Coders often become so wrapped up in coding they lose sight of what the end goal is - ship a product
I think that this perception of developers is what most companies use to justify letting the businesspeople run the show. In reality, most of the (good) developers I've run across have a clear view of what their finished product should look like - and know when it's done. How to meet deadlines, at least, should be clear to anyone, programmer or otherwise, who did not party and sleep his way through college.
Letting someone who can code an also understand the bigger picture is certainly a good solution. The goal is to make a profitable product that meets customer needs - there are many ways to do that; just as there are many ways to turn a project into developer's personal wish lists if they are left unchecked.
A more accurate problem is that some developers do not know how to sell their products to customers. If a developer does, however, it is unlikely that anyone will be more passionate about the product than the person who designed it.
The main problem I've seen with developers trying to sell a product is that they tend to oversell capabilities on the assumption that features can be added in as needed - the "Sure it can do that; we just can't show you that right now on this release..." answer; and then get bogged down in actually shipping the product on schedule as problems arise; often they decide to leave out features that are "too hard right now" and rationalize it by saying the customer really doesn't need it even though it's in the specs.
Of course, clueless sales people will promise the moon as well - that's why you really need a team that can understand the customers needs and the product's capabilities - and come up with a realistic solution that both sides can live with.
"Listen to the people actually writing the code and making your products."
While that is important, it's not the same as "and let them run the show." Someone needs to ensure all the pieces fit in place - things like deadlines, performance, cost, etc. Coders often become so wrapped up in coding they lose sight of what the end goal is - ship a product. If it works, is stable and meets performnce requirements; spending more time and money to make it better or more elegant a solution is wasteful - move on to the next problem.
Or as I've told people - "Don't engineer a $5 solution to a 50 cent problem."
Good point - what many people fail to realize is that the engineers and sales people are a team - without each other a company won't succeed. Engineers need to develop good products and sales peopel need to create cash flow to keep the development pipeline funded. I've done both, and both jobs have their unique challenges.
The proposed law adds a new weapon against someone who violate Linux' EULA - and now makes it a criminal action to even try to violate it.
Linux's what? Linux doesn't have an EULA. Linux has an optional license, the GPL, that you may use if you want to copy it for others, but it doesn't require a license to use it.
No matter what you call it, the GPL imposes certain restrictions on the user (and as such is the same as an EULA) - it's just that none o those are of any conswquencew unless you redistribute it.
Remember - the law is a neutral weapon - much like a landmind. It can be used against friend and foe alike. The key is to see how a law can help your cause - even if taht was not the original intent.
The proposed law adds a new weapon against someone who violate Linux' EULA - and now makes it a criminal action to even try to violate it.
Think of the law a giant real world RPG - you need to understand teh rules and bend them to your ends.
I use Goodlink, and while it is good, it has several flaws taht need to be addressed (IMHO):
It is a memory hog on the Treo - it uses 50% of the available memory and can't run from a card It doesn't paly nice with other aps - either crashing or preventing them from functioning (such as voice activated dialing) It uses a proprietary data store - so normal Palm aps can't read the calender / contact info - which also means if it crashes you have no way to get your calender / contact info until you fix the problem with Goodlink
You miss the real reason for licensing - it enables a profession to control the number of practioners by creating barriers to entry; thereby raising salaries.
Naturally, I'd consider paying a half-dollar an episode for one of the good slightly old shows, like The Prisoner or The Six Million Dollar Man.
One problem with that is how do you split the money. Unless everything was done as a work for hire (acting, music, etc.), there's a lot of people who are entitled to a share of the sale. It'd be interseting to se what distribution rights were in teh original contracts.
As a side note, isn't that how the original owners of Caspergotthe rights back - they decided they could release DVD's of new material since those rights were not sold when the others were, which lead to soem negotiations since a DVD released at teh time of teh theatrical release was a situation th emovie producers wanted to avoid.
One of teh bsst fuck comments came from Allen Sherman (Hello mutha, hello fatha) in a book - he had a chapter that was nothing but fuck repeated over and over until the last sentence, which basically said after 100 or so repetitions it lost all of its power.
Of course, the Simpsons never makes fun of Christians or conservatives.
Actually, while they make fun of everyone, many of their portrayals are sympathetic. Homer's long suffering Christian neighbor reflects Christian values and tries to act on them - which is more than I can say for many real Christians. Co-opting the portrayal and using it to teach values would be an interesting twist on the Simpson's approach. There's a book on the portrayal of Christians in the Simpsons that's an interesting read.
Of course, it's easier to complain than it is to turn it to your advantage - I worked in the nuke industry and many senior executives hated the Simpsons - while the worker level embraced Homer as their hero and you often saw Simpson's stuff at plants; to "pull a Homer" was a good thing. I suggested we license Homer for our own Emmy award - which got nothing but "WTF are you smoking" looks; they didn't grasp that the best way to deflect criticism and dull satire is to embrace those delivering the message.
A burger flipper in McDonalds may well earn more than a street level crack dealer, but McDonalds will sack you if they find out you are on drugs. You won't be sacked as a dealer for being on drugs.
For people on drugs, the only option they really have is a job sucking other people into it.
I wouldn't bet on that - Levitt's paper notes that drug use is acitvely discouraged and estimates about 1/3 of the drugs skimmed by dealers is for their own consumption. From a gang's perspective, junky dealers are bad employyees, no different than McD's viewpoint. Getting fired, however, probably means something else to a gang member.
The funny (sort of) thing about crime is that criminal jobs suck. Take being a drug dealer. Your clients won't pay you. You get calls at all hours of the day and night. Your competition wants to shoot you and the police will give you 5 to 10. If you put this much effort into running a convience store you would be rich.
There is a very interesting article on this In Freakenomics analyzing the earnings of a Chicago drug gang. The interesting points:
1. The street level dealer would make more working at McDonalds than dealing drugs with an added bonus of not being shot or arrested; 2. The gang was organized much like a corporation with the CEO making the most money and the workers getting very little.
They leaders also hated competition amongst gangs - turf wars were costly and drove away customers.
Meanwhile, a big chunk of the smart kids get depressed and kill themselves because school offers them nothing. Hooray for the future of our country
I have little sympathy for whining smart kids - if they're so smart thye can go to a library and check out books to satisfy their curiosity. The school system owes them no more than anyone else - a basic education. Their special needs are no more important than anyone elses.
Only on certain matters. If you read the constitution you will note that the States are sovereign. They do agree to give up certain things to the federal government yes, just as you would expect in a federative union. But in many ways they still do act as individual countries. Not in matters of foreign politics, war, or economics sure, we are united on those things, but in most other areas the States retain full sovereignty. And in many cases, a State's rights can trump an attempt at federal law. In fact, any time the Feds try to regulate an area where the power belongs to the States...they always have a big political fight on their hands.
The US Constitution is both very broad in the powers granted the federal government (provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States) as well as very specific about the ability of the federal government to trump state government (This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.)
So while it has some pretty specific things the federal government is allowed to do it also leaves a wide hole to drive other things through as well as clear indication that US law is supreme. So unless the supremes decide a law is unconstitutional the states have little recourse. Of course, this is teh strct construction vs. loose construction arguement; I tend to favor loose construction.
Nor should we. We are a federation of sovereign States here, not one big centralized republic. Basically a bunch of little countries that work together as one big country on certain matters. If we were a direct democracy....we simply wouldn't be the United States any more. Maybe in name, but not in form, not in government, not really in society. This would be a massive break in form of government for us. A major change in way of life. A major change in culture. We'd become one giant State, rather than collection of them that come together to (try to) help each other on certain things. Furthermore, really, the only realistic way to do it would involve violating the soverignty of all 50 States, and taking away their rights. That sort of thing just doesn't sit right. USA might as well be dead, than be a direct democracy.
Except that we have a strong federal government who's laws trump state law. The states ceded the right to act as individual countries to the federal government when they joined the Union.
While I agree direct democracy won't work very well, I think it's because of teh regional concetration of power that would result; not beacsue of any perceived loss of state soveriegnity.
Yeah, that's a problem with living in a Democracy - sometimes you're not the majority. It's why the US wouldn't work as a true democracy, too. We've focused so much attention on raising people so that "everyone's a winner" - we do things like wasting tons of educational money trying to beat half a brain into retards who will never be anything but retards while the exceptionally bright children get drug down to "average" level, since the average and below average kids might feel bad if someone was identified as smarter (though it's just fine to have athletic competitions and make a big deal out of those kids) - that everyone feels like their vote has to win.
In many cases that's probably a result of funding - schools have to, by law, provide an education to all; given a choice of offering AP classes or providing an education to everyone they're forced forgo AP classes w/o money (until some parent finds a way to apply the law to"gifted" kids as well). My district does both, but then again it's an affluent area overall.
Witness the previous election, for example. Bush won the popular vote and the electoral vote, and is president. Even today, several *years* after the election, people are still driving around with their "defeat Bush" bumper stickers on and saying idiotic things like "he's not my president". People don't realize that sometimes they'll lose, but they should just congratulate the winner and give it a better shot next time. By participating in the election, they're implicitly agreeing to support the winner. But since no one knows how to gracefully lose anymore, it turns into a big mess. Just think what a mess it'd be if the voters over here actually had to experience losing more than once every four years!
Welcome to US politics - there were plenty of " I didn't vote for her or her husband" and "Impeach Clinton" stickers around a few years back. Not too many Republicans were willing to congratulate Clinton and agree to support him since he won.
You see I live in a country that has true democracy and it is called Switzerland. In fact true democracy works well because believe it or not there are "STUPID" swiss! People who say, "it's because the framers were smart enough not to trust the public with such power" are in fact saying, "An elite number of people know what's good for the masses!". Let's carry this thought through and call it what it is namely fascism.
Interestingly enough, the Swiss Germans make up the majority of Switzerland; so in any direct vote they would get to decide what is best for everyone. When I lived there one of the complaints I heard from my Italian and French Swiss friends was that if the German Swiss decided something was good it became law at the national level.
While direct democracy can work well it starts to break down as people become less homogeneous and have varying views of what is good based on their cultural norms. Even a country as small as Switzerland is not a country of only cows, Heidis, and chocolate or watch makers.
Speaking of Heide, Switzerland was the last European country to give women suffrage; and unless it has changed they still can't vote in some local (largely ceremonial) elections.
It's wonderful and interesting country to live in, but the reality is very different than the popular image (in the US at least) most people have of Switzerland.
The US has true democracy on a local level to a limited extent - we vote on laws directly, as well as many revenue issues. Some states allow citizens to overturn or create laws via popular referendum as well (CA falls to mind). We just don't do it on a national level; as a republic with limited federal powers that's probably not a bad idea considering it would concentrate power in a few very populous parts of the country.
was thinking about this the other day. As far as I know it's only legal to resell, e.g., candy if you buy it from a place like Sam's Club that markets to resellers. But doesn't the right of first sale apply everywhere?
Not necessarily - I did some research into this a few years ago, and he lawyers I spoke with said how first sale applies in not cut and dry - it varies form state to state and from product to product.
Slander is considered an abuse of free speech and will get you in trouble whether political or personal. The case wasn't whether the blogger had a right to free speech, but to anonymity. We aren't constitutionally guaranteed anonymity, as we're expected to take responsibility for what we say. This is news because typically people are held responsible for slander and the consequences can be costly.
The court didn't say a person can't be held responsible for slander, it said that someone must first prove they have been slandered before releasing an anonymous poster's identity. Forcing ISP's to reveal the identities of people has a chilling effect on free speech; so it is appropriate that the government (whose actions are bound by the first amendment) not act in a manner that limits speech; which a chilling effect certainly would do.
I'm glad anonymity won, but I don't know if I'd feel the same way if some anonymous ass was slandering me on a popular website and people were believing it. It's a career killer for professional politicians, especially on the local level.
People have the opportunity to respond to blogger comment's; so it's appropriate the courts said you can't stop someone from saying something you don't like unless you can first prove it was slanderous.
If one could develop a web-based office suite that met the needs of DoD/Dod contractors, then I think a lot of them might go for that idea. It would allow a military unit in Iraq and a command post at Ft. Bragg to view/edit their files without having to worry about transmitting them back and forth; likewise for contractors who have to travel all over the country.
Connectivity is a big issue in this scenario - most people who design web based apps assume everyone is sitting at a desk with always on high speed access - not in the back of a commo HumVee; and even though the military has some very reliable high speed connections document editting would be a very low priority use. I agree it's a neat idea but has some problems. I'd like to be able to edit a document that tracks chanes, then send only my changes to a central area that incorporates them while allowing other authors to view and comment; ideally I could tag must changes and nice to haves but not essential changes as well.
I worked on a web-based system for teh military; we wound up installing local versions for deployed units because conectivity and latency issues interfereed with the apps usability; they then sent updates via email back to the central data store.
I know some contractors who travel 100+ days/year, so having a central repository of files would be excellent for them. I think if the security needs can be met, web-based office might just work. It'll be interesting to see if anyone can actually implement it though.
I want one of those jobs - I'd love to cut my travel time in half...
Well, maybe it's not cruel (if you're gay, you might actually enjoy it...), but you'll have to agree that it is a tad unusual. Or do such excesses happen everyday in the US?
In the US, it must be cruel AND unusual to be unconstitutional; one or the other is not enough.
Slashdot Mirror
Coders often become so wrapped up in coding they lose sight of what the end goal is - ship a product
I think that this perception of developers is what most companies use to justify letting the businesspeople run the show. In reality, most of the (good) developers I've run across have a clear view of what their finished product should look like - and know when it's done. How to meet deadlines, at least, should be clear to anyone, programmer or otherwise, who did not party and sleep his way through college.
Letting someone who can code an also understand the bigger picture is certainly a good solution. The goal is to make a profitable product that meets customer needs - there are many ways to do that; just as there are many ways to turn a project into developer's personal wish lists if they are left unchecked.
A more accurate problem is that some developers do not know how to sell their products to customers. If a developer does, however, it is unlikely that anyone will be more passionate about the product than the person who designed it.
The main problem I've seen with developers trying to sell a product is that they tend to oversell capabilities on the assumption that features can be added in as needed - the "Sure it can do that; we just can't show you that right now on this release..." answer; and then get bogged down in actually shipping the product on schedule as problems arise; often they decide to leave out features that are "too hard right now" and rationalize it by saying the customer really doesn't need it even though it's in the specs.
Of course, clueless sales people will promise the moon as well - that's why you really need a team that can understand the customers needs and the product's capabilities - and come up with a realistic solution that both sides can live with.
"Listen to the people actually writing the code and making your products."
While that is important, it's not the same as "and let them run the show." Someone needs to ensure all the pieces fit in place - things like deadlines, performance, cost, etc. Coders often become so wrapped up in coding they lose sight of what the end goal is - ship a product. If it works, is stable and meets performnce requirements; spending more time and money to make it better or more elegant a solution is wasteful - move on to the next problem.
Or as I've told people - "Don't engineer a $5 solution to a 50 cent problem."
Good point - what many people fail to realize is that the engineers and sales people are a team - without each other a company won't succeed. Engineers need to develop good products and sales peopel need to create cash flow to keep the development pipeline funded. I've done both, and both jobs have their unique challenges.
Very well. I propose the following law:
Any person posting on slashdot as "Registered Coward v2" (id # 447531) shall be publically burned at the stake.
Aside from great BBQ, please tell me the upshot?
Once I get you (or convince those with teh stake and matches you are RC v2)to post as RC v2 you get to be burnt as well.
The proposed law adds a new weapon against someone who violate Linux' EULA - and now makes it a criminal action to even try to violate it.
Linux's what? Linux doesn't have an EULA. Linux has an optional license, the GPL, that you may use if you want to copy it for others, but it doesn't require a license to use it.
No matter what you call it, the GPL imposes certain restrictions on the user (and as such is the same as an EULA) - it's just that none o those are of any conswquencew unless you redistribute it.
Remember - the law is a neutral weapon - much like a landmind. It can be used against friend and foe alike. The key is to see how a law can help your cause - even if taht was not the original intent.
The proposed law adds a new weapon against someone who violate Linux' EULA - and now makes it a criminal action to even try to violate it.
Think of the law a giant real world RPG - you need to understand teh rules and bend them to your ends.
I use Goodlink, and while it is good, it has several flaws taht need to be addressed (IMHO):
It is a memory hog on the Treo - it uses 50% of the available memory and can't run from a card
It doesn't paly nice with other aps - either crashing or preventing them from functioning (such as voice activated dialing)
It uses a proprietary data store - so normal Palm aps can't read the calender / contact info - which also means if it crashes you have no way to get your calender / contact info until you fix the problem with Goodlink
You miss the real reason for licensing - it enables a profession to control the number of practioners by creating barriers to entry; thereby raising salaries.
Naturally, I'd consider paying a half-dollar an episode for one of the good slightly old shows, like The Prisoner or The Six Million Dollar Man.
One problem with that is how do you split the money. Unless everything was done as a work for hire (acting, music, etc.), there's a lot of people who are entitled to a share of the sale. It'd be interseting to se what distribution rights were in teh original contracts.
As a side note, isn't that how the original owners of Caspergotthe rights back - they decided they could release DVD's of new material since those rights were not sold when the others were, which lead to soem negotiations since a DVD released at teh time of teh theatrical release was a situation th emovie producers wanted to avoid.
One of teh bsst fuck comments came from Allen Sherman (Hello mutha, hello fatha) in a book - he had a chapter that was nothing but fuck repeated over and over until the last sentence, which basically said after 100 or so repetitions it lost all of its power.
Of course, the Simpsons never makes fun of Christians or conservatives.
Actually, while they make fun of everyone, many of their portrayals are sympathetic. Homer's long suffering Christian neighbor reflects Christian values and tries to act on them - which is more than I can say for many real Christians. Co-opting the portrayal and using it to teach values would be an interesting twist on the Simpson's approach. There's a book on the portrayal of Christians in the Simpsons that's an interesting read.
Of course, it's easier to complain than it is to turn it to your advantage - I worked in the nuke industry and many senior executives hated the Simpsons - while the worker level embraced Homer as their hero and you often saw Simpson's stuff at plants; to "pull a Homer" was a good thing. I suggested we license Homer for our own Emmy award - which got nothing but "WTF are you smoking" looks; they didn't grasp that the best way to deflect criticism and dull satire is to embrace those delivering the message.
A burger flipper in McDonalds may well earn more than a street level crack dealer, but McDonalds will sack you if they find out you are on drugs. You won't be sacked as a dealer for being on drugs.
p df
For people on drugs, the only option they really have is a job sucking other people into it.
I wouldn't bet on that - Levitt's paper notes that drug use is acitvely discouraged and estimates about 1/3 of the drugs skimmed by dealers is for their own consumption. From a gang's perspective, junky dealers are bad employyees, no different than McD's viewpoint. Getting fired, however, probably means something else to a gang member.
The paper is online at: http://www.freakonomics.com/pdf/DrugGangFinances.
The funny (sort of) thing about crime is that criminal jobs suck. Take being a drug dealer. Your clients won't pay you. You get calls at all hours of the day and night. Your competition wants to shoot you and the police will give you 5 to 10. If you put this much effort into running a convience store you would be rich.
There is a very interesting article on this In Freakenomics analyzing the earnings of a Chicago drug gang. The interesting points:
1. The street level dealer would make more working at McDonalds than dealing drugs with an added bonus of not being shot or arrested;
2. The gang was organized much like a corporation with the CEO making the most money and the workers getting very little.
They leaders also hated competition amongst gangs - turf wars were costly and drove away customers.
I highly recommend the book.
Meanwhile, a big chunk of the smart kids get depressed and kill themselves because school offers them nothing. Hooray for the future of our country
I have little sympathy for whining smart kids - if they're so smart thye can go to a library and check out books to satisfy their curiosity. The school system owes them no more than anyone else - a basic education. Their special needs are no more important than anyone elses.
Only on certain matters. If you read the constitution you will note that the States are sovereign. They do agree to give up certain things to the federal government yes, just as you would expect in a federative union. But in many ways they still do act as individual countries. Not in matters of foreign politics, war, or economics sure, we are united on those things, but in most other areas the States retain full sovereignty. And in many cases, a State's rights can trump an attempt at federal law. In fact, any time the Feds try to regulate an area where the power belongs to the States...they always have a big political fight on their hands.
The US Constitution is both very broad in the powers granted the federal government (provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States) as well as very specific about the ability of the federal government to trump state government (This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.)
So while it has some pretty specific things the federal government is allowed to do it also leaves a wide hole to drive other things through as well as clear indication that US law is supreme. So unless the supremes decide a law is unconstitutional the states have little recourse. Of course, this is teh strct construction vs. loose construction arguement; I tend to favor loose construction.
I agree that that's what's happened since Abe Lincoln, but that's not the way it was designed. Have you read the 10th Amendment lately?
Yes, but Abe and his federal troops pretty convincingly ended any argument over who wins in the end.
Nor should we. We are a federation of sovereign States here, not one big centralized republic. Basically a bunch of little countries that work together as one big country on certain matters. If we were a direct democracy....we simply wouldn't be the United States any more. Maybe in name, but not in form, not in government, not really in society. This would be a massive break in form of government for us. A major change in way of life. A major change in culture. We'd become one giant State, rather than collection of them that come together to (try to) help each other on certain things. Furthermore, really, the only realistic way to do it would involve violating the soverignty of all 50 States, and taking away their rights. That sort of thing just doesn't sit right. USA might as well be dead, than be a direct democracy.
Except that we have a strong federal government who's laws trump state law. The states ceded the right to act as individual countries to the federal government when they joined the Union.
While I agree direct democracy won't work very well, I think it's because of teh regional concetration of power that would result; not beacsue of any perceived loss of state soveriegnity.
Yeah, that's a problem with living in a Democracy - sometimes you're not the majority. It's why the US wouldn't work as a true democracy, too. We've focused so much attention on raising people so that "everyone's a winner" - we do things like wasting tons of educational money trying to beat half a brain into retards who will never be anything but retards while the exceptionally bright children get drug down to "average" level, since the average and below average kids might feel bad if someone was identified as smarter (though it's just fine to have athletic competitions and make a big deal out of those kids) - that everyone feels like their vote has to win.
In many cases that's probably a result of funding - schools have to, by law, provide an education to all; given a choice of offering AP classes or providing an education to everyone they're forced forgo AP classes w/o money (until some parent finds a way to apply the law to"gifted" kids as well). My district does both, but then again it's an affluent area overall.
Witness the previous election, for example. Bush won the popular vote and the electoral vote, and is president. Even today, several *years* after the election, people are still driving around with their "defeat Bush" bumper stickers on and saying idiotic things like "he's not my president". People don't realize that sometimes they'll lose, but they should just congratulate the winner and give it a better shot next time. By participating in the election, they're implicitly agreeing to support the winner. But since no one knows how to gracefully lose anymore, it turns into a big mess. Just think what a mess it'd be if the voters over here actually had to experience losing more than once every four years!
Welcome to US politics - there were plenty of " I didn't vote for her or her husband" and "Impeach Clinton" stickers around a few years back. Not too many Republicans were willing to congratulate Clinton and agree to support him since he won.
You see I live in a country that has true democracy and it is called Switzerland. In fact true democracy works well because believe it or not there are "STUPID" swiss! People who say, "it's because the framers were smart enough not to trust the public with such power" are in fact saying, "An elite number of people know what's good for the masses!". Let's carry this thought through and call it what it is namely fascism.
Interestingly enough, the Swiss Germans make up the majority of Switzerland; so in any direct vote they would get to decide what is best for everyone. When I lived there one of the complaints I heard from my Italian and French Swiss friends was that if the German Swiss decided something was good it became law at the national level.
While direct democracy can work well it starts to break down as people become less homogeneous and have varying views of what is good based on their cultural norms. Even a country as small as Switzerland is not a country of only cows, Heidis, and chocolate or watch makers.
Speaking of Heide, Switzerland was the last European country to give women suffrage; and unless it has changed they still can't vote in some local (largely ceremonial) elections.
It's wonderful and interesting country to live in, but the reality is very different than the popular image (in the US at least) most people have of Switzerland.
The US has true democracy on a local level to a limited extent - we vote on laws directly, as well as many revenue issues. Some states allow citizens to overturn or create laws via popular referendum as well (CA falls to mind). We just don't do it on a national level; as a republic with limited federal powers that's probably not a bad idea considering it would concentrate power in a few very populous parts of the country.
was thinking about this the other day. As far as I know it's only legal to resell, e.g., candy if you buy it from a place like Sam's Club that markets to resellers. But doesn't the right of first sale apply everywhere?
Not necessarily - I did some research into this a few years ago, and he lawyers I spoke with said how first sale applies in not cut and dry - it varies form state to state and from product to product.
Slander is considered an abuse of free speech and will get you in trouble whether political or personal. The case wasn't whether the blogger had a right to free speech, but to anonymity. We aren't constitutionally guaranteed anonymity, as we're expected to take responsibility for what we say. This is news because typically people are held responsible for slander and the consequences can be costly.
The court didn't say a person can't be held responsible for slander, it said that someone must first prove they have been slandered before releasing an anonymous poster's identity. Forcing ISP's to reveal the identities of people has a chilling effect on free speech; so it is appropriate that the government (whose actions are bound by the first amendment) not act in a manner that limits speech; which a chilling effect certainly would do.
I'm glad anonymity won, but I don't know if I'd feel the same way if some anonymous ass was slandering me on a popular website and people were believing it. It's a career killer for professional politicians, especially on the local level.
People have the opportunity to respond to blogger comment's; so it's appropriate the courts said you can't stop someone from saying something you don't like unless you can first prove it was slanderous.
If one could develop a web-based office suite that met the needs of DoD/Dod contractors, then I think a lot of them might go for that idea. It would allow a military unit in Iraq and a command post at Ft. Bragg to view/edit their files without having to worry about transmitting them back and forth; likewise for contractors who have to travel all over the country.
Connectivity is a big issue in this scenario - most people who design web based apps assume everyone is sitting at a desk with always on high speed access - not in the back of a commo HumVee; and even though the military has some very reliable high speed connections document editting would be a very low priority use. I agree it's a neat idea but has some problems. I'd like to be able to edit a document that tracks chanes, then send only my changes to a central area that incorporates them while allowing other authors to view and comment; ideally I could tag must changes and nice to haves but not essential changes as well.
I worked on a web-based system for teh military; we wound up installing local versions for deployed units because conectivity and latency issues interfereed with the apps usability; they then sent updates via email back to the central data store.
I know some contractors who travel 100+ days/year, so having a central repository of files would be excellent for them. I think if the security needs can be met, web-based office might just work. It'll be interesting to see if anyone can actually implement it though.
I want one of those jobs - I'd love to cut my travel time in half...
Better tell the army
You're assuming the Army is a monolithic organization where a central decision is made to go with a platform and everyone uses it.
That's not how much of its procurement occurs - local organizations buy what they want based on price, quality, price, need, price, etc...
Some sould sell for less than 99 cents.
You could even make the arguement that some should have a negative price.
Well, maybe it's not cruel (if you're gay, you might actually enjoy it...), but you'll have to agree that it is a tad unusual. Or do such excesses happen everyday in the US?
In the US, it must be cruel AND unusual to be unconstitutional; one or the other is not enough.