> If you look at any organization with a microscope you will see plenty of random Brownian motion going on. But there is still a whole, and this whole moves in a certain direction.
Exactly. It's silly to single out MS for special criticism in this regard. We don't need any controlling evil mastermind to produce the appearance of a conspiracy. All we need is a set of implicit and unstated tendancies where most people do what they think ought to be done, and the mass moves inexhorably in a particular direction, irrespective of a few free thinkers trying to throw a spanner in the works.
The media prints what they believe people want to see. The strongest motivation for reading newspapers is not to obtain information, it's to seek reassurance that you know whats going on and you are intelligent and informed. People don't read newspapers - they get into them like a warm bath. Opinions that you disagree with arouse discomfort and distrust. Almost everybody reads the journals and papers whose opinions they agree with, ie they read papers that tell them what they already "know". Which means papers print what they think people already believe. There's a massive positive feedback loop. You end up with ridiculously slanted propoganda, and increasingly paranoid "weirdos" handing out pamphlets unable to understand why nobody is interested in the truth.
On the other hand, in places where there is a an attempt to control the media, (eg Soviet Union), people are naturally far less trusting of media, and far more interested in hearing the truth. I'm quite sure the average Russian during the soviet years had a far more informed and balanced picture of America than the average American had about Russia (or America for that matter).
The western propoganda machine was(is) based on self-interest, flattery and greed. Soviet propoganda was based on fear. We won the propoganda war for the same reason that we won the economic war - distributed processing is more efficient than central control.
Panic driven nonsense. ILOVEYOU is a pretty flimsy excuse to increase police powers, even by the contorted logic processes of the average politician.
What exactly is the definition of a virus anyway ? It is generally taken to be a self replicating piece of code. However, viruses often rely on a little help from naive humans. For instance ILOVEYOU required you to disable security settings on Outlook, then double click on an attatchment with a.vbs suffix. The clever part of the virus was the psychological hacking that exploited a typical human's immense curiosity to see who was sending them a message saying ILOVEYOU. If we include self replicating organisms that exploit psychological weaknesses, then does that include memes. Should we imprison everyone from Vatican city to Madison avenue ? (I've heard worse ideas...)
Suppose we restrict our attention to computer viruses. Harmful code that corrupts data, replicates itself over the network (either fully automatically or with the assistance of duped humans). How about if we add the proviso that it performs action on the host's computer that are purely for the benefit of the author of the virus, rather than for the service of the user. How about a virus that exploits humanity's addiction to pointless ritual. A really sophisticated virus would be so effective it would try to eliminate competing pieces of software from being able to operate properly even on separate computers. Kudos to Bill Gates for creating the most successful computer virus of all time.
It's a question of responsiblity. There's this notion that if you get infected with a virus, you're the victim. The way I see it, if you're infected with a virus you are to blame. If your computer is performing illegal activities then I believe you are at least partially at fault. Certainly running stupid software (Outlook) makes this more likely, but ultimately it's your responsibility to run good software, and to use it sensibly.
You own a computer which is connected to a worldwide network. In the wrong hands your computer could cause untold damage. As computers become ever more tightly integrated into the fabric of civilisation, the damage that can be caused grows. If you own a gun and leave it loaded and lying in a playground, you can blame the kid for stealing it and shooting someone, but you're also at fault for not exercising due dilligence. A malicious virus gaining control of as many computers as ILOVEYOU managed could cause more damage than a postal worker. Suppose the virus contained voice software and dialed in hoax messages to emergency services, etc etc.
If the network is to have any chance of robustness, then everybody has to take responsiblity for their part of the network. It's worse than useless to say "virus writing is illegal, so if I catch a virus I'm a victim". Unless we have some relatively harmless mechanism to continually stress test the network, we leave ourselves open to catastrophic effect.
Owners of equipment are traditionally held responsible for any damage that equipment may cause. If you leave your handbreak off and your car rolls down the hill wrecking another car, then you pay. If it turns out that you purchased a car with faulty handbrakes, then maybe you can sue the manafacturer for damages. Although, it should be within the rights of the manafacturer to sell a car "as is", ie caveat emptor.
We don't need to worry about catching the "criminals" who write viruses. Just make it clear that catching a virus is irresponsible, and comes with it's own instant punishment.
Though this guys credentials are as good as anyone's as far as I'm concerned. If his arguments make sense then he is as worthy of attention as the next man.
Of course, there are many people with such low self esteem that they will only listen to opinions from some "authority" on the subject. How else could they possibly know what to think ? Heaven forbid they should actually try judging the worth of the arguments irrespective of where they come from. That would involve thinking for themselves. That's not how things are done in a civilised society - it's not efficient. Instead we must have experts on every topic under the sun who decide these things for us.
This is great. As a news site, publicity and name recognition are your life blood. They've really put you in a win win situation. If they decide to take you to court and you eventually lose the extra publicity will be worth far more than the fine. On the other hand, if you win then you get the "David slays Goliath" kudos.
The worst thing that can happen if you tell them to fuck off is better than than the best thing that can happen if you give in.
It's a question of responsiblity. People claim my scheme is legalized extortion. I see it more as a fine for irresponsible behaviour. There's this notion that if you get infected with a virus, you're the victim. The way I see it, if you're infected with a virus you are to blame. If your computer is performing illegal activities then I believe you are at least partially at fault. Certainly running stupid software (Outlook) makes this more likely, but ultimately it's your responsibility to run good software, and to use it sensibly.
You own a computer which is connected to a worldwide network. In the wrong hands your computer could cause untold damage. As computers become ever more tightly integrated into the fabric of civilisation, the damage that can be caused grows. If you own a gun and leave it loaded and lying in a playground, you can blame the kid for stealing it and shooting someone, but you're also at fault for not exercising due dilligence. A malicious virus gaining control of as many computers as ILOVEYOU managed could cause more damage than a postal worker. Suppose the virus contained voice software and dialed in hoax messages to emergency services, etc etc.
If the network is to have any chance of robustness, then everybody has to take responsiblity for their part of the network. It's worse than useless to say "virus writing is illegal, so if I catch a virus I'm a victim". Unless we have some relatively harmless mechanism to continually stress test the network, we leave ourselves open to catastrophy.
PS, when I said ILOVEYOU was not malicious, I meant it. The author simply didn't give a damn how much damage he caused. Which is not the same as deliberately causing maximum damge (eg format c: | rm -rf/).
Are you being deliberately obtuse, or does it come naturally.
Government policies make the massive propogation of damaging viruses inevitable because they cause under exposure of the immune system. We don't need world wide policy changes, one country with reasonable technological sohphistication would be sufficient.
> It does absolutely nothing to address the real issue: preventing virii like this from affecting so many people in such a drastic way.
No, it does absolutely everything to prevent virii like this from effecting (look it up) people in such a drastic way. Within weeks of some variation of this policy being taken up, the number of exploitable holes left in computer systems would plummit. This way, the holes which are exploited will cause limited damage. It will soon be beyond the reach of lone nutters to cause any damage.
I'm saying that viruses are potentially damaging, and all we've seen so far is a tiny taster of what is to come. If people continue to bury their heads in the sand, we are going to see some real damage, and it won't be some script kiddie wiping out a few files, it will be some well funded fanatical group with an axe to grind indulging in cyber-warefare.
I'm not sure whether payment for fixing is necessary, it's the most secure, but it might be overkill.
Think of your anti-virus software as your immune system. Anti-virus companies would charge a fair bit, but would guarantee you against infection. Fees payable to virus companies could be paid by anti-virus companies if you were on maintenance. Virus companies would really start to compete with one another.
As for malicious, rm *.mp3 *.jpg is nasty, but format f: format e: format d: format c: would be malicious. The author was going for maximum propogation, not maximum damage.
Hey, not fair, who beat me to the number 1 and 2 spots ?
I would prefer to have the option of paying not be shot, and buying a bullet proof jacket rather than just getting shot. If you had read fully you would see that I proposed a (fairly small) limit be set on maximum chargeable fee. Do you really think that professional teams of terrorist programmers would be deferred by the (minimal) danger of capture ? Is it really wise to leave vast amounts of infrastructure at the mercy of anybody anywhere ?
So, they think they've caught the person responsible for ILOVEYOU virus. No, they haven't, the best they can hope to do is shoot the messenger.
Who's really responsible for ILOVEYOU virus ? Conventional wisdom would blame one of these groups:
1. The virus author 2. Clueless users 3. Microsoft 4. System Administrators
these are all wrong.
1. It takes one person to create a virus, there are 6,000,000,000 people on the planet. A policy of trying to dissuade anyone from writing a virus is unlikely to be successful.
2. You can't really expect everybody to become a computer security expert, they're unaware of the dangers until they've been hit. Also, not all viruses propagate through user stupidity.
3. Microsoft is only partly to blame. Their main crime here is encouraging user ignorance.
4. System Administrators do what they can, but there will always be a trade-off between how much power the user has and how much damage they can cause through carelessness. Also, management won't pay for the extra security unless they know it's necessary, ie holes will only be plugged after they're exploited.
The real culprit is short-sited government policies, where as ever they believe that the best way to make a problem go away is to legislate against it. The stupidity of these policies is driven home by the fact that the more successful law enforcement is at pursuing virus writers, the more dangerous the situation becomes.
Suppose the FBI manages to catch and prosecute almost every 37337 loser who puts together a virus. A strong chance of getting caught will discourage legions of mostly harmless experimenters from trying out new viruses. This will certainly cut down on the number of exploits explored. User carelessness will steadily grow, security measures will become half hearted and forgotten, meanwhile reliance on computer/networked infrastructure will increase, backups will be ignored. However, someone sometime is going to put together a truly effective, malicious virus. Even ILOVEYOU was not deliberately malicious, and furthermore only relied on a single propogation exploit. Without a constant flow of new viruses a dedicated team will be able to exploit multiple unguarded exploits.
The role of the FBI here is that of an overprotective mother who tries to make sure that her precious (corporate America) never gets exposed to any germs. She does everything in her power to keep her baby out of harm's way and pumps it full of anti-biotics as soon it gets the sniffles.
So far, no great harm has come to her child, except for a recent nasty cold. This last outbreak has the FBI desperately searching for the nasty virus writer to seek out and punish him/her (more anti-biotics). The anxious mother wants more resources to keep those nasty bugs away from her baby (corporate America).
Trouble is, this policy has left her child sickly and pitifully devoid of natural defences. When a really nasty bug comes along it's going to hurt. Mummy's heart is in the right place, but her head is lodged deep in her anal cavity. If she had any sense, she would send her kid off to play at Kenny's house, he'll probably complain, but it's for his own good.
If you want your children to grow up healthy and strong they must be exposed to viruses. Instead of clamping down on virus writers, we should reward them. Encourage a legalised virus industry. The user periodically looks at a file called c:/gotcha which would occasionally pop into existence with a message along the lines of:
HI, THIS MACHINE HAS CAUGHT A VIRUS FROM VIRAL INFECTIONS CORPORATION A CURE FOR THIS VIRUS CAN BE PURCHASED FROM WWW.VIRALINFECTIONS.COM AT $2 PER MACHINE, THE ID FOR THIS MACHINE IS 239884623
Purchasing the official fix would repair any damage done by the virus, and also provide an explanation of the exploit used to gain access to the users machine. Viruses that caused data corruption without an available fix would still be illegal.
The scheme needs a little fine-tuning, like a maximum chargeable fix-up fee etc, but something like this is the only workable long term solution. The current approach is leading to a situation where a truly malicious virus will cause serious harm.
It's worth reflecting that the Mellisa author achieved far more in protecting society from harmful computer viruses than the FBI could possibly hope to achieve. So he gets blamed for "billions of dollars" worth of damage, and gets a longer jail sentence than the average rapist. There is no way of directly calculating how much more money would have been lost if ILOVEYOU had arrived on the scene before Mellisa.
Even ILOVEYOU has probably done more good than harm. Suppose ILOVEYOU had deliberately corrupted harddrives at random instead of just mp3/jpg/etc files. Suppose it had done something really nasty. For instance, searched for Quicken files and appended "Transfer-Balance" instructions to the end of your home banking todo list. This was a clever little exploit put together by some German hackers who wanted to demonstrate the dangers of ActiveX, another nutrious primordial soup Microsoft created for viruses. The beauty of this exploit was, you would go through all the security procedures, entering passwords, the bank calling your computer back, etc, and without knowing it you were escorting the rogue instructions past security. There's worse things that can happen than losing a few songs or images.
Apologies for going over the top, but the circumstances you describe are very different to that implied by your original post. Doing a search as a one-off as a result of coming across kiddie porn is entirely sensible.
I'm slightly sceptical about the kiddie porn business though. It's the example that's always given whenever politians try to justify surveillance, encryption bans, whatever. What kind of admissions policy would hire someone stupid enough, nevermind sick enough, to view kiddie porn in a government office ? Do you think that blanket surviellance of the population is justified (we must protect the children...), after all kiddie porn is equally detestable at home or at work ?
I'm not arguing that employers don't have the right to monitor their employees, just that it's usually misguided.
> I would far prefer competent creative employees doing their job all the time
Does the word "Duh" mean anything to you ? The point I was making which you ignored (reasonably considering my rudeness) is that it makes far more sense to judge people according to what they produce rather than how they spend their time.
Suppose I have 2 employees: Bill produces 10 widgets a day, Fred produces 5 widgets a day (of equal quality), Fred spends his whole time working diligently, but Bill spends half the day masturbating in the bathroom. I would fire Fred before Bill. It would be even better if Bill cut down on the wanking and produced 20 widgets a day.
Distrust and intimidation is seldom an optimal way to get better performance from your workers. It might be a reasonable way to run a cotton farm with slave labour, but it's less effective in a software shop.
> Your premise is compeltely off. To restate the above: "Java shouls run code tuned for C++ as fast as C++."
You completely mis-respresent what I say, then refute it. What I'm saying is people should not believe your statements wrt performance because they are false , do your own testing.
> In general java today is MUCH better at in-lining then ANY C++ compiler
So why is it only 1/5 the speed ?
> It is at this point I believe an undisputed fact that a Java coder can write correct code faster then a C++ coder.
Totally disagree. I have been coding Java for 5 years and C++ for 9, I have written a commercial application consisting of 30,000 lines of Java. I first learned Java when 0.9 was released. I'm not some fucking novice.
Several people who's opinion I respect insist that they can develop stuff faster with Java than with C++. If they really know C++ I just don't understand this, unless they are comparing old (pre-STL) C++ with modern (post-collections)java. The other possibility is that they have been using MFC, a piece of code so vile, that I can barely speak it's name.
I can see that if you're working on a project where (2 or more apply): threads are important; has to work on multiple platforms; requires functionality that JDK library classes cover well; is deployed over the internet; speed is not an issue; memory useage is not an issue; very precise control is not important; some team members are inexperienced;
then Java may well be the best choice.
However for implementing arbitrary fresh functionality I can develop far faster in C++ than java. For instance a fragment of a C++ program that reads in a file and gets a list of the starting positions for every word in the file:
Writing the equivalent in Java would take 20+ lines.
Now, I admit this is a contrived example, but do it the other way round - give me a nice piece of algorithmic code in Java and I believe the equivalent C++ will almost always be considerably smaller, and thus easier to grasp. Java is good the beginners, there are fewer pitfalls, but as a language it's just almost entirely a subset of C++.
A sane organisation judges employees by their performance, ie by what they achieve, not by whether they had "inappropriate images" in their cache.
Who cares much time is spent working, what matters is what gets done.
A competent creative person will achieve more of value in 30 minutes than some droid who diligently spends 50 hours a week "behaving professionally". I would far prefer employees who browsed porn or spent the odd hour checking out/. than some self-righteous prick who thought a good use of his time was snooping on other employees. If they're good at their job, I couldn't care less how they spend their time. If they're not, then they can "act professionally" all day long, and I'll still fire their ass.
In the commerical world this is self correcting, companies with their priorities screwed eventually go belly up. There's no correcting mechanism in the public sector, you end up with bloated monsters that piss taxpayers money away paying a bunch of useless cretins to stare up each others asses all day.
For anybody listening to this BS, I suggest you actually do some experiments yourself. Java and C++ are close enough that it's quite easy to compile virtually identical code in both. There are too many lies told by both sides and ymmv depending on what you're doing.
I typically find Java runs at 1/5th the speed of C++ (using latest compilers). My own results correlate closely with http://sprout.stanford.edu/uli/java_cpp.html
Listening to what Sun says about Java v C is like listening to what Microsoft says about W2k v Linux.
Your arguments are fine theoretically, they're just false in practise. HotSpot is not nearly that good yet.
We're at the edge of something deeper than you think.
The most immediate thing to look forward to is better human computer interaction. Much, much better HCI. The implications of this are somewhat surprising. Right now you type on your keyboard, its inefficient. Well lets just imagine the key board and type in space then used a camera hooked up to a computer to observe the fingers. This is possible today but pointless. How about if electrodes were planted in your arm and acted on the signals before they reached your fingers. Again, we could do this today. How about we tracked the signals back and intercepted them via an implant in the brain. This is today's cutting edge. However things are moving fairly fast. There already exist mechanisms that can detect brainwaves and people have been trained to move a mouse around a screen just by thinking about it. The interface is kinda clunky at the moment, they have to think about sex to move left and right, or oceans to move up and down. Still, it's a proof of concept, things will improve.
Screw wearable PC's, bring on the implants. With the kind of information density, we can manage these days it's actually worthwhile. Wouldn't it be nice to be able to remember everything ever said to you, or said by you. If nothing else, it would be a great help when you get into one of those "he said, she said" arguments. With todays technology you could build a portable device that remembers and voice recognizes everything you ever hear for five years. A little further down the line, and you'll be able to get an implant which will let you remember everything you ever saw. When the interface gets good enough, it will be pointless to worry about whether its stored in neurons or stored on a chip.
BT are already working on the foundations for a device that could be installed in the brain to store everything you ever see,hear feel touch or smell. Its called project "Soul Catcher", I'm not making this up.
And for all those out there who think we're going to evolve into a race of cyborgs: you're crazy... it'll go MUCH further than that.
After all, once people have got decent hardware implanted in their heads, do you think we're going to be satisfied with a 200baud connection (human speech). No, we'll use the hardware in our heads to communicate with other people (through the hardware in their heads). With sufficient communication, it stops making sense to talk about multiple communicating processors - you end up with a single, massively parallel computer. When people get used to taking part in the enhanced meta-brain it will become literally unthinkable to go back being an individual entity. You might as well try to imagine what it would be like to be a mollusc. Don't believe me ? - we already have this idea of "however did we manage without the internet", it's only been in mainstream use for 2 years !
We will become the Borg, but not in a bad way. If you combine the properties of humans and computers and end up with something which does not have the best of both.. then you haven't done it right. The internet will evolve from being a global suppository of all human knowledge into actually being humanity. We will be the nodes on the network. It won't take long either. Just a couple of hundred years or so at this rate.
I appreciate the time spent answer our queries, but there are a couple of points I take issue with
The notion that open source advocates are "left" while IP advocates are "right" is severely misleading. The argument has got virtually nothing to do with left/right wing. The notion that there should be restrictions on copying of information is a form of protectionism. The arguments to justify IP ie "protect the creators" seem more socialist to me than the anti-IP arguments (not that there's anything inherently wrong with that). A "free market" is one in which there are no artificial barriers to entry, and the price of an article becomes the price of production. For instance, some socialist countries have laws that make it illegal for someone to do a job unless they are a member of the relevent union. These laws exist to maintain wage levels for people in those industries. IP laws which exist to protect the investment of the original creators are in some ways equivalent.
> Gene Roddenberry died before coming up with the > backstory for how to have a non-mediocre > society with unlimited replication for all.
This takes us to the crux of the argument, which is whether there can be sufficient motivation for IP creation without IP protection. For the moment, I think the answer is no, and I believe your IP scheme is probably preferable to the status quo. However, in the long run, I think we will move to a gift economy and that this will work even better.
In richer societies, people don't work in order to survive, they work to improve their status. An advertising executive might be prepared to work 60 hours a week so he can afford a mercedes. Is it because a mercedes is so much more comfortable and faster than a Pinto - of course not, it's because of the status driving a mercedes confers on him. Once material necessities are satisified, you might think people would relax more, but they don't because status is a primary motivator.
Of course status has to be tradeable for a gift economy to be healthy, but somehow status always ends up being tradeable. IP that can be freely replicated reproduces much more effectively than proprietary IP, so we don't need to change IP laws (except patents) in order for a gift economy to develop, it'll happen naturally, and it will work better than a market economy, but the two can co-exist indefinitely.
> Wealth is an aggregate measure of exchange power between individuals
Your definition of wealth is actually a constant. By your definition *total* wealth cannot rise or fall, so when you claim free IP would be "decreasing overall wealth" you're obviously confused.
By your terminology raising total "utility" (which is pretty much equivalent to what I call wealth) is the goal which improves mankinds economic condition.
> So, the real question is, is the tradeoff worth it?
Agreed.
> If everybody on earth had access to all the IP you would have a relatively few very happy people,
Strange claim. Imagine if everyone had free access to all books, records, drugs, movies, software, artwork... Everybody would be far richer (or more "util-full" if you must). Yeah, wealth can't buy you happiness, but neither can poverty.
When we reach a world where you go to the mechanic and he downloads and "prints" your new part instead of ordering it (possible already - www.3dsystems.com) then *most* wealth will be in the form of IP. In the future, if all IP was free then everyone would be so much richer that working to stay alive will not be necessary.
The real question is: would anybody bother to create new drugs, software, music, etc in a free-IP world.
I think they would, and here's why: Even today (in Western society) everybody works long hours not in order to survive but for status.
A marketing executive (for instance) doesn't work 60 hours a week because a mercedes is so much more comfortable than a pinto. He does it because of the status driving a mercedes confers on him. If everybody drove a mercedes, then he would work harder so he could afford an S-class. A free-IP economy would still be based on status, but it would be a gift economy, ie status would be attained by producing and distributing valuable IP (we've already moved to this model in the open source world). Of course, status must be tradeable, for this type of economy to develop, but somehow status always manages to be tradeable.
I also read your IP proposal, and agree with the points mentioned above.
However, I also have a problem with your proposal from an economic perspective:
Property laws developed as a mechanism for optimal utilisation of scarce resources. The laws and ethics for standard property make little sense when the cost of replication is $0. The market is the best mechanism for distributing scarce resources, so you propose we make all IP resources scarce so that IP behaves like other commodities and all the laws of the market apply.
We are rapidly entering a world where most wealth is held as a form of IP. Free replication of IP increases the net wealth of the planet. If everybody on earth had access to all the IP on earth, then everybody would be far richer - it's not a zero sum game . Of course, we're several decades at least from this being a viable option since we've reached a local minima. (Need equivalent to starship replicators first - nanotech...)
Artificially pretending that IP is a scarce resource will keep the lawyers, accountants, politicians in work, and will also allow some money to flow back to the creatives, but at the cost of impoverishing humanity.
I could actually see your proposal being adopted, and I can see how it will maintain capitalism as the dominant model, but I also believe that it is the most damaging economic suggestion in human history
Does anyone know if you can use this (or any other open source option) for noise reduction / pop & click removal.
I wanna move LP collection to CD, but need a way to clean up the WAV files and get rid of clicks etc. Do I have to go commercial on this ?
I'm also wondering about writing my own. If I took 2/3 recordings from an LP, then used the 2nd copy to repair the waveform at clicks rather than guessing or manually drawing it in, it seems like pretty decent results should be possible (of course, this won't help with scratches, but it would help with random noise). Has anyone tried this ? I would like to try coding this myself, but I'm kinda busy right now - one for the backburner.
I've used Xlib, motif, MFC(yuck), Visual Cafe, Jbuilder, tcl/tk, VB, Delphi and more...
Unlike most of the posters, I've actually done what you're talking about.
The best solution I've ever seen is FLTK. Qt is second best, and is easier to get started with than FLTK, but Qt is not LGPL & doesn't allow quite as much low level control.
Jbuilder is problematic, it's better to use java directly (emacs/vi + make files), but implementation of swing is terrible.
http://www.fltk.org/
I spent two years developing with java & 3 months accomplishing far more with fltk (on a different, harder project). The app is used exclusively on NT, but I developed under Linux because I prefer the environment.
Your main options are:
FLTK: Fast, flexible, reliable, small, simple Java: Slow, limiting, buggy, bloated, complicated QT: Good, attractive, larger widget set than FLTK, but FLTK is better in the long run.
Spent last weekend sticking 6.3 on my new 40G maxtor. Left me feeling pretty up to date for er, 4 whole days.
Now I feel like a putz. I should have gone to the pub instead, waited a few weeks and stuck 6.4 on a 75G IBM.
Does anyone know if you can overcome the ATA 33.8G limit with 2.2.14, (2.3.??) ? How can I install 6.3 and get to use the whole drive instead of a measly 33.8 gig ?
Has anyone tried going after the big five (studios) on a price fixing basis.
After all, the difference between production costs and retail costs are huge. Why is it that CDs all cost virtually the same amount ? It's certainly got nothing to do with having to provide revenue to the bands, although that's what they try to make you think.
If there was anything like a free market going on here (even if one blindly accepted current IP laws), then there would be a far higher discrepency in CD prices. Maybe the latest rolling stones CD would cost $12, but a CD from some fringe band hardly anybody has heard of would have a completely different price.
An API is a specification rather than something that you need to copy in order to conform to the API.
You don't have the right (as far as I know) to write a specification and say: "everybody who produces something that fulfills this specification must abide by these conditions" - and nor should you IMO, IP laws should be weaker, not stronger. For instance, MS has no right to impose restrictions (apart from practical ones) on who can implement win32 api, hence legaility of WINE.
Slashdot Mirror
> If you look at any organization with a microscope you will see plenty of random Brownian motion going on. But there is still a whole, and this whole moves in a certain direction.
Exactly. It's silly to single out MS for special criticism in this regard. We don't need any controlling evil mastermind to produce the appearance of a conspiracy. All we need is a set of implicit and unstated tendancies where most people do what they think ought to be done, and the mass moves inexhorably in a particular direction, irrespective of a few free thinkers trying to throw a spanner in the works.
The media prints what they believe people want to see. The strongest motivation for reading newspapers is not to obtain information, it's to seek reassurance that you know whats going on and you are intelligent and informed. People don't read newspapers - they get into them like a warm bath. Opinions that you disagree with arouse discomfort and distrust. Almost everybody reads the journals and papers whose opinions they agree with, ie they read papers that tell them what they already "know". Which means papers print what they think people already believe. There's a massive positive feedback loop. You end up with ridiculously slanted propoganda, and increasingly paranoid "weirdos" handing out pamphlets unable to understand why nobody is interested in the truth.
On the other hand, in places where there is a an attempt to control the media, (eg Soviet Union), people are naturally far less trusting of media, and far more interested in hearing the truth. I'm quite sure the average Russian during the soviet years had a far more informed and balanced picture of America than the average American had about Russia (or America for that matter).
The western propoganda machine was(is) based on self-interest, flattery and greed. Soviet propoganda was based on fear. We won the propoganda war for the same reason that we won the economic war - distributed processing is more efficient than central control.
1. If you want unicode, use something like:
typedef std::basic_string<short> Qstring;
2. Almost all std::basic_string implementations are
reference counted also
3. Reference counting can be bad in multithreaded
4. std::basic_string has been around for YEARS
5. The main question is the containers, std containers/algorithms are one of the best things about c++
I know it will cause a little pain to migrate, but it'll be worth it in the long run.
Panic driven nonsense. ILOVEYOU is a pretty flimsy excuse to increase police powers, even by the contorted logic processes of the average politician.
.vbs suffix. The clever part of the virus was the psychological hacking that exploited a typical human's immense curiosity to see who was sending them a message saying ILOVEYOU. If we include self replicating organisms that exploit psychological weaknesses, then does that include memes. Should we imprison everyone from Vatican city to Madison avenue ? (I've heard worse ideas...)
What exactly is the definition of a virus anyway ? It is generally taken to be a self replicating piece of code. However, viruses often rely on a little help from naive humans. For instance ILOVEYOU required you to disable security settings on Outlook, then double click on an attatchment with a
Suppose we restrict our attention to computer viruses. Harmful code that corrupts data, replicates itself over the network (either fully automatically or with the assistance of duped humans). How about if we add the proviso that it performs action on the host's computer that are purely for the benefit of the author of the virus, rather than for the service of the user. How about a virus that exploits humanity's addiction to pointless ritual. A really sophisticated virus would be so effective it would try to eliminate competing pieces of software from being able to operate properly even on separate computers. Kudos to Bill Gates for creating the most successful computer virus of all time.
It's a question of responsiblity. There's this notion that if you get infected with a virus, you're the victim. The way I see it, if you're infected with a virus you are to blame. If your computer is performing illegal activities then I believe you are at least partially at fault. Certainly running stupid software (Outlook) makes this more likely, but ultimately it's your responsibility to run good software, and to use it sensibly.
You own a computer which is connected to a worldwide network. In the wrong hands your computer could cause untold damage. As computers become ever more tightly integrated into the fabric of civilisation, the damage that can be caused grows. If you own a gun and leave it loaded and lying in a playground, you can blame the kid for stealing it and shooting someone, but you're also at fault for not exercising due dilligence. A malicious virus gaining control of as many computers as ILOVEYOU managed could cause more damage than a postal worker. Suppose the virus contained voice software and dialed in hoax messages to emergency services, etc etc.
If the network is to have any chance of robustness, then everybody has to take responsiblity for their part of the network. It's worse than useless to say "virus writing is illegal, so if I catch a virus I'm a victim". Unless we have some relatively harmless mechanism to continually stress test the network, we leave ourselves open to catastrophic effect.
Owners of equipment are traditionally held responsible for any damage that equipment may cause. If you leave your handbreak off and your car rolls down the hill wrecking another car, then you pay. If it turns out that you purchased a car with faulty handbrakes, then maybe you can sue the manafacturer for damages. Although, it should be within the rights of the manafacturer to sell a car "as is", ie caveat emptor.
We don't need to worry about catching the "criminals" who write viruses. Just make it clear that catching a virus is irresponsible, and comes with it's own instant punishment.
Though this guys credentials are as good as anyone's as far as I'm concerned. If his arguments make sense then he is as worthy of attention as the next man.
Of course, there are many people with such low self esteem that they will only listen to opinions from some "authority" on the subject. How else could they possibly know what to think ? Heaven forbid they should actually try judging the worth of the arguments irrespective of where they come from. That would involve thinking for themselves. That's not how things are done in a civilised society - it's not efficient. Instead we must have experts on every topic under the sun who decide these things for us.
This is great. As a news site, publicity and name recognition are your life blood. They've really put you in a win win situation. If they decide to take you to court and you eventually lose the extra publicity will be worth far more than the fine. On the other hand, if you win then you get the "David slays Goliath" kudos.
The worst thing that can happen if you tell them to fuck off is better than than the best thing that can happen if you give in.
It's a question of responsiblity. People claim my scheme is legalized extortion. I see it more as a fine for irresponsible behaviour. There's this notion that if you get infected with a virus, you're the victim. The way I see it, if you're infected with a virus you are to blame. If your computer is performing illegal activities then I believe you are at least partially at fault. Certainly running stupid software (Outlook) makes this more likely, but ultimately it's your responsibility to run good software, and to use it sensibly.
/).
You own a computer which is connected to a worldwide network. In the wrong hands your computer could cause untold damage. As computers become ever more tightly integrated into the fabric of civilisation, the damage that can be caused grows. If you own a gun and leave it loaded and lying in a playground, you can blame the kid for stealing it and shooting someone, but you're also at fault for not exercising due dilligence. A malicious virus gaining control of as many computers as ILOVEYOU managed could cause more damage than a postal worker. Suppose the virus contained voice software and dialed in hoax messages to emergency services, etc etc.
If the network is to have any chance of robustness, then everybody has to take responsiblity for their part of the network. It's worse than useless to say "virus writing is illegal, so if I catch a virus I'm a victim". Unless we have some relatively harmless mechanism to continually stress test the network, we leave ourselves open to catastrophy.
PS, when I said ILOVEYOU was not malicious, I meant it. The author simply didn't give a damn how much damage he caused. Which is not the same as deliberately causing maximum damge (eg format c: | rm -rf
Are you being deliberately obtuse, or does it come naturally.
Government policies make the massive propogation of damaging viruses inevitable because they cause under exposure of the immune system. We don't need world wide policy changes, one country with reasonable technological sohphistication would be sufficient.
> It does absolutely nothing to address the real issue: preventing virii like this from affecting so many people in such a drastic way.
No, it does absolutely everything to prevent virii like this from effecting (look it up) people in such a drastic way. Within weeks of some variation of this policy being taken up, the number of exploitable holes left in computer systems would plummit. This way, the holes which are exploited will cause limited damage. It will soon be beyond the reach of lone nutters to cause any damage.
I'm saying that viruses are potentially damaging, and all we've seen so far is a tiny taster of what is to come. If people continue to bury their heads in the sand, we are going to see some real damage, and it won't be some script kiddie wiping out a few files, it will be some well funded fanatical group with an axe to grind indulging in cyber-warefare.
I'm not sure whether payment for fixing is necessary, it's the most secure, but it might be overkill.
Think of your anti-virus software as your immune system. Anti-virus companies would charge a fair bit, but would guarantee you against infection. Fees payable to virus companies could be paid by anti-virus companies if you were on maintenance. Virus companies would really start to compete with one another.
As for malicious, rm *.mp3 *.jpg is nasty, but
format f:
format e:
format d:
format c:
would be malicious. The author was going for maximum propogation, not maximum damage.
Nice, but there are reasons why the argument is valid in one instance, but not in the other.
How likely is the production of nasty viruses without encouragement ?
computer viruses: inevitable
real viruses: unlikely (for the moment)
How much protection from similar exploits does one gain from an exposed exploit ?
computer viruses: substantial
real viruses: minimal
In the long run, your reductio ad absurdum argument might be less preposterous than you suppose.
Hey, not fair, who beat me to the number 1 and 2 spots ?
I would prefer to have the option of paying not be shot, and buying a bullet proof jacket rather than just getting shot. If you had read fully you would see that I proposed a (fairly small) limit be set on maximum chargeable fee. Do you really think that professional teams of terrorist programmers would be deferred by the (minimal) danger of capture ? Is it really wise to leave vast amounts of infrastructure at the mercy of anybody anywhere ?
So, they think they've caught the person responsible for ILOVEYOU virus. No, they haven't, the best they can hope to do is shoot the messenger.
Who's really responsible for ILOVEYOU virus ? Conventional wisdom would blame one of these groups:
1. The virus author
2. Clueless users
3. Microsoft
4. System Administrators
these are all wrong.
1. It takes one person to create a virus, there are 6,000,000,000 people on the planet. A policy of trying to dissuade anyone from writing a virus is unlikely to be successful.
2. You can't really expect everybody to become a computer security expert, they're unaware of the dangers until they've been hit. Also, not all viruses propagate through user stupidity.
3. Microsoft is only partly to blame. Their main crime here is encouraging user ignorance.
4. System Administrators do what they can, but there will always be a trade-off between how much power the user has and how much damage they can cause through carelessness. Also, management won't pay for the extra security unless they know it's necessary, ie holes will only be plugged after they're exploited.
The real culprit is short-sited government policies, where as ever they believe that the best way to make a problem go away is to legislate against it. The stupidity of these policies is driven home by the fact that the more successful law enforcement is at pursuing virus writers, the more dangerous the situation becomes.
Suppose the FBI manages to catch and prosecute almost every 37337 loser who puts together a virus. A strong chance of getting caught will discourage legions of mostly harmless experimenters from trying out new viruses. This will certainly cut down on the number of exploits explored. User carelessness will steadily grow, security measures will become half hearted and forgotten, meanwhile reliance on computer/networked infrastructure will increase, backups will be ignored. However, someone sometime is going to put together a truly effective, malicious virus. Even ILOVEYOU was not deliberately malicious, and furthermore only relied on a single propogation exploit. Without a constant flow of new viruses a dedicated team will be able to exploit multiple unguarded exploits.
The role of the FBI here is that of an overprotective mother who tries to make sure that her precious (corporate America) never gets exposed to any germs. She does everything in her power to keep her baby out of harm's way and pumps it full of anti-biotics as soon it gets the sniffles.
So far, no great harm has come to her child, except for a recent nasty cold. This last outbreak has the FBI desperately searching for the nasty virus writer to seek out and punish him/her (more anti-biotics). The anxious mother wants more resources to keep those nasty bugs away from her baby (corporate America).
Trouble is, this policy has left her child sickly and pitifully devoid of natural defences. When a really nasty bug comes along it's going to hurt. Mummy's heart is in the right place, but her head is lodged deep in her anal cavity. If she had any sense, she would send her kid off to play at Kenny's house, he'll probably complain, but it's for his own good.
If you want your children to grow up healthy and strong they must be exposed to viruses. Instead of clamping down on virus writers, we should reward them. Encourage a legalised virus industry. The user periodically looks at a file called c:/gotcha which would occasionally pop into existence with a message along the lines of:
HI, THIS MACHINE HAS CAUGHT A VIRUS FROM VIRAL INFECTIONS CORPORATION A CURE FOR THIS VIRUS CAN BE PURCHASED FROM WWW.VIRALINFECTIONS.COM AT $2 PER MACHINE, THE ID FOR THIS MACHINE IS 239884623
Purchasing the official fix would repair any damage done by the virus, and also provide an explanation of the exploit used to gain access to the users machine. Viruses that caused data corruption without an available fix would still be illegal.
The scheme needs a little fine-tuning, like a maximum chargeable fix-up fee etc, but something like this is the only workable long term solution. The current approach is leading to a situation where a truly malicious virus will cause serious harm.
It's worth reflecting that the Mellisa author achieved far more in protecting society from harmful computer viruses than the FBI could possibly hope to achieve. So he gets blamed for "billions of dollars" worth of damage, and gets a longer jail sentence than the average rapist. There is no way of directly calculating how much more money would have been lost if ILOVEYOU had arrived on the scene before Mellisa.
Even ILOVEYOU has probably done more good than harm. Suppose ILOVEYOU had deliberately corrupted harddrives at random instead of just mp3/jpg/etc files. Suppose it had done something really nasty. For instance, searched for Quicken files and appended "Transfer-Balance" instructions to the end of your home banking todo list. This was a clever little exploit put together by some German hackers who wanted to demonstrate the dangers of ActiveX, another nutrious primordial soup Microsoft created for viruses. The beauty of this exploit was, you would go through all the security procedures, entering passwords, the bank calling your computer back, etc, and without knowing it you were escorting the rogue instructions past security. There's worse things that can happen than losing a few songs or images.
Apologies for going over the top, but the circumstances you describe are very different to that implied by your original post. Doing a search as a one-off as a result of coming across kiddie porn is entirely sensible.
I'm slightly sceptical about the kiddie porn business though. It's the example that's always given whenever politians try to justify surveillance, encryption bans, whatever. What kind of admissions policy would hire someone stupid enough, nevermind sick enough, to view kiddie porn in a government office ? Do you think that blanket surviellance of the population is justified (we must protect the children...), after all kiddie porn is equally detestable at home or at work ?
I'm not arguing that employers don't have the right to monitor their employees, just that it's usually misguided.
> I would far prefer competent creative employees doing their job all the time
Does the word "Duh" mean anything to you ? The point I was making which you ignored (reasonably considering my rudeness) is that it makes far more sense to judge people according to what they produce rather than how they spend their time.
Suppose I have 2 employees: Bill produces 10 widgets a day, Fred produces 5 widgets a day (of equal quality), Fred spends his whole time working diligently, but Bill spends half the day masturbating in the bathroom. I would fire Fred before Bill. It would be even better if Bill cut down on the wanking and produced 20 widgets a day.
Distrust and intimidation is seldom an optimal way to get better performance from your workers. It might be a reasonable way to run a cotton farm with slave labour, but it's less effective in a software shop.
> Your premise is compeltely off. To restate the above: "Java shouls run code tuned for C++ as fast as C++."
You completely mis-respresent what I say, then refute it. What I'm saying is people should not believe your statements wrt performance because they are false , do your own testing.
> In general java today is MUCH better at in-lining then ANY C++ compiler
So why is it only 1/5 the speed ?
> It is at this point I believe an undisputed fact that a Java coder can write correct code faster then a C++ coder.
Totally disagree. I have been coding Java for 5 years and C++ for 9, I have written a commercial application consisting of 30,000 lines of Java. I first learned Java when 0.9 was released. I'm not some fucking novice.
Several people who's opinion I respect insist that they can develop stuff faster with Java than with C++. If they really know C++ I just
don't understand this, unless they are comparing old (pre-STL) C++ with modern (post-collections)java. The other possibility is that they have been using MFC, a piece of code so vile, that I can barely speak it's name.
I can see that if you're working on a project where (2 or more apply):
threads are important;
has to work on multiple platforms;
requires functionality that JDK library classes cover well;
is deployed over the internet;
speed is not an issue;
memory useage is not an issue;
very precise control is not important;
some team members are inexperienced;
then Java may well be the best choice.
However for implementing arbitrary fresh functionality I can develop far faster in C++ than java. For instance a fragment of a C++ program that reads in a file and gets a list of the starting positions for
every word in the file:
map > word_positions;
string word;
while (cin >> word)
word_positions[word].push_back((int)cin.tellg() - word.size());
Writing the equivalent in Java would take 20+ lines.
Now, I admit this is a contrived example, but do it the other way round - give me a nice piece of algorithmic code in Java and I believe the equivalent C++ will almost always be considerably smaller, and thus easier to grasp. Java is good the beginners, there are fewer pitfalls, but as a language it's just almost entirely a subset of C++.
A sane organisation judges employees by their performance, ie by what they achieve, not by whether they had "inappropriate images" in their cache.
/. than some self-righteous prick who thought a good use of his time was snooping on other employees. If they're good at their job, I couldn't care less how they spend their time.
Who cares much time is spent working, what matters is what gets done.
A competent creative person will achieve more of value in 30 minutes than some droid who diligently spends 50 hours a week "behaving professionally". I would far prefer employees who browsed porn or spent the odd hour checking out
If they're not, then they can "act professionally" all day long, and I'll still fire their ass.
In the commerical world this is self correcting, companies with their priorities screwed eventually go belly up. There's no correcting mechanism in the public sector, you end up with bloated monsters that piss taxpayers money away paying a bunch of useless cretins to stare up each others asses all day.
For anybody listening to this BS, I suggest you actually do some experiments yourself. Java and C++ are close enough that it's quite easy to compile virtually identical code in both. There are too many lies told by both sides and ymmv depending on what you're doing.
I typically find Java runs at 1/5th the speed of C++ (using latest compilers). My own results correlate closely with http://sprout.stanford.edu/uli/java_cpp.html
Listening to what Sun says about Java v C is like listening to what Microsoft says about W2k v Linux.
Your arguments are fine theoretically, they're just false in practise. HotSpot is not nearly that good yet.
We're at the edge of something deeper than you think.
The most immediate thing to look forward to is better human computer interaction. Much, much better HCI. The implications of this are somewhat surprising. Right now you type on your keyboard, its inefficient. Well lets just imagine the key board and type in space then used a camera hooked up to a computer to observe the fingers. This is possible today but pointless. How about if electrodes were planted in your arm and acted on the signals before they reached your fingers. Again, we could do this today. How about we tracked the signals back and intercepted them via an implant in the brain. This is today's cutting edge. However things are moving fairly fast. There already exist mechanisms that can detect brainwaves and people have been trained to move a mouse around a screen just by thinking about it. The interface is kinda clunky at the moment, they have to think about sex to move left and right, or oceans to move up and down. Still, it's a proof of concept, things will improve.
Screw wearable PC's, bring on the implants. With the kind of information density, we can manage these days it's actually worthwhile. Wouldn't it be nice to be able to remember everything ever said to you, or said by you. If nothing else, it would be a great help when you get into one of those "he said, she said" arguments. With todays technology you could build a portable device that remembers and voice recognizes everything you ever hear for five years. A little further down the line, and you'll be able to get an implant which will let you remember everything you ever saw. When the interface gets good enough, it will be pointless to worry about whether its stored in neurons or stored on a chip.
BT are already working on the foundations for a device that could be installed in the brain to store everything you ever see,hear feel touch or smell. Its called project "Soul Catcher", I'm not making this up.
And for all those out there who think we're going to evolve into a race of cyborgs: you're crazy... it'll go MUCH further than that.
After all, once people have got decent hardware implanted in their heads, do you think we're going to be satisfied with a 200baud connection (human speech). No, we'll use the hardware in our heads to communicate with other people (through the hardware in their heads). With sufficient communication, it stops making sense to talk about multiple communicating processors - you end up with a single, massively parallel computer. When people get used to taking part in the enhanced meta-brain it will become literally unthinkable to go back being an individual entity. You might as well try to imagine what it would be like to be a mollusc. Don't believe me ? - we already have this idea of "however did we manage without the internet", it's only been in mainstream use for 2 years !
We will become the Borg, but not in a bad way. If you combine the properties of humans and computers and end up with something which does not have the best of both.. then you haven't done it right. The internet will evolve from being a global suppository of all human knowledge into actually being humanity. We will be the nodes on the network. It won't take long either. Just a couple of hundred years or so at this rate.
I appreciate the time spent answer our queries, but there are a couple of points I take issue with
The notion that open source advocates are "left" while IP advocates are "right" is severely misleading. The argument has got virtually nothing to do with left/right wing. The notion that there should be restrictions on copying of information is a form of protectionism. The arguments to justify IP ie "protect the creators" seem more socialist to me than the anti-IP arguments (not that there's anything inherently wrong with that). A "free market" is one in which there are no artificial barriers to entry, and the price of an article becomes the price of production. For instance, some socialist countries have laws that make it illegal for someone to do a job unless they are a member of the relevent union. These laws exist to maintain wage levels for people in those industries. IP laws which exist to protect the investment of the original creators are in some ways equivalent.
> Gene Roddenberry died before coming up with the > backstory for how to have a non-mediocre
> society with unlimited replication for all.
This takes us to the crux of the argument, which is whether there can be sufficient motivation for IP creation without IP protection. For the moment, I think the answer is no, and I believe your IP scheme is probably preferable to the status quo. However, in the long run, I think we will move to a gift economy and that this will work even better.
In richer societies, people don't work in order to survive, they work to improve their status. An advertising executive might be prepared to work 60 hours a week so he can afford a mercedes. Is it because a mercedes is so much more comfortable and faster than a Pinto - of course not, it's because of the status driving a mercedes confers on him. Once material necessities are satisified, you might think people would relax more, but they don't because status is a primary motivator.
Of course status has to be tradeable for a gift economy to be healthy, but somehow status always ends up being tradeable. IP that can be freely replicated reproduces much more effectively than proprietary IP, so we don't need to change IP laws (except patents) in order for a gift economy to develop, it'll happen naturally, and it will work better than a market economy, but the two can co-exist indefinitely.
> Wealth is an aggregate measure of exchange power between individuals
Your definition of wealth is actually a constant. By your definition *total* wealth cannot rise or fall, so when you claim free IP would be "decreasing overall wealth" you're obviously confused.
By your terminology raising total "utility" (which is pretty much equivalent to what I call wealth) is the goal which improves mankinds economic condition.
> So, the real question is, is the tradeoff worth it?
Agreed.
> If everybody on earth had access to all the IP you would have a relatively few very happy people,
Strange claim. Imagine if everyone had free access to all books, records, drugs, movies, software, artwork... Everybody would be far richer (or more "util-full" if you must).
Yeah, wealth can't buy you happiness, but neither can poverty.
When we reach a world where you go to the mechanic and he downloads and "prints" your new part instead of ordering it (possible already - www.3dsystems.com) then *most* wealth will be in the form of IP. In the future, if all IP was free then everyone would be so much richer that working to stay alive will not be necessary.
The real question is: would anybody bother to create new drugs, software, music, etc in a free-IP world.
I think they would, and here's why:
Even today (in Western society) everybody works long hours not in order to survive but for status.
A marketing executive (for instance) doesn't work 60 hours a week because a mercedes is so much more comfortable than a pinto. He does it because of the status driving a mercedes confers on him. If everybody drove a mercedes, then he would work harder so he could afford an S-class. A free-IP economy would still be based on status, but it would be a gift economy, ie status would be attained by producing and distributing valuable IP (we've already moved to this model in the open source world). Of course, status must be tradeable, for this type of economy to develop, but somehow status always manages to be tradeable.
I also read your IP proposal, and agree with the points mentioned above.
However, I also have a problem with your proposal from an economic perspective:
Property laws developed as a mechanism for optimal utilisation of scarce resources. The laws and ethics for standard property make little sense when the cost of replication is $0. The market is the best mechanism for distributing scarce resources, so you propose we make all IP resources scarce so that IP behaves like other commodities and all the laws of the market apply.
We are rapidly entering a world where most wealth is held as a form of IP. Free replication of IP increases the net wealth of the planet. If everybody on earth had access to all the IP on earth, then everybody would be far richer - it's not a zero sum game . Of course, we're several decades at least from this being a viable option since we've reached a local minima. (Need equivalent to starship replicators first - nanotech...)
Artificially pretending that IP is a scarce resource will keep the lawyers, accountants, politicians in work, and will also allow some money to flow back to the creatives, but at the cost of impoverishing humanity.
I could actually see your proposal being adopted, and I can see how it will maintain capitalism as the dominant model, but I also believe that it is the most damaging economic suggestion in human history
Could you tell me why I'm wrong.
That's just the ticket. When I have time I'll
integrate the dual-sample processing idea into gramofile, the source looks respectable.
Does anyone know if you can use this (or any other open source option) for noise reduction / pop & click removal.
I wanna move LP collection to CD, but need a way to clean up the WAV files and get rid of clicks etc. Do I have to go commercial on this ?
I'm also wondering about writing my own. If I took 2/3 recordings from an LP, then used the 2nd copy to repair the waveform at clicks rather than guessing or manually drawing it in, it seems like pretty decent results should be possible (of course, this won't help with scratches, but it would help with random noise). Has anyone tried this ? I would like to try coding this myself, but I'm kinda busy right now - one for the backburner.
I've used Xlib, motif, MFC(yuck), Visual Cafe, Jbuilder, tcl/tk, VB, Delphi and more...
Unlike most of the posters, I've actually done what you're talking about.
The best solution I've ever seen is FLTK.
Qt is second best, and is easier to get started
with than FLTK, but Qt is not LGPL & doesn't allow quite as much low level control.
Jbuilder is problematic, it's better to use java directly (emacs/vi + make files), but implementation of swing is terrible.
http://www.fltk.org/
I spent two years developing with java & 3 months accomplishing far more with fltk (on a different, harder project). The app is used exclusively on NT, but I developed under Linux because I prefer the environment.
Your main options are:
FLTK: Fast, flexible, reliable, small, simple
Java: Slow, limiting, buggy, bloated, complicated
QT: Good, attractive, larger widget set than FLTK, but FLTK is better in the long run.
Use emacs/vi & DDD & fluid (FLTK gui builder)
Spent last weekend sticking 6.3 on my new 40G maxtor. Left me feeling pretty up to date for er, 4 whole days.
Now I feel like a putz. I should have gone to the pub instead, waited a few weeks and stuck 6.4 on a 75G IBM.
Does anyone know if you can overcome the ATA 33.8G limit with 2.2.14, (2.3.??) ?
How can I install 6.3 and get to use the whole drive instead of a measly 33.8 gig ?
Has anyone tried going after the big five (studios) on a price fixing basis.
After all, the difference between production costs and retail costs are huge. Why is it that CDs all cost virtually the same amount ? It's certainly got nothing to do with having to provide revenue to the bands, although that's what they try to make you think.
If there was anything like a free market going on here (even if one blindly accepted current IP laws), then there would be a far higher discrepency in CD prices. Maybe the latest rolling stones CD would cost $12, but a CD from some fringe band hardly anybody has heard of would have a completely different price.
Standard IANAL disclaimer, but...
GPL relies on copyright law
An API is a specification rather than something
that you need to copy in order to conform to
the API.
You don't have the right (as far as I know) to
write a specification and say: "everybody who
produces something that fulfills this specification must abide by these conditions"
- and nor should you IMO, IP laws should be weaker, not stronger. For instance, MS has no
right to impose restrictions (apart from practical ones) on who can implement win32 api,
hence legaility of WINE.