If you recall, there was a significant drop-off in the market during the late 80's and 90's, which would correspond to the time between the initial frenzy over 2nd edition and the release of 3rd.
The market shifted when Magic: The Gathering appeared and WotC took over the industry. I remember my last GenCon when the WotC booth was nearly as large as the rest of the booths combined. Seemingly every other company was tripping over themselves to provide some sort of card-based game in retaliation, to the detriment of all roleplayers.
The article -- and its bit about the bill requiring the source to be disclosed to citizens -- refers to the bill as introduced. On November 3rd, the committee gutted the disclosed source requirement. On November 10th, the new version of the bill was in place and THAT was what was passed.
Hence my "replicate, never innovate" comment earlier in this article's life (that was modded down to troll). A rep from one of the funders in the project even claimed, "Google's push has galvanized everyone else," and it's so true. Where are Microsoft's pushes... aside from lack of business ethics?
I believe the article misrepresents the options available to users.
Someone who works in the internet industry and who holds a Ph.D. in computer science thought it "cheaper and faster" to buy another new PC running Windows. A director of a internet-related research group considers this a "rational response." Followed by a list of statistics related to Windows viruses, ad- and mal-ware. Then a professor of computer science at Yale, with another story of another infected Windows machine.
Then a few paragraphs about Microsoft releasing software to combat the problem, noting 800 _million_ uses of the software this year alone, but then not offering any connection to how this affected the personal stories mentioned in the article. Not at all, I would guess, but then this isn't addressed.
Then a story of a woman, a physician, solved her problem by buying a computer that doesn't run Windows. The case selected for this inclusion used nearly the most expensive possible option available, a top-end Macintosh laptop at $3K. The final two stories listed a stockbroker who is at "wits' [sic] end" and considering a new Windows-based PC purchase, and a bank manager who was the only one to clean their own computer of the offending software, albeit via a 15+ hour process of self-education and work.
So what does a reader of this story who doesn't know that much about computers (ie, most users) learn? That very smart, very well-educated people -- even those that are computer professionals, are throwing their old Windows computers out and buying new ones because it's just too complicated or troublesome to fix the old ones. This behavior isn't questioned, but bolstered by the declaration of an important-sounding research group that claims this is a "rational response." And even if you do replace your Windows computer, it'll get infected all over again.
The one person who buys something else other than Windows has to pay $3000 for it. The other person who teaches themselves to remove the infection and hopefully combat it successfully in the future must go through hours of self-teaching and work.
However, the fact that this virus, mal- and ad-ware epidemic only exists on Windows is not discussed. Linux is not discussed. That the woman who bought a $3000 Macintosh could have bought a $500 Macintosh that would have offered her the same safety is not discussed. Hell, even the option of inserting a restore CD and returning the computer back to the way it was delivered to the owner is not discussed.
These are all valid options. I'm not a Ph.D., a physician, or member of a research firm so maybe my opinions don't mean as much. I'm not an employee of a Windows-based PC manufacturer (I will mention though that I the ad that I had to click through to read this article was for Dell). But I use a Macintosh, and have used them exclusively for the past 10+ years, and have never had a single infestation. Ever. So what do I know.
Oh yeah, that I have options. Successful, inexpensive options that were completely overlooked in this article. And after reading the article, if I didn't know any better (and ran Windows), I'd be far more likely to buy a new computer to replace my old infected PC. Maybe even with a new... umm... Dell?
I have plenty of ram as it is. What the hell am I gonna do with 2gigs?
I'm old enough to remember a Radio Shack employee telling me that I'd never need more than 4K of RAM. Or of an Apple employee telling me some years later that I'd never need more than a 5 MB HD. Or now of you, asking what they'd ever do with 2 GB of RAM.
The more RAM, the less has to be done in a HD. I don't ever turn my computers off as it is and leave as many apps running as possible. Things are always just a click away and my access to things is nearly instantaneous. This is what I want, and I always want more.
Kinda' makes 1/2 of the whole "patent thing" null
on
VLC & European Patents
·
· Score: 1
The generally accepted practice in the business world is build it without having any awareness that it was previously discovered or patented, then have your lawyers look for infringement and negotiate a deal.
But weren't patents supposedly a legal bargain between the public and patent holders? The deal was that the patent holder would have exclusive limited-term use of their invention (allowing them to earn compensation now), while the public would have free access to how the invention works (allowing the public to gain compensation later).
Re-inventing the wheel, indeed. How backwards we fall when we attempt to reach so far...
You use the term "specifically [sic] for you" as if it has some meaning in the context of theft.
I spelled "specifically" correctly.
Secondly, I believe it does. Because I speak in the broader sense of logic and personal ethics, not necessarily "the law", something that I'm hopeful we'll both agree as to having its share of mistakes and eventual corrections. I'm not advocating lawlessness, merely... skepticism and prudent civil disobedience.
It matters not who the service was performed for. A technician performed a deed under a contract (social, legal, whatever) that stated he be reimbursed. You propose to benefit from the man's work but to skip out on your side of the deal, i.e. to pay him for the shit that you got.
I doubt anyone on the OS X development team has problems cashing their checks. The man's work in this instance, was paid for by his employer. The legalistic and intellectual barrier that the product of that labor needs to get through to reach you or I, that's the difficult part. It's no longer a physical object or physical service performed in exchange for something.
The ideas of capitalism and intellectual property in 2004 are basically incompatible... capitalism being primarily a property and services based system. Tossed upon an electronic canvas where property loses it's meaning -- where the concept that I can "give" someone something without me losing it, and they in turn can give it to everyone else in the world so that we all can have the same thing -- is anathema to any financial models we've been accustomed to, or even conscious of, since as long as humans have developed trade..
And the thing is that this is a good thing; something that should be strived for at every level. One person suffers a lack of income so that an entire society benefits, vs. one person getting rich while everyone else lies wanting? Which is more profitable for the individual and which more profitable for society?
[514.060 Kentucky Theft of services statute... ] The person intentionally obtains services by deception or threat or by false token or other means to avoid payment for the services he knows are available only for compensation
So, a flirtatious attitude with the bartenders in hopes of scoring free drinks will land you in jail. "Other means" covers a lot of ground, potentially to the point of anything, and thus reads like a catch-all rule for LEOs to get someone with if they can't get anything else to stick.
What's your opinion about third world countries... in respect to how many do either not have or respect copyright laws? Business demands that they enact and enforce these laws, but virtually no citizen of these countries would gain use from these laws. Only the outsiders' interests would remain. The copyright industry has gotten so arrogant that it would ask foreign nations to sign over their citizens' freedoms for nothing in return.
Remember, copyright is not and has never been, a "right" in the same sense that freedom of speech and the right to life are rights. It has always been a government-enacted privilege, enacted for a purpose. Namely, "to promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries." When it fails to actually promote art and science but instead restricts unduly their progress, favoring instead economic special interests, copyright has lost its purpose and in so doing so has become unconstitutional.
When making an illegal copy of something, you may be doing something considered against the law (depending on where you reside geographically on the surface of this planet) but it is not -- technically -- stealing. In the haircut example, labor is performed by someone specifically for you, and you were to have paid them for it. When you don't, that's "theft of services".
When _you_ copy a 10.3 CD, no one has rendered any work specifically for you, and in fact, no one has been required to perform any work at ALL for you. You have not "stolen" the CD from anyone because you are making a COPY. You have not reduced the value of the original CD nor have you harmed the owner of the CD or the manufacturer of it in any physical way. They spent no extra time or effort that has gone uncompensated.
Please don't adopt their language. It's not stealing. It's illegal copying. And that's all it is.
I don't suppose there's a "negotiate a peaceful solution to the dispute" option in the game either. But then, when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail...
So basically your saying your giving the moral highground to a service that is "better" for committing priacy and copyright infringement as opposed to one that fosters spyware?
No "moral highgrounds" are traversed here, I believe. Support in this case is given to the set of tools that interferes the least with an individual's goals. Namely, transferring files efficently without other things to worry about (spyware).
Say you had two handguns. One operated as a normal pistol but the ammunition was harder to obtain, the other used easier-to-find ammo but each gun had a secret GPS installed in the handle that radioed its location back to the manufacturer. Now, even if you used the gun to shoot busloads of schoolchildren, you might rightly say that the non-GPS gun is a better gun, something you'd purchase and from a manufacturer you'd support. What you actually do with the gun is of no consequence to the decision... or this argument.
[...] it wouldn't be too hard to dump a very large truckload of dead-tree pulp and ink on the doorstep of Congress. That's the way demoracy works isn't it?
Thanks for the 1800's nostalgia. Now, back to 2002...
A bunch of people suddenly stopping use of a product(s) does not send a company a message. It must involve some sort of media frenzy so that the message is clear. If we just stop buying/supporting RIAA/MPAA without letting them know that there is a boycott, then they'll just see that as further justifcation that pirates are cutting into their profits.
Unfortunately the crux of the control over how that battle is percieved by the general public flows through the media... and they will obey their corporate and governmental masters to a fault. Transpose "see" with "use" in your last sentence.
And what's wrong with that? No, really, I want to know what the problem is when an entity attempts to defend rights which were granted to it by law.
The concepts of "right" and "wrong" often have little correlation with what is legal and isn't. Think slavery, or the war on drugs, to name two overly obvious examples.
Don't play their game. Do what you think is right and judge others accordingly. It's us vs. the corporations; in the end it will be them if we don't at every purchase assert ourselves so that the public prevails.
Tom's Hardware did a comparative review a little while ago that explained how the Apple Cinema Displays are neat and all, but they don't use current-gen technology. Which is to say, their refresh rate is slooow compared to others, especially in that price range... which is to say, hiiiiigh.:)
Besides, talk to any graphic designer (I'm one). Color reproduction sucks compared to even low-end CRTs and no matter what marketing spin Apple places on their LCDs, this isn't going to change reality. ColorSync can only make things optimum for that display. An LCDs color, at least at this stage in the game, is _not_ optimum and anyone who does any sort of even moderately color-intensive work is no one who should be depended upon to produce trustworthy output.
The other point, have you ever seen the iMac screen or any Apple flat screen? I mean, these screens are used by major print houses because of their color accuracy.
Actually, even top-end LCD monitors don't have the color-reproduction accuracy of even a middle-end CRT. They come close but if you're actually doing any prepress color-sensitive work you're using a CRT if you know what's up.
Microsoft and Sony can impose a monopoly on where you play online, which isn't the case for PC's.
But some PC games communicate with authentication services run by the game publishers, thereby maintaining a monopoly on who can play their games even if the software is already on your HD. Take Quake 3 Arena, for instance. There is one valid authorization key for each game sold. No one shares their keys because if they do, Id Software's authentication server catches more than one instance of that key in use at a time and it invalidates the key -- barring you from access to multiplayer servers.
So following this strategy, publishers could issue unique keys with their XBOX or PS/2 games and have the games check in with a keyserver. If your game is hacked by you or by outsiders (that r00ted your box) and this causes you to get caught, your key gets suspended or revoked.
Slashdot Mirror
If you recall, there was a significant drop-off in the market during the late 80's and 90's, which would correspond to the time between the initial frenzy over 2nd edition and the release of 3rd.
The market shifted when Magic: The Gathering appeared and WotC took over the industry. I remember my last GenCon when the WotC booth was nearly as large as the rest of the booths combined. Seemingly every other company was tripping over themselves to provide some sort of card-based game in retaliation, to the detriment of all roleplayers.
... the Pentagon says it will wage war against the internet ...
Is there anything that America doesn't "wage war" against? It's like a mentally retarded child who responds in the same way, regardless of stimulus.
Evil is a subjective term, and therefore to "not do it" isn't legally enforceable.
My guess is that an evil shrink could induce anxiety disorder/phobias in otherwise normal people, just through the power of suggestion.
s/shrink/girlfriend/
The article -- and its bit about the bill requiring the source to be disclosed to citizens -- refers to the bill as introduced. On November 3rd, the committee gutted the disclosed source requirement. On November 10th, the new version of the bill was in place and THAT was what was passed.
p df
Legislative history of AB627: http://www.legis.state.wi.us/2005/data/AB-627hst.
Hence my "replicate, never innovate" comment earlier in this article's life (that was modded down to troll). A rep from one of the funders in the project even claimed, "Google's push has galvanized everyone else," and it's so true. Where are Microsoft's pushes... aside from lack of business ethics?
...never innovate.
Only 10 supported network connections, on even their premier version. What a steaming pile of authoritarian B.S.
I believe the article misrepresents the options available to users.
Someone who works in the internet industry and who holds a Ph.D. in computer science thought it "cheaper and faster" to buy another new PC running Windows. A director of a internet-related research group considers this a "rational response." Followed by a list of statistics related to Windows viruses, ad- and mal-ware. Then a professor of computer science at Yale, with another story of another infected Windows machine.
Then a few paragraphs about Microsoft releasing software to combat the problem, noting 800 _million_ uses of the software this year alone, but then not offering any connection to how this affected the personal stories mentioned in the article. Not at all, I would guess, but then this isn't addressed.
Then a story of a woman, a physician, solved her problem by buying a computer that doesn't run Windows. The case selected for this inclusion used nearly the most expensive possible option available, a top-end Macintosh laptop at $3K. The final two stories listed a stockbroker who is at "wits' [sic] end" and considering a new Windows-based PC purchase, and a bank manager who was the only one to clean their own computer of the offending software, albeit via a 15+ hour process of self-education and work.
So what does a reader of this story who doesn't know that much about computers (ie, most users) learn? That very smart, very well-educated people -- even those that are computer professionals, are throwing their old Windows computers out and buying new ones because it's just too complicated or troublesome to fix the old ones. This behavior isn't questioned, but bolstered by the declaration of an important-sounding research group that claims this is a "rational response." And even if you do replace your Windows computer, it'll get infected all over again.
The one person who buys something else other than Windows has to pay $3000 for it. The other person who teaches themselves to remove the infection and hopefully combat it successfully in the future must go through hours of self-teaching and work.
However, the fact that this virus, mal- and ad-ware epidemic only exists on Windows is not discussed. Linux is not discussed. That the woman who bought a $3000 Macintosh could have bought a $500 Macintosh that would have offered her the same safety is not discussed. Hell, even the option of inserting a restore CD and returning the computer back to the way it was delivered to the owner is not discussed.
These are all valid options. I'm not a Ph.D., a physician, or member of a research firm so maybe my opinions don't mean as much. I'm not an employee of a Windows-based PC manufacturer (I will mention though that I the ad that I had to click through to read this article was for Dell). But I use a Macintosh, and have used them exclusively for the past 10+ years, and have never had a single infestation. Ever. So what do I know.
Oh yeah, that I have options. Successful, inexpensive options that were completely overlooked in this article. And after reading the article, if I didn't know any better (and ran Windows), I'd be far more likely to buy a new computer to replace my old infected PC. Maybe even with a new... umm... Dell?
I have plenty of ram as it is. What the hell am I gonna do with 2gigs?
I'm old enough to remember a Radio Shack employee telling me that I'd never need more than 4K of RAM. Or of an Apple employee telling me some years later that I'd never need more than a 5 MB HD. Or now of you, asking what they'd ever do with 2 GB of RAM.
The more RAM, the less has to be done in a HD. I don't ever turn my computers off as it is and leave as many apps running as possible. Things are always just a click away and my access to things is nearly instantaneous. This is what I want, and I always want more.
The generally accepted practice in the business world is build it without having any awareness that it was previously discovered or patented, then have your lawyers look for infringement and negotiate a deal.
But weren't patents supposedly a legal bargain between the public and patent holders? The deal was that the patent holder would have exclusive limited-term use of their invention (allowing them to earn compensation now), while the public would have free access to how the invention works (allowing the public to gain compensation later).
Re-inventing the wheel, indeed. How backwards we fall when we attempt to reach so far...
Umm... for when you're offline?
This is a GAME. It should be ENTERTAINING.
But this is the U.S., where Capitalism is sport.
You use the term "specifically [sic] for you" as if it has some meaning in the context of theft.
... ] The person intentionally obtains services by deception or threat or by false token or other means to avoid payment for the services he knows are available only for compensation
I spelled "specifically" correctly.
Secondly, I believe it does. Because I speak in the broader sense of logic and personal ethics, not necessarily "the law", something that I'm hopeful we'll both agree as to having its share of mistakes and eventual corrections. I'm not advocating lawlessness, merely... skepticism and prudent civil disobedience.
It matters not who the service was performed for. A technician performed a deed under a contract (social, legal, whatever) that stated he be reimbursed. You propose to benefit from the man's work but to skip out on your side of the deal, i.e. to pay him for the shit that you got.
I doubt anyone on the OS X development team has problems cashing their checks. The man's work in this instance, was paid for by his employer. The legalistic and intellectual barrier that the product of that labor needs to get through to reach you or I, that's the difficult part. It's no longer a physical object or physical service performed in exchange for something.
The ideas of capitalism and intellectual property in 2004 are basically incompatible... capitalism being primarily a property and services based system. Tossed upon an electronic canvas where property loses it's meaning -- where the concept that I can "give" someone something without me losing it, and they in turn can give it to everyone else in the world so that we all can have the same thing -- is anathema to any financial models we've been accustomed to, or even conscious of, since as long as humans have developed trade..
And the thing is that this is a good thing; something that should be strived for at every level. One person suffers a lack of income so that an entire society benefits, vs. one person getting rich while everyone else lies wanting? Which is more profitable for the individual and which more profitable for society?
[514.060 Kentucky Theft of services statute
So, a flirtatious attitude with the bartenders in hopes of scoring free drinks will land you in jail. "Other means" covers a lot of ground, potentially to the point of anything, and thus reads like a catch-all rule for LEOs to get someone with if they can't get anything else to stick.
What's your opinion about third world countries... in respect to how many do either not have or respect copyright laws? Business demands that they enact and enforce these laws, but virtually no citizen of these countries would gain use from these laws. Only the outsiders' interests would remain. The copyright industry has gotten so arrogant that it would ask foreign nations to sign over their citizens' freedoms for nothing in return.
Remember, copyright is not and has never been, a "right" in the same sense that freedom of speech and the right to life are rights. It has always been a government-enacted privilege, enacted for a purpose. Namely, "to promote the progress of science and useful arts, by securing for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries." When it fails to actually promote art and science but instead restricts unduly their progress, favoring instead economic special interests, copyright has lost its purpose and in so doing so has become unconstitutional.
Prost,
Craig
When making an illegal copy of something, you may be doing something considered against the law (depending on where you reside geographically on the surface of this planet) but it is not -- technically -- stealing. In the haircut example, labor is performed by someone specifically for you, and you were to have paid them for it. When you don't, that's "theft of services".
When _you_ copy a 10.3 CD, no one has rendered any work specifically for you, and in fact, no one has been required to perform any work at ALL for you. You have not "stolen" the CD from anyone because you are making a COPY. You have not reduced the value of the original CD nor have you harmed the owner of the CD or the manufacturer of it in any physical way. They spent no extra time or effort that has gone uncompensated.
Please don't adopt their language. It's not stealing. It's illegal copying. And that's all it is.
I don't suppose there's a "negotiate a peaceful solution to the dispute" option in the game either. But then, when all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail...
Funny, I don't recall cabinet positions ever appearing on a ballot.
For families that only had $700 to spend on toys for kids, this was a fiasco.
Really, I mean, how could the parents look their children in the eyes come December 26th?
So basically your saying your giving the moral highground to a service that is "better" for committing priacy and copyright infringement as opposed to one that fosters spyware?
No "moral highgrounds" are traversed here, I believe. Support in this case is given to the set of tools that interferes the least with an individual's goals. Namely, transferring files efficently without other things to worry about (spyware).
Say you had two handguns. One operated as a normal pistol but the ammunition was harder to obtain, the other used easier-to-find ammo but each gun had a secret GPS installed in the handle that radioed its location back to the manufacturer. Now, even if you used the gun to shoot busloads of schoolchildren, you might rightly say that the non-GPS gun is a better gun, something you'd purchase and from a manufacturer you'd support. What you actually do with the gun is of no consequence to the decision... or this argument.
[...] it wouldn't be too hard to dump a very large truckload of dead-tree pulp and ink on the doorstep of Congress. That's the way demoracy works isn't it?
Thanks for the 1800's nostalgia. Now, back to 2002...
A bunch of people suddenly stopping use of a product(s) does not send a company a message. It must involve some sort of media frenzy so that the message is clear. If we just stop buying/supporting RIAA/MPAA without letting them know that there is a boycott, then they'll just see that as further justifcation that pirates are cutting into their profits.
Unfortunately the crux of the control over how that battle is percieved by the general public flows through the media... and they will obey their corporate and governmental masters to a fault. Transpose "see" with "use" in your last sentence.
And what's wrong with that? No, really, I want to know what the problem is when an entity attempts to defend rights which were granted to it by law.
The concepts of "right" and "wrong" often have little correlation with what is legal and isn't. Think slavery, or the war on drugs, to name two overly obvious examples.
Don't play their game. Do what you think is right and judge others accordingly. It's us vs. the corporations; in the end it will be them if we don't at every purchase assert ourselves so that the public prevails.
Tom's Hardware did a comparative review a little while ago that explained how the Apple Cinema Displays are neat and all, but they don't use current-gen technology. Which is to say, their refresh rate is slooow compared to others, especially in that price range... which is to say, hiiiiigh. :)
Besides, talk to any graphic designer (I'm one). Color reproduction sucks compared to even low-end CRTs and no matter what marketing spin Apple places on their LCDs, this isn't going to change reality. ColorSync can only make things optimum for that display. An LCDs color, at least at this stage in the game, is _not_ optimum and anyone who does any sort of even moderately color-intensive work is no one who should be depended upon to produce trustworthy output.
The other point, have you ever seen the iMac screen or any Apple flat screen? I mean, these screens are used by major print houses because of their color accuracy.
Actually, even top-end LCD monitors don't have the color-reproduction accuracy of even a middle-end CRT. They come close but if you're actually doing any prepress color-sensitive work you're using a CRT if you know what's up.
Microsoft and Sony can impose a monopoly on where you play online, which isn't the case for PC's.
But some PC games communicate with authentication services run by the game publishers, thereby maintaining a monopoly on who can play their games even if the software is already on your HD. Take Quake 3 Arena, for instance. There is one valid authorization key for each game sold. No one shares their keys because if they do, Id Software's authentication server catches more than one instance of that key in use at a time and it invalidates the key -- barring you from access to multiplayer servers.
So following this strategy, publishers could issue unique keys with their XBOX or PS/2 games and have the games check in with a keyserver. If your game is hacked by you or by outsiders (that r00ted your box) and this causes you to get caught, your key gets suspended or revoked.