Maybe that's the REAL reason behind the 1 yr warranty... Once Palladium/TCPA/SSSCA/CBPTA arrives, all the pre-ban hardware will have conveniently "expired".
5) How Do You Feel About Intellectual Property? by Phil Gregory
In this age of the Internet, intellectual property has become a very important concept to many people. Many companies make their living on the artificial scarcity provided by intellectual property laws, selling information that they have either created or aggregated. Some others, mostly in the Free Software world, make their living seemingly in spite of these laws, selling their services based on information that is freely given.
Do you feel that out current system of intellectual property is a good one? Which parts of it (e.g. trademarks, patents, copyrights) do you feel are well suited to the world of the Internet and which do you think need to be changed (and, if changes are needed, what changes are needed)?
Bush:
In the next five years, we anticipate that two-thirds of software will be distributed over the Internet, making it more important than ever to ensure strong copyright protection for computer software. In the United States, much of the legal framework already exists, but we need to redouble our efforts on enforcement. In particular, the next President must make sure that the US Department of Justice and US law enforcement agencies have the resources to enforce our intellectual property laws. In the international community, the challenge is even tougher since we must both help establish a legal framework for intellectual property protection and ensure it is enforced.
Ross Perot spent millions of his own money on those wacky 1/2 hr commercials when he ran for President, and the networks were happy to take his money. The networks' advertising sales depts are the last people who'd let a few philosophical differences stand in the way of you spending your money.
Considering the $1500-2000 price, it'll still be a dud even with the DRM cracked. They're marketing this as a high-end system with value-added features. Sure, anybody can build a DVR box for half the price with an ATI or Hauppauge tuner, but a GUI that works on a high res computer monitor pretty much sucks for a settop box. The big feature with XP Media Center edition is the dual mode GUI. One for regular PC use, and a simpler GUI for DVR/settop box use. There's a freeware project called Media Box that does pretty much the same thing. The other big question mark is the program guide. Tivo is $10/mo. ReplayTV is about the same or $200 for a lifetime subscription. Nothing in the article about whether there's a free program guide.
Sony's stance on DRM makes this article quote even more surprising. Maybe Sony remembers how their earlier strong-DRM hardware flopped (Music Clip walkman).
"Already Sony ships Vaio PCs with DVRs and most of the other features found on the HP Media Center PC. But Sony does not impose copy protection. So a consumer could use Sony's GigaPocket Personal Video Recorder software to record a TV show, convert the file to MPEG-2 video with another Sony application and burn the program to a DVD."
How much of application bloat is actually executable object code? I'm sure data and graphics take up a large part of the disk usage. Still, even assuming each application will double in size, it's not even close to the same problem as it was in the days of 300MB hard drives.
So GM put 1 billion dollars of engineering into the EV1 just to prove practical electric cars are impossible?
If electric cars failed it wasn't for lack of trying. You cannot change the laws of physics. 1000 lbs of lead acid batteries holds roughly the same amount of energy as a gallon of gasoline. More advanced chemical batteries might give incremental improvements, but nothing close to the orders of magnitude improvement needed to make electric cars practical.
The best hope now for clean cars is hydrogen fuel cells. There's just the small problem of safely and economically refining and storing hydrogen.
Long hours are common in Japan, but it's not about working. At quitting time, the businessmen are supposed to brown-nose the boss by going out drinking and singing karaoke. They might be going home at 10PM, but an American wouldn't call it "work".
Whether it's cars or software, lack of openness has its price. You can take your car to an independant mechanic or do maintenance and repairs yourself. Under the Magnusson Moss act, car manufacturers cannot void your warranty solely because you used aftermarket parts or did not get your car serviced at the dealer. With proprietary software, the vendor has a complete monopoly on maintenance and bugfixes.
The closest Microsoft analogy would be their free (beer) software like Internet Explorer and Netmeeting. Some of their licenses have said a licensed copy of a Microsoft OS is required to use the software. Under such a license, it would be illegal to run the software in a compatible non-Microsoft environment like Wine.
Forget about scratches. If it keeps shrinking, at some point we'll have to worry about cosmic rays flipping bits on the disk.
Re:Licensing: licensed VHS to pretty much anyone
on
Sony Kills Betamax
·
· Score: 1
Another reason no one ever bought movies back then was because the movies on tape cost $80-100 each while movie tickets were less than $5. By the late 80s they started dropping to $20.
Back in the day, a friend's benchmark of computer speed was to see how fast the cards fell after you won a game of solitaire. By the we had P200's the cards fell too fast to see.
With a few exceptions, fresh produce is usually not branded by the grower. The brand recognition usually comes from the store, and lots of commercials for supermarkets promote their produce department.
Although your local grocer may not be trying to build huge brand recognition for themselves, you still trust them implicitly to supply consistent quality for the same varieties.
It's not that hard to put a hard copy audit log in this system. Put a printer inside the voting machine, preferably in a sealed tamper-proof compartment. Then print a record of each vote onto a roll like cash register tape. There you go. No problemo if the power goes out.
Now the question is, were they smart enough to build a basic safety measure like this into the system? The article doesn't say. The manufacturer is Diebold, who've been making ATMs for 30 years, so I'd expect them to have some expertise in secure embedded systems and data integrity. Still, that makes the choice of Windows even more strange.
Eric Olsen: How are you actually going to overcome the "fair use" doctrine? It's already a fact that "archival" copies are allowed, so why is "space shifting" not archival and thus "fair use"?
Cary Sherman:... It is not a fact that "archival" copies are allowed. Copyright law specifically allows certain kinds of archival copies of software, but not of music, movies, books or anything else. In fact, in the Texaco case, the court held that making archival copies of scientific papers was not a fair use. As for space shifting, I don't think any court has actually held that it's a fair use. And a couple have specifically ruled that it isn't.
Now compare and contrast with Orrin Hatch questioning Hilary Rosen in the Senate- here:
''Can I make a copy of a CD that I buy and put it into a car?'' asked Hatch. When Rosen hemmed and hawed, Hatch muttered, ''The answer is yes.''
He sold it himself personally? The only criminal charge was for selling the software, not for writing it or giving the lecture. I'm sure that being an officer of the company, he had some peripheral role in US sales- at least to authorize the US sales of his software. Regardless of whether Dmitri's prosecutions was "by the book", it was very very stupid for Adobe and the prosecutors to only charge the programmer and not the president, sales, manager, payment processor, or anybody else who was actually selling the software. Did they want to make an example out of the programmer? Now the case is proceeding with Elcomsoft as the defendent (not sure how they file criminal charges against a corporation).
Maybe not cargo pilots, but I'm pretty sure combat pilots all have a survival kit that includes a gun, in case they get shot down over enemy territory.
That's pretty much it. Educate the users so they are aware of the level of privacy. Police, fire, taxis and pilots have for years used (and still use) unencrypted analog 2 way radios. Anybody with a scanner could eavesdrop on them, and they lived with that risk.
I'm not saying it's a good idea to just forget about security, but people should remember there's nothing sacred about privacy electronic communications. If it's really important to keep something secret, don't say it on an insecure line.
Second that. A USB or PCMCIA CF reader works great in Linux. Mount it like a hard drive and copy stuff to and from it. You might have gotten the costs reversed. My USB adapter cost $20 and PCMCIA adapter cost $10.
If they got Windows preinstalled on their computers, it's most likely an OEM license that's tied to that piece of hardware and is non-transferable. Of course, you could probably stay legal if you "upgrade" the old computer by keeping the case, hard drive, or maybe even the keyboard and mouse.
That's right. TVs are very durable; they can last 10-20 years easily. The plan for 85% of homes with digital TVs by 2006 is hopelessly optimistic. Here's the FCC timetable for mandating digital tuners and the conditions for reclaiming the analog TV spectrum:
The FCC voted 3-1 to require digital tuners be included starting with half of televisions with screens 36-inch or larger by July 2004. Tuners would be phased into smaller sets over the next three years with the deadline of July 1, 2007 for all sets with screens 13 inches and bigger to have them.
The government cannot reclaim the analog airwaves from broadcasters until 2007 or until 85 percent of Americans receive digital signals, whichever comes later.
There's no way 85% are going to buy brand new digital TVs between 2004-2006 even if they could afford it. The more well-off buyers who bought an expensive big-screen in the last few years won't just throw it away, and low-income people just plain can't afford it. What are they going to do? Subsidize new TVs for poor people?
Slashdot Mirror
"What *really* makes the RIAA nervous?"
Maybe that's the REAL reason behind the 1 yr warranty... Once Palladium/TCPA/SSSCA/CBPTA arrives, all the pre-ban hardware will have conveniently "expired".
Remember, GWB isn't your enemy (last I checked, he hadn't made a public stance on the issue of copyright law)
Actually yes he has:
5) How Do You Feel About Intellectual Property?
by Phil Gregory
In this age of the Internet, intellectual property has become a very important concept to many people. Many companies make their living on the artificial scarcity provided by intellectual property laws, selling information that they have either created or aggregated. Some others, mostly in the Free Software world, make their living seemingly in spite of these laws, selling their services based on information that is freely given.
Do you feel that out current system of intellectual property is a good one? Which parts of it (e.g. trademarks, patents, copyrights) do you feel are well suited to the world of the Internet and which do you think need to be changed (and, if changes are needed, what changes are needed)?
Bush:
In the next five years, we anticipate that two-thirds of software will be distributed over the Internet, making it more important than ever to ensure strong copyright protection for computer software. In the United States, much of the legal framework already exists, but we need to redouble our efforts on enforcement. In particular, the next President must make sure that the US Department of Justice and US law enforcement agencies have the resources to enforce our intellectual property laws. In the international community, the challenge is even tougher since we must both help establish a legal framework for intellectual property protection and ensure it is enforced.
Ross Perot spent millions of his own money on those wacky 1/2 hr commercials when he ran for President, and the networks were happy to take his money. The networks' advertising sales depts are the last people who'd let a few philosophical differences stand in the way of you spending your money.
Considering the $1500-2000 price, it'll still be a dud even with the DRM cracked. They're marketing this as a high-end system with value-added features. Sure, anybody can build a DVR box for half the price with an ATI or Hauppauge tuner, but a GUI that works on a high res computer monitor pretty much sucks for a settop box. The big feature with XP Media Center edition is the dual mode GUI. One for regular PC use, and a simpler GUI for DVR/settop box use. There's a freeware project called Media Box that does pretty much the same thing. The other big question mark is the program guide. Tivo is $10/mo. ReplayTV is about the same or $200 for a lifetime subscription. Nothing in the article about whether there's a free program guide.
Sony's stance on DRM makes this article quote even more surprising. Maybe Sony remembers how their earlier strong-DRM hardware flopped (Music Clip walkman).
"Already Sony ships Vaio PCs with DVRs and most of the other features found on the HP Media Center PC. But Sony does not impose copy protection. So a consumer could use Sony's GigaPocket Personal Video Recorder software to record a TV show, convert the file to MPEG-2 video with another Sony application and burn the program to a DVD."
Fuel cell != independance from oil
They'll likely run on natural gas, methanol (made from natural gas) or hydrogen (made from natural gas).
"inefficient fat-package route"
How much of application bloat is actually executable object code? I'm sure data and graphics take up a large part of the disk usage. Still, even assuming each application will double in size, it's not even close to the same problem as it was in the days of 300MB hard drives.
So GM put 1 billion dollars of engineering into the EV1 just to prove practical electric cars are impossible?
If electric cars failed it wasn't for lack of trying. You cannot change the laws of physics. 1000 lbs of lead acid batteries holds roughly the same amount of energy as a gallon of gasoline. More advanced chemical batteries might give incremental improvements, but nothing close to the orders of magnitude improvement needed to make electric cars practical.
The best hope now for clean cars is hydrogen fuel cells. There's just the small problem of safely and economically refining and storing hydrogen.
Long hours are common in Japan, but it's not about working. At quitting time, the businessmen are supposed to brown-nose the boss by going out drinking and singing karaoke. They might be going home at 10PM, but an American wouldn't call it "work".
Whether it's cars or software, lack of openness has its price. You can take your car to an independant mechanic or do maintenance and repairs yourself. Under the Magnusson Moss act, car manufacturers cannot void your warranty solely because you used aftermarket parts or did not get your car serviced at the dealer. With proprietary software, the vendor has a complete monopoly on maintenance and bugfixes.
The closest Microsoft analogy would be their free (beer) software like Internet Explorer and Netmeeting. Some of their licenses have said a licensed copy of a Microsoft OS is required to use the software. Under such a license, it would be illegal to run the software in a compatible non-Microsoft environment like Wine.
Forget about scratches. If it keeps shrinking, at some point we'll have to worry about cosmic rays flipping bits on the disk.
Another reason no one ever bought movies back then was because the movies on tape cost $80-100 each while movie tickets were less than $5. By the late 80s they started dropping to $20.
Back in the day, a friend's benchmark of computer speed was to see how fast the cards fell after you won a game of solitaire. By the we had P200's the cards fell too fast to see.
With a few exceptions, fresh produce is usually not branded by the grower. The brand recognition usually comes from the store, and lots of commercials for supermarkets promote their produce department.
Although your local grocer may not be trying to build huge brand recognition for themselves, you still trust them implicitly to supply consistent quality for the same varieties.
There's a few mini-BSDs out there. PicoBSD and ClosedBSD are based on FreeBSD. EmBSD is based on OpenBSD.
It's not that hard to put a hard copy audit log in this system. Put a printer inside the voting machine, preferably in a sealed tamper-proof compartment. Then print a record of each vote onto a roll like cash register tape. There you go. No problemo if the power goes out.
Now the question is, were they smart enough to build a basic safety measure like this into the system? The article doesn't say. The manufacturer is Diebold, who've been making ATMs for 30 years, so I'd expect them to have some expertise in secure embedded systems and data integrity. Still, that makes the choice of Windows even more strange.
In this interview with the President of the RIAA he spouts the party line.
... It is not a fact that "archival" copies are allowed. Copyright law specifically allows certain kinds of archival copies of software, but not of music, movies, books or anything else. In fact, in the Texaco case, the court held that making archival copies of scientific papers was not a fair use. As for space shifting, I don't think any court has actually held that it's a fair use. And a couple have specifically ruled that it isn't.
Eric Olsen: How are you actually going to overcome the "fair use" doctrine? It's already a fact that "archival" copies are allowed, so why is "space shifting" not archival and thus "fair use"?
Cary Sherman:
Now compare and contrast with Orrin Hatch questioning Hilary Rosen in the Senate- here:
''Can I make a copy of a CD that I buy and put it into a car?'' asked Hatch. When Rosen hemmed and hawed, Hatch muttered, ''The answer is yes.''
He sold it himself personally? The only criminal charge was for selling the software, not for writing it or giving the lecture. I'm sure that being an officer of the company, he had some peripheral role in US sales- at least to authorize the US sales of his software. Regardless of whether Dmitri's prosecutions was "by the book", it was very very stupid for Adobe and the prosecutors to only charge the programmer and not the president, sales, manager, payment processor, or anybody else who was actually selling the software. Did they want to make an example out of the programmer? Now the case is proceeding with Elcomsoft as the defendent (not sure how they file criminal charges against a corporation).
Maybe not cargo pilots, but I'm pretty sure combat pilots all have a survival kit that includes a gun, in case they get shot down over enemy territory.
That's pretty much it. Educate the users so they are aware of the level of privacy. Police, fire, taxis and pilots have for years used (and still use) unencrypted analog 2 way radios. Anybody with a scanner could eavesdrop on them, and they lived with that risk.
I'm not saying it's a good idea to just forget about security, but people should remember there's nothing sacred about privacy electronic communications. If it's really important to keep something secret, don't say it on an insecure line.
Second that. A USB or PCMCIA CF reader works great in Linux. Mount it like a hard drive and copy stuff to and from it. You might have gotten the costs reversed. My USB adapter cost $20 and PCMCIA adapter cost $10.
That's correct
If they got Windows preinstalled on their computers, it's most likely an OEM license that's tied to that piece of hardware and is non-transferable. Of course, you could probably stay legal if you "upgrade" the old computer by keeping the case, hard drive, or maybe even the keyboard and mouse.
That's right. TVs are very durable; they can last 10-20 years easily. The plan for 85% of homes with digital TVs by 2006 is hopelessly optimistic. Here's the FCC timetable for mandating digital tuners and the conditions for reclaiming the analog TV spectrum:
The FCC voted 3-1 to require digital tuners be included starting with half of televisions with screens 36-inch or larger by July 2004. Tuners would be phased into smaller sets over the next three years with the deadline of July 1, 2007 for all sets with screens 13 inches and bigger to have them.
The government cannot reclaim the analog airwaves from broadcasters until 2007 or until 85 percent of Americans receive digital signals, whichever comes later.
There's no way 85% are going to buy brand new digital TVs between 2004-2006 even if they could afford it. The more well-off buyers who bought an expensive big-screen in the last few years won't just throw it away, and low-income people just plain can't afford it. What are they going to do? Subsidize new TVs for poor people?