I've tried konfabulator, and while there were some interesting little utilities that it had, how are these widgets any different/better than any other app that I can write with Xcode? What makes a widget so special?
But you see no problem with taking resources that I (and others) payed for for your own purposes. In the eyes of the general public, illegal P2P slid by most people because it wasn't affecting their pocketbook....
Sorry that'll never justify illegal P2P activity on Internet2.
I guess we'll just have to wait for the Supreme Court to decide MGM v. Grokster to see if there is such justification. Lower courts have already ruled in favor of Grokster.
As for your money being wasted, society stands to gain a great deal if a truly anonymous P2P architecture is developed and implemented. Think freedom of speech issues - think human rights and the great firewall of China, etc... Internet2 is the perfect host for such development. The parent poster argued that P2P was not a legitimate use of Internet2, I showed that it could very well be. I also denounced copyright infringement.
Your position seems to be that because the technology can be used to commit acts of copyright infringement, then your tax dollars should not go to funding its research. That position is so short-sighted as to be absurd. By your reasoning, we should not even fund research into new types of higher density writable media, as they might (and inevitably will) be used by some people to make illegal copies of things. Imagine the losses that society might suffer were we all to believe as you do.
Not necessarily. I don't see any reason why i2 couldn't be used to develop secure, anonymous, and impervious to lawsuit P2P networks, a lá freenet (but maybe with a more "gnutellish" interface). But then, architectural issues aside, I'm sure that no publicly funded research is undertaken for the sole purpose of copyright infringement. Here's hoping that there is other stuff on that hub that (legally) justifies its existence.
On a related note, anyone who hasn't read Lawrence Lessig's "Free Culture" and has strong oppinions on the topic of filesharing and copyrights owes it to themselves to read this wonderful book. It really gives alot of background to the debate, and puts to rest alot of myths that the major copyright owners would have you buy into. More info at Lessig.org.
If your freedom is being taken away by a DRM scheme, then don't use that DRM scheme. Don't shop from the iTunes Music Store (and don't ruin it for everyone else by trying to sabotage it).
The only problem with that logic, is that because even the weakest DRM is still given the legal protection of the DMCA it is only a matter of time before all products are released with some weak DRM thus making it illegal for you to enjoy the fair use that you once had legally for analog and paper products. You can have balance with DRM and copyright law, but not the former included in the latter.
...is if they collected this information, but didn't cross reference it between fields. Let them have my SSN, my majors, etc... but don't let them tie them all together in one big identifying lump.
Where the cost of bringing the product to market is very high (e.g., pharma), the company/investors needs some assurance that another company can't just copy the results when the product comes out.
You mean a patent? Anyone care to comment on a related note about why publicly funded research (like at a university) should be able to secure patents for the researchers? I have seen many an experiment hampered by a patent/NDA/legal nightmare when collaborating with other universities. The university pushes for their researchers to secure patents. Why shouldn't the taxpayers benefit immediately? Why have to wait 17 years?
I have been asked several times to try to secure a patent for the university on some piece of code or algorithm that I needed to devise for doing data analysis. I have always refused. But I am just a student. It's not clear to me that a professor or paid researcher has that right.
The employment environment at EA was built to allow you flexibility as professionals, with the expectation that time on the job could be managed without watching the clock. Unfortunately, labor laws have not kept pace with this spirit of entrepreneurialism, innovation and creativity.
I don't understand: are they saying that because there are no laws preventing them from subjecting their employees to such unethical working conditions that they haven't felt obligated to treat their employees ethically (until now)? Or are they instead saying that it is unfortunate that such laws are, in fact, in place because now they can no longer be successful "entrepeneurs"?
This is how real journalists get press passes, by the way - they join the associations, which check their credentials, and issue passes.
Nowhere in the constitution does it establish any such association that officiates over who is allowed to become a member of the press. If I publish a newspaper, or an informational flyer of the same nature, I should be granted the same freedoms as any other. To do otherwise would be to claim that any citizens right to free speech can be denied because he or she was not a member of the Citizens for Free Speech Association, the likes of which may even be able to selectively deny membership. I would love to see this go to the Supreme Court. They usually have more sense over these sorts of issues.
Well, a very simple and naïve view of causation would be that: A causes B just in case if A weren't the case then B would not be the case. Let A be something like "Johnny shoots Charlie in the head" and let B be "Charlie dies". Now on this view of causation, Johnny's shooting Charlie causes charlie to die. On the other hand, what I didn't mention was that at the exact same time that Johnny was shooting Charlie, Charlie was detonating the explosives that he had strapped to his chest earlier. If A weren't the case - that is, if Johnny didn't shoot Charlie, then it is not correct to say that Charlie wouldn't have died - he would have died from the explosion. Perhaps we might like to say something like "It was the combination of shooting and self-detonation that killed charlie", but then things start to get hairy.
The point is, it is very hard to pinpoint the exact cause of something and at the same time maintain a semantic notion that applies equally well to all situations. Sometimes, our notions can be downright deceptive.
Anything else is an illegal overstepping of their mandate.
What I meant to say is that if the government can authorize the FCC to censor one medium, then they can authorize them to censor the other. Censorship is a slippery slope. Though it was made by a fictional character, this quote resonates with me:
"With the first link, a chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." Capt. Jean-Luc Picard - The Drumhead
On Satitalite radio/TV and Cable, you choose to pay for the service. Broadcast television is over air transmission anyone with TV may tune in at only the cost of the TV and electricity to run it.
Which, again, is still a choice. If the FCC can censor one then they can censore the other. The only good choice here is not to censor at all. If you don't like what's on TV - don't watch. Don't buy one. People who can't handle the reality that comes along with living in society should extricate themselves from it post-haste.
Basically, as long as we put a disclaimer on the package saying the program had to be removed from the patron's computer before it was all kosher with the EULA.
Is that the case with all EULAs? That is, can a EULA explicitly forbid the transfer of software to another party once installed? In such cases, the first user would be allowed to use the game, but may not even be able to return the box and discs to the library.
I agree that it seems problematic and too much effort for libraries to deploy, but this in itself seems to suggest that EULAs are bad, bad, bad.
So commerical companies can keep their IP violations largely secret, while FOSS ones get vetted publicly.
Also, does the FOSS comunity actively seek out new patents? That is, do FOSS developers patent those innovations that they produce with the intent of using them in a counter-suit? Even if the individual developers did (we're not talking the likes of IBM, and Novell, but rather Linus et al.), is there some way that the collection of patents could be transfered to such individuals for use in countersuits? Without a large patent portfolio, such small developers are easy pickens. The entire system is unbalanced and corrupt.
I wonder what the legal ramifications of this would be/will be if they do not just limit themselves to console games, but include computer games as well. Even if the games include prohibitive EULAs, if the librarians don't install the software themselves, buth rather provide the physical media (boxes, serials, etc...) it would be a violation of the end-user at best, but not the library. Is this correct?
This brings up the question: what would an RPG dream team look like? Or rather, what aspects of each RPG would you splice and dice together to make the best overall experience?
f software copyright went away, we wouldn't have (much of) a problem because all that illegal Windows source code floating around would suddenly be up for grabs too...
Except that the Windows code would likely be a trade secret type of thing. That falls under another branch of the Intellectual Property Tree.
The initial price of printers will increase, and the corresponding cost of cartridges will decrease.
My prediction: things will stay the same. This isn't about maximizing profit - at least not to the extent that Lexmark would have you believe. It's about control. Big business would love to have ultimate control over its products. That's why you see the RIAA et al. trying to crush P2P when signs point to the fact that P2P actually increases their business. There seems to be a fallacy that control=profit.
, the 6th Circuit US Court of Appeals found that the Toner Loading Program was not a copyrightable work, as it was less a work of expression than of function. Copyright is not available merely to "any idea, procedure, process, system, method of operation, concept, principle, or discovery," but Lexmark's use falls exclusively on the idea side of the fence. "[I]nteroperable devices" may use proprietary security systems to lock out unauthorized interoperability, but a technology developed solely for this functional purpose is not copyrightable. Furthermore, the court noted that even if these programs were copyrightable, SCC's copying of protected portions of the work would likely still enjoy fair use protections, because the courts have ruled that "fair use doctrine preserves public access to the ideas and functional elements embedded in copyrighted computer software programs."
Does anyone know what the status of the DeCSS lawsuits are, and whether this applies? I would also love to see this applied to other things.
But wouldn't this have other implications as well? The notion that a work that is designed merely as a means to function is not copyrightable may have implications for the GPL, would it not? How much code is copyrighted and protected under the GPL that was designed only with function in mind, and nothing else?
What about the code that SCO claims ownership of? Even if it existed, could they in fact have copyright over it, given this ruling?
Slashdot Mirror
I've tried konfabulator, and while there were some interesting little utilities that it had, how are these widgets any different/better than any other app that I can write with Xcode? What makes a widget so special?
Oh I get it now... YHBT. YHL. HAND. right? Nice. Mod parent funny.
But you see no problem with taking resources that I (and others) payed for for your own purposes. In the eyes of the general public, illegal P2P slid by most people because it wasn't affecting their pocketbook....
Sorry that'll never justify illegal P2P activity on Internet2.
I guess we'll just have to wait for the Supreme Court to decide MGM v. Grokster to see if there is such justification. Lower courts have already ruled in favor of Grokster.
As for your money being wasted, society stands to gain a great deal if a truly anonymous P2P architecture is developed and implemented. Think freedom of speech issues - think human rights and the great firewall of China, etc... Internet2 is the perfect host for such development. The parent poster argued that P2P was not a legitimate use of Internet2, I showed that it could very well be. I also denounced copyright infringement.
Your position seems to be that because the technology can be used to commit acts of copyright infringement, then your tax dollars should not go to funding its research. That position is so short-sighted as to be absurd. By your reasoning, we should not even fund research into new types of higher density writable media, as they might (and inevitably will) be used by some people to make illegal copies of things. Imagine the losses that society might suffer were we all to believe as you do.
Not necessarily. I don't see any reason why i2 couldn't be used to develop secure, anonymous, and impervious to lawsuit P2P networks, a lá freenet (but maybe with a more "gnutellish" interface). But then, architectural issues aside, I'm sure that no publicly funded research is undertaken for the sole purpose of copyright infringement. Here's hoping that there is other stuff on that hub that (legally) justifies its existence.
On a related note, anyone who hasn't read Lawrence Lessig's "Free Culture" and has strong oppinions on the topic of filesharing and copyrights owes it to themselves to read this wonderful book. It really gives alot of background to the debate, and puts to rest alot of myths that the major copyright owners would have you buy into. More info at Lessig.org.
If your freedom is being taken away by a DRM scheme, then don't use that DRM scheme. Don't shop from the iTunes Music Store (and don't ruin it for everyone else by trying to sabotage it).
The only problem with that logic, is that because even the weakest DRM is still given the legal protection of the DMCA it is only a matter of time before all products are released with some weak DRM thus making it illegal for you to enjoy the fair use that you once had legally for analog and paper products. You can have balance with DRM and copyright law, but not the former included in the latter.
...is if they collected this information, but didn't cross reference it between fields. Let them have my SSN, my majors, etc... but don't let them tie them all together in one big identifying lump.
You mean a patent? Anyone care to comment on a related note about why publicly funded research (like at a university) should be able to secure patents for the researchers? I have seen many an experiment hampered by a patent/NDA/legal nightmare when collaborating with other universities. The university pushes for their researchers to secure patents. Why shouldn't the taxpayers benefit immediately? Why have to wait 17 years?
I have been asked several times to try to secure a patent for the university on some piece of code or algorithm that I needed to devise for doing data analysis. I have always refused. But I am just a student. It's not clear to me that a professor or paid researcher has that right.
Funny how that argument looks if the research is being done by the NSA....
I don't understand: are they saying that because there are no laws preventing them from subjecting their employees to such unethical working conditions that they haven't felt obligated to treat their employees ethically (until now)? Or are they instead saying that it is unfortunate that such laws are, in fact, in place because now they can no longer be successful "entrepeneurs"?
Or is there a third choice?
Nowhere in the constitution does it establish any such association that officiates over who is allowed to become a member of the press. If I publish a newspaper, or an informational flyer of the same nature, I should be granted the same freedoms as any other. To do otherwise would be to claim that any citizens right to free speech can be denied because he or she was not a member of the Citizens for Free Speech Association, the likes of which may even be able to selectively deny membership. I would love to see this go to the Supreme Court. They usually have more sense over these sorts of issues.
The point is, it is very hard to pinpoint the exact cause of something and at the same time maintain a semantic notion that applies equally well to all situations. Sometimes, our notions can be downright deceptive.
Only if we can hold law makers accountable for citizens committing crimes because of the lawmakers making such acts illegal.
Seriously, though - causation is such an ill defined concept.
What I meant to say is that if the government can authorize the FCC to censor one medium, then they can authorize them to censor the other. Censorship is a slippery slope. Though it was made by a fictional character, this quote resonates with me:
"With the first link, a chain is forged. The first speech censored, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably." Capt. Jean-Luc Picard - The Drumhead
Which, again, is still a choice. If the FCC can censor one then they can censore the other. The only good choice here is not to censor at all. If you don't like what's on TV - don't watch. Don't buy one. People who can't handle the reality that comes along with living in society should extricate themselves from it post-haste.
Is that the case with all EULAs? That is, can a EULA explicitly forbid the transfer of software to another party once installed? In such cases, the first user would be allowed to use the game, but may not even be able to return the box and discs to the library.
I agree that it seems problematic and too much effort for libraries to deploy, but this in itself seems to suggest that EULAs are bad, bad, bad.
Also, does the FOSS comunity actively seek out new patents? That is, do FOSS developers patent those innovations that they produce with the intent of using them in a counter-suit? Even if the individual developers did (we're not talking the likes of IBM, and Novell, but rather Linus et al.), is there some way that the collection of patents could be transfered to such individuals for use in countersuits? Without a large patent portfolio, such small developers are easy pickens. The entire system is unbalanced and corrupt.
I wonder what the legal ramifications of this would be/will be if they do not just limit themselves to console games, but include computer games as well. Even if the games include prohibitive EULAs, if the librarians don't install the software themselves, buth rather provide the physical media (boxes, serials, etc...) it would be a violation of the end-user at best, but not the library. Is this correct?
Next time use hydrofluroic acid to etch the glass...
This brings up the question: what would an RPG dream team look like? Or rather, what aspects of each RPG would you splice and dice together to make the best overall experience?
To save time, I think I'll just make it my new sig.
It's built into the file format: mp3, et al. Kinda hard to compress it further.
Except that the Windows code would likely be a trade secret type of thing. That falls under another branch of the Intellectual Property Tree.
My prediction: things will stay the same. This isn't about maximizing profit - at least not to the extent that Lexmark would have you believe. It's about control. Big business would love to have ultimate control over its products. That's why you see the RIAA et al. trying to crush P2P when signs point to the fact that P2P actually increases their business. There seems to be a fallacy that control=profit.
Does anyone know what the status of the DeCSS lawsuits are, and whether this applies? I would also love to see this applied to other things.
But wouldn't this have other implications as well? The notion that a work that is designed merely as a means to function is not copyrightable may have implications for the GPL, would it not? How much code is copyrighted and protected under the GPL that was designed only with function in mind, and nothing else?
What about the code that SCO claims ownership of? Even if it existed, could they in fact have copyright over it, given this ruling?
Or to drool over them - well, preferably not over them, more like at them. Seriously though, forget different - just think!