In other news, Linus Torvalds announced today that the popular "Linux" operating system would take affirmative action to avoid infringing on the MS patents on "one" and "zero". From this point on, all references to or including "zero" will be replaced with "buzz", and references to or including "one" will be replaced with "fizz".
He was quoted as saying "we should have acted on this from day fizz. We expect buzz infringements by the time the kernel reaches version 2.7.buzz, or at least 2.7.fizz."
In the meantime, Linus has filed a patent on the numbers 2 and 5. All future non-infringing software will be required to skip from version buzz to "version 3 (copyright SCO, 2004)".
In a democracy, criticism of the government during war is patriotic.
That depends on what that "criticism" is and the effect it has.
There has been a lot of stuff going on that has been labelled "criticism" and thus "patriotic". Such as, Kerry meeting in Paris with representatives of the Hanoi government, while he was still in the military. That's not "criticism", that's treason. Such as, Kerry's famous testimony in front of Congress in which he branded every soldier as a rapist and thug. That's not criticism, that's lying.
Such as, the city councils of a number of cities meddling in foreign policy before the start of the war by passing "no war" resolutions, which cut the legs out from under the authorized foreign policy official (Pres. Bush). These resolutions were reported heavily on Iraqi TV, controlled by Sadam, to help him keep control prior to the start of the war.
Let's be blunt: this "news" dissuaded his own people from acting against him and supported the terrorists, because it made the US look weak and unwilling to act. That's not patriotic, that's pathetic. If it allowed Sadam to stay in power longer, then it cost lives; something that these meddling city councils will certainly not accept responsibility for. That meddling certainly made the threat of war less usefull as a negotiation tool -- and the same people who made negotiation harder are the ones who are whining that negotiation should have been tried!
If you want to attack their conclusion, please make a comment relevant to the analysis or its assumptions.
The "analysis" is gobbledygook and starts with the assumption of fraud. It uses meaningless numbers (such as: how many people voted for Dole, who didn't happen to be running in this election) and came up with meaningless numbers.
It's not as if anyone can point to one critical failure in their logic. The entire process they went through was designed to come up with the answer they got, because they cannot imagine any reason other than fraud for why their candidate lost.
But isn't it curious that the largest disparity between expected and actual e-voting results occurred in heavily democratic counties?
No, it isn't curious. If you assume that those counties are "heavily democratic" because Democrats controlled the system, then perhaps e-voting leveled the playing field and Republican votes didn't get lost like they used to.
If you're going to assume fraud is rampant, you're going to get hit by your own double-edged sword, and you ought to be ready to accept that. On the other hand, you could assume that "heavily democratic" counties have more people who got tired of the nonsense coming from their candidate and changed sides. The more democrats there are, the more there are to change sides.
Why would a hurricane, cause there to be more discrepancy between who people said they voted for, coming out of the polls, and who actually was given the votes?
Who people said they voted for means nothing. If you read the Constitution carefully, you might find that "exit polls" are not listed in any form as a means of electing the President. Why not? Because exit polls can (and are) wrong, are based on non-validated data, and are done by biased individuals using private selection criteria.
Who gets asked? Whoever the pollster thinks will give a useful answer. Did that person actually vote? Who knows? They might be paid policital workers bringing other people to the polls.
I think technical errors, or voter fraud, are the most likely culprits for this statistical anomaly.
If you read the paper, you'll note that this "statistical anomaly" starts with the assumption
that there was fraud, not proves it. Of course, a liberal university does a "recount" on electronic voting machines, starts with the assumption that there was fraud, and FINDS IT! What an earthshattering bit of news.
So, is NASA 8 months behind schedule on this, or four months ahead? I mean, this is already November, they missed March by... excuse me a second, the phone's ringing...
Some people are talking on this site like the thing was a CRT, but was it?
Yes, it was a CRT. Flat screen CRT, with broken DVD
player and VCR.
I'm interested because the story doesn't say where or how the signal was being generated,...
Boy, I'd tell you how it was if I could figure it out, but I suspect Toshiba will have to rip the thing open when it gets back to find out exactly what was the cause.
On a side note, I'm suprised they responded so quickly, less than 24 hours between recieving the signal and a response team at the door.
I'm not surprised. In Oregon, the Sheriffs have assumed the responsibility for downed aircraft search and rescue. They have staff to deal with this, and it is a very serious issue. We have three or four radio-oriented volunteers on call to help look for this stuff, and probably a dozen general SAR people. After all, the one call that gets dropped may very well be a real crash where people's lives are at stake. Twenty four hours is a long time.
...but nothing like a mountain that would require a large search & rescue squad.
Yes, there are mountains here. There is also a lot of national forest and wild areas. Mary's Peak is the largest mountain, and you can find one group online if you google for Mary's Peak Search and Rescue. We also host Corvallis Mountain Rescue in this county. They operate state-wide on many of the actual climbing rescues.
In this case, the "squad" was pretty small. Six or seven CAP cadets, a handful of city cops, and two county people. One of them was the county ES manager. I was the other. I got called in after the signal was localized to a small apartment building. Almost nobody was home and the ES manager wanted help identifying which apartment in case he needed to gain access.
In the longer articles, you read about someone saying "the signal's gone". That's me. The real question was "before you answered the door, did you turn something off?" When he turned his TV back on, it was obvious.
I was able to pick the signal up a block away, and when I was inside the building I had to take the antenna off my radio because the signal was so strong. It was also very strong near the electrical panel for the building, so I know that some of it was leaking out the wiring.
I'm glad Toshiba is helping him out. It was a very dissappointing result to have to say "you can't watch TV" and not be able to help him fix it. We had to explain why we couldn't just ignore any satellite hits from his TV: his TV could interfere with a real emergency beacon and either keep the satellite from seeing it at all, or make it harder to find it on the ground.
Thank you, your comments are extremely stupid too.
How did people manage as recently as 1990?
How DID people manage in 1990 without slash-dot? If everyone else ought to give up their cells phones because a few of them annoy you (not all of them, just a tiny tiny minority), then YOU ought to give up slashdot because YOU are annoying the rest of us. And no, the fact that you've grown dependent on it is not an answer.
Yes, it's considered EXTREMELY RUDE (sic) to take calls in a theatre. This does not stop your average asshole. If I can encourage cinemas and universities to install the Asshol-Blok 5000, with asshole-silencing technology, I will.
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety
A more hypocritical pair of statements I have rarely seen. Of course, give up everyone's liberty of getting even simple SMS messages while in a public place, just so you won't be annoyed at those who forget to put their phones on vibrate.
Come up with a way to punish the assholes, by all means. If it punishes anyone else, it is a bad system. In fact, as soon as it starts punishing me, I'll remember to forget to put my phone on vibrate just so I can annoy you even more.
I suppose one solution to this would be to leave the phone with the cinema and the cinema provides a vibrate only pager.
And, of course, patrons are strip-searched on entry to make sure they have declared every cell phone they carry? And when the cinema has to buy replacement phones when they screw up and give the wrong person the wrong phone?
Why not just use the vibrate feature already found on so many cell phones?
In a place like a theatre or concert hall you could either have the same solution or notify the hospital before you go in of the theatre's number and your seat number.
Now, I haven't gone to a theater to see a movie for a long time, simply because there are already so many rude people (without considering ringing cell phones), but I don't recall EVER knowing in advance what seat I was going to sit in. Damn it, before I have to give up being able to get messages on my nearly-silent cell phone, I expect theaters to put a halt to every other annoying disturbing thing that everyone else does. People who read the credits aloud or rip open packages of snacks ought to be physically removed from the theater. But no, they get to stay, and my cellphone becomes the target.
The simplest solution would simply to not go out when you're on call.
Spoken like someone who's never been on call for anything in his life. UNlike those who are on call 24/7 for emergency service activities.
Your conditions are obviously not satisfactory enough to attend a public showing of a film.
Interesting concept. Let's examine whose conditions are not satisfactory.
Doctors. "Your patient, who was stable earlier, is now convulsing. I know you aren't on call, but he's yours..."
Parents who do not take their children with them at all times. "This is the babysitter, Beth Anne broke her arm, she's on the way to the hospital..."
Children who do not take their parents with them at all times. "Mr. Harris, this is Lutheran General Hospital, your mother is here, unconscious after having a stroke, we need next-of-kin approval for life-saving surgery..."
Spouses who do not take their mates with them at all times.
Anyone who owns a house. "Hey, Bill, your house is on fire..."
Anyone who rents a house. "Hey, deadbeat, we're tossing your stuff out into the street..."
Anyone who volunteers their time and effort doing emergency services. "We've got a lost ten year old, we need searchers..."
That covers a lot of people.
Just how DO they intend on determining what is and is not an emergency phone call? And just why the hell do people get so bent out of shape that my cell phone might vibrate a little bit when I get an incoming message?
How they intend on keeping them from spilling over the property boundaries will also be interesting to see.
...if you wake up to find your bedroom 3 feet deep in seawater.
If you wake up to three feet of water in your bedroom due to global warming, then it is only because you decided you would ignore it when there was one foot, and then when it rose to two feet, and then two and a half...
Global warming isn't going to drown us all overnight. That's just more of the fear-mongering that tries to keep people in line and get funding for more research. Smart people will just move back from the coast, just like they already move back from the coast when the beaches erode in the normal course of nature.
I'll skip your wonderful proof that 4ppm of CO2 is a serious problem because it can be a problem for other chemicals, and your comparison to cancer, and just respond to this...
You need independant, real scientists,...
Do you really believe that there are any "independant" scientists anymore? You tell us that funding from the oil industry "in one way or another" doesn't make them independent. That may be true.
But if that is true, then it is just as true that those funded to seek out global warming are just as dependent. If your paycheck comes only because there is some potential catastrophe that you want to investigate, you are not independent. The moment you announce "there isn't a catastrophe", you lose your funding.
But it's even broader than that. Science deals with peer review. If you aren't funded by global warming research money directly, the chances are that someone who is a peer is, and if you come out saying there is no catastrophe, you jeopardize HIS funding, and whatever review of your work he does is likely to be less than friendly. When it is a review for a grant, there goes YOUR money, too.
If you work in a college or other institute that is getting global warming research money, then you threaten that money if you say there is no catastrophe coming, and have a building or two of people who want to see you go away.
If you thought that the "religion" in science went away after Galileo, you are wrong. Science is still rife with beliefs in things not proven (what religion calls "faith", but science sometimes calls "theory"), and going against the science papacy is still dangerous.
As for 4ppm being a problem, you ought to know that your breath when you exhale is several percent CO2. Each percent is 10,000ppm. How many people are you killing every time you breath out?
I didn't say there was a prohibition against stating my opinion, just that there was a prohibition against someone else stating their opinion.
Who is this mystical "someone else" you are standing up for? We know YOU aren't prohibited from expressing your opinion, and I am not prohibited from doing so. I know that at least I am not in a position to merit special consideration to allow it (and I assume you aren't, as well), so just what prohibition is this you keep talking about? Any prohibition would certainly cover both of us, and nobody who is in a position to enforce any prohibition has told me about one.
And yes it is my business if someone else's freedom of expression is restricted. The fact that you don't hear them shows that the censorship is doing its job =P.
The fact that I don't hear WHO? I certainly hear people expressing their opinions about the Olympics. I hear sportscasters doing so, I read it in the paper. I read it here. The "local" CBS affiliate did a long story on the gymnast who the IOC is trying to pull the medal back from. Who is it that I am not hearing that proves this censorship?
What I don't hear is anything like the RIAA shower of subpoenas against the people who are expressing their opinions. Certainly with all the opinions being expressed, there'd be someone brave enough to say "I got sued by the IOC for expressing my opinion". Where are they?
The sports anchors get to comment freely? Really?
Yes. And they are doing so.
Can they tell you the play-by-play as well?
Of course not, because that is not expressing an opinion, that is using licensed content. They can use small amounts of "play-by-play" under fair use, but a full play-by-play, of course not. But
are they prohibited from expressing their opinion just because they cannot present the full content? Hardly.
I never said they couldn't make money. I just don't think they should be able to abuse their monopoly position in contract negotiations.
I agree. They ought not to be able to abuse anything. But that begs the question of what abuse you think exists. There is no prohibition on people expressing their opinions or commenting on the olympics, which is the topic of this discussion, so what abuse is there?
I'm sure an enterprising station that didn't have assholes for commentators would have picked it up, and made a mint.
I'm not so sure of that. A non-exclusive contract is worth less for a reason. If two networks in the US bought contracts, that means that they would be competing against each other for the same viewers. There wouldn't suddenly be twice as many people who want to watch, so the networks know that their viewing numbers will be, on average, half of what they would be with an exclusive. (And if three networks carried the coverage, they all know that their average viewership would be less than 1/3, because people will get fed up with seeing the same thing on all their channels and they'll shut the TV off.)
Advertisers know that too, and they pay by the number of viewers. Each network will have fixed costs that might not be covered by the lower advertising revenue. And advertisers know that people who are presented with an advertisement on one channel can simply flip to another channel that is carrying the same content to avoid them.
Oh, NBC is in commercial break, let's go watch
ABC, they've got the same thing...
The fact is, an exclusive license is worth more to eveyone involved, and if one network is willing to pay it, bravo for them. If nobody pays it, then the IOC loses big, too, and you'd find the price coming down. But it would still be exclusive, and the IOC has the right to do that.
Now, to temp the fate of this prohibition, I'll express some olympic-related opinions.
The judging for gymnastics is hosed and a better system needs to be installed.
The judging for the 4x400 mens relay was hosed and needs to be fixed. It was clear in the replays that
The problem isn't that someone mistook Ted Kennedy for a terrorist.
That is exactly the problem. The problem is not that he was prevented from flying, because he wasn't prevented from flying. The problem is not that the name (I'll not call it "his name", because there are unfortunate people who have the same name) wasn't removed from the list, because it eventually was.
And I'd love to hear the protests from people who are unhappy that someone who was a known terrorist was let on an airplane after something happens to that plane (even if it is a mechanical failure).
"Topping tonight's news, XYZ has learned that the man responsible for the downing of Flight 43 was allowed to check in and board the flight because the TSA removed his name from the list of known terrorist suspects just one week earlier." I'd bet
two bits that Ted Kennedy's part in getting the name removed would not be mentioned.
On the whole (which means I'm not arguing that the system is particularly effective to begin with), I'd rather have Ted Kennedy, Senator, showing extra ID when he checks in than having some low-level data-pusher removing a name that matches his from the list just to keep from inconveniencing him. That's just creating a way to bypass the system for those who can get id that say they really are Ted Kennedy or Gordon Smith or Ted Stevens (or any of the other lesser-known Senators and Congressmen.) And if that means that Ted Kennedy, Senator, has to get to the airport at least an hour prior to his flight just like the rest of us innocent people, that's too bad. If Ted
Kennedy, Senator, knows his name is on a list and will take longer to check in, then better he gets
their early than having him pull strings to get off the list altogether.
You think planes are more crowded because more people are flying,
No, planes are more crowded because fewer people are flying and the airlines have cut back the number of flights because of that. They fact that
the numbers are once again increasing whilst the number of flights is not is making the problem worse.
I guess if I told you it had more to do with airlines trying to maximize profits, you'd say I was just another paranoid conspiracy nut.
Why don't you just say what you think is correct
and let me worry about how I'll respond?
Were it just a case of "maximizing profits", the number of flights would have been cut a long time ago. The sudden drop in passengers had the most to do with it. The airlines could fly with half- or 3/4 full airplanes and still make a profit, as long as their fixed and variable expenses were being covered. As soon as the number of passengers dropped below that magic point, they had to cut
the number of flights to make any profit.
Making flying convenient for the passengers is one way of increasing profits, since more people will fly. Cattle-cars like People's (I think that was the name, I flew on it once and vowed never again) aren't around anymore because they made it uncomfortable for the large-profit pax to fly. The packed airplanes and limited schedules they are keeping now aren't helping them back into the black.
I never said I wasn't able to express my viewpoint. I never even implied it.
It's so nice to take each sentence one at a time...
You said "the policies involve prohibit alternative viewpoints from being expressed." They don't. You are quite free to express yours. I'm free to express mine. Other people are free to express theirs. If expressing viewpoints really WAS being prohibited, someone would be coming after you to stop you from doing just that. They aren't. That's pretty good proof that you are wrong about any prohibition. And since you admit that YOU are free to express your alternative opinion, then it's a bit odd that you complain about a prohibition against doing so.
Who says it has to be unlicensed?
Read the words. Nobody said is HAS to be unlicensed; it IS unlicensed. The fact that the owner of the copyrighted material did not grant them a license to use it for broadcast is what makes it such. They could have given a license to anyone they wanted to. They chose not to.
If there wasn't an exclusive contract for showing the Olympics, then every station or network could license it, if they so pleased.
But there is an exclusive license holder, so they cannot. This is not censorship. This is contract law 101.
I'm not too familiar with the licensing scheme used in baseball, but as long as anyone who wants be a commentator can pay the license fee and comment, I'm ok with it.
You missed the point completely. You don't have to pay any licensing fee to comment. You have to pay the license fee to use the copyrighted material. TV stations don't pay license fees to use the highlights in their sports coverage, and their sports anchors comment freely on the games. It is covered under fair use. Comment away all you want. If you're good at it, you might get hired to do it on ESPN or for some newspaper. Just don't use the copyrighted material without licensing. They DO come after you for that.
The IOC has a monopoly on the Olympics. The exclusive contracts are a method of artificially limiting supply in order to raise prices.
And? What's the problem? It costs money to produce an olympics, do you think they ought to spend their money and then give away the video? Shouldn't the investors be able to profit from the risk they are taking?
Unregulated monopolies are the least efficient structure in the capitalist system.
You know, if this discussion were about something that had some measurable impact on people's lives, it might be worth discussing whether the IOC ought to be regulated (by whom is an interesting question in its own right). But it is not. Boo hoo you don't get to watch the olympic coin-flipping championship between the Ukranian and Flatvian teams. I think you'll survive. If it is so critical to see an event, pay the price and get a ticket.
For an analogy, let's presume there is a warrant out for a person that goes by the name MysticalFruit.
Twice, while returning to the country from foreign travel, I was questioned by Immigration. The first time, they asked me things like "have you ever lived in Colorado?" The second time, I started out by saying "Good morning, I'm not the one from Colorado" and I was waved through without further delay.
I assume nothing. Whatever testing they did was prima facie insufficient, due to the fact that this problem arose.
Let's see, to prevent this someone would have had to predict that 1) a terrorist would use the name of a major political office holder that is instantly recognizable by anyone over the age of 20, and 2) this rich, famous, instantly recognizable super-human member of the species would actually want to fly on a bargain-rate airline instead of in the family jet.
Yep, they ought to have guessed this ahead of time.
I hope they learned from this and removed "Jesus", "Mother Teresa" and "Gandi" from the list already. I wouldn't want to be delayed while trying to prove who I am.
Yes, there ought to be a "-1 Gratuitous Political Deception" moderation category.
Remember that Florida tried to purge Democratic-friendly voters a second time.
I refuse to remember fictitious "history". On the other hand, I remember quite clearly Gore trying to purge every absentee ballot from three counties, after they had been counted and found to be favoring Bush. The courtroom sessions were televised and were a wonderful lesson in democrat politics. In one county, the reason being used was that the Democratic committee chairman in the county was too stupid to put correct data on the absentee applications (and the Republican one had).
A lot of those ballots were from US military personnel serving overseas. Gore desperately wanted to be CIC, but didn't want his minions able to vote.
I'm looking at a 14 hour drive in October for me and my wife. I am reluctant to try flying. What if my name is on the no-fly list?
If you are that paranoid, you ought to drive. And the fewer people flying, the better. I remember the days when planes often had empty seats and travel was a lot more comfortable, even in the tiny seats.
Is what is happening with the Olympics censorship? Yes and no.
Yes because the policies involve prohibit alternative viewpoints from being expressed.
You seem quite able to express your alternative viewpoint. I don't see the IOC sending lawyers to stop you.
It is not an "alternative viewpoint" to broadcast women's spear-chucking on ABC. It is unlicensed use of Olympic content. ABC would love to profit by carrying Olympic games without having to pay the licensing fee. It is not censorship for them to be prevented from doing so.
I'm sure many stations and commentators have insights they would like to express during the competitions, but due to the exclusive contract, they are not able to.
Who is being stopped? News programs all around the world are carrying reports of the games and commentary about what is going on. I'm sure that there are a lot of wanna-be baseball commentators who would love to use AL and NL games as a background to promote themselves; it is not censorship that the AL and NL have contracts for carriage that prevent just anyone from broadcasting AL and NL games. But every sports anchor on every news program can show clips and comment to his little heart's desire.
Myself, I happen to believe that all exclusive contracts are and forever shall be an anathema to free market capitalism.
What would be a problem is exclusion of people from bidding on those contracts. ABC and CBS were free to bid, and probably did, they just didn't offer as much. "Free market capitalism" is not just the consumer, it also has to consider the producer.
"During my service in the United States Congress, I took the initiative in creating the Internet."
That does not say he funded it (which he did not, although he may have directed OUR funds to pay for enhancements). This says he was involved in creating it, AND that HE took the initiative. Even though it was in existance before he got into office.
It wasn't his money, it existed before he got into office, and he didn't create it anymore than he could bother to fix the toilets in his run-down rental housing.
Isn't it interesting, the same people who defend Gore tooth-and-nail for making this grandious claim are unable to look in their own dictionaries to see that "potatoe" is a valid alternative spelling for "potato". Depends on who says something, huh?
Slashdot Mirror
He was quoted as saying "we should have acted on this from day fizz. We expect buzz infringements by the time the kernel reaches version 2.7.buzz, or at least 2.7.fizz."
In the meantime, Linus has filed a patent on the numbers 2 and 5. All future non-infringing software will be required to skip from version buzz to "version 3 (copyright SCO, 2004)".
That depends on what that "criticism" is and the effect it has.
There has been a lot of stuff going on that has been labelled "criticism" and thus "patriotic". Such as, Kerry meeting in Paris with representatives of the Hanoi government, while he was still in the military. That's not "criticism", that's treason. Such as, Kerry's famous testimony in front of Congress in which he branded every soldier as a rapist and thug. That's not criticism, that's lying.
Such as, the city councils of a number of cities meddling in foreign policy before the start of the war by passing "no war" resolutions, which cut the legs out from under the authorized foreign policy official (Pres. Bush). These resolutions were reported heavily on Iraqi TV, controlled by Sadam, to help him keep control prior to the start of the war.
Let's be blunt: this "news" dissuaded his own people from acting against him and supported the terrorists, because it made the US look weak and unwilling to act. That's not patriotic, that's pathetic. If it allowed Sadam to stay in power longer, then it cost lives; something that these meddling city councils will certainly not accept responsibility for. That meddling certainly made the threat of war less usefull as a negotiation tool -- and the same people who made negotiation harder are the ones who are whining that negotiation should have been tried!
The "analysis" is gobbledygook and starts with the assumption of fraud. It uses meaningless numbers (such as: how many people voted for Dole, who didn't happen to be running in this election) and came up with meaningless numbers.
It's not as if anyone can point to one critical failure in their logic. The entire process they went through was designed to come up with the answer they got, because they cannot imagine any reason other than fraud for why their candidate lost.
No, it isn't curious. If you assume that those counties are "heavily democratic" because Democrats controlled the system, then perhaps e-voting leveled the playing field and Republican votes didn't get lost like they used to.
If you're going to assume fraud is rampant, you're going to get hit by your own double-edged sword, and you ought to be ready to accept that. On the other hand, you could assume that "heavily democratic" counties have more people who got tired of the nonsense coming from their candidate and changed sides. The more democrats there are, the more there are to change sides.
Who people said they voted for means nothing. If you read the Constitution carefully, you might find that "exit polls" are not listed in any form as a means of electing the President. Why not? Because exit polls can (and are) wrong, are based on non-validated data, and are done by biased individuals using private selection criteria.
Who gets asked? Whoever the pollster thinks will give a useful answer. Did that person actually vote? Who knows? They might be paid policital workers bringing other people to the polls.
I think technical errors, or voter fraud, are the most likely culprits for this statistical anomaly.
If you read the paper, you'll note that this "statistical anomaly" starts with the assumption that there was fraud, not proves it. Of course, a liberal university does a "recount" on electronic voting machines, starts with the assumption that there was fraud, and FINDS IT! What an earthshattering bit of news.
Oh, MACH Ten. Nevermind.
Yes, it was a CRT. Flat screen CRT, with broken DVD player and VCR.
I'm interested because the story doesn't say where or how the signal was being generated,...
Boy, I'd tell you how it was if I could figure it out, but I suspect Toshiba will have to rip the thing open when it gets back to find out exactly what was the cause.
I'm not surprised. In Oregon, the Sheriffs have assumed the responsibility for downed aircraft search and rescue. They have staff to deal with this, and it is a very serious issue. We have three or four radio-oriented volunteers on call to help look for this stuff, and probably a dozen general SAR people. After all, the one call that gets dropped may very well be a real crash where people's lives are at stake. Twenty four hours is a long time.
Yes, there are mountains here. There is also a lot of national forest and wild areas. Mary's Peak is the largest mountain, and you can find one group online if you google for Mary's Peak Search and Rescue. We also host Corvallis Mountain Rescue in this county. They operate state-wide on many of the actual climbing rescues.
In this case, the "squad" was pretty small. Six or seven CAP cadets, a handful of city cops, and two county people. One of them was the county ES manager. I was the other. I got called in after the signal was localized to a small apartment building. Almost nobody was home and the ES manager wanted help identifying which apartment in case he needed to gain access.
In the longer articles, you read about someone saying "the signal's gone". That's me. The real question was "before you answered the door, did you turn something off?" When he turned his TV back on, it was obvious.
I was able to pick the signal up a block away, and when I was inside the building I had to take the antenna off my radio because the signal was so strong. It was also very strong near the electrical panel for the building, so I know that some of it was leaking out the wiring.
I'm glad Toshiba is helping him out. It was a very dissappointing result to have to say "you can't watch TV" and not be able to help him fix it. We had to explain why we couldn't just ignore any satellite hits from his TV: his TV could interfere with a real emergency beacon and either keep the satellite from seeing it at all, or make it harder to find it on the ground.
How DID people manage in 1990 without slash-dot? If everyone else ought to give up their cells phones because a few of them annoy you (not all of them, just a tiny tiny minority), then YOU ought to give up slashdot because YOU are annoying the rest of us. And no, the fact that you've grown dependent on it is not an answer.
They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety
A more hypocritical pair of statements I have rarely seen. Of course, give up everyone's liberty of getting even simple SMS messages while in a public place, just so you won't be annoyed at those who forget to put their phones on vibrate.
Come up with a way to punish the assholes, by all means. If it punishes anyone else, it is a bad system. In fact, as soon as it starts punishing me, I'll remember to forget to put my phone on vibrate just so I can annoy you even more.
And, of course, patrons are strip-searched on entry to make sure they have declared every cell phone they carry? And when the cinema has to buy replacement phones when they screw up and give the wrong person the wrong phone?
Why not just use the vibrate feature already found on so many cell phones?
In a place like a theatre or concert hall you could either have the same solution or notify the hospital before you go in of the theatre's number and your seat number.
Now, I haven't gone to a theater to see a movie for a long time, simply because there are already so many rude people (without considering ringing cell phones), but I don't recall EVER knowing in advance what seat I was going to sit in. Damn it, before I have to give up being able to get messages on my nearly-silent cell phone, I expect theaters to put a halt to every other annoying disturbing thing that everyone else does. People who read the credits aloud or rip open packages of snacks ought to be physically removed from the theater. But no, they get to stay, and my cellphone becomes the target.
The simplest solution would simply to not go out when you're on call.
Spoken like someone who's never been on call for anything in his life. UNlike those who are on call 24/7 for emergency service activities.
Interesting concept. Let's examine whose conditions are not satisfactory.
- Doctors. "Your patient, who was stable earlier, is now convulsing. I know you aren't on call, but he's yours..."
- Parents who do not take their children with them at all times. "This is the babysitter, Beth Anne broke her arm, she's on the way to the hospital..."
- Children who do not take their parents with them at all times. "Mr. Harris, this is Lutheran General Hospital, your mother is here, unconscious after having a stroke, we need next-of-kin approval for life-saving surgery..."
- Spouses who do not take their mates with them at all times.
- Anyone who owns a house. "Hey, Bill, your house is on fire
..."
- Anyone who rents a house. "Hey, deadbeat, we're tossing your stuff out into the street..."
- Anyone who volunteers their time and effort doing emergency services. "We've got a lost ten year old, we need searchers..."
That covers a lot of people.Just how DO they intend on determining what is and is not an emergency phone call? And just why the hell do people get so bent out of shape that my cell phone might vibrate a little bit when I get an incoming message?
How they intend on keeping them from spilling over the property boundaries will also be interesting to see.
If you wake up to three feet of water in your bedroom due to global warming, then it is only because you decided you would ignore it when there was one foot, and then when it rose to two feet, and then two and a half...
Global warming isn't going to drown us all overnight. That's just more of the fear-mongering that tries to keep people in line and get funding for more research. Smart people will just move back from the coast, just like they already move back from the coast when the beaches erode in the normal course of nature.
You need independant, real scientists, ...
Do you really believe that there are any "independant" scientists anymore? You tell us that funding from the oil industry "in one way or another" doesn't make them independent. That may be true.
But if that is true, then it is just as true that those funded to seek out global warming are just as dependent. If your paycheck comes only because there is some potential catastrophe that you want to investigate, you are not independent. The moment you announce "there isn't a catastrophe", you lose your funding.
But it's even broader than that. Science deals with peer review. If you aren't funded by global warming research money directly, the chances are that someone who is a peer is, and if you come out saying there is no catastrophe, you jeopardize HIS funding, and whatever review of your work he does is likely to be less than friendly. When it is a review for a grant, there goes YOUR money, too.
If you work in a college or other institute that is getting global warming research money, then you threaten that money if you say there is no catastrophe coming, and have a building or two of people who want to see you go away.
If you thought that the "religion" in science went away after Galileo, you are wrong. Science is still rife with beliefs in things not proven (what religion calls "faith", but science sometimes calls "theory"), and going against the science papacy is still dangerous.
As for 4ppm being a problem, you ought to know that your breath when you exhale is several percent CO2. Each percent is 10,000ppm. How many people are you killing every time you breath out?
Who is this mystical "someone else" you are standing up for? We know YOU aren't prohibited from expressing your opinion, and I am not prohibited from doing so. I know that at least I am not in a position to merit special consideration to allow it (and I assume you aren't, as well), so just what prohibition is this you keep talking about? Any prohibition would certainly cover both of us, and nobody who is in a position to enforce any prohibition has told me about one.
And yes it is my business if someone else's freedom of expression is restricted. The fact that you don't hear them shows that the censorship is doing its job =P.
The fact that I don't hear WHO? I certainly hear people expressing their opinions about the Olympics. I hear sportscasters doing so, I read it in the paper. I read it here. The "local" CBS affiliate did a long story on the gymnast who the IOC is trying to pull the medal back from. Who is it that I am not hearing that proves this censorship?
What I don't hear is anything like the RIAA shower of subpoenas against the people who are expressing their opinions. Certainly with all the opinions being expressed, there'd be someone brave enough to say "I got sued by the IOC for expressing my opinion". Where are they?
The sports anchors get to comment freely? Really?
Yes. And they are doing so.
Can they tell you the play-by-play as well?
Of course not, because that is not expressing an opinion, that is using licensed content. They can use small amounts of "play-by-play" under fair use, but a full play-by-play, of course not. But are they prohibited from expressing their opinion just because they cannot present the full content? Hardly.
I never said they couldn't make money. I just don't think they should be able to abuse their monopoly position in contract negotiations.
I agree. They ought not to be able to abuse anything. But that begs the question of what abuse you think exists. There is no prohibition on people expressing their opinions or commenting on the olympics, which is the topic of this discussion, so what abuse is there?
I'm sure an enterprising station that didn't have assholes for commentators would have picked it up, and made a mint.
I'm not so sure of that. A non-exclusive contract is worth less for a reason. If two networks in the US bought contracts, that means that they would be competing against each other for the same viewers. There wouldn't suddenly be twice as many people who want to watch, so the networks know that their viewing numbers will be, on average, half of what they would be with an exclusive. (And if three networks carried the coverage, they all know that their average viewership would be less than 1/3, because people will get fed up with seeing the same thing on all their channels and they'll shut the TV off.)
Advertisers know that too, and they pay by the number of viewers. Each network will have fixed costs that might not be covered by the lower advertising revenue. And advertisers know that people who are presented with an advertisement on one channel can simply flip to another channel that is carrying the same content to avoid them. Oh, NBC is in commercial break, let's go watch ABC, they've got the same thing...
The fact is, an exclusive license is worth more to eveyone involved, and if one network is willing to pay it, bravo for them. If nobody pays it, then the IOC loses big, too, and you'd find the price coming down. But it would still be exclusive, and the IOC has the right to do that.
Now, to temp the fate of this prohibition, I'll express some olympic-related opinions.
That is exactly the problem. The problem is not that he was prevented from flying, because he wasn't prevented from flying. The problem is not that the name (I'll not call it "his name", because there are unfortunate people who have the same name) wasn't removed from the list, because it eventually was.
And I'd love to hear the protests from people who are unhappy that someone who was a known terrorist was let on an airplane after something happens to that plane (even if it is a mechanical failure). "Topping tonight's news, XYZ has learned that the man responsible for the downing of Flight 43 was allowed to check in and board the flight because the TSA removed his name from the list of known terrorist suspects just one week earlier." I'd bet two bits that Ted Kennedy's part in getting the name removed would not be mentioned.
On the whole (which means I'm not arguing that the system is particularly effective to begin with), I'd rather have Ted Kennedy, Senator, showing extra ID when he checks in than having some low-level data-pusher removing a name that matches his from the list just to keep from inconveniencing him. That's just creating a way to bypass the system for those who can get id that say they really are Ted Kennedy or Gordon Smith or Ted Stevens (or any of the other lesser-known Senators and Congressmen.) And if that means that Ted Kennedy, Senator, has to get to the airport at least an hour prior to his flight just like the rest of us innocent people, that's too bad. If Ted Kennedy, Senator, knows his name is on a list and will take longer to check in, then better he gets their early than having him pull strings to get off the list altogether.
No, planes are more crowded because fewer people are flying and the airlines have cut back the number of flights because of that. They fact that the numbers are once again increasing whilst the number of flights is not is making the problem worse.
I guess if I told you it had more to do with airlines trying to maximize profits, you'd say I was just another paranoid conspiracy nut.
Why don't you just say what you think is correct and let me worry about how I'll respond?
Were it just a case of "maximizing profits", the number of flights would have been cut a long time ago. The sudden drop in passengers had the most to do with it. The airlines could fly with half- or 3/4 full airplanes and still make a profit, as long as their fixed and variable expenses were being covered. As soon as the number of passengers dropped below that magic point, they had to cut the number of flights to make any profit.
Making flying convenient for the passengers is one way of increasing profits, since more people will fly. Cattle-cars like People's (I think that was the name, I flew on it once and vowed never again) aren't around anymore because they made it uncomfortable for the large-profit pax to fly. The packed airplanes and limited schedules they are keeping now aren't helping them back into the black.
It's so nice to take each sentence one at a time ...
You said "the policies involve prohibit alternative viewpoints from being expressed." They don't. You are quite free to express yours. I'm free to express mine. Other people are free to express theirs. If expressing viewpoints really WAS being prohibited, someone would be coming after you to stop you from doing just that. They aren't. That's pretty good proof that you are wrong about any prohibition. And since you admit that YOU are free to express your alternative opinion, then it's a bit odd that you complain about a prohibition against doing so.
Who says it has to be unlicensed?
Read the words. Nobody said is HAS to be unlicensed; it IS unlicensed. The fact that the owner of the copyrighted material did not grant them a license to use it for broadcast is what makes it such. They could have given a license to anyone they wanted to. They chose not to.
If there wasn't an exclusive contract for showing the Olympics, then every station or network could license it, if they so pleased.
But there is an exclusive license holder, so they cannot. This is not censorship. This is contract law 101.
I'm not too familiar with the licensing scheme used in baseball, but as long as anyone who wants be a commentator can pay the license fee and comment, I'm ok with it.
You missed the point completely. You don't have to pay any licensing fee to comment. You have to pay the license fee to use the copyrighted material. TV stations don't pay license fees to use the highlights in their sports coverage, and their sports anchors comment freely on the games. It is covered under fair use. Comment away all you want. If you're good at it, you might get hired to do it on ESPN or for some newspaper. Just don't use the copyrighted material without licensing. They DO come after you for that.
The IOC has a monopoly on the Olympics. The exclusive contracts are a method of artificially limiting supply in order to raise prices.
And? What's the problem? It costs money to produce an olympics, do you think they ought to spend their money and then give away the video? Shouldn't the investors be able to profit from the risk they are taking?
Unregulated monopolies are the least efficient structure in the capitalist system.
You know, if this discussion were about something that had some measurable impact on people's lives, it might be worth discussing whether the IOC ought to be regulated (by whom is an interesting question in its own right). But it is not. Boo hoo you don't get to watch the olympic coin-flipping championship between the Ukranian and Flatvian teams. I think you'll survive. If it is so critical to see an event, pay the price and get a ticket.
Webster's Unabridged.
Twice, while returning to the country from foreign travel, I was questioned by Immigration. The first time, they asked me things like "have you ever lived in Colorado?" The second time, I started out by saying "Good morning, I'm not the one from Colorado" and I was waved through without further delay.
I feel so violated. How dare they question me!
Let's see, to prevent this someone would have had to predict that 1) a terrorist would use the name of a major political office holder that is instantly recognizable by anyone over the age of 20, and 2) this rich, famous, instantly recognizable super-human member of the species would actually want to fly on a bargain-rate airline instead of in the family jet.
Yep, they ought to have guessed this ahead of time. I hope they learned from this and removed "Jesus", "Mother Teresa" and "Gandi" from the list already. I wouldn't want to be delayed while trying to prove who I am.
Remember that Florida tried to purge Democratic-friendly voters a second time.
I refuse to remember fictitious "history". On the other hand, I remember quite clearly Gore trying to purge every absentee ballot from three counties, after they had been counted and found to be favoring Bush. The courtroom sessions were televised and were a wonderful lesson in democrat politics. In one county, the reason being used was that the Democratic committee chairman in the county was too stupid to put correct data on the absentee applications (and the Republican one had).
A lot of those ballots were from US military personnel serving overseas. Gore desperately wanted to be CIC, but didn't want his minions able to vote.
I'm looking at a 14 hour drive in October for me and my wife. I am reluctant to try flying. What if my name is on the no-fly list?
If you are that paranoid, you ought to drive. And the fewer people flying, the better. I remember the days when planes often had empty seats and travel was a lot more comfortable, even in the tiny seats.
What makes you think it was ignorance? Maybe there's somebody named Kopechne who does data entry for the list?
You seem quite able to express your alternative viewpoint. I don't see the IOC sending lawyers to stop you.
It is not an "alternative viewpoint" to broadcast women's spear-chucking on ABC. It is unlicensed use of Olympic content. ABC would love to profit by carrying Olympic games without having to pay the licensing fee. It is not censorship for them to be prevented from doing so.
I'm sure many stations and commentators have insights they would like to express during the competitions, but due to the exclusive contract, they are not able to.
Who is being stopped? News programs all around the world are carrying reports of the games and commentary about what is going on. I'm sure that there are a lot of wanna-be baseball commentators who would love to use AL and NL games as a background to promote themselves; it is not censorship that the AL and NL have contracts for carriage that prevent just anyone from broadcasting AL and NL games. But every sports anchor on every news program can show clips and comment to his little heart's desire.
Myself, I happen to believe that all exclusive contracts are and forever shall be an anathema to free market capitalism.
What would be a problem is exclusion of people from bidding on those contracts. ABC and CBS were free to bid, and probably did, they just didn't offer as much. "Free market capitalism" is not just the consumer, it also has to consider the producer.
That does not say he funded it (which he did not, although he may have directed OUR funds to pay for enhancements). This says he was involved in creating it, AND that HE took the initiative. Even though it was in existance before he got into office.
It wasn't his money, it existed before he got into office, and he didn't create it anymore than he could bother to fix the toilets in his run-down rental housing.
Isn't it interesting, the same people who defend Gore tooth-and-nail for making this grandious claim are unable to look in their own dictionaries to see that "potatoe" is a valid alternative spelling for "potato". Depends on who says something, huh?