These places tend to be asset-less companies that do not care about being sued, they simply form another shell and fold.
Per TFA, the lawsuit also has 10 John Doe defendants and they intend to go after the copyright holders Rightscorp represents. Given their deep pockets, if the lawsuit successfully includes them then who has what assets is moot since they all are on hook for the judgement so if one can't pay the other must.
Remember how they busted Al Capone? Tax evasion? They knew for a fact how he got his money, but they also knew that to prove he was innocent he'd have to admit to how he got his money. So, despite violating his rights, the spirit of the law, and perverting the justice system. they got him anyway. Win at all costs...
Actually they used the tax code properly. He failed to report income and was tried and convicted. He could have reported it and paid taxes on it and avoided prosecution.
Greed.
There is/was a popular scam that involved getting people to look at their Windows error log in order to convince them that they needed "help." It was quite effective because the average user easily accepts that errors are the same as problems.
Fortunately, many of the scammers aren't to bright either and are easily played if they think you're a mark. I get those calls every now and then and drew with them until they are clearly really pissed. Then I tell them I'm bored and thank them for the free entertainment. That causes them to blow a gasket and I start laughing and hang up. You can go many ways with the game and if you slowly and progressively win their trust ask all kinds of strange questions.
Not sure if that analogy works as it is more a practical vs. theoretical split.
Designing things isn't practical? Are you an arts graduate?
No, an engineer. I was referring to design being an exercise in theoretical knowledge while maintaining / repairing is more of a practical skill. It has nothing to do with weather the item designed is practical. Given how many engineers have designed cars to make them as hard a possible to repair (Remove the air filter to replace a headlight bulb? The trunk trim to replace a tail light? reallY?) "practical" may not be in their toolbox.
It is as simple as programing as a vocation vs a profession.
More like cheap source of labor vs. more expensive one. Companies don't have to pay as much and get a ready supply to replace them as technologies change.
Think car mechanic vs engineer. One can fix an engine or even put it together the other designs it. Of course the best is when you have an engineer that is also a mechanic.
Not sure if that analogy works as it is more a practical vs. theoretical split. Perhaps more like quick change oil guy vs a mechanic. One can do one or two things cheaply and the other understand the underlying concepts and can actually troubleshoot and solve problems based on experience and training.
Maybe some places don't care, but usually there's some kind of dollar cost to companies that do a lot of at-will terminations that result in unemployment compensation.
Yes, their premiums rise as claims increase, to a point. At that point, it is cheaper to layoff employees, let them collect unemployment, and then rehire them when demand picks back up since you've already maxed out your premiums. Seasonal employment is perfect for this, with employees getting a paid vacation through unemployment knowing they will be rehired when the season restarts. It's an economically rational approach to the problem of seasonal demand and low wage workers that works out well for both sides.
So what to do? Buy good chocolate. A bar should be anywhere from $5-$15. You can't make really good chocolate without using great cocoa. You can't get great cocoa without paying a significant premium to the farmers -- often 2-4 times the NY or London terminal price. So you know they are paid well. You simply can't have a $1-2 chocolate bar after if has been run though the supply chain (stores, distributors, the factory, various cocoa brokers, etc.) and know the farmers were paid well no matter the certification.
Correct. The problem is not that there is a coach shortage but that there is a shortage of cheap cocoa. High end producers who want to make good chocolate pay a premium and get what they need. Mars, which doesn't really produce chocolate but a brown substance to cover filings, can't.
In the US, FOIA requests can be denied on the basis of privacy violations (exemption 6), and law enforcement information (which this qualifies, I think) can be denied if its release could endanger the life or physical safety of any individual. http://www.foia.gov/faq.html#e...
Except that it is a state FOIA request; which may have the limits. The problem is most people are not sympathetic to strippers; and unlike gun owners who managed to get carry permit applications exempt, the lack a powerful lobby.
...Any such devices like this would be removed from any car I buy...
Agreed! But the key work here is 'buy' - the implication being you buy it outright, and are the owner.
On the other hand, if you are financing through the dealer, the RO (registered owner) is the dealer, not you.
Not quite true. The seller has a lean on the vehicle but you are the owner. If the dealer was still the legal one that could open them up for liability in the event of an accident, etc.
A constitutionalist (you know, the supreme law of the land, the thing they all swore to uphold) would also notice that no part of the Constitution granted authority to do such a thing: An application of Sarbanes-Oxley needs to involve interstate commerce in some fashion.
Fishing is distinctly intrastate commerce (if commerce at all!), and cannot be covered by federal law. Criminal law is supposed to be a state issue.
Not necessarily. the US Federal government has jurisdiction over coastal waters and thus federal law would apply.
The Eighth Amendment to the Constitution also requires "Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted." I doubt 20 years prison listed in the statute is ever warranted.
Cruel and unusual. It may be cruel but it is not unusual, so a strict constructionist would say it was OK.
Also remember many jobs will drug test you.
This is already being tested in the courts. There's not yet (as far as I know) a test for marijuana intoxication, only detection that you've used marjuana at some point in the past few days/weeks, so there's little justification for testing for marijuana when it's already legal for recreational and/or medicinal use. It's particularly controversial when an employee uses marijuana medicinally -- cough medicine is going to affect employee performance much more than smoking pot over the weekend.
Legality is irrelevent to on the job testing. A valid medical reason would mor ethan likely give the employee a pass but recreational use could still result in adverse actions.
I feel like I've lost my entire cultural identity in effort to be part of the culture I've spent the majority of the last decade in.
Translation: I want to impose my culture on my team mates.
No, more like I am always acutely aware of my differences and it can be uncomfortable. Until you have been their it is hard to understand but one day you may find yourself there even if your just "the old guy."
Let's ignore race for a moment. What's the percentage of people in tech who came from a single parent home? Ditto for the population at large? How many people in tech had welfare crack whores for mothers? The population at large? What's the percentage of people in tech where education was a priority for the family? The population at large?
the real question is "how do we identify and support talent that may not be able to reach their potential without help?" It is easy to dismiss people but the reality is if someone cares and helps people can overcome the odds.
I have to admit that I still disagree with you.
I have about nine engineers working for me. I appreciate the work they do, and -- as someone who's a vastly less qualified engineer than they are -- deeply respect and admire their skills.
At my company, my job as a manager is defined to be all about attracting and retaining great engineers, and giving them context (and then they figure out what they're going to do with that context). So retaining them is, quite simply, my job.
That said, these engineers don't _belong_ to me or my company. They're human beings, and if I want them to work for me I should be willing and able to compete for them every. single. day. And that means that I don't win by making it harder for them to know what's out there in the job market that's better than the job they've got here -- I win by making this job the bast damned job they could want.
Trying to keep recruiters away from my engineers as a way to have a lock on them feels oddly similar to Apple suing Samsung to not have their competing product on the market.
I think we are closer than our comments appear. To me, it's not that you are keeping recruiters away from them; it's simply that if someone is hired to fill a vacant slot for you their loyalty should be to you and not use their position to your detriment. I would expect a good recruiter to learn your staffing needs, what current skills you have on staff, etc. to find the best fit candidate. For that recruiter then to go after you staff seems to me to be a conflict of interest and it would be unethical for them to tell someone else in their firm to go after them as well. however, I would think it perfectly OK for a recruiter at the same firm to independently reach out to your talent and try to poach them.
It's the same as what I do in consulting. A client has every right to expect I won't use what I learn about their company to help a fellow consultant at one of their competitors and it would be unethical for me to offer a competitor information on them I have learned while working for the client. To me, it's a matter of putting the client's interests first.
As a manager myself I fully agree with your comments concerning a manager's role and would not want to be a roadblock to their understanding the job market or having other recruiters contact them.
(Anti-poaching agreements, though, are just evil)
I disagree. It depends on the agreement. I would want one where the recruiter for my open positions can't recruit or recommend my staff for open positions they have at other firms. I do not think it is unreasonable for me to expect the recruiter not to have a colloquia say "I hear your in at X. I need someone who can do Y and they are noted for that. Help me find someone..." You are either working for me or for someone else. Plain and simple. If the firm does work for competitors other recruiters certainly can poach my staff, just without the help from mine; and a non-compete that would lock out the entire firm (assuming it is reasonably large) would be unreasonable.
"The one charm of marriage is that it makes a life of deception a neccessity." - Oscar Wilde
