Those Apple copmputers are a plague on this land. A plaaaauuuugge! We won't be safe until they're all destroyed, and all their users dead! Go forth, and cleanse our great world, PC-users!!!
-Bill Gates, spoken through Jim Louderback (Editor of PC Mag)
These guys make a variety of bags for cameras, laptops, phones, etc. Weird website, but pretty good bags. They're an Australian company, I think. presumably they export to the U.S (where, I assume, you live;-)
If you don't believe in regulation of 'free-trade', then do you think it would be ok for someone (like Microsoft) to bribe/coerce/blackmail the people with whom they trade in order to lock out competitors? Would it be ok for them to do a similar thing to force some DRM scheme to lock out open source? What if they bribed/blackmailed Intel into charging more for Apple to buy their chips? What about sending spies into rival organisations to poach employees? what about sending spies to steal trade secrets? what about sending spies to sabotage development?
You might notice that these examples get progressively more extreme. Presumably one would want to draw the line somewhere, in the interests of trade - and that would require legislation.
"Watch how many evil things slither in with it even if it passes."
Government isn't great. It's corrupt. That doesn't make it inherently bad. Don't criticize the concept based on the implementation. Anyway, even with the current situation, I still think we're better of with regulation than no regulation at all.
"AT&T was explicitly given a government monopoy"
That's a seperate problem. That has to do with the ideological bias of some governments towards privitsing some services at all costs. These kind of large-scale open-ended government quasi-private deals often cause problems. This has nothing to do with regulating trade!
I've read this a few times on Slashdot now. It's usually followed by some comment about a special case (or special interest?) where legislation is a Good Thing. This bugs me, because it's hypocritical.
As an example, the entire concept of laissez-faire (free-market) economics (thank you, Adam Smith!) is based upon assumptions that do not hold in the real world. If we want an economy that even approximates a 'free-market', then we need legislation.
Look at Microsoft, or AT&T. Were it not for legislation, there's be no check to their anti-competitive practices. In my opinion (FWIW) the natural end-consequence of a totally free market (in the absence of any control) are cartels - massive companies bribing (what remains of) the government, and helping their cronies and friends.
In Oz, we get a piece of paper, with all the candidates' names listed. We number them all in the order of preference (to assist in this, candidates produce 'how to vote' cards). Then there's a recursive selection process that takes the votes from the least popular candidates, and redistributes them amongst the more popular candidates, according to the preferences. This continues until there are only 2 candidates remaining, and there is a clear winner.
I think you missed the benefits of 'preferential voting'. Essentially it means:
'I'll vote for this guy, but if he doesn't get in then
I'll vote for her, but if she doesn't get in then
I'll vote for them.. etc'
To use an example from the previous US election, one could vote for (say) Ralph Nader, but preference John Kerry. (Yeah, yeah, so I'm left-of-centre). With preferential voting, you're not wasting your vote, even though Nader will probably not get in. Rather, you're sending Kerry a message that you don't really approve of his policies, but just prefer him to the Other Guy. The crux is, that your vote still goes to Kerry.
Another benefit, is that minor parties can allocate their own preferences. So one could just vote for (say) Nader, and he could negotiate his preferences with the major parties. This would give him leverage in the policy development of the major parties in the lead-up to the election. It also makes people more inclined to vote for minor parties, because they know it's not a 'wasted vote'.
That's the system we have in Australia, and I think it works really well. I think it's absolutely essential if we're to encourage multiple parties (even if they're minor parties).
eMusic does this, and does it without DRM. They sell mp3s (LAME --alt-preset standard), and keep track of what each customer has downloaded. Songs can be re-downloaded for free, and they also use these data to make recommendations (via people with similar taste, etc).
I actually find eMusic better to use than iTunes, because it's geared toward people discovering new music, rather than being 'told' what's cool.
But no, eMusic doesn't have the latest Britney pop ditty...;-)
We hear so often that variable pricing is good. I think it's interesting that newly released music is commonly considered more valuable just by virtue of being new. This particularly applies to covers, rehashes, etc.
The problem with an ID card, as I see it, is that it gives the government lots of information about the citizenry, which it should not *need* to know. History shows us that there are always cycles of totalitarianism and 'freedom'. Having national ID cards mean that when a totalitarian authority comes to power, it can do a lot more damage.
Part of the reason the Nazis were so efficient at rounding up the Jews and other 'undesirables' was because they had good information about where they were living/employed/etc, and the Public Service was quite happy to provide that information to the SS (or whoever it was who coordinated the death camps - my knowledge of history is a bit shady). Had they had a national ID card, this process would have been even more efficient.
We should oppose an ID card, unless we're certain that such a government will never arise in our country. If you believe it never will, I think you're deluding yourself.
ps. This assumes that the ID cards are 100% secure - an impossible feat. If you consider ID card hacking, and identity theft, etc, then you uncover a heap of additional reasons why they're a Bad Thing.
I had this 10 years ago, playing DOOM2 on my 486SX33. Whenever there were more than about 10 monsters nearby, I'd get about 1 frame per second... just awesome!
Wow. That's a bloody long way! I only live about 8 kms (5 miles) from my work - a little closer!
Shame about the showers and public transport too..
But seriously, what do you think would happen to your city if the price of oil doubled? it'd be crippled! It sounds like the city planners/leaders are not doing their job..
the *real* solution is not to drive at all. I know this will make me sound like an unpatriotic communist, but (disclaimer - I live in a relatively small Australian city of about 1 million poeple) I can definitely commute much faster in rush hour traffic than I can in a car. I get to work in about 1/2 the time of driving, and about 1/3 the time of public transport. Cycling's very cheap, and it turns an otherwise stressful time into a pleasant experience. And it gives exercise!! What a deal!!:-)
The other plus, is that finding parking for a bicycle is always easy. No more hunting/paying for car parking. My fiance and I both cycle, and this means that we only run one car. A big economic saving. I highly recommend it.
Regarding the 'nuclear tax', do you think it's sufficient to cover the costs of maintaining the waste storage facilities for the required length of time?
My understanding is that if we reuse the waste as you describe, the best case scenario is that we would need to store it for 'only' about 300 years, otherwise it needs to be stored for thousands. Can you clarify this?
Hmm. Not totally sure. I think Russia has some, but beyond that I can't say.
My understanding of the origin of Uranium is as follows: Our sun is a second generation star, and all the matter in our solar system came from the remnants of a previous star that had gone nova. This process produced all the elements heavier than iron (which the end product of the fusion reactions that occur in the sun - i believe... it could be lead)
So, all the uranium that we have now has existed for the lifetime of our planet/solar system, and has been decaying the whole time. When it runs out, we won't get any more!
What you say is essentially true. Please don't read my post as supporting nuclear power - personally, I don't think it's the best option. Having said that, hysterical opposition to the 'big N' isn't going to do anybody any favours either. I believe that any balanced examination of the facts will lead us to conclude that nuclear is not the solution.
I think we _need_ to move away from the use of fossil-fuel based power (both electricity and transport) if our civilisation is to survive another century in any recognisable form. I think we should adopt what are classically known as 'renewable technologies' (wind, solar and hydro, among others) as much as possible and then - MAYBE - use nuclear when all other avenues of power production have been utilised.
This also needs to include the massive implementation of energy efficiency, which would reduce our power consumption by at least 20% (that's electricity only - implementing such technologies in the transport sector could have much larger benefits).
Even if it's true that modern 'pebble bed' reactors are 'meltdown proof' (whatever that means) we still have the problem of the waste. With the onset of global warming, and peak oil, and the consequent climatic and geopolitical instability, there is nowhere that can be considered stable enough to store high-level waste for the required duration (IMO).
There's potentially huge amounts of money to be made if the world 'switches' to nuclear electricity generation. There are strong vested interests in promoting nuclear technology as the successor to coal and oil.
I live in South Australia, which has approximately 30% of the world's known uranium, and if we started selling it, we could (as a state) make a ton of money - probably more than the goldrush that helped some other Australian states.
I've noticed a _lot_ of (what I would describe as) pro-nuclear articles recently, and I'd put this article in the same basket. I read this article as containing spin to make nuclear radiation/contamination sound less dangerous than it really is so that the public is less wary of adopting nuclear electricity generation, with the associated dumping of radioactive waste.
I'm all for having informed debate regarding the use of nuclear power, and it's possible that in some cases nuclear power is the best option currently available - especially if augmented with wind/tidal/solar power. I don't think we'll see such debate though - there's simply too much money involved.
No. 'Free Software' is better semantically because it considers the primary benefit of Free Software: Freedom.
If that was ignored, why would anyone ever develop an opensource product? Look at Linux - to start with it was inferior to the competing products. It's _only_ advantage was that it was Free (libre). If it wasn't for Linux, you probably wouldn't have DVD ripping tools right now.
Ideology matters - it's also known as ethics and morals.
I think he's saying that the term 'Open Source' doesn't recognise the importance of the 'Free' (libre) part of 'Free Software', and that it focuses only on 'what job it does, and how much money it costs.'
To continue your example, imagine in the future that Photoshop so dominated the graphic design market, that they were able to introduce DRM into their save-files, and made them operate only with other Adobe products. That would make the Free (libre) aspect of GIMP much more important, don't you think?
Merely emphasising the price/performance aspects of GIMP (in comparison to Photoshop) would not illustrate the benefit of having the freedom to use the software however one wishes.
I know it's kinda cool to be oh-so-cynical and mock Stallman, but he's really an incredibly important person. Sure, he's a stickler for details, and I'm not sure I'd want him at a dinner party - but we really need people like him. They can remind us of the potential consequences of decisions - consequences that we are typically *very* bad at predicting.
I think this issue is similar to trade-unions. Sure, they can be corrupt (and full of nepotism), but criticising the _concept_ based on the _implementation_ is crazy. People died fighting for workers rights, and now we are notchalently throwing them away.
Similarly (though not to quite the same extreme) people have sacrificed lots of time to produce free (libre) software tools for everybody. Yes, it's an idealistic goal. Yes, Stallman is an idealist, and can be a PITA. But freedom is lost incrementally. Just look at Naz...
Oops! Almost did a Godwin!;-)
Anyway Ritchie, I've got a lot of respect for you - please keep being a stickler on our behalf!:-)
With all due respect, just because _one_ self-proclaimed environmentalist, ex-anti-nuclear 'activist' now says he was wrong, and nuclear is good, this doesn't suddenly count as a huge weight of evidence against every person who's ever spoken against nuclear.
Some people are quick to forget that it's possible to weigh the benefits of nuclear objectively, and conclude that it is NOT THE BEST OPTION. Sure - there will be opinions that differ, but that doesn't make anyone who is against nuclear power a tree-hugging hippy!
Personally, I think it's curious that humans think we need a SINGLE source of energy. why can't we make as much use of efficiency/wind/solar/hydro as is reasonable/practical/possible and then 'top-up' with nuclear on an as-needs basis? To my mind, that would be a much better solution than just replacing every fossil-fuel power plant with a nuclear substitute.
"aquatic animals that exist today don't have arms"
Wrong.
Dolphins and whales have arms (just not really as we know them). They are mammals, and don't have gills. They breathe air. The reason for this is that they are descended from land animals and over time their 'hands/arms' became fins.
If you don't believe me, look at an xray of a dolphin's fin, and compare it to an xray of a human hand - the bone structure is *very* similar.
"Evolution approaches theories by assuming a HUGE number of assertions" (sic)
I'm not quite sure what you mean by this, but I think you're trying to say that evolution makes unfounded assumptions. Probably the only real 'assumption' evolution makes that can never be tested, is that chemical processes have always worked the way they work today. This seems quite reasonable, since we have no reason to believe that the laws of the universe behaved differently in the past.
"next generation of 'scientists' will think that these assumptions have been proven"
This line shows that you do not understand the scientific method. One cannot *prove* evolution. It is a theory, and like all theories, can *never* be proven. People talk about the 'law' of gravity - but it's not a law. It's likely in the future it will be replaced by a better and deeper understanding of the universe.
How many times must it be said?!? Evolution is a theory that can never be proved - it can only be disproved. Just like *every* other scientific theory. Despite a hundred or more years' research, it has not been disproved. In fact, the theory of evolution has been used to make predictions that scientists have validated. This means that evolution is likely an accurate description of how life on Earth has developed. It's called a 'falsifiable hypothesis' - one can design experiments that could potentially disprove evolution. NONE HAVE.
Compare this to 'intelligent design', where any inconsistancy between reality and the theory can be glossed over by saying 'God did it that way'. THAT's why ID is NOT science.
Re:You obviously don't have children
on
Region-free PS3
·
· Score: 2, Informative
"Why should distributors of electronic content bear that burden when other mediums don't?"
Because they're trying to sell their product as a license - *not* as a product. For example, I can buy a spade, and hire it to whomever I choose. I cannot legally do that with a cd because, although I own the cd, I've only licensed the contents.
Thus, even if the cd breaks, I *still* own the license to listen to the music, and thus ought to be able to - using either my own backup, or a company provided replacement.
There is no *proof* that climate change is real, and even if it was, there's no *proof* that it's human caused.
Now... back to my cigarette. Just let those greenie-commies try to prove that smoking will kill me. Nope - they can't *proove* that neither... damn hippies..
Slashdot Mirror
Your quote says this:
"DeWitt reported no significant difference in egg hatching between birds fed DDT and birds not fed DDT"
and then, one sentance later, this:
"DeWitt's report that DDT-fed pheasants hatched about 50 percent more eggs than 'control' pheasants."
Now, I don't know who DeWitt is, and I don't claim to be knowledgable about DDT, but these sound like contradictory statements to me!
Maybe spiked-online and/or DeWitt have a vested interest in DDT...
Those Apple copmputers are a plague on this land. A plaaaauuuugge! We won't be safe until they're all destroyed, and all their users dead! Go forth, and cleanse our great world, PC-users!!!
-Bill Gates, spoken through Jim Louderback (Editor of PC Mag)
These guys make a variety of bags for cameras, laptops, phones, etc. Weird website, but pretty good bags. They're an Australian company, I think. presumably they export to the U.S (where, I assume, you live ;-)
http://www.crumpler.com.au/home.php
If you don't believe in regulation of 'free-trade', then do you think it would be ok for someone (like Microsoft) to bribe/coerce/blackmail the people with whom they trade in order to lock out competitors? Would it be ok for them to do a similar thing to force some DRM scheme to lock out open source? What if they bribed/blackmailed Intel into charging more for Apple to buy their chips? What about sending spies into rival organisations to poach employees? what about sending spies to steal trade secrets? what about sending spies to sabotage development?
You might notice that these examples get progressively more extreme. Presumably one would want to draw the line somewhere, in the interests of trade - and that would require legislation.
"Watch how many evil things slither in with it even if it passes."
Government isn't great. It's corrupt. That doesn't make it inherently bad. Don't criticize the concept based on the implementation. Anyway, even with the current situation, I still think we're better of with regulation than no regulation at all.
"AT&T was explicitly given a government monopoy"
That's a seperate problem. That has to do with the ideological bias of some governments towards privitsing some services at all costs. These kind of large-scale open-ended government quasi-private deals often cause problems. This has nothing to do with regulating trade!
"I am not a big fan of legislation, but..."
I've read this a few times on Slashdot now. It's usually followed by some comment about a special case (or special interest?) where legislation is a Good Thing. This bugs me, because it's hypocritical.
As an example, the entire concept of laissez-faire (free-market) economics (thank you, Adam Smith!) is based upon assumptions that do not hold in the real world. If we want an economy that even approximates a 'free-market', then we need legislation.
Look at Microsoft, or AT&T. Were it not for legislation, there's be no check to their anti-competitive practices. In my opinion (FWIW) the natural end-consequence of a totally free market (in the absence of any control) are cartels - massive companies bribing (what remains of) the government, and helping their cronies and friends.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preferential_voting for more info.
In Oz, we get a piece of paper, with all the candidates' names listed. We number them all in the order of preference (to assist in this, candidates produce 'how to vote' cards). Then there's a recursive selection process that takes the votes from the least popular candidates, and redistributes them amongst the more popular candidates, according to the preferences. This continues until there are only 2 candidates remaining, and there is a clear winner.
I think you missed the benefits of 'preferential voting'. Essentially it means:
'I'll vote for this guy, but if he doesn't get in then
I'll vote for her, but if she doesn't get in then
I'll vote for them.. etc'
To use an example from the previous US election, one could vote for (say) Ralph Nader, but preference John Kerry. (Yeah, yeah, so I'm left-of-centre). With preferential voting, you're not wasting your vote, even though Nader will probably not get in. Rather, you're sending Kerry a message that you don't really approve of his policies, but just prefer him to the Other Guy. The crux is, that your vote still goes to Kerry.
Another benefit, is that minor parties can allocate their own preferences. So one could just vote for (say) Nader, and he could negotiate his preferences with the major parties. This would give him leverage in the policy development of the major parties in the lead-up to the election. It also makes people more inclined to vote for minor parties, because they know it's not a 'wasted vote'.
That's the system we have in Australia, and I think it works really well. I think it's absolutely essential if we're to encourage multiple parties (even if they're minor parties).
eMusic does this, and does it without DRM. They sell mp3s (LAME --alt-preset standard), and keep track of what each customer has downloaded. Songs can be re-downloaded for free, and they also use these data to make recommendations (via people with similar taste, etc).
;-)
I actually find eMusic better to use than iTunes, because it's geared toward people discovering new music, rather than being 'told' what's cool.
But no, eMusic doesn't have the latest Britney pop ditty...
We hear so often that variable pricing is good. I think it's interesting that newly released music is commonly considered more valuable just by virtue of being new. This particularly applies to covers, rehashes, etc.
The problem with an ID card, as I see it, is that it gives the government lots of information about the citizenry, which it should not *need* to know. History shows us that there are always cycles of totalitarianism and 'freedom'. Having national ID cards mean that when a totalitarian authority comes to power, it can do a lot more damage.
Part of the reason the Nazis were so efficient at rounding up the Jews and other 'undesirables' was because they had good information about where they were living/employed/etc, and the Public Service was quite happy to provide that information to the SS (or whoever it was who coordinated the death camps - my knowledge of history is a bit shady). Had they had a national ID card, this process would have been even more efficient.
We should oppose an ID card, unless we're certain that such a government will never arise in our country. If you believe it never will, I think you're deluding yourself.
ps. This assumes that the ID cards are 100% secure - an impossible feat. If you consider ID card hacking, and identity theft, etc, then you uncover a heap of additional reasons why they're a Bad Thing.
I had this 10 years ago, playing DOOM2 on my 486SX33. Whenever there were more than about 10 monsters nearby, I'd get about 1 frame per second... just awesome!
;-)
bring on the future!
Wow. That's a bloody long way! I only live about 8 kms (5 miles) from my work - a little closer!
Shame about the showers and public transport too..
But seriously, what do you think would happen to your city if the price of oil doubled? it'd be crippled! It sounds like the city planners/leaders are not doing their job..
the *real* solution is not to drive at all. I know this will make me sound like an unpatriotic communist, but (disclaimer - I live in a relatively small Australian city of about 1 million poeple) I can definitely commute much faster in rush hour traffic than I can in a car. I get to work in about 1/2 the time of driving, and about 1/3 the time of public transport. Cycling's very cheap, and it turns an otherwise stressful time into a pleasant experience. And it gives exercise!! What a deal!! :-)
The other plus, is that finding parking for a bicycle is always easy. No more hunting/paying for car parking. My fiance and I both cycle, and this means that we only run one car. A big economic saving. I highly recommend it.
Regarding the 'nuclear tax', do you think it's sufficient to cover the costs of maintaining the waste storage facilities for the required length of time?
My understanding is that if we reuse the waste as you describe, the best case scenario is that we would need to store it for 'only' about 300 years, otherwise it needs to be stored for thousands. Can you clarify this?
Cheers!
Hmm. Not totally sure. I think Russia has some, but beyond that I can't say.
My understanding of the origin of Uranium is as follows:
Our sun is a second generation star, and all the matter in our solar system came from the remnants of a previous star that had gone nova. This process produced all the elements heavier than iron (which the end product of the fusion reactions that occur in the sun - i believe... it could be lead)
So, all the uranium that we have now has existed for the lifetime of our planet/solar system, and has been decaying the whole time. When it runs out, we won't get any more!
What you say is essentially true. Please don't read my post as supporting nuclear power - personally, I don't think it's the best option. Having said that, hysterical opposition to the 'big N' isn't going to do anybody any favours either. I believe that any balanced examination of the facts will lead us to conclude that nuclear is not the solution.
I think we _need_ to move away from the use of fossil-fuel based power (both electricity and transport) if our civilisation is to survive another century in any recognisable form. I think we should adopt what are classically known as 'renewable technologies' (wind, solar and hydro, among others) as much as possible and then - MAYBE - use nuclear when all other avenues of power production have been utilised.
This also needs to include the massive implementation of energy efficiency, which would reduce our power consumption by at least 20% (that's electricity only - implementing such technologies in the transport sector could have much larger benefits).
Even if it's true that modern 'pebble bed' reactors are 'meltdown proof' (whatever that means) we still have the problem of the waste. With the onset of global warming, and peak oil, and the consequent climatic and geopolitical instability, there is nowhere that can be considered stable enough to store high-level waste for the required duration (IMO).
There's potentially huge amounts of money to be made if the world 'switches' to nuclear electricity generation. There are strong vested interests in promoting nuclear technology as the successor to coal and oil.
I live in South Australia, which has approximately 30% of the world's known uranium, and if we started selling it, we could (as a state) make a ton of money - probably more than the goldrush that helped some other Australian states.
I've noticed a _lot_ of (what I would describe as) pro-nuclear articles recently, and I'd put this article in the same basket. I read this article as containing spin to make nuclear radiation/contamination sound less dangerous than it really is so that the public is less wary of adopting nuclear electricity generation, with the associated dumping of radioactive waste.
I'm all for having informed debate regarding the use of nuclear power, and it's possible that in some cases nuclear power is the best option currently available - especially if augmented with wind/tidal/solar power. I don't think we'll see such debate though - there's simply too much money involved.
Ugh - Obtuse!
No. 'Free Software' is better semantically because it considers the primary benefit of Free Software: Freedom.
If that was ignored, why would anyone ever develop an opensource product? Look at Linux - to start with it was inferior to the competing products. It's _only_ advantage was that it was Free (libre). If it wasn't for Linux, you probably wouldn't have DVD ripping tools right now.
Ideology matters - it's also known as ethics and morals.
I seem to be the RMS advocate in this thread.. ;-)
I think he's saying that the term 'Open Source' doesn't recognise the importance of the 'Free' (libre) part of 'Free Software', and that it focuses only on 'what job it does, and how much money it costs.'
To continue your example, imagine in the future that Photoshop so dominated the graphic design market, that they were able to introduce DRM into their save-files, and made them operate only with other Adobe products. That would make the Free (libre) aspect of GIMP much more important, don't you think?
Merely emphasising the price/performance aspects of GIMP (in comparison to Photoshop) would not illustrate the benefit of having the freedom to use the software however one wishes.
I know it's kinda cool to be oh-so-cynical and mock Stallman, but he's really an incredibly important person. Sure, he's a stickler for details, and I'm not sure I'd want him at a dinner party - but we really need people like him. They can remind us of the potential consequences of decisions - consequences that we are typically *very* bad at predicting.
;-)
:-)
I think this issue is similar to trade-unions. Sure, they can be corrupt (and full of nepotism), but criticising the _concept_ based on the _implementation_ is crazy. People died fighting for workers rights, and now we are notchalently throwing them away.
Similarly (though not to quite the same extreme) people have sacrificed lots of time to produce free (libre) software tools for everybody. Yes, it's an idealistic goal. Yes, Stallman is an idealist, and can be a PITA. But freedom is lost incrementally. Just look at Naz...
Oops! Almost did a Godwin!
Anyway Ritchie, I've got a lot of respect for you - please keep being a stickler on our behalf!
Cheers.
With all due respect, just because _one_ self-proclaimed environmentalist, ex-anti-nuclear 'activist' now says he was wrong, and nuclear is good, this doesn't suddenly count as a huge weight of evidence against every person who's ever spoken against nuclear.
Some people are quick to forget that it's possible to weigh the benefits of nuclear objectively, and conclude that it is NOT THE BEST OPTION. Sure - there will be opinions that differ, but that doesn't make anyone who is against nuclear power a tree-hugging hippy!
Personally, I think it's curious that humans think we need a SINGLE source of energy. why can't we make as much use of efficiency/wind/solar/hydro as is reasonable/practical/possible and then 'top-up' with nuclear on an as-needs basis? To my mind, that would be a much better solution than just replacing every fossil-fuel power plant with a nuclear substitute.
one other thing...
"aquatic animals that exist today don't have arms"
Wrong.
Dolphins and whales have arms (just not really as we know them). They are mammals, and don't have gills. They breathe air. The reason for this is that they are descended from land animals and over time their 'hands/arms' became fins.
If you don't believe me, look at an xray of a dolphin's fin, and compare it to an xray of a human hand - the bone structure is *very* similar.
"Evolution approaches theories by assuming a HUGE number of assertions" (sic)
I'm not quite sure what you mean by this, but I think you're trying to say that evolution makes unfounded assumptions. Probably the only real 'assumption' evolution makes that can never be tested, is that chemical processes have always worked the way they work today. This seems quite reasonable, since we have no reason to believe that the laws of the universe behaved differently in the past.
"next generation of 'scientists' will think that these assumptions have been proven"
This line shows that you do not understand the scientific method. One cannot *prove* evolution. It is a theory, and like all theories, can *never* be proven. People talk about the 'law' of gravity - but it's not a law. It's likely in the future it will be replaced by a better and deeper understanding of the universe.
How many times must it be said?!?
Evolution is a theory that can never be proved - it can only be disproved. Just like *every* other scientific theory. Despite a hundred or more years' research, it has not been disproved. In fact, the theory of evolution has been used to make predictions that scientists have validated. This means that evolution is likely an accurate description of how life on Earth has developed. It's called a 'falsifiable hypothesis' - one can design experiments that could potentially disprove evolution. NONE HAVE.
Compare this to 'intelligent design', where any inconsistancy between reality and the theory can be glossed over by saying 'God did it that way'. THAT's why ID is NOT science.
"Why should distributors of electronic content bear that burden when other mediums don't?"
Because they're trying to sell their product as a license - *not* as a product. For example, I can buy a spade, and hire it to whomever I choose. I cannot legally do that with a cd because, although I own the cd, I've only licensed the contents.
Thus, even if the cd breaks, I *still* own the license to listen to the music, and thus ought to be able to - using either my own backup, or a company provided replacement.
There is no *proof* that climate change is real, and even if it was, there's no *proof* that it's human caused.
Now... back to my cigarette. Just let those greenie-commies try to prove that smoking will kill me. Nope - they can't *proove* that neither... damn hippies..