1. I think your point about reducing the length of copyright protection is spot-on. I'd love to see it happen. But until then, it is patently unfair for the studios to continue to make money from the writer's work without compensating them fairly for it. The first law of thermodynamics says you can't get something for nothing. The studios are trying to defy the laws of physics; the writers are just pointing out that they can't get away with it.
2. why don't the writers sell their script for the price they think it's worth?
This is the crux of the matter. Outside of the union contract, they *can't*, because the studio will take their script and hire some other writer to do the same thing but cheaper, and then it becomes a race to the bottom where writers simply can't make a living doing their jobs. The power distribution between the writers and the studios does not allow writers to bargain fairly. Without the union, the writers would effectively be McDonalds employees- fungible, disposable, no rights whatsoever, making minimum wage. Sure, people would still do it. But lots of people made sausage in Chicago before there were unions too. I for one am glad that my chances of finding human body parts in my packaged meat products are much lower than they were in the early 1900s. The same kind of thing applies to TV and movies. Corporations are sociopathic in nature becuase there is essentially no financial reward for ethical corporate behavior. The only way to force corporations to treat people like... people... is to flex a little muscle, and that's exactly what the union is doing.
So the real message here is that they've realized they can't stop people from copying it without paying them. And they're going to try to compete by offering content at higher consistent quality, and making money from ad revenue. There is huge demand for downloadable video, and some revenue is better than no revenue.
Isn't this what the copyfighters have been saying will happen, ever since Napster? And this makes it clear that DMCA and longer copyright protections are not going to help. You can't fight the tides with a bucket.
For anyone looking to cause and effect, the cause is widespread piracy. The effect is the official distribution channels are forced to compete with free by lowering their prices and improving their quality. And this isn't the first time in the last six months that a studio has decided to fight piracy by lowering prices. Maybe the're finally starting to get the message.
Warner Home Video said Wednesday it will begin selling low-priced DVDs of movies from two major Hollywood studios in China in a bid to curb widespread sales of pirated versions.
The DVDs, priced at 22 yuan (2.90 dollars) each, will be distributed in over 50 major Chinese cities beginning this month, according to the agreement that Warner Home Video signed with Paramount and Dreamworks Animation.
1. Did you ever ask for residuals? Did your parents? Do you have a union to help you negotiate?
Business isn't about getting what you deserve. It's about deserving as much as you can get. Unions help little people get more.
2. The studios are going to get paid for the rest of the writers lives for that one momentary spark years ago. Copyright protects works for 95 years. If the studios are going to get paid, why shouldn't the writers? The alternative is to come up with an estimate for the total 95-year revenue stream for a given product, an estimate for the interest and inflation rates over that 95 years, and then discount the future value back to additional dollars in the present day. Residuals are actually a much cleaner way of getting the job done- the studios only pay if they actually end up making money. Long copyright terms and no residuals is just another example of big business trying to have their cake and kick the writers in the nuts too.
The penalty for corruption in public office shoud be death. Nasty, 14th-century-style, public execution. They fuck with our country, we should make sure they're fucking with the best. Bob Ney should have been gutted and then hung by the neck on the Washington mall- that would have gotten some attention. Cunningham, DeLay, "Cold Cash" Jefferson- ditto. Those caught paying bribes should be burned alive. Those caught TAKING bribes should be literally crucified. Leave the bodies to rot and let the crows have the eyes.
He has not committed treason as defined in the Constitution ("levying War against [the Untied States], or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort");
It is official; ACLU now confirms: RealID is dying
One more crippling bombshell hit the already beleaguered RealID community when DOJ confirmed that RealID market share has dropped yet again, now down to less than a fraction of 1 percent of all state government ID programs. Coming close on the heels of a recent Homeland Security survey which plainly states that RealID has lost more market share, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. RealID is collapsing in complete disarray, as fittingly exemplified by failing dead last in the recent Immigration and Customs comprehensive identification test.
You don't need to be a Brownie to predict RealID's future. The hand writing is on the wall: RealID faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all for RealID because RealID is dying. Things are looking very bad for RealID. As many of us are already aware, RealID continues to lose market share. Fake passports and imitations flow like a river of blood.
The Department of Justice is the most endangered of them all, having lost 93% of its DC managing political stooges. The sudden and unpleasant departures of long time DOJ water-carriers Monica Goodling and Alberto Gonzales only serve to underscore the point more clearly. There can no longer be any doubt: RealID is dying.
Let's keep to the facts and look at the numbers.
RealID leader Mike Chertoff states that there are 100 states which plan to use RealID. How many users of RealID are there? Let's see. The number of RealID versus other ID posts on Usenet is roughly in ratio of 5 to 1. Therefore there are about 100/5 = 20 RealID users. RealID posts on Usenet are about half of the volume of other ID posts. Therefore there are about 10 users of RealID. A recent article put RealID at about 80 percent of the overall ID market. Therefore there is only one actual RealID user. This is consistent with the number of RealID Usenet posts.
All major surveys show that RealID proponents have steadily declined in market share. RealID is very sick and its long term survival prospects are very dim. If RealID is to survive at all it will be among National Security Theatre dilettante dabblers. RealID continues to decay. Nothing short of a cockeyed miracle could save RealID from its fate at this point in time. For all practical purposes, RealID is dead.
Go ask poor Ted Stevens about why it's 1337 to refer to Internet connections as "pipes" but you're a retard if you say "tubes"
The series of tubes comment is the last thing Senator Stevens has to worry about right now.
"poor" Ted Stevens (R-AK) is a dirty, rotten, crooked scumbag who deserves every second of the prison term he's going to get. Three AK oil execs have already pled guilty and testified about paying bribes to your buddy Ted. In open court. No one has disputed their testimony. This is much worse than Wide Stance or the fallout from Congressmen like Mark Foley making a habit out of harassing teenage boys- sex makes headlines, but public corruption undermines our system of government.
If Ted had a shred of conscience left, he would resign in shame and then go perform seppuku, to save society the embarassment of having to punish an old man for his disgusting weakness.
1. US Senator John Tester. He won election as a Democrat in Montana, with a platform built largely from anti-federal-government planks. He's been anti-patriot act all along.
2. US Rep and (sorta) presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich. He's running for president against the patriot act.
There are probably others; these are the two I can think of right off the top of my head. Note also the absence of any D-prez frontrunners from this list... I bet Hillary can't wait to get her hands on the levers of power that work the police state. And, truth be told, if she promises to stick an electric cattle prod up Dick Cheney's ass and show it on national television, she would win my vote in a heartbeat.
He doesn't. Ever. Full stop. See, e.g., Youngstown Sheet and Tube, 343 US 579. Anyone who tells you otherwise is lying and has probably been committing war crimes.
do COURTS have the right and duty to ignore laws
No. That's the whole point of a having a society based on laws, rather than one based on a personality cult. Nobody is allowed to just ignore laws.
Courts, however, have a duty to say what the law is- so if Congress passes a bad law, federal courts have a duty to hear challenges to that law, and to strike it down if it does not comport with the Constitution. Unfortunately Congress tends to act much faster than the courts, which leaves us with a whole lot of bad laws just waiting for the court to get around to them.
That may all be true, but your example assumes that the telecoms are suffering as a result of the oversell. Boo hoo for comcast, their business is being damaged by the freeloading p2p pirates, so we should just look the other way when they retaliate and breach their contracts...
But if that was the case, Comcast would be in financial dire straits. They'd be cutting back, negotiating with unions, looking for a buyer, fighting bankruptcy, etc etc etc. That ain't happening.
This letter is to inform you that your post #20918375 may violate Section 1201 of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act. Please delete your post, go out into your garage, replace the fuse, and weld your hood shut to prevent any repeat occurances.
We reserve the right to sue you for damages or put you in jail if you ever tell anyone about this letter.
It's called adapting to the environment. It's something you'll need to learn to do to get by in the future.
You have a surprisingly stodgy viewpoint for someone who has figured out how to use the internet. Why should I adapt to the environment, when I can change it to suit me?
If you're staring at your laptop, the professor has no feedback available to determine whether you're "getting it". Personally, I'm hoping that it's a required class and she's the only faculty member in the department who is teaching it.
Fixed that for you. And sorry to disappoint, but it's not, and she ain't. I'll take the same class from someone more sober and less technophobic next term. Why so defensive, and why do you wish me ill? Feeling sorry for teachers? You know what they say, "Those who can, do. Those who can't..."
you'll find this out when you enter the Real World . . ..
I worked in the real world for almost ten years after college. I quit a job that paid six figures to go back to school. I refuse to accept "teachers" who insist on treating my classmates and me like children. The school requires me to own a laptop; I don't think it's unreasonable for me to expect that the school will allow me to use it.
Or just disable the internet. I'm sure she just doesn't want people chatting or surfing the web when she goes of on her alcoholic tangents- I don't think that the actual typing is the problem as much as the tuning out from class. Can't bear to think that she's not the most interesting thing in the room.
But- it's 2007. Why should I pay $10,000 per term to take classes from a drunk who won't let me either skip her worthless lectures or at least sit in the back and check my email while she's prattling on about which client paid her more for less work, or what she had for lunch with her bottle of chardonnay?
Thanks, but no thanks. I'll just wait to take the same class from a different prof.
That's the point, dude. The profs won't allow me to record lectures, or I would do so. I'm not taking freshman chemistry any more. Sometimes a prof's castaway phrase or emphasis on a particular case is the most important thing to know for an exam- but in the second class of the year, when I won't have a the only graded exam until 15 weeks later, how the hell am I supposed to decide in advance what is important?
That's why I've got to get everything in the first couple of weeks. Later on in the course it's easier to know what matters and what doesn't, but up front, EVERYTHING is important.
Please see Bar/Bri. Maybe there isn't enough demand in undergraduate education, because there are so many schools available- but in professional schools, there is certainly a market for charismatic profs to lead review seminars, especially for licensing exams.
Or not- and then students will just refuse to take their classes. There's a prof here who doesn't allow laptops in class- and many many students avoid her classes becuase of that limitation. I guess she has tenure, so she can do what she wants... but if you don't give your customers what they want, they will go somewhere else.
It must be nice to be able to read your own handwriting three months later. I can't. And never mind that I can type essentially as fast as my profs can speak. My handwriting speed can't possibly keep up.
Someone still signed off on the site before it went live, meaning at least one marketdroid or PHB decided that it was OK to use those photos without asking where they came from. Unless the operation is totally half-assed. Which I guess is the point.
Slashdot Mirror
1. I think your point about reducing the length of copyright protection is spot-on. I'd love to see it happen. But until then, it is patently unfair for the studios to continue to make money from the writer's work without compensating them fairly for it. The first law of thermodynamics says you can't get something for nothing. The studios are trying to defy the laws of physics; the writers are just pointing out that they can't get away with it.
2. why don't the writers sell their script for the price they think it's worth?
This is the crux of the matter. Outside of the union contract, they *can't*, because the studio will take their script and hire some other writer to do the same thing but cheaper, and then it becomes a race to the bottom where writers simply can't make a living doing their jobs. The power distribution between the writers and the studios does not allow writers to bargain fairly. Without the union, the writers would effectively be McDonalds employees- fungible, disposable, no rights whatsoever, making minimum wage. Sure, people would still do it. But lots of people made sausage in Chicago before there were unions too. I for one am glad that my chances of finding human body parts in my packaged meat products are much lower than they were in the early 1900s. The same kind of thing applies to TV and movies. Corporations are sociopathic in nature becuase there is essentially no financial reward for ethical corporate behavior. The only way to force corporations to treat people like... people... is to flex a little muscle, and that's exactly what the union is doing.
But to stop you, they have to sue. And if they sue, they will lose. Diamond Multimedia will trump the anti-circumvention provisions of the DMCA.
Warner Bros. has already admitted this point: more copying leads to lower prices, whether or not it is fair use. DRM is dead. Why pretend it's not?
Isn't this what the copyfighters have been saying will happen, ever since Napster? And this makes it clear that DMCA and longer copyright protections are not going to help. You can't fight the tides with a bucket.
For anyone looking to cause and effect, the cause is widespread piracy. The effect is the official distribution channels are forced to compete with free by lowering their prices and improving their quality. And this isn't the first time in the last six months that a studio has decided to fight piracy by lowering prices. Maybe the're finally starting to get the message.
1. Did you ever ask for residuals? Did your parents? Do you have a union to help you negotiate?
Business isn't about getting what you deserve. It's about deserving as much as you can get. Unions help little people get more.
2. The studios are going to get paid for the rest of the writers lives for that one momentary spark years ago. Copyright protects works for 95 years. If the studios are going to get paid, why shouldn't the writers? The alternative is to come up with an estimate for the total 95-year revenue stream for a given product, an estimate for the interest and inflation rates over that 95 years, and then discount the future value back to additional dollars in the present day. Residuals are actually a much cleaner way of getting the job done- the studios only pay if they actually end up making money. Long copyright terms and no residuals is just another example of big business trying to have their cake and kick the writers in the nuts too.
. . . towards Durham?
(sorry, can't help myself)
because Duke sucks.
If only there was some way to write the code out-of-state, and then transfer it to the buyer in Maryland... ... like a big series of tubes ...
US $137 billion. how much is that in hard currency, like 500 Euros?
so... was the change yesterday? the googlogo is normal today. Who schedules a national holiday on a Sunday?
The penalty for corruption in public office shoud be death. Nasty, 14th-century-style, public execution. They fuck with our country, we should make sure they're fucking with the best. Bob Ney should have been gutted and then hung by the neck on the Washington mall- that would have gotten some attention. Cunningham, DeLay, "Cold Cash" Jefferson- ditto. Those caught paying bribes should be burned alive. Those caught TAKING bribes should be literally crucified. Leave the bodies to rot and let the crows have the eyes.
He has not committed treason as defined in the Constitution ("levying War against [the Untied States], or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort");
ahem. Cheney ordered Libby to leak the NIE and to blow Valerie Plame's cover. Revealing a spy to the public certainly gives "Aid and Comfort" to your enemies, when the spy's only job is to spy on those enemies.
It is official; ACLU now confirms: RealID is dying
One more crippling bombshell hit the already beleaguered RealID community when DOJ confirmed that RealID market share has dropped yet again, now down to less than a fraction of 1 percent of all state government ID programs. Coming close on the heels of a recent Homeland Security survey which plainly states that RealID has lost more market share, this news serves to reinforce what we've known all along. RealID is collapsing in complete disarray, as fittingly exemplified by failing dead last in the recent Immigration and Customs comprehensive identification test.
You don't need to be a Brownie to predict RealID's future. The hand writing is on the wall: RealID faces a bleak future. In fact there won't be any future at all for RealID because RealID is dying. Things are looking very bad for RealID. As many of us are already aware, RealID continues to lose market share. Fake passports and imitations flow like a river of blood.
The Department of Justice is the most endangered of them all, having lost 93% of its DC managing political stooges. The sudden and unpleasant departures of long time DOJ water-carriers Monica Goodling and Alberto Gonzales only serve to underscore the point more clearly. There can no longer be any doubt: RealID is dying.
Let's keep to the facts and look at the numbers.
RealID leader Mike Chertoff states that there are 100 states which plan to use RealID. How many users of RealID are there? Let's see. The number of RealID versus other ID posts on Usenet is roughly in ratio of 5 to 1. Therefore there are about 100/5 = 20 RealID users. RealID posts on Usenet are about half of the volume of other ID posts. Therefore there are about 10 users of RealID. A recent article put RealID at about 80 percent of the overall ID market. Therefore there is only one actual RealID user. This is consistent with the number of RealID Usenet posts.
All major surveys show that RealID proponents have steadily declined in market share. RealID is very sick and its long term survival prospects are very dim. If RealID is to survive at all it will be among National Security Theatre dilettante dabblers. RealID continues to decay. Nothing short of a cockeyed miracle could save RealID from its fate at this point in time. For all practical purposes, RealID is dead.
Fact: RealID is dying
Go ask poor Ted Stevens about why it's 1337 to refer to Internet connections as "pipes" but you're a retard if you say "tubes"
The series of tubes comment is the last thing Senator Stevens has to worry about right now.
"poor" Ted Stevens (R-AK) is a dirty, rotten, crooked scumbag who deserves every second of the prison term he's going to get. Three AK oil execs have already pled guilty and testified about paying bribes to your buddy Ted. In open court. No one has disputed their testimony. This is much worse than Wide Stance or the fallout from Congressmen like Mark Foley making a habit out of harassing teenage boys- sex makes headlines, but public corruption undermines our system of government.
If Ted had a shred of conscience left, he would resign in shame and then go perform seppuku, to save society the embarassment of having to punish an old man for his disgusting weakness.
What Democrat has offered to repeal USA PATRIOT?
1. US Senator John Tester. He won election as a Democrat in Montana, with a platform built largely from anti-federal-government planks. He's been anti-patriot act all along.
2. US Rep and (sorta) presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich. He's running for president against the patriot act.
There are probably others; these are the two I can think of right off the top of my head. Note also the absence of any D-prez frontrunners from this list... I bet Hillary can't wait to get her hands on the levers of power that work the police state. And, truth be told, if she promises to stick an electric cattle prod up Dick Cheney's ass and show it on national television, she would win my vote in a heartbeat.
If the POTUS has the right to ignore (some) laws
He doesn't. Ever. Full stop. See, e.g., Youngstown Sheet and Tube, 343 US 579. Anyone who tells you otherwise is lying and has probably been committing war crimes.
do COURTS have the right and duty to ignore laws
No. That's the whole point of a having a society based on laws, rather than one based on a personality cult. Nobody is allowed to just ignore laws.
Courts, however, have a duty to say what the law is- so if Congress passes a bad law, federal courts have a duty to hear challenges to that law, and to strike it down if it does not comport with the Constitution. Unfortunately Congress tends to act much faster than the courts, which leaves us with a whole lot of bad laws just waiting for the court to get around to them.
That may all be true, but your example assumes that the telecoms are suffering as a result of the oversell. Boo hoo for comcast, their business is being damaged by the freeloading p2p pirates, so we should just look the other way when they retaliate and breach their contracts...
But if that was the case, Comcast would be in financial dire straits. They'd be cutting back, negotiating with unions, looking for a buyer, fighting bankruptcy, etc etc etc. That ain't happening.
Dear ChangeOnInstall,
This letter is to inform you that your post #20918375 may violate Section 1201 of the Digital Millenium Copyright Act. Please delete your post, go out into your garage, replace the fuse, and weld your hood shut to prevent any repeat occurances.
We reserve the right to sue you for damages or put you in jail if you ever tell anyone about this letter.
Thanks for being a GM OnStar customer!
And if you register the work before the infringement begins, the infringer can't claim innoncence (I didn't know it was copyrighted) as a defense.
Or just disable the internet. I'm sure she just doesn't want people chatting or surfing the web when she goes of on her alcoholic tangents- I don't think that the actual typing is the problem as much as the tuning out from class. Can't bear to think that she's not the most interesting thing in the room.
But- it's 2007. Why should I pay $10,000 per term to take classes from a drunk who won't let me either skip her worthless lectures or at least sit in the back and check my email while she's prattling on about which client paid her more for less work, or what she had for lunch with her bottle of chardonnay?
Thanks, but no thanks. I'll just wait to take the same class from a different prof.
That's the point, dude. The profs won't allow me to record lectures, or I would do so. I'm not taking freshman chemistry any more. Sometimes a prof's castaway phrase or emphasis on a particular case is the most important thing to know for an exam- but in the second class of the year, when I won't have a the only graded exam until 15 weeks later, how the hell am I supposed to decide in advance what is important?
That's why I've got to get everything in the first couple of weeks. Later on in the course it's easier to know what matters and what doesn't, but up front, EVERYTHING is important.
Please see Bar/Bri. Maybe there isn't enough demand in undergraduate education, because there are so many schools available- but in professional schools, there is certainly a market for charismatic profs to lead review seminars, especially for licensing exams.
Or not- and then students will just refuse to take their classes. There's a prof here who doesn't allow laptops in class- and many many students avoid her classes becuase of that limitation. I guess she has tenure, so she can do what she wants... but if you don't give your customers what they want, they will go somewhere else.
It must be nice to be able to read your own handwriting three months later. I can't. And never mind that I can type essentially as fast as my profs can speak. My handwriting speed can't possibly keep up.
But if it works for you...
I am not your lawyer. If you are driving a car, the police are ALWAYS your enemy.
Someone still signed off on the site before it went live, meaning at least one marketdroid or PHB decided that it was OK to use those photos without asking where they came from. Unless the operation is totally half-assed. Which I guess is the point.