Just a simple answer to a question. I was arguing copyrights, not the First Amendment.
You (falsely) claimed that congress can pass any copyright law they like, thereby turning anything into copyright infringment.
But Congress hasn't done that, even though Congress can, in fact, pass any law they wish.
Fair use is NOT granted or defined by congress of by copyright law. In fact fair use did not appear in the text of copyright law before 1976.
If Fair Use is in the text of the law, then it was granted by Congress. Only Congress can pass a law.
This appeal is perfectly consistant with the Eldred case you cite.
If they are arguing that the extension of the duration of copyrights is unconstitutional, then it is not consistent. The Supreme Court ruling was directly on point with regard to that argument, which prevents any further argument. Legally speaking, the issue is settled, and it is no longer a Constitutional issue until Congress changes the law.
Congress' power of impeachment cannot be used to remove a judge simply because that judge's decisions are unpopular, any more than it can impeach the president for being of the opposite political party.
Not only can Congress impeach whomever it wishes, but Congress can simply dissolve a court if it wishes. The courts are established by Congress. Only the Supreme Court has a Constitutional origin.
An almost unlimited Congress scares me a lot more than shoddy reasoning on the Supreme Court.
Congress is by far the most powerful branch of the government. It is the only branch that can act on its own. It is one of only two legislatures that can amend the Constitution (the other being a convention of states). The only branch that can make treaties. The only branch that can impeach. The only branch that can obligate the Treasury.
Congress, however, unlike the other branches, is elected every two years.
For example, if I decide to use the following statement in my book: "This isn't a Constitutional issue. It's a Congressional issue. Congress has the Constitutional power to establish copyrights. In order to change that system, Congress simply needs to pass a new copyright act."...even if I cite you, is that legal?
Probably. The copyright on those four sentences is not very likely to have any commercial value. Quoting four sentences is hardly copyright infringement.
Can Congress extend copyright to require me to get permission from you to even cite you here in my response to your silly question?
Yes. Congress can pass whatever copyright laws it wishes because the Constitution gives them that power. I didn't ask any questions, even silly ones.
To what degree can they deny me the right to say what I like?
When it becomes copyright infringement.
There's an important safe harbor for copyright users called "fair use". It's a longstanding collection of doctrines which more or less say that copyright can only go so far, and though Congress has the right to establish copyright law, it can't push it too far into the realm of first ammendment violation.
Correct, and if it weren't for Congress there would be no such thing as fair use. The First Amendment does not guarantee the right of the people to infringe each other's copyrights.
The recent changes in copyright largely shrunk the fair use region.
Agreed.
Congress may not have had the right to do that. This is very much a constitutional issue.
It was a Constitutional issue, right up to the point where the Supreme Court of the United States ruled 7-2 that Congress still has the power to change the duration of a copyright. It is no longer a Constitutional issue until either the Supreme Court reverses the previous ruling or another act of Congress.
As I understand it, their argument on appeal are that the continuous extensions of the period of copyright protection violate the limited times clause,
The Supreme Court has already ruled on that matter. From a Constitutional standpoint, the issue is settled. Without another act of Congress, this part of the case simply can no longer be aruged.
and - separately - that the current system impinges on First Amendment free speech.
This doesn't make much sense either, but I suppose they can argue this part of the case.
This isn't a Constitutional issue. It's a Congressional issue. Congress has the Constitutional power to establish copyrights. In order to change that system, Congress simply needs to pass a new copyright act.
Just as a company can't give "creative time" to their people and expect dramatic results.
Dramatic results are quite rare. Why must every business pursue "dramatic" results? Why not pursue something more realistic, like plain results?
When farmers plant wheat, they don't call a meeting to announce they expect their new crop to conduct The Brandenburg Concertos in Vienna. But they do have bread for sandwiches.
They have evolved large bureaucracies as a way of extracting valuable workproduct from extremely mediocre talent.
Not quite. Large bureaucracies prevent work and progress which results in "mediocre talent." Such employees could also easily be described as "intelligent, capable and bored."
Thus making it a non-independent project by definition.
Some people might use it as an oppurtunity to start another business that competes with your own, which might not be what you had in mind.
The horror of it all. Why, people might invent something really useful and employ more people! Can't have that. Better to just install another time clock and take away some more benefits.
Notice everyone in this example has a mechanism to recover their loss except the employee? AOL replaces the employee, probably at a lower salary. The bank gets the house.
This is why W-4 employment is unfair. It's a ripoff for the employee. Employees are expected to depend on their paycheck for food, mortgage payments, etc. But they can't really depend on their paycheck, because the company can fire them any time they feel like it.
A business would never make such an agreement. AOL would never accept significant revenue in installments from another company without an enforceable contract, but that is exactly what they expect their employees to do.
but the responsibility-disclaiming attitude present in your posts has gotten on my nerves -- and I'm senior tech staff, involved in hiring decisions. (And yes -- I've been fired too, even by places for which I did good work. Nonetheless, it was my fault every time, and I've taken steps not to make the same mistakes again
So managers are never going to be required to take the responsibility, are they? They're never going to have to explain why they fire people, are they? They're never going to have to explain why they are allowed to destroy people's finances and their careers and their income for no reason at all.
We did what we were supposed to do. We went to school and spent years getting educations which managers declare worthless. We have years of professional experience which managers declare worthless. We have skills which managers declare worthless and we are NEVER ALLOWED TO COMPLAIN. You can read it right here in this thread. Management is blameless. They never make a mistake. It's always the employee's fault. Always.
So what do we do? Just keep working temp jobs into our 30s and 40s? Give up on ever owning a home? Give up on a career? Give up on retirement? Because at this rate we can't afford any of those things. I worked my ass off for years and years and I have absolutely nothing to show for it.
Manager after manager lied to and cheated me and my coworkers. Hundreds were fired. People lost homes, cars, savings, credit, careers. Years of work were flushed into a toilet.
And now, I'm expected to say "yep, you're right, it was all my fault" and go right back to a temp job.
The division was the animation division in Orlando that animated Lilo and Stitch and Mulan. That's about $200 million at the box office and tens of millions more for the DVD sales.
Disney fired 250 people who cannot be replaced because they "decided" 2-D animation wasn't profitable anymore.
Of course, it's BEEN profitable for EIGHTY YEARS but who are we to argue with middle management?
Meanwhile, in Japan, 2-D animation makes billions of dollars a year. There are four HUNDRED animation studios in Japan. Pokemon has a worldwide market of THIRTY BILLION DOLLARS. And yes, that's 2-D animation. The same animation Disney claims is no longer profitable. Well, they're WRONG.
In that context, they fired 250 animators because they felt like it and wanted the short-term cash grab. Period.
I can't afford a mortgage now. I couldn't afford a mortgage when I was employed.
because you'd be paying higher costs on everything because companies would be wasting money paying people to not do anything. Can't you see that?
No. If those companies don't need the employees, they shouldn't have hired them in the first place. Once they are hired, the company is responsible for those people unless the company is going out of business.
Firing people as a routine cost control mechanism is cruel, arbitrary, unfair and destructive.
There are plenty of things YOU could've done to avoid finding yourself in such a dire situation.
Such as? They got a good job. They bought a house. They were doing the responsible thing: what our society constantly encourages everyone to do every day: Get an education, get a good job, buy a house, get fired, watch your credit destroyed, become unemployable, live in your car. All that good stuff.
YOU could've saved up some money or not gotten such an expensive mortgage.
So they should have paid cash for the house? Mortgages are always expensive.
If you're driving yourself at your financial red-line and praying nothing goes wrong, that's a pretty big risk you're taking, bucko.
They took no larger a risk than the bank. Of course, the bank gets the house when the inevitable layoff happens. What does the employee get? You know, the employee who did all the work? Well, they get shit.
Like any company, AOLs goal is to make a profit, not to provide jobs.
Yeah, well they shouldn't have hired them in the first place. The only justification for layoffs of thousands is Chapter 7. That's management's responsibility. They hired them. THEY ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THOSE EMPLOYEES' ABILITY TO EARN A LIVING. That's part of being a manager. They should step up to the plate and take care of their people. Not abandon and betray them.
If those 950 people were helping profits, they would still be with the company...
Maybe Disney fired those people because they could be a more profitable company without them.
Or more likely they just felt like it. Those irreplaceable animators were responsible for $200 MILLION in top line revenue. That's several hundred thousand dollars per employee. I'd call that profitable.
Just a guess, since most corporations (you know, thos big evil things you blindly hate) need to employ people in order to get anything done.
It's not the corporations. It's the lying rat fuck illiterate cheat bastard middle managers. You know, the ones who wait until escrow closes to announce layoffs. The ones who announce layoffs during the holidays.
Oh good! Permanent 10% unemployment! That would be WONDERFUL! Let's see, that would be a perpetually financially powerless group of about 15 million people.
And if someone happens to be in that 10% too often, well, I guess they get to live in a refrigerator box, right? We owe everyone an opportunity to earn a living, or we are being dishonest about the "pursuit of happiness."
Slashdot Mirror
Keeping people employed for more than five weeks?
Circular argument.
Just a simple answer to a question. I was arguing copyrights, not the First Amendment.
You (falsely) claimed that congress can pass any copyright law they like, thereby turning anything into copyright infringment.
But Congress hasn't done that, even though Congress can, in fact, pass any law they wish.
Fair use is NOT granted or defined by congress of by copyright law. In fact fair use did not appear in the text of copyright law before 1976.
If Fair Use is in the text of the law, then it was granted by Congress. Only Congress can pass a law.
This appeal is perfectly consistant with the Eldred case you cite.
If they are arguing that the extension of the duration of copyrights is unconstitutional, then it is not consistent. The Supreme Court ruling was directly on point with regard to that argument, which prevents any further argument. Legally speaking, the issue is settled, and it is no longer a Constitutional issue until Congress changes the law.
Congress' power of impeachment cannot be used to remove a judge simply because that judge's decisions are unpopular, any more than it can impeach the president for being of the opposite political party.
Not only can Congress impeach whomever it wishes, but Congress can simply dissolve a court if it wishes. The courts are established by Congress. Only the Supreme Court has a Constitutional origin.
An almost unlimited Congress scares me a lot more than shoddy reasoning on the Supreme Court.
Congress is by far the most powerful branch of the government. It is the only branch that can act on its own. It is one of only two legislatures that can amend the Constitution (the other being a convention of states). The only branch that can make treaties. The only branch that can impeach. The only branch that can obligate the Treasury.
Congress, however, unlike the other branches, is elected every two years.
For example, if I decide to use the following statement in my book: "This isn't a Constitutional issue. It's a Congressional issue. Congress has the Constitutional power to establish copyrights. In order to change that system, Congress simply needs to pass a new copyright act." ...even if I cite you, is that legal?
Probably. The copyright on those four sentences is not very likely to have any commercial value. Quoting four sentences is hardly copyright infringement.
Can Congress extend copyright to require me to get permission from you to even cite you here in my response to your silly question?
Yes. Congress can pass whatever copyright laws it wishes because the Constitution gives them that power. I didn't ask any questions, even silly ones.
To what degree can they deny me the right to say what I like?
When it becomes copyright infringement.
There's an important safe harbor for copyright users called "fair use". It's a longstanding collection of doctrines which more or less say that copyright can only go so far, and though Congress has the right to establish copyright law, it can't push it too far into the realm of first ammendment violation.
Correct, and if it weren't for Congress there would be no such thing as fair use. The First Amendment does not guarantee the right of the people to infringe each other's copyrights.
The recent changes in copyright largely shrunk the fair use region.
Agreed.
Congress may not have had the right to do that. This is very much a constitutional issue.
It was a Constitutional issue, right up to the point where the Supreme Court of the United States ruled 7-2 that Congress still has the power to change the duration of a copyright. It is no longer a Constitutional issue until either the Supreme Court reverses the previous ruling or another act of Congress.
As I understand it, their argument on appeal are that the continuous extensions of the period of copyright protection violate the limited times clause,
The Supreme Court has already ruled on that matter. From a Constitutional standpoint, the issue is settled. Without another act of Congress, this part of the case simply can no longer be aruged.
and - separately - that the current system impinges on First Amendment free speech.
This doesn't make much sense either, but I suppose they can argue this part of the case.
This isn't a Constitutional issue. It's a Congressional issue. Congress has the Constitutional power to establish copyrights. In order to change that system, Congress simply needs to pass a new copyright act.
How could you not have a nest egg when making a combined $130k a year?!?!?
Taxes, inflation, taxes, car repairs, taxes, insurance, taxes, confiscatory prices at the grocery store, taxes...
the US job market is going these days?
Imagine dropping a 100 lb. block of lead into a toilet.
W-4 employment is obsolete. Business insisted it be that way.
Home prices have increased 40%, inflation is over 3% and despite the tax cuts, about 1/3 of the average paycheck goes to taxes of one kind or another.
One step forward, Chapter 7 steps back. Thanks boss.
Why do so many TV show and movie makers think that Sci-Fi is exclusively about technology?
Because they fail to hire writers. Writers understand the difference between Science Fiction and technobabble.
Just as a company can't give "creative time" to their people and expect dramatic results.
Dramatic results are quite rare. Why must every business pursue "dramatic" results? Why not pursue something more realistic, like plain results?
When farmers plant wheat, they don't call a meeting to announce they expect their new crop to conduct The Brandenburg Concertos in Vienna. But they do have bread for sandwiches.
They have evolved large bureaucracies as a way of extracting valuable workproduct from extremely mediocre talent.
Not quite. Large bureaucracies prevent work and progress which results in "mediocre talent." Such employees could also easily be described as "intelligent, capable and bored."
It's the poor carpenter who blames his tools.
Dinner tables and patio decks don't clusterfuck themselves at 2AM on a weekend for no apparent reason.
But make sure you enforce what they can work on.
Thus making it a non-independent project by definition.
Some people might use it as an oppurtunity to start another business that competes with your own, which might not be what you had in mind.
The horror of it all. Why, people might invent something really useful and employ more people! Can't have that. Better to just install another time clock and take away some more benefits.
Notice everyone in this example has a mechanism to recover their loss except the employee? AOL replaces the employee, probably at a lower salary. The bank gets the house.
This is why W-4 employment is unfair. It's a ripoff for the employee. Employees are expected to depend on their paycheck for food, mortgage payments, etc. But they can't really depend on their paycheck, because the company can fire them any time they feel like it.
A business would never make such an agreement. AOL would never accept significant revenue in installments from another company without an enforceable contract, but that is exactly what they expect their employees to do.
but the responsibility-disclaiming attitude present in your posts has gotten on my nerves -- and I'm senior tech staff, involved in hiring decisions. (And yes -- I've been fired too, even by places for which I did good work. Nonetheless, it was my fault every time, and I've taken steps not to make the same mistakes again
So managers are never going to be required to take the responsibility, are they? They're never going to have to explain why they fire people, are they? They're never going to have to explain why they are allowed to destroy people's finances and their careers and their income for no reason at all.
We did what we were supposed to do. We went to school and spent years getting educations which managers declare worthless. We have years of professional experience which managers declare worthless. We have skills which managers declare worthless and we are NEVER ALLOWED TO COMPLAIN. You can read it right here in this thread. Management is blameless. They never make a mistake. It's always the employee's fault. Always.
So what do we do? Just keep working temp jobs into our 30s and 40s? Give up on ever owning a home? Give up on a career? Give up on retirement? Because at this rate we can't afford any of those things. I worked my ass off for years and years and I have absolutely nothing to show for it.
Manager after manager lied to and cheated me and my coworkers. Hundreds were fired. People lost homes, cars, savings, credit, careers. Years of work were flushed into a toilet.
And now, I'm expected to say "yep, you're right, it was all my fault" and go right back to a temp job.
The context of the quote is obvious.
The division was the animation division in Orlando that animated Lilo and Stitch and Mulan. That's about $200 million at the box office and tens of millions more for the DVD sales.
Disney fired 250 people who cannot be replaced because they "decided" 2-D animation wasn't profitable anymore.
Of course, it's BEEN profitable for EIGHTY YEARS but who are we to argue with middle management?
Meanwhile, in Japan, 2-D animation makes billions of dollars a year. There are four HUNDRED animation studios in Japan. Pokemon has a worldwide market of THIRTY BILLION DOLLARS. And yes, that's 2-D animation. The same animation Disney claims is no longer profitable. Well, they're WRONG.
In that context, they fired 250 animators because they felt like it and wanted the short-term cash grab. Period.
Why is AOL on the hook for what you irresponsibly did?
Because the BANK wanted to see the PAYCHECK from AOL as proof they could make the PAYMENTS.
So the employee gets fired and...
AOL saves money
The bank gets the house
The employee gets SHIT
That's called unfair. The employee did nothing except show up and do a good job.
You wouldn't be able to afford a mortgage
I can't afford a mortgage now. I couldn't afford a mortgage when I was employed.
because you'd be paying higher costs on everything because companies would be wasting money paying people to not do anything. Can't you see that?
No. If those companies don't need the employees, they shouldn't have hired them in the first place. Once they are hired, the company is responsible for those people unless the company is going out of business.
Firing people as a routine cost control mechanism is cruel, arbitrary, unfair and destructive.
There are plenty of things YOU could've done to avoid finding yourself in such a dire situation.
Such as? They got a good job. They bought a house. They were doing the responsible thing: what our society constantly encourages everyone to do every day: Get an education, get a good job, buy a house, get fired, watch your credit destroyed, become unemployable, live in your car. All that good stuff.
YOU could've saved up some money or not gotten such an expensive mortgage.
So they should have paid cash for the house? Mortgages are always expensive.
If you're driving yourself at your financial red-line and praying nothing goes wrong, that's a pretty big risk you're taking, bucko.
They took no larger a risk than the bank. Of course, the bank gets the house when the inevitable layoff happens. What does the employee get? You know, the employee who did all the work? Well, they get shit.
That's called... uhhh ummm hmmm UNFAIR.
Virtually everyone has a college degree.
In 2003, the states with the highest percentages of college graduates were at only 29%. That's 71% of the population having not graduated college.
Which also means that having a Bachelor's Degree makes a person better educated than almost THREE-FOURTHS of the rest of the population.
Interesting, isn't it, how nobody ever responds to the Disney example? Or the Disney quote?
Maybe because it is a great example of people being laid off for no reason?
Like any company, AOLs goal is to make a profit, not to provide jobs.
Yeah, well they shouldn't have hired them in the first place. The only justification for layoffs of thousands is Chapter 7. That's management's responsibility. They hired them. THEY ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR THOSE EMPLOYEES' ABILITY TO EARN A LIVING. That's part of being a manager. They should step up to the plate and take care of their people. Not abandon and betray them.
If those 950 people were helping profits, they would still be with the company...
Maybe Disney fired those people because they could be a more profitable company without them.
Or more likely they just felt like it. Those irreplaceable animators were responsible for $200 MILLION in top line revenue. That's several hundred thousand dollars per employee. I'd call that profitable.
Just a guess, since most corporations (you know, thos big evil things you blindly hate) need to employ people in order to get anything done.
It's not the corporations. It's the lying rat fuck illiterate cheat bastard middle managers. You know, the ones who wait until escrow closes to announce layoffs. The ones who announce layoffs during the holidays.
Cruel, arbitrary, dishonest and destructive.
Every company should do that.
Oh good! Permanent 10% unemployment! That would be WONDERFUL! Let's see, that would be a perpetually financially powerless group of about 15 million people.
And if someone happens to be in that 10% too often, well, I guess they get to live in a refrigerator box, right? We owe everyone an opportunity to earn a living, or we are being dishonest about the "pursuit of happiness."