You are confusing the term "independent label" with the term "non-RIAA member label".
Well, you got me there... I certainly am confused! I don't recall using either of those terms, and I certainly don't recall trying to define them as any one thing or another...
What I was responding to was GP's wild claim that "thousands" of the so-called "indie" labels which are available on eMusic are all RIAA affiliates to extent that they are contributing money to the RIAA's coffers. I simply challenged him to prove his allegation with something other than that ridiculous list which RIAA itself supplies and which everyone seems to believe represents their list of card-carrying financial supporters.
With respect to that discussion, who owns the "indie" label is in itself largely irrelevant as far as my point is concerned - what's important is whether anyone in the ownership chain is an actual RIAA member or financial backer. I think it's loopy to use the RIAA's own list as definitive proof of such a connection and I strongly disagree with GP's incredible claim that buying downloads from eMusic therefore helps to fund the RIAA.
(btw, Rusty... I LOVE SomaFM!!! You are my #1 radio station - Internet or otherwise - and I am happy to support you in the fight against this insane change)
I asked for proof because he didn't give any... one anecdotal example does not equal proof and quoting the RIAA's own list does not equal proof of RIAA membership either. That's why their list is referred to as "Distributed Labels of Reporting Companies" and not "RIAA Members". Do you understand what that means or do you need me to parse it for you?
The RIAA would love to have you believe that their list represents actual members - and obviously you believe - but it's NOT. It's yet another of their misleading representations that makes them look bigger and more powerful than they really are.
As for RIAA Radar, yeah... I should have mentioned that too. I used to go by that as well until I realized that they are simply using the same damn "Distributed Labels" list that the RIAA is publishing. Net result? You're not buying stuff from hundreds of labels who truly are independant simply because you can't see through the RIAA's semantic ruse. Meanwhile, the RIAA is laughing because they've convinced you to boycott many of the very people you want to support.
No... if you want to be certain of who is RIAA and who isn't you're going to have to show me their actual paid membership list. Now THAT I will accept as proof... but you can't show me that because the RIAA won't give you that list. Their actual membership is so secret that members don't even pay their dues directly to the RIAA - you're supposed to pay them "in confidence" by way of their accountants. Why do you suppose they do that?!?
If you want to cite Beggar's Banquet then show me where they paid dues to the RIAA, or where they are owned by a company that paid dues to the RIAA, or where they actually admit to being an RIAA member. But then you'll also have to explain to me how one single example extends to GP's claim of "thousands of labels". Good luck with either of those tasks...
...to check out just how many RIAA labels there are on emusic - there's thousands listed on emusic, and you can bet thousands of those are RIAA affiliates
WTF? So the basis of your statement is that you found that there were thousands of labels on eMusic, therefore thousands of them are RIAA affiliates? What a breath-taking leap of logic!
I'd be happy to believe your opinion - because that's all it seems to be at this point - if you can provide some actual proof of what you're saying. And please don't simply cite RIAA's own page of "distributed labels of reporting companies" or the Wikipedia equivalent, because neither of those lists are verifiable of actual paying members
No... that is painfully wrong. Boobytraps are illegal because they are indiscriminate. They have no intrinsic ability to determine right vs wrong, or appropriate response vs inappropriate response. Maybe that's why they're called boobytraps?
Wiring your car seat to injure a car thief sounds like a good idea until it inadvertently blows the ass off a parking valet, that towtruck driver who's trying to help you out of the ditch, or perhaps your own teenage daughter who you asked to please move the car into the garage, sweetie...
IANAL, but it's one of the few principles I still remember from my undergraduate "Intro to Law" class.
Sure it's possible to burn a CD with those images, and not just because some mysterious pedophile hacker is doing it remotely or via malicious code.
Ever burn an mp3 disc by simply dropping and dragging folders? Did you check each and every folder to make sure that there were only your expected mp3's stored there?
Ever burned a backup disc? Again, did you copy that 600+ MB's of data over one file at a time or did you just drag bunches of folders over?
If the kid's hard drive was compromised and there were images on there that he didn't know about, it's reasonable to suggest that some of those images may have unknowingly been burned to disc. One would have to know a lot more of the specific circumstances surrounding that disc before passing judgement.
Now if someone had written "Kiddie Pr0n" on the CD using a Sharpie, then circumstance might be a bit more obvious...
I would prefer to say that they are guilty of very confusing advertising...
Just to be clear on what is meant by "subscription only", they are NOT like Rhapsody, et al, where you are only renting the songs for as long as you subscribe. What you get are unadulterated and DRM-free mp3 files which are yours to keep forever. In fact, you can download them again and again - as long as you are a current subscriber and the songs are still in eMusic's catalog.
The biggest complaint with eMusic's FAQ pages is that they are not easy to get to, especially for the new user who comes to the site cold or via a promotional ad link. They're not impossible to get to, but they sure don't make it easy and it requires a bit of browsing.
You can find eMusic's own Help pages here which include answers about subscriptions, including price. Also, there is a very good eMusic FAQ here which is maintained by an avid eMusic fan.
GP's $0.22USD per track is correct, given that eMusic's charge per song ultimately depends on your subscription level. It also depends on whether you are a relatively new subscriber or not.
The $0.33USD you are quoting is based on a current 65 downloads/month subscription - this rate went into effect sometime last November. The GP's cost is based on the 90 downloads/month rate which was in effect prior to last November. My own cost is even less than $0.22USD per download as I am on an Annual subscription rate.
What is interesting about this difference in rates is that if you were an older (pre-November) subscriber you get to keep your old rate for as long as you keep your subscription current... the new rate only applies to new subscribers. There's not too many services of any kind that are willing to do that. How would you like to be a charter subscriber to Time magazine and still be paying the 1923 price of fifteen cents per issue?
It should be noted that although eMusic may charge $0.22USD per download, they actually pay more to the label/distributor/artist per download than what they charge the subscribers. The key is that it's a subscription service and they bank on the fact that not all subscribers will use up all of their monthly allotted downloads. Think "gym membership" as a suitable analogy - you pay each month, whether you exercise or not.
Also, with eMusic you can effectively take the RIAA's "cut" out of the equation - as the number one download site for independent music (and number two download site overall, behind iTunes) they don't deal with the majors at all or subsidize their litiginous behaviour.
Since when does the phrase "keep track of..." mean the same as "keep copies of..." or "keep forever..."?
I'm reading comments about "retention policies" mentioned in TFA but it doesn't say anything at all about any particular policy.
I'm reading comments about not being able to overwrite backup tapes anymore but again TFA doesn't say that at all.
What the hell is the panic?!? All it says is that companies should keep track of their documents and - in case of litigation - should be able to produce those documents in a timely manner and readable form. Where exactly does it say anything more than that?
As an aside, the comment about a routine backup being considered "virtual shredding" is a great example of how really crappy journalism has become these days with their sensationalist fear-mongering for the sake of making a dull story sound scary. It makes it suddenly sound illegal or suspicious when in fact there is nothing illegal about shredding in itself... we do it all the time where I work and it's NOT illegal or even remotely suspicious! And there is nothing intrinsically illegal about "virtual shredding" either. But they won't bother to clarify that in TFA because then it wouldn't sound as dangerous. So much for truthiness...
The point is not that the train wouldn't run with one blocked door open, it's that all the other doors would not close either - even the ones that were not blocked. So how do you tell which door is the one that has the gum stuck in it? If all of the unstuck doors were to close you could tell quite easily and be on your way in short order... but if ALL of them stayed open you'd have to check each and every door and hope that you find the bad door sooner rather than later.
But good citizens don't have secrets! As long as the discussion keeps getting entangled with this whole issue of "keeping secrets", our right to privacy will continue to be eroded.
Personally, I'm sick of hearing people say "It doesn't bother me because I have nothing to hide"... and believe me I've heard it a lot since you-know-when. That's not the point!
Privacy isn't about keeping secrets - it's about being safe from intrusion and unwarranted observation. There's nothing secret about the places I go or the things I do, but that doesn't mean I'm OK with having my activities showing up in a database or on a video monitor somewhere.
Well... you could begin by explaining how you managed to get YOUR facts wrong. The fact that you misquoted the parent's sig makes me think that you may have some special insight into the process.:)
I actually work at such a place! I do enterprise level development for a major manufacturer and switch between MSSQL and DB2 on a regular basis. We also have Oracle based apps but I've managed to avoid them. So far. But when I finally get called on to do Oracle work it's nice to know my first edition copy of this book will continue to serve me well.
fwiw, I also use MySQL at home. I have definitely gotten my $$$'s worth from it and recommend it highly.
I don't know about the second edition, but I have the first and I use it - a lot! It's great and the small size makes it easy to carry around in my gear bag.
The book isn't about the different database products as it is about SQL in general, so it's not really divided into sections by database (oracle vs db2, etc.). As you say, the majority of SQL is the same between various db's. The first edition documents SQL in general and only footnotes product differences when and where they exist. Most of its content is assumed to apply to all of the products and a lot of the actual differences are only noted parenthetically.
IIRC, it was Borland that got sued over their Quatro Pro spreadsheet. The issue wasn't about the "look and feel" in general, it was about Borland creating a "compatibility mode" feature which - when enabled - duplicated the Lotus command structure (keystrokes and menu tree).
Last I heard Lotus had won the case but got reversed on appeal. It was supposed to go to the SCOTUS but I don't recall if it did or not.
GoDaddy is owned by Bob Parsons, of Parson's Technology fame. Parson's Technology had tax and accounting software that rivaled Intuit's at half the cost. In the true spirit of American competition, Intuit responded by buying out Parson's, leaving Bob with a boatload of money and a forced 4-year retirement (as stipulated in the Intuit deal) in Arizona.
After 4 years of boredom, Bob got back into the biz by starting up GoDaddy with the proceeds of the Intuit deal. GoDaddy was already paid for by the time they opened their doors.
When you first start to find graves, burial sites of ancient man, you have to suggest there was a reason, a belief in an afterlife of some sort... a religion.
You're assuming that the concept of burial wasn't "invented" simply as a way of keeping predators away from the tribal settlements.
Like most things in life, there's no real need to assume that religion had anything to do with the origin of the practice, but it's plenty obvious that religion has taken it over at some point. It's this shameless co-opting of history and reality by that particularly bothers me.
If I get a machine calling me, I hang up right away.
As long as you're not paying for the call, do what I do: DON'T HANG UP! Keep the g*damn machine on the line as long as possible and make their system as inefficient as possible.
EVEN AFTER THE MACHINE HANGS UP, I still keep the line open until I know the line has disconnected from MY end (you'll know its dropped when it starts to dial you into the pre-recorded message that tells you to hang up).
I like to go that extra mile because it keeps the line open a while longer and when the machine tries to flash the line to make another call all it gets is dead air until the line is completely dropped. You can even hear it trying to flash to the next call while your line is still open.
It's a small, but satisfying victory. But imagine the impact if everyone were to do this!
Slashdot Mirror
You are confusing the term "independent label" with the term "non-RIAA member label".
Well, you got me there... I certainly am confused! I don't recall using either of those terms, and I certainly don't recall trying to define them as any one thing or another...
What I was responding to was GP's wild claim that "thousands" of the so-called "indie" labels which are available on eMusic are all RIAA affiliates to extent that they are contributing money to the RIAA's coffers. I simply challenged him to prove his allegation with something other than that ridiculous list which RIAA itself supplies and which everyone seems to believe represents their list of card-carrying financial supporters.
With respect to that discussion, who owns the "indie" label is in itself largely irrelevant as far as my point is concerned - what's important is whether anyone in the ownership chain is an actual RIAA member or financial backer. I think it's loopy to use the RIAA's own list as definitive proof of such a connection and I strongly disagree with GP's incredible claim that buying downloads from eMusic therefore helps to fund the RIAA.
(btw, Rusty... I LOVE SomaFM!!! You are my #1 radio station - Internet or otherwise - and I am happy to support you in the fight against this insane change)
I asked for proof because he didn't give any... one anecdotal example does not equal proof and quoting the RIAA's own list does not equal proof of RIAA membership either. That's why their list is referred to as "Distributed Labels of Reporting Companies" and not "RIAA Members". Do you understand what that means or do you need me to parse it for you?
The RIAA would love to have you believe that their list represents actual members - and obviously you believe - but it's NOT. It's yet another of their misleading representations that makes them look bigger and more powerful than they really are.
As for RIAA Radar, yeah... I should have mentioned that too. I used to go by that as well until I realized that they are simply using the same damn "Distributed Labels" list that the RIAA is publishing. Net result? You're not buying stuff from hundreds of labels who truly are independant simply because you can't see through the RIAA's semantic ruse. Meanwhile, the RIAA is laughing because they've convinced you to boycott many of the very people you want to support.
No... if you want to be certain of who is RIAA and who isn't you're going to have to show me their actual paid membership list. Now THAT I will accept as proof... but you can't show me that because the RIAA won't give you that list. Their actual membership is so secret that members don't even pay their dues directly to the RIAA - you're supposed to pay them "in confidence" by way of their accountants. Why do you suppose they do that?!?
If you want to cite Beggar's Banquet then show me where they paid dues to the RIAA, or where they are owned by a company that paid dues to the RIAA, or where they actually admit to being an RIAA member. But then you'll also have to explain to me how one single example extends to GP's claim of "thousands of labels". Good luck with either of those tasks...
...to check out just how many RIAA labels there are on emusic - there's thousands listed on emusic, and you can bet thousands of those are RIAA affiliates
WTF? So the basis of your statement is that you found that there were thousands of labels on eMusic, therefore thousands of them are RIAA affiliates? What a breath-taking leap of logic!
I'd be happy to believe your opinion - because that's all it seems to be at this point - if you can provide some actual proof of what you're saying. And please don't simply cite RIAA's own page of "distributed labels of reporting companies" or the Wikipedia equivalent, because neither of those lists are verifiable of actual paying members
No... that is painfully wrong. Boobytraps are illegal because they are indiscriminate. They have no intrinsic ability to determine right vs wrong, or appropriate response vs inappropriate response. Maybe that's why they're called boobytraps?
Wiring your car seat to injure a car thief sounds like a good idea until it inadvertently blows the ass off a parking valet, that towtruck driver who's trying to help you out of the ditch, or perhaps your own teenage daughter who you asked to please move the car into the garage, sweetie...
IANAL, but it's one of the few principles I still remember from my undergraduate "Intro to Law" class.
Sure it's possible to burn a CD with those images, and not just because some mysterious pedophile hacker is doing it remotely or via malicious code.
Ever burn an mp3 disc by simply dropping and dragging folders? Did you check each and every folder to make sure that there were only your expected mp3's stored there?
Ever burned a backup disc? Again, did you copy that 600+ MB's of data over one file at a time or did you just drag bunches of folders over?
If the kid's hard drive was compromised and there were images on there that he didn't know about, it's reasonable to suggest that some of those images may have unknowingly been burned to disc. One would have to know a lot more of the specific circumstances surrounding that disc before passing judgement.
Now if someone had written "Kiddie Pr0n" on the CD using a Sharpie, then circumstance might be a bit more obvious...
I would prefer to say that they are guilty of very confusing advertising...
Just to be clear on what is meant by "subscription only", they are NOT like Rhapsody, et al, where you are only renting the songs for as long as you subscribe. What you get are unadulterated and DRM-free mp3 files which are yours to keep forever. In fact, you can download them again and again - as long as you are a current subscriber and the songs are still in eMusic's catalog.
The biggest complaint with eMusic's FAQ pages is that they are not easy to get to, especially for the new user who comes to the site cold or via a promotional ad link. They're not impossible to get to, but they sure don't make it easy and it requires a bit of browsing.
You can find eMusic's own Help pages here which include answers about subscriptions, including price. Also, there is a very good eMusic FAQ here which is maintained by an avid eMusic fan.
GP's $0.22USD per track is correct, given that eMusic's charge per song ultimately depends on your subscription level. It also depends on whether you are a relatively new subscriber or not.
The $0.33USD you are quoting is based on a current 65 downloads/month subscription - this rate went into effect sometime last November. The GP's cost is based on the 90 downloads/month rate which was in effect prior to last November. My own cost is even less than $0.22USD per download as I am on an Annual subscription rate.
What is interesting about this difference in rates is that if you were an older (pre-November) subscriber you get to keep your old rate for as long as you keep your subscription current... the new rate only applies to new subscribers. There's not too many services of any kind that are willing to do that. How would you like to be a charter subscriber to Time magazine and still be paying the 1923 price of fifteen cents per issue?
It should be noted that although eMusic may charge $0.22USD per download, they actually pay more to the label/distributor/artist per download than what they charge the subscribers. The key is that it's a subscription service and they bank on the fact that not all subscribers will use up all of their monthly allotted downloads. Think "gym membership" as a suitable analogy - you pay each month, whether you exercise or not.
Also, with eMusic you can effectively take the RIAA's "cut" out of the equation - as the number one download site for independent music (and number two download site overall, behind iTunes) they don't deal with the majors at all or subsidize their litiginous behaviour.
... but is everyone taking crazy pills today?
Since when does the phrase "keep track of..." mean the same as "keep copies of..." or "keep forever..."?
I'm reading comments about "retention policies" mentioned in TFA but it doesn't say anything at all about any particular policy.
I'm reading comments about not being able to overwrite backup tapes anymore but again TFA doesn't say that at all.
What the hell is the panic?!? All it says is that companies should keep track of their documents and - in case of litigation - should be able to produce those documents in a timely manner and readable form. Where exactly does it say anything more than that?
As an aside, the comment about a routine backup being considered "virtual shredding" is a great example of how really crappy journalism has become these days with their sensationalist fear-mongering for the sake of making a dull story sound scary. It makes it suddenly sound illegal or suspicious when in fact there is nothing illegal about shredding in itself... we do it all the time where I work and it's NOT illegal or even remotely suspicious! And there is nothing intrinsically illegal about "virtual shredding" either. But they won't bother to clarify that in TFA because then it wouldn't sound as dangerous. So much for truthiness...
The point is not that the train wouldn't run with one blocked door open, it's that all the other doors would not close either - even the ones that were not blocked. So how do you tell which door is the one that has the gum stuck in it? If all of the unstuck doors were to close you could tell quite easily and be on your way in short order... but if ALL of them stayed open you'd have to check each and every door and hope that you find the bad door sooner rather than later.
everyone has secrets...
But good citizens don't have secrets! As long as the discussion keeps getting entangled with this whole issue of "keeping secrets", our right to privacy will continue to be eroded.
Personally, I'm sick of hearing people say "It doesn't bother me because I have nothing to hide"... and believe me I've heard it a lot since you-know-when. That's not the point!
Privacy isn't about keeping secrets - it's about being safe from intrusion and unwarranted observation. There's nothing secret about the places I go or the things I do, but that doesn't mean I'm OK with having my activities showing up in a database or on a video monitor somewhere.
Well... you could begin by explaining how you managed to get YOUR facts wrong. The fact that you misquoted the parent's sig makes me think that you may have some special insight into the process. :)
Police can't hire private citizens to do those tasks that the laws prohibit law-enforcement from performing.
Good luck explaining that to the FBI, although I guess since they didn't actually "hire" this guy it doesn't really count the same...
* raises hand *
I actually work at such a place! I do enterprise level development for a major manufacturer and switch between MSSQL and DB2 on a regular basis. We also have Oracle based apps but I've managed to avoid them. So far. But when I finally get called on to do Oracle work it's nice to know my first edition copy of this book will continue to serve me well.
fwiw, I also use MySQL at home. I have definitely gotten my $$$'s worth from it and recommend it highly.
I don't know about the second edition, but I have the first and I use it - a lot! It's great and the small size makes it easy to carry around in my gear bag.
The book isn't about the different database products as it is about SQL in general, so it's not really divided into sections by database (oracle vs db2, etc.). As you say, the majority of SQL is the same between various db's. The first edition documents SQL in general and only footnotes product differences when and where they exist. Most of its content is assumed to apply to all of the products and a lot of the actual differences are only noted parenthetically.
IIRC, it was Borland that got sued over their Quatro Pro spreadsheet. The issue wasn't about the "look and feel" in general, it was about Borland creating a "compatibility mode" feature which - when enabled - duplicated the Lotus command structure (keystrokes and menu tree).
Last I heard Lotus had won the case but got reversed on appeal. It was supposed to go to the SCOTUS but I don't recall if it did or not.
Make that "Goverment Idiots Association of America". Then I can catch all of the morons with one single regex ("*IAA")
I see.
So if a giga-byte is a billion bytes and a giga-watt is a billion watts, then wtf is a giga-ntic...?
Don't you mean 1 point 21 Jiggawatts...???
Not in GoDaddy's case...
GoDaddy is owned by Bob Parsons, of Parson's Technology fame. Parson's Technology had tax and accounting software that rivaled Intuit's at half the cost. In the true spirit of American competition, Intuit responded by buying out Parson's, leaving Bob with a boatload of money and a forced 4-year retirement (as stipulated in the Intuit deal) in Arizona.
After 4 years of boredom, Bob got back into the biz by starting up GoDaddy with the proceeds of the Intuit deal. GoDaddy was already paid for by the time they opened their doors.
members of the general public will be able to mail in their own DNA
Here's the address:
Sign Me Up!
Box TIA^h^h^hDNA
Dept. of Homeland Security
Somewhere
Washington, D.C. 20666
i'd say you already have a 'browser extension' for it.
However, if you're unhappy with the size of your extension, i h4v3 s0m3 pi11z th4t cn f1x th4t 4 U!!!!!
When you first start to find graves, burial sites of ancient man, you have to suggest there was a reason, a belief in an afterlife of some sort... a religion.
You're assuming that the concept of burial wasn't "invented" simply as a way of keeping predators away from the tribal settlements.
Like most things in life, there's no real need to assume that religion had anything to do with the origin of the practice, but it's plenty obvious that religion has taken it over at some point. It's this shameless co-opting of history and reality by that particularly bothers me.
Can you put a pole in the ground just outside your door and then put the dish on the pole?
That's what I did...
If I get a machine calling me, I hang up right away.
As long as you're not paying for the call, do what I do: DON'T HANG UP! Keep the g*damn machine on the line as long as possible and make their system as inefficient as possible.
EVEN AFTER THE MACHINE HANGS UP, I still keep the line open until I know the line has disconnected from MY end (you'll know its dropped when it starts to dial you into the pre-recorded message that tells you to hang up).
I like to go that extra mile because it keeps the line open a while longer and when the machine tries to flash the line to make another call all it gets is dead air until the line is completely dropped. You can even hear it trying to flash to the next call while your line is still open.
It's a small, but satisfying victory. But imagine the impact if everyone were to do this!
but wont they get scratched/ruined easily? ... as reported previously on slashdot