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Comment Let's hope so. (Score 1) 436

I certainly hope so. The last 3D film I went to was Tron: Legacy, and the reason it was my last was before the movie started, there was a disclaimer that said that all scenes were not in 3D, but to keep the glasses on. If everything is not in 3D than what the hell am I paying an extra six dollars for? I also never liked 3D anyways since I do not enjoy having to wear an apparatus to view it.

Submission + - Guns Don't Kill People SSRIs Do (ssristories.com)

blackbeak writes: I'm certainly aware that the recent school shooting is being discussed at length, but the direct correlation of increased prescription of SSRI medication to the increase in horrific incidents is so staggering and so pertinent that this "elephant in the room" deserves it's own discussion. Unlike guns, which can only be held in the hand, SSRIs are held in the mind controlling the hand. You'll see a huge upsurge in news stories again about how guns need to be curtailed, but (again) few stories, if any, about the medications pulling the trigger. Yet SSRIs are obviously behind these killings. SSRIs mess with brain chemistry in ways we cannot fully understand or control, way too often resulting in horrifyingly confused, disordered and psychotic manifestations. How about discussing how these meds are insufficiently tested, driven through the FDA (a "captured" regulatory agency), released into the wild and then prescribed to children on (and off!) label.
United States

Submission + - Marijuana Prosecution Not a High Priority Says Obama

Hugh Pickens writes writes: "VOA reports that President Obama says it does not make sense for federal authorities to seek prosecution of recreational marijuana users in states where such use is legal. "As it is, you know, the federal government has a lot to do when it comes to criminal prosecutions," said Obama during a television interview with ABC's Barbara Walters . "It does not make sense from a prioritization point of view for us to focus on recreational drug users in a state that has already said that, under state law, that's legal." When asked if he supported legalizing marijuana, the president said he was not endorsing that. ""I wouldn't go that far, but what I think is that, at this point, Washington and Colorado, you've seen the voters speak on this issue.""
China

Submission + - Chinese Moon Probe Flies by Asteroid Toutatis (shanghaidaily.com)

hackingbear writes: Chinese moon probe Chang'e-2 made a flyby of the near-earth asteroid Toutatis on December 13 at 16:30:09 Beijing Time (08:30"09 GMT), the State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense (SASTIND) announced today. The flyby was the first time an unmanned spacecraft launched from Earth has taken such a close viewing of the asteroid, named after a Celtic god, making China the fourth country after the US, the EU and Japan to be able to examine an asteroid by spacecraft. Chang'e-2 came as close as 3.2 km from Toutatis, which is about 7 million km away from the Earth, and took pictures of the asteroid at a relative velocity of 10.73 km per second, the SASTIND said in a statement. Chang'e-2, originally designated as the backup of Chang'e-1, left its lunar orbit for an extended mission to the Earth-Sun L2 Lagrangian point on June 9, 2011, after finishing its lunar objectives, and then again began its mission to Toutatis this year. "The success of the extended missions also embodies that China now possesses spacecraft capable of interplanetary flight," said Wu Weiren, chief designer of China's lunar probe program.
Google

Submission + - Google To Shut Down Calendar Features, Google Sync, Google Calendar Sync, Punchd 1

An anonymous reader writes: Google on Friday announced it is shutting down a slew of features and services as part of its winter cleaning. Google Calendar will be losing a few features, Google Sync will be axed (on the consumer side), as will Google Calendar Sync, SyncML, the Issue Tracker Data API, and the Punchd app.
Android

Submission + - California sues Delta Air Lines over mobile privacy (ca.gov)

mrheckman writes: California is suing Delta Air Lines for violation of California's on-line privacy law. Delta failed to "conspicuously post a privacy policy within their mobile app that informs users of what personally identifiable information is being collected and what will be done with it" after a 30-day notice. Delta's app collects "substantial personally identifiable information such as a user’s full name, telephone number, email address, frequent flyer account number and pin code, photographs, and geo-location". Why is it we still can't control what permissions an app has on our phones? It's absurd and disturbing that an app for checking flights and baggage demands all of those permissions.

Comment Re:Too many people... (Score 5, Interesting) 144

That's not really the point. Yes, Usenet is old, but it was generally unknown to the majority of your average computer users. For years, the MAFIAA has been going after torrenting, with seemingly no knowledge of the capabilities and common use for Usenet. Now all of the sudden, NZB sites and Usenet providers have been getting hit with the DMCA notices. Again, seemingly it's apparent that the MAFIAA has only recently become aware of Usenet, so spagthorpe was using a funny and appropriate movie reference to point out that a lot of people couldn't keep the Usenet secret to themselves.

Comment Precisely the problem. (Score 5, Insightful) 233

This is one of the fundamental reasons why we have the issues we have. Including amendments or clauses that have absolutely nothing to do with the main content of the bill itself should not be allowed. It has historically and currently used to sneak in laws that are not openly discussed with the public in order to pass those laws without public knowledge. This is because they know it is harder to eliminate a law after it has passed than it is to block a law before it passes.

While arguments could be made that legitimate laws that should be passed would take too long to get passed, this ability is abuses far more frequently than being used for legitimate laws. And for that reason, things like this need to stop.

Comment Re:Why is it... (Score 1) 298

Well, as a provider, they are not legally allowed to ban customer owned eqipment. By law they are required to let customers use their own equipment. But all the services are still controlled by the provider.

Unfortunately, it's not a violation of DMCA since as a customer, you are allowed to suspend your DVR service. That doesn't require a different box, the provider just eliminates your access to DVR functionality. If that doesn't violate DMCA, why would blocking the ability to FFW through commercials? Sorry to say, it doesn't.

You also should try to keep in mind that a lot of your service functionality is not decided on by the service provider, but instead contracts with the content providers (NBC, CBS, Viacom, etc).

Which is why Dish network put themselves in hot water with the network companies over their Hopper dvr box, which allows customers to skip commercials on recorded programs all together.

That doesn't directly apply in this specific case, but it could also be what is pressuring TWC to do this. Either way, it's not a violation of DMCA.

Source: I work for a major service provider. We suck, I know, but unfortunately everything I said is true.

Comment A lot of hostility.... (Score 1) 298

There is a lot of hostility against TWC for this. Let me be the first to say, just because TWC got this patent does NOT mean that they will be utilizing it. If anything, they are doing consumers a favor, because now in order for any other provider to do it, they would have to pay royalties to TWC. There is absolutely no indication that TWC will actually implement disabling fast forwarding on their DVRs.

Comment Re:You are incredibly naive if you believe Obama h (Score 1) 222

Since when do we need any privacy bill of rights? The first 10 Amendments to the United States Constitution already applies here. Or at least they should.

Also, calling it a "bill of rights" is extremely deceitful about what a bill of rights is. The first 10 Amendments to the Constitution are rights that protect the PEOPLE from the GOVERNMENT. This 'privacy bill of rights' conveniently EXEMPTS the GOVERNMENT from it's protections. So in reality what this is doing is conditioning people into falsehoods regarding privacy, and the bill of rights.

1. Privacy is only applicable to private institutions, and the people should not expect privacy from the Government.

2. A 'bill of rights' again does not apply to the Government, but instead private entities. This is extremely important when the Government decides to pass laws that are in direct violation of the Bill of Rights. To say it won't happen is naive, as it already has happened (PATRIOT Act and NDAA being two examples).

Comment Re:Drastically reduced profits? (Score 1) 438

Yes, the percentage that fell is specifically their profit margin. And while 43.7% to 42.2% is only a 1.5% difference, that is a 1.5% difference in millions of dollars. Since their business practices are centered around huge profit margins, this decrease is pretty significant for them. Please don't think of me being sympathetic towards them, I am not. I could care less if they only made $250 million dollars last year rather than $260 million (these numbers are not based in fact, just using it as an example).

However, when their business model is dependent on them making $260 million, they either have to scale back some where or raise service rates in order to compensate for the $10 million that they were expecting to be there but isn't. Where it gets ridiculous, is that for tax purposes, they are actually able to write off this $10 million as a "loss". Even though in reality they didn't lose anything instead they just made less than what they were expecting.

Comment Re:Massive Respect for Wendy Seltzer (Score 3, Interesting) 338

I decided to look for more info about her on Princeton's website, and she definitely deserves massive respect. You can read a bio about her here: http://wendy.seltzer.org/shortbio.html

She works in support of the internet users, even heading up a website that helps internet users understand their rights when they receive cease and desist threats. I like her too.

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