If there's no union contract and no law to protect teachers' jobs, then the employer can simply say "by showing up for work after __REASONABLY_FAR_IN_THE_FUTURE_DATE__ you agree to __NEW_CONDITIONS_OF_EMPLOYMENT__.
For most jobs, "reasonably far in the future date" for a change that hurts employees would be anywhere from 2 weeks to a few months for items that can wait, or immediately for health and safety issues, emergencies, and issues where the deadline is imposed from outside (e.g. a change in law), etc.
For teachers, "reasonably far in the future" date is either the start of the next school year or, if it's late in this school year or late in the "job search season" for teachers who are planning to change employers, the following school year.
In the 1990s many universities made faculty and grad students who took research-assistantships assign copyrights for "relevant to their job" works even if they were done "on their own time." The logic was that the school was paying you for your brain, or at least the part of your brain related to your job, and your brain didn't punch a clock.
I can see a K-12 school system asking teachers to assign copyrights to creative works that are relevant to their jobs, but not to things that are irrelevant. A 2nd grade teacher who does art work that isn't related to teaching 2nd graders shouldn't have to quit her job to keep the copyrights on her paintings. On the other hand, it is reasonable to tell new-hire or renewing-contract teacher who creates worksheets for use in the classroom that things she creates in the future will belong to the district.
As for K-12 students, this is not only immoral but probably illegal: Until the age of 16 in most states, school attendance is mandatory. Up until high school graduation or a certain age cut-off, usually 21, it's an "entitlement" - teenagers over 16 have a legal right to finish a 12th grade education.
Expect a judge to enjoin the district from claiming copyright on student works shortly. Expect either a negotiated agreement or a lawsuit and temporary injunction barring non-job-related forced copyright assignments within a few months.
Expect high-quality teachers who earn extra money selling what they create to begin avoiding this district immediately.
9 Two are better than one,
because they have a good return for their labor: 10 If either of them falls down,
one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls
and has no one to help them up. 11 Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm.
But how can one keep warm alone? 12 Though one may be overpowered,
two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.
* Reasonable file- and path-size limits that won't break common usage scenarios. * Support for common meta-data that everyone expects to be there, like date-stamps. * The speed that you would expect from a simple file system (#2 above).
I can think of two uses off the bat for kernel-level NTFS overwrite-existing-file support:
* Use an existing fixed-size pagefile.sys as a Linux swap file on a dual-boot machine. Just be sure the system isn't hibernated before trying this trick. I don't think I want to take the performance hit of doing this in user-space.
* File-blanker. OK, this can be done in userspace, but I can contrive of oddball situations where it might be better to do it in kernel space.
* Make the law match the "talk" and give companies incentives to REALLY keep their money parked overseas. * Keep things the way they are. * Try to "crack down" and watch the companies see what other legal tricks they can use.
The "ultimate" legal maneuver to "outwit the IRS" is to move the International HQ overseas and make the US company a subsidiary of the overseas-based company, and make sure the US company never "handles" money that isn't already somehow tied to American operations. If Congress wants this, they can pass laws that will make this option very attractive.
For many years my only cell phones were prepaid by-the-minute "emergency" phones. They stayed in the car glove box and were turned off all the time unless I needed to make an outgoing call or needed to be reachable away from home. I charged them up every week or two.
There are laptops WiFi detectors that give you approximate direction and strength.
While strength != distance, if I'm "x dB" today and "x dB" tomorrow and so on for 10 days, on most of those days I'm probably in about the same spot. Unless of course I'm a/. reader, in which case I'm mucking around with my WiFi settings just to muddy the data.
Turn off "location" and other "always want the network" apps that you don't need. Put your mail in "on demand" rather than "periodically polling" mode. Set your phone so the only thing it's routinely monitoring for over the air are incoming phone calls and texts.
At this point your WiFi will be a waste of battery when you aren't actually using your phone.
Now you can turn off your WiFi and save your battery.
If the opposition is subject to courts of law and the law is on your side, use the courts.
Otherwise, if it's just a matter of having your web site under constant attack, find a "bullet proof" hosting provider and an "angel" to fund its high fees. Bonus points if they are one in the same.
If it's more than that and the legal system isn't an option, move or go into hiding if that will provide safety, hire security, or pay the Danegeld, which in this case means caving in and shutting down.
If you are fortunate enough to be a sovereign nation, literally going to war or taking less extreme political options such as a trade war or engaging in covert cyber-attacks may be options. Just be prepared for your actions to hurt you more than your opposition.
Barring uncovering something nasty during due diligence, I'd pay $0.25 for them if all unsecured debt and unwanted future obligations were canceled. Now if they demanded two quarters, that's another story.
Remember, a quarter isn't worth what it was in Atari's heyday.
Excluding still-hypothetical malware which takes control of hardware that can decimate the human population or does something that causes a human to do the same, about the worst that malware can do is maybe knock a few planes out of the sky, disable a few cities' water supplies, etc. until we decide we no longer trust technology. At that point we'll be back to the 1950s, at worst.
We've had enough bombs to send the human race back to the per-industrial age if not to extinction for over 40 years now.
So, yeah, in practical terms of "arms" available to the average bad guy who has money, software may be a lot more damaging, but at its limit the current state of the art in bomb-type weapons is far worse than "malware"-type weapons: If China or Russia and the United States decide to nuke each other and take the world with it, bend over and kiss your rear end good-bye.
That's a good start, but how do you keep man-made-stuff that's in the air, rain, and bird droppings, watershed-run-off, etc. from getting into the grass the cattle eat and the water they drink?
Slashdot Mirror
My first thought was "yeah, Maryland *IS* close to Washington, D.C."
Cue rimshot.
I wish I'd read the WHOLE article before I posted my earlier comments.
The school system isn't TRYING to take the copyrights on everything, and they know they need to do a re-write.
After reading the WHOLE article, I support their intent and, with respect to teachers' work-related stuff, their actions.
It will be interesting to see what the final draft of this will say.
If there's no union contract and no law to protect teachers' jobs, then the employer can simply say "by showing up for work after __REASONABLY_FAR_IN_THE_FUTURE_DATE__ you agree to __NEW_CONDITIONS_OF_EMPLOYMENT__.
For most jobs, "reasonably far in the future date" for a change that hurts employees would be anywhere from 2 weeks to a few months for items that can wait, or immediately for health and safety issues, emergencies, and issues where the deadline is imposed from outside (e.g. a change in law), etc.
For teachers, "reasonably far in the future" date is either the start of the next school year or, if it's late in this school year or late in the "job search season" for teachers who are planning to change employers, the following school year.
It's the results of his creative efforts.
In the 1990s many universities made faculty and grad students who took research-assistantships assign copyrights for "relevant to their job" works even if they were done "on their own time." The logic was that the school was paying you for your brain, or at least the part of your brain related to your job, and your brain didn't punch a clock.
I can see a K-12 school system asking teachers to assign copyrights to creative works that are relevant to their jobs, but not to things that are irrelevant. A 2nd grade teacher who does art work that isn't related to teaching 2nd graders shouldn't have to quit her job to keep the copyrights on her paintings. On the other hand, it is reasonable to tell new-hire or renewing-contract teacher who creates worksheets for use in the classroom that things she creates in the future will belong to the district.
As for K-12 students, this is not only immoral but probably illegal: Until the age of 16 in most states, school attendance is mandatory. Up until high school graduation or a certain age cut-off, usually 21, it's an "entitlement" - teenagers over 16 have a legal right to finish a 12th grade education.
Expect a judge to enjoin the district from claiming copyright on student works shortly. Expect either a negotiated agreement or a lawsuit and temporary injunction barring non-job-related forced copyright assignments within a few months.
Expect high-quality teachers who earn extra money selling what they create to begin avoiding this district immediately.
Ecclesiastes 4:9-12
9 Two are better than one,
because they have a good return for their labor:
10 If either of them falls down,
one can help the other up.
But pity anyone who falls
and has no one to help them up.
11 Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm.
But how can one keep warm alone?
12 Though one may be overpowered,
two can defend themselves.
A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.
[NIV]
Source: BibleGateway.com, Ecclesiastes 4, Holy Bible, New International Version
Only a suicidal country would nuke the Untied St... oh wait, nevermind.
But unrelated-use trademarks, such as a restaurant called "Gaymer" run by Mr. Joe Gaymer, would be valid within their scopes.
* Reasonable file- and path-size limits that won't break common usage scenarios.
* Support for common meta-data that everyone expects to be there, like date-stamps.
* The speed that you would expect from a simple file system (#2 above).
I can think of two uses off the bat for kernel-level NTFS overwrite-existing-file support:
* Use an existing fixed-size pagefile.sys as a Linux swap file on a dual-boot machine. Just be sure the system isn't hibernated before trying this trick. I don't think I want to take the performance hit of doing this in user-space.
* File-blanker. OK, this can be done in userspace, but I can contrive of oddball situations where it might be better to do it in kernel space.
In tech circles, english units are the Steampunk of measurements.
If the code isn't good, NO SLASHDOT FOR YOU!
It's up to Congress:
* Make the law match the "talk" and give companies incentives to REALLY keep their money parked overseas.
* Keep things the way they are.
* Try to "crack down" and watch the companies see what other legal tricks they can use.
The "ultimate" legal maneuver to "outwit the IRS" is to move the International HQ overseas and make the US company a subsidiary of the overseas-based company, and make sure the US company never "handles" money that isn't already somehow tied to American operations. If Congress wants this, they can pass laws that will make this option very attractive.
For many years my only cell phones were prepaid by-the-minute "emergency" phones. They stayed in the car glove box and were turned off all the time unless I needed to make an outgoing call or needed to be reachable away from home. I charged them up every week or two.
There are laptops WiFi detectors that give you approximate direction and strength.
While strength != distance, if I'm "x dB" today and "x dB" tomorrow and so on for 10 days, on most of those days I'm probably in about the same spot. Unless of course I'm a /. reader, in which case I'm mucking around with my WiFi settings just to muddy the data.
... so it's probably already happened.
Turn off "location" and other "always want the network" apps that you don't need. Put your mail in "on demand" rather than "periodically polling" mode. Set your phone so the only thing it's routinely monitoring for over the air are incoming phone calls and texts.
At this point your WiFi will be a waste of battery when you aren't actually using your phone.
Now you can turn off your WiFi and save your battery.
It's frequently wrong to assume malice when getting sloppy in a rush to deliver explains everything.
If the opposition is subject to courts of law and the law is on your side, use the courts.
Otherwise, if it's just a matter of having your web site under constant attack, find a "bullet proof" hosting provider and an "angel" to fund its high fees. Bonus points if they are one in the same.
If it's more than that and the legal system isn't an option, move or go into hiding if that will provide safety, hire security, or pay the Danegeld, which in this case means caving in and shutting down.
If you are fortunate enough to be a sovereign nation, literally going to war or taking less extreme political options such as a trade war or engaging in covert cyber-attacks may be options. Just be prepared for your actions to hurt you more than your opposition.
... for a sufficiently large value of "67 years."
See comments above about the cluster&*(# about licensing issues.
Barring uncovering something nasty during due diligence, I'd pay $0.25 for them if all unsecured debt and unwanted future obligations were canceled. Now if they demanded two quarters, that's another story.
Remember, a quarter isn't worth what it was in Atari's heyday.
Excluding still-hypothetical malware which takes control of hardware that can decimate the human population or does something that causes a human to do the same, about the worst that malware can do is maybe knock a few planes out of the sky, disable a few cities' water supplies, etc. until we decide we no longer trust technology. At that point we'll be back to the 1950s, at worst.
We've had enough bombs to send the human race back to the per-industrial age if not to extinction for over 40 years now.
So, yeah, in practical terms of "arms" available to the average bad guy who has money, software may be a lot more damaging, but at its limit the current state of the art in bomb-type weapons is far worse than "malware"-type weapons: If China or Russia and the United States decide to nuke each other and take the world with it, bend over and kiss your rear end good-bye.
...differently homeworlded.
That's a good start, but how do you keep man-made-stuff that's in the air, rain, and bird droppings, watershed-run-off, etc. from getting into the grass the cattle eat and the water they drink?