Good lord. 32 hours a week for 80% of the pay would be a dream job. Likewise, a spouse with a similar schedule would be amazing. More time with family and friends and so forth. Obviously, it all depends on how much money you make to begin with (minimum wage workers barely get by working 60 hours a week in some cases, for example), but if I could do it, I certainly would.
In college, one of my engineering professors and her husband both worked full-time until they had children. Then the husband - also an engineer - left his high paying job to work for the county part-time and do consulting on the side. He told me a couple of years later that it was the best decision he ever could have done and improved his quality of life considerably. He ended up working a quarter of the hours of his old job for roughly half the pay, could work mostly from home, and got to be with his kids.
Honestly, I'd love to teach (on the university level) at some point down the road in my career, in part for similar reasons.
I gave myself a nasty slice on the hand a few years back that was bleeding a lot and wouldn't stop. I didn't have much around me at the time to help. I had heard that cayenne pepper works as a reasonable astringent to staunch bleeding, so I poured it all over the wound and applied pressure. *&%!(*%!@ Worked like a charm (very fast!) but it was *horribly* painful for a few minutes.
Slavery was commonplace in many, if not most, cultures for the first, oh, 5000 years of civilization, from indentured servitude to wholly-owned human beings. England didn't abolish slavery until the Abolition of Slavery Act of 1833. The USA followed suit in 1863 - a bare 30 years later - with Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation and subsequent laws. Note that the Emancipation proclamation only terminated slavery in the states at war with the North; there were border states that were loyal to the North which still had slavery technically legal. So while it may be morally reprehensible to both of us - and certainly to many people then, or there never would have been abolitionist movements - there was no abuse of 'traditional' (common law) principals in any sense, nor violation of positive statutory or constitutional provisions. In fact, some cultures open practiced slavery into the beginning of the 20th century, and it still exists clandestinely in parts of the world.
Now, Justice Thomas of the US Supreme Court alone believes that the Declaration of Independence and the Preamble to the Constitution should basically the force of law, although nearly everyone else thinks the words are merely aspirational. I tend to agree with Justice Thomas on this; there is just something powerful and basic about "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal..." Under his interpretation, I think he might say that, as a technical, textual matter, we abolished slavery the moment we severed our ties to England.
You can't infringe an expired patent. However, under US contract law (which covers licenses in general), you can agree to just about anything. The government and courts have swayed back and forth over the years about where the line is drawn as to what you can't agree to, for public safety, health, welfare, etc. Obviously, the RIAA, et al, say that buying and/or using the recording in this case means that you implicitly agree to their license.
There have been a number of patent cases that have apparently contradictory results. While the courts consider it patent abuse/misuse to "extend a monopoly beyond the term of the patent," they aren't always clear as to what that means. I read an opinion by Judge Posner in which he felt that royalty payments beyond the term of the patent, for example, only affected when you would receive your money and had basically nothing to do with extending the monopoly. (E.g., I have a patent due to expire in 17 years. I offer you the use of my patent if you pay me royalties for the next 100 years. Judge Posner's position is that that is okay. You wouldn't have agreed to the contract if you didn't think you'd profit from it, your royalties would be discounted by knowing the patent would expire, or whatever. Chicago school of law & economics at work.) I disagree with Posner.
You can give the potential infringer notice that you have a patent application pending that covers their 'invention.' If they don't stop once you give notice, then you can collect 'reasonable royalties' from the time of your notice to them until your patent actually issues - if your patent issues. (What in the world would be 'reasonable royalties' in this case, btw? Damned if I know.) After it the patent issues, you have the normal patent remedies. Damages + a permanent injunction (which is thankfully not certain anymore. The Federal Circuit has actually been using the SCOTUS' guidelines in last year's eBay case and not automagically granting injunctive relief.)
>>Most people don't confuse copyright infringement (copying an album off a friend/taping a song or tv show off the tv/photocopying a map when they're going to visit someone/using a 'pirate' copy of a program at home) with physically stealing someone's wallet/purse etc, nor do they tend of think of it as morally wrong. >>
You know, I used to think that exact thing. I still hope you are correct. However, in the past two weeks, I have talked to two unrelated lay-individuals who *do indeed* feel that copyright infringement is exactly the same as physical theft, and equally morally repugnant. I could not convince them otherwise, not with historical, rational,or emotive argument. The notion of a natural law "right" to "intellectual property" in perpetuity seems to be creeping into the general populace and it scares the ever-loving crap out of me.
Oh, you can get into some really deep philosophical discussions on the nature of property. In the US, for example, each State generally determines what property is and who can own what, etc. Obviously, they typically accept what was considered private property at Common Law at the time of the American Revolution, which in turn came about through centuries of development between "what I can grab and keep others away from by sword-point" and "what the King allows me to have". Obviously, Locke began to figure in later on too.
Lockean property rights basically come down to "What I earned is mine, and I can do whatever I want with it." And that concept works pretty well with material goods. Resources are scarce and finite. If you give that finite resource to someone else, you're deprived of it and the labor you put into it.
So called "intellectual property" doesn't fit the bill. Once the resource is "created" (e.g., thought up and put into practice), it is essentially unlimited and infinite, subject only to marginal costs to implement it (such as printing a book). Giving the resource to someone else doesn't deprive the original person of the resource either; once you have an idea, you don't lose it. What's more, once someone else has it, you can't deprive them of the idea. It makes it difficult to put the same restraints on IP as real property.
The current (majority) trend - in legal thought and implementation - is to treat IP basically as a Lockean Natural Right, which governments just codify as positive law. I personally reject that notion out of hand. (And for us Americans, I think Thomas Jefferson is probably turning over in his grave at the state of IP.) I agree wholeheartedly that IP is nothing more than an artificial government-sanctioned market monopoly, of often dubious quality, applicability, and duration.
I believe in giving incentives to create and rewards for creating, but the modern IP system fails to protect that most essential element: the public interest.
I too have a landline as a phone+DSL package. However, I'd ditch the phone service if I could. There's only one telco out here in the boonies and they gouge us like you wouldn't believe. ($35/mo for *basic* phone service, no long distance, for example.) I finally broke down and got a cellphone too. Not because I wanted one, but because I couldn't call anyone from my landline anymore. Everyone has a cell, so everyone is "long distance" to my landline.
Worse, mobile phone service out here is non-existent from anyone but Verizon, and even then, it's analog service half the time. This is rural Ohio we're talking about, not the middle of the badlands.
I'm not arguing that the documents doesn't need interpretation, I'm just arguing to what degree. The historical judicial interpretation of the 11th amendment, for example, is arguably contrary to the plain reading of the text. "Between a state and a citizen of another state" has been construed to include a person and their own state.
The US Constitution is one of the briefest and most broadly written of such documents in the world, and thus necessitates more interpretation. The downside is that it gives the party in power even more power to dictate the interpretation of the document. ("Animal Farm" is the worst-case scenario.) I'm a big fan of Justice Black in many ways, as I like his "interpretation" of the first amendment.
"All I am doing is following what to me is the clear wording of the First Amendment that "Congress shall make no law... abridg[ing] the freedom of speech or of the press." These words follow Madison's admonition that there are some powers the people did not mean the federal government to have at all. As I have said innumerable times before, I simply believe that "Congress shall make no law" means Congress shall make no law." Is he 'interpreting'? Clearly so, he says as much, but He isn't reading in to the words what isn't there. "Congress shall make no law [except when we feel like it, such as with the Alien and Sedition Acts]"
I, for one, don't buy in to the 'living' document idea. It is too wishy-washy for me. While I believe the courts need leeway to interpret and enforce the laws, I am a textualist at heart. What the Constitution says should be the law, not what people say it says. Where there is ambiguity or just a plain lack of subject matter covered, the solution should be to amend the document, not construe it far beyond the original wording. The fact that the US Constitution is hard as heck to amend is another matter in iteself.
An epic example of "interpretation" is the Roe v. Wade decision. Regardless of which camp you fall into, the Opinion is a horribly written hodgepodge of judicial interpretation. The way the Commerce Clause has been used to vastly expand the powers of the Federal government in the 20th centurty is another example.
I don't think it's ever too late to do something new. One of my professors related a story about a student of his that just died at age 94. The man worked a full career, retired at age 60, and decided to go to law school. He got a job as an attorney for a nearby city and worked literally until the day he died, because he enjoyed it and didn't like being idle. The man worked *a whole second 30 year career* after putting in 38 years in his first career.
As an engineer currently in law school, I'm something of the reverse (although I feel I'm 'adding law' rather than 'leaving science'). They're just different mindsets.
In a related note, it was this article in Discover magazine back in the day that influenced my decision to go into engineering. It's a shame we've never seen anything come of it.
Well, the only time I ever get them (or any headache, really) is when I don't have breakfast, so my solution is just to eat:-) I've missed breakfast perhaps five times in the past 10 years. Good to know though and I appreciate it.
Most days it's a bowl of cereal (typically Raisin Bran or Frosted Shredded Wheat), a banana, and a nice big glass or two of tea, typically green. In the wintertime, it's hot oatmeal or cream of wheat. If I have a lot to do that day, or an exam, or whatnot, I'll get up a bit earlier and make a couple of eggs, whole grain toast with peanut butter, yogurt, etc. Brain food.
Breakfast has never been optional for me. Not only do I not like to be hungry, if I haven't had something of substance to eat within a couple of hours of waking up, I typically get a horrible splitting headache that lasts all day and which doesn't respond to analgesics. (No, it's not the caffeine. I can go days without tea - I just won't be happy about it.)
>> Most skilled trades (law, medicine) have secondary post-college programs entirely on top of arbitrary undergraduate degrees. It's a shame in a way that engineering gets crammed in with everything else; I think the secondary programs confer more respect on the people that go through them -- and a higher salary. If you had to get a Degree of Engineering on top of your undergraduate degree of choice, maybe engineers would have the respect they (IMNSHO) deserve. >>
An interesting & appealing idea, and you're surely right for law about any arbitrary degree being sufficient, but medicine isn't so arbitrary. I'm willing to be 95% of med students were biology or chemistry majors (of all flavors) - they had to do well on the MCATs after all. Similarly, if Engineering were post-grad only, I think the selection pool would be effectively reduced to say, physicists and mathematicians, which is an even more limited group.
As far as real-world observations go, I'm an engineer who is currently enjoying law school. My dentist was an Astronomy major. And q fair number of the engineers with whom I graduated are idiots who couldn't think themselves out of a box, but who are great at following direction.:-)
Fahrenheit changed his calibration points several times, eventually arriving at 32 for freezing and 212 for boiling water. Why? They are "polar opposites" of 180 degrees. That also meant that "blood temperature" fell at around 96 on the scale instead of the intended 100 degree. Oh well. I've used metric for scientific/engineering things for the past, oh, 15 years, but I still prefer the Fahrenheit scale for actual ambient temperature perception.
>>Consider that even if an artist was the last of his bloodline, owned all his copyrights, and did not will those rights to anyone, you still couldn't copy any of his works for however long Disney decided they should be extended.
IANAL, but I think that'd be untrue under a couple of legal theories at least:
First, if she had no heirs at all (including parents, siblings, cousins, etc.) then her property would escheat to the State. The practical effect of which (I believe - I haven't researched it) would be to put the work in the public domain. I have no idea if anyone has done any work with this area, but it'd be fun thing to try...
Next, if the copyright is in limbo and no one seems to have any rights to it, it would probably be considered an Orphaned Work. There have been Bills recently in Congress to clarify and codify the status of such works, but none have passed yet (that I know of.) The Copyright Office was soliciting advice from the public on what should be done last year. ( http://www.copyright.gov/fedreg/2005/70fr3739.html ). I personally opined that they should go into the public domain, possibly with a grace period to allow for a lost author to suddenly show up before it becomes public property*.
*I admit my anti-copyright bias, but I don't think this is unfair. If you want your work to be protected, you should have to put a notice of copyright within the work, as under the old system. And you should have up to a year or so to decide you want to do that (to prevent people copying your expression.) Beyond that, it's public - period.
Hmmm. In both undergrad (private, 3k students) and grad school (state, 25k students), I had any number of upper-level classes with between 6-12 students*. I'm in law school now, and in a couple of my (admittedly more specialized) second-year courses, there are 6-8 students. And yes, profs do tend to have 3-4 classes each per term.
*Electrical, Computer, and Nuclear engineering classes
Bravo and likewise. My day-to-day watch is a 17J 1911 Hamilton pocket watch - runs like a dream. I have a couple of other that I've been meaning to fix up and tune, but just haven't had the time yet. It's really true that "they don't make them like that anymore." I love to show people the beautiful craftsmanship of the gearings, etc.
Also, IIRC, she just wanted McDonalds to cover her medical expenses (because her insurance company was being difficult) and indeed it was her insurance company who asked for so much more money (since under her policy, there was a [very common] subrogation clause removing her right to sue and giving it to them.)
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Good lord. 32 hours a week for 80% of the pay would be a dream job. Likewise, a spouse with a similar schedule would be amazing. More time with family and friends and so forth. Obviously, it all depends on how much money you make to begin with (minimum wage workers barely get by working 60 hours a week in some cases, for example), but if I could do it, I certainly would.
In college, one of my engineering professors and her husband both worked full-time until they had children. Then the husband - also an engineer - left his high paying job to work for the county part-time and do consulting on the side. He told me a couple of years later that it was the best decision he ever could have done and improved his quality of life considerably. He ended up working a quarter of the hours of his old job for roughly half the pay, could work mostly from home, and got to be with his kids.
Honestly, I'd love to teach (on the university level) at some point down the road in my career, in part for similar reasons.
I gave myself a nasty slice on the hand a few years back that was bleeding a lot and wouldn't stop. I didn't have much around me at the time to help. I had heard that cayenne pepper works as a reasonable astringent to staunch bleeding, so I poured it all over the wound and applied pressure. *&%!(*%!@ Worked like a charm (very fast!) but it was *horribly* painful for a few minutes.
Slavery was commonplace in many, if not most, cultures for the first, oh, 5000 years of civilization, from indentured servitude to wholly-owned human beings. England didn't abolish slavery until the Abolition of Slavery Act of 1833. The USA followed suit in 1863 - a bare 30 years later - with Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation and subsequent laws. Note that the Emancipation proclamation only terminated slavery in the states at war with the North; there were border states that were loyal to the North which still had slavery technically legal. So while it may be morally reprehensible to both of us - and certainly to many people then, or there never would have been abolitionist movements - there was no abuse of 'traditional' (common law) principals in any sense, nor violation of positive statutory or constitutional provisions. In fact, some cultures open practiced slavery into the beginning of the 20th century, and it still exists clandestinely in parts of the world.
Now, Justice Thomas of the US Supreme Court alone believes that the Declaration of Independence and the Preamble to the Constitution should basically the force of law, although nearly everyone else thinks the words are merely aspirational. I tend to agree with Justice Thomas on this; there is just something powerful and basic about "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal..."
Under his interpretation, I think he might say that, as a technical, textual matter, we abolished slavery the moment we severed our ties to England.
You can't infringe an expired patent. However, under US contract law (which covers licenses in general), you can agree to just about anything. The government and courts have swayed back and forth over the years about where the line is drawn as to what you can't agree to, for public safety, health, welfare, etc. Obviously, the RIAA, et al, say that buying and/or using the recording in this case means that you implicitly agree to their license.
There have been a number of patent cases that have apparently contradictory results. While the courts consider it patent abuse/misuse to "extend a monopoly beyond the term of the patent," they aren't always clear as to what that means. I read an opinion by Judge Posner in which he felt that royalty payments beyond the term of the patent, for example, only affected when you would receive your money and had basically nothing to do with extending the monopoly. (E.g., I have a patent due to expire in 17 years. I offer you the use of my patent if you pay me royalties for the next 100 years. Judge Posner's position is that that is okay. You wouldn't have agreed to the contract if you didn't think you'd profit from it, your royalties would be discounted by knowing the patent would expire, or whatever. Chicago school of law & economics at work.) I disagree with Posner.
You can give the potential infringer notice that you have a patent application pending that covers their 'invention.' If they don't stop once you give notice, then you can collect 'reasonable royalties' from the time of your notice to them until your patent actually issues - if your patent issues. (What in the world would be 'reasonable royalties' in this case, btw? Damned if I know.) After it the patent issues, you have the normal patent remedies. Damages + a permanent injunction (which is thankfully not certain anymore. The Federal Circuit has actually been using the SCOTUS' guidelines in last year's eBay case and not automagically granting injunctive relief.)
Thank you! Some of these comments just make me shake my head in wonderment and abject horror...
>>Most people don't confuse copyright infringement (copying an album off a friend/taping a song or tv show off the tv/photocopying a map when they're going to visit someone/using a 'pirate' copy of a program at home) with physically stealing someone's wallet/purse etc, nor do they tend of think of it as morally wrong.
>>
You know, I used to think that exact thing. I still hope you are correct. However, in the past two weeks, I have talked to two unrelated lay-individuals who *do indeed* feel that copyright infringement is exactly the same as physical theft, and equally morally repugnant. I could not convince them otherwise, not with historical, rational,or emotive argument. The notion of a natural law "right" to "intellectual property" in perpetuity seems to be creeping into the general populace and it scares the ever-loving crap out of me.
I was going to make some amusing quip about that...but then again, I'm a libertarian who believes in completely nationalizing the power grid.
Oh, you can get into some really deep philosophical discussions on the nature of property. In the US, for example, each State generally determines what property is and who can own what, etc. Obviously, they typically accept what was considered private property at Common Law at the time of the American Revolution, which in turn came about through centuries of development between "what I can grab and keep others away from by sword-point" and "what the King allows me to have". Obviously, Locke began to figure in later on too.
Lockean property rights basically come down to "What I earned is mine, and I can do whatever I want with it." And that concept works pretty well with material goods. Resources are scarce and finite. If you give that finite resource to someone else, you're deprived of it and the labor you put into it.
So called "intellectual property" doesn't fit the bill. Once the resource is "created" (e.g., thought up and put into practice), it is essentially unlimited and infinite, subject only to marginal costs to implement it (such as printing a book). Giving the resource to someone else doesn't deprive the original person of the resource either; once you have an idea, you don't lose it. What's more, once someone else has it, you can't deprive them of the idea. It makes it difficult to put the same restraints on IP as real property.
Thomas Jefferson's letter to Isaac McPhearson is a nice, short read that highlights the 'pecuiar nature' of ideas.
The current (majority) trend - in legal thought and implementation - is to treat IP basically as a Lockean Natural Right, which governments just codify as positive law. I personally reject that notion out of hand. (And for us Americans, I think Thomas Jefferson is probably turning over in his grave at the state of IP.) I agree wholeheartedly that IP is nothing more than an artificial government-sanctioned market monopoly, of often dubious quality, applicability, and duration.
I believe in giving incentives to create and rewards for creating, but the modern IP system fails to protect that most essential element: the public interest.
I too have a landline as a phone+DSL package. However, I'd ditch the phone service if I could. There's only one telco out here in the boonies and they gouge us like you wouldn't believe. ($35/mo for *basic* phone service, no long distance, for example.) I finally broke down and got a cellphone too. Not because I wanted one, but because I couldn't call anyone from my landline anymore. Everyone has a cell, so everyone is "long distance" to my landline.
Worse, mobile phone service out here is non-existent from anyone but Verizon, and even then, it's analog service half the time. This is rural Ohio we're talking about, not the middle of the badlands.
"Between a state and a citizen of another state" has been construed to include a person and their own state.
The US Constitution is one of the briefest and most broadly written of such documents in the world, and thus necessitates more interpretation. The downside is that it gives the party in power even more power to dictate the interpretation of the document. ("Animal Farm" is the worst-case scenario.) I'm a big fan of Justice Black in many ways, as I like his "interpretation" of the first amendment. "All I am doing is following what to me is the clear wording of the First Amendment that "Congress shall make no law
I, for one, don't buy in to the 'living' document idea. It is too wishy-washy for me. While I believe the courts need leeway to interpret and enforce the laws, I am a textualist at heart. What the Constitution says should be the law, not what people say it says. Where there is ambiguity or just a plain lack of subject matter covered, the solution should be to amend the document, not construe it far beyond the original wording. The fact that the US Constitution is hard as heck to amend is another matter in iteself.
An epic example of "interpretation" is the Roe v. Wade decision. Regardless of which camp you fall into, the Opinion is a horribly written hodgepodge of judicial interpretation.
The way the Commerce Clause has been used to vastly expand the powers of the Federal government in the 20th centurty is another example.
Are things any better in Civil Law nations?
I don't think it's ever too late to do something new. One of my professors related a story about a student of his that just died at age 94. The man worked a full career, retired at age 60, and decided to go to law school. He got a job as an attorney for a nearby city and worked literally until the day he died, because he enjoyed it and didn't like being idle. The man worked *a whole second 30 year career* after putting in 38 years in his first career.
As an engineer currently in law school, I'm something of the reverse (although I feel I'm 'adding law' rather than 'leaving science'). They're just different mindsets.
Likewise, the research reactor at NC State http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=en&q=raleigh,+n c&ie=UTF8&z=19&ll=35.785763,-78.668804&spn=0.00221 7,0.005107&t=k&om=1 is unblurred.
:-)
This thread is inspiring a list of nuclear reactor satellite images. Probably not the best thing
Home flywheels. I used to have some much better links bookmarked, but here's what a quick google search turned up:
http://home.earthlink.net/~fradella/homepage.htm
In a related note, it was this article in Discover magazine back in the day that influenced my decision to go into engineering. It's a shame we've never seen anything come of it.
Well, the only time I ever get them (or any headache, really) is when I don't have breakfast, so my solution is just to eat :-)
I've missed breakfast perhaps five times in the past 10 years. Good to know though and I appreciate it.
Most days it's a bowl of cereal (typically Raisin Bran or Frosted Shredded Wheat), a banana, and a nice big glass or two of tea, typically green. In the wintertime, it's hot oatmeal or cream of wheat.
If I have a lot to do that day, or an exam, or whatnot, I'll get up a bit earlier and make a couple of eggs, whole grain toast with peanut butter, yogurt, etc. Brain food.
Breakfast has never been optional for me. Not only do I not like to be hungry, if I haven't had something of substance to eat within a couple of hours of waking up, I typically get a horrible splitting headache that lasts all day and which doesn't respond to analgesics. (No, it's not the caffeine. I can go days without tea - I just won't be happy about it.)
>> Most skilled trades (law, medicine) have secondary post-college programs entirely on top of arbitrary undergraduate degrees. It's a shame in a way that engineering gets crammed in with everything else; I think the secondary programs confer more respect on the people that go through them -- and a higher salary. If you had to get a Degree of Engineering on top of your undergraduate degree of choice, maybe engineers would have the respect they (IMNSHO) deserve.
:-)
>>
An interesting & appealing idea, and you're surely right for law about any arbitrary degree being sufficient, but medicine isn't so arbitrary. I'm willing to be 95% of med students were biology or chemistry majors (of all flavors) - they had to do well on the MCATs after all. Similarly, if Engineering were post-grad only, I think the selection pool would be effectively reduced to say, physicists and mathematicians, which is an even more limited group.
As far as real-world observations go, I'm an engineer who is currently enjoying law school. My dentist was an Astronomy major. And q fair number of the engineers with whom I graduated are idiots who couldn't think themselves out of a box, but who are great at following direction.
Fahrenheit changed his calibration points several times, eventually arriving at 32 for freezing and 212 for boiling water. Why? They are "polar opposites" of 180 degrees. That also meant that "blood temperature" fell at around 96 on the scale instead of the intended 100 degree. Oh well. I've used metric for scientific/engineering things for the past, oh, 15 years, but I still prefer the Fahrenheit scale for actual ambient temperature perception.
>>Consider that even if an artist was the last of his bloodline, owned all his copyrights, and did not will those rights to anyone, you still couldn't copy any of his works for however long Disney decided they should be extended.
l ). I personally opined that they should go into the public domain, possibly with a grace period to allow for a lost author to suddenly show up before it becomes public property*.
IANAL, but I think that'd be untrue under a couple of legal theories at least:
First, if she had no heirs at all (including parents, siblings, cousins, etc.) then her property would escheat to the State. The practical effect of which (I believe - I haven't researched it) would be to put the work in the public domain. I have no idea if anyone has done any work with this area, but it'd be fun thing to try...
Next, if the copyright is in limbo and no one seems to have any rights to it, it would probably be considered an Orphaned Work. There have been Bills recently in Congress to clarify and codify the status of such works, but none have passed yet (that I know of.) The Copyright Office was soliciting advice from the public on what should be done last year. ( http://www.copyright.gov/fedreg/2005/70fr3739.htm
*I admit my anti-copyright bias, but I don't think this is unfair. If you want your work to be protected, you should have to put a notice of copyright within the work, as under the old system. And you should have up to a year or so to decide you want to do that (to prevent people copying your expression.) Beyond that, it's public - period.
>>and I have some of the earliest ever DVD releases, which are ten years old now.
Man. Has it really been that long? I got my first DVD player in 1997 and...holy crap...you're right.
Now I'm feeling old.
Hmmm. In both undergrad (private, 3k students) and grad school (state, 25k students), I had any number of upper-level classes with between 6-12 students*. I'm in law school now, and in a couple of my (admittedly more specialized) second-year courses, there are 6-8 students. And yes, profs do tend to have 3-4 classes each per term.
*Electrical, Computer, and Nuclear engineering classes
Bravo and likewise. My day-to-day watch is a 17J 1911 Hamilton pocket watch - runs like a dream. I have a couple of other that I've been meaning to fix up and tune, but just haven't had the time yet. It's really true that "they don't make them like that anymore." I love to show people the beautiful craftsmanship of the gearings, etc.
Also, IIRC, she just wanted McDonalds to cover her medical expenses (because her insurance company was being difficult) and indeed it was her insurance company who asked for so much more money (since under her policy, there was a [very common] subrogation clause removing her right to sue and giving it to them.)