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Wow... even more complicated than I thought. Thanks. I know... YANAL.... but sounds plausible.

Theoretically, when you have a business relationship with someone, you and the business can sign a contract together containing anything that is not against criminal law. "You agree not to use your personal hotspot while you are in our hotel" is not against criminal law. The enforcement of that contract would get bad, though - they obviously can't block other service, they just got fined for that. They would have to proactively search for wifi other than their own within the building, address the person serving it, and request that they either stop or leave the building. (Technically speaking, that's quite easy. Just look for the radio waves.)

If that person had signed the agreement, they would then be liable under the agreement and could be penalized or sued or some other appropriate punishment. If the person had not signed the agreement (and keep in mind, they might not be the ones who made the travel arrangements and things would get trickier there - just because you authorize your travel agent to reserve a room for you does not mean you authorize them to sign legal agreements on your behalf), the Marriott could only evict them, and request police assistance if they refused to leave.

If the case went to court, the victim's contract lawyer would have a field day confirming whether or not the contract was actually valid - any number of factors could get it ruled invalid. If the victim was not the one who made the arrangements and did not authorize the signing; if the victim was in any way incapacitated; if the victim was presented with "oh, it's just a standard form, you have to sign it" talk by the clerk; if the Marriott failed to uphold its end of the contract in any way, including not providing the mandatory complimentary breakfast with hot oatmeal as specified in the contract; if the Marriott selectively enforced the rule (HE got away with it, why are you picking on ME?)... the list probably goes on quite a while, but IANAL.

The victim could then hit the hotel up for attorney's fees and infliction of emotional distress, and might do so anyway, regardless of whether they won or lost the suit, arguing that the agreement was egregious compared to the agreements other hotels force you to sign, and was deceptively pitched - and they very well might win. (It'd probably end up as a class action suit for all guests who had to sign the thing.) The lawyers would probably have a field day and everyone else would get shafted, as is usual for these things.

But, yeah, that would get rid of those "customer" critters Marriott would rather like to keep getting paid by, so you're right, it's only theoretical. Theory is fun!

I am wondering, is it possible for Marriott hotels to forbid the use of personal hotspots? Part of the ToS guests have to sign? Could they then use their Wi-Fi monitoring system not to disrupt the customers hotspots, but to identify them and then fine the customer?

Ok, being able to send "de-authorization" packets does not mean to be able to identify or localize the hotspot. And doing this in the open is surely not a way to get more guests. So this is more a theoretical question.

Lost my love ~25 years ago. :-D

No love for MUD? Any Discworld mudders in the house?

I am officially addicted. Swordigo did in a 7" tablet. HumbleBundle has had a few good ones. Great way to pass the time.

Seconded. I use GitHub for a project, I have other projects I intend to host publicly in the future, I will take GitHub's actions into account when deciding where to host them.

Probably a dead horse, but I wanted to mention that SolarCity has just announced a financing program whereby you own the panels and they will [fully] finance 'em. That way you own the panels for as little as $0 down - as much as you own anything with a mortgage.

Mostly this takes care of the transfer issue if you sell your house. I think there are also states that have issues with third parties owning parts of a home.

Again, not a lawyer, rep, etc.

http://www.solarcity.com/residential/mypower-solar-loan

I would think the legal section is meant to be for issues that are at least tangentially related to science and technology. I just submitted one as a matter of fact... Not seeing the relevance in syrup and likeness licensing.

True, but we also have a 'legal' section here.
Not that much different:
http://pipedot.org/story/2014-08-13/judge-rejects-apple-google-intel-etc-settlement-says-parties-need-to-pay-more

But I don't care, so no vote from me.

N/T

That seems to be one of the biggest issues here. People constantly claim GG is supporting harassment, but when you start to look at it... I mean just look what happened to Intel when they pulled ads for a perfectly logical reason, the behavior of Gamsutra and its editor, that was only minimally related to GG, which just pointed it out. Tons of articles painting them as supporting misogyny trying to get them to fall back in line.

It's not going to be long before the real truth is out in the open. These media sites are losing their ads and their readers. They're basically down on one knee now, it's only a matter of time before the other one hits the ground. I can't speak for others, but I'm personally using this as a way to gather names of companies not to do business with in the future. I'll support them if they can remain natural and keep quiet or the can stand up for GG.

Dell's off the list now too. George Reeves posted a rather nasty comparison of GG to ISIS, he's since deleted it.

The Qt mirror project was also removed from GitHub. Ok, might not have something to do with GG. They moved to the Qt Company. But if it were because of GG and I would be responsible for this move, I would not announce it. Because there definitely is harassment around GG... and it does not come from the GG side.

Why does evolution matter so much to creationists? Too many people cannot distinguish between pure scientific facts and possible social and cultural reactions to scientific findings.

Though he is not totally wrong. This article is sensationalistic. The leap from 'fruit flies have the size of a former mate' and possible similar mechanisms in mammals is gigantic. First they should research the exact mechanism for the effect in fruit flies. Especially if there is DNA in any way involved. For all I care they can already start similar experiments with mice. But to speculate at this point about humans... too early.

But then again... often a huge gap between what scientists say and what journalists hear.

I actually remember that popping up on /. I think. I read about it a few times before realizing it was a joke and went WTF... I've looked at it on Gitorious in the last week. Someone really put a lot of effort into it, there's a ton of documentation as well as sample programs. There was also a facebook page at one point.

Those guys were really committed.

I actually think that was what set the precedent for what happened with GamerGate here, and is my primary concern for using GitHub. All anyone has to do is claim your organization is misogynistic and BAM! nuked repo.

Update from my camp. almost all the devs are on board for moving off GitHub for our project. There are a few now claiming they'll leave the project if we do because they won't support a harassment campaign. The main admins are still want to take a "let's wait and see" approach because the think it'll just be a huge headache and want to hold out to see if GitHub rectifies the situation before expending the effort to either procure the assets to setup and internal Git server, which also has a lot of logistical issues, or to see if there's another service.

GamerGate moved to several different services. GitLab was one that invited them, then disabled the repo almost the next day because of the same issue with some anonymus nobody claiming it's a harassment against women campaign. There's an on going discussion with @GitLabHQ, which is citing the GamerGate controversy article on wikipedia. Despite there now being a disclaimer on the page that says "There maybe be some problems with this article". They were also told and pointed to the dispute resolution page where it's looking like the article might end up in mediation and I'm guessing a lot of the editors are really close to being topic ban for obvious bias and personal attacks.

So far Gitorious is the service that's looking like it's going to win out.

Anyone that's following GamerGate might also have noticed the media is starting to crack. We're starting to see more, "Journalists just need to have a dialog" articles that are starting to sound an awful lot like a half arsed apology. They're still factually incorrect, but I give it another two to three weeks and it'll be an all out apology, probably with a lot of "but" and without an admission of guilt that is.

And why does it matter so much to this person?

Check out C+=, the hilarious feminist language that surprisingly works against the odds.
It was born in 4chan's /g/ as a joke.
GitHub was used to host it but it was deleted because "misogyny" and it was moved to Gitorious.

It's 100% plausible that this effect is fully applicable to humans. Plenty of environmental factors have epigenetic effects on us. Your denials, saying it can't possibly apply to us, is utterly baseless, wishful thinking.

Bah. Pickups changed in 1997 and they ain't been the same since.

...says the person driving a 1991 F-350.

No. You're wrong. In quick succession she used "FAMILIES", "parent", "children", and "child". She's talking to a reporter. You know exactly what she was trying to imply to get her name in the papers. The only situation in which this is even theoretically applicable to humans would be a remarkably well timed gang bang.

'Cause you can just picture the fly family sitting around the teeny tiny TV at night.

What? You don't think fruit fly adults can be called "parents" and offspring can't be called their "children"?

I think your paranoia is running amok. And for some reason you desperately want to believe humans are immune, despite that being undetermined.

And he left out the best part.

"Tiny Core Linux (TCL) is a minimal Linux operating system focusing on providing a base system using BusyBox and FLTK, developed by Robert Shingledecker"

Shingledecker! The developer's name is Shingledecker! That might be the best name ever. :)

Also, the desktop is reputed to have an OSX look and feel, which is amusing (or distressing). I don't think I'd bother with SliTaz, but I might like to play with TinyCore a bit.

When a person contributes actual useful detail to a conversation, how can they be a troll just because they have a lousy attitude? It drives me nuts how thin skinned some of the user-level moderation seems to be. I'm not the AC who found the 12 MB distro, and he comes off harsh, but who cares? Glad to see Zafe here is made of sterner stuff. :)

Never heard of SliTaz but it just sounds like the nicknames of two authors.

Absolutely, going by the quote in the summary right here.

""We know that features that run in families are not just influenced by the genes that are passed down from parents to their children. Various non-genetic inheritance mechanisms make it possible for environmental factors to influence characteristics of a child. Our new findings take this to a whole new level - showing a male can also transmit some of his acquired features to offspring sired by other males,"

From parents to their CHILDREN. She is talking about humans and human families. It's irresponsible of her. Worse, it's stupid.

Almost all my gaming is done on a phone nowadays (I'm assuming "Card games" means non-computer games that involve cards of some kind, which is the other gaming I do). Which option covers simple phone games? (Mainly puzzle games)

Or... a scientist is attempting to explain why the kids do not look like their dad

For me it's easy - not a gamer. In fact so much so that when I put up this poll I braced for the inevitable volley of complaints that I forgot a category or duplicated a category under two titles, etc. (it happens anyway).

The last game I played seriously was Elite, in like 1985. Also Karateka on my C64. I even skipped the Tetris fad back in the day.

Not really mixed. But your answer in "Large Storms..."

"Earthquake weather" has been dismissed by scientists repeatedly. And the story right above this one is that telegony, roundly

"Earthquake weather" and telegony confused me a bit. Way beyond my bed time... But have to stay awake and kill time. :-D

You're seeing these two stories mixed together? Nothing like that here. No clue what you're talking about. You should follow that "Bugs" link at the bottom of the page.

And the story right above this one is that telegony, roundly denounced by prevailing scientific wisdom for over a century, may actually be true.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. I am very skeptical with this one. Not my field of expertise, so what I do here is nothing more as speculation. However, I suppose some scientific papers have been misinterpreted and/or to much dumbed down by journalists. Would not be the first time.

Various non-genetic inheritance mechanisms make it possible for environmental factors to influence characteristics of a child.

Sure, changes through the environment may make children stronger, weaker, taller, smaller, may influence the immune system. No doubt about that. Question is what is meant with 'resemble'? In a human context it would mean something like hair colour, eye colour, facial features...the usual stuff when people say 'this kid resembles his mother/father/grand parents, etc. But those traits are encoded in DNA. I don't see a way how these traits can be passed without DNA just by some chemicals in the males sperm. Not saying this is impossible. And maybe there is DNA involved in some unknown way. However... as I initially said: Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

The lead author sounds like a terrible person, purposely conflating insect reproduction with a implied human connection

Was there a specific quote you're referring to? She did specifically say: "But we don't know yet whether this applies to other species."

Don't confuse the study authors for the journalist taking the story whichever direction they prefer. For an extreme example, the Guardian article on the same subject was one big estrogen-fueled rant about the journalist's previous boyfriends...

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/oct/02/baby-looks-like-ex-research

human connection that completely doesn't exist.

Just because a human connection hasn't yet been proven, doesn't mean it doesn't exist. This is just the first study establishing that the effect exists... Humans absolutely are known to be greatly affected by other epigenetic effects, as TFA and tanuki both mention. It may take decades to determine how significantly affected, if at all, humans are.

The age-old problem is: Many things which "make perfect sense" happen to be completely wrong. It's only after-the-fact that we can sit back and say how obvious something is, and ignore the other stuff that seemed obvious, but was found to be incorrect.

"Earthquake weather" has been dismissed by scientists repeatedly. And the story right above this one is that telegony, roundly denounced by prevailing scientific wisdom for over a century, may actually be true. I certainly wasn't trying for a theme by submitting these two stories close together, but that's how it worked out...

Wrong story? ;-)

Perhaps you should do some research first. Gender/sex/psych? Not so much in GamerGate.
http://techcrunch.com/2014/09/25/gamergate-an-issue-with-2-sides/
Ok, not totally without gender, but instrumentalized on purpose to distract from what initially caused GG.

GamerGate is far more interesting than the github thing. But that ain't saying much.

I'd much rather see a distanced article on the subject. Not enough that I'll be writing one, myself. But Gender/sex/psych roles in gaming is certainly an interesting topic.

I just don't think the recent hoohah is very insightful or informative.

You say this based on which insights? Epigenetic effects are known for quite some time.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epigenetics
Knowing that and from the article:

The researchers propose that the effect is due to molecules in the semen of the first mate being absorbed by the female's immature eggs where they influence future offspring.

Not much of a stretch.
And I think it is only natural, that when such a mechanism is found in one species, to look if the same mechanism can be found in other species, too.

The lead author sounds like a terrible person, purposely conflating insect reproduction with a implied human connection that completely doesn't exist. AW.

I had the feeling you were a bit annoyed about the GamerGate stuff here in the other story. You know... "News at 11?". And now you drag it in this one? Does not seem to be that uninteresting. :-)

It's more than one developer leaving. It's also all of the developers and organizations who will never use GitHub going forward thanks to the total uncertainty that this debacle has caused.

...is nowadays almost a political question.

No more than simply being human.

If it weren't for the pipedot coverage of the github thing (which, as far as I'm concerned, is nothing more than drama for drama's sake), I'd have had no idea any of the drama were going on.

I'm betting that 99.9%+ of 'gamers' also have no idea.

To be perfectly honest, the whole gamergate thing seems like a whole lotta drama over very little - and nothing much new.

If non-code repos can be removed, then code repos can be removed, too. I don't see any reason to differentiate between the two.

But: Not surprising. Large hurricanes generate and can be identified through their seismic signals.
If they can, why shouldn't they be able to trigger an earthquake? Before an earthquake there is pressure. Not sure if one can say that the system is in a meta stable state. For many meta stable systems very little energy is needed to trigger the boom. When a hurricane really registers on a seismograph, its energy is cannot be that little.

Why bad style? Even if it makes perfectly sense, it has to be researched and quantified. Just saying: 'Not surprising' is definitely not enough. :-)

...is nowadays almost a political question.
Am I one? No idea. Probably not. You decide. At best I play every six month a game. Never online.
When it gets me, it is almost 24/7 for two or three weeks... little exaggeration here. ;-)

Last two games I played:
Skyrim... When I played this, it was: Wow... hard to top this one. It is just great. Can't get any better. But then...
Dishonored... Erm... Skyrim? Hmm... nice game, but nothing special. :-D

I have yet to find another game, which comes even close to Dishonored.
Of course... very personal taste here and very IMHO.

So... The effect is that one developer is thinking about leaving?

OK, how about 'virtually no effect?'

Yes, you've found a distro even lighter weight than SliTaz. Congrats! Looks pretty interesting to me. If others are interested maybe I'll give it a spin for an upcoming Distro Friday. Agree with you SliTaz is a pretty awful name. I poked around to figure out the origin of the name and didn't find an obvious one. Make up your own acronym day? There are many contenders for the 'worst distro name ever' title, I'm afraid.

I'm not sure if your post is intended to offend or you're just not a clear writer. I'll assume the best, in hopes I'm not just feeding an anonymous troll here - of which there are either suddenly more, or the existing ones have suddenly gotten more verbose. Yawn.

I find it interesting that you claimed this would have no impact on developpers, then one comes forwards to say it does affect him, and now you're just arguing and nitpicking. There's really no need to argue here. At least one developper has come forward to say it will bother him, therefore the claim that this will not affect any developper is objectively wrong.

Don't read very much do ya, AC. Try it again. Then apologize for twittery.

I'm in discussions with my organization now about moving to either another service or an internal Git server.

... because GitHub removed a non-code related repo that recommended social/political actions not related to coding. I think y'all need a hobby. Or maybe you've found one.

The main admin is looking at it as though it'll be a huge headache.

To move to another git host? I think maybe you need a new admin.

Github isn't going to blog about using ideological reasoning to remove a repository on the basis of of it being a harassment campaign.

Pretty sure they're not going to address it because it's a non-issue.

Anyone that takes this at more than face value is going to see it's not a harassment campaign and Github devs are using personal agendas to make decisions on what stays and goes.

Are they? How do you figure?

This was posted in the Reddit thread I linked in the story. The original twitter account accusing GamerGate of being harassment admitted to literally lying to get the repo taken down.

Original Tweet: https://twitter.com/nexxylove/status/518203296784207872
Archived: https://archive.today/1vuWC

But no, it's not a big deal Github is playing favorites.

I'm in discussions with my organization now about moving to either another service or an internal Git server. Oddly enough I wasn't the one who brought it up, but more than half of over a hundred the devs are on board. The main admin is looking at it as though it'll be a huge headache. A few have voiced concerns about not supporting Github and how that might reflect on our organization and project.

Github isn't going to blog about using ideological reasoning to remove a repository on the basis of of it being a harassment campaign. Anyone that takes this at more than face value is going to see it's not a harassment campaign and Github devs are using personal agendas to make decisions on what stays and goes.