragraph A and:
(1) The value of the services is more than $10,000. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class B crime;
(2) The person is armed with a dangerous weapon at the time of the offense. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class B crime;
(3) The value of the services is more than $1,000 but not more than $10,000. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class C crime;
(4) The value of the services is more than $500 but not more than $1,000. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class D crime; or
(5) The person has 2 prior Maine convictions for any combination of the following: theft; any violation of section 401 in which the crime intended to be committed inside the structure is theft; any violation of section 405 in which the crime intended to be committed inside the motor vehicle is theft; any violation of section 651; any violation of section 702, 703 or 708; or attempts thereat. Section 9-A governs the use of prior convictions when determining a sentence. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class C crime. [2001, c. 667, Pt. D, 7 (amd); 36 (aff).] [2001, c. 667, Pt. D, 7 (amd); 36 (aff).]
2. A person is guilty of theft if:
2.
A. Having control over the disposition of services of another, to which the person knows the person is not entitled, the person diverts such services to the person's own benefit or to the benefit of some other person who the person knows is not entitled to the services. Violation of this paragraph is a Class E crime; or [2001, c. 383, 42 (new); 156 (aff).]
B. The person violates paragraph A and:
(1) The value of the services is more than $10,000. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class B crime;
(2) That person is armed with a dangerous weapon at the time of the offense. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class B crime;
(3) The value of the services is more than $1,000 but not more than $10,000. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class C crime;
(4) The value of the services is more than $500 but not more than $1,000. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class D crime; or
(5) The person has 2 prior Maine convictions for any combination of the following: theft; any violation of section 401 in which the crime intended to be committed inside the structure is theft; any violation of section 405 in which the crime intended to be committed inside the motor vehicle is theft; any violation of section 651; any violation of section 702, 703 or 708; or attempts thereat. Section 9-A governs the use of prior convictions when determining a sentence. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class C crime. [2001, c. 667, Pt. D, 8 (amd); 36 (aff).] [2001, c. 667, Pt. D, 8 (amd); 36 (aff).]
3. As used in this section:
3.
A. "Deception" has the same meaning as in section 354; [2001, c. 383, 42 (new); 156 (aff).]
B. "Services" includes, but is not limited to, labor; professional service; public utility service; transportation service; ski-lift service; restaurant, hotel, motel, tourist cabin, rooming house and like accommodations; the supplying of equipment, tools, vehicles or trailers for temporary use; telephone, cellular telephone, telegraph, cable television or computer service; gas, electricity, water or steam; admission to entertainment, exhibitions, sporting events or other events; or other services for which a charge is made; and [2001, c. 383, 42 (new); 156 (aff).]
I Suggest that you peruse the laws on theft of services and copyright.
Producing music is a service, and one that the people performing it have a right to recive payment in lieu of those services. If you download a mp3 without paying for the services when the person providing the services expects a fee, then you have comitted theft of services, and are a thief. If you distrubit the files then you are both violating copyright law and aiding and abbetting theft of services, which also makes you a thief.
"Filesharers" are also aiding the executives at the RIAA, because they are giving them an excuse to give to the stockholders for plummitting CD sales. They are blaiming it all on piracy, when a large part of the problem is they have a large portfolio of lame crap that no one wants to buy, and that they have managed to alienate many thier customers by palming off over priced lame crap on them for years.
Two wrongs don't make a right, a basic premise of ethics. The RIAA's wrong doing dosen't give anyone a "right" to break the law. Boycott the RIAA. Don't buy thier crap. Don't see concerts by RIAA bands. Don't listen to it on the radio, and most of all Don't "fileshre" RIAA garbage. Have nothing to do with them, that is what they fear more than anything else.
No You need to grow up and realize that entertainment isn't some god given "right", it's a luxauy. That committing a crime to obtain luxury goods and services places you in the exact same class as the Enron exeecutives in intent, differeing only in scale. You also need to take a course in ethics if you think this is just Economics 101.
I Won't dispute that the RIAA are a bunch of jerks, but that dosen't give you the "right" to take part in an economic lynching via mass piracy of thier products. If you don't like the RIAA, then boycott thier asses. That sends a clear message of disapproval, while the mass piracy sends the message of "I'm too cheap to pay for music"
If it was four orders of magnitude smaller the whinning would continue.
If it was a compamy violating copyright law by distrubiting GPLed software in binary only form the whinning would continue even if the sum was four orders of magnitude higher, despite the fact that the company was doing exactly the same thing the "file sharers" are doing, distrubting copyrighted works in a manner against the wishes of the copyright holder.
When the RIAA was suing Napster, Kazaa, and others, Slashdot was full of posts claiming that these programs had legitimate uses, and the RIAA should go after people pirating copyrighted works instead of the companines offering P2P software.
Now the RIAA is following the advice that so many Slashdotters offered in the recent past, so why are so many of y'all bitching?
If all the whinners of the world pulled a dollar out of thier wallets, instead of worrying about getting thier grubby little fingers into someone else's wallet, the total would likely exceed the 50 million dollar investment. They won't because itwould have an undesirable side effect. They wouldn't be able to use the "starving children" as an excuse to promote thier real agenda, taking money away from those nasty rich people they are so envious of.
Wealth isn't "distrubited" in a lawful society, it is earned or created, but that is beside the point. A lot of the rhetoric from the free/open source software community is openly hostile towards business. When you make hostile comments towards business you can expect a hostile attitude from business in return.
"Anyone who bothers to give it a little thought realizes that in the modern economic system, the wealth of the 5% that own 85% of everything is protected by a business environment where the barriers of entry are too high to permit the appearance of significant competition from below."
"Now, it's plain enough that we among the 95% are largely responsible for all of this wealth getting shuffled around. We do the work, we buy the products. Our retirement plans sit around for 40 years, a nice capital base in the market while the fat cats try to speculate their way to another billion."
"Unlike these things, though, while the Open Source "movement" may be informed by an ideology, the integrity of its product is maintained by an adherence to the strictly capitalist, legal definition of intellectual property. What is truly offensive to the Forbes set is that the grubby horde would have the audacity to coopt one of THEIR legal power tools to create a product that nakedly opposes the dynamics of the status quo."
"Is Forbes genuinely incapable of understanding that the whole point of Open Source is that it represents a parallel software development strategy that is opposed to the conventional business paradigm of proprietary I.P., or are they engaged in conscious propaganda in defense of the status quo?"
"It's little surprise, then, that Forbes falls back on the rhetoric of Communism and revolution to characterize the Open Source movement, because it represents a similar kind of threat to that system.
When the proponants of open source spout rhetoric like I've quoted from you, why would you expect them to look at open source as anything other than a Communist or far left movement?
If the proponants of open source insist on making statements that sound like they are channelling Che Guevara, then unfriendlyness towards the movement from the business world can be expected.
The same mistakes from the war on drugs are being proposed for the war on Spam. Going after the "dealers". As long as there are people who are willing to purchase drugs, there will be someone who is willing to take legal risks to sell them. As long as there are businesses who are willing to pay a spammer, there will be people willing to find ways to evade any laws or costs to send it for these sleezy busunesses.
Unlike Spammers who try to hide, the business/con artist has to have a means of contact for the victim to get ahold of them. This is the weak link in the spam chain. Make it illegal to hire a spammer AND to send it out on your own, then start nailing the SOBs.
Palestine may not have been an independent nation state, but the Palestinian people had existed as a distinct race since biblical times when the Semitic tribes split along religious grounds. Remember that Jews and Palestinians are both Semitic races.
ROFLMAO,
The Palestinian "race" started as a mixture of ancestral Jews who converted to Christanity, Hellenistic Greeks who converted to Christanity, and smaller ammounts of assorted semites who converted to Christanity during the later stages of the Roman Empire. The Arabic Conquest added the Arab language and Arab Genes to the mix, and in most cases a conversion to Islam, though there remains a fairly large percentage of Palestinians who are Christians. Palestinians are an ethnic subgroup of the arab culture, NOT a race.
The "Public" Airwaves would have zero value if someone wasn't willing to make a considerable investment in them. The "Public" didn't create the value. The TV spectrum hasn't been very limited since UHF became common about 30 years ago. There are few markets where all availble channels are used. The notion of a limited resource might have had some validity when there were only 12 Chanels, only 4 of which were availble in any given market. It's rather outdated today. The TV Channels ought to be sold to the highest bidder, and the FCC should step back to the role of traffic cop, not public Censor.
The Companies selling the junk are the problem, not the spammers. Spammers don't spam for the Hell of it, they do it because a sleezeball paid them X dollars to send out X spams. Most spammers get a flat fee, and demand the money up front because they are well aware that they are dealing with unethical businesses who will shaft them if they get a chance.
So if that Millionare had the infinate libality for SSI that you want, would you be whinning if he also had an infinate size to the Check he picked up at 65?
Right now the size of the check is like his liability, limited.
"Theft of Services" is a legal phrase that describes taking a service without paying for it. It appears in most legal codes as a specific charge right along with Theft by conversion and theft by fraud. You can be charged with the crime of theft of services and be imprisioned for comitting a felony. Don't make the mistake of thinking that just because a tangible piece of properity wasn't taken that it can't be theft. The law says otherwise.
That is just three of the links of laws from a google search for "Theft of Services" "Criminal Code". Pretend all you wish, if you take services without paying for them, then according to the law you are a thief.
Since when is "theft of services" not considered theft? Those songs didn't record themselves, those CDs didn't pop up like mushrooms, someone put time and effort into creating them, and they have as much right to be compensated for thier services in creating that product as you do when you provide services to your employer.
It was global warming. The heavy use of Flintstone type cars by cavemen resulted in increased work to push those log and stone wheel cars with thier feet. The increased work caused them to exhale more Carbon Dioxide touching off the global warming that ended the Ice age.
Victims of Klan violence have won several lawsuits against Klan groups and leaders after general statements about blacks resulted in personal harm to them by Klansmen.
Sorry paper rots over time, and there is always danger of a fire. The ultimate backup is cuneiform on clay tablets. They remain readable after thousands of years.
1) The company I work for, and am a minority partner in donates 5% of it's profits to causes like the ones I mentioned. That means a 5% reduction in my share of the profits.
2) I Also donate out of my own income, most recently to this group. http://www.opportunity.org/international.html
So what are YOU doing about the hungry and AIDs cases? Just Boo-hooing, or just trying to shift the cost to "executives and companies worth millions of dollars"? Or are you actually pulling money out of your OWN pocket to buy food and drugs for these people? If the Whinners of the world put THIER money where thier mouths are, instead of trying to get thier hands in others pockets then a lot of these problems would be lessened if not solved. Of course that assumes that the hungry and sick are a real concern, and not just an excuse to attack those who have more money.
Slashdot Mirror
Questions:
What services will a government a thousand miles away offer my business in return for the taxes they are attempting to collect? Will California send Road repair crews out of state to fix the roads near my business? Will New York send funds out of state to pay for Teachers in the school district where my business is located?
If the taxpayers that actually who actually live in areas that need funds for roads and schools don't care enough to pay for them, then why should I care if they have substandard schools and pothole filled roads?
If a group of people think so little of me that they are willing to tax me without providing any benifit to me in return, why should I care what they have to do without?
The desire to tax the internet is being driven by deadbeats who don't want to pay for local services they are unwilling to do without, and by sleezy politicans who are pandering to those deadbeats.
Copying songs isn't the subject of the music industry law suits. Distrubiting copyrighted material by allowing others to make a coppies of material that you are offering is.
Maine is the first state law that comes up under a google for "theft of services" /17-A/title17-Asec357.html
http://janus.state.me.us/legis/statutes
1. A person is guilty of theft if:
1.
A. The person obtains services by deception, threat, force or any other means designed to avoid the due payment for the services that the person knows are available only for compensation. Violation of this paragraph is a Class E crime; or [2001, c. 383, 42 (new); 156 (aff).]
B. The person violates paragraph A and:
(1) The value of the services is more than $10,000. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class B crime;
(2) The person is armed with a dangerous weapon at the time of the offense. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class B crime;
(3) The value of the services is more than $1,000 but not more than $10,000. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class C crime;
(4) The value of the services is more than $500 but not more than $1,000. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class D crime; or
(5) The person has 2 prior Maine convictions for any combination of the following: theft; any violation of section 401 in which the crime intended to be committed inside the structure is theft; any violation of section 405 in which the crime intended to be committed inside the motor vehicle is theft; any violation of section 651; any violation of section 702, 703 or 708; or attempts thereat. Section 9-A governs the use of prior convictions when determining a sentence. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class C crime.
[2001, c. 667, Pt. D, 7 (amd); 36 (aff).]
[2001, c. 667, Pt. D, 7 (amd); 36 (aff).]
2. A person is guilty of theft if:
2.
A. Having control over the disposition of services of another, to which the person knows the person is not entitled, the person diverts such services to the person's own benefit or to the benefit of some other person who the person knows is not entitled to the services. Violation of this paragraph is a Class E crime; or [2001, c. 383, 42 (new); 156 (aff).]
B. The person violates paragraph A and:
(1) The value of the services is more than $10,000. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class B crime;
(2) That person is armed with a dangerous weapon at the time of the offense. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class B crime;
(3) The value of the services is more than $1,000 but not more than $10,000. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class C crime;
(4) The value of the services is more than $500 but not more than $1,000. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class D crime; or
(5) The person has 2 prior Maine convictions for any combination of the following: theft; any violation of section 401 in which the crime intended to be committed inside the structure is theft; any violation of section 405 in which the crime intended to be committed inside the motor vehicle is theft; any violation of section 651; any violation of section 702, 703 or 708; or attempts thereat. Section 9-A governs the use of prior convictions when determining a sentence. Violation of this subparagraph is a Class C crime.
[2001, c. 667, Pt. D, 8 (amd); 36 (aff).]
[2001, c. 667, Pt. D, 8 (amd); 36 (aff).]
3. As used in this section:
3.
A. "Deception" has the same meaning as in section 354; [2001, c. 383, 42 (new); 156 (aff).]
B. "Services" includes, but is not limited to, labor; professional service; public utility service; transportation service; ski-lift service; restaurant, hotel, motel, tourist cabin, rooming house and like accommodations; the supplying of equipment, tools, vehicles or trailers for temporary use; telephone, cellular telephone, telegraph, cable television or computer service; gas, electricity, water or steam; admission to entertainment, exhibitions, sporting events or other events; or other services for which a charge is made; and [2001, c. 383, 42 (new); 156 (aff).]
C. "Threat" is
I Suggest that you peruse the laws on theft of services and copyright.
Producing music is a service, and one that the people performing it have a right to recive payment in lieu of those services. If you download a mp3 without paying for the services when the person providing the services expects a fee, then you have comitted theft of services, and are a thief. If you distrubit the files then you are both violating copyright law and aiding and abbetting theft of services, which also makes you a thief.
"Filesharers" are also aiding the executives at the RIAA, because they are giving them an excuse to give to the stockholders for plummitting CD sales. They are blaiming it all on piracy, when a large part of the problem is they have a large portfolio of lame crap that no one wants to buy, and that they have managed to alienate many thier customers by palming off over priced lame crap on them for years.
Two wrongs don't make a right, a basic premise of ethics. The RIAA's wrong doing dosen't give anyone a "right" to break the law. Boycott the RIAA. Don't buy thier crap. Don't see concerts by RIAA bands. Don't listen to it on the radio, and most of all Don't "fileshre" RIAA garbage. Have nothing to do with them, that is what they fear more than anything else.
ROFLMAO,
No You need to grow up and realize that entertainment isn't some god given "right", it's a luxauy. That committing a crime to obtain luxury goods and services places you in the exact same class as the Enron exeecutives in intent, differeing only in scale. You also need to take a course in ethics if you think this is just Economics 101.
I Won't dispute that the RIAA are a bunch of jerks, but that dosen't give you the "right" to take part in an economic lynching via mass piracy of thier products. If you don't like the RIAA, then boycott thier asses. That sends a clear message of disapproval, while the mass piracy sends the message of "I'm too cheap to pay for music"
If it was four orders of magnitude smaller the whinning would continue.
If it was a compamy violating copyright law by distrubiting GPLed software in binary only form the whinning would continue even if the sum was four orders of magnitude higher, despite the fact that the company was doing exactly the same thing the "file sharers" are doing, distrubting copyrighted works in a manner against the wishes of the copyright holder.
When the RIAA was suing Napster, Kazaa, and others, Slashdot was full of posts claiming that these programs had legitimate uses, and the RIAA should go after people pirating copyrighted works instead of the companines offering P2P software.
Now the RIAA is following the advice that so many Slashdotters offered in the recent past, so why are so many of y'all bitching?
So How many starving children did you feed today?
If all the whinners of the world pulled a dollar out of thier wallets, instead of worrying about getting thier grubby little fingers into someone else's wallet, the total would likely exceed the 50 million dollar investment. They won't because itwould have an undesirable side effect. They wouldn't be able to use the "starving children" as an excuse to promote thier real agenda, taking money away from those nasty rich people they are so envious of.
Wealth isn't "distrubited" in a lawful society, it is earned or created, but that is beside the point. A lot of the rhetoric from the free/open source software community is openly hostile towards business. When you make hostile comments towards business you can expect a hostile attitude from business in return.
"Anyone who bothers to give it a little thought realizes that in the modern economic system, the wealth of the 5% that own 85% of everything is protected by a business environment where the barriers of entry are too high to permit the appearance of significant competition from below."
"Now, it's plain enough that we among the 95% are largely responsible for all of this wealth getting shuffled around. We do the work, we buy the products. Our retirement plans sit around for 40 years, a nice capital base in the market while the fat cats try to speculate their way to another billion."
"Unlike these things, though, while the Open Source "movement" may be informed by an ideology, the integrity of its product is maintained by an adherence to the strictly capitalist, legal definition of intellectual property. What is truly offensive to the Forbes set is that the grubby horde would have the audacity to coopt one of THEIR legal power tools to create a product that nakedly opposes the dynamics of the status quo."
"Is Forbes genuinely incapable of understanding that the whole point of Open Source is that it represents a parallel software development strategy that is opposed to the conventional business paradigm of proprietary I.P., or are they engaged in conscious propaganda in defense of the status quo?"
"It's little surprise, then, that Forbes falls back on the rhetoric of Communism and revolution to characterize the Open Source movement, because it represents a similar kind of threat to that system.
When the proponants of open source spout rhetoric like I've quoted from you, why would you expect them to look at open source as anything other than a Communist or far left movement?
If the proponants of open source insist on making statements that sound like they are channelling Che Guevara, then unfriendlyness towards the movement from the business world can be expected.
The same mistakes from the war on drugs are being proposed for the war on Spam. Going after the "dealers". As long as there are people who are willing to purchase drugs, there will be someone who is willing to take legal risks to sell them. As long as there are businesses who are willing to pay a spammer, there will be people willing to find ways to evade any laws or costs to send it for these sleezy busunesses.
Unlike Spammers who try to hide, the business/con artist has to have a means of contact for the victim to get ahold of them. This is the weak link in the spam chain. Make it illegal to hire a spammer AND to send it out on your own, then start nailing the SOBs.
"In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida"=="In a garden of Eden"
Palestine may not have been an independent nation state, but the Palestinian people had existed as a distinct race since biblical times when the Semitic tribes split along religious grounds. Remember that Jews and Palestinians are both Semitic races.
ROFLMAO,
The Palestinian "race" started as a mixture of ancestral Jews who converted to Christanity, Hellenistic Greeks who converted to Christanity, and smaller ammounts of assorted semites who converted to Christanity during the later stages of the Roman Empire. The Arabic Conquest added the Arab language and Arab Genes to the mix, and in most cases a conversion to Islam, though there remains a fairly large percentage of Palestinians who are Christians. Palestinians are an ethnic subgroup of the arab culture, NOT a race.
The "Public" Airwaves would have zero value if someone wasn't willing to make a considerable investment in them. The "Public" didn't create the value. The TV spectrum hasn't been very limited since UHF became common about 30 years ago. There are few markets where all availble channels are used. The notion of a limited resource might have had some validity when there were only 12 Chanels, only 4 of which were availble in any given market. It's rather outdated today. The TV Channels ought to be sold to the highest bidder, and the FCC should step back to the role of traffic cop, not public Censor.
The Companies selling the junk are the problem, not the spammers. Spammers don't spam for the Hell of it, they do it because a sleezeball paid them X dollars to send out X spams. Most spammers get a flat fee, and demand the money up front because they are well aware that they are dealing with unethical businesses who will shaft them if they get a chance.
So if that Millionare had the infinate libality for SSI that you want, would you be whinning if he also had an infinate size to the Check he picked up at 65?
Right now the size of the check is like his liability, limited.
"Theft of Services" is a legal phrase that describes taking a service without paying for it. It appears in most legal codes as a specific charge right along with Theft by conversion and theft by fraud. You can be charged with the crime of theft of services and be imprisioned for comitting a felony. Don't make the mistake of thinking that just because a tangible piece of properity wasn't taken that it can't be theft. The law says otherwise.
http://janus.state.me.us/legis/statutes/17-A/title 17-Asec357.html
3 7/ 637-8.htm
http://www.gencourt.state.nh.us/rsa/html/LXII/6
http://www.etext.org/CuD/Law/alabama
That is just three of the links of laws from a google search for "Theft of Services" "Criminal Code". Pretend all you wish, if you take services without paying for them, then according to the law you are a thief.
Since when is "theft of services" not considered theft? Those songs didn't record themselves, those CDs didn't pop up like mushrooms, someone put time and effort into creating them, and they have as much right to be compensated for thier services in creating that product as you do when you provide services to your employer.
It was global warming. The heavy use of Flintstone type cars by cavemen resulted in increased work to push those log and stone wheel cars with thier feet. The increased work caused them to exhale more Carbon Dioxide touching off the global warming that ended the Ice age.
It can work for others IF the market for Open source/Free software is large enough for more than one successful company, and that is a big if.
Victims of Klan violence have won several lawsuits against Klan groups and leaders after general statements about blacks resulted in personal harm to them by Klansmen.
Sorry paper rots over time, and there is always danger of a fire. The ultimate backup is cuneiform on clay tablets. They remain readable after thousands of years.
1) The company I work for, and am a minority partner in donates 5% of it's profits to causes like the ones I mentioned. That means a 5% reduction in my share of the profits.
2) I Also donate out of my own income, most recently to this group. http://www.opportunity.org/international.html
So what are YOU doing about the hungry and AIDs cases? Just Boo-hooing, or just trying to shift the cost to "executives and companies worth millions of dollars"? Or are you actually pulling money out of your OWN pocket to buy food and drugs for these people? If the Whinners of the world put THIER money where thier mouths are, instead of trying to get thier hands in others pockets then a lot of these problems would be lessened if not solved. Of course that assumes that the hungry and sick are a real concern, and not just an excuse to attack those who have more money.