Also I'll get hate for saying this but the guy is a douche. there are plenty of online Linux vendors that would have been MORE than happy to have his business, its assholes like him that just go buy winboxes that convinces OEMs there is no point in offering Linux. so next time you can't find drivers for some Dell blame Mr windows buying douchebag who made sure the OEMs don't care about you.
This is about the fact that the license clearly states: YOU CAN GET REFUND. And then if u request it... U GET NOTHING. It is about the fact that vendors are stating clearly something that they will not honor. If they dont want to offer a refund... then they should not write it into the agreement. The reason they have to write this into the agreement is because to condition the sale of one product on the requirement to purchase a second product is a clear example of anti-competitive behaviour. It is illegal and this is exactly what they would be doing if they forced u to purchase the PC with windows together with no option to purchase them separately. Being found guilty of anti-competitive practices is an expensive proposition (millions and millions likely). So they write that they will offer a refund, with clearly no intent to do it. I think this is the main reason that the microsoft EULA is offered from the Vendor to the consumer and not a direct offering from Microsoft. Because microsoft themselves is probably way to scared to force consumers to purchase windows with a PC. I believe they were fined for this in the US already. So it is the vendor that takes on the risk on behalf of Microsoft.
I know because I requested a refund from Hewlett Packard for months. And never used the windows license ever. It sucks to pay for something you dont use in the box... but its far worse when it says in the box "you can have a refund" and then when u go to get it... U GET NOTHING. And if u presist in asking why you get nothing when it says u will get something they provide no answer and eventually get mad and say to you: "You will never get a refund from us!".
Lenovo is supplying a legal document, they fully expect you to honour if you accept it. There is no reason for a customer to go through great issue to get them to honor their end of the contract. You shouldnt have to take a company to court in order to have them do wat they say they will do. Instead the company should just never write the offer for refund in the first place. But they do write it.
For those of u who love Microsoft and like that it is bundled with ur PC purchase. Please be quiet. This has nothing to do with u. There is no problem with the option of vendors supplying windows for those who want it. Fighting for the rights outlined in the agreement has nothing to do with anyone who likes microsoft already. U guys r sitting pretty and get exactly wat u want. Having a company follow the contracts they offer to u is not about bashing microsoft. It is about doing the right thing. If it doesnt effect u, then just ignore this... it wont effect u. It doesnt make ur PC any cheaper or better to force others to pay for something they dont want.
I have purchased several PCs with an included microsoft license. I read the agreement and in all cases the Vendor stated that they would refund the operating system cost if it was requested and not installed. Having called these companies, I can tell u that they will pretend to have no idea wat u r talking about and insist that u return the entire purchase for a refund. I choose not to refund and tried for months to communicate with them in order to receive the refund they promised in the agreement they sent to me. The first thing their support staff told me was to call Microsoft for a refund. But the windows license agreement clearly states in the beginning it is between u (consumer) and the vendor (HP, Lenovo, etc). I copied the entire agreement and quoted the pertinent parts to their support staff. But they continued to pretend not to understand what they had written. Finally, a support staff member from Hewlett Packard stated directly to me: "You will never get a refund from us".
The only recourse is to sue the vendor in order to get a refund. But realistically, who is going to do this. I commend this consumer for sticking to his guns and taking the vendor to task. It is about time some people stand up to fight for the agreement that the vendor puts in writing themselves. It is ridiculous that a vendor provides u with an agreement that they wont even honor and pretend to not understand. What do u think the vendor would do if u began to violate the license agreement urself? Like if I began selling free copies of the operating system. Do u think the vendor would continue to pretend that they dont understand the letter of this license?
It seems clear to me that Vendors supply the option for a refund in the agreement, because to not do so would subject them to anti-competitive practice lawsuits... which can be a huge fine. But the reality is that they have absolutely no intent of honoring this agreement and provide only two options: pay for something u dont want or refund everything and go away.
IMO, this situation is ripe for a class action lawsuit. I live in Canada. I would be more then happy to support such a case and offer all my assistance of past correspondence to assist in the case. I cannot believe I am the only one who finds the Microsoft bundled products less then useless and requested a refund as outlined in the agreement. Alone, it is difficult to do anything, but together I believe that real change could occur.
All the additionally bundled software vendors pay the Vendor to have their products installed with windows. Except in some situations like for certain required licenses such as MPEG and adobe flash which microsoft pays to have bundled into windows because it is basically required to make the Internet experience useful. Since the vendor (Lenovo in this case) gets money from these vendors for every windows install... it is in their interest to force the user to have windows installed by default. If windows is not installed and specifically refunded then the vendor would not receive this money from 3rd parties which very well may exceed the cost of the windows license they pay to microsoft. In other words, it is a net profit situation when the user installs windows.
Regardless of how much money the vendor gets from 3rd party vendors, there is no way that the vendor can claim that against any possible refund for the windows operating system. So legally, the vendor cannot say: "we get $10 profit for every windows install, so if u want a refund for windows, then it means u (the customer) owes us $10 now". That just doesnt make any sense. The refund amount has to be the amount paid to microsoft for the windows license and 3rd party vendor funding would not come into play.
I called my representative by telephone the day Wikipedia went down. I hate SOPA and PIPA, but it has nothing to do with a desire to get free music or movies. I care about file sharing but that doesnt mean I support piracy. So it would be best if the two goals were separated completely as far as I am concerned. It seems to be in the interest of those who support these laws to tie them together.
It would be very nice if there was a way to stop piracy. The practice of piracy does not effect me because I dont do it. I am not trying to take a moral issue over how others use the Internet. In general, I just dont care if piracy exists or not. My gut feeling is that it should not be done, because it is theft. Even if they are charging too much or limiting content or mucking it up with DRM... they own it. The problem is that the act of piracy and the attempt to curtail it is probably going to effect me regardless. I see how the corporations are making the fight against piracy into a fight against sharing. Sharing is not piracy... and the laws of ur country are not the same laws of all countries. In some countries it is perfectly legal to share music and other content u own with people u know. For now... I can still do this. But I see a time where we will all have to obey the limited laws of fair use as written in America. So now I fight for the side of the pirates. Not because I think it is right, but because... to allow governments and corporations to control the Internet at large in the name of just one issue is wrong. I wish piracy would go away... so corporations wouldnt have a leg to stand on when requesting such drastic measures of control. Its so obvious to me that they just want to see all traffic going through them. I realize megaupload had some issues. But it was also a massive sharing site for many artists with legal content.
Whether piracy lives or dies doesnt matter to me. I expect there will always be theft in all areas of business regardless of the controls. I just dont want laws to come in that effect everyone and retard the future of open sharing online.
Primarily they are distributors. They control distribution and broadcasting rights. And they work to ensure that everyone follows this and if not provides the legal funding to stop it. Also, they do marketing to make sure every kid in their target market believes that they wanted it.
Basically, everything they do and charge money for is approaching $0. So they are having a really tough time right now, because marketing and distribution is something that the artist can do directly themselves. In the wake of this new paradigm they are struggling hard to prevent others from making this fact obvious. Like megaupload.com who provided a good tool for artists to do themselves exactly what the existing "producers" used to do for them at an inflated fee.
Linux has been around a long time but is no where near taking over or making Apple or Microsoft from going bankrupt.
U obviously dont have experience working with servers. U know, like the computers producing the pages here on slashdot ur looking at now. There is a big winner in the server market and the answer may surprise u.
Slashdot on piracy: "Abolish all copyrights! Copying isn't theft! Everyone is entitled to everything!"
Slashdot on the GPL: "Gee whiz, the GPL copyright license protects this code. Down with leeching violators! Protect against GPL theft!"
Obviously the 2 licenses are polar opposites. One license is designed to specifically prevent sharing and the other is designed to specifically force sharing. I know I am over simplifying, but if u cant see any difference between these two types of licensing... then generalisation is wat u need.
Its like complaining about someone who believes that private gun ownership should have more control and then push this in their face when the army uses guns to defend their country. Theirs a big difference between the two implementations. Get it?
I think ur right. Its either a fake flyer or it is fake in the sense that someone was paid to do something they know nothing about... and now they are producing bogus security flyers in order to justify their the pay they are getting for their fake credentials. This is a stupid flyer. It was produced either by stupid people or faked to look like it was drafted by stupid people. What makes it believable is that recently some British tourists were recently sent back to Ireland because they tweeted "I am going to destroy America". And then they were forced to apologise because some idiot took these words literally. I hope ur right tho... I hope this sort of information is not produced by people being paid to protect us.
The solution to this is to encourage everyone to use privacy tools. This makes this sort of profiling useless. Like the solution to those British tourists who were jailed for a funny tweet recently... is for everyone to begin tweeting "Destroy America". Because these sorts of profiling are written by and for stupid people who have to write or do something to justify their jobs. Searching for a terrorist in an internet cafe is a stupid practice.
If u run linux, using these tools is easy. Fist use Gmail, because they support XMPP which allows u to run OTR encryption for chat. Install Pidgin and the OTR addon. Set OTR to automatically be used when available. Create a PGP under "Passwords and Encryption Keys" in System->Administration. Use Evolution to collect ur email by POP or preferably IMAP. Evolution will allow u to PGP encrypt/decrypt messages with a single checkbox. Install polipio application as instructed on the Tor website. Then add the torbutton plugin to firefox. This will allow u to browse the internet anonymously after a single click of the icon.
All of these steps are easy in Linux. The hart part is getting others to support it on their end.
It bugs me, because I use all of these tools all the time. I just consider myself a more careful Internet tourist then the average citizen. I make my computer a little more difficult to track and attack... so virus writers and hackers will move on to easier targets. If you use email and chat for business... I think all of these tools would be a minimum requirement in order to protect ur assests.
Being careful online doesnt make me suspicious at all. But this sort of document will make ignorant people suspicious of my care.
BTW: does anyone else suspect that maybe this article is BS? Because I cant believe the FBI would have anything to do with encouraging people to look for potential terrorist in an Internet cafe. I just cant believe that our intelligence service is that stupid.
The answer is the same reason governments are scared of RIMs encrypted BB mail system. They cant back door it, so they hope it doesnt gain wide acceptance.
Google and other mail clients "could" implement encryption on your behalf. The reason they do not, is because it is in their interest to know as much about you as possible. This is how they maximize their main business: selling ads. Secondly, when the government requests wide or targeted searches on their customer data (your email and chats), they charge the government money for this. I mean having ur data unencrypted is a source of revenue when they sell it to government bodies.
These companies do not wish to offer privacy for u because there is money in having ur private communications available for them to search and sell. If it wasnt this way, then we would all have privacy, because there is a competitive advantage in providing privacy. If one of the major online email companies (like Gmail, Yahoo, MSN) offered true privacy... I would switch to them right away. Instead these companies would rather have you believe they are providing security when they are not. For example, see the "encryption" option for skype. Its a lie, and it does not provide anything close to the protection a regular land line already offers. Another example is in Google Talk which has an "Off the Record" option. Off the Record http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Off-the-Record_Messaging provides encryption and anonymity for chat... but this is not at all what google provides http://support.google.com/talk/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=29291.
These companies are not providing privacy or security to answer to the government. They are doing this because it is profitable to keep ur data insecure and as a result they would prefer u remain ignorant of this fact.
After 14 years, the business model has been completed and all money made from the original work has been made. The only way to make additional money off the same content is to re-introduce it into something totally new. For example, if an artist makes a song and it doesnt do well in 14 years... and then at 15 years, Volkswagen uses it in a commercial and a movie company puts it into a blockbuster... why should the original artist of the song make any money at all? I dont think they should because it wasnt their song that was popular, but rather the new content that drove it to the masses. If the artist then wants to make money off this, they should then make or produce something new using the popularity they achieved through no work of their own.
The other way to make money off old content is to highly limit the release of it. Like the way disney holds movies that are now 75 YEARS OLD and re-releases them every few years for a short period of time. I think it is a dam shame that we allow companies to do this and it is a great reduction in the shared cultural experience that is possible for all people (it limits experience for the poor). I think snow white and dumbo and others should now be free to all the world to enjoy regardless of funds and it is ridiculous to assume that anyone related to the making of these or even the company business model requires this extensive amount of time to recover profits from that endeavour.
About linux: you can always make ur own closed fork of linux. You just cant sell it that way. So make all the changes u want to ur linux version and use it in ur company and for ur employees... thats fine. If u compare this to music copyrights... well u cant. If u are suggesting all music and video have the same license... I would support that too.
does it clearly state on the box that you are buying a license rather than a game, and that it is worth less second hand, and that if you buy second hand you get a cut down version?
I havent seen the box, but I would guess that the license text clearly states that you (the consumer) accept exactly what they are doing. Because every EULA I've read states that the company can do outrageous and highly questionable things and that you promise not to complain about it and give up all ur rights to sue them over it. This is what I used to read every time I read the monthly EULA XBox live made me agree to continue to use their service. I couldnt believe the stuff they were making me sign. And the microsoft windows EULA said that they could shut down any and all Internet service at any time. I'm glad I got rid of those products. But reality is that most people will not bother to read any of this, because it will take u over 45 minutes to read it all and hours longer if u try to understand it. They will claim watever they want in their EULA and then let the courts figure out wat is and wat is not legal should u dispute it later.
The reduction in 2nd hand value due to the license restrictions will not be part of the agreement. That is just speculative... although it will likely be true.
Hitler was not atheist in the slightest, he made many references to Jesus in his speeches. He also got to power in part thanks to support from right wing social conservatives and Christian fundies.
R u suggesting that a politician would never lie about their beliefs in order to obtain power? By this logic, one would think that G.W.Bush really was a christian.
and then walk around like they are jesus because of it
Exactly. Almost everybody runs software without understanding every aspect of the underpins. What separates "script kiddies" is the fact that they run other peoples software and then act like it somehow makes them more intelligent than those who dont have access to the tools they just found. When in reality they know that the sum of their pride can usually be summarised into a process of three sentences or less and can be followed by a uneducated pre-teen.
This matches my theory where the solar system is a sort of Element of the universe at a larger scale of much higher order beyond what we can see and at much larger time scales (slower).
If u r suggesting that I use an online site in order to generate a password. I will tell u that this is highly insecure. It is kinda useless, because you have to trust that website is not storing the passwords it generated for you along with ur IP location into a database. To be use later against the websites. I think this is just a bad idea to be trusting others to create ur passwords... especially a website where u dont know who owns it. Ur better of just jamming the keyboard with ur fist a few times or rolling dice for a while. But if u have perl... the above script is easy to edit and run locally. If u dont have viruses then it is fairly safe. Also, if u use cut/paste and never type ur password, then it cannot be found from a keylogger.
Except that maybe, just maybe, they're not all assholes who just want to make a quick buck. Maybe they're scientists who are trying to figure out the truth.
By your logic we would all still be firmly in support of the Ether because that's what dominated scientific conferences at one point.
I understand wat u mean: theory of AGW = theory of Ether
So the year is hotter. Wat does this prove about the cause? Nothing really, because as mentioned, there have been many such climate changes prior to mankind having the ability to cause it. Wat is apparent that certain parties r using theories of a correlation to force change upon the masses which amounts to control. There r some who r aligned in such a way to profit greatly from forcing these changes upon us. We have absolutely no idea whether we r causing this and absolutely no idea whether there is anything we can do to stop it. I do believe we need to be aware of wat we r doing on mass and limit or stop things which ARE causing real harm. However, I think the most real and significant issue for our future is simply the limited supply of worldwide oil. And the more drastic steps in direct destruction of the earth we will need to take to supply our demand for it. Because there is no question that this is REAL... and we r the cause of it. So I support any rational or irrational behaviour that leads to alternate energy research. I just mean to say that simply because we can show the earth was warmer last year does not prove that we r the cause of it. And I feel those who focus on global warming r the real one with their head in the sand when it comes to the present and real short term realities of limited energy supply.
Ur being too drastic. The dangers of backing up to the cloud has nothing to do with authorities stepping in and physically removing the servers. The only danger of note is if the company goes out of business... or the cloud business is incompetent or if the cloud service becomes hacked and ur private data is accessed. This is something entirely different where a legal body of authority steps in and ceases ur cloud data when u were not doing anything wrong at all. My question for u is: what backup do u have for all ur digital data? Do you have hard copy print outs on paper of all your data? Because that is the only way you can protect against a large EM pulse from the sun or by some electromagnetic bomb or lightning. And then wat if there is a fire in your house or an earthquake destroys ur city. Im not suggesting u have to take precautions for all of this. But I am saying that backing up to the cloud is an additional option that provides many benefits other backups solutions do not provide. If backing up to the cloud is ur only backup solution... then it is 100% better then no solution at all. Because no solution is what most people I know have. You can brag and brag about wat u do... but if ur honest and look around... most people do nothing at all. Further... a reason not to backup to the cloud has nothing at all to do with legal authorities stepping in and seizing the providers servers. There are valid reasons not to use the cloud for ur primary backup... however those reasons have nothing to do with wat actually happened here to megaupload.
I use youtube to upload video and then I use their video editor software to splice it together and put music tracks on it. Its not the most professional solution, but it is cheap and easy. Now I have about 10 family videos put up there. Youtube doesnt provide me with the option to download this "new" edited version of it. So imagine, that youtube is taken down in the same way due to some violation of the laws or not properly controlling content other user put up. Well if that happens then I lose all my created content and there was never any way for me to back this up. Im not saying this is the same situation as megaupload... Im just saying there may be legitimate reasons that content owners do not have the option to keep an additional backup of online content. Even when the content is entirely legal. Pulling down such a large site has certainly effected some and destroyed access to very much legal content. Maybe u think my example of youtube being taken down is ridiculous. But I contend that if SOPA was already a law, then Youtube would never exist. Im sad to admit that I am very glad youtube sold out to a well established company like Google and didnt go the way of napster. Also, ur tone suggests that those who did lose legal content deserved it because they should know better. I find that akin to people who lose all their data when a virus takes out their data. Yes, we should know better. But in reality most dont bother to take proper precautions until it is too late. When u blame the content owners for not having a backup... its like u r blaming the user and not the virus. In this case, the US government and other agents ARE THE VIRUS.
Generally wat u say is true. Ireland doesnt listen to other countries demands. And generally, the request is open for legal debate in their courts. But I know for certain they do listen to the requests for extradition from request by the International courts in the Hauge. And there is absolutely no option to appeal to the courts of Ireland in this regard. Regardless of any evidence presented to Ireland. This may not be related to the topic of this article... but lets hope that the International courts never take a position on IP.
The anti trust issues arise from the outrageous limitations that Microsoft puts on their software license. I mean the fact that they do not sell the operating system to u allows them to claim that u cannot move the operating system to a new PC or make copies, install to a new hard drive, add remove components, etc, etc. The computer hardware is not sold this way. You purchase it. As a result the two items are completely separate purchases. The first is the computer u own, and the second is the operating system you lease a license to use under limited rights. Too force a consumer to buy both in order to get just one is a serious anti trust issue. The current EULAs you agree to on first use after purchase specifically states that u r entitled to a refund of the MS operating system if u choose to reject it. But usually the computer vendor will not honor this. This is what happened to me after I purchased a Hewlett Packard Netbook with Microsoft OS pre-installed. I read through the agreement which entitled me to a refund, so I never accepted the license. But when I called HP for a software refund, they declined and insisted I return the entire purchase. I find it funny that these companies (such as Hewlett Packard) will hold u to the fire if u do not honor ur part of the EULA, but at the same time, they dont even bother to honor the portions of the agreement defining wat they say they will do. Let me repeat this: Hewlett Packard for one will not honor the EULA agreement they provide to their customers. Because they did not do this for me. In fact after calling and calling and sighting portions of their EULA to their support staff an agent said to me: "You will never get a refund from us". Directly contradicting what Hewlett Packard wrote in the EULA they expected me to honor. After one full year of not using the hard drive in hopes to get my refund... I finally totally overwrote the hard drive and wiped off the crappy Microsoft Operating System they put on their. I never used the MS operating system because there are so many viruses and weaknesses and the netbook version they put on was limited and required additional money just to make it function like a normal operating system. Fortunately, I am running this PC with a strong fully encrypted and free Linux operating system.
I guess my point is that it would be an anti trust issue if they do not offer the computer without the operating system, but apparently they just dont care and will probably do it anyways... because there is nobody out there standing up for consumer rights. Because there is a large portion of consumers who dont even understand that there is an option for operating systems and they also dont know that they are paying money for the one that comes for "free" on the PC they just purchased.
Slashdot Mirror
Also I'll get hate for saying this but the guy is a douche. there are plenty of online Linux vendors that would have been MORE than happy to have his business, its assholes like him that just go buy winboxes that convinces OEMs there is no point in offering Linux. so next time you can't find drivers for some Dell blame Mr windows buying douchebag who made sure the OEMs don't care about you.
This is about the fact that the license clearly states: YOU CAN GET REFUND. And then if u request it... U GET NOTHING. It is about the fact that vendors are stating clearly something that they will not honor. If they dont want to offer a refund... then they should not write it into the agreement. The reason they have to write this into the agreement is because to condition the sale of one product on the requirement to purchase a second product is a clear example of anti-competitive behaviour. It is illegal and this is exactly what they would be doing if they forced u to purchase the PC with windows together with no option to purchase them separately. Being found guilty of anti-competitive practices is an expensive proposition (millions and millions likely). So they write that they will offer a refund, with clearly no intent to do it. I think this is the main reason that the microsoft EULA is offered from the Vendor to the consumer and not a direct offering from Microsoft. Because microsoft themselves is probably way to scared to force consumers to purchase windows with a PC. I believe they were fined for this in the US already. So it is the vendor that takes on the risk on behalf of Microsoft.
I know because I requested a refund from Hewlett Packard for months. And never used the windows license ever. It sucks to pay for something you dont use in the box... but its far worse when it says in the box "you can have a refund" and then when u go to get it... U GET NOTHING. And if u presist in asking why you get nothing when it says u will get something they provide no answer and eventually get mad and say to you: "You will never get a refund from us!".
Lenovo is supplying a legal document, they fully expect you to honour if you accept it. There is no reason for a customer to go through great issue to get them to honor their end of the contract. You shouldnt have to take a company to court in order to have them do wat they say they will do. Instead the company should just never write the offer for refund in the first place. But they do write it.
For those of u who love Microsoft and like that it is bundled with ur PC purchase. Please be quiet. This has nothing to do with u. There is no problem with the option of vendors supplying windows for those who want it. Fighting for the rights outlined in the agreement has nothing to do with anyone who likes microsoft already. U guys r sitting pretty and get exactly wat u want. Having a company follow the contracts they offer to u is not about bashing microsoft. It is about doing the right thing. If it doesnt effect u, then just ignore this... it wont effect u. It doesnt make ur PC any cheaper or better to force others to pay for something they dont want.
I have purchased several PCs with an included microsoft license. I read the agreement and in all cases the Vendor stated that they would refund the operating system cost if it was requested and not installed. Having called these companies, I can tell u that they will pretend to have no idea wat u r talking about and insist that u return the entire purchase for a refund. I choose not to refund and tried for months to communicate with them in order to receive the refund they promised in the agreement they sent to me. The first thing their support staff told me was to call Microsoft for a refund. But the windows license agreement clearly states in the beginning it is between u (consumer) and the vendor (HP, Lenovo, etc). I copied the entire agreement and quoted the pertinent parts to their support staff. But they continued to pretend not to understand what they had written. Finally, a support staff member from Hewlett Packard stated directly to me: "You will never get a refund from us".
The only recourse is to sue the vendor in order to get a refund. But realistically, who is going to do this. I commend this consumer for sticking to his guns and taking the vendor to task. It is about time some people stand up to fight for the agreement that the vendor puts in writing themselves. It is ridiculous that a vendor provides u with an agreement that they wont even honor and pretend to not understand. What do u think the vendor would do if u began to violate the license agreement urself? Like if I began selling free copies of the operating system. Do u think the vendor would continue to pretend that they dont understand the letter of this license?
It seems clear to me that Vendors supply the option for a refund in the agreement, because to not do so would subject them to anti-competitive practice lawsuits... which can be a huge fine. But the reality is that they have absolutely no intent of honoring this agreement and provide only two options: pay for something u dont want or refund everything and go away.
IMO, this situation is ripe for a class action lawsuit. I live in Canada. I would be more then happy to support such a case and offer all my assistance of past correspondence to assist in the case. I cannot believe I am the only one who finds the Microsoft bundled products less then useless and requested a refund as outlined in the agreement. Alone, it is difficult to do anything, but together I believe that real change could occur.
All the additionally bundled software vendors pay the Vendor to have their products installed with windows. Except in some situations like for certain required licenses such as MPEG and adobe flash which microsoft pays to have bundled into windows because it is basically required to make the Internet experience useful. Since the vendor (Lenovo in this case) gets money from these vendors for every windows install... it is in their interest to force the user to have windows installed by default. If windows is not installed and specifically refunded then the vendor would not receive this money from 3rd parties which very well may exceed the cost of the windows license they pay to microsoft. In other words, it is a net profit situation when the user installs windows.
Regardless of how much money the vendor gets from 3rd party vendors, there is no way that the vendor can claim that against any possible refund for the windows operating system. So legally, the vendor cannot say: "we get $10 profit for every windows install, so if u want a refund for windows, then it means u (the customer) owes us $10 now". That just doesnt make any sense. The refund amount has to be the amount paid to microsoft for the windows license and 3rd party vendor funding would not come into play.
And the bonus follow up question Scott Aaronson asks: "Prove that Iraq does not have weapons of mass destruction"
I called my representative by telephone the day Wikipedia went down. I hate SOPA and PIPA, but it has nothing to do with a desire to get free music or movies. I care about file sharing but that doesnt mean I support piracy. So it would be best if the two goals were separated completely as far as I am concerned. It seems to be in the interest of those who support these laws to tie them together.
It would be very nice if there was a way to stop piracy. The practice of piracy does not effect me because I dont do it. I am not trying to take a moral issue over how others use the Internet. In general, I just dont care if piracy exists or not. My gut feeling is that it should not be done, because it is theft. Even if they are charging too much or limiting content or mucking it up with DRM... they own it. The problem is that the act of piracy and the attempt to curtail it is probably going to effect me regardless. I see how the corporations are making the fight against piracy into a fight against sharing. Sharing is not piracy... and the laws of ur country are not the same laws of all countries. In some countries it is perfectly legal to share music and other content u own with people u know. For now... I can still do this. But I see a time where we will all have to obey the limited laws of fair use as written in America. So now I fight for the side of the pirates. Not because I think it is right, but because... to allow governments and corporations to control the Internet at large in the name of just one issue is wrong. I wish piracy would go away... so corporations wouldnt have a leg to stand on when requesting such drastic measures of control. Its so obvious to me that they just want to see all traffic going through them. I realize megaupload had some issues. But it was also a massive sharing site for many artists with legal content.
Whether piracy lives or dies doesnt matter to me. I expect there will always be theft in all areas of business regardless of the controls. I just dont want laws to come in that effect everyone and retard the future of open sharing online.
Primarily they are distributors. They control distribution and broadcasting rights. And they work to ensure that everyone follows this and if not provides the legal funding to stop it. Also, they do marketing to make sure every kid in their target market believes that they wanted it.
Basically, everything they do and charge money for is approaching $0. So they are having a really tough time right now, because marketing and distribution is something that the artist can do directly themselves. In the wake of this new paradigm they are struggling hard to prevent others from making this fact obvious. Like megaupload.com who provided a good tool for artists to do themselves exactly what the existing "producers" used to do for them at an inflated fee.
Linux has been around a long time but is no where near taking over or making Apple or Microsoft from going bankrupt.
U obviously dont have experience working with servers. U know, like the computers producing the pages here on slashdot ur looking at now. There is a big winner in the server market and the answer may surprise u.
Slashdot on piracy: "Abolish all copyrights! Copying isn't theft! Everyone is entitled to everything!" Slashdot on the GPL: "Gee whiz, the GPL copyright license protects this code. Down with leeching violators! Protect against GPL theft!"
Obviously the 2 licenses are polar opposites. One license is designed to specifically prevent sharing and the other is designed to specifically force sharing. I know I am over simplifying, but if u cant see any difference between these two types of licensing... then generalisation is wat u need.
Its like complaining about someone who believes that private gun ownership should have more control and then push this in their face when the army uses guns to defend their country. Theirs a big difference between the two implementations. Get it?
I think ur right. Its either a fake flyer or it is fake in the sense that someone was paid to do something they know nothing about... and now they are producing bogus security flyers in order to justify their the pay they are getting for their fake credentials. This is a stupid flyer. It was produced either by stupid people or faked to look like it was drafted by stupid people. What makes it believable is that recently some British tourists were recently sent back to Ireland because they tweeted "I am going to destroy America". And then they were forced to apologise because some idiot took these words literally. I hope ur right tho... I hope this sort of information is not produced by people being paid to protect us.
The solution to this is to encourage everyone to use privacy tools. This makes this sort of profiling useless. Like the solution to those British tourists who were jailed for a funny tweet recently... is for everyone to begin tweeting "Destroy America". Because these sorts of profiling are written by and for stupid people who have to write or do something to justify their jobs. Searching for a terrorist in an internet cafe is a stupid practice.
If u run linux, using these tools is easy. Fist use Gmail, because they support XMPP which allows u to run OTR encryption for chat. Install Pidgin and the OTR addon. Set OTR to automatically be used when available. Create a PGP under "Passwords and Encryption Keys" in System->Administration. Use Evolution to collect ur email by POP or preferably IMAP. Evolution will allow u to PGP encrypt/decrypt messages with a single checkbox. Install polipio application as instructed on the Tor website. Then add the torbutton plugin to firefox. This will allow u to browse the internet anonymously after a single click of the icon.
All of these steps are easy in Linux. The hart part is getting others to support it on their end.
It bugs me, because I use all of these tools all the time. I just consider myself a more careful Internet tourist then the average citizen. I make my computer a little more difficult to track and attack... so virus writers and hackers will move on to easier targets. If you use email and chat for business... I think all of these tools would be a minimum requirement in order to protect ur assests.
Being careful online doesnt make me suspicious at all. But this sort of document will make ignorant people suspicious of my care.
BTW: does anyone else suspect that maybe this article is BS? Because I cant believe the FBI would have anything to do with encouraging people to look for potential terrorist in an Internet cafe. I just cant believe that our intelligence service is that stupid.
The answer is the same reason governments are scared of RIMs encrypted BB mail system. They cant back door it, so they hope it doesnt gain wide acceptance.
Google and other mail clients "could" implement encryption on your behalf. The reason they do not, is because it is in their interest to know as much about you as possible. This is how they maximize their main business: selling ads. Secondly, when the government requests wide or targeted searches on their customer data (your email and chats), they charge the government money for this. I mean having ur data unencrypted is a source of revenue when they sell it to government bodies.
These companies do not wish to offer privacy for u because there is money in having ur private communications available for them to search and sell. If it wasnt this way, then we would all have privacy, because there is a competitive advantage in providing privacy. If one of the major online email companies (like Gmail, Yahoo, MSN) offered true privacy... I would switch to them right away. Instead these companies would rather have you believe they are providing security when they are not. For example, see the "encryption" option for skype. Its a lie, and it does not provide anything close to the protection a regular land line already offers. Another example is in Google Talk which has an "Off the Record" option. Off the Record http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Off-the-Record_Messaging provides encryption and anonymity for chat... but this is not at all what google provides http://support.google.com/talk/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=29291.
These companies are not providing privacy or security to answer to the government. They are doing this because it is profitable to keep ur data insecure and as a result they would prefer u remain ignorant of this fact.
After 14 years, the business model has been completed and all money made from the original work has been made. The only way to make additional money off the same content is to re-introduce it into something totally new. For example, if an artist makes a song and it doesnt do well in 14 years... and then at 15 years, Volkswagen uses it in a commercial and a movie company puts it into a blockbuster... why should the original artist of the song make any money at all? I dont think they should because it wasnt their song that was popular, but rather the new content that drove it to the masses. If the artist then wants to make money off this, they should then make or produce something new using the popularity they achieved through no work of their own.
The other way to make money off old content is to highly limit the release of it. Like the way disney holds movies that are now 75 YEARS OLD and re-releases them every few years for a short period of time. I think it is a dam shame that we allow companies to do this and it is a great reduction in the shared cultural experience that is possible for all people (it limits experience for the poor). I think snow white and dumbo and others should now be free to all the world to enjoy regardless of funds and it is ridiculous to assume that anyone related to the making of these or even the company business model requires this extensive amount of time to recover profits from that endeavour.
About linux: you can always make ur own closed fork of linux. You just cant sell it that way. So make all the changes u want to ur linux version and use it in ur company and for ur employees... thats fine. If u compare this to music copyrights... well u cant. If u are suggesting all music and video have the same license... I would support that too.
does it clearly state on the box that you are buying a license rather than a game, and that it is worth less second hand, and that if you buy second hand you get a cut down version?
I havent seen the box, but I would guess that the license text clearly states that you (the consumer) accept exactly what they are doing. Because every EULA I've read states that the company can do outrageous and highly questionable things and that you promise not to complain about it and give up all ur rights to sue them over it. This is what I used to read every time I read the monthly EULA XBox live made me agree to continue to use their service. I couldnt believe the stuff they were making me sign. And the microsoft windows EULA said that they could shut down any and all Internet service at any time. I'm glad I got rid of those products. But reality is that most people will not bother to read any of this, because it will take u over 45 minutes to read it all and hours longer if u try to understand it. They will claim watever they want in their EULA and then let the courts figure out wat is and wat is not legal should u dispute it later.
The reduction in 2nd hand value due to the license restrictions will not be part of the agreement. That is just speculative... although it will likely be true.
Hitler was not atheist in the slightest, he made many references to Jesus in his speeches. He also got to power in part thanks to support from right wing social conservatives and Christian fundies.
R u suggesting that a politician would never lie about their beliefs in order to obtain power? By this logic, one would think that G.W.Bush really was a christian.
and then walk around like they are jesus because of it
Exactly. Almost everybody runs software without understanding every aspect of the underpins. What separates "script kiddies" is the fact that they run other peoples software and then act like it somehow makes them more intelligent than those who dont have access to the tools they just found. When in reality they know that the sum of their pride can usually be summarised into a process of three sentences or less and can be followed by a uneducated pre-teen.
This matches my theory where the solar system is a sort of Element of the universe at a larger scale of much higher order beyond what we can see and at much larger time scales (slower).
If u r suggesting that I use an online site in order to generate a password. I will tell u that this is highly insecure. It is kinda useless, because you have to trust that website is not storing the passwords it generated for you along with ur IP location into a database. To be use later against the websites. I think this is just a bad idea to be trusting others to create ur passwords... especially a website where u dont know who owns it. Ur better of just jamming the keyboard with ur fist a few times or rolling dice for a while. But if u have perl... the above script is easy to edit and run locally. If u dont have viruses then it is fairly safe. Also, if u use cut/paste and never type ur password, then it cannot be found from a keylogger.
Finally Microsoft takes a stand I can support. Ive been waiting a long time for anything agreeable to come from Redmond.
Except that maybe, just maybe, they're not all assholes who just want to make a quick buck. Maybe they're scientists who are trying to figure out the truth.
By your logic we would all still be firmly in support of the Ether because that's what dominated scientific conferences at one point.
I understand wat u mean: theory of AGW = theory of Ether
So the year is hotter. Wat does this prove about the cause? Nothing really, because as mentioned, there have been many such climate changes prior to mankind having the ability to cause it. Wat is apparent that certain parties r using theories of a correlation to force change upon the masses which amounts to control. There r some who r aligned in such a way to profit greatly from forcing these changes upon us. We have absolutely no idea whether we r causing this and absolutely no idea whether there is anything we can do to stop it. I do believe we need to be aware of wat we r doing on mass and limit or stop things which ARE causing real harm. However, I think the most real and significant issue for our future is simply the limited supply of worldwide oil. And the more drastic steps in direct destruction of the earth we will need to take to supply our demand for it. Because there is no question that this is REAL... and we r the cause of it. So I support any rational or irrational behaviour that leads to alternate energy research. I just mean to say that simply because we can show the earth was warmer last year does not prove that we r the cause of it. And I feel those who focus on global warming r the real one with their head in the sand when it comes to the present and real short term realities of limited energy supply.
Ur being too drastic. The dangers of backing up to the cloud has nothing to do with authorities stepping in and physically removing the servers. The only danger of note is if the company goes out of business... or the cloud business is incompetent or if the cloud service becomes hacked and ur private data is accessed. This is something entirely different where a legal body of authority steps in and ceases ur cloud data when u were not doing anything wrong at all. My question for u is: what backup do u have for all ur digital data? Do you have hard copy print outs on paper of all your data? Because that is the only way you can protect against a large EM pulse from the sun or by some electromagnetic bomb or lightning. And then wat if there is a fire in your house or an earthquake destroys ur city. Im not suggesting u have to take precautions for all of this. But I am saying that backing up to the cloud is an additional option that provides many benefits other backups solutions do not provide. If backing up to the cloud is ur only backup solution... then it is 100% better then no solution at all. Because no solution is what most people I know have. You can brag and brag about wat u do... but if ur honest and look around... most people do nothing at all. Further... a reason not to backup to the cloud has nothing at all to do with legal authorities stepping in and seizing the providers servers. There are valid reasons not to use the cloud for ur primary backup... however those reasons have nothing to do with wat actually happened here to megaupload.
I use youtube to upload video and then I use their video editor software to splice it together and put music tracks on it. Its not the most professional solution, but it is cheap and easy. Now I have about 10 family videos put up there. Youtube doesnt provide me with the option to download this "new" edited version of it. So imagine, that youtube is taken down in the same way due to some violation of the laws or not properly controlling content other user put up. Well if that happens then I lose all my created content and there was never any way for me to back this up. Im not saying this is the same situation as megaupload... Im just saying there may be legitimate reasons that content owners do not have the option to keep an additional backup of online content. Even when the content is entirely legal. Pulling down such a large site has certainly effected some and destroyed access to very much legal content. Maybe u think my example of youtube being taken down is ridiculous. But I contend that if SOPA was already a law, then Youtube would never exist. Im sad to admit that I am very glad youtube sold out to a well established company like Google and didnt go the way of napster. Also, ur tone suggests that those who did lose legal content deserved it because they should know better. I find that akin to people who lose all their data when a virus takes out their data. Yes, we should know better. But in reality most dont bother to take proper precautions until it is too late. When u blame the content owners for not having a backup... its like u r blaming the user and not the virus. In this case, the US government and other agents ARE THE VIRUS.
Generally wat u say is true. Ireland doesnt listen to other countries demands. And generally, the request is open for legal debate in their courts. But I know for certain they do listen to the requests for extradition from request by the International courts in the Hauge. And there is absolutely no option to appeal to the courts of Ireland in this regard. Regardless of any evidence presented to Ireland. This may not be related to the topic of this article... but lets hope that the International courts never take a position on IP.
This is all very interesting. But can u explain to me how SODA relates to SOPA?
The anti trust issues arise from the outrageous limitations that Microsoft puts on their software license. I mean the fact that they do not sell the operating system to u allows them to claim that u cannot move the operating system to a new PC or make copies, install to a new hard drive, add remove components, etc, etc. The computer hardware is not sold this way. You purchase it. As a result the two items are completely separate purchases. The first is the computer u own, and the second is the operating system you lease a license to use under limited rights. Too force a consumer to buy both in order to get just one is a serious anti trust issue. The current EULAs you agree to on first use after purchase specifically states that u r entitled to a refund of the MS operating system if u choose to reject it. But usually the computer vendor will not honor this. This is what happened to me after I purchased a Hewlett Packard Netbook with Microsoft OS pre-installed. I read through the agreement which entitled me to a refund, so I never accepted the license. But when I called HP for a software refund, they declined and insisted I return the entire purchase. I find it funny that these companies (such as Hewlett Packard) will hold u to the fire if u do not honor ur part of the EULA, but at the same time, they dont even bother to honor the portions of the agreement defining wat they say they will do. Let me repeat this: Hewlett Packard for one will not honor the EULA agreement they provide to their customers. Because they did not do this for me. In fact after calling and calling and sighting portions of their EULA to their support staff an agent said to me: "You will never get a refund from us". Directly contradicting what Hewlett Packard wrote in the EULA they expected me to honor. After one full year of not using the hard drive in hopes to get my refund... I finally totally overwrote the hard drive and wiped off the crappy Microsoft Operating System they put on their. I never used the MS operating system because there are so many viruses and weaknesses and the netbook version they put on was limited and required additional money just to make it function like a normal operating system. Fortunately, I am running this PC with a strong fully encrypted and free Linux operating system. I guess my point is that it would be an anti trust issue if they do not offer the computer without the operating system, but apparently they just dont care and will probably do it anyways... because there is nobody out there standing up for consumer rights. Because there is a large portion of consumers who dont even understand that there is an option for operating systems and they also dont know that they are paying money for the one that comes for "free" on the PC they just purchased.