copyright protects the actual code, the expression of the idea in a tangible medium as it were. Patents protect the idea itself (as long as it's a unique and patentable idea). The sooner you slashmonkeys understand the simple, 101 level basics of intellectual property, the quicker we can get over these stupid blogs and forum comments ranting and raving about things they don't understand well enough to formulate a well reasoned opinion, much less formal argument.
"I like that point but I'm pretty sure Zune doesn't have 10% of the MP3 player market by a long shot."
And you know this because of what...your spidey sense? How is this comment insightful? It makes broad assumptions with one sentence and poses not onesingle fact, clue, link or other supporting evidence of any kind whatsoever. Slashdot either needs to do away with their moderation system and replace it with one similar to Digg where everyone gets to voice their uninformed opinion or add a few more categories so moderators can be at least somewhat honest (i.e. "+1 I'm an idiot but your comment conincides with my irrational belief system...good job.", stuff like that).
I'm not going to bother with most of your comment because you are simply an idiot. However, I'll address one issue you brought up about Article 8 (what you so casually call "the quote"). Our Constitution does not actually say what we can or cannot do, it's left up to case law to interpret the Constitution and apply the guidance it provides. While Article 8 says nothing about allowing transference of rights to a third party, years of case law does. Article 10, by the away, does not change this at all. Congress si still allowed, through Article 8, to grant temporary monopolies for the purposes of promoting Science and useful arts.
By the way, you misspelled "owned", and no I did not get owned or pwned.
I'm not looking at copyright backwards, I'm simply stating facts. When you "share" intellectual property you are not expressing an idea, you are passing on an idea someone else already expressed. While the Bill of Rights does not enumerate "the right to make money off creative work" there are two things to consider, 1) the Bill of Rights does not enumerate rights one has, it simply lists some examples of the ones our founding fathers felt were more important than all others, and 2) the U.S. Constitution does mention "The Congress shall have Power . . . To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Author and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;". This was a part of the original Articles, before any Bill of Rights existed. As far as I know, copyright is not indefinite, therefore it is still temporary, albeit longer than the original terms. However, even with the original terms still in place, most intellectual property traded on P2P networks is still infringing. Any more cliches and bad information you'd like me to dispel?
There are a few problems with this. First of all, the M2010 is a rather unique computer. It's a great portable workstation (sold as a laptop but at 18.5 lbs, I don't think so) and has been invaluable at work on a recent project where I just so happened to have After Effects and Audition on it and only Flash MX on my G5 at work. The project would have been an absolute nightmare had I only been able to work in Flash.
Second problem is the number of system builders who do this. Hunting down white box system builders in my area who I can trust is bad enough. Try finding people who build laptops. You can't which means you have to go to the Dells and Gateway's of the world.
Sure, Dell is more than welcome to put whatever crap they want on their systems but that in no way means I have to like it and be content with a system loaded with silly crap like this.
What's too complicated about understanding that you do not have the right of distribution? You cannot upload files, period. Call it sharing, make it sound altruistic, whatever the hell you want to do, it's distribution plain and simple and it's the one right that allows the economics of intellectual property to work at all. Why should content creators have to give this right up in the digital age?
I recently purchased a Dell M2010 and noticed this "problem". It bugged me but I found no obvious way to shut it off, including the add/remove programs suggestion mentioned in the article. After reading this article I did a little more poking around and discovered that Dell is now utilizing a browser add-on called CBrowser Helper Object (or something close to that) to perform this functionality, which I promptly disabled. The point is this is not an obvious fix and Dell shouldn't be doing it anyway. PC manufacturers need to really stop loading the system up with crapware and silly little "branded experiences". I have utility programs on my Dell that basically mimic the basic functionality for some things already available in Windows. The biggest difference is Dell has their programmers "design" hideous interfaces that make absolutely no sense whatsoever and redirect the user to these utilities at every chance, just to get in yet another "branded experience". My experience thus far has been great computer, now how can I go about obtaining another clean copy of Windows Vista Ultimate to replace the shit Dell installed.
Intent is an important part of our legal system. I can't imagine an altruistic use of this site and its information. It's much like the list right-to-lifers put up with pictures of doctors who perform abortions, X's through those who have been killed, personal information on the rest. Sure, that information is publicly available but the intent was to intimidate those doctors from performing abortions or they might get a red X through their picture too. By posting names and personal information of "snitches" then you're intimidating them and others to not snitch. If you can name an altruistic use of this information and prove that it's the most likely use then I, and I'm sure many others, would be rather impressed.
You do not lose patents by not enforcing them , that's trademarkls. Really, how difficult is it to educate yourself a little bit about intellectual property, even just a little bit? Most of the stupid stories and subsequent comments would cease to exist if this would occur. Until then, please do us all a favor and stop posting on these stories until you've become more familiar with the issue. You can do your small part to make the dream of intelligent Slashmoneky posts a reality.
My point was re-making Disney's Robin Hood, for instance, using a badger instead of a fox does little to nothing to evolve art and culture. Retelling the story of Robin Hood in various ways, reinventing the character and applying modern circumstances to that tale does. I keep hearing how computers are a threat to big media because the lttle guy can now record an album in his basement or edit the next big film. The only threat computers are to big media is as illegitimate avenues of distribution for intellectual property they did not create or have the right to distribute. Creative professionals are going to use computers to improve what it is they do,but there is not going to be a huge explosion of creativity because of them. You were either creative before and computers allow you to express yourself in new and more efficient ways, or you were a hack and can only use your pirated copy of Photoshop to screw up someone elses work.
For the umteen-millionth time, copyright law DOES NOT FUCKING PROTECT IDEAS, IT ONLY PROTECTS THEEXPRESSION OF AN IDEA IN A FIXED, TANGIBLE MEDIUM!!! When will you Slashmonkeys learn this simple basic FACT about copyright law?!?!? You are more than willing to create a cartoon about a fucking mouse, just don't call him Mickey and give him red pants with yellow buttons. And no, the world is not a better place with fifty gazillion hacks trying to rework Disney cartoons, we are far richer as a culture when a smalll handful of talented people are rewarded fairly for creating the next Mickey Mouse.
Yeah, I loved having conversations on my Newton. Oh, wait, you couldn't do that could you? While SmartPhones are not 11 years old, Microsoft has been in teh cell phone industry with proven products for years now. What does Apple have to show? A promise and nothing more. Even when the iPhone is released to market it will have less functionality then SmartPhones that are a few years old.
...I guess she should find another business model like selling t-shirts or something since information wants to be free. Screw her if she thinks I'm going to pay for photographs that I could go take myself.
...I'm anxiously awaiting CableCards so I can dump the sh*tty Comcast guide and replace it with my Windows Media Center guide on the MCPC connected to my HDTV.
"And something more students need to be taught in school."
I hope you take that class because copyright protection is life of author plus 70 years. However, even if we went to the original 14 plus a 14 year exte3nsion that could be filed for, most of the stuff on P2P site will still grossly violate copyrights. I've said it before and I'll say it again, this arugment from most people is merely about getting shit for free. Want proof? Why is it that current movies, music and software is the most popular stuff on these networks? Because people want shit for free.
Windows NT has been out for well over 10 years now and has ALWAYS been a multi-user OS. Windows NT4 was the first really user-friendly version of NT and was the version I started using and never looked back. Developers NEVER coded apps with this in mind, they were too busy hacking together apps to run on Windows 95 and if they worked on NT great. I'm not talking about little utilities or games here either. Photoshop, Office, 3DS Studio MAX, you name it, none of them took into account the security features of NT or the fact that one can run NT in a non-Administrator mode. UAC is not the best answer from a security standpoitn but it is a way for Microsoft to prod developers to think about users when they develop apps for Vista. Windows 95 and its progeny are long since dead (some users just haven't figured that out yet - you know who you are *Windows 98 users - cough*) and the NT based OSes are the future of Windows. Developers now need to work with what they have and stop being lazy.
"people will still make movies. people will still make music."
I can't wait to see all the product placement blockbusters. And all those ad-laden songs are going to be really cool to dance to. </sarcasm>
Just because distribution is easier on the internet does not give anyone with access to a computer the right to distribute content they do not hold the copyrights to. Many new services of downloadable content are springing up and work just fine and they support the production studios. Use them if you want to download movies/music or don't consume copyrighted entertainment. It is really they simple.
"No driver for the printer, some software he uses won't work, had trouble with the camera etc..."
And this is Microsoft's fault how? Linux must be a complete and utter disaster for most then based on this criteria. Developers knew well ahead of time that the driver model was going to change (for the better) and that software would need to be rewritten (at the very least to stop requiring the Admin accont - again, for the better) to take advantage of new features and changes of architecture in Vista. Since Microsoft isn't writing the drivers or developing the software (and when they do slashbots invariably ask why they needed to duplicate someone else's application or that they're violating anti-trust laws or other such crap) they can only notify developers and answer questions when they arise. To my knowledge they have done so thus far so I ask again, how is this Microsoft's fault?
Open Source is now the foundation of many businesses and thus should have to play by the same rules as everyone else. If they can't afford to license the patent, too fricking bad, they should sell more t-shirts or find another business model to be able to afford to pay the required licensing fees.
...Apple should be spending more time on fixing the way fonts work in OSX. You want to know the real reason why no one bothers to write viruses for OSX? Because Apple has already built-in systemwide destruction capabilities through their crappy implementation of fonts and font caches. I have seen so many problems with just two OSX systems (and out IT guy has stories of many, many, many more) caused solely by font cahes and corrupted fonts; hard drives being toasted, the system itself becoming so corrupt that nothing short of a complete reinstall will fix it, and numerous app crashes. All of this traced back to something you'd think Apple would want to get right in the first place since their biggest proponents are those of us in the graphic design industry. And before anyone asks or makes a smart ass comment, these aren't fly-by-night fonts that are causing the problems, they are high-qiuality fonts created by respected font foundries.
You "conveniently" left off one of the most vocal opposing arguments for the outrage, Al Sharpton. Or more specifically his hypocrisy for [making] an unprovoked derogatory slur on national media against a -specific- group of men, simply because they were white and rich. Where's Al Sharpton's apology? What can be done to punish him for his moral crimes? That's what Imus comments were, moral crimes. For that he was to serve a two-week suspension, a fair penalty given the circumstances. That wasn't enough for Sharpton and his racist thugs. I have used the "N" word in anger at a fellow student once in my life and have regretted it to this day. I wish I could go back and undo what I did, or at the very least find this person and apologize, even if he's forgotten or gotten over it. For Sharpton I'd use the word without remorse because he is just that, a f*****g n****r who needs to be taken behind the woodshed. His whole career is based on creating racial tension, in many cases by being racist himself. How much farther would we be in moving beyond race if more people like Martin Luther King stepped forward and took the reins from asshats like Sharpton and Farakan, and to a certain extent Jesse Jackson?
"but this seems like a move for Microsoft to compete with AppleTV"
Apple's the "me too" in this equation. They created AppleTV to compete with the offerings from Microsoft and those they partner with through their Media Center. This is also one area that Microsoft simply trounces Apple in terms of usability and a better interface. The only thing killing MCPC systems is the cable companies being stubborn assholes. Once the OpenCable cards are made available I'm going to get one and dump my Comcast cable box. I'll finally be able to record full HDTV on a top notch media center system. Yeah, I know about HD Tivo's, blah, blah, blah. I canceled my Tivo subscription when I got my MCPC and have been very happy about that decision (until I got an HDTV that is but that problem will be remedied soon).
Slashdot Mirror
copyright protects the actual code, the expression of the idea in a tangible medium as it were. Patents protect the idea itself (as long as it's a unique and patentable idea). The sooner you slashmonkeys understand the simple, 101 level basics of intellectual property, the quicker we can get over these stupid blogs and forum comments ranting and raving about things they don't understand well enough to formulate a well reasoned opinion, much less formal argument.
"I like that point but I'm pretty sure Zune doesn't have 10% of the MP3 player market by a long shot."
And you know this because of what...your spidey sense? How is this comment insightful? It makes broad assumptions with one sentence and poses not onesingle fact, clue, link or other supporting evidence of any kind whatsoever. Slashdot either needs to do away with their moderation system and replace it with one similar to Digg where everyone gets to voice their uninformed opinion or add a few more categories so moderators can be at least somewhat honest (i.e. "+1 I'm an idiot but your comment conincides with my irrational belief system...good job.", stuff like that).
I'm not going to bother with most of your comment because you are simply an idiot. However, I'll address one issue you brought up about Article 8 (what you so casually call "the quote"). Our Constitution does not actually say what we can or cannot do, it's left up to case law to interpret the Constitution and apply the guidance it provides. While Article 8 says nothing about allowing transference of rights to a third party, years of case law does. Article 10, by the away, does not change this at all. Congress si still allowed, through Article 8, to grant temporary monopolies for the purposes of promoting Science and useful arts.
By the way, you misspelled "owned", and no I did not get owned or pwned.
I'm not looking at copyright backwards, I'm simply stating facts. When you "share" intellectual property you are not expressing an idea, you are passing on an idea someone else already expressed. While the Bill of Rights does not enumerate "the right to make money off creative work" there are two things to consider, 1) the Bill of Rights does not enumerate rights one has, it simply lists some examples of the ones our founding fathers felt were more important than all others, and 2) the U.S. Constitution does mention "The Congress shall have Power . . .
To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Author and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries;". This was a part of the original Articles, before any Bill of Rights existed. As far as I know, copyright is not indefinite, therefore it is still temporary, albeit longer than the original terms. However, even with the original terms still in place, most intellectual property traded on P2P networks is still infringing. Any more cliches and bad information you'd like me to dispel?
There are a few problems with this. First of all, the M2010 is a rather unique computer. It's a great portable workstation (sold as a laptop but at 18.5 lbs, I don't think so) and has been invaluable at work on a recent project where I just so happened to have After Effects and Audition on it and only Flash MX on my G5 at work. The project would have been an absolute nightmare had I only been able to work in Flash.
Second problem is the number of system builders who do this. Hunting down white box system builders in my area who I can trust is bad enough. Try finding people who build laptops. You can't which means you have to go to the Dells and Gateway's of the world.
Sure, Dell is more than welcome to put whatever crap they want on their systems but that in no way means I have to like it and be content with a system loaded with silly crap like this.
What's too complicated about understanding that you do not have the right of distribution? You cannot upload files, period. Call it sharing, make it sound altruistic, whatever the hell you want to do, it's distribution plain and simple and it's the one right that allows the economics of intellectual property to work at all. Why should content creators have to give this right up in the digital age?
I recently purchased a Dell M2010 and noticed this "problem". It bugged me but I found no obvious way to shut it off, including the add/remove programs suggestion mentioned in the article. After reading this article I did a little more poking around and discovered that Dell is now utilizing a browser add-on called CBrowser Helper Object (or something close to that) to perform this functionality, which I promptly disabled. The point is this is not an obvious fix and Dell shouldn't be doing it anyway. PC manufacturers need to really stop loading the system up with crapware and silly little "branded experiences". I have utility programs on my Dell that basically mimic the basic functionality for some things already available in Windows. The biggest difference is Dell has their programmers "design" hideous interfaces that make absolutely no sense whatsoever and redirect the user to these utilities at every chance, just to get in yet another "branded experience". My experience thus far has been great computer, now how can I go about obtaining another clean copy of Windows Vista Ultimate to replace the shit Dell installed.
Intent is an important part of our legal system. I can't imagine an altruistic use of this site and its information. It's much like the list right-to-lifers put up with pictures of doctors who perform abortions, X's through those who have been killed, personal information on the rest. Sure, that information is publicly available but the intent was to intimidate those doctors from performing abortions or they might get a red X through their picture too. By posting names and personal information of "snitches" then you're intimidating them and others to not snitch. If you can name an altruistic use of this information and prove that it's the most likely use then I, and I'm sure many others, would be rather impressed.
Hundreds, perhaps thousands, of dead bodies in shallow graves, at the bottom of rivers, and sealed in concrete say different.
You do not lose patents by not enforcing them , that's trademarkls. Really, how difficult is it to educate yourself a little bit about intellectual property, even just a little bit? Most of the stupid stories and subsequent comments would cease to exist if this would occur. Until then, please do us all a favor and stop posting on these stories until you've become more familiar with the issue. You can do your small part to make the dream of intelligent Slashmoneky posts a reality.
My point was re-making Disney's Robin Hood, for instance, using a badger instead of a fox does little to nothing to evolve art and culture. Retelling the story of Robin Hood in various ways, reinventing the character and applying modern circumstances to that tale does. I keep hearing how computers are a threat to big media because the lttle guy can now record an album in his basement or edit the next big film. The only threat computers are to big media is as illegitimate avenues of distribution for intellectual property they did not create or have the right to distribute. Creative professionals are going to use computers to improve what it is they do,but there is not going to be a huge explosion of creativity because of them. You were either creative before and computers allow you to express yourself in new and more efficient ways, or you were a hack and can only use your pirated copy of Photoshop to screw up someone elses work.
"an artificial monopoly on an idea..."
For the umteen-millionth time, copyright law DOES NOT FUCKING PROTECT IDEAS, IT ONLY PROTECTS THEEXPRESSION OF AN IDEA IN A FIXED, TANGIBLE MEDIUM!!! When will you Slashmonkeys learn this simple basic FACT about copyright law?!?!? You are more than willing to create a cartoon about a fucking mouse, just don't call him Mickey and give him red pants with yellow buttons. And no, the world is not a better place with fifty gazillion hacks trying to rework Disney cartoons, we are far richer as a culture when a smalll handful of talented people are rewarded fairly for creating the next Mickey Mouse.
Yeah, I loved having conversations on my Newton. Oh, wait, you couldn't do that could you? While SmartPhones are not 11 years old, Microsoft has been in teh cell phone industry with proven products for years now. What does Apple have to show? A promise and nothing more. Even when the iPhone is released to market it will have less functionality then SmartPhones that are a few years old.
Amen. How the hell did the OP get modded insightful? Oh, yeah, over-zealous Apple fanbois who probably think Apple invented the computer.
...I guess she should find another business model like selling t-shirts or something since information wants to be free. Screw her if she thinks I'm going to pay for photographs that I could go take myself.
No, you are not. Stop being a stupid pedantic fuckwit or go kill yourself and spare the rest of society.
...I'm anxiously awaiting CableCards so I can dump the sh*tty Comcast guide and replace it with my Windows Media Center guide on the MCPC connected to my HDTV.
"And something more students need to be taught in school."
I hope you take that class because copyright protection is life of author plus 70 years. However, even if we went to the original 14 plus a 14 year exte3nsion that could be filed for, most of the stuff on P2P site will still grossly violate copyrights. I've said it before and I'll say it again, this arugment from most people is merely about getting shit for free. Want proof? Why is it that current movies, music and software is the most popular stuff on these networks? Because people want shit for free.
Windows NT has been out for well over 10 years now and has ALWAYS been a multi-user OS. Windows NT4 was the first really user-friendly version of NT and was the version I started using and never looked back. Developers NEVER coded apps with this in mind, they were too busy hacking together apps to run on Windows 95 and if they worked on NT great. I'm not talking about little utilities or games here either. Photoshop, Office, 3DS Studio MAX, you name it, none of them took into account the security features of NT or the fact that one can run NT in a non-Administrator mode. UAC is not the best answer from a security standpoitn but it is a way for Microsoft to prod developers to think about users when they develop apps for Vista. Windows 95 and its progeny are long since dead (some users just haven't figured that out yet - you know who you are *Windows 98 users - cough*) and the NT based OSes are the future of Windows. Developers now need to work with what they have and stop being lazy.
"people will still make movies. people will still make music."
I can't wait to see all the product placement blockbusters. And all those ad-laden songs are going to be really cool to dance to. </sarcasm>
Just because distribution is easier on the internet does not give anyone with access to a computer the right to distribute content they do not hold the copyrights to. Many new services of downloadable content are springing up and work just fine and they support the production studios. Use them if you want to download movies/music or don't consume copyrighted entertainment. It is really they simple.
"No driver for the printer, some software he uses won't work, had trouble with the camera etc..."
And this is Microsoft's fault how? Linux must be a complete and utter disaster for most then based on this criteria. Developers knew well ahead of time that the driver model was going to change (for the better) and that software would need to be rewritten (at the very least to stop requiring the Admin accont - again, for the better) to take advantage of new features and changes of architecture in Vista. Since Microsoft isn't writing the drivers or developing the software (and when they do slashbots invariably ask why they needed to duplicate someone else's application or that they're violating anti-trust laws or other such crap) they can only notify developers and answer questions when they arise. To my knowledge they have done so thus far so I ask again, how is this Microsoft's fault?
"...(but exempt open source)..."
Open Source is now the foundation of many businesses and thus should have to play by the same rules as everyone else. If they can't afford to license the patent, too fricking bad, they should sell more t-shirts or find another business model to be able to afford to pay the required licensing fees.
...Apple should be spending more time on fixing the way fonts work in OSX. You want to know the real reason why no one bothers to write viruses for OSX? Because Apple has already built-in systemwide destruction capabilities through their crappy implementation of fonts and font caches. I have seen so many problems with just two OSX systems (and out IT guy has stories of many, many, many more) caused solely by font cahes and corrupted fonts; hard drives being toasted, the system itself becoming so corrupt that nothing short of a complete reinstall will fix it, and numerous app crashes. All of this traced back to something you'd think Apple would want to get right in the first place since their biggest proponents are those of us in the graphic design industry. And before anyone asks or makes a smart ass comment, these aren't fly-by-night fonts that are causing the problems, they are high-qiuality fonts created by respected font foundries.
You "conveniently" left off one of the most vocal opposing arguments for the outrage, Al Sharpton. Or more specifically his hypocrisy for [making] an unprovoked derogatory slur on national media against a -specific- group of men, simply because they were white and rich. Where's Al Sharpton's apology? What can be done to punish him for his moral crimes? That's what Imus comments were, moral crimes. For that he was to serve a two-week suspension, a fair penalty given the circumstances. That wasn't enough for Sharpton and his racist thugs. I have used the "N" word in anger at a fellow student once in my life and have regretted it to this day. I wish I could go back and undo what I did, or at the very least find this person and apologize, even if he's forgotten or gotten over it. For Sharpton I'd use the word without remorse because he is just that, a f*****g n****r who needs to be taken behind the woodshed. His whole career is based on creating racial tension, in many cases by being racist himself. How much farther would we be in moving beyond race if more people like Martin Luther King stepped forward and took the reins from asshats like Sharpton and Farakan, and to a certain extent Jesse Jackson?
"but this seems like a move for Microsoft to compete with AppleTV"
Apple's the "me too" in this equation. They created AppleTV to compete with the offerings from Microsoft and those they partner with through their Media Center. This is also one area that Microsoft simply trounces Apple in terms of usability and a better interface. The only thing killing MCPC systems is the cable companies being stubborn assholes. Once the OpenCable cards are made available I'm going to get one and dump my Comcast cable box. I'll finally be able to record full HDTV on a top notch media center system. Yeah, I know about HD Tivo's, blah, blah, blah. I canceled my Tivo subscription when I got my MCPC and have been very happy about that decision (until I got an HDTV that is but that problem will be remedied soon).