Religion or spiritual belief is fine when it's individual and personal.
A person would never develop anything even remotely approaching anything comparable to any religion. Religion is a social phenomenon, and it can not exist in a non-organized form.
The type of phenomenon it is doesn't automatically dismiss its reasons for existing. Most religions (Christianity, for example) were actually started by people who were extreme non-conformists to the point that it put their lives in jeopardy. Prior to the advent of free speech, saying certain things and not following the crowd was a great way to end up crucified (or put to some other horrible death). The following that came later is the social phenomenon of which you speak. That was built around the actual movers by third parties who meant well but couldn't recognize the danger of making it into a social movement.
You know the same sort of mentality today in the form of the nanny-state (to use a non-religious example), full of people who just want you to be happy who refuse to look at the suffering caused by the way they want to make that happen. Politicians just love people like that and would have a very hard time fulfilling most of their control fantasies without their support.
Again using Jesus as an easy example, he wasn't much of a religious person. He tended to piss off the priests and other religious people of his day. He was described as having a sort of authority but "not like the scribes" who wrote down the scriptures of the time. It was the offended, organized, religious leaders who hated him so much that they wanted to kill him just to shut him up. They, the organized form, are what opposed a man who merely wanted to share his own idea of the nature of existence and otherwise posed no threat.
The problem with organizing such things is that how one deals with the mysteries of life in this Universe is and always has been a deeply individualistic enterprise. It is not something you can do for another person, no more than you could urinate for another person. You cannot make it a corporate experience without trivializing it, profaning it, and reducing it to its lowest common denominator. All that can do is attract weak, insecure people who weren't doing anything with their individuality anyway and so are willing to sell it in exchange for a sense of belonging that temporarily relieves their inability to cope with life.
Okay so I saw this and it's a common mistake and I'd like to clear this up for you. You seem unusually able to entertain an idea with which you don't initially agree.
But I think you need to acknowledge that the same is true for me - it makes me feel bad that you're cutting me down for no reason.
What made you think anything he said was about you? He didn't mention your userID and he didn't make rude jokes about your mama. He talked specifically about Apple products and explained why he does not prefer them.
Why on earth would you take that personally? I mean, even if he meant it personally (which he didn't) why would you go along with it by taking it that way? Are you a member of Apple's upper management? No? Then, can you not consider whether liking a company and its products does not have to make them an extension of your personal ego, and in fact you are much better off (more like your own man) if you don't allow that to happen?
Eventually every single country with a big debt will suffer because the world is understanding that debt is not sustainable and it can't be a way of living.
God damn, I sure am tired of "the world" requiring a big disaster before it finally begins understanding something I could have told it a long time ago.
This quote sums up all you need to know about religion:
"Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful." – Lucius Annaeus Seneca (Seneca the Younger).
Back then, the religions he spoke of were different to today's, the cultures of the people were different to today's, and the nature of education was different to today's, but nothing has changed. Not even the hypocrisy of the rulers/politicians.
BTW, regarding your extraordinarily generous assessment of statesmen:
"Now I know what a statesman is; he's a dead politician. We need more statesmen." – Bob Edwards.
Religion or spiritual belief is fine when it's individual and personal. Like with so many other insanities of mankind, the problem kicks in when it becomes an organized corporate activity. Then it appeals to the need that insecure, weak people have to feel like a member of something greater than themselves because they do not have the courage to be individuals. Or you could say that courageous people satisfy the same need by being in this vast Universe; they can handle the vastness and the unanswered questions and do not need membership in a club of like-minded sycophants to give them self-worth.
Either way, that weakness and neediness is the exploitable vulnerability that rulers (cloth or crown, and lately media) have always exploited. I know some of you hate the term "sheeple" and for those I say, suck it up and learn to deal with it. Print it out and read it a few times until you desensitize yourself if that's what it takes. When you can handle a simple term, even one you wouldn't use yourself (the horror!) like a calm dispassionate adult, read the rest of this.
They are sheeple not because they join a group. They are sheeple not because they happen to do what others happen to do. They are sheeple because they need other people to define their reality for them, to give them a framework within which to interpret their own lives. That's how fundamental this is. It's about levels of consciousness arranged by framing of information. The need for this is so strong that almost any framework will do. It may be organized religion, it may be professional prestige, or nationalism, it may be hatred of a rival sports team, or it may be presented in terms like rich and poor, black and white, left and right. It doesn't matter -- they are all interchangeable flavors different prepackaged flavors appeal to different people who share this sick need.
It takes real strength to actually think for yourself, to not be deceived into falsely believing you know what that means, and to truly know the difference. It takes a certain kind of real purpose to observe all the frameworks and -isms, learn what you can from them, accept the tiny kernel of truth they often contain without hating them for the way they mislead, and move on without ever getting stuck in one.
The people with that unhealthy need get stuck as soon as they find one they like. The promise of acceptance and affirmation and fellowship lulls them into a slumber. They now have a loyalty and an interpretation to which everything else must be related no matter how much of a forced fit it requires. Almost everyone is so compromised. You could call it Satan or a thousand other names. I personally explain that it is to mind what viruses are to DNA. Either way, it's nothing less than the single principle which is wrong with the entire world.
The problem is that there is no absolute definition of Satan. Anonymous hackers come in as many varieties as the people/companies they hack. No matter what your beliefs, morals, or political affiliation, there is a hacker out there who disagrees with you. The only way to choose "not to work for Satan" in the eyes of all hackers, is to choose not to work at all.
The best way to work around that lack of absolute, perfect definition is to instead regard whether all dealings it has involve no use of force or fraud and are therefore entirely voluntary for all participants. If not, you have an objectively evil organization. For example, deliberate vendor lock-in is a kind of force used to artificially raise the cost of doing business with a competitor and serves no other purpose; it is evil and it is a cowardly act performed by those who do not believe in their own merits and thus fear open competition.
That's a question as old as democracy. Can a just democracy survive the shenanigans of evil organizations without resorting to evil tactics itself?
No democracy or republic can survive long if its people are broken and needy. Such people have vulnerabilities that dictators and such easily exploit by giving broken people a false sense of worth, usually some form of nationalism or other irrational, emotional pride that always needs to create an enemy in order to triumph over it. This is not at all the same as legitimately defending oneself against an unprovoked attack by an aggressor.
Can you become what you behold and be content that you have done right? Because that's what you're doing if you do not condemn black hat hacking when it's used to take down evil organizations.
In a vacuum, I would agree with you. The problem is, it is not a vacuum. The very best, time-tested, and most highly effective way to create vigilantes is to selectivey enforce existing laws such that some people have justice and others do not. Ever heard that saying that everyone wants either less corruption or more opportunities to participate in it? Our government is certainly in the latter camp and that's why anyone at Anonymous ever thought to do any of these things.
Even people who are rotten to the core recognize a need to have some kind of justification for their actions. The difference between them and noble people is that rotten ones don't care how absurd, flimsy, or transparent the justification is and will happily make one up if it suits their purposes. The street thug might pull his pistol on someone who makes eye contact, but he does at least wait for eye contact.
But to argue that you'd have to read the study. Instead you'd rather whine about nerd rage, Apple envy, and some made-up conspiracy to get page views.
That an organization will further its own profits when it knows with confidence that there will be no penalty or backlash is emphatically not a conspiracy theory. In fact Slashdot's point of view could very well be that they are merely tailoring their service to meet the demands of what their users want to read.
In fact this particular brand of profiteering happens often enough to have its own specific term: yellow journalism. It is not difficult to find more examples of the theme. This common, well-documented phenomenon is as much of a "conspiracy" as anyone here has suggested.
You did not use the loaded, connotation-ridden term "conspiracy" because it was the most reasonable one available; clearly it is not. No, you used it because you want to imply, without actually making the case, that anyone who suspects yellow journalism happened here is some kind of absurdly paranoid crazy person. If you believe that, understand that the burden of proof is on the accuser and be ready to present your evidence of a stranger's psychological state (assuming you are qualified to do so, of course).
That's the bind you find yourself in when you are tempted by the lazy and unworthy path of trying to score an instant victory without earning it through superior reason, merely because you happen to have strong feelings (just like the guy you responded to, incidentally). I mean if you're going to strongly call out somebody else, at least cover basics like this.
As for me, I am inclined personally to believe that "iconic" is a more neutral, less loaded way of saying "causes great polarization". One side of that polarization is sometimes called nerd rage. The other side of that polarization involves customers who for whatever reasons (frivolous and hipster and/or truly merit-based) are very satisfied with the Apple products they purchased. The way I see it, you both have slightly different perspectives on the same point. Remove this puerile need to quibble over nothing and it becomes that simple.
You shouldn't get me wrong either, I don't believe that corporations should get away with 'evil'. However in life it's not always easy to recognise that you've ended up in the wrong place, and some individuals on this list probably have no idea that some people even consider this organisation evil.
No, it's not always easy to recognize. In fact lots of times it is not. It takes discernment.
I'll put it to you this way. Consider the time, effort, and energy that is routinely poured into useless pursuits like celebrity worship and jock-sniffing (i.e. athlete worship) and all the fuss and worry about the intimate private lives of people not because they are involved in one's own life but because they can sing, dance, act, or play a sport. I'd wager that less than one-tenth of that effort would be required to cultivate the kind of wise discernment I'm talking about.
It's not a matter of inability. It's a matter of priority combined with the notion of reaping what you sow. How many of those individuals took half an afternoon to do any research on an organization and its practices and its history prior to deciding to dedicate a career working in it? How many of them considered that most employers perform at least basic background checks prior to making a job offer for all of the same reasons? Just like the situation with network security, they couldn't be bothered and decided it should be someone else's job and received their results accordingly.
I don't know at what point our society decided it was a virtue to never do anything yourself, to never be terribly involved in even important decisions, and to never take some responsibility for one's own situation rather than being willfully helpless and pretending to be a victim, but to quote Bill Hicks, "I missed that meeting".
What happens the day that someone releases the names? What happens when some poor secretary who's name is on the list gets her details released to netizens without a social conscience. I understand that Stratfor are probably 'evil' from some of their recent actions, but if this activism is attempted then I hope that just a list of names isn't considered sufficient proof by and of itself of wrongdoing.
All I'm trying to say is that an itchy-trigger finger in obtaining information can lead to problems. I equate it to identifying downloaders by their IP, it's not sufficient proof and may be highly misleading.
The flip side of that... is that choosing not to work for Satan means having a lot less to fear from would-be exorcists.
There are career paths I personally didn't take because I realized the particular industry was corrupt to its core and I wanted no part in that. An honest living that does not make the world a worse place is an integral part of a clear conscience. The kind of numb indifference it would take to not care about such things, to consider them a bother and not a responsibility, would be like a sort of living death.
Since some of you have severe reading comprehension problems, and love to project your personal interpretation onto whatever you read, I'll spell this out for you: nowhere did I say it's perfectly OK that underlings may catch some of the fallout for decisions made by the higher-ups. What I am saying is that if they were more careful about choosing their employer they wouldn't have these concerns. When you choose to become part of something, you're part of it, for better or worse.
The evil organizations of the world never seem to have a problem finding those who will join ranks with them. Ever notice that and wonder if that's the real problem?
50% off the first month or 25% off the entire order is your choice. And that what is to say that you're not spamming your own referral code when they both are nosopa?
The point is, if you had one shred of integrity you would have clearly stated up-front that you derive a monetary benefit from someone using the code that you supplied. Then the readers can decide on their own whether this makes your advice biased and unworthy of consideration. Being aware of that, you "conveniently" omitted that part.
Such an omission had to have been intentional. It is a lie by omission and that makes you a liar.
I wonder if people who are afraid to say no to their employers live longer, or if they die younger. I wonder if they lose more than just those evenings and weekends, free of worrying about work. I wonder if they just stay in the harness until they have a stroke, or a heart-attack, and die at 48? I wonder if growing a spine is good for you.
W
If you have a spine, you tend not to be around people who don't respect that. It naturally repels them because your presence alone makes them feel insecure by comparison. That is, no matter how politely you do it, they are threatened by someone who won't go along with their unreasonable demands (if they were reasonable they wouldn't have to be demands...).
That might limit your job prospects if it is not respected and you can easily be replaced with someone who doesn't. It also limits how many friends you have since most people like to use social pressure to obligate you into serving them. It's how egos deal with the world. It's worthwhile to realize how useless that is and cultivate relationships with people who enjoy and appreciate the purely voluntary nature of everything you do for them, which is often more than someone who feels obliged.
Having a spine is definitely a preference for quality over quantity.
I kind of like the way that Ross Perot treated his employees.
He expected the world from them, and he received it.
He also protected his employees with all his might.
I call that leading by example instead of leading by fiat. Effective leaders understand it's a two-way relationship and their high expectations are often met or exceeded. Poor leaders think it's a one-way street and would balk at doing themselves what they expect from their underlings; they tend to get the minimum it takes to avoid disciplinary action.
I wouldn't want a 'career' at that place. If they want you to work 40+ hours a week then they need to compensate for it. Otherwise there are many more places out there that won't expect you to work 24/7.
Yes. Isn't it amusing the way things are framed?
If you're goofing off on company time, or claim more hours than you actually worked, then you're stealing. If you think the company should pay you for all the time you spend creating value for them, and should not ever make you work for free off the clock, then you're "not a team player".
It's standard "do as I say, not as I do" hypocrisy.
I don't expect this to catch on...either that or it will move to some other social media vehicle like Twitter. Most companies LIKE the fact that they can get their employees free efforts after hours!
This applies on the personal level in terms of what kind of manager someone is, and on the corporate level in terms of what kind of company it is and the culture they have.
There are of course companies that try to squeeze the most out of everyone with no regard to the impact this has on morale, that treat the employees like furniture or machines. They are looking at short-term productivity. There actually are companies that take a longer view. They realize that happy, enthusiastic workers who feel like they are respected as human beings are actually more productive and more willing to go above and beyond what it takes to merely avoid disciplinary action. It's more of an investment that pays dividends. It's as simple as tit-for-tat: treat your people well and they'll treat you well in return, even when you're not looking.
They encourage a culture of people who are "on board" in more ways that those of a mere mercenary, who actually do want the company to succeed and grow. It's a type of mind-share not available to the "crack the whip and make sure they know their place" style of management. That kind of management might seem effective in the short term but it's suffocating. Eventually it drives away everyone who is talented enough to be marketable and find better positions elsewhere, leaving the company with those who are stuck because they can find nothing better and then de-motivating them.
I think part of the problem with IT is that it's viewed as a maintainence function, like building repair or janitorial services. It's not a sexy bread-winner like the sales department. It tends towards reminding you how replacable you are while under-valuing just how much downtime can actually cost. There really are companies who value in-house expertise and who treat their workers with respect without regard for the type of work they do. They don't do it because they are such saints, of course, but because it works every time it's tried.
There are too many managers and other authority figures who think that once they obtain a title, their word is the decree of some kind of god. They don't feel that a certain responsibility goes along with that and have no idea what it's like to actually earn the confidence of their subordinates. They tend to alienate everyone who works with them. They are also more likely to be the sociopathic types who were willing to say and do anything to obtain that position in the first place and are now more concerned with being in charge than with making wise decisions.
No, I label people stupid when they repeatedly do the same stupid things, and actively refuse education and correction.
People who revel in their ignorance, refuse to better themselves when given every possible opportunity, and fail at basic logic and show no inclination to improve themselves are people I consider stupid.
As such your assumption is wrong. Everyone does make mistakes, and I am no exception. Refusal to grow, improve, and learn on the other hand, is the hallmark of being stupid.
Amen to that. The total blindness and lack of self-awareness and introspection are what I cannot relate to myself.
It's some kind of ego issue. It's a combination of "I'm a king and you don't question the king" and "it's okay to be helpless and never try to identify and solve my own problems because as king I should have people for that". The second aspect is well-known to anyone who has ever worked a tech support line and heard from literate adults who need handholding to follow the most basic instructions already available to them.
They rarely ever actually say they are kings and it may or may not be a thought in their minds but in their hearts they think so and act accordingly. That's why they don't treat themselves as flawed beings who are here to learn and grow and overcome personal shortcomings. They treat themselves like that's a lot of unnecessary work they can get away with not performing.
IANAL, but the logical reasoning (yeah, that doesn't usually any similarity with the law...) is: That some users may be willing to give up a legal right in exchange for something that they wouldn't otherwise be able to get (or not at that price)?
I understand why it could be tempting. But there are lots of tempting things the law does not allow (eh use your imagination if you like).
What makes this one special? Especially considering the nature of a contract of adhesion and the tendency for all companies in a given market to use extremely similar agreements? It's just a bad idea. I see no benefit to it being allowed by law. That's especially true in the USA which is founded on the concept of natural inalienable rights. It would be more understandable in a country where rights are considered something granted by law.
You should had bought an actual media box or built one yourself to begin with, not buy a game console. Use the right tool for the job if you want something done.
Just curious, do you ever actually put forth your own ideas instead of waiting for opportunities to condescend and tell people why they're wrong on matters that aren't even factual in nature?
For example... there was a time when the PS3 was one of the more affordable Blu-Ray players. That time may have passed, but at one point it was a good deal and significantly cheaper than a standalone player or a PC with a Blu-Ray drive. This is attractive to people who are on a budget and are willing to work with the ways that a PS3 is less flexible than a home-built media box. If you are unwilling to deal with such things, and spending more money is worthwhile to you, that is your own preference. The GP obviously has a different one. Your preference is more suitable for you personally but that does not make it superior to his.
I will say that few people are such a purist about a damned media machine. If it connects to their TV and plays the media they want to play, most people are satisfied at this point. Do you have any idea how smug you come across when you say they used the wrong tool? The problem here is not the tool or any technical aspects of the tool. The problem is the legal agreement surrounding the tool.
Tired of seeing this mentality everywhere. If you really must insist on looking down your nose at everyone else, try earning it by contributing more than they do.
If this EULA update worries you, then just give them a written notice that you don't accept that clause. They allow it as long as you notice Sony, and they still let you accept rest of the EULA and use PSN. It's even written there right next to the clause. Read it.
Marketer says: if my decision to automatically sign you up for our endless reams of junk mail err I mean special promotions, adding your name to every advertising database we maintain, and spamming you err I mean keeping you posted about interesting new offers worries you, just waste your time by opting-out of them!
This is a little like mail-in rebates. The company is counting on the fact that most people are lazy, are not diligent, and won't follow through. The number of customers who would say they dislike this clause if asked directly is far higher than the number who actually read through the EULA of their own initiative and used their limited time to follow up on each provision they disliked. Sony knows this.
If you think a business practice that depends solely on laziness and lack of due diligence is perfectly legitimate and deserves to be successful... well, that's where we would disagree. If we are going to have that sort of free-for-all marketplace then I also want all warning labels removed from all products, all drugs to be legal and unrestricted (you still go to a doctor because it's a good idea, if you are too stupid to realize that then you take your chances), all other victimless-crime laws to be repealed, and all scams to be legal since the targets should have known better anyway.
In some ways, I would like that because laziness and stupidity would become much, much more painful to the point of become rarities. People would learn that no one cares about their own interests more than they do. They'd also learn how to perform basic research when in doubt about something important. However, I'm not really so sure that replacing lazy, fat, stupid people with smart, fit, evil assholes would be an improvement. At any rate, some time ago we decided that "consumer" protection was a good idea and shady business practices don't deserve to be rewarded. All I'm asking for is a little consistency.
And, IIRC, didn't the Supreme Court recently rule that an AT&T provision in their contracts did not violate the law? If you are an AT&T customer, your lack of right to sue them (for any reason, no less) has apparently been upheld by the courts. Your sole method of redress is binding arbitration with, as I recall, some sort of liability cap.
What's the good, compelling reason that anyone is allowed to forfeit (or demand another party forfeit) what is otherwise a legal right? What was the justification given for considering this a legitimate part of contract law? Especially in one-sided, non-negotiable contracts of adhesion?
If there are any lawyers who can answer that, I'd really like to know. It seems like one of those incredibly short-sighted ideas that does more harm than good.
for a medieval peasant even to muster the will to break that conditioning was something major.
The only difference between then and now is that back then there were a few agreed-upon forms of conditioning that few individuals were able to question. We're much more sophisticated now. We've developed a wide variety of forms of conditioning that few individuals are able to question. Fewer would listen anyway -- they're too busy defending their particular form and explaining why other forms are absurd.
These days, the conditioned can feel like they had a choice in the matter. It's like choosing your master in order to celebrate your great freedom of choice.
If you had the kind of freedom that celebrates itself, you wouldn't choose any master.
Wow, for the guy who thinks that in response to being offended, that one should suck it up and move on, you are not very good at it.
I have to agree with the AC on this one: a pompous, self-righteous fuckwit. Try taking your own advice and grow a pair.
I did take my own advice. I argued why I think there's something wrong with that.
Those who cannot grow a pair? You know what they do? They look to the site admin, or a government agent, or some other authority figure to censor whatever it is they don't like. Is that what I did? No. I countered bad speech with more speech, not with censorship.
You fail to comprehend the point. Not because it is beyond your comprehension; it isn't. You fail because that way and only that way do you get to bitch about something and feel "right" even if only for the interval between that time and my setting you straight.
If by "pompous and self-righteous" you mean "I'll tell the truth and I won't make any apologies for it" then yes, that I am. What you want is for someone to kiss your ass and say things delicately to suit your tastes, to mince words and be diplomatic to avoid your ire. What you want is a people-pleaser who cares about your approval. Sorry, but fuck you, I won't play that game. Go ahead and hate me just as much as you like. Call me some more names if that fulfills your puerile needs. That's what is called having a pair. Not kow-towing to hyperemotional sensitives such as yourself who must make everything personal.
I'd like to see the argument you put up when a stolen car you buy gets taken away from you. Two consenting adults, right?
That scenario involves a quite unwilling third party. That's exactly the problem I have with Amazon's action -- the issue was between Amazon and the rightsholder. They chose to involve unwilling third parties (their own customers at that). You are only reinforcing my point here.
That isn't two consenting adults. That's two consenting adults, one of which is using fraud, and a third adult who's very much not consenting. It's a big difference.
As said already, this was ONE frigging book in the existence of their ebook store, and people got full refunds to purchase the very same book, word from word, from a source that was legally able to sell it.
That's a most amicable way to handle it. I appreciate you highlighting the goodwill that Amazon showed once the situation happened. That part is easy to underappreciate and was worth a reminder.
I still don't find it acceptable to make this your customers' problem. You didn't do your homework and vet the product you offered for sale, that's your fault, you get to sort it out on your own. There are records of how many copies were sold, so you remit payments to the actual rightsholder plus some negotiated fee for accidentally infringing on their copyright and you're done. To put it another way, if this happened with a physical paper book would you support them breaking into your home to take it back as long as they leave an envelope with the money on your kitchen table? After all, on page 37 of the EULA you clearly gave them that right...
Why is this so acceptable in the digital world? If it's intellectual _property_ let's treat it like property. If it's zeroes and ones, let's treat it like zeroes and ones. This is a desire to have one's cake and eat it too. It's not reasonable.
To make a more minor point... instead of going through a refund process and all the transactions that involves... why not just overwrite the book on the device and replace it with the legal copy? Customers might not even notice it happened. Why inconvenience them if you're going to have such remote capabilities at all?
You decry the apologists. But quite the contrary, I think you just want to find fault in anything a "big evil corporation" does.
When they do things the hard way for no good reason, and cause problems that could have been prevented, then the fault is there whether I find it or not.
You responded to a troll, with a long, pompous, self-righteous rant.
I thought the first post was preachy and a little misguided, but I didn't think you were a fuckwit.
Now I do. You're a fuckwit.
And news flash: they hated as much as the purchasers did if not more - really bad pr when they're trying to build a business around how safe and reliable it is to make electronic manuscript purchases. You think there wasn't some serious internal policy changes to ensure that chances of it happenin g again areas close to zero as possible?
How to make it absolutely zero: don't build devices with this kind of remote-deletion functionality. When negotiating with publishers, tell them up-front that any such option is off the table, that you (the business) will settle any copyright disputes with them, without dreaming of making this your customers' problem. It's not like Amazon doesn't have the resources. Imagine the great PR they could have had if they positioned themselves as protecting their customers from such errors.
I'm just not impressed with how painful and tedious it was for them to try avoiding the use of an option that doesn't belong there in the first place. They deserved the bad PR. If telling the truth is bad PR, that's not the messenger's fault.
I hate to say things like this but you're a fuckwit.
You hate to say such things because it's a sorry excuse for having your own point of view. I'd hate to be that way myself; that's why I'm not. I don't know if it's some kind of jealousy or what, but I see lots of posts like this written by people who clearly could not articulate their own position and why they believe it's better.
It reminds me of a post I made some weeks back about Mohandas Gandhi. I misremembered how the man's name was spelled and I wrote it as "Ghandi". So what does some useless little AC come along and do? He points this out and calls me a liar, saying obviously I never read the man's autobiography as I had said. This appeals to the bitchy base nature of a lot of people so he even got modded up. Of course, he didn't dispute anything I said about Gandhi's life, beliefs, or impact on the world. That would have required substance, something he obviously lacked. It would have also required me being wrong about the important part of the post and he knew I wasn't. His entire contribution was "you made a spelling error, therefore you're wrong and I'm right!" I guess to him that represented some kind of conquest or victory.
You're just like him.
It's that desperate need of nothing-human-beings to look down their nose at something and judge it less worthy than themselves. No power to uplift and edify, only to try to degrade in order to relieve the pain of their wretched, stressful, purposeless existence. Little do they understand it makes it worse. Enjoy your perverse, imaginary sense of superiority, if you can. I can see how my love of reason makes me an unusually tempting target. Meanwhile, my works speak for themselves and are open to constructive discourse.
Personally, I couldn't stand being like you. It would burden me with the kind of inner conflict I very much love being free from. That's why I bother to write this -- certainly not for you, as that would be pearls before swine. It's for people who see this going on everywhere and struggle with self-doubt, who might appreciate knowing they really are seeing it correctly.
True, but they had legally good grounds for doing so, and really bent over backwards to make it right. I don't like the idea that they can do it at all, but I don't see how they really did anything morally wrong.
What's morally wrong is they didn't even attempt to obtain consent. The entire notion of a marketplace is based on a willing buyer and a willing seller doing business without coercion of any kind. The initial sale of the book was done in this consentual, voluntary fashion. The revocation of the book and refunds etc. were done against the will of many customers. It was not a voluntary transaction.
If you don't want to sell something of yours to me, I don't have the right to simply take it against your will and leave you the money. If I did that but you didn't want to sell it then I just coerced you into a sale. I am certain you have some possession you are unwilling to part with and would be outraged if someone did this to you. Others feel the same way about other things they purchase.
That they sold a book they didn't have the right to sell is their problem, to be resolved between them and the rightsholder. It's not like Amazon is struggling to financially survive and couldn't have possibly worked out some kind of royalty. To make that your customers' problem is a shitty way to do business. A good business looks after their customers better than that and cleans up its own messes without involving unwilling third parties. Even if the only reason they do it is selfish, to avoid losing sales from pissed off former customers.
I'm sure it's not legally wrong since they almost definitely had the multiple pages of fine-print legalese in some kind of EULA to legally cover their asses. So no surprise the state isn't intervening here. The idea here is that coming up with a clever legal way to coerce someone into a bargain is still morally wrong. It makes some people not want to do business with you.
I don't understand this trend of making apologetics for large organizations. At all. It's as though they have to murder kittens or something before some of you will say "hey, that doesn't look right to me!". To make your problem into your customers' problem when the customers did nothing wrong (while you did) is simply unethical.
Slashdot Mirror
Religion or spiritual belief is fine when it's individual and personal.
A person would never develop anything even remotely approaching anything comparable to any religion. Religion is a social phenomenon, and it can not exist in a non-organized form.
The type of phenomenon it is doesn't automatically dismiss its reasons for existing. Most religions (Christianity, for example) were actually started by people who were extreme non-conformists to the point that it put their lives in jeopardy. Prior to the advent of free speech, saying certain things and not following the crowd was a great way to end up crucified (or put to some other horrible death). The following that came later is the social phenomenon of which you speak. That was built around the actual movers by third parties who meant well but couldn't recognize the danger of making it into a social movement.
You know the same sort of mentality today in the form of the nanny-state (to use a non-religious example), full of people who just want you to be happy who refuse to look at the suffering caused by the way they want to make that happen. Politicians just love people like that and would have a very hard time fulfilling most of their control fantasies without their support.
Again using Jesus as an easy example, he wasn't much of a religious person. He tended to piss off the priests and other religious people of his day. He was described as having a sort of authority but "not like the scribes" who wrote down the scriptures of the time. It was the offended, organized, religious leaders who hated him so much that they wanted to kill him just to shut him up. They, the organized form, are what opposed a man who merely wanted to share his own idea of the nature of existence and otherwise posed no threat.
The problem with organizing such things is that how one deals with the mysteries of life in this Universe is and always has been a deeply individualistic enterprise. It is not something you can do for another person, no more than you could urinate for another person. You cannot make it a corporate experience without trivializing it, profaning it, and reducing it to its lowest common denominator. All that can do is attract weak, insecure people who weren't doing anything with their individuality anyway and so are willing to sell it in exchange for a sense of belonging that temporarily relieves their inability to cope with life.
But I think you need to acknowledge that the same is true for me - it makes me feel bad that you're cutting me down for no reason.
What made you think anything he said was about you? He didn't mention your userID and he didn't make rude jokes about your mama. He talked specifically about Apple products and explained why he does not prefer them.
Why on earth would you take that personally? I mean, even if he meant it personally (which he didn't) why would you go along with it by taking it that way? Are you a member of Apple's upper management? No? Then, can you not consider whether liking a company and its products does not have to make them an extension of your personal ego, and in fact you are much better off (more like your own man) if you don't allow that to happen?
Eventually every single country with a big debt will suffer because the world is understanding that debt is not sustainable and it can't be a way of living.
God damn, I sure am tired of "the world" requiring a big disaster before it finally begins understanding something I could have told it a long time ago.
Aren't you?
This quote sums up all you need to know about religion: "Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful." – Lucius Annaeus Seneca (Seneca the Younger). Back then, the religions he spoke of were different to today's, the cultures of the people were different to today's, and the nature of education was different to today's, but nothing has changed. Not even the hypocrisy of the rulers/politicians.
BTW, regarding your extraordinarily generous assessment of statesmen: "Now I know what a statesman is; he's a dead politician. We need more statesmen." – Bob Edwards.
Religion or spiritual belief is fine when it's individual and personal. Like with so many other insanities of mankind, the problem kicks in when it becomes an organized corporate activity. Then it appeals to the need that insecure, weak people have to feel like a member of something greater than themselves because they do not have the courage to be individuals. Or you could say that courageous people satisfy the same need by being in this vast Universe; they can handle the vastness and the unanswered questions and do not need membership in a club of like-minded sycophants to give them self-worth.
Either way, that weakness and neediness is the exploitable vulnerability that rulers (cloth or crown, and lately media) have always exploited. I know some of you hate the term "sheeple" and for those I say, suck it up and learn to deal with it. Print it out and read it a few times until you desensitize yourself if that's what it takes. When you can handle a simple term, even one you wouldn't use yourself (the horror!) like a calm dispassionate adult, read the rest of this.
They are sheeple not because they join a group. They are sheeple not because they happen to do what others happen to do. They are sheeple because they need other people to define their reality for them, to give them a framework within which to interpret their own lives. That's how fundamental this is. It's about levels of consciousness arranged by framing of information. The need for this is so strong that almost any framework will do. It may be organized religion, it may be professional prestige, or nationalism, it may be hatred of a rival sports team, or it may be presented in terms like rich and poor, black and white, left and right. It doesn't matter -- they are all interchangeable flavors different prepackaged flavors appeal to different people who share this sick need.
It takes real strength to actually think for yourself, to not be deceived into falsely believing you know what that means, and to truly know the difference. It takes a certain kind of real purpose to observe all the frameworks and -isms, learn what you can from them, accept the tiny kernel of truth they often contain without hating them for the way they mislead, and move on without ever getting stuck in one.
The people with that unhealthy need get stuck as soon as they find one they like. The promise of acceptance and affirmation and fellowship lulls them into a slumber. They now have a loyalty and an interpretation to which everything else must be related no matter how much of a forced fit it requires. Almost everyone is so compromised. You could call it Satan or a thousand other names. I personally explain that it is to mind what viruses are to DNA. Either way, it's nothing less than the single principle which is wrong with the entire world.
The problem is that there is no absolute definition of Satan. Anonymous hackers come in as many varieties as the people/companies they hack. No matter what your beliefs, morals, or political affiliation, there is a hacker out there who disagrees with you. The only way to choose "not to work for Satan" in the eyes of all hackers, is to choose not to work at all.
The best way to work around that lack of absolute, perfect definition is to instead regard whether all dealings it has involve no use of force or fraud and are therefore entirely voluntary for all participants. If not, you have an objectively evil organization. For example, deliberate vendor lock-in is a kind of force used to artificially raise the cost of doing business with a competitor and serves no other purpose; it is evil and it is a cowardly act performed by those who do not believe in their own merits and thus fear open competition.
That's a question as old as democracy. Can a just democracy survive the shenanigans of evil organizations without resorting to evil tactics itself?
No democracy or republic can survive long if its people are broken and needy. Such people have vulnerabilities that dictators and such easily exploit by giving broken people a false sense of worth, usually some form of nationalism or other irrational, emotional pride that always needs to create an enemy in order to triumph over it. This is not at all the same as legitimately defending oneself against an unprovoked attack by an aggressor.
Can you become what you behold and be content that you have done right? Because that's what you're doing if you do not condemn black hat hacking when it's used to take down evil organizations.
In a vacuum, I would agree with you. The problem is, it is not a vacuum. The very best, time-tested, and most highly effective way to create vigilantes is to selectivey enforce existing laws such that some people have justice and others do not. Ever heard that saying that everyone wants either less corruption or more opportunities to participate in it? Our government is certainly in the latter camp and that's why anyone at Anonymous ever thought to do any of these things.
Even people who are rotten to the core recognize a need to have some kind of justification for their actions. The difference between them and noble people is that rotten ones don't care how absurd, flimsy, or transparent the justification is and will happily make one up if it suits their purposes. The street thug might pull his pistol on someone who makes eye contact, but he does at least wait for eye contact.
But to argue that you'd have to read the study. Instead you'd rather whine about nerd rage, Apple envy, and some made-up conspiracy to get page views.
That an organization will further its own profits when it knows with confidence that there will be no penalty or backlash is emphatically not a conspiracy theory. In fact Slashdot's point of view could very well be that they are merely tailoring their service to meet the demands of what their users want to read.
In fact this particular brand of profiteering happens often enough to have its own specific term: yellow journalism. It is not difficult to find more examples of the theme. This common, well-documented phenomenon is as much of a "conspiracy" as anyone here has suggested.
You did not use the loaded, connotation-ridden term "conspiracy" because it was the most reasonable one available; clearly it is not. No, you used it because you want to imply, without actually making the case, that anyone who suspects yellow journalism happened here is some kind of absurdly paranoid crazy person. If you believe that, understand that the burden of proof is on the accuser and be ready to present your evidence of a stranger's psychological state (assuming you are qualified to do so, of course).
That's the bind you find yourself in when you are tempted by the lazy and unworthy path of trying to score an instant victory without earning it through superior reason, merely because you happen to have strong feelings (just like the guy you responded to, incidentally). I mean if you're going to strongly call out somebody else, at least cover basics like this.
As for me, I am inclined personally to believe that "iconic" is a more neutral, less loaded way of saying "causes great polarization". One side of that polarization is sometimes called nerd rage. The other side of that polarization involves customers who for whatever reasons (frivolous and hipster and/or truly merit-based) are very satisfied with the Apple products they purchased. The way I see it, you both have slightly different perspectives on the same point. Remove this puerile need to quibble over nothing and it becomes that simple.
You shouldn't get me wrong either, I don't believe that corporations should get away with 'evil'. However in life it's not always easy to recognise that you've ended up in the wrong place, and some individuals on this list probably have no idea that some people even consider this organisation evil.
No, it's not always easy to recognize. In fact lots of times it is not. It takes discernment.
I'll put it to you this way. Consider the time, effort, and energy that is routinely poured into useless pursuits like celebrity worship and jock-sniffing (i.e. athlete worship) and all the fuss and worry about the intimate private lives of people not because they are involved in one's own life but because they can sing, dance, act, or play a sport. I'd wager that less than one-tenth of that effort would be required to cultivate the kind of wise discernment I'm talking about.
It's not a matter of inability. It's a matter of priority combined with the notion of reaping what you sow. How many of those individuals took half an afternoon to do any research on an organization and its practices and its history prior to deciding to dedicate a career working in it? How many of them considered that most employers perform at least basic background checks prior to making a job offer for all of the same reasons? Just like the situation with network security, they couldn't be bothered and decided it should be someone else's job and received their results accordingly.
I don't know at what point our society decided it was a virtue to never do anything yourself, to never be terribly involved in even important decisions, and to never take some responsibility for one's own situation rather than being willfully helpless and pretending to be a victim, but to quote Bill Hicks, "I missed that meeting".
What happens the day that someone releases the names? What happens when some poor secretary who's name is on the list gets her details released to netizens without a social conscience. I understand that Stratfor are probably 'evil' from some of their recent actions, but if this activism is attempted then I hope that just a list of names isn't considered sufficient proof by and of itself of wrongdoing.
All I'm trying to say is that an itchy-trigger finger in obtaining information can lead to problems. I equate it to identifying downloaders by their IP, it's not sufficient proof and may be highly misleading.
The flip side of that ... is that choosing not to work for Satan means having a lot less to fear from would-be exorcists.
There are career paths I personally didn't take because I realized the particular industry was corrupt to its core and I wanted no part in that. An honest living that does not make the world a worse place is an integral part of a clear conscience. The kind of numb indifference it would take to not care about such things, to consider them a bother and not a responsibility, would be like a sort of living death.
Since some of you have severe reading comprehension problems, and love to project your personal interpretation onto whatever you read, I'll spell this out for you: nowhere did I say it's perfectly OK that underlings may catch some of the fallout for decisions made by the higher-ups. What I am saying is that if they were more careful about choosing their employer they wouldn't have these concerns. When you choose to become part of something, you're part of it, for better or worse.
The evil organizations of the world never seem to have a problem finding those who will join ranks with them. Ever notice that and wonder if that's the real problem?
50% off the first month or 25% off the entire order is your choice. And that what is to say that you're not spamming your own referral code when they both are nosopa?
The point is, if you had one shred of integrity you would have clearly stated up-front that you derive a monetary benefit from someone using the code that you supplied. Then the readers can decide on their own whether this makes your advice biased and unworthy of consideration. Being aware of that, you "conveniently" omitted that part.
Such an omission had to have been intentional. It is a lie by omission and that makes you a liar.
I wonder if people who are afraid to say no to their employers live longer, or if they die younger. I wonder if they lose more than just those evenings and weekends, free of worrying about work. I wonder if they just stay in the harness until they have a stroke, or a heart-attack, and die at 48? I wonder if growing a spine is good for you.
W
If you have a spine, you tend not to be around people who don't respect that. It naturally repels them because your presence alone makes them feel insecure by comparison. That is, no matter how politely you do it, they are threatened by someone who won't go along with their unreasonable demands (if they were reasonable they wouldn't have to be demands...).
That might limit your job prospects if it is not respected and you can easily be replaced with someone who doesn't. It also limits how many friends you have since most people like to use social pressure to obligate you into serving them. It's how egos deal with the world. It's worthwhile to realize how useless that is and cultivate relationships with people who enjoy and appreciate the purely voluntary nature of everything you do for them, which is often more than someone who feels obliged.
Having a spine is definitely a preference for quality over quantity.
I kind of like the way that Ross Perot treated his employees. He expected the world from them, and he received it. He also protected his employees with all his might.
I call that leading by example instead of leading by fiat. Effective leaders understand it's a two-way relationship and their high expectations are often met or exceeded. Poor leaders think it's a one-way street and would balk at doing themselves what they expect from their underlings; they tend to get the minimum it takes to avoid disciplinary action.
I wouldn't want a 'career' at that place. If they want you to work 40+ hours a week then they need to compensate for it. Otherwise there are many more places out there that won't expect you to work 24/7.
Yes. Isn't it amusing the way things are framed?
If you're goofing off on company time, or claim more hours than you actually worked, then you're stealing. If you think the company should pay you for all the time you spend creating value for them, and should not ever make you work for free off the clock, then you're "not a team player".
It's standard "do as I say, not as I do" hypocrisy.
I don't expect this to catch on...either that or it will move to some other social media vehicle like Twitter. Most companies LIKE the fact that they can get their employees free efforts after hours!
This applies on the personal level in terms of what kind of manager someone is, and on the corporate level in terms of what kind of company it is and the culture they have.
There are of course companies that try to squeeze the most out of everyone with no regard to the impact this has on morale, that treat the employees like furniture or machines. They are looking at short-term productivity. There actually are companies that take a longer view. They realize that happy, enthusiastic workers who feel like they are respected as human beings are actually more productive and more willing to go above and beyond what it takes to merely avoid disciplinary action. It's more of an investment that pays dividends. It's as simple as tit-for-tat: treat your people well and they'll treat you well in return, even when you're not looking.
They encourage a culture of people who are "on board" in more ways that those of a mere mercenary, who actually do want the company to succeed and grow. It's a type of mind-share not available to the "crack the whip and make sure they know their place" style of management. That kind of management might seem effective in the short term but it's suffocating. Eventually it drives away everyone who is talented enough to be marketable and find better positions elsewhere, leaving the company with those who are stuck because they can find nothing better and then de-motivating them.
I think part of the problem with IT is that it's viewed as a maintainence function, like building repair or janitorial services. It's not a sexy bread-winner like the sales department. It tends towards reminding you how replacable you are while under-valuing just how much downtime can actually cost. There really are companies who value in-house expertise and who treat their workers with respect without regard for the type of work they do. They don't do it because they are such saints, of course, but because it works every time it's tried.
There are too many managers and other authority figures who think that once they obtain a title, their word is the decree of some kind of god. They don't feel that a certain responsibility goes along with that and have no idea what it's like to actually earn the confidence of their subordinates. They tend to alienate everyone who works with them. They are also more likely to be the sociopathic types who were willing to say and do anything to obtain that position in the first place and are now more concerned with being in charge than with making wise decisions.
No, I label people stupid when they repeatedly do the same stupid things, and actively refuse education and correction.
People who revel in their ignorance, refuse to better themselves when given every possible opportunity, and fail at basic logic and show no inclination to improve themselves are people I consider stupid.
As such your assumption is wrong. Everyone does make mistakes, and I am no exception. Refusal to grow, improve, and learn on the other hand, is the hallmark of being stupid.
Amen to that. The total blindness and lack of self-awareness and introspection are what I cannot relate to myself.
It's some kind of ego issue. It's a combination of "I'm a king and you don't question the king" and "it's okay to be helpless and never try to identify and solve my own problems because as king I should have people for that". The second aspect is well-known to anyone who has ever worked a tech support line and heard from literate adults who need handholding to follow the most basic instructions already available to them.
They rarely ever actually say they are kings and it may or may not be a thought in their minds but in their hearts they think so and act accordingly. That's why they don't treat themselves as flawed beings who are here to learn and grow and overcome personal shortcomings. They treat themselves like that's a lot of unnecessary work they can get away with not performing.
IANAL, but the logical reasoning (yeah, that doesn't usually any similarity with the law...) is: That some users may be willing to give up a legal right in exchange for something that they wouldn't otherwise be able to get (or not at that price)?
I understand why it could be tempting. But there are lots of tempting things the law does not allow (eh use your imagination if you like).
What makes this one special? Especially considering the nature of a contract of adhesion and the tendency for all companies in a given market to use extremely similar agreements? It's just a bad idea. I see no benefit to it being allowed by law. That's especially true in the USA which is founded on the concept of natural inalienable rights. It would be more understandable in a country where rights are considered something granted by law.
You should had bought an actual media box or built one yourself to begin with, not buy a game console. Use the right tool for the job if you want something done.
Just curious, do you ever actually put forth your own ideas instead of waiting for opportunities to condescend and tell people why they're wrong on matters that aren't even factual in nature?
... there was a time when the PS3 was one of the more affordable Blu-Ray players. That time may have passed, but at one point it was a good deal and significantly cheaper than a standalone player or a PC with a Blu-Ray drive. This is attractive to people who are on a budget and are willing to work with the ways that a PS3 is less flexible than a home-built media box. If you are unwilling to deal with such things, and spending more money is worthwhile to you, that is your own preference. The GP obviously has a different one. Your preference is more suitable for you personally but that does not make it superior to his.
For example
I will say that few people are such a purist about a damned media machine. If it connects to their TV and plays the media they want to play, most people are satisfied at this point. Do you have any idea how smug you come across when you say they used the wrong tool? The problem here is not the tool or any technical aspects of the tool. The problem is the legal agreement surrounding the tool.
Tired of seeing this mentality everywhere. If you really must insist on looking down your nose at everyone else, try earning it by contributing more than they do.
If this EULA update worries you, then just give them a written notice that you don't accept that clause. They allow it as long as you notice Sony, and they still let you accept rest of the EULA and use PSN. It's even written there right next to the clause. Read it.
Marketer says: if my decision to automatically sign you up for our endless reams of junk mail err I mean special promotions, adding your name to every advertising database we maintain, and spamming you err I mean keeping you posted about interesting new offers worries you, just waste your time by opting-out of them!
... well, that's where we would disagree. If we are going to have that sort of free-for-all marketplace then I also want all warning labels removed from all products, all drugs to be legal and unrestricted (you still go to a doctor because it's a good idea, if you are too stupid to realize that then you take your chances), all other victimless-crime laws to be repealed, and all scams to be legal since the targets should have known better anyway.
This is a little like mail-in rebates. The company is counting on the fact that most people are lazy, are not diligent, and won't follow through. The number of customers who would say they dislike this clause if asked directly is far higher than the number who actually read through the EULA of their own initiative and used their limited time to follow up on each provision they disliked. Sony knows this.
If you think a business practice that depends solely on laziness and lack of due diligence is perfectly legitimate and deserves to be successful
In some ways, I would like that because laziness and stupidity would become much, much more painful to the point of become rarities. People would learn that no one cares about their own interests more than they do. They'd also learn how to perform basic research when in doubt about something important. However, I'm not really so sure that replacing lazy, fat, stupid people with smart, fit, evil assholes would be an improvement. At any rate, some time ago we decided that "consumer" protection was a good idea and shady business practices don't deserve to be rewarded. All I'm asking for is a little consistency.
And, IIRC, didn't the Supreme Court recently rule that an AT&T provision in their contracts did not violate the law? If you are an AT&T customer, your lack of right to sue them (for any reason, no less) has apparently been upheld by the courts. Your sole method of redress is binding arbitration with, as I recall, some sort of liability cap.
What's the good, compelling reason that anyone is allowed to forfeit (or demand another party forfeit) what is otherwise a legal right? What was the justification given for considering this a legitimate part of contract law? Especially in one-sided, non-negotiable contracts of adhesion?
If there are any lawyers who can answer that, I'd really like to know. It seems like one of those incredibly short-sighted ideas that does more harm than good.
for a medieval peasant even to muster the will to break that conditioning was something major.
The only difference between then and now is that back then there were a few agreed-upon forms of conditioning that few individuals were able to question. We're much more sophisticated now. We've developed a wide variety of forms of conditioning that few individuals are able to question. Fewer would listen anyway -- they're too busy defending their particular form and explaining why other forms are absurd.
These days, the conditioned can feel like they had a choice in the matter. It's like choosing your master in order to celebrate your great freedom of choice.
If you had the kind of freedom that celebrates itself, you wouldn't choose any master.
Wow, for the guy who thinks that in response to being offended, that one should suck it up and move on, you are not very good at it.
I have to agree with the AC on this one: a pompous, self-righteous fuckwit. Try taking your own advice and grow a pair.
I did take my own advice. I argued why I think there's something wrong with that.
Those who cannot grow a pair? You know what they do? They look to the site admin, or a government agent, or some other authority figure to censor whatever it is they don't like. Is that what I did? No. I countered bad speech with more speech, not with censorship.
You fail to comprehend the point. Not because it is beyond your comprehension; it isn't. You fail because that way and only that way do you get to bitch about something and feel "right" even if only for the interval between that time and my setting you straight.
If by "pompous and self-righteous" you mean "I'll tell the truth and I won't make any apologies for it" then yes, that I am. What you want is for someone to kiss your ass and say things delicately to suit your tastes, to mince words and be diplomatic to avoid your ire. What you want is a people-pleaser who cares about your approval. Sorry, but fuck you, I won't play that game. Go ahead and hate me just as much as you like. Call me some more names if that fulfills your puerile needs. That's what is called having a pair. Not kow-towing to hyperemotional sensitives such as yourself who must make everything personal.
I'd like to see the argument you put up when a stolen car you buy gets taken away from you. Two consenting adults, right?
That scenario involves a quite unwilling third party. That's exactly the problem I have with Amazon's action -- the issue was between Amazon and the rightsholder. They chose to involve unwilling third parties (their own customers at that). You are only reinforcing my point here.
That isn't two consenting adults. That's two consenting adults, one of which is using fraud, and a third adult who's very much not consenting. It's a big difference.
As said already, this was ONE frigging book in the existence of their ebook store, and people got full refunds to purchase the very same book, word from word, from a source that was legally able to sell it.
That's a most amicable way to handle it. I appreciate you highlighting the goodwill that Amazon showed once the situation happened. That part is easy to underappreciate and was worth a reminder.
... instead of going through a refund process and all the transactions that involves... why not just overwrite the book on the device and replace it with the legal copy? Customers might not even notice it happened. Why inconvenience them if you're going to have such remote capabilities at all?
I still don't find it acceptable to make this your customers' problem. You didn't do your homework and vet the product you offered for sale, that's your fault, you get to sort it out on your own. There are records of how many copies were sold, so you remit payments to the actual rightsholder plus some negotiated fee for accidentally infringing on their copyright and you're done. To put it another way, if this happened with a physical paper book would you support them breaking into your home to take it back as long as they leave an envelope with the money on your kitchen table? After all, on page 37 of the EULA you clearly gave them that right...
Why is this so acceptable in the digital world? If it's intellectual _property_ let's treat it like property. If it's zeroes and ones, let's treat it like zeroes and ones. This is a desire to have one's cake and eat it too. It's not reasonable.
To make a more minor point
You decry the apologists. But quite the contrary, I think you just want to find fault in anything a "big evil corporation" does.
When they do things the hard way for no good reason, and cause problems that could have been prevented, then the fault is there whether I find it or not.
You responded to a troll, with a long, pompous, self-righteous rant. I thought the first post was preachy and a little misguided, but I didn't think you were a fuckwit. Now I do. You're a fuckwit.
It doesn't work twice in the same thread :-)
And news flash: they hated as much as the purchasers did if not more - really bad pr when they're trying to build a business around how safe and reliable it is to make electronic manuscript purchases. You think there wasn't some serious internal policy changes to ensure that chances of it happenin g again areas close to zero as possible?
How to make it absolutely zero: don't build devices with this kind of remote-deletion functionality. When negotiating with publishers, tell them up-front that any such option is off the table, that you (the business) will settle any copyright disputes with them, without dreaming of making this your customers' problem. It's not like Amazon doesn't have the resources. Imagine the great PR they could have had if they positioned themselves as protecting their customers from such errors.
I'm just not impressed with how painful and tedious it was for them to try avoiding the use of an option that doesn't belong there in the first place. They deserved the bad PR. If telling the truth is bad PR, that's not the messenger's fault.
I hate to say things like this but you're a fuckwit.
You hate to say such things because it's a sorry excuse for having your own point of view. I'd hate to be that way myself; that's why I'm not. I don't know if it's some kind of jealousy or what, but I see lots of posts like this written by people who clearly could not articulate their own position and why they believe it's better.
It reminds me of a post I made some weeks back about Mohandas Gandhi. I misremembered how the man's name was spelled and I wrote it as "Ghandi". So what does some useless little AC come along and do? He points this out and calls me a liar, saying obviously I never read the man's autobiography as I had said. This appeals to the bitchy base nature of a lot of people so he even got modded up. Of course, he didn't dispute anything I said about Gandhi's life, beliefs, or impact on the world. That would have required substance, something he obviously lacked. It would have also required me being wrong about the important part of the post and he knew I wasn't. His entire contribution was "you made a spelling error, therefore you're wrong and I'm right!" I guess to him that represented some kind of conquest or victory.
You're just like him.
It's that desperate need of nothing-human-beings to look down their nose at something and judge it less worthy than themselves. No power to uplift and edify, only to try to degrade in order to relieve the pain of their wretched, stressful, purposeless existence. Little do they understand it makes it worse. Enjoy your perverse, imaginary sense of superiority, if you can. I can see how my love of reason makes me an unusually tempting target. Meanwhile, my works speak for themselves and are open to constructive discourse.
Personally, I couldn't stand being like you. It would burden me with the kind of inner conflict I very much love being free from. That's why I bother to write this -- certainly not for you, as that would be pearls before swine. It's for people who see this going on everywhere and struggle with self-doubt, who might appreciate knowing they really are seeing it correctly.
True, but they had legally good grounds for doing so, and really bent over backwards to make it right. I don't like the idea that they can do it at all, but I don't see how they really did anything morally wrong.
What's morally wrong is they didn't even attempt to obtain consent. The entire notion of a marketplace is based on a willing buyer and a willing seller doing business without coercion of any kind. The initial sale of the book was done in this consentual, voluntary fashion. The revocation of the book and refunds etc. were done against the will of many customers. It was not a voluntary transaction.
If you don't want to sell something of yours to me, I don't have the right to simply take it against your will and leave you the money. If I did that but you didn't want to sell it then I just coerced you into a sale. I am certain you have some possession you are unwilling to part with and would be outraged if someone did this to you. Others feel the same way about other things they purchase.
That they sold a book they didn't have the right to sell is their problem, to be resolved between them and the rightsholder. It's not like Amazon is struggling to financially survive and couldn't have possibly worked out some kind of royalty. To make that your customers' problem is a shitty way to do business. A good business looks after their customers better than that and cleans up its own messes without involving unwilling third parties. Even if the only reason they do it is selfish, to avoid losing sales from pissed off former customers.
I'm sure it's not legally wrong since they almost definitely had the multiple pages of fine-print legalese in some kind of EULA to legally cover their asses. So no surprise the state isn't intervening here. The idea here is that coming up with a clever legal way to coerce someone into a bargain is still morally wrong. It makes some people not want to do business with you.
I don't understand this trend of making apologetics for large organizations. At all. It's as though they have to murder kittens or something before some of you will say "hey, that doesn't look right to me!". To make your problem into your customers' problem when the customers did nothing wrong (while you did) is simply unethical.