In November, the city withdrew its demand that Reisinger not link to city government sites.
SO um, what's the issue?
Not only that, but the headline says that the city is suing the woman, but both the article and the summary state that the woman is suing the city. Did the editor even read the summary?
The results demonstrate that democratic economists lean left and republicans lean right.Economics ought to be unbaised. The fact that it is baised indicatse that economists can't be trusted to understand economic issues objectively.
You're assuming that they've based their view of economics on their pre-existing political affiliation, but it could actually be the other way around. Perhaps 80% of people who have a solid understanding of economics become Democrats as a result.
Re:I don't know if I fully agree with that
on
Fire Your IT Boss
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· Score: 1
I completely fail to understand how an issue tracking program is going to allow a non-technical manager to track the productivity of individual members of his team.
Perhaps this is why you're not a manager.;)
There is no easy mapping from user-visible features to programmer-written modules. A single user-visible feature will include GUI code, backend code, and mediation code between them, and each one of those pieces could be worked on by several people.
Managing a software development team is far too complex to describe in this posting, and what I've talked about are merely some of the tools that a competent manager has at his or her disposal. It doesn't have to be a one-to-one mapping between a user clicking button X and being satisfied with the result and a developer who wrote that functionality, especially since, as you said, multiple developers may have worked on that functionality. However, code gets written, it gets tested, and bugs get sent back to the development team. On almost every project I've ever worked on, the bugs get sent back to the developer who worked on the code. This is not magic. Development teams all over the world are doing it every day.
If a developer is constantly producing code that gets sent back by the QA team, a manager is going to notice. If a developer is never able to meet his deadlines because his code can't get past QA, a manager is going to notice. If a developer is constantly requesting more work because the work he was given was completed early and cleared QA without any issues, a manager is going to notice.
...but he need to understand the basics of what's involved in programming computers in order to properly manage the team...
He needs to understand the development cycle. He needs to know how to coordinate work between team members. He definitely needs to be able to "talk the talk", but there is no reason for him to know how to write even a single line of code.
The best management I've worked with were never developers. Some of the worst management I've worked with were former developers who thought (incorrectly) that they could be managers. And even though those managers knew how to program (usually in some obsolete language far removed from the ones we were actually working with) they never wrote any code, looked at code, or discussed details of code with anyone -- nor did they ever need to.
Re:I don't know if I fully agree with that
on
Fire Your IT Boss
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· Score: 1
Sounds like you don't actually write software.
I do. Professionally, in fact. From your response, I'd say it sounds like you've only contributed to open source projects.
Every organization I've worked for has used some sort of issue tracking software, so that it's well known who has worked on what area of the system. A bug keeps getting reissued because the "fix" didn't work in all cases, or borked some other code? No problem, just look up who completed the "fix". Additionally, when it comes to new development, management is responsible for assigning projects to developers. Module X is getting rave reviews from the users, and the manager wants to know who wrote that module? No problem, since he's the one who assigned the module to the developer in the first place.
A new application could go many months before it's in a state to be tested by the users.
Well, then there's QA. Most professionally written code goes through multiple layers of testing before it even gets to UAT. All of the back and forth between development and testing is tracked in the issue management software, or at the very least in the version control repository. These tools can generally print pretty reports that even PHBs can read.
And I haven't even addressed code reviews, among other tools available to management.
Management and development are two very different skills. I want a manager who is a natural leader, a planner, an organizer, is capable of managing client expectations, as well as the expectations of the sales team and upper management, and who can encourage a productive team environment. If he happens to be able to code as well, cool. If not, no big deal. That's my job.
Actually, it is going somewhere. The prize is being discontinued in March of 2010.
Re:I don't know if I fully agree with that
on
Fire Your IT Boss
·
· Score: 1
If you don't know about programming, how exactly are you going to measure output?
The output of programming is something completely non-technical. It's called "an application", which is used by "users", who are usually not programmers.
The measurement of that output is pretty simple: are the users happy with the application that was delivered to them? Does it meet their specifications? Does it pass their user acceptance testing?
If the developer who works long hours produces code that never gets past user acceptance testing, while the developer who slacks off half the time produces code that users rave about, then it's pretty obvious to even the least technical boss who's doing a good job.
For a lot of people, this EULA thing might make them snap and ditch Firefox completely. If that happens Mozilla will lose a bit of market share, maybe even a significant bit.
I think you grossly overestimate the number of people who actually care about having to click "I Agree" on a box full of text that they won't read anyway.
The most recent estimates I could find showed Linux users at just under 4%, and Ubuntu users at about 30% of that. That puts Ubuntu at about 1.2% of all computer users. So, assuming that we can extrapolate to say that the percentage of Firefox users that are on Ubuntu is the same as the percentage of general computer users that are on Ubuntu (not necessarily accurate, but probably pretty close), then even if every single Ubuntu user boycotted Firefox after this (guaranteed not accurate, since I, for one, will not boycott Firefox because of this), then that's 1.2% of Firefox's market share gone.
However, if you're willing to go absolutely bare-bones you can probably get a cheaper ticket at Air Canada's site. I bet if you compared apples to apples with identical options on the tickets, you'd find the prices the same.
It was a simple two-hour flight within the country, so there actually were no options at all -- no first class, no meal, no nothing. Actually, that's not entirely true: booking on Air Canada's site gave me a seat selection option, which I did not have on Expedia. Yet it still cost less, even after paying an extra $30 for that option.
People earn respect. I'm not saying no police deserve respect, but if the only reason you pretend to respect a public servant is so that they will continue to not violently abuse you, something is wrong.
By expecting people to earn respect, does that mean you automatically disrespect them until they earn that respect? If so, they will have no reason to respect you, and will therefore never earn your respect.
On the other hand, if you start off by giving people the benefit of the doubt, and allow them the chance to earn the respect that you're already giving them, then you'll find interactions with other people much more pleasant, and more people will, in fact, earn your respect.
I think what GP was saying is simply that the above applies to police officers, too.
Having said that, I will point out that, at least where I live, while being polite and courteous to the police helps to ensure that they treat you with equal respect, it also really helps if you happen to be white, male, and above the age of 30.
Services like expedia.ca make it easy to search many airlines from one form.
Interestingly, I just used Expedia to do precisely that a couple days ago.
The odd thing about it, though, was that once I selected the flights that I wanted, I was able to go directly to the airline's website (Air Canada, in this case) and buy the tickets for cheaper than Expedia was offering.
So, yes, services like that make it easy to search many airlines from one form, but it's certainly in your interest to check the airline's website as well to make sure you're getting the best price.
These day's unsubscribe processes are a pain in the ass at times...
The key words there are "at times". You see, not all unsubscribe processes are painful. Many of them involve a simple reply or a simple click on a single link -- which is exactly the same amount of effort as clicking the "spam" button.
Instead of being so fucking lazy that anything more than one click is considered to be too much effort, all it takes is this: follow the instructions (ie. click the "unsubscribe" link or hit "reply", whatever it is). If this works, great. Now you haven't messed up anyone else, you don't have to worry about not receiving emails that you actually did sign up for but forgot, and there's no problem if you later decide to sign up again. If, however, that simple act turns out not to be enough (ie. they start trying to make you jump through hoops), then take alternate measures.
An unsubscribe process takes more clicks then hitting 'mark as spam'. That's all the reason people need to use the spam button. Can you honestly say you've never done it?
Um, yes, actually. I'm kind of shocked that you even consider it a valid option. Does it not occur to you that this has the potential to impact other people, too? I mean, I can be as lazy as the next person sometimes, but how hard is a couple fucking clicks of a mouse?
Is it? Usually the copyright is held by the record company.
Ever notice that it's record companies, not bands, that are suing P2Pers? They're the copyright holders.
Plus, even if the band holds the copyright, the manager is just an employee of the band. He doesn't have the authority to single-handedly dictate the band's distribution policy without their consultation.
There are "good cops". My uncle used to be a police officer, and I believe he was one of the "good cops". Of course, he's my uncle, so I'm biased.
However, right now there is an inquiry going on in my home town. A couple of years ago, a bunch of cops went out partying at a restaurant lounge until the restaurant closed, then took the party to a cop's house. They partied until the wee hours of the morning. One of the cops left early in the morning, extremely drunk, and rear-ended a stopped car at high speed, killing its driver.
Now, police officer after police officer are filing into this inquiry to testify that the accused was not drunk, and that there has been no effort on the part of the police to cover anything up, despite evidence otherwise.
I'm still waiting for the "good cops" to show up and admit that this guy screwed up, that he was as drunk as everyone knows he was, and that he was in fact so drunk that the other cops were trying to prevent him from driving home -- a responsible thing to do, but they're now denying that because to do so would be admitting that he was drunk in the first place.
It won't work, because the management will simply say they were unaware of the activity going on.
I'm not saying it will work. Viacom has a hell of a fight ahead of them even if they get the information they want. Their evidence will be tenuous at best. All I'm saying is that the point of doing it is to attack the Safe Harbour defense, and that if they succeed, they will have succeeded only in putting the blame on the company, not the individuals, and that if they don't succeed, then there will be no blame to put anywhere.
To be clear, I think the whole thing sucks, and I wish Viacom would just go away. I'm concerned about the precedent being set if personally identifiable information is handed over, but I'm not all that concerned about individual employees being targeted by anyone.
I highly doubt that any employees were doing that. Not in their "official capacity", in any event.
Why do you doubt this? When a website that's based on user-created content gets started, it's pretty standard for the company behind the site to plant some content in order to get things rolling. It only makes sense that they would want to plant good content, so clips from popular TV shows would be a great way to get a site like YouTube rolling. It has long been rumoured that they did exactly that, and honestly I'd be surprised if they didn't.
The key word is identifying, which is exactly what Viacom originally said they weren't trying to do.
Actually, they said they weren't going to pursue legal action against individuals, only YouTube itself. This has not changed. The whole point of this is the "Safe Harbour" defense. They need to strike down that defense in order to beat Google on this one. They need to know what employees have been doing in order to accomplish this. In order to strike down the Safe Harbour defense, the judge would have to be convinced that the company itself willingly and knowlingly contributed infringing content to the site. In other words, it is essential to Viacom's case that it be proven that the employees were not acting as individuals, but acting on behalf of the company. For this tactic to work in court, they need to show that the employees are not individually liable.
Anyway, the employees will get screwed over anyway, because even if Viacom doesn't "go after" them, they'll still be fired if Viacom identifies them because Google will then have to engage in CYA.
This is pure speculation, and even if it's true, it would be Google screwing the employees, not Viacom. If the court determines that the employees acted as individuals, then Google can continue to hide behind Safe Harbour, and there'd be no reason to retaliate against the individuals. If the court determines that the employees acted as representatives of the company, then the company would be really stupid to fire them, as nothing would be accomplished by doing that since the company itself would be liable for the actions of those employees.
First, corporations are not sentient entities and can't be "aware" of anything.
Corporations are made up of people, who are sentient. When someone says "Company X did Y", what they are really saying is "people who work for and represent Company X did Y". Whether or not the actions of an individual who is part of a company represent the actions of that company depends entirely on whether or not those actions were performed as part of their job, and whether or not those actions were sanctioned by the company (which, in turn, means sanctioned by other people within the company who have the appropriate authority). If Viacom can prove that employees, in their official capacity, uploaded infringing videos, then Google is liable for it and cannot use the "Safe Harbour" defense.
Viacom is not going after the individuals, simply because individuals don't have the kind of money that Google has. They're going after Google.
Actually, Google == employees. Viacom is trying to use the actions of individual employees as representatives of the company to go after the company.
If employees, as part of their function as employees, are uploading videos, then it is valid to say that Google is aware of these videos. Therefore, if these videos are infringing copyrights, Google's "Safe Harbour" defense, which is basically "we're not responsible for what others do without our knowledge", goes out the window, because it's no longer "others" and no longer "without our knowledge".
Most likely, employees have a YouTube account that is set up specifically for work purposes. They may also have a personal YouTube account, but that's not likely what's relevant here. What's relevant is their work account. If an employee posts a video using that account, it can be assumed that it was done so with the company's knowledge. If they did it from home, that wouldn't mean anything since employees can work from home.
Slashdot Mirror
In November, the city withdrew its demand that Reisinger not link to city government sites.
SO um, what's the issue?
Not only that, but the headline says that the city is suing the woman, but both the article and the summary state that the woman is suing the city. Did the editor even read the summary?
The results demonstrate that democratic economists lean left and republicans lean right.Economics ought to be unbaised. The fact that it is baised indicatse that economists can't be trusted to understand economic issues objectively.
You're assuming that they've based their view of economics on their pre-existing political affiliation, but it could actually be the other way around. Perhaps 80% of people who have a solid understanding of economics become Democrats as a result.
I completely fail to understand how an issue tracking program is going to allow a non-technical manager to track the productivity of individual members of his team.
Perhaps this is why you're not a manager. ;)
There is no easy mapping from user-visible features to programmer-written modules. A single user-visible feature will include GUI code, backend code, and mediation code between them, and each one of those pieces could be worked on by several people.
Managing a software development team is far too complex to describe in this posting, and what I've talked about are merely some of the tools that a competent manager has at his or her disposal. It doesn't have to be a one-to-one mapping between a user clicking button X and being satisfied with the result and a developer who wrote that functionality, especially since, as you said, multiple developers may have worked on that functionality. However, code gets written, it gets tested, and bugs get sent back to the development team. On almost every project I've ever worked on, the bugs get sent back to the developer who worked on the code. This is not magic. Development teams all over the world are doing it every day.
If a developer is constantly producing code that gets sent back by the QA team, a manager is going to notice. If a developer is never able to meet his deadlines because his code can't get past QA, a manager is going to notice. If a developer is constantly requesting more work because the work he was given was completed early and cleared QA without any issues, a manager is going to notice.
...but he need to understand the basics of what's involved in programming computers in order to properly manage the team...
He needs to understand the development cycle. He needs to know how to coordinate work between team members. He definitely needs to be able to "talk the talk", but there is no reason for him to know how to write even a single line of code.
The best management I've worked with were never developers. Some of the worst management I've worked with were former developers who thought (incorrectly) that they could be managers. And even though those managers knew how to program (usually in some obsolete language far removed from the ones we were actually working with) they never wrote any code, looked at code, or discussed details of code with anyone -- nor did they ever need to.
Sounds like you don't actually write software.
I do. Professionally, in fact. From your response, I'd say it sounds like you've only contributed to open source projects.
Every organization I've worked for has used some sort of issue tracking software, so that it's well known who has worked on what area of the system. A bug keeps getting reissued because the "fix" didn't work in all cases, or borked some other code? No problem, just look up who completed the "fix". Additionally, when it comes to new development, management is responsible for assigning projects to developers. Module X is getting rave reviews from the users, and the manager wants to know who wrote that module? No problem, since he's the one who assigned the module to the developer in the first place.
A new application could go many months before it's in a state to be tested by the users.
Well, then there's QA. Most professionally written code goes through multiple layers of testing before it even gets to UAT. All of the back and forth between development and testing is tracked in the issue management software, or at the very least in the version control repository. These tools can generally print pretty reports that even PHBs can read.
And I haven't even addressed code reviews, among other tools available to management.
Management and development are two very different skills. I want a manager who is a natural leader, a planner, an organizer, is capable of managing client expectations, as well as the expectations of the sales team and upper management, and who can encourage a productive team environment. If he happens to be able to code as well, cool. If not, no big deal. That's my job.
...the money is real and is going nowhere.
Actually, it is going somewhere. The prize is being discontinued in March of 2010.
If you don't know about programming, how exactly are you going to measure output?
The output of programming is something completely non-technical. It's called "an application", which is used by "users", who are usually not programmers.
The measurement of that output is pretty simple: are the users happy with the application that was delivered to them? Does it meet their specifications? Does it pass their user acceptance testing?
If the developer who works long hours produces code that never gets past user acceptance testing, while the developer who slacks off half the time produces code that users rave about, then it's pretty obvious to even the least technical boss who's doing a good job.
FSM theory is consistent with heliocentricity, which we all know is correct now.
Oh, really?
For a lot of people, this EULA thing might make them snap and ditch Firefox completely. If that happens Mozilla will lose a bit of market share, maybe even a significant bit.
I think you grossly overestimate the number of people who actually care about having to click "I Agree" on a box full of text that they won't read anyway.
The most recent estimates I could find showed Linux users at just under 4%, and Ubuntu users at about 30% of that. That puts Ubuntu at about 1.2% of all computer users. So, assuming that we can extrapolate to say that the percentage of Firefox users that are on Ubuntu is the same as the percentage of general computer users that are on Ubuntu (not necessarily accurate, but probably pretty close), then even if every single Ubuntu user boycotted Firefox after this (guaranteed not accurate, since I, for one, will not boycott Firefox because of this), then that's 1.2% of Firefox's market share gone.
I doubt anyone's losing sleep over it.
However, if you're willing to go absolutely bare-bones you can probably get a cheaper ticket at Air Canada's site. I bet if you compared apples to apples with identical options on the tickets, you'd find the prices the same.
It was a simple two-hour flight within the country, so there actually were no options at all -- no first class, no meal, no nothing. Actually, that's not entirely true: booking on Air Canada's site gave me a seat selection option, which I did not have on Expedia. Yet it still cost less, even after paying an extra $30 for that option.
People earn respect. I'm not saying no police deserve respect, but if the only reason you pretend to respect a public servant is so that they will continue to not violently abuse you, something is wrong.
By expecting people to earn respect, does that mean you automatically disrespect them until they earn that respect? If so, they will have no reason to respect you, and will therefore never earn your respect.
On the other hand, if you start off by giving people the benefit of the doubt, and allow them the chance to earn the respect that you're already giving them, then you'll find interactions with other people much more pleasant, and more people will, in fact, earn your respect.
I think what GP was saying is simply that the above applies to police officers, too.
Having said that, I will point out that, at least where I live, while being polite and courteous to the police helps to ensure that they treat you with equal respect, it also really helps if you happen to be white, male, and above the age of 30.
Yeah that might hold true for murder or extortion...
No, actually cops cover up murder as well.
Services like expedia.ca make it easy to search many airlines from one form.
Interestingly, I just used Expedia to do precisely that a couple days ago.
The odd thing about it, though, was that once I selected the flights that I wanted, I was able to go directly to the airline's website (Air Canada, in this case) and buy the tickets for cheaper than Expedia was offering.
So, yes, services like that make it easy to search many airlines from one form, but it's certainly in your interest to check the airline's website as well to make sure you're getting the best price.
These day's unsubscribe processes are a pain in the ass at times...
The key words there are "at times". You see, not all unsubscribe processes are painful. Many of them involve a simple reply or a simple click on a single link -- which is exactly the same amount of effort as clicking the "spam" button.
Instead of being so fucking lazy that anything more than one click is considered to be too much effort, all it takes is this: follow the instructions (ie. click the "unsubscribe" link or hit "reply", whatever it is). If this works, great. Now you haven't messed up anyone else, you don't have to worry about not receiving emails that you actually did sign up for but forgot, and there's no problem if you later decide to sign up again. If, however, that simple act turns out not to be enough (ie. they start trying to make you jump through hoops), then take alternate measures.
An unsubscribe process takes more clicks then hitting 'mark as spam'. That's all the reason people need to use the spam button. Can you honestly say you've never done it?
Um, yes, actually. I'm kind of shocked that you even consider it a valid option. Does it not occur to you that this has the potential to impact other people, too? I mean, I can be as lazy as the next person sometimes, but how hard is a couple fucking clicks of a mouse?
Since the copyright is registered to the band...
Is it? Usually the copyright is held by the record company.
Ever notice that it's record companies, not bands, that are suing P2Pers? They're the copyright holders.
Plus, even if the band holds the copyright, the manager is just an employee of the band. He doesn't have the authority to single-handedly dictate the band's distribution policy without their consultation.
There are "good cops". My uncle used to be a police officer, and I believe he was one of the "good cops". Of course, he's my uncle, so I'm biased.
However, right now there is an inquiry going on in my home town. A couple of years ago, a bunch of cops went out partying at a restaurant lounge until the restaurant closed, then took the party to a cop's house. They partied until the wee hours of the morning. One of the cops left early in the morning, extremely drunk, and rear-ended a stopped car at high speed, killing its driver.
Now, police officer after police officer are filing into this inquiry to testify that the accused was not drunk, and that there has been no effort on the part of the police to cover anything up, despite evidence otherwise.
I'm still waiting for the "good cops" to show up and admit that this guy screwed up, that he was as drunk as everyone knows he was, and that he was in fact so drunk that the other cops were trying to prevent him from driving home -- a responsible thing to do, but they're now denying that because to do so would be admitting that he was drunk in the first place.
I come to Slashdot for tech news, not for a sneak peak at the TV commercials of tomorrow.
Ah, you must be looking for the second part of the Slashdor slogan: "stuff that matters".
Unfortunately, this falls under the first part, "news for nerds", which, due to the nature of what interests nerds, usually fails the second part.
It won't work, because the management will simply say they were unaware of the activity going on.
I'm not saying it will work. Viacom has a hell of a fight ahead of them even if they get the information they want. Their evidence will be tenuous at best. All I'm saying is that the point of doing it is to attack the Safe Harbour defense, and that if they succeed, they will have succeeded only in putting the blame on the company, not the individuals, and that if they don't succeed, then there will be no blame to put anywhere.
To be clear, I think the whole thing sucks, and I wish Viacom would just go away. I'm concerned about the precedent being set if personally identifiable information is handed over, but I'm not all that concerned about individual employees being targeted by anyone.
Your humour depreciates? I guess I'll have to check this thread out in a year or two to see if it's still funny.
I highly doubt that any employees were doing that. Not in their "official capacity", in any event.
Why do you doubt this? When a website that's based on user-created content gets started, it's pretty standard for the company behind the site to plant some content in order to get things rolling. It only makes sense that they would want to plant good content, so clips from popular TV shows would be a great way to get a site like YouTube rolling. It has long been rumoured that they did exactly that, and honestly I'd be surprised if they didn't.
The key word is identifying, which is exactly what Viacom originally said they weren't trying to do.
Actually, they said they weren't going to pursue legal action against individuals, only YouTube itself. This has not changed. The whole point of this is the "Safe Harbour" defense. They need to strike down that defense in order to beat Google on this one. They need to know what employees have been doing in order to accomplish this. In order to strike down the Safe Harbour defense, the judge would have to be convinced that the company itself willingly and knowlingly contributed infringing content to the site. In other words, it is essential to Viacom's case that it be proven that the employees were not acting as individuals, but acting on behalf of the company. For this tactic to work in court, they need to show that the employees are not individually liable.
Anyway, the employees will get screwed over anyway, because even if Viacom doesn't "go after" them, they'll still be fired if Viacom identifies them because Google will then have to engage in CYA.
This is pure speculation, and even if it's true, it would be Google screwing the employees, not Viacom. If the court determines that the employees acted as individuals, then Google can continue to hide behind Safe Harbour, and there'd be no reason to retaliate against the individuals. If the court determines that the employees acted as representatives of the company, then the company would be really stupid to fire them, as nothing would be accomplished by doing that since the company itself would be liable for the actions of those employees.
First, corporations are not sentient entities and can't be "aware" of anything.
Corporations are made up of people, who are sentient. When someone says "Company X did Y", what they are really saying is "people who work for and represent Company X did Y". Whether or not the actions of an individual who is part of a company represent the actions of that company depends entirely on whether or not those actions were performed as part of their job, and whether or not those actions were sanctioned by the company (which, in turn, means sanctioned by other people within the company who have the appropriate authority). If Viacom can prove that employees, in their official capacity, uploaded infringing videos, then Google is liable for it and cannot use the "Safe Harbour" defense.
Viacom is not going after the individuals, simply because individuals don't have the kind of money that Google has. They're going after Google.
Actually, Google == employees. Viacom is trying to use the actions of individual employees as representatives of the company to go after the company.
If employees, as part of their function as employees, are uploading videos, then it is valid to say that Google is aware of these videos. Therefore, if these videos are infringing copyrights, Google's "Safe Harbour" defense, which is basically "we're not responsible for what others do without our knowledge", goes out the window, because it's no longer "others" and no longer "without our knowledge".
Most likely, employees have a YouTube account that is set up specifically for work purposes. They may also have a personal YouTube account, but that's not likely what's relevant here. What's relevant is their work account. If an employee posts a video using that account, it can be assumed that it was done so with the company's knowledge. If they did it from home, that wouldn't mean anything since employees can work from home.
Fuels from bodily waste. Will you choose peesel or shitroleum?
No, no, no. We already have a use for that.
Even a cursory look at the New Testament sees the word 'priest' used hundreds of times. For example- Hebrews 6:20...
Wow. I've learned something new today. I had no idea that the book of Hebrews was written in English.