Oh wait, I forget. The record companies have it coming because they charge too much and put out crap and rip off the artists and drag their feet in new technology and pay off politicians for favorable legislation.
Arggh - how frustrating! The guy sarcastically expresses my exact sentiments. That's pretty difficult to respond to.;-)
I'll admit it, I've been downloading MP3s for a long time. And guess what - it ain't because I'm previewing songs before I buy them. It's because I'm not going to pay $18 for one damn song.
Napster is stealing. But so is getting together with your buddies (RIAA) and collectively deciding to overcharge the rest of the world for a commodity that you have exclusive access to. Believe it or not, there is a reason for the class action suits against the recording industry.
So fuck the RIAA. If they want to rip me off, I'll rip them off. However, if someday they decide that they can sell me single songs, in a relatively unencumbered format - then we'll talk.
Just think of Napster as a commercial version of the Boston Tea Party.
The WSJ article also mentioned how WinXP happens to "break" existing encoders as well (IIRC it's the tweaks to NTFS that accomplished that) so there is *some* creedence to the "Microsoft is trying to squash MP3 with WinXP" angle.
That's pure bullshit. XP could possibly break rippers because there are fairly low-level system calls being used, but the notion that it breaks encoders is ridiculous. NTFS tweaks wouldn't harm an encoder because they use standard file writing system calls. Encoders read a file, work some data manipulation, and write the results. To break any part of the reading or writing process would break a lot of software.
I'd wager that XP breaks the current generation of rippers and the tech "authorities" at WSJ just got a little confused.
Reminds me of Saturday Night Live - Weekend Update
on
Soybean Powered Harley
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· Score: 2
Jimmy Fallon: 'New Scientist' magazine reported on Wednesday that in the future, cars could be powered by hazelnuts. That's encouraging, considering an eight-ounce jar of hazelnuts costs about nine dollars. Yeah, I've got an idea for a car that runs on bald eagle heads and Faberge eggs.
There's a common misconception that people seem to make regarding this scenario: Linus has complete control over the kernel.
It just ain't true.
Just because Linus has headed kernel development up until now doesn't mean he always will. IBM (or anyone) could suddenly split off from the main tree and begin development on their own. And provided they remain true to the GPL, there is no reason this couldn't happen (and frankly, I'm amazed it hasn't happened yet).
I think that fact that Linus still heads development is just a testament to his phenomenal abilities as a project manager. But it doesn't have to be that way.
>If it was as simple as turning a single gene on
>or off, I'm sure evolution would already have done
>it for us...
You are quite wrong - evolution doesn't work that way. Death is an evolutionary necessity because in order for a species to evole, the old (and possibly inferior) must stop reproducing and die so that the new (and possibly improved) can reproduce.
And logically, the longer a generation lasts, the slower that species will evolve.
I can guarantee you that I've grossly over-simplified; but rest assurred, really long lifespans are NOT an evolutionary advantage.
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Arggh - how frustrating! The guy sarcastically expresses my exact sentiments. That's pretty difficult to respond to. ;-)
I'll admit it, I've been downloading MP3s for a long time. And guess what - it ain't because I'm previewing songs before I buy them. It's because I'm not going to pay $18 for one damn song.
Napster is stealing. But so is getting together with your buddies (RIAA) and collectively deciding to overcharge the rest of the world for a commodity that you have exclusive access to. Believe it or not, there is a reason for the class action suits against the recording industry.
So fuck the RIAA. If they want to rip me off, I'll rip them off. However, if someday they decide that they can sell me single songs, in a relatively unencumbered format - then we'll talk.
Just think of Napster as a commercial version of the Boston Tea Party.
That's pure bullshit. XP could possibly break rippers because there are fairly low-level system calls being used, but the notion that it breaks encoders is ridiculous. NTFS tweaks wouldn't harm an encoder because they use standard file writing system calls. Encoders read a file, work some data manipulation, and write the results. To break any part of the reading or writing process would break a lot of software.
I'd wager that XP breaks the current generation of rippers and the tech "authorities" at WSJ just got a little confused.
Jimmy Fallon:
'New Scientist' magazine reported on Wednesday that in the future, cars could be powered by hazelnuts. That's encouraging, considering an eight-ounce jar of hazelnuts costs about nine dollars. Yeah, I've got an idea for a car that runs on bald eagle heads and Faberge eggs.
There's a common misconception that people seem to make regarding this scenario: Linus has complete control over the kernel.
It just ain't true.
Just because Linus has headed kernel development up until now doesn't mean he always will. IBM (or anyone) could suddenly split off from the main tree and begin development on their own. And provided they remain true to the GPL, there is no reason this couldn't happen (and frankly, I'm amazed it hasn't happened yet).
I think that fact that Linus still heads development is just a testament to his phenomenal abilities as a project manager. But it doesn't have to be that way.
>If it was as simple as turning a single gene on
>or off, I'm sure evolution would already have done
>it for us...
You are quite wrong - evolution doesn't work that way. Death is an evolutionary necessity because in order for a species to evole, the old (and possibly inferior) must stop reproducing and die so that the new (and possibly improved) can reproduce.
And logically, the longer a generation lasts, the slower that species will evolve.
I can guarantee you that I've grossly over-simplified; but rest assurred, really long lifespans are NOT an evolutionary advantage.