Ross Ulbricht wrote code. The legal equivalent of writing a book. He never sold any drugs.He wasn't prosecuted for buying drugs, cause there was no evidence he ever did. They threw him in prison for practicing his first amendment rights, sending a chilling effect to all programmers everywhere "Don't you dare write code that makes citizens more free, or we will throw you in jail. you should only be writing code that helps us spy on and control our citizens like those good guys at Facebook"

Trump can be a bad guy yet still do a good thing. Ross Ulbricht deserves to be free: just like Kim Dotcom, just like Edward Snowden, and just like the three teenagers who wrote us The Pirate Bay

The widely regarded FACT that 'the number of Marijuana deaths is zero' is based on the well observed historical precedent that no human has ever died directly from Marijuana Consumption. Yes of course if you count car accidents (like this study did, which i think weakens its arguments) that number is arguably non-zero, I say 'arguably' because every study i've read on the subject points out that all the accidents they looked at that involved marijuana consumption ALSO included alcohol consumption, making it unclear if it was the weed or the beer that caused the car crash

But back to that previous point, most substances have a toxicity level that will eventually kill someone. E.g. you can snort enough cocaine in one sitting to kill you. Ditto for alcohol, heroin, and most stimulants. But marijuana? The toxicity level is only theoretical. The theoretical number is so high no one has ever reached it. You can literally sit down at a table and non-stop smoke blunts your entire life and not die provided you don't smoke so much you suffer from oxygen deprivation no one in the history of mankind has EVER died DIRECTLY from smoking marijuana. Theoretically if i distilled THC (the active ingredient of cannabis) into a liquid concentrated enough, i could give you a shot that would kill you. They've done this to mice to prove it is possible, but no human has ever overdosed on weed.

If we limited copyright terms to instead of 3 LIFETIMES (life of author plus 150 years) to say... 10-20 years. The constitution, which doesn't directly mention copyright but "securing for limited time exclusive right to authors..." I don't think anyone would say three lifetimes counts as a 'limited' time.

Were we thought in the future everyone would be able to permanently own a copy of their favorite movie/tv show/album. We figured in the future artists would still be paid gratis (e.g. 'you are my faviorate here is $30 donation please make another album!') But the digital information would be free, in the future anyone would be able to access any movie ever made for free, and maybe only be 'forced' to pay if they wanted HD quality of the latest episode/release. We figured all this increased internet freedom would bring the copyright regime tumbling down, and finally we would have the necessary reform that would allow derivative works like fanfics/fanart and remixes to flourish on the interwebs instead of being shut down.

15 years later and you either need a subscription to Netflix, Amazon, Hulu etc. to maybe watch a couple of movies you might like that may or may not be available that month. Otherwise you are stuck with a box under your TV that demands you pay $5.99-$9.99 EVERY SINGLE TIME you want to watch your favorite action movie. The oppressive copyright regime marches on into new territories and countries, with the US government sending agents to arrest teenagers in countries where its not even illegal to share files online. Youtube continues to take down videos for using 15 seconds of video that is declared 'infringing' even when the included content is not even owned by the party that flagged it to be taken down. Heck this happens even when the content is in the public domain! The same thing happened to music, with more people volunteering to pay for limited streaming access to a library instead of just sharing their favorite tracks with friends.

Instead of technology making us more free it helped the oligarchs to control us even more.

There is so much wrong with what you said, but instead of explaining it i guess i'll just go home and program my version of UBER that uses blockchain (and therefore has no 'centralized service' for you to ticket/fine) and then build in features into the app that helps users avoid under-cover cops, or allows drivers to flag riders as undercover cops so they can be identified and avoided by the other drivers. Like the original poster said, the more you tighten your grip, the more will slip through your fingers.

its not that they haven't allocated enough money to the infrastructure, its that all that money is being lost to corruption and fraud. Calcified quasi-governmental corporations that have learned to game the bureaucratic system for maximum financial gain with no real increase in output/productivity. Honestly this is the one example where selling lines off to completely new companies (not the ones that are currently maintaining them with quasi-governmental protection/power) would actually help the entire system. But the city is to liberal/democratic if you just mention the word 'privatization' and you will be tarred and feathered

I've seen video's of subway personnel in japan 'shoving/packing' people into subway cars like cattle, cause the local government would rather pay people to shove others in dozens of stations instead of just increasing the number of cars running on the line so as to reduce congestion. So i don't think i would call that 'nearly perfect'

This is reuters, one of the oldest news reporting agencies around, so yes. These people (and what they think their most popular demographic is) probably couldn't hold a video game controller in their hands, let alone tell you weather the controller they are a holding is a PS4, Xbox One, or Steam Controller. So yes, to them cosmetic micro-transactions in a 'free-to-play' game along with the new PUBG game format is cutting edge latest technology that the 'tweens' are enjoying

Turns out there is a product called 'Hempcrete' but its better used for insulation than the kinds of things we would use concrete for. Hempcrete will float in a bucket of water

source: http://www.americanlimetechnol...

Well you already are first-to-market, so you already have a big advantage over your competitors. once they copy and release a similar app, yours has already had several weeks/months of exposure and advertising on the market as the only supplier of such an app. So if you complain about people copying you, your really just being an entitled asshole.

Nice to see the house of mouse loosing at least one copyright battle

Every daylight savings time heart attacks increase by 25%, car crashes increase by 17% (2.75 billion cost over 10 yrs). The only reason people do daylight savings time anymore is because we've been doing it for so long we don't question it anymore. It never saved any daylight, I think a study after world war II showed the policy barely had its intended effect (increased productivity, energy savings) and came with a whole host of unintended consequences. For the love of god we need to quit this idiotic experiment!

Unfortunately at this point there are established interests that want to keep it going. Starbucks knows they get more business when the clocks change, and would resist any proposed law to get rid of daylight savings time. There are dozens of other companies in a similar situation. sources: https://www.reuters.com/articl... http://www.telegram.com/articl...

From my cold dead hands

literally the first search result i got for 'bitcoin venezuela': https://www.theatlantic.com/ma...

Venezuela, unfortunately, has a central bank like we do. The currency in that country has crashed, such that millions of citizens want to get out of the Venezuelan currency and use dollars/pesos/anything else. The government has prevented this by 'fixing' the currency to the dollar to ensure a very bad exchange rate, trapping the citizens into using a worthless currency that can't buy them much of anything. Bitcoin has been enabling transactions, allowing some of the poorest in that country to buy bread, milk, and other necessities, often on the border where a healthy 'black market' thrives and accepts other currencies, including bitcoin.

This action by the Venezuelan government is their attempt to completely squash any last monetary freedom present amongst their citizens.