They've filed an injunction to prevent SCO from claiming that IBM's license has been revoked.
SCO doesn't have the right to revoke IBM's license. Perpetual, and irrevocable.
IBM claiming that they need to stop SCO is not the correct approach. Instead, IBM is demanding that SCO not be permitted to say that the license has been revoked, because there is no way for SCO to revoke it.
If you have contributed to a linux kernel, 2.4.19, or higher, I suggest you send this letter to SCO.
You can e-mail it, you can print it out and mail it, whatever.
SCO is in violation of the GPL, in regards to 2.4.19 and higher? Why do I say that?
Because they no longer distribute the source. I've made a request that they issue the source to me, but I don't believe that they will.
They still provide binaries, however. This is, in my mind, a simple, cut and dry problem on their part.
They need to stop providing linux, completely. Otherwise, they are in violation of the GPL.
And even if they beat the GPL in court, then they are in violation of copyright.
Close and Shut, people. You can easily stop this licensing scheme. Use the power of slashdot. Anyone who has ever submitted even the tiniest patch to the kernel.
The SCO Group 355 South 520 West Suite 100 Lindon, Utah 84042 USA 801-765-4999 phone 801-765-1313 fax ATTN:Chris Sontag, Senior VP and General Manager, SCOSource
Re: Infringements of Linux Kernel Copyrights
Mr. Sontag:
As you are no doubt aware, the Linux Kernel is distributed under the GPL. The Linux Kernel is not, and has never been, public domain. The GPL provides certain distribution rights, assuming one remains in compliance with it. If distributor does not maintain GPL complaince, or the GPL itself is rendered void, the original authors retain all rights. These rights are protected by copyright.
I have recently learned that your company, SCO (formerly Caldera) is attempting to sublicense portions of the Linux Kernel under an non-GPL compatible license. As you may not be aware, the GPL specifically precludes any distributor from sublicensing any code that has been distributed under its terms. As a reminder:
4. You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Program except as expressly provided under this License. Any attempt otherwise to copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Program is void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License. However, parties who have received copies, or rights, from you under this License will not have their licenses terminated so long as such parties remain in full compliance.
Based upon the foregoing, I hereby demand that you cease and desist from distributing the Linux Kernel, and from selling licenses to the Linux Kernel, and that you confirm to me in writing within ten days of receipt of this notice that you have removed all infringing materials from your site and that you will refrain from distributing any Linux product until you have accepted the terms of the GPL in full.
No portion of this notice should be interpreted as granting any distribution rights for the Linux Kernel outside was is avaliable under the GPL.
If they don't satisify my request, I'll submit a GPL compliance complaint to the FSF, GNU, and whoever else will listen.
I suggest you all make the same request.
If they send you a NO reply, ask them what license they think they are allowed to distribute linux under?
Hello. I am a Caldera OpenLinux user, and I recently have had the need to recompile my linux kernel.
As I understand, all Caldera OpenLinux users still have a license to use the operating system.
The Linux operating system is licensed under the GPL, and therefore I am entitled to the source code for any binaries distributed.
I am running Kernel 2.4.19, but I have noticed that the source code for caldera's version of this kernel is no longer avaliable on your ftp server. Specifically---> kernel-source-2.4.19.SuSE-82.nos rc.rpm is the only file avaliabe, and it does not contain the source code that I need.
Please make this code avaliable, so that I am able to update my kernel for Windows NTFS file system support.
First of all, I was talking about 6 months of copyright, for music (audio recordings).
How about this---Copyright is 10 years. 6 months after the date of pressing, however, it expires.
In my mind, this period would be slightly longer for books/code. Maybe 2-3 years.
Publishers will not get even more money. Why? After the copyright period expires, it'll be distributed, free, online. This includes books, code, music, movies, etc . ..
More succintly, copyright should be based on the period that it takes to capitalize on an asset. Music/Movies, it takes under a year. Books, it probably only takes a couple years. Software, defintely only a year or two---after that, its probably out of date.
Copyright infringment doesn't deprive anyone of anything.
Copyright was BY the government, to give content creators a reprieve, so they would have time to capitalize on their content. They no longer need a 140 year reprieve. They really only need 1-3 years.
This would SPEED progress, not slow progress.
Human works are a continuning project. Not a communal project, but a continuous one--- I can best produce my next work, if I'm allowed to build on your previous work. Why should you have rights to your previous work for 140 years after your death? That's bizarre and arbitrary, has little to do with the constitution (limited period?), and slows progress.
Intellectual property has less meaning now days than it used to--Because the world changes so quickly. Few works of art last beyond 5 years, or even stay popular beyond 5 years. How much music, or how many movies, are 30-40 years into their lifecycle, and still at least 70 years away from going into the public domain? Lots. How much of that is being properly archived for posterity? Almost nothing.
The rate of consumption and disposal in the modern world is so rapid that every 5-10 years that our 'creative culture' morphs. Copyright should reflect this.
Otherwise, we'll end up in a world where no one is allowed to reproduce 'classic' works, not to 'protect' and investment, but just because some weasly old bastard is unwilling to let go of his 'property'. He's not making any money off it any more. He's not distributing it. He's just stoping people from accessing it.
Look at the entire abandonware games scene. Video games from 10-15 years ago. Out of print, unavaliable ANYWHERE. Yet the IDSA rabidly attacks any site that puts those products up for free.
Heck, I remembering owning some of thse games. Master of Magic, Master of Orion, etc. . . My floppies have litterally rotted away. But I purchased a license to use them. And in 20 years or so, no one will be able to play them, except for those how distribute them illegally.
Ultimately, however, technology makes this debate irrelevant. As I've said before, things like freenet will distribute information. Information wants to be free, and it will be.
The questions is, will the government be willing to negotiate a reasonable compromise, or are we going to see the end of property rights?
Either copyright is limited to a short, reasonable period of 2-6 years, or copyright will functionally become irrlevant. I think the pressures driving P2P would lessen greatly if people only had to wait 2-6 years to get a hold of content. 140 years after the death of the creator? Never, ever, ever, gonna happen. If that stays the standard, you'll see P2P in every device in the world. Everything will be shared. Copyright will be null.
I'm sorry, I didn't explain myself clearly enough. I say that copyright should be shortened to an extremely brief period for audio recordings, only.
However, while I do agree that it is impossible right now for every program to work on opensource software, I do believe that it is possible for coders to make money off of their work without strict notions of copyright.
That's neither here nor there, since the open source market/movement is not near developed enough to support everbody, or every technical field, and it may never be.
As I understand it, wasn't nullsoft waste attempting to create some sort of peer-to-peer content distribution that was able to serve you what it thought you might like?
There are technological solutions to our rising demand for water.
No, desalinzation (at least not in the conventional sense), is not one of them.
New soil polymer technologies are coming along that will drastically reduce the amount of water needed for plants---Imagine a lawn that you only have to water every 3 weeks, even in the southwest.
Other composite materials actually alter the thermal properities of the soil, increase the rate of air->soil water transfer. Imagine this->Digging resevoirs, filling them with salt water, and the resulting increase in humidity actually alterating the region, creating a microclimate.....
No, I'm not a soil scientist. But, I'm involved in a company right now that is bringing these new technologies to the market. And best of all, they are all designed to faciliate sustainable, organic farming. All of the component chemicals are organic.
I'm not certain that I'm allowed to discuss the specifics right now (I'll ask), but we are currently developing a test facility, to show case these technologies, in a water poor area. Irrigating land, entirely from seasonal rain water and ocean salt water. I'm not scientist enough to be able to explain all of this, an I'm not even certain that I'm using the right terminology. But I've read some of our experimental results, and I've seen a lot of our proto-marketing materials.
Neat, eh?
The problem with the U.S. now is water management. Not amount of water. We don't collect nearly enough of our rainwater. We use far too much water in our irrigation. We overuse aquarifers, and allow runoff to contaminate our basins.
There is plenty of water on this planet. Its a question of bringing our water resources to bear in a sustainable fashion.
IANAWC (I am not a worm creator), but, you could have all kinds of worms running around. One that attacked on a large scale, seeking to infect as many systems as possible. Then it would download extra components as needed, but otherwise sit dormant, awaiting the final component. One that sought out unpatched, vulernable, Windows 2000/XP boxes, to use as a permanent base of operations (This one could be BIG). One that sought out infected systems, and modified the worm continuously, to confuse scanners. Any maybe, you could even have the dang things self-destruct? I don't know much about this, but you can setup applications on a Windows 2000/XP box that won't run until the next realmode boot, right? If it installs itself as a system file, scanners won't be able to remove it unless they run before the system is fully booted up. But if your worm runs the next time pre-bootup system maintenance is scheduled, and runs before any other task, you could have it eat the harddrive.
If one were to prepare this sort of thing ahead of time, and released the worms one by one, most of the security community wouldn't anticipate the attack. Especially if they were all encrypted, and you released them in a quick enough period such that it would not be obviously that they were working together until after the fact.
The other thing I wonder is why worms haven't targeted the infrastructure of weak networks. Like that worm that was discovered on the comcast dns servers. If somewhere were to create something that attacked the Windows 2000/XP (or any other operating system, but Windows seems like it would be the most vulnerable) TCP/IP stack, and only attacked systems behind vulnerable routers, and then utilized the hacked TCP/IP stack and hacked routers to hide all of the traffic, it would be extremely hard for anyone to tell what had happened, right?
Of course, all of the things I have just said won't work, as I've described them. My knowledge of this topic is just too limited to really make much sense, but my point is I don't think we have seen a coordinated effort to run multiple, smaller worms in concert. This way you can spread a rapid, smaller infection, and use it to pave the way for a much more deadly, and harder to remove infection.
I wasn't trying to show a connection. I was showing correlation, same as the RIAA.
Let me break it down:
RIAA points at current decline CD sales, claims that is the result of P2P.
I point at how CD sales rose during the napster days.
Neither argument escapes the fallacy. Both are equally valid. We can attempt to evaluate the probability of both, by examining the context of both situations.
I just think that the RIAA arguments about how P2P hurts their business are bunk. There is no reason to believe that, and the simple correlation that the RIAA posits to 'prove' their point both a)falls afoul of the causality fallacy, and b) sales actually moved in the opposite direction as they claimed (P2P and sales are positively correlated, not inversely correlated).
I'm confused - are you saying that people shouldn't have lost their money / been expelled over blatant, often industrial-scale copyright infringement and doubtless simultaneous violation of a whole host of AUPs and ethical codes?
Look - the problem is still 99% piracy and 1% RIAA overreach. it's nice that somebody is looking at the 1%, but don't forget that the major problem still is piracy.
I'm saying that the government should define the problem away. Copyright is a limited monopoly assigned by the government to artists for the purposes of promoting the arts. IMHO, copyright should be 2-3 years. Most P2P copyright infringement would vanish. Me, I'm extreme enough to say that there shouldn't be any copyright past 6 months, but thats not going to happen.
Why is this not a copout? The notion of copyright was established in a different era, because of the costs associated with distribution and creation. Why would an artist produce anything if they couldn't capitalize on their works?
Now, things have changed a bit. I think artists can support themselves on concert performances. Indeed, most artists HAVE too---they don't make much from CD sales. Copyright is not something assigned by god, nor do I consider it some sort of inalienable human right. Recognize copyright for what it is----a limited MONOPOLY on a product assigned by the government.
Given that monopoly is no longer a necessary condition for the production of music, the monopoly only IMPEDES efficent economic distribution. Why? Because P2P, without cost (because distribution costs are borne by the P2P users) to artists, is the MOST efficent means of distribution currently avaliable.
If the Government eliminated copyright on music tomorrow, artists would still make music. And the world would keep spinning.
Indeed, what we would probably see would be extremely similar to what we have now----Where small and mid-level bands made their money on live performances, and large bands would make their money on live performances and sales of memorablia. Heck, if artist X produced a REALLY good album, sold it in a nice case, included a book of lyrics and information, wouldn't you buy it? I would.
Fact is, copyright on music is an outdated notion. So outdated, that technologies like Freenet WILL end it, without truely draconian government legislation. Like mandated palladium on steroids. Like banning all 'old' non-palladium computers. And I just don't see that happening.
Why won't that happen? Go look up the size of the music industry. Then look up the size of the home electronics industry. 'Nuff said
It will improve it, though----You have to remember, sneaky people can get around laws
And politicans are the sneakiest of the bunch. These laws will improve the situation somewhat, until some more corruption is unveiled by the media, and then another iteration of laws will be implemented.
I agree with you twofold, and have to add a little more.....
I do want to legalize this currently illegal distribution,
But: There are valid arguments that P2P is HELPING the music industry.
CD sales ROSE at napsters peak. CD sales declined when napster was shutdown.
These days, we are seeing a further decline in CD sales, however, there are more intervening variables now, which, in an entirely non-scientific fashion, suggest that the current decline in sales is caused by exterior factors, not the subsequent rise of kazaa.
Posible exteroir factors?
Well, the shutdown of Napster for one. You punch me, I punch back. While this doesn't make any legal or ethical sense, I know that (well, at least in my group of friends) Joe Sixpack feels that way. "I buy CDs, but I liked napster, so I'm not going to buy CDs anymore"
Or general displeasure with the xxIAAs? Anger with their hamfisted tactics? Disgust with artists complaining about how you are taking money out of their multi-millonare pockets? Displeasure with the notion that 5 cents worth of damage in terms of copyright infringement invalidates YEARS as a loyal customer?
Beyond that, how about the economy? As an economist, I know that the economy isn't that bad. But people keep throwing the dirty r word around. Thats right, recession. Strangely enough, purchases of luxury goods decline in a negative economic climate, especially if there is a) lots of media coverage of the condition of the economy, and b) it contrasts with a long period of sustained growth.
Your right, illegal distribution of copyrighted material hurts the business of the corporations that the RIAA presents. But I don't think that ANYONE has enough evidence to suggest that it net hurts their business. It may be true that during the napster days, the effects of illegal distribution actually bolstered CD sales, and the positive effects on business outweighed the negative effects.
It may be that the negative effects that those corporations are experiencing now are because of external factors.
And it may even be true that the negative effects those corporations are experiencing now is because they are prosecuting their own customers as criminals, and their customers are no longer interested in doing business.
You dug your own grave, RIAA.
Good riddance. Technologies like Freenet will destroy you, guaranteed.
And you know what, not a terribly bad idea:) I'm not certain that I will immediately start stealing, BUT---given the 'powers that be' disdain for my rights, why should I give two hoots about the RIAA rights?
Already, I don't believe that there should be copyrights on music, and certainly not for more than a couple of years. I know that I should 'fear the law', but, unlike some of you slashbots, I don't believe that legal code=moral code.
As the RIAA practices become less and less reasonable, so shall mine.
Aren't there any politicans who read slashdot? No Congressional representatives, or wannabes?
Let me make this clear. 60 million people use P2P.
Those people are now, rightly, fearing jail. But they continue to use P2P, because they like it so much.
That implies it is an important value to them.
60 million people constitute a LARGE voting population. Certainly larger than RIAA+artists, most probably large than any campagin affects the RIAA efforts can have.
Take the Bull by the Horns. Advocate legislation that protects P2P users. Copyright infringement be damned---60 million is a HUGH voting block. Enough to sway a presidential election. In area with high broadband saturation, enough to sway a congressional (state or federal election). Be the candidate to protect your voters. Call P2P a fundamental right. Certainly, more radical changes have been advocated, and although opponents will say 'Your putting artists in the poor house', it really doesn't matter. If your constituents were worried about that, they WOULDN'T be using P2P.
Besides, if you were willing to hire them as an aid, I'm certain that many young, asprining, fresh out of college polisci people would be willing to write papers defending P2P.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, I know of ONE way....
Internet Death Penalty.
End of Story
Now, the problem is, most individuals are unwilling to go that far. Me, I have no problem---I think the IDP should be used more often than it is.
*.verisign.com, (plus all associated ip addresses).
*.sco.com (and all SCO related addresses (ip/names).
Everyone will need to switch to OpenNIC, or something else, first.
Closer to possible political reality, switch to OpenNIC, and get all your friends to switch to OpenNIC.
Um...I can imagine something worse.
How long will it be till some blackhat group looking for chaos chooses to install something dark and sinister on it.
All those IE users mistyping all those domains....
Done.
Ask and ye shall receive:
OpenNIC
Don't worry, it resolves on verisign's servers (for now).
sorry scratch that
i'm retarded
I don't really know much about anything....
but...
can't you just put
sitefinder.verisign.com 255.255.255.255 (or other invalid ip) in your hosts file?
doesn't that prevent sitefinder.verisign.com from resolving dns correctly? or am I wrong? i'm pretty sleepy, so I might not be thinking clearly.
I'm not certain that you can get a court to have them destroy/recall all copies of linux they have sold/licensed.
I do believe, however, that you can win damages from them, for copyright violation. I think it is something like $10,000 per violation.
You don't even have to go after the customers---just the distributor (TSG).
IBM's already filed this injunction...
Sort of.
They've filed an injunction to prevent SCO from claiming that IBM's license has been revoked.
SCO doesn't have the right to revoke IBM's license. Perpetual, and irrevocable.
IBM claiming that they need to stop SCO is not the correct approach. Instead, IBM is demanding that SCO not be permitted to say that the license has been revoked, because there is no way for SCO to revoke it.
This will hurt SCO's stock, me thinks.
Well, sort of
.1%
850 shares.
Not exactly a huge holding in the company.
Way under
Yikes----
:)
:)
Sorry
Do proofread everything you send out under your name, ok---
it was a test, all right?
I was just testing y'all----
If you have contributed to a linux kernel, 2.4.19, or higher, I suggest you send this letter to SCO.
You can e-mail it, you can print it out and mail it, whatever.
SCO is in violation of the GPL, in regards to 2.4.19 and higher? Why do I say that?
Because they no longer distribute the source. I've made a request that they issue the source to me, but I don't believe that they will.
They still provide binaries, however. This is, in my mind, a simple, cut and dry problem on their part.
They need to stop providing linux, completely. Otherwise, they are in violation of the GPL.
And even if they beat the GPL in court, then they are in violation of copyright.
Close and Shut, people. You can easily stop this licensing scheme. Use the power of slashdot. Anyone who has ever submitted even the tiniest patch to the kernel.
The SCO Group
355 South 520 West
Suite 100
Lindon, Utah 84042 USA
801-765-4999 phone
801-765-1313 fax
ATTN:Chris Sontag, Senior VP and General Manager, SCOSource
Re: Infringements of Linux Kernel Copyrights
Mr. Sontag:
As you are no doubt aware, the Linux Kernel is distributed under the GPL. The Linux Kernel is not, and has never been, public domain. The GPL provides certain distribution rights, assuming one remains in compliance with it. If distributor does not maintain GPL complaince, or the GPL itself is rendered void, the original authors retain all rights. These rights are protected by copyright.
I have recently learned that your company, SCO (formerly Caldera) is attempting to sublicense portions of the Linux Kernel under an non-GPL compatible license. As you may not be aware, the GPL specifically precludes any distributor from sublicensing any code that has been distributed under its terms. As a reminder:
4. You may not copy, modify, sublicense, or distribute the Program except as expressly provided under this License. Any attempt otherwise to copy, modify, sublicense or distribute the Program is void, and will automatically terminate your rights under this License. However, parties who have received copies, or rights, from you under this License will not have their licenses terminated so long as such parties remain in full compliance.
Based upon the foregoing, I hereby demand that you cease and desist from distributing the Linux Kernel, and from selling licenses to the Linux Kernel, and that you confirm to me in writing within ten days of receipt of this notice that you have removed all infringing materials from your site and that you will refrain from distributing any Linux product until you have accepted the terms of the GPL in full.
No portion of this notice should be interpreted as granting any distribution rights for the Linux Kernel outside was is avaliable under the GPL.
Very truly yours,
(insert name here)
Here was my request to SCO.
s rc.rpm
If they don't satisify my request, I'll submit a GPL compliance complaint to the FSF, GNU, and whoever else will listen.
I suggest you all make the same request.
If they send you a NO reply, ask them what license they think they are allowed to distribute linux under?
Hello. I am a Caldera OpenLinux user, and I recently have had the need to recompile my linux kernel.
As I understand, all Caldera OpenLinux users still have a license to use the operating system.
The Linux operating system is licensed under the GPL, and therefore I am entitled to the source code for any binaries distributed.
I am running Kernel 2.4.19, but I have noticed that the source code for caldera's version of this kernel is no longer avaliable on your ftp server. Specifically--->
kernel-source-2.4.19.SuSE-82.no
is the only file avaliabe, and it does not contain the source code that I need.
Please make this code avaliable, so that I am able to update my kernel for Windows NTFS file system support.
Thank you for your time,
First of all, I was talking about 6 months of copyright, for music (audio recordings).
.
How about this---Copyright is 10 years. 6 months after the date of pressing, however, it expires.
In my mind, this period would be slightly longer for books/code. Maybe 2-3 years.
Publishers will not get even more money. Why? After the copyright period expires, it'll be distributed, free, online. This includes books, code, music, movies, etc . .
More succintly, copyright should be based on the period that it takes to capitalize on an asset. Music/Movies, it takes under a year. Books, it probably only takes a couple years. Software, defintely only a year or two---after that, its probably out of date.
Trolling about, eh?
How's that working out for you?
Copyright infringment != theft
Copyright infringment doesn't deprive anyone of anything.
Copyright was BY the government, to give content creators a reprieve, so they would have time to capitalize on their content. They no longer need a 140 year reprieve. They really only need 1-3 years.
This would SPEED progress, not slow progress.
Human works are a continuning project. Not a communal project, but a continuous one--- I can best produce my next work, if I'm allowed to build on your previous work. Why should you have rights to your previous work for 140 years after your death? That's bizarre and arbitrary, has little to do with the constitution (limited period?), and slows progress.
Intellectual property has less meaning now days than it used to--Because the world changes so quickly. Few works of art last beyond 5 years, or even stay popular beyond 5 years. How much music, or how many movies, are 30-40 years into their lifecycle, and still at least 70 years away from going into the public domain? Lots. How much of that is being properly archived for posterity? Almost nothing.
The rate of consumption and disposal in the modern world is so rapid that every 5-10 years that our 'creative culture' morphs. Copyright should reflect this.
Otherwise, we'll end up in a world where no one is allowed to reproduce 'classic' works, not to 'protect' and investment, but just because some weasly old bastard is unwilling to let go of his 'property'. He's not making any money off it any more. He's not distributing it. He's just stoping people from accessing it.
Look at the entire abandonware games scene. Video games from 10-15 years ago. Out of print, unavaliable ANYWHERE. Yet the IDSA rabidly attacks any site that puts those products up for free.
Heck, I remembering owning some of thse games. Master of Magic, Master of Orion, etc. . . My floppies have litterally rotted away. But I purchased a license to use them. And in 20 years or so, no one will be able to play them, except for those how distribute them illegally.
Ultimately, however, technology makes this debate irrelevant. As I've said before, things like freenet will distribute information. Information wants to be free, and it will be.
The questions is, will the government be willing to negotiate a reasonable compromise, or are we going to see the end of property rights?
Either copyright is limited to a short, reasonable period of 2-6 years, or copyright will functionally become irrlevant. I think the pressures driving P2P would lessen greatly if people only had to wait 2-6 years to get a hold of content. 140 years after the death of the creator?
Never, ever, ever, gonna happen. If that stays the standard, you'll see P2P in every device in the world. Everything will be shared. Copyright will be null.
It's your choice.
Resistance is futile.
Nope.
I'm sorry, I didn't explain myself clearly enough. I say that copyright should be shortened to an extremely brief period for audio recordings, only.
However, while I do agree that it is impossible right now for every program to work on opensource software, I do believe that it is possible for coders to make money off of their work without strict notions of copyright.
That's neither here nor there, since the open source market/movement is not near developed enough to support everbody, or every technical field, and it may never be.
As I understand it, wasn't nullsoft waste attempting to create some sort of peer-to-peer content distribution that was able to serve you what it thought you might like?
I said that my changes to copyright should only apply to audio recording. Is that specific enough?
Your sarcams aside, I think that this notion of copyright can be modified in a strict enough fashion to preserve your, and other authors, rights.
Songs=still copyright.
Performances of those songs=! copyright
HAHAHAHAHA
ROFL
I'm crying.
That was funny
There are technological solutions to our rising demand for water.
No, desalinzation (at least not in the conventional sense), is not one of them.
New soil polymer technologies are coming along that will drastically reduce the amount of water needed for plants---Imagine a lawn that you only have to water every 3 weeks, even in the southwest.
Other composite materials actually alter the thermal properities of the soil, increase the rate of air->soil water transfer. Imagine this->Digging resevoirs, filling them with salt water, and the resulting increase in humidity actually alterating the region, creating a microclimate.....
No, I'm not a soil scientist. But, I'm involved in a company right now that is bringing these new technologies to the market. And best of all, they are all designed to faciliate sustainable, organic farming. All of the component chemicals are organic.
I'm not certain that I'm allowed to discuss the specifics right now (I'll ask), but we are currently developing a test facility, to show case these technologies, in a water poor area. Irrigating land, entirely from seasonal rain water and ocean salt water. I'm not scientist enough to be able to explain all of this, an I'm not even certain that I'm using the right terminology. But I've read some of our experimental results, and I've seen a lot of our proto-marketing materials.
Neat, eh?
The problem with the U.S. now is water management. Not amount of water. We don't collect nearly enough of our rainwater. We use far too much water in our irrigation. We overuse aquarifers, and allow runoff to contaminate our basins.
There is plenty of water on this planet. Its a question of bringing our water resources to bear in a sustainable fashion.
Or, maybe, create a set of worms
IANAWC (I am not a worm creator), but, you could have all kinds of worms running around. One that attacked on a large scale, seeking to infect as many systems as possible. Then it would download extra components as needed, but otherwise sit dormant, awaiting the final component. One that sought out unpatched, vulernable, Windows 2000/XP boxes, to use as a permanent base of operations (This one could be BIG). One that sought out infected systems, and modified the worm continuously, to confuse scanners. Any maybe, you could even have the dang things self-destruct? I don't know much about this, but you can setup applications on a Windows 2000/XP box that won't run until the next realmode boot, right? If it installs itself as a system file, scanners won't be able to remove it unless they run before the system is fully booted up. But if your worm runs the next time pre-bootup system maintenance is scheduled, and runs before any other task, you could have it eat the harddrive.
If one were to prepare this sort of thing ahead of time, and released the worms one by one, most of the security community wouldn't anticipate the attack. Especially if they were all encrypted, and you released them in a quick enough period such that it would not be obviously that they were working together until after the fact.
The other thing I wonder is why worms haven't targeted the infrastructure of weak networks. Like that worm that was discovered on the comcast dns servers. If somewhere were to create something that attacked the Windows 2000/XP (or any other operating system, but Windows seems like it would be the most vulnerable) TCP/IP stack, and only attacked systems behind vulnerable routers, and then utilized the hacked TCP/IP stack and hacked routers to hide all of the traffic, it would be extremely hard for anyone to tell what had happened, right?
Of course, all of the things I have just said won't work, as I've described them. My knowledge of this topic is just too limited to really make much sense, but my point is I don't think we have seen a coordinated effort to run multiple, smaller worms in concert. This way you can spread a rapid, smaller infection, and use it to pave the way for a much more deadly, and harder to remove infection.
I wasn't trying to show a connection. I was showing correlation, same as the RIAA.
Let me break it down:
RIAA points at current decline CD sales, claims that is the result of P2P.
I point at how CD sales rose during the napster days.
Neither argument escapes the fallacy. Both are equally valid. We can attempt to evaluate the probability of both, by examining the context of both situations.
I just think that the RIAA arguments about how P2P hurts their business are bunk. There is no reason to believe that, and the simple correlation that the RIAA posits to 'prove' their point both a)falls afoul of the causality fallacy, and b) sales actually moved in the opposite direction as they claimed (P2P and sales are positively correlated, not inversely correlated).
I'm saying that the government should define the problem away. Copyright is a limited monopoly assigned by the government to artists for the purposes of promoting the arts. IMHO, copyright should be 2-3 years. Most P2P copyright infringement would vanish. Me, I'm extreme enough to say that there shouldn't be any copyright past 6 months, but thats not going to happen.
Why is this not a copout? The notion of copyright was established in a different era, because of the costs associated with distribution and creation. Why would an artist produce anything if they couldn't capitalize on their works?
Now, things have changed a bit. I think artists can support themselves on concert performances. Indeed, most artists HAVE too---they don't make much from CD sales. Copyright is not something assigned by god, nor do I consider it some sort of inalienable human right. Recognize copyright for what it is----a limited MONOPOLY on a product assigned by the government.
Given that monopoly is no longer a necessary condition for the production of music, the monopoly only IMPEDES efficent economic distribution. Why? Because P2P, without cost (because distribution costs are borne by the P2P users) to artists, is the MOST efficent means of distribution currently avaliable.
If the Government eliminated copyright on music tomorrow, artists would still make music. And the world would keep spinning.
Indeed, what we would probably see would be extremely similar to what we have now----Where small and mid-level bands made their money on live performances, and large bands would make their money on live performances and sales of memorablia. Heck, if artist X produced a REALLY good album, sold it in a nice case, included a book of lyrics and information, wouldn't you buy it? I would.
Fact is, copyright on music is an outdated notion. So outdated, that technologies like Freenet WILL end it, without truely draconian government legislation. Like mandated palladium on steroids. Like banning all 'old' non-palladium computers. And I just don't see that happening.
Why won't that happen? Go look up the size of the music industry. Then look up the size of the home electronics industry. 'Nuff said
Good riddance, RIAA
Resistance is Futile.
It won't FIX the problem.
:)
It will improve it, though----You have to remember, sneaky people can get around laws
And politicans are the sneakiest of the bunch. These laws will improve the situation somewhat, until some more corruption is unveiled by the media, and then another iteration of laws will be implemented.
Anyways, I'm hoping for the best
I agree with you twofold, and have to add a little more.....
I do want to legalize this currently illegal distribution,
But: There are valid arguments that P2P is HELPING the music industry.
CD sales ROSE at napsters peak. CD sales declined when napster was shutdown.
These days, we are seeing a further decline in CD sales, however, there are more intervening variables now, which, in an entirely non-scientific fashion, suggest that the current decline in sales is caused by exterior factors, not the subsequent rise of kazaa.
Posible exteroir factors?
Well, the shutdown of Napster for one. You punch me, I punch back. While this doesn't make any legal or ethical sense, I know that (well, at least in my group of friends) Joe Sixpack feels that way. "I buy CDs, but I liked napster, so I'm not going to buy CDs anymore"
Or general displeasure with the xxIAAs? Anger with their hamfisted tactics? Disgust with artists complaining about how you are taking money out of their multi-millonare pockets? Displeasure with the notion that 5 cents worth of damage in terms of copyright infringement invalidates YEARS as a loyal customer?
Beyond that, how about the economy? As an economist, I know that the economy isn't that bad. But people keep throwing the dirty r word around. Thats right, recession. Strangely enough, purchases of luxury goods decline in a negative economic climate, especially if there is a) lots of media coverage of the condition of the economy, and b) it contrasts with a long period of sustained growth.
Your right, illegal distribution of copyrighted material hurts the business of the corporations that the RIAA presents. But I don't think that ANYONE has enough evidence to suggest that it net hurts their business. It may be true that during the napster days, the effects of illegal distribution actually bolstered CD sales, and the positive effects on business outweighed the negative effects.
It may be that the negative effects that those corporations are experiencing now are because of external factors.
And it may even be true that the negative effects those corporations are experiencing now is because they are prosecuting their own customers as criminals, and their customers are no longer interested in doing business.
You dug your own grave, RIAA.
Good riddance. Technologies like Freenet will destroy you, guaranteed.
Resistance is Futile
I don't know whether this is funny or insightful.
:)
Both, I guess
And you know what, not a terribly bad idea
I'm not certain that I will immediately start stealing, BUT---given the 'powers that be' disdain for my rights, why should I give two hoots about the RIAA rights?
Already, I don't believe that there should be copyrights on music, and certainly not for more than a couple of years. I know that I should 'fear the law', but, unlike some of you slashbots, I don't believe that legal code=moral code.
As the RIAA practices become less and less reasonable, so shall mine.
Aren't there any politicans who read slashdot?
No Congressional representatives, or wannabes?
Let me make this clear. 60 million people use P2P.
Those people are now, rightly, fearing jail. But they continue to use P2P, because they like it so much.
That implies it is an important value to them.
60 million people constitute a LARGE voting population. Certainly larger than RIAA+artists, most probably large than any campagin affects the RIAA efforts can have.
Take the Bull by the Horns. Advocate legislation that protects P2P users. Copyright infringement be damned---60 million is a HUGH voting block. Enough to sway a presidential election. In area with high broadband saturation, enough to sway a congressional (state or federal election). Be the candidate to protect your voters. Call P2P a fundamental right. Certainly, more radical changes have been advocated, and although opponents will say 'Your putting artists in the poor house', it really doesn't matter. If your constituents were worried about that, they WOULDN'T be using P2P.
Besides, if you were willing to hire them as an aid, I'm certain that many young, asprining, fresh out of college polisci people would be willing to write papers defending P2P.