There's an episode (Voyager, I think) where crew are handed out single letters from home on a PADD. Looks like their hard disks were really, really small.
In Star Trek, interstellar flight and communication usually costs next to nothing in time, money, manpower or material resources.
Voyager - at least in the beginning - had the guts to strip away most the magic - leaving a ship and crew that are on their own and the odds very much against them.
The theatrical prop is prior art only for the patent on the theatrical prop. It is - after all - only a safe, practical, and economical way of sustaining the illusion.
The secret to Goldin's [1920] illusion lies in the construction of his apparatus. The audience watches a stage assistant climb into a large box resting on a platform. What it does not see is that the platform is actually a second box, in which another assistant is concealed. At some point during the illusion, the bottom of the first box, from which the first assistant's feet protrude, is temporarily hidden, either by rotating the apparatus on stage or by nonchalantly blocking that end of it with a panel or prop. The first assistant takes this opportunity to withdraw her feet and retract her body into the upper half, where built-in footrests ensure that she will remain in one piece. The second assistant then pushes her feet--clad, of course, in an identical pair of shoes--through the vacated holes and scrunches down in the bottom end of the box.
When the performer starts to saw, the audience seems to see the blade penetrate the body of the woman. In fact, it is passing harmlessly between two assistants. Once the sawing is complete and the two halves of the box, after being pulled apart to heighten the illusion, are pushed back together, the substitution process is reversed; the first assistant's feet are again extended through the lower end of the box, and she is able to emerge in one piece. The exposure of his secret forced Goldin to abandon his sawing illusion. In its place he developed "The Living Miracle," in which an assistant is cut in half by a giant circular saw. Unlike his original sawing illusion, however, the assistant is not enclosed in a box; rather, the sawing is performed in full view of the audience. The method used to accomplish the illusion, which was never patented, is still known only to a select few.
Today his sawing apparatus remains a staple of stage magicians around the globe, while the circular-saw illusion is used only by top performers, such as David Copperfield and Harry Blackstone, Jr. Audiences may not know Horace Goldin's name, but among magicians he will always be remembered as the man who created one of the profession's sturdiest illusions and failed in attempting to protect it. In so doing he made clear both the power and the limits of America's patent system. For a while that system served Goldin well, as it has many other inventors. In the end, however, he asked it to do something it simply was not designed for, and like any human contrivance similarly misused, the system did not respond the way he wanted.
Does this mean that file sharing and sites like Wikileaks could just pull up anchor and go to the next country if being pressured by local law enforcement?
In maritime law, actions can proceed "in rem."
You can take a ship into court - as if it were a person and not property - if you can't reach or identify the owners. You'll be thinking about that when the title to your top-secret servers passes to the plaintiff.
You won't make it far if the Coast Guard and the Navy decides they don't want you leaving the Port of San Francisco.
Really guys, your president is Center-Right from the perspective of the rest of the world
It isn't far from the truth to say that every American President has been center-right.
The USA needs Democrats with balls to propose truly liberal policy, not watered down compromises, imho
Things to remember about the American political system:
There is no such thing as party discipline or a national party organization as those who know a Parliamentary system of government would understand it.
The constitutional framework of the government was built from the ground up to enforce compromise.
Nothing much gets done until there is broad agreement among states and cities - the Senate and the Congress - that something needs to be done.
Governing coalitions are forged within the two major parties.
The most promising ideas that emerge from a fledgling third party are repackaged for sale under the Republican or Democratic banner - and often both.
Degeneration (and general baseline stupidity) is strongest in that corner of the planet. "And Linux use has dropped from a high of 2.5% in 2004 to a rounding error this year" proves this.
How?
OSX and Windows 7 are both modern, capable, operating systems. The OEM system bundle generally well balanced and competitively priced.
You can chose from the best in both FOSS and commercial/proprietary software.
That's essentially where Linux stands in the July stats from Net Applications. The iPhone at 0.7%. Linux, all flavors, at 0.9%. Operating System Market Share
You'll get sued, and you might even spend a day or two in jail for contempt of court after a court ordered you to turn something over and you refused to do so.
No.
You'll remain in the county lock-up until you turn over the keys or until hell freezes over.
Whichever comes first.
[For H. Beatty Chadwick, it was fourteen years]
But you do realize that if you had the key to a building, and were fired, and refused to hand those keys over, you wouldn't be going to prison, right?
Wrong.
Consider how "Obstruction of Justice" is defined in the federal system:
"Obstruction of justice is the frustration of governmental purposes by violence, corruption, destruction of evidence, or deceit. It is a federal crime. In fact, it is several crimes. Obstruction prosecutions regularly involve charges under several statutory provisions. Federal obstruction of justice laws are legion; too many for even passing reference to all of them in a single report."Obstruction of Justice: An Abridged Overview of Related Federal Criminal Laws
Interfering with government operations is broadly criminal.
I'm betting that if you hold the keys to a Catholic hospital - or to the server rooms within a Catholic hospital - you would also be looking at criminal charges.
You can very easily get more time in jail for, what most would consider a prank, than for rape or other violent crimes.
Citation needed.
The "prank" can be devastating.
There is a reason why The Joker remains the most unsettling and memorable of all Batman villains.
It is interesting that in this case Terry Childs did very little actual damage but got 4 years.
Now you are being dishonest.
The city's network had to be forensically examined and rebuilt. That does not come cheap.
I know this sounds very arrogant, but I would love to see trials change so you're actually judged by your peers instead of members of the public, so for example doctors by doctors, network admin by other network admin, and such. That way you can get a bunch of people who know how far this person has stepped out of line.
Doctors refuse to discipline other doctors, lawyers other lawyers. The jury of KKK does not convict their fellow Klansman. Not if they want to go on living.
The jury of your peers means that you are and will remain answerable to the community - to the world - as a whole.
That there is nothing about you that demands special treatment.
The owner of the city of San Francisco network isn't the mayor or some manager in the city administration, those are only the administrators. The true owner of that network is the people of San Francisco.
Formally true, but legally and practically meaningless.
The keys can't be surrendered to the "people of San Francisco" but only to their elected or appointed representatives.
Would you care to try for Double Jeopardy, where the stakes are higher?
What I'm going to be more interested in is the appeal. There's no way that he isn't going to try and appeal, and if as much of it has been glossed over or ignored as it seems to be at this time, he may get the conviction and any financial penalties overturned.
Factual disputes are for the trial courts.
You must raise the issue there and you must do it clearly and competently.
You won't be given a second chance on appeal.
The court of appeals is only interested in whether the judge or jury made a fundamental legal mistake in their handling of the case.
My responsibilities and duties as an IT worker end the moment I quit or someone fires me. Because I am in IT, for some reason I must make myself available weeks or months after the fact to provide passwords.
Lewis was the last to command a destroyer-escort on its way to join the mothball fleet - and mislaid it somewhere along the way.
Now the Navy wants it back - or restitution, paid in full.
The gag was familiar to any veteran of that era and it carries more than a grain of truth.
You aren't being paid the big bucks because you work harder than the kid on the loading dock. You are being paid the big bucks because someone believed you were both technically competent and responsible.
You do not build a puzzle box for your employers to decipher after you are gone.
Passwords are accessible in emergencies. They are surrendered before you exit the main gate. These things are basic.
The IT worker is held to a standard above that of officers, managers, and other employees.
I keep wondering if one could turn a highway into a kind of electric railroad tho, by equipping electric vehicles with a system to tap supply system pretty much like a electric train do today.
I'd argue that republicans are the only ones with party loyalty though..
Just a reminder for readers outside the United States:
Party discipline does not exist in the U.S. as anyone who knows only parliamentary government would understand it.
Governing coalitions are forged within - and between - the two major parties. Third parties tend to organize around a charismatic leader and issues that have no great staying power. When one or the other fades from view, the party fades with it.
she couldn't answer the question of whether or not the government has the power to tell you what to eat.
The Supreme Court is limited to deciding real-life "cases and controversies."
It doesn't like loaded questions and it isn't there to deliver free legal advice in the form of an advisory opinion.
Farm subsidies. Pure Food & Drug Acts.
School Lunch programs. Pre-Natal Care, Food Stamps. Medicaid. SSI. SSD. The VA.
The government has a substantial say in what crops are raised and how they will be processed and marketed.
The government helps feed the young, the poor, the elderly, the sick and the disabled. It pays a substantial part of their living and medical expenses. Poor nutrition adds to the cost.
Cooperative Extension goes back to 1914. The federal role in teaching "Home Economics" is at least as old as that.
The Free State Project is a proposal to have 20,000 individuals move to New Hampshire, with the intent of reducing the size and scope of government at the local, state, and federal levels. The Free State Project holds the annual New Hampshire Liberty Forum and the annual Porcupine Freedom Festival, also known as PorcFestNew Hampshire As of August 2010, there were 10,300 participants, 838 of which had moved to New Hampshire.Free State Project
Slashdot Mirror
The Computer Word story is light on details. No surprise there.
How is your data protected against accidental deletion - hardware failure, power outages, etc?
There's an episode (Voyager, I think) where crew are handed out single letters from home on a PADD. Looks like their hard disks were really, really small.
In Star Trek, interstellar flight and communication usually costs next to nothing in time, money, manpower or material resources.
Voyager - at least in the beginning - had the guts to strip away most the magic - leaving a ship and crew that are on their own and the odds very much against them.
Prior Art!
The theatrical prop is prior art only for the patent on the theatrical prop. It is - after all - only a safe, practical, and economical way of sustaining the illusion.
The secret to Goldin's [1920] illusion lies in the construction of his apparatus. The audience watches a stage assistant climb into a large box resting on a platform. What it does not see is that the platform is actually a second box, in which another assistant is concealed. At some point during the illusion, the bottom of the first box, from which the first assistant's feet protrude, is temporarily hidden, either by rotating the apparatus on stage or by nonchalantly blocking that end of it with a panel or prop. The first assistant takes this opportunity to withdraw her feet and retract her body into the upper half, where built-in footrests ensure that she will remain in one piece. The second assistant then pushes her feet--clad, of course, in an identical pair of shoes--through the vacated holes and scrunches down in the bottom end of the box.
When the performer starts to saw, the audience seems to see the blade penetrate the body of the woman. In fact, it is passing harmlessly between two assistants. Once the sawing is complete and the two halves of the box, after being pulled apart to heighten the illusion, are pushed back together, the substitution process is reversed; the first assistant's feet are again extended through the lower end of the box, and she is able to emerge in one piece.
The exposure of his secret forced Goldin to abandon his sawing illusion. In its place he developed "The Living Miracle," in which an assistant is cut in half by a giant circular saw. Unlike his original sawing illusion, however, the assistant is not enclosed in a box; rather, the sawing is performed in full view of the audience. The method used to accomplish the illusion, which was never patented, is still known only to a select few.
Today his sawing apparatus remains a staple of stage magicians around the globe, while the circular-saw illusion is used only by top performers, such as David Copperfield and Harry Blackstone, Jr.
Audiences may not know Horace Goldin's name, but among magicians he will always be remembered as the man who created one of the profession's sturdiest illusions and failed in attempting to protect it. In so doing he made clear both the power and the limits of America's patent system. For a while that system served Goldin well, as it has many other inventors. In the end, however, he asked it to do something it simply was not designed for, and like any human contrivance similarly misused, the system did not respond the way he wanted.
Sawing A Woman In Half
Not if you buy a used hybrid.
This assumes that the used hybrid is more or less as economical to keep on the road as the new.
Does this mean that file sharing and sites like Wikileaks could just pull up anchor and go to the next country if being pressured by local law enforcement?
In maritime law, actions can proceed "in rem."
You can take a ship into court - as if it were a person and not property - if you can't reach or identify the owners. You'll be thinking about that when the title to your top-secret servers passes to the plaintiff.
You won't make it far if the Coast Guard and the Navy decides they don't want you leaving the Port of San Francisco.
Really guys, your president is Center-Right from the perspective of the rest of the world
It isn't far from the truth to say that every American President has been center-right.
The USA needs Democrats with balls to propose truly liberal policy, not watered down compromises, imho
Things to remember about the American political system:
There is no such thing as party discipline or a national party organization as those who know a Parliamentary system of government would understand it.
The constitutional framework of the government was built from the ground up to enforce compromise.
Nothing much gets done until there is broad agreement among states and cities - the Senate and the Congress - that something needs to be done.
Governing coalitions are forged within the two major parties.
The most promising ideas that emerge from a fledgling third party are repackaged for sale under the Republican or Democratic banner - and often both.
True.
But the resident population of Manhattan Island is 1.63 million. 71,000 per square mile. Commuters and tourists add perhaps 1.3 to 1.5 million more.
There are about 500 miles of roads in a rigorous grid-iron pattern.
How you street level mesh network communicates cross-town through buildings that range from five to one hundred stories in height is another problem.
For those unfamiliar with this ultracheap Augen tablet, I'll do my best to sum it up: it's an unusable POS that somehow made it into production
Just wonderful. Another bottom feeder to poison Linux sales in big box retail.
Degeneration (and general baseline stupidity) is strongest in that corner of the planet. "And Linux use has dropped from a high of 2.5% in 2004 to a rounding error this year" proves this.
How?
OSX and Windows 7 are both modern, capable, operating systems. The OEM system bundle generally well balanced and competitively priced.
You can chose from the best in both FOSS and commercial/proprietary software.
Linux dropped to a rounding error? Really??
That's essentially where Linux stands in the July stats from Net Applications. The iPhone at 0.7%. Linux, all flavors, at 0.9%. Operating System Market Share
You'll get sued, and you might even spend a day or two in jail for contempt of court after a court ordered you to turn something over and you refused to do so.
No.
You'll remain in the county lock-up until you turn over the keys or until hell freezes over.
Whichever comes first.
[For H. Beatty Chadwick, it was fourteen years]
But you do realize that if you had the key to a building, and were fired, and refused to hand those keys over, you wouldn't be going to prison, right?
Wrong.
Consider how "Obstruction of Justice" is defined in the federal system:
"Obstruction of justice is the frustration of governmental purposes by violence, corruption, destruction of evidence, or deceit. It is a federal crime. In fact, it is several crimes. Obstruction prosecutions regularly involve charges under several statutory provisions. Federal obstruction of justice laws are legion; too many for even passing reference to all of them in a single report." Obstruction of Justice: An Abridged Overview of Related Federal Criminal Laws
Interfering with government operations is broadly criminal.
I'm betting that if you hold the keys to a Catholic hospital - or to the server rooms within a Catholic hospital - you would also be looking at criminal charges.
The stakes are simply too high.
Guess they don't have any backbone to just drop the country and let the end-users take action.
Just what action do you propose the users take - against the Islamic Saudi state and monarchy?
Citation needed.
The "prank" can be devastating.
There is a reason why The Joker remains the most unsettling and memorable of all Batman villains.
It is interesting that in this case Terry Childs did very little actual damage but got 4 years.
Now you are being dishonest.
The city's network had to be forensically examined and rebuilt. That does not come cheap.
I know this sounds very arrogant, but I would love to see trials change so you're actually judged by your peers instead of members of the public, so for example doctors by doctors, network admin by other network admin, and such. That way you can get a bunch of people who know how far this person has stepped out of line.
Doctors refuse to discipline other doctors, lawyers other lawyers. The jury of KKK does not convict their fellow Klansman. Not if they want to go on living.
The jury of your peers means that you are and will remain answerable to the community - to the world - as a whole.
That there is nothing about you that demands special treatment.
The owner of the city of San Francisco network isn't the mayor or some manager in the city administration, those are only the administrators. The true owner of that network is the people of San Francisco.
Formally true, but legally and practically meaningless.
The keys can't be surrendered to the "people of San Francisco" but only to their elected or appointed representatives.
Would you care to try for Double Jeopardy, where the stakes are higher?
He will likely do only 6 months of actual jail time...
It may not be quite that easy, since he has a prior felony conviction for robbery and burglary.
What I'm going to be more interested in is the appeal. There's no way that he isn't going to try and appeal, and if as much of it has been glossed over or ignored as it seems to be at this time, he may get the conviction and any financial penalties overturned.
Factual disputes are for the trial courts.
You must raise the issue there and you must do it clearly and competently.
You won't be given a second chance on appeal.
The court of appeals is only interested in whether the judge or jury made a fundamental legal mistake in their handling of the case.
My responsibilities and duties as an IT worker end the moment I quit or someone fires me. Because I am in IT, for some reason I must make myself available weeks or months after the fact to provide passwords.
Some here may remember the old Jerry Lewis comedy Don't Give Up the Ship. (1959)
Lewis was the last to command a destroyer-escort on its way to join the mothball fleet - and mislaid it somewhere along the way.
Now the Navy wants it back - or restitution, paid in full.
The gag was familiar to any veteran of that era and it carries more than a grain of truth.
You aren't being paid the big bucks because you work harder than the kid on the loading dock. You are being paid the big bucks because someone believed you were both technically competent and responsible.
You do not build a puzzle box for your employers to decipher after you are gone.
Passwords are accessible in emergencies. They are surrendered before you exit the main gate. These things are basic.
The IT worker is held to a standard above that of officers, managers, and other employees.
It's not a different standard at all.
I keep wondering if one could turn a highway into a kind of electric railroad tho, by equipping electric vehicles with a system to tap supply system pretty much like a electric train do today.
This idea has been around forever.
CAL (Cornell Aeronautics) sketched out an automated third-rail system in 1967. How You'll "Drive" The Amazing New Urbmobile
Heinlein seems to have had something similar in mind in "Methuselah's Children." (1941/1958)
In most states, you'll be a registered sex offender for taking a leak in public
Slashdot loves the anecdote.
Facts tend to be more elusive.
I thought it would be a useful reality check to call up the sex registry of my home county.
It was not an easy read.
You do not make the list by pissing on the sidewalk.
You make the list after being convicted for the rape and abuse of young girls and teens - girls three years old, five year-old, nine years-old.
You make it by being good with your fists.
When pornography is a factor, it is often because you have been taking pictures of your victims.
I'd argue that republicans are the only ones with party loyalty though..
Just a reminder for readers outside the United States:
Party discipline does not exist in the U.S. as anyone who knows only parliamentary government would understand it.
Governing coalitions are forged within - and between - the two major parties. Third parties tend to organize around a charismatic leader and issues that have no great staying power. When one or the other fades from view, the party fades with it.
Best would be a service with a dead-man's switch, so that if I don't access it in, say, three months, it auto-purges. Any thoughts?"
Don't leave the country.
Don't let an auto crash leave you in a coma.
Don't be trapped on the Gulf Coast in hurricane season.
Dead doesn't always mean dead-dead. It can mean nothing more than that you or your files have become temporarily inaccessible.
she couldn't answer the question of whether or not the government has the power to tell you what to eat.
The Supreme Court is limited to deciding real-life "cases and controversies."
It doesn't like loaded questions and it isn't there to deliver free legal advice in the form of an advisory opinion.
Farm subsidies. Pure Food & Drug Acts.
School Lunch programs. Pre-Natal Care, Food Stamps. Medicaid. SSI. SSD. The VA.
The government has a substantial say in what crops are raised and how they will be processed and marketed.
The government helps feed the young, the poor, the elderly, the sick and the disabled. It pays a substantial part of their living and medical expenses. Poor nutrition adds to the cost.
Cooperative Extension goes back to 1914. The federal role in teaching "Home Economics" is at least as old as that.
Gods, why can't all the states be that progressive.....
Population 1.32 million
White 95.5%
[25% French-Canadian]
Hispanic 2.6%
Asian 1.9%
Black 1.2%
Native American 0.3%
Women owned business 25%
Minority owned 2.7%
QuickFacts New Hampshire
The Free State Project is a proposal to have 20,000 individuals move to New Hampshire, with the intent of reducing the size and scope of government at the local, state, and federal levels. The Free State Project holds the annual New Hampshire Liberty Forum and the annual Porcupine Freedom Festival, also known as PorcFest New Hampshire
As of August 2010, there were 10,300 participants, 838 of which had moved to New Hampshire. Free State Project
Like most people developing for the iPhone, I wouldn't have the money to fight them patenting ideas from my apps.
Your ideas are free to all.
Only a novel implementation of an an idea can be patented.
To be honest, pretty much only an idiot develops for them.
The iPhone has a 0.7% share of the web.
That is within easy striking distance of Linux, all flavors, at 0.93% Operating System Market Share
Impressive, when you remember that the Net Applications stats are global.