As others have pointed out, the do not call lists work, but there are many exceptions. And politics happens to be one.
I have found simple ways to deal with surveys and political calls.
I really don't mind doing surveys, its just sometimes when they call its very inconvenient. When its not convenient, I have simply asked "I'd be happy to answer your survey, but not right now...could you call me back in an hour or so?" I have never had a survey company not honor my request. They WANT your opinion.
As for political candidates, I merely do this. When they call and identify, I politely state "If you EVER want me to consider your candidate, or any candidate of their party, for any political office, you will never call this number again." And then I hang up. I haven't gotten a political call now in at least 5 years. I will point out also, though, that in my state (Indiana) I have an advantage...it is illegal to use a sequential autodialer for political calls here...all calls must be initially dialed by a human. Our attorney general recently reminded candidates of this.
Even if I were to agree with you, stealing the product is still not a legitimate form of protest. Whether the price is absurd or the company treats users like garbage does not change that.
Go get 5 gallons of gasoline and then drive off from the pump without paying. When the cops show up at your house, tell them "I'm protesting the absurd price of gasoline and the poor treatment of consumers by big oil companies" and see how that affects your situation. The only way it will help you is if the cops are laughing so hard they can't arrest you.
And no, this is not "apples and oranges". Theft is theft, and the only people who try to say otherwise are people doing the stealing. The fact that one product (gasoline) is a physical thing and the other (the software or designs) is intangible is totally irrelevant.
Even though this goes against the principles of Slashdot, I did in fact RTFA. While I don't agree that its a good idea from a PR standpoint to go after grannies, I also don't see anything in the article, or at the organization's web site, that is factually incorrect. They are merely exercising their rights under US law. Don't like it? Then don't buy their product. Don't want to get in trouble? Then besides not buying their product, don't *cough* acquire *cough* their product either.
It works the same way with the RIAA. I think the RIAA sucks. Suing teenagers is usually not a good idea from a PR standpoint. That's why I don't buy their product. I also don't *cough* acquire *cough* their product either. But regardless, most of what the RIAA says (and noticed I didn't say "all of what they say") is in fact correct under US law.
Its also quite obvious in reading most of the replies here, that none of you have ever made or marketed a product that has a very limited pool of customers. Just like most of you have never created music, artwork, or software for sale. If you did, and someone started passing your creation around and cut in to your sales, I bet a lot of you would be changing your responses (and hiring lawyers). If you want to create something and give it away for free, that's your right to do so. But its equally someone else's right to create something and offer it only in exchange for money. You only have two choices in this debate...to pay and use, or to keep your money and not use. You never have the right to steal their product because you don't like their policies or prices.
Instead of trying to impress us with innuendo and Microsoft bashing, the summary would have been a lot more helpful if it were written a different way. Oh, I don't know...like maybe for instance...TELL US WHAT THE FUCK "IRONPYTHON" IS! But then I guess, after all, that is the Slashdot Way. Why waste time on informative content when you can print Microsoft jabs instead.
What it means is that police departments will have to hire people who know what the fuck they're doing, instead of wannabes that just started yesterday and only learned "modern" equipment.
While I will agree that the general public needs to be educated about wi-fi security, at the same time I feel it is *not* the job of government to protect one from one's own stupidity. While there are still people going hungry, uneducated, unclothed, unsheltered, and without proper health care in this country, wi-fi security education should not even be on government radar, much less a priority.
"All of us know that we violated our NDA and ethics policy. Therefore, because we had the character to tell the truth and to face the consequences of our actions, we were terminated,"
How about the lack of character you showed by violating the NDA in the first place. If you had any character (or ethics) you would have obeyed the obligations of the contract you signed.
On your next job application where it asks "Why did you leave your most recent job?", now you can write "I was fired because I was fucking stupid."
As a Dish Network customer for the last 6 years and the owner of one of their DVRs, I'll deal with this when the time comes and move to another option. And I'll make goddamned sure that other option isn't a TiVo or anything they are connected with.
I can't speak for all of Indiana, but I can speak for what I see in Bartholomew County, one of the richer counties in the state. Both of our public high schools have astroturf on their football fields. And both also have libraries that are woefully behind the times, with poor book collections that are held together with tape, and very little money to upgrade anything. If its for athletics, money can be found to do anything, and people will be fighting each other to be the first to donate. If its for academics, it takes a back seat and is ignored.
Using Linux here might appeal from an older equipment standpoint, but computer labs are not a priority here in the first place.
It doesn't even have to be a "black program", the military can announce the project with a full press release and this new license won't have any impact. You'll find that US law is rather broadly written in areas where the military is concerned. If its deamed by The Powers That Be to be in the best interest of national security, most patent and copyright laws do not apply to the military.
All this license does is stir controversy and give lip service. In reality it stops or prevents absolutely nothing.
Besides sales, marketing, IT, etc, there is also the other end of the scale...how many of those employees will volunteer to clean the toilets and empty the trash cans every day. Sooner or later, every "we're all equal" business is going to have trouble with the proverbial (and now politically incorrect way to say it) too many chiefs and not enough indians. Nobody aspires to be a grunt.
have these two states proven anti-spam laws like these -- unlike CAN-SPAM -- really have teeth?"
Folks, we're putting the proverbial cart *way* ahead of the horse here. This law doesn't have teeth until it produces a win in a courtroom. In the US, I can file a suit against anyone reading this message just because I don't like you're hair color...but that doesn't mean I'm going to win that suit.
Whether you all like it or not (and note that I use Firefox myself), Microsoft Internet Explod...um...Explorer is the proverbial tail that wags the dog. In the minds of the great majority of computer users, Microsoft *sets* the standard, not breaks it, and you will not convince them otherwise. You can whine and moan all you want, but I got 5 bucks that says when IE7 rolls out, we start seeing a new round of sites that work *only* in IE7, and when you complain the response will be words to the effect of "get a real browser like everyone else uses".
While this is fun and all that, in reality I don't know of anyone outside of the Slashdot community that would write the year as simply '6'. 99.99 percent of real people are going to write it as either '06' or '2006'.
If you don't want the bossman seeing you're up to something evil, then don't be using the bossman's machine for something you shouldn't be. I have absolutely *NO* sympathy for anyone who does something on the company computer that is against policy or is at best questionable and then gets busted for it. If you want privacy, then use your own home machine.
It always amuses me to see how many people here would object to being told what to do on their own computer that they paid for, but they have no problem telling a company what they should do with a computer the company paid for.
The *only* way that the general computer-buying public (read: not geeks) will massively switch to Apple is if Apple produces something that can compete in price with the $350 machines for sale at Walmart. Until then, the author of this article is living in a dream world.
In a word, horse shit (okay, that's actually two words).
Better design has nothing to do with it. The number one reason why the Mac is currently more secure than Windows is because the Mac is not on the radar of virus and malware authors.
It works the same way as it works with graffiti. A friend has a large garage that is always getting "tagged" with graffiti. I also have a large garage, but it never has a graffiti problem. Why? Because my friend lives in the city, and I live in the middle of nowhere in the country. Graffiti creators are not going to waste time on my garage because *no one will ever see it*.
Let's pretend you are a virus or malware author. You want fame in your circles. Who are you going to concentrate on...the guys with 4 percent of the market, or the guys with 95 percent of the market? Duh!
Its a lot like how unpopular cars are not the ones in the top-ten lists for most stolen vehicles.
Let's see...as of their last quarterly statement (ended March 2006), Microsoft has $33.51 Billion dollars in cash. At the rate of $2.51 million in fines per day, and backdating it to 2004, they should have another 33 years and some before they run out of cash. And that assumes they don't make another single penny profit in sales to add to their cash. It also ignores non-cash holdings.
I'm sure they're really sweating at Microsoft now...
Because if you have WGA do the killing, then what does Microsoft do when it fucks up and kills *legitimate* copies of Windows by mistake. And don't tell me that won't happen. So far since Microsoft started doing their WGA rollout, I've had 4 different systems with totally legitimate and legally purchased (by me) copies of Windows XP where WGA has come up and informed me they were pirated.
Who? SCO? What's a 'SCO'? Oh, wait!!! Yeah, I know!!! I remember now!!!
SCO is that company that was never relavant to the computer industry even in the best of times. And finally after not being able to create or innovate, they decided to litigate. And apparently they aren't even any good at that...
Honest, officer, I was just checking the doors
on
Immunizing the Internet
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
So to use this same idea, y'all have no problem if I discover your back door to your house is unlocked and I come in just to look around and make sure there are no other 'security issues', right? I promise I won't steal or damage anything, I just want to look around...
Sorry, it don't work that way, and just because computers are computers doesn't make it any different. If you want to come in to my computer and inspect, I expect you to ask, just like I would for my house.
When Microsoft is caught sniffing around anyone's computer without permission, even if they don't damage or alter anything, everyone here wants Bill Gates' head on a pike for public display and criminal charges against Microsoft. But if its a white-hat hacker, that's okay, and we should have the law allow them in. Funny how that works.
Slashdot Mirror
As others have pointed out, the do not call lists work, but there are many exceptions. And politics happens to be one.
I have found simple ways to deal with surveys and political calls.
I really don't mind doing surveys, its just sometimes when they call its very inconvenient. When its not convenient, I have simply asked "I'd be happy to answer your survey, but not right now...could you call me back in an hour or so?" I have never had a survey company not honor my request. They WANT your opinion.
As for political candidates, I merely do this. When they call and identify, I politely state "If you EVER want me to consider your candidate, or any candidate of their party, for any political office, you will never call this number again." And then I hang up. I haven't gotten a political call now in at least 5 years. I will point out also, though, that in my state (Indiana) I have an advantage...it is illegal to use a sequential autodialer for political calls here...all calls must be initially dialed by a human. Our attorney general recently reminded candidates of this.
Even if I were to agree with you, stealing the product is still not a legitimate form of protest. Whether the price is absurd or the company treats users like garbage does not change that.
Go get 5 gallons of gasoline and then drive off from the pump without paying. When the cops show up at your house, tell them "I'm protesting the absurd price of gasoline and the poor treatment of consumers by big oil companies" and see how that affects your situation. The only way it will help you is if the cops are laughing so hard they can't arrest you.
And no, this is not "apples and oranges". Theft is theft, and the only people who try to say otherwise are people doing the stealing. The fact that one product (gasoline) is a physical thing and the other (the software or designs) is intangible is totally irrelevant.
Even though this goes against the principles of Slashdot, I did in fact RTFA. While I don't agree that its a good idea from a PR standpoint to go after grannies, I also don't see anything in the article, or at the organization's web site, that is factually incorrect. They are merely exercising their rights under US law. Don't like it? Then don't buy their product. Don't want to get in trouble? Then besides not buying their product, don't *cough* acquire *cough* their product either.
It works the same way with the RIAA. I think the RIAA sucks. Suing teenagers is usually not a good idea from a PR standpoint. That's why I don't buy their product. I also don't *cough* acquire *cough* their product either. But regardless, most of what the RIAA says (and noticed I didn't say "all of what they say") is in fact correct under US law.
Its also quite obvious in reading most of the replies here, that none of you have ever made or marketed a product that has a very limited pool of customers. Just like most of you have never created music, artwork, or software for sale. If you did, and someone started passing your creation around and cut in to your sales, I bet a lot of you would be changing your responses (and hiring lawyers). If you want to create something and give it away for free, that's your right to do so. But its equally someone else's right to create something and offer it only in exchange for money. You only have two choices in this debate...to pay and use, or to keep your money and not use. You never have the right to steal their product because you don't like their policies or prices.
Instead of trying to impress us with innuendo and Microsoft bashing, the summary would have been a lot more helpful if it were written a different way. Oh, I don't know...like maybe for instance...TELL US WHAT THE FUCK "IRONPYTHON" IS! But then I guess, after all, that is the Slashdot Way. Why waste time on informative content when you can print Microsoft jabs instead.
What it means is that police departments will have to hire people who know what the fuck they're doing, instead of wannabes that just started yesterday and only learned "modern" equipment.
While I will agree that the general public needs to be educated about wi-fi security, at the same time I feel it is *not* the job of government to protect one from one's own stupidity. While there are still people going hungry, uneducated, unclothed, unsheltered, and without proper health care in this country, wi-fi security education should not even be on government radar, much less a priority.
"All of us know that we violated our NDA and ethics policy. Therefore, because we had the character to tell the truth and to face the consequences of our actions, we were terminated,"
How about the lack of character you showed by violating the NDA in the first place. If you had any character (or ethics) you would have obeyed the obligations of the contract you signed.
On your next job application where it asks "Why did you leave your most recent job?", now you can write "I was fired because I was fucking stupid."
As a Dish Network customer for the last 6 years and the owner of one of their DVRs, I'll deal with this when the time comes and move to another option. And I'll make goddamned sure that other option isn't a TiVo or anything they are connected with.
If Microsoft really wants to be like Apple, now they need to file a suit against iLounge for leaking the pictures.
I can't speak for all of Indiana, but I can speak for what I see in Bartholomew County, one of the richer counties in the state. Both of our public high schools have astroturf on their football fields. And both also have libraries that are woefully behind the times, with poor book collections that are held together with tape, and very little money to upgrade anything. If its for athletics, money can be found to do anything, and people will be fighting each other to be the first to donate. If its for academics, it takes a back seat and is ignored.
Using Linux here might appeal from an older equipment standpoint, but computer labs are not a priority here in the first place.
It doesn't even have to be a "black program", the military can announce the project with a full press release and this new license won't have any impact. You'll find that US law is rather broadly written in areas where the military is concerned. If its deamed by The Powers That Be to be in the best interest of national security, most patent and copyright laws do not apply to the military.
All this license does is stir controversy and give lip service. In reality it stops or prevents absolutely nothing.
Besides sales, marketing, IT, etc, there is also the other end of the scale...how many of those employees will volunteer to clean the toilets and empty the trash cans every day. Sooner or later, every "we're all equal" business is going to have trouble with the proverbial (and now politically incorrect way to say it) too many chiefs and not enough indians. Nobody aspires to be a grunt.
have these two states proven anti-spam laws like these -- unlike CAN-SPAM -- really have teeth?"
Folks, we're putting the proverbial cart *way* ahead of the horse here. This law doesn't have teeth until it produces a win in a courtroom. In the US, I can file a suit against anyone reading this message just because I don't like you're hair color...but that doesn't mean I'm going to win that suit.
Whether you all like it or not (and note that I use Firefox myself), Microsoft Internet Explod...um...Explorer is the proverbial tail that wags the dog. In the minds of the great majority of computer users, Microsoft *sets* the standard, not breaks it, and you will not convince them otherwise. You can whine and moan all you want, but I got 5 bucks that says when IE7 rolls out, we start seeing a new round of sites that work *only* in IE7, and when you complain the response will be words to the effect of "get a real browser like everyone else uses".
While this is fun and all that, in reality I don't know of anyone outside of the Slashdot community that would write the year as simply '6'. 99.99 percent of real people are going to write it as either '06' or '2006'.
If you don't want the bossman seeing you're up to something evil, then don't be using the bossman's machine for something you shouldn't be. I have absolutely *NO* sympathy for anyone who does something on the company computer that is against policy or is at best questionable and then gets busted for it. If you want privacy, then use your own home machine.
It always amuses me to see how many people here would object to being told what to do on their own computer that they paid for, but they have no problem telling a company what they should do with a computer the company paid for.
The *only* way that the general computer-buying public (read: not geeks) will massively switch to Apple is if Apple produces something that can compete in price with the $350 machines for sale at Walmart. Until then, the author of this article is living in a dream world.
Didn't People PC and a few other companies try this already...and give up on it after it didn't work?
In a word, horse shit (okay, that's actually two words).
Better design has nothing to do with it. The number one reason why the Mac is currently more secure than Windows is because the Mac is not on the radar of virus and malware authors.
It works the same way as it works with graffiti. A friend has a large garage that is always getting "tagged" with graffiti. I also have a large garage, but it never has a graffiti problem. Why? Because my friend lives in the city, and I live in the middle of nowhere in the country. Graffiti creators are not going to waste time on my garage because *no one will ever see it*.
Let's pretend you are a virus or malware author. You want fame in your circles. Who are you going to concentrate on...the guys with 4 percent of the market, or the guys with 95 percent of the market? Duh!
Its a lot like how unpopular cars are not the ones in the top-ten lists for most stolen vehicles.
Let's see...as of their last quarterly statement (ended March 2006), Microsoft has $33.51 Billion dollars in cash. At the rate of $2.51 million in fines per day, and backdating it to 2004, they should have another 33 years and some before they run out of cash. And that assumes they don't make another single penny profit in sales to add to their cash. It also ignores non-cash holdings.
I'm sure they're really sweating at Microsoft now...
Because if you have WGA do the killing, then what does Microsoft do when it fucks up and kills *legitimate* copies of Windows by mistake. And don't tell me that won't happen. So far since Microsoft started doing their WGA rollout, I've had 4 different systems with totally legitimate and legally purchased (by me) copies of Windows XP where WGA has come up and informed me they were pirated.
Who? SCO? What's a 'SCO'? Oh, wait!!! Yeah, I know!!! I remember now!!!
SCO is that company that was never relavant to the computer industry even in the best of times. And finally after not being able to create or innovate, they decided to litigate. And apparently they aren't even any good at that...
So to use this same idea, y'all have no problem if I discover your back door to your house is unlocked and I come in just to look around and make sure there are no other 'security issues', right? I promise I won't steal or damage anything, I just want to look around...
Sorry, it don't work that way, and just because computers are computers doesn't make it any different. If you want to come in to my computer and inspect, I expect you to ask, just like I would for my house.
When Microsoft is caught sniffing around anyone's computer without permission, even if they don't damage or alter anything, everyone here wants Bill Gates' head on a pike for public display and criminal charges against Microsoft. But if its a white-hat hacker, that's okay, and we should have the law allow them in. Funny how that works.
And precisely how do these people expect to get past the front switchboard or the secretary to actually talk to Mr. Powerfull RIAA Person?
Damn...is it April 1st again already?