Damned if they do, damned if they don't, I suppose.
False dichotomy; they could have just shipped tablets that were not locked down, or as you yourself suggest, tablets which can be unlocked by the user.
In other words, their freedom to choose is conditional on aligning with your wishes. Now who's restricting freedom?
Remember: Jailbreaks are code execution vulnerabilities. On your oh so secure Apple device.
No software is 100% secure, all you can do is fix bugs and security holes as they become evident.
Speaking of that, when Apple *does* fix these security holes, it's painted as "Apple patches jailbreaking because they hate freedom!!!" instead of "Apple closes security vulnerability".
Damned if they do, damned if they don't, I suppose.
(Disclaimer: I think iOS should have a built in 'advanced' mode that effectively results in the same thing as jailbreaking).
It's a small and relatively simple example, and clearly well known even outside chemistry, but standardised spellings do matter (eg, hexane, hexene, hexyne), so while introducing regional variation into the more obvious ones doesn't make it hard to know what you mean, it can create ambiguity with more complex compounds. For example, are hexyne and hexene the same thing? Perhaps they are just spelled differently in different parts of the world (like tire and tyre on a car).
IUPAC is the body that sets those spellings, and they went with the US form for "sulfur" and the UK one for "aluminium". It wasn't personal;p
My in-line spell check still underlines "sulfur" as incorrect, even though I know it isn't.
"We" being everyone who works in the field of chemistry and science in general. We sort of have to agree on shit like this, in the same way that we agree on SI units and so on.
What measures am I willing to accept to enforce a requirement for insurance?
What the hell are you smoking.
Driving a car is not a right. It has never been a right, it never will be a right. Exception: if you drive that car on private land, then the government gets no say. Driving a car on a public road requires that you obey the law. The law requires that you have third party insurance (you are free not to have personal insurance, but you must have insurance to cover the costs of someone you hit if you are at fault). The government can use the ANPR system to determine this, as they have been doing for many, many years here in the UK. This is not a new thing. The current proposal to pre-empt fuel theft (which is almost always a crime committed by uninsured drivers) is simply something that will help to reduce the number of uninsured drivers on the road.
It is not "anti individual rights" to stop people driving around with no insurance. Just like it's not against individual rights to put restrictions on gun ownership in the US (for example). You're free to own a gun in the states, but that doesn't mean you can do absolutely anything at all that you like with it - there are certain rules that the government sets that you must follow. Owning a car and using it in public is much the same.
The government is not "expanding" the surveillance - CCTV cameras have been at petrol stations since the invention of video camera systems. The ANPR system has been in use at petrol stations since its introduction. This new proposed measure will simply flag the system automatically to prevent an uninsured car from filling up.
Well, Fox news did take them to court over the cartoon representation of Fox news on the show itself, claiming that viewers might be misled into thinking it was real news and endorsed by Fox, so... maybe?
I assume GP was referring to the likely event of a genuine mistake, a fully law-abiding citizen who gets screwed over by some technical issue.
Hmm... I've just realised that, for me, "law-abiding" is a more negative adjective than "criminal". Perhaps I should spend less time on Slashdot.:)
Even in that case, if you have not planned enough to deal with such issues then it's no one's fault but your own. No system is perfect, people make mistakes, and holdups and errors happen.
To the guy "screwed over" for being late for work due to leaving the refuelling of his vehicle to the very last minute, such that not being able to fill up at a petrol station would ensure he could not get to work is the principal agent of his own downfall - as are many people who go into a rage and start talking about suing the government (and in fact, in this case *individual government employees*) because they were late due to a hold up.
Sure, it sucks to have an administration issue to deal with, especially if you're legit and it's a genuine error, but getting all entitled and sue-happy because it affected you when you left something crucial to the very last minute that would only be fine if everything were 100% perfect all the time is really silly.
I see you're also unfamiliar with the use of "you" to create an argument. I was not speaking directly to the original poster, just creating a premise based on his train of thought.
It does not mean "you personally want to drive an illegal vehicle".
I'm sorry, but when it comes to 'rights' you are wrong. In almost every western country in the world you have the 'right' to do anything that is not forbidden by law. That's just how the system works.
So, you have no insurance and you get into a wreck with another car, then just.... screw the other law abiding citizen? Car insurance does not cover *your car* (at least, not the legal minimum - most people's car insurance is fully comprehensive, so covers your own car and person too).
The legal minimum you need is third party fire and theft cover - ie, if you wreck someone and it's your fault, your insurance pays them for their car, their lost earnings, their legal expenses etc.
So, it's fine to just "skip out" on those payments, eh?
Hope he doesn't hit me!
If you can afford to run a car in the UK (even if you are very poor - we have a much better welfare state than the US) then you can afford to insure it to a legal standard.
Not paying for insurance is akin to walking around with a loaded shotgun. Sure, occasionally it might go off and cripple some poor bystander, but fuck him, right? He shouldn't have been standing near you when it accidentally went off.
The first person who loses his job because of a database or connectivity problem keeping him from gassing up on the way to work should be able to sue those who came up with this INDIVIDUALLY.
Not sue the government so the taxpayers make up for up for their mistakes. But these people who think they can tweak our lives any way they want need to learn there can be real consequences.
I still wish some government bureaucrat in the US could be in jail for manslaughter for the first kid who died from a mandated airbag before multi-stage, safer airbags were developed.
Failure to plan on your part does not constitute an emergency on mine.
Jesus, what happened to the idea of personal responsibility? So, what? The hypothetical guy who can't gas up on the way to work gets to sue the gas station if it's closed that day too?
It's the driver's responsibility to ensure that he has gas, has a roadworthy vehicle and to ensure that it is adequately taxed and insured.
Those "real consequences" like suing someone because you didn't have enough gas to drive to work and an admin issue at the gas station, where you went to fill up your almost totally empty tank at the last minute (ie, on your way to work) certainly are serious.
"Yes, your honour, I didn't have enough gas to get to work, and I thought I'd fill up on the way at the last minute because I believe that unless every single thing involved in my journey is 100% perfect I am entitled to sue".
Not at all. It's a cultural thing. Our equivalent of pre-pay are the card readers on the pumps that will only let you fuel if your card checks as valid, and then sets a maximum spend (usually more than enough for a full tank). The equivalent of leaving your card with the waiter, I guess.
We just don't have a pre-pay culture here - while most people put round-number-values of fuel in (say £20 or 30) the idea that you'd pay for that first is an alien concept! However, sticking your card in and have the machine say "take what you want, I'll charge it when you're done" is they way we do that.
Card readers are gradually being installed at more and more places, but sometimes not on all of the pumps. The ANPR system is part of the police network, and is installed in gas stations anyway - the leap to link the pump activation to an insurance check is merely a checkbox on a piece of software. Much easier than rolling out new card systems on all of the pumps, that is happening much more slowly.
Yes, the dye removal has been present for as long as the illegal fuel sales - it's one of those arms-race type things where new, more difficult to separate, dyes are used, and ever-evolving bucket chemistry processes are used to try and stay ahead of it.
It does mean that this black market fuel can end up with all sorts of crap in it that can potentially damage your engine - it's just not worth the risk to save money, unless you don't care about dumping the car when it breaks.
The database already exists and is used for more than just drive-offs. It's been in place and running for years. This is not new - the only new part is the potential to deny fuelling if the car pings as uninsured.
It's a large problem - mainly because fuel is so expensive ($8-9 per gallon) and almost all stations are "fill, then pay" and almost none at all have pre-payment. Some have card readers on the pumps themselves, too, but usually only on a few pumps in a station.
The ANPR system being at gas stations is just a natural extension of where it's normally used (and it's already well established in fuel stations, and has been for some years) - in police cars and on main motorways. Cars have to visit fuel stations, so if you're uninsured or your car is stolen etc, it has a higher chance of being seen on the system. It's not solely about fuel theft.
It wouldn't surprise me. There's already a major problem with cloned plates being used to avoid the congestion charge in central London, with innocent people living hundreds of miles away who've never been near the city being landed with fines for non payment because "their" car was caught in the zone.
Seriously determined crooks have been doing that sort of thing since the introduction of the ANPR system as a whole, and especially since the police procedures changed for roadside stops so that they no longer gave out a "producer" (a form that required you to take proof of insurance and licence etc to a police station within 7 days) that could be easily ignored by a habitual offender and instead started using the PNC and mobile phones to do instant checks, with the power to seize the car immediately.
It's still not perfect - many will simply drive around in disposable beaters until they get stopped and then buy another one when the police crush it, or they'll run around on a cloned plate that matches the make, model and colour of whatever they're driving which is harder to detect.
There already is a black market for gasoline and diesel.
Exactly. I'm surprised that they don't just let them fill up (get the duty and VAT on the fuel) and then have a panda pull them over as they're about to drive off.
Many uninsured drivers skip that pesky "payment" step of the refuelling process, so stopping them before they steal the fuel just cuts out the paperwork and lost revenue for the petrol station.
I would be ecstatic for prices that absurdly cheap
I would be ecstatic if the US government added a $4/gal tax on gasoline and used the proceeds to develop public transit, bicycle lanes, and walkable cities.
I'd love to use those bike lanes, but some chav stole my bike from my shed a week or so ago.
Praise the CCTV culture of the UK though, since the hotel next door has a camera that points right towards my shed, so if it was taken in the window we think (during the day) then the little bastard will be on camera and I can start hunting down and maiming his children. Or reporting him to the police. One of those two things.
This is the UK, where we already drive high efficiency vehicles (my own is a minivan that does over 45 mpg [US adjusted figure] and is only middle of the road for efficiency) and pay $8-9 per gallon for fuel. We already think twice about driving short distances for errands.
Adding the insurance to fuel would disproportionately hurt people and industries that drive for a living (truckers, haulage firms, salesmen, on-call service engineers etc).
The UK is not a market where "gas guzzlers" are at all common. More than 50% of vehicles sold are diesels, for that very reason (higher efficiency, cheaper to run).
Slashdot Mirror
Damned if they do, damned if they don't, I suppose.
False dichotomy; they could have just shipped tablets that were not locked down, or as you yourself suggest, tablets which can be unlocked by the user.
In other words, their freedom to choose is conditional on aligning with your wishes. Now who's restricting freedom?
Remember: Jailbreaks are code execution vulnerabilities. On your oh so secure Apple device.
No software is 100% secure, all you can do is fix bugs and security holes as they become evident.
Speaking of that, when Apple *does* fix these security holes, it's painted as "Apple patches jailbreaking because they hate freedom!!!" instead of "Apple closes security vulnerability".
Damned if they do, damned if they don't, I suppose.
(Disclaimer: I think iOS should have a built in 'advanced' mode that effectively results in the same thing as jailbreaking).
It's a small and relatively simple example, and clearly well known even outside chemistry, but standardised spellings do matter (eg, hexane, hexene, hexyne), so while introducing regional variation into the more obvious ones doesn't make it hard to know what you mean, it can create ambiguity with more complex compounds. For example, are hexyne and hexene the same thing? Perhaps they are just spelled differently in different parts of the world (like tire and tyre on a car).
IUPAC is the body that sets those spellings, and they went with the US form for "sulfur" and the UK one for "aluminium". It wasn't personal ;p
My in-line spell check still underlines "sulfur" as incorrect, even though I know it isn't.
"We" being everyone who works in the field of chemistry and science in general. We sort of have to agree on shit like this, in the same way that we agree on SI units and so on.
But IUPAC goes with "aluminium", so we'll go with that.
Just as we had to capitulate and accept "sulfur". Gah.
768 mph..... at sea level.
Joe was..... not at sea level for some time when jumping from a balloon at 70k+ feet.
(Hint, the speed of sound varies as a function of density of the medium it propagates through).
What measures am I willing to accept to enforce a requirement for insurance?
What the hell are you smoking.
Driving a car is not a right. It has never been a right, it never will be a right. Exception: if you drive that car on private land, then the government gets no say. Driving a car on a public road requires that you obey the law. The law requires that you have third party insurance (you are free not to have personal insurance, but you must have insurance to cover the costs of someone you hit if you are at fault). The government can use the ANPR system to determine this, as they have been doing for many, many years here in the UK. This is not a new thing. The current proposal to pre-empt fuel theft (which is almost always a crime committed by uninsured drivers) is simply something that will help to reduce the number of uninsured drivers on the road.
It is not "anti individual rights" to stop people driving around with no insurance. Just like it's not against individual rights to put restrictions on gun ownership in the US (for example). You're free to own a gun in the states, but that doesn't mean you can do absolutely anything at all that you like with it - there are certain rules that the government sets that you must follow. Owning a car and using it in public is much the same.
The government is not "expanding" the surveillance - CCTV cameras have been at petrol stations since the invention of video camera systems. The ANPR system has been in use at petrol stations since its introduction. This new proposed measure will simply flag the system automatically to prevent an uninsured car from filling up.
Well, Fox news did take them to court over the cartoon representation of Fox news on the show itself, claiming that viewers might be misled into thinking it was real news and endorsed by Fox, so... maybe?
I assume GP was referring to the likely event of a genuine mistake, a fully law-abiding citizen who gets screwed over by some technical issue.
Hmm... I've just realised that, for me, "law-abiding" is a more negative adjective than "criminal". Perhaps I should spend less time on Slashdot. :)
Even in that case, if you have not planned enough to deal with such issues then it's no one's fault but your own. No system is perfect, people make mistakes, and holdups and errors happen.
To the guy "screwed over" for being late for work due to leaving the refuelling of his vehicle to the very last minute, such that not being able to fill up at a petrol station would ensure he could not get to work is the principal agent of his own downfall - as are many people who go into a rage and start talking about suing the government (and in fact, in this case *individual government employees*) because they were late due to a hold up.
Sure, it sucks to have an administration issue to deal with, especially if you're legit and it's a genuine error, but getting all entitled and sue-happy because it affected you when you left something crucial to the very last minute that would only be fine if everything were 100% perfect all the time is really silly.
It comes back to personal responsibility.
You should have logged in.
I see you're also unfamiliar with the use of "you" to create an argument. I was not speaking directly to the original poster, just creating a premise based on his train of thought.
It does not mean "you personally want to drive an illegal vehicle".
I'm sorry, but when it comes to 'rights' you are wrong. In almost every western country in the world you have the 'right' to do anything that is not forbidden by law. That's just how the system works.
Stopped reading right here. This is not true.
Do you require a license plate on your gas can when you need to fill up? How about your lawnmower or ATV or generator or .....
I guess the only things that need gas are insured motor vehicles.
If you drive your ATV or lawnmower up to the gas station? Yes.
If you want to fill a can, then clearly they hit the override button.
We have that too - it is being rolled out. It is just taking time. Changing all the pumps takes time.
Wow. I really can't tell if you're trolling.
So, you have no insurance and you get into a wreck with another car, then just.... screw the other law abiding citizen? Car insurance does not cover *your car* (at least, not the legal minimum - most people's car insurance is fully comprehensive, so covers your own car and person too).
The legal minimum you need is third party fire and theft cover - ie, if you wreck someone and it's your fault, your insurance pays them for their car, their lost earnings, their legal expenses etc.
So, it's fine to just "skip out" on those payments, eh?
Hope he doesn't hit me!
If you can afford to run a car in the UK (even if you are very poor - we have a much better welfare state than the US) then you can afford to insure it to a legal standard.
Not paying for insurance is akin to walking around with a loaded shotgun. Sure, occasionally it might go off and cripple some poor bystander, but fuck him, right? He shouldn't have been standing near you when it accidentally went off.
I didn't say that they weren't being rolled out (they are) just that they weren't at all common at the moment.
Infrastructure upgrades take time.
The first person who loses his job because of a database or connectivity problem keeping him from gassing up on the way to work should be able to sue those who came up with this INDIVIDUALLY.
Not sue the government so the taxpayers make up for up for their mistakes. But these people who think they can tweak our lives any way they want need to learn there can be real consequences.
I still wish some government bureaucrat in the US could be in jail for manslaughter for the first kid who died from a mandated airbag before multi-stage, safer airbags were developed.
Failure to plan on your part does not constitute an emergency on mine.
Jesus, what happened to the idea of personal responsibility? So, what? The hypothetical guy who can't gas up on the way to work gets to sue the gas station if it's closed that day too?
It's the driver's responsibility to ensure that he has gas, has a roadworthy vehicle and to ensure that it is adequately taxed and insured.
Those "real consequences" like suing someone because you didn't have enough gas to drive to work and an admin issue at the gas station, where you went to fill up your almost totally empty tank at the last minute (ie, on your way to work) certainly are serious.
"Yes, your honour, I didn't have enough gas to get to work, and I thought I'd fill up on the way at the last minute because I believe that unless every single thing involved in my journey is 100% perfect I am entitled to sue".
mmm.
Not at all. It's a cultural thing. Our equivalent of pre-pay are the card readers on the pumps that will only let you fuel if your card checks as valid, and then sets a maximum spend (usually more than enough for a full tank). The equivalent of leaving your card with the waiter, I guess.
We just don't have a pre-pay culture here - while most people put round-number-values of fuel in (say £20 or 30) the idea that you'd pay for that first is an alien concept! However, sticking your card in and have the machine say "take what you want, I'll charge it when you're done" is they way we do that.
Card readers are gradually being installed at more and more places, but sometimes not on all of the pumps. The ANPR system is part of the police network, and is installed in gas stations anyway - the leap to link the pump activation to an insurance check is merely a checkbox on a piece of software. Much easier than rolling out new card systems on all of the pumps, that is happening much more slowly.
Yes, the dye removal has been present for as long as the illegal fuel sales - it's one of those arms-race type things where new, more difficult to separate, dyes are used, and ever-evolving bucket chemistry processes are used to try and stay ahead of it.
It does mean that this black market fuel can end up with all sorts of crap in it that can potentially damage your engine - it's just not worth the risk to save money, unless you don't care about dumping the car when it breaks.
The database already exists and is used for more than just drive-offs. It's been in place and running for years. This is not new - the only new part is the potential to deny fuelling if the car pings as uninsured.
The UK, which is the country talked about in this ANPR plan. I should have specified though.
It's a large problem - mainly because fuel is so expensive ($8-9 per gallon) and almost all stations are "fill, then pay" and almost none at all have pre-payment. Some have card readers on the pumps themselves, too, but usually only on a few pumps in a station.
The ANPR system being at gas stations is just a natural extension of where it's normally used (and it's already well established in fuel stations, and has been for some years) - in police cars and on main motorways. Cars have to visit fuel stations, so if you're uninsured or your car is stolen etc, it has a higher chance of being seen on the system. It's not solely about fuel theft.
It wouldn't surprise me. There's already a major problem with cloned plates being used to avoid the congestion charge in central London, with innocent people living hundreds of miles away who've never been near the city being landed with fines for non payment because "their" car was caught in the zone.
Seriously determined crooks have been doing that sort of thing since the introduction of the ANPR system as a whole, and especially since the police procedures changed for roadside stops so that they no longer gave out a "producer" (a form that required you to take proof of insurance and licence etc to a police station within 7 days) that could be easily ignored by a habitual offender and instead started using the PNC and mobile phones to do instant checks, with the power to seize the car immediately.
It's still not perfect - many will simply drive around in disposable beaters until they get stopped and then buy another one when the police crush it, or they'll run around on a cloned plate that matches the make, model and colour of whatever they're driving which is harder to detect.
There already is a black market for gasoline and diesel.
Exactly. I'm surprised that they don't just let them fill up (get the duty and VAT on the fuel) and then have a panda pull them over as they're about to drive off.
Many uninsured drivers skip that pesky "payment" step of the refuelling process, so stopping them before they steal the fuel just cuts out the paperwork and lost revenue for the petrol station.
I would be ecstatic if the US government added a $4/gal tax on gasoline and used the proceeds to develop public transit, bicycle lanes, and walkable cities.
I'd love to use those bike lanes, but some chav stole my bike from my shed a week or so ago.
Praise the CCTV culture of the UK though, since the hotel next door has a camera that points right towards my shed, so if it was taken in the window we think (during the day) then the little bastard will be on camera and I can start hunting down and maiming his children. Or reporting him to the police. One of those two things.
This is the UK, where we already drive high efficiency vehicles (my own is a minivan that does over 45 mpg [US adjusted figure] and is only middle of the road for efficiency) and pay $8-9 per gallon for fuel. We already think twice about driving short distances for errands.
Adding the insurance to fuel would disproportionately hurt people and industries that drive for a living (truckers, haulage firms, salesmen, on-call service engineers etc).
The UK is not a market where "gas guzzlers" are at all common. More than 50% of vehicles sold are diesels, for that very reason (higher efficiency, cheaper to run).