Her application of the 3d factor analysis (p88) (following the 3d factor discussion) reads
"Where a book is not divided into chapters or contains fewer than ten chapters, unpaid copying of no more than 10% of the pages in the book is permissible under factor three. The pages are counted as previously set forth in this Order. In practical effect, this will allow copying of about one chapter or its equivalent. Where a book contains ten or more chapters, the unpaid copying of up to but no more than one chapter (or its equivalent) will be permissible under fair use factor three."
The 10% figure comes from a discussion of the legislative history of the 1976 Copyright Act, specifically a related House Report called the "Agreement on Guidelines for Classroom Copying in Not-For-Profit Educational Institutions with Respect to Books and Periodicals." Interestingly, in her 3d use analysis section she notes that the Guideline figures --including the 10%-- were considered by Congress to be a minimum threshold, not a maximum. So her use of the 10% seems to conflict with her earlier discussion on p59, in which she suggests that such a
"brightline restriction (would stand) in contrast to the statutory scheme described in section 107 (of the US Copyright Act.)"
Conflict of interest is when he has a commercial venture with the plaintiff, the nature of which is not necessarily related to the case. Corruption is when he has a commercial venture with the plaintiff and he doesn't reveal this and dismiss himself.
And this is where you make exactly the same error; there is no such distinction. The difference you miss is between the what and the why. You aren't only swallowing the premise (COI) of TFA without question, you're following the conclusion (corruption) of the unsupported premise of TFA. Accepting both an unsupported premise, AND its conclusion about an actor, from a party who suffered an adverse ruling from the same actor, is simple-minded and hot-headed.
What the article describes is a conflict of interest, not corruption, and that's assuming all the claims are factually accurate.
That makes the judge not only corrupt, but textbook corrupt.
Falkvinge, next time actually read a fucking textbook on the subject at hand before you claim that something is a textbook example. Words have meanings, particularly in legal settings. This sort of imprecision just damages your credibility.
As a US citizen, I'm much more afraid of the NSA (or any US agency) getting access to my Google*(*& Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Dropbox,etc) account data than I am of any arm of the Chinese government getting access.
If you feel that way, you really have been approaching all of those accounts wrong from the outset. You'd have be in a better position now had you assumed they would be compromised before you created them, and used them accordingly.
I don't understand why you'd be so concerned about the NSA having your account details, when all of your information has been most certainly churned through any number of private companies, all trying to actively mine your data for profit. Again, you'd be in a better position now if you'd assumed that they were doing that all along.
tl;dr Yes, trained spies will probably be able to sneak in and access whatever data you create that leaves your local control. Deal with it appropriately.
Fair use is a difficult concept. What this jury was asked to do isn't so much as decide a question of fact -- "fair use" is an artificial construct, and the boundaries are nebulous. In addition to being asked to decide whether or not the defendant did or didn't do something, the jury is being asked to make a public policy decision.
That's something that the average person just doesn't do. It's difficult, there are a lot of conflicting interests to balance, and you can only guess as to the effect your decision will have on the future.
Audiologists can test your hearing range with properly calibrated equipment.
I had them test my frequency range last time I went in to get fitted for earplugs. I plan on tracking this as I age, since I'm curious to know how my frequency range declines. At the border of my audio range, "hearing" the high frequencies was more like feeling a pressure in the ears -- my mind wasn't able to "hear" the high noises as any sort of distinct pitch.
Judge Alsup is in fact very much correct. Like I said, it's not simple. Fair use is a defense that excuses actions that would otherwise be a violation of copyright.
By car analogy: a car running a red light is breaking a traffic law, but if that car is an emergency vehicle with its lights on, while it's still technically breaking that traffic law in a sense, it's not a civil offense. The judge is just asking them to start out by first deciding if it was an emergency vehicle. Later the jury will decide if the car even ran a red light in the first place.
Google has at least two avenues to win: (1) it was a violation, but since it was fair use it's completely excused (emergency vehicle running the light), or (2) it wasn't even copyright violation in the first place (didn't even run the light.)
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. --H. L. Mencken.
Your response is just what I meant by "armchair lawyering." I'm not making it complicated; the fair use defense is complicated. Copyright law in general is complicated.
While jury nullification (here in the more limited sense of disregarding jury instructions) might sound like it would be an easy hack, it's exactly the kind of shortcut that works only from the armchair. If they were to do as you suggest, the judge could (and probably would, since it would so clear that they disregarded the instructions) issue a "judgment notwithstanding the verdict" -- IOW, the judge has the discretion to ismiss the verdict of the jurors.
Case law and precedent is relevant b/c it is how the judge needs to present the concept of the four prong analysis of fair use. And yes the four factors are in the copyright statute, at 17 USC sec. 107.
Well... I tried upgrading every Ubuntu install I had (about 7.10 up to I think 10.10, possibly gave 11.4 a try.) Only one worked smoothly. All other updates broke something essential, from the boot screen to obsoleting and killing packages that I had been functional before the upgrade. Every would require at least a few hours of tinkering, and often the forum recommendations were to just do a clean install from scratch.
While I think package managers and united application updates are still far superior to Window's piecemeal approach, the reality of the Linux upgrades is that they can be a crapshoot: they might just work, but odds are good that you'll ultimately save yourself hours if you just do a clean install of the new version.
I don't envy that jury at all. Google is claiming "fair use", which is really a difficult, and nebulous concept. Hell, it's a rough subject for law school students to grasp in copyright courses.
At first look, fair use doesn't seem that difficult. US Copyright law identifies four factors to be used to determine whether an infringement is excused as "fair use":
1. the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
2. the nature of the copyrighted work;
3. the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
4. the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
Problems: each of those factors already starts out as a vague kind of grey area, and while some examples are provided in the legislative history, none of those is further defined in the statute. On top of that, there's a rather large amount of case law focusing on what each of the four factors really means in any given context.
While it's easy enough to armchair lawyer yourself and just blow through a fair use analysis, that's simply not how it works at trial. Determining whether or not it's fair use when there is already solid precedent for your context is tough enough -- making that decision on a novel concept is just a motherfucking bear.
Neither Sony nor any other private party can sue Comcast under the Sherman Antitrust law, if that is in fact what you are suggesting. That law does not private right of action -- individuals/companies can't sue over it, only the federal government can, I believe through either the FTC or the DOJ.
This is a rumor spread by "sources", as the NY Post helpfully explains. It looks like it's only a speculative rumor; it's certainly nothing official. I just got off the phone w/ Hulu customer service about this --if it were true, I would have immediately canceled my Hulu Plus subscription.
While the customer support guy was not permitted to respond directly to claims in new stories, he said they hadn't heard of such a change, he'd be shocked if they did so, and would feel the same way about it that I did. It doesn't make much sense, as this would precisely eliminate the reason I bother to pay for Hulu Plus -- because I don't have, and will not buy, cable service. A move like this would do nothing to enhance Hulu's revenue, and would almost certainly eliminate a large part of their subscribers.
If you're a Hulu Plus subscriber and you're actually concerned about it, call them yourself; 1-877-719-2773. No hold time, no phone tree; it goes directly to a human in customer service.
And why not? Sure, the 92 y/o veteran spending his own money to support troop morale overseas is a lawyer's dream version of a sympathetic client. But the 92 y/o veteran part of it isn't essential! Anyone spending their own time and money to support the morale of troops overseas is going to be a sympathetic client.
With a large number of people openly, blatantly doing this, it can force the MPAA's position into the public spotlight. This is an election year, and this kind of popular sentiment is the sort of thing that can catalyze legislation --incumbents love the opportunity to pander to popular sentiment, and the support-the-troops angle is such an appetizing bonus that's it'd practically be like wrapping a proposed bill in bacon. Or a flag.
Step 1: a bunch of people do exactly what this guy is doing. Step 2: online discussion ensues. (This guy is already popping up in my aunts' f/b feeds, so it's not much of a stretch.) Step 3: the more organized and well-heeled of we the unwashed masses bring this to the attention of our local legislators. Step 4: the legislators jump at the opportunity to draft various bills proscribing legal relief for this kind of activity. Step 5: Bills are debated, compromises reached, bill opposition gets demonized in the public eye. Step 6: MPAA takes a very serious blow to the legal structure that has propped them up for far too long.
The German judicial branch's approach is often a fascinating contrast to that of US state and federal courts. Germany has specialized highest courts for specific subject matters: tax, admin, labor, social, constitutional... and the high court in TFA.
As an example: the Bundesverfassungsgericht (the highest German conlaw court, not the highest "ordinary" court in TFA) decreed it unconstitutional to publicly print (or run big news stories about) the names of notorious, convicted criminals, once the criminals have completed their sentences and have been released. The idea is that imprisonment is supposed to be such a thing that, once a person is released, they have actually been rehabilitated to the point where they can once again function in society without posing a threat to the well-being of others.
Given the depth of the cultural grab of the US first amendment --freedom of speech, baby!-- the thought that one shouldn't be able to print the names of convicted criminals in news media probably sets off all sorts of knee-jerk 1st amendment concerns. But given the realities of prison, enforcing that the prison goals of rehabilitation and public safety over raw punishment seems to me a wise approach that I wish the US would adopt. But over here, such a concept probably sounds like something that would be characterized as deplorable, pollyannish weak liberal democrat thinking.
I've read a handful of English translations of the decisions of the Constitutional Court/Bundesverfassungsgericht (the German conlaw court, not the "ordinary" court in TFA). Last time I checked, most of the text of the most useful read I found is here: http://goo.gl/dlwi9 [goo.gl]
Want to hack law ? Then start by by putting the entire code of law in an SVN-like system. Including proposed laws. With traceability of authors, who voted for them, etc... And an associated wiki for comments. And a complete list of cases that used them. This would be invaluable.
Law seems to be the social equivalent of TFA: most people will base their entire opinions on the summary, and never bother to actually read the thing itself.
The functional equivalent of an SVN-system already exists and has for decades. What you're describing are very basic components of what is called "legislative history." Bill authors, vote counts, comments made both on the floor of the legislature and in committee: these things (and more) can all be found in the Congressional Record for federal material, and every state legislature has a similar record. Lists of cases that refer to particular laws have been around for well over a century; the various publication types are called annotations, citators, and legal encyclopedias.
The real problem is that very few people will bother to read what is actually out there. Ask yourself: when was the last time you commented on proposed legislation without actually bothering to read it? When was the last time you commented on a court decision without bothering to read the decision? These things are already available, for free, in most cases online and without any ads.
I'm a librarian, and years of increasingly tight budgets have brought me to the point that I view large journal publishers primarily as a massive, parasitic obstacle to public access to information. More from TFA:
In 2010, the comparable amount accounted for more than 20% of all periodical subscription costs and just under 10% of all collection costs for everything the Library acquires. Some journals cost as much as $40,000 per year, others in the tens of thousands. Prices for online content from two providers have increased by about 145% over the past six years, which far exceeds not only the consumer price index, but also the higher education and the library price indices. These journals therefore claim an ever-increasing share of our overall collection budget. Even though scholarly output continues to grow and publishing can be expensive, profit margins of 35% and more suggest that the prices we must pay do not solely result from an increasing supply of new articles.
Libraries are necessarily nonprofit organizations, and their budgets are funded through taxes and tuition. The current journal publication business model treats library budgets as little more than a vehicle to launder money that was taken from Mr. and Ms. Taxpayer.You pay to support Elsevier, ThomsonReuters, et al, in the form of taxes and tuition. Journal publishers seem to perceive library budgets the way that petroleum companies perceive oil fields. In case you think this is hyperbole, consider:
An annual subscription to Tetrahedron, a chemistry journal, will cost your university library $20,269; a year of the Journal of Mathematical Sciences will set you back $20,100.
http://www.economist.com/node/21552574 Given these kinds of costs, it would be cheaper for a library to fly the most prominent publishing mathematicians out for a visit and have them lecture on the topics of their latest publications.
I know this is/. and we're supposed to focus only on the glaring privacy issues because that's how the discussion must be framed, but beyond that context there are actual great uses for this tech.
I would find this level of analysis of my own driving habits useful for improving. Throw in time-synced biofeedback monitoring + cameras on each angle, and, for example, you could identify the closest proximity a vehicle had to your before you became aware of it. You could review your closest calls, and get addition insight into how you might be able to improve your driving skills.
There's also the problem that, if self-driving cars are to be an eventual reality, real-time monitoring of velocity and operating controls will be a necessary step. And yes, I've heard Franklin's quote about sacrificing liberty for safety, but to be fair the man lived in the age of the horse-drawn carriage.
To elevate a liberty concept on measurable driving data --which essentially measures precisely how one is operating a vehicle on public roads, not some form of communication-- above the public safety concern seems to be an awfully bloody business. US vehicle deaths have gradually dropped from a peak of 54,589 in 1972 to 32,885 last year. (Interestingly, that's now around the number of motor vehicle deaths around 1929.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_motor_vehicle_deaths_in_U.S._by_year
Who Gives and Who Doesn't.. Yes, you can call it biased... yet no liberals have ever been able to disprove it, just attack the authors without substantive arguments.
The article you linked concludes that "religious people donate more to charity" by checking the donation levels to a Salvation Army bucket in San Francisco and Sioux Falls.
And almost all of the people who gave to our bell ringers in San Francisco and Sioux Falls said they were religious or spiritual.
This study might as well have set up a donation table to the Republican party, and concluded that "Republicans donate more than Democrats." Set up a Planned Parenthood donation table in both San Francisco and Sioux Falls, measure the respective donations, and then get back to us on which group *gives more to charity.* Go ahead, we'll wait.
Please take note! Only hijinks can ensue. Nothing else can ensue, ever. Including injuries. Even if injuries do *technically* ensue, please use a different word to describe the phenomenon.
monetize: Econ.
1.trans. a. To establish (a metal) as standard currency in the coinage of a country; to put into circulation as currency. Now chiefly hist. b.To convert (an asset, debt, etc.) into money, to realize the value of (an asset, debt, etc.) as currency; spec. to convert (government debt) to a more liquid form, as by redeeming Treasury bills or replacing bonds with bills. Also: to assess in terms of monetary value. 2.trans. To convert to the use of money; to convert (an economy) to a monetary system.
Words mean things. It looks like Al Perry simply doesn't understand the word "monetize." Good thing too, because as distribution models continue to evolve, useless people like Perry and useless distribution dinosaurs like Paramount will be increasingly cut out of the profits that keep them alive.
Since I'm looking forward to watching these parasitic organizations starve to the point of insolvency, I'm very happy to hear that an executive doesn't understand exactly how the ground is shifting underneath his cumbersome, unnecessary business models. We simply no longer need studios for production, distribution, or even PR.
It seems like the people who prefer tablets aren't clear on the difference between the hardware and the OS. A Chromebook is a laptop, it has minimal internal storage and impressive battery life. You can install other Linux flavors on it besides ChromeOS.
To clarify: a Chromebook is not limited to ChromeOS. If you were going to buy a laptop with similar specs and price already, and the only difference is what OS comes preinstalled, ChromeOS will be the most widely available preinstalled Linux option.
I can't think of a single thing a Chromebook can do that a Netbook can't also do, but a Netbook can do literally everything that any other computer can do, while Chromebooks are limited to "I can do some things that happen within a browser."
You're conflating the hardware (Chromebook) with the OS (ChromeOS). You can install other OSes on Chromebooks; in fact you're guaranteed to be able to install other Linux flavors on it, since ChromeOS is itself one... and thus can do literally everything that any other computer can do, at least as far as any Netbook can.
Slashdot Mirror
Her application of the 3d factor analysis (p88) (following the 3d factor discussion) reads
"Where a book is not divided into chapters or contains fewer than ten chapters, unpaid copying of no more than 10% of the pages in the book is permissible under factor three. The pages are counted as previously set forth in this Order. In practical effect, this will allow copying of about one chapter or its equivalent. Where a book contains ten or more chapters, the unpaid copying of up to but no more than one chapter (or its equivalent) will be permissible under fair use factor three."
The 10% figure comes from a discussion of the legislative history of the 1976 Copyright Act, specifically a related House Report called the "Agreement on Guidelines for Classroom Copying in Not-For-Profit Educational Institutions with Respect to Books and Periodicals." Interestingly, in her 3d use analysis section she notes that the Guideline figures --including the 10%-- were considered by Congress to be a minimum threshold, not a maximum. So her use of the 10% seems to conflict with her earlier discussion on p59, in which she suggests that such a
"brightline restriction (would stand) in contrast to the statutory scheme described in section 107 (of the US Copyright Act.)"
Conflict of interest is when he has a commercial venture with the plaintiff, the nature of which is not necessarily related to the case. Corruption is when he has a commercial venture with the plaintiff and he doesn't reveal this and dismiss himself.
And this is where you make exactly the same error; there is no such distinction. The difference you miss is between the what and the why. You aren't only swallowing the premise (COI) of TFA without question, you're following the conclusion (corruption) of the unsupported premise of TFA. Accepting both an unsupported premise, AND its conclusion about an actor, from a party who suffered an adverse ruling from the same actor, is simple-minded and hot-headed.
That makes the judge not only corrupt, but textbook corrupt.
Falkvinge, next time actually read a fucking textbook on the subject at hand before you claim that something is a textbook example. Words have meanings, particularly in legal settings. This sort of imprecision just damages your credibility.
As a US citizen, I'm much more afraid of the NSA (or any US agency) getting access to my Google*(*& Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Dropbox,etc) account data than I am of any arm of the Chinese government getting access.
If you feel that way, you really have been approaching all of those accounts wrong from the outset. You'd have be in a better position now had you assumed they would be compromised before you created them, and used them accordingly.
I don't understand why you'd be so concerned about the NSA having your account details, when all of your information has been most certainly churned through any number of private companies, all trying to actively mine your data for profit. Again, you'd be in a better position now if you'd assumed that they were doing that all along.
tl;dr Yes, trained spies will probably be able to sneak in and access whatever data you create that leaves your local control. Deal with it appropriately.
In the US there most certainly are limits on commercial speech. Advertisers cannot just say whatever they want; see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Central_Hudson_Gas_%26_Electric_Corp._v._Public_Service_Commission for details.
Ha! While it was still undisclosed, I correctly guessed that the jury was hanging on the question of fair use. http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2829865&cid=39897025
Fair use is a difficult concept. What this jury was asked to do isn't so much as decide a question of fact -- "fair use" is an artificial construct, and the boundaries are nebulous. In addition to being asked to decide whether or not the defendant did or didn't do something, the jury is being asked to make a public policy decision.
That's something that the average person just doesn't do. It's difficult, there are a lot of conflicting interests to balance, and you can only guess as to the effect your decision will have on the future.
Audiologists can test your hearing range with properly calibrated equipment.
I had them test my frequency range last time I went in to get fitted for earplugs. I plan on tracking this as I age, since I'm curious to know how my frequency range declines. At the border of my audio range, "hearing" the high frequencies was more like feeling a pressure in the ears -- my mind wasn't able to "hear" the high noises as any sort of distinct pitch.
Judge Alsup is in fact very much correct. Like I said, it's not simple. Fair use is a defense that excuses actions that would otherwise be a violation of copyright.
By car analogy: a car running a red light is breaking a traffic law, but if that car is an emergency vehicle with its lights on, while it's still technically breaking that traffic law in a sense, it's not a civil offense. The judge is just asking them to start out by first deciding if it was an emergency vehicle. Later the jury will decide if the car even ran a red light in the first place.
Google has at least two avenues to win: (1) it was a violation, but since it was fair use it's completely excused (emergency vehicle running the light), or (2) it wasn't even copyright violation in the first place (didn't even run the light.)
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. --H. L. Mencken.
Your response is just what I meant by "armchair lawyering." I'm not making it complicated; the fair use defense is complicated. Copyright law in general is complicated.
While jury nullification (here in the more limited sense of disregarding jury instructions) might sound like it would be an easy hack, it's exactly the kind of shortcut that works only from the armchair. If they were to do as you suggest, the judge could (and probably would, since it would so clear that they disregarded the instructions) issue a "judgment notwithstanding the verdict" -- IOW, the judge has the discretion to ismiss the verdict of the jurors.
Case law and precedent is relevant b/c it is how the judge needs to present the concept of the four prong analysis of fair use. And yes the four factors are in the copyright statute, at 17 USC sec. 107.
Well... I tried upgrading every Ubuntu install I had (about 7.10 up to I think 10.10, possibly gave 11.4 a try.) Only one worked smoothly. All other updates broke something essential, from the boot screen to obsoleting and killing packages that I had been functional before the upgrade. Every would require at least a few hours of tinkering, and often the forum recommendations were to just do a clean install from scratch.
While I think package managers and united application updates are still far superior to Window's piecemeal approach, the reality of the Linux upgrades is that they can be a crapshoot: they might just work, but odds are good that you'll ultimately save yourself hours if you just do a clean install of the new version.
I don't envy that jury at all. Google is claiming "fair use", which is really a difficult, and nebulous concept. Hell, it's a rough subject for law school students to grasp in copyright courses.
At first look, fair use doesn't seem that difficult. US Copyright law identifies four factors to be used to determine whether an infringement is excused as "fair use":
1. the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;
2. the nature of the copyrighted work;
3. the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and
4. the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.
Problems: each of those factors already starts out as a vague kind of grey area, and while some examples are provided in the legislative history, none of those is further defined in the statute. On top of that, there's a rather large amount of case law focusing on what each of the four factors really means in any given context.
While it's easy enough to armchair lawyer yourself and just blow through a fair use analysis, that's simply not how it works at trial. Determining whether or not it's fair use when there is already solid precedent for your context is tough enough -- making that decision on a novel concept is just a motherfucking bear.
What's next, is there going to be an extra $5 charge every time I change the BIOS settings? A $2 charge by the firmware when I add RAM?
SHH! For heaven's sake, please do not give them any more ideas along this line of thought.
Neither Sony nor any other private party can sue Comcast under the Sherman Antitrust law, if that is in fact what you are suggesting. That law does not private right of action -- individuals/companies can't sue over it, only the federal government can, I believe through either the FTC or the DOJ.
This is a rumor spread by "sources", as the NY Post helpfully explains. It looks like it's only a speculative rumor; it's certainly nothing official. I just got off the phone w/ Hulu customer service about this --if it were true, I would have immediately canceled my Hulu Plus subscription.
While the customer support guy was not permitted to respond directly to claims in new stories, he said they hadn't heard of such a change, he'd be shocked if they did so, and would feel the same way about it that I did. It doesn't make much sense, as this would precisely eliminate the reason I bother to pay for Hulu Plus -- because I don't have, and will not buy, cable service. A move like this would do nothing to enhance Hulu's revenue, and would almost certainly eliminate a large part of their subscribers.
If you're a Hulu Plus subscriber and you're actually concerned about it, call them yourself; 1-877-719-2773. No hold time, no phone tree; it goes directly to a human in customer service.
And why not? Sure, the 92 y/o veteran spending his own money to support troop morale overseas is a lawyer's dream version of a sympathetic client. But the 92 y/o veteran part of it isn't essential! Anyone spending their own time and money to support the morale of troops overseas is going to be a sympathetic client.
With a large number of people openly, blatantly doing this, it can force the MPAA's position into the public spotlight. This is an election year, and this kind of popular sentiment is the sort of thing that can catalyze legislation --incumbents love the opportunity to pander to popular sentiment, and the support-the-troops angle is such an appetizing bonus that's it'd practically be like wrapping a proposed bill in bacon. Or a flag.
Step 1: a bunch of people do exactly what this guy is doing.
Step 2: online discussion ensues. (This guy is already popping up in my aunts' f/b feeds, so it's not much of a stretch.)
Step 3: the more organized and well-heeled of we the unwashed masses bring this to the attention of our local legislators.
Step 4: the legislators jump at the opportunity to draft various bills proscribing legal relief for this kind of activity.
Step 5: Bills are debated, compromises reached, bill opposition gets demonized in the public eye.
Step 6: MPAA takes a very serious blow to the legal structure that has propped them up for far too long.
The German judicial branch's approach is often a fascinating contrast to that of US state and federal courts. Germany has specialized highest courts for specific subject matters: tax, admin, labor, social, constitutional... and the high court in TFA.
As an example: the Bundesverfassungsgericht (the highest German conlaw court, not the highest "ordinary" court in TFA) decreed it unconstitutional to publicly print (or run big news stories about) the names of notorious, convicted criminals, once the criminals have completed their sentences and have been released. The idea is that imprisonment is supposed to be such a thing that, once a person is released, they have actually been rehabilitated to the point where they can once again function in society without posing a threat to the well-being of others.
Given the depth of the cultural grab of the US first amendment --freedom of speech, baby!-- the thought that one shouldn't be able to print the names of convicted criminals in news media probably sets off all sorts of knee-jerk 1st amendment concerns. But given the realities of prison, enforcing that the prison goals of rehabilitation and public safety over raw punishment seems to me a wise approach that I wish the US would adopt. But over here, such a concept probably sounds like something that would be characterized as deplorable, pollyannish weak liberal democrat thinking.
I've read a handful of English translations of the decisions of the Constitutional Court/Bundesverfassungsgericht (the German conlaw court, not the "ordinary" court in TFA). Last time I checked, most of the text of the most useful read I found is here: http://goo.gl/dlwi9 [goo.gl]
Want to hack law ? Then start by by putting the entire code of law in an SVN-like system. Including proposed laws. With traceability of authors, who voted for them, etc... And an associated wiki for comments. And a complete list of cases that used them. This would be invaluable.
Law seems to be the social equivalent of TFA: most people will base their entire opinions on the summary, and never bother to actually read the thing itself.
The functional equivalent of an SVN-system already exists and has for decades. What you're describing are very basic components of what is called "legislative history." Bill authors, vote counts, comments made both on the floor of the legislature and in committee: these things (and more) can all be found in the Congressional Record for federal material, and every state legislature has a similar record. Lists of cases that refer to particular laws have been around for well over a century; the various publication types are called annotations, citators, and legal encyclopedias.
The real problem is that very few people will bother to read what is actually out there. Ask yourself: when was the last time you commented on proposed legislation without actually bothering to read it? When was the last time you commented on a court decision without bothering to read the decision? These things are already available, for free, in most cases online and without any ads.
In 2010, the comparable amount accounted for more than 20% of all periodical subscription costs and just under 10% of all collection costs for everything the Library acquires. Some journals cost as much as $40,000 per year, others in the tens of thousands. Prices for online content from two providers have increased by about 145% over the past six years, which far exceeds not only the consumer price index, but also the higher education and the library price indices. These journals therefore claim an ever-increasing share of our overall collection budget. Even though scholarly output continues to grow and publishing can be expensive, profit margins of 35% and more suggest that the prices we must pay do not solely result from an increasing supply of new articles.
Libraries are necessarily nonprofit organizations, and their budgets are funded through taxes and tuition. The current journal publication business model treats library budgets as little more than a vehicle to launder money that was taken from Mr. and Ms. Taxpayer.You pay to support Elsevier, ThomsonReuters, et al, in the form of taxes and tuition. Journal publishers seem to perceive library budgets the way that petroleum companies perceive oil fields. In case you think this is hyperbole, consider:
An annual subscription to Tetrahedron, a chemistry journal, will cost your university library $20,269; a year of the Journal of Mathematical Sciences will set you back $20,100.
http://www.economist.com/node/21552574 Given these kinds of costs, it would be cheaper for a library to fly the most prominent publishing mathematicians out for a visit and have them lecture on the topics of their latest publications.
Applying a profiteering mentality to scholarly work has predictable resulted in a systematic degradation of the quality of academic output itself. The results are demonstrable.http://science.slashdot.org/story/12/04/20/220201/studies-suggest-massive-increase-in-scientific-fraud
I know this is /. and we're supposed to focus only on the glaring privacy issues because that's how the discussion must be framed, but beyond that context there are actual great uses for this tech.
I would find this level of analysis of my own driving habits useful for improving. Throw in time-synced biofeedback monitoring + cameras on each angle, and, for example, you could identify the closest proximity a vehicle had to your before you became aware of it. You could review your closest calls, and get addition insight into how you might be able to improve your driving skills.
There's also the problem that, if self-driving cars are to be an eventual reality, real-time monitoring of velocity and operating controls will be a necessary step. And yes, I've heard Franklin's quote about sacrificing liberty for safety, but to be fair the man lived in the age of the horse-drawn carriage.
To elevate a liberty concept on measurable driving data --which essentially measures precisely how one is operating a vehicle on public roads, not some form of communication-- above the public safety concern seems to be an awfully bloody business. US vehicle deaths have gradually dropped from a peak of 54,589 in 1972 to 32,885 last year. (Interestingly, that's now around the number of motor vehicle deaths around 1929.) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_motor_vehicle_deaths_in_U.S._by_year
Who Gives and Who Doesn't.. Yes, you can call it biased... yet no liberals have ever been able to disprove it, just attack the authors without substantive arguments.
The article you linked concludes that "religious people donate more to charity" by checking the donation levels to a Salvation Army bucket in San Francisco and Sioux Falls.
The Salvation Army is a conservative religious organization; check out their own position statements on abortion or homosexuality, for example. http://www.salvationarmyusa.org/usn/www_usn_2.nsf/0/B6F3F4DF3150F5B585257434004C177D?Opendocument
And almost all of the people who gave to our bell ringers in San Francisco and Sioux Falls said they were religious or spiritual.
This study might as well have set up a donation table to the Republican party, and concluded that "Republicans donate more than Democrats." Set up a Planned Parenthood donation table in both San Francisco and Sioux Falls, measure the respective donations, and then get back to us on which group *gives more to charity.* Go ahead, we'll wait.
Please take note! Only hijinks can ensue. Nothing else can ensue, ever. Including injuries. Even if injuries do *technically* ensue, please use a different word to describe the phenomenon.
monetize:
Econ.
1. trans.
a. To establish (a metal) as standard currency in the coinage of a country; to put into circulation as currency. Now chiefly hist.
b.To convert (an asset, debt, etc.) into money, to realize the value of (an asset, debt, etc.) as currency; spec. to convert (government debt) to a more liquid form, as by redeeming Treasury bills or replacing bonds with bills. Also: to assess in terms of monetary value.
2. trans.
To convert to the use of money; to convert (an economy) to a monetary system.
Words mean things. It looks like Al Perry simply doesn't understand the word "monetize." Good thing too, because as distribution models continue to evolve, useless people like Perry and useless distribution dinosaurs like Paramount will be increasingly cut out of the profits that keep them alive.
Since I'm looking forward to watching these parasitic organizations starve to the point of insolvency, I'm very happy to hear that an executive doesn't understand exactly how the ground is shifting underneath his cumbersome, unnecessary business models. We simply no longer need studios for production, distribution, or even PR.
When was the last time you saw a couple guilty of adultery begin stoned to death at the city gates?
August 2010, in Afghanistan, under the guise of Islamic rule of law. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/16/taliban-stone-couple-for_n_683080.html
And only a few days ago a woman in Iran was sentenced to stoning for adultery. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1291166/Iranian-mother-faces-death-stoning-convicted-adultery.html
It seems like the people who prefer tablets aren't clear on the difference between the hardware and the OS. A Chromebook is a laptop, it has minimal internal storage and impressive battery life. You can install other Linux flavors on it besides ChromeOS.
To clarify: a Chromebook is not limited to ChromeOS. If you were going to buy a laptop with similar specs and price already, and the only difference is what OS comes preinstalled, ChromeOS will be the most widely available preinstalled Linux option.
I can't think of a single thing a Chromebook can do that a Netbook can't also do, but a Netbook can do literally everything that any other computer can do, while Chromebooks are limited to "I can do some things that happen within a browser."
You're conflating the hardware (Chromebook) with the OS (ChromeOS). You can install other OSes on Chromebooks; in fact you're guaranteed to be able to install other Linux flavors on it, since ChromeOS is itself one... and thus can do literally everything that any other computer can do, at least as far as any Netbook can.