See I don't even have cable or satellite. There are only 5 or 6 shows that I care to watch regularly and they are all online a day or a week after they air on TV. House, The Office, Pushing Daisies, Eli Stone, and Lost. Why do I need to spend $40 or more a month for something that I'll hardly use. Granted I would watch some sports on there when I have the time, but I rarely do, so its a mute point really.
As long as the networks keep rolling out their shows online I can wait the extra day to watch it. They have less commercials and I can watch it at my convenience. I see this hurting the cable companies more than the small IPTV market.
The real kick in the balls is that since I don't subscribe to the cable companies plan but only go through them for my internet they charge me $10/month extra. They are actually just a reseller of an ISP, they don't actually provide the internet service themselves. I'm not sure that the extra charge is legal, IANAL. If anyone knows of a way to get it waved that would be great.
How is this a good thing? I'm thinking that the financial resources being spent to roll this out would have done more good had they actually invested in their architecture to simply increase bandwidth. Now they are watching your total bandwidth, not to mention your average over 15 minute periods for every 15 minutes. Just upgrade your network, you'll have happier customers.
On a side note, I have a friend who is a cable guy for Comcast. I told him that they need to start running fiber. He said, "They have fiber all over the place." And I replied, "I can't get it here." Then he's like, well not to your home, just to the neighborhood and then it gets split, it would be too expensive to run it to the home."
Then I reminded him that Verizon is doing it and he came back with the argument of, "Yeah but it costs a couple hundred bucks just to have it set up." Now, I don't know what it actually costs, all I know is that there are enough people signing up as they roll it out that they haven't yet stopped rolling it out.
I think I'd pay a $200 hook up fee to get 50mb/sec. Seems reasonable.
Actually, ANY job isn't better than NO job. A job that pays more than your unemployment benefits might be better than no job, but only if that extra money out weighs the extra cost of working (ie gas, car maintenence, etc).
I'm really really sad to see Pandora go. I had dozens of stations for any kind of mood I was in. I got to hear lots of stuff that I normally wouldn't have heard. The reason why the government stepped in, at least from what I remember from back when this all happened, was because the industry wanted to charge MORE than what the government set the price at. And the reason why it costs so much is because they can actually charge per person because they know how many streams are running from their servers... you can't track that with broadcast radio.
Its all about money, follow that and you'll find your culprits... its anti-competitive garbage and it sucks that people don't realize what's being done to them.
Here is a nice explanation of the diesel fuel prices, even stating that if more people would drive diesel that the refiners would focus on producing more of it so the price would actually come down and would probably cause diesel taxes to be lowered which would help a bit as well.
I would love to drive a diesel car but right now I'm not in the market for a car since I got a great deal on a 8 year old car with 22,000 miles on it last year that was driven by a little old lady... I can spend the money for the new more expensive (much more expensive in the States) diesel car right now. But when this one is on its way out (in about 6 years) I'll be ready to get a diesel car. But until then I wouldn't save enough on fuel to justify the switch.
And I think that is where quite a few people are right now, there is a price barrier for entry due to low demand which keeps demand low and prices high. Its a vicious cycle.
When you download music to a HDD its no different that having it on CD. Its just a physical medium holding data. The only difference is that the physical medium is already paid for in bulk... you basically only have rights to the data.
First of all, you don't really have any problems if you are just downloading, its when you share them out that you break the law. Obtaining isn't the part that will get you in trouble, its the distributing. Like you said, how can they prove how you got it? They can't. But they can "prove" that you distributed the content, albeit they can't do it by any legal means, but it can be done for the most part.
As to Firehed... If you buy a book and then lose that book or accidentally set it on fire then do you think you have a right to another copy? You paid for your copy, you ruined/lost/destroyed it, you then have to buy another one. The same thing goes with the CD. Your argument only strengthens my point that once you obtain your copy you are responsible for preserving it. I don't prescribe to their notion of licensing and fair use supports me.
I think you are a bit unrealistic. Did you also demand that if you broke or otherwise rendered useless your CD/Tapes/VHS/DVDs purchased that you should be able to return the broken medium with a proof of purchase for a replacement copy? I highly doubt it. So why, after you purchase a digital copy, is it their responsibility to know that *you* bought it and have the *right* to it? Once you have your copy you should be able to do with it what you please, including backing it up how you see fit to preserve said copy.
How is that for NO hassles? Full reliability? Its not like they would even give you those rights, but that is where it should be.
When I was a senior our math department got a grant from HP and I had the pleasure of using an HP tablet for a year and a half and since I was doubling as a CS/Math major I got to play with them all the time. I loved it. I didn't even have a notebook or paper my last 3 semesters.
The problem though is price. To even get one of the ones I was working on would still cost over $1200 today. If I was a freshman just entering school I would probably spend the money, but right now it doesn't make sense for me to buy one, not when I can get a regular laptop that will allow me to do dev work for much less than that. They are still a bit of a novelty.
Spam is kind of like me going and vandalizing someone's business. It wastes their resources and causes them losses, and I would be sent to jail for it.
Why aren't we sending the FBI out to these physical locations in the US where these companies are located, or their servers reside and pulling the plugs and cuffing the owners? I want to know how a company like Atrivo can operate in the US for years and nothing be done? How is this possible? Who is in charge? Who needs to lose their job?
So what you really want is a $3000 laptop? At this point the screen alone would cost you $2000, then add touch.... and what is this fetish with built in web cams? Did I really miss something here? Who actually uses them? I admit, I got suckered back in the day too, ooohhh aahhhh gotta have a webcam.... for what?
Then I look at your sig, and understand... price isn't something you are worried about...
we just got a new iseries in feb and it has been running without a hitch. what is nice is that they really do take care of their customers. So if you do have a DOA (3 in your case which is probably a statistical anomaly) they make sure you are up and running very quickly, and at no additional cost (as long as you are on maintenance of course).
I'll be the first to admit that IBM is expensive, but I haven't had any problems with their quality. Of course most of my experience with them is in mid-range servers and not consumer electronics, but I do have a keyboard of theirs that is quite a few years old....I just like the sounds it makes...
I think their quality started becoming a joke about the time they put out their XPlode line of car audio equipment. Sony used to produce car audio systems that were really good back in the day, I think this was a company wide shift in focus. Increase sales volume on lower cost equipment and they cut their quality in the process.
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I'm guessing you eat a lot of Tofu, drink soy milk, and donate regularly to PETA?
See I don't even have cable or satellite. There are only 5 or 6 shows that I care to watch regularly and they are all online a day or a week after they air on TV. House, The Office, Pushing Daisies, Eli Stone, and Lost. Why do I need to spend $40 or more a month for something that I'll hardly use. Granted I would watch some sports on there when I have the time, but I rarely do, so its a mute point really.
As long as the networks keep rolling out their shows online I can wait the extra day to watch it. They have less commercials and I can watch it at my convenience. I see this hurting the cable companies more than the small IPTV market.
The real kick in the balls is that since I don't subscribe to the cable companies plan but only go through them for my internet they charge me $10/month extra. They are actually just a reseller of an ISP, they don't actually provide the internet service themselves. I'm not sure that the extra charge is legal, IANAL. If anyone knows of a way to get it waved that would be great.
And the last time I checked that was called versioning.
gmail.
How is this a good thing? I'm thinking that the financial resources being spent to roll this out would have done more good had they actually invested in their architecture to simply increase bandwidth. Now they are watching your total bandwidth, not to mention your average over 15 minute periods for every 15 minutes. Just upgrade your network, you'll have happier customers.
On a side note, I have a friend who is a cable guy for Comcast. I told him that they need to start running fiber. He said, "They have fiber all over the place." And I replied, "I can't get it here." Then he's like, well not to your home, just to the neighborhood and then it gets split, it would be too expensive to run it to the home."
Then I reminded him that Verizon is doing it and he came back with the argument of, "Yeah but it costs a couple hundred bucks just to have it set up." Now, I don't know what it actually costs, all I know is that there are enough people signing up as they roll it out that they haven't yet stopped rolling it out.
I think I'd pay a $200 hook up fee to get 50mb/sec. Seems reasonable.
simply because it's hard to track a vast number of stats in a meaningful way.
Do you think they could build a supercomputer to do that?
" I did this exact same thing, IN honors classes. I did it because it was far more enjoyable for me to 'get by' and go half fun out side of school "
I'm guessing that it wasn't honors English was it?
Actually, ANY job isn't better than NO job. A job that pays more than your unemployment benefits might be better than no job, but only if that extra money out weighs the extra cost of working (ie gas, car maintenence, etc).
GOTO? You've been drinking on the job again haven't you?
I'm really really sad to see Pandora go. I had dozens of stations for any kind of mood I was in. I got to hear lots of stuff that I normally wouldn't have heard. The reason why the government stepped in, at least from what I remember from back when this all happened, was because the industry wanted to charge MORE than what the government set the price at. And the reason why it costs so much is because they can actually charge per person because they know how many streams are running from their servers... you can't track that with broadcast radio.
Its all about money, follow that and you'll find your culprits... its anti-competitive garbage and it sucks that people don't realize what's being done to them.
Here is a nice explanation of the diesel fuel prices, even stating that if more people would drive diesel that the refiners would focus on producing more of it so the price would actually come down and would probably cause diesel taxes to be lowered which would help a bit as well. I would love to drive a diesel car but right now I'm not in the market for a car since I got a great deal on a 8 year old car with 22,000 miles on it last year that was driven by a little old lady... I can spend the money for the new more expensive (much more expensive in the States) diesel car right now. But when this one is on its way out (in about 6 years) I'll be ready to get a diesel car. But until then I wouldn't save enough on fuel to justify the switch.
And I think that is where quite a few people are right now, there is a price barrier for entry due to low demand which keeps demand low and prices high. Its a vicious cycle.
When you download music to a HDD its no different that having it on CD. Its just a physical medium holding data. The only difference is that the physical medium is already paid for in bulk... you basically only have rights to the data.
First of all, you don't really have any problems if you are just downloading, its when you share them out that you break the law. Obtaining isn't the part that will get you in trouble, its the distributing. Like you said, how can they prove how you got it? They can't. But they can "prove" that you distributed the content, albeit they can't do it by any legal means, but it can be done for the most part. As to Firehed... If you buy a book and then lose that book or accidentally set it on fire then do you think you have a right to another copy? You paid for your copy, you ruined/lost/destroyed it, you then have to buy another one. The same thing goes with the CD. Your argument only strengthens my point that once you obtain your copy you are responsible for preserving it. I don't prescribe to their notion of licensing and fair use supports me.
I think you are a bit unrealistic. Did you also demand that if you broke or otherwise rendered useless your CD/Tapes/VHS/DVDs purchased that you should be able to return the broken medium with a proof of purchase for a replacement copy? I highly doubt it. So why, after you purchase a digital copy, is it their responsibility to know that *you* bought it and have the *right* to it? Once you have your copy you should be able to do with it what you please, including backing it up how you see fit to preserve said copy.
How is that for NO hassles? Full reliability? Its not like they would even give you those rights, but that is where it should be.
This is a civil matter. No one is going to jail. Nice flaimbait post however.
When I was a senior our math department got a grant from HP and I had the pleasure of using an HP tablet for a year and a half and since I was doubling as a CS/Math major I got to play with them all the time. I loved it. I didn't even have a notebook or paper my last 3 semesters.
The problem though is price. To even get one of the ones I was working on would still cost over $1200 today. If I was a freshman just entering school I would probably spend the money, but right now it doesn't make sense for me to buy one, not when I can get a regular laptop that will allow me to do dev work for much less than that. They are still a bit of a novelty.
The US passed 300M in October of 2006
Well at least it is getting better, it used to be puppies getting kicked...
Spam is kind of like me going and vandalizing someone's business. It wastes their resources and causes them losses, and I would be sent to jail for it.
Why aren't we sending the FBI out to these physical locations in the US where these companies are located, or their servers reside and pulling the plugs and cuffing the owners? I want to know how a company like Atrivo can operate in the US for years and nothing be done? How is this possible? Who is in charge? Who needs to lose their job?
I don't want a crash course in piloting anything, however a flying course would be ok...
So what you really want is a $3000 laptop? At this point the screen alone would cost you $2000, then add touch.... and what is this fetish with built in web cams? Did I really miss something here? Who actually uses them? I admit, I got suckered back in the day too, ooohhh aahhhh gotta have a webcam.... for what?
Then I look at your sig, and understand... price isn't something you are worried about...
If only I had a few mod points...
Why exactly are you restricting based on IP? Who the hell really cares where someone lives?
we just got a new iseries in feb and it has been running without a hitch. what is nice is that they really do take care of their customers. So if you do have a DOA (3 in your case which is probably a statistical anomaly) they make sure you are up and running very quickly, and at no additional cost (as long as you are on maintenance of course).
I'll be the first to admit that IBM is expensive, but I haven't had any problems with their quality. Of course most of my experience with them is in mid-range servers and not consumer electronics, but I do have a keyboard of theirs that is quite a few years old....I just like the sounds it makes...
I think their quality started becoming a joke about the time they put out their XPlode line of car audio equipment. Sony used to produce car audio systems that were really good back in the day, I think this was a company wide shift in focus. Increase sales volume on lower cost equipment and they cut their quality in the process.