It has none of the charm or actual science of Mythbusters and yet the people who make it think they're the coolest, funniest, sexiest people in the world. What they don't realise is that they're actually English.
And you have to wonder about the gratuitous link to the F.E.A.R. website - what does that have to do with ANYTHING? I notice this a lot in articles posted by Zonk - he leaves in lots of misleading and pointless links and his grammar and sentence structures don't make it clear which link is the actual story and which are just window dressing/kickback-funded advertorial content.
If./ readers want to know about high end games they can use Google. News should be news, not commercials.
Correction - whilst fox has reduced the order to 13 episodes, they have not officially cancelled Arrested Development and are currently shopping it around.
I would also like to take this opportunity to state that if you do not think Arrested Development is funny then this is a reflection on your own lack of a sense of humour, or at least the fact that you have a 'different' sense of humour ("Man fall down... funny" perhaps). I would rate it as close to the funniest comedy ever made.
In Australia, we manage to get the results of most of our lower house seats counted on the evening of the election at least as quickly as the US did at the last presidential election.
Transparency is maintained through both neutral and partisan observers from all interested parties verifying the count as it happens. I participated (for a political party) at the last Australian federal election and I can tell you that if any votes were under or over counted in an electorate of maybe 30,000 it would have been in the order of 10 or fewer. Whenever a vote is in doubt it is put in a separate pile which is then debated by members of the interested parties and ultimately decided upon by a neutral scrutineer.
The only downside is that many votes are incorrectly cast on a paper ballot - as high as 1-3% - which is technically impossible on an electronic ballot. Unless you vote for Bush. *ducks*
Apparently in an upcoming AD there is a 'Save Our Bluths' drive (mirroring the fan driven 'Save Our Bluths' campaign in real life) where the Bluth Company appeals to the Home Builders Organization to save the company... I love it.
In Season 2 Michael Bluth also referred to an order for houses to be built being cut back from 22 to 18, which at the time was a comment on the fact that Fox had just reduced the order for S2 from 22 to 18 shows.
However, I have heard in several places that HBO has expressed an unwillingness to pick up someone else's leftovers.
On a related note, let's not forget Bender in Futurama: "Another classic science fiction show cancelled before its time."
In a simplistic sense you are right about agnosticism. However, take for instance gravity. No matter how many times it is observed in action, it can never be conclusively proven to work the way we think it does. We can make a million, a trillion, observations confirming our theory of gravity and yet this can never preclude the possibility that one day we might make an observation that directly contradicts it.
Nevertheless, instinct and logic tell us that in the end we might as well take the chance and rely on our observations to treat the theory of gravity as a law.
Atheism is the equivalent of this last step. Once we do that we can go on, like the Wright brothers, and build an aeroplane that works, for example. Agnosticism is the equivalent of refusing to get into a plane because gravity cannot be conclusively proven to work the way we think it does.
I guess religion would be sitting on the tarmac praising the gods for the magical metal birds we ride around in and blaming the devil if they crash.
As an atheist, I find that this statement is actually extremely offensive, not to mention misguided.
Atheism is a religious belief in that it is a belief regarding spirituality and man's place in the universe. I do not wish to start a pedantic semantic argument, but one definition of religion is "[a] cause, principle, or activity pursued with zeal or conscientious devotion." I would say that as an atheist I am conscientiously devoted to the notion that there is no god and that a moral or ethical system must therefore be derived by humans for themselves. I further strongly believe that organised religion represents nothing more than an attempt to organise such a system but is frequently, perhaps universally, rendered ineffective by superstition, dogma and human ambition.
Let me put it another way: belief in nothing is not no belief. It merely means that I don't believe there is a being 'out there' or 'up there' to which I am answerable or by which I am controlled, created or otherwise influenced. Does this mean I have no morals? Am I an inherently bad, or amoral, or otherwise non-spiritual person? Not in the least. I believe (note the use of the word) very strongly in the capacity of human intelligence to allow us to produce something greater than the sum of our parts. Love is an excellent example of this capacity in action.
The parent, and many of the responses to it, are perhaps mistaking the issue of fundamentalism vs tolerance for the issue of atheism vs theism. A fundamentalist atheist is no different to any other fundamentalist. This does not justify lumping all atheists together, being dismissive, or otherwise belittling another person's belief system.
Here in Australia our constitution was based on the very principle you refer to and includes no individual rights other than freedom of religion and the right to a trial in relation to certain types of offence. To this day a bill of rights is opposed, mainly be conservative politicians, because "we couldn't list all of our freedoms" and "it would be unneccessary" and so on.
Sadly, we have recently seen wave after wave of terrible, terrible legislation encroaching on the lives and freedoms of ordinary, innocent people. Refugees are treated like criminals rather than people who are likely to be seeking shelter and are detained in appalling conditions in the desert or on remote islands, potentially indefinitely. The original inhabitants of this country are marginalised and ignored. More fundamentally, every Australian is now subject to arbitrary and relatively unchecked laws relating to 'terrorism' which allow for extended periods of detention without trial and without a warrant. These laws are enthusiastically promoted by the police and security agencies. Australia has one of the highest rates of phone-tapping in the world, and also retains ridiculous sedition laws essentially making it illegal to criticise the government too strongly.
We have it worse than the US - at least you have SOME protected rights. We have none, and in times like these that means we are gradually losing them all. A bill of rights is essential in protecting basic freedoms, which are not inherent characteristics but human constructions and therefore must be protected by humans.
...you should consider getting a job as a sitcom writer or possibly working on a Julia Roberts romantic 'comedy.'
[the following is said with no intention to offend the parent poster, but...]
"Also, women are not 'bat-shit insane.' They just see the world completely differently.... They want you to UNDERSTAND what they are talking about. Which of course, you never will."
Is this seriously how people see the world? If anyone is actually reading this Hallmark card, guys-and-girls-are-so-different, Venus/Mars stuff and taking it seriously, please don't. Yes, there are some very general tendencies, mostly socially induced, for men and women to exhibit different behaviours. However, instead of trying to 'understand' that women are 'more emotional' why not try examining yourself and actually understanding and expressing your own emotions.
In any case, plenty of women display an inability to express or understand emotions, particularly their own. Far more imporant differences between people are not gender-based in the slightest, unless you choose to adopt and live up to a tired stereotype. For example: differences in basic intelligence; differences in ability to empathise with others; differences in awareness of human psychology and behavioural patterns; level of socialisation; and so on. Yes, there are certain biologically induced trends apparent across large samples in some of these categories. But as an individual, you have the freedom to behave as you wish, and I urge you to reject the notion that men and women are 'just different' and learn to interact as a human.
Even more fundamentally, please don't take intelligent, empathetic women out of circulation if you see the world as the parent does (boys like gamez, girls like touchy-feely crap). Find a girl with your own lack of emotional depth and complexity and marry her instead - leave the smart, emotionally mature ones for the rest of us. I certainly meet enough shallow, vacuous women to know that there must be someone perfect for you out there.
PS
Yes I play and love games. But I am enough of a balanced human being to know when to put the Nintendo away and get the candles and red wine out, i.e. MOST OF THE TIME.
Parent post brought to you by the Political Propaganda Organisation of Singapore.
Look at any other functioning democracy. One party garnering 80%+ of the popular vote does not point to masterful administration of the country, it points to corruption, brainwashing and totalitarianism dressed up as a free society.
Parrot the Singaporean government's lies all you like, it won't make them true.
Please, please moderate or metamoderate the above comments appropriately and demonstrate that./ is not in fact run by a pack of psychotic, racially and religiously prejudiced fascists.
The parent post simply confirms the real problem the world faces today: ignorance, extremism and intolerance of any form threatening our open, liberal democratic societies.
"They seem to charge the people who want my time, which I think is fine."
How is that fine? YOUR time. GOOGLE charging other people for it. Yes, you get 'paid' through Google's services... but really, they are taking your time and more importantly your conscious and sub-conscious attention, and selling it to other people. So while this doesn't leave a hole in your pocket, it arguably does take a bit of your freedom of choice away, possibly without you even realising it.
I mean, am I the only one who thinks that advertising will eventually get subtle and targeted enough that we effectively won't have free will in some respects? Has this already happened? GMail in particular really, really bothers me. Microsoft may try to screw me in many ways, but as far as I know they are neither smart nor subtle enough to pull of the marketing tactics that Google employs. With MS I can say, no, I don't want to pay $500 for Office. With Google it can be hard to work out what I'm paying for their services.
And this whole 'trust them, they're nice' thing has got to end. The answer to the question, "Who's afraid of Google" should be anyone who understands why competition and a balance of power is an inherently good thing. People like those of us at./ should be doing everything in our power to make sure Google stays accountable, not worshipping them for writing a cool search algorithm.
The standards are exactly where you let them be. You don't like it, do something about it. Get involved in political processes. Write to the fucking newspaper. Go and learn about the history of courts and how legal ethics are supposed to work then try to raise awareness somehow. Just don't sit around bleating about how 'lawyers are bad/greedy/evil.'
Has it ever occurred to you that your attitude is exactly WHY we need laws, lawyers and courts? Have you considered that maybe the people in the MPAA and RIAA, in their own twisted way, actually have exactly as much conviction in the righteousness of their position as you?
This is precisely why lawyers SHOULD represent anyone with a grievance that is at least conceivably legitimate. Everyone believes they are absolutely right and the other side is absolutely wrong: legal representation creates a systematic process for determining who is actually right. And you will note that many of these cases are getting thrown out of the courts with prejudice by judges who are not as stupid as you might think.
Let me put it differently: if you fucking people could stop fucking fighting that would give you your wish because lawyers would all be unemployed. Until then, grown the fuck up and realise that everyone is entitled to representation. Fuck.
You should really read up on legal ethics before you post. Lawyers do have a duty, to the Court, to uphold the integrity of the legal process above all other interests. A lawyer may not knowingly engage in unfair or illegal activities for a client. For example, a lawyer is absolutely forbidden to lie in court, or allow a client to lie in court, or to institute legal proceedings for a client with the objective of gaining some collateral commercial advantage. And so on.
I think that perhaps the MPAA's lawyers are breaching these ethical rules quite seriously. But if that is the case, you should blame the system that lets them get away with it: they should be punished for abuse of process and contempt of court if they truly have no case against these people.
No, people don't hate corporations, and maybe that's the problem. Because what is a corporation? Answer: a legal structure with the sole objective of maximising profits for its *shareholders*. Therefore, unless you are a shareholder, a corporation is on some level going to benefit from not being as fully fair with you as it could. Even if it's something as simple as taking a profit margin out of the price it puts on its products (i.e. charging you more than the product is worth), that discrepancy will always be there.
So maybe instead of slagging off lawyers you should think about how the corporations laws should be amended to require corporations to put other objectives ahead of their shareholders. Some laws (e.g. environmental) do this already, or they did pre-Bush II, but fundamentally the system is flawed if what you want it to produce is good social outcomes.
Let me put it this way: the MPAA would not be suing some old man for $600K or whatever it is if the MPAA didn't believe this would give the most benefit to the shareholders of the MPAA's members. I do not believe lawyers are responsible for this.
No, no-one holds a gun to your head. But the parent and grandparent are incorrect to assert that a lawyer in the civil sphere can simply refuse to represent a client whose position they disagree with. There is a rule called the 'Cab Rank Rule' which is exactly what it sounds like: when a client comes to you asking you to represent them, you must take their case whether you like them or not. The only grounds for refusal are if you are too busy to adequately represent them, you lack the necessary exptertise, you are personally involved in the case in some way, or you are so horrified by the client that you would be unable to fully and fairly represent them.
Admittedly some of you no doubt would say that the last category is sufficient basis to refuse to represent the MPAA, and I tend to agree from a personal perspective. But a lawyer is actually being unethical if he or she refuses representation simply because of a disagreement about ideology.
IAAL working in IP and media law and I take strong exception to your attitude. Lawyers are not the cause of this problem. Lawyers are paid money to argue for their clients interests (or perceived interests). If the MPAA pays money to a good lawyer and gives them instructions, that lawyer goes and researches the law, determines what tactics will be effective, and ASKS THE CLIENT FOR FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS. It is the client who decides to go ahead and sue a grandfather for $400K, and the client who decides to lobby Washington.
If you want to obliquely suggest killing any group of people because you think this will solve the problem I suggest you review and include (in reverse order):
4. Artists who continue to participate in the corrupt entertainment industry
3. The MPAA for ruthlessly trying to protect its own profits and interests
2. Politicians for being so pathetically weak that they can be bought and sold like prostitutes
1. Yourself and everyone else who does not fall into 4, 3 or 2 but who (a) funds the MPAA and the artists by buying their crap, (b) funds the politicians with their taxes, and (c) allows the politicians to get away with it by being politically disengaged and reelecting them all the time.
Do not blame lawyers. In my experience most lawyers tend to be more sympathetic to the views of people like us who are unhappy with these stupid laws and stupid lawsuits than they are to the views of organisations like the MPAA. Most lawyers I know think that the DMCA and its international equivalents are idiotic and outrageously biased, for example. But lawyers are part of an adversarial system, and their duty is to represent the interests of those who retain them to the best of their abilities. So instead of attacking lawyers, why not pony up some cash for your beliefs and help the EFF or someone like that get their own kick ass legal team.
I am so sick of people who bitch about the corporations owning everything but ignore the fact that the corporations only have as much power as you, the consumer, gives them. And I am SO SICK of people bashing lawyers, who tend to be progressive, intelligent, and politically and socially engaged individuals (real lawyers, not ambulance chasers).
No, grandparent is correct. It is illegal in many places to force a person to purchase one product if they want to purchase another. However, this is typically only the case where the product they actually want (the 360, in this case) has significant market power that is being abused in the sale of the secondary product (the games).
...who actually likes the Windows one better? Much more elegant and configurable so far than Google's rather boring page. And as many others have pointed out Google also 'ripped off' older portals in making their page.
Slashdot Mirror
EVER.
It has none of the charm or actual science of Mythbusters and yet the people who make it think they're the coolest, funniest, sexiest people in the world. What they don't realise is that they're actually English.
You will soon be the first ./ user to 'do the worm' twice in one year.
And you have to wonder about the gratuitous link to the F.E.A.R. website - what does that have to do with ANYTHING? I notice this a lot in articles posted by Zonk - he leaves in lots of misleading and pointless links and his grammar and sentence structures don't make it clear which link is the actual story and which are just window dressing/kickback-funded advertorial content.
./ readers want to know about high end games they can use Google. News should be news, not commercials.
If
Take this rack of DVDs and sink it deep within your body.
We smoke while we flip the bird.
Correction - whilst fox has reduced the order to 13 episodes, they have not officially cancelled Arrested Development and are currently shopping it around.
I would also like to take this opportunity to state that if you do not think Arrested Development is funny then this is a reflection on your own lack of a sense of humour, or at least the fact that you have a 'different' sense of humour ("Man fall down... funny" perhaps). I would rate it as close to the funniest comedy ever made.
In Australia, we manage to get the results of most of our lower house seats counted on the evening of the election at least as quickly as the US did at the last presidential election.
Transparency is maintained through both neutral and partisan observers from all interested parties verifying the count as it happens. I participated (for a political party) at the last Australian federal election and I can tell you that if any votes were under or over counted in an electorate of maybe 30,000 it would have been in the order of 10 or fewer. Whenever a vote is in doubt it is put in a separate pile which is then debated by members of the interested parties and ultimately decided upon by a neutral scrutineer.
The only downside is that many votes are incorrectly cast on a paper ballot - as high as 1-3% - which is technically impossible on an electronic ballot. Unless you vote for Bush. *ducks*
Apparently in an upcoming AD there is a 'Save Our Bluths' drive (mirroring the fan driven 'Save Our Bluths' campaign in real life) where the Bluth Company appeals to the Home Builders Organization to save the company... I love it.
In Season 2 Michael Bluth also referred to an order for houses to be built being cut back from 22 to 18, which at the time was a comment on the fact that Fox had just reduced the order for S2 from 22 to 18 shows.
However, I have heard in several places that HBO has expressed an unwillingness to pick up someone else's leftovers.
On a related note, let's not forget Bender in Futurama: "Another classic science fiction show cancelled before its time."
That was the precise point I was making. A Divine Being (tm) is not observable. In other words, all of the evidence suggests there IS NO divine being.
In a simplistic sense you are right about agnosticism. However, take for instance gravity. No matter how many times it is observed in action, it can never be conclusively proven to work the way we think it does. We can make a million, a trillion, observations confirming our theory of gravity and yet this can never preclude the possibility that one day we might make an observation that directly contradicts it.
Nevertheless, instinct and logic tell us that in the end we might as well take the chance and rely on our observations to treat the theory of gravity as a law.
Atheism is the equivalent of this last step. Once we do that we can go on, like the Wright brothers, and build an aeroplane that works, for example. Agnosticism is the equivalent of refusing to get into a plane because gravity cannot be conclusively proven to work the way we think it does.
I guess religion would be sitting on the tarmac praising the gods for the magical metal birds we ride around in and blaming the devil if they crash.
As an atheist, I find that this statement is actually extremely offensive, not to mention misguided.
Atheism is a religious belief in that it is a belief regarding spirituality and man's place in the universe. I do not wish to start a pedantic semantic argument, but one definition of religion is "[a] cause, principle, or activity pursued with zeal or conscientious devotion." I would say that as an atheist I am conscientiously devoted to the notion that there is no god and that a moral or ethical system must therefore be derived by humans for themselves. I further strongly believe that organised religion represents nothing more than an attempt to organise such a system but is frequently, perhaps universally, rendered ineffective by superstition, dogma and human ambition.
Let me put it another way: belief in nothing is not no belief. It merely means that I don't believe there is a being 'out there' or 'up there' to which I am answerable or by which I am controlled, created or otherwise influenced. Does this mean I have no morals? Am I an inherently bad, or amoral, or otherwise non-spiritual person? Not in the least. I believe (note the use of the word) very strongly in the capacity of human intelligence to allow us to produce something greater than the sum of our parts. Love is an excellent example of this capacity in action.
The parent, and many of the responses to it, are perhaps mistaking the issue of fundamentalism vs tolerance for the issue of atheism vs theism. A fundamentalist atheist is no different to any other fundamentalist. This does not justify lumping all atheists together, being dismissive, or otherwise belittling another person's belief system.
Unfortunately, the federalists were wrong.
Here in Australia our constitution was based on the very principle you refer to and includes no individual rights other than freedom of religion and the right to a trial in relation to certain types of offence. To this day a bill of rights is opposed, mainly be conservative politicians, because "we couldn't list all of our freedoms" and "it would be unneccessary" and so on.
Sadly, we have recently seen wave after wave of terrible, terrible legislation encroaching on the lives and freedoms of ordinary, innocent people. Refugees are treated like criminals rather than people who are likely to be seeking shelter and are detained in appalling conditions in the desert or on remote islands, potentially indefinitely. The original inhabitants of this country are marginalised and ignored. More fundamentally, every Australian is now subject to arbitrary and relatively unchecked laws relating to 'terrorism' which allow for extended periods of detention without trial and without a warrant. These laws are enthusiastically promoted by the police and security agencies. Australia has one of the highest rates of phone-tapping in the world, and also retains ridiculous sedition laws essentially making it illegal to criticise the government too strongly.
We have it worse than the US - at least you have SOME protected rights. We have none, and in times like these that means we are gradually losing them all. A bill of rights is essential in protecting basic freedoms, which are not inherent characteristics but human constructions and therefore must be protected by humans.
This was on Boing Boing a solid 4 days ago.
./ readers who want slightly less nerd in their news.
Incidentally, that site is strongly recommended for
...you should consider getting a job as a sitcom writer or possibly working on a Julia Roberts romantic 'comedy.'
[the following is said with no intention to offend the parent poster, but...]
"Also, women are not 'bat-shit insane.' They just see the world completely differently.... They want you to UNDERSTAND what they are talking about. Which of course, you never will."
Is this seriously how people see the world? If anyone is actually reading this Hallmark card, guys-and-girls-are-so-different, Venus/Mars stuff and taking it seriously, please don't. Yes, there are some very general tendencies, mostly socially induced, for men and women to exhibit different behaviours. However, instead of trying to 'understand' that women are 'more emotional' why not try examining yourself and actually understanding and expressing your own emotions.
In any case, plenty of women display an inability to express or understand emotions, particularly their own. Far more imporant differences between people are not gender-based in the slightest, unless you choose to adopt and live up to a tired stereotype. For example: differences in basic intelligence; differences in ability to empathise with others; differences in awareness of human psychology and behavioural patterns; level of socialisation; and so on. Yes, there are certain biologically induced trends apparent across large samples in some of these categories. But as an individual, you have the freedom to behave as you wish, and I urge you to reject the notion that men and women are 'just different' and learn to interact as a human.
Even more fundamentally, please don't take intelligent, empathetic women out of circulation if you see the world as the parent does (boys like gamez, girls like touchy-feely crap). Find a girl with your own lack of emotional depth and complexity and marry her instead - leave the smart, emotionally mature ones for the rest of us. I certainly meet enough shallow, vacuous women to know that there must be someone perfect for you out there.
PS
Yes I play and love games. But I am enough of a balanced human being to know when to put the Nintendo away and get the candles and red wine out, i.e. MOST OF THE TIME.
Parent post brought to you by the Political Propaganda Organisation of Singapore.
Look at any other functioning democracy. One party garnering 80%+ of the popular vote does not point to masterful administration of the country, it points to corruption, brainwashing and totalitarianism dressed up as a free society.
Parrot the Singaporean government's lies all you like, it won't make them true.
Please, please moderate or metamoderate the above comments appropriately and demonstrate that ./ is not in fact run by a pack of psychotic, racially and religiously prejudiced fascists.
The parent post simply confirms the real problem the world faces today: ignorance, extremism and intolerance of any form threatening our open, liberal democratic societies.
"They seem to charge the people who want my time, which I think is fine."
./ should be doing everything in our power to make sure Google stays accountable, not worshipping them for writing a cool search algorithm.
How is that fine? YOUR time. GOOGLE charging other people for it. Yes, you get 'paid' through Google's services... but really, they are taking your time and more importantly your conscious and sub-conscious attention, and selling it to other people. So while this doesn't leave a hole in your pocket, it arguably does take a bit of your freedom of choice away, possibly without you even realising it.
I mean, am I the only one who thinks that advertising will eventually get subtle and targeted enough that we effectively won't have free will in some respects? Has this already happened? GMail in particular really, really bothers me. Microsoft may try to screw me in many ways, but as far as I know they are neither smart nor subtle enough to pull of the marketing tactics that Google employs. With MS I can say, no, I don't want to pay $500 for Office. With Google it can be hard to work out what I'm paying for their services.
And this whole 'trust them, they're nice' thing has got to end. The answer to the question, "Who's afraid of Google" should be anyone who understands why competition and a balance of power is an inherently good thing. People like those of us at
...and all I've done is enter my name: 'Thrillhouse'!
The standards are exactly where you let them be. You don't like it, do something about it. Get involved in political processes. Write to the fucking newspaper. Go and learn about the history of courts and how legal ethics are supposed to work then try to raise awareness somehow. Just don't sit around bleating about how 'lawyers are bad/greedy/evil.'
Has it ever occurred to you that your attitude is exactly WHY we need laws, lawyers and courts? Have you considered that maybe the people in the MPAA and RIAA, in their own twisted way, actually have exactly as much conviction in the righteousness of their position as you?
This is precisely why lawyers SHOULD represent anyone with a grievance that is at least conceivably legitimate. Everyone believes they are absolutely right and the other side is absolutely wrong: legal representation creates a systematic process for determining who is actually right. And you will note that many of these cases are getting thrown out of the courts with prejudice by judges who are not as stupid as you might think.
Let me put it differently: if you fucking people could stop fucking fighting that would give you your wish because lawyers would all be unemployed. Until then, grown the fuck up and realise that everyone is entitled to representation. Fuck.
You should really read up on legal ethics before you post. Lawyers do have a duty, to the Court, to uphold the integrity of the legal process above all other interests. A lawyer may not knowingly engage in unfair or illegal activities for a client. For example, a lawyer is absolutely forbidden to lie in court, or allow a client to lie in court, or to institute legal proceedings for a client with the objective of gaining some collateral commercial advantage. And so on.
I think that perhaps the MPAA's lawyers are breaching these ethical rules quite seriously. But if that is the case, you should blame the system that lets them get away with it: they should be punished for abuse of process and contempt of court if they truly have no case against these people.
No, people don't hate corporations, and maybe that's the problem. Because what is a corporation? Answer: a legal structure with the sole objective of maximising profits for its *shareholders*. Therefore, unless you are a shareholder, a corporation is on some level going to benefit from not being as fully fair with you as it could. Even if it's something as simple as taking a profit margin out of the price it puts on its products (i.e. charging you more than the product is worth), that discrepancy will always be there.
So maybe instead of slagging off lawyers you should think about how the corporations laws should be amended to require corporations to put other objectives ahead of their shareholders. Some laws (e.g. environmental) do this already, or they did pre-Bush II, but fundamentally the system is flawed if what you want it to produce is good social outcomes.
Let me put it this way: the MPAA would not be suing some old man for $600K or whatever it is if the MPAA didn't believe this would give the most benefit to the shareholders of the MPAA's members. I do not believe lawyers are responsible for this.
No, no-one holds a gun to your head. But the parent and grandparent are incorrect to assert that a lawyer in the civil sphere can simply refuse to represent a client whose position they disagree with. There is a rule called the 'Cab Rank Rule' which is exactly what it sounds like: when a client comes to you asking you to represent them, you must take their case whether you like them or not. The only grounds for refusal are if you are too busy to adequately represent them, you lack the necessary exptertise, you are personally involved in the case in some way, or you are so horrified by the client that you would be unable to fully and fairly represent them.
Admittedly some of you no doubt would say that the last category is sufficient basis to refuse to represent the MPAA, and I tend to agree from a personal perspective. But a lawyer is actually being unethical if he or she refuses representation simply because of a disagreement about ideology.
IAAL working in IP and media law and I take strong exception to your attitude. Lawyers are not the cause of this problem. Lawyers are paid money to argue for their clients interests (or perceived interests). If the MPAA pays money to a good lawyer and gives them instructions, that lawyer goes and researches the law, determines what tactics will be effective, and ASKS THE CLIENT FOR FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS. It is the client who decides to go ahead and sue a grandfather for $400K, and the client who decides to lobby Washington.
If you want to obliquely suggest killing any group of people because you think this will solve the problem I suggest you review and include (in reverse order):
4. Artists who continue to participate in the corrupt entertainment industry
3. The MPAA for ruthlessly trying to protect its own profits and interests
2. Politicians for being so pathetically weak that they can be bought and sold like prostitutes
1. Yourself and everyone else who does not fall into 4, 3 or 2 but who (a) funds the MPAA and the artists by buying their crap, (b) funds the politicians with their taxes, and (c) allows the politicians to get away with it by being politically disengaged and reelecting them all the time.
Do not blame lawyers. In my experience most lawyers tend to be more sympathetic to the views of people like us who are unhappy with these stupid laws and stupid lawsuits than they are to the views of organisations like the MPAA. Most lawyers I know think that the DMCA and its international equivalents are idiotic and outrageously biased, for example. But lawyers are part of an adversarial system, and their duty is to represent the interests of those who retain them to the best of their abilities. So instead of attacking lawyers, why not pony up some cash for your beliefs and help the EFF or someone like that get their own kick ass legal team.
I am so sick of people who bitch about the corporations owning everything but ignore the fact that the corporations only have as much power as you, the consumer, gives them. And I am SO SICK of people bashing lawyers, who tend to be progressive, intelligent, and politically and socially engaged individuals (real lawyers, not ambulance chasers).
No, grandparent is correct. It is illegal in many places to force a person to purchase one product if they want to purchase another. However, this is typically only the case where the product they actually want (the 360, in this case) has significant market power that is being abused in the sale of the secondary product (the games).
Fairly typical competition law stuff.
...who actually likes the Windows one better? Much more elegant and configurable so far than Google's rather boring page. And as many others have pointed out Google also 'ripped off' older portals in making their page.