Sorry, I admit that I was slightly off topic there, responding to the separation of church and state comment. I was trying to point out that separation of church and state doesn't practically exist. I'm not saying the company is trying to make it difficult, I'm saying the religion as whole is trying to make it difficult for EVERYONE, not just their adherents. Mind you, why should one employer be exempt based on religous grounds but another employer not be exempt from paying for work place safety because the owner of that system is a free market capitalist who doesn't believe he should have to pay for worker safety? Why is religous objection special? Why do we even entertain these arguments, but not say technology company that doesn't want to have to pay for medical costs related to cancers with incredibly high mortatlity rates regardless of treatment. Or CPR, which has something riduclous like 4% chance of being successful. These arguments are based on on a sincere belief in that data and backed by evidence.

Looking from the outside, your separation of church and state in the U.S. is a joke. The fact that issues like abortion and contraception are issues of state/federal policy and not individual conscience is only the most obvious indicator of this. Then there's the disproportional political clout of the bible belt in your politics. Yes, while technically the U.S. is a secular state with freedom of religion, the electoral system links the church and state in non-explicit ways. Practically speaking, the U.S. is a Christian nation which tolerates (very impressively in most cases) the practice and observance of other religions, but for the most part it's laws are drafted from a Christian moral background, and generally benefit Christians above others.

In general religions can be organised according to their permissiveness, and Christianity is fairly permissive. But when it comes to politics, we don't like to talk about permisiveness. We prefer to call it liberty. Some religions believe in some incrediblby harsh punishements for minor social/religious infractions. But no, in a modern democracy, where some people (i.e. 'Us Christains') don't believe those infractions are infractions at all, or merit such punishments, we call it 'liberty' and say people can't be punished that way. I agree with this, personally. Up a level, some religions don't allow the eating of pork. But some people like pork and eat it (i.e. 'Us Christians' again), so we can't ban prok products outright becasue that would infringe on my liberty. You are free not to eat pork products, but you can't stop me from having them. That's called 'liberty' buddy! Some religions don't like people having casual sex (generally women are judged more harshly in this than men, but I'll ignore that for the moment). But some people do like fucking around, so we can't interfere with their practices ... well actually, fine! we can't BAN it, but we can make it difficult, i.e. interfere with their actions, for those people to have access to the medical care that supports their choices. Because that's 'liberty' buddy, I'm free to do as much as I (a modern Christian) want to do, but anything I don't like... well that's different.

The insurance provider is required by law to provide coverage for contraception, but it's still free to charge what it wants for that coverage based on risk. Why don't they create a plan which they offer only to specific groups people where that plan still provides coverage for contraception/maternity/etc, based on a vastly reduced risk factor. The risk of a nun wanting contraception is very small, but not non-existent I'm guessing. The risks of a nun needing maternity care are slightly higher (e.g. in cases of rape, where the nun would never choose to abort or prevent pregnancy with a morning after pill). The point being, because the risks are low, the insurance provider can say: Hey, on our plan, you won't pay for cover of contraceptives, maternity, family planning etc, but we will still provide the cover if it happens, because the risk is so low the cover can be paid for out of a little bit of the general risk pool. Every insurance provider manages has a general risk pool, where they aggregate all the possible events that occur so infrequently as to be entirely stochastic over the time periods in question, for example, a year, 5 years etc. They just can't plan for covering the expenses down that level of risk detail, because the stats don't work at such low frequencies. I'm sure there will be cases, but very rarely, in which maternity care and even possibly contraception might be medically necessary for someone who hasn't acted against their faith. Again, the case of rape springs to mind, but there's also the use of oral contraceptives to deal with disease related hormonal imbalances, and probably others.

There are sensible ways to do this where faith doesn't need to be compromised, so yeah, this is about a certain group of people trying to enforce their own way on other people. Cristian Scientists refuse a wide variety of modern medical procedures becasue it goes against their faith. Will they get to challenge mandatory health care in it's entirety?

Storing value on a or other physical token that is clonable and/or manipulable basically means you can create 'value' out of nothing. This is government sanctioned. Created value isn't taxed, can be used a anonymously as cash, and can be used to transfer money (real or fake) without the governments knowledge. Granted, I don't see your local drug dealer accepting cloned MiFare cards... actually, chances are local organised crime already distributes them, so they are already part of the same economy, so if they can be sold, they could be accepted. But bitcoins are bad? I don't get it.

Yes, different tool for different jobs, but presumably you expect your plumber to know how use his tools effectively and productively. Same for your electrician, car mechanic, etc. Also, you expect these guys to be able to do basic diagnostics and repairs on their own tools. Why then do you think it's okay for your local government admin clerk, or bank cashier, or receptionist to be able to competently use their tools, i.e. computers. Sure, they only need to know how to use MS Word, how to connect to the network, the internet, the filesystem, excel, how to burn a CD/DVD, ... wow, actually there's quite a bit to know. So much so it takes some time to learn it all. If you don't know all of it then you are not qualified to do your job. Yes, not everyone needs to know the command line, but everyone who uses a computer professionally does need some basic admin skills.

Not strictly true. All companies have a brand. Brands are a form of intellectual property, and trademarks are the legal representation thereof. Almost every company has IP to benefit from, but most companies don't care because even if someone rips of "Joe's plumbing" brand, he's so small and has enough business anyway that it doesn't affect him. It will only affect Joe when when someone mistakenly sues him instead of "Jo's plumbing"... And this is an unlikely mistake, since the identity of a company isn't just it's name/logo, but it's contact details, physical address etc, when it comes to law suits.

Sorry, I can't tell whether you're talking about the UN still, or have drifted onto the related topics of the failings of pretty much any modern business or political entity...

Well put!

There are hundreds of thousands of developers world wide following the "Stallman method" as you call it. We call ourselves contract programmers, or "solutions architects" if were hawking our wares bizniz types. We get paid for our time and skill, not per copy of the code. The client gets to (0) run the software for whatever purpose they chose; (1) inspect the code to verify it works the way they want and modify it to suit their needs (practically, they hire another guy to do code review, QA, modifications etc) (2) distribute copies to all their staff without onerous licensing agreements, and if they really want to give a copy of the software to others; they're a business so they won't, but they are free to do so, and finally (3) distribute modified copies of the code. The majority of software written in the world (measured by lines of code) supposedly falls into this category of development. Off-the shelf, or in the modern world, off the internet software accounts for a surprisingly small percentage of software in the real world; most developers don't work for micro-gapple sized companies.

Actually, this makes a twisted form of sense. The DMCA and earlier wire tapping and computer fraud laws state two things iirc 1) Attempting to access a system which you do not have permission to access is illegal, and 2) subverting a security mechanism to provide unintended access is illegal. Now (1) only applies if someone uses the back door to gain access to your system, but (2) applies just because the back door exists. The stated intent is that these routers are secure (read the advertising gumph), which means the existence of the back door was a subversion of the intent for security. Someone, somewhere did this, and should be held liable. Considering the "OMFG it's on a computer" factor and the peculiarly zealous manner in which violations are normally prosecuted, I don't see why this shouldn't carry jail time, and a lot of it, as a sentence. I make this argument in support of consistency. What's good for goose is good for the gander. I don't actually agree with the sentences recommended/allowed by those acts.

.. in a law firm

I have a friend who is a very junior lawyer at a local firm. The senior partner she reports to charges 8 times what my friend charges per hour. I asked her how they could justify this rate considering she was technically equally qualified, albeit way less experienced. She answered, because he can get eight times as much done in a hour as I can; he doesn't have to look stuff up.

Rock star programmers are the same. They are the guys who can just get to grips with the problem, and don't need to look at the reference books or google around to see if there's a library that they can use; they already know one exists, the names of several of them and probably the basics of API of one off the top of their head. In one hour of being left alone, they can do the work of eight hours of a 'regular' programmer. Yes they deserve to be paid eight times the other guys, if they get eight times the stuff done.

That being said, they don't have to be assholes. I've met a number of "rock star programmers" that were pretty easy to get on with. The one thing they do tend to have in common though, is that they don't suffer shitty developers gladly. They will happily tell management a) don't hire him, b) fine, don't make me work with him, c) it takes more time for me to delegate a simple task and watch that he does it right, than to just do it myself; he CAN'T PROGRAM. The problem there are a lot of so called developers who really cannot program, so the rock stars look like they throw their toys a lot

If there is one field/sector that REALLY needs to learn how to use a database, it's the sciences. Keeping experimental data from anything but the simplest of experiments in spreadsheets is just ridiculous.

I don't see what's so bad about SQL. I am forever hearing from business types who want their reporting to be more flexible, and complaining that there must already be some tool for the job. My answer is invariably, there is a tool for the job. It's called SQL. Your data is already in a relational database, so learn how to use it. But that's too hard. And SAP, and Oracle Forms, and web front ends etc. are just plaster over the crumbling wall that is the fact that people who don't know how to use the right tools for their job and refuse to learn to do so are always being hired.

If I have a conversation on the phone with someone, that's protected, even though the phone call is routed through a third party (the telecoms company). Why is it different on the internet, or on a computer? Consider these situations:

I have a conversation in a room in my house with two other people: There's a third party, depending on how you choose to group the three people. That conversation is private. The conversation isn't encrypted, and it's technically very easy to record, by bug or parabolic mic for example, but the police would require a warrant to record the conversation. The expectation of privacy is based on the physical boundaries involved, regardless of whether I own or rent the property. If the conversation was in the garden, and overheard. A prosecutor could use the testimony whoever overheard the conversation. But the police still couldn't record the conversation without a warrant.

I am conducting business via snail mail, sending a contract back and forth between myself and two other people, but it's probably going to be seen by by various secretaries and flunkies as they manage/facilitate the technicalities of getting the documents to and from their intended recipients, such as putting text on letterhead (formatting) putting it in an envelope (marshalling) and putting in the post box (transmitting), and photocopy it for record keeping (storing). That conversation is private. The police would require a warrant to intercept the mail. In fact, the police couldn't even ask for on of the receptionists to forward a copy of the mail to them, or even to report to them the dates, times and addresses on the envelopes. For that they would require a warrant.

I'm conducting a conversation on facebook/google+. I've set up my privacy settings so that only people I approve can see the conversation. The expectation of privacy is that people I haven't approved can't see the conversation, based on the "boundaries" of my settings. I don't own the digital space where the conversation is taking place, but I do in a sense rent it based on the agreements in the terms of service. Compared to the first case, why shouldn't this conversation be considered private. Sure, Facebook or Google or whoever it is can see the conversation as they FORMAT it into the correct protocol, MARSHAL it for network TRANSMISSION, ad STORE it it for eventual delivery. Compared to the second case, they are acting as my digital secretary, even if that secretary is a Kelly Temp, i.e. a third party.

Just because it's on a computer and EASIER to access, shouldn't make it LEGAL to access without a warrant.

Exaclty! It's not about friends, it's about associations. Share a bank branch? That's an association. Shop at the same flower store, just once? That's an association. So the Dunbar number is not applicable. This is about all the people, institutions, companies, and services we interact with even only sporadically. 3 hops in this environment is a huge number of people