Of course the original purchasers stopped playing.
He doesn't have the game anymore you twit.
Think of it this way. Say I am the one millionth person to purchase a game to play online. If I sell or give my copy to someone else who goes to play online, I have stopped playing since I no longer have the game. The person who got the game from me is now the one millionth person online. Doing some arithmetic, 1,000,000 + 1 (the player I sold the game to) - 1 (being me the person who stopped playing) = 1,000,000. Math shows that you had one million players before the game got sold second hand to someone else, and that after the game was sold, you still had only one million players online (not one million and one).
What this looks like is a developer/publisher looking to get paid TWICE for ONE game license. And if that second person decides to sell it second hand to a third person, then that's the developer/publisher getting paid THREE times for ONE game license.
As a developer/publisher, you already sold that copy of the game. What the customer does with that game copy, either selling it or giving it away to someone else, as long as he/she didn't copy it, is not doing anything illegal or ethically wrong and frankly it's none of your business.
It's an anecdote—an extremely well known anecdote I might add; meant to be used to convey an idea, not represent scientific facts. So first thing, get off the high horse.
Secondly, from a legal perspective, states maintain databases such as the one suggested, through DMV records. Obviously that requires a level of voluntary acceptance by the populace, since nothing forces you to maintain a state ID or driver's license.
Thirdly, the federal government in reality probably already has a national database derived from DMV records and passports. The clause being included in this bill is nothing more than a formality making a current practice officially legal.
No where in his post does he touch on someone's "right" to suicide. He is talking about the rate of suicide in relation to the prevalence of a deadly mechanism. There is no relation, is what he was saying. Not once did he talk about suicide rights.
In response to your question though, I will ask you a question. What do you think the people that tried suicide but were stopped by a friend or family member would say about it? Those that are happy about it at least. Don't fool yourself into believing that out of the people that were attempting suicide or plannining to, none of them feel grateful for the individuals who stopped them from doing it. I can't give exact percentages, but there are people who have attempted to kill themselves and were stopped—against their will at the time—who are glad someone was there who cared about them enough to save their lives.
Suicide is a permanent "solution" to temporary problems. Yes, there are people who genuinely want to off themselves, and the fact that nothing would help them from seeing the value in their lives is sad. The people who fail, whether by their own failure, or who are forced to live by others do still have to live with the depression. Well, they can always try again.
But if we did what you would seem to suggest, which is "just let people off themselves at will with no intervention of any kind", people who truly didn't want to kill themselves will, because they had no one to try and stop them.
I am sorry, but this is extermely short-sighted and naive. If an individual or entity has a history of abusing powers granted to them, you do NOT set up a system that makes it easier for them to abuse power.
>If the US were going to turn into "papers, please" it would've done so already
This is flat out false. The ideals of freedom are so deeply rooted into our culture and society, if it were to just switch from freedom to police state, yes, that would cause problems. But that is not what is happening. The federal government is gradually expanding it's powers.
To use a well-known, simple analogy, think of boiling a frog. Drop the frog into already boiling water, and it will jump out. Put the frog in the bottom of the pan and slowly heat up the pot to a boil, and the frog will boil.
It's a slow expansion of power, and almost always granted to help increase "security".
Yes and no. The 360 was used in the last few years more of a 'proof of concept' and to stay competitive with things like AppleTV. I predict the 720 will include a "wealth of new features" that includes Microsoft Office, and full IE integration. Launch accessories will include wireless keyboard and mouse, and the Kinect (or next iteration of) will be utilized for the Metro interface that the 720 will most likely carry.
I wouldn't be surprised if eventually Windows is fully utilized on the 720 at a later date if it's not included outright.
So here begins service based computing. This is the direction Microsoft is trying to bring the computer industry, and it's all starting with the next Xbox. I know it's a futile hope, but I still hope the Xbox 720 fails, or at the least has significantly less adoption like Windows 8. This is the opportunity consumers have to try and stop Microsoft from taking computing in this direction. I doubt it will happen, but I do hope.
His point is, that there is a wealth of information that SHOULD be getting told to the people, but doesn't because government knows that the people aren't truly interested. Since when we do find out when the government has overreached it's bounds or violated the Constitution, people don't give a shit. Which is sad, and stupid on the part of the people.
I certainly hope so. The last 3D film I went to was Tron: Legacy, and the reason it was my last was before the movie started, there was a disclaimer that said that all scenes were not in 3D, but to keep the glasses on. If everything is not in 3D than what the hell am I paying an extra six dollars for? I also never liked 3D anyways since I do not enjoy having to wear an apparatus to view it.
That's not really the point. Yes, Usenet is old, but it was generally unknown to the majority of your average computer users. For years, the MAFIAA has been going after torrenting, with seemingly no knowledge of the capabilities and common use for Usenet. Now all of the sudden, NZB sites and Usenet providers have been getting hit with the DMCA notices. Again, seemingly it's apparent that the MAFIAA has only recently become aware of Usenet, so spagthorpe was using a funny and appropriate movie reference to point out that a lot of people couldn't keep the Usenet secret to themselves.
This is one of the fundamental reasons why we have the issues we have. Including amendments or clauses that have absolutely nothing to do with the main content of the bill itself should not be allowed. It has historically and currently used to sneak in laws that are not openly discussed with the public in order to pass those laws without public knowledge. This is because they know it is harder to eliminate a law after it has passed than it is to block a law before it passes.
While arguments could be made that legitimate laws that should be passed would take too long to get passed, this ability is abuses far more frequently than being used for legitimate laws. And for that reason, things like this need to stop.
Well, as a provider, they are not legally allowed to ban customer owned eqipment. By law they are required to let customers use their own equipment. But all the services are still controlled by the provider.
Unfortunately, it's not a violation of DMCA since as a customer, you are allowed to suspend your DVR service. That doesn't require a different box, the provider just eliminates your access to DVR functionality. If that doesn't violate DMCA, why would blocking the ability to FFW through commercials? Sorry to say, it doesn't.
You also should try to keep in mind that a lot of your service functionality is not decided on by the service provider, but instead contracts with the content providers (NBC, CBS, Viacom, etc).
Which is why Dish network put themselves in hot water with the network companies over their Hopper dvr box, which allows customers to skip commercials on recorded programs all together.
That doesn't directly apply in this specific case, but it could also be what is pressuring TWC to do this. Either way, it's not a violation of DMCA.
Source: I work for a major service provider. We suck, I know, but unfortunately everything I said is true.
Because you don't own the equipment or its software. And per the subscriber agreement you agreed to upon activating service, your provider retains the right to alter their service features and pricing.
There is a lot of hostility against TWC for this. Let me be the first to say, just because TWC got this patent does NOT mean that they will be utilizing it. If anything, they are doing consumers a favor, because now in order for any other provider to do it, they would have to pay royalties to TWC. There is absolutely no indication that TWC will actually implement disabling fast forwarding on their DVRs.
Since when do we need any privacy bill of rights? The first 10 Amendments to the United States Constitution already applies here. Or at least they should.
Also, calling it a "bill of rights" is extremely deceitful about what a bill of rights is. The first 10 Amendments to the Constitution are rights that protect the PEOPLE from the GOVERNMENT. This 'privacy bill of rights' conveniently EXEMPTS the GOVERNMENT from it's protections. So in reality what this is doing is conditioning people into falsehoods regarding privacy, and the bill of rights.
1. Privacy is only applicable to private institutions, and the people should not expect privacy from the Government.
2. A 'bill of rights' again does not apply to the Government, but instead private entities. This is extremely important when the Government decides to pass laws that are in direct violation of the Bill of Rights. To say it won't happen is naive, as it already has happened (PATRIOT Act and NDAA being two examples).
Yes, the percentage that fell is specifically their profit margin. And while 43.7% to 42.2% is only a 1.5% difference, that is a 1.5% difference in millions of dollars. Since their business practices are centered around huge profit margins, this decrease is pretty significant for them. Please don't think of me being sympathetic towards them, I am not. I could care less if they only made $250 million dollars last year rather than $260 million (these numbers are not based in fact, just using it as an example).
However, when their business model is dependent on them making $260 million, they either have to scale back some where or raise service rates in order to compensate for the $10 million that they were expecting to be there but isn't. Where it gets ridiculous, is that for tax purposes, they are actually able to write off this $10 million as a "loss". Even though in reality they didn't lose anything instead they just made less than what they were expecting.
I decided to look for more info about her on Princeton's website, and she definitely deserves massive respect. You can read a bio about her here: http://wendy.seltzer.org/shortbio.html
She works in support of the internet users, even heading up a website that helps internet users understand their rights when they receive cease and desist threats. I like her too.
That, of course, is not the intended purpose to freedom of religion. You are speaking more along the lines of freedom FROM religion, which is not guaranteed nor mandated by any federal or state document (thankfully).
But there is a very fine line between socially vilifying a group of people and violating their rights (whether it comes from the left or the right); and very few people can walk that line without crossing it.
That is the last thing they "need to do". Our government is supposed to protect us and our liberties even from international "law".
We would have to obey? That is the mentality of a defeatist. Our Constitution does not allow for an international body to have the power to govern the United States. Nor should it.
Remember though, every step towards less freedom needs to be exactly that. A step. Obviously they aren't going to take away the URL bar completely right from the start. It starts with a "UI change" until Google, or some other company looks at data and sees that no one really uses the URL bar anymore and then they choose to disable it by default. So in order to have it, you have to go into settings and enable it. Then after a few years (possibly less) they look at the data again, and determine that they can eliminate the option completely because less than 1% of computer users actually use it.
There is a reason the saying "Out of sight, out of mind" exists. Now, I am not trying to say that I think that Google or Mozilla is eliminating the URL bar for the specific purpose of getting people to forget about it or any kind of conspiracy theories like that. I am sure they are doing it because it will improve the overall look of the browser. But I do feel it will come with a level of unfavorable results in our options or level of control of where and how we browse the Internet in the future.
Specifically the second paragraph concerns me, "Noting that Win7 allows programs like Photoshop to insert themselves stealthily into your firewall exception list. Further, that the OS allows large software vendors to penetrate your machine."
I wonder if this is why the NSA wants everyone to upgrade.
Amazing how many people are missing this point....
You filed a lawsuit basically for copyright infringement and won. Might have been a tough battle, sure. But you won. BE HAPPY. Besides that obviously judges are going to protect other lawyers yada yada yada, no offense, you got greedy. Instead of taking your $19,000 and change and being happy that you were a little guy who won a case against "the man" you had to be juvenile and take it to the next level and file a lawsuit because of what the lawyers tried to do during the original lawsuit? I am glad that you won your original case, and I am glad you lost this case.
Slashdot Mirror
At $650, the GTX 780 costs less than one monthly rent payment for me.
Of course the original purchasers stopped playing.
He doesn't have the game anymore you twit.
Think of it this way. Say I am the one millionth person to purchase a game to play online. If I sell or give my copy to someone else who goes to play online, I have stopped playing since I no longer have the game. The person who got the game from me is now the one millionth person online. Doing some arithmetic, 1,000,000 + 1 (the player I sold the game to) - 1 (being me the person who stopped playing) = 1,000,000. Math shows that you had one million players before the game got sold second hand to someone else, and that after the game was sold, you still had only one million players online (not one million and one).
What this looks like is a developer/publisher looking to get paid TWICE for ONE game license. And if that second person decides to sell it second hand to a third person, then that's the developer/publisher getting paid THREE times for ONE game license.
As a developer/publisher, you already sold that copy of the game. What the customer does with that game copy, either selling it or giving it away to someone else, as long as he/she didn't copy it, is not doing anything illegal or ethically wrong and frankly it's none of your business.
It's an anecdote—an extremely well known anecdote I might add; meant to be used to convey an idea, not represent scientific facts. So first thing, get off the high horse.
Secondly, from a legal perspective, states maintain databases such as the one suggested, through DMV records. Obviously that requires a level of voluntary acceptance by the populace, since nothing forces you to maintain a state ID or driver's license.
Thirdly, the federal government in reality probably already has a national database derived from DMV records and passports. The clause being included in this bill is nothing more than a formality making a current practice officially legal.
My original comment still stands.
No where in his post does he touch on someone's "right" to suicide. He is talking about the rate of suicide in relation to the prevalence of a deadly mechanism. There is no relation, is what he was saying. Not once did he talk about suicide rights.
In response to your question though, I will ask you a question. What do you think the people that tried suicide but were stopped by a friend or family member would say about it? Those that are happy about it at least. Don't fool yourself into believing that out of the people that were attempting suicide or plannining to, none of them feel grateful for the individuals who stopped them from doing it. I can't give exact percentages, but there are people who have attempted to kill themselves and were stopped—against their will at the time—who are glad someone was there who cared about them enough to save their lives.
Suicide is a permanent "solution" to temporary problems. Yes, there are people who genuinely want to off themselves, and the fact that nothing would help them from seeing the value in their lives is sad. The people who fail, whether by their own failure, or who are forced to live by others do still have to live with the depression. Well, they can always try again.
But if we did what you would seem to suggest, which is "just let people off themselves at will with no intervention of any kind", people who truly didn't want to kill themselves will, because they had no one to try and stop them.
I am sorry, but this is extermely short-sighted and naive. If an individual or entity has a history of abusing powers granted to them, you do NOT set up a system that makes it easier for them to abuse power.
>If the US were going to turn into "papers, please" it would've done so already
This is flat out false. The ideals of freedom are so deeply rooted into our culture and society, if it were to just switch from freedom to police state, yes, that would cause problems. But that is not what is happening. The federal government is gradually expanding it's powers.
To use a well-known, simple analogy, think of boiling a frog. Drop the frog into already boiling water, and it will jump out. Put the frog in the bottom of the pan and slowly heat up the pot to a boil, and the frog will boil.
It's a slow expansion of power, and almost always granted to help increase "security".
Yes and no. The 360 was used in the last few years more of a 'proof of concept' and to stay competitive with things like AppleTV. I predict the 720 will include a "wealth of new features" that includes Microsoft Office, and full IE integration. Launch accessories will include wireless keyboard and mouse, and the Kinect (or next iteration of) will be utilized for the Metro interface that the 720 will most likely carry.
I wouldn't be surprised if eventually Windows is fully utilized on the 720 at a later date if it's not included outright.
So here begins service based computing. This is the direction Microsoft is trying to bring the computer industry, and it's all starting with the next Xbox. I know it's a futile hope, but I still hope the Xbox 720 fails, or at the least has significantly less adoption like Windows 8. This is the opportunity consumers have to try and stop Microsoft from taking computing in this direction. I doubt it will happen, but I do hope.
His point is, that there is a wealth of information that SHOULD be getting told to the people, but doesn't because government knows that the people aren't truly interested. Since when we do find out when the government has overreached it's bounds or violated the Constitution, people don't give a shit. Which is sad, and stupid on the part of the people.
I certainly hope so. The last 3D film I went to was Tron: Legacy, and the reason it was my last was before the movie started, there was a disclaimer that said that all scenes were not in 3D, but to keep the glasses on. If everything is not in 3D than what the hell am I paying an extra six dollars for? I also never liked 3D anyways since I do not enjoy having to wear an apparatus to view it.
That's not really the point. Yes, Usenet is old, but it was generally unknown to the majority of your average computer users. For years, the MAFIAA has been going after torrenting, with seemingly no knowledge of the capabilities and common use for Usenet. Now all of the sudden, NZB sites and Usenet providers have been getting hit with the DMCA notices. Again, seemingly it's apparent that the MAFIAA has only recently become aware of Usenet, so spagthorpe was using a funny and appropriate movie reference to point out that a lot of people couldn't keep the Usenet secret to themselves.
This is one of the fundamental reasons why we have the issues we have. Including amendments or clauses that have absolutely nothing to do with the main content of the bill itself should not be allowed. It has historically and currently used to sneak in laws that are not openly discussed with the public in order to pass those laws without public knowledge. This is because they know it is harder to eliminate a law after it has passed than it is to block a law before it passes.
While arguments could be made that legitimate laws that should be passed would take too long to get passed, this ability is abuses far more frequently than being used for legitimate laws. And for that reason, things like this need to stop.
Well, as a provider, they are not legally allowed to ban customer owned eqipment. By law they are required to let customers use their own equipment. But all the services are still controlled by the provider.
Unfortunately, it's not a violation of DMCA since as a customer, you are allowed to suspend your DVR service. That doesn't require a different box, the provider just eliminates your access to DVR functionality. If that doesn't violate DMCA, why would blocking the ability to FFW through commercials? Sorry to say, it doesn't.
You also should try to keep in mind that a lot of your service functionality is not decided on by the service provider, but instead contracts with the content providers (NBC, CBS, Viacom, etc).
Which is why Dish network put themselves in hot water with the network companies over their Hopper dvr box, which allows customers to skip commercials on recorded programs all together.
That doesn't directly apply in this specific case, but it could also be what is pressuring TWC to do this. Either way, it's not a violation of DMCA.
Source: I work for a major service provider. We suck, I know, but unfortunately everything I said is true.
Because you don't own the equipment or its software. And per the subscriber agreement you agreed to upon activating service, your provider retains the right to alter their service features and pricing.
There is a lot of hostility against TWC for this. Let me be the first to say, just because TWC got this patent does NOT mean that they will be utilizing it. If anything, they are doing consumers a favor, because now in order for any other provider to do it, they would have to pay royalties to TWC. There is absolutely no indication that TWC will actually implement disabling fast forwarding on their DVRs.
Since when do we need any privacy bill of rights? The first 10 Amendments to the United States Constitution already applies here. Or at least they should.
Also, calling it a "bill of rights" is extremely deceitful about what a bill of rights is. The first 10 Amendments to the Constitution are rights that protect the PEOPLE from the GOVERNMENT. This 'privacy bill of rights' conveniently EXEMPTS the GOVERNMENT from it's protections. So in reality what this is doing is conditioning people into falsehoods regarding privacy, and the bill of rights.
1. Privacy is only applicable to private institutions, and the people should not expect privacy from the Government.
2. A 'bill of rights' again does not apply to the Government, but instead private entities. This is extremely important when the Government decides to pass laws that are in direct violation of the Bill of Rights. To say it won't happen is naive, as it already has happened (PATRIOT Act and NDAA being two examples).
Yes, the percentage that fell is specifically their profit margin. And while 43.7% to 42.2% is only a 1.5% difference, that is a 1.5% difference in millions of dollars. Since their business practices are centered around huge profit margins, this decrease is pretty significant for them. Please don't think of me being sympathetic towards them, I am not. I could care less if they only made $250 million dollars last year rather than $260 million (these numbers are not based in fact, just using it as an example).
However, when their business model is dependent on them making $260 million, they either have to scale back some where or raise service rates in order to compensate for the $10 million that they were expecting to be there but isn't. Where it gets ridiculous, is that for tax purposes, they are actually able to write off this $10 million as a "loss". Even though in reality they didn't lose anything instead they just made less than what they were expecting.
I decided to look for more info about her on Princeton's website, and she definitely deserves massive respect. You can read a bio about her here: http://wendy.seltzer.org/shortbio.html
She works in support of the internet users, even heading up a website that helps internet users understand their rights when they receive cease and desist threats. I like her too.
That, of course, is not the intended purpose to freedom of religion. You are speaking more along the lines of freedom FROM religion, which is not guaranteed nor mandated by any federal or state document (thankfully).
But there is a very fine line between socially vilifying a group of people and violating their rights (whether it comes from the left or the right); and very few people can walk that line without crossing it.
Apparently "freedom of religion" doesn't mean anything to you. Thankfully, the Bill of Rights disagrees with you.
That is the last thing they "need to do". Our government is supposed to protect us and our liberties even from international "law".
We would have to obey? That is the mentality of a defeatist. Our Constitution does not allow for an international body to have the power to govern the United States. Nor should it.
That was the most brilliantly written synopsis of the IP situation in the U.S. My hat is off to you.
Remember though, every step towards less freedom needs to be exactly that. A step. Obviously they aren't going to take away the URL bar completely right from the start. It starts with a "UI change" until Google, or some other company looks at data and sees that no one really uses the URL bar anymore and then they choose to disable it by default. So in order to have it, you have to go into settings and enable it. Then after a few years (possibly less) they look at the data again, and determine that they can eliminate the option completely because less than 1% of computer users actually use it.
There is a reason the saying "Out of sight, out of mind" exists. Now, I am not trying to say that I think that Google or Mozilla is eliminating the URL bar for the specific purpose of getting people to forget about it or any kind of conspiracy theories like that. I am sure they are doing it because it will improve the overall look of the browser. But I do feel it will come with a level of unfavorable results in our options or level of control of where and how we browse the Internet in the future.
This reminds me of a previous /. post that talked about draconian DRM: http://tech.slashdot.org/story/09/02/16/2259257/Draconian-DRM-Revealed-In-Windows-7
Specifically the second paragraph concerns me, "Noting that Win7 allows programs like Photoshop to insert themselves stealthily into your firewall exception list. Further, that the OS allows large software vendors to penetrate your machine."
I wonder if this is why the NSA wants everyone to upgrade.
Amazing how many people are missing this point....
You filed a lawsuit basically for copyright infringement and won. Might have been a tough battle, sure. But you won. BE HAPPY. Besides that obviously judges are going to protect other lawyers yada yada yada, no offense, you got greedy. Instead of taking your $19,000 and change and being happy that you were a little guy who won a case against "the man" you had to be juvenile and take it to the next level and file a lawsuit because of what the lawyers tried to do during the original lawsuit? I am glad that you won your original case, and I am glad you lost this case.