If the ??AA would actually sit down with people, listen to why they didn't do it, and resolve such cases (where the person really didn't do it) out of court without money changing hands, it would be fine. But they don't, which is why they've earned the moniker "Mafiaa" on/.. Instead, they go through a protracted legal battle (due to the ??AA's attorneys dragging their feet and filing countless ridiculous motions) in a feeble effort to try to claim their money by presenting incredibly flimsy evidence. On the plus side, it looks like you'll generally be able to claim attorneys' fees from the ??AA when you win your case.
The plot: Kirk, Spock, and crew travel back in time to early 21st century Earth using the tried-and-true slingshot effect. They are arrested by police for their suspicious activities as they recon various historic landmarks in the United States. When a policeman removes the dew rag that Spock is wearing around his face, Kirk must convince him that Spock's appearance is due to a childhood accident in which his nose was caught in a mechanical rice picker.
There is nothing rational about organized religion. Now you could make an arguement that Rationality is not the be all and end all of existence, and in fact it's quite limited and I would agree with that. But you cannot possibly argue that there is any such thing as a rational, organized religion. The entire concept is irrational.
I didn't try to argue that at all. What I was trying to argue is that treating all devout religious people (or the organized religions they participate in) as being terrorist whackjobs (or terrorist whackjob organizations) due to their beliefs is irrational, chiefly because it isn't true. It is likewise irrational to use the bad acts of certain people or certain organizations at certain times in history in order to defend intolerance of all beliefs that differ from yours.
On the plus side, if you get involved in any shirtless hand-to-hand combat with strangely humanoid aliens, you won't have to go looking for any styrofoam rocks.
What you fail to realize is that people who get rich don't get rich for richness's sake. They get rich so they can use the money to do other things.
If they're using the money to invest in new businesses, it helps the economy and employs more people at better wages. If they're spending it on stuff for their own enjoyment, they get taxed on it.
BTW, I'm not rich. Far from it. But I still support FairTax.
There's a better way to go solar than to enslave yourself to some fly-by-night company for the rest of your life. It's called a loan. Here's how it works.
You go to the bank, get a loan, use the loan money to install your very own solar panel system, and use the money you save on electric bills to pay back the loan. Later, once you've paid off the loan, you get to keep the money that you aren't spending on those electric bills instead of continuing to pay a permanent rental fee to some company. And if you generate more power than you use, you can actually sell it to make more money.
Works great for retirement, and if you decide to sell the house instead, you can mark it up because of the solar panels, allowing you to install solar panels at your next house as well, perhaps without needing a loan.
Professor Farnsworth: Now, we all know telescopes allow us to see distant objects. But what if we want to smell distant objects? Well, now we can! Thanks to my new invention: the Smelloscope. The odor travels past this coffee stain here, around the olive pit, and into this cigar burn. And this appears to be a doodle of myself as a cowboy. But the Smelloscope is brilliant, I tell you! Think of the astronomical odors you'll smell, thanks to me.
In terms of good filmmaking, I don't see the problem. At its core, films are supposed to tell a compelling story and possibly make some sort of societal commentary, and that's it. Anything that gets done behind the scenes to make that story more compelling is a good thing for the film and its audience.
However, I'm gonna laugh when some overrated actor wins an Oscar, only to have some no-name visual effects guy break it to the world the next morning that half of their performance was "digitally enhanced". It'll be Milli Vanilli all over again.
Hold on while I wipe the beverage from my monitor. We get the same thing here with articles about the US government. These sites are like that not because they're US-centric, but because they get a substantial subsidy from the tin foil industry. Or, at least, that's the theory.
The exemptions not specifically mentioned in the statute itself. Application for an exemption is made to the Librarian of Congress, who then makes a ruling as to whether or not the exemption should be granted. The cell phone exemption unlocking was granted in the most recent cycle:
That's the macroeconomic view, that in the long run, prices are determined by seller supply and consumer demand. The microeconomic view is that optimum profit doesn't necessarily mean maximum unit sales, so an individual retailer may be better off raising their prices and selling less product.
Police may trump the average citizen, but the press trumps the police. While many of the stories they do are bunk, your local TV news station's investigative reporter will be only too happy to put your story on the air, from the car crashes to your investigation to the problems the city and its police caused for you.
As with anything, there's no guarantees that this will work, but it's probably the best way to get someone with some clout on your side.
Well, there is now a DMCA exemption to unlock your cell phone to connect to another carrier (assuming you have an open account with said carrier). Not having an iPhone myself (I like cell phones that let me talk to people, and not much else), I don't know the answer to this question: How long before another carrier reverse engineers whatever service is being provided, so that you can buy an iPhone and subscribe to another carrier's service?
A big problem for Vivendi could be that click-through contracts are not real contracts.
Not true. I don't have the references handy, but EULAs have been found valid on many occasions. The two big problems are when (a) you don't actually have to have seen the agreement before installing the software, and (b) when you pay for the software (or can't get your money back for it) before agreeing to the EULA. In WoW's case specifically, Blizzard provides a way for you to get your money back for the boxed game if you decide not to agree with the EULA, and they also ask you to agree to their TOS when you contract with them for a game account as well as when you first run the game (and after some game patches as well). Their specific EULA hasn't been challenged in court AFAIK, but agreements which haven't caused problems as mentioned in (a) and (b) above have generally been upheld the few times they've been tested.
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That strategy I can almost respect, assuming that Universal isn't using this as a strategy to backstab you for doing the right thing.
If the ??AA would actually sit down with people, listen to why they didn't do it, and resolve such cases (where the person really didn't do it) out of court without money changing hands, it would be fine. But they don't, which is why they've earned the moniker "Mafiaa" on /.. Instead, they go through a protracted legal battle (due to the ??AA's attorneys dragging their feet and filing countless ridiculous motions) in a feeble effort to try to claim their money by presenting incredibly flimsy evidence. On the plus side, it looks like you'll generally be able to claim attorneys' fees from the ??AA when you win your case.
Adrian Brody as Spock, huh?
The plot: Kirk, Spock, and crew travel back in time to early 21st century Earth using the tried-and-true slingshot effect. They are arrested by police for their suspicious activities as they recon various historic landmarks in the United States. When a policeman removes the dew rag that Spock is wearing around his face, Kirk must convince him that Spock's appearance is due to a childhood accident in which his nose was caught in a mechanical rice picker.
There is nothing rational about organized religion. Now you could make an arguement that Rationality is not the be all and end all of existence, and in fact it's quite limited and I would agree with that. But you cannot possibly argue that there is any such thing as a rational, organized religion. The entire concept is irrational.
I didn't try to argue that at all. What I was trying to argue is that treating all devout religious people (or the organized religions they participate in) as being terrorist whackjobs (or terrorist whackjob organizations) due to their beliefs is irrational, chiefly because it isn't true. It is likewise irrational to use the bad acts of certain people or certain organizations at certain times in history in order to defend intolerance of all beliefs that differ from yours.
On the plus side, if you get involved in any shirtless hand-to-hand combat with strangely humanoid aliens, you won't have to go looking for any styrofoam rocks.
I see somebody was not a fan of Men in Black.
A rational person would know better than to paint all "organized religion" with the same brush.
I suggest a picture of Vincent D'Onofrio:
0 2_mib_opti_donofrio.jpg
http://poly.chromatic.net/blog/wp-content/_films_
Well, he does spend all his public time self-righteously pandering to his base. He'd be perfect!
Personally, I think the number of Flash widgets on the main page should be considered inversely proportional to the goodness of the website.
Clinton, Giuliani, Romney: 0
Obama: 1
Edwards: 2
McCain: 4
Hey, you folks forgot somebody!
Throwing a brochure at someone and saying, "Read this and don't waste my time until you do," is definitely a winning sales strategy.
What you fail to realize is that people who get rich don't get rich for richness's sake. They get rich so they can use the money to do other things.
If they're using the money to invest in new businesses, it helps the economy and employs more people at better wages. If they're spending it on stuff for their own enjoyment, they get taxed on it.
BTW, I'm not rich. Far from it. But I still support FairTax.
If the average homeowner can't recover the value of their loan through electricity savings, then how do you guys expect to do the same thing?
Also, I didn't call Google "fly-by-night". I was describing many of the folks who advertise through AdSense when I made that comment.
There's a better way to go solar than to enslave yourself to some fly-by-night company for the rest of your life. It's called a loan. Here's how it works.
You go to the bank, get a loan, use the loan money to install your very own solar panel system, and use the money you save on electric bills to pay back the loan. Later, once you've paid off the loan, you get to keep the money that you aren't spending on those electric bills instead of continuing to pay a permanent rental fee to some company. And if you generate more power than you use, you can actually sell it to make more money.
Works great for retirement, and if you decide to sell the house instead, you can mark it up because of the solar panels, allowing you to install solar panels at your next house as well, perhaps without needing a loan.
In Soviet Russia, Beowulf Cluster explains you!
And Netcraft confirms it!
Professor Farnsworth: Now, we all know telescopes allow us to see distant objects. But what if we want to smell distant objects? Well, now we can! Thanks to my new invention: the Smelloscope. The odor travels past this coffee stain here, around the olive pit, and into this cigar burn. And this appears to be a doodle of myself as a cowboy. But the Smelloscope is brilliant, I tell you! Think of the astronomical odors you'll smell, thanks to me.
In terms of good filmmaking, I don't see the problem. At its core, films are supposed to tell a compelling story and possibly make some sort of societal commentary, and that's it. Anything that gets done behind the scenes to make that story more compelling is a good thing for the film and its audience.
However, I'm gonna laugh when some overrated actor wins an Oscar, only to have some no-name visual effects guy break it to the world the next morning that half of their performance was "digitally enhanced". It'll be Milli Vanilli all over again.
Hold on while I wipe the beverage from my monitor. We get the same thing here with articles about the US government. These sites are like that not because they're US-centric, but because they get a substantial subsidy from the tin foil industry. Or, at least, that's the theory.
The exemptions not specifically mentioned in the statute itself. Application for an exemption is made to the Librarian of Congress, who then makes a ruling as to whether or not the exemption should be granted. The cell phone exemption unlocking was granted in the most recent cycle:
http://www.copyright.gov/1201/
That's the macroeconomic view, that in the long run, prices are determined by seller supply and consumer demand. The microeconomic view is that optimum profit doesn't necessarily mean maximum unit sales, so an individual retailer may be better off raising their prices and selling less product.
Police may trump the average citizen, but the press trumps the police. While many of the stories they do are bunk, your local TV news station's investigative reporter will be only too happy to put your story on the air, from the car crashes to your investigation to the problems the city and its police caused for you.
As with anything, there's no guarantees that this will work, but it's probably the best way to get someone with some clout on your side.
Well, there is now a DMCA exemption to unlock your cell phone to connect to another carrier (assuming you have an open account with said carrier). Not having an iPhone myself (I like cell phones that let me talk to people, and not much else), I don't know the answer to this question: How long before another carrier reverse engineers whatever service is being provided, so that you can buy an iPhone and subscribe to another carrier's service?
The simple solution is a situation like EVE Online, where your charcters level grind is based on real time and not play time.
I suppose that would solve their server load problems completely.
A big problem for Vivendi could be that click-through contracts are not real contracts.
Not true. I don't have the references handy, but EULAs have been found valid on many occasions. The two big problems are when (a) you don't actually have to have seen the agreement before installing the software, and (b) when you pay for the software (or can't get your money back for it) before agreeing to the EULA. In WoW's case specifically, Blizzard provides a way for you to get your money back for the boxed game if you decide not to agree with the EULA, and they also ask you to agree to their TOS when you contract with them for a game account as well as when you first run the game (and after some game patches as well). Their specific EULA hasn't been challenged in court AFAIK, but agreements which haven't caused problems as mentioned in (a) and (b) above have generally been upheld the few times they've been tested.