I know a few Iranian students, and from what I can tell, there is a *huge* gap between the people and the government in Iran. While the leaders are frantically screaming and warmongering, the population just sighs, shake their heads, and go on living. The petty rules are simply ignored whenever they can. Civil disobedience is a national hobby. I love that attitude. This is especially true in the larger cities that are more modern than you might think.
What you describe is a relic of a past. Until 1953, iran was quite democratic, progressive and western-oriented country. Unfortunately, great britain and US were afraid, that iran will align with soviet russia and orchestraded coup d'état which transfered the power to authoritan leader and later to religious groups. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d'%C3%A9tat or the movie/comix Persepolis, if your are interested about actions which lead to current situation.
Unfortunately the actions of current regime (internet censorhip, ban on women higher education etc) will soon mark end for that few groups of freedom-thinking people that are left there.
Are the schools to blame though, or rent seeking stock photo sources? Some of the licences these guys try to pull are insane.
In this case, these are the things/people to blame (in no particular order):
- Authors of the textbook. - School teachers who force the textbook on the students - Students who bend over and buy such shitty book - Insane copyright laws which allows photographers to charge money for photos of public domain paintings.
Fat stupid people who aren't terribly aware of what's going on is an environment. Government tyranny is an organism that thrives in this particular environment
I agree with your post mostly but i think you are forgetting about slim stupid people.
Lynch's Dune is not close to the book in terms of story, but it is very accurate in terms of over all feeling I find.
Note that the original dune was heavily cuted and edited before screening in theaters. The original dune had runtime of 137 minutes. There exists extended edition (with 177 minutes of runtime) featuring outtakes, additional footage, test close-up shots of certain actors, and even fabricated (i.e. "cheated") footage, which is closer story-wise to the Herberts original book.
Personaly i think that even the original dune managed to capture the atmosphere of Herberts universe quite well. Maybe it was incomprehensible to the viewer not familiar with the book, but that was no problem for me.
Once upon a time, when I first got on the Internet (late 1980s), there was no anonymity. Sysadmins voluntarily adhered to a policy where each user's online identity and their real identity were linked [rajivshah.com]. If someone ever found a way to break this link, it was considered a bug [google.com] which needed to be fixed. It was staunchly enforced by admins who believed the net would devolve into a morass of misbehavior if people were allowed to post anonymously.
I belive soon after the internet spread beyond the few academic institutions in late eighties, there started a discussion about the pros and cons of real names and handles, about corresponding security issues etc. There is very nice article about this topic on textfiles.com from 1992: http://www.textfiles.com/100/anonymit After reading it, i think that the usage of anonymous/pseudoanonymous nicknames and handles in internet discussions is more then justified.
In Iowa, emails of teachers/professors are considered a part of public record [educateiowa.gov] and can be requested. I know that Iowa probably has different laws.
The media asked for emails of an administrator of the Des Moines school district and the emails were released [cjr.org].
Only emails sent and received between February 1 and May 10 containing the words “Omaha”, “charter school”, “Nina Rasmusson” and “Jennifer Kreashko” were released, e.g. only work-related emails are subjects of public record.
Personal e-mails sent and recieved by goverment employee using his work e-mail adress are still protected by privacy laws.
As for "copyright infringement", and "file sharing", there's little point in people getting their panties in a twist. Technology evolves and so do industries. We already have services like MOG and NETFLIX, which replace what a lot of questionable activities used to provide, for a combined total of a whopping $13 USD/mo. And this is just the tip of the iceberg. In the coming years, we should find more content available to more people in massive libraries like both of these services for *very affordable* subscriptions.
I wish i could share your optimism, but i think that your prediction won't come true while current copyright law is in effect. You mention netflix, they are operating since 1999, still they are only available in america and their catalog contains only fraction of available material (they contain cca 100k titles according to wikipedia. There is cca 2280k movies listed just on IMDB, there are many more titles not listed there). Why should i think that this situation will change in near future?
The problem is, copyright doesn't allow you to include some work in your library without the consent of the author. Many authors won't grant you such consent because you never ask them (there are too many of them), they are dead, unknown, they don't care or some other reason. When this happens, your only option is piracy.
Just see what happened when google tried to create comprehensive library of e-book materials. Lot's of greedy authors accused them of theft. While the era of copyright lasts, there will be no comprehensive library of works, because authors will never give blanket approval for everyone to include their creation in their library. In order to profit with copyright, authors need to maintain tight control over the distribution of their work. They don't care that majority of intelectual property is not legaly available to most people as consequence.
In Relativity, traveling faster than light relative to any reference frame, via any method, presents problems with causality. And the whole point of a Warp Drive is that someone will agree that you went faster than light, and thus went backward in time.
How do you explain the current astrophysical consensus, that distant galaxies are traveling several times faster then light (and speeding up) from us due to our universe expanding exponentialy?
I'm pretty sure nobody abuses children because they think they can be famous online or they think they'll make a buck (especially the latter... I have never heard of anyone actually getting rich off of child pornographyâ"you'd think they'd make a big deal when they caught the person).
They are not making it for the money, but several studies about the behaviour of child molesters actualy sugest, that they do it mainly for the attention from their peers.
I personaly thing that sane child porn laws would look like this: - if no child is harmed, the material is legal (this covers 2d/cartoon child porn, written material like Lolita etc) - creation and/or consensual possesion of material, where real children is sexualy abused is illegal, with few exceptions which cover situations, where you need the material to notify the police that a crime is happening etc. I think that criminalising only the creation of child porn is not enough, we have to take into acount the privacy of victims which often do not wish for the material, where they are abused to be shared freely over internet and cause further problems in their lifes. - the age boundary, for what is considered child porn, should be lowered so it matches the age, from which sexual intercourse is legal. This covers cases of teens sexting nude photos of themself to each other. - nude images of children, where no sexual abuse is happening (e.g. they are not in sexual pose), should be legal (this covers images of little babies in bathtub, "Virgin Killers" album cover from Scorpions etc.)
Yep.. if you don't like the terms the artist provides the content under, you can just do what ever you feel like.
Like when Linksys used Linux for it's routers, and didn't provide the source code... the FSF went after them for it, and they eventually settled and provided the source.
And that was their mistake. They should never have settled or provided source. They should have just told the FSF to fuck off. GPL non-compliance makes for a better product!
If i had to choose between a world without copyright and gnu/gpl and current world, where copyright and gnu/gpl can exist, i would surely choose the former and i think that FSF would do the same. (Of course the ideal situation for FSF would be a world where no one can limit distribution of intelectual property and everyone has to provide sources/specs to their work if they distribute it)
Um, considering that more than likely, every person in the car is already being tracked at a personal level via their cell phone (and other devices, such as tablets, etc), I don't see this as being all that much worse than the de facto privacy of the modern digital world.
I agree with you that the privacy breach and surveilance probably won't be any worse than what we have now with today cell phones.
I'm more concerned about the security of automated car systems and network protocols from hacking attempts. I imagine that at least at the beggining, there won't be much diversity between the car models. Much of the internal logic and IP will be provided by Google, who made most testing. If someone manages to discover security flaw in the car, which would gave him remote control over it, it could lead to some pretty dangerous situations.
What if I told you that Samsung has also sued its competitors for patent infringement?
Can you please provide some example, where samsung used his patents offensively? i tried to search google but i only got hits from recent apple-samsung cases.
The problem is that all other currencies have some entity backing them that has a motive to or already does instituted financial regulation -- like stopping ponzi schemes. And the logic for this is quite simple. If you don't protect idiots, then idiots can't use your currency. Since much of the population is idiots, you need to protect them from the really bad stuff that comes along with capitalism -- otherwise your system starts to look really shitty and third world really fast.
Are you trying to say, that what the Pirateat40 did is legal in USA? I suppose that his users had some kind of agreement with him and he broke this agreement. Does US legal system not protect the citisens from such things? I was aware that the legal system in US is in pretty bad shape (copyrights, patents etc) but if breaking agreement and stealing things from other people is legal, it's worse that i thought.
I think most people who are against software patents are actually against stupid patents, "design" patents, and not against the idea that software could be an original invention that entitles its creator to protection.
I don't think so. Most people i know, who are against software patents (including me), are actualy against the idea that you should be able to patent some piece of code for many years in a field which is developing so dynamicaly, that years of monopoly on some invetion will clearly hinder the technological progress.
I'm one of the 1 million who didn't vote in NZ. I don't believe any of the parties reflect my personal views. I'm not apathetic, I'm disenchanted.
There will never be a party which accurately reflects all of your personal views. You should vote for the party which is most compatible with your views. If you don't vote, you support the party which wins the elections (e.g. you support this business oriented party).
So, that leaves what? Nothing. There is nothing on the Moon even remotely worth the multi-trillion-dollar expense. It's just rocks in a vacuum. We've got plenty of rocks here!
If you start thinking outside of the box, that everything we mine in the space must be hauled and used back on Earth, then you will find out that access to metals/water/fuel etc. outside of the Earth gravity well could be very desireable and economical for constructions of e.g. moon base, orbital dock and subsequent space ships for interplanetary travels etc.
I've always said I'd like to live at least 500 years. Of course, it would be interesting to be able to stay relatively "young" more or less indefinitely.
Might not be something everyone is interested in but I would love to never feel any pressure to hurry up and do all those things I want to do. I could spend 50 years just reading interesting books. Maybe spend ten years building a house. And thinking more long-term, how about a few hundred years in deep space? You'd have the time...
Exatcly my lines of thoughts. The options the guy in TFA provided to his audience (80, 120, 150 years and infinity) look quite unbalanced to me. I wouldn't certainly want to live infinitely but perhaps i wouldn't mind to live for few millions or even billions years to see universe exploration, alien civilisations, to find the purpose and origin of matter and time etc. Enyone knows later books in Ender's game series by Orson Scot Card? The main character lived for thousands years just because he traveled at relativistic speeds. Leto Atreides II (aka the Gold emperaror of Dune) is another example of "human" who lived for more than thousand years. Does anyone know more examples of long-living people from science fiction litarature?
I fully agree that copyright and patent laws should be abolished. The technology has changed significantly since their introduction, maybe there is no need to provide further legal support to IP creators. If we find out, thet such support is still desirable, it should definitely take some form which doesn't prevent copying/sharing of information.
There are two basic problems with copyrights. 1- eternal duration (they last until the material is worthless), 2-they are under no obligation to offer it for sale.
The main problem of copyright is, that it creates artificial scarity where none is needed. Without copyright, the whole knowledge of humankind could be available to anyone on the planet instantly. With copyright, only the knowledge you can personaly financialy afford and the creator is willing to sell you is available. This is imo totaly wrong and there is absolutely no reason for such cripling restriction to exist.
Money is not the problem. We already pay for intelectual property. We just don't want to share it with everyone because we fear, that if IP is widely available, none would purchuase new stuff, everyone would just wait for someone else to make the purchuase and share the it. The solution is IMO to force people to spend some money on intelectual property in the form of tax, tax-deductible coupons etc. and then find some fair way to distribute such funds between creators.
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I know a few Iranian students, and from what I can tell, there is a *huge* gap between the people and the government in Iran. While the leaders are frantically screaming and warmongering, the population just sighs, shake their heads, and go on living. The petty rules are simply ignored whenever they can. Civil disobedience is a national hobby. I love that attitude. This is especially true in the larger cities that are more modern than you might think.
What you describe is a relic of a past. Until 1953, iran was quite democratic, progressive and western-oriented country. Unfortunately, great britain and US were afraid, that iran will align with soviet russia and orchestraded coup d'état which transfered the power to authoritan leader and later to religious groups. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d'%C3%A9tat or the movie/comix Persepolis, if your are interested about actions which lead to current situation.
Unfortunately the actions of current regime (internet censorhip, ban on women higher education etc) will soon mark end for that few groups of freedom-thinking people that are left there.
Are the schools to blame though, or rent seeking stock photo sources? Some of the licences these guys try to pull are insane.
In this case, these are the things/people to blame (in no particular order):
- Authors of the textbook.
- School teachers who force the textbook on the students
- Students who bend over and buy such shitty book
- Insane copyright laws which allows photographers to charge money for photos of public domain paintings.
Making a photo of an existing painting is creative, as you created something that wasn't there before.
Great, so when i copy a movie or a book, i can claim copyright on the copy?
Fat stupid people who aren't terribly aware of what's going on is an environment. Government tyranny is an organism that thrives in this particular environment
I agree with your post mostly but i think you are forgetting about slim stupid people.
IMO nicer version: http://xkcd-map.rent-a-geek.de/
And Nokia started it...
So apple has every moral right to sue nokia back. But why does it sue google?
Using the GP bully analogy - When someone bullies alice in a school, it doesn't mean alice can now punch every other kid in the class.
Companies like Apple feel like the only way to maintain is to stifle the competition not to keep innovating.
And yet now we find it is Google doing so, not Apple.
Both are equally guilty of bullshit.
I belive apple started this. Google acquired motorola for its large mobile patent portfolio, but they are using it only for defensive purposes.
If you have some case where google used its pattents offensively, please provide it.
Lynch's Dune is not close to the book in terms of story, but it is very accurate in terms of over all feeling I find.
Note that the original dune was heavily cuted and edited before screening in theaters. The original dune had runtime of 137 minutes. There exists extended edition (with 177 minutes of runtime) featuring outtakes, additional footage, test close-up shots of certain actors, and even fabricated (i.e. "cheated") footage, which is closer story-wise to the Herberts original book.
Personaly i think that even the original dune managed to capture the atmosphere of Herberts universe quite well. Maybe it was incomprehensible to the viewer not familiar with the book, but that was no problem for me.
Once upon a time, when I first got on the Internet (late 1980s), there was no anonymity. Sysadmins voluntarily adhered to a policy where each user's online identity and their real identity were linked [rajivshah.com]. If someone ever found a way to break this link, it was considered a bug [google.com] which needed to be fixed. It was staunchly enforced by admins who believed the net would devolve into a morass of misbehavior if people were allowed to post anonymously.
I belive soon after the internet spread beyond the few academic institutions in late eighties, there started a discussion about the pros and cons of real names and handles, about corresponding security issues etc. There is very nice article about this topic on textfiles.com from 1992: http://www.textfiles.com/100/anonymit
After reading it, i think that the usage of anonymous/pseudoanonymous nicknames and handles in internet discussions is more then justified.
In Iowa, emails of teachers/professors are considered a part of public record [educateiowa.gov] and can be requested. I know that Iowa probably has different laws.
The media asked for emails of an administrator of the Des Moines school district and the emails were released [cjr.org].
Only emails sent and received between February 1 and May 10 containing the words “Omaha”, “charter school”, “Nina Rasmusson” and “Jennifer Kreashko” were released, e.g. only work-related emails are subjects of public record.
Personal e-mails sent and recieved by goverment employee using his work e-mail adress are still protected by privacy laws.
As for "copyright infringement", and "file sharing", there's little point in people getting their panties in a twist. Technology evolves and so do industries. We already have services like MOG and NETFLIX, which replace what a lot of questionable activities used to provide, for a combined total of a whopping $13 USD/mo. And this is just the tip of the iceberg. In the coming years, we should find more content available to more people in massive libraries like both of these services for *very affordable* subscriptions.
I wish i could share your optimism, but i think that your prediction won't come true while current copyright law is in effect. You mention netflix, they are operating since 1999, still they are only available in america and their catalog contains only fraction of available material (they contain cca 100k titles according to wikipedia. There is cca 2280k movies listed just on IMDB, there are many more titles not listed there). Why should i think that this situation will change in near future?
The problem is, copyright doesn't allow you to include some work in your library without the consent of the author. Many authors won't grant you such consent because you never ask them (there are too many of them), they are dead, unknown, they don't care or some other reason. When this happens, your only option is piracy.
Just see what happened when google tried to create comprehensive library of e-book materials. Lot's of greedy authors accused them of theft. While the era of copyright lasts, there will be no comprehensive library of works, because authors will never give blanket approval for everyone to include their creation in their library. In order to profit with copyright, authors need to maintain tight control over the distribution of their work. They don't care that majority of intelectual property is not legaly available to most people as consequence.
In Relativity, traveling faster than light relative to any reference frame, via any method, presents problems with causality. And the whole point of a Warp Drive is that someone will agree that you went faster than light, and thus went backward in time.
How do you explain the current astrophysical consensus, that distant galaxies are traveling several times faster then light (and speeding up) from us due to our universe expanding exponentialy?
I'm pretty sure nobody abuses children because they think they can be famous online or they think they'll make a buck (especially the latter... I have never heard of anyone actually getting rich off of child pornographyâ"you'd think they'd make a big deal when they caught the person).
They are not making it for the money, but several studies about the behaviour of child molesters actualy sugest, that they do it mainly for the attention from their peers.
I personaly thing that sane child porn laws would look like this:
- if no child is harmed, the material is legal (this covers 2d/cartoon child porn, written material like Lolita etc)
- creation and/or consensual possesion of material, where real children is sexualy abused is illegal, with few exceptions which cover situations, where you need the material to notify the police that a crime is happening etc. I think that criminalising only the creation of child porn is not enough, we have to take into acount the privacy of victims which often do not wish for the material, where they are abused to be shared freely over internet and cause further problems in their lifes.
- the age boundary, for what is considered child porn, should be lowered so it matches the age, from which sexual intercourse is legal. This covers cases of teens sexting nude photos of themself to each other.
- nude images of children, where no sexual abuse is happening (e.g. they are not in sexual pose), should be legal (this covers images of little babies in bathtub, "Virgin Killers" album cover from Scorpions etc.)
Yep.. if you don't like the terms the artist provides the content under, you can just do what ever you feel like.
Like when Linksys used Linux for it's routers, and didn't provide the source code... the FSF went after them for it, and they eventually settled and provided the source.
And that was their mistake. They should never have settled or provided source. They should have just told the FSF to fuck off. GPL non-compliance makes for a better product!
If i had to choose between a world without copyright and gnu/gpl and current world, where copyright and gnu/gpl can exist, i would surely choose the former and i think that FSF would do the same. (Of course the ideal situation for FSF would be a world where no one can limit distribution of intelectual property and everyone has to provide sources/specs to their work if they distribute it)
Um, considering that more than likely, every person in the car is already being tracked at a personal level via their cell phone (and other devices, such as tablets, etc), I don't see this as being all that much worse than the de facto privacy of the modern digital world.
I agree with you that the privacy breach and surveilance probably won't be any worse than what we have now with today cell phones.
I'm more concerned about the security of automated car systems and network protocols from hacking attempts. I imagine that at least at the beggining, there won't be much diversity between the car models. Much of the internal logic and IP will be provided by Google, who made most testing. If someone manages to discover security flaw in the car, which would gave him remote control over it, it could lead to some pretty dangerous situations.
Did "Jurassic Park" teach nothing?
It teached me that Steven Spielberg is realy bad director:)
What if I told you that Samsung has also sued its competitors for patent infringement?
Can you please provide some example, where samsung used his patents offensively? i tried to search google but i only got hits from recent apple-samsung cases.
The feds won't come after him, 30 days or otherwise, because as far as they are concerned, bitcoins are not money.
Wow, are the FEDs only interested in money? Other valuables are free to steal in US?
The problem is that all other currencies have some entity backing them that has a motive to or already does instituted financial regulation -- like stopping ponzi schemes. And the logic for this is quite simple. If you don't protect idiots, then idiots can't use your currency. Since much of the population is idiots, you need to protect them from the really bad stuff that comes along with capitalism -- otherwise your system starts to look really shitty and third world really fast.
Are you trying to say, that what the Pirateat40 did is legal in USA? I suppose that his users had some kind of agreement with him and he broke this agreement. Does US legal system not protect the citisens from such things? I was aware that the legal system in US is in pretty bad shape (copyrights, patents etc) but if breaking agreement and stealing things from other people is legal, it's worse that i thought.
I think most people who are against software patents are actually against stupid patents, "design" patents, and not against the idea that software could be an original invention that entitles its creator to protection.
I don't think so. Most people i know, who are against software patents (including me), are actualy against the idea that you should be able to patent some piece of code for many years in a field which is developing so dynamicaly, that years of monopoly on some invetion will clearly hinder the technological progress.
I'm one of the 1 million who didn't vote in NZ. I don't believe any of the parties reflect my personal views. I'm not apathetic, I'm disenchanted.
There will never be a party which accurately reflects all of your personal views. You should vote for the party which is most compatible with your views. If you don't vote, you support the party which wins the elections (e.g. you support this business oriented party).
So, that leaves what? Nothing. There is nothing on the Moon even remotely worth the multi-trillion-dollar expense. It's just rocks in a vacuum. We've got plenty of rocks here!
If you start thinking outside of the box, that everything we mine in the space must be hauled and used back on Earth, then you will find out that access to metals/water/fuel etc. outside of the Earth gravity well could be very desireable and economical for constructions of e.g. moon base, orbital dock and subsequent space ships for interplanetary travels etc.
I've always said I'd like to live at least 500 years. Of course, it would be interesting to be able to stay relatively "young" more or less indefinitely.
Might not be something everyone is interested in but I would love to never feel any pressure to hurry up and do all those things I want to do. I could spend 50 years just reading interesting books. Maybe spend ten years building a house. And thinking more long-term, how about a few hundred years in deep space? You'd have the time...
Exatcly my lines of thoughts. The options the guy in TFA provided to his audience (80, 120, 150 years and infinity) look quite unbalanced to me. I wouldn't certainly want to live infinitely but perhaps i wouldn't mind to live for few millions or even billions years to see universe exploration, alien civilisations, to find the purpose and origin of matter and time etc.
Enyone knows later books in Ender's game series by Orson Scot Card? The main character lived for thousands years just because he traveled at relativistic speeds. Leto Atreides II (aka the Gold emperaror of Dune) is another example of "human" who lived for more than thousand years. Does anyone know more examples of long-living people from science fiction litarature?
Nice post, too bad i have no mod points for you.
I fully agree that copyright and patent laws should be abolished. The technology has changed significantly since their introduction, maybe there is no need to provide further legal support to IP creators. If we find out, thet such support is still desirable, it should definitely take some form which doesn't prevent copying/sharing of information.
There are two basic problems with copyrights. 1- eternal duration (they last until the material is worthless), 2-they are under no obligation to offer it for sale.
The main problem of copyright is, that it creates artificial scarity where none is needed. Without copyright, the whole knowledge of humankind could be available to anyone on the planet instantly. With copyright, only the knowledge you can personaly financialy afford and the creator is willing to sell you is available. This is imo totaly wrong and there is absolutely no reason for such cripling restriction to exist.
Money is not the problem. We already pay for intelectual property. We just don't want to share it with everyone because we fear, that if IP is widely available, none would purchuase new stuff, everyone would just wait for someone else to make the purchuase and share the it. The solution is IMO to force people to spend some money on intelectual property in the form of tax, tax-deductible coupons etc. and then find some fair way to distribute such funds between creators.