"Basically, she's saying that Congress wrote this law, and it's not unconstitutional, so she can't strike it down. If you want to change it, contact your legislator. Don't biatch at her."
Yes, that's what she is saying. What she didn't say is that the law fundamentally conflicts with previously established and adjudicated law. If we have a right to make a backup copy of a DVD, how can it then be illegal to make and distribute the means to back it up? In Miranda, the Supreme court established that a right is useless, and therefore abridged, if there is no means to execute that right.
The media companies have every legal right to make it as hard as possible for me to copy their material; but Congress does not have the power to enforce that business decision under the color of law. Either copying DVD's under fair use is a right, (which makes her ruling incorrect), or copying DVD's under fair use is NOT a right, in which she should have had the balls to rule that way and take the appellate beat down.
:Why can't both hybrid and clean diesel owns accept the fact that they're both good solutions...? :
Because the government and public attention is almost wholly focused on hybrids, due to some excellent marketing by Toyota and GM's horrible missteps in the 80's.
For instance, in the DC area HOV lanes are a big deal. You can drive in them solo if you have an "alternative fuel" vehicle. Somehow, hybrids got classified as "alternative fuel", which means that the HOV lanes in northern VA are about 50% hybrids.
When TDi owners ask what is "alternative" about gasoline as a fuel, we are told "Hybrids get so much better mileage."
So we say "Cool - so you'll let me drive my TDI on the HOV, because it gets better mileage than the Prius."
"No, you can't."
"Why not?"
"Diesel isn't an alternative fuel, and it's, well, diesel."
"But gasoline isn't an alternative fuel either!"
"Yes, but hybrids are...well...hybrids. They're better."
"Why in the hell couldn't GM have just come out with a normal 50MPG car that didn't suck ass like the Metro? That would sell well and be a ton cheaper to make."
Because it wouldn't have been "green", and therefore they wouldn't be able to convince the Obama administration that they "get it", and therefore would have already gone TU.
"That would be a strange thing for it to do, since it would be contradicting the user's wishes."
Aaaaannnd you just succinctly stated the major conflict between consumerism and environmentalism - in order for the latter to actually be effective, SOMEONE has to have the power to deny people what they wish, regardless of market forces.
"In a lot of ways Canada, like the US under President Obama, has done alright on Net Neutrality issues."
Yeah, like when the FCC told Comcast to knock it off with messing with people's Bittorrent.
Oh, wait - that happened under the Bush administration. Well, I'm sure Obama has done plenty since his inauguration...[searches Google]...Hmmm, I see a whole page of hits on his campaign promises.
Well, that's fine - everyone knows that he will fulfill all of his campaign promises.
"If you want a leader who's against new copyright laws you have to look to the ones who're anti-american like the Bloc, and the NDP, or Green."
Puh-lease. Are Canadians so insecure that they think the US is at the root of all their ills? That you are children who can't do for themselves but for US support? When you stub your toe, is it Mommy's fault?
You are entirely missing the point - in it's original form, the theory of intelligent design is a philosophical construct. It is not subject to the strictures of scientific proof. It's the equivalent of the scene in "Animal House" where Donald Sutherland and Pinto get stoned and start discussing universes in the palm of their hands. These things are supposed to be argued in the context of a philosophy or, yes, a religion class.
Fundamentalists have basically hijacked the name and applied it to ideas that only bear the slightest resemblance to their philosophical roots. They WANT their ideas to be taught as science, so they've dressed them up with the trappings of philosophy as a weak disguise. If it were only being taught as religion, I wouldn't care, but when jackasses in my home state of PA start demanding "Who looks out for Jesus?" in school board meetings, it's a problem.
Have phone companies started issuing that number again?
Oh, and from Wikipedia:
"Brown University transferred the number to Gem Plumbing & Heating,[9] a local business. In 2002, Gem began using the number in advertising campaigns both in Rhode Island and in eastern Massachusetts (area code 617). Gem trademarked the number in 2005.
In 2006, Benjamin Franklin Franchising LLC, a large national plumbing firm, began using a toll-free version of the number (+1-866-867-5309). In 2007, Gem brought suit against Clockwork Home Services, the parent company of Benjamin Franklin Franchising, alleging a violation of its trademark. Clockwork contended that Gem's trademark was invalid. Effective in May 2007, Clockwork was ordered by a court to stop using the number in New England.[10][11]
The number in several area codes has been listed on eBay for sale.[12]
In July 2009, a Pennsylvania company had the number assigned to a Vonage phone line in the name of a small business, and then listed the entire business for sale on eBay[13], possibly allowing them to avoid the general rule amongst wireline telephone companies that numbers are the property of the carrier and may not be sold -- which is why earlier attempts failed.[14]"
"Not really because the WS license requires an annual renewal. So even if they accidentally bought the appliance with Websense, they would have to actively be renewing the license."
"The author is applying his own feelings and standards to a very different people and culture."
No, the author is applying his own feelings and standards to the company that make Websense.The rant has little to do with Yemeni censorship and much to do with how Websense is going against their corporate policy. Of course, they may not even be aware of the Yemeni ISP's use, since it came as part of a 3rd party appliance, but that's irrelevant.
Repeat after me: "US Bad" "Everywhere Else good, unless bad. In which case, Everywhere Else has some connection to US. See above.
Oh, wait - it's 1/3 of the way down the voluminous post. Which has (un)surprisingly little content.
From TFA (after I found it)
"The ISP YemenNet continues to have an issue with its filtering system; ONI investigation found that the ISP uses a Blue Coat integrated cache/filter appliance to run Websense but possesses a limited number of concurrent user licenses--not nearly enough to cover all of the Internet users in the country. Thus, when the number of subscribers accessing the Internet at a given time exceeds the limited number of user licenses, the requests of all users circumvent the filtering software.
Is it possible they simply bought the Blue Coat appliances which came prepackaged with the software?
"While I think this is kind of a creepy practice, I am less concerned with the impact on the students (who I agree probably agreed with the viewpoint to begin with) than I am with the impact on the level of discourse on the Internet at large."
You mean it could go even lower? It's not as if Einstein, Proust, and Gauguin were dominating the discourse.
"Intelligent design is not based on Biblical literalism at all. Instead it is a philosophical point based on a scientific argument. Now, most scientists have found the argument unconvincing. But to conflate it with creationism per sé shows that you know as little about theology as the use of the word "theologist" does (the word is "theologian".)"
You are simultaneously exactly right and wholly wrong. In it's initial form, ID is a philosophical position - that the structure of physical laws, the universe, and everything has some guiding intelligence involved. Period. That's it. I myself favor the the "watch maker" or "spinning top" idea - wind it up, set it loose, and watch what happens.
But ID as pushed by fundamentalists takes it one step further - that the intelligence is God, that it bears a striking resemblance to the fundamentalist world view, and that it should be taught in science classes, NOT philosophy classes. They are not pushing it as an abstract philosophical concept, or even a religious one, but an historical and political one.
Truth be told, I'm more irritated at the fundamentalist hijacking of a perfectly interesting philosophical concept than the content of their version of ID.
I may be the first (and only) poster to defend the professor in the article, but here goes.
It is a course at a Baptist Seminary in Intelligent Design and Christian Apologetics. From Wikipedia:
"Apologetics is the whole of the consensus of the views of those who defend a position in an argument of long standing. The term comes from the Greek word apologia (), meaning a speaking in defense.
Early Christian writers (c 120-220) who defended their faith against critics and recommended their faith to outsiders were called apologists[1]
In modern times, apologists refers to authors, writers, editors of scientific logs or academic journals, and leaders known for defending the points in arguments, conflicts or positions that receive great popular scrutinies and/or are minority views.
These people are studying to be ministers in a religion. One of their roles is to defend their faith and its tenets. Given the position of the Internet in the world today, how could anyone say they are qualified to do that without having done work on the internet? And, since the focus is on defense of those tenets, the best place to practice that is on hostile websites. So I believe the assignment is appropriate to the course aims.
Note that I am not a Baptist (RC here), I think ID (except as a philosophical experiment) is creationism in disguise, and trolls irritate me too. But lets face it - who here hasn't trolled in order to tweak someone or start a flamewar? Hell, the folks on Slashdot practically invented some forms of trolling (Goatse, anyone?).
So, instead of excoriating the professor, we should invite his students onto here and "help" them with their studies.
I think the researchers are going for something that women can do for themselves that the man doesn't even need to know about, much less cooperate with.
Scenario 1: "What are you doing?" "Getting a condom for you" Response: - Whine - bitch, piss, moan - threaten force - use force.
Scenario 2: "What are you doing?" "Just applying some lubricant." "What?" "Well, you're so big I just can't handle it without lube." "That's right, Baby - use as much as you want."
He may be old, and he may be singing a tune you don't like, but he was old when he decided to change the media business, and he did. Massively and permanently. The changes may suck, or may not, but pretending it's pretty naive to think that because he is old, or doesn't do things the way you want, it follows that he is weak and ineffectual. He is neither.
Actually, from an epidemiological standpoint, that would have worked a lot better if it could have been enforced. If GRID/AIDS had been treated like any other venereal disease, we would be in a significantly different situation than we are now. There are myriad reasons it wasn't, and some are perhaps valid, but to pretend that promiscuous behavior among a subset of gay men was insignificant is a fantasy.
I was thinking more of the situation in Africa, where the primary vector for the spread of HIV is truck drivers and other transient men having sex with prostitutes in the many places they visit and then infecting their wives and all of the other women with which they have sex. The focus has been on prevention has been on women since, as another poster put it, "Men were not meant to be monogamous" and "You'd have to be borderline autistic to even remotely think this was practical." So the focus has been on "Make your man wear a condom" and "no glove, no love". But is that really going to work in a culture that already excuses such male promiscuity? If a truck driver is fucking any piece of ass he can get on the road, I can't imagine he respects his woman at home enough to wear a rubber.
So, the study authors are focusing on a solution for women that DOESN'T require the participation, or even the knowledge, of the male partner. "What's taking so long? "Just lubing up, honey - your SO big I have trouble taking it all."
But this still continues to ignore the larger problem of male promiscuity. And it IS a problem, because it's not a binary choice, monogamy vs. serial partners. 20% of sub-Saharan Africans are infected with HIV not because they are fucking monkeys, or they are the victim of a western plot, or the virus in Africa is SOOO much more contagious - it's because of the behavior of the males in those cultures.
Want to change the behavior? Same as everything else - make the consequences of being a male slut worse than the benefits. Give someone HIV? Prosecuted for negligence, they get everything you own. Busted with a prostitute (not that it's likely)? The state notifies wife, relatives, etc. and gets HIV tests on his dime.
Radical? Sure. But isn't having 1/5 of your population afflicted with a fatal disease an unprecedented problem? Until something more radical is done in such places, the burden will continually be on the women to carry society through.
Slashdot Mirror
"Basically, she's saying that Congress wrote this law, and it's not unconstitutional, so she can't strike it down. If you want to change it, contact your legislator. Don't biatch at her."
Yes, that's what she is saying. What she didn't say is that the law fundamentally conflicts with previously established and adjudicated law. If we have a right to make a backup copy of a DVD, how can it then be illegal to make and distribute the means to back it up? In Miranda, the Supreme court established that a right is useless, and therefore abridged, if there is no means to execute that right.
The media companies have every legal right to make it as hard as possible for me to copy their material; but Congress does not have the power to enforce that business decision under the color of law. Either copying DVD's under fair use is a right, (which makes her ruling incorrect), or copying DVD's under fair use is NOT a right, in which she should have had the balls to rule that way and take the appellate beat down.
"Concrete is a rather proven material that has been proven over hundreds of years; "
More like thousands.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_concrete
:Why can't both hybrid and clean diesel owns accept the fact that they're both good solutions...? :
Because the government and public attention is almost wholly focused on hybrids, due to some excellent marketing by Toyota and GM's horrible missteps in the 80's.
For instance, in the DC area HOV lanes are a big deal. You can drive in them solo if you have an "alternative fuel" vehicle. Somehow, hybrids got classified as "alternative fuel", which means that the HOV lanes in northern VA are about 50% hybrids.
When TDi owners ask what is "alternative" about gasoline as a fuel, we are told "Hybrids get so much better mileage."
So we say "Cool - so you'll let me drive my TDI on the HOV, because it gets better mileage than the Prius."
"No, you can't."
"Why not?"
"Diesel isn't an alternative fuel, and it's, well, diesel."
"But gasoline isn't an alternative fuel either!"
"Yes, but hybrids are...well...hybrids. They're better."
Apparently, Hybrids go to "11".
But...but...it's green!
And...and...Obama and Leonardo DiCaprio drive hybrids, and this is better than a hybrid, although it's really the same as a hybrid, and...
"Why in the hell couldn't GM have just come out with a normal 50MPG car that didn't suck ass like the Metro? That would sell well and be a ton cheaper to make."
Because it wouldn't have been "green", and therefore they wouldn't be able to convince the Obama administration that they "get it", and therefore would have already gone TU.
"That would be a strange thing for it to do, since it would be contradicting the user's wishes."
Aaaaannnd you just succinctly stated the major conflict between consumerism and environmentalism - in order for the latter to actually be effective, SOMEONE has to have the power to deny people what they wish, regardless of market forces.
How many GSM towers does it take to cover the whole of Finland?
""If x happens, I'll just move to Canada," argument."
BTW, did any of those folks who said that during Kerry/Bush actually do that?
Didn't think so.
"In a lot of ways Canada, like the US under President Obama, has done alright on Net Neutrality issues."
Yeah, like when the FCC told Comcast to knock it off with messing with people's Bittorrent.
Oh, wait - that happened under the Bush administration. Well, I'm sure Obama has done plenty since his inauguration...[searches Google]...Hmmm, I see a whole page of hits on his campaign promises.
Well, that's fine - everyone knows that he will fulfill all of his campaign promises.
"If you want a leader who's against new copyright laws you have to look to the ones who're anti-american like the Bloc, and the NDP, or Green."
Puh-lease. Are Canadians so insecure that they think the US is at the root of all their ills? That you are children who can't do for themselves but for US support? When you stub your toe, is it Mommy's fault?
Or is it just you?
You are entirely missing the point - in it's original form, the theory of intelligent design is a philosophical construct. It is not subject to the strictures of scientific proof. It's the equivalent of the scene in "Animal House" where Donald Sutherland and Pinto get stoned and start discussing universes in the palm of their hands. These things are supposed to be argued in the context of a philosophy or, yes, a religion class.
Fundamentalists have basically hijacked the name and applied it to ideas that only bear the slightest resemblance to their philosophical roots. They WANT their ideas to be taught as science, so they've dressed them up with the trappings of philosophy as a weak disguise. If it were only being taught as religion, I wouldn't care, but when jackasses in my home state of PA start demanding "Who looks out for Jesus?" in school board meetings, it's a problem.
Have phone companies started issuing that number again?
Oh, and from Wikipedia:
If "12345" doesn't bring up Spaceballs, it's a fail.
(Oh God - I've contracted net-speak from my kids. Is there a cure?)
So, put in the (numerical) answer and it gives you the question?
Thank God Douglass Adams didn't know about this.
"Not really because the WS license requires an annual renewal. So even if they accidentally bought the appliance with Websense, they would have to actively be renewing the license."
Legally requires, or the software stops working?
"The author is applying his own feelings and standards to a very different people and culture."
No, the author is applying his own feelings and standards to the company that make Websense.The rant has little to do with Yemeni censorship and much to do with how Websense is going against their corporate policy. Of course, they may not even be aware of the Yemeni ISP's use, since it came as part of a 3rd party appliance, but that's irrelevant.
Repeat after me:
"US Bad"
"Everywhere Else good, unless bad. In which case, Everywhere Else has some connection to US. See above.
Oh, wait - it's 1/3 of the way down the voluminous post. Which has (un)surprisingly little content.
From TFA (after I found it)
Is it possible they simply bought the Blue Coat appliances which came prepackaged with the software?
Oh, and editors, ffs, EDIT!
You mean it could go even lower? It's not as if Einstein, Proust, and Gauguin were dominating the discourse.
You are simultaneously exactly right and wholly wrong. In it's initial form, ID is a philosophical position - that the structure of physical laws, the universe, and everything has some guiding intelligence involved. Period. That's it. I myself favor the the "watch maker" or "spinning top" idea - wind it up, set it loose, and watch what happens.
But ID as pushed by fundamentalists takes it one step further - that the intelligence is God, that it bears a striking resemblance to the fundamentalist world view, and that it should be taught in science classes, NOT philosophy classes. They are not pushing it as an abstract philosophical concept, or even a religious one, but an historical and political one.
Truth be told, I'm more irritated at the fundamentalist hijacking of a perfectly interesting philosophical concept than the content of their version of ID.
I may be the first (and only) poster to defend the professor in the article, but here goes.
It is a course at a Baptist Seminary in Intelligent Design and Christian Apologetics. From Wikipedia:
These people are studying to be ministers in a religion. One of their roles is to defend their faith and its tenets. Given the position of the Internet in the world today, how could anyone say they are qualified to do that without having done work on the internet? And, since the focus is on defense of those tenets, the best place to practice that is on hostile websites. So I believe the assignment is appropriate to the course aims.
Note that I am not a Baptist (RC here), I think ID (except as a philosophical experiment) is creationism in disguise, and trolls irritate me too. But lets face it - who here hasn't trolled in order to tweak someone or start a flamewar? Hell, the folks on Slashdot practically invented some forms of trolling (Goatse, anyone?).
So, instead of excoriating the professor, we should invite his students onto here and "help" them with their studies.
I think the researchers are going for something that women can do for themselves that the man doesn't even need to know about, much less cooperate with.
Scenario 1: "What are you doing?"
"Getting a condom for you"
Response:
- Whine
- bitch, piss, moan
- threaten force
- use force.
Scenario 2: "What are you doing?"
"Just applying some lubricant."
"What?"
"Well, you're so big I just can't handle it without lube."
"That's right, Baby - use as much as you want."
If you have a steam engine, you don't find replacement parts - you make them.
You beat me to it, but I've got one better:
1957 Chrysler New Yorker. These, my friend, are tailfins.
http://alamedarides.com/chrysler-newyorker1957/57Chrysler-NewYorkerB.jpg
http://jalopnik.com/assets/resources/2007/07/57_NY_Rear.jpg
http://telstarlogistics.typepad.com/photos/uncategorized/2008/01/28/newyorker017x.jpg
He may be old, and he may be singing a tune you don't like, but he was old when he decided to change the media business, and he did. Massively and permanently. The changes may suck, or may not, but pretending it's pretty naive to think that because he is old, or doesn't do things the way you want, it follows that he is weak and ineffectual. He is neither.
Actually, from an epidemiological standpoint, that would have worked a lot better if it could have been enforced. If GRID/AIDS had been treated like any other venereal disease, we would be in a significantly different situation than we are now. There are myriad reasons it wasn't, and some are perhaps valid, but to pretend that promiscuous behavior among a subset of gay men was insignificant is a fantasy.
I was thinking more of the situation in Africa, where the primary vector for the spread of HIV is truck drivers and other transient men having sex with prostitutes in the many places they visit and then infecting their wives and all of the other women with which they have sex. The focus has been on prevention has been on women since, as another poster put it, "Men were not meant to be monogamous" and "You'd have to be borderline autistic to even remotely think this was practical." So the focus has been on "Make your man wear a condom" and "no glove, no love". But is that really going to work in a culture that already excuses such male promiscuity? If a truck driver is fucking any piece of ass he can get on the road, I can't imagine he respects his woman at home enough to wear a rubber.
So, the study authors are focusing on a solution for women that DOESN'T require the participation, or even the knowledge, of the male partner.
"What's taking so long?
"Just lubing up, honey - your SO big I have trouble taking it all."
But this still continues to ignore the larger problem of male promiscuity. And it IS a problem, because it's not a binary choice, monogamy vs. serial partners. 20% of sub-Saharan Africans are infected with HIV not because they are fucking monkeys, or they are the victim of a western plot, or the virus in Africa is SOOO much more contagious - it's because of the behavior of the males in those cultures.
Want to change the behavior? Same as everything else - make the consequences of being a male slut worse than the benefits. Give someone HIV? Prosecuted for negligence, they get everything you own. Busted with a prostitute (not that it's likely)? The state notifies wife, relatives, etc. and gets HIV tests on his dime.
Radical? Sure. But isn't having 1/5 of your population afflicted with a fatal disease an unprecedented problem? Until something more radical is done in such places, the burden will continually be on the women to carry society through.