I can't think of anyone who couldn't find a job with a different work schedule.
In the US, we currently have a large number of people who can't find a job with ANY work schedule, so I think it might be a bit harder to find another job with reasonable pay in your field with a different work schedule than you think. If it were easy, those jobs would already be taken by those who don't have any job.
All that means is that rather than going to work at 9:00 AM PST, I'd be doing to work at 17:00 GMT, which would be of no benefit at all to most people.
And more significant, if anyone from anyplace else in the world wanted to call you at work, they'd have to know that where you work normal hours are 1700 GMT through 0100 GMT. How do you tell them this version of "normal workday"? Hmmm, the easy way is to tell them... a TIMEZONE where you work. Instead of telling everyone a different offset depending on where THEY work, you tell them your offset from GMT, they know their offset from GMT, and they figure it out. Yes, that "offset" can be as simple as -0500 or whatever, but that's not significantly different than saying "Eastern Standard Time".
No, while there are reasons to use UTC for some things, there are still reasons to have timezones.
... and one patch to get rid of the stupid system on computers.
One patch to find them, and in the darkness bind them? Really? The same patch for my desktop CentOS5 here will patch my SGI O2 running IRIS 6.5 and my multiple embedded RPis and the systems I have in other remote sites? Cool. It won't make them invisible, too, will it?
so there is always the potential for ongoing maintenance to time code anyway.
The potential for code changes does not mean that the effort is "literally zero" to make those changes. That's all I'm saying. One patch PER SYSTEM when we're talking about a huge number of systems is still a large effort.
but so it would be that much easier to deal with other timezones, so I don't have to look at clocks that are an hour off if I forget to reset them, etc.
Other timezones will still exist, and you'll still have clocks that are an hour off if you forget to set them NOT to automatically switch to DST...
If you get jet lagged by a one hour change in time, you should see a doctor. It shouldn't have such a significant effect on you.
Congress changed the DST dates in 2005 (effective 2007), so ending DST wouldn't be any worse than that.
"Wouldn't be any worse than" is a far cry from "literally zero effort", isn't it? I lived through the last change, and I'm still finding systems that didn't get changed (just this last Monday, for instance). I didn't say it was impossible to do, just that it isn't zero effort.
Indeed, but there's literally about zero effort to just not fall back. This is low hanging fruit on the pain-in-the-ass fruit tree.
Except for changes to every computer, embedded or otherwise, that would normally "fall back" and thus have the wrong time for half the year, there is zero effort involved. If you have zero responsibility for maintaining anything, yes, there's zero effort.
It would be somewhat less effort to fall back one more time and then stay there, since it is somewhat easier to set up systems to stay on standard time year-round than to stay on daylight saving time.
Yes, but it doesn't meet the dimensions required to qualify as carry on.
I have yet to see any airline prohibit someone from carrying something on that would fit somewhere, even if it doesn't fit inside the cage they have showing allowable dimensions. Most of the bags I see marketed as carryon are larger than the limits. I don't recall any of them ever actually enforcing the "one carryon and one personal item" rule, either.
I haven't even seen many cases of them enforcing a limit on truly oversize (larger than the overhead height in every dimension so it absolutely won't fit in the overhead no matter how much you push) bags. Mostly they let you try if you want, and then force you to gate check it after you fail.
If you are nice to the waitresses, they'll even sometimes allow you to stow long things (like garment bags or hockey sticks) in the closet instead of the overhead.
It is interesting how you pick and choose what you consider a "qualification"
Unlike you picking and choosing?
how about the fact that she barely had a BS in communications from the University of Idaho in Moscow versus his BA in political science from Columbia and a JD magna cum laude from Harvard?
How about the fact that she had one piece of paper and he had two (or three or a hundred), in a forum where the common feeling is that educational degrees aren't the full story about someone's qualifications to do something? Where did the requirement for someone to have a legal degree to be vice president come from?
Like I said, the number of previous OJT for VP makes any sudden requirement for strict (educational) requirements seem rather silly. Or simply arbitrary.
if you dismiss his academic qualifications either as unrelated or worse some sort of conspiracy theory,
I see what you did there. Tried to put words in my mouth. Deal with what I said. The insults that Palin had to go through were serious and irrelevant and patently absurd. You're trying to continue them now by ignoring the meaning of the comment.
I don't see anyone else mentioning those points here, but since you brought them up "lipstick on a pig" is nothign but fauxrage given the how McCain himself used the phrase a year prior with respect to Clinton's health care proposal.
You see no difference between using that insult towards a proposed law and towards a woman (a human being)? Wow. You have no concept of the difference between discussing an idea and insulting the person. I see how far you will go to smear someone you don't like.
Palin is the one who put them in the spot light, you can't run around using them as positive PR material and the whine when they get used as negative PR material.
mmm. Sascha and Malia ring a bell? Do you say the same thing when people point out the political mileage being made from them, or do you just try to label them as "conspiracy theorists" like you did with me?
If you graciously admit that indeed Obama's academic qualifications vastly exceeded Palin's and that they reflect strongly on their respective levels of competence, then we might actually have a meeting of the minds.
Yes, if I agree with your opinion on his qualifications we will have a meeting of the minds. And I have to agree "graciously", to boot. Can you not look at what you wrote and see where it fails any reasonable discussion standards?
Not sure what your point is here. You're all over the map.
Pretty simple. You are upset that a business used "your money" to do something you didn't agree with, and you stopped doing business with them because they did that. I asked if they had the same right to refuse to do business with you for something you do that they don't agree with, and you said that it was moot whether you chose not to do business with them or them with you.
Why is turnabout not fair play? Why is it "your money" long after you've paid for something they provided to you?
Refusing to do business based on a protected class is illegal,
Yes, I know. That's what I told you. Is the refusal to do business with you for irrelevant reasons still moot? Is the law wrong? Why do you have a choice and they have none?
As a business I cannot refuse service to homosexual Chinese Jew,
Why not? If you can refuse to buy things from a homosexual Chinese Jew, why should they be forced to sell anything to you? This is a serious question. Fair is fair. Unfair is unfair. In this particular case, we're talking about an ice cream store. It's not like a refusal to sell ice cream to you would really do you any harm. They're not the only food store in an 83 mile radius. You won't starve when they turn you away.
As for marriage, "basic human rights" is probably an exaggeration.
I agree.
I'm open to a better description.
Hmm. It's a label. Those who want to apply it to gay unions don't really care about the label, do they? They want the legal status. That's the emphasis of every political ad regarding ballot initiatives I've seen. "My life mate is in the hospital and I can't visit him" is just one example. That's a legal status issue. So, I'd say "marriage" in this context (as a label) is a convenience.
Now, before you click that reply link, read this. I have absolutely no problem with modifying the law as necessary to grant any two people the same legal rights and responsibilities that traditional marriage conveys. None at all. Put it on the ballot, I'll vote for it. You don't want the religious claptrap that goes with marriage, fine. Civil unions give you exactly what you want. There is no reason other than spite to demand that every civil union be called 'marriage' too, especially since the common refrain is that 'marriage is just a piece of paper'. In fact, civil union laws were created specifically to deal with people who didn't want the religious part of marriage but wanted the legal status. It seems like a no-brainer to extend that coverage from "two people of the opposite sex" to "any two people". It's not like those who have civil unions are going to care, are they?
I've asked many people I've met who are demanding "gay marriage" what they get from "gay marriage" that civil union wouldn't provide. The only answer they have is that civil unions aren't complete enough. Ok, I buy that. That's an argument to change the civil union laws. If they aren't complete enough to give two gay people enough legal status, then they probably aren't complete enough for anyone else and should be changed anyway. You've got to change some law somewhere, why not go after the law that is most specifically deficient? I can't get an answer to that. Usually, support for their attempts at getting legal equality results in the label 'homophobe" appearing somewhere. I fear you because I support your goal of equality before the law? Interesting.
But if you can't figure out why "social contract with certain legal ramifications" is different from a tax break or a zoning law from the viewpoint of a business then you probably don't understand why its absurd in the first place for a ice cream business or book writing business to even get involved in that sort of lawmaking.
And if you cannot understand that businesses are made up of people w
It won't fit under the seat in front of you or the overhead bin.
A hockey stick certainly would fit in an overhead bin, at least on any aircraft larger than the Embraer/CRJ types used by commuter and express operators.
You don't want to start that argument because you'll lose. She was qualified according to the Constitution, and running a state government is much better qualification for President than being a US Senator for a year or two, and she was only running for VP. The number of VPs who have been OJT makes strict claims for superior qualifications ridiculous.
Of course, you understood what I meant was the stuff like "lipstick on a pig" and the innuendo about her children and grandchild, but if you admitted that you'd miss a good chance at another cheap shot at her, right?
As for Leatherby's, whether they choose not to serve me or I choose not to buy from them because of a difference in views is moot.
Hmm. Would it still be moot if the difference in view was based on religion? "No Jews" ok? Sexual orientation? "No Gays"? Seems like I heard about some laws that prevent that. You support those laws or are they moot, too?
We're not talking about tax breaks or zoning laws, we're talking about basic human rights.
The latter is not a fact, it is an opinion. The right to be called "married" is specious. The right to legal protections is your best argument here, but it isn't just legal protections that are being sought.
They sing something else because it's more fun than every single restaurant singing that same song. In a way, it lets them distinguish themselves from others.
There is a valuable use for copyright lawsuits. If we could only find the owner of the copyright to the songs those Coldstone Creamery nits sing at the drop of a hat and have them sued until they stop that annoying practice...
I suspect that Coldstone owns the copyright. Sigh. Such a potential for good from the use of copyright law, such an abuse by Coldstone. (I don't know, do they still sing like that? I had it happen the first time I was in one and haven't gone back.)
The main problems with the legal system are that penalties completely outstrip harm and it is too costly to defend yourself. If I share out a music file and five people download it, I've caused about $5 worth of damage. (Assuming that each person who downloaded it would have purchased it. Perhaps not a fair assumption, but let's give it to them for a second.) However, were I sued, I could face a fine of between $750 and $150,000.
It is a reasonable feature of the legal system that there be not only a mitigation of damages component but an element of prevention as well. E.g., what if the only possible fine for copyright infringement was to simply pay the retail amount for what has been infringed? Well, it's clear from your statement -- people would think "at worst I have to pay for what I've taken, at best I pay nothing." What is really going to stop it from happening again? You wind up with, say, 1000 songs and you got caught five times. That's $5 for 1000 songs. A very good deal, I'd say.
Now say that you had those 1000 songs and got caught five times, but the fine was $1000 (for round numbers). $5000 for 1000 songs, not so good a deal. Maybe you're better off paying for them?
That's the same concept that applies to parking tickets. What do you think public parking would be like if the amount of the ticket for an expired meter was just a quarter? Nobody would pay the meter, they'd park all day and pay a quarter every day they got ticketed. Essentially free parking. Imagine handicap parking. A grocery store parking lot full of free spaces and a few handicap spaces. Well, the cost of parking normally is zero, so the ticket for parking in a handicap space (at cost) would be zero. There is absolutely no incentive to obey the law. But make a parking ticket be $25, handicap violation $300. That's incentive to obey the law.
Fix the legal system and I would have no problem with lawsuits against those who infringe copyright.
I'm not sure what fixes are possible that would resolve the issues you listed with the system. Even if you make it possible for the plaintiff in such a case to have much better evidence before they can file, you still have to pay legal fees, they can still drop the suit partway through, and they will always have much deeper pockets than you. Even if you somehow manage to get a system where defendants get free legal counsel for any lawsuit, civil or criminal, you'd still be losing a huge amount of time defending yourself, and you'd just be pushing the cost of lawsuits out onto everyone else through much higher taxes.
It would seem the only legal system that would fix the problems is no legal system at all. But then, your argument would be "I would support a legal system that isn't a legal system", and that's not a very productive discussion to have.
I am under the impression that this system does go after people who 'share', rather than those who download.
Since the alert system triggers on the agents downloading copyrighted material to make the determination that it is infringing, then yes, it is going after sharing and not simply downloading. Those agents cannot determine what other people who are connected to a server are downloading, much less who is connected. They can only see what the server is handing out.
So, if you don't want to be caught by this, don't serve copyright material.
Yes, I'm sure that it could be extended to downloads in the future,
Theoretically, the *AA can set up honeypots so they can determine who is downloading what, but at that point I would expect there to be a reasonable defense that "I assumed that if you were serving it you had authority to do so". This defense doesn't work for servers, since they know they don't have the authority to distribute.
... I think we can agree that if I somehow pressured the FBI into going around and taking DNA samples of all my neighbor's dogs and then threatening them with fines well in excess of their lifetime earning potential, we could agree that I was getting disproportionate government assistance on my private matter, even though that private matter could leverage reasonable government support like getting the local police involved with minor fines and a warning.
If you could somehow manage to elevate this neighbor's violations to interstate issues (does his dog cross a state line to crap in your yard?) or to federal law violations (does his dog crap small baggies of cocaine or remnants of human bodies, or full sized illegal aliens?) then you'd have a matter for the FBI and they would have jurisdiction. Copyright is federal law, and the copies probably cross state lines at some point. Just as the FBI doesn't have a "dog crapping on the lawn" department, I can't imagine any local police department having a "copyright infringement division."
Yes, exactly that. The most effective way I can fight his message is to not fund him, so good author or not he's not getting any of my money.
The most effective way to fight any message is the basis for the first amendment. Make a better argument and show why he's wrong.
Trying to silence someone in whatever manner does not remove the message, it only drives it into hiding where it festers and becomes a rallying cry for others. Trying to remove someone's means of making a living because he doesn't agree with you on a certain issue isn't the best way to do anything.
I was horrified to know my money was connected to that effort...
It wasn't your money. It was theirs. You traded your money for their product in what you felt was a fair trade. Would you accept the quid pro quo in this matter? I.e., you say something they don't agree with and they refuse to serve you their product. "We are horrified to know that this kind of person would eat our ice cream...".
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I can't think of anyone who couldn't find a job with a different work schedule.
In the US, we currently have a large number of people who can't find a job with ANY work schedule, so I think it might be a bit harder to find another job with reasonable pay in your field with a different work schedule than you think. If it were easy, those jobs would already be taken by those who don't have any job.
All that means is that rather than going to work at 9:00 AM PST, I'd be doing to work at 17:00 GMT, which would be of no benefit at all to most people.
And more significant, if anyone from anyplace else in the world wanted to call you at work, they'd have to know that where you work normal hours are 1700 GMT through 0100 GMT. How do you tell them this version of "normal workday"? Hmmm, the easy way is to tell them ... a TIMEZONE where you work. Instead of telling everyone a different offset depending on where THEY work, you tell them your offset from GMT, they know their offset from GMT, and they figure it out. Yes, that "offset" can be as simple as -0500 or whatever, but that's not significantly different than saying "Eastern Standard Time".
No, while there are reasons to use UTC for some things, there are still reasons to have timezones.
... and one patch to get rid of the stupid system on computers.
One patch to find them, and in the darkness bind them? Really? The same patch for my desktop CentOS5 here will patch my SGI O2 running IRIS 6.5 and my multiple embedded RPis and the systems I have in other remote sites? Cool. It won't make them invisible, too, will it?
so there is always the potential for ongoing maintenance to time code anyway.
The potential for code changes does not mean that the effort is "literally zero" to make those changes. That's all I'm saying. One patch PER SYSTEM when we're talking about a huge number of systems is still a large effort.
but so it would be that much easier to deal with other timezones, so I don't have to look at clocks that are an hour off if I forget to reset them, etc.
Other timezones will still exist, and you'll still have clocks that are an hour off if you forget to set them NOT to automatically switch to DST...
If you get jet lagged by a one hour change in time, you should see a doctor. It shouldn't have such a significant effect on you.
Congress changed the DST dates in 2005 (effective 2007), so ending DST wouldn't be any worse than that.
"Wouldn't be any worse than" is a far cry from "literally zero effort", isn't it? I lived through the last change, and I'm still finding systems that didn't get changed (just this last Monday, for instance). I didn't say it was impossible to do, just that it isn't zero effort.
Every computer system I've seen (and written) allows you to turn off DST. We could just turn it off.
Yes, which requires non-zero effort. And is also easier than turning DST on permanently. Like I said.
Biannual or semiannual cycle. Twice a year. Biennial is only every two years.
Indeed, but there's literally about zero effort to just not fall back. This is low hanging fruit on the pain-in-the-ass fruit tree.
Except for changes to every computer, embedded or otherwise, that would normally "fall back" and thus have the wrong time for half the year, there is zero effort involved. If you have zero responsibility for maintaining anything, yes, there's zero effort.
It would be somewhat less effort to fall back one more time and then stay there, since it is somewhat easier to set up systems to stay on standard time year-round than to stay on daylight saving time.
You'll be far more likely to see South Korea joining the North Korean side then North Korea using a nuclear weapon on Seoul.
Why would North Korea nuke South Korea after they've joined sides? Oops, wrong button?
It works when both Russia and China wont let their boarder areas be radiated with nuclear contaminates
How much rent does Korea and Japan pay to their landlords?
You could just get a lock with the little TSA identifier on it. They have keys for those.
The last time I used one of those TSA locks the "key" was a pair of pliers and they took the zipper pulls off with it.
Yes, but it doesn't meet the dimensions required to qualify as carry on.
I have yet to see any airline prohibit someone from carrying something on that would fit somewhere, even if it doesn't fit inside the cage they have showing allowable dimensions. Most of the bags I see marketed as carryon are larger than the limits. I don't recall any of them ever actually enforcing the "one carryon and one personal item" rule, either.
I haven't even seen many cases of them enforcing a limit on truly oversize (larger than the overhead height in every dimension so it absolutely won't fit in the overhead no matter how much you push) bags. Mostly they let you try if you want, and then force you to gate check it after you fail.
If you are nice to the waitresses, they'll even sometimes allow you to stow long things (like garment bags or hockey sticks) in the closet instead of the overhead.
It is interesting how you pick and choose what you consider a "qualification"
Unlike you picking and choosing?
how about the fact that she barely had a BS in communications from the University of Idaho in Moscow versus his BA in political science from Columbia and a JD magna cum laude from Harvard?
How about the fact that she had one piece of paper and he had two (or three or a hundred), in a forum where the common feeling is that educational degrees aren't the full story about someone's qualifications to do something? Where did the requirement for someone to have a legal degree to be vice president come from?
Like I said, the number of previous OJT for VP makes any sudden requirement for strict (educational) requirements seem rather silly. Or simply arbitrary.
if you dismiss his academic qualifications either as unrelated or worse some sort of conspiracy theory,
I see what you did there. Tried to put words in my mouth. Deal with what I said. The insults that Palin had to go through were serious and irrelevant and patently absurd. You're trying to continue them now by ignoring the meaning of the comment.
I don't see anyone else mentioning those points here, but since you brought them up "lipstick on a pig" is nothign but fauxrage given the how McCain himself used the phrase a year prior with respect to Clinton's health care proposal.
You see no difference between using that insult towards a proposed law and towards a woman (a human being)? Wow. You have no concept of the difference between discussing an idea and insulting the person. I see how far you will go to smear someone you don't like.
Palin is the one who put them in the spot light, you can't run around using them as positive PR material and the whine when they get used as negative PR material.
mmm. Sascha and Malia ring a bell? Do you say the same thing when people point out the political mileage being made from them, or do you just try to label them as "conspiracy theorists" like you did with me?
If you graciously admit that indeed Obama's academic qualifications vastly exceeded Palin's and that they reflect strongly on their respective levels of competence, then we might actually have a meeting of the minds.
Yes, if I agree with your opinion on his qualifications we will have a meeting of the minds. And I have to agree "graciously", to boot. Can you not look at what you wrote and see where it fails any reasonable discussion standards?
Not sure what your point is here. You're all over the map.
Pretty simple. You are upset that a business used "your money" to do something you didn't agree with, and you stopped doing business with them because they did that. I asked if they had the same right to refuse to do business with you for something you do that they don't agree with, and you said that it was moot whether you chose not to do business with them or them with you.
Why is turnabout not fair play? Why is it "your money" long after you've paid for something they provided to you?
Refusing to do business based on a protected class is illegal,
Yes, I know. That's what I told you. Is the refusal to do business with you for irrelevant reasons still moot? Is the law wrong? Why do you have a choice and they have none?
As a business I cannot refuse service to homosexual Chinese Jew,
Why not? If you can refuse to buy things from a homosexual Chinese Jew, why should they be forced to sell anything to you? This is a serious question. Fair is fair. Unfair is unfair. In this particular case, we're talking about an ice cream store. It's not like a refusal to sell ice cream to you would really do you any harm. They're not the only food store in an 83 mile radius. You won't starve when they turn you away.
As for marriage, "basic human rights" is probably an exaggeration.
I agree.
I'm open to a better description.
Hmm. It's a label. Those who want to apply it to gay unions don't really care about the label, do they? They want the legal status. That's the emphasis of every political ad regarding ballot initiatives I've seen. "My life mate is in the hospital and I can't visit him" is just one example. That's a legal status issue. So, I'd say "marriage" in this context (as a label) is a convenience.
Now, before you click that reply link, read this. I have absolutely no problem with modifying the law as necessary to grant any two people the same legal rights and responsibilities that traditional marriage conveys. None at all. Put it on the ballot, I'll vote for it. You don't want the religious claptrap that goes with marriage, fine. Civil unions give you exactly what you want. There is no reason other than spite to demand that every civil union be called 'marriage' too, especially since the common refrain is that 'marriage is just a piece of paper'. In fact, civil union laws were created specifically to deal with people who didn't want the religious part of marriage but wanted the legal status. It seems like a no-brainer to extend that coverage from "two people of the opposite sex" to "any two people". It's not like those who have civil unions are going to care, are they?
I've asked many people I've met who are demanding "gay marriage" what they get from "gay marriage" that civil union wouldn't provide. The only answer they have is that civil unions aren't complete enough. Ok, I buy that. That's an argument to change the civil union laws. If they aren't complete enough to give two gay people enough legal status, then they probably aren't complete enough for anyone else and should be changed anyway. You've got to change some law somewhere, why not go after the law that is most specifically deficient? I can't get an answer to that. Usually, support for their attempts at getting legal equality results in the label 'homophobe" appearing somewhere. I fear you because I support your goal of equality before the law? Interesting.
But if you can't figure out why "social contract with certain legal ramifications" is different from a tax break or a zoning law from the viewpoint of a business then you probably don't understand why its absurd in the first place for a ice cream business or book writing business to even get involved in that sort of lawmaking.
And if you cannot understand that businesses are made up of people w
-Have you tried turning him off and on again?
There is no on/off switch, so you have to unplug the cellphone charger you're using as his power supply.
Come to think of it, I think many kids would improve considerably if you unplugged their cellphone charger and forgot to plug it back in.
It won't fit under the seat in front of you or the overhead bin.
A hockey stick certainly would fit in an overhead bin, at least on any aircraft larger than the Embraer/CRJ types used by commuter and express operators.
If the *AA sets up a honeypot, then there would be no copyright infringement.
Thus my statement about the defense if they tried to use this method to find and charge alleged offenders.
Like that she was qualified to be Vice-President.
You don't want to start that argument because you'll lose. She was qualified according to the Constitution, and running a state government is much better qualification for President than being a US Senator for a year or two, and she was only running for VP. The number of VPs who have been OJT makes strict claims for superior qualifications ridiculous.
Of course, you understood what I meant was the stuff like "lipstick on a pig" and the innuendo about her children and grandchild, but if you admitted that you'd miss a good chance at another cheap shot at her, right?
As for Leatherby's, whether they choose not to serve me or I choose not to buy from them because of a difference in views is moot.
Hmm. Would it still be moot if the difference in view was based on religion? "No Jews" ok? Sexual orientation? "No Gays"? Seems like I heard about some laws that prevent that. You support those laws or are they moot, too?
We're not talking about tax breaks or zoning laws, we're talking about basic human rights.
The latter is not a fact, it is an opinion. The right to be called "married" is specious. The right to legal protections is your best argument here, but it isn't just legal protections that are being sought.
They sing something else because it's more fun than every single restaurant singing that same song. In a way, it lets them distinguish themselves from others.
There is a valuable use for copyright lawsuits. If we could only find the owner of the copyright to the songs those Coldstone Creamery nits sing at the drop of a hat and have them sued until they stop that annoying practice ...
I suspect that Coldstone owns the copyright. Sigh. Such a potential for good from the use of copyright law, such an abuse by Coldstone. (I don't know, do they still sing like that? I had it happen the first time I was in one and haven't gone back.)
The main problems with the legal system are that penalties completely outstrip harm and it is too costly to defend yourself. If I share out a music file and five people download it, I've caused about $5 worth of damage. (Assuming that each person who downloaded it would have purchased it. Perhaps not a fair assumption, but let's give it to them for a second.) However, were I sued, I could face a fine of between $750 and $150,000.
It is a reasonable feature of the legal system that there be not only a mitigation of damages component but an element of prevention as well. E.g., what if the only possible fine for copyright infringement was to simply pay the retail amount for what has been infringed? Well, it's clear from your statement -- people would think "at worst I have to pay for what I've taken, at best I pay nothing." What is really going to stop it from happening again? You wind up with, say, 1000 songs and you got caught five times. That's $5 for 1000 songs. A very good deal, I'd say.
Now say that you had those 1000 songs and got caught five times, but the fine was $1000 (for round numbers). $5000 for 1000 songs, not so good a deal. Maybe you're better off paying for them?
That's the same concept that applies to parking tickets. What do you think public parking would be like if the amount of the ticket for an expired meter was just a quarter? Nobody would pay the meter, they'd park all day and pay a quarter every day they got ticketed. Essentially free parking. Imagine handicap parking. A grocery store parking lot full of free spaces and a few handicap spaces. Well, the cost of parking normally is zero, so the ticket for parking in a handicap space (at cost) would be zero. There is absolutely no incentive to obey the law. But make a parking ticket be $25, handicap violation $300. That's incentive to obey the law.
Fix the legal system and I would have no problem with lawsuits against those who infringe copyright.
I'm not sure what fixes are possible that would resolve the issues you listed with the system. Even if you make it possible for the plaintiff in such a case to have much better evidence before they can file, you still have to pay legal fees, they can still drop the suit partway through, and they will always have much deeper pockets than you. Even if you somehow manage to get a system where defendants get free legal counsel for any lawsuit, civil or criminal, you'd still be losing a huge amount of time defending yourself, and you'd just be pushing the cost of lawsuits out onto everyone else through much higher taxes.
It would seem the only legal system that would fix the problems is no legal system at all. But then, your argument would be "I would support a legal system that isn't a legal system", and that's not a very productive discussion to have.
I am under the impression that this system does go after people who 'share', rather than those who download.
Since the alert system triggers on the agents downloading copyrighted material to make the determination that it is infringing, then yes, it is going after sharing and not simply downloading. Those agents cannot determine what other people who are connected to a server are downloading, much less who is connected. They can only see what the server is handing out.
So, if you don't want to be caught by this, don't serve copyright material.
Yes, I'm sure that it could be extended to downloads in the future,
Theoretically, the *AA can set up honeypots so they can determine who is downloading what, but at that point I would expect there to be a reasonable defense that "I assumed that if you were serving it you had authority to do so". This defense doesn't work for servers, since they know they don't have the authority to distribute.
... I think we can agree that if I somehow pressured the FBI into going around and taking DNA samples of all my neighbor's dogs and then threatening them with fines well in excess of their lifetime earning potential, we could agree that I was getting disproportionate government assistance on my private matter, even though that private matter could leverage reasonable government support like getting the local police involved with minor fines and a warning.
If you could somehow manage to elevate this neighbor's violations to interstate issues (does his dog cross a state line to crap in your yard?) or to federal law violations (does his dog crap small baggies of cocaine or remnants of human bodies, or full sized illegal aliens?) then you'd have a matter for the FBI and they would have jurisdiction. Copyright is federal law, and the copies probably cross state lines at some point. Just as the FBI doesn't have a "dog crapping on the lawn" department, I can't imagine any local police department having a "copyright infringement division."
Yes, exactly that. The most effective way I can fight his message is to not fund him, so good author or not he's not getting any of my money.
The most effective way to fight any message is the basis for the first amendment. Make a better argument and show why he's wrong.
Trying to silence someone in whatever manner does not remove the message, it only drives it into hiding where it festers and becomes a rallying cry for others. Trying to remove someone's means of making a living because he doesn't agree with you on a certain issue isn't the best way to do anything.
I was horrified to know my money was connected to that effort...
It wasn't your money. It was theirs. You traded your money for their product in what you felt was a fair trade. Would you accept the quid pro quo in this matter? I.e., you say something they don't agree with and they refuse to serve you their product. "We are horrified to know that this kind of person would eat our ice cream...".
Perhaps you'd understand a bit better if he'd had said the same thing about having a "nagger as a president"?
Unfortunately, Hillary lost the nomination. But Palin had much worse things said about her, so maybe some people do understand.