A class action lawsuit directed at all window (as in for houses, cars, etc.) manufacturers on behalf of all the individuals who have had home or vehicle broken into and lost goods due to security holes in windows.
Just an interesting point...there is evidence that laws such as bicycle helmet laws actually end up causing more problems than they prevent.
About a year or two ago, I recall watching one of those magazine tv-shows (20-20, Dateline, something like that), and they were talking about evidence that bicycle helmet laws, while reducing the number of head injuries per accident, also seemed to have an affect of increasing the number of accidents (tending to push up the total number of head injuries), resulting in an insignificant net change in the number of head injuries to children due to bicycle accidents.
When I saw this report, it amused me, but it didn't surprise me. Years earlier, an economics professor (using the case to demonstrate cost/benefit) talked about in the 60's when a law was passed that all automobiles had to be manufactured with a seatbelt. A study done over the course of (I believe...not exactly sure on all the details) the next 10 years, showed the following:
1) Total number of driver deaths due to accidents decreased per accident.
2) Total number of accidents increased (people were driving less safe).
The net affect was that the total number of people (I believe the study was focused on drivers...) dieing in car accidents was about the same. Accidents were safer, but people were driving more recklessly.
The last affect, was that because people were driving more recklessly, there was a significant increase in the number of pedestrians killed in car accidents.
The purpose of the example was to demonstrate the idea of cost/benefit, and also a demonstration on the outcome of legislation not always being so obvious. However, I think this also demonstrates the general incompatency of the government. Most (if not all) laws are made for purely political reasons. Sure, they may throw out some figures to try and support the law, but generally, the law comes from lobby, political pressure (or deals) and what some people consider to be called common sense; rather than careful, subjective consideration.
However, (as in the examples above) common sense doesn't always tell the whole story. Who would have thought that the net result from a seatbelt law would be an increase in the number of people dieing? Not many people I'll wager. But I'm sure there were plenty of people who hadn't really given the issue mush thought, pushing for just such a law.
Less government is good. Let people be free to make choices for themselves. Most people know what they want and/or need, and how to get it, better than any idiot on capital hill ever will.
There are irresponsible wealthy people too, ya know...
There are very few financially irresponsible wealthy people. Otherwise, they don't remain wealthy for long. And just because some blows lots of money, doesn't make them irresponsible...if they have the money to blow.
Bottom line, even if there is some wealthy person with tons of cash, but who is irresponsible, their irresponsibility won't cost the bank. And that's the bottom line.
No, responsible (not "rich") people don't pay those fees. Further, if an occasion arises where a person generally considered to be responsible in this regard *does* bounce a check, the bank may wave the fee, because this is an unusual event.
However, responsible people also tend to have more money. The fact that banks charge these fees mostly to poorer people may be true, but it's only a correlation. The bank don't target poor people (as in a causative relationship) but rather charge financially irresponsible people, who generally also happen to be poor (a correlative relationship).
I was building boats that would *never* float, military type bunkers, and skipping school...
Either this kid has no life, or I just wasn't motivated enough...
Beer...not coffee. I can't stand coffee. And noone forces you to pay insurance premiums. It's a voluntary act, to enter into part of a group where costs are essentially split. You're fault, not mine.
Keep believing that. Keep believing that patents/copyrights and intellectual property protection in general, is necessary for people to continue to innovate.
That's what they want you to believe. They make more money that way.
Marketing isn't focused towards the sick people always. Granted, sometimes it is, like with cold medicines. However, much of the marketing in the pharmaceutical industry is aimed at the doctors themselves.
Sort of like, you've never seen a commercial for a machine to align your car, you just take the car to the mechanic. HE, however, probably *has* seen advertisments for these machines.
I don't necessarily agree that Open source solutions are better....but what you are saying is, because MS has developed a superior product, they should be penalized by not being allowed to do what anyone else *is* allowed to do.
While we're at it, why don't we force Jaguar and Mercedes to start selling their cars for 20k a piece? They are superior after all...
Somehow, I imagine if they same type of logic were applied to you, say you had some skill that was in very high demand, but only a few people had, and say the government decided you HAD to work, and HAD to accept far lower pay, you might get just a little...shall we say, hypocritical?
There are word processors available. Choose one. Microsoft should be able to ask what they want, and you should be able to choose to use it or not.
So it's better to sue words out of the English lexicon in order to provide a few people making money, than allow the language to change even if it means a certain person (or small group) can no longer be the only users of a particular string of words...
Dictionarys are reflection of language, not the other way around. Leave it alone. Else, how would someone who didn't know what the term "to google" mean, be able to find out? THAT's what dictionarys are for.
Re:Redifference between uppercase and lowercase
on
Verbing Weirds Google
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
There is no such verb.
There most certainly is, if people start using the word in that fashion. What, we can't make new words anymore? Or can we just not make new words that were inspired originally by trademarked names? Which is it?
The English language (or any language) is delimited by usage first, and books (such as a dictionary) second. Just because the word is not in the dictionary (and it may or may not be...I assume it isn't) does not invalidate the word in common usage.
Remember, the dictionary is revised every so often to reflect common usage of the language, not the other way around.
Assuming this isn't sarcasm...
It's because frequently the development time is a hell of a lot faster. Sure, you may be able to write a program in C that runs in half the time as my Perl script, but when my perl script runs in 15 seconds to begin with, you've probably spent several more hours (at least) to lave 7.5 seconds.
I guess I must be both a programmer and a script kiddie. When appropriate, I use Perl frequently. Other times, I use C/C++ with/without Oracle's ProC compiler. Sometimes one is better, sometimes the other.
"At this point in time, I find it highly incredible that anyone still bothers to make excuses for Microsoft in this area or persist in presenting these weak ass "websters" arguments."
How a "websters" argument can be "weak ass" is, well, curious. If we can't agree on definitions of words, then...what?
Does Bill give you blow jobs or something? What makes you think you should care, or even bother?
Well, my interest is philosophical, and partly because I see the country going more changing in ways that are detrimental. When someone is successful, their success becomes a target itself. Microsoft was going along just fine, until they became too successful. People have a tendency to want to bring other people down. That's not good, but it's really bad when those people are given legal means to do so. In this case, all of Microsoft's competitors were cheering for the antitrust proceedings. Not because these companies were sincerely concerned that MS was engaging in business detrimental to the world, but because they saw profit in it themselves.
That type of behavior concerns me. And it concerns me when politicians can be bought and sold (either with a dollar or with a vote) to act on your behalf in such a manner...
Fortunately, most corporations are run by people that aren't quite so clueless or naieve as yourself. Any MBA or Lawyer with half a brain cell could quickly peruse a relevant Legal Reference and give Billy Boy a more reasonable answer.
When you cannot formulate a reasonable thoutght, just resort to insults. I expect that's probably about par for yourself...
The fact that Microsoft was infact delared a monopoly by a federal court and an appellate court rather undermines your whole idea. Nevermind the fact that this was their second offense and that Microsoft quickly violated it's previous "plea bargain" agreement.
Considering my whole argument is really in opposition to that finding...this doesn't make much sense, does it?
Just, how out of touch do you need to be to paint a rosey picture of Microsoft in this area?
I don't think I painted a rosy picture of MS. I was being critical of the government in this regard, as well as the ignorance (jealousy?) of the general public that allowed them to swallow this crap. The MS case just happens to be the current subject matter.
by the same team that coached them initially in the antitrust trial. i.e. some truly stupid, arrogant and overconfident lot.
I realize bashing anyone associated with MS is popular, but they weren't that far out to think having other OS's available (Macintosh, OS2, Linux) meant they didn't have a monopoly.
Everyone agrees that their actions were only illegal if they had a monopoly. The judge that decided they did in fact have a monopoly was just wrong...how can you have a monopoly in a market, when there are other products available in said market?
monopoly n. pl. monopolies
1. Exclusive control by one group of the means of producing or selling a commodity or service: "Monopoly frequently... arises from government support or from collusive agreements among individuals" (Milton Friedman).
2. Law. A right granted by a government giving exclusive control over a specified commercial activity to a single party.
3
a. A company or group having exclusive control over a commercial activity.
b. A commodity or service so controlled.
4.
a. Exclusive possession or control: arrogantly claims to have a monopoly on the truth.
b. Something that is exclusively possessed or controlled: showed that scientific achievement is not a male monopoly.
MS far from fits this description...but then I guess the only important thing waas for the beauracrats to look busy.
Right, but the fluctuation is do to the aggregate of the market, rather than the whim of a politician.
I didn't mean to imply it would stop any inflation at all, only that the inflation wouldn't have to be "controlled" as it is now.
unless it's tied to something tangible like gold....
Giving the government that power allows them to "pay less" (a frequent occurence) for debts, thus basically ripping off creditors. (such as people holding govt. bonds)
Slashdot Mirror
Just out of curiosity..how would you propose to do this? Assuming you could influence all votes...
I guess I should...
A class action lawsuit directed at all window (as in for houses, cars, etc.) manufacturers on behalf of all the individuals who have had home or vehicle broken into and lost goods due to security holes in windows.
Power moving from state/local towards national is a threat to everyone...just generally.
Just an interesting point...there is evidence that laws such as bicycle helmet laws actually end up causing more problems than they prevent.
About a year or two ago, I recall watching one of those magazine tv-shows (20-20, Dateline, something like that), and they were talking about evidence that bicycle helmet laws, while reducing the number of head injuries per accident, also seemed to have an affect of increasing the number of accidents (tending to push up the total number of head injuries), resulting in an insignificant net change in the number of head injuries to children due to bicycle accidents.
When I saw this report, it amused me, but it didn't surprise me. Years earlier, an economics professor (using the case to demonstrate cost/benefit) talked about in the 60's when a law was passed that all automobiles had to be manufactured with a seatbelt. A study done over the course of (I believe...not exactly sure on all the details) the next 10 years, showed the following:
1) Total number of driver deaths due to accidents decreased per accident.
2) Total number of accidents increased (people were driving less safe).
The net affect was that the total number of people (I believe the study was focused on drivers...) dieing in car accidents was about the same. Accidents were safer, but people were driving more recklessly.
The last affect, was that because people were driving more recklessly, there was a significant increase in the number of pedestrians killed in car accidents.
The purpose of the example was to demonstrate the idea of cost/benefit, and also a demonstration on the outcome of legislation not always being so obvious. However, I think this also demonstrates the general incompatency of the government. Most (if not all) laws are made for purely political reasons. Sure, they may throw out some figures to try and support the law, but generally, the law comes from lobby, political pressure (or deals) and what some people consider to be called common sense; rather than careful, subjective consideration.
However, (as in the examples above) common sense doesn't always tell the whole story. Who would have thought that the net result from a seatbelt law would be an increase in the number of people dieing? Not many people I'll wager. But I'm sure there were plenty of people who hadn't really given the issue mush thought, pushing for just such a law.
Less government is good. Let people be free to make choices for themselves. Most people know what they want and/or need, and how to get it, better than any idiot on capital hill ever will.
There are irresponsible wealthy people too, ya know...
There are very few financially irresponsible wealthy people. Otherwise, they don't remain wealthy for long. And just because some blows lots of money, doesn't make them irresponsible...if they have the money to blow.
Bottom line, even if there is some wealthy person with tons of cash, but who is irresponsible, their irresponsibility won't cost the bank. And that's the bottom line.
No, responsible (not "rich") people don't pay those fees. Further, if an occasion arises where a person generally considered to be responsible in this regard *does* bounce a check, the bank may wave the fee, because this is an unusual event.
However, responsible people also tend to have more money. The fact that banks charge these fees mostly to poorer people may be true, but it's only a correlation. The bank don't target poor people (as in a causative relationship) but rather charge financially irresponsible people, who generally also happen to be poor (a correlative relationship).
I was building boats that would *never* float, military type bunkers, and skipping school... Either this kid has no life, or I just wasn't motivated enough...
Beer...not coffee. I can't stand coffee. And noone forces you to pay insurance premiums. It's a voluntary act, to enter into part of a group where costs are essentially split. You're fault, not mine.
Keep believing that. Keep believing that patents/copyrights and intellectual property protection in general, is necessary for people to continue to innovate.
That's what they want you to believe. They make more money that way.
Marketing isn't focused towards the sick people always. Granted, sometimes it is, like with cold medicines. However, much of the marketing in the pharmaceutical industry is aimed at the doctors themselves.
Sort of like, you've never seen a commercial for a machine to align your car, you just take the car to the mechanic. HE, however, probably *has* seen advertisments for these machines.
Fortunately for the sick, there are people who want to make money off of them.
I don't necessarily agree that Open source solutions are better....but what you are saying is, because MS has developed a superior product, they should be penalized by not being allowed to do what anyone else *is* allowed to do.
While we're at it, why don't we force Jaguar and Mercedes to start selling their cars for 20k a piece? They are superior after all...
I find this type of logic to be...horrifying.
Somehow, I imagine if they same type of logic were applied to you, say you had some skill that was in very high demand, but only a few people had, and say the government decided you HAD to work, and HAD to accept far lower pay, you might get just a little...shall we say, hypocritical?
There are word processors available. Choose one. Microsoft should be able to ask what they want, and you should be able to choose to use it or not.
So it's better to sue words out of the English lexicon in order to provide a few people making money, than allow the language to change even if it means a certain person (or small group) can no longer be the only users of a particular string of words...
Dictionarys are reflection of language, not the other way around. Leave it alone. Else, how would someone who didn't know what the term "to google" mean, be able to find out? THAT's what dictionarys are for.
There is no such verb.
There most certainly is, if people start using the word in that fashion. What, we can't make new words anymore? Or can we just not make new words that were inspired originally by trademarked names? Which is it?
The English language (or any language) is delimited by usage first, and books (such as a dictionary) second. Just because the word is not in the dictionary (and it may or may not be...I assume it isn't) does not invalidate the word in common usage.
Remember, the dictionary is revised every so often to reflect common usage of the language, not the other way around.
Assuming this isn't sarcasm... It's because frequently the development time is a hell of a lot faster. Sure, you may be able to write a program in C that runs in half the time as my Perl script, but when my perl script runs in 15 seconds to begin with, you've probably spent several more hours (at least) to lave 7.5 seconds. I guess I must be both a programmer and a script kiddie. When appropriate, I use Perl frequently. Other times, I use C/C++ with/without Oracle's ProC compiler. Sometimes one is better, sometimes the other.
"At this point in time, I find it highly incredible that anyone still bothers to make excuses for Microsoft in this area or persist in presenting these weak ass "websters" arguments."
How a "websters" argument can be "weak ass" is, well, curious. If we can't agree on definitions of words, then...what?
Does Bill give you blow jobs or something? What makes you think you should care, or even bother?
Well, my interest is philosophical, and partly because I see the country going more changing in ways that are detrimental. When someone is successful, their success becomes a target itself. Microsoft was going along just fine, until they became too successful. People have a tendency to want to bring other people down. That's not good, but it's really bad when those people are given legal means to do so. In this case, all of Microsoft's competitors were cheering for the antitrust proceedings. Not because these companies were sincerely concerned that MS was engaging in business detrimental to the world, but because they saw profit in it themselves. That type of behavior concerns me. And it concerns me when politicians can be bought and sold (either with a dollar or with a vote) to act on your behalf in such a manner...
Fortunately, most corporations are run by people that aren't quite so clueless or naieve as yourself. Any MBA or Lawyer with half a brain cell could quickly peruse a relevant Legal Reference and give Billy Boy a more reasonable answer.
When you cannot formulate a reasonable thoutght, just resort to insults. I expect that's probably about par for yourself...
The fact that Microsoft was infact delared a monopoly by a federal court and an appellate court rather undermines your whole idea. Nevermind the fact that this was their second offense and that Microsoft quickly violated it's previous "plea bargain" agreement.
Considering my whole argument is really in opposition to that finding...this doesn't make much sense, does it?
Just, how out of touch do you need to be to paint a rosey picture of Microsoft in this area?
I don't think I painted a rosy picture of MS. I was being critical of the government in this regard, as well as the ignorance (jealousy?) of the general public that allowed them to swallow this crap. The MS case just happens to be the current subject matter.
"Exclusive" !+ "Excessive" Re-read the post. Except this time see what is there, rather than what you want to see.
is going to die on . Pop her tires or something the night before...in fact, pop all the tires on all the cars/trucks at the house.
erm...the vote was in 2000. Hence "The 2000 Presedential Elections..."
by the same team that coached them initially in the antitrust trial. i.e. some truly stupid, arrogant and overconfident lot.
I realize bashing anyone associated with MS is popular, but they weren't that far out to think having other OS's available (Macintosh, OS2, Linux) meant they didn't have a monopoly.
Everyone agrees that their actions were only illegal if they had a monopoly. The judge that decided they did in fact have a monopoly was just wrong...how can you have a monopoly in a market, when there are other products available in said market?
monopoly n. pl. monopolies
1. Exclusive control by one group of the means of producing or selling a commodity or service: "Monopoly frequently... arises from government support or from collusive agreements among individuals" (Milton Friedman).
2. Law. A right granted by a government giving exclusive control over a specified commercial activity to a single party.
3
a. A company or group having exclusive control over a commercial activity.
b. A commodity or service so controlled.
4.
a. Exclusive possession or control: arrogantly claims to have a monopoly on the truth.
b. Something that is exclusively possessed or controlled: showed that scientific achievement is not a male monopoly.
MS far from fits this description...but then I guess the only important thing waas for the beauracrats to look busy.
but unfortunately, the others gain the right to vote all your money into their pockets. So they still win.
Right, but the fluctuation is do to the aggregate of the market, rather than the whim of a politician. I didn't mean to imply it would stop any inflation at all, only that the inflation wouldn't have to be "controlled" as it is now.
unless it's tied to something tangible like gold....
Giving the government that power allows them to "pay less" (a frequent occurence) for debts, thus basically ripping off creditors. (such as people holding govt. bonds)