You need to apply the correct definition of "abuse" for the unique usage of rule 11. You are confusing colloquial "abuse" with "rule 11 abuse". In a rule 11 context we are not talking about the ill effect enforcement would have on the individual -- we're talking about whether there is a legal basis for the suit. When a lawsuit is filed for which there is no legal basis, both the court and the sued-party are "abused" -- but we're talking "abuse of process". So while a valid lawsuit may have a "non-rule-11-abusive" effect (under other definitions of the term "abuse"), "abuse" in the rule 11 context flows from specific circumstances, i.e, "abuse" exists only when the lawsuit itself has a no valid legal and factual basis.
Not quite: "abusive" means without a basis in existing law or fact, or that there are no reasonable arguments to extend existing law. A law is not "abusive" just because one dislikes it. So for example, if a person violates another's copyright, the content-owner may sue the infringing-user for damages.
An example of abusive litigation would be if the RIAA intentionally sued someone when it absolutely knew he/she had not violtaed their copyrights. It is not likely to be considered abusive for the RIAA to sue someone if they have a reasonable factual basis to believe a violation took place. Note, a "reasonable factual basis" is not the same as an "ironclad case". So linking an IP address "owner" with shared music files is probably a strong enough basis to start a case. Other facts might change this during the discovery process but at least intially, it certainly wouldn't be "abusive" in the sense used here. For example, if in discovery it came out that the IP address "owner" didn't actually buy the network service, but someone else did after stealing his credit card, the RIAA would really need to drop the suit.
[re music] they sell you something then insist you're not allowed to do as you please with it, which is direct impediment of the individual right to personal property in the civilized world.
They sell you a disc of media with the understanding that you can listen to it. You have the choice to NOT shell out $15 to them to get the listening rights to the music contained on the disc and thus protect your personal property. If you want to be able to copy and distribute the music, you are free to negotiate with them, though the price will likely be somewhat in excess of $15. Now, I'll agree that the RIAA is backwards and trying to protect outdated distribution models... but really, they own the music and can sell it under their terms. Your dislike of the conditions of the sale does not threaten your personal property -- it's an indication to you that you should support artists who provide music on different contractual terms. Really, it's that simple. If you think RIAA music is a bad deal, then don't buy it and don't listen to it by means that will get you sued. In other words, shun it.
not really, a judge's duties are to interpret existing laws and weigh evidence to determine the guilt or innocence of a party.
FYI, the court rules are created by the court (although there may be procedural rules enacted by the legislature as well). So for example, a State Supreme Court might promulgate rules of procedure to ensure a fair process, and local courts will all have their own special local rules (e.g., attach X cover page to Y motion, Motion Z are heard every Tuesday at 1:30, etc. etc. so long as they don't conflict with the generally applicable rules -- the Feds do the same thing essentially). It is very non-astonoshing that a court would then interpret rules it created, and FWIW, when a court interprets it's own rules, it is not engaging in the practice known as "legislating from the bench".
The purpose of Rule 11 is to prevent parties from engaging in abusive litigation. In the most general terms, Rule 11 means that if a party brings a suit, they need a minimal basis for that suit. Rule 11 is a court adopted rule and as such, it should be expected that courts will be responsible for interpreting and applying it. Remember, court procedure is merely about creating a fair forum so that a fact finder (judge or jury) can decide the ultimate issues. Shotgunning the court with baseless claims is detrimental to a fair process. Because it is the court's duty to provide a fair process, it must be able to step in when things get out of hand.
Not having the menubar as part of the app window is kind of one of the major aspects of the Mac UI.
I understand that it made sense "back in the day" when a screen had a few hundred pixels in either direction. But on large monitors, it is a detriment. Fortunately, I use plenty of remote X apps so my second monitor is used efficiently -- but for people who don't do remote X sessions, apple does need to do something, even if it is a live top bar on each screen. I don't feel like that is ideal either though -- when the height of screens gets to the point you can have two app windows vertically stacked without overlap, you're still going to be spending a lot of time shooting for the menu (plus there's the whole "have to click on the app window first before you can see the menu" issue). I don't hate OS X, and I don't hate the top bar when I'm using my laptop in single screen mode -- but I definitely see it as cludgy on large displays because it's logic (saves space on small displays) doesn't apply when the screen is large.
OS X only has a single menu bar for all applications and all screens. So if your active application window isn't on the primary screen and you want to access the menu, you need to track all the way back to whichever screen is the primary to access it.
I have an external 23" monitor with my powerbook and I love it for the extra real-estate. However, on the extra screen I only run ssh forwarded X apps. That keeps my mac apps near their menu bar, but gives me a nice big chunk of space to run the X apps which fortunately, have the menu bar built into each instance. I've looked at the 30" monitor setup in an apple store and simply can't understand it -- it takes two mouse sweeps to hit "file", or a really hard accelaration on the mouse. Either way, not ideal. Apple should make it optional to decouple the menu from the top bar and put it in the application window. I'd think that would help them sell fancy hardware.
Vertical would be foolish -- arm fatigue was discovered ages and ages ago. But what about a touchpad? For example, the "two-finger scroll" on apple's laptops is a primitive form of this. Already, I can't live without it because it's so easy and natural. Now, it would be annoying to have a large touchpad off to one side, but what about a regular mouse pad, and then a keyboard of heat senistive character keys with a little toggle switch -- flip it one way, the whole keyboard is a touch sensitive device. Flip it the other, the keyboard acts like a regular keyboard. Perhaps caps-lock could finally have actual use beyond an incitement to profanity? Uses CL to toggle between keyboard as keyboard and keyboard as touchpad.
For simplicity sake, let's say that a student completely owns the rights to a paper and can decide how it is used. The school would simply make it a rule that in order to be graded, the paper must be submitted and checked against a plagarism database. If a student refuses as is his or her right -- it is likewise the school's right to not review the paper. Conceivably, a student could submit a paper but require a $10 payment before it is read as recompense for his/her IP. Realistically, the school would just round file work with such a demand.
Tubes? What about the boob-tube? I spend a lot of time on the internet. By the same token, I spend almost no time watching television -- I see DVDs from time to time -- no cable, no antenna, just a DVD player connected to the TV, and yeah, call me an elitist I don't care. Anyway, why does the internet get bashed for being addicting, but television doesn't? Some people watch 5 or 6 hours of TV each day and yet I rarely see articles about how addictive TV is. "Internet Addiction" is just another way to bash the net as an evil place by those who either don't understand its utility, or don't want people to understand its utility.
True -- it is easier online, but less effective perhaps. For example, if you are trying to get laid and present yourself as Mr. Buff Superdink -- it's very easy to get away with it online but as soon as you try to meet Ms. Hottie, she'll see the pot belly, the slouch and all other parts of the deception. Real life deceit is more difficult, but also perhaps more effective. Look at all the brown-nosers and sociopaths who get promoted ever higher for good examples.
People put on faces in real life as well in any number of ways. Some people like to appear richer than they are. Some people present a happy face on a sad/angry family life. Some people seem friendly while only out for themselves.
You understand that you need 2 (TWO) dual-core chips? The Mac Pro is a quad-core machine. So the total price from "ajump" would be $1800 for the requisite number of processors.
Google News happens to be the only way I ever end up on a news-source's site. So if a paper intentionally keeps itself out of google, it intentionally excludes me. I don't really care though -- most news is the roughly the same across sources.
Maybe the switch will happen when the CD player is less dominant elsewhere (like stereos) and the media center PC becomes a reality in every home.
That's pretty much already happened. How many people actually play CDs in standalone CD players these days?
I remember back in my college days (late 80s), I had a stack of LPs. Then I bought a CD player and started getting cds. Somewhere along the line in the early 90s, my turntable broke down -- I "Goodwilled" it and then didn't replace it. About a year ago, my last CD player quit working reliably -- off to Goodwill. I haven't replaced it and have no intention to. Rather, I set up an old ibook on top of the stereo cabinet and it became my music player, yellow pages, and occasional wireless bridge. I have no intention of buying a cd player again (though I may still buy CDs and rip them).
Why do I need to buy all those again... I've got a large catalog already purchased.
Your point is excellent. My music catalog is about 16gb (small by some standards I know). Probably 1-2gb is iTunes and 2-3gb is emusic stuff. The rest is from CDs (192kbs). I've been buying cds since the 80s when I stopped buying records. As a result, it's hardly a surprise that most of the content on my iPod didn't come from iTunes -- I already had it, why would I buy it again? No doubt, many people share similar circumstances.
Without having seen Brolsma (sp?) lip sync the Numa Numa song, I would never have bought it on iTunes. So in certain circumstances, it is true that distributing the song without permission will benefit the artist. On the other hand, if something already is very popular -- the chances of an infringing use generating a sale are probably low.
I'm a lawyer but I don't have any specific knowledge about copyright and I can't really speak to the statute itself and how it will play out. In general however, when interpreting a statute, the first principle is to look at the plain language -- if it is clear, then no statutory construction is necessary. You must also presume the legislature meant what it said by the words it chose and that each word is meaningful (unless the statute is determined to be ambiguous). Whether a statute is ambiguous and is subject to statutory construction (i.e., interpreation beyond or different from the plain meaning) is the subject of $big_number's worth of litigation every year. Construction can include the legislative history, other related statutes, and other things that escape me as I sit here in my PJs on my day off.
Anyway, looking at just the cited statute alone, and no case law decided under it, it's plain that ripping a CD for personal use isn't included in the non-exhaustive list of acceptable uses. That means personal copying must fall under the more general test. In other words, it's going to cost a lot to find out whether it's OK to rip to your computer, or make a copy CD for your car (BTW, something the police in my area suggest to prevent vehicle prowls). It will cost even more if you lose.
It bears emphasis however that the people being sued by the RIAA aren't being sued for making a burned copy of media they own to play in their cars. They're being sued for giving copies of music to other people willy nilly. So while I personally use my ipod for my entire library, I don't engage in file sharing (neither receive nor send). I don't know if I'm safe on the first count, but it's pretty obvious I'm subject to litigation if I did the second -- and remember, merely by virtue of being caught up in litigation, you lose, even if you win. Think of the last line in the Seven Samurai -- defeating the bandits came at great cost.
From now on, if someone says IANAL at the top of their post, that tells me the probably know MORE about the subject, not LESS. Sheesh.
Perhaps you have had the experience that the deeper into a particular subject you get, the MORE you know you DON'T know. So if you ask a lawyer about a subject in which he/she has extensive knowledge, for certain fact patterns, the answers you get will be closer to "I don't know, it isn't settled". If you ask someone who has a casual understanding, that person is much more likely to say "Oh yeah, that's fine -- no question about it."
This applies in any field -- those with greater knowledge actually know what they don't know. Another thing to realize is that when a lawyer gives you an answer you don't like, it isn't because he wants to piss you off. It's because that's the answer. The lawyer may be sympathetic but if the answer is against you, wouldn't you rather know?
However, if you insist on non-pro advice perhaps the next time your car breaks down, ask a guitarist how to fix it. Next time you have a legal issue, ask a car mechanic how to fix it. And next time you want to learn a new chord on your guitar, ask a lawyer for help. You might find someone by luck who knows the other fields from off-hours research, but chances are, you're car won't work, you're music will suck, and you'll end up in jail/owing people money. Best of luck though.
If you're using a laptop, why not just use a power inverter and deep cycle battery. I just spent $150 for a UPS for my desktop and that makes sense because any interruption will cause it shut down. Even at that cost, I only 30 minutes or so. laptop will automatically switch to battery power giving you time plug into the inverter instead.
I used to run a small radio and a 50 watt compact flourescent light for about 14-18 hours on such a setup (and from time to time a desktop with CRT -- though that was a real juice sucker so I used it only sparingly). If the laptop powersupply is 65 or 80 watts, it should do pretty well for longer term emergency power.
Amps * volts gives you total wattage. A 500 amp 12 volt battery is going to be less than $100 and an inverter less than $50. When considering power draw, don't forget the cost from the inverter itself. And do get deep cycle battery rather than a regular car battery as car batteries are designed to give bursts of power rather than long steady output.
A Digital Recorder makes it even easier. Saves to a CF card, just rename the file and upload it. Granted, it's a $500 device, but if time is all so valuable, it's a good solution.
I think you guys should stop shooting from the hip, and actually (I know this is asking a lot on/.) do a little research.
If you want people to not think it is just a DB record scam, it would be helpful to link to a site that explains what this is good for. Yes, I looked at every link in the header, and sub-links as well, and for the life of me, I can't see why this is useful. The i-names main site meanders around a bit, but mostly says it is a great deal at $5 because next year it will be $20. Whatever -- even at $5 if it has no use to me, it's a crappy deal.
i-Names have i-Numbers in a similar manner to which DNS records have IP's. These services may, for instance, be include a basic web page, and in that way would be similar to a URL. But the service might just as well be email, a VOIP address, heck a dating service even (who want's a piece of me?). The services do not replace things like email and VOIP. They abstract them. They provide a layer where you control who communicates with you and how.
I still don't see how this is valuable. If I want someone to have my email -- I tell them. If I want them to have my phone number -- I tell them. This sounds like a way to get contacted by lots of random people who might match up some percentage of answers on some questionaire. I just understand why I would need an automated process to give out this information when the fact is, I want to be contacted LESS. Yeah yeah yeah, I control who has access. Well, presently I control who has access fairly well and I don't have as high a risk of the data being leaked either by my own error, or the DB's maintainers.
Anyway, it's up to the people asking for money to explain why I ought to spend it, and these iname people just haven't done that yet.
I was young and naive -- it was a ploy to keep me off of unemployment. They said: "If you quit, we'll give you a good letter of recomendation. If you don't quit, we'll fire you and we won't give you the letter." I took the letter and got a different crappy job.
My first job out of college in 1992 (during a nasty recession) was as a car salesman. I almost didn't get the job (and then of course, I was asked to quit after two months because I was so lousy at it). Anyway, during the interview, the guy asked me if I gambled or did cocaine. I said "of course not"... which was true BTW. Then he shook his head a bit and siad that the people who have expensive habits like that often make really good salesmen because they really need money.
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You need to apply the correct definition of "abuse" for the unique usage of rule 11. You are confusing colloquial "abuse" with "rule 11 abuse". In a rule 11 context we are not talking about the ill effect enforcement would have on the individual -- we're talking about whether there is a legal basis for the suit. When a lawsuit is filed for which there is no legal basis, both the court and the sued-party are "abused" -- but we're talking "abuse of process". So while a valid lawsuit may have a "non-rule-11-abusive" effect (under other definitions of the term "abuse"), "abuse" in the rule 11 context flows from specific circumstances, i.e, "abuse" exists only when the lawsuit itself has a no valid legal and factual basis.
Not quite: "abusive" means without a basis in existing law or fact, or that there are no reasonable arguments to extend existing law. A law is not "abusive" just because one dislikes it. So for example, if a person violates another's copyright, the content-owner may sue the infringing-user for damages.
An example of abusive litigation would be if the RIAA intentionally sued someone when it absolutely knew he/she had not violtaed their copyrights. It is not likely to be considered abusive for the RIAA to sue someone if they have a reasonable factual basis to believe a violation took place. Note, a "reasonable factual basis" is not the same as an "ironclad case". So linking an IP address "owner" with shared music files is probably a strong enough basis to start a case. Other facts might change this during the discovery process but at least intially, it certainly wouldn't be "abusive" in the sense used here. For example, if in discovery it came out that the IP address "owner" didn't actually buy the network service, but someone else did after stealing his credit card, the RIAA would really need to drop the suit.
The purpose of Rule 11 is to prevent parties from engaging in abusive litigation. In the most general terms, Rule 11 means that if a party brings a suit, they need a minimal basis for that suit. Rule 11 is a court adopted rule and as such, it should be expected that courts will be responsible for interpreting and applying it. Remember, court procedure is merely about creating a fair forum so that a fact finder (judge or jury) can decide the ultimate issues. Shotgunning the court with baseless claims is detrimental to a fair process. Because it is the court's duty to provide a fair process, it must be able to step in when things get out of hand.
Vertical would be foolish -- arm fatigue was discovered ages and ages ago. But what about a touchpad? For example, the "two-finger scroll" on apple's laptops is a primitive form of this. Already, I can't live without it because it's so easy and natural. Now, it would be annoying to have a large touchpad off to one side, but what about a regular mouse pad, and then a keyboard of heat senistive character keys with a little toggle switch -- flip it one way, the whole keyboard is a touch sensitive device. Flip it the other, the keyboard acts like a regular keyboard. Perhaps caps-lock could finally have actual use beyond an incitement to profanity? Uses CL to toggle between keyboard as keyboard and keyboard as touchpad.
For simplicity sake, let's say that a student completely owns the rights to a paper and can decide how it is used. The school would simply make it a rule that in order to be graded, the paper must be submitted and checked against a plagarism database. If a student refuses as is his or her right -- it is likewise the school's right to not review the paper. Conceivably, a student could submit a paper but require a $10 payment before it is read as recompense for his/her IP. Realistically, the school would just round file work with such a demand.
Tubes? What about the boob-tube? I spend a lot of time on the internet. By the same token, I spend almost no time watching television -- I see DVDs from time to time -- no cable, no antenna, just a DVD player connected to the TV, and yeah, call me an elitist I don't care. Anyway, why does the internet get bashed for being addicting, but television doesn't? Some people watch 5 or 6 hours of TV each day and yet I rarely see articles about how addictive TV is. "Internet Addiction" is just another way to bash the net as an evil place by those who either don't understand its utility, or don't want people to understand its utility.
I must be getting old -- college kids seem like "kids" to me -- anyone under 25 in fact.
True -- it is easier online, but less effective perhaps. For example, if you are trying to get laid and present yourself as Mr. Buff Superdink -- it's very easy to get away with it online but as soon as you try to meet Ms. Hottie, she'll see the pot belly, the slouch and all other parts of the deception. Real life deceit is more difficult, but also perhaps more effective. Look at all the brown-nosers and sociopaths who get promoted ever higher for good examples.
People put on faces in real life as well in any number of ways. Some people like to appear richer than they are. Some people present a happy face on a sad/angry family life. Some people seem friendly while only out for themselves.
You understand that you need 2 (TWO) dual-core chips? The Mac Pro is a quad-core machine. So the total price from "ajump" would be $1800 for the requisite number of processors.
Google News happens to be the only way I ever end up on a news-source's site. So if a paper intentionally keeps itself out of google, it intentionally excludes me. I don't really care though -- most news is the roughly the same across sources.
I remember back in my college days (late 80s), I had a stack of LPs. Then I bought a CD player and started getting cds. Somewhere along the line in the early 90s, my turntable broke down -- I "Goodwilled" it and then didn't replace it. About a year ago, my last CD player quit working reliably -- off to Goodwill. I haven't replaced it and have no intention to. Rather, I set up an old ibook on top of the stereo cabinet and it became my music player, yellow pages, and occasional wireless bridge. I have no intention of buying a cd player again (though I may still buy CDs and rip them).
Without having seen Brolsma (sp?) lip sync the Numa Numa song, I would never have bought it on iTunes. So in certain circumstances, it is true that distributing the song without permission will benefit the artist. On the other hand, if something already is very popular -- the chances of an infringing use generating a sale are probably low.
I'm a lawyer but I don't have any specific knowledge about copyright and I can't really speak to the statute itself and how it will play out. In general however, when interpreting a statute, the first principle is to look at the plain language -- if it is clear, then no statutory construction is necessary. You must also presume the legislature meant what it said by the words it chose and that each word is meaningful (unless the statute is determined to be ambiguous). Whether a statute is ambiguous and is subject to statutory construction (i.e., interpreation beyond or different from the plain meaning) is the subject of $big_number's worth of litigation every year. Construction can include the legislative history, other related statutes, and other things that escape me as I sit here in my PJs on my day off.
Anyway, looking at just the cited statute alone, and no case law decided under it, it's plain that ripping a CD for personal use isn't included in the non-exhaustive list of acceptable uses. That means personal copying must fall under the more general test. In other words, it's going to cost a lot to find out whether it's OK to rip to your computer, or make a copy CD for your car (BTW, something the police in my area suggest to prevent vehicle prowls). It will cost even more if you lose.
It bears emphasis however that the people being sued by the RIAA aren't being sued for making a burned copy of media they own to play in their cars. They're being sued for giving copies of music to other people willy nilly. So while I personally use my ipod for my entire library, I don't engage in file sharing (neither receive nor send). I don't know if I'm safe on the first count, but it's pretty obvious I'm subject to litigation if I did the second -- and remember, merely by virtue of being caught up in litigation, you lose, even if you win. Think of the last line in the Seven Samurai -- defeating the bandits came at great cost.
Perhaps you have had the experience that the deeper into a particular subject you get, the MORE you know you DON'T know. So if you ask a lawyer about a subject in which he/she has extensive knowledge, for certain fact patterns, the answers you get will be closer to "I don't know, it isn't settled". If you ask someone who has a casual understanding, that person is much more likely to say "Oh yeah, that's fine -- no question about it."
This applies in any field -- those with greater knowledge actually know what they don't know. Another thing to realize is that when a lawyer gives you an answer you don't like, it isn't because he wants to piss you off. It's because that's the answer. The lawyer may be sympathetic but if the answer is against you, wouldn't you rather know?
However, if you insist on non-pro advice perhaps the next time your car breaks down, ask a guitarist how to fix it. Next time you have a legal issue, ask a car mechanic how to fix it. And next time you want to learn a new chord on your guitar, ask a lawyer for help. You might find someone by luck who knows the other fields from off-hours research, but chances are, you're car won't work, you're music will suck, and you'll end up in jail/owing people money. Best of luck though.
If you're using a laptop, why not just use a power inverter and deep cycle battery. I just spent $150 for a UPS for my desktop and that makes sense because any interruption will cause it shut down. Even at that cost, I only 30 minutes or so. laptop will automatically switch to battery power giving you time plug into the inverter instead.
I used to run a small radio and a 50 watt compact flourescent light for about 14-18 hours on such a setup (and from time to time a desktop with CRT -- though that was a real juice sucker so I used it only sparingly). If the laptop powersupply is 65 or 80 watts, it should do pretty well for longer term emergency power.
Amps * volts gives you total wattage. A 500 amp 12 volt battery is going to be less than $100 and an inverter less than $50. When considering power draw, don't forget the cost from the inverter itself. And do get deep cycle battery rather than a regular car battery as car batteries are designed to give bursts of power rather than long steady output.
Everybody have fun tonight,
Everybody Wang Chung tonight
A Digital Recorder makes it even easier. Saves to a CF card, just rename the file and upload it. Granted, it's a $500 device, but if time is all so valuable, it's a good solution.
Anyway, it's up to the people asking for money to explain why I ought to spend it, and these iname people just haven't done that yet.
I was young and naive -- it was a ploy to keep me off of unemployment. They said: "If you quit, we'll give you a good letter of recomendation. If you don't quit, we'll fire you and we won't give you the letter." I took the letter and got a different crappy job.
My first job out of college in 1992 (during a nasty recession) was as a car salesman. I almost didn't get the job (and then of course, I was asked to quit after two months because I was so lousy at it). Anyway, during the interview, the guy asked me if I gambled or did cocaine. I said "of course not" ... which was true BTW. Then he shook his head a bit and siad that the people who have expensive habits like that often make really good salesmen because they really need money.