The truth is that the most fundimental right is the right to know what your rights are. America's rights are codified in the Constitution, but they are not respected. The enforcement of, for example, right to trial, has now become arbitrary.
To me, a government exists as a social contract - and I'd rather deal with a government that acknowledges fewer rights but keeps it's word about the ones it respects. That's not what's happening in America.
I understand that by moving to New Zealand, I will lose the right to vote (until I earn citizenship, which is not an undue requirement. I waited 18 years to vote in America, I can wait 3 to vote in New Zealand.) New Zealand actually has a greater respect for free speech than America does - check Reporters without Borders if you want the skinny on that. I mean, "Free Speech Zones?" That's not the America I know.
As for the right to bear arms - the problem with the right to bear arms is that those who bear arms then have a responsibility to monitor the government, and when it encroaches, attempt to change it - hopefully through non-violent means.
Specifically, the NRA, despite being one of the most powerful lobbying groups in America, has done nothing to try to preserve and protect the other 9 amendments in the Bill of Rights. Indeed, by supporting Republicans, the NRA is undercutting the "other 9 amendments that the 2nd is supposed to protect." If you're not going to fight for your rights when doing so is a bloodless, painless excersise, then why would I believe you to fight for them when it means risking your neck and your family's neck?
The truth is, in order for the 2nd amendment to preserve freedom, it needs not just an armed populace but an educated and motivated one. We don't have that in America.
The truth is - and we see this around the world - that a motivated and educated populace is MORE likely to overthrow a corrupt government than an armed one. Look at the Ukraine. Look at Lebanon. These were not victories won by gunpoint - these were victories won standing up to a gunpoint.
The problem is, in America, if you oppose the government, you're in the minority. Most Americans really do want a government that they feel protects the safety and social mores of the majority at the expense of minority rights. Fascism, to them, works, just so long as it's *their* fascist in power.
And that won't go away anytime soon - Jeb Bush will be the next President of the United States because the Republican primaries and the national elections will be held on black-box voting machines. I really don't think, in America, we have the right to vote - and that's the one fundimental right in a democracy.
If there was hope for things to get better - one, tiny, little shred of hope that things were going to improve - I would not be going. There is no hope and the difference between those who stay and fight and those who leave is that the latter have realized this.
First, the RIAA really has no interest in guilt or innocence. Under the methods they are using to "detect" copyright infringement, they are netting a good number of false positives, including people whose computers were hacked or hijacked, people who shared a computer or an internet connection, people not technically savvy enough to encrypt their WiFi... the list goes on. The problem is, guilty or innocent, the cost of a lawsuit against the RIAA is prohibitive - you can't afford to fight against a phalanx of lawyers and in a civil case you don't have one provided for you. At $3000 to $5000 a pop, it's cheaper to settle than it is to pay for a lawyer - even if you fight, there's no guarantee that you'll win, and with infringement penalties that can reach into the billions or trillions of dollars, it's really best not to fight even if you are innocent. There's a term for this - barratry - and it's illegal, but under our current administration (and to be fair, probably under Clinton or a hypothetical Kerry administration too) it wouldn't be enforced.
This is a single case where the person is clearly guilty and wishes to rectify it. We can't assume that Apple gave him a slap on the wrist, but that seems likely. (Note that by not disclosing the sum, they've got the best of both worlds - it COULD be alot, putting the fear of getting caught into other would-be leakers - or it COULD be a little, making Apple seem like a "not so evil" company.) In any case, this is not a false-positive case based on barratry.
Another thing about the RIAA is that they pretty much got the law they wanted by buying Congressmen. Not very endearing - you can't even say "Well, the law's the law" because the RIAA literally wrote the law. Combine this with the fact that the RIAA is a monopoly trust (while Apple is a large computer manufacturer with #3 marketshare,) and you're more likely to cut Apple some slack. The RIAA has sued thousands - Apple, so far, has sued 1 guy for pre-leaking a program and another guy for leaking upcoming product information (but subpoenaing three journalists, which makes them the bad guy in that case, but that's another story.)
First off, Christian rock sucks. Manson, from time to time, rocks. (Christ is okay but he's so unlike Christians.) That may be a part of your declining sales.
Secondly, fewer and fewer customers are entering your store to buy CDs because the costs of CDs have gone up during an economic downturn where OTHER electronic media are becoming cheaper and cheaper. Mass-market DVDs cost the same price as mass-market CDs - how is the price point not broken on this? You are losing money because you are paying too much wholesale for music, and because of that, you have to put your retail price points up way too high for people to buy them. This would be happening even without peer-to-peer.
Guess what, though. Peer-to-peer was helping you out, even if you didn't know it. From 1998-1999, didn't you have a great year? That was Napster. People were "trying before they buy" with Napster and becoming more informed consumers. They were also exposed to new artists and new music that isn't played on the radio, and went out and bought it.
But then the RIAA shut down Napster and started suing students - right when your business took a downturn, I'm guessing. Personally, I stopped buying RIAA CDs (which, let me guess, are just about all your store stocks.) I still buy music, but I buy it from places like www.cdbaby.com - indie music only. (And not Indie the style, but indie the business model.) Locally, I buy from places that stock local artists and local music - Encore and Waterloo in Austin.
Anyway... your plan to stop piracy is to prevent people who download music from buying music legitimately. Which means that instead of going with piracy as a model of "try before you buy," you're going to force them to go either to your competitors or to the Internet. Now, can you tell me why this won't work?
You may have felt morally justified in kicking out that "pirate," but the guy was just about to make a sale when you kicked him out. Not to mention the future purchases the kid would have made. Not to mention the kid's friends' who have now heard this story and have considered you - rightfully - an asshole and will not shop from you.
Finally, don't give me a sob story about your goddamn kids. You started a store based on one type of product from an industry dominated by a monopoly trust supplier. The monopoly trust is now screwing you over and screwing itself over. You didn't think to diversify your selection with DVDs, or with video games, or t-shirts or something so that you didn't have more than music to sell. Well, whoop de doo, I wonder why your kids have to have ragged haircuts. Maybe it's because your business model is horribly flawed.
From the "Christian Rock" to the "War on Drugs fought with skill" (ha) comments, to the way that you treat your customers, I'm willing to bet you voted for the Republicans last election cycle. If that's the case, I extend no pity when you try to declare bankruptcy and find out that you can't. I love small businesses but only when they treat people like customers rather than consumers - something you've long since forgotten.
The strange thing about iTMS is that eventually, there will be a tipping point where so many people are used to buying with iTMS that they won't care that the major labels have left.
After all, the absolute worst thing, from the RIAA's point of view, to happen is for them to threaten to leave and Apple to say: "Well, sure was nice having you, but we think we can handle it ourselves from here on in."
I don't think Apple likes it's relationship with the record labels. It's running iTMS at a loss because the RIAA companies make most of the profit - and it's all profit - and the DRM has got to be the most expensive part of the game. The RIAA continually pressures for price increases and really does not have a vested interest in keeping legal downloads going.
I think Apple would *like* to offer a DRM-free service - but can't do it with the RIAA labels. Right now Apple has to comply because they're in the less advantageous position. If that ever tips, there's no reason why Apple *needs* the RIAA.
Quote:"This obviously doesn't apply to having one'spicture taken and being fingerprinted as that happens to everybody who get arrested, felon or not. How is DNA any different?"
You can't use an inked fingerprint to plant fingerprints at the scene of the crime.
I'm sorry, but that's just plain wrong. If you call up an airline, you're most likely talking with a prisoner. The Prison-Industrial complex in America is real and growing.
I'm assuming you are not a United States citizen based on your choice of words here. Civics 101: laws are drafted and then passed around the Senate and the House of Representatives. Only after both groups have approved the bill does it get sent to the President to be signed into law. This means that the PATRIOT act did not pass due to GWB. The PATRIOT act passed because a majority in the House and Senate thought it was a good idea, and the President agreed.
It would seem that I understand my freedoms and democracy better than you. Oh, and I voted for Bush, too. I guess I shouldn't exist according to your logic.
The problem is that the world doesn't work according to Civics 101, sad but true. Had you studied Civics 201, Advanced Civics or, "How things actually work," you would have learned that while laws are proposed by representatives and voted on, the Executive branch since the 1940s has wielded immense unofficial but nonetheless real authority in legislation.
In the case of the Patriot Act, the Executive branch actually *wrote* the darn thing, and it was passed to sympathetic members of Congress to propose. One of the reasons that it passed was because the vote for the Patriot Act occured before most congressmen and senators had even read the law.
So while it's entirely true that the law passed because the majority in the House and Senate approved it, in many ways, particularly with the passage of the Patriot Act, Congress merely acted as a rubber stamp.
Perhaps if you did more reading on what actually happened, rather than what should have happened, you'll understand why alot of people are pissed off that what should have happened didn't.
A green laser beam is quite visible, and is very useful for sky-pointing for astronomers.
So is aircraft at night. They tend to have blinking lights to inform air traffic control that they're in the air.
I can understand that pointing at stars with a green light is a "non infringing use," but this is not a Sony Vs. Betamax issue. What's getting punished here is the *act* of trying to blind aircraft to make them crash. You'd have to be really stupid to shine a lazer at a plane by "accident." Even if you did, stop using the lazer pointer, pay attention to the paper to see if it's being investigated, and if it is, call in and explain to the investigators what happened.
So long as the files aren't DRMed, I'm cool with this. I've had to give up on alot of gaming material because with an international move coming up in a few months, I really can't afford to get books in any other format EXCEPT electronic - but there's no way I'm going to get the DRM stuff that alot of companies are putting out through White Wolf's Adobe-ebook based pay-for-play site.
It's time that we came out and say it: It is true that we don't agree with copyright law, and we OUGHT to be allowed to violate the law with impunity and that anyone who invorces the law in their own interests is a Greedy Bastard.
The problem isn't that the law works in favor of the Greedy Bastards. The law works in favor of the Greedy Bastards because the Greedy Bastards wrote the law.
When you've got literal RIAA shock troops, price-gouging cartels and EULAs on movie stubs, and the end of the public domain, you tend to begin to see the CopyrightKops as greedy bastards. When they start using barratry to force college-age programmers to shut down useful (and non-infringing) innovations, and use barratry in order to take $2000 from 12 year olds in the projects, you begin to see them as Greedy Bastards.
And this is the final point: If these corporations make decisions based on economics, not ethics, when dealing with me, I'm not only justified, I'm practically required to make decisions based on economics, not ethics, when dealing with them.
I was much the same way with my laptop. Now, my main computer is a MacOSX desktop, but I had occasion to use the laptop every now and again. I also had to deal with my Windows98 work computer and my father's computer (WinXPHome) All were getting spyware. Mine wasn't.
I think it was because of a combination of factors:
First, I used Mozilla, rather than IE. Second, I connected through a Belkin router, with firewall built in.
I do know that I immediately had trouble with the computer upon hooking it up via a modem to Earthlink (my net connection was down a few days.) I got hit with a virus almost immediately - no browsing nessessary.
My ex-girlfriend's computer was much the same way - we got hit with a virus there IMMEDIATELY after a reformat. We had to reformat again, this time using my secure Mac computer to download a firewall and install it BEFORE connecting the computer to the network.
If I can find a Wi-Fi PCMCIA card - or better, a USB dongle, that works with Linux, I'm reformatting my laptop immediately to get it to work with linux. It's only on XP because I don't have the time to do it right this second.
That said, it WOULD be helpful if the guys at the computer places could point out "A wi-fi card that works with Linux" to me on the retail shelves... every Linux Wi-Fi guide that I've find points out which *chipsets* work with Linux, but that doesn't help me when I'm looking at wi-fi cards in the store - they don't publish chipsets on the box (indeed, I got my current wi-fi card because it was SUPPOSED to be Linux compatable but the company changed the chipset without changing the name of the card -- I'm steamed!)
I'm actually planning a move to New Zealand (from Texas) in about 7 months.
I still don't see the point in buying from iTunes, when I can get the music I like to listen to, the way I like to listen to it, cheaper, simply by composing it myself!
There is a DECIDED lack of Country-Techno music on iTunes.
I'm sorry, but conservatives are just as "isolating" as any liberal. Why? Because the differences are just so radically opposed that the gap CANNOT be bridged. There is no point. This was a case of faith vs. reason, and reason lost.
You cannot get any more binary than that in philosophy.
The problem is that social change is predicated by an underlying assumption that the majority is moral. Even during the Jim Crow laws of the South, most of the U.S. population didn't support it - only the south did, and the rest of the U.S. was able to elect people to abolish it.
What we have now is, essentially, an evil populace. 51% of America care more about some gay guys getting married than they do about 200,000 dead in Iraq. I'm oversimplifying, but not by much.
I suppose the point is that Bush voters are evil. If they are ignorant or misguided, the information is out there on the internet to inform them. Too lazy to look it up? I cut you no breaks - your apathy costs lives.
So, you have to look at a world where 51% of the population is, essentially, walking psychopathically down main street.
Sure, I could stay and fight, but I honestly believe we just blew our last, best chance. And fighting now is a excercise in futility.
I have 6 months to go before my Master's degree is complete. After that, I plan to see if I can't find a job in Canada - a Starbucks would do - and relocate, working my way into renouncing U.S. citizenship. I no longer wish to pay for Iraq.
Socrates drank hemlock because he believed that there was a responsibility to the society - that if you accept society's protections, you are also bound by a social contract to accept it's judgements. I do not accept it's judgements, so I suppose I'll have to find a new society.
Didn't New Scientist just recently post that the civilian death toll was 100,000, not including Fallujah, and 200,000 including Fallujah?
So, thatt's 100,000/1.5= 66K. Hmm... beats Saddam by a factor of 5.
Better, more lasting peace? Yeah, right.
I don't know man. Bin Laden killed 3000 civilians, and what, 50 servicemen on the USS Cole?
Bush has killed 100,000 civilians and 1000 servicemen.
This is not to say that Bin Laden isn't a violent murderous psychopath. It's just to say that, even though I saw the towers fall with my own eyes, even though I hate bin Laden and everything he stands for with a firey, burning passion, even though if given the chance I would rip bin Laden's balls off and feed them to him before I rip off his head, shit down his neck, and feed him to the wolves...
It's just that, put into perspective, he's less scary than Bush.
I don't know about that.
Voting to "send a message" might be the case on the presidential election ballot, but, remove the "I'm wasting my vote" stigmata of the current winner-take-all system, in some congressional districts, you could end up with third party congressmen right off the bat. I would be surprized if, if we had instant runoff voting here in Austin, the Green party candidate wouldn't last until the second round of voting, knocking out the Republican. Conversely, in places a bit more rural, I would be surprized if the Libertarians didn't win a couple of seats.
IRV, despite it's flaws, allows people to vote their concience and not have to limit themselves to the lesser of two evils. And the elimination of the electoral college means that one-person, one-vote ideal of democracy is finally achieved, AND it means that it'll be harder to corrupt the system. Look at 2000. A discrepancy of only 1000 votes in Florida would have swung the election - a popular vote screwup would require shifting half a million.
I'm going to root for both bills to pass - Concordet might be better, but this is a case where perfect is the enemy of good.
True, Texas did go 60/40 for Bush, but you must remember that many of those people voted cross-ticket - that is to say that they voted for Bush the person - and voted Democratic on the rest of the ticket. We're not that far removed from the time of Ann Richards, remember.
The problem is, however, that this is far more than a correction. The new districts aren't coming down 60/40. They're far more favorable to the Republicans than the straight numbers would suggest.
The city of Austin, once two close democratic districts, has been gerrymandered into 8 seperate districts - to the point where some of those districts reach into Houston or all the way down to Mexico. One district, specifically, was designed to eliminate influential Democratic congressman Lloyd Doggett specifically - he had to move from District 10 to District 25 to have a chance at winning *a* Texas district.
It is so bad that the Democratic party isn't putting up candidates in some districts - the "official" democratic candidate for one of the districts is Lorenzo Sadun - a write in candidate.
An indirect election system like the ones used in the Westminster style of government would have given the EXACT proportion of Republicans and Democrats as those that actually voted.
This was designed so that it would be very hard for a political majority of Democrats - which might actually be likely this year at least in Houston and Austin, to throw Republican incumbants out.
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I'm planning a move to New Zealand soon.
The truth is that the most fundimental right is the right to know what your rights are. America's rights are codified in the Constitution, but they are not respected. The enforcement of, for example, right to trial, has now become arbitrary.
To me, a government exists as a social contract - and I'd rather deal with a government that acknowledges fewer rights but keeps it's word about the ones it respects. That's not what's happening in America.
I understand that by moving to New Zealand, I will lose the right to vote (until I earn citizenship, which is not an undue requirement. I waited 18 years to vote in America, I can wait 3 to vote in New Zealand.) New Zealand actually has a greater respect for free speech than America does - check Reporters without Borders if you want the skinny on that. I mean, "Free Speech Zones?" That's not the America I know.
As for the right to bear arms - the problem with the right to bear arms is that those who bear arms then have a responsibility to monitor the government, and when it encroaches, attempt to change it - hopefully through non-violent means.
Specifically, the NRA, despite being one of the most powerful lobbying groups in America, has done nothing to try to preserve and protect the other 9 amendments in the Bill of Rights. Indeed, by supporting Republicans, the NRA is undercutting the "other 9 amendments that the 2nd is supposed to protect." If you're not going to fight for your rights when doing so is a bloodless, painless excersise, then why would I believe you to fight for them when it means risking your neck and your family's neck?
The truth is, in order for the 2nd amendment to preserve freedom, it needs not just an armed populace but an educated and motivated one. We don't have that in America.
The truth is - and we see this around the world - that a motivated and educated populace is MORE likely to overthrow a corrupt government than an armed one. Look at the Ukraine. Look at Lebanon. These were not victories won by gunpoint - these were victories won standing up to a gunpoint.
The problem is, in America, if you oppose the government, you're in the minority. Most Americans really do want a government that they feel protects the safety and social mores of the majority at the expense of minority rights. Fascism, to them, works, just so long as it's *their* fascist in power.
And that won't go away anytime soon - Jeb Bush will be the next President of the United States because the Republican primaries and the national elections will be held on black-box voting machines. I really don't think, in America, we have the right to vote - and that's the one fundimental right in a democracy.
If there was hope for things to get better - one, tiny, little shred of hope that things were going to improve - I would not be going. There is no hope and the difference between those who stay and fight and those who leave is that the latter have realized this.
Well, there's quite a bit of difference.
First, the RIAA really has no interest in guilt or innocence. Under the methods they are using to "detect" copyright infringement, they are netting a good number of false positives, including people whose computers were hacked or hijacked, people who shared a computer or an internet connection, people not technically savvy enough to encrypt their WiFi... the list goes on. The problem is, guilty or innocent, the cost of a lawsuit against the RIAA is prohibitive - you can't afford to fight against a phalanx of lawyers and in a civil case you don't have one provided for you. At $3000 to $5000 a pop, it's cheaper to settle than it is to pay for a lawyer - even if you fight, there's no guarantee that you'll win, and with infringement penalties that can reach into the billions or trillions of dollars, it's really best not to fight even if you are innocent. There's a term for this - barratry - and it's illegal, but under our current administration (and to be fair, probably under Clinton or a hypothetical Kerry administration too) it wouldn't be enforced.
This is a single case where the person is clearly guilty and wishes to rectify it. We can't assume that Apple gave him a slap on the wrist, but that seems likely. (Note that by not disclosing the sum, they've got the best of both worlds - it COULD be alot, putting the fear of getting caught into other would-be leakers - or it COULD be a little, making Apple seem like a "not so evil" company.) In any case, this is not a false-positive case based on barratry.
Another thing about the RIAA is that they pretty much got the law they wanted by buying Congressmen. Not very endearing - you can't even say "Well, the law's the law" because the RIAA literally wrote the law. Combine this with the fact that the RIAA is a monopoly trust (while Apple is a large computer manufacturer with #3 marketshare,) and you're more likely to cut Apple some slack. The RIAA has sued thousands - Apple, so far, has sued 1 guy for pre-leaking a program and another guy for leaking upcoming product information (but subpoenaing three journalists, which makes them the bad guy in that case, but that's another story.)
First off, Christian rock sucks. Manson, from time to time, rocks. (Christ is okay but he's so unlike Christians.) That may be a part of your declining sales.
Secondly, fewer and fewer customers are entering your store to buy CDs because the costs of CDs have gone up during an economic downturn where OTHER electronic media are becoming cheaper and cheaper. Mass-market DVDs cost the same price as mass-market CDs - how is the price point not broken on this? You are losing money because you are paying too much wholesale for music, and because of that, you have to put your retail price points up way too high for people to buy them. This would be happening even without peer-to-peer.
Guess what, though. Peer-to-peer was helping you out, even if you didn't know it. From 1998-1999, didn't you have a great year? That was Napster. People were "trying before they buy" with Napster and becoming more informed consumers. They were also exposed to new artists and new music that isn't played on the radio, and went out and bought it.
But then the RIAA shut down Napster and started suing students - right when your business took a downturn, I'm guessing. Personally, I stopped buying RIAA CDs (which, let me guess, are just about all your store stocks.) I still buy music, but I buy it from places like www.cdbaby.com - indie music only. (And not Indie the style, but indie the business model.) Locally, I buy from places that stock local artists and local music - Encore and Waterloo in Austin.
Anyway... your plan to stop piracy is to prevent people who download music from buying music legitimately. Which means that instead of going with piracy as a model of "try before you buy," you're going to force them to go either to your competitors or to the Internet. Now, can you tell me why this won't work?
You may have felt morally justified in kicking out that "pirate," but the guy was just about to make a sale when you kicked him out. Not to mention the future purchases the kid would have made. Not to mention the kid's friends' who have now heard this story and have considered you - rightfully - an asshole and will not shop from you.
Finally, don't give me a sob story about your goddamn kids. You started a store based on one type of product from an industry dominated by a monopoly trust supplier. The monopoly trust is now screwing you over and screwing itself over. You didn't think to diversify your selection with DVDs, or with video games, or t-shirts or something so that you didn't have more than music to sell. Well, whoop de doo, I wonder why your kids have to have ragged haircuts. Maybe it's because your business model is horribly flawed.
From the "Christian Rock" to the "War on Drugs fought with skill" (ha) comments, to the way that you treat your customers, I'm willing to bet you voted for the Republicans last election cycle. If that's the case, I extend no pity when you try to declare bankruptcy and find out that you can't. I love small businesses but only when they treat people like customers rather than consumers - something you've long since forgotten.
The strange thing about iTMS is that eventually, there will be a tipping point where so many people are used to buying with iTMS that they won't care that the major labels have left. After all, the absolute worst thing, from the RIAA's point of view, to happen is for them to threaten to leave and Apple to say: "Well, sure was nice having you, but we think we can handle it ourselves from here on in." I don't think Apple likes it's relationship with the record labels. It's running iTMS at a loss because the RIAA companies make most of the profit - and it's all profit - and the DRM has got to be the most expensive part of the game. The RIAA continually pressures for price increases and really does not have a vested interest in keeping legal downloads going. I think Apple would *like* to offer a DRM-free service - but can't do it with the RIAA labels. Right now Apple has to comply because they're in the less advantageous position. If that ever tips, there's no reason why Apple *needs* the RIAA.
"No rich white guy has ever gotten anywhere with me by comparing himself to Rosa Parks." -- Isaac Jaffe, played by Robert Guillaume in "Sports Night"
Quote:"This obviously doesn't apply to having one'spicture taken and being fingerprinted as that happens to everybody who get arrested, felon or not. How is DNA any different?"
You can't use an inked fingerprint to plant fingerprints at the scene of the crime.
I'm sorry, but that's just plain wrong. If you call up an airline, you're most likely talking with a prisoner. The Prison-Industrial complex in America is real and growing.
The problem is that the world doesn't work according to Civics 101, sad but true. Had you studied Civics 201, Advanced Civics or, "How things actually work," you would have learned that while laws are proposed by representatives and voted on, the Executive branch since the 1940s has wielded immense unofficial but nonetheless real authority in legislation.
In the case of the Patriot Act, the Executive branch actually *wrote* the darn thing, and it was passed to sympathetic members of Congress to propose. One of the reasons that it passed was because the vote for the Patriot Act occured before most congressmen and senators had even read the law.
So while it's entirely true that the law passed because the majority in the House and Senate approved it, in many ways, particularly with the passage of the Patriot Act, Congress merely acted as a rubber stamp.
Perhaps if you did more reading on what actually happened, rather than what should have happened, you'll understand why alot of people are pissed off that what should have happened didn't.
A green laser beam is quite visible, and is very useful for sky-pointing for astronomers.
So is aircraft at night. They tend to have blinking lights to inform air traffic control that they're in the air.
I can understand that pointing at stars with a green light is a "non infringing use," but this is not a Sony Vs. Betamax issue. What's getting punished here is the *act* of trying to blind aircraft to make them crash. You'd have to be really stupid to shine a lazer at a plane by "accident." Even if you did, stop using the lazer pointer, pay attention to the paper to see if it's being investigated, and if it is, call in and explain to the investigators what happened.
So long as the files aren't DRMed, I'm cool with this. I've had to give up on alot of gaming material because with an international move coming up in a few months, I really can't afford to get books in any other format EXCEPT electronic - but there's no way I'm going to get the DRM stuff that alot of companies are putting out through White Wolf's Adobe-ebook based pay-for-play site.
It depends. Were the minorities caught red handed with a "Desperate Housewives" divx?
It's time that we came out and say it: It is true that we don't agree with copyright law, and we OUGHT to be allowed to violate the law with impunity and that anyone who invorces the law in their own interests is a Greedy Bastard. The problem isn't that the law works in favor of the Greedy Bastards. The law works in favor of the Greedy Bastards because the Greedy Bastards wrote the law. When you've got literal RIAA shock troops, price-gouging cartels and EULAs on movie stubs, and the end of the public domain, you tend to begin to see the CopyrightKops as greedy bastards. When they start using barratry to force college-age programmers to shut down useful (and non-infringing) innovations, and use barratry in order to take $2000 from 12 year olds in the projects, you begin to see them as Greedy Bastards. And this is the final point: If these corporations make decisions based on economics, not ethics, when dealing with me, I'm not only justified, I'm practically required to make decisions based on economics, not ethics, when dealing with them.
I was much the same way with my laptop. Now, my main computer is a MacOSX desktop, but I had occasion to use the laptop every now and again. I also had to deal with my Windows98 work computer and my father's computer (WinXPHome) All were getting spyware. Mine wasn't.
I think it was because of a combination of factors:
First, I used Mozilla, rather than IE. Second, I connected through a Belkin router, with firewall built in.
I do know that I immediately had trouble with the computer upon hooking it up via a modem to Earthlink (my net connection was down a few days.) I got hit with a virus almost immediately - no browsing nessessary.
My ex-girlfriend's computer was much the same way - we got hit with a virus there IMMEDIATELY after a reformat. We had to reformat again, this time using my secure Mac computer to download a firewall and install it BEFORE connecting the computer to the network.
If I can find a Wi-Fi PCMCIA card - or better, a USB dongle, that works with Linux, I'm reformatting my laptop immediately to get it to work with linux. It's only on XP because I don't have the time to do it right this second.
That said, it WOULD be helpful if the guys at the computer places could point out "A wi-fi card that works with Linux" to me on the retail shelves... every Linux Wi-Fi guide that I've find points out which *chipsets* work with Linux, but that doesn't help me when I'm looking at wi-fi cards in the store - they don't publish chipsets on the box (indeed, I got my current wi-fi card because it was SUPPOSED to be Linux compatable but the company changed the chipset without changing the name of the card -- I'm steamed!)
I'm actually planning a move to New Zealand (from Texas) in about 7 months. I still don't see the point in buying from iTunes, when I can get the music I like to listen to, the way I like to listen to it, cheaper, simply by composing it myself! There is a DECIDED lack of Country-Techno music on iTunes.
Bush opposes the Kyoto protocol because it'll "cost jobs."
Yet, Bush doesn't even notice the job losses due to outsourcing.
Let's think about this a bit - does Bush really care about jobs?
No - he just doesn't want his big business friends to pay for decent pollution prevention standards.
*This* is why I'm trying to move to Canada.
I'm sorry, but conservatives are just as "isolating" as any liberal. Why? Because the differences are just so radically opposed that the gap CANNOT be bridged. There is no point. This was a case of faith vs. reason, and reason lost.
You cannot get any more binary than that in philosophy.
The problem is that social change is predicated by an underlying assumption that the majority is moral. Even during the Jim Crow laws of the South, most of the U.S. population didn't support it - only the south did, and the rest of the U.S. was able to elect people to abolish it.
What we have now is, essentially, an evil populace. 51% of America care more about some gay guys getting married than they do about 200,000 dead in Iraq. I'm oversimplifying, but not by much.
I suppose the point is that Bush voters are evil. If they are ignorant or misguided, the information is out there on the internet to inform them. Too lazy to look it up? I cut you no breaks - your apathy costs lives.
So, you have to look at a world where 51% of the population is, essentially, walking psychopathically down main street.
Sure, I could stay and fight, but I honestly believe we just blew our last, best chance. And fighting now is a excercise in futility.
I have 6 months to go before my Master's degree is complete. After that, I plan to see if I can't find a job in Canada - a Starbucks would do - and relocate, working my way into renouncing U.S. citizenship. I no longer wish to pay for Iraq.
Socrates drank hemlock because he believed that there was a responsibility to the society - that if you accept society's protections, you are also bound by a social contract to accept it's judgements. I do not accept it's judgements, so I suppose I'll have to find a new society.
That's why I'm moving to Canada.
It also has the added benifit of blocking your evil schemes from the likes of Superman.
Didn't New Scientist just recently post that the civilian death toll was 100,000, not including Fallujah, and 200,000 including Fallujah? So, thatt's 100,000/1.5= 66K. Hmm... beats Saddam by a factor of 5. Better, more lasting peace? Yeah, right.
And if he *did* do it again, you'd still be voting for Bush, using the excuse that Kerry would be worse.
I don't know man. Bin Laden killed 3000 civilians, and what, 50 servicemen on the USS Cole? Bush has killed 100,000 civilians and 1000 servicemen. This is not to say that Bin Laden isn't a violent murderous psychopath. It's just to say that, even though I saw the towers fall with my own eyes, even though I hate bin Laden and everything he stands for with a firey, burning passion, even though if given the chance I would rip bin Laden's balls off and feed them to him before I rip off his head, shit down his neck, and feed him to the wolves... It's just that, put into perspective, he's less scary than Bush.
I don't know about that. Voting to "send a message" might be the case on the presidential election ballot, but, remove the "I'm wasting my vote" stigmata of the current winner-take-all system, in some congressional districts, you could end up with third party congressmen right off the bat. I would be surprized if, if we had instant runoff voting here in Austin, the Green party candidate wouldn't last until the second round of voting, knocking out the Republican. Conversely, in places a bit more rural, I would be surprized if the Libertarians didn't win a couple of seats. IRV, despite it's flaws, allows people to vote their concience and not have to limit themselves to the lesser of two evils. And the elimination of the electoral college means that one-person, one-vote ideal of democracy is finally achieved, AND it means that it'll be harder to corrupt the system. Look at 2000. A discrepancy of only 1000 votes in Florida would have swung the election - a popular vote screwup would require shifting half a million. I'm going to root for both bills to pass - Concordet might be better, but this is a case where perfect is the enemy of good.
Well, Badnarik's philosophies are more in line with Kerry's than with Bush.
True, Texas did go 60/40 for Bush, but you must remember that many of those people voted cross-ticket - that is to say that they voted for Bush the person - and voted Democratic on the rest of the ticket. We're not that far removed from the time of Ann Richards, remember.
The problem is, however, that this is far more than a correction. The new districts aren't coming down 60/40. They're far more favorable to the Republicans than the straight numbers would suggest.
The city of Austin, once two close democratic districts, has been gerrymandered into 8 seperate districts - to the point where some of those districts reach into Houston or all the way down to Mexico. One district, specifically, was designed to eliminate influential Democratic congressman Lloyd Doggett specifically - he had to move from District 10 to District 25 to have a chance at winning *a* Texas district.
It is so bad that the Democratic party isn't putting up candidates in some districts - the "official" democratic candidate for one of the districts is Lorenzo Sadun - a write in candidate.
An indirect election system like the ones used in the Westminster style of government would have given the EXACT proportion of Republicans and Democrats as those that actually voted.
This was designed so that it would be very hard for a political majority of Democrats - which might actually be likely this year at least in Houston and Austin, to throw Republican incumbants out.
-- Brian Boyko
-- Columnist, Daily Texan Newspaper
-- Austin, Texas.
Note that Brokaw, Wright, Cheney, and Clinton no longer LIVE in rural areas.