I sign up to the "Do Not Call List" Telemarketer from a shady company calls anyway, thinking they can simply move to another company if they're sued. Phone rings, I pick it up and it's a telemarketer. Phone company supplied "smart-box" detects the usual sales patterns of the telemarketer, traces them right through their little *67, and forwards the information to NORAD. I listen to the annoying sales pitch while NORAD dispatches two F-16s to the source of the call. After 3 minutes of leading the telemarketer on, I hear a loud noise approaching in the distance through the phone. 4 minutes into the call, two F-16s drop multiple satellite-guided 500lbs JDAMs on the source of the call. 4 minutes, 12 seconds into the call - silence.
I hang up the phone, almost giddy with my accomplishment.
OpenBSD, and BSD in general is so much more secure than any version of Windows, it's laughable to even compare the two. This isn't about tightening up their own code, this is about tightening their code to prevent poorly-written 3rd-party applications from becoming launching platforms for attacks against OpenBSD machines. Microsoft's main problem with security isn't 3rd part apps, it's the millions of lines of unsecure and buggy code in highly integrated applications such as Internet Explorer and Windows Media Player.
To compare this to Trusted Computing is like comparing apples and black holes.
I'm guessing you're not an English professor. The was should be a were because you're trying to say that the condition has already been determined to be false. Using were, you make it clear that those students are not the only ones you've seen.
D+ for effort, and don't let me catch your parents trying to argue your way to an A.
Per chance, does anyone know of any movements out there to have the major record lables indicted under federal RICO statutes?
Their current business model pretty much rests on bribery, extortion, fraud, theft, computer network tampering, price gouging, and price fixing.
If there is no such movement, perhaps we need someone to organize a website where we can weigh in on this. Instead of debating the theoretical and philosophical aspects of the issues, let's start going on the offensive. Let's begin exposing the RIAA for what it is. Letter and email writing to congresscritters and media types would be a good beginning. If a single major media outlet were to give coverage to the necessary topics, it would be a great boost to the cause. For once in the 20 years of corrupt business practices within the major media companies, let's put them on the defensive and make them justify their own theft.
"2. The black market will be hurt because there will be fewer pirates to downloading and selling [eliminate the pirate competition]."
This statement stems from the fact that the music industry, through it's mouthpiece and flakjacket the RIAA, has perpetuated the myth that anyone with a computer and a broadband connection is a thief putting "artists" (read: Britney Spears, read: N' Sync) in the poor house. It neglects to include the vision of rich record execs taking multi-million dollar per year salaries and travelling with these so-called "artists" at the "artists'" expense.
If I make music, and a Kazaa user copies the bits that encode the music, and then a record executive flies around the world charging his/her airfare, hotel, meals, and other expenses to me, who's the thief taking money out of my pocket?
The icing on the cake is, of course: "Perhaps we would better let it be known what we desire if we lay prostrate before his excellency and humbly beg for his mercy."
First of all, I'm not the anonymous coward who posted the other response to this comment, however I agree with what that person had to say.
Have I ever stopped to think what our history would look like? There's not much need, as there are pro's and con's any which way you look at it, and the speculation for the past, the present, and the future is absolutely endless. We may have been much better off as two seperate unions. Certainly those hundreds of thousands of people who died during the US Civil War (stated as such to avoid semantecal arguments) would have been better off; they'd have not been killed in that war.
As for WWII, I shall assess the situation based on your own logic and assumptions. Let's assume that the two unions created by the cecession of the southern states were not strong enough to defeat Germany in 1945. First of all, without the help of the US (single nation) in WWI, it's possible the Germans would have signed a very beneficial peace accord with the rest of the allies, thereby heading off the economic desparity that lead to the rise of Hitler and the Nazis. Assuming the Nazis did come to power anyway, we could also speculate that after 50 years, changes in internal politics within the united, conquered Nazis Europe would have had a massive and unparalleled good effect on the rest of the world. To be clear, I am absolutely not defending any of the horrific atrocities commited by the Nazi party in and around WWII; only speculating that 50 years could potentially bring about major changes in policies. A united Europe could have potentially devoted itself to helping people all over the world. Instead of small member states in the EU and the UN, we could have a world governing body that actually gets things done. Low pollution, advances in science, elimination of most wars and diseases; the possibilities are endless. On the other side, we could also have possibly seen the most horrible nightmares imagined come to life under the rule of the Nazi party. Then again, it's possible that with the collapse of the eastern front in WWII, the Allies could have possibly won with no help at all from the US.
In the end, the only thing we can say for certain is what is in the history books. What I see in them is a tail of unforgivable treachery from a government devised solely to better implement the will of the states and the will of the people. There is a reason the Civil War is said to have pitted brother against brother: it was wrong. The South was not "reclaimed", it was destroyed; hence the period of time post-dating the Civil War called "Reconstruction". From murderous barbarity, much good has come to be sure, but at what price? Do you sacrifice every moral fiber in your body because what comes next seems good? Lincoln had a choice to make: to follow the spirit of the law and allow the southern states to go their own way as it was always intended they ought to be able to do, or to start a massive, bloody war that would tear apart families and costs hundreds of thousands of lives and millions in damages. To allow the southern states to leave would put the economy of the North in jeopardy. It was a financial decision; it was the easy decision; it was the wrong decision. Unfortunately, the North won the war, and to the victors go the spoils. Thus, history spins the Civil War as a good thing and teaches the youth to believe that it was a hard and morally sound decision.
War is rarely a hard decision, and for damn sure is almost never a morally sound decision.
As for totally disagreeing with everything I said, I invite you to teach me about Ex Parte Milligan, in which the Supreme Court of the United States of America directly stated in no uncertain terms that the suspension of Habeas Corpus by the President was unconstitutional. Perhaps what you mean is that you disagree with the Supreme Court. That's fine; you have a right to do so, and I encourage you to petition the court to review that decision. Somehow, I doubt you'll find their response encouraging.
from the ruling in Ex Parte Milligan: "it could be well said that a country, preserved at the sacrifice of all the cardinal principles of liberty, is not worth the cost of preservation."
And: "Martial rule can never exist where the courts are open, and in the proper and unobstructed exercise of their jurisdiction. It is also confined to the locality of actual war."
Martial law is, of course, required for the suspension of Habeas Corpus. (Unless you ask the Bush Administration, which can come up with justification for anything the resident President does, even if it doesn't make any sense or have any relevence)
"I just want to get a few facts straight, and not have them misrepersented."
Very well; let's have at it then.
"Even if it was unconstitutional, it was vital to the survival of America."
Ahh, so then our priciples and our laws must be cast aside whenever it suites our needs. This relies on the most basic animal instinct; survival. A truly civil society stands true to its convictions even in the face of total annihilation. Lest you forget that in the War of 1812, our forefathers stuck to their convictions even as Washington DC and even the White House itself was burned to the ground. During the War of 1812, we weren't just invaded; we were on the verge of being beaten back into submission by England and having all those who signed the US Constitution killed for treason. Those were true men, men who put everything they ever knew in life on the line because of what they believed in. Those were true men, and we need more like them today.
"But this action was completely Constitutional."
Aww, I'm afraid not. The US Supreme Court ruled in Ex Parte Milligan that the only time Habeas Corpus may be suspended is when the courts cease to function. At this point, one could argue that the civilian government has already been annihilated, and therefore civilian laws have no value. However, the courts remained open throughout Lincoln's little empire; thus making his suspension of Habeas Corpus illegal, unconstitutional, and unforgivable. Many see Lincoln as a hero, yet I see him as little more than a tyrannical emperor and a coward. Rather than lead the union on without the southern states as he ought have done, he took the easier way out; declaring war.
"This makes it sound like the Confederacy was perfectly legal and just, and Lincoln himself ordered the pillaging of the south."
Actually, this is exactly what happened. Each state within the union was supposedly just that; a sovereign state. The union was created to mediate disputes between the states and to allow all states to act as a single entity for such things as national defense, where it would benefit all to act as one (ie. strength in numbers). Ergo, when any one or more states had a major dispute with a ruling or policy of the federal government, they had three options. They could sit there and take it, they could continue fighting it within the union itself, or they could cecede from the union. If Maryland, Virginia, and Delaware decided in 1800 to cecede, do you honestly believe there would have been a massive war costing thousands and thousands of lives over it? Chances are, it would have been a peaceful transition after a bitter diplomatic struggle. In all of this, one fact remains: Each state is a seperate and whole entity entitled to act on its own accord. Any member state of the UN or the EU could cecede at will, and I seriously doubt we'd see that state attacked over it. Lincoln was a coward for not having the courage to lead his country through a difficult time without resorting to massacring farmers when they didn't lay down and roll over upon command.
" Finally, when you say the spirit of the law is dead, you are obviously forgetting the Supreme Court, who has the job of interpreting the spirit of the law."
This is the job of all courts; not just the Supreme Court. The problem is that laws are written poorly, the judicial system is completely overloaded, and we've become such a litigous society that common law is impossible to aptly interpret within the context of thousands of conflicting rulings on the same subject. As a Virginia school student, I was always taught that it was called the "War of Northern Agression". When I went to high school in another state, it was taught as the "Civil War". I thought little of it at the time, but since I've become more politically active and have become much more interested in the past of our great nation, I've come to the conclusion that "The War of Northern Agression" best describes the circumstances of what happened. Don't forget that the Union army was the first to attack, and never forget Sherman's march to the sea in which he went from town to town burning everything in sight to the ground and slaughtering unarmed civilians. To call it barbaric does not do it justice.
The spirit of the law died when Lincoln invaded the southern, soverign states following their cecession from the union. It was during this time that more laws were violated than in any other time in history, including the suspension of Habeas Corpus by the President. Even though this particular action was later ruled unconstitutional, it proved that when it comes to breaking the law, it's easy to get forgiveness than it is to get permission. Once our leaders began to set aside the law when and where they saw fit, the "spirit" of the law was dead.
Point was that the state could not require stores to get your SSN as a requirement for a transaction. To do so would deny the right to conduct financial transactions between private citizens simply because of a refusal by one party to make available their SSN. The store's policy may be to require the SSN, but the state cannot require it by law. That was my point.
In Soviet Russia, modern American survillance techniques and technology that are used to surveil American citizens were but a distant dream of the KGB.
" Is this even true that I would have to have my photo and SSN taken when I buy a used DVD?"
The short answer to the part about the SSN is probably not. As this site points out, there are specific restrictions on the use of the Social Security Number, and you generally don't need to give it. From the site:
"In addition, that section makes it illegal for Federal, state, and local government agencies to deny any rights, privileges or benefits to individuals who refuse to provide their SSNs unless the disclosure is required by Federal statute, or the disclosure is to an agency for use in a record system which required the SSN before 1975. ( 5 USC 552a note)."
More than likely, when they're talking about "personally identifiable information", they're talking about simple things like name, address, telephone number. Basically, they want to be able to find the person should there be a problem with the sale at a later date. I personally don't see where they have any right to require this, but unless you have the funds to fight it in court, chances are you have little choice.
Welcome to the land of the free, now please step this way so we can get your name, address, telephone number, date of birth, social security number, current occupation, annual income, political allegiances, place of origin, ethnicity, financial history, medical history, criminal history, political beliefs, religious beliefs, shopping habits, list of friends and aquantences, sexual preferences, and a list of books you like to read. In addition, we would also ask that you be fingerprinted, submit to a retinal scan and a polygraph, give a blood sample, hair sample, handwriting sample, urine sample, and wear this GPS-enabled chip under the skin of your left arm after we stamp your barcode there.
First, I'd like to compliment you on a well-written, intelligent response; something or a rarity these days. A couple nitpicking points, and then a more general response. Many of the potential customers you lose never actually go near the limit; they just have no concept of how much 10GB really is. I have people ask me where I work if they can fit pictures on a CD-R. As for complaints, most non-technical people don't send an email or post to a message board; they call. That means you have to staff enough people to handle these extra billing complaints, which don't exist if the price of the service is set each month.
As for bad press, I'm of course not talking about CNN covering how much your customers hate your company; people almost expect any large company to be hated by most people (a sad fact). I'm talking about people going to places like DSLreports where they can lower your ISP rating and denounce you as the new Satan on the boards there. You then get a snowball effect as many other current and former customers chime in with the always-popular, "me too" rants. This too cuts down on your potential customer base, as many people really do check out sites like DSLreports before signing up to a new ISP.
When you're a monopoly, you can do whatever you like. "Don't like this 10GB cap? Go back to dial-up." Most people can't imagine going back to dial-up after using broadband for a while, so they'll take whatever abuse you hand them. As for packet loss, I would venture a guess that upwards of 90% of people on the internet have absolutely no idea what "packet loss" is. Aside from slashdot, you've got grandma looking up cooking tips on Martha Stuart's homepage and Jr. trying to get into that pr0n site to impress his buddies. Do not forget that the elderly make up the fastest growing group of internet users. Trying to advertise a "slower" service to them by saying, "but we have less packet loss than company A!" looks like you're trying to pull a fast one on them. This is the same reason Intel doesn't try explaining pipeline stages and SSE-2 instruction sets to its customers, why AMD and Apple both try to explain similar CPU concepts, and why Intel dominates the market. You post bigger numbers than your competitors, you get more customers; regardless of quality of service.
A limit on speed is indeed a limit on data transfer. The point I was trying to make is that you can limit data transfer and keep costs down without all the problems previously mentioned by offering more choices to your customers. When you offer more choices, most people see more options without noticing the implied restrictions. As for the first tier, I would probably say go with 60/60kbps service, just so you can plainly tell people that it's faster than their 56k modem without explaining FCC regulations regarding telephone line interference. You want to get across the point that it's faster, better, and more reliable. I'm completely astounded that no one has thought to make a $20/mo broadband service, as this would effectively wipe out the dial-up market in their area.
The crazies aren't the only ones who will complain about the cap; I will. Right now, I have the ability to do much of my money-making work from home. This is side work which I make extra money from, but it involves massive databases. Now, I could sit at work this weekend and do some of these things, but thanks to an unlimited connection, I can get stuff done any time, any day I please. Do I max my connection out 24/7? No, but thanks to my much slower upload (384k as opposed to 3.5mbit downstream), I end up maxing the upload out for 2 or 3 days at a time. This was a very painful process before tier'd service became an option, so I signed up for the higher tier as soon as it became available (even before they began advertising it). As for the "Nimda patients", many of these people are folks like your mother or your grandmother. I think you would be pretty pissed off if your mother's ISP sent her a $400 bill and she had no idea why. Especially if they refused to back down (which you suggested they ought to do). What's worse is if she decides to pay that bill before cancelling the service, despite the fact that she can't really afford to do so. And sure you can say spam costs you money, but that gives you the right to complain; nothing more, really. For me, with unlimited service, spam is an annoyance. For you, spam (potentially) is a financial burden. I fail to see how that puts you in a better position. The quality of service for my connection has been excellent. As much as I dislike Comcast (they try to squeeze every dollar they can out of every customer, while often providing sub-standard service), they internet service I've had from them since they took it over from @home has been very good. The service since I went to the higher tier has been incredible. In the 6 months or so since I switched, I think I've had about an hour of downtime total (two times, one was about 15 minutes, the other was close to an hour), and that was a few weeks after I switched. Since then, I've had a truly 24/7 connection available to me at a reasonable price. While I'd love for them to offer a similarly priced tier with something like 1.5/1.0 instead of 3.5/384k, I'm not about to complain about what I have.
All I'm trying to say is that you can reach the same goals by tiering as you would by capping without most of the negatives associated with the latter. You and I both apparently think very highly of different tiers, and we're both very willing to pay more money for better service. I suspect there are many, many others like us, and many others who would love to pay less for a slower service. I would suggest the following as a strong tier system:
$20/mo
60kbps downstream
60kbps upstream
Market to current dial-up users
$50/mo
1.5mbps downstream
128kbps upstream
Market to most home broadband users
$60/mo
1.25mbps downstream
384kbps upstream
Market to other home broadband users
$100/mo
2.0mbps downstream
512kbps upstream
Market to "power" users and businesses
$200/mo
2.0mbps downstream
1.5mbps upstream
Market to businesses using T-1's (no service contract)
"A proper business plan would have included a limit. For example, 10 Gigs for $50."
No.
If we're going to take this simplistic view of their business model, let's at least think it through to a minimal level. First of all, you lose a number of potential customers who fear going over the limit (or know for a fact that they will). Secondly, you have additional costs associated with such things as having to constantly tell people how close to the limit they are and having customers dispute how much they've transfered in a given time period. You'll then lose those customers who you don't give in to and they'll generate significant bad press. You can also forget collecting the last month's bill from many of those who leave who will decide that since your company is so incredibly greedy, you deserve nothing. Next, for the few customers you have left, most of them will switch as soon as an otherwise comparable service without the 10GB limit becomes available to them.
So, after cutting off potential revenue, alienating otherwise loyal customers, racking up huge numbers of "uncollectable"'s, and generating enough bad press to make Arie Flischer cry, your company's offices are raided by your creditors just before your disgruntled former customer burn your offices to the ground. Congratulations.
Caps work in very specific situations: when you have a monopoly on high-speed internet access, when your customers are perfectly happy to take limits on their use, and when any potential competitors also have similar limits. A better idea would be to introduce a tiered pricing scheme with limits on speed, as opposed to data transfer. A service at around $20 per month with speeds only slightly higher than dial-up would slaughter the dial-up market (same cost, better speed, no dialing up/missed calls/annoying modem noises), a $50 tier with speeds similar to what we see today in home broadband, and one or two higher end services with speeds that go up along-side the price; perhaps in the $100 and $200 ranges. This effectively limits your customers' total monthly data transfers without imposing limits that would increase costs to you while alienating your customer base.
But then again, any business with a single and specific method of generating revenue is pretty much doomed to fail anyway. Diversification is a necessary component in any business model, along-side strong management and adaptability. While you may wish to turn a cold shoulder to the so-called "power users", I would much rather solve the situation by putting a well thought out tiered pricing scheme in place, and modifying it once a year to ensure costs stay in line with revenue.
Then again, I'm a "power user" who eats up plenty of bandwidth (no comments about pr0n/warez/etc necessary, I'm talking about dBase transfers), yet I pay Comcast twice as much as their average home user, and do so without complaint - as I suspect many "power users" would do if offered the chance. The simple lesson to be learned is this: don't restrict your customer, give them more options to choose from and ensure that any choice they make benefits you. You come out looking like the good guy while still maintaining a strong revenue foundation.
My price is hereby set at $12million (USD) per minute. Please, please call me. Call me day and night; call me at 3am; call me during dinner. For $12million, you can call me during sex. Not only will I cheerfully listen to your entire pre-determined message, but I will ask questions - oh so many questions, and not necessarily about the product you're selling.
The 10th Amendment wouldn't be irrelevant in modern times if it weren't for the War of Northern Aggression, (commonly called the 'Civil War' in the North), in which an authoritarian federal government beat and burned the southern states into submission. The fact is that the southern states had every right to secede from the union. Instead, the current president, Lincoln, took the unprecidented position of giving himself absolute authority, suspending habeus corpus (later ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, See: Ex Parte Milligan), and imprisoning and executing numerous people for such things as speaking out against the war or refusing to fight in the war. Lincoln didn't give two shits about slaves and their rights, and anyone who believes he did is insane. The Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 was issued two years after the beginning of the war, and was specifically designed to encourage slaves in the South to rebel and thus weaken the South, which stood a strong chance of beating the North at that point in the war.
In any event, amoung the casualties of the War of Northern Aggression and Lincoln's private war against the Bill of Rights was the understood sovereignty of each state in the union. States' rights and powers have since been largely ignored, although California is starting to kick up a bit of a fuss over the whole medicinal marijuana debate. I say good for them, and it's about damn time the states began standing up for themselves. The purpose of the federal government was to provide a forum for issues that affected several or all of the states. It was supposed to be a UN of sorts, where elected representatives from each state (try replacing the word "state" with the word "nation" or "country" if it helps you) could resolve disputes surrounding issues such as interstate commerce, where different states may have different views of what should happen, but a uniform policy for all states would be beneficial. Instead, ever since Lincoln's state-smashing/burning spree, we've had little more than lines on a map within a single federal government. I see this as simply evidence of how much we've managed to pervert the framework for government created by brilliant people like Jefferson. I think that states asserting their Constitutional rights would go a long way to restoring this country to its strong and moral roots. The federal government exerts a ridiculous amount of control over all citizens, to the point that we hardly realize our state governments exist. It seems to me that an overbearing government ruling from Washington DC is not much better than an overbearing government ruling from London. I hope the federal government cracks down really, really hard on California; so much so that it prompts other states to rise up again and declare firmly that they are indeed sovereign and only remain part of the United States so long as it benefits their citizens. I don't want to see the USA broken up, not even to lose one state - but I'd love to see a return to a government that's much closer to the citizens, ie. state governments.
This isn't about America in-and-of-itself, it's about what the current government of America has done and is doing. I do specifically critique a number of things as examples, but never have I said I'm ashamed to be an American, or that my country sucks. I love my country; it's my government that needs fixing or replacing.
Slashdot Mirror
Fantasy system? Weak.
Here's my idea of a fantasy system:
I sign up to the "Do Not Call List"
Telemarketer from a shady company calls anyway, thinking they can simply move to another company if they're sued.
Phone rings, I pick it up and it's a telemarketer.
Phone company supplied "smart-box" detects the usual sales patterns of the telemarketer, traces them right through their little *67, and forwards the information to NORAD.
I listen to the annoying sales pitch while NORAD dispatches two F-16s to the source of the call.
After 3 minutes of leading the telemarketer on, I hear a loud noise approaching in the distance through the phone.
4 minutes into the call, two F-16s drop multiple satellite-guided 500lbs JDAMs on the source of the call.
4 minutes, 12 seconds into the call - silence.
I hang up the phone, almost giddy with my accomplishment.
OpenBSD, and BSD in general is so much more secure than any version of Windows, it's laughable to even compare the two. This isn't about tightening up their own code, this is about tightening their code to prevent poorly-written 3rd-party applications from becoming launching platforms for attacks against OpenBSD machines. Microsoft's main problem with security isn't 3rd part apps, it's the millions of lines of unsecure and buggy code in highly integrated applications such as Internet Explorer and Windows Media Player.
To compare this to Trusted Computing is like comparing apples and black holes.
Yes.
Perm node.
24/7 uptime, 384k upstream.
30GB datastore and counting.
Indeed. It's a shame no one thought of it sooner.
"If all I ever saw was those kids,"
I'm guessing you're not an English professor. The was should be a were because you're trying to say that the condition has already been determined to be false. Using were, you make it clear that those students are not the only ones you've seen.
D+ for effort, and don't let me catch your parents trying to argue your way to an A.
Per chance, does anyone know of any movements out there to have the major record lables indicted under federal RICO statutes?
Their current business model pretty much rests on bribery, extortion, fraud, theft, computer network tampering, price gouging, and price fixing.
If there is no such movement, perhaps we need someone to organize a website where we can weigh in on this. Instead of debating the theoretical and philosophical aspects of the issues, let's start going on the offensive. Let's begin exposing the RIAA for what it is. Letter and email writing to congresscritters and media types would be a good beginning. If a single major media outlet were to give coverage to the necessary topics, it would be a great boost to the cause. For once in the 20 years of corrupt business practices within the major media companies, let's put them on the defensive and make them justify their own theft.
"2. The black market will be hurt because there will be fewer pirates to downloading and selling [eliminate the pirate competition]."
This statement stems from the fact that the music industry, through it's mouthpiece and flakjacket the RIAA, has perpetuated the myth that anyone with a computer and a broadband connection is a thief putting "artists" (read: Britney Spears, read: N' Sync) in the poor house. It neglects to include the vision of rich record execs taking multi-million dollar per year salaries and travelling with these so-called "artists" at the "artists'" expense.
If I make music, and a Kazaa user copies the bits that encode the music, and then a record executive flies around the world charging his/her airfare, hotel, meals, and other expenses to me, who's the thief taking money out of my pocket?
Note to Music Biz -
Keep fucking your customers and it'll go down 100%
Beautiful, just beautiful.
The icing on the cake is, of course: "Perhaps we would better let it be known what we desire if we lay prostrate before his excellency and humbly beg for his mercy."
First of all, I'm not the anonymous coward who posted the other response to this comment, however I agree with what that person had to say.
Have I ever stopped to think what our history would look like? There's not much need, as there are pro's and con's any which way you look at it, and the speculation for the past, the present, and the future is absolutely endless. We may have been much better off as two seperate unions. Certainly those hundreds of thousands of people who died during the US Civil War (stated as such to avoid semantecal arguments) would have been better off; they'd have not been killed in that war.
As for WWII, I shall assess the situation based on your own logic and assumptions. Let's assume that the two unions created by the cecession of the southern states were not strong enough to defeat Germany in 1945. First of all, without the help of the US (single nation) in WWI, it's possible the Germans would have signed a very beneficial peace accord with the rest of the allies, thereby heading off the economic desparity that lead to the rise of Hitler and the Nazis. Assuming the Nazis did come to power anyway, we could also speculate that after 50 years, changes in internal politics within the united, conquered Nazis Europe would have had a massive and unparalleled good effect on the rest of the world. To be clear, I am absolutely not defending any of the horrific atrocities commited by the Nazi party in and around WWII; only speculating that 50 years could potentially bring about major changes in policies. A united Europe could have potentially devoted itself to helping people all over the world. Instead of small member states in the EU and the UN, we could have a world governing body that actually gets things done. Low pollution, advances in science, elimination of most wars and diseases; the possibilities are endless. On the other side, we could also have possibly seen the most horrible nightmares imagined come to life under the rule of the Nazi party. Then again, it's possible that with the collapse of the eastern front in WWII, the Allies could have possibly won with no help at all from the US.
In the end, the only thing we can say for certain is what is in the history books. What I see in them is a tail of unforgivable treachery from a government devised solely to better implement the will of the states and the will of the people. There is a reason the Civil War is said to have pitted brother against brother: it was wrong. The South was not "reclaimed", it was destroyed; hence the period of time post-dating the Civil War called "Reconstruction". From murderous barbarity, much good has come to be sure, but at what price? Do you sacrifice every moral fiber in your body because what comes next seems good? Lincoln had a choice to make: to follow the spirit of the law and allow the southern states to go their own way as it was always intended they ought to be able to do, or to start a massive, bloody war that would tear apart families and costs hundreds of thousands of lives and millions in damages. To allow the southern states to leave would put the economy of the North in jeopardy. It was a financial decision; it was the easy decision; it was the wrong decision. Unfortunately, the North won the war, and to the victors go the spoils. Thus, history spins the Civil War as a good thing and teaches the youth to believe that it was a hard and morally sound decision.
War is rarely a hard decision, and for damn sure is almost never a morally sound decision.
As for totally disagreeing with everything I said, I invite you to teach me about Ex Parte Milligan, in which the Supreme Court of the United States of America directly stated in no uncertain terms that the suspension of Habeas Corpus by the President was unconstitutional. Perhaps what you mean is that you disagree with the Supreme Court. That's fine; you have a right to do so, and I encourage you to petition the court to review that decision. Somehow, I doubt you'll find their response encouraging.
from the ruling in Ex Parte Milligan:
"it could be well said that a country, preserved at the sacrifice of all the cardinal principles of liberty, is not worth the cost of preservation."
And:
"Martial rule can never exist where the courts are open, and in the proper and unobstructed exercise of their jurisdiction. It is also confined to the locality of actual war."
Martial law is, of course, required for the suspension of Habeas Corpus. (Unless you ask the Bush Administration, which can come up with justification for anything the resident President does, even if it doesn't make any sense or have any relevence)
"I just want to get a few facts straight, and not have them misrepersented."
Very well; let's have at it then.
"Even if it was unconstitutional, it was vital to the survival of America."
Ahh, so then our priciples and our laws must be cast aside whenever it suites our needs. This relies on the most basic animal instinct; survival. A truly civil society stands true to its convictions even in the face of total annihilation. Lest you forget that in the War of 1812, our forefathers stuck to their convictions even as Washington DC and even the White House itself was burned to the ground. During the War of 1812, we weren't just invaded; we were on the verge of being beaten back into submission by England and having all those who signed the US Constitution killed for treason. Those were true men, men who put everything they ever knew in life on the line because of what they believed in. Those were true men, and we need more like them today.
"But this action was completely Constitutional."
Aww, I'm afraid not. The US Supreme Court ruled in Ex Parte Milligan that the only time Habeas Corpus may be suspended is when the courts cease to function. At this point, one could argue that the civilian government has already been annihilated, and therefore civilian laws have no value. However, the courts remained open throughout Lincoln's little empire; thus making his suspension of Habeas Corpus illegal, unconstitutional, and unforgivable. Many see Lincoln as a hero, yet I see him as little more than a tyrannical emperor and a coward. Rather than lead the union on without the southern states as he ought have done, he took the easier way out; declaring war.
"This makes it sound like the Confederacy was perfectly legal and just, and Lincoln himself ordered the pillaging of the south."
Actually, this is exactly what happened. Each state within the union was supposedly just that; a sovereign state. The union was created to mediate disputes between the states and to allow all states to act as a single entity for such things as national defense, where it would benefit all to act as one (ie. strength in numbers). Ergo, when any one or more states had a major dispute with a ruling or policy of the federal government, they had three options. They could sit there and take it, they could continue fighting it within the union itself, or they could cecede from the union. If Maryland, Virginia, and Delaware decided in 1800 to cecede, do you honestly believe there would have been a massive war costing thousands and thousands of lives over it? Chances are, it would have been a peaceful transition after a bitter diplomatic struggle. In all of this, one fact remains: Each state is a seperate and whole entity entitled to act on its own accord. Any member state of the UN or the EU could cecede at will, and I seriously doubt we'd see that state attacked over it. Lincoln was a coward for not having the courage to lead his country through a difficult time without resorting to massacring farmers when they didn't lay down and roll over upon command.
" Finally, when you say the spirit of the law is dead, you are obviously forgetting the Supreme Court, who has the job of interpreting the spirit of the law."
This is the job of all courts; not just the Supreme Court. The problem is that laws are written poorly, the judicial system is completely overloaded, and we've become such a litigous society that common law is impossible to aptly interpret within the context of thousands of conflicting rulings on the same subject. As a Virginia school student, I was always taught that it was called the "War of Northern Agression". When I went to high school in another state, it was taught as the "Civil War". I thought little of it at the time, but since I've become more politically active and have become much more interested in the past of our great nation, I've come to the conclusion that "The War of Northern Agression" best describes the circumstances of what happened. Don't forget that the Union army was the first to attack, and never forget Sherman's march to the sea in which he went from town to town burning everything in sight to the ground and slaughtering unarmed civilians. To call it barbaric does not do it justice.
"Whatever happened to spirit of the law?"
The spirit of the law died when Lincoln invaded the southern, soverign states following their cecession from the union. It was during this time that more laws were violated than in any other time in history, including the suspension of Habeas Corpus by the President. Even though this particular action was later ruled unconstitutional, it proved that when it comes to breaking the law, it's easy to get forgiveness than it is to get permission. Once our leaders began to set aside the law when and where they saw fit, the "spirit" of the law was dead.
"Spirit of the Law"
R . I . P . 1861
Point was that the state could not require stores to get your SSN as a requirement for a transaction. To do so would deny the right to conduct financial transactions between private citizens simply because of a refusal by one party to make available their SSN. The store's policy may be to require the SSN, but the state cannot require it by law. That was my point.
In Soviet Russia, modern American survillance techniques and technology that are used to surveil American citizens were but a distant dream of the KGB.
" Is this even true that I would have to have my photo and SSN taken when I buy a used DVD?"
The short answer to the part about the SSN is probably not. As this site points out, there are specific restrictions on the use of the Social Security Number, and you generally don't need to give it. From the site:
"In addition, that section makes it illegal for Federal, state, and local government agencies to deny any rights, privileges or benefits to individuals who refuse to provide their SSNs unless the disclosure is required by Federal statute, or the disclosure is to an agency for use in a record system which required the SSN before 1975. ( 5 USC 552a note)."
More than likely, when they're talking about "personally identifiable information", they're talking about simple things like name, address, telephone number. Basically, they want to be able to find the person should there be a problem with the sale at a later date. I personally don't see where they have any right to require this, but unless you have the funds to fight it in court, chances are you have little choice.
Welcome to the land of the free, now please step this way so we can get your name, address, telephone number, date of birth, social security number, current occupation, annual income, political allegiances, place of origin, ethnicity, financial history, medical history, criminal history, political beliefs, religious beliefs, shopping habits, list of friends and aquantences, sexual preferences, and a list of books you like to read. In addition, we would also ask that you be fingerprinted, submit to a retinal scan and a polygraph, give a blood sample, hair sample, handwriting sample, urine sample, and wear this GPS-enabled chip under the skin of your left arm after we stamp your barcode there.
Wired is carrying the same article. I sent them a correction and a link.
As for bad press, I'm of course not talking about CNN covering how much your customers hate your company; people almost expect any large company to be hated by most people (a sad fact). I'm talking about people going to places like DSLreports where they can lower your ISP rating and denounce you as the new Satan on the boards there. You then get a snowball effect as many other current and former customers chime in with the always-popular, "me too" rants. This too cuts down on your potential customer base, as many people really do check out sites like DSLreports before signing up to a new ISP.
When you're a monopoly, you can do whatever you like. "Don't like this 10GB cap? Go back to dial-up." Most people can't imagine going back to dial-up after using broadband for a while, so they'll take whatever abuse you hand them. As for packet loss, I would venture a guess that upwards of 90% of people on the internet have absolutely no idea what "packet loss" is. Aside from slashdot, you've got grandma looking up cooking tips on Martha Stuart's homepage and Jr. trying to get into that pr0n site to impress his buddies. Do not forget that the elderly make up the fastest growing group of internet users. Trying to advertise a "slower" service to them by saying, "but we have less packet loss than company A!" looks like you're trying to pull a fast one on them. This is the same reason Intel doesn't try explaining pipeline stages and SSE-2 instruction sets to its customers, why AMD and Apple both try to explain similar CPU concepts, and why Intel dominates the market. You post bigger numbers than your competitors, you get more customers; regardless of quality of service.
A limit on speed is indeed a limit on data transfer. The point I was trying to make is that you can limit data transfer and keep costs down without all the problems previously mentioned by offering more choices to your customers. When you offer more choices, most people see more options without noticing the implied restrictions. As for the first tier, I would probably say go with 60/60kbps service, just so you can plainly tell people that it's faster than their 56k modem without explaining FCC regulations regarding telephone line interference. You want to get across the point that it's faster, better, and more reliable. I'm completely astounded that no one has thought to make a $20/mo broadband service, as this would effectively wipe out the dial-up market in their area.
The crazies aren't the only ones who will complain about the cap; I will. Right now, I have the ability to do much of my money-making work from home. This is side work which I make extra money from, but it involves massive databases. Now, I could sit at work this weekend and do some of these things, but thanks to an unlimited connection, I can get stuff done any time, any day I please. Do I max my connection out 24/7? No, but thanks to my much slower upload (384k as opposed to 3.5mbit downstream), I end up maxing the upload out for 2 or 3 days at a time. This was a very painful process before tier'd service became an option, so I signed up for the higher tier as soon as it became available (even before they began advertising it). As for the "Nimda patients", many of these people are folks like your mother or your grandmother. I think you would be pretty pissed off if your mother's ISP sent her a $400 bill and she had no idea why. Especially if they refused to back down (which you suggested they ought to do). What's worse is if she decides to pay that bill before cancelling the service, despite the fact that she can't really afford to do so. And sure you can say spam costs you money, but that gives you the right to complain; nothing more, really. For me, with unlimited service, spam is an annoyance. For you, spam (potentially) is a financial burden. I fail to see how that puts you in a better position. The quality of service for my connection has been excellent. As much as I dislike Comcast (they try to squeeze every dollar they can out of every customer, while often providing sub-standard service), they internet service I've had from them since they took it over from @home has been very good. The service since I went to the higher tier has been incredible. In the 6 months or so since I switched, I think I've had about an hour of downtime total (two times, one was about 15 minutes, the other was close to an hour), and that was a few weeks after I switched. Since then, I've had a truly 24/7 connection available to me at a reasonable price. While I'd love for them to offer a similarly priced tier with something like 1.5/1.0 instead of 3.5/384k, I'm not about to complain about what I have.
All I'm trying to say is that you can reach the same goals by tiering as you would by capping without most of the negatives associated with the latter. You and I both apparently think very highly of different tiers, and we're both very willing to pay more money for better service. I suspect there are many, many others like us, and many others who would love to pay less for a slower service. I would suggest the following as a strong tier system:
"A proper business plan would have included a limit. For example, 10 Gigs for $50."
No.
If we're going to take this simplistic view of their business model, let's at least think it through to a minimal level. First of all, you lose a number of potential customers who fear going over the limit (or know for a fact that they will). Secondly, you have additional costs associated with such things as having to constantly tell people how close to the limit they are and having customers dispute how much they've transfered in a given time period. You'll then lose those customers who you don't give in to and they'll generate significant bad press. You can also forget collecting the last month's bill from many of those who leave who will decide that since your company is so incredibly greedy, you deserve nothing. Next, for the few customers you have left, most of them will switch as soon as an otherwise comparable service without the 10GB limit becomes available to them.
So, after cutting off potential revenue, alienating otherwise loyal customers, racking up huge numbers of "uncollectable"'s, and generating enough bad press to make Arie Flischer cry, your company's offices are raided by your creditors just before your disgruntled former customer burn your offices to the ground. Congratulations.
Caps work in very specific situations: when you have a monopoly on high-speed internet access, when your customers are perfectly happy to take limits on their use, and when any potential competitors also have similar limits. A better idea would be to introduce a tiered pricing scheme with limits on speed, as opposed to data transfer. A service at around $20 per month with speeds only slightly higher than dial-up would slaughter the dial-up market (same cost, better speed, no dialing up/missed calls/annoying modem noises), a $50 tier with speeds similar to what we see today in home broadband, and one or two higher end services with speeds that go up along-side the price; perhaps in the $100 and $200 ranges. This effectively limits your customers' total monthly data transfers without imposing limits that would increase costs to you while alienating your customer base.
But then again, any business with a single and specific method of generating revenue is pretty much doomed to fail anyway. Diversification is a necessary component in any business model, along-side strong management and adaptability. While you may wish to turn a cold shoulder to the so-called "power users", I would much rather solve the situation by putting a well thought out tiered pricing scheme in place, and modifying it once a year to ensure costs stay in line with revenue.
Then again, I'm a "power user" who eats up plenty of bandwidth (no comments about pr0n/warez/etc necessary, I'm talking about dBase transfers), yet I pay Comcast twice as much as their average home user, and do so without complaint - as I suspect many "power users" would do if offered the chance. The simple lesson to be learned is this: don't restrict your customer, give them more options to choose from and ensure that any choice they make benefits you. You come out looking like the good guy while still maintaining a strong revenue foundation.
My price is hereby set at $12million (USD) per minute. Please, please call me. Call me day and night; call me at 3am; call me during dinner. For $12million, you can call me during sex. Not only will I cheerfully listen to your entire pre-determined message, but I will ask questions - oh so many questions, and not necessarily about the product you're selling.
Gee, maybe you should have made her walk and used the cab fare to upgrade your web server. ;)
Congratz you two...
The 10th Amendment wouldn't be irrelevant in modern times if it weren't for the War of Northern Aggression, (commonly called the 'Civil War' in the North), in which an authoritarian federal government beat and burned the southern states into submission. The fact is that the southern states had every right to secede from the union. Instead, the current president, Lincoln, took the unprecidented position of giving himself absolute authority, suspending habeus corpus (later ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, See: Ex Parte Milligan), and imprisoning and executing numerous people for such things as speaking out against the war or refusing to fight in the war. Lincoln didn't give two shits about slaves and their rights, and anyone who believes he did is insane. The Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 was issued two years after the beginning of the war, and was specifically designed to encourage slaves in the South to rebel and thus weaken the South, which stood a strong chance of beating the North at that point in the war.
In any event, amoung the casualties of the War of Northern Aggression and Lincoln's private war against the Bill of Rights was the understood sovereignty of each state in the union. States' rights and powers have since been largely ignored, although California is starting to kick up a bit of a fuss over the whole medicinal marijuana debate. I say good for them, and it's about damn time the states began standing up for themselves. The purpose of the federal government was to provide a forum for issues that affected several or all of the states. It was supposed to be a UN of sorts, where elected representatives from each state (try replacing the word "state" with the word "nation" or "country" if it helps you) could resolve disputes surrounding issues such as interstate commerce, where different states may have different views of what should happen, but a uniform policy for all states would be beneficial. Instead, ever since Lincoln's state-smashing/burning spree, we've had little more than lines on a map within a single federal government. I see this as simply evidence of how much we've managed to pervert the framework for government created by brilliant people like Jefferson. I think that states asserting their Constitutional rights would go a long way to restoring this country to its strong and moral roots. The federal government exerts a ridiculous amount of control over all citizens, to the point that we hardly realize our state governments exist. It seems to me that an overbearing government ruling from Washington DC is not much better than an overbearing government ruling from London. I hope the federal government cracks down really, really hard on California; so much so that it prompts other states to rise up again and declare firmly that they are indeed sovereign and only remain part of the United States so long as it benefits their citizens. I don't want to see the USA broken up, not even to lose one state - but I'd love to see a return to a government that's much closer to the citizens, ie. state governments.
This isn't about America in-and-of-itself, it's about what the current government of America has done and is doing. I do specifically critique a number of things as examples, but never have I said I'm ashamed to be an American, or that my country sucks. I love my country; it's my government that needs fixing or replacing.
"First in the morning I wrote"
So did you wake up early this morning, or are you still up from the night before, like me?
"Who knows what it will be next year?"
I've got money on OS/2.
"Where is your journal? I would like to see it, and possibly contribute to it."
:)
Hmmm.. Well, I'm sure it's around here somewhere. Oh, there it is.