All right, their trust metric strategy does seem really cool, but there is a far cry between understanding their strategy in an abstract sense and being able to implement it in perl or php code. Or even java servlets. Anyone know if they have notes on how to actually write the code? When I start thinking of code traversing webs of relationships like that, all I can think of is that it must take a LOT of sql queries, memory, and time to process it each time. Recursive loops with sql queries each time. (Look up this guy... ok what do his peers say about him... hold on, what do THEIR peers say about THEM... et cetera... ok, let him post...)
Any good tutorials on this kind of stuff out there? Code examples?
And good for slashdot for rallying behind them. I guess that shows that in order for mass moderation to work on Anonymous users, the readership has to be a few orders of magnitude more active than any script kiddie poster. Taking away anonymous posting probably is the best way to deal with it for now.
It really is complicated to think about the best methods of moderation compared to traffic levels. I've got a creative writing site that makes group-created cyoa books - right now it's low-traffic enough that I don't need any of these techniques, but I've thought a lot about how to increase it with popularity. The best idea I've had so far is a sort of clustering approach where people vouch for each other - popularity combined with there being an "in" crowd - but that feels a bit complicated to implement for someone who doesn't have a CS degree like myself.
Looking forward to next month when they come live again...
So, for future authors/musicians setting up this kind of thing, does anyone know of any micropayment methods that are easier or quicker than SK's Amazon solution, or PayPal?
I've got a site that publishes MP3 choose-your-own-adventure audiobooks. (Sounds weird, but it's quite cool when you think about - listen to the first episode, make a choice, listen to the next one you chose, etc.) Everybody always talks about how it would be great to put a tip jar up on an mp3.com page, how people would probably use it if it were there, so I set one up. I signed up for PayPal, enabled "Web Accept", and now I can accept credit card "donations" of any size from anyone. PayPal takes like 2% of the payment.
It's the easiest method out there that I know of, but even that still feels kind of annoying. A person has to give their name and shipping address even if they aren't being shipped a product. People tip on the street because it's easy and no big deal. 50c here, a buck there, into the street musician's hat. Easy. But on the net it's still a major pain. Are there any easier methods out there? What about the near future?
So, who here knows how to go about getting to the head of the line for the new domains? How does the average consumer give himself a fighting chance of getting a good domain name early in the process?
I know Mandrake is redhat based, but I assumed it was different enough that Bastille wouldn't work on Mandrake. However, he makes direct reference in his interview to Mandrake - guess it works on Mandrake after all!
But I don't WANT the X-Box to be good.:-) I read more about that other open-source gaming console, the Indrema, and I'd much rather that be the box of choice. I just think the ability to allow mister fan-boy joe-schmoe to write, market, release his on game on the console is very, very cool.
Lo and behold, I am a normally functioning member of society. I have a well-paying job as a network administrator, I'm 22 years old, I play in a hockey league at the local ice rink, I have a girlfriend, and I don't have a criminal record.
Check back with us in a few years. Bet it doesn't last.
I've been reviewing the articles that refer to the congress meeting. One of them on abcnews.com said, "Drummer Lars Ulrich of the heavy metal band Metallica condemned online song-swapping entities such as Napster Inc. and MP3.com for giving away other's music." Other sites have referred to Napster and MP3.com in same breath without referring to Lars.
Just how many morons are there in the media? This is more than annoying, it gets kind of dangerous to know that this kind of misinformation is being propagated.
MP3.Com at least made an effort to protect artist's rights. Their regular mp3.com service doesn't even have anything to do with established contract-bound artists, and everyone in the know is familiar with their security strategy at my.mp3.com, which you have to admit was pretty effective. The security criticism was about how it was easy to give a friend your cds and have them put it in their accounts. But the lawsuit didn't have anything to do with piracy. The stupid thing about the lawsuit was that if the users had actually uploaded the tracks rather than uploading proof, the whole thing would have been legal. The whole thing only hinged on a technicality. my.mp3.com is an example of something that followed the spirit of the law, but not the letter.
Napster, however, is the opposite. Their whole defense strategy can be put in the "wink, wink, nudge, nudge" category. "Oh, we just have a technology that enables people to do something illegal. We're not doing it OURSELVES." They write a utility whose express purpose is to enable this, and then put on a disclaimer saying they don't condone it. Uh, bullshit? And finding undiscovered music through it? Please. You search off of artist name and title. Yeah, you can browse other tracks in a person's directory, but I'd love to see the comparitive percentage usage of that feature. They are following the letter of the law, and not the spirit.
Their new strategy of arguing copyrights might work, but it still doesn't help ultimately. Say they win, and there's a precedent that trading any record company's tracks for free are legal. What about the artist?? Are they just SOL? For those of lazy morality, Napster is cool because they are against the RIAA. But Napster is also against the artist, and ultimately, the consumer. Lazy consumers can convince themselves that going against the RIAA and going against the artist are the same thing, but they are very different. Using the service and hurting artists will eventually hurt the consumer. Using Napster to protest the RIAA is short-sighted and immature.
For those interested in consumer rights versus just getting something for nothing, a real solution is to investigate the anti-competitive practices of the RIAA, and champion artists' rights. Don't defend your "right" to download and keep your free tracks from Napster and Gnutella. And be honest with yourself when you are telling yourself you are only downloading the tracks to see if you want to buy the album. How often have you rationalized this and then realized that the unpaid-for mp3s are still on your disk and playlist weeks later?
Protest the RIAA. Throw away your Napster client. Show your support for micropayment solutions. Write your congressman, write your favorite artists. And to take a break, go to your local open-mic night and drop some coins into the tip jar. Being a responsible consumer doesn't mean figuring out how to get the most while costing yourself the least; damn the consequences. It means to do your part to protect the free economy. To be responsible consumers, it is OUR duty to know when our actions are damaging or constructive in the long run.
I'll be impressed when they develop a Mozilla version of Dragon's Lair.
Or "Hear" Your Own Adventure...
on
Movies Online?
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· Score: 1
I've been crazy about these since I was a kid. Just recently I released an audiobook version of CYOA. It's pretty cool, it is at http://www.mp3.com/StorySprawl - listen to an episode, make your choice, etc. We're gradually adding more music and sound effects.
It's based off of a website that I run called StorySprawl (http://www.storysprawl.com/) - where people can write CYOA books together. Pretty fun stuff once you get the good authors writing.
Like anyone believes the technological advances will stop here. Only a few steps away, these techniques will be a lot faster and more accurate.
What I'm worried about is the removal of physical action between thought and effect. One of the best protections we have as humans is that we need to decide to physically act to express a thought - it's a clear division between thought and action. This sort of thing blurs that distinction. How many of us have had urges that would be illegal if not for the fact that we didn't actually physically do it? And if we were hooked up to a device that would act on these thoughts, then it brings up all sorts of messy issues. Legislating thought among them.
So what is really the difference between a thought followed by the action, and thought by itself? How would a device distinguish between the two if you weren't actually going through the physical motions? The instant you stop making the action itself a requirement, there isn't much of a difference between the thoughts you would act on and the thoughts you wouldn't.
Again, this might actually be wrong if you're referring to cds of someone else's music that you bought. Where's the clear precedent? Where is it spelled out? RIAA says you're wrong. Home Recording Act says you're wrong - someone mentioned an amendement in 1998 but I haven't found that one yet. Making an analog copy of your digital music is okay, but a digital extraction onto your personal computer is illegal (says the RIAA). And it appears that the judge in the my.mp3.com case agrees with that.
You're right, of course, if you're referring to music that you WROTE (or that you otherwise have as IP).
I mean, obviously the judge in the my.mp3.com case disagrees with you here. my.mp3.com was only sued for compiling a database of 80,000 tracks. So they were either found guilty for making the mp3s, or for organizing/categorizing them, and I doubt it's the latter. Remember the suit didn't have anything to do with broadcasting or their customers listening to copies that WEREN'T their own copies. It was simply that mp3.com made mp3s of this music without the artists' consent, and the judge agreed with this.
Where's that amendment? I'd like to look it over.
tunesmith
Re:Copying CD content to ANY hard drive is illegal
on
MP3.com Loses In Court
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· Score: 1
Wow, that's a fascinating article. Someone up the score on that article containing the link.
Are they on crack? Well duh, if some judge agrees with them, then of course mp3.com is illegal; the whole broadcasting/whose-copy-is-it/database-compilation junk is moot; they "broke the law" the instant they burned their cds. But come on, is RIAA just making up stuff here? What about all the US-made products that are specifically marketed to assist in burning cds, like that CreativeLabs model of SBLive that specifically advertises mp3 tools all over its site, or RealPlayer Jukebox, or the other mp3 tools? Are they all covering their ass by explicitly stating they are assuming that users would only use it for their own Intellectual Property?
The one difference between my.mp3.com's scenario and yours is that on my.mp3.com, the users aren't listening to the mp3s that THEY encoded. They're listening to someone ELSE's fair use copies (yes, the mp3s themselves are mp3.com's fair use copies). It's a stupid distinction and a really dangerous precedent. Basically meaning we don't have a right to use a backup copy of IP that we've licensed, if we weren't the ones that made the actual copy. tune
my.mp3.com should have introduced their technology in phases, to isolate what was really the illegal part of their technology. It would have shown how idiotic this ruling and precedent is (especially with the lack of detail on the ruling). For instance:
1. Allow user accounts where people can upload their mp3s (but so that only they can access them). Other sites already do this and they aren't being sued. Fair use.
2. Allow people to listen to their OWN mp3s through streaming instead of downloading them. Someone convince me that that step itself is illegal. That simply ain't a broadcast.
3. Allow people to upload their mp3s using a client software that would also enable them to burn their cds and make the mp3s before uploading. Fair use, just bundling other legal technology.
4. Here's the kicker - my.mp3.com notices that there are several thousand byte-identical copies of that Santana tune on their server... and to save disk space, start going through and deleting SOME of these copies, replacing them with links to other already existing copies.
Get it? That's essentially what they are saying is illegal. 'ln -s'. The users aren't listening to THEIR fair use copies, they're listening to someone else's. THAT's the precedent here.
The rest of the technology is irrelevant and not illegal by itself. They've already done the link. Updating the client to check the server and see if it's necessary to do the upload is just an added feature. Refusing to accept new submissions and only allowing links to the ones that already exist on the server isn't illegal either. The practice they are criminalizing is that we can't use a copy that someone else made of something we've licensed ourself, EVEN IF IT IS BIT-IDENTICAL. How many other companies and applications are breaking this law?
I think we should launch a campaign to save 'ln -s'. SAVE ln -s !!!!
Slashdot Mirror
Any good tutorials on this kind of stuff out there? Code examples?
tune
It really is complicated to think about the best methods of moderation compared to traffic levels. I've got a creative writing site that makes group-created cyoa books - right now it's low-traffic enough that I don't need any of these techniques, but I've thought a lot about how to increase it with popularity. The best idea I've had so far is a sort of clustering approach where people vouch for each other - popularity combined with there being an "in" crowd - but that feels a bit complicated to implement for someone who doesn't have a CS degree like myself.
Looking forward to next month when they come live again...
tune
I've got a site that publishes MP3 choose-your-own-adventure audiobooks. (Sounds weird, but it's quite cool when you think about - listen to the first episode, make a choice, listen to the next one you chose, etc.) Everybody always talks about how it would be great to put a tip jar up on an mp3.com page, how people would probably use it if it were there, so I set one up. I signed up for PayPal, enabled "Web Accept", and now I can accept credit card "donations" of any size from anyone. PayPal takes like 2% of the payment.
It's the easiest method out there that I know of, but even that still feels kind of annoying. A person has to give their name and shipping address even if they aren't being shipped a product. People tip on the street because it's easy and no big deal. 50c here, a buck there, into the street musician's hat. Easy. But on the net it's still a major pain. Are there any easier methods out there? What about the near future?
tune
tune
tune
tune
Check back with us in a few years. Bet it doesn't last.
Just how many morons are there in the media? This is more than annoying, it gets kind of dangerous to know that this kind of misinformation is being propagated.
MP3.Com at least made an effort to protect artist's rights. Their regular mp3.com service doesn't even have anything to do with established contract-bound artists, and everyone in the know is familiar with their security strategy at my.mp3.com, which you have to admit was pretty effective. The security criticism was about how it was easy to give a friend your cds and have them put it in their accounts. But the lawsuit didn't have anything to do with piracy. The stupid thing about the lawsuit was that if the users had actually uploaded the tracks rather than uploading proof, the whole thing would have been legal. The whole thing only hinged on a technicality. my.mp3.com is an example of something that followed the spirit of the law, but not the letter.
Napster, however, is the opposite. Their whole defense strategy can be put in the "wink, wink, nudge, nudge" category. "Oh, we just have a technology that enables people to do something illegal. We're not doing it OURSELVES." They write a utility whose express purpose is to enable this, and then put on a disclaimer saying they don't condone it. Uh, bullshit? And finding undiscovered music through it? Please. You search off of artist name and title. Yeah, you can browse other tracks in a person's directory, but I'd love to see the comparitive percentage usage of that feature. They are following the letter of the law, and not the spirit.
Their new strategy of arguing copyrights might work, but it still doesn't help ultimately. Say they win, and there's a precedent that trading any record company's tracks for free are legal. What about the artist?? Are they just SOL? For those of lazy morality, Napster is cool because they are against the RIAA. But Napster is also against the artist, and ultimately, the consumer. Lazy consumers can convince themselves that going against the RIAA and going against the artist are the same thing, but they are very different. Using the service and hurting artists will eventually hurt the consumer. Using Napster to protest the RIAA is short-sighted and immature.
For those interested in consumer rights versus just getting something for nothing, a real solution is to investigate the anti-competitive practices of the RIAA, and champion artists' rights. Don't defend your "right" to download and keep your free tracks from Napster and Gnutella. And be honest with yourself when you are telling yourself you are only downloading the tracks to see if you want to buy the album. How often have you rationalized this and then realized that the unpaid-for mp3s are still on your disk and playlist weeks later?
Protest the RIAA. Throw away your Napster client. Show your support for micropayment solutions. Write your congressman, write your favorite artists. And to take a break, go to your local open-mic night and drop some coins into the tip jar. Being a responsible consumer doesn't mean figuring out how to get the most while costing yourself the least; damn the consequences. It means to do your part to protect the free economy. To be responsible consumers, it is OUR duty to know when our actions are damaging or constructive in the long run.
tune
It's based off of a website that I run called StorySprawl (http://www.storysprawl.com/) - where people can write CYOA books together. Pretty fun stuff once you get the good authors writing.
Curt
What I'm worried about is the removal of physical action between thought and effect. One of the best protections we have as humans is that we need to decide to physically act to express a thought - it's a clear division between thought and action. This sort of thing blurs that distinction. How many of us have had urges that would be illegal if not for the fact that we didn't actually physically do it? And if we were hooked up to a device that would act on these thoughts, then it brings up all sorts of messy issues. Legislating thought among them.
So what is really the difference between a thought followed by the action, and thought by itself? How would a device distinguish between the two if you weren't actually going through the physical motions? The instant you stop making the action itself a requirement, there isn't much of a difference between the thoughts you would act on and the thoughts you wouldn't.
tunesmith
You're right, of course, if you're referring to music that you WROTE (or that you otherwise have as IP).
tunesmith
I mean, obviously the judge in the my.mp3.com case disagrees with you here. my.mp3.com was only sued for compiling a database of 80,000 tracks. So they were either found guilty for making the mp3s, or for organizing/categorizing them, and I doubt it's the latter. Remember the suit didn't have anything to do with broadcasting or their customers listening to copies that WEREN'T their own copies. It was simply that mp3.com made mp3s of this music without the artists' consent, and the judge agreed with this.
Where's that amendment? I'd like to look it over.
tunesmith
Are they on crack? Well duh, if some judge agrees with them, then of course mp3.com is illegal; the whole broadcasting/whose-copy-is-it/database-compilation junk is moot; they "broke the law" the instant they burned their cds. But come on, is RIAA just making up stuff here? What about all the US-made products that are specifically marketed to assist in burning cds, like that CreativeLabs model of SBLive that specifically advertises mp3 tools all over its site, or RealPlayer Jukebox, or the other mp3 tools? Are they all covering their ass by explicitly stating they are assuming that users would only use it for their own Intellectual Property?
tune
The one difference between my.mp3.com's scenario and yours is that on my.mp3.com, the users aren't listening to the mp3s that THEY encoded. They're listening to someone ELSE's fair use copies (yes, the mp3s themselves are mp3.com's fair use copies). It's a stupid distinction and a really dangerous precedent. Basically meaning we don't have a right to use a backup copy of IP that we've licensed, if we weren't the ones that made the actual copy. tune
1. Allow user accounts where people can upload their mp3s (but so that only they can access them). Other sites already do this and they aren't being sued. Fair use.
2. Allow people to listen to their OWN mp3s through streaming instead of downloading them. Someone convince me that that step itself is illegal. That simply ain't a broadcast.
3. Allow people to upload their mp3s using a client software that would also enable them to burn their cds and make the mp3s before uploading. Fair use, just bundling other legal technology.
4. Here's the kicker - my.mp3.com notices that there are several thousand byte-identical copies of that Santana tune on their server... and to save disk space, start going through and deleting SOME of these copies, replacing them with links to other already existing copies.
Get it? That's essentially what they are saying is illegal. 'ln -s'. The users aren't listening to THEIR fair use copies, they're listening to someone else's. THAT's the precedent here.
The rest of the technology is irrelevant and not illegal by itself. They've already done the link. Updating the client to check the server and see if it's necessary to do the upload is just an added feature. Refusing to accept new submissions and only allowing links to the ones that already exist on the server isn't illegal either. The practice they are criminalizing is that we can't use a copy that someone else made of something we've licensed ourself, EVEN IF IT IS BIT-IDENTICAL. How many other companies and applications are breaking this law?
I think we should launch a campaign to save 'ln -s'. SAVE ln -s !!!!
tune
You can't "uncompress" an mp3, can you? That's like the same thing as "zooming in" on a jpg. mp3 works by sacrificing bits.