I don't know if you are an American but here your property is taxed just so you can have the privilage of keeping it.
Depending upon the state you live in, that can include your car, your house, your investment accounts, ect. This is in addition to the "sales tax" you payed to aquire them. Intellectual Property should be taxed the same way, if you want to own a patent and tie up an idea for many years you should get to pay a property tax for the privilage of keeping it. Just like an automobile.
Although this may hurt Tenn. in the short run it will help the country as a whole in the long term.
IP (intellectual property) should be hit with the same property taxes as are houses, cars, possessions, and other "real" property. If the corporations and their lawyers want to call ideas "property" then I think we should legitimize that for them by taxing it for them.
There wouldn't be such a large amount of patent, trademark, ect. hording if the owners were forced to pay a market value taxation on those holdings.
The public wins either way. Either there is more tax revenue generated for the common good -or- more patents, trademarks, ect. fall into the public domain.
I pity people like you.....all W has to do is manage to stumble out the word "threat" and you go charging off without asking any questions...How much money did we just waste in NY over one of your threats?
I thought the RepubliCONS thought that we needed to do away with the "Nanny State". You whine "Oh please, please protect me from Saddam's WMDs". In return I promise not to notice that you didn't find any.
Also Mr. Neanderthal, what about the REAL women you've managed to get killed in Iraq?
....For example there is no room for tolerance as far as violating constitutional rights relating to religious tolerance. I'm not well informed on this, but I think that the founding fathers would seriously disapprove of banning all religion from public school....
________
Would these be the same Founding Fathers who decreed that black people were 3/5ths of a white person? You know the ones I'm talking about...they forgot to outlaw slavery in those original documents too.
And what religion would they disapprove of being removed from schools? Christianity? Sorry but a religion that decrees that I must kill my neighbor if he works on the Sabbath and also also fails to condemm slavery has no place in schools.
The Founding Fathers put together a remarkable country and are to be commended for it but we really need to get away from this idea that we should operate today by what the Founding Fathers intended.
I work for a fairly large institution that has settled on Dell as our supplier.
Supposed to have 3 year on-site warranty.
I constantly run into the same problem as this poster. Jump through this hoop....this was never meant to work with that software....our built-in testing software shows that the device is working...reinstall the OS and your broken CD drive tray will now open...really stupid, evasive, let me get you off the phone type answers.
Unless you want to spend four hours talking tech support, the solution that we have found is to short out the suspected bad part so that it is dead, dead, dead before calling tech support.
I worry that the "good" followers of Mohammed, Jesus, etc would give an alien visiting earth the "convert or die" choice they are famous for giving their fellow humans.
I wish there were moderation points for stupidity.
Here's my specific criticism: You're the kind of person who is more dangerous to our liberties than the people trying to foist this crap on the public. Don't you realize that every time "the man" tries to take away your freedoms, privacy, or liberty they do it "to protect the children"?
You're dangerous! People like you hear this "protect the children" crap and just roll over and turn off their critical thinking skills. I just hope you're one of the 1st in line to drink the Bush Kool-Aid which will also be given to you to "protect the children".
If you want another specific criticism: The library is not supposed to be responsible for filtering what kids can or cannot see. If parents are so paranoid that their children will be "corrupted" by information at the library then the parents should accompany and supervise their offspring!
Make parents do their job and leave my liberties alone!
>>>>I am tired of hearing this "trek needs a break" comment from the producers of Star Trek.
Amen to that.
The 4th season of Enterprise can hold its own with just about any other Trek. The problem is that no one was still around to watch it.
>>>>They are convinced the ratings dropped due to the show competing against other Trek re-runs.
They may have a point here. The reruns showed how good Trek can be and it showed how bad their 1st three seasons of Enterprise were.
>>>>This does not mean they wont bring something new to the screen; they will just wait a few years.
Why bother. As long as this production team is in charge Star Trek will continue its decline. The only question is if the "suits" let it decline beyond recovery?
Re:Sorry Folks: HD just not worth the effort.
on
Voom No More
·
· Score: 1
The point of my post wasn't aimed at your "great" home entertainment system so you can zip up your pants and stop waving it around. It was intended to give you HD worshipers an idea of what the average person is going to think.
Are you going to invite 250 million+ people to see your home theater setup? If not, then the average person is going to be exposed to HD at Best Buy and Fry's and we both agree it looks like "sh*t" (your word not mine). You can't convince the average Joe to shell out money for it. His $250 dollar 27" is just fine like it is.
As for being a "nostalgic idiot" are you too ignorant to realise that most of everything currently broadcast on network, cable, and pay movie channels is back catalogue? It will take decades before that changes and till then old TV shows and movies that were not filmed in sharp enough focus to gain anything from HD will be the norm.
As to moving from black and white to color in the 50s it was an improvement the average Joe could see, understand, and want. That's why it happened. HD hasn't justified itself yet.
What you fail to see is that in the end it's just TV.
Sorry Folks: HD just not worth the effort.
on
Voom No More
·
· Score: 1
I know that this comment is not going to be popular with the "bleeding edge"/. types but its got to be said.
HD is not that great. HD is not in great demand by the general public. HD will/would have never gained any market share unless forced upon it by the government.
While HD material that was filmed in HD looks really good it simply isn't necessary because in the end it's still just TV.
Most people don't feel that they need to be able to see every pore in Dan Rather's nose to be able to understand the evening news. Whatever entertainment value you get out of the O.C. does not depend upon being able to count Mischa Barton's arm hairs. The picture we currently have is more than adequate for general TV.
When you move on to DTV type services it gets even worse. Go into an electronics store and look hard at a HDTV picture (areas of large black are some of the worst) and you can see the individual blocks of picture information that are not noticeable on the non HD units.
Then add the fact that 99.9% of back catalogue movies and old TV shows were not filmed in sharp enough focus to gain anything from HD and you have to draw one conclusion:
I am soooo sick of all of the holier than thou posters who feel that any time money is spent that it should be spent to feed the homeless, fight AIDS, fund anti-terrorism, or cure halitosis.
As long as they earned it/raised it legally there is absolutely no reason that they shouldn't spend it however they want. If donating to the above causes is how you want to spend the fruits of your labor then so be it. On the other hand, if sticking the money in a stripper's g-string makes you happy it's just as legitimate a usage.
The last freedom you have is your choice of spending the fruits of your labor the way you want to.
....the model will move to small, impressive displays of technology, where you will order what you want, and it will be shipped to your door, or alternatively, to the store for pickup.... _______________________ Didn't Gateway try this very thing with their retail stores and it failed miserably?
This concept cannot work for two reasons:
1.) It kills the impulse buy.
2.) People are too impatient to wait for something to be shipped, the draw of "have it now" is simply too strong.
Convincing people to get out of their chairs, go to a store, and then wait for arrival will never work. The reason Internet shopping works now is because people never have to get out of their chair.
Cute how you clipped the parts of my post you couldn't refute and made wild suppositions about the others. I was simply pointing out the man's intolerance to anything or anyone who did not follow is perverted view of Islam. The "birds of a feather" argument.
Their wars WERE local until they developed the ability to spread them. Osama wants a one world Muslim state and nothing anyone does or fails to has any bearing on that goal.
If you want to believe that Osama attacked the US over Israel--fine, it's a free country--but I contend he would have found an excuse even if Israel didn't exist.
I am soooo sick of the "Hate America 1st" 'ers posting their ignorance.
1.) The oil crisis was in the 70's not the 80's
2.) Air Power cannot defend (or conquer) all by itself.
3.) Osama wants(ed) the establishment of a worldwide Fundamentalist Islamic state.
As an aside, Osama lived in a country where you were punished for playing chess and ancient statues were purposefully destroyed, he's from a country that would rather see female students burned to death instead of being seen in public improperly clothed. Nothing the United States could do, stop doing, or make others do could ever change that kind of ignorant religious zealotry.
If there was only one lawnmower in the entire world (like the Hubble) then you would spend whatever it takes to keep it working even if you could build 3 or 4 other mowers.
Keep the Hubble AND build the others. There is enough research (or lawns to mow) for both.
Again, it's a stupid philosphy to live by, but's it's not illegal to be racist/judgemental. ________________________
In the US (and this is/was a discussion of US currency) it is not illegal to be a racist but it is illegal to refuse to do business with someone due to race, religion, national origion, etc.
If you really think that: "If a seller doesn't want to sell to someone else becaues he's black/jewish/whatever, that's his right." Then I really feel sorry for you.
I'm divided on this issue (mostly with retail stores), and here's why: a business has the right to conduct business on it's own terms. Businesses can (and should) refuse to sell something to any customer for any reason. __________________________
ANY reason? Like for being Black, Jewish, or Left-handed?
My point is that it hasn't stopped you from doing it anyway.
You say you can't LEGALLY do it, but I'll bet you still do it legal or not.
The club of the DMCA is just the sort of thing that the Supreme Court of the United States likes to whittle down when it gets the chance. I'll ask again, has the SC ever gotten a DMCA case?
..I'm sure that they'll find some law, like the DMCA, to use against anyone who dares try to assert this bizarre "privacy right". If no law can currently be manipulated into supporting their agenda, they'll write a new one and pay Congress to enact it. ___
Has the DMCA really ever stopped anyone from doing anything?
From what I've read it seems like it mainly keeps corporate lawyers busy suing each other.
Who (other than that Russian) has been convicted criminally of a DMCA violation (the Russian's charges were dropped?) I think it's just used as an intimidation ploy, they are afraid that it will not stand up on appeal if used criminally.
Slashdot Mirror
Now that G4 has killed ALL tech (and most game programs) in favor of old reruns can we please have a tech channel back?
...They're called "sales taxes"...
I don't know if you are an American but here your property is taxed just so you can have the privilage of keeping it.
Depending upon the state you live in, that can include your car, your house, your investment accounts, ect. This is in addition to the "sales tax" you payed to aquire them. Intellectual Property should be taxed the same way, if you want to own a patent and tie up an idea for many years you should get to pay a property tax for the privilage of keeping it. Just like an automobile.
Although this may hurt Tenn. in the short run it will help the country as a whole in the long term.
IP (intellectual property) should be hit with the same property taxes as are houses, cars, possessions, and other "real" property. If the corporations and their lawyers want to call ideas "property" then I think we should legitimize that for them by taxing it for them.
There wouldn't be such a large amount of patent, trademark, ect. hording if the owners were forced to pay a market value taxation on those holdings.
The public wins either way. Either there is more tax revenue generated for the common good -or- more patents, trademarks, ect. fall into the public domain.
Tax Disney's rat and let the revolution begin!
WOW
I pity people like you.....all W has to do is manage to stumble out the word "threat" and you go charging off without asking any questions...How much money did we just waste in NY over one of your threats?
I thought the RepubliCONS thought that we needed to do away with the "Nanny State". You whine "Oh please, please protect me from Saddam's WMDs". In return I promise not to notice that you didn't find any.
Also Mr. Neanderthal, what about the REAL women you've managed to get killed in Iraq?
Now that the war on terror has been won I'm glad that the FBI NOW has a reason to look for him.
When I hear that someone has shot and killed some moron, my 1st thought now days is "I wonder if the moron deseved to be shot"
This is because of people like you.
Now Winston Smith can "correct" history with just a few keystrokes.
Orwell really was an optimist, wasn't he?
....For example there is no room for tolerance as far as violating constitutional rights relating to religious tolerance. I'm not well informed on this, but I think that the founding fathers would seriously disapprove of banning all religion from public school....
________
Would these be the same Founding Fathers who decreed that black people were 3/5ths of a white person? You know the ones I'm talking about...they forgot to outlaw slavery in those original documents too.
And what religion would they disapprove of being removed from schools? Christianity? Sorry but a religion that decrees that I must kill my neighbor if he works on the Sabbath and also also fails to condemm slavery has no place in schools.
The Founding Fathers put together a remarkable country and are to be commended for it but we really need to get away from this idea that we should operate today by what the Founding Fathers intended.
Just my $.02
I work for a fairly large institution that has settled on Dell as our supplier.
Supposed to have 3 year on-site warranty.
I constantly run into the same problem as this poster. Jump through this hoop....this was never meant to work with that software....our built-in testing software shows that the device is working...reinstall the OS and your broken CD drive tray will now open...really stupid, evasive, let me get you off the phone type answers.
Unless you want to spend four hours talking tech support, the solution that we have found is to short out the suspected bad part so that it is dead, dead, dead before calling tech support.
Makes for less wasted time.
I worry that the "good" followers of Mohammed, Jesus, etc would give an alien visiting earth the "convert or die" choice they are famous for giving their fellow humans.
I wish there were moderation points for stupidity.
Here's my specific criticism: You're the kind of person who is more dangerous to our liberties than the people trying to foist this crap on the public. Don't you realize that every time "the man" tries to take away your freedoms, privacy, or liberty they do it "to protect the children"?
You're dangerous! People like you hear this "protect the children" crap and just roll over and turn off their critical thinking skills. I just hope you're one of the 1st in line to drink the Bush Kool-Aid which will also be given to you to "protect the children".
If you want another specific criticism: The library is not supposed to be responsible for filtering what kids can or cannot see. If parents are so paranoid that their children will be "corrupted" by information at the library then the parents should accompany and supervise their offspring!
Make parents do their job and leave my liberties alone!
>>>>I am tired of hearing this "trek needs a break" comment from the producers of Star Trek.
Amen to that.
The 4th season of Enterprise can hold its own with just about any other Trek. The problem is that no one was still around to watch it.
>>>>They are convinced the ratings dropped due to the show competing against other Trek re-runs.
They may have a point here. The reruns showed how good Trek can be and it showed how bad their 1st three seasons of Enterprise were.
>>>>This does not mean they wont bring something new to the screen; they will just wait a few years.
Why bother. As long as this production team is in charge Star Trek will continue its decline. The only question is if the "suits" let it decline beyond recovery?
The point of my post wasn't aimed at your "great" home entertainment system so you can zip up your pants and stop waving it around. It was intended to give you HD worshipers an idea of what the average person is going to think.
Are you going to invite 250 million+ people to see your home theater setup? If not, then the average person is going to be exposed to HD at Best Buy and Fry's and we both agree it looks like "sh*t" (your word not mine). You can't convince the average Joe to shell out money for it. His $250 dollar 27" is just fine like it is.
As for being a "nostalgic idiot" are you too ignorant to realise that most of everything currently broadcast on network, cable, and pay movie channels is back catalogue? It will take decades before that changes and till then old TV shows and movies that were not filmed in sharp enough focus to gain anything from HD will be the norm.
As to moving from black and white to color in the 50s it was an improvement the average Joe could see, understand, and want. That's why it happened. HD hasn't justified itself yet.
What you fail to see is that in the end it's just TV.
I know that this comment is not going to be popular with the "bleeding edge" /. types but its got to be said.
HD is not that great. HD is not in great demand by the general public. HD will/would have never gained any market share unless forced upon it by the government.
While HD material that was filmed in HD looks really good it simply isn't necessary because in the end it's still just TV.
Most people don't feel that they need to be able to see every pore in Dan Rather's nose to be able to understand the evening news. Whatever entertainment value you get out of the O.C. does not depend upon being able to count Mischa Barton's arm hairs. The picture we currently have is more than adequate for general TV.
When you move on to DTV type services it gets even worse. Go into an electronics store and look hard at a HDTV picture (areas of large black are some of the worst) and you can see the individual blocks of picture information that are not noticeable on the non HD units.
Then add the fact that 99.9% of back catalogue movies and old TV shows were not filmed in sharp enough focus to gain anything from HD and you have to draw one conclusion:
HD is just not worth the effort.
...Maybe the monolith would come back and make monkeys MORE intelligent than us, just to keep us busy...
"Get your stinkin' paws off of me you damn, dirty ape!"
>>Aren't there better destinations for donations?
NO! There is no better use for THEIR money!
I am soooo sick of all of the holier than thou posters who feel that any time money is spent that it should be spent to feed the homeless, fight AIDS, fund anti-terrorism, or cure halitosis.
As long as they earned it/raised it legally there is absolutely no reason that they shouldn't spend it however they want. If donating to the above causes is how you want to spend the fruits of your labor then so be it. On the other hand, if sticking the money in a stripper's g-string makes you happy it's just as legitimate a usage.
The last freedom you have is your choice of spending the fruits of your labor the way you want to.
....the model will move to small, impressive displays of technology, where you will order what you want, and it will be shipped to your door, or alternatively, to the store for pickup....
_______________________
Didn't Gateway try this very thing with their retail stores and it failed miserably?
This concept cannot work for two reasons:
1.) It kills the impulse buy.
2.) People are too impatient to wait for something to be shipped, the draw of "have it now" is simply too strong.
Convincing people to get out of their chairs, go to a store, and then wait for arrival will never work. The reason Internet shopping works now is because people never have to get out of their chair.
Just my $.02
Cute how you clipped the parts of my post you couldn't refute and made wild suppositions about the others. I was simply pointing out the man's intolerance to anything or anyone who did not follow is perverted view of Islam. The "birds of a feather" argument.
Their wars WERE local until they developed the ability to spread them. Osama wants a one world Muslim state and nothing anyone does or fails to has any bearing on that goal.
If you want to believe that Osama attacked the US over Israel--fine, it's a free country--but I contend he would have found an excuse even if Israel didn't exist.
I am soooo sick of the "Hate America 1st" 'ers posting their ignorance.
1.) The oil crisis was in the 70's not the 80's
2.) Air Power cannot defend (or conquer) all by itself.
3.) Osama wants(ed) the establishment of a worldwide Fundamentalist Islamic state.
As an aside, Osama lived in a country where you were punished for playing chess and ancient statues were purposefully destroyed, he's from a country that would rather see female students burned to death instead of being seen in public improperly clothed. Nothing the United States could do, stop doing, or make others do could ever change that kind of ignorant religious zealotry.
No Links: Google them yourself.
Bad Analogy.
If there was only one lawnmower in the entire world (like the Hubble) then you would spend whatever it takes to keep it working even if you could build 3 or 4 other mowers.
Keep the Hubble AND build the others. There is enough research (or lawns to mow) for both.
They blew it big-time.
Anthony Stewart Head (the watcher from Buffy the Vampire Slayer) was the perfect choice.
Bummer!
Again, it's a stupid philosphy to live by, but's it's not illegal to be racist/judgemental.
________________________
In the US (and this is/was a discussion of US currency) it is not illegal to be a racist but it is illegal to refuse to do business with someone due to race, religion, national origion, etc.
If you really think that: "If a seller doesn't want to sell to someone else becaues he's black/jewish/whatever, that's his right." Then I really feel sorry for you.
I'm divided on this issue (mostly with retail stores), and here's why: a business has the right to conduct business on it's own terms. Businesses can (and should) refuse to sell something to any customer for any reason.
__________________________
ANY reason? Like for being Black, Jewish, or Left-handed?
I hope you simply spoke before thinking.
My point is that it hasn't stopped you from doing it anyway.
You say you can't LEGALLY do it, but I'll bet you still do it legal or not.
The club of the DMCA is just the sort of thing that the Supreme Court of the United States likes to whittle down when it gets the chance. I'll ask again, has the SC ever gotten a DMCA case?
..I'm sure that they'll find some law, like the DMCA, to use against anyone who dares try to assert this bizarre "privacy right". If no law can currently be manipulated into supporting their agenda, they'll write a new one and pay Congress to enact it.
___
Has the DMCA really ever stopped anyone from doing anything?
From what I've read it seems like it mainly keeps corporate lawyers busy suing each other.
Who (other than that Russian) has been convicted criminally of a DMCA violation (the Russian's charges were dropped?) I think it's just used as an intimidation ploy, they are afraid that it will not stand up on appeal if used criminally.