I think I made my point above about financing of non-talent with real talent. If you need help "creating demand" for your music... You're in the wrong business. If you work hard long hours to make your music why would you not work even harder to promote it? And that is what has the RIAA frightened...
Perhaps because artists like to spend their time creating art, not marketing it? I mean, yes, it takes months to get a deal and such with a record company, but think about it: WHY do artists today do it? I mean, if it were as simple as you say, record companies wouldn't exist in the first place! Sad as it may be, and as corrupt as the system is, I think it's obvious that, at the very least, artists WANT to let a 3rd party handle the business side of things as much as possible.
That said, I certainly think that the current system where record companies take the vast majority of the profit has room for improvment, and that we should work toward streamlining the process of audiences finding the material they'll like.. BUT, the system that succeeds will be the one that lets artists EASILY promote their music. If artists have to chose between letting record companies make most of the profit andn spending all their time trying in vain to promote their material, a lot of artists would (and do) choose the former.
This is all well and good, but this program costs quite a bit of money, and for, say, educational and other use, I think it'd be really nice for a free X Server to be available for OS X. Does anyone know if there are any efforts out there to create one? (Afaik, John Carmack's project is for a complete X environment on top of Darwin, and not one that meshes with Aqua, which would be infinitely more useful.)
Exactly.
"First, you must type an 'h', then next, you should type a 't', and you can wait around for a while before you type another 't', then comes the obligatory 'p', the colon, and two slashes...."
Sure, I agree that they need money, but what's that money for? It's for give the world the Games.. and as it is, with NBC's coverage no one in the US is getting to see more than, like, 5 minutes of the games every day!
(Actually, I've seen an article during the 98 Olympics that said NBC showed sports only 10-20% of the time.)
I mean, if I got rich and gave them a trillion dollars, in exchange for exclusive rights, and decide not to show the games at all, would they accept my money?
The problem with deleting via a key is that it's vulnerable to attack from a single source. Deleting old data is a distributed action and thus not vulnerable to an attack from a single source.
Everyone should be exposed to Life at some point. It really stimulates your thinking about emergent behavior and complexity stemming from simplicity and such things.
When those big floods happened in the Midwest a while back, a bunch of riders were tacked on to the flood relief bill, delaying relief for quite some time (I think eventually the people who wrote the riders gave in).
That's a situation where these riders probably cost lives.
In Theoretical CS, perhaps, but not SW Engineering
on
Too Old To Code?
·
· Score: 2
I think that perhaps someone can be a genius at theoretical CS; they might be really good at thinking through algorithms and control flow and whatnot, but I don't think there can ever be any genius software engineers.
Engineering is one profession that you simply can't be "just good at" because experience is such an incredibly essential aspect of it. A kid might be a good hacker, but they could never come up with a good design.
Yeah, I think this is a really scary trend. Personally, I just plain wouldn't want to work for a company like that. I've worked with such a company before, and it just ain't fun to work off of ugly code. Hopefully, there are enough companies out there with hiring managers that have a clue...
Yeah, I agree that rights are not limited by what's in the Consitution, but my point is that some people seem to imply that copyright IS a basic right guaranteed by the Consitution.
I completely respect your opinion about copyright being fundamental, since you're saying that (like privacy) it's a right outside of the Constitution. I disagree with you, but I respect your opinion.:)
I'd say that the term, "Intellectual Property" is also propaganda, since the Consitution only mentions securing "authors" (not "owners") the temporary right to exclusive use of the work.
Copyrights and patents are more an exclusive license than an inherent right of the author, but some people keep portraying it that way.
I'm not saying music-copying is right.. I just want to point out a major difference between stealing a TV and copying music.
In the TV case, the store is out of a TV. They've very definitively lost whatever money they paid for the TV, and probably lost whatever profit they could have made on it, assuming they would eventually have sold it.
In the music case, the artists have lost only a POTENTIAL sale. They have not lost any cost, only potential profit. And is every copy a lost potential sale? Of course not. Not any more than every copy of, say, Photoshop is a lost potential sale. Fact is, when people copy software or music, they copy a lot more than they otherwise would buy. They copy a lot of singles and a lot of expensive software and such that they never would have bought in the first place.
Of course, they also copy a lot of music that they WOULD have bought, but even then, they often do buy the album anyway, if it's good. There is definitely a lot of added value to a physical album that is missing with copies. In Lars's example where a band is selling 600 copies, and now 550 people have copied copies, I'd say that they band will probably sell MORE than 50 copies because more people are exposed to their music, and there will be people who want to buy their album anyway. Will a full 600 buy their album? Perhaps; perhaps not.
I guess my point is just that comparisons with stealing TVs, or mentioning that every copy is a lost sale, is misleading and untrue.
So, in other words, just because people are being assholes, we should be assholes too to reciprocate? I don't buy that. I DO think that there needs to be more incentive not to violate and so forth, and I even agree that perhaps people should look into being more forceful about GPL violations, but I do NOT think that being angry and making it "painful" just out of retribution is the way to go.
P.S. Good luck on those moderation points, nice to know that anyone who mildly likes Microsoft's products has no opinion in your eyes. For a group supposedly dedicated to free speech, you sure are fascist in your approach to such liberties. Free the code, shut up Microsoft supporters eh?
I never stated my position about the Microsoft case in my post. Please don't assume you know what it is.
As a matter of fact, I'm typing this post up on IE as we speak, because I find it a superior product (though not without its flaws) to Netscape. I'm also personally against any Microsoft breakup.
However, precisely because I use Microsoft product, and because of Microsoft's general importance in the world, I find these stories very relevant.
Why not simply wait until the end of the trial instead of speculating and drooling every other day over some new tidbit?
Have you ever watched a game of sports? Do you just always wait till the end and check the score? The process is often just as interesting as the result. Perhaps you're not interested, but it would be arrogant of you to claim that others shouldn't be interested either. It would be even more arrogant to claim that anyone who is interested must be a Microsoft hater.
I've never denied that Slashdot is a Linux-oriented site with a general anti-MS bias. However, I said it was not a Linux-ONLY site. Btw, note that in every story about MS, there are many anti-breakup posts, such as this, this, and this, all from this story.
In short, this is relevant news that a lot of people, both pro- and anti-MS, care about, and just because you don't care about it doesn't mean no one else does, or should, or that anyone who does is anti-MS.
Any action taken by the gov't on Microsoft would have enormous ramifications for the entire computing community (and the world, for that matter). These effects would take place regardless of your personal view on the matter.
Thus, this is important and relevant information.
Realize also that any breakup of Microsoft will have very little impact on Linux.
This is NOT just a Linux site. This ruling would definitely affect all computer users.
P.S.: If I had any moderation points, I would be moderating this post down as "overrated" instead of posting. It seems that any post saying "Slashdot sucks now" gets moderated up these days. *sigh*
Remember, Stone is the one who claimed to be entitled to "artistic license" *in a documentary* when he was called on his fabrications . . . (specifically, _Born on the Fourth of July)
Unless Born on the Fourth of July was about the life of Tom Cruise's ordeal in making the movie (or something), it was a based-on-true-story movie, NOT a documentary. BIG difference.
Double major. Triple major. There are people that do it. They go to your school. I know there exist people who can do it. I also know that most people cannot. And some of these people who cannot may not know it, and when they try it, they will burn out. I'm just saying that for these cases, Ars Digita University needs to have a plan.
When I read about Ars Digita University, the first thing that came to mind was what an extreme amount 12 hrs/day, 6 days/week, on A SINGLE SUBJECT is. I mean, there do exist people who can take that much work, but don't you think a large percentage of your student population would simply burn out?
I go to a major university, there's no way I put in 12 hrs a day of work, and I'm still already stressed out. And that's with multiple subjects so I can take my mind off of one and switch gears occassionally.
Do you have any plans to counter potential burnout?
Slashdot Mirror
True, but it'd be great if people would start working on an open source version..
If you have your own domain, can you get email sent to that domain to be forwarded automatically to your ISP?
Perhaps because artists like to spend their time creating art, not marketing it? I mean, yes, it takes months to get a deal and such with a record company, but think about it: WHY do artists today do it? I mean, if it were as simple as you say, record companies wouldn't exist in the first place! Sad as it may be, and as corrupt as the system is, I think it's obvious that, at the very least, artists WANT to let a 3rd party handle the business side of things as much as possible.
That said, I certainly think that the current system where record companies take the vast majority of the profit has room for improvment, and that we should work toward streamlining the process of audiences finding the material they'll like.. BUT, the system that succeeds will be the one that lets artists EASILY promote their music. If artists have to chose between letting record companies make most of the profit andn spending all their time trying in vain to promote their material, a lot of artists would (and do) choose the former.
This is all well and good, but this program costs quite a bit of money, and for, say, educational and other use, I think it'd be really nice for a free X Server to be available for OS X. Does anyone know if there are any efforts out there to create one? (Afaik, John Carmack's project is for a complete X environment on top of Darwin, and not one that meshes with Aqua, which would be infinitely more useful.)
Exactly. "First, you must type an 'h', then next, you should type a 't', and you can wait around for a while before you type another 't', then comes the obligatory 'p', the colon, and two slashes...."
(Actually, I've seen an article during the 98 Olympics that said NBC showed sports only 10-20% of the time.)
I mean, if I got rich and gave them a trillion dollars, in exchange for exclusive rights, and decide not to show the games at all, would they accept my money?
The problem with deleting via a key is that it's vulnerable to attack from a single source. Deleting old data is a distributed action and thus not vulnerable to an attack from a single source.
Well, according to INTERCAL notation, which I'm sure we're all familiar with, it's a "mesh". :)
Everyone should be exposed to Life at some point. It really stimulates your thinking about emergent behavior and complexity stemming from simplicity and such things.
We've at least got the Space Shuttle Enterprise (okay, so that was only a quasi-space shuttle) and Deep Space 1..
That's a situation where these riders probably cost lives.
Engineering is one profession that you simply can't be "just good at" because experience is such an incredibly essential aspect of it. A kid might be a good hacker, but they could never come up with a good design.
Yeah, I think this is a really scary trend. Personally, I just plain wouldn't want to work for a company like that. I've worked with such a company before, and it just ain't fun to work off of ugly code. Hopefully, there are enough companies out there with hiring managers that have a clue...
I completely respect your opinion about copyright being fundamental, since you're saying that (like privacy) it's a right outside of the Constitution. I disagree with you, but I respect your opinion. :)
Copyrights and patents are more an exclusive license than an inherent right of the author, but some people keep portraying it that way.
In the TV case, the store is out of a TV. They've very definitively lost whatever money they paid for the TV, and probably lost whatever profit they could have made on it, assuming they would eventually have sold it.
In the music case, the artists have lost only a POTENTIAL sale. They have not lost any cost, only potential profit. And is every copy a lost potential sale? Of course not. Not any more than every copy of, say, Photoshop is a lost potential sale. Fact is, when people copy software or music, they copy a lot more than they otherwise would buy. They copy a lot of singles and a lot of expensive software and such that they never would have bought in the first place.
Of course, they also copy a lot of music that they WOULD have bought, but even then, they often do buy the album anyway, if it's good. There is definitely a lot of added value to a physical album that is missing with copies. In Lars's example where a band is selling 600 copies, and now 550 people have copied copies, I'd say that they band will probably sell MORE than 50 copies because more people are exposed to their music, and there will be people who want to buy their album anyway. Will a full 600 buy their album? Perhaps; perhaps not.
I guess my point is just that comparisons with stealing TVs, or mentioning that every copy is a lost sale, is misleading and untrue.
If only that poster had a source for /.'s involvement, this would be worthy of the front page. :)
I think that "small mag" comment was meant sarcastically...
So, in other words, just because people are being assholes, we should be assholes too to reciprocate? I don't buy that. I DO think that there needs to be more incentive not to violate and so forth, and I even agree that perhaps people should look into being more forceful about GPL violations, but I do NOT think that being angry and making it "painful" just out of retribution is the way to go.
I never stated my position about the Microsoft case in my post. Please don't assume you know what it is.
As a matter of fact, I'm typing this post up on IE as we speak, because I find it a superior product (though not without its flaws) to Netscape. I'm also personally against any Microsoft breakup.
However, precisely because I use Microsoft product, and because of Microsoft's general importance in the world, I find these stories very relevant.
Have you ever watched a game of sports? Do you just always wait till the end and check the score? The process is often just as interesting as the result. Perhaps you're not interested, but it would be arrogant of you to claim that others shouldn't be interested either. It would be even more arrogant to claim that anyone who is interested must be a Microsoft hater.
I've never denied that Slashdot is a Linux-oriented site with a general anti-MS bias. However, I said it was not a Linux-ONLY site. Btw, note that in every story about MS, there are many anti-breakup posts, such as this, this, and this, all from this story.
In short, this is relevant news that a lot of people, both pro- and anti-MS, care about, and just because you don't care about it doesn't mean no one else does, or should, or that anyone who does is anti-MS.
Thus, this is important and relevant information.
This is NOT just a Linux site. This ruling would definitely affect all computer users.
P.S.: If I had any moderation points, I would be moderating this post down as "overrated" instead of posting. It seems that any post saying "Slashdot sucks now" gets moderated up these days. *sigh*
Unless Born on the Fourth of July was about the life of Tom Cruise's ordeal in making the movie (or something), it was a based-on-true-story movie, NOT a documentary. BIG difference.
Double major. Triple major. There are people that do it. They go to your school. I know there exist people who can do it. I also know that most people cannot. And some of these people who cannot may not know it, and when they try it, they will burn out. I'm just saying that for these cases, Ars Digita University needs to have a plan.
I go to a major university, there's no way I put in 12 hrs a day of work, and I'm still already stressed out. And that's with multiple subjects so I can take my mind off of one and switch gears occassionally.
Do you have any plans to counter potential burnout?
Where is this info? I couldn't find any info on the Mac release.