It's not even a question of whether the state has a responsibility to break up big companies, it's a question of whether it ought have the right to. As long as you don't agress anyone by physical force or deception, there should be no reason to force you to do anything.
A true free market is, well, free from the kind of government interferance you're calling for.
2. Hell yes. The whole "resistance" was mostly a way to save face and go on living without to much guilt... sure they was some resistance, but definitely not what it was claimed to have been. Hey I'm french by the way and I know quite a bit about Vichy's governement.
Except there's no such thing as sovereign countries, only politicians stealing the sovereignty of individuals leaving within as set of borders. No one should decide for me which licence term are or are not acceptable, I should be the only judge.
If microsoft does not wish to reveal their file format structure or protocol structure there's no reason to force them to. On the other hand, they should have no ground to complain if someone reverses engineers it. Two wrongs don't make a right though, and even though they're unjustly protected by law against reverse engineering, it doesn't make it ok to force them to provide documentation.
Vichy's government was not a dictatorship, yet it outlawed hiding jews in one's basement. The point is, just claiming "law is law" is stupid. I don't care if Microsoft is dominant or if some european bureaucrats claim its illegal. There's no just reason to force Microsoft to reveal its trade secrets. Microsoft is big, it produces buggy unsafe software and it's a pain in the ass for interoperability, I don't like them but that's hardly a reason to caution racketeering by the EU politicians.
This is between me and the people living there, the EU court should shut up. If the people working in the EU court don't like it, let them not do business with me, they don't have to take down the whole EU population with them. They're human, their shit stinks like yours, not supermen with the power to decide for everyone else.
GOOD DAY TO YOU AND GOD BLESS. I HAVE BEEN MANUFACTURING HELICOPTERS FROM USED CAR SINCE 10 YEARS (AS SEEN ON YAHOO) AND RECENTLY SOLD MY FLEET FOR THE SUM OF $100,000,000. UNFORTUNATELY, THE PAYMENT OF THIS MONEY IS STILL SITTING IN ESCROW IN A NIGERIAN BANK AS THE STATE AIRFORCE WHO BOUGHT THE HELICOPTERS REFUSE TO PAY. I NEED YOUR HELP TO UNLOCK THAT SUM FROM THE ESCROW, FOR THIS SERVICE YOU WILL BE PAID A FULL 5%, THAT IS $5,000,000. IF YOU CAN HELP ME PLEASE FAX ME YOUR PASSPORT.
Eventually the taxpayer pays for his own wiretapping. Oh the irony.
Nothing new though, the taxpayers pays for tax collection & enforcement, cute but sad.
does not mean coackroaches would inherit the earth. A good experiment would need to test radiation exposure over different generations... what if radiation makes them sterile? What if they have so much mutations due to radiation they start to drift and look the precious genetic information that allowed them to survive. We are constantly degenerating and are constantly evolving to preserve our fitness... would the coackroaches be able to do that if genetic drift was significantly increased? Maybe, maybe not.
That is not quite true. There are other alternative to the free market than fascism, nazism, communism or socialism come to mind. "Fascism" is but one brand of socialism, there are others, varying by degree and ideology.
How has voting anything to do with freedom? A ballot is a bullet ! It's not freedom, it's a way to take other people's freedom away !
Re:Forbidding this is not part of a democracy
on
eBay The Vote
·
· Score: 1
You're being inconsistent. You claim "you also have the right to democratically select a dictatorship" so according to you democracy can chose to pass laws restricting freedom.
Then you say "If the citizens want to be bought voluntarily and sell their freedom, a democracy should let them do that. If not, it's not a true democracy."
What if they democratically decide to forbid vote selling and buying? If you accept the idea of democracy selecting a dictatoship surely you accept the idea that democracy can chose to outlaw vote selling.
If democracy is inherently ethically good - which is the view held by many people - then democratic choice must be inherently ethically good. However since democratic vote can be anti-democratic, those many people face a dilemna (and unfortunately, no they don't disappear in a puff of logical contradiction)
Good thing
on
eBay The Vote
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
This deligitimizes the democratic process, it breaks the mystic belief of people "participating" in the political process.
This belief is dangerous because people gamble with it, they figure they can gain an advantage against the others by pushing their own views on the political scene. In the end, only the political class wins and everyone is fooled into perpuating a system that strive at their own expense by they believing they can game it. In a country like Argentina, where presidents are often openly kleptocrats, it is easy to shake the belief... some countries have more subtle leaders and the myth is harder to shake.
Re:This is HIGHLY illegal in the US
on
eBay The Vote
·
· Score: 4, Funny
if by THAT you mean politicians, I cheerfully agree:)
I just want to reacte to the makesense tag. I think it is an example of hindsight bias... given the statistics we think:
"An anonymous user who makes a single edit is probably a good guy who spotted a mistake, an anonymous user who makes lots of edit is probably a vandal, if his contribution were good he'd probaly register to get credit. A registred user who does bad edits would be kicked pretty soon therefore registered user with large number of edits probably do quality edits".
Duh ?
If the finding were the opposite, namely that regardless of the anonymous status a large number of edits means better quality, wouldn't you think
"Duhh... the ip of the anonymous user is blocked if a large number of edit is made..." or "Large number of edit means the user invests time, he is commited and strives to make quality edit"
And it would make perfect sense....
When presented with data, our mind often builds a little story around it to convince ourselves that, "we knew it all along", even when the result is far from obvious.
So...
Cisco's big and Brazil government figures it can make some quick bucks by looting... hey, who cares if this network equipment actually helps Brazil to develop, Cisco has money, we have guns, let's take it and let everyone know that they can't do business here without paying protection money. Oh sure on the short term they (the officials) will get the money and people will keep investing in Brazil, on the long term they're driving everyone to poverty.
Oh my god you are so right, the countries in the third world have so low taxes... oh wait they don't ! They have kleptocratic government. And they don't have education as well...
What ? Many do have efficient cheap private schools ? My my my...
But your are right, I am stupid, according to my logic food would be bad since it is well known food can only be provided by the state through compulsory taxation.
I'm glad the government taught you government's taxation is good in its government run public school.
Slashdot Mirror
It's not even a question of whether the state has a responsibility to break up big companies, it's a question of whether it ought have the right to. As long as you don't agress anyone by physical force or deception, there should be no reason to force you to do anything. A true free market is, well, free from the kind of government interferance you're calling for.
2. Hell yes. The whole "resistance" was mostly a way to save face and go on living without to much guilt... sure they was some resistance, but definitely not what it was claimed to have been. Hey I'm french by the way and I know quite a bit about Vichy's governement.
Except there's no such thing as sovereign countries, only politicians stealing the sovereignty of individuals leaving within as set of borders. No one should decide for me which licence term are or are not acceptable, I should be the only judge.
If microsoft does not wish to reveal their file format structure or protocol structure there's no reason to force them to. On the other hand, they should have no ground to complain if someone reverses engineers it. Two wrongs don't make a right though, and even though they're unjustly protected by law against reverse engineering, it doesn't make it ok to force them to provide documentation.
Vichy's government was not a dictatorship, yet it outlawed hiding jews in one's basement. The point is, just claiming "law is law" is stupid. I don't care if Microsoft is dominant or if some european bureaucrats claim its illegal. There's no just reason to force Microsoft to reveal its trade secrets. Microsoft is big, it produces buggy unsafe software and it's a pain in the ass for interoperability, I don't like them but that's hardly a reason to caution racketeering by the EU politicians.
Indeed, the fact that they are unjust does. Hiding jews in your basement was illegal in many European countries not so long ago.
This is between me and the people living there, the EU court should shut up. If the people working in the EU court don't like it, let them not do business with me, they don't have to take down the whole EU population with them. They're human, their shit stinks like yours, not supermen with the power to decide for everyone else.
GOOD DAY TO YOU AND GOD BLESS. I HAVE BEEN MANUFACTURING HELICOPTERS FROM USED CAR SINCE 10 YEARS (AS SEEN ON YAHOO) AND RECENTLY SOLD MY FLEET FOR THE SUM OF $100,000,000. UNFORTUNATELY, THE PAYMENT OF THIS MONEY IS STILL SITTING IN ESCROW IN A NIGERIAN BANK AS THE STATE AIRFORCE WHO BOUGHT THE HELICOPTERS REFUSE TO PAY. I NEED YOUR HELP TO UNLOCK THAT SUM FROM THE ESCROW, FOR THIS SERVICE YOU WILL BE PAID A FULL 5%, THAT IS $5,000,000. IF YOU CAN HELP ME PLEASE FAX ME YOUR PASSPORT.
(hey it's caps-lock day today anyway)
I think the saddest thing is that people don't even question the justness of laws anymore.
If I have a secret, I don't care what the antitrust european court says, it's my secret, they shoudln't take that nor my money away for me.
Eventually the taxpayer pays for his own wiretapping. Oh the irony. Nothing new though, the taxpayers pays for tax collection & enforcement, cute but sad.
The wheat you eat is already a man made chromosomic monster, it's hexaploid!
does not mean coackroaches would inherit the earth. A good experiment would need to test radiation exposure over different generations... what if radiation makes them sterile? What if they have so much mutations due to radiation they start to drift and look the precious genetic information that allowed them to survive. We are constantly degenerating and are constantly evolving to preserve our fitness... would the coackroaches be able to do that if genetic drift was significantly increased? Maybe, maybe not.
That is not quite true. There are other alternative to the free market than fascism, nazism, communism or socialism come to mind. "Fascism" is but one brand of socialism, there are others, varying by degree and ideology.
This was Mr Accurate's minute.
Hum sorry but to nitpick but there's no reason to pay back a tax-break at least no more than a "mugging-break".
Granted the lines that were built by the government should be auctionned and the proceeds given to the taxpayers.
Well the acceptation of kleptocrat generally implies a certain lack of subtelty and a massive scale but otherwise, agreed.
How has voting anything to do with freedom? A ballot is a bullet ! It's not freedom, it's a way to take other people's freedom away !
You're being inconsistent. You claim "you also have the right to democratically select a dictatorship" so according to you democracy can chose to pass laws restricting freedom.
Then you say "If the citizens want to be bought voluntarily and sell their freedom, a democracy should let them do that. If not, it's not a true democracy."
What if they democratically decide to forbid vote selling and buying? If you accept the idea of democracy selecting a dictatoship surely you accept the idea that democracy can chose to outlaw vote selling.
If democracy is inherently ethically good - which is the view held by many people - then democratic choice must be inherently ethically good. However since democratic vote can be anti-democratic, those many people face a dilemna (and unfortunately, no they don't disappear in a puff of logical contradiction)
This deligitimizes the democratic process, it breaks the mystic belief of people "participating" in the political process.
This belief is dangerous because people gamble with it, they figure they can gain an advantage against the others by pushing their own views on the political scene. In the end, only the political class wins and everyone is fooled into perpuating a system that strive at their own expense by they believing they can game it. In a country like Argentina, where presidents are often openly kleptocrats, it is easy to shake the belief... some countries have more subtle leaders and the myth is harder to shake.
if by THAT you mean politicians, I cheerfully agree :)
I just want to reacte to the makesense tag. I think it is an example of hindsight bias... given the statistics we think:
"An anonymous user who makes a single edit is probably a good guy who spotted a mistake, an anonymous user who makes lots of edit is probably a vandal, if his contribution were good he'd probaly register to get credit. A registred user who does bad edits would be kicked pretty soon therefore registered user with large number of edits probably do quality edits".
Duh ?
If the finding were the opposite, namely that regardless of the anonymous status a large number of edits means better quality, wouldn't you think
"Duhh... the ip of the anonymous user is blocked if a large number of edit is made..." or "Large number of edit means the user invests time, he is commited and strives to make quality edit"
And it would make perfect sense....
When presented with data, our mind often builds a little story around it to convince ourselves that, "we knew it all along", even when the result is far from obvious.
If the guy that was targeted thought someone was breaking in and tried to defend himself, he would probably have been killed... nice prank :(
Actually yes they should. Cisco brings in the country $500M worth of network equipement. Think hard: good thing or bad thing for Brazil ?
So... Cisco's big and Brazil government figures it can make some quick bucks by looting... hey, who cares if this network equipment actually helps Brazil to develop, Cisco has money, we have guns, let's take it and let everyone know that they can't do business here without paying protection money. Oh sure on the short term they (the officials) will get the money and people will keep investing in Brazil, on the long term they're driving everyone to poverty.
Oh my god you are so right, the countries in the third world have so low taxes... oh wait they don't ! They have kleptocratic government. And they don't have education as well... What ? Many do have efficient cheap private schools ? My my my... But your are right, I am stupid, according to my logic food would be bad since it is well known food can only be provided by the state through compulsory taxation. I'm glad the government taught you government's taxation is good in its government run public school.
Why yes they are. If they were good they wouldn't need be compulsory would they...