The whole issue here is the implied consent, not having judges on site (which is what people here seem to be flipping out over).

These work like a normal DUI checkpoint. Most people have been through them. They have the road blocked, you drive up, they ask for you license. When you hand it to them they smell your breath and the car and shine a flashlight into your eyes to see how they dilate. If any of those offer probably cause they ask you to pull over and go through a sobriety check. Failing that they generally give a breathalyzer test and failing that you get arrested. You, through the fifth amendment, have a right to voluntarily refuse. They, through how our legal system work, then have a right to request a judge review the case and issue a warrant, usually for a blood test as you have no physical control of that (no warrant could make you blow through the tube hard). All of that is perfectly legal and has been since the US was first founded and, IMO is just fine.

Now, people who drive drunk often have tricks, most do not work. One of them that might maybe work is to simply refuse everything and wait for a judge to be consulted, review the case, issue the warrant, get a medical technician down there, and draw blood. A process that can even take a couple of hours on busy nights. During that time you metabolize alcohol and have a chance to fall below the legal limit, especially if you were barely over the limit to begin with.

The *only* difference is that the Judge and medical worker are on site. If, as stated in some of these articles Florida has some "implied consent" then the issue is there, not with this type of checkpoint. They could have a drunk tank collect up people, drive the to the county building, issue the warrants, and take blood already on the simple refusal. This isn't a change in law or a change in practice, it is a change in the amount of time needed. They make the argument (and again, this part is *not* new by any means) that by accepting your drivers license that you have already pre-agreed to take a breathalyzer test any time, anywhere, and for any reason. Not really sure though why you can't suddenly decide that to not be the case as you can certainly decide in a question by question case to exercise your fifth amendment rights, further the fourth amendment isn't a tiny one either and is fairly explicit about refusal not being evidence for a warrant. Obviously given the amount of time this has been in effect it either hasn't been challenged or has and some crazy judge found it constitutional. I suspect that a constitutional fight against an "implied consent" would win (but, as we have seen with our current courts the constitution is seen as a "living document" where the bigger question is can you rationalize it to say what you want it too so who knows), I suspect they know that, and like many other crappy laws they only enforce in places that they know they would not loose.

As for the Judge on site, many other states do them and its a pretty good idea. In most states they can't detain for refusal of the breathalyzer unless they have fairly strong probable cause - basically if they would have detained you and gotten blood before they still can. If the police have probable cause to require testing and given that the most accurate gathering of facts will occur this way it is quite within the intents of our judiciary system to do this. Further with the Judge on site they can personally oversee the idea of probable cause and the treatment of the detainees by the police. Lastly it certainly works well on the whole "speedy justice system". For everyone but the person that is only slightly over the legal limit who would have gotten away with it this is a win. There isn't a constitutional argument that it is his right for a slow gathering of facts simply because that would favor them.

I would bet Florida is on shaky grounds with it not because of the judge on site, but because implied consent is, well, stupid. Having a Judge on site is a pretty good idea IMO.

Personally I love it when people smugly complain about people complaining about smug. Even better when we do smug=smug+1 and prove that to be true (which is I guess what my post is). we can post these posts indefinitely and be useful!

I guess the real question is when does "smug" end?

For myself I consider this truly "smug" - that is people who are the primary source of pollution are projecting their issues on anyone they can rationalize as Teh Evil whilst doing nothing about the real issue. Yea, SUV's give out a higher proportion that than their usage would indicate, but when you are a small percentage of the usage it isn't going to make much difference. It is "smug" in that they hit an easy target that isn't going to do any good other than make people feel better about their choice that is the primary source of pollution yet allow them to continue doing what they have been doing. Even if they cut out *all* SUV driving it would be a drop in the bucket against the primary pollutant which they aren't going to touch with a 200 foot pole as too many will rebel against it (after all, you should be going against someone else as all those others are the ones that do not care - I *CARE* and that is worth a whole PILE of carbon credits and makes my greenhouse emissions be greatly cleaner!!!!!).

But yea, I guess I fear change and find myself a Slashtard. It *couldn't* be that, you know, I would like to see things actually change instead of give most people a warm fuzzy as we go into the abyss. But then isn't this France? Is there any entity on the planet that doesn't expect this behavior from them?

Really, as a movie it wasn't very good. It's plot was a strange combination of overused cliche's that were forced into a "modern" setting with much of it left up to the watcher to fill in. If you were technical enough with a good imagination you filled in the blanks to where you liked it, if not then it was just pretty graphics that even 5 years later didn't look that good. Even then most of the enjoyment was technical, not really to do with the story or cinematography.

I liked it and still do today, but I do so because someone somewhere in the process had a good combination of understanding of technology and decision making to force the confusing parts to be done anyway. It created a "realistic" (as much as you can say that) environment for a program to live in. For me the part I truly liked and still love watching is the interaction between Flynn and the Bit - it is one of the best pieces of cyberpunk moviedom out there. Of course part of that is that cyberpunk movies traditionally blow chunks.

I haven't seen the sequel yet - I fell on a patch of ice and injured my back before it came out and until I get the MRI done this Wednesday am not supposed to do that much movement. My guess is it is either the same things and will simply be a cult classic or they just raped the whole thing. It is VERY unlikely that they created something that appeals to such a strange and unforgiving market as the people who love the original Tron and those that watch movies now. Given that I'm one of the ones that liked the original I hope for a cult classic, but I figure they probably raped it.

A simple Words per Minute test also excludes a number of quite qualified programmers that I happen to belong too - Dyslexics. My WPM sucks royally, I can't spell to save my life. Were it not for the nice little red lines under words and the ability to right click and find a correct spelling (and it often takes a few attempts to get close enough) my posts would look like a strange five year old posted them (my handwriting looks like a three year old did - bad spelling *and* terrible penmanship). As is a a great deal of the strangely worded sentences are work arounds for the issue. There are times that I just can't even get close enough that the spell/grammar checker can figure out what I want.

I type quite quickly if one were to count "typo's" as only things I didn't mean to hit. That is, the myriad "thier" was intentional and thus not a reduction against my WPM. Indeed, in every job I have had even the secretaries comment on how fast I type, yet I get a TON of red underlines. Were most of them not simply my inability to spell that would be OK, indeed I know the vast majority of times I mis-hit keys (and backspace them out), but that doesn't matter when you have a severe difficulty in telling "their" from "thier" if not for the red underlines the spell checker added.

And yes, this makes weakly typed languages a real pain if they get to be any size at all. However, for the most part it is so common an error outside of when I was first learning it is quickly checked with other automated tools.

in 3..2..1..

Nifty things - I always wondered why the RC aircraft people never really got into this. The technology can't be that tough to do and there looks to be quite a bit of fun involved. As pretty as this was in a city I would *love* to see a number of rural recording through some of the mountainous regions or night flying. Whilst I have a fairly severe fear of heights I normally still request a window seat on air planes because the anxiety is generally worth the view, I've tried to take pictures but commercial airliners windows aren't optimized for taking them. Were I to guess I would have said money is the primary reason - but well I know more than a few into the larger scale RC planes and money isn't their primary concern (many have more invested than they would for a decent car and the *know* at some point it is going to crash). They have all just looked at me like I was crazy when I asked.

I'm also surprised he got permission (and, for the moment, I'll ignore the 900lb gorilla of our current clamp downs) and note that there are two types of RC planes - those that have crashed and burned and those that will. As such even in rural areas if you are going to go outside of a really small range (basically around your own house) you have to go to specific areas designated for them. It's not just other aircraft (it would be ...bad... if a real airplane hit one of these where it wasn't supposed to be) but they are where people normally aren't so they do not crash on unsuspecting heads. Most of those areas in the film are not that - they are dense urban areas. Whilst the footage is neat, had there been one of the not so rare glitches and someone that was simply walking down a street got killed for it, not so much. The video shows more than one place this would *not* have been an unlikely scenario. Heck they keep manned aircraft that are MUCH more stable limited for that reason too.

Not that I'm against this being in our hands, but just that NYC may not be the best place for fly overs :) (lots of really nice non-urban areas).

There is an old statement out there about it that has been around in one form another for - well - about as long as people have been around.

I'll tell it the way I first heard it (late 80's): "A death of another is comedy, a paper cut on my finger is a tragedy".

That pretty much sums up a great deal of our attitudes going on now. DDoS someone you do not like and it is Power to the People, the only way we can fight back, how *dare* you prosecute them. DDoS someone we like and where are the feds, these people need decades in jail as it is obvious these are private servers - this is a travesty and is near treason!!!! Further I think this attitude is *not* seen as being in conflict with itself and most are confused others do not share it, it isn't a convenient argument but is a truly held belief.

Personally I think what will eventually be seen is that civilization only moves forward faster than its core principles do. This means that whilst the core principles move forward in the long run, short term we move ahead, collapse back behind them, and then move ahead of them again. While that average moves forward at a nice smooth pace the actual in this moment level of civilization swings back and forth. I think we are nearing a swing backwards as these ideas need to be truly internalized and not rationalized to whatever the individual wants at the moment.

Electric cars aren't the fist industry to be effected by this. They aren't the first electric vehicles around pedestrians in the wild, nor are they they first to find too silent means people get run over.

Ever wonder why so many electric vehicles make that nice annoying beeping when backing up (say, forklifts and such)? That is because so many people got backed over and severely injured even with alert drivers. Tire noise? Yea, that will work in so many places where the noise (even if everyone was electric) is high enough you can't hear the gravel crunching (and woe be to any place that smooths surfaces). Want to have to driver watch - do you *really* want the guy with 4 hours of sleep last night and two beers being the primary responsibility you can walk the rest of your life (again note that tire noise isn't that loud when in most public places)? It may be a moral victory that he was in the wrong, but I would rather have working legs than a moral victory and needing to navigate by pushing a small rod with my tongue.

I've been in more than one place where an electric vehicle pulls up behind me and the drivers voice makes me jump. They have been with cars, forklifts, and simple golf carts. The only ones that have ever truly scared me are the cars - they have been the only ones that *both* of us jumped when it was noticed (and in all cases they were backing - I'm not counting someone focused and alert trying to scare me, those are irritating but not severe accidents due to accidental circumstances). The others all had audible cues when they were moving in any way other than forward, even then being the person outside the reinforced steel cage I wish they had some audible cue they were moving. Whilst I've certainly been one inside of said cage (that is - driving forward whilst alert in an attempt to make someone jump), I've also felt the idea of if the driver had been distracted and rolled a 2 ton monstrosity over me due to inattention so we could be extra quite to be, well, not really a good idea. I rather suspect that most people would feel the same way - that a life in a wheel chair (and I have to note that this is being optimistic and assuming you live through the accident) wasn't worth everyone else not hearing a slight hum.

But hey - lots of people here do not want that noise!!!!

Quite is certainly good and a reduction in noise pollution is certainly a plus for electrics (and hybrids - where most of us have experience with a vehicle running under electric power). Yet one can get too quite when you are talking a high fraction of a metric ton (or usually greater) moving at speeds enough to kill. Tire noise isn't that much and with most electrics that is all you get. Even were it only the blind I would argue for it, however for those of us gifted with sight we *still* use our ears more than our eyes for situational awareness. There isn't *anyone* on this planet that this wouldn't benefit.

Really - does *anyone* out there but Iran want them to have nuclear weapons? Is there a country out there that doesn't at least have one or two decent enough engineers to do this type of work? While many of their engineers may not be immediately trained to do this type of work it isn't *that* hard to do. After all, look at the number of teenagers that do it - they aren't that worldly and have a vast knowledge of the world that a 30+ year old does, they just have motivation to do it. Most then age into engineers that do not do that type of work but excel in more mainstream activities - it isn't like that ability goes away either.

Well, I guess Uzbekistan is probably pretty low on the list, but I bet you can't come up with a country that doesn't at least have two or three capable of doing this (which is all it would take) and would not like to find Iran with a nuclear arsenal. Indeed, I would be happy if it *were* the US that did this as it would be uncharacteristically competent of them. I'll buy Russia or China well before even Israel for the same reason - they would have had to have been hit with the Clue Bat to get this to work out and not be leaked by this point (and no, this has nothing to do with Wikileaks as that has tended to be more an isolated incident that is stirring up all the traffic - though there is a good joke there about secrecy). I would look to, as you say, countries that specialize in this type of thing and that is mostly a short list - however it isn't *that* hard either so I wouldn't limit it to them.

Really - what did anyone think would happen?

So, lets assume that Wikileaks kept it to things pretty much anyone would consider to be a violation of basic human rights. That would probably have resulted in an attempt to kept stuff secret (for instance no removable devices and such), but for the most part life would have went on. But no, they had to simply release everything in a slow process to maximize publicity.

They didn't stop at embarrassing things said (much of which needs to be expressed but doesn't really need to be broadcast - two diplomats really need to confer that someone is a douchbag but it is best that it isn't publicised) to things that just are internal communications and could be used against us but really do not have embarrassing information (some of the procedural discussions and such). These communications are vital to *any* govt operating and are best not really being talked about (anyone think the US is the only one doing the UN spy stuff? I have some ocean front property in Arizona I'll sell cheap - yet it is best left unsaid and just implied). Heck, you can't even have a working negotiation over your salary if you have that level of transparency let alone if the diplomatic channels did.

Given this they *are* going to lock down on the whole thing and, as many have pointed out that is difficult to do. Therefore the lock down is going to be harsh to limit it as much as possible. If they can still function and only have half the documents leak-able that is a win from that point of view. Further Wikileaks lost a great deal of its support in the last release because of that too. There is nothing that really had a burning need to be told and a lot that was only going to give concrete ammunition to people who would truly oppress your rights in major way. One can talk about all the vetting done before the release, yet the vast majority of people can see the information released and make up their own minds (and regardless of how much you call them "sheople"it turns out most do just that - see the last US election for how well running with that idea worked out, heck see the last three or four ones for everyone involved to see how well that idea worked out - turns out reality doesn't give a flip about how much you believe your fantasy).

But hey, lets all DDOS everyone that thinks this way and it will solve the worlds problems!!!! If you want to win then embrace a similar idea - until then you will, at best, get short periods of time where enough give you the benefit of the doubt. Love them, hate them. be indifferent but this is precisely why both Clinton and Bush did as they wanted for eight years each no matter who ran Congress and is why Obama is totally lost after 2 (even though Bush and Clinton were VERY different governing styles they each ran circles around the other side of the political isle).

Ahh, but you see - the context is your own. I'm certain that a few thousand people in New York on 9/11 certainly felt repressed for the short while they were alive after the plane hit the tower - one could even argue that their oppression is more significant than yours (after all death is pretty much the single biggest removal of civil rights one can think of). It was certainly injustice.

Indeed, it isn't hard to find situations across the world where this happens - lets say if you were a non-Baathist in Iraq. There was some true injustice - so you were for that? After all you weren't even neutral, you were *against* the action to halt it so that means you were siding with the the Baathists. Or how about Darfur - didn't see people championing that one - you like those Africans getting killed and support it? I would call that situation "injustice" - MUCH more than anything happening with Wikileaks.

Let me guess, you thought it was wrong but that we should leave it alone? OK, I think the harassment of Wikileaks is wrong is too - if I campaign to leave it alone and let the govt do whatever it wants are you going to support me as a True Friend of Justice? Bet not. The primary difference is this is one *you* care about.

Lots of injustice out there like that - lots of it you only care enough to half shed a single tear and move on, much of it you oppose any measure to try and stop. Lots of it you get all nice and worked up over the "with us or against us" meme but more than willing to trot it out in defense of your own cause.

Note *none* of those cases were "terrorists" but pure injustice of the type feared our govt will come to (but not there yet).

Personally I find both sets to be laughable propaganda. Not sure which is sadder if you truly believe what you write or do not but think that it is persuasive.

Truth is somewhere in between - terrorist exist and there has to be some form of action against them and our govt is running amok and needs reeled in. Just because someone wants a line drawn someplace where I do not want it doesn't necessarily mean they are "against me", though I will have to say attitudes like yours are so. All they will do is swap one set of people trying to force me to do something with another and *that* is injustice.

So, you are either with us or against us?

I thought that attitude was totally wrong? Or does adding more words make it a nice and proper thing to think and act on?

It largely depends on yoru definition of a PC. I'm too lazy to look it up, nor is it an original idea (many of us thought this *well* before it was wrote) but ESR has a great article about the future of computing and how it is converging on a single small device.

So, we are going away from the PC to the Tablet - OK, what makes it a tablet vs a PC? The interface? There is no reason whatsoever that I can not get a PC with a touchscreen and get that interface with all the versatility of the PC. The form factor? Well I can't certainly get that PC performance and nice touch screen in a tablet yet but heck, we are close to it.

Lets take the Apple MacBook Air - and easy target as it is currently a widely known set standard. So where does that fit in? Apple wants us to think it isn't a PC, isn't a Tablet, but something in between - yet it *is* a PC replacement we are looking at corporate wide. There isn't anything really lacking there either (well, other than application availability for Mac OS, though bootcamp and a purchase of Windows Professional would fix - but that is software and mostly irrelevant to what we are discussing). In what we call the 'PC" world (by that we mean windows based) you can for the same price as it and get a CPU two generations later, twice the ram and slightly faster, a built in DVD-writer, and a few other hardware upgrades for the same price, weight, and a one inch thick instead of .8 inches thick form factor (we just purchased a Sony VAIO at work equipped as such). So it isn't Apple has any truly special hardware there either - their advertising campaign is quite correct about where that device fits in. Give us a good port replicator (ours has yet to arrive so I can't say how it will work) and the only reason to do otherwise is cost (~1600 for the laptop plus the port replicator and whatever monitor you choose is four or more times the cost of a desktop similarly equipped, but then it doesn't weigh a few pounds and fit in a folder either). Truly that "PC's" form factor is close enough to the tablets that if it had as convenient and OS as they do it would supplant them.

Add in that phones are quickly looking at multiple core 1.5+ ghz processors and multiple ports/outputs/inputs and the line becomes really blurred hardware wise. Indeed, we are already seeing phones that can *capture* as decent quality as their optics allow 1080p video and play any 1080p video stream at full quality as well as a dedicated Blu-Ray player - those lines are blurring. With some of them add a port replicator and hardware wise you are going to be hard pressed to find a difference. Further given time and it being primarily a software issue the following statement comes to mind - once a problem is totally software anything is fixable, it just is a matter of time. So yes, these firms are correct. However one has to note they are wanting money for their advice and, while correct from a strict standpoint the hardware convergence has some time to go and the software had a great deal left. It isn't remotely time to have them the same or invest as such - but long term that is where we are very much moving.

Yea, because Verizon doesn't have any Smartphone competitors out there that are competing with AT&T and their data plans are even worse. Oh, wait a minute - Droid, unlimited data, and tethering for free? I guess only a fraction of the people out there use Android phones over iPhones. Oh, crap - that isn't true either?

I guess Apple has Magic Bits that cost more Bits than others and are thusly making AT&T's service blow for most people. Yea, it couldn't be that it blew before Apple got on there and, indeed, has improved since then. No it must be that Apple iPhones are so popular that no network on the planet could handle the data load and all others are as motes of dust compared to them.

Come one, this is *soo* early 2010's type of thinking - have you even bothered to look at sales data in the last 8 months?

AT&T had that excuse last year sometime but has lost it - they aren't the only ones with lots of streaming video and such anymore (and I would bet not even the highest as the multitude of Android Phones have come out on other carriers). Verizon has all sorts of warts - some of them just as big - but it doesn't have the crappy service AT&T delivers to most places in the US. When the iPhone was really the only Smartphone out there I could buy that - but now? Really? You want to run with you speeds suck because you have this tremedous usage other carriers do not have because your Phone does video and such? Even when we get down to Whose Phone is Better most Apple users haven't drunk *that* much of the kool-aid in a while.

If AT&T looses the majority of thier base to Verizon then you may be - at least - somewhat accurate. I can't say if their network could handle the bulk of the three most popular around (they already handle two of them - blackberry and Android) and a great deal of loss of AT&T's customers would certainly free up bandwidth. However I can't figure out how that is a win for AT&T either even if the Verizon network totally breaks down under the load (not is it any validation of your idea - that person B can lift more than Person A isn't invalidated when person B is crushed by person A dropping their weights on them at the same time they are lifting their own). It just seems a great deal of money that AT&T looses.

You either do not live in the US or have fallen for the idea that unions here express without ever having to live by them - I have *never* seen unions here work that way. In other countries I have certainly see them do that, but in those unions have to compete for your membership (and you don't even have to belong to one) *and* compete within the strictures of the people hiring them. That is a fairly decent system and is why so many non-us workers are so confused over why the US has such a backlash against unions.

I come from a mostly blue collar worker family (like many in East Tennessee - lots of high tech white collar workers but most from out of state). Of the myriad relatives I have I know many that have tried to rely on those union provided niceties and I can count the number that have had them work better than the federal provided one (say, medicare or medicaid) on one hand and have five fingers left over. That is to say none whatsoever. In every case when the time came the money was elsewhere and the union higher ups didn't know where it went or it was coming along shortly (and 30 years later after they died it was the unions to keep).

If we were to have a European version of unions I would be fine with it, most people around would too. For most of us in the US we have seen your noble ideas crash into the dust and the reality of Big Money (otherwise known as Unions in the US) come to play. I'm highly reminded of someone at my parents camp ground that ran out of savings last year - she is wondering where all her years of savings sent to the union went, why she has to strike for things she doesn't want, and what good this is going to do when they finally reach an agreement. Unless you want a long document you can find elsewhere don't ask me what I went through at Oak Ridge National Labs with the teamsters, electricians, and carpenters with changing a simple ethernet card (short version: teamsters move things, electricians plug/unplug anything electrical, and carpenters take screws in and out - and yes they are strict about that and no it doesn't matter the purpose - if your screw is holding an ethernet card you need the carpenters to remove it. Further you have to pay for two at a time for a minimum of one hour each nor could you schedule them in succession as you could only know a window of time they could come out that may or may not be fulfilled).

I'm reminded of how my mother dealt with the union when she works at a steel factory - she reminded them she also had a gun and knew how to use it. Our system blows - bringing the tech industry into it will not solve anything.

It depends - if he held her down and forced the sexual intercourse to continue, yes it is rape by any definition. Indeed, there is no reason whatsoever that consensual sex can not even turn into aggravated rape with severe trauma resulting in death. As such the defense of "But she was for it at the beginning" doesn't work very well. If she said "Please Stop", he said "Wha" and her reply was "Oh well" and they kept going no it is not.

She claims the former, he claims the latter. Lots of people rush to his defense because of who he is (recall how many many here just knew that Hans Reiser didn't kills his wife and it was some grand conspiracy primarily because someone who wrote ReiserFS wouldn't do such a thing - Assange is MUCH easier to create a case for false accusations), others rush to condemn any man accused of a rape (see the Duke Lacrosse Team a few years ago and ask them about the rush to guilt).

Since none of us here know much at all of the case and are each reading stories that are trying to further a narrative I'll hold off on saying it is right or wrong. If there is ample evidence that he forced sex upon an unwilling partner (and forensics are quite capable of showing that with bruise patterns if she went to the doctor early enough) then he should never have been allowed out of Sweden. If it is simply his word against hers then I'm not sure how you could begin to build a case (at least in any country where guilt has to be mostly proved) and ought to be dropped. As of now we now one party says it happened, another says it didn't, and then people mostly square up based on what they think if Wikileaks, not the facts of the case (which we do not really know).

Also if you *really* think that saying "it might nor be true" gets modded to a -1 troll you may want to read the responses above you. I read at +2 and *all* of them but one at the time of my posting are defending him and saying it is a hit job by the American govt. The one that wasn't defending him was simply a quote from a news paper with the paraphrasing of what the women had said with no other cometary. I don't really think that Slashdot is this hotbed of right-wing silencing types out to get Wikileaks that you seem to be seeing. At least the Apple/Android wars *do* have a substantial group on each "side".