Hacking Digital Video Recorders: Potential Copyright Liability for DVR Hackers and Service Providers

To what extent does Sony\u27s time-shifting fair use argument extend to recent innovations that make it easier for hackers use DVR technology to generate copies of protected material? The author assesses the potential liability of DVR manufacturers against the backdrop of traditional fair use doctrines

Homology and closure properties of autostackable groups

Autostackability for finitely presented groups is a topological property of the Cayley graph combined with formal language theoretic restrictions, that implies solvability of the word problem. The class of autostackable groups is known to include all asynchronously automatic groups with respect to a prefix-closed normal form set, and all groups admitting finite complete rewriting systems. Although groups in the latter two classes all satisfy the homological finiteness condition $FP_\infty$, we show that the class of autostackable groups includes a group that is not of type $FP_3$. We also show that the class of autostackable groups is closed under graph products and extensions.Comment: 20 page

Cybersquatting: The Latest Challenge in Federal Trademark Protection

The explosion in Internet technology in the past decade has drawn the Lanham Act into the realm of electronic commerce. Trademark owners seeking to register domain names have recently found themselves entwined in a number of disputes, such as disputes involving claims to multiple domain names and disputes over whether the domain name registration system is fairly administered. One important legal issue that has recently come to the fore is over the practice of cybersquatting. Today, courts must contend with the cybersquatter, a speculator who reserves trademarks as Internet domain names for the sole purpose of selling or licensing them back to trademark owners willing to pay a considerable price for their use. Complicating matters, the most potent weapons in the Government\u27s anticybersquatting arsenal--the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (ACPA) and Federal Trademark Dilution Act (FTDA)--each give rise to grave constitutional concerns

Cybersquatting: The Latest Challenge in Federal Trademark Protection

The explosion in Internet technology in the past decade has drawn the Lanham Act into the realm of electronic commerce. Trademark owners seeking to register domain names have recently found themselves entwined in a number of disputes, such as disputes involving claims to multiple domain names and disputes over whether the domain name registration system is fairly administered. One important legal issue that has recently come to the fore is over the practice of cybersquatting. Today, courts must contend with the cybersquatter, a speculator who reserves trademarks as Internet domain names for the sole purpose of selling or licensing them back to trademark owners willing to pay a considerable price for their use. Complicating matters, the most potent weapons in the Government\u27s anticybersquatting arsenal--the Anticybersquatting Consumer Protection Act (ACPA) and Federal Trademark Dilution Act (FTDA)--each give rise to grave constitutional concerns

K-12 Education Fostering White Fragility

Scholars such as Carol Anderson (2017) and Joe Feagin (1994; 2006) have written extensively about the prevalence of white rage and systemic racism in contemporary society. We are seeing this played out in real time with Florida Governor De Santis trying to enact legislation to remove discussions of African American history and block dialogues about racism in schools. Robin DiAngelo (2019) explains “white fragility” as blaming “others with less social power for their discomfort” (109). DiAngelo and others have asserted that efforts, such as that of Governor De Santis, reinforce white fragility in schools. Specifically, curricula and instructional materials that deny and ignore racial power structures in the United States promote a sense of white fragility, especially for white students. To best understand and address this, I plan to conduct a content analysis of selected K-12 history textbooks, curricula, and instructional materials and apply a CTRR (critical theories of race and racism) lens to my analysis. Encouraging dialogue in schools and fostering critical education about the racism embedded in American society will propel this country forward.https://digitalcommons.morris.umn.edu/urs_2023/1002/thumbnail.jp

The Implementation of Total System Performance Responsibility to Avoid a Weakened Systems Engineering Department

During the 1990\u27s the Department of Defense (DoD) underwent an Acquisition Reform (AR) intended to reduce cost and improve schedule. This increase in efficiency was to be brought about by reducing the responsibility of the Government acquisition community and relying more on industry to deliver completed programs. Known as Total System Performance Responsibility (TSPR), this strategy removed many bureaucratic reporting processes from contractors and gave them freedom to make decisions within the trade space in order to meet operational requirements. With the intention of leveraging industry best practice and reducing Government oversight, TSPR was implemented on many defense contracts in the late 1990\u27s. Contractors would focus on delivering a fully operational system while the Government would continue to execute their core functions of program direction, financials/budgeting, requirements determination, contract management, and security. While sound in theory, the implementation of TSPR did not produce the expected results. Many programs on which TSPR was implemented resulted in poor cost and schedule performance as well as struggled with systems engineering functions including requirements decomposition and flow down. The Government was intended to fulfill an insight role with the implementation of TSPR. However, it was often the case that the removal of Government oversight was never replaced with the close working relationship associated to insight. Contractors had new responsibilities that they may not have been prepared to take over as part of their experienced best practices, and the lack of Government involvement in these areas negatively impacted the overall program performance. The TSPR label has been applied in many forms. For the purposes of this paper TSPR in the use of acquisition efforts for which Systems Engineering was impacted will be considered. Other TSPR implementations include Performance Based Logistics and Reduction in Total Ownership Cost. These were other Acquisition Reform era efforts that focused on more contractor responsibility, but did not have the systems engineering impacts and therefore do not provide the lessons learned to base recommendations from regarding systems engineering efforts. In order to realize many of the benefits originally intended by this acquisition reform effort the implementation must be modified. Recommendations contained within this paper are aimed at how TSPR may reduce the cost and schedule associated to acquisition programs without negatively impacting the systems engineering function within Government

Rewriting the Narrative that Surrounds Mental Illness

The focus of this work is to change the narrative that surrounds mental health issues by portraying mental battles through animation. Buddhism heavily influenced the crux of this project, which is the conscious decision to accept oneself and choose to work towards inner balance instead of battles. 3D animation is used to distill complex thoughts into simplified characters that drive the narrative through performance and choreographed fight scenes

An Action Research Study of the Influence of Cultural and Cognitive Characteristics on Students’ Mathematical Abilities

In recent years, there have been a number of studies regarding mathematics instruction. Specifically, efforts to address the achievement gap across the United States have been discussed and still the contributing factors and possible solutions have either been unacknowledged or partly recognized. Hence, the need for such research is critical and imperative to educating persons of the matter that exists within mathematics education today. This study was conducted in a natural setting in which cognitive and cultural characteristics were explored in order to identify how such differences amongst students influence their exhibition of mathematical abilities. In particular, literature regarding cognitive style, culture in the classroom, and teacher preparation were consulted in order to establish a foundation for this study. The research conducted and the implications that follow are significant to the discipline of mathematics and perhaps more importantly to teachers seeking to educate today’s diverse group of students of mathematical concepts. Hence, the implications of this study are of great value and necessary for improving education at the national level as well as individual practices for mathematics instructors as well

GROUP I INTRON-DERIVED RIBOZYME REACTIONS

Group I introns are catalytic RNAs capable of self-splicing out of RNA transcripts. Ribozymes derived from these group I introns are used to explore the molecular recognition properties involved in intron catalysis. New ribozyme reactions are designed based on the inherent ability of these ribozymes to perform site-specific nucleophilic attacks. This study explores the molecular recognition properties of group I intron-derived ribozyme reactions and describe a new ribozyme reaction involving molecular recognition properties previously not seen.We report the development, analysis, and use of a new combinatorial approach to analyze the substrate sequence dependence of suicide inhibition, cyclization, and reverse cyclization reactions catalyzed by a group I intron from the opportunistic pathogen Pneumocystis carinii. We demonstrate that the sequence specificity of these Internal Guide Sequence (IGS) mediated reactions is not high, suggesting that RNA targeting strategies which exploit tertiary interactions could have low specificity due to the tolerance of mismatched base pairs.A group I intron-derived ribozyme from P. carinii has been previously shown to bind an exogenous RNA substrate, splice-out an internal segment, and then ligate the two ends back together (the trans excision-splicing reaction). We now report that a group I intron derived ribozyme from the ciliate Tetrahymena thermophila can also perform the trans excision-splicing reaction, although not nearly as well as the P. carinii ribozyme.In addition, we discovered a new ribozyme reaction called trans insertion-splicing where the P. carinii ribozyme binds two exogenous RNA substrates and inserts one directly into the other. Although this reaction gives the reverse products of the trans excision-splicing reaction, the trans insertion-splicing reaction is not simply the reverse reaction. The ribozyme recognizes two exogenous substrates through more complex molecular recognition interactions than what has been previously seen in group I intron-derived ribozyme reactions. We give evidence for this new reaction mechanism composed of three steps, with intermediates attached to the ribozyme