Posted by
chrisd
on from the taking-your-toys-apart-to-see-how-they-work dept.
shaikeiro writes "A fine
article in the Economist about Ed Felten and what he is up to now. Also a good summary of what "freedom to tinker" means. From the article: "Thus, the freedom to tinker ends up being about the freedom of culture."" Are you a member of the EFF yet?
Thought this seemed familiar, I read it nearly three months ago in the print edition.
Still, he makes some very good points. Have a look at the news story below to read about the 5-year jailterm Champion Of The People Fritz 'they named an evil chip after me' Hollings and others are trying to get you if you dare to tinker. How do people who work against the interests of the people who elected them so continue to get elected?
Thoughts on the subject
by
Diabolical
·
· Score: 5, Informative
All of the arguments given in the article is well known by many of the audience targeted by this article. However, most of them allready discarded the idea. A company isn't interested in someone improving on their products. They want to be the only one owning all rights to that device or software because that's how they make their money. They aren't concerned with cultural or social implications. That's not their issue. They want to secure as much marketshare as possible before some new technology becomes available that could replace their product.
What would be an issue though is that increasingly, corporations seek out the help of their paid representatives to get their agenda legalised. And that's where law should stop. It should not be a responsibility of lawmakers to protect large corporations. They should invent or create other ways, within legal boundaries of course, to protect their income. Laws should be made to protect the individual as much as possible against not only other individuals as well as against organisations who are just planning to seperate ones money from ones wallet.
It is not just the US who has these issues at hand. The European Union as well, is facing these same problems. Lots of/. people who aren't US based believe these issues are only a problem in the US. Well.. it's not. The EU has shown time after time they are very capable of making the same mistakes as the US government does. Wether it is because they so fondly want to shape another worldpower or that they are too lazy to come up with decent laws and rules i'll leave in the eye of the beholder.
Fact is we must react quickly on these kind of issues before even that right has been removed from us. Not just in the US but in the entire world.
Slashdot Mirror
Thought this seemed familiar, I read it nearly three months ago in the print edition.
t op
Still, he makes some very good points. Have a look at the news story below to read about the 5-year jailterm Champion Of The People Fritz 'they named an evil chip after me' Hollings and others are trying to get you if you dare to tinker. How do people who work against the interests of the people who elected them so continue to get elected?
http://news.com.com/2100-1023-956811.html?tag=fd_
All of the arguments given in the article is well known by many of the audience targeted by this article. However, most of them allready discarded the idea. A company isn't interested in someone improving on their products. They want to be the only one owning all rights to that device or software because that's how they make their money. They aren't concerned with cultural or social implications. That's not their issue. They want to secure as much marketshare as possible before some new technology becomes available that could replace their product.
/. people who aren't US based believe these issues are only a problem in the US. Well.. it's not. The EU has shown time after time they are very capable of making the same mistakes as the US government does. Wether it is because they so fondly want to shape another worldpower or that they are too lazy to come up with decent laws and rules i'll leave in the eye of the beholder.
What would be an issue though is that increasingly, corporations seek out the help of their paid representatives to get their agenda legalised. And that's where law should stop. It should not be a responsibility of lawmakers to protect large corporations. They should invent or create other ways, within legal boundaries of course, to protect their income. Laws should be made to protect the individual as much as possible against not only other individuals as well as against organisations who are just planning to seperate ones money from ones wallet.
It is not just the US who has these issues at hand. The European Union as well, is facing these same problems. Lots of
Fact is we must react quickly on these kind of issues before even that right has been removed from us. Not just in the US but in the entire world.