So when I try to play my DVD film on windows, or AAC files, or watch a quicktime video in the browser, visit a flash website, or try to open a microsoft office document on vanilla windows, it has failed and I should buy a different OS?
NO OS has a reader or player for every file format out there, largely because many of them are proprietary and require payments or at least additional proprietary software. To expect linux to be different is simply stupid. MP3 playback will not be freely supported out of the box on free distros as it would be illegal to so inside the US, until the patents expire. Blame US patent law for this, not linux.
As far as wireless cards go? There are *plenty* that don't work under windows vista, and never will. I know this because I have 4 of them, all different brands and interfaces.
Ubuntu Linux is at the same point as vista in terms of polish and ease of use. I use both daily. Linux generally has easier driver support, with the exception of USB peripherals. Vista has more application support. They both require poking and tweaking to do what you want. Linux costs a hell of a lot less.
If vendors could advertise the same PC for £50-100 less, the price of a mass OEM windows licence, side-by-side with the vista version, across a broad product range without fear of microsoft retaliation (removal of ad-spend contributions, for example), you'd see a hell of an increase in non-windows pc sales. Big up the different office apps to replace microsoft office which is massive overkill for 90% of users, and save people another £100 (or £400 if they have to pay full retail).
It's microsoft's existing massive monopoly in the desktop space, which they tie to their office monopoly to keep both propped up at this point, combined with agressive licensing setups with vendors and heavy marketing that keeps them where they are. I'll not say linux is miles better than windows, it isn't, but the current market shares really don't represent the actual relative quality of the OSes in question. The biggest thing the EU could do is force vendors to put the OS cost clearly as part of the pc price, just like VAT. When people see that 25% or worse of the PC price is the microsoft tax, they might ask a few more questions about alternatives.
The penalty of purjury applies to the bit you elided, not the bit you included. Specifically, where it says "I swear under penalty of perjury that I am authorized to act on behalf of Microsoft in regard to its exclusive rights in the work(s) identified above"
I.e. the DMCA makes sending takedown notices for works you don't own a perjury offence; a copyright holder or their agent cocking up or just not doing due dilligence or even just being asshats and sending a notice about the wrong work entirely is not covered by the perjury penalty.
Besides, it's all fairly irrelevent since the DMCA does not apply to swedes in sweden running a swedish website!
Yes, but the UK is ALSO behind much of europe. Try France, for example. ADSL1 (8Mbs) is pretty much universal. ADSL2+ (24Mbs) is far more widespread than in the UK, you can get it even in many rural areas, whereas it's only available in the centre of major cities in the UK - and costs triple what it does in france. 50Mbs FTTH fibre rollout is now available in dense urban populations in france, and is being rapidly expanded due to the existing fibre infrastructure.
The UK, i.e. BT, decided to stick with copper back in the 80s and 90s as it was cheaper, whereas much of europe switched to fibre, at least to the curbside. Now copper is a lot more expensive, and the limit of the UK ambitions is to rollout ADSL2 to most of the country by the end of the decade. It will still cost more than france, and will take another decade to get us over to fibre-to-the-home - if BT will even do that.
I've been to a number of places in France, and ADSL is far more widespread, cheaper and faster than the UK. (no throttling or caps)
I do not buy music from the major labels. I do not download any of it illegally it either. All my new music I buy from smaller indies like cdbaby, DRM free or get for free legally from the artist. Mostly, I listen to my large collection of old ripped CDs or the radio.
I strongly object to being forced to pay U2 as part of a flat fee. I owe them *nothing*. I also strongly object to having my ISP log everything I do and everywhere I go in a hunt for copyright infringement I'm not commiting, and then being charged by the ISP for the privilege. I have a right of privacy in my internet communications just as I do with my written letters and my phone conversations.
At what point did the ISP business become responsible for making sure the music industry meets the level of profit that they're used from when they were the only game in town? Why do we cripple one large industry and sacrifice such a huge chunk of users' civil liberties in order to 'save' a small one? I'm sure once the ISPs have 7 year logs of all internet traffic for perusal by a copyright cartel association, every government agency will be right behind to snoop through everybody's affairs.
As you say, DRM-free music is available from the majors, at last, via online retailers. We disagree on the reasonable price, especially in the UK. Still, that business is growing. Studies have shown that filesharing, even at worst, does not significantly reduce sales; in fact, exposure can increase sales for smaller artists.
The recording industry is not guaranteed a profit. I object to being screwed by the government and ISPs to ensure they get the profit they feel they deserve. They've driven their customers away by treating them like shit, and ripping them off for decades (remember the CD pricing lawsuits they lost?). Now they're crying that they might only get 1 billion instead of 18 billion? Well tough goddamn titty. They had their opportunities to stay in the middle and carry on ripping off artist and customer alike, and blew it through complete lack of foresight. Radiohead made more profit off their new album, even with people getting it free than every other album they've ever done combined.
Sweden does not have the vicarious or contributory copyright infringment offences the US does, which were what they got napster and grokster with. In sweden, it's only if you are directly committing copyright violations you are liable. Since there is not copyrighted material in the tracker itself, they're not breaking swedish law. Until the US government on behalf of the copyright cartel do manage to get the swedish government to change the law anyway, as they've been trying to do.
You're assuming the restrictions on personal data are greater than they are. If IP's are judged personal data, that makes them like a telephone number or an address (The Act covers any data which can be used to identify a living person). Still, you do have some responsibilities, *if you're in the EU* with regards handling personal data. Basically, there are restrictions on publishing it or sharing it around without permission, and you can only use it for the original purpose for which it was collected. (Sensitive personal data, i.e. really private stuff, is more strictly controlled)
For example, say you were to publish your webserver access logs; you'd be better off anonymising the IP's somewhat first. Just as if I call you on the phone, you're allowed to store the caller ID, call me back or even put me on your internal call-list - but publishing my phone number, along with transcripts of our conversations without permission would be a no-no. Nor can you flog it off on the open market to cold callers. When you sign up for a phone line here, you're asked if you want the number to appear in the phone book, or go ex-directory.
Again, this only applies if you live in an EU country with data protection laws.
If IP addresses are personal data, and you visit my web page, and my access logs show I served an IP that you used at a certain time (or even just that I served an IP you used), am I now subject to laws regarding the holding of personal information? If you're an individual holding the data for your own personal use, you are exempt from much of the data protection act, including having to tell people when they ask what data you hold on them. If you're a company, when given a proper request and the fee to handle the request, would have to look in the logs when given the IP, and would have to report that yes, you hold 7 instances of that IP in your log. If your log expires before you have to answer the request (40 days I think) , you don't have to give anything.
If you were to contact me and request that information how would I authenticate you? If I was to disclose certain parts of the "personal data" that you claimed belonged to you,how could I know that I was not disclosing someone else's personal information, given that I can't necessarily authenticate you or anyone else and IP's can be re-allocated? You don't have to disclose the other data that goes with the IP, just the IP itself that they supply to you. You then say whether you hold that or not.
If I ban an IP address for abusing my server and it is later re-allocated to someone else, is that slander? It'd be libel as it's written, not slander as that's spoken. Libel only applies if you *publish* lies about someone, such as 'this IP searches for goat porn' (when they don't). Storing it for your own blacklist is fine. If you're a company, the new holder of the IP could ask that you correct your record under data protection law though.
If I forward an e-mail whose headers contain IP addresses of relay servers, is that unlawful disclosure of personal information? No, because relay servers do not identify a living human. Also, it's the processing and storage of personal identifying data for later use that's covered, not mere transmission. The owners of servers that store those emails would likely have responsibilities under the data protection act, but then they do anyway because of the contents of the email itself!
Plus, there was fuel all over the runway after the crash. They had plenty fuel in the tanks (before landing, anyway!). Whether it could get to the engines, or was of decent quality is another question. Just bloody lucky it didn't catch fire. As you say, BA is not a budget operator, especially on its long-haul flights.
According to the preliminary report of the investigators of the black boxes (reported on the BBC), the autothrottle asked for more thrust when it was coming in slightly too steep, and didn't get it from the engines. The pilots then manually increased the throttle levers, and didn't get any more thrust then either. By the sounds of it, they had to manually dive the aircraft to keep up sufficient speed to stop it stalling altogether, then pull up the nose just before impact.
Both pilots have been heavily praised for getting the plane more or less safely on the ground by gliding in with insufficient power on final approach - if they hadn't, there's a good chance it would have stalled and crashed badly, quite possibly into the 6 lanes of traffic and houses near the end of the runway they narrowly managed to fly over.
A failure in the autopilot and autothrottle in a plane taking off from Perth might have caused a crash in a 777 if the pilots hadn't disconnected them both and got the plane under control - that was due to a faulty sensor and software bug combined. The chances of *both* engines on a 777 suffering a major mechanical problem at the same time is considered virtually impossible; it's possible to successfully take off in a 777 even if one engine fails, so both must have failed to cause such a major loss of thrust. The most likely cause of both to lose power (excluding fuel exhaustion) is a control problem, and again it's more likely a software bug that affects both engine control systems (or major pilot error which doesn't appear to be a factor here).
The engines weren't hit by birds, as the blades visually weren't damaged. They didn't run out of fuel (as has been speculated), as there was fuel all over the runway after the crash, though a feed problem affecting both engines is a possibility, but again that's most likely a software controlled pump issue to affect both at once.
I never really liked pong, it was too boring, and then it got destroyed by leaking batteries. A few years later, I ended up with game and watch (donkey kong jr, donkey kong and lifeboat) and was hooked.
SEO IS bad for users of search engines. It means that when I search for something, I don't get relevant links to what I asked for, but instead some spammers latest scam. This applies to all search engines gamed by SEO users, not just google.
You also forget, commercial speech is not protected speech under free speech laws. SEO Advertising is NOT free speech, it's an attempt to subvert the normal function of the web for commercial advantage of a particular user. I'm not required to read it, and neither is google required to index it.
What's your next suggestion, mail server admins shouldn't perform any spam filtering as its infringing on the "free speech" rights of the spammers? Free speech means the government won't censor you, not that it won't punish you for illegal speech, and it has nothing to do with commercial speech or the interactions between non-government people and companies.
You seem to think that civil law is like a computer language; think of a clever technical loophole, and you'll get off scot free. Factor in that many or most of them are techno-illiterate, and such technical trickery will just be ignored or misunderstood. Next, the court weighs on the balance of probabilities, and frankly nitpicking detail like only sharing the encrypted version may well be seen as an attempt to subvert the law, and probably put the judge against you. They're not after the 'exact and true to the letter' result, but the 'right' result, within the law. The law is incredibly flexible and malleable to its expert users, they're very open to interpretation.
Copyright infringement is not a criminal offence, it's a civil one. At it's heart, the copyright owner is suing the alleged filesharer for monetary loss, by making available their works without permission. However, by only showing that he 'made available', without any evidence of distribution actually taking place, no harm can be shown. It therefore seems unreasonable, especially given that is how the law is drafted, to order the man to recompense (plus punitive damages) the copyright holder for monetary loss, when no monetary loss can be proven.
And did anyone think about what will happen when these planes are specifically hijacked by terrorists in order to fly into a tall building fitted with an anti-air missile system? We're through the looking glass here people...
You don't think teaching in science classes that 'God/an intelligent being did it' is a violation of the separation of church and state?
God/intelligent design have no place in a science class, in any fashion. Science is by definition the study of the natural. Religion is by definition the worship of the supernatural. ID/creationism have none of the hallmarks of scientific study. They make no predictions, and cannot be disproven which is a requirement of science.
The theory of evolution is as true as the theory of gravity or the carbon cycle. It is testable, it makes predictions, and the current evidence matches the theory. An alternative theory that can explain all the current evidence of evolution, and can make predictions about those areas not yet investigated should probably be taught in science classes. ID is not that theory, and never will be as it is not science. God deserves no place in science classes. He should not even be mentioned, and ID is creationism by God by another name.
There shouldn't be little stars in evolution text books with little notes saying 'some people say that this theory is wrong, and that God did it', any more than there should be that little star by every other single item in a science text book.
The study of natural phenomenons (i.e. evidence, that which is seen) with the theories that explain that evidence using only testable hypothesis. Otherwise, I demand that schools also teach in science classes my theory that things fall down because invisible unicorns jump upon them, imparting momentum...
"It also fits well the model of the sun being a *source* of the solar wind plasma, which will stretch out the magnetic field as seen. A nice confirmation of the standard theory. However, if the sun is the focus of an electrical discharge, then the solar wind should be in-bound instead of out-bound. Or, more precisely, an electric current should be in-bound. But such is not the case; protons and electrons both flee the sun rapidly in all directions, consistent with a thermally driven wind, and inconsistent with an electrical origin. The field and plasma observation actually serves to *disprove* the electric star hypothesis, and to confirm the standard theory."
You try to pretend that astro-physicists ignore the electro- side of electromagnetism. They obviously have a close relationship. Without going into the many other flaws of Electric Universe theory, where are the electrons flowing back towards the sun from this supposed electrical current between the sun and earth?
Actually, the evidence and observations often directly contradict the electric universe theories, and they just ignore the studies they don't like - then claim that standard model astrophysicists are ignoring the electro- side of electromagnetism, as seen upthread.
No true scientist is afraid of being proved wrong, they embrace it and use it to improve their work. Electric Universe proponents rarely provide ways for their theories to be falsified, and when what should be there according to their theories isn't, it's because we're not looking hard enough/in the right places/with the right equipment.
Electric fields disrupt plasma, magnetic fields contain them from observation, plus magnetic fields are much bigger than electrical fields in the sun's corona, plus where is the flow of electrons back towards the sun? Electric Universe proponents have no explanation for where all the energy is coming from that concentrates in the 'pinch areas' of stars. It shares many of the same characteristics as the over-unity (free energy) crowd. Standard model nuclear fusion matches many observations, though there's still some kinks around neutrinos.
I'm no astro-physicist, but of the research I've done into this, the majority of Electric Universe theories are poorly thought out horse pucky that don't match observational data, that try to explain holes in standard theory that aren't there.
"It also fits well the model of the sun being a *source* of the solar wind plasma, which will stretch out the magnetic field as seen. A nice confirmation of the standard theory. However, if the sun is the focus of an electrical discharge, then the solar wind should be in-bound instead of out-bound. Or, more precisely, an electric current should be in-bound. But such is not the case; protons and electrons both flee the sun rapidly in all directions, consistent with a thermally driven wind, and inconsistent with an electrical origin. The field and plasma observation actually serves to *disprove* the electric star hypothesis, and to confirm the standard theory."
The problem is, it destroys trust. You're altering someone else's page in order to insert your own 'advert'. How do I then know, as a customer, that you're not altering or inserting new things in other pages more silently using the same kit? Yes, in *this particular* case it's a pretty innocuous, even useful change. But it opens the door to lot of other possible changes, and the customer has no way of knowing whether they're happening or not.
Perhaps a better way would be to have it as a separate full page the user receives (with a rogers url), with a 'click here to carry on to your original page', but only if using a standard browser (don't want to screw with automated url checkers!). Even that has the possibility to break screen scrapers, or other tools not expecting the source page to change midstream, but at least it's consistent with other ad-supported sites that redirect periodically to a flash ad before letting you carry on.
Give mechanisms on the customer panel for automated alerts, including this one. Make them opt-in, or at least opt-out. If people want knowledge, it's up to them to provide accurate details. Yes, you'll get the numpties who can't read or think beyond the next two minutes who'll ring up and complain when they didn't read or understand what they signed up to, but you'll get them calling you regardless.
The wii is not user-switchable between regions. People who've applied the wrong region wii updates have caused all sorts of problems for themselves, including bricking the wii completely.
It's possible nintendo can reflash them, but the firmware itself is keyed to the hardware, and as far as I'm aware has not been broken. The main attention for playing backups and homebrew has been on fooling the optical drives with modchips, so there's been no 'build your own firmware' mods out there yet.
Energy in greater than energy out has to be stored. However, what determines energy in and out? Energy in in the food is the same regardless, it's a calorific value. Energy out goes out in waste heat (and other waste), useful work in the muscles and in other chemical reactions in the body, and is stored in various forms including fat.
the rate at which energy is spent on useful work is not a fixed amount. Exercising will increase your energy used for work. Cutting down the amount of energy going in via food will also reduce the difference in in vs out. Yet humans are not simple machines, and they are not controlled by dispassionate observers.
Alcoholism is a disease, not a moral failing. People smoke, knowing full well it will probably kill them, despite their many desperate attempts to quit. Tobacco and alcohol are known addictions, and we've moved on from expecting everyone to resist them with will power alone. Yet obesity is treated as a simple matter of will - eat less, exercise more, and you'll be thin like me - you lazy slob. The body resists. Hunger is a powerful force, if not the most powerful. Metabolisms treat diets like starvation, and adjust their energy spending to be more conservative. Some people can eat half the recommended calorie intake of a healthy adult, and still not lose weight. Those who are dangerously underweight can eat triple the recommended daily amount, under medical supervision with exercise strictly limited, and still not put on weight. Nor is the human mind a simple on/off switch.
Yes, eating more healthily and exercising do help. But as the one and only solution, it's up there with 'just stop drinking; how hard can it be?'
72.91% are dx9 sm3 12.17% are dx9 sm2 (i.e. old radeon x800's and the like) 9.36% are dx8.1! 5.38% are dx8
with 0.18% unknown. This doesn't tell us anything about vista takeup, but it does tell us a number of people playing hl2ep2 are doing so with old technology. nvidia 5900's default to 8.1 for example (their dx9 shader performance sucked), and that's a 4 year old card. Native DX 8 cards are even older!
http://www.steampowered.com/status/survey.html from the hardware survey, directx10 capable (vista with dx10 cards) players make up 7.38% of steam users, while 14.10% overall took the survey on vista.
The only one I've ever had partial success with in the UK is "that means they'll have your children's fingerprints (and DNA in those cases) in the police database for life, alongside the real criminals". Even that doesn't succeed very often. Most people really don't value their personal information or privacy; they know they're innocent, so why should an innocent person ever fear their own government? No matter how many examples of corrupt officials using cctv cameras to look down dresses, or look into the financial affairs of their neighbours, or check on their partner to see if they're cheating, they fundamentally trust 'the system' to only affect the 'bad men'. They know politicians and companies are weaselly to each other; they expect them to pull dirty tricks on their opponents. They don't even see it as bad behaviour any more.
Those that do care are just ignored by the politicians, because we don't have enough of a voice (i.e. money) to matter.
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So when I try to play my DVD film on windows, or AAC files, or watch a quicktime video in the browser, visit a flash website, or try to open a microsoft office document on vanilla windows, it has failed and I should buy a different OS?
NO OS has a reader or player for every file format out there, largely because many of them are proprietary and require payments or at least additional proprietary software. To expect linux to be different is simply stupid. MP3 playback will not be freely supported out of the box on free distros as it would be illegal to so inside the US, until the patents expire. Blame US patent law for this, not linux.
As far as wireless cards go? There are *plenty* that don't work under windows vista, and never will. I know this because I have 4 of them, all different brands and interfaces.
Ubuntu Linux is at the same point as vista in terms of polish and ease of use. I use both daily. Linux generally has easier driver support, with the exception of USB peripherals. Vista has more application support. They both require poking and tweaking to do what you want. Linux costs a hell of a lot less.
If vendors could advertise the same PC for £50-100 less, the price of a mass OEM windows licence, side-by-side with the vista version, across a broad product range without fear of microsoft retaliation (removal of ad-spend contributions, for example), you'd see a hell of an increase in non-windows pc sales. Big up the different office apps to replace microsoft office which is massive overkill for 90% of users, and save people another £100 (or £400 if they have to pay full retail).
It's microsoft's existing massive monopoly in the desktop space, which they tie to their office monopoly to keep both propped up at this point, combined with agressive licensing setups with vendors and heavy marketing that keeps them where they are. I'll not say linux is miles better than windows, it isn't, but the current market shares really don't represent the actual relative quality of the OSes in question. The biggest thing the EU could do is force vendors to put the OS cost clearly as part of the pc price, just like VAT. When people see that 25% or worse of the PC price is the microsoft tax, they might ask a few more questions about alternatives.
The penalty of purjury applies to the bit you elided, not the bit you included. Specifically, where it says "I swear under penalty of
perjury that I am authorized to act on behalf of Microsoft in regard to its exclusive rights in the work(s) identified above"
I.e. the DMCA makes sending takedown notices for works you don't own a perjury offence; a copyright holder or their agent cocking up or just not doing due dilligence or even just being asshats and sending a notice about the wrong work entirely is not covered by the perjury penalty.
Besides, it's all fairly irrelevent since the DMCA does not apply to swedes in sweden running a swedish website!
Yes, but the UK is ALSO behind much of europe. Try France, for example. ADSL1 (8Mbs) is pretty much universal. ADSL2+ (24Mbs) is far more widespread than in the UK, you can get it even in many rural areas, whereas it's only available in the centre of major cities in the UK - and costs triple what it does in france. 50Mbs FTTH fibre rollout is now available in dense urban populations in france, and is being rapidly expanded due to the existing fibre infrastructure.
The UK, i.e. BT, decided to stick with copper back in the 80s and 90s as it was cheaper, whereas much of europe switched to fibre, at least to the curbside. Now copper is a lot more expensive, and the limit of the UK ambitions is to rollout ADSL2 to most of the country by the end of the decade. It will still cost more than france, and will take another decade to get us over to fibre-to-the-home - if BT will even do that.
I've been to a number of places in France, and ADSL is far more widespread, cheaper and faster than the UK. (no throttling or caps)
I do not buy music from the major labels. I do not download any of it illegally it either. All my new music I buy from smaller indies like cdbaby, DRM free or get for free legally from the artist. Mostly, I listen to my large collection of old ripped CDs or the radio.
I strongly object to being forced to pay U2 as part of a flat fee. I owe them *nothing*. I also strongly object to having my ISP log everything I do and everywhere I go in a hunt for copyright infringement I'm not commiting, and then being charged by the ISP for the privilege. I have a right of privacy in my internet communications just as I do with my written letters and my phone conversations.
At what point did the ISP business become responsible for making sure the music industry meets the level of profit that they're used from when they were the only game in town? Why do we cripple one large industry and sacrifice such a huge chunk of users' civil liberties in order to 'save' a small one? I'm sure once the ISPs have 7 year logs of all internet traffic for perusal by a copyright cartel association, every government agency will be right behind to snoop through everybody's affairs.
As you say, DRM-free music is available from the majors, at last, via online retailers. We disagree on the reasonable price, especially in the UK. Still, that business is growing. Studies have shown that filesharing, even at worst, does not significantly reduce sales; in fact, exposure can increase sales for smaller artists.
The recording industry is not guaranteed a profit. I object to being screwed by the government and ISPs to ensure they get the profit they feel they deserve. They've driven their customers away by treating them like shit, and ripping them off for decades (remember the CD pricing lawsuits they lost?). Now they're crying that they might only get 1 billion instead of 18 billion? Well tough goddamn titty. They had their opportunities to stay in the middle and carry on ripping off artist and customer alike, and blew it through complete lack of foresight. Radiohead made more profit off their new album, even with people getting it free than every other album they've ever done combined.
The major record companies are dying? GOOD.
Sweden does not have the vicarious or contributory copyright infringment offences the US does, which were what they got napster and grokster with. In sweden, it's only if you are directly committing copyright violations you are liable. Since there is not copyrighted material in the tracker itself, they're not breaking swedish law. Until the US government on behalf of the copyright cartel do manage to get the swedish government to change the law anyway, as they've been trying to do.
DId you deliberately screw up that correction of a correction? You did, didn't you.
You're assuming the restrictions on personal data are greater than they are. If IP's are judged personal data, that makes them like a telephone number or an address (The Act covers any data which can be used to identify a living person). Still, you do have some responsibilities, *if you're in the EU* with regards handling personal data. Basically, there are restrictions on publishing it or sharing it around without permission, and you can only use it for the original purpose for which it was collected. (Sensitive personal data, i.e. really private stuff, is more strictly controlled)
For example, say you were to publish your webserver access logs; you'd be better off anonymising the IP's somewhat first. Just as if I call you on the phone, you're allowed to store the caller ID, call me back or even put me on your internal call-list - but publishing my phone number, along with transcripts of our conversations without permission would be a no-no. Nor can you flog it off on the open market to cold callers. When you sign up for a phone line here, you're asked if you want the number to appear in the phone book, or go ex-directory.
Again, this only applies if you live in an EU country with data protection laws.
If IP addresses are personal data, and you visit my web page, and my access logs show I served an IP that you used at a certain time (or even just that I served an IP you used), am I now subject to laws regarding the holding of personal information?
If you're an individual holding the data for your own personal use, you are exempt from much of the data protection act, including having to tell people when they ask what data you hold on them. If you're a company, when given a proper request and the fee to handle the request, would have to look in the logs when given the IP, and would have to report that yes, you hold 7 instances of that IP in your log. If your log expires before you have to answer the request (40 days I think) , you don't have to give anything.
If you were to contact me and request that information how would I authenticate you? If I was to disclose certain parts of the "personal data" that you claimed belonged to you,how could I know that I was not disclosing someone else's personal information, given that I can't necessarily authenticate you or anyone else and IP's can be re-allocated?
You don't have to disclose the other data that goes with the IP, just the IP itself that they supply to you. You then say whether you hold that or not.
If I ban an IP address for abusing my server and it is later re-allocated to someone else, is that slander?
It'd be libel as it's written, not slander as that's spoken. Libel only applies if you *publish* lies about someone, such as 'this IP searches for goat porn' (when they don't). Storing it for your own blacklist is fine. If you're a company, the new holder of the IP could ask that you correct your record under data protection law though.
If I forward an e-mail whose headers contain IP addresses of relay servers, is that unlawful disclosure of personal information?
No, because relay servers do not identify a living human. Also, it's the processing and storage of personal identifying data for later use that's covered, not mere transmission. The owners of servers that store those emails would likely have responsibilities under the data protection act, but then they do anyway because of the contents of the email itself!
Plus, there was fuel all over the runway after the crash. They had plenty fuel in the tanks (before landing, anyway!). Whether it could get to the engines, or was of decent quality is another question. Just bloody lucky it didn't catch fire. As you say, BA is not a budget operator, especially on its long-haul flights.
According to the preliminary report of the investigators of the black boxes (reported on the BBC), the autothrottle asked for more thrust when it was coming in slightly too steep, and didn't get it from the engines. The pilots then manually increased the throttle levers, and didn't get any more thrust then either. By the sounds of it, they had to manually dive the aircraft to keep up sufficient speed to stop it stalling altogether, then pull up the nose just before impact.
Both pilots have been heavily praised for getting the plane more or less safely on the ground by gliding in with insufficient power on final approach - if they hadn't, there's a good chance it would have stalled and crashed badly, quite possibly into the 6 lanes of traffic and houses near the end of the runway they narrowly managed to fly over.
A failure in the autopilot and autothrottle in a plane taking off from Perth might have caused a crash in a 777 if the pilots hadn't disconnected them both and got the plane under control - that was due to a faulty sensor and software bug combined. The chances of *both* engines on a 777 suffering a major mechanical problem at the same time is considered virtually impossible; it's possible to successfully take off in a 777 even if one engine fails, so both must have failed to cause such a major loss of thrust. The most likely cause of both to lose power (excluding fuel exhaustion) is a control problem, and again it's more likely a software bug that affects both engine control systems (or major pilot error which doesn't appear to be a factor here).
The engines weren't hit by birds, as the blades visually weren't damaged. They didn't run out of fuel (as has been speculated), as there was fuel all over the runway after the crash, though a feed problem affecting both engines is a possibility, but again that's most likely a software controlled pump issue to affect both at once.
I never really liked pong, it was too boring, and then it got destroyed by leaking batteries. A few years later, I ended up with game and watch (donkey kong jr, donkey kong and lifeboat) and was hooked.
SEO IS bad for users of search engines. It means that when I search for something, I don't get relevant links to what I asked for, but instead some spammers latest scam.
This applies to all search engines gamed by SEO users, not just google.
You also forget, commercial speech is not protected speech under free speech laws. SEO Advertising is NOT free speech, it's an attempt to subvert the normal function of the web for commercial advantage of a particular user. I'm not required to read it, and neither is google required to index it.
What's your next suggestion, mail server admins shouldn't perform any spam filtering as its infringing on the "free speech" rights of the spammers? Free speech means the government won't censor you, not that it won't punish you for illegal speech, and it has nothing to do with commercial speech or the interactions between non-government people and companies.
You seem to think that civil law is like a computer language; think of a clever technical loophole, and you'll get off scot free. Factor in that many or most of them are techno-illiterate, and such technical trickery will just be ignored or misunderstood. Next, the court weighs on the balance of probabilities, and frankly nitpicking detail like only sharing the encrypted version may well be seen as an attempt to subvert the law, and probably put the judge against you. They're not after the 'exact and true to the letter' result, but the 'right' result, within the law. The law is incredibly flexible and malleable to its expert users, they're very open to interpretation.
Copyright infringement is not a criminal offence, it's a civil one. At it's heart, the copyright owner is suing the alleged filesharer for monetary loss, by making available their works without permission. However, by only showing that he 'made available', without any evidence of distribution actually taking place, no harm can be shown. It therefore seems unreasonable, especially given that is how the law is drafted, to order the man to recompense (plus punitive damages) the copyright holder for monetary loss, when no monetary loss can be proven.
There is a third possibility - he wanted to keep the dildo clean...
And did anyone think about what will happen when these planes are specifically hijacked by terrorists in order to fly into a tall building fitted with an anti-air missile system?
We're through the looking glass here people...
You don't think teaching in science classes that 'God/an intelligent being did it' is a violation of the separation of church and state?
God/intelligent design have no place in a science class, in any fashion. Science is by definition the study of the natural. Religion is by definition the worship of the supernatural. ID/creationism have none of the hallmarks of scientific study. They make no predictions, and cannot be disproven which is a requirement of science.
The theory of evolution is as true as the theory of gravity or the carbon cycle. It is testable, it makes predictions, and the current evidence matches the theory. An alternative theory that can explain all the current evidence of evolution, and can make predictions about those areas not yet investigated should probably be taught in science classes. ID is not that theory, and never will be as it is not science. God deserves no place in science classes. He should not even be mentioned, and ID is creationism by God by another name.
There shouldn't be little stars in evolution text books with little notes saying 'some people say that this theory is wrong, and that God did it', any more than there should be that little star by every other single item in a science text book.
The study of natural phenomenons (i.e. evidence, that which is seen) with the theories that explain that evidence using only testable hypothesis. Otherwise, I demand that schools also teach in science classes my theory that things fall down because invisible unicorns jump upon them, imparting momentum...
"It also fits well the model of the sun being a *source* of the solar
wind plasma, which will stretch out the magnetic field as seen. A nice
confirmation of the standard theory. However, if the sun is the focus
of an electrical discharge, then the solar wind should be in-bound
instead of out-bound. Or, more precisely, an electric current should be
in-bound. But such is not the case; protons and electrons both flee the
sun rapidly in all directions, consistent with a thermally driven wind,
and inconsistent with an electrical origin. The field and plasma
observation actually serves to *disprove* the electric star hypothesis,
and to confirm the standard theory."
http://www.tim-thompson.com/grey-areas.html
You try to pretend that astro-physicists ignore the electro- side of electromagnetism. They obviously have a close relationship. Without going into the many other flaws of Electric Universe theory, where are the electrons flowing back towards the sun from this supposed electrical current between the sun and earth?
Actually, the evidence and observations often directly contradict the electric universe theories, and they just ignore the studies they don't like - then claim that standard model astrophysicists are ignoring the electro- side of electromagnetism, as seen upthread.
No true scientist is afraid of being proved wrong, they embrace it and use it to improve their work. Electric Universe proponents rarely provide ways for their theories to be falsified, and when what should be there according to their theories isn't, it's because we're not looking hard enough/in the right places/with the right equipment.
Electric fields disrupt plasma, magnetic fields contain them from observation, plus magnetic fields are much bigger than electrical fields in the sun's corona, plus where is the flow of electrons back towards the sun? Electric Universe proponents have no explanation for where all the energy is coming from that concentrates in the 'pinch areas' of stars. It shares many of the same characteristics as the over-unity (free energy) crowd. Standard model nuclear fusion matches many observations, though there's still some kinks around neutrinos.
I'm no astro-physicist, but of the research I've done into this, the majority of Electric Universe theories are poorly thought out horse pucky that don't match observational data, that try to explain holes in standard theory that aren't there.
http://www.tim-thompson.com/grey-areas.html
"It also fits well the model of the sun being a *source* of the solar
wind plasma, which will stretch out the magnetic field as seen. A nice
confirmation of the standard theory. However, if the sun is the focus
of an electrical discharge, then the solar wind should be in-bound
instead of out-bound. Or, more precisely, an electric current should be
in-bound. But such is not the case; protons and electrons both flee the
sun rapidly in all directions, consistent with a thermally driven wind,
and inconsistent with an electrical origin. The field and plasma
observation actually serves to *disprove* the electric star hypothesis,
and to confirm the standard theory."
Thing is, now you know they have the ability, equipment and willingness to modify your datastream...
Write again when a (non-free) ISP injects ads or blocks competitor's websites.
How would you know whether they are, or not?
The problem is, it destroys trust. You're altering someone else's page in order to insert your own 'advert'. How do I then know, as a customer, that you're not altering or inserting new things in other pages more silently using the same kit? Yes, in *this particular* case it's a pretty innocuous, even useful change. But it opens the door to lot of other possible changes, and the customer has no way of knowing whether they're happening or not.
Perhaps a better way would be to have it as a separate full page the user receives (with a rogers url), with a 'click here to carry on to your original page', but only if using a standard browser (don't want to screw with automated url checkers!). Even that has the possibility to break screen scrapers, or other tools not expecting the source page to change midstream, but at least it's consistent with other ad-supported sites that redirect periodically to a flash ad before letting you carry on.
Give mechanisms on the customer panel for automated alerts, including this one. Make them opt-in, or at least opt-out. If people want knowledge, it's up to them to provide accurate details. Yes, you'll get the numpties who can't read or think beyond the next two minutes who'll ring up and complain when they didn't read or understand what they signed up to, but you'll get them calling you regardless.
The wii is not user-switchable between regions. People who've applied the wrong region wii updates have caused all sorts of problems for themselves, including bricking the wii completely.
It's possible nintendo can reflash them, but the firmware itself is keyed to the hardware, and as far as I'm aware has not been broken. The main attention for playing backups and homebrew has been on fooling the optical drives with modchips, so there's been no 'build your own firmware' mods out there yet.
They originally intended to licence psyche rock for the theme song, but were unable to. In the end, they had Tyng do a tribute version.
Energy in greater than energy out has to be stored. However, what determines energy in and out? Energy in in the food is the same regardless, it's a calorific value. Energy out goes out in waste heat (and other waste), useful work in the muscles and in other chemical reactions in the body, and is stored in various forms including fat.
the rate at which energy is spent on useful work is not a fixed amount. Exercising will increase your energy used for work. Cutting down the amount of energy going in via food will also reduce the difference in in vs out. Yet humans are not simple machines, and they are not controlled by dispassionate observers.
Alcoholism is a disease, not a moral failing. People smoke, knowing full well it will probably kill them, despite their many desperate attempts to quit. Tobacco and alcohol are known addictions, and we've moved on from expecting everyone to resist them with will power alone. Yet obesity is treated as a simple matter of will - eat less, exercise more, and you'll be thin like me - you lazy slob. The body resists. Hunger is a powerful force, if not the most powerful. Metabolisms treat diets like starvation, and adjust their energy spending to be more conservative. Some people can eat half the recommended calorie intake of a healthy adult, and still not lose weight. Those who are dangerously underweight can eat triple the recommended daily amount, under medical supervision with exercise strictly limited, and still not put on weight. Nor is the human mind a simple on/off switch.
Yes, eating more healthily and exercising do help. But as the one and only solution, it's up there with 'just stop drinking; how hard can it be?'
Bad assumption. Source doesn't use directx 10 yet.
From the stats:
http://steamgames.com/status/ep2/ep2_stats.php
72.91% are dx9 sm3
12.17% are dx9 sm2 (i.e. old radeon x800's and the like)
9.36% are dx8.1!
5.38% are dx8
with 0.18% unknown. This doesn't tell us anything about vista takeup, but it does tell us a number of people playing hl2ep2 are doing so with old technology. nvidia 5900's default to 8.1 for example (their dx9 shader performance sucked), and that's a 4 year old card. Native DX 8 cards are even older!
http://www.steampowered.com/status/survey.html
from the hardware survey, directx10 capable (vista with dx10 cards) players make up 7.38% of steam users, while 14.10% overall took the survey on vista.
The only one I've ever had partial success with in the UK is "that means they'll have your children's fingerprints (and DNA in those cases) in the police database for life, alongside the real criminals". Even that doesn't succeed very often. Most people really don't value their personal information or privacy; they know they're innocent, so why should an innocent person ever fear their own government? No matter how many examples of corrupt officials using cctv cameras to look down dresses, or look into the financial affairs of their neighbours, or check on their partner to see if they're cheating, they fundamentally trust 'the system' to only affect the 'bad men'. They know politicians and companies are weaselly to each other; they expect them to pull dirty tricks on their opponents. They don't even see it as bad behaviour any more.
Those that do care are just ignored by the politicians, because we don't have enough of a voice (i.e. money) to matter.