Next Tuesday, everyone stake out the local Krispy Kreme with your video camera for 8 or 10 hours and just record every cop that walks in. It will drive them crazy. Right???? Ok. Maybe not.
I'm tired of the super-surveilance-society we are turning into. Now, they are going to give financial incentives to be monitored (cheaper tolls if you pay tolls electronically).
We all act differently when we know we're being watched. If anything, the super-surveilance-society has taken away our right to act a bit goofy every now and then.
I despise every camera I see. From the shopping mall to the workplace. Get rid of every one of them.
Please visit my webcam at www.irony.com/myneighborswindow.
This is clearly illegal if you are some how, some way, making money from the price gathering or providing it to the public. It is clearly protected in law. In the exact case (airline pricing), they are backed up by previous court rulings. It is a no-brainer. Don't compare this to gathering prices on apples at the local grocery store chains.
Don't go there. I worked on similar projects in the travel industry and what you are doing will get a cease-and-desist as soon as they find out about it.
If you see others doing it (priceline, etc.), they are paying for it in some manner. All the airlines have legal means for you to pull pricing info from them (it may be from a 3rd party service). That's where you want to start.
they are punishing themselves before they sue themselves. Maybe they sent themselves a cease and desist order and they took it seriously. I think they realized they had enough legal issues going on and they didn't need another one from themselves. I hope the Smoking Gun gets ahold of a copy of the cease and desist. Then, we can get the real inside story.
They are setting an example. Of course, that example is "stupidity". But you have to give them credit for trying.
In other news, Rambus merged with SCO to form the largest legal team in the universe(s). Cease and desist letters were sent to every inhabitant of Earth as a precautionary measure.
Re:These spam laws are a waste of time
on
Spam, Milord
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
I think that the laws will have a small effect. There will be a few big profile arrests, fines, confiscation of computers, public lynchings, etc.
The real issues are the international issue and then the sheer magnitude of the problem. The individual States are strapped for cash. No AG office or law enforcement agency needs more work. Call a state communications commission and ask what they hear about... They will tell you that ALL they hear about all day long is telemarketing complaints. They are completely swamped by that alone, which is mostly legal. Just think how up to their necks they will be in spam complaints. I sure don't want to pay more a lot more taxes to fight spam, keep spammers in jail, or pay for the syringe to put them away for good.
I'd have to agree that the answer to spam is in the technology. We need to re-engineer the email system. We all knew it was open for abuse from day one. If someone suggests a good effort that is taking place in that direction, let me know so I can toss some money their way. Now there is something I'd rather throw money at.
Great. Then don't have an abortion. I would never want my spouse to have one and would argue very strongly against it.
But stay away from the laws. It is an issue that does not belong in the laws.
For you, 7 1/2 months. For the guy next door, 6 months. For the gal down the street, 7 1/2 microseconds. See the problem?
Before arguing for abortion laws, go and perform some duties in the inner city, or wherever for abstinence and better birth control. Heck, donate some money to Planned Parenthood if you want to lower the abortion rate. Do something besides moaning to your friendly, local government to help the problem. The shortcut is always to get gov't involved. "Solve it for us!!! I'm too busy!!". There is a ton that can be done to work on this problem before gov't needs to get involved.
Ditto with free market media. Go do something about it. Support your local alternatives, or national, or international alternatives.
Regulation is NOT forcing them to do a damn thing. Geez. You really sound like a big L liberal... "See how good a job regulation did to fix the trans-fat problem at McD's!! We need more regulation!"
They did it on their own. The free market "forced" them to do it. There is NO regulation that made them do a thing. (Well, except for the vegetarian fry thing last year, which was rather funny.)
Threats of lawsuits are ludicrous, as the last "McD's made me fat" lawsuit was laughed out of court and all the way to Bally's.
Please let us know which regulation made McD's change their meals. Oh, and when you provide a link, perhaps it should help to prove your point. This link did not.
Most Big R Republicans and Big D Democrats consider libertarian-style thinkers to be the opposition.
All my Big R friends think I'm a flaming liberal... "What, you satanic baby killer? You think abortion is a right? Hippy freak!"
All my Big D friends think I'm a child-hating, white supremicist, Limbaugh-lover.
I must be doing something right to piss off all the not-so-moderates. I think that you are too big of a Big R to know where either the middle or libertarians might be. They are all the opposition to you. And yikes. If you ran across a moderate liberal, you'd probably call him a Marxist, or something horrible like that.
Um. It is. Why, just in the past week, I can site two examples that at least partially refute your sarcasm.
One story was about Burger King focusing more on quality to better compete against McD.
The second story I saw was about McD's changing the trans-fat content of their meals rather significantly. This, in part, was positioned to better compete with BK/Subway.
McD's and BK serve a very large market, just like clearchannel. But, we all know there are alternatives. I suggest that the lack of alternatives is not a symptom of clearchannel "taking over", but rather a survival of the fittest among the alternatives.
Well, I think it is. I don't have a problem with the free market listening to as much Brittany and Back Street Boys as they can handle. Just because I don't like it, doesn't mean I should try to change it. Just take a look at what happened to CNN when FNC came along. Whoops. All the assumptions about cable news were tossed out the window when FNC regularly beat CNN.
Where I live, I have 4 or 5 classic rock stations. I'm happy with the choices of popping between them incessantly. I have no idea who owns them, nor do I care.
For other stuff, there is plenty of choice. I find plenty of Internet radio stations, Web pages, Cable channels, etc. for what I consider "unbiased" sources or "clean" sources. That is, they tend to agree with my point of view or talk about what I want to listen to. Everyone has plenty of choices in media, and clearchannel owning every "major" radio station won't change that.
The public wants chioces in media. If clearchannel becomes too homogenized, then someone will somehow break through and take away market share. It has always been this way. Everyone thought there was room for only one cable news channel. I have at least 5 on my system. There are hundreds of other such examples.
If you read both the Economist and Newsweek, let's say, I think you get a pretty good picture of what's going on for the big stories on a weekly basis.
Cable news is good for breaking stuff and ongoing stories. Always colored, but they won't not cover a breaking story.
Newspapers are good for local stories. I try to read a daily and weekly local paper. Lousy for big stories because they always seem to color a story a certain way and don't provide enough background, motivations, or agendas.
So what's missing from that mix? I'd say that you can keep up on facts and what happened somewhere, but you can't get a really good political picture of what's going on. What are the big bill's coming up for debate in local/state/federal gov't? What are the real issues? Who's on what side and why? This is not what I necessarily miss, but it is severely missing from what the entire public sees on a day to day basis. This is, I think, what we all want foisted upon us. We want the media to provide us with a forum for real public debate by presenting as many of these sorts of facts as possible. We want the pretty, marketing, happy face take off of politics and the so-called debate that we now see through the media's eyes.
No matter how much media I inhale, I still get the distinct feeling that all of our government takes place in secret behind closed doors, and we only see what they want us to see. Not that there is some vast conspiracy, but it is all cloaked in marketing, slogans, and very personal agendas.
I suggest that most slashdot types are libertarian in their political thought. Not Libertarian(tm), but libertarian in thought.
At least that's what I seem to get from reading at +1 or -1.
It seems hip to call yourself liberal, but then go home and secretly watch Fox News.
The vast majority of Americans (sorry foreigners) have very mixed political views, and fewer and fewer can strongly identify with one of the two major parties.
My point is that this MS bashing is a waste of time and makes the open source community look VERY foolish and VERY bitter. I mean for god's sake. Just because a story has both "toilet" and "MS" in it, we get some sort of slashdot editor beavis-and-butthead snicker.
I did not say that MS is BETTER. That is a subjective troll of a statement to make. Rather, I simply said that the numbers speak for themselves.
The score of the game is 90% to 4%. Linux scored another half point last year and you place your head in the sand and claim that it is not an ass-kicking. Yay for our team.
Get real. Nothing I said was a troll. A troll would have said "Windows is better than Linux". Speaking the truth is not a troll, it is just that you don't want to hear it.
When we can agree on facts, then perhaps we can finally start taking Linux somewhere and having positive discussions. Until then, with your head buried in the sand, we are unlikely to move forward while others do. Something's wrong with Linux on the desktop (ok, maybe more than that). We need to fix it. I suggest that a not-for-profit effort will fail over both the short term and long term. Given that, what needs to be done?
You sound like some marketing droid. "We gained marketshare, so we're not losing!" And you're not behaving like Microsoft in what way?
Could not agree more. How pathetic. Can't beat 'em? Then beat 'em up. Make fun of them. Point and laugh. Repeat the same tripe over and over as if it somehow related to the interests of the slashdot community. Bashing MS has become a full time undertaking here.
XP is better for the average desktop than Linux. Period.
I don't understand the motivations of the slashdot editors with regard to MS future direction... Do they want MS to take a DIFFERENT direction? If so, what is it and do they regulary communicate this to MS? Are they posting this criticism in an attempt to get MS to take action so that XP/Longhorn is even BETTER than Linux next time around? If so, aren't they sort of digging their own grave wrt Linux vs. MS? Your bashing of MS only serves to make MS products better, but does nothing for the Linux/alternatives. Is that the slashdot editors' goal?
Bash, bash, bash. Come on. Be a bit more constructive. Got any stories about positive directions Linux is taking lately wrt the desktop or competing with MS? Oh, yeah, there was that one story yesterday about how open source projects don't interact very well. Beautiful. Just beautiful, guys.
MS has whooped Linux's butt on the desktop. Get over it. Was always such and will always be so. Why? Because of the attitude of the Linux community as perfectly displayed in this slashdot story.
If MS decided to scrutinize the open source community as slashdot does to MS, my guess is that they would have a field day with bugs, incompatible software, inconsistent interfaces, driver issues from hell, etc. Let's hope they don't folks.
What are you going to record? And why would you suddenly have the urge from work.
Yes, I'm asking the forbidden "why" question. Don't forgive me, just mod me down.
I keep telling myself I want a TIVO, but then I look at the TV Guide and there is a vast wasteland. Almost vaster in its waste factor than the Internet. And you want to combine the two. Wow. What a waste. Literally.
Again, there's nothing on. Figure out another way to use technology to make your life more interesting. TIVO is a failure in that regard due to content issues.
Oh, and if you miss something. Don't worry. 75% of the channels are dedicated to reruns. And the other 25% only show original content 10% of the time. TV itself is becoming the best TIVO out there.
So why didn't they just stick with their "car" precedent and say that it's illegal run an insecure network. Once the gov't makes it illegal to run an insecure network (like say, the Internet:) ), the free market will come up with all sorts of really good, easy to use, security solutions for home users because people will demand them. People are not demanding it, so companies aren't providing it. I don't think this is as naive as it sounds.
Not just wi-fi security, but nobody cares if they're running an open relay or DDOS hot spot because there are really no consequences to doing it. I say, if you run an open relay, then you are aiding and abetting the enemy (note to self: look up definition of abetting) and you should be slapped with a $200 fine or something.
N.H. also legalized taking cars for a joy ride if the cars are left running in a convenient store parking lot.
Give me a frickin' break... The BEST thing for gov't to do was to do NOTHING and let the courts sort it out on a case by case basis.
It's like nerds are now a protected class.
Please mod as flaimbait. tia.
When something happens, just point to it and claim that it really didn't happen. That, in fact, the exact opposite just happened and everyone is just looking at it wrong. You're bound to get headlines and your very own slashdot story.
No, abandon all your critical thinking skills and embrace all ideas as equal.
Slashdot Mirror
Next Tuesday, everyone stake out the local Krispy Kreme with your video camera for 8 or 10 hours and just record every cop that walks in. It will drive them crazy. Right???? Ok. Maybe not.
I'm tired of the super-surveilance-society we are turning into. Now, they are going to give financial incentives to be monitored (cheaper tolls if you pay tolls electronically).
We all act differently when we know we're being watched. If anything, the super-surveilance-society has taken away our right to act a bit goofy every now and then.
I despise every camera I see. From the shopping mall to the workplace. Get rid of every one of them.
Please visit my webcam at www.irony.com/myneighborswindow.
This is clearly illegal if you are some how, some way, making money from the price gathering or providing it to the public. It is clearly protected in law. In the exact case (airline pricing), they are backed up by previous court rulings. It is a no-brainer. Don't compare this to gathering prices on apples at the local grocery store chains.
Don't go there. I worked on similar projects in the travel industry and what you are doing will get a cease-and-desist as soon as they find out about it.
If you see others doing it (priceline, etc.), they are paying for it in some manner. All the airlines have legal means for you to pull pricing info from them (it may be from a 3rd party service). That's where you want to start.
they are punishing themselves before they sue themselves. Maybe they sent themselves a cease and desist order and they took it seriously. I think they realized they had enough legal issues going on and they didn't need another one from themselves. I hope the Smoking Gun gets ahold of a copy of the cease and desist. Then, we can get the real inside story.
They are setting an example. Of course, that example is "stupidity". But you have to give them credit for trying.
In other news, Rambus merged with SCO to form the largest legal team in the universe(s). Cease and desist letters were sent to every inhabitant of Earth as a precautionary measure.
I think that the laws will have a small effect. There will be a few big profile arrests, fines, confiscation of computers, public lynchings, etc.
The real issues are the international issue and then the sheer magnitude of the problem. The individual States are strapped for cash. No AG office or law enforcement agency needs more work. Call a state communications commission and ask what they hear about... They will tell you that ALL they hear about all day long is telemarketing complaints. They are completely swamped by that alone, which is mostly legal. Just think how up to their necks they will be in spam complaints. I sure don't want to pay more a lot more taxes to fight spam, keep spammers in jail, or pay for the syringe to put them away for good.
I'd have to agree that the answer to spam is in the technology. We need to re-engineer the email system. We all knew it was open for abuse from day one. If someone suggests a good effort that is taking place in that direction, let me know so I can toss some money their way. Now there is something I'd rather throw money at.
Great. Then don't have an abortion. I would never want my spouse to have one and would argue very strongly against it.
But stay away from the laws. It is an issue that does not belong in the laws.
For you, 7 1/2 months. For the guy next door, 6 months. For the gal down the street, 7 1/2 microseconds. See the problem?
Before arguing for abortion laws, go and perform some duties in the inner city, or wherever for abstinence and better birth control. Heck, donate some money to Planned Parenthood if you want to lower the abortion rate. Do something besides moaning to your friendly, local government to help the problem. The shortcut is always to get gov't involved. "Solve it for us!!! I'm too busy!!". There is a ton that can be done to work on this problem before gov't needs to get involved.
Ditto with free market media. Go do something about it. Support your local alternatives, or national, or international alternatives.
Regulation is NOT forcing them to do a damn thing. Geez. You really sound like a big L liberal... "See how good a job regulation did to fix the trans-fat problem at McD's!! We need more regulation!"
They did it on their own. The free market "forced" them to do it. There is NO regulation that made them do a thing. (Well, except for the vegetarian fry thing last year, which was rather funny.)
Threats of lawsuits are ludicrous, as the last "McD's made me fat" lawsuit was laughed out of court and all the way to Bally's.
Please let us know which regulation made McD's change their meals. Oh, and when you provide a link, perhaps it should help to prove your point. This link did not.
Most Big R Republicans and Big D Democrats consider libertarian-style thinkers to be the opposition.
All my Big R friends think I'm a flaming liberal... "What, you satanic baby killer? You think abortion is a right? Hippy freak!"
All my Big D friends think I'm a child-hating, white supremicist, Limbaugh-lover.
I must be doing something right to piss off all the not-so-moderates. I think that you are too big of a Big R to know where either the middle or libertarians might be. They are all the opposition to you. And yikes. If you ran across a moderate liberal, you'd probably call him a Marxist, or something horrible like that.
Um. It is. Why, just in the past week, I can site two examples that at least partially refute your sarcasm.
One story was about Burger King focusing more on quality to better compete against McD.
The second story I saw was about McD's changing the trans-fat content of their meals rather significantly. This, in part, was positioned to better compete with BK/Subway.
McD's and BK serve a very large market, just like clearchannel. But, we all know there are alternatives. I suggest that the lack of alternatives is not a symptom of clearchannel "taking over", but rather a survival of the fittest among the alternatives.
Well, I think it is. I don't have a problem with the free market listening to as much Brittany and Back Street Boys as they can handle. Just because I don't like it, doesn't mean I should try to change it. Just take a look at what happened to CNN when FNC came along. Whoops. All the assumptions about cable news were tossed out the window when FNC regularly beat CNN.
Where I live, I have 4 or 5 classic rock stations. I'm happy with the choices of popping between them incessantly. I have no idea who owns them, nor do I care.
For other stuff, there is plenty of choice. I find plenty of Internet radio stations, Web pages, Cable channels, etc. for what I consider "unbiased" sources or "clean" sources. That is, they tend to agree with my point of view or talk about what I want to listen to. Everyone has plenty of choices in media, and clearchannel owning every "major" radio station won't change that.
The public wants chioces in media. If clearchannel becomes too homogenized, then someone will somehow break through and take away market share. It has always been this way. Everyone thought there was room for only one cable news channel. I have at least 5 on my system. There are hundreds of other such examples.
If you read both the Economist and Newsweek, let's say, I think you get a pretty good picture of what's going on for the big stories on a weekly basis.
Cable news is good for breaking stuff and ongoing stories. Always colored, but they won't not cover a breaking story.
Newspapers are good for local stories. I try to read a daily and weekly local paper. Lousy for big stories because they always seem to color a story a certain way and don't provide enough background, motivations, or agendas.
So what's missing from that mix? I'd say that you can keep up on facts and what happened somewhere, but you can't get a really good political picture of what's going on. What are the big bill's coming up for debate in local/state/federal gov't? What are the real issues? Who's on what side and why? This is not what I necessarily miss, but it is severely missing from what the entire public sees on a day to day basis. This is, I think, what we all want foisted upon us. We want the media to provide us with a forum for real public debate by presenting as many of these sorts of facts as possible. We want the pretty, marketing, happy face take off of politics and the so-called debate that we now see through the media's eyes.
No matter how much media I inhale, I still get the distinct feeling that all of our government takes place in secret behind closed doors, and we only see what they want us to see. Not that there is some vast conspiracy, but it is all cloaked in marketing, slogans, and very personal agendas.
I suggest that most slashdot types are libertarian in their political thought. Not Libertarian(tm), but libertarian in thought.
At least that's what I seem to get from reading at +1 or -1.
It seems hip to call yourself liberal, but then go home and secretly watch Fox News.
The vast majority of Americans (sorry foreigners) have very mixed political views, and fewer and fewer can strongly identify with one of the two major parties.
Did you see Dilbert yesterday? It's easier than you think.
Elbonians bribing a congressman with a stick of gum.
My point is that this MS bashing is a waste of time and makes the open source community look VERY foolish and VERY bitter. I mean for god's sake. Just because a story has both "toilet" and "MS" in it, we get some sort of slashdot editor beavis-and-butthead snicker.
I did not say that MS is BETTER. That is a subjective troll of a statement to make. Rather, I simply said that the numbers speak for themselves.
The score of the game is 90% to 4%. Linux scored another half point last year and you place your head in the sand and claim that it is not an ass-kicking. Yay for our team. Get real. Nothing I said was a troll. A troll would have said "Windows is better than Linux". Speaking the truth is not a troll, it is just that you don't want to hear it. When we can agree on facts, then perhaps we can finally start taking Linux somewhere and having positive discussions. Until then, with your head buried in the sand, we are unlikely to move forward while others do. Something's wrong with Linux on the desktop (ok, maybe more than that). We need to fix it. I suggest that a not-for-profit effort will fail over both the short term and long term. Given that, what needs to be done? You sound like some marketing droid. "We gained marketshare, so we're not losing!" And you're not behaving like Microsoft in what way?
Could not agree more. How pathetic. Can't beat 'em? Then beat 'em up. Make fun of them. Point and laugh. Repeat the same tripe over and over as if it somehow related to the interests of the slashdot community. Bashing MS has become a full time undertaking here.
XP is better for the average desktop than Linux. Period.
I don't understand the motivations of the slashdot editors with regard to MS future direction... Do they want MS to take a DIFFERENT direction? If so, what is it and do they regulary communicate this to MS? Are they posting this criticism in an attempt to get MS to take action so that XP/Longhorn is even BETTER than Linux next time around? If so, aren't they sort of digging their own grave wrt Linux vs. MS? Your bashing of MS only serves to make MS products better, but does nothing for the Linux/alternatives. Is that the slashdot editors' goal?
Bash, bash, bash. Come on. Be a bit more constructive. Got any stories about positive directions Linux is taking lately wrt the desktop or competing with MS? Oh, yeah, there was that one story yesterday about how open source projects don't interact very well. Beautiful. Just beautiful, guys.
MS has whooped Linux's butt on the desktop. Get over it. Was always such and will always be so. Why? Because of the attitude of the Linux community as perfectly displayed in this slashdot story.
If MS decided to scrutinize the open source community as slashdot does to MS, my guess is that they would have a field day with bugs, incompatible software, inconsistent interfaces, driver issues from hell, etc. Let's hope they don't folks.
What are you going to record? And why would you suddenly have the urge from work.
Yes, I'm asking the forbidden "why" question. Don't forgive me, just mod me down.
I keep telling myself I want a TIVO, but then I look at the TV Guide and there is a vast wasteland. Almost vaster in its waste factor than the Internet. And you want to combine the two. Wow. What a waste. Literally.
Again, there's nothing on. Figure out another way to use technology to make your life more interesting. TIVO is a failure in that regard due to content issues.
Oh, and if you miss something. Don't worry. 75% of the channels are dedicated to reruns. And the other 25% only show original content 10% of the time. TV itself is becoming the best TIVO out there.
did this guy talk to CNN? CNN is owned by AOL/TW and they are a major part of RIAA. I'd go so far as to say that they ARE RIAA.
And where is CNN's disclaimer about THAT?!?!
Again, why would you agree to an interview with someone who just shook you down?
Hold on, my jaw's on the floor...
So why didn't they just stick with their "car" precedent and say that it's illegal run an insecure network. Once the gov't makes it illegal to run an insecure network (like say, the Internet:) ), the free market will come up with all sorts of really good, easy to use, security solutions for home users because people will demand them. People are not demanding it, so companies aren't providing it. I don't think this is as naive as it sounds. Not just wi-fi security, but nobody cares if they're running an open relay or DDOS hot spot because there are really no consequences to doing it. I say, if you run an open relay, then you are aiding and abetting the enemy (note to self: look up definition of abetting) and you should be slapped with a $200 fine or something.
N.H. also legalized taking cars for a joy ride if the cars are left running in a convenient store parking lot. Give me a frickin' break... The BEST thing for gov't to do was to do NOTHING and let the courts sort it out on a case by case basis. It's like nerds are now a protected class. Please mod as flaimbait. tia.
When something happens, just point to it and claim that it really didn't happen. That, in fact, the exact opposite just happened and everyone is just looking at it wrong. You're bound to get headlines and your very own slashdot story. No, abandon all your critical thinking skills and embrace all ideas as equal.