The specific problem of the CoS telling Google to remove pages from the database without any legal reason, since they don't quote from copyrighted texts, has been solved. This is newsworthy.
You are correct. Given Google's unethical behavior, this is almost a minor issue. They have shown that they do not care enough about these issues to give them any consideration until public pressure is applied.
Unfortunately, it's not up to Google to legitimise the use of any given legislation for a given purpose
1) They could have refused to remove the pages from the index until evidence is presented for their infringing nature (the DMCA requires no evidence) and a response by the webmaster is evaluated. 2) They could (and should) have taken this to court as a test case on linking liability. 3) They could have made the censorship public, which they did not. Not necessarily by listing the censored URLs, which in itself could be seen as a violation, but by having a page that lists a) who complained b) the name (title) of the censored site c) the nature of the content.
Their decision not to do any of these things was unethical and a bad business decision.
That's a complete separate discussion because the reaction of people to Blizzard's behavior has nothing to do at all with the question whether Blizzard abused its customers using a government-mandated law. Even in this separate discussion, libertarianism is hopelessly naive, since it rests on the assumption that no new power monopolies (yes, there can be several ones, in different areas -- see Middle Ages) would arise in place of the previously abolished government (whether you call these government or not is, again, irrelevant).
Thank you, Mr. Omlette, for refuting one of the essential myths of libertarianism, namely that the consumer will buy the competitor's product if the producer misbehaves. Of course, libertarians will argue that this just shows that the consumer never really cared about the misbehavior (use of the DMCA to censor speech) in the first place and thus it is correct and desirable if it continues.
That's because you don't understand. Google never bothered to check the legitimacy of $ci's claims, they only did so under public pressure. By still censoring the remaining URLs, they have effectively legtimized the use of the DMCA for censoring alleged copyright violations, and thereby have revealed that they see no ethical problem with their own behavior in this matter. You can therefore expect them to continue to act in the exact same way they acted in this case, before the public pressure.
Reasons or not, that's not the point. The DMCA itself is the problem, and if you tolerate its anti-circumvention clause in some cases, when you like the product (ooh, shiny!), and to not tolerate it in others (DVDs on Linux), that makes you a hypocrite and will never get you anywhere. This is especially true since Blizzard's anti-circumvention claims were absolutely ridiculous, as bnetd's primary purpose is not the circumvention of copy prevention. Thus, if you support Blizzard here, to not support any much more obvious use of the DMCA is idiotic and illogical.
This reminds me of the Slashdot reaction to Tivo's privacy violations.
Wow, good troll (in a positive sense!). I don't think that different modes of traditional organization would be really helpful because, as you say, further fragmentation may be the end result. But what I'd like to see is more "enlightened democracy", with formalized voting processes among those who care enough to participate. This would allow competing ideas, but at the same time secure an emotional majority behind one product. I'm not sure the KDE/GNOME example is really so good, the argument goes both ways and I'm more inclined to prefer a standardized desktop.
Quite possible. But then I think about all the poor starving developers who could put food on their families if kernel.org gave their bandwidth budget to them and used BitTorrent instead..
You make some valid points. Distributing dynamic web content is immensely difficult. There are some projects that attempt to do it, and usually, synchronization servers come into the mix at some point (data loss can be avoided by tracking server availability and assigning new servers as needed, you quickly get mathematical safety). The problems are not unsolvable, but I don't see any large corporation pushing the idea, so it will probably still take a while. Realize that this is about high load on static large files, though, where P2P makes very immediate sense.
I'm sure Bram will notice his server being slashdotted soon enough, but let me say a few words in defense of BT anyway. What makes BT different from Morpheus and BearShare is that files are sent by users to each other, while they are still downloading. This way, the downloaders themselves act as backup. It's not simple multi-source downloading, but targeted towards content-providers who want to reduce load on a central server. In its advantages and disadvantages it's similar to Multicast. Good for high load for specific files at specific times. Kernel.org should use it.
eDonkey has the same feature (with some differences in the publishing process), but is really an application of its own, very file sharing oriented, closed-source and banner-supported. Not exactly what a content provider would want users to download before they can access his files. Still, ed2k has the advantage of a large user base, and also supports ed2k:// URIs that can be used on webpages.
SwarmCast is interesting, but the company behind it mostly died, and now it is somewhat in limbo. Its Java base has made it problematic as a desktop application. The only real alternative to BT is Mojo Nation, which is currently being reworked as "MNet".
If you want to know what CodeCon is all about, check the Feature box on infoAnarchy, we had some detailed coverage.
If you want to defeat ICANN, then where's the alternative? It's no use if people run like headless chickens into different directions. We need a single democratic body that is better than ICANN and that we agree on. And damnit, if you want to make this happen, put a large banner or button supporting it on Slashdot, too. Make it a campaign banner that also encourages people to spread the word.
OpenNic sounds like a reasonably democratic choice. They allow voting on new TLDs. If there is any criticism of them, I'd like to hear it right here. Remember, if we can't vote, we can still vote with our feet.
.. OpenOffice is LGPL. StarOffice is the proprietary version of OpenOffice. Are there any differences between StarOffice and OpenOffice (applications)?
Compare this with installing Linux. Even setting up Linux to see NTFS drives is a pain,
Possibly (though some distros recognize both FAT and NTFS partitions automatically and put nifty icons on your KDE desktop). However, setting up Windows to see ext2 or ReiserFS drives is much more painful.
Unfortunately, software pirates have spoiled this situation for hobbyists.
1201a of the DMCA reads:
''(2) No person shall manufacture, import, offer to the public, provide, or otherwise traffic in any technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof, that--
''(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls
access to a work protected under this title;
''(B) has only limited commercially significant purpose or use other than to circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title;
or
''(C) is marketed by that person or another acting in concert with that person with that person's knowledge for use in circumventing
a technological measure that effectively controls
access to a work protected under this title."
It does not take a lawyer to know that bnetd is not a "circumvention device" under the DMCA, and by saying that the "pirates" "spoiled" it for the rest of legitimate users, they are even admitting that there are substantial legal uses and bnetd is not "primarily designed" to circumvent a copy prevention mechanism.
They wouldn't stand a chance if this went to court.
Corporations are amoral. Their only purpose is to maximize shareholder value, i.e. sales and profits. If they act in a way that reduces their shareholder value, e.g. by acting "morally responsible", they can even be sued by their shareholders under certain circumstances.
The same corporations that create airplanes also manufacture weapons that are sold into the third world. The insurance companies lobby for safer cars, but also for less privacy to create better consumer profiles. The clothes corporations employ kids under deplorable conditions. The oil corporations support corrupt regimes in order to get drilling rights. And so on ad infinitum. Cisco supplying tools that can be used for censorship is hardly the worst crime that corporations can be accused of. The whole arms industry thrives of death and suffering, and it is in their corporate interest to create more of it.
That's why corporations need to be regulated. You just can't expect them to do the right thing, that would not only be idiotically naive, it would be fatal.
I had some similar thoughts when I posted this, which describes a system that would be capable of reading and writing various configuration files and at the same time try to establish a common configuration file standard. The idea is not new, a lot of similar attempts have already been made. I think the only way this can be successful is through massive collaboration in writing filters to support existing config formats. This means that the filters themselves have to be fairly simple (possibly even simpler than something like perl or awk, but everything should be supported), and that the configuration manager, as the Freshmeat author calls it, should offer direct access to the filter library so that you can easily add modules to support new programs.
There's lots of cool stuff you can do with standardized configuration files, and dynamically generated GUIs are only one part of it. But developers are not going to change their file formats unless there's a real push for a specific format. Thus, to establish any format, you first have to develop lots of filters to support legacy software. As the FM author correctly points out, such a system would make software configuration under *x potentially much easier than under Windows.
Finally, to all the hackers who fear that this will take away their file-meddling options: If properly implemented, it won't -- and if it does, it will not get accepted as a standard, exactly because of stubborn people like you:-)
In 1984, the SCOTUS ruled that VCRs are legal -- with a majority of only one vote. Everything else from the Eighties is repeating, so it doesn't surprise me that the studios try again.
Welcome back.
A lot of implicit rating data can be gathered from the links pointing to a page. Google is already doing this when sorting the search results (frequently linked-to pages rank higher). It would be interesting to see how this could be used to detect very popular new sites. I sent this mail to Google a while ago:
Hi,
it occurred to me, since you are evaluating the number of links
pointing to a page anyway, that it would be a very nice thing to have
a sort of "Top 40 Links of the Day" page, regularly updated to
include only new and unique stuff. You could use an algorithm similar
to the one used by
Both of these sites have become immensely popular through this
feature (in the case of Daypop, I find http://www.daypop.com/top.htm
very valuable), and I think it would also be a great addition to
Google. I don't think inappropriate content would be much of a
problem since it would hardly show up high on the list, and besides,
a top 40 list can be looked through by a human.
What do you think?
Of course this could be spammed, but as I said, a human could filter the results every day; besides, it would be hard to create a very large number of unique links from different servers pointing to a page. I'm sure Google is already doing some of this to prevent spamming their search-order algorithm anyway.
Actually, Miguel has already discussed patent concerns in this recent Slashdot Interview done by Microsoft's Carnage4Life:
We are trying to stay on the safe side regarding patents. That means that we implement things in a way that has been used in the past and we are not doing tremendously elaborate or efficient things in Mono yet. We are still very far from that. But just using existing technologies and techniques.
Slashdot Mirror
SearchDay - Curling Up with a Good Book Search Engine.
Um, so, copyright would still exist in your no-government world? Or are we talking about private enforcers with machine guns?
A libertarian is NOT required to believe that the market can correct the errors of the government
That was not the point. The point here is that the market, in many cases, doesn't correct errors at all.
Sure, if your opinion is logically consistent and can be turned into an actual amendment to the DMCA.
You are correct. Given Google's unethical behavior, this is almost a minor issue. They have shown that they do not care enough about these issues to give them any consideration until public pressure is applied.
Unfortunately, it's not up to Google to legitimise the use of any given legislation for a given purpose
1) They could have refused to remove the pages from the index until evidence is presented for their infringing nature (the DMCA requires no evidence) and a response by the webmaster is evaluated. 2) They could (and should) have taken this to court as a test case on linking liability. 3) They could have made the censorship public, which they did not. Not necessarily by listing the censored URLs, which in itself could be seen as a violation, but by having a page that lists a) who complained b) the name (title) of the censored site c) the nature of the content.
Their decision not to do any of these things was unethical and a bad business decision.
That's a complete separate discussion because the reaction of people to Blizzard's behavior has nothing to do at all with the question whether Blizzard abused its customers using a government-mandated law. Even in this separate discussion, libertarianism is hopelessly naive, since it rests on the assumption that no new power monopolies (yes, there can be several ones, in different areas -- see Middle Ages) would arise in place of the previously abolished government (whether you call these government or not is, again, irrelevant).
Thank you, Mr. Omlette, for refuting one of the essential myths of libertarianism, namely that the consumer will buy the competitor's product if the producer misbehaves. Of course, libertarians will argue that this just shows that the consumer never really cared about the misbehavior (use of the DMCA to censor speech) in the first place and thus it is correct and desirable if it continues.
That's because you don't understand. Google never bothered to check the legitimacy of $ci's claims, they only did so under public pressure. By still censoring the remaining URLs, they have effectively legtimized the use of the DMCA for censoring alleged copyright violations, and thereby have revealed that they see no ethical problem with their own behavior in this matter. You can therefore expect them to continue to act in the exact same way they acted in this case, before the public pressure.
This reminds me of the Slashdot reaction to Tivo's privacy violations.
This report is false. Google is still censoring Operation Clambake, they have just relisted the root URL.
Wow, good troll (in a positive sense!). I don't think that different modes of traditional organization would be really helpful because, as you say, further fragmentation may be the end result. But what I'd like to see is more "enlightened democracy", with formalized voting processes among those who care enough to participate. This would allow competing ideas, but at the same time secure an emotional majority behind one product. I'm not sure the KDE/GNOME example is really so good, the argument goes both ways and I'm more inclined to prefer a standardized desktop.
Heh. You don't really want to know the answer to that question :-)
Quite possible. But then I think about all the poor starving developers who could put food on their families if kernel.org gave their bandwidth budget to them and used BitTorrent instead ..
You make some valid points. Distributing dynamic web content is immensely difficult. There are some projects that attempt to do it, and usually, synchronization servers come into the mix at some point (data loss can be avoided by tracking server availability and assigning new servers as needed, you quickly get mathematical safety). The problems are not unsolvable, but I don't see any large corporation pushing the idea, so it will probably still take a while. Realize that this is about high load on static large files, though, where P2P makes very immediate sense.
eDonkey has the same feature (with some differences in the publishing process), but is really an application of its own, very file sharing oriented, closed-source and banner-supported. Not exactly what a content provider would want users to download before they can access his files. Still, ed2k has the advantage of a large user base, and also supports ed2k:// URIs that can be used on webpages.
SwarmCast is interesting, but the company behind it mostly died, and now it is somewhat in limbo. Its Java base has made it problematic as a desktop application. The only real alternative to BT is Mojo Nation, which is currently being reworked as "MNet".
If you want to know what CodeCon is all about, check the Feature box on infoAnarchy, we had some detailed coverage.
How much do you know about PR, really?
OpenNic sounds like a reasonably democratic choice. They allow voting on new TLDs. If there is any criticism of them, I'd like to hear it right here. Remember, if we can't vote, we can still vote with our feet.
.. OpenOffice is LGPL. StarOffice is the proprietary version of OpenOffice. Are there any differences between StarOffice and OpenOffice (applications)?
Possibly (though some distros recognize both FAT and NTFS partitions automatically and put nifty icons on your KDE desktop). However, setting up Windows to see ext2 or ReiserFS drives is much more painful.
1201a of the DMCA reads: ''(2) No person shall manufacture, import, offer to the public, provide, or otherwise traffic in any technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof, that-- ''(A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title; ''(B) has only limited commercially significant purpose or use other than to circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title; or ''(C) is marketed by that person or another acting in concert with that person with that person's knowledge for use in circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title."
It does not take a lawyer to know that bnetd is not a "circumvention device" under the DMCA, and by saying that the "pirates" "spoiled" it for the rest of legitimate users, they are even admitting that there are substantial legal uses and bnetd is not "primarily designed" to circumvent a copy prevention mechanism.
They wouldn't stand a chance if this went to court.
The same corporations that create airplanes also manufacture weapons that are sold into the third world. The insurance companies lobby for safer cars, but also for less privacy to create better consumer profiles. The clothes corporations employ kids under deplorable conditions. The oil corporations support corrupt regimes in order to get drilling rights. And so on ad infinitum. Cisco supplying tools that can be used for censorship is hardly the worst crime that corporations can be accused of. The whole arms industry thrives of death and suffering, and it is in their corporate interest to create more of it.
That's why corporations need to be regulated. You just can't expect them to do the right thing, that would not only be idiotically naive, it would be fatal.
There's lots of cool stuff you can do with standardized configuration files, and dynamically generated GUIs are only one part of it. But developers are not going to change their file formats unless there's a real push for a specific format. Thus, to establish any format, you first have to develop lots of filters to support legacy software. As the FM author correctly points out, such a system would make software configuration under *x potentially much easier than under Windows.
Finally, to all the hackers who fear that this will take away their file-meddling options: If properly implemented, it won't -- and if it does, it will not get accepted as a standard, exactly because of stubborn people like you :-)
In 1984, the SCOTUS ruled that VCRs are legal -- with a majority of only one vote. Everything else from the Eighties is repeating, so it doesn't surprise me that the studios try again. Welcome back.
No. Please read again.
Of course this could be spammed, but as I said, a human could filter the results every day; besides, it would be hard to create a very large number of unique links from different servers pointing to a page. I'm sure Google is already doing some of this to prevent spamming their search-order algorithm anyway.