Whereas your XP vs. Mandriva ISO diff set would probably be as large as the ISO itself. I wouldn't be surprised if the court said your ISO-diff is just a weakly-encrypted copy of the XP ISO, with the Mandriva ISO serving as the decryption key.
Could be. That would be a reasonable ruling (meaning that it probably would not happen).
I think the DGA should have sued separately, as CleanFlicks was doing something, IMHO, vastly different than ClearPlay.
I view it as essentially the same: Delivering a derivative work to a customer's screen. The only difference is in the details of how they get it to the customer.
If "artistic vision" is so important, why do I see movies on television all the time, prefaced with "this film has been modified to fit this screen, to run in the time alloted, and editted for content" ? Because the directors are whores, and they will sell their artistic vision to the top bidder.
Some will and some will not. But don't you think that, from an ethical standpoint, it should be up to the owners of the film to decide who gets to make the edits?
As I understood the story, they wanted to screen Schindler's List, but there wasn't a cut-down version. The proposal on the table at the time was to actually do an edit, to remove the nudity and whatever swearing there was, but Spielberg said his studio would make sure the Varsity Theatre never got another one of their films again.
It sounds like artistic vision is important to some directors, doesn't it? It doesn't sound like Spielberg was a "whore" who would sell his artistic vision to the top bidder, does it?
ClearPlay is not presenting the film, they are saying, "take this data you already paid for (the DVD), here's some code to make it skip and mute parts that might offend you based on the preferences you set."
But what the customer is ultimately paying them for is to edit a film for them. That the edit takes place at the viewer's home is of little consequence since ClearPlay controls the edit (with some categorical choices by the viewer).
Artistic vision, shmartistic vision.
Not your strongest argument to date...
99% of the movie-viewing public can't taste the difference between shit and french fries. You also make it sound like people (in their home, not at a movie theatre) don't realize they're turning on a cut-list and modifying the presentation of a film.
Sure they realize that the film is being modified, but, as you pointed out, they don't know what the specific modifications are. They are left with an opinion of the film that they just saw -- and many will not differentiate between a bad film and a film damaged by Clearplay's edit. Cut the scenes of forced sexual contact out of Dr. Zhivago, and the viewer is left wondering why Lara is so cold towards Victor Komarovsky. That's a film that epitomizes the term "artistic vision" and director David Lean's reputation should not be tarnished by a clumsy edit by ClearPlay.
Well, maybe my kids don't realize it, but really, do you care what my kids think of the "artistic vision" of the doofus that directed Harry Potter?
Harry Potter was a film made for children. Why would it need ClearPlay editing?
Schindler's List is a poor choice. Spielberg has made some statements that lead me to believe he will never re-cut it.
But the principle is still there: If there is money to be made by distributing a cleaned-up version of a movie, that money belongs to the film's owners, not to ClearPlay. If Director X wants to release two versions, knowing that some families will buy both, his market should not be undercut by ClearPlay.
Because I'd like to demonstrate to the studios that if they put out stuff where I don't have to cover my kids' ears every third word, there's a market for it.
Your use of ClearPlay undercuts your ability to do that. The studio releases a movie with f
so: the edited videos might well be derivative works, but the cutting instructions aren't, which is the crux of what we're discussing.
No, that's what you're discussing -- not what I'm discussing or what the lawsuits were discussing. My contention is that it doesn't matter if the video is delivered on DVD, via the airwaves, or via an automated, on-the-fly editing system like ClearPlay uses. Moving the final editing process from the ClearPlay headquarters to the viewer's home does not change the fact that ClearPlay is delivering a derivative work.
Tell you what: Take two ISO images, one of Windows XP and the other of the free, downloadable demo version of Lindows. Publish a file which is the result of XORing the two ISO images. Then, anyone with that file and the Lindows ISO could create a Windows XP CD. You can claim that the XOR file does not contain any copyrighted material (either from Microsoft or Lindows), but I bet that a judge won't agree with you.
A more astute legal mind would have grasped the attempt at misdirection;)
A really astute legal mind would have read the entire text of the lawsuits as well as listened to presentations from attorneys on both sides to understand better. It took me some time, but it was time well spent.;-)
I have to say that I like you -- despite our differences on this subject.
OK, so let's instead call it an "encrypted delta for a known set of data."
That works for me. Want to buy a delta between the Windows XP Pro ISO and the Mandriva Linux ISO? It certainly wouldn't be an infringement since it's just a list of differences.
If your program instead grabbed portions of the video image (Snow White bending over to pick something up, Dopey smiling that Dopey smile, etc.) and composited them, you'd be treading a very fine line to distribute that program.
But what if my program rendered the characters for additional scenes in real-time? Would one could argue that it was not me distributing the likenesses of those characters -- just encrypted instructions for creating them.
ClearPlay was threatened with a lawsuit, the one that started with CleanFlicks.
No, they were actually sued. The Director's Guild of America amended the suit and included ClearPlay.
I'm just asking for the same sort of control that people wanted when they hacked CSS so they could make a linux DVD player, or the Go Video folks set up their player to skip all the trailers, warnings and commercials. I bought the DVD, paid good money for it, and I will watch it however I damn well please. I want CONTROL.
I'm really with you as far as demanding control over my DVDs and I'll even grant that I'd side with the Go Video folks as the trailers, warnings, and ads were not what the consumer paid for when they bought the disc. Those things also aren't part of ther artistic creation that is the movie.
But what you're asking for is not control, but rather the permission to give control to a third party to create a derivative work for display on your screen. I realize that the language I use may sound somewhat tortured, but this is a subtle (but important) principle that I feel merits precise language.
I'd support ClearPlay's right to distribute editing instructions to anyone in human-readable form. That's free expression and deserves protection. And I am completely in favor of your fair-use rights to mute, fast-forward, rewind, speed-up, or slow-down play while you watch the movie. I even acknowledge that you have a fair-use right to make a "Paul's Cut" of any movie you buy.
What galls me is that CleanFlicks, ClearPlay, and the handful of other companies engaged in this kind of editing are potentially harming the reputation of a director and presenting their own "vision" of how the movie should be viewed to thousands of people.
From a business perspective, suppose that Steven Spielberg and Universal Pictures decide that a "family-friendly" version of Schindler's List would be a big seller. Maybe Spielberg and Universal envision a family buying two versions: an unedited one for the parents and a less scary one for them to share with the children. Why should the market for that be undermined by ClearPlay's cleaned-up version? Why should ClearPlay reap the rewards when they don't own the copyright to the movie?
If you think I'm committing a crime against some director's "artistic vision," go ahead and look down on me, just like Bill G. looks down on us "open source hippies." But I will continue to use the tools I have available to control my own media experience to the largest extent possible.
I don't look down on you. I just believe that there's a big difference between you exercising your fair-use rights and ClearPlay essentially selling on-the-fly edits of works they don't own.
What's your alternative? Will you put me in a straightjacket and clip my eyelids open to make me watch the movie exactly how the dircetor thought I should? Real horrorshow flicks at the sinny, eh, Alex?
This may come as a shock, but before there were DVDs -- or even VHS, parents decided what movies were appropriate for their kids. If they thought that the kids weren't ready to see a Stanley Kubrick movie, then they didn't take the kids to see it. They didn't hire someone to transform the Kubrick movie into some kind of kid-friendly (and probably artistically butchered) flick.
I think that the collective legal might of Hollywood probably has a better idea of what does or doesn't constitute a derivative work than the average slashdot denizen, don't you? I mean, IANAL... but then again I rather doubt whether you are a lawyer either;)
From The digital censor: Utah firm locked in legal battle over software that blocks out sex and violence on DVDs by Benny Evangelista, San Francisco Chronicle Staff Writer, published on Monday, January 20, 2003:
In September, the DGA fired back with a counterclaim against CleanFlicks, widening the scope of the litigation to include ClearPlay and 12 firms that offer cleaned-up movies.
In December, eight major studios -- Warner Bros., the Walt Disney Co., Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Sony Picture Entertainment, Universal Studios, Twentieth Century Fox, Paramount and DreamWorks -- also sued, claiming that the editing companies violated trademark laws and that only copyright holders have the right to make the "derivative works" that the edited videos become.
Apparently I'm an above average Slashdot denizen and a lot closer to being a lawyer than you are.;-)
Did you read my comment before you replied? That's my #2 complaint, that I can't tell what is missing.
Yes, and I'm saying that the complaint you voice shows why the ClearPlay is not "publishing" a "cut list", as you claimed.
ClearPlay does not distribute others' copyrighted works. They distribute precise instructions in a machine-readable form for your DVD player to skip scenes or mute dialog that someone matched up to a list of criteria. That's ALL.
The derivative work is what appears on your screen. That's what you are paying for -- ClearPlay producing the derivative work that you watch. ClearPlay's business model isn't selling you written instructions for editing your own videos. Instead, they moved their automated editing equipment into your home and the edit is done in real-time there -- but it's being done by them, not by you.
Referring to my previous post:
Or, maybe I could have a PS-2 program that rendered the nasty scenes in real-time. Then, by your argument, I would not be publishing a derivative work. It would just be a set of instructions to a computer so that it could create the scenes on the fly. Sounds analogous to me.
Do you agree with that analogy? If not, why? I would not be distributing images of Snow White, just computer instructions on how to create them through rendering.
I don't know if they're still in business, but IMHO they were at least toes-on-the-line, if not already over it.
But you're arguing that the technological means of achieving on-the-fly editing should make it legal for ClearPlay to create derivative works which appear on your screen. I just don't see why creating the derivative work at viewing time is somehow morally superior to editing it ahead of time and sending back an edited copy on optical media.
Because ClearPlay doesn't publish anything but "cut lists." It's the high-tech and highly-precise equivalent of giving the parents ta printed document that says, "at 23 minutes and 20 seconds into the film, hit Mute. Un-mute two seconds later."
That's quite different, because then you would know what was being skipped, muted, etc. The ClearPlay system leaves the viewer unable to discern whether a movie he/she just saw was confusing, lacked emotional impact, etc. because the director lacked talent or because the ClearPlay butchery "damaged" the movie.
Can you see the cut lists? Can you see where the movie will be fast-forwarded? Do you know when a split-second mute will be applied? No, because ClearPlay didn't publish that. In fact, the so-called "cut-list" is a closely guarded secret which is not published at all. It is basically an encrypted series of commands so that ClearPlay, not you, can modify a movie on-the-fly.
Now, if Snow White and the dwarves getting nasty is your thing, then go ahead and make an altered version, or hire someone to do it, and view it in your own home.
Or, maybe I could have a PS-2 program that rendered the nasty scenes in real-time. Then, by your argument, I would not be publishing a derivative work. It would just be a set of instructions to a computer so that it could create the scenes on the fly. Sounds analogous to me.
I don't see why [some]/.'ers object so much to me skipping parts that I feel are inappropriate for my kids.
I don't object to that at all. I object to some business distributing derivative works for profit without the permission of the directors or studios. While not all to my taste, movies are art. They are an expression by actors, actresses, screenwriters, and directors. If, when filming Saving Private Ryan, Tom Hanks thought that the horrors of war needed to be shown for emotional impact, how dare ClearPlay subvert his wishes?
I also object to parents turning over the responsibility for deciding what their children should and should not see to some third party. What some group of Mormon's in Utah thinks is appropriate for children should not become your standard due to the "convenience factor" of using the ClearPlay service.
They're not forcing you to buy it, nor forcing you to use it. Much like proprietary vs. open-source, the issue is choice, or more specifically, do I have a choice at all?
No, the real question is whether ClearPlay has a right to create a derivative work from a copyrighted movie. Now, apparently, they do. Whether they should have that right is another issue.
If ClearPlay has a right to filter out sexual content from a movie, do I have a right to add sexual content to copyrighted movies? What about the people who would like to watch Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarves -- but would really like a group sex scene between Snow White and the dwarves? Don't they have a choice? Couldn't my firm hire animators to create and insert such scenes via a special DVD player? Would that be wrong?
Maybe I should publish a coffee table book containing colorized versions of Ansel Adams B&W photographs. If ClearPlay can create modified versions of movies, why can't I publish a book of modified Ansel Adams photographs?
At some point you have to look beyond what you want and ask whether your desire to see a modified version of a movie should override the right of a director and studio to control the artistic content and vision of their movies.
And if webcrawlers harvest my email address posted here, do you think I want it to find my hotmail address, or do you think I want it to find my "real" email address? I think that using free email accounts in relation to posting in forums is a good idea.
I create and delete e-mail addreses and even subdomains on an as-needed basis. An attempt by a spammer to send to an older, harrvested e-mail address of mine will fail and it may even be directed to a non-existent subdomain.
If my hotmail account gets overburdened with spam, I abandon it for another one. I ain't gonna do that with my real address... Stuff that's actually important gets told about my real address where I have more space, privacy, larger attachments, etc.
That's what confuses me: Why have a single "real" e-mail address? I have given out dozens of addresses, usually personalized for the sender (guess who got "_yahoo@{mydomain}" when I placed an order?). That way, I can kill an individual e-mail address given to a single sender without losing correspondence from every other sender. That lets me pick up, organize, store, backup, etc. all of my e-mail with normal SMTP e-mail clients and tools.
1. Privacy. If it's on Yahoo!'s servers, you have no idea who can see it.
2. Spam filtering. Yahoo!'s spam filtering is practically non-existent.
3. Backup capability. With everything stored on Yahoo!'s servers, you have no real ability to backup your e-mail.
4. Contract. Because you have no contract with Yahoo!, they can decide next month to discontinue their mail service, deleting all of your stored e-mail in the process, and there's nothing that you can do about it.
5. Capabilities. Yahoo!'s e-mail cannot be used with standard SMTP/IMAP mail clients, meaning that you only have access to their limited feature set.
6. Attachment size. With a Yahoo! e-mail account, one is limited as to the size of e-mail attachments.
7. Storage. The total storage for e-mail is limited to 250MB.
got something to prove?
Yes -- that I have the technical savvy to run my domain and e-mail server. My mail does not sit on some ISP's server. I can use any spam filtering methods and lists that I choose. I can use standard mail clients and backup my e-mail so that I don't lose valuable correspondence. If I want someone to send me a 650MB attachment, I can enable it. If I want to store all of the e-mail that I receive, I can (and do).
How are we supposed to take a question about cost-is-no-object custom motherboards seriously when it comes from someone who uses a free Yahoo! e-mail address, with all of it's inherent limitations, because he's either cheap or lacks the technical skills to run a domain?
The same person who wants to buy a one-of-a-kind custom motherboard has to use a free e-mail address from Yahoo: Druegan2001@yahoo.com. Now that's funny!
No, it is not. But from that opening salvo, I gather that's where you're trying to steer this discussion.
The FSF has explained why this license is a non-free license.
No, they have explained how it fails to meet their restrictive definition of a free software license. Others would disagree with that definition.
Unlike you writing and selling Harry Potter books (which, actually, I wouldn't object to you doing but given your writing sample here, I doubt you could match what fans of that series are used to reading), I need my computer to express myself politically in the way I choose to do and I use a computer to cooperate with other people in the way people in ethical societies should do.
I have been published in several major magazines and served as a consultant to Time-Life Books. Given that practically incomprehensible run-on-sentence quoted above, your criticism of my writing is ironic.
To answer the non-flamebait portion of your run-on sentence, just who are you to decide how "people in ethical societies should" behave?
This includes distributing software for a fee, if I choose.
You are free to distribute any software that you write for a fee, but you do not have a right, God-given, moral, or otherwise, to distribute, for a fee, software that others write unless they specifically permit such distribution. In you previous post, you stated that you "deserve the right to... distribute modified or verbatim copies of the covered work for a fee." Again, I ask you why you "deserve" to be able to do that. There is a difference between wanting to do something and deserving the right to do it.
Distribution is key to spreading copies of programs that help people, or spreading copies of improved programs. Distributing copies of a program for a fee is a great way to justify writing more free software.
Again, you can distribute your original works in whatever way you see fit. But your desire to make money by distributing works of others doesn't encourage most people to write free software. They don't think "I'm so happy that Jeff Nicholson-Owens was able to profit from my countless man-hours of coding. I'll have to write more free software so that he can further profit from my efforts."
To maintain that I shouldn't be able to do these things is to advocate for a power we don't grant readers of books or other published works--I can buy and sell copies of other copyrighted works by leveraging my rights under the first sale doctrine.
That is blatantly untrue. The First Sale Doctrine does not give you the right to offer derivative works for sale. Nor does it allow you to sell copies of a copyrighted work you purchased. That's what you want to do with software, though.
Ultimately, free software sets a better standard against which we can compare other software and see if the rights we have with free software are also granted to us.
No, it sets a standard, not a "better standard." That it fits in with your world view does not make it superior.
I'm not willing to give up these rights, so I place them high on my priority list when evaluating a program.
You're welcome to do that, but it is egotistical of you to assume that your value system should be shared by everyone else. Many people want to assure that their software, and derivative works, are always distributed at no charge. They don't want large corporations reselling their work. Others want to prevent their software from being used by organizations whose views or labor practices they find reprehensible. You think that the purity of the free software movement is so important that authors should not prohibit their software from being used by companies producing snuff kiddie porn. Others would disagree. And just as those people have no right to unilaterally decide what is a "better standard," neither do you.
I'll stick by my "Stallman-like" comment. Like Stallman, you remain convinced that anyone who disagrees with you is wrong.
That's a good point, but I was thinking more along the lines of hardware for in-house playing of music. I have my music ripped to a lossless format in a central location in my residence and I'd like to be able to play music in my living room stereo or any of the N computers in various room. Streaming + hardware devices for playback to stereo systems (think: airTunes) makes this fairly painless. One the fly transcoding is certainly the other option, but why do it if you don't have to?
I tend to prefer the simpler alternative of small form factor PCs that directly access the files on the network drives. Then I can install the codec and player software of choice.
I don't either, and I wish him the best and biggest slice of the pie possible. But the reality is that for many people, myself included, restrictivly licensed software is simply less attractive, and when that and all the various technical merits of the various lossless formats are taken together, at least for me, FLAC comes out on top.
FLAC is a good format. I respect your views on restrictive software licenses, but I'm hoping that the dual-licensing (non-commercial vs. commercial use) becomes more commonplace. I believe that many more developers will enter the open-source fray if they know that their software will not be resold by others. They may want to contribute to the common good without contributing to the coffers of SCO, IBM, RedHat, and every other corporation who chooses to use and sell open-source software written by others. To each his own...
True, APE does compress a bit better than FLAC, however it's important to note the following:
1. FLAC is streamable (APE is not.)
A valid point, but I have no need for streaming. I need to store lots of music on my hard drive.
2. FLAC has native support for several hardware players (APE supports none, to my knowledge.)
For portable players, I'll stick with high-quality VBR MP3 files. There's just not enough storage for lossless audio on them yet. When there is, I can easily transcode from APE to whatever format they support.
3. FLAC is asymmetric with a bias towards faster decoding (APE is symmetric with respect to encode and decode speeds.)
True. And APE is fairly CPU-intensive during both encoding and decoding. Not a problem for me on my computer, though. And it will only get easier over time.
4. FLAC is licensed under the OSI approved Xiph modification to the BSD license with supporting reference code licensed under the GPL (APE code is generally available but the license is apparently non-standard enough that several Linux distributions are unwilling to package it.
APE's license provides for unrestricted non-commercial use, which is good enough for me. I don't blame the author if he wants his slice of the pie when a for-profit corporation distributes his software as part of a commercial Linux distro. Nor do I blame him if he wants to refuse permission for commercial use by organizations whose views, labor practices, or ethics he finds offensive. If he doesn't want the RIAA and his ex-employer to use the package, he should be able to deny such use.
According to the Monkey's Audio developer site: "If you're trying to make money, in any way, talk to me first.". This is a restatement of section 2 of the Monkey's Audio license ("2. The use of Monkey's Audio or the Monkey's Audio source code for any commercial purposes including, but not limited to, implementation in shareware packages is strictly prohibited without first obtaining written permission from the author.").
This means that you need additional permission beyond the license to do something you deserve the right to do--distribute modified or verbatim copies of the covered work for a fee; something you would have the right to do if Monkey's Audio license qualified as a free software license, which it clearly does not. The copyright holder could deny your business permission ad hoc. Choosing to deal with licensors like this means that you are choosing to build your business on sand (metaphorically speaking).
Why do you "deserve the right" to build a business around the hard work of the author(s) of Monkey's audio without getting their permission or giving them compensation? That's like me saying that I "deserve the right" to write and sell Harry Potter books without the permission of the author and without compensating her.
It's that absolutist, Stallman-like thinking that is harming open-source movement. Many authors would be happy to write open-source software for the good of the community, but they don't want some organization, maybe one that layed them off or that represents views they find reprehensible, using their software in a commercial venture. Still others do not want some large corporation like RedHat or IBM profiting from their work while paying them nothing.
I can hardly believe I need to tell open source proponents about the value of paying attention to all computer users, including those in business.
You should learn the difference between "need" and "want" -- something your parents should have taught you the first time you said that you 'needed' some toy you saw on TV. Nike may want to use my software (without paying me), but they don't need to use it -- and if I find their labor practices of employing children for pennies a day in third world countries to be abhorrent, then I should be able to deny them permission to use software that I created.
FLAC remains the easy choice primarily because it is free software. It might not compress best (but it compresses better than Shorten), but it works well enough and its inherent freedom offers a compelling case for long-term archiving.
The fact that NAMBLA, the RIAA, the KKK, and SCO are all permitted to use and resell FLAC does not make it my compression software of choice. I'll stick with the software which works the best -- especially when I can get the source code.
State sales tax is collected at the time of sale on the full amount of the purchase, but that's hardly a big deal if you're paying $150 for a hard drive and getting $80 back. And then you put stamps on two or three rebate forms so it's like only getting $75 back. Not a bad deal.
As to 'claiming the tax', I'm not sure what you mean. I pay income tax to the feds, not sales tax. Sales tax is paid at the time of sale. Are you suggesting that the state might audit me for paying sales tax on $150 even though I got $80 in rebates?
I'm looking at a 19" monitor that I got for $-10 after rebates. My computer has a 200GB hard drive that cost me $22 after rebates. I'm accessing the Internet through an SMC WiFi 802.11G router that cost me 98 cents after rebates. I just did my taxes with Taxcut and filed electronically. The total price for federal, state, and electronic filing will be $10 after rebates. My girlfriend and I got Sony T610 mobile phones with camera, color screen, organizer features, etc. The after-rebate price on EACH phone was $-175.
Rebates let me profit off of the laziness of others. To all of the smug people who proudly proclaim that they "ignore" rebates, I say "thank you!" You're helping to subsidize my purchases. I would much prefer that I get a hard drive for $80 after rebate and that you buy the same one for $150 and never claim your rebate. That's much better than both of us getting the hard drive for $115 with no rebates.
If you think, for a moment, that Best Buy is doing this to please customers, you're on drugs! Best Buy is only doing this to combat their so-called "devil customers" -- the ones who come in and take advantage of loss-leaders and giant rebates without also buying $18.99 Britney Spears CDs, 8-packs of batteries, non-discounted DVD players, LCD TVs, etc.
If you recognize an imaginary sword as being currency valued at $800 and tax it, then those taxes could be paid in that same currency. You can't have it count as currency for calculating what is due but not count as currency for paying that due. Either it is tender or it is not.
No, either it has value or it does not. It has nothing to do with accepting it as currency. If you receive four motorcycles as payment for work you do, the IRS is not going to accept one of them as payment for taxes owed on the set of four. See "Topic 420 Bartering Income" on the IRS's web pages.
I make it a point to find out something about a subject before I comment on it. Perhaps your statements would be harder to dispute if you sought knowledge rather than simply collecting that which incidently comes your way.
Perhaps you would be more successful as disputing my statements if you spent more time researching meaningful information rather than calculating the exact hourly wages of people who play Warcraft games. Or you could invest your mental energies in thinking about the ramifications of claiming that "virtual weapons" are income for labor.
The labor contributes as much to society as creating a piece of art, writing a poem, writing a fictional story, or making a movie.
Art, a poem, a fictional story, or a movie has lasting value. How can you claim that someone playing, even at an extreme skill level, an online computer game contributes as much to society as a Salvadore Dali, Edgar Allen Poe, Ernest Hemingway, or Stanley Kubrick?
Personally I tend to think that investing any time in the worship of a mythical magic man in the sky is crazy. But people dedicate their entire lives and spend billions engaged in and convincing other to engage in the worship of figments of imagination that do not even exist in a virtual world let alone the real one.
And on that, we find ourselves completely in agreement. But, for many, it's just a means of taking advantage of the mentally feeble. If you call an old woman, claim to be representing her bank, and get her to write a check to you for her life's savings, you are called a "con man" and are sent to prison. If you do the same thing, but claim to be representing God, you are called a tele-evangelist and you get to drive a car worth more than the old woman's home.
Oooooh, pity - just missed the one hour mark. Seventy whole minutes of "life" - people around here will be jealous.
That's probably true for many. But keep your chin up and take baby steps. Walk away from the computer for just ten minutes. Work your way up to 1/2 an hour. Pretty soon, you might even be able go outside. If you do, maybe we'll run into one another.
To me, he's anonymous and a coward. I have no idea who he is based on some self-chosen screen name and I'm sure that he's not man enough to talk that way to my face.
As to the delay, I use Slashdot when my time allows. Sometimes I hit it several times a day, checking responses to my comments each time. Other times, a week or more goes by between when I post a comment and check for responses. Why? I have a life. You might try getting one sometime.
The virtual weapon was no less an intangible asset than is a computer password. It too is just bits in a computer. And like a password, a gaming object can give access to places on a server otherwise inaccessible.
And what is the value of the information to which you will gain access with the virtual weapon? Also, it's very clear what you will be able to access with a password. Exactly what can one access with a virtual weapon? Does it not depend, at all, on the skill of the player?
And those policies are written to an "agreed-upon value," not the fair market value. You said that what collectors pay for things sets the value -- and that's blatantly wrong, as I showed with the aforementioned insurance/Ford Pinto example. The fair market value of something is not the highest amount that anyone would, or ever did, pay for one of them.
I realize this is Slashdot but in the future I would prefer you not respond to my posts with random assertations you have no basis for making.
I had very good reason for making that assertion: Because it is true. Your inability to counter my arguments doesn't mean that I should stop making them.
This IRS red herring is interesting but it is a red herring and nothing more.
No, it is a real issue: Is an imaginary sword really $800+ real-world income or is it not? You can't have it both ways where it's income when someone steals it but it's not when you do your taxes.
The issue is whether the gold is currency, not whether it is taxable.
Gold is a precious metal. It is mined from the Earth. If you can't weigh it on a scale, it isn't gold.
If the IRS chooses to recognize virtual currency income I would be happy to deduct my game loses and pay any leftover tax in gold.
You're mixing apples and oranges: If you claim that an imaginary sword has a real-world value of $800, then you should be paying real-world taxes on $800 if you win/steal/earn such a sword in game play.
It takes about 8hrs of solid game time in world of warcraft about level 45 to earn 8-10gold. It takes hundreds of hours of work to get to lvl45 in the first place. That gold will sell in lots of 100 for about $0.22/gold. That means after a two or three hundred hour investment; if you cut out all the middlemen; both farming and selling gold yourself; you can make a whopping $1.76-$2.20/day.
So, from that, I can conclude that people who buy and sell imaginary gold are idiots. And, by the way, it's scary that you know that much about the subject. Perhaps you should turn off your computer and venture forth into the real world.
That means this guy stole the equivelent of 494 8hr days (about 1 3/4yrs with weekends off of repetative work about like a factory). Perhaps you think currency representative of that much labor should have no value. Personally, I do not.
If the labor contributes nothing to society, then that's the value of the labor. If you choose to spend your every waking moment playing solitaire, I don't think that the virtual "currency" you win should have any value. Any 41 year old man who invests 1.75 years of his life (or over $800) to get an imaginary sword needs pschiatric help -- thus explaining why they were willing to kill someone over the "theft" of said imaginary item.
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Whereas your XP vs. Mandriva ISO diff set would probably be as large as the ISO itself. I wouldn't be surprised if the court said your ISO-diff is just a weakly-encrypted copy of the XP ISO, with the Mandriva ISO serving as the decryption key.
Could be. That would be a reasonable ruling (meaning that it probably would not happen).
I think the DGA should have sued separately, as CleanFlicks was doing something, IMHO, vastly different than ClearPlay.
I view it as essentially the same: Delivering a derivative work to a customer's screen. The only difference is in the details of how they get it to the customer.
If "artistic vision" is so important, why do I see movies on television all the time, prefaced with "this film has been modified to fit this screen, to run in the time alloted, and editted for content" ? Because the directors are whores, and they will sell their artistic vision to the top bidder.
Some will and some will not. But don't you think that, from an ethical standpoint, it should be up to the owners of the film to decide who gets to make the edits?
As I understood the story, they wanted to screen Schindler's List, but there wasn't a cut-down version. The proposal on the table at the time was to actually do an edit, to remove the nudity and whatever swearing there was, but Spielberg said his studio would make sure the Varsity Theatre never got another one of their films again.
It sounds like artistic vision is important to some directors, doesn't it? It doesn't sound like Spielberg was a "whore" who would sell his artistic vision to the top bidder, does it?
ClearPlay is not presenting the film, they are saying, "take this data you already paid for (the DVD), here's some code to make it skip and mute parts that might offend you based on the preferences you set."
But what the customer is ultimately paying them for is to edit a film for them. That the edit takes place at the viewer's home is of little consequence since ClearPlay controls the edit (with some categorical choices by the viewer).
Artistic vision, shmartistic vision.
Not your strongest argument to date...
99% of the movie-viewing public can't taste the difference between shit and french fries. You also make it sound like people (in their home, not at a movie theatre) don't realize they're turning on a cut-list and modifying the presentation of a film.
Sure they realize that the film is being modified, but, as you pointed out, they don't know what the specific modifications are. They are left with an opinion of the film that they just saw -- and many will not differentiate between a bad film and a film damaged by Clearplay's edit. Cut the scenes of forced sexual contact out of Dr. Zhivago, and the viewer is left wondering why Lara is so cold towards Victor Komarovsky. That's a film that epitomizes the term "artistic vision" and director David Lean's reputation should not be tarnished by a clumsy edit by ClearPlay.
Well, maybe my kids don't realize it, but really, do you care what my kids think of the "artistic vision" of the doofus that directed Harry Potter?
Harry Potter was a film made for children. Why would it need ClearPlay editing?
Schindler's List is a poor choice. Spielberg has made some statements that lead me to believe he will never re-cut it.
But the principle is still there: If there is money to be made by distributing a cleaned-up version of a movie, that money belongs to the film's owners, not to ClearPlay. If Director X wants to release two versions, knowing that some families will buy both, his market should not be undercut by ClearPlay.
Because I'd like to demonstrate to the studios that if they put out stuff where I don't have to cover my kids' ears every third word, there's a market for it.
Your use of ClearPlay undercuts your ability to do that. The studio releases a movie with f
so: the edited videos might well be derivative works, but the cutting instructions aren't, which is the crux of what we're discussing.
;)
;-)
No, that's what you're discussing -- not what I'm discussing or what the lawsuits were discussing. My contention is that it doesn't matter if the video is delivered on DVD, via the airwaves, or via an automated, on-the-fly editing system like ClearPlay uses. Moving the final editing process from the ClearPlay headquarters to the viewer's home does not change the fact that ClearPlay is delivering a derivative work.
Tell you what: Take two ISO images, one of Windows XP and the other of the free, downloadable demo version of Lindows. Publish a file which is the result of XORing the two ISO images. Then, anyone with that file and the Lindows ISO could create a Windows XP CD. You can claim that the XOR file does not contain any copyrighted material (either from Microsoft or Lindows), but I bet that a judge won't agree with you.
A more astute legal mind would have grasped the attempt at misdirection
A really astute legal mind would have read the entire text of the lawsuits as well as listened to presentations from attorneys on both sides to understand better. It took me some time, but it was time well spent.
I have to say that I like you -- despite our differences on this subject.
OK, so let's instead call it an "encrypted delta for a known set of data."
That works for me. Want to buy a delta between the Windows XP Pro ISO and the Mandriva Linux ISO? It certainly wouldn't be an infringement since it's just a list of differences.
If your program instead grabbed portions of the video image (Snow White bending over to pick something up, Dopey smiling that Dopey smile, etc.) and composited them, you'd be treading a very fine line to distribute that program.
But what if my program rendered the characters for additional scenes in real-time? Would one could argue that it was not me distributing the likenesses of those characters -- just encrypted instructions for creating them.
ClearPlay was threatened with a lawsuit, the one that started with CleanFlicks.
No, they were actually sued. The Director's Guild of America amended the suit and included ClearPlay.
I'm just asking for the same sort of control that people wanted when they hacked CSS so they could make a linux DVD player, or the Go Video folks set up their player to skip all the trailers, warnings and commercials. I bought the DVD, paid good money for it, and I will watch it however I damn well please. I want CONTROL.
I'm really with you as far as demanding control over my DVDs and I'll even grant that I'd side with the Go Video folks as the trailers, warnings, and ads were not what the consumer paid for when they bought the disc. Those things also aren't part of ther artistic creation that is the movie.
But what you're asking for is not control, but rather the permission to give control to a third party to create a derivative work for display on your screen. I realize that the language I use may sound somewhat tortured, but this is a subtle (but important) principle that I feel merits precise language.
I'd support ClearPlay's right to distribute editing instructions to anyone in human-readable form. That's free expression and deserves protection. And I am completely in favor of your fair-use rights to mute, fast-forward, rewind, speed-up, or slow-down play while you watch the movie. I even acknowledge that you have a fair-use right to make a "Paul's Cut" of any movie you buy.
What galls me is that CleanFlicks, ClearPlay, and the handful of other companies engaged in this kind of editing are potentially harming the reputation of a director and presenting their own "vision" of how the movie should be viewed to thousands of people.
From a business perspective, suppose that Steven Spielberg and Universal Pictures decide that a "family-friendly" version of Schindler's List would be a big seller. Maybe Spielberg and Universal envision a family buying two versions: an unedited one for the parents and a less scary one for them to share with the children. Why should the market for that be undermined by ClearPlay's cleaned-up version? Why should ClearPlay reap the rewards when they don't own the copyright to the movie?
If you think I'm committing a crime against some director's "artistic vision," go ahead and look down on me, just like Bill G. looks down on us "open source hippies." But I will continue to use the tools I have available to control my own media experience to the largest extent possible.
I don't look down on you. I just believe that there's a big difference between you exercising your fair-use rights and ClearPlay essentially selling on-the-fly edits of works they don't own.
What's your alternative? Will you put me in a straightjacket and clip my eyelids open to make me watch the movie exactly how the dircetor thought I should? Real horrorshow flicks at the sinny, eh, Alex?
This may come as a shock, but before there were DVDs -- or even VHS, parents decided what movies were appropriate for their kids. If they thought that the kids weren't ready to see a Stanley Kubrick movie, then they didn't take the kids to see it. They didn't hire someone to transform the Kubrick movie into some kind of kid-friendly (and probably artistically butchered) flick.
From The digital censor: Utah firm locked in legal battle over software that blocks out sex and violence on DVDs by Benny Evangelista, San Francisco Chronicle Staff Writer, published on Monday, January 20, 2003:
Apparently I'm an above average Slashdot denizen and a lot closer to being a lawyer than you are.
Did you read my comment before you replied? That's my #2 complaint, that I can't tell what is missing.
Yes, and I'm saying that the complaint you voice shows why the ClearPlay is not "publishing" a "cut list", as you claimed.
ClearPlay does not distribute others' copyrighted works. They distribute precise instructions in a machine-readable form for your DVD player to skip scenes or mute dialog that someone matched up to a list of criteria. That's ALL.
The derivative work is what appears on your screen. That's what you are paying for -- ClearPlay producing the derivative work that you watch. ClearPlay's business model isn't selling you written instructions for editing your own videos. Instead, they moved their automated editing equipment into your home and the edit is done in real-time there -- but it's being done by them, not by you.
Referring to my previous post:
Or, maybe I could have a PS-2 program that rendered the nasty scenes in real-time. Then, by your argument, I would not be publishing a derivative work. It would just be a set of instructions to a computer so that it could create the scenes on the fly. Sounds analogous to me.
Do you agree with that analogy? If not, why? I would not be distributing images of Snow White, just computer instructions on how to create them through rendering.
I don't know if they're still in business, but IMHO they were at least toes-on-the-line, if not already over it.
But you're arguing that the technological means of achieving on-the-fly editing should make it legal for ClearPlay to create derivative works which appear on your screen. I just don't see why creating the derivative work at viewing time is somehow morally superior to editing it ahead of time and sending back an edited copy on optical media.
If Tom Hanks wants us to run naked across the Mojave Desert singing camp songs, how dare we subvert his wishes?
Because that would be visible to others against their will. You don't just happen to see "Saving Private Ryan" as you go off-roading in the desert.
Because ClearPlay doesn't publish anything but "cut lists." It's the high-tech and highly-precise equivalent of giving the parents ta printed document that says, "at 23 minutes and 20 seconds into the film, hit Mute. Un-mute two seconds later."
/.'ers object so much to me skipping parts that I feel are inappropriate for my kids.
That's quite different, because then you would know what was being skipped, muted, etc. The ClearPlay system leaves the viewer unable to discern whether a movie he/she just saw was confusing, lacked emotional impact, etc. because the director lacked talent or because the ClearPlay butchery "damaged" the movie.
Can you see the cut lists? Can you see where the movie will be fast-forwarded? Do you know when a split-second mute will be applied? No, because ClearPlay didn't publish that. In fact, the so-called "cut-list" is a closely guarded secret which is not published at all. It is basically an encrypted series of commands so that ClearPlay, not you, can modify a movie on-the-fly.
Now, if Snow White and the dwarves getting nasty is your thing, then go ahead and make an altered version, or hire someone to do it, and view it in your own home.
Or, maybe I could have a PS-2 program that rendered the nasty scenes in real-time. Then, by your argument, I would not be publishing a derivative work. It would just be a set of instructions to a computer so that it could create the scenes on the fly. Sounds analogous to me.
I don't see why [some]
I don't object to that at all. I object to some business distributing derivative works for profit without the permission of the directors or studios. While not all to my taste, movies are art. They are an expression by actors, actresses, screenwriters, and directors. If, when filming Saving Private Ryan, Tom Hanks thought that the horrors of war needed to be shown for emotional impact, how dare ClearPlay subvert his wishes?
I also object to parents turning over the responsibility for deciding what their children should and should not see to some third party. What some group of Mormon's in Utah thinks is appropriate for children should not become your standard due to the "convenience factor" of using the ClearPlay service.
They're not forcing you to buy it, nor forcing you to use it. Much like proprietary vs. open-source, the issue is choice, or more specifically, do I have a choice at all?
No, the real question is whether ClearPlay has a right to create a derivative work from a copyrighted movie. Now, apparently, they do. Whether they should have that right is another issue.
If ClearPlay has a right to filter out sexual content from a movie, do I have a right to add sexual content to copyrighted movies? What about the people who would like to watch Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarves -- but would really like a group sex scene between Snow White and the dwarves? Don't they have a choice? Couldn't my firm hire animators to create and insert such scenes via a special DVD player? Would that be wrong?
Maybe I should publish a coffee table book containing colorized versions of Ansel Adams B&W photographs. If ClearPlay can create modified versions of movies, why can't I publish a book of modified Ansel Adams photographs?
At some point you have to look beyond what you want and ask whether your desire to see a modified version of a movie should override the right of a director and studio to control the artistic content and vision of their movies.
That's him in the goatse.cx photo!
And if webcrawlers harvest my email address posted here, do you think I want it to find my hotmail address, or do you think I want it to find my "real" email address? I think that using free email accounts in relation to posting in forums is a good idea.
I create and delete e-mail addreses and even subdomains on an as-needed basis. An attempt by a spammer to send to an older, harrvested e-mail address of mine will fail and it may even be directed to a non-existent subdomain.
If my hotmail account gets overburdened with spam, I abandon it for another one. I ain't gonna do that with my real address... Stuff that's actually important gets told about my real address where I have more space, privacy, larger attachments, etc.
That's what confuses me: Why have a single "real" e-mail address? I have given out dozens of addresses, usually personalized for the sender (guess who got "_yahoo@{mydomain}" when I placed an order?). That way, I can kill an individual e-mail address given to a single sender without losing correspondence from every other sender. That lets me pick up, organize, store, backup, etc. all of my e-mail with normal SMTP e-mail clients and tools.
why pay for something you can have free?
With e-mail accounts:
1. Privacy. If it's on Yahoo!'s servers, you have no idea who can see it.
2. Spam filtering. Yahoo!'s spam filtering is practically non-existent.
3. Backup capability. With everything stored on Yahoo!'s servers, you have no real ability to backup your e-mail.
4. Contract. Because you have no contract with Yahoo!, they can decide next month to discontinue their mail service, deleting all of your stored e-mail in the process, and there's nothing that you can do about it.
5. Capabilities. Yahoo!'s e-mail cannot be used with standard SMTP/IMAP mail clients, meaning that you only have access to their limited feature set.
6. Attachment size. With a Yahoo! e-mail account, one is limited as to the size of e-mail attachments.
7. Storage. The total storage for e-mail is limited to 250MB.
got something to prove?
Yes -- that I have the technical savvy to run my domain and e-mail server. My mail does not sit on some ISP's server. I can use any spam filtering methods and lists that I choose. I can use standard mail clients and backup my e-mail so that I don't lose valuable correspondence. If I want someone to send me a 650MB attachment, I can enable it. If I want to store all of the e-mail that I receive, I can (and do).
How are we supposed to take a question about cost-is-no-object custom motherboards seriously when it comes from someone who uses a free Yahoo! e-mail address, with all of it's inherent limitations, because he's either cheap or lacks the technical skills to run a domain?
The same person who wants to buy a one-of-a-kind custom motherboard has to use a free e-mail address from Yahoo: Druegan2001@yahoo.com. Now that's funny!
Much of your post is flamebait,
No, it is not. But from that opening salvo, I gather that's where you're trying to steer this discussion.
The FSF has explained why this license is a non-free license.
No, they have explained how it fails to meet their restrictive definition of a free software license. Others would disagree with that definition.
Unlike you writing and selling Harry Potter books (which, actually, I wouldn't object to you doing but given your writing sample here, I doubt you could match what fans of that series are used to reading), I need my computer to express myself politically in the way I choose to do and I use a computer to cooperate with other people in the way people in ethical societies should do.
I have been published in several major magazines and served as a consultant to Time-Life Books. Given that practically incomprehensible run-on-sentence quoted above, your criticism of my writing is ironic.
To answer the non-flamebait portion of your run-on sentence, just who are you to decide how "people in ethical societies should" behave?
This includes distributing software for a fee, if I choose.
You are free to distribute any software that you write for a fee, but you do not have a right, God-given, moral, or otherwise, to distribute, for a fee, software that others write unless they specifically permit such distribution. In you previous post, you stated that you "deserve the right to... distribute modified or verbatim copies of the covered work for a fee." Again, I ask you why you "deserve" to be able to do that. There is a difference between wanting to do something and deserving the right to do it.
Distribution is key to spreading copies of programs that help people, or spreading copies of improved programs. Distributing copies of a program for a fee is a great way to justify writing more free software.
Again, you can distribute your original works in whatever way you see fit. But your desire to make money by distributing works of others doesn't encourage most people to write free software. They don't think "I'm so happy that Jeff Nicholson-Owens was able to profit from my countless man-hours of coding. I'll have to write more free software so that he can further profit from my efforts."
To maintain that I shouldn't be able to do these things is to advocate for a power we don't grant readers of books or other published works--I can buy and sell copies of other copyrighted works by leveraging my rights under the first sale doctrine.
That is blatantly untrue. The First Sale Doctrine does not give you the right to offer derivative works for sale. Nor does it allow you to sell copies of a copyrighted work you purchased. That's what you want to do with software, though.
Ultimately, free software sets a better standard against which we can compare other software and see if the rights we have with free software are also granted to us.
No, it sets a standard, not a "better standard." That it fits in with your world view does not make it superior.
I'm not willing to give up these rights, so I place them high on my priority list when evaluating a program.
You're welcome to do that, but it is egotistical of you to assume that your value system should be shared by everyone else. Many people want to assure that their software, and derivative works, are always distributed at no charge. They don't want large corporations reselling their work. Others want to prevent their software from being used by organizations whose views or labor practices they find reprehensible. You think that the purity of the free software movement is so important that authors should not prohibit their software from being used by companies producing snuff kiddie porn. Others would disagree. And just as those people have no right to unilaterally decide what is a "better standard," neither do you.
I'll stick by my "Stallman-like" comment. Like Stallman, you remain convinced that anyone who disagrees with you is wrong.
That's a good point, but I was thinking more along the lines of hardware for in-house playing of music. I have my music ripped to a lossless format in a central location in my residence and I'd like to be able to play music in my living room stereo or any of the N computers in various room. Streaming + hardware devices for playback to stereo systems (think: airTunes) makes this fairly painless. One the fly transcoding is certainly the other option, but why do it if you don't have to?
I tend to prefer the simpler alternative of small form factor PCs that directly access the files on the network drives. Then I can install the codec and player software of choice.
I don't either, and I wish him the best and biggest slice of the pie possible. But the reality is that for many people, myself included, restrictivly licensed software is simply less attractive, and when that and all the various technical merits of the various lossless formats are taken together, at least for me, FLAC comes out on top.
FLAC is a good format. I respect your views on restrictive software licenses, but I'm hoping that the dual-licensing (non-commercial vs. commercial use) becomes more commonplace. I believe that many more developers will enter the open-source fray if they know that their software will not be resold by others. They may want to contribute to the common good without contributing to the coffers of SCO, IBM, RedHat, and every other corporation who chooses to use and sell open-source software written by others. To each his own...
True, APE does compress a bit better than FLAC, however it's important to note the following:
1. FLAC is streamable (APE is not.)
A valid point, but I have no need for streaming. I need to store lots of music on my hard drive.
2. FLAC has native support for several hardware players (APE supports none, to my knowledge.)
For portable players, I'll stick with high-quality VBR MP3 files. There's just not enough storage for lossless audio on them yet. When there is, I can easily transcode from APE to whatever format they support.
3. FLAC is asymmetric with a bias towards faster decoding (APE is symmetric with respect to encode and decode speeds.)
True. And APE is fairly CPU-intensive during both encoding and decoding. Not a problem for me on my computer, though. And it will only get easier over time.
4. FLAC is licensed under the OSI approved Xiph modification to the BSD license with supporting reference code licensed under the GPL (APE code is generally available but the license is apparently non-standard enough that several Linux distributions are unwilling to package it.
APE's license provides for unrestricted non-commercial use, which is good enough for me. I don't blame the author if he wants his slice of the pie when a for-profit corporation distributes his software as part of a commercial Linux distro. Nor do I blame him if he wants to refuse permission for commercial use by organizations whose views, labor practices, or ethics he finds offensive. If he doesn't want the RIAA and his ex-employer to use the package, he should be able to deny such use.
According to the Monkey's Audio developer site: "If you're trying to make money, in any way, talk to me first.". This is a restatement of section 2 of the Monkey's Audio license ("2. The use of Monkey's Audio or the Monkey's Audio source code for any commercial purposes including, but not limited to, implementation in shareware packages is strictly prohibited without first obtaining written permission from the author.").
This means that you need additional permission beyond the license to do something you deserve the right to do--distribute modified or verbatim copies of the covered work for a fee; something you would have the right to do if Monkey's Audio license qualified as a free software license, which it clearly does not. The copyright holder could deny your business permission ad hoc. Choosing to deal with licensors like this means that you are choosing to build your business on sand (metaphorically speaking).
Why do you "deserve the right" to build a business around the hard work of the author(s) of Monkey's audio without getting their permission or giving them compensation? That's like me saying that I "deserve the right" to write and sell Harry Potter books without the permission of the author and without compensating her.
It's that absolutist, Stallman-like thinking that is harming open-source movement. Many authors would be happy to write open-source software for the good of the community, but they don't want some organization, maybe one that layed them off or that represents views they find reprehensible, using their software in a commercial venture. Still others do not want some large corporation like RedHat or IBM profiting from their work while paying them nothing.
I can hardly believe I need to tell open source proponents about the value of paying attention to all computer users, including those in business.
You should learn the difference between "need" and "want" -- something your parents should have taught you the first time you said that you 'needed' some toy you saw on TV. Nike may want to use my software (without paying me), but they don't need to use it -- and if I find their labor practices of employing children for pennies a day in third world countries to be abhorrent, then I should be able to deny them permission to use software that I created.
FLAC remains the easy choice primarily because it is free software. It might not compress best (but it compresses better than Shorten), but it works well enough and its inherent freedom offers a compelling case for long-term archiving.
The fact that NAMBLA, the RIAA, the KKK, and SCO are all permitted to use and resell FLAC does not make it my compression software of choice. I'll stick with the software which works the best -- especially when I can get the source code.
Monkey's Audio (APE) is open-source and multi-platform. It compresses better than FLAC or Shorten (SHN). Easy choice.
State sales tax is collected at the time of sale on the full amount of the purchase, but that's hardly a big deal if you're paying $150 for a hard drive and getting $80 back. And then you put stamps on two or three rebate forms so it's like only getting $75 back. Not a bad deal.
As to 'claiming the tax', I'm not sure what you mean. I pay income tax to the feds, not sales tax. Sales tax is paid at the time of sale. Are you suggesting that the state might audit me for paying sales tax on $150 even though I got $80 in rebates?
I'm looking at a 19" monitor that I got for $-10 after rebates. My computer has a 200GB hard drive that cost me $22 after rebates. I'm accessing the Internet through an SMC WiFi 802.11G router that cost me 98 cents after rebates. I just did my taxes with Taxcut and filed electronically. The total price for federal, state, and electronic filing will be $10 after rebates. My girlfriend and I got Sony T610 mobile phones with camera, color screen, organizer features, etc. The after-rebate price on EACH phone was $-175.
Rebates let me profit off of the laziness of others. To all of the smug people who proudly proclaim that they "ignore" rebates, I say "thank you!" You're helping to subsidize my purchases. I would much prefer that I get a hard drive for $80 after rebate and that you buy the same one for $150 and never claim your rebate. That's much better than both of us getting the hard drive for $115 with no rebates.
If you think, for a moment, that Best Buy is doing this to please customers, you're on drugs! Best Buy is only doing this to combat their so-called "devil customers" -- the ones who come in and take advantage of loss-leaders and giant rebates without also buying $18.99 Britney Spears CDs, 8-packs of batteries, non-discounted DVD players, LCD TVs, etc.
If you recognize an imaginary sword as being currency valued at $800 and tax it, then those taxes could be paid in that same currency. You can't have it count as currency for calculating what is due but not count as currency for paying that due. Either it is tender or it is not.
No, either it has value or it does not. It has nothing to do with accepting it as currency. If you receive four motorcycles as payment for work you do, the IRS is not going to accept one of them as payment for taxes owed on the set of four. See "Topic 420 Bartering Income" on the IRS's web pages.
I make it a point to find out something about a subject before I comment on it. Perhaps your statements would be harder to dispute if you sought knowledge rather than simply collecting that which incidently comes your way.
Perhaps you would be more successful as disputing my statements if you spent more time researching meaningful information rather than calculating the exact hourly wages of people who play Warcraft games. Or you could invest your mental energies in thinking about the ramifications of claiming that "virtual weapons" are income for labor.
The labor contributes as much to society as creating a piece of art, writing a poem, writing a fictional story, or making a movie.
Art, a poem, a fictional story, or a movie has lasting value. How can you claim that someone playing, even at an extreme skill level, an online computer game contributes as much to society as a Salvadore Dali, Edgar Allen Poe, Ernest Hemingway, or Stanley Kubrick?
Personally I tend to think that investing any time in the worship of a mythical magic man in the sky is crazy. But people dedicate their entire lives and spend billions engaged in and convincing other to engage in the worship of figments of imagination that do not even exist in a virtual world let alone the real one.
And on that, we find ourselves completely in agreement. But, for many, it's just a means of taking advantage of the mentally feeble. If you call an old woman, claim to be representing her bank, and get her to write a check to you for her life's savings, you are called a "con man" and are sent to prison. If you do the same thing, but claim to be representing God, you are called a tele-evangelist and you get to drive a car worth more than the old woman's home.
Oooooh, pity - just missed the one hour mark. Seventy whole minutes of "life" - people around here will be jealous.
That's probably true for many. But keep your chin up and take baby steps. Walk away from the computer for just ten minutes. Work your way up to 1/2 an hour. Pretty soon, you might even be able go outside. If you do, maybe we'll run into one another.
To me, he's anonymous and a coward. I have no idea who he is based on some self-chosen screen name and I'm sure that he's not man enough to talk that way to my face.
As to the delay, I use Slashdot when my time allows. Sometimes I hit it several times a day, checking responses to my comments each time. Other times, a week or more goes by between when I post a comment and check for responses. Why? I have a life. You might try getting one sometime.
The virtual weapon was no less an intangible asset than is a computer password. It too is just bits in a computer. And like a password, a gaming object can give access to places on a server otherwise inaccessible.
And what is the value of the information to which you will gain access with the virtual weapon? Also, it's very clear what you will be able to access with a password. Exactly what can one access with a virtual weapon? Does it not depend, at all, on the skill of the player?
Most insurance companies do insure collectables.
And those policies are written to an "agreed-upon value," not the fair market value. You said that what collectors pay for things sets the value -- and that's blatantly wrong, as I showed with the aforementioned insurance/Ford Pinto example. The fair market value of something is not the highest amount that anyone would, or ever did, pay for one of them.
I realize this is Slashdot but in the future I would prefer you not respond to my posts with random assertations you have no basis for making.
I had very good reason for making that assertion: Because it is true. Your inability to counter my arguments doesn't mean that I should stop making them.
This IRS red herring is interesting but it is a red herring and nothing more.
No, it is a real issue: Is an imaginary sword really $800+ real-world income or is it not? You can't have it both ways where it's income when someone steals it but it's not when you do your taxes.
The issue is whether the gold is currency, not whether it is taxable.
Gold is a precious metal. It is mined from the Earth. If you can't weigh it on a scale, it isn't gold.
If the IRS chooses to recognize virtual currency income I would be happy to deduct my game loses and pay any leftover tax in gold.
You're mixing apples and oranges: If you claim that an imaginary sword has a real-world value of $800, then you should be paying real-world taxes on $800 if you win/steal/earn such a sword in game play.
It takes about 8hrs of solid game time in world of warcraft about level 45 to earn 8-10gold. It takes hundreds of hours of work to get to lvl45 in the first place. That gold will sell in lots of 100 for about $0.22/gold. That means after a two or three hundred hour investment; if you cut out all the middlemen; both farming and selling gold yourself; you can make a whopping $1.76-$2.20/day.
So, from that, I can conclude that people who buy and sell imaginary gold are idiots. And, by the way, it's scary that you know that much about the subject. Perhaps you should turn off your computer and venture forth into the real world.
That means this guy stole the equivelent of 494 8hr days (about 1 3/4yrs with weekends off of repetative work about like a factory). Perhaps you think currency representative of that much labor should have no value. Personally, I do not.
If the labor contributes nothing to society, then that's the value of the labor. If you choose to spend your every waking moment playing solitaire, I don't think that the virtual "currency" you win should have any value. Any 41 year old man who invests 1.75 years of his life (or over $800) to get an imaginary sword needs pschiatric help -- thus explaining why they were willing to kill someone over the "theft" of said imaginary item.
It shows just how important the opinion of a rude anonymous coward is to me.