Quoth TFA -- "He added that AT&T had already discovered and corrected the issue by Nov. 2010, and had given refunds to customers who contacted AT&T."
Whatever their fine is, it should be increase by 100-fold because AT&T discovered the issue 2 years ago, but only refunded customers who contacted them and complained. You'd think that if they discovered unfair customer overcharging, they would refund every affected customer?
I'll admit I voted for Rmoney. Not because I like that finger in the wind flip flopper, but I think Obama's policies are disastrous.
Do you really think Romney's policies would have been less disastrous? Did you think that Romney would be able to shake off the control of nutjob right-wing Republicans as President? Or has that question not entered your consideration?
(I am honestly curious)
George W. Bush will forever be known as the President who first sanctioned torture in the USA.
Absolutely, yes. And Obama was definitely the lesser evil in this election
But Obama will be forever known as the President who first sanctioned mass assassinations (in a semi-official way). Even if Obama did not start the practice, he (to my knowledge) is the first to openly brag about the success of the drone attacks, while arguing in court that the program is too secret to admit its existence.
If you think you know better, post a rebuttal instead of modding this down.
but not to make Obama look bad. They should obstruct his "agenda" because it is the wrong direction for the country.
Yes, it would be bad form for the country to
help veterans find jobs. I am sure every single one of the republicans that voted against this bill had also opposed the unfunded wars that created these veterans in the first place
Oh, wait...
The thing is, there has probably been more rampant voter fraud during the days of paper ballots than anything happening with these machines.
Ignoring the fact that you have absolutely no data to backup your assertion...
The difference is, with electronic machines NO ONE WILL EVER KNOW. It is possible (even if difficult) to find lost ballots, get evidence of ballot tampering, etc. But good luck doing that without physical evidence.
And it doesn't even have to be malicious tampering. Do those thing run RAID storage? What if someone brings a magnet into the voting booth?
Harder than an ATM machine? Harder than a nuclear power plant control room? Harder than a 787 Dreamliner fly by wire system?
In all of the cases you describe, a contractor that screws up will be fined and sued into oblivion (ATM machine spitting out money, nuclear power plant meltdown, 787 falling down from the sky due to faulty wiring)
What we desperately need is to sue the contractors responsible for delivering malfunctioning voter machines into non-existence. Not "take machines offline" and probably buy from the same contractor next year.
Of course an even better solution is to go back to paper...
And I look for my textbooks second hand ( I like the margin notes, anyway )
And the book stores really like you. Ah, I remember it like it was yesterday --
A new textbook went for $100
You could return that textbook for $30 (assuming that a new edition did not popup all of the sudden)
And then you could buy the same used textbook at a steeply discount price of $75-$80.
I suspect reselling used textbooks is far more lucrative than selling new ones. At least for the bookstores.
He's an egomaniac career criminal who by pure accident was shot this side of the street and now we think he's one of ours. He isn't. He is the exact kind of people we do not want on our side.
No one is proclaiming that he's one of us
But in the recent years the only times I see some justice served is when two large corporations (or other wealthy entities) get into a fight for their own reasons. I will still cheer for the one who landed on my side in any particular battle, even if that happened by pure accident.
I'm fine with my credit card company, who haven't, on even a single occasion sent an EULA update allowing them to harvest my information for whoever knows what reason,
I occasionally receive very thick updated "user and privacy agreement" from my credit card. It's in very small font and I usually get bogged down half way through reading it. But I am pretty sure they are talking about "occasionally" sharing info with affiliates and their affiliates' affiliates.
do not try to harvest my phone number sugar coating with "security concerns in case I lose my password".
My credit cards harvest my cell phone number by sugar coating it with "a way to contact you in case of suspicious activity on your account". Not to mention that they already have my home number from the application
This company has grown too large and is WAY too much intrusive in its current form.
True, but I think the issue is simply in aggregating all of the info. I hate the fact that google group searches now require you to login with google account to read the posts. I used to just read them for many years
I think Google is doing the same thing as everyone else, but they simply have more clout and cover/aggregate a wider range of services.
I think Romney's plan won't work, and I won't vote for him, but I appreciate that small step to a better tax system
I know that Romney's plan won't work, because he hasn't given the details (you know, the ones that have the devil in them). I am not saying his plan is bad, I am saying it is at best half-defined and thus hard to evaluate either way.
Until he gives us some idea of the cap amounts he is thinking of, the non-partisan budget office can't even evaluate his plan. And I suspect that he is keeping it vague, because he knows it won't work
Is it really too much to demand a specific economic plan (with some numbers) from the president _before_ he is elected? Especially as he makes some significant promises about what his plan would achieve?
So now you want to tax wealth? Get the hell out of here.
Taxing wealth may be a bad (or at least hard to implement) idea
But taxing investment (i.e. wealth-derived) income at a higher rate than the standard income seems fair. Instead, once your wealth is earning you money, you pay less than 15% on such income.
As your salary increases, you progressively move into higher income brackets and pay more taxes. But jump to a point where you only earn money from capital tax gains, then suddenly you are back to 15%?
I would never have heard about this had they left it up.
Sure you would have.
Obama would probably site it in his address (or debates, even) and release ads that mention it
I assume that it just doesn't have the same ring to it:
"Romney wants to cut taxes for the rich, but a never-released economic report proves him wrong".
The goal here is to keep the report from the undecided voters and the remaining sane Republicans. That may have been a success.
Non-partisan is just a politically correct way of saying, Lib'rul bias.
All politicians have their issues, but Republicans are departing further and further into never-land
It's one thing to argue in generalities, but to directly and blatantly contradict facts - that's something else.
How do you reconcile a non-partisan analysis that directly contradicts one of your main philosophies? In tune with Romney/Ryan platform of cutting taxes on everyone, increasing spending on military and keeping the good parts of Health Care Act (that cost money), while getting rid of the "bad" parts (that bring in money). And of course all of this will balance the budget somehow.
Then take an image, and bring it back up (with the suspect accounts suspended). There is no reason to take it all down for so long.
Sure there is!
First of all, it takes work to identify suspected accounts (not as much as proving anything, but still work). Easier to grab everything on someone's say-so.
Second, such takedown will also send a clear message to hosting companies. Some of them may start policing their customers and cut off anyone _they_ suspect, just to protect the rest of the customers (and to ensure hosting company's survival)
I rent a locker at a local storage locker company.
The guy with the locker next to mine, fills his with drugs... and gets caught.
Police put a crime scene tape around the entire facility and block my access to my stuff.
Police want to verify that there isn't any drugs in my locker.
I think you missed the best part.
Police confiscates drugs along with your stuff and the contents of every other locker in the facility
You are invited to sue them and prove that your stuff is yours and is acquired legally. But you are (probably) never getting your things back if you just wait.
And Obama, plucky Senator from Illinois, railed against the program.
Until he became president.
Merely three days after being sworn in, the tune changed,
I think the explanation is obvious
There is a black book at the oval office that explains why the world will end if the people are not watched by a benign dictator that knows what's best. Obama read that manual right after being sworn in and was compelled to switch his position.
Either that or Obama cynically lied to his supporters throughout his entire campaign.
Actually you do for cloud services. Read the contracts that Google has....so the government can argue you don't have any expectation of property rights if you waive them with the cloud carrier.
Huh? I haven't read the contract with google, but do you really relinquish your rights to data??
I assume the contract says that they are not liable if they lose your data and that you should have backups, but I would be surprised if the ToS actually said that Google can take your data (copy it and deny you access) and use it for something else whenever they feel like it.
storing said data on hard drives owned and physically controlled by someone else, was ever YOURS.
What you are arguing here is that we live in the state of anarchy? So the stuff I have in the bank safe-deposit box is not mine either because a 3rd party controls it? Because I think it is and access to it still requires a warrant.
I realize that government _could_ get access to things you do not physically control, but then they can also access data that you physically control, too. They just need a warrant, oddly enough.
I believe warrantless wire taping started under Bush....*eye roll*
But this is certainly the first one someone claims you lose your rights to data by placing it with an external providers
I am sure that companies that provide storage lockers are watching this with interest. Next, on suspicion of drugs, seize the entire local U-Store branch... Or the entire contents of bank safebox room. And let the owners come forward and sue to recover if they can prove them own their stuff legally. (and imagine there was a car analogy somewhere in there)
And...WHY is this bad exactly? I've had friends and relatives go through arbitration and frankly the corps ended up settling for MORE than they asked for
One reason -- arbitration is not a service provided by magical fairies. Arbitrators are both chosen by and paid for by the corporation. If that's not a problem, then I don't know what is. How can a glaring conflict of interest NOT be a problem?
Your single data point notwithstanding, arbitrators that rule in favor of the plaintiff too often get replaced by other arbitrators. Maybe your friends/relatives that got "more then they asked for" were the last business that their particular arbitrator ever got.
I currently run an open wireless SSID as a guest connection and I am not concerned with being sued. Here in the UK, I don't think the law has yet been tested that you are held liable for someone else's actions.
Here, in the US (several years ago), my roommate had received a threat letter for downloading a movie soundtrack. Her options were
a. Go to court and pay who knows how much money
b. Settle and pay 3K-5K right away
She took option b. Fortunately, she was the one downloading the soundtrack -- but she obviously didn't have to be. Even with a protected router, it was a total of 3 roommate students living in the apartment (and there is only one cable hookup, so separate internet account was not really an option). I have no idea why my OP was modded funny.
If I were designing a security system for TSA, I would definitely consider printing a (possibly fake) screening status in the barcode in plain text. If you keep a database of what status you assigned to which boarding ticket, then you can more thoroughly screen (or arrest and jail indefinitely) anyone who changes the easily hackable obvious screening status on their boarding pass.
This is an interesting point, but what does any of this have to do with catching terrorists? Now TSA will detain people who mess with barcodes and claim them to be terrorists?
To extend your line of thought -- If _I_ were designing a security system for TSA (an organization that has never caught a terrorist on its own accord), I too would make up an easily game-able system so that TSA can actually arrest some people and then trump such arrests as success and therefore request more funding.
It would be a lot cheaper and just as efficient to go back to pre-9-11 security and invest in an "anti-terrorism rock" for contractors (if contractors must be funded by this).
Slashdot Mirror
They'll make enough by lunch time to cover it.
Quoth TFA -- "He added that AT&T had already discovered and corrected the issue by Nov. 2010, and had given refunds to customers who contacted AT&T."
Whatever their fine is, it should be increase by 100-fold because AT&T discovered the issue 2 years ago, but only refunded customers who contacted them and complained. You'd think that if they discovered unfair customer overcharging, they would refund every affected customer?
I'll admit I voted for Rmoney. Not because I like that finger in the wind flip flopper, but I think Obama's policies are disastrous.
Do you really think Romney's policies would have been less disastrous? Did you think that Romney would be able to shake off the control of nutjob right-wing Republicans as President? Or has that question not entered your consideration?
(I am honestly curious)
George W. Bush will forever be known as the President who first sanctioned torture in the USA.
Absolutely, yes. And Obama was definitely the lesser evil in this election
But Obama will be forever known as the President who first sanctioned mass assassinations (in a semi-official way). Even if Obama did not start the practice, he (to my knowledge) is the first to openly brag about the success of the drone attacks, while arguing in court that the program is too secret to admit its existence.
If you think you know better, post a rebuttal instead of modding this down.
but not to make Obama look bad. They should obstruct his "agenda" because it is the wrong direction for the country.
Yes, it would be bad form for the country to help veterans find jobs. I am sure every single one of the republicans that voted against this bill had also opposed the unfunded wars that created these veterans in the first place
Oh, wait...
Those who count the votes might decide everything, but they are still accountable to anyone who might be witness to them doing said counting.
That's probably why the electronic machines are being pushed as a replacement.
So that there is no counting that can be witnessed.
The thing is, there has probably been more rampant voter fraud during the days of paper ballots than anything happening with these machines.
Ignoring the fact that you have absolutely no data to backup your assertion...
The difference is, with electronic machines NO ONE WILL EVER KNOW. It is possible (even if difficult) to find lost ballots, get evidence of ballot tampering, etc. But good luck doing that without physical evidence.
And it doesn't even have to be malicious tampering. Do those thing run RAID storage? What if someone brings a magnet into the voting booth?
Harder than an ATM machine? Harder than a nuclear power plant control room? Harder than a 787 Dreamliner fly by wire system?
In all of the cases you describe, a contractor that screws up will be fined and sued into oblivion (ATM machine spitting out money, nuclear power plant meltdown, 787 falling down from the sky due to faulty wiring)
What we desperately need is to sue the contractors responsible for delivering malfunctioning voter machines into non-existence. Not "take machines offline" and probably buy from the same contractor next year.
Of course an even better solution is to go back to paper...
And I look for my textbooks second hand ( I like the margin notes, anyway )
And the book stores really like you. Ah, I remember it like it was yesterday --
A new textbook went for $100
You could return that textbook for $30 (assuming that a new edition did not popup all of the sudden)
And then you could buy the same used textbook at a steeply discount price of $75-$80.
I suspect reselling used textbooks is far more lucrative than selling new ones. At least for the bookstores.
He's an egomaniac career criminal who by pure accident was shot this side of the street and now we think he's one of ours. He isn't. He is the exact kind of people we do not want on our side.
No one is proclaiming that he's one of us
But in the recent years the only times I see some justice served is when two large corporations (or other wealthy entities) get into a fight for their own reasons.
I will still cheer for the one who landed on my side in any particular battle, even if that happened by pure accident.
I'm fine with my credit card company, who haven't, on even a single occasion sent an EULA update allowing them to harvest my information for whoever knows what reason,
I occasionally receive very thick updated "user and privacy agreement" from my credit card. It's in very small font and I usually get bogged down half way through reading it. But I am pretty sure they are talking about "occasionally" sharing info with affiliates and their affiliates' affiliates.
do not try to harvest my phone number sugar coating with "security concerns in case I lose my password".
My credit cards harvest my cell phone number by sugar coating it with "a way to contact you in case of suspicious activity on your account". Not to mention that they already have my home number from the application
This company has grown too large and is WAY too much intrusive in its current form.
True, but I think the issue is simply in aggregating all of the info. I hate the fact that google group searches now require you to login with google account to read the posts. I used to just read them for many years
I think Google is doing the same thing as everyone else, but they simply have more clout and cover/aggregate a wider range of services.
The only way I can see to get around this would be for everyone to protest together or for all merchants to implement credit card surcharges.
I buy most of the things I own online. Protest/surcharge/etc only work for your local brick-and-mortar merchant where paying cash is an option.
Buying something by mailing a check is a terrible experience which is worth 2%-3% surcharge to avoid.
I think Romney's plan won't work, and I won't vote for him, but I appreciate that small step to a better tax system
I know that Romney's plan won't work, because he hasn't given the details (you know, the ones that have the devil in them). I am not saying his plan is bad, I am saying it is at best half-defined and thus hard to evaluate either way.
Until he gives us some idea of the cap amounts he is thinking of, the non-partisan budget office can't even evaluate his plan. And I suspect that he is keeping it vague, because he knows it won't work
Is it really too much to demand a specific economic plan (with some numbers) from the president _before_ he is elected? Especially as he makes some significant promises about what his plan would achieve?
So now you want to tax wealth? Get the hell out of here.
Taxing wealth may be a bad (or at least hard to implement) idea
But taxing investment (i.e. wealth-derived) income at a higher rate than the standard income seems fair. Instead, once your wealth is earning you money, you pay less than 15% on such income.
As your salary increases, you progressively move into higher income brackets and pay more taxes. But jump to a point where you only earn money from capital tax gains, then suddenly you are back to 15%?
I would never have heard about this had they left it up.
Sure you would have.
Obama would probably site it in his address (or debates, even) and release ads that mention it
I assume that it just doesn't have the same ring to it:
"Romney wants to cut taxes for the rich, but a never-released economic report proves him wrong".
The goal here is to keep the report from the undecided voters and the remaining sane Republicans. That may have been a success.
Non-partisan is just a politically correct way of saying, Lib'rul bias.
All politicians have their issues, but Republicans are departing further and further into never-land
It's one thing to argue in generalities, but to directly and blatantly contradict facts - that's something else.
How do you reconcile a non-partisan analysis that directly contradicts one of your main philosophies? In tune with Romney/Ryan platform of cutting taxes on everyone, increasing spending on military and keeping the good parts of Health Care Act (that cost money), while getting rid of the "bad" parts (that bring in money). And of course all of this will balance the budget somehow.
Then take an image, and bring it back up (with the suspect accounts suspended). There is no reason to take it all down for so long.
Sure there is!
First of all, it takes work to identify suspected accounts (not as much as proving anything, but still work). Easier to grab everything on someone's say-so.
Second, such takedown will also send a clear message to hosting companies. Some of them may start policing their customers and cut off anyone _they_ suspect, just to protect the rest of the customers (and to ensure hosting company's survival)
I rent a locker at a local storage locker company. ... and gets caught.
The guy with the locker next to mine, fills his with drugs
Police put a crime scene tape around the entire facility and block my access to my stuff.
Police want to verify that there isn't any drugs in my locker.
I think you missed the best part.
Police confiscates drugs along with your stuff and the contents of every other locker in the facility
You are invited to sue them and prove that your stuff is yours and is acquired legally. But you are (probably) never getting your things back if you just wait.
Or is this aiming to legally protect doctors who are assisting patients?
And Obama, plucky Senator from Illinois, railed against the program.
Until he became president.
Merely three days after being sworn in, the tune changed,
I think the explanation is obvious
There is a black book at the oval office that explains why the world will end if the people are not watched by a benign dictator that knows what's best. Obama read that manual right after being sworn in and was compelled to switch his position.
Either that or Obama cynically lied to his supporters throughout his entire campaign.
Actually you do for cloud services. Read the contracts that Google has....so the government can argue you don't have any expectation of property rights if you waive them with the cloud carrier.
Huh? I haven't read the contract with google, but do you really relinquish your rights to data??
I assume the contract says that they are not liable if they lose your data and that you should have backups, but I would be surprised if the ToS actually said that Google can take your data (copy it and deny you access) and use it for something else whenever they feel like it.
storing said data on hard drives owned and physically controlled by someone else, was ever YOURS.
What you are arguing here is that we live in the state of anarchy? So the stuff I have in the bank safe-deposit box is not mine either because a 3rd party controls it? Because I think it is and access to it still requires a warrant.
I realize that government _could_ get access to things you do not physically control, but then they can also access data that you physically control, too. They just need a warrant, oddly enough.
I believe warrantless wire taping started under Bush....*eye roll*
But this is certainly the first one someone claims you lose your rights to data by placing it with an external providers
I am sure that companies that provide storage lockers are watching this with interest. Next, on suspicion of drugs, seize the entire local U-Store branch... Or the entire contents of bank safebox room. And let the owners come forward and sue to recover if they can prove them own their stuff legally. (and imagine there was a car analogy somewhere in there)
And...WHY is this bad exactly? I've had friends and relatives go through arbitration and frankly the corps ended up settling for MORE than they asked for
One reason -- arbitration is not a service provided by magical fairies. Arbitrators are both chosen by and paid for by the corporation. If that's not a problem, then I don't know what is. How can a glaring conflict of interest NOT be a problem?
Your single data point notwithstanding, arbitrators that rule in favor of the plaintiff too often get replaced by other arbitrators. Maybe your friends/relatives that got "more then they asked for" were the last business that their particular arbitrator ever got.
I currently run an open wireless SSID as a guest connection and I am not concerned with being sued. Here in the UK, I don't think the law has yet been tested that you are held liable for someone else's actions.
Here, in the US (several years ago), my roommate had received a threat letter for downloading a movie soundtrack. Her options were
a. Go to court and pay who knows how much money
b. Settle and pay 3K-5K right away
She took option b. Fortunately, she was the one downloading the soundtrack -- but she obviously didn't have to be. Even with a protected router, it was a total of 3 roommate students living in the apartment (and there is only one cable hookup, so separate internet account was not really an option). I have no idea why my OP was modded funny.
If I were designing a security system for TSA, I would definitely consider printing a (possibly fake) screening status in the barcode in plain text. If you keep a database of what status you assigned to which boarding ticket, then you can more thoroughly screen (or arrest and jail indefinitely) anyone who changes the easily hackable obvious screening status on their boarding pass.
This is an interesting point, but what does any of this have to do with catching terrorists? Now TSA will detain people who mess with barcodes and claim them to be terrorists?
To extend your line of thought -- If _I_ were designing a security system for TSA (an organization that has never caught a terrorist on its own accord), I too would make up an easily game-able system so that TSA can actually arrest some people and then trump such arrests as success and therefore request more funding.
It would be a lot cheaper and just as efficient to go back to pre-9-11 security and invest in an "anti-terrorism rock" for contractors (if contractors must be funded by this).