So...will a rapper try to trademark the word n-igg-er (seems you can't actually type the word on slashdot anymore..?)....to keep others from using it?
Would there be a revolt is a white person trademarked the word?
Then blacks couldn't claim " that is our word, you can't use it"....
Just musing over what this might imply...
Based on your statements, I'll assume that either you don't really know anything about how trademark works, or you're just a lousy troll.
No, you cannot trademark a regular word and prevent others from using that word in the course of ordinary conversation. The point of a trademark is to give your product a unique identifier (the "mark") that distinguishes it from other products of the same type (collectively the "trade"), with the goal being to prevent customers from confusing a competitor's product for yours. A computer manufacturer can trademark the name "Apple", and that would prevent any other computer manufacturer from marketing their own "Apple Computer". That doesn't mean that people can't talk about apples, or that growers can't sell their fruit by calling them apples, or even that people can't talk about Apple computers.
If they implement the patent and prevent you from going to a competitor's website they are restraining your ability to do business with that company, which counts as an illegal restraint of trade.
But they would only be doing it if you're in their store and using their Internet access. If it's that easy to get past their restraints, the FTC probably wouldn't care.
Further, it would be a FCC violation for interfering with your communications.
Has the FCC ruled against ISPs that do things like intercept DNS lookups?
Why would it be restraint of trade? Does the patent prevent other stores from being able to do business? If so, the patent is probably invalid, either for being too broad or too obvious.
Or did you mean the system that is described by the patent?
This is a good point to raise. A patent gives you the "exclusive right to your invention", but the important word is "exclusive". In case people aren't aware, a patent does not give you the right to implement your patent, it only gives you the right to prevent others from implementing it (via monetary restitution or an injunction by a court). You can patent something that's illegal (e.g. a new method for manufacturing heroin), and you can sue anyone that infringes your patent, but you can still be arrested or sued for implementing it yourself.
Note that I'm not arguing whether or not Amazon's system counts as wire tapping, I'm only saying that it's not the USPTO's job to decide if it counts as wire tapping.
Why would it matter? That isn't a patent, it's a patent application. The application was rejected in 2005 (because of prior art) and abandoned by the PTO when the lawyers didn't respond for 6 months.
You can see the complete history by going to USPTO PAIR, searching for application 10/737483, and going to the Image File Wrapper tab.
As others have mentioned, the reason for extra punishment for "hate crimes" is because you're implicitly threatening a large number of other people in addition to the victim of the primary crime. If it makes you feel better, you can replace all instances of "hate crime" with "criminal threatening".
Yes, all of that is true. My only point (which could have been clearer) was that a case doesn't become meritless after the fact just because you don't win.
"Merit" and "Faith" are somewhat related. I suppose it's theoretically possible that she believes, in good faith, that she was discriminated against because of her gender, but if she can't provide any facts or evidence to support her belief, it would still be a meritless lawsuit.
I was speaking generally, as the post I was replying to did.
In terms of this specific type of situation, I'm in the middle on it. Demanding a password should never be allowed as a way of establishing access or ownership; if a phone is found at a crime scene, the prosecutor should not be able to demand the password from you and then use the fact that you know the password as evidence that you were at the crime scene. If it's already shown beyond a reasonable doubt that you own a phone, though (such as the phone being in your pocket when you were arrested), I would be fine with a warrant that compels production of the contents of your phone.
Retaliation cases are for cases which have merit. If your employee sues you and loses then she attempted to attack you or your business without merit.
Um, no, that isn't true. A lawsuit "without merit" means that you have no reasonable evidence to support your argument. You can have reasonable evidence, and you will still lose your case if the other side's evidence is stronger. You can't retroactively declare a case to be without merit after the verdict.
As far as I know, making threats is an independent crime in most states. So the question would be how credible the threat is. That's going to depend entirely on the details and circumstances of a specific case (and probably the feelings of the jury), so it's hard to predict exact outcomes. I think we're generally in agreement, though.
Why should hate speech be punishable?... If you mean in general then I would argue that hate speech is unequivocally protected by the Constitution.
In general, speech that carries a threat is not protected by the Constitution. "Canadians are greedy assholes" might be considered hate speech by some people, but it certainly wouldn't be punishable. "Canadians are greedy assholes, and I wish someone would kill them all" would be arguable, since you're intentionally encouraging violence against a group of people. "Canadians are greedy assholes, and I'm going to shoot them if I see them" will probably get you into trouble, since you are clearly threatening a group of people.
Similarly, this is why hate crimes carry additional punishments. It isn't because of your hatred of a group of people, it's because your crime also includes an implied threat to other members of the targeted group. Hating people isn't illegal, but threatening people is.
Specifically, a recipe (or its end result) is a composition of matter, which is patentable. You can look up patent applications for pies and see that the rejections have to be over prior art.
The subject matter of copyright is extremely broad, including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, audiovisual, and architectural works.
(Emphasis added) Does standup comedy not effectively take this form?
Yes, but it still only applies to the tangible medium. A video tape of a comedian's performance is definitely covered by copyright. Simply repeating a joke, especially if you don't use the exact same words, is a less clear situation.
I'm sorry that I wasn't clear about that. I meant that changing the password would be done with the agreement of the prosecutor and/or approval of the judge, which is why I said it would be changed by an attorney or some other court-appointed neutral party. It could be a compromise that would allow for proper discovery of evidence without needing to provide the original password. One should definitely never do anything like that without the judge telling you to.
The fact that a phone is in my pocket, or on my desk, doesn't necessarily show it's mine. It could have been planted on me, or I might have picked it up and not had a chance to try to return it yet.
In a criminal case, they should have more than reasonable proof. They should have proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
Based on how often either of those things happen, I don't think a judge (who decides on issuing a warrant, the admissibility of evidence, and finding a person in contempt) or a jury (if the question makes it to them) is going to consider that a reasonable doubt. But I'm not a criminal attorney (or a lawyer at all), so I can only make semi-educated guesses based on my experience working in certain civil lawsuits.
Yeah, my experience was almost entirely with civil lawsuits, so I'm not certain if the rule applies to criminal trials in the same way. For a criminal trial, unless you come up with a really good explanation, though, jurors probably won't consider the doubt to be reasonable.
I suppose the one exception is if you can argue that the password itself, not the data on the systems it unlocks, or the data that it decrypts, actually incriminates you. If your password is "I killed sarah and dumped her body behind my grandmas old barn", then you can probably plead the 5th. Maybe. The prosecutor could just offer to immunize you from any incrimination that arises from the password itself, or anything that might be inferred or discovered from it (like Sarah's body) other than what is contained in the data it unlocks.
The other potential alternatives are either to change such a password before handing the device over to law enforcement (most likely done by your attorney or some neutral party, neither of whom could be asked to provide the original password), or to provide all of the data from the device instead of the device itself (which might not be enough in all cases, but would probably provide all of the relevant data in many cases).
>You're not providing any information about the crime
Yes you are. Given that passwords are supposed to be secrets kept by you and only you, by supplying the password you are testifying that you indeed have control over that phone; that it is your phone and the contents are yours. You are linking the evidence in that phone to yourself.
Absolutely, law enforcement should have reasonable proof that you know the password before compelling you to unlock the device. If the phone was in your pocket when they arrested you, or if it was on your desk when they executed a search warrant at your home, it would be reasonable to conclude that you know the password. You could lie and say that you don't know it, but courts get kind of annoyed with perjury.
Slashdot Mirror
So...will a rapper try to trademark the word n-igg-er (seems you can't actually type the word on slashdot anymore..?)....to keep others from using it?
Would there be a revolt is a white person trademarked the word?
Then blacks couldn't claim " that is our word, you can't use it"....
Just musing over what this might imply...
Based on your statements, I'll assume that either you don't really know anything about how trademark works, or you're just a lousy troll.
No, you cannot trademark a regular word and prevent others from using that word in the course of ordinary conversation. The point of a trademark is to give your product a unique identifier (the "mark") that distinguishes it from other products of the same type (collectively the "trade"), with the goal being to prevent customers from confusing a competitor's product for yours. A computer manufacturer can trademark the name "Apple", and that would prevent any other computer manufacturer from marketing their own "Apple Computer". That doesn't mean that people can't talk about apples, or that growers can't sell their fruit by calling them apples, or even that people can't talk about Apple computers.
It is absolutely a restraint of interstate trade. How the patent office couldn't see this is beyond me.
Because it isn't the job of the USPTO to determine things like wire tapping or restraint of trade. How you can't understand this is beyond me.
If they implement the patent and prevent you from going to a competitor's website they are restraining your ability to do business with that company, which counts as an illegal restraint of trade.
But they would only be doing it if you're in their store and using their Internet access. If it's that easy to get past their restraints, the FTC probably wouldn't care.
Further, it would be a FCC violation for interfering with your communications.
Has the FCC ruled against ISPs that do things like intercept DNS lookups?
Why would it be restraint of trade? Does the patent prevent other stores from being able to do business? If so, the patent is probably invalid, either for being too broad or too obvious.
Or did you mean the system that is described by the patent?
It's called "wire tapping"
This is a good point to raise. A patent gives you the "exclusive right to your invention", but the important word is "exclusive". In case people aren't aware, a patent does not give you the right to implement your patent, it only gives you the right to prevent others from implementing it (via monetary restitution or an injunction by a court). You can patent something that's illegal (e.g. a new method for manufacturing heroin), and you can sue anyone that infringes your patent, but you can still be arrested or sued for implementing it yourself.
Note that I'm not arguing whether or not Amazon's system counts as wire tapping, I'm only saying that it's not the USPTO's job to decide if it counts as wire tapping.
I wonder if Logitech forgot about the patent on this
Why would it matter? That isn't a patent, it's a patent application. The application was rejected in 2005 (because of prior art) and abandoned by the PTO when the lawyers didn't respond for 6 months.
You can see the complete history by going to USPTO PAIR, searching for application 10/737483, and going to the Image File Wrapper tab.
As others have mentioned, the reason for extra punishment for "hate crimes" is because you're implicitly threatening a large number of other people in addition to the victim of the primary crime. If it makes you feel better, you can replace all instances of "hate crime" with "criminal threatening".
Yes, all of that is true. My only point (which could have been clearer) was that a case doesn't become meritless after the fact just because you don't win.
"Merit" and "Faith" are somewhat related. I suppose it's theoretically possible that she believes, in good faith, that she was discriminated against because of her gender, but if she can't provide any facts or evidence to support her belief, it would still be a meritless lawsuit.
I was speaking generally, as the post I was replying to did.
In terms of this specific type of situation, I'm in the middle on it. Demanding a password should never be allowed as a way of establishing access or ownership; if a phone is found at a crime scene, the prosecutor should not be able to demand the password from you and then use the fact that you know the password as evidence that you were at the crime scene. If it's already shown beyond a reasonable doubt that you own a phone, though (such as the phone being in your pocket when you were arrested), I would be fine with a warrant that compels production of the contents of your phone.
Retaliation cases are for cases which have merit. If your employee sues you and loses then she attempted to attack you or your business without merit.
Um, no, that isn't true. A lawsuit "without merit" means that you have no reasonable evidence to support your argument. You can have reasonable evidence, and you will still lose your case if the other side's evidence is stronger. You can't retroactively declare a case to be without merit after the verdict.
If a judge issues a warrant, then you aren't (alternatively, the search isn't unreasonable). You should try reading all the way to the end some time.
As far as I know, making threats is an independent crime in most states. So the question would be how credible the threat is. That's going to depend entirely on the details and circumstances of a specific case (and probably the feelings of the jury), so it's hard to predict exact outcomes. I think we're generally in agreement, though.
Yes. It was a homophobic 'joke' according to SJW's
It was only homophobic to people who assume that oral sex is only for homosexuals.
Why should hate speech be punishable? ... If you mean in general then I would argue that hate speech is unequivocally protected by the Constitution.
In general, speech that carries a threat is not protected by the Constitution. "Canadians are greedy assholes" might be considered hate speech by some people, but it certainly wouldn't be punishable. "Canadians are greedy assholes, and I wish someone would kill them all" would be arguable, since you're intentionally encouraging violence against a group of people. "Canadians are greedy assholes, and I'm going to shoot them if I see them" will probably get you into trouble, since you are clearly threatening a group of people.
Similarly, this is why hate crimes carry additional punishments. It isn't because of your hatred of a group of people, it's because your crime also includes an implied threat to other members of the targeted group. Hating people isn't illegal, but threatening people is.
Well played, sir.
Specifically, a recipe (or its end result) is a composition of matter, which is patentable. You can look up patent applications for pies and see that the rejections have to be over prior art.
The subject matter of copyright is extremely broad, including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, audiovisual, and architectural works.
(Emphasis added) Does standup comedy not effectively take this form?
Yes, but it still only applies to the tangible medium. A video tape of a comedian's performance is definitely covered by copyright. Simply repeating a joke, especially if you don't use the exact same words, is a less clear situation.
Yes, I'm quite aware of all of that. The point that I wasn't certain about was exactly how spoliation is handled.
That's a really awesome strawman you've got there. Where can I get one like that?
I'm sorry that I wasn't clear about that. I meant that changing the password would be done with the agreement of the prosecutor and/or approval of the judge, which is why I said it would be changed by an attorney or some other court-appointed neutral party. It could be a compromise that would allow for proper discovery of evidence without needing to provide the original password. One should definitely never do anything like that without the judge telling you to.
The fact that a phone is in my pocket, or on my desk, doesn't necessarily show it's mine. It could have been planted on me, or I might have picked it up and not had a chance to try to return it yet.
In a criminal case, they should have more than reasonable proof. They should have proof beyond a reasonable doubt.
Based on how often either of those things happen, I don't think a judge (who decides on issuing a warrant, the admissibility of evidence, and finding a person in contempt) or a jury (if the question makes it to them) is going to consider that a reasonable doubt. But I'm not a criminal attorney (or a lawyer at all), so I can only make semi-educated guesses based on my experience working in certain civil lawsuits.
Yeah, my experience was almost entirely with civil lawsuits, so I'm not certain if the rule applies to criminal trials in the same way. For a criminal trial, unless you come up with a really good explanation, though, jurors probably won't consider the doubt to be reasonable.
How would you prove which code I gave you?
By easily seeing that the phone had been wiped? Contrary to popular belief around here, most judges aren't stupid.
I suppose the one exception is if you can argue that the password itself, not the data on the systems it unlocks, or the data that it decrypts, actually incriminates you. If your password is "I killed sarah and dumped her body behind my grandmas old barn", then you can probably plead the 5th. Maybe. The prosecutor could just offer to immunize you from any incrimination that arises from the password itself, or anything that might be inferred or discovered from it (like Sarah's body) other than what is contained in the data it unlocks.
The other potential alternatives are either to change such a password before handing the device over to law enforcement (most likely done by your attorney or some neutral party, neither of whom could be asked to provide the original password), or to provide all of the data from the device instead of the device itself (which might not be enough in all cases, but would probably provide all of the relevant data in many cases).
>You're not providing any information about the crime
Yes you are. Given that passwords are supposed to be secrets kept by you and only you, by supplying the password you are testifying that you indeed have control over that phone; that it is your phone and the contents are yours. You are linking the evidence in that phone to yourself.
Absolutely, law enforcement should have reasonable proof that you know the password before compelling you to unlock the device. If the phone was in your pocket when they arrested you, or if it was on your desk when they executed a search warrant at your home, it would be reasonable to conclude that you know the password. You could lie and say that you don't know it, but courts get kind of annoyed with perjury.