"This is clearly not true with regards to voting machines, and there is obvious pressure to use Microsoft products, or aren't you aware of the various anti-trust actions?"
are you aware of linux and mac osx? or are you unaware of alternatives to Microsoft products. You can continue to use the monopoly or anti-trust excuse, but that has not been the case for at least 5 years. My last two jobs have both used macs exclusively.
"Was President James Madison, "father of the Constitution" a fool when he used "slavery" as the result of not requiring the separation of church and state? No, he was using "slavery," not as a metaphor, but as a literal definition of when one is compelled to do something unjustly."
President James madison was sick of the bullshit he saw over in europe, where the church owned lots of land and controlled the people. Software does not have this power.
"I am no kid, at 45 years old I appreciate freedom and know what it is first hand. And I do use free software."
Wow you are 45? You sure haven't learned much in your time on this earth. I feel sorry for you.
"I resent that participation in society sometimes requires proprietary software. When the U.S. and state governments require documents in Word format, that IMHO, is a treasonous abdication of sovereignty by my elected officials. Putting a private corporation in charge of public works, without public oversight, without due process is criminal."
Microsoft word docs are the de-facto standard. 99% of all offices use them. This is why the state governments use this format. Because they know the majority of people will be able to open it. When something else becomes popular, the format will be dropped and the popular one will be used instead.
The difficult part is actually creating software that works well and is very popular. Since most open source projects are either horribly disorganized or lack the usability factor that most commercial apps have, they lose out on this front every time.
The trend by the advocates tends to be bitching about why it isn't popular and ways to force usage by government (even if is inferior).
"I resent that participation in society sometimes requires proprietary software. When the U.S. and state governments require documents in Word format, that IMHO, is a treasonous abdication of sovereignty by my elected officials. Putting a private corporation in charge of public works, without public oversight, without due process is criminal."
I resent that Obama was elected president. I resent that he is a socialist. I resent that my hard-earned money is going to be wasted on a broken health care system.
"The biggest misunderstanding that people have about Stallman's positions is the assumed fundamental disconnect between "capitalism" and "free software." He's not a communist, but he values his freedom above profit. If anything, that is historically a very "American" position."
He is a socialist border-lining on a communist. The only way for him to achieve his dream is if it is mandated by law, which isn't freedom. All dictator's have his dream. I'm so glad he has almost no power.
"In many ways, and this my sound radical, the right to create proprietary software is similar to the right to own slaves. Look at proprietary software in voting machines! Is there a better example of the destruction of human rights and democracy by proprietary software?"
yes, this is radical and insane. If I create proprietary software...you are not forced to use it or buy it. Bits and bytes are not living creatures. Calling this slavery is an insult to actual slaves. Please stop. You sound like a fool.
This is the difference between Stallman and the rest of the world. In a truly "free" market (not stallman's version of free), you have a choice between proprietary software and free.
"I understand the desire to sell your product and keep the source code a secret, but no other aspect of human technology works that way."
True, but you can't take an electronic component and make an exact duplicate for no cost and almost no energy. There is nothing else in human technology that is like this.
"Every electronic component is documented. Every part in a car is documented. Every building is built with approved materials and is inspected. Every switch, nail, screw, and device is documented and open to public inspection. Why is not software? Why do we allow large corporations to sell us software that does not necessarily operate in our best interests? Do you think DRM is in any way beneficial to you a stake holder? Do you think it is right that YOUR DVD player will *not* let you skip a commercial?"
If we can do all this and not allow the recipient to copy and pass on to all of their friends at no cost, I am all for it.
"The freedom to restrict another's freedom is not freedom, it is tyranny. There may be financial gain in such actions, but is freedom something that we fight for only to sell to the highest bidder?"
You have no concept of freedom. You sound like a spoiled kid that has been given everything. you have no rights to software. It is a privilege given to you by the actual companies or people that create it. If you don't like it, you have the freedom to use something else...like open source.
"Web sites collect so much data about us. Are we really free? Is our own computer really our own property?"
Websites are privately owned and operated. Don't like it? don't go there, it's just that easy.
"Microsoft's success is due to luck and stupidity on the part of IBM in giving Microsoft a contract, not some amazing level of quality in Microsoft's software or even Bill Gates' business acumen."
People keep bringing up dos, which did give Microsoft its start..but keep forgetting about windows..which revolutionized the desktop computer industry.
Bill gates had the foresight to know the potential of the IBM contract. This was a very intelligent business move. IBM also needed an OS for their hardware..and MS provided it for them. At the time, it was win-win.
The people in the open source community have been trying for the last 15 years to make a GUI as good as Microsoft windows..and have failed miserably. Even OSX beat them out..and it has only been around for half the time.
Microsoft has to be doing something right when they can always beat out 1000s of individul programmers hands-down.
"If you want another example, look at the success of Miley Cyrus, who just so happens to be the daughter of Billy Ray Cyrus and thus had the entertainment connections to get a TV show started and a music tour. More talented girls without those connections aren't touring the country right now making millions of dollars."
The entertainment industry is almost always about who you know..it has nothing to to with knowledge or talent.
"Not to diminish Mr Obama's accomplishment, but it is really a situation of right place and right time. You couldn't with with a change message if everything was going well. Lack of experience would cause his campaign to sink like the Lusatania."
Also, if the country truly was still racist, he wouldn't have even made it past the primaries.
"So blacks, women, and people under the age of 40 just aren't working hard enough?"
You should also look at other stats:
1) the percentage of blacks that are in college and in Jail, which would directly effect their earning potential. Or how about the percentage of single black mothers..which makes it 10X more difficult to make money.
The problem isn't racism..it's a culture that accepts the above as normal.
We just hired a black man as president..so really, there should be no more excuses.
2) The types of jobs women take (teachers, nurses, etc.). Most women are not interested in jobs that pay higher salaries and as a result, on average, get a lower salary.
"Because those are the people that are most likely to be making less than average wages, more likely to be working without benefits, etc. You call it an excuse, but for people who have poured their heart and soul into their work year after year and realized nothing from it, they call it prejudice."
actually, I call it bullshit.
"And it's just self-serving crap for you to say that "proper knowledge or experience" is the only pathway to opportunity when every day on the news we read about Haliburton and kickbacks, slush funds, and back room deals."
Knowledge and experience does give you more opportunities. This is one of the reasons why people get a higher education.
However, slush funds and back room deals do happen.
If you are going to mention those, I think you also need to mention the fact that people like Al Gore are milking the American people out of their hard-earned money by convincing them to purchase carbon credits (when it has not been proven that humans are the direct cause of global warming).
"Intelligence is a bell curve, but almost 80% of the wealth in this country is concentrated amongst 5% of the population; And most of that held by white men who are over the age of 50. I don't suppose you're willing to say that this is because that's the only group that works hard."
90% of the people that are wealthy in the U.S. started out in the middle/lower class. The last 10% inherited it/got it through family.
I run my own business..and most people just aren't willing to sacrifice their free time to start a business and make it successful.
Just because you are intelligent..does not mean you will know how to use that intelligence to make money.
"This is the excuse I heard from unsuccessful people who think they can be successful just by putting in the time and effort."
I'm successful and not using this as an excuse. I am a programmer and have had many opportunities come my way. The funny thing is that those same opportunities passed by other people at the same time..but because they didn't have the knowledge or foresight to do anything about it..they were unsuccessful.
"Truth is, if you're doing something on your own, being timing is crucial. eBay was in the right place at the right time.
They weren't particularly talented and now you can't do another eBay. Same with PayPal. Same with Google. Same with Yahoo. Same with just about any truly successful company out there. Perhaps the most vivid example of this is early Microsoft. Their success was built on the software they didn't even write."
Now you are the one sounding bitter. Ebay might have been created at the right place at the right time..but why are they the most successful? Countless other people have tried creating online auction systems that failed. It's the talent (maybe not in programming...but in design and or marketing) that made them the best.
The guys at google (Larry Page and Sergey Brin) I would hardly call talentless. They created a new search engine when there were already tons of existing ones (webcrawler,lycos,yahoo,etc). There are countless search engines that failed...but google didn't. It's because of their talent.
Microsoft may have purchased dos, but they engineered windows. You can't deny the fact that they brought the personal computer into the homes of most people world-wide.
"No matter how much time and effort you put in today, you will not replicate the success of those companies in their respective niches. Solely because you're not in the right place at the right time."
wow, this is one of the most defeatist posts I have seen all week. I'm actually glad that you feel this way, because it just means less competition for me.
"Success is being in the right place at the right time. That's 50% of it. The remaining 50% are 30% hard work and 20% talent. The point being, unless you're in the right place at the right time and you see the opportunity, your hard work and talent are unlikely to pay off."
This is the excuse I have heard from un-successful people that don't want to put the time and effort that it takes to actually be successful.
We have potential opportunities that pass by us every day. Without the proper knowledge or experience, these opportunities will just continue to pass by.
I would say it's more along the lines of 10% finding the opportunity (right place, right time) and 90% knowing what do do when you get it (talent and experience)
"No terrorist in Guantanamo (or Afghanistan, for that matter) could ever do this much damage to the country, and yet none of those responsible will ever be executed, waterboarded, or undergo"
This is true. They should have been arrested, but instead, we hire them as new leaders of our country.
Obama received the third highest in campaign contributions.
"Seriously though, do you think wearing sophisticated clothes is more important than actually knowing something about the real issues? Maybe what's in the package is more important than how shiny the package is?"
Tell that to all the people voting for obama.
I haven't really heard why people are actually voting for him..beyond vague and simplistic ideas such as "change".
It makes me realize just how easy it is for a population to hire somebody like hitler into power. I just hope that when the US goes to complete shit, the people that vote obama into office take the blame.
"There is validity in what you say. However, it is a poor analogy because creating and selling music does not translate well to a 9-5 job."
You are right. Music is a creative art and can take years to actually create something good. A 9-5 job doesn't nearly take as much effort.
"Common sense backs it up. People like that do exist, and if CDs were less expensive, the numbers would be larger. As for the number of people like that, I don't know how many there are. Maybe it is a small number. But during the hey-day of illegal download (napster), there were still a fair amount of people purchasing CDs. I would certainly love to see a study that could show what these numbers might be. "
maybe..and maybe not..we still don't know.
"Horrible analogy.
I guess there is a larger drive to pirate then there is to burgle. "
you say that it's pointless for companies to lock music with DRM because it will just get pirated anyway.
I said it's the same with locking your house. They do make better locks (just like with software), but if a crook really wants to get into your house, they will (just like software pirates).
"There are those that will never pay for music, and nothing can change that. But there are those that would pay for music, but for various reason don't. If you wanted to limit the amount of piracy going on, it would be a good idea to finding out why some that would pay for music don't, and make the changes to turn them into music purchasers."
I think the Record industry is getting mixed signals. When Napster came out, Many people said it was the cost of the cds that were people to download it for free. Over the last couple of years, they started to change the model. You can now get individual tracks for 99 cents or less.
Piracy has gotten even worse. (you could take a discussion on slashdot back during the napster days and the same people are giving the same excuses).
It seems like there will always be an excuse until they are giving everything away for free..and when this happens, the greedy culture of p2p users will be crying foul of something else that they feel they deserve.
"They do. While someone might pirate vs. $15 for a CD, they might purchase the actual CD if it was at a lower price point."
Would you do work for free and then expect your employer to pay you what they thought it was worth?
If people aren't willing to fork over the cash for music, they shouldn't get the luxury of listening to it either.
"There are people that download illegally and still purchase new CDs at $15 a pop. There would be more that fit into that catagory if the price was lower."
any stats to back this up? I keep hearing this, but see no actual evidence. I think this probably does happen, but at a much smaller level than you are trying to convey here.
"Having a better product (CD artwork & "extra's") at a more affordable price is a better plan then offering an inferior product (Bogged down with DRM, vs. DRM free pirated MP3's) and the current price."
DRM was created because of piracy. If all restrictions were lifted, piracy would still continue.
There is no evidence to show otherwise.
"These are computers. If someone can create the security, someone can break it. It's pretty much that simple. The only thing stopping someone from breaking security measures is drive, and it seems that there is a lot of drive for free music, games, & movies. The sooner that these companies realize that, the sooner they can move towards accepting different business models."
It's pretty easy to break into a house, but people still have locks.
"I give Radio Head and NIN as examples of bands that are changing the RIAA business model, and proving that they can still produce studio quality work while allowing their works to be purchased at a price point of $0."
This shows two examples that moderately worked. However, you left out the part where trent reznor tried it with a lesser known artists named saul williams and it was a complete failure (less than 20% paid). (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080305-reznor-makes-750000-even-when-the-music-is-free.html)
This model may work with the top 1% of musicians, but lesser known ones that make the majority of their money from online music sales will not be as successful, if at all.
What's changing the RIAA are services like iTunes, which actually sell music online. Giving something away for free (especially when it is counterfeit..and not part of an actual competing business) is not new or innovative.
It may be easy to copy something digital, but the original talent and work it took to create the original copy is not. There is also a demand, because people do want to listen or use it.
Human nature is what we are seeing here. No matter how useful something is, if most people can get it for free, they won't pay for it. This isn't a flaw in a business model but pure greed.
"hey would just start charging a rate more balanced to the adjusted end profits. So, people that want to pay for properly produced studio albums will still have that option."
This isn't 1999. They already started charging less with services such as itunes and piracy is worse than ever.
This shows that all the excuses for piracy are nothing more than a smokescreen for getting free shit.
"Business models change over time. Maybe Studio Produced music would die out, or maybe they would lower their costs."
They do, but in this case the studios have no reason to lower their costs. Normally, when a business model changes, it's the result of a superior technology (such as the horse and buggy analogy that people love to bring up on slashdot during this kind of discussion).
However, in the case of piracy, it offers nothing superior except a price point of $0 (which doesn't cost $0 to product the original content). The only thing the studios can do to really prevent this is to create a better lock.
Now, if artists were releasing their music independently (on myspace for example) and actually competing with the RIAA, it would be a different story. The ironic part is that because piracy is so rampant, independent artists have no choice but to go with the RIAA if they want to actually make money on their music.
"IF a million people (in America/Europe) want to download a CD, then there is probably enough draw that the artist will sell some CD's too. "
If there was no option to get it for free. They might sell more. Plus, the artist should have a choice whether to offer their work for free or for pay. You do when you go to work every day.
"one downloaded song does not equal one lost sale. Many people that download would never purchase albums in the first place (i.e. they are cheap). So those people do not result in lost sales."
no, but a million downloads does. If your business is selling music and everybody can get it for free, you aren't going to be in business anymore.
Also, if it didn't cause a loss in sales, why would they care?
"sure, CD sales (particularly CD singles) are plummeting, but internet download purchases have more than made up for those losses. so it's internet users who are keeping the music industry alive, and even helping it to prosper. but i suppose exploring music online is rather "insular" and "rude." how dare consumers discover music for themselves instead of letting the radio tell them what to purchase."
The reason internet download purchases have increased has nothing to do with p2p or its users. It's because CD players are on the way out.
Everyone I know owns and MP3 player and hasn't actually used or purchased a CD in years. Technology has changed.
"or maybe the RIAA are just pissed off that their Payola scheme is losing effectiveness."
Your reasoning reminds me of the labor unions in the US. They started out saying they were for the little guy..but are now just as bad and corrupt as any of the big companies.
"As it stands, you'd get in less trouble for stealing a CD then copyright infringement"
Which is a good thing. Stealing a CD may result in some money lost to best buy..but when the entire album is shared to 1,000,000 it could put the label or artist out of business.
"The problem with the terminology is that words like "theft" and "steal" (which gain merit from the word "piracy," as this was one thing sea pirates did) are deliberately used by the powers that be to confuse people into thinking that the infringement of copyright carries exactly the same consequences as shoplifting or other deprivation of physical property. Only a moron would believe that you can receive spam (the food) through e-mail."
well, is closer to counterfeiting than stealing (since we are deciding that it isn't a physical object), and it's worse for the copyright owner.
One person downloading one copy might not result in a direct loss in sales, but if everybody online can search google and get to a pirate copy of your software before getting to your website, it will devalue your software over time. After all, digital goods are only worth what people are willing to pay.
You need to ask yourself, if piracy didn't result in any loss in sales, why would a software company waste their money or time trying to stop it?
"The developers who write open source code do so primarily because they want to use the code themselves. Putting the code out as open source means it gets "evolved" over time by the wider community. Everyone wins through getting better code."
ok, and what happens when there is something that the open source developer just doesn't feel like fixing? It just doesn't get fixed. I have seen this many times with OSS projects.
"That is a SIGNIFICANTLY better motivator than the developers of closed source. Most closed source developers simply work 9 to 5 for some big corporation. Yawn."
yeah, and most open source developers have a 9-5 and have to work on it after hours. I would much rather have the person that is getting paid to work on it.
"OpenOffice.org has gone from laughable to better capability than MS Office in just 5 years."
Now you can't be serious. Open Office isn't even close to MS office in terms of features and performance. I think it will probably take another 5 years to come close to office 97.
"He should be prosecuted under relevant laws for what he did. However, he unwittingly uncovered other illegal activity.
For that reason he is a reluctant hero (which I agree that "hero" was probably not the best word to use). --"
violating the privacy of a citizen of the united states is much worse than the crime of using a hotmail account to conduct business.
Honestly, this entire campaign scares me. It's the closet the US has gotten to a communist dictator and the average, moronic citizen doesn't seem to care.
"On the other hand, we've used emacs, cvs, firefox, gcc, and tons of other OSS software"
So you are comparing the reliability of a large anonymous, commercial database to emacs, cvs, and firefox?
"and had none of these problems. Of course, the plural of anecdote isn't data - so if you'll stop trying to paint the entire OSS movement with a few examples, I think we can agree that there are good and bad projects in both models."
I'm not saying all open source projects are shitty and bug ridden, just around 98%. The last 2% include: firefox, php, apache and mysql, which is interesting because they all are backed and supported by large companies.
"Products with backend databases that became corrupt, losing days of hundreds of peoples' work as we had to restore to older versions; or even worse, slowly rotted with corruption, so we couldn't trust the restored data either"
And how is this any different than open source software? Even linux, the golden child of the OSS community would have the tendency to lose entire partitions if you didn't shutdown properly (or just cut the power) until only recently. I have NEVER had this problem with windows.
That might be the case, but it still doesn't refute what I said about open source software. Developers have no reason to fix a flaw or security issue in an open source project. Again, as a business, why would I want to take the risk?
Even though proprietary software companies don't want you to find out about malicious code, the minute it is found out (and publicized), it needs to be fixed ASAP or they could lose their business..which is a huge motivating factor.
Open source projects have no such motivating factor.
"What's to stop a commercial vendor from putting evil code in? All it takes is one disgruntled employee and some poor review processes (which certainly isn't uncommon in smaller companies)."
a commercial software vendor could get sued (or lose credibility among people purchasing it..and lose the business) if there is malicious code in place, so it is in their best interest to make sure it's not there.
Open source projects have no risk. They can put out buggy or insecure code (look at projects like oscommerce or wordpress as an example) and if there is a problem, the most you get is a "my bad", and the hope of a fix (or you can spend days trying to weed through the source and fix it yourself). Also, since most open source projects are hobbies, sometimes you don't even get glaring bug fixes finished for months (filezilla has a nice feature that deletes your files when transferring..I lost an entire weeks worth of work one time. The main programmer there also has denied any issues).
This also doesn't account for all the GPL liabilities. As a company, it's just better to stay away from open source software.
Slashdot Mirror
"This is clearly not true with regards to voting machines, and there is obvious pressure to use Microsoft products, or aren't you aware of the various anti-trust actions?"
are you aware of linux and mac osx? or are you unaware of alternatives to Microsoft products. You can continue to use the monopoly or anti-trust excuse, but that has not been the case for at least 5 years. My last two jobs have both used macs exclusively.
"Was President James Madison, "father of the Constitution" a fool when he used "slavery" as the result of not requiring the separation of church and state? No, he was using "slavery," not as a metaphor, but as a literal definition of when one is compelled to do something unjustly."
President James madison was sick of the bullshit he saw over in europe, where the church owned lots of land and controlled the people. Software does not have this power.
"I am no kid, at 45 years old I appreciate freedom and know what it is first hand. And I do use free software."
Wow you are 45? You sure haven't learned much in your time on this earth. I feel sorry for you.
"I resent that participation in society sometimes requires proprietary software. When the U.S. and state governments require documents in Word format, that IMHO, is a treasonous abdication of sovereignty by my elected officials. Putting a private corporation in charge of public works, without public oversight, without due process is criminal."
Microsoft word docs are the de-facto standard. 99% of all offices use them. This is why the state governments use this format. Because they know the majority of people will be able to open it. When something else becomes popular, the format will be dropped and the popular one will be used instead.
The difficult part is actually creating software that works well and is very popular. Since most open source projects are either horribly disorganized or lack the usability factor that most commercial apps have, they lose out on this front every time.
The trend by the advocates tends to be bitching about why it isn't popular and ways to force usage by government (even if is inferior).
"I resent that participation in society sometimes requires proprietary software. When the U.S. and state governments require documents in Word format, that IMHO, is a treasonous abdication of sovereignty by my elected officials. Putting a private corporation in charge of public works, without public oversight, without due process is criminal."
I resent that Obama was elected president.
I resent that he is a socialist.
I resent that my hard-earned money is going to be wasted on a broken health care system.
Tough shit.
"The biggest misunderstanding that people have about Stallman's positions is the assumed fundamental disconnect between "capitalism" and "free software." He's not a communist, but he values his freedom above profit. If anything, that is historically a very "American" position."
He is a socialist border-lining on a communist. The only way for him to achieve his dream is if it is mandated by law, which isn't freedom. All dictator's have his dream. I'm so glad he has almost no power.
"In many ways, and this my sound radical, the right to create proprietary software is similar to the right to own slaves. Look at proprietary software in voting machines! Is there a better example of the destruction of human rights and democracy by proprietary software?"
yes, this is radical and insane. If I create proprietary software...you are not forced to use it or buy it. Bits and bytes are not living creatures. Calling this slavery is an insult to actual slaves. Please stop. You sound like a fool.
This is the difference between Stallman and the rest of the world. In a truly "free" market (not stallman's version of free), you have a choice between proprietary software and free.
"I understand the desire to sell your product and keep the source code a secret, but no other aspect of human technology works that way."
True, but you can't take an electronic component and make an exact duplicate for no cost and almost no energy. There is nothing else in human technology that is like this.
"Every electronic component is documented. Every part in a car is documented. Every building is built with approved materials and is inspected. Every switch, nail, screw, and device is documented and open to public inspection. Why is not software? Why do we allow large corporations to sell us software that does not necessarily operate in our best interests? Do you think DRM is in any way beneficial to you a stake holder? Do you think it is right that YOUR DVD player will *not* let you skip a commercial?"
If we can do all this and not allow the recipient to copy and pass on to all of their friends at no cost, I am all for it.
"The freedom to restrict another's freedom is not freedom, it is tyranny. There may be financial gain in such actions, but is freedom something that we fight for only to sell to the highest bidder?"
You have no concept of freedom. You sound like a spoiled kid that has been given everything. you have no rights to software. It is a privilege given to you by the actual companies or people that create it. If you don't like it, you have the freedom to use something else...like open source.
"Web sites collect so much data about us. Are we really free? Is our own computer really our own property?"
Websites are privately owned and operated. Don't like it? don't go there, it's just that easy.
"Microsoft's success is due to luck and stupidity on the part of IBM in giving Microsoft a contract, not some amazing level of quality in Microsoft's software or even Bill Gates' business acumen."
People keep bringing up dos, which did give Microsoft its start..but keep forgetting about windows..which revolutionized the desktop computer industry.
Bill gates had the foresight to know the potential of the IBM contract. This was a very intelligent business move. IBM also needed an OS for their hardware..and MS provided it for them. At the time, it was win-win.
The people in the open source community have been trying for the last 15 years to make a GUI as good as Microsoft windows..and have failed miserably. Even OSX beat them out..and it has only been around for half the time.
Microsoft has to be doing something right when they can always beat out 1000s of individul programmers hands-down.
"If you want another example, look at the success of Miley Cyrus, who just so happens to be the daughter of Billy Ray Cyrus and thus had the entertainment connections to get a TV show started and a music tour. More talented girls without those connections aren't touring the country right now making millions of dollars."
The entertainment industry is almost always about who you know..it has nothing to to with knowledge or talent.
"Not to diminish Mr Obama's accomplishment, but it is really a situation of right place and right time. You couldn't with with a change message if everything was going well. Lack of experience would cause his campaign to sink like the Lusatania."
Also, if the country truly was still racist, he wouldn't have even made it past the primaries.
"So blacks, women, and people under the age of 40 just aren't working hard enough?"
You should also look at other stats:
1) the percentage of blacks that are in college and in Jail, which would directly effect their earning potential. Or how about the percentage of single black mothers..which makes it 10X more difficult to make money.
The problem isn't racism..it's a culture that accepts the above as normal.
We just hired a black man as president..so really, there should be no more excuses.
2) The types of jobs women take (teachers, nurses, etc.). Most women are not interested in jobs that pay higher salaries and as a result, on average, get a lower salary.
"Because those are the people that are most likely to be making less than average wages, more likely to be working without benefits, etc. You call it an excuse, but for people who have poured their heart and soul into their work year after year and realized nothing from it, they call it prejudice."
actually, I call it bullshit.
"And it's just self-serving crap for you to say that "proper knowledge or experience" is the only pathway to opportunity when every day on the news we read about Haliburton and kickbacks, slush funds, and back room deals."
Knowledge and experience does give you more opportunities. This is one of the reasons why people get a higher education.
However, slush funds and back room deals do happen.
If you are going to mention those, I think you also need to mention the fact that people like Al Gore are milking the American people out of their hard-earned money by convincing them to purchase carbon credits (when it has not been proven that humans are the direct cause of global warming).
"Intelligence is a bell curve, but almost 80% of the wealth in this country is concentrated amongst 5% of the population;
And most of that held by white men who are over the age of 50. I don't suppose you're willing to say that this is because that's the only group that works hard."
90% of the people that are wealthy in the U.S. started out in the middle/lower class. The last 10% inherited it/got it through family.
I run my own business..and most people just aren't willing to sacrifice their free time to start a business and make it successful.
Just because you are intelligent..does not mean you will know how to use that intelligence to make money.
"That is the excuse I hear from successful people who think they got where they got via hard work instead of mostly mere chance. Everyone works hard."
Everyone works hard..but not everyone works smart. This is the difference.
"This is the excuse I heard from unsuccessful people who think they can be successful just by putting in the time and effort."
I'm successful and not using this as an excuse. I am a programmer and have had many opportunities come my way. The funny thing is that those same opportunities passed by other people at the same time..but because they didn't have the knowledge or foresight to do anything about it..they were unsuccessful.
"Truth is, if you're doing something on your own, being timing is crucial. eBay was in the right place at the right time.
They weren't particularly talented and now you can't do another eBay. Same with PayPal. Same with Google. Same with Yahoo. Same with just about any truly successful company out there. Perhaps the most vivid example of this is early Microsoft. Their success was built on the software they didn't even write."
Now you are the one sounding bitter. Ebay might have been created at the right place at the right time..but why are they the most successful? Countless other people have tried creating online auction systems that failed. It's the talent (maybe not in programming...but in design and or marketing) that made them the best.
The guys at google (Larry Page and Sergey Brin) I would hardly call talentless. They created a new search engine when there were already tons of existing ones (webcrawler,lycos,yahoo,etc). There are countless search engines that failed...but google didn't. It's because of their talent.
Microsoft may have purchased dos, but they engineered windows. You can't deny the fact that they brought the personal computer into the homes of most people world-wide.
"No matter how much time and effort you put in today, you will not replicate the success of those companies in their respective niches. Solely because you're not in the right place at the right time."
wow, this is one of the most defeatist posts I have seen all week. I'm actually glad that you feel this way, because it just means less competition for me.
"Success is being in the right place at the right time. That's 50% of it. The remaining 50% are 30% hard work and 20% talent. The point being, unless you're in the right place at the right time and you see the opportunity, your hard work and talent are unlikely to pay off."
This is the excuse I have heard from un-successful people that don't want to put the time and effort that it takes to actually be successful.
We have potential opportunities that pass by us every day. Without the proper knowledge or experience, these opportunities will just continue to pass by.
I would say it's more along the lines of 10% finding the opportunity (right place, right time) and 90% knowing what do do when you get it (talent and experience)
"No terrorist in Guantanamo (or Afghanistan, for that matter) could ever do this much damage to the country, and yet none of those responsible will ever be executed, waterboarded, or undergo"
This is true. They should have been arrested, but instead, we hire them as new leaders of our country.
Obama received the third highest in campaign contributions.
Barney Frank should also be investigated.
"Seriously though, do you think wearing sophisticated clothes is more important than actually knowing something about the real issues? Maybe what's in the package is more important than how shiny the package is?"
Tell that to all the people voting for obama.
I haven't really heard why people are actually voting for him..beyond vague and simplistic ideas such as "change".
It makes me realize just how easy it is for a population to hire somebody like hitler into power. I just hope that when the US goes to complete shit, the people that vote obama into office take the blame.
"There is validity in what you say. However, it is a poor analogy because creating and selling music does not translate well to a 9-5 job."
You are right. Music is a creative art and can take years to actually create something good. A 9-5 job doesn't nearly take as much effort.
"Common sense backs it up. People like that do exist, and if CDs were less expensive, the numbers would be larger. As for the number of people like that, I don't know how many there are. Maybe it is a small number. But during the hey-day of illegal download (napster), there were still a fair amount of people purchasing CDs. I would certainly love to see a study that could show what these numbers might be. "
maybe..and maybe not..we still don't know.
"Horrible analogy.
I guess there is a larger drive to pirate then there is to burgle. "
you say that it's pointless for companies to lock music with DRM because it will just get pirated anyway.
I said it's the same with locking your house. They do make better locks (just like with software), but if a crook really wants to get into your house, they will (just like software pirates).
"There are those that will never pay for music, and nothing can change that. But there are those that would pay for music, but for various reason don't. If you wanted to limit the amount of piracy going on, it would be a good idea to finding out why some that would pay for music don't, and make the changes to turn them into music purchasers."
I think the Record industry is getting mixed signals. When Napster came out, Many people said it was the cost of the cds that were people to download it for free. Over the last couple of years, they started to change the model. You can now get individual tracks for 99 cents or less.
Piracy has gotten even worse. (you could take a discussion on slashdot back during the napster days and the same people are giving the same excuses).
It seems like there will always be an excuse until they are giving everything away for free..and when this happens, the greedy culture of p2p users will be crying foul of something else that they feel they deserve.
"They do. While someone might pirate vs. $15 for a CD, they might purchase the actual CD if it was at a lower price point."
Would you do work for free and then expect your employer to pay you what they thought it was worth?
If people aren't willing to fork over the cash for music, they shouldn't get the luxury of listening to it either.
"There are people that download illegally and still purchase new CDs at $15 a pop. There would be more that fit into that catagory if the price was lower."
any stats to back this up? I keep hearing this, but see no actual evidence. I think this probably does happen, but at a much smaller level than you are trying to convey here.
"Having a better product (CD artwork & "extra's") at a more affordable price is a better plan then offering an inferior product (Bogged down with DRM, vs. DRM free pirated MP3's) and the current price."
DRM was created because of piracy. If all restrictions were lifted, piracy would still continue.
There is no evidence to show otherwise.
"These are computers. If someone can create the security, someone can break it. It's pretty much that simple. The only thing stopping someone from breaking security measures is drive, and it seems that there is a lot of drive for free music, games, & movies. The sooner that these companies realize that, the sooner they can move towards accepting different business models."
It's pretty easy to break into a house, but people still have locks.
"I give Radio Head and NIN as examples of bands that are changing the RIAA business model, and proving that they can still produce studio quality work while allowing their works to be purchased at a price point of $0."
This shows two examples that moderately worked. However, you left out the part where trent reznor tried it with a lesser known artists named saul williams and it was a complete failure (less than 20% paid). (http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20080305-reznor-makes-750000-even-when-the-music-is-free.html)
This model may work with the top 1% of musicians, but lesser known ones that make the majority of their money from online music sales will not be as successful, if at all.
What's changing the RIAA are services like iTunes, which actually sell music online. Giving something away for free (especially when it is counterfeit..and not part of an actual competing business) is not new or innovative.
It may be easy to copy something digital, but the original talent and work it took to create the original copy is not. There is also a demand, because people do want to listen or use it.
Human nature is what we are seeing here. No matter how useful something is, if most people can get it for free, they won't pay for it. This isn't a flaw in a business model but pure greed.
"hey would just start charging a rate more balanced to the adjusted end profits. So, people that want to pay for properly produced studio albums will still have that option."
This isn't 1999. They already started charging less with services such as itunes and piracy is worse than ever.
This shows that all the excuses for piracy are nothing more than a smokescreen for getting free shit.
"Business models change over time. Maybe Studio Produced music would die out, or maybe they would lower their costs."
They do, but in this case the studios have no reason to lower their costs. Normally, when a business model changes, it's the result of a superior technology (such as the horse and buggy analogy that people love to bring up on slashdot during this kind of discussion).
However, in the case of piracy, it offers nothing superior except a price point of $0 (which doesn't cost $0 to product the original content). The only thing the studios can do to really prevent this is to create a better lock.
Now, if artists were releasing their music independently (on myspace for example) and actually competing with the RIAA, it would be a different story. The ironic part is that because piracy is so rampant, independent artists have no choice but to go with the RIAA if they want to actually make money on their music.
"IF a million people (in America/Europe) want to download a CD, then there is probably enough draw that the artist will sell some CD's too. "
If there was no option to get it for free. They might sell more. Plus, the artist should have a choice whether to offer their work for free or for pay. You do when you go to work every day.
"one downloaded song does not equal one lost sale. Many people that download would never purchase albums in the first place (i.e. they are cheap). So those people do not result in lost sales."
no, but a million downloads does. If your business is selling music and everybody can get it for free, you aren't going to be in business anymore.
Also, if it didn't cause a loss in sales, why would they care?
"sure, CD sales (particularly CD singles) are plummeting, but internet download purchases have more than made up for those losses. so it's internet users who are keeping the music industry alive, and even helping it to prosper. but i suppose exploring music online is rather "insular" and "rude." how dare consumers discover music for themselves instead of letting the radio tell them what to purchase."
The reason internet download purchases have increased has nothing to do with p2p or its users. It's because CD players are on the way out.
Everyone I know owns and MP3 player and hasn't actually used or purchased a CD in years. Technology has changed.
"or maybe the RIAA are just pissed off that their Payola scheme is losing effectiveness."
Your reasoning reminds me of the labor unions in the US. They started out saying they were for the little guy..but are now just as bad and corrupt as any of the big companies.
"As it stands, you'd get in less trouble for stealing a CD then copyright infringement"
Which is a good thing. Stealing a CD may result in some money lost to best buy..but when the entire album is shared to 1,000,000 it could put the label or artist out of business.
"The problem with the terminology is that words like "theft" and "steal" (which gain merit from the word "piracy," as this was one thing sea pirates did) are deliberately used by the powers that be to confuse people into thinking that the infringement of copyright carries exactly the same consequences as shoplifting or other deprivation of physical property. Only a moron would believe that you can receive spam (the food) through e-mail."
well, is closer to counterfeiting than stealing (since we are deciding that it isn't a physical object), and it's worse for the copyright owner.
One person downloading one copy might not result in a direct loss in sales, but if everybody online can search google and get to a pirate copy of your software before getting to your website, it will devalue your software over time. After all, digital goods are only worth what people are willing to pay.
You need to ask yourself, if piracy didn't result in any loss in sales, why would a software company waste their money or time trying to stop it?
"Arrr, we know you're 'ere, poppet!!"
Haha, it's SO funny when you use the literal term for pirate.
you must be gay (i'm using the literal term for happiness).
"The developers who write open source code do so primarily because they want to use the code themselves. Putting the code out as open source means it gets "evolved" over time by the wider community. Everyone wins through getting better code."
ok, and what happens when there is something that the open source developer just doesn't feel like fixing? It just doesn't get fixed. I have seen this many times with OSS projects.
"That is a SIGNIFICANTLY better motivator than the developers of closed source. Most closed source developers simply work 9 to 5 for some big corporation. Yawn."
yeah, and most open source developers have a 9-5 and have to work on it after hours. I would much rather have the person that is getting paid to work on it.
"OpenOffice.org has gone from laughable to better capability than MS Office in just 5 years."
Now you can't be serious. Open Office isn't even close to MS office in terms of features and performance. I think it will probably take another 5 years to come close to office 97.
"Quit being a partisan asshole! He would have been exactly equally "reluctantly heroic" if he'd done the same thing to Biden."
No, they would have been called racist.
I am not a partisan asshole, It just seems like nobody cares about the trashing of personal privacy and rights.
Hell, with current state of the liberally controlled media, hitler could run and still be made out to be the "good guy".
"He should be prosecuted under relevant laws for what he did. However, he unwittingly uncovered other illegal activity.
For that reason he is a reluctant hero (which I agree that "hero" was probably not the best word to use).
--"
violating the privacy of a citizen of the united states is much worse than the crime of using a hotmail account to conduct business.
Honestly, this entire campaign scares me. It's the closet the US has gotten to a communist dictator and the average, moronic citizen doesn't seem to care.
"On the other hand, we've used emacs, cvs, firefox, gcc, and tons of other OSS software"
So you are comparing the reliability of a large anonymous, commercial database to emacs, cvs, and firefox?
"and had none of these problems. Of course, the plural of anecdote isn't data - so if you'll stop trying to paint the entire OSS movement with a few examples, I think we can agree that there are good and bad projects in both models."
I'm not saying all open source projects are shitty and bug ridden, just around 98%. The last 2% include: firefox, php, apache and mysql, which is interesting because they all are backed and supported by large companies.
"Products with backend databases that became corrupt, losing days of hundreds of peoples' work as we had to restore to older versions; or even worse, slowly rotted with corruption, so we couldn't trust the restored data either"
And how is this any different than open source software? Even linux, the golden child of the OSS community would have the tendency to lose entire partitions if you didn't shutdown properly (or just cut the power) until only recently. I have NEVER had this problem with windows.
"Fixed that for you."
That might be the case, but it still doesn't refute what I said about open source software. Developers have no reason to fix a flaw or security issue in an open source project. Again, as a business, why would I want to take the risk?
Even though proprietary software companies don't want you to find out about malicious code, the minute it is found out (and publicized), it needs to be fixed ASAP or they could lose their business..which is a huge motivating factor.
Open source projects have no such motivating factor.
"What's to stop a commercial vendor from putting evil code in? All it takes is one disgruntled employee and some poor review processes (which certainly isn't uncommon in smaller companies)."
a commercial software vendor could get sued (or lose credibility among people purchasing it..and lose the business) if there is malicious code in place, so it is in their best interest to make sure it's not there.
Open source projects have no risk. They can put out buggy or insecure code (look at projects like oscommerce or wordpress as an example) and if there is a problem, the most you get is a "my bad", and the hope of a fix (or you can spend days trying to weed through the source and fix it yourself). Also, since most open source projects are hobbies, sometimes you don't even get glaring bug fixes finished for months (filezilla has a nice feature that deletes your files when transferring..I lost an entire weeks worth of work one time. The main programmer there also has denied any issues).
This also doesn't account for all the GPL liabilities. As a company, it's just better to stay away from open source software.