>> the multi-touch Magic Mouse is right up there on the techno-lust-inspiration scale.
It seems like a half-assed implementation of multi-touch so far. Example: you need a keyboard shortcut to use it for zoom. Why the hell wouldn't they just use "pinch" like on their other multi-touch systems? I smell another epic fail in the world of Apple mice.
The mini-server is interesting though... and I'm already lusting after the 27" quad-core i7. Having video-IN on the 27" is impressive, and negates some of the planned-obsolesence of such a huge monitor while making it also a potential bridge to AV systems.
Well, maybe my corporate IT dept. has borked their standard image, but those are real timed numbers. After all, I have little else I can do with my computer while waiting.:)
Nothing else running, fresh boot (after waiting for all other startup crap to finish). Windows XP professional, 2GB RAM, etc., etc.
Our older version wasn't great (no sort-on-subject at all), but easily 3x faster.
>> Lotus Notes was pure crap, and I say that as an ex-Lotus employee.
Actually, Lotus Notes is pure crap. I say that as a current Lotus Notes user. It's a reason unto itself to find a new employer.
Two simple examples:
- we just "upgraded" to v8.5. It takes 127 seconds to start up. It takes 38 seconds more to show me my inbox. It takes 47 seconds to bring up the editor to reply to the first mail of the day. This is all on a fairly new Dell D630 laptop.
- Sort by subject: "Hello world" does not get sorted with "Re: Hello World", nor with "Fw: Hello World". All your "Re:"s and "Fw:"s get sorted together.
It gets better even on the main page... I was wondering why the hell "Microsoft" would be tagged in the red light article... they're evil, but that's a new low for them to be behind that kinda stuff.:)
How did I end up in the Windows 7 thread from the "CA City Mulls Evading the Law On Red Light Cameras" article? It even shows that in the address bar, so I'm not crazy here...
It certainly is an interesting area - unfortunately I can't quote a case that shows it decided one way or the other though (IANAL, etc).
>>For me a photograph at a wedding is nothing more than a band hired to perform a gig at this same wedding where they don't hold musical score rights
Well... I'd counter that with: does hiring the band give the bride the right to videotape their performance and sell copies of that video online? Probably not.
Photography for hire is a strange one for sure. I guess you need to be explicit in the contract up front on who owns the copyright, otherwise it defaults to the photographer. I know photographers that will sell the copyright to the bride/groom, but for a significant sum (i.e. about the same as their expected profit from the job total). Usually that means they get the negatives / original files too.
By now, it's probably just us debating this, I'm sure.:)
>> Considering this, I think that in a trial, fair use reproduction of a wedding photograph would include:
- reframing
- copy for personal backup
- electronic copy
- use on a greeting card
- copy to put on display in the house
- copy to send to close family
- copy to put on a web page, on a Facebook profile etc.
And so on. I would really like to see literature suggesting otherwise
Yes, but all your examples above are creating a new product from the original, each with the value of the original, which could have been purchased from the copyright holder. "Fair Use" is not about creating a duplicate or getting around paying for another copy of something... it's not an excuse to not pay.
"Backup" of a physical item is a strange concept, but I guess I might be persueded to listen if you made a digital scan of a photo and archived it in a valut. However, if you start displaying that digital copy on your web page or greeting cards, you've infringed my copyright. I don't see that as a grey area... it's clear infringement.
As an analogy to music (sorry!) - making backup MP3 copies is fine... but posting them on your web page is not. Giving them with friends is not (and yes, I realize that one is debated, but I don't believe successfully).
>>Because yes, you can totally copy pictures all you want, even if they are made by a professional photographer, as long as it's under private / fair use.
Sorry for the late post here, but "Private" does not equate to "Fair Use". Fair use has nothing to do with commercial application / profit... even copying your own family portrait for your own use is not "fair use".
Reproducing a thumbnail of it to publish alongside a critique of a photographer's work... probably fair use. Cropping to a small section to show the grain structure of the film used... probably fair use. Reproducing the whole work for other uses? Probably not.
>> Your average citizen wouldn't realize that it's a copyright violation to scan that wedding picture that a professional photographer took (99 times out of 100 unless you negotiated that in the contract.)
Unfortunately I'll slightly disagree... In highschool I made some side money photographing all the sports teams in our school (action shots) and selling them to the kids/parents (I went on to become a professional photographer). All pictures were stamped on the back with a blatant copyright and do not copy notice. Despite the VERY reasonable prices I charged for reprints, I had parents bring the prints into the camera shop I also worked in on weekends to get them copied.
I'd usually play it cool and simply show them the stamp on the back (they didn't know who I was at the time) and they'd always say "yeah, I know, but can you do it for me anyways?". I loved the sheepish look they got when I explained that no, I couldn't, even if I wasn't the photographer. ("tee hee... oops...")
So, ignorance isn't as prevalent as their desire to avoid cost, even when that cost is minimal. (about $2 surcharge at the time)
I challenge any claim that this has environmental benefits...
1) metal computer cases do not significantly contribute to environmental issues. Sure, they add bulk to landfills, but they aren't full of toxins or dangerous substances. It's the motherboards and components that are of concern with disposing of this type of stuff... and that's all still present in a cardboard-cased computer.
2) by making the outside of the computer more "disposable", they're encouraging people to throw them away at the end of life more than to recycle them... people will feel less guilty about doing so. If you think 18% recycling today is bad, this won't help improve things. You'd be better off making cases out of lead, mercury, and plutonium to get people to handle them properly upon disposal.
Net effect? More disposal of the stuff that actually causes problems... sorry, this ain't a winner.
>> If anything the last decade has taught us about the modus operandi of music industries is that they simply dont care and want their dollars.
Actually to be more specific, they want their dollars now. The actions they've taken are very short-sighted, and don't consider the long-term impact on the demand for music (or demand for "legitimate" music) in general.
If you make listening to music a pain in the butt, people will do it less. This negatively impacts the size of their potential market (both legal and illegal). The music listening and appreciation habits people pick up as a youngster will follow them for life... so even if you're successful in reducing the amount of pirated music teenagers listen to, you're only reducing the volume of legitimate music they'll purchase later in life.
I can't believe I'm saying this, but the RIAA should take the approach that Microsoft did in China... turn a blind eye to the pirated copies of their product in order to build a larger future market when that market matures.
At an old company, our lead tech kept talking about how to configure one of our digital scanners, using the acronym for "Scanner Look-Up Table"... even writing it in big, bold letters on the board. Being a 50+year-old Vietnamese guy, it didn't mean anything to him, and he just kept on going.
We peed ourselves laughing... our boss didn't when he walked into the room to see a huge "SLUT" written on the board.:)
I can barely accomplish it, and it's not legible when it's finished. Your version may seem logical, but it's incorrect. Thanks for playing the "grammar nazi" game, better luck next time.:)
I rarely hand-write anything anymore, and find that although I can type over 80wpm, I can barely hand-scratch an illegible paragraph without significant hand pain. My writing quality - and even my signature - has gone downhill over the last 10 years to the point where it's almost useless.
What I think is now putting it over the edge is that I broke my thumb, and although it's now healed, it's painful to properly grip a pen. In the old days, forcing myself to write would have probably been enough physio therapy to help that, but I do it so seldom now, it just keeps me from trying.
If we have a nuclear war and all our electronics get toasted, we're in trouble...
If the key is as large as the data (hence my reference to one-time-padding), then ANY result is possible - up to a result the size of the data of course, including compression.
Even with a smaller key, there are multiple possibilities. The bigger the difference in size, the less chances of any of those possibilities being useful - 99.999999%+++ would be trash.
However, it would be possible to hide innocuous files in the random data store - using different keys would show different contents. i.e. key1 results in fileA + lots of garbage. key2 decodes some garbage, filesB+C, and more garbage, etc. You could give them any of the valid keys, and claim that the rest truly is random crap. It would be trivial to code.
Assuming that you still live in one of the few societies that still have a presumption of innocence until proven guilty, the matter is simple... the burden of proof is on the prosecution.
It's simple in that case, isn't it?
1) you have a block of encrypted data on your computer. Posession of encrypted data should NOT mean that you're guilty... however some draconian laws now say that you have to provide the keys.
2) so long as ANY key will decrypt the data successfully, just with varying results (some valid, others not), shouldn't it be sufficient to provide ANY key, claiming it was the valid one? So long as the software creates a random-sized, randomly-generated block of data when you install it, it should be impossible to say for sure if there was ever anything valid in there in the first place.
Theoretically, a block of random data could decrypt an infinate number of ways (well, almost infinate) depending on the key you provide. It's the "infinate monkeys, infinate typewriters" argument - if the police got lucky and provided the right key, they could theoretically convert that random data into child porn, or into gospel music... something that you could probably prove in court using a one-time-pad system.
My suggestion: - write a program that handles file encryption - ensure that when it installs, it creates a random-sized, random-content storage file which is updated regularly by a daemon, even if not used. - include multiple encryption options, including one-time-padding, to enable plausable deniability later
Guilty-until-proven-innocent is an impossible situation because you can't generally prove a negative. If simple posession of encryption tools or encrypted data is enough to hang you... flee. That's all I can suggest.
>> âoePiracy, counterfeiting and other intellectual property rights violations not only cost U.S. businesses jobs and billions of dollars a year in lost revenue, they can also pose significant health and safety risks to consumers,â he said.
Health and Safety risks? Give me a f*&%ing break... at least with regards to Intellectual Property. Sure, counterfeit aircraft replacement parts pose a real safety problem (and it's a real problem... go after that one, guys!), but copying videogames?
If the guy was overtly doing this to enable the use of pirated games, then sure, he's guilty. But if the majority of his work is to enable homebrew or emulation software, they should set him free and give him a pat on the back. I lose all sympathy for the copyright holders when they try to use FUD about "Health and Safety" to prop up their failing business model.
I certainly agree... I wasn't an Apple fan before I bought the iMac, but I was looking for a quiet, compact desktop system. Their stuff is gorgeously designed and has a quality feel you can't get with most PC stuff.
What really convinced me was their official support for Boot Camp. It took the risk out of trying Apple. I started running Parallels, having Windows on one monitor and OSX on the other... now I don't bother, and just run OSX. It was the smartest marketing strategy Apple has had.
The "OSX Experience" has been very enlightening... not having to fight drivers, viruses, crashing, slowness... maybe I could have bought a computer for 1/2 the price, but it wouldn't have been even 50% as good of an experience.
You get what you pay for... and I'm sick of the disposable crap that most companies want to sell you these days.
They gave me a full year of normal warranty on the new machine, even though my original warranty+Applecare was almost expired. Most companies would have only warrantied to the original date.
On top (again), they offered me another AppleCare plan for $129 to bring the warranty on the new machine to 3 years. I was impressed by that.
Slashdot Mirror
>> the multi-touch Magic Mouse is right up there on the techno-lust-inspiration scale.
It seems like a half-assed implementation of multi-touch so far. Example: you need a keyboard shortcut to use it for zoom. Why the hell wouldn't they just use "pinch" like on their other multi-touch systems? I smell another epic fail in the world of Apple mice.
The mini-server is interesting though... and I'm already lusting after the 27" quad-core i7. Having video-IN on the 27" is impressive, and negates some of the planned-obsolesence of such a huge monitor while making it also a potential bridge to AV systems.
MadCow.
>> preferred 39 days of abstinence to 6 months!
So, bring girl astronauts too... problem solved. As long as they look like the Bond girls in Moonraker, who cares how long the trip takes? :)
Well, maybe my corporate IT dept. has borked their standard image, but those are real timed numbers. After all, I have little else I can do with my computer while waiting. :)
Nothing else running, fresh boot (after waiting for all other startup crap to finish). Windows XP professional, 2GB RAM, etc., etc.
Our older version wasn't great (no sort-on-subject at all), but easily 3x faster.
>> Lotus Notes was pure crap, and I say that as an ex-Lotus employee.
Actually, Lotus Notes is pure crap. I say that as a current Lotus Notes user. It's a reason unto itself to find a new employer.
Two simple examples:
- we just "upgraded" to v8.5. It takes 127 seconds to start up. It takes 38 seconds more to show me my inbox. It takes 47 seconds to bring up the editor to reply to the first mail of the day. This is all on a fairly new Dell D630 laptop.
- Sort by subject: "Hello world" does not get sorted with "Re: Hello World", nor with "Fw: Hello World". All your "Re:"s and "Fw:"s get sorted together.
There are many more.
MadCow.
$10k is a marketing expense... not a penalty. It won't change anything.
It gets better even on the main page... I was wondering why the hell "Microsoft" would be tagged in the red light article... they're evil, but that's a new low for them to be behind that kinda stuff. :)
Exactly... Slashcode... he's a jackass. :)
How did I end up in the Windows 7 thread from the "CA City Mulls Evading the Law On Red Light Cameras" article? It even shows that in the address bar, so I'm not crazy here...
It certainly is an interesting area - unfortunately I can't quote a case that shows it decided one way or the other though (IANAL, etc).
>>For me a photograph at a wedding is nothing more than a band hired to perform a gig at this same wedding where they don't hold musical score rights
Well... I'd counter that with: does hiring the band give the bride the right to videotape their performance and sell copies of that video online? Probably not.
Photography for hire is a strange one for sure. I guess you need to be explicit in the contract up front on who owns the copyright, otherwise it defaults to the photographer. I know photographers that will sell the copyright to the bride/groom, but for a significant sum (i.e. about the same as their expected profit from the job total). Usually that means they get the negatives / original files too.
By now, it's probably just us debating this, I'm sure. :)
>>Wrong. People in glass houses shouldn't undress.
No - people in glass houses should undress... but people shouldn't buy glass houses unless they're hot 21-year-old nurses.
>> Considering this, I think that in a trial, fair use reproduction of a wedding photograph would include:
- reframing
- copy for personal backup
- electronic copy
- use on a greeting card
- copy to put on display in the house
- copy to send to close family
- copy to put on a web page, on a Facebook profile etc.
And so on. I would really like to see literature suggesting otherwise
Yes, but all your examples above are creating a new product from the original, each with the value of the original, which could have been purchased from the copyright holder. "Fair Use" is not about creating a duplicate or getting around paying for another copy of something... it's not an excuse to not pay.
"Backup" of a physical item is a strange concept, but I guess I might be persueded to listen if you made a digital scan of a photo and archived it in a valut. However, if you start displaying that digital copy on your web page or greeting cards, you've infringed my copyright. I don't see that as a grey area... it's clear infringement.
As an analogy to music (sorry!) - making backup MP3 copies is fine... but posting them on your web page is not. Giving them with friends is not (and yes, I realize that one is debated, but I don't believe successfully).
MadCow.
>>Because yes, you can totally copy pictures all you want, even if they are made by a professional photographer, as long as it's under private / fair use.
Sorry for the late post here, but "Private" does not equate to "Fair Use". Fair use has nothing to do with commercial application / profit... even copying your own family portrait for your own use is not "fair use".
Reproducing a thumbnail of it to publish alongside a critique of a photographer's work... probably fair use. Cropping to a small section to show the grain structure of the film used... probably fair use. Reproducing the whole work for other uses? Probably not.
>> Your average citizen wouldn't realize that it's a copyright violation to scan that wedding picture that a professional photographer took (99 times out of 100 unless you negotiated that in the contract.)
Unfortunately I'll slightly disagree... In highschool I made some side money photographing all the sports teams in our school (action shots) and selling them to the kids/parents (I went on to become a professional photographer). All pictures were stamped on the back with a blatant copyright and do not copy notice. Despite the VERY reasonable prices I charged for reprints, I had parents bring the prints into the camera shop I also worked in on weekends to get them copied.
I'd usually play it cool and simply show them the stamp on the back (they didn't know who I was at the time) and they'd always say "yeah, I know, but can you do it for me anyways?". I loved the sheepish look they got when I explained that no, I couldn't, even if I wasn't the photographer. ("tee hee... oops...")
So, ignorance isn't as prevalent as their desire to avoid cost, even when that cost is minimal. (about $2 surcharge at the time)
I challenge any claim that this has environmental benefits...
1) metal computer cases do not significantly contribute to environmental issues. Sure, they add bulk to landfills, but they aren't full of toxins or dangerous substances. It's the motherboards and components that are of concern with disposing of this type of stuff... and that's all still present in a cardboard-cased computer.
2) by making the outside of the computer more "disposable", they're encouraging people to throw them away at the end of life more than to recycle them... people will feel less guilty about doing so. If you think 18% recycling today is bad, this won't help improve things. You'd be better off making cases out of lead, mercury, and plutonium to get people to handle them properly upon disposal.
Net effect? More disposal of the stuff that actually causes problems... sorry, this ain't a winner.
MadCow.
>> If anything the last decade has taught us about the modus operandi of music industries is that they simply dont care and want their dollars.
Actually to be more specific, they want their dollars now. The actions they've taken are very short-sighted, and don't consider the long-term impact on the demand for music (or demand for "legitimate" music) in general.
If you make listening to music a pain in the butt, people will do it less. This negatively impacts the size of their potential market (both legal and illegal). The music listening and appreciation habits people pick up as a youngster will follow them for life... so even if you're successful in reducing the amount of pirated music teenagers listen to, you're only reducing the volume of legitimate music they'll purchase later in life.
I can't believe I'm saying this, but the RIAA should take the approach that Microsoft did in China... turn a blind eye to the pirated copies of their product in order to build a larger future market when that market matures.
MadCow.
At an old company, our lead tech kept talking about how to configure one of our digital scanners, using the acronym for "Scanner Look-Up Table"... even writing it in big, bold letters on the board. Being a 50+year-old Vietnamese guy, it didn't mean anything to him, and he just kept on going.
We peed ourselves laughing... our boss didn't when he walked into the room to see a huge "SLUT" written on the board. :)
MadCow.
>>Fixed that for you.
No, actually, you didn't...
I can barely accomplish it, and it's not legible when it's finished. Your version may seem logical, but it's incorrect. Thanks for playing the "grammar nazi" game, better luck next time. :)
MadCow.
I rarely hand-write anything anymore, and find that although I can type over 80wpm, I can barely hand-scratch an illegible paragraph without significant hand pain. My writing quality - and even my signature - has gone downhill over the last 10 years to the point where it's almost useless.
What I think is now putting it over the edge is that I broke my thumb, and although it's now healed, it's painful to properly grip a pen. In the old days, forcing myself to write would have probably been enough physio therapy to help that, but I do it so seldom now, it just keeps me from trying.
If we have a nuclear war and all our electronics get toasted, we're in trouble...
Bonus points if you know who the "Friendly Giant" is... :)
Wow... I'm old.
If the key is as large as the data (hence my reference to one-time-padding), then ANY result is possible - up to a result the size of the data of course, including compression.
Even with a smaller key, there are multiple possibilities. The bigger the difference in size, the less chances of any of those possibilities being useful - 99.999999%+++ would be trash.
However, it would be possible to hide innocuous files in the random data store - using different keys would show different contents. i.e. key1 results in fileA + lots of garbage. key2 decodes some garbage, filesB+C, and more garbage, etc. You could give them any of the valid keys, and claim that the rest truly is random crap. It would be trivial to code.
MadCow.
Assuming that you still live in one of the few societies that still have a presumption of innocence until proven guilty, the matter is simple... the burden of proof is on the prosecution.
It's simple in that case, isn't it?
1) you have a block of encrypted data on your computer. Posession of encrypted data should NOT mean that you're guilty... however some draconian laws now say that you have to provide the keys.
2) so long as ANY key will decrypt the data successfully, just with varying results (some valid, others not), shouldn't it be sufficient to provide ANY key, claiming it was the valid one? So long as the software creates a random-sized, randomly-generated block of data when you install it, it should be impossible to say for sure if there was ever anything valid in there in the first place.
Theoretically, a block of random data could decrypt an infinate number of ways (well, almost infinate) depending on the key you provide. It's the "infinate monkeys, infinate typewriters" argument - if the police got lucky and provided the right key, they could theoretically convert that random data into child porn, or into gospel music... something that you could probably prove in court using a one-time-pad system.
My suggestion:
- write a program that handles file encryption
- ensure that when it installs, it creates a random-sized, random-content storage file which is updated regularly by a daemon, even if not used.
- include multiple encryption options, including one-time-padding, to enable plausable deniability later
Guilty-until-proven-innocent is an impossible situation because you can't generally prove a negative. If simple posession of encryption tools or encrypted data is enough to hang you... flee. That's all I can suggest.
MadCow.
It is not without precident... Case in point: Avro Arrow. Look it up.
Madcow
>> âoePiracy, counterfeiting and other intellectual property rights violations not only cost U.S. businesses jobs and billions of dollars a year in lost revenue, they can also pose significant health and safety risks to consumers,â he said.
Health and Safety risks? Give me a f*&%ing break... at least with regards to Intellectual Property. Sure, counterfeit aircraft replacement parts pose a real safety problem (and it's a real problem... go after that one, guys!), but copying videogames?
If the guy was overtly doing this to enable the use of pirated games, then sure, he's guilty. But if the majority of his work is to enable homebrew or emulation software, they should set him free and give him a pat on the back. I lose all sympathy for the copyright holders when they try to use FUD about "Health and Safety" to prop up their failing business model.
MadCow.
I certainly agree... I wasn't an Apple fan before I bought the iMac, but I was looking for a quiet, compact desktop system. Their stuff is gorgeously designed and has a quality feel you can't get with most PC stuff.
What really convinced me was their official support for Boot Camp. It took the risk out of trying Apple. I started running Parallels, having Windows on one monitor and OSX on the other... now I don't bother, and just run OSX. It was the smartest marketing strategy Apple has had.
The "OSX Experience" has been very enlightening... not having to fight drivers, viruses, crashing, slowness... maybe I could have bought a computer for 1/2 the price, but it wouldn't have been even 50% as good of an experience.
You get what you pay for... and I'm sick of the disposable crap that most companies want to sell you these days.
MadCow.
I also forgot to mention:
They gave me a full year of normal warranty on the new machine, even though my original warranty+Applecare was almost expired. Most companies would have only warrantied to the original date.
On top (again), they offered me another AppleCare plan for $129 to bring the warranty on the new machine to 3 years. I was impressed by that.