Courts of Appeal typically attempt to avoid setting brand spanking new precedent out of the box. This is the job of the Supreme Court. The SCOTUS is far within its judicial history to establish such novel precedents, while the Courts of Appeals are expected to hold to existing precedents, and establishing precedents only when there is good precedent to build upon.
I would speculate computer inability is rooted in the whole GUI paradigm -- if it isn't on some menu you cannot do it.
"Find..." is on the menu, and people still failed to use it. This isn't a problem with GUI vs. CLI, it's about people knowing what tools are there. That being said, I am 99.99% certain that you don't know every VIM feature and keyboard shortcut. And more so, even if you do, I'm 100% sure that you don't use all of them regularly.
Right, so the word "nut" meaning a testis is only viewed as vulgar, because the OED declares that it is vulgar? Or perhaps, the OED labeled it "vulgar" because that's how people use it.
As a test for if a dictionary is prescriptivist vs descriptivist, consider the situation where a word is not widely considered vulgar in the population, let's go with "apple". Would the dictionary fell justified in declaring this word to be vulgar apart from popular usage, and thus attempt to make the popular usage match the usage that they are declaring? If they would, they're prescriptivist, if they're not, they're descriptivist.
A good example is French, where the Académie française has recommended, with mixed success, that some loanwords from English (such as walkman, software and email) be avoided, in favour of words derived from French (baladeur, logiciel, and courriel respectively).
The OED would never coin new words to replace words in common use and attempt to get people to use them.
70% of the Anglosphere is using woot on a regular basis?
Hyperbole... look it up in a dictionary.
Anyway, descriptivists like to portray themselves as men of the people. "We just note the words, we don't prescribe them."
The problem with 100% descriptivism is that language is a social phenomenon. And when some comes to a place of work saying "ain't", he won't be lynched, but some people may view him as less educated.
Again, this is because language is a social phenomenon.
Any dictionary would be wise to note that certain words are view pejoratively by certain speakers.
But when you do that you lose the claim to purist descriptivism.
Noting the connotations that people will have to a word does not make it less of a descriptivist dictionary. You're not telling people to treat the word as slang, or vulgar, or colloquial, you're telling people looking up the word that most people have such connotations related to its use.
The whole point I was trying to make is, "it's in the dictionary so it's a word" is not a valid argument when the dictionary is the OED, because the OED makes no such authoritative comment. It says, "this is what people are using, and what they're using it to mean, and these are the circumstances under which some words occur."
If you want to take a real prescriptivist dictionary, the RAE (Real Academia Española) issues a dictionary regarding Spanish as spoken in Spain. If it is not in the RAE's dictionary, then it is not a valid word. You are automatically using non-standard bad Spanish if you are using a word inconsistent with the way the RAE's dictionary declares it to be. This is opposed to the OED, where they say, "we just haven't gotten around to documenting that usage yet."
Do you understand the difference now? Prescriptivist says, "this is how it is, and if you disagree then you're wrong" the descriptivist says, "this is what we've seen, and if you disagree, that's fine, we're not an authority."
*shock* Lawyers presenting only the evidence that shows their argument in the best light. News at 11...
Seriously, every lawyer does this. There's a massive amount of "confirmation bias" like argument that goes on in court, where each lawyer only really presents the evidence and laws that best support their arguments. It's up to the other side to point to the flaws in their legal arguments. Welcome to the adversarial legal system.
The OED is a descriptivist dictionary, as opposed to a prescriptivist dictionary. That means that the OED includes words that are actually being used, rather than prescribing which words should and should not be used. This means including words that many people object to, but too bad, there are a large number of people who use the word regardless of any official position about the word.
If you want to speak a language which has a prescriptivist authority, then I recommend French or Spanish, they have institutes that declare what is and is not proper language, and if you disagree, then you're wrong. If you want a language that is generally descriptivist, then stick with the Germanic languages, where we recognize that the authority on language is a native speaker, and not some people locked up in a room declaring that "ain't isn't a word" even though 70% of the population uses it on a regular basis.
My wife [has 20/400 corrected vision]. She still watches movies.
I have a friend who is completely blind. He, too, also watches movies.
There is no reason that the person named in the suit could not have been responsible for the download. (I'm not saying he was, but blindness does not rule him out.)
I'm glad that you have provided anecdotal evidence that some blind people do watch movies. Congratulations, you just restated exactly what the post I was responding to stated.
However, you still have to throw out the evidence that this particular blind guy does not watch movies. Unless you have some amazing evidence that shows that all blind people watch movies, your argument is unpersuasive.
As someone that knows, you might find it interesting to understand the definition of "legally blind" vs. more functional blindness.
I lived with a blind girl for a while. She was functionally blind and could see only extremely bright and extremely high contrast objects. For the most part, she couldn't see anything and was around five years old before she realized other people could see things.
A friend of the blind girl's was "legally blind". This meant that she couldn't get a driver's license but otherwise was quite functional. She could certainly watch TV, go to movies and read large-print books.
Legally blind does not mean "can't watch a movie" in any respect.
He needs emails read to him, and to have magnification. While "legally blind" does not alone constitute "cannot watch a movie", this guy in particular does not watch movies, because his legal blindness is close enough to "true" blindness that he can't see any of the imagery. So, while your point is valid, the particular circumstances of this case remain true... he wouldn't have downloaded a movie, because he doesn't/can't watch movies.
There is an exemption for police officers in the MGL wiretap statute MGL Part IV, Title I, Chapter 272, Section 99): It shall not be a violation of this section— [..]
for investigative and law enforcement officers of the United States of America to violate the provisions of this section if acting pursuant to authority of the laws of the United States and within the scope of their authority. [..] for investigative or law enforcement officers to violate the provisions of this section for the purposes of ensuring the safety of any law enforcement officer or agent thereof who is acting in an undercover capacity, or as a witness for the commonwealth; provided, however, that any such interception which is not otherwise permitted by this section shall be deemed unlawful for purposes of paragraph P.
This section is basically saying that as long as they have a warrant/court order, they can actually wiretap you, and you can't attempt to bring it to court at all. Also, the laws hold that they can record conversations occurring in prisons and jails as long as it does not breach lawyer-client confidentiality. (Namely, if you call your sister on the jailhouse phone and tell her to move some evidence, the cops could have been recording that and actually use it in order to find the evidence and convict you for it.)
I spoke to a lawyer about this and my understanding (though I am not a lawyer myself) is that consent doesn't mean what you'd expect. Or, at least, what I'd expect. You don't actually need permission to record someone, you just can't do it secretly (key word). I guess if you tell them and they say something, the law seems to take it as consent. I'm not sure if consent meant something differently at one time, but I'd expect consent would mean I could tell you to not record me and you'd have to stop, but that doesn't appear to be the case, which is why TV reporters can get away with it.
It's implied consent. If you're told that you're being recorded, or the recorder has made it otherwise explicitly obvious that you're being recorded then anything you said is obviously of the understanding that you consent to the recording. I mean, you knew you were being recorded and still said whatever you said, after all.
About the only exception is if it's blatantly obvious that you're being recorded, which has been taken to mean "news team" - in other words, an absolutely gigantic, impossible-to-miss camera, or a large microphone, like TV reporters carry with the station logo on it.
Otherwise, it's "wire tapping."
Ridiculous? You bet. Going to change? Hah!
Incidentally, as far as I know, you're allowed to take video of people in public places. Just not the audio.
You're right about the situation in two-party consent states. As well, yes, you're allowed to take video, but not audio. The only concern in two-party states is that people will say one thing when not being recorded, and another if they know they are being recorded. (Take Rod Blagojevich, he would have never said "this is *bleep*ing golden, and I'm not just giving it away," if he knew he were being recorded.)
The intent is to protect people from inadvertently saying something retarded, because we all say retarded things fairly often. However, video records actions not speech, and therefore aren't recording conversations... unless you're Deaf and using Sign Language... I've often wondered about that from time to time... can it be wiretapping to record a conversation in Sign Language, because the wording is about recording conversations (in Washington State at least) not about "audio vs. video" or whatever.
Believe it or not, there are people who would do that, even in this economy. The may come as a shock to you, but someone people will die for other people. You surprise belays an undertone of selfishness that is beneath you.
I totally understand that people can be unselfish... I'm just a pessimist.
Follow the money. How will they capture a recurring income stream without forcing always online play? DRM is possibly just an added bonus.
Well, I think the thing is two parts, convincing people to always play online producing the recurring income stream, while DRM creates a mandatory online play. (Playing "single player" that can be taken online and back readily is playing solo in a multiplayer game, not actual single player gaming.)
So, yeah, it's all about directing them towards revenue streams, it's just about coaxing them to come by providing benefits (chatting with friends, you can keep in touch, easy linking up and co-op play, etc and forcing them into it (DRM). But I don't see one or the either as being a secret way to get people to the other.
One nice thing about Morrowind is one of the first patches removed the DRM scheme that was in the game, replacing it with a simple CD check, because the DRM was causing problems. Props to Bethesda for that.
Props to Bethesda for releasing a broken game, and then removing the broken content when it looks like it might affect sales?
Let's all have a round of applause for the makers of lawn darts for taking it off the market when they realized that they were killing people...
No, but why should other people get less fun gaming experience just because some people...
Whoa there. Now you've made the jump to always online DRM making the game a more fun gaming experience? I have played Diablo 1 and Diablo 2 and I can't think of a single reason that turning it into yet another shitty MMO is going to make it a "more fun gaming experience". We have a long history showing that whenever a major change is made to a game just so that a more-restrictive DRM scheme could be implemented it has never, ever made the game better. Do you really believe that the online and "MMO-like" elements of Diablo 3 were added first or do you think they added them strictly because they're looking for a way to add DRM? What are the odds that an element added for that reason is going to actually make a game better?
No BS, friend, who do you work for?
I'm on the verge of thinking that you're falling the other way in the argument, in automatically assuming a malicious motive for adding this stuff.
It can entirely be that there is a synergy. They want to enhance the game (which I will grant, always-online can add some really cool enhancements to the regular gameplace) but that's the point, these are enhancements and should thusly not be mandatory. Sure, my X-Box 360 does some really cool things when it's online... but when it's offline, at least I can still play my games.
The problem is that they want to add this always-on draconian DRM, and using "enhancements as mandatory" to justify it. YES, provide cool online enhancements, and sure, require always-on DRM to use those online enhancements, but there is not a single enhancement in that group that justifies making it mandatory for playing it single player.
Not even "preventing cheating" is a good enough reason to remove all ability at single player offline play. I'm not playing with anyone else after all.
If the liberals questioned aren't able to decompose a situation into component parts and answer questions about each of them separately, but have to shout a "YAY" or "BOO" on the basis of their feelings about the situation, totally ignoring whatever is asked about, then something is wrong.
But there was no accounting for the possibility that the conservatives questioned weren't doing the exact same thing, because the whole survey suffers from a confirmation bias. They're only looking for confirmation of their preconceived theory (that liberals are gullible to trick questions), rather than looking for disproving theory (that conservatives are just as gullible to trick questions). If a conservative were to answer entirely without reason or logic according to his "YAY" or "BOO" on the basis of his feelings about the situation, then he would answer every single answer as "enlightened", but not because he can actually decompose a situation into component parts and answer it properly and logically.
As my sibling post points out, many of the questions were unattached from the unfortunate negative consequences of the actual terms. However, I will point out that this was done with direct intent to make liberals/progressives answer wrong. Watch, let me do it to conservatives: "Deregulation of medicine and healthcare will result in more deaths." If you answered "disagree" then congratulations, you're empirically wrong.
What happened though was I intentionally gave a question whose consequences the individual's political beliefs would object to, and therefore basically handing them the wrong answer with a big "DO IT!!!! Come on, YOU KNOW YOU WANT TO!"
So, the problem with all of the questions is that they're all trick questions. Even if a libertarian/progressive can see through all the sham, the best answers they can give are "yeah, but..." or "no, but..." But that's not how people answer surveys. They don't answer the question they're presented, they answer the questions they think they've been asked, and when you have trick questions intended to obfuscate the details to elicit an ideological response, you're going to get ideological responses. This also effects the conservatives as well though! There's no provision for questioning why the person answered the way that they did, so even if someone gives an "enlightened" answer, there's no guaranteed that they arrived at that answer through "enlightened" thought. A statement that is true can still be a lie, if the person speaking it thinks that they are lying. "Yes, Jenny went to the movies." (She actually did, but I thought she went to a party, and I was trying to cover up that she went to a party, so I'm lying even though my statement is true.)
1) "Mandatory licensing raises prices." Yes, but why would we ever consider endangering people's lives and/or livelihoods over removing mandatory licenses? If I make potato soup, then buying potato soup raises my prices. It's a trick question because few people will actually logically break down the question properly, and will just answer with a gut answer that is ideologically based. 2) "Standard of living is better now than 30 years ago." The median standard of living has factually gone down relative to the mean standard of living, even though both have risen as absolute values. The two ideologies are answering different questions about the vague term "standard of living". 3) "Rent control leads to housing shortages." Making french fries leads to a shortage of potatoes. People renting more than one property leads to housing shortages... I mean, the statement is technically true, but the original premise behind asking it is so absurd, that no one would expect it. So they answer a different question based on their perceived premise behind the question. 4) "Largest market share is a monopoly" Yes, because everyone will give the most unique answer possible here. Oh wait, I just abused the word "unique" like the entire population does. "Monopoly" doesn't mean "single supplier" to most people anymore, it means "the person with the largest market share." because true monopolies are rare, but one doesn't need a true monopoly to begin leveraging the benefits of being a monopoly. It's a trick question because most people don't use "monopoly" exclusively for true monopolies anymore. 5) "Third World workers working for Americans are being exploited." Well, some liberals/progressives think that American employees are being exploited. What does "exploited" really mean? Are Third World employers using the relatively massive pay that they can offer the third world workers to make those workers concede reasonable accommodations in their employment? Tell you what: I have a job, it pays a million dollars a year, but you have to work 14 hours a day, 7 days a week, with zero vacation time, and no benefits, or other perks. Would you take this job? Many people would, because hey, it's freaking a million dollars a year! Would you count it as exploitation? Some people think there are maximums
It's scary. I understand why they do it... usually because they don't want people destroying evidence.
But let's just say they stormed my house without identifying themselves... by accident (wrong house, bogus tip, whatever). I don't know a raid from junkies kicking my door in, so I'm going to shoot, and I'm probably going to die when they shoot back. Equally tragic, is if I manage to hurt someone.
They're a bad idea unless they REALLY need to.
As I mentioned above, "could destroy evidence" isn't a good enough reason for me. There is a severe chance that potentially innocent people could die as a result of a no-knock raid, so "could destroy evidence" is not good enough. There have to be LIVES on the line. "If we give warning they could KILL people." Anything less is insufficient for the risk that the cops are assuming. Forget even guns, the residents could come at them with baseball bats, and tap-tap, innocent person down, and they didn't even pose a lethal threat to the officers.
I can think of one good case for a no-knock raid...where there is good reason to believe there are potential hostages (who are not also likely accomplices). Other than that, I completely agree about no-knock raids.
This. There are some cases where a no-knock policy is a good idea, but it should be expected that if you're asking for a no-knock search warrant, then you're basically asking for permission to go in there and potentially kill everyone inside that poses a threat, even if they were innocent.
Doing it to avoid destruction of evidence should not be a sufficient reason, it should be that lives hang in the balance, and giving warning to the criminals will result in people's deaths. THAT is the only bar I'm willing to acknowledge for a no-knock raid.
Are you kidding in your subject line? Signing away first amendment rights is a common practice. Security Clearances, employment agreements, settlement agreements, nondisclosure agreements, all kinds of things let you sign away your rights. (Though consult a lawyer if it matters to you in a particular situation, obviously.)
This is spot on. The issue is that one cannot be forced to forfeit their 1st amendment rights, however, if one willingly and voluntarily signed a contract to forfeit their 1st amendment rights in some way, then that contract can be enforced in court.
Now, there are certain unconscionable conditions for contracts that you cannot do. You cannot contract to consent to slavery, as well you cannot consent to be intentionally killed. (You can however consent to be involved in potentially lethal physical combat, so long as all reasonable precautions against death are taken. This is how boxing works.) However, "freedom of speech" is not an inalienable right.
Slashdot Mirror
Courts of Appeal typically attempt to avoid setting brand spanking new precedent out of the box. This is the job of the Supreme Court. The SCOTUS is far within its judicial history to establish such novel precedents, while the Courts of Appeals are expected to hold to existing precedents, and establishing precedents only when there is good precedent to build upon.
This case has none of that.
The teacher wasn't making fun of the student, the teacher was explaining how creationism fails as a science.
I would speculate computer inability is rooted in the whole GUI paradigm -- if it isn't on some menu you cannot do it.
"Find..." is on the menu, and people still failed to use it. This isn't a problem with GUI vs. CLI, it's about people knowing what tools are there. That being said, I am 99.99% certain that you don't know every VIM feature and keyboard shortcut. And more so, even if you do, I'm 100% sure that you don't use all of them regularly.
Right, so the word "nut" meaning a testis is only viewed as vulgar, because the OED declares that it is vulgar? Or perhaps, the OED labeled it "vulgar" because that's how people use it.
As a test for if a dictionary is prescriptivist vs descriptivist, consider the situation where a word is not widely considered vulgar in the population, let's go with "apple". Would the dictionary fell justified in declaring this word to be vulgar apart from popular usage, and thus attempt to make the popular usage match the usage that they are declaring? If they would, they're prescriptivist, if they're not, they're descriptivist.
A good example is French, where the Académie française has recommended, with mixed success, that some loanwords from English (such as walkman, software and email) be avoided, in favour of words derived from French (baladeur, logiciel, and courriel respectively).
The OED would never coin new words to replace words in common use and attempt to get people to use them.
70% of the Anglosphere is using woot on a regular basis?
Hyperbole... look it up in a dictionary.
Anyway, descriptivists like to portray themselves as men of the people. "We just note the words, we don't prescribe them."
The problem with 100% descriptivism is that language is a social phenomenon. And when some comes to a place of work saying "ain't", he won't be lynched, but some people may view him as less educated.
Again, this is because language is a social phenomenon.
Any dictionary would be wise to note that certain words are view pejoratively by certain speakers.
But when you do that you lose the claim to purist descriptivism.
Noting the connotations that people will have to a word does not make it less of a descriptivist dictionary. You're not telling people to treat the word as slang, or vulgar, or colloquial, you're telling people looking up the word that most people have such connotations related to its use.
The whole point I was trying to make is, "it's in the dictionary so it's a word" is not a valid argument when the dictionary is the OED, because the OED makes no such authoritative comment. It says, "this is what people are using, and what they're using it to mean, and these are the circumstances under which some words occur."
If you want to take a real prescriptivist dictionary, the RAE (Real Academia Española) issues a dictionary regarding Spanish as spoken in Spain. If it is not in the RAE's dictionary, then it is not a valid word. You are automatically using non-standard bad Spanish if you are using a word inconsistent with the way the RAE's dictionary declares it to be. This is opposed to the OED, where they say, "we just haven't gotten around to documenting that usage yet."
Do you understand the difference now? Prescriptivist says, "this is how it is, and if you disagree then you're wrong" the descriptivist says, "this is what we've seen, and if you disagree, that's fine, we're not an authority."
*shock* Lawyers presenting only the evidence that shows their argument in the best light. News at 11...
Seriously, every lawyer does this. There's a massive amount of "confirmation bias" like argument that goes on in court, where each lawyer only really presents the evidence and laws that best support their arguments. It's up to the other side to point to the flaws in their legal arguments. Welcome to the adversarial legal system.
but now I no longer have any respect for the OED
The OED is a descriptivist dictionary, as opposed to a prescriptivist dictionary. That means that the OED includes words that are actually being used, rather than prescribing which words should and should not be used. This means including words that many people object to, but too bad, there are a large number of people who use the word regardless of any official position about the word.
If you want to speak a language which has a prescriptivist authority, then I recommend French or Spanish, they have institutes that declare what is and is not proper language, and if you disagree, then you're wrong. If you want a language that is generally descriptivist, then stick with the Germanic languages, where we recognize that the authority on language is a native speaker, and not some people locked up in a room declaring that "ain't isn't a word" even though 70% of the population uses it on a regular basis.
My wife [has 20/400 corrected vision]. She still watches movies.
I have a friend who is completely blind. He, too, also watches movies.
There is no reason that the person named in the suit could not have been responsible for the download. (I'm not saying he was, but blindness does not rule him out.)
I'm glad that you have provided anecdotal evidence that some blind people do watch movies. Congratulations, you just restated exactly what the post I was responding to stated.
However, you still have to throw out the evidence that this particular blind guy does not watch movies. Unless you have some amazing evidence that shows that all blind people watch movies, your argument is unpersuasive.
I prefer "Flowers By Irene".
... for no fucking reason ...
... see the fricking water!
I find your inconsistent application of profanity appalling...
As someone that knows, you might find it interesting to understand the definition of "legally blind" vs. more functional blindness.
I lived with a blind girl for a while. She was functionally blind and could see only extremely bright and extremely high contrast objects. For the most part, she couldn't see anything and was around five years old before she realized other people could see things.
A friend of the blind girl's was "legally blind". This meant that she couldn't get a driver's license but otherwise was quite functional. She could certainly watch TV, go to movies and read large-print books.
Legally blind does not mean "can't watch a movie" in any respect.
He needs emails read to him, and to have magnification. While "legally blind" does not alone constitute "cannot watch a movie", this guy in particular does not watch movies, because his legal blindness is close enough to "true" blindness that he can't see any of the imagery. So, while your point is valid, the particular circumstances of this case remain true... he wouldn't have downloaded a movie, because he doesn't/can't watch movies.
Can the government record you without permission?
There is an exemption for police officers in the MGL wiretap statute MGL Part IV, Title I, Chapter 272, Section 99):
It shall not be a violation of this section— [..]
for investigative and law enforcement officers of the United States of America to violate the provisions of this section if acting pursuant to authority of the laws of the United States and within the scope of their authority.
[..] for investigative or law enforcement officers to violate the provisions of this section for the purposes of ensuring the safety of any law enforcement officer or agent thereof who is acting in an undercover capacity, or as a witness for the commonwealth; provided, however, that any such interception which is not otherwise permitted by this section shall be deemed unlawful for purposes of paragraph P.
This section is basically saying that as long as they have a warrant/court order, they can actually wiretap you, and you can't attempt to bring it to court at all. Also, the laws hold that they can record conversations occurring in prisons and jails as long as it does not breach lawyer-client confidentiality. (Namely, if you call your sister on the jailhouse phone and tell her to move some evidence, the cops could have been recording that and actually use it in order to find the evidence and convict you for it.)
I spoke to a lawyer about this and my understanding (though I am not a lawyer myself) is that consent doesn't mean what you'd expect. Or, at least, what I'd expect. You don't actually need permission to record someone, you just can't do it secretly (key word). I guess if you tell them and they say something, the law seems to take it as consent. I'm not sure if consent meant something differently at one time, but I'd expect consent would mean I could tell you to not record me and you'd have to stop, but that doesn't appear to be the case, which is why TV reporters can get away with it.
It's implied consent. If you're told that you're being recorded, or the recorder has made it otherwise explicitly obvious that you're being recorded then anything you said is obviously of the understanding that you consent to the recording. I mean, you knew you were being recorded and still said whatever you said, after all.
He'll win, easily.
It's illegal to record audio of people without their express permission in Massachusetts. Period. Doesn't matter where.
About the only exception is if it's blatantly obvious that you're being recorded, which has been taken to mean "news team" - in other words, an absolutely gigantic, impossible-to-miss camera, or a large microphone, like TV reporters carry with the station logo on it.
Otherwise, it's "wire tapping."
Ridiculous? You bet. Going to change? Hah!
Incidentally, as far as I know, you're allowed to take video of people in public places. Just not the audio.
You're right about the situation in two-party consent states. As well, yes, you're allowed to take video, but not audio. The only concern in two-party states is that people will say one thing when not being recorded, and another if they know they are being recorded. (Take Rod Blagojevich, he would have never said "this is *bleep*ing golden, and I'm not just giving it away," if he knew he were being recorded.)
The intent is to protect people from inadvertently saying something retarded, because we all say retarded things fairly often. However, video records actions not speech, and therefore aren't recording conversations... unless you're Deaf and using Sign Language... I've often wondered about that from time to time... can it be wiretapping to record a conversation in Sign Language, because the wording is about recording conversations (in Washington State at least) not about "audio vs. video" or whatever.
Because it's AWESOME!
Believe it or not, there are people who would do that, even in this economy. The may come as a shock to you, but someone people will die for other people.
You surprise belays an undertone of selfishness that is beneath you.
I totally understand that people can be unselfish... I'm just a pessimist.
'Leaking' a statement of that magnitude was 100% intentional by someone who didn't want it 'going down without a hitch'. You know it's true.
A paralegal willingly giving up their job for the benefit of faceless consumers? ... in this economy?
Follow the money. How will they capture a recurring income stream without forcing always online play? DRM is possibly just an added bonus.
Well, I think the thing is two parts, convincing people to always play online producing the recurring income stream, while DRM creates a mandatory online play. (Playing "single player" that can be taken online and back readily is playing solo in a multiplayer game, not actual single player gaming.)
So, yeah, it's all about directing them towards revenue streams, it's just about coaxing them to come by providing benefits (chatting with friends, you can keep in touch, easy linking up and co-op play, etc and forcing them into it (DRM). But I don't see one or the either as being a secret way to get people to the other.
One nice thing about Morrowind is one of the first patches removed the DRM scheme that was in the game, replacing it with a simple CD check, because the DRM was causing problems. Props to Bethesda for that.
Props to Bethesda for releasing a broken game, and then removing the broken content when it looks like it might affect sales?
Let's all have a round of applause for the makers of lawn darts for taking it off the market when they realized that they were killing people...
Whoa there. Now you've made the jump to always online DRM making the game a more fun gaming experience? I have played Diablo 1 and Diablo 2 and I can't think of a single reason that turning it into yet another shitty MMO is going to make it a "more fun gaming experience". We have a long history showing that whenever a major change is made to a game just so that a more-restrictive DRM scheme could be implemented it has never, ever made the game better. Do you really believe that the online and "MMO-like" elements of Diablo 3 were added first or do you think they added them strictly because they're looking for a way to add DRM? What are the odds that an element added for that reason is going to actually make a game better?
No BS, friend, who do you work for?
I'm on the verge of thinking that you're falling the other way in the argument, in automatically assuming a malicious motive for adding this stuff.
It can entirely be that there is a synergy. They want to enhance the game (which I will grant, always-online can add some really cool enhancements to the regular gameplace) but that's the point, these are enhancements and should thusly not be mandatory. Sure, my X-Box 360 does some really cool things when it's online... but when it's offline, at least I can still play my games.
The problem is that they want to add this always-on draconian DRM, and using "enhancements as mandatory" to justify it. YES, provide cool online enhancements, and sure, require always-on DRM to use those online enhancements, but there is not a single enhancement in that group that justifies making it mandatory for playing it single player.
Not even "preventing cheating" is a good enough reason to remove all ability at single player offline play. I'm not playing with anyone else after all.
If the liberals questioned aren't able to decompose a situation into component parts and answer questions about each of them separately, but have to shout a "YAY" or "BOO" on the basis of their feelings about the situation, totally ignoring whatever is asked about, then something is wrong.
But there was no accounting for the possibility that the conservatives questioned weren't doing the exact same thing, because the whole survey suffers from a confirmation bias. They're only looking for confirmation of their preconceived theory (that liberals are gullible to trick questions), rather than looking for disproving theory (that conservatives are just as gullible to trick questions). If a conservative were to answer entirely without reason or logic according to his "YAY" or "BOO" on the basis of his feelings about the situation, then he would answer every single answer as "enlightened", but not because he can actually decompose a situation into component parts and answer it properly and logically.
As my sibling post points out, many of the questions were unattached from the unfortunate negative consequences of the actual terms. However, I will point out that this was done with direct intent to make liberals/progressives answer wrong. Watch, let me do it to conservatives: "Deregulation of medicine and healthcare will result in more deaths." If you answered "disagree" then congratulations, you're empirically wrong.
What happened though was I intentionally gave a question whose consequences the individual's political beliefs would object to, and therefore basically handing them the wrong answer with a big "DO IT!!!! Come on, YOU KNOW YOU WANT TO!"
So, the problem with all of the questions is that they're all trick questions. Even if a libertarian/progressive can see through all the sham, the best answers they can give are "yeah, but..." or "no, but..." But that's not how people answer surveys. They don't answer the question they're presented, they answer the questions they think they've been asked, and when you have trick questions intended to obfuscate the details to elicit an ideological response, you're going to get ideological responses. This also effects the conservatives as well though! There's no provision for questioning why the person answered the way that they did, so even if someone gives an "enlightened" answer, there's no guaranteed that they arrived at that answer through "enlightened" thought. A statement that is true can still be a lie, if the person speaking it thinks that they are lying. "Yes, Jenny went to the movies." (She actually did, but I thought she went to a party, and I was trying to cover up that she went to a party, so I'm lying even though my statement is true.)
1) "Mandatory licensing raises prices." Yes, but why would we ever consider endangering people's lives and/or livelihoods over removing mandatory licenses? If I make potato soup, then buying potato soup raises my prices. It's a trick question because few people will actually logically break down the question properly, and will just answer with a gut answer that is ideologically based.
2) "Standard of living is better now than 30 years ago." The median standard of living has factually gone down relative to the mean standard of living, even though both have risen as absolute values. The two ideologies are answering different questions about the vague term "standard of living".
3) "Rent control leads to housing shortages." Making french fries leads to a shortage of potatoes. People renting more than one property leads to housing shortages... I mean, the statement is technically true, but the original premise behind asking it is so absurd, that no one would expect it. So they answer a different question based on their perceived premise behind the question.
4) "Largest market share is a monopoly" Yes, because everyone will give the most unique answer possible here. Oh wait, I just abused the word "unique" like the entire population does. "Monopoly" doesn't mean "single supplier" to most people anymore, it means "the person with the largest market share." because true monopolies are rare, but one doesn't need a true monopoly to begin leveraging the benefits of being a monopoly. It's a trick question because most people don't use "monopoly" exclusively for true monopolies anymore.
5) "Third World workers working for Americans are being exploited." Well, some liberals/progressives think that American employees are being exploited. What does "exploited" really mean? Are Third World employers using the relatively massive pay that they can offer the third world workers to make those workers concede reasonable accommodations in their employment? Tell you what: I have a job, it pays a million dollars a year, but you have to work 14 hours a day, 7 days a week, with zero vacation time, and no benefits, or other perks. Would you take this job? Many people would, because hey, it's freaking a million dollars a year! Would you count it as exploitation? Some people think there are maximums
It's scary. I understand why they do it... usually because they don't want people destroying evidence.
But let's just say they stormed my house without identifying themselves... by accident (wrong house, bogus tip, whatever). I don't know a raid from junkies kicking my door in, so I'm going to shoot, and I'm probably going to die when they shoot back. Equally tragic, is if I manage to hurt someone.
They're a bad idea unless they REALLY need to.
As I mentioned above, "could destroy evidence" isn't a good enough reason for me. There is a severe chance that potentially innocent people could die as a result of a no-knock raid, so "could destroy evidence" is not good enough. There have to be LIVES on the line. "If we give warning they could KILL people." Anything less is insufficient for the risk that the cops are assuming. Forget even guns, the residents could come at them with baseball bats, and tap-tap, innocent person down, and they didn't even pose a lethal threat to the officers.
I can think of one good case for a no-knock raid...where there is good reason to believe there are potential hostages (who are not also likely accomplices). Other than that, I completely agree about no-knock raids.
This. There are some cases where a no-knock policy is a good idea, but it should be expected that if you're asking for a no-knock search warrant, then you're basically asking for permission to go in there and potentially kill everyone inside that poses a threat, even if they were innocent.
Doing it to avoid destruction of evidence should not be a sufficient reason, it should be that lives hang in the balance, and giving warning to the criminals will result in people's deaths. THAT is the only bar I'm willing to acknowledge for a no-knock raid.
Are you kidding in your subject line? Signing away first amendment rights is a common practice. Security Clearances, employment agreements, settlement agreements, nondisclosure agreements, all kinds of things let you sign away your rights. (Though consult a lawyer if it matters to you in a particular situation, obviously.)
This is spot on. The issue is that one cannot be forced to forfeit their 1st amendment rights, however, if one willingly and voluntarily signed a contract to forfeit their 1st amendment rights in some way, then that contract can be enforced in court.
Now, there are certain unconscionable conditions for contracts that you cannot do. You cannot contract to consent to slavery, as well you cannot consent to be intentionally killed. (You can however consent to be involved in potentially lethal physical combat, so long as all reasonable precautions against death are taken. This is how boxing works.) However, "freedom of speech" is not an inalienable right.