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TorrentSpy Ordered By Judge to Become MPAA Spy
PC Guy writes "TorrentSpy, one of the world's largest BitTorrent sites, has been ordered by a federal judge to monitor its users. They are asked to keep detailed logs of their activities which must then be handed over to the MPAA. Ira Rothken, TorrentSpy's attorney responded to the news by stating: 'It is likely that TorrentSpy would turn off access to the U.S. before tracking its users. If this order were allowed to stand, it would mean that Web sites can be required by discovery judges to track what their users do even if their privacy policy says otherwise.'"
The thing is ... copyright royalties aren't just getting 'paid for your work'.
I'm a programmer. I get paid by the hour to write code that's used by tens of thousands of people every day. I don't get a share every time someone uses a piece of code that I wrote. Even if I was the one who designed that particular functionality too. Nope, just a flat fee for my creativity and hard work.
Now, music takes talent and a lot of hard work, but it's still just work. Why don't musicians just get paid by the hour for writing, recording, and performing? Why do people have to pay big bucks to listen to a recording of what they did? And please don't give me crap about the high cost of promoting bands, etc. The Internet is a wonderful and inexpensive way to promote music ... at least that's where I've done most of my music dicovery lately - sites like last.fm are an absolute joy for music buffs, and technology and paradimgs like that will get increasingly more common and sophisticated in the future.
The advent of the Internet means that information will flow freely, no matter what anyone does to try to stop that. I know this is getting to be a tired debate, but the simple truth is that the record companies will simply need to come up with different models to adapt to changing times. The same applies to movie producers, etc.
I, for one, don't forsee a collapse of the creative industries just because the old business models are being undermined. There are ways to cope; the people in charge are just to stubborn to admit that they need to find them.
I hear there's rumors on the Slashdots
"Why do the folks who insist on keeping 'God' in 'one nation under God' want to get rid of 'liberty and justice for all'?"
I'd say that's pretty consistent. They want you to *say* all of that stuff, and for all of it to be equally make-believe.
We know where leadership by an anti-intellectual "strongman" who scapegoats minorities and likes boisterous rallies goes
Don't be fooled by all the "God" talk in the US. By my observation, not one in 50 Americans lives according to any religious belief. For the vast majority of us, "God" is invoked when buying a lottery ticket or upon learning of a diagnosis of cancer, but little or no effort is made to either learn about the actual moral basis behind their respective religions or to live according to that basis
We have been trained to say that we believe in God, and indeed, given the choice between having our lives end at death and having our personalities continue eternally, we would naturally choose the latter. That's why you get these huge percentages in polls asking Americans whether they believe in God. Don't make the mistake of thinking most Americans are religious. They are not.
Now, the "God" in "One nation under God" is another story entirely. In this context, "God" means "The Way I Want Things To Be". Thus, when you hear a group of yahoos trying to assert that the US is a "Christian" nation, what they are saying is "It's a Nation that should be the way we want it" (generally, one where gays, blacks or immigrants are treated poorly, abortions are only available to their own daughters, and their own immature view of the world is constantly justified). At heart, most of this impulse is a way to try to assert some control over the vagaries of life. For example, if it really was a "Nation Under God", then they'll never get cancer because they consider themselves righteous folk, and God doesn't do that the righteous folk. Of course, when they do end up getting cancer, it's often because either they have done something to anger God, or more frequently, the Blacks, Gays or Jews have done something to anger God. This last also serves to justify their hatreds.
The more I travel through this marvelous country, and the more I listen and learn from fellow Americans, the more sympathetic I am to their religious claims and cries, which to an outsider would seem to be slightly insane. I'm learning to be a little more understanding because, after all, they're just scared, and fear mixed with ignorance is a very destructive combination.
I don't mean to imply that there is no value or truth to religous faith, only that faith and morality have little to do with all the God talk one hears in the USA. A recent example of this phenomenon can be seen in the last few Republican debates, where each candidate did their best to assert their love of God and Christ, while demonstrating very little concern for their fellow man, especially the poor or foreign. A cursory reading of the Gospels will show that this is an extremely contradictory assertion, but one that resonates with the basest of the Republican "base", who share this disconnect between the language of religion and its meaning.
You are welcome on my lawn.
rabid koala bear. lol. Made me laugh. all cute and fuzzy, then it jumps at you like a brain spider on half life. lol. still laughing. Anyway, continue on!
Flappinbooger isn't my real name
Oh please. Atheists are some of the judgmental people on Earth and I say that as an atheist myself.
You want to know who isn't running Firefox 2.x? They spell it "definately" and "rediculous".
Some vocal Atheists can be judgemental in that they will call all religious individuals naive and dismiss their views out of hand, but in comparison to the rest of the people in the religious world you're barking up the wrong tree if you think Atheism somehow requires you to judge anybody more than another philosophical belief (or lack thereof.) Some religions require that you condemn entire countries of people, even if the reason is hundreds of years old and nobody (except said group) cares any more :)
Either way, I don't think it's fair to call someone judgemental based on their philosophical beliefs until you are sure you actually know what their beliefs are. Someone can call themselves a follower of a particular religious group, but that doesn't mean they believe everything about said group.