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Slashback: Drives, Errors, Copyright
Spin control for some IBM drives? If you are one ofthe people who have the same results with IBM 75GXP hard drives that Sean Kelly did when he posed a recent Ask Slashdot, you may be interested in this report from legLess, who writes: "Pair Networks is swapping out every IBM 75GXP hard drive they have "[b]ased on an amazingly high failure rate." Pair is a big host: 114,000 sites all running on FreeBSD 4.1.1, including cdrom.com and Tom's Hardware. "We currently use and recommend Maxtor drives" they say. Big black eye for IBM."
GNU isn't Linux, either. Amid the stream of recent and upcoming software releases (Suse 7.3, Red Hat 7.2, Qt 3.0), it's sometimes easy for projects with smaller followings or more esoteric goals to get lost. BorrisYeltsin writes: "The Debian HURD iso images are now available from your local ftp.gnu.org mirror. There are 3 iso's available, so get downloading now!" (And read through the recent months' on the HURD Kernel Cousin too.)
Update: 10/16 14:20 GMT by T : Please note that the GNU Project maintains a list of ftp mirrors -- look for one local to you for best results all around :)
Placing warning signs along the road to consumerism brigc writes: "Good interview in the Chronicle of Higher Education with Jessica Litman about changes in the copyright arena since the publication of her book.
For those who were asleep, Litman's book 'Digital Copyright' does a good job of discussing why the copyright process got handed over to the industry and Congress has failed to protect the rights of the public."
Litman's book got a rave review from Michael a few months back; I suggest you check it out, and better yet ask you local library to put it up on display. Libraries have a strong vested interest in not ceding all control to copyright holders forever and ever amen.
It might pay to have a big fat mouth and ask for a refund on defective merchandise, too. anonicon writes: "Here's a heads up to the web site I'm running at http://www.fatchucks.com. I've started both a Corrupt CDs list for people who wish to report 'copy-protected' CDs or find out which ones they are, and an Indie Rec for people who want to recommend independent artists to the public. Thank you."
I was planning on upgrading my own small servers with some of these drives, but have also made the switch to Matrox. I grew up the son of an IBM company man, who had great pride in IBM. This pride was passed down to me, and I've always trusted IBM for quality and dependability when it came to hardware for "Business Machines"... this is not just a black eye for IBM, but an end of an era.
Does anyone else have any anecdotal evidence of IBM drive problems? For all we know, Pair is just damned unlucky.
The copyright holders have always been allowed to stop fair use copying, by contract or by taking technological steps to prevent the copying. Fair use merely prevents them from using section 106 of the Copyright Act to stop copying.
Actually, IIRC, Metallica does exactly that; they allow (and I think even encourage) their fans to make and trade concert recordings. They felt (reasonably, IMO) that they had a fan-friendly view of copying and trading songs, and really exploded only when they found out that one of their works in progress was being traded online. That's why they phrased so many of their complaints in terms of protecting their artistic integrity; they felt that the public trading of a song that they hadn't finished yet got in the way of their ability to change it further.
There's no point in questioning authority if you aren't going to listen to the answers.
Personally I believe that the best way to do it is to allow free recording of every show that an artist puts out. A devout fan is more likely to BUY a studio album if they can already get a taste of what the band is capable of on stage.
:) There are many other artists like this, Dave is just one of them.
Dave Matthews does exactly that. He allows recorders at his shows and allows his music to be freely traded/swapped/copied/etc. He's ok with people making CD's out of his shows and selling them (including those shows he makes into albums). He's ok with people making MP3s (and other formats) out of his albums and shows and then placing them on p2p services.
Why does he do this? His philosophy is that of a Jazz musician (his music has an element of Jazz to it, btw) (i shouldnt really be singling out jazz, a lot of other types of musicians are the same way). They like their music to be listened to and enjoyed, not the monetary value they get in return. That philosophy is very similar to programmers who contribute to Open Source projects.
You are correct by saying a devout fan buys music - I have all of Dave's CDs
The One Rule Of Chess You'll Ever Need: Don't play someone who carries a kit in their bookbag.
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GNU/HURD should indeed be called just GNU, since it's the GNU OS proper; RMS said recently in a mailing-list that although this is the case one should use GNU/HURD whenever there is need to differenciate (e.g. "Debian GNU" would be awkward and misleading, hence GNU/Linux and GNU/HURD). Apart from that, the HURD is indeed GNU (since the kernel is part of the GNU system there is no need to use GNU/HURD, unlike GNU/Linux where there is such a need).
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Usability: how many people have actually tried installing and running GNU/HURD? From the comments, not a lot... Sure, there are still several things missing, but the concept of the HURD is elegant and interesting enough to make it worthwhile... the fundamental servers are already done, many interesting translators are done and others being developed (think for example of the ftp translator... that give system wide transparent FTP, with no modification on any user program...). All the gnu shell and text utils are there, and so is Emacs and hundrends of other programs, including XFree. I wouldn't call this 'useless'...
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Some limitations and shortcomings are still there, and some of them probably give the appearance of a slowdown in development (threads, the 1GB limit for the partitions that the it can handle and the ppp code); this will be hopefully soon solved (I would say very soon). The truth is that, apart from the hardware support - that will be greatly improved with oskit-mach - and some programs that depend on libs that are hard to port everything is available. I can browse the web on GNU/HURD; I can program in GNU/HURD; I can do huge ammounts of important stuff while using GNU/HURD, and all this without even going for HURD specific features that are very intriging and useful (again, servers and translators come to mind... check the GNU/HURD website for info on all this.
Instalation and packaging is pure Debian, so nobody should have major problems (always keeping in mind that it's still being developed).All in all I'm very pleased with the status of it and the possibilities it gives (and the ones that are to follow).
Try it; get involved; you could just come to like it.
What happened to giving credit where credit is due? RMS claims the name of a system should be GNU/Linux because you can't run Linux without GNU tools. You sure as shit can't run the HURD without a microkernel - so it should be the Mach/HURD.
Take the example of my best friend. He owns TWO copies of every Metallica CD up to the Napster fiasco. One copy of every cassette tape up to then. 4 or 5 posters, up to then. 5 or 6 T-shirts. A baseball cap. He was The World's Biggest Metallica Fan, all caps, in stereo. He was also the second-biggest Napster user I ever met. Then came the Napster Fiasco, and he got banned for an mp3 of No-Leaf Clover, found on his machine, *ripped off his own legitimate CD and not available for downloads*. Result?
;-) Second, he dropped Metallica cold, and hates their guts today, Lars in particular. He gets a grim satisfaction from anti-metallica sites like killmetallica.com. He is now one of the biggest Metallica HATERS I know. There is no evidence that his Napster use ever cost them a dime, and he must have spent hundreds on them over the years. Would have spent hundreds more if he'd remained a fan. Now, nothing.
Well, first he hacked his way out of the ban like any self-respecting music fan.
Talk about your Operation: Footbullets.
This is not about fan's respect. A fan who likes a band is MORE likely to share its music. Metallica was all in favor of tape trading back in the day, when they were little. We haven't forgotten, Lars, even if fame has made you forget. Face it - this is about money, and about destroying those fair-use rights that cut in on corporate profit. Nothing more, nothing less.
-Kasreyn
P.S. Doubly ironic, they banned him for a reallu sUxx0r song like No Leaf Clover, when there were also mp3's of Master of Puppets, Orion, One, etc...
Kasreyn: Cheerfully playing the part of Devil's Advocate to hairtrigger
Linux was not devised to be GNU; therefore it is not GNU. Nevermind the fact that it contains components from GNU. Other operating systems contain GNU components, and yet they are not GNU either.
-russ
Don't piss off The Angry Economist
I hate the idea of copy-protected CDs (and personally I will not buy them) but I have a feeling we won't have a choice. Boycotting them won't work (try boycotting any chain, etc) it is HIGHLY unlikely that numbers of bought CDs will drop in any significant amount. (Just as they haven't dropped due to Napster, Gnutella, whatever).
Actually....
So quickly we forget the details. It's kinda sad in a way.
I remember seeing something on CNN in early 2000 right when the Napster lawsuits were filed and/or aired to the general public as a whole. The news went something like this:
"The RIAA has filed a lawsuit against Napster, the online music-sharing service, due to it's ability to facilitate piracy of music and potential to cripple sales.
"In other news, CD sales this quarter are up almost 20%, a near-record quarter for the music industry."
The teeny little smirk of irony that the guy let slip through spoke volumes for those that saw it.
Very shortly afterwards, hundreds of people started boycotting the RIAA by refusing to purchase CDs released by RIAA member labels. Everyone was outraged by the total ridiculousness of the charges in the lawsuit and by God they were going to DO something about it!
And you know what? It worked. Unfortunately, because it was such a grassroots and spontaneous choice by hundreds and even thousands of individuals, nobody bothered to tell the MEDIA that people were boycotting the RIAA. And so it backfired on us.
Whatsernutz, the RIAA's Head Hatchetwoman... er... spokeswoman, that is, pointed to CD sales in 2001 being down even further than usual to points much lower than in the past two to three years as proof that Napster and other music-sharing services ARE hurting the industry. Never mind the fact that the major player - Napster - has been stopped cold, with no way to trade anything over it. Never mind that online music piracy has been reduced, effectively, to that of pre-Napster levels. CD sales are slipping. They know why, and can even truthfully say that it's because of Napster. They just haven't bothered to tell anyone that, hey, it's because we SUED Napster that they're slipping. The cause is Napster, but not in the way that they want everyone to think.
And nobody's bothered to point this out to the Media, the courts, or the world at large.
So you say that it's highly unlikely that a boycott would do any good. I say that you're right, but not for the same reasons. Boycotts are USELESS if the public isn't made aware of them. The number of CDs purchased in the past year HAS dropped significantly, and as of right now, it's only filling their ammo bins. We need someone to step up and tell people that the reason CD sales are slipping is because the people who buy the majority of music aren't buying anymore in protest. And it needs to be someone famous - or at least vaguely well-known - and respected.
Just some food for thought for all of ya.
You thought that this sig was what you think that I thought you wanted me to think. I think.
What is so frigging hard to understand? We have the "right" (I thought they *were* rights, but whatever the permission is called...) to format-shift. We have the right to time-shift. They (for now) have the right to make it hard for us to do these things.
Mutual exclusivity aside, until the Supremes do something about it, we still have fair-use rights.
What we don't have is the right to distribute copies. There's a big difference. I don't care if 90% of burner owners use them with illegal MP3's. That doesn't mean I do, or that I should be further deprived of my fair-use rights.
GTRacer
- Stop the insanity!
Defending IP by destroying access to it? That makes sense, RIAA/MPAA. Go to the corner until you can play nice!