Slashdot Mirror
20 Lawmakers Want to Kill Your Television
Macki writes "As previously mentioned, the Broadcast Flag is back before congress. There are 20 law makers currently supporting the bill. The insane thing about it is the fact that no one supports the bill except a handful of entertainment companies. Probably not even the employees of the entertainment companies. It's bad enough they want to break our televisions, but the way that they are subverting democracy is just astounding. Danny O'Brien at the EFF has done a spectacular job deconstructingthe MPAA/RIAA's efforts to ramrod this through, and more importantly, the motivations of the members of congress who are helping them."
Because that's 20 lawmakers who were either bought out by the industry, or are clueless about technology in a technological age. In either case, they can heavily influence their cohorts. It can (not saying it will) be a viral effect.
It's bad enough they want to break our televisions, but the way that they are subverting democracy is just astounding
Okay, now with this issue there might be an exception here, but there is a reason we don't have a true democracy in the United States: people are stupid. That's why we pick representatives to do the voting for us. It's not because it would be inconvenient to have a popular vote on every issue, it's because the framers were smart enough not to trust the public with such power.
Think of all the things that the majority of people in the U.S. hold as being a "good thing" for the country that would probably end up being disasterous. If slavery and civil rights were held to a popular vote, there's a good chance the laws never would have passed.
So please, before you trash Congress for against "the will of the people," bear in mind that is exactly why Congress exists; so that when the time is appropriate, Congress can go against the majority of the people in order to protect the minority.
I make no claim as to the application of my statements to this particular article. Just a general remark about the issue raised by the article summary.
What?
For me, like for many people here, TV is already dead.
I'll do it for cheesy poofs.
Haven't had a TV for the past 10 years, and I'm still alive. Who'd care to watch this bullshit anyway. TV is insulting to any sane person's intelligence.
The number of people who support a piece of legislation is irrelivant in terms of whether a law is right or wrong. At some point in our nation's history it was only a handful of people who wanted to:
There are plenty of reasons not to vote for this law, but that line of reasoning isn't one of them.
(fyi, do not mistake this comment as support for the law)
Reason, free market capitalism, and individualism
"Never get between an American and his TV set." If Congress passes this bill, there will be hell to pay.
If someone says he and his monkey have nothing to hide, they almost certainly do.
We may be a motivated army of geeks, but we're no match for American apathy.
It won't be until Bubba goes out and buys one of those nice new Sony DVD writing PVR's and he tries to save his lastest [Nascar race | Jerry Springer | Reality TV show] to DVD that the broadcast flag will hit him in the face.
Then suddenly the shit will hit the fan and it'll be too late.
Yes Francis, the world has gone crazy.
The broadcast flag won't do a thing to break your TV. Your TV shouldn't have to care one way or the other about the thing.
What this breaks is your PVR, by making it unlawful for Best Buy (or whoever) to sell you one that will record something they don't want you to. That doesn't stop you watching TV.
So they're not killing your home entertainment centre per se, just transporting it back to those lovely 1970s, where video recorders don't exist and the only way to watch something is to do so when they want to broadcast it. Which is pretty rubbish, admittedly.
"I Know You Are But What Am I?"
If you're a do-it-yourselfer like me, those days are quickly coming to an end in the US. They don't want a producer society, they want a consumer society. It's good for their pockets. But they are not going to be able to stop people with the intelligence to be able to do this stuff on their own. The GNU Radio Project is a perfect example. It might eventually be "illegal" but for no good reason other than the supposed protection of intellectual property which is also a crock. I plan to be experimenting with this stuff myself since... science is not a crime.
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
TV makes you fat, lazy and stupid, so maybe it's a blessing in disguise if they want to kill it.
On a personal note, I probably watched about 10 hours of TV last year. Have more time for gym and books, though.
"How long could any of us stay at a company if we consistently opposed our bosses ideas?"
In an idealistic world people would not work for a company whose ideals conflict with personal interests.
In the real world people will do almost anything to get paid.
It's easy to walk out on a job when you live in your Mom's basement.
It's not so easy when you work in a tight job market and have a family to support.
You write letters, as in black print on white paper, in a real envelope, with a real stamp, to your Congresscritters, explaining that you oppose this, you think it is a really bad idea, and you want them to vote AGAINST it.
You send three letters, at a minimum: one to each Senator from your state, and one to the Congressman who represents you.
You get all your friends to do the same thing.
E-mail WON'T CUT IT. They KNOW that e-mail takes no effort, compared to sending an actual physical letter.
If any of the Congresscritters sponsoring this travesty are from your state, whether they represent you or not, you also send them letters.
The letters should be short, polite, to-the-point. They should not use profanity, they should not use 1337-speak, they should not make any kind of threat, not even the threat to vote against them in the next election if they support this. (That last threat is implicit in the fact that you sent the letter.)
The vast majority of Congresscritters *NEVER* hear from "The Folks Back Home". The corollary is that every actual physical letter they receive indicates at least 100 voters who feel the same way, but didn't bother to write a letter. (Every phone call is assumed to indicate 10 voters.)
You almost certainly will receive a reply to your letter. It may or may not indicate that anyone actually read it. If you do not receive a reply, you send more letters, to the State party headquarters, complaining about that clown in Washington who can't be bothered to answer mail from constituents. Those letters also get read, and said clown will hear about it from the guys who made his election happen.
And anyone who thinks that these things can't be fixed should re-read the results of the 1994 mid-term elections.
except that the current administration is NOT (fiscally) CONSERVATIVE!
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Yes, they have copyrights, and those should be respected. But if the movie companies don't feel that current distribution methods allow their copyrights to be respected, then they don't have to distribute them. Of course, they'll lose a lot of money if they refuse to distribute. But rather than doing the hard work of researching alternate models, and compromising with technology companies and consumers, they want to be able to dictate to everyone else. Why should they be allowed to have this power?
I am so tired of people saying if we had a true democracy then stupid things would result because look at the stupid people. My answer is maybe you are one of those STUPID people? And maybe you happen to be one of those biased people who thought, "If it was up to me I would fix things".
You see I live in a country that has true democracy and it is called Switzerland. In fact true democracy works well because believe it or not there are "STUPID" swiss! People who say, "it's because the framers were smart enough not to trust the public with such power" are in fact saying, "An elite number of people know what's good for the masses!". Let's carry this thought through and call it what it is namely fascism.
If a country like the US switched to true democracy yes in the first decade all hell would break out because people would vote based on silly ideas. HOWEVER, after people realize that their vote counts people will vote differently. People will think about their votes and they will try to understand the isses. And if the issue is too complex then a simple no will do. That is what happens here in Switzerland. If the issues get too complex they just say NO!
"You can't make a race horse of a pig"
"No," said Samuel, "but you can make very fast pig"
At one point the Internet looked like providing a fix, at least for the literate, in terms of supplying information. But even there the good stuff is increasingly subject to Gresham's Law - it's being buried under the piles of shit. And now that Rupert Murdoch has suddenly discovered the interthingy, and is moving the centre of his empire to the US, it won't get better any time soon. But cheer up! The Roman Empire ran on panem et circenses; it's just a social cycle and eventually it will collapse. Probably when the barbarian hordes from China invade, steal all the electronic goods, and put the population of the US to work building giant terracotta statues.
Panurge has posted for the last time. Thanks for the positive moderations.
Unfortunately, it is obvious from US political history that members of both political parties are more beholden to corporate interests than to the rights of the individual. The people in government are usually quite disconnected from reality, and have bought into the concept that "what's good for business is good for the individual - no matter what".
Actually I doubt that's only true here in the US - watching European governments deal with countries like China has given me the same sour taste in my mouth.
#DeleteChrome
I don't see her on the list.
It's bad enough they want to break our televisions, but the way that they are subverting democracy is just astounding.
There's nothing new about this kind of subversion. Lawmakers are already ignoring their constituents on issues such as the Iraq war, immigration and the economy. They have been bought off by corporate interests. The United States is being cannibalized to generate profits for big corporations.
Wansu, th' chinese sailor
Ok, lets look at what we will be missing if we turn off "free broadcast television". 5% of stupid people will not be able to watch "COPS". Now lets look at what we will get. More bandwidth for newer more efficent media outlets. More internet media competition for local news, sports, weather etc. Government sponsored free or close to it broadband (It seems like this is a basic human right at this point in our country) I imagine wireless broadband, wifi, cell, telephone, cable companys would pick up the slack. How many people here have viewed Broadcast Television in the past 5 years? Not me.
Their "threat" is so transparently false that it makes me laugh. Broadcasting companies are threatening to stop broadcasting? If they don't get their way, they'll just close up shop, lay everyone off, liquidate their assetts and cease to be? Right. Do you think their shareholders would support them getting out of broadcast television?
They're like a 4 year old threatening to hold their breath until they die if they don't get the candy bar they want. They cannot do it, period. Sorry kid, no candy bar for you.
If Congress doesn't deliver a Broadcast Flag pronto, warns the letter, content producers will abandon free, over-the-air broadcast TV.
Obviously, that means that we should, under no circumstances, deliver a Broadcast Flag; we really need the bandwidth for more useful purposes. For example, if we use those channels for WiFi or WiMax, then Internet access becomes easier and people can choose what to watch, as opposed to having ABC and NBC show them bad television with worse advertising mixed in.
Correct, but each and every one of those people will keep or lose their jobs based on party-line issues. The bile in your throat you feel over this particular issue won't hurt them at all.
This is why politicians on both sides love the abortion issue, especially when raising funding for their campaigns. Nothing can be done about it one way or the other, because Roe v. Wade is established constitutional law, and not enough people want to change things for an Amendment, which is what it would take. However, Republicans know they can count on the "pro-life" vote, so long as they keep pretending they have the capacity to outlaw abortions. Democrats know they can count on the "pro-choice" vote, so long as they keep pretending that the Republicans have the capacity to outlaw abortions.
Every once in a while an honest politician like Tim Penny comes along and openly admits that the whole debate is completely irrelevant, and we should be voting on issues that matter, like the budget, but nobody wants to hear it, so it all just gets drowned out in the din of partisan screaming.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
is that Switzerland is small and homogenous, and that's why pure democracy works. It's worked in New England, too. But the founders just thought that it wasn't the best way.
Describing the voters as stupid is taking it too far. Voters are smarts, mobs are dumb and we all know it. Even pure democracy doesn't allow lynchings, no matter how popular.
I'd strongly suspect that most of these commoners just love whatever comes with the box. Which in almost all cases (thank you Mr Monopoly) would be Windows.
To justify your statement you'd need to test two groups of people with Linux and Windows respectively, neither group having touched a computer in their life. I don't believe such a test has ever been done on a suitably large scale.
For the love of God, please learn to spell "ridiculous"!!!
And then they don't want to take a side. So they recommend a referendum where the voters choose instead.
The current administration is only conservative in the sense of social and military. They do not seek smaller government, and the size of government has expanded under their watch. Check some of Bush's campaign promises (he promised to sign any gun control legislation that crossed his desk) and facts from the congressional budget office.
Agreed. And all the "State's Rights" stuff is BS also. Only when it suits their agenda. Take a few issues recently:
- Medicinal Marijuana. The State of California enacted laws to allow it. The feds went in and arrested folks growing it. Had the feds followed their mantra of "states know better" this would have never gone to the Supreme Court.
- Right to die. The State of Oregon passed laws to allow it. John Asscroft made a unilateral decision to bar doctors from prescribing drugs for this purpose, effectively squashing it. Even though Asscroft is gone, there has been no attempt to reverse that decision.
- Gay marriage. A few states have passed laws to allow it. The feds are doing whatever they can to circumvent them or at least ignore them. No federal tax advantages of marriage, no ability to get a same-sex spouse citizenship, etc. No attempt to enforce the constitutional requirement that states recognize the public acts of other states.
If a state passed a law to do something in their agenda (read: Christian Fundamentalist or their fellow rich guy's view) that conflicted with Federal law I am sure we would see a very different reaction from this administration.
Pretty sad state of affairs.
The only athletic sport I ever mastered was backgammon - Douglas William Jerrold
Democracy has been subverted for ages and will continue to be. The only thing that keeps it rolling along is the electorate eventually gets pissed off enough and kicks the scoundrels out and installs new scoundrels. Rotating the bastards out is something akin to hitting the reset button - things work well for awhile until it's time to reset again.
These 20 congress folk who signed the letter need to be reminded who voted them into office. The bribes the MPAA and RIAA are paying had better be enough for them to live on once they're kicked out.
Which is why Buffet and Soros are both Democrats, and why small business men and farmers tend to vote Republican.
Your statement is simplistic. The parties are coalitions of pressure groups. The "platforms" are just plans to benefit the groups in the coalitions at the expense of those outside. Some industries support the Republicans some support the Democrats. Some consumer groups support one, other groups support the other. The pressure groups vote for whoever promises to give them the most stuff.
Democracy (where the government represents the interest of the people) is essentially dead in this country. All we have now is pressure group warfare.
Incidentally, it is interesting to note that the greek roots of "democracy" mean "people" and "power" while the greek roots of "monarchy" mean "one" and "rule". The implication seems to be that while the people have "power" in a democracy they do not "rule". An interesting observation...
The policy of the United States is worse than bad---it is insane. -- Ludwig von Mises, Economic Policy(1959)
...and she's supposed to be on our side.
Our side? What the fuck is "our side"?!?!? Did Slashdot just become a Democrats-only club while I was away?
A Government Is a Body of People, Usually Notably Ungoverned
The salaries of Doctors in the US are about 3.5x what they would be if the supply was not restricted. That's the single biggest source of cost reduction. That's why many poorer Americans see a nurse practitioner first and only go to a doctor when they must.
The cost of prescription drugs is the second biggest source of problems, but again the FDA has policies designed to raise the cost of drugs. Get rid of the policies and the higher cost americans pay will go down.
When I said 75-90% of the problems in this country are caused by bad economics, I wasn't kidding.
The policy of the United States is worse than bad---it is insane. -- Ludwig von Mises, Economic Policy(1959)
Thank you for proving my point.
Yes, Bush is a radical "pro-lifer," and gets a lot of his support from people who want abortions outlawed.
If Roe v. Wade can survive two terms of Reagan plus one-and-a-half terms of Bush The Younger, then it's clearly bulletproof enough that the debate is completely redundant at this point.
The same goes for all the screaming and yelling over Iraq. Whether you think going in was the right call or not, you can't "un-invade" a country any more than you can unscramble an egg. The debate is over, because the war is a fact now. The only thing worth discussing is what will be done next.
What we should be talking about is changing bad laws, like RICO and PATRIOT, fixing our budget problems (and while our military spending has been significant, far greater long-term impact has been made by foolish domestic spending introduced on Bush's watch), improving our border security, decentralizing education policy ("no child left behind" should not mean "let's all go back and get him") and coming up with an energy policy which moves us to better fuel sources in a way which doesn't involve artificially inflating the cost of oil until gasoline costs more per volume than premium imported sake.
Information wants to be anthropomorphized.
Really? Well, the internet at my house ends at the end of the cat5 cable. When I turn my wireless router on, it ends just outside the walls of my house, and even then doesn't cover some rooms inside very well at all.
While content may be available on the internet from every country, that content is not available at every end-point that is now served by broadcast television.
TV is dead,...
Let me guess, you live in an area where high-bandwidth (said jokingly, since DSL and cable are hardly "high" in real terms) is readily available and/or free.
If this attitude had prevailed during the early parts of this century, nobody outside the cities would have telephones or electric power. It was only mandates put on the utilities to force them to provide services where rates of return were small or negative that got "rural" america wired at all. Now they've got people telling them that they aren't worth the bandwidth to have broadcast TV signals sent out to them.
There is a significant number of people who talk about the internet creating a "digital divide" between the haves and have-nots. Do not make this divide worse by arguing for the removal of the information services that those who are internet-have-nots do currently have.
Democrats have historically been more servile than Republicans to the entertainment industry moguls, despite their pious declarations of support for the interests of the little guy, and their campaign donations reflect this.
Certainly, but it isn't even in the same ballpark as the Republicans who are the slaves of the oil and weapons industries who see their best way to increase profits as murdering a bunch of people despite their idiotic lies of being "moral" people. Complete oxymoron that. A Republican with morals. What next.
Nice try throwing irrelevant partisan hackery in though. Better luck next time.