It will be interesting to see how the RIAA gets the evidence it needs for these cases. Its fair to say that access to University networks is only granted to authorised persons. So I read it as a case of RIAA got its evidence illegally, by somehow tapping in to the "local area Napster network" as they call it or that someone on site snitched in which case they must be hoping they aren't identified.
The RIAA may be able to prove someone on campus is sharing files illegally on to the internet. However, proving that a private internal network is being used for something dodgy requires a bit more evidence gathering than just making the accusation and hoping it sticks.
As much I like this idea and I could see it work as a good business model, I can see a potential consumer abuse issue here.
What if you could only get your music in return for commiting yourself to something? e.g. You get your 1000 hours of music with your car, but what if you also have to have adverts plastered on your car as well? What if publishers made deals to ensure you had to buy a particular product in order to get a particular piece of music. What if teeny-bopper type music was only available with alcopop drinks (dodgy combination)? What if Disney media products were only available to those who bought a particular brand of washing powder? It is well know just how brilliantly Disney has exploited pester power to sell its products.
The system may do away with DRM and copy protection, but that wouldn't stop publishers exploiting the concept and shacking up with advertisers/manufacturers to say you can only get this piece of music for free if you buy Product X. I see this as very dangerous, it could be used to exploit consumers in a way never seen before.
Such a scheme could only be in the consumers interest if there were very, very tough laws to regulate the system, otherwise publishers and manufacturers in general would abouse the system.
In the UK we have the Data Protection Act 1998. Basically it stipulates that if you want to hold personal data on someone you must by law be on the register of data controllers, see here. It also stipulates you can only hold someones personal information so long as you have a bona fide reason for having that information (e.g. business relationship etc). If you are holding or using personal data without authority you are committing a criminal act and the company's data controller can be held personally liable to criminal action. It is also required that the data controllers tell the registrar what they do with personal data and they are then restricted to doing only what they said they would do. Failure to comply can lead to big fines and payment of compensation to the victim.
I personally have used the act many times to look at my data, all I do is pay £10 for costs and the company/organisation has to give me everything they have on me, including CCTV footage they may have of me (suitably modified so as to obscure the identifying features of other people). If I find something amiss I can complain to the Information Commisioner who has the legal powers to put it right and award me compensation. It would seem this sort of act would prevent a case like this, by effectively shutting down information brokers. Does no such similar act exist in New Hampshire or other states?
,i>Revenues collected by the BSA stay with the BSA. None of it goes to members.
What I was implying was that whenever a business gets the threatening letters from the BSA, the majority will check their software and if something is amiss they will immediately go and buy whatever licenses are needed. The BSA's members will view that as a few extra sales for the cost of sending the threating letters.
A man I know as a regular in my local pub owns a chain of estate agents. They have 4 branches and they own about 40 PCs and a server or two. The only BSA related software the agency uses is the Windoze OS and a few copies of MS Office which are only used by secretary's (all 100% legit). The main software used for running the agency is actually a bespoke application, developed locally by a small software house.
He got the letter from the BSA mentioning the grace period, thretening a surprise audit etc. He reponded by informing the BSA if they made any attempt to enter any of his premises he would treat the matter as aggravated tresspass and use whatever means necesary to te remove them. The was followed up with a "We are sorry you are taking this attitude, but we have a right blah, blah" letter, but after that he heard nothing.
The BSA may have a (questionable) contractual right to audit your software, what they don't have is the right to enter buildings and act like they have legal backing. I know someone who was at the sharp end of such and audit and aparently it is not very pleasant. The BSA folks do act as if they are policemen and they are very upfront.
The BSA is just a trade body, the software equivalent of the Taxidermists Association of Scotland or the Charterd Institute of Accountants. They exist only to represnt the interests of MS, Adobe etc. They have no legal powers whatsoever. Their powers of enforcement as an organisation are exactly the same as mine as an individual. If they hassle you, ignore them and tell them to sue you or go away, simple as that.
Whatever your moral stance, legally speaking software piracy is wrong. However there are existing mechanisms in place to deal with piracy. The BSA approach seems to be to squeeze the biggest amount of cash out of the existing customers of its members. What about the many SME's that have never, ever bought legit software? How does the BSA deal with these types, given that the BSA probably doesn't even know they exist? I know of several businesses who don't have one single piece of legit software, the BSA doesn't even know they exist. BTW I won't snitch on these businesses, I live in Northern Ireland and I like having knee caps.
The BSA duses extortion to make money for its members. Its picks on those who are largely 100% legit, but may have made mistakes, these are easy targets. It would seem to ignore those who are serial pirates, those who do not intend to now or ever buy software. This approach is easy for the BSA, they really should sort their priorities out.
I don't understand the logic
on
Giant Sucking Noise
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· Score: 2, Informative
I live in Derry in Northern Ireland. This is a part of the world which was a bit like India for a good few years. What I mean by that is a lot of American companies set up operations here as it was cheaper. Near me we have Prumerica (Prudential) and Northbrook (Allstate) doing software and up the street we have a massive DuPont plant. There is also a load of call centres, MSN used to have support for its American operation based here. These are fairly safe purely on the grounds of the geographical location which is good for Europe and America.
Another sector that was established here was clothing and textiles. In the early 90's Fruit of the Loom set up several factories here, at considerable cost albeit offset by some government grants. So did Lee Aparell and a few other big names. Fruit of the Loom opened two plants near me and 3 over the Irish border a few miles away in Buncrana, Donegal. This was in the early 90s, only one plant is left and that is at risk of closing. Most of the plants that closed didn't last 5 years. The reason? management got uppity at staff joining unions and wanting better conditions and they were afraid of the upcomming minimum wage. So they shipped all the work off to Morocco, where the costs were 25% of the costs here. Even taking in to account the costs incurred building new factories here only a few years earlier it was still cheaper to move to Morocco.
This is where the weird logic kicks in, what happens when the Morrocan workers decide they want better pay, which will inevitably happen? Pretty much the same thing which happened here, management will not like the unions causing trouble and they will move somewhere else.
When will big business learn wages are not the only thing to think about when trying to make more money. A happy workforce with job security is a productive workforce, a productive workforce cuts manufacturing costs, lower manufacturing costs means more profits. Well at least I think thats how it works.
It has long been said that standing in or near a crop circle gives you a funny feeling. Sensations such as a gentle buzzing in the ears, feeling warm on cool days and static discharge when touching other people are said to occur.
I have had similar feelings. Once I visited a crop circle and felt a sensation that made me give the farmer £5.00 to have a closer look at the circle. When I left the field I felt a sensation that made me approach the travelling crop circle shop and pay £15.00 for a poster of a crop circle. The was an overwhelming feeling of being drained, not my energy or spirit, but my wallet. Strangely enough I didn't get any feelings of an alien presence....
To hell with Betamax and VHS. Philips V2000 format was better than the both of them. It had double sided tapes, supeior picture quality, embedded timecode and really long tapes. It was years ahead of both Betamax and VHS. I'm surprised the author of the article didn't llok in to V2000 as it was quite popular in Britain for a while, before losing the marketing battle.
As to the comparisons between VHS and Beta, I think the author makes a big blunder about VHS's success. I recall a TV interview with Alan Sugar, the founder of Amstrad which is a UK stack em high, sell em cheap electronics manufacturer. In the interview he said that his decision to make VHS machines in the early 80's was down to the fact that JVC offered him much more attractive licensing terms to use VHS as opposed to Sony who wanted twice as much for the Betamax system. Although market forces may have had an effect, surely VHS's success was more to do with the bigger profit margins it made for the manufacturers? Thus causing VHS to be promoted more at the expense of Betamax.
If you have a ganders here. You will see that Pace have released a box that allows you to watch one channel while recording another on to hard disk. Plus this box sells officially for £299, but I've seen it on sale locally for £249. If a two tuner box can be launched for such a low price, I can't see cost being the barrier to a 4 tuner recording version. Surely its only a case of getting faster hard disks, before a 4 channel recording version becomes available.
I'm quite happy to stick with my Tivo, but when they launch a box that can record two channels at once I'll jump for it. I'd love to be able to record The Kumars at No 42 and The News at the same time. I give it a year or two before such a device hits the market.
As for the current I am able to view two channels at once on my Mandrake box using two Hauppauge cards, I can only record on one though as the HD strains when I try both. There is a windoze product called PowerVCR and it is made by CyberLink, this compresses video in to MPEG for recording to disk, thus the main bottleneck is processor power and RAM, not HD speed. That is what is needed on Linux, a good realtime analog to MPEG encoder as a stop gap before recording the digital stream directly to disk is possible (drivers, copyright etc).
AND, no doubt, led to the resignation of some of the company's best talent (perhaps including yourself).
I went off to University, thankfully! Most of the people working here came thrugh a training scheme run by the company owner. He was being given money by the government to train these people (all 16-17 year olds) and then he was given a subsidy to employ them! No wonder the only programming language used was Visual Basic.
The company was called Barr IT Services, run and owned by a very shrewd local businessman called Pete Barr. He sold the business to a crowd based in Belfast called Sx3 just before the dot.com bust for a significant sum (they had branched out in to web development previously). The new owners have a great reputation and aparently since being assimilated in to Sx3 the company has become a much fancied place to work in.
Pete Barr still runs lots of local businesses here in Derry, he has a horrendous reputaion locally. There is little that could be done to hurt him. As if you would want to, he spent several years in prison in the 70's for directing terrorism, he's a real tough nut.
If you had met the company owner you would understand. He was a local businessman whose software firm was just one of many different businesses he operated. He had his hands in pubs, gyms, training services and renting property. He was after one thing only, money.
He knew nothing about programming, he had set the business up to exploit others and pay them not very competative wages. He was notoriously paranoid about productivity as he wanted to be sure we were working our backs off to make him more moolah. When ADT offered him the add on to the security system, he jumped at the chance to install it. His reasoning was to do that he was rarely in the building, but the reports generated by this system didn't lie and he liked that as he did not trust the managers to keep us working our backs off.
I can easily spend 10 minutes evacuating my bowels as I'm sure many, many other people do. Surely this is a legitimate explanation. I'm surprised the management didn't expect to see receipts.
That is exactly why the unions took issue with the system. They argued it would be a breach of privacy laws and threatened court cases to get the system deativiated, the owner must have realised he was on dodgy ground as he deativiated the system, which was not like him.
I used to work for a software firm, who were based in a large building and with multiple tennants. To control access to our part of the building we were issued with contactless swipe cards. Which are a sort of crude, low power RFID system.
We thought they were purely for access control, but we were in for a surprise. The management had fitted special sensors at the toilet and cafe doors as well as at the drinks machines and smoking rooms. We had no idea management had done this, we just though new heating control thermometers were being fitted.
Once our bi-monthly productivity appraisals came round we were presented with a detailed breakdown of our movement round the building. I was asked why I made 12 visits to the coffee machine in one day (all drinks were free) and why I once spent more than 10 minutes in the toilet,
What management had done was turn the securty cards in to tracking devices. Basically if we went within 4 feet of these sensors, it was logged. We had always assumed that the cards had to be within 2 inches of a sensor to be recognised, not so aparently. This whole setup was implemented to try and achieve productivity gains, in fact it did the opposite. A lot of people spent more and more time on the toilet for some reason and other people developed a habit of forgetting their cards and having to get security to release the doors remotely.
The moral of the story is what started as a innocent security system, turned in to a tracking system which caused people serious stress. I know my employers are allowed to know what I do on their time, but having to justify my toilet habits is my idea of how such technology as RFID systems can be misused. Incidentally, the system was switched off after the unions got on the case.
Today it was announced that a new toy product was lauched on to the market.
"Speak and Tinnitus" is an updated version of the popular 1980's toy "Speak and Spell". Unlike the original which taugh kids how to spell. The new varsion gives children the condition known as Tinnitus, also known as ringing in the ears....
This will be bad for the Linux community, especially the new users. I'll admit Mandrake had its quirks and its testing could have benn better, e.g. the dodgy supermount in Mandrake 9.
What set Mandrake apart was that it made getting in to Linux easy for new Linux users. I have installed Mandrake on several peoples PC and they have since abandoned Windows completely. Could you do the same ewith Debian or Slackware? I know SuSE and RedHat are claimed to be easy for newbies, but RedHat is too corporate for some and SuSE is just too big for someone wanting to check out Linux on a 2 gig partition.
Mandrake gave the world an easy to use, compact version of Linux, which must have gained the Linux community a fair few converts.
I wish MandrakeSoft luck and I hope they pull through.
A few moths back there was a story about NatWest (a UK bank) and their peculiar Java based online banking system. Someone tried to login using Mozilla with the latest official Sun JVM. They were presented with a message telling them they were using an incompatible JVM and they should use the proper M$ one as the one they were using 'lacked' important features.
Apart from the irony of the situation, this goes to shows the dangers of the actions of MS. Look at this way, MS adds ActiveX like features to Java, devlopers start using these features, users forced to use the MS JVM, a few years down the line MS suggests to developers "Why not switch from Java to ActiveX controls?, MS drops Java. As a result of this more users are locked in to MS systems as it will become a pain to have a Doze system on hand to access certain website or services.
The same thing happened with the browser wars and is still happening. MS may have pretty much killed off Netscape, but they will continue to add IE specific features to make it a pain for users of other OS's to access certain sites. How many sites fail to work in Linux? Quite a few, the more irritating it is for me to access popular sites the happier MS are.
Sadly, it pretty much is with GSM/GPRS-based phones. However, good ones will maintain the connection once established so that you usually don't have to wait. Newer, better wireless technologies should fix that.
I already have an Ericsson T68i with GPRS on Orange and it logs on within 10 seconds. The SPV seemed to spend at least 40-50 seconds just to boot up its OS, before attempting to log on to the network. You must admit that is slooooow.
Apart from being a bit of a big irritation it could have other implications. Imagine coming across a road accident and having to wait a minute before being able to call the emergency services, just because the phone wasn't switched on.
I went in to my local Orange shop to get a demo of one of these phones last week as I was tempted to get one.
Fortunately I decided against getting one when the salesman tried to make me believe it was normal for a mobile phone to take 60 seconds to start up and log on to the network!
My overall impressions of the device was that it was incredibly slow, not slow as in running Doze 98 on a P75, but slow as in Doze XP on a 286. It was also incredibly heavy and long for a mobile phone.
I can't see Orange shifting many. Me, I'm waiting for the SonyEricsson P800.
The comment in the article about there being fewer ads due to a viwers ability to fast forward past them makes me wonder... Isn't it inevitable that broadcasters and advertisers try to bring in laws to prevent this? Even if all TV goes subscription or PPV, there will still be advertising, simply because it makes more money for the broadcaster. A good example is Sky TV in the UK. I used to pay £34.00 per month untill I realised there were 20 minutes of adverts per hour! Effectively Sky was getting paid twice for the airtime, by me and by the advertisers. This is the way of the future and broadcasters will not allow PVRs to stop this. Could the fact that Sky have developed and launched their own PVR called Sky+ (which has software that can be changed remotely, without getting the owners permission) be a sign of things to came as broadcasters try to take control of viewing habits?
We already have a form on enforced advertising with DVDs that won't allow you to fast forward past the trailers. IMHO this will happen with television as well, no doubt backed up with laws to ensure PVRs take their instructions from the broadcaster and not from the viewer.
The popular beat combo known as The Beatles own their own company which manages all their affairs and rights. This company happens to be called Apple Corp and it has been going internationally since the 1960's. Its logo also happens to be an apple with a bite out of it.
Methinks Apple computer should bear in mind there were companies called Apple in existence long before it came in to being, before it goes after anyone with the word apple in their name.
What I see happening here is a classic example of scare one and the rest will follow. I don't know much about Danish law, but I will assume it is roughly similar to other European countries. If all they have to go on is screen grabs of files names, then the don't have a leg to stand on, like the expert said without access to the alleged offenders computer they are largely unable to prove the case.
Also consdider where the files came from. If they have screen grabbed an image of what is in someones share list, all that proves is they have a file called 'such and such' on that users HD. If the user downloaded a file from another user and APG had some way to monitor that, then that probably breaches all sorts of privacy and computer misuse laws. But, if the user had downloaded the files from computers belonging to AntiPiratGruppen then you are getting in to the realms of entrapment, plus you must ask if AntiPiratGruppen wasn't breaching copyright itself. All this is speculation, but it leads me on to an important point.
It is certain some of these 150 so called 'Pirates' will pay up. They might not pay the full amount, they may negotiate a lower price and it will be because they are scared of what AntiPiratGruppen may or may not do to them. Once one person pays up APG will shout that fact from the roof tops and it will no doubt have the effect of scaring others in complying with the wishes of RIAA/BSA/FACT etc and leave P2P well enough alone. Effectively they will be using bully boy tactics to succeed. Regardless of your view on the legality and morals of P2P, you must admit this is a not a good thing as it sets a dangerous precident if it works.
I agree toally with the whole DRM is pointless argument, simply because as long as record companies charge ridiculous amounts for music then people will look for a cheaper source of music elsewhere. In the case of music and movies its P2P systems that people turn too.
Recently it was announced in the UK that singles sales had halved since 1988, why 1988? IIRC 1988 was the year that CD sales started to make an impact on vinyl sales. I alse remeber noticing that a CD single cost £2.99 in 1998 but a vinyl single cost £1.99. The same trend applies to CD albums they are more expensive than their vinyl ancestors. We are also seeing it again with DVD.
Now I don't know if it is cheaper to produce a CD/DVD then their analogue ancestors, I would say it is, despite what some people say about patent royalties etc. All I know is that record and movie companies use every little excuse in the book to put their prices up and make more profit, completely oblivious to the fact that they are alienating consumers. Is it no wonder we turn to P2P systems when it costs £16.99 for a CD and £19.99 for DVD? There is also the irony that the costs of developing DRM and copyright protection technolgies is passed on to the consumer, alienting us even more!
They need to learn that if they reduce the prices of thier products, people will buy them rather than copy them, simple really? In fact I would go as far as saying the record companies are following a business model that is doomed to failure. Does a department store raise its prices and force people not to share clothes they buy when their sales drop? Nope, they reduce prices to encourage people buy more clothes. When will the record and movie companies learn the basic concepts of how businesses operate?
Do you ever get put under pressure (e.g. lobbying, words with MP's etc) by big business to grant a patent, or are you just left to get on with it without any pressure being put on you?
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It will be interesting to see how the RIAA gets the evidence it needs for these cases. Its fair to say that access to University networks is only granted to authorised persons. So I read it as a case of RIAA got its evidence illegally, by somehow tapping in to the "local area Napster network" as they call it or that someone on site snitched in which case they must be hoping they aren't identified.
The RIAA may be able to prove someone on campus is sharing files illegally on to the internet. However, proving that a private internal network is being used for something dodgy requires a bit more evidence gathering than just making the accusation and hoping it sticks.
As much I like this idea and I could see it work as a good business model, I can see a potential consumer abuse issue here.
What if you could only get your music in return for commiting yourself to something? e.g. You get your 1000 hours of music with your car, but what if you also have to have adverts plastered on your car as well? What if publishers made deals to ensure you had to buy a particular product in order to get a particular piece of music. What if teeny-bopper type music was only available with alcopop drinks (dodgy combination)? What if Disney media products were only available to those who bought a particular brand of washing powder? It is well know just how brilliantly Disney has exploited pester power to sell its products.
The system may do away with DRM and copy protection, but that wouldn't stop publishers exploiting the concept and shacking up with advertisers/manufacturers to say you can only get this piece of music for free if you buy Product X. I see this as very dangerous, it could be used to exploit consumers in a way never seen before.
Such a scheme could only be in the consumers interest if there were very, very tough laws to regulate the system, otherwise publishers and manufacturers in general would abouse the system.
The site of the Commisioner of Irish Lights has a very good 101 on Differential GPS for those who are interested.
2day I hd a gr8 tme. I wnt 2 my m8s wrk levng do nd nded up gting drnk :-) On a relted nte ppl hve bin cmplaing abt my blg bng dfficlt 2 red, no wy mn!
In the UK we have the Data Protection Act 1998. Basically it stipulates that if you want to hold personal data on someone you must by law be on the register of data controllers, see here. It also stipulates you can only hold someones personal information so long as you have a bona fide reason for having that information (e.g. business relationship etc). If you are holding or using personal data without authority you are committing a criminal act and the company's data controller can be held personally liable to criminal action. It is also required that the data controllers tell the registrar what they do with personal data and they are then restricted to doing only what they said they would do. Failure to comply can lead to big fines and payment of compensation to the victim.
I personally have used the act many times to look at my data, all I do is pay £10 for costs and the company/organisation has to give me everything they have on me, including CCTV footage they may have of me (suitably modified so as to obscure the identifying features of other people). If I find something amiss I can complain to the Information Commisioner who has the legal powers to put it right and award me compensation. It would seem this sort of act would prevent a case like this, by effectively shutting down information brokers. Does no such similar act exist in New Hampshire or other states?
,i>Revenues collected by the BSA stay with the BSA. None of it goes to members.
What I was implying was that whenever a business gets the threatening letters from the BSA, the majority will check their software and if something is amiss they will immediately go and buy whatever licenses are needed. The BSA's members will view that as a few extra sales for the cost of sending the threating letters.
A man I know as a regular in my local pub owns a chain of estate agents. They have 4 branches and they own about 40 PCs and a server or two. The only BSA related software the agency uses is the Windoze OS and a few copies of MS Office which are only used by secretary's (all 100% legit). The main software used for running the agency is actually a bespoke application, developed locally by a small software house.
He got the letter from the BSA mentioning the grace period, thretening a surprise audit etc. He reponded by informing the BSA if they made any attempt to enter any of his premises he would treat the matter as aggravated tresspass and use whatever means necesary to te remove them. The was followed up with a "We are sorry you are taking this attitude, but we have a right blah, blah" letter, but after that he heard nothing.
The BSA may have a (questionable) contractual right to audit your software, what they don't have is the right to enter buildings and act like they have legal backing. I know someone who was at the sharp end of such and audit and aparently it is not very pleasant. The BSA folks do act as if they are policemen and they are very upfront.
The BSA is just a trade body, the software equivalent of the Taxidermists Association of Scotland or the Charterd Institute of Accountants. They exist only to represnt the interests of MS, Adobe etc. They have no legal powers whatsoever. Their powers of enforcement as an organisation are exactly the same as mine as an individual. If they hassle you, ignore them and tell them to sue you or go away, simple as that.
Whatever your moral stance, legally speaking software piracy is wrong. However there are existing mechanisms in place to deal with piracy. The BSA approach seems to be to squeeze the biggest amount of cash out of the existing customers of its members. What about the many SME's that have never, ever bought legit software? How does the BSA deal with these types, given that the BSA probably doesn't even know they exist? I know of several businesses who don't have one single piece of legit software, the BSA doesn't even know they exist. BTW I won't snitch on these businesses, I live in Northern Ireland and I like having knee caps.
The BSA duses extortion to make money for its members. Its picks on those who are largely 100% legit, but may have made mistakes, these are easy targets. It would seem to ignore those who are serial pirates, those who do not intend to now or ever buy software. This approach is easy for the BSA, they really should sort their priorities out.
I live in Derry in Northern Ireland. This is a part of the world which was a bit like India for a good few years. What I mean by that is a lot of American companies set up operations here as it was cheaper. Near me we have Prumerica (Prudential) and Northbrook (Allstate) doing software and up the street we have a massive DuPont plant. There is also a load of call centres, MSN used to have support for its American operation based here. These are fairly safe purely on the grounds of the geographical location which is good for Europe and America.
Another sector that was established here was clothing and textiles. In the early 90's Fruit of the Loom set up several factories here, at considerable cost albeit offset by some government grants. So did Lee Aparell and a few other big names. Fruit of the Loom opened two plants near me and 3 over the Irish border a few miles away in Buncrana, Donegal. This was in the early 90s, only one plant is left and that is at risk of closing. Most of the plants that closed didn't last 5 years. The reason? management got uppity at staff joining unions and wanting better conditions and they were afraid of the upcomming minimum wage. So they shipped all the work off to Morocco, where the costs were 25% of the costs here. Even taking in to account the costs incurred building new factories here only a few years earlier it was still cheaper to move to Morocco.
This is where the weird logic kicks in, what happens when the Morrocan workers decide they want better pay, which will inevitably happen? Pretty much the same thing which happened here, management will not like the unions causing trouble and they will move somewhere else.
When will big business learn wages are not the only thing to think about when trying to make more money. A happy workforce with job security is a productive workforce, a productive workforce cuts manufacturing costs, lower manufacturing costs means more profits. Well at least I think thats how it works.
It has long been said that standing in or near a crop circle gives you a funny feeling. Sensations such as a gentle buzzing in the ears, feeling warm on cool days and static discharge when touching other people are said to occur.
I have had similar feelings. Once I visited a crop circle and felt a sensation that made me give the farmer £5.00 to have a closer look at the circle. When I left the field I felt a sensation that made me approach the travelling crop circle shop and pay £15.00 for a poster of a crop circle. The was an overwhelming feeling of being drained, not my energy or spirit, but my wallet. Strangely enough I didn't get any feelings of an alien presence....
To hell with Betamax and VHS. Philips V2000 format was better than the both of them. It had double sided tapes, supeior picture quality, embedded timecode and really long tapes. It was years ahead of both Betamax and VHS. I'm surprised the author of the article didn't llok in to V2000 as it was quite popular in Britain for a while, before losing the marketing battle.
As to the comparisons between VHS and Beta, I think the author makes a big blunder about VHS's success. I recall a TV interview with Alan Sugar, the founder of Amstrad which is a UK stack em high, sell em cheap electronics manufacturer. In the interview he said that his decision to make VHS machines in the early 80's was down to the fact that JVC offered him much more attractive licensing terms to use VHS as opposed to Sony who wanted twice as much for the Betamax system. Although market forces may have had an effect, surely VHS's success was more to do with the bigger profit margins it made for the manufacturers? Thus causing VHS to be promoted more at the expense of Betamax.
If you have a ganders here. You will see that Pace have released a box that allows you to watch one channel while recording another on to hard disk. Plus this box sells officially for £299, but I've seen it on sale locally for £249. If a two tuner box can be launched for such a low price, I can't see cost being the barrier to a 4 tuner recording version. Surely its only a case of getting faster hard disks, before a 4 channel recording version becomes available.
I'm quite happy to stick with my Tivo, but when they launch a box that can record two channels at once I'll jump for it. I'd love to be able to record The Kumars at No 42 and The News at the same time. I give it a year or two before such a device hits the market.
As for the current I am able to view two channels at once on my Mandrake box using two Hauppauge cards, I can only record on one though as the HD strains when I try both. There is a windoze product called PowerVCR and it is made by CyberLink, this compresses video in to MPEG for recording to disk, thus the main bottleneck is processor power and RAM, not HD speed. That is what is needed on Linux, a good realtime analog to MPEG encoder as a stop gap before recording the digital stream directly to disk is possible (drivers, copyright etc).
AND, no doubt, led to the resignation of some of the company's best talent (perhaps including yourself).
I went off to University, thankfully! Most of the people working here came thrugh a training scheme run by the company owner. He was being given money by the government to train these people (all 16-17 year olds) and then he was given a subsidy to employ them! No wonder the only programming language used was Visual Basic.
The company was called Barr IT Services, run and owned by a very shrewd local businessman called Pete Barr. He sold the business to a crowd based in Belfast called Sx3 just before the dot.com bust for a significant sum (they had branched out in to web development previously). The new owners have a great reputation and aparently since being assimilated in to Sx3 the company has become a much fancied place to work in.
Pete Barr still runs lots of local businesses here in Derry, he has a horrendous reputaion locally. There is little that could be done to hurt him. As if you would want to, he spent several years in prison in the 70's for directing terrorism, he's a real tough nut.
If you had met the company owner you would understand. He was a local businessman whose software firm was just one of many different businesses he operated. He had his hands in pubs, gyms, training services and renting property. He was after one thing only, money.
He knew nothing about programming, he had set the business up to exploit others and pay them not very competative wages. He was notoriously paranoid about productivity as he wanted to be sure we were working our backs off to make him more moolah. When ADT offered him the add on to the security system, he jumped at the chance to install it. His reasoning was to do that he was rarely in the building, but the reports generated by this system didn't lie and he liked that as he did not trust the managers to keep us working our backs off.
I can easily spend 10 minutes evacuating my bowels as I'm sure many, many other people do. Surely this is a legitimate explanation. I'm surprised the management didn't expect to see receipts.
That is exactly why the unions took issue with the system. They argued it would be a breach of privacy laws and threatened court cases to get the system deativiated, the owner must have realised he was on dodgy ground as he deativiated the system, which was not like him.
I used to work for a software firm, who were based in a large building and with multiple tennants. To control access to our part of the building we were issued with contactless swipe cards. Which are a sort of crude, low power RFID system.
We thought they were purely for access control, but we were in for a surprise. The management had fitted special sensors at the toilet and cafe doors as well as at the drinks machines and smoking rooms. We had no idea management had done this, we just though new heating control thermometers were being fitted.
Once our bi-monthly productivity appraisals came round we were presented with a detailed breakdown of our movement round the building. I was asked why I made 12 visits to the coffee machine in one day (all drinks were free) and why I once spent more than 10 minutes in the toilet,
What management had done was turn the securty cards in to tracking devices. Basically if we went within 4 feet of these sensors, it was logged. We had always assumed that the cards had to be within 2 inches of a sensor to be recognised, not so aparently. This whole setup was implemented to try and achieve productivity gains, in fact it did the opposite. A lot of people spent more and more time on the toilet for some reason and other people developed a habit of forgetting their cards and having to get security to release the doors remotely.
The moral of the story is what started as a innocent security system, turned in to a tracking system which caused people serious stress. I know my employers are allowed to know what I do on their time, but having to justify my toilet habits is my idea of how such technology as RFID systems can be misused. Incidentally, the system was switched off after the unions got on the case.
Today it was announced that a new toy product was lauched on to the market.
"Speak and Tinnitus" is an updated version of the popular 1980's toy "Speak and Spell". Unlike the original which taugh kids how to spell. The new varsion gives children the condition known as Tinnitus, also known as ringing in the ears....
This will be bad for the Linux community, especially the new users. I'll admit Mandrake had its quirks and its testing could have benn better, e.g. the dodgy supermount in Mandrake 9.
What set Mandrake apart was that it made getting in to Linux easy for new Linux users. I have installed Mandrake on several peoples PC and they have since abandoned Windows completely. Could you do the same ewith Debian or Slackware? I know SuSE and RedHat are claimed to be easy for newbies, but RedHat is too corporate for some and SuSE is just too big for someone wanting to check out Linux on a 2 gig partition.
Mandrake gave the world an easy to use, compact version of Linux, which must have gained the Linux community a fair few converts.
I wish MandrakeSoft luck and I hope they pull through.
A few moths back there was a story about NatWest (a UK bank) and their peculiar Java based online banking system. Someone tried to login using Mozilla with the latest official Sun JVM. They were presented with a message telling them they were using an incompatible JVM and they should use the proper M$ one as the one they were using 'lacked' important features.
Apart from the irony of the situation, this goes to shows the dangers of the actions of MS. Look at this way, MS adds ActiveX like features to Java, devlopers start using these features, users forced to use the MS JVM, a few years down the line MS suggests to developers "Why not switch from Java to ActiveX controls?, MS drops Java. As a result of this more users are locked in to MS systems as it will become a pain to have a Doze system on hand to access certain website or services.
The same thing happened with the browser wars and is still happening. MS may have pretty much killed off Netscape, but they will continue to add IE specific features to make it a pain for users of other OS's to access certain sites. How many sites fail to work in Linux? Quite a few, the more irritating it is for me to access popular sites the happier MS are.
Sadly, it pretty much is with GSM/GPRS-based phones. However, good ones will maintain the connection once established so that you usually don't have to wait. Newer, better wireless technologies should fix that.
I already have an Ericsson T68i with GPRS on Orange and it logs on within 10 seconds. The SPV seemed to spend at least 40-50 seconds just to boot up its OS, before attempting to log on to the network. You must admit that is slooooow.
Apart from being a bit of a big irritation it could have other implications. Imagine coming across a road accident and having to wait a minute before being able to call the emergency services, just because the phone wasn't switched on.
I went in to my local Orange shop to get a demo of one of these phones last week as I was tempted to get one.
Fortunately I decided against getting one when the salesman tried to make me believe it was normal for a mobile phone to take 60 seconds to start up and log on to the network!
My overall impressions of the device was that it was incredibly slow, not slow as in running Doze 98 on a P75, but slow as in Doze XP on a 286. It was also incredibly heavy and long for a mobile phone.
I can't see Orange shifting many. Me, I'm waiting for the SonyEricsson P800.
The comment in the article about there being fewer ads due to a viwers ability to fast forward past them makes me wonder... Isn't it inevitable that broadcasters and advertisers try to bring in laws to prevent this? Even if all TV goes subscription or PPV, there will still be advertising, simply because it makes more money for the broadcaster. A good example is Sky TV in the UK. I used to pay £34.00 per month untill I realised there were 20 minutes of adverts per hour! Effectively Sky was getting paid twice for the airtime, by me and by the advertisers. This is the way of the future and broadcasters will not allow PVRs to stop this. Could the fact that Sky have developed and launched their own PVR called Sky+ (which has software that can be changed remotely, without getting the owners permission) be a sign of things to came as broadcasters try to take control of viewing habits?
We already have a form on enforced advertising with DVDs that won't allow you to fast forward past the trailers. IMHO this will happen with television as well, no doubt backed up with laws to ensure PVRs take their instructions from the broadcaster and not from the viewer.
The popular beat combo known as The Beatles own their own company which manages all their affairs and rights. This company happens to be called Apple Corp and it has been going internationally since the 1960's. Its logo also happens to be an apple with a bite out of it.
Methinks Apple computer should bear in mind there were companies called Apple in existence long before it came in to being, before it goes after anyone with the word apple in their name.
What I see happening here is a classic example of scare one and the rest will follow. I don't know much about Danish law, but I will assume it is roughly similar to other European countries. If all they have to go on is screen grabs of files names, then the don't have a leg to stand on, like the expert said without access to the alleged offenders computer they are largely unable to prove the case.
Also consdider where the files came from. If they have screen grabbed an image of what is in someones share list, all that proves is they have a file called 'such and such' on that users HD. If the user downloaded a file from another user and APG had some way to monitor that, then that probably breaches all sorts of privacy and computer misuse laws. But, if the user had downloaded the files from computers belonging to AntiPiratGruppen then you are getting in to the realms of entrapment, plus you must ask if AntiPiratGruppen wasn't breaching copyright itself. All this is speculation, but it leads me on to an important point.
It is certain some of these 150 so called 'Pirates' will pay up. They might not pay the full amount, they may negotiate a lower price and it will be because they are scared of what AntiPiratGruppen may or may not do to them. Once one person pays up APG will shout that fact from the roof tops and it will no doubt have the effect of scaring others in complying with the wishes of RIAA/BSA/FACT etc and leave P2P well enough alone. Effectively they will be using bully boy tactics to succeed. Regardless of your view on the legality and morals of P2P, you must admit this is a not a good thing as it sets a dangerous precident if it works.
I agree toally with the whole DRM is pointless argument, simply because as long as record companies charge ridiculous amounts for music then people will look for a cheaper source of music elsewhere. In the case of music and movies its P2P systems that people turn too.
Recently it was announced in the UK that singles sales had halved since 1988, why 1988? IIRC 1988 was the year that CD sales started to make an impact on vinyl sales. I alse remeber noticing that a CD single cost £2.99 in 1998 but a vinyl single cost £1.99. The same trend applies to CD albums they are more expensive than their vinyl ancestors. We are also seeing it again with DVD.
Now I don't know if it is cheaper to produce a CD/DVD then their analogue ancestors, I would say it is, despite what some people say about patent royalties etc. All I know is that record and movie companies use every little excuse in the book to put their prices up and make more profit, completely oblivious to the fact that they are alienating consumers. Is it no wonder we turn to P2P systems when it costs £16.99 for a CD and £19.99 for DVD? There is also the irony that the costs of developing DRM and copyright protection technolgies is passed on to the consumer, alienting us even more!
They need to learn that if they reduce the prices of thier products, people will buy them rather than copy them, simple really? In fact I would go as far as saying the record companies are following a business model that is doomed to failure. Does a department store raise its prices and force people not to share clothes they buy when their sales drop? Nope, they reduce prices to encourage people buy more clothes. When will the record and movie companies learn the basic concepts of how businesses operate?
Do you ever get put under pressure (e.g. lobbying, words with MP's etc) by big business to grant a patent, or are you just left to get on with it without any pressure being put on you?