That's a little too harsh. There is always the remote change that one of these perpetual motion inventors stumbles across a new source of previously unusable energy.
That's doesn't make it a "perpetual motion" machine, but it could still be enormously useful.
Off the top of my head, I could imagine that the earth's magnetic field might be used as an energy source. Some unknown affect might convert subatomic particles to energy in special situations.
The bottom line is that this device should be easy to test. Either it puts out more energy than is (apparently) put into it, or not. If it does, then begin looking for non-apparent sources of energy.
It might be groundbreaking and amazing if any of the following happen:
Someone finds phantom matter
Someone devises a test for proving the existence of phantom matter
Someone devises a test that can be used to find wormholes that look like black holes
Someone actually finds a wormhole
An unexpected result from a particle accelerator experiment suggests the existence of phantom matter
Until then this is just isn't newsworthy; it's not like it is the first time someone speculated about wormholes. This has nothing to do with the nationality of whomever makes the discovery.
Answering these questions do nothing to change the important issues of today and the future.
Knowing how life began is a very important part of understanding life in general. This is relevant to the important issue of making me a cyborg body before my current one wears out.
There may be a new type of matter which could hold open wormholes (which might exist), and maybe they would look like black holes.
STOP THE PRESSES!
Seriously, the time for a press release would be when you have something concrete, like some way to test any of these speculations: "I predict that if a black hole has (observable property), then it is actually a wormhole" or "We could determine if phantom matter exists by doing experiment foo"
From what I can see, the loss was 5 billion, but the total amount sold was 50 billion. A sudden sale of 5% of the market causing a 10% drop seems a lot more plausible than a sale of 0.5% causing a 10% drop.
Yes but why as an artist don't I have to right to control my work?
Because "controlling your work" requires you to control other people's work too.
Imagine you write a song. A person listens to the song and starts whistling the tune sometime later. Does he owe you royalties?
The only way to really "own" an idea it to never tell anyone. Once a piece of "intellectual property" is released into the wild, the only to control it is to infringe on the rights of other people.
The compromise of copyright was a small and limited time infringement of the rights of the public in exchange for more creative output. When copyright creates more harm to individuals than benefit, then its only justification for existence disappears.
Criminal acts (murder, rape, theft) are more generally "wrong", while civil infractions are generally ambiguous.
Note that copyright infringement is not theft, as defined by the law. The attempts by the RIAA and others to redefine it as such are propaganda.
If you want to go to extremes, they are all just words you can use them however you want. It's just a lot easier to communicate if we all stick to consistent usages. Using the same adjective to refer to an action that causes real, objective harm to a human being as well as to violations of artificial government-granted monopolies which can not be proven to harm anyone is a little disingenuous.
If you allow yourself to really empathize with all the tragedy in the world, then you would collapse emotionally. Humor is a psychological self-defense. You can consider a situation and possible learn something from it without getting too emotionally invested.
Threatening would more often fall under assault than attempted murder.
The main point that the law defines many murder-related crimes: performing it, attempting it, planning it, threatening it - but for copyright infringement only actually doing it is illegal.
Well, if it isnt illegal (and I suspect that it is illegal) then it really should be.
Everyone is entitled to his opinion. I'm more inclined to the view that copyright as it is currently practiced is a "legal loop hole" that shouldn't be around for much longer.
Slashdot Mirror
That's doesn't make it a "perpetual motion" machine, but it could still be enormously useful.
Off the top of my head, I could imagine that the earth's magnetic field might be used as an energy source. Some unknown affect might convert subatomic particles to energy in special situations.
The bottom line is that this device should be easy to test. Either it puts out more energy than is (apparently) put into it, or not. If it does, then begin looking for non-apparent sources of energy.
- Someone finds phantom matter
- Someone devises a test for proving the existence of phantom matter
- Someone devises a test that can be used to find wormholes that look like black holes
- Someone actually finds a wormhole
- An unexpected result from a particle accelerator experiment suggests the existence of phantom matter
Until then this is just isn't newsworthy; it's not like it is the first time someone speculated about wormholes. This has nothing to do with the nationality of whomever makes the discovery.I'm just saying that "I have an idea, but have no clue how to test it yet" is a little premature for a press release
There may be a new type of matter which could hold open wormholes (which might exist), and maybe they would look like black holes.
STOP THE PRESSES!
Seriously, the time for a press release would be when you have something concrete, like some way to test any of these speculations: "I predict that if a black hole has (observable property), then it is actually a wormhole" or "We could determine if phantom matter exists by doing experiment foo"
How about publicizing actual discoveries instead of random speculation?
From what I can see, the loss was 5 billion, but the total amount sold was 50 billion. A sudden sale of 5% of the market causing a 10% drop seems a lot more plausible than a sale of 0.5% causing a 10% drop.
you are doing it wrong
All of them are thieves and pirates, stealing money from the poor recording companies.
I'm more concerned about bot flies eating my brain.
Forget about athletes; just think of all the people who buy viagra now
Imagine you write a song. A person listens to the song and starts whistling the tune sometime later. Does he owe you royalties?
The only way to really "own" an idea it to never tell anyone. Once a piece of "intellectual property" is released into the wild, the only to control it is to infringe on the rights of other people.
The compromise of copyright was a small and limited time infringement of the rights of the public in exchange for more creative output. When copyright creates more harm to individuals than benefit, then its only justification for existence disappears.
and it wants its headline back.
(yes I know this is a different story than back then, but it's the same headline)
Criminal acts (murder, rape, theft) are more generally "wrong", while civil infractions are generally ambiguous.
Note that copyright infringement is not theft, as defined by the law. The attempts by the RIAA and others to redefine it as such are propaganda.
If you want to go to extremes, they are all just words you can use them however you want. It's just a lot easier to communicate if we all stick to consistent usages. Using the same adjective to refer to an action that causes real, objective harm to a human being as well as to violations of artificial government-granted monopolies which can not be proven to harm anyone is a little disingenuous.
It's the difference between a civil court and a criminal court.
The law already recognizes the distinction.
I think this article is informative.
If you allow yourself to really empathize with all the tragedy in the world, then you would collapse emotionally. Humor is a psychological self-defense. You can consider a situation and possible learn something from it without getting too emotionally invested.
Threatening would more often fall under assault than attempted murder.
The main point that the law defines many murder-related crimes: performing it, attempting it, planning it, threatening it - but for copyright infringement only actually doing it is illegal.
But the only evidence of any uploads whatsoever were initiated by the RIAA.
If they had never performed that investigation, would there every have been an infringement?