As we know, the USA, or more precisely, Hollywood, always needs a Bad Guy.
1970's - The Red Commie Threat.
1980's - Those evil arab nations that sell us our oil and have corrupt military leaders.
1990's - Drug runners (with links to evil S. American nations with corrupt military leaders).
Late 90's - Those terrible two-dimensional Terrorists whose sole purpose in life is to kill as many Americans as possible. Why this is, we're not told (perhaps we might sympathise with them?). They're just born that way apparently.
Coming up next - those evil computer thieves and hackers who wield greater threat to your lives than all the above combined.
In most movies to date, hackers have usually been the good guys, and bad hackers are usually just opposition for the good hackers to defeat. Movies in which a Joe Average hero is besieged on all sides by a foe with unlimited resources have usually had the foe played by things like intelligence services, corrupt institutions and the like.
I suspect that as Hollywood execs in their isolated circles hear more and more about how great a threat is posed by these computer people, and as the net remains a sexy background for movies, but familiar to more people, we may start to see more movies in which we get to play the archvillain, whether we want to or not. And we'll have powers we never dreamed of (like hacking Russian spy satellites in order to take telephoto pictures of your credit card number as you pay for something, or your wife undressing*. Actually, they would have to be US satellites because Hollywood is currently dedicated to the idea that all Russian technology is stuck in the 50's)
Hmmm, writing this incredibly 2d summary of Hollywood movies yet having it so aptly sum up so many movies sorta rams home how numbingly stupid the films are.
Obviously, a perjury case (won or lost) would be a huge slap in the credibility of the MPAA, and perhaps even dent the "We're the Good Guys!" lie.
Reading all the comments, a defamation case faces some pretty fatal problems. I think we should turn our attention to perjury - also difficult, but plausible. Garbus and co (working on another case) have screeds and screeds of documents from the MPAA, which include selected "incriminating" logs of the community which (despite the bias) almost certainly include enough information about the community to be good evidence. The question is - can those documents be accessed for such purposes? (My suspicion is no).
The MPAA has clearly done enough (one-sided) research into open-source that they do know better, and there will be documentation to that effect somewhere. How can we go about finding it? Is anyone with access to MPAA documentation (or working for the MPAA) able and willing to "leak" such a document?
They boasted of the thousands of pages of information they had that was written by the community. That almost certainly means we're talking perjury, if we can only get our hands on their documents.
Write the letter, have/. post an "Ask Slashdot" for signatures to the letter. Hopefully we would get over thousands as readers ask then submit their co-workers and friends as well as themselves. Print it all out in Large Type on thick paper, such that several boxes are needed to carry it all, then tell mainstream press that a truck is delivering the volumes of paper needed to contain the signatures of an open letter challenging the MPAA to "stop hiding behind court freedom from defamation and come into the public arena and say that!" and correcting the errors, etc.
I'm just hoping that the link was placed there very deliberately by someone who understood the issue and CNN's link with TimeWarner, and wanted to make a statement and/or help 2600. No threat to CNN - the link is gone hours later, but a fantasic way to protest.
Whoever you are, working in the depths of CNN, great stuff! And extra kudos to you if my conspiracy theory on your motive comes close to the mark:-)
I accepted the dare and didn't look at the pictures. Now I dare Jamie to actually fly one of the contraptions...
And everybody here should stop talking about nonsense like personal helicopterst. If they really existed, I think I would have seen pictures of them by now.
>This seems to be a guide to circumvent censorship software, with detailed instructions.
>Since Peacefire is usually blocked who is it helping?
Actually, this question sounds like a defence for peacefire - they oppose censorware, but pages like that open them up to accusations of trying to expose children to indecency (yeah, I don't see the logic anyway, but we're talking about the pro-censorware lobby). That they Deliberately put that information on a blocked page is a good response.
As to who it is helping - the page has been slashdotted. It's yet another thing to hold up when the lobby is claiming the infallibility of their product - like "95% of pronographic images are blocked by our neural net AI program" (while peacefire found it to be 40% or whatever for pron and non-pron alike...)
>minidiscs at cost = minidiscs including fees payed to sony to legally manufacture them
No, I mean at cost, eg 10 cents each.
Even if fully 30% of that 10c is gross profit or fees or whatever for sony, they can have their 78c, and I'll keep the $600 in sony fees that I would have paid for CDs, player, etc.
I think that's fair.:-)
(And at 10c each, it sounds to me like the supply is direct from the factory floor without such niceties as fee-paying... (though I plan to check that they're not simply stolen, but it doesn't sound like it)
If sony has something you really want to buy, rather than not buy it at all (or worse - cave in and buy it), buy secondhand.
Sony gets nothing.
You only pay half price.
The consumer junk market shrinks somewhat.
The environment suffers less as less crap is consumed and manufactured.
Sure, this isn't a cure, and it has drawbacks, but it's a good start - it temporarily avoids the fundamental problem that individually boycotting the products of big companies often hurts us more than it hurts them.
Also, I don't think this is the same as "I boycott MS by pirating Windows" whereby mere use of Windows aids its dominance - in the appliance world, all brands of video work with all brands of TV and all brands of stereo, thus merely having sony gear doesn't aid sony indirectly (but watch those CD and DVD titles).
If your unsure, scratch the labels of the gear. No impressionable friends will know that your setup is sony, and if they ask why the label is scratched off, you get to explain and boost awareness of these issues.
>> Oh. I'm glad now that my new discman isn't a Sony.
>That's okay, they get a cut from every single CD you put in it anyway.
>Loads more if it's by a Sony-owned label of course. I'd say nice try, but it didn't even sound like one.
Ok, how about this: I bought a sony minidisc player secondhand (Sony doesn't see a cent), and I might be able to get in on a source of minidiscs at cost. Record friend's CDs rather than buying your own, and keep an eye on the progress of online artist tipping sites.
Oh - and rip the "sony" label off my minidisc.
(By the time I'm finished with it, it'll have features that no sony has anyway:)
"Everybody knows that the dice are loaded...
Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed.
Everybody knows that the war is over...
Everybody knows that the good guys lost.
Everybody knows that...
Funny thing about that song - no matter where you are or what you're doing, the lyrics seem uncannily relevant to what is happening.
(Maybe I need to burn me a Happy Album (with lashings of Optimism)).
>It would not be hard to justify the forceful removal of servers by armed invasion.
>lets not forget that a few simple court orders to shut down their traffic
I know your point, but I think you oversimplify - armed invasion requires the UK's blessing regardless of whether Sealand is independant or not, and aquiring court orders in every one of all the different back-up countries they'll have servers in is no mean feat either - it just takes one slightly-patriotic judge to think "Our nation will not simply kneel to every whim of the USA".
Use of force would have repercussions such that would be a last resort unless the police could handle it. As it probably needs military action, they'd have to have _really_ offended some big cheeses!
(Mind you, the USA deliberately bombed (without warning) a factory of innocents in another country a couple of years ago, citing "intelligence" that turned out to be simple hyperbole, then walked away under media silence without repercussion, so it's pretty clear that These Things Can Happen).
Anyway, I didn't actually mean Sealands vs the MPAA, I meant that oppressive USA legislation will create an environment in which Sealands flourishes, not that foes of Corporate America will use Sealands in their fight or whatever.
>Can you ever imagine a true conservative saying that a bunch of "lefties" in Hollywood
>should tell you what you can do with your own computer equipment?
Can you ever imagine a true conservative even listening to the defense of some lefty anarchist hacker punks who flagrantly flout the law and are proud of it, while an upstanding MPAA man in a respectible suit is saying that they're stealing, pirating, corrupting others, breaking the law, and probably showing people how to crack porn sites to boot.
Quite frankly, I think a liberal judge offers more hope, however, I don't think that such factors are even remotely significant next to the things that are actually important, like getting an open-minded judge who grasps the ramifications...
I think it a little uncharitable to be smarmy on the dubious premise that you have supernatural insight as to his voting habits.
Besides which, while both parties are owned by the MPAA and the RIAA, the only thing that voting affects is the nameplate on the desk of the guy whose job it is to rubber-stamp the MPAA's legislation. Votes have nothing to do with the leaders of the USA, votes are only pick which lackeys do the same dirty work.
Actually, I don't quite believe that - I think that all those strange people who vote for one of the big two (and thus ensure corporate rule) should wake up and vote for the smaller parties. If the two-horse race can eventually become an 11-horse trifector, buying the Whitehouse won't be so easy anymore.
In this country (not the USA), the voting process was reformed before the second-to-last election. Previously we had a two horse race. 6 Years later, the politicians brains of those two parties are still locked in us-vs-them two-horse thinking, but they lack the numbers for a straightforward majority and need to co-operate with one or more other parties to get their way, and each election, they grow weaker and the alternatives grow much, much stronger (and are much less hindered by deep us-vs-them dogma)
Like stupid children, both old parties unthinkingly oppose the other in pitiful kneejerk reaction because oppose the other is what they've always done. There is a lot of inertia in politicians, and a lot more "my way or no-one's way" than "the people's way", but the poison is in the system and it is a thrill to watch the first hints of democracy emerging from what used to masquerade under the name.
My (quasi-realistic-in-the-near-term) ideal of Democracy is when there are a multitude of parties representing a multitude of ideals and demographics, and not one of those parties has anything even close to a majority.
My (poor) understanding of the USA suggests a fundamental electoral overhaul might be necessary first.
But damn is it a thrill to watch politicians who put kindergartons to shame wake up to the repercussions. Politicians don't like genuinely working democracy very much. They much prefer the version where votes give them the power to to ignore the voices of the other representitives of socitey and steamroll over any opposition.
The way Kaplin and the DMCA is going, the Principality of Sealand is going to make a killing.
Invest some money in Sealand and you've got a bet each way - if the Supreme Court lacks Kaplin's bigotry, then you - as a normal citizen - keep your rights. If Kaplin leads the Charge of Ignorance to eventual Victory over Light and Goodness, then you - as the now-wealthy invester - gain the rights of the elite, and can defend those rights with Cold Hard Cash (MPAA style).
If you can't beat 'em (and are completely lacking all moral substance), sell out and join 'em.
No, I'm not being serious:)
If you're a normal citizen and thus don't have sufficent money to earn your wealth for you, well... give what little you've got to the EFF, and pray.
Now Witness The Destructive Power Of This Fully Armed And Operational DMCA...
I've been working on a simple (but hopefully cool) modication for my minidisc, which reminded me of the "operation" a guy offers in the UK whereby you can get a digital output installed on a DVD player. This offers (yet another) way of helping maintain one's fair use access to the works of others, and gets up the nose of the MPAA as well.
Does anyone know if there are details online as to how to go about doing this? (detailed details?:-)
Damn this thing is annoying - how do you fight your own favourite movies?
Yet another Unwilling Victim of Corporate-owned Culture
The questionable ethics of putting lethal force into the hands of a machine reminded me of a documentary where a US military offical was addressing the issue now that technology made it more feasible.
He said something like "But I can assure you that the US military will never give a machine the decision to take a human live*".
Because this was around the same time that the USA got together with China and Burma in refusing to stop using landmines, I nearly choked at his lies (or idiocy, or mental blinkers, or whatever it was that allowed him to say that with a straight face).
High tech gee-whizzery might be more glamerous, but if the issue here is armed machines operating with little human oversight, or the risk that a machine might kill when it is patently obvious to a human not to, then we're also talking about things like landmines.
A minefield in your yard is also a pretty good guard:-)
This post might seem somewhat off-topic, but I wrote it because some of the posts here talk as if armed machines deciding to kill people is a new (and sexy) issue. It isn't. It's old and coated in the blood of innocents.
*He might have also added some disclaimers like "until safeguards can be guarenteed", I can't remember. Speaking of which - would that be a "money-back" guarentee? Anyway...
>Not to mention the orchestrated letter campaign from people in Japan,
>calling for the US to ban guns.
Fair enough I guess.
>(I wonder what they'd think of an orchestrated letter campaign in the US calling
>for Japan to ban knives - especially deadly assault katanas?)
They'd think "Why don't those American's get a clue and actually look beyond the USA - we're way ahead of them as usual. Or maybe the status quo is best after all - our tech industries do quite well out of the trait".:)
I suggest this because my understanding is that you're 50 years too late - swordmaking has been banned in Japan since WW2. The exception is art - blades forged as works of art for aesthetic appreciation only. There are strict limits to the numbers of such works a smith can produce (hence they spend a lot of time on each masterpiece, rather than producing swords). It keeps the ancient arts alive and could even be a role-model for the USA (except that the USA* always knows best, so Weapons Are Good Things And Above Question, and Anyone Who Says Otherwise Hasn't Earned Human Rights Like Freedom. And Is Stupid. And Probably A Fag Too).
Actually, I would suggest that you made a greater departure from reality tha he did, but there may be a good reason for this - you lived in Europe and he didn't (guess).
Computer prices in Europe were sky high and so the Amiga was very competitive. In other places in the world, the Amiga was stupidly expensive.
Example: You say the reign lasted until '94. In the part of the world where I live, in '94 an entry level PC was running 24bit graphics faster than an A4000 ran 8bit graphics, and that A4000 (with only AGA) cost nearly twice as much as the PC, (and that's ignoring what happened if you needed support or repairs)
When saying what the Amiga was or wasn't, you are always going to wrong unless you also specify where.
J. Robert Oppenheimer has been quoted and referred to as a prime example of creators not being responsible for the use of their creations. However, this is half the story. I can't remember if it was Oppenheimer or not (if not, it was someone else high up in the Manhatten Project), but according to him, the scientists felt a great responsibility for the possible use of the weapon they had been asked to develope, and it was after some soul searching and moral consideration based on what Hitler was doing, and what he could accomplish, that they decided it was the right thing to do.
One of his biggest regrets was that once they had made that decision, they got caught up in their work, and it never even occurred to them to re-evaluate their reasons when the reason they were building it - Hitler - ceased to exist.
In hindsight, he would have liked to have acted differently.
This neatly concurs with my own view, that creators have a degree of responsibility for the nature of their creations.
The distinction is as follows:
Can someone cause harm by using the device?
Can someone cause harm by absuing the device?
The creator takes responsibility for the former, the user takes responsibility for the later (and sometimes the former).
Of course, primary and ultimate responsibility lies with the user.
I'd suggest that while Napster falls primarily on the last count, it does also meet the first - even a token check-box system to indicate which files were copyrighted and thus not to be downloaded unless you had the right would make a difference.
My understanding of the gun manufacturer lawsuits is that they claim the manufacturers deliberately designed and marketed their guns for illegal purposes. This is slightly different from the manufacturers being liable for how users used their products. Again, the first as well as the second catagory is met.
>Or do you want to say that offices of European companies in US don't need to listen to US laws?
Yes! Say yes! I could set up a company in the US and make a killing by flouting the law! I could sell military weapons to the public.. oh wait, that's legal... ok, I could make furnature and undercut the competition by forcing illegal migrants to work for quarter minimum wage! Oh, damn - that's already being done too. Er... I know! I know! I could sell T-shirts with DeCSS source on them!
Oooh maybe not, that's just asking for trouble...
My guess is that while political leaders sign GATT and the like, the pressure for them to do so comes from the business community, particually multinationals. If this is the case, I can see a possible conflict of interests regarding anything that would make multinationals more accountable to "meddling government interference".
>kick the shit out of someone not playing nicely.
>If sun ain't good enough to compete then go file bankrupcy or sell out to another company is my solution for sun.
I think that's a terrible attitude. We have enough trouble with businesses covertly adopting unethical and socially or environmentally destructive methods for gaining the slightest competitive edge. We don't need people encouraging it by hailing competitiveness as the cure for everything and fairness as a crutch for the weak. This is a road to disaster, and we're already too far down it.
Sure, the whining might be annoying, but I'd still prefer twice as much of it if it makes it harder for the ethically-challenged to get away with the shit they pull.
I don't know the details of this case, but I tend to side with the EU on most things, and I tend to side against MS on most things, so I think I can safely conclude that MS is quite clearly in the wrong here and deserves everything it gets, plus some.
(Informed debate is something that happens to other people)
Slashdot Mirror
As we know, the USA, or more precisely, Hollywood, always needs a Bad Guy.
:)
1970's - The Red Commie Threat.
1980's - Those evil arab nations that sell us our oil and have corrupt military leaders.
1990's - Drug runners (with links to evil S. American nations with corrupt military leaders).
Late 90's - Those terrible two-dimensional Terrorists whose sole purpose in life is to kill as many Americans as possible. Why this is, we're not told (perhaps we might sympathise with them?). They're just born that way apparently.
Coming up next - those evil computer thieves and hackers who wield greater threat to your lives than all the above combined.
In most movies to date, hackers have usually been the good guys, and bad hackers are usually just opposition for the good hackers to defeat. Movies in which a Joe Average hero is besieged on all sides by a foe with unlimited resources have usually had the foe played by things like intelligence services, corrupt institutions and the like.
I suspect that as Hollywood execs in their isolated circles hear more and more about how great a threat is posed by these computer people, and as the net remains a sexy background for movies, but familiar to more people, we may start to see more movies in which we get to play the archvillain, whether we want to or not. And we'll have powers we never dreamed of (like hacking Russian spy satellites in order to take telephoto pictures of your credit card number as you pay for something, or your wife undressing*. Actually, they would have to be US satellites because Hollywood is currently dedicated to the idea that all Russian technology is stuck in the 50's)
Hmmm, writing this incredibly 2d summary of Hollywood movies yet having it so aptly sum up so many movies sorta rams home how numbingly stupid the films are.
Harlequin - Archvillain for hire...
hire details
(And offended at the idea of working for hollywood against my will
*Telephoto pictures of your wife undressing, not pictures of you paying your wife to undress...
Obviously, a perjury case (won or lost) would be a huge slap in the credibility of the MPAA, and perhaps even dent the "We're the Good Guys!" lie.
Reading all the comments, a defamation case faces some pretty fatal problems. I think we should turn our attention to perjury - also difficult, but plausible. Garbus and co (working on another case) have screeds and screeds of documents from the MPAA, which include selected "incriminating" logs of the community which (despite the bias) almost certainly include enough information about the community to be good evidence. The question is - can those documents be accessed for such purposes? (My suspicion is no).
The MPAA has clearly done enough (one-sided) research into open-source that they do know better, and there will be documentation to that effect somewhere. How can we go about finding it? Is anyone with access to MPAA documentation (or working for the MPAA) able and willing to "leak" such a document?
They boasted of the thousands of pages of information they had that was written by the community. That almost certainly means we're talking perjury, if we can only get our hands on their documents.
Maybe do it the Starr way:
/. post an "Ask Slashdot" for signatures to the letter. Hopefully we would get over thousands as readers ask then submit their co-workers and friends as well as themselves. Print it all out in Large Type on thick paper, such that several boxes are needed to carry it all, then tell mainstream press that a truck is delivering the volumes of paper needed to contain the signatures of an open letter challenging the MPAA to "stop hiding behind court freedom from defamation and come into the public arena and say that!" and correcting the errors, etc.
Write the letter, have
I'm just hoping that the link was placed there very deliberately by someone who understood the issue and CNN's link with TimeWarner, and wanted to make a statement and/or help 2600. No threat to CNN - the link is gone hours later, but a fantasic way to protest.
:-)
Whoever you are, working in the depths of CNN, great stuff! And extra kudos to you if my conspiracy theory on your motive comes close to the mark
Perhaps not everyone is a drone.
It was intended to be humorous, but we're clearly on very different wavelengths.
Ah well, at least the second part was noticed.
I accepted the dare and didn't look at the pictures. Now I dare Jamie to actually fly one of the contraptions...
And everybody here should stop talking about nonsense like personal helicopterst. If they really existed, I think I would have seen pictures of them by now.
>This seems to be a guide to circumvent censorship software, with detailed instructions.
>Since Peacefire is usually blocked who is it helping?
Actually, this question sounds like a defence for peacefire - they oppose censorware, but pages like that open them up to accusations of trying to expose children to indecency (yeah, I don't see the logic anyway, but we're talking about the pro-censorware lobby). That they Deliberately put that information on a blocked page is a good response.
As to who it is helping - the page has been slashdotted. It's yet another thing to hold up when the lobby is claiming the infallibility of their product - like "95% of pronographic images are blocked by our neural net AI program" (while peacefire found it to be 40% or whatever for pron and non-pron alike...)
>minidiscs at cost = minidiscs including fees payed to sony to legally manufacture them
:-)
No, I mean at cost, eg 10 cents each.
Even if fully 30% of that 10c is gross profit or fees or whatever for sony, they can have their 78c, and I'll keep the $600 in sony fees that I would have paid for CDs, player, etc.
I think that's fair.
(And at 10c each, it sounds to me like the supply is direct from the factory floor without such niceties as fee-paying... (though I plan to check that they're not simply stolen, but it doesn't sound like it)
If sony has something you really want to buy, rather than not buy it at all (or worse - cave in and buy it), buy secondhand.
Sony gets nothing.
You only pay half price.
The consumer junk market shrinks somewhat.
The environment suffers less as less crap is consumed and manufactured.
Sure, this isn't a cure, and it has drawbacks, but it's a good start - it temporarily avoids the fundamental problem that individually boycotting the products of big companies often hurts us more than it hurts them.
Also, I don't think this is the same as "I boycott MS by pirating Windows" whereby mere use of Windows aids its dominance - in the appliance world, all brands of video work with all brands of TV and all brands of stereo, thus merely having sony gear doesn't aid sony indirectly (but watch those CD and DVD titles).
If your unsure, scratch the labels of the gear. No impressionable friends will know that your setup is sony, and if they ask why the label is scratched off, you get to explain and boost awareness of these issues.
>> Oh. I'm glad now that my new discman isn't a Sony.
:)
>That's okay, they get a cut from every single CD you put in it anyway.
>Loads more if it's by a Sony-owned label of course. I'd say nice try, but it didn't even sound like one.
Ok, how about this: I bought a sony minidisc player secondhand (Sony doesn't see a cent), and I might be able to get in on a source of minidiscs at cost. Record friend's CDs rather than buying your own, and keep an eye on the progress of online artist tipping sites.
Oh - and rip the "sony" label off my minidisc.
(By the time I'm finished with it, it'll have features that no sony has anyway
Am I overlooking anything?
I have Lenord Choen stuck in my head:
"Everybody knows that the dice are loaded...
Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed.
Everybody knows that the war is over...
Everybody knows that the good guys lost.
Everybody knows that...
Funny thing about that song - no matter where you are or what you're doing, the lyrics seem uncannily relevant to what is happening.
(Maybe I need to burn me a Happy Album (with lashings of Optimism)).
>It would not be hard to justify the forceful removal of servers by armed invasion.
>lets not forget that a few simple court orders to shut down their traffic
I know your point, but I think you oversimplify - armed invasion requires the UK's blessing regardless of whether Sealand is independant or not, and aquiring court orders in every one of all the different back-up countries they'll have servers in is no mean feat either - it just takes one slightly-patriotic judge to think "Our nation will not simply kneel to every whim of the USA".
Use of force would have repercussions such that would be a last resort unless the police could handle it. As it probably needs military action, they'd have to have _really_ offended some big cheeses!
(Mind you, the USA deliberately bombed (without warning) a factory of innocents in another country a couple of years ago, citing "intelligence" that turned out to be simple hyperbole, then walked away under media silence without repercussion, so it's pretty clear that These Things Can Happen).
Anyway, I didn't actually mean Sealands vs the MPAA, I meant that oppressive USA legislation will create an environment in which Sealands flourishes, not that foes of Corporate America will use Sealands in their fight or whatever.
>Can you ever imagine a true conservative saying that a bunch of "lefties" in Hollywood
>should tell you what you can do with your own computer equipment?
Can you ever imagine a true conservative even listening to the defense of some lefty anarchist hacker punks who flagrantly flout the law and are proud of it, while an upstanding MPAA man in a respectible suit is saying that they're stealing, pirating, corrupting others, breaking the law, and probably showing people how to crack porn sites to boot.
Quite frankly, I think a liberal judge offers more hope, however, I don't think that such factors are even remotely significant next to the things that are actually important, like getting an open-minded judge who grasps the ramifications...
>Did you vote?
I think it a little uncharitable to be smarmy on the dubious premise that you have supernatural insight as to his voting habits.
Besides which, while both parties are owned by the MPAA and the RIAA, the only thing that voting affects is the nameplate on the desk of the guy whose job it is to rubber-stamp the MPAA's legislation. Votes have nothing to do with the leaders of the USA, votes are only pick which lackeys do the same dirty work.
Actually, I don't quite believe that - I think that all those strange people who vote for one of the big two (and thus ensure corporate rule) should wake up and vote for the smaller parties. If the two-horse race can eventually become an 11-horse trifector, buying the Whitehouse won't be so easy anymore.
In this country (not the USA), the voting process was reformed before the second-to-last election. Previously we had a two horse race. 6 Years later, the politicians brains of those two parties are still locked in us-vs-them two-horse thinking, but they lack the numbers for a straightforward majority and need to co-operate with one or more other parties to get their way, and each election, they grow weaker and the alternatives grow much, much stronger (and are much less hindered by deep us-vs-them dogma)
Like stupid children, both old parties unthinkingly oppose the other in pitiful kneejerk reaction because oppose the other is what they've always done. There is a lot of inertia in politicians, and a lot more "my way or no-one's way" than "the people's way", but the poison is in the system and it is a thrill to watch the first hints of democracy emerging from what used to masquerade under the name.
My (quasi-realistic-in-the-near-term) ideal of Democracy is when there are a multitude of parties representing a multitude of ideals and demographics, and not one of those parties has anything even close to a majority.
My (poor) understanding of the USA suggests a fundamental electoral overhaul might be necessary first.
But damn is it a thrill to watch politicians who put kindergartons to shame wake up to the repercussions. Politicians don't like genuinely working democracy very much. They much prefer the version where votes give them the power to to ignore the voices of the other representitives of socitey and steamroll over any opposition.
The way Kaplin and the DMCA is going, the Principality of Sealand is going to make a killing.
:)
Invest some money in Sealand and you've got a bet each way - if the Supreme Court lacks Kaplin's bigotry, then you - as a normal citizen - keep your rights. If Kaplin leads the Charge of Ignorance to eventual Victory over Light and Goodness, then you - as the now-wealthy invester - gain the rights of the elite, and can defend those rights with Cold Hard Cash (MPAA style).
If you can't beat 'em (and are completely lacking all moral substance), sell out and join 'em.
No, I'm not being serious
If you're a normal citizen and thus don't have sufficent money to earn your wealth for you, well... give what little you've got to the EFF, and pray.
Now Witness The Destructive Power Of This Fully Armed And Operational DMCA...
I've been working on a simple (but hopefully cool) modication for my minidisc, which reminded me of the "operation" a guy offers in the UK whereby you can get a digital output installed on a DVD player. This offers (yet another) way of helping maintain one's fair use access to the works of others, and gets up the nose of the MPAA as well.
:-)
Does anyone know if there are details online as to how to go about doing this? (detailed details?
Damn this thing is annoying - how do you fight your own favourite movies?
Yet another Unwilling Victim of Corporate-owned Culture
A hero.
The questionable ethics of putting lethal force into the hands of a machine reminded me of a documentary where a US military offical was addressing the issue now that technology made it more feasible.
:-)
He said something like "But I can assure you that the US military will never give a machine the decision to take a human live*".
Because this was around the same time that the USA got together with China and Burma in refusing to stop using landmines, I nearly choked at his lies (or idiocy, or mental blinkers, or whatever it was that allowed him to say that with a straight face).
High tech gee-whizzery might be more glamerous, but if the issue here is armed machines operating with little human oversight, or the risk that a machine might kill when it is patently obvious to a human not to, then we're also talking about things like landmines.
A minefield in your yard is also a pretty good guard
This post might seem somewhat off-topic, but I wrote it because some of the posts here talk as if armed machines deciding to kill people is a new (and sexy) issue. It isn't. It's old and coated in the blood of innocents.
*He might have also added some disclaimers like "until safeguards can be guarenteed", I can't remember. Speaking of which - would that be a "money-back" guarentee? Anyway...
>Not to mention the orchestrated letter campaign from people in Japan,
:)
>calling for the US to ban guns.
Fair enough I guess.
>(I wonder what they'd think of an orchestrated letter campaign in the US calling
>for Japan to ban knives - especially deadly assault katanas?)
They'd think "Why don't those American's get a clue and actually look beyond the USA - we're way ahead of them as usual. Or maybe the status quo is best after all - our tech industries do quite well out of the trait".
I suggest this because my understanding is that you're 50 years too late - swordmaking has been banned in Japan since WW2. The exception is art - blades forged as works of art for aesthetic appreciation only. There are strict limits to the numbers of such works a smith can produce (hence they spend a lot of time on each masterpiece, rather than producing swords). It keeps the ancient arts alive and could even be a role-model for the USA (except that the USA* always knows best, so Weapons Are Good Things And Above Question, and Anyone Who Says Otherwise Hasn't Earned Human Rights Like Freedom. And Is Stupid. And Probably A Fag Too).
*One of the most vocal parts anyway.
:-)
>Sorry, but you're wrong.
Actually, I would suggest that you made a greater departure from reality tha he did, but there may be a good reason for this - you lived in Europe and he didn't (guess).
Computer prices in Europe were sky high and so the Amiga was very competitive. In other places in the world, the Amiga was stupidly expensive.
Example: You say the reign lasted until '94. In the part of the world where I live, in '94 an entry level PC was running 24bit graphics faster than an A4000 ran 8bit graphics, and that A4000 (with only AGA) cost nearly twice as much as the PC, (and that's ignoring what happened if you needed support or repairs)
When saying what the Amiga was or wasn't, you are always going to wrong unless you also specify where.
J. Robert Oppenheimer has been quoted and referred to as a prime example of creators not being responsible for the use of their creations. However, this is half the story. I can't remember if it was Oppenheimer or not (if not, it was someone else high up in the Manhatten Project), but according to him, the scientists felt a great responsibility for the possible use of the weapon they had been asked to develope, and it was after some soul searching and moral consideration based on what Hitler was doing, and what he could accomplish, that they decided it was the right thing to do.
One of his biggest regrets was that once they had made that decision, they got caught up in their work, and it never even occurred to them to re-evaluate their reasons when the reason they were building it - Hitler - ceased to exist.
In hindsight, he would have liked to have acted differently.
This neatly concurs with my own view, that creators have a degree of responsibility for the nature of their creations.
The distinction is as follows:
Can someone cause harm by using the device?
Can someone cause harm by absuing the device?
The creator takes responsibility for the former, the user takes responsibility for the later (and sometimes the former).
Of course, primary and ultimate responsibility lies with the user.
I'd suggest that while Napster falls primarily on the last count, it does also meet the first - even a token check-box system to indicate which files were copyrighted and thus not to be downloaded unless you had the right would make a difference.
My understanding of the gun manufacturer lawsuits is that they claim the manufacturers deliberately designed and marketed their guns for illegal purposes. This is slightly different from the manufacturers being liable for how users used their products. Again, the first as well as the second catagory is met.
>Or do you want to say that offices of European companies in US don't need to listen to US laws?
Yes! Say yes! I could set up a company in the US and make a killing by flouting the law! I could sell military weapons to the public.. oh wait, that's legal... ok, I could make furnature and undercut the competition by forcing illegal migrants to work for quarter minimum wage! Oh, damn - that's already being done too. Er... I know! I know! I could sell T-shirts with DeCSS source on them!
Oooh maybe not, that's just asking for trouble...
:)
>Possibly as part of the GATT
My guess is that while political leaders sign GATT and the like, the pressure for them to do so comes from the business community, particually multinationals. If this is the case, I can see a possible conflict of interests regarding anything that would make multinationals more accountable to "meddling government interference".
>kick the shit out of someone not playing nicely.
>If sun ain't good enough to compete then go file bankrupcy or sell out to another company is my solution for sun.
I think that's a terrible attitude. We have enough trouble with businesses covertly adopting unethical and socially or environmentally destructive methods for gaining the slightest competitive edge. We don't need people encouraging it by hailing competitiveness as the cure for everything and fairness as a crutch for the weak. This is a road to disaster, and we're already too far down it.
Sure, the whining might be annoying, but I'd still prefer twice as much of it if it makes it harder for the ethically-challenged to get away with the shit they pull.
I don't know the details of this case, but I tend to side with the EU on most things, and I tend to side against MS on most things, so I think I can safely conclude that MS is quite clearly in the wrong here and deserves everything it gets, plus some.
(Informed debate is something that happens to other people)