Atomictumor

A judge in the “Government eavesdropping without warrents” thing has said that the Fourth Amendment was pissed, and did the Temple of Doom heart grab on Alberto Gonzalez.

Democracy is now safe in America once again, even if the Feds think you’re a turrist.

Don’t say the Tumor doesn’t keep you posted on 12 hour old news.

The word-of-mouth campaign is in full swing as supports across our state take to the streets in support of A. Tom Ictuma’s bid for office!

AT and I made a run to Staples the other night.  He opted to wait in the car.  A few seconds after I walked into the store, he saw a woman in a bright blue truck back into a parking spot.  She did an A+ job, except she backed into the maroon sports car behind her. Her kid got out of the truck, ran around to the back and began freaking out. The mom saw what she did, yelled at the kid to come on, and entered the store.

When I came out, AT told me what had happened, described the woman and pointed out the truck in question. The rear bumper was sitting completely on top of the front bumper of the sports car.  So I, being the tattle-tale that I am, went into the store to tell the manager.  The woman AT described was at the register, checking out.  I went to the next register over, where the manager was, and told her loudly what had happened.  The manager was less than thrilled about having to do something about it and told me to call mall security.  I told her that the driver was currently in Staples and would be gone by the time mall security got there, so I’d just get the make and model of both cars for her.

As I started out of the store, the driver looks at me all innocent-like and says, “Did you say a blue truck?”  I assented and she said, “Oh, my, that must be me.”

So I told her she did a crap job of parking and needed to find the person she backed into.  As there were about 8 witnesses to this conversation, I hope she didn’t just jump in her truck and leave.

Another case of people thinking they can get away with shit.

A few minutes ago, I called the police station to report a parking violation on my street. Not one, but two cars are parked in front of fire hydrants. We only have three of them, and it’d be a damn shame if the firetrucks responded to a fire and were unable to get to any water. But more than that, it pisses me off that people get away with things.

I’ve always been a tattle-tale. I remember telling on Eric Wilson in third grade because he had candy in his desk and was sneaking pieces when Mrs. Alstead wasn’t looking. I remember in second grade Mrs. Crouch picked a classroom monitor after lunch every day while she was out of the room. We had to write names on the board of anyone who talked or did anything else they weren’t supposed to. This was my first taste of retalliation, as a punk kid named Bryan wrote my name down the day after I tattled on him. Even though I didn’t do anything.

I don’t tattle out of spite, though. It’s mostly an overblown sense of justice, I think. If I don’t do anything bad, no one else should, either. And if you do, then you deserve to get busted.

But that brings up a contrary idea. Perhaps I tattle because I’m jealous that I don’t have the courage to do naughty things. I’m never the person who drives on the shoulder to get past blocked traffic. I never cut line. I never cheat on tests or cut corners on assignments. I never park in front of fire hydrants. I never miss more than the maximum number of excused absences, even though I know other people in class do it and get away with it. I never behave rudely in movie theaters.

Of course, some would say this is just common courtesy on my part. It’s not, though, I don’t think. Because sometimes I want to do those bad things. I’m just too chicken shit to do it.

Things aren’t going well for the RIAA and their tactics of throwing a lawsuit on people accused of downloading music.  Its been working well when the folks accused roll over and pay the few thousand dollar settlements offered, but when they man up and take the case to court, well, its just not working well.

Ars Technica talks about two recent cases, one involving an Oklahoma mother, another involving a cheerleader in California, and both dismissed for lack of proof.  See, the RIAA has so far been getting an easily obtainable IP address of an alleged copyright infringer, getting the name from the ISP distributing the IP address (all easy stuff to do), and dropping the lawsuit down on the person who owns the internet account.

Problem is, theres no way to connect the person who owns the internet account to the person doing the downloading.  In both of these cases, they were able to provide evidence that other people in the house may have done the downlading, the former being an ex-husband who lived at the house, the latter being cheerleaders constantly at the house for lessons.

RIAA dropped the cases like a hot potato when it became apparent that they had no leg to stand on.

Does this mean its OK to fire up Kazaa and download that Paris Hilton song that I know you all want?  Well, maybe not, because its a king hell of a messed up legal situation.  You get sued for uploading, not downloading, so technically, as long as you don’t share what you got, you’re all good.  However, that makes you no friends on the internet. 

You know, I don’t really have a problem with this being illegal.  What I have a problem with is the extent to which these corporations can legally go to ruin your life for an essentially victimless crime.  And yes, it is victimless.  Nobody goes hungry.  In exchange for a poor ass me being able to listen to a little music, a rich ass them maybe doesn’t get another champaign bath.