i agree with Wickline that this is the next ploy by MS to try and subvert/control/destroy OSS, especially as it pertains to commercial enterprises. at the end of the day MS are always going to try and involve the courts, as it is the easiest and most cost-effective. why innovate when you can litigate? i wonder how this will affect the new patent review group (here), as this news makes it look like a mexican standoff, with GE casting the deciding vote.
written by a partner in a law firm, undoubtedly to increase their google page rank. there are only apples and oranges here. nothing to truly compare, unless of course we're talking about better devices to reconstruct dead magnetic media. only then could it be called archaelogy.
the best algorithm in the world is worthless in a poor implementation. enacting legislation that governed the process of counting the votes and verifying them is just as important as the machines themselves.
iraq was more than just a friend; they were our proxy against iran. the taliban were our proxy against the russians. the kurds, who we told we would assist, are currently our very skeptical friends; they've seen firsthand how we treat our friends.
on the subject of how the country will be left, there's nothing very surprising. bush should be charged with treason for lying to the public to take the country to war. cheney should be charged with fraud, and whoever in cheney's office 'outed' a cia agent should also be tried for treason; clinton should get a box of cigars.
this post was in response to a discussion on privacy, but it is equally valid here. the parent is in my opinion right on the money; this is an invasion of privacy. furthermore, it is a change in the status quo; citizenship now depends on your financial participation in the system in a manner in which business approves.
democracy *is* being replaced by a corporate republic.
they shouldn't, people should care, and by extension so should their governments. but when a country buys information from private companies in order to contravene its own laws concerning the privacy of its citizens, then you can't really expect the people to care, can you? the battle over control of personal information is already over; the consumer lost. frankly, the consumer never new there was a battle, never cared, and at any point in the conflict when they could have made a difference, were far more likely to open the door and let the invaders in than they were to barricade it.
take frequent customer supermarket discounts. is your purchasing info really worth 15$/wk? mine isn't. i've recently had a building management company ask me for the transactional history of my chekcing account because i don't have a credit rating. thats right, 'don't have a credit rating.' i've lived outside of the US, where its illegal for companies to transfer personal information across borders. i don't have a credit card because i don't need one. why should i have to pay interest to spend my own money. a car rental company asked me for a second credit card because i was from out of state; why should i need a second one? because i owe that much money, and i'm therefore paying twice as much in interest payments just to buy things.
the future? forget the future, the present. the present is the matrix, as in the movie. except that instead of electricity you're providing goos and services. you're not batteries, but you are drones. and many of you continue to function in this role despite the fact that you know you're drones. you think that you're with the overseers of the drones. you're not. you're think you're better than all the poor people that buy used cars and use all the coupons they can. you're not.
when you can't speak your mind or they fire you, take away your credit cards and get you evicted, so that you can't rent another apartment, or a car, or anything else that requires that you possess a credit card in order to be considered a citizen, will you still be free, if in fact you ever were?
no, the (grand)parent is correct. i'm curioius, what do you know about 'anywhere in the world'? in fact disposable handhelds have been available for at least ten years in countries that are generally referred to as 3rd world. take chile for example, or mexico.
perhaps you followed the vodaphone scandal in greece this spring, whereby telephone network software was hacked in order to route communication to one of a number of 'disposable' phones? you can buy them at tag sales; do you really think that they're going to ask for your ID at a tag sale?
there are some plain and simple aspects here. *every* business wants more profit for less work; not just telcos. look at haliburton!
as far as fios is concerned, verizon is marketing it very heavily. even going as far as sending 2-day UPS letters announcing it. that, and some of their marketing materials state, 'an important announcement about your cable service'. as has been pointed out here before, fios is not PSTN, and is not regulated as such. furthermore, once your off the telco grid they won't reconnect you.
lets use the GM analogy. you're going to drive you're car and go to the casino, so i want an extra dollar per gallon for this gas because someone else is making money on it. plain and simple, this is extortion.
there is not enough competition in the marketplace for this service, due to the financial barrier to entry, to ensure the consumer gets the best service for the lowest cost. and while poorly managed corporations may eventually go out of business or aquired my more successful companies, this will not compensate those who were overcharged. the only possible manner in which to assure fair and equal service, which should be the goal of our government, is by mandating it legally.
are you people stupid? you must be, the government just announced it spent 30 million of your money to buy exactly this type of information. in my mind thats the ultimate indignation, they broke the law, and operated against my interests using my cash. if you're going to sit around and just carp about privacy policies rather than demanding serious reforms AND regulations in the laws governing personal information then thats exactly what you are...
unregulated markets, huh? you mean like california's energy deregulation? do you mean like repealing the US banking laws put in place after the depression? or maybe you mean like the state of massachusett's attempt to allow businesses to self-police for environmental infractions? and you call yourself a european? would that be an old-europe european or a new-europe european? because frankly you sound like a poster-child for US initiatives to get europe to reduce its social welfare so that american companies can treat workers the same way they treat them in the US. and that, my friend, is despicable.
i've flown on El Al a few times. invariably they find something they don't like about me after 30-45 minutes of questions. the last time i flew them i asked the questioner to call their supervisor, and then just asked that they search me. they asked me to calm down, etc. and i explained that i had no desire to go through the interrogation and that it would be easier for both of us if they just searched me. so yeah, let them search me.
This is a business decision; ie. its cheaper to hire lobbyists to change the laws regarding visas and then higher foreigners with lower exepcations/demands than it is to pay local wages. Besides, do the senior executives of your company play golf with you? No, they play golf with the lobbyist.
No, I didn't RTFA. I RTFC'd. Lots of them. And judging from what I saw I see gross misunderstanding on both sides. So why doesn't everyone stop screaming for just a minute. Thanks. Oh, and because I'm really lazy and don't want to have to make two seperate points, I'm going to roll them together into one, where its likely that the sarcasm subchannel will actually have the higher signal-to-noise ratio, so you had better pay attention.
In this corner, the Challenger, the world's most popular onlline music store. Having sold 500 million songs since inception, having managed by focused training and blind luck to create the largest, most-scalable distribution mechanism with the highest name-brand recognition, they now seek to dictate terms on the pricing of individual goods; They contest that their one price fits all is a good and just system for the reward of investment to the Champion.
In the opposite corner, the Champion,...
anyways, you get the point. Its like Borges, if I imagine a really great book, and then tell you about it as though it existed, then it does for our purposes, doesn't it?
the deal is this; the music industry has traditionally disitributed its product as a package deal. that is, you get the hits and the b-sides, and you get a stew of both for X dollars. now, steve jobs wants you to pay X/10. whats the problem? the problem is that you're probably not going to buy the b-sides, and forget about the rest of the songs on the album. but the music industry can't scale down to an individual song level, because there are too many costs associated with the production, that they would have to be incurred for every song. think about it.
just in case you're wondering i'm not an industry apologist, far from it. personally i'm surprised no one has posted a link to the famous Steve Albini commentary on the industry. so i will, its here,.
but there was a really intersting piece i read the other day about a guy who had bought 20k worth of high-end digital gear because he wanted access to his jukebox in every room. and the only way that was going to happen was if he used an adapter of some kind - what do you call those things for iPods?
i hope you see the point; its that Steve Jobs isn't freeing you from anything, he's only grabbing as much power as he can right now because he can. he doesn't care about good or just or fair or anything. ask Woz about the $1000.
the only way this goes forward the right way, is that we decide to reward people who decide to move outside of this system to make a living. they release stuff for free and ask for PayPal donations if you like their stuff. and you know what, if everyone who listened to a song more than 3 times paid for it, they would have a decent livelihood and probably be a lot happier about the way things worked. all except for the napoleons of the world. yeah, you know who i mean, the ego-possessed, i want a gold toilet for the guest bedroom crowd. they and mr bronfman, that is.
apple is _not_ moving towards open source. apple is merely playing the field enough not to make enemies. their attitude towards DRM is the same as anyone else who is trying to play in the content distribution space. and if you have 80% of that market already, and are looking at another, larger market about to open if, and only if, you have the right credentials (secure hardware platform), then supporting that platform is going to be one of your business activities. bet on it.
the pulse of the people? no, the pulse of the people's purchasing decisions, yes.
i wrote about this and linked to the inquirer article yesterday.
i've been thinking this very thing for the past several days. on a hunch, i checked the registration for 'iflicks.' its no surprise that its already registered, but its registered to tucows!
seriously, maybe you've heard of East Fork, and Secure Premium Content Module? in the inquirer article they talk about how this technology will be used to keep linux out of the contant market. and the article about 'Longhorn to Require Monitor-Based DRM' here makes it quite plain why apple 'switched.'
in another report about next-generation broadband services from cablevision, speeds of 100 Mbps were achieved in a trial deployment.
so the answer is quite plain, apple wants to be part of the future of content distribution, and going with intel is the only way they can get there.
when's the last time that microsoft did such a thing, turned around a year later saying it was hopelessly broken, and _then_ offered their new and improved overlord mail control system?
Slashdot Mirror
i agree with Wickline that this is the next ploy by MS to try and subvert/control/destroy OSS, especially as it pertains to commercial enterprises. at the end of the day MS are always going to try and involve the courts, as it is the easiest and most cost-effective. why innovate when you can litigate? i wonder how this will affect the new patent review group (here), as this news makes it look like a mexican standoff, with GE casting the deciding vote.
written by a partner in a law firm, undoubtedly to increase their google page rank. there are only apples and oranges here. nothing to truly compare, unless of course we're talking about better devices to reconstruct dead magnetic media. only then could it be called archaelogy.
the best algorithm in the world is worthless in a poor implementation. enacting legislation that governed the process of counting the votes and verifying them is just as important as the machines themselves.
iraq was more than just a friend; they were our proxy against iran. the taliban were our proxy against the russians. the kurds, who we told we would assist, are currently our very skeptical friends; they've seen firsthand how we treat our friends.
on the subject of how the country will be left, there's nothing very surprising. bush should be charged with treason for lying to the public to take the country to war. cheney should be charged with fraud, and whoever in cheney's office 'outed' a cia agent should also be tried for treason; clinton should get a box of cigars.
at that point shouldn't they all say 'any'?
is "Where Money Comes From."
this post was in response to a discussion on privacy, but it is equally valid here. the parent is in my opinion right on the money; this is an invasion of privacy. furthermore, it is a change in the status quo; citizenship now depends on your financial participation in the system in a manner in which business approves.
democracy *is* being replaced by a corporate republic.
they shouldn't, people should care, and by extension so should their governments. but when a country buys information from private companies in order to contravene its own laws concerning the privacy of its citizens, then you can't really expect the people to care, can you? the battle over control of personal information is already over; the consumer lost. frankly, the consumer never new there was a battle, never cared, and at any point in the conflict when they could have made a difference, were far more likely to open the door and let the invaders in than they were to barricade it.
take frequent customer supermarket discounts. is your purchasing info really worth 15$/wk? mine isn't. i've recently had a building management company ask me for the transactional history of my chekcing account because i don't have a credit rating. thats right, 'don't have a credit rating.' i've lived outside of the US, where its illegal for companies to transfer personal information across borders. i don't have a credit card because i don't need one. why should i have to pay interest to spend my own money. a car rental company asked me for a second credit card because i was from out of state; why should i need a second one? because i owe that much money, and i'm therefore paying twice as much in interest payments just to buy things.
the future? forget the future, the present. the present is the matrix, as in the movie. except that instead of electricity you're providing goos and services. you're not batteries, but you are drones. and many of you continue to function in this role despite the fact that you know you're drones. you think that you're with the overseers of the drones. you're not. you're think you're better than all the poor people that buy used cars and use all the coupons they can. you're not.
when you can't speak your mind or they fire you, take away your credit cards and get you evicted, so that you can't rent another apartment, or a car, or anything else that requires that you possess a credit card in order to be considered a citizen, will you still be free, if in fact you ever were?
no, the (grand)parent is correct. i'm curioius, what do you know about 'anywhere in the world'? in fact disposable handhelds have been available for at least ten years in countries that are generally referred to as 3rd world. take chile for example, or mexico.
perhaps you followed the vodaphone scandal in greece this spring, whereby telephone network software was hacked in order to route communication to one of a number of 'disposable' phones? you can buy them at tag sales; do you really think that they're going to ask for your ID at a tag sale?
His opinion only reflects corporate/consumer use in the US. In the rest of the world Linux use is growing at the expense of Windows.
what would the score of iraq under saddam hussein have been.
there are some plain and simple aspects here. *every* business wants more profit for less work; not just telcos. look at haliburton!
as far as fios is concerned, verizon is marketing it very heavily. even going as far as sending 2-day UPS letters announcing it. that, and some of their marketing materials state, 'an important announcement about your cable service'. as has been pointed out here before, fios is not PSTN, and is not regulated as such. furthermore, once your off the telco grid they won't reconnect you.
lets use the GM analogy. you're going to drive you're car and go to the casino, so i want an extra dollar per gallon for this gas because someone else is making money on it. plain and simple, this is extortion.
there is not enough competition in the marketplace for this service, due to the financial barrier to entry, to ensure the consumer gets the best service for the lowest cost. and while poorly managed corporations may eventually go out of business or aquired my more successful companies, this will not compensate those who were overcharged. the only possible manner in which to assure fair and equal service, which should be the goal of our government, is by mandating it legally.
i hate regulation...
privacy policy...
etc.
are you people stupid? you must be, the government just announced it spent 30 million of your money to buy exactly this type of information. in my mind thats the ultimate indignation, they broke the law, and operated against my interests using my cash. if you're going to sit around and just carp about privacy policies rather than demanding serious reforms AND regulations in the laws governing personal information then thats exactly what you are...
there's always these pistachio people, and i've heard you can even run linux on top of it.
this guy is just shilling his web page for some revenue. move along, there's nothing to see here...
in the mall near where i live (huntington, ny), apple and sephora are right next door to each other!
the only reason you really need to know about why you should switch to linux
unregulated markets, huh? you mean like california's energy deregulation? do you mean like repealing the US banking laws put in place after the depression? or maybe you mean like the state of massachusett's attempt to allow businesses to self-police for environmental infractions? and you call yourself a european? would that be an old-europe european or a new-europe european? because frankly you sound like a poster-child for US initiatives to get europe to reduce its social welfare so that american companies can treat workers the same way they treat them in the US. and that, my friend, is despicable.
i've flown on El Al a few times. invariably they find something they don't like about me after 30-45 minutes of questions. the last time i flew them i asked the questioner to call their supervisor, and then just asked that they search me. they asked me to calm down, etc. and i explained that i had no desire to go through the interrogation and that it would be easier for both of us if they just searched me. so yeah, let them search me.
This is a business decision; ie. its cheaper to hire lobbyists to change the laws regarding visas and then higher foreigners with lower exepcations/demands than it is to pay local wages. Besides, do the senior executives of your company play golf with you? No, they play golf with the lobbyist.
No, I didn't RTFA. I RTFC'd. Lots of them. And judging from what I saw I see gross misunderstanding on both sides. So why doesn't everyone stop screaming for just a minute. Thanks. Oh, and because I'm really lazy and don't want to have to make two seperate points, I'm going to roll them together into one, where its likely that the sarcasm subchannel will actually have the higher signal-to-noise ratio, so you had better pay attention.
...
In this corner, the Challenger, the world's most popular onlline music store. Having sold 500 million songs since inception, having managed by focused training and blind luck to create the largest, most-scalable distribution mechanism with the highest name-brand recognition, they now seek to dictate terms on the pricing of individual goods; They contest that their one price fits all is a good and just system for the reward of investment to the Champion.
In the opposite corner, the Champion,
anyways, you get the point. Its like Borges, if I imagine a really great book, and then tell you about it as though it existed, then it does for our purposes, doesn't it?
the deal is this; the music industry has traditionally disitributed its product as a package deal. that is, you get the hits and the b-sides, and you get a stew of both for X dollars. now, steve jobs wants you to pay X/10. whats the problem? the problem is that you're probably not going to buy the b-sides, and forget about the rest of the songs on the album. but the music industry can't scale down to an individual song level, because there are too many costs associated with the production, that they would have to be incurred for every song. think about it.
just in case you're wondering i'm not an industry apologist, far from it. personally i'm surprised no one has posted a link to the famous Steve Albini commentary on the industry. so i will, its here,.
but there was a really intersting piece i read the other day about a guy who had bought 20k worth of high-end digital gear because he wanted access to his jukebox in every room. and the only way that was going to happen was if he used an adapter of some kind - what do you call those things for iPods?
i hope you see the point; its that Steve Jobs isn't freeing you from anything, he's only grabbing as much power as he can right now because he can. he doesn't care about good or just or fair or anything. ask Woz about the $1000.
the only way this goes forward the right way, is that we decide to reward people who decide to move outside of this system to make a living. they release stuff for free and ask for PayPal donations if you like their stuff. and you know what, if everyone who listened to a song more than 3 times paid for it, they would have a decent livelihood and probably be a lot happier about the way things worked. all except for the napoleons of the world. yeah, you know who i mean, the ego-possessed, i want a gold toilet for the guest bedroom crowd. they and mr bronfman, that is.
apple is _not_ moving towards open source. apple is merely playing the field enough not to make enemies. their attitude towards DRM is the same as anyone else who is trying to play in the content distribution space. and if you have 80% of that market already, and are looking at another, larger market about to open if, and only if, you have the right credentials (secure hardware platform), then supporting that platform is going to be one of your business activities. bet on it.
the pulse of the people? no, the pulse of the people's purchasing decisions, yes.
i wrote about this and linked to the inquirer article yesterday.
i've been thinking this very thing for the past several days. on a hunch, i checked the registration for 'iflicks.' its no surprise that its already registered, but its registered to tucows!
seriously, maybe you've heard of East Fork, and Secure Premium Content Module? in the inquirer article they talk about how this technology will be used to keep linux out of the contant market. and the article about 'Longhorn to Require Monitor-Based DRM' here makes it quite plain why apple 'switched.'
in another report about next-generation broadband services from cablevision, speeds of 100 Mbps were achieved in a trial deployment.
so the answer is quite plain, apple wants to be part of the future of content distribution, and going with intel is the only way they can get there.
when's the last time that microsoft did such a thing, turned around a year later saying it was hopelessly broken, and _then_ offered their new and improved overlord mail control system?
a recent guardian weekly article states that it is not considered worth the estimated US$ 2 billion it would cost to put a man on the moon.