It may just be that the lawyers aren't allowed to give any straight answer to this because they will be horribly misquoted. "Yes we provided one e-mail of a convicted serial rapist in a murder case when we got a court order that commanded us to do so" transforms into "OMG Google gives away your e-mails to anyone who asks" which in turn tarnishes Google's public image which means spending even more money on PR to improve the image.
The problem with your logic is that writing code is fun. Changing bedpans or dressings or being around sick people is not fun.
This depends on the point of view. Nurses might find helping injured/sick people fun, too. If not fun, then at least emotionally gratifying. Meaning that they like that they are able to make someone's life better (or less painful), save a life every now and then or see someone being brought to intensive care and see the same person walk out of the hospital a while later. After a working day a nurse could go home knowing that there's one guy that survived that day because the nurse was doing her job. Is that really so different from a programmer finishing some fancy feature of a web app he/she had been working on for a while? At the end of the day they both feel that they have accomplished something, or made the world a better place for everyone.
But studies funded by the tobacco manufacturers have shown that smoking is completely harmless. Are you implying that their massive lobbying/ad campaigns/brainwashing is not completely impartial and is done only to increase their profit?
try links then. Speed: it doesn't run javascript or display images. That's a huge boost in rendering a page. Ad-blocking: you only see the text-only ads that are included when the page loads. Security: when's the last time there was a security bug found in links? Also, no security advisories listed by Secunia. Privacy: there's no direct connection made from Links to Google, Microsoft or any other search provider, unless you type in their respective URLs and open their respective search pages. AFAIK, page history is only kept until you close the browser.
How about adding usability to the things you care about? A nice GUI perhaps, or the ability to display (or use) key elements in today's popular web pages?
Of course, the average user is known to thoroughly read the warnings and definitely will not click "OK, just get this thing out of my face" within half a second after the dialog box has finished rendering.
I guess one of the reasons for hosting the ACTA is to see how the government responds to it. If they demand it to be taken down on the basis of copyright infringement or breach of NDA terms, then it's quite clear there's something fishy going on (that hasn't been discovered yet). If the government claims that the document is libelous ("we never wanted those things that are written in the document and have our name next to it"), then they're in denial -- or perhaps the document is faked. This would become clear after the ACTA documents are publicized by those that take part of the negotiations (not a leak but a "proper" publication).
If the government ignores the whole deal, then they either don't care or don't see anything wrong with it.
Do you expect the average person to know that Europe mandated the ballot? If they blame anyone, I'd expect Windows to get the most heat for it (mistakenly, but still). It does say "Windows Internet Explorer" in the titlebar...
As demonstrated by Nine Inch Nails with their "Ghosts I-IV" album, giving away music for free can result in significant financial gain.
Look at it this way: in most music shops there's a section where you can listen to a CD before you buy it (at least here in Estonia). I can listen to an album without paying for it and then decide whether I want to buy it or not. It's the same thing with downloading music - I download it, give it a listen and if I deem it to be good enough, I'll buy it. I buy 4-5 albums a year this way. Of course, this comes down to my being responsible enough to actually buy the albums I like. That's not something you can write into law, though (since I can decide that I don't like a particular album). How is my behavior destroying copyright? Would strict enforcement of copyright (not allowing me to listen before buying) increase or decrease the number of albums I buy?
Overall, I see the ruling as accepting the current public opinion. If a government has a priori knowledge that most people under a certain age download music and movies via P2P networks, would it make sense to start prosecuting as many of them as possible, hoping that the public opinion regarding P2P will change? Sure, if you beat a man enough, you can make him say there are five lights instead of four - but would that work on a large scale? I mean, there has to be something terribly wrong if a large part of population (I'd love to cite some statistics here but couldn't find anything recent) is considered to actively participate in criminal/illegal activities. The people want their horseless carriages and no matter how hard you try to outlaw them (for example, by requiring the drivers to disassemble those carriages whenever seeing horses down the road), the public has already made up their mind about it.
This looks like an infinite loop. Al Qaida attacks Americans because Americans torture/kill Al Qaida members. Americans attack Al Qaida members because Al Qaida members torture/kill Americans.
I don't use ad blockers. However, I do have ad.doubleclick.com and a few other ad serving sites in/etc/hosts, mapped to 127.0.0.1.
The logic works like this: if an annoying ad is shown somewhere, the ad server gets added to/etc/hosts. Ad servers that serve static or text only ads are fine by me.
1. Push the clutch pedal 2. Shift into neutral 3. Press brake pedal 4. Car stops
The process is independent from the gas pedal. A car that has manual transmission but will not allow you to complete the described process would not be allowed on the streets, IMO.
there are fewer user errors due to them actually paying attention and learning, and the sysadmins actually get work done
There are fewer user errors due to users not using the software (or being scared of using it), not because they start paying attention to the messages.
If the "print" button always spits out error messages, the user stops pushing it eventually. If the button works at their co-worker's computer, they ask the coworker to do the printing. Productivity is much lower - but at least nobody is bothering the sysadmins.
Slashdot Mirror
How many UK citizens have enough money to even reach European courts after being disconnected?
It may just be that the lawyers aren't allowed to give any straight answer to this because they will be horribly misquoted. "Yes we provided one e-mail of a convicted serial rapist in a murder case when we got a court order that commanded us to do so" transforms into "OMG Google gives away your e-mails to anyone who asks" which in turn tarnishes Google's public image which means spending even more money on PR to improve the image.
"No comment" is very difficult to misquote.
The problem with your logic is that writing code is fun. Changing bedpans or dressings or being around sick people is not fun.
This depends on the point of view. Nurses might find helping injured/sick people fun, too. If not fun, then at least emotionally gratifying. Meaning that they like that they are able to make someone's life better (or less painful), save a life every now and then or see someone being brought to intensive care and see the same person walk out of the hospital a while later. After a working day a nurse could go home knowing that there's one guy that survived that day because the nurse was doing her job. Is that really so different from a programmer finishing some fancy feature of a web app he/she had been working on for a while? At the end of the day they both feel that they have accomplished something, or made the world a better place for everyone.
sysadmin is "administrative assistant of systems"?
Life expectancy:
male: 75.65 years
female: 80.69 years
Source
Therefore, middle age for women is 40.345 and middle age for men is 37.825 years.
But studies funded by the tobacco manufacturers have shown that smoking is completely harmless. Are you implying that their massive lobbying/ad campaigns/brainwashing is not completely impartial and is done only to increase their profit?
try links then.
Speed: it doesn't run javascript or display images. That's a huge boost in rendering a page.
Ad-blocking: you only see the text-only ads that are included when the page loads.
Security: when's the last time there was a security bug found in links? Also, no security advisories listed by Secunia.
Privacy: there's no direct connection made from Links to Google, Microsoft or any other search provider, unless you type in their respective URLs and open their respective search pages. AFAIK, page history is only kept until you close the browser.
How about adding usability to the things you care about? A nice GUI perhaps, or the ability to display (or use) key elements in today's popular web pages?
Of course, the average user is known to thoroughly read the warnings and definitely will not click "OK, just get this thing out of my face" within half a second after the dialog box has finished rendering.
Can you name any affordable personal computing devices that do not have any Chinese-manufactured parts in them?
I guess one of the reasons for hosting the ACTA is to see how the government responds to it. If they demand it to be taken down on the basis of copyright infringement or breach of NDA terms, then it's quite clear there's something fishy going on (that hasn't been discovered yet). If the government claims that the document is libelous ("we never wanted those things that are written in the document and have our name next to it"), then they're in denial -- or perhaps the document is faked. This would become clear after the ACTA documents are publicized by those that take part of the negotiations (not a leak but a "proper" publication).
If the government ignores the whole deal, then they either don't care or don't see anything wrong with it.
Oracle database license prices scale very well, too.
How about not allowing the patent to change ownership? I mean, shouldn't a patent be proof of the fact that you have invented something?
Go ahead and construct a formal verification for any browser currently available. Here's a starting point, let's see how far you'll get.
Last I heard, MSFT is a pubically traded company.
MSFT is traded through pubic areas?
Do you expect the average person to know that Europe mandated the ballot? If they blame anyone, I'd expect Windows to get the most heat for it (mistakenly, but still). It does say "Windows Internet Explorer" in the titlebar...
As demonstrated by Nine Inch Nails with their "Ghosts I-IV" album, giving away music for free can result in significant financial gain.
Look at it this way: in most music shops there's a section where you can listen to a CD before you buy it (at least here in Estonia). I can listen to an album without paying for it and then decide whether I want to buy it or not. It's the same thing with downloading music - I download it, give it a listen and if I deem it to be good enough, I'll buy it. I buy 4-5 albums a year this way. Of course, this comes down to my being responsible enough to actually buy the albums I like. That's not something you can write into law, though (since I can decide that I don't like a particular album). How is my behavior destroying copyright? Would strict enforcement of copyright (not allowing me to listen before buying) increase or decrease the number of albums I buy?
Overall, I see the ruling as accepting the current public opinion. If a government has a priori knowledge that most people under a certain age download music and movies via P2P networks, would it make sense to start prosecuting as many of them as possible, hoping that the public opinion regarding P2P will change? Sure, if you beat a man enough, you can make him say there are five lights instead of four - but would that work on a large scale? I mean, there has to be something terribly wrong if a large part of population (I'd love to cite some statistics here but couldn't find anything recent) is considered to actively participate in criminal/illegal activities. The people want their horseless carriages and no matter how hard you try to outlaw them (for example, by requiring the drivers to disassemble those carriages whenever seeing horses down the road), the public has already made up their mind about it.
This looks like an infinite loop.
Al Qaida attacks Americans because Americans torture/kill Al Qaida members. Americans attack Al Qaida members because Al Qaida members torture/kill Americans.
I don't use ad blockers. However, I do have ad.doubleclick.com and a few other ad serving sites in /etc/hosts, mapped to 127.0.0.1.
The logic works like this: if an annoying ad is shown somewhere, the ad server gets added to /etc/hosts. Ad servers that serve static or text only ads are fine by me.
(emphasis mine)
No, they will not stop there.
What percentage of Windows users are even aware that there are other file systems?
If a person has no idea what a file system is, (s)he cannot be expected to compare two different file systems.
Would you like to drive next to (or behind) a car that is able to eject it's axles at, say, 60 MPH? Sounds like a suicide to me
1. Push the clutch pedal
2. Shift into neutral
3. Press brake pedal
4. Car stops
The process is independent from the gas pedal.
A car that has manual transmission but will not allow you to complete the described process would not be allowed on the streets, IMO.
yeah, let's put DRM in CPU, OS and in installed software! It's the only way to be sure.
</sarcasm>
there are fewer user errors due to them actually paying attention and learning, and the sysadmins actually get work done
There are fewer user errors due to users not using the software (or being scared of using it), not because they start paying attention to the messages.
If the "print" button always spits out error messages, the user stops pushing it eventually. If the button works at their co-worker's computer, they ask the coworker to do the printing. Productivity is much lower - but at least nobody is bothering the sysadmins.
2d. A patent troll discovers you. You get sued. You lose all your money. The end.