The difference in energy release from a microwave and the energy by a human body is 10 DBm. So to go from harmful (putting your hand in a microwave) to harmless (touching another person) that's a good baseline on an exponential scale.
Now the difference between standing in a wifi zone, and a microwave is ~60DBm. To put it another way, the person standing next to you is emitting the same amount of energy as just over 3000 laptops wifi. If you afraid of wifi, you should be deathly afraid of other people.
You know who I blame? The assholes who don't obey the law.
In NZ if you use the internet to do something illegal apart from copyright infringement (lets say child porn) you are held responsible for your actions, not the account holder. This is the way it should be: if you break the law, you are responsible.
So I don't hold 'the assholes who don't obey the law' responsible. They will always exist. I hold the media execs that can't be bothered tracking down the actual lawbreakers responsible, and the politicians that re-wrote the law on their request.
I'm more disgusted by the politicians to be honest, throwing away basic principles of law, and adding overhead costs to the entire business sector on the say-so of vested interests like this is sickening.
My parents are partially retired (one is one isn't), and a fair portion of their income comes from rental properties that they have invested in over time.
They run short term rentals (a few weeks to a few months) of fully furnished properties. As such you need to provide utilities: Power, phone and internet. I live in NZ so we have a 3 strike law in place already, and it holds the account holder responsible for any infringement by the users.
Their guests are often international visitors to whom internet access is incredibly important. However there is no way that said guests are able to get an internet account setup for the short time they are staying.
The liability this poses on the account owner and the costs associated are insane. This should be a matter of 'get a router, get an account'. But instead small business owners are looking at hiring an IT professional, doing complicated setups with expensive routers (filtering won't do the job here), and running VPN pipes overseas just so that your guests can check their mail.
This is all just working around the law, not working within it. There IS no way for my parents to provide internet to their guests without exposing themselves to significant liability.
Hold on there.. how about we just block wikipedia to the USA. While I appreciate there is bound to be all sorts of stupid flow on effects to the rest of the world if this law goes through I don't think we need to get ahead of the game here.
I think it's high time that all new houses were built with cameras recording all the activity in the house for two years. Don't worry though, because the government will only review the footage if you are accused of child pornography.
It may be possible to retrofit old houses and this should be done as much as is practical, there is nothing we shouldn't do to protect children from these predators.
i'd pay good money to see the RIAA lot fragged by a rocket jump/gauntlet to the face combo like. that really would make my life complete.You are talking about ingame right?
Don't overreact to this. Recent studies suggest that DHMO may be an intergral part of our planets ecological balance. Read the Friends of Hydrogen Hydroxide page before doing anything rash like calling for a ban.
More to the point, if there was a causation running on the other direction you would expect the numbers of violent crimes per capita to grow, not decrease.
Sure there may be other factors 'countering' the supposed influence of violent games, but it would have to be a hell of a factor.
My personal belief is that society as a whole is becoming less tolerant of violent behaviour causing a slow drop in the violent crime stats. Video games (like Violent TV, Heavy Metal, Rap Music, Rock and Roll etc) are not really an influence in either direction.
Hell, the idea getting lost in a fantasy world created by new media goes back at least as far 1615 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Quixote the poor guy in the story was driven to believe he was a knight errant through reading too many books about knights errant. That theory is just as ridiculous now as it was then.
While I feel that comparisons between the digital world and the physical world are often full of inaccuracies, I was lead down the path of making the comparison to Self Storage units.
I hope we can all agree that the Owner of a self storage service should Co-Operate with law enforcement if they have a search warrant. However shouldn't allow 3rd parties access to the units because they feel aggrieved with the client of the unit. And finally defiantly shouldn't be responsible for anything illegal stored in the unit.
I think that is a pretty fair comparison to what Hotfile is doing here. But the metaphor doesn't translate to the sorts of services that want to index your music files, then provide you with access to them via a streaming service where the server only holds one copy of the media.
My modified analogy is a bank. Someone turns up to store an object. The service (in this case the bank) inspects it, validates it, then keeps a record of it being stored. Then the client some time later goes to use the object they are given another one, very similar to the first but not the same one.
I feel the that essentially the locker services that run an index like that are becoming the banks of digital files, and as such we should be looking at banks for a starting point to the obligations / limitations of obligation to ensure that the data submitted to them is legitimate.
I have no idea on the viability of the news of the world, but given the sad song that most people pushing dead paper seem to be singing, is this just a convenient excuse for them to prune the business?
Ooh are we solving child porn at any cost? I have a good one: Compulsary sterialisation for everyone. No children: no child porn. Problem completely solved in 16 years.
I'm about halfway through the memo, and so far, I haven't seen any argument that can't be rebutted easily. Fantastic! Care to share? (because if ICE can't rebutt every single one of them they are going to get smacked down.) I don't think I'm asking too much of you here: as you said, it's easy.
the inevitable (but highly questionable) "computer fraud" charges
I think the usefulness of the computer fraud laws (as proven by how often they come up) means we should extend them to other kinds of media. I propose a "Paper Fraud" law. Then if a computer was used to print a fraudulent document we can charge criminals under both laws.
Poes Law
It sounds like they've been taking tips from this guy http://twitter.com/NotAPoliceman
Re: Not dangerous?
The difference in energy release from a microwave and the energy by a human body is 10 DBm. So to go from harmful (putting your hand in a microwave) to harmless (touching another person) that's a good baseline on an exponential scale.
Now the difference between standing in a wifi zone, and a microwave is ~60DBm. To put it another way, the person standing next to you is emitting the same amount of energy as just over 3000 laptops wifi. If you afraid of wifi, you should be deathly afraid of other people.
Numbers came from here.. any math was my fault :)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DBm#Unit_conversions
Double Encrypt it
I suggest they use ROT13.. twice to be extra certain.
Re: Re: Cafe's arn't the only ones
In NZ if you use the internet to do something illegal apart from copyright infringement (lets say child porn) you are held responsible for your actions, not the account holder. This is the way it should be: if you break the law, you are responsible.
So I don't hold 'the assholes who don't obey the law' responsible. They will always exist. I hold the media execs that can't be bothered tracking down the actual lawbreakers responsible, and the politicians that re-wrote the law on their request.
I'm more disgusted by the politicians to be honest, throwing away basic principles of law, and adding overhead costs to the entire business sector on the say-so of vested interests like this is sickening.
Cafe's arn't the only ones
I've had to deal with this.
My parents are partially retired (one is one isn't), and a fair portion of their income comes from rental properties that they have invested in over time.
They run short term rentals (a few weeks to a few months) of fully furnished properties. As such you need to provide utilities: Power, phone and internet. I live in NZ so we have a 3 strike law in place already, and it holds the account holder responsible for any infringement by the users.
Their guests are often international visitors to whom internet access is incredibly important. However there is no way that said guests are able to get an internet account setup for the short time they are staying.
The liability this poses on the account owner and the costs associated are insane. This should be a matter of 'get a router, get an account'. But instead small business owners are looking at hiring an IT professional, doing complicated setups with expensive routers (filtering won't do the job here), and running VPN pipes overseas just so that your guests can check their mail.
This is all just working around the law, not working within it. There IS no way for my parents to provide internet to their guests without exposing themselves to significant liability.
-Qyiet
Woah, woah..
Hold on there.. how about we just block wikipedia to the USA. While I appreciate there is bound to be all sorts of stupid flow on effects to the rest of the world if this law goes through I don't think we need to get ahead of the game here.
What kind of democracy is that?
What kind of democracy is that?
The best kind that money can buy.
You can't compete with free
If you could people would be making money selling bottled water.
Weak link: houses?
I think it's high time that all new houses were built with cameras recording all the activity in the house for two years. Don't worry though, because the government will only review the footage if you are accused of child pornography.
It may be possible to retrofit old houses and this should be done as much as is practical, there is nothing we shouldn't do to protect children from these predators.
Re: everything should be settled like this
i'd pay good money to see the RIAA lot fragged by a rocket jump/gauntlet to the face combo like. that really would make my life complete.You are talking about ingame right?
Re: Re: Re:
Don't overreact to this. Recent studies suggest that DHMO may be an intergral part of our planets ecological balance. Read the Friends of Hydrogen Hydroxide page before doing anything rash like calling for a ban.
http://www.armory.com/~crisper/DHMO/
Re: Re: Re: It's obvious that violent video games de-sensitize.
More to the point, if there was a causation running on the other direction you would expect the numbers of violent crimes per capita to grow, not decrease.
Sure there may be other factors 'countering' the supposed influence of violent games, but it would have to be a hell of a factor.
My personal belief is that society as a whole is becoming less tolerant of violent behaviour causing a slow drop in the violent crime stats. Video games (like Violent TV, Heavy Metal, Rap Music, Rock and Roll etc) are not really an influence in either direction.
Hell, the idea getting lost in a fantasy world created by new media goes back at least as far 1615 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Don_Quixote the poor guy in the story was driven to believe he was a knight errant through reading too many books about knights errant. That theory is just as ridiculous now as it was then.
Re: I'm Amazed they didn't go after other games. (as qyiet)
The templars were the bad guys in Assassins Creed, so it's harder to spin. I just hope that the media dosn't get to this list http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knights_Templar_and_popular_culture#Games
Re: Re: Re: Real World Analogies
Just leave the poor unloved troll alone.
Real World Analogies (as qyiet)
While I feel that comparisons between the digital world and the physical world are often full of inaccuracies, I was lead down the path of making the comparison to Self Storage units.
I hope we can all agree that the Owner of a self storage service should Co-Operate with law enforcement if they have a search warrant. However shouldn't allow 3rd parties access to the units because they feel aggrieved with the client of the unit. And finally defiantly shouldn't be responsible for anything illegal stored in the unit.
I think that is a pretty fair comparison to what Hotfile is doing here. But the metaphor doesn't translate to the sorts of services that want to index your music files, then provide you with access to them via a streaming service where the server only holds one copy of the media.
My modified analogy is a bank. Someone turns up to store an object. The service (in this case the bank) inspects it, validates it, then keeps a record of it being stored. Then the client some time later goes to use the object they are given another one, very similar to the first but not the same one.
I feel the that essentially the locker services that run an index like that are becoming the banks of digital files, and as such we should be looking at banks for a starting point to the obligations / limitations of obligation to ensure that the data submitted to them is legitimate.
Dumping them for PR or using it as an excuse
I have no idea on the viability of the news of the world, but given the sad song that most people pushing dead paper seem to be singing, is this just a convenient excuse for them to prune the business?
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
Ooh are we solving child porn at any cost? I have a good one: Compulsary sterialisation for everyone. No children: no child porn. Problem completely solved in 16 years.
Re: Re: (as qyiet)
I'm about halfway through the memo, and so far, I haven't seen any argument that can't be rebutted easily.
Fantastic! Care to share? (because if ICE can't rebutt every single one of them they are going to get smacked down.)
I don't think I'm asking too much of you here: as you said, it's easy.
Media Based Fraud (as qyiet)
the inevitable (but highly questionable) "computer fraud" charges
I think the usefulness of the computer fraud laws (as proven by how often they come up) means we should extend them to other kinds of media. I propose a "Paper Fraud" law. Then if a computer was used to print a fraudulent document we can charge criminals under both laws.
Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: (as qyiet)
What assumption did I make?
Seeing as you Everything after the word "perhaps".