Re:Things like this are easy to fix.
on
Google's Evil NDA
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· Score: 4, Insightful
Just line out, and initial the parts you want struck. Add the phrase to the effect that by accepting this NDA as modified that Google agrees to it in it's modified entirety.
That works if the potential employee pool is shallow. People are knocking down doors to work at Google, so Google can just say no and move on to the next highly qualified applicant who won't potentially cause them legal nightmares down the road.
If Internet radio is turned into the playground for rich corporations, they'll be locked into the RIAA for the foreseeable future. Who benefits from that?
Let's see:
Shareholders of RIAA & big media companies (Clearchannel, etc). Boardmembers and execs at RIAA & big media companies. Politicians and political parties who take donations from the RIAA and RIAA & big media companies.
What do these have in commom? They are already the ones vested in positions of power. They have no interest in reducing their profits, power, and interest -- so why should they take any action that reduces any of them?
The only reason for legislators to act against the interest of Clearchannel & Co is if they become convinced that individual voters' collective concern with this one issue is more important than the media companies who provide voters with information. Good luck with that, since internet radio as an election issue pales in comparison to the issues the media and churches will be focusing on come November 08.
I think it's time the USA started doing things that the world could admire, instead of steadfastly serving its own interests.
I wish the US had been steadfastly serving its own interests. Instead, it's been steadfastly serving the interests of the political and economic elite at the expense of the nation as a whole.
The US is becoming less and less relevant internationally, and this will continue at a marginal rate until the Ponzi revolving credit scheme falls apart -- then the US's relevancy will sink to near zero quite quickly. Of course, it's likely to drag the world economy down with it for a while.
metamoderation only provides a means for grading the performance of moderators and doesn't really make the problem go away.
Except that accounts who are deemed via metamoderation to moderate badly a lot no longer get mod points. In the long run, this really reduces the problem.
Well, since the study said it's about earthworms, I'll say that I'm of five pairs of hearts about it.
Seriously, though, if the average person loved and extra 35 years, the drain on the world's resources would be HUGE. And economically, we'd all have to work much, much longer in order to support our retirements, and the gap between rich and poor would increase. I'm not sure I'd be enthused with working for 90 years before retirement, and I don't know what widening the income gap further would do.
There are tons of oil resources (bitumen, coal liquifaction, oil shale, arctic and deep sea extraction, etc), but we're running out of the "cheap" ones. The question is, how much of the more expensive ones do we think we'll need, ten years down the road?
The other question, which relates to this thread, is, "Will renewables be less expensive than these expensive-to-access-and-refine oil resources?"
Throw in a carbon tax to the issues you've touched on, and the answer may very well be yes. Plus, in the short run, greenwashing is good for consumer relations and the bottom line.
I wouldn't be surprised if there were a few dirty HMOs that were taking kickbacks from hospitals for over-billing
That's how HMOs work. Instead of kickbacks, they negotiate lower charges for participating medical organizations.
I got Lyme Disease again last summer. I received a bill for $700 for a doctor's visit and several lab tests; my HMO paid $220, and the doctor's office was trying to get me to pay the difference. Not being a moron, I called my HMO, and they got me on a conference call with the doctor's billing firm. As a participant in my HMO, he was not allowed to bill me the excess charges -- but if I didn't have insurance, that visit would have cost me $700.
The real reason those hospital visits cost so much is that people go to the ER when they have a dislocated finger or a bad sunburn, instead of seeing a GP the following day. Hospitals are overwhelmed by trivial medical problems, and all those doctors, nurses, PAs, and support staff cost a fortune, never mind the fact that we all have to pay for indigent care through increased regular charges to those who can pay.
I've yet to see a health care cost study in a respectable journal that cites regulation of the industry as the number one cause of high costs. It's a contributor, but even the Cato institute cites the #1 cause as overuse of resources (due to third-party-payer systems like insurance, both public and private), #2 as administrative and paperwork costs (again, due to third-party-payer systems), and #3 as malpractice liability.
It's the separation of payment from the user of the medical resources that really has driven costs up.
Show me an economist who cites overregulation as the primary cause of high health care costs, please! I'd be extremely interested to read their studies.
All this based on his side of the story... which I'm not saying is incorrect, just that I'd take it with a grain of salt. Especially since the blog post we're talking about was written by Micah Sifry, who has an interest in tearing down the major candidates of the Democratic Party -- Sifry advocates an overthrow of the Democratic Party machine as well as the end of the two-party system (I happen to agree with Micah -- but I also feel it colors everythin he writes).
The big thing you're missing, though, is that as Anthony's site crossed into a more 'official' status (when the Obama campaign had it linked from the impact channel) it set up the conflict:
Meanwhile, Chris Hughes had handed the MySpace portfolio to a new campaign hire, Scott Goodstein, who came to Chicago with tons of experience running social network-focused efforts for an impressive array of progressive groups and causes.
The campaign had hired an experienced professional to do the job that Anthony was asking for. Anthony should have known right then that this was the end of the road for him; instead, he asked for a paid position.
We do not know the actual negotiations that took place. All we have is the second-hand story of someone who has seen a copy of the offer emailed by Anthony -- which is funny, since Anthony never states that he presented an offer to the campaign, only "It was clear at that time that there was no "one-time fee" at the time of the meeting.
This Chris guy at the campaign that Anthony refers to may have overstepped his bounds; he may have told Anthony to make an offer just to get him off his back; he may have really been acting in an underhanded fashion. I don't know; what I do know is that unless I can see this correspondence in writing (especially the solicitation for an offer) I'm not convinced that Anthony's and Micah's perspectives aren't clouding the facts.
I'm not a Barck supporter. I just think that Anthony is a bit daft if he didn't see it coming -- that's what happens when you get involved in politics.
This example of his behavior says he would be a very lousy leader.
Just wanted to point out that Obama likely had *zero* influence in this decision.
Also, if you really think underlings' 'being nice' is so important in presidential elections, then look at Rove wrt Bush 2004.
You're right, it was about control of the site. However, it was also about Anthony's role in the campaign. He wanted to be a big cheese, in effect, and the campaign staff he dealt with didn't agree. He'd already shown that his management of the site was unreliable (they'd had to have him pull false information he'd posted several times).
Or unless you happen to be comfortable with eating animal byproducts. I grew up on a farm, I can eat a lamb sandwich while I give an orphaned baby lamb its bottle. No dissonance, just the satisfaction that I'm helping raise next year's lamb sandwiches.
Hell, I eat scrapple. There's no way a bit o' sausage is going to bother you when you know what goes into THAT.
The point is that familiarity with the political process makes it tolerable, for idealist and realist both.
For a year of work that has been that effective as it has
What, he grabbed some low-hanging fruit (people who looked for Barack's MySpace profile)?
Did Anthony ever really expect that the campaign wouldn't eventually want full control of the page, especially since they'd already had problems with him posting incorrect content, and the fiascos with unauthorized staffers making huge gaffs and causing candidates credibility?
Anthony KNEW he was going to have to give over control, or he was stupid. He wanted to be a big cheese in the campaign's online presence, though, and the campaign managers didn't want him to be. He stonewalled, then made an unreasonable offer (the time he spent means nothing in terms of the offer, from the campagn's standpoint. What matters is the value of what he's offering -- which is very small, considering the campaign could get it anyway for nearly nothing). One guy's goodwill is not worth $50,000 -- especially since it was already clear that they wouldn't have his goodwill no matter the settlement amount.
I don't have access to every profile using "my" name (least of which multiple people have the same handle in real life) on every website in the web.
Read the MySpace T&C. If someone used your name and likeness on a profile, you could get that profile removed, and control assigned to you...
I'm talking about MySpace specifically (which, by the way, is free to assign control of that page to Obama's campaign if they so choose), not "every website on the web".
Also, from what I have read - Anthony was not an official volunteer. He built it up himself of his own initiative since 2004 before Obama was even on the national radar.
Which is central to my point. As an unaffiliated volunteer, the designee of Barack Obama (his official campaign) has a much greater case for gaining control of the page.
There are definite parallels to domain squatting (please don't deny that they exist, since they do) even though it's murky here since he operated the page for a while with tacit agreement of the official campaign.
Re::Just another sleazeball politician
on
Obama's MySpace Drama
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· Score: 2, Insightful
I do. You don't take what isn't yours.
Funny, then, that you take Anthony's side, since the MySpace profile uses another individual's name... he took what wasn't his. When the cooperative situation proved unworkable, the sides couldn't come to agreement on fee for volunteered (!) services, and so the campaign took back what should have been theirs from the get-go.
but then having the most popular MySpace page for your candidate being controlled by a random person, and therefore having no control over the content yourself, is also politically unwise.
According to TFA, they had password access to the site, so they could edit if necessary -- not that closing the barn door is useful if the horse is already out.
On the other hand, the volunteer's decision to try and cash out rather than cooperate with the campaign is a little short-sighted.
Well, they were having a dispute over control of the site, and apparently the campaign solicited an offer from him... they basically said, "Make us an offer, and we'll see what we can do."
They didn't like his sizable request (as no volunteer would) and so they sent him to the curb and got control through MySpace. Just noting that it wasn't his decision to try and cash out.
Sorry if I come off as a bit of a jerk in the following response, but your post is misinformed, and doesn't seem to be based on what's in the articles at all -- just a knee-jerk reaction to "big money" campaigns.
And if the guy invested $10k of his own money on good faith that it would help the campaign
He didn't. Summary is a bit off, he asked to split out-of-pocket to MySpace since Jan 1. FT(first-linked)A:
Plus I asked that if any fees were to be paid to MySpace by the campaign up to that point in time, those should be shared with me, up to $10,000.
I mean, isn't that chump change to Obama?
Ever worked on a political campaign? Volunteers don't get paid. Low-level staffers are paid less than half that if they are lucky. Hell, ever worked at a company with 19 Million in annual revenues? My current employer has revenues far higher than that... but still they quibble over $100 expenses. A $50,000 expense is a big-ticket item, especially when a *free* alternative exists. And how would it make your other volunteers feel if they knew that some dude who registered a Myspace page gets paid off more than the entire budget for their local campaign volunteer group?
And doesn't Obama have to dispose of that money before the election otherwise it's gotta go to charity (I'm not a politician, I forget the rules of soft money).
No, and that's completely besides the point anyway. From the campaign's perspective, why should they pay something when it's available for free? Why should they reward hugely this one volunteer when there are literally thousands of others who don't see a penny?
Nobody's doing anything wrong though, this is clear cut capitalism. The man has the only supply for the product
What? First, capitalism != microeconomics. One can apply microeconomics to any politicoeconomic structure. Second:
Obama's campaign managers didn't like it so decided to make their own.
No. Obama's campaign went to the authority figure (MySpace) and co-opted Anthony's Obama profile since they have the rights to it according to MySpace. They did not make their own to compete. Clearly not capitalism in action.
I'm getting the feeling that one of the big reasons you feel that you're not getting the whole story is because you didn't bother to read the whole story.
Couldn't Obama or his people send in the lawyers and ask the guy to take down the site or remove references on the guys site to being the official page?
Actually, Anthony's page specifically states that it's NOT the official page.
And if his claims that it wasn't about money aren't true, then where are the specific amounts of money coming from?
The Obama campaign solicited a figure from him.
It's not a cut-and-dried case of squatting -- Anthony had actually worked with the campaign on the profile. The campaign had password access, so that they could maintain some kind of control over the content just-in-case.
It isn't about money, IMO. This guy built a significant amount of grassroots support for Obama, then found out that presidential politics is big business, and there's no room for the little guy. How would you feel if a 2.5 year labor of love was pulled out from underneath you? The campaign told him to make an offer... he did, based upon an approximated value of the time he spent on the profile this year. They scoffed, and went around him.
I don't blame the creator of the profile. I don't blame the Obama campaign, either -- centralized control is necessary for presidential campaigns today.
It's politics, sometimes people don't get what they want and feelings get hurt. Same as it ever was, same as it ever will be.
There are quite a few posts below this that are certain that this is the case.
However, I'm not so certain that turbines in the median would have that great an impact on the tailwind for cars in the traffic lanes. What happens normally to that tailwind? It is funneled upwards, into space above traffic, where it dissipates. Without a full analysis, there is no way that any slashdotter could say whether the turbines would increase drag on traffic, or whether they would simply reduce the amount of wind energy that dissipates into the surrounding environs.
There is also no way to know offhand, without full analysis, whether the median's distance from traffic is great enough so that reducing the airflow has no impact on traffic.
OK, makes sense. But what if you're just looking for a few dozen catch phrases in a few dozen dialects? No need to do full translation, just need to recognize a few hundred data sequences.
If you trigger a flag, then the system prompts more attention (say, human attention) for contextural analysis.
Slashdot Mirror
Shareholders of RIAA & big media companies (Clearchannel, etc).
Boardmembers and execs at RIAA & big media companies.
Politicians and political parties who take donations from the RIAA and RIAA & big media companies.
What do these have in commom? They are already the ones vested in positions of power. They have no interest in reducing their profits, power, and interest -- so why should they take any action that reduces any of them?
The only reason for legislators to act against the interest of Clearchannel & Co is if they become convinced that individual voters' collective concern with this one issue is more important than the media companies who provide voters with information. Good luck with that, since internet radio as an election issue pales in comparison to the issues the media and churches will be focusing on come November 08.
The US is becoming less and less relevant internationally, and this will continue at a marginal rate until the Ponzi revolving credit scheme falls apart -- then the US's relevancy will sink to near zero quite quickly. Of course, it's likely to drag the world economy down with it for a while.
Seriously, though, if the average person loved and extra 35 years, the drain on the world's resources would be HUGE. And economically, we'd all have to work much, much longer in order to support our retirements, and the gap between rich and poor would increase. I'm not sure I'd be enthused with working for 90 years before retirement, and I don't know what widening the income gap further would do.
Throw in a carbon tax to the issues you've touched on, and the answer may very well be yes. Plus, in the short run, greenwashing is good for consumer relations and the bottom line.
I got Lyme Disease again last summer. I received a bill for $700 for a doctor's visit and several lab tests; my HMO paid $220, and the doctor's office was trying to get me to pay the difference. Not being a moron, I called my HMO, and they got me on a conference call with the doctor's billing firm. As a participant in my HMO, he was not allowed to bill me the excess charges -- but if I didn't have insurance, that visit would have cost me $700.
The real reason those hospital visits cost so much is that people go to the ER when they have a dislocated finger or a bad sunburn, instead of seeing a GP the following day. Hospitals are overwhelmed by trivial medical problems, and all those doctors, nurses, PAs, and support staff cost a fortune, never mind the fact that we all have to pay for indigent care through increased regular charges to those who can pay.
It's the separation of payment from the user of the medical resources that really has driven costs up.
Show me an economist who cites overregulation as the primary cause of high health care costs, please! I'd be extremely interested to read their studies.
The big thing you're missing, though, is that as Anthony's site crossed into a more 'official' status (when the Obama campaign had it linked from the impact channel) it set up the conflict:The campaign had hired an experienced professional to do the job that Anthony was asking for. Anthony should have known right then that this was the end of the road for him; instead, he asked for a paid position.
We do not know the actual negotiations that took place. All we have is the second-hand story of someone who has seen a copy of the offer emailed by Anthony -- which is funny, since Anthony never states that he presented an offer to the campaign, only "It was clear at that time that there was no "one-time fee" at the time of the meeting.
This Chris guy at the campaign that Anthony refers to may have overstepped his bounds; he may have told Anthony to make an offer just to get him off his back; he may have really been acting in an underhanded fashion. I don't know; what I do know is that unless I can see this correspondence in writing (especially the solicitation for an offer) I'm not convinced that Anthony's and Micah's perspectives aren't clouding the facts.
Just wanted to point out that Obama likely had *zero* influence in this decision.
Also, if you really think underlings' 'being nice' is so important in presidential elections, then look at Rove wrt Bush 2004.
You're right, it was about control of the site. However, it was also about Anthony's role in the campaign. He wanted to be a big cheese, in effect, and the campaign staff he dealt with didn't agree. He'd already shown that his management of the site was unreliable (they'd had to have him pull false information he'd posted several times).
Or unless you happen to be comfortable with eating animal byproducts. I grew up on a farm, I can eat a lamb sandwich while I give an orphaned baby lamb its bottle. No dissonance, just the satisfaction that I'm helping raise next year's lamb sandwiches.
Hell, I eat scrapple. There's no way a bit o' sausage is going to bother you when you know what goes into THAT.
The point is that familiarity with the political process makes it tolerable, for idealist and realist both.
Did Anthony ever really expect that the campaign wouldn't eventually want full control of the page, especially since they'd already had problems with him posting incorrect content, and the fiascos with unauthorized staffers making huge gaffs and causing candidates credibility?
Anthony KNEW he was going to have to give over control, or he was stupid. He wanted to be a big cheese in the campaign's online presence, though, and the campaign managers didn't want him to be. He stonewalled, then made an unreasonable offer (the time he spent means nothing in terms of the offer, from the campagn's standpoint. What matters is the value of what he's offering -- which is very small, considering the campaign could get it anyway for nearly nothing). One guy's goodwill is not worth $50,000 -- especially since it was already clear that they wouldn't have his goodwill no matter the settlement amount.
The editorial control part is about ideals. The fact that the campaign scoffed at his offer is about money and ideals.
I'm talking about MySpace specifically (which, by the way, is free to assign control of that page to Obama's campaign if they so choose), not "every website on the web".Which is central to my point. As an unaffiliated volunteer, the designee of Barack Obama (his official campaign) has a much greater case for gaining control of the page.
There are definite parallels to domain squatting (please don't deny that they exist, since they do) even though it's murky here since he operated the page for a while with tacit agreement of the official campaign.
Well, they were having a dispute over control of the site, and apparently the campaign solicited an offer from him... they basically said, "Make us an offer, and we'll see what we can do."
They didn't like his sizable request (as no volunteer would) and so they sent him to the curb and got control through MySpace. Just noting that it wasn't his decision to try and cash out.
Ever worked on a political campaign? Volunteers don't get paid. Low-level staffers are paid less than half that if they are lucky. Hell, ever worked at a company with 19 Million in annual revenues? My current employer has revenues far higher than that... but still they quibble over $100 expenses. A $50,000 expense is a big-ticket item, especially when a *free* alternative exists. And how would it make your other volunteers feel if they knew that some dude who registered a Myspace page gets paid off more than the entire budget for their local campaign volunteer group?
No, and that's completely besides the point anyway. From the campaign's perspective, why should they pay something when it's available for free? Why should they reward hugely this one volunteer when there are literally thousands of others who don't see a penny?
What? First, capitalism != microeconomics. One can apply microeconomics to any politicoeconomic structure. Second:No. Obama's campaign went to the authority figure (MySpace) and co-opted Anthony's Obama profile since they have the rights to it according to MySpace. They did not make their own to compete.
Clearly not capitalism in action.
I'm getting the feeling that one of the big reasons you feel that you're not getting the whole story is because you didn't bother to read the whole story.
The Obama campaign solicited a figure from him.
It's not a cut-and-dried case of squatting -- Anthony had actually worked with the campaign on the profile. The campaign had password access, so that they could maintain some kind of control over the content just-in-case.
It isn't about money, IMO. This guy built a significant amount of grassroots support for Obama, then found out that presidential politics is big business, and there's no room for the little guy. How would you feel if a 2.5 year labor of love was pulled out from underneath you? The campaign told him to make an offer... he did, based upon an approximated value of the time he spent on the profile this year. They scoffed, and went around him.
I don't blame the creator of the profile. I don't blame the Obama campaign, either -- centralized control is necessary for presidential campaigns today.
It's politics, sometimes people don't get what they want and feelings get hurt. Same as it ever was, same as it ever will be.
There are quite a few posts below this that are certain that this is the case.
However, I'm not so certain that turbines in the median would have that great an impact on the tailwind for cars in the traffic lanes. What happens normally to that tailwind? It is funneled upwards, into space above traffic, where it dissipates. Without a full analysis, there is no way that any slashdotter could say whether the turbines would increase drag on traffic, or whether they would simply reduce the amount of wind energy that dissipates into the surrounding environs.
There is also no way to know offhand, without full analysis, whether the median's distance from traffic is great enough so that reducing the airflow has no impact on traffic.
I think we can all relax and rest assured that the June issue of Business 2.0 will have all its intended advertising.
OK, makes sense. But what if you're just looking for a few dozen catch phrases in a few dozen dialects? No need to do full translation, just need to recognize a few hundred data sequences.
If you trigger a flag, then the system prompts more attention (say, human attention) for contextural analysis.
I'm sure it has a storage cell. But it's been locked in a desk for two months without failing -- my bank says it's time-based, however.