I'm not convinced that an incredibly rigid false advertising standard would be a bad thing. Make it illegal to even imply that your product can do anything it can't provably do (This means no more flying with Windows, no more sex with cars [or much else], etc, etc) would be a bad thing. Make people sell thier products on the merits. This has the side benefit of pressuring consumers to be more aware of merits and less of titties.
It's very hard (if not impossible) to press a false advertising claim for an intangible like "secure", "cheap", or "reliable".
As for AOL, it's only false advertising if, in fact, you can't sort your email, or can't sort with Google. It doesn't matter if you can do it anywhere. The fact it, AOL does it, and AOL didn't do it before, so it's a new feature and there's nothing wrong with claiming it.
They all have the little asterix that says speeds are not guaranteed, and they all say "up to" 100 times faster. That said, I do actually occasionally achieve 500-600 KB/s downloads on my cable modem.
It's kinda of amusing how tweaking the machines to guarantee a profit for the casino is good buisness, but exploiting flaws in that tweaking to guarantee a profit for the gambler is fraud.
Because when it was 5% on small volume a bunch of people saw it going up and started a stampere. You don't think the stock market works on logical principles, do you?
Having working in retail, it's much easier to just make a fuss. Most places, including where I've worked, permit cashiers to take 10% off just to shit you up, without needing a manager.
His point is that the patent, as he describes it, would cover ANY additive that improves plastics. A classic example of an overly-broad patent. So, for 14 years (more with extensions), the company with this patent would be able to stifle and/or profit off of ANY improvement to plastics making that involved an additive.
The implication is, obviously, that he believed that he had alot more autonomy than he thought he did. Perhaps he was naive. Perhaps since the clauses in his contract were never brought up, he didn't think about them. Perhaps the clauses are in sufficently complex legalese that he didn't understand them. Perhaps lots of things - but the clear implication of his blog is that AOL is now exerting pressure that they didn't before and that he would rather leave than fight it.
Alot of people are talking about how it's not hard for him because he's got alot of money, or that he should expect it for selling out, blah blah blah, but regardless it's hard to walk away from a project you've spent so many years on.
You're actually wrong - as long as the person receiving the product has reason to believe that the posting was in good faith (like being on the official company website, posted by a major (CEO?) office of the company, and with the companies name in the copyright notice, then it's yours. You'd be suprised at how hard it is to get stolen goods back if they've been legitmatly re-sold (hard to have it be legit unless it's passed through a fair amount of hands, though...)
The 2 series is still being actively developed. 2.91 is the latest version of 2, not just a maintenance release. 3 is kind of dead in the water for exactly the reasion you mentioned (although Wasabi is a very cool idea).
I wouldn't buy my software for money - the minimal amount of cash I would be willing to pay for it isn't worth the time and effort of the transaction. Thats not to say that it's crap or that I don't take pride in it, it's simply that it's features and purpose don't justify it. Even something wider scale I doubt I'd sell it. Selling things is work. Mainly, I write for myself. It doesn't cost me anything to distribute it - I'd have written the software anyway - and why not let other people use it (I suspect this basic philosphy is the basis of alot of open source development).
Interestingly, anything I would make money off of, I would pay for - it WOULD feel wrong to me to pirate, say, a libarary or control set or even an IDE and sell the proceeds of that. The software I use at work (where I don't make software for sale, but I still get paid for what I do) is all legit and paid for.
Note I'm not trying to claim that I'm in the moral right or that other people should think I'm correct. I'm simply explaining why I will pirate certain things, and why I don't feel like I'm doing something wrong, although intellectually I know I should pay for what I'm using. I wouldn't dream of shoplifting, but I'll pirate software without thinking too much about it. Wierd, eh? I think the percieved quality of commercial software has alot to do with it, too. I've had far to many issues that only arise AFTER I've paid money for something (I'm willing to deal with or work around those issues in something free, even if I stole it, or something OSS so I can at least pretend I might fix it. Commercial software with the same disclaimer of warranty as OSS bothers me).
Thats the whole point - I CAN'T get a car without stealing one from someone else. Because I can easily, freely, and without depriving anyone else of thier software, it doesn't FEEL as immoral as stealing a car would be. Just like speeding, or jaywalking, or any number of other crimes that millions of people do every day.
Amusingly, someone not making money isn't theft either! Woo!
Put simply: I'm willing to pay for software. On the other hand, alof of the software I want is really expensive (generally far outpricing it's value). On the other hand, unlike the expensive car I want, I can get it anyway. So I do. I'd pay for it if it were cheaper. So there you go. Is it theft? Certainly not technically. Is it morally kind of stealing? Probably. Is there actual harm involved to anyone? Rarely. I can't remember the last piece of software I would have bought if I couldn't have gotten it illegally. So perhaps it's immoral. But, like speeding and spitting on the London Bridge, it doesn't FEEL immoral. Nobody is harmed. I haven't deprived anyone of anything.
The fact that I see this issue this way is one reason I will never base my livelihood on my selling software - because I can't morally justify, to myself, the kind of draconian copyright measures or ridiculously over-inflated prices people tend to charge. I give my software away for as much as I feel like it's worth.
Failing to provide an accuarate postal address is against the TOS of your domain registrar (and also Tucows, who're they're a reseller for, and also ICANN). Get a PO box if you're that worried.
The amendment instructs the government to protect "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects". This is part of why we have laws against, for example, burglary. The constitution doesn't say anything about not having your car stolen, either. Or your house broken into. Or any number of things that other people can't legally do to you under normal circumstances.
That said, the location of a home and who owns it should be, under normal circumstances, public information, and I think the injunction is ridiculous.
The problem is that in many rural areas, the price point is beyond what people are willing to pay - if the price doubled, probably less than half the same amount of people would still get it. The way we "solved" this in the US is through public funding of infrastructure and massive legislation (requiring ISPs to make cities subsidize towns, as you mention). The simple solution is to publicize infrastructure while privatizing service. Or even just publicize all of it but keep it on a local level, so the public utility remains responsive. This has worked great for the few towns that have done it so far.
Deregulation is good, but what we're ending up with is a corporate monopoly (in most places it's already a regional monopoloy), which is even worse than the governmental one. Thats what people are complaining about.
There's a similar issue with the rail in the US. Amtrack is (by law) the only non-mass transit passenger rail service. Also by law, Amtrack cannot own track or carry freight. All the freight companies also own the track, and they cannot carry passengers.
The end result of this is that we don't have high speed passenger rail, because there's no incentive for the companies that own the rail to upgrade it. The same thing would probably have happened with telco - we'd all still be on noisy dialup lines because there's no incentive for them to do the upgrades needed for DSL.
See, your response to my post is what you should have said in his - the figures you quoted in your first don't disprove him. These do. If only technically, because 45% of employment is rather alot. In fact, given that information, and the fact that it doesn't (and, you said, cannot) track subsidaries, I submit that it's very likely that any given person works for a major corporation, or at least takes thier marching orders from one. At the least it's likely that any given person has worked for a corporation at one time.
I'd still be interested in how many of those employers were legal fictions or 1-person buisnesses. One employer for every 50 people in the US sounds very extreme.
Not saying the poster is right, but your math sucks ass. For one thing, if there was one company that employed 99% of the people in the US, he'd be right and your figures wouldn't invalidate it. Further, those numbers don't include subsidaries, so just because the corporation you work for has only 500 employees doesn't mean that it (and 100 like it) aren't owned by another, larger corporation (who you do ultimately work for).
I find your numbers somewhat interesting - 5.8 million buisnesses, but only 291 million people in the US. So thats a small buisness for every 50 people. Note thats PEOPLE, not workers, or even adults. Certainly doesn't match the ratios I see. Further! You said those are Small Business Administration stats, do they even COUNT corporations?
So, in conclusion: Before you berate someone for making numbers up, make sure that yours are at least relevant.
So you design your web page and design to maximise page rank rather than quality. See, that pretty clearly states that you're the bottom feeding sort of Internet abuser that we really don't need. Make a good page. Provide a useful service, and/or have interesting information on it. Even just stupid cartoons. If people like it, they'll link to it. You don't have to do anything to manipulate your page rank. Stop thinking about page rank. Just make a good site. If you want to show up on google, buy some ad words.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm not convinced that an incredibly rigid false advertising standard would be a bad thing. Make it illegal to even imply that your product can do anything it can't provably do (This means no more flying with Windows, no more sex with cars [or much else], etc, etc) would be a bad thing. Make people sell thier products on the merits. This has the side benefit of pressuring consumers to be more aware of merits and less of titties.
As for AOL, it's only false advertising if, in fact, you can't sort your email, or can't sort with Google. It doesn't matter if you can do it anywhere. The fact it, AOL does it, and AOL didn't do it before, so it's a new feature and there's nothing wrong with claiming it.
They all have the little asterix that says speeds are not guaranteed, and they all say "up to" 100 times faster. That said, I do actually occasionally achieve 500-600 KB/s downloads on my cable modem.
It's kinda of amusing how tweaking the machines to guarantee a profit for the casino is good buisness, but exploiting flaws in that tweaking to guarantee a profit for the gambler is fraud.
Because when it was 5% on small volume a bunch of people saw it going up and started a stampere. You don't think the stock market works on logical principles, do you?
Having working in retail, it's much easier to just make a fuss. Most places, including where I've worked, permit cashiers to take 10% off just to shit you up, without needing a manager.
Ah, but if the price rings up wrong (dairy and some other products excepted) you can get it free!
His point is that the patent, as he describes it, would cover ANY additive that improves plastics. A classic example of an overly-broad patent. So, for 14 years (more with extensions), the company with this patent would be able to stifle and/or profit off of ANY improvement to plastics making that involved an additive.
What, every company has to offer something unique? And proven? I guess we don't need any more new buisnesses then...
Alot of people are talking about how it's not hard for him because he's got alot of money, or that he should expect it for selling out, blah blah blah, but regardless it's hard to walk away from a project you've spent so many years on.
You're actually wrong - as long as the person receiving the product has reason to believe that the posting was in good faith (like being on the official company website, posted by a major (CEO?) office of the company, and with the companies name in the copyright notice, then it's yours. You'd be suprised at how hard it is to get stolen goods back if they've been legitmatly re-sold (hard to have it be legit unless it's passed through a fair amount of hands, though...)
The 2 series is still being actively developed. 2.91 is the latest version of 2, not just a maintenance release. 3 is kind of dead in the water for exactly the reasion you mentioned (although Wasabi is a very cool idea).
Interestingly, anything I would make money off of, I would pay for - it WOULD feel wrong to me to pirate, say, a libarary or control set or even an IDE and sell the proceeds of that. The software I use at work (where I don't make software for sale, but I still get paid for what I do) is all legit and paid for.
Note I'm not trying to claim that I'm in the moral right or that other people should think I'm correct. I'm simply explaining why I will pirate certain things, and why I don't feel like I'm doing something wrong, although intellectually I know I should pay for what I'm using. I wouldn't dream of shoplifting, but I'll pirate software without thinking too much about it. Wierd, eh? I think the percieved quality of commercial software has alot to do with it, too. I've had far to many issues that only arise AFTER I've paid money for something (I'm willing to deal with or work around those issues in something free, even if I stole it, or something OSS so I can at least pretend I might fix it. Commercial software with the same disclaimer of warranty as OSS bothers me).
Thats the whole point - I CAN'T get a car without stealing one from someone else. Because I can easily, freely, and without depriving anyone else of thier software, it doesn't FEEL as immoral as stealing a car would be. Just like speeding, or jaywalking, or any number of other crimes that millions of people do every day.
Put simply: I'm willing to pay for software. On the other hand, alof of the software I want is really expensive (generally far outpricing it's value). On the other hand, unlike the expensive car I want, I can get it anyway. So I do. I'd pay for it if it were cheaper. So there you go. Is it theft? Certainly not technically. Is it morally kind of stealing? Probably. Is there actual harm involved to anyone? Rarely. I can't remember the last piece of software I would have bought if I couldn't have gotten it illegally. So perhaps it's immoral. But, like speeding and spitting on the London Bridge, it doesn't FEEL immoral. Nobody is harmed. I haven't deprived anyone of anything.
The fact that I see this issue this way is one reason I will never base my livelihood on my selling software - because I can't morally justify, to myself, the kind of draconian copyright measures or ridiculously over-inflated prices people tend to charge. I give my software away for as much as I feel like it's worth.
Failing to provide an accuarate postal address is against the TOS of your domain registrar (and also Tucows, who're they're a reseller for, and also ICANN). Get a PO box if you're that worried.
I guess I missed the part where Gentoo became a commericial OS company rather than a Linux distro.
That said, the location of a home and who owns it should be, under normal circumstances, public information, and I think the injunction is ridiculous.
The problem is that in many rural areas, the price point is beyond what people are willing to pay - if the price doubled, probably less than half the same amount of people would still get it. The way we "solved" this in the US is through public funding of infrastructure and massive legislation (requiring ISPs to make cities subsidize towns, as you mention). The simple solution is to publicize infrastructure while privatizing service. Or even just publicize all of it but keep it on a local level, so the public utility remains responsive. This has worked great for the few towns that have done it so far.
Deregulation is good, but what we're ending up with is a corporate monopoly (in most places it's already a regional monopoloy), which is even worse than the governmental one. Thats what people are complaining about.
Selling off stuff is one thing, selling off public assets, like public land or (especially) monopoly rights is altogether different.
The end result of this is that we don't have high speed passenger rail, because there's no incentive for the companies that own the rail to upgrade it. The same thing would probably have happened with telco - we'd all still be on noisy dialup lines because there's no incentive for them to do the upgrades needed for DSL.
I'd still be interested in how many of those employers were legal fictions or 1-person buisnesses. One employer for every 50 people in the US sounds very extreme.
So, in conclusion: Before you berate someone for making numbers up, make sure that yours are at least relevant.
So you design your web page and design to maximise page rank rather than quality. See, that pretty clearly states that you're the bottom feeding sort of Internet abuser that we really don't need. Make a good page. Provide a useful service, and/or have interesting information on it. Even just stupid cartoons. If people like it, they'll link to it. You don't have to do anything to manipulate your page rank. Stop thinking about page rank. Just make a good site. If you want to show up on google, buy some ad words.