"But if it IS legal to work 12 year olds 18 hours a day in some country, can you hold it against a company if they move there and do so?"
Yes I would hold it against them. If it is legal for a corporation to kill retarded people and sell their kidneys for profit, I would also hold it against companies who did that.
"Agreed, they work terrible hours, get no rights, and get paid very little - but if they didn't do the work, they would not get paid AT ALL."
If the children didn't do the work, their parents would get paid more (due to the lower supply of labor) and the children could spend their time getting an education, so they could earn even more in the long run.
It has been discovered that there is an extremely strong link between terrorism and dihydrogen monoxide. 100% of terrorists use dihydrogen monoxide on a regular basis. To protect the USA from terrorism, anyone in possession of dihydrogen monoxide has to be prosecuted.
"I believe that waiting tables in the US is the closest you will come to pure capitalism anywhere. You tip based on their performance. If they suck, you pay them nothing, but if they provide excellent service, you pay them well. I've been known to give 200% tips for excellent service."
That is much closer to socialism. They do something for you then hope and pray you'll pay them out of the goodness of your heart.
I hate tipping because a customer's idea of a good tip isn't necessarily the same as the waiter/waitress's idea. I'll give what I think is a good tip, and by the expression on their face I can see they weren't pleased with it. I've even had a waitress actually call me cheap after getting a tip for more than 20%. I stormed out of the place in anger so I wouldn't do something that would get me arrested. But on further thought I should have called the manager to get the damn bitch fired.
With real capitalism, you either know the price up front or you negotiate it before making the purchase. Thus the transaction only takes place if the dollar amount is mutually acceptable. If the wait staff up-front declared a dollar amount or percentage that they'd be willing to serve me for, I can decline if it's too high, and if I accept their terms they can't complain about not receiving a high enough tip.
I'll have somebody take a picture of me sitting at the computer.
Then I'll take that picture and shrink it to place it within the monitor screen that is within the picture. Repeat. Then I'll make that recursive scene become the screen background.
What's wrong with mental masturbation?
on
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Mental masturbators can do it anytime, anywhere in public or private, without anybody else's knowledge and without making a mess. What's wrong with that?
"Entry level graduate salary in the UK starts at 18K pounds (27K dollars). A senior engineer/applications developer in London could earn 50K pounds (80K dollars)."
Not 27K dollars and 80K dollars... that should be $35K and $96K. It's called devaluation of the US dollar. 1 UK pound = 1.922 USD.
The article said 41% of consumers don't send in the rebate paperwork. Well I send in close to 100% of mine, and I fail to get the checks for about 41% of them. So they will maintain their 41% non-payment rate one way or another.
Now I stop thinking about rebates before purchasing and only buy based on the full price. If one thing is plain $50 and a similar product is $60 with a $20 rebate, I'll buy the $50 one.
If I do buy something with a rebate, after buying I'll send in the papers and hope to receive the money and if I get it, it's a bonus. But I won't factor it into my purchase decision because I don't trust that I'll actually get it.
Unlike physical property, patents are artificial monopolies created by the government. Taking away somebody's house and land is much worse than dismantling a government-granted monopoly.
If eminent domain is going to continue to be part of the legal landscape, patents should be among the first things subject to be taken away for the public good.
Some people think that as dreadful as the conditions may be, the sweatshops are still good for the workers because the alternatives are worse.
However, they fail to consider that a big part of the reason why the alternatives are worse or nonexistent is because of what the sweatshop owners and big corporations have done to the environment and economy.
For example, corporations pollute a river and kill the fish and the fishermen go out of business, so some of the former fishermen end up working in a sweatshop. Or they use their money to cut off or otherwise influence the distribution channels of the small farmer, and the farmer can't find anybody to truck his tomatoes to market. Or they buy up lots of land and drive up the land values so the young adult can't start his/her own small farm with a couple of cows and chicken coops.
Other tactics involve blackballing any employee who quits so no one else will hire them. The sweatshops also deceive prospective employees about how terrible the conditions are. They train every current employee to speak wonderful things about the company, then when a new worker is hired they have to work so much that they don't even have time or energy to look for another job. They also can't outright quit because their pay is so low that a week without pay could lead to starvation.
Similar trends are emerging in the US; the big corporations are progressively taking away the ability of the small business to succeed. For example, it is practically impossible for the 2-person software shop to sell any game for any of the popular game consoles, because they have to pay licensing fees just to make a game that will work with a console without the owner having to hack it. If "trusted computing"/Palladium gets a stronghold, it will also become infeasible for new and small software companies to sell anything that will run on an unhacked computer, so developers who want to stay in the industry will have no choice but to work for a big corporation, probably with EA-sweatshop conditions.
Sweatshops aren't doing the workers a favor. The alternatives are worse only because the sweatshops helped to take away the better opportunities.
It's those who bought the ads that should be liable, not Google.
Google is just the medium by which the ads are distributed. If an ad has false information or infringes a trademark, hold the people who created and paid for the ad responsible, not the messenger who delivered the ad.
Company buys COTS package. Company realizes the COTS doesn't do half of what they need it to do. Company builds a customized hodge-podge of scripts, glue, interfaces, and translators, around and on top of the COTS. If they're lucky it will sort of work for what they need to do.
Result: the worst of both worlds. The labor and time costs of customized software, with the inflexibility and vendor-dependence of COTS.
"This place got hit by the last economic downturn just like everyone else. It took me two months to find my current job after my last redundancy."
The difference in the perception of job markets in New Zealand vs. here in the US continues to amaze me. I was looking into moving to New Zealand myself, and someone in New Zealand warned me that it could take a "long time" to find a job if I moved there without a job offer in hand... probably as much as three months.
THREE MONTHS? I almost laughed. If you can find another job in the US in less than SIX months after being laid off, in the same field as your previous job, it's considered a good job market or you consider yourself very lucky! Years ago I realized I had to prepare myself for the prospect of being unemployed for a year, and budgeted and saved accordingly. Surviving 2-3 months of unemployment in New Zealand definitely would not be a problem.
Using even modest encryption such as 40-bit RSA would seriously cut down the number of IDs that an identity thief could profitably steal. Because they don't want to use the strongest encryption available, they make everything plain-text?
And there are stronger forms of encryption that originated outside the US or have already been distributed around the world, so many choices exist that would make things too hard for all but the most skilled and well-equipped ID thieves, without exposing other countries to encryption techniques that they don't already know.
Of course, it is also quite ridiculous that they still have this fear of exporting encryption technology.
"Basically, the real question is what is the purpose of a passport. If it is to track every individual, then this new measure is good. If it is merely a pass to travel, then these new measures definity step on civil liberties."
You only need a US passport if you intend to travel outside the US. Your civil liberties don't include the freedom to enter any country you want, just as the US doesn't give all foreigners the legal freedom to enter America.
But there is definitely another motive of command and control going on here. Why is the US government doing this when other countries aren't demanding it? Other countries are asking for machine-readable passports, but that may be served with enhanced bar codes and other such methods, not necessarily RFID.
Software is the only thing in the world that can be patented, copyrighted, and be a trade secret at the same time (because source code in usually not revealed). That definitely makes it different, and that sort of multi-level IP protection is excessive.
If anybody is good at saving costs it's Wal-Mart. I don't agree with many of their business practices (such as screwing employees out of overtime pay), but saving costs is one thing they're really good at.
They are smart enough to realize that in software development, the real cost savings come from quality and productivity, not per-person labor costs. Hiring, training and retaining people who can produce twice as much per person is much more profitable than hiring people who each cost half as much to employ.
Outsourcing to cheap labor might work well for manufacturing toys or T-shirts, but cheap IT labor doesn't so easily bring your total IT costs down.
Slashdot Mirror
"But if it IS legal to work 12 year olds 18 hours a day in some country, can you hold it against a company if they move there and do so?"
Yes I would hold it against them. If it is legal for a corporation to kill retarded people and sell their kidneys for profit, I would also hold it against companies who did that.
"Agreed, they work terrible hours, get no rights, and get paid very little - but if they didn't do the work, they would not get paid AT ALL."
If the children didn't do the work, their parents would get paid more (due to the lower supply of labor) and the children could spend their time getting an education, so they could earn even more in the long run.
"A company that lets morals hinder its profit-making is betraying its shareholders."
So is one that lets a lack of morals hinder its profit making.
Exactly ... Survey says corporations prefer dictatorships.u rvey.html
http://www.globalexchange.org/campaigns/econ101/s
It has been discovered that there is an extremely strong link between terrorism and dihydrogen monoxide. 100% of terrorists use dihydrogen monoxide on a regular basis. To protect the USA from terrorism, anyone in possession of dihydrogen monoxide has to be prosecuted.
For decades immigrant scientists have been a major force in developing technology that is used by the US military.
So in order to make the US safer, we're going to drive them away so they'll develop such technology for other countries?
Microsoft for stealing the kids' thoughts by having them give up their intellectual property to Microsoft.
"I believe that waiting tables in the US is the closest you will come to pure capitalism anywhere. You tip based on their performance. If they suck, you pay them nothing, but if they provide excellent service, you pay them well. I've been known to give 200% tips for excellent service."
That is much closer to socialism. They do something for you then hope and pray you'll pay them out of the goodness of your heart.
I hate tipping because a customer's idea of a good tip isn't necessarily the same as the waiter/waitress's idea. I'll give what I think is a good tip, and by the expression on their face I can see they weren't pleased with it. I've even had a waitress actually call me cheap after getting a tip for more than 20%. I stormed out of the place in anger so I wouldn't do something that would get me arrested. But on further thought I should have called the manager to get the damn bitch fired.
With real capitalism, you either know the price up front or you negotiate it before making the purchase. Thus the transaction only takes place if the dollar amount is mutually acceptable. If the wait staff up-front declared a dollar amount or percentage that they'd be willing to serve me for, I can decline if it's too high, and if I accept their terms they can't complain about not receiving a high enough tip.
I'll have somebody take a picture of me sitting at the computer.
Then I'll take that picture and shrink it to place it within the monitor screen that is within the picture. Repeat. Then I'll make that recursive scene become the screen background.
Mental masturbators can do it anytime, anywhere in public or private, without anybody else's knowledge and without making a mess. What's wrong with that?
"Entry level graduate salary in the UK starts at 18K pounds (27K dollars). A senior engineer/applications developer in London could earn 50K pounds (80K dollars)."
... that should be $35K and $96K. It's called devaluation of the US dollar. 1 UK pound = 1.922 USD.
Not 27K dollars and 80K dollars
The article said 41% of consumers don't send in the rebate paperwork. Well I send in close to 100% of mine, and I fail to get the checks for about 41% of them. So they will maintain their 41% non-payment rate one way or another.
Now I stop thinking about rebates before purchasing and only buy based on the full price. If one thing is plain $50 and a similar product is $60 with a $20 rebate, I'll buy the $50 one.
If I do buy something with a rebate, after buying I'll send in the papers and hope to receive the money and if I get it, it's a bonus. But I won't factor it into my purchase decision because I don't trust that I'll actually get it.
Unlike physical property, patents are artificial monopolies created by the government. Taking away somebody's house and land is much worse than dismantling a government-granted monopoly.
If eminent domain is going to continue to be part of the legal landscape, patents should be among the first things subject to be taken away for the public good.
The main story concerns third-world sweatshops, not just MMORPGs.
Some people think that as dreadful as the conditions may be, the sweatshops are still good for the workers because the alternatives are worse.
However, they fail to consider that a big part of the reason why the alternatives are worse or nonexistent is because of what the sweatshop owners and big corporations have done to the environment and economy.
For example, corporations pollute a river and kill the fish and the fishermen go out of business, so some of the former fishermen end up working in a sweatshop. Or they use their money to cut off or otherwise influence the distribution channels of the small farmer, and the farmer can't find anybody to truck his tomatoes to market. Or they buy up lots of land and drive up the land values so the young adult can't start his/her own small farm with a couple of cows and chicken coops.
Other tactics involve blackballing any employee who quits so no one else will hire them. The sweatshops also deceive prospective employees about how terrible the conditions are. They train every current employee to speak wonderful things about the company, then when a new worker is hired they have to work so much that they don't even have time or energy to look for another job. They also can't outright quit because their pay is so low that a week without pay could lead to starvation.
Similar trends are emerging in the US; the big corporations are progressively taking away the ability of the small business to succeed. For example, it is practically impossible for the 2-person software shop to sell any game for any of the popular game consoles, because they have to pay licensing fees just to make a game that will work with a console without the owner having to hack it. If "trusted computing"/Palladium gets a stronghold, it will also become infeasible for new and small software companies to sell anything that will run on an unhacked computer, so developers who want to stay in the industry will have no choice but to work for a big corporation, probably with EA-sweatshop conditions.
Sweatshops aren't doing the workers a favor. The alternatives are worse only because the sweatshops helped to take away the better opportunities.
It's those who bought the ads that should be liable, not Google.
Google is just the medium by which the ads are distributed. If an ad has false information or infringes a trademark, hold the people who created and paid for the ad responsible, not the messenger who delivered the ad.
The redistribution license on their fonts was perpetual, then they revoked it.
They did it with fonts, they'll do it with the XML if it suits them.
Company buys COTS package.
Company realizes the COTS doesn't do half of what they need it to do.
Company builds a customized hodge-podge of scripts, glue, interfaces, and translators, around and on top of the COTS. If they're lucky it will sort of work for what they need to do.
Result: the worst of both worlds. The labor and time costs of customized software, with the inflexibility and vendor-dependence of COTS.
"This place got hit by the last economic downturn just like everyone else. It took me two months to find my current job after my last redundancy."
... probably as much as three months.
The difference in the perception of job markets in New Zealand vs. here in the US continues to amaze me. I was looking into moving to New Zealand myself, and someone in New Zealand warned me that it could take a "long time" to find a job if I moved there without a job offer in hand
THREE MONTHS? I almost laughed. If you can find another job in the US in less than SIX months after being laid off, in the same field as your previous job, it's considered a good job market or you consider yourself very lucky! Years ago I realized I had to prepare myself for the prospect of being unemployed for a year, and budgeted and saved accordingly. Surviving 2-3 months of unemployment in New Zealand definitely would not be a problem.
... will have to pay royalties on their scholarships if ACS wins?!
Now we'll be receiving a dozen CDs a day in the mail ... each with the resume of a laid-off AOL employee!
Doesn't matter if you're willing to accept what the cheapest Joe Schmoe would. Employers will still think you'll insist on a big salary.
Using even modest encryption such as 40-bit RSA would seriously cut down the number of IDs that an identity thief could profitably steal. Because they don't want to use the strongest encryption available, they make everything plain-text?
And there are stronger forms of encryption that originated outside the US or have already been distributed around the world, so many choices exist that would make things too hard for all but the most skilled and well-equipped ID thieves, without exposing other countries to encryption techniques that they don't already know.
Of course, it is also quite ridiculous that they still have this fear of exporting encryption technology.
"Basically, the real question is what is the purpose of a passport. If it is to track every individual, then this new measure is good. If it is merely a pass to travel, then these new measures definity step on civil liberties."
You only need a US passport if you intend to travel outside the US. Your civil liberties don't include the freedom to enter any country you want, just as the US doesn't give all foreigners the legal freedom to enter America.
But there is definitely another motive of command and control going on here. Why is the US government doing this when other countries aren't demanding it? Other countries are asking for machine-readable passports, but that may be served with enhanced bar codes and other such methods, not necessarily RFID.
Software is the only thing in the world that can be patented, copyrighted, and be a trade secret at the same time (because source code in usually not revealed). That definitely makes it different, and that sort of multi-level IP protection is excessive.
If anybody is good at saving costs it's Wal-Mart. I don't agree with many of their business practices (such as screwing employees out of overtime pay), but saving costs is one thing they're really good at.
They are smart enough to realize that in software development, the real cost savings come from quality and productivity, not per-person labor costs. Hiring, training and retaining people who can produce twice as much per person is much more profitable than hiring people who each cost half as much to employ.
Outsourcing to cheap labor might work well for manufacturing toys or T-shirts, but cheap IT labor doesn't so easily bring your total IT costs down.