Internet sales should be taxed the same as mail-order/catalog sales. They are the same thing for all intents and purposes. The only difference is the media of the catalog and order form, one is on paper and the other on your monitor. Why should mom & pop catalog company have their goods taxed while Amazon and Buy.com get a free ride? If mail orders are taxed, then internet orders should be taxed too. If internet sales are not taxed, then mail orders should be freed of the taxation.
You're right. They can't sell their own products, so they are trying to squeeze revenue by collecting royalties on 20 year old patents. "If you can't beat'em, sue 'em"
I think there might end up being "Windows PCs" that will have motherboards that support the Palladium standard and then "other PC's" that won't. When you want to build a box for linux or BSD or whatever else, you'll have to buy the "other" hardware instead of Windows hardware. If there is enough profit in it, somebody will make it.
Lexmark claims that Smartek "mimics the authentication sequence" of Lexmarks printers. That is classic backward engineering by observing the effect and trying to re-create it. If Lexmark succeeds in this, what effect will it have on other backwards engineering efforts? Will Microsoft be able to sue the Samba project because it "mimics the authentication sequence" of NT/Win2000?
Actually, the whole point of the idea is two fold: 1- legally dissuade a company from hiring a H1B by making it more expensive by requiring the extra cost of educating an American. This removes the "cheap labor" incentive for the H1B. And 2- provide a legally mandated incentive for companies to educate workers in the first place without ever actually hiring the H1B. If we manipulate the laws to alter the cost-benefit of H1Bs versus training/educating American workers, companies will fall in line because they are primarily motivited by cutting costs and making profits. Companies will do whatever they need to do to maximize profits and minimize cost in the current legal-economic environment If we change the environment with legislation, thier behavior will change and they will be more willing to pay for education.
In your situation, I think you should contact an attorney to sue you former employer for an un-lawful termination. What they did was clearly illegal. The H1Bs are supposed to only have jobs for which no American can be found. They are not supposed to replace current employees because the law expressly forbids that.
Every company that sponsors an H1B because they can find "qualified Amercians" should be required to sponsor the college education for one American for every H1B they hire. The H1Bs last for 6 years. In 6 years you can get a Bachelors & a Master. You'd have an Amercian with a Masters Degree that you could employ at the end of the 6 year H1B.
The link in my previous post was broke, here is a good one: http://www.itworld.com/Tech/2987/021129china33/
(if you find any broken URLs in this post - just delete the spaces in the URLs - for some reason slashdot is putting spaces in my long URLs)
I will agree with you on one point - censorship is a symptom and not the disease. I think the disease is the Chinese Communist Party.
I'm very sad to see that you have been completely duped into repeating the lies of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). All the "laws" in China are made by the CCP to support the CCP's legal monopoly on power. There are no free multiparty elections in China. The laws are totalitarian and repressive, allowing no independent civil society. For example, Boy Scouts or Campfire Girls are not allowed in the People's Republic. Only youth organizations controlled by the Communist Party are allowed. You talk about religious freedom in China and you mention a large Catholic Church - you must be joking. The oppression of the Catholic Church in China is known throughout the world. There are two catholic churches in China - the real church which reports to the Pope (as does every Catholic Church everywhere) has to hold secret underground services and its clergy members are jailed if they are detected. The other "Patriotic Catholic Church" is completely controlled by the Communist government, which appoints the clergy members and governance of this enslaved puppet church. Do a Google search on China and the Catholic Church and you will see what I mean. (Whoops - that's not allowed in china either - can't allow people to know the truth). There is no religious freedom in China. There is no civil freedom in China. Everything is controlled by the CCP, which is the definition of totalitarianism
Your point about Amnesty International admitting that none of these people was executed is wrong. Well... maybe technically right, because they were tortured to death. I think I'd rather be executed straightaway than tortured to death. The Amnesty International Press Release titled " China: Internet users at risk of arbitrary detention, torture and even execution" can be found at http://web.amnesty.org/ai.nsf/recent/ASA170562002? OpenDocument
You comments on China's prison system are completely off base except for one point. You stated that China rarely executes condemned prisoners, but Amnesty International reports at http://web.amnesty.org/ai.nsf/recent/ASA170542002! Open 'Since the "Strike Hand" anti-crime campaign was launched in April 2001, there has been a dramatic rise in the number of people executed. Amnesty International reported at least 4,015 death sentences and 2,468 executions in China during 2001, with a peak of 2,960 death sentences and 1,781 executions between April and June 2001. The organization believes that the actual figure is much higher, because the Chinese authorities do not reveal the total number of executions carried out, considering such statistics a state secret. ' That's over 50% of death sentences carried out in quick succession.
As far as china's penal system being about reform, you are partially right, the Chinese call it reform through re-education - we call it brain-washing. In addition to common criminals, political and religious prisoners are put into forced labor camps call Laogai until they recant their "counter-revolutionary" ideas. The Laogai system 'serves the one-party dictatorship as the primary instrument for detaining political dissidents and penal criminals. The two major aims of the Laogai are to use all prisoners as a source of cheap labor for the communist regime and to "reform criminals" through hard labor and compulsory political indoctrination.' You can read all about the Chinese forced labor camps at http://www.laogai.org/chinese/aboutus.html.The reform that you speak of consists of the following: 'Once in the Laogai, inmates are forced to confess their "crimes," denounce any anti-Party beliefs and submit to a regimen of reeducation and labor.' Often these "crimes" are religious or political activity. Since its inception after the Communists came to power, an estimated 40-50 million people have been enslaved in this system.
Your denouncement of the United States and equation of it with Communist China is both astoundingly false and malicious (and if you are American, extremely unpatriotic). Like you, I also sometimes disagree with American policy, but I can tell the difference between misguided policy (in the case of the US) and pure evil (in the case of the Chinese Communists). The US bombing campaigns are directed at military targets and any civilian casualties, while regretful and tragic, are few and accidental - and certainly do not number in the "thousands". All of the governments on the receiving end of American bombs are unsavory characters that have done something to deserve it. But the millions of people put into forced labor and re-education camps by China are often guilty of nothing more than wanting to vote in a free election or practice their religion or express their own views.
As far as using economic stability to justify massive political and religious oppression, I just can't find the words to articulate my dismay. Money or profit should not come before human freedom or dignity. The Communist Party should give up its monopoly on power. It should be just one of many parties. If it can't share power and stop its evil repression, then it should fall regardless of the immediate economic turmoil that would cause. Look across the strait to Taiwan. Taiwan was once a one-party state ruled by the Nationalist Party. Now it is a multi-party democracy with a vibrant free-market economy and a standard of living much higher than mainland China. China should be re-united as one - but on the Taiwan model, not on the Communist model.
As far as you not fearing arrest in China, then I would invite you to hold a sign in a public square in China that says "Free Political Prisionors Now!". People do this every day in Washington without fear. But I bet you couldn't do it in Beijing and not run afoul of the People Police.
Apologizing for the communist enslavement of a billion people will do nothing to serve human freedom. This kind of oppressive censorship and police state is not acceptable in any culture or government anywhere in the world. There are certain universal human rights that apply everywhere. Among those rights is the right to conscience (i.e. the right to think and believe what you want). As reported in ITWorld ( http://www.itworld.com/Tech/2987/021129china33/pfi ndex.html ), China is arresting and even torturing to death people for expressing their views on the internet. The same kind of free expression that you and I are now exercising here on slashdot would get you arrested, tried in a kangaroo court, and shot in the head in communist china. Notice that a large portion of the blocked sites are about religion. The right to freely practice religion is a universal right and certainly should not be considered purely an expression of American culture. All humans should have this right. But again, expressing religious views in china can get you jailed or executed. Looking at or posting to the wrong web site in Communist China can get you killed. This is simply intolerable and must be stopped.
Why not punish the evil Chinese communist regime by completely stripping China of all Internet access? The Internet was created by and for the US Government. ICANN (which basically runs the internet by assigning ip addresses and top level domains including the "cn" china domain) is a creation of the US Department of Commerce. Most internet traffic transits US routers in northern Virginia. It would be relatively easy matter for the US Government to render all Chinese IP addresses and the cn domain unusable by rejecting connections at the routers and top-level DNS. The internet should for the free exchange of ideas and not for a distorted, propagandized, and censored view foisted on the people by an evil totalitarian regime. By allowing China to do this, the US is tacitly going along with this censorship and Chinese propaganda. We should tell them it's all or nothing. We should not allow China to use the internet to enrich itself with commerce while keeping their people ignorant and oppressed.
Slashdot Mirror
What was that about mission critical applications?
but they call it "Redhat Database" http://www.redhat.com/software/database/
Internet sales should be taxed the same as mail-order/catalog sales. They are the same thing for all intents and purposes. The only difference is the media of the catalog and order form, one is on paper and the other on your monitor. Why should mom & pop catalog company have their goods taxed while Amazon and Buy.com get a free ride? If mail orders are taxed, then internet orders should be taxed too. If internet sales are not taxed, then mail orders should be freed of the taxation.
You're right. They can't sell their own products, so they are trying to squeeze revenue by collecting royalties on 20 year old patents. "If you can't beat'em, sue 'em"
I think there might end up being "Windows PCs" that will have motherboards that support the Palladium standard and then "other PC's" that won't. When you want to build a box for linux or BSD or whatever else, you'll have to buy the "other" hardware instead of Windows hardware. If there is enough profit in it, somebody will make it.
Lexmark claims that Smartek "mimics the authentication sequence" of Lexmarks printers. That is classic backward engineering by observing the effect and trying to re-create it. If Lexmark succeeds in this, what effect will it have on other backwards engineering efforts? Will Microsoft be able to sue the Samba project because it "mimics the authentication sequence" of NT/Win2000?
Actually, the whole point of the idea is two fold: 1- legally dissuade a company from hiring a H1B by making it more expensive by requiring the extra cost of educating an American. This removes the "cheap labor" incentive for the H1B. And 2- provide a legally mandated incentive for companies to educate workers in the first place without ever actually hiring the H1B. If we manipulate the laws to alter the cost-benefit of H1Bs versus training/educating American workers, companies will fall in line because they are primarily motivited by cutting costs and making profits. Companies will do whatever they need to do to maximize profits and minimize cost in the current legal-economic environment If we change the environment with legislation, thier behavior will change and they will be more willing to pay for education.
In your situation, I think you should contact an attorney to sue you former employer for an un-lawful termination. What they did was clearly illegal. The H1Bs are supposed to only have jobs for which no American can be found. They are not supposed to replace current employees because the law expressly forbids that.
Every company that sponsors an H1B because they can find "qualified Amercians" should be required to sponsor the college education for one American for every H1B they hire. The H1Bs last for 6 years. In 6 years you can get a Bachelors & a Master. You'd have an Amercian with a Masters Degree that you could employ at the end of the 6 year H1B.
So microsoft will have to licence/pay royalties on DRM technologies.... they will just pass the cost onto the end user with a higher price.
The link in my previous post was broke, here is a good one: http://www.itworld.com/Tech/2987/021129china33/
? OpenDocument
! Open 'Since the "Strike Hand" anti-crime campaign was launched in April 2001, there has been a dramatic rise in the number of people executed. Amnesty International reported at least 4,015 death sentences and 2,468 executions in China during 2001, with a peak of 2,960 death sentences and 1,781 executions between April and June 2001. The organization believes that the actual figure is much higher, because the Chinese authorities do not reveal the total number of executions carried out, considering such statistics a state secret. ' That's over 50% of death sentences carried out in quick succession.
.The reform that you speak of consists of the following: 'Once in the Laogai, inmates are forced to confess their "crimes," denounce any anti-Party beliefs and submit to a regimen of reeducation and labor.' Often these "crimes" are religious or political activity. Since its inception after the Communists came to power, an estimated 40-50 million people have been enslaved in this system.
(if you find any broken URLs in this post - just delete the spaces in the URLs - for some reason slashdot is putting spaces in my long URLs)
I will agree with you on one point - censorship is a symptom and not the disease. I think the disease is the Chinese Communist Party.
I'm very sad to see that you have been completely duped into repeating the lies of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). All the "laws" in China are made by the CCP to support the CCP's legal monopoly on power. There are no free multiparty elections in China. The laws are totalitarian and repressive, allowing no independent civil society. For example, Boy Scouts or Campfire Girls are not allowed in the People's Republic. Only youth organizations controlled by the Communist Party are allowed. You talk about religious freedom in China and you mention a large Catholic Church - you must be joking. The oppression of the Catholic Church in China is known throughout the world. There are two catholic churches in China - the real church which reports to the Pope (as does every Catholic Church everywhere) has to hold secret underground services and its clergy members are jailed if they are detected. The other "Patriotic Catholic Church" is completely controlled by the Communist government, which appoints the clergy members and governance of this enslaved puppet church. Do a Google search on China and the Catholic Church and you will see what I mean. (Whoops - that's not allowed in china either - can't allow people to know the truth). There is no religious freedom in China. There is no civil freedom in China. Everything is controlled by the CCP, which is the definition of totalitarianism
Your point about Amnesty International admitting that none of these people was executed is wrong. Well... maybe technically right, because they were tortured to death. I think I'd rather be executed straightaway than tortured to death. The Amnesty International Press Release titled " China: Internet users at risk of arbitrary detention, torture and even execution" can be found at http://web.amnesty.org/ai.nsf/recent/ASA170562002
You comments on China's prison system are completely off base except for one point. You stated that China rarely executes condemned prisoners, but Amnesty International reports at http://web.amnesty.org/ai.nsf/recent/ASA170542002
As far as china's penal system being about reform, you are partially right, the Chinese call it reform through re-education - we call it brain-washing. In addition to common criminals, political and religious prisoners are put into forced labor camps call Laogai until they recant their "counter-revolutionary" ideas. The Laogai system 'serves the one-party dictatorship as the primary instrument for detaining political dissidents and penal criminals. The two major aims of the Laogai are to use all prisoners as a source of cheap labor for the communist regime and to "reform criminals" through hard labor and compulsory political indoctrination.' You can read all about the Chinese forced labor camps at http://www.laogai.org/chinese/aboutus.html
Your denouncement of the United States and equation of it with Communist China is both astoundingly false and malicious (and if you are American, extremely unpatriotic). Like you, I also sometimes disagree with American policy, but I can tell the difference between misguided policy (in the case of the US) and pure evil (in the case of the Chinese Communists). The US bombing campaigns are directed at military targets and any civilian casualties, while regretful and tragic, are few and accidental - and certainly do not number in the "thousands". All of the governments on the receiving end of American bombs are unsavory characters that have done something to deserve it. But the millions of people put into forced labor and re-education camps by China are often guilty of nothing more than wanting to vote in a free election or practice their religion or express their own views.
As far as using economic stability to justify massive political and religious oppression, I just can't find the words to articulate my dismay. Money or profit should not come before human freedom or dignity. The Communist Party should give up its monopoly on power. It should be just one of many parties. If it can't share power and stop its evil repression, then it should fall regardless of the immediate economic turmoil that would cause. Look across the strait to Taiwan. Taiwan was once a one-party state ruled by the Nationalist Party. Now it is a multi-party democracy with a vibrant free-market economy and a standard of living much higher than mainland China. China should be re-united as one - but on the Taiwan model, not on the Communist model.
As far as you not fearing arrest in China, then I would invite you to hold a sign in a public square in China that says "Free Political Prisionors Now!". People do this every day in Washington without fear. But I bet you couldn't do it in Beijing and not run afoul of the People Police.
Apologizing for the communist enslavement of a billion people will do nothing to serve human freedom. This kind of oppressive censorship and police state is not acceptable in any culture or government anywhere in the world. There are certain universal human rights that apply everywhere. Among those rights is the right to conscience (i.e. the right to think and believe what you want). As reported in ITWorld ( http://www.itworld.com/Tech/2987/021129china33/pfi ndex.html ), China is arresting and even torturing to death people for expressing their views on the internet. The same kind of free expression that you and I are now exercising here on slashdot would get you arrested, tried in a kangaroo court, and shot in the head in communist china. Notice that a large portion of the blocked sites are about religion. The right to freely practice religion is a universal right and certainly should not be considered purely an expression of American culture. All humans should have this right. But again, expressing religious views in china can get you jailed or executed. Looking at or posting to the wrong web site in Communist China can get you killed. This is simply intolerable and must be stopped.
Why not punish the evil Chinese communist regime by completely stripping China of all Internet access? The Internet was created by and for the US Government. ICANN (which basically runs the internet by assigning ip addresses and top level domains including the "cn" china domain) is a creation of the US Department of Commerce. Most internet traffic transits US routers in northern Virginia. It would be relatively easy matter for the US Government to render all Chinese IP addresses and the cn domain unusable by rejecting connections at the routers and top-level DNS. The internet should for the free exchange of ideas and not for a distorted, propagandized, and censored view foisted on the people by an evil totalitarian regime. By allowing China to do this, the US is tacitly going along with this censorship and Chinese propaganda. We should tell them it's all or nothing. We should not allow China to use the internet to enrich itself with commerce while keeping their people ignorant and oppressed.