For accuracy, the app should also notify them of what you were actually doing during your "peaceful demonstration" which caused the arrest:

"John was arrested for...spitting on an officer...while peacefully demonstrating."

"John was arrested for...trespassing on private property...while peacfully demonstrating."

"John was arrested for...impeding access of emergency vehicles...while peacfully demonstrating."

It's simple and of very little actual use, but I like the Lexar flash drives which have the E-Ink capacity meter on the side.

See , you have no idea what you're talking about here. Determining a strike zone *does* require complex/critical thought if you're going to do it correctly. If it's not complex and critical, it's being done wrong.

On the stances you missed the entire point. Historical analysis will tell you almost nothing about the current stance. For example, Cal Ripken Jr. He had a different stance legitimately almost every at-bat. He would tailor it to the situation and what he hoped to accomplish. Historical analysis would do nothing to determine the validity of his stance. So unless the robot had a Cal Ripken switch, all your magical heuristics would fail.

Even if they got the robot to "sort of" work, players would figure out how to game the robot, and the moment that happens in a big game, everyone would be clamoring for real live umpires again.

It would *never* work. It boggles my mind that people think a robot could even do a passable job, let alone a better one that we currently get.

The difference is that Pete Sampras, John McEnroe, and Rafael Nadal all have the same tennis court. Out for one is out for all.

John Rauch (6'11") and Dustin Pedroia (5'8") do not have the same strike zone, though. Hell, Dustin Pedroia could have five different correct strike zones over the course of a single game.

The strike zone is subjective, the tennis court is not. That's the difference.

Again, incorrect. An umpire will determine what your actual stance is. If I stay crouched down in a full squat during pitches I take, but bounce up straight in a swing, that is what the umpire will use to determine my strike zone, not the squat. The robot cannot do this. If I take the first pitch while in the crouch, the robot cannot know what my strike zone is during my swing. It cannot go back to a previous at-bat either because stances change, what was a strike yesterday is not necessarily a strike today. The umpire *can*, however, say "Hey, you're being an asshole and squatting, and that is not your true strike zone, I'm calling anything even close a strike." which is the right thing to do. Is the robot ump going to call balks? Is it going to determine intention on pitches hitting batters? If it can't do those things, and you need an ump anyway, then why have the robot? Also: "umpires do something mysterious and magical that can't be captured by heuristics" is not an argument: it is a baseless and probably false assertion. Actually they can, it's called 'thinking'.

I'm aware of this. My point though is how would the robot do this? Do the batter have a 1-ft bubble around him, and if that bubble touches the bag the runner is out? What if using that 1-ft bubble was the only way the fielder could have beaten the runner to the bag? Does the robot have the ability to identify that and make the correct call?

and my formatting broke. shit where's my coffee? The official rule:

Strike Zone is the area over home plate, the upper limit of which is a horizontal line at the midpoint between the top of the shoulders and the top of the uniform pants, and the lower level is a line at the hollow beneath the knee cap. The Strike Zone shall be determined from the batter’s stance as the batter is prepared to swing at a pitched ball.

What if the robot can't see the top of my pants? (My shirt is loose and blouses over)
What if my shoulders are angled? (Where's the 'top'?)
What if I have loose pants and a locked knee stance? (Where's my knee, and thus the hollow below the cap?)
When does the robot determine the boundaries of the zone? (If it's at the windup, I'll crouch during it then stand up. If it's as the pitch comes in, I'll squat on high strikes)

A living, breathing umpire makes all these subjective decisions on every pitch. There's no way to trick the umpire into giving you a smaller or undefined strike zone.

You have to keep umpires, even if there's instant replay.

For another example: on a large fraction of 6-4-3 and 4-6-3 double plays, the infielder making the play at second base doesn't actually tag the bag. Umpires are very generous on the player touching the base on the turn. Relying on a robot to make that call would be incredibly disruptive with the way that call has been made for over a century.

(goddamn it, I wasn't logged in) The official rule: Strike Zone is the area over home plate, the upper limit of which is a horizontal line at the midpoint between the top of the shoulders and the top of the uniform pants, and the lower level is a line at the hollow beneath the knee cap. The Strike Zone shall be determined from the batter’s stance as the batter is prepared to swing at a pitched ball. What if the robot can't see the top of my pants? (My shirt is loose and blouses over) What if my shoulders are angled? (Where's the 'top'?) What if I have loose pants and a locked knee stance? (Where's my knee, and thus the hollow below the cap?) When does the robot determine the boundaries of the zone? (If it's at the windup, I'll crouch during it then stand up. If it's as the pitch comes in, I'll squat on high strikes) A living, breathing umpire makes all these subjective decisions on every pitch. There's no way to trick the umpire into giving you a smaller or undefined strike zone. You have to keep umpires, even if there's instant replay. For another example: on a large fraction of 6-4-3 and 4-6-3 double plays, the infielder making the play at second base doesn't actually tag the bag. Umpires are very generous on the player touching the base on the turn. Relying on a robot to make that call would be incredibly disruptive with the way that call has been made for over a century.

Actually, he was wearing his seatbelt, and it snapped. After which he was flung from the car before it smashed into a tree. Additionally, it happened while he was in high school, so it would have effected our ability to have ep4-6 as well...and I will any day of the week gladly accept ep1-3 if the alternative is no ep4-6 either.

The problem isnt suppressing people from talking about negative side effects, it's that they need to be suppressed from doing it "like this". Legally, as an employee of a pharmaceutically company, I am required to report when I hear by any means of a side-effect, defect, or off-label use of one of the products manufactured by my company. The company would prefer these complaints to be filtered by doctors, not come directly from consumers. We need to spend our time investigating "My patient used drug X while taking acetominophen, and experienced heart murmurs." not "I took drug drug X and now my leg hurts real bad. (but I didnt tell you about when I fucked my leg up playing softball last weekend)." I can easily imagine many people going "My doctor told me it was all the hamburgers I eat causing my heart pain...but I think it's the anti-excema meds I take...Im going to complain on Facebook because people need to know!" Then the company ends up having to investigate a baseless claim, and improper information gets disseminated via the internet because people wil believe anyone that says "Big Pharma doesnt want you to know!"

The same way that fingerprints are.

"... no more suspicion that you are guilty of a crime than he would be suspicious of any other random person." I wasn't aware that "random" was the criteria for making felony arrests.

So you voluntarily give your fingerprints then?

There is absolutely no assumption of guilt involved with this. Your fingerprints, your properties, your vehicles...all these exist in databases which the polica already search through without any assumption of your guilt or innocence. This is no different. Go bitch about those databases if you're going to bitch about this one. There is nothing to fear in having your DNA on file unless you have something to fear already.

What happens when there's an amber alert? Shit! The police search through car registrations for a match. I'm being searched without suspicion!