How much does it cost? Currently you can't grab the videos from youtube and do anything with them without violating the youtube TOS. So the videos are effectivly theirs and not the publics unless your wanting to face felony computer trespass charges like the chick who caused the girl to commit suicide.
So how much does it cost to produce videos of government and give them away to a company that supported the current administration's election so that company can end up with exclusive control over them and serve all the ads they want? I would say the cost of production at least. And I would say the cost of freedom when the government is allowed to do this without an open bidding process or authorization by congress to give public domain works to a company that backed the president during his bid for election.
Is this the hope and change we can believe in? Or is it yet another example of politics as usual being blinded by technology?
Ministry of truth? Do you mean a propagnda machine? At least with CSPAN and their video service you get the entire story. It looks like here you will only get the tidbits they deem worthy.
I'm waiting for one of them to only contain a half statement from a congressman or senator or something that makes them look entirely opposite of their stated positions.
Well, this story also forgets the question of Costs and why wasn't this process bidded out?
I mean I can sort of understand giving Haliburten a no bid contract in the early portions of the wars because of the need to have a company of their capabilities there in such short time was necessary. Granted, the no bid portion may have lasted longer then what might have been necessary but there was an initial need. I don't really know what is so pressing about time or anything on this that it couldn't undergo an open bid process.
Even if the youtube services is free to the government, the content belongs to the people and giving Google control over it is definitely a payment because you are forced to see their adds and visit their site. There should be an open bid process just like any other government contract and the best bid should win. I wonder if this is the change we can believe in? Stacking unnecessary pork that doesn't do what it intended into a stimulus package and no bid contracts to campaign supporters. The only change here is that people don't seem to care now that Bush and Cheney is out of office.
Wait a minute, your not arguing that I'm wrong, your arguing that the penalties of something wasn't severe enough.
The supreme court backed Exxon up in the "law" of the situation and the captain was prosecuted according to the law. They paid about 2 billion in clean up efforts and another billion in criminal charges, the captain of the Exxon Valdez was brought up on felony charges but the jury didn't convict him of those and instead convicted him on misdemeanor charges that carried $50,000 fine and community service. The US coast guard suspended his license and he couldn't work for 9 months.
This is not a case in disagreement with me or what I said. Your just not happy about the penalties that came about. Again, the law was used and no one hid behind a corporate veil. Everyone responsible had the law applied to them even though the state couldn't get a felony conviction on the captain and Exxon had the law behind the lawsuits applied properly after several appeals to higher courts and ultimately the Supreme Court. It's the same thing that would have happened if it was you and your brother instead of some corporation if all of the circumstances leading up to and just after the accident were the same. It was a Jury and a Court of law properly applying the law that caused the penalties to be the way they were, not the corporate veil.
BTW, This is an odd case because it involves maritime law which states the Captain of the vessel is responsible for the ship regardless of where he was at the time or if his subordinate caused the problem. Maritime law is different then regular laws when the water is large enough to be navigated for commerce. That is why he was prosecuted when the accident happened when he was in his bunk taking personal time. Because the people actually steering the ship didn't get prosecuted was a result of maritime laws, not some corporate veil.
Maritime laws are a unique set of laws designed to deal specifically with the hazards of ships and shipping. Think of it as FAA laws/rules that regulate pilots differently then civilians driving to work.
Indeed, if they can't even get the difference between "their" and "they're," how do they expect to get the difference between a motion to dismiss for lack of personal jurisdiction and a motion to dismiss for lack of subject matter jurisdiction?
And this is in no way an attack on you specifically, sumdumass.
Read it again. This time with some quotes they need to know that their short sighted "I can't be punished" theories aren't all that strong outside of their mind or circle.
I didn't intend for it to go that way but I guess it show a little about how we both understood something might not be the way it actually is or was intended. This was the point I was after with the Short sighted Theories. My mistake cause you to see something different then it was intended which caused you to react with intentions that I didn't really intend. This is why law can be so difficult to the untrained person and why the author of the article thought it necessary to talk about it. Minor misconceptions can lead to legal catastrophe.
Something your missing is that the portion of any company doing business in any other country then they are based from are subject to the laws of the country they are doing business in. This means that if Egypt or China has a law requiring the information to be turned over, if they don't, not only can the be bared from doing business in those countries, but their corporate personnel who are operating inside the country who also refuse to hand the information over are subject to penalties of those laws.
If Egypt truly does "disappear", Torture and kill their prisoners and suspects, then I'm not sure why exposing the execs of Vodaphone to that warrants any more carelessness then the people the government are looking after. Are Vodaphone employees any less important in life, will their families not suffer just the same with them locked up in prison or missing forever? The best they can do is make the information public that they complied with it so any criminal activities that were perpetrated by necessity can be covered and those responsible can take actions to protect themselves. The disadvantage is that regular criminals will be able to do the same but that seems like an even trade.
What would you do in their situation? Throw your loyal employees into a situation where they are facing everything you fear for the others or protect them by handing the information over and then disclosing it another country where it's outside the reach of the Egyptian government and hope it leaks back into the country to protect the innocent who were acting out of necessity?
I'm not sure why people think some dissident is more important then another human being.
The problem is when you have patterns of abuse from certain corporations over a period of time. The corporation itself, based on its business model, is incentivized to act in certain ways, and whoever happens to be in the driver seat will feel the pull of those incentives. Knowing that there are counter-incentives (the risk of losing it all) could help balance the action of corporations. Imagine if Viacom could be executed for sending too many fraudulent DMCA takedown notices.
Don't conflate abuse with breaking the law. They aren't always the same things. Now, someone breaking the law to commit what you consider an abuse is someone who will be punished under the law. Inventive or not, anyone breaking the law is subject to the penalties of breaking the law, anyone who is conspiring to break the law, perhaps by ordering a subordinate to break it, is subject to the same. The incentives you notice are nothing more then the willingness to break a law by the people working at the corporation.
Of course, I'm of the opinion that memetic organisms should have life spans artifically imposed on them, purely as a matter of enlightened self interest. Allowing any entity, memetic or biological, to accumulate power over too long a time is a very very bad idea.
I'm not entirely sure how that could be a good idea, every year, 1/20th of the country would lose their jobs entirely. Every year, 1/20th of GDP will disappear with little to no hope for improvement. And every year, all US based corps would be subject to the powers of foreign corps.
Now don't get hung up on the one twentieth numbers, it will equalize out to that if they are all disbanded after 20 years. Some will be less and some will be more but the average will be the same or near enough to make the number real enough for our purposes.
I wouldn't even mind seeing a 20 year "flush" on congress where every 20 years you simply clean out the whole thing and start from scratch, with no one who previously served being allowed to serve again.
This doesn't sound bad but I think is should be more like life in public office or some sort of term limit to a maximum of 20 years. If we reset congress every 20 years altogether, then after 10 years in, some people won't run against failed congressmen. At around 5 years, they would probably have a free ride because no one who is capable of raising the type of money needed to run against incumbent politicians would waste it for such a little term. Everyone who thinks they can do some good will have too little time to do it and so on.
Surely with the hundreds of millions of people we have in this country, we can find a few hundred every 20 years to step up and do some public service.
With all the proven people out of the mix, I'm not sure who would be left to do it. My neighbor is a welfare recipient who I'm sure would act in his own interest, then there are business people who would probably do the same, in the end, we are in the same boat that we have now except that some people won't toss their hat in when we need them the most.
Not really, it just means that the vice president won't have to wait 8 years before running. You would end up switching roles of the president and vice president for 16 years instead of one riding on the coat tails of the other after 4 or 8 years.
Here is the question, would you vote for Biden-Obama knowing that you already voted for Obama-Biden? Most people would say yes, especially if whoever was playing president put the other front and center on a lot of issues.
I think it's more along the lines of his name then seniority.
He didn't have that much seniority when he drowned that call girl after driving drunk into the river/lake whatever it was.
There once was a senator from mass Who went out in search of some ass, lucked up and found it, but fucked up and drowned it, but that was not the end of his ass.
You know, they estimate that he was going between 80-90 miles per hour when the accident happened. They say it would take that much force for the impact to remover her panties and put them in the glove box.
Ok, I know that was low but I remember it like it was yesterday.
The law would probably be better phrased as something like
No internet service provider can by their own action or actions by others hired by them or acting on their behalf: route, shape, or otherwise make any packet or internet transmission over the internet service slower then what the customer is charged for as implied by advertising, billing structure, and common interpretations of the service offered or advertised because of a payment or nonpayment of a third party. And no traffic originating from ports shall be blocked, impeded, slowed down, or otherwise restricted beyond the same limits without express permission of the customer. No extra charge can be applied to the customer for refusing to allow certain ports to be blocked. Nothing in this prohibits the the management of traffic to ensure the integrity of the network outside of providing the customer what they pay for.
That law would be short and to the point but allow ISPs to negotiate faster connections from certain sites as long as the consumer gets what they paid for. The Idea of net neutrality (to me at least) is similar to Micheal Powell's interpretation, You can give them more but not less. When I pay for my service, I pay to the site, the site pays for their service which pays to come back to me. If I get more then I paid for, I'm happy, If I only get what I paid for, I'm happy. If I get less then what I paid for because the ISP is demanding a payment from a site that isn't affiliated with them, then I'm getting screwed.
That's a little misunderstanding that a lot of people have. ISP's are not common carriers even though they have protections similar to one and sometimes use lines that are regulated as common carrier status.
The ISPs never actually had common carrier status at all. A few years back with the communications deregulation act, someone (I forget who) attempted to force Time Warner to provide access to their road runner lines. The FCC ruled that internet was an information service and not subject to common carrier status like Cable TV or Phone service. This made it through the courts upholding the FCC's notion of it being an information service and not a common carrier even though the lines it is delivered on, other internet services might be, and/or the parent company might be. The DMCA legislation provides common carrier like protections to ISPs which keeps the confusion alive.
The problem is that a corporation doesn't act by itself. It acts at the direction of the board and management that direct it's actions. In essence, we do have the death penalty for corporations because any manager or director shown to have intentionally killed someone, will be subject to the death penalty just as you or I would.
Don't let this separate entity thing confuse you. It you take all the people out of a corporation, it will do exactly nothing. It won't sell anything, it won't poison anyone, it won't pollute the environment, it won't do anything. Now just as there are with most laws, there is a component called intent. If you intend to set out and do something illegal, you get the full charges pressed against you. If you unintentionally do the same, then you get lesser penalties. Being a corporation does nothing to hide the actions of the people involved and they will be held accountable to the same respect. At best, the corporation will end up being fined in addition to any penalties assessed to the employees responsible for any wrong doing.
Take this peanut problem we currently have where a shipment of tainted peanuts were used knowing they were bad. It's a criminal investigation that will whoever ordered the shipment to be used as well as anyone who knew about its condition but didn't report it to be exposed to criminal fines and penalties. If the order came from the owners themselves, the corporate veil will not protect them at all.
That's something else that people seem to ignore. The Corporate veil only protects the owners or shareholders who took no direct action in the illegal activity. A misconception is that if you incorporate, your bullet proof or something and that simply isn't true. If your actions cause damage, you are personally responsible too. If your business practices cause a bankruptcy, your personal assets aren't protected. If you are responsible for anything the corporation does, you can be and most likely are responsible. Now when you invest in something and take a silent approach and a worker comes in still drunk and kills another employee or kills a civilian not affiliated with the company, then you are separated from his actions even though the company might not be. That's the only protection a corporation offers someone.
That's actually not quite true... reneging on a significant loan like that can very well kill your credit rating & make it impossible to do anything requiring credit (including renting property).
Every town, I mean, Every Town, no matter how big or how small it is will have areas with low income and poor credit people. HUD makes sure of that threw the denial of state and federal grant monies and so on. There will always be housing availible for the poor and even people with poor credit.
Now those rentals might not be choice locations, they might not be properties up to your standards and so on, but they are somewhere around the town. Homelessness because of a foreclosure would be nothing but a temporary thing for 99% of people being foreclosed on. I think I'm giving that 99% a generous latitude towards your side of the argument too. I think the remaining 1% would be because of mental issues and a refusal to lower ones standards to live in a certain area.
As mental issues go, they can be weird, When I was 16, my uncle would call me to drive him around anytime he needed to go somewhere. He had a lexus (I think) as a company car for almost 6 years before and when he lost his job (the car too), he would only ride in the back seat of any car, including his own Lincoln Park Avenue for about 2 years after. The theory he spouted was that he didn't want people to think he owned the cars so he wanted it to look like he was always being driven around. I suspect many home owners would be the same way or similar enough to make a bad situation worse but it doesn't mean they are homeless because they would probably set up home in a motel or something.
Suppose your tax documents and accounting and everything was open to the public and you start off a new year, there might be mistakes in it but your balance sheets will reflect that and eventually be discovered.
Now here is where your concept is removed from OSS. You see, in the tax example you mentioned, it's just there, in OSS with an active community, several things will be different. First, when someone opens something, others get interested and decide to work with and on it. They take the books and review backwards, from the start, and through the middle to get an idea of how things are operating then they set about to fix things in it or to add functionality to it. So right there is a review to check the balance sheets. Now the patch that fixes something or adds new functionality gets reviewed by all the members of the team and goes through a process that determines if it should be added or not. If it is, it gets recorded and is listed in the change log as well as tracked by the person who submitted the patch. Now, there is accountability that could lead to criminal charges if the patch is designed to allow something illegal to happen. Although the anonymity might prove hard to actually go after someone.
So to keep in comparison, each and every time you change your balance sheets for your accounting, it would have been thoroughly reviewed by people in the know who have some intimate knowledge of your business' actions. It's really no different then sending the books off to the accountant's office once a week.
Then the program's code is added and packaged up into a container which is then presented to the public in source or binary format with options to get the source. This would be the reference of your taxes being made out and ready to be filed. Now the people who download and use the program, as long as they got it from the source and not an untrusted third parts, has a reasonable expectation that they are getting somewhat of a secure program with it's faults known. But it goes on for more, Before you file your taxes, people actually seek out the product and start to use it. If it doesn't work as advertised or their firewall log report unexplained communications to the programs, it gets reported and we find out what the problem is. So yea, even before you file your taxes, there is one more verification to make sure things are somewhat secure.
Now, that process isn't fool proof, it isn't even going to catch everything. But it is a little more then presenting a load of books that no one would look at, and it is more transparent then a proprietary app which receives no independent review that is public. Most OSS apps are more then a program being thrown to the wolves as is. There is a complex process and community behind it and this is especially proven when the app or whatever gets bundled into a distro and a separate, maybe larger community puts their name and support behind it.
Many small shops like to think they are more important then they are. I don't know how many times I have had to switch to some other software because a partner found that a larger firm used something else just to find it willfully inadequate compared to what was being used before the 20 grand switch. This is true for law firms, Tax shops and accounting shops, insurance agencies and almost everything else I have worked with. They seem to think that using the software they use will give them the edge to be as profitable as they are.
The counter spin tactics that would probably be beneficial is something along the lines of Sun, IBM, Novel, and several other big Iron shops use OSS. Even the smaller shops mid level shops that use DB back ends use OSS like pervasive SQL, Oracle, MySQL, and so on. How is it that the large shops who spend the money for the Sun or Novel or IBM or Oracle servers that cost probably more then what they paid for IT in the last year don't have security concerns with Open-Source Software but a Microsoft rep who is attempting to sell you software and lock your into their specific version/line can convince you that it is unsafe?
I would still attempt to back that up with other facts concerning OSS usage like by Cisco, Zycell, and several other routing companies who provide industry leading security and routing products. I mean if the routers are configures correctly and capable of acting as a firewall, it's the first line of defense. And if their OSS servers and software aren't directly connected to the internet, then where is the worry because in order to hack them, you would need to bypass the routers or gain physical access to them.
You're spouting a myth. No bank was forced to make risky loans. Banks always have the option of saying no if they felt the applicant was too much of a risk. They had to prove that was the case, and that the decision wasn't race based if they were audited, but they could say no.
Risky loans is a legal definition not something the bank thinks up at the time for a reason to deny giving someone a loan. The banks could have not made those loans but then they wouldn't have been able to make any home loans until their ratios were in line with government requirements. So if you think folding up shop and stop doing what make you money is a viable alternative, your full of it. That's like saying you don't need to drive ever so legalizing random searches of your car is justified, because otherwise, you could just walk.
i>'m not going to argue strawmen when the facts are quite clear. I suggest you try doing some research before you spout off nonsense.
Yes, the facts are quite clear, however your not going to argue your straw man because you know you have to ignore facts to make your statement resemble something that is true. Like I already said, Learn something about which you intend to speak about.
Why? The investors didn't look into the house of cards they were investing into, so they deserve to get reamed up the ass. Some of the homeowners are just as guilty as well.. but the greatest good right now would be to forgive the loans. The investors learn a very hard but much needed lesson, and people aren't out in the street leaving houses sitting uninhabited with no one wanting to buy them.
Because you don't give someone something for nothing. The person who purchased the house agreed to at least pay the purchasing costs. IF he doesn't, then they have taken that amount of money from someone else. I can see where the interest gets dismissed but not giving someone something for free, especially when they agreed in not only one instance, but two (buying the house and asking for a loan for it) that the property was worth what they paid for it.
There is no reaming someone's ass by expecting them to pay for what they get. I'm not sure how you can come to that conclusion but from looking at the other shit you ignore, I have no doubt that you can justify it somehow. But judging from what else you have said, that justification will be ignoring the important facts and reality that is life so I'm sure it will be as worthless as your piss poor excuses so far.
BTW, those people in the street would be paying rent somewhere, losing your house does not make you homeless, it makes you move to a home you can afford. There is no reason why that rent cannot be paying the principle on the loans they took out for the houses they wanted to purchase.
The government is trying to bail the banks out because they are in bed with Wall Street, and it benifits them individually to do so.
If by "in bed with wall street" you mean share the responsibility, you would be right because it is primarily their action that caused the mess. IF you mean "benefit" because they can use this as an excuse to cram shit onto the public that they wouldn't have otherwise accepted, then your right again. Look at the stimulus bill, there is so much shit buried in there that we wouldn't accept under any other conditions that it isn't funny. Some of it got pulled out, some of it was left in, some more will probably be added and none of it will do what the "designed purpose" claims it will do. Or at least most of it won't.
see this is where this whole argument falls apart. what is legal today may not be tomorrow. in which case can you be prosecuted for something you did when it was legal after its been made legal?
In America at least, this isn't the case unless you continue to do it after it became illegal. But then you wouldn't be in compliance with "Don't do anything illegal.".
It's a legal principle called post facto and ex post facto. It states that you can't make something illegal after the fact and apply penalties as if it was illegal when done legally. It's actually in our constitution and it prevents what you have mentioned from happening.
Re:IANAL and who would want to be?
on
You Are Not a Lawyer
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· Score: 5, Insightful
I don't think the point is getting involved, it is that many tech types, and more likely self proclaimed techies, will stray into gray areas and they need to know that their short sighted, I can't be punished theories aren't all that strong outside of their mind or circle.
I have seen this in the past where people on IRC serve ip copyrighted materials and think a simple warning "if you are a law enforcement or affiliated with them, you are not allowed in the server" will get any evidence thrown out if they are busted. It's stuff like that which people think justifies behavior or removes possible penalties from it that is being addressed. It's the I'm using Lime wire but I have an open access point which I will blame everything on, just to have your computer taken by warrant before you can delete the lime wire program or any of the files your sharing.
You mean the government which was deregulating banking since George I, allowing "investors" to buy up subprime mortgages given to people that really couldn't afformd them? And then the ponzi scheme collapsed?
Yea, the same government that since before George 1 forced banks to take out risky loans (through the CRA and other tactics) and during Clinton ended up increasing the required amounts of risk loans for every good loan. It is the same government who did this in an attempt to drive up home values so certain members and their contributors could profit from artificially inflated prices and the use of other people's money. There is more, but I'm sure you already know that right. It's the same government that under Clinton put the US back on the world oil markets leading to the speculation runs that doubled the costs of gas and energy after 2006 coincidentally when the democrats took congress, that stressed all that risk and caused it to fail becoming "toxic".
It was a failure of captialize; let it run wild, and this is what we reap.
If I put dynamite inside a hole in a dam, then detonate it causing the dam to breach, is it really a flaw in the dam that failed? If a drunk got behind the wheel of a car and lost control of it on a seemingly dry and safe night but ended up killing a family of five, did the car's safety system's fail or was it something else? If your walking down the street and pass through a road closed baracade, walk past warnings that say dangerous open holes ahead, and then fall into one, is it the failure of government for not providing you with a safe public street?
In all of those, the failures rest outside the system. It's no different with capitalism and this current problem. The failures were outside the system and not with the system itself. I know this is dificult for people like you to understand so I will repeat what I told the OP, You would do yourself a little good to find out some of the fact about what your talking about. Also, if I was you, I would stay away from political biased sources who's end game is going to be having you clueless and blindly supporting their ideals.
Of course the real solution to the mortgage problem would be 1) tell the investors "tough shit, you made a bad investment, you lose your shirt" and 2) tell the homeowners "you lucked out; you own your home free and clear."
I'm not against doing that but they would at minimum have to pay the principle amount borrowed. I'm not for taking from one to give to another. But I can see where dropping the interest on the failed mortgages in order to repay the original lending amount would be a benefit. The reason the government is so interested in bailing these lending institutions out is because they are complicit in their demise.
If your calling Tarp v0.1 proof of your ideals that capitalism is a fallacy, then you need to wake up from your dreams. It was/is neither and the failure resulted from abuse instituted by the government, not capitalism.
You would do yourself a little good to find out some of the fact about what your talking about. Also, if I was you, I would stay away from political biased sources who's end game is going to be having you clueless and blindly supporting their ideals.
That doesn't mean you have a better connection or that the US needs an upgrade, it just means that halfway around the world, you have less of a life then some of the "other slashdot crowd".
It's a one step forward and two steps back. Take the DC gun ban for instance. They had been attempting to take guns away for a while and finally the Supreme court took the case up and made the anti-gun people take 10 steps back. The former President wanted to take habeas corpus away from prisoners held at club gitmo, the court made them take a few steps back.
We won't be free of people, however innocently intentioned they think they are, who will attempt to take rights away from the people. However, because it is so difficult to do so, we end up with a document which gives the government directions for all the power it can derive from the people and being enforced by the supreme court of the land who steps in eventually and puts a stop to it. There is no higher legal authority in England where the courts can say "stop doing that because the constitution doesn't allow it". There is nothing others then rights that can be easily legislated away. It's especially easier to do so when the government has no fear of reprisal from the people. Taking the right to defend yourself from not only a criminal but a tyrannical and/or oppressive government away from the people only makes it easier for the government to becomes tyranical and oppresive when it takes other rights away. Perhaps you right to vote against them, or you right to free speech (which shouldn't be confused as a right to deny others their speech and some seem to think) or to speak against them will be next.
Besides, it wasn't(isn't) just overseas calls. Remember the entire floor at AT&T that the NSA is camped out in? The one with *ALL* AT&T traffic flowing through it including domestic calls?
Because they were there does not mean they were tapped without a wattant. There was a law passed in the mid 90's that mandated the telecoms to update their offices to make intercepting calls efficient and expedient when appropriate. The entire floor at ATT is simple compliance with that. And of course, if all calls go through there, then it makes a pretty good central location to intercept foreign calls into the country.
To date, no one has done any more then speculate about domestic calls. Don't act like it is some sort of fact.
Actually, for things like killing the 4th amendment it should take a new amendment with all the states agreeing. But it's far easier to break the law, then pass a new law saying "Everything we did before is now OK. Oh, and by the way, no one can investigate what we did, and even if you do investigate we've destroyed the records anyway." (See FISA 2008).
The fourth amendment always ended at the borders of the country. The very first congress seated in the United States under the Constitution allowed for warrant-less searches at the borders. This was a law made by the very same founding fathers who not only wrote the constitution but presented it to the people and convinced them to ratify it. There was no objection by those in government nor was there objections by those out of government. The Supreme court has upheld the law on at least two occasions and referred to it when upholding the border searched of electronic devices.
Not to detract from your point, but to be fair, we are only looking at some pissed of European attempting to reconcile his losses by saying "I bet they do it in America too". I know your addressing his seemingly ignorant comment but don't let the chanter convince you that it is being done.
Slashdot Mirror
How much does it cost? Currently you can't grab the videos from youtube and do anything with them without violating the youtube TOS. So the videos are effectivly theirs and not the publics unless your wanting to face felony computer trespass charges like the chick who caused the girl to commit suicide.
So how much does it cost to produce videos of government and give them away to a company that supported the current administration's election so that company can end up with exclusive control over them and serve all the ads they want? I would say the cost of production at least. And I would say the cost of freedom when the government is allowed to do this without an open bidding process or authorization by congress to give public domain works to a company that backed the president during his bid for election.
Is this the hope and change we can believe in? Or is it yet another example of politics as usual being blinded by technology?
Ministry of truth? Do you mean a propagnda machine? At least with CSPAN and their video service you get the entire story. It looks like here you will only get the tidbits they deem worthy.
I'm waiting for one of them to only contain a half statement from a congressman or senator or something that makes them look entirely opposite of their stated positions.
Well, this story also forgets the question of Costs and why wasn't this process bidded out?
I mean I can sort of understand giving Haliburten a no bid contract in the early portions of the wars because of the need to have a company of their capabilities there in such short time was necessary. Granted, the no bid portion may have lasted longer then what might have been necessary but there was an initial need. I don't really know what is so pressing about time or anything on this that it couldn't undergo an open bid process.
Even if the youtube services is free to the government, the content belongs to the people and giving Google control over it is definitely a payment because you are forced to see their adds and visit their site. There should be an open bid process just like any other government contract and the best bid should win. I wonder if this is the change we can believe in? Stacking unnecessary pork that doesn't do what it intended into a stimulus package and no bid contracts to campaign supporters. The only change here is that people don't seem to care now that Bush and Cheney is out of office.
Wait a minute, your not arguing that I'm wrong, your arguing that the penalties of something wasn't severe enough.
The supreme court backed Exxon up in the "law" of the situation and the captain was prosecuted according to the law. They paid about 2 billion in clean up efforts and another billion in criminal charges, the captain of the Exxon Valdez was brought up on felony charges but the jury didn't convict him of those and instead convicted him on misdemeanor charges that carried $50,000 fine and community service. The US coast guard suspended his license and he couldn't work for 9 months.
This is not a case in disagreement with me or what I said. Your just not happy about the penalties that came about. Again, the law was used and no one hid behind a corporate veil. Everyone responsible had the law applied to them even though the state couldn't get a felony conviction on the captain and Exxon had the law behind the lawsuits applied properly after several appeals to higher courts and ultimately the Supreme Court. It's the same thing that would have happened if it was you and your brother instead of some corporation if all of the circumstances leading up to and just after the accident were the same. It was a Jury and a Court of law properly applying the law that caused the penalties to be the way they were, not the corporate veil.
BTW, This is an odd case because it involves maritime law which states the Captain of the vessel is responsible for the ship regardless of where he was at the time or if his subordinate caused the problem. Maritime law is different then regular laws when the water is large enough to be navigated for commerce. That is why he was prosecuted when the accident happened when he was in his bunk taking personal time. Because the people actually steering the ship didn't get prosecuted was a result of maritime laws, not some corporate veil.
Maritime laws are a unique set of laws designed to deal specifically with the hazards of ships and shipping. Think of it as FAA laws/rules that regulate pilots differently then civilians driving to work.
Read it again. This time with some quotes
they need to know that their short sighted "I can't be punished" theories aren't all that strong outside of their mind or circle.
I didn't intend for it to go that way but I guess it show a little about how we both understood something might not be the way it actually is or was intended. This was the point I was after with the Short sighted Theories. My mistake cause you to see something different then it was intended which caused you to react with intentions that I didn't really intend. This is why law can be so difficult to the untrained person and why the author of the article thought it necessary to talk about it. Minor misconceptions can lead to legal catastrophe.
Something your missing is that the portion of any company doing business in any other country then they are based from are subject to the laws of the country they are doing business in. This means that if Egypt or China has a law requiring the information to be turned over, if they don't, not only can the be bared from doing business in those countries, but their corporate personnel who are operating inside the country who also refuse to hand the information over are subject to penalties of those laws.
If Egypt truly does "disappear", Torture and kill their prisoners and suspects, then I'm not sure why exposing the execs of Vodaphone to that warrants any more carelessness then the people the government are looking after. Are Vodaphone employees any less important in life, will their families not suffer just the same with them locked up in prison or missing forever? The best they can do is make the information public that they complied with it so any criminal activities that were perpetrated by necessity can be covered and those responsible can take actions to protect themselves. The disadvantage is that regular criminals will be able to do the same but that seems like an even trade.
What would you do in their situation? Throw your loyal employees into a situation where they are facing everything you fear for the others or protect them by handing the information over and then disclosing it another country where it's outside the reach of the Egyptian government and hope it leaks back into the country to protect the innocent who were acting out of necessity?
I'm not sure why people think some dissident is more important then another human being.
Don't conflate abuse with breaking the law. They aren't always the same things. Now, someone breaking the law to commit what you consider an abuse is someone who will be punished under the law. Inventive or not, anyone breaking the law is subject to the penalties of breaking the law, anyone who is conspiring to break the law, perhaps by ordering a subordinate to break it, is subject to the same. The incentives you notice are nothing more then the willingness to break a law by the people working at the corporation.
I'm not entirely sure how that could be a good idea, every year, 1/20th of the country would lose their jobs entirely. Every year, 1/20th of GDP will disappear with little to no hope for improvement. And every year, all US based corps would be subject to the powers of foreign corps.
Now don't get hung up on the one twentieth numbers, it will equalize out to that if they are all disbanded after 20 years. Some will be less and some will be more but the average will be the same or near enough to make the number real enough for our purposes.
This doesn't sound bad but I think is should be more like life in public office or some sort of term limit to a maximum of 20 years. If we reset congress every 20 years altogether, then after 10 years in, some people won't run against failed congressmen. At around 5 years, they would probably have a free ride because no one who is capable of raising the type of money needed to run against incumbent politicians would waste it for such a little term. Everyone who thinks they can do some good will have too little time to do it and so on.
With all the proven people out of the mix, I'm not sure who would be left to do it. My neighbor is a welfare recipient who I'm sure would act in his own interest, then there are business people who would probably do the same, in the end, we are in the same boat that we have now except that some people won't toss their hat in when we need them the most.
Not really, it just means that the vice president won't have to wait 8 years before running. You would end up switching roles of the president and vice president for 16 years instead of one riding on the coat tails of the other after 4 or 8 years.
Here is the question, would you vote for Biden-Obama knowing that you already voted for Obama-Biden? Most people would say yes, especially if whoever was playing president put the other front and center on a lot of issues.
I think it's more along the lines of his name then seniority.
He didn't have that much seniority when he drowned that call girl after driving drunk into the river/lake whatever it was.
There once was a senator from mass
Who went out in search of some ass,
lucked up and found it, but fucked up and drowned it,
but that was not the end of his ass.
You know, they estimate that he was going between 80-90 miles per hour when the accident happened. They say it would take that much force for the impact to remover her panties and put them in the glove box.
Ok, I know that was low but I remember it like it was yesterday.
The law would probably be better phrased as something like
No internet service provider can by their own action or actions by others hired by them or acting on their behalf: route, shape, or otherwise make any packet or internet transmission over the internet service slower then what the customer is charged for as implied by advertising, billing structure, and common interpretations of the service offered or advertised because of a payment or nonpayment of a third party. And no traffic originating from ports shall be blocked, impeded, slowed down, or otherwise restricted beyond the same limits without express permission of the customer. No extra charge can be applied to the customer for refusing to allow certain ports to be blocked. Nothing in this prohibits the the management of traffic to ensure the integrity of the network outside of providing the customer what they pay for.
That law would be short and to the point but allow ISPs to negotiate faster connections from certain sites as long as the consumer gets what they paid for. The Idea of net neutrality (to me at least) is similar to Micheal Powell's interpretation, You can give them more but not less. When I pay for my service, I pay to the site, the site pays for their service which pays to come back to me. If I get more then I paid for, I'm happy, If I only get what I paid for, I'm happy. If I get less then what I paid for because the ISP is demanding a payment from a site that isn't affiliated with them, then I'm getting screwed.
That's a little misunderstanding that a lot of people have. ISP's are not common carriers even though they have protections similar to one and sometimes use lines that are regulated as common carrier status.
The ISPs never actually had common carrier status at all. A few years back with the communications deregulation act, someone (I forget who) attempted to force Time Warner to provide access to their road runner lines. The FCC ruled that internet was an information service and not subject to common carrier status like Cable TV or Phone service. This made it through the courts upholding the FCC's notion of it being an information service and not a common carrier even though the lines it is delivered on, other internet services might be, and/or the parent company might be. The DMCA legislation provides common carrier like protections to ISPs which keeps the confusion alive.
The problem is that a corporation doesn't act by itself. It acts at the direction of the board and management that direct it's actions. In essence, we do have the death penalty for corporations because any manager or director shown to have intentionally killed someone, will be subject to the death penalty just as you or I would.
Don't let this separate entity thing confuse you. It you take all the people out of a corporation, it will do exactly nothing. It won't sell anything, it won't poison anyone, it won't pollute the environment, it won't do anything. Now just as there are with most laws, there is a component called intent. If you intend to set out and do something illegal, you get the full charges pressed against you. If you unintentionally do the same, then you get lesser penalties. Being a corporation does nothing to hide the actions of the people involved and they will be held accountable to the same respect. At best, the corporation will end up being fined in addition to any penalties assessed to the employees responsible for any wrong doing.
Take this peanut problem we currently have where a shipment of tainted peanuts were used knowing they were bad. It's a criminal investigation that will whoever ordered the shipment to be used as well as anyone who knew about its condition but didn't report it to be exposed to criminal fines and penalties. If the order came from the owners themselves, the corporate veil will not protect them at all.
That's something else that people seem to ignore. The Corporate veil only protects the owners or shareholders who took no direct action in the illegal activity. A misconception is that if you incorporate, your bullet proof or something and that simply isn't true. If your actions cause damage, you are personally responsible too. If your business practices cause a bankruptcy, your personal assets aren't protected. If you are responsible for anything the corporation does, you can be and most likely are responsible. Now when you invest in something and take a silent approach and a worker comes in still drunk and kills another employee or kills a civilian not affiliated with the company, then you are separated from his actions even though the company might not be. That's the only protection a corporation offers someone.
Every town, I mean, Every Town, no matter how big or how small it is will have areas with low income and poor credit people. HUD makes sure of that threw the denial of state and federal grant monies and so on. There will always be housing availible for the poor and even people with poor credit.
Now those rentals might not be choice locations, they might not be properties up to your standards and so on, but they are somewhere around the town. Homelessness because of a foreclosure would be nothing but a temporary thing for 99% of people being foreclosed on. I think I'm giving that 99% a generous latitude towards your side of the argument too. I think the remaining 1% would be because of mental issues and a refusal to lower ones standards to live in a certain area.
As mental issues go, they can be weird, When I was 16, my uncle would call me to drive him around anytime he needed to go somewhere. He had a lexus (I think) as a company car for almost 6 years before and when he lost his job (the car too), he would only ride in the back seat of any car, including his own Lincoln Park Avenue for about 2 years after. The theory he spouted was that he didn't want people to think he owned the cars so he wanted it to look like he was always being driven around. I suspect many home owners would be the same way or similar enough to make a bad situation worse but it doesn't mean they are homeless because they would probably set up home in a motel or something.
Well, sort of.
Suppose your tax documents and accounting and everything was open to the public and you start off a new year, there might be mistakes in it but your balance sheets will reflect that and eventually be discovered.
Now here is where your concept is removed from OSS. You see, in the tax example you mentioned, it's just there, in OSS with an active community, several things will be different. First, when someone opens something, others get interested and decide to work with and on it. They take the books and review backwards, from the start, and through the middle to get an idea of how things are operating then they set about to fix things in it or to add functionality to it. So right there is a review to check the balance sheets. Now the patch that fixes something or adds new functionality gets reviewed by all the members of the team and goes through a process that determines if it should be added or not. If it is, it gets recorded and is listed in the change log as well as tracked by the person who submitted the patch. Now, there is accountability that could lead to criminal charges if the patch is designed to allow something illegal to happen. Although the anonymity might prove hard to actually go after someone.
So to keep in comparison, each and every time you change your balance sheets for your accounting, it would have been thoroughly reviewed by people in the know who have some intimate knowledge of your business' actions. It's really no different then sending the books off to the accountant's office once a week.
Then the program's code is added and packaged up into a container which is then presented to the public in source or binary format with options to get the source. This would be the reference of your taxes being made out and ready to be filed. Now the people who download and use the program, as long as they got it from the source and not an untrusted third parts, has a reasonable expectation that they are getting somewhat of a secure program with it's faults known. But it goes on for more, Before you file your taxes, people actually seek out the product and start to use it. If it doesn't work as advertised or their firewall log report unexplained communications to the programs, it gets reported and we find out what the problem is. So yea, even before you file your taxes, there is one more verification to make sure things are somewhat secure.
Now, that process isn't fool proof, it isn't even going to catch everything. But it is a little more then presenting a load of books that no one would look at, and it is more transparent then a proprietary app which receives no independent review that is public. Most OSS apps are more then a program being thrown to the wolves as is. There is a complex process and community behind it and this is especially proven when the app or whatever gets bundled into a distro and a separate, maybe larger community puts their name and support behind it.
Many small shops like to think they are more important then they are. I don't know how many times I have had to switch to some other software because a partner found that a larger firm used something else just to find it willfully inadequate compared to what was being used before the 20 grand switch. This is true for law firms, Tax shops and accounting shops, insurance agencies and almost everything else I have worked with. They seem to think that using the software they use will give them the edge to be as profitable as they are.
The counter spin tactics that would probably be beneficial is something along the lines of Sun, IBM, Novel, and several other big Iron shops use OSS. Even the smaller shops mid level shops that use DB back ends use OSS like pervasive SQL, Oracle, MySQL, and so on. How is it that the large shops who spend the money for the Sun or Novel or IBM or Oracle servers that cost probably more then what they paid for IT in the last year don't have security concerns with Open-Source Software but a Microsoft rep who is attempting to sell you software and lock your into their specific version/line can convince you that it is unsafe?
I would still attempt to back that up with other facts concerning OSS usage like by Cisco, Zycell, and several other routing companies who provide industry leading security and routing products. I mean if the routers are configures correctly and capable of acting as a firewall, it's the first line of defense. And if their OSS servers and software aren't directly connected to the internet, then where is the worry because in order to hack them, you would need to bypass the routers or gain physical access to them.
Risky loans is a legal definition not something the bank thinks up at the time for a reason to deny giving someone a loan. The banks could have not made those loans but then they wouldn't have been able to make any home loans until their ratios were in line with government requirements. So if you think folding up shop and stop doing what make you money is a viable alternative, your full of it. That's like saying you don't need to drive ever so legalizing random searches of your car is justified, because otherwise, you could just walk.
Yes, the facts are quite clear, however your not going to argue your straw man because you know you have to ignore facts to make your statement resemble something that is true. Like I already said, Learn something about which you intend to speak about.
Because you don't give someone something for nothing. The person who purchased the house agreed to at least pay the purchasing costs. IF he doesn't, then they have taken that amount of money from someone else. I can see where the interest gets dismissed but not giving someone something for free, especially when they agreed in not only one instance, but two (buying the house and asking for a loan for it) that the property was worth what they paid for it.
There is no reaming someone's ass by expecting them to pay for what they get. I'm not sure how you can come to that conclusion but from looking at the other shit you ignore, I have no doubt that you can justify it somehow. But judging from what else you have said, that justification will be ignoring the important facts and reality that is life so I'm sure it will be as worthless as your piss poor excuses so far.
BTW, those people in the street would be paying rent somewhere, losing your house does not make you homeless, it makes you move to a home you can afford. There is no reason why that rent cannot be paying the principle on the loans they took out for the houses they wanted to purchase.
If by "in bed with wall street" you mean share the responsibility, you would be right because it is primarily their action that caused the mess. IF you mean "benefit" because they can use this as an excuse to cram shit onto the public that they wouldn't have otherwise accepted, then your right again. Look at the stimulus bill, there is so much shit buried in there that we wouldn't accept under any other conditions that it isn't funny. Some of it got pulled out, some of it was left in, some more will probably be added and none of it will do what the "designed purpose" claims it will do. Or at least most of it won't.
In America at least, this isn't the case unless you continue to do it after it became illegal. But then you wouldn't be in compliance with "Don't do anything illegal.".
It's a legal principle called post facto and ex post facto. It states that you can't make something illegal after the fact and apply penalties as if it was illegal when done legally. It's actually in our constitution and it prevents what you have mentioned from happening.
I don't think the point is getting involved, it is that many tech types, and more likely self proclaimed techies, will stray into gray areas and they need to know that their short sighted, I can't be punished theories aren't all that strong outside of their mind or circle.
I have seen this in the past where people on IRC serve ip copyrighted materials and think a simple warning "if you are a law enforcement or affiliated with them, you are not allowed in the server" will get any evidence thrown out if they are busted. It's stuff like that which people think justifies behavior or removes possible penalties from it that is being addressed. It's the I'm using Lime wire but I have an open access point which I will blame everything on, just to have your computer taken by warrant before you can delete the lime wire program or any of the files your sharing.
Yea, the same government that since before George 1 forced banks to take out risky loans (through the CRA and other tactics) and during Clinton ended up increasing the required amounts of risk loans for every good loan. It is the same government who did this in an attempt to drive up home values so certain members and their contributors could profit from artificially inflated prices and the use of other people's money. There is more, but I'm sure you already know that right. It's the same government that under Clinton put the US back on the world oil markets leading to the speculation runs that doubled the costs of gas and energy after 2006 coincidentally when the democrats took congress, that stressed all that risk and caused it to fail becoming "toxic".
If I put dynamite inside a hole in a dam, then detonate it causing the dam to breach, is it really a flaw in the dam that failed? If a drunk got behind the wheel of a car and lost control of it on a seemingly dry and safe night but ended up killing a family of five, did the car's safety system's fail or was it something else? If your walking down the street and pass through a road closed baracade, walk past warnings that say dangerous open holes ahead, and then fall into one, is it the failure of government for not providing you with a safe public street?
In all of those, the failures rest outside the system. It's no different with capitalism and this current problem. The failures were outside the system and not with the system itself. I know this is dificult for people like you to understand so I will repeat what I told the OP, You would do yourself a little good to find out some of the fact about what your talking about. Also, if I was you, I would stay away from political biased sources who's end game is going to be having you clueless and blindly supporting their ideals.
I'm not against doing that but they would at minimum have to pay the principle amount borrowed. I'm not for taking from one to give to another. But I can see where dropping the interest on the failed mortgages in order to repay the original lending amount would be a benefit. The reason the government is so interested in bailing these lending institutions out is because they are complicit in their demise.
If your calling Tarp v0.1 proof of your ideals that capitalism is a fallacy, then you need to wake up from your dreams. It was/is neither and the failure resulted from abuse instituted by the government, not capitalism.
You would do yourself a little good to find out some of the fact about what your talking about. Also, if I was you, I would stay away from political biased sources who's end game is going to be having you clueless and blindly supporting their ideals.
That doesn't mean you have a better connection or that the US needs an upgrade, it just means that halfway around the world, you have less of a life then some of the "other slashdot crowd".
Wow, I didn't know so much porn could be so free.
Some of the models look a little young though, are you sure they are all legal at that site?
Anyways, thanks for the tip.
Exactly.
It's a one step forward and two steps back. Take the DC gun ban for instance. They had been attempting to take guns away for a while and finally the Supreme court took the case up and made the anti-gun people take 10 steps back. The former President wanted to take habeas corpus away from prisoners held at club gitmo, the court made them take a few steps back.
We won't be free of people, however innocently intentioned they think they are, who will attempt to take rights away from the people. However, because it is so difficult to do so, we end up with a document which gives the government directions for all the power it can derive from the people and being enforced by the supreme court of the land who steps in eventually and puts a stop to it. There is no higher legal authority in England where the courts can say "stop doing that because the constitution doesn't allow it". There is nothing others then rights that can be easily legislated away. It's especially easier to do so when the government has no fear of reprisal from the people. Taking the right to defend yourself from not only a criminal but a tyrannical and/or oppressive government away from the people only makes it easier for the government to becomes tyranical and oppresive when it takes other rights away. Perhaps you right to vote against them, or you right to free speech (which shouldn't be confused as a right to deny others their speech and some seem to think) or to speak against them will be next.
Because they were there does not mean they were tapped without a wattant. There was a law passed in the mid 90's that mandated the telecoms to update their offices to make intercepting calls efficient and expedient when appropriate. The entire floor at ATT is simple compliance with that. And of course, if all calls go through there, then it makes a pretty good central location to intercept foreign calls into the country.
To date, no one has done any more then speculate about domestic calls. Don't act like it is some sort of fact.
The fourth amendment always ended at the borders of the country. The very first congress seated in the United States under the Constitution allowed for warrant-less searches at the borders. This was a law made by the very same founding fathers who not only wrote the constitution but presented it to the people and convinced them to ratify it. There was no objection by those in government nor was there objections by those out of government. The Supreme court has upheld the law on at least two occasions and referred to it when upholding the border searched of electronic devices.
Not to detract from your point, but to be fair, we are only looking at some pissed of European attempting to reconcile his losses by saying "I bet they do it in America too". I know your addressing his seemingly ignorant comment but don't let the chanter convince you that it is being done.