They can still supply it in SD content which is still DIGITAL. DIGITAL is the new medium, no HD. HD is merely one of the perks.
OK, so they can transmit at the old resolution on the new channel. This doesn't stop the government from reclaiming and auctioning the old spectrum, so the threat (of refusing to broadcast HDTV unless they get their demanded restrictions) is still empty.
The content publishers said adopt some form of control or we won't supply HD content.
Given that the whole point of the HDTV transition is to clear a chunk of spectrum for auction (i.e. the transmission channel for the old format won't exist any more), the proper response is to shrug and call their bluff -- they either supply HD content or they go out of the media business.
Tell the [RI/MP]AA that they are actually super-secret encoded BitTorrent file transfers...
Or, better yet, wake up the Department of Homeland Security to the fact that spam is a perfect medium for transmitting brief hidden messages (e.g. the "go-code" for a terrorist op). Not only is the message itself concealed, but traffic analysis is defeated (there's no way to tell which of several million people is getting the real message).
That depends on the circumstances. Guns optimally designed to defend you from a burglar or rapist ought to kill -- that minimizes the risk of being subjected to a frivolous lawsuit for hurting the poor widdle cwiminal. Guns optimally designed for war should preferably disable rather than kill -- that takes up more enemy resources unless you're fighting somebody who doesn't give a damn about his own wounded.
Quoth Lautenberg: "On any given day people across the country can turn on their TV news or read in their local paper the sad story of a child taking another child's life because they got their hands on a loaded gun."
This statement is based on statistics which count 25-year-olds as "children". (Similarly, the usual anti-gun statistics about killings by "acquaintances" include gang-bangers on neighboring turf shooting each other.)
It seems like there are only pro-gun comments modded up.
Er, because the analogy to DRM (recognized by most/.ers as evil for reasons that have been beaten to death) couldn't be more obvious if it had arrived with a brass band? (Of course, the stakes are different -- being unable to transfer your lawfully purchased music to your iPod is a bit less bothersome than being raped or murdered.)
A nation wide database with authorized users of available guns linked with an mandatory index of bullet mark charachteristics from every gun sold would be very helpful to police investigations of shootings
The ballistics signature of a gun can be completely removed in a few minutes with a rat-tail file (this makes the gun less accurate at range, but that's not an issue for most criminals).
Pressure sensors would not be affected by blood, mud, dirt and grime.
They would, however, be affected by the difference in one's grip between 1)calmly squeezing off a few rounds during a calibration session and 2)defending yourself in a life-or-death fight.
During the civil rights movement in the US, there was a similar attempt to take away the right of blacks to vote. All voters were required to take a test (or something else that required literacy), and those that couldn't do were not able to vote. Since blacks were (at the time) not predominantly literate, this denied most of them the right to vote. This was struck down as un-constitutional.
Before you get flamed for that statement, I'd like to offer a friendly amendment.
The problem wasn't that blacks weren't literate (though the Jim Crow regime certainly threw up roadblocks between blacks and a decent education), it was that the definition of "literate" was in the hands of (generally racist) local officials. As one bitter old joke put it, a black man presented with a page of dense legal meeble in Greek was able to tell exactly what it meant -- "Ain't no n*gg*r gonna vote here today."
Whites, on the other hand, were determined to be sufficiently literate if they could spell "cat" two letters correct out of three.
The proposed New Jersey law (private citizens are restricted to hardware-enforced Gun Rights Management, police are not) is analogous in that respect.
Then I can state that there is a high likelyhood that you will not be taken in by DRM enforcement found in files which claim to be by artists who are exclusively licensed for distribution by the RIAA or the MPAA.
That flushing sound you hear is your credibility circling the commode as a result of your absurd equation of "legally authorized" with "approved by the **AA".
This is not a security breach in Windows Media Player.
Here is what happens. A wma/wmv DRM protected file needs a license to be played. When WMP plays a file that does not have a license it will open a dialog with a web browser control inside and navigate to the "license store url" that was written inside the file.
A program that can be directed to navigate to a URL listed in some file without asking for user verification is "not a security breach"?
Ok, even if Rove did forge the documents, HOW COULD HE KNOW 60 MINUTES WOULD BE SO FUCKING STUPID AS TO USE THEM?
If they didn't fall for it, it would just be one of the thousands of crank contacts any big news organization gets every day. If they did, it sinks the National Guard story. Heads Rove wins; tails doesn't count.
The 'prima facie' evidence for it can be ascertained by the instruments of your brain and senses. However it depends on how sensitively they are tuned or if they have "reception" trouble in picking up the signals due to neglect or abuse.
Since you've just explicitly admitted that your case is subjective (i.e. some people see it that way and other people don't) rather than objective (i.e. based on facts observable to all), I'll consider the argument over.
The quoted excerpt from the Bill of Rights can only be interpreted to have meant verbal language created from human lips and printing presses. There was no form of recording of sound and no method of amplified transmission.
Your homework assignment: Use this line of reasoning to convince the governing board of the National Rifle Association that the Second Amendment applies only to muzzle-loading black-powder firearms.
The argument of "turning the dial" can be compared to a guest coming into my home, lighting up a cigarette, and then when I nicely ask them to put it out because I don't want to damage the health of my lungs they then flippantly say "leave the room".
A partial count of the ways in which this analogy is invalid:
1. Your house is your personal property. The airwaves are not your personal property. Ergo, you control what goes on within the former, but not the latter.
2. The agenda you are defending does not correspond to telling your guest "you may not smoke in my house". It corresponds to telling your guest "you may not smoke anywhere, even on the property of someone who approves of smoking".
3. You have an opportunity to decide in advance what media broadcasts to accept and reject, just as you have an opportunity to object to your guest's actions when he first takes out the cigarette and match.
4. Using the arcane technologies known by the technical names "the off button" and "the channel changer" does not correspond to leaving the room. It corresponds to ejecting the unwanted guest.
Freedom is not the goal
Here, I simply reject your premise out of hand as un-American.
Where there are disagreements we should work together and patiently try to persuade one another until we come to a common understanding.
Well, then, why didn't you say up front that you were opposed to the FCC's coercive methods?
That doesn't overshadow the fact that the consequences of obscenity pollution are just as real as the consequences of environmental pollution.
Nonsense. The results of inhaling toxic chemicals are a matter of verifiable objective fact. The results of hearing and viewing unwanted messages are a subjective function of the recipient's predelections.
The original remit of the FCC was to regulate "non-Federal Government use of the radio spectrum". Most notably, this meant the issuing and revoking of licences permitting broadcasting and ensuring that electronic equipment did not interfere with other electronic equipment owned by someone else. However, laterly (and this predates the Powell regime) regulation of the radio spectrum has been interpreted to mean regulation of the content of any messages broadcast over the radio waves. There is no democratic remit for this, it is simply how the original remit is now interpreted.
The root problem is that socialist ideas were respectable at the time that radio was developed into a mass medium. As a result, instead of a rational property-rights model (Joe Blow can't broadcast interference on John Doe's channel, and the government's role is to resolve disputes as to who owns which channel in a given area), we got a muddle based on the notion that "the public owns the airwaves" (which, in reality, translates to "the politicians control the broadcast media").
Precisely -- hiding a message in spam also has the advantage of defeating traffic analysis (there's no way to tell which of the millions of recipients knows that the exact percentage on the "mortgage offer", or whatever, is a code).
In the general case, you should not require any more evidence from an extraordinary claim, or any less evidence from an ordinary one.
If John Doe told you "I just saw a 5'11" white guy with one eye" and Joe Blow told you "I just saw a 11'5" green guy with two heads", would you treat the two assertions as equally credible?
The maxim "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" refers to the new evidence being brought to the table. The definition of "extraordinary claim" presupposes that the old evidence is strongly against the claim. Thus, a strong body of new evidence for the claim is necessary to bring it up to the "neutral" credibility level of a mundane claim.
For instance, in the above example, you would weigh the two claims using the total evidence available to you (including a lot of background information about humans). This would probably lead you to accept the first claim and reject the second.
Actually identity cannot be "stolen" because I still have mine if someone else uses it.
Actually, no you don't -- if somebody steals your identity and racks up a bunch of bad debt, your own identity is affected (as a simple before-and-after attempt to secure a loan will demonstrate).
If someone is a murder, are you "sinking down to their level" if you have them executed?
Actually that's precisely why many of us are opposed to the Death Penalty. I don't want to sink to the same level as the people whose actions I hate. Throw them in prison for the rest of their lives.
OK -- if somebody is a kidnapper and locks his victim up in a 6 x 10 cage, are you "sinking down to their level" by locking them in prison?
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The repentant ones could, instead of actually filling potholes, be permitted to shovel asphalt into them.
OK, so they can transmit at the old resolution on the new channel. This doesn't stop the government from reclaiming and auctioning the old spectrum, so the threat (of refusing to broadcast HDTV unless they get their demanded restrictions) is still empty.
Given that the whole point of the HDTV transition is to clear a chunk of spectrum for auction (i.e. the transmission channel for the old format won't exist any more), the proper response is to shrug and call their bluff -- they either supply HD content or they go out of the media business.
Or, better yet, wake up the Department of Homeland Security to the fact that spam is a perfect medium for transmitting brief hidden messages (e.g. the "go-code" for a terrorist op). Not only is the message itself concealed, but traffic analysis is defeated (there's no way to tell which of several million people is getting the real message).
That depends on the circumstances. Guns optimally designed to defend you from a burglar or rapist ought to kill -- that minimizes the risk of being subjected to a frivolous lawsuit for hurting the poor widdle cwiminal. Guns optimally designed for war should preferably disable rather than kill -- that takes up more enemy resources unless you're fighting somebody who doesn't give a damn about his own wounded.
This statement is based on statistics which count 25-year-olds as "children". (Similarly, the usual anti-gun statistics about killings by "acquaintances" include gang-bangers on neighboring turf shooting each other.)
RTFA. Conventional guns have exceeded "90 percent reliability" ever since the fifteenth century.
So the FUD claiming that the police were not actually going to use the weapon because they "knew better" is exposed for what it is.
The fact that the New Jersey law specifically exempts the police is a pretty damning indication to the contrary.
A recognition system does not need to be 100%.
Yes, it does, given that 1)the system is not necessary in the first place and 2)it may cause the death of the user if it fails.
Er, because the analogy to DRM (recognized by most /.ers as evil for reasons that have been beaten to death) couldn't be more obvious if it had arrived with a brass band? (Of course, the stakes are different -- being unable to transfer your lawfully purchased music to your iPod is a bit less bothersome than being raped or murdered.)
The ballistics signature of a gun can be completely removed in a few minutes with a rat-tail file (this makes the gun less accurate at range, but that's not an issue for most criminals).
They would, however, be affected by the difference in one's grip between 1)calmly squeezing off a few rounds during a calibration session and 2)defending yourself in a life-or-death fight.
Before you get flamed for that statement, I'd like to offer a friendly amendment.
The problem wasn't that blacks weren't literate (though the Jim Crow regime certainly threw up roadblocks between blacks and a decent education), it was that the definition of "literate" was in the hands of (generally racist) local officials. As one bitter old joke put it, a black man presented with a page of dense legal meeble in Greek was able to tell exactly what it meant -- "Ain't no n*gg*r gonna vote here today."
Whites, on the other hand, were determined to be sufficiently literate if they could spell "cat" two letters correct out of three.
The proposed New Jersey law (private citizens are restricted to hardware-enforced Gun Rights Management, police are not) is analogous in that respect.
Why are you arguing when you recognize that my criticism ("legally authorized" != "approved by **AA") is completely correct?
That flushing sound you hear is your credibility circling the commode as a result of your absurd equation of "legally authorized" with "approved by the **AA".
Here is what happens. A wma/wmv DRM protected file needs a license to be played. When WMP plays a file that does not have a license it will open a dialog with a web browser control inside and navigate to the "license store url" that was written inside the file.
A program that can be directed to navigate to a URL listed in some file without asking for user verification is "not a security breach"?
What is a "security breach" in your world?
If they didn't fall for it, it would just be one of the thousands of crank contacts any big news organization gets every day. If they did, it sinks the National Guard story. Heads Rove wins; tails doesn't count.
Since you've just explicitly admitted that your case is subjective (i.e. some people see it that way and other people don't) rather than objective (i.e. based on facts observable to all), I'll consider the argument over.
Your homework assignment: Use this line of reasoning to convince the governing board of the National Rifle Association that the Second Amendment applies only to muzzle-loading black-powder firearms.
Your homework assingment: Provide a citation for the section of the law against revealing the identities of CIA agents which supports this exemption.
A partial count of the ways in which this analogy is invalid:
1. Your house is your personal property. The airwaves are not your personal property. Ergo, you control what goes on within the former, but not the latter.
2. The agenda you are defending does not correspond to telling your guest "you may not smoke in my house". It corresponds to telling your guest "you may not smoke anywhere, even on the property of someone who approves of smoking".
3. You have an opportunity to decide in advance what media broadcasts to accept and reject, just as you have an opportunity to object to your guest's actions when he first takes out the cigarette and match.
4. Using the arcane technologies known by the technical names "the off button" and "the channel changer" does not correspond to leaving the room. It corresponds to ejecting the unwanted guest.
Freedom is not the goal
Here, I simply reject your premise out of hand as un-American.
Where there are disagreements we should work together and patiently try to persuade one another until we come to a common understanding.
Well, then, why didn't you say up front that you were opposed to the FCC's coercive methods?
That doesn't overshadow the fact that the consequences of obscenity pollution are just as real as the consequences of environmental pollution.
Nonsense. The results of inhaling toxic chemicals are a matter of verifiable objective fact. The results of hearing and viewing unwanted messages are a subjective function of the recipient's predelections.
If the Supreme Court says that a tail is a leg, how many legs does a cow have?
The root problem is that socialist ideas were respectable at the time that radio was developed into a mass medium. As a result, instead of a rational property-rights model (Joe Blow can't broadcast interference on John Doe's channel, and the government's role is to resolve disputes as to who owns which channel in a given area), we got a muddle based on the notion that "the public owns the airwaves" (which, in reality, translates to "the politicians control the broadcast media").
Precisely -- hiding a message in spam also has the advantage of defeating traffic analysis (there's no way to tell which of the millions of recipients knows that the exact percentage on the "mortgage offer", or whatever, is a code).
If John Doe told you "I just saw a 5'11" white guy with one eye" and Joe Blow told you "I just saw a 11'5" green guy with two heads", would you treat the two assertions as equally credible?
The maxim "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof" refers to the new evidence being brought to the table. The definition of "extraordinary claim" presupposes that the old evidence is strongly against the claim. Thus, a strong body of new evidence for the claim is necessary to bring it up to the "neutral" credibility level of a mundane claim.
For instance, in the above example, you would weigh the two claims using the total evidence available to you (including a lot of background information about humans). This would probably lead you to accept the first claim and reject the second.
Actually, no you don't -- if somebody steals your identity and racks up a bunch of bad debt, your own identity is affected (as a simple before-and-after attempt to secure a loan will demonstrate).
Actually that's precisely why many of us are opposed to the Death Penalty. I don't want to sink to the same level as the people whose actions I hate. Throw them in prison for the rest of their lives.
OK -- if somebody is a kidnapper and locks his victim up in a 6 x 10 cage, are you "sinking down to their level" by locking them in prison?