there are countless advantages to alternate networks and battle.net clones elsewhere, the one that pops to mind being bandwidth.
bring out the DMCA bandwagon. there are perfectly "legit" uses for alternate servers, but blizzard has a right to take action when their EULA is violated.
the warcraft 3 beta that has been circulating however is a slightly different story. LAN play has been disabled, with battle.net being the only option for multiplayer play. i do feel, however, as a testing beta, the benefits one might gain from an alternate server, such as internet lag, would be something blizzard analysists would be collecting data on, and not something theyd require input on from the gameplayers.
even if the microsoft argument were that the OS and MSIE were inseperable, i would see this as a valid argument even if they were technically "seperable".
windows without MSIE is like a woman without breasts--fun, but something's missing.
they might be seperable in terms of how they are coded, but maybe not so from a business standpoint. source code will show nothing,
but who am i to stand in between MS source being revealed... gimme gimme!
in an oligopolistic market, firms cannot compete on price.
in a monopolostic market, *cough*.
i live in a country far far away, so i haven't a clue really what rogers cable is... but either rogers' competitors drive up their prices too, to take advantage of the situation (or cartel?), or reduce their prices to steal rogers' market share.
in a region where rogers is the only broadband choice, tough luck.
any firm needs to cover their average variable costs in the short run. if a firm is selling at less than what they're paying, on average, there is a problem--and i doubt this is the case, otherwise rogers would be out of business (again i apologize if i am misinformed, i know nothing of the situation).
i've always wondered why MS sat through this IANAL but ridiculous lawsuit with the government. in a society that promotes a free market, and free speech, i find it somewhat hypocritical.
no matter what legalese you put on top of it, my browser of choice now on any workstations running windows is MSIE. i am confident a very small percentage of people use netscape browsers now, and i am also confident that should both browsers have been bundled with the Windows OS, MSIE would still be the browser of choice.
all that aside, i do not quite see where the legal line is drawn. does MS not have a right to give different treatment, prices, and consideration to their customers at their own discresion? or is what they are doing illegal because customers are unable to choose?
i find this ridiculous. is the Gap doing anything illegal by selling childrensware, as full grown adults are unable to use these goods? since when was price discrimination illegal? how bout if Gap were to give me a 10% off VIP discount card, would they be breaking the law? whatever happened to a free america?
regardless, if MS is were facing a prospective breakup like they were, why not just pack up their bags and move up to canada? no doubt the canadian government would welcome them with open arms--just how much cash would MS bring canada?
we all just love to hate MS... running debian on my servers, windows on my workstations--by choice. they aren't that bad people, can you imagine your grandma trying to send her grandson email with pine?
there is countless number of legitimate uses of great deals of bandwidth, particularly for university students. what if i, a media student, wanted to download my video project from my home computer, a few gigs of high quality MPEG2 video. or to transfer backups to a remote location. the list goes on and on.
the solution? don't penalise those using great deals of bandwidth for legitimate purposes--and as this is often a difficult/impossible distinction to make, don't penalise anybody. your AUP must include very severe penalties for illegitimate use, and other than that,
sigh...
things like this should be allowed to be published...
people will always find bugs in software, crack encryption algorithms, and exploits in security of nearly everything. when documented properly, published, the developers are identified of the problem after which they can make the necessary ammendments. also, properly documented bug reports notify users and system admins of the problems, outlining the need to upgrade or patch as instructed by the software vendor (taken as an example).
no doubt sooner or later another tech savvy 'user' will accomplish the same as the first. a bug may become relatively well known, and allow exploits by malicious 'users', while it has not been called to the software vendor's attention.
occasionally, the 'user' who discovers a bug, workaround, or cracks an encryption algorithm, may not be of the right ethical nature to bring it forward, contact the relevant parties to have it resolved, or make it public domain--and instead may be of a malicious nature, as per Code Red. no doubt it was a new undocumented exploit--had some user found it 2 months ago and documented it properly, well, this could have been prevented, somewhat. had some user found it 2 months ago and left it silent, well, just look at what has happened.
i think many of you are missing the point.
this article outlines linux being used in a high-profile mission-critical situation, and does not imply in any way the reason for doing so being due to ms os instability. no doubt an airline would have properly configured systems, adequate backups and work-arounds, should their tasks be 'mission critical'.
from what i understood from the article, korean airlines has switched to linux to help online flight information services, which may be due to better perfomance in this particular situation with linux over other operating systems, including the unixes and windows, and/or more cost effective, or one of the other hundred reasons to choose between o/s.
alright, here in hong kong, this is how things work.
so you know, hong kong is the piracy capital of the world--those of you who think you're all l33t and with it when you download Blair Witch 2 Cam 0day, just know that half the population of hong kong has probably seen that movie off their $1.40 VCD screener which they bought at the corner of watsons.
okay, it is illegal to pirate software, movies, games, music. but it is done, and youll find it in every corner of every street in hong kong.
the mp3 scene here has become HUGE. companies advertise their mp3 players on buses, DSL isps offer free mp3 players after 9 months of stickin with their shit slow DSL--come on, an isp offering their customers a free mp3 player, it couldn't possibly be to playback music downloaded off napster now could it? its obvious what theyre trying to appeal to, and get this: this particular DSL provider is the BIGGEST in hong kong, and just happens to be Cable & Wireless HKT--by far the biggest phone company in hong kong, and the sole provider of land lines.
the govt however, has tried to stop this. 2 16-year-old kids were arrested and sentenced to 2 years for running 10-hit-a-day 5-song mp3 websites, in an attempt to scare the public. too bad the public heard about it, and i believe started some sort of demonstration, it is my understanding that the kids were released and their records wiped clean. some govt.
computers are common in hong kong, probably 99% of the urban population have had at least 2 computers thus far, and a good 70% of them, at a minimum, with internet access (check the exact stats here. every person i know not only has napster installed, but a quite substantial mp3 collection, and probably half of them have bought burners as a result.
a personal friend of mine was charged with some sort of hacking, which i wont go into, and his computer was confiscated, with his binder of burned cds, which included about 50 mp3 cds, plus what was on his hds. they were returned to him, fully intact.
but hk, in which only 50% of microsoft software users are actually using their software legally licensed, isn't quite as bad as some parts of china, where only 5% of their ms software is licensed (this figure is NOT an estimate... any admins feel like checking the logs, in particular the origin of this post?), the situation is MUCH worse, and the govt couldnt care less. govt officials, even higher up in the hierarchy, use pirated ms software. i found a.gov.cn website which included links to mp3 albums, and i will be sure to post it if i find the url again.
i really cant remember the topic of this post, oh well. its almost like MP3 is fully legal in hong kong. ive seen raids where cops would take away the vcd vendor, but not the guy with a bigger stall selling mp3 cds.
---------please read----------
ive just spent the last 10 mins reading up on this whole conspiricy, and microsoft wanted their source code to become public, and death to the open source community via legals.
use your fucking heads.
the microsoft operating system, and office suite, appeals to the less computer literate users, which seems to be the majority of the market--how many first time users would go out and buy a system running FreeBSD or slackware7.1. the kind of things these users take into account are the ease of use, internet functionality and compatibility, possibly gameplay, and security.
security, especially due to the media. im sure wed all agree the media portrays images way off to the public. as a man with a computer related occupation, you can only imagine how many calls ive got from friends telling me theyve been hacked--when somebody stumbled across netbus at some l33t hax0r website or bbs. so security will have a major impact on the consumers decision when choosing an operating system.
SO, why on EARTH would microsoft 'hack' into their own systems, or hire somebody to do so. thats ridiculous. they arent worried enough about open source software to scar their reputation as much as that. i quote a man, whos name i shall not reveal, in microsoft senior management, "we aren't worried about linux. linux is a fad, itll die out. we are, on the other hand, worried about sun/solaris. their o/s is much more expensive than ours.".
for you paranoid oss'ers out there, if ms wanted their code to become public, so they could destroy open source software, why not just RELEASE their damn source code? that wouldn't harm them security wise, and they could still sue the assess off you little private developers, and even the larger developers would become extinct. and microsoft releasing their code would get you stubborn unix users to see them in a new light.
im not going to lie, i'm an ms employee, and a regular slashdot reader. lost of ms employees are. maybe rob/co should check their logs for *.microsoft.com requests. im running 2 boxes at home, one, the one with more powerful hardware, running win2k, the other running slackware 7.1. linux fascinates me, and id much rather use it than windows, likely because of the anti-ms hate in the air. and i'm an ms employee.
dont get all excited, read the damn article.
nintendo, sega, and EA are teaming up...
but not to make a new console, instead to sue Yahoo, for hosting illegal auctions, and refusing to remove them after numerous requests, when they have the 'responsibility and capability'.
just what id call the CGIAA, console game industry association of america. damnit, when are we going to see all of these organisations united, we're gonna need a SYAAA, sue your ass association of america. fuckin america, gotta love it.
the current hong kong identity cards are simply card with a textured background with black print, laminated. easily forgable.
first things first, i live in hong kong.
the local tv news report on the new ID cards stated they were to avoid forgery. data will be well encrypted.
at the age of 14 in hong kong, you are required by law to carry your hong kong identification card with you AT ALL TIMES. cops do regular checks on the street, i've been stopped maybe one out of every 3 times passing a cop. this is done due to hk's huge illegal immigrant problem.
in a country where 20% of the population are triads, color copies onto PVC cards can be done at your street photocopier, and triads have cracked the PSX, DC, PSX2 and even produced game systems for the nintendo systems before they officially hit the streets, and pirated games/vcds/apps are available on every street corner, REAL IDs with fake information can be bought for $20 in the right places (including magnetic strip, hologram, et al), its a huge waste of $4B. after all, i could do with a new house, a new paint job for my porsche, and also, my diamond shoes are too tight, and my wallet is too small for my $1000s.
but from a resident's point of view, i could do with a new flashy lookin piece of pvc to replace that stupid oversized laminated piece of shit. and if theyre promising show-card-place-thumb-on-pad-then-go-through immigration systems, just bring it on, i could do with the extra time, could be long enough to jerk it once or twice. if i heard some guy sliced up a nun and fled to germany, and he happens to be me, ima gonna be pissed.
i currently live in hong kong,...
heres a couple of things for you to think on.
hong kong and china are both developing independently, and are governed independently, however they of course would have certain links.
when hong kong was handed back over to china in 1997, the chinese government decided the success of hong kong was due to its unique nature, and governing it like the rest of china would cause it to lose its international flair--so therefore decided it should be governed independently. this is why hong kong is now known as the Hong Kong SAR (Special Administrative Region).
mr. tung chee hwa was selected as the chief designate (the big guy), and decided hong kong should be run very similiar to the way it previously was--not a single law (that i know of) was added, removed, or changed. fireworks werent allowed in hong kong while they were common in china, the one child policy wasn't implemented into hong kong, etc.
certain things did, however, change.
white people (excuse the language, i'm not chinese either) basically got freaked out and left. there are now way less white people in hong kong. bleh. well it isn't british owned anymore,...
a very reliable source has given the information as follows (maybe a/. on this? i can provide info):
50% of the MS software in hong kong is pirated. sound bad? get this.
95% of the MS software in china is pirated. this isnt an estimate.
before the handover, 80% of MS software was pirated, and pirated software was most readily publically available in late 1998/early 1999.
here are things on a new perspective for you. the population of hong kong is approx 7million. 2 million of these are triads on some level. the night of the handover, triads higher up in the 14k and WSW hierarchy found a perfect opportunity to move to macau, as the handover ceremony involved english police stepping down and chinese police taking over. with china in power, the triads were much worse off--they wouldn't be cut any slack, the govt wouldn't be scared of triads--why exactly i dont know, but apparantly there were plenty of reasons.
it would be interesting to compare the development in hong kong and macau. you'd be astounded how much triads can stop a country from developing.
hong kong is just about as high tech as i've seen. it would be awkward for a 6th grader not to have a mobile phone with them at school, and even more awkward for a student even in primary school not to have a computer at home with internet access, running MS software. hong kong is very enthiuastic about holding the asian games in 2006, and have launched various strong campaigns.
china, on the other hand, is also developing steadily. it is of course more rural, and much less developed than hong kong, but is still developing steadily. the olympics in 2008 will only boost hong kong's tourism, as will the disneyland amusement park being constructed in hong kong right next to their new airport.
its hard for two countries right next to each other, from the same colony not to effect each others development, but you're almost comparing the development of nigeria and downtown NYC.
well im tired, if you want more, ill write more. okahbah.
source code is not exactly the same as a set of instructions.
a set of instructions, say to produce a bomb, is protected by the first ammendment. this set of instructions can be used for numerous things--chemical research, properties of chemicals and how they behave, well i'm not a chemist, but you get the point--it is not limited to creating a bomb. the purpose it is most likely used for, however, could possibly be to make a bomb. the author's intent is most probably to teach the reader to create a bomb, but it is not impossible that their intentions were otherwise. in the united states of america, a man is innocent until proven guilty beyond reasonable doubt, and however improbable the chances of legitimate uses of a bomb recipe may be, they cannot be ruled out.
source code differs mainly in one way: its intentions can be proved beyond reasonable doubt, as it is programmed to serve a particular function. or at least this is one of the queries of the case.
i see 2 main questions in this case, the first not crossing the legal/illegal boundry, but the second doing so:
1. does source code in fact classify as free speech. personally, i believe not.
2. does the use and intent of deCCS directly or indirectly to a substantial level disagree with the DMCA, and can be held responsible for any piracy that may occur as a result of using the deCCS code. here i strongly believe not. this is getting ridiculous. lets not forget the law--it is fully legitamite to make a single backup copy for personal purposes (please excuse me if im out of date).
i have not read the PDF, but i do intend to. i am not legally qualified, nor am i doubting the ability of the defendants' attourneys. after all, they are qualified professionals. but judging by some of the reader comments on slashdot, i feel some of you are missing the point.
i am 100% behind 2600 and the likes, and feel this case is ridiculous. if their attourneys are infact focusing on the point that source code must be protected by free speech, i feel they are running on a very thin thread... why do so when the suspension bridge is just meters away. however i feel the attourneys are not focusing on this point as much as the slashdot readers are.
the MPAA must lose this case. it is absoletly ridiculous.
as long as movies exist, movies will be made duplicateable in some way, shape or form. lets not forget in order for us to enjoy movies, they must be in an analogue format--god forbid we ever find joy out of staring at scrolling hex code to represent a movie. as long as this analogue transformation is made, there is space to duplicate them. how does your dvd player connect to your tv? what if you connected it to your video input card instead? and then distributed it? how many people will buy a tv with an included dvd player, with no form of output. not i, that is for sure.
source code isnt the same as a set of instructions--lets not lie to ourselves, the ONLY purpose possible of deCCS is to, alas, decode CCS. however can deCCS be held accountable for dvd piracy, most certainly not. legal uses of deCCS do exist, so they cannot be held accountable and responsible beyond reasonable doubt.
i've probably missed the point, after all, how many readers have said otherwise. i am neither arrogant nor superior. well anyway heres just my 2c.
maybe i've been watching too much of dylan mcdermott. maybe we should get him on this case.
Slashdot Mirror
downloading media protected by personal property rights that you do not act within (own a copy, etc) is not legal, under any fair use act.
whether or not it boosts cd sales is irrelevant, as i for one do not picture the RIAA offering downloadable mp3s as a standard anytime soon.
it really depends.
there are countless advantages to alternate networks and battle.net clones elsewhere, the one that pops to mind being bandwidth.
bring out the DMCA bandwagon. there are perfectly "legit" uses for alternate servers, but blizzard has a right to take action when their EULA is violated.
the warcraft 3 beta that has been circulating however is a slightly different story. LAN play has been disabled, with battle.net being the only option for multiplayer play. i do feel, however, as a testing beta, the benefits one might gain from an alternate server, such as internet lag, would be something blizzard analysists would be collecting data on, and not something theyd require input on from the gameplayers.
even if the microsoft argument were that the OS and MSIE were inseperable, i would see this as a valid argument even if they were technically "seperable".
windows without MSIE is like a woman without breasts--fun, but something's missing.
they might be seperable in terms of how they are coded, but maybe not so from a business standpoint. source code will show nothing,
but who am i to stand in between MS source being revealed... gimme gimme!
easy...
how bout a few blacklists of bad spam blacklists?
and a few blacklists of bad blacklists of bad spam bla...
erm, nevermind, scratch that.
simple economics.
in an oligopolistic market, firms cannot compete on price.
in a monopolostic market, *cough*.
i live in a country far far away, so i haven't a clue really what rogers cable is... but either rogers' competitors drive up their prices too, to take advantage of the situation (or cartel?), or reduce their prices to steal rogers' market share.
in a region where rogers is the only broadband choice, tough luck.
any firm needs to cover their average variable costs in the short run. if a firm is selling at less than what they're paying, on average, there is a problem--and i doubt this is the case, otherwise rogers would be out of business (again i apologize if i am misinformed, i know nothing of the situation).
i've always wondered why MS sat through this IANAL but ridiculous lawsuit with the government. in a society that promotes a free market, and free speech, i find it somewhat hypocritical.
no matter what legalese you put on top of it, my browser of choice now on any workstations running windows is MSIE. i am confident a very small percentage of people use netscape browsers now, and i am also confident that should both browsers have been bundled with the Windows OS, MSIE would still be the browser of choice.
all that aside, i do not quite see where the legal line is drawn. does MS not have a right to give different treatment, prices, and consideration to their customers at their own discresion? or is what they are doing illegal because customers are unable to choose?
i find this ridiculous. is the Gap doing anything illegal by selling childrensware, as full grown adults are unable to use these goods? since when was price discrimination illegal? how bout if Gap were to give me a 10% off VIP discount card, would they be breaking the law? whatever happened to a free america?
regardless, if MS is were facing a prospective breakup like they were, why not just pack up their bags and move up to canada? no doubt the canadian government would welcome them with open arms--just how much cash would MS bring canada?
we all just love to hate MS... running debian on my servers, windows on my workstations--by choice. they aren't that bad people, can you imagine your grandma trying to send her grandson email with pine?
high speed internet access is the key.
there is countless number of legitimate uses of great deals of bandwidth, particularly for university students. what if i, a media student, wanted to download my video project from my home computer, a few gigs of high quality MPEG2 video. or to transfer backups to a remote location. the list goes on and on.
the solution? don't penalise those using great deals of bandwidth for legitimate purposes--and as this is often a difficult/impossible distinction to make, don't penalise anybody. your AUP must include very severe penalties for illegitimate use, and other than that,
just stack up the pipe! more and more of it...
you can never have too much bandwidth.
sigh... things like this should be allowed to be published... people will always find bugs in software, crack encryption algorithms, and exploits in security of nearly everything. when documented properly, published, the developers are identified of the problem after which they can make the necessary ammendments. also, properly documented bug reports notify users and system admins of the problems, outlining the need to upgrade or patch as instructed by the software vendor (taken as an example). no doubt sooner or later another tech savvy 'user' will accomplish the same as the first. a bug may become relatively well known, and allow exploits by malicious 'users', while it has not been called to the software vendor's attention. occasionally, the 'user' who discovers a bug, workaround, or cracks an encryption algorithm, may not be of the right ethical nature to bring it forward, contact the relevant parties to have it resolved, or make it public domain--and instead may be of a malicious nature, as per Code Red. no doubt it was a new undocumented exploit--had some user found it 2 months ago and documented it properly, well, this could have been prevented, somewhat. had some user found it 2 months ago and left it silent, well, just look at what has happened.
i think many of you are missing the point. this article outlines linux being used in a high-profile mission-critical situation, and does not imply in any way the reason for doing so being due to ms os instability. no doubt an airline would have properly configured systems, adequate backups and work-arounds, should their tasks be 'mission critical'. from what i understood from the article, korean airlines has switched to linux to help online flight information services, which may be due to better perfomance in this particular situation with linux over other operating systems, including the unixes and windows, and/or more cost effective, or one of the other hundred reasons to choose between o/s.
so you know, hong kong is the piracy capital of the world--those of you who think you're all l33t and with it when you download Blair Witch 2 Cam 0day, just know that half the population of hong kong has probably seen that movie off their $1.40 VCD screener which they bought at the corner of watsons.
okay, it is illegal to pirate software, movies, games, music. but it is done, and youll find it in every corner of every street in hong kong.
the mp3 scene here has become HUGE. companies advertise their mp3 players on buses, DSL isps offer free mp3 players after 9 months of stickin with their shit slow DSL--come on, an isp offering their customers a free mp3 player, it couldn't possibly be to playback music downloaded off napster now could it? its obvious what theyre trying to appeal to, and get this: this particular DSL provider is the BIGGEST in hong kong, and just happens to be Cable & Wireless HKT--by far the biggest phone company in hong kong, and the sole provider of land lines.
the govt however, has tried to stop this. 2 16-year-old kids were arrested and sentenced to 2 years for running 10-hit-a-day 5-song mp3 websites, in an attempt to scare the public. too bad the public heard about it, and i believe started some sort of demonstration, it is my understanding that the kids were released and their records wiped clean. some govt.
computers are common in hong kong, probably 99% of the urban population have had at least 2 computers thus far, and a good 70% of them, at a minimum, with internet access (check the exact stats here. every person i know not only has napster installed, but a quite substantial mp3 collection, and probably half of them have bought burners as a result.
a personal friend of mine was charged with some sort of hacking, which i wont go into, and his computer was confiscated, with his binder of burned cds, which included about 50 mp3 cds, plus what was on his hds. they were returned to him, fully intact.
but hk, in which only 50% of microsoft software users are actually using their software legally licensed, isn't quite as bad as some parts of china, where only 5% of their ms software is licensed (this figure is NOT an estimate... any admins feel like checking the logs, in particular the origin of this post?), the situation is MUCH worse, and the govt couldnt care less. govt officials, even higher up in the hierarchy, use pirated ms software. i found a .gov.cn website which included links to mp3 albums, and i will be sure to post it if i find the url again.
i really cant remember the topic of this post, oh well. its almost like MP3 is fully legal in hong kong. ive seen raids where cops would take away the vcd vendor, but not the guy with a bigger stall selling mp3 cds.
---------please read----------
ive just spent the last 10 mins reading up on this whole conspiricy, and microsoft wanted their source code to become public, and death to the open source community via legals.
use your fucking heads.
the microsoft operating system, and office suite, appeals to the less computer literate users, which seems to be the majority of the market--how many first time users would go out and buy a system running FreeBSD or slackware7.1. the kind of things these users take into account are the ease of use, internet functionality and compatibility, possibly gameplay, and security.
security, especially due to the media. im sure wed all agree the media portrays images way off to the public. as a man with a computer related occupation, you can only imagine how many calls ive got from friends telling me theyve been hacked--when somebody stumbled across netbus at some l33t hax0r website or bbs. so security will have a major impact on the consumers decision when choosing an operating system.
SO, why on EARTH would microsoft 'hack' into their own systems, or hire somebody to do so. thats ridiculous. they arent worried enough about open source software to scar their reputation as much as that. i quote a man, whos name i shall not reveal, in microsoft senior management, "we aren't worried about linux. linux is a fad, itll die out. we are, on the other hand, worried about sun/solaris. their o/s is much more expensive than ours.".
for you paranoid oss'ers out there, if ms wanted their code to become public, so they could destroy open source software, why not just RELEASE their damn source code? that wouldn't harm them security wise, and they could still sue the assess off you little private developers, and even the larger developers would become extinct. and microsoft releasing their code would get you stubborn unix users to see them in a new light.
im not going to lie, i'm an ms employee, and a regular slashdot reader. lost of ms employees are. maybe rob/co should check their logs for *.microsoft.com requests. im running 2 boxes at home, one, the one with more powerful hardware, running win2k, the other running slackware 7.1. linux fascinates me, and id much rather use it than windows, likely because of the anti-ms hate in the air. and i'm an ms employee.
dont get all excited, read the damn article. nintendo, sega, and EA are teaming up... but not to make a new console, instead to sue Yahoo, for hosting illegal auctions, and refusing to remove them after numerous requests, when they have the 'responsibility and capability'. just what id call the CGIAA, console game industry association of america. damnit, when are we going to see all of these organisations united, we're gonna need a SYAAA, sue your ass association of america. fuckin america, gotta love it.
the current hong kong identity cards are simply card with a textured background with black print, laminated. easily forgable.
first things first, i live in hong kong.
the local tv news report on the new ID cards stated they were to avoid forgery. data will be well encrypted.
at the age of 14 in hong kong, you are required by law to carry your hong kong identification card with you AT ALL TIMES. cops do regular checks on the street, i've been stopped maybe one out of every 3 times passing a cop. this is done due to hk's huge illegal immigrant problem.
in a country where 20% of the population are triads, color copies onto PVC cards can be done at your street photocopier, and triads have cracked the PSX, DC, PSX2 and even produced game systems for the nintendo systems before they officially hit the streets, and pirated games/vcds/apps are available on every street corner, REAL IDs with fake information can be bought for $20 in the right places (including magnetic strip, hologram, et al), its a huge waste of $4B. after all, i could do with a new house, a new paint job for my porsche, and also, my diamond shoes are too tight, and my wallet is too small for my $1000s.
but from a resident's point of view, i could do with a new flashy lookin piece of pvc to replace that stupid oversized laminated piece of shit. and if theyre promising show-card-place-thumb-on-pad-then-go-through immigration systems, just bring it on, i could do with the extra time, could be long enough to jerk it once or twice. if i heard some guy sliced up a nun and fled to germany, and he happens to be me, ima gonna be pissed.
i currently live in hong kong,... heres a couple of things for you to think on. hong kong and china are both developing independently, and are governed independently, however they of course would have certain links. when hong kong was handed back over to china in 1997, the chinese government decided the success of hong kong was due to its unique nature, and governing it like the rest of china would cause it to lose its international flair--so therefore decided it should be governed independently. this is why hong kong is now known as the Hong Kong SAR (Special Administrative Region). mr. tung chee hwa was selected as the chief designate (the big guy), and decided hong kong should be run very similiar to the way it previously was--not a single law (that i know of) was added, removed, or changed. fireworks werent allowed in hong kong while they were common in china, the one child policy wasn't implemented into hong kong, etc. certain things did, however, change. white people (excuse the language, i'm not chinese either) basically got freaked out and left. there are now way less white people in hong kong. bleh. well it isn't british owned anymore,... a very reliable source has given the information as follows (maybe a /. on this? i can provide info):
50% of the MS software in hong kong is pirated. sound bad? get this.
95% of the MS software in china is pirated. this isnt an estimate.
before the handover, 80% of MS software was pirated, and pirated software was most readily publically available in late 1998/early 1999.
here are things on a new perspective for you. the population of hong kong is approx 7million. 2 million of these are triads on some level. the night of the handover, triads higher up in the 14k and WSW hierarchy found a perfect opportunity to move to macau, as the handover ceremony involved english police stepping down and chinese police taking over. with china in power, the triads were much worse off--they wouldn't be cut any slack, the govt wouldn't be scared of triads--why exactly i dont know, but apparantly there were plenty of reasons.
it would be interesting to compare the development in hong kong and macau. you'd be astounded how much triads can stop a country from developing.
hong kong is just about as high tech as i've seen. it would be awkward for a 6th grader not to have a mobile phone with them at school, and even more awkward for a student even in primary school not to have a computer at home with internet access, running MS software. hong kong is very enthiuastic about holding the asian games in 2006, and have launched various strong campaigns.
china, on the other hand, is also developing steadily. it is of course more rural, and much less developed than hong kong, but is still developing steadily. the olympics in 2008 will only boost hong kong's tourism, as will the disneyland amusement park being constructed in hong kong right next to their new airport.
its hard for two countries right next to each other, from the same colony not to effect each others development, but you're almost comparing the development of nigeria and downtown NYC.
well im tired, if you want more, ill write more. okahbah.
let me just get a few things straight.
source code is not exactly the same as a set of instructions.
a set of instructions, say to produce a bomb, is protected by the first ammendment. this set of instructions can be used for numerous things--chemical research, properties of chemicals and how they behave, well i'm not a chemist, but you get the point--it is not limited to creating a bomb. the purpose it is most likely used for, however, could possibly be to make a bomb. the author's intent is most probably to teach the reader to create a bomb, but it is not impossible that their intentions were otherwise. in the united states of america, a man is innocent until proven guilty beyond reasonable doubt, and however improbable the chances of legitimate uses of a bomb recipe may be, they cannot be ruled out.
source code differs mainly in one way: its intentions can be proved beyond reasonable doubt, as it is programmed to serve a particular function. or at least this is one of the queries of the case.
i see 2 main questions in this case, the first not crossing the legal/illegal boundry, but the second doing so:
1. does source code in fact classify as free speech. personally, i believe not.
2. does the use and intent of deCCS directly or indirectly to a substantial level disagree with the DMCA, and can be held responsible for any piracy that may occur as a result of using the deCCS code. here i strongly believe not. this is getting ridiculous. lets not forget the law--it is fully legitamite to make a single backup copy for personal purposes (please excuse me if im out of date).
i have not read the PDF, but i do intend to. i am not legally qualified, nor am i doubting the ability of the defendants' attourneys. after all, they are qualified professionals. but judging by some of the reader comments on slashdot, i feel some of you are missing the point.
i am 100% behind 2600 and the likes, and feel this case is ridiculous. if their attourneys are infact focusing on the point that source code must be protected by free speech, i feel they are running on a very thin thread... why do so when the suspension bridge is just meters away. however i feel the attourneys are not focusing on this point as much as the slashdot readers are.
the MPAA must lose this case. it is absoletly ridiculous.
as long as movies exist, movies will be made duplicateable in some way, shape or form. lets not forget in order for us to enjoy movies, they must be in an analogue format--god forbid we ever find joy out of staring at scrolling hex code to represent a movie. as long as this analogue transformation is made, there is space to duplicate them. how does your dvd player connect to your tv? what if you connected it to your video input card instead? and then distributed it? how many people will buy a tv with an included dvd player, with no form of output. not i, that is for sure.
source code isnt the same as a set of instructions--lets not lie to ourselves, the ONLY purpose possible of deCCS is to, alas, decode CCS. however can deCCS be held accountable for dvd piracy, most certainly not. legal uses of deCCS do exist, so they cannot be held accountable and responsible beyond reasonable doubt.
i've probably missed the point, after all, how many readers have said otherwise. i am neither arrogant nor superior. well anyway heres just my 2c.
maybe i've been watching too much of dylan mcdermott. maybe we should get him on this case.