All of these people make arguments that are based on faith and hand waving. While I will freely admit that arguments the other direction are no better, I do not think that making a snarky conclusion that it isn't money is a justifiable opinion based on any of the available arguments.
Unfortunately for your logic, bitcoin keeps on ending up with more people using it. It's not a rocket growth curve to be sure. But it isn't negative either.
I've met the VC (actually angel investor) in question. He's a really good and honest guy. He's not a shark.
This is due to two problems. First, the changeover to new management had not been completed yet, and when one of their systems was hacked it gave an opening to hack the trading site itself. This was a really serious failure, but also understandable since they hadn't finished auditing things to figure out how to secure them.
The second problem is that Bitoinica was hacked together quickly by a very talented individual without a lot of experience. He didn't cover his bases. The lack of backups is one of the major bases he didn't cover. He did at least take the precaution of making sure most of the bitcoins his trading platform was managing were in an offline wallet, which is why bitcoinica lost 80k USD work of bitcoins instead of some much larger amount.
In your scenario, yes, there will eventually become more secure garages. Some may eventually become extremely secure. But do you really want to bank out of someone's garage?
I trust this far more than I trust the legal framework surrounding our current banks. If they're big enough, they don't really have to comply with the law, just give the appearance of doing so. Most of our laws and regulations designed to reign in larger business actually work that way. They might accomplish something for a few years, but as soon as people stop paying really close attention the regulators start acting on the behalf of the industry they regulate instead of the people they're supposed to be serving.
The amount of money that was stolen was only a fairly small fraction of the total money held by the exchange. The site designer at least had the good sense to keep most of the site's money in offline storage.
Of course, the lack of database backups make it really difficult to figure out who's money it is now.:-/
He or she is not a theorist. All of the things (s)he mentions actually happen. It's become increasingly common for banks to refuse to do business with someone because someone in power disagrees with them. And then it doesn't matter how many people want to vote with their dollars, there is no longer any way for those dollars to get to them.
They all exist to make Microsoft more money. In this case, they want to manipulate developers into developing for a platform they're trying to push because they think they can make more money off it it. Everything you do when you base your stuff on their platform exists to enrich them. And if it happens to enrich you in the process, well insomuch as the vague promise that it might happen keeps people developing for their platform, Microsoft cares. Otherwise, they don't care at all, and if you become really successful, they'll look for a way to make sure your success feeds their success at the expense of your success.
That's the nature of the Microsoft game, and they haven't ever changed how they play it. They can't. Their chosen business model depends on it.
Actually, Steam is coming to Linux. And there has been a lot of pressure on Kickstarter projects to support Linux. And the Humble Indie Bundle has shown that Linux people are even more willing to pay for their games than Windows people. So I'm hopeful that will change soon. It's starting to be seen as a platform rather than a toy by the people who make games.
This is actually totally believable. I have encountered more random people running Ubuntu than anything else. Random non-geek people. Seriously. In fact, I've never encountered non-geek people running any other distribution.
It isn't a huge number, but it's not insignificant. 5% is very believable.
So, how do you propose that the workers that Microsoft depends on be educated? Do you have a means of making this happen that will actually function properly, or are you just all for no taxes for companies that enjoy the benefit of public services?
Sorry, my last post was accidentally made as AC.:-/
Next we'll be wondering "Which are the most dangerous books to write?", or "What are the most dangerous sentences to say?". I reject the premise.
If I were to pick at all, almost none of that would be on the list. Only things that had the potential to create society ending things that are not stoppable by individual action. Diseases, for example, fall into that category. But I find even that highly suspect.
No, they're not. A significant number of people treat them as pre-orders, not as 'goodwill'. I suppose in the back of their heads they know they could eventually get it for free when it came out. But this way they're notified with a download link when it comes out, get their names in the credits and any number of other things, including the feeling that they had some small part in creating it. They aren't 'goodwill' gifts. They're pre-orders with bennies.
And this isn't about whatever you define as 'monetization'. That term is so vague you could make it mean almost anything that involves making money by making art. And that's what this is about. It's perfectly possible for people to make money off their art sans copyright protection. Enough people have accomplished it that you can call it a business model.
Make no mistake, those Kickstarter projects wouldn't get a dime if they all promised the kitschy stuff with no art. What's being sold there is the chance to participate in the artistic process in some way. To feel like you helped make it. That's the reason the Grateful Dead was able to make so much money too.
The model of fan participation is actually a more profitable model for artists. It's also one that permits them far greater artistic freedom. And it's replicable. Anybody can do it if their stuff is good enough or it caters to the right niche. It's a business model, a way to get money for your art. A way to 'monetize' it.
I agree. Fan based funding models (patronage being just one example of such) are how creative works will happen in the future. Given the constraints (making digital data non-copyable is like making water not wet), the copyright model is dead.
Well, it's two sides of a coin, there's "guilt" on one side and "goodwill" on the other, both create revenue but neither is really a business model. There are people like Louis CK, just like there are people like you, but I think it's evident, at least at this time, that there aren't enough people like you to keep anybody but the Louis CKs of the world paid more than occasionally. It really is just a way for superstars to extract a premium, after making their name on the back of "monetized" media.
What an interesting set of blinders you wear. Exactly how many people have to be wildly successful with a business model based on goodwill (or I will grant you that perhaps some people feel guilty) before it's considered a 'business model'?
There are a lot of independent artists that succeed with very little in the way of copyright enforcement. There is practically no webcomic author that sues his or her customers, though sometimes cranky letters are written. There are numerous Kickstarter projects funding various kinds of artistic expression that have been wildly successful (including the Order of the Stick webcome). There's Radiohead and NIN doing 'pay what you want' albums that have been wild financial successes. And, of course, there's the example of Johnathan Coulton.
And Kickstarter projects (as an example) are certainly not wholly goodwill based, and they aren't in the least guilt based. They are based on people getting together collectively to pay for the creation of something they all want.
So, how many have to succeed without the iron bands of copyright before you agree that those aren't necessary for you to be wildly profitable? Seriously. Is there any possible number of counterexamples that will actually change your mind, or do you feel that the only reason anybody does anything is because they will be sued or put in jail if they don't?
When I enjoy your work, I have a moral obligation to help you stay alive so that you can produce more work.
I have no such moral obligation. It's in my own interests to support someone who's work I like. You don't need to add the additional pressure of making it an 'obligation'. It's like telling me I'm obligated to eat, or watch sunsets.
That's a fairly cynical view. Another view is he provided a convenient way for people to support entertainment they liked. I don't contribute to Kickstarter projects out of guilt. I don't click on the contribute via PayPal links on Open Source projects out of guilt. I do it as a way to reward the people who make stuff I like. I full well realize that they are likely to make more of it if they don't have to worry so much about food and things.
And they haven't really done anything that dispells that reputation. Their recent attempt at bullying with patents is a case in point.
But I still agree with the article. But that's because I don't think Apple or Google are appropriately taken to task for some things they do that are wrong. Particularly Apple.
I think it's the content of the end of the list, 10f-h, and the specific calling-out of black people in events where any person should be considered a threat (10i).
I strongly agree with this. I felt the exact same way reading the list. It was like "Well, that's reasonable, and that..." followed by "WTF?! You have to be dangerously prejudiced for thinking that."
No, they both explicitly mention skin color, not attitudes like racism. I resent the implication that because I'm white I'm any more racist than anybody else. And most of us (black, white, whatever) are racist to an extent. We all prefer people who 'look like us' or look like the people we're used to.
Now, the 'good black people' section I think is where he starts being really ridiculous. In my experience in living in predominantly black neighborhoods, the number of people who will be decent to you far outnumber the ones who will hurt you for being in the wrong neighborhood. But the ones who will hurt you for being in the wrong neighborhood are numerous enough that a bit of extra wariness is worthwhile. And, in my experience, those neighborhoods do tend to be more violent on average.
I also don't feel this is about people's skin color. I would feel very differently about living in a neighborhood dominated by recent immigrants from Africa, for example. But I strongly suspect the author does. I think the author really is being not-kosher. But his list is not the reason why.
Why is one list racist and not the other? Is it because the color of skin each list is warning you about? Isn't that really messed up? I mean, making those kinds of judgments based on skin color is really messed up in the first place. That's a given. But isn't really weird for it to be somehow OK to warn against one skin color but not the other?
This guy's way of encouraging new ideas from the employees is a good one. But publishing the failures on a website runs the risk of the website becoming a 'wall of shame' instead of being seen as a reward for having presented the idea in the first place. It also runs the risk of having people submit ideas they know are ridiculous just so they can be given whatever reward comes for presenting an idea at all.
But otherwise his head is screwed on straight as far as I can tell. He's right, it's very difficult to create an organization that rewards new ideas. Almost everything in business is set against this. It's why so many big companies 'innovate' by acquisition. And punishing failure makes the problem worse.
If the industry has problems, who do the regulators regulate? Also, where do you think the people in the regulatory agencies worked before they worked in the regulatory agency? If the regulators are called over-zealous by the industry, there is no disaster that happens immediately if they are forced to back down unless they do their jobs extremely poorly.
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All of these people make arguments that are based on faith and hand waving. While I will freely admit that arguments the other direction are no better, I do not think that making a snarky conclusion that it isn't money is a justifiable opinion based on any of the available arguments.
Hah, hah. Very funny. In what way are they not money?
Unfortunately for your logic, bitcoin keeps on ending up with more people using it. It's not a rocket growth curve to be sure. But it isn't negative either.
I've met the VC (actually angel investor) in question. He's a really good and honest guy. He's not a shark.
This is due to two problems. First, the changeover to new management had not been completed yet, and when one of their systems was hacked it gave an opening to hack the trading site itself. This was a really serious failure, but also understandable since they hadn't finished auditing things to figure out how to secure them.
The second problem is that Bitoinica was hacked together quickly by a very talented individual without a lot of experience. He didn't cover his bases. The lack of backups is one of the major bases he didn't cover. He did at least take the precaution of making sure most of the bitcoins his trading platform was managing were in an offline wallet, which is why bitcoinica lost 80k USD work of bitcoins instead of some much larger amount.
In your scenario, yes, there will eventually become more secure garages. Some may eventually become extremely secure. But do you really want to bank out of someone's garage?
I trust this far more than I trust the legal framework surrounding our current banks. If they're big enough, they don't really have to comply with the law, just give the appearance of doing so. Most of our laws and regulations designed to reign in larger business actually work that way. They might accomplish something for a few years, but as soon as people stop paying really close attention the regulators start acting on the behalf of the industry they regulate instead of the people they're supposed to be serving.
The amount of money that was stolen was only a fairly small fraction of the total money held by the exchange. The site designer at least had the good sense to keep most of the site's money in offline storage.
Of course, the lack of database backups make it really difficult to figure out who's money it is now. :-/
He or she is not a theorist. All of the things (s)he mentions actually happen. It's become increasingly common for banks to refuse to do business with someone because someone in power disagrees with them. And then it doesn't matter how many people want to vote with their dollars, there is no longer any way for those dollars to get to them.
They all exist to make Microsoft more money. In this case, they want to manipulate developers into developing for a platform they're trying to push because they think they can make more money off it it. Everything you do when you base your stuff on their platform exists to enrich them. And if it happens to enrich you in the process, well insomuch as the vague promise that it might happen keeps people developing for their platform, Microsoft cares. Otherwise, they don't care at all, and if you become really successful, they'll look for a way to make sure your success feeds their success at the expense of your success.
That's the nature of the Microsoft game, and they haven't ever changed how they play it. They can't. Their chosen business model depends on it.
Actually, Steam is coming to Linux. And there has been a lot of pressure on Kickstarter projects to support Linux. And the Humble Indie Bundle has shown that Linux people are even more willing to pay for their games than Windows people. So I'm hopeful that will change soon. It's starting to be seen as a platform rather than a toy by the people who make games.
This is actually totally believable. I have encountered more random people running Ubuntu than anything else. Random non-geek people. Seriously. In fact, I've never encountered non-geek people running any other distribution.
It isn't a huge number, but it's not insignificant. 5% is very believable.
So, how do you propose that the workers that Microsoft depends on be educated? Do you have a means of making this happen that will actually function properly, or are you just all for no taxes for companies that enjoy the benefit of public services?
Sorry, my last post was accidentally made as AC. :-/
Actions can be dangerous. Ideas are not. That is an ethical principle I hold dear.
Next we'll be wondering "Which are the most dangerous books to write?", or "What are the most dangerous sentences to say?". I reject the premise.
If I were to pick at all, almost none of that would be on the list. Only things that had the potential to create society ending things that are not stoppable by individual action. Diseases, for example, fall into that category. But I find even that highly suspect.
Yes, I agree with you on that. :-)
No, they're not. A significant number of people treat them as pre-orders, not as 'goodwill'. I suppose in the back of their heads they know they could eventually get it for free when it came out. But this way they're notified with a download link when it comes out, get their names in the credits and any number of other things, including the feeling that they had some small part in creating it. They aren't 'goodwill' gifts. They're pre-orders with bennies.
And this isn't about whatever you define as 'monetization'. That term is so vague you could make it mean almost anything that involves making money by making art. And that's what this is about. It's perfectly possible for people to make money off their art sans copyright protection. Enough people have accomplished it that you can call it a business model.
Make no mistake, those Kickstarter projects wouldn't get a dime if they all promised the kitschy stuff with no art. What's being sold there is the chance to participate in the artistic process in some way. To feel like you helped make it. That's the reason the Grateful Dead was able to make so much money too.
The model of fan participation is actually a more profitable model for artists. It's also one that permits them far greater artistic freedom. And it's replicable. Anybody can do it if their stuff is good enough or it caters to the right niche. It's a business model, a way to get money for your art. A way to 'monetize' it.
I agree. Fan based funding models (patronage being just one example of such) are how creative works will happen in the future. Given the constraints (making digital data non-copyable is like making water not wet), the copyright model is dead.
Well, it's two sides of a coin, there's "guilt" on one side and "goodwill" on the other, both create revenue but neither is really a business model. There are people like Louis CK, just like there are people like you, but I think it's evident, at least at this time, that there aren't enough people like you to keep anybody but the Louis CKs of the world paid more than occasionally. It really is just a way for superstars to extract a premium, after making their name on the back of "monetized" media.
What an interesting set of blinders you wear. Exactly how many people have to be wildly successful with a business model based on goodwill (or I will grant you that perhaps some people feel guilty) before it's considered a 'business model'?
There are a lot of independent artists that succeed with very little in the way of copyright enforcement. There is practically no webcomic author that sues his or her customers, though sometimes cranky letters are written. There are numerous Kickstarter projects funding various kinds of artistic expression that have been wildly successful (including the Order of the Stick webcome). There's Radiohead and NIN doing 'pay what you want' albums that have been wild financial successes. And, of course, there's the example of Johnathan Coulton.
And Kickstarter projects (as an example) are certainly not wholly goodwill based, and they aren't in the least guilt based. They are based on people getting together collectively to pay for the creation of something they all want.
So, how many have to succeed without the iron bands of copyright before you agree that those aren't necessary for you to be wildly profitable? Seriously. Is there any possible number of counterexamples that will actually change your mind, or do you feel that the only reason anybody does anything is because they will be sued or put in jail if they don't?
When I enjoy your work, I have a moral obligation to help you stay alive so that you can produce more work.
I have no such moral obligation. It's in my own interests to support someone who's work I like. You don't need to add the additional pressure of making it an 'obligation'. It's like telling me I'm obligated to eat, or watch sunsets.
That's a fairly cynical view. Another view is he provided a convenient way for people to support entertainment they liked. I don't contribute to Kickstarter projects out of guilt. I don't click on the contribute via PayPal links on Open Source projects out of guilt. I do it as a way to reward the people who make stuff I like. I full well realize that they are likely to make more of it if they don't have to worry so much about food and things.
And they haven't really done anything that dispells that reputation. Their recent attempt at bullying with patents is a case in point.
But I still agree with the article. But that's because I don't think Apple or Google are appropriately taken to task for some things they do that are wrong. Particularly Apple.
I think it's the content of the end of the list, 10f-h, and the specific calling-out of black people in events where any person should be considered a threat (10i).
I strongly agree with this. I felt the exact same way reading the list. It was like "Well, that's reasonable, and that..." followed by "WTF?! You have to be dangerously prejudiced for thinking that."
No, they both explicitly mention skin color, not attitudes like racism. I resent the implication that because I'm white I'm any more racist than anybody else. And most of us (black, white, whatever) are racist to an extent. We all prefer people who 'look like us' or look like the people we're used to.
Now, the 'good black people' section I think is where he starts being really ridiculous. In my experience in living in predominantly black neighborhoods, the number of people who will be decent to you far outnumber the ones who will hurt you for being in the wrong neighborhood. But the ones who will hurt you for being in the wrong neighborhood are numerous enough that a bit of extra wariness is worthwhile. And, in my experience, those neighborhoods do tend to be more violent on average.
I also don't feel this is about people's skin color. I would feel very differently about living in a neighborhood dominated by recent immigrants from Africa, for example. But I strongly suspect the author does. I think the author really is being not-kosher. But his list is not the reason why.
Why is one list racist and not the other? Is it because the color of skin each list is warning you about? Isn't that really messed up? I mean, making those kinds of judgments based on skin color is really messed up in the first place. That's a given. But isn't really weird for it to be somehow OK to warn against one skin color but not the other?
This guy's way of encouraging new ideas from the employees is a good one. But publishing the failures on a website runs the risk of the website becoming a 'wall of shame' instead of being seen as a reward for having presented the idea in the first place. It also runs the risk of having people submit ideas they know are ridiculous just so they can be given whatever reward comes for presenting an idea at all.
But otherwise his head is screwed on straight as far as I can tell. He's right, it's very difficult to create an organization that rewards new ideas. Almost everything in business is set against this. It's why so many big companies 'innovate' by acquisition. And punishing failure makes the problem worse.
If the industry has problems, who do the regulators regulate? Also, where do you think the people in the regulatory agencies worked before they worked in the regulatory agency? If the regulators are called over-zealous by the industry, there is no disaster that happens immediately if they are forced to back down unless they do their jobs extremely poorly.