Happy Birthday

**RobC1907** · Posted: Sat Jul 19, 2008 12:02 pm Post subject: Happy Birthday

It's my birthday today. To be completely honest I think it was a waste of time. In the morning I went to the beach and got horrible sunburn all over my shoulders, my back, and my face. Then my friends had the idea to go walking over a mountain, leaving me behind to chase after them for two miles across a mountain, a natural pool full of mud and a pebble beach, not to mention the wasteland between each one.

When I finally caught up I found them sitting in a bar, having blown all our money on a bottle of Malibu, which they then proceeded to drink.

Eventually we get home, and go out for a pizza. That was fine until they decided to go to the bank and get out 100 Euros (160 Dollars or 80 Pounds) which they spent on two pathetic hats, two bottles of Malibu and two bottles of Coca-Cola. They got me an ice-cream.

Now we're home again, and I just found out that I have to go to work in the morning down in some bar owned by friend's uncle, just because he's understaffed and needs to pull in completely random people to help.

This is pathetic, I'm not getting up tomorrow at 7 AM and working until midnight, thank you very much. I normally don't care at all but I haven't spent more than four hours sleeping this week, and I was planning to catch up on that tomorrow.

I'm not celebrating my birthday next year.
_________________

'Cause love's such an old fashioned word
And love dares you to care for
The people on the edge of the night
And loves dares you to change our way of
Caring about ourselves
This is our last dance
This is our last dance
This is ourselves

**Vicious88** · Posted: Sat Jul 19, 2008 4:40 pm Post subject:

Wow, Rob, I'm sorry to hear you've had a bad birthday. I'm also sorry you had to make your own birthday post (I was under the impression your birthday was this sunday, but then agian, it's been a while since you've been on messenger so I couldn't exactly check the status messages, you know?)...

It sounds like your friends took advantage of your birthday as an excuse to treat themselves... That's not cool at all.

As far as working tomorrow goes: You're old enough to work in a bar? The age for that in America is 21 (well 21 to drink, 18 to be in a bar).

Again, I'm really sorry your birthday didn't work out better for you. If it helps, you have the deepest happy birthday wishes my worthless little keyboard can spawn.
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Ah, Signature Changes...

**RobC1907** · Posted: Sat Jul 19, 2008 5:11 pm Post subject:

My friends and myself are all 15, and they were allowed to buy three bottles of Malibu. Trust me, nobody cares about alcohol laws in Spain.

Legal age for drinking here is 16.
Legal age for driving is 18 (you can drive a Moped at 16)
Legal age for having sex is 13.

So far I've only ever heard stories about the driving one being upheld anywhere.
_________________

'Cause love's such an old fashioned word
And love dares you to care for
The people on the edge of the night
And loves dares you to change our way of
Caring about ourselves
This is our last dance
This is our last dance
This is ourselves

**Vicious88** · Posted: Sat Jul 19, 2008 8:33 pm Post subject:

Wow... That's a shame. I guess I'm just a believer in the enforcement of laws, but hey, to each their own.
_________________

Ah, Signature Changes...

**RobC1907** · Posted: Sun Jul 20, 2008 2:21 am Post subject:

**Vicious88** · Posted: Sun Jul 20, 2008 5:14 am Post subject:

Granted, I violate the minor laws... But that's merely because no one enforces them, lol.
_________________

Ah, Signature Changes...

**RobC1907** · Posted: Wed Jul 23, 2008 7:01 pm Post subject:

**Vicious88** · Posted: Thu Jul 24, 2008 7:52 am Post subject:

The RIAA tags like... 1 out of every 11 million people who do online pirating. And I don't pirate music, which is the thing they mostly go after, so there's no big threat from them. I have a better chance of winning the Florida lottery AND the Publisher's Clearing House prize, than I do of getting sued by the RIAA, and besides all of this: I have enough legal knowledge and the ability to relate to people, that so long as I can have any sort of trial, judge or jury, I will make this whole ordeal seem really stupid and fruitless (which it is), minimizing my punishment down to next to nothing.

For any giant corperation that can feel their wallets thinning as a result of even 10 million counts of piracy (way more than one person could ever achieve against a single company), I will truely apologize and serve time. And indeed, if anyone has come up sort on a bill as a result of my downloading something, I'll apologize, serve time, and pay off whatever sort of debts they might have.

But let's face facts...

Whether your downloading programs, music, or pretty much anything - you're not affecting the original source in the slightest way. I'm not out their redistributing these downloads to the masses by selling CDs or trying to turn a profit. I just don't believe that I should have to go without food in order to pay for something that will only make insanely rich businesses and people, even richer.

If I download a program, I don't tie up their lines with tech support questions or anything like that, because that would be disrespectful to the minimum wage workers who's pay was SUPPOSED to be derived from my software purchase. I can much more easily respect some minimum waged tech support person who doesn't have anything in life but is out their trying, than I can fabulously rich people who are bickering over pennies and dimes, because I'm stopping them from purchasing a third private island.

And I, as the defendant, have the right to both a jury trial and to admit the media into the court room proceedings. So tagging me as one for arrest, would be a VERY counter-productive move for the IRAA. Even if I was convicted, the message that would be nationally, if not internationally portraid would be one similar to what I've listed here, except I might also mention that the IRAA is a group of individuals profitting huge paychecks for trying to accomplish the impossible. Online piracy will never be stopped. You can slow us down, or make us change how we do things, but you can't stop us. We can overcome and web restrictions, and we can get around any sort of product key, activation, or registration.

If they want to chase after an impossible-to-solve internet crime, they should chase after Identity Theft and Trading. Because that affects real people who aren't trying to buy another private jet for their fleet or get their own show on MTV, but rather just to pay their bills and keep the bank from taking their home. If you're going to try and change to world, change it for the people who most need it.
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Ah, Signature Changes...