The Hubble Space Telescope could have just as easily been launched using either Delta IV OR Proton M rockets instead of the Shuttle. It might be argued that the subsequent servicing mission to correct the optics (an uforseen event) would have required the shuttle, but that does not negate the central point that the Hubble *could* have been launched without the Shuttle.
Is it really true that the ISS could not have been built without the space shuttle? The shuttle has a maximum payload of around 100 tons but as far as I know this amount of payload has rarely if ever been flown during the entire shuttle program (the chandra x-ray observatory payload weighed 50 tons or so, but that was not part of the ISS construction). The Russian Proton heavy lift rocket is reputed to be have a lifting capacity of 22 tons for Low Earth Orbit and even if more launches were needed to accomodate this somewhat lower payload it would still have been cheaper (almost certainly) than using the shuttles to build the ISS as we did.
Last time I checked, Pirate Bay ran scads of ads, which they don't give away for free.
Just about every site on the Internet today runs ads to generate revenue (that hopefully covers expenses) regardless of what their other primary goals may be. It seems reasonable to suppose that the stipulation in article IV was intended to apply to sites which are primarily used for commercial gain (i.e. an online store with shopping cart and payment processing as the primary focus of the site OR primarily promoting a for profit legal entity such as an established corporation). Under the circumstances, a good case can be made for article IV being unapplicable in this case since neither the IFPI nor the Pirate Bay are registered as corporations with the primary focus of earning revenue to the exclusion of other goals.
They will not do this for every open source project out there, remember the ignored and consigned to oblivion part? They will only single out those projects and formats or standards which are strategically important to long term survival and growth OR present a short term opportunity for a tactical victory in order to preserve or extend an existing cash cow or revenue stream. In other words, the open source community would not be able to, at least for now, open up enough fronts to seriously strain the resources of Microsoft who has carefully maintained and husbanded a huge hoard of cash and liquid securities to cover any short term bumps, unexpected reverses, and disruptive technologies which might come along the way.
The point of open source is not to destroy Microsoft, the world is big enough for both the open source people and the Microsofts and IBMs and too big for one player to control everything. The point of open source is to provide a viable alternative and if they succeed in that then they have achieved their objective (GNU and the other true believers aside).
I think only the threat the college finding a new provider or possible lawsuits for breach of contract prompted them to act.
Sometimes one has to speak in language that CEO types respect and understand (i.e. "we will take our business elsewhere" and "we will refer the matter to our legal counsel for a possible breach of contract tort"). The CEO understands the ramifications of lost business, especially to the telcos (who have their own problems, but have been providing professional grade network and communications services for a lot longer then the cable companies), and he understands and respects the language of lawyers, lawsuits, and contracts. Perhaps the college should have been quicker to issue their ultimatum to the Comcast instead of meeting with them to talk it over in endless meetings with lots of hand wringing, the CEOs take that as a sign of weakness to be exploited, not as a customer in need of assistance.
You're an NPC to them. They don't hate you, they just don't care.
You might say that if we were all of us involved in an episode of Star Trek: The Original Series as a shuttle landing party that the CEO's would be like Captain Kirk and their executive friends would be the rest of the bridge crew whereas the rest of us would be wearing red shirts and have names like "crewman number three", destined to be vaporized by the alien anomaly, killed by an errant phaser discharge, or caught in the explosion of the warp plasma accident merely to underscore the point that the alien planet is a dangerous place (dangerous to people like "crewman number three" that is, not the bridge crew of course since they all have to appear in next week's episode). Spock would raise his eyebrow and comment that the situation was "curious" while the bridge crew took cover and captain Kirk continues on without losing a second of sleep over the untimely death of "crewman number three" on Planet X.
They will engage you with their embrace, extended, and finally extinguish strategy with enough resources to outpace your independent project in an escalating features and incompatible formats fight. Unless your independent project gets backing from another tech superpower, IBM for example, then defeat is practically certain. There was and is a reason why small companies partner with Microsoft rather than going head to head with them in all out competition. Microsoft may treat their partners poorly sometimes, but they treat their competitors even worse and it is better for many small companies to join the monopolist and have some profit instead of standing in the way of juggernaut to be crushed once you are perceived as a threat or ignored and consigned to oblivion if you are not.
Comcast and the others who engage in packet shaping are only hastening the day when encrypted protocols protected by strong encryption (AES probably) are commonplace. Perhaps they realize this and are using the packet shapers as a stop-gap measure while they upgrade their infrastructure to handle the increased loads, but I doubt it.
You should have tossed all of the email addresses on their site to the pr0n and pills spammers while you were at it, given them a taste of their own medicine.
We do not permit our website to be "spidered", or a program run through the website, for purposes of obtaining email addresses to be used in commercial email campaigns.
Yeah, I am sure that the Russian and Chinese hackers and botnet operators give a flying f**k about what some American lawyers "permit" them to do. Are these lawyers living in the real world? Its open warfare out there on the public Internet and foreign hackers, operating outside the United States, are among the most prominent players and they don't concern themselves with laws.
Because human beings are so good at shooting down low flying supersonic aircraft.
The relatively high closing speeds and generally higher altitudes of modern military jet aircraft combined with the very small windows of opportunity to engage with unguided cannon rounds, even with radar tracking and computer calculated leading, make such a system seem anachronistic at best. It would probably be more useful against helicopters and other slower moving and lower flying threats, but missiles are much more versatile in the anti-aircraft role (and they are guided so they can come around for another pass or engage in a chase if they don't intercept successfully on the first pass) albeit more expensive per shot. It seems that in many militaries these types of computer controlled auto cannons are relegated to the point defense roll (ala Phalanx and Goalkeeper) where the ability to acquire targets and fire quickly at point blank ranges (again with a very short window of engagement opportunity) is potentially valuable as a last ditch defense against incoming cruise missiles. However, one wonders how effective this would actually be against incoming supersonic anti-shipping missiles given that the only widely reported instance of CIWS usage in a combat situation produced less than impressive results:
"In February 1991 during the Gulf War the battleship USS Missouri, escorted by HMS Gloucester (carrying Sea Dart) and the USS Jarrett (equipped with Phalanx CIWS), was engaged by an Iraqi Silkworm missile (also known as a Seersucker). After an unsuccessful response from the Phalanx 20 mm CIWS of Jarrett, which targeted chaff launched by the Missouri rather than the incoming missile, the Silkworm missile was intercepted and destroyed by a Sea Dart fired from Gloucester"
We all pay for our internet connection and then a significant portion of our bandwidth is used solely for the benefit and profit of Google to stream ads all over your screen.
"Did you know that the first Matrix was designed to be a perfect human world? Where none suffered, where everyone would be happy. It was a disaster. No one would accept the program. Entire crops were lost. Some believed we lacked the programming language to describe your perfect world. But I believe that, as a species, human beings define their reality through suffering and misery. The perfect world was a dream that your primitive cerebrum kept trying to wake up from. Which is why the Matrix was redesigned to this, the peak of your civilization. I say your civilization because as soon as we started thinking for you it really became our civilization which is of course what this is all about..."
It would be a little comical to see a whole bunch of seasoned network engineers and other greybeards try to claim that they had no idea there was copyrighted material on Usenet. ("Warez? On my Usenet?") But that's sort of the position they have to put themselves in, in order to get a successful 512(c) defense.
Why is that a barrier to a successful 512(c) defense? If the host, Usenet.com in this case, services all take down notices in a reasonable and timely fashion and makes reasonable efforts to accommodate copyright holders (the court decides what is and is not reasonable) then have they not fulfilled their obligation under the law? How would they know if there was a copy of Eric Clapton's greatest hits on their network? Sure they could search for it if they wanted to but are they required to have automated agents searching all of the time for everything that might be copyrighted? Is that reasonable or even feasible? Certainly not, it is the responsibility of the copyright holder to locate infringement and take the legally required step of sending a take down notice. As long as there is a reasonable system in place to service requests from copyright holders, then the content host has fulfilled its obligations and should be able to take refuge in the safe harbor.
That is true, but in the interest of striking a blow against the MAFIAA distribution models and out of respect for the band one should offer to pay *something* for downloading the album, even if that is only one dollar. If the album is worth zero dollars then why are those people downloading it? Are they trying to say that they derive zero dollars worth of entertainment value from listening to the album? If that is the case then why listen? At the very least, people should explain why they cannot afford to pay a dollar for the album before downloading it (in a text box area). There may be some good reasons why a genuinely deserving fan cannot afford to pay for the album, but surely that is the exception and not the rule.
If you want to download the album then pay what you can or think is appropriate people...don't be a leacher.
Why haven't we seen similar improvements in fuel efficiency
With regard to vehicle fuel efficiency there are other considerations in a practical everyday vehicle other than fuel efficiency. It has long been known for example that some very complex concept cars, when maintained meticulously by teams of engineers and employing technologies which are either extremely expensive, high maintenance, or impractical or all of the above, have achieved very high fuel efficiencies on the order of 70+ miles per gallon. However, this technology is not reliable enough to be used in consumer vehicles where reliability, even at the expense of some fuel efficiency, is of top importance. Would you rather have a car that achieved 70+ miles per gallon, but broke down frequently if it was not meticulously maintained with frequent and cumbersome procedures and precisely calibrated OR would you be willing to trade some of that mileage for a vehicle which broke down only rarely and was highly reliable? The choice for most people is pretty clear. If you are asking, "Can we do better here in America" then the answer is probably yes, provided that you are willing to trade off some other features, namely performance, safety, and reliability. Many Americans, for a variety of reasons, are not willing to make those trade offs so the market produces what the consumers are willing to buy, not necessarily what the government or the environmentalists say that they should want.
The first rule of Usenet is you do not talk about Usenet...The second rule of Usenet is you DO NOT talk about Usenet...if this is your first time on Usenet then you have to upload.
And it would mean the end of the US as a Republic and an official beginning of the Empire.
Which is precisely what happened to Ancient Rome. The Republic of Rome was effectively dead by the time Julius Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus had fully consolidated their positions, but for the following several hundred years most Roman citizens politely pretended otherwise. I am not suggesting that this will happen to us, but it is wise to learn the lessons of history.
Which every audiophile knows requires a $5000 electro magnetosphere conversion unit to filter the signal for clean power over monster sized gold plated cables with thick carbon fiber shielding.
Sales is really a soul sucking job. I knew from an early age that I didn't want to be in sales. It seems like the best salesmen, or at least the ones who earn the highest commisions or advance into management most quickly, are invariably the ones who are most dishonest, cheat the most people, and are generally sociopathic in their dealings with underlings.
For example, one of my previous coworkers, who was the best salesmen I have ever known, had sidelines in loan sharking (thousand(s) of percent yearly interest) and illegal drugs which probably tripled his income, at least, over what he was making at his legitimate job. He had a forceful personality and was good at pushing marks in high pressure sales situations, but he was also the most amoral person that I have ever known. I lost track of him when I changed jobs, but I have no doubt that he is still wheeling and dealing in anything that will turn a profit.
The matter seems to hinge upon what the RICO laws, or perhaps the law in general, define as "coercion" (i.e. the legal definition). The colloquial definition of "coercion" is generally understood to mean the use of force or threat of force to induce fear or intimidate another party into acceding to one's demands. However, it is not unreasonable to extend the application of this definiton beyond the use or threat of direct physical force, as in Argumentum ad baculum, to include other types of force. The threat of a civil tort and the possibility of runious damages can be very intimidating, just ask all of the people who settled with the MAFIAA rather than risk an expensive and drawn out court battle with an uncertain outcome.
Now, proving that Microsoft and Best Buy are corrupt and racketeer influed organizations is another matter entirely, but there is no reason to dismiss these types of cases out of hand in a blanket fashion merely because Microsoft and Best Buy, along with other corporations, find the possibility of such litigation inconvenient. The Supreme Court was absolutely right in allowing these types of cases to proceed on the merits.
Slashdot Mirror
The Hubble Space Telescope could have just as easily been launched using either Delta IV OR Proton M rockets instead of the Shuttle. It might be argued that the subsequent servicing mission to correct the optics (an uforseen event) would have required the shuttle, but that does not negate the central point that the Hubble *could* have been launched without the Shuttle.
Is it really true that the ISS could not have been built without the space shuttle? The shuttle has a maximum payload of around 100 tons but as far as I know this amount of payload has rarely if ever been flown during the entire shuttle program (the chandra x-ray observatory payload weighed 50 tons or so, but that was not part of the ISS construction). The Russian Proton heavy lift rocket is reputed to be have a lifting capacity of 22 tons for Low Earth Orbit and even if more launches were needed to accomodate this somewhat lower payload it would still have been cheaper (almost certainly) than using the shuttles to build the ISS as we did.
Last time I checked, Pirate Bay ran scads of ads, which they don't give away for free.
Just about every site on the Internet today runs ads to generate revenue (that hopefully covers expenses) regardless of what their other primary goals may be. It seems reasonable to suppose that the stipulation in article IV was intended to apply to sites which are primarily used for commercial gain (i.e. an online store with shopping cart and payment processing as the primary focus of the site OR primarily promoting a for profit legal entity such as an established corporation). Under the circumstances, a good case can be made for article IV being unapplicable in this case since neither the IFPI nor the Pirate Bay are registered as corporations with the primary focus of earning revenue to the exclusion of other goals.
They will not do this for every open source project out there, remember the ignored and consigned to oblivion part? They will only single out those projects and formats or standards which are strategically important to long term survival and growth OR present a short term opportunity for a tactical victory in order to preserve or extend an existing cash cow or revenue stream. In other words, the open source community would not be able to, at least for now, open up enough fronts to seriously strain the resources of Microsoft who has carefully maintained and husbanded a huge hoard of cash and liquid securities to cover any short term bumps, unexpected reverses, and disruptive technologies which might come along the way.
The point of open source is not to destroy Microsoft, the world is big enough for both the open source people and the Microsofts and IBMs and too big for one player to control everything. The point of open source is to provide a viable alternative and if they succeed in that then they have achieved their objective (GNU and the other true believers aside).
I think only the threat the college finding a new provider or possible lawsuits for breach of contract prompted them to act.
Sometimes one has to speak in language that CEO types respect and understand (i.e. "we will take our business elsewhere" and "we will refer the matter to our legal counsel for a possible breach of contract tort"). The CEO understands the ramifications of lost business, especially to the telcos (who have their own problems, but have been providing professional grade network and communications services for a lot longer then the cable companies), and he understands and respects the language of lawyers, lawsuits, and contracts. Perhaps the college should have been quicker to issue their ultimatum to the Comcast instead of meeting with them to talk it over in endless meetings with lots of hand wringing, the CEOs take that as a sign of weakness to be exploited, not as a customer in need of assistance.
You're an NPC to them. They don't hate you, they just don't care.
You might say that if we were all of us involved in an episode of Star Trek: The Original Series as a shuttle landing party that the CEO's would be like Captain Kirk and their executive friends would be the rest of the bridge crew whereas the rest of us would be wearing red shirts and have names like "crewman number three", destined to be vaporized by the alien anomaly, killed by an errant phaser discharge, or caught in the explosion of the warp plasma accident merely to underscore the point that the alien planet is a dangerous place (dangerous to people like "crewman number three" that is, not the bridge crew of course since they all have to appear in next week's episode). Spock would raise his eyebrow and comment that the situation was "curious" while the bridge crew took cover and captain Kirk continues on without losing a second of sleep over the untimely death of "crewman number three" on Planet X.
They will engage you with their embrace, extended, and finally extinguish strategy with enough resources to outpace your independent project in an escalating features and incompatible formats fight. Unless your independent project gets backing from another tech superpower, IBM for example, then defeat is practically certain. There was and is a reason why small companies partner with Microsoft rather than going head to head with them in all out competition. Microsoft may treat their partners poorly sometimes, but they treat their competitors even worse and it is better for many small companies to join the monopolist and have some profit instead of standing in the way of juggernaut to be crushed once you are perceived as a threat or ignored and consigned to oblivion if you are not.
Comcast and the others who engage in packet shaping are only hastening the day when encrypted protocols protected by strong encryption (AES probably) are commonplace. Perhaps they realize this and are using the packet shapers as a stop-gap measure while they upgrade their infrastructure to handle the increased loads, but I doubt it.
You should have tossed all of the email addresses on their site to the pr0n and pills spammers while you were at it, given them a taste of their own medicine.
We do not permit our website to be "spidered", or a program run through the website, for purposes of obtaining email addresses to be used in commercial email campaigns.
Yeah, I am sure that the Russian and Chinese hackers and botnet operators give a flying f**k about what some American lawyers "permit" them to do. Are these lawyers living in the real world? Its open warfare out there on the public Internet and foreign hackers, operating outside the United States, are among the most prominent players and they don't concern themselves with laws.
Because human beings are so good at shooting down low flying supersonic aircraft.
The relatively high closing speeds and generally higher altitudes of modern military jet aircraft combined with the very small windows of opportunity to engage with unguided cannon rounds, even with radar tracking and computer calculated leading, make such a system seem anachronistic at best. It would probably be more useful against helicopters and other slower moving and lower flying threats, but missiles are much more versatile in the anti-aircraft role (and they are guided so they can come around for another pass or engage in a chase if they don't intercept successfully on the first pass) albeit more expensive per shot. It seems that in many militaries these types of computer controlled auto cannons are relegated to the point defense roll (ala Phalanx and Goalkeeper) where the ability to acquire targets and fire quickly at point blank ranges (again with a very short window of engagement opportunity) is potentially valuable as a last ditch defense against incoming cruise missiles. However, one wonders how effective this would actually be against incoming supersonic anti-shipping missiles given that the only widely reported instance of CIWS usage in a combat situation produced less than impressive results:
"In February 1991 during the Gulf War the battleship USS Missouri, escorted by HMS Gloucester (carrying Sea Dart) and the USS Jarrett (equipped with Phalanx CIWS), was engaged by an Iraqi Silkworm missile (also known as a Seersucker). After an unsuccessful response from the Phalanx 20 mm CIWS of Jarrett, which targeted chaff launched by the Missouri rather than the incoming missile, the Silkworm missile was intercepted and destroyed by a Sea Dart fired from Gloucester"
We all pay for our internet connection and then a significant portion of our bandwidth is used solely for the benefit and profit of Google to stream ads all over your screen.
Firefox + Adblock + NoScript = User Control
Declare your independence from Internet advertisers and take back control of the connection that you pay for. Your bandwidth, your client, your rules.
"Did you know that the first Matrix was designed to be a perfect human world? Where none suffered, where everyone would be happy. It was a disaster. No one would accept the program. Entire crops were lost. Some believed we lacked the programming language to describe your perfect world. But I believe that, as a species, human beings define their reality through suffering and misery. The perfect world was a dream that your primitive cerebrum kept trying to wake up from. Which is why the Matrix was redesigned to this, the peak of your civilization. I say your civilization because as soon as we started thinking for you it really became our civilization which is of course what this is all about..."
-- Agent Smith
It would be a little comical to see a whole bunch of seasoned network engineers and other greybeards try to claim that they had no idea there was copyrighted material on Usenet. ("Warez? On my Usenet?") But that's sort of the position they have to put themselves in, in order to get a successful 512(c) defense.
Why is that a barrier to a successful 512(c) defense? If the host, Usenet.com in this case, services all take down notices in a reasonable and timely fashion and makes reasonable efforts to accommodate copyright holders (the court decides what is and is not reasonable) then have they not fulfilled their obligation under the law? How would they know if there was a copy of Eric Clapton's greatest hits on their network? Sure they could search for it if they wanted to but are they required to have automated agents searching all of the time for everything that might be copyrighted? Is that reasonable or even feasible? Certainly not, it is the responsibility of the copyright holder to locate infringement and take the legally required step of sending a take down notice. As long as there is a reasonable system in place to service requests from copyright holders, then the content host has fulfilled its obligations and should be able to take refuge in the safe harbor.
That is true, but in the interest of striking a blow against the MAFIAA distribution models and out of respect for the band one should offer to pay *something* for downloading the album, even if that is only one dollar. If the album is worth zero dollars then why are those people downloading it? Are they trying to say that they derive zero dollars worth of entertainment value from listening to the album? If that is the case then why listen? At the very least, people should explain why they cannot afford to pay a dollar for the album before downloading it (in a text box area). There may be some good reasons why a genuinely deserving fan cannot afford to pay for the album, but surely that is the exception and not the rule.
If you want to download the album then pay what you can or think is appropriate people...don't be a leacher.
Why haven't we seen similar improvements in fuel efficiency
With regard to vehicle fuel efficiency there are other considerations in a practical everyday vehicle other than fuel efficiency. It has long been known for example that some very complex concept cars, when maintained meticulously by teams of engineers and employing technologies which are either extremely expensive, high maintenance, or impractical or all of the above, have achieved very high fuel efficiencies on the order of 70+ miles per gallon. However, this technology is not reliable enough to be used in consumer vehicles where reliability, even at the expense of some fuel efficiency, is of top importance. Would you rather have a car that achieved 70+ miles per gallon, but broke down frequently if it was not meticulously maintained with frequent and cumbersome procedures and precisely calibrated OR would you be willing to trade some of that mileage for a vehicle which broke down only rarely and was highly reliable? The choice for most people is pretty clear. If you are asking, "Can we do better here in America" then the answer is probably yes, provided that you are willing to trade off some other features, namely performance, safety, and reliability. Many Americans, for a variety of reasons, are not willing to make those trade offs so the market produces what the consumers are willing to buy, not necessarily what the government or the environmentalists say that they should want.
they might as well sue "email" as well.
They will probably try that too...or perhaps the ISPs for providing a service which can be used to infringe copyright.
The first rule of Usenet is you do not talk about Usenet...The second rule of Usenet is you DO NOT talk about Usenet...if this is your first time on Usenet then you have to upload.
However, you don't make a new car by tearing out the carburetor of a 1995 Ford
Incidentally, the last new production carbureted car sold in the US was the 1990 model year of the Subaru Justy.
And it would mean the end of the US as a Republic and an official beginning of the Empire.
Which is precisely what happened to Ancient Rome. The Republic of Rome was effectively dead by the time Julius Caesar, Pompey, and Crassus had fully consolidated their positions, but for the following several hundred years most Roman citizens politely pretended otherwise. I am not suggesting that this will happen to us, but it is wise to learn the lessons of history.
Which every audiophile knows requires a $5000 electro magnetosphere conversion unit to filter the signal for clean power over monster sized gold plated cables with thick carbon fiber shielding.
You mean "downgraded" right?
Sales is really a soul sucking job. I knew from an early age that I didn't want to be in sales. It seems like the best salesmen, or at least the ones who earn the highest commisions or advance into management most quickly, are invariably the ones who are most dishonest, cheat the most people, and are generally sociopathic in their dealings with underlings.
For example, one of my previous coworkers, who was the best salesmen I have ever known, had sidelines in loan sharking (thousand(s) of percent yearly interest) and illegal drugs which probably tripled his income, at least, over what he was making at his legitimate job. He had a forceful personality and was good at pushing marks in high pressure sales situations, but he was also the most amoral person that I have ever known. I lost track of him when I changed jobs, but I have no doubt that he is still wheeling and dealing in anything that will turn a profit.
Excuse me, but isn't that fraud?
The matter seems to hinge upon what the RICO laws, or perhaps the law in general, define as "coercion" (i.e. the legal definition). The colloquial definition of "coercion" is generally understood to mean the use of force or threat of force to induce fear or intimidate another party into acceding to one's demands. However, it is not unreasonable to extend the application of this definiton beyond the use or threat of direct physical force, as in Argumentum ad baculum, to include other types of force. The threat of a civil tort and the possibility of runious damages can be very intimidating, just ask all of the people who settled with the MAFIAA rather than risk an expensive and drawn out court battle with an uncertain outcome.
Now, proving that Microsoft and Best Buy are corrupt and racketeer influed organizations is another matter entirely, but there is no reason to dismiss these types of cases out of hand in a blanket fashion merely because Microsoft and Best Buy, along with other corporations, find the possibility of such litigation inconvenient. The Supreme Court was absolutely right in allowing these types of cases to proceed on the merits.