What disgusts me most about the Circuit City scenario (which is also played out in many other industries every day) is that these "artificial persons" (for what is a corporation if not a legally recognized entity under law?) have forsaken their responsibility to society in order to worship at the altar of profitability.
And, yes, "artificial person" is the correct legal phrase according to my fifth edition of The Law Dictionary (based on the 1888 Cochran's Law Lexicon).
One principal of a democracy is that everyone can verify the counting of votes. Now unless you teach everyone how to program I don't see how you can preserve this principal.
It also requires you teach everyone to count, which is up for question given the quality of our schools these days. ("Principle", by the way.)
If source cannot be produced (or it does not compile to the same machine code present on the voting machines) then those responsible should be rounded up and tried for treason.
No, no, no; the constitution strictly defines and limits "treason" for compelling reasons. Maintain a sense of proper proportion. I'll settle for having the corporation and its officers convicted on fraud and conspiracy charges (both criminal felony and civil damages); and any elected or appointed officials who facilitated such should face the same, along with impeachment to prohibit them from serving any office of honor, profit, or trust ever again. And, of course, there's some poetry that the felony convictions should strip them of their right to vote.
"For the first time, California is demanding the right to try hacking every voting machine with 'red teams' of computer experts and to study the software inside the machines, line-by-line, for security holes."
And this is a bad thing for the public... HOW?
Because Democrats have an equal or superior history with vote fraud; the effort is obviously incomplete without 'blue teams' to try hacking them as well. =)
It amazes me that the US can't get their elections done right. They have the technology to power the worlds most important financial systems [...] Or am I over looking something here...?
It's a four cylinder game... Audience Size, Audience Composition, Writing Quality, Shmoozing Skill. Fire on all four and you'll get what you need, blogger or "journalist".
Three cylinders CAN be made to work, if they're mighty enough; eg., Gabe and Tycho, who don't seem to do noticable schmoozing, chosing instead to rule by fear. Of course, you can only afford to rule by fear if you are the eight hundred pound gorilla for Audience Size, Audience Composition, and Writing Quality... or if you count "felony-grade blackmail" as a "schmoozing skill".
The upper limit price for about the next hundred years, even with exponential growth, is near $4000/kilo, or an increase of around 4000%; at that point, extraction from seawater becomes economically practical. Back at that last big price spike (see previously linked graph) in the late 1970's the Japanese set up a pilot plant, which ended up showing about that level of cost. They had hoped it would work better than it did, and it was good research, but immediately most un-useful given the way prices fell back by the time (1986) they had it producing.
And, speaking of things others will probably mention, plutonium extraction from ANY kind of used fuel is a prerequisite for breeders, BTW, and we've already been holding back on that due to proliferation worries.
Yes, but consider enriched uranium costs ~1500$ while raw uranium costs 90$ So making raw uranium cost 400x will just effectively double their costs, and I doubt it'll rise so much.
Umm... dead wrong.
First, the enrichment process starts with one pile of natural uranuium (NU), at about 0.7% U235, a trace of U234, and the remaining 99+% U238. At the end of the enrichment process, you have two piles; one is at 3-5% enrichment (for commercial LEU reactor fuel; more for research reactors or bombs), the other about 0.1 to 0.3% U235 (depleted uranium, or DU). To get the extra U235 in the EU, you need between five and eleven weights of NU, depending on desired output grade and DU depletion capabilities.
The output DU is worth only marginally more than an equivalent mass of lead, useful but neglectable here. Thus, of the $1500 (assuming that price is correct), between $350 and 1000 of it (probably about $600) are the cost of the input Uranium. The rest is the cost of energy (plus some enrichment equipment amortization) for the separation process (call it $900). So, to double the output price of $1500 you probably only need to increase by about a factor of 3.5 or so.
Disclaimer: the input numbers sound about right, but it's been over a decade since I was studying nuclear engineering.
How long until Mr Davidson gets prosecuted by some lawyer working for McCain who hasn't realised that laughing along with the joke is a lot more dignified than litigation?
Even if McCain's team would be so politically stupid as to try such a lawsuit during what is evidently (but depressingly) the 2008 presidential campaign season, and even if they could find a lawyer stupid enough to help them, no doubt Mr. Davidson can find a not-so-stupid lawyer to file a countersuit, claiming that every instance where McCain's page loaded the image was a violation of the template terms of use, and thus a copyright violation... which, in turn, might bring his stance on copyright into political focus, where he faces the horrible choices of (a) pissing off the **AA copyright-holding consortia with their lovely financial campaign contributions, (b) pissing off the copyright-violating unwashed masses with their ever so important votes, or (c) coming up with a solution to the problem of balancing the interests of these two rapaciously greedy sides in the copyright wars that will prove universally acclaimed.
If he can manage (c), he is the reincarnation of King Solomon, and for his wisdom deserves to win the nomination and election uncontested; solving the Iraq mess, the impending US energy Crisis, and the US Left-Right political divide will be trivial challenges for such a man. However, I don't think that will be the case (and I still won't vote Republican even then; blame Tricky Dick and Shrubbery Junior). Choices (a) and (b) remaining, this leaves a lose-lose situation. Even without the fabled Wisdom of Solomon, I think his team has enough political savvy to avoid being that stupid. Most ex-soldiers turned politician have the sense not to start unnecessary wars.
UpMod Parent, BTW. While I'd agree that a warning that a normal part of their warranty "repair" process could reasonably include restoring the hard drive to the factory state, even if only for their convenience, I don't think insisting on Windows On Board sounds kosher.
what next in the agenda? Mandate water to flow upwards? Ice to burn things? Pigs to fly?
Trying to set "pi" equal to three is a traditional passtime of Bible thumpers, and about on my expectation level for this White House.
There are rumors that such things exist, in very special cases, but is easier to see pigs fly than to see a secure windows machine.
This is because most geeks who try it find building a trebuchet simple and fun, with clear documentation readily available. It also usually involves less shit being thrown at your efforts to make the project blow up.
Viacom have adequate reason to believe that this infringes copyright.
On what basis do you make such an assertion?
And on what basis would they get around 17 USC 201(a):
Copyright in a work protected under this title vests initially in the author or authors of the work. The authors of a joint work are co-owners of copyright in the work.
...and 17 USC 103:
"The subject matter of copyright as specified by section 102 includes compilations and derivative works, but protection for a work employing preexisting material in which copyright subsists does not extend to any part of the work in which such material has been used unlawfully.
The copyright in a compilation or derivative work extends only to the material contributed by the author of such work, as distinguished from the preexisting material employed in the work, and does not imply any exclusive right in the preexisting material. The copyright in such work is independent of, and does not affect or enlarge the scope, duration, ownership, or subsistence of, any copyright protection in the preexisting material.
I don't think the creators of this video have a strong enough claim that this was deliberate misrepresentation.
By Definition, a DMCA notice must include "A statement that the information in the notification is accurate, and under penalty of perjury, that the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed." Emphasis added to point out how serious the misrepresentation is, even if it isn't deliberate. IAmALaymanNotALawyer, but someone else claiming "under penalty of perjury" that they are the rightful copyright holder to a parody you created sounds like almost enough for a Slander of Title lawsuit. (Alas, it probably isn't.)
...we allow it, but discourage it heavily. It's useful as a fallback measure; the local disaster plan admits we're going to use GMail as an interim step if central IT feels a burning need to clusterfsck the mail server while leaving the main network intact. However, as part of the annual data security lecture, we remind faculty and staff that sending FERPA-protected data over insecure network methods is a big no-no, that email is inherently insecure, and that web mail is doubly so. (Well, mostly; the local webmail app is on an https: server, meaning it's no worse than regular email checks via ssh to a mail server unix shell, so it's just "insecure".) A basic "any competent geek can forge an email" demonstration is included in the lecture, so local users are properly skeptical about email origins, and I also remind users of the basic insecurity any time I notice them using webmail.
If you're in a HIPPA environment, on the other hand, I'd give it some strong thought.
They should just pull a Viacom though, and ask for $1,000,000,000 in compensation.
Kinda hard to do with a straight face, given that they're trying to convince a judge that his lawsuits are frivolous— the word "Chutzpah" springs to mind.
There's no hope of them getting a billion bucks out of him, even if he not only goes bankrupt but shishishorupf.
I'd settle for disbarring and a federal injunction, since they might have a hope of actually getting that. Tar and feathers would be a classic touch, but more honor than Thompson deserves.
However demanding compensation from them is a bit much.
Mostly.
However... if you have a support contract; if you have well-written and up-to-date documentation complete with change logs, describing your network infrastructure, how the widget integrates into your systems, and which of its marketing-brochure functions it is expected to perform in practice; if you have created a maintenance user account with all necessary and sufficient permissions and access to allow their technicians to diagnose and maintain their product; and if you provide them with a procedure for requesting supplements to the aforementioned documentation and/or maintenance account permissions... THEN to the extent that they either are failing to meet the support level stated in the contract, or to the extent that their techs need assistance or support beyond a demonstration of the problem and the aforementioned supplement requests, you might (In My ta Hell with y'all Opinion) have some sort of basis for claiming reimbursement.
Of course, I strongly suspect VincenzoRomano is lacking one or more of those prerequisites, and that getting compensation without a visit to court is unlikely. In the future, odds of this problem might be reduced by an inquiry to the manufacturer before purchasing as to whether they have any satisfied customers using similar products for similar functions who might be willing to discuss their experiences. If there's one local, you can point your boss to this incident, and possibly get a company-expensed lunch for you and an opposite number at the "satisfied" customer for extended technical discussion. If you've the gift o' gab, you might even convince the boss that a few libations shared while on the expense account would be more likely to reveal the candid truth. Just make sure it's your company's account, not the sales critter's. =)
And I'm split. Should I run around worrying that it might go off, or should I get the popcorn ready for one helluva show?
I wouldn't worry; you should expect to be within the area of total destruction, and dead instantly — much better than trying to survive the subsequent ice age. The caldera covers a large hunk of Wyoming.
Can? The cycle's not that regular (even assuming it's real), so it could easily be another hundred millenia. It's probably more realistic to expect that the next pop is about twenty millenia off... give or take thirty.
If the Yellowstone Supervolcano blows, the last forecast I heard was that it will be about 100 times as powerful as the Thera/Santorini explosion. The sound alone will probably kill everyone in the contenental US instantly. It's only the rest of the human race that has to suffer and die during the resulting ice age.
For every problem there is a solution which is simple, obvious, and wrong."
— Albert Einstein
For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
— H. L. Mencken
A friend of mine in high school was pretty seriously stocky in his freshman year (5'6, 230#, BMI=37). He got fed up with being picked on for it, and started serious weight training and some flavor of martial arts (no, not sumo, but it wasn't karate). Be senior year, he was... just slightly taller, and just slightly heavier (5'8", 250#, BMI=38). He had a little bit of "baby fat" in his cheeks, but the rest had shifted from fat to muscle.
Genetics and diet largely determine BMI; exercise helps shift body fat ratios.
Don't the laws of conservation apply to children as well, or are they from an alternate universe? The UK should be careful publishing these results, lest some nut starts enslaving children to build his perpetual motion device.
You're obviously not a mother or a father (even Slashdot dating jokes aside). The parents of any teenager will cheerfully agree that their children are obviously from an alternate universe, and the parents of any small child will assure you that a typical toddler and a typical perpetual motion machine can only be distinguished in that the toddler never stops accelerating.
Slashdot Mirror
What disgusts me most about the Circuit City scenario (which is also played out in many other industries every day) is that these "artificial persons" (for what is a corporation if not a legally recognized entity under law?) have forsaken their responsibility to society in order to worship at the altar of profitability.
They haven't forsaken it, corporations were ordered to abandon such responsibility by the courts; one of the last legal legacies of the robber baron age of capitalism.
And, yes, "artificial person" is the correct legal phrase according to my fifth edition of The Law Dictionary (based on the 1888 Cochran's Law Lexicon).
the 50's era (a time that conservatives like yourself laud as being the American ideal)
1950's or 1850's?
(Yes, it's flamebait and a troll. Go ahead and mod it.)
One principal of a democracy is that everyone can verify the counting of votes. Now unless you teach everyone how to program I don't see how you can preserve this principal.
It also requires you teach everyone to count, which is up for question given the quality of our schools these days. ("Principle", by the way.)
If source cannot be produced (or it does not compile to the same machine code present on the voting machines) then those responsible should be rounded up and tried for treason.
No, no, no; the constitution strictly defines and limits "treason" for compelling reasons. Maintain a sense of proper proportion. I'll settle for having the corporation and its officers convicted on fraud and conspiracy charges (both criminal felony and civil damages); and any elected or appointed officials who facilitated such should face the same, along with impeachment to prohibit them from serving any office of honor, profit, or trust ever again. And, of course, there's some poetry that the felony convictions should strip them of their right to vote.
And this is a bad thing for the public... HOW?
Because Democrats have an equal or superior history with vote fraud; the effort is obviously incomplete without 'blue teams' to try hacking them as well. =)
It amazes me that the US can't get their elections done right. They have the technology to power the worlds most important financial systems [...] Or am I over looking something here...?
Today's piece on the largest financial data breach in history, perhaps?
HTH. HAND.
So, does this also help explain the strange allure of gold throughout history, and the use of gold for religious ornamentation?
It's a four cylinder game... Audience Size, Audience Composition, Writing Quality, Shmoozing Skill. Fire on all four and you'll get what you need, blogger or "journalist".
Three cylinders CAN be made to work, if they're mighty enough; eg., Gabe and Tycho, who don't seem to do noticable schmoozing, chosing instead to rule by fear. Of course, you can only afford to rule by fear if you are the eight hundred pound gorilla for Audience Size, Audience Composition, and Writing Quality... or if you count "felony-grade blackmail" as a "schmoozing skill".
The upper limit price for about the next hundred years, even with exponential growth, is near $4000/kilo, or an increase of around 4000%; at that point, extraction from seawater becomes economically practical. Back at that last big price spike (see previously linked graph) in the late 1970's the Japanese set up a pilot plant, which ended up showing about that level of cost. They had hoped it would work better than it did, and it was good research, but immediately most un-useful given the way prices fell back by the time (1986) they had it producing.
And, speaking of things others will probably mention, plutonium extraction from ANY kind of used fuel is a prerequisite for breeders, BTW, and we've already been holding back on that due to proliferation worries.
Yes, but consider enriched uranium costs ~1500$ while raw uranium costs 90$ So making raw uranium cost 400x will just effectively double their costs, and I doubt it'll rise so much.
Umm... dead wrong.
First, the enrichment process starts with one pile of natural uranuium (NU), at about 0.7% U235, a trace of U234, and the remaining 99+% U238. At the end of the enrichment process, you have two piles; one is at 3-5% enrichment (for commercial LEU reactor fuel; more for research reactors or bombs), the other about 0.1 to 0.3% U235 (depleted uranium, or DU). To get the extra U235 in the EU, you need between five and eleven weights of NU, depending on desired output grade and DU depletion capabilities.
The output DU is worth only marginally more than an equivalent mass of lead, useful but neglectable here. Thus, of the $1500 (assuming that price is correct), between $350 and 1000 of it (probably about $600) are the cost of the input Uranium. The rest is the cost of energy (plus some enrichment equipment amortization) for the separation process (call it $900). So, to double the output price of $1500 you probably only need to increase by about a factor of 3.5 or so.
Disclaimer: the input numbers sound about right, but it's been over a decade since I was studying nuclear engineering.
How long until Mr Davidson gets prosecuted by some lawyer working for McCain who hasn't realised that laughing along with the joke is a lot more dignified than litigation?
Even if McCain's team would be so politically stupid as to try such a lawsuit during what is evidently (but depressingly) the 2008 presidential campaign season, and even if they could find a lawyer stupid enough to help them, no doubt Mr. Davidson can find a not-so-stupid lawyer to file a countersuit, claiming that every instance where McCain's page loaded the image was a violation of the template terms of use, and thus a copyright violation... which, in turn, might bring his stance on copyright into political focus, where he faces the horrible choices of (a) pissing off the **AA copyright-holding consortia with their lovely financial campaign contributions, (b) pissing off the copyright-violating unwashed masses with their ever so important votes, or (c) coming up with a solution to the problem of balancing the interests of these two rapaciously greedy sides in the copyright wars that will prove universally acclaimed.
If he can manage (c), he is the reincarnation of King Solomon, and for his wisdom deserves to win the nomination and election uncontested; solving the Iraq mess, the impending US energy Crisis, and the US Left-Right political divide will be trivial challenges for such a man. However, I don't think that will be the case (and I still won't vote Republican even then; blame Tricky Dick and Shrubbery Junior). Choices (a) and (b) remaining, this leaves a lose-lose situation. Even without the fabled Wisdom of Solomon, I think his team has enough political savvy to avoid being that stupid. Most ex-soldiers turned politician have the sense not to start unnecessary wars.
Clicky.
UpMod Parent, BTW. While I'd agree that a warning that a normal part of their warranty "repair" process could reasonably include restoring the hard drive to the factory state, even if only for their convenience, I don't think insisting on Windows On Board sounds kosher.
what next in the agenda? Mandate water to flow upwards? Ice to burn things? Pigs to fly?
Trying to set "pi" equal to three is a traditional passtime of Bible thumpers, and about on my expectation level for this White House.
There are rumors that such things exist, in very special cases, but is easier to see pigs fly than to see a secure windows machine.
This is because most geeks who try it find building a trebuchet simple and fun, with clear documentation readily available. It also usually involves less shit being thrown at your efforts to make the project blow up.
FTFA, the real prize is a Golden Piece of Shit. It's actually quite attractive looking. =)
Viacom have adequate reason to believe that this infringes copyright.
On what basis do you make such an assertion?
And on what basis would they get around 17 USC 201(a):
I don't think the creators of this video have a strong enough claim that this was deliberate misrepresentation.
By Definition, a DMCA notice must include "A statement that the information in the notification is accurate, and under penalty of perjury, that the complaining party is authorized to act on behalf of the owner of an exclusive right that is allegedly infringed." Emphasis added to point out how serious the misrepresentation is, even if it isn't deliberate. IAmALaymanNotALawyer, but someone else claiming "under penalty of perjury" that they are the rightful copyright holder to a parody you created sounds like almost enough for a Slander of Title lawsuit. (Alas, it probably isn't.)
If you're in a HIPPA environment, on the other hand, I'd give it some strong thought.
They should just pull a Viacom though, and ask for $1,000,000,000 in compensation.
Kinda hard to do with a straight face, given that they're trying to convince a judge that his lawsuits are frivolous— the word "Chutzpah" springs to mind.
There's no hope of them getting a billion bucks out of him, even if he not only goes bankrupt but shishishorupf . I'd settle for disbarring and a federal injunction, since they might have a hope of actually getting that. Tar and feathers would be a classic touch, but more honor than Thompson deserves.
However demanding compensation from them is a bit much.
Mostly.
However... if you have a support contract; if you have well-written and up-to-date documentation complete with change logs, describing your network infrastructure, how the widget integrates into your systems, and which of its marketing-brochure functions it is expected to perform in practice; if you have created a maintenance user account with all necessary and sufficient permissions and access to allow their technicians to diagnose and maintain their product; and if you provide them with a procedure for requesting supplements to the aforementioned documentation and/or maintenance account permissions... THEN to the extent that they either are failing to meet the support level stated in the contract, or to the extent that their techs need assistance or support beyond a demonstration of the problem and the aforementioned supplement requests, you might (In My ta Hell with y'all Opinion) have some sort of basis for claiming reimbursement.
Of course, I strongly suspect VincenzoRomano is lacking one or more of those prerequisites, and that getting compensation without a visit to court is unlikely. In the future, odds of this problem might be reduced by an inquiry to the manufacturer before purchasing as to whether they have any satisfied customers using similar products for similar functions who might be willing to discuss their experiences. If there's one local, you can point your boss to this incident, and possibly get a company-expensed lunch for you and an opposite number at the "satisfied" customer for extended technical discussion. If you've the gift o' gab, you might even convince the boss that a few libations shared while on the expense account would be more likely to reveal the candid truth. Just make sure it's your company's account, not the sales critter's. =)
And I'm split. Should I run around worrying that it might go off, or should I get the popcorn ready for one helluva show?
I wouldn't worry; you should expect to be within the area of total destruction, and dead instantly — much better than trying to survive the subsequent ice age. The caldera covers a large hunk of Wyoming.
how much time can we really have left?
Can? The cycle's not that regular (even assuming it's real), so it could easily be another hundred millenia. It's probably more realistic to expect that the next pop is about twenty millenia off... give or take thirty.
Judging by all the inflation, pressure and possible eruptions - scientists have concluded that Yellowstone really needs to get laid.
Ah! I always wondered where that "sacrifice a virgin" meme came from.
If the Yellowstone Supervolcano blows, the last forecast I heard was that it will be about 100 times as powerful as the Thera/Santorini explosion. The sound alone will probably kill everyone in the contenental US instantly. It's only the rest of the human race that has to suffer and die during the resulting ice age.
Have a nice day. =)
For every problem there is a solution which is simple, obvious, and wrong."
— Albert Einstein
For every complex problem, there is a solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
— H. L. Mencken
A friend of mine in high school was pretty seriously stocky in his freshman year (5'6, 230#, BMI=37). He got fed up with being picked on for it, and started serious weight training and some flavor of martial arts (no, not sumo, but it wasn't karate). Be senior year, he was... just slightly taller, and just slightly heavier (5'8", 250#, BMI=38). He had a little bit of "baby fat" in his cheeks, but the rest had shifted from fat to muscle.
Genetics and diet largely determine BMI; exercise helps shift body fat ratios.
Don't the laws of conservation apply to children as well, or are they from an alternate universe? The UK should be careful publishing these results, lest some nut starts enslaving children to build his perpetual motion device.
You're obviously not a mother or a father (even Slashdot dating jokes aside). The parents of any teenager will cheerfully agree that their children are obviously from an alternate universe, and the parents of any small child will assure you that a typical toddler and a typical perpetual motion machine can only be distinguished in that the toddler never stops accelerating .
Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!