I think I could be pretty good at this, it is a long time since I predicted that the US would go in and finish what the Soviets couldn't in Afghanistan.
The problem is, what I would want to happen is not often what I expect will happen. Give me a real way to influence policy makers instead, and I'll be much more happy.
Yes, it is quite unlikely that it is correct to estimate the loss as "number of copies * licence fee", but what really should be addressed is the idea that "the only way to make money is to control the copies". That's the root of the problem.
We need to design a system where it is very easy to pay without restricting copies, and we need to do it soon. To some extent, they do this with shareware, but the payment options there are far from efficient enough.
As I was finishing my thesis in autumn 2001, a moved out to a small cabin in the woods. The world was going mad, I was completely without focus, and I just needed to get away.
I found a small cabin without water, toilet and of course no connection, but it had electricity. I lived there for a month while finishing my thesis. It was a 45 minute bike-ride on rather rugged roads down to campus (and a whole lot longer back, mainly because I would usually have a heavy backpack with food and bad uphill).
But it was absolutely great living out there. You can live at a so much slower pace, yet get so much more work done. pics from the place.
I posted another comment about this just the other day. Then, the topic was mainly creating a cashflow to avoid further DMCAing.
I think we should write an application that people can use to get an idea of what applications they use. A program that tracks what is most important to them. Then, payment information follows each application, and each month, a list is brought up to allow the user to select who he wants to send money to.
A click or two, and the money is on the way to the developer.
The trick is to make the payment simple enough for Joe Average to actually do it now and then.
How about instead, people put some thought into the possibilities of beating some sort of system and what the actual outcome of such regulation would be?
I think we need to hack up some way to keep a cashflow going from end-user to creators, be it music, film, software or underlying technological infrastructure.
I think it is counterproductive to insist on control of copies, or private monopolies, enforced with copyrights or patents. However, those who do the job need to eat, and it is also counterproductive to force them to sell auxillary products (e.g. sell a t-shirt to fund writing music), or make money through advertising (I'd like to see the death of todays advertising business).
It is therefore we must focus on getting the money from the end user to the creator with the least possible resistance.
We could draw up a standard where payment information could be included as metadata in web pages, Ogg files or software. The applications that is used to view or play keep track of what you're viewing, and every week or month, it presents you with a list of what you've done in the past week or month, and what payment is requested by the author or artist. Most likely, the payment is passed as a voluntary (anonymous) micropayment.
If we can get this working, and hackers and independent artists start making a living from it, we'll see some opposition, but I think that we would be in a much better position to argue that *AA is just protecting old style business models, worth no protection.
But I think it is the only way we can do it: Provide a new business model, that can be seen to be sustainable.
Something can be funny, true, and horrifying at the same time. For example, sarcasm can, when used well by a gifted author, be hilariously funny, yet provide the reader with insight that he would not have gotten by reading a "serious" text. That a text about serious matters should not be funny, is a serious misunderstanding, IMHO. Conversely, a unfunny, "serious" text, can be complete garbage. There are many examples of that...
Danish poet and scientist Piet Hein has a nice piece about this, in my poor translation it goes something like:
He who only takes a joke for a joke,
and seriousness only seriously,
he or she has grasped both things
very poorly.
Wow, 15 comments, and the Ethernut webserver is still running fine. Wow, I'm impressed! Looks like servedby.advertising.com is going to be/.ed before that card!:-)
It's not good enough for me. When you're trying to make a buck over spam, then you should be clued enough to understand what spam is yourself, and not spam. There's no second chance.
Obviously, they're not as stupid as to send spam to their own customers, but there has been talk about them selling lists of people who send you e-mail and go through the confirmation. Those confirmed addresses are what they may be selling.
They give most of the power to whoever runs the micropayment system.
No, we just need open standards, unencumbered by patents, that anyone can implement, for the client side, the providers side and the "banking" side. I agree that if there were a single or even a few corporations controlling the market, it would be a Bad Thing[tm], but it doesn't need to be. But that's also the reason why BitPass won't take off, it is not going to happen anything before there are open standards.
Try the subscription model. It works beautifully,
What? Look around you? Do you see the subscription model working beautifully? If *AA could be making money on subscriptions, do you really think they wouldn't go for it, and we wouldn't be in the deep shit we are now. Look, the subscription model requires that you at least to a great extent control the copies of the stuff you're selling, you cannot allow your subscribers to pass it on. That's the core problem of everything that is bad about payments for immaterial goods now.
I subscribed to Salon for a year, but I stopped, because for my subscription I not only got some very interesting and enlightening material, I also got quite a lot that was not well written at all. I didn't want to pay for that. If I could have paid by micropayments, Salon would have gotten a lot of money from me. Salon is constantly on the brink of going broke. Subscriptions does not work! (on this scale)
I'd much prefer a huge one-time payment so that I didn't have to worry as much about it.
I'm sure you would. But I wouldn't, and the problems you mention can be solved if just somebody bright enough sits down and think about it. Subscriptions have their place, I'm sure. Probably, many publications can successfully use subscriptions, and I have nothing against that (as long as they stay away from DRM).
But you're saying that I should never been given the choice of paying with micropayments, that's just incredibly closed minded.
I'm a Debian user, not a developer, and I chose Debian for two main reasons: I like to understand what goes on, and many distros try to hide things from me to be "friendly". I don't have anything against RTFM, at least to a great extent. The other reason is that it is the most free distro around. Additionally, I had many good friends using Debian, always somebody I can call up.
However, I'm not capable of packaging anything myself, and I'm not a hacker. I'm a newbie. Things are hard, even after RTFMing...
Woody is allready terribly outdated, security packages like snort and nessus are pretty much useless. Then, KDE 3 is a whole lot more stable in my experience than KDE 2.2.2 which is in Woody. SpamAssasin must be kept up-to-date in the arms race with spammers. Exim is so old, people on the Exim-lists can't help you because they don't remember how Exim 3 was configured...
There are many who cries for an easier install, but I don't. It wasn't that hard, even for a newbie like me. Just had to call up my friends a few times. Debian folks are very helpful.
It seems like Sarge is following pretty much the same path as Woody did, released when really big things has been done. What I would like to see is Sarge being just an updated Woody. No new installer, no new groundbreaking stuff, just updated packages, Snort, Exim 4, Apache 2.0, KDE 3.1, GNOME 2.0, etc. Up-to-date, tested and out the door...
That's what I would like to see, but I realize there is very little I can do to help it happen.
So, make it transparent to the user, so that the user don't need to know the difference between having stored it on the a web server and having sent it as an attachment. That should be really simple.
Besides, when a binary attachment is encoded, it is enlarged by an additional 1/3 of its original size, so it is a huge waste of bandwidth too.
Well, MS marketing hype says that you shouldn't need to learn anything... So, perhaps we shouldn't blame MS techies for this one, but their marketdroids are certainly responsible.
Oh, so this is the reason why I'm still on 1.2 on Tru64...:-(
I've tried to build 1.3.1 myself, but it stopped because I lacked some header-files, and I didn't try that hard.
The build I have now crashes every time it encounters a plugin. Very annoying. The bug is fixed, but it doesn't help a lot if there are other show-stoppers.
Well, it is not going to help a lot whining about it on/. so I guess I should get back to work....
My mom is actually a happy Debian user. I'm admining the box, and I've added latest Mozilla, KDE 3.0.5 and OO 1.0.2 on top of it, but it still works well!
Why don't you try island... ice... polar bears... But much greater bandwidth!:-)
The Svalbard archipelago gets two real fiber optic cables 3000 kms from the Norwegian mainland. It is mainly going to be used by the Norwegian Space Centre to transfer satellite data to their customers, but in fact, every house will be connected to the backbone with a VDSL line.
Come to think about it, it shouldn't be that far along the great circle to put a fibre optic cable under the north pole when you're that close to it to Alaska, thus making a backbone with very few hops and rather short distance between Europe and US West coast...
Not what I had in mind. Transaction costs are too high. More like micropayments. And perhaps have a piece of software that actually tracks how much you use another piece and let you know how much the author thinks it is worth...
Re:Quazikotel & The End Of The World + compuro
on
Incas Used Binary?
·
· Score: 1
The only caveat to this calendar is that it ends in the year 2012.
Yeah, and the funny thing with our calendar is that it ends on Dec 31. Then it begins again. So, your point was?
Slashdot Mirror
The problem is, what I would want to happen is not often what I expect will happen. Give me a real way to influence policy makers instead, and I'll be much more happy.
We need to design a system where it is very easy to pay without restricting copies, and we need to do it soon. To some extent, they do this with shareware, but the payment options there are far from efficient enough.
I found a small cabin without water, toilet and of course no connection, but it had electricity. I lived there for a month while finishing my thesis. It was a 45 minute bike-ride on rather rugged roads down to campus (and a whole lot longer back, mainly because I would usually have a heavy backpack with food and bad uphill).
But it was absolutely great living out there. You can live at a so much slower pace, yet get so much more work done. pics from the place.
That's physical infrastructure, mostly. A different matter alltogether.
True, but perhaps he's just thinking in different terms than the Free Software community.
I think we should write an application that people can use to get an idea of what applications they use. A program that tracks what is most important to them. Then, payment information follows each application, and each month, a list is brought up to allow the user to select who he wants to send money to. A click or two, and the money is on the way to the developer.
The trick is to make the payment simple enough for Joe Average to actually do it now and then.
I think we need to hack up some way to keep a cashflow going from end-user to creators, be it music, film, software or underlying technological infrastructure.
I think it is counterproductive to insist on control of copies, or private monopolies, enforced with copyrights or patents. However, those who do the job need to eat, and it is also counterproductive to force them to sell auxillary products (e.g. sell a t-shirt to fund writing music), or make money through advertising (I'd like to see the death of todays advertising business).
It is therefore we must focus on getting the money from the end user to the creator with the least possible resistance.
We could draw up a standard where payment information could be included as metadata in web pages, Ogg files or software. The applications that is used to view or play keep track of what you're viewing, and every week or month, it presents you with a list of what you've done in the past week or month, and what payment is requested by the author or artist. Most likely, the payment is passed as a voluntary (anonymous) micropayment.
If we can get this working, and hackers and independent artists start making a living from it, we'll see some opposition, but I think that we would be in a much better position to argue that *AA is just protecting old style business models, worth no protection.
But I think it is the only way we can do it: Provide a new business model, that can be seen to be sustainable.
You're not by any chance reading at Score: 1, are you...? :-)
Hehe, patenting unethical AI and refuse to license the patent to anyone could Save The World Someday[tm]... :-)
Something can be funny, true, and horrifying at the same time. For example, sarcasm can, when used well by a gifted author, be hilariously funny, yet provide the reader with insight that he would not have gotten by reading a "serious" text. That a text about serious matters should not be funny, is a serious misunderstanding, IMHO. Conversely, a unfunny, "serious" text, can be complete garbage. There are many examples of that...
Danish poet and scientist Piet Hein has a nice piece about this, in my poor translation it goes something like:
Wow, 15 comments, and the Ethernut webserver is still running fine. Wow, I'm impressed! Looks like servedby.advertising.com is going to be /.ed before that card! :-)
Obviously, they're not as stupid as to send spam to their own customers, but there has been talk about them selling lists of people who send you e-mail and go through the confirmation. Those confirmed addresses are what they may be selling.
No, we just need open standards, unencumbered by patents, that anyone can implement, for the client side, the providers side and the "banking" side. I agree that if there were a single or even a few corporations controlling the market, it would be a Bad Thing[tm], but it doesn't need to be. But that's also the reason why BitPass won't take off, it is not going to happen anything before there are open standards.
Try the subscription model. It works beautifully,
What? Look around you? Do you see the subscription model working beautifully? If *AA could be making money on subscriptions, do you really think they wouldn't go for it, and we wouldn't be in the deep shit we are now. Look, the subscription model requires that you at least to a great extent control the copies of the stuff you're selling, you cannot allow your subscribers to pass it on. That's the core problem of everything that is bad about payments for immaterial goods now.
I subscribed to Salon for a year, but I stopped, because for my subscription I not only got some very interesting and enlightening material, I also got quite a lot that was not well written at all. I didn't want to pay for that. If I could have paid by micropayments, Salon would have gotten a lot of money from me. Salon is constantly on the brink of going broke. Subscriptions does not work! (on this scale)
I'm sure you would. But I wouldn't, and the problems you mention can be solved if just somebody bright enough sits down and think about it. Subscriptions have their place, I'm sure. Probably, many publications can successfully use subscriptions, and I have nothing against that (as long as they stay away from DRM).
But you're saying that I should never been given the choice of paying with micropayments, that's just incredibly closed minded.
I'm pretty sure (though not 100%) that SpamArrest is a spammer operation, designed to collect "confirmed live" addresses.
Stay away from them as far as you can, never respond to a challange is my advice now.
I'm a Debian user, not a developer, and I chose Debian for two main reasons: I like to understand what goes on, and many distros try to hide things from me to be "friendly". I don't have anything against RTFM, at least to a great extent. The other reason is that it is the most free distro around. Additionally, I had many good friends using Debian, always somebody I can call up.
However, I'm not capable of packaging anything myself, and I'm not a hacker. I'm a newbie. Things are hard, even after RTFMing...
Woody is allready terribly outdated, security packages like snort and nessus are pretty much useless. Then, KDE 3 is a whole lot more stable in my experience than KDE 2.2.2 which is in Woody. SpamAssasin must be kept up-to-date in the arms race with spammers. Exim is so old, people on the Exim-lists can't help you because they don't remember how Exim 3 was configured...
There are many who cries for an easier install, but I don't. It wasn't that hard, even for a newbie like me. Just had to call up my friends a few times. Debian folks are very helpful.
It seems like Sarge is following pretty much the same path as Woody did, released when really big things has been done. What I would like to see is Sarge being just an updated Woody. No new installer, no new groundbreaking stuff, just updated packages, Snort, Exim 4, Apache 2.0, KDE 3.1, GNOME 2.0, etc. Up-to-date, tested and out the door...
That's what I would like to see, but I realize there is very little I can do to help it happen.
Around here, very few businesses use dailups. I'm not aware of any, actually, and in fact, it seems most people are getting DSL lines anyway.
However, that's beside the point. The main point are all the advantages of not forcing the recipient to download it all if they don't want to.
Besides, when a binary attachment is encoded, it is enlarged by an additional 1/3 of its original size, so it is a huge waste of bandwidth too.
Well, MS marketing hype says that you shouldn't need to learn anything... So, perhaps we shouldn't blame MS techies for this one, but their marketdroids are certainly responsible.
weapons of mass disappearence are the words you're looking for! :-)
There is Bruce Perens' Global Technology Policy Institute, I thought that might be relevant in this context.
Oh, so this is the reason why I'm still on 1.2 on Tru64... :-(
I've tried to build 1.3.1 myself, but it stopped because I lacked some header-files, and I didn't try that hard.
The build I have now crashes every time it encounters a plugin. Very annoying. The bug is fixed, but it doesn't help a lot if there are other show-stoppers.
Well, it is not going to help a lot whining about it on /. so I guess I should get back to work....
My mom is actually a happy Debian user. I'm admining the box, and I've added latest Mozilla, KDE 3.0.5 and OO 1.0.2 on top of it, but it still works well!
The Svalbard archipelago gets two real fiber optic cables 3000 kms from the Norwegian mainland. It is mainly going to be used by the Norwegian Space Centre to transfer satellite data to their customers, but in fact, every house will be connected to the backbone with a VDSL line.
Come to think about it, it shouldn't be that far along the great circle to put a fibre optic cable under the north pole when you're that close to it to Alaska, thus making a backbone with very few hops and rather short distance between Europe and US West coast...
Copyright infringement is not a crime. Never was. And blurring the distinction is extremely dangerous.
Not what I had in mind. Transaction costs are too high. More like micropayments. And perhaps have a piece of software that actually tracks how much you use another piece and let you know how much the author thinks it is worth...
Yeah, and the funny thing with our calendar is that it ends on Dec 31. Then it begins again. So, your point was?