Let me start off by saying that I agree that it's a bad idea to text message while driving. However, I have seen people reading while driving, applying makeup while driving, and looking through a bag/purse/glove box while driving. And I'm sure that I could come up with many other things that people shouldn't do while they're driving. But none of those other things have had a specific law created to stop them, even though some of them are equally dangerous, much more common, and have been happening for a lot longer. Plus, it will be pretty hard to enforce this law since most people will have their cell phone below the window level when texting. The police officer will only see them looking down, but he won't see what they're looking down at. The point of my rant is, this is a silly law.
IT departments could still stick to a schedule though... They could apply all available updates once a month just like they do now. If a vulnerability is fixed a week after they usually do the updates, any IT department that wants to stick to a schedule can always ignore the patch until their next scheduled update.
I have seen one example of how this could work at a university where I used to be employed. They disabled automatic Windows updates by default, and they had some 3rd party software that pushed out the updates instead. After Microsoft released updates, they would evaluate them to make sure they wouldn't break anything. Then they would push out the updates later. It wouldn't have really affected them if they updates were released one at a time as opposed to all at once.
Just look at how attached people get to their cars, for example. I have friends that name their cars, talk to their cars, etc. I have also had friends talk about how they missed old cars and get worked up when talking about it.
Unless you threaten violence or some other illegal action...
There have been a growing number of cases where people that aren't guilty are reportedly told by the RIAA's representatives that, even if they aren't guilty, the RIAA isn't dropping the suit. What I was wondering is, is it illegal to sue someone, or press forward with a suit, even if you know (or should know) that they probably aren't guilty of what you are accusing them of? I know that the person or company initiating the suit can be found liable for damages, but are they committing a criminal offense?
I can explain it like this using your example...
What if you noticed that your car was damaged and you suspect, although have no proof, that the auto shop that worked on the car a month ago is responsible? And what if, when you confront them, they deny damaging the car? Is it extortion to tell them that you plan on suing them, proof or no proof, but they can make it easier on themselves by giving you $1000 right now to avoid a messy trial?
It has always seemed to me that demanding money from someone, and threatening to financially ruin them if they don't comply, is nothing more than extortion. Does the RIAA's activities amount to extortion, and does extortion carry a jail sentence?
There is no question that forced online sexual activity -- whether through text, animation, malicious scripts or other means -- is real; and is a traumatic experience that can have a profound and unpleasant aftermath, shaking your faith in yourself, in the community, in the platform, even in sex itself.
It sounds like they are trying to suggest that this "forced online sexual activity" may equate to rape. And if that's what they're saying, then when a website displays an unwanted porn pop-up, does that mean that the owner of the website is raping me?
I posted (what I thought) was a clever headline for the whole issue, and I linked to Digg's main page. I figured that it was legitimate news. Fark hadn't posted any warnings about it yet. So what did they do? They banned me for "Submission queue abuse."
Thank God! Someone who has common sense. I was arguing this with people at the bar yesterday. I asked them, "Do you think that, if there is a shooting in this bar, the Wal-Mart (which is about a half mile away) should close?" They told me that "it's not the same thing." Somehow, I doubt that they had ever seen a university though...
Remember the days when everyone ran Windows 9X and you could make an "undeletable" folder?
I always used to make a folder called "Îgayporn" on my buddy's desktop (which would show up as "_gayporn") and he wasn't able to delete it. It was a feature in my book!
Here's how "harassment" is defined by Indiana's law:
"Harassment" means conduct directed toward a victim that includes but is not limited to repeated or continuing impermissible contact that would cause a reasonable person to suffer emotional distress and that actually causes the victim to suffer emotional distress. Harassment does not include statutorily or constitutionally protected activity, such as lawful picketing pursuant to labor disputes or lawful employer-related activities pursuant to labor disputes.
That already prohibits pretty much all cyber-bullying.
Targeted harassment, even if not directly threatening, is already illegal. The only thing that this law could cover, that others do not, is general "bad-mouthing." The problem is, talking bad about someone is acceptable in some cases and not acceptable in others. I have a feeling that, if enacted, this is going to turn into another zero-tolerance-type mess where good kids are going to end up with criminal records even though they didn't do anything wrong.
I don't think that it's their business model that is failing... Rather, they are failing at their business model. Granted, the current system needs some tweaks. But the main problem is that the record companies are just not doing their job. Their whole purpose is to go out and find music that people will like and then market it to people. They are doing the opposite though... They are trying to TELL people what music to like instead of finding music that people WILL really like.
I agree. Most people don't realize that you can die from drinking too much water at once. I was telling my friend about this story, and his response was: "Water? How much did she drink? I have drank 20 beers in a night and not died, and all she drank was water!"
I had to explain to him about alcohol being a diuretic and about excessive water upsetting the electrolyte balance in your blood. Anyway, the point is, I wouldn't say that she is stupid for not knowing this. People aren't generally taught about this problem because it's very unlikely to happen. The only reason that I knew about this was from another similar news story about 8 years ago.
If someone really wants to get on MySpace, it won't be any problem at all to make a Yahoo address and get around the system. As always, this contradicts with my opinion on how sex offenders should be handled. The way I see it, if the offender doesn't pose a significant risk of repeating the offense, leave him alone once he has served his time. If he does pose a significant risk of repeating his offense, either leave him in jail or, at the very least, put him in an environment similar to a group home where he can be monitored effectively. When the government puts someone out on the street but tries to monitor them in this way, it makes me think of two scenarios. Either they're wasting time and money by harassing someone who has already served his time, or they are doing a half-assed job of watching someone who is a legitimate danger to the community.
Everytime I have read a story about someone being banned even though they weren't cheating, they were doing something that an average joe wouldn't do. I haven't read any blogs or forum posts about people being banned and having no idea why. I have read many posts about people being banned for emulating Windows, writing and debugging "legal" scripts, and using programmable macros on a keyboard. Basically, when I have read posts about people being mistakenly banned, it's because they were doing something unusual. I think it would only be right for Blizzard to listen to and sincerely consider someone's explanation if they get banned and want to appeal.
I don't think that there should be warnings; I'm glad that Blizzard bans people when they are using bots. But there should be appeals. If someone gets banned as a cheater, they should have the opportunity show Blizzard a legitimate program that they were running that triggered the false positive. And Blizzard should test it and see if it really does give a false positive. And that scenario should play out EVERY time someone requests it.
Let's be clear. The CEA's primary concern is not consumers, but technology companies--often large, multinational corporations which, like us, strive to make a profit.
Sometimes, all of these entities are the same company. Look at Sony for example. They own a record label, produce consumer electronics, and sell blank media.
Slashdot Mirror
Let me start off by saying that I agree that it's a bad idea to text message while driving. However, I have seen people reading while driving, applying makeup while driving, and looking through a bag/purse/glove box while driving. And I'm sure that I could come up with many other things that people shouldn't do while they're driving. But none of those other things have had a specific law created to stop them, even though some of them are equally dangerous, much more common, and have been happening for a lot longer. Plus, it will be pretty hard to enforce this law since most people will have their cell phone below the window level when texting. The police officer will only see them looking down, but he won't see what they're looking down at. The point of my rant is, this is a silly law.
IT departments could still stick to a schedule though... They could apply all available updates once a month just like they do now. If a vulnerability is fixed a week after they usually do the updates, any IT department that wants to stick to a schedule can always ignore the patch until their next scheduled update.
I have seen one example of how this could work at a university where I used to be employed. They disabled automatic Windows updates by default, and they had some 3rd party software that pushed out the updates instead. After Microsoft released updates, they would evaluate them to make sure they wouldn't break anything. Then they would push out the updates later. It wouldn't have really affected them if they updates were released one at a time as opposed to all at once.
Why don't they just release patches as the make them? Is there a specific reason that they hold them all until "patch Tuesday?"
Just look at how attached people get to their cars, for example. I have friends that name their cars, talk to their cars, etc. I have also had friends talk about how they missed old cars and get worked up when talking about it.
Unless you threaten violence or some other illegal action...
There have been a growing number of cases where people that aren't guilty are reportedly told by the RIAA's representatives that, even if they aren't guilty, the RIAA isn't dropping the suit. What I was wondering is, is it illegal to sue someone, or press forward with a suit, even if you know (or should know) that they probably aren't guilty of what you are accusing them of? I know that the person or company initiating the suit can be found liable for damages, but are they committing a criminal offense?
I can explain it like this using your example...
What if you noticed that your car was damaged and you suspect, although have no proof, that the auto shop that worked on the car a month ago is responsible? And what if, when you confront them, they deny damaging the car? Is it extortion to tell them that you plan on suing them, proof or no proof, but they can make it easier on themselves by giving you $1000 right now to avoid a messy trial?
Oops. What I meant to say was, "Do the RIAA's activities..."
It has always seemed to me that demanding money from someone, and threatening to financially ruin them if they don't comply, is nothing more than extortion. Does the RIAA's activities amount to extortion, and does extortion carry a jail sentence?
There is no question that forced online sexual activity -- whether through text, animation, malicious scripts or other means -- is real; and is a traumatic experience that can have a profound and unpleasant aftermath, shaking your faith in yourself, in the community, in the platform, even in sex itself.
It sounds like they are trying to suggest that this "forced online sexual activity" may equate to rape. And if that's what they're saying, then when a website displays an unwanted porn pop-up, does that mean that the owner of the website is raping me?
I posted (what I thought) was a clever headline for the whole issue, and I linked to Digg's main page. I figured that it was legitimate news. Fark hadn't posted any warnings about it yet. So what did they do? They banned me for "Submission queue abuse."
Thank God! Someone who has common sense. I was arguing this with people at the bar yesterday. I asked them, "Do you think that, if there is a shooting in this bar, the Wal-Mart (which is about a half mile away) should close?" They told me that "it's not the same thing." Somehow, I doubt that they had ever seen a university though...
Since when is Marxist revolution a sci-fi item?
Remember the days when everyone ran Windows 9X and you could make an "undeletable" folder? I always used to make a folder called "Îgayporn" on my buddy's desktop (which would show up as "_gayporn") and he wasn't able to delete it. It was a feature in my book!
We're one step closer to real sheeple.
Here's how "harassment" is defined by Indiana's law:
"Harassment" means conduct directed toward a victim that includes but is not limited to repeated or continuing impermissible contact that would cause a reasonable person to suffer emotional distress and that actually causes the victim to suffer emotional distress. Harassment does not include statutorily or constitutionally protected activity, such as lawful picketing pursuant to labor disputes or lawful employer-related activities pursuant to labor disputes.
That already prohibits pretty much all cyber-bullying.
Targeted harassment, even if not directly threatening, is already illegal. The only thing that this law could cover, that others do not, is general "bad-mouthing." The problem is, talking bad about someone is acceptable in some cases and not acceptable in others. I have a feeling that, if enacted, this is going to turn into another zero-tolerance-type mess where good kids are going to end up with criminal records even though they didn't do anything wrong.
I don't see how it's a company's job to keep people from lying on the internet. If it was, AOL's chat rooms would be in a lot of trouble...
I don't think that it's their business model that is failing... Rather, they are failing at their business model. Granted, the current system needs some tweaks. But the main problem is that the record companies are just not doing their job. Their whole purpose is to go out and find music that people will like and then market it to people. They are doing the opposite though... They are trying to TELL people what music to like instead of finding music that people WILL really like.
I agree. Most people don't realize that you can die from drinking too much water at once. I was telling my friend about this story, and his response was: "Water? How much did she drink? I have drank 20 beers in a night and not died, and all she drank was water!"
I had to explain to him about alcohol being a diuretic and about excessive water upsetting the electrolyte balance in your blood. Anyway, the point is, I wouldn't say that she is stupid for not knowing this. People aren't generally taught about this problem because it's very unlikely to happen. The only reason that I knew about this was from another similar news story about 8 years ago.
If someone really wants to get on MySpace, it won't be any problem at all to make a Yahoo address and get around the system. As always, this contradicts with my opinion on how sex offenders should be handled. The way I see it, if the offender doesn't pose a significant risk of repeating the offense, leave him alone once he has served his time. If he does pose a significant risk of repeating his offense, either leave him in jail or, at the very least, put him in an environment similar to a group home where he can be monitored effectively. When the government puts someone out on the street but tries to monitor them in this way, it makes me think of two scenarios. Either they're wasting time and money by harassing someone who has already served his time, or they are doing a half-assed job of watching someone who is a legitimate danger to the community.
As a person who plays a horde character, I second that.
Everytime I have read a story about someone being banned even though they weren't cheating, they were doing something that an average joe wouldn't do. I haven't read any blogs or forum posts about people being banned and having no idea why. I have read many posts about people being banned for emulating Windows, writing and debugging "legal" scripts, and using programmable macros on a keyboard. Basically, when I have read posts about people being mistakenly banned, it's because they were doing something unusual. I think it would only be right for Blizzard to listen to and sincerely consider someone's explanation if they get banned and want to appeal.
I don't think that there should be warnings; I'm glad that Blizzard bans people when they are using bots. But there should be appeals. If someone gets banned as a cheater, they should have the opportunity show Blizzard a legitimate program that they were running that triggered the false positive. And Blizzard should test it and see if it really does give a false positive. And that scenario should play out EVERY time someone requests it.
I was in Florida, I saw sunscreen lotion that had an SPF somewhere in the 70's.
Let's be clear. The CEA's primary concern is not consumers, but technology companies--often large, multinational corporations which, like us, strive to make a profit.
Sometimes, all of these entities are the same company. Look at Sony for example. They own a record label, produce consumer electronics, and sell blank media.
I am on the Horde side. Now that the BGs are multi-server, I can immediately get into a AV, and it takes less than 10 miuntes to get into WSG or AB.