I'd remember if one of my fellow service members was the son of a congressman who was on the House Ways and Means Committee, the committee which oversaw the draft and could have brought the halting of the draft up for a vote. Who was also the grandson of a senator. And whose family was very wealthy. The Bush family is another Kennedy family.
You're telling me that people 30 years after Kennedy served in WWII don't remember serving with him? People sure remembered serving with Kerry enough to attack him heavily for things he supposedly did to NOT deserve honor.
There's a saying where I come from (New New York): That dog won't hunt, monsignor.
But it wouldn't matter if he got fired, because Obama just wants to take all of the working class's money and give it to welfare mamas and papas, right?
Sometimes I can't tell if Slashdot trolling is becoming/b/trolling, or if people are serious.
If Bush went AWOL, then it he de facto did not serve. This is like saying you're qualified to run IBM because you went to business school. And not Harvard Business School, either.
In my opinion, the CIC power is the least important Presidential power. For one, with a non-interventionist foreign policy, the CIC power is extremely diminished. The founding fathers (and many alive today) want a non-interventionist philosophy. Or, at least, a humble foreign policy, to borrow a phrase from a man who promised and did not deliver that.
The President's most important power is either to use the bully pulpit to push his mandate onto Congress, or to appoint federal judges (especially to SCOTUS justices).
The Gulf War made people donate some toys to children of vets. The Afghani and Iraqi Conflicts ("war [weren't] declared") have tarnished our image, but that can be repaired over the course of a decade.
SCOTUS appointments shape the next couple centuries of national development. We're still making decisions based on what they said 200 years ago.
Give me an expert in Constitutional Law (SCOTUS appointments) and someone who can inspire people to action (using the bully pulpit). That is what we need in a President.
Adams served as chairman of the Continental Congress's Board of War (1776-1777), making him the simultaneous equivalent of today's Secretary of Defense and Chairman of Senate Armed Services Committee
And thus a civilian, not a military man. Regardless, the other guy's point still stands: The founding fathers made the CIC position a civilian position.
That Bill Clinton has sent only two e-mails in his 8 years of Presidency [cnn.com] â" while presiding over an 8-trillion dot-com bust â" does not bother Obama's fans, they would've lined up behind either of the Clintons for President in a heartbeat. But that McCain, who is physically unable to type due to injuries, uses his wife's help with computers, is fair target of ridicule for them.
Wow. Just wow.
I'm an Obama supporter. Were it Hillary's and not Barack's name on the ballot, I would probably be voting for her only to vote against "bomb bomb bomb bomb bomb Iran" McCain, a man I truly respected until about 2004; perhaps I might even be voting for McKinney instead. Additionally, I know plenty of people who support Obama but hate both Clintons. And I mean HATE.
And I'm an Obama supporter, and I couldn't be arsed to care about Bill Clinton's lack of e-mail experience. But, of course, I couldn't be arsed to care about McCain's inability to use a computer.
An earlier pro-middle class, spread-the-wealth program [hitler.org].
Of course, we should expect these kinds of generalizations from a man who likens Obama to Hitler(!!). Need I point out that Hitler's economic policies pulled Germany out of a terrible depression and provided the average German with affordable automobiles vehicles for the first time in history? Hitler perpetrated absolutely terrible acts. But his economic policies arguably saved the country. Your attempts to liken Obama to Hitler are absolutely laughable because if your argument is taken as true, it is an argument for Obama, a man you clearly despise. And if the argument is taken as false, then you're words aren't shit for shit.
Well, at least I know with whom not to talk about foreign policy. I suggest you read our favorite pro-Iraq-War secular humanist on waterboarding. Hitchens: It's Torture. Just to point out, Hitchens had himself waterboarded to prove it wasn't torture.
There's a ridiculously easy-to-recognize distinction between "inability to use the most important technological innovation of the past 100 years, if not further back" and "choice to do something other than serve in the military."
That being said, I think DQing McCain for inability to use a computer is idiotic. What's next? DQing someone for not being able to SMS quickly?
A company can dismiss an employee for good cause, bad cause, or even no cause at allthis is black letter law. Ignoring a contract defining a specific work timeline, the only exceptions I know of are
civil rights violations (sexism/racism/ageism/...); or
if you
say you won't do act X;
are told if you don't do act X you will be terminated;
are terminated based on your continued refusal; and
the act violates some constitutionally- or legislatively-demonstrated public policy.
If you did the act and then got fired for something else, you likely will not prevail on a wrongful termination suit.
Then you should be aware that IQ tests don't really mean anything (other than that you are good at taking IQ tests). Especially not for someone over the age of 20.
For example, if you're 35 (just a guess based on the fact that you have five kids), an IQ of 180 means (stated simply) you're "as smart as someone who is 63." What the hell does that even mean? Clearly it's a bullshit metric.
I mean, if we define intelligence as
the ability to acquire information;
the ability to apply knowledge; and
the ability to engage in abstract reasoning,
most IQ tests (nearly all?) test only the third prong.
However, your point that IQ doesn't mean shit for shit is well said.
You guys are all missing the point. The Netherlands is a CIVIL LAW state. This means there really isn't any such thing as "precedent." Especially not at a Arrondissementsrechtbank-level court.
You raise extremely good points. I think your argument defeats mine. I have nothing really to refute with at this point, but I still wanted to congratulate you for what I consider to be excellent analysis.
It also makes me happy, as I really don't want to consider virtual property "real" in any case, either. I don't want it taxable in the future!
I've typically been on your side in these debates, trying to draw parallels between points won in a tennis match toward winning championship prize money being untaxable. Your Pac-Man example is basically the same thing.
Thanks for the debate. This is why Slashdot is still the best place for nerdy news.
Ah, you remind me of one of my favorite songs, Positronic Pimp:
Let me tell you about a man from the 24th century, put a lot of fools in a space penitentiary. He's the futuristic sex android, too cool for school or bad hemorrhoids. He's the only one, he's that unique, and he saved the ship every single week. With 88 petabytes in his brain, his freestyles flow like fine champagne.
The positronic pimp, built by Noonien Soong. Call him up, he won't go limp, or finish too soon.
Government recognizes that risky and anti-consumer behavior by corporations may destroy the economy or incite revolution.
All sarcasm aside, you have a really, really bleak view of politicians if you think they actually sit around all day basing their decisions on what will prevent revolution.
I'm very glad I retain my faith that most politicians have at least a modicum of desire to merely better society.
Or do you actually think the "government" is a single, self-interested entity that is not made up of individual actors?
It's like when people talk about how Big Pharma has a cure for HIV and cancer but is sitting on it to make more money from treatment rather than cures.
You know, completely ignoring the fact that Big Pharma is made up of, among other things, a ton of people who actually know people in real life dying of AIDS and cancer.
My impression was that absent a license/contract provision, you believe a reasonable person would think they owned the pieces.
I'd like to make a fine distinction. I don't think it's reasonable. However, I think it's possible that a jury comprised of twelve US citizens would think it's reasonable.
If I didn't make that clear, then that's my fault.
But on a relevant but also not-relevant note, if the gold/weapons don't belong to you in the game, what is your recourse when someone does what happened in the Netherlands? How do you get compensated for the damage done to your character?
I mean, if you've put in hundreds of hours toward attaining something and then it's taken from you, shouldn't you be able to get it back?
Complain to an indifferent corporation? I think the existence of lawsuits demonstrates that the United States citizenry and polity disagree with this concept--were it possible to remedy injuries by mere protest to corporations, lawsuits against corporations would be impermissible.
The law recognizes that (absent a lawsuit) companies are not responsive to injured parties most of the time that they "ought to" be to make the injured "whole again." My concern is that if we do not agree that this is actual property belonging to the player, then there is no recourse for this.
As such, if you could sell your character for $500 on eBay but someone forces you to transfer all your treasure/gold/whatnot away and the value of your character plummets, have you not lost something of value for which you should be able to obtain restitution (either in the form of damages or specific performance)?
And if we acknowledge that you can sue someone for causing such damage to you, how is the Blizzard case (absent a license/contract provision) any different? It is yours, after all, under the presumptions of the previous paragraph...
I suppose we could say that you and Blizzard are tenants in common of the in-game property or something. Or perhaps you are the tenant and Blizzard is the lessor. If someone deprives you of your rental car, they can be sued, I'm sure. However, I'm not sure whether the lessor or lessee would have to initiate the suit, and this could prove problematic if it's the lessor's (Blizzard's) responsibility to sue. I doubt they would sue for something so trivial. And only in an ideal world would corporations be 100% responsive to these issues.
However, the license/contract provision saves Blizzard (and us) the trouble of having to hammer out legal doctrine in this case.
But insofar as discussing how a question of fact might be resolved, its not improper to discuss how 'reasonability' was determined in previous cases.
I'm fairly confident you're wrong (although I've never actually tried a case before, I have taken Evidence--let's hope that B+ helps me out here). Let me walk you through it:
The lawyer cannot discuss an issue like how a jury in another trial decided an issue unless he has introduced that fact as evidence.
Ignoring FRE 401 issues of relevancy (under which another decision in another case would probably be ruled irrelevant), you'd presumably bring such a prior decision in through the testimony of an expert witness (you definitely would not use a lay witness). However, an expert witness cannot tell the jury the answer to an ultimate issue at a trial. As one of the elements of estoppel is "reasonability of an actor," a witness could not testify as to whether the actor was reasonable or not.
See FRE 704(b):
No expert witness testifying with respect to the mental state or condition of a defendant in a criminal case may state an opinion or inference as to whether the defendant did or did not have the mental state or condition constituting an element of the crime charged or of a defense thereto. Such ultimate issues are matters for the trier of fact alone.
you must acknowledge that a license/provision does in fact exist
I agree with you. In our hypothetical case, Blizzard is covered. However, it's a really boring case. So I spiced it up by saying "absent a license/contract provision."
Precedents matter only when determining legal issues, not fact issues. "Reasonability" is a fact issue, not a legal issue. Thus, precedent does not matter.
Now, on top of that, WoW has gone to considerable lengths to communicate that this is in fact the situation in their EULA, Terms of Use, etc, etc.
I'll say it again. absent a license/contract provision . ..
There is simply no way you can make the argument that WoW has some how created or induced a false expectation here. If anything, they are bending over backwards to be absolutely clear on the point.
I'll say it again. absent a license/contract provision . ..
I think the problem comes in right at number one: Blizzard is not telling you that if you "earn" something in the game, they have to change their rules/policies to prevent you from ever losing it.
There is another legal doctrine (of contract) that states that if two people enter into a contract, one person only has one interpretation of the contract, and the other person knows of two interpretations and knows the other person only knows of the one interpretation, then the "shared" interpretation holds. In this case, if Blizzard knows one interpretation is "gold belongs to the player" and another is "gold is not the player's" and knows that a player thinks the gold belongs to him, then the prevailing interpretation of the contract is "gold belongs to the player."
Or maybe "gold belongs to the player until WoW gets shut down completely"?
In fact, I'm sure the EULA says the opposite: it's their game and you play by their rules. Even if no part of the EULA is enforceable, you can't accuse them of creating some expectation when they have attempted to give you the opposite expectation.
Which is precisely why I said "absent a license/contract provision" in my previous post. A EULA is an end user license agreement.
Disagree with me if you want. I'm not saying you're wrong. I don't even think I'm right. I'm just engaging in intellectual masturbation.
At what point does offering access to a game constitute 'inducing an expectation' that the game items you might acquire somehow belong to you? If you pay to join a soccer leage does that create the expectation that when someone passes you the ball that its yours to sell ebay?
The typical legal standard for answering a question like that is "reasonability." I.e., would a reasonable person be induced?
In your soccer case, a reasonable person would not be induced. In the WoW case, it may actually be true that a reasonable person would be induced. That is precisely the reason we have a jury of peers--to answer as to what is reasonable.
The answers to the rest of your questions follow straight from this legal theory. I.e., would a reasonable person think a soccer ball kicked to them was theirs? Would a reasonable bridge player think the cards now belonged to them?
I mean, shit, I didn't even change the legal doctrine at all! You're proposing questions that have been answered by my estoppel doctrine for hundreds of years. Did you think the law never addressed these issues before? My extension into WoW doesn't rely on any modification of the estoppel doctrine.
As for your analogy to other games, it is possibly distinguishable on the same reasonability issue. I feel pretty safe saying that a reasonable person (as determined by a jury) would not think the tiles in Scrabble are theirs.
The issue is, as always, Would a reasonable person think that gold won in WoW belongs to them?
Slashdot Mirror
I'd remember if one of my fellow service members was the son of a congressman who was on the House Ways and Means Committee, the committee which oversaw the draft and could have brought the halting of the draft up for a vote. Who was also the grandson of a senator. And whose family was very wealthy. The Bush family is another Kennedy family.
You're telling me that people 30 years after Kennedy served in WWII don't remember serving with him? People sure remembered serving with Kerry enough to attack him heavily for things he supposedly did to NOT deserve honor.
There's a saying where I come from (New New York): That dog won't hunt, monsignor.
But it wouldn't matter if he got fired, because Obama just wants to take all of the working class's money and give it to welfare mamas and papas, right?
Sometimes I can't tell if Slashdot trolling is becoming /b/trolling, or if people are serious.
As opposed to "fake torturing" like listening to Nickelback?
If Bush went AWOL, then it he de facto did not serve. This is like saying you're qualified to run IBM because you went to business school. And not Harvard Business School, either.
The Texas Air National Guard is not part of the Armed Services of the United States. It's a Texas outfit. Need proof? It's URL is agd.STATE.TX.us.
In my opinion, the CIC power is the least important Presidential power. For one, with a non-interventionist foreign policy, the CIC power is extremely diminished. The founding fathers (and many alive today) want a non-interventionist philosophy. Or, at least, a humble foreign policy, to borrow a phrase from a man who promised and did not deliver that.
The President's most important power is either to use the bully pulpit to push his mandate onto Congress, or to appoint federal judges (especially to SCOTUS justices).
The Gulf War made people donate some toys to children of vets. The Afghani and Iraqi Conflicts ("war [weren't] declared") have tarnished our image, but that can be repaired over the course of a decade.
SCOTUS appointments shape the next couple centuries of national development. We're still making decisions based on what they said 200 years ago.
Give me an expert in Constitutional Law (SCOTUS appointments) and someone who can inspire people to action (using the bully pulpit). That is what we need in a President.
And thus a civilian, not a military man. Regardless, the other guy's point still stands: The founding fathers made the CIC position a civilian position.
Wow. Just wow.
I'm an Obama supporter. Were it Hillary's and not Barack's name on the ballot, I would probably be voting for her only to vote against "bomb bomb bomb bomb bomb Iran" McCain, a man I truly respected until about 2004; perhaps I might even be voting for McKinney instead. Additionally, I know plenty of people who support Obama but hate both Clintons. And I mean HATE.
And I'm an Obama supporter, and I couldn't be arsed to care about Bill Clinton's lack of e-mail experience. But, of course, I couldn't be arsed to care about McCain's inability to use a computer.
Of course, we should expect these kinds of generalizations from a man who likens Obama to Hitler(!!). Need I point out that Hitler's economic policies pulled Germany out of a terrible depression and provided the average German with affordable automobiles vehicles for the first time in history? Hitler perpetrated absolutely terrible acts. But his economic policies arguably saved the country. Your attempts to liken Obama to Hitler are absolutely laughable because if your argument is taken as true, it is an argument for Obama, a man you clearly despise. And if the argument is taken as false, then you're words aren't shit for shit.
Well, at least I know with whom not to talk about foreign policy. I suggest you read our favorite pro-Iraq-War secular humanist on waterboarding. Hitchens: It's Torture. Just to point out, Hitchens had himself waterboarded to prove it wasn't torture.
So did you use Dragon Naturally Speaking to input "gazillions of aides," or were you talking about McCain?
There's a ridiculously easy-to-recognize distinction between "inability to use the most important technological innovation of the past 100 years, if not further back" and "choice to do something other than serve in the military."
That being said, I think DQing McCain for inability to use a computer is idiotic. What's next? DQing someone for not being able to SMS quickly?
A company can dismiss an employee for good cause, bad cause, or even no cause at allthis is black letter law. Ignoring a contract defining a specific work timeline, the only exceptions I know of are
If you did the act and then got fired for something else, you likely will not prevail on a wrongful termination suit.
Then you should be aware that IQ tests don't really mean anything (other than that you are good at taking IQ tests). Especially not for someone over the age of 20.
For example, if you're 35 (just a guess based on the fact that you have five kids), an IQ of 180 means (stated simply) you're "as smart as someone who is 63." What the hell does that even mean? Clearly it's a bullshit metric.
I mean, if we define intelligence as
most IQ tests (nearly all?) test only the third prong.
However, your point that IQ doesn't mean shit for shit is well said.
You guys are all missing the point. The Netherlands is a CIVIL LAW state. This means there really isn't any such thing as "precedent." Especially not at a Arrondissementsrechtbank-level court.
You raise extremely good points. I think your argument defeats mine. I have nothing really to refute with at this point, but I still wanted to congratulate you for what I consider to be excellent analysis.
It also makes me happy, as I really don't want to consider virtual property "real" in any case, either. I don't want it taxable in the future!
I've typically been on your side in these debates, trying to draw parallels between points won in a tennis match toward winning championship prize money being untaxable. Your Pac-Man example is basically the same thing.
Thanks for the debate. This is why Slashdot is still the best place for nerdy news.
Err, shouldn't that be "pot in every bong"?
Two wrongs do not make a right, man. A government behaving lawlessly inspires the citizenry to respond in kind.
Is that what you want?
Ah, you remind me of one of my favorite songs, Positronic Pimp:
I think your sig is missing the sound effect of a duckbill being bent upwards: p-tainnnng!
All sarcasm aside, you have a really, really bleak view of politicians if you think they actually sit around all day basing their decisions on what will prevent revolution.
I'm very glad I retain my faith that most politicians have at least a modicum of desire to merely better society.
Or do you actually think the "government" is a single, self-interested entity that is not made up of individual actors?
It's like when people talk about how Big Pharma has a cure for HIV and cancer but is sitting on it to make more money from treatment rather than cures.
You know, completely ignoring the fact that Big Pharma is made up of, among other things, a ton of people who actually know people in real life dying of AIDS and cancer.
I'd like to make a fine distinction. I don't think it's reasonable. However, I think it's possible that a jury comprised of twelve US citizens would think it's reasonable.
If I didn't make that clear, then that's my fault.
But on a relevant but also not-relevant note, if the gold/weapons don't belong to you in the game, what is your recourse when someone does what happened in the Netherlands? How do you get compensated for the damage done to your character?
I mean, if you've put in hundreds of hours toward attaining something and then it's taken from you, shouldn't you be able to get it back?
Complain to an indifferent corporation? I think the existence of lawsuits demonstrates that the United States citizenry and polity disagree with this concept--were it possible to remedy injuries by mere protest to corporations, lawsuits against corporations would be impermissible.
The law recognizes that (absent a lawsuit) companies are not responsive to injured parties most of the time that they "ought to" be to make the injured "whole again." My concern is that if we do not agree that this is actual property belonging to the player, then there is no recourse for this.
As such, if you could sell your character for $500 on eBay but someone forces you to transfer all your treasure/gold/whatnot away and the value of your character plummets, have you not lost something of value for which you should be able to obtain restitution (either in the form of damages or specific performance)?
And if we acknowledge that you can sue someone for causing such damage to you, how is the Blizzard case (absent a license/contract provision) any different? It is yours, after all, under the presumptions of the previous paragraph...
I suppose we could say that you and Blizzard are tenants in common of the in-game property or something. Or perhaps you are the tenant and Blizzard is the lessor. If someone deprives you of your rental car, they can be sued, I'm sure. However, I'm not sure whether the lessor or lessee would have to initiate the suit, and this could prove problematic if it's the lessor's (Blizzard's) responsibility to sue. I doubt they would sue for something so trivial. And only in an ideal world would corporations be 100% responsive to these issues.
However, the license/contract provision saves Blizzard (and us) the trouble of having to hammer out legal doctrine in this case.
I'm fairly confident you're wrong (although I've never actually tried a case before, I have taken Evidence--let's hope that B+ helps me out here). Let me walk you through it:
The lawyer cannot discuss an issue like how a jury in another trial decided an issue unless he has introduced that fact as evidence.
Ignoring FRE 401 issues of relevancy (under which another decision in another case would probably be ruled irrelevant), you'd presumably bring such a prior decision in through the testimony of an expert witness (you definitely would not use a lay witness). However, an expert witness cannot tell the jury the answer to an ultimate issue at a trial. As one of the elements of estoppel is "reasonability of an actor," a witness could not testify as to whether the actor was reasonable or not.
See FRE 704(b):
I do. And as I said before in the same thread,
I agree with you. In our hypothetical case, Blizzard is covered. However, it's a really boring case. So I spiced it up by saying "absent a license/contract provision."
Precedents matter only when determining legal issues, not fact issues. "Reasonability" is a fact issue, not a legal issue. Thus, precedent does not matter.
I'll say it again. absent a license/contract provision . . .
I'll say it again. absent a license/contract provision . . .
There is another legal doctrine (of contract) that states that if two people enter into a contract, one person only has one interpretation of the contract, and the other person knows of two interpretations and knows the other person only knows of the one interpretation, then the "shared" interpretation holds. In this case, if Blizzard knows one interpretation is "gold belongs to the player" and another is "gold is not the player's" and knows that a player thinks the gold belongs to him, then the prevailing interpretation of the contract is "gold belongs to the player."
Or maybe "gold belongs to the player until WoW gets shut down completely"?
Which is precisely why I said "absent a license/contract provision" in my previous post. A EULA is an end user license agreement.
Disagree with me if you want. I'm not saying you're wrong. I don't even think I'm right. I'm just engaging in intellectual masturbation.
The typical legal standard for answering a question like that is "reasonability." I.e., would a reasonable person be induced?
In your soccer case, a reasonable person would not be induced. In the WoW case, it may actually be true that a reasonable person would be induced. That is precisely the reason we have a jury of peers--to answer as to what is reasonable.
The answers to the rest of your questions follow straight from this legal theory. I.e., would a reasonable person think a soccer ball kicked to them was theirs? Would a reasonable bridge player think the cards now belonged to them?
I mean, shit, I didn't even change the legal doctrine at all! You're proposing questions that have been answered by my estoppel doctrine for hundreds of years. Did you think the law never addressed these issues before? My extension into WoW doesn't rely on any modification of the estoppel doctrine.
As for your analogy to other games, it is possibly distinguishable on the same reasonability issue. I feel pretty safe saying that a reasonable person (as determined by a jury) would not think the tiles in Scrabble are theirs.
The issue is, as always, Would a reasonable person think that gold won in WoW belongs to them?