With all the pseudo-science on this show, the hardest thing for me to believe is that Harris would:
(1) Get his job back after the allegations made about him. IIRC, he got off on a technicality of some sort. If so, that would only prevent him from being prosecuted. OTOH, he'd be done at the DOD or FBI.
(2) Let's assume he overcame the last hurdle, never in a million years would he be allowed to investigate the "Fringe" unit, and in particular, Olivia. It wouldn't happen. (3) But if it did happen, nobody would give a shit about what he said about Olivia. Or it would come under incredibly scrutiny if it was considered at all.

The whole scenario was ludicrous, but, worse, it was wholly unnecessary to create this backstory. The writers could have simply made him an asshole. There are plenty of shows that feature some hard-nosed supervisor out to get the protagonist.

The only way I can believe this scenario is if it is later revealed that there's a big conspiracy among higher-ups to shut down the department and Harris is the guy they figured would be the most aggressive.

The writers also constantly rely on the lousy TV plot device of having the main character simply not tell people relevant information. It heightens the tension, but makes Olivia look like an idiot. As someone mentioned above, why didn't she mention the evidence piled in the dirt? Why didn't she just say to her "partner" at the FBI how she was going to prove Loeb was a bad guy? Did she tell him during the commercial?

There are certain things I'm willing to overlook for the sake of sci-fi, but they need to get the stuff grounded in reality correct.

"Good, I for one won't miss that no talent construction worker. Maybe he could do radio as his retirement gig."

I'm trying to figure out if that's just stupidity or an intentional, but strange, inversion of what Baldwin said to Sean Hannity. Baldwin never did construction, but he did say to Sean Hannity, "BALDWIN: Why would I want to come on the show with a no-talent, former construction worker hack like you?"

Electronic Arts wants to make money off of Jim Brown's accomplishments without paying him? Let me put it another way, a multi-billion dollar corporation wants to make money off of one of the greatest football players in history who worked many hard years to do what he did, without compensating him at all.

If they don't want to use him or #32 for the All Browns Team, that's their prerogative. But if they want to take advantage of his hard work, they need to pay up. The game certainly makes them enough for them to afford to compensate the players.

One of the greatest rock stars to ever live is bored by Rock Band because he's allegedly too old to, I assume, "get it." Not because he's been doing the real thing for the past 40 years and faking it with a console doesn't quite compare.

Brilliant work by Kyle Orland.

Thought this might answer some comments. From the website:

"we're even building an accessory pedal to allow for double-pedal setups."

"Drum Rocker comes with two cymbals and mounting hardware out of the box, and a third cymbal is available as an optional accessory."

XBox 360. The last few nights, I put the disc in from the dashboard after playing another game (usually Rock Band).

The game loads, and as soon as I see my character in-game, I get a screen that says, "Reconnect Controller." No matter what I do, I can't get it to connect and my profile is grayed out as if somebody else is logged in as me.

I just have to turn the 360 off and on again, but GTA IV doesn't seem to like second place.

I see a bright future for the designer(s) of this car.

Wow.

Subaru needs to print out these pictures and hand them to their design team shortly before they're all fired.

The bar would be covered by the license from ASCAP. The license between the musicians and the producers of Guitar Hero (or Rock Band) would be irrelevant with regards to the music. (And, it should be noted that there is no chance that the license between the game producers and copyright holders allows or contemplates public performance of the tracks)

The question is solely of public performance regardless of the source/medium of the performance (e.g., CD, MP3, kazoo, video game). The bar needs only one license for the music.

The ASCAP license is a blanket license that covers the public performance:
"One of the greatest advantages of the ASCAP license is that it give you the right to perform ANY or ALL of the millions of the musical works in our repertory. Whether your music is live, broadcast, transmitted or played via CD's or videos, your ASCAP license covers your performances."
http://www.ascap.com/licensing/licensingfaq.html
The ASCAP license would encompass video games as well.

Therefore, if the bar's license with ASCAP was all paid up (bwahahaha), it would not have to worry about the interplay of the two different licenses discussed above.

However, the outstanding issue is the video, which is the exclusive property of Harmonix or whatever and not covered by the license from ASCAP. That would be an entirely different license and I doubt permitted by the game producer (who in all likelihood would not bother to enforce their copyrights in the video against a bar).

"The content of this [comment] is not legal advice. It only constitutes commentary on legal issues, and is for educational and informational purposes only."

Dan,

Question for you, what takes less time, arguing on ablog about legal ethics rules that only apply to attorneys, or RTFA? To wit:

"She also had reached the limit of her patience. In November, she filed her $54 million lawsuit against Best Buy -- by herself, without legal representation." (emphasis added)

I'm going with the latter, but maybe you're really quick at talking @#$% on the Internet.

Don't get me started on how one could have a good faith belief that the loss of a laptop resulted in $54 million in damages.

I lived in Rome a years ago, and just got back from a 2.5 week trip to Italy at the end of September/beginning of October (including 5 days in Rome, visited Asciano), and have to say that this blog post is incredibly obnoxious and pathetic.

It is the kind of thing an incredibly lazy and "privileged" tourist would write. "Boo hoo, look at all the tourists! I can't be bothered to leave the dead center of Rome. Why can't culture come to me????"

It's clear that the poster did nothing to try and see the "real" Rome away from the crowds. Probably did a circuit from the Vatican, to Piazza Navona, Pantheon, Fountain of Trevi, Spanish Steps, Colosseum, and the Forum,, sticking to the main roads, then comes complaining about how there were so many tourists.

Please.

I know for a fact that there are Italians all over even the center of Rome. Walking over one street and you won't hear a single non-Italian voice. I was just there, staying in the heart of Rome near Piazza Navona, and it took less than a minute to find quiet streets of small shops, and "the Italians" away from the maddening crowd. Streets that took me to the crowded sights, but allowed me to avoid these crowds to and from.

I had a leg up knowing Rome without need for a map, but these streets are all parallel to the main ones. It takes a few minutes to look at a map to find them.

"where were all the Italians!?" This statement is unreal. Why do they allow you to blog here? You should not be speaking of "other places" given your obvious inability to do anything to educate yourself about a local.

"A cappuchino [sic] cost me €3.50 everywhere in the center."

Maybe it cost you €3.50, but I was buying cappuccnos every day for €1.50 across from the Piazza Navona on Via Vittorio Emmanuelle II. Were you getting table service?

"The lines to get into any place of significance like the Vatican or the Colosseum were endless, and it wasn't even peak season."

I used Rick Steve's guide and literally walked into the Vatican Museum with no line. I walked into the Colosseum and skipped past the line in high season. How? Research. Took me a few minutes, sure, but I didn't wait in line at all.

(Vatican Museum: go in the afternoon on a weekday; Colosseum: buy your ticket at the Forum and walk over to the Colosseum (they're next to each other)).

"It felt nothing like an ancient Roman city; it felt more like Disneyland with the odd Bulgarian dressed like a gladiator as opposed to Mickey Mouse."

Yeah, maybe if it wasn't abundantly clear that you made zero effort to actually try and see anything except the tourists sights in the center of Rome, it wouldn't feel like that.

Asciano is boring, for the record.

Ironically, I'm incredibly sympathetic the the gist of this post. Every time I go to Italy, the crowds get a little worse. It's depressing.

However, the fact that Italy is becoming more touristy isn't an excuse to be lazy and claim that it's impossible to avoid tourists, particularly with Rome where it's very easy to avoid the tourist traps and the crowds.

In much of Italy, it is getting harder and harder to avoid the crowds.
Venice? Yeah, it's tough to get off the beaten path since so much is beaten.

Florence? Similar to Venice, you have to try pretty hard to see stuff of interest that isn't overrun (the Pitti Palace was relatively desolate while the Uffizi was a madhouse at the very same time).

Siena? Getting worse every year, but not too hard to get away from it all.

Tuscany? You can still find undisturbed areas (e.g., Asciano), but in other towns (e.g., Cortona, Montelcino), the tourists stick to the main streets in town. And if one is looking for a "real" city and not some hill town, Bologna is pretty tourist free.

But to say that Rome has succumbed to tourism is really weak given how easy it is to get away from the crowds. I'm talking one block. It's not a Catch-22. Not even close. It just takes a few minutes of planning and research.