Jeez. Read the damn article. The Register pointed out most of the things that people are comlaining about in the/. story. But since nobody bothers to read the Reg article, everyone seems to assume that THEY were the ones that left all the important info out.
You are correct. Oversight on my part. Since we were talking about corporate use primarily, I assumed that the program would be distributed and neglected to mention that you weren't obligated to release anything if you don't distribute it. Thanks.
Nope, you got it wrong. It is GPL proponents who are outraged at corporation for their EULAs and yet they are using the very same methods.
Not even close. You can do whatever you want with a GPL'd program as long as it doesn't violate copyright law. You don't even have to agree to the license. However, if you'd like to use the GPL'd code in a program of your own, then you can do so by agreeing to the GPL which states that you must release the source code to the resulting derivative program as well.
Contrast that with standard industry EULAs which routinely take away all sorts of rights such as publishing benchmarks, using the program in a way that criticizes the maker, making backup copies, running the software on more than one machine, etc. It becomes quite ridiculous. There is no real comparison between the GPL and EULAs. At least with GPL'd software you can use it without having to agree to such a ridiculous licensing agreement. If these corporations put this many restrictions on simply USING their software, imagine what kinds of restrictions they would put on using their source code!
Which proves again,GPL is completely unusable in commerical settings.
Depends on what you want to do with the software. If it's something that you don't plan to sell anyway (and IBM and Microsoft both have a lot of software that would qualify) then there's no real problem with using GPLed software.
If you want real and usefull code exchange between profesionals with no social or political strings attached go for BSD style license.
Seems to me that corporate types should be even more averse to BSD style licenses than to the GPL. After all, GPL software authors are asking for something in return for their work, it just isn't money. BSD licensed software authors are just giving their code away. Which one is closer to selling as the corporations want to do?
It really pisses me off that these corporations think they can jam all sorts of crap into their EULAs to take away our rights to do anything with their software except exactly what they want us to do with it, but then they turn around and balk at the GPL. Seems like a bunch of hypocrites.
Sorry about the abuse, but yours is about the 4th or 5th post saying basically the same thing and it was getting on my nerves. I apologize. Now, about your post. Think about it. Do you really believe that she thinks she can convince people that copyright law should be changed to allow the "free flow of ideas" for everyone except herself? Jeez, give her SOME credit at least. She's not an idiot. She is arguing for copyright reform. She wants people to realize what has been done with the law over the years and what effect it has had on them. She knows as well as any of us that copyright is a good thing in theory. But what it has become is no longer a good thing. We need to change it so that it will be good again. If we got the DMCA repealed next week and copyright term limits changed to 20 years the week after, I'm sure she would be as happy as the rest of us.
Yes, I know people have mentioned before that with a DVD burner you can make as many copies as you like without DeCSS, but has anyone pointed out that there's nothing stopping you copying a whole DVD to your hard disk and sharing that over the internet, viewable by anyone with an appropriate player (or is there something stopping this - have I missed something?).
Ok, you're misinformed. First of all, without DeCSS, only licensed players can exist. These players cannot not play an encrypted DVD without the encryption keys. Nor can you burn a bit-for-bit copy of a DVD with consumer-grade DVD burners. They cannot write to the portion of the disc that contains the encryption keys, therefore you can't make an exact copy. It will be unplayable. The only ways to make mass-copies of DVDs are to acquire a commercial-grade DVD burner (not easy to do) or somehow decrypt the DVD and distribute it in a non-encrypted (and usually compressed) form (which is what you can do with DeCSS). Now don't get me wrong, there are plenty of reasons why DeCSS is good, and even necessary, but the argument you're talking about isn't one of them.
I really have no idea why a lot of stuff gets rejected. There seems to be absolutely no rhyme or reason to it at all. Maybe it just depends on who happens to review your particular submission. I'm sure they get a lot of junk every day to sift through, but damn, it sounds like they really dropped the ball on that one. Maybe you should try submitting it again. Perhaps someone else will review it this time and post it.
Have you even read the book, or any of her papers? Apparently not. She's not arguing for the elimination of copyright. She's arguing for copyright reform. Yes, producers should get paid. The real questions are "for how long?" and "for what uses?" Take your uninformed trolling elsewhere.
I've been arguing almost exactly what Ms. Litman seems to be saying for quite a while now. Here's an email I sent in response to a recent InfoWorld "Ethics Matters" article by Carlton Vogt regarding music sharing.
Mr. Vogt,
Please forgive the longwindedness of this email. I really tried to cut it back:)
If we want to discuss this strictly at the ethical level rather than the
legal level, then I think it becomes quite a bit simpler. We have 3 sides trying to get what they want. The consumer wants good music at a
low price. The artist wants their music to be available to as many people as possible and for those people to pay them for that music. The
recording industry wants to own or control as much music as possible for as long as possible in order to continue selling it to the consumer for
the highest price possible while paying the artist as little as possible.
Now, ethically, I think the recording industry (along with the movie industry and certain [other] huge corporations) has behaved atrociously. They
are the part of the system that is most at odds with both the artist and consumer. They have lobbied hard over the years for copyright term
extensions, and have snatched many works away from the brink of becoming public domain as all copyrighted works are supposed to eventually
become. I believe this has harmed consumers. The government is supposed to grant copyrights for a limited time to encourage the creation of new works, not to continually increase the term limit so that corporations can continue to profit from these works indefinitely. Copyright is supposed to be a bargain between the creators and the rest of the people. Without it, everything that is published or revealed somehow would be public domain. Since such a situation is not terribly encouraging for creators, we acknowledged the need for an incentive. Thus Congress was given the power "To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries." Under copyright law, the people agree to grant the creators a limited period of exclusive control over the copying and distribution of their work so that they may earn a profit from those works. This is to encourage them to continue to create new works. Once that period ends, the work belongs to the public.
Unfortunately, due to their huge amounts of money, the copyright industry (music, books, movies, software, etc.) has been able to secure
longer and longer periods of control and more and more restrictive terms of control. I believe the bargain has been broken. I believe that
people instinctively realize that they are getting shafted and this is why so many people don't really respect copyright laws anymore. The law seems arbitrary and unfair now (and I think most of us can see this, which is why we spend more time discussing the ethics of copyright than
the law itself). We see nothing in return. Practically nothing has entered the public domain in decades. Copyrights now last longer than
a normal human lifetime. I think that defeats the purpose of the "limited period" portion of the Constitution. What we need now is some
serious copyright reform.
That's the most relevant part, anyway. I went on to talk about the music industry specifically, but that's less relevant to this discussion. I think I've posted things here that were written better than that reply, but it does contain the gist of my arguments.
I just heard Ms. Litman on NPR last Friday along with Lawrence Lessig. It was interesting, but frustrating since they really don't get enough time to talk and the host tends to redirect things too often to keep it "light" enough for the listeners. I'm ordering her book today though. Sounds like it would be very interesting reading. Might help me make my point better next time we have a Napster argument here on slashdot. I just wish there was some good way to get more public attention on these issues. Most people I know really don't have a clue what copyright laws really say. It's exactly as Litman says, they just do what they feel they should be able to do. It's hard to figure out where things will go now. I think that the copyright industry is bound to start drawing some real public attention in the next few years as their various "content protection technologies" come to fruition. It could be a bucket of cold water to wake up consumers to what's been going on with copyright law for the last century or so. Or maybe their propaganda will have taken hold by then and people will simply accept it. I don't know. It worries me though.
You are practicing equivocation which is illogical.
I don't believe I am. There is no such thing as "big enough" when it comes to corporations. As long as they can find a way to maintain their profits, they will continue to grow. We have seen corporations go to great lengths to generate more profit. As I said before, it's often at the expense of their workers, consumers and the environment. It's not that they just want to turn a profit. It's the fact that they often use reprehensible methods to gain those profits. I think that pretty well fits the definition of greed.
No, it is based on the control of the means of production. Cavemen probably acted greedily, but you would never accuse on of being a Rockefeller.
Corporations constantly look for ways to maximize profits. Often at the expense of their employees, consumers, the environment, etc. Why? To make higher profits! Greed! Exactly what I said. If you think otherwise, you'd better offer up a better explanation than that. Greed isn't exclusive to capitalism (hence your caveman reference makes no sense), but it's certainly an integral part. "Self-interest" is another good term for it.
Never said anything about them "b[ing] criativ indevijuals an fele GUD aboute themsalvs" being the only thing that matters. There will always be a certain amount of memorization that is necessary. I'm just saying that memorization isn't gonna do them a damn bit of good if you haven't taught them to think properly for themselves as well. Something that seems to be completely overlooked as teachers scramble to drill facts into the kids so they can pass the tests.
Nope, and you dodged again by telling him that "studies along similar lines exist" even though he said he'd never heard of one. I haven't either, despite many many stories such as this one on Slashdot. If valid studies along those lines existed, why haven't people who think as you do trotted them out in your responses to these stories?
Damn near every industry plays on ignorance and naivete. Capitalism is based on greed. They're out to get the best deal for themselves. If you can get your workers to do more for less, you do it. If you can convince people that working for you is a good opportunity, you do it. Whether it's true or not doesn't matter. It's only an opinion anyway. Many people don't understand that.
What's with all the pathetic replies that do nothing but bash the author of the post? Ya'll can't come up with a decent rebuttal? Maybe you should reconsider the value of teaching kids to think instead of teaching them to memorize.
Most games SUCK when played on WinCE pdas. They're slow and rather laggy usually. Most of the good, playable games for WinCE have equally good counterparts on Palm, aside from the color. But now that we have color Palm and Handspring pdas, even that isn't an issue.
Of course he really didn't have any reason to think they'd care or even know about it. If you're visiting fuckgeneralmotors.com, you probably didn't get there by accident, and anyone can look up the domain owner if they want.
Statistical statements such as "a gun is 6 times more likely to kill a resident of the household than an intruder" can also be quite misleading. How likely is it that you will kill an intruder with the gun? 10%? 0.01%? It makes a difference. Top that off with the fact that the statistics are highly suspect themselves and it becomes meaningless. The study seemed to be deliberately misleading. I've been trying to find the actual paper so I can read the whole thing, but haven't hand any luck so far. I've only found pieces of it, and they seemed misleading.
Re:Mixed Response on This One
on
Congress@Work
·
· Score: 2
As it has been pointed out elsewhere in these posts, the Constitution exists to tell the government what it can and cannot do, not the people. If the Constitution doesn't say that the government can do something, then it can't do it.
Gay rights marchers are on the defensive side of things. They are threatened by people like Dr. Laura with a ban on their way of life. They aren't trying to prevent Dr. Laura from having a heterosexual relationship or any other kind. They're trying to prevent her and people like her from making decisions about how gay people should live their lives.
Re:That's my congressman!
on
Congress@Work
·
· Score: 1
Maybe you can tell this poster where to send his letter.
I still think that a simple, polite email or phone call was warranted before unleashing the lawyers. It could very well have averted the whole situation.
Even ignoring for the moment the distinct possibility that the methods and assumptions used in the study are flawed, which I believe they are, you seem to have disregarded the remainder of the article after coming across the statement that you cite. It goes on to say:
But even this number is of precarious
significance, for it embodies the dubious assumption that comparing "body counts" is a meaningful way to report the usefulness of firearms.
As reported by Gary Kleck's study, the vast majority of defensive uses of guns do not result in injury. Guns are quite effective at deterring crime. Criminals don't like targets that can defend themselves and possibly kill them. Additionally, as the article says:
One does not measure the effectiveness
of a police department, for example, by comparing the number of officers and criminals killed over some time period. Rather, one asks what effect the police have had on the rate of crime. Similarly, one should not compare the number of burglars or other intruders and civilians killed by domestic firearms, but rather ask how many burglars or other intruders were driven away or deterred by the firearm.
Slashdot Mirror
Jeez. Read the damn article. The Register pointed out most of the things that people are comlaining about in the /. story. But since nobody bothers to read the Reg article, everyone seems to assume that THEY were the ones that left all the important info out.
Yeah, it's been posted before... but it's still relevant, and not everyone reads every story. Handy for karma accumulation too :)
You are correct. Oversight on my part. Since we were talking about corporate use primarily, I assumed that the program would be distributed and neglected to mention that you weren't obligated to release anything if you don't distribute it. Thanks.
Nope, you got it wrong. It is GPL proponents who are outraged at corporation for their EULAs and yet they are using the very same methods.
Not even close. You can do whatever you want with a GPL'd program as long as it doesn't violate copyright law. You don't even have to agree to the license. However, if you'd like to use the GPL'd code in a program of your own, then you can do so by agreeing to the GPL which states that you must release the source code to the resulting derivative program as well.
Contrast that with standard industry EULAs which routinely take away all sorts of rights such as publishing benchmarks, using the program in a way that criticizes the maker, making backup copies, running the software on more than one machine, etc. It becomes quite ridiculous. There is no real comparison between the GPL and EULAs. At least with GPL'd software you can use it without having to agree to such a ridiculous licensing agreement. If these corporations put this many restrictions on simply USING their software, imagine what kinds of restrictions they would put on using their source code!
Which proves again,GPL is completely unusable in commerical settings.
Depends on what you want to do with the software. If it's something that you don't plan to sell anyway (and IBM and Microsoft both have a lot of software that would qualify) then there's no real problem with using GPLed software.
If you want real and usefull code exchange between profesionals with no social or political strings attached go for BSD style license.
Seems to me that corporate types should be even more averse to BSD style licenses than to the GPL. After all, GPL software authors are asking for something in return for their work, it just isn't money. BSD licensed software authors are just giving their code away. Which one is closer to selling as the corporations want to do?
It really pisses me off that these corporations think they can jam all sorts of crap into their EULAs to take away our rights to do anything with their software except exactly what they want us to do with it, but then they turn around and balk at the GPL. Seems like a bunch of hypocrites.
Sorry about the abuse, but yours is about the 4th or 5th post saying basically the same thing and it was getting on my nerves. I apologize. Now, about your post. Think about it. Do you really believe that she thinks she can convince people that copyright law should be changed to allow the "free flow of ideas" for everyone except herself? Jeez, give her SOME credit at least. She's not an idiot. She is arguing for copyright reform. She wants people to realize what has been done with the law over the years and what effect it has had on them. She knows as well as any of us that copyright is a good thing in theory. But what it has become is no longer a good thing. We need to change it so that it will be good again. If we got the DMCA repealed next week and copyright term limits changed to 20 years the week after, I'm sure she would be as happy as the rest of us.
Yes, I know people have mentioned before that with a DVD burner you can make as many copies as you like without DeCSS, but has anyone pointed out that there's nothing stopping you copying a whole DVD to your hard disk and sharing that over the internet, viewable by anyone with an appropriate player (or is there something stopping this - have I missed something?).
Ok, you're misinformed. First of all, without DeCSS, only licensed players can exist. These players cannot not play an encrypted DVD without the encryption keys. Nor can you burn a bit-for-bit copy of a DVD with consumer-grade DVD burners. They cannot write to the portion of the disc that contains the encryption keys, therefore you can't make an exact copy. It will be unplayable. The only ways to make mass-copies of DVDs are to acquire a commercial-grade DVD burner (not easy to do) or somehow decrypt the DVD and distribute it in a non-encrypted (and usually compressed) form (which is what you can do with DeCSS). Now don't get me wrong, there are plenty of reasons why DeCSS is good, and even necessary, but the argument you're talking about isn't one of them.
I really have no idea why a lot of stuff gets rejected. There seems to be absolutely no rhyme or reason to it at all. Maybe it just depends on who happens to review your particular submission. I'm sure they get a lot of junk every day to sift through, but damn, it sounds like they really dropped the ball on that one. Maybe you should try submitting it again. Perhaps someone else will review it this time and post it.
...your stupidity is showing.
Have you even read the book, or any of her papers? Apparently not. She's not arguing for the elimination of copyright. She's arguing for copyright reform. Yes, producers should get paid. The real questions are "for how long?" and "for what uses?" Take your uninformed trolling elsewhere.
I've been arguing almost exactly what Ms. Litman seems to be saying for quite a while now. Here's an email I sent in response to a recent InfoWorld "Ethics Matters" article by Carlton Vogt regarding music sharing.
Mr. Vogt,
Please forgive the longwindedness of this email. I really tried to cut it back :)
If we want to discuss this strictly at the ethical level rather than the legal level, then I think it becomes quite a bit simpler. We have 3 sides trying to get what they want. The consumer wants good music at a low price. The artist wants their music to be available to as many people as possible and for those people to pay them for that music. The recording industry wants to own or control as much music as possible for as long as possible in order to continue selling it to the consumer for the highest price possible while paying the artist as little as possible.
Now, ethically, I think the recording industry (along with the movie industry and certain [other] huge corporations) has behaved atrociously. They are the part of the system that is most at odds with both the artist and consumer. They have lobbied hard over the years for copyright term extensions, and have snatched many works away from the brink of becoming public domain as all copyrighted works are supposed to eventually become. I believe this has harmed consumers. The government is supposed to grant copyrights for a limited time to encourage the creation of new works, not to continually increase the term limit so that corporations can continue to profit from these works indefinitely. Copyright is supposed to be a bargain between the creators and the rest of the people. Without it, everything that is published or revealed somehow would be public domain. Since such a situation is not terribly encouraging for creators, we acknowledged the need for an incentive. Thus Congress was given the power "To promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries." Under copyright law, the people agree to grant the creators a limited period of exclusive control over the copying and distribution of their work so that they may earn a profit from those works. This is to encourage them to continue to create new works. Once that period ends, the work belongs to the public.
Unfortunately, due to their huge amounts of money, the copyright industry (music, books, movies, software, etc.) has been able to secure longer and longer periods of control and more and more restrictive terms of control. I believe the bargain has been broken. I believe that people instinctively realize that they are getting shafted and this is why so many people don't really respect copyright laws anymore. The law seems arbitrary and unfair now (and I think most of us can see this, which is why we spend more time discussing the ethics of copyright than the law itself). We see nothing in return. Practically nothing has entered the public domain in decades. Copyrights now last longer than a normal human lifetime. I think that defeats the purpose of the "limited period" portion of the Constitution. What we need now is some serious copyright reform.
That's the most relevant part, anyway. I went on to talk about the music industry specifically, but that's less relevant to this discussion. I think I've posted things here that were written better than that reply, but it does contain the gist of my arguments.
I just heard Ms. Litman on NPR last Friday along with Lawrence Lessig. It was interesting, but frustrating since they really don't get enough time to talk and the host tends to redirect things too often to keep it "light" enough for the listeners. I'm ordering her book today though. Sounds like it would be very interesting reading. Might help me make my point better next time we have a Napster argument here on slashdot. I just wish there was some good way to get more public attention on these issues. Most people I know really don't have a clue what copyright laws really say. It's exactly as Litman says, they just do what they feel they should be able to do. It's hard to figure out where things will go now. I think that the copyright industry is bound to start drawing some real public attention in the next few years as their various "content protection technologies" come to fruition. It could be a bucket of cold water to wake up consumers to what's been going on with copyright law for the last century or so. Or maybe their propaganda will have taken hold by then and people will simply accept it. I don't know. It worries me though.
You are practicing equivocation which is illogical.
I don't believe I am. There is no such thing as "big enough" when it comes to corporations. As long as they can find a way to maintain their profits, they will continue to grow. We have seen corporations go to great lengths to generate more profit. As I said before, it's often at the expense of their workers, consumers and the environment. It's not that they just want to turn a profit. It's the fact that they often use reprehensible methods to gain those profits. I think that pretty well fits the definition of greed.
No, it is based on the control of the means of production. Cavemen probably acted greedily, but you would never accuse on of being a Rockefeller.
Corporations constantly look for ways to maximize profits. Often at the expense of their employees, consumers, the environment, etc. Why? To make higher profits! Greed! Exactly what I said. If you think otherwise, you'd better offer up a better explanation than that. Greed isn't exclusive to capitalism (hence your caveman reference makes no sense), but it's certainly an integral part. "Self-interest" is another good term for it.
Never said anything about them "b[ing] criativ indevijuals an fele GUD aboute themsalvs" being the only thing that matters. There will always be a certain amount of memorization that is necessary. I'm just saying that memorization isn't gonna do them a damn bit of good if you haven't taught them to think properly for themselves as well. Something that seems to be completely overlooked as teachers scramble to drill facts into the kids so they can pass the tests.
Actually, I thought I did both. :)
Nope, and you dodged again by telling him that "studies along similar lines exist" even though he said he'd never heard of one. I haven't either, despite many many stories such as this one on Slashdot. If valid studies along those lines existed, why haven't people who think as you do trotted them out in your responses to these stories?
Damn near every industry plays on ignorance and naivete. Capitalism is based on greed. They're out to get the best deal for themselves. If you can get your workers to do more for less, you do it. If you can convince people that working for you is a good opportunity, you do it. Whether it's true or not doesn't matter. It's only an opinion anyway. Many people don't understand that.
What's with all the pathetic replies that do nothing but bash the author of the post? Ya'll can't come up with a decent rebuttal? Maybe you should reconsider the value of teaching kids to think instead of teaching them to memorize.
Most games SUCK when played on WinCE pdas. They're slow and rather laggy usually. Most of the good, playable games for WinCE have equally good counterparts on Palm, aside from the color. But now that we have color Palm and Handspring pdas, even that isn't an issue.
Of course he really didn't have any reason to think they'd care or even know about it. If you're visiting fuckgeneralmotors.com, you probably didn't get there by accident, and anyone can look up the domain owner if they want.
Statistical statements such as "a gun is 6 times more likely to kill a resident of the household than an intruder" can also be quite misleading. How likely is it that you will kill an intruder with the gun? 10%? 0.01%? It makes a difference. Top that off with the fact that the statistics are highly suspect themselves and it becomes meaningless. The study seemed to be deliberately misleading. I've been trying to find the actual paper so I can read the whole thing, but haven't hand any luck so far. I've only found pieces of it, and they seemed misleading.
As it has been pointed out elsewhere in these posts, the Constitution exists to tell the government what it can and cannot do, not the people. If the Constitution doesn't say that the government can do something, then it can't do it.
Gay rights marchers are on the defensive side of things. They are threatened by people like Dr. Laura with a ban on their way of life. They aren't trying to prevent Dr. Laura from having a heterosexual relationship or any other kind. They're trying to prevent her and people like her from making decisions about how gay people should live their lives.
Maybe you can tell this poster where to send his letter.
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=01/05/18/18252 41&cid=119
Here's the link in plain text in case you fear the link. http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=01/05/18/18252 41&cid=119
I still think that a simple, polite email or phone call was warranted before unleashing the lawyers. It could very well have averted the whole situation.
Point taken.
Even ignoring for the moment the distinct possibility that the methods and assumptions used in the study are flawed, which I believe they are, you seem to have disregarded the remainder of the article after coming across the statement that you cite. It goes on to say:
But even this number is of precarious significance, for it embodies the dubious assumption that comparing "body counts" is a meaningful way to report the usefulness of firearms.
As reported by Gary Kleck's study, the vast majority of defensive uses of guns do not result in injury. Guns are quite effective at deterring crime. Criminals don't like targets that can defend themselves and possibly kill them. Additionally, as the article says:
One does not measure the effectiveness of a police department, for example, by comparing the number of officers and criminals killed over some time period. Rather, one asks what effect the police have had on the rate of crime. Similarly, one should not compare the number of burglars or other intruders and civilians killed by domestic firearms, but rather ask how many burglars or other intruders were driven away or deterred by the firearm.