Granted, idea four is a good one... an excellent one, really. But the rest?
Boycotts are often effective, but let's be honest... you didn't pay for your CDs to begin with, did you? It's pretty much given that people who buy CDs are buying more CDs, whereas people who don't still aren't.
As for advocating illegal 'hacktivism', that's just petulant and childish.
Shoplifting? Dumb answer. Ignore the morality (or lack thereof), and ask yourself this: if the CD is stolen from your local music store, who eats the cost? Certainly not the RIAA. That's right, the RIAA got paid before the wholesaler stage. That money is coming out of the retailer's pocket. All you're doing is stealing from the retailer.
It's not like file-sharing is going to get shut down. It would take a complete shutdown of the internet to accomplish that.
I don't agree with how the RIAA is doing everything, but cheap thuggery is cheap thuggery, no matter what your cause.
What would be a simple and effective way to solve this problem is for a company like Amazon or B&N to say sure, we'll just pass the cost along to the consumer as an "AT&T Surchage" with a detailed note like this:
"Our system has detected that your are connecting to our servers from the AT&T@Home network.
Unfortunately, AT&T has adopted the practice of billing us for its customers who purchase goods from our site. We feel it would be unfair to raise our prices to all consumers because of a single ISP's presumption, and therefore we must past these surcharges on to you.
If you feel that you've already paid for the right to browse and buy products over the internet, we agree with you, even if AT&T does not. You have three alternatives available to you:
1) Make this purchase from a machine not connected to the AT&T@Home network. Simply disconnecting your computer from the AT&T@Home network and dialing with a 'Free ISP' will suffice.
2) Contact AT&T customer service and explain to them that their policies are affecting your ability to shop effectively-- an ability for which you have already paid.
3) Contact one of AT&T's competitors and take your business to a company with more sensible billing practices.
We apologize for the inconvenience."
Second alternative:
"Dear AT&T,
During the first quarter of 2001, approximately 26 million visitors from your network visited Amazon.com, resulting in (insert bandwidth estimate here) of traffic.
We represent (insert name of bandwidth provider), and have determined that you have profitted from these transactions through our network. Accordingly, you are being billed (insert obscene figure) in accordance with your 'billing at both ends' business model."
Yeah, they weren't really on top of their orders for a very long time-- My credit card got stolen after I ordered mine... eleven days to be precise, when they were supposed to have charged it after ten. I even called them to ask if it was a problem and they said it wouldn't be, as the card had already been charged.
Lo and behold, I received my visor a few days later, and as I was taking it out of the box, they called and asked about the decline. I explained the situation and that I was still waiting for my new credit card. They were very cool about it (not, of course, that they had a lot of choice in the matter, I already had the thing in my hand)... said they'd call me back later.
They never called back... I'm one of those people who gets guilty feelings, so I let it ride for about a month and shot their customer service a note with the title "How I got you to send me a Visor without paying for it."
Then I called them and gave them the number. they were quite relieved.
"I think, arguably, his development efforts have had as much an influence on free and open software as his public relations efforts through the FSF."
Arguably? No. Definitely. I'm one of Stallman's detractors mind you-- I think he's out of touch with reality and the GNU/Linux thing just gets on my last nerve-- but the whole software world owes him a debt that we'll never be able to measure.
Oh, I'm looking forward to this. Bad enough people are putting speakers in their trunks so I have to listen to their music even when they can't. Now they can make their windshields blare the music. I worked in a video store some years back and it wasn't uncommon for people to park and crank up their stereos so we could hear them while they looked for movies.
But on the bright side, I can take out their speakers with a rock while walking by. This may be a good devlopment after all.
Our motive for adopting Linux is that we want money. More and more it is becoming known that software is not the cash cow in computers anymore. Hardware is part of it, but the real money lies in SUPPORT and MAINTENANCE. One of Microsoft's biggest FUD tools was the lack of technical support... by remedying that, we're in a position to not only boost the OS but reap a lot of the profit in the process. Fortunately, other service providers will profit, because we won't be able to monopolise the support area, but our existence there will cause an increase in the use of Linux overall.... more users means more software & drivers, which means more users.... we won't be the only people helping break the no software=no users=no software cycle, but we'll certainly be making a start!!
(Note: I'm not speaking in any official capacity. I just work for Big Blue, and I know how we think.)
I support IBM Thinkpads for a living... for IBM. From a hardware perspective, they rock. The MWave setup (for those that don't know, MWave is where your sound, modem, and sometimes CD are all controlled by one software driven chip) sucks, yes... under Windows. Under OS/2 it's stable and reliable, but under Windows you often have to choose between your modem and sound. I'd love to see how the thing performs under linux.
Best Thinkpad Support call: "I dropped my Thinkpad from a third story window and cracked the case. The Duct Tape that's holding the display on is starting to peel off, so I figure it's time to get it replaced."
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Wow. You really are amoral, aren't you?
Granted, idea four is a good one... an excellent one, really. But the rest?
Boycotts are often effective, but let's be honest... you didn't pay for your CDs to begin with, did you? It's pretty much given that people who buy CDs are buying more CDs, whereas people who don't still aren't.
As for advocating illegal 'hacktivism', that's just petulant and childish.
Shoplifting? Dumb answer. Ignore the morality (or lack thereof), and ask yourself this: if the CD is stolen from your local music store, who eats the cost? Certainly not the RIAA. That's right, the RIAA got paid before the wholesaler stage. That money is coming out of the retailer's pocket. All you're doing is stealing from the retailer.
It's not like file-sharing is going to get shut down. It would take a complete shutdown of the internet to accomplish that.
I don't agree with how the RIAA is doing everything, but cheap thuggery is cheap thuggery, no matter what your cause.
I'm inclined to agree. I have my preferences set similarly, and recieved no e-mail.
I also agree with the point-- corporate america may not always be ethical. But usually, when they're being evil, they're smarter about it than this.
What would be a simple and effective way to solve this problem is for a company like Amazon or B&N to say sure, we'll just pass the cost along to the consumer as an "AT&T Surchage" with a detailed note like this:
"Our system has detected that your are connecting to our servers from the AT&T@Home network.
Unfortunately, AT&T has adopted the practice of billing us for its customers who purchase goods from our site. We feel it would be unfair to raise our prices to all consumers because of a single ISP's presumption, and therefore we must past these surcharges on to you.
If you feel that you've already paid for the right to browse and buy products over the internet, we agree with you, even if AT&T does not. You have three alternatives available to you:
1) Make this purchase from a machine not connected to the AT&T@Home network. Simply disconnecting your computer from the AT&T@Home network and dialing with a 'Free ISP' will suffice.
2) Contact AT&T customer service and explain to them that their policies are affecting your ability to shop effectively-- an ability for which you have already paid.
3) Contact one of AT&T's competitors and take your business to a company with more sensible billing practices.
We apologize for the inconvenience."
Second alternative:
"Dear AT&T,
During the first quarter of 2001, approximately 26 million visitors from your network visited Amazon.com, resulting in (insert bandwidth estimate here) of traffic.
We represent (insert name of bandwidth provider), and have determined that you have profitted from these transactions through our network. Accordingly, you are being billed (insert obscene figure) in accordance with your 'billing at both ends' business model."
Yeah, they weren't really on top of their orders for a very long time-- My credit card got stolen after I ordered mine... eleven days to be precise, when they were supposed to have charged it after ten. I even called them to ask if it was a problem and they said it wouldn't be, as the card had already been charged.
Lo and behold, I received my visor a few days later, and as I was taking it out of the box, they called and asked about the decline. I explained the situation and that I was still waiting for my new credit card. They were very cool about it (not, of course, that they had a lot of choice in the matter, I already had the thing in my hand)... said they'd call me back later.
They never called back... I'm one of those people who gets guilty feelings, so I let it ride for about a month and shot their customer service a note with the title "How I got you to send me a Visor without paying for it."
Then I called them and gave them the number. they were quite relieved.
"I think, arguably, his development efforts have had as much an influence on free and open software as his public relations efforts through the FSF."
Arguably? No. Definitely. I'm one of Stallman's detractors mind you-- I think he's out of touch with reality and the GNU/Linux thing just gets on my last nerve-- but the whole software world owes him a debt that we'll never be able to measure.
Oh, I'm looking forward to this. Bad enough people are putting speakers in their trunks so I have to listen to their music even when they can't. Now they can make their windshields blare the music. I worked in a video store some years back and it wasn't uncommon for people to park and crank up their stereos so we could hear them while they looked for movies.
But on the bright side, I can take out their speakers with a rock while walking by. This may be a good devlopment after all.
-
Our motive for adopting Linux is that we want money. More and more it is becoming known that software is not the cash cow in computers anymore. Hardware is part of it, but the real money lies in SUPPORT and MAINTENANCE. One of Microsoft's biggest FUD tools was the lack of technical support... by remedying that, we're in a position to not only boost the OS but reap a lot of the profit in the process. Fortunately, other service providers will profit, because we won't be able to monopolise the support area, but our existence there will cause an increase in the use of Linux overall.... more users means more software & drivers, which means more users.... we won't be the only people helping break the no software=no users=no software cycle, but we'll certainly be making a start!!
(Note: I'm not speaking in any official capacity. I just work for Big Blue, and I know how we think.)
I support IBM Thinkpads for a living... for IBM. From a hardware perspective, they rock. The MWave setup (for those that don't know, MWave is where your sound, modem, and sometimes CD are all controlled by one software driven chip) sucks, yes... under Windows. Under OS/2 it's stable and reliable, but under Windows you often have to choose between your modem and sound. I'd love to see how the thing performs under linux.
Best Thinkpad Support call: "I dropped my Thinkpad from a third story window and cracked the case. The Duct Tape that's holding the display on is starting to peel off, so I figure it's time to get it replaced."
"When did you drop it sir?"
"About eight months ago."