Sure fire 100% guaranteed way...to not get sued for pirating movies.
Don't pirate movies.
Tell that to people the RIAA sued but yet had never heard of Napster, Limewire, Kazaa, etc.
Blame it on dynamic IPs, unsecured wifi, or even malfeasance on part of the RIAA and MPAA but not downloading does not protect you from being sued. Heck, even running tor might possibly be a liability, because you then become part of the distribution network.
I've never understood the whole thing about tax write offs.
If I'm rich and I invest a million pounds cash in a film that makes no profit, I've lost a million pounds in cash.
If you own a business and buy a car personally, you can write off a percentage of the costs, or you can write off mileage.
If you own a business and lease or buy the car through the business, it's 100% a business expense and a writeoff. Sure, you needed to buy the car anyhow, but now you can deduct it.
(for me writing off mileage is actually more advantageous due to the miles I drive)
If you own a film production company and invest a million dollars in the film, and you work for your company and contractually oblige the company to pay you one million in salary plus points on the gross (with a minimum guaranteed), you just created a loss (at least on paper), got your million back and can write off the million as an expense (and will have to pay income tax on that one million you paid yourself but it will be less than if you had not invested it) and the "loss" of the contractual liability the company now has.
I'm more than a little embarrassed to admit that I quite enjoyed Rampage. Boll's bad cinematography actually makes the movie work in a way I didn't expect.
The voltage+current surges required to destroy the power grid are enormous. The power required to fry a VSLI is miniscule - especially for modern ICs that run at 1.5V. I'm sure a "perfect storm" could scale down accordingly and cause damage to some smaller devices in regions that are receiving a particularly strong blast. The thing is, it's an unknown and even the "experts" (in quotes because it's all just hypothesis having never truly been observed with modern instrumentation on the scale that is feared in this speculative article) in the field are questioning what the extent of the damage will be if we get the equivalent (or worse) to the storm of 1859.
We rely so much on technology - how could you get by? Coal is hard to come by, most of us do not know how to smelt iron (I sure don't), fireplaces are not present in most homes now, and most of us do not own horses, so just surviving in modern society could prove to be extremely difficult in colder climates in an industrialized region. The Amish will be laughing at us saying "we told you English that modern conveniences are nothing but trouble."
What are the chances of such a major storm hitting, AND the conditions being exactly right to take out the entire power grid and induce enough voltage to fry household and office electronics, and the ECUs in our cars/trucks/SUVs? Probably very slim at best. The paranoid among us might want to run out and vehicles with diesel engines though.;)
As long as you keep a spare car battery to recharge any bionics that require that, and provided that the outage doesn't last too long, I'd expect something like a pacemaker to be just fine.
I haven't heard of any rechargeable defibrillators/pacemakers. They usually have lithium ion or nuclear (Pu-238) batteries, don't they?
GPS and cars are mentioned because its the satellites themselves that are vulnerable. The "ipods etc" stuff in the telegraph, assuming there's any reasoning behind their inclusion in the article at all, beyond scaring telegraph readers, will be just because they need recharged regularly.
The problem is that is an unknown. An EMP from a solar storm isn't going to discharge the batteries - the potential energy is going to be there from the oxides, sulfates/sulfites, or other chemical storage type the battery is designed around. The problem is the EMP will induce current and the potential is there for it to fry integrated circuits. Check this out:
The auroral current could be used for transmitting and receiving telegraphic dispatches. This was done between 8:30 and 11:00 in the morning, on September 2, 1859, on the wires of the American Telegraph Company between Boston and Portland, and upon the wires of the Old Colony and Fall River Railroad Company between South Braintree and Fall River, among others. The length of time during each positive wave was only, however, 15 to 60 seconds. The following account came from between Boston and Portland.
Boston operator (to Portland operator): “Please cut off your battery [power source] entirely for fifteen minutes.” Portland operator: “Will do so. It is now disconnected.” Boston: “Mine is disconnected, and we are working with the auroral current. How do you receive my writing?” Portland: “Better than with our batteries on. – Current comes and goes gradually.” Boston: “My current is very strong at times, and we can work better without the batteries, as the aurora seems to neutralize and augment our batteries alternately, making current too strong at times for our relay magnets. Suppose we work without batteries while we are affected by this trouble.” Portland: “Very well. Shall I go ahead with business?” Boston: “Yes. Go ahead.”
At which point, the Boston operator began transcribing 19th Century Vintage erotica.
The conversation was carried on for around two hours using no battery power at all and working solely with the current induced by the aurora, and it was said that this was the first time on record that more than a word or two was transmitted in such manner.
Keep in mind that over the long distance (even if it's just Portland, ME and not Portland, OR) it requires more than a few volts to traverse the distance and run those electromagnets due to transmission losses. Any voltage+current strong enough to run the electromagnets in those telegraph stations is probably way more than enough to fry modern integrated circuits.
You can buy an "officially" unlocked phone from Apple or AT&T if you are willing to pay full price. In the US those phones are intended primarily for developers but anyone can buy one.
However you can get around getting sodomized on the price if you travel internationally; if you travel to China or any of the EU member states, or if you have a relative or friend who lives abroad, you can buy an unlocked iPhone anywhere for the normal price as those countries do not allow tying of a phone to a service. Apple will not ship outside the country of purchase so if you live in the US you can't be slick and order one from Apple in Germany, for example.
I don't know why Apple caters to the carriers - Apple has reached the point in the market where they can dictate the rules to AT&T, Rogers, etc.
Do you really want a blu-ray player, AND an HTPC, AND an Xbox 360, etc. cluttering up your living room (or in the case of some slashdotters, mom's basement;))? I for one, do not. I do like components for my stereo system, but when it comes to blu-ray, HTPC, and gaming consoles - those are all tasks well suited for a single device.
So yes, Blu-ray would be a valuable feature at this juncture.
I'm sorry, I can't picture current Xbox 360 owners lining up to buy new consoles for this incremental upgrade. The few people left who are into gaming but don't yet own an Xbox are the only real market for it, and personally I've been holding out hoping that they (Microsoft) will finally concede that HD-DVD was a huge mistake and release an Xbox 360 with blu-ray. NIH (not invented here) has never been a problem for Microsoft (since they usually copy everyone else - poorly), so why is it a problem when it comes to Blu-ray?
I might buy this Xbox - but then again, I might wait a bit longer. I already have a rack full of AV components so do I really need another box to further increase clutter?
Where is Blu-ray? I know, Ballmer, offering blu-ray would be admitting you were wrong, but getting Windows 7 out so quickly after the monstrosity known as "Vista" is a pretty loud admission that you do fuck up now and then. You're only compounding it by not embracing blu-ray while the rest of the world already has.
I'll admit, I do want an XBox 360, and while it's nice the power supply, wifi, and HDD are all now internal, what I am waiting on is blu-ray. I want it more as a media extender/STB more than anything else, primarily for Hulu and Netflix, and possibly for Rockband 3 once the "real" keyboard comes out.
Ruby, python, perl, flash, mono, java... There's valid reasons to not want all this crud on customers devices, there's also valid reasons for specialist apps to bundle runtimes.
But I could see lawsuits coming if they raised speed limits to reasonable levels, but then some dork wipes out on a turn and sues the state because they were trying to "keep up" with the posted limits.
So we should have a system similar to Germany: no limit during the day through off-peak hours in rural areas, a reasonable limit during rush hour, reasonable speed limits in urban areas, and "reasonable and prudent" during night time or inclement/grey weather.
However: they should enforce the following STRICTLY at ALL times: failure to yield the right of way, tailgating, improper lane changes, improper turns, California stops., running traffic signals (and yellows should all be at LEAST 3.6 seconds), impeding the flow of traffic, traveling in the left lane, passing on the right, traveling in the breakdown lane, and so forth. Incidentally, those are actually the issues that cause accidents, not speeding and not talking on cellphones. If those are enforced strictly, the "distracted driving" issue becomes moot as those laws are redundant and more difficult to enforce than the actual traffic violations.
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Shop for antique buggy whips? ;)
Since citizens are technically the employer. . .
I would like to review ALL of Obama's texts. Now.
So, are you saying I need to RTFA? OH NOES! That is not the /. way! ;)
Could you please convert that to "volkswagens?"
How would they withstand high winds from the likes of thunderstorms, hurricanes/typhoons, and so on?
Don't forget - Futurama marks its return on June 24 at 22:00 (10:00pm for you non geeks) on Comedy Central
Well, there is the scene with Denise Richards. . .
Well with Jobs' ego surpassing that of Darth Vader or Palpatine, he can change the terms of the contract at will and AT&T will kiss his feet.
Hey, if AT&T can do it to subscribers, why can't Apple do it to AT&T?
Tell that to people the RIAA sued but yet had never heard of Napster, Limewire, Kazaa, etc.
Blame it on dynamic IPs, unsecured wifi, or even malfeasance on part of the RIAA and MPAA but not downloading does not protect you from being sued. Heck, even running tor might possibly be a liability, because you then become part of the distribution network.
If you own a business and buy a car personally, you can write off a percentage of the costs, or you can write off mileage.
If you own a business and lease or buy the car through the business, it's 100% a business expense and a writeoff. Sure, you needed to buy the car anyhow, but now you can deduct it.
(for me writing off mileage is actually more advantageous due to the miles I drive)
If you own a film production company and invest a million dollars in the film, and you work for your company and contractually oblige the company to pay you one million in salary plus points on the gross (with a minimum guaranteed), you just created a loss (at least on paper), got your million back and can write off the million as an expense (and will have to pay income tax on that one million you paid yourself but it will be less than if you had not invested it) and the "loss" of the contractual liability the company now has.
There is no such thing. Next thing you know, you will be claiming they made a sequel to Highlander.
I heard of that but never saw it.
It took "midichlorians" to destroy Star Wars for me.
you forgot:
Really? ;)
Can you post a link to a torrent?
The voltage+current surges required to destroy the power grid are enormous. The power required to fry a VSLI is miniscule - especially for modern ICs that run at 1.5V. I'm sure a "perfect storm" could scale down accordingly and cause damage to some smaller devices in regions that are receiving a particularly strong blast. The thing is, it's an unknown and even the "experts" (in quotes because it's all just hypothesis having never truly been observed with modern instrumentation on the scale that is feared in this speculative article) in the field are questioning what the extent of the damage will be if we get the equivalent (or worse) to the storm of 1859.
We rely so much on technology - how could you get by? Coal is hard to come by, most of us do not know how to smelt iron (I sure don't), fireplaces are not present in most homes now, and most of us do not own horses, so just surviving in modern society could prove to be extremely difficult in colder climates in an industrialized region. The Amish will be laughing at us saying "we told you English that modern conveniences are nothing but trouble."
What are the chances of such a major storm hitting, AND the conditions being exactly right to take out the entire power grid and induce enough voltage to fry household and office electronics, and the ECUs in our cars/trucks/SUVs? Probably very slim at best. The paranoid among us might want to run out and vehicles with diesel engines though. ;)
I haven't heard of any rechargeable defibrillators/pacemakers. They usually have lithium ion or nuclear (Pu-238) batteries, don't they?
The problem is that is an unknown. An EMP from a solar storm isn't going to discharge the batteries - the potential energy is going to be there from the oxides, sulfates/sulfites, or other chemical storage type the battery is designed around. The problem is the EMP will induce current and the potential is there for it to fry integrated circuits. Check this out:
From http://oddculture.com/culture/the-solar-super-storm-of-1859/ :
Keep in mind that over the long distance (even if it's just Portland, ME and not Portland, OR) it requires more than a few volts to traverse the distance and run those electromagnets due to transmission losses. Any voltage+current strong enough to run the electromagnets in those telegraph stations is probably way more than enough to fry modern integrated circuits.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_storm_of_1859
http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2003/23oct_superstorm/
You can buy an "officially" unlocked phone from Apple or AT&T if you are willing to pay full price. In the US those phones are intended primarily for developers but anyone can buy one.
http://www.iphoneuserguide.com/apple/2009/07/02/iphone3g/buy-iphone-3gs-from-apple-online-unlocked/
However you can get around getting sodomized on the price if you travel internationally; if you travel to China or any of the EU member states, or if you have a relative or friend who lives abroad, you can buy an unlocked iPhone anywhere for the normal price as those countries do not allow tying of a phone to a service. Apple will not ship outside the country of purchase so if you live in the US you can't be slick and order one from Apple in Germany, for example.
I don't know why Apple caters to the carriers - Apple has reached the point in the market where they can dictate the rules to AT&T, Rogers, etc.
Do you really want a blu-ray player, AND an HTPC, AND an Xbox 360, etc. cluttering up your living room (or in the case of some slashdotters, mom's basement ;))? I for one, do not. I do like components for my stereo system, but when it comes to blu-ray, HTPC, and gaming consoles - those are all tasks well suited for a single device.
So yes, Blu-ray would be a valuable feature at this juncture.
I'm sorry, I can't picture current Xbox 360 owners lining up to buy new consoles for this incremental upgrade. The few people left who are into gaming but don't yet own an Xbox are the only real market for it, and personally I've been holding out hoping that they (Microsoft) will finally concede that HD-DVD was a huge mistake and release an Xbox 360 with blu-ray. NIH (not invented here) has never been a problem for Microsoft (since they usually copy everyone else - poorly), so why is it a problem when it comes to Blu-ray?
I might buy this Xbox - but then again, I might wait a bit longer. I already have a rack full of AV components so do I really need another box to further increase clutter?
No blu-ray, no new features, smaller, and positioned as a must-buy?
Gee, where have I seen this before? I know I have seen similar restylings that offered no real improvement.
Where is Blu-ray? I know, Ballmer, offering blu-ray would be admitting you were wrong, but getting Windows 7 out so quickly after the monstrosity known as "Vista" is a pretty loud admission that you do fuck up now and then. You're only compounding it by not embracing blu-ray while the rest of the world already has.
I'll admit, I do want an XBox 360, and while it's nice the power supply, wifi, and HDD are all now internal, what I am waiting on is blu-ray. I want it more as a media extender/STB more than anything else, primarily for Hulu and Netflix, and possibly for Rockband 3 once the "real" keyboard comes out.
It's the device you will be using to watch Futurama when it returns on June 24, 2010. :)
Since when are Ruby and Python crud?
I'll bet certain senators are discussing the possiblity of setting up a series of such tubes, and then letting the Internet soak it all up!
Haven't chefs been using cheesecloth and other cloths to separate oil from other liquids for many years now?
So we should have a system similar to Germany: no limit during the day through off-peak hours in rural areas, a reasonable limit during rush hour, reasonable speed limits in urban areas, and "reasonable and prudent" during night time or inclement/grey weather.
However: they should enforce the following STRICTLY at ALL times: failure to yield the right of way, tailgating, improper lane changes, improper turns, California stops., running traffic signals (and yellows should all be at LEAST 3.6 seconds), impeding the flow of traffic, traveling in the left lane, passing on the right, traveling in the breakdown lane, and so forth. Incidentally, those are actually the issues that cause accidents, not speeding and not talking on cellphones. If those are enforced strictly, the "distracted driving" issue becomes moot as those laws are redundant and more difficult to enforce than the actual traffic violations.
What crime? Who is the injured party in the case of speeding?
20,000 times less? You don't have enough variables mentioned to use that phrase.
ITYM "1/20,000" or you could maybe say the RIAA wants 20,000 times the damages BP has to pay for coastline damages.
Sorry, the "(n) times less" thing bothers me as much as less vs. more and their/there/they're.