It's the Nickel-Cadmium batteries that are highly toxic.
Um, I think lead-acid batteries are also pretty toxic.
Nicads are also recyclable. You can drop them off at your local Radio Shack. (Nicads seem to be getting phased out in favor of less toxic and better-performing NiMH batteries.)
As soon as you get government involved, OS becomes political, and influenced by political forces.
Government is already involved. It's the government that issues copyrights and patents. The government funded the ARPANET, and funds endeavors like SELinux.
So if someone created a game where you could rape children that would be ok with everyone, and since it's freedom of speech, we couldn't do anything about it?
Would it be ok with everyone? Of course not. Many people would complain, call the creators sickos, divest themselves of any financial interest in the company, organize boycotts of any retailer that carrried it, osttacise the authors and anyone who played the game, and so on.
Would it be legally or ethically permissible to take authors, distributors, or players of such a game and force them into cages at gunpoint? No. That's freedom of speech.
I'm all for freedom of speech in games, but does that mean that they - games companies - should people able to do what they want in their games?
Yes. It does.
It's not a hard question. Freedom of expression applied to video games means that games companies can do what they want in their games. Don't like it? Your freedom of expression includes the right to say you don't like it, and to encourage other people to not buy or play the game, and to boycott the game company.
If you're entering a country, they have just about any rights they feel like having.
Fair enough. But the context here is the United States, which has a Constitution which explicitly states
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
The authority of TSA screeners is limited to making sure that I'm not carrying a hazardous item. Viewing the contents of files is not relevant to that determination.
If a screener asked me to display files on my laptop, I would demand to speak to his/her supervisor. If I was prevented from boarding the plane, legal action would be called for.
I also have a Replay TV. I'm on my 3rd unit, as the first two went kaput and had to be RMAd. Customer service during this time was a mixed bag, some reps were great, others did not appear to be native speakers of English and I could only understand every other word they spoke.
However, now that I've got a working box I'm pretty happy with it. Never had any problem with dl'ing the channel guide. And with its "sharing" feature and client software that others have written, you can send shows off to your PC for storage (or I think even burning to VCD, though I've never tried that).
We've been taking fingerprints of criminals - and suspected criminals - for decades, and it hasn't extended to include anything unreasonable.
You have a different defintion of "unreasonable" than I do then. I think it's unreasonable that people volunteering to work with kids these days are often fingerprinted and run through FBI checks because of paranoia about child molestation. (Which isn't to say parents shouldn't exercise reasonable caution.)
So maybe I'm an April Fool, but it seems to me that the Y10K issue is worth
a little serious thought.
There are areas of human endeavor in which 8000 years is not an extreme time
span. At present, we deal with these long time spans only in modeling things
like geological and cosmological events. But it is not unreasonable that
within the next century, we may begin to build very high technology systems
with mission durations of thousands of years - for example, a system to
contain radioactive wastes, or a probe to another star system.
Y2K issues have raised our consciousness about timer overflows, but it's
quite possible that this may fade in succeeding generations. There's no
reason not to start setting standards now.
If A gives a file to B, but it actually goes through C, D, and E, then if it is determines that the content is infringing, then C, D, and E are all responsible too.
By that argument, if I make an obscene phone call the guys who strung the copper and wrote the software that drives the telecom network are guilty. If I send you a bootleg DVD in the mail, the postman's guilty.
If I'm a participent in a peer-to-peer filesharing, I have no idea of the copyright status of what's being routed through my box.
So, not, C, D, and E aren't responsible. Legally or ethically.
(Remember that a lot of what goes around is porn, and a lot of that is amateur stuff that people voluntarily share...yes, porn can be your defense of non-copyright-infringing use.)
evading law enforcement...copyright and homeland security implications be damned.
Secure communications are a gain for the security of the people's liberties. Which, present administration's confusion notwithstanding, is what "homeland security" is supposed to be about. "Secure the blessings of liberty", ya know?
For the record, it's not censorship for a retailer to choose what they're willing to sell...A Government saying that no retailer can sell the unedited version, that'd be censorship.
That is often claimed, but Webster says otherwise:
censor
Function: transitive verb
Inflected Form(s): censored; censoring/'sen(t)-s&-ri[ng], 'sen(t)s-ri[ng]/
Date: 1882
: to examine in order to suppress or delete anything considered objectionable
Censorship doesn't imply action by the state.
Re:Agricultural output
on
Global Dimming
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
Since agricultural output has already multipled and skyrocketed over the years thanks to technology and IPM, this isn't necessarily a burning crisis.
Since those yields are not sustainable, we're headed for trouble with or without global dimming.
Saying industrial agriculture is the solution to feeding our overcrowded planet is rather like saying that getting more credit cards is the solution to personal financial problems.
Re:So instead
on
Global Dimming
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
of Global Warming, we have to worry about Global Cooling.
Not necessarily. Venus, hottest planet in the system, is completely covered in clouds. They act as a blanket to keep heat in (cloudy nights are warmer).
Turns out it was a Flash banner ad for an underwear company
There ought to be a convenient way to turn plugins like flash on and off in the browser. Right now I've made a pair of one-line shell scripts to do it:
I simply can't read a website with dancing animations. I don't mean "I don't like it", I mean that my brain (perhaps because I'm old enough to have done most of my growing up before MTV shortened everyones attention span) can't deal with hyperkinetic images and with reading text at the same time.
Are you listening, content providers and advertisers? A page with intrusive advertising is not useful to many of use and we will go elsewhere, so less intrusive advertising will be more widely seen. BAM! BAM! BAM! goes the cluestick. Down with Flash ads. Up with AdWords.
1) Are there any affordable region free players available legally in the U.S.?
Plenty. I got my Phillips 724 about a year ago, paid ~$120 IIRC (would be a lot cheaper today, given the pricing trends). All it needed was a code from the remote to reset it to region 0.
This site has a lot of information about liberating your DVD player.
Slashdot Mirror
Um, I think lead-acid batteries are also pretty toxic.
Nicads are also recyclable. You can drop them off at your local Radio Shack. (Nicads seem to be getting phased out in favor of less toxic and better-performing NiMH batteries.)
Government is already involved. It's the government that issues copyrights and patents. The government funded the ARPANET, and funds endeavors like SELinux.
Since Diesel engines can run on biodiesel, yes, a diesel engine can be more environmentally friendly than a gasoline one.
Lead-acid batteries are highly recyclable. (Though, like computers, because of poor regulation such batteries are often just dumped on third-world nations.)
Would it be ok with everyone? Of course not. Many people would complain, call the creators sickos, divest themselves of any financial interest in the company, organize boycotts of any retailer that carrried it, osttacise the authors and anyone who played the game, and so on.
Would it be legally or ethically permissible to take authors, distributors, or players of such a game and force them into cages at gunpoint? No. That's freedom of speech.
Yes. It does.
It's not a hard question. Freedom of expression applied to video games means that games companies can do what they want in their games. Don't like it? Your freedom of expression includes the right to say you don't like it, and to encourage other people to not buy or play the game, and to boycott the game company.
Fair enough. But the context here is the United States, which has a Constitution which explicitly states
The authority of TSA screeners is limited to making sure that I'm not carrying a hazardous item. Viewing the contents of files is not relevant to that determination.
If a screener asked me to display files on my laptop, I would demand to speak to his/her supervisor. If I was prevented from boarding the plane, legal action would be called for.
"If you could just step behind this curtain, sir? Pants around your ankles please. And bend over this table. This'll only take a few minutes."
Point being, there are limits on what friggin' Mr. Security is allowed to ask you to do.
I also have a Replay TV. I'm on my 3rd unit, as the first two went kaput and had to be RMAd. Customer service during this time was a mixed bag, some reps were great, others did not appear to be native speakers of English and I could only understand every other word they spoke.
However, now that I've got a working box I'm pretty happy with it. Never had any problem with dl'ing the channel guide. And with its "sharing" feature and client software that others have written, you can send shows off to your PC for storage (or I think even burning to VCD, though I've never tried that).
Exactly. The sovereignty of the state ends at our skins.
You have a different defintion of "unreasonable" than I do then. I think it's unreasonable that people volunteering to work with kids these days are often fingerprinted and run through FBI checks because of paranoia about child molestation. (Which isn't to say parents shouldn't exercise reasonable caution.)
I also think it's unreasonable that recovered fingerprints are used as evidence despite the lack of scientific backing
To the contrary, any nation where the government forces innocent citizens to be fingerprinted has very very deep problems.
Fingerprints are on outside the body. Getting a DNA sample involves the state violating the bodies of citizens.
The authority of the state ends at my skin.
There's nothing at all odd about printing the reporter's contact information. Many papers do it.
Why in the world would you see that as a plea for donations? Did you not read carefully and though that Mr. Stratton was the victim, or something?
Harlan Ellison did a wonderful script.
Hollywood gives us a script written by the guy who gave us two of the criminally bad Batman movies and the Lost in Space camp-fest.
By that argument, if I make an obscene phone call the guys who strung the copper and wrote the software that drives the telecom network are guilty. If I send you a bootleg DVD in the mail, the postman's guilty.
If I'm a participent in a peer-to-peer filesharing, I have no idea of the copyright status of what's being routed through my box.
So, not, C, D, and E aren't responsible. Legally or ethically.
(Remember that a lot of what goes around is porn, and a lot of that is amateur stuff that people voluntarily share...yes, porn can be your defense of non-copyright-infringing use.)
Secure communications are a gain for the security of the people's liberties. Which, present administration's confusion notwithstanding, is what "homeland security" is supposed to be about. "Secure the blessings of liberty", ya know?
U.S. taxes are the lowest in the industrialized world.
Of course taxes are lower in developing nations - so is the quality and quantity of government service.
The difference has little to do with taxes, and more with total cost-of-living.
That is often claimed, but Webster says otherwise: censor /'sen(t)-s&-ri[ng], 'sen(t)s-ri[ng]/
Function: transitive verb
Inflected Form(s): censored; censoring
Date: 1882
: to examine in order to suppress or delete anything considered objectionable
Censorship doesn't imply action by the state.
Since those yields are not sustainable, we're headed for trouble with or without global dimming.
Saying industrial agriculture is the solution to feeding our overcrowded planet is rather like saying that getting more credit cards is the solution to personal financial problems.
Not necessarily. Venus, hottest planet in the system, is completely covered in clouds. They act as a blanket to keep heat in (cloudy nights are warmer).
There ought to be a convenient way to turn plugins like flash on and off in the browser. Right now I've made a pair of one-line shell scripts to do it:
flashon: mv /usr/lib/flash-plugin/libflashplayer.so.xxx /usr/lib/flash-plugin/libflashplayer.so
flashoff: mv /usr/lib/flash-plugin/libflashplayer.so /usr/lib/flash-plugin/libflashplayer.so.xxx
I usually have it off.
I simply can't read a website with dancing animations. I don't mean "I don't like it", I mean that my brain (perhaps because I'm old enough to have done most of my growing up before MTV shortened everyones attention span) can't deal with hyperkinetic images and with reading text at the same time.
Are you listening, content providers and advertisers? A page with intrusive advertising is not useful to many of use and we will go elsewhere, so less intrusive advertising will be more widely seen. BAM! BAM! BAM! goes the cluestick. Down with Flash ads. Up with AdWords.
Plenty. I got my Phillips 724 about a year ago, paid ~$120 IIRC (would be a lot cheaper today, given the pricing trends). All it needed was a code from the remote to reset it to region 0. This site has a lot of information about liberating your DVD player.