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InitialsDiceBearhttps://github.com/dicebear/dicebearhttps://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/„Initials” (https://github.com/dicebear/dicebear) by „DiceBear”, licensed under „CC0 1.0” (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)ME
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172
Joined
2 yr. ago

  • In court cases, ideally you save the crystallization of your argument for summing up, because if you reveal it too early on you give the opposing side the opportunity to rebut it.

    I like to hope that's Starmer's strategy. If he says anything too exciting too far for an election, it gives the Tories an angle, and time to spin nonsense against him. But you can't punch fog.

  • Ahem. I believe you are referring to this request, made by the ADL to the Icelandic Ministry for Foreign Affairs, that the Minister take action to shut down the hosting of a website

    mapping and publishing addresses of Jewish individuals and institutions [in Boston] and calling for these individuals and institutions to be “dismantled” and “disrupted”

    which had recently migrated to a hosting service based in Iceland. Its anonymous "anti-Zionist" creators state that they

    have shown physical addresses, named officers and leaders, and mapped connections. These entities exist in the physical world and can be disrupted in the physical world. We hope people will use our map to help figure out how to push back effectively.

    So I'm not really sure what you mean in terms of "precedent". Telling people that anti-Semitic material being hosted on servers inside a country is being hosted on servers inside a country is not a false accusation of anything.

    https://www.adl.org/resources/letter/adl-letter-icelands-minister-foreign-affairs-regarding-mapping-project

    https://www.adl.org/boston-mapping-project

  • Yes exactly. It isn't in the public domain, and so is still protected by copyright, and arguably fails the test for Fair Use. But OP's earlier comment suggested they were not aware that federal works sit in the public domain.

  • Federal government works generally aren't domestically copyrightable. They are considered to be in the public domain within the USA.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_status_of_works_by_the_federal_government_of_the_United_States

    ETA: I will add that that USA has some of the best protections for Fair Use. But Fair Use definitely doesn't extend to selling it at that scale.

    These are the tests for Fair Use:

    • the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes; [very commercial]
    • the nature of the copyrighted work; [photographic, publicly available]
    • the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and [100% of it]
    • the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work. [Effectively eliminated the value to the copyright holder]
  • And yet...?

    Blair got elected. Blair stayed elected, and only stepped down after being ousted by the Labour Party membership.

    Brown was popular with the Labour Party membership. Brown lost.

    Corbyn was popular with the Labour Party membership. Corbyn lost.

    A pragmatic Labour party that is actually electable, and that wins, is orders of magnitude better than a "pure" Labour party that loses.

    Shouting about how you want to see NATO disbanded, how the Falklands should be given to Argentina, and how much you admire Hugo Chavez, is not electable.

  • It was eventually removed from the woman’s abdomen in 2021, approximately 18 months after the initial procedure and a number of visits to her GP. On one occasion, her pain was so severe that she visited the emergency department at Auckland city hospital.

    I wish this was surprising.

    From heart disease to IUDs: How doctors dismiss women’s pain

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/interactive/2022/women-pain-gender-bias-doctors

    ‘I was told to live with it’: women tell of doctors dismissing their pain

    https://www.theguardian.com/society/2021/apr/16/painkillers-women-tell-of-doctors-dismissing-their-pain

  • Related reading:

    Prison Privatisation: A Failure of the British Penal System

    During the early 1990s, the British government began to rely on the private sector to provide extra prison places to deal with overcrowding and help spread the costs of interning offenders. Currently in England and Wales, there are 14 prisons run by private companies such as G4S Justice Services, Serco Custodial Services and Sodexo Justice Services.

    A 2019 analysis of official UK prison data found that private prisons tend to generally be more dangerous than public prisons.

    For the past 17 years, privately-run prisons have been more likely to have overcrowded conditions than public sector prisons.

    The three companies that run the UK’s private prisons have faced accusations of violating prisoners’ human rights.

    https://www.standrewslawreview.com/post/prison-privatisation-a-failure-of-the-british-penal-system

    After a decade of austerity, urgent changes are needed to improve prison services

    The UK government’s austerity measures, implemented in English prisons by the 2012 Benchmarking Programme, have led to a sharp reduction in the prison workforce and a cut in budgets. This has left English prisons unable to provide safe environments for rising prison populations.

    https://www.bristol.ac.uk/policybristol/policy-briefings/prison-funding-austerity/

  • They are known to hitch rides in pot plant soil. The EU has banned import of pot plant soil originating from the UK for this reason.

    There is an established population in France. Have we reciprocally banned the import of pot plant soil from France? Of course not.

    https://www.bali.org.uk/news/import-controls-on-plants-and-plant-products-postponed-to-2023/

    Biosecurity is overseen by DEFRA. How well has DEFRA been funded under Tory austerity?

    Defra hit by largest budget cuts of any UK government department, analysis shows

    Economists at the RSPB say that this will translate into a cut of 57% in real terms since the Conservatives came into power, once inflation has been taken into account.

    https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/nov/11/defra-hit-by-largest-budget-cuts-of-any-uk-government-department-analysis-shows

  • In related news

    In a little over three decades, Thames Water, the biggest water and sewerage company in England, serving 15 million people, has transformed from a debt-free public utility into what critics argue is a privately owned investment vehicle carrying the highest debt in the industry.

    Over those years – as admitted by Sarah Bentley, the firm’s departing CEO – its executives and the shareholders and private equity companies who own it have presided over decades of underinvestment, aggressive cost-cutting and huge dividend payments.

    https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/jun/30/in-charts-how-privatisation-drained-thames-waters-coffers