You are right that in doing this he "ripped" off people other then himself though it may have been more of an experiment in how to P2P then anything else. Do you not think he has a few copies of CD laying around the house? Do you not think he can't go to his producing company and say "gimmie"? Do you not think he can't walk into a local store pick one up and the store manager will charge him (he will give it for free and ask for a photograph to hang up).
You are wrong about this part
So Ulrich's logic is that he never would have paid for this album in the first place and therefore it's ok for him to download it... yet the many file sharers that have no intent(or in some cases the means) to pay for it are thieves?
1) You don't know if he would have or would not have paid for it ever.
2) Not having the means to purchase something is no excuse for downloading it - so yes they are thieves
3) Having no intent to buy something does not give them the right to d/l it for free. A car thief has no intention of buying a car by your logic he is not a thief.
In all honesty your post took things out of context by a LOT. First I would be safe to say that Lars has copies of the music. Both originals or cases of CDs sitting in his garage so he can give them out to his friends/family/fans.
It amazes me as to how much the/. crowd believe they are entitled to things for free. It is akin to lifetime wellfare members who believe they should be on wellfare for their entire lives even though they COULD work.
Pirating is wrong...period. If you want to listen to someone's music then acquire it in a manner they allow or write to them a letter saying how poor you are and beg them to send you a copy (hey they may do this).
Well if Cable TV is a "natural monopoly" why was it necessary for local government to forbid other companies from adding their own CATV networks? From where I'm sitting, if the government removed that prohibition, other corporations would flock-in and setup their own parallel network of CATV lines. Then you'd have Comcast, Cox, and Time-Warner, all available to every urban home.
And how will you get that cable tv access to someones house when you don't have the wires running under the streets? The existing CATV company will charge you such a high price you would make a home user look like they got a 100% discount. Without the gov'ts involvement you would never get permission to lay lines down (and honestly who wants 10 cable companies cutting up the streets fumbling over each other to lay lines). Gov't regulations do things like forcing your local provider to give competition cheap rates so they can resell at competative rates.
He used a bunch of people with little education and below-average IQs. Hardly an accurate experiement, since it was not representative of the population as a whole.
How do you know what the education/IQ level of these people were? Do you have evidence to back this up? These are the people hit hardest by the economic downturn. A simple google search states that Milgrim used "ordinary" people.
Most sales people are idiots who were just trained yesterday, or last week, and now they're pretending to be experts. I don't listen to a word they say, in regards to giving advice. Neither should you.
Actually most sales people don't go to their clients and say 'I just got this job yesterday'. They do however say they are licensed by the state. Also mortgage underwriters is not an entry level job.
I think you're just yet another one of those damn Socialist-democrats who think, "Americans are too dumb to run their own lives, therefore they need government to run it for them," and I am sick and tired of hearing that shit. I am a highly intelligent person who can run his own life, so stop treating me like I'm a child and the U.S. Congress is my mommy/daddy.
Personal attacks - LOVE IT!!! You know nothing about me and yet you attack me. GREAT JOB!! You are still full of EPIC FAIL! Hey, at least you think you are a "highly intelligent person".
Right, because attorney generals and/or mayors have never prosecuted for the sole reason as to win votes in the upcoming elections./end sarcasm. - Many banks & individuals were drug into court even though they had done nothing wrong, just to "set an example" and "vote for me because I'm standing up for you, the homeowners". This is called corruption, and it doesn't infect just the corporate world, but also the government. It creates a govt-applied pressure to approve loans that never should have been approved.
Then we are talking about two completely different issues. You are discussing corruption and I am talking about appropriate laws. Corruption can happen with any law - e.g. criminal court for murder - this does not mean ant-murder laws are wrong. BTW you changed the topic with the above quote.
In addition, you said I missed your "whole" post but you quoted me? Epic...FAIL....
Not to low-income, high-risk persons they don't. They'd be driving themselves into bankruptcy, and no underwriter is that stupid, unless he's acting in fear that the State AG will toss him in jail.
Do you honestly believe that mortgage underwriter X gives a crap if some bank loses money? He cares about his commission.
Well then you should be extremely-qualified to explain why the housing market collapsed. And don't just say "deregulation did it". I want a specific listing of regs that were abandoned, and HOW those eliminated regs made the artificial bubble happen.
Quoted for hilarities sake. If you think i am going to spend 2-3 hours doing research for you, especially when you will just slap it with "fud" your insane. The other post was correct - you already made up your mind before you came into the argument.
Which is, by itself, unfair. Minorities typically have less money (for various reasons). The high decline rate is not a race issue, but a financial issue - the loans are high risk.
You skipped over a few of my comments which removes the "unfairness". Analyze the following:
1) "high rejection of minority loans (compared to non-minority loans for the area)." The fed wouldn't compare poor minority person living in the poorest neighborhoods of america to Bill Gate's neighbor. Apples to apples
2) "The bank could either justify their decisions by showing the reasoning for minority rejections, or the bank could get fined." If you can justify your decisions based on mathematical facts you were correct then the fed would leave you alone.
As a person who WORKED in banking/mortgages I can tell you for a fact I have never heard of a racism issue in any of the three banks I worked at, in the news, or even the rumor mill. Anectodal, yes, but it still says something about racism. This was not the case in the pre-1980s. Does it happen today, probably, does it happen often no? Want to know why? Because mortgage underwriters make commissions - they want to sell. Also most banks have mortgage underwriters who 1) don't meet the client so don't know the clients race, 2) don't live in the same area and 3) may be minorities themselves. This law came about before the intarweb and big banks were accessible to people in rural areas. When your option was tom's savings and loans or travel 100 miles to bill's savings and loans so your mortgage underwriter was your potential neighbor you didn't have much of an option.
Well you shouldn't put people on the bottom. You should put them at the top of the list. People need to BE authorities and run their own lives, not let others tell them what to do. I have lots of people telling me everyday
I understand the argument but remember while Milgram's experiment was heinous it was accurate. You also need to remember that while the/. crowd may be fairly knowledgeable (the very nature of the site topics/crowd) most people are not knowledgeable especially when it comes to areas outside their fields. For example - family lawyer...incredibly smart, about 80 years old. I had to TEACH him, last year, how to turn on a computer. He is a genious of a lawyer, but has no clue about computers. Learned, within a few days, how to access e-mail, send e-mail, send attachments. But he needed to be taught - something that not everyone has the luxary of.
YOU are responsible for your own decisions.
Absolutely
Stop trying to blame others after the fact./quote
Not trying to but there is more blame then one person and due to experience with sales people, knowing the nature of people I am assigning more blame to the sales person. The authoratative figure with licenses, certifications, "proven track records", happy customer testimonials, etc is in a great position to influence people - especially those who are uninformed. I don't expect Joe construction worker to know how mortages work - I expect him to know how to build a house. He builds my house, he doesn't educate me how to build a house. I sell him a mortgage, I don't educate him how to "build" a mortgage. I expect him to do the best possible job to give me a 100% structurally sound house. He expects me to do the best possible job to give him a 100% structurally sound mortgage. When he fails I sue him, when I fail who does he sue? Oh he is told that he should have known better. Double standard.
It IS the fault of the government if the politicians unjustly prosecuted various underwriters when they turned-down loans. ("But I did it because he only gets minimum wage!" "No you did it because you're racist; we're dragging you to court.") Other underwriters would observe this, decide it wasn't worth the hassle, and therefore approved risky loans just to stay out of jail.
The fed did not go after folks who rejected one person; they would go after a lending institution that showed a trend. If a bank had a dramatically high rejection of minority loans (compared to non-minority loans for the area) then the fed would look at the bank. The bank could either justify their decisions by showing the reasoning for minority rejections, or the bank could get fined. So if the bank was able to show the declined minority loans were from those who could not afford the loans they wanted or had a terrible credit scores then the bank orgnization was fine. This is not hard to prove: Bank statement showing wage earnings (including job history), credit score, & account history with banks.
This is one of the reasons why mortgage underwriters are in the back-office of most banks instead of dealing with customers directly. They do this so there can be little argument of racism. Cut the FUD...it wasn't a witch-hunt.
This has no similarity to do with the DTV extension. Congress realizes this is not optimal, but they are trying to cater to those (typically in lower economic households) who did not get a converter (could not afford it or could not get a device because they ARE sold out).
Yes you need regulation to prevent regulation. Sounds dumb but it makes sense. If you have no laws about it the companies will do it anyhow. They will implement whatever they want...and why not, there are no laws around it. So if you want to prevent a company from throtteling services and charging tiered rates, and other fun stuff then you need to make regulations preventing that.
I agree with you 100%. We use buy instead of license because 1) it's shorter and 2) who would license. In sales talk licensing implies you have to return it at some point (think lease on a car). I have CDs I bought in 1994... nobody has every asked for them back. I am ok with the language and most people understand (especially/. folk) what the deal is - they just want to argue due to a sense of entitlement or just to argue.
BTW for those people on iTunes and other similar sites, registering involves a TOS "click to agree" and while I haven't read it (I don't shop on iTunes) I am sure it states all the fun facts.
And yes you can do whatever you want with it except giving out copies to people. No lawyer will come after you just because you backed it up...and if you wrote a letter to the RIAA/MPAA saying "hey, just to let you know, I bought these cd's and i am backing them up"...they would send you a response letter "thank you for your continued support of artists.... enjoy the cd's...p.s. remember not to give those copies to people". That's it.
You can sue for anything, and you can win for almost anything. Sue away. Btw, when you are ready to sue I know a good lawyer. And even if you don't sue, and you are interested in pursuing more kinky fetish stuff...call me
You should see the mess that is the ATM (Automated Teller Machine) processing industry. If you wonder why ATM fees are so high, you have to know that there are several links in the processing chain and that everyone in that chain pushes their small fees that ultimately amount to large fees. If the internet were to adopt this model, you'd be paying $2/hr to post on slashdot.
I did an intern for a company that processes whole-sale lockboxes for major banks. This gave me some pretty neat stories, & documentations into different areas like ATMs.
Back when ATMs first came out the gov't mandated that nobody could charge fee's. This was so people would start using the system (hey if you've always gone to your bank teller to get money, why would you now use a machine and have to pay a fee?). Eventually, once ATM's were mainstream the gov't dropped these regulations and BAM Citibank was the first to charge ATM fee's. This continued & escalated until today. As of the year 2002 (when I did my internship) the ATM fee's, per transaction, is 4 CENTS on both sides. Meaning your bank Plus the other bank pays 4 cents per transaction COMBINED! These numbers are obviously on average - high volume atms have a lower cost/transaction while low volume atms have a higher cost/transaction. The charging $1, $2, 3$, $5, $10 is just to try and get people to pay and see how much they can..or as 100% pure-pro capitalism people love to spout until they realize what they are talking about "What the market will bear".
The CRA wasn't about getting loans to minorities who couldn't afford it; the CRA was about getting loans to minorities who COULD afford it but were being discriminated against. There were many minorities who could afford these loans and were being told they couldn't get the loan on spec. This was sometimes done by unconscious racism or conscious racism by people who didn't want "colored folk" from moving into their community
Now if some mortgage underwriter took this law to mean "give people who can't afford mortgages a mortgage" or "Hey now i have an excuse to sell an extra mortgage and raise my commission" that is not the fault of the gov't that is the fault of the mortgage underwriter who abused the system (shocker).
"High risk borrowers" is a very loose statement. It's akin to saying "How much do I love you? I love you THIS much". The science of mortgage lending is more art then science - if you don't believe me speak to someone who is or was in the lending industry...oh wait, you are.
So before talking about "pesky facts" make sure you don't skew them.
Not for nothing, this statement...
The pressure to make more loans to minorities (read: to borrowers with weak credit histories) became relentless.
Agreed. The gov't reduced regulations to give the banks more flexibility - they didn't tell the banks to shoot the country in the foot.
The banking industry complained regulations were too restrictive and they couldn't get people into homes - so the Clinton administration made it easier by pushing Congress to remove a lot of these regulations. The banking industry, & republicans loved this on a business level (more sales, less rules). The democrats loved this on a "we are helping the little guy buy a home" level. Nothing was wrong with that...except as history has proven over and over and over again if you give people the opportunity they will do whatever it takes to gain power/money even at the expense of other people. There are way too many sales people, and their managers who demand this, who just want to "SELL SELL SELL". How many times have we heard this on tv shows or movies "SELL SELL SELL"...you think that is a myth? It's "SELL no matter what" attitude.
There is a local jewelry store (been around for over 30 years) in Philadelphia. They have an insane commercial that says "if you really love her, you can't let the economy stop you. Buy her that diamond because if you love her she is worth it and so is that diamond".... as opposed to saying "You want to get married, the economy is tough, we can help you by getting you and affordable ring. Oh and we can upgrade it down the road for you" Again sales people just want to sell and they don't care about you.
Order of blame:
Banks who abused the system
Gov't who didn't monitor the system
People who got into those stupid loans.
Why do I put "People" on the bottom of the list? It is similar to the Stanley Milgram experiment. Given an authoratative figure people will do what they are told even if it is known to be wrong. Authoratative figure = real estate agent (with a LICENSE) & mortgage officer (with a LICENSE) in nice suits telling their customers "don't worry we know what we are doing with years of experience and fancy computer programs that say you CAN do this."
here's no reason why every urban home can't have access to Comcast, Cox, Time-Warner, et cetera and simply choose which provider they like best.
Sure there is...price control. Just because it's not good for consumer doesn't mean it's not good for someone else. Don't be greedy pay comcast more money. $200 for that phone/internet/cable package is a fair price for a gimped Internet connection, tv connection & phone connection. Don't worry if Google pays comcast a fee you will get full gimp speed to their content.
You own the DVD/CD, you LICENSE the content. Big difference. You may not like it, as most/.'rs don't, but that is supported by the law. Besides, even if you owned the movie (you can't ACTUALLY own the movie by buying the dvd at walmart, that requires paying a lot of money to the owners of the movie and going through contract negotiations/signings/etc) you are still bound by the contract that came with it. Again - you may not like the terms of the contract - but you do have an option - don't buy it.
Yes a bunch of you will argue with me why I am wrong, and suck, and should be modded down - but in the end the law supports me and if you think I am wrong go into a court of law and argue your point...use the same arguments you use in/. and let's see what a judge says.
Wow...like really, DUH! Anytime you repetatively perform an action, especially when it can be strenuous and cause things like sweat, you will get sores/callouses/etc.
The fact they "just discovered" it is more along the lines "I am a worthless doctor and want to get my name into the medical books. Now i can spin-off a book 'why gaming consoles are dangerous to your health'"....In other news "12 year old girl bashes doctor in the face with her Ps3 console"
Why shouldn't people pirate it? Give me one good reason. There's no actual consequences for Nintendo, so you're going to have to either trot out your flawed understanding of property rights (which will then be summarily debunked), or fall back on appeals to "THE LAW" (in which case, who the fuck cares?).
You, sir, are an idiot. Bet you don't have those kinds of balls in a court of law. Would you tell a judge "THE LAW...who the fuck cares?" No didn't think so. Until you are willing to tell that to a judge in his courtroom STFU troll.
Seeing as your entire post is based on the delusion that Nintendo makes an effort to protect their software then please explain why it is an issue that primarily effects Nintendo's consoles and not Microsoft or Sony's?
The fact is, Microsoft and Sony put much better protection in place with their latest batch of consoles whilst Nintendo did very little.
Even if this were true, and I am not qualified to state who has better protection in place though Xbox and ps3 get pirated all the time, it still does not justify. A company does not have to put protections in place to have the law enforced. Justifying theft by saying "the lock wasn't good enough" is retarded.
I'm sorry if you can't accept that but it's fact, it's far more trivial to crack Nintendo's systems than it is Microsoft and Sony's and this is purely down to the amount of time and money spent on anti-piracy measures. Nintendo fucked up here, end of.
First - I could care less which system is harder to crack. Second - and again security or no does not justify pirating. Third - Xbox and Ps3 get pirated.
Oh and regarding the idea they're just trying to push enforcement of laws they already have you're wrong there too. In Spain personal copying isn't illegal and in China creation of modchips etc. aren't illegal, but in both territories Nintendo is trying to turn these laws around, so you're not even correct on that account.
They are not going after the personal copiers (i need a backup), they are going after the sellers of mod chips and those who are selling pirated games. So yes I am correct.
Playing a game for free that can't even be bought in your country will not cause the games industry to die, so get over it.
It doesn't matter how it affects their product - they, for whatever reason, are refusing to do business with you and guess what they are entitled refuse it. This does not give you a right to go in and steal their product. Let me give you an example. So how about you get over it.
Piracy is a problem companies have to deal with themselves, not expect everyone else to deal with for them
FUD - Anti-piracy laws already exist in the US and China. Companies are not allowed to enforce these, the police must enforce these. Companies are begging police TO enforce these. You are rambling. BTW even if they are now making profits on their consoles - it does not justify someone pirating.
Slashdot Mirror
You are wrong about this part
So Ulrich's logic is that he never would have paid for this album in the first place and therefore it's ok for him to download it ... yet the many file sharers that have no intent(or in some cases the means) to pay for it are thieves?
1) You don't know if he would have or would not have paid for it ever.
/. crowd believe they are entitled to things for free. It is akin to lifetime wellfare members who believe they should be on wellfare for their entire lives even though they COULD work.
2) Not having the means to purchase something is no excuse for downloading it - so yes they are thieves
3) Having no intent to buy something does not give them the right to d/l it for free. A car thief has no intention of buying a car by your logic he is not a thief.
In all honesty your post took things out of context by a LOT. First I would be safe to say that Lars has copies of the music. Both originals or cases of CDs sitting in his garage so he can give them out to his friends/family/fans.
It amazes me as to how much the
Pirating is wrong...period. If you want to listen to someone's music then acquire it in a manner they allow or write to them a letter saying how poor you are and beg them to send you a copy (hey they may do this).
Well if Cable TV is a "natural monopoly" why was it necessary for local government to forbid other companies from adding their own CATV networks? From where I'm sitting, if the government removed that prohibition, other corporations would flock-in and setup their own parallel network of CATV lines. Then you'd have Comcast, Cox, and Time-Warner, all available to every urban home.
And how will you get that cable tv access to someones house when you don't have the wires running under the streets? The existing CATV company will charge you such a high price you would make a home user look like they got a 100% discount. Without the gov'ts involvement you would never get permission to lay lines down (and honestly who wants 10 cable companies cutting up the streets fumbling over each other to lay lines). Gov't regulations do things like forcing your local provider to give competition cheap rates so they can resell at competative rates.
Another epic FAIL post by you.
He used a bunch of people with little education and below-average IQs. Hardly an accurate experiement, since it was not representative of the population as a whole.
How do you know what the education/IQ level of these people were? Do you have evidence to back this up? These are the people hit hardest by the economic downturn. A simple google search states that Milgrim used "ordinary" people.
Most sales people are idiots who were just trained yesterday, or last week, and now they're pretending to be experts. I don't listen to a word they say, in regards to giving advice. Neither should you.
Actually most sales people don't go to their clients and say 'I just got this job yesterday'. They do however say they are licensed by the state. Also mortgage underwriters is not an entry level job.
I think you're just yet another one of those damn Socialist-democrats who think, "Americans are too dumb to run their own lives, therefore they need government to run it for them," and I am sick and tired of hearing that shit. I am a highly intelligent person who can run his own life, so stop treating me like I'm a child and the U.S. Congress is my mommy/daddy.
Personal attacks - LOVE IT!!! You know nothing about me and yet you attack me. GREAT JOB!! You are still full of EPIC FAIL! Hey, at least you think you are a "highly intelligent person".
Right, because attorney generals and/or mayors have never prosecuted for the sole reason as to win votes in the upcoming elections. /end sarcasm. - Many banks & individuals were drug into court even though they had done nothing wrong, just to "set an example" and "vote for me because I'm standing up for you, the homeowners". This is called corruption, and it doesn't infect just the corporate world, but also the government. It creates a govt-applied pressure to approve loans that never should have been approved.
Then we are talking about two completely different issues. You are discussing corruption and I am talking about appropriate laws. Corruption can happen with any law - e.g. criminal court for murder - this does not mean ant-murder laws are wrong. BTW you changed the topic with the above quote.
In addition, you said I missed your "whole" post but you quoted me? Epic...FAIL....
Not to low-income, high-risk persons they don't. They'd be driving themselves into bankruptcy, and no underwriter is that stupid, unless he's acting in fear that the State AG will toss him in jail.
Do you honestly believe that mortgage underwriter X gives a crap if some bank loses money? He cares about his commission.
Well then you should be extremely-qualified to explain why the housing market collapsed. And don't just say "deregulation did it". I want a specific listing of regs that were abandoned, and HOW those eliminated regs made the artificial bubble happen.
Quoted for hilarities sake. If you think i am going to spend 2-3 hours doing research for you, especially when you will just slap it with "fud" your insane. The other post was correct - you already made up your mind before you came into the argument.
Which is, by itself, unfair. Minorities typically have less money (for various reasons). The high decline rate is not a race issue, but a financial issue - the loans are high risk.
You skipped over a few of my comments which removes the "unfairness". Analyze the following:
1) "high rejection of minority loans (compared to non-minority loans for the area)." The fed wouldn't compare poor minority person living in the poorest neighborhoods of america to Bill Gate's neighbor. Apples to apples
2) "The bank could either justify their decisions by showing the reasoning for minority rejections, or the bank could get fined." If you can justify your decisions based on mathematical facts you were correct then the fed would leave you alone.
As a person who WORKED in banking/mortgages I can tell you for a fact I have never heard of a racism issue in any of the three banks I worked at, in the news, or even the rumor mill. Anectodal, yes, but it still says something about racism. This was not the case in the pre-1980s. Does it happen today, probably, does it happen often no? Want to know why? Because mortgage underwriters make commissions - they want to sell. Also most banks have mortgage underwriters who 1) don't meet the client so don't know the clients race, 2) don't live in the same area and 3) may be minorities themselves. This law came about before the intarweb and big banks were accessible to people in rural areas. When your option was tom's savings and loans or travel 100 miles to bill's savings and loans so your mortgage underwriter was your potential neighbor you didn't have much of an option.
Well you shouldn't put people on the bottom. You should put them at the top of the list. People need to BE authorities and run their own lives, not let others tell them what to do. I have lots of people telling me everyday
I understand the argument but remember while Milgram's experiment was heinous it was accurate. You also need to remember that while the /. crowd may be fairly knowledgeable (the very nature of the site topics/crowd) most people are not knowledgeable especially when it comes to areas outside their fields. For example - family lawyer...incredibly smart, about 80 years old. I had to TEACH him, last year, how to turn on a computer. He is a genious of a lawyer, but has no clue about computers. Learned, within a few days, how to access e-mail, send e-mail, send attachments. But he needed to be taught - something that not everyone has the luxary of.
YOU are responsible for your own decisions.
Absolutely
Stop trying to blame others after the fact./quote Not trying to but there is more blame then one person and due to experience with sales people, knowing the nature of people I am assigning more blame to the sales person. The authoratative figure with licenses, certifications, "proven track records", happy customer testimonials, etc is in a great position to influence people - especially those who are uninformed. I don't expect Joe construction worker to know how mortages work - I expect him to know how to build a house. He builds my house, he doesn't educate me how to build a house. I sell him a mortgage, I don't educate him how to "build" a mortgage. I expect him to do the best possible job to give me a 100% structurally sound house. He expects me to do the best possible job to give him a 100% structurally sound mortgage. When he fails I sue him, when I fail who does he sue? Oh he is told that he should have known better. Double standard.
It IS the fault of the government if the politicians unjustly prosecuted various underwriters when they turned-down loans. ("But I did it because he only gets minimum wage!" "No you did it because you're racist; we're dragging you to court.") Other underwriters would observe this, decide it wasn't worth the hassle, and therefore approved risky loans just to stay out of jail.
The fed did not go after folks who rejected one person; they would go after a lending institution that showed a trend. If a bank had a dramatically high rejection of minority loans (compared to non-minority loans for the area) then the fed would look at the bank. The bank could either justify their decisions by showing the reasoning for minority rejections, or the bank could get fined. So if the bank was able to show the declined minority loans were from those who could not afford the loans they wanted or had a terrible credit scores then the bank orgnization was fine. This is not hard to prove: Bank statement showing wage earnings (including job history), credit score, & account history with banks.
This is one of the reasons why mortgage underwriters are in the back-office of most banks instead of dealing with customers directly. They do this so there can be little argument of racism. Cut the FUD...it wasn't a witch-hunt.
This has no similarity to do with the DTV extension. Congress realizes this is not optimal, but they are trying to cater to those (typically in lower economic households) who did not get a converter (could not afford it or could not get a device because they ARE sold out).
Yes you need regulation to prevent regulation. Sounds dumb but it makes sense. If you have no laws about it the companies will do it anyhow. They will implement whatever they want...and why not, there are no laws around it. So if you want to prevent a company from throtteling services and charging tiered rates, and other fun stuff then you need to make regulations preventing that.
I agree with you 100%. We use buy instead of license because 1) it's shorter and 2) who would license. In sales talk licensing implies you have to return it at some point (think lease on a car). I have CDs I bought in 1994... nobody has every asked for them back. I am ok with the language and most people understand (especially /. folk) what the deal is - they just want to argue due to a sense of entitlement or just to argue.
BTW for those people on iTunes and other similar sites, registering involves a TOS "click to agree" and while I haven't read it (I don't shop on iTunes) I am sure it states all the fun facts.
And yes you can do whatever you want with it except giving out copies to people. No lawyer will come after you just because you backed it up...and if you wrote a letter to the RIAA/MPAA saying "hey, just to let you know, I bought these cd's and i am backing them up"...they would send you a response letter "thank you for your continued support of artists.... enjoy the cd's...p.s. remember not to give those copies to people". That's it.
You can sue for anything, and you can win for almost anything. Sue away. Btw, when you are ready to sue I know a good lawyer. And even if you don't sue, and you are interested in pursuing more kinky fetish stuff...call me
it's that they will outright BLOCK it (and any sites related to it).
No...free....porn???? :(_-_-_-_-
You should see the mess that is the ATM (Automated Teller Machine) processing industry. If you wonder why ATM fees are so high, you have to know that there are several links in the processing chain and that everyone in that chain pushes their small fees that ultimately amount to large fees. If the internet were to adopt this model, you'd be paying $2/hr to post on slashdot.
I did an intern for a company that processes whole-sale lockboxes for major banks. This gave me some pretty neat stories, & documentations into different areas like ATMs.
Back when ATMs first came out the gov't mandated that nobody could charge fee's. This was so people would start using the system (hey if you've always gone to your bank teller to get money, why would you now use a machine and have to pay a fee?). Eventually, once ATM's were mainstream the gov't dropped these regulations and BAM Citibank was the first to charge ATM fee's. This continued & escalated until today. As of the year 2002 (when I did my internship) the ATM fee's, per transaction, is 4 CENTS on both sides. Meaning your bank Plus the other bank pays 4 cents per transaction COMBINED! These numbers are obviously on average - high volume atms have a lower cost/transaction while low volume atms have a higher cost/transaction. The charging $1, $2, 3$, $5, $10 is just to try and get people to pay and see how much they can..or as 100% pure-pro capitalism people love to spout until they realize what they are talking about "What the market will bear".
Now if some mortgage underwriter took this law to mean "give people who can't afford mortgages a mortgage" or "Hey now i have an excuse to sell an extra mortgage and raise my commission" that is not the fault of the gov't that is the fault of the mortgage underwriter who abused the system (shocker).
"High risk borrowers" is a very loose statement. It's akin to saying "How much do I love you? I love you THIS much". The science of mortgage lending is more art then science - if you don't believe me speak to someone who is or was in the lending industry...oh wait, you are.
So before talking about "pesky facts" make sure you don't skew them.
Not for nothing, this statement...
The pressure to make more loans to minorities (read: to borrowers with weak credit histories) became relentless.
...Is extremely racist.
Agreed. The gov't reduced regulations to give the banks more flexibility - they didn't tell the banks to shoot the country in the foot.
The banking industry complained regulations were too restrictive and they couldn't get people into homes - so the Clinton administration made it easier by pushing Congress to remove a lot of these regulations. The banking industry, & republicans loved this on a business level (more sales, less rules). The democrats loved this on a "we are helping the little guy buy a home" level. Nothing was wrong with that...except as history has proven over and over and over again if you give people the opportunity they will do whatever it takes to gain power/money even at the expense of other people. There are way too many sales people, and their managers who demand this, who just want to "SELL SELL SELL". How many times have we heard this on tv shows or movies "SELL SELL SELL"...you think that is a myth? It's "SELL no matter what" attitude.
There is a local jewelry store (been around for over 30 years) in Philadelphia. They have an insane commercial that says "if you really love her, you can't let the economy stop you. Buy her that diamond because if you love her she is worth it and so is that diamond".... as opposed to saying "You want to get married, the economy is tough, we can help you by getting you and affordable ring. Oh and we can upgrade it down the road for you" Again sales people just want to sell and they don't care about you.
Order of blame:
Banks who abused the system
Gov't who didn't monitor the system
People who got into those stupid loans.
Why do I put "People" on the bottom of the list? It is similar to the Stanley Milgram experiment. Given an authoratative figure people will do what they are told even if it is known to be wrong. Authoratative figure = real estate agent (with a LICENSE) & mortgage officer (with a LICENSE) in nice suits telling their customers "don't worry we know what we are doing with years of experience and fancy computer programs that say you CAN do this."
here's no reason why every urban home can't have access to Comcast, Cox, Time-Warner, et cetera and simply choose which provider they like best.
Sure there is...price control. Just because it's not good for consumer doesn't mean it's not good for someone else. Don't be greedy pay comcast more money. $200 for that phone/internet/cable package is a fair price for a gimped Internet connection, tv connection & phone connection. Don't worry if Google pays comcast a fee you will get full gimp speed to their content.
something that I purchased and "own".
You own the DVD/CD, you LICENSE the content. Big difference. You may not like it, as most /.'rs don't, but that is supported by the law. Besides, even if you owned the movie (you can't ACTUALLY own the movie by buying the dvd at walmart, that requires paying a lot of money to the owners of the movie and going through contract negotiations/signings/etc) you are still bound by the contract that came with it. Again - you may not like the terms of the contract - but you do have an option - don't buy it.
/. and let's see what a judge says.
Yes a bunch of you will argue with me why I am wrong, and suck, and should be modded down - but in the end the law supports me and if you think I am wrong go into a court of law and argue your point...use the same arguments you use in
In this day and age you want to send them free energy? Send them a rotten banana peel. Pretty sure they haven't made Mr. Fusion a reality.
On a second thought, do I still have the address of my bitch ex-girlfriend? Hmmmm *punders*
No, but Google does. Isn't it "ponders"?
Wife of Harried Pirate Bay Witness Gets Buried in Internet Love
....makes my eyes bleed.
they retire to several hours
Exagerating a bit aren't we? More like "several minutes".
Wow...like really, DUH! Anytime you repetatively perform an action, especially when it can be strenuous and cause things like sweat, you will get sores/callouses/etc.
The fact they "just discovered" it is more along the lines "I am a worthless doctor and want to get my name into the medical books. Now i can spin-off a book 'why gaming consoles are dangerous to your health'"....In other news "12 year old girl bashes doctor in the face with her Ps3 console"
Why shouldn't people pirate it? Give me one good reason. There's no actual consequences for Nintendo, so you're going to have to either trot out your flawed understanding of property rights (which will then be summarily debunked), or fall back on appeals to "THE LAW" (in which case, who the fuck cares?).
You, sir, are an idiot. Bet you don't have those kinds of balls in a court of law. Would you tell a judge "THE LAW...who the fuck cares?" No didn't think so. Until you are willing to tell that to a judge in his courtroom STFU troll.
Seeing as your entire post is based on the delusion that Nintendo makes an effort to protect their software then please explain why it is an issue that primarily effects Nintendo's consoles and not Microsoft or Sony's?
Wow you TOTALLY fail - again two links talking about people CRACKING nintendo's consoles:
http://www.iconocast.com/0000000013/S1/News1.htm [iconocast.com] (do a search for Nintendo)
http://www.ocmodshop.com/news/displaygamingnews.asp?articleid=33394&zoneid=15 [ocmodshop.com] (do a search for Despite)
The fact is, Microsoft and Sony put much better protection in place with their latest batch of consoles whilst Nintendo did very little.
Even if this were true, and I am not qualified to state who has better protection in place though Xbox and ps3 get pirated all the time, it still does not justify. A company does not have to put protections in place to have the law enforced. Justifying theft by saying "the lock wasn't good enough" is retarded.
I'm sorry if you can't accept that but it's fact, it's far more trivial to crack Nintendo's systems than it is Microsoft and Sony's and this is purely down to the amount of time and money spent on anti-piracy measures. Nintendo fucked up here, end of.
First - I could care less which system is harder to crack. Second - and again security or no does not justify pirating. Third - Xbox and Ps3 get pirated.
Oh and regarding the idea they're just trying to push enforcement of laws they already have you're wrong there too. In Spain personal copying isn't illegal and in China creation of modchips etc. aren't illegal, but in both territories Nintendo is trying to turn these laws around, so you're not even correct on that account.
They are not going after the personal copiers (i need a backup), they are going after the sellers of mod chips and those who are selling pirated games. So yes I am correct.
Playing a game for free that can't even be bought in your country will not cause the games industry to die, so get over it.
It doesn't matter how it affects their product - they, for whatever reason, are refusing to do business with you and guess what they are entitled refuse it. This does not give you a right to go in and steal their product. Let me give you an example. So how about you get over it.
Piracy is a problem companies have to deal with themselves, not expect everyone else to deal with for them
FUD - Anti-piracy laws already exist in the US and China. Companies are not allowed to enforce these, the police must enforce these. Companies are begging police TO enforce these. You are rambling. BTW even if they are now making profits on their consoles - it does not justify someone pirating.