Yes copyright is automatic but if the mere act of downloading copyrighted material was a crime then the internet simply could not (legally) work the way it does since you would need explicit permission to visit a random page prior to visiting said page. So the reasoning goes that if someone puts something on the net, a third party can freely copy it. What the third party can't do is redistribute the material, so messages such as "leave your computer running" are going to hang them. When you think about it. It's not that different to the way libraries work, you can take the book home and read it, and even take a personal copy, but you can start handing out copies to all your mates.

No matter how much "downloading is theft" propaganda the MAFIAA spews, or how much I despise them for it, the above "default" arrangement is the only one that makes any sense. If we allowed redistributions w/o permission then I could simply buy up the iTunes catalog for a one time fee of $1/song and start selling copies at $0,90/song. Five seconds after I've done that, someone else does the same to me and sells at $0.50/song.

A tricorder's nice and all, but you wanna see real technological innovation? Here, I got your technological innovation right here:

https://vine.co/v/O7jjJMi5wTa

I like how you think. I'm OK with this thread turning into ideas for ways to turn the ebola zombie apocalypse to our advantage.

On the down side, I'm leading my fantasy football league by almost thirty points. Just my luck the world comes to an end in week five.

Early symptoms of Ebola are "flu-like" and it is contagious during these "flu-like" symptoms. Now ... consider the fact that flu season is upon us. But you know what's _really_ frightening about this? Not one of the goddamn idiot "authorities" has even mentioned, let alone assessed, this confounding situation's impact on public health containment measures.

Now THAT'S frightening!

Read the CDC's guidelines on monitoring and movement of persons with "exposure" and tell me their guidelines work for a country in the throes of massive incidence of "flu-like symptoms".

While reading this wisdom from on high, imagine there is, in this multi-"culture"al heaven that is the US nowadays, a "community" somewhere with strong identity, Hollywood-fired resentment of the US's white-supremacist history of slavery and colonial exploitation with corresponding suspicion of its public health measures (just look at the murders of public health workers in West Africa -- and many of those health workers weren't even "white-devils"), strong relations in West Africa and -- to top it all off -- a flu season that has a good percentage of its community exhibiting the early stage symptoms of Ebola...

I don't think you'll have to use Nukes. Once Texans figure out that there's Ebola running loose around their state, they'll get out their shooting irons and go full survivalist. If the guy who's the first ebola case turns out to be a black man, I've got a feeling there are going a whole lot of people of color heading for Oklahoma and New Mexico tonight.

By the end of the week, Texas will look like an episode of Walking Dead. In other words, nobody in the rest of the country will notice.

Is the end of humanity due to the Ebola virus an acceptable excuse for adultery?

Asking for a friend.

I've been reading up about that story, and the city officials didn't really mention anything about the fact that it was a connected domicile. If their rationale was based, as the officials said, on the International Building Code, there's no mention of connected vs standalone domiciles in the IBC. So I really don't know what this was about.

It seems like they were looking for a reason to cite this homeowner, who has had other run-ins with housing before, mostly for capping off her sewers.

A surprising number of sites use CloudFlare. The trouble with CloudFlare is, if you want to stay anonymous on the internet using Tor, you're SOL, as they serve you captchas every 3 pages when they see a connection coming from a Tor exit node.

So essentially, if you're a Tor user, CloudFlare:

- Renders a sizeable portion of the internet unusuable for you
- Makes money on your back by making you solve captcha, and turning you into a human OCR.

CloudFlare and Google (which also serve captchas to Tor users, only fewer exit nodes are concerned) are quickly making Tor unusable, which must make the NSA wet their pants.

Can you point me at an example of this verbiage somewhere?

I found this pretty quickly. It seems like local officials are using overbroad interpretations of codes to keep people from disconnecting from the grid. I don't know how widespread it is.

http://reason.com/blog/2014/02...

Pardon my linking to Reason Magazine. I don't like to use them as a news source because they're kind of unhinged over there. But they have the most thorough coverage of this story that I've found. If you want a more balanced source, the same story is covered by Al Jazeera and several local Florida sources.

OK, I get it. I agree. There are some externalities that are obvious, like the downstream pollution caused by certain types of mining or drilling.

But there has to be proof when you try to put a number on it, whether it's a $5 solar surcharge or a 20% tax on solar cells. Like you say, "prove it". Unfortunately, it seems like the only proof they need is a fat bundle of bills in a lobbyist's hands.

I don't know if you've been following this story, but the efforts of the energy companies to thwart any development in renewables has gone a heck of a lot further than a $5 monthly surcharge.

In Oklahoma, Wisconsin and other states, they are requesting special taxes on solar panels. They don't even care if the money goes to them, they just want solar users penalized. Yes, this is about more than just the economics of energy. There is malicious intent.

First there will need to be a minor revolt against codes requiring electrical service as a condition of human occupancy.

I'm convinced we will see houses with electrical service that are not attached to the grid. In our lifetime.

That's like saying, "Anyone can say anything, so that means everything is BS except what I say".

I can't tell. Do you not believe that there can be costs in a product or service that are not reflected in its price because they are passed along to others? Or were you just offering us all a Zen koan?

I'm comfortable with the notion that Apple users should bear extra scrutiny.

Safety first, I say.

I hate hearing described this supposed "10,000 hour Malcom Gladwell rule". There's no such thing. Gladwell has long been trying to explain that the 10,000 hour rule was not a recipe for success, only a requirement for mastery. The fact is that mastery is no guarantee of success.

And lately, Gladwell has been giving a much greater emphasis to the notion of love for what you're doing being a more direct quality of those who are successful. And it's more than really just "love". There's an element of intent and desire and yes, love. What made Michael Jordan shoot free throws for hours and hours after it had gotten dark when he was 12 years old? And continue to do so when he was 27 and already a world champion? Why did Charlie Parker disappear for three years and practice 13 hours every day after he had been so badly embarrassed on the bandstand for not knowing how to play in more than one key? Part of it was his desire to "show those guys" after his earlier failure. And part of Michael Jordan's incentive was his famous (or infamous) almost pathological competitiveness. But those things are never enough. Because spite and desire can only take you so far, and they both have negative effects. They'll eventually eat you up (as may have been the case in Bird's example, because clearly his drug use and self-destructiveness would seem to indicate that something was eating him up). But to put the time in requires love. Doing something because it's something you can't imagine not doing. Because that's how you see yourself - that's who you are. The possible financial rewards are not nearly certain enough for that to be the sole motivation. I will bet that Michael saw himself as a basketball player and Bird as a jazz man well before they were on their way to success.

There's no guarantee for success, but there are recipes and the ingredients are often kind of specific. The good news, is that if you really love doing something, it improves the chances the recipe will be successful. Kind of like garlic and butter. There's no guarantee that a dish will be delicious, but if you start with garlic and butter, the odds improve, you know?