Being an American of Indian descent who has spent time in India, I can assure you that this will never happen. India's infrastructure (electricity, roads, communications, etc.) is horrible, and the country refuses to adopt modern methods to improve its vast problems. For example, if a road needs to be build here in the US, the Dept. of Transportation (at whatever appropriate level of government) will assemble a crew of professionals that use modern road-making machinery and techniques. In India, because they wish to appease peasant laborers, only manual labor can be used. The same road that would take two weeks to build here would take over a year in India. Only the simplest of machinery would be allowed, with all the other work coming from unskilled day laborers using shovels and hand tools. The end result is a road that will only last 5 years at best, is not level and doesn't drain water, and took almost a year to build.
This is the sad reality, and with the exception of the newest high-tech areas like Bangalore, this is the way projects are tackled in all of India, and it isn't going to change anytime soon.
An Indian on the moon? Forget about feasability, I can't even imagine all the people that would need to be bribed to get the project off paper. EVERYTHING in India requires bribes, especially police and bureacrats.
What scares me far more than all of this gov't intrusion and monitoring of simple, everyday activites is the willingness of people to justify the intrusions. Go back and read all these comments. Even the Slashdot crowd, which is most likely smarter than your average random population sample, will denigrate the poster as a "demagogue", and come up with every justification for the intrusions (keeping cough syrup from kids or cold pills from drug dealers, catching terrorists, etc.) even if his point remains valid. Even they are willing to justify these ever-growing intrusions in the name of security.
What possible chance does personal liberty and privacy stand if the citizenry doesn't give a shit? We don't even need the gov't to force us -- our "patriotic" citizens are all too willing to play along. No one intends to willingly give up all their freedoms. They just remain complacent and ignore it long enough for the intrusions keep escalating until legitimate dissent is no longer possible.
When history looks back, I wonder how we will be judged. Will historians shake their heads and cry at how we so willingly lost the very freedom that once made our country unique? Or will gov't intrusion have gotten so bad that questioning any gov't policies, even past ones, will deem the citizen "unpatriotic" and a "threat to his country"?
What do you think?
//Seeker
"Naturally the common people don't want war...That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along...All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country."
Herman Goering
Nazi Reichsmarshall and Chief of the Luftwaffe
Germany, Third Reich
During his trial at Nuremburg, before he was hanged.
Does anyone know the setup they were using? I would imagine that since Vicodin is a schedule III medication the doctor just "called it in" to the pharmacy. But, in this case, the doctor and the pharmacy were probably in the same office, so I would imagine that the individuals answering calls simply took the order, listing him as the prescribing doctor, and he just approved it with a "click". The same goes for web orders. I find it highly doubtful that he either a) wrote out 72,000 actual prescriptions, and that b) he actually spoke to any, if at all, of the patients over the phone. It seems that this literally was a pill-pushing business, and the fact that they could fill it under a doctor's name to make it somewhat legal is incidental.
The Arab world was the cornerstone of world civilization in the Middle Ages -- they invented the zero, we still use Arabic digits, they were astronomers and mathematicians...
Both the concept of the zero and the "arabic" numerals originated in India, but were exported to the West through the Middle East, hence the misnomer.
If nothing else, this country seems to need more lawyers, if not good developers.
This country does NOT just need more lawyers! What we need are lawyers willing to work in public service, willing to do pro bono work, willing to advance worthy social causes and attack government/corporate abuse for principle, and not for money. The last thing this country needs is more "personal injury" or "medical malpractice" lawyers who advertise on TV every 2 minutes guaranteeing $10,000 (or at a minimum $1,500 to dismiss the suit) just because someone looked at you cross-eyed or because you experienced the mental anguish of watching someone have a seizure.
I'm afraid that "clunka-clunka-clunka" sound has been copyrighted by the RIAA and you are clearly infringing on their right to profit from it. Don't you at least have the decency not to pirate the sounds of their death ships?!
When this occurs, do you (not necessarily you, but your employer, the hierarchy, etc.) immediately comply with the order unquestioned and give them absolute access? Or do you require a court order in order to initiate such an action?
If you don't, why not? Does it not bother any of you in the least bit that the government has unfettered access to the private communications of completely innocent citizens?
I'm dying to know what you and your coworkers think about this, and I'm sure I'm not the only one! Thanks for your insight.
Is anyone else disturbed in the least by the fact that they chose to post all of this information publically before an investigation was completed? Given that it's on a site as popular as/. the individuals will certainly find out, erase any links between them and their activities, and get the hell outta Dodge.
Granted that it was this publicity that allowed the investigation to begin, what are the chances that this will yield anything useful?
Slashdot Mirror
Being an American of Indian descent who has spent time in India, I can assure you that this will never happen. India's infrastructure (electricity, roads, communications, etc.) is horrible, and the country refuses to adopt modern methods to improve its vast problems. For example, if a road needs to be build here in the US, the Dept. of Transportation (at whatever appropriate level of government) will assemble a crew of professionals that use modern road-making machinery and techniques. In India, because they wish to appease peasant laborers, only manual labor can be used. The same road that would take two weeks to build here would take over a year in India. Only the simplest of machinery would be allowed, with all the other work coming from unskilled day laborers using shovels and hand tools. The end result is a road that will only last 5 years at best, is not level and doesn't drain water, and took almost a year to build. This is the sad reality, and with the exception of the newest high-tech areas like Bangalore, this is the way projects are tackled in all of India, and it isn't going to change anytime soon. An Indian on the moon? Forget about feasability, I can't even imagine all the people that would need to be bribed to get the project off paper. EVERYTHING in India requires bribes, especially police and bureacrats.
What scares me far more than all of this gov't intrusion and monitoring of simple, everyday activites is the willingness of people to justify the intrusions. Go back and read all these comments. Even the Slashdot crowd, which is most likely smarter than your average random population sample, will denigrate the poster as a "demagogue", and come up with every justification for the intrusions (keeping cough syrup from kids or cold pills from drug dealers, catching terrorists, etc.) even if his point remains valid. Even they are willing to justify these ever-growing intrusions in the name of security.
//Seeker
What possible chance does personal liberty and privacy stand if the citizenry doesn't give a shit? We don't even need the gov't to force us -- our "patriotic" citizens are all too willing to play along. No one intends to willingly give up all their freedoms. They just remain complacent and ignore it long enough for the intrusions keep escalating until legitimate dissent is no longer possible.
When history looks back, I wonder how we will be judged. Will historians shake their heads and cry at how we so willingly lost the very freedom that once made our country unique? Or will gov't intrusion have gotten so bad that questioning any gov't policies, even past ones, will deem the citizen "unpatriotic" and a "threat to his country"?
What do you think?
"Naturally the common people don't want war...That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along...All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same in every country."
Herman Goering
Nazi Reichsmarshall and Chief of the Luftwaffe
Germany, Third Reich
During his trial at Nuremburg, before he was hanged.
Does anyone else find it amusing that it doesn't come with any doors, yet there's a $695 option for an Alpine stereo system? :P
Does anyone know the setup they were using? I would imagine that since Vicodin is a schedule III medication the doctor just "called it in" to the pharmacy. But, in this case, the doctor and the pharmacy were probably in the same office, so I would imagine that the individuals answering calls simply took the order, listing him as the prescribing doctor, and he just approved it with a "click". The same goes for web orders. I find it highly doubtful that he either a) wrote out 72,000 actual prescriptions, and that b) he actually spoke to any, if at all, of the patients over the phone. It seems that this literally was a pill-pushing business, and the fact that they could fill it under a doctor's name to make it somewhat legal is incidental.
This country does NOT just need more lawyers! What we need are lawyers willing to work in public service, willing to do pro bono work, willing to advance worthy social causes and attack government/corporate abuse for principle, and not for money. The last thing this country needs is more "personal injury" or "medical malpractice" lawyers who advertise on TV every 2 minutes guaranteeing $10,000 (or at a minimum $1,500 to dismiss the suit) just because someone looked at you cross-eyed or because you experienced the mental anguish of watching someone have a seizure.
I'm afraid that "clunka-clunka-clunka" sound has been copyrighted by the RIAA and you are clearly infringing on their right to profit from it. Don't you at least have the decency not to pirate the sounds of their death ships?!
When this occurs, do you (not necessarily you, but your employer, the hierarchy, etc.) immediately comply with the order unquestioned and give them absolute access? Or do you require a court order in order to initiate such an action? If you don't, why not? Does it not bother any of you in the least bit that the government has unfettered access to the private communications of completely innocent citizens?
I'm dying to know what you and your coworkers think about this, and I'm sure I'm not the only one! Thanks for your insight.
Is anyone else disturbed in the least by the fact that they chose to post all of this information publically before an investigation was completed? Given that it's on a site as popular as
Granted that it was this publicity that allowed the investigation to begin, what are the chances that this will yield anything useful?