A good article on how your civil liberties are being eroded by large corporations. The culprit in this instance: John Deere
Link: https://www.wired.com/2015/04/dmca-ownership-john-deere/
There are, of course, abundant others - Apple springs to mind. Laws are made for corporations, by corporations.
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I really didn't want to comment on this, it seemed self-explanatory. The incident where United Airlines beats up a passenger to reassign his seat to a higher priority staff member, followed by the CEO declaring he was belligerent, the corporate lack of apology, followed by later acknowledgement and apology (damage control as the situation escalated in the media).
The CEO, Oscar Munoz, you're garden variety corporate sociopath, even in the face of overwhelming evidence of abuse - video footage, denying, blaming the passenger, in small things you find worlds of detail. The apology, well, given the circumstance, the duress that finally forced it, no, thanks, if there's a board of directors they should be looking for another CEO right about now.
That, of course, wasn't the only misstep they made. There was the Scorpion on the Plane, accidents happen (more often on United). There was the man who was threatened with handcuffs if he didn't give up his seat to a higher priority passenger. And, just in, United Suspends an Employee over threats, rude treatment of flyers.
It's good they're getting all this publicity, they deserve it, they are the perfect example of how power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely. And, imagine, especially now, what a terrible place that must be to work - the culture - toxic as it gets, reeking of implicit arrogance and abuse, now being faced with an army of increasingly hostile and fed-up passengers...
UPDATE: Apparently the abundant bad PR has had consequences for Mr. Munoz. Trivial, but we can hope it signals a change in their corporate culture.
Link: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-39675265
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...doesn't exist. It hasn't for awhile. It comes as no epiphany while I battle a number of addictions, amongst them being the internet - that there is no news. "Terror in England...Stockholm...Wherever...." is not news. "Snack-Shaming" is not news. Give me news. I need news. This is my addiction. Lethbridge, an abundance of people fornicating in outdoor spaces. Not news. Salacious, but not news.
"Jian Gomeshi launches new podcast", "Shootings in California", "Drug bust in ...", "Stabbing in ...", "Iceberg off Canada..."
YouTube, I've seen everything of interest, it's pandering to my "Confirmation Bias", showing me videos that tell me Trump is wrong or a lunatic, or that the Gold is definitely out there, what it's not doing is showing me interesting new content, refresh it's recommendations a dozen times in a row, there's nothing to watch...
...and it seems to be giving up, or because it's AI has grown lazy, now it's cute animal and pet videos, parent videos, self improvement videos, time wasters, wasting, wasting...
It reminds me of a video game, wherein the game staggers the rewards at just the right interval to keep you engaged, interested, only as of late, the more I leave the internet, the more I find that nothing's new, it's the same news over and over again, formulaic, banal, yet still I click and search onward for fear that I've missed some small piece of information that will give me my epiphany, my "ah-ha" of understanding, and everything will make sense...
I've become so well read on a hundred different irrelevant subjects that I can remember none of them, mixing up facts from a hundred different articles, mixing chronologies, quotes, politics, it's the full-on blender of ideas that results in nothing but thinly processed mush and gruel.
There's no denying, I'm an addict needing his fix, and like any addict I need more, crave more, there's nothing that surprises me, engages me, anymore, "Nuclear Missiles strike the US..." gets a "Meh" and a quick scan, like a lot of people I suspect I've grown indifferent to this whole news thing. I've been habituated to the larger bar of world-wars and genocides, it's time, really, to turn off the internet and get busy with life...
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In the vein of my rant on Kaleo Pharma, another link to good information on the drug company "Valeant". They're all crooks, folks, and they're killing you for profit...
Link: "How Drug Company Benevolence Silences the Sick"
And, if that weren't bad enough, there's this from the Washington Post: Cherokee Nation sues drug firms, retailers for flooding communities with opioids
Of course, this should be obvious, look at the rate of addictions on reserves in Canada.
And, related, another story of pharmaceutical companies foisting dangerous drugs onto an uninformed public: http://www.adbusters.org/featured/the-lilly-suicides/
AND THIS: https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/big-pharmas-dirtiest-dealer-insys
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