Did i fall asleep and miss a court case? AOL, a monopoly? I dont' think so... Monopoly's a strong word to use, when you're actually looking for "dominant", i think.
Yes, they own a lot of media, but they have no power in stopping you or i from starting our own competing website or magazine, etc...
I'm sure they didn't hire you to sit there and see how ineffiecient things were... Unless you're a complete mercenary, you could have, for instance, showed them what you developed and who knows? maybe they'ed have decided to make you a full-timer rather than a contracter for showing such initiative.
And, you know, this isn't the best of times to be that mercenary. Not the worst of times either, but definetly not the best
Hold on... you cand do whatever yo uplease on you own computer. You can put whatever you'd like on it as well. For the 10 millionth time, they're just saying "don't let people copy files from you if you arent allowed to distribute the songs", and , unless you've a contract with a band, odds are you don't.
WHy does this keep turning into a civil liberties issue?
A problem with your OS is, if they can't find it, neither can you or the rest of the world which you'd like to share it with... And once there's a means available for "authorized" users to share files with you, there's the means for "unauthorized"/unwanted people checking what files are being shared as well...
Try your own MP3's, ripped from your own CD's? Or perhaps one of the many tunes available on mp3.com and the like? Or songs downloaded from a bands official site?
Just because they sell an mp3 player doesn't mean they're implicitly okaying the concept of "free" music.
It seems like you fooled them, in a sense, by asking only people that didn't understand the nature of the licence if you could apply that license to the software you developed. Seems wrong in my eyes.
The work is copywritten in your name, but have you gone so far as to read the contract, because generally, software developed for 3rd parties, done on their pay and in their space, is owned by them, not you the developer.
Regardlessof the outcome, my feeling is that it was rather low of you to only ask people that didn't know the implications if you could indeed GPL your software... It's a rather big decision that should have been explained thoroughly to people who would understand the ultimate implications and coudl therefore make a more informed choice.
If you've paid for ADSL for the month, and they've cut you off, they're breaching contract.
not a chance, really... Try reading the TERMS OF SERVICE for just about any consumer account available. Cable supposedly bars servers, but they seem to look the other way. DSL accounts see mto be more lenient in the server aspect, but most of the TOS's i've read...
For instance, from AT&T/Mediaone Acceptable Ussage Policy:
Any.mp3 files that you wish to distribute must not be copyrighted material. Most.mp3 files found on the internet today are illegal copies of copyrighted music. Distribution of these files violates copyright infringement law and can not be distributed over the AT&T Road Runner service.
Separately, in their terms and conditions:
10.3 You agree to abide by the policies of the Road Runner Service as they are electronically posted and added to or modified from time to time. You agree not to use the Road Runner Service, including but not limited to the equipment and software provided by AT&T: ...
(c) for unauthorized access or distribution of any software, data, or material protected by copyright, patent or trade secret material; ...
10.5 For violation of these policies, AT&T reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to:
(a) remove any offending materials,
(b) hold the End-User liable for any damages resulting from such violations,
(c) terminate this Agreement and Your continued purchase of the Road Runner Service. ...
10.6 It is AT&T's policy to terminate Road Runner Service to account holders for repeated copyright infringements.
So really, read the terms of service as they apply to you before you pick up that phone. And don't imply anything about court stuff, if you ask me, because at that point they can call in they lawyers, and if you lose your case, guess who's paying for said lawyers?
Sorry but i fail to understand how this is an "insightful" comment...
The model of napster has proven to be profitable. The record comapnies want that profit. So what are they going to do? Chase after
There is no proof whatsoever that Napster is a profitable business idea. All they've done is burn through VC money thus far. The real challenge will be to see how many users stick around once fees are instituted, and how many will jump ship. But again, they haven't earned one penny from a single user, so there's no way you can call them "proven to be profitable"...
The only thing this far that can be proven about them is that they have, or that they pose a strong likelihood, of decreasing the profitablility of labels and musicians. Big difference, i think...
Drug companies using their patents to extort high prices for AIDS treatment from third world countries is a good example of an extremely bad situation related to patents.
Naah... Actually the drug companies (from how i understand it) charge much more reasonable prices to 3rd world countries, and even all the European countries... They manage to hose us because a great many of us don't know what we're paying past the $10 co-pay may of us get. So they just bill the insuarance companies the rest, and who are the insurance companies to complain, because then they get to point to the high cost of drugs as a reason their rates are so high...
Forget MSLinux already. Never gonna happen. IF it were, why would they be spending all their time and resources on Windows XP, when all they really would need to do is make a new skin for KDE or GNOME?
No, they dumped the shares in Corel because they didn't want to have to answer any more questions to the Justice Department about Corel's activities since they invested in them (dumping Linux, etc). This way, if Corel goes bottom up a year from now they can step back and say "Hey, we bought into them, things weren't working out, we sold out, and look what happened, we were right", rather than having to explain "yes, we bought this company and purposefully drove it into the ground".
Well, the BSD was out and available well before Linux came about, so why not ask Linus why he wasted his own and thousands of other peoples times developing a second Unix with freely available source code?
And gee, we already have windows on the desktop, why even bothering trying to create another desktop OS? After all, that'd just split the developer community as well?
Free software isn't about competing with proprietary software (in my eyes). It's about people volunteering to work on projects which trully interest them. Whether or not those projects compete with proprietary software is another story...
Naah... wishful thinking. Even if there was GPLed code in Windows (and why would there be? Afterall they can pick up whatever they want from the BSDs and not face any of the potential implications), they'ed surely rewrite whatever was being used rather than open windows up. Just add a critical update to windowsupdate.microsoft.com, and within a few months a lot of instances of the code would be erradicated...
Actually, we don't seem to put spies to death anymore... They all seem to get life sentences. I guess that means they could apply for a pardon, once they're sufficiently forgotten about...
Spyings spying. That's all. It's going to happen, but no country is actually going to say "hey, come on in, take every secret we know".
It's accepted that there is spying going on, and that there will be spying in the future. But when a spy gets caught, there are consequences to be faced, if only to set an example, like "hey! We didn't like you doing that..."
Well, considering apple's core users are much more prone to run Photoshop than they are to say, compile programs, develop databases, or even deal much with spreadsheets, it's nice that they picked a processor that excels at what they need it to do...
And, for reference, where are these benchmarks of 500 MHz G4's vs. 500 MHz Athlons which show the G4 to be lacking, anyhow? I've never seen it and am therefor quite curious...
or just stop running windows 2000... AN editor in my current company runs quark on her PC, and i just walk to her desk, stand there amazed like "They actualyl make you run this program on this platform?"
Everything Microsft does is against anyone ever possibly being createive. From all the big things to the little things like giving their mice shadows. It looks nice in reviews, but in the real world, why oh whY?
No... i'm actually one of those artists... When ever i have some serious batch processing to do (read: Actions), i always set it up on my dual processor NT machine to burn through. But if i actyauly have to sit at the computer, i'd rather Power Mac 8100 (80 MHz PPC 601) running Mac OS 7.6 to a 1 GHz Athlon running Win2000. The mac interface is just that much better for one. The color management is superb. Inter application communication works much better.
Yes, the mac may win a couple benchmarks. But thats just for marketing, as the graphic design industry will never leave the Mac platform... It's just a jab at intel hoping to get the fence sitters on apples side.
Apple spends plenty of money on R&D.. They just don't want other companies using their research in order to come to market with products that compete with theirs. That isn't asking much.
So far as your cars comment goes... Has it ever occured to you that maybe theres enough room in the universe for more than just x86 PC's? Does apple NEED to get 10% market share to survive? No. They can live quite comfortably as a $10 or $12 billion dollar company that does $3 billion in sales per year.That's not a bad position to be in, yet somehow you imply that they're dying?!?
And lastly... Again, and undrinformed comment. MHz is for people who know or care nothing about processors. They're not equal. Yes, Apples been stuck at a bit of a plateau for a while, but again, comparing the G4 to the fastest Athlon you can buy, you'd be sorrowfully disappointed about how many transistors are wasted for such a little performance gain...
But then, i'm one of those people that figures that 500 MHz is good enough for most people to last quite a long time.... Until someone actually creates a piece of software that actually needs more than that. And no... Voice Recognition will not be te next big thing....
Yes... emachines even went so far as running ads for the eOne in MacWarehouse catalogs, proudly stateing it contained a 366 or 433 MHz processor, but never once mentioning it was an x86 processor or that it ran windows....
The thing looked nearly identical to the iMac, it was almost absurd. The G4 powerbook looks completely unique, in it's own class, IMHO. Yes, it may be inspired by the viao's, but it's not like they stole Sony's molds and reproduced something in the same casing. they took an idea and put their own spin on it. eMachines didn't do that. Nor are any of the skinmkers. They're mearly taking apples idea's and repackaging them as their own without actually adding anything to them
NO. there are many ways to present a spreadsheet to a user. It's not like a spreadsheet is A copywritten or a trademarked item. Just aS GUIs are. There are plenty of variations on the theme of a Graphical user interface. But only on actually appears to the user as Aqua does... and no one else implented anything siimilar to it until after Apple demo'ed it... Isn't that rather clear cut. Just as Apples case vs. eMachines? No one thought to introdcue an all in one PC housed in translucent plastics until apple intro'd the imac, and then all of a sudden, emachines comes up with the "same idea" even utilizing the same color scheme no less....
Ummm... he actually brought Apple's stock to it's all time high. The pummeling you've seen as of recent is just an exagerated version of the tech fallout on NASDAQ.
Yes, Bill Gates appears to be evil at times. Yes, Steve Jobs could appear in the same light.But i bet if you acquired the power and influence they possess, you'd be just as hated by slashdot's AC's...
It would seem to me that the linux ranks are filled with far many zealots. And so many of them are 10 times more vocal than the equivalent *BSD & MacOS "zealots" that they complain so bitterly about.
Ermmm... I've told Roadrunner's tech support staff that i run Linux. No problems with that whatsoever, they just won't provide tech support.
I ended up needing to install Win98 on my machine just so that they could actually be sure that everything was setup fine on my end, and that the issue indeed was that they hadn't updated the entry for my MAC address in their systems. But in the end,they couldn't care less what you run, according to my experience.
Same for my linksys router. They don't care. They'll only charge you more for additional computers if your extra computers are using their IP addresses.
The only time that you're required to run Windows or Mac is if you need their help setting your machine up.
Slashdot Mirror
Did i fall asleep and miss a court case? AOL, a monopoly? I dont' think so... Monopoly's a strong word to use, when you're actually looking for "dominant", i think.
Yes, they own a lot of media, but they have no power in stopping you or i from starting our own competing website or magazine, etc...
I'm sure they didn't hire you to sit there and see how ineffiecient things were... Unless you're a complete mercenary, you could have, for instance, showed them what you developed and who knows? maybe they'ed have decided to make you a full-timer rather than a contracter for showing such initiative.
And, you know, this isn't the best of times to be that mercenary. Not the worst of times either, but definetly not the best
Hold on... you cand do whatever yo uplease on you own computer. You can put whatever you'd like on it as well. For the 10 millionth time, they're just saying "don't let people copy files from you if you arent allowed to distribute the songs", and , unless you've a contract with a band, odds are you don't.
WHy does this keep turning into a civil liberties issue?
A problem with your OS is, if they can't find it, neither can you or the rest of the world which you'd like to share it with... And once there's a means available for "authorized" users to share files with you, there's the means for "unauthorized"/unwanted people checking what files are being shared as well...
Try your own MP3's, ripped from your own CD's? Or perhaps one of the many tunes available on mp3.com and the like? Or songs downloaded from a bands official site?
Just because they sell an mp3 player doesn't mean they're implicitly okaying the concept of "free" music.
It seems like you fooled them, in a sense, by asking only people that didn't understand the nature of the licence if you could apply that license to the software you developed. Seems wrong in my eyes.
The work is copywritten in your name, but have you gone so far as to read the contract, because generally, software developed for 3rd parties, done on their pay and in their space, is owned by them, not you the developer.
Regardlessof the outcome, my feeling is that it was rather low of you to only ask people that didn't know the implications if you could indeed GPL your software... It's a rather big decision that should have been explained thoroughly to people who would understand the ultimate implications and coudl therefore make a more informed choice.
If you've paid for ADSL for the month, and they've cut you off, they're breaching contract.
...
.mp3 files that you wish to distribute must not be copyrighted material. Most .mp3 files found on the internet today are illegal copies of copyrighted music. Distribution of these files violates copyright infringement law and can not be distributed over the AT&T Road Runner service.
not a chance, really... Try reading the TERMS OF SERVICE for just about any consumer account available. Cable supposedly bars servers, but they seem to look the other way. DSL accounts see mto be more lenient in the server aspect, but most of the TOS's i've read
For instance, from AT&T/Mediaone Acceptable Ussage Policy:
Any
Separately, in their terms and conditions:
10.3 You agree to abide by the policies of the Road Runner Service as they are electronically posted and added to or modified from time to time. You agree not to use the Road Runner Service, including but not limited to the equipment and software provided by AT&T:
...
(c) for unauthorized access or distribution of any software, data, or material protected by copyright, patent or trade secret material;
...
10.5 For violation of these policies, AT&T reserves the right, in its sole discretion, to:
(a) remove any offending materials,
(b) hold the End-User liable for any damages resulting from such violations,
(c) terminate this Agreement and Your continued purchase of the Road Runner Service.
...
10.6 It is AT&T's policy to terminate Road Runner Service to account holders for repeated copyright infringements.
So really, read the terms of service as they apply to you before you pick up that phone. And don't imply anything about court stuff, if you ask me, because at that point they can call in they lawyers, and if you lose your case, guess who's paying for said lawyers?
Sorry but i fail to understand how this is an "insightful" comment...
The model of napster has proven to be profitable. The record comapnies want that profit. So what are they going to do? Chase after
There is no proof whatsoever that Napster is a profitable business idea. All they've done is burn through VC money thus far. The real challenge will be to see how many users stick around once fees are instituted, and how many will jump ship. But again, they haven't earned one penny from a single user, so there's no way you can call them "proven to be profitable"...
The only thing this far that can be proven about them is that they have, or that they pose a strong likelihood, of decreasing the profitablility of labels and musicians. Big difference, i think...
Drug companies using their patents to extort high prices for AIDS treatment from third world countries is a good example of an extremely bad situation related to patents.
Naah... Actually the drug companies (from how i understand it) charge much more reasonable prices to 3rd world countries, and even all the European countries... They manage to hose us because a great many of us don't know what we're paying past the $10 co-pay may of us get. So they just bill the insuarance companies the rest, and who are the insurance companies to complain, because then they get to point to the high cost of drugs as a reason their rates are so high...
Forget MSLinux already. Never gonna happen. IF it were, why would they be spending all their time and resources on Windows XP, when all they really would need to do is make a new skin for KDE or GNOME?
No, they dumped the shares in Corel because they didn't want to have to answer any more questions to the Justice Department about Corel's activities since they invested in them (dumping Linux, etc). This way, if Corel goes bottom up a year from now they can step back and say "Hey, we bought into them, things weren't working out, we sold out, and look what happened, we were right", rather than having to explain "yes, we bought this company and purposefully drove it into the ground".
Well, the BSD was out and available well before Linux came about, so why not ask Linus why he wasted his own and thousands of other peoples times developing a second Unix with freely available source code?
And gee, we already have windows on the desktop, why even bothering trying to create another desktop OS? After all, that'd just split the developer community as well?
Free software isn't about competing with proprietary software (in my eyes). It's about people volunteering to work on projects which trully interest them. Whether or not those projects compete with proprietary software is another story...
Naah... wishful thinking. Even if there was GPLed code in Windows (and why would there be? Afterall they can pick up whatever they want from the BSDs and not face any of the potential implications), they'ed surely rewrite whatever was being used rather than open windows up. Just add a critical update to windowsupdate.microsoft.com, and within a few months a lot of instances of the code would be erradicated...
Actually, we don't seem to put spies to death anymore... They all seem to get life sentences. I guess that means they could apply for a pardon, once they're sufficiently forgotten about...
Spyings spying. That's all. It's going to happen, but no country is actually going to say "hey, come on in, take every secret we know".
It's accepted that there is spying going on, and that there will be spying in the future. But when a spy gets caught, there are consequences to be faced, if only to set an example, like "hey! We didn't like you doing that..."
if all music were distributed this way, services like Napster wouldn't exist.
All music isn't distributed that way, and Napsters pretty close to not existing anyhow...
Well, considering apple's core users are much more prone to run Photoshop than they are to say, compile programs, develop databases, or even deal much with spreadsheets, it's nice that they picked a processor that excels at what they need it to do...
And, for reference, where are these benchmarks of 500 MHz G4's vs. 500 MHz Athlons which show the G4 to be lacking, anyhow? I've never seen it and am therefor quite curious...
Fixed. :P
or just stop running windows 2000... AN editor in my current company runs quark on her PC, and i just walk to her desk, stand there amazed like "They actualyl make you run this program on this platform?"
Everything Microsft does is against anyone ever possibly being createive. From all the big things to the little things like giving their mice shadows. It looks nice in reviews, but in the real world, why oh whY?
No... i'm actually one of those artists... When ever i have some serious batch processing to do (read: Actions), i always set it up on my dual processor NT machine to burn through. But if i actyauly have to sit at the computer, i'd rather Power Mac 8100 (80 MHz PPC 601) running Mac OS 7.6 to a 1 GHz Athlon running Win2000. The mac interface is just that much better for one. The color management is superb. Inter application communication works much better.
Yes, the mac may win a couple benchmarks. But thats just for marketing, as the graphic design industry will never leave the Mac platform... It's just a jab at intel hoping to get the fence sitters on apples side.
Apple spends plenty of money on R&D.. They just don't want other companies using their research in order to come to market with products that compete with theirs. That isn't asking much.
So far as your cars comment goes... Has it ever occured to you that maybe theres enough room in the universe for more than just x86 PC's? Does apple NEED to get 10% market share to survive? No. They can live quite comfortably as a $10 or $12 billion dollar company that does $3 billion in sales per year.That's not a bad position to be in, yet somehow you imply that they're dying?!?
And lastly... Again, and undrinformed comment. MHz is for people who know or care nothing about processors. They're not equal. Yes, Apples been stuck at a bit of a plateau for a while, but again, comparing the G4 to the fastest Athlon you can buy, you'd be sorrowfully disappointed about how many transistors are wasted for such a little performance gain...
But then, i'm one of those people that figures that 500 MHz is good enough for most people to last quite a long time.... Until someone actually creates a piece of software that actually needs more than that. And no... Voice Recognition will not be te next big thing....
Yes... emachines even went so far as running ads for the eOne in MacWarehouse catalogs, proudly stateing it contained a 366 or 433 MHz processor, but never once mentioning it was an x86 processor or that it ran windows....
The thing looked nearly identical to the iMac, it was almost absurd. The G4 powerbook looks completely unique, in it's own class, IMHO. Yes, it may be inspired by the viao's, but it's not like they stole Sony's molds and reproduced something in the same casing. they took an idea and put their own spin on it. eMachines didn't do that. Nor are any of the skinmkers. They're mearly taking apples idea's and repackaging them as their own without actually adding anything to them
NO. there are many ways to present a spreadsheet to a user. It's not like a spreadsheet is A copywritten or a trademarked item. Just aS GUIs are. There are plenty of variations on the theme of a Graphical user interface. But only on actually appears to the user as Aqua does... and no one else implented anything siimilar to it until after Apple demo'ed it... Isn't that rather clear cut. Just as Apples case vs. eMachines? No one thought to introdcue an all in one PC housed in translucent plastics until apple intro'd the imac, and then all of a sudden, emachines comes up with the "same idea" even utilizing the same color scheme no less....
Ummm... he actually brought Apple's stock to it's all time high. The pummeling you've seen as of recent is just an exagerated version of the tech fallout on NASDAQ.
Yes, Bill Gates appears to be evil at times. Yes, Steve Jobs could appear in the same light.But i bet if you acquired the power and influence they possess, you'd be just as hated by slashdot's AC's...
I'd bet that Apple pay's intel a few bucks per computer it sells for such niceties as PCI, AGP and USB, actually.
It would seem to me that the linux ranks are filled with far many zealots. And so many of them are 10 times more vocal than the equivalent *BSD & MacOS "zealots" that they complain so bitterly about.
--Um... Lucas
(posting logged in. fuck karma.)
Ermmm... I've told Roadrunner's tech support staff that i run Linux. No problems with that whatsoever, they just won't provide tech support.
I ended up needing to install Win98 on my machine just so that they could actually be sure that everything was setup fine on my end, and that the issue indeed was that they hadn't updated the entry for my MAC address in their systems. But in the end,they couldn't care less what you run, according to my experience.
Same for my linksys router. They don't care. They'll only charge you more for additional computers if your extra computers are using their IP addresses.
The only time that you're required to run Windows or Mac is if you need their help setting your machine up.
My experience, at least.