The fundamental point of copyrights is that it gives content creators the ability to control the reproduction of their work (with restrictions). It is irrelevant whether or not someone is losing money as a result of the violation of a copyright; focusing on the RIAA and its stupid, self-serving comments only draws attention away from the illegal, dare I say immoral, acts of IP theives.
As Larry Wall pointed out in Monday's WSJ, "Persons of leisurely moral growth often confuse giving with taking." It's one thing to listen to music, re-use code, etc. that people have given away. It's quite another to use these things without permission. That you're not also taking money out of their pockets is not a defense.
You watch too many cartoons. Having a 100 tons of concrete fall on you, a tree, ect. is not funny. Laughing at human suffering is not a "good way to deal with it."
The human condition is absurd. There are only two sane responses to it: laughter or suicide.
Oh yes, the Commordore 1541 Drive... The most intelligent, SLOWEST floppy drive available for any 8 bit personal computer. I'm sure you needed to copy ALL DAY because the thing was so damn slow.
(Please note that I'm not saying that it's "intelligence" was responsible for its horrific performance, just that having a 6502 (or 6510 or whatever) in the drive didn't keep the thing from being blown away by the Apple Disk ][ as well as nearly every other form of non-cassette tape storage.)
1. Wookies rip droids' arms out of their sockets when Wookies loose holographic Star Wars chess games.
2. Chewbacca reassembles '3P0 on Cloud City (irony?)
3. When Han's being tortured on Cloud City to get Luke to confront Vader, Chewie's crying is one of the most touching parts of any of the movies. Much more real than the violins playing when worthless Ewoks get what's coming.
There are several other scenes in which Chewbecca more than earns his keep. As for him dying in the book: everyone dies eventually.
Unfortunately, I can't say that "I'll never understand this" propensity to ascribe events like this to the "American mentality." For every moron in the U.S. who is talked into doing this by a sleazy lawyer, there are a hundred who recognize the innanity of such lawsuits. As you may have noticed, there are plenty of U.S. citizens here on Slashdot.org calling this lawsuit what it is.
Why do such things happen in the U.S. and nowhere else? First of all, it's premature to say that such things don't happen elsewhere. Second, that these things happen in the U.S. at all has more to do with the dynamics that encourage law firms to file frivolous lawsuits (hot coffee, stock prices, addictive games, etc.) and nothing to do with the character of U.S. citizens as a whole.
I'm no flag waver: I too used to think that the U.S. had a monopoly on stupid people, but your comments have given me occasion to reconsider.
No one with half a brain thought the world was flat in 1492. However, Columbus did fudge the numbers quite a bit to get Earth's circumference small enough to make a westward route to the East plausible. If the Americas hadn't gotten in his way, his voyage would have ended at the bottom of the ocean.
On the other hand, Eratosthenes measured the circumference of the Earth to pretty amazing accuracy about 1,500 years earlier.
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The fundamental point of copyrights is that it gives content creators the ability to control the reproduction of their work (with restrictions). It is irrelevant whether or not someone is losing money as a result of the violation of a copyright; focusing on the RIAA and its stupid, self-serving comments only draws attention away from the illegal, dare I say immoral, acts of IP theives.
As Larry Wall pointed out in Monday's WSJ, "Persons of leisurely moral growth often confuse giving with taking." It's one thing to listen to music, re-use code, etc. that people have given away. It's quite another to use these things without permission. That you're not also taking money out of their pockets is not a defense.
You watch too many cartoons. Having a 100 tons of concrete fall on you, a tree, ect. is not funny. Laughing at human suffering is not a "good way to deal with it."
The human condition is absurd. There are only two sane responses to it: laughter or suicide.
Oh yes, the Commordore 1541 Drive... The most intelligent, SLOWEST floppy drive available for any 8 bit personal computer. I'm sure you needed to copy ALL DAY because the thing was so damn slow.
(Please note that I'm not saying that it's "intelligence" was responsible for its horrific performance, just that having a 6502 (or 6510 or whatever) in the drive didn't keep the thing from being blown away by the Apple Disk ][ as well as nearly every other form of non-cassette tape storage.)
1. Wookies rip droids' arms out of their sockets when Wookies loose holographic Star Wars chess games.
2. Chewbacca reassembles '3P0 on Cloud City (irony?)
3. When Han's being tortured on Cloud City to get Luke to confront Vader, Chewie's crying is one of the most touching parts of any of the movies. Much more real than the violins playing when worthless Ewoks get what's coming.
There are several other scenes in which Chewbecca more than earns his keep. As for him dying in the book: everyone dies eventually.
Unfortunately, I can't say that "I'll never understand this" propensity to ascribe events like this to the "American mentality." For every moron in the U.S. who is talked into doing this by a sleazy lawyer, there are a hundred who recognize the innanity of such lawsuits. As you may have noticed, there are plenty of U.S. citizens here on Slashdot.org calling this lawsuit what it is.
Why do such things happen in the U.S. and nowhere else? First of all, it's premature to say that such things don't happen elsewhere. Second, that these things happen in the U.S. at all has more to do with the dynamics that encourage law firms to file frivolous lawsuits (hot coffee, stock prices, addictive games, etc.) and nothing to do with the character of U.S. citizens as a whole.
I'm no flag waver: I too used to think that the U.S. had a monopoly on stupid people, but your comments have given me occasion to reconsider.
No one with half a brain thought the world was flat in 1492. However, Columbus did fudge the numbers quite a bit to get Earth's circumference small enough to make a westward route to the East plausible. If the Americas hadn't gotten in his way, his voyage would have ended at the bottom of the ocean.
On the other hand, Eratosthenes measured the circumference of the Earth to pretty amazing accuracy about 1,500 years earlier.