fretmeister

I agree completely. Any judgment without the ability to enforce it is useless. The best way to start to restore confidence is civics and basic law at school. Have an electorate that is genuinely educated about how the system should work so they know when certain groups of people are taking the fosters. Calls for civics and law at school have been made for years. Makes you wonder why those in the highest positions of power don’t want an educated voter. I did actually start the application process to retrain as a teacher with a view to teaching humanities / A-level law, but the training period with zero or extremely low income was impossible to work round. My wife is unable to work full time so we couldn’t afford to live if I stopped working to study. I was most upset. I feel very strongly about it, but I can’t make us homeless.

Equal between strings I think. I don’t measure, I do it visually. I set the outside strings first then the inner ones.

I do equal distance.

I’m sorry but that’s nonsense. ”follow the law blindly” - as opposed to what? Ignore the law? That would be unlawful! And it’s the clients that bring the cases, not the lawyers. The lawyers do as they are instructed. In the UK a lawyers first duty is to the court, not their client. Other jurisdictions are different. Lawyers are not allowed to lie for their client. That’s why a criminal lawyer will never ask their client if they did it. They will ask how they want to plead. If the client says they did it and then says they want to still plead not guilty then The lawyer has to withdraw or not offer any evidence. Cannot lie for their client. And you are missing the subtleties too. Often lawyers represent people who know they are wrong. It’s those people who need representation the most! The lawyers job then isn’t to “get them off” it’s to make sure the punishment or penalty is correct and proportionate and within the law. It is not a binary job in the slightest. If a claimant lawyer goes to trial and relies on a precedent judgment that for whatever the dispute is awarded 50,000 then the defendant is entitled to show a precedent that only awarded 20,000 on similar facts. Cases are not just about winning or losing. Sometimes it’s about controlling the extent of the win / loss. Every one of these sorts of threads shows that misinformation and misunderstanding is rife and confirms the need for civics and basic law to be in the national curriculum. The old “ignorance of the law is no defence” has to apply for obvious reasons, but the state should also have to make an effort to educate too.

Anyone assembled one of them? I’m tempted to do one for a bit of fun. How much woodworking is needed to make it a half decent job?

Not in music cases. There just aren’t enough music cases for that to make a difference. And if they do swap experts and decide not to rely on a report then they can’t recover the fees from the other side. Do that a couple of times and all of a sudden you are in a loss unless the claim is for a massive amount of money. Medicine is very difficult though. Ask 100 consultants and you’ll get 100 different expert opinions. But there are thousands of those cases so it is easy for a party to have a look at court reports and see which experts tend to lean one way or the other. The availability of those reports is good though. It’s easy enough to object to experts who don’t have a roughly equal split of claimant and defendant instructions. And the experts sign a declaration that they recognise their duty is to the court and not the person instructing them. They can get in serious trouble if they breach that.

no win no fee means that many cases are not taken on in the first place due to the ending of legal aid in 99% of civil matters. And if a matter is taken on and then is either abandoned later or lost at trial then the lawyers have effectively funded the claimants action and then not actually been paid a penny. That’s not even covering the overhead. That’s a massive loss. No win no fee retainers were introduced by government because the govt wanted to remove legal aid from as many civil matters as possible. More people do know their rights now and that’s a very good thing. The amount of serious injury and fatal accidents at work has plummeted since no win no fee was introduced because employers actually discovered it was cheaper to properly protect their employees. The employers didn’t do it out of the goodness of their hearts! Nothing else ever improved that situation as much as that single change. Yes, the lawyers got paid just like every other profession. But the benefits were to every single employee in the country who had concerns about the safety at their place or work. Once again, the way to avoid paying lawyers is to not break the law in the first place. As another example the case of RvR in 1991. Before that case it was impossible for a husband to be accused of rape of his own wife. Before that date the marriage was deemed to be unconditional consent to sex. A man could hold his wife down every day and violate her and there wasn’t even anything the police could do. The thankfully aggressive lawyers ran it all the way to the House of Lords to get the interpretation of the law changed. Parliament updated statute later on. It needed the aggressive lawyers to get the law changed. That benefited every woman in the country. Similar approaches had equally wide benefits regarding asbestos exposure , smoking risks, clinical negligence and informed consent to surgical risks etc etc. Calling it aggressive as an insult is pointless. It’s always 2 or more opposing views that need a referee to sort it out. It’s never pleasant and it is always a last resort because the opposing parties cannot agree on something. But it’s the clients that decide on the approach and give the instructions to their lawyers and as long as those instructions are lawful the lawyer must follow them. The way litigation is conducted is set by parliament, and the way lawyers are paid is also set by parliament and various sub committees parliament sets up. The lawyers operate within those rules or they get struck off. A lawyer is only a spokesman for their client. They often do not share the same views as their client. There is a reason why the cab rank rule exists for barristers, to make sure everyone gets representation if they need it. A good recent example of this is Dinah Rose QC. She took instructions to defend the homophobic policies of the Cayman Islands in the Privy Council. She is not homophobic. The issue to be resolved was were the policies unlawful. Personal views do not come into it. Refusing the instructions was not an option. As for my job, my job is all about challenging lawyers fees and setting budgets for high value litigation. It’s my job to make sure litigation spending is proportionate so nobody spends a million quid to sue over a £10,000 dispute but also to make sure that the parties understand what needs to be spent to actually achieve a resolution to the dispute. The parties then get to make an informed choice and give their instructions to their lawyers. I’ve been doing this work for over 20 years and I am well aware of the problems in the system but the concerns you raise are not within them.

Very nice!

I think he should do some signature pyjamas. I’d probably buy some! 😂

If that was the case then a strat could be humbucking as well as in positions 2 and 4 it is. I wonder if it was a bit of sloppy writing when it was launched and the person doing the specs just looked at a picture and thought 'looks like a humbucker' As an aside, I do like Lobster. He's a proper bass nut who just seems to love the instrument. Of course he makes every bass sound like him, just like all the other youtube instrument demo players, but he's great anyway. And as silly as it is - I love the lobster hand thing. The world needs more silliness.

Why does everything come down to lawyers earning money? Lawyers exist only because their clients do stuff they shouldn't have done, or because someone else's client did something they shouldn't have done and the wronged person needs to have it put right. Lawyers wouldn't be needed if people kept to their obligations. It's a pathetic argument. What next? Accountants being happy about tax rule changes? Doctors being pleased about over time because of a pile-up? Lawyers only do what their clients tell them to do. They don't do anything on their own. Just like accountants / surveyors / even plumbers.

I wonder if any other instruments have not been properly described for a decade?

Not a clue either!

That's not pedantic, it's accurate. Every case ever bought for any type of dispute at all is pedantic and it has to be. Hindsight doesn't work. If the other guy had shown ES had heard the song before then it certainly would not have been a waste of time, and with the granting of the declaratory relief it wasn't a waste of time for ES in any circumstance, even if the counter claim hadn't been made. There was enough of a triable case to mean than ES had to put a hold on a couple of million quid pending the outcome. And we also need to remember each side had their own music experts - those experts have to sign a Statement of Truth confirming that their duty is to the court and not their own client, and their pay is not allowed to be linked to the outcome of the trial. Trials proceeding because opposing experts cannot agree is common in all types of litigation where experts might be needed. Medical, engineering, accountancy etc etc. There will now be another hearing about the costs. The usual outcome is that the loser pays the winners costs "on the standard basis" - that means any doubt as to the reasonableness of the costs is resolved in favour of the paying party - the LOSER of the main event gets the benefit of the doubt and the costs payable will be smaller. If the loser has done something particularly unwise or has failed to accept a sensible offer made by the winner then the court can punish them for wasting everybody's time for all or part of the costs by making an "Indemnity Costs" order where any doubt as to reasonableness of the costs is resolved in favour of the receiving party - the winner (ES) and then the loser will have to pay a higher percentage of the winner's costs. The costs order will decide whether the judge thought the matter was a waste of time as a whole or in part. And now for the bigger picture - all cases form part of precedent. So while the other guy didn't get what he wanted, and ES did get the Order he wanted there might be other benefits from this case being run. The judge's very careful and indeed pedantic review of the music led to a conclusion that the melody structure being argued about is very common and that there's nothing special about it. This decision will now be used as a basis to help decide whether other songs that are similar to each other in the same sort of way are just using a common melody structure or if there are genuinely unique elements that have been copied. It's not a binding decision as it's only in the High Court and not in the CA, but it will be powerfully persuasive. It is now likely that a potential claimant in an IP related case will not even start the matter if the type of similarity doesn't go beyond the ES example. On the flip side, any defendant will now find it easier to defend such an action bought by an unwise claimant. It also means that if someone writes a song that last year they would not have released because it's too close to ES's song for the relevant few bars, they can now release it knowing ES probably can't sue them for that common element. We all know how inadequate IP law is in the modern world and in the absence of parliament getting round to re-writing the law the way the law develops is through precedent. So no - this hasn't been a waste of time. It's helped develop the law on the issue. Just like the process does in other areas of law where parliament has no interest in updating statute.

Perfect! Thank you.

I've picked up a lovely shortscale P. The existing pickup has very high poles and as I like to use the pickup top as a ramp that doesn't really work. In most basses I stick EMGs in but I'd like to keep this bass passive. Can anyone recommend a good covered P bass pickup, or at least one with visible poles that are flush with the plastic? Not looking to spend loads, the bass was under £150 so I don't want to put £150 pickup in it! Any ideas?

The old school nature of the pickups can be 'improved' (if that's your taste) by moving the plugs on the preamp. It takes about 10 mins and is reversible. No money needed.

I really liked them both. I prefered the P bass as a di, but the ray with an amp sim. I think the Ray needs that extra fat that a good amp gives it. They can be a bit thin sounding without, but then with a good amp - 'Nard Edwards is right there (probably my favourite stingray sound). I think the Ray just edges it for me, but it's really tight.

Yes. The Traveller ones are the cheaper ones. The Standard are the better ones. And then there's some unique things like the "Classic" and "New York" stuff.

As it is painfully clear that nobody in this thread has actually read the judgment here it is https://www.bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/Ch/2022/827.html 1: Sheeran sued first for a declaration that there was no copyright theft, basically to stop the allegations. 2: Chokri then counter claimed Both issues were dealt with at the same hearing. So they both got their day in court and Sheeran needed his day in court too. The massive delays and underfunding in the criminal justice system were not affected at all by the time taken in this civil matter.

It was actually Sheeran that sued for declaratory relief first.

No. Because I want one too!

Sandberg Superlight TT4 (jazz), 6.5lb or sometimes lower!