Prozac. You'll find that *ALMOST* all of the kids who do this stuff are on Prozac
This talking point brought to you by the Church of Scientology. Just trust in Scientology alone to maintain your sanity, look at everything it has done for Tom Cruise...
A problem with this line of reasoning is that we aren't talking about whether or not the kid committed a crime. The police decided that he did not, and chose not to arrest him for any crime.
However, what the kid did was a violation of school policy, and for that he was suspended, which is a valid punishment under the school policy.
This has nothing to do with prosecution of thought crimes or anything of that nature. There are certain things that you are not allowed to do in certain circumstances, even though those actions may be legal. Criminal law is not the only collection of rules that a person must follow.
word of the day on your google homepage? cause I know I've been trying to use that word since it came up a few days ago....
Checking Google, it appears that this was the word of the day for August 22nd, 2005, better than nine months ago... You might want to consider cutting back on the skinny cigarettes, they appear to be affecting your time sense...:)
If what you say were true, it would be perfectly fine to use a telescope to peek into every window you could see.. You are not distributing anything there..
Last time I checked however, this is not considered legal..
Exactly... And it is also not considered legal to freely distribute someone else's copyrighted work. I'm having real difficulty here understanding why people can't put together the facts on this issue.
Simple breakdown: (we'll use a music CD as an example)
You have a writer that pens the lyrics to the next great chart topping song. You have the performer who sings it. You have the producer that records it. You have the record label that presses it onto CDs, packages it and sells it. Together, they have created a series of rules as to how the product of their work can be used. They generally state that you can listen to their product privately, and not for profit. They have separate agreements with radio stations and other broadcasters who pay other fees for the usage.
They offer their product to you under these terms for a certain amount of money. If you agree to the terms that they offer, you give them the money, and they give you a CD which contains a copy of their work. You own the CD, but your purchase agreement doesn't give you ownership of the recorded work on the CD, just the right to use that work in a manner consistent with the agreement that you made.
Then someone decides to break the agreement by making copies of the work and giving it away for free. I understand that there are people on Slashdot who believe that they can do whatever they want simply because they want to do it, but the fact is that what is happening is violating the rights of the people who own the recording.
It doesn't matter whether you believe that it isn't that big of a deal, or whether you believe that you aren't really stealing anything. It doesn't matter that you believe that you really own the contents of the CD you purchased. You can believe that you own the Golden Gate bridge, but just try crossing it without paying the toll...
For the most part, neither the RIAA or anyone else really cares about people who are copying a CD for use in their car while leaving the original at home. They really don't care all that much about someone that gives a copy to a friend. What they have a problem with are the services out there that allow you to freely give out thousands of copies of music that they paid to produce, package, and market.
I do agree that if the MPAA did what they are being accused of, then they are even bigger criminals than TorrentSpy. And while it may be a bit cliche to state "Two Wrongs Don't Make a Right", it is the truth. Just listen to your mothers from time to time...
You are absolutely correct. A large part of this discussion is fed by the frustration that comes from a very difficult definition.
Technically, the recording companies do have the right to define in fairly rigid terms how you may use the content that you purchase on CDs or on iTunes. In many cases, it appears that the way they define their terms of use is difficult to comply with, and even inconvenient. There are laws which make that a little easier, such as fair use laws which allow some use of copyrighted material, as well as laws which allow you to make backup copies of copyrighted material.
But there are some cases such as the one you have pointed out where it is possible for someone to lose all their copies of a song, and be forced to purchase it again. I had to do that fairly recently myself when I found that my dog had damaged a vintage a-ha CD of mine, rendering it useless. I had to purchase the replacement...
And there are many people who go and copy their CDs so that they can carry one copy in their car, and leave one at home. I know the legality of that is questionable as well, but there hasn't been any desire expressed by the RIAA to prosecute those people, since they generally have bought one copy and aren't usually listening to the music at home and in their car at the same time.
The problem really comes from people who are "sharing" music, a term which I place in quotes since they really aren't sharing, simply allowing others to make copies of their music and distribute them anonymously. Sharing would probably suggest that while someone else is listening to a copy of Barry Manilow's greatest hits that you chose to share with him, you would not also be listening to that as well. The anonymous distribution being done through P2P really shows the "sharing" argument to be disingenuous.
The problem you are facing is over terms of use, and the companies are making it more and more complicated in an effort to try and deal with people who are participating in unlawful copyright violation and distribution.
What is "stolen" from the RIAA/MPAA is entertainment material intended for distribution to the public. What is "stolen" from Torrentspy is private, personal communications and business numbers.
And here is the problem once again, a definition issue. the MPAA doesn't believe that what TorrentSpy is helping to steal is simply "material intended for distribution to the public". Generally most movies have a legal statement on them which makes it clear that the product is NOT for public distribution, but instead is only for private viewing.
Do you believe that they do not have a right to do this?
And I would like to see a video of Scarlett Johannsen in the shower, but the fact is that I don't own such a video. Should I have a right to peek in her window? I'm just taking some reflected light, something which I don't see how anyone can miss...
I don't berate people for wanting to have things for free. I breate people for demanding that they have a right to have a free copy of someone else's hard work.
The whole concept boils down to property. and until we are able to define the term in a way that everyone on here can accept, this argument will go on forever...
We can bounce around analogies and we will find that there is a point at which they don't work. For example, your analogy doesn't work because I don't own AUDI, I simply own AN AUDI. If someone began copying Audis and distributing them, whether for free or for profit, they are harming the company that does own Audi, Volkswagen Audi Group of Germany.
VAG spends many millions of dollars doing research and development to design a superior automobile. Audi's Quattro four wheel drive system has won numerous awards, and while other car manufacturers can also develop a four wheel drive system, they can't duplicate the Quattro, and they can't call their own system a Quattro.
In the music or video side this means that your average Joe is allowed to go and make movies or music all they want, and they can even distribute their product as they see fit. However, they cannot duplicate the work of others and distribute it, and they cannot falsely claim to be what they aren't. For example, you cannot create a Flash animated version of Star Wars and distribute it under the Star Wars name.
You can use generic terms, such as calling your music Rock and Roll or Punk or grunge, or you can call your movie an Action movie or a Drama. However, it must be your own product if you are to claim that you have the right to distribute it.
And that is the key. What is going on here isn't about people creating a product of their own and distributing it. They are taking the product from someone else, duplicating it unlawfully, and then distributing it. If it isn't your property (and remember, just because you may own a CD doesn't mean that the music on it is your property) then you don't have a right to do anything you want with it.
The real problem with this discussion is that everyone is disagreeing with the idea of what property is. Until we can create a clear definition that is understandable to everyone, this discussion will continue to be misunderstood by most the people who are participating in it.
And that is a valid argument, even though I disagree with it.
If the MPAA did what this article claims, then they are guilty of a similar offense. Obviously, in filing their lawsuit, TorrentSpy states that they believe that the use of proprietary information can be restricted. For example, the article states:
"We have very significant proof of wrongdoing and the MPAA's involvement," Rothken said. "We think it's ironic for the MPAA to claim that they are protecting the rights of the movie studios and then go out and pirate other people's property."
The representative for TorrentSpy, attorney Ira Rothken, states his opinion that the MPAA is supporting piracy of other people's property. He isn't just making a public claim that the MPAA supports piracy, but instead he is suing the MPAA since he recognizes that piracy is unlawful.
But it can also be stated that if the accusations are correct, then the MPAA doesn't commit piracy themselves, they just facilitated it by paying someone else to do so... Yes, that would be very ironic. So if the MPAA is accused of piracy, then shouldn't we recognize that TorentSpy should also be seen as facilitating piracy in their own actions?
The whole situation is one which takes some real ethical tapdancing. I understand the feeling of schadenfreude that comes from TorrentSpy suing the MPAA. However, there is a hypocracy that is inherent in both sides of this argument. The root of the hypocracy is the concept that since an MP3 is information, and not a physical construct, then it doesn't harm anyone when you steal it.
However, the people that own the rights to that MP3 do feel that it is being stolen, and we really should be giving more respect to their point of view as well.
Because the truth is there are people who want this crap, just not at the price and/or with the conditions that the MPAA imposes.
That's really not your best possible argument here...
For example, I drive a pretty nice car, an Audi. If I was to sell it, it wouldn't be cheap. However, there are people out there that would like to drive an Audi, but do not want to pay the amount of money that they cost. Should I be required to sell my car to them for a lower price than I wish simply because other people don't want to pay the amount of money that I would be willing to sell at?
We aren't talking about air, water or food here... You don't need an MP3 to survive, so if the MPAA and the recording artists want to price their product out of the range where people are willing to buy, then it is up to them. Don't buy their product.
I agree that most people who just go and borrow a friend's CD and rip it to their iPod aren't trying to do damage to the recording artists. However, many of those recording artists have decided that it does damage them when someone uses P2P or other "sharing" software to distribute free copies of these artists work over the internet.
Seriously people, how many of you walk into a WalMart, grab a handful of stuff and just walk out the door? It isn't your property, and you shouldn't be acting with righteous indignation when the rightful property owner gets upset.
I'm still puzzled as to how publishing information impacts on the ability of federal government to go after criminal activity. Surely it depends on the information. For instance, publishing information about the illegal activities of corrupt policemen, for instance, will surely help bring them to justice?
You are correct, and I am embarrassed that I didn't think of it myself.
Certainly we must recognize that if our own government were to become unfettered by the law, it would become a far greater threat than a few Mohammedan terrorists with homemade bombs. As such, leaks such as the current ones which have made a public discussion out of the illegal phone record data mining can be seen as a public service in advancing the possible prosecution of government representatives that have overstepped their authority.
I'm all for prosecuting that crime. Somehow I don't think that Gonzo is as equally passionate about investigating this one though.
You can assume whatever you want, but nobody else here is going to see your comment as anything other than a slippery slope fallacy.
The government will always state that anything they don't want the public to know about is a national security risk in some form or another. This danger becomes even more severe as we enter into this new type of "War on Terror" where the proponents of such war would like to have the public believing that there are hobgoblins hiding in every shadow. If they can convince the public that everything is a threat, then everything becomes an issue of national security. And once everything becomes an issue of national security, and is classified accordingly, then there is no reason to worry about those pesky journalists.
I have mentioned this in previous discussions, and I will bring it up again. I am not comfortable with one branch of government having the sole power to determine what the public is and is not allowed to see. This is the situation we are beginning to fall into. We have been here before, with Nixon using the national security argument in an effort to protect his activities.
There isn't an independent clearing house for verifying whether something is national security or not, and since I don't trust giving the power to decide this to a single branch of government, I would rather error on the side of caution and support the Constitutional protection of a free press. Without this protection, only a fool would trust the government.
Show me one example where the press has even tried to publish troop locations or a LEGAL military strategy. Of course, some people could argue that exposing the secret prison facilities is just such a case, while I disagree with the legality of the issue. However, we wouldn't even have the ability to argue whether the government's actions are legal or illegal if it were not for the media forcing the issue into the public discussion.
"But it can't be the case that that right trumps over the right that Americans would like to see, the ability of the federal government to go after criminal activity," he said. "And so those two principles have to be accommodated."
So, according to the U.S. Attorney General, the first amendment is a great right, but it can't be allowed when it gets in the way of law enforcement. I wonder if he feels the same things about other Constitutional amendments which restrict law enforcement, like the fourth and fifth amendments. I'm sure that the people who wrote those Constitutional Amendments didn't really mean for them to limit the power of government (BTW, that's sarcasm...)
Of course, we really have to consider that the federal government should only be going after criminal activity when such criminal activity is actually present. Something cannot be a crime when the law which makes it a crime is not constitutional.
There is a reason why we have made freedom of the press a nearly absolute right. Throughout history we have seen that hiding the activities of government creates corruption, and even when the media is biased, we need them to be able to get the issues out to the public so that they can be discussed.
It is also interesting to see the philosophy involved in Gonzo's "Pass the Buck" stragegy. He wants to claim that it isn't the Bush administration that is going after the reporters, it's actually Congress that passed the laws which REQUIRE the Bush administration to go after the press.
"That's a policy judgment by the Congress in passing that kind of legislation," he continued. "We have an obligation to enforce those laws. We have an obligation to ensure that our national security is protected."
I guess that what really bothers me is that good Republicans who should really know better, individuals who have long complained about the growing powers of the federal government, should be more concerned about this. They need to come to their senses and realize that Bush is not helping the ideologies that make the Republican Party, and they need to abandon him.
Nixon was run out of office not by Democrats, and not even by the Washington Post reporters. He was run out of office by fellow Republicans who came to him and told him that he had become an embarrassment, and it was time for him to resign. Modern day Republican leaders have to do the same thing and rid us of our modern day Nixon.
There is a major difference between nanoparticles and self-replicating nanobots...
People who are afraid that minature killer robots are going to wipe out humanity should dial back the amount of time they spend watching the SciFi channel...
First of all, someone is going to bring it up eventually, so I might as well be helpful and give everyone the link to the website that has the actual game...
By the way, it appears that the game was designed using a program called "RPG Maker 2000"
Hopefully their website charges them for bandwidth, and once they get Slashdotted the server hosting bill will bankrupt the authors...
Secondly, I think that most people would feel some concern about copycats, and being that I haven't played the game myself, I don't know whether the perspective in the game glorifies the actions of Harris and Klebold. If it does, this can be pretty dangerous for some kids... Some of the comments in the news story tend to suggest that they are glorifying the murders. For example, the article stated that when someone is killed in the game, a dialogue box pops up stating "Another victory for the Trench Coat Mafia".
I would be against any effort to impose government censorship on this kind of thing, but the authors should have really thought about whether this was a good idea.
If you are going to download this game, you may want to do it soon. The article indicated that some of the content within the game may be in violation of a copyright.
I'd more like to know if there's a way to communicate over the power lines, which you'd have to run anyway, or if this is already done.
If they have to run power lines anyway, then just string the fiber along with the power line. Fiber isn't significantly affected by EMI, so what would it matter...
You have brought up an additional point though... If a plane needs to have power in both the front and back, then what is someone going to do without wires? Batteries located everywhere power is needed? That pretty much trashes the whole "weight saving" aspect of this project.
Or maybe some sort of microwave transmission of power from the front of the plane to the back... The upside to that is that anyone sitting in the middle of the plane wouldn't need a blanket to stay warm.
Does an optical cable REALLY weigh that much that someone would want to replace it with wireless?
This goes for any situation where functionality is considered to be important. I have a wireless network at home, but I've also run gigabit ethernet through the entire house. The wireless goes down from time to time, but the hard cable does not.
The article talks about two benefits, weight reduction and power reduction. In both situations, I would expect that a single lightweight fiber connection and some LED lasers would not be significantly heaver, and would likely use a good deal less power...
It just seems to me that the whole idea is little more than academic. I can't think of a single situation where it would be more desirable for a device like an automobile or an airplane to use a wireless system for communicating control information.
Someone's got way too much free time on his hands...
You are partially correct... There is evidence that some reporters will give let illegal behavior slide when it is conducted by an administration that they are ideoligically allied with.
In the past this has been more of a problem than it currently is, since so much of the media was dominated by individuals who are positively inclined toward Democrats. Now we have a little greater diversity in the news media, and if a Democrat administration tried to get away with anything illegal, we have Fox News and talk radio that would be on them in an instant. We also now have the blogosphere that can often drive news stories as well...
We don't need to have EVERY media channel screaming at the first sign of inappropriate activities, but we should have at least some reporters looking. The fact that the public might find out is an excellent check on government power.
It was just two reporters at a single newspaper that broke the Watergate story wide open.
I'm really not comfortable with simply letting the administration decide which internal leaks are whistleblowers, and which are national security risks. The fact is that anything that threatens the authority of the administration is considered to be a national security risk by that administration.
I expect that Nixon felt that the leaks which exposed Watergate were threats to national security, and would have stopped them if they could. No administration is happy to have their corruption or other illegal activities released to the media, but if we allowed the government to do whatever they think is necessary, then we are pretty much guaranteeing that they will do things which are not authorized under the Constitution.
Look, I am a Republican myself, and am very politically active. It doesn't matter whether the President is a Republican or a Democrat, both parties are capable of horrendus corruption when they don't have the media actively trying to keep the public informed. I won't hesitate when stating that I am not comfortable with the activities that Bush has gotten involved in lately, but I am confident that if we allow the public to know as much as is possible about what is going on, it will serve as a check upon his powers. This will also encourage him to think twice before he does something really raw...
Allowing the administration to hide behind the cover of "national security" is very dangerous.
Finally, does anyone else see the irony in the Bush Administration going through phone records to identify who leaked the stories which exposed their program of going through people's phone records?
Slashdot Mirror
A problem with this line of reasoning is that we aren't talking about whether or not the kid committed a crime. The police decided that he did not, and chose not to arrest him for any crime.
However, what the kid did was a violation of school policy, and for that he was suspended, which is a valid punishment under the school policy.
This has nothing to do with prosecution of thought crimes or anything of that nature. There are certain things that you are not allowed to do in certain circumstances, even though those actions may be legal. Criminal law is not the only collection of rules that a person must follow.
In communist America, the government chips you!
Checking Google, it appears that this was the word of the day for August 22nd, 2005, better than nine months ago... You might want to consider cutting back on the skinny cigarettes, they appear to be affecting your time sense... :)
Exactly... And it is also not considered legal to freely distribute someone else's copyrighted work. I'm having real difficulty here understanding why people can't put together the facts on this issue.
Simple breakdown: (we'll use a music CD as an example)
You have a writer that pens the lyrics to the next great chart topping song. You have the performer who sings it. You have the producer that records it. You have the record label that presses it onto CDs, packages it and sells it. Together, they have created a series of rules as to how the product of their work can be used. They generally state that you can listen to their product privately, and not for profit. They have separate agreements with radio stations and other broadcasters who pay other fees for the usage.
They offer their product to you under these terms for a certain amount of money. If you agree to the terms that they offer, you give them the money, and they give you a CD which contains a copy of their work. You own the CD, but your purchase agreement doesn't give you ownership of the recorded work on the CD, just the right to use that work in a manner consistent with the agreement that you made.
Then someone decides to break the agreement by making copies of the work and giving it away for free. I understand that there are people on Slashdot who believe that they can do whatever they want simply because they want to do it, but the fact is that what is happening is violating the rights of the people who own the recording.
It doesn't matter whether you believe that it isn't that big of a deal, or whether you believe that you aren't really stealing anything. It doesn't matter that you believe that you really own the contents of the CD you purchased. You can believe that you own the Golden Gate bridge, but just try crossing it without paying the toll...
For the most part, neither the RIAA or anyone else really cares about people who are copying a CD for use in their car while leaving the original at home. They really don't care all that much about someone that gives a copy to a friend. What they have a problem with are the services out there that allow you to freely give out thousands of copies of music that they paid to produce, package, and market.
I do agree that if the MPAA did what they are being accused of, then they are even bigger criminals than TorrentSpy. And while it may be a bit cliche to state "Two Wrongs Don't Make a Right", it is the truth. Just listen to your mothers from time to time...
Technically, the recording companies do have the right to define in fairly rigid terms how you may use the content that you purchase on CDs or on iTunes. In many cases, it appears that the way they define their terms of use is difficult to comply with, and even inconvenient. There are laws which make that a little easier, such as fair use laws which allow some use of copyrighted material, as well as laws which allow you to make backup copies of copyrighted material.
But there are some cases such as the one you have pointed out where it is possible for someone to lose all their copies of a song, and be forced to purchase it again. I had to do that fairly recently myself when I found that my dog had damaged a vintage a-ha CD of mine, rendering it useless. I had to purchase the replacement...
And there are many people who go and copy their CDs so that they can carry one copy in their car, and leave one at home. I know the legality of that is questionable as well, but there hasn't been any desire expressed by the RIAA to prosecute those people, since they generally have bought one copy and aren't usually listening to the music at home and in their car at the same time.
The problem really comes from people who are "sharing" music, a term which I place in quotes since they really aren't sharing, simply allowing others to make copies of their music and distribute them anonymously. Sharing would probably suggest that while someone else is listening to a copy of Barry Manilow's greatest hits that you chose to share with him, you would not also be listening to that as well. The anonymous distribution being done through P2P really shows the "sharing" argument to be disingenuous.
The problem you are facing is over terms of use, and the companies are making it more and more complicated in an effort to try and deal with people who are participating in unlawful copyright violation and distribution.
And here is the problem once again, a definition issue. the MPAA doesn't believe that what TorrentSpy is helping to steal is simply "material intended for distribution to the public". Generally most movies have a legal statement on them which makes it clear that the product is NOT for public distribution, but instead is only for private viewing.
Do you believe that they do not have a right to do this?
I don't berate people for wanting to have things for free. I breate people for demanding that they have a right to have a free copy of someone else's hard work.
The whole concept boils down to property. and until we are able to define the term in a way that everyone on here can accept, this argument will go on forever...
VAG spends many millions of dollars doing research and development to design a superior automobile. Audi's Quattro four wheel drive system has won numerous awards, and while other car manufacturers can also develop a four wheel drive system, they can't duplicate the Quattro, and they can't call their own system a Quattro.
In the music or video side this means that your average Joe is allowed to go and make movies or music all they want, and they can even distribute their product as they see fit. However, they cannot duplicate the work of others and distribute it, and they cannot falsely claim to be what they aren't. For example, you cannot create a Flash animated version of Star Wars and distribute it under the Star Wars name.
You can use generic terms, such as calling your music Rock and Roll or Punk or grunge, or you can call your movie an Action movie or a Drama. However, it must be your own product if you are to claim that you have the right to distribute it.
And that is the key. What is going on here isn't about people creating a product of their own and distributing it. They are taking the product from someone else, duplicating it unlawfully, and then distributing it. If it isn't your property (and remember, just because you may own a CD doesn't mean that the music on it is your property) then you don't have a right to do anything you want with it.
The real problem with this discussion is that everyone is disagreeing with the idea of what property is. Until we can create a clear definition that is understandable to everyone, this discussion will continue to be misunderstood by most the people who are participating in it.
If the MPAA did what this article claims, then they are guilty of a similar offense. Obviously, in filing their lawsuit, TorrentSpy states that they believe that the use of proprietary information can be restricted. For example, the article states:
The representative for TorrentSpy, attorney Ira Rothken, states his opinion that the MPAA is supporting piracy of other people's property. He isn't just making a public claim that the MPAA supports piracy, but instead he is suing the MPAA since he recognizes that piracy is unlawful.
But it can also be stated that if the accusations are correct, then the MPAA doesn't commit piracy themselves, they just facilitated it by paying someone else to do so... Yes, that would be very ironic. So if the MPAA is accused of piracy, then shouldn't we recognize that TorentSpy should also be seen as facilitating piracy in their own actions?
The whole situation is one which takes some real ethical tapdancing. I understand the feeling of schadenfreude that comes from TorrentSpy suing the MPAA. However, there is a hypocracy that is inherent in both sides of this argument. The root of the hypocracy is the concept that since an MP3 is information, and not a physical construct, then it doesn't harm anyone when you steal it.
However, the people that own the rights to that MP3 do feel that it is being stolen, and we really should be giving more respect to their point of view as well.
That's really not your best possible argument here...
For example, I drive a pretty nice car, an Audi. If I was to sell it, it wouldn't be cheap. However, there are people out there that would like to drive an Audi, but do not want to pay the amount of money that they cost. Should I be required to sell my car to them for a lower price than I wish simply because other people don't want to pay the amount of money that I would be willing to sell at?
We aren't talking about air, water or food here... You don't need an MP3 to survive, so if the MPAA and the recording artists want to price their product out of the range where people are willing to buy, then it is up to them. Don't buy their product.
I agree that most people who just go and borrow a friend's CD and rip it to their iPod aren't trying to do damage to the recording artists. However, many of those recording artists have decided that it does damage them when someone uses P2P or other "sharing" software to distribute free copies of these artists work over the internet.
Seriously people, how many of you walk into a WalMart, grab a handful of stuff and just walk out the door? It isn't your property, and you shouldn't be acting with righteous indignation when the rightful property owner gets upset.
You are correct, and I am embarrassed that I didn't think of it myself.
Certainly we must recognize that if our own government were to become unfettered by the law, it would become a far greater threat than a few Mohammedan terrorists with homemade bombs. As such, leaks such as the current ones which have made a public discussion out of the illegal phone record data mining can be seen as a public service in advancing the possible prosecution of government representatives that have overstepped their authority.
I'm all for prosecuting that crime. Somehow I don't think that Gonzo is as equally passionate about investigating this one though.
The government will always state that anything they don't want the public to know about is a national security risk in some form or another. This danger becomes even more severe as we enter into this new type of "War on Terror" where the proponents of such war would like to have the public believing that there are hobgoblins hiding in every shadow. If they can convince the public that everything is a threat, then everything becomes an issue of national security. And once everything becomes an issue of national security, and is classified accordingly, then there is no reason to worry about those pesky journalists.
I have mentioned this in previous discussions, and I will bring it up again. I am not comfortable with one branch of government having the sole power to determine what the public is and is not allowed to see. This is the situation we are beginning to fall into. We have been here before, with Nixon using the national security argument in an effort to protect his activities.
There isn't an independent clearing house for verifying whether something is national security or not, and since I don't trust giving the power to decide this to a single branch of government, I would rather error on the side of caution and support the Constitutional protection of a free press. Without this protection, only a fool would trust the government.
Show me one example where the press has even tried to publish troop locations or a LEGAL military strategy. Of course, some people could argue that exposing the secret prison facilities is just such a case, while I disagree with the legality of the issue. However, we wouldn't even have the ability to argue whether the government's actions are legal or illegal if it were not for the media forcing the issue into the public discussion.
So, according to the U.S. Attorney General, the first amendment is a great right, but it can't be allowed when it gets in the way of law enforcement. I wonder if he feels the same things about other Constitutional amendments which restrict law enforcement, like the fourth and fifth amendments. I'm sure that the people who wrote those Constitutional Amendments didn't really mean for them to limit the power of government (BTW, that's sarcasm...)
Of course, we really have to consider that the federal government should only be going after criminal activity when such criminal activity is actually present. Something cannot be a crime when the law which makes it a crime is not constitutional.
There is a reason why we have made freedom of the press a nearly absolute right. Throughout history we have seen that hiding the activities of government creates corruption, and even when the media is biased, we need them to be able to get the issues out to the public so that they can be discussed.
It is also interesting to see the philosophy involved in Gonzo's "Pass the Buck" stragegy. He wants to claim that it isn't the Bush administration that is going after the reporters, it's actually Congress that passed the laws which REQUIRE the Bush administration to go after the press.
I guess that what really bothers me is that good Republicans who should really know better, individuals who have long complained about the growing powers of the federal government, should be more concerned about this. They need to come to their senses and realize that Bush is not helping the ideologies that make the Republican Party, and they need to abandon him.
Nixon was run out of office not by Democrats, and not even by the Washington Post reporters. He was run out of office by fellow Republicans who came to him and told him that he had become an embarrassment, and it was time for him to resign. Modern day Republican leaders have to do the same thing and rid us of our modern day Nixon.
There is a major difference between nanoparticles and self-replicating nanobots...
People who are afraid that minature killer robots are going to wipe out humanity should dial back the amount of time they spend watching the SciFi channel...
Personally, I'll take a pass on any pseudoscience that comes from the "Friends of the Earth"...
They don't appear to be selling it... It is a free download on their website.
First of all, someone is going to bring it up eventually, so I might as well be helpful and give everyone the link to the website that has the actual game...
http://www.columbinegame.com/
By the way, it appears that the game was designed using a program called "RPG Maker 2000"
Hopefully their website charges them for bandwidth, and once they get Slashdotted the server hosting bill will bankrupt the authors...
Secondly, I think that most people would feel some concern about copycats, and being that I haven't played the game myself, I don't know whether the perspective in the game glorifies the actions of Harris and Klebold. If it does, this can be pretty dangerous for some kids... Some of the comments in the news story tend to suggest that they are glorifying the murders. For example, the article stated that when someone is killed in the game, a dialogue box pops up stating "Another victory for the Trench Coat Mafia".
I would be against any effort to impose government censorship on this kind of thing, but the authors should have really thought about whether this was a good idea.
If you are going to download this game, you may want to do it soon. The article indicated that some of the content within the game may be in violation of a copyright.
Question: Even with the wireless, how far can the plane fly after the wing comes off?
Answer: All the way to the scene of the crash...
Using the previous message's assumptions of 17 miles of control wiring, it would total out to be about 60 lbs of wire...
If they have to run power lines anyway, then just string the fiber along with the power line. Fiber isn't significantly affected by EMI, so what would it matter...
You have brought up an additional point though... If a plane needs to have power in both the front and back, then what is someone going to do without wires? Batteries located everywhere power is needed? That pretty much trashes the whole "weight saving" aspect of this project.
Or maybe some sort of microwave transmission of power from the front of the plane to the back... The upside to that is that anyone sitting in the middle of the plane wouldn't need a blanket to stay warm.
Does an optical cable REALLY weigh that much that someone would want to replace it with wireless? This goes for any situation where functionality is considered to be important. I have a wireless network at home, but I've also run gigabit ethernet through the entire house. The wireless goes down from time to time, but the hard cable does not. The article talks about two benefits, weight reduction and power reduction. In both situations, I would expect that a single lightweight fiber connection and some LED lasers would not be significantly heaver, and would likely use a good deal less power... It just seems to me that the whole idea is little more than academic. I can't think of a single situation where it would be more desirable for a device like an automobile or an airplane to use a wireless system for communicating control information. Someone's got way too much free time on his hands...
You are partially correct... There is evidence that some reporters will give let illegal behavior slide when it is conducted by an administration that they are ideoligically allied with.
In the past this has been more of a problem than it currently is, since so much of the media was dominated by individuals who are positively inclined toward Democrats. Now we have a little greater diversity in the news media, and if a Democrat administration tried to get away with anything illegal, we have Fox News and talk radio that would be on them in an instant. We also now have the blogosphere that can often drive news stories as well...
We don't need to have EVERY media channel screaming at the first sign of inappropriate activities, but we should have at least some reporters looking. The fact that the public might find out is an excellent check on government power.
It was just two reporters at a single newspaper that broke the Watergate story wide open.
I'm really not comfortable with simply letting the administration decide which internal leaks are whistleblowers, and which are national security risks. The fact is that anything that threatens the authority of the administration is considered to be a national security risk by that administration.
I expect that Nixon felt that the leaks which exposed Watergate were threats to national security, and would have stopped them if they could. No administration is happy to have their corruption or other illegal activities released to the media, but if we allowed the government to do whatever they think is necessary, then we are pretty much guaranteeing that they will do things which are not authorized under the Constitution.
Look, I am a Republican myself, and am very politically active. It doesn't matter whether the President is a Republican or a Democrat, both parties are capable of horrendus corruption when they don't have the media actively trying to keep the public informed. I won't hesitate when stating that I am not comfortable with the activities that Bush has gotten involved in lately, but I am confident that if we allow the public to know as much as is possible about what is going on, it will serve as a check upon his powers. This will also encourage him to think twice before he does something really raw...
Allowing the administration to hide behind the cover of "national security" is very dangerous.
Finally, does anyone else see the irony in the Bush Administration going through phone records to identify who leaked the stories which exposed their program of going through people's phone records?
Do you believe that Karl Marx did not consider the economy to be a zero-sum model?