Cloning is clearly what's needed here. Or Ninja's proposal.
The problem, scientifically, with both of those proposals is that knowledge/experience is not genetic. Cloning him, or producing off-spring will not necessarily cause the derivatives to be the same.
What we need is a perfect cloning machine, which clones not only the body, but the electrical impulses of the mind.
Trust me, not many politicians are worried about that. They already know exactly who is going to pay for it.
Sadly, I believe you are correct about this.
Unfortunately, the laws that exist to keep government employees from benefiting in corruption such as bribes and kickbacks don't exist for the politicians. Sure, there are laws against bribing politicians, but campaign donations don't qualify.
No, his argument relies on dealing with the government as if it's an enemy of the people.
I admit I had to go back and read what I said, because I don't remember ever saying anything of the sort. Luckily, I did read exactly what I said, and I am pretty sure you are putting words in my mouth. I can't be certain, as what I said was said before I had enough coffee.
I believe what I said, and what I meant, was exactly what you said (as nasch pointed out.) If the companies want to use government money to help purchase and build their business model, then they can't be upset when the public (through the government) comes back and takes their infrastructure away and gives it back to the people who actually paid for it (as in, the American public.)
In Kansas, for example, cable operators recently ran into a bit of a chainsaw when they attempted to ban towns and cities in the state from running their own fiber or working with partners like Google Fiber (operating in Kansas City).
I believe in capitalism, but in the case of crony capitalism, I think the best solution is to go to the logical conclusion of their argument. If they don't like government "meddling" in their affairs, than they should not be allowed to own or control any network built using government funds (even if it only supplemented their own, and/or they received funds from the government for, during construction, or as a result of the build.) If they don't like it, don't accept the money in the first place.
Now that the government owns and controls the entire infrastructure (since government money was used to build it,) then the government can open it up to anyone who wishes to pay to connect to and provide infrastructure support. Problem solved.
Good thing I am not a politician...it seems so easy to figure this stuff out when you don't have to worry about who's going to pay for your next round of hookers and blow.
New FCC Unlicensed Allocation, coming from CBS band?
I hope the FCC adds that band CBS will be giving up to the unlicensed band for use in wifi and public networking spaces. We could really use more bands for the public use...
How many folks want to wager on how quickly CBS plays the Weather Channel "its a matter of life or death" card when they lose their bluff and have to go through with their threat.
Only thing I'll miss on CBS is Big Bang Theory...but there is always reruns on other channels.
I thought this was a national thing, but perhaps it's a state thing -- but in my state, this is overtly illegal.
It may have been illegal here, but since it was a contract thing, it probably would have been a civil matter. I never tried to fight it (until they told me the contract was dead anyway because the company was out of business.)
Auto dealerships will, however, lie about this and they do tell their customers that they have to use the dealership or approved shops.
I suspect it was very much a lie. I suspect if I had taken it to my mechanic (who is certified and runs his own garage,) they probably never would have known. But I wasn't willing to test it at the time.
Perhaps some states allow two-tier sales of beer. In California, I can't purchase a case of beer from a distributor. Has to be a retailer, but there is an exception for on-site craft brewers selling directly to consumers.
That isn't because of legal reasons...but contractual or a policy by the distributor. California does not have a Three-Tier Distribution system (though I can guarantee the majors are trying to corrupt the system pushing for the same three-tier scam they have with other states,) and brewers can sell the beer directly to you or directly to a retailer without going through a wholesaler.
By using contracts to make them pay more for substandard service that is offered by other businesses. Dealer work on cars is tremendously more expensive, time consuming, and annoying.
I had a vehicle that lived under one of these contracts (extended warranty.) If I used anything other than the dealer for any car repairs, the contract was null and void and I'd be on my own for future repairs. This included oil changes and routine maintenance, which they required every three months or every 3000 miles. The vehicle was primarily a "vacation vehicle", which had very low mileage. But, following the rules, I did my best to comply with the contract. While the jiffy-lube down the street can take your car in at a moments notice for an oil change, and usually costs far less, I'd be a chump and schedule my maintenance every 3 months or 3000 miles weeks in advance, and would deliver the car at 8am to be picked up around 5pm (they wouldn't schedule any less than a full day, even if the change took 30 minutes.)
The company went out of business and the contract became null and void, despite my efforts. Another company "bought" the contract, but failed to hold up their end of the bargain. I didn't find this out until I had an issue with the vehicle that needed work, so I took it to them only to find out they were gone, and the replacement company wouldn't honor the contract. The end result, my extended warranty was cancelled even though I paid an arm-and-a-leg and lots of heartache to keep up my end of the bargain (and then paid even more to fix problems that would have been covered by the warranty.)
A year ago, the vehicle had a recall, and I was told to take it to another dealer to fix a problem that the company would pay for. When I took it in, they screwed up the repair, and then told me that there was a bunch more stuff wrong with the car that needed to be repaired right then and there, because it was unsafe for me to drive the vehicle away without repair. I laughed, because stuff they said was broken was stuff my mechanic just fixed (including "balding tires" that were just replaced a month before, with the sales slip still sitting in the car.) I took it back to my mechanic, who fixed their shoddy work and checked the car over again to make sure that all the stuff they said was wrong wasn't. Their $450 bill turned out to be about $80 worth of work by my mechanic, and that was just fixing what they broke. A scam, pure and simple.
I swore off extended warranty's from that point forward, since I see them now as little more than a carrot to keep you paying them. I will never take a vehicle, recall or otherwise, to the dealer. I could have taken it to my mechanic all along, who I trust, who schedules stuff better and takes walk-ins, and who charges me far less for far better work.
Guess that will mean no more updates for DVDFab, wink wink, nudge nudge.
Kinda like when they originally sold their software online and had the software that breaks DVD copy-protection on dvdfab.net and the software that doesn't on dvdfab.com (for those non-freedom-loving countries, or at least those countries that like to treat intellectual property is property for producers, but not for consumers.) Everyone I knew, even those in the US, downloaded the software from dvdfab.net even though the DMCA made it illegal to distribute.
I suspect dvdfab.cn will work just as well as dvdfab.com/.net.
That's fascinating. I hadn't heard of this tier at all, despite a number of calls to Comcast in a failed attempt to get internet service at not-insane prices.
I am really, really confused. I pay $73 a month for 50 Mbps down. Either their 6 Mbps @ $50 a month includes all you can eat Cocaine and prostitutes, or their upper tiers are at insane prices.
Couldn't you just pay your cable company $50 to turn it on for one month and then cancel?
Have you ever tried to cancel something from the Cable Company?
No, seriously.
When I subscribed to cable many moons ago, I could do so from the website. They had all sorts of ways to subscribe or upgrade your subscription. When I cut the cord, I tried to cancel via the website, only to find that you had to call a phone number, and when I called that phone number, I was told I had to go to the cable company's storefront property to cancel. I went on a relatively calm day, in the middle of the week, and took a number and sat down. Three and a half hours later, they called my number. I walked up and told them I wanted to cancel my cable subscription and only have phone and internet. They had me go through a twenty minute survey on why I was cancelling my service, then spent another twenty minutes trying to persuade me to keep cable and just reduce my options. Finally, they "cancelled" my subscription. A week later, I received a bill which said I still had basic cable. I called again, only to be told to go into the store to fix the problem. Rinse, repeat.
Seems like it isn't worth the time or the money to get NBC for a month and then cancel.
But did they prevent critical features of Windows 95 from working when that support ended?
Depends, does issuing patches for discovered security flaws count? Not that I disagree, and Windows 95 works fine without security updates/patches...but some people would argue that critical features includes security flaw mitigation.
The RSA Conference is not run or hosted by RSA, the Security Division of EMC. It's an entirely separate entity, and what you've reported is skewed so that you would have something to write about.
Anonymous Coward, get your facts straight before you slam Mike for not getting his facts straight.
RSA Conference *IS* run by EMC Corporation. While it is true that they use a couple contractors to provide support for the conference, they are very much behind the conference.
Wow, at one point RSA were crypto heroes to me. Phil Zimmerman was an inspiration to my studies. They've just burned the last tenuous bit of bridge remaining between us.
Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir, Leonard Adleman and Phil Zimmerman are still crypto heroes. None of them currently have anything to do with the company RSA Security LLC (which is owned by EMC.) Zimmerman never had anything to do with RSA, except having RSA use the government goons to shut down PGP as "munitions" when PGP and RSA got into a little licensing spat.
Re: Re: "Threatening people with a pellet gun and pretending to rob them"
Every state has a concealed carry law now.
This is correct, though in some states the law specifically states that the government does not regulate or restrict concealed carry, meaning that no permit is required. However, there are many that would argue that there are still 7 states that make it impossible for any legal citizen to receive a permit to carry a concealed weapon (unless they happen to be best buds with the politician who assigns these permits or a huge financial contributor of the current political party in power,) and thus really isn't in any way helpful for citizens in these states to provide meaningful defense against this situation.
But, contrary to what the anti-gunners would have you believe, very few people carry a gun.
I believe that is kinda the point. If only a few people carry, and you don't know who, the degree of difficulty in committing a crime is raised. You may be lucky, but when you aren't, you're dead. The degree of luck decreases as more states allow unrestricted or sane concealed carry, and while that number will remain small due to most people not carrying, the fact that you can't really tell who is makes the issue far less "worth it" for a criminal bent on using a weapon to scare the crap out of people.
Re: Re: Re: Re: What about those inplane phones that were common in the '90s?
I believe it is known as courtesy, a concept that seems here to have fallen into disfavor.
Having been on trains and public transportation in the US, for the most part, the courtesy still exists. And usually it exists on planes too. However, when you start talking loudly to someone else on a Japanese train, you very quickly find the whole train car staring at you...that is often enough to get you to shut up. Having the flight attendant come over and ask you to keep it down might be enough, and making it a law is overkill.
There is already too much stuff in the law-books that is poorly enforced and I'd hope by now we'd recognize as a nation that you can't regulate good behavior.
On the post: Judge Otis Wright Slams 'Made Up' Government 'Plot' Designed To Ensnare Gullible Poor People
Re: Re: Re:
The problem, scientifically, with both of those proposals is that knowledge/experience is not genetic. Cloning him, or producing off-spring will not necessarily cause the derivatives to be the same.
What we need is a perfect cloning machine, which clones not only the body, but the electrical impulses of the mind.
Either that or a transporter which can accidentally copy him a bunch of times or genetic memory.
On the post: If You Want To Fix U.S. Broadband Competition, Start By Killing State-Level Protectionist Laws Written By Duopolists
Re:
Sadly, I believe you are correct about this.
Unfortunately, the laws that exist to keep government employees from benefiting in corruption such as bribes and kickbacks don't exist for the politicians. Sure, there are laws against bribing politicians, but campaign donations don't qualify.
On the post: If You Want To Fix U.S. Broadband Competition, Start By Killing State-Level Protectionist Laws Written By Duopolists
Re: Re: Re: Re:
I admit I had to go back and read what I said, because I don't remember ever saying anything of the sort. Luckily, I did read exactly what I said, and I am pretty sure you are putting words in my mouth. I can't be certain, as what I said was said before I had enough coffee.
I believe what I said, and what I meant, was exactly what you said (as nasch pointed out.) If the companies want to use government money to help purchase and build their business model, then they can't be upset when the public (through the government) comes back and takes their infrastructure away and gives it back to the people who actually paid for it (as in, the American public.)
On the post: If You Want To Fix U.S. Broadband Competition, Start By Killing State-Level Protectionist Laws Written By Duopolists
I believe in capitalism, but in the case of crony capitalism, I think the best solution is to go to the logical conclusion of their argument. If they don't like government "meddling" in their affairs, than they should not be allowed to own or control any network built using government funds (even if it only supplemented their own, and/or they received funds from the government for, during construction, or as a result of the build.) If they don't like it, don't accept the money in the first place.
Now that the government owns and controls the entire infrastructure (since government money was used to build it,) then the government can open it up to anyone who wishes to pay to connect to and provide infrastructure support. Problem solved.
Good thing I am not a politician...it seems so easy to figure this stuff out when you don't have to worry about who's going to pay for your next round of hookers and blow.
On the post: CBS Once Again Threatens To Move Content Off The Air If Aereo Wins; Why Is That A Problem?
New FCC Unlicensed Allocation, coming from CBS band?
How many folks want to wager on how quickly CBS plays the Weather Channel "its a matter of life or death" card when they lose their bluff and have to go through with their threat.
Only thing I'll miss on CBS is Big Bang Theory...but there is always reruns on other channels.
On the post: Corruption Index: If A State Moves To Ban Tesla Direct Sales, It's A Sign Of Corruption
Re: Re: Re:
It may have been illegal here, but since it was a contract thing, it probably would have been a civil matter. I never tried to fight it (until they told me the contract was dead anyway because the company was out of business.)
Auto dealerships will, however, lie about this and they do tell their customers that they have to use the dealership or approved shops.
I suspect it was very much a lie. I suspect if I had taken it to my mechanic (who is certified and runs his own garage,) they probably never would have known. But I wasn't willing to test it at the time.
On the post: Corruption Index: If A State Moves To Ban Tesla Direct Sales, It's A Sign Of Corruption
Re: Re: Re: Beer and Cars
That isn't because of legal reasons...but contractual or a policy by the distributor. California does not have a Three-Tier Distribution system (though I can guarantee the majors are trying to corrupt the system pushing for the same three-tier scam they have with other states,) and brewers can sell the beer directly to you or directly to a retailer without going through a wholesaler.
On the post: Corruption Index: If A State Moves To Ban Tesla Direct Sales, It's A Sign Of Corruption
Re:
I had a vehicle that lived under one of these contracts (extended warranty.) If I used anything other than the dealer for any car repairs, the contract was null and void and I'd be on my own for future repairs. This included oil changes and routine maintenance, which they required every three months or every 3000 miles. The vehicle was primarily a "vacation vehicle", which had very low mileage. But, following the rules, I did my best to comply with the contract. While the jiffy-lube down the street can take your car in at a moments notice for an oil change, and usually costs far less, I'd be a chump and schedule my maintenance every 3 months or 3000 miles weeks in advance, and would deliver the car at 8am to be picked up around 5pm (they wouldn't schedule any less than a full day, even if the change took 30 minutes.)
The company went out of business and the contract became null and void, despite my efforts. Another company "bought" the contract, but failed to hold up their end of the bargain. I didn't find this out until I had an issue with the vehicle that needed work, so I took it to them only to find out they were gone, and the replacement company wouldn't honor the contract. The end result, my extended warranty was cancelled even though I paid an arm-and-a-leg and lots of heartache to keep up my end of the bargain (and then paid even more to fix problems that would have been covered by the warranty.)
A year ago, the vehicle had a recall, and I was told to take it to another dealer to fix a problem that the company would pay for. When I took it in, they screwed up the repair, and then told me that there was a bunch more stuff wrong with the car that needed to be repaired right then and there, because it was unsafe for me to drive the vehicle away without repair. I laughed, because stuff they said was broken was stuff my mechanic just fixed (including "balding tires" that were just replaced a month before, with the sales slip still sitting in the car.) I took it back to my mechanic, who fixed their shoddy work and checked the car over again to make sure that all the stuff they said was wrong wasn't. Their $450 bill turned out to be about $80 worth of work by my mechanic, and that was just fixing what they broke. A scam, pure and simple.
I swore off extended warranty's from that point forward, since I see them now as little more than a carrot to keep you paying them. I will never take a vehicle, recall or otherwise, to the dealer. I could have taken it to my mechanic all along, who I trust, who schedules stuff better and takes walk-ins, and who charges me far less for far better work.
On the post: Ridiculously Broad Ruling Against DVD Ripper Software Has Court Allow Seizure Of Domains, Social Media & More
Re: Re: Re:
FWIW, it was hideously expensive last time I looked.
They have sales every once in a while (I still get ads for them via email.) I bought the suite a number of years ago for $49, and it was unlimited.
Of course, that was back when I used Windows.
On the post: Ridiculously Broad Ruling Against DVD Ripper Software Has Court Allow Seizure Of Domains, Social Media & More
Kinda like when they originally sold their software online and had the software that breaks DVD copy-protection on dvdfab.net and the software that doesn't on dvdfab.com (for those non-freedom-loving countries, or at least those countries that like to treat intellectual property is property for producers, but not for consumers.) Everyone I knew, even those in the US, downloaded the software from dvdfab.net even though the DMCA made it illegal to distribute.
I suspect dvdfab.cn will work just as well as dvdfab.com/.net.
On the post: Dutch Supreme Court Agrees To Let Rights Group Collect Back 'You Must Be A Pirate' Taxes On Mp3 Players And Hard Drives
Re: Re: The Pirate Bay
Well, that is good fit then, considering TPB isn't actually uploading anything. TPB just provides pointers to download stuff.
On the post: Comcast Applauds Itself For Barely Adhering To NBC Merger Conditions, Most Of Which Comcast Created
Re: Re: Re:
Theoretically, we do pay for it, in the form of gasoline taxes and state licensing fees.
But then again, we also paid for national broadband, a number of times.
On the post: Comcast Applauds Itself For Barely Adhering To NBC Merger Conditions, Most Of Which Comcast Created
Re: BIAS?
I am really, really confused. I pay $73 a month for 50 Mbps down. Either their 6 Mbps @ $50 a month includes all you can eat Cocaine and prostitutes, or their upper tiers are at insane prices.
And I thought I was getting ripped off.
On the post: NBC Crows About Thwarting 45,000 'Illegal' Olympic Videos, Ignores The Fact That It Drove Users To Them
Re: Re: Tried to watch legally
Have you ever tried to cancel something from the Cable Company?
No, seriously.
When I subscribed to cable many moons ago, I could do so from the website. They had all sorts of ways to subscribe or upgrade your subscription. When I cut the cord, I tried to cancel via the website, only to find that you had to call a phone number, and when I called that phone number, I was told I had to go to the cable company's storefront property to cancel. I went on a relatively calm day, in the middle of the week, and took a number and sat down. Three and a half hours later, they called my number. I walked up and told them I wanted to cancel my cable subscription and only have phone and internet. They had me go through a twenty minute survey on why I was cancelling my service, then spent another twenty minutes trying to persuade me to keep cable and just reduce my options. Finally, they "cancelled" my subscription. A week later, I received a bill which said I still had basic cable. I called again, only to be told to go into the store to fix the problem. Rinse, repeat.
Seems like it isn't worth the time or the money to get NBC for a month and then cancel.
On the post: Nintendo Kills Online Functionality For Wii, DS Titles, Highlighting Need For Greater User Control Over Content They Supposedly Own
Re: Re:
Depends, does issuing patches for discovered security flaws count? Not that I disagree, and Windows 95 works fine without security updates/patches...but some people would argue that critical features includes security flaw mitigation.
On the post: RSA Tried To Get TrustyCon Booted
Re:
Anonymous Coward, get your facts straight before you slam Mike for not getting his facts straight.
RSA Conference *IS* run by EMC Corporation. While it is true that they use a couple contractors to provide support for the conference, they are very much behind the conference.
Please feel free to visit the website, http://www.rsaconference.com.
On the post: RSA Tried To Get TrustyCon Booted
Re:
Ron Rivest, Adi Shamir, Leonard Adleman and Phil Zimmerman are still crypto heroes. None of them currently have anything to do with the company RSA Security LLC (which is owned by EMC.) Zimmerman never had anything to do with RSA, except having RSA use the government goons to shut down PGP as "munitions" when PGP and RSA got into a little licensing spat.
On the post: Keurig Will Use DRM In New Coffee Maker To Lock Out Refill Market
Re: Re: Re: Only idiots use pods anyway, the coffee SUCKS and is expensive
Yet everyone goes to Starbucks.
Something tells me that those people who know what good coffee is a very, very small sample size. Maybe a sample size of one?
On the post: Moron Posts Videos Of Himself Terrorizing People With A BB Gun, Is Summarily Arrested
Re: Re: "Threatening people with a pellet gun and pretending to rob them"
This is correct, though in some states the law specifically states that the government does not regulate or restrict concealed carry, meaning that no permit is required. However, there are many that would argue that there are still 7 states that make it impossible for any legal citizen to receive a permit to carry a concealed weapon (unless they happen to be best buds with the politician who assigns these permits or a huge financial contributor of the current political party in power,) and thus really isn't in any way helpful for citizens in these states to provide meaningful defense against this situation.
But, contrary to what the anti-gunners would have you believe, very few people carry a gun.
I believe that is kinda the point. If only a few people carry, and you don't know who, the degree of difficulty in committing a crime is raised. You may be lucky, but when you aren't, you're dead. The degree of luck decreases as more states allow unrestricted or sane concealed carry, and while that number will remain small due to most people not carrying, the fact that you can't really tell who is makes the issue far less "worth it" for a criminal bent on using a weapon to scare the crap out of people.
On the post: Congress Moves to Ban In-Flight Cell Calls, Blowhards at 30,000 Feet
Re: Re: Re: Re: What about those inplane phones that were common in the '90s?
Having been on trains and public transportation in the US, for the most part, the courtesy still exists. And usually it exists on planes too. However, when you start talking loudly to someone else on a Japanese train, you very quickly find the whole train car staring at you...that is often enough to get you to shut up. Having the flight attendant come over and ask you to keep it down might be enough, and making it a law is overkill.
There is already too much stuff in the law-books that is poorly enforced and I'd hope by now we'd recognize as a nation that you can't regulate good behavior.
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