Won't work. They've already got that base covered. You will only be able to exchange the item for another identical item. No returns.
I signed no such agreement, therefore I do not feel morally bound by their one-sided policy. I'd rather not have to do it, but if it is necessary, if reasoning with them should fail, I am within my rights to be as much of an unprofitable hassle for them as legally possible.
Therefore, if they want to play hardball, that's fine. Up the ante by increasing their hassle and therefore their expense. Be certain to make the purchase with a credit card. Call up your credit card company and dispute the charge, citing that you are dissatisfied with the merchandise and you were refused a refund. Force the matter to arbitration if necessary, taking up more of their time and money. Credit card chargebacks are a pain in the ass for retailers and they overwhelmingly favor the cardholder. The retailer knows this. At some point all of the personnel involved and time and hassle won't be worth the $15 dollars or so they charged for the movie, let alone the small portion of that which is a retailer's profit margin.
As usual, we tend to receive just as much bullshit as we're willing to put up with. If you act like docile sheep it makes you easy to walk all over. Make such asinine return policies as unprofitable as possible the moment they are inflicted on you. Corporations that will listen to little else will certainly listen to wasted profits.
Thankfully I have yet to have to actually do this, but I know that anyone who tries to screw me over is not going to do it easily. It will be more trouble than it is worth for them. Why anyone else would just lie down and take this shit is a mystery to me. It is no wonder corporations feel so free to shaft people because so many of them are willing to take it.
Umm... what? How exactly to you defeat inflation.. wait...
Does the President have a secret plan to fight inflation?
The President caused a lot of inflation with his stimulus. When you run a budget deficit that trillion or so has to come from someplace; it was created from nothing like all other fiat currencies. I don't think he's likely to do much to prevent it. Same deal with the Bush bailouts. Print (well, more like create electronically) money from nothing, give it to businesses which are "too big to fail", and voila, you have taken the value from the savings of the poor and middle classes (that they might have used to acquire wealth and move upwards) and transferred it to corporations without ever actually taking anyone's money.
The best way to fight inflation is to do away with fiat currency and move to a representative currency like a gold standard or a silver standard. Then you don't print money unless you actually have a scarce hard asset to back it. There will be no real political support for such a move however, because the license to print money is too useful for politicians of both parties. They'd have a much harder time if they had to actually raise taxes each time they wanted to spend large amounts of money that we don't have.
Well obviously what Mitnick did was much worse than killing people... he stole money from wealthy people! I think it's pretty obvious by just about every measure of our American society that stealing from the wealthy is a much more dire crime than murder.
Stealing from the poor? not so much.
And God help you if you infringe someone's copyright.
FYI the primary method of stealing from the poor and middle class is inflation. Why would you go through all the nastiness of taking the money itself away from them when you can leave the money right where it is, safe and sound in their bank accounts, and just take its value away instead? It's the biggest hidden tax in existence and incredibly regressive, since the truly wealthy don't keep piles of cash in a giant vault; they tend to invest most of their money in assets. What, did you really think you could have a scenario where about 50% of the population pay no federal taxes without finding some other way to make them pay? This is government we're talking about.
This is the reason the USA is in such an economic swirly. THE COST OF A LIFE IS NOT INFINITE! The sooner people accept this the sooner we can get on with a health care plan, welfare system, prison system, and most importantly defense budget that actually make sense. The military has put the cost of a human life at 2 million dollars for a long time, did you know that? The public needs to do the same, meaning even though Kevin Metnick did not kill anyone, he caused great financial harm, and that is just as bad. Even though you cannot rationalize it your head, the economy doesn't care. Since Metnick admitting that he caused 5 to 10 million dollars in damages, that would be equal to him killing 2-5 people, now what do you think his sentence should be?
Does that mean that if a wealthy person spends $300 million on a huge mansion he didn't really need, then he's actually a mass murderer?
Of course that's absurd. I see that you disagree with this, but personally I draw a (gigantic) distinction between causing financial damage to those fictitious legal entities we call corporations, versus directly causing the death of another real human being. If you understand nothing else, note that money can be paid back or earned back or restitution made, but resurrecting people who are dead and buried isn't possible. The legal system recognizes this distinction too, which is why Mitnick wasn't charged with 2-5 counts of murder.
The reason the US is in an economic "swirly" isn't because we failed to sufficiently devalue human life. It's because of the worst kind of people making all of its important decisions who make a revolving door between political office and corporate executive positions, because we thought that building up tremendous bubbles that must eventually burst was a good idea, because rampant speculation has made a casino out of what was intended to be all about long-term investment in viable companies, because much credit was given to people who were not creditworthy, because bad debts were made into securities and resold again and again, because the US hardly makes anything anymore other than movies and music and has accumulated gigantic trade deficits especially with China, because the US routinely spends more money than it has causing it to print more money causing inflation, because average consumers have a negative savings index, and generally because we fail to understand that debt is the only form of slavery that's still legal. Fix all of those things and the economy will improve without ever charging Mitnick with mass murder.
If you want to demonize Mitnick, seems rather useless but OK fine, have at it. Don't pretend like he's a murderer or some imaginary equivalent to a murderer though because he simply isn't. Everyone from the state to the lawyers to the private prison operators gets more money if more criminal charges stick. They would have nailed him with it if they could have because they have plenty of incentive. They didn't because the case cannot reasonably be made.
I hope you're trolling. I'd rather believe that than think you're seriously that deluded.
The issue is teaching the public how dangerous doing other things while driving is.
The people who need to have that explained to them should never be trusted with a driver's license.
Also, permanently revoking her license doesn't imply prison time. There may be prison time, but it's not a requirement of taking her license away for life.
I would be careful if I were you. Don't let them know that you have read the Constitution. They prefer ignorant drudges. Obama is hiding under your bed, and as soon as you fall asleep, he's going to sneak out and take all your guns. And your gold. You are hoarding gold, aren't you? After the collapse, all you will be able to buy with the fiat money will be Fiats, and everyone knows they are made in that soon-to-be-Muslim-Caliphate Italy.
Watch out!!
Is this mockery your way of saving face upon realizing that I have provided rational, non-paranoid reasoning for why limited government that does not try to exceed its enumerated powers is a Good Thing? I suppose it upsets you when it suddenly becomes difficult to portray everyone who disagrees with you as some kind of paranoid lunatic, like an unruly child who just had his toy taken away.
Hell, you're an AC, there's not much "face" to save really. Anyway if you're feeling low and in need of an echo chamber, you won't get that from me but that's alright. There are many who respond to reason as you just did so you have a lot of like-minded company.
Aside from the people who disbelieve in government entirely, I don't feel there is, as in my experience most of the anti-Census type rhetoric is based on principles of limitation and hamstringing the government out of spite, not because it's genuinely not a good idea to know these things, or because it's somehow a gross intrusion on the citizenry.
The Census as spelled out in the Constitution (Article 1, Section 2) has two purposes: it determines the number of representatives each state gets to elect and send to the House of Representatives. Unlike the Senate wherein each state gets two representatives, the House is proportional to the population of each state. It also determines the number of electoral votes a state may cast during a Presidential election.
It's not unreasonable to want the government to stick to the actual limited purpose of this power, instead of finding clever ways to exceed the Constitutional mandate to go beyond the scope of what the Founders intended. If they really want to do that, there is a Constitutional amendment process that would make it legitimate and that's the part I think you fail to appreciate. Intrusive questions like those about your income and lifestyle have absolutely nothing to do with the requirement that the House and electoral votes are properly apportioned.
Otherwise, those who refuse to answer the Census with anything more than the Constitutionally-required data are implicitly recognizing one important fact: information is a form of power. There are many who quite rationally believe that the U.S. Federal Government is already too powerful. Just to make the point, there have already been abuses of this data. In fact, it greatly facilitated the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. This was made possible because the Second War Powers Act of 1941 repealed all of the legal confidentiality protections that would normally apply to the Census data, which were not restored until 1947.
If you know anything about the U.S. Federal Government and the kind of people who make its important decisions, then you have to wonder whom they will next target. Maybe it will be Muslims or people of Middle Eastern descent, since we are currently fighting them overseas. History does have this annoying way of repeating itself. Refusing to help that happen is not a matter of spiting the government or anyone else; it's a recognition that there is no dire need for them to know so much about you and that this information can be and has been abused. I don't question the reason of those who understand this; I question the naivete of those who don't.
Using wiping software designed for mechanical disks makes absolutely no sense and the results from this study are 100% predictable.
If people were never surprised by predictable things the entire news industry would take a nosedive and be reduced to a shadow of its current self. It'd fuck up the economy!
"Trust but verify"? Verification results from the exact opposite of "trust":p You're right to verify, but saying stuff like that sounds silly..
Verification is after-the-fact. Prior to that, the vendor could still do something dishonest like fail to deliver on its promises. You're trusting them not to do that as indicated by your willingness to do business with them in the first place. Verification is an attempt to check against not only dishonesty on their part but also well-intentioned mistakes that wouldn't strictly be issues of trustworthiness.
It's sort of like when I deposit cash at a bank. If I tell them "this is 200 dollars, please put it into my account" they are going to count the money. I don't take that as an accusation that I am trying to deceive them, because it isn't. It's a standard practice because multiple pairs of eyes are more likely to catch both honest mistakes and deliberate deception. That's an example of "trust but verify".
It's not really so silly and it's far less extreme than "I want to be involved in each step of the process so I can watch your every move". That would be distrust.
It's one of those "to fill a void" type of desires that is not natural; it's a response to the kind of sense of alienation of which Erich Fromm gives such a great description... When something is being done not because it is voluntary and considered a joy, but out of some sense of desperation and unhealthy desire for attention, of course stress and anxiety is going to scale up with increasing involvement.
How could it work any other way? It's not a matter of whether anyone is forcing anyone -- clearly that is not the case. It's a matter of well-intentioned but thoroughly misguided compensatory problem-solving.
Interesting. Seems to me you argue that the "having friends on FB" is not the cause of an eventual stress but a retribution of one's misguided attempts to escape other types of stress (in the context of TFA, a correlation between too-many-FB-friends/anxiety due of a common cause rather then causation).
Universally, no. There are some people who really do simply enjoy using FB. There just aren't nearly enough of them to explain how it exploded overnight into such a trendy bandwagon that most people just had to jump on. There's a kind of compensatory desperation behind that one, a desire for the casual attention of strangers strong enough to make one ignore all of the privacy violations.
It's easier to understand once you get past one giant hurdle: by nature, human beings are not herd animals. That can be hard to believe in a modern world where millions of people follow neat little graphs all the time, but we're conditioned to be that way by the twin forces of public schooling and mass media (incidentally, our "ruling class" overwhelmingly sends their children to special private schools where they are taught to be leaders because they know this is true). The conditioning works much better in some people than it does in others. You cannot condition a creature to act against its nature without also inflicting trauma and causing dissonance.
What does it say that I have (literally) 50 times more Facebook friends than you and I'm not stressed out at all?
It says that you genuinely enjoy using Facebook and are not using it to make up for a deeper dissatisfaction with what you do and don't have in your life.
That or you're in a hell of a lot of denial, but it's not my place to tell you which is true. In the absence of any strong evidence either way, I'm inclined to believe the former, for what it's worth.
What does it say when I have only 24 facebook friends and I'm still stressed out by all the "noise".
That you are masochistic enough to stay in a situation nobody forced you in?
I have rarely and almost never observed actual masochism. What I usually witness instead is a mentality that thinks like this: "if I jump through the hoops and pay the price then maybe I'll get something I want." The difference of course is that, by definition, a real masochist isn't doing it out of hope for some reward or the achievement of some goal.
For as long as Facebook stories have appeared on Slashdot, I have said that the desire for the attention and evaluation of casual strangers is unhealthy. It's one of those "to fill a void" type of desires that is not natural; it's a response to the kind of sense of alienation of which Erich Fromm gives such a great description. It's one of those things where one must be careful to retain one's sense and objectivity, otherwise it is easy to mistake the increasing status of "common" with any sense of "normal". When something is being done not because it is voluntary and considered a joy, but out of some sense of desperation and unhealthy desire for attention, of course stress and anxiety is going to scale up with increasing involvement.
How could it work any other way? It's not a matter of whether anyone is forcing anyone -- clearly that is not the case. It's a matter of well-intentioned but thoroughly misguided compensatory problem-solving.
They can harden the Windows codebase and require that software be built with address randomization, non-executable pages, and other stack-smashing protections before it is allowed to use the little Windows certified logo.
Shouldn't this be done via the kernel and OS support libraries?
Yes, the way I worded that was sloppy of me. Still, for address randomization you'd have to compile the applications with position-independent (i.e. relocatable) code. So I should have said require that software built for Windows is compatible with such security measures. While they're at it, they can place canaries at the end of buffers like GCC's SSP to offer an additional layer of protection in userspace.
Microsoft should take realistic, do-able steps like this to actually address its security problems, or they should never speak of "innovation" again and admit that they have succumbed to stagnation.
All they need is to DL and run a checker that reports Pass/Fail and nothing more.
Do you intend to audit all of the network traffic to ensure that "pass/fail" is all it's reporting? Do you think an average user who can't be bothered to learn basic secure practices has the skill or the inclination to do that? This is assuming of course that the traffic isn't encrypted -- it would probably use SSL for the communications to ensure that no one has tampered with the results.
Uploading my data en masse or spelunking my files with their eyes would not be reasonable. Nor would it be at all profitable for them to do it.
It wouldn't be done en masse. Dishonest companies could target specific items that are small and have recognizable patterns, such as credit card numbers and bank account numbers. They're scanning your files anyway; the rest is basic pattern matching. That could be quite profitable, not to mention such data could be sold to other criminals so that the ones collecting it are not the ones using it, lending them some plausible deniability. If I can think of that in a few minutes I would assume that the real criminals can think of something more insidious (they're evil but they're definitely not stupid).
Also, what kind of scanning would this perform that decent AV software couldn't? What makes you think malware wouldn't be crafted to evade this just as malware is currently crafted to evade AV software? This has all the markings of a bad solution: it doesn't do much to address the problem it intends to solve and it also introduces new problems that have no simple solutions.
Do you consider it a "violation of your privacy" to tell your prospective sexual partners whether you have an STD or not?
Because this is the computational equivalent.
It is perfectly reasonable for anyone coming in virtual contact with your data to request that you prove that your data is sanitary.
Yes, it's always "for the children", "to prevent terrorism", and "for your safety" isn't it? Since you have nothing to hide, why would you possibly object to a full cavity search every time you enter any building? Do you want the evil terrorists/criminals/hackers to win or something? This is the computational equivalent.
The difference between this and your scenario is simple: the prospective sexual partners are giving mutual consent. If they don't like that arrangement, they can always decide that casual sex with strangers is inherently risky, or they could do something crazy like have sex with someone they love, trust, and know very well. By contrast, if this system is implemented, every bank and probably lots of other corporations are going to require it in order to do business. It's rather difficult to live in a modern world without ever doing business with banks and other corporations, which is why this would be forced on us with or without consent.
The responsibility goes to the consumer, when Microsoft is assigning responsibility (blame). After all, the highly vulnerable operating system clearly has nothing to do with it, hence the company behind said vulnerable operating system shouldn't have any liability either.
In a way they have a point. Those customers have created a market where those who make highly vulnerable operating systems are rewarded with literally billions of dollars and greater than 90% marketshare. It's a logical extension of this reality for Microsoft to assign responsibility as you describe.
I think the it would have to be a third party company that the consumer and the bank would both need to trust. Like how we trust verisign to prove the identity of an https provider.
I don't think it's a good solution, though.
There's another glaring problem with this idea. Those of us who study computer security and take steps to use our systems responsibly don't want to be burdened by all of these requirements intended for those who don't. I'm sorry that a few bad people defraud others of their money, but the minimum requirements for any proposed solution include not punishing those who are doing things correctly by imposing such intrusive measures.
As far as banks are concerned, securing their own systems is all I would expect from them. As their customer, I really don't want my bank getting into the end-user computer security business and telling me how I should run my systems. I want them to stick with what they know. I also don't want to pay the higher fees and less favorable interest rates it would take to cover this expense. That's not even considering the support costs, as the users for whom this is really intended are the same ones who need the most handholding.
If Microsoft really wants to do something helpful, they can stop marketing Windows as "the easiest thing ever!" to non-technical users. They can start being more realistic and up-front about the basic competency required to safely use a worldwide untrusted network. They can harden the Windows codebase and require that software be built with address randomization, non-executable pages, and other stack-smashing protections before it is allowed to use the little Windows certified logo. They could do a much better job of treating data from the network as untrusted and potentially malicious (the sandboxing they are beginning to implement for IE is a step in that direction).
Hell, for that matter they could split the company up into separate corporations which make competing operating systems that all implement the Win32/64 API. Perhaps some of them could be based on *BSD like Mac OSX. Getting rid of the "write once, infect everywhere" Windows monoculture would be a decently effective way to limit the spread of malware.
There are many options to be considered before we even think about universally intruding into everyone's PC and making this into a common practice that is somehow considered acceptable. Normally that's what the bad guys who write malware are trying to do. This is a terrible precedent. Not to mention that if average users get used to the idea of some company (that they don't get to audit) scanning their systems, what's to stop the organized criminals from just running their own scanning companies and collecting any financial data they find? This could change the nature of the attacks but has little or no hope of preventing attacks.
Question: What does a service provider have to do in order to qualify for safe harbor protection?
Answer: In addition to informing its customers of its policies (discussed above), a service provider must follow the proper notice and takedown procedures (discussed above) and also meet several other requirements in order to qualify for exemption under the safe harbor provisions....
Finally, the service provider must not have knowledge that the material or activity is infringing or of the fact that the infringing material exists on its network. [512(c)(1)(A)], [512(d)(1)(A)].
If it does discover such material before being contacted by the copyright owners, it is instructed to remove, or disable access to, the material itself. [512(c)(1)(A)(iii)], [512(d)(1)(C)].
The service provider must not gain any financial benefit that is attributable to the infringing material. [512(c)(1)(B)], [512(d)(2)].
Question: What is third-party liability, also known as "secondary liability"?
Answer: The concept of third party liability refers, as the name implies, to situations in which responsibility for harm can be placed on a party in addition to the one that actually caused the injury. The most common example comes from tort law: a customer in a grocery store drops a bottle of wine and another customer slips on the puddle and injures himself; he may bring an action for negligence against the customer who dropped the bottle and against the owner of the grocery store. Under the common law doctrine of third-party liability, a plaintiff must show not only that an injury actually occurred, but also (in most cases) that some sort of connection existed between the third party and the person who actually caused the injury.
As such the concept of third-party liability is often divided into two different types: contributory infringement and vicarious liability.
Typically, contributory infringement exists when the third party either assists in the commission of the act which causes the injury, or simply induces the primary party to do so commit the act which caused the injury.
Vicarious liability often requires the third party to have exerted some form of control over the primary party's actions.
In copyright law, vicarious liability may be established if the third party had the "right and ability to control" the infringer's activities, and if the third party received some financial benefit from the acts of infringement.
If you know you are hosting infringing content and do nothing about it you are dead.
You can't let things slide until someone rats you out.
If you are aiding the infringer in any way - or rewarding him for posting infringing content - you are dead. If you penalize the legitimate content provider you are dead.
If you are making money on the infringement you are dead.
Total freedom maximized by the GPL? Bullshit. You need to go read the definition of freedom, then you can tell me where forcing someone to do something is a part of freedom.
Maybe you can brush up on the definition of "force" sometime before suggesting anything to me.
You're not entitled to use someone else's work. If you want to use someone else's work and it's available under the GPL, you can decide whether you can live with the GPL. That's hardly forcing you to do anything. But if you do use the work licensed under the GPL, and decide to distribute it, you cannot then prevent others from doing the same.
Expecting you to take responsibility for the choices you make, such as using GPL-licensed works, is not an infringement on your freedom. You are so free, in fact, that you can shun the GPL entirely and find or create something more to your liking. Hate it all you like.
Because it gives you the freedom to do just about anything you want, except take away the same level of freedom from others. This way total freedom is maximized.
I am frankly surprised someone has heard of the GPL and doesn't know this. If you did know this and just don't like it because you feel that you would gain something from placing restrictions on what others may do with your code that the GPL wouldn't allow, well, you have the freedom to release your code under a different license.
61% of those participating in the poll believe themselves to have never once uttered a profanity or raised their voice in the direction of a malfunctioning machine. Are the majority of us genuinely possessed of such remarkable self-control? Or might some of these self-reported stoics be exercising a bit of selective memory?
I have an alternate theory: maybe they're just a bunch of liars, answering with "what they think would sound better" instead of answering with the truth since the issue itself is unimportant. Little white lies, if you will.
For example, what if the problem is that Wikipedia's procedures/culture/approach do not appeal to women? Then that means that Wikipedia is missing out on a very large group of potential contributors (contributors being the lifeblood of Wikipedia). In that case, relatively straightforward changes might make a vast difference in women's participation.
Very few institutional/organization procedures, cultures, and approaches appeal to me. I find large hierarchies to be cumbersome, tedious, boring, and full of petty politics. For example, every large corporation I have ever seen and worked for was bureaucratic and riddled with the problems of groupthink. None of that appeals to me in the slightest. Did that prevent me from doing the business that I set out to do, or accomplishing the work I was determined to get done? No, it didn't. Why? Because I wanted to do it.
Is there a reason why women are incapable of doing the same? I know of none. I know of a reason why they might not be willing to do the same: they choose not to. Something else is more important to them. They have that right and that choice should be respected.
In the absence of confirmed deliberate discrimination, any other way of looking it is a thinly-veiled claim that somehow women can't cut it just because they are women and therefore need special accommodations, as though being a woman were some type of handicap. I just don't believe that.
You do women a tremendous disrespect if you really think that they can't do anything unless it's tailor-made to specially appeal to them. To think that is to assume that they are inferior and cannot independently make their own decisions, find their own talents, discern their own path. It goes back to my original post in this discussion -- that mentality treats women like they are objects, a way to score points, some kind of prize you win if you put on a good enough show. If large masses of women really wanted to get involved in Wikipedia, not only would you not need to specially appeal to women-only to get them to do that, but in fact you'd have one hell of a time trying to stop them.
If you really care about women so much then you respect their choices instead of trying to tell them that they'd see things your way if only you made it delightful enough for them to do so.
The idea that you need to change wikipedia , so it attracts more women, implies that you do not respect women enough to allow them to make up there [sic] own mind about whether to join or not ( as you already assume that they won't like it, before they had a chance to voice their opinion ).
The message it sends is that women are not self-determined and able to decide for themselves, but rather, are some kind of commodity to be traded or prize to be won. For some reason this is celebrated with lofty talk about diversity and such... I don't understand why so few see it as the insult that it really is. It can be phrased as "we know what you women want even better than you do and clearly your failure to recognize that is why our percentage of women is so low."
Garden-variety arrogance is obviously condescending and is intended to be. The refined, concentrated kind is very good at disguising itself as some kind of noble impulse. The people who perpetrate it are not really liars. They're true believers because they don't see the hypocrisy of their position. It doesn't help that so many naive people thoughtlessly give automatic support to anything that sounds like it has good intentions.
Now if there are women who make good contributions to Wikipedia who are getting shunned for no reason except that they are women, by all means this needs to be stopped. There's no good reason to do that to anyone who follows the rules and makes useful contributions. But once that's accomplished, stop telling people what they should want to do and how many of them should want to do it, especially on the basis of some group identity.
Thanks for taking care of the obligatory comment bitching about the/. editors. We need at least one per thread.
Seems a hell of a lot more logical to me to blame that on the "editors" who can't handle elementary-school English, not on the users who point it out. The former is the entirely preventable cause; the latter is the nearly inevitable effect.
Nor do I understand why anyone believes they can perform a task at which they are incompetent and expect good results, to the point where they are willing to bet their life on it.
Because most people have never had to bet heir lives even on things they are fully competent in.
If they can't understand that it's a lethal risk to go to a place like Death Valley without adequate supplies, without survival skills, without contingency plans, without making sure someone knows that you're there and knows your intended route and by when you should return... then I'm sorry but we do in fact call that natural selection. The only mystery about it is how we managed to produce a nation full of so many people who can't understand something so simple and basic and easy to comprehend.
And yes, if you drive an automobile then you bet your life (and those around you) daily on things in which you have at least some competence. The point is to understand this as a general concept.
Slashdot Mirror
Won't work. They've already got that base covered. You will only be able to exchange the item for another identical item. No returns.
I signed no such agreement, therefore I do not feel morally bound by their one-sided policy. I'd rather not have to do it, but if it is necessary, if reasoning with them should fail, I am within my rights to be as much of an unprofitable hassle for them as legally possible.
Therefore, if they want to play hardball, that's fine. Up the ante by increasing their hassle and therefore their expense. Be certain to make the purchase with a credit card. Call up your credit card company and dispute the charge, citing that you are dissatisfied with the merchandise and you were refused a refund. Force the matter to arbitration if necessary, taking up more of their time and money. Credit card chargebacks are a pain in the ass for retailers and they overwhelmingly favor the cardholder. The retailer knows this. At some point all of the personnel involved and time and hassle won't be worth the $15 dollars or so they charged for the movie, let alone the small portion of that which is a retailer's profit margin.
As usual, we tend to receive just as much bullshit as we're willing to put up with. If you act like docile sheep it makes you easy to walk all over. Make such asinine return policies as unprofitable as possible the moment they are inflicted on you. Corporations that will listen to little else will certainly listen to wasted profits.
Thankfully I have yet to have to actually do this, but I know that anyone who tries to screw me over is not going to do it easily. It will be more trouble than it is worth for them. Why anyone else would just lie down and take this shit is a mystery to me. It is no wonder corporations feel so free to shaft people because so many of them are willing to take it.
Umm... what? How exactly to you defeat inflation.. wait...
Does the President have a secret plan to fight inflation?
The President caused a lot of inflation with his stimulus. When you run a budget deficit that trillion or so has to come from someplace; it was created from nothing like all other fiat currencies. I don't think he's likely to do much to prevent it. Same deal with the Bush bailouts. Print (well, more like create electronically) money from nothing, give it to businesses which are "too big to fail", and voila, you have taken the value from the savings of the poor and middle classes (that they might have used to acquire wealth and move upwards) and transferred it to corporations without ever actually taking anyone's money.
The best way to fight inflation is to do away with fiat currency and move to a representative currency like a gold standard or a silver standard. Then you don't print money unless you actually have a scarce hard asset to back it. There will be no real political support for such a move however, because the license to print money is too useful for politicians of both parties. They'd have a much harder time if they had to actually raise taxes each time they wanted to spend large amounts of money that we don't have.
Well obviously what Mitnick did was much worse than killing people... he stole money from wealthy people! I think it's pretty obvious by just about every measure of our American society that stealing from the wealthy is a much more dire crime than murder.
Stealing from the poor? not so much.
And God help you if you infringe someone's copyright.
FYI the primary method of stealing from the poor and middle class is inflation. Why would you go through all the nastiness of taking the money itself away from them when you can leave the money right where it is, safe and sound in their bank accounts, and just take its value away instead? It's the biggest hidden tax in existence and incredibly regressive, since the truly wealthy don't keep piles of cash in a giant vault; they tend to invest most of their money in assets. What, did you really think you could have a scenario where about 50% of the population pay no federal taxes without finding some other way to make them pay? This is government we're talking about.
This is the reason the USA is in such an economic swirly. THE COST OF A LIFE IS NOT INFINITE! The sooner people accept this the sooner we can get on with a health care plan, welfare system, prison system, and most importantly defense budget that actually make sense. The military has put the cost of a human life at 2 million dollars for a long time, did you know that? The public needs to do the same, meaning even though Kevin Metnick did not kill anyone, he caused great financial harm, and that is just as bad. Even though you cannot rationalize it your head, the economy doesn't care. Since Metnick admitting that he caused 5 to 10 million dollars in damages, that would be equal to him killing 2-5 people, now what do you think his sentence should be?
Does that mean that if a wealthy person spends $300 million on a huge mansion he didn't really need, then he's actually a mass murderer?
Of course that's absurd. I see that you disagree with this, but personally I draw a (gigantic) distinction between causing financial damage to those fictitious legal entities we call corporations, versus directly causing the death of another real human being. If you understand nothing else, note that money can be paid back or earned back or restitution made, but resurrecting people who are dead and buried isn't possible. The legal system recognizes this distinction too, which is why Mitnick wasn't charged with 2-5 counts of murder.
The reason the US is in an economic "swirly" isn't because we failed to sufficiently devalue human life. It's because of the worst kind of people making all of its important decisions who make a revolving door between political office and corporate executive positions, because we thought that building up tremendous bubbles that must eventually burst was a good idea, because rampant speculation has made a casino out of what was intended to be all about long-term investment in viable companies, because much credit was given to people who were not creditworthy, because bad debts were made into securities and resold again and again, because the US hardly makes anything anymore other than movies and music and has accumulated gigantic trade deficits especially with China, because the US routinely spends more money than it has causing it to print more money causing inflation, because average consumers have a negative savings index, and generally because we fail to understand that debt is the only form of slavery that's still legal. Fix all of those things and the economy will improve without ever charging Mitnick with mass murder.
If you want to demonize Mitnick, seems rather useless but OK fine, have at it. Don't pretend like he's a murderer or some imaginary equivalent to a murderer though because he simply isn't. Everyone from the state to the lawyers to the private prison operators gets more money if more criminal charges stick. They would have nailed him with it if they could have because they have plenty of incentive. They didn't because the case cannot reasonably be made.
I hope you're trolling. I'd rather believe that than think you're seriously that deluded.
The people who need to have that explained to them should never be trusted with a driver's license.
Also, permanently revoking her license doesn't imply prison time. There may be prison time, but it's not a requirement of taking her license away for life.
I would be careful if I were you. Don't let them know that you have read the Constitution. They prefer ignorant drudges. Obama is hiding under your bed, and as soon as you fall asleep, he's going to sneak out and take all your guns. And your gold. You are hoarding gold, aren't you? After the collapse, all you will be able to buy with the fiat money will be Fiats, and everyone knows they are made in that soon-to-be-Muslim-Caliphate Italy.
Watch out!!
Is this mockery your way of saving face upon realizing that I have provided rational, non-paranoid reasoning for why limited government that does not try to exceed its enumerated powers is a Good Thing? I suppose it upsets you when it suddenly becomes difficult to portray everyone who disagrees with you as some kind of paranoid lunatic, like an unruly child who just had his toy taken away.
Hell, you're an AC, there's not much "face" to save really. Anyway if you're feeling low and in need of an echo chamber, you won't get that from me but that's alright. There are many who respond to reason as you just did so you have a lot of like-minded company.
The Census as spelled out in the Constitution (Article 1, Section 2) has two purposes: it determines the number of representatives each state gets to elect and send to the House of Representatives. Unlike the Senate wherein each state gets two representatives, the House is proportional to the population of each state. It also determines the number of electoral votes a state may cast during a Presidential election.
It's not unreasonable to want the government to stick to the actual limited purpose of this power, instead of finding clever ways to exceed the Constitutional mandate to go beyond the scope of what the Founders intended. If they really want to do that, there is a Constitutional amendment process that would make it legitimate and that's the part I think you fail to appreciate. Intrusive questions like those about your income and lifestyle have absolutely nothing to do with the requirement that the House and electoral votes are properly apportioned.
Otherwise, those who refuse to answer the Census with anything more than the Constitutionally-required data are implicitly recognizing one important fact: information is a form of power. There are many who quite rationally believe that the U.S. Federal Government is already too powerful. Just to make the point, there have already been abuses of this data. In fact, it greatly facilitated the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II. This was made possible because the Second War Powers Act of 1941 repealed all of the legal confidentiality protections that would normally apply to the Census data, which were not restored until 1947.
If you know anything about the U.S. Federal Government and the kind of people who make its important decisions, then you have to wonder whom they will next target. Maybe it will be Muslims or people of Middle Eastern descent, since we are currently fighting them overseas. History does have this annoying way of repeating itself. Refusing to help that happen is not a matter of spiting the government or anyone else; it's a recognition that there is no dire need for them to know so much about you and that this information can be and has been abused. I don't question the reason of those who understand this; I question the naivete of those who don't.
If people were never surprised by predictable things the entire news industry would take a nosedive and be reduced to a shadow of its current self. It'd fuck up the economy!
"Trust but verify"? Verification results from the exact opposite of "trust" :p You're right to verify, but saying stuff like that sounds silly..
Verification is after-the-fact. Prior to that, the vendor could still do something dishonest like fail to deliver on its promises. You're trusting them not to do that as indicated by your willingness to do business with them in the first place. Verification is an attempt to check against not only dishonesty on their part but also well-intentioned mistakes that wouldn't strictly be issues of trustworthiness.
It's sort of like when I deposit cash at a bank. If I tell them "this is 200 dollars, please put it into my account" they are going to count the money. I don't take that as an accusation that I am trying to deceive them, because it isn't. It's a standard practice because multiple pairs of eyes are more likely to catch both honest mistakes and deliberate deception. That's an example of "trust but verify".
It's not really so silly and it's far less extreme than "I want to be involved in each step of the process so I can watch your every move". That would be distrust.
It's one of those "to fill a void" type of desires that is not natural; it's a response to the kind of sense of alienation of which Erich Fromm gives such a great description... When something is being done not because it is voluntary and considered a joy, but out of some sense of desperation and unhealthy desire for attention, of course stress and anxiety is going to scale up with increasing involvement.
How could it work any other way? It's not a matter of whether anyone is forcing anyone -- clearly that is not the case. It's a matter of well-intentioned but thoroughly misguided compensatory problem-solving.
Interesting.
Seems to me you argue that the "having friends on FB" is not the cause of an eventual stress but a retribution of one's misguided attempts to escape other types of stress (in the context of TFA, a correlation between too-many-FB-friends/anxiety due of a common cause rather then causation).
Universally, no. There are some people who really do simply enjoy using FB. There just aren't nearly enough of them to explain how it exploded overnight into such a trendy bandwagon that most people just had to jump on. There's a kind of compensatory desperation behind that one, a desire for the casual attention of strangers strong enough to make one ignore all of the privacy violations.
It's easier to understand once you get past one giant hurdle: by nature, human beings are not herd animals. That can be hard to believe in a modern world where millions of people follow neat little graphs all the time, but we're conditioned to be that way by the twin forces of public schooling and mass media (incidentally, our "ruling class" overwhelmingly sends their children to special private schools where they are taught to be leaders because they know this is true). The conditioning works much better in some people than it does in others. You cannot condition a creature to act against its nature without also inflicting trauma and causing dissonance.
What does it say that I have (literally) 50 times more Facebook friends than you and I'm not stressed out at all?
It says that you genuinely enjoy using Facebook and are not using it to make up for a deeper dissatisfaction with what you do and don't have in your life.
That or you're in a hell of a lot of denial, but it's not my place to tell you which is true. In the absence of any strong evidence either way, I'm inclined to believe the former, for what it's worth.
What does it say when I have only 24 facebook friends and I'm still stressed out by all the "noise".
That you are masochistic enough to stay in a situation nobody forced you in?
I have rarely and almost never observed actual masochism. What I usually witness instead is a mentality that thinks like this: "if I jump through the hoops and pay the price then maybe I'll get something I want." The difference of course is that, by definition, a real masochist isn't doing it out of hope for some reward or the achievement of some goal.
For as long as Facebook stories have appeared on Slashdot, I have said that the desire for the attention and evaluation of casual strangers is unhealthy. It's one of those "to fill a void" type of desires that is not natural; it's a response to the kind of sense of alienation of which Erich Fromm gives such a great description. It's one of those things where one must be careful to retain one's sense and objectivity, otherwise it is easy to mistake the increasing status of "common" with any sense of "normal". When something is being done not because it is voluntary and considered a joy, but out of some sense of desperation and unhealthy desire for attention, of course stress and anxiety is going to scale up with increasing involvement.
How could it work any other way? It's not a matter of whether anyone is forcing anyone -- clearly that is not the case. It's a matter of well-intentioned but thoroughly misguided compensatory problem-solving.
They can harden the Windows codebase and require that software be built with address randomization, non-executable pages, and other stack-smashing protections before it is allowed to use the little Windows certified logo.
Shouldn't this be done via the kernel and OS support libraries?
Yes, the way I worded that was sloppy of me. Still, for address randomization you'd have to compile the applications with position-independent (i.e. relocatable) code. So I should have said require that software built for Windows is compatible with such security measures. While they're at it, they can place canaries at the end of buffers like GCC's SSP to offer an additional layer of protection in userspace.
Microsoft should take realistic, do-able steps like this to actually address its security problems, or they should never speak of "innovation" again and admit that they have succumbed to stagnation.
Do you intend to audit all of the network traffic to ensure that "pass/fail" is all it's reporting? Do you think an average user who can't be bothered to learn basic secure practices has the skill or the inclination to do that? This is assuming of course that the traffic isn't encrypted -- it would probably use SSL for the communications to ensure that no one has tampered with the results.
It wouldn't be done en masse. Dishonest companies could target specific items that are small and have recognizable patterns, such as credit card numbers and bank account numbers. They're scanning your files anyway; the rest is basic pattern matching. That could be quite profitable, not to mention such data could be sold to other criminals so that the ones collecting it are not the ones using it, lending them some plausible deniability. If I can think of that in a few minutes I would assume that the real criminals can think of something more insidious (they're evil but they're definitely not stupid).
Also, what kind of scanning would this perform that decent AV software couldn't? What makes you think malware wouldn't be crafted to evade this just as malware is currently crafted to evade AV software? This has all the markings of a bad solution: it doesn't do much to address the problem it intends to solve and it also introduces new problems that have no simple solutions.
Wait.
Do you consider it a "violation of your privacy" to tell your prospective sexual partners whether you have an STD or not?
Because this is the computational equivalent.
It is perfectly reasonable for anyone coming in virtual contact with your data to request that you prove that your data is sanitary.
Yes, it's always "for the children", "to prevent terrorism", and "for your safety" isn't it? Since you have nothing to hide, why would you possibly object to a full cavity search every time you enter any building? Do you want the evil terrorists/criminals/hackers to win or something? This is the computational equivalent.
The difference between this and your scenario is simple: the prospective sexual partners are giving mutual consent. If they don't like that arrangement, they can always decide that casual sex with strangers is inherently risky, or they could do something crazy like have sex with someone they love, trust, and know very well. By contrast, if this system is implemented, every bank and probably lots of other corporations are going to require it in order to do business. It's rather difficult to live in a modern world without ever doing business with banks and other corporations, which is why this would be forced on us with or without consent.
The responsibility goes to the consumer, when Microsoft is assigning responsibility (blame). After all, the highly vulnerable operating system clearly has nothing to do with it, hence the company behind said vulnerable operating system shouldn't have any liability either.
In a way they have a point. Those customers have created a market where those who make highly vulnerable operating systems are rewarded with literally billions of dollars and greater than 90% marketshare. It's a logical extension of this reality for Microsoft to assign responsibility as you describe.
I think the it would have to be a third party company that the consumer and the bank would both need to trust. Like how we trust verisign to prove the identity of an https provider.
I don't think it's a good solution, though.
There's another glaring problem with this idea. Those of us who study computer security and take steps to use our systems responsibly don't want to be burdened by all of these requirements intended for those who don't. I'm sorry that a few bad people defraud others of their money, but the minimum requirements for any proposed solution include not punishing those who are doing things correctly by imposing such intrusive measures.
As far as banks are concerned, securing their own systems is all I would expect from them. As their customer, I really don't want my bank getting into the end-user computer security business and telling me how I should run my systems. I want them to stick with what they know. I also don't want to pay the higher fees and less favorable interest rates it would take to cover this expense. That's not even considering the support costs, as the users for whom this is really intended are the same ones who need the most handholding.
If Microsoft really wants to do something helpful, they can stop marketing Windows as "the easiest thing ever!" to non-technical users. They can start being more realistic and up-front about the basic competency required to safely use a worldwide untrusted network. They can harden the Windows codebase and require that software be built with address randomization, non-executable pages, and other stack-smashing protections before it is allowed to use the little Windows certified logo. They could do a much better job of treating data from the network as untrusted and potentially malicious (the sandboxing they are beginning to implement for IE is a step in that direction).
Hell, for that matter they could split the company up into separate corporations which make competing operating systems that all implement the Win32/64 API. Perhaps some of them could be based on *BSD like Mac OSX. Getting rid of the "write once, infect everywhere" Windows monoculture would be a decently effective way to limit the spread of malware.
There are many options to be considered before we even think about universally intruding into everyone's PC and making this into a common practice that is somehow considered acceptable. Normally that's what the bad guys who write malware are trying to do. This is a terrible precedent. Not to mention that if average users get used to the idea of some company (that they don't get to audit) scanning their systems, what's to stop the organized criminals from just running their own scanning companies and collecting any financial data they find? This could change the nature of the attacks but has little or no hope of preventing attacks.
Question: What does a service provider have to do in order to qualify for safe harbor protection?
Answer: In addition to informing its customers of its policies (discussed above), a service provider must follow the proper notice and takedown procedures (discussed above) and also meet several other requirements in order to qualify for exemption under the safe harbor provisions. ...
Finally, the service provider must not have knowledge that the material or activity is infringing or of the fact that the infringing material exists on its network. [512(c)(1)(A)], [512(d)(1)(A)].
If it does discover such material before being contacted by the copyright owners, it is instructed to remove, or disable access to, the material itself. [512(c)(1)(A)(iii)], [512(d)(1)(C)].
The service provider must not gain any financial benefit that is attributable to the infringing material. [512(c)(1)(B)], [512(d)(2)].
Question: What is third-party liability, also known as "secondary liability"?
Answer: The concept of third party liability refers, as the name implies, to situations in which responsibility for harm can be placed on a party in addition to the one that actually caused the injury. The most common example comes from tort law: a customer in a grocery store drops a bottle of wine and another customer slips on the puddle and injures himself; he may bring an action for negligence against the customer who dropped the bottle and against the owner of the grocery store. Under the common law doctrine of third-party liability, a plaintiff must show not only that an injury actually occurred, but also (in most cases) that some sort of connection existed between the third party and the person who actually caused the injury.
As such the concept of third-party liability is often divided into two different types: contributory infringement and vicarious liability.
Typically, contributory infringement exists when the third party either assists in the commission of the act which causes the injury, or simply induces the primary party to do so commit the act which caused the injury.
Vicarious liability often requires the third party to have exerted some form of control over the primary party's actions.
In copyright law, vicarious liability may be established if the third party had the "right and ability to control" the infringer's activities, and if the third party received some financial benefit from the acts of infringement.
Frequently Asked Questions (And Answers) about DMCA Safe Harbor
If you know you are hosting infringing content and do nothing about it you are dead.
You can't let things slide until someone rats you out.
If you are aiding the infringer in any way - or rewarding him for posting infringing content - you are dead. If you penalize the legitimate content provider you are dead.
If you are making money on the infringement you are dead.
And if you die of old age, you are dead.
Total freedom maximized by the GPL? Bullshit. You need to go read the definition of freedom, then you can tell me where forcing someone to do something is a part of freedom.
Maybe you can brush up on the definition of "force" sometime before suggesting anything to me.
You're not entitled to use someone else's work. If you want to use someone else's work and it's available under the GPL, you can decide whether you can live with the GPL. That's hardly forcing you to do anything. But if you do use the work licensed under the GPL, and decide to distribute it, you cannot then prevent others from doing the same.
Expecting you to take responsibility for the choices you make, such as using GPL-licensed works, is not an infringement on your freedom. You are so free, in fact, that you can shun the GPL entirely and find or create something more to your liking. Hate it all you like.
If FOSS is about freedom why do they use the GPL?
Because it gives you the freedom to do just about anything you want, except take away the same level of freedom from others. This way total freedom is maximized.
I am frankly surprised someone has heard of the GPL and doesn't know this. If you did know this and just don't like it because you feel that you would gain something from placing restrictions on what others may do with your code that the GPL wouldn't allow, well, you have the freedom to release your code under a different license.
I have an alternate theory: maybe they're just a bunch of liars, answering with "what they think would sound better" instead of answering with the truth since the issue itself is unimportant. Little white lies, if you will.
Very few institutional/organization procedures, cultures, and approaches appeal to me. I find large hierarchies to be cumbersome, tedious, boring, and full of petty politics. For example, every large corporation I have ever seen and worked for was bureaucratic and riddled with the problems of groupthink. None of that appeals to me in the slightest. Did that prevent me from doing the business that I set out to do, or accomplishing the work I was determined to get done? No, it didn't. Why? Because I wanted to do it.
Is there a reason why women are incapable of doing the same? I know of none. I know of a reason why they might not be willing to do the same: they choose not to. Something else is more important to them. They have that right and that choice should be respected.
In the absence of confirmed deliberate discrimination, any other way of looking it is a thinly-veiled claim that somehow women can't cut it just because they are women and therefore need special accommodations, as though being a woman were some type of handicap. I just don't believe that.
You do women a tremendous disrespect if you really think that they can't do anything unless it's tailor-made to specially appeal to them. To think that is to assume that they are inferior and cannot independently make their own decisions, find their own talents, discern their own path. It goes back to my original post in this discussion -- that mentality treats women like they are objects, a way to score points, some kind of prize you win if you put on a good enough show. If large masses of women really wanted to get involved in Wikipedia, not only would you not need to specially appeal to women-only to get them to do that, but in fact you'd have one hell of a time trying to stop them.
If you really care about women so much then you respect their choices instead of trying to tell them that they'd see things your way if only you made it delightful enough for them to do so.
The message it sends is that women are not self-determined and able to decide for themselves, but rather, are some kind of commodity to be traded or prize to be won. For some reason this is celebrated with lofty talk about diversity and such... I don't understand why so few see it as the insult that it really is. It can be phrased as "we know what you women want even better than you do and clearly your failure to recognize that is why our percentage of women is so low."
Garden-variety arrogance is obviously condescending and is intended to be. The refined, concentrated kind is very good at disguising itself as some kind of noble impulse. The people who perpetrate it are not really liars. They're true believers because they don't see the hypocrisy of their position. It doesn't help that so many naive people thoughtlessly give automatic support to anything that sounds like it has good intentions.
Now if there are women who make good contributions to Wikipedia who are getting shunned for no reason except that they are women, by all means this needs to be stopped. There's no good reason to do that to anyone who follows the rules and makes useful contributions. But once that's accomplished, stop telling people what they should want to do and how many of them should want to do it, especially on the basis of some group identity.
Thanks for taking care of the obligatory comment bitching about the /. editors. We need at least one per thread.
Seems a hell of a lot more logical to me to blame that on the "editors" who can't handle elementary-school English, not on the users who point it out. The former is the entirely preventable cause; the latter is the nearly inevitable effect.
Nor do I understand why anyone believes they can perform a task at which they are incompetent and expect good results, to the point where they are willing to bet their life on it.
Because most people have never had to bet heir lives even on things they are fully competent in.
If they can't understand that it's a lethal risk to go to a place like Death Valley without adequate supplies, without survival skills, without contingency plans, without making sure someone knows that you're there and knows your intended route and by when you should return ... then I'm sorry but we do in fact call that natural selection. The only mystery about it is how we managed to produce a nation full of so many people who can't understand something so simple and basic and easy to comprehend.
And yes, if you drive an automobile then you bet your life (and those around you) daily on things in which you have at least some competence. The point is to understand this as a general concept.