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Comment Re:Hexidecimal (Score 2) 169

Did he also decide to produce the Hex output that is entirely useless and without merit? I understand that's for debugging purposes, but who decided that was a good idea to leave in for a consumer-level OS? Seriously.

WTF? of all the idiotic things they have done, leaving the debug information available in the consumer-level OS was one of the BEST ideas. It gives even the most clueless user a chance to google it, or read the screen to someone that understands it, or in the case of my mother send a photo of it so someone can look up what went wrong.

Comment Re:PE In Software Engineering (Score 1) 546

The engineering community has never had a problem with someone being called a software Engineer. The objection has always been people being labelled software engineers without needing any formal certification and hence degrading the term engineer. Where I work here there are 3 hundred people that label themselves software engineers, of that maybe a dozen have any real certification in the field that would approach that of a real engineer, the rest just have computer science degrees or on the job training.

Comment Re:Good. How is uber any different... (Score 1) 312

Well, for one, Uber has about 10 times as much insurance coverage as a taxi--a million dollars, instead of $25,000 to $100,000. Slugging and hitching have Guest PIP at $5000.

Uber also has traceability. Every Uber charter has passenger, driver, and time centrally logged. Passengers can comment on drivers, and drivers can comment on passengers. There's a rating system. A rapist will expose themselves to a hard evidence chain establishing where they were and that they were with the accuser, as well as a rating of "1 Star, Driver raped me, would not ride again".

Only in the USA are such low levels of insurance appropriate, in the rest of the world a million dollars for a taxi would mean the taxi is UNDERINSURED. most countries I am aware of require between $5 million-$10 million minimum, I believe Germany is even higher. $1 million is underinsured even for a private car.

Comment Re:Uncompetitive? (Score 1) 312

$1 million insurance is actually very low level of insurance for commercial operators and is far below that which is required in many countries. Insurance is also only valid if the driver is licensed, driving for hire vehicles in many countries requires a different license, therefore the drivers are in many cases driving unlicensed.

Comment Re:Good... (Score 1) 312

They didn't outright outlaw Uber, they outlawed their illegal practices. Such laws are common in many countries, e.g. Australia it is also illegal to act as a for hire car without appropriate license and insurance, but here they have been directly targeting any driver that drives for them with multi thousand dollar fines. I also don't think the laws around this are absurd, they are about ensuring people are correctly protected by the for hire vehicle as without the regulations it is a cut throat industry with everyone looking to screw over their competitors for an edge.

Comment Re:Sigh... (Score 2, Interesting) 789

Ukraine, "previously" held control of Russia's only viable winter port for the Russian fleet. The US's intervention in forcing a government change to a pro west/anti Russian government meant Russia was at risk of losing access to a vital military facility as well as have a close friendly neighbour suddenly become a NATO stronghold, wrongly or rightly Russia still view NATO with a great deal of suspicion if not as an outright enemy. If that isn't backing him into a corner and prodding the bear with a massive cattle prod then I don't know what is. It would be the equivalent of mexico and Canada suddenly becoming communist north Korean and expecting the US would not react.

Comment Re:I can't believe we're afraid of these assholes (Score 1) 542

Given the French revolution was a direct response in part to the excess, privilege and abuses committed by the church and state the actions their while excessive are hardly surprising and the pre French revolution time is an excellent example of why the church should never be permitted to have any sort of power in society. It is important to note though the revolution WASN'T based on atheism at all, it was based on overthrowing an aristocracy and class system that was oppressing the people through taxes and starvation.

Comment Re:Since when did Microsoft become a EU company (Score 2) 419

The question is not about whether they are subject to US law, they are, it is whether US can tell a US based company to ignore another countries laws. The argument here is that what the US court is demanding isn't legal and the US doesn't have the legal authority to do.

Comment Re:customer-centric (Score 5, Insightful) 419

Can any internet company be publicly ordered to break laws in other countries, regardless of where it is based?

Why shouldn't they? MS is a United States company. Why should MS, or any other corporation, be able to only abide by US law when it is convenient for them, and break it other times? If the laws of two jurisdictions are incompatible with each other, the corporation should have to make a hard choice and only operate in a single jurisdiction, and use other avenues to expand business to the other.

This is not a case of the US trying to compel a European Company into doing something, it is compelling Microsoft, subject to US law, to turn over data it holds, albeit in a different company. If an American individual is subpoenaed for information relating to a crime, resisting turning it over because it's held in a safe deposit box abroad, is no more an acceptable excuse than "it's in my other pants".

An individual in the United States must abide by US law even when abroad, in addition to abiding by the rules of the foreign country. It's still illegal for an American to smoke weed or solicit 14 year old prostitutes abroad, despite those being legal in some places of the world. If American persons have to play by United States rules 24x7, why should a corporation get to pick and choose?

The US legal system starts and ENDS at the US borders. You seem to have completely misunderstood this situation, For example your safe deposit box example, if the US wanted the contents of a safe deposit box in Europe they cannot legally seize it, doing so would be a violation of europan law and the US officials doing it would be guilty of bank robbery and treated like any other common criminal. They must go through the countries legal system that holds the goods they want to seize, similarly the same applies to Data, the US can get access to it as long as it follows the appropriate laws and procedures. What the US government is trying to do is say other countries laws don't matter with data and therefore are asking a US companies to break another countries laws. You yourself said it that when in other countries you must abide by that countries rules, you cannot compel an individual or company to break the laws of another country. No one is suggesting that MS gets to ignore US laws, it is the US government saying that they get it ignore other countries laws and can compel US companies to do the same while they are in those countries.

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