Just how is anyone selling anything ripping off anyone? No one is forcing anyone to buy anything.
Since most of the/. crowd really only cares about movies and throwaway music and other luxuries, maybe they ought to get a clue and realize that the way to thwart the Big Evil Corporate Bogeymen is to stop buying the stuff.
Smacks more than a bit of the obese bitching that Big Macs cost too much.
I agree; I would never read a book displayed on any kind of monitor screen.
If Google simply displays a tiny excerpt and then offers a "buy" link, you're right: everyone wins. That, I believe, would not break copyright law. But, since the copyright law is not a decision tree , a publisher might still sue in order to obtain a court ruling.
If a work isn't under copyright, then Google owes no one.
The Pony Express and telegraph analogy is misguided. We're talking about unauthorized distribution of products, not different ways of transmitting information.
I'm tempted to say Doctorow was simply feeding a line to the "What's Yours Is Mine" Crowd so those among them with actual disposable income would run down to the bookstore and buy his book.
Doctorow's assertion, of course, is entirely anecdotal. Where are the numbers that might substantiate it?
It defies logic to deny that people who make money selling books will not be harmed if someone else provides free copies of those books. This may be especially true for publishers of specialized and academic books that, by definition, have very small potential audiences.
The publishers should sue Google and Google should be required to pay the publishers each time a publication is accessed via Google.
I don't know, but this could just as easily happened in the UK. Bank employees knowingly sold the data. The staff at your local Barclays could do the same thing, too.
Two points to remember: 1. No law (and there are laws against this in the U.S.) will prevent crime if the criminal believes he can get away with it; 2. The only techbical aspect of this crime is the way the data were stored. The same crime could have occured in 1905, except the info would have been passed in ledger books.
The FCC, for those whose attention spans collapsed before they finished reading the article, ordered the companies to ensure that mobile VOIP users can update their location and callback numbers. No big databases needed. Just ask the phone where it is and route the call to the right 911 center. (User update of the new area code and exchange might do the trick.)
What planet are you from? Obviously, not Earth. Otherwise, you'd know that the possibility that the average VOIP user is ever going to have a clue why 911 doesn't work is effectively nil.
What's wrong here is that the FCC allowed VOIP to be marketed without a solution to the 911 problem.
All I've said is that it is both unnecessary and impossible to point to "facts" to justify going to the Moon or Mars. We go because we want to go, which was also your grandfather's motivation.
>> The engineering requirements to do so are under discussion.
No, they aren't. I simply stated that the speeds possible with chemical propulsion are not sufficient to allow the human race to efficiently expand into and exploit the inner Solar System. Of course, that's not a fact, since it cannot be a fact. It is only my considered opinion. Even if I'm starving on Earth and there is food on Mars, it remains an opinion.
>>... there were many reasons large and small why people came to America...
Reasons aren't facts. They came because they wanted to come, not because some "fact" existed.
>> Red Hat '...makes its living packaging and selling other people's ideas.'
We often see this assertion. It makes no sense.
Unless you buy or acquire your software directly from each individual developer, everyone cranking out Linux distributions is packaging and selling "other people's ideas".
You might as well argue that McDonald's got rich by stealing the idea of the hamburger.
Nothing more than simple opposition toward and envy of anyone that's successful.
And, don't forget, understanding something doesn't always lead to agreement. We often think: "If only they'd understand why this is so important, they'd be on my side." Not necessarily.
The Test Ban Treaty of 1963 prohibits nuclear weapons tests or any other nuclear explosion in the atmosphere, in outer space, and under water.
I didn't mean to assert that lawsuits would be premised on this treaty. Rather, the suits might well come from the states in which the testing might occur, especially if the governors aren't of the same party as the President at the time.
Personally, I'd welcome a reexamination of the basic Orion principle. I'd like to see a focus on using an increased number of much smaller nukes, or non-nukes, appled to propulsion. We should consider other means of repeatedly generating massive explosions before we write off the Orion idea.
Even at that, I still think such a craft is politically viable only if it never see's Earth's surface.
How did I "attack" you? You challenged my earlier post because it didn't contain a "fact". I simply pointed to the impossibility, and lack of need, to back up statements like mine with a "fact". There will never be a "fact" to justify going to Mars at any speed, just as there was never a "fact" justfying migration to the Americans. We do it because we want to do it. That's sufficient.
>> You're saying stealing a car, robbing a gas station, or breaking into someone's house is the same as shoplifting -- or breaking into a system?
No. I didn't say that, did I? I was pointing to the silliness of arguing that unauthorized acquisition of data in a computer network (I call that theft, but that seems to create heartburn for a lot of folks around here who can't quite grasp the notion that the nonphysical can be stolen) can be excused because it highlights a security flaw. So do shoplifting, car theft, and breaking and entering, but try telling a judge or a jury that "I should be exonerated because I exposed how easy it is to steal that car."
Misunderstanding isn't the issue. People are scared to death of nuclear weapons. That's a reasonable position to take. They're also very afraid of nuclear fallout; also a reasonable position. No misunderstanding there.
No politican dependent on the good will of the people is going to support something that scares them to death.
Orion, then, requires the atmosphereic detonation of a very large number of nuclear weapons. Even if someone believed they could build a nuke that would produce zero fallout, it would remain a treaty violation simply to test it to see if that claim were valid. So long as the U.S. is attempting to quell the spread of nukes, it will not violate that treaty and resume atmospheric testing. In addition, the political climate in the U.S. is much different than it was years ago when we were doing atmosphereic testing. The odds that testing could resume without political uproar and a long series of court cases is effectively nil.
Of course, they're both my opinion. So what? Have you got a "fact" that says we shouldn't go?
It is irrelevant to look for "facts" in this arena. There was no "fact" to compel Europeans to migrate to the Americas, but they still migrated.
People are free to do what they choose. We don't need to find "facts" to motivate us.
If people like you were running the show, we'd all still be hanging around the Olduvai Gorge chasing game because no you wouldn't see any "facts" justifying going somewhere else.
I'm not confusing democracy with politics. Democracy is politics, legitimate politics. (I don't see "politics" as some kind of dirty game to be avoided. Politics is simply the way we all bargain, maneuver and compromise to advance our own best interests. That's the way people behavem because we all honestly disagree about what is good and what is right.)
So, if the majority of the people in the U.S. don't want atmospheric nuclear explosions, that's exactly what should happen. It's not someone's "purely political agenda".
Yes, blocking research is usually (not always) wrong. Many people oppose research in areas I support. Many other's agree with me. But, the right of the people to express their will democratically always takes precedence over a single individual's opinion.
Note, too, that I've not expressed my own opinion of Orion. I've only said that testing it and launching it from Earth's surface is a political impossiblity for the forseeable future.
Slashdot Mirror
Why is attempting to eliminate illegal activity wrong? Why is trying to stop someone from stealing something an act of oppression?
People who steal deserve what happens to them.
Not only are you Canadian, you're a loon.
/. crowd really only cares about movies and throwaway music and other luxuries, maybe they ought to get a clue and realize that the way to thwart the Big Evil Corporate Bogeymen is to stop buying the stuff.
Just how is anyone selling anything ripping off anyone? No one is forcing anyone to buy anything.
Since most of the
Smacks more than a bit of the obese bitching that Big Macs cost too much.
>> here we have rather convincing "anecdotal evidence" that giving things away free doesn't necessarily kill sales...
I didn't say giving things away would "kill" sales. I said, in effect, that it would hurt sales.
More to the point, the only people who have the right to sell or give away a book are people to whom the author has licensed that right.
I agree; I would never read a book displayed on any kind of monitor screen.
If Google simply displays a tiny excerpt and then offers a "buy" link, you're right: everyone wins. That, I believe, would not break copyright law. But, since the copyright law is not a decision tree , a publisher might still sue in order to obtain a court ruling.
If a work isn't under copyright, then Google owes no one.
The Pony Express and telegraph analogy is misguided. We're talking about unauthorized distribution of products, not different ways of transmitting information.
I'm tempted to say Doctorow was simply feeding a line to the "What's Yours Is Mine" Crowd so those among them with actual disposable income would run down to the bookstore and buy his book.
Doctorow's assertion, of course, is entirely anecdotal. Where are the numbers that might substantiate it?
It defies logic to deny that people who make money selling books will not be harmed if someone else provides free copies of those books. This may be especially true for publishers of specialized and academic books that, by definition, have very small potential audiences.
The publishers should sue Google and Google should be required to pay the publishers each time a publication is accessed via Google.
Forget about the morality part of it. If everyone agreed on what is moral and everyone always lived up to that standard, we'd have no need for laws.
ANd, the law would require you to specify what "confidentiality" means.
I don't know, but this could just as easily happened in the UK. Bank employees knowingly sold the data. The staff at your local Barclays could do the same thing, too.
Two points to remember: 1. No law (and there are laws against this in the U.S.) will prevent crime if the criminal believes he can get away with it; 2. The only techbical aspect of this crime is the way the data were stored. The same crime could have occured in 1905, except the info would have been passed in ledger books.
Podcasting is a technology, just like radio and TV. What counts is the content that's being podcast.
Garbage in, garbage out.
Here's a quote from the article you seem not to have read:
"Under the order, VoIP carriers must provide a way for customers to update their location and callback numbers when they travel.
There's no reason VoIP shouldn't be required to do 911 correctly, unless you're atavistic
The FCC, for those whose attention spans collapsed before they finished reading the article, ordered the companies to ensure that mobile VOIP users can update their location and callback numbers. No big databases needed. Just ask the phone where it is and route the call to the right 911 center. (User update of the new area code and exchange might do the trick.)
What planet are you from? Obviously, not Earth. Otherwise, you'd know that the possibility that the average VOIP user is ever going to have a clue why 911 doesn't work is effectively nil.
What's wrong here is that the FCC allowed VOIP to be marketed without a solution to the 911 problem.
Who said the energy has to come from chemicals?
All I've said is that it is both unnecessary and impossible to point to "facts" to justify going to the Moon or Mars. We go because we want to go, which was also your grandfather's motivation.
>> ...ground launches
Will never happen.
>> Non-nukes are a non-starter...
Only if we don't look for something new.
>> The engineering requirements to do so are under discussion.
No, they aren't. I simply stated that the speeds possible with chemical propulsion are not sufficient to allow the human race to efficiently expand into and exploit the inner Solar System. Of course, that's not a fact, since it cannot be a fact. It is only my considered opinion. Even if I'm starving on Earth and there is food on Mars, it remains an opinion.
>>
Reasons aren't facts. They came because they wanted to come, not because some "fact" existed.
>> Red Hat '...makes its living packaging and selling other people's ideas.'
We often see this assertion. It makes no sense.
Unless you buy or acquire your software directly from each individual developer, everyone cranking out Linux distributions is packaging and selling "other people's ideas".
You might as well argue that McDonald's got rich by stealing the idea of the hamburger.
Nothing more than simple opposition toward and envy of anyone that's successful.
And, don't forget, understanding something doesn't always lead to agreement. We often think: "If only they'd understand why this is so important, they'd be on my side." Not necessarily.
The Test Ban Treaty of 1963 prohibits nuclear weapons tests or any other nuclear explosion in the atmosphere, in outer space, and under water.
I didn't mean to assert that lawsuits would be premised on this treaty. Rather, the suits might well come from the states in which the testing might occur, especially if the governors aren't of the same party as the President at the time.
Personally, I'd welcome a reexamination of the basic Orion principle. I'd like to see a focus on using an increased number of much smaller nukes, or non-nukes, appled to propulsion. We should consider other means of repeatedly generating massive explosions before we write off the Orion idea.
Even at that, I still think such a craft is politically viable only if it never see's Earth's surface.
How did I "attack" you? You challenged my earlier post because it didn't contain a "fact". I simply pointed to the impossibility, and lack of need, to back up statements like mine with a "fact". There will never be a "fact" to justify going to Mars at any speed, just as there was never a "fact" justfying migration to the Americans. We do it because we want to do it. That's sufficient.
>> You're saying stealing a car, robbing a gas station, or breaking into someone's house is the same as shoplifting -- or breaking into a system?
No. I didn't say that, did I? I was pointing to the silliness of arguing that unauthorized acquisition of data in a computer network (I call that theft, but that seems to create heartburn for a lot of folks around here who can't quite grasp the notion that the nonphysical can be stolen) can be excused because it highlights a security flaw. So do shoplifting, car theft, and breaking and entering, but try telling a judge or a jury that "I should be exonerated because I exposed how easy it is to steal that car."
Pedantics. Crime is crime.
Happy now?
>> If it is because of misunderstanding...
Misunderstanding isn't the issue. People are scared to death of nuclear weapons. That's a reasonable position to take. They're also very afraid of nuclear fallout; also a reasonable position. No misunderstanding there.
No politican dependent on the good will of the people is going to support something that scares them to death.
Orion, then, requires the atmosphereic detonation of a very large number of nuclear weapons. Even if someone believed they could build a nuke that would produce zero fallout, it would remain a treaty violation simply to test it to see if that claim were valid. So long as the U.S. is attempting to quell the spread of nukes, it will not violate that treaty and resume atmospheric testing. In addition, the political climate in the U.S. is much different than it was years ago when we were doing atmosphereic testing. The odds that testing could resume without political uproar and a long series of court cases is effectively nil.
Of course, they're both my opinion. So what? Have you got a "fact" that says we shouldn't go?
It is irrelevant to look for "facts" in this arena. There was no "fact" to compel Europeans to migrate to the Americas, but they still migrated.
People are free to do what they choose. We don't need to find "facts" to motivate us.
If people like you were running the show, we'd all still be hanging around the Olduvai Gorge chasing game because no you wouldn't see any "facts" justifying going somewhere else.
I'm not confusing democracy with politics. Democracy is politics, legitimate politics.
(I don't see "politics" as some kind of dirty game to be avoided. Politics is simply the way we all bargain, maneuver and compromise to advance our own best interests. That's the way people behavem because we all honestly disagree about what is good and what is right.)
So, if the majority of the people in the U.S. don't want atmospheric nuclear explosions, that's exactly what should happen. It's not someone's "purely political agenda".
Yes, blocking research is usually (not always) wrong. Many people oppose research in areas I support. Many other's agree with me. But, the right of the people to express their will democratically always takes precedence over a single individual's opinion.
Note, too, that I've not expressed my own opinion of Orion. I've only said that testing it and launching it from Earth's surface is a political impossiblity for the forseeable future.