This is almost exactly the idea that I had had a couple of years ago on Slashdot (not copyrighted). I think I suggested doubling the rate at each step, but the principle is the same. If Disney is really convinced that the entire conglomerate is going to go under if somebody samples "Steamboat Willie" in a commercial, then they can pay to prevent it. Most stuff would arrive in the public domain pretty rapidly, and the things that stayed in private hands would be available to the public, as someone would be actively promoting it.

The periods should probably be scaled according to the medium somewhat -- protection for a computer program could actually be much shorter than for a book or movie. As it is, PacMan has another 65 years of protection or so

By the logic of most of the people posting here, if I publish a book and anyone chooses not to stock it in their store, I can claim censorship and take them to court. What if my book isn't any good? What if I'm trying to get my commentary on the Gospels into the Atheist book store? What if...

The right of the stores to sell the material that they deem appropriate is sacrosanct. Otherwise, all the bookstores are going to go down by being forced to keep lots of books in stock that they may sell once every 10 years. Is it "censorship" that WalMart refuses to carry graduate-level Mathematics texts? No, it's simple business. For better or worse, WalMart has determined that it is in their interests to provide only products that meet with a certain set of moral norms. This is primarily a business decision -- they presume that if they are selling CDs that parents will not approve of, the parents will not allow children to shop there, thus cutting their revenue.

Apple has to have the ability to decide what they sell, otherwise, by the Slashdot "all censorship is wrong" mentality, they would be forced to carry child pornography - Nazi - Holocaust denial - Terrorism howto software, and then be shut down by the government. And the decision of what they choose to sell or not sell must rest with the company, otherwise we can't hold the company responsible for what they sell.

It is another thing if the government steps in and says that a particular piece of software cannot be sold anywhere. That's why we have a special name for this practice. The common usage of "censorship" to apply to anyone who chooses not to distribute material for any reason, cited in the parent post, essentially makes the term useless. We need to expand our vocabulary. WalMart doesn't "censor" artists, but rather "bowdlerizes" them.

The Wizard of Oz: contrast between the sepia tones in Kansas with the Technicolor of Oz. A major plot point.

Schindler's List: by coloring only the little girl's coat in the scene of Jews being rounded up, the filmmakers sought to increase the emotional attachment to the people being killed.

But as an adjective, meaning #2 of "moot" in the link you so kindly provided is "deprived of practical significance: made abstract or purely academic". One could argue that your parent was using this meaning.

The key is that the military personnel is in uniform, and so are immediately singled out for perks. I'm sure policemen in uniform have the same sort of reception. Clergy occasionally gets the same (depending on flight and ground crew -- other times they are singled out for "special treatment" by the TSA). Most doctors and nurses don't travel recognisably "medical", so would hardly expected to get random upgrades...

Strictly speaking, the Vatican didn't claim Copyright or Trademark, but ownership of the names and images.

I think that the point of this is connected with Catholic schools and churches taking names like "Pope John Paul the Great", before Pope John Paul II is even declared a saint, much less having stood the test of time to earn the title "Great". Or organizations that oppose the Catholic Church, but claim the patronage of a pope, like the hypothetical "Blessed John XXIII Society for the Abolition of Liturgy". They are just instructing the bishops to be careful what permissions they give. I doubt this declaration will have any effect at all outside of the Catholic Church.

There is admittedly a lot of this attitude. That said, I generally can find an answer for a difficult Linux problem much more readily than for a difficult Windows problem, where the solution is very often "Have you tried doing a full backup and re-installing?" Obviously, I am much better at using search engines to find what I want than much of the general Internet population (as are most users of Slashdot), but there are reliable sources of help out there. The sources for help in Windows, except for Windows' own knowledge base, which has often worked for me, seem to be more spotty to me.

It's my understanding that anyone who was around in 1958 is actually immune to H1N1. That didn't stop the doctor from trying to bully a man I know into getting the vaccine.

"Oh look! I just happen to have an H1N1 vaccine here! Do you want it?"

"No, not really."

A few minutes later, the receptionist, who herself looked like she had the flu, said, "Are you sure? You really, really ought to get this."

"I already lived through the Spanish flu, so I should be immune, shouldn't I?"

Doctor, looking concerned: "Are you really sure you don't want the vaccine?"

Apparently the vaccine comes in 10 packs, and has to be used up within 24 hours....

I personally had a really nasty flu that developed into bronchitis and a nasty conjunctivitis, lasting almost a month, all told, but no one made a move to officially label it H1N1... I got better.

This is correct. Dei is found, but di is more common in Nom. Sg. Vocative singular is "deus" rather than the regular "dee" -- "Deus meus, ut quid me dereliquisti?" Because the dative and ablative plural of "dea" (goddess) would look the same as the form for "deus", this form is regularly substituted with "deabus". Gods in general produce a lot of irregularities in Latin. The genitive of Iuppiter (Jupiter) is Iovis (Jovis). Hence, we say "Jumping Jupiter!", but "By Jove!"

I was stuck on IE and trying to download MPlayer for Windows.... Out of habit from Firefox, I naively used the Bing-box to search. All the results I got were for Windows Media Player -- and those pages don't even contain the word "MPlayer" at all. Fortunately, I realized that I knew MPlayer's address by memory anyway, so found it through the home page.

I think that there is the problem. Most of the experts seem to easily give up when faced by the Wikipedia system. Expert: "Um... actually, I'm the most reknowned expert in this author, having published 40 books about him, so I can really state with certainty that his favorite color was in fact blue." Wikipedia-Drone: "Original research! Reverting to 'fuscia'!" Expert: "Wikipedia is worthless. I'm going home."

If the expert has to dedicate hours of his valuable time to correct even the most trivial error, the people who have time to devote their entire day to Wikipedia are going to win every time.

I think "Enterprise" expanded on this, and had the smooth-headed Klingons resulting from a genetic disease, caused by trying to implement human Eugenics techniques. The disease was cured, but the physical results remained, and took many generations for the Klingons to get rid of them.