I'm not asking for this sound truck to drive trough my street. Most advertisement can be easily avoided if you don't want to be hit by it. You can switch off your TV, not visit that spammy web site, etc. You cannot just turn off this sound truck. This is also why e-mail spam is becomming increasingly illegal in countries all over the world.
The difference is a pump action shotgun will probably deal with a "sound truck". It's kind of hard to remotly destroy the source of spam.
I find it very interesting that Israel is on the list as it is the only country on the list that could really be affected by US sanctions.
Given that the Israeli economy is effectivly kept solvent by the US in the first place. However can you really see the US Government changing their (longstanding) policy to providing Israel with cash (and weapons)?
I cannot imagine why they think that issuing public orders to China is going to get them anything other than a lot of very pissed off Chinese. This little stunt has probably ensured that China will not be doing anything about copyright complaints from US corporations, just so that the Chinese leaders can show they don't take orders from the US.
It's not as if there is much the US can do to threaten China. Any trade sanctions would hurt the US more and an military threat has the "problem" that the Chinese can actually shoot back...
I believe the GSM standards actually mandate encryption. However, such encryption isn't going to do very much to protect you from wiretaps if the wiretapper has the permission from the carrier
The encryption is only between the handset and basestation. If people have the ability to make "legal" taps it wouldn't even help with a call between two phones connected to the same basestation. You'd need end to end encryption which would also require you to establish a "data" call, which could well be charged differently from a "voice" call.
Trying to silence ESR? Isn't that like the proverbial unstopable rock hitting the unmoveable object? Silencing ESR would require the violation of at least 7 laws of physics:-)
A pity SCO can't manage to gag themselves. That would keep just about everyone happy!
Notice that the BBC have never pursued those who upload their programmes onto p2p except in one case, when ep1 of New Dr Who was leaked before transmission.
It's rather easier to track down a programme leaked before any broadcast than one uploaded after it has been broadcast. There's a much smaller list of possible suspects.
Our society is so out of balance that even though we live in a constant state of excess, people get sick from vitamin C deficiency. Here's a link specifically about the United States, which may not be representative of other modern countries. And if we can be deficient in one vitamin due to our high-calorie, low-nutrient diet, why not another?
Nutrient deficiency may actually be more important a factor than "calories".
I remember hearing about a case where somebody who was "hearing voices" turned out to be picking up a radio station through the fillings in their teeth and hearing the sound through bone conduction. Must have been an AM radio station I expect, not FM. Anyways, it would be interesting to find out if those people you know have amalgam fillings. If they do, they could try getting them replaced with the white non metallic (plastic/ceramic?) alternative to see if it solves the problem.
One of the early episode of "Mythbusters" tested this and were unable to get any such effect. IIRC the conditions involved an amalgam filling and a gold filling/crown in close proximity to each other...
I don't believe you. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
Or at least they should, there are claims where this does not appear to be the case...
Show me the results of your double-blind trial. If you personally know "a number of people" who can do this, it should be quite easy to perform.
In the case of "hearing WiFi" the tests would need to include comparing regular access points with those of the exact same model which have been modified to emit no RF.
One other thing I forgot to mention - DVDs. I don't see why people spend a fortune on bandwidth (and time) downloading the things, in a compressed format, when you can usually buy the DVD dirt cheap, save yourself the trouble and the bandwidth, and have something better quality too.
Assuming the material in question is available on DVD in the first place. Even if it is you may be faced with spending plenty of time, trouble and money to get hold of a DVD only available somewhere else in the world. Being able to "buy the DVD dirt cheap" (even at all) is the exception rather than the rule.
When I hear the word "harmonise", I usually think of things being harmonious... however, what happens in looney Euroland is that harmonisation of laws results in things becoming equally bad for everyone... things never become less restrictive, they always manage to find a way for all the most restrictive laws to be kept and amalgated into the new "harmonised" version...
Hardly restricted to the EU, especially in the context of copyright, is there even one example of a copyright treaty which resulted in a reduction of copyright for some parties?
Not voting means you don't approve of any of the candidates.
A big problem would be working out how many non voters are "don't care" and how many are "none of the above". Unless these are explicit on the ballot.
A low voter turnout robs the government of legitimacy.
It could also be a sign of things such as lack of diversity amongst candidates. Which makes it more likely that a voter will be unable to find any candidate who actually represents his or her views.
In my opinion null votes should count towards "empty chair" positions in the government, which automatically vote against any new legislation.
That's probably just as wrong in practice than the status quo of assuming that all non voters are apathetic.
From the text of the IPRED 2 directive "Article 3 Offences Member States shall ensure that all intentional infringements of an intellectual property right on a commercial scale, and attempting, aiding or abetting and inciting such infringements, are treated as criminal offences."
Interesting how these kind of laws never appear to be used against the likes of SCO or TV stations rebroadcasting other channels without proper acknowlagement.
My problem is the RIAA does not appear to always perform what is called "due diligence" in the legal world before suing. I may be wrong, I have been before and will be again...but, it seems to me that there are way too many cases where they have made huge assumptions and sued people based on those assumptions.
Effectivly what they are doing is using litigation or more likely the threat of litigation in order to extort money from people.
They may also be violating the law in pursuing their agenda, in some cases.
If they are actually suing people then in could be "Barratry". If they are just making threats to sue then they probably are just being annoying.
This puts the RIAA between a rock and a hard place. Either they can admit that they broke into her home computer, or they can admit that they were lying about that bit. Of course, if they admit they never really had any evidence in the first place, that strengthens the other claims against them.
Also known as "giving the RIAA enough rope to hang themselves".
No wonder they want the counterclaim dismissed.
It appears to be the case that the RIAA dosn't want cases to actually go to court even when they are simply the plaintiff. Here they have effectivly ended up as the defendent in a case where a judge is quite likely to "throw the book at them".
XP made a killing on the fact that consumers were fed up with the 9x line. Particularly, WinME. The disaster to end all disasters, which was still probably worse then what Vista currently is.
Let the morons rant and rave and expose themselves for the fools they are so we know who to avoid.
That'll also help identify exactly who the ranting and raving fools actually are. It's quite possible for "hate speach" restrictions to be used to silence opposition and critique of rather distasteful points of view.
I'd rather know who the racist/sexist/religionist/homophobic assholes are, than not.
It also helps if they can still be identified as such, even if their bigotry is politically correct or they are a member of some "minority/historically opressed group".
The exact same spirit applies to free speech. Anyone should be able to deny the holocaust openly.
As well as investigate or just discuss the evidence.
It's up to society at large to consider and then dismiss
Actually would more be a case of "dismiss", "accept" or "come to different conclusions".
such claims with their own free thought, research, and insight, rather than be protected from this kind of speech by censors.
If point of view requires censorship of any opposing viewpoints even the imprisonment of anyone who dosn't agree with it. What does that tell you about the actual evidence (and logic) for that position?
the pure act of banning that speech *makes it true to some point* to some since there is no longer any debate, confrontation, to show that the opposite is/may be true (i.e. that you should not be a rascist).
Banning something also acts as very effective "free advertising". This holds as much for a political party as for a movie or song. There are also people who may be attracted to a political group simply because it is banned...
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I'm not asking for this sound truck to drive trough my street. Most advertisement can be easily avoided if you don't want to be hit by it. You can switch off your TV, not visit that spammy web site, etc. You cannot just turn off this sound truck. This is also why e-mail spam is becomming increasingly illegal in countries all over the world.
The difference is a pump action shotgun will probably deal with a "sound truck". It's kind of hard to remotly destroy the source of spam.
I find it very interesting that Israel is on the list as it is the only country on the list that could really be affected by US sanctions.
Given that the Israeli economy is effectivly kept solvent by the US in the first place. However can you really see the US Government changing their (longstanding) policy to providing Israel with cash (and weapons)?
I cannot imagine why they think that issuing public orders to China is going to get them anything other than a lot of very pissed off Chinese. This little stunt has probably ensured that China will not be doing anything about copyright complaints from US corporations, just so that the Chinese leaders can show they don't take orders from the US.
It's not as if there is much the US can do to threaten China. Any trade sanctions would hurt the US more and an military threat has the "problem" that the Chinese can actually shoot back...
I believe the GSM standards actually mandate encryption. However, such encryption isn't going to do very much to protect you from wiretaps if the wiretapper has the permission from the carrier
The encryption is only between the handset and basestation. If people have the ability to make "legal" taps it wouldn't even help with a call between two phones connected to the same basestation.
You'd need end to end encryption which would also require you to establish a "data" call, which could well be charged differently from a "voice" call.
Trying to silence ESR? Isn't that like the proverbial unstopable rock hitting the unmoveable object? Silencing ESR would require the violation of at least 7 laws of physics :-)
A pity SCO can't manage to gag themselves. That would keep just about everyone happy!
Many of us have thought SCO was dead before - they aren't just Evil, they're The Undead.
Presumably there is a headline somewhere along the lines of "SCO attemps to silence Buffy Summers"...
Notice that the BBC have never pursued those who upload their programmes onto p2p except in one case, when ep1 of New Dr Who was leaked before transmission.
It's rather easier to track down a programme leaked before any broadcast than one uploaded after it has been broadcast. There's a much smaller list of possible suspects.
Our society is so out of balance that even though we live in a constant state of excess, people get sick from vitamin C deficiency. Here's a link specifically about the United States, which may not be representative of other modern countries. And if we can be deficient in one vitamin due to our high-calorie, low-nutrient diet, why not another?
Nutrient deficiency may actually be more important a factor than "calories".
Just doing a check on what food I eat daily, I am getting 500% my RDA in vitamin D.
This kind of research appears to imply that the RDA values could be wrong though...
I get outside a decent amount, walk to the store, beach and hiking on weekends, etc..
It's also going to depend what you are wearing, i.e. how much skin you have exposed to the sun when you perform these activities.
Yeah, get rid of the shopping channels (never watch then)
Thing is that these along with the quiz (lottery) channels are likely to cost nothing to the broadcaster, possibly they even pay to be broadcast...
I remember hearing about a case where somebody who was "hearing voices" turned out to be picking up a radio station through the fillings in their teeth and hearing the sound through bone conduction. Must have been an AM radio station I expect, not FM. Anyways, it would be interesting to find out if those people you know have amalgam fillings. If they do, they could try getting them replaced with the white non metallic (plastic/ceramic?) alternative to see if it solves the problem.
One of the early episode of "Mythbusters" tested this and were unable to get any such effect. IIRC the conditions involved an amalgam filling and a gold filling/crown in close proximity to each other...
I don't believe you. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
Or at least they should, there are claims where this does not appear to be the case...
Show me the results of your double-blind trial. If you personally know "a number of people" who can do this, it should be quite easy to perform.
In the case of "hearing WiFi" the tests would need to include comparing regular access points with those of the exact same model which have been modified to emit no RF.
One other thing I forgot to mention - DVDs. I don't see why people spend a fortune on bandwidth (and time) downloading the things, in a compressed format, when you can usually buy the DVD dirt cheap, save yourself the trouble and the bandwidth, and have something better quality too.
Assuming the material in question is available on DVD in the first place. Even if it is you may be faced with spending plenty of time, trouble and money to get hold of a DVD only available somewhere else in the world.
Being able to "buy the DVD dirt cheap" (even at all) is the exception rather than the rule.
When I hear the word "harmonise", I usually think of things being harmonious... however, what happens in looney Euroland is that harmonisation of laws results in things becoming equally bad for everyone... things never become less restrictive, they always manage to find a way for all the most restrictive laws to be kept and amalgated into the new "harmonised" version...
Hardly restricted to the EU, especially in the context of copyright, is there even one example of a copyright treaty which resulted in a reduction of copyright for some parties?
Not voting means you don't approve of any of the candidates.
A big problem would be working out how many non voters are "don't care" and how many are "none of the above". Unless these are explicit on the ballot.
A low voter turnout robs the government of legitimacy.
It could also be a sign of things such as lack of diversity amongst candidates. Which makes it more likely that a voter will be unable to find any candidate who actually represents his or her views.
In my opinion null votes should count towards "empty chair" positions in the government, which automatically vote against any new legislation.
That's probably just as wrong in practice than the status quo of assuming that all non voters are apathetic.
From the text of the IPRED 2 directive "Article 3 Offences Member States shall ensure that all intentional infringements of an intellectual property right on a commercial scale, and attempting, aiding or abetting and inciting such infringements, are treated as criminal offences."
Interesting how these kind of laws never appear to be used against the likes of SCO or TV stations rebroadcasting other channels without proper acknowlagement.
My problem is the RIAA does not appear to always perform what is called "due diligence" in the legal world before suing. I may be wrong, I have been before and will be again...but, it seems to me that there are way too many cases where they have made huge assumptions and sued people based on those assumptions.
Effectivly what they are doing is using litigation or more likely the threat of litigation in order to extort money from people.
They may also be violating the law in pursuing their agenda, in some cases.
If they are actually suing people then in could be "Barratry". If they are just making threats to sue then they probably are just being annoying.
This puts the RIAA between a rock and a hard place. Either they can admit that they broke into her home computer, or they can admit that they were lying about that bit. Of course, if they admit they never really had any evidence in the first place, that strengthens the other claims against them.
Also known as "giving the RIAA enough rope to hang themselves".
No wonder they want the counterclaim dismissed.
It appears to be the case that the RIAA dosn't want cases to actually go to court even when they are simply the plaintiff. Here they have effectivly ended up as the defendent in a case where a judge is quite likely to "throw the book at them".
XP made a killing on the fact that consumers were fed up with the 9x line. Particularly, WinME. The disaster to end all disasters, which was still probably worse then what Vista currently is.
:)
I've heard Vista called "Windows ME v2"
Let the morons rant and rave and expose themselves for the fools they are so we know who to avoid.
That'll also help identify exactly who the ranting and raving fools actually are. It's quite possible for "hate speach" restrictions to be used to silence opposition and critique of rather distasteful points of view.
I'd rather know who the racist/sexist/religionist/homophobic assholes are, than not.
It also helps if they can still be identified as such, even if their bigotry is politically correct or they are a member of some "minority/historically opressed group".
Bad arguments should be countered with good arguments, not with laws and bans.
Remember too that bad arguments can be defended by laws and bans...
By banning parties that do not share "democractic values" could on one hand it could stop a dictator, perhaps.
Or it could help elect one. Depending exactly who is defining "democratic values".
The exact same spirit applies to free speech. Anyone should be able to deny the holocaust openly.
As well as investigate or just discuss the evidence.
It's up to society at large to consider and then dismiss
Actually would more be a case of "dismiss", "accept" or "come to different conclusions".
such claims with their own free thought, research, and insight, rather than be protected from this kind of speech by censors.
If point of view requires censorship of any opposing viewpoints even the imprisonment of anyone who dosn't agree with it. What does that tell you about the actual evidence (and logic) for that position?
the pure act of banning that speech *makes it true to some point* to some since there is no longer any debate, confrontation, to show that the opposite is/may be true (i.e. that you should not be a rascist).
Banning something also acts as very effective "free advertising". This holds as much for a political party as for a movie or song. There are also people who may be attracted to a political group simply because it is banned...
Why should a democracy allow and even support a group with the declared aim to destroy that democracy?
It really depends what they want to replace the existing system of government with.