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I ask these questions because anyone who reads the article in English will find it... um... less than coherent. Although the article's tone is consistent, and it is clear that Müller-Maguhn is trying to establish a position of leadership on par with those of the world's major nations, the article contains frequent references that I just couldn't keep up with.

For instance, as Müller-Maguhn caricaturizes the evolution of the Internet, he is preoccupied with the idea of the Internet as "parallel universe" , which as far as I can tell, includes

• bits [that] flower, flourish and reproduce
• boundless amounts of money
• spaceports
• (an alternative to) Blowing up concrete prisons

Additionally, Müller-Maguhn's attitude towards the "suits" is unbelievably simplistic:

And these suit-wearers wear ties, which are known to restrict the oxygen supply to the brain -- thus depriving them of any imagination and preventing them from [blah blah blah...]

So, I ask, is this a fake? Did translation so mangle the connotation of his metaphors as to completely destroy his meaning? Or does this guy have a good dealer?


If you're not wasted, the day is.

No,

People invent things like Dilbert to caricature the following

I write database driven websites for a living, including e-commerce.

My boss does not know how to write website or database code.

My boss does not understand what the difference between http and https is and which should be used where.

My boss does not know what sorts of functions are done on the website side of things and what sort of things are done by the database

My boss does not understand what a database is for.

My boss has heard of Internet Explorer and Netscape but is incapable of installing them without my help.

My boss believes that the password field in a HTML form prevents anyone from intercepting your password.

My boss believes that if they change the password on the intranet administration website that the database developers will no longer be able to access and change their information without permission.

My boss does not realise that you must be connected to the internet to access a website.

My boss gets confused when his laptop stops working after a few hours, especially as I can fix it by plugging it in.

My boss believes that his first name is a great password for the company systems, it helps him to remember it (as does the post it note on his monitor).

My boss provides the client with an accurate estimate of how long a project will take and how much it will cost *without* consulting me - afterall my boss must know better than me - otherwise he wouldn't be my boss.

Now do you see why I have little confidence in my boss. The only reason that any money is made is because my boss multiplies the number of paragraphs in the specification by ten and quotes for that many hours, shows it to me for about ten seconds and if I don't yelp sends it to the client, afterall we must be a forward looking proactively leveraged organisation.

Jar Jar, however, produces an interesting and perhaps revealing reaction.

The crows in Dumbo were later castigated for being racist stereotypes. OK, they were, in fact, black, and they did jive a bit.

The hyenas in Lion King got the same reaction. Well, Whoopi Goldberg did one of the voices, but then again, so did Bobcat Goldthwaite (sp?). I don't recall who played the third. Just why did anybody assume that they were meant to be caricatures of black people?

Jar Jar had a vaguely Jamaican lilt, and his ears or whatever they were kind of echoed dreds. His people lived in a pretty high-tech society, fought bravely, and had not been conquered by the "humans" (for lack of a better term to describe these folks -- either they weren't human, it wasn't a long time ago, or G. Lucas doesn't believe Darwin). "Slave" hardly seems apt, and yet many people seem to see either a slave everytime a character might be black, or a black everytime a character is a criminal.

Perhaps the fault lies in your lens and not Mr Lucas'.

I'm just curious--did you get sick of the character assassination of Dan Quayle

YES!

I'm a liberal democrat. I think of this as the politics of decency. I think it is hypocritical for liberals to collect material on Mr. Quayle with the intention of destroying his stature. Look -- Quayle had a talent for misstating himself, and while this may have been enough to disqualify him from high office it does not necessarily make him stupid. However, the press picked up on this and amplified it out of proportion; it turned him into a one dimensional caricature.

For some it as a political vendetta, but what it was really about was that the press likes a good story whether it gives a true picture of the man or not. Remember their depiction of Ted Kennedy in the 1980 election; you may hate Kennedy, but he is not a moron. In fact he is widely considered by his peers as one of the best parliamentarians on the Senate.

Gore has made a career out of having his gaffes under-reported. There was a great bit I recall seeing once--perh. in the National Review--which demonstrated that he may very well have had more moronicisms than Quayle.

Which goes to show how intellectually empty the excercise of reporting misstatements is. Gore is an exceptionally intelligent person, with a tremendous capacity for hard work, and superb memory for facts. However when you speak as a politician, you have to be on guard that nothing you say can be taken out of context and spliced together in a way that twists your meaning. No wonder all we get from politicians is emotionalistic gobbledygook.

In any case, if story gets out that a politican makes mistakes when he speaks extemporaneously, he's going to get exactly the same treatment. Quayle was crucified because he jumped onto stage (literally) as a young unknown and everyone questioned whether he had the weight to do the job. That stuff doesn't stick to Gore because the lazy media already has decided what the story is on him: hard working, but a cold fish -- too much intellect and not enough heart.

Me, I don't vote. It's a stupid way to select leaders. The majority don't know any more and are no more noble than a minority. Most people are twits. It's bread & circuses time folks.

You are horribly misquided on this one. It is true that if you can identify a minority of the population who are reliably intelligent, informed, reasonable and wise you could give over government to them. It is also true that if you can identify a minority of the population who are reliably intelligent, informed, reasonable and wise then the moon is made of green cheese -- a falsehood implies anything. If the history of the 20th century shows anything, it shows that governments that cannot be replaced by the people are extremely dangerous to them.

Not voting is volunteering to be a slave. Not voting because voters are stupid is volunteering to be a slave to stupid people.

If the public is uniformed, inform them. If they are ignorant, teach them. If they are foolish guide them.

Kant and Jesus were mystics, Mill is the one with the circular definition (the good is what is good for the most people).

You don't have a concept of natural rights, as the fact that you insisted "you had better have a damned good reason that benefits everyone more than it harms everyone". That's a utilitarian argument, and utilitarianism is directly opposed to natural rights. In natural rights theory, you cannot deny anyone a right no matter how many other people it benefits; that's what makes it a right.

And which moral theories, other than the ones I listed, have more influence on our society?

Now relativism. I agree that those three schools are the most powerful in modern definitions of morality. That doesn't make them right, and that doesn't mean their morality is moral.

All are based on the lack of intrinsic worth of the individual. A Christian is nothing before God, and is commanded to conform his will to God as a slave, even if his reason suggests another course of action. Kant, of course, wrote a "Critque of Pure Reason" that set up a straw man caricature of reason and then declared faith and religion superior the the caricature, and declared that morality is the denial of the self and serving others. Utilitarians will execute an innocent and harvest him for organs that could save a dozen other lives, since saving a dozen lives is of greater value than the innocent's right to life.

I am an advocate of the fourth school of morality influenceing modern thought, one that is strongest in the United States and weakening there. It is the school of the Enlightenment and of Locke and of Jefferson and of the Declaration of the Rights of Man. It is the doctrine of natural rights.

Steven E. Ehrbar

The problem here is that copyrights are NOT property. Property as defined in the traditional capitalist economic theory is forever

Wrong. All forms of capitalist theory except the most simplictic and caricatured have accepted the concept of property rights for limited times in numerous forms.

And it exists for one reason...It exists because one object cannot be owned by two persons at the same time. They cannot use it both.

Wrong. Labor creates property in the theories of Locke, Smith, and the Chicago and Austrian schools. It exists because you have a right to the products of your labor.

Please learn capitalist theory before you lecture about it.

Steven E. Ehrbar

> Nobody's saying that your kid can't read, watch, and play what he wants. If
> you want it that way, go to KMart yourself and buy it for him or her.

You are missing the mark by a mile or two. How am I to teach my kids to be free and use that freedom responsibly, if they're living in a very un-free country which requires them to "present their papers" to buy a CD, video game, or film? That's what this is about. Making a parent go up to the counter and buy a video game for a 16 year old, as if he were a child of 5 instead of a young adult, sends a message to that teenager: you're a child; we may say you're a young adult, but that's just lip service since you have no more rights than a 5 year old; if you hurt someone we can try you as an adult, and put you in adult prison, and you have all the responsibilities of an adult--but you have *NO* adult rights, even though the responsibilities are yours; you have no rights; you are property, unable to make any decisions for yourself, your parents must make all decisions for you; your parents matter, you do not. You may not think it sends that message, but it does: ask teenagers about it, since they have a perspective different from yours.

Now, it would be impossible--*IMPOSSIBLE*--for me to treat my teenager as a young adult if I have to go to the counter with him to buy him a CD or video game. All of a sudden, he's being treated *exactly* like he's five years old, and all my work is ruined. Way to instill self-confidence and self-sufficiency in someone, oh wise society.

That's not even bringing up the issue of rights and fairness. If someone is expected to behave as an adult, he should be given the rights and privileges attendant upon those responsibilities. To do any less is a gross unfairness. I find it revolting and disgusting that we can and do try and sentence young teens as adults, and yet we don't give them any adult rights whatsoever. A fifteen-year-old, legally, has no more rights than a five-year-old, and yet has far more legal and social responsibilities. there is something quite wrong with that.

> (Of course,
> you have other things to do than that, and couldn't be bothered to take any
> responsibility for your views by taking some action.)

On the contrary, I am clearly much more able and willing to be involved in raising my children than you are. After all, I have thought out the implications of treating them like children when they are no longer mere children, but young adults; and you seem content to treat teenagers like second-graders with no regard for their maturing process and self-esteem. And, I take as much action as I can to make sure my kids will grow to be adults in a world which is friendly to them--I write and have published in actual print media articles about the troubles facing teens these days, most of which come from parents and other adults who are well-meaning but misguided.

Let's look at the immediate issue, though; if stores card everyone for video games and CDs with mature content, and therefore either parents or older kids have to buy such materials for their teenage kids, what are the effects?

1) I and other parents who actually desire to treat our teenagers as young adults, in an effort to nurture responsibility and self-worth, will be unable to avoid treating our teens like they're five years old whenever they want a video game or CD. Of course, this sends our kids the same message we try so hard not to give them, and it can't be avoided.

2) *Your* teens, whom you wish to treat like immature little kids instead of nurturing their growing minds and self-consciousness, will still get the games and music you don't want them to by having older kids get them or by playing them at friends' houses. Your kids won't like you because you're an overbearing bastard who tries to give them all the responsibilities of adulthood but NONE of the rights and privileges.

Nothing truly constructive, in other words. Now, compare that to what heppens without such restrictions:

1) Progressives like me have one less thing to worry about in raising our teens.

2) Teenagers may still be put upon and held back by clueless parents, overbearing administrators, and some fellow classmates, but at least the video game store/CD store/arcade is one less place that they're treated like five-year-olds whose opinions and self-esteem are worthless.

3) People like you will have to actually *parent* instead of letting retailers do it for you, but you can still have control over what your kids bring into your house. If you find a contraband copy of Diablo 2, throw it away and chastise your teen.

4) As with the other list above, your kids can still see all the video game violence and arcade sexuality they want--by going over to the houses of friends with more progressive parents. Like, well, my house. ;-) That's the way it's always been; kids will see what they want to see, regardless of what the parents want.

So, we can clearly see that censorship-at-the-store helps no one, and hurts parents who actually trust and nurture their children.

> You can disagree with KMart
> and WalMart all you want, but saying that they should share your views is

I don't say they should share my views; I say they shouldn't share *yours*. Retailers should be parenting-neutral; it isn't their job to make decisions for anyone's kids, mine or yours. *Yours* is the only opinion that would have corporations making parenting decisions for us, not mine.

> unfounded arrogance on your part,

Well, I already disputed this above, but on a side note: yes, I'm arrogant, but my arrogance is well-founded. Unlike you, I've actually read most of the best, most recent literature on adolescent development. Unlike you, I care more about raising teenagers to be healthy and completely developed adults, rather than in misguidedly exposing them only to things which I personally approve of 100% and attempting to shield them from the world.

> that's shared by most of your clueless slashdot colleagues.

I disagree with a lot of people on /. when it comes to tech matters. What can I say, I don't think Windows is so bad, because it's so functional and easy to use. But I share the more progressive views which the majority of /.ers tend to hold. After all, a lot of people here were geeks in high school who played video games or roleplaying games or got into violent films as a relief of tensions that geeks above most others are subject to. As such, we can understand better than you can what it's like to be a stressed teenager, and how cathartic such release valves are. Without them, many teens would become the next Eric Harris. Is that what you want? No? Then stop being selfish and start to think about what teenagers need, instead of thinking about what you personally dislike.

> If graphical depictions of violence are considered good psychological
> replacements for actually dealing with you problems, or even are treated as
> a generic escape route, then I think that there's a problem, and it's not
> KMart's.

That's your opinion, and you're welcome to it; but it's an unfounded opinion and you shouldn't try to force it upon everyone else. Every single human being is an escapist--why else do we dream? Without dreams, we cannot function. If you allow a person to sleep as long as he wants, but wake him briefly whenever REM sleep indicates he's ready to dream, you'll have a very agitated and unhelthy person in short order. This has been proven by clinical studies. For whatever reason, we need to dream. We need that escape. Video games perhaps serve a similar function--we exercise our reflexes in ways we can't in day-to-day life, but which were common in our primordial days; we exorcise our violent impulses, which otherwise would stay bottled up inside us until they flare up IRL; we can be powerful, important characters in video and roleplaying games, to make up for the lack of power and importance which plague so many teenage lives.

Using games as a cathrsis doesn't mean that you're not solving your problems IRL; but often there are problems in real life which we cannot solve. For example, when society gets medieval with teenagers and starts treating them like little children, as in the present example of restricting the purchase of simple games, there's little a teenager can do about it. He can complain all he wants, but sadly enough, adults won't listen to him because too many of them are as thoughtless as you are.

> ...the majority of parents have some ideas of what they do and don't want
> their kids to see, and appreciate a policy that agrees with them.

Yes, but the majority are often wrong. That's why the founders of our country and its Constitution used phrases like "the tyranny of the majority" and "the rights of the minority." Just because a majority of parents--and I don't think it's anywhere near a majority, but for the sake of the argument--have an opinion does not mean that they have the right to violate the rights of other parents and the rights of teens. Sadly enough, though, in legal terms teenagers have few rights--not much more than young children do, and that's not right. Just because the majority desires something doesn't make it right; in fact, the majority is typically wrong. That's why there are so many safeguards in the Constitution against tyranny of the ignorant masses, like the Electoral College. Who should be making decisions, smart people (the minority) or average people (the majority)? And, before you answer, realize that the "average" person can't locate South America on a globe, or learn to use Windows without calling tech support *a lot*.

> The rest of your paragraph is a fine argument that
> unrestricted access is ideal, but it misses the point. KMart is taking reasonable
> actions to fit in to the society that it caters to.

If indeed unrestricted access is ideal, you should support it. "Society," though I hate to use such a blanket term here, should be changed through education if it's wrong, and ignored if it won't listen. After all, what makes the U.S. fairly unique is not the rule of the majority, but the respect we maintain for the rights of the minority. So, if unrestricted access is, as you say, ideal, then that's the way it should be.

> ...And anyone that's going to "snap" because they're denied their video games
> has mental problems anyway

Where have you been lately, my friend? Most teenagers have mental problems--or at least what society chooses to call mental problems. A very significant portion of the teenage population are permanently medicated--why, you can't walk into a classroom these days without finding someone who'd at least on Ritalin, if not anti-depressants. Personally, I chalk most of these "mental problems" up to being merely symptoms of adolescence and the emotional intensities that are always a part of it. Many doctors agree that Ritalin is definitely over-prescribed. I've also known teenagers on Zoloft and Wellbutrin. Most of them should not be. But, most teenagers have clinically diagnosable "mental problems" like depression. But largely they're just part of growing up. It's sad that we medicate our teenagers to remove the symptoms of adolescence, but we do.

> Everyone has limits on what they're allowed to do.

Yes, but in the U.S. we have far too many. That would be why the only country with a larger percentage of its population in prison is Russia. That's very telling and hideous. "The more corrupt the state, the more numerous the laws"--Tacitus, *The Annals*

> Teenagers have a few more; they always have in our society.

True, and many of the "extra" limitations are necessary. But new ones are not. Unfortunately, every year we oppress teenagers more. Legally enforced curfews--in my city, a teenager can't legally spend the night in a friend's house, even if they stay indoors all night, without written parental consent. WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT ABOUT?!? In Michigan(?) a 16 year old boy was found guilty of statutory rape and subject to the sex offender registry for having consensual sex with his 14 year old girlfriend. That's *wrong*, and would never have happened even during the height of the Reagan morality police. Kids are now being profiled in schools by FBI software. We have tried 11 year old kids as adults and given them life in prison for murders which they quite frankly could not have understood--no rehabilitation, they're just thrown away. Our young people are at risk--from their elders. This video game business may be a relatively minor thing, but it's one more thing which should be stopped, one more thing which goes over the line. A small evil is still an evil.

> Learning to live with that is part of growing up.

No, for all the kids I knew growing up and know now as an adult, learning to get around those rules is part of growing up. After all, when I was a kid, movie theaters didn't even card for R-rated movies--the ratings were a "suggestion" and not enforced. And now, I can't buy a damned cigar without being carded even though I look about 34 with my beard and all. We are becoming a pathetic country in which no one is free anymore. I remember back in the 80s we used to say that what separated us from the Soviets was that a Russian had to show his papers everywhere he goes, and an American could go wherever he wanted to and no one would question him about it. Now, we have to show our papers as much as anyone in the Soviet Union ever had to. And we treat our teenagers like they aren't even people. in 20 years, America has gone from being the soul and savior of the world, to being a mocked and ridiculed and hated caricature. Our children are failing because we've failed to protect them by guaranteeing basic rights.

> BTW: Great song, great Lyrics, and great point, but completely irrelevant

If you think so. But I think it's the whole point. It's why Columbine and Jonesboro happened. Violent video games didn't do it; boxing our teenagers in, treating them like veal, did.

--Fesh
"Citizens have rights. Consumers only have wallets." - gilroy

Couple things:

Almost all of the cartoons and anime is created for the express purpose of selling toys. Ever notice how Bandai and Hasbro (or whoever they are now stateside) produce a boatload of animation and have the toys on the shelves before it even hits the airwaves?

Also, a note on censorship on cartoon network: I've noticed (assuming that many of you have not) that a whole lot is cut out of nearly every DBZ episode.. of course this is usually crazy death, destruction, japanese humor (that they assume the 15-year-old audience wont understand), and vulgarity (not to mention assorted swearing).

Personally, I cant even watch Tenchi on cartoon network because I know they have carved the storyline to pieces so that they can insert 8 min of commercials and translated ineffectively so that the voice "talent" can speak on queue. Anyway, it bothers me.

I suppose I'm just one of those purists that likes to watch fansubs instead of commercially produced anime. Quality over quantity. :/

Maybe someone should write an article (because I know no one will ask me to) on how repressed cable tv is in its current state. I'm <b> paying </b>for the privilege of watching premium television, and I'm being delivered a caricature of the original work.

I think there's something wrong with that.

- 0 -

I had to test the Slashdot Emergency Response System, didn't I?

Thanks for spotting that, now fixed. If only I could remember how to spell his name, I could win on final jeopardy in the year 2018. (under "apparently misinterpreted famous software caricatures of evil")

timothy

Nobody wants to censor advertisers - they are welcome to put up a web page with their advertisements for those who are interested. However, they aren't welcome to use my network to send me their content without my request (and neither are the publishers of those other types of content). Also, they shouldn't be sending me ads when I really requested music, for instance.

As a separate issue, I don't feel that the information necessarily wants to be free if it is copyrighted. It is a caricature to say that all /.ers feel that way - they are just the most vocal about their opinions.

I just finished this book myself. It's well worth reading. It's well written and extremely funny in places.

However, you shouldn't read it for the author's critical view of the culture in Silicon Valley. She either doesn't understand most of what she's talking about, or (more likely) is too concerned about keeping her writing lively to spend much time on nuances. She spends most of the book setting up a series of straw men, each based on a wild caricature, and burning each in effigy. She doesn't often meet the opposition head-on. She tends to sideswipe, then move on before the reader notices that she hasn't really inflicted much real damage.

So why should you read this book? Because it's a fascinating, although unintended, glimpse into the way the Progressive subculture views, and pretty much completely misunderstands, the Valley subculture. If you ever tune in to Pacifica Radio, and wonder where their strange and schizophrenic ideas about high tech come from, this is a good place to start. If you've ever been on a blind date with an Arts student who seemed half afraid of you, you will know why after reading this book. (It has to do with geeks' well-known fascination with S&M---if you don't believe me, just read the book.) If you wonder why ex-hippy waitresses in Santa Cruz coffee shops react so strangely to your Cisco teeshirt, the explanation for that is probably here too.

Biochemists aren't the best ones to come to for opinions about evolution, since they look at complex chemical pathways in near isolation. It's their job, after all, to isolate things like the Krebs Cycle or RNA transcription, and not to figure out how such a pathway could come from something less complex or to try understanding the similarities between pathways and surmise that they could have been the result of the divergence of a common pathway. You don't say you're a graduate student, but you claim to be about to graduate with a degree in biochemistry from a "top school" without naming it. You also use terms like "intelligent design" after trashing, without attribution, caricatures of biological teachings. You sound like a garden-variety creationist trying to sneak in under the radar and hoping nobody will notice, and I suspect that the "top school" you're about the "graduate" from is the Institute for Creation Research's phony graduate school. For those interested in the actual facts, I suggest http://www.talkorigins.org as an excellent starting place.

I used to know a lot of people in college who were fanatical about Ayn Rand. Then they grew up. I've yet to meet a Randite who thought they were anything short of exceptional.

I've read a lot of posts on slashdot and elsewhere from pompous Rand naysayers, who almost always seem compelled to throw in gratuitous ad hominems and a generous sprinkling of "Randite." These posts usually amount to one or two anecdotal references to "people I knew in college." I've read only a few that even attempted a real argument--most attempted to use logic to prove the non-existence of logic.

Real live humans are much more diverse and complex than Rand's caricatures, and the difference really does matter. The simplistic half-solutions offered by Rand share a fatal flaw with earlier simplistic solutions inspired (ironically) by Marx, which is that they work only for cartoon characters. Bill Gates is the closest real-life approximation to a Rand "hero", and I don't think we need more of him.

Rand's fiction is Romantic, and she made no pretense otherwise. Her heroes were intended to present the ideal, not real life.

If you think Bill Gates is anything like one of Rand's heroes then you've missed the point of all her work. If Gates is anything like any of Rand's characters, he's a Peter Keating or Gail Wynand--a "second-hander," not a hero--whose wealth has been created by selling inferior technology with slick marketing and heavy-handed tactics. A monopoly does not an Objectivist hero make.

I used to know a lot of people in college who were fanatical about Ayn Rand. Then they grew up. I've yet to meet a Randite who thought they were anything short of exceptional. Every last one cherished the fantasy that they were a Roark or a Galt, that their lack of stunning success in life was because they were surrounded by "leeches", and that under the right circumstances their utter superiority would become manifest and incontrovertible. It's a seductive daydream, particularly to nerds who have raised escapism to an art form, but it's no more than that.

Real live humans are much more diverse and complex than Rand's caricatures, and the difference really does matter. The simplistic half-solutions offered by Rand share a fatal flaw with earlier simplistic solutions inspired (ironically) by Marx, which is that they work only for cartoon characters. Bill Gates is the closest real-life approximation to a Rand "hero", and I don't think we need more of him.

Let's assume that music distributed electronically by whatever means becomes so widespread that big labels will no longer be able to make money from them.

Does this mean the end of the big label?

Hell, no. TheTomcat is absolutely correct in stating that record labels act as screening agents and production and project managers. These activities give them access to the big media distribution centers (radio, TV, etc). Since they'll no longer be able to make money on CDs, their only other option lies in making money through their artists' personal likeness and popularity.

Case in point: How many products is Britney Speaks hawking? How many things have her name on it that someone receives a royalty for? Can she even give her autograph to anyone she wants? Don't scoff, some baseball players CAN'T. Today, professional sports players can make more money with product endorsements. Will the same be true of musicians? In a few years, will all the "popular" artists just be flashy caricatures with an 18 month product life cycle? Think how easy that will be to manage! Get a few good-looking boys from some backstreet neighborhoods (Hey, that's a great name, "Backstreet Boys"), tell them to sign on the dotted line and they will become famous - as an added bonus throw in $50,000 to sweeten the deal (more money than they're ever known). Now put them on the road, manage them, write songs for them and rake in the dough. As an added insurance policy, secretly train another group to take their place in case things don't work out and they decide their plans don't need to be in sync (hey, another great name, "In Sync") with yours. Now that's a cool business plan. I wonder if it would work????

If an artist wants to make millions of dollars, be prepared to sell out. There is no way to avoid it. Big money attracts more big money. Sure there might be some corporate interests that want to see you make big money, but only if they can too. Not to say anyone should starve, but I would think that an artist can better communicate his or her own ideas without having to look over his or her shoulder for the corporate censor.

Perhaps the internet will allow new styles and artists to flourish. There is a need for originality now more than ever before. New ideas mean new possibilities. I'm sure there's a place for individual music distribution right along side the big labels.

Seriously, can you imagine Gendarme Ludovic Cruchot pulling off what you're implying?

That must be the French strategy... export lots of comical caricatures of your police and in the meantime build up your secret police into an international menace. Much like Canada.

=)

--

' I like having the "geek industry" dominated by males. '

*nod*. What I think is worthwhile pointing out is that these people who say "look everyone, the geek industry isn't 50% male/female, there's something wrong here" really don't know fsck-all. They start from the assumption that what works for members of one sex works for the other and say "all probabilities are 50%". Er....
What's *wrong* with there being an uneven distribution of skill level, interest, suitability, whatever, between the sexes?
(Stereotypical caricature alert: I wouldn't "go for" a woman into chopping trees and I would be surprised if all females on the planet "went for" guys who knitted and sew!!)

~Tim
--
.|` Clouds cross the black moonlight,

I still believe that the two extreme fundamentalists (from Arkansas, no less) are
caricatures and stereotypes rather than genuine
religious extremists.

The really great thing about most of the fundies I've met is that they ARE charicatures of an Xtian fundamentalist.

Being a fundamentalist Xtian, in the cases I'm familiar with, involves adherance to doctrine - and the sterotype of a fundie is someone who blindly obeys said doctrines.

I haven't read the book, but I don't see any problems at all with that particular characterization.

Being a somewhat liberal evangelical Christian, I personally know quite a few people who can be fairly characterized as religious extremists -- and they definitely would not take the actions that the book's characters take. So the subplot concerning them is weak.

Heh.. this just makes me giggle.

--
blue, slashdotting for spirituality without religion.

Unfortunately, there is a different paradigm at work when it comes to Art.

Art is created in the Cathedral, by big-name Artists, as a one-of-a-kind expression of that Artist's vision (like Sistine Chapel). Artists tend to keep hush about their Art until it is completed. Artists want to get paid for their Art. Artists also feel that they "own" their Art in perpetuity. They don't like people making changes in their Art, even if the Artist gets credit for the original work.

There is another product, similar to Art, which is produced in the Bazaar. The people who produce this product are called Artisans. Artisans also create art, but do so without the feeling that their art is proprietary. Think of the 1-minute caricature artist or the person who mass-produces cheap landscape paintings or the sidewalk chalk artist. The Artisan simply produces works-for-hire. Once the work is finished and sold (or given away) the Artisan is also finished.

Most software programmers see themselves as Artisans. However, most artists see themselves as Artists. More unfortunately, Artists see Artisans either as hacks or as artists who have sold out.

The problem is: how do we convince current Artists and aspiring artists to become Artisans? Or, is there something fundamentally different about Art such that it can never be commoditized?

Ben