Actually, it was pretty new as of Windows 95.:) Well, at least to the DOS/Windows world. There wasn't generally a "shutdown". You'd save your data to the floppy, wait for the drive light to stop flickering, and then slap the power switch. They "innovated" it later on.
Of course, the prior art folks will bring up the obvious ones. "init" was introduced to AT&T's Unix back in the 1970's. Plenty of people will say "I had a up/down [batch file | script]" I'm sure the AT&T one is documented somewhere. As for the rest of us, most of us ditched our old up/down scripts years ago. I distinctly remember having them for my BBS, way back when Internet access was rare.
It's just another fine example of how poor the current patent system is. Not to knock the patent examiners, but it'd be nice if someone familiar with the field that they're examining would approve or disapprove the patents. I'm sure folks like Microsoft submit patents for anything and everything they can think of, so they can enforce "their" patent later on. Then it's a matter of court time, and who can afford to keep their lawyers on it for the longest.
A company I worked for had several patents for products they had. Well, the patents were vague at best. It was a software patent, where the application was entirely hosted on the companies network. Basically, a customer decided that they could do it better themselves, rather than continuing to pay for the hosted application. After a few years, and a few million spent on lawyers, the courts the company lost in court. So, for millions of dollars, all they got was "nope, the customer was right".
Most people don't have millions to spend to keep a lawsuit alive, knowing that it's a gamble. Microsoft obviously does have those kinds of funds. You, or I, or Joe Developer who innovated an amazing tool, would lose simply because they couldn't afford to stay in the game.
But it would be correct in French for the feminine version of "a", "the", "her", or "it", depending on the word it was before. Wha? I have no idea. Maybe it was a "What the fuck", sometimes simply said phonetically as "wha tha?!" Or maybe English is a second language for him, and Yoda is his first.:)
They had not read the doctrine of assured continuity. Exact duplicates in geographically diverse storage facilities would have helped. Hell, they didn't even have a solid order of succession. "Don't worry, I'll be back" doesn't really cut it. (blah, blah, Apostolic succession, blah, blah).
That's why I include 10 cover sheets, each with their name in large letters at the top. Really though, I've seen it where multiple bosses want the same information provided in a different fashion. It's particularly annoying when one dictates a particular method, and each time you give it to them, they say "No, I wanted it this way..." Even if you ask for the specific format and an written example of it, and you replicated it precisely, yours will be wrong.
The good starting point is at the beginning. 679 episodes, that take up 202Gb, and are available on your friendly neighborhood bit torrent (titled "Doctor Who Seasons 1 to 26"). Don't worry, it'll take a few months to download.
If my script worked properly, the total runtime is 1,023,749.521 seconds. Or in something a little easier to understand. 11 days, 20 hours, 22 minutes, and 26.521 seconds. That's assuming all the files worked, there is no gap between episodes (add 11.31 minutes, if there is a 1 second gap between episodes). If you dedicated full work weeks to it, it would be 284.374 hours, or 7.1 normal work work weeks (assuming 40 hours). Give yourself 2 months of not working, and being glued to the TV in your mothers basement.
Unfortunately, this has started a discussion of having a DoctorWhoConThon (Doctor Who Convention and Marathon). Segmented into 12 hour runs, to be played twice (for those who fell out during the first run that day), it would take 24 days.
Shhh. You're not suppose to tell them anything about their future. It will disturb the timeline. You know what happened last time. Observe. That's all we can do. Don't touch anything. Don't consume anything. Don't change anything. Look what happened last time. A fool with a sonic screwdriver hotwired your T-box and started mucking about all over the timeline. Do you want to get stuck on a planet primarily populated by those furless monkeys and blattaria again? Last time it took you 100 years to signal for help. You do remember how long it took us to clean up the mess from you killing one lepidoptera, right?
Ya, I heard those projects didn't go so well after I left. Damn, I gave you infinite space, and a large rock orbiting a star to work with. I don't get how you could screw it up from there. I'll come back over when I'm done these other projects and give you a hand with those bugs.
[tappity, tappity, tappity] Ok, you're scheduled for after I get these multiverse wormholes done. I know it's not a big deal for your pets on that planet, but there were project managers who actually did their job right and populated their rocks quickly.
While you guys were messing around with bugfixes on "dirt", the other rocks slated for sentient life were already thriving. You really should have used the templates. It's not so hard. Now your rock is 4 billion years behind the others. They'll never catch up, especially with the way that "life" as you call it can't work through simple problems. If I've told you once, I've told you 10^100 times, a ground up rewrite really isn't necessary for these simple projects.
I checked the planning schedule. They're discussing completely scrapping that rock so you can start over. You aren't too attached to those pets running around on that rock, are you? It looks like they'll be diverting the atmosphere from that rock to one of the newer projects that is actually on schedule.
Don't be too sure about this one. You may be sued or arrested almost anywhere for anything, regardless of the location it occurred.
There have been actions that would have been crimes in the US, but happened on foreign soil where it may or may not have been against the law. The individuals were arrested and tried in the US for those crimes.
The reverse could very easily happen. Since the US and China aren't exactly on the best of terms, it is doubtful that you would be extradited between either of the two nations to each other.
A few examples to consider are (in no particular order)
Manuel Noriega (... do I have to make a list?)
Jon Lech Johansen (DeCSS)
Paul Hillier (British citizen, arrested in US for not paying child support in the UK)
Jack Sporich, Erik Peeters, and Ronald "John" Boyajian, (Operation Twisted Traveler)
Dmitry Sklyarov (Hacker, DMCA crimes)
I do not know of any inverse cases, but I strongly suspect China would be more than happy to deal with people who have done illegal actions in other nations. Those just won't make the state run news.
I do totally agree with your ideal of the international legal system. A person, regardless of nationality, should be tried where they committed the crime. It is completely inappropriate to apply laws of another locale to a person. Cultures and societies decide their laws, and it is not up to the global community to decide them for us. While it may seem like a good idea to set a high moral standard for all citizens of the world, it only seems like a good idea as long as they match your own ideals. Those who don't agree should be allowed to leave that culture or society, and join one which does match their own beliefs. In times long since gone, we were. There was once a place where you could escape to, where you were free to speak, to believe, or to act (within social norms). You could leave your homeland, and travel there for a new start, to live your dream. From 1776 to 1875, there were no restrictions on entry to the US, other than getting there alive. In 1875, laws were created to protect individuals from human trafficking (Chinese slave labor, and women being imported for prostitution were made illegal). It ramped up over the years to exclude everyone, where they are daily wondering if they will be returned to the place they escaped. But I digress.
I've been to coffee shops in the Netherlands, and perfectly legal brothels in 3 different countries (other than the handful in the US). Before you get your hopes up, I don't smoke pot, and I didn't partake of any services at the brothels. I was more than happy to drink perfectly legal alcohol (legal in both the US and those countries), and observe. In all cases, I was brought along with locals to see some of the local life. Should I be tried in the US for being to such places? I hope not.
While I do find it a bit morally wrong to do some things, it's up to the local government to do something about it. I hold exactly one person up to my moral standard, and that is myself. My morals are higher than some people, and lower than others. I wouldn't fit in well in an Amish community, nor would I fit in well in some of the decided seedier communities around the world. I would like to find a place that was open like the US was in yesteryear, but it doesn't seem such a place exists, nor would I likely be allowed to leave for it after writing things such as this.
2000 TransAm WS/6. Depending on the source you read, it came from the factory with between 325hp to 375hp. I've made several changes which have helped the power quite a bit. Those kind of numbers aren't unheard of. The 2008 GTO was at 400hp. The 2010 Camaro SS is at 426hp. The base model 2010 Corvette is 430hp.
I don't have to be the fastest guy on the road, I just like to be in one of the quicker ones.
A friend of mine had "barn cats" They were mostly domesticated, but not fixed. You could get close, and if they were curious, they'd let you touch them. They lived in the barn, and were perfectly happy catching mice. They were never fed, but were still healthy and happy. The population was about 3. One of them had a litter of kittens, and the population went up to about 7, but dwindled down on it's own to 4, which then became 3 when one of the older ones died. I would have been surprised if it was predators that got them. Predators would likely have gone after the much easier chickens. It would have taken a pretty significant predator to go after the cattle or pigs. If only the predators had done more about the damned squirrels.:) They kept a 22 by the door, and the squirrels were target practice, since they had a bad habit of climbing into engine compartments and chewing through wires.
With cats that I've had, I've noticed a few different behaviors with food, including kills. I've had a lot of cats over the years, and have paid attention to their behaviors. These are some general categories of their behaviors with food.
1) Pet food. They usually don't care much, but it's food so they eat it. They'll fight a little with each other when they're eating (growling, and the occasional paw smack), but they aren't very interested in protecting it.
2) Special food or kills. Special foods would be human scraps. They'll take it away somewhere safe, as you described, to eat it. The only noises they'll make are growls if they're approached by another animal (including people) indicating to "go away". Sometimes they'll take it to their nest (or den, as you said).
3) Tribute kills. They'll bring it to a regular tribute location, or right up to you. If they can find you, they'll come up, while trying to meow with their tribute in their mouth. They're not being very secretive, if they're meowing to get your attention.:)
There are exceptions to these too. It really depends on the animal. They all have unique personalities.
The cats that we domesticated were comfortable laying around the house (the porch was enclosed, but the doors were left open).
I never said we domesticated them to make them pets. There were a few reasons. The most "friendly" was that we could then get them fixed. The real reason though was so we didn't have wild animals fighting with our domesticated animals.
The argument wasn't for or against adoption. The statistic counts an unfixed female cat, and how many other cats it will spawn over a period. It really doesn't matter if it's domesticated or feral, it's still a cat who can reproduce.
Food was more than abundant out there. It may have just been in the woods in Florida, but you didn't want to go out in the woods without boots on, unless you liked snake bites, and other not so comfortable things. The well fed domesticated cats would bring home "tributes" to the alpha "cats" (i.e., the people feeding them). We received gifts from them just about daily of mouse parts (mostly heads and tails, but nothing in between), small birds (beaks and feet), lizards (usually just tails), etc, etc. It was a bit weird when they'd leave the tributes on a window sill. It was downright freaky when I found a spot in a crawl space that was full of small animal remains. the ones that weren't tributes, they'd had in their nest.
The male orange tabby in question was welcome in the house. He just seemed to prefer staying outside, but he would come inside sometimes, such as during heavy storms (typical Florida afternoon/evening storms up to hurricanes). A female feral that we domesticated spent most of her time indoors. It took a couple years, but she became a friendly lap cat. She to died of old age after about 10 years after being domesticated. She was a bit moody, but no worse than any other moody domesticated animal (or woman). Actually two cats died within a month of my father dying. I believe they felt an affinity towards him, so they just laid down and died shortly after.
Wrong continent? Invisible moose? No chupacabra? Now I'm curious. I thought the chupacabra had spread all around the world, but they're still good at hiding themselves. Maybe they use the same technique the invisible moose use.:)
But you are totally ignoring the reality of a very specific situation - feral cats in urban areas. What exactly is the natural control at work?
With urban sprawl, "urban" or "suburban" areas have grown into what was wild natural areas. At one house I lived in, I was talking to people who had lived there since the community was built. 15 years prior, it wasn't uncommon to see wild foxes or otters. The area was almost infested with large snakes. When I moved in, the first day I saw an osprey land on a tree branch no more than 100 feet from the house. We spotted wild animals on a fairly regular basis.
In Los Angeles, we had a problem with coyotes. When they were hungry and the food supply was poor, they would come into the neighborhoods looking for food. That food could be food left out for pets, but more commonly it was pets themselves who became their food. I called animal control to ask what could be done. This was a few years ago, so the rules may have changed, but what I was told was this. They were not allowed to trap wild animals, unless they posed an immediate threat to a human. The community, or individuals, could hire trappers, but the coyote population was large enough where taking a few out wouldn't pose a significant impact to their population. I asked about shooting them. They were posing a threat to my family (coming up to the house, pawing at the doors because we had pets). I was told that it is illegal to discharge a firearm inside the Los Angeles city limits. I then asked a more subtle question, "What happens if you find a dead coyote that has been shot?" Unofficially, they wouldn't report the fact that it had been shot. They would only report that a dead wild animal was found and disposed of.
Almost anywhere along the edges of a large metro area, you'll find plenty of wild predators. It's perfectly likely to find faster moving ones (such as birds of prey) in the interior of a city. If they are hungry, and can find the food, they will go after it.
I've either spotted or found signs of coyotes, hawks, osprey, huge owls, and buzzards in urban locations. Beyond the predators, I've seen plenty of squirrels, opossums, and armadillos. For example, I almost ran over an armadillo late one night near the intersection of Colorado St and Brand Blvd, in Glendale, CA. There were frequent sightings of coyotes nearby. I'd have a hard time calling that a rural area. It may not be times square, but it's urban.
Well... I guess even in Manhattan, there are predatory animals. There was coyote caught in Manhattan just a few months ago. I'll concede that other predators, such as alligators, most likely won't be found in too many urban settings (except in US states bordering the Gulf of Mexico, and a few others towards the south on the Atlantic coast).
A really feral cat CANNOT be made a pet. If you get them really, really early as kittens (a few weeks old) you can, but after that - forget it.
Well, you can. It's not like you can walk up and say "hi kitty, let me hold you." It takes significant time.
I grew up on a farm. There were feral cats living in the woods nearby. They would come out looking for food, and we would spot them. With truly feral cats (i.e., several generations wild), it could take months of baiting them with food, just to get them to come close enough to touch. Even then, it was weeks or months of reassurance to get them comfortable enough to be picked up. After a good bit of time, most of them became comf
Of course it's a worthless statistic, that's why they use it.:)
They never (and can't) account for population restrictions. That could include...
Food supply. If there are too many cats, not enough food, some cats die of starvation. There are an abundance of natural controls at work there. Malnurished animals don't tend to reproduce very well. But, if there is a good food supply (rodents, birds, snakes, etc), they will reproduce more.
Natural mistakes. Not every animal is born perfectly. Some are stillborn. Some die at only a few days or weeks old due to health problems.
Illnesses. Sick animals without treatment have a lower chance of survival.
Predators. A bunch of warm fuzzy kittens running around make good snacks for birds of prey. Well, also for foxes, coyotes, snakes, alligators, etc, etc, etc. Sometimes it doesn't have to be a predator that can actually eat it. I had a cat who was bitten twice by poisonous snakes. She could have died without medical assistance. Since she was a pet, she had readily available food and water. The same can't be said for feral animals.
And of course we have to mention human influences. People taking feral cats out of the population to make fixed house pets out of them. Some may be trapped and sent off to the pound and subsequently euthanized. Others are killed through accidents, such as catastrophic intersections between the animal and vehicle vectors (i.e., run over).
There are plenty of statistics on the likelihood of a feral animal surviving to maturity. That varies tremendously by their local environment. A stray cat in a suburban neighborhood may live very happily, as there are not many natural predators around (except humans). They'll also likely have access to food and water left outside for pets. A stray cat in a wooded area will have less of a chance. Sometimes the distance between the two is only a few miles. As with the statistics in the article, you cannot blindly assume either set of statistics is correct.
I love statistics. They can be used to prove or disprove anything, and you can usually find statistics to argue both sides of the same issue. The statistics can be dramatically swayed by who paid for the study to be done.
Well, people lie. People representing companies lie even more.
On the other hand, most folks lie all the time, don't they. They caught a fish THIS big, or their penis is SO long. Oh well, there goes the last bit of faith that I had in humanity. So long, and thanks for all the fish.
Golden parachutes are wonderful, but I doubt they're applicable to the people doing this kind of piracy.
It's more likely that the people doing it will have cash reserves somewhere safe, so when they declare bankruptcy, all of their "assets" will be taken (as applicable by law), and they'll use their cash reserves instead. I've known of plenty of people who hide assets in different ways. For example, when going through a nasty divorce, people have "sold" their cars, houses, etc, to trustworthy friends, who then loan the property back or rent it for a very small amount ($1/year rent). That's just one little example. There are people who do this professionally and/or habitually, who can show you how to hide everything you own, in perfectly legal manners. They could write novels on how to do it, but most are "trade secrets", even though they're well known in the trade.
Then there are folks like me. You can't touch my money, because I don't have any.:)
That could work, but they may (and probably would) use the DMCA "Safe Harbor" clause. Basically "Nope, not us, we only provide a service, we are not responsible for the content". A C&D to Lulu would get rid of the content though, but not guarantee that it won't come back as another user with a bit of modification. If they get in enough hot water from enough publishing houses, they would then have to take more action against it. It's in the best interest of Lulu financially to allow the illegal activity to happen. It's obviously not in the best interest of the authors and copyright holders though.
Plenty of people will make the same arguments that are used against the RIAA and MPAA for piracy of music and movies. Myself, I don't see a huge problem with movie or music piracy. If a person wants to see the movie or hear an album, they'll buy it, rent it, or borrow it from a friend. If they didn't want to pay for it, they've always copied it. If they aren't willing to pay for it, and can't pirate it, they still won't buy. That's been the case since 8 tracks came out for music, and VHS came out for movies.
The big difference here is that there is a discernible loss. With movies or music, the user who is pirating the media would likely not actually purchase it, as I mentioned above. For example, I don't listen to music unless it's on the radio or a friend is playing their CD's or legally downloaded music. In this case, the user not only would, but usually must purchase the book as part of the curriculum, so there is no question of if the user would purchase the book. The answer is definitely "yes". There are other edge cases, but that's not important here (i.e., roommates taking the same course, sharing a book).
The site is going too slow for me to see where the "seller" is. If they're off-shored appropriately, the list will end at 3.1, with a sidenote of lawyers pitching fits and trying to find all the parties to sue. "John Doe" works well in the US, but if Mr. John Doe lives in rural Obscuristain, it's a lot harder to serve him.
Don't forget your fingerprints on the box, both the virtual ones (like coding practices, notes, and hostnames) and real ones like physical fingerprints on the outside of the box.
You may have a hard time sniffing for traffic on a good switched network. All you may see is broadcast traffic. If you can gain access to the switch itself, you could set up a monitor port and listen to various things. Open file shares are a bit obvious, but not always useful if they have anything resembling security practices (i.e., password protected shares). A bit of brute force may work wonders, even with just a dictionary file.
It could result in a waste of a little spy box, or a goldmine for stolen data. Of course, if you use the stolen data, it may (and likely will) come back to haunt you. Best case, you'll end up in civil court. Worse case would be you end up in criminal court with a serious conviction, jail time, and more fines than you'll ever be able to pay. Worst case, you stole from the wrong folks, and your mutilated body is found years later. The coroner's report may read something like "The victim died peacefully, after all his minor extremities were removed with common hand tools, every rib was broken through blunt force trauma, skull fractures were caused by what appeared to be a baseball bat, and then he drowned while wearing cement shoes."
Hacking is all fun and games, until you end up dead. Those are the cases we rarely hear about, but I wouldn't be too quick to dismiss them as impossible.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, it was pretty new as of Windows 95. :) Well, at least to the DOS/Windows world. There wasn't generally a "shutdown". You'd save your data to the floppy, wait for the drive light to stop flickering, and then slap the power switch. They "innovated" it later on.
Of course, the prior art folks will bring up the obvious ones. "init" was introduced to AT&T's Unix back in the 1970's. Plenty of people will say "I had a up/down [batch file | script]" I'm sure the AT&T one is documented somewhere. As for the rest of us, most of us ditched our old up/down scripts years ago. I distinctly remember having them for my BBS, way back when Internet access was rare.
It's just another fine example of how poor the current patent system is. Not to knock the patent examiners, but it'd be nice if someone familiar with the field that they're examining would approve or disapprove the patents. I'm sure folks like Microsoft submit patents for anything and everything they can think of, so they can enforce "their" patent later on. Then it's a matter of court time, and who can afford to keep their lawyers on it for the longest.
A company I worked for had several patents for products they had. Well, the patents were vague at best. It was a software patent, where the application was entirely hosted on the companies network. Basically, a customer decided that they could do it better themselves, rather than continuing to pay for the hosted application. After a few years, and a few million spent on lawyers, the courts the company lost in court. So, for millions of dollars, all they got was "nope, the customer was right".
Most people don't have millions to spend to keep a lawsuit alive, knowing that it's a gamble. Microsoft obviously does have those kinds of funds. You, or I, or Joe Developer who innovated an amazing tool, would lose simply because they couldn't afford to stay in the game.
But it would be correct in French for the feminine version of "a", "the", "her", or "it", depending on the word it was before. Wha? I have no idea. Maybe it was a "What the fuck", sometimes simply said phonetically as "wha tha?!" Or maybe English is a second language for him, and Yoda is his first. :)
They had not read the doctrine of assured continuity. Exact duplicates in geographically diverse storage facilities would have helped. Hell, they didn't even have a solid order of succession. "Don't worry, I'll be back" doesn't really cut it. (blah, blah, Apostolic succession, blah, blah).
And the more recent rewrite said "Jesus saves at Bank of America". Damned corporations are using every chance they can to do a product placement.
That's why I include 10 cover sheets, each with their name in large letters at the top. Really though, I've seen it where multiple bosses want the same information provided in a different fashion. It's particularly annoying when one dictates a particular method, and each time you give it to them, they say "No, I wanted it this way..." Even if you ask for the specific format and an written example of it, and you replicated it precisely, yours will be wrong.
The good starting point is at the beginning. 679 episodes, that take up 202Gb, and are available on your friendly neighborhood bit torrent (titled "Doctor Who Seasons 1 to 26"). Don't worry, it'll take a few months to download.
If my script worked properly, the total runtime is 1,023,749.521 seconds. Or in something a little easier to understand. 11 days, 20 hours, 22 minutes, and 26.521 seconds. That's assuming all the files worked, there is no gap between episodes (add 11.31 minutes, if there is a 1 second gap between episodes). If you dedicated full work weeks to it, it would be 284.374 hours, or 7.1 normal work work weeks (assuming 40 hours). Give yourself 2 months of not working, and being glued to the TV in your mothers basement.
Unfortunately, this has started a discussion of having a DoctorWhoConThon (Doctor Who Convention and Marathon). Segmented into 12 hour runs, to be played twice (for those who fell out during the first run that day), it would take 24 days.
Shhh. You're not suppose to tell them anything about their future. It will disturb the timeline. You know what happened last time. Observe. That's all we can do. Don't touch anything. Don't consume anything. Don't change anything. Look what happened last time. A fool with a sonic screwdriver hotwired your T-box and started mucking about all over the timeline. Do you want to get stuck on a planet primarily populated by those furless monkeys and blattaria again? Last time it took you 100 years to signal for help. You do remember how long it took us to clean up the mess from you killing one lepidoptera, right?
Ya, I heard those projects didn't go so well after I left. Damn, I gave you infinite space, and a large rock orbiting a star to work with. I don't get how you could screw it up from there. I'll come back over when I'm done these other projects and give you a hand with those bugs.
[tappity, tappity, tappity] Ok, you're scheduled for after I get these multiverse wormholes done. I know it's not a big deal for your pets on that planet, but there were project managers who actually did their job right and populated their rocks quickly.
While you guys were messing around with bugfixes on "dirt", the other rocks slated for sentient life were already thriving. You really should have used the templates. It's not so hard. Now your rock is 4 billion years behind the others. They'll never catch up, especially with the way that "life" as you call it can't work through simple problems. If I've told you once, I've told you 10^100 times, a ground up rewrite really isn't necessary for these simple projects.
I checked the planning schedule. They're discussing completely scrapping that rock so you can start over. You aren't too attached to those pets running around on that rock, are you? It looks like they'll be diverting the atmosphere from that rock to one of the newer projects that is actually on schedule.
Don't be too sure about this one. You may be sued or arrested almost anywhere for anything, regardless of the location it occurred.
There have been actions that would have been crimes in the US, but happened on foreign soil where it may or may not have been against the law. The individuals were arrested and tried in the US for those crimes.
The reverse could very easily happen. Since the US and China aren't exactly on the best of terms, it is doubtful that you would be extradited between either of the two nations to each other.
A few examples to consider are (in no particular order)
Manuel Noriega (... do I have to make a list?)
Jon Lech Johansen (DeCSS)
Paul Hillier (British citizen, arrested in US for not paying child support in the UK)
Jack Sporich, Erik Peeters, and Ronald "John" Boyajian, (Operation Twisted Traveler)
Dmitry Sklyarov (Hacker, DMCA crimes)
I do not know of any inverse cases, but I strongly suspect China would be more than happy to deal with people who have done illegal actions in other nations. Those just won't make the state run news.
I do totally agree with your ideal of the international legal system. A person, regardless of nationality, should be tried where they committed the crime. It is completely inappropriate to apply laws of another locale to a person. Cultures and societies decide their laws, and it is not up to the global community to decide them for us. While it may seem like a good idea to set a high moral standard for all citizens of the world, it only seems like a good idea as long as they match your own ideals. Those who don't agree should be allowed to leave that culture or society, and join one which does match their own beliefs. In times long since gone, we were. There was once a place where you could escape to, where you were free to speak, to believe, or to act (within social norms). You could leave your homeland, and travel there for a new start, to live your dream. From 1776 to 1875, there were no restrictions on entry to the US, other than getting there alive. In 1875, laws were created to protect individuals from human trafficking (Chinese slave labor, and women being imported for prostitution were made illegal). It ramped up over the years to exclude everyone, where they are daily wondering if they will be returned to the place they escaped. But I digress.
I've been to coffee shops in the Netherlands, and perfectly legal brothels in 3 different countries (other than the handful in the US). Before you get your hopes up, I don't smoke pot, and I didn't partake of any services at the brothels. I was more than happy to drink perfectly legal alcohol (legal in both the US and those countries), and observe. In all cases, I was brought along with locals to see some of the local life. Should I be tried in the US for being to such places? I hope not.
While I do find it a bit morally wrong to do some things, it's up to the local government to do something about it. I hold exactly one person up to my moral standard, and that is myself. My morals are higher than some people, and lower than others. I wouldn't fit in well in an Amish community, nor would I fit in well in some of the decided seedier communities around the world. I would like to find a place that was open like the US was in yesteryear, but it doesn't seem such a place exists, nor would I likely be allowed to leave for it after writing things such as this.
2000 TransAm WS/6. Depending on the source you read, it came from the factory with between 325hp to 375hp. I've made several changes which have helped the power quite a bit. Those kind of numbers aren't unheard of. The 2008 GTO was at 400hp. The 2010 Camaro SS is at 426hp. The base model 2010 Corvette is 430hp.
I don't have to be the fastest guy on the road, I just like to be in one of the quicker ones.
You know, that's a great example.
A friend of mine had "barn cats" They were mostly domesticated, but not fixed. You could get close, and if they were curious, they'd let you touch them. They lived in the barn, and were perfectly happy catching mice. They were never fed, but were still healthy and happy. The population was about 3. One of them had a litter of kittens, and the population went up to about 7, but dwindled down on it's own to 4, which then became 3 when one of the older ones died. I would have been surprised if it was predators that got them. Predators would likely have gone after the much easier chickens. It would have taken a pretty significant predator to go after the cattle or pigs. If only the predators had done more about the damned squirrels. :) They kept a 22 by the door, and the squirrels were target practice, since they had a bad habit of climbing into engine compartments and chewing through wires.
With cats that I've had, I've noticed a few different behaviors with food, including kills. I've had a lot of cats over the years, and have paid attention to their behaviors. These are some general categories of their behaviors with food.
1) Pet food. They usually don't care much, but it's food so they eat it. They'll fight a little with each other when they're eating (growling, and the occasional paw smack), but they aren't very interested in protecting it.
2) Special food or kills. Special foods would be human scraps. They'll take it away somewhere safe, as you described, to eat it. The only noises they'll make are growls if they're approached by another animal (including people) indicating to "go away". Sometimes they'll take it to their nest (or den, as you said).
3) Tribute kills. They'll bring it to a regular tribute location, or right up to you. If they can find you, they'll come up, while trying to meow with their tribute in their mouth. They're not being very secretive, if they're meowing to get your attention. :)
There are exceptions to these too. It really depends on the animal. They all have unique personalities.
Feral are wild.
The cats that we domesticated were comfortable laying around the house (the porch was enclosed, but the doors were left open).
I never said we domesticated them to make them pets. There were a few reasons. The most "friendly" was that we could then get them fixed. The real reason though was so we didn't have wild animals fighting with our domesticated animals.
The argument wasn't for or against adoption. The statistic counts an unfixed female cat, and how many other cats it will spawn over a period. It really doesn't matter if it's domesticated or feral, it's still a cat who can reproduce.
Food was more than abundant out there. It may have just been in the woods in Florida, but you didn't want to go out in the woods without boots on, unless you liked snake bites, and other not so comfortable things. The well fed domesticated cats would bring home "tributes" to the alpha "cats" (i.e., the people feeding them). We received gifts from them just about daily of mouse parts (mostly heads and tails, but nothing in between), small birds (beaks and feet), lizards (usually just tails), etc, etc. It was a bit weird when they'd leave the tributes on a window sill. It was downright freaky when I found a spot in a crawl space that was full of small animal remains. the ones that weren't tributes, they'd had in their nest.
The male orange tabby in question was welcome in the house. He just seemed to prefer staying outside, but he would come inside sometimes, such as during heavy storms (typical Florida afternoon/evening storms up to hurricanes). A female feral that we domesticated spent most of her time indoors. It took a couple years, but she became a friendly lap cat. She to died of old age after about 10 years after being domesticated. She was a bit moody, but no worse than any other moody domesticated animal (or woman). Actually two cats died within a month of my father dying. I believe they felt an affinity towards him, so they just laid down and died shortly after.
Wrong continent? Invisible moose? No chupacabra? Now I'm curious. I thought the chupacabra had spread all around the world, but they're still good at hiding themselves. Maybe they use the same technique the invisible moose use. :)
That sounds more like she was dissecting chupacabra, not feral cats. Are you sure her PhD isn't in cryptozoology? :) Do you have any pictures? :)
With urban sprawl, "urban" or "suburban" areas have grown into what was wild natural areas. At one house I lived in, I was talking to people who had lived there since the community was built. 15 years prior, it wasn't uncommon to see wild foxes or otters. The area was almost infested with large snakes. When I moved in, the first day I saw an osprey land on a tree branch no more than 100 feet from the house. We spotted wild animals on a fairly regular basis.
In Los Angeles, we had a problem with coyotes. When they were hungry and the food supply was poor, they would come into the neighborhoods looking for food. That food could be food left out for pets, but more commonly it was pets themselves who became their food. I called animal control to ask what could be done. This was a few years ago, so the rules may have changed, but what I was told was this. They were not allowed to trap wild animals, unless they posed an immediate threat to a human. The community, or individuals, could hire trappers, but the coyote population was large enough where taking a few out wouldn't pose a significant impact to their population. I asked about shooting them. They were posing a threat to my family (coming up to the house, pawing at the doors because we had pets). I was told that it is illegal to discharge a firearm inside the Los Angeles city limits. I then asked a more subtle question, "What happens if you find a dead coyote that has been shot?" Unofficially, they wouldn't report the fact that it had been shot. They would only report that a dead wild animal was found and disposed of.
Almost anywhere along the edges of a large metro area, you'll find plenty of wild predators. It's perfectly likely to find faster moving ones (such as birds of prey) in the interior of a city. If they are hungry, and can find the food, they will go after it.
I've either spotted or found signs of coyotes, hawks, osprey, huge owls, and buzzards in urban locations. Beyond the predators, I've seen plenty of squirrels, opossums, and armadillos. For example, I almost ran over an armadillo late one night near the intersection of Colorado St and Brand Blvd, in Glendale, CA. There were frequent sightings of coyotes nearby. I'd have a hard time calling that a rural area. It may not be times square, but it's urban.
Well ... I guess even in Manhattan, there are predatory animals. There was coyote caught in Manhattan just a few months ago. I'll concede that other predators, such as alligators, most likely won't be found in too many urban settings (except in US states bordering the Gulf of Mexico, and a few others towards the south on the Atlantic coast).
Well, you can. It's not like you can walk up and say "hi kitty, let me hold you." It takes significant time.
I grew up on a farm. There were feral cats living in the woods nearby. They would come out looking for food, and we would spot them. With truly feral cats (i.e., several generations wild), it could take months of baiting them with food, just to get them to come close enough to touch. Even then, it was weeks or months of reassurance to get them comfortable enough to be picked up. After a good bit of time, most of them became comf
Of course it's a worthless statistic, that's why they use it. :)
They never (and can't) account for population restrictions. That could include...
Food supply. If there are too many cats, not enough food, some cats die of starvation. There are an abundance of natural controls at work there. Malnurished animals don't tend to reproduce very well. But, if there is a good food supply (rodents, birds, snakes, etc), they will reproduce more.
Natural mistakes. Not every animal is born perfectly. Some are stillborn. Some die at only a few days or weeks old due to health problems.
Illnesses. Sick animals without treatment have a lower chance of survival.
Predators. A bunch of warm fuzzy kittens running around make good snacks for birds of prey. Well, also for foxes, coyotes, snakes, alligators, etc, etc, etc. Sometimes it doesn't have to be a predator that can actually eat it. I had a cat who was bitten twice by poisonous snakes. She could have died without medical assistance. Since she was a pet, she had readily available food and water. The same can't be said for feral animals.
And of course we have to mention human influences. People taking feral cats out of the population to make fixed house pets out of them. Some may be trapped and sent off to the pound and subsequently euthanized. Others are killed through accidents, such as catastrophic intersections between the animal and vehicle vectors (i.e., run over).
There are plenty of statistics on the likelihood of a feral animal surviving to maturity. That varies tremendously by their local environment. A stray cat in a suburban neighborhood may live very happily, as there are not many natural predators around (except humans). They'll also likely have access to food and water left outside for pets. A stray cat in a wooded area will have less of a chance. Sometimes the distance between the two is only a few miles.
As with the statistics in the article, you cannot blindly assume either set of statistics is correct.
I love statistics. They can be used to prove or disprove anything, and you can usually find statistics to argue both sides of the same issue. The statistics can be dramatically swayed by who paid for the study to be done.
Well, people lie. People representing companies lie even more.
On the other hand, most folks lie all the time, don't they. They caught a fish THIS big, or their penis is SO long. Oh well, there goes the last bit of faith that I had in humanity. So long, and thanks for all the fish.
It wouldn't be news, it would be a rerun. They should have shortened the title to "ISPs Lie", which directly relates to "Companies Lie".
Golden parachutes are wonderful, but I doubt they're applicable to the people doing this kind of piracy.
It's more likely that the people doing it will have cash reserves somewhere safe, so when they declare bankruptcy, all of their "assets" will be taken (as applicable by law), and they'll use their cash reserves instead. I've known of plenty of people who hide assets in different ways. For example, when going through a nasty divorce, people have "sold" their cars, houses, etc, to trustworthy friends, who then loan the property back or rent it for a very small amount ($1/year rent). That's just one little example. There are people who do this professionally and/or habitually, who can show you how to hide everything you own, in perfectly legal manners. They could write novels on how to do it, but most are "trade secrets", even though they're well known in the trade.
Then there are folks like me. You can't touch my money, because I don't have any. :)
That could work, but they may (and probably would) use the DMCA "Safe Harbor" clause. Basically "Nope, not us, we only provide a service, we are not responsible for the content". A C&D to Lulu would get rid of the content though, but not guarantee that it won't come back as another user with a bit of modification. If they get in enough hot water from enough publishing houses, they would then have to take more action against it. It's in the best interest of Lulu financially to allow the illegal activity to happen. It's obviously not in the best interest of the authors and copyright holders though.
Plenty of people will make the same arguments that are used against the RIAA and MPAA for piracy of music and movies. Myself, I don't see a huge problem with movie or music piracy. If a person wants to see the movie or hear an album, they'll buy it, rent it, or borrow it from a friend. If they didn't want to pay for it, they've always copied it. If they aren't willing to pay for it, and can't pirate it, they still won't buy. That's been the case since 8 tracks came out for music, and VHS came out for movies.
The big difference here is that there is a discernible loss. With movies or music, the user who is pirating the media would likely not actually purchase it, as I mentioned above. For example, I don't listen to music unless it's on the radio or a friend is playing their CD's or legally downloaded music. In this case, the user not only would, but usually must purchase the book as part of the curriculum, so there is no question of if the user would purchase the book. The answer is definitely "yes". There are other edge cases, but that's not important here (i.e., roommates taking the same course, sharing a book).
The site is going too slow for me to see where the "seller" is. If they're off-shored appropriately, the list will end at 3.1, with a sidenote of lawyers pitching fits and trying to find all the parties to sue. "John Doe" works well in the US, but if Mr. John Doe lives in rural Obscuristain, it's a lot harder to serve him.
Don't forget your fingerprints on the box, both the virtual ones (like coding practices, notes, and hostnames) and real ones like physical fingerprints on the outside of the box.
You may have a hard time sniffing for traffic on a good switched network. All you may see is broadcast traffic. If you can gain access to the switch itself, you could set up a monitor port and listen to various things. Open file shares are a bit obvious, but not always useful if they have anything resembling security practices (i.e., password protected shares). A bit of brute force may work wonders, even with just a dictionary file.
It could result in a waste of a little spy box, or a goldmine for stolen data. Of course, if you use the stolen data, it may (and likely will) come back to haunt you. Best case, you'll end up in civil court. Worse case would be you end up in criminal court with a serious conviction, jail time, and more fines than you'll ever be able to pay. Worst case, you stole from the wrong folks, and your mutilated body is found years later. The coroner's report may read something like "The victim died peacefully, after all his minor extremities were removed with common hand tools, every rib was broken through blunt force trauma, skull fractures were caused by what appeared to be a baseball bat, and then he drowned while wearing cement shoes."
Hacking is all fun and games, until you end up dead. Those are the cases we rarely hear about, but I wouldn't be too quick to dismiss them as impossible.
Sorry, you were only 4,999,999,999. That makes ... umm ... ME the winner!
I'll be waiting patiently for Ed McMahon to show up with a fat check.
If you're going to do it, do it right. Take some notes.
If you can't make them puke, faint, cry so hard they can't talk, or go into full body convulsions, you just aren't doing it right.