Last time I checked, "fascist states" like China and North Korea had no problem regulating content on the internet (the ongoing Cisco fiasco, the Yahoo debacle in China, etc.). For that matter, organizations like the MPAA and RIAA don't even have a big problem regulating content on the internet here in North America, with the help of the U.S. gov't.
The problem isn't so much one of controlling content, it's the problem of controlling tax bases and influencing the future direction of the internet. And like it or not, the future direction of the internet is going to involve surveillance and lots of it from every possible government. The tax base problem is already being faced by low-tax regimes that allow international corporations to incorporate in their jurisdiction but lack the connectivity to make an online business viable there. So businesses (now mainly online gaming and porn) deal with a North American or European hosting company, but are incroporated in a low tax jurisdiction in the Carribean, which puts them into a legal gray area for taxation purposes. Are they doing business in the Caymans where they are incorporated, or in Texas, where their servers are hosted? Although some laws exist to address this, most countries still see this as a source of tax leakage.
And the two things that really get governments riled up are not being able to collect taxes and not being able to spy on people.
You're right about Knoppix not being any faster, but it does look better (and I'm a GNOME fan). So at least when you're showing your MCSE brother in law what this new fangled "Leeenuks" thing is he can see some bright colors and flashy things to keep his attention span. Also, if I remember right, Mandrake / Mandriva has / had a similar idea, with Mandrake on a portable hard drive. Does anyone have any idea how that sold?
You're absolutely right that not everyone who cries environmental foul is right, or even legitimate. But when this woman received letters from Environment Canada (like the EPA) about her efforts, this lends a bit of credibility to her claims. Also, the fact that this development company didn't post a rebuttal that disproved her claims but rather filed a lawsuit intending to shut her up and shut her site down makes me think she was on to something.
This sounds like a good idea, but does it apply to sites and businesses in Canada? Our laws are usually designed to be as incomprehensible and ineffective as possible, which makes me think that something as practical as insuring your business / site against slander would be illegal here.
IANAL, but I think that here in Canada it's up to the presiding judge's discretion as to who pays the legal fees. I think you're right that the losing party can or usually does pay a portion of the victor's bill, but I'm not certain it's an automatic rule. Having had one experience with this kind of thing, that's what my lawyer told me at the time, anyway.
I love Ubuntu and I've ran it on my desktop and my notebook for almost a year now without a hitch, but I don't see the upside to using it for this application. Portable units like this are generally used for rescue service or showing off Linux to would be converts. And although Ubuntu has good hardware support, etc. it's not an overly zippy distro to begin with so running it off of a USB hard drive is going to slow it down so much that anyone watching you wait for 4 minutes to boot up your new, supposedly better OS is going to laugh at you and run back to Windows (especially when they see the default Ubuntu theme). As far as rescue service goes, Knothing Beats Knoppix. So I'm just wondering what niche this would fit into.
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Last time I checked, "fascist states" like China and North Korea had no problem regulating content on the internet (the ongoing Cisco fiasco, the Yahoo debacle in China, etc.). For that matter, organizations like the MPAA and RIAA don't even have a big problem regulating content on the internet here in North America, with the help of the U.S. gov't. The problem isn't so much one of controlling content, it's the problem of controlling tax bases and influencing the future direction of the internet. And like it or not, the future direction of the internet is going to involve surveillance and lots of it from every possible government. The tax base problem is already being faced by low-tax regimes that allow international corporations to incorporate in their jurisdiction but lack the connectivity to make an online business viable there. So businesses (now mainly online gaming and porn) deal with a North American or European hosting company, but are incroporated in a low tax jurisdiction in the Carribean, which puts them into a legal gray area for taxation purposes. Are they doing business in the Caymans where they are incorporated, or in Texas, where their servers are hosted? Although some laws exist to address this, most countries still see this as a source of tax leakage. And the two things that really get governments riled up are not being able to collect taxes and not being able to spy on people.
You're right about Knoppix not being any faster, but it does look better (and I'm a GNOME fan). So at least when you're showing your MCSE brother in law what this new fangled "Leeenuks" thing is he can see some bright colors and flashy things to keep his attention span. Also, if I remember right, Mandrake / Mandriva has / had a similar idea, with Mandrake on a portable hard drive. Does anyone have any idea how that sold?
Even if their MP3 player did kill you, they would only be on the hook for five bucks (eerily enough, also in the EULA).
You're absolutely right that not everyone who cries environmental foul is right, or even legitimate. But when this woman received letters from Environment Canada (like the EPA) about her efforts, this lends a bit of credibility to her claims. Also, the fact that this development company didn't post a rebuttal that disproved her claims but rather filed a lawsuit intending to shut her up and shut her site down makes me think she was on to something.
This sounds like a good idea, but does it apply to sites and businesses in Canada? Our laws are usually designed to be as incomprehensible and ineffective as possible, which makes me think that something as practical as insuring your business / site against slander would be illegal here.
IANAL, but I think that here in Canada it's up to the presiding judge's discretion as to who pays the legal fees. I think you're right that the losing party can or usually does pay a portion of the victor's bill, but I'm not certain it's an automatic rule. Having had one experience with this kind of thing, that's what my lawyer told me at the time, anyway.
I love Ubuntu and I've ran it on my desktop and my notebook for almost a year now without a hitch, but I don't see the upside to using it for this application. Portable units like this are generally used for rescue service or showing off Linux to would be converts. And although Ubuntu has good hardware support, etc. it's not an overly zippy distro to begin with so running it off of a USB hard drive is going to slow it down so much that anyone watching you wait for 4 minutes to boot up your new, supposedly better OS is going to laugh at you and run back to Windows (especially when they see the default Ubuntu theme). As far as rescue service goes, Knothing Beats Knoppix. So I'm just wondering what niche this would fit into.