A commenter said:

"they can pollute their own air"

Hmm, and since when does air know borders?

Or we'll cut off your supply of mars bars and batter

</stereotype>

Do a google for "scotland+hydro-electric"

I'm off to check the half-life of H2O. ;)

"Microsoft only has to prove that one patent has been violated and the whole open source house of cards comes crashing down. The open source movement prides itself on the idea that it has the moral certainty of not stealing ideas. It only has to be shown to have done this once and it will do huge damage to the movement.

Anon"

I thought we in the enlightened open source movement were against the ownership of ideas ?

Quite aside from the point that patents don't cover ideas, only specific implementations of them, does the proof that Microsoft has violated somebody elses patent bring their whole monopoly crashing down ?

That comment smells of Microsoft troll.

Several members of my local Linux Users Group don't shower frequently. It s hard to say whether they violate patents, but if the do, they do it fragrantly.

Yes, they pollute their own air.

...what happened to the last people that fucked with the linux community.

Now, I am not aware of any rulings inside New York state specifically relating to unsecured wifi, but I do know that New York has what is known as an "open door" law- basically, if my front door is wide open, people can walk in. This is useful for a variety of good samaritan reasons, such as suspicious noises in the house, and making sure people are alright, but it could, by a saavy lawyer, be extended to unsecured wifi systems.

It already means that, if I walk on someone's property, and there are no visible "Posted: Keep out" signs, I cannot be legally held responsible for simply walking there. I can be held accountable for actions taken there that would normally be illegal on their own, but I cannot be charged with trespassing if it is not posted.

Now, if this guy was doing something else while online that isn't mentioned, like downloading, say, kiddy porn, (Something law enforcement takes an extremely dim view of) he could get completely reamed for it. If, on the other hand, he simply connected and did things like check The Register, then, well....there is no legal basis for it that I know of.

You might not be arrested for walking through an open door, but you would be areested for stealing the things in the house.

"...what happened to the last people that fucked with the linux community."

I've been in the Linux community for a while now and ever since the one thing I haven't got is fucked :-(

After reading through these posts I realised that this Anon guy is a really funny guy, someone should give him a job on TV!!!!

752.795 Prohibited conduct.

Sec. 5.

A person shall not intentionally and without authorization or by exceeding valid authorization do any of the following:

(a) Access or cause access to be made to a computer program, computer, computer system, or computer network to acquire, alter, damage, delete, or destroy property or otherwise use the service of a computer program, computer, computer system, or computer network.

@@@@@

Because he did get permision first he broke the (Overly broad) law.

|||||Paul|||||