It's a right as much as any other form of health care. For one thing, plenty of women take hormonal birth control for medical reasons unrelated to family planning. Should a bunch of religious zealots get special rights not to comply with a law that affects every other employer?
I don't have the highest income, so I won't buy *anything* without watching it first.
If they don't want to offer it that way, why do you feel entitled to take it like that?
Fair enough, since they'd be the ones shooting themselves in the foot, since they'd be going from a potential lost sale from my seeing it first and deciding it's not worth buying to a definite lost sale. From a utilitarian point of view, it's better for the authors if I do what I'm doing.
The more convenient businesses make access to IP for consumers, the more people who will pay rather than seek out the alternatives.
I agree wholeheartedly. Doesn't change the fact that pirates are assholes who seem entitled to something without paying for it.
Well, any of my exes can certainly testify that I'm a jerk. In this case, however, I still can claim the moral high-horse over the MAFIAA.
I remember how when I was studying photography, I had this documentary class where the professor was going off on how great the DMCA was because it allowed artists to take down sites that posted such low-res photos that nobody could print or do anything useful with. I had the audacity to say "What about due-process?" He tried to fail me despite my acing every assignment just because of my stance on copyright.
Not for life, no. But I do think that they should be able to derive income from that work. Copyrights in the 10-14 range give authors, musicians, etc enough time to have a legal monopoly on distribution to get properly paid. If they want to have their work give them income for life, they're free to invest the profits. Assuming, that is, that the publishers/labels actually pay them any of the money that they deserve rather than steal it via questionable accounting practices.
Furthermore, you seem to be tarring all "pirates" with the same brush. There are those who will never pay, there is nothing that can be done about that without breaking the internet. Anything that can be converted to data *will* be transmitted around the world for essentially nothing. Trying to put that genie back into the bottle is like trying to use DRM to keep someone from Star Trek from replicating a fancy watch. Can't be done. Companies dealing in IP need to change their business model to adapt, rather than try to put the genie back into the bottle. I'll say it again, there is NOTHING that can be done to prevent file-sharing, and businesses need to stop fighting it and work on finding new ways to monetize their content. Here's a hint: People pay for convenience and quality. Trying to find a good rip on TBP can be like pulling teeth from an angry velociraptor sometimes. Most people would rather pay than dealing with finding a good.torrent.
I'm a heavy downloader, myself. I'll happily admit it. I also believe in paying the creative folks. I don't have the highest income, so I won't buy *anything* without watching it first. If I like it, I'll buy it. If not, I'll delete it, especially with HDD prices these days. Hell, half the cds/dvds/LPs that I've purchased in the last year are still in the shrink wrap. Even if it's something I know I'm going to buy, I'll also download a copy since I'm too lazy to rip it and stick it on my file server.
And don't get me started on heavily DRMed stuff. I'll put up with Steam since it's fairly unobtrusive and generally is the easiest way to get a game installed on Linux. But do you have any idea how much of a PITA it is to play Blu-Ray content on *nix? It'd take me longer to break copy protection, grab the image, and transcode it into a watchable file than it does to just.torrent the bloody thing. Give me a legitimate way to access this content without obnoxious DRM, and I'll happily pay.
In short: Authors *should* get paid if people use their work, but you can't stop piracy. The more convenient businesses make access to IP for consumers, the more people who will pay rather than seek out the alternatives.
For most users, the fact that a whole bunch of stuff works right out of the box with little or no effort to bring it up is a huge selling point. The ability to buy almost any software title and have it work on Windows is a huge selling point.
I've really given up on working to get converts lest I become as annoying as the JWs. I really have come to the conclusion that there really isn't One True OS that satisfies the needs of all users. And even on the *nix side, most folk pick a distro that "just works" (which can be a rather subjective criterion).as well.
After the latest rounds of virus infections hit them (clueless family members), my sister got a Mac (which I will provide phone support for) and my folks still stick with windows because they "don't want to change" (nevermind that MS keeps overhauling the interface). They're stuck calling tech support.
I'd have done it myself if my mod points didn't vanish yesterday. I've certainly been the sort of geek who hasn't done well in communicating with others when it comes to technical matters. Despite years of bugging friends and family members to "just get a Mac" every time I had to give out free tech support, no one ever did because I didn't/couldn't articulate the reasons why this would be a good idea. I think I've learnt my lesson, and have been able to get people to at least start playing with *nix by actually *showing* how it's not so scary to use and how easy it is to run plenty of Windows software through WINE.
Depending on how long MS supports 7 (and given that yeah, most users do stick with the version it comes with), 8 may have quite a number of people hold off from hardware upgrades until something better comes along. It's really a pity that MS, Apple and Canonical seem determined to foist tablet OSes onto laptops and workstations. It's a serious regression. Windows 7 is actually good, I'll admit to keeping it on a spare partition on the laptop and a copy under Virtualbox on the Desktop. Apple had just about everything right with Snow Leopard, but now they're moving closer and closer to iOS on the mac.
All of this makes me quite glad that I can use any DE I want on Linux.
Great suggestion, and if I ever decide to start getting ebooks, that's what I'll probably end up doing either through torrents or stripping it myself. At this point, though, I still prefer dead-tree format for anything I want to keep.
I'd have tossed you an insightful point, but I feel like I need to make a small critique here. Yes, drm-laden ebooks can't be resold but as other posters have pointed out, the rapid release of new editions also deeply cuts into the ability to resell. When I was still taking classes, I sucked it up and got the electronic versions of any book that I didn't intend on keeping simply because at half the price I was still coming out ahead. Students are going to vote with their wallets irrespective of publisher profits. In this case it's unfortunately tied to the iPad so I wouldn't benefit even if I was still a student.
To each his or her own, obviously. I actually enjoyed both versions quite a bit. And there really is no way to be sure if the way either film was directed or produced that couldn't just boil down to artistic differences in the best way to work with the source material.
Obviously, most US audiences tend to avoid subtitles, but that really isn't the point. Plenty of British films with substantially lower cost are reasonably successful in the States, as are quite a number of independent titles. It's rather insane that the American version of "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" automatically had to cost over six times what the Swedish version without really adding anything. Might have well saved a bit of money and dubbed the original into English. The scale of something like LotR obviously justifies the kind of expense but your average title *isn't* some giant epic.
Only replying to this troll due to having too much Ambien and not much better to do at the moment.
We need to do *more* for cripples, rather than less, because having them just sit there trying to survive off of disability cheques is a waste of resources. It makes more sense to help them contribute more. I remember sitting on a bus one day talking with some guy with no legs who was frustrated that his nearly broken wheelchair would take a few months to replace. The guy had all the credentials needed to become a psychologist. I'd *hope* that the folks at the Social Security office would do more than just hand him enough to avoid starvation and homelessness, but to maybe provide mental therapy *he* could have used (at least to overcome depression related to being stuck on disability), or at least a list of jobs at the local VA for qualified individuals. I'd figure, that a soldier coming back missing bits would more likely identify with a shrink who was also an amputee. Most disabled people *want* to work, and most *can* if given a bit of help.
Oh, and hell, even retards are probably giving more to society than you. Just about everyone I've ever met who had Downs is a far better person than you'll ever be in your pathetic lifetime, and plenty of them manage to take care of themselves, work, and pay taxes.
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I know OpenSuSE still supports KDE 3, and I"m sure there are other distros as well for those who don't like 4.x
It's a right as much as any other form of health care. For one thing, plenty of women take hormonal birth control for medical reasons unrelated to family planning. Should a bunch of religious zealots get special rights not to comply with a law that affects every other employer?
I don't have the highest income, so I won't buy *anything* without watching it first.
If they don't want to offer it that way, why do you feel entitled to take it like that?
Fair enough, since they'd be the ones shooting themselves in the foot, since they'd be going from a potential lost sale from my seeing it first and deciding it's not worth buying to a definite lost sale. From a utilitarian point of view, it's better for the authors if I do what I'm doing.
The more convenient businesses make access to IP for consumers, the more people who will pay rather than seek out the alternatives.
I agree wholeheartedly. Doesn't change the fact that pirates are assholes who seem entitled to something without paying for it.
Well, any of my exes can certainly testify that I'm a jerk. In this case, however, I still can claim the moral high-horse over the MAFIAA.
The word you're looking for is "chutzpah."
I remember how when I was studying photography, I had this documentary class where the professor was going off on how great the DMCA was because it allowed artists to take down sites that posted such low-res photos that nobody could print or do anything useful with. I had the audacity to say "What about due-process?" He tried to fail me despite my acing every assignment just because of my stance on copyright.
Or a site anywhere else in the world for that matter.
Not for life, no. But I do think that they should be able to derive income from that work. Copyrights in the 10-14 range give authors, musicians, etc enough time to have a legal monopoly on distribution to get properly paid. If they want to have their work give them income for life, they're free to invest the profits. Assuming, that is, that the publishers/labels actually pay them any of the money that they deserve rather than steal it via questionable accounting practices.
Furthermore, you seem to be tarring all "pirates" with the same brush. There are those who will never pay, there is nothing that can be done about that without breaking the internet. Anything that can be converted to data *will* be transmitted around the world for essentially nothing. Trying to put that genie back into the bottle is like trying to use DRM to keep someone from Star Trek from replicating a fancy watch. Can't be done. Companies dealing in IP need to change their business model to adapt, rather than try to put the genie back into the bottle. I'll say it again, there is NOTHING that can be done to prevent file-sharing, and businesses need to stop fighting it and work on finding new ways to monetize their content. Here's a hint: People pay for convenience and quality. Trying to find a good rip on TBP can be like pulling teeth from an angry velociraptor sometimes. Most people would rather pay than dealing with finding a good .torrent.
I'm a heavy downloader, myself. I'll happily admit it. I also believe in paying the creative folks. I don't have the highest income, so I won't buy *anything* without watching it first. If I like it, I'll buy it. If not, I'll delete it, especially with HDD prices these days. Hell, half the cds/dvds/LPs that I've purchased in the last year are still in the shrink wrap. Even if it's something I know I'm going to buy, I'll also download a copy since I'm too lazy to rip it and stick it on my file server.
And don't get me started on heavily DRMed stuff. I'll put up with Steam since it's fairly unobtrusive and generally is the easiest way to get a game installed on Linux. But do you have any idea how much of a PITA it is to play Blu-Ray content on *nix? It'd take me longer to break copy protection, grab the image, and transcode it into a watchable file than it does to just .torrent the bloody thing. Give me a legitimate way to access this content without obnoxious DRM, and I'll happily pay.
In short: Authors *should* get paid if people use their work, but you can't stop piracy. The more convenient businesses make access to IP for consumers, the more people who will pay rather than seek out the alternatives.
For most users, the fact that a whole bunch of stuff works right out of the box with little or no effort to bring it up is a huge selling point. The ability to buy almost any software title and have it work on Windows is a huge selling point.
I've really given up on working to get converts lest I become as annoying as the JWs. I really have come to the conclusion that there really isn't One True OS that satisfies the needs of all users. And even on the *nix side, most folk pick a distro that "just works" (which can be a rather subjective criterion).as well.
After the latest rounds of virus infections hit them (clueless family members), my sister got a Mac (which I will provide phone support for) and my folks still stick with windows because they "don't want to change" (nevermind that MS keeps overhauling the interface). They're stuck calling tech support.
I'd have done it myself if my mod points didn't vanish yesterday. I've certainly been the sort of geek who hasn't done well in communicating with others when it comes to technical matters. Despite years of bugging friends and family members to "just get a Mac" every time I had to give out free tech support, no one ever did because I didn't/couldn't articulate the reasons why this would be a good idea. I think I've learnt my lesson, and have been able to get people to at least start playing with *nix by actually *showing* how it's not so scary to use and how easy it is to run plenty of Windows software through WINE.
I think that the good folks in Liverpool know how to deal with the Murdoch empire.
An interest that might develop once Win8 comes out.
Depending on how long MS supports 7 (and given that yeah, most users do stick with the version it comes with), 8 may have quite a number of people hold off from hardware upgrades until something better comes along. It's really a pity that MS, Apple and Canonical seem determined to foist tablet OSes onto laptops and workstations. It's a serious regression. Windows 7 is actually good, I'll admit to keeping it on a spare partition on the laptop and a copy under Virtualbox on the Desktop. Apple had just about everything right with Snow Leopard, but now they're moving closer and closer to iOS on the mac.
All of this makes me quite glad that I can use any DE I want on Linux.
And you were using a semi-condensed font?
Last time I checked, I could use any installed font in konsole and turn AA on or off without a problem.
Meh. At least it was obvious what to which agency you were referring once I stopped transposing letters in my head.
Methinks I need to work on my reading skills. I was starting to wonder what British film awards had to do with any of this.
Great suggestion, and if I ever decide to start getting ebooks, that's what I'll probably end up doing either through torrents or stripping it myself. At this point, though, I still prefer dead-tree format for anything I want to keep.
I'd have tossed you an insightful point, but I feel like I need to make a small critique here. Yes, drm-laden ebooks can't be resold but as other posters have pointed out, the rapid release of new editions also deeply cuts into the ability to resell. When I was still taking classes, I sucked it up and got the electronic versions of any book that I didn't intend on keeping simply because at half the price I was still coming out ahead. Students are going to vote with their wallets irrespective of publisher profits. In this case it's unfortunately tied to the iPad so I wouldn't benefit even if I was still a student.
To each his or her own, obviously. I actually enjoyed both versions quite a bit. And there really is no way to be sure if the way either film was directed or produced that couldn't just boil down to artistic differences in the best way to work with the source material.
Obviously, most US audiences tend to avoid subtitles, but that really isn't the point. Plenty of British films with substantially lower cost are reasonably successful in the States, as are quite a number of independent titles. It's rather insane that the American version of "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo" automatically had to cost over six times what the Swedish version without really adding anything. Might have well saved a bit of money and dubbed the original into English. The scale of something like LotR obviously justifies the kind of expense but your average title *isn't* some giant epic.
Perhaps they want (relative) anonymity because of draconian laws combined with third-world prison conditions in the US.
It's amazing how so many foreign films and independent titles seem to get by on much smaller budgets.
True enough. But I don't see MAFIAA cokeheads having the charm/allure generally attributed to Señor Diablo in most mythological accounts.
An "angel" offering fame and fortune but demanding complete ownership of the artist sounds more like a deal with the devil to me.
Only replying to this troll due to having too much Ambien and not much better to do at the moment.
We need to do *more* for cripples, rather than less, because having them just sit there trying to survive off of disability cheques is a waste of resources. It makes more sense to help them contribute more. I remember sitting on a bus one day talking with some guy with no legs who was frustrated that his nearly broken wheelchair would take a few months to replace. The guy had all the credentials needed to become a psychologist. I'd *hope* that the folks at the Social Security office would do more than just hand him enough to avoid starvation and homelessness, but to maybe provide mental therapy *he* could have used (at least to overcome depression related to being stuck on disability), or at least a list of jobs at the local VA for qualified individuals. I'd figure, that a soldier coming back missing bits would more likely identify with a shrink who was also an amputee. Most disabled people *want* to work, and most *can* if given a bit of help.
Oh, and hell, even retards are probably giving more to society than you. Just about everyone I've ever met who had Downs is a far better person than you'll ever be in your pathetic lifetime, and plenty of them manage to take care of themselves, work, and pay taxes.