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"Everything that can be invented has been invented." -- Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Office of Patents, 1899.

One day a student came to Moon and said: "I understand how to make a better garbage collector. We must keep a reference count of the pointers to each cons."

Moon patiently told the student the following story:
"One day a student came to Moon and said: `I understand how to make a better garbage collector...

[Ed. note: Pure reference-count garbage collectors have problems with circular structures that point to themselves.]

Hell, even their 'witty' name is ripping off the name Apple Computer came up with for a system sound after predicting a lawsuit from Apple Records.

These guys at from the app-formerly-known-as-xtunes project need to learn a thing or two about originality!

I'm sorry kind sir, but, YHBT. YHL. HAND.

I replied to a troll with a troll. I win, suck my anal tulup.

YHBT. YHL. HAND.

How many of them are homosexuals, bisexuals, heterosexuals, black, white, jewish, arab, hispanics, asians, native Americans, Romans, Sicilians, French, communist, socialist, capitalist, hippies, democrats, libertarians, librarians, barbarians, fascists, racists, fundamentalists, objectivists, moral relavivists, secular humanists, scientists, teachers, janitors, police officers, criminals, zoologists, ad executives, superheros, college students, rich, poor, sick, healthy, male, female, hermaphrodites, circus clowns, goat-herders, farmers, assembly-line workers, web designers, programmers, artists, scuba divers, pyrotechnicians, Moonies, Mormons, Scientologists, Satanists, cultists, Wiccans, Pagans, Christians, Muslims, Jews, Amish, Quakers, Discordians, Feynman-worshippers, Star Wars fans, porn-hounds, sexists, mob bosses, drug lords, straight edge, pop-culture sheeple, ravers, indie rawk kids, rappers, gangsters, photographers, entertainment execs, government workers, employees of a multinational conglomerate, self-employed, unemployed, homeless, construction workers, demolition experts, Navy SEALs, Army Special Forces, paratroopers, illegal aliens, cab drivers, bus drivers, space shuttle pilots, rocket scientists, surgeons, pharmacists, heroin addicts, piano players, animal trainers, dentists, sadists, masochists, humorists, political science majors, helicopter pilots, spies, snipers, second gunmen, "magic bullet" theorists, "no bullet" theorists, paranoid, schizophrenic, autistic, Aspergerers, snake charmers, crocodile hunters, fools, idealists, cynics, lookalikes, soundalikes, surrealists, musicians, savage beasts, mutants, hijackers, terrorists, little old ladies who meet after church every Sunday to drink tea and discuss their gardens, priests, pedophiles, porn stars, spy camera manufacturers, sneaky bastards, Ninjas, swordsmiths, goldsmiths, jewelers, little plastic egg makers, midgets, tall bastards, talk-show hosts, talk-show guests, celebrities, plastic surgeons, evil overlords, trusted lieutenants, inept subordinates, Darwin Award nominees, Academy Award winners, actors, directors, producers, sound effects men, voice actors, game designers, reverse-engineers, makers of extremely long lists, and/or people who are going to stop now?

How many of them are homosexuals, bisexuals, heterosexuals, black, white, jewish, arab, hispanics, asians, native Americans, Romans, Sicilians, French, communist, socialist, capitalist, hippies, democrats, libertarians, librarians, barbarians, fascists, racists, fundamentalists, objectivists, moral relavivists, secular humanists, scientists, teachers, janitors, police officers, criminals, zoologists, ad executives, superheros, college students, rich, poor, sick, healthy, male, female, hermaphrodites, circus clowns, goat-herders, farmers, assembly-line workers, web designers, programmers, artists, scuba divers, pyrotechnicians, Moonies, Mormons, Scientologists, Satanists, cultists, Wiccans, Pagans, Christians, Muslims, Jews, Amish, Quakers, Discordians, Feynman-worshippers, Star Wars fans, porn-hounds, sexists, mob bosses, drug lords, straight edge, pop-culture sheeple, ravers, indie rawk kids, rappers, gangsters, photographers, entertainment execs, government workers, employees of a multinational conglomerate, self-employed, unemployed, homeless, construction workers, demolition experts, Navy SEALs, Army Special Forces, paratroopers, illegal aliens, cab drivers, bus drivers, space shuttle pilots, rocket scientists, surgeons, pharmacists, heroin addicts, piano players, animal trainers, dentists, sadists, masochists, humorists, political science majors, helicopter pilots, spies, snipers, second gunmen, "magic bullet" theorists, "no bullet" theorists, paranoid, schizophrenic, autistic, Aspergerers, snake charmers, crocodile hunters, fools, idealists, cynics, lookalikes, soundalikes, surrealists, musicians, savage beasts, mutants, hijackers, terrorists, little old ladies who meet after church every Sunday to drink tea and discuss their gardens, priests, pedophiles, porn stars, spy camera manufacturers, sneaky bastards, Ninjas, swordsmiths, goldsmiths, jewelers, little plastic egg makers, midgets, tall bastards, talk-show hosts, talk-show guests, celebrities, plastic surgeons, evil overlords, trusted lieutenants, inept subordinates, Darwin Award nominees, Academy Award winners, actors, directors, producers, sound effects men, voice actors, game designers, reverse-engineers, makers of extremely long lists, and/or people who are going to stop now?

Okay, you can sit around with your TI-86 all night long and talk about XML parsing times, but who cares? The only real test of a site is how much it provides content, and by content, I mean a peek into the life of CowboyNeal. Using this test, let's compare:

CowboyNeal on e2

CowboyNeal's livejournal account.

Aside from technical details, which one of these gives us more insight into the delicate poetic soul that is Mr. Pater?

or something equally [retarded|k-rad] and [ph33r--|fearful].

long live E2! LONG LIVE THE DATABASE!

you will be [everythingites eat babies!|assimilated].

[MONKEYS! LESBIANS! SOY!]

-loquacious

Perhaps this is more relevant/informative.

I have an iPod. I watch out for people wearing headphones each day to check out what they're using. This happens to be something that interests me (once you've spent $1100 on a music player, they quickly become interesting).

I also travel into the CBD each morning and out of it each night via the train, and get around on foot and on trams during the day. (All inside Zone 1, so don't push any of your "cheap suburb" crap onto me).

Almost no-one has Mini-disc players.

The majority of people that are listening to portable music have either CD players, tape players, or tiny radios.

Look, I don't care about your high school age friend and what they happen to be using to listen to music (even though I'm still just inside the age bracket you mentioned). I don't care if three or four of your friends happen to have Mini-disc players, because they are not everyone in Australia.

There is virtually no demand for mini-discs here, because no one uses them. If you'd like to show me otherwise, come to the next Slashdot Meetup and show me some Mini-disc users. Although I've missed the last two meetups due to picking up people from airports for nodermeets, and because of being at work a few hours too long, I'll be at the next one. Really. I'm sure...

http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node_id=531479

(n) Originally a term from Reconstruction time (1870) to mean southern men. Now it means white bigot, from whip-cracker or slavedriver.
"Got a little problem with the redneck cracker" -- Ice Cube (The Predator).

Now, one could convincingly argue that software patents shouldn't be allowed in the first place, or that they should have shorter terms, or that the patent office doesn't do a competent job of checking for obviousness or prior art. I'd probably agree. But the fact remains that any damage done by patents is at worst a temporary setback to everyone else, not an irretrievable disaster.

We see very little use of strong cryptography, as the technology was expensive to use for a long while. The start of the "Internet Revolution" (the time when most people got on the net) passed without the use of cryptography being routine, partially because it was not possible to include cryptography in the software everybody used without a lot of hassle.

We are seeing similar results from another patent - David Chaum's patent on blind signatures. This blocks the simple implementations of digital cash, and is at least part of the reason why true digital cash is not widely used, and we instead of use substitutes (like Visa over SSL).

Also, both of these blocks has resulted in a large interia of non-use, with alternative solutions being employed (in the case of RSA, non-encryption, in the case of blind signatures, accounting-based systems). It is in my opinion a high risk that neither of these will be really resolved, as we got sub-optimal de-facto standards, and standards have a way of staying around (look at qwerty for an example.)

It is clear that patents do have permanent influence, as the availability of technology during particular periods of change is relevant for the future development of society. And with the pace of change in software "scenery" (what becomes realistic to do due to changing external constraints - there are few changes in software itself), 20 years gives a permanent change of direction. The potential of the technology is lost in an attempt at commercial exploitation, like the beauty of a valley turned into a reservoir. When the reservoir is drained 20 years later the valley is not the same, and it takes a long time before it becomes even similar.

Eivind, who has not decided whether software patents may be a good idea, but is certain he does not like the way they are implemented.

To have "jumped the shark" pretty much means to have "gone to hell" - based on a Happy Days show where Fonzie waterski-jumped a shark. The show was pretty much game over from then on. More definition and I'll also bet the above poster reads Boondocks.

That's like saying all possible DNA sequences have been created. IDIC: Infinite Diversity in Infinite Combinations.

In melodies, there is not an infinite sequence of notes to choose from. Had you read the article I linked to, you would have discovered that a songwriter can get taken to court for matching four notes of an existing melody, which is fewer than infinity.

No, the real problem is that music artists are getting lazier and less creative.

I have written software to test that hypothesis, by generating random sequences of note intervals, and you know what they sounded like? Copyrighted pop songs from the 1950s through the 1990s.

I wish there was some kind of P2P network to only offer legal content

Performers not supported by RIAA labels do not have access to RIAA A&R and thus do not have access to songwriters. They must write their own songs. But problem: Just about all possible melodies are taken. So how again can such "legal content" exist?

The copyright on the song "Happy Birthday" is owned by Warner-Chappell, the music publishing division of AOL Time Warner. Because the song was first published on or after January 1, 1923, it falls under perpetual copyright on the installment plan (19-year extension in 1978, 20-year extension in 1998, who knows what in 2018).

[ Read More ]

If I create a song or movie, it is perfectly legal for me to distribute it on a p2p network

Not necessarily. If a song you wrote is "substantially similar" to an existing song, the copyright owner of the existing song may have grounds for legal action. How does a fellow make sure that the melodies in your song aren't the same as any other song released in the last 95 years?

Don't distribute works you don't own the copyright for.

How is it possible to write a song without infringing on an existing copyright? There exist fewer than 50,000 possible melodies in the Western musical scale. So how do I check that the song I just wrote isn't "substantially similar" to some song that was played on the radio 10 years ago?

Actually, that's already been done.

As explained HERE, there is no difference.

You would think "Flamebait" applies to posts intended to get responses (i.e., bait for flames) however I usually see it applied to posts like "Linux sucks! Fuck off!" which clearly was not bait for anything and where a moderation such as "Offtopic" would have been more appropriate.

You would also think "Troll" applies to the classic usenet-style "trolling for suckers"... YHBT, YHL, HAND, etc. However, I see "Troll" being applied to everything, left and right.

In my opinion we need another category called "Jackass" or "Fucktard" to apply to all these -1 posts.

Or you can just call it "Offtopic", like this post.

First point: CPU cycles and memory required to render a web page probably are irrelivent if you have a Pentium 4 1-2 Ghz CPU and 512 MB or a gig of RAM, but not all of us do. Personally, I don't use IE because I don't like supporting MS (by numbers if not by money) and I don't like all the security holes so I can't compare to IE directly, but I can compare to Mozilla. On older, slower machines with less RAM Opera is a life saver. I have an older system with a Celeron 800 and 256 MB of RAM, and tried Mozilla for a couple of weeks. There were a lot of things I liked about Mozilla, but I found that pages came up more slowly and more resources were used by Mozilla, so I stuck with Opera. This can also be an issue not only if you're machine is slow, but also if you just tend to have a LOT of applications open simultaneously. On even older systems the differenece is much more pronounced. If you have an old system you want to make useful as a web terminal, your choices are basically Opera and Links.A last note on render speed: This only matters if you're on a fast connection, since on a slow one render speed is insignificant compared to load time. But if you're on a good broadband connection, this CAN matter.

Second Point: Resource usage seems to scale much better with the number of pages viewed in Opera than in Mozilla. If you're like me when you browse the web you often have 10 pages open at once, maybe more, so the browser that deals better with this situation is clearly preferable. I don't really know why this is, or if it is a percularity of the versions I'm using, but on my system Opera has this advantage.

Third point: Opera also has a lot of advantages in terms of user interface. It was out in front of Mozilla in using MDI. The extensive use of hotkeys, mouse gestures (also ahead of Mozilla), etc. contribute to an interface that is designed for ease of use and efficiency. Mozilla does have a lot of nice features, though, and I think it does compete well in this aspect.

In summary, Opera consumes less resources than Mozilla and renders pages faster. This may not make a difference if you have a top of the line computer, but it does if you have a system with fewer free resources. Mozilla does compete well in terms of features, however IE does not. Opera is also much more secure than IE, and plus it's not part of the evil empire. ;)

Yup.

I love doing the dutch oven, even though I sleep alone.

"Learn more about lesbians and soy."

Sir, your sentence seems to have lost it's monkeys.

Malarkey? or Effective Way?

"Learn more about lesbians and soy."

Sir, your sentence seems to have lost it's monkeys.

Malarkey? or Effective Way?

How to change a Starbucks T-Shirt into something filthy

PAL defined.

more info @ the link above and Ander's Transhuman Resources

Hey,

I think hundreds of people making up amateur fonts is exactly what we need.

The problem with having lots of fonts is I have trouble keeping more than about 3 fonts in my memory. Specifically, I know of 'system' (fixed width), 'times new roman' (normal writing) and 'arial' (sans-serif normal).

My fonts folder has no less than 463 fonts. I don't need more fonts - I need a few select, high quality fonts.

The only way to learn rocket science is to DO rocket science.

Um... it's conventionally learned by years of study in school and university, leading to a degree in Physics, before you even approach a real rocket.

The font Times New Roman took two years to design, and considerable research into legibility and readability.

Anyway, here's my point: Designing a good font takes years of practice and experience. Hundreds of amuteurs producing mostly chaff only makes sorting out the wheat harder.

Just my $0.02,

Michael

Well, this isn't new, but it is great that someone is finally actually doing it. I hope I don't offend gamers, but I think there are some places where discussions more fruitful then just about games. I think e2 would certainly benefit from having a 3-D city to interact in.

Well, Cliff,

There's plenty of good stuff out there, but you'll have to do some editing. As somebody who grew up around teachers and has worked in textbook publishing I can assure you that teachers all have to do it too. Their stuff sucks far worse than anything referenced here.

While Project Gutenberg is great, you should also check out on-line encyclopedias like NuPedia, and Everything2 which are all open source, as is The Open Directory Project . A great source of fiction, which can be a wonderful learning tool, is Baen Books who have put hundreds of book online and are eager to have them downloaded and spread around.

For science materials, there are lots of great sites for kids done by educators pursuing whever they're into. All of which you'll want to use to spice up access to sites like Science Daily that are handy but a bit too serious some days for young minds.

Which brings me to Make Stuff which should fill in quite nicely for the "arts and crafts" part of most school curricula.

For biography I'ld check out American National Biography and for history a good start can be made with pages like Anyday which can be amazing or useless, all based on where *you* go from the starting point that they provide. Places like Colonial America are designed just for this but again, check out more than one.

For reference material you should check out Theodora which, while not meant to be open source, is very handy, Geographic.Org, which is open source and student-oriented, should do the rest. I've found that the CIA sourcebook is terrible, as folk should have long since figured out. Biased, misinformed, and sometimes just wierd; leave it behind. However if you hunt you'll find that within various.gov sites there's tons of great stuff, from manuals on camping to stuff on solar panels.

The space science community is very kid friendly, from NASA down to the local Mars Society chapter, having plenty of materials on quite a range of topics that you're free to reproduce and spread around. If you can handle it, the neopagan community is reliably eager to provide information and links on ancient indo-european history, from the government of Sumeria, to Celtic ironwork. (You might be surprised at how many neopagans have advanced degrees in history and/or literature.)

Speaking of limits, you'll always have to be careful that your kids aren't ending up places they shouldn't be but again, every teacher and librarian faces that one.

Lastly, the reason that I've got all this ready to hand is that I took it from my source database, more of which can be found on my web site, which is primarily oriented towards adults and older kids but does have plenty of other links like the ones here.

Best of luck to you and be sure to post back to slashdot in a few years about how it's going.

Rustin H. Wright - Information Geek
"It's all about the information, Marty. Little ones and zeros!"

People naturally want to preserve the human race, not plants, animals, or the planet, per se.

I think most have some kind of feeling that there are other values in nature worth fighting for beyond the survival of the human race. I'm pretty sure that most people who are concerned about the environment primarily aren't too troubled about the rational stuff, like the long term survival of mankind. What people care about is those majestic rain forrest trees being cut down or those poor gorillas being shot by poachers. If it was only about preserving the human race, few people would be interested. People are usually pretty immune to rational arguments -- just look at how hard it is to get people to stop smoking (or not starting in the first place).

There is a law, the Federal Tort Claims Act ("FTCA"), that provides blanket authorization to sue the government. However, the FTCA only allows suits based on "operational" aspects of government duties. "Discretionary" decisions are not actionable.

Really? Then what's ACLU v. Reno? What's Eldred v. Ashcroft? (I wouldn't have so much of a problem with the Bono Act that Eldred et al. seek to overturn, except that in some fields such as songwriting, there exist only a limited number of possible original works, and it's possible to run out of them.)

In general, if a fellow wants to sue the government over a "discretionary" action, he sues the persons in charge of enforcing the regulation, such as the Attorney General, the head of the USPTO, the examiner who approved the patent, etc. in their official capacities. Hence, ACLU v. Janet Reno in her official capacity as AG, Eldred et al. v. John Ashcroft in his official capacity as AG.

There is a law, the Federal Tort Claims Act ("FTCA"), that provides blanket authorization to sue the government. However, the FTCA only allows suits based on "operational" aspects of government duties. "Discretionary" decisions are not actionable.

Really? Then what's ACLU v. Reno? What's Eldred v. Ashcroft? (I wouldn't have so much of a problem with the Bono Act that Eldred et al. seek to overturn, except that in some fields such as songwriting, there exist only a limited number of possible original works, and it's possible to run out of them.)

In general, if a fellow wants to sue the government over a "discretionary" action, he sues the persons in charge of enforcing the regulation, such as the Attorney General, the head of the USPTO, the examiner who approved the patent, etc. in their official capacities. Hence, ACLU v. Janet Reno in her official capacity as AG, Eldred et al. v. John Ashcroft in his official capacity as AG.

All compilers have to deal with an ABI.

"Calling convention" isn't an accurate enough term since it could describe a number of things in application development. ABI is better since it accurately implies it has something to do with the binaries themselves.

Essentially, the ABI is how a object files and libraries are linked together.

This story suddenly reminded me of Peter F. Hamilton's Night's Dawn trilogy. In that, many people (especially starship crews) have 'neural nanonics' implanted. They act as kind of an onboard computer system for an individual, allowing them control over their nervous system, letting them run programs to enhance their vision and affect their state of mind (like drug-programs), and even leave 'to do' notes to themselves (how many times have you made a mental note about something, but forgot about it?). At first, I thought 'wow... that's really cyberpunk. Yawn'. But after reading through the whole trilogy, I was amazed at how well Hamilton integrated this potentially overused technology into the story, making it quite seamless and natural.

Plus, I think it would be totally awesome to be able to choose what kind of window manager I'd want overlayed on my eye's input.

Here is some more information on technology in the Night's Dawn trilogy, and a good description of nanonics are near the top.

This story suddenly reminded me of Peter F. Hamilton's Night's Dawn trilogy. In that, many people (especially starship crews) have 'neural nanonics' implanted. They act as kind of an onboard computer system for an individual, allowing them control over their nervous system, letting them run programs to enhance their vision and affect their state of mind (like drug-programs), and even leave 'to do' notes to themselves (how many times have you made a mental note about something, but forgot about it?). At first, I thought 'wow... that's really cyberpunk. Yawn'. But after reading through the whole trilogy, I was amazed at how well Hamilton integrated this potentially overused technology into the story, making it quite seamless and natural.

Plus, I think it would be totally awesome to be able to choose what kind of window manager I'd want overlayed on my eye's input.

Here is some more information on technology in the Night's Dawn trilogy, and a good description of nanonics are near the top.

Ground control to major Tom...

Give the girl a pearl necklace

From http://llr.lls.edu/eldred/martin-original1.pdf:

The fact that creators of new works cannot merely re-use the expression contained in copyrighted work of others without permission forces them to be creative. Composers cannot rehash the melodies created by earlier composers, they must create their own new original melodies.

How is this possible? Case law states that copying four notes of another song's "hook" is enough to get a songwriter in trouble with copyright law, and that the standard for copying is not an exact match but merely substantial similarity. Another case that I've read somewhere states that there is no unprotected "idea" in music, only "expression".

Melodies are determined by the distances between adjacent notes in frequency (intervals) and in time (note duration). Four notes will contain three (interval, duration) distance vectors. Assume that the scale contains twelve distinct intervals and that a judge will distinguish three distinct note durations (eighth, quarter, and half); thus, there are 36 possible distance vectors from one note to the next, and 36 to the third power equals 46,656 distinct melodies. No other melodies are possible in the Western musical scale. If only one hundred songwriters in the world were to create one melody each week, they would run out of melodies within nine years.

"Melancholy Elephants" by Spider Robinson details the dire consequences of literally running out of new ideas.

"The Right to Read" by Richard M. Stallman is another interesting short story.

Well, my first thought is that just because something is changed in a manner that is able to be predicted, *does not* mean that you (or anyone else) will be able to predict it. This is very similar to the halting problem (see also Turing machines), in basic computing theory. How do you know if you can't predict the behavior (ie it's truly random) or just that you haven't found the correct functional description yet?

My second thought is that your first premise, as stated above, can be taken in (at least) two ways, a strong sense and a trivial sense. First, the trivial sense: you're simply labeling anything that can predictably change the entropy of a system as intelligent. simple, and actually setting yourself up for a nice, simple tautology of equivillences. The strong sense: Intelligence is *required* to change the entropy of a system in a predictable way. This then requires a definition of what you mean by intelligence and I somehow don't think that this strong sense is what you mean. So, it's the trival case you're interested in (that is to say that you've defined intelligence for us).

Is it true that the study of HOW entropy changes in any given system is the study of intelligence itself, in that given system?

Inasmuch as the "how" really gets at the "what" (or that they're intimately connected, see Aristotle's 4 causes, covered well at everything2).

The real issue though, is that you seem to be trying to accurately describe/define intelligence but do not do a good enough job accounting for the common usage of the word to be anything more than either putting forth a simple tautological statement or you are failing to accomplish your goal in an effective or substantial way...but that's just my simple opinion.

-inco

Well, my first thought is that just because something is changed in a manner that is able to be predicted, *does not* mean that you (or anyone else) will be able to predict it. This is very similar to the halting problem (see also Turing machines), in basic computing theory. How do you know if you can't predict the behavior (ie it's truly random) or just that you haven't found the correct functional description yet?

My second thought is that your first premise, as stated above, can be taken in (at least) two ways, a strong sense and a trivial sense. First, the trivial sense: you're simply labeling anything that can predictably change the entropy of a system as intelligent. simple, and actually setting yourself up for a nice, simple tautology of equivillences. The strong sense: Intelligence is *required* to change the entropy of a system in a predictable way. This then requires a definition of what you mean by intelligence and I somehow don't think that this strong sense is what you mean. So, it's the trival case you're interested in (that is to say that you've defined intelligence for us).

Is it true that the study of HOW entropy changes in any given system is the study of intelligence itself, in that given system?

Inasmuch as the "how" really gets at the "what" (or that they're intimately connected, see Aristotle's 4 causes, covered well at everything2).

The real issue though, is that you seem to be trying to accurately describe/define intelligence but do not do a good enough job accounting for the common usage of the word to be anything more than either putting forth a simple tautological statement or you are failing to accomplish your goal in an effective or substantial way...but that's just my simple opinion.

-inco

Well, my first thought is that just because something is changed in a manner that is able to be predicted, *does not* mean that you (or anyone else) will be able to predict it. This is very similar to the halting problem (see also Turing machines), in basic computing theory. How do you know if you can't predict the behavior (ie it's truly random) or just that you haven't found the correct functional description yet?

My second thought is that your first premise, as stated above, can be taken in (at least) two ways, a strong sense and a trivial sense. First, the trivial sense: you're simply labeling anything that can predictably change the entropy of a system as intelligent. simple, and actually setting yourself up for a nice, simple tautology of equivillences. The strong sense: Intelligence is *required* to change the entropy of a system in a predictable way. This then requires a definition of what you mean by intelligence and I somehow don't think that this strong sense is what you mean. So, it's the trival case you're interested in (that is to say that you've defined intelligence for us).

Is it true that the study of HOW entropy changes in any given system is the study of intelligence itself, in that given system?

Inasmuch as the "how" really gets at the "what" (or that they're intimately connected, see Aristotle's 4 causes, covered well at everything2).

The real issue though, is that you seem to be trying to accurately describe/define intelligence but do not do a good enough job accounting for the common usage of the word to be anything more than either putting forth a simple tautological statement or you are failing to accomplish your goal in an effective or substantial way...but that's just my simple opinion.

-inco

Free Speech doesn't give you the right to steal someone's work.

I understand what you're trying to say for code and for text, but music is different, as there is only a finite number of melodies. There are only 12 distinct notes in an octave, and about three meaningful durations in music (eighth note, quarter note, and longer than quarter note). Thus, the musical alphabet consists of 36 letters. In the United States, having four notes match four notes in a previously copyrighted song will get you sued; the precedent is the "Yes! We have no bananas!" case. For reasons explained in music theory (namely transposition and fermata), you can ignore the first note and the last duration, giving you effectively only three symbols in a melody. (If you're unclear on the math, reply, and I'll try to explain further.)

If you take 36 to the third power, you get fewer than 50,000 possible "hook" melodies, and given the number of musical works already registered at the Library of Congress, a songwriter is bound to write a song whose hook is "substantially similar" to one of them sometime or other. Arguing the coincidence defense (which is a valid defense under US copyright law, called "independent creation") costs more in legal expenses than most songwriters make in a year. So when almost all possible melodies are copyrighted, how will anybody be able to write music?

The solution is to nix the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act and to set more realistic standards for what constitutes musical plagiarism.

The biggest problem with gnutella is not technical. It is that gnutella was invented so that true hardcore underground people such as myself could complete our collection of harcore underground things, such as the entire run of Evangelion. However, gnutella is cluttered with people only interested in Brittney Spears. Here is an idea I first proposed on everything2 for making gnutella less crowded.

Gnutella is one of the best things to come out of Sedona, AZ since the hordes of Alien Invaders who passed through the vortex. At leat for those of us who have DSL or better, Gnutella is the best way to complete our collection of Evangelion episodes, obscure hip hop mp3s and fets.com sets.

The problem with gnutella though, is that it is crowded, and according to my estimates, about 75% of this crowding is due to people looking either for mp3s of that damn song that plays on the radio every half hour and\or nude pictures of celebrities. Often to compound matters, these people are looking for nude pictures of that one celebrity that sings that damn song they play on the radio every half hour.

If we have a tool that allows us to download obscure 90 minute long epic techno ballads from the Slovak Republic, why are we allowing people to use it to listen to music that they can hear by turning on MTV?

The answer is because we don't know how to stop them. But I have a possible solution for our problem. All it requires is for about 100 or so people to put a file in a shared directory called "Brittneyspearsbarebreasts.jpg" or something along those lines. But instead of said picture actually being of Miss Spears beare breats, why not make it something else...such as possibly goatse.cx?

After seeing this picture one too many times (which will probably be the first time), many people will cease to use gnutella as a vehicle for their pop culture stupidities.

Beyond that, I'd love to see Talking Heads' Stop Making Sense in an IMAX theater, Dark City, Felini's Juliette of the Spirits, and the Garbage Pail Kids movie....

d. Taylor Singletary, reality technician
(experimental music)

DRM: Digital Rights Management. Been talked about A LOT recently.

Check out the following sites:
Microsoft's DRM site
Or for a better perspective, see Everything2 a geeky must have as far as any random information goes.
or google it

LART! LART! LART!

Luser Attitude Readjustment Tool. 1. n. In the collective mythos of scary devil monastery, this is an essential item in the toolkit of every BOFH. The LART classic is a 2x4 or other large billet of wood usable as a club, to be applied upside the head of spammers and other people who cause sysadmins more grief than just naturally goes with the job. Perennial debates rage on alt.sysadmin.recovery over what constitutes the truly effective LART; knobkerries, semiautomatic weapons, flamethrowers, and tactical nukes all have their partisans. Compare clue-by-four. 2. v. To use a LART. Some would add "in malice", but some sysadmins do prefer to gently lart their users as a first (and sometimes final) warning. 3. interj. Calling for one's LART, much as a surgeon might call "Scalpel!". 4. interj. [rare] Used in flames as a rebuke. "LART! LART! LART!"

As Far As I Know