There are times you dont have to prove someone commited at crime because they have either admitted it or were caught doing it. Conviction is only necessary for appling penalties.
This is completely untrue. Confessions can be coerced (and often are according to most research). No matter how much evidence a law enforcement officer gathers they still can't judge the guilt or innocence of a person. Say I'm driving along and a police car pulls me over for speeding. They give me a ticket. Does that mean I'm guilty and don't deserve my day in court? Hell no. If I can show they were radar gunning every car coming down the road, it will be tossed out because they did not have probably cause. If I can show there is reasonable doubt that the radar gun was functioning properly and used properly I can have it thrown out. They did remember to have a qualified person calibrate the gun within the last 6 months right, and have records to show that right? If I can show that the officer has reason to be lying, like they have a personal grudge against me, I can get it thrown out. If I can show evidence that contradicts the statements made by the officer I can get it thrown out.
Just because a cop says that I was speeding does not make it so. Just because police say they have reason to believe a person was hacking into government computers, does not automatically make them a criminal. "Innocent until proven guilty," is the template for our criminal justice system and just because you don't seem to understand that system or because most people don't bother to go to court when they get a speeding ticket, thankfully, does not change that.
Since they broke up AT&T free market forces have been in play.
Making one big monopoly into a bunch of regional monopolies does not bring market forces into action. In most regions of the US one of said companies has a government enforced monopoly on the last-mile right of ways. It is not a free market when for my home I can choose to go with AT&T for my DSL line or with another company that has to get AT&T to hook it up for me and pay AT&T a pile of fees on top of the normal expense. It certainly isn't a free market when after a month of trying a major telecom company has to call me and tell me they can't get the line installed because the AT&T won't hook it up and they aren't willing to go to court over an individual account.
The closest thing to competition that the phone companies face is satellite internet and phones, cellphones, and phones over the cable network. The trouble is, the first two are completely different technologies with different limitations and the last one is available only in a tiny number of locations.
The day I can legally start stringing lines to houses and digging new lines into the public right of ways, then we will have real competition, but not before. Until that time, we have one phone and one cable company, each with the exclusive right in a region to hang lines on one spot on the poles. We have a government enforced and regulated industry, not a free market.
So other than the original break up it has all been free market pressures that have forced the various mergers and acqusitions.
Running telecom lines is inherently geographical. Sure they buy each other and merge, but they don't compete directly.
Are you having issues with the English language? Calling someone a criminal means the committed or were convicted of a crime. Agreed? Since this person has not been convicted of a crime and since not having all the facts that should be presented in a court of law we are in no position to judge if he committed a crime, he should not be called a criminal. What part of this are you failing to grasp? Is it just that since you think he committed a crime you can't conceive that maybe you're wrong, or misinformed? He's referred to as an "alleged hacker" because it has not yet been determined if he did it. Punishing him at this point (as you previously advocated) is un-american and unjust. Setting yourself up as some sort of long-range judge using solely the evidence you've gleaned from the media, with no verification of their accuracy or opportunity for the accused to defend himself is just plain stupid.
It's not intrinsically sexual, any more than, say, marriage, which is seen as a perfect topic for family-friendly stuff.
Your sexual, gender preference is not intrinsically sexual? Weird. As for marriage, it is simply about buying a woman, or being paid to take one in... and a bunch of weird traditions that have grown up around it. Really it is more of a religious/legal/slavery issue than a sexual one. If some religion decided it's adherents were not allowed to have sex with one another until they ate fried chicken in a penguin costume together, would that make either chicken or penguins an inherently sexual topic?
back when I took software engineering the definition I was given for beta was: has major bugs but will not lose user data. Sounds to me like boot camp is still in alpha.....
By that definition some types of software can never be beta, let alone GM. Firmware, disk utilities, and partitioning software always has a risk of losing data. When combined with user error, most software can cause loss of data. The majority of the problems we've seen fall into one of the above.
Anyway, the definition of beta at this development shop is, "the documented features for this beta release are complete and it does not have any known, critical bugs."
The important thing to distinguish here is that you are unimportant and have no authority. Another thing to note: a criminal commits crimes, a convict is convicted.
I don't think either of those things is important in this context. The concept of "rule by law" means it does not matter how important a person is or what authority they claim, people should be ruled and judged equally under the law. If the US attorney general says we should torture and kill someone because they are a "hacker" it should have no more force than if Michael Jackson says the same thing. Bypassing the rule of law is not a valid government process. Every person needs to be brought to trial, evidence presented, given the opportunity to speak in their own defense, and judged by an impartial party. If there is doubt that this will be the case, everything that can be done to ensure it, should be, either for you or the accused.
Yes, a criminal commits crimes. This person is accused of having done so. To call them a criminal presumes their guilt. Remember the whole "innocent until proven guilty" concept? That is why the press keeps referring to him as an "alleged hacker." Someone has made the allegation that they are hacker, just as I made the allegation that you have committed some unspecified crime; which you almost certainly have.
Who's hauling him off for torture? This is an off the wall claim made by a defense lawyer in an attempt to get the minimalist sentance within his own country.
Maybe the US government is hauling him off for torture. Given the new laws in the US and the fact that the executive branch does not seem to be obeying the laws, who can say? The US has a pretty crappy track record in very recent history of obeying international human rights accords. Why should the UK expect them to do so now? Supposedly there was a warning about this via an anonymous note, but that is not particularly important. What is important is that the US feels pressure to respect due process of law and the basic humans rights of all people. When they fail to do so, it is the duty of other countries to protect the basic humans rights inherently held by all people. If they have to restrict who they extradite to the US to do this, so be it.
P.S. I don't think you know what "minimalist" means and who says a conviction in the UK would not appropriately punish this script kiddie for his crimes?
Why all the fuss about the telecom mergers/aqusitions? It is the nature of a free market that some companies will win and others lose.
What exactly do you think the merger of two government enforced monopolies into a larger government enforced monopoly has to do with a "free market?" The free market is not operating on phone companies. AT&T was not taken down by the free market, they were split up by the government for breaking the law and because the situation was so bad everyone had to rent their telephone as well as pay high rates for crappy service.
Still, if the UK wants anyone who attacks the UK in the future to flee to (or stay in) the US knowing that the US will offer safe haven then fine, otherwise they should hand the guy over.
As others have pointed out, the UK-US extradition agreement is one way. The US already does not extradite to the UK except in special circumstances.
Telecomm customer service and response has NEVER been good, so why call it into question in light of recent mergers?
Both of the issues exemplified in the article were new issues arising from the fact that because of the merger the new company could no longer provide services they once did. Since there is no competition due to the merger, I'd say it is reasonable to call into question how much the merger has crippled the ability of businesses to acquire and use these services. This is concrete harm to the consumer and the economy. It is always worthwhile to question the decisions made by the government to see if they are doing their job. It seems in this case they are not.
Given the fact that this guy is a national security threat, he should be lucky to get tried in court and NOT be going straight to Guantanamo.
This is true, and it is still completely wrong. If you were designing the perfect government for the UK, would you make laws that handed over citizens to other countries where they would be subject to unethical laws or did not hand over citizens to countries where they would be subject to unethical laws? Should the allow extradition to countries where all suspected criminals are slowly tortured to death for no reason? How tragic it is that the US is that country with unethical laws (and who don't enforce their own laws) to such an extent that people are taken seriously when the issue of whether or not the US will conform to basic human rights accords is raised.
His lawyers would do well to just try to get in writing that he'll get a court trial - they're not going to stop him from being sent to the US.
It's actually hard to say how this will fly in the current UK political climate.
Do you mean to imply you're not a criminal, or at least an alleged criminal? I hereby allege that you have broken laws. Is it okay if I just haul you off to a third world country and torture you now?
No, that's not fitting to the offense at all, but if you know the bear will react that way and you poke the bear in the ribs anyway... that's just stupid. The US enjoys power driven at least in part by fear. If they overlook offenses against them that fear goes away. Do you think the US is going to send that message and give up that power? No, they like being feared and the power that goes with it.
So the important question is, "what should the UK do?" Right now the UK is standing between the bear and the man. Knowing that the Bear might kill the man, and being responsible for his welfare as one of their citizens should they give him to the US? I think they absolutely should not. Until the US adopts reasonable human rights laws in compliance with international agreements why risk handing him over? Just convict him in the UK. If the US wants any extraditions to go forward in the future when there is any doubt about US laws and behaviors then they can fix the bloody problem. Why encourage a country to act like an rabid animal? The UK should seriously consider whether or not they should hand him over. If they do, it should be with guarantees that he will be treated in accord with accepted international humans rights agreements as monitored by an independent third party.
Re:Am I the only one scared of this?
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That's like being scared that Domino's knows what pizza you like. How do you expect them to know when and what to deliver to you unless you call them and give them the information?
Actually, a lot of companies buy information from pizza companies. Law enforcement, government agencies, PI's, bail bondsmen, etc. People will give the wrong address and phone number to the dept. of motor vehicles, the IRS, their parole officer, etc., but they aren't willing to go the extra mile and pick up their pizza. There is even a company (whose name I forget) that just collects names, addresses, and phone numbers from pizza companies and resells them.
Wrong. "--With a T&L capable video card with at least 32 MB of video RAM (such as nvidia GeForce 2 or better or ATI Radeon 7000 or better):
Maybe you should actually check the official site, rather than some random forum. Below is the current list of graphics cards supported by The Sims 2 (T&L recommended):
ATI RadeonTM series (7000 or better)
Radeon 7000/VE series (non-T&L)
7200, 7500
8500, All-In-Wonder 8500
9000, 9200, 9500, 9600, 9700, 9800
X300, X600, X800
Nvidia® QuadroTM series
Quadro, Quadro2, Quadro4
Nvidia® Geforce series (GeForce2 and better)
GeForce2
GeForce3, 3 Ti
GeForce4, 4Ti, MX 420, 440
GeForce FX 5200, 5600, 5700, 5800, 5900, 5950
GeForce 6600, 6800
Intel® Extreme Graphics (non-T&L)
82845, 82865, 82915
A number of these cards have 8, 16, or shared video ram
I doubt you could identify more than a handful of popular PC games from the last few years that would play with that configuration.
The top selling Amazon game today is, Sims 2, requiring 8Mb of video RAM and an 800Mhz CPU. Amazon is an online store that caters to the more technically savvy market. Most games are sold at Walmart. Want to take any guesses as to whether the actual top selling games have higher or lower requirements?
Of the 5 top selling games of the year to date, all require less than a 1.6 Ghz processor. We have, The Sims 2 and Half-life 2, which require less than what I listed as the average. Brothers in Arms and WoW require a 32 MB video card. Star Wars Republic Commando requires a 64 Mb video card. None of these are close to exceeding the specs of any of the available Intel Mac systems.
Wake up to reality already. The most popular games do not require some "super gaming system" and most people don't buy that type of computer. Most people buying games and new machines buy a less powerful system than the Intel Macs.
If you have any evidence to suggest they wait a year let alone five years before purchasing, contrary to the accepted view that most sales occur when a title is released, I suggest you provide it.
All of the top five sellers of the year so far are over a year old. The majority of any game's sales is long after the first year. There is a spike at the beginning, but the sellable life of a game is around five years, with most of the purchases taking place after the first year.
I am quite able to read comparative benchmarks of the new Intel Macs to know they are utterly hopeless as gaming platforms.
Except they're outclassed as gaming platforms if you're comparing top of the line systems designed for gaming. If you instead look at the average system used in gaming they are above average. Of course being a dedicated gamer, with no sense of perspective, who can't seem to conceive of people different from yourself, you can't seem to grasp the fact that most people don't buy systems designed for gaming with $500 graphics cards.
The Mac Mini is so utterly hopeless that it is a waste of time even trying to play the relatively undemanding World of Warcraft on it.
Interesting how you think your opinion of what WoW is like on a mac mini is more accurate than what people who actually use minis say. Performance was acceptable even on the first generation mac mini, provided it had enough RAM. I know a number of people who play WoW on newer minis and ibooks (think, "most of their waking time") and they don't seem to have any complaints. Get a clue.
Marketing: I can not agree to Linux, I do not know how many boxes we can sell like that. People who have to go out and buy retail copies of Windows would need to spend a lot more! They will mentally add that cost into the cost of the computer and I am just not sure we can overcome that!!! I will not sign off on anything other than Windows, it is as simple as that!
First, sales is the one who cares more about the price of the system and what the end user will pay. Second, do you really think anyone would care more about the concept that people might worry about the cost of acquiring an OS (which is almost free there) versus the cost increase from paying MS real money for a license?
Really, some companies will include Windows, if this is enforced, but mostly the high-end ones. Some will include it if MS makes it basically free to them, or pays them to include it (this is a very real possibility). Aside from that though, I seriously doubt the price conscious Chinese market is going to be willing to pay even $8 US more for machines that come with an OS they can buy for pennies elsewhere.
...not that this law is likely to be enforced in practice in a month's time anyway.
In that case wouldn't Tom be guilty of illicit insider trading, as he used confidential information when trading securities?
I don't believe so, as he was the cause of the stock price change, not just taking advantage of it. For example, he isn't using inside knowledge to decide whether to buy or sell, he's using it to change the price of the stock. The information he used would be theoretically useless to traders since only the exposure of the info would affect the stock price (realistically of course this is a different story). It is perfectly legal for the inventor of a new transportation device to short a bunch of auto stocks, even though they know they are about to cause the price to fall, so long as their action that makes it fall is legal.
He might even be in violation of some market manipulation laws.
I must confess ignorance as to market manipulation laws. I doubt many lawyers could even give you a definitive answer without a lot of research.
A gamer is a person who plays games. There are thousands of games sold for the mac today. You;'re telling me that is just because all those companies haven't realized they're losing money on them and they've all been lying on their profit reports? I reiterate, you're an idiot.
Lots of people buy PCs to play games or use their machines predominantly for that purpose.
According to market research, that number is so small as to be an insignificant chunk of the total PC market.
And I'd say you're a zealot whose worked his panties in a bunch because someone dared be critical about their machine.
I don't even own one, I just think you're an idiot making ridiculous and unsupported assertions.
The original poster claimed that now they'd be able to run Battlefield 2. Yeah right
Ahh, the old, "I know more than the person who has actually done it argument." Brilliant! Test it or find someone who has and get some facts before spouting off.
...the current lineup is hopeless. That's a fact.
Actually, that your opinion based upon your admitted ignorance of having never even tried one and your obvious lack of understanding about what most people use to play games. Perhaps you should look up 'fact' in a dictionary.
Very few games produced in the last 3-4 years would play at all, let alone acceptably on such an underpowered system even with the resolution and settings turned down to their minimum values.
You're completely wrong and only considering the latest big titles that only run on the newest machines. Most people don't buy games until they have been on the market for over a year and often not for as long as five years. But of course myself and all the people who actually make games must be wrong because you are an expert on the market somehow. How many game companies do you run again? You are such an ignorant twit.
That's an unnecessary insult. Just because I disagree with you, doesn't mean I'm stupid. I've presented valid points that are both pro- and anti-Microsoft.
I never claimed you were stupid. I claimed you were ignorant and/or deliberately deceived. Almost every point you made was based upon incorrect facts or a failure to grasp the intention, motivation, and enacting of the law. From your post it is obvious you don't understand the economics or history of monopolies. It is equally apparent that you have a number of misconceptions about the legal action against Microsoft. Pointing these facts out is not an insult or an ad hominem attack. I'm sure you can take some time and educate yourself about the facts. The only issue I have with you is that you did not do so before posting erroneous assertions that may well misinform someone else.
When did I say anything about Microsoft selling computers?...This is either an attempt at a 'straw man' argument, or you can't read.
It is neither a straw man or an indication of illiteracy (although that is both an ad hominem attack and and emotive one). You stated that the action taken to stop Microsoft from bundling other applications would prevent you from buying them when you purchase your computer and add extra work for you. This contains the implicit assertion that either you buy your computer from Microsoft or you expect that legal actions against Microsoft will restrict the people you do buy computers from as well (for some unspecified reason).
I said that Microsoft has used underhanded, and possibly illegal business practices to push their software. But that should be dealt with in court, IE and WMA being pre-installed shouldn't be an issue - the extortion should be an issue.
Bundling a product from one market with a product from a monopolized one is the very first example of illegal behavior listed in US antitrust law. That is what is illegal, for reasons anyone who passed Econ 101 should understand. It bypasses the free market, removing all benefits of competition and gives the consumer a product that is not necessarily the best nor the cheapest. Microsoft knows this. The US knows this. the EU knows this. Microsoft intentionally broke this law as part of their business plan. They have bet that it is more profitable to break this law and be punished for it than it is to obey the law, as other companies do. So far they have been completely right. They've made a fortune breaking the law and bribed the US to drop all punishments against them after they were convicted. They've settled hundreds of lawsuits, but it has still cost much less than they are making, since most injured parties can't afford to take them to court. Even the full EU punishments don't come close to the profits they make performing this illegal behavior. Right now they are trying to weasel out of the punishment in the EU that says they have to stop breaking the law. (Imagine a thief arguing after their conviction that they don't want to stop stealing and it is unfair that they are being punished in this way.)
One of the ways MS is trying to get out of their punishment is by pressuring the EU using US politicians, EU politicians who are "consulting" for them, and making lots of press releases that completely misinform the public about the situation in the hopes that public opinion (based upon very misleading information) will help. That is where you fit in.
This is another 'straw man' argument, you're setting up an opposing view that no one supports to attempt to gain credibility.
No, this is you completely failing to understand what the courts ruled MS guilty of.
I said "They squash competitors with cheaper, inferior products, they've stolen and copied hardware and software designs from other companies, they push their products on retailers in a hostile and underhanded manor." You keep taking what I said out of context, or completely misunderstand what I'm saying.
I'm pretty sure I'm the only one who actually hates the anti-trust suits against Microsoft.
Nope, there are plenty of people who are clueless or who have been fooled by their constant PR campaign of misinformation.
I hate that the EU has made Microsoft ship separate versions of Windows: ones without Media Player or IE. But what if I use WMA and IE? These are important pieces of software that every computer needs. Every PC needs to be able to go online, and play media files.
When was the last time you bought a computer from Microsoft? What's that? They don't sell computers? This in about whether Dell or Gateway or Lenovo can sell you a computer pre-loaded with Windows and IE and WMP. This is about whether Microsoft can force Dell and Gateway and Lenovo to sell you a computer pre-loaded with Windows and IE and WMP instead of their choice of browser and media player. This is whether Dell can not install IE and instead ship Firefox.
Now, Microsoft has used terrible methods of making themselves the best.
Not at all. Microsoft has used terrible methods to force people to use them despite them obviously not being the best or the cheapest or the most reliable. It is about consumers using sub-par products because the free market is bypassed by MS's illegal abuse of their monopoly.
Every other electronics and computer company does exactly the same thing, Microsoft's just better at it...
Microsoft is not on trial. They lost their trial and were judged guilty. Microsoft is arguing that they don't have to obey the court's punishments or that they really did obey when they didn't. Second, Microsoft was judged guilty of abusing their monopoly. None of the other companies have a monopoly, thus they can't possibly be "doing the same thing."
The best thing is both blaster and slammer had fixes released well before the worms hit.
...for some versions of Windows that allowed most software to work on those versions.
RPC should never have been running and exposed on a desktop OS in the first place. Basically no services should be running and exposed on a default install of a desktop OS.
It's most assuredly not Microsoft's fault that people don't patch.
For the most part I agree, but MS has a pretty awful track record of issuing patches that break things and change other parts of the system, unrelated to the security hole. They also have a pretty unmanageable system of patches, which often leaves even seasoned admins wondering what patches in what order need to be installed for a given set of functionality to work.
And any fool who says Linux or MacOS X don't need to be patched, are just that, fools.
Of course every OS will have bugs that should be patched. That does not mean every OS is likely to have trivial remote exploits granting full access as often as it does not. It also does not imply that they make the same, basic architectural mistakes that lead to such a preponderance of vulnerabilities. No one with a clue would argue that Windows takes security seriously or even that it manages to do it as well as the average OS. Sorry, it's just the facts of life.
Utter bullshit. By complex install process you mean, hit setup, choose a folder and hit next a few times. Without reboots. Most games run just fine with other apps going, assuming you have the memory for doing that. My system runs games just fine even with apps like Azureus running in the background.
You're an idiot. If I'm running OS X, and have 15 applications open it is a huge pain in the ass to shutdown all my apps and reboot into Windows to play a game. If you actually bothered to read my previous post you'd see I wasn't talking about running Windows all the time on an Apple machine because basically no one wants to do that. Installing a second OS in dual boot configuration, even with bootcamp is beyond the abilities of the average user, who can't even install Windows in the first place. Thus, the number of people who will be using it, compared to the total market is insignificant.
People don't buy systems hoping that some day at some unspecified point in the future, the platform will become popular enough to make it useful for the reason they bought it for in the first place.
You're still an idiot. People who want to play games generally buy a console. People who buy a mac want to do general purpose computing. They may want to play games as part of that, but to claim a significant portion of the market would buy any sort of computer just to play games is absurd.
As for most PCs, I'd say anyone intent on even casual gaming would choose something considerably more powerful than anything you'd see in a MacBook or Mini.
I'd say you're full of shit. The average PC used to play games today has a 1.2 Ghz processor and a 16 mb graphics card. That is the middle of the road machine of the average game buyer. Your perception of what the market has is so skewed by your "gamer" point of view that you can't grasp that you are not the market. Most people just don't blow $500 on a new graphics card every year. They buy a new computer with fairly cheap graphics capabilities every three years and give their current one to their kids. The market is made up of 1-5 year old machines. The average brand new computer purchased today and used to play games has a 64 mb card and less than 5% of machines purchased have more than 128mb according to numbers compiled by several game development programs at major universities. I just can't stress this enough, but you have no clue what the market looks like. Game developers do.
Its non-Microsoft client operating systems that they have the problem with.
Not really. MS has not been judged as having a monopoly in the server space (rightfully so, IMHO). It has been judged as having a monopoly in the desktop space. MS can tie its servers to anything it wants, except its desktop. Because it has a monopoly on the desktop it is illegal for them to tie anything to the desktop via bundling or secret protocols, because it gives them an unfair advantage in the new market (in this case servers). No one buys MS servers because they are stable, the multitask well, they are cheap, they are fast, or because they are innovative in and of themselves. Most admins will tell you how many MS servers they need compared to Linux ones and how they pretty much have to be dedicated to one application if you want them to work. People buy them because they are the only ones that work perfectly with the desktop OS for filesharing, authentication, logging, etc. via active directory and exchange.
Not providing full and complete documentation of all interactions with the desktop client is illegal and part of the punishment for that was that they were ordered to *gasp* stop doing it. Since that judgement has been handed down MS has done everything possible sans actually obeying the courts. They've appealed. They made numerous statements to the press. They've tried to pressure the EU using both the US government and other EU politician who are *ahem* consulting for them. They've released wrong and incomplete documentation. They've offered to license the source code in such a way that it will not actually remedy the situation.
This is what everyone expects of them because they are liars and untrustworthy criminals. This is a non-story.
The last one that I personally played was Tropico 2: Pirate Cove to give some idea of how recent a game can be, yet plagued with this issue out of the box.
Gee, and it's made by Microsoft too, what a surprise. I stopped buying MacSoft's crappy games long ago. They are always unstable and poorly done.
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There are times you dont have to prove someone commited at crime because they have either admitted it or were caught doing it. Conviction is only necessary for appling penalties.
This is completely untrue. Confessions can be coerced (and often are according to most research). No matter how much evidence a law enforcement officer gathers they still can't judge the guilt or innocence of a person. Say I'm driving along and a police car pulls me over for speeding. They give me a ticket. Does that mean I'm guilty and don't deserve my day in court? Hell no. If I can show they were radar gunning every car coming down the road, it will be tossed out because they did not have probably cause. If I can show there is reasonable doubt that the radar gun was functioning properly and used properly I can have it thrown out. They did remember to have a qualified person calibrate the gun within the last 6 months right, and have records to show that right? If I can show that the officer has reason to be lying, like they have a personal grudge against me, I can get it thrown out. If I can show evidence that contradicts the statements made by the officer I can get it thrown out.
Just because a cop says that I was speeding does not make it so. Just because police say they have reason to believe a person was hacking into government computers, does not automatically make them a criminal. "Innocent until proven guilty," is the template for our criminal justice system and just because you don't seem to understand that system or because most people don't bother to go to court when they get a speeding ticket, thankfully, does not change that.
Since they broke up AT&T free market forces have been in play.
Making one big monopoly into a bunch of regional monopolies does not bring market forces into action. In most regions of the US one of said companies has a government enforced monopoly on the last-mile right of ways. It is not a free market when for my home I can choose to go with AT&T for my DSL line or with another company that has to get AT&T to hook it up for me and pay AT&T a pile of fees on top of the normal expense. It certainly isn't a free market when after a month of trying a major telecom company has to call me and tell me they can't get the line installed because the AT&T won't hook it up and they aren't willing to go to court over an individual account.
The closest thing to competition that the phone companies face is satellite internet and phones, cellphones, and phones over the cable network. The trouble is, the first two are completely different technologies with different limitations and the last one is available only in a tiny number of locations.
The day I can legally start stringing lines to houses and digging new lines into the public right of ways, then we will have real competition, but not before. Until that time, we have one phone and one cable company, each with the exclusive right in a region to hang lines on one spot on the poles. We have a government enforced and regulated industry, not a free market.
So other than the original break up it has all been free market pressures that have forced the various mergers and acqusitions.
Running telecom lines is inherently geographical. Sure they buy each other and merge, but they don't compete directly.
Dictionary.com: _committed_ OR convicted
Are you having issues with the English language? Calling someone a criminal means the committed or were convicted of a crime. Agreed? Since this person has not been convicted of a crime and since not having all the facts that should be presented in a court of law we are in no position to judge if he committed a crime, he should not be called a criminal. What part of this are you failing to grasp? Is it just that since you think he committed a crime you can't conceive that maybe you're wrong, or misinformed? He's referred to as an "alleged hacker" because it has not yet been determined if he did it. Punishing him at this point (as you previously advocated) is un-american and unjust. Setting yourself up as some sort of long-range judge using solely the evidence you've gleaned from the media, with no verification of their accuracy or opportunity for the accused to defend himself is just plain stupid.
It's not intrinsically sexual, any more than, say, marriage, which is seen as a perfect topic for family-friendly stuff.
Your sexual, gender preference is not intrinsically sexual? Weird. As for marriage, it is simply about buying a woman, or being paid to take one in... and a bunch of weird traditions that have grown up around it. Really it is more of a religious/legal/slavery issue than a sexual one. If some religion decided it's adherents were not allowed to have sex with one another until they ate fried chicken in a penguin costume together, would that make either chicken or penguins an inherently sexual topic?
back when I took software engineering the definition I was given for beta was: has major bugs but will not lose user data. Sounds to me like boot camp is still in alpha.....
By that definition some types of software can never be beta, let alone GM. Firmware, disk utilities, and partitioning software always has a risk of losing data. When combined with user error, most software can cause loss of data. The majority of the problems we've seen fall into one of the above.
Anyway, the definition of beta at this development shop is, "the documented features for this beta release are complete and it does not have any known, critical bugs."
The important thing to distinguish here is that you are unimportant and have no authority. Another thing to note: a criminal commits crimes, a convict is convicted.
I don't think either of those things is important in this context. The concept of "rule by law" means it does not matter how important a person is or what authority they claim, people should be ruled and judged equally under the law. If the US attorney general says we should torture and kill someone because they are a "hacker" it should have no more force than if Michael Jackson says the same thing. Bypassing the rule of law is not a valid government process. Every person needs to be brought to trial, evidence presented, given the opportunity to speak in their own defense, and judged by an impartial party. If there is doubt that this will be the case, everything that can be done to ensure it, should be, either for you or the accused.
Yes, a criminal commits crimes. This person is accused of having done so. To call them a criminal presumes their guilt. Remember the whole "innocent until proven guilty" concept? That is why the press keeps referring to him as an "alleged hacker." Someone has made the allegation that they are hacker, just as I made the allegation that you have committed some unspecified crime; which you almost certainly have.
Who's hauling him off for torture? This is an off the wall claim made by a defense lawyer in an attempt to get the minimalist sentance within his own country.
Maybe the US government is hauling him off for torture. Given the new laws in the US and the fact that the executive branch does not seem to be obeying the laws, who can say? The US has a pretty crappy track record in very recent history of obeying international human rights accords. Why should the UK expect them to do so now? Supposedly there was a warning about this via an anonymous note, but that is not particularly important. What is important is that the US feels pressure to respect due process of law and the basic humans rights of all people. When they fail to do so, it is the duty of other countries to protect the basic humans rights inherently held by all people. If they have to restrict who they extradite to the US to do this, so be it.
P.S. I don't think you know what "minimalist" means and who says a conviction in the UK would not appropriately punish this script kiddie for his crimes?
Why all the fuss about the telecom mergers/aqusitions? It is the nature of a free market that some companies will win and others lose.
What exactly do you think the merger of two government enforced monopolies into a larger government enforced monopoly has to do with a "free market?" The free market is not operating on phone companies. AT&T was not taken down by the free market, they were split up by the government for breaking the law and because the situation was so bad everyone had to rent their telephone as well as pay high rates for crappy service.
Still, if the UK wants anyone who attacks the UK in the future to flee to (or stay in) the US knowing that the US will offer safe haven then fine, otherwise they should hand the guy over.
As others have pointed out, the UK-US extradition agreement is one way. The US already does not extradite to the UK except in special circumstances.
Telecomm customer service and response has NEVER been good, so why call it into question in light of recent mergers?
Both of the issues exemplified in the article were new issues arising from the fact that because of the merger the new company could no longer provide services they once did. Since there is no competition due to the merger, I'd say it is reasonable to call into question how much the merger has crippled the ability of businesses to acquire and use these services. This is concrete harm to the consumer and the economy. It is always worthwhile to question the decisions made by the government to see if they are doing their job. It seems in this case they are not.
Given the fact that this guy is a national security threat, he should be lucky to get tried in court and NOT be going straight to Guantanamo.
This is true, and it is still completely wrong. If you were designing the perfect government for the UK, would you make laws that handed over citizens to other countries where they would be subject to unethical laws or did not hand over citizens to countries where they would be subject to unethical laws? Should the allow extradition to countries where all suspected criminals are slowly tortured to death for no reason? How tragic it is that the US is that country with unethical laws (and who don't enforce their own laws) to such an extent that people are taken seriously when the issue of whether or not the US will conform to basic human rights accords is raised.
His lawyers would do well to just try to get in writing that he'll get a court trial - they're not going to stop him from being sent to the US.
It's actually hard to say how this will fly in the current UK political climate.
No sympathy for a criminal.
Do you mean to imply you're not a criminal, or at least an alleged criminal? I hereby allege that you have broken laws. Is it okay if I just haul you off to a third world country and torture you now?
No, that's not fitting to the offense at all, but if you know the bear will react that way and you poke the bear in the ribs anyway... that's just stupid. The US enjoys power driven at least in part by fear. If they overlook offenses against them that fear goes away. Do you think the US is going to send that message and give up that power? No, they like being feared and the power that goes with it.
So the important question is, "what should the UK do?" Right now the UK is standing between the bear and the man. Knowing that the Bear might kill the man, and being responsible for his welfare as one of their citizens should they give him to the US? I think they absolutely should not. Until the US adopts reasonable human rights laws in compliance with international agreements why risk handing him over? Just convict him in the UK. If the US wants any extraditions to go forward in the future when there is any doubt about US laws and behaviors then they can fix the bloody problem. Why encourage a country to act like an rabid animal? The UK should seriously consider whether or not they should hand him over. If they do, it should be with guarantees that he will be treated in accord with accepted international humans rights agreements as monitored by an independent third party.
That's like being scared that Domino's knows what pizza you like. How do you expect them to know when and what to deliver to you unless you call them and give them the information?
Actually, a lot of companies buy information from pizza companies. Law enforcement, government agencies, PI's, bail bondsmen, etc. People will give the wrong address and phone number to the dept. of motor vehicles, the IRS, their parole officer, etc., but they aren't willing to go the extra mile and pick up their pizza. There is even a company (whose name I forget) that just collects names, addresses, and phone numbers from pizza companies and resells them.
Wrong. "--With a T&L capable video card with at least 32 MB of video RAM (such as nvidia GeForce 2 or better or ATI Radeon 7000 or better):
Maybe you should actually check the official site, rather than some random forum. Below is the current list of graphics cards supported by The Sims 2 (T&L recommended):
ATI RadeonTM series (7000 or better) Radeon 7000/VE series (non-T&L) 7200, 7500 8500, All-In-Wonder 8500 9000, 9200, 9500, 9600, 9700, 9800 X300, X600, X800 Nvidia® QuadroTM series Quadro, Quadro2, Quadro4 Nvidia® Geforce series (GeForce2 and better) GeForce2 GeForce3, 3 Ti GeForce4, 4Ti, MX 420, 440 GeForce FX 5200, 5600, 5700, 5800, 5900, 5950 GeForce 6600, 6800 Intel® Extreme Graphics (non-T&L) 82845, 82865, 82915
A number of these cards have 8, 16, or shared video ram
I doubt you could identify more than a handful of popular PC games from the last few years that would play with that configuration.
The top selling Amazon game today is, Sims 2, requiring 8Mb of video RAM and an 800Mhz CPU. Amazon is an online store that caters to the more technically savvy market. Most games are sold at Walmart. Want to take any guesses as to whether the actual top selling games have higher or lower requirements?
Of the 5 top selling games of the year to date, all require less than a 1.6 Ghz processor. We have, The Sims 2 and Half-life 2, which require less than what I listed as the average. Brothers in Arms and WoW require a 32 MB video card. Star Wars Republic Commando requires a 64 Mb video card. None of these are close to exceeding the specs of any of the available Intel Mac systems.
Wake up to reality already. The most popular games do not require some "super gaming system" and most people don't buy that type of computer. Most people buying games and new machines buy a less powerful system than the Intel Macs.
If you have any evidence to suggest they wait a year let alone five years before purchasing, contrary to the accepted view that most sales occur when a title is released, I suggest you provide it.
All of the top five sellers of the year so far are over a year old. The majority of any game's sales is long after the first year. There is a spike at the beginning, but the sellable life of a game is around five years, with most of the purchases taking place after the first year.
I am quite able to read comparative benchmarks of the new Intel Macs to know they are utterly hopeless as gaming platforms.
Except they're outclassed as gaming platforms if you're comparing top of the line systems designed for gaming. If you instead look at the average system used in gaming they are above average. Of course being a dedicated gamer, with no sense of perspective, who can't seem to conceive of people different from yourself, you can't seem to grasp the fact that most people don't buy systems designed for gaming with $500 graphics cards.
The Mac Mini is so utterly hopeless that it is a waste of time even trying to play the relatively undemanding World of Warcraft on it.
Interesting how you think your opinion of what WoW is like on a mac mini is more accurate than what people who actually use minis say. Performance was acceptable even on the first generation mac mini, provided it had enough RAM. I know a number of people who play WoW on newer minis and ibooks (think, "most of their waking time") and they don't seem to have any complaints. Get a clue.
Marketing: I can not agree to Linux, I do not know how many boxes we can sell like that. People who have to go out and buy retail copies of Windows would need to spend a lot more! They will mentally add that cost into the cost of the computer and I am just not sure we can overcome that!!! I will not sign off on anything other than Windows, it is as simple as that!
First, sales is the one who cares more about the price of the system and what the end user will pay. Second, do you really think anyone would care more about the concept that people might worry about the cost of acquiring an OS (which is almost free there) versus the cost increase from paying MS real money for a license?
Really, some companies will include Windows, if this is enforced, but mostly the high-end ones. Some will include it if MS makes it basically free to them, or pays them to include it (this is a very real possibility). Aside from that though, I seriously doubt the price conscious Chinese market is going to be willing to pay even $8 US more for machines that come with an OS they can buy for pennies elsewhere.
...not that this law is likely to be enforced in practice in a month's time anyway.
In that case wouldn't Tom be guilty of illicit insider trading, as he used confidential information when trading securities?
I don't believe so, as he was the cause of the stock price change, not just taking advantage of it. For example, he isn't using inside knowledge to decide whether to buy or sell, he's using it to change the price of the stock. The information he used would be theoretically useless to traders since only the exposure of the info would affect the stock price (realistically of course this is a different story). It is perfectly legal for the inventor of a new transportation device to short a bunch of auto stocks, even though they know they are about to cause the price to fall, so long as their action that makes it fall is legal.
He might even be in violation of some market manipulation laws.
I must confess ignorance as to market manipulation laws. I doubt many lawyers could even give you a definitive answer without a lot of research.
The point is no gamer is going to buy a Mac.
A gamer is a person who plays games. There are thousands of games sold for the mac today. You;'re telling me that is just because all those companies haven't realized they're losing money on them and they've all been lying on their profit reports? I reiterate, you're an idiot.
Lots of people buy PCs to play games or use their machines predominantly for that purpose.
According to market research, that number is so small as to be an insignificant chunk of the total PC market.
And I'd say you're a zealot whose worked his panties in a bunch because someone dared be critical about their machine.
I don't even own one, I just think you're an idiot making ridiculous and unsupported assertions.
The original poster claimed that now they'd be able to run Battlefield 2. Yeah right
Ahh, the old, "I know more than the person who has actually done it argument." Brilliant! Test it or find someone who has and get some facts before spouting off.
Actually, that your opinion based upon your admitted ignorance of having never even tried one and your obvious lack of understanding about what most people use to play games. Perhaps you should look up 'fact' in a dictionary.
Very few games produced in the last 3-4 years would play at all, let alone acceptably on such an underpowered system even with the resolution and settings turned down to their minimum values.
You're completely wrong and only considering the latest big titles that only run on the newest machines. Most people don't buy games until they have been on the market for over a year and often not for as long as five years. But of course myself and all the people who actually make games must be wrong because you are an expert on the market somehow. How many game companies do you run again? You are such an ignorant twit.
That's an unnecessary insult. Just because I disagree with you, doesn't mean I'm stupid. I've presented valid points that are both pro- and anti-Microsoft.
I never claimed you were stupid. I claimed you were ignorant and/or deliberately deceived. Almost every point you made was based upon incorrect facts or a failure to grasp the intention, motivation, and enacting of the law. From your post it is obvious you don't understand the economics or history of monopolies. It is equally apparent that you have a number of misconceptions about the legal action against Microsoft. Pointing these facts out is not an insult or an ad hominem attack. I'm sure you can take some time and educate yourself about the facts. The only issue I have with you is that you did not do so before posting erroneous assertions that may well misinform someone else.
When did I say anything about Microsoft selling computers? ...This is either an attempt at a 'straw man' argument, or you can't read.
It is neither a straw man or an indication of illiteracy (although that is both an ad hominem attack and and emotive one). You stated that the action taken to stop Microsoft from bundling other applications would prevent you from buying them when you purchase your computer and add extra work for you. This contains the implicit assertion that either you buy your computer from Microsoft or you expect that legal actions against Microsoft will restrict the people you do buy computers from as well (for some unspecified reason).
I said that Microsoft has used underhanded, and possibly illegal business practices to push their software. But that should be dealt with in court, IE and WMA being pre-installed shouldn't be an issue - the extortion should be an issue.
Bundling a product from one market with a product from a monopolized one is the very first example of illegal behavior listed in US antitrust law. That is what is illegal, for reasons anyone who passed Econ 101 should understand. It bypasses the free market, removing all benefits of competition and gives the consumer a product that is not necessarily the best nor the cheapest. Microsoft knows this. The US knows this. the EU knows this. Microsoft intentionally broke this law as part of their business plan. They have bet that it is more profitable to break this law and be punished for it than it is to obey the law, as other companies do. So far they have been completely right. They've made a fortune breaking the law and bribed the US to drop all punishments against them after they were convicted. They've settled hundreds of lawsuits, but it has still cost much less than they are making, since most injured parties can't afford to take them to court. Even the full EU punishments don't come close to the profits they make performing this illegal behavior. Right now they are trying to weasel out of the punishment in the EU that says they have to stop breaking the law. (Imagine a thief arguing after their conviction that they don't want to stop stealing and it is unfair that they are being punished in this way.)
One of the ways MS is trying to get out of their punishment is by pressuring the EU using US politicians, EU politicians who are "consulting" for them, and making lots of press releases that completely misinform the public about the situation in the hopes that public opinion (based upon very misleading information) will help. That is where you fit in.
This is another 'straw man' argument, you're setting up an opposing view that no one supports to attempt to gain credibility.
No, this is you completely failing to understand what the courts ruled MS guilty of.
I said "They squash competitors with cheaper, inferior products, they've stolen and copied hardware and software designs from other companies, they push their products on retailers in a hostile and underhanded manor." You keep taking what I said out of context, or completely misunderstand what I'm saying.
You're still
I'm pretty sure I'm the only one who actually hates the anti-trust suits against Microsoft.
Nope, there are plenty of people who are clueless or who have been fooled by their constant PR campaign of misinformation.
I hate that the EU has made Microsoft ship separate versions of Windows: ones without Media Player or IE. But what if I use WMA and IE? These are important pieces of software that every computer needs. Every PC needs to be able to go online, and play media files.
When was the last time you bought a computer from Microsoft? What's that? They don't sell computers? This in about whether Dell or Gateway or Lenovo can sell you a computer pre-loaded with Windows and IE and WMP. This is about whether Microsoft can force Dell and Gateway and Lenovo to sell you a computer pre-loaded with Windows and IE and WMP instead of their choice of browser and media player. This is whether Dell can not install IE and instead ship Firefox.
Now, Microsoft has used terrible methods of making themselves the best.
Not at all. Microsoft has used terrible methods to force people to use them despite them obviously not being the best or the cheapest or the most reliable. It is about consumers using sub-par products because the free market is bypassed by MS's illegal abuse of their monopoly.
Every other electronics and computer company does exactly the same thing, Microsoft's just better at it...
Microsoft is not on trial. They lost their trial and were judged guilty. Microsoft is arguing that they don't have to obey the court's punishments or that they really did obey when they didn't. Second, Microsoft was judged guilty of abusing their monopoly. None of the other companies have a monopoly, thus they can't possibly be "doing the same thing."
You seem to be very, very misinformed.
The best thing is both blaster and slammer had fixes released well before the worms hit.
...for some versions of Windows that allowed most software to work on those versions.
RPC should never have been running and exposed on a desktop OS in the first place. Basically no services should be running and exposed on a default install of a desktop OS.
It's most assuredly not Microsoft's fault that people don't patch.
For the most part I agree, but MS has a pretty awful track record of issuing patches that break things and change other parts of the system, unrelated to the security hole. They also have a pretty unmanageable system of patches, which often leaves even seasoned admins wondering what patches in what order need to be installed for a given set of functionality to work.
And any fool who says Linux or MacOS X don't need to be patched, are just that, fools.
Of course every OS will have bugs that should be patched. That does not mean every OS is likely to have trivial remote exploits granting full access as often as it does not. It also does not imply that they make the same, basic architectural mistakes that lead to such a preponderance of vulnerabilities. No one with a clue would argue that Windows takes security seriously or even that it manages to do it as well as the average OS. Sorry, it's just the facts of life.
Utter bullshit. By complex install process you mean, hit setup, choose a folder and hit next a few times. Without reboots. Most games run just fine with other apps going, assuming you have the memory for doing that. My system runs games just fine even with apps like Azureus running in the background.
You're an idiot. If I'm running OS X, and have 15 applications open it is a huge pain in the ass to shutdown all my apps and reboot into Windows to play a game. If you actually bothered to read my previous post you'd see I wasn't talking about running Windows all the time on an Apple machine because basically no one wants to do that. Installing a second OS in dual boot configuration, even with bootcamp is beyond the abilities of the average user, who can't even install Windows in the first place. Thus, the number of people who will be using it, compared to the total market is insignificant.
People don't buy systems hoping that some day at some unspecified point in the future, the platform will become popular enough to make it useful for the reason they bought it for in the first place.
You're still an idiot. People who want to play games generally buy a console. People who buy a mac want to do general purpose computing. They may want to play games as part of that, but to claim a significant portion of the market would buy any sort of computer just to play games is absurd.
As for most PCs, I'd say anyone intent on even casual gaming would choose something considerably more powerful than anything you'd see in a MacBook or Mini.
I'd say you're full of shit. The average PC used to play games today has a 1.2 Ghz processor and a 16 mb graphics card. That is the middle of the road machine of the average game buyer. Your perception of what the market has is so skewed by your "gamer" point of view that you can't grasp that you are not the market. Most people just don't blow $500 on a new graphics card every year. They buy a new computer with fairly cheap graphics capabilities every three years and give their current one to their kids. The market is made up of 1-5 year old machines. The average brand new computer purchased today and used to play games has a 64 mb card and less than 5% of machines purchased have more than 128mb according to numbers compiled by several game development programs at major universities. I just can't stress this enough, but you have no clue what the market looks like. Game developers do.
Its non-Microsoft client operating systems that they have the problem with.
Not really. MS has not been judged as having a monopoly in the server space (rightfully so, IMHO). It has been judged as having a monopoly in the desktop space. MS can tie its servers to anything it wants, except its desktop. Because it has a monopoly on the desktop it is illegal for them to tie anything to the desktop via bundling or secret protocols, because it gives them an unfair advantage in the new market (in this case servers). No one buys MS servers because they are stable, the multitask well, they are cheap, they are fast, or because they are innovative in and of themselves. Most admins will tell you how many MS servers they need compared to Linux ones and how they pretty much have to be dedicated to one application if you want them to work. People buy them because they are the only ones that work perfectly with the desktop OS for filesharing, authentication, logging, etc. via active directory and exchange.
Not providing full and complete documentation of all interactions with the desktop client is illegal and part of the punishment for that was that they were ordered to *gasp* stop doing it. Since that judgement has been handed down MS has done everything possible sans actually obeying the courts. They've appealed. They made numerous statements to the press. They've tried to pressure the EU using both the US government and other EU politician who are *ahem* consulting for them. They've released wrong and incomplete documentation. They've offered to license the source code in such a way that it will not actually remedy the situation.
This is what everyone expects of them because they are liars and untrustworthy criminals. This is a non-story.
The last one that I personally played was Tropico 2: Pirate Cove to give some idea of how recent a game can be, yet plagued with this issue out of the box.
Gee, and it's made by Microsoft too, what a surprise. I stopped buying MacSoft's crappy games long ago. They are always unstable and poorly done.