I'll bet many of those intelligent individuals realize that once you let someone download your stuff you lose your ability to collect ad revenue for that person's use of your site.
Ever hear of profit? It is what is left over after paying for the 'actual work'. It represents things like the fact that you had a good idea for a product, which could have been a very long time ago. The profit made from selling a copy of a song is no different than the profit made selling anything else.
Right. All of the hardware manufacturers are operating as charities, and only charge the actual BOM+labor cost for their products. None of them make any profit selling those devices.
Guess what? A house is not someone's property either except for the fact that congress made it so. How about we get congress to void all deeds (or simply not enforce them) and see what remains your property.
Bullshit. The whole purpose of copyright is to encourage creation of new works. The method of encouraging creation is giving people control over their works.
Not the stupid 'get paid wages' argument again! Here is a clue for you: the ONLY reason you get paid a wage is because someone else expects to make more off of your work than they paid you to do the work. The only reason that person expects to be paid more than they pay you is because they intend to sell or use your product in a money-making operation. Now, if you eliminate (or substantially reduce) the ability for someone to sell your work, do you really think they are going to continue to pay you?
Native Americans didn't consider land to be 'property' either. Does that mean it is not property?
The only thing that says you 'own' a house, land, or any other 'real' property is a piece of paper with some words on it - a legal fiction. You only reason you can 'own' anything is because the government says that you can, and backs that up with laws.
Here is a longer summary for those too lazy to read TFA.
An NPR intern named Emily White did a piece where she mentioned that she has downloaded over 11,000 songs, but has only ever paid for about 15 CDs. She justifies this with the same rationale that many slashdotters use: the labels are just ripping off the artists and the artists don't get the money anyway, and artists have always made more money touring than through sales, so they such just tour and not worry about sales.
A musician named David Lowery has responded to her. As to her first point (the the labels are just ripping off the artists), he says that despite a few well-known abuses, in the "vast majority" of cases that is false. As to her second point, he says that touring is generally a money-losing operation, and that only the very top acts make any money at all touring.
The "companies" he is complaining about are not the labels, they are The Pirate Bay and MegaUpload.
No, the coolant does not just need to be cooler than the core itself. It has to also be able to absorb heat faster than the core is generating it. This means that all the thermal resistances in the path must be accounted for. Usually this means that the coolant temperature must be MUCH lower than the core, which requires chilling the coolant. The difference with this system is that the incoming water temperature does not need to be particularly cool - it can be 45C/113F, which means it takes less cooling to get it down to that temperature.
Having no money makes no difference at all. If you don't have the money to settle, you aren't going to have the money to lose the case either. Settling almost always costs less than losing, and now you want to saddle the loser with the winner's legal tab.
Your first scenario is the current system.
Your second scenario is flawed. Today, the plaintiffs lawyer is trying to get the biggest payoff for his client, while minimizing his own expenses. The bigger the payout, the more he makes. Under your scheme, the plaintiffs lawyer, if he has a solid case, has incentive to make the proceedings as expensive as possible for the defense, so he gets a bigger paycheck. There is no upside to that for anyone except the two lawyers involved. Also, your second scenario does not work at all when you take your third scenario into account.
Your third scenario fails if the plaintiff is paying his lawyers on contingency.
Your whole proposal is based on faulty assumptions, namely that is usually a richer entity suing a poorer one (rarely), and that the only reason the richer entity wins is because of poor representation for the poorer one (as opposed to the poorer one just being in the wrong). Remember that this is civil court, and the standards of proof are lower than in criminal court. A Johnny Cochran like song and dance is not as likely to prevail as defense in a civil case.
Well, it used to be that the increased transistor density predicted by Moore's prediction (not a law in any sense) lead to faster processors. That has not been true for quite a while. So the guy is 100% right when he says you can't just wait for Moore's law to lead to faster processors. Today, the increased density is used to make more, not faster, processors. Using all those processors effectively is the challenge.
And yes, the limits of Moore's law will be hit in the relatively near future, possibly within a decade. If you are in charge of designing supercomputers you had better be well aware of that, and start preparing for it now. Which is exactly what IBM is doing.
No, it is not an Intel based supercomputer, it is POWER based. The processors were manufactured in Fishkill, NY, and the system was assembled in Rochester, MN.
If you know you are going to lose anyway, just settle.
The main problem though is that you are starting from a faulty premise. The number of times 'Big company sues little man' is tiny compared to the number of times 'Little man sues big company'. And the number of times Big company files a suit that is doesn't have a very good chance of winning is even smaller than that.
Today, most cases of 'little man sues big company' are on a contingency basis. If the plaintiff doesn't win, he has no expenses. However, if the plaintiff does win, he may have to give 30% to the lawyer. So how does your 'loser pays' idea work with that? A losing plaintiff has zero expenses, so will never have to pay.
If we do away with the contingency fees, then someone who is truly harmed by another party must first weigh what will happen if they lose. They can not mount the best possible case because if they lose they will be out twice the money.
These types of proposals harm the little guy far more often than the big guy.
So if someone sues you you should spend as little as possible defending yourself, because if you lose you are going to have double your legal costs? What a stupid idea.
The Relays for example often cost almost as much money to run as they get out of them
So what? Not everything is measured in dollars. I have several people close to me who have or had cancer, and I can't tell you how much things like Relay For Life mean to them.
I see. So the FTC takes over the role of making sure that the drugs are safe and effective, and the FTC makes sure that the drugs are manufactured and handled correctly. And the FTC takes over making sure that the drugs are only sold by licensed pharmacies, etc. And how, exactly, is that any different, other than the name of the agency, from the current situation?
From TFA: The current charges come two years after Strempler agreed to have his name removed from the Manitoba Pharmaceutical Association registry. That move came after disciplinary hearings in which the association alleged Strempler's company sold drugs from overseas locations that weren't approved by Health Canada.
So even when he was registered as a pharmacy in Canada he wasn't selling drugs approved by Canada.
That's a mighty big IF you've got there. How do you KNOW it's the same drug? How do you know it isn't counterfeit? How do you know it was manufactured and handled under the same conditions as approved by the FDA?
He said that the ONLY function of the FDA should be "gathering and publishing data on whats in a drug and what side effects have been observed. Period". Which means there are no US laws and regulations to rely on when you buy it from CVS.
Yeah, the stuff came from Canada. Except for the stuff that he said came from Canada but actually came from somewhere else. As for 'working for US pharma (ooh, evil!)', are you saying that the FDA does not approve drugs from non-US companies? Bullshit.
Getting the same prescription from two different pharmacies should certainly NOT result in two different labels. If it does something is very wrong. The 'labeling' includes not only the sticker the pharmacy puts on the bottle, but also the patient information sheet that comes with the drug. The bottles may be different (they are not regulated), but the patient information sheet (the real 'label') is the same.
Slashdot Mirror
I'll bet many of those intelligent individuals realize that once you let someone download your stuff you lose your ability to collect ad revenue for that person's use of your site.
I'd be willing to bet it has a whole lot more to do with the fact that Google gets no ad revenue once you have recorded it.
Who do you think makes more profit off an iPod, Apple or Foxconn? Who did the actual work? Profit has nothing to do with actual work
Ever hear of profit? It is what is left over after paying for the 'actual work'. It represents things like the fact that you had a good idea for a product, which could have been a very long time ago. The profit made from selling a copy of a song is no different than the profit made selling anything else.
Right. All of the hardware manufacturers are operating as charities, and only charge the actual BOM+labor cost for their products. None of them make any profit selling those devices.
So, in other words, if people stop pirating there is no impact on the internet, but if people continue pirating the internet may get broken.
So again, how does the internet break if people stop pirating?
Guess what? A house is not someone's property either except for the fact that congress made it so. How about we get congress to void all deeds (or simply not enforce them) and see what remains your property.
Bullshit. The whole purpose of copyright is to encourage creation of new works. The method of encouraging creation is giving people control over their works.
Not the stupid 'get paid wages' argument again! Here is a clue for you: the ONLY reason you get paid a wage is because someone else expects to make more off of your work than they paid you to do the work. The only reason that person expects to be paid more than they pay you is because they intend to sell or use your product in a money-making operation. Now, if you eliminate (or substantially reduce) the ability for someone to sell your work, do you really think they are going to continue to pay you?
Here is a novel thought: if you can't pay for something that is a 100% luxury (and having your own copies of songs is exactly that), do without!
Native Americans didn't consider land to be 'property' either. Does that mean it is not property?
The only thing that says you 'own' a house, land, or any other 'real' property is a piece of paper with some words on it - a legal fiction. You only reason you can 'own' anything is because the government says that you can, and backs that up with laws.
Please explain how the internet stops working if people stop pirating. I am not seeing the connection.
Here is a longer summary for those too lazy to read TFA.
An NPR intern named Emily White did a piece where she mentioned that she has downloaded over 11,000 songs, but has only ever paid for about 15 CDs. She justifies this with the same rationale that many slashdotters use: the labels are just ripping off the artists and the artists don't get the money anyway, and artists have always made more money touring than through sales, so they such just tour and not worry about sales.
A musician named David Lowery has responded to her. As to her first point (the the labels are just ripping off the artists), he says that despite a few well-known abuses, in the "vast majority" of cases that is false. As to her second point, he says that touring is generally a money-losing operation, and that only the very top acts make any money at all touring.
The "companies" he is complaining about are not the labels, they are The Pirate Bay and MegaUpload.
No, the coolant does not just need to be cooler than the core itself. It has to also be able to absorb heat faster than the core is generating it. This means that all the thermal resistances in the path must be accounted for. Usually this means that the coolant temperature must be MUCH lower than the core, which requires chilling the coolant. The difference with this system is that the incoming water temperature does not need to be particularly cool - it can be 45C/113F, which means it takes less cooling to get it down to that temperature.
Having no money makes no difference at all. If you don't have the money to settle, you aren't going to have the money to lose the case either. Settling almost always costs less than losing, and now you want to saddle the loser with the winner's legal tab.
Your first scenario is the current system.
Your second scenario is flawed. Today, the plaintiffs lawyer is trying to get the biggest payoff for his client, while minimizing his own expenses. The bigger the payout, the more he makes. Under your scheme, the plaintiffs lawyer, if he has a solid case, has incentive to make the proceedings as expensive as possible for the defense, so he gets a bigger paycheck. There is no upside to that for anyone except the two lawyers involved. Also, your second scenario does not work at all when you take your third scenario into account.
Your third scenario fails if the plaintiff is paying his lawyers on contingency.
Your whole proposal is based on faulty assumptions, namely that is usually a richer entity suing a poorer one (rarely), and that the only reason the richer entity wins is because of poor representation for the poorer one (as opposed to the poorer one just being in the wrong). Remember that this is civil court, and the standards of proof are lower than in criminal court. A Johnny Cochran like song and dance is not as likely to prevail as defense in a civil case.
Well, it used to be that the increased transistor density predicted by Moore's prediction (not a law in any sense) lead to faster processors. That has not been true for quite a while. So the guy is 100% right when he says you can't just wait for Moore's law to lead to faster processors. Today, the increased density is used to make more, not faster, processors. Using all those processors effectively is the challenge.
And yes, the limits of Moore's law will be hit in the relatively near future, possibly within a decade. If you are in charge of designing supercomputers you had better be well aware of that, and start preparing for it now. Which is exactly what IBM is doing.
No, it is not an Intel based supercomputer, it is POWER based. The processors were manufactured in Fishkill, NY, and the system was assembled in Rochester, MN.
If you know you are going to lose anyway, just settle.
The main problem though is that you are starting from a faulty premise. The number of times 'Big company sues little man' is tiny compared to the number of times 'Little man sues big company'. And the number of times Big company files a suit that is doesn't have a very good chance of winning is even smaller than that.
Today, most cases of 'little man sues big company' are on a contingency basis. If the plaintiff doesn't win, he has no expenses. However, if the plaintiff does win, he may have to give 30% to the lawyer. So how does your 'loser pays' idea work with that? A losing plaintiff has zero expenses, so will never have to pay.
If we do away with the contingency fees, then someone who is truly harmed by another party must first weigh what will happen if they lose. They can not mount the best possible case because if they lose they will be out twice the money.
These types of proposals harm the little guy far more often than the big guy.
So if someone sues you you should spend as little as possible defending yourself, because if you lose you are going to have double your legal costs? What a stupid idea.
The Relays for example often cost almost as much money to run as they get out of them
So what? Not everything is measured in dollars. I have several people close to me who have or had cancer, and I can't tell you how much things like Relay For Life mean to them.
I see. So the FTC takes over the role of making sure that the drugs are safe and effective, and the FTC makes sure that the drugs are manufactured and handled correctly. And the FTC takes over making sure that the drugs are only sold by licensed pharmacies, etc. And how, exactly, is that any different, other than the name of the agency, from the current situation?
From TFA: The current charges come two years after Strempler agreed to have his name removed from the Manitoba Pharmaceutical Association registry. That move came after disciplinary hearings in which the association alleged Strempler's company sold drugs from overseas locations that weren't approved by Health Canada.
So even when he was registered as a pharmacy in Canada he wasn't selling drugs approved by Canada.
That's a mighty big IF you've got there. How do you KNOW it's the same drug? How do you know it isn't counterfeit? How do you know it was manufactured and handled under the same conditions as approved by the FDA?
He said that the ONLY function of the FDA should be "gathering and publishing data on whats in a drug and what side effects have been observed. Period". Which means there are no US laws and regulations to rely on when you buy it from CVS.
Yeah, the stuff came from Canada. Except for the stuff that he said came from Canada but actually came from somewhere else. As for 'working for US pharma (ooh, evil!)', are you saying that the FDA does not approve drugs from non-US companies? Bullshit.
Getting the same prescription from two different pharmacies should certainly NOT result in two different labels. If it does something is very wrong. The 'labeling' includes not only the sticker the pharmacy puts on the bottle, but also the patient information sheet that comes with the drug. The bottles may be different (they are not regulated), but the patient information sheet (the real 'label') is the same.