Never, because the size and thickness of the power cable is due to its need to handle X amps of 120/240VAC. The only way to make it smaller is to move the transformer to an external box like laptops use (which obviously is nothing new).
They are under no compulsion to rush. Once he's charged the right to a speedy trial kicks in.
That, right there, is exactly why they should have already charged him: because doing otherwise circumvents and destroys the right to a speedy trial. They need to put up or shut up; anything else is [or should be!] harassment and unconstitutional.
Oh well, at least they didn't pull an Apple and label it "The New Xbox(tm)".
Volkswagen is even worse about that. First they had the old air-cooled Beetle (except it was actually called the "Type 1"), then they had the "New Beetle" (from 1998 to 2011), and now they have the "Beetle" (from 2012 on). So now, to avoid confusion, I have to refer to my 1998 model as my "old New Beetle" and my friend with a 2013 model has to refer to it as a "2012 Beetle" because if he calls it simply "new" people will think it's the 1998-2011 version!
(And no matter what we call it, we'll still get asked "is the engine in the back?")
I'm talking about a hypothetical situation where somebody bought Portal but regrets their hypocrisy (re: DRM) now. In other words, a "you're usually not OK with it, but sometimes can't help yourself" thing.
If you're OK getting something like Portal, than you've... well, your anti-DRM ideas have their price in some sense. (I'm not trying to criticize here -- mine definitely have their own price -- but just be realistic.) And at that point it's the old joke about how now it's just a matter of haggling over price, as you've established that your attitude is "DRM decreases the value of something" instead of "I won't buy DRM at all." And at that point, who's to say that the console price isn't below the limit?
Or you bought a DRM'd thing during an irrational lapse of judgement.
The consumers (aka, the mindless bleating masses) may repurchase all of their games, but the customers, the ones who are able to make intelligent decisions instead of just blindly accepting everything their corporate overlords throw at them, would just hang on to their 360 consoles in order to play their 360 games, and only purchase new titles for this new system, if they decide they want it.
"Customers" would never have bought a 360 in the first place.
So what you're saying is that PC + DRM and other assorted lock-in = Xbox? I think you should direct your "fuck, you are stupid" comment towards those who actually decide to buy it...
H. G. Wells-style (and Futurama-style) time-traveling avoids this issue, since the time machine passes through all the interim moments between the start and end of the trip, albeit really, really fast. Since it exists in all those moments, it maintains the same frame of reference as the ground it's sitting on.
Um, if the point isn't to demonstrate/exercise your skills in the field, why not go buy your game meat from the store?
Since when did they sell game meat in stores?
Aside from the obvious problem that "game meat" doesn't come from stores by definition, even when you can find it (e.g. duck meat, which is relatively easy because it's common in Chinese and French cooking) it isn't from the same (sub-)species as the wild version and tastes different because it's been raised on commercial feed instead of foraging.
What happens when you've got Brad Pitt running against Igor in a world's sexiest man poll? Brad Pitt gets $1 million from giggling housewives and Igor gets $50 from his mom. Should both end up with equal financial backing?
Maybe Igor's mom is a billionaire, and gives him $50 million dollars instead. Does that still sound like a good plan?
(Replace "Igor" with any actual politician and "Igor's mom" with any special interest group as necessary.)
He bought generic seeds that may or may not have been transgenic. (He may have guessed that they were likely to be, but he didn't "know.") They weren't sold as "transgenic," they were sold as "soybean seeds!"
What's happened here is that what should have been a perfectly normal sale (as humans have done for thousands of years) of perfectly normal seeds (as have been grown and saved also for thousands of years) has somehow become beholden to monopolistic amoral corporation, and that the system (legal, economics, USDA regulations, etc.) makes it exceedingly difficult to avoid it.
What is happening here is both wrong and dangerous on many levels: food safety, property rights (such as the right of a farmer to use his own seeds), etc.
I don't see why IP law should be in a different category than other property, if you are in the strong property rights crowd
Regular property law merely recognizes and codifies the inherent nature of regular property: if I control some physical object (or spot of land) then it's mine, I can use it however I want, and it is physically impossible for you to control or use it at the same time.
"Intellectual Property" law attempts to contravene the inherent nature of information: the value of information is derived from the act of sharing. If I create a new idea (or work of art, etc.) but don't share it with anybody then it has no value. The "use" is the sharing.
Therefore, it is perfectly reasonable for "Intellectual Property" to be regulated differently than actual property: their inherent natures are almost opposite!
I guess the car analogy is that if you buy a stolen car, you are in possession of a stolen vehicle , but the real wrong doer is the guy selling 50 stolen cars on his used car lot.
Not quite: being in possession of a stolen car is a criminal offense in and of itself. Being peripherally associated with somebody else who broke a civil contract is not!
What you've just described is normal selective breeding, as practiced in agriculture for thousands of years. If he had discovered that some of his crop had a naturally-occurring resistance to glyphosate (I'm so pissed I won't even say the brand name!) and selectively bred his crop to express that gene, that would be no problem. And that's exactly what he actually did do, except that his seed stock was contaminated with genetically-modified trash seeds. How the fuck is that his fault?
In other words:
First, if the patent covers a soybean plant that's been made glyphosate resistant by any means, then that's a bad, overly-broad patent. It is unreasonable to restrict anyone from independently breeding a plant that "just so happens" to exhibit similar traits! It is only reasonable to patent the particular GMO technique, not the gene sequence itself.
Second, if the breeding wasn't independent, that was the fault of whoever sold the seeds to the farmer (i.e., the people who bought the previous generation of seeds directly from The Company That Shall Not Be Named in the first place). They're the ones who broke their contract, not the farmer who was actually sued!
Slashdot Mirror
Never, because the size and thickness of the power cable is due to its need to handle X amps of 120/240VAC. The only way to make it smaller is to move the transformer to an external box like laptops use (which obviously is nothing new).
That's fine, but the key is that you're not the government.
Step 1: install thermite booby trap in your computer.
Step 2: ???
Step N+1: Get convicted of arson?
That, right there, is exactly why they should have already charged him: because doing otherwise circumvents and destroys the right to a speedy trial. They need to put up or shut up; anything else is [or should be!] harassment and unconstitutional.
I have an encrypted from about 5 or 10 years ago that I've forgotten the password for, but which I keep around in case I remember one day.
Volkswagen is even worse about that. First they had the old air-cooled Beetle (except it was actually called the "Type 1"), then they had the "New Beetle" (from 1998 to 2011), and now they have the "Beetle" (from 2012 on). So now, to avoid confusion, I have to refer to my 1998 model as my "old New Beetle" and my friend with a 2013 model has to refer to it as a "2012 Beetle" because if he calls it simply "new" people will think it's the 1998-2011 version!
(And no matter what we call it, we'll still get asked "is the engine in the back?")
I'm talking about a hypothetical situation where somebody bought Portal but regrets their hypocrisy (re: DRM) now. In other words, a "you're usually not OK with it, but sometimes can't help yourself" thing.
Or you bought a DRM'd thing during an irrational lapse of judgement.
"Customers" would never have bought a 360 in the first place.
So what you're saying is that PC + DRM and other assorted lock-in = Xbox? I think you should direct your "fuck, you are stupid" comment towards those who actually decide to buy it...
H. G. Wells-style (and Futurama-style) time-traveling avoids this issue, since the time machine passes through all the interim moments between the start and end of the trip, albeit really, really fast. Since it exists in all those moments, it maintains the same frame of reference as the ground it's sitting on.
Four [Doctors], shalt thou not count?
Since when did they sell game meat in stores?
Aside from the obvious problem that "game meat" doesn't come from stores by definition, even when you can find it (e.g. duck meat, which is relatively easy because it's common in Chinese and French cooking) it isn't from the same (sub-)species as the wild version and tastes different because it's been raised on commercial feed instead of foraging.
When Tesla makes a car in the same category as the 3-series, your statistic will become relevant.
And it worked, until GM's schizophrenic management killed it for no good reason.
By the way, Scion had the same kind of "no haggle" policy too, last time I checked.
Maybe Igor's mom is a billionaire, and gives him $50 million dollars instead. Does that still sound like a good plan?
(Replace "Igor" with any actual politician and "Igor's mom" with any special interest group as necessary.)
Right, and the good guy would be the one attacking the shortsighted, uncultured heathens who desecrated the pyramid. It makes sense to me...
If we were to ask the person responsible, maybe he'd say "Smoking Mirror made me do it!"
If you're that upset about it, you should ask the ISO to revise ISO-639 to include your dialect.
He bought generic seeds that may or may not have been transgenic. (He may have guessed that they were likely to be, but he didn't "know.") They weren't sold as "transgenic," they were sold as "soybean seeds!"
What's happened here is that what should have been a perfectly normal sale (as humans have done for thousands of years) of perfectly normal seeds (as have been grown and saved also for thousands of years) has somehow become beholden to monopolistic amoral corporation, and that the system (legal, economics, USDA regulations, etc.) makes it exceedingly difficult to avoid it.
What is happening here is both wrong and dangerous on many levels: food safety, property rights (such as the right of a farmer to use his own seeds), etc.
Regular property law merely recognizes and codifies the inherent nature of regular property: if I control some physical object (or spot of land) then it's mine, I can use it however I want, and it is physically impossible for you to control or use it at the same time.
"Intellectual Property" law attempts to contravene the inherent nature of information: the value of information is derived from the act of sharing. If I create a new idea (or work of art, etc.) but don't share it with anybody then it has no value. The "use" is the sharing.
Therefore, it is perfectly reasonable for "Intellectual Property" to be regulated differently than actual property: their inherent natures are almost opposite!
No.
The grain elevator was selling seed. Full stop. It's not their goddamn business what the buyer does with it!
Or, if they want it to be their business to control what the "buyer" does with it, then they need to use a goddamn contract!
If they don't have the right to sell it without restriction, but they did so anyway, then they should be liable.
This whole "I'm quote-on-quote 'selling' something to you, but not really selling it to you" idea is absolute bullshit and needs to stop!
Bowman practiced selective breeding, as farmers have done for literally thousands of years. If you think that was wrong, you can go fuck yourself!
I surely hope that anyone reading this can instantly realize that it makes no fucking sense!
Not quite: being in possession of a stolen car is a criminal offense in and of itself. Being peripherally associated with somebody else who broke a civil contract is not!
What you've just described is normal selective breeding, as practiced in agriculture for thousands of years. If he had discovered that some of his crop had a naturally-occurring resistance to glyphosate (I'm so pissed I won't even say the brand name!) and selectively bred his crop to express that gene, that would be no problem. And that's exactly what he actually did do, except that his seed stock was contaminated with genetically-modified trash seeds. How the fuck is that his fault?
In other words: