Here's how it's still legal...

The people who put on the PS3 3.2.1 lawsuit failed to hold forth a legal theory under which Sony was liable. Therefore, there is no case law in which a party was enjoined from doing what nVidia is now doing.

This is not to say that there is *not* a legal theory; only that the PS3 class action idiots failed to put one forth. I can think of several theories that would apply; several of them bear on the insistence these companies have on treating intellectual property as real property:

(1) An easement is a non-possessory right to use and/or enter onto the real property of another without possessing it. Sounds like a software license, doesn't it? In this particular case, the right to run the old software on the nVidia device -- or the right to run "Other OS" on a PS3 device -- would be either an implied easement (based on the practices and customs of use for a property), or an "easement by necessity", or easement by prior use.

(1)(a) The strongest claim for an implied easement in the case of a firmware update would be for persons who have had prior use of the easement (in the PS3 case, it means that you must have loaded an "other OS"; in the nVidia case, it means you must have periodically used or relied upon the features being removed).

(1)(b) The next strongest claim for an implied easement would be the intent of the parties; what was the intent nVidia had, when they shipped the features being removed in the update? What was the intent of the person purchasing the device, prior to the removal of the feature, and their expectation of non-removal, if any? Similarly, in the PS3 case, what was the intent of Sony in offering "Other OS"? Was it to drive sales, such that they received benefit from it? What was the intent of the person when they purchased the PS3? Was it only to run "Other OS" (in which case, not updating the firmware is not an issue), or was it use of both the "Other OS" feature *and* the features that would be removed as a result of *not* updating the firmware?

(1)(c) An Easement by necessity could be established in the PS3 case for "Other OS"; like a land-locked parcel without access to a public way, necessity may be established if there was no other way to reach the parcel *and* there was some original intent to provide access to the parcel. This argument would only be likely to be usable by someone who had in fact used "Other OS" on a periodic or regular basis. Given that I do not have the entire laundry list of features that currently exist which will and/or will not be lost when the nVidia update is declined, I can't state for a certainty one way or another whether this could apply in the nVidia case as well.

(1)(d) An Easement by prior use. You would be unlikely to be able to establish this in the PS3 or nVidia cases, given that three of the five elements to establish such an easement are not present: (i) common ownership, (ii) severance, (iii) continued use after severance. It bears mentioning, however, because the threshold for the definition of "necessity" is more lenient than in (1)(c), and a clever lawyer could /potentially/ construct an argument.

OK, what other theories are there?

(2) "Intentionally blocked view"; if your neighbor intentionally and with forethought, built a fence, or plants trees/bamboo that subsequently block your view, and thereby devalued your property or your enjoyment thereof; the legal term for this varies, but it's often called a "spite fence".

(2)(a) The "spite fence" argument, is clearly applicable in the Sony PS3 case, since you would lose access to existing features of the device should you *not* install the firmware update, and lose access to existing features if you *do* install the update could likely be easily construed by the court, especially with a little prompting as "malicious intent" -- a key factor required for judgement on your behalf. Again, I don't know if you could make an "either or" case with the nVidia update -- bu I expect you could, for people who bought the device after the update announcement, before the update was released, and the terms on the loss of the games revealed, on the basis of the forward compatibility.

All in all: the PS3 class action guys should have done a better job.

Technically, you can. There are three methods:

1. A surety bond

2. Funds deposited with the state

3. Certificate of self-insurance

Check with your local DMV to see which of these options are available; all three are accepted in California. Most multiple DUI offender movie stars utilize surety bonds.

That's easy:

Then I shall print one.

Sadly, the haze is reddish-brown, rather than Purple Haze.

It's their plan, and yes, it's questionable. French politics are such that the politics of going non-nuclear while at the same time supporting ITER and the LHC are incompatible (unless they also plan to pull out of ITER).

I'm now currently laughing a little at being modded down, since there were no nuclear closures announced as part of the plan; someone is bad at math:

100% = 75% + 25%; if the 75% is to turn into 50%, then 75% + 75% = 150%. So they plan to increase utilization 50%, if they do not plan plant closures, otherwise the amount provided by nuclear not changing doesn't work out. :^)

Awnings and shading will reduce cooling costs. Heating oil is not used for cooling, electricity is. They will increase heating oil consumption. Insulation will help in both directions, but it's largely not an option for existing buildings. You believe that the 80% of the legacy building can be refit to save the 40% of the energy costs? That's 65% of the legacy buildings you would need to effectively reconstruct. It's not going to happen.

The subway isn't an issue, except to say that, operating on electricity, it's just "carbon shifting" to move the greenhouse gas generation elsewhere than NYC, and then pretend that NYC has reduced its own greenhouse emissions as a result of increasing them in Camden, NJ. See my other post (below) on how "deck chair accounting" is just fudging the numbers.

What percentage of buildings in Manhattan are less than 10 years old? The new Trade Center doesn't count, since I doubt NYC is prepared to withstand that kind of "urban renewal" on a large scale.

Read the article, and then read the linked document I provided on the sourcing of greenhouse gasses in NYC: It's predominantly from buildings. Adding square footage by rebuilding up is going to increase this; even if you do a "green building" as you build higher, you're going to increase heating pressure on your neighbors as you block their sunlight.

Use of heating oil and boilers is the reason there are greenhouse gasses from buildings; a secondary sourcing of greenhouse gasses comes from summer cooling costs. If you look at the graphs (again, in the linked document), you'll see this called out a "CDD + HDD", which are the total number of days in which greenhouse expenditures must go up for combined cooling and heating, per year. These have been increasing since 2012, and we are climbing out of the 2012 CDD+HDD minima for the current sunspot cycle, so this will be unlikely to reverse trend before 2.5 years from now: expect larger pendulum swings, resulting in higher CDD+HDD until the 11 year cycle starts in the other direction.

Bottom line is: more people = more energy usage, and you aren't going to "green" or rebuild every skyscraper in Manhattan over night -- if at all -- without an insane amount of investment (as in: demolition and rebuilding, which for sky scrapers tends to be expensive).

You could potentially make a (small) dent in the proposed reduction numbers by getting rid of all gasoline vehicles, and replacing them with electric, or forcing people onto public transportation. However, this is already reaching its limits; rich people simply pay the penalty, rather than foregoing private transportation. This is probably great for the city coffers in terms of revenue, but does nothing for the environment, even if that's the excuse being used to enrich the city coffers. There is no shortage of rich people in Manhattan.

You could make a (much larger) dent in the proposed reduction numbers by moving from heating oil to electric, and from fossil fuels for cooling energy.

However...

This is deck-chair shifting, in the same way that you can select "green energy producers" on your power bill, pay a higher cost, and thus force other energy consumers to be "less green". Further, the carbon debt under grid loading is a green energy swap; that is, the energy you use will be from a fossil fuel plant when the grid is loaded, and then you will "pay it back" by accounting those kWh as "borrowed", and then later "pay them back" by accounting other people's green energy use as your own (and theirs as fossil fuel usage that you "borrowed" from them).

Likewise, moving to electric -- and the electrics used in the subway system and other public transportation -- is what's called "carbon shifting". You move the generation of the electricity to elsewhere on the grid, and so the greenhouse gas generation has been NIMBY'ed away into someone else's jurisdiction, making you definitionally "greener".

Short of moving away from fossil fuels, while simultaneously keeping up with increased demand for energy -- and let's not kid ourselves, renewables will not cut this Gordian Knot, we are talking nuclear or space-based solar -- there's just no way to *ACTUALLY* hit those 40% numbers, with the current building and population trends.

Canada: land of retrying a case until you win

---Round one:
City of Toronto: "Uber is a Taxi service!"
Canadian Judge: "No, it's not."

---Round two (this one):
Taxi driver: "Uber is a taxi service!"
Canadian Judge: (hope they get the same one) -- case in progress

---Round three:
Place your bets now!

Growing square footage, population... good luck.

Not to mention the climate swings that have been increasing since 2004, requiring both more cooling in the summer and more heating in the winter.

http://www.nyc.gov/html/planyc...

Maybe they can build vertical solar farms, and pass an ordinance that the sun has to shine horizontally...

TL;DR translation... "We plan on increasing our energy use by 50%, but do not plan on building additional nuclear plants to provide that capacity".

You should have launched a Windows 3.11 attack instead.

"if a homeowner neglects to cover a window with drapes, he would lose his reasonable expectation of privacy with respect to a viewer looking into the window from outside of his property,"

That's OK.

A viewer looking into my window from outside my property loses his reasonable expectation of eyesight while I am conducting laser experiments.

Missing answer: it's about gaming journalism.

So what you are saying... is that when I build my own weaponized drone, I should arm it with a flamethrower instead of a hand gun?

Good to know...

Spain has a history of doing stupid things involving the Internet.

Their "unintended consequence" to forcing search services to not list headlines from news services unless payment for the content happened, was that they got delisted from news.google.com and other Google search results.

"We wanted you to pay us, not delist us!" was a stupid response to the delisting.

The unintended consequence in this case, should the court agree to hear it, is that there will be a single law on the books regulating taxi companies in all EU countries as a result.

This "cure" will likely be worse than the "disease", in terms of overall fallout.