I submit that anyone that conceivable _could_ do any damage of any significant nature through the BASIC interpreter on a C64 emulator on an iPhone has almost certainly already jail broken their phone and are already doing much wackier things. Further, if they haven't, then this provides further incentive to jailbreak.

Add to that the PR nightmare of constantly pulling the same app repeatedly, and it should make both users and developers feel increasingly gun shy about the app store.

If you have a contract to produce a certain number of albums, but you also sign over ownership of your works during the contract, then the songs you produce during your contract even if they don't make it to an album belong to Sony (or whoever).

IANAL and it depends on the fine print, but there's a good chance this guy is boned.

Excuse me, but your analogy was accurate and didn't involve a car. Do we need to take away your slashdot badge? ;-)

We don't. Downloading music is legal in Canada. Because we already pay the "Celine Dion Tax" on recordable media, the courts ruled we couldn't be pursued for downloading because the "Tax" basically gives us the right to download. It's almost like double jeopardy. The recording industry here got the initial levy passed, then tried to have their cake and eat it too. Fortunately the legal system here is just sane enough to have laughed them out of court.

Now the funny thing is that I thought we already paid on iPods and MP3 players. I don't know if that was just never passed the first time, or if it was rescinded, or if they're trying for a SECOND one (which wouldn't surprise me, or anyone else I would imagine). Whatever the case, as far as I (and the legal system) are concerned, if you charge the extra $ for MP3 players, you get to fill 'em for free.

Here's the ugly truth:

Rogers is a horrible company that will treat you like crap, and generally try to rip you off... they're also the best of the bunch. (Actually, I find Fido, which is owned by Rogers, but technically a separate company is a bit better) Rogers will at least work with you a little sometimes, Bell will wait until you're on a contract, then screw you, then say "oh well, have a nice day". Telus is about the same.

Here's a great example of Bell/Telus customer service; A friend of mine bought a Telus blackberry after her old phone started to die. She had frequently been disconnected for failure to pay her bill, despite the fact that she always paid her bill, so I really don't know why she stayed with Telus, but that's another bag of snakes... back to the point. So this phone has horrible issues. She takes it back to get it exchanged for a working one, which apparently she has to wait 3 weeks+ for. Next phone, more issues, exchange again. Gets HER FIRST BLACKBERRY BACK as a "new" phone. Finally when that one doesn't work, she gets a different model which she has to spend hours on the phone over the course of a week to get them to agree to. Here's the kicker; ~$40 charge every time the phone#/account was switched to a different handset. That's right they charge to switch from your broken handset, to a working one (which in this case was also broken).

And I'd STILL deal w/ Telus before Bell. Everyone's got at least one horror story with any given provider, and they're all a bunch of pricks, but having a lot of experience w/ pretty much all of the carriers here, I can't recommend anyone other than Fido or Rogers. It's a case of picking the least of the evils. Kinda like picking your personal bank. (Which is TD btw, or at least stay the HELL away from CIBC!!!)

I don't think you understand what bail is for or how it works. It's kinda like insurance. You're accused of a crime, you put money up saying you wont skip town or do it again during the proceedings. Regardless of the verdict, as long as you don't repeat the offence, or miss trial dates, you get the cash back. If you screw around, then you lose the money.

Your reasoning is very short sighted. Yes the "in case of bus" envelope is important, but if you've ever actually been a sysadmin, you know you're the blame guy. There are always idiots up the corporate chain that will blame you for anything technical even if the problem stems directly from them not following your instructions, or otherwise doing something stupid.

That aside, this isn't about you. I know it's hard to imagine, but try to bear with me. It goes like this:

Maybe he's a dick, but that doesn't matter. What matters is that WHAT HE DID WAS CORRECT! You do NOT give the "bus envelope", password or whatever, to some guy, the janitor, the mail boy or whoever, you give it to one of a small number of people only. It may be handled by a secretary or other assistant, but opening said envelope would be grounds for immediate dismissal, as would revealing that same password info to any of the afore mentioned individuals without appropriate "clearance" or what have you.

So here's the situation, your boss, who may or may not have the right to know the password, with some people in the room who DEFINITELY aren't on the access list demands the password.

Situation #1:
You refuse to divulge sensitive info in front of inappropriate individuals because 1) it's actually your job, and 2) if you do so, you can be held liable for any damage done as a result. You are arrested immediately. Happy fun.

Situation #2:
You give up the password immediately, someone brings the system to a crashing halt by incompetence, and you are arrested immediately because it's obviously something you did. Happy fun.

Sure, an envelope is a good idea, but there wasn't one, and that's not his fault, that's a management oversight. Even if this guy's difficult, or abrasive or whatever, he didn't break anything, and was willing to go forward with relinquishing the password, just on very specific terms. If that's a reason to spend over a year in jail, then we better start handing out life sentences for J walking, because unlike not giving up a password, J walking could actually harm someone.

Bail exists to a) manage flight risk and b) prevent repeat occurrences of the same crime. So unless he decides to not tell the city the password again(which they now know), it's not even possible to repeat the "crime".

So to put it in perspective, bail is set at $5 Mill because he would only tell the password to the Mayor, which is apparently a crime 5x more severe than killing someone, even though it can't exactly be repeated.

"He might do damage in some other way which has nothing to do with what we're charging him for.", is NOT a reason to set bail ludicrously high. Maybe the guy's a dick, maybe he even did some stuff wrong, but he's definitely having his rights stepped on now.

IANAL, etc. etc.

Marvel has been going downhill for a long time. So much so that I consider this deal to be part of a natural progression. Between poor writing and poor management, I haven't seen anything good from Marvel Comics since the late 90s, or maybe early 00s. Some of their movies have been good, some have been horrid. I know "continuity" is optional at best, but you can only "re-imagine" a plot so many times before it becomes complete drivel.

This deal will ruin Marvel like old mayonnaise ruins a dog crap sandwich.

I mean... really? I don't even have a lame/wildly inaccurate car analogy to throw at this one, I'm just in awe of how dumb this is.

I think it would be hilarious if the iPhone Devel Team fixed this in the jailbroken firmware before Apple fixed it officially.

Apple: "Jailbreaking should be illegal because it dangerously closes security holes... er..."

Ah, perchance to dream...

They both want control. Right now, they're getting along, but 2 companies like this will eventually want something that's a "deal breaker". Apple will be offered something too good to pass up in order to break the exclusivity arrangement, or AT&T will tell Apple they MUST do something that will seriously piss off even the devout fanboys which even Apple isn't retarded enough to comply with and then BOOM... skittle trains.

You won't have to, just write it into mythbusters. It's not really about a myth, but it's cool enough they'll find an excuse.

You forgot Space Quest.

Car analogies! Yay! OK, I'll bite.

1) We're going to ignore the stolen argument as a) I already said "except for stolen stuff" and b) it's not what this is about.

2) As per the status quo, your analogy is off base. I'm going to assume this is just tradition since we're on slashdot, so you were obligated to use a bad analogy.

Now, as for the appropriate analogy, say you bought a car (new, like the ebook(s) we're talking about), but someone put the wrong logo on it (or painted it a colour not offered on that model, or something else they had access to but weren't supposed to do, not stolen, because that has nothing to do with the case at hand). The dealer or manufacturer or whoever's fault it is might get sued/fired/whatever, but could not in any way shape or form repossess the car. They _might_ be able to refuse to warranty the car or something, but it stays yours.

Let's make something very clear; This situation called for a "recall". Unless it involves a safety issue a recall is VOLUNTARY! It's voluntary because when someone takes back something you bought without your consent, there's a problem. If the item is physical, it's theft. If it's not, it's something else, but still wrong.

While there are some issues w/ treating virtual items and media like physical ones when it comes to the law there are enough parallels that we should just use the existing laws as much as possible until someone with half a brain works out something better. It would simplify the RIAA mess, "Oh, 20 songs stolen? That's petty theft, $20 owed, plus a fine and community service, maybe some time if it's a repeat offence, have a nice day.". Sell something you shouldn't have, "Oops! Our bad, here's a recall request, and we'll throw in a $5 gift cert to make it worth your while.".

But maybe I'm just old fashioned. Like the good old days when things were simple, property was property, and we didn't need a car analogy for everything. I never thought I'd miss the 90s so much...