So wait. I pay $5000 for the privilege to be this landing zone of a huge cloud of fast-moving debris? Wow. The US government should bring back above ground nuclear weapons testing, and just sell tickets to be near ground-zero when the bomb goes off. You won't need to experiment on unsuspecting Army soldiers anymore, and you'll get money.
Nop, this is not a troll but a very sound comment.
Just to clarify, I was actually wondering out loud if the parent of my original post was a troll. I didn't state that very clearly. I only say this because I personally get tired of people who point out that their own posts might be trolls, or that the moderator might think that they are trolls. It's some weird reverse-psychology on the moderators, I think, and it annoys me.
Anyway, that really has little to with your response.
Just to point out, 2600 has the money and support of the Electronic Frontier Foundation behind them. You can contribute to EFF's DVD legal defense fund. You can bet 2600 would be SOL without the EFF behind them (and a very prominent First Amendment lawyer working for them).
You might still think Slashdot is chickening out, but not as bad as it first seems. VA Linux is already in a lawsuit with its stockholders. I don't think they want anymore legal trouble.
I think the occasional spasms where Dr. Strangelove starts doing the Nazi hand thing make it pretty clear that the guy is supposed to be an ex-Nazi. (And one who hasn't changed much.)
I started doing some research on whether Goddard had any influence on von Braun. I didn't find anything conclusive either way, but I did find out that the character Dr. Strangelove is apparently a parody of Wernher von Braun. I guess people were generally suspicious of a former Nazi all of the sudden working for the U.S.
Yes, yes. And Jefferson had slaves, and Heisenberg was probably a Nazi-supporter. Minimizing people who were racist doesn't change the fact that they might have made a significant contribution to history. In fact, distorting your view of history (as you alude to in your comment about "wise historians") in order to say less about such people is not much different than the Nazis trying to write Jews out of the history books.
I too am sad that brilliant people like Goddard and Heisenberg supported the Nazis. But that doesn't change the fact that Goddard was influential to American rocketry, and that Heisenberg was pivotal in the creation of Quantum Mechanics.
(And to those of you in the audience: Before you YHBT YHL HAND me, I realize this might be a troll. At the same time, there are a lot of people in History and English at the college level who think like this poster.)
Back in the 30's, people were driven by pure ideals.
I suspect people have always been driven by the same things: love, greed, altruism, hate, curiosity, fear, hunger, lust, etc. I certainly don't think these motivations have changed in the last century.
But then we go back to the other problem. Common carriers aren't broadcast agencies. I could read OT III over the phone to a friend, and the phone company could never be busted, but if I went on public-access TV and read OT III every week, the station would eventually get busted for continuing to run my show (the first time they could claim ignorance, maybe), even if they had a strict "no censorship" policy.
I think you're partially correct. This article gives a good history of the clear and present danger (CPD) test. The law which first inspired the CPD test (the Espionage Act of 1917) was probably later overturned (they don't say), but the CPD test survived beyond it. It has been "tightened up," so to speak, through the use of the word "imminent" rather than "present," but has still be used in cases more complex than the fire example I gave. Flag burning, communist plots, and all sorts of interesting stuff. The rest of the article is an argument against CPD, which, if you're interested in legal theory, is quite interesting.
BTW, was Wilson actually a minister of some sort, or do you call him Reverend as a sarcastic allusion to religious officials who seek to limit the freedoms of others?
It's not political speech because CoS is not the government. That is first and foremost what the First Amendment is there for: To protect you from your government. Back when it was written, governments were the most powerful entities on Earth (the Catholic church had long since retired from that title), and had been know to oppress their citizens quite regularly.
The change now is that businesses (and CoS, whatever category you wish to put them in) now have the power to harass persons who wish to criticize them. The courts haven't stretched the First Amendment to cover that type of speech as fully as political speech. They've done something, but not enough, and that's why this is still legally shakey ground.
On the flip side, businesses inhabit this netherworld between public agency and private entity. How much should you be allow to publicize about a business in the name of public discourse and criticism. I don't think we should be able to publish the Windows source code or the details of Intel's chip manufacturing process in order to critically analyze it. I'll agree that the CoS is using the laws in ways that were never intended, but that doesn't necessarily mean we should chuck the laws.
Yes, thankfully new Slashdot stories keep getting posted and forcefully retire the madness. It sort of puts the flame fest on hold until the next story comes out. For example, if you wait long enough, KDE vs. Gnome will come back around and the flaming will resume. In fact, I think almost every topic has a characteristic argument that resurfaces every time a story in that topic is posted:
Space: NASA vs. Private Space Corps, NASA vs. Feed the Children!
KDE and GNOME: KDE vs. GNOME
Microsoft: Microsoft vs. Linux
Patents: No more IP! vs. Shut up you theiving punks!
Mozilla: Yay Mozilla! vs. Mozilla sucks donkey parts!
Perl: Perl vs. Python
I think after a while, you'll have seen every possible argument on Slashdot, and won't need to read the comments anymore.:)
Heck, if you were a Scientologist, would you post here? Regardless of what you might think of them, I don't think they're stupid enough to try and defend themselves in a forum where they will just get flamed into oblivion.
Even beyond that. Someone at Slashdot has the root password on the database box. As long as they have that, they have the power to remove posts, no matter what their policies might be.
I've noticed that. I've had to buy 3 in the last 8 years. (Every time the darn plastic hinge cracked and there was no way to reattach the wrist band.) The first two were identical, and the 3rd added a prominent "Light" button and a metal wrist band (but still a cheap plastic housing that will probably crack in another year.)
People also need to realize that for quite a long while, the Supreme Court has distinguished between different types of speech, and given them different protection. Speech of a political nature receives the highest protection. It's the reason we can go around an bash the DMCA all day long and not get in trouble. (Notice I said "bash" and not "break".)
On the other end, speech that would present a "clear and present danger" (as I think the quote goes) is not protected. Classic example: shouting "fire" as a prank in a crowded area.
I think our current speech problems have to do with speech about businesses and IP, something which has not been given too much support in the past.
In the end, Slashdot got busted for copyright violation. Notice that we can still all sit here and say anything we want about the Church of Scientology, and they can't send Rob another cease-and-desist order. (They can picket our homes and places of business if we are really obnoxious, but that's a different story.)
This really isn't about free speech at all. Cut and paste has never been protected.
Common carrier status might protect the people who give Slashdot its Internet connection and the owners of the network segments. However, Slashdot bears much more resemblence to a newspaper, magazine, or news program. Those types of organizations are not going to be protected, even if they decide to let people post whatever they wanted.
Right. Not to be cynical, but I doubt there are many sponsors out there who are willing to burn lots of their cash defending the rights of their non-paying users in lawsuits that they will almost surely lose. (At least in the case of this incident.)
Maybe the ACLU would be willing to run a discussion board with the side purpose of creating an incident that they could use as a test case for the DMCA. I would suggest the EFF, but I suspect they are already hemoraging cash over the DeCSS case. (You can, by the way, make a donation to the DeCSS defense fund if you want to help support them.)
Slashdot Mirror
Some moderator has a sense of humor. :)
So wait. I pay $5000 for the privilege to be this landing zone of a huge cloud of fast-moving debris? Wow. The US government should bring back above ground nuclear weapons testing, and just sell tickets to be near ground-zero when the bomb goes off. You won't need to experiment on unsuspecting Army soldiers anymore, and you'll get money.
I didn't say the responses would be justified. :)
They didn't say they were going to replace Irix with Linux on *all* of their machines. They just don't want to port Irix to IA-64.
Using my psychic powers, I predict 5 replys to this calling you not-nice things for removing Irix and putting Linux on a MIPS workstation.
Just to clarify, I was actually wondering out loud if the parent of my original post was a troll. I didn't state that very clearly. I only say this because I personally get tired of people who point out that their own posts might be trolls, or that the moderator might think that they are trolls. It's some weird reverse-psychology on the moderators, I think, and it annoys me.
Anyway, that really has little to with your response.
See post 750 for my explanation of the problems with this.
You might still think Slashdot is chickening out, but not as bad as it first seems. VA Linux is already in a lawsuit with its stockholders. I don't think they want anymore legal trouble.
The source I found said 1500 rockets were fired and 2500 people were killed.
I think the occasional spasms where Dr. Strangelove starts doing the Nazi hand thing make it pretty clear that the guy is supposed to be an ex-Nazi. (And one who hasn't changed much.)
I started doing some research on whether Goddard had any influence on von Braun. I didn't find anything conclusive either way, but I did find out that the character Dr. Strangelove is apparently a parody of Wernher von Braun. I guess people were generally suspicious of a former Nazi all of the sudden working for the U.S.
I too am sad that brilliant people like Goddard and Heisenberg supported the Nazis. But that doesn't change the fact that Goddard was influential to American rocketry, and that Heisenberg was pivotal in the creation of Quantum Mechanics.
(And to those of you in the audience: Before you YHBT YHL HAND me, I realize this might be a troll. At the same time, there are a lot of people in History and English at the college level who think like this poster.)
I suspect people have always been driven by the same things: love, greed, altruism, hate, curiosity, fear, hunger, lust, etc. I certainly don't think these motivations have changed in the last century.
But then we go back to the other problem. Common carriers aren't broadcast agencies. I could read OT III over the phone to a friend, and the phone company could never be busted, but if I went on public-access TV and read OT III every week, the station would eventually get busted for continuing to run my show (the first time they could claim ignorance, maybe), even if they had a strict "no censorship" policy.
BTW, was Wilson actually a minister of some sort, or do you call him Reverend as a sarcastic allusion to religious officials who seek to limit the freedoms of others?
The change now is that businesses (and CoS, whatever category you wish to put them in) now have the power to harass persons who wish to criticize them. The courts haven't stretched the First Amendment to cover that type of speech as fully as political speech. They've done something, but not enough, and that's why this is still legally shakey ground.
On the flip side, businesses inhabit this netherworld between public agency and private entity. How much should you be allow to publicize about a business in the name of public discourse and criticism. I don't think we should be able to publish the Windows source code or the details of Intel's chip manufacturing process in order to critically analyze it. I'll agree that the CoS is using the laws in ways that were never intended, but that doesn't necessarily mean we should chuck the laws.
Ozone
- Space: NASA vs. Private Space Corps, NASA vs. Feed the Children!
- KDE and GNOME: KDE vs. GNOME
- Microsoft: Microsoft vs. Linux
- Patents: No more IP! vs. Shut up you theiving punks!
- Mozilla: Yay Mozilla! vs. Mozilla sucks donkey parts!
- Perl: Perl vs. Python
I think after a while, you'll have seen every possible argument on Slashdot, and won't need to read the comments anymore.Heck, if you were a Scientologist, would you post here? Regardless of what you might think of them, I don't think they're stupid enough to try and defend themselves in a forum where they will just get flamed into oblivion.
Christian Scientists != Church of Scientology
Even beyond that. Someone at Slashdot has the root password on the database box. As long as they have that, they have the power to remove posts, no matter what their policies might be.
I've noticed that. I've had to buy 3 in the last 8 years. (Every time the darn plastic hinge cracked and there was no way to reattach the wrist band.) The first two were identical, and the 3rd added a prominent "Light" button and a metal wrist band (but still a cheap plastic housing that will probably crack in another year.)
On the other end, speech that would present a "clear and present danger" (as I think the quote goes) is not protected. Classic example: shouting "fire" as a prank in a crowded area.
I think our current speech problems have to do with speech about businesses and IP, something which has not been given too much support in the past.
In the end, Slashdot got busted for copyright violation. Notice that we can still all sit here and say anything we want about the Church of Scientology, and they can't send Rob another cease-and-desist order. (They can picket our homes and places of business if we are really obnoxious, but that's a different story.)
This really isn't about free speech at all. Cut and paste has never been protected.
Common carrier status might protect the people who give Slashdot its Internet connection and the owners of the network segments. However, Slashdot bears much more resemblence to a newspaper, magazine, or news program. Those types of organizations are not going to be protected, even if they decide to let people post whatever they wanted.
Maybe the ACLU would be willing to run a discussion board with the side purpose of creating an incident that they could use as a test case for the DMCA. I would suggest the EFF, but I suspect they are already hemoraging cash over the DeCSS case. (You can, by the way, make a donation to the DeCSS defense fund if you want to help support them.)