Bob the Hamster - Slashdot User

Scientology Charged With Slavery, Human Trafficking 802

Posted by kdawson on Tuesday December 01, 2009 @05:29PM from the to-name-but-a-few dept.

eldavojohn writes "A formal complaint was filed in California (caged PDF) last week by John Lindstein naming David Miscavige and the Church of Scientology International as defendants. Lindstein claims that for sixteen years (from age 8) he was forced to work as a slave at Gold Base, a secret CoS site run by Golden Era Productions with 'razor wire, security guard patrols, surveillance posts, and three roll calls each day.' The pay was $50 a week. The allegations include 'Violations of wage and hour laws as well as unfair/illegal business practices actionable under California B&P 17200 Et. Seq.' and a complaint under the 13th Amendment of the US Constitution, which abolished slavery. Members of the group Anonymous praised the summons."

Comment fun times, fun times (Score 1, Funny) 830

by Bob the Hamster on Monday September 28, 2009 @07:36PM (#29573891) Attached to: Mainstream Press "Cringes" At Win7 Launch Parties

Oh, all you haters just don't want to admit how much fun it would be to throw a party that damn nerdy.

Comment Right to Teach, Right to Learn (Score 1) 151

by Bob the Hamster on Friday June 12, 2009 @07:38PM (#28315649) Attached to: How Should a Constitution Protect Digital Rights?

I think a "right to teach" and a "right to learn" is a nice way of stating in human-friendly terms the right to perform write-operations and read-operation without limitation.

Comment "Some of my word files don't work right" (Score 2, Informative) 503

by Bob the Hamster on Tuesday January 20, 2009 @05:17PM (#26536423) Attached to: Can a Small Business Migrate Smoothly To OpenOffice.org v3?

Every time I try to migrate users at my company from MS Office to OpenOffice, the story is the same. They accept it at first, but a week or a month later, they come back to me and say "Some of my word files don't work right in my office. can you give me the same version that [name] has?" where [name] is the name of a person who still have MS Office 2002 on their computer.

When I try to track down specific complaints, I usually find a subtle formatting problem that breaks a table over a page boundary, or makes an awkwardly formatted page, or a font that ends up making a particular line of text just one pixel wider than it used to be causing a reflow. Stuff like that.

I get *almost* the same reaction from people when I try to upgrade them to MS Office 2007. (with higher emphasis on "I can't find feature X" and lower emphasis on "this document formats wrong")

ACLU Creates Map of US "Constitution-Free Zone" 979

Posted by kdawson on Friday October 24, 2008 @03:42PM from the stay-well-inland dept.

trackpick points out a recent ACLU initiative to publicize a recent expansion of authority claimed by the Border Patrol to stop and search individuals up to 100 miles from any US border. They have created a map of what they call the US Constitution-Free Zone. "Using data provided by the US Census Bureau, the ACLU has determined that nearly 2/3 of the entire US population (197.4 million people) live within 100 miles of the US land and coastal borders. The government is assuming extraordinary powers to stop and search individuals within this zone. This is not just about the border: This 'Constitution-Free Zone' includes most of the nation's largest metropolitan areas.'"

Comment not just the first known analog computer... (Score 5, Funny) 268

by Bob the Hamster on Wednesday July 30, 2008 @03:48PM (#24407323) Attached to: Workings of Ancient Calculating Device Deciphered

... also the first known example of "feature creep"

Submission + - a cell phone my boss can use?

Submitted by James Paige on Tuesday June 26, 2007 @01:35PM

James Paige writes: Question: Where can I find a cell phone with voice mail that my boss can actually use? No phone I have ever seen has been remotely simple enough to suit his tastes.

For his land line he has an answering machine with two buttons "PLAY" and "DELETE" and one flashing light. It is red when there are messages and blank when there are not. In his mind, this is the ultimate pinnacle of of voice mail user-interface, and anything like menu-button-pick-voice-mail-wait-input-password-li sten-to-nasal-female-voice-read-off-a-selection-me nu to get to his messages is just too complex.

His solution? Call me, ask me to check his messages, and then I call him back and report them to him.

But why can't a phone just have a "Play Messages" button? An actual physical button, not a gui on the screen, and not a spoken menu. Doesn't anybody make this? I don't think my boss is so far off base in wanting this. I would like it too.

Submission + - Canadian Govt sees no need for new anti-CAM law

Submitted by

SOCALchillin

on Tuesday February 13, 2007 @06:54PM

SOCALchillin writes: "Canadian Justice Minister Rob Nicholson says current copyright laws against camcorded movie bootlegging are just fine. After threats from Hollywood to delay opening box office dates for the movies it distributes to Canada, the country to our North has responded in kind to the warnings. Initially taken aback by the heated rhetoric, now on the offensive to counter Hollywood's claims. Canadian Justice Minister Rob Nicholson said recently that the current laws the country already has on the books are enough to effectively combat piracy in his country."

Submission + - BBC decides to release content with Windows DRM

Submitted by Serious Callers Only on Tuesday February 13, 2007 @06:48PM

Serious Callers Only writes: Arstechnica looks at the BBC decision to use Microsoft DRM for their iPlayer software — forcing users to purchase Windows software to access BBC media. The BBC trust have expressed concerns about the plan, but for now have allowed the BBC to go ahead with their scheme. From the article :

"The BBC now has the means and the opportunity to make its vast archives available over the Internet, but it faces a major problem: rights. On the podcast, BBC workers point out that the difficulty in making the BBC's massive archive freely available is not primarily technical, but legal."

Unfortunately the use of DRM means that the primary problems users encounter in using BBC content will not be legal, but technical. The BBC podcast is available from backstage.

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