You so sure about that?

Apple is competing on commercials and patent lawyers, the company sells its image more than it sells any engineering expertise. For a company like Apple, appearing politically correct may be in the shareholders best interest.

Perhaps if they had started out as a company that made stories with decent original plots instead of a expensive graphics company then yes. It wouldn't exactly hurt the industry if producers had to show actual story telling talent before getting fortunes for making shallow eye candy.

Reasonable is the opposite of arbitrary. To be arbitrary is to have no reason behind a choice. "Maximum of life plus 10 or 40 years" is arbitrary. There is no reason to it. That is why there is no patent reform. Because a small handful can rally around "longer" because that does have reasons (even if you personally don't like them), but no one can rally around a random choice. Until you can actually come up with a plan with REASONS then no patent or copyright reform will ever occur because no one will support you.

Again more arbitrary crap. What counts as an attempt to sell is completely subjective. Almost everything is for sale at some price. And begging for different lengths of time for different kinds of inventions? More arbitrary guessing.

I hate when people say this. No you don't want people to get paid for their work. If your neighbor paints your house while you are away, do you want him to get paid for his work? We want people to get paid for what others agreed to pay them, regardless of how much "hard work" was involved.

Desires are not policies. You basically just stated that you both want IP law and that you don't want IP law. You just can't decide so you come up with subjective (that is, nonexistent) qualifiers like "cultural change". And all the time those who want IP law rally around 1 objective goal: longer longer longer. It is why IP law won't be "reformed".

God, I wish Israel and Hamas would just stop fighting and admit they love each other and get laid with each other already. The tsundere teasing was cute at first but now it's just getting to be old news.

I'd rather read 6 good comments about an interesting subject than see another global-warming/climate-change/climate-disruption troll post on slashdot. If you don't like soylent, good, please stay out and we'll both be happy.

It is also theft when the government gives away things to privileged individuals. Such as land rights for building railroads, or rights to the spectrum for privileged companies.

No, we're already there. Name one thing the Russians did that the US Congress doesn't assume that it has the authority to do to a US company.

Do you lack so much creativity that you can't think of "why" someone would do this? Wow.

  - Relative of previous victim angry that defendant got out of jail
  - Petty teenager looks up registry email and doesn't realize the implications of his actions
  - Self righteous crusader thinks we're too soft on crime, decides to do something on his own
  - Thin skinned keyboard warrior gets offended by an internet forum post of the defendant, looks up his email, cross references it with a registry
  - Defendant refuses to allow a cop to bully him, cop has access to all this stuff and decides to get even
  - Angry ex girlfriend, ex employee, ex employer...

And you have to ask "why?"

No there aren't. You could say that there laws on the books which were never enforced. You could say that there are laws on the books which have not been enforced *yet*.

But unless the universe ends the moment you click "submit", then there is no such thing as "laws on the books which are never enforced", since never hasn't ended yet. Are you sure no one has ever been convicted on your never laws? Are you sure they've not been used to obtain otherwise unlawful warrants? Are you sure no one has been forced into a plea deal because of these "never enforced" laws? I doubt it very much.

I believe parent poster is generally why you have a right to face your accuser and his witnesses. Sure if the Google informant wishes to stay anonymous then by all means be suspicious. But you are suggesting that the informant formed a bias against the defendant without the defendant knowing who he is and being able to say "hey I know this guy, this is a setup". It's possible (the informant might not have liked the defendants political positions or whatever), but it is not the kind of thing that you can get away with very many times before a pattern emerges.

Either way, when you make possession illegal absent recklessness or intent to cause harm, this kind of easy setup is unavoidable. It's why you should never abandon mens rea.

Maybe now I can finally manage to play an F chord.

This is why I chose "mostly idiots yelling". Too bad I don't win anything.

Link to irrefutable data and data collection details please

Whether it's religion or nationalism, they have one thing in common: loyalty. Loyalty is a very convenient excuse, and I hate that it is considered a virtue. When controlling people with greed is not an option, controlling them with sermons about loyalty is just as effective.