Uh, what is the worst that could happen? People would kill themselves. A victimless crime. [...] I laugh even more at the thought that it is illegal to dispense vetrinary medicine without a prescription. This is just a nanny-state mentality - we can't let people suffer the harm of a lost pet - better to put the pet to sleep since nobody can afford to pay thousands for treatment.
It sounds like you're coming from the "I own my body, it's my right to put what I want in it" camp. I have no issue with that, and agree in many ways. The state should not own us or have control over what we choose to do to ourselves. However, there is a difference between not being allowed to take medication and managing access to that medication. Access management is required for at least all the reasons I've listed below. What should not be illegal is you taking any of those medications once you've managed to get them. Believe it or not, people killing themselves is not a victimless crime, as it does have effects on society at large. An example where this can be seen is seatbelt law in some states, like mine. Who cares if a numbskull wants to risk dying in an accident right? But when they don't die, and suffer huge injuries, their insurance has to cover the costs, and that drives insurance costs up for everyone over time. In a perfect world we'd just void their policiy if they aren't buckled up, and I'm sure there's rules/laws in place that cover that, but it's not always possible to prove. This is just a quick exmaple, let's not hash it to death, but it does demonstrate that a personal safety choice can eventually effect society negatively. Additionally, some people may kill themselves who really tried to get/take the correct medicine and attempted to do due diligence. They may get the wrong dose, or a bad medicine interaction precisely because everything is unregulated and not tracked to the degree it is now. Also, to make an analogy that slashdotters can relate to, the security of a system is only as strong as it's weakest link. Right now because qualified doctors who are under regulatory scrunity are the only ones allowed to prescribe, it's a lot easier to make sure those doctors are giving good medical advice and prescribing appropriately. When anyone can order medication, anyone can recommend it. Someone may go to a doctor for advice on what to take and that doctor may make a recommendation they are not qualified to make, or without enough knowledge on the patients medical history. End result, patient thinks they've done their homework and still get a bad prescrip and die/are injured. We're not talking about any idiot that wants to take codeine for his headache and who cares if they die, there is a risk that without a system of controls even intelligent well-meaning individuals will come to harm.
For the second part of pet medications, the problem is that the drugs can be abused directly by people, or used to synthesize other more potent drugs. Again, I don't want to argue about the larger issue of the war on drugs in the US (although I favor a more rational fact-based policy and less SWAT mentality which is clearly not working). But if pet medications are unregulated - assuming all else stays the same - then there is an avenue for abuse of those drugs that is currently unacceptable in today's legal system. And of course in our litiguous society even people who are told, or hell sign contracts, that they are solely responsible for using the medicines acquired in an unregulated system, they will still try to sue when they eventually kill their child or dog. And some will win, and it will cause a further burden on society for all these cases. By regulating the industry you prevent what would surely be many times the legal costs of the current system for such accidents. Plenty of us are smart enough to handle an unregulated system, but there are so many other people that would abuse it or use it improperly that eventually other costs to society would cause us to need to reign it in.
The xbox has already popularized terms for its failures, "The red rings of death"(the system's indicator for internal hardware failure) and "bricked"
"Bricked" is a term for dead hardware that has been around for a long time before the 360. Its failure rates may be high, but c'mon, let's not rewrite history to claim this system is solely responsible for a totally new term for dead technology. For reference search for "bricked" and "ipod" and I'm confident you'll find articles from well before the 360 launch.
Thanks for the video link. Anyone else notice the reporter in the video said the captured squid was only 3.5 meters, not ~7 as the other articles claim? Maybe they were only referring to the body and not body + tentacles? From what you can see in the video it looks a lot closer to only being 11 ft long rather than 22ft. Quick meter-to-foot estimate, go easy on me.;)
So please spare me all the lectures on consumerism, the next shiny thing and the meaning of "standard". It's amazing how much crap the average/. reader extrapolates from a small comment. Well let's see, here's your original comment: I was boycotting Sony until they released the best rear-projection TV on the market. What can I say? Should I watch substandard TV just to make a point?
You claim to have been boycotting Sony, presumably from the article this thread is attached to your boycott was because you disagreed with some or all of Sony's recent malevolent behavior, probably regarding rootkits. And yet as soon as they make something you want, you drop your boycott. Hint: that's not a boycott, or at least, not one worth a damn. So in that regard why should you be spared a lecture in consumerism, specifically what it means to boycott something since you don't seem to be practicing what you claim. As to the meaning of standard, again you're claiming that anything less that the top of the line model is sub-standard, which is a load of crap. "Standard: an average or normal requirement, quality, quantity, level, grade, etc." That's a widely accepted definition of standard, which would not encompass the best of the state-of-the art in any field. Now for affordable 1080p TVs here are some choices from a 10 second froogle search. On the first page alone there are 6 different manufacturers offering comparable products, so clearly Sony is not the only company providing this technology. It could certainly be argued that theirs is the best of the bunch, but you can't claim that you broke your boycott because Sony was the only possible option, merely the one you liked the most.
You're the one who claimed to be boycotting Sony when in fact it was a boycott of convenience at best, AND you asked the question "Should I watch substandard TV just to make a point?" Don't be surprised when in a public forum you're given an answer to a question you posted, rhetorical or not. Sorry you don't like the answer but own up to the fact that you were never really boycotting Sony as that would have required you to not consider their products in the decision to upgrade your TV. I have not extrapolated anything from your original comment, merely addressed it in detail.
Well, the 50% number I just sort of threw out there and is certainly something that would depend on what the industry could reasonably bear before it became overly prohibitive. The other 85% of profits certainly do go to overhead, but there have been studies that indicate that the ratio of advertising dollars to research dollars is as much as 4 to 1 in some cases. With figures like that it seems obvious that there's a lot more money that could be rolled into research without killing the company or product. Of course, I also recognize that less advertising means less sales, means less money for reasearch..... But it's not a binary balance, there's got to be other ratios of advertising to research funding that result in more money and effort going to reaserch. Or other expenses could be scaled back, such as executive compensation. High level execs certainly do a lot for a successful company, and they invest a huge amount of their lives (the good ones) but I think it's a no brainer that the difference between a $50 million and a $100 million yearly salary still leaves them damn well off. And $50 million buys a LOT of R&D. If tax incentives are a better way to encourage investment, then that should be explored as well, or a combination of all of the above. While I don't have a lot of experience with all the inticacies of new drug development, I was involved for a few years in a project to build an automated robotic laboratory for one of the biggest pharmas around. The idea was we would automate the process of chemical tests performed for release candidate drugs, freeing up substantial amounts of time, money, and scientists to do what they do best and leave the monotonous chemical testing to machines. We were at the point where we had built a complete automated lab on their campus and were tuning the system for 3-day continuous uptime w/o supervision. When one of the company's major drugs was recalled from the market suddenly something like $2 billion-with-a-B of projected revenue was lost, and our work was one of the first to get its funding completely cut.:( That project gave me a good deal of experience with what is involved in testing for bringing a drug to market, and I have a greater appreciation for the time, effort, and huge amounts of money that is required. Even so, like so many other aging policies and structures in our government - I think drug patents (and patents in general) need to be reevaluated and modernized. And part of that should include some oversight and accountability on the part of the patent holder for actually making a good faith effort to advance society in return for the limited time monopoly they are given. The system as been figured out over decades of use and abuse and is being gamed in ways that were not intended. I feel there needs to be a greater focus on ensuring a patent holder upholds their end of the bargain, and that probably means preventing things like granting a term extension for insignificant changes, not allowing tangental patents which block generics on technicalities after a patent expires, etc.
If they were so god damn sure of themselves they wouldn't need so much insurance.
Except that even if a doctor is in the right, they can still incur thousands to hundreds of thousands in legal fees to prove it in court if sued. Part of the reason they need so much insurance is that settlement amounts and legal fees have been increasing, particularly the settlements. Granted, if someone's life is ruined or severely handicapped because of malpractice, I am all for compensating them well and appropriately. But there have been plenty of cases where the damages awarded are huge compared to the actual harm done. This is part of why we see such inflated health care costs, especially here in the US.
Also, considering the side effects of many prescription drugs, the specifics of dosage levels for a given patient/condition, and potential harmful interactions - it's really quite infeasible to do away with prescriptions entirely. Should Joe Schmoe really have the only word on whether or not he should be taking blood thinners? Or liver medication? Or antibiotics? There are some decisions that need to be controlled by professionals and advanced medicine is definitely one of them. There are just way too many ways to inadvertantly kill or injure yourself by taking prescription drugs without adequate oversight. Not to mention the potential harm to society by misusing antibiotics. And yes, this is different than letting people do their own brake jobs or some similar metaphor. The human body and its chemistry are very complex, way more complex than working on a car. Even professionals with years of education and training, experience, peer review, etc. can get diagnoses wrong. I'd hate to see what would happen if we let everybody figure out for themselves (with and without professional input) what medications were best for them.
I like your line of thinking on this one. Allow me to propose another method of getting the same results. Since the patents are a government provided monopoly, and the government defines the rules for the patents, why not add a clause for drug patents that requires 50% of profits from the drug be rolled back into research, instead of the ~15% that is now. Now, of course, this will probably result in drug companies starting to do some funny accounting practices ala MPAA movie profit breakdowns. But since this is anticipated it can be codified into the law to some extent to help combat it. Will every accounting loophole be closed? Probably not, but a regulatory commission could be in place to keep on top of the latest loophole exploits and release advisories on closing them, with some mandate in the law that requires the issues actually be adressed. Penalties should be HUGE, not dollars huge, but total loss of patent huge. Now, normally I'm one for less government intereference in the market, but in the case of drug patents the market itself exists in in current state precisely because of the government-granted patents. And those patents are in place to benefit the advancement of the arts and sciences (and in the case of drug patents I would also argue quality of life/health). Would it really be so terrible a thing to better define the requirements to demonstrate a patent is actually advancing things? It requires good legal wording, it requires constant supervision, and it requires that people familiar with - but not influenced by - the industry monitor it. Correctly balancing such laws are not easy, but nor should they be, however I don't think it's impossible to do it right either.
What can I say? Should I watch substandard TV just to make a point?
Uhhh.... YES. That's the point of a boycott, as soon as you actually buy something from them you've crossed the picket line. Additionally you need to TELL them you are boycotting them and why, if you just casually never buy a product from Sony it doesn't tell them you disagree with their policies/practices/etc it just tells them you're not interested in their products for some unknown reason. Also, there's a big difference between "best" and "substandard", in fact it's in the words themselves. By definition, the best product is not the standard for that field, the standard would be something more like the mean or median product. There are plenty of other TV producers that make very high quality TVs of all kinds, and considering the transient nature of the title of 'best' in such a rapidly changing market, your lapse in your boycott is essentially for a title that will likely be irrelevent in 6 months if all you care about is what's the 'best'. But by all means, keep pretending you're actually making a statement until the next shiny thing comes along.
The people looking for Auntie's Christmas stockings don't have anywhere else to go. Presumably they're they're looking for her because they don't want something made in a Chinese prison camp. If the latter was what they wanted they would have gone to Wal*Mart and been back already. No legitimate business which had a chance of succeeding will be materially harmed.
It's like you have no grasp of how people use the internet. People didn't jsut sit down and type in "www.auntiesstockings.com", they most likmely went to their search engine of choice and searched for something like 'holiday stockings crafts homemade' and got a bunch of hits for sites with those keywords. Then they see "Auntie's Christmas Stockings" and decide to give the site a try. As soon as they get there however the bar doesn't turn green, so they decide it's not a legitimate business and click Back on the browser and buy from a different site.
The point is not that previous customers are going to suddenly stop trusting a site they've already done business with (although that is a possibility). The point is that new users coming to a site for the first time, who use the IE7 green color as the sole indicator of trust, will immediately distrust the site when they don't see that green. It has nothing to do with the quality of the products or anythign else, no green bar will mean they assume it's a scam.
I agree that giving the user more info is a good thing, but the problem is MS has not provided adequate means for small legitimate businesses to display the same level of 'trust' as a major corporation. MS needs to provide a streamlined and straightforward way for ALL legitimate businesses to properly utilize this extra feature, by not doing that MS is essentially raising an artifical barrier to competition because of the lack of knowledge by the vast majority of the web using public. And the catch-22 is, if Joe Sixpack were savvy enough to properly use the anti-phishing notifications from IE7 then he probably wouldn't need to be protected from phishing/scam sites in the first place.
Actually, in the US you can contest any claim on a bank statement of credit card report and the bank is required to prove that you made the purchase.
Which is exactly why the eventual full implementation of RealID becomes a problem. With a single point of entry for proof of identity that is considered Super Secure, Nigh Unspoofable (TM) by all institutions, all they will do is look in their records and confirm that, yes, your RealID was used in that transaction so it MUST have been you. Even today we have people who are victims of identity theft who struggle for years with the consequences of the fraud, sometimes even in the face of much evidence of identity theft companies refuse loans or other credit tools to victims. When the same scenario occurs in a few year's time, and the victim is trying to prove there was fraud in a system that's considered perfect by creditors, do you really think it will be easier to get them to believe you?
Still, the greatest argument against the RealID is a proper list of Pros and Cons for the system. When you write one up (exercise for the reader) and include things like cost of implementation and problems with the current system that will be solved, it doesn't make much sense at all. Unless you're the state and the little entry 'ability to monitor and track citizens at an unprecidented level' is in your Pro column, whereas for a citizen who values liberty, it sits squarely in the Con. (pun intended)
It couldn't possibly have anything to do with the fact that many of these artists we're "supporting" are actually dead? And that even if they're alive they very likely aren't receiving money?
I totally agree, that's also a big part of it. There are so many absurdities and abuses in the current music industry it's a herculean effort to name them all. I certainly wasn't suggesting that my viewpoint was the only issue, but one I feel has strong influence on the topic.
As a software enigineer especially, I see many parallels with what I do as compared to what musicians with RIAA contracts do. I don't get payed for every machine my code is put on, or for every time the program is run, that's not part of my contract, but it's also not part of ANY individual programmer's contract that I've ever heard of. It's hard then for me to sympathize when Johnny Rockstar gets $Y contracted and also $X for every time his song is played, and is complaining that after 50 years he stops getting that money. Granted, most of the money goes to the RIAA, we can make parallels with per-processor licensing, etc, etc... But there's still a big divide between Johhny's pay-per-play and my contracted one-time payment models. Is my software necessarily worth that kind of return? Possibly, that's up to the market to decide. But it's more easy to say that e.g. an MRI software engineer - whose software is daily responsible for helping diagnose illness and ultimately save lives - probably deserves continuous compensation more than a musician who sings about hanging with his buddies in a club. When you make a comparison like that the copyright protection and compensation mechanisms currently at work make even less sense.
I think you missed the original poster's point, when he said "an industry that has so thoroughly attacked Judao-Christian morality is finally reaping the socialist entitlement mentality whirlwind that it has sewn." The 'socialist entitlement mentality' bit doesn't refer to the music industry, but to the public at large who are using P2P and the like to share music. The common defense of which is usually something along the lines of "I want it but not for the price/restrictions that the music industry is demanding so I'll take it anyway and say 'damn The Man.'" That's the entitlement mentality at work. Now, whether or not this was brought on by the music industry attacking judeo-christian morality I'm not so sure. I think it's more a combination of having a highly demanded product, operating using monopoly and cartel business practices, creating artifical scarcity of something that is at the same time seemingly ubiquitous, and complaining about lost revenue while simultaneously raking in cash hand over fist. Not to mention extremely confusing and ever-shifting definitions of what, exactly, the consumer has purchased when they "buy" an album - is it licensed? is it owned? Do I own the song data or just the physcial CD? - and the rights that would therefore come with that product.
Anyway, I think the ubiquity of popular music coupled with the absurdly minimal costs of data copying today is what has lead people to feel entitled to music, if not free, then at least a lot cheaper then they can legally get it for. And really, can you blame us? The cost of an album hasn't really gone down for decades even though we can prove that one of the biggest costs to the music industry - distribution and physical media - has gone to nearly zero in the same period. That's the underlying problem the RIAA needs to address. People are on to their game and we aren't very happy about being manipulated into playing along.
So the reason they monitor you is to keep you innocent.
That's it, you win the doublespeak award this week and it's not even Tuesday yet. Your extremely light two sentences about Belgium announcing "mobile control" whatever that is, doesn't defend the above quote in the least. It's also a logical fallacy. People are not innocent only because they are being watched, they can be innocent just because they ARE, they don't need to be monitored to force them into that state. Others may (or may not) check their behavior knowing they are under surveillance, but being watched is certainly not a prerequisite for obeying the law.
The reason 'they' - the state - monitor you is to catch you doing something wrong, anything. Maybe it wasn't even illegal last week, but it is this week and now you're guilty. With the huge numbers of laws on the books everyone is almost guaranteed to be guilty of something at some point, the only problem has been catching everyone in the act of breaking some law. With ubiquitous surveillance, monitoring algorithms, etc. the state now, more than any other time in history, can keep a dirty file on everyone. The state can only punish criminals, but if everyone is a criminal then the state has achieved another level of control and can selectively enforce prosecution at will to manipulate, coherce, and consolidate more power. That particular 'power' may even be something as minor as increasing traffic ticket revenue, but the result is the same.
"selling out of consoles by underproducing" != "huge consumer demand"
For all we know there are only X-hundred-thousand harcore PS fans (in the US) who really want a PS3 and once that many have finally been released here by Sony demand will drop to nearly zero. Current estimates from EA say Sony only shipped around 200,000 at release. Now of course this may not be the case, but claiming that your product has a huge consumer demand because you didn't even make enough to satisfy initial demand is at best misinterpretting demand and at worst an ouright lie. For the record I'm not getting a next gen console so forget the strawman fanboy arguments.
Why the hell are all our bills the same size, shape, and color?
Well, this may not be the actual truth, but I seem to recall that this is what I learned in grade school. When the US government finally standardized the monetary system they made a conscious decision to make all bills the same size and color to prevent them from being easily recognizable from a distance as a security measure. The idea was if someone pulls out a wad of bright orange $100 bills, as opposed to blue $1s then a mugger could spy this and know just who to rob. Of course, I always thought this was a bit silly because a wealthy mark gives themselves away in other ways such as quality of clothing, jewelry, etc. which is why I'm not sure this is a real fact. More likely, I think, is that it was easier and cheaper to use just one ink and one size on the cutting machine. I'll bet wikipedia probably has a better explanation but I leave that as an exercise to the reader.;)
Right, which works perfectly assuming also that everyone the RIAA brings a suit against actually committed copyright infringement (*fixed that for ya). However the GP's question was how to support the people who aren't necessarily guilty, and/or being absolutely wiped out financially by the RIAA. One of the points that is usually contested is that the fine per infringement is rediculously high ($750 per song) and that level of damage doesn't even have to be demonstrated by the RIAA, they just need to prove there was infringement, whether one copy or 100. Adiitionally their tactics are very underhanded, to the point of almost being outright extortion. They have demonstrated in many cases thus far - sorry don't have time to go compile all the links - that they will use legal stalls to drag out the suits and make it more expensive for the defendent, as well as in a couple cases dropping the charges when it looks like they will lose, usually in such a way that the defendent cannot make a motion to recoup lawyers fees. THAT is what we're looking for solutions for. The fact is that the cost to defend oneself even when you are 100% innocent is so high that for a lot of people it's cheaper and easier to fold and pay the settlement money to the RIAA. That's not justice, that's scamming the system and taking advantage of people to prevent them from even having a chance to defend themselves. And even if they ARE guilty of the infringement, going to court might give them the chance to have the fines imposed be more reasonable than the proposed settlement value. Justice is not being served by people being extorted with the choice of admit full guilt and pay $X now, or suffer the financially crushing wrath of our multi-million dollaar legal team who can and will bleed you dry to make a point if nothing else.
I welcome your response to this but please at least identify yourself as the parent AC for clarity and continuity if you respond.
It would certainly appear that "for pain compliance against passive resisters" is the meat of that quote. Ergo, the position of the UCPD is exactly what we saw in the video.
It was also obvious that the use of the taser in the video meets that definition in letter only, the intent of the officers - and intent has a bearing in law - seemed to be something other than compliance. And this also brings us back to the question of could the student have even complied with the request to stand up? Many people have posted first-hand accounts of being tasered that support each side of that debate, so all we can say with certainty is that some people are temporarily immobilized and some are not. Now, I also submit that the LEOs who have been tasered as part of training and get right back up are likely in much better physical shape than your average Joe, so already they have a slight advantage in dealing with the effects of the taser. But, more importantly it is also demonstrated that multiple tasings exacerbate the effects. Which means even if he was just passivley resisting for shocks 1, 2 and 3, what about number 4? How about the fifth time? At some point the residual effects of multiple shocks in rapid succession DO incapacitate a person for a period of time. Also, biologically this makes sense since the taser causes rapid involuntary contraction of the muscles, rapidly burning ATP which takes time to be replenished. Shocking someone over and over again in a 6 minute period will magnify the effects of this. So when do we legally draw the line between tasing for "pain compliance" and just plain tasing to harm or intimidate? It is clear that the taser cannot be used on a person without limit, ie the more you tase them the more likely they are to comply. That may be true for a short time, but after that you're actually doing enough harm to them that it is counter to your goal because they lose ability to function mentally and physically. I also submit that the police made very little attempt to actually put him under arrest. Sure, it's easier to just electrocute somebody until they're totally incapacitated then deal with them, but that is not the intent of this policy. You don't just give an order then shock them until they nearly pass out if they don't comply. Is that how we want the police to deal with everything? Let's replace "taser" in this instance with "baton". Are you ok with the officers cracking him in the ribs every time he doesn't comply? At what point do you say that the use of force being applied is unjustified? It's nearly the same thing, just much easier to see/understand the pain being inflicted by a baton. A taser causes less lasting damage but inflicts as much, if not more, pain. In this case I'm arguing that the level of force used was unjustified, once the kid was down there were other options available to the officers who chose instead to shock him repeatedly. In the end they handcuffed him and carried him out, why did it require three extra tasings before they did that if they were going to do it anyway?
In addition the officer threatened to taser a student demanding his badge number. Now it was a bad time to be demanding the badge number, the officer was obviously busy, but the demand was not a taser-worthy offense. Threatening to taser the student showed that the officer was willing to use force indiscriminately. If the student had made a threatening move or direct threat he would have been justified in threatening to taser him, but demanding a badge number is not a threatening action. After all couldn't he have said instead "you'll get my damn badge number when we're done with this guy"? Or any number of other things instead of direct threat of violence?
So if they solicit minors in person at a small town playground it's one crime, but if they do it at Disney World where there are more kids, it should carry a different sentence? This is what I'm getting at, you can't just willy nilly pick and choose how you want to word the law, there has to be a consistent basis. Plus you ignored my suggestion that you apply your reasoning to the scenario of phone solicitiation vs VOIP phone solicitation. The VOIP phone uses the internet so therefore the crime must be worse right? Plus the net the predator casts for victims is limited by the predator's willingness and ability to travel, it is not in most cases worldwide. So we're still talking about a relatively small (one or two states) physical area. If you're going to appeal to the efficiency of the predator's search by using the internet, then refer to my example above about soliciting in Disney World vs a town park, why wouldn't that carry a heavier sentence as well?
I don't believe you're addressing the same point as me. My argument is not about convicting criminals by charging them with multiple crimes - although that is another argument in and of itself - or about the differences in criminal definitions between states. This is a question of whether it is appropriate and under what circumstances would there be different penalties for essentially the same crime in the same jurisdiction. Why is it necessary or appropriate to differentiate whether one committed this crime over the phone or over the internet? In either case it could be across state lines or not, so that doesn't enter into it. This is not to say we should never differentiate between crimes based on minor differences. Assualting someone with your fists vs with a tire iron should be taken into account. I'm arguing that using the internet in the case of this crime is a trivial detail that has no bearing on the underlying act such that it should affect sentencing. Specifically relating to this case we're talking about a crime committed IN Florida, and ONLY in Florida so we can even rule out the hypothetical cross-border state law variations. Why does solicitng a minor in person vs soliciting a minor over the internet require a different penalty? I am fully willing to accept that it should require a different penalty, but only if it makes sense and there is a legitimate reason, which thus far I have not heard. It is a crime to solicit a minor, period. The medium used in this case does not enter into it in the same way that it might in for example a libel case where the medium used might more directly affect the scope of damages.
You make good points, but I think you missed the parent's point. The question is, why is the exact same act, under the same circumstances, but over a slightly different transmission medium subject to stiffer penalties? Note that I specified "transmission medium" and not just medium, i.e. we're still talking about text communication, and not voice only vs full video with voice, that would change the basis of this debate. Does sending IMs via AOL instant messenger somehow make the crime worse than if they were sent over SMS? What if the two were talking on the phone, should the penalty for soliciting a minor over the phone somehow have a steeper penalty if the offender's phone was using VOIP? In both of these cases I'm trying to provide examples where the only difference between the scenarios is one takes place using the internet. I don't see how utilizing the internet makes the crime any worse and is deserving of stiffer penalties. Committing a crime across state lines can be done via post, phone, shortwave radio transmision, laser communications, telegraph, visual signaling, etc. and yet there is not a different punishment for each of these different transmission methods, but suddenly using the network of the internet makes the crime worse? If there is a justification then I'm all ears, but thus far I can't think of one and no one has provided one yet. And before anyone replies, try applying your argument to the phone vs VOIP phone scenario and see if it still sticks. But I welcome all reasonable replies.
Now to fend off any straw men: 1) I do not disagree what happened was a crime and the offender should be punished if tried and found guilty.
2) My argument here is that ANY crime should not have the punishment increased just because it involved the internet unless that is specifically relevent to the case, otherwise same crime = same time. I'm generalizing this to help people step back from the immediate overreaction that seems to cause all logic to fly out the window when discussing crimes involving sexual assault/soliciting/etc of a minor.
3) Yes, I agree sexual crimes against a minor are horrible and should be pursued and punished fully, no one is saying otherwise. However, when developing laws we must weigh all facts and not just go with our gut, there needs to be reason on our side to hold the moral high ground.
4) We can have our cake and eat it too: we can make sure the perpetrators of these crimes are punished appropriately AND uphold the rule of law, we just need to actually divorce ourselves from emotion when crafting the laws to be sure that they make sense and are enforcable.
How about YOU try to respond to a trespassing call as a police officer, while surrounded by 50 idiot college kids screaming at you with an EXTREMELY suspicious individual also screaming nonsense at you and trying to incite the stupid kids to attack you. So according to your account of the events an otherwise routine trespassing call had 50 kids screaming and ranting at cops BEFORE the cops had done anything? The crowd was not what provoked the situation, the guy screaming brought the crowd and the repeated tasering of him while on the ground is what got the crowd angry. Next, please find the quote in the video or other accounts wherein the suspect was inciting the crowd to attack the officers. Hint you won't find it, yelling "this is your patriot act, this is your police brutality" is NOT incitement to riot/attack police. Saying somthing like "get these fucking cops off me" or "someone do something" might be construed in that fashion, but nothing he yells is anything like those statements.
Another hint - he WAS handcuffed Here's a hint for you, after the suspect is handcuffed and subdued it's excessive use of force to taser him again unless he is violently resisting. He's not violently resisting (key word 'violently') at any point, and especially after he is in cuffs. It's very straightforward in law: if the suspect is subdued, further use of force, in this case tasering, is unjustified.
The officers did what they were supposed to do when confronted with a non-cooperative individual who is lying limply, Bzzzt wrong again, what they are supposed to do when someone is lying limply is subdue them and place them under arrest. Officers are taught numerous techniques for immobilizing a suspect and handcuffing them. After the first taser shock while he is on the ground it would have been trivial to handcuff him and place him under arrest which was not done. Are you seriously saying here that any time an officer encounters a limp person who doesn't cooperate they should first taser them? Yeah, that sounds completely reasonable and very legal. I challenged you to produce any police procedure, training manual, or law that indicates that is the proper course of action.
I agree the kid was being a complete ass, and yelling at an officer is never a good way to resolve things. In fact I will go so far as to say the first use of the taser may have been justified. However, once the taser has been employed the subject needs to be subdued, the officers chose instead to give him orders and tase him when he did not follow them (nevermind the legitimate argument that because of the shock he MAY not have been physically able to comply). A taser is not designed or issued to officers as a motivational tool, or to induce subjects to comply with orders, it is for incapacitating a violent or forcefully uncooperative suspect, the next step being taking them into custody and/or handcuffing them. Police training stipulates these are non-lethal takedown devices, not motivational aids, to be used in lieu of other uses of force when required. And the law also requires that any force used be justified and PROPORTIONAL to the threat. Tasings 3, 4 and 5 in this particular case were no longer in proportion to the threat, no matter how legitimate the first two may have been.
The force used in this video is necessary for some violent suspects, and in many other cases might have been warranted, but in THIS CASE the use of force appears to be patently gratuitous and needs to be addressed by a formal review of the officers actions and some form of punishment if found to be in violation of police procedure/the law, which it most likely is.
Mod parent back up to repair karma (assuming the karma equations even work out that way), this wasn't flamebait, it was a quote from a character in Clerks. You know, meant to be funny. Sheesh, some people read something they hate and mod w/o a clue, sorry dude.:( You even attributed the quote to Randal, how much easier could you have made it?
Don't forget LASER. I find it much more terrifying to tell captured secret agents that they are going to be executed by being fed to my tank full of sharks with frikkin Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation devices on their heads!;)
Slashdot Mirror
Uh, what is the worst that could happen? People would kill themselves. A victimless crime. [...] I laugh even more at the thought that it is illegal to dispense vetrinary medicine without a prescription. This is just a nanny-state mentality - we can't let people suffer the harm of a lost pet - better to put the pet to sleep since nobody can afford to pay thousands for treatment.
It sounds like you're coming from the "I own my body, it's my right to put what I want in it" camp. I have no issue with that, and agree in many ways. The state should not own us or have control over what we choose to do to ourselves. However, there is a difference between not being allowed to take medication and managing access to that medication. Access management is required for at least all the reasons I've listed below. What should not be illegal is you taking any of those medications once you've managed to get them.
Believe it or not, people killing themselves is not a victimless crime, as it does have effects on society at large. An example where this can be seen is seatbelt law in some states, like mine. Who cares if a numbskull wants to risk dying in an accident right? But when they don't die, and suffer huge injuries, their insurance has to cover the costs, and that drives insurance costs up for everyone over time. In a perfect world we'd just void their policiy if they aren't buckled up, and I'm sure there's rules/laws in place that cover that, but it's not always possible to prove. This is just a quick exmaple, let's not hash it to death, but it does demonstrate that a personal safety choice can eventually effect society negatively.
Additionally, some people may kill themselves who really tried to get/take the correct medicine and attempted to do due diligence. They may get the wrong dose, or a bad medicine interaction precisely because everything is unregulated and not tracked to the degree it is now. Also, to make an analogy that slashdotters can relate to, the security of a system is only as strong as it's weakest link. Right now because qualified doctors who are under regulatory scrunity are the only ones allowed to prescribe, it's a lot easier to make sure those doctors are giving good medical advice and prescribing appropriately. When anyone can order medication, anyone can recommend it. Someone may go to a doctor for advice on what to take and that doctor may make a recommendation they are not qualified to make, or without enough knowledge on the patients medical history. End result, patient thinks they've done their homework and still get a bad prescrip and die/are injured. We're not talking about any idiot that wants to take codeine for his headache and who cares if they die, there is a risk that without a system of controls even intelligent well-meaning individuals will come to harm.
For the second part of pet medications, the problem is that the drugs can be abused directly by people, or used to synthesize other more potent drugs. Again, I don't want to argue about the larger issue of the war on drugs in the US (although I favor a more rational fact-based policy and less SWAT mentality which is clearly not working). But if pet medications are unregulated - assuming all else stays the same - then there is an avenue for abuse of those drugs that is currently unacceptable in today's legal system.
And of course in our litiguous society even people who are told, or hell sign contracts, that they are solely responsible for using the medicines acquired in an unregulated system, they will still try to sue when they eventually kill their child or dog. And some will win, and it will cause a further burden on society for all these cases. By regulating the industry you prevent what would surely be many times the legal costs of the current system for such accidents. Plenty of us are smart enough to handle an unregulated system, but there are so many other people that would abuse it or use it improperly that eventually other costs to society would cause us to need to reign it in.
Also, there's t
The xbox has already popularized terms for its failures, "The red rings of death"(the system's indicator for internal hardware failure) and "bricked"
"Bricked" is a term for dead hardware that has been around for a long time before the 360. Its failure rates may be high, but c'mon, let's not rewrite history to claim this system is solely responsible for a totally new term for dead technology. For reference search for "bricked" and "ipod" and I'm confident you'll find articles from well before the 360 launch.
Thanks for the video link. Anyone else notice the reporter in the video said the captured squid was only 3.5 meters, not ~7 as the other articles claim? Maybe they were only referring to the body and not body + tentacles? From what you can see in the video it looks a lot closer to only being 11 ft long rather than 22ft. Quick meter-to-foot estimate, go easy on me. ;)
So please spare me all the lectures on consumerism, the next shiny thing and the meaning of "standard". It's amazing how much crap the average /. reader extrapolates from a small comment.
Well let's see, here's your original comment: I was boycotting Sony until they released the best rear-projection TV on the market. What can I say? Should I watch substandard TV just to make a point?
You claim to have been boycotting Sony, presumably from the article this thread is attached to your boycott was because you disagreed with some or all of Sony's recent malevolent behavior, probably regarding rootkits. And yet as soon as they make something you want, you drop your boycott. Hint: that's not a boycott, or at least, not one worth a damn. So in that regard why should you be spared a lecture in consumerism, specifically what it means to boycott something since you don't seem to be practicing what you claim.
As to the meaning of standard, again you're claiming that anything less that the top of the line model is sub-standard, which is a load of crap. "Standard: an average or normal requirement, quality, quantity, level, grade, etc." That's a widely accepted definition of standard, which would not encompass the best of the state-of-the art in any field.
Now for affordable 1080p TVs here are some choices from a 10 second froogle search. On the first page alone there are 6 different manufacturers offering comparable products, so clearly Sony is not the only company providing this technology. It could certainly be argued that theirs is the best of the bunch, but you can't claim that you broke your boycott because Sony was the only possible option, merely the one you liked the most.
You're the one who claimed to be boycotting Sony when in fact it was a boycott of convenience at best, AND you asked the question "Should I watch substandard TV just to make a point?" Don't be surprised when in a public forum you're given an answer to a question you posted, rhetorical or not. Sorry you don't like the answer but own up to the fact that you were never really boycotting Sony as that would have required you to not consider their products in the decision to upgrade your TV. I have not extrapolated anything from your original comment, merely addressed it in detail.
Well, the 50% number I just sort of threw out there and is certainly something that would depend on what the industry could reasonably bear before it became overly prohibitive. The other 85% of profits certainly do go to overhead, but there have been studies that indicate that the ratio of advertising dollars to research dollars is as much as 4 to 1 in some cases. With figures like that it seems obvious that there's a lot more money that could be rolled into research without killing the company or product. Of course, I also recognize that less advertising means less sales, means less money for reasearch..... But it's not a binary balance, there's got to be other ratios of advertising to research funding that result in more money and effort going to reaserch. Or other expenses could be scaled back, such as executive compensation. High level execs certainly do a lot for a successful company, and they invest a huge amount of their lives (the good ones) but I think it's a no brainer that the difference between a $50 million and a $100 million yearly salary still leaves them damn well off. And $50 million buys a LOT of R&D. If tax incentives are a better way to encourage investment, then that should be explored as well, or a combination of all of the above. :(
While I don't have a lot of experience with all the inticacies of new drug development, I was involved for a few years in a project to build an automated robotic laboratory for one of the biggest pharmas around. The idea was we would automate the process of chemical tests performed for release candidate drugs, freeing up substantial amounts of time, money, and scientists to do what they do best and leave the monotonous chemical testing to machines. We were at the point where we had built a complete automated lab on their campus and were tuning the system for 3-day continuous uptime w/o supervision. When one of the company's major drugs was recalled from the market suddenly something like $2 billion-with-a-B of projected revenue was lost, and our work was one of the first to get its funding completely cut.
That project gave me a good deal of experience with what is involved in testing for bringing a drug to market, and I have a greater appreciation for the time, effort, and huge amounts of money that is required. Even so, like so many other aging policies and structures in our government - I think drug patents (and patents in general) need to be reevaluated and modernized. And part of that should include some oversight and accountability on the part of the patent holder for actually making a good faith effort to advance society in return for the limited time monopoly they are given. The system as been figured out over decades of use and abuse and is being gamed in ways that were not intended. I feel there needs to be a greater focus on ensuring a patent holder upholds their end of the bargain, and that probably means preventing things like granting a term extension for insignificant changes, not allowing tangental patents which block generics on technicalities after a patent expires, etc.
Excellent conversing with you.
If they were so god damn sure of themselves they wouldn't need so much insurance.
Except that even if a doctor is in the right, they can still incur thousands to hundreds of thousands in legal fees to prove it in court if sued. Part of the reason they need so much insurance is that settlement amounts and legal fees have been increasing, particularly the settlements. Granted, if someone's life is ruined or severely handicapped because of malpractice, I am all for compensating them well and appropriately. But there have been plenty of cases where the damages awarded are huge compared to the actual harm done. This is part of why we see such inflated health care costs, especially here in the US.
Also, considering the side effects of many prescription drugs, the specifics of dosage levels for a given patient/condition, and potential harmful interactions - it's really quite infeasible to do away with prescriptions entirely. Should Joe Schmoe really have the only word on whether or not he should be taking blood thinners? Or liver medication? Or antibiotics? There are some decisions that need to be controlled by professionals and advanced medicine is definitely one of them. There are just way too many ways to inadvertantly kill or injure yourself by taking prescription drugs without adequate oversight. Not to mention the potential harm to society by misusing antibiotics. And yes, this is different than letting people do their own brake jobs or some similar metaphor. The human body and its chemistry are very complex, way more complex than working on a car. Even professionals with years of education and training, experience, peer review, etc. can get diagnoses wrong. I'd hate to see what would happen if we let everybody figure out for themselves (with and without professional input) what medications were best for them.
I like your line of thinking on this one. Allow me to propose another method of getting the same results. Since the patents are a government provided monopoly, and the government defines the rules for the patents, why not add a clause for drug patents that requires 50% of profits from the drug be rolled back into research, instead of the ~15% that is now.
Now, of course, this will probably result in drug companies starting to do some funny accounting practices ala MPAA movie profit breakdowns. But since this is anticipated it can be codified into the law to some extent to help combat it. Will every accounting loophole be closed? Probably not, but a regulatory commission could be in place to keep on top of the latest loophole exploits and release advisories on closing them, with some mandate in the law that requires the issues actually be adressed. Penalties should be HUGE, not dollars huge, but total loss of patent huge.
Now, normally I'm one for less government intereference in the market, but in the case of drug patents the market itself exists in in current state precisely because of the government-granted patents. And those patents are in place to benefit the advancement of the arts and sciences (and in the case of drug patents I would also argue quality of life/health). Would it really be so terrible a thing to better define the requirements to demonstrate a patent is actually advancing things? It requires good legal wording, it requires constant supervision, and it requires that people familiar with - but not influenced by - the industry monitor it. Correctly balancing such laws are not easy, but nor should they be, however I don't think it's impossible to do it right either.
There has been a revolution. It was even televised, so I'm not sure what your excuse for missing it is.
Verizon decided not to lay fiber to my neighborhood because it was not cost-effective and this decision allowed them to do so. That's why I missed it.
What can I say? Should I watch substandard TV just to make a point?
Uhhh.... YES. That's the point of a boycott, as soon as you actually buy something from them you've crossed the picket line. Additionally you need to TELL them you are boycotting them and why, if you just casually never buy a product from Sony it doesn't tell them you disagree with their policies/practices/etc it just tells them you're not interested in their products for some unknown reason.
Also, there's a big difference between "best" and "substandard", in fact it's in the words themselves. By definition, the best product is not the standard for that field, the standard would be something more like the mean or median product. There are plenty of other TV producers that make very high quality TVs of all kinds, and considering the transient nature of the title of 'best' in such a rapidly changing market, your lapse in your boycott is essentially for a title that will likely be irrelevent in 6 months if all you care about is what's the 'best'. But by all means, keep pretending you're actually making a statement until the next shiny thing comes along.
The people looking for Auntie's Christmas stockings don't have anywhere else to go. Presumably they're they're looking for her because they don't want something made in a Chinese prison camp. If the latter was what they wanted they would have gone to Wal*Mart and been back already. No legitimate business which had a chance of succeeding will be materially harmed.
It's like you have no grasp of how people use the internet. People didn't jsut sit down and type in "www.auntiesstockings.com", they most likmely went to their search engine of choice and searched for something like 'holiday stockings crafts homemade' and got a bunch of hits for sites with those keywords. Then they see "Auntie's Christmas Stockings" and decide to give the site a try. As soon as they get there however the bar doesn't turn green, so they decide it's not a legitimate business and click Back on the browser and buy from a different site.
The point is not that previous customers are going to suddenly stop trusting a site they've already done business with (although that is a possibility). The point is that new users coming to a site for the first time, who use the IE7 green color as the sole indicator of trust, will immediately distrust the site when they don't see that green. It has nothing to do with the quality of the products or anythign else, no green bar will mean they assume it's a scam.
I agree that giving the user more info is a good thing, but the problem is MS has not provided adequate means for small legitimate businesses to display the same level of 'trust' as a major corporation. MS needs to provide a streamlined and straightforward way for ALL legitimate businesses to properly utilize this extra feature, by not doing that MS is essentially raising an artifical barrier to competition because of the lack of knowledge by the vast majority of the web using public. And the catch-22 is, if Joe Sixpack were savvy enough to properly use the anti-phishing notifications from IE7 then he probably wouldn't need to be protected from phishing/scam sites in the first place.
...if we should trust someone to give design interface advice who spreads their article over four pages.
;)
No, but we could probably get some sponsored ad income advice from them.
I must admit I loathe that tactic however.
Actually, in the US you can contest any claim on a bank statement of credit card report and the bank is required to prove that you made the purchase.
Which is exactly why the eventual full implementation of RealID becomes a problem. With a single point of entry for proof of identity that is considered Super Secure, Nigh Unspoofable (TM) by all institutions, all they will do is look in their records and confirm that, yes, your RealID was used in that transaction so it MUST have been you. Even today we have people who are victims of identity theft who struggle for years with the consequences of the fraud, sometimes even in the face of much evidence of identity theft companies refuse loans or other credit tools to victims. When the same scenario occurs in a few year's time, and the victim is trying to prove there was fraud in a system that's considered perfect by creditors, do you really think it will be easier to get them to believe you?
Still, the greatest argument against the RealID is a proper list of Pros and Cons for the system. When you write one up (exercise for the reader) and include things like cost of implementation and problems with the current system that will be solved, it doesn't make much sense at all. Unless you're the state and the little entry 'ability to monitor and track citizens at an unprecidented level' is in your Pro column, whereas for a citizen who values liberty, it sits squarely in the Con. (pun intended)
It couldn't possibly have anything to do with the fact that many of these artists we're "supporting" are actually dead? And that even if they're alive they very likely aren't receiving money?
I totally agree, that's also a big part of it. There are so many absurdities and abuses in the current music industry it's a herculean effort to name them all. I certainly wasn't suggesting that my viewpoint was the only issue, but one I feel has strong influence on the topic.
As a software enigineer especially, I see many parallels with what I do as compared to what musicians with RIAA contracts do. I don't get payed for every machine my code is put on, or for every time the program is run, that's not part of my contract, but it's also not part of ANY individual programmer's contract that I've ever heard of. It's hard then for me to sympathize when Johnny Rockstar gets $Y contracted and also $X for every time his song is played, and is complaining that after 50 years he stops getting that money. Granted, most of the money goes to the RIAA, we can make parallels with per-processor licensing, etc, etc... But there's still a big divide between Johhny's pay-per-play and my contracted one-time payment models. Is my software necessarily worth that kind of return? Possibly, that's up to the market to decide. But it's more easy to say that e.g. an MRI software engineer - whose software is daily responsible for helping diagnose illness and ultimately save lives - probably deserves continuous compensation more than a musician who sings about hanging with his buddies in a club. When you make a comparison like that the copyright protection and compensation mechanisms currently at work make even less sense.
I think you missed the original poster's point, when he said "an industry that has so thoroughly attacked Judao-Christian morality is finally reaping the socialist entitlement mentality whirlwind that it has sewn." The 'socialist entitlement mentality' bit doesn't refer to the music industry, but to the public at large who are using P2P and the like to share music. The common defense of which is usually something along the lines of "I want it but not for the price/restrictions that the music industry is demanding so I'll take it anyway and say 'damn The Man.'" That's the entitlement mentality at work. Now, whether or not this was brought on by the music industry attacking judeo-christian morality I'm not so sure. I think it's more a combination of having a highly demanded product, operating using monopoly and cartel business practices, creating artifical scarcity of something that is at the same time seemingly ubiquitous, and complaining about lost revenue while simultaneously raking in cash hand over fist. Not to mention extremely confusing and ever-shifting definitions of what, exactly, the consumer has purchased when they "buy" an album - is it licensed? is it owned? Do I own the song data or just the physcial CD? - and the rights that would therefore come with that product.
Anyway, I think the ubiquity of popular music coupled with the absurdly minimal costs of data copying today is what has lead people to feel entitled to music, if not free, then at least a lot cheaper then they can legally get it for. And really, can you blame us? The cost of an album hasn't really gone down for decades even though we can prove that one of the biggest costs to the music industry - distribution and physical media - has gone to nearly zero in the same period. That's the underlying problem the RIAA needs to address. People are on to their game and we aren't very happy about being manipulated into playing along.
So the reason they monitor you is to keep you innocent.
That's it, you win the doublespeak award this week and it's not even Tuesday yet. Your extremely light two sentences about Belgium announcing "mobile control" whatever that is, doesn't defend the above quote in the least. It's also a logical fallacy. People are not innocent only because they are being watched, they can be innocent just because they ARE, they don't need to be monitored to force them into that state. Others may (or may not) check their behavior knowing they are under surveillance, but being watched is certainly not a prerequisite for obeying the law.
The reason 'they' - the state - monitor you is to catch you doing something wrong, anything. Maybe it wasn't even illegal last week, but it is this week and now you're guilty. With the huge numbers of laws on the books everyone is almost guaranteed to be guilty of something at some point, the only problem has been catching everyone in the act of breaking some law. With ubiquitous surveillance, monitoring algorithms, etc. the state now, more than any other time in history, can keep a dirty file on everyone. The state can only punish criminals, but if everyone is a criminal then the state has achieved another level of control and can selectively enforce prosecution at will to manipulate, coherce, and consolidate more power. That particular 'power' may even be something as minor as increasing traffic ticket revenue, but the result is the same.
"selling out of consoles by underproducing" != "huge consumer demand"
For all we know there are only X-hundred-thousand harcore PS fans (in the US) who really want a PS3 and once that many have finally been released here by Sony demand will drop to nearly zero. Current estimates from EA say Sony only shipped around 200,000 at release. Now of course this may not be the case, but claiming that your product has a huge consumer demand because you didn't even make enough to satisfy initial demand is at best misinterpretting demand and at worst an ouright lie. For the record I'm not getting a next gen console so forget the strawman fanboy arguments.
Why the hell are all our bills the same size, shape, and color?
;)
Well, this may not be the actual truth, but I seem to recall that this is what I learned in grade school. When the US government finally standardized the monetary system they made a conscious decision to make all bills the same size and color to prevent them from being easily recognizable from a distance as a security measure. The idea was if someone pulls out a wad of bright orange $100 bills, as opposed to blue $1s then a mugger could spy this and know just who to rob. Of course, I always thought this was a bit silly because a wealthy mark gives themselves away in other ways such as quality of clothing, jewelry, etc. which is why I'm not sure this is a real fact. More likely, I think, is that it was easier and cheaper to use just one ink and one size on the cutting machine. I'll bet wikipedia probably has a better explanation but I leave that as an exercise to the reader.
1. Don't steal* music.
Right, which works perfectly assuming also that everyone the RIAA brings a suit against actually committed copyright infringement (*fixed that for ya). However the GP's question was how to support the people who aren't necessarily guilty, and/or being absolutely wiped out financially by the RIAA. One of the points that is usually contested is that the fine per infringement is rediculously high ($750 per song) and that level of damage doesn't even have to be demonstrated by the RIAA, they just need to prove there was infringement, whether one copy or 100. Adiitionally their tactics are very underhanded, to the point of almost being outright extortion. They have demonstrated in many cases thus far - sorry don't have time to go compile all the links - that they will use legal stalls to drag out the suits and make it more expensive for the defendent, as well as in a couple cases dropping the charges when it looks like they will lose, usually in such a way that the defendent cannot make a motion to recoup lawyers fees. THAT is what we're looking for solutions for. The fact is that the cost to defend oneself even when you are 100% innocent is so high that for a lot of people it's cheaper and easier to fold and pay the settlement money to the RIAA. That's not justice, that's scamming the system and taking advantage of people to prevent them from even having a chance to defend themselves. And even if they ARE guilty of the infringement, going to court might give them the chance to have the fines imposed be more reasonable than the proposed settlement value. Justice is not being served by people being extorted with the choice of admit full guilt and pay $X now, or suffer the financially crushing wrath of our multi-million dollaar legal team who can and will bleed you dry to make a point if nothing else.
I welcome your response to this but please at least identify yourself as the parent AC for clarity and continuity if you respond.
It would certainly appear that "for pain compliance against passive resisters" is the meat of that quote. Ergo, the position of the UCPD is exactly what we saw in the video.
It was also obvious that the use of the taser in the video meets that definition in letter only, the intent of the officers - and intent has a bearing in law - seemed to be something other than compliance. And this also brings us back to the question of could the student have even complied with the request to stand up? Many people have posted first-hand accounts of being tasered that support each side of that debate, so all we can say with certainty is that some people are temporarily immobilized and some are not. Now, I also submit that the LEOs who have been tasered as part of training and get right back up are likely in much better physical shape than your average Joe, so already they have a slight advantage in dealing with the effects of the taser. But, more importantly it is also demonstrated that multiple tasings exacerbate the effects. Which means even if he was just passivley resisting for shocks 1, 2 and 3, what about number 4? How about the fifth time? At some point the residual effects of multiple shocks in rapid succession DO incapacitate a person for a period of time. Also, biologically this makes sense since the taser causes rapid involuntary contraction of the muscles, rapidly burning ATP which takes time to be replenished. Shocking someone over and over again in a 6 minute period will magnify the effects of this. So when do we legally draw the line between tasing for "pain compliance" and just plain tasing to harm or intimidate? It is clear that the taser cannot be used on a person without limit, ie the more you tase them the more likely they are to comply. That may be true for a short time, but after that you're actually doing enough harm to them that it is counter to your goal because they lose ability to function mentally and physically. I also submit that the police made very little attempt to actually put him under arrest. Sure, it's easier to just electrocute somebody until they're totally incapacitated then deal with them, but that is not the intent of this policy. You don't just give an order then shock them until they nearly pass out if they don't comply. Is that how we want the police to deal with everything? Let's replace "taser" in this instance with "baton". Are you ok with the officers cracking him in the ribs every time he doesn't comply? At what point do you say that the use of force being applied is unjustified? It's nearly the same thing, just much easier to see/understand the pain being inflicted by a baton. A taser causes less lasting damage but inflicts as much, if not more, pain. In this case I'm arguing that the level of force used was unjustified, once the kid was down there were other options available to the officers who chose instead to shock him repeatedly. In the end they handcuffed him and carried him out, why did it require three extra tasings before they did that if they were going to do it anyway?
In addition the officer threatened to taser a student demanding his badge number. Now it was a bad time to be demanding the badge number, the officer was obviously busy, but the demand was not a taser-worthy offense. Threatening to taser the student showed that the officer was willing to use force indiscriminately. If the student had made a threatening move or direct threat he would have been justified in threatening to taser him, but demanding a badge number is not a threatening action. After all couldn't he have said instead "you'll get my damn badge number when we're done with this guy"? Or any number of other things instead of direct threat of violence?
So if they solicit minors in person at a small town playground it's one crime, but if they do it at Disney World where there are more kids, it should carry a different sentence? This is what I'm getting at, you can't just willy nilly pick and choose how you want to word the law, there has to be a consistent basis. Plus you ignored my suggestion that you apply your reasoning to the scenario of phone solicitiation vs VOIP phone solicitation. The VOIP phone uses the internet so therefore the crime must be worse right? Plus the net the predator casts for victims is limited by the predator's willingness and ability to travel, it is not in most cases worldwide. So we're still talking about a relatively small (one or two states) physical area. If you're going to appeal to the efficiency of the predator's search by using the internet, then refer to my example above about soliciting in Disney World vs a town park, why wouldn't that carry a heavier sentence as well?
I don't believe you're addressing the same point as me. My argument is not about convicting criminals by charging them with multiple crimes - although that is another argument in and of itself - or about the differences in criminal definitions between states. This is a question of whether it is appropriate and under what circumstances would there be different penalties for essentially the same crime in the same jurisdiction. Why is it necessary or appropriate to differentiate whether one committed this crime over the phone or over the internet? In either case it could be across state lines or not, so that doesn't enter into it.
This is not to say we should never differentiate between crimes based on minor differences. Assualting someone with your fists vs with a tire iron should be taken into account.
I'm arguing that using the internet in the case of this crime is a trivial detail that has no bearing on the underlying act such that it should affect sentencing. Specifically relating to this case we're talking about a crime committed IN Florida, and ONLY in Florida so we can even rule out the hypothetical cross-border state law variations. Why does solicitng a minor in person vs soliciting a minor over the internet require a different penalty? I am fully willing to accept that it should require a different penalty, but only if it makes sense and there is a legitimate reason, which thus far I have not heard. It is a crime to solicit a minor, period. The medium used in this case does not enter into it in the same way that it might in for example a libel case where the medium used might more directly affect the scope of damages.
You make good points, but I think you missed the parent's point. The question is, why is the exact same act, under the same circumstances, but over a slightly different transmission medium subject to stiffer penalties? Note that I specified "transmission medium" and not just medium, i.e. we're still talking about text communication, and not voice only vs full video with voice, that would change the basis of this debate. Does sending IMs via AOL instant messenger somehow make the crime worse than if they were sent over SMS? What if the two were talking on the phone, should the penalty for soliciting a minor over the phone somehow have a steeper penalty if the offender's phone was using VOIP? In both of these cases I'm trying to provide examples where the only difference between the scenarios is one takes place using the internet. I don't see how utilizing the internet makes the crime any worse and is deserving of stiffer penalties.
Committing a crime across state lines can be done via post, phone, shortwave radio transmision, laser communications, telegraph, visual signaling, etc. and yet there is not a different punishment for each of these different transmission methods, but suddenly using the network of the internet makes the crime worse? If there is a justification then I'm all ears, but thus far I can't think of one and no one has provided one yet. And before anyone replies, try applying your argument to the phone vs VOIP phone scenario and see if it still sticks. But I welcome all reasonable replies.
Now to fend off any straw men:
1) I do not disagree what happened was a crime and the offender should be punished if tried and found guilty.
2) My argument here is that ANY crime should not have the punishment increased just because it involved the internet unless that is specifically relevent to the case, otherwise same crime = same time. I'm generalizing this to help people step back from the immediate overreaction that seems to cause all logic to fly out the window when discussing crimes involving sexual assault/soliciting/etc of a minor.
3) Yes, I agree sexual crimes against a minor are horrible and should be pursued and punished fully, no one is saying otherwise. However, when developing laws we must weigh all facts and not just go with our gut, there needs to be reason on our side to hold the moral high ground.
4) We can have our cake and eat it too: we can make sure the perpetrators of these crimes are punished appropriately AND uphold the rule of law, we just need to actually divorce ourselves from emotion when crafting the laws to be sure that they make sense and are enforcable.
How about YOU try to respond to a trespassing call as a police officer, while surrounded by 50 idiot college kids screaming at you with an EXTREMELY suspicious individual also screaming nonsense at you and trying to incite the stupid kids to attack you.
So according to your account of the events an otherwise routine trespassing call had 50 kids screaming and ranting at cops BEFORE the cops had done anything? The crowd was not what provoked the situation, the guy screaming brought the crowd and the repeated tasering of him while on the ground is what got the crowd angry. Next, please find the quote in the video or other accounts wherein the suspect was inciting the crowd to attack the officers. Hint you won't find it, yelling "this is your patriot act, this is your police brutality" is NOT incitement to riot/attack police. Saying somthing like "get these fucking cops off me" or "someone do something" might be construed in that fashion, but nothing he yells is anything like those statements.
Another hint - he WAS handcuffed
Here's a hint for you, after the suspect is handcuffed and subdued it's excessive use of force to taser him again unless he is violently resisting. He's not violently resisting (key word 'violently') at any point, and especially after he is in cuffs. It's very straightforward in law: if the suspect is subdued, further use of force, in this case tasering, is unjustified.
The officers did what they were supposed to do when confronted with a non-cooperative individual who is lying limply,
Bzzzt wrong again, what they are supposed to do when someone is lying limply is subdue them and place them under arrest. Officers are taught numerous techniques for immobilizing a suspect and handcuffing them. After the first taser shock while he is on the ground it would have been trivial to handcuff him and place him under arrest which was not done. Are you seriously saying here that any time an officer encounters a limp person who doesn't cooperate they should first taser them? Yeah, that sounds completely reasonable and very legal. I challenged you to produce any police procedure, training manual, or law that indicates that is the proper course of action.
I agree the kid was being a complete ass, and yelling at an officer is never a good way to resolve things. In fact I will go so far as to say the first use of the taser may have been justified. However, once the taser has been employed the subject needs to be subdued, the officers chose instead to give him orders and tase him when he did not follow them (nevermind the legitimate argument that because of the shock he MAY not have been physically able to comply). A taser is not designed or issued to officers as a motivational tool, or to induce subjects to comply with orders, it is for incapacitating a violent or forcefully uncooperative suspect, the next step being taking them into custody and/or handcuffing them. Police training stipulates these are non-lethal takedown devices, not motivational aids, to be used in lieu of other uses of force when required. And the law also requires that any force used be justified and PROPORTIONAL to the threat. Tasings 3, 4 and 5 in this particular case were no longer in proportion to the threat, no matter how legitimate the first two may have been.
The force used in this video is necessary for some violent suspects, and in many other cases might have been warranted, but in THIS CASE the use of force appears to be patently gratuitous and needs to be addressed by a formal review of the officers actions and some form of punishment if found to be in violation of police procedure/the law, which it most likely is.
Mod parent back up to repair karma (assuming the karma equations even work out that way), this wasn't flamebait, it was a quote from a character in Clerks. You know, meant to be funny. Sheesh, some people read something they hate and mod w/o a clue, sorry dude. :( You even attributed the quote to Randal, how much easier could you have made it?
Don't forget LASER. I find it much more terrifying to tell captured secret agents that they are going to be executed by being fed to my tank full of sharks with frikkin Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation devices on their heads! ;)