This is exactly the reason that platforms like OSX and Windows are so secure, and linux is so riddled with viruses. Can you imagine the problems we would be facing if people actually had access to review and update those operating systems?
How many lives have been lost as the result of Journalism?
Every major U.S. media player has published the name of at least one active CIA agent. Names of key witnesses have been published. We have media pundits calling for assassinations on a regular basis. Political commentators regularly and knowingly lie to the american public, and those lies have cost lives.
The difference here is that although WikiLeaks has received numerous awards, and has been internationally recognized for their journalistic efforts, is that it is not a mainstream media entity, and it has information that people with a lot of political weight do not want published.
It's been years, and I'm still upset about the way they treated me as a long-term customer.
AT&T has done things for me above and beyond what sprint ever would have done.
1) You chose a plan below your activity. We'll go ahead and backdate a plan upgrade for you because that'll be cheaper. If your calling habits change, you can downgrade at any time.
2) My phone was stolen, they activated GPS tracking on it immediately and gave me the location for law enforcement.
3) Provided me with a discount on a new phone prior to my contract expiring.
4) Never lied to me.
5) Never made me wait for hours on end on customer service calls to resolve a billing problem.
6) Never actually had a billing problem.
7) Always answered the phone with a US based service representative who actually had the power and desire to resolve my problems.
Price, frankly, doesn't mean much to me. Customer service does. I'm glad you're having a good experience with Sprint - more power to you. They've done enough damage that I will never consider them as a carrier again.
Bay area being what it is (I don't go there much), I do travel extensively. The only area AT&T ever gave me problems was in a small area near the New Hampshire border in Massachusetts.
I'm not much of a bandwidth user - just email and google maps. Google maps isn't what I'd hope often enough, but meh - it's a phone.
Still - my coverage would have to take a major drop from what I currently experience to put myself through the horror of offshore call centers and subpar customer service.
I guess if I didn't have such a bad experience with Sprint for a decade I wouldn't be so impressed with the change AT&T provided me with.
I'm sure dissatisfaction has a lot to do with the iPhone antenna issue. I'll tell you - I switched from Sprint when I bought an iPhone and I've never been happier. U.S. based call centers. You don't have to wait 30 minutes to talk to a person. And the service just works. You couldn't pay me any amount of money to go back to Sprint.
With Sprint, they double-billed me, tried to blackmail me from leaving by stating that I agreed to a new contract when I did not, and they made me spend countless hours on the phone when I ever had a problem.
I have been happy with my Verizon broadband, but I'd be hard pressed to move away from AT&T based on the fact that I always get an american on the phone and it always happens quickly.
Unfortunately, the message for TSA security measures are simple: "Terrorists Bad, Must Stop Them"
The message against TSA security is more difficult to understand: "4th amendment violations are not the appropriate response."
Gaining a national mindset on a complex subject requires simplicity. If you look at abortion, the choices for a view are simple "Pro-Choice" or "Pro-Life". I think the views on TSA security should be equally simple.
You are "Pro-Security" or "Pro-Liberty"
It should also be clear to everyone out there that without the "Pro-Security" propoganda, terrorism has zero effectiveness.
But it's pretty much a moot point anyways - if the terrorists acted because they hate us for our freedom, then they probably don't hate us anymore anyways.
This isn't "small independent development". This is leveraging somebody else's hard work for your own profit. Hopefully you are in bigger trouble than a DMCA notice.
Be prepared to give back all of the money you earned and to throw in some additional funds as well. And go find a new line of work. You're giving the rest of us a bad name.
The fact that the U.S. killed civilians and tortured people wasn't a revelation. Sad that it's not what I would consider interesting, but these things were widely documented pre-leak, and frankly are things that should be expected in time of war, given history.
The fact that the US demanded the documents be deleted or returned isn't interesting. Again, this should be expected.
If these are the kinds of revelations that WikiLeaks is going to give us, then I would expect that 99% of the populace will simply ignore them.
I still don't understand why anyone would post info to WikiLeaks if they were whistleblowing. You can post information anywhere, let people know about it via any of a number of means and it will garner more attention and be more widely distributed. WikiLeaks will apparently hold information indefinitely, gain the immediate attention of those wishing to suppress the information, and generate little traffic from people that would or should be interested.
They might even try to leverage your "whistle" for other means. (If not, then why hold onto information at all?)
I can't recall anything interesting coming out of the last release. I don't follow this closely at all, but I would think if there was anything really interesting it would have been picked up by enough mainstream media outlets that it would have been difficult to avoid.
So I suppose they could say that they are releasing 100 or 1000 times the amount of interesting information this time because any number multiplied by zero is...
I'm an avid web developer and an early adopter techie. I couldn't pay attention past the first sentence of the slashdot summary, let alone be bothered to figure out what way facebook has figured out how to rob my grandma of her privacy next.
Honestly, it just sounds like whoop-dee-fucking-doo bells and whistles on top of status updates.
Here's some advice Zuckerberg. When you can summarize it in a sentence, people will pay attention.
Then again, what do I know. I never would have guessed you could build a hundred million dollar company by enabling people to tell their friends where they eat dinner and how well they are doing at bejeweled.
I think the bigger question is: does anybody care? Judging from the Farmville, Mafia Wars, etc. posts, you'd think that 150 users would have pushed facebook over the edge two years ago.
Both are still plenty vulnerable (google less so, but still) to an upstart with marketing money and a decent business plan.
Regardless, people who spend all day on either site aren't the people that make them money. Well except for offshore ones who are getting paid a dollar an hour to click on ads.
I'm being purely hypothetical, but let's work out a word problem.
So let's assume that there's some DNA in question, and that dna according to all 10 other calculations (assumed accurate) has a unique match number of 1 in 100,000.
Nobody ever asked if the defendant has a twin. (Again, assuming that an identical twin would have matching DNA which I don't actually know for certain).
Let's assume for simple math that in the real world twins occur 1/100 times.
Is the statistical uniqueness now 1/1000, 1/2, 1/50,000, or 1/100,000 or some other number.
"I would have done it diffferently" does not mean that the format is bad. None of these "flaws" render the format unusable. Maybe it doesn't perform as well as another format, maybe it isn't designed the way you would like, but it's implemented, it's available, and it's in use.
Actually, Apple stole the tech from Xerox, then licensed the tech to HP and Microsoft.
Xerox sued, but this was way back when. I don't think there was even a concept of a software patent when the Star system was developed. They originally tried to sue for copyright infringement, but the timing of the suit caused problems. They then tried to sue for unfair business practices. IIRC, they eventually settled out of court.
The policy exists because multiple people actually have to lift the luggage on it's way to and from the airplane. They lift literally hundreds of bags each day, and lifting extraordinarily heavy bags without notice could cause an injury. The fee isn't to generate revenue, it's a deterrent in the best interest of the baggage handlers, and to offset the cost of handling a small number of bags in a different way than most other luggage. Every U.S. airline has a similar policy, usually at 50 pounds.
So - in a trial limited to "the issue of the appropriate amount of statutory damages", what really is discussed during the trial?
The RIAA has consistently been working the angle of statutory damages and avoiding the question of actual damages.
Are they going to have to argue actual damages moving forward?
It sounds like the trial would be a trial of the RIAA this time around, and not so much on Jammie Thomas.
It would seem that they would be limited too, in the discussion of the damages by the tracks she was determined to have infringed on copyrights, and in the damages suffered by the plaintiff's individually, not on the industry as a whole.
It would be a welcome discussion to hear: 1) How many copies of these particular recordings were found to have existed? 2) How many downloads of these particular recordings were estimated to have occurred? 3) How much money did each of these tracks earn in the year prior to the copyright infringement? 4) How much money did each of these tracks earn the year's during and after the copyright infringement?
The problem with that logic is that they already have in front of them one of the worst offenders they are likely to sue. As part of this trial, they insisted that she pirated thousands of songs, that she lied on the stand, and that she destroyed evidence.
The judge as part of his ruling, went with the ~$2500 number, in part, because she lied. Someone who does not lie, should therefore have a lesser fine.
When you start looking at bringing similar suits to trial, if your target collection # is $20K, you are much less intimidating than if your target collection number is $2M. Ms. Thomas really is in a position to say "I'll settle - give me $50K and I'll sign a non-disclosure." The only other real option for the RIAA is to take it to trial again. Granted, they are 2 for 2 with big verdicts, but the circumstances have changed and it's still a gamble.
I recently went to cancel DirecTV service - which I've had for more than a decade, only to find out they tacked on a $400 early termination fee. This had nothing to do with an agreement that I signed or ever verbally agreed to. It's just a tactic that they used to try to prevent me from leaving. The problem is that they can add on these fees and demand payment and in absence of payment, they'll affect your credit. My only solution is to go to small claims, which will cost me $75 + time and energy. Most people wouldn't go through all that and either stay or pay the fee and forget about it.
Slashdot Mirror
This is exactly the reason that platforms like OSX and Windows are so secure, and linux is so riddled with viruses. Can you imagine the problems we would be facing if people actually had access to review and update those operating systems?
You just highlighted the unspoken truth about juries - you're about to be judged by 12 people not smart enough to get out of jury duty.
How many lives have been lost as the result of Journalism?
Every major U.S. media player has published the name of at least one active CIA agent. Names of key witnesses have been published. We have media pundits calling for assassinations on a regular basis. Political commentators regularly and knowingly lie to the american public, and those lies have cost lives.
The difference here is that although WikiLeaks has received numerous awards, and has been internationally recognized for their journalistic efforts, is that it is not a mainstream media entity, and it has information that people with a lot of political weight do not want published.
It's been years, and I'm still upset about the way they treated me as a long-term customer.
AT&T has done things for me above and beyond what sprint ever would have done.
1) You chose a plan below your activity. We'll go ahead and backdate a plan upgrade for you because that'll be cheaper. If your calling habits change, you can downgrade at any time.
2) My phone was stolen, they activated GPS tracking on it immediately and gave me the location for law enforcement.
3) Provided me with a discount on a new phone prior to my contract expiring.
4) Never lied to me.
5) Never made me wait for hours on end on customer service calls to resolve a billing problem.
6) Never actually had a billing problem.
7) Always answered the phone with a US based service representative who actually had the power and desire to resolve my problems.
Price, frankly, doesn't mean much to me. Customer service does. I'm glad you're having a good experience with Sprint - more power to you. They've done enough damage that I will never consider them as a carrier again.
Bay area being what it is (I don't go there much), I do travel extensively. The only area AT&T ever gave me problems was in a small area near the New Hampshire border in Massachusetts.
I'm not much of a bandwidth user - just email and google maps. Google maps isn't what I'd hope often enough, but meh - it's a phone.
Still - my coverage would have to take a major drop from what I currently experience to put myself through the horror of offshore call centers and subpar customer service.
I guess if I didn't have such a bad experience with Sprint for a decade I wouldn't be so impressed with the change AT&T provided me with.
I'm sure dissatisfaction has a lot to do with the iPhone antenna issue. I'll tell you - I switched from Sprint when I bought an iPhone and I've never been happier. U.S. based call centers. You don't have to wait 30 minutes to talk to a person. And the service just works. You couldn't pay me any amount of money to go back to Sprint.
With Sprint, they double-billed me, tried to blackmail me from leaving by stating that I agreed to a new contract when I did not, and they made me spend countless hours on the phone when I ever had a problem.
I have been happy with my Verizon broadband, but I'd be hard pressed to move away from AT&T based on the fact that I always get an american on the phone and it always happens quickly.
Unfortunately, the message for TSA security measures are simple: "Terrorists Bad, Must Stop Them"
The message against TSA security is more difficult to understand: "4th amendment violations are not the appropriate response."
Gaining a national mindset on a complex subject requires simplicity. If you look at abortion, the choices for a view are simple "Pro-Choice" or "Pro-Life". I think the views on TSA security should be equally simple.
You are "Pro-Security" or "Pro-Liberty"
It should also be clear to everyone out there that without the "Pro-Security" propoganda, terrorism has zero effectiveness.
But it's pretty much a moot point anyways - if the terrorists acted because they hate us for our freedom, then they probably don't hate us anymore anyways.
This isn't "small independent development". This is leveraging somebody else's hard work for your own profit. Hopefully you are in bigger trouble than a DMCA notice.
Be prepared to give back all of the money you earned and to throw in some additional funds as well. And go find a new line of work. You're giving the rest of us a bad name.
Responding to all who responded to this thread...
The fact that the U.S. killed civilians and tortured people wasn't a revelation. Sad that it's not what I would consider interesting, but these things were widely documented pre-leak, and frankly are things that should be expected in time of war, given history.
The fact that the US demanded the documents be deleted or returned isn't interesting. Again, this should be expected.
If these are the kinds of revelations that WikiLeaks is going to give us, then I would expect that 99% of the populace will simply ignore them.
I still don't understand why anyone would post info to WikiLeaks if they were whistleblowing. You can post information anywhere, let people know about it via any of a number of means and it will garner more attention and be more widely distributed. WikiLeaks will apparently hold information indefinitely, gain the immediate attention of those wishing to suppress the information, and generate little traffic from people that would or should be interested.
They might even try to leverage your "whistle" for other means. (If not, then why hold onto information at all?)
I can't recall anything interesting coming out of the last release. I don't follow this closely at all, but I would think if there was anything really interesting it would have been picked up by enough mainstream media outlets that it would have been difficult to avoid.
So I suppose they could say that they are releasing 100 or 1000 times the amount of interesting information this time because any number multiplied by zero is...
I'm an avid web developer and an early adopter techie. I couldn't pay attention past the first sentence of the slashdot summary, let alone be bothered to figure out what way facebook has figured out how to rob my grandma of her privacy next.
Honestly, it just sounds like whoop-dee-fucking-doo bells and whistles on top of status updates.
Here's some advice Zuckerberg. When you can summarize it in a sentence, people will pay attention.
Then again, what do I know. I never would have guessed you could build a hundred million dollar company by enabling people to tell their friends where they eat dinner and how well they are doing at bejeweled.
Are there seriously slashdotters who don't know what akamai is? What is this world coming to?
I think the bigger question is: does anybody care? Judging from the Farmville, Mafia Wars, etc. posts, you'd think that 150 users would have pushed facebook over the edge two years ago.
Both are still plenty vulnerable (google less so, but still) to an upstart with marketing money and a decent business plan.
Regardless, people who spend all day on either site aren't the people that make them money. Well except for offshore ones who are getting paid a dollar an hour to click on ads.
Would it be a bad idea to have a more critical review of what we classify and a periodic review of releasing such information?
It's not impossible. It would be hard, but wholesale release of everything is simply not acceptable.
You do realize that process is already in place, don't you? (here in the U.S.)
It's years behind, with very little staff, no oversight, and a pretty bad track record.
I'm not a big fan of these sounds, but I like the idea.
Merge Sort - traffic sound
Bubble Sort - blowing bubble sound from bubble bobble
Insert Sort - coin slot
Select sort - crain game sounds
Gnome Sort - 7 dwarfs singing Hi-Ho, Hi-Ho
At least that way you can associate sounds with different algorithm types and remember what they are.
I'm being purely hypothetical, but let's work out a word problem.
So let's assume that there's some DNA in question, and that dna according to all 10 other calculations (assumed accurate) has a unique match number of 1 in 100,000.
Nobody ever asked if the defendant has a twin. (Again, assuming that an identical twin would have matching DNA which I don't actually know for certain).
Let's assume for simple math that in the real world twins occur 1/100 times.
Is the statistical uniqueness now 1/1000, 1/2, 1/50,000, or 1/100,000 or some other number.
This whole conversation is stupid.
"I would have done it diffferently" does not mean that the format is bad. None of these "flaws" render the format unusable. Maybe it doesn't perform as well as another format, maybe it isn't designed the way you would like, but it's implemented, it's available, and it's in use.
Actually, Apple stole the tech from Xerox, then licensed the tech to HP and Microsoft.
Xerox sued, but this was way back when. I don't think there was even a concept of a software patent when the Star system was developed. They originally tried to sue for copyright infringement, but the timing of the suit caused problems. They then tried to sue for unfair business practices. IIRC, they eventually settled out of court.
Actually - he states $.70 per song, and the only evidence there is of the pricing is in Starr v. Sony BMG and that was referenced in the brief.
The policy exists because multiple people actually have to lift the luggage on it's way to and from the airplane. They lift literally hundreds of bags each day, and lifting extraordinarily heavy bags without notice could cause an injury. The fee isn't to generate revenue, it's a deterrent in the best interest of the baggage handlers, and to offset the cost of handling a small number of bags in a different way than most other luggage. Every U.S. airline has a similar policy, usually at 50 pounds.
So - in a trial limited to "the issue of the appropriate amount of statutory damages", what really is discussed during the trial?
The RIAA has consistently been working the angle of statutory damages and avoiding the question of actual damages.
Are they going to have to argue actual damages moving forward?
It sounds like the trial would be a trial of the RIAA this time around, and not so much on Jammie Thomas.
It would seem that they would be limited too, in the discussion of the damages by the tracks she was determined to have infringed on copyrights, and in the damages suffered by the plaintiff's individually, not on the industry as a whole.
It would be a welcome discussion to hear:
1) How many copies of these particular recordings were found to have existed?
2) How many downloads of these particular recordings were estimated to have occurred?
3) How much money did each of these tracks earn in the year prior to the copyright infringement?
4) How much money did each of these tracks earn the year's during and after the copyright infringement?
The problem with that logic is that they already have in front of them one of the worst offenders they are likely to sue. As part of this trial, they insisted that she pirated thousands of songs, that she lied on the stand, and that she destroyed evidence.
The judge as part of his ruling, went with the ~$2500 number, in part, because she lied. Someone who does not lie, should therefore have a lesser fine.
When you start looking at bringing similar suits to trial, if your target collection # is $20K, you are much less intimidating than if your target collection number is $2M. Ms. Thomas really is in a position to say "I'll settle - give me $50K and I'll sign a non-disclosure." The only other real option for the RIAA is to take it to trial again. Granted, they are 2 for 2 with big verdicts, but the circumstances have changed and it's still a gamble.
I recently went to cancel DirecTV service - which I've had for more than a decade, only to find out they tacked on a $400 early termination fee. This had nothing to do with an agreement that I signed or ever verbally agreed to. It's just a tactic that they used to try to prevent me from leaving. The problem is that they can add on these fees and demand payment and in absence of payment, they'll affect your credit. My only solution is to go to small claims, which will cost me $75 + time and energy. Most people wouldn't go through all that and either stay or pay the fee and forget about it.
Who in their right mind would actually buy a 3D tv that required you to wear glasses while viewing. That's absurd.