Remember my.mp3.com? For those that don't, you could pop in your purchased cd at home, it would authorize you as having bought it, and then you could stream the mp3 from anywhere from that point, but only with your login. I thought it would stand up to legality as well, and used it quite a bit, authorizing at home and listening at work - no lugging! But of course mp3.com lost that lawsuit. Your example is different b/c you actually made those mp3s yourself, and I have plenty of those as well (a binder full), but proof enough that simply owning is not necessarily enough in the eyes of the law.
I was mostly joking, of course there is nothing inherently illegal about it, most of us wouldn't be on Slashdot if we disagreed with that statement. Target Kill Bury is what Disney et al want most consumers to equate Rip Mix Burn with, in their attempts to demonize fair use. But, "mostly" joking because this ad campaign was one of the first major media attempts that I can recall that would encourage consumers to make copies of their music - by encouraging this first step, it could be argued that they're pushing consumers down that road.
To give another example, why aren't mod chips for Playstation 2 being advertised? Of course they allow one to make backups of your game in case it gets scratched, but what's its primary use? To play pirated and imported games, of course. So if an ad campaign said "Mod your Playstation to make backups." but said "Do not steal games.", could Sony be miffed? I would say yes. I realize there are holes in this analogy, but just an example.
Umm, it's just as easy on my PC. I just install Adaptec Easy CD Creator, reboot after it installs the necessary SCSI drivers, download and install the latest service pack for it, then uninstall it and install an earlier one when I discover that it has incompatibilities with Windows 2000, then do a Test burn just to ensure that Adaptec has correctly detected the data extraction speed of my cdrom, and then voila, I can copy the music cd! Ok, maybe you have a point.
Advertising is not meant to be subtle. It was an effective tagline that summarized a product feature, and was memorable. Anyone remember any taglines for those dual CD decks from Panasonic, because I sure don't. Apple is not to blame here, and plenty of artists are on their side and love their technology - Moby, BT, Francis Ford Coppola, all of these people would not support a company that would allow users to take income away from them.
I'm going to resist making all the obligatory "when hell freezes over" jokes, because your idea regarding Microsoft getting it's own distro actually intrigues me and one I have not heard expressed. As much resistance as they would get from many staunch opposers, this move would potentially win them tremendous support and would definitely give Linux a boost. However, I fail to see what MS would gain from this - by not making source available, they really would not get any support in enhancements from the OSS community, and would essentially be supporting their own demise if they did open the source to anything. When selling the product, they would keep pricing most likely identical, so what would be the advantage of buying MS Office for Linux if it costs the same? So neat idea, but 1 to 1 billion odds of this happening.
If you look at the journal entry in his sig, he is quite possibly doing an experiment to gauge anti-MS bias. Therefore he does not necessarily believe those comments, and is not using his primary account in case it would be modded down.
You're addressing a techie audience for the most part, so of course we can usually type faster than write, that part is clear. I am seeing a lot of posts like this though, and might as well respond to this one.
First of all, nobody is about to replace the keyboard for computers or laptops. The target here are more portable or smaller devices, where such a full keyboard is a hassle. I hate those pagers with tiny full keyboards for example - even people who claim to be adept on them are breaking their fingers. Wouldn't it be better if it had the perfected handwriting recognition that you're talking about?
Secondly, smaller devices should not all have to support keyboards. Cell phones, LCD screen remote controls, those fabled built-in refrigerator recipe computers that we won't see anytime soon, your GPS device that wants to know your target address. All these devices need fast input. In essence, keyboards are great for long text, but for short interaction, single device (mouse or stylus) is superior. Voice is of course another alternative, but MS is working on support for that as well.
Lastly, as I said the audience here is techie, but let's not forget that MS is always looking to grow the market. So while the keyboard may be faster for us, for millions of other people, it is not, and we're being self-centered by ignoring it. While future generations will have lesser and lesser amounts of computer illiteracy, handwriting recognition will still enable faster input from many users.
Thanks for the Red Herring link, that is an interesting interview. With the previous "MS Says HTTP is Dead!" and such articles on Slashdot, I'm surprised this one got missed, as he essentially says that the Internet will never see another killer app after browsing and email (Internet is dead!), and that "edge" applications, those that operate on the fringe of networks rather than centrally, are the future. This is fascinating given the MS push towards web services that seek to centralize software. It's almost going against the company line.
Besides the fact that.NET has opened up a whole new can of worms, and there is still possibility of future litigation, let's not forget that USA is not the only country in the world where MS operates. Israel has already declared MS a monopoly there and EU has been giving them heat as well. Since this was before an Australian audience, perhaps the sentiment was being targeted locally, although I'm sure MS is looking for as many governments as possible to support them with this argument.
They're obviously not concerned about taxes here, but rather trying to get politicians on their side - "our company is contributing more to the economy and therefore the government purse". I think this is pretty clear and am wondering why so many posts are asking the question of why MS is mentioning taxes.
I think this is as close as MS can get to saying "if you support free software, then the communists may have already won."
The article is pretty short, and I can't help but wondering if any of his statements were taken at all out of context. For example, the "should be offered an alternative" statement seems pretty silly for MS to take - after all the monopoly allegation problems, why complain that there is a movement to have a Passport alternative? One would think that the presence of other central authentication database standards would allow them to continue to tout the "we are not dominating" stance.
It's especially disengenuous for MS to complain as Passport is/will be included with every MS OS, whereas the Liberty Alliance one will have a hard time making it in the Windows world.
GPL knock is classic MS though - "free software cannot make money" is their normal approach and is almost hardly newsworthy.
How long before someone carefully screens through/., filters out the crap, enhances it on their own with some research, and simply publishes a condensed version in print form and make some cash off of it? Probably not long.
I've heard several people echo this sentiment. How would this work exactly and who the heck would buy it? How would you filter false posts from the true? Online, we pretty much accept that a +5 Insightful post might be blatantly wrong, because moderators can make mistakes. But that's ok, b/c we're used to it. In the print world, even editorials are subject to a higher standard of veracity, I think. For someone to publish it would mean assuming responsibility, and I don't see that happening.
Not to mention that this would not exactly sell like hotcakes - how many letter pages do you read in the magazines that you subscribe? Most of the time I tend to ignore opinions of readers in the print world, and skip directly to the people who should know what they're talking about, the authors of the articles. Although the community model may work for some small publications, I cannot see a large scale republication about comments about what (by that time) would be old news, achieving any popularity. Call me a cynic.
/me smacks myself in the head. You're right, that is completely true, I should've known that. For some reason, not having my message on the error page made me forget that the browser remembers what it posted to the page as part of the headers, and then I just got used to the hitting back key and didn't stop to question my actions. Thanks for the tip.
There are already a great deal of posts, but I tried to find anyone suggesting this, and haven't. I know the premium feature that I would like would be the lack of the 2 minute post separation rule, that prevents you from posting too soon after your last.
As I mentioned in a different post, I'm obligated to not cache my pages due to the nature of some web applications I use, so that means that when I hit back after being told that "You just posted 1 minute 30 seconds ago", my whole comment is gone. I have started copying and pasting before hitting submit every time now, just in case, but it's still a pain.
I think this would be a good feature for those paying. Or at least decrease from 2 minutes to 30 seconds or something. Very frequently in answering different posts I get tripped up by this.
.org is for non-profits; it seems to me that as soon as you start charging for admission, you're moving into the for-profit sector. Of course, the whole idea of non-profits is a joke to begin with - the CEO of the typical non-profit makes very nearly as much as the CEO of the typical for-profit. The for-profit/non-profit distinction is just an accounting fiction that allows marxists to pretend that they're superior to the rest of us. Nevertheless, the hypocrisy of charging admission to a.org is startling.
Well, first of all, they own the.com domain as well. Secondly, I don't see the.org being a part of the name anywhere, certainly not in the logo, nor anywhere on the front page, nor in the headline of this article. Lastly, I'm not sure I see them raking money hand over fist with this scheme, perhaps breaking even or losing less is more likely for as much page views as this site gets.
So although your comment is interesting, I do not believe it to be valid.
So basically, "subscribe in order to see if a subscription would make sense for you." Right? I'm required to not cache pages for several web applications I work with, and this means every back page is a reload. Just as an estimate, I bet I go through at least a hundred pages a day by that logic, from reading and replying to comments, MetaModerating and seeing context, responding to posts, participating in polls, and so on.
I think a 1000 seems like a really low number to me, and I know this will make me afraid to click on any pages I'm not sure I need if I subscribe.
Hahah, you made double-take on my calendar. "Today is the first, did I really fall for it?" What a relief, not April. Although perhaps it'd be nicer if it was, based on the topic.
Your baby went corporate, and became a whore. Now she's been around the block, and nobody's going to shell out cash when they know she puts out for free.
Sounds like it to me, and there are plenty others.
I don't think you read the actual post perhaps? They're going to start having larger, more obtrusive ads. I'm sure you'll start to notice it when they do.
This took forever to come up, I think this topic is causing Slashdot to be Slashdotted.
Slashdot is essentially a portal with a strong community of knowledgeable supporters. In asking what value it contributes, let's ask why you are here? Obviously you found some value in coming here, and so do the rest of us. Slashdot filters out interesting stories and allows us access to a great base of commentators (some not so great:). This is of value to many people, some of which already seem to be willing to pay for it.
I do however see the point of letting high karma people off a little easier, and making non-contributors pay for just reading, which is what I think you're pointing out is a problem. At the same time though, people who participate like Slashdot the most and are most likely to pay, don't you think?
Slashdot Mirror
Remember my.mp3.com? For those that don't, you could pop in your purchased cd at home, it would authorize you as having bought it, and then you could stream the mp3 from anywhere from that point, but only with your login. I thought it would stand up to legality as well, and used it quite a bit, authorizing at home and listening at work - no lugging! But of course mp3.com lost that lawsuit. Your example is different b/c you actually made those mp3s yourself, and I have plenty of those as well (a binder full), but proof enough that simply owning is not necessarily enough in the eyes of the law.
I was mostly joking, of course there is nothing inherently illegal about it, most of us wouldn't be on Slashdot if we disagreed with that statement. Target Kill Bury is what Disney et al want most consumers to equate Rip Mix Burn with, in their attempts to demonize fair use. But, "mostly" joking because this ad campaign was one of the first major media attempts that I can recall that would encourage consumers to make copies of their music - by encouraging this first step, it could be argued that they're pushing consumers down that road.
To give another example, why aren't mod chips for Playstation 2 being advertised? Of course they allow one to make backups of your game in case it gets scratched, but what's its primary use? To play pirated and imported games, of course. So if an ad campaign said "Mod your Playstation to make backups." but said "Do not steal games.", could Sony be miffed? I would say yes. I realize there are holes in this analogy, but just an example.
Well, to be completely fair, I haven't seen too many gun ads lately that state "Target. Kill. Bury."
Umm, it's just as easy on my PC. I just install Adaptec Easy CD Creator, reboot after it installs the necessary SCSI drivers, download and install the latest service pack for it, then uninstall it and install an earlier one when I discover that it has incompatibilities with Windows 2000, then do a Test burn just to ensure that Adaptec has correctly detected the data extraction speed of my cdrom, and then voila, I can copy the music cd! Ok, maybe you have a point.
Advertising is not meant to be subtle. It was an effective tagline that summarized a product feature, and was memorable. Anyone remember any taglines for those dual CD decks from Panasonic, because I sure don't. Apple is not to blame here, and plenty of artists are on their side and love their technology - Moby, BT, Francis Ford Coppola, all of these people would not support a company that would allow users to take income away from them.
I'm going to resist making all the obligatory "when hell freezes over" jokes, because your idea regarding Microsoft getting it's own distro actually intrigues me and one I have not heard expressed. As much resistance as they would get from many staunch opposers, this move would potentially win them tremendous support and would definitely give Linux a boost. However, I fail to see what MS would gain from this - by not making source available, they really would not get any support in enhancements from the OSS community, and would essentially be supporting their own demise if they did open the source to anything. When selling the product, they would keep pricing most likely identical, so what would be the advantage of buying MS Office for Linux if it costs the same? So neat idea, but 1 to 1 billion odds of this happening.
Definitely interesting to discuss though.
If you look at the journal entry in his sig, he is quite possibly doing an experiment to gauge anti-MS bias. Therefore he does not necessarily believe those comments, and is not using his primary account in case it would be modded down.
You're addressing a techie audience for the most part, so of course we can usually type faster than write, that part is clear. I am seeing a lot of posts like this though, and might as well respond to this one.
First of all, nobody is about to replace the keyboard for computers or laptops. The target here are more portable or smaller devices, where such a full keyboard is a hassle. I hate those pagers with tiny full keyboards for example - even people who claim to be adept on them are breaking their fingers. Wouldn't it be better if it had the perfected handwriting recognition that you're talking about?
Secondly, smaller devices should not all have to support keyboards. Cell phones, LCD screen remote controls, those fabled built-in refrigerator recipe computers that we won't see anytime soon, your GPS device that wants to know your target address. All these devices need fast input. In essence, keyboards are great for long text, but for short interaction, single device (mouse or stylus) is superior. Voice is of course another alternative, but MS is working on support for that as well.
Lastly, as I said the audience here is techie, but let's not forget that MS is always looking to grow the market. So while the keyboard may be faster for us, for millions of other people, it is not, and we're being self-centered by ignoring it. While future generations will have lesser and lesser amounts of computer illiteracy, handwriting recognition will still enable faster input from many users.
Thanks for the Red Herring link, that is an interesting interview. With the previous "MS Says HTTP is Dead!" and such articles on Slashdot, I'm surprised this one got missed, as he essentially says that the Internet will never see another killer app after browsing and email (Internet is dead!), and that "edge" applications, those that operate on the fringe of networks rather than centrally, are the future. This is fascinating given the MS push towards web services that seek to centralize software. It's almost going against the company line.
Besides the fact that .NET has opened up a whole new can of worms, and there is still possibility of future litigation, let's not forget that USA is not the only country in the world where MS operates. Israel has already declared MS a monopoly there and EU has been giving them heat as well. Since this was before an Australian audience, perhaps the sentiment was being targeted locally, although I'm sure MS is looking for as many governments as possible to support them with this argument.
They're obviously not concerned about taxes here, but rather trying to get politicians on their side - "our company is contributing more to the economy and therefore the government purse". I think this is pretty clear and am wondering why so many posts are asking the question of why MS is mentioning taxes.
I think this is as close as MS can get to saying "if you support free software, then the communists may have already won."
Perhaps he was just encouraging sales of the MS Natural Keyboard line?
The article is pretty short, and I can't help but wondering if any of his statements were taken at all out of context. For example, the "should be offered an alternative" statement seems pretty silly for MS to take - after all the monopoly allegation problems, why complain that there is a movement to have a Passport alternative? One would think that the presence of other central authentication database standards would allow them to continue to tout the "we are not dominating" stance.
It's especially disengenuous for MS to complain as Passport is/will be included with every MS OS, whereas the Liberty Alliance one will have a hard time making it in the Windows world.
GPL knock is classic MS though - "free software cannot make money" is their normal approach and is almost hardly newsworthy.
How long before someone carefully screens through /., filters out the crap, enhances it on their own with some research, and simply publishes a condensed version in print form and make some cash off of it? Probably not long.
I've heard several people echo this sentiment. How would this work exactly and who the heck would buy it? How would you filter false posts from the true? Online, we pretty much accept that a +5 Insightful post might be blatantly wrong, because moderators can make mistakes. But that's ok, b/c we're used to it. In the print world, even editorials are subject to a higher standard of veracity, I think. For someone to publish it would mean assuming responsibility, and I don't see that happening.
Not to mention that this would not exactly sell like hotcakes - how many letter pages do you read in the magazines that you subscribe? Most of the time I tend to ignore opinions of readers in the print world, and skip directly to the people who should know what they're talking about, the authors of the articles. Although the community model may work for some small publications, I cannot see a large scale republication about comments about what (by that time) would be old news, achieving any popularity. Call me a cynic.
/me smacks myself in the head. You're right, that is completely true, I should've known that. For some reason, not having my message on the error page made me forget that the browser remembers what it posted to the page as part of the headers, and then I just got used to the hitting back key and didn't stop to question my actions. Thanks for the tip.
I don't see the .org being a part of the name anywhere, certainly not in the logo, nor anywhere on the front page, nor in the headline of this article.
Are you blind?! At the top of the page of your post (and this one) I see a good-sized "slashdot.org" logo.
Oh yes, in the article type logo. The main logo is what I obviously meant.
There are already a great deal of posts, but I tried to find anyone suggesting this, and haven't. I know the premium feature that I would like would be the lack of the 2 minute post separation rule, that prevents you from posting too soon after your last.
As I mentioned in a different post, I'm obligated to not cache my pages due to the nature of some web applications I use, so that means that when I hit back after being told that "You just posted 1 minute 30 seconds ago", my whole comment is gone. I have started copying and pasting before hitting submit every time now, just in case, but it's still a pain.
I think this would be a good feature for those paying. Or at least decrease from 2 minutes to 30 seconds or something. Very frequently in answering different posts I get tripped up by this.
.org is for non-profits; it seems to me that as soon as you start charging for admission, you're moving into the for-profit sector. Of course, the whole idea of non-profits is a joke to begin with - the CEO of the typical non-profit makes very nearly as much as the CEO of the typical for-profit. The for-profit/non-profit distinction is just an accounting fiction that allows marxists to pretend that they're superior to the rest of us. Nevertheless, the hypocrisy of charging admission to a .org is startling.
.com domain as well. Secondly, I don't see the .org being a part of the name anywhere, certainly not in the logo, nor anywhere on the front page, nor in the headline of this article. Lastly, I'm not sure I see them raking money hand over fist with this scheme, perhaps breaking even or losing less is more likely for as much page views as this site gets.
Well, first of all, they own the
So although your comment is interesting, I do not believe it to be valid.
So basically, "subscribe in order to see if a subscription would make sense for you." Right? I'm required to not cache pages for several web applications I work with, and this means every back page is a reload. Just as an estimate, I bet I go through at least a hundred pages a day by that logic, from reading and replying to comments, MetaModerating and seeing context, responding to posts, participating in polls, and so on.
I think a 1000 seems like a really low number to me, and I know this will make me afraid to click on any pages I'm not sure I need if I subscribe.
This should be updated in the article text so that more people see it, as this question is coming up over and over again.
Hahah, you made double-take on my calendar. "Today is the first, did I really fall for it?" What a relief, not April. Although perhaps it'd be nicer if it was, based on the topic.
Look for flames, there are none, you jumped the gun.
Are you sure? Let's see...
Your baby went corporate, and became a whore. Now she's been around the block, and nobody's going to shell out cash when they know she puts out for free.
Sounds like it to me, and there are plenty others.
And of course after 4 minutes of loading, my post is now redundant. Doh! Sorry :)
I don't think you read the actual post perhaps? They're going to start having larger, more obtrusive ads. I'm sure you'll start to notice it when they do.
This took forever to come up, I think this topic is causing Slashdot to be Slashdotted.
Slashdot is essentially a portal with a strong community of knowledgeable supporters. In asking what value it contributes, let's ask why you are here? Obviously you found some value in coming here, and so do the rest of us. Slashdot filters out interesting stories and allows us access to a great base of commentators (some not so great :). This is of value to many people, some of which already seem to be willing to pay for it.
I do however see the point of letting high karma people off a little easier, and making non-contributors pay for just reading, which is what I think you're pointing out is a problem. At the same time though, people who participate like Slashdot the most and are most likely to pay, don't you think?