Hi folks. I'm very excited that this project is finally getting some attention. The concept is simple, but it has been overlooked for quite some while.
Let me give some straight facts through all this futuristic market speak in the articles and from my professor. Where are we now?
1. We are trying to do a proof-of-concept that a team of robots can indeed assemble structures together in a near-frictionless environment.
2. We are currently trying to build a triangle out of 3 reconfigurable beams assembled by a pair of tethered robots. With a triangle we can realize more rigid and useful structures such as trusses.
3. We are halfway there. We have achieved two-beam assembly with reconfigurable connectors and everything.
We have been working on this thing for almost a year, and one of the things you might be asking is why is this so difficult?
1. Main issue is connectors. You want to have connectors that can be automatically assembled together yet provided tight tolerances and carry heavy loads. These are often conflicting requirements and this has required a lot of tinkering to accomplish.
2. Reconfigurable connectors. These are connectors that not only automatically connect, but also automatically disconnect. Give the above requirements in 1 and this becomes doubly more difficult.
3. Precision control in a "near-frictionless" yet noisy environment. This is very difficult. Our positioning is kind of crude, our propulsion is non-linear, and the noise in the air-table is not predictable. We've been able to accomplish a lot of our results by using the tether to pull the two robots together and assemble the beams together with a rolling motion.
For those of you who are interested in seeing our latest results I recommend going to the media page at our lab here
The last video (which is surprisingly not up yet) is here
For future reference, the research involved in "evolving and adapting" has not yet been done. That is future work.
Well, the parking fee is just a premise to get a declaration of ownership from the federal government. The invoice is like $10 per century, so its not really anything to get up in arms for.
So NASA said there claims are without basis. Then state department says it violates the Outer Space Treaty, however that only applies to governments annexing extra terrestrial bodies and doesn't apply to private citizens.
So now he's involved in litigation and his argument is based on some complex legal theory that I don't pretend understand called work-equity. You can think of like it homesteading, where you squat a piece of land, and put development in it. After a while, the government recognizes your claim because of all the work you put in it. However, Nemitz isn't physically at the asteroid. Possession is 9/10th of the law, but he doesn't have possession, so his legal arguments are based on other 1/10th.
Anyway, though his claims may be dubious, his goal is to set a legal precedent for this kind of thing where one does not currently exist. This will give investors a clearer understanding and more certain environment of the legal framework for space property where one does not currently exist.
Gregory Nemitz is an interesting character. I am a little skeptical about the deal since you are purchasing a "project" and not an actual mission. So there are very few guarantees attached, and you have limited authority of the project.
I think Nemitz's more interesting project is the most credible attempt to assert ownership over an extraterrestrial body. Specifically, he is asserting his claim over the near earth asteroid Eros.
On his website you can see legal correspondence between him and NASA as he gives them an invoice for a parking fee for their NEAR spacecraft that crash landed on the asteroid. Also available is his explanation of what he is doing and why he is doing. A very interesting read, and it gives some in-depth analysis of the nature of property ownership.
My research lab is working on a project to do just this. We're developing a system to assemble structures in space using an array of distributed self-reconfigurable robots. You can view the project at this website: SOLAR
Re:Please be respectful on this topic
on
Working with ADHD?
·
· Score: 1
I don't doubt that ADHD is a fuzzy category over a rough cross-section of the entire human race. Does this mean it is not useful? It is simply a model in which to try and understand something enormously complicated as a human being.
Speaking as someone who has personally benefited from this "scam" purported on my person, I was diagnosed in the 80's, and I'd probably be in jail right now if my parents hadn't taken me to a psychologist and seen me through all those years.
Now since you demonized both psychologists and psychiatrists, and you described yourself under the shady term of "therapist", I would assume your job could be under any of the trendy titles such as "counselor", or my personal favorite, "life coach"-- both of which have no educational requirements.
Perhaps there is a little resentment in your words? Maybe a little ignorance in your attacks?
I grew up ADHD in the age when it was called ADD and even then it wasn't much known. After 2 years of counseling at the age of 6, they finally put me on the ritalin. The result was my academic achievements propelled me from the bottom to the very top of my 1st grade class.
Now I don't want to bore you with success stories and the ethics of child ADHD diagnosis. I do agree that ritalin is over-prescribed in children. However ADHD is very different when it comes to adults.
By the time I reached 9th grade, ritalin was no longer cutting it with me. I sank into a deep deep depression. A psychiatrist after many months of counseling switched me to a new drug called imipramine. Again miracles. That was about 10 years ago.
The real problem with ritalin is its short period of effect. The full dose is felt over a period of several hours after which the effect begins to taper off. Imipramine has the advantage of being able to miss a dose or two before any noticeable changes to your mindset occur. Even though my doses are once per day, I have been known to miss an entire week. From what I remember, you barely realize that the effect is wearing off, and by the very nature of the attention-deficit, you fail to remember to take your next dose.
What's worse, you actually begin to rationalize not taking it. "I don't want to conform to society's image." "I should learn to live with my true self." "I should not be chemical dependent." I can't remember how many times I told myself these things and let my dosages slip. My life would begin to fall apart, I would start getting frustrated and depressed, and those around me would start freaking out in my presence. I couldn't actually notice the change in my personality directly. I had to see indirectly in the people around me. My mother once yelled at me maniacally after 2 weeks off my meds, "Have you been taking your medication?! If so, why am I acting like THIS?!"
However, choosing the proper meds for ADHD is a roulette wheel and has different effects on different people. It's been too long since I last took ritalin, so I can't remember the effects very well. However, I can give you the pros and cons of my current drug imipramine.
Advantages: One of the most depressing things about ADHD is all your wonderful ideas and your complete inability to act upon them. Imipramine facilitated my own self-control and the ability to act on my goals. You won't believe how immensely positive this has been to my life. Next fall semester I will begin pursuing my Ph.D. in CS, whereas before I started taking the drug, I thought I'd have to get by as a new age healer or a fantasy fiction writer. Pretty depressing huh?
Other secondary, but no less beneficial effects include more self-esteem, no longer being an asshole to other people, and no longer am abusive towards animals (a big plus since I love cats!).
Disadvantages: My dosage causes extreme drowsiness but I've learned to deal with this by taking at the night. As a consequence of many years of this routine, it is very difficult for me to sleep *without* taking my meds.
I am chemically dependent to run my life effectively. This is not to say I am addicted. Imipramine is not an addictive substance. However, if I don't take my meds I will probably lose my job, flunk out of school, and destroy my relationships with people I love.
Imipramine is not very sensitive in lapses in dosage for any period longer than 2 days. However, sudden increases in the dosage can cause sickness.
Finally, the saddest disadvantage is the loss of compulsive creativity. There was a period of time in 11th grade where I stayed off my meds for almost 2 months. In that time I began writing a novel. I'm not sure if it was good or not, but the drive was insatiable. I forsaked all my other studies and any all relationships with the outside world. Of course my life was falling apart around me but I didn't much care. Part of this drive was an unwillingness to live in the present reality since it was all very depressing. I can say that it wasn't a very happy time for me, but the results of that time are quite impressive and vivid. The almost insane drive to create does not exist when I am under the influence. I am creative, just not compulsively so.
One of the groups involved in that sparring match in Ohio was the Discovery Institute.
This Discovery Institute is something else. According to their article, the Ohio Board saw through the thin arguments of pro-Darwinist fanatics and mandated teaching the criticisms of evolutionary theory.
Of course, what this means is anybody's guess. They cite all these experts and the "rising tide of criticism" as evidence that they're on the right side. Of course their citations are thin and often unspecified.
I'm kind of alarmed to hear this news. I've been following a project headed by Robert Kaye called Musicbrainz. Basically its planning on being the open standard for music metadata served on a distributed system for replacing the proprietary licensed CDDB. All data is entered in by the public, moderated by the public, and distributed under the Open Content License which means it will be forever free.
They haven't quite made their official release, but hop on over and show some support. The original data comes from FreeDB.
I'm looking at this written statement from the president of Apollo here
Apparently it was all about a this greeting card sent to some unknown person. Subsequently the local and federal government jumped through hoops to get the identity of the sender.
In addition, they playerd a lot of dirty tricks to issue this gag order.
So who the hell was it that received this greeting card? Obviously it was somone really important.
Quote: "Then there were the politics of privacy and the Internet that interestingly relates to the upcoming Presidential election. Privacy is a front page issue that has provoked the attention of the candidates for President of the United States, one of whom is a member of the Administration that sought and defended the order and gag order, the other is from the very state and city where federal and local officials joined efforts to deploy federal investigative resources regarding an unpleasant communication aimed at a local person."
Can you say conspiracy?!?
Theoretically, Apollo could reveal the identity of the person who received the greeting card, but they don't probably because they want to look righteous:
"We said then, as we do now, that we would use our own journalistic integrity and moral judgment to make such a determination rather than be compelled to do so by an order of the court. And today, we continue to choose to refrain from publishing the name of the alleged victim, despite having fought and won the right to do so."
Anybody want to dig up this dirt where Apollo won't?
I've been studying the issues of digital music for about a month now, and I originally went into it with the idea that I could apply software analogies to digital music, and I was totally wrong.
Legally software and music are covered under the same laws, but economically and culturally they're very very different.
The fundament argument behind copyrights is someone puts an enormous amount of effort into a piece of work and that they should be compensated for this work. Philosophically, one could argue in how best to apply this due to the following facts:
Software = application
Music = culture
I don't believe the banner call behind the Napster ordeal is that "Information should be free." Rather, I think it's the motto, "Culture should not be controlled."
Music copyrights originally started out with 2 parties in mind: the artist and the public. The law was set up so that the creator would have due incentive to make works in an environment in which they would be sufficiently compensated. After they had received sufficient pay over time, their work would pass into the public domain for the public good. Copyright has since mutated to extend copyright terms from 30yrs to 70rs to owner lifetime to 30yrs after creators death. There are a number of other factors that have also taken away from the "public good" such as monopolization of "culture" via the big 5 record labels and the homogenization resulting thereof.
So basically the Napster craze is the liberation of the public via technology and the backlash of the past legislation to take away from the public good. Sure people, you could say people are in it for the free music, but I would argue that people generally understand that the creators need to be compensated. There just isn't sufficient facilities to do this in the way the music fan wants to.
You mentioned that you'd rather every artist had a Paypal account and you be able donate a certain amount to that artist. I too have found out that a lot of people would rather have it this way which is partly the reason why I've bought into it.
Remember the Slashdot article a while ago about the virtual tip jar? Basically it was a way to send any artist a donation even if they didn't have an "account" per se. Well, I've joined ranks with these guys and I've been helping them develop the concept along. We've since added PayPal support and a bunch of other stuff that I wont' go into.
I'm not saying that artists should only work for tips. That's a common misconception we get. I'm just saying that the public wants to pay in different ways rather than buying an $18 CD, and that this is one possible source of alternative revenue.
Note: I've found out that this "model" is not very useful to your average "Superstar", especially when they're legally bound to a Record Label and they don't publically acknowledge tips as an option.;)
Basically, in summation I'm trying to say you shouldn't morally have the same type of "control" over music that you would expect from a commercial piece of software. Music is an expression of culture, and it enters into the cultural consciousness. No one person should have complete legal control over how its used-- at least not for 100 years under current legislation!!!
Just informing you that there's a project called MusicBrainz, (currently cdindex.org).
Its designed to completely supercede CDDB by providing a free and open database for information without the cumbersome album model and cumbersome license agreements. Its being sponsored by Emusic.com and Relatable.com.
The project leader is Robert Kaye. He's currently at Burning Man so he's not here to defend himself.
Here's a very relevant article criticizing most accounts of computer history. This fellow basically says that most people just tell stories with classic heroes like RMS. I think a computer historian would be a great profession, since its very badly needed.
I used fairtunes yesterday. I filled out the form and submitted one of my favorite bands, Qkumba Zoo $20. I've had their mp3's for 2 years and never owned an album. I really didn't want to go out and buy one of those metal coasters, but I really wanted to support them. So I used fairtunes.
I accidentally pressed the submit button twice and they caught it and sent me a message: --------------------------------------- Thanks for your contribution to Qkumba Zoo. But we have a question. Did you mean to charge $20 twice? If you did that's cool.. If not then we'll refund one of the transactions for you.
Just let us know.
Matt ceo / co-founder Fairtunes Inc. www.fairtunes.com -- 204-292-1321 ---------------------------------------
I support this organization in principle. I believe the model of music-as-product is dying and the model of music-as-service is returning. I like the fact that I can completely bypass the Record Label and send my money directly to artist.
I have to agree that the most important part of this service is open accounting and I told them. They told me their working on it and I tend to believe them from all the attention they've got in the past 2 days. If I thought they were a fraud or had any evidence of it I would be the first to blow the horn. I'm trying to contact the band to see if they actually received the money, but that will be a while.
This is a service in its infancy, so don't expect too much too soon. I'm just glad I had a way to tip one of my favorite musicians without buying the CD.
Hey, I think this is a great idea. In fact, I think I might send money to some of the artists whose mp3s I have that I've grown fond of.
I think this service greatly decreases the gap they feel between themselves and the artist of preference. I have a suggestion though. You could close the gap even further by providing the opportunity to include the payer's name and/or a short text message saying how much they enjoy their music. Perhaps be able to include an email address with the hope they might get contacted by their artist. Not likely to happen, but don't underestimate the market of hope (lottery).
I think the musicians will be delighted to know that they have fans that pay for their music with no hardcopy distribution costs on their part.
Can anyone set up a discussion board for troubleshooting the demo? I'd do it myself, but my site's not working right now.
If not, might as well start right here: I'm using a USB mouse and joystick.
I'm getting erratic super rapid mouse movement, jerky keyboard movement, and no recognition of the joystick even though I can 'cat/dev/input/js0' and get output.
Using a V3 3000, with Glide, XFree86-3.3, 1024x768 16bit. It runs, but its not playable.
I read your live chat interview over at Yahoo and you gained a lot more respect from me when I found out it wasn't just about the money. From what I derived, one of your fundamental concerns is that you want to have control of the way your music is presented. I feel this is actually a noble cause, but I also think you're fighting for something that doesn't exist. Napster is just a conduit and there are more less-centralized (less law suit-able) conduits out there. What makes you think a successful law suit of Napster will give you any more control? Wildmage
Did we really need to have this article on Slashdot? Sure it feels good to gang up on this guy, but I would have much rather preferred to read an editorial that cleverly attacked open source with highly credible arguments that leave you questioning your entire foundation of values until a very few highly intelligent people in the community come out with refutations that make you glad that they're on your side. In that case I would learn something. In this article I learned nothing. Wildmage
Slashdot Mirror
Let me give some straight facts through all this futuristic market speak in the articles and from my professor. Where are we now?
1. We are trying to do a proof-of-concept that a team of robots can indeed assemble structures together in a near-frictionless environment.
2. We are currently trying to build a triangle out of 3 reconfigurable beams assembled by a pair of tethered robots. With a triangle we can realize more rigid and useful structures such as trusses.
3. We are halfway there. We have achieved two-beam assembly with reconfigurable connectors and everything.
We have been working on this thing for almost a year, and one of the things you might be asking is why is this so difficult?
1. Main issue is connectors. You want to have connectors that can be automatically assembled together yet provided tight tolerances and carry heavy loads. These are often conflicting requirements and this has required a lot of tinkering to accomplish.
2. Reconfigurable connectors. These are connectors that not only automatically connect, but also automatically disconnect. Give the above requirements in 1 and this becomes doubly more difficult.
3. Precision control in a "near-frictionless" yet noisy environment. This is very difficult. Our positioning is kind of crude, our propulsion is non-linear, and the noise in the air-table is not predictable. We've been able to accomplish a lot of our results by using the tether to pull the two robots together and assemble the beams together with a rolling motion.
For those of you who are interested in seeing our latest results I recommend going to the media page at our lab here
The last video (which is surprisingly not up yet) is here
For future reference, the research involved in "evolving and adapting" has not yet been done. That is future work.
Thanks,
Jacob Everist
everist@usc.edu
Well, the parking fee is just a premise to get a declaration of ownership from the federal government. The invoice is like $10 per century, so its not really anything to get up in arms for.
So NASA said there claims are without basis. Then state department says it violates the Outer Space Treaty, however that only applies to governments annexing extra terrestrial bodies and doesn't apply to private citizens.
So now he's involved in litigation and his argument is based on some complex legal theory that I don't pretend understand called work-equity. You can think of like it homesteading, where you squat a piece of land, and put development in it. After a while, the government recognizes your claim because of all the work you put in it. However, Nemitz isn't physically at the asteroid. Possession is 9/10th of the law, but he doesn't have possession, so his legal arguments are based on other 1/10th.
Anyway, though his claims may be dubious, his goal is to set a legal precedent for this kind of thing where one does not currently exist. This will give investors a clearer understanding and more certain environment of the legal framework for space property where one does not currently exist.
The company is Orbital Development.
Gregory Nemitz is an interesting character. I am a little skeptical about the deal since you are purchasing a "project" and not an actual mission. So there are very few guarantees attached, and you have limited authority of the project.
I think Nemitz's more interesting project is the most credible attempt to assert ownership over an extraterrestrial body. Specifically, he is asserting his claim over the near earth asteroid Eros.
On his website you can see legal correspondence between him and NASA as he gives them an invoice for a parking fee for their NEAR spacecraft that crash landed on the asteroid. Also available is his explanation of what he is doing and why he is doing. A very interesting read, and it gives some in-depth analysis of the nature of property ownership.
My research lab is working on a project to do just this. We're developing a system to assemble structures in space using an array of distributed self-reconfigurable robots. You can view the project at this website: SOLAR
Speaking as someone who has personally benefited from this "scam" purported on my person, I was diagnosed in the 80's, and I'd probably be in jail right now if my parents hadn't taken me to a psychologist and seen me through all those years.
Now since you demonized both psychologists and psychiatrists, and you described yourself under the shady term of "therapist", I would assume your job could be under any of the trendy titles such as "counselor", or my personal favorite, "life coach"-- both of which have no educational requirements.
Perhaps there is a little resentment in your words? Maybe a little ignorance in your attacks?
Now I don't want to bore you with success stories and the ethics of child ADHD diagnosis. I do agree that ritalin is over-prescribed in children. However ADHD is very different when it comes to adults.
By the time I reached 9th grade, ritalin was no longer cutting it with me. I sank into a deep deep depression. A psychiatrist after many months of counseling switched me to a new drug called imipramine. Again miracles. That was about 10 years ago.
The real problem with ritalin is its short period of effect. The full dose is felt over a period of several hours after which the effect begins to taper off. Imipramine has the advantage of being able to miss a dose or two before any noticeable changes to your mindset occur. Even though my doses are once per day, I have been known to miss an entire week. From what I remember, you barely realize that the effect is wearing off, and by the very nature of the attention-deficit, you fail to remember to take your next dose.
What's worse, you actually begin to rationalize not taking it. "I don't want to conform to society's image." "I should learn to live with my true self." "I should not be chemical dependent." I can't remember how many times I told myself these things and let my dosages slip. My life would begin to fall apart, I would start getting frustrated and depressed, and those around me would start freaking out in my presence. I couldn't actually notice the change in my personality directly. I had to see indirectly in the people around me. My mother once yelled at me maniacally after 2 weeks off my meds, "Have you been taking your medication?! If so, why am I acting like THIS?!"
However, choosing the proper meds for ADHD is a roulette wheel and has different effects on different people. It's been too long since I last took ritalin, so I can't remember the effects very well. However, I can give you the pros and cons of my current drug imipramine.
Advantages: One of the most depressing things about ADHD is all your wonderful ideas and your complete inability to act upon them. Imipramine facilitated my own self-control and the ability to act on my goals. You won't believe how immensely positive this has been to my life. Next fall semester I will begin pursuing my Ph.D. in CS, whereas before I started taking the drug, I thought I'd have to get by as a new age healer or a fantasy fiction writer. Pretty depressing huh?
Other secondary, but no less beneficial effects include more self-esteem, no longer being an asshole to other people, and no longer am abusive towards animals (a big plus since I love cats!).
Disadvantages: My dosage causes extreme drowsiness but I've learned to deal with this by taking at the night. As a consequence of many years of this routine, it is very difficult for me to sleep *without* taking my meds.
I am chemically dependent to run my life effectively. This is not to say I am addicted. Imipramine is not an addictive substance. However, if I don't take my meds I will probably lose my job, flunk out of school, and destroy my relationships with people I love.
Imipramine is not very sensitive in lapses in dosage for any period longer than 2 days. However, sudden increases in the dosage can cause sickness.
Finally, the saddest disadvantage is the loss of compulsive creativity. There was a period of time in 11th grade where I stayed off my meds for almost 2 months. In that time I began writing a novel. I'm not sure if it was good or not, but the drive was insatiable. I forsaked all my other studies and any all relationships with the outside world. Of course my life was falling apart around me but I didn't much care. Part of this drive was an unwillingness to live in the present reality since it was all very depressing. I can say that it wasn't a very happy time for me, but the results of that time are quite impressive and vivid. The almost insane drive to create does not exist when I am under the influence. I am creative, just not compulsively so.
A programming language already exists. It's called QCL by Bernhard Oemer.
It also includes an emulator with 64 qubits. Pretty neat.
He also wrote some very useful papers on understanding quantum computing.
This Discovery Institute is something else. According to their article, the Ohio Board saw through the thin arguments of pro-Darwinist fanatics and mandated teaching the criticisms of evolutionary theory.
Of course, what this means is anybody's guess. They cite all these experts and the "rising tide of criticism" as evidence that they're on the right side. Of course their citations are thin and often unspecified.
They haven't quite made their official release, but hop on over and show some support. The original data comes from FreeDB.
http://www.musicbrainz.org
------
Jacob Everist
wildmage@mad.scientist.com
Apparently it was all about a this greeting card sent to some unknown person. Subsequently the local and federal government jumped through hoops to get the identity of the sender.
In addition, they playerd a lot of dirty tricks to issue this gag order.
So who the hell was it that received this greeting card? Obviously it was somone really important.
Quote: "Then there were the politics of privacy and the Internet that interestingly relates to the upcoming Presidential election. Privacy is a front page issue that has provoked the attention of the candidates for President of the United States, one of whom is a member of the Administration that sought and defended the order and gag order, the other is from the very state and city where federal and local officials joined efforts to deploy federal investigative resources regarding an unpleasant communication aimed at a local person."
Can you say conspiracy?!?
Theoretically, Apollo could reveal the identity of the person who received the greeting card, but they don't probably because they want to look righteous:
"We said then, as we do now, that we would use our own journalistic integrity and moral judgment to make such a determination rather than be compelled to do so by an order of the court. And today, we continue to choose to refrain from publishing the name of the alleged victim, despite having fought and won the right to do so."
Anybody want to dig up this dirt where Apollo won't?
wildmage
Anybody have access to this software?
We could reverse engineer the database and create an open and free alternative.
Any takers?
I've been studying the issues of digital music for about a month now, and I originally went into it with the idea that I could apply software analogies to digital music, and I was totally wrong.
Legally software and music are covered under the same laws, but economically and culturally they're very very different.
The fundament argument behind copyrights is someone puts an enormous amount of effort into a piece of work and that they should be compensated for this work. Philosophically, one could argue in how best to apply this due to the following facts:
Software = application
Music = culture
I don't believe the banner call behind the Napster ordeal is that "Information should be free." Rather, I think it's the motto, "Culture should not be controlled."
Music copyrights originally started out with 2 parties in mind: the artist and the public. The law was set up so that the creator would have due incentive to make works in an environment in which they would be sufficiently compensated. After they had received sufficient pay over time, their work would pass into the public domain for the public good. Copyright has since mutated to extend copyright terms from 30yrs to 70rs to owner lifetime to 30yrs after creators death. There are a number of other factors that have also taken away from the "public good" such as monopolization of "culture" via the big 5 record labels and the homogenization resulting thereof.
So basically the Napster craze is the liberation of the public via technology and the backlash of the past legislation to take away from the public good. Sure people, you could say people are in it for the free music, but I would argue that people generally understand that the creators need to be compensated. There just isn't sufficient facilities to do this in the way the music fan wants to.
You mentioned that you'd rather every artist had a Paypal account and you be able donate a certain amount to that artist. I too have found out that a lot of people would rather have it this way which is partly the reason why I've bought into it.
Remember the Slashdot article a while ago about the virtual tip jar? Basically it was a way to send any artist a donation even if they didn't have an "account" per se. Well, I've joined ranks with these guys and I've been helping them develop the concept along. We've since added PayPal support and a bunch of other stuff that I wont' go into.
I'm not saying that artists should only work for tips. That's a common misconception we get. I'm just saying that the public wants to pay in different ways rather than buying an $18 CD, and that this is one possible source of alternative revenue.
Note: I've found out that this "model" is not very useful to your average "Superstar", especially when they're legally bound to a Record Label and they don't publically acknowledge tips as an option. ;)
Basically, in summation I'm trying to say you shouldn't morally have the same type of "control" over music that you would expect from a commercial piece of software. Music is an expression of culture, and it enters into the cultural consciousness. No one person should have complete legal control over how its used-- at least not for 100 years under current legislation!!!
Jacob Everist
jeverist@fairtunes.com
Its designed to completely supercede CDDB by providing a free and open database for information without the cumbersome album model and cumbersome license agreements. Its being sponsored by Emusic.com and Relatable.com.
The project leader is Robert Kaye. He's currently at Burning Man so he's not here to defend himself.
Jacob Everist
jeverist@fairtunes.com
Here's a very relevant article criticizing most accounts of computer history. This fellow basically says that most people just tell stories with classic heroes like RMS. I think a computer historian would be a great profession, since its very badly needed.
I used fairtunes yesterday. I filled out the form and submitted one of my favorite bands, Qkumba Zoo $20. I've had their mp3's for 2 years and never owned an album. I really didn't want to go out and buy one of those metal coasters, but I really wanted to support them. So I used fairtunes.
I accidentally pressed the submit button twice and they caught it and sent me a message:
---------------------------------------
Thanks for your contribution to Qkumba Zoo. But we have a question. Did you
mean to charge $20 twice? If you did that's cool.. If not then we'll refund
one of the transactions for you.
Just let us know.
Matt
ceo / co-founder
Fairtunes Inc.
www.fairtunes.com -- 204-292-1321
---------------------------------------
I support this organization in principle. I believe the model of music-as-product is dying and the model of music-as-service is returning. I like the fact that I can completely bypass the Record Label and send my money directly to artist.
I have to agree that the most important part of this service is open accounting and I told them. They told me their working on it and I tend to believe them from all the attention they've got in the past 2 days. If I thought they were a fraud or had any evidence of it I would be the first to blow the horn. I'm trying to contact the band to see if they actually received the money, but that will be a while.
This is a service in its infancy, so don't expect too much too soon. I'm just glad I had a way to tip one of my favorite musicians without buying the CD.
Wildmage
Hey, I think this is a great idea. In fact, I think I might send money to some of the artists whose mp3s I have that I've grown fond of.
I think this service greatly decreases the gap they feel between themselves and the artist of preference. I have a suggestion though. You could close the gap even further by providing the opportunity to include the payer's name and/or a short text message saying how much they enjoy their music. Perhaps be able to include an email address with the hope they might get contacted by their artist. Not likely to happen, but don't underestimate the market of hope (lottery).
I think the musicians will be delighted to know that they have fans that pay for their music with no hardcopy distribution costs on their part.
Can anyone set up a discussion board for troubleshooting the demo? I'd do it myself, but my site's not working right now.
/dev/input/js0' and get output.
If not, might as well start right here:
I'm using a USB mouse and joystick.
I'm getting erratic super rapid mouse movement, jerky keyboard movement, and no recognition of the joystick even though I can 'cat
Using a V3 3000, with Glide, XFree86-3.3, 1024x768 16bit. It runs, but its not playable.
Wildamge
I read your live chat interview over at Yahoo and you gained a lot more respect from me when I found out it wasn't just about the money. From what I derived, one of your fundamental concerns is that you want to have control of the way your music is presented. I feel this is actually a noble cause, but I also think you're fighting for something that doesn't exist. Napster is just a conduit and there are more less-centralized (less law suit-able) conduits out there. What makes you think a successful law suit of Napster will give you any more control? Wildmage
Did we really need to have this article on Slashdot? Sure it feels good to gang up on this guy, but I would have much rather preferred to read an editorial that cleverly attacked open source with highly credible arguments that leave you questioning your entire foundation of values until a very few highly intelligent people in the community come out with refutations that make you glad that they're on your side. In that case I would learn something. In this article I learned nothing. Wildmage