I have a teenage sister, and just talking to her you realize how pop culture sells her music so well
You said "her" - you do realise that the same thing applied to you a few years ago too? In fact it's likely that the techniques they used then were much simpler so, if anything, you were less-savvy than her.
Frightening to realise how dumb we were, isn't it;-)
Getting back to the OP's point, it won't happen like that at all. Future generations won't be whinging how hard things are in their day compared to ours, and the RIAA/MPAA won't be long-dead dinosaur monopolistic cartels lining the side of society's road. Future generations will be the same as ours - swallowing the latest & greatest styles and technologies in their teens, then in their 20's and 30's bemoaning how when they were teenagers a DRM'd HD-AV-cube could be played on any licensed player, but now they're tied to individual machines so you have to buy a new licence for each machine you want to play it in...
Do we advocate illegal copying of commercial software, and if so, why?
Well, if you're interested in an individual rather than groupthink answer here's mine: I don't care. In fact, if you agree to strip away all the artificial constructs that abound in the argument, it comes down to this: There's a market, and it's being filled. That's capitalism. What's the problem, other than that somebody doesn't like it?
The United States has a big software business. It has copyright laws that are, on paper, agreed to by other countries by international agreement. So why the big fuss when they want them to be enforced?
Because these copyright laws that are held so dear tend to be one sided, favouring individual organisations rather than the market? Because they have primarily been spread world-wide through fear, threat, misrepresentation and ignorance rather than usefulness or mutual benefit? Because those that demand them most are also quite happy to misrepresent, ignore, or twist them to suit their purposes?
You seem to advocate a purely interpretive view of the structure of copyright law, rather than assesing its suitability for purpose. Unfortunately, while the purpose is still supposedly "for the greater good of mankind", the interpretation has been twisted to become "for the greater enrichment of me, the copyright holder". That's the problem lying under all of this.
If we stand for the violation of commercial intellectual property, we must allow for the violation of open-source intellectual property. Legally, they are no different.
Legally, you're right. Morally, you've got a shaky argument. Now, I don't particularly like the GPL myself (in fact, for the same reason I'm about to argue in its defence!), but I have to give it props for this: it's an attempt to use a broken, misused, and abused system to product a more morally correct result.
Wow... "+5, Insightful". How did the moderation system manage to work so well?. I mean, last week this would have been moderated to "-5, Commie Pinko Raghead Axis Of Evil Troll".
Did they take the crack out of the water supply around here when they rejigged for CSS?
Somebody should keep an eye on the editors for withdrawal symptoms - like posting timely, up-to-date, brand-spanking-new, non-dupe news stories...
If you want to send a Dutch advisor, go for it. Very likely there's already one here, but feel free to send another. Nobody will care or notice.
Which is exactly how it should be with this announcement from the US.
What, you don't like that? Well, just enjoy this free sample of the "it sucks to be you" attitude which seems to be the US's major export these days...
Are you implying that the current state of the trade deficit is somehow good?
Sure. Why not? Maybe not from your POV, but from the POV of China it certainly is. And since I'm not from China or the US, I don't care much either way about that particular case.
What you *seem* to be complaining about, really, is that you were sold a pup - you were told all this stuff about free trade, globalisation, etc, being good (and I'm not arguing that it isn't in theory...), and were happy to reap the benefits - but now you see that it has a cost you're not happy with. Well, boo-fucking-hoo, cry me a river.
Congratulations. What you've just discovered is the incongruity between all the rhetoric about the global economy and globalisation, and the self-centredness inherent in people and their constructs (cities, states, countries, trade organisations, companies, etc).
Ah, but you've forgotten the question. It wasn't "When will E-Books become suitable for particular applications by techno-toy-loving nerds?", it was "When will E-Books become mainstream?"
Face it, you and others like you are not even a footnote compared to the (I'm guessing) several billion paperbacks sold worldwide each year. For most people, e-books fail even the most basic comparison with paperbacks - the readers are expensive, fragile, unwieldy to use, and can't run forever on 0 energy input.
The only real advantage they might claim for general use is capacity - you can, as you say, buy a reader and stuff it with 3 bookcases worth of books. Exactly the same advantage that an iPod, or even the first-generation Walkmans, has. But they succeeded by filling other niches - portability and, in the case of the CD walkman/iPod, random accessability. A problem that the written word doesn't face, for 3 reasons. Firstly, it's already been solved by paperbacks. Secondly, the attention span is longer - a song goes for 3 minutes, a CD goes for 60 minutes, but a good book can go for days. And thirdly, 99% of people don't need to flip between books or search for text.
But did you buy your car without a limiter fitted? Did the dealer later fit one as a compulsory "upgrade" when you took it in for a service?
If they did, did they later tell you about it by couching it in weasel-words, such as "an exciting new enhancement", "improved functionality", or "for your safety & convenience"?
"That guy over there taking a smoke break after just assembling 1200 widgets in 50 minutes is lazy, even if he's only being paid to assemble 1000 widgets per hour. I, on the other hand, am special, and those rules don't apply to me."
As a person who's job straddles the manual and the technological, I think you're an arrogant self-centred fsckwit with an inflated sense of self-importance and a borderline Randian superiority complex.
If you really think you do a better job working hard for 6 hours and goofing off for 2, convince your management of this - I'm sure they'll be glad to only pay you for 6 hours, and let you goof off on your own time...
"Plasma displays suck. LCD displays suck, but for different reasons. RP and DLP suck too, as do projectors. CRTs suck least of all, mainly because after 50 years everybody has become immune to the ways they suck.
Buy a CRT, and live with the size and weight. If you really want something bigger than about 80cm then you have another, more easily cured, problem : buy some Viagra."
Seriously. You've just learnt a useful new word today. It means something like an array, or maybe a.conf or.ini file, except in the real world. Use it. If nothing else, it's much more succinct than the usual "a list of names and stuff and other shit".
Technology is a great way to shift learning towards problem solving, creativity and less on rote.
I presume, when you say "technology", you actually mean "using computers" - and not, say, building a relaxation oscillator (to flash your front panel blue LED), or pondering why LIRC is a bad software solution to something that should properly be done in hardware...
In which case : have you seen any "educational" software? Have you seen how the average person/student uses computers?
To reply to my own first question, if there's one thing that computers (ok, software) isn't good at, it's complex answers and abstracts. It can't parse your answer as to why the Hapsburg Empire collapsed, or how it affected international relations in Europe, setting the stage for a couple of world wars. It can't even prove that your explanation of how a differential equation is solved is correct. Why is why such things are presented in (a) (b) (c) (d) multiple choice.
And, to reply to my own second question, look around your class or office. There'll be one person who can code in javascript, VB, or write a HTML page. There'll be a couple more who can actually install software when autorun is disabled. Then there's the other 95% who, as somebody else mentioned earlier, get thoroughly confused when their icons get re-sorted or IE doesn't start up in full-screen...
I'm sorry, but your courses will not gurantee (or even encourage) people to think or actually talk (regurgitate yes, talk no). History in particular (and to a lesser extant your artistic course) is one that would benefit greatly from use of technology. History can become very dogmatic...
Wow. Is dogmatic regurgitation really how history is taught in the US? When I was in high school (admittedly 20-odd years ago, in Australia), history was the one subject that used multiple sources, with multiple viewpoints, and much in-class discussion. Basically, it was the only subject where critical thinking and analysis skills were developed and practised.
Which, come to think of it, may explain why I failed Ancient History (places & dates), and topped the state in Modern History (how & why).
Funnily enough, the only other subjects which come to mind that encouraged thinking were woodwork and metalwork. Which I also failed, but I happen to be pretty handy with these days - I'm no carpenter or metalworker, but I can build a set of cabinets, turn an armature or cut a thread on a lathe, or fabricate a metal box or bracket better than the average handyman (and some so-called "tradesmen").
... and he can cure polyps and ulcers. Teach a man to build his own endoscope, and you can sell him the bits, let him cure polyps and ulcers, and sue him for IP infringement!
But hey, what would I know. I still laugh at all the/. libertarians - right-wing and accelerating rapidy towards a sort of political event horizon as far the rest of the world is concerned - who get rabidly fanatical over Linux, as nice a piece of applied socialism as the world has ever seen...
Personally, I vote for hypocritical, with a good dash of arrogant ignorance thrown in.
And, after that, a proctologist to remove a Sandgroper's boot from your arse...
Being a Queenslander, I though we were the thinnest-skinned, most parochial state in the country. Until the day I accidently insulted an Eagles supporter...
The thing that bugs me is the entitlement mentality that some have about this. If it is "WiFi" then it should be free.
I think the mentality is that if it's the internet then it should be free.
I put it down to the lack of a visible, physical aspect. With a computer, you buy a box. With teh internets, you buy a modem. With ethernet, you buy a nic, router, and cables. Wireless is different - no wires = no physical aspect = no pay.
Same goes for MP3s - no CD, no pay. My theory falls down a bit when you consider iTMS, but the iTunes app seems to have gained a sort of pseudo-physical solidness - probably due to its (a) Mac-ness, (b) cool factor [yeah, OK, I know it sucks dogs balls on Wintel, but it's quite nice on the Mac], and (c) its tie-in with the physical iPod.
What I think would work is for one of the large supermarket chains (e.g. Coles or Woolworths in australia or whatever it is in your part of the world) to get into online sales.
Having said that, don't use them - they have a *very* limited range (yes, even your local drop-the-product-you-want-and-replace-with-paid-pr oduct-placement Woolies or Coles has a better range), substitute at the drop of a hat ("sorry, we're out of Nescafe Gold Blend, here's some International Roast instead"), and their very few "specials" are usually of the "1.7kg for only $5.00!" variety - where a 1kg pack sells alongside it for $2.00...
A while ago I was had a job to do at the local international airport, and had to park at the back of the bus station and walk to the terminal. Now, the bus terminal there is large, single-level, baking-hot concrete open to the tropical sun. The only undercover area was taken up almost entirely with drink machines dispensing Coke - at $3 a can. Inside the terminal, machines sold Coke for $2 a can.
Outside, in the real world, cold cans of Coke sell for ~$1.20. You can buy a hot can from the supermarket for around half that. When I mentioned this to the maintenance supervisor, he pointed out the total lack of places to buy cold drinks in the non-customs area of the terminal.
Largely, the mythical free market works - as long as you remember that the ultimate purpose of each player in a free market is to turn it into a non-free market, with them at the centre. Doesn't matter it it happens through real competition, buying protection from the market regulator (usually government; in my example the airport corporation), or making up bullshit excuses to cripple the opposition...
Take a 500 amp-hour battery - typically, in a telephone exchange, these consist of twenty-four 2.2v cells in series, each cell rated at 500A/H. A small telephone exchange, servicing a few hundred customers, would have 2 such banks in parallel.
Now, that A/H rating is actually calculated at what is called the C/10 rate - that is, the battery won't really supply 500A for one hour, but will supply 50A for ten hours.
The rule-of-thumb for calculating the instantaneous current a battery bank could supply was to multiply the A/H rating by 11 - so, a 500A/H battery could supply 5500A into a spanner dropped across the teminals.
I regularly worked on 2170A/H batteries, and the biggest I ever saw were 3200A/H - or a touch over 35 thousand amps instantaneous current through the soon-to-be-ex-spanner you just dropped onto the busbar...
It's just the typical/. lack of knowledge about any technology outside of programming and go-faster blue LEDs...
I used to work daily with battery banks quite capable of supplying 19,000A instantaneous current (@ 50v) - and I'd guess there's at least 100 of those in Australia, let alone all the smaller ones scattered around the country. By/. math, that'd mean that Telstra has at a minimum 1 one-hundredth of the worlds total electrical power stored away in their telephone exchanges.
Somebody else has already mentioned that that is a fairly common and logical strategy - no single point of failure and all.
I'd just like to add this:
AD tree? That's a server licence.
IIS server? That's another server licence.
SQL server? That's yet another server licence.
Somehow I think MS's particular line of reasoning for running services on separate boxes has less to do with security, and more to do with maximising revenue...
Slashdot Mirror
Frightening to realise how dumb we were, isn't it
Getting back to the OP's point, it won't happen like that at all. Future generations won't be whinging how hard things are in their day compared to ours, and the RIAA/MPAA won't be long-dead dinosaur monopolistic cartels lining the side of society's road. Future generations will be the same as ours - swallowing the latest & greatest styles and technologies in their teens, then in their 20's and 30's bemoaning how when they were teenagers a DRM'd HD-AV-cube could be played on any licensed player, but now they're tied to individual machines so you have to buy a new licence for each machine you want to play it in...
Because these copyright laws that are held so dear tend to be one sided, favouring individual organisations rather than the market? Because they have primarily been spread world-wide through fear, threat, misrepresentation and ignorance rather than usefulness or mutual benefit? Because those that demand them most are also quite happy to misrepresent, ignore, or twist them to suit their purposes?
You seem to advocate a purely interpretive view of the structure of copyright law, rather than assesing its suitability for purpose. Unfortunately, while the purpose is still supposedly "for the greater good of mankind", the interpretation has been twisted to become "for the greater enrichment of me, the copyright holder". That's the problem lying under all of this.
Legally, you're right. Morally, you've got a shaky argument. Now, I don't particularly like the GPL myself (in fact, for the same reason I'm about to argue in its defence!), but I have to give it props for this: it's an attempt to use a broken, misused, and abused system to product a more morally correct result.
Define "proper". Because it sounds like that good old definition of "cheating: somebody's not playing the cards I dealt them."
Wow ... "+5, Insightful". How did the moderation system manage to work so well?. I mean, last week this would have been moderated to "-5, Commie Pinko Raghead Axis Of Evil Troll".
Did they take the crack out of the water supply around here when they rejigged for CSS?
Somebody should keep an eye on the editors for withdrawal symptoms - like posting timely, up-to-date, brand-spanking-new, non-dupe news stories...
What, you don't like that? Well, just enjoy this free sample of the "it sucks to be you" attitude which seems to be the US's major export these days...
What you *seem* to be complaining about, really, is that you were sold a pup - you were told all this stuff about free trade, globalisation, etc, being good (and I'm not arguing that it isn't in theory...), and were happy to reap the benefits - but now you see that it has a cost you're not happy with. Well, boo-fucking-hoo, cry me a river.
Congratulations. What you've just discovered is the incongruity between all the rhetoric about the global economy and globalisation, and the self-centredness inherent in people and their constructs (cities, states, countries, trade organisations, companies, etc).
Ah, but you've forgotten the question. It wasn't "When will E-Books become suitable for particular applications by techno-toy-loving nerds?", it was "When will E-Books become mainstream?"
Face it, you and others like you are not even a footnote compared to the (I'm guessing) several billion paperbacks sold worldwide each year. For most people, e-books fail even the most basic comparison with paperbacks - the readers are expensive, fragile, unwieldy to use, and can't run forever on 0 energy input.
The only real advantage they might claim for general use is capacity - you can, as you say, buy a reader and stuff it with 3 bookcases worth of books. Exactly the same advantage that an iPod, or even the first-generation Walkmans, has. But they succeeded by filling other niches - portability and, in the case of the CD walkman/iPod, random accessability. A problem that the written word doesn't face, for 3 reasons. Firstly, it's already been solved by paperbacks. Secondly, the attention span is longer - a song goes for 3 minutes, a CD goes for 60 minutes, but a good book can go for days. And thirdly, 99% of people don't need to flip between books or search for text.
I use a Mac, you insensitive clod!
But did you buy your car without a limiter fitted? Did the dealer later fit one as a compulsory "upgrade" when you took it in for a service?
If they did, did they later tell you about it by couching it in weasel-words, such as "an exciting new enhancement", "improved functionality", or "for your safety & convenience"?
I thought not...
2) On your criteria, most of
As a person who's job straddles the manual and the technological, I think you're an arrogant self-centred fsckwit with an inflated sense of self-importance and a borderline Randian superiority complex.
If you really think you do a better job working hard for 6 hours and goofing off for 2, convince your management of this - I'm sure they'll be glad to only pay you for 6 hours, and let you goof off on your own time...
"Plasma displays suck. LCD displays suck, but for different reasons. RP and DLP suck too, as do projectors. CRTs suck least of all, mainly because after 50 years everybody has become immune to the ways they suck.
Buy a CRT, and live with the size and weight. If you really want something bigger than about 80cm then you have another, more easily cured, problem : buy some Viagra."
"He's making a list, ..."
.conf or .ini file, except in the real world. Use it. If nothing else, it's much more succinct than the usual "a list of names and stuff and other shit".
Checking it twice
Seriously. You've just learnt a useful new word today. It means something like an array, or maybe a
In which case : have you seen any "educational" software? Have you seen how the average person/student uses computers?
To reply to my own first question, if there's one thing that computers (ok, software) isn't good at, it's complex answers and abstracts. It can't parse your answer as to why the Hapsburg Empire collapsed, or how it affected international relations in Europe, setting the stage for a couple of world wars. It can't even prove that your explanation of how a differential equation is solved is correct. Why is why such things are presented in (a) (b) (c) (d) multiple choice.
And, to reply to my own second question, look around your class or office. There'll be one person who can code in javascript, VB, or write a HTML page. There'll be a couple more who can actually install software when autorun is disabled. Then there's the other 95% who, as somebody else mentioned earlier, get thoroughly confused when their icons get re-sorted or IE doesn't start up in full-screen...
Which, come to think of it, may explain why I failed Ancient History (places & dates), and topped the state in Modern History (how & why).
Funnily enough, the only other subjects which come to mind that encouraged thinking were woodwork and metalwork. Which I also failed, but I happen to be pretty handy with these days - I'm no carpenter or metalworker, but I can build a set of cabinets, turn an armature or cut a thread on a lathe, or fabricate a metal box or bracket better than the average handyman (and some so-called "tradesmen").
... and he can cure polyps and ulcers. Teach a man to build his own endoscope, and you can sell him the bits, let him cure polyps and ulcers, and sue him for IP infringement!
/. libertarians - right-wing and accelerating rapidy towards a sort of political event horizon as far the rest of the world is concerned - who get rabidly fanatical over Linux, as nice a piece of applied socialism as the world has ever seen...
But hey, what would I know. I still laugh at all the
Personally, I vote for hypocritical, with a good dash of arrogant ignorance thrown in.
And, after that, a proctologist to remove a Sandgroper's boot from your arse...
Being a Queenslander, I though we were the thinnest-skinned, most parochial state in the country. Until the day I accidently insulted an Eagles supporter...
I think the mentality is that if it's the internet then it should be free.
I put it down to the lack of a visible, physical aspect. With a computer, you buy a box. With teh internets, you buy a modem. With ethernet, you buy a nic, router, and cables. Wireless is different - no wires = no physical aspect = no pay.
Same goes for MP3s - no CD, no pay. My theory falls down a bit when you consider iTMS, but the iTunes app seems to have gained a sort of pseudo-physical solidness - probably due to its (a) Mac-ness, (b) cool factor [yeah, OK, I know it sucks dogs balls on Wintel, but it's quite nice on the Mac], and (c) its tie-in with the physical iPod.
*Yawn*
That's nothing. Wake me when they're loud enough to be heard in New York...
Yes. We call them "budgie smugglers"...
Having said that, don't use them - they have a *very* limited range (yes, even your local drop-the-product-you-want-and-replace-with-paid-p
A while ago I was had a job to do at the local international airport, and had to park at the back of the bus station and walk to the terminal. Now, the bus terminal there is large, single-level, baking-hot concrete open to the tropical sun. The only undercover area was taken up almost entirely with drink machines dispensing Coke - at $3 a can. Inside the terminal, machines sold Coke for $2 a can.
Outside, in the real world, cold cans of Coke sell for ~$1.20. You can buy a hot can from the supermarket for around half that. When I mentioned this to the maintenance supervisor, he pointed out the total lack of places to buy cold drinks in the non-customs area of the terminal.
Largely, the mythical free market works - as long as you remember that the ultimate purpose of each player in a free market is to turn it into a non-free market, with them at the centre. Doesn't matter it it happens through real competition, buying protection from the market regulator (usually government; in my example the airport corporation), or making up bullshit excuses to cripple the opposition...
Perhaps I should elaborate a bit...
Take a 500 amp-hour battery - typically, in a telephone exchange, these consist of twenty-four 2.2v cells in series, each cell rated at 500A/H. A small telephone exchange, servicing a few hundred customers, would have 2 such banks in parallel.
Now, that A/H rating is actually calculated at what is called the C/10 rate - that is, the battery won't really supply 500A for one hour, but will supply 50A for ten hours.
The rule-of-thumb for calculating the instantaneous current a battery bank could supply was to multiply the A/H rating by 11 - so, a 500A/H battery could supply 5500A into a spanner dropped across the teminals.
I regularly worked on 2170A/H batteries, and the biggest I ever saw were 3200A/H - or a touch over 35 thousand amps instantaneous current through the soon-to-be-ex-spanner you just dropped onto the busbar...
It's just the typical /. lack of knowledge about any technology outside of programming and go-faster blue LEDs...
/. math, that'd mean that Telstra has at a minimum 1 one-hundredth of the worlds total electrical power stored away in their telephone exchanges.
I used to work daily with battery banks quite capable of supplying 19,000A instantaneous current (@ 50v) - and I'd guess there's at least 100 of those in Australia, let alone all the smaller ones scattered around the country. By
Yes, Telstra is evil, but not for that reason...
I'd just like to add this
- AD tree? That's a server licence.
- IIS server? That's another server licence.
- SQL server? That's yet another server licence.
Somehow I think MS's particular line of reasoning for running services on separate boxes has less to do with security, and more to do with maximising revenue...