Reader X - Slashdot User

Comment Overdue ruling of common sense (Score 4, Interesting) 270

by Mad-cat on Saturday September 13, 2008 @11:07PM (#24994717) Attached to: Judge Rules Defense Can Get DUI Machine Source Code

I work in the State of Florida as a police officer, and I arrest and charge people with DUI on a regular basis.

In my opinion, this ruling was exactly on the money, and far too long in coming. If a company refuses to disclose evidence, the State should immediately stop using their product to obtain evidence.

As a certified expert witness, I am able to testify to the impairment of a subject without the need of a breath analysis to verify. About 20-30% of the cases I testify in have no breath results because the defendant refuses to provide a breath sample. We only forcefully obtain samples (of blood, not breath) when a traffic homicide is involved.

If the evidence is faulty, I *need* to know. I can only uphold my oath of office if I can testify in good faith that I am using proper methods of obtaining evidence. If this company is witholding vital information, they should not be allowed to sell their product to law enforcement.

Comment Pre-emptive Godwin (Score 5, Interesting) 250

by Reader X on Tuesday July 08, 2008 @11:03AM (#24098679) Attached to: Telecom Amnesty Opponents Back New Amendment

So I was browsing Wikipedia and came across the following definition for "fascism":

Fascism may be defined as a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victim-hood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion.

Hm. Committed nationalist militants working in collaboration with "traditional elites", such as large telcos.

Discuss.

Submission + - Is Microsoft getting paid for patents in Linux?

Submitted by

kripkenstein

on Sunday February 11, 2007 @08:08AM

kripkenstein writes: "In an interview, Jeremy Allison (of the Samba project) implies that Microsoft is secretly getting paid for patent licenses on Linux-related products:

[Interviewer:] One of the persistent rumors that's going around is that certain large IT customers have already been paying Microsoft for patent licensing to cover their use of Linux, Samba and other free software projects.[...]

Allison: Yes, that's true, actually. I mean I have had people come up to me and essentially off the record admit that they had been threatened by Microsoft and had got patent cross license and had essentially taken out a license for Microsoft patents on the free software that they were using [...] But they're not telling anyone about it. They're completely doing it off the record.
If true, is this slowing down Linux adoption? Or are these just rumors — which may accomplish much the same effect?"

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