I was in the same situation once. Laid off by Northern Telecom in the late '80s, I started work as a contractor at their head office three weeks later for double what I'd been paid as an employee. :)

That's kind of the whole point. This is another "but on the internet/with a computer" idea that's tried and failed many times throughout history.

Even addiction is not a problem. Back in the day when opium was legal, many people were addicted to it. But they had ready access to a cheap supply of their drug of choice, so they were able to function in society, hold down a job, etc.

Caffeine is another good example. Lots of people are addicted to caffeine, but function in society.

Even tobacco (evil though it is) has functional addicts.

The point is that it's not addiction itself that is a problem, but the stigmatization of addicts by society and the crimes they're forced to commit to feed black market pricing. Put an opiate addict on a methadone program, and they stop breaking into houses to feed their habit.

Addiction is not a *good* thing, but it should be a personal choice and health issue, not an excuse for ostracizing someone from society.

Why would corporations be forced to improve? As Hobby Lobby taught us, "corporation" is just shorthand for the will of the rich stockholders. And they don't give a whit about the plight of the average American worker when they have access to the world. If they can't move the Malaysian to the US office, they'll move the US office to Malaysia. Visa problem solved.

Any company which lays off 10% of their workforce should be banned from the H1B program for at least 5 years.

This sounds like paper-tracked barter, with a delayed payment on half of the deal. Which is kind of the key problem that money was intended to solve -- money can be traded for *anything*, not just what the issuer has that is of value. This ends up being a throwback to the days of "store scrip", only even more limited.

An interesting experiment, but ultimately futile and pointless.

Seriously this is what it's come to, editors? "As it lays 18,000 off workers"? You can't even proofread the title?

Anyway, it's mostly non-American Nokia employees who are being laid off, and it has nothing to do with the H1-B situation. So bottom line Sessions is an idiot.

That taxation is my biggest issue. My bank does not have free, unlimited ATM transactions on my plan. I withdraw my cash, spend it where I will, and don't pay their damned ATM fees.

Why the hell should I pay them to spend my money?

I have no money to spare for seeing movies. Period.

So when I download a torrent and watch it (and there's a disgustingly small number that I watch more than 15-20 minutes of), there is absolutely NO loss to the studio. Because if I *had* to pay for it, I just wouldn't see it at all.

I *hate* theatres on top of being broke -- they're full of ignorant perfume and aftershave wearing buttheads playing with their cell phones and talking about what they're going to do after the movie. I don't own a TV, so I'd have to play a DVD on my Linux box. If I'm still going to see it on a small computer screen, why *wouldn't* I settle for a low-res torrent instead of a DVD?

The studios like to portray every case of piracy as "lost revenue." It's not. I firmly believe that in most cases where people download a torrent, either they couldn't *afford* to go to the theatre, or they're previewing the flick to decide if it's worth spending money at the theatre. And if it's not worth the money, they'd have been demanding refunds, so there *still* isn't a loss of revenue.

Seriously -- it costs my buddy over $100 to take the family out for a movie. You think he's going to *gamble* that the movie is worth watching with all the crap that Hollywood pukes onto the big screen nowadays?

I agree. It sounds like the most useless concept I've ever heard of.

The only good thing about so-called "smart" watches is that they don't have cameras like Glassholes wear that you need to worry about in public.

I foresee a resounding "thud" from the sales volume on these devices.

But then again, I use a desktop computer and a laptop, and have absolutely no touch devices, portable or otherwise. I wouldn't mind one of the newer Samsung android tablets with high resolution video and a stylus, but it's so far down my list of "would like to purchase" that I expect Android itself to be obsolete by the time there would be money available for one. :P

The whole reason we used to get paid extra to provide support was to provide support. That meant weird hours, weekends, and late nights.

If you don't like it, get another job.

One of the big issues with flashing lights is that they have to avoid frequencies which set off epileptic seizures. The last thing you want is for the driver of that hunk of metal behind you to have a seizure behind the wheel, stomping on the gas and jerking to the right as they collapse in a frothing fit...

There's a big difference. Dish pays for broadcast rights. Use of the internet is not a question, legally. It's just a transmission medium.

So as long as Dish is paying their fees, they should be free and clear.