Using a competitor's trademark without permission in your own advertising is not necessarily illegal. If Google is blocking particular trademarks from being used, it's probably just a CYA measure.
"What purpose could he have for posting to Slashdot and antagonizing people's preconceptions (in an admittedly confrontational way) other than the sake of argument?"
It almost sounds like you're saying he's trolling. The thing is, trolls don't troll for the sake of argument. They troll for the sake of personal amusement.
"He admits he's harassed several city officials in his OMG POLICE ARE EVIL AND RAPED ME! post."
Where does he admit to "harassing several city officials"?
As far as I can tell, dear troll, the claim is that the blog itself constitutes harassment, which is simply ridiculous. Public criticism of public officials doesn't constitute harassment, no matter how offended the cops are by the blog posts.
"He is innocent until proven guilty, but the cops aren't? What kind of bullshit is that?"
The only bullshit here is your interpretation of the phrase "innocent until proven guilty". The cops aren't the ones being charged under the law, and the presumption of innocence applies only to those so charged. The presumption of innocence doesn't apply at all to criticism of public officials, which is apparently all this blogger is guilty of.
In any case, you are clearly an idiot. If I had mod points I'd have modded you a troll instead of replying.
I think we should standardize on EULAs being non-binding on all terms except those that grant new rights under particular terms. Thus, Free Software licenses are valid while licenses that take away existing rights are not.
What Open Source means for cloud computing is customers will get more hosting options than they otherwise would. Microsoft's plan is to sell you access to both hardware and software, but Open Source software would open the hosting end of the equation to greater competition between hosting companies, allowing customers to choose between hosting companies in a manner similar to how they can today choose web hosts.
I'd probably break their arms as well, but the sexual assault charges are up to the state, and unfortunately the state is itself the offender. I doubt you'd manage to convince the DA to file charges against the school.
If you didn't vote libertarian, you ASKED FOR THIS
I thought Libertarians were the private property advocates par excellence. Why would they not support strong IP, other than the fact that the government enforces it?
Ideally you shouldn't have to throttle your users' connections at all, but if you must I hope at least that you'll pick a strategy that doesn't discriminate unfairly against specific protocols. The purpose of QOS should be to ensure equitable sharing of bandwidth between all your customers, and not to penalize those who are heavy users of protocols the people in charge consider illegitimate due to the kinds of content being transmitted.
I wonder... Would your boss be so quick to suggest throttling if the heaviest users were VOIP users instead of P2P users, where the FCC might respond negatively to any throttling?
Are you saying that an act is not immoral so long as it's done for "technical or business reasons"?
Say I'm the CEO of a nationwide cable TV provider that's afraid of competition from streaming media. I decide, for business reasons, to throttle all streaming media connections to the point that they are useless, unless the content providers pay me $$$ not to throttle them. You'd call it a "business decision", while I'd call it an immoral act. Whether or not I am right, there's nothing about it being a business decision that precludes it from also being immoral.
It's a frightening prospect. The penalties are significant, but there's no due process of law.
So why the push? I'm not sure, but I think it has to do with how easy it is to block things at the ISP level (whether workarounds exist, it's easy enough to block things in a way that you have to look for a workaround). It's just easier for the government to inflict the burden of enforcement upon ISPs that to deal with the problem through the courts. As the saying goes: "Out of sight, out of mind."
You think depriving people of access to the Internet == which is quickly becoming an essential resource to many -- is more fair than suing people left and right?
I see. So rather than a straight presentation of the RSS feed, Boxee is taking the RSS feed and using that to figure out which videos to embed?
I can see how such use of the RSS feed might be seen as questionable, but aren't they still embedding the videos according to Hulu's own embed code? The original poster complained about missing ads, but if Boxee is embedding videos according to Hulu's own standards for third-party embedding then I still can't see much wrong with what they're doing.
You're quite welcome to miss the point, if you like. Who am I to stop you if such a thing makes you feel better?
On the other hand... if you'd rather understand what it is I'm actually saying, you should take note of the fact that RSS is meant for content syndication and is meant to be interpreted as a set of individual items, while a web page is meant to be displayed as a whole. Unless Boxee is stripping the RSS content itself, its use is consistent with the purpose of an RSS feed. That's my point.
The software package cuts out the entire site, the adverts, etc and repackages it as almost its own material (with a small source icon).
What do youy mean "the entire site"? It's RSS, not HTML. There's no "entire site" for Boxee to display.
Now I'm not familiar with Boxee or with Hulu's RSS feed, so I cannot comment on the specifics, but, unless Boxee is actually modifying the contents of the RSS feed, it seems to me that Hulu are acting like jerks.
Putting aside the ridiculous assumption that you have a right to the product of someone else's creative efforts by virtue of being born...
You're looking at the issue from the wrong perspective. It's not a matter of "having the right... to someone else's creative efforts by virtue of being born", but a matter of you, the author, having or not the right to prevent others from making unauthorized copies of those works that you voluntarily publish.
Copying is a mechanical process that does not require your involvement in any way beyond the original act of publishing your work. Your right to prevent others from making copies of your published works is an artificial right, granted by government for the sole purpose of promoting the creation of new works.
One of the more interesting responses came from an ISP called Videotron, which told the CRTC that controlling access to content... 'could be beneficial not only to users of Internet services but to society in general.' As examples of such benefits, Videotron mentioned the control of spam, viruses...
What blatant misdirection! There's a huge difference between blocking spam and viruses in order to protect customers against hassle and harm, and blocking access to content because it allows you to make a buck once the content producer begs you to please stop blocking their content. Protecting customers against spam and viruses is a service; blocking content because the content provider hasn't paid you off, on the other hand, is extortion. Net Neutrality is supposed to prevent just this kind of extortion.
Wiktionary defines a monkey trap as "a cage containing a banana with a hole large enough for a monkey's hand to fit in, but not large enough for a monkey's fist (clutching a banana) to come out. Used to 'catch' monkeys that lack the intellect to let go of the banana and run away."
I think the lure of requiring customers to buy new books rather than borrow or buy them used has placed book publishers in a situation similar to that of the monkey who can't get his hand out of the trap because he's too greedy -- or perhaps just not intelligent enough -- to realize it's in his best interests to let go.
Sorry, but as cool as I think the concept of e-Ink really is, I can't get past the fact that native Kindle books are tied to your Amazon account. The Kindle represents an attack on the first sale doctrine, and I refuse to support it to the tune of $400 plus the price of crippled books.
Slashdot Mirror
It seems to me this is meant to cover only the use of Google's own services.
I Don't know why they'd include this in their browser's EULA, however.
Using a competitor's trademark without permission in your own advertising is not necessarily illegal. If Google is blocking particular trademarks from being used, it's probably just a CYA measure.
"What purpose could he have for posting to Slashdot and antagonizing people's preconceptions (in an admittedly confrontational way) other than the sake of argument?"
It almost sounds like you're saying he's trolling. The thing is, trolls don't troll for the sake of argument. They troll for the sake of personal amusement.
"He admits he's harassed several city officials in his OMG POLICE ARE EVIL AND RAPED ME! post."
Where does he admit to "harassing several city officials"?
As far as I can tell, dear troll, the claim is that the blog itself constitutes harassment, which is simply ridiculous. Public criticism of public officials doesn't constitute harassment, no matter how offended the cops are by the blog posts.
"He is innocent until proven guilty, but the cops aren't? What kind of bullshit is that?"
The only bullshit here is your interpretation of the phrase "innocent until proven guilty". The cops aren't the ones being charged under the law, and the presumption of innocence applies only to those so charged. The presumption of innocence doesn't apply at all to criticism of public officials, which is apparently all this blogger is guilty of.
In any case, you are clearly an idiot. If I had mod points I'd have modded you a troll instead of replying.
I think we should standardize on EULAs being non-binding on all terms except those that grant new rights under particular terms. Thus, Free Software licenses are valid while licenses that take away existing rights are not.
The world will go on, but humanity might not.
What Open Source means for cloud computing is customers will get more hosting options than they otherwise would. Microsoft's plan is to sell you access to both hardware and software, but Open Source software would open the hosting end of the equation to greater competition between hosting companies, allowing customers to choose between hosting companies in a manner similar to how they can today choose web hosts.
Posts like yours make me wish mod points went up to 10.
I'd probably break their arms as well, but the sexual assault charges are up to the state, and unfortunately the state is itself the offender. I doubt you'd manage to convince the DA to file charges against the school.
If anything, it seems to me a strip search of a girl is more intrusive: There's two orifices to hold contraband instead of just one.
I thought Libertarians were the private property advocates par excellence. Why would they not support strong IP, other than the fact that the government enforces it?
"I bet they'd have been whining pretty loudly if the cops were faster but didn't a thorough job of it."
I can imagine. Just think of all the lives they'd have put at risk by not taking every precaution necessary in disabling a toy grenade.
Ideally you shouldn't have to throttle your users' connections at all, but if you must I hope at least that you'll pick a strategy that doesn't discriminate unfairly against specific protocols. The purpose of QOS should be to ensure equitable sharing of bandwidth between all your customers, and not to penalize those who are heavy users of protocols the people in charge consider illegitimate due to the kinds of content being transmitted.
I wonder... Would your boss be so quick to suggest throttling if the heaviest users were VOIP users instead of P2P users, where the FCC might respond negatively to any throttling?
Are you saying that an act is not immoral so long as it's done for "technical or business reasons"?
Say I'm the CEO of a nationwide cable TV provider that's afraid of competition from streaming media. I decide, for business reasons, to throttle all streaming media connections to the point that they are useless, unless the content providers pay me $$$ not to throttle them. You'd call it a "business decision", while I'd call it an immoral act. Whether or not I am right, there's nothing about it being a business decision that precludes it from also being immoral.
It's a frightening prospect. The penalties are significant, but there's no due process of law.
So why the push? I'm not sure, but I think it has to do with how easy it is to block things at the ISP level (whether workarounds exist, it's easy enough to block things in a way that you have to look for a workaround). It's just easier for the government to inflict the burden of enforcement upon ISPs that to deal with the problem through the courts. As the saying goes: "Out of sight, out of mind."
You think depriving people of access to the Internet == which is quickly becoming an essential resource to many -- is more fair than suing people left and right?
I see. So rather than a straight presentation of the RSS feed, Boxee is taking the RSS feed and using that to figure out which videos to embed?
I can see how such use of the RSS feed might be seen as questionable, but aren't they still embedding the videos according to Hulu's own embed code? The original poster complained about missing ads, but if Boxee is embedding videos according to Hulu's own standards for third-party embedding then I still can't see much wrong with what they're doing.
You're quite welcome to miss the point, if you like. Who am I to stop you if such a thing makes you feel better?
On the other hand... if you'd rather understand what it is I'm actually saying, you should take note of the fact that RSS is meant for content syndication and is meant to be interpreted as a set of individual items, while a web page is meant to be displayed as a whole. Unless Boxee is stripping the RSS content itself, its use is consistent with the purpose of an RSS feed. That's my point.
What do youy mean "the entire site"? It's RSS, not HTML. There's no "entire site" for Boxee to display.
Now I'm not familiar with Boxee or with Hulu's RSS feed, so I cannot comment on the specifics, but, unless Boxee is actually modifying the contents of the RSS feed, it seems to me that Hulu are acting like jerks.
You're looking at the issue from the wrong perspective. It's not a matter of "having the right ... to someone else's creative efforts by virtue of being born", but a matter of you, the author, having or not the right to prevent others from making unauthorized copies of those works that you voluntarily publish.
Copying is a mechanical process that does not require your involvement in any way beyond the original act of publishing your work. Your right to prevent others from making copies of your published works is an artificial right, granted by government for the sole purpose of promoting the creation of new works.
What blatant misdirection! There's a huge difference between blocking spam and viruses in order to protect customers against hassle and harm, and blocking access to content because it allows you to make a buck once the content producer begs you to please stop blocking their content. Protecting customers against spam and viruses is a service; blocking content because the content provider hasn't paid you off, on the other hand, is extortion. Net Neutrality is supposed to prevent just this kind of extortion.
Wiktionary defines a monkey trap as "a cage containing a banana with a hole large enough for a monkey's hand to fit in, but not large enough for a monkey's fist (clutching a banana) to come out. Used to 'catch' monkeys that lack the intellect to let go of the banana and run away."
I think the lure of requiring customers to buy new books rather than borrow or buy them used has placed book publishers in a situation similar to that of the monkey who can't get his hand out of the trap because he's too greedy -- or perhaps just not intelligent enough -- to realize it's in his best interests to let go.
Yes. If I want a friend to read it but the book is no longer available, DRM would prevent me from simply giving him my copy.
Sorry, but as cool as I think the concept of e-Ink really is, I can't get past the fact that native Kindle books are tied to your Amazon account. The Kindle represents an attack on the first sale doctrine, and I refuse to support it to the tune of $400 plus the price of crippled books.