Archive for July 5th, 2008

Profit.

Saturday, July 5th, 2008

A for profit corporation exists for one purpose, and if it deviates from that single purpose it can be successfully sued by its stockholders. That singular purpose is “make as much money as possible”. If breaking the law and paying the fines costs less than obeying the law they’ll break the law and pay the fines. If treating its employees well costs more than treating their employees poorly, they’ll treat their employees poorly.

For profit corporations are extremely good at fulfilling their singular purpose, and not so good at much else. It turns out that you can only “do no evil” when your profits are doubling every year. After that, evil becomes necessary to secure the bottom line.

Stop looking at my bottom!

Saturday, July 5th, 2008

Christian Extremist on 30 Days

Saturday, July 5th, 2008

[Quote:]

No, I am not talking abut the infamous episode where an atheist woman went to live with a Christian extremist family. That one has been dissected ad nauseum, and I’ve already posted about it here.

The episode I am focusing on here involved a Christian extremist moving in with two gay parents and their adopted children for 30 days. What made this one a particularly volatile set up from the beginning was that the extremist and her husband were also raising adopted children but believed strongly that gays and lesbians should have no legal or moral right to raise children. For the episode, she would not only move in with two gay dads and their four children but would have to immerse herself in the activities of various gay rights groups who were championing equality for the GLBT community when it came to same-sex marriage and parental rights.

It took our extremist woman almost no time at all to explicitly state that her beliefs were rooted in her religion (Mormonism). Throughout the episode, she appeared to wrestle with the many contradictions inherent in her belief system - but only up to a point. When she hit this threshold, she became hysterical and stormed out of whatever interaction she was involved in.

[..]

Every one of us should get a copy of this episode and use it whenever we are asked about what is wrong with religion.

You’ll find the episode here:

http://www.hulu.com/watch/24921/30-days-same-sex-parenting

or here:

http://www.mininova.org/tor/1536352

USA

Saturday, July 5th, 2008

European Parliament rushes towards Soviet Internet

Saturday, July 5th, 2008

[Quote:]

Tomorrow, popular software applications like Skype or even Firefox might be declared illegal in Europe if they are not certified by an administrative authority. This is compromising the whole open development of the internet as we know it today. Once the Soviet Union required the registration of all typewriters and printing devices with the authorities.”

New “Orphaned Works” Copyright Bill Threatens Open Source, GPL

Saturday, July 5th, 2008

[Quote:]

A new bill, The Orphan Works Act of 2008, is currently making its way through congress, and it threatens to take away copyright protection from unregistered works. This includes virtually all open source software.

Essentially, the bill (as I understand it — and I’m not a lawyer) will modify copyright law such that if the owner of a work can not be found by “reasonable search”, anyone can use the work for whatever they want, regardless of the author’s intentions, or the license the work was released under.

This means companies could ignore the GPL, or any other open source license, simply by claiming they couldn’t find the author. If a copyright holder decides to sue, the infringing party just has to show proof that they performed a “reasonable search”.

A+++++++++++++ would vote again!

Saturday, July 5th, 2008

[Quote:]

A college student claimed it was all a joke when he put his vote in this fall’s presidential election up for sale on the Web auction site eBay. But prosecutors didn’t see the humor.

University of Minnesota student Max P. Sanders, 19, was charged with a felony Thursday in Hennepin County District Court after allegedly asking for a minimum of $10 in exchange for voting for the bidder’s preferred candidate.

[..]

“We take it very seriously. Fundamentally, we believe it is wrong to sell your vote,” said John Aiken, a spokesman for the office. “There are people that have died for this country for our right to vote, and to take something that lightly, to say, ‘I can be bought.’

Could somebody point John Aiken to this?

Cartoons

Saturday, July 5th, 2008


indoor-dictatorial