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Comment Don't forget chromatic abberation (Score 1) 124

Blue- and red-pixels adjacent or lined up on top of each other? Unless we are looking at them straight on, those get cross-ways and overlap or no longer line up for those of us wearing thick glasses. Not only can this cause distractions and headaches, but in some cases like a poorly-done bar chart it can actually lead to me reading the bar chart differently than a person with thinner glasses, contacts, or 20/20 vision.

Comment Even if they were, it would be different (Score 2) 124

In the case of the BSA, you can easily identify all legitimate plaintiffs - there is usually only 1 per possible violation - and it or they can authorize the BSA to act on its behalf.

Even if every ADA-advocacy-group signed on with Prenda, Prenda could still not speak for individuals who were not members of these groups, and it could not speak for those who were members of the groups unless the individuals had authorized the groups to act as their legal representatives in such cases.

In short, Prenda is saying "settle with us" without saying "but oh by the way there are millions of potential plaintiffs out there who can sue you over this same issue tomorrow."

If that isn't worthy of sanctions by the state bar associations, it should be.

Comment Don't pay the dane-geld (Score 5, Interesting) 124

Unlike a copyright claim that only has one potential plaintiff, EVERY disabled person in America is a potential plaintiff, as well as your state's Attorney General and the US Attorney General.

Plus, once you've been sued, you can no longer claim ignorance if someone else sues you over the same issue later.

The only proper response is to say "thank you for informing us of the problem" and if there is an actual violation, fix it or find some legal work-around (You have excess bathrooms that aren't ADA-compliant? Close them down. Is there a way to apply for a waiver? Apply. Etc. etc.). But do not pay the dane-geld or you will never get rid of the "Dane".

Oh, and yes, these guys should be disbarred for offering to settle a claim when they know good and well they cannot speak for all potential plaintiffs AND they know good and well that if a settlement is reached, it will at least temporarily defeat the purpose and intent of the law.

Submission + - North Carolina Still Wants To Block Municipal Broadband (arstechnica.com)

An anonymous reader writes: In February, when the FCC rolled out its net neutrality rules, it also voted to override state laws that let Texas and North Carolina block ISPs created by local governments and public utilities. These laws frequently leave citizens facing a monopoly or duopoly with no recourse, so the FCC abolished them. Now, North Carolina has sued the FCC to get them back. North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper claims, "the FCC unlawfully inserted itself between the State and the State’s political subdivisions." He adds that the new rule is "arbitrary, capricious, and an abuse of discretion within the meaning of the Administrative Procedure Act; and is otherwise contrary to law."

Comment Goodwill, fluctuating valuations (Score 1) 335

Many companies own assets that are hard to value or quickly fluctuate in value so any expert appraisal of the "asset value" of a company should be assumed to have non-trivial "error bars."

Also, some "assets" like "goodwill" are very difficult to measure reliably. Let's take the company that makes Blue Bell Ice Cream. It's got 100+ years of "goodwill" stored up in the minds of Texas Ice Cream and once they get their production going again, their ice cream will fly off the shelf in Texas simply because many customers will buy it "as a show of support".

However, the current recall as "spent" a good deal of that "goodwill": If they have a similar recall any time in the next 30 years, or if they do anything that indicates they don't care about their product's quality, they won't have it nearly as easy a time if they have another corporate disaster.

Submission + - Texas appearently sharing drivers' license photos with FBI (dallasnews.com)

An anonymous reader writes: The Dallas Morning News "Watchdog" column reports that the Texas Dept. of Public Safety entered into a "Memorandum of Understanding" with the FBI back in 2013 that allows the DPS to share drivers' license photos with the FBI under limited circumstances. It also reports that back in 2012 the FBI was working to get similar agreements with other states.

Texas is the state that recently added — and later repealed — a requirement that you submit a full set of fingerprints to get or renew your driver's license.

Submission + - Four quasars found clustered together defy current cosmological expectations

StartsWithABang writes: Get a supermassive black hole feeding on matter, particularly on large amounts of cool, dense gas, and you're likely to get a quasar: a luminous, active galaxy emitting radiation from the radio all the way up through the X-ray. Our best understanding and observations indicate that these objects should be rare, transient, and isolated; no more than two have ever been found close together before. Until this discovery, that is, where we just found four within a million light years of one another, posing a problem for our current theories of structure formation in the Universe.

Submission + - PandaLabs discovers 'Phantom Menace' hack targeting oil tankers (thestack.com)

An anonymous reader writes: A malicious cyberattack has been exposed which specifically targeted the maritime oil industry, according to cloud security firm PandaLabs. Discovered in January last year, the attack which has been dubbed ‘The Phantom Menace’ by Panda is thought to have started in 2013. The security firm believes that the malware continues to target the oil sector, stealing critical data in an attempt to defraud oil brokers. Despite Panda revealing the highly-targeted attacks, the dozens of maritime companies affected by the virus have refused to provide comment on the data breach facing public concern over the security of their IT networks. In a report titled ‘Operation Oil Tanker: The Phantom Menace’, Panda explores what it claims to be one of the most unique hacks it has revealed in its 25-year history. The virus was not detected by any antivirus software as those behind the attacks were using a combination of tools and scripts to disguise their activity and avoid detection by traditional security systems.

Submission + - Prenda Allums are Suing People Again (startribune.com)

Hokan writes: Paul Hansmeier and John Steele, formerly of Prenda, are suing again. Each have started nonprofits, in Minnesota and Illinois, claiming to defend disabled people and are suing small businesses for ADA violations.

Submission + - South Africa publishes commercial drone regulations (htxt.co.za)

An anonymous reader writes: South Africa has become the latest country to publish official regulations for the use of drone aircraft for commercial operations, and it's bad news for the film and mining industry. The regulations require every drone and every pilot be registered and licenced, and drones can't be operated within 10km of aerodromes or 50m of buildings. And certainly not above crowds of people. Industry so far reckons enforcement is going to be impossible...

Submission + - Linux Dev's Purported 4096 bit RSA Key Factored 1

An anonymous reader writes: A PGP subkey for Kernel developer Peter Anvin from a public Sks Keyserver was discovered to be divisible by 3. The weak key was discovered by a web service which calls itself the Phuctor which has since factored two other keys as a chews on an sks keyserver dump. Whether the key was generated weak or if it was strong before becoming corrupted on a keyserver it is extremely troubling that such a weak key representing such an important Linux developer could be served.

Comment Give travelers a meaningful way to say "no" (Score 1) 200

All outbound travelers should have a meaningful way of saying "no, I don't want you to search this thing. Hold it for me until I get back or until the person I designate retrieves it. I will pay reasonable and customary storage charges." The same option should be given for "not allowed on the plane" items like over-sized bottles, etc. where the flyer would not otherwise be arrested (in other words, either arrest and charge the person with a crime or give him the option of not having his "contraband" forfeited/trashed).

All inbound travelers should be able to say "no, I do not give you permission to search it. If it is suspected of being too dangerous to transport (e.g. explosives) you may destroy it at my expense, otherwise you may either ship it back to my home country at my expense or hold it until my departure and I will pay reasonable and customary storage costs."

Comment Time for a change in the law? (Score 1) 167

Perhaps its time to exclude "occasionally paid" haulers, such as those with a gross annual revenue of under $1,000 and who do less than 12 hauling jobs for pay in any 12-month period, and provide simple registration and lower liability requirements for "weekenders" who do up to $10,000/year in gross revenue and up to 104 jobs in any 12-month period. I would also exempt "charity-benefit" jobs from the calculations - if someone makes it clear up front that all the money the customer pays is going straight to a bona fide charity, the law should treat it the same as if he was doing the job for free.*

For those excluded from the law, I would require that all ads include a disclaimer which included a link to a state-run web site explaining that if something goes wrong, the customer will be left holding the bag.

I would also clarify the law to either explicitly protect people who hire un-registered or registered-but-lightly-insured couriers from 3rd-party lawsuits due to damages to 3rd parties caused by the mover and protect them from civil liability if they don't run a background check on their mover, OR, of the people of that state don't want to do that, to EXPLICITLY put the customers "on notice" that they may be hauled into court if their mover causes damage to a 3rd party. Of course, doing the latter would practically kill this cottage industry altogether, which is why I favor the first option of making the customer immune from 3rd-party damages.

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* When friends or family ask me to do more than a few hours of my time and it's not a situation of "family obligations" or the like, I give them an estimate and ask them to make out a check in that amount to some charity. In my case I do it so 1) they will at least consider hiring a poor starving college student instead, 2) so they will understand the value of what they are asking for, and 3) because I don't need the money and I want to be very clear that when I can, I am willing to share my time with them without being paid or having them feel like they "owe me one."

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