Not being recognized as a crime works, sure, but it's easier and (from the point of view of a person who does this, at least) more satisfactory to kill two birds with one stone and put someone you dislike in jail for your crime.
"Law IS regulation. Of behavior. That's kind of the point. Perhaps I'm being pedantic, but you said it.... "
Like most words it has a range of meanings emanating from a basic root meaning. In this case 'to make regular.'
Regulation in the 18th century was in general use in a broad sense, for instance when a shotgun barrel had deteriorated it would be regulated so that all the shot would have equal access to smooth bore again. 'Regulating trade' was understood to mean prohibiting barriers and distortions in trade, not decreeing the details of how trade could and could not be carried out, but just making sure that a farmer from one side of a state line had access to markets on the same terms as the farmer on the other side of the state line did.
But in this century when you hear someone speak of 'regulation' they are normally referring to the system that became important nationally in the 1930s where a 'regulatory agency' is created which then sets and enforces rules across an industry. I thought this meaning was clearly intended from the context.
"I have to keep asking me to show them a free market anywhere in the world. Anywhere. It's a mythical beast used in econ101 textbooks."
You sound like a creationist patiently explaining that no one has ever witnessed evolution. You're both wrong, too. There are free markets all over the world, even (perhaps especially) in the midst of the most oppressive systems on earth people come together for consensual trading constantly, in back streets if not in public squares. Productive human economic activities depends on the market and even where prohibited it arises because it must. Even in the darkest days of the Soviet Union markets continued to function and sustain life, and even today in North Korea the same is true, there are markets where one can buy everything from rice to uncensored internet even in a rigid Marxist dictatorship.
"Then I have to ask them how We the People have punished ANY of the companies that have screwed us over in recent decades. Please. They can't."
And that's a direct consequence of adopting the regulatory system. In order to get punished they would have to be caught breaking the regulations, and that could only happen through tremendous stupidity on their part, since they have ready avenues to influence and alter those regulations in whatever direction they want instead.
"So... before regulation, which, I imagine has existed for a long time, really ever since there has BEEN government, there was liability law? What? "
Well there's your first mistake. In the US, at least, the predominant legal model for business was still liability, not regulation, up into the first part of last century. This means that in regards to, well lets says environmental damage. Let's say you live upstream to me and you are poisoning my water supply, not on purpose, but as a side effect of your business. The liability remedy is to go to civil court and seek an injunction (to stop future harm) as well as a monetary judgement.
To some this seems too permissive for business (since there is really no prior restraint, they can go ahead and try what they want to try and if it turns out it was a bad idea later, the court may not really be able to make the people they harmed whole.) But too many of the wealthiest players it seemed too restrictive by far, and unfair to them specifically since they have more to lose in a judgement.
The modern regulatory system was just starting to take form in 1906 with the Pure Food and Drug act, and did not really take hold of the economy until the 30s. And what it does is say, the bureaucrats now have the authority to make rules concerning allowable amounts of poison, garbage, etc. and as long as you follow their rules in good faith, you are immune to civil suits for the damage you are causing! Just as long as it was within regulations.
Sure, it sounds reasonable. Until you factor in the known reality of regulatory capture.
And yes, judicial corruption could have the same effect. But the judiciary at least can be expected to be somewhat resistant to capture. Judges almost never sit on cases where one of the parties is a likely future employer. They are only supposed to know the law, and rely on expert witnesses for technical knowledge outside their field, while regulators instead must be hired specifically for knowledge of the industry they are to regulate, and the skills they learn on the job are in the same field as well, and this leaves being the regulator or the regulatee as their two main options for employment, so capture is effectively guaranteed.
I am not trying to be rude but your argument is wildly historically inaccurate. You think we had a 'sweet spot' and we can get it again but you also think that a system that has existed for approximately a century has been around for centuries if not millenia as well. You assert that if a company poisons you while following EPA regulations you can still sue them, which is not simply wrong but mistakes the nature of the regulatory system completely.
'The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation said the five original nuclear weapons states - The United States, Russia, Britain, France and China - were all parties to the NPT, while the others - Israel, India, Pakistan and North Korea - were "bound by these nuclear disarmament provisions under customary international law."'
It's an excellent point though not a new one. One that is often studiously ignored by the media, so it's good to see it getting a little press. The terms of the NPT are pretty clear, and while they are unfortunately not operational and thus subject to all the normal lawyer tricks... the fact is every signatory has been pretty blatantly violating it almost from the moment of signing. No one has been negotiating in good faith towards eliminating nukes even after being maneuvered into solemnly agreeing on the record to do so.
The mainstream media outlets are always happy to press this case on North Korea. They have ratchetted back and forth a bit over Russia and China, but always at least hostile. Yet how often do they say anything about the other members of this 'club?'
And just how do these nuclear signatories of the NPT expect to have credibility in pushing non-signatory states to accept being bound to it by custom despite having deliberately declined to sign, when they themselves flaunt its obligations?
I could be wrong, I am not in HR and insanity is rampant, but I am at least hoping that is one of the questions they do not even read the answer to.
The entire point is presumably simply to give you an opportunity to lie on the record. If you have sued an employer in the past, being human and thus stupid, you are likely to lie on your application to get your job. On the other hand they are extremely unlikely to spend the money for anything like a serious investigation of your answers before hiring you.
But if you somehow become a pain later, and you lied on your application, they can insta-terminate you at any time by simply "discovering" that fact. Even if you are in a jurisdiction where they have to have cause. And if you are not in such a jurisdiction, having cause is still gravy. So it's later, if at all, that they might actually pay some attention to your answer and consider paying for an investigation to determine its veracity.
On the other hand, if you have sued an employer in the past *and admit it* then there is a very good chance you're substantially more honest and loyal than half the workforce and have a really really good story about how exactly you were forced into that situation against your will. Which HR would love to read one day if they are ever caught up on paperwork and bored with facebook, but for purposes of the interview they might well just skim through it as unimportant without even properly reading it.
Like I said, I could be wrong. Would love to hear replies from HR folks, anonymously is fine, agree or disagree is fine too as long as you tell us *why.*
A successful escape from the gravity well requires a lot of cooperation. It's much easier to simply take the resources you wish, scarce as they are on the planet, than to expand and colonize off-planet. That's a dead-end route, of course, you and your descendents for a few generations rule a dying world, until it dies, and you with it. Whether you manage to hold out until the world dies naturally, or you purify it with nuclear fire, the outcome is essentially the same.
And those dead-end routes are the odds on favorites for any species in our position. Just a few minutes reviewing the news on any randomly chosen day should make that clear. Many nasty characteristics that have been selected for prior to this point suddenly become liabilities. Physical technology has improved dramatically, but our social tech level is little if any improved from its state 10k years ago. If we do not improve the social tech dramatically and very very quickly then we are extremely likely to exterminate ourselves with our physical technology.
I suspect there ARE other species that have crossed this threshold already, actually, but if there are the last thing they would do is let a primitive, violent race like ours know of their existence.
Nice strawman. It exists only in your imagination.
The alternative to regulation, which existed before the latter was invented, is law. Liability law, primarily, although other aspects could certainly be invoked from time to time as well.
Regulation was invented to shield business from liability law, so it makes perfect sense that repealing it would mean a return to liability. It makes no sense at all to assume the alternative is *nothing* but hey, it works better for dismissing me without the discomfort of thinking, right?
"So how long until the BPU commissioners get their nice cushy jobs as lobbyists for Verizon or a Verizon supported trade group?"
More importantly, how many times can someone see this happen and still cling to the absurd belief that government regulation leads to anything other than regulatory capture.
"I'll be damned if an ad on this very site (Slashdot) not only showed a video ad but the damn thing even autoplayed"
Not to defend the crappy code (it's been crappy from day one and unlikely to improve) the other point of failure here is your browser. You should be able to configure it to pass on any website suggestions that involve executing "active content" without your explicit approval. Which is necessary for a large and growing portion of the web, I am afraid, certainly not just slashdot.
"Okay, so among the changes you've made to your terminal is the automatic insertion of a tag to make your slashdot posts monospace to others."
Uh, no. I'm inserting no tags. I have simply made sure my browser is configured to use fonts that work well with my combination of hardware, software, and wetware. A basic task preliminary to actually using the web which one would expect, especially on a supposedly technology oriented website, most people should have already accomplished before they got here.
"But it's 'their browser settings'."
Yes, it is. It's puzzling this seems difficult for you to understand, it's simply the obvious truth. My browser settings do not affect you (or you would see your own posts in my font, which you do not - you are seeing the fonts you have chosen and I am seeing the fonts I have chosen.) Browser settings are stored on the local computer, not on some server somewhere.
"In case you hadn't noticed we have had a quite severe depression, I don't think it's unreasonable to assume it could and probably would have been considerably worse without prompt intervention"
It's very much like treating a hangover with more booze. Yes, it can reduce the pain in the short term, but in the long run it's only making things worse.
I know, right? That was exactly what I thought when I found it. Slashdot is inserting it, not I.
"On that note, why is my browser even interpreting the tt tag"
That is a good question, and one my technologically illiterate stalker should ponder as well. It's probably good in that case for the browser to take the hint and use a monospace font, but it's certainly not required, and there is a reason we have the ability to change the default fonts. If a particular font looks bad on your browser the obvious answer is to choose a different font that does not have this problem.
I use monospaced fonts to render essentially all web content, which is why I see no difference in the font of my posts and yours. They both appear in a very clean easily readable font called anonymous pro. It's monospace so it does not mangle text elements that make use of positional cues, it has a proper '0' rather than a second 'O' misplaced in the numbers section, and these are critical requirements that default fonts lacked across the board.
"Most highly read sites are using layouts like this now because they adapt well to both Mobile and Tablets,"
Except that's bullshit. Absolute and total bullshit.
Platform agnosticism is a basic feature of the web for a reason. If you want to be widely accessible construct and send an actual webpage and let the user agent do its job. Offering an executable instead is bad enough - offering it in the name of accessibility is not a little lie.
"There's the Steam-type which let's be honest very few people complain about"
Bugger off with your kool-aid, mate. Just because a large number of you jack-asses drunk up and like to validate each others failure does not change facts. DRM is DRM and Steam is DRM and you either wear your masters collar or you do not.
At any rate, a new 'Witcher' game with no DRM? If true, I will happily buy it without any dickering. I will confess I am skeptical though. Too many of you idiots out there happy to buy DRM and try to pretend otherwise makes it very tempting for the publishers to simply lie and take your money, you know.
"If you have sold 3 Terabytes per second of data connections, you must have 1.25 Terabytes per second of bandwidth connected to the internet available on your public network."
I disagree. It is a smoking gun. Incompetence rather than malice may be just barely credible, but incompetence at that level amounts to the same thing.
I can tell my employees to break stuff, or I can simply create an incentive structure that motivates them to break stuff and wait. There should be no legal difference between the two acts.
It didnt start with cable companies, but other than that you are right.
And it's not only in the provision of bandwidth where the big players have been determined from day one to kill the internet and build something they can control out of our corpse. It's also in your browser. They were perverting HTML before it was even standardized, and you see that today on every big website (and many small ones as well) - unconscionable bullshit sent out in place of an actual web page.
One tiny example - any blogger site that is flagged for adult content. You get an instant redirect to a non-web page, and unless your browser is configured to execute random executables whenever a remote server wants it to, you will see nothing but a blank page. I doubt many blogger users desire this breakage, but they are powerless, they are not customers, and neither am I. The customers are the advertisers, the lowest and most debased form of humanity.
I am not sure what the answer is. Rampant ignorance and stupidity among web users enables this, and I am afraid I have no solution to the problem. If it were only the willfully ignorant who suffer, that would be ok, but it's not. They destroy it for everyone.
"I've been running this setup for the last 4 years and have not had any problems with it at all."
When it works it's not a problem, obviously. But when something obscure breaks in new and interesting ways for no apparent reason - you'll probably find eliminating the double NAT fixes it.
"My daughter who is an avid gamer has no issues with latency either."
As long as your total latency is relatively low no one is likely to notice it of course. With a fast link and a slow router it might be as much as 10% of total, typically less than that, but that does not mean it's not there. Just one more stop among several but it's the one that can be eliminated and is not actually needed.
You are shifting the goalposts and you are not unique. When pressed, you fall back to a reasonable argument (the risks of vaccination are less than the risks of non-vaccination) but *only after* the initial blanket assertion of 'safety' was challenged.
This pattern will lead to people instinctively questioning your credibility, and frankly it should. Too many people think it's ok to lie as long as it's for a good reason - like convincing your stupid neighbor to do the smart thing when it could affect you both, am I right? No, it's really not ok. Convince her in the short term with a lie - in the long term she is less likely to listen to what you have to say at all.
TFA in the broader sense is fatally flawed as well. It purports to measure acceptance of science, but it measures instead acceptance of scientism, and the two are very different things despite the surface similarities. Scientific thinkers will 'fail' this test on several points, as they habitually doubt everything to begin with, and most especially e.g. cosmological theories developed on the basis of incredibly limited data which can be expected to be revised significantly many times over the next few millenia (if someone survives to do the revisions at least.)
What it's really measuring is whether or not people obediently recite the catechism of the state church, nothing more.
"If you're walking around with a firearm you're almost certainly a <strike>paranoid idiot</strike> loyal and law-abiding US citizen. If the police weren't keeping an eye on you they <strike>wouldn't</strike> might be doing their job."
Not a fixed supply per se, but one that cannot be routinely manipulated to siphon peoples savings into the pockets of the well-connected and already super wealthy would certainly be nice.
The bimetallic standard, for example, did not result in a fixed money supply. New gold and silver are still being mined, after all. But unlike paper money, the expansion was somewhat limited, it takes time, and effort (and money!) to mine precious metals. Supply and demand moderated the expansion as well - when expansion was more desirable the price of the precious metals rose, encouraging mining, and when it was less desirable the price came down, discouraging the same activities.
With fiat money we lost all of those safeguards. The only limitation on inflation is political, not physical or material. And the outcome of that is as predictable as it is tragic - the powerful gain massively (and are happy to send a tiny portion of their windfall out as 'campaign contributions' to those who enable it, of course) while the common people are each 'only' losing a few cents here, a few cents there, not enough to really motivate an effective pushback.
Which means financial collapse is in our future and approaching at a gallop.
Slashdot Mirror
It's a horrible excuse for a website and also seems to fail at journalism.
IBTimes huh? Any relation to TBUpdater?
Not being recognized as a crime works, sure, but it's easier and (from the point of view of a person who does this, at least) more satisfactory to kill two birds with one stone and put someone you dislike in jail for your crime.
Either way works though.
"Can anybody report what the major differences are between the races right now?"
Sure. One human race exists with considerable population. All others have been extinct for thousands of years at this point.
"Law IS regulation. Of behavior. That's kind of the point. Perhaps I'm being pedantic, but you said it.... "
Like most words it has a range of meanings emanating from a basic root meaning. In this case 'to make regular.'
Regulation in the 18th century was in general use in a broad sense, for instance when a shotgun barrel had deteriorated it would be regulated so that all the shot would have equal access to smooth bore again. 'Regulating trade' was understood to mean prohibiting barriers and distortions in trade, not decreeing the details of how trade could and could not be carried out, but just making sure that a farmer from one side of a state line had access to markets on the same terms as the farmer on the other side of the state line did.
But in this century when you hear someone speak of 'regulation' they are normally referring to the system that became important nationally in the 1930s where a 'regulatory agency' is created which then sets and enforces rules across an industry. I thought this meaning was clearly intended from the context.
"I have to keep asking me to show them a free market anywhere in the world. Anywhere. It's a mythical beast used in econ101 textbooks."
You sound like a creationist patiently explaining that no one has ever witnessed evolution. You're both wrong, too. There are free markets all over the world, even (perhaps especially) in the midst of the most oppressive systems on earth people come together for consensual trading constantly, in back streets if not in public squares. Productive human economic activities depends on the market and even where prohibited it arises because it must. Even in the darkest days of the Soviet Union markets continued to function and sustain life, and even today in North Korea the same is true, there are markets where one can buy everything from rice to uncensored internet even in a rigid Marxist dictatorship.
"Then I have to ask them how We the People have punished ANY of the companies that have screwed us over in recent decades. Please. They can't."
And that's a direct consequence of adopting the regulatory system. In order to get punished they would have to be caught breaking the regulations, and that could only happen through tremendous stupidity on their part, since they have ready avenues to influence and alter those regulations in whatever direction they want instead.
"So... before regulation, which, I imagine has existed for a long time, really ever since there has BEEN government, there was liability law? What? "
Well there's your first mistake. In the US, at least, the predominant legal model for business was still liability, not regulation, up into the first part of last century. This means that in regards to, well lets says environmental damage. Let's say you live upstream to me and you are poisoning my water supply, not on purpose, but as a side effect of your business. The liability remedy is to go to civil court and seek an injunction (to stop future harm) as well as a monetary judgement.
To some this seems too permissive for business (since there is really no prior restraint, they can go ahead and try what they want to try and if it turns out it was a bad idea later, the court may not really be able to make the people they harmed whole.) But too many of the wealthiest players it seemed too restrictive by far, and unfair to them specifically since they have more to lose in a judgement.
The modern regulatory system was just starting to take form in 1906 with the Pure Food and Drug act, and did not really take hold of the economy until the 30s. And what it does is say, the bureaucrats now have the authority to make rules concerning allowable amounts of poison, garbage, etc. and as long as you follow their rules in good faith, you are immune to civil suits for the damage you are causing! Just as long as it was within regulations.
Sure, it sounds reasonable. Until you factor in the known reality of regulatory capture.
And yes, judicial corruption could have the same effect. But the judiciary at least can be expected to be somewhat resistant to capture. Judges almost never sit on cases where one of the parties is a likely future employer. They are only supposed to know the law, and rely on expert witnesses for technical knowledge outside their field, while regulators instead must be hired specifically for knowledge of the industry they are to regulate, and the skills they learn on the job are in the same field as well, and this leaves being the regulator or the regulatee as their two main options for employment, so capture is effectively guaranteed.
I am not trying to be rude but your argument is wildly historically inaccurate. You think we had a 'sweet spot' and we can get it again but you also think that a system that has existed for approximately a century has been around for centuries if not millenia as well. You assert that if a company poisons you while following EPA regulations you can still sue them, which is not simply wrong but mistakes the nature of the regulatory system completely.
You do that with your credit card initially, and afterwards by logging into your account.
'The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation said the five original nuclear weapons states - The United States, Russia, Britain, France and China - were all parties to the NPT, while the others - Israel, India, Pakistan and North Korea - were "bound by these nuclear disarmament provisions under customary international law."'
It's an excellent point though not a new one. One that is often studiously ignored by the media, so it's good to see it getting a little press. The terms of the NPT are pretty clear, and while they are unfortunately not operational and thus subject to all the normal lawyer tricks... the fact is every signatory has been pretty blatantly violating it almost from the moment of signing. No one has been negotiating in good faith towards eliminating nukes even after being maneuvered into solemnly agreeing on the record to do so.
The mainstream media outlets are always happy to press this case on North Korea. They have ratchetted back and forth a bit over Russia and China, but always at least hostile. Yet how often do they say anything about the other members of this 'club?'
And just how do these nuclear signatories of the NPT expect to have credibility in pushing non-signatory states to accept being bound to it by custom despite having deliberately declined to sign, when they themselves flaunt its obligations?
I could be wrong, I am not in HR and insanity is rampant, but I am at least hoping that is one of the questions they do not even read the answer to.
The entire point is presumably simply to give you an opportunity to lie on the record. If you have sued an employer in the past, being human and thus stupid, you are likely to lie on your application to get your job. On the other hand they are extremely unlikely to spend the money for anything like a serious investigation of your answers before hiring you.
But if you somehow become a pain later, and you lied on your application, they can insta-terminate you at any time by simply "discovering" that fact. Even if you are in a jurisdiction where they have to have cause. And if you are not in such a jurisdiction, having cause is still gravy. So it's later, if at all, that they might actually pay some attention to your answer and consider paying for an investigation to determine its veracity.
On the other hand, if you have sued an employer in the past *and admit it* then there is a very good chance you're substantially more honest and loyal than half the workforce and have a really really good story about how exactly you were forced into that situation against your will. Which HR would love to read one day if they are ever caught up on paperwork and bored with facebook, but for purposes of the interview they might well just skim through it as unimportant without even properly reading it.
Like I said, I could be wrong. Would love to hear replies from HR folks, anonymously is fine, agree or disagree is fine too as long as you tell us *why.*
No, I think you are essentially correct.
And this is the "Great Filter."
A successful escape from the gravity well requires a lot of cooperation. It's much easier to simply take the resources you wish, scarce as they are on the planet, than to expand and colonize off-planet. That's a dead-end route, of course, you and your descendents for a few generations rule a dying world, until it dies, and you with it. Whether you manage to hold out until the world dies naturally, or you purify it with nuclear fire, the outcome is essentially the same.
And those dead-end routes are the odds on favorites for any species in our position. Just a few minutes reviewing the news on any randomly chosen day should make that clear. Many nasty characteristics that have been selected for prior to this point suddenly become liabilities. Physical technology has improved dramatically, but our social tech level is little if any improved from its state 10k years ago. If we do not improve the social tech dramatically and very very quickly then we are extremely likely to exterminate ourselves with our physical technology.
I suspect there ARE other species that have crossed this threshold already, actually, but if there are the last thing they would do is let a primitive, violent race like ours know of their existence.
Nice strawman. It exists only in your imagination.
The alternative to regulation, which existed before the latter was invented, is law. Liability law, primarily, although other aspects could certainly be invoked from time to time as well.
Regulation was invented to shield business from liability law, so it makes perfect sense that repealing it would mean a return to liability. It makes no sense at all to assume the alternative is *nothing* but hey, it works better for dismissing me without the discomfort of thinking, right?
"So how long until the BPU commissioners get their nice cushy jobs as lobbyists for Verizon or a Verizon supported trade group?"
More importantly, how many times can someone see this happen and still cling to the absurd belief that government regulation leads to anything other than regulatory capture.
"I'll be damned if an ad on this very site (Slashdot) not only showed a video ad but the damn thing even autoplayed"
Not to defend the crappy code (it's been crappy from day one and unlikely to improve) the other point of failure here is your browser. You should be able to configure it to pass on any website suggestions that involve executing "active content" without your explicit approval. Which is necessary for a large and growing portion of the web, I am afraid, certainly not just slashdot.
"Okay, so among the changes you've made to your terminal is the automatic insertion of a tag to make your slashdot posts monospace to others."
Uh, no. I'm inserting no tags. I have simply made sure my browser is configured to use fonts that work well with my combination of hardware, software, and wetware. A basic task preliminary to actually using the web which one would expect, especially on a supposedly technology oriented website, most people should have already accomplished before they got here.
"But it's 'their browser settings'."
Yes, it is. It's puzzling this seems difficult for you to understand, it's simply the obvious truth. My browser settings do not affect you (or you would see your own posts in my font, which you do not - you are seeing the fonts you have chosen and I am seeing the fonts I have chosen.) Browser settings are stored on the local computer, not on some server somewhere.
"In case you hadn't noticed we have had a quite severe depression, I don't think it's unreasonable to assume it could and probably would have been considerably worse without prompt intervention"
It's very much like treating a hangover with more booze. Yes, it can reduce the pain in the short term, but in the long run it's only making things worse.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTQnarzmTOc
"Who the hell uses the tt tag?!"
I know, right? That was exactly what I thought when I found it. Slashdot is inserting it, not I.
"On that note, why is my browser even interpreting the tt tag"
That is a good question, and one my technologically illiterate stalker should ponder as well. It's probably good in that case for the browser to take the hint and use a monospace font, but it's certainly not required, and there is a reason we have the ability to change the default fonts. If a particular font looks bad on your browser the obvious answer is to choose a different font that does not have this problem.
I use monospaced fonts to render essentially all web content, which is why I see no difference in the font of my posts and yours. They both appear in a very clean easily readable font called anonymous pro. It's monospace so it does not mangle text elements that make use of positional cues, it has a proper '0' rather than a second 'O' misplaced in the numbers section, and these are critical requirements that default fonts lacked across the board.
"Most highly read sites are using layouts like this now because they adapt well to both Mobile and Tablets,"
Except that's bullshit. Absolute and total bullshit.
Platform agnosticism is a basic feature of the web for a reason. If you want to be widely accessible construct and send an actual webpage and let the user agent do its job. Offering an executable instead is bad enough - offering it in the name of accessibility is not a little lie.
"There's the Steam-type which let's be honest very few people complain about"
Bugger off with your kool-aid, mate. Just because a large number of you jack-asses drunk up and like to validate each others failure does not change facts. DRM is DRM and Steam is DRM and you either wear your masters collar or you do not.
At any rate, a new 'Witcher' game with no DRM? If true, I will happily buy it without any dickering. I will confess I am skeptical though. Too many of you idiots out there happy to buy DRM and try to pretend otherwise makes it very tempting for the publishers to simply lie and take your money, you know.
"If you have sold 3 Terabytes per second of data connections, you must have 1.25 Terabytes per second of bandwidth connected to the internet available on your public network."
No, you should have 3. WTF?
I disagree. It is a smoking gun. Incompetence rather than malice may be just barely credible, but incompetence at that level amounts to the same thing.
I can tell my employees to break stuff, or I can simply create an incentive structure that motivates them to break stuff and wait. There should be no legal difference between the two acts.
It didnt start with cable companies, but other than that you are right.
And it's not only in the provision of bandwidth where the big players have been determined from day one to kill the internet and build something they can control out of our corpse. It's also in your browser. They were perverting HTML before it was even standardized, and you see that today on every big website (and many small ones as well) - unconscionable bullshit sent out in place of an actual web page.
One tiny example - any blogger site that is flagged for adult content. You get an instant redirect to a non-web page, and unless your browser is configured to execute random executables whenever a remote server wants it to, you will see nothing but a blank page. I doubt many blogger users desire this breakage, but they are powerless, they are not customers, and neither am I. The customers are the advertisers, the lowest and most debased form of humanity.
I am not sure what the answer is. Rampant ignorance and stupidity among web users enables this, and I am afraid I have no solution to the problem. If it were only the willfully ignorant who suffer, that would be ok, but it's not. They destroy it for everyone.
NBC News really needs to either figure out WWW technology, or die.
"I've been running this setup for the last 4 years and have not had any problems with it at all."
When it works it's not a problem, obviously. But when something obscure breaks in new and interesting ways for no apparent reason - you'll probably find eliminating the double NAT fixes it.
"My daughter who is an avid gamer has no issues with latency either."
As long as your total latency is relatively low no one is likely to notice it of course. With a fast link and a slow router it might be as much as 10% of total, typically less than that, but that does not mean it's not there. Just one more stop among several but it's the one that can be eliminated and is not actually needed.
You are shifting the goalposts and you are not unique. When pressed, you fall back to a reasonable argument (the risks of vaccination are less than the risks of non-vaccination) but *only after* the initial blanket assertion of 'safety' was challenged.
This pattern will lead to people instinctively questioning your credibility, and frankly it should. Too many people think it's ok to lie as long as it's for a good reason - like convincing your stupid neighbor to do the smart thing when it could affect you both, am I right? No, it's really not ok. Convince her in the short term with a lie - in the long term she is less likely to listen to what you have to say at all.
TFA in the broader sense is fatally flawed as well. It purports to measure acceptance of science, but it measures instead acceptance of scientism, and the two are very different things despite the surface similarities. Scientific thinkers will 'fail' this test on several points, as they habitually doubt everything to begin with, and most especially e.g. cosmological theories developed on the basis of incredibly limited data which can be expected to be revised significantly many times over the next few millenia (if someone survives to do the revisions at least.)
What it's really measuring is whether or not people obediently recite the catechism of the state church, nothing more.
"If you're walking around with a firearm you're almost certainly a <strike>paranoid idiot</strike> loyal and law-abiding US citizen. If the police weren't keeping an eye on you they <strike>wouldn't</strike> might be doing their job."
Fixed that for you.
"You would prefer a fixed money supply?"
Not a fixed supply per se, but one that cannot be routinely manipulated to siphon peoples savings into the pockets of the well-connected and already super wealthy would certainly be nice.
The bimetallic standard, for example, did not result in a fixed money supply. New gold and silver are still being mined, after all. But unlike paper money, the expansion was somewhat limited, it takes time, and effort (and money!) to mine precious metals. Supply and demand moderated the expansion as well - when expansion was more desirable the price of the precious metals rose, encouraging mining, and when it was less desirable the price came down, discouraging the same activities.
With fiat money we lost all of those safeguards. The only limitation on inflation is political, not physical or material. And the outcome of that is as predictable as it is tragic - the powerful gain massively (and are happy to send a tiny portion of their windfall out as 'campaign contributions' to those who enable it, of course) while the common people are each 'only' losing a few cents here, a few cents there, not enough to really motivate an effective pushback.
Which means financial collapse is in our future and approaching at a gallop.