The answer, of course, is that it's their work that creates the idea, and the ability to profit from this is a strong motivator to create things.
Then that should be sufficient incentive--what public interest is there in funding them with tax dollars? If they want to be a university and accept financial aid, they can be a university. If they want to profit from patents, they can either become a non-tax funded corporation or a non-tax funded university.
I also disagree with the government holding intellectual "property." The taxpayer paid for the property once, already. I know this is routinely gotten around with subterfuges along the lines of "But it's the contractor's intellectual 'property.'"
. . . how is it that universities, such as Cornell, which, though private (but a Land Grant college), receives significant Federal funds for its mission and infrastructure (think Title IV financial aid, for example), are even allowed to hold patents to begin with?
I have no problem with an institution being able to hold intellectual "property," so long as they don't take one dime of tax money.
. . . like they'll probably be licensing that Microsoft Digital "Rights" Management patent. I would beware of any OS offering from the likes of Sony that claims to be all about media over a broadband connection.
I can't believe I'm replying to apparent flamebait here from a 500000+ userid, but everyone was new some time, so I'll give you the benefit of the doubt.
1. How are you so sure I'm an American?
2. What is particularly American about entertainment in general? Europeans like American entertainment in addition to native entertainment. Americans like European and Asian entertainment in addition to that made in America.
3. Who benefits from artificially imposed borders on the network?
4. (obligatory flamebait) If we're going to pick nationality fights, what country created the network to begin with?
If we could broadcast around the world all at the same time
I'm going to admit to my own ignorance--are the barriers to being able to do this primarily technological (e.g. synchronization of satellite downlinks, lag of radio waves, etc.), economic (e.g. timing of release in Europe for maximum sales diffrent from release in Asia), or political (e.g. censorship enforcement is particularly heavy in country X right now; can't release there yet)?
Wah. The net's for sharing real information, not to allow entertainment moguls to artificially segregate their market. If this is an example of a noble purpose, I'm not waiting to see the nefarious ones before participating in getting around the technology.
. . . that as use of this information becomes more widespread, and as more effective geopolitical lockout technologies (which is how this will be used) become available, that open proxies remain available throughout the world. This trend toward the Balkanization of the net is an evil thing.
But that vastly limits the potential audience, and thus the potential pool of files. If I just want to share files with people I already know, I'll burn them to CDR and transfer them in person, or encrypted via the US Mail--and I won't have to pay the cable company $50/month to do it.
The fact that you can (apparently seriously) say that is scary. You might belong in a "loony bin" if you're willing to accept one of these implants. Are you? Maybe I'll be in a "loony bin" and you'll be in Hell. Who knows.
It's going to take a lot of mod points to mod down all the people who make this argument. Even as a non-believer, I'll be gratified to see the "religious right" scuttle the reelection campaign of any legislator, governor, or president that even thinks this might be a good idea. And if it still somehow happens, I'll be on my knees praying for my soul with a rifle in my hand to kill whatever agent of Satan that attempts to force me to accept one.
So you're willing to be one of the first to take this implant? I'm not a particularly religious man--not someone who would call himself "saved." However, if there's something that would push me into the arms of the most right-wing, fundamentalist factions of society, it would be the government not immediately intervening to prohibit the requirement of such a device as a condition of commerce.
And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.
Eder added that the company intends to sharply limit the amount of data a user can download in a month without paying a higher fee. "We're in the a la carte business now," Eder said, adding that AT&T Broadband can no longer support At Home's "all you can eat" policies that led to abuse of the system.
Want to see the broadband market in the U.S. disappear overnight? Try actually doing that. The second there's a meter running, there go the subscribers (and as the subscribers go, so goes the revenue). There aren't too many more useless things than a fast connection with an aggregate bandwidth cap. But if they're too ignorant to realize that free music, movies, and warez drive their business, they'll figure it out soon enough.
Once ISP's start to care about that, the days of ISP's may be over soon! What's the draw for broadband without a bit of free stuff, at least now and then? RIAA/MPAA/IDSA/BSA/SPA blessed "content" that you're charged US$0.005 per kilobyte to view?
Or is it going to be: "Your bandwidth usage is more than two standard deviations from the mean... which is not allowed under your residential use contract"
Dialup providers have been doing that forever (q.v. Prodigy, AT&T)--sending out warnings to people whose usage seems "excessive." They just didn't tell customers that they were using a two standard deviation test:).
Yeah, that's wonderful. A piece of software whose primary purpose is the appropriation of copyrighted works in a way not intended by the author, for which a fee is charged. I wonder if the guy who wrote this program groks the irony.
If someone's going to be a cracker, the least they can do is make the software free. But I'm sure it's been cracked, anyway. More irony.
One thought that comes to mind is to install the OS under test to a VMware virtual disk. Copy the virtual disk. Perform some activity and make sure you can account for the changes. Of course, this assumes that any of the features are active at all without a trigger from $THREE_LETTER_AGENCY.
They'll do this--the baseline charge will be $49.99/month. "abusers" like you and I will be charged $49.99/month + packet charges. Don't think that bandwidth sensitive pricing will be a good deal for the light user!
Seriously, though, this could always end up being one of those things where they buttrig the internet connection so much that you've got to run all sorts of proprietary software on your computer just to authorize your machine to connect to the internet. What happens to those of us who want to run non-MS OSes then?
We use the one MS machine running the proprietary software as a gateway, running a router on it if necessary.
"I hereby withdraw all licenses, everyone who has MS software or operating systems on their computer must remove them at once. You don't own the software, read your EULA, I do."
Fat chance. The EULA grants the purchaser of a license perpetual right to use, so even if that clickwrap is enforceable, that's an absurd scenario.
How about boycotting the companies that sell it, as was done with corporations doing business in South Africa during apartheid?
Just because corporations tend towards immorality in the name of the almighty buck doesn't mean right-minded people shouldn't do something about it. So, Jon, how about naming some names? Who are these companies? How many of you buy their products? Influence purchase of their products at work? Let's send a message!
A related tidbit--I have seen spammers refer to people who report them to their ISP's as "Internet terrorists", along the lines of
The email address for removal is working at the time this message is sent. However, it may have been removed as a result of Internet terrorists sending malicious complaints. <usual blather about SB 1618 and the First Amendment deleted>
Slashdot Mirror
Then that should be sufficient incentive--what public interest is there in funding them with tax dollars? If they want to be a university and accept financial aid, they can be a university. If they want to profit from patents, they can either become a non-tax funded corporation or a non-tax funded university.
I also disagree with the government holding intellectual "property." The taxpayer paid for the property once, already. I know this is routinely gotten around with subterfuges along the lines of "But it's the contractor's intellectual 'property.'"
~~~
I have no problem with an institution being able to hold intellectual "property," so long as they don't take one dime of tax money.
Ouch. Copy protection meets the Workplace Shell.
. . . like they'll probably be licensing that Microsoft Digital "Rights" Management patent. I would beware of any OS offering from the likes of Sony that claims to be all about media over a broadband connection.
1. How are you so sure I'm an American?
2. What is particularly American about entertainment in general? Europeans like American entertainment in addition to native entertainment. Americans like European and Asian entertainment in addition to that made in America.
3. Who benefits from artificially imposed borders on the network?
4. (obligatory flamebait) If we're going to pick nationality fights, what country created the network to begin with?
I'm going to admit to my own ignorance--are the barriers to being able to do this primarily technological (e.g. synchronization of satellite downlinks, lag of radio waves, etc.), economic (e.g. timing of release in Europe for maximum sales diffrent from release in Asia), or political (e.g. censorship enforcement is particularly heavy in country X right now; can't release there yet)?
Wah. The net's for sharing real information, not to allow entertainment moguls to artificially segregate their market. If this is an example of a noble purpose, I'm not waiting to see the nefarious ones before participating in getting around the technology.
. . . that as use of this information becomes more widespread, and as more effective geopolitical lockout technologies (which is how this will be used) become available, that open proxies remain available throughout the world. This trend toward the Balkanization of the net is an evil thing.
But that vastly limits the potential audience, and thus the potential pool of files. If I just want to share files with people I already know, I'll burn them to CDR and transfer them in person, or encrypted via the US Mail--and I won't have to pay the cable company $50/month to do it.
The fact that you can (apparently seriously) say that is scary. You might belong in a "loony bin" if you're willing to accept one of these implants. Are you? Maybe I'll be in a "loony bin" and you'll be in Hell. Who knows.
It's going to take a lot of mod points to mod down all the people who make this argument. Even as a non-believer, I'll be gratified to see the "religious right" scuttle the reelection campaign of any legislator, governor, or president that even thinks this might be a good idea. And if it still somehow happens, I'll be on my knees praying for my soul with a rifle in my hand to kill whatever agent of Satan that attempts to force me to accept one.
So you're willing to be one of the first to take this implant? I'm not a particularly religious man--not someone who would call himself "saved." However, if there's something that would push me into the arms of the most right-wing, fundamentalist factions of society, it would be the government not immediately intervening to prohibit the requirement of such a device as a condition of commerce.
And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.
If root doesn't know his employer is a criminal, he's not a very good root, anyway.
Want to see the broadband market in the U.S. disappear overnight? Try actually doing that. The second there's a meter running, there go the subscribers (and as the subscribers go, so goes the revenue). There aren't too many more useless things than a fast connection with an aggregate bandwidth cap. But if they're too ignorant to realize that free music, movies, and warez drive their business, they'll figure it out soon enough.
Once ISP's start to care about that, the days of ISP's may be over soon! What's the draw for broadband without a bit of free stuff, at least now and then? RIAA/MPAA/IDSA/BSA/SPA blessed "content" that you're charged US$0.005 per kilobyte to view?
and
D) The public relations disaster resulting from prosecuting traders of 20 year old 4K ROM images
Dialup providers have been doing that forever (q.v. Prodigy, AT&T)--sending out warnings to people whose usage seems "excessive." They just didn't tell customers that they were using a two standard deviation test :).
If someone's going to be a cracker, the least they can do is make the software free. But I'm sure it's been cracked, anyway. More irony.
One thought that comes to mind is to install the OS under test to a VMware virtual disk. Copy the virtual disk. Perform some activity and make sure you can account for the changes. Of course, this assumes that any of the features are active at all without a trigger from $THREE_LETTER_AGENCY.
They'll do this--the baseline charge will be $49.99/month. "abusers" like you and I will be charged $49.99/month + packet charges. Don't think that bandwidth sensitive pricing will be a good deal for the light user!
We use the one MS machine running the proprietary software as a gateway, running a router on it if necessary.
Fat chance. The EULA grants the purchaser of a license perpetual right to use, so even if that clickwrap is enforceable, that's an absurd scenario.
Just because corporations tend towards immorality in the name of the almighty buck doesn't mean right-minded people shouldn't do something about it. So, Jon, how about naming some names? Who are these companies? How many of you buy their products? Influence purchase of their products at work? Let's send a message!