Even without a formal system of precedent, and treating prior cases as authorities to be cited, I'd imagine that the outcomes of past cases, and the various arguments and concepts employed, likely have an influence on future cases, at least those where the person overseeing them is undecided or has no particular opinion on the matter.

At least in the US, that seems to be a factor when(for some reason of how the courts are structured and arranged) a given court decision is not official precedent for the purposes of another court; but still has a decent shot at being cited if it framed the issue persuasively. It's not 100%, it might also be mentioned in the process of vehemently disagreeing with the decision of the other court and politely-but-brutally rubbishing their line of thought; but even without binding legal obligation to consider a given case, sufficiently similar past cases tend to help shape future thinking on the matter(as well as encouraging or discouraging prospective litigants).

Under what legal theory would it be forbidden to offer a product that blocks shitware? Even if we grant that this 'freemium.com' must be tolerated as legal-but-sleazy, rather than dragged out and hung from a lamp post; is there some sort of 'right to be installed' that software possesses that nobody told me about?

It seems about as silly as arguing that throwing away junk mail without opening it is abridging the spammer's right to free speech.

You aren't fighting the evil government or evil gossipmongers.

You're fighting the basic facts of how information works.

Europe has produced many great literary works. Such as Cervantes' Don Quixote jousting at windmills. Same absurd effort at containing information that is public. You're an absurd character fighting reality in the name of a dead era and losing.

I mean I'm sad I am going to die someday and I think it's unfair. Should I pass a law against dying and that solves the problem? Same thing with this moronic European delinking law: it doesn't work and you're just fighting the inevitable.

The test says that the class with private members and no setters is intended to be immutable after creation, so that's not a problem. Having a single linked list for the entire grid (rather than a list of lists) is completely insane though. I'd expect a student who actually knew what he or she was doing to be more confused than one that would end up writing code with horrible algorithmic complexity. Looking at the rest of the test, it's not much better. If this is what AP tests look like in the USA, then I'll make sure not to weight it very highly when looking at applicants next academic year.

Do you think a credit agency would really have a problem getting around your dumb law? Another search engine? A proxy? Heck: it's a big business, they can write their own damn spider that simply looks for financial personal info on the web.

So if the problem really bothers you, you pass a law: "credit agencies can't keep records past 10 years"

That's actually effective.

Not this bulshit "the info is still there but you have to use a proxy or another search engine to find it." You really think someone committed to finding out this info about you won't make the extra 20 seconds of effort involved?

A dirtbag employer who is spending 5 minutes looking for dirt on potential employees won't think to use a proxy to find out the dirt he knows is out there? Really? You think using a proxy is as hard as going for microfiche in a library? Really?

Your "solution" is a pathetic band aid to make a few airheads feel good about your concern in a shallow way and with zero thought, without actually solving the actual fucking problem in a meaningful way.

Indeed; that's why I included the "don't need bitcoins" case(already have euros in hand) and the "won't be helped by bitcoins"(nominal euro holdings are frozen in a bank or similar, and are at risk; but also unavailable to buy bitcoins with.)

I definitely suspect that somebody is going to be taking quite a bath on this; either holders of Greek state debt, or Greeks with cash in easy reach of the state, or both; but I just don't see how bitcoins outperform 'in-hand' euros, or dollars in terms of weathering the transition; while anyone who can't get their euros is probably in deep shit; but can't buy bitcoins because they can't get to their euros, so they won't be helped much by bitcoins.

I definitely wouldn't want to have money stuck inside Greece should it exit; but barring all but the most heroic border controls, not a historical strong point of the Greek government, just walking the euros out if you have them will be relatively simple(and, if doing so is illegal, so would getting the same euros out-of-country by buying bitcoins from a non-greek, the money needs to move either way); while anyone who doesn't have them may well be stuck; but also doesn't have cash on hand to buy bitcoins.

I realize that any instance of fiat currencies looking foolish is a happy day for the goldbugs, physical and virtual; but I'm not sure I follow:

Greece has been part of the euro zone for a while now, any remaining pre-euro currency is just a collector's item, and has no value now and no expectation of gaining value as the basis of a post-euro greek currency.

The euro itself will presumably do some fluctuating based on whether people are more nervous about the fact that the euro zone basically can't pull together when things look vaguely bad; or more enthusiastic about the fact that a weak member of the euro zone dropped out, leaving a stronger survivor group and establishing a precedent for (relatively) orderly drumming-out of any future weaklings.

In any case, greeks who currently have cash holdings either don't need bitcoins(if they just put the euros under their pillow they'll still be able to drive into the nearest euro zone country and spend them) or won't be helped by bitcoins(their euros are just numbers in the ledger of some deeply fucked bank that is imposing withdrawal limits or freezes, so they can't get them to hide under their pillow or to buy bitcoins).

A 'grexit' is actually more or less the opposite of the classic 'my holdings are in the dysfunctional currency of inflationistan; but capital controls are keeping me from expatriating them or buying dollars!' problem that bitcoin might actually be useful for addressing. If Greece drops out, all the greeks holding euros still have relatively hard currency, probably superior to whatever is introduced as a local replacement. They gain no obvious advantage from shifting euros into bitcoins, unless Greece bumps up their border controls into a veritable Berlin wall to prevent physical transport of currency; but continues to ignore online activity.

This story just seems orthogonal to bitcoins.

The design can be changed; but this design is as it is in large part because of how much surface area it needs to collect enough sunlight to sustain even its distinctly frugal operation.

Improvements are likely, with better solar panels, better batteries, or both; but you don't beat the fact that optimal insolation is 1366w/m^2; and real world values typically lower, at least on average. A liter of Jet A is 35.3 MJ, so ~9880watt/h. Even at peak insolation, a square meter of solar collection takes a little over 7 hours to amount to as much energy as a liter of jet fuel. Jet engines are, of course, hardly perfectly efficient; but you get some sense of perspective from the fact that a relatively modern design, aimed at fuel efficient operation, like the 787 still has storage for in excess of 100,000 liters of fuel, a big 747-400 more like twice that.

On the plus side, your sunlight supply doesn't weigh anything, or require any volume(though your batteries do, and barring major improvements their energy density is dreadful compared to hydrocarbons); but even given perfectly efficient solar hardware, there just isn't that much energy to work with, by the standards of hydrocarbon aircraft. Any possible design is going to reflect this through some combination of gigantic wing area per unit capacity and a flight plan that sticks relatively carefully to maximally efficient speeds.

That's why I expressed curiosity about pH, rather than temperature. We know that some amount of temperature variation leads to survivable bleach/recolonize cycles; but a shift in the direction of making calcium-based structures more expensive to build and maintain under water could be quite different in impact.

It's pretty profoundly useless as a replacement for a commercial airliner or cargo plane(basically the wingspan of a 747; but transports a single pilot at a painfully tedious 50-100km/h); but suitably automated versions of the very-long-endurance solar aircraft concept have other uses. Longer life, and greater control, than balloons; but markedly cheaper to launch, and lower ping, than anything in orbit.

As a manned aircraft it's a pure novelty; but its performance is increasingly close to 'like a small satellite; but closer to the ground and requires only a large strip of pavement for launch and recovery', which could definitely find some takers.

you're acting as if an asshole bigot of a boss is some new invention the internet has given vast power to. this type of person always existed, and instead leveled his moronic judgments against you based on gossip or your appearance

the real solution is not to work for asshole bigots, or go after them if you have something actionable. what is never the solution is make believing you can censor the internet just for the sake of escaping the judgment of narrow minded assholes you don't want in your life anyway. even if such censorship magically worked, the douchebag boss will still be pulling this crap on you. he always did. he always will. the problem is the douchebag. not the technology. trying to change the technology is the wrong solution to the problem

the subject we are talking about is info being censored. the subject is not who is doing the censoring. you don't make any valid points by changing the subject

hey, i'd much rather have a job than not dying of black lung

hey, i'd much rather have a job than not be sexually harassed

hey, i'd much rather have a job than ever see my family and have a life

pretty moronic game you;re playing, no? a job doesn't justify abuse. if an employer is abusive piece of shit, someone should do something about the asshole employer. not roll over and take it up the ass. suit yourself, but not all of us are completely spineless

exactly. it's not effective, at best it's a weak lame censorship that will be abused

the information is still there

you think it's hard to use another search engine or use a proxy and search from an IP address in another country without the moronic law?

the law purports to make public info magically not exist. why don't we pass laws against gravity while we're at it?

so fucking stupid