if the price of oil goes up, then you save more actual dollars.. after all, 30% of $100 versus 30% of $200 is more money saved (especially if you don't have it in the first place!) and at the quantity of fuels Ships use, that's big money rather quickly.
real database servers already have 32 GB (or even more!) of RAM... that's right full speed RAM, as well as SCSI cards with several hundred MB of battery backed up ram buffers... tied to 5+ RAIDS of disks... that's far more thru-put than these puny little flash setups have.
it's not about cheap laptop hardware.. it's about how kids USE that hardware. XO is designed to work without administrators, or regular maintenance or even networks! It's meet to be always sharing, remote updating and user programmed. It's also NOT windows, so it shouldn't have viruses or blue screens or ever-changing hardware-of-the week that the cheap Dells do.
Kids don't need computers to do the same kinds of things adult workers do. Why should they be pressed to use the poorly implemented stuff we have now, in manners the programs weren't designed for, and companies don't support?
Fact is that a Wintel PC, with out support, networking, anti-virus, etc. as well as custom software for education and content (all needs to be PAID FOR by the way) simply doesn't meet the needs out-of-the box right this very minute. How useful really is a brand new PC? Does Microsoft or Intel INCLUDE educational resources in the box? Or tools for communication... hell the default windows for home users can't even connect to a sharing domain.. or be managed without paying extra money to other companies. The goal of the OLPC project is to do computers for EDUCATION right! It's not a work PC with some edu-tainment software thrown on.. it's a ground up education computer.
The REAL trouble is that if the OLPC project works as planned, the software methods could work on regular school PCs as well, and on cheaper hardware too!!! Schools have relatively fixed needs for computers even in the US, but nobody has done a good job at representing that market. Until OLPC.
I've been places that are quite civilized but turn off TV at 8pm and power from 11p to 5a every night.
most third world countries only have things like power for part of the day for residences, or the guerrillas cut of power every so often to keep the villages in line... These places are way behind, but functional, and almost as normal as us from day-to-day. they often get their water from the public well, while having a radio or DVD player to use a few days a month...and of course a Coke machine! strange and weird.
it's somewhat worse than that. He went to Intel and asked them to help out meeting the projects hardware needs and attempting to hit his price points and they laughed him off.
So he went out, spent several years, found somebody willing to meet his needs and has the product ready to manufacture and customers willing to buy it... There was a considerable amount of engineering new technologies to hit is performance goals, new LCD technologies, and custom wireless chips and software models. They've invented something NEW and it deserves the chance for their customers to actually get to buy it! NOW Microsoft and Intel care? and spend 4 months of press releases rolling out something to rain on his parade... and try to poach his hard won customers, much like Microsoft recently tried to poach Mandriva's customers in Africa as well. It's lame, unethical, and unsportsmanlike.
she could sign her org up to buy a few right now from the buy one- give one program and start work on the software! Health care is another HUGE issue that's rightfully outside the OLPC scope at this time. Granted the problem of health care are almost exactly the same as OLPC is trying to address in education, but it's not their problem right now... it takes discipline to stay on your task and not get distracted.
but that is the real question... we are so productive in agriculture we have to pay farmers to not grow food to keep enough in the market. We set aside foodstuff that expires in storage for emergency purposes. We can feed the world... we grow more than enough food for everybody to have a fair share. The trouble is, that kind of bounty is REAL power.. those we share it with have power over the people the govern... that allows the African dictators to rule with scorched-earth policies because THEY never have to go hungry with that supply of western food, they can burn their entire land and kill All their citizens and never suffer... how do we fix that problem? Only information can fix the situation... that is a completely different issue to food and basics and the people of Africa won't get the food until they have fair leaders. Perhaps education and access to the rest of the world will help the next generation of African children outgrow their history.
to second that, GL didn't use the talents of the awesome actors he hired. If you watch the out takes, GL seems to pride himself on surprise script lines on the set... which is the most awful thing a director can do to actors and it shows in the performances. Even in episode 1 (perhaps by Ep 6 actually) , the actors were stiff, disconnected from each other. There was no ensemble performance, no benefit of characterization by "happy accidents" by having the group of actors bang out the lines until the word work on their own... Jar Jar was hated because the character's timing was off, he simply didn't fit the style or performance of the other actors and fans picked up on that as distracting.
That's why Pixar's films are SO good in contrast... they spend a great deal of time letting the actors play out the roles and it feels like theater performance, the actors are right there in the room, before the animation ever starts. GL seemed to pride himself on using technology to do what HE wanted and not capture the life his story had... and THAT is the art of story telling he seems to want to do so much. Stories aren't perfect, they grow on their own and GL ignored his own work, the work is own company did, the work of official licensees, and the expectations of the fans... a master story teller plays to his crowd... GL completely missed the boat. The movies were technically awesome, but the story fell flat.
looks more like they're trying to knock off the Office Live service than MS Office itself. It seems to use the real MS Office and a plug in to store all your documents online for easy access. That makes a lot of sense as it's what most people would use, but I don't see it hurting Microsoft unless they have an online editor good enough to replace things yet, but for personal organization and companies it seems like a good compromise adding the leading software package and simply adding a plugin to put those documents online... so simple and neat.
Of course Apple could do something similar with their iEverything, but they want it tied to THEIR service just like everybody else... if Apple's iApps could talk to non-Apple servers just as well as.Mac ones they'd have a real product instead of just a wannabe.
copyright is copyright... they PAID for a copyright license to the owners of the music and lyrics. That's probably NOT the actual band that made the piece famous. Getting into sound-alikes of 20 year old pieces is a bit silly, the band should have taken what the publishers offered in the first place, even if they win it will all go to lawyers and they'll still put LESS into their pockets. I've seen the box and the artist/tracks are clearly labeled on the OUTSIDE of the package as covers or originals. There is absolutely no misrepresentation going on.
As far as little artist being beat up, I'm sure they were offered fair compensation, but wanted more, like they always do. They signed away the rights to the song and the lyrics years ago, or it wasn't even THEIR song to begin with, they were just performing what somebody else wrote for them. yes, it sucks but that's what happens... EVERYBODY's job is for sale to the low bidder.. just like companies hire Indian programmers to implement YOUR designs that are owned by the company, music is the same thing, it's just a job and some studio guys got a weeks pay to sound like somebody famous, just like a Mexican worker gets paid less instead of a UAW worker to turn a bolt on a car.
but mommy and daddy are only supposed to work 25 hours a week and have flying cars...
That said, the most useful robot will be like R2-D2 rather than C3PO. Consider why R2 is more useful than C3PO. Robots should do "robot" things so we don't have to. Replace your computer, and rooms full of electronics with just one smart box that can store movies, connect to the internet, and change your car's oil!! From a resource allocation perspective it's fewer crappy electronics being generated and doing more useful stuff for people.
I've wondered why Lucas hasn't licensed the studies they did for how R2 "talks" to some robot OEM. Much like the Star Trek LCARS, the guys that thought that stuff up put way to much time into it to be just a movie prop, it was also a hobby project for them to get it just right.
so why do we allow business there... allowing billions of dollars trade with them is de-facto approval by our government that China is OK. the rest is simply getting OUR rules in line with how THEY behave so our companies can compete "fairly" over here too. mercenary companies like "have been in the news lately" get paid big buck by the US govt and corporations to actually shoot these same "common folk" that get in the way of US big business even when those locals are completely right... when will that change? Saudi Arabia and Dubai have even worse Human rights records than China (but lack the body count) and the US government actively supports them, stations troops to protect then when they restrict our own CITIZENS from bringing religous materials into those countries because it might upset them. The US govt only supports freedom of speech and religion when it doesn't get in the way of business dealings. If this journalist was trying to crack a story about a toy company using lead paint on purpose, it'd be just fine to bury them.
I would venture that the same sales tax exempt rules would apply as well. Much like if you purchase a computer as office equipment you pay sales tax, but if it is included as a capital project running a robot or such it typically does not have sales tax as you pay manufacturing taxes on it. You pay tax on BOXED software most of the time anyway. Like you said, several states are changing this to get some extra dime. Michigan recently made similar changes and I was surprised I WASN'T paying sales tax on things like car repairs and tanning etc.
I don't think that closing the loophole will do any good because many of these businesses are so small it will cost more to account for the tax than they'll pay. Also, many of these are direct owners, so profits get taxed at personal income tax levels (25%) rather than sales tax levels, it would seem like double-dipping, but hey, it's taxes what is there to really like about it anyway?
government lives and dies by paperwork. Vendors know this, govt employees know this. After all, a speeding ticket is just not following the "paperwork". Or how about Taxes, filing those properly is just some "paperwork" as well.
When the military orders hammers they order an EXACT hammer, down to what color and finish... it's all very important to somebody so the specs have to be followed exactly, even if the hammer is functionally identical, that's not good enough. It's high time that computer and software people get the message and play by the same rules as other vendors when they produce their products. Software makers need to learn how to follow their OWN documentation and provide the exact documented service called for in the contract... when it comes to e-voting even 1 line of code errant is cheating, it would be as important as "just changing" a line item of your taxes because the form "works better" that way.
The FDA and IRS and Military and Casinos and Banks all demand EXACT procedures when lives or money is on the line.... I'd say VOTING is even MORE important that the rules be followed. It's a fundamental shift in how software is expected to be provided and operated that's been LONG overdue. The whole attitude in software that it works "good enough" so release and move on has absolutely no place in the e-voting market any more than in banking or running the space shuttle... a certain large software Making Software firm refuses to be bound by those kind of contracts even when it's the military doesn't mean their underlings can get away with it forever.
no, the GOVERNMENT sent something they are claiming is a secret to a DEFENDANT'S lawyer as evidence in a case. In practical terms, it's not a state secret anymore as it was intended to be used in court in defense. That lawyer told his buddies that the UNSEALED evidence he got showed that they were illegally spying on the LAWYER involved in the case.. they sent the guy his own spying records!!! It'a about as damning evidence as you can get because the govt was spying an a defense lawyer outside legal allowances. The court should be flamming pissed about the govt spying on LAWYERS just on principal, not to mention the ramifications it has on fair trials!! About the only thing the court can do is to try to invalidate the evidence at the govt's request, of course being as it was mailed unsealed, directly to the victim releasing the info in the internet might not be a bad idea.
Exactly, if the US govt can't speak to the case, then they can't speak to the case. period. If the plaintiffs have information gained directly from AT&T by accident then AT&T needs to deal with that.. much how the Quest CEO had to deal with being accused of "insider trading" while having official government deals backed out but he couldn't talk about. I don't see why AT&T has any rights more than him.
The alternative is that the courts start locking people up for contempt of state secrets anyway... it might be legal, it might not, but contempt of court is a near absolute right of the court itself.. perhaps what really need to happen is for those claiming secrets to sit it the hole for their country!!!
you have a point, that there's too much conflict of interest in our court system to be truly fair. Judges should be downright hostile to DAs as much as suspects on trial, but often that's hard when the offices are in the same building! Also, separation of powers is not DA/police.. they are the same branch!! But it's easy for police to "trick" the over eager DAs into presenting outright lies in court because police are "assumed" to always tell the truth... something that should be done away with. Once you get that combination of pieces in place, "expert" witnesses are hard to beat because they're supposedly "sworn" to the court... but everybody has their own agenda and the actual suspect is against 5 other people with their own intents... DA, police, judge, and defender... you're rights and interests are dead last.
Content is content... if it's on your windows machine and a supported format, why can it NOT be played...especially if it was RECORDED on your machine!!!! By Windows... kinda dumb
only because they have massive profit to sink into the ventures. This sounds like another Microsoft "me too" announcement... call us when it's ready, working and good!
What about the writer's strike that will cause reruns and crappy programming on for weeks? This should be a great chance for free and open projects to get a chance. The online media should be all over this. I'm surprised Taco hasn't make a section on Slashdot just for new media. It's a great chance to get close to a million people interested in something! The whole problem with online culture is that it's not tied to your locality, or social group unless you sit and IM people all day. Most old-school geeks don't really do that.
but this was an ILLEGAL action in China and Yahoo China provided the legally required data under rules very similar to the USA PATRIOT Act here.
I believe there was some help from Yahoo US in locating the data in US servers. Here's the deal, how is this morally different from Big Box retailers propping up China's govt by paying their legal share of chinese taxes for the police that arrested these guys? Or for providing commerce to the regime?
How about when an airline provides a passenger list including passengers that won't be debarking then allows the plane to "land for repairs" causing them to get arrested for things like Online-gambling even when they don't get off the plane? How about those people that got arrested off the plane returning from the middle east and sent to Cuba? Can they sue the airline because they were illegally treated by the US and were ratted out?
It cuts both ways in spite of how Congress wants to be all high-n-mighty about it, they have passed dozens of laws that require US companies to do the same thing to both companies and citizens of foreign lands when it's convenient for them.
how about when the DOJ arrests a UK citizen, off an in-transit plane (outside customs entry into the USA) at a US airport on layover, that runs an online gambling site legal in the UK but not in the USA, using data the airline supplied under homeland security? Isn't that EXACTLY the same thing. Airline Companies not of US origin allowing the USA govt to arrest their passengers when they are still on that companies property via international travel should not get a free pass either.
because it's discovery for criminal processes run by another EXECUTIVE agency. The "executive" branch is not just the President anymore like when that was tried. This is executive officers conducting investigation under the power of law against another department, so this is "normal" proceedings, and preservation of evidence... unless the White House wants to say they have power to destroy criminal evidence now!
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if the price of oil goes up, then you save more actual dollars.. after all, 30% of $100 versus 30% of $200 is more money saved (especially if you don't have it in the first place!) and at the quantity of fuels Ships use, that's big money rather quickly.
real database servers already have 32 GB (or even more!) of RAM... that's right full speed RAM, as well as SCSI cards with several hundred MB of battery backed up ram buffers... tied to 5+ RAIDS of disks... that's far more thru-put than these puny little flash setups have.
it's not about cheap laptop hardware.. it's about how kids USE that hardware. XO is designed to work without administrators, or regular maintenance or even networks! It's meet to be always sharing, remote updating and user programmed. It's also NOT windows, so it shouldn't have viruses or blue screens or ever-changing hardware-of-the week that the cheap Dells do.
Kids don't need computers to do the same kinds of things adult workers do. Why should they be pressed to use the poorly implemented stuff we have now, in manners the programs weren't designed for, and companies don't support?
Fact is that a Wintel PC, with out support, networking, anti-virus, etc. as well as custom software for education and content (all needs to be PAID FOR by the way) simply doesn't meet the needs out-of-the box right this very minute. How useful really is a brand new PC? Does Microsoft or Intel INCLUDE educational resources in the box? Or tools for communication... hell the default windows for home users can't even connect to a sharing domain.. or be managed without paying extra money to other companies. The goal of the OLPC project is to do computers for EDUCATION right! It's not a work PC with some edu-tainment software thrown on.. it's a ground up education computer.
The REAL trouble is that if the OLPC project works as planned, the software methods could work on regular school PCs as well, and on cheaper hardware too!!! Schools have relatively fixed needs for computers even in the US, but nobody has done a good job at representing that market. Until OLPC.
I've been places that are quite civilized but turn off TV at 8pm and power from 11p to 5a every night.
most third world countries only have things like power for part of the day for residences, or the guerrillas cut of power every so often to keep the villages in line... These places are way behind, but functional, and almost as normal as us from day-to-day. they often get their water from the public well, while having a radio or DVD player to use a few days a month...and of course a Coke machine! strange and weird.
it's somewhat worse than that.
He went to Intel and asked them to help out meeting the projects hardware needs and attempting to hit his price points and they laughed him off.
So he went out, spent several years, found somebody willing to meet his needs and has the product ready to manufacture and customers willing to buy it... There was a considerable amount of engineering new technologies to hit is performance goals, new LCD technologies, and custom wireless chips and software models. They've invented something NEW and it deserves the chance for their customers to actually get to buy it!
NOW Microsoft and Intel care? and spend 4 months of press releases rolling out something to rain on his parade... and try to poach his hard won customers, much like Microsoft recently tried to poach Mandriva's customers in Africa as well. It's lame, unethical, and unsportsmanlike.
she could sign her org up to buy a few right now from the buy one- give one program and start work on the software! Health care is another HUGE issue that's rightfully outside the OLPC scope at this time. Granted the problem of health care are almost exactly the same as OLPC is trying to address in education, but it's not their problem right now... it takes discipline to stay on your task and not get distracted.
but that is the real question... we are so productive in agriculture we have to pay farmers to not grow food to keep enough in the market. We set aside foodstuff that expires in storage for emergency purposes. We can feed the world... we grow more than enough food for everybody to have a fair share.
The trouble is, that kind of bounty is REAL power.. those we share it with have power over the people the govern... that allows the African dictators to rule with scorched-earth policies because THEY never have to go hungry with that supply of western food, they can burn their entire land and kill All their citizens and never suffer... how do we fix that problem?
Only information can fix the situation... that is a completely different issue to food and basics and the people of Africa won't get the food until they have fair leaders. Perhaps education and access to the rest of the world will help the next generation of African children outgrow their history.
to second that, GL didn't use the talents of the awesome actors he hired. If you watch the out takes, GL seems to pride himself on surprise script lines on the set... which is the most awful thing a director can do to actors and it shows in the performances. Even in episode 1 (perhaps by Ep 6 actually) , the actors were stiff, disconnected from each other. There was no ensemble performance, no benefit of characterization by "happy accidents" by having the group of actors bang out the lines until the word work on their own... Jar Jar was hated because the character's timing was off, he simply didn't fit the style or performance of the other actors and fans picked up on that as distracting.
That's why Pixar's films are SO good in contrast... they spend a great deal of time letting the actors play out the roles and it feels like theater performance, the actors are right there in the room, before the animation ever starts. GL seemed to pride himself on using technology to do what HE wanted and not capture the life his story had... and THAT is the art of story telling he seems to want to do so much. Stories aren't perfect, they grow on their own and GL ignored his own work, the work is own company did, the work of official licensees, and the expectations of the fans... a master story teller plays to his crowd... GL completely missed the boat. The movies were technically awesome, but the story fell flat.
looks more like they're trying to knock off the Office Live service than MS Office itself. It seems to use the real MS Office and a plug in to store all your documents online for easy access. That makes a lot of sense as it's what most people would use, but I don't see it hurting Microsoft unless they have an online editor good enough to replace things yet, but for personal organization and companies it seems like a good compromise adding the leading software package and simply adding a plugin to put those documents online... so simple and neat.
.Mac ones they'd have a real product instead of just a wannabe.
Of course Apple could do something similar with their iEverything, but they want it tied to THEIR service just like everybody else... if Apple's iApps could talk to non-Apple servers just as well as
That's why the Real Elvis isn't out there making money... damn those copycats!
copyright is copyright... they PAID for a copyright license to the owners of the music and lyrics. That's probably NOT the actual band that made the piece famous. Getting into sound-alikes of 20 year old pieces is a bit silly, the band should have taken what the publishers offered in the first place, even if they win it will all go to lawyers and they'll still put LESS into their pockets. I've seen the box and the artist/tracks are clearly labeled on the OUTSIDE of the package as covers or originals. There is absolutely no misrepresentation going on.
As far as little artist being beat up, I'm sure they were offered fair compensation, but wanted more, like they always do. They signed away the rights to the song and the lyrics years ago, or it wasn't even THEIR song to begin with, they were just performing what somebody else wrote for them. yes, it sucks but that's what happens... EVERYBODY's job is for sale to the low bidder.. just like companies hire Indian programmers to implement YOUR designs that are owned by the company, music is the same thing, it's just a job and some studio guys got a weeks pay to sound like somebody famous, just like a Mexican worker gets paid less instead of a UAW worker to turn a bolt on a car.
but mommy and daddy are only supposed to work 25 hours a week and have flying cars...
That said, the most useful robot will be like R2-D2 rather than C3PO. Consider why R2 is more useful than C3PO. Robots should do "robot" things so we don't have to. Replace your computer, and rooms full of electronics with just one smart box that can store movies, connect to the internet, and change your car's oil!! From a resource allocation perspective it's fewer crappy electronics being generated and doing more useful stuff for people.
I've wondered why Lucas hasn't licensed the studies they did for how R2 "talks" to some robot OEM. Much like the Star Trek LCARS, the guys that thought that stuff up put way to much time into it to be just a movie prop, it was also a hobby project for them to get it just right.
so why do we allow business there... allowing billions of dollars trade with them is de-facto approval by our government that China is OK. the rest is simply getting OUR rules in line with how THEY behave so our companies can compete "fairly" over here too. mercenary companies like "have been in the news lately" get paid big buck by the US govt and corporations to actually shoot these same "common folk" that get in the way of US big business even when those locals are completely right... when will that change? Saudi Arabia and Dubai have even worse Human rights records than China (but lack the body count) and the US government actively supports them, stations troops to protect then when they restrict our own CITIZENS from bringing religous materials into those countries because it might upset them. The US govt only supports freedom of speech and religion when it doesn't get in the way of business dealings. If this journalist was trying to crack a story about a toy company using lead paint on purpose, it'd be just fine to bury them.
I would venture that the same sales tax exempt rules would apply as well. Much like if you purchase a computer as office equipment you pay sales tax, but if it is included as a capital project running a robot or such it typically does not have sales tax as you pay manufacturing taxes on it. You pay tax on BOXED software most of the time anyway. Like you said, several states are changing this to get some extra dime. Michigan recently made similar changes and I was surprised I WASN'T paying sales tax on things like car repairs and tanning etc.
I don't think that closing the loophole will do any good because many of these businesses are so small it will cost more to account for the tax than they'll pay. Also, many of these are direct owners, so profits get taxed at personal income tax levels (25%) rather than sales tax levels, it would seem like double-dipping, but hey, it's taxes what is there to really like about it anyway?
government lives and dies by paperwork. Vendors know this, govt employees know this. After all, a speeding ticket is just not following the "paperwork". Or how about Taxes, filing those properly is just some "paperwork" as well.
When the military orders hammers they order an EXACT hammer, down to what color and finish... it's all very important to somebody so the specs have to be followed exactly, even if the hammer is functionally identical, that's not good enough. It's high time that computer and software people get the message and play by the same rules as other vendors when they produce their products. Software makers need to learn how to follow their OWN documentation and provide the exact documented service called for in the contract... when it comes to e-voting even 1 line of code errant is cheating, it would be as important as "just changing" a line item of your taxes because the form "works better" that way.
The FDA and IRS and Military and Casinos and Banks all demand EXACT procedures when lives or money is on the line.... I'd say VOTING is even MORE important that the rules be followed. It's a fundamental shift in how software is expected to be provided and operated that's been LONG overdue. The whole attitude in software that it works "good enough" so release and move on has absolutely no place in the e-voting market any more than in banking or running the space shuttle... a certain large software Making Software firm refuses to be bound by those kind of contracts even when it's the military doesn't mean their underlings can get away with it forever.
then somebody in the DOJ needs to go to the wall for commiting treason by exporting these documents to the lawyers... balance restored.
no, the GOVERNMENT sent something they are claiming is a secret to a DEFENDANT'S lawyer as evidence in a case. In practical terms, it's not a state secret anymore as it was intended to be used in court in defense. That lawyer told his buddies that the UNSEALED evidence he got showed that they were illegally spying on the LAWYER involved in the case.. they sent the guy his own spying records!!! It'a about as damning evidence as you can get because the govt was spying an a defense lawyer outside legal allowances. The court should be flamming pissed about the govt spying on LAWYERS just on principal, not to mention the ramifications it has on fair trials!! About the only thing the court can do is to try to invalidate the evidence at the govt's request, of course being as it was mailed unsealed, directly to the victim releasing the info in the internet might not be a bad idea.
Exactly, if the US govt can't speak to the case, then they can't speak to the case. period. If the plaintiffs have information gained directly from AT&T by accident then AT&T needs to deal with that.. much how the Quest CEO had to deal with being accused of "insider trading" while having official government deals backed out but he couldn't talk about. I don't see why AT&T has any rights more than him.
The alternative is that the courts start locking people up for contempt of state secrets anyway... it might be legal, it might not, but contempt of court is a near absolute right of the court itself.. perhaps what really need to happen is for those claiming secrets to sit it the hole for their country!!!
you have a point, that there's too much conflict of interest in our court system to be truly fair. Judges should be downright hostile to DAs as much as suspects on trial, but often that's hard when the offices are in the same building! Also, separation of powers is not DA/police.. they are the same branch!! But it's easy for police to "trick" the over eager DAs into presenting outright lies in court because police are "assumed" to always tell the truth... something that should be done away with. Once you get that combination of pieces in place, "expert" witnesses are hard to beat because they're supposedly "sworn" to the court... but everybody has their own agenda and the actual suspect is against 5 other people with their own intents... DA, police, judge, and defender... you're rights and interests are dead last.
Content is content... if it's on your windows machine and a supported format, why can it NOT be played...especially if it was RECORDED on your machine!!!! By Windows... kinda dumb
only because they have massive profit to sink into the ventures. This sounds like another Microsoft "me too" announcement... call us when it's ready, working and good!
What about the writer's strike that will cause reruns and crappy programming on for weeks? This should be a great chance for free and open projects to get a chance. The online media should be all over this. I'm surprised Taco hasn't make a section on Slashdot just for new media. It's a great chance to get close to a million people interested in something! The whole problem with online culture is that it's not tied to your locality, or social group unless you sit and IM people all day. Most old-school geeks don't really do that.
but this was an ILLEGAL action in China and Yahoo China provided the legally required data under rules very similar to the USA PATRIOT Act here.
I believe there was some help from Yahoo US in locating the data in US servers. Here's the deal, how is this morally different from Big Box retailers propping up China's govt by paying their legal share of chinese taxes for the police that arrested these guys? Or for providing commerce to the regime?
How about when an airline provides a passenger list including passengers that won't be debarking then allows the plane to "land for repairs" causing them to get arrested for things like Online-gambling even when they don't get off the plane? How about those people that got arrested off the plane returning from the middle east and sent to Cuba? Can they sue the airline because they were illegally treated by the US and were ratted out?
It cuts both ways in spite of how Congress wants to be all high-n-mighty about it, they have passed dozens of laws that require US companies to do the same thing to both companies and citizens of foreign lands when it's convenient for them.
how about when the DOJ arrests a UK citizen, off an in-transit plane (outside customs entry into the USA) at a US airport on layover, that runs an online gambling site legal in the UK but not in the USA, using data the airline supplied under homeland security? Isn't that EXACTLY the same thing. Airline Companies not of US origin allowing the USA govt to arrest their passengers when they are still on that companies property via international travel should not get a free pass either.
because it's discovery for criminal processes run by another EXECUTIVE agency. The "executive" branch is not just the President anymore like when that was tried. This is executive officers conducting investigation under the power of law against another department, so this is "normal" proceedings, and preservation of evidence... unless the White House wants to say they have power to destroy criminal evidence now!