I submitted this article to Slashdot. This sort of plays right into that topic. View your privacy as an asset of yours, one that can be sold or bartered. In other words, if you want to buy something without having your privacy violated (e.g. the store keeping an entry for you in their records) be prepared to pay extra.
What I am essentially saying is that you can view receiving spam from Amazon with their recommendations, and having them know what you buy, is part of the price that you paid for that book (or CD, etc.). If Amazon isn't willing to accept this deal, then I'm sure that some other e-tailer will.
For instance, you can use NetZero et al. You're paying for internet access, but instead of paying in cash, you're paying in privacy. Whereas, should you go to a regular ISP, you pay more cash, but less privacy (a good ISP only logs stuff that's directly related to QoS; limiting the number of ICMP packets that can be sent from one account to, say 1 per 20 seconds, or so is a good idea, imho).
Napster does support VBR, but in a horribly broken way. What it does is it looks at the first frame, which is normally near-silent, so it's at a very low bitrate. This is the bitrate that's reported by Napster for the file. So a VBR encoded file will generally show up as around half of its maximum bitrate, which is not an indication of actual quality.
The end result is that users don't grab VBR mp3's because they appear to be of low quality.
Of course if Napster implements a bitrate filter, then VBR could become the ultimate chink in their armor...
VBR is only common with self-ripped mp3's (I myself use lame -V6 -B112 , but I don't really notice a difference on my VIA 82C686 sound chip with el cheapo speakers) because Napster' (and OpenNap) really don't support it that well. Until that's fixed, VBR will not be distributed through Napster on any major basis.
The CD, DVD, VHS stores make sense for Amazon. They have a huge amount of "shipwidth" (warehouses, etc.: the shipping and receiving equivalent of bandwidth) that's fixed cost. To add small things like that to the books adds almost no marginal shipping cost (the warehouses have to be staffed and have their power bill paid whether Amazon sells just 10,000 units a day or 100,000 units a day. It makes no sense to waste that bandwidth.
It's the same reason that people hook up five computers to a DSL/Cable/personal T1 connection. With the exception of Napster and the like, there's no common use of the 'net that will actively flood a fat pipe like that. So you set up a computer in every room. It takes away relatively little bandwidth, and you get added convenience. The only barrier is the startup cost: even buying a $500 K6-2 box for every room gets expensive after a while.
Perhaps what Amazon should do is extend the zShops concept and rent out their warehouse space and shipping services to smaller e-tailers. Amazon could charge $300/month and manage the store database, all the client has to do is ensure that Amazon is provided with sufficient inventories to ship.
For that, you can watch Pat Robertson's newcast (I think it's CBN) on Fox Family...
Re:American Television - Killed by commerce
on
15 Minutes
·
· Score: 3
And even PBS stations are somewhat ruled by the market. If someone who's contributed money at every fund-drive for PBS hears about this great show that the CBC, BBC, etc. are doing, and they ask the station to show it, the station is definitely going to consider it. If a lot of regular contributors decide they want to see that program, the station will in all probability show it.
I think that programming that challenges need not sell poorly. Yes, it most likely won't appeal to the masses. But, then again, Slashdot does not appeal to the average web-surfer. Yahoo! does. Look at which one recently had some trouble. Narrowly-focused programming can work if the target is sufficiently attractive to advertisers. The demographic that would enjoy programs that challenge would tend to be a demographic that has higher than average intelligence/education. In the US, in general, higher intelligence/education translates into higher income, which tends to imply higher disposable income. Thus, makers of more expensive products would advertise, and be willing to pay higher rates per person.
This is the reason that the PGA Tour survives. In raw viewership, it cannot compare to the NBA. But PGA Tour viewers are more likely to have a high disposable income and/or be corporate bigwigs. Thus, Lexus (after disposable income) advertises, as does Compaq (after corporate mindshare).
All of which brings the interesting idea: if Red Hat (or any other commercial distro) really wants to make Linux a reality in corporate America, they should sponsor a stop on the PGA Tour.
The definition of what constitutes a secret in Masonic circles is up to each individual Grand Lodge. The Unified Grand Lodge of England, like many others, have taken the view that the only secrets are the means of recognition (handshakes, passwords, and such).
The secrets of a Master Mason aren't that difficult to figure out. I myself am a member of one of the "appendant orders", but I know the password of a Master Mason (it starts with an M).
One thing though that's important to remember is that the Old Testament and the Gospels written by Hebrews are/were the product of a Hebrew thought process, which has largely disappeared, to be replaced by a Hellenic thought process. Hebrew thought/writing often uses allegory and symbolism. Hellenic thought focuses on truth, and logic. To say that what happened in those works actually did happen as described (as fundamentalists are wont to do) is to apply Hellenic thought to Hebrew thought. It is thus very unlikely that the resulting interpretation woud fail all logic.
For instance, Genesis can be viewed as an allegory of the Mesopotamian civilizations that preceded Judaism. Adam symbolizes a "first city". Some people left the city (forced out, possibly) and founded a new city (Eve). Cain and Abel could be two cities that went to war.
As for the second reference made, some have conjectured that Yahoshua ben Joseph (known to the world as Jesus Christ) and his disciples were members of a secret ultra-Orthodox society (the Nasoreans/Qumranians) and that references to raising the dead, turning water into wine, etc. are references to him bringing in members for an uprising against the Romans.
Of course, Christianity is the weakest religion because it is the only one whose theology depends entirely on an event that happened some 1,978 years ago in a Roman province. Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, Shintoism, Taoism, et al. do not have this weakness. They are based on a gradual evolution of thought.
I think we're not that far away from one of the TV networks pulling a similar stunt. Big Brother was sort of this idea (the viewers influence the "plot"), but I can see this applied to a miniseries or perhaps a show like ER. At the end of each episode they show a blurb for nbc.com or what not and the voters decide what happens next. I suppose the soaps could do a similar thing, as well.
Our favorite band, Metallica, also was among the first to use multiple angles, in Cunning Stunts, which I believe was released way back in 1998. I seem to remember that five songs were available with different angles, though you couldn't switch angles in the middle of the song.
I think the main reason that the non-porn film industry isn't taking advantage is this: in the porn-biz, the directors really don't have much/any power, while Hollywood revolves around directors. I'm sure that a lot of directors feel that their conception of the angles to use is the best, and that us lowly viewers couldn't change the angles without ruining their grand artistic vision.
The only difference between a terrorist and a freedom fighter: one's on our side. The assorted Palestinian groups are freedom fighters, but because "our side" happens to be Israel, the US media brands them as terrorists.
This idea, though, kind of falls apart when you deal with the ELF types, though. I suppose that they're fighting for the Earth's freedom, though, so this might still apply.
After the crash of 1987, the excehanges were forced by the SEC to automatically block trading of a volatile stock. The exchange itself has to shut down if it's keynote index (the Dow, the Nasdaq...) falls more than a certain amount. The purpose of this was because computers do a fair amount of trading (as in actually making decisions), and they can really start beating stocks down without merit. It's kind of like the karma cap, I guess...
I think I read a while back on how some management firms (like Aimee Mann's) were building lists of people who have shares on lots of Aimee Mann tunes (in this example) and IM'ing them with "We have notied that you have lots of Aimee Mann MP3's. If you visit http://www.aimeemann.com/downloads, you can download a demo version of Song XXX, which you don't seem to have yet," or something akin to that.
The way I see it, this is good marketing. There are two reasons to have a file shared on Napster:
You like that file, in which case this is a chance to get more music by that artist.
You share as a public service, a belief in helping the community, In this case, the more music you share, the more you help the community, right?
I'd also not be suprised if assorted market research firms try to build lists of what the hot shares on Napster are, to sell them to radio and other interested parties. I have a feeling that when the pay service goes online, Napster will sell subscriptions to view the statistics on what's being shared.
I think what the poster you're replying to meant was something like this (at least how I read it):
Bob records "I Disband (A parody of Metallica's I Disappear)".
Bob sends Napster an mp3 at a variety of bitrates to Napster.
Napster employee verifies that the song in question is not Metallica.
Napster takes an MD5 checksum of the file(s), puts in exception for files with that name and that checksum (the odds that a copyrighted song has that name and checksum are fairly slim)
Tada, that file is freely distributable through Napster, as long as other users aren't modifying the file (which, provided that multiple bitrates are provided and Bob encoded it with a standards based encoder isn't likely to occur that often.
I'm not certain how practical such an idea is, though
I, too, am irked when people refer to the US as a democracy or of Democracy being the highest ideal of this country. Neither is true, and frankly, freedom is better for it. The fundamental problem with democracy is its core assumption: that what is good for the majority of people is automatically good for all.
But what's to stop the RIAA from buying lotsa computers, downloading the obfuscate client and figuring out the obfuscated names? The crypto's not going to work (the trust question), and the RIAA might be willing to set up clusters of UltraSPARCs to run the server if a client-intensive system is used.
And if a slow server response is built in, people will quit using it...
But this will only work if Napster recodes the clients to support VBR mp3's, otherwise there is a huge loophole, because the Napster client (iirc) effectively just looks at the first frame of the file's bitrate and uses that as its bitrate. Thus VBR files often turn up as 64 kbps, when their maximum quality is often above 128 kbps...
BTW, I realize that CNN getting a techie thing right would be news, but it's 128 kilobits per second, not 128 kilobytes
Methinks you're referring to Tomorrow Never Dies (which did have a Rupert Murdoch/Ted Turner figure for the villain who hacked GPS). GoldenEye was the Russian EMP satellite in the movie of the same name...
Because it's a federal judge, he can be impeached using the same procedure used for all federal officials (such as the president). (i.e.: the House impeaches and the Senate may remove from office). The "high crimes or misdemeanors" standard applies, but it's generally thought that this means whatever Congress thinks it means at that particular moment (I'm not sure if an impeachment can be overturned by the Supreme Court).
The first federal judge to be impeached was John Pickering, the judge of the US District Court for New Hampshire, who was removed from office in 1804. Since then, 12 judges have been impeached, of whom 6 were convicted and removed from office. One of the 12, though, resigned before the trial.
Even then, unless he lives right next to the airport, less than 2 hours is pushing it. figure 300 miles air distance. That's a roughly one hour flight (terminal to terminal), but you add in all the overhead at the airports and you're talking 3 hours easy.
Sorry about this, but slashcode wouldn't let me post this in response to the article...
Personally, I've lived in Portland, Oregon for all my 22 years, and would like to stay here. RidgeRun is in Boise, Idaho, so I do some commuting (less than 2 hours door-to-door), but it is telecommuting for the most part. [Emphasis mine...]
Uh, according to Maps.com, the distance between Boise and Portland is ~421 miles. I know you can drive fast out west, but I don't think that hitting 250 is acceptable...
Slashdot Mirror
I submitted this article to Slashdot. This sort of plays right into that topic. View your privacy as an asset of yours, one that can be sold or bartered. In other words, if you want to buy something without having your privacy violated (e.g. the store keeping an entry for you in their records) be prepared to pay extra.
What I am essentially saying is that you can view receiving spam from Amazon with their recommendations, and having them know what you buy, is part of the price that you paid for that book (or CD, etc.). If Amazon isn't willing to accept this deal, then I'm sure that some other e-tailer will.
For instance, you can use NetZero et al. You're paying for internet access, but instead of paying in cash, you're paying in privacy. Whereas, should you go to a regular ISP, you pay more cash, but less privacy (a good ISP only logs stuff that's directly related to QoS; limiting the number of ICMP packets that can be sent from one account to, say 1 per 20 seconds, or so is a good idea, imho).
Napster does support VBR, but in a horribly broken way. What it does is it looks at the first frame, which is normally near-silent, so it's at a very low bitrate. This is the bitrate that's reported by Napster for the file. So a VBR encoded file will generally show up as around half of its maximum bitrate, which is not an indication of actual quality.
The end result is that users don't grab VBR mp3's because they appear to be of low quality.
Of course if Napster implements a bitrate filter, then VBR could become the ultimate chink in their armor...
VBR is only common with self-ripped mp3's (I myself use lame -V6 -B112 , but I don't really notice a difference on my VIA 82C686 sound chip with el cheapo speakers) because Napster' (and OpenNap) really don't support it that well. Until that's fixed, VBR will not be distributed through Napster on any major basis.
The CD, DVD, VHS stores make sense for Amazon. They have a huge amount of "shipwidth" (warehouses, etc.: the shipping and receiving equivalent of bandwidth) that's fixed cost. To add small things like that to the books adds almost no marginal shipping cost (the warehouses have to be staffed and have their power bill paid whether Amazon sells just 10,000 units a day or 100,000 units a day. It makes no sense to waste that bandwidth.
It's the same reason that people hook up five computers to a DSL/Cable/personal T1 connection. With the exception of Napster and the like, there's no common use of the 'net that will actively flood a fat pipe like that. So you set up a computer in every room. It takes away relatively little bandwidth, and you get added convenience. The only barrier is the startup cost: even buying a $500 K6-2 box for every room gets expensive after a while.
Perhaps what Amazon should do is extend the zShops concept and rent out their warehouse space and shipping services to smaller e-tailers. Amazon could charge $300/month and manage the store database, all the client has to do is ensure that Amazon is provided with sufficient inventories to ship.
For that, you can watch Pat Robertson's newcast (I think it's CBN) on Fox Family...
And even PBS stations are somewhat ruled by the market. If someone who's contributed money at every fund-drive for PBS hears about this great show that the CBC, BBC, etc. are doing, and they ask the station to show it, the station is definitely going to consider it. If a lot of regular contributors decide they want to see that program, the station will in all probability show it.
I think that programming that challenges need not sell poorly. Yes, it most likely won't appeal to the masses. But, then again, Slashdot does not appeal to the average web-surfer. Yahoo! does. Look at which one recently had some trouble. Narrowly-focused programming can work if the target is sufficiently attractive to advertisers. The demographic that would enjoy programs that challenge would tend to be a demographic that has higher than average intelligence/education. In the US, in general, higher intelligence/education translates into higher income, which tends to imply higher disposable income. Thus, makers of more expensive products would advertise, and be willing to pay higher rates per person.
This is the reason that the PGA Tour survives. In raw viewership, it cannot compare to the NBA. But PGA Tour viewers are more likely to have a high disposable income and/or be corporate bigwigs. Thus, Lexus (after disposable income) advertises, as does Compaq (after corporate mindshare).
All of which brings the interesting idea: if Red Hat (or any other commercial distro) really wants to make Linux a reality in corporate America, they should sponsor a stop on the PGA Tour.
The definition of what constitutes a secret in Masonic circles is up to each individual Grand Lodge. The Unified Grand Lodge of England, like many others, have taken the view that the only secrets are the means of recognition (handshakes, passwords, and such).
The secrets of a Master Mason aren't that difficult to figure out. I myself am a member of one of the "appendant orders", but I know the password of a Master Mason (it starts with an M).
One thing though that's important to remember is that the Old Testament and the Gospels written by Hebrews are/were the product of a Hebrew thought process, which has largely disappeared, to be replaced by a Hellenic thought process. Hebrew thought/writing often uses allegory and symbolism. Hellenic thought focuses on truth, and logic. To say that what happened in those works actually did happen as described (as fundamentalists are wont to do) is to apply Hellenic thought to Hebrew thought. It is thus very unlikely that the resulting interpretation woud fail all logic.
For instance, Genesis can be viewed as an allegory of the Mesopotamian civilizations that preceded Judaism. Adam symbolizes a "first city". Some people left the city (forced out, possibly) and founded a new city (Eve). Cain and Abel could be two cities that went to war.
As for the second reference made, some have conjectured that Yahoshua ben Joseph (known to the world as Jesus Christ) and his disciples were members of a secret ultra-Orthodox society (the Nasoreans/Qumranians) and that references to raising the dead, turning water into wine, etc. are references to him bringing in members for an uprising against the Romans.
Of course, Christianity is the weakest religion because it is the only one whose theology depends entirely on an event that happened some 1,978 years ago in a Roman province. Islam, Judaism, Buddhism, Shintoism, Taoism, et al. do not have this weakness. They are based on a gradual evolution of thought.
I think we're not that far away from one of the TV networks pulling a similar stunt. Big Brother was sort of this idea (the viewers influence the "plot"), but I can see this applied to a miniseries or perhaps a show like ER. At the end of each episode they show a blurb for nbc.com or what not and the voters decide what happens next. I suppose the soaps could do a similar thing, as well.
Our favorite band, Metallica, also was among the first to use multiple angles, in Cunning Stunts, which I believe was released way back in 1998. I seem to remember that five songs were available with different angles, though you couldn't switch angles in the middle of the song.
I think the main reason that the non-porn film industry isn't taking advantage is this: in the porn-biz, the directors really don't have much/any power, while Hollywood revolves around directors. I'm sure that a lot of directors feel that their conception of the angles to use is the best, and that us lowly viewers couldn't change the angles without ruining their grand artistic vision.
The only difference between a terrorist and a freedom fighter: one's on our side. The assorted Palestinian groups are freedom fighters, but because "our side" happens to be Israel, the US media brands them as terrorists.
This idea, though, kind of falls apart when you deal with the ELF types, though. I suppose that they're fighting for the Earth's freedom, though, so this might still apply.
Uh, Napster just shares MP3's (afaik)... Harlan Ellison is an author (of books).
After the crash of 1987, the excehanges were forced by the SEC to automatically block trading of a volatile stock. The exchange itself has to shut down if it's keynote index (the Dow, the Nasdaq...) falls more than a certain amount. The purpose of this was because computers do a fair amount of trading (as in actually making decisions), and they can really start beating stocks down without merit. It's kind of like the karma cap, I guess...
Kuro5hin means Kuroshin in l33t-speak... As to what Kuroshin means, I can't help you there...
I think I read a while back on how some management firms (like Aimee Mann's) were building lists of people who have shares on lots of Aimee Mann tunes (in this example) and IM'ing them with "We have notied that you have lots of Aimee Mann MP3's. If you visit http://www.aimeemann.com/downloads, you can download a demo version of Song XXX, which you don't seem to have yet," or something akin to that.
The way I see it, this is good marketing. There are two reasons to have a file shared on Napster:
- You like that file, in which case this is a chance to get more music by that artist.
- You share as a public service, a belief in helping the community, In this case, the more music you share, the more you help the community, right?
I'd also not be suprised if assorted market research firms try to build lists of what the hot shares on Napster are, to sell them to radio and other interested parties. I have a feeling that when the pay service goes online, Napster will sell subscriptions to view the statistics on what's being shared.I think what the poster you're replying to meant was something like this (at least how I read it):
- Bob records "I Disband (A parody of Metallica's I Disappear)".
- Bob sends Napster an mp3 at a variety of bitrates to Napster.
- Napster employee verifies that the song in question is not Metallica.
- Napster takes an MD5 checksum of the file(s), puts in exception for files with that name and that checksum (the odds that a copyrighted song has that name and checksum are fairly slim)
- Tada, that file is freely distributable through Napster, as long as other users aren't modifying the file (which, provided that multiple bitrates are provided and Bob encoded it with a standards based encoder isn't likely to occur that often.
I'm not certain how practical such an idea is, thoughI, too, am irked when people refer to the US as a democracy or of Democracy being the highest ideal of this country. Neither is true, and frankly, freedom is better for it. The fundamental problem with democracy is its core assumption: that what is good for the majority of people is automatically good for all.
What did PT Barnum say about that sort of thing?....
But what's to stop the RIAA from buying lotsa computers, downloading the obfuscate client and figuring out the obfuscated names? The crypto's not going to work (the trust question), and the RIAA might be willing to set up clusters of UltraSPARCs to run the server if a client-intensive system is used.
And if a slow server response is built in, people will quit using it...
But this will only work if Napster recodes the clients to support VBR mp3's, otherwise there is a huge loophole, because the Napster client (iirc) effectively just looks at the first frame of the file's bitrate and uses that as its bitrate. Thus VBR files often turn up as 64 kbps, when their maximum quality is often above 128 kbps...
BTW, I realize that CNN getting a techie thing right would be news, but it's 128 kilobits per second, not 128 kilobytes
Methinks you're referring to Tomorrow Never Dies (which did have a Rupert Murdoch/Ted Turner figure for the villain who hacked GPS). GoldenEye was the Russian EMP satellite in the movie of the same name...
</bondfan>Because it's a federal judge, he can be impeached using the same procedure used for all federal officials (such as the president). (i.e.: the House impeaches and the Senate may remove from office). The "high crimes or misdemeanors" standard applies, but it's generally thought that this means whatever Congress thinks it means at that particular moment (I'm not sure if an impeachment can be overturned by the Supreme Court).
The first federal judge to be impeached was John Pickering, the judge of the US District Court for New Hampshire, who was removed from office in 1804. Since then, 12 judges have been impeached, of whom 6 were convicted and removed from office. One of the 12, though, resigned before the trial.
Even then, unless he lives right next to the airport, less than 2 hours is pushing it. figure 300 miles air distance. That's a roughly one hour flight (terminal to terminal), but you add in all the overhead at the airports and you're talking 3 hours easy.
Sorry about this, but slashcode wouldn't let me post this in response to the article...
Uh, according to Maps.com, the distance between Boise and Portland is ~421 miles. I know you can drive fast out west, but I don't think that hitting 250 is acceptable...
That couldn't describe me...