I'd argue that if they look at the "not-hit" songs they will find the same percentage mach their formula, or very close to it. What they've found is that most songs are written in a very similar fashion based on old Blues and Bluegrass riffs.
The formula for a hit song is 20cents per play on local radio stations. It's called payola, and they've been doing it since the invention of radio.
I know there will be a lot of flaming about Amazon not "paying their fair share" but the fact is, they aren't the ones that pay this... their customers are. Paying taxes is not our civic duty. It's not un-patriotic to feel the urge to keep your own damned money. There is a simple solution to Californians problem: stop spending so much.
Are you saying that "known" USB sticks are better? I find it far more likely that an attacker would infect a known USB stick of a targeted employee... or the USB stick would be mailed to them as "Vendor bling" It would be relatively easy to get several dozen USB sticks with "Cisco" or "Microsoft" printed on them, mail to random people with a note that says "thanks for using our products" and I'm sure 90%+ of them would get plugged strait in and considered "safe".
OR... we could just pirate it and not have to deal with this garbage at all. For supposedly hating piracy so much they sure seem to be doing everything in their power to make sure we pirate their games.
"If the hallmark of real geekiness — of America — is determination..."
See, on that point right there, you're wrong. So there is a problem with fake geeks, and even more troubling, the author of this article is one of them.
Pointing out other violations of the constitution does not make this one ok. In most cases however, you're talking about a companies policy to not sell to minors... which is a world of difference from a LAW forbidding it. Stores can continue to ask for ID, they just can't be forced to by law. I think the exception here is for porn, which I believe was held as an exception by the court. I personally would never want a minor to be able to buy porn without parental concent, but that's for parents and businesses to work out together. When the government gets involved in deciding which media is appropriate for your child to see, that's far more damaging to their future than them seeing a gang of midgets pooping on each other.
Even if they lose half their players, if they remaining half are spending 4x the money on the game it's a net win for the company. Just ask SOE. They can keep a game running with 100 subscribers left if those subscribers are willing to pay enough.
Women don't buy ridiculous gadgets like Xboxes and such... so why would those systems make games for them? That doesn't mean women are being ignored. Facebook games anyone? Bejeweled? I'd argue that if you just counted the number of games out there, there's actually MORE tailored to women than to men. The only difference being, Men are willing to pay a lot more for their entertainment and entertainment companies are happily willing to take their money.
All of your arguments are pointless. They've proven time and again that logic doesn't matter in these cases. They sue people to get them to settle. They don't want any of these cases to go to court. They HAVE made huge profits suing people. They do not have to prove you downloaded or not. There was a case a couple of years ago in which the person sued owned ALL of the music he had downloaded and he still lost the case. As far as the RIAA and our court systems are concerned, digital music files are illegal.
Not only is that article off topic, it completely misunderstands the premise of net neutrality. The EQUIPMENT that the "internet" resides on is not, the internet. "The internet" is like "speech" or "Writing" it's an intangible medium for relating information and it's owned by humanity as a whole. We've collectively decided that to connect to the internet, you need to do so in a neutral way. ISPs connecting you to something other than the internet do not have to do so in a neutral way. But if you want to provide INTERNET access you need to do it without prejudice against or for certain voices on the net.
I can just as easily take a picture of your credit card number with my cellphone. I don't need to reverse engineer a damned thing.
Not that I want this... or a credit card. When I want to spend money, I have to go to the bank and fill out a withdraw slip. If I don't want whatever it was I was going to buy bad enough to do that... I didn't need it in the first place.
None of it matters. We are not going to stop using gas or burning coal. Period. Even if we did, China is definitely not going to... ever. When the atmosphere actually starts becoming toxic... then maybe something will be done... far too late, but that's what's going to happen.
The government grants themselves even more power to circumvent the constitution while passing legislation absolving businesses from any legal mandate to secure themselves from what is clearly an unstoppable army of cyber criminals?
Slashdot Mirror
I'd argue that if they look at the "not-hit" songs they will find the same percentage mach their formula, or very close to it. What they've found is that most songs are written in a very similar fashion based on old Blues and Bluegrass riffs.
The formula for a hit song is 20cents per play on local radio stations. It's called payola, and they've been doing it since the invention of radio.
Brilliant!
Sounds good to me. Lets let all the states vote on if we really want to keep California and see how that turns out for you.
I have a choice in restaurants, and if I don't like the wallpaper I can certainly chose a different one.
I know there will be a lot of flaming about Amazon not "paying their fair share" but the fact is, they aren't the ones that pay this... their customers are. Paying taxes is not our civic duty. It's not un-patriotic to feel the urge to keep your own damned money. There is a simple solution to Californians problem: stop spending so much.
Are you saying that "known" USB sticks are better? I find it far more likely that an attacker would infect a known USB stick of a targeted employee... or the USB stick would be mailed to them as "Vendor bling" It would be relatively easy to get several dozen USB sticks with "Cisco" or "Microsoft" printed on them, mail to random people with a note that says "thanks for using our products" and I'm sure 90%+ of them would get plugged strait in and considered "safe".
OR... we could just pirate it and not have to deal with this garbage at all. For supposedly hating piracy so much they sure seem to be doing everything in their power to make sure we pirate their games.
"If the hallmark of real geekiness — of America — is determination..."
See, on that point right there, you're wrong. So there is a problem with fake geeks, and even more troubling, the author of this article is one of them.
Pointing out other violations of the constitution does not make this one ok. In most cases however, you're talking about a companies policy to not sell to minors... which is a world of difference from a LAW forbidding it. Stores can continue to ask for ID, they just can't be forced to by law. I think the exception here is for porn, which I believe was held as an exception by the court. I personally would never want a minor to be able to buy porn without parental concent, but that's for parents and businesses to work out together. When the government gets involved in deciding which media is appropriate for your child to see, that's far more damaging to their future than them seeing a gang of midgets pooping on each other.
A fool and his money... (or job)
Yes.
Don't live in a flood plain moron.
Even if they lose half their players, if they remaining half are spending 4x the money on the game it's a net win for the company. Just ask SOE. They can keep a game running with 100 subscribers left if those subscribers are willing to pay enough.
You're forgetting that nearly all that competition is better that Opera. This wasn't always the case, but it certainly is now.
Sounds great! Why aren't WIRED carriers included?
Women don't buy ridiculous gadgets like Xboxes and such... so why would those systems make games for them? That doesn't mean women are being ignored. Facebook games anyone? Bejeweled? I'd argue that if you just counted the number of games out there, there's actually MORE tailored to women than to men. The only difference being, Men are willing to pay a lot more for their entertainment and entertainment companies are happily willing to take their money.
Now if we could only ignore them at home as well...
All of your arguments are pointless. They've proven time and again that logic doesn't matter in these cases. They sue people to get them to settle. They don't want any of these cases to go to court. They HAVE made huge profits suing people. They do not have to prove you downloaded or not. There was a case a couple of years ago in which the person sued owned ALL of the music he had downloaded and he still lost the case. As far as the RIAA and our court systems are concerned, digital music files are illegal.
This sometimes get mixed up when they translate from the UK press to the American Press.
Not only is that article off topic, it completely misunderstands the premise of net neutrality. The EQUIPMENT that the "internet" resides on is not, the internet. "The internet" is like "speech" or "Writing" it's an intangible medium for relating information and it's owned by humanity as a whole. We've collectively decided that to connect to the internet, you need to do so in a neutral way. ISPs connecting you to something other than the internet do not have to do so in a neutral way. But if you want to provide INTERNET access you need to do it without prejudice against or for certain voices on the net.
I can just as easily take a picture of your credit card number with my cellphone. I don't need to reverse engineer a damned thing.
Not that I want this... or a credit card. When I want to spend money, I have to go to the bank and fill out a withdraw slip. If I don't want whatever it was I was going to buy bad enough to do that... I didn't need it in the first place.
Can someone summarize this article for me? I can't open the link because firefox has been constantly locking up on me since the last release.
And the hundreds of Sci-fi books that used this device decades before that movie as well...
None of it matters. We are not going to stop using gas or burning coal. Period. Even if we did, China is definitely not going to... ever. When the atmosphere actually starts becoming toxic... then maybe something will be done... far too late, but that's what's going to happen.
The government grants themselves even more power to circumvent the constitution while passing legislation absolving businesses from any legal mandate to secure themselves from what is clearly an unstoppable army of cyber criminals?