I agree with you. It's going to be tough to please everyone, but I think that all the good episodes had one thing in common: excellent writing. Styles changed, the level of special effects changed from almost nonexistent to horribly cheesy, but the writing was always intelligent and witty. I watched the show up until the very end (at least as much as was possible by scrounging it off of whatever PBS station I could get at the time), and I think the thing that killed it was a shift in the focus in the writing to cater to kids and/or a less sophisticated audience. I also saw the 1996 TV movie, and I think it got too caught up in trying to carry the show along with special effects, and that just won't work for Dr. Who. The fact of the matter is that we Americans...well, at least American television studios...have no business getting involved in a show like this. Some independent film/video people could probably pull it off, but the big studios are too fixated on laser beams, explosions, and whatever other special effects they can cram into a production. This may work for Star Trek, but it won't work here.
And now to veer off on a tangent. One thing that I've always wondered about is the play on words in The Doctor and The Master. Was this a subtle joke? I mean, in academics, at least in the United States, the highest degree you can attain is a doctorate, and the second highest is a master's degree. So, does this imply that The Master may be good at what he does (evil, that is), but The Doctor will always prevail?
A much "lower-tech" version of this was tried on cable over 20 years ago. I can remember the ads. You paid a subscription fee and got a special game console that connected to the cable system. I never knew anyone who ever tried it, so I have no idea how good it was, but I guess that's the point: Very few tried it.
I can't see how this will succeed any more than pay-per-view has. Some people will use it, but I find that most people evaluate games by seeing them on their friends' computers, then go out and buy the game if they like it. And if none of their friends have the game, they download a demo. Considering that most games cost in the $30-$40 range, renting the game more than once or twice gets rather expensive relative to the retail price. I'd imagine that the hard-core gamers will prefer to buy, and casual gamers will only rent once or twice a month. And with broadband stilll only used by a minority of Net users, their potential market is going to be limited for a while.
And, as others have already stated, this thing is going to be hacked. Then the race between the cracks and the security patches begins. If they can't keep the system reasonably secure, game publishers aren't going to make their titles available, and the only way this has a chance of succeeding is if it has a massive library of games to choose from.
FYI, the information I was "spoon fed" was from church-history classes at a Catholic high school, so I doubt they'd have any reason to make things sound any worse than they were. And nowhere did I say that most people were put to death, but getting convicted of heresy by an ecclesiastical court was for all intents and purposes the end of your life, even if they didn't kill you. There was no separation of church and state. In the Papal States in central Italy, the Church was the state, period.
But to return to my point, you had an organization that, although it was not technically a government, had enough influence that it had many of the powers of governments. It was multinational, it was rich, it could make or break politicians almost at will, and it was accountable to no one. In short, it could make the rules, either directly or indirectly. And it controlled information. If you weanted a book copied, you didn't take it to the local Kinko's, you had to use monks, and they were pretty picky about what they copied. But I'm not writing this to beat up on the Church; I'm writing it to illustrate the parallels we face today. Look at the power that the multinational corps have. Did the DMCA or the Telecom Act of 1996 become law because of a groundswell of public support for them? Of course not! They were bought and paid for by the companies who stand to gain from them. Money talks, and these companies have so much of it that it's almost impossible for the average person to have an impact. If you don't believe me, call the White House and ask to have lunch with President Bush next week. Tell whoever you speak to that you'd like to discuss the DMCA with the president. Do you think you'll get that lunch date? Now suppose that Rupert Murdoch, Steve Case, Jack Valenti, or Hillary Rosen made that call. Need I say more? The same goes for having a meeting with your Congressman or Senator. You won't even get in the door, but these folks can practically hand over a draft of a bill and get it introduced in Congress, and if they have enough meetings with enough politicians, they might even get it passed.
And to touch on control of the mass media, consider spectrum auctions. Want to get a chunk of frequencies? Unless you can outbid the big telecom companies for it, forget it. The whole thing is justified by saying that it avoids companies freeloading off of the public airwaves, since they have to pay for their frequencies, but what it does in reality is ensure that only the richest companies get to use them. Once again, money talks. Even the regulations that we used to have restricting how much one broadcaster can own have been almost completely thrown out. The big fish eat the little fish, people are exposed to fewer and fewer voices, and we're told it's a good thing. Except in the mass media, where most people still turn for information. The mass media says nothing, nothing about the dangers of the DMCA, nothing about fair use, nothing about concentrated media ownership; in short, nothing that will make people question the status quo. The public gets its daily dose of sex scandals, Hollywood gossip, and puff pieces promoting the latest movie of CD, a product that may even be produced by the same company that produced and aired the "informative news story". And everyone is happy, the money keeps rolling in, and anyone who makes trouble is quietly crushed.
Somebody mod this guy up. This is an excellent point. In the Middle Ages, the Church had reached a status that essentially put it above the law. In fact, it had its own laws and "justice system". Get out of line, and you were dead...literally. It was an international entity that was beyond the regulatory reach of any nation-state. In fact, any political figure who dared to oppose it did so at grave peril. We can see the same lines developing with the multinational corporations.
It's also worth noting that this dark time lasted for centuries, and there were many setbacks to breaking the Church's grip on power. Let us not forget that Gallileo was forced to recant his theories. We can look back now and say that his ideas prevailed in the end, but I bet he didn't see it that way at the time. We're in this for the long haul, and we will face setbacks along the way, but the important thing is to never give up.
I should also point out that one of the biggest achievements in the fight against Church power was the Protestant Reformation. Martin Luther gave the people an alternative to the Church, and that opened the floodgates of pent-up frustration and dissatisfaction. Suddenly, there were choices that had never existed before. In the same way, we can't forget that the big entertainment companies don't own our lives. There is alternative content, and we need to expose as many people as possible to it. And there's even an alternative to that: Go outside, play ball, have a conversation with someone. IOW, take control of your leisure time and take it out of the hands of the corps. The less money we give them, the less money they'll have to buy the tools to control our lives. And no, this isn't an easy chore. For the past 50 years at least, our entire culture has been built around mass-produced entertainment, and to turn away from that is to remake ourselves. Couch potatoes all over the land will howl in protest, but we have to try to break this addiction and bring the corporate dealers to heel.
Agreed! This man is an unrepentant spammer, and anyone who monitors the net-abuse newsgroups knows it. If you're going to ask him anything, don't forget to bring this up.
If we keep this up, will the next person/. chooses to interview be Sam Khuri, the infamous Benchmark Print Supply spammer? We could ask him about all those judgements against him and how he manages to keep going after getting sued so many times. Or, I don't know, maybe we could get the University Diplomas spammer(s) on here to discuss nontraditional education. Sheesh!
Well, you have to use a public IP because, if you don't, there's no way for your traffic to get routed, since others have to know your IP in order to send and receive data to/from you. You could set up your network to use all private IPs, but you'd only be able to talk to your local machines.
OTOH, if what you're asking is why we have things like ICANN and why the Commerce Department is involved, you have to trace the history of the Net back to its beginnings, when it was dominated by the military and universities, but that's too long a discussion for me to get into here. But what it boils down to is that you don't have to use the root servers and DNS infrastructure that ICANN is taking control of if you don't want to. In fact, there's been some discussion on/. about bailing out on ICANN. If enough site admins decided to do it, then it'd happen.
But what it comes down to is this: Being a common carrier is a legal definition, so if you want to know whether or not the Internet is or isn't (it most certainly isn't), you can look up the Telecommunications Act of 1996, or, if you don't want to do that, give the FCC a call and ask them, since they regulate all common carriers in this country. You can reach the FCC Consumer Information Bureau at 1-888-225-5322 or the FCC's main switchboard at 202-418-0190.
The Internet is a collection of private networks, not a common carrier. Therefore, anyone connected to the Internet, whether it is an office LAN, an ISP or a backbone provider, can block traffic from any part of the Internet it chooses. Anyone who doesn't like the policies of their upstream can find another connection point.
Yes, that sounds harsh, but consider the alternative. If the Internet was a common carrier, the whole concept of self-policing goes out the window. If you're a service provider, you can't block any traffic entering or leaving your network. Forget about filtering spam, and forget about refusing to sell a connection to that guy you know is going to use it to send spam. Forget about cutting him off if he's already connected, unless sending spam happens to be illegal in your jurisdiction. You have to serve anyone who can pay and who don't have some legal impediment to getting service, and you have to allow all traffic to enter and leave your network, whether you want it or not.
Well, they aren't shipping with receivers now, so either they aren't required to, or that decision hasn't been made yet. However, HDTV receivers are already out there (the DISH Network 6000 comes to mind, plus broadcast tuners and possibly also one or more DirecTV boxes), so if the standard was changed to allow only encryption-enabled tuners to connect, then that'll break every unit already shipped. Granted, it's still early in the game, but I have a feeling that any company that's already selling tuners is going to be pretty pissed about their units suddenly becoming obsolete. They could redesign them, but that would mean they'd have to stop production for several months at least. If this came to pass, I could easily see Charlie Ergen (DISH's CEO) filing a lawsuit. Anyone who's kept up with DISH knows that they don't take kindly to anything they see as collusion or restraint of trade. Since they design and manufacture their own equipment, they'd be in a world of hurt if something like this happened, so they'd most likely fight it rather than stopping production and redesigning their boxes.
Over-the-air streams can be unencrypted or unencrypted, but if they're encrypted, the broadcasters have to pay fees for the spectrum, at least that's the way I understand it. The article mentioned the unencrypted nature of broadcast streams as an impediment to the copy-protection system. It pointed out that cable would be easier, since those streams can be encrypted without penalty.
So, even if some broadcasters encrypted, the monitor would have to accept unencrypted data, or you wouldn't be able to watch anything that wasn't encrypted.
I agree with you about the problems of lots of users trying to grab streams at the same time, but I don't think adoption would be that quick, so hopefully by the time you got 10% adoption, we'll have more bandwidth available. Two years ago, almost no one had DSL or cable, and look how far they've come in that time. I'm not absolutely sure that bandwidth will keep pace, but I'd be willing to bet that we'd see improvements.
You're right about using off-the-shelf boxes, but you're also right about the proprietary software, and that's the problem. For this to work, we need something as open as possible so that programmers couldn't be excluded because they're using the wrong kind of stream. For this reason, Realvideo, Windows Media, and Quicktime are out, but I wouldn't see a problem allowing them to have access to the box if the software vendors that owned them wanted to create plugins.
And about the digital interface to the TV, I certainly hope you're wrong, but I'll admit that anything's possible these days. I still believe that you have a huge lawsuit if the electronics makers and media companies got together and developed a closed standard. It'd be similar to a scenario in which Microsoft would get together with PC manufacturers and devise a way to allow only Windows and Microsoft or Microsoft-approved software to be installed on computers.
I'm not saying that the average person out there would produce his own stuff (although he could if he wanted to). I'm talking about things like independent films (Star Wars parodies, short films such as those on iFilm, etc.), streaming audio (KPIG, Radio Paradise, SkyFM), and possibly issue-oriented programs (could you imagine Slashdot TV?).
Here's my basic argument. Right now, we have three primary modes of live video delivery systems: broadcast, cable, and DBS. There are others, but these account for most all of the ways we get TV, and they're almost completely controlled by the large media companies. Couple that with the fact that there's effectively no way for anyone not in the "club" to gain entry. You can't get into anything that resembles a major broadcast market because all the frequencies are already taken, you can't get on most cable systems because the cable companies prefer to carry channels either partly or totally owned by their parent companies, and you can't get on DBS because these services want major programmers, and their signals are overcompressed as it is because they're already carrying more channels than they ought to. Many people here and elsewhere are bemoaning the monopoly held by the big media companies, but you're never, and I repeat never, going to break that monopoly until you find an alternate distribution method. The Internet is the best choice we have right now, and in fact, it works fairly well, especially for radio. In fact, as I write this, I'm listening to a high-quality feed of KPIG. Problem is, most people, including myself, don't want to sit in front of a computer in order to enjoy this content. I'd rather be able to go out into my living room and sit on my couch to watch and listen. I have a neat little gadget from X10 that will let me transmit the content out there, and it works pretty well. However, this is a bit of a kludge. What would be ideal is a box that I could hook up to my entertainment system to do all this, and that's what I'm talking about.
Look, the big media companies are in a pretty good position right now. They're going to squeeze consumers as hard as they can because they can. Right now, the listener or viewer has no real alternative, at least not unless he's willing to sit in front of a computer. If you can get that content out into the living room, where most folks are used to getting it, you'll open up a new world of possibilities. And I'll say one more thing about programming. There are scores of cable and satellite channels that have failed over the years because they couldn't get carriage on satellite and cable systems. If you devise an alternative distribution method, programmers will use it. Yes, you'll get crap, but you'll also get good stuff. And you'll finally give people options and give the media companies much-needed competition.
I have a feeling that digital TVs are still going to have analog interfaces for quite a while, so you can still get in that way. Besides, I'm not talking about streaming HDTV content--there isn't enough available bandwidth to do that into the home yet. Good old NTSC will be fine for now. And even if you choose to use the digital interface, I would imagine that if the set manufacturers built the interface so that only approved content could get through (as opposed to encrypted/watermarked content that you weren't authorized to watch), they'd have the mother of all antitrust suits on their hands. Besides, it wouldn't make sense to do that from a technical standpoint because people are going to have things like camcorders that they'll want to hook up to watch their videos, and these are already using digital interfaces in some cases. Not to mention all the locally-produced TV programming, such as local newscasts and public-access channels on cable systems. I really don't think the idea will be to exclude non-encrypted/watermarked signals. There would be too many technical and legal pitfalls to doing that.
But back to the media box I'm talking about. All it would have to be is a computer with NTSC output capability and a remote, but with no monitor, keyboard, or mouse, at least not in the standard package. Build it with off-the-shelf components and load it up with open-source software and audio/video codecs, then publish the specs for it online so anyone could build it. That way, anyone from Dell to your local computer store to an end user could put these things together. The main challenges would be to make it as cheap as possible and very easy to use, so all the owner would have to do is turn it on and choose what channel he wanted to watch (or hear, in the case of radio) from an on-screen menu. There'd have to be some way to automatically update the channel list as new ones came on, as well as updating software as needed, but this ought to be possible.
But, as I've said several times before, this has nothing to do with piracy. It doesn't even have anything to do with stopping the technically-inclined from finding a way around it. What is is intended to do is stop the average consumer from exercising their fair use rights so the media companies can sell those rights back. You want that program you just saw? It'll cost you. It's all about maximizing profits. The broadcasters tried to stop time-shifting when VCRs first appeared. Now they're going to try again, and the DMCA makes it illegal even to try to reassert your fair use rights. Beautiful, ain't it? I don't think I could have thought of a better way to screw consumers.
I will point out, however, that no one is forcing us to consume this mass-produced junk. People can turn it off and go outside to play ball, or at the very least, we can come up with alternative programming. I'm still convinced that an open-source (so anyone can build it), easy to use (and I can't stress that enough) set-top box with an Ethernet jack plugged into a broadband Net connection could allow Internet TV channels to be streamed onto a standard television. Can you imagine the possibilities? Anyone with a fat enough pipe could launch their own channel, and if you can build a box to let the average Joe watch it on his TV, you'll have the chance to break the video stranglehold of the media companies. You wouldn't even need slick programming. Many people would try it just for the novelty.
No, no, no. For this setup, you use rats. They're used to crawling around in small spaces, and besides, NYC has millions of 'em. Of course, you'd better use the small ones because I doubt the regular sized ones could fit through the tubes. And the nice thing about using rats is that the only kind of DoS attack that could possibly be used against them is a bunch of cats, but you'd need some really tough felines to stop New York rats.
You bet it was their intent. You see, all the things you say you want to do with your movies are things that can become profit centers for the media companies.
You want to be able to watch a movie on your laptop, perhaps while you're on a plane? Sure, we can help you with that. Just plug your laptop into this Ethernet port here, key your credit card number into the seatback terminal, and you'll have your choice of hundreds of movies, all for one low price, to watch while you fly.
Did your DVD get damaged? Oh, sorry about that, but don't worry, they're cheap, so you can just buy another one.
Do you need excerpts of this film for a presentation? No problem. For a small licensing fee, we can supply you with a package of pre-selected promotional clips.
It's the same story for any other form of media. All this furor over piracy is just an attempt to make sure content is locked down, not from pirates, but from anyone who might want to use it in other than the strictly prescribed way. The media companies know full well that this won't stop pirates. All it will do is limit what everyone else can do with media content, providing the companies the opportunity to sell those rights back to consumers.
Don't believe for a second that these guys are stupid. They aren't. They know that if they lay out all their reasons for locking down content, it would become clear that they're trampling all over people's fair use rights, so they hide behind the piracy argument. Not only does this obscure their true motives, it facilitates a heavy-handed crackdown on anyone who gets in the way.
It's all about the money. For every way you might use media content, there is an opportunity for profit, if the media companies can erect an electronic toll booth. The more of these toll booths they can set up, the more money they can extract from you. DivX was one attempt to do this, but it failed because there was an alternative: DVDs. Sony's plan to authenticate PS2 games and lock them to one machine will be another. Restrictions on when and where you can play SDMI-protected music files will be another, as will the concept of limited-time-use books on CD-ROM. I'll even dust off my crystal ball and predict some others:
PPV movies will be un-recordable, unless you pay a higher fee. Actually, SkyPix, a failed DBS venture in the early 1990s, was going to do this using Macrovision. If you paid a lower fee, Macrovision would prevent you from recording the movie. For a higher fee, the Macrovision would be turned off. For anyone who's wondering, this was done by sending instructions to the customer's receiver.
You'll become unable to fast-forward through commercials recorded on your PVR. The networks have hated the fact that viewers could zap commercials on taped shows. Now, they finally have a way to stop it. How will they manage it? My guess is they'll say that their schedules are copyrighted material and demand that if the PVR makers want to use them, they'll have to meet their demands.
Some shows will, like PPV, become un-recordable. The technology to do this has already been mandated for digital set-top boxes by the FCC. This will let the content owners sell copies of these programs to consumers who would otherwise just tape the shows.
Music fans will be given the "opportunity" to buy different listening rights for their favorite songs. For one amount, you can listen on your home computer/stereo system, for a small additional fee, you can copy tracks to your car's audio system, and for yet another small fee, you can download songs into a portable player. But forget about sharing your tunes with your friends. These songs will only play on devices licensed to you. The fees won't be any lower than what you pay for standard CDs, even though the music companies' distribution cost will decrease dramatically, but that's OK because you're paying for the "convenience" of instantly downloading albums from the Internet.
Electronic books won't be sold to you; they'll be leased. Are you in college? All you have to do is pay a subscription fee to whichever publisher your school has selected, and you'll always have access to its most up-to-date texts. But don't forget to get that payment in on time, or all your textbooks will suddenly disappear. Oh, and about those used textbooks, it was always a pain to go back to the bookstore and sell them at the end of the semester, wasn't it? Well, don't worry, that's no longer a problem, since you have nothing to resell anymore.
Now repeat this aloud three times: "It isn't about piracy--it's about maximizing profits." Careful, though, because I believe that fact is a trade secret, so you might get sued if you say it too loudly.
Agreed! I've said this before, and I'll say it again. The only way to stop the destruction of our fair use rights, as well as the patent and IP madness, is to make a stand. Get out there and fight like hell. Bring the battle to the forefront of the news as often as possible, and turn up the heat on the greedy corporations whenever possible.
Speaking of copyrights, The New York Times has a column by Lawrence Lessig on just that subject. I strongly suggest everyone here go and read it. And after you're done, write a letter to the editor on this subject and mail it in. The Times is an influential newspaper, and any issue that can get traction within its pages is going to find its way into other media sooner or later. Here's the opening. Anyone care to take advantage of it?
I'm not sure if they'd pull the plug or not, but it would be a public relations coup for the alternate domain owners if they did. Can you imagine how much of a black eye the backbone providers would get if they did this? But I can't see them doing this. Why should they care what root servers their customers are pointing to? Now, if you mean that management at the various ISPs would pull the plug on this if they found out their admins were doing it, yes, they probably would, and I'm not sure I'd object to that. If I owned an ISP, and I found out that my employees were doing something without my permission, I'd be pretty pissed off about it, especially something as fundamental as redirecting DNS traffic.
But the question becomes how to do this without causing mass confusion. IOW, what exactly are you wanting to do? Create new TLDs? Rewrite the rules for existing TLDs? Both? Overthrow ICANN and replace it with something else? Personally, I think that the main danger is that'd we'd end up with a splintered domain naming system and the chaos that would go along with it. Therefore, overthrowing ICANN would probably be the wisest course of action. If we went that route, then the first step is to set up a rival organization. Get some well-respected folks on board and write a charter that Internet users and admins can support. Build the organization up from a grass-roots level and make no bones about what its goal is: to replace ICANN with or without ICANN's support. And don't be shy about what will happen after that. If the new organization intends to repudiate the agreements that ICANN has made with Network Solutions, then say so. If it intends to throw out the current domain name dispute resolution policy, then make that crystal clear. IMHO, these are all things that people hate about the current situation we find ourselves in. Capitalize on that anger. Point out all the things we've grown to hate about ICANN, then put forward an organization that'll fix these problems. Don't go the "underground" route with this. Let everyone know what your intent is. But above all, keep the new organization unified. The one thing that will scare the hell out of people is the possibility that all you're doing is creating chaos.
I'm not blaming anyone outside of the U.S., since no one is forcing our government to sign these treaties. I may have been unclear as to who is doing what in my earlier post, but I understand perfectly well that many of these things are heavily influenced by our own government. That's what I was talking about when I referred to government agencies doing this to get powers they can't normally get. What I mean is that they do this because it's easier to get the Senate to ratify a treaty than for a bill to go through Congress. Then, once the treaty is ratified, its proponents will use it as a rationale for passing whatever pieces of legislation they can cook up.
But don't hold everyone but us Americans blameless for everything. The latest stir over the cybercrime treaty involves European nations lobbying for a ban on racist speech, something that's clearly unconstitutional here in the U.S. but part of the laws in other countries. As I said earlier, that's fine for them, and there's nothing wrong with harmonizing laws across national boundaries, but this can only be taken so far.
And FWIW, the post was not intended as flamebait for whoever modded it as such. Treaties are treated as sacred things in many instances, things that we must do whatever it takes to live up to, no matter how much it turns our stomachs to do so, and the people who draft them know this. Perhaps that outlook should change. If a treaty turns out to have bad consequences for us as a nation, then it should get dumped just like a bad law.
If this is true (and I did read the follow-up post disputing this), then maybe we should bail out of the WIPO treaty. I'm usually a pretty easygoing guy, but I'm getting sick and tired of treaties that conflict with our tradition of free speech being rammed down our throats. As an example, look at the cybercrime treaty being drafted by the Council of Europe. I realize that different countries have different sensibilities on these issues, and that's fine with me. If these nations like these agreements, then they can sign them all they want, but it seems to me that these things are being shoved down our throats with the reason given that we must have them to promote free trade, law enforcement, whatever. And is it any surprise that the average person is never the beneficiary of these agreements. No, it's usually some multinational corporation looking to increase its profits or a government agency that's looking for a way to more easily keep tabs on the population and who couldn't get these powers through the normal legislative process.
BTW, if any of this sounded like things Pat Buchanan might say, please know that it's purely coincidental and agreeing with him on anything was definitely not my intention.
And how are consumers supposed to know what drugs have and have not been tested? And how are they supposed to know the test results? Should drug companies be required to provide that information? If you answer yes, then you must admit that there are cases when regulation is necessary. If you answer no, then drug companies are under no obligation to provide that information, and consumers will not be able to make the informed choices that you claim they will make. Look at the drug commercials on TV these days. The manufacturers aren't telling you about possible side effects out of the goodness of their hearts. They're doing it because they're required to do so. Ditto for the warning labels on cigarettes. The tobacco companies have known the dangers of their products for decades, and they've fought like hell to keep that fact away from the public. It's the same for any industry. No one is going to do any more than they are legally required to do. It's true of individuals, too. How many people do you know who let their dogs relieve themselves on their neighbors' lawns? That's one of the reasons we have leash laws and requirements for dogs to be kept in enclosed areas. It's the same with any kind of regulation. Without laws and regulations, we would descend into anarchy, and only the strong would prevail. The real question is what we want our society to look like. That's how we decide what kinds of boundaries we set. We can argue all day about what rules are and are not needed (I have a definite libertarian streak, myself), but several thousand years of history have pretty much shown us that some order must be imposed. Maybe we'll one day evolve into a civilization where everyone respects each other, gets along, and treats others fairly out of the kindness of their hearts, but we aren't there yet.
Well, this depends on how broadly you want to look at this. Let's see. If we got rid of the FDA, new drugs would get to market a lot faster, as would genetically-engineered foods. This is a double-edged sword, though. We might get new medicines faster, but we'd also have more dangerous drugs reaching consumers when they shouldn't.
And coming from the perspective of a farmer's son, I can tell you that if the EPA wasn't around, we'd have much better pesticides and herbicides. Of course, we'd still probably have DDT and all the proplems it's caused.
Getting back to telecom, one could argue that less regulation is better, but a lack of regulation has killed technologies as well. Look at the AM stereo fiasco. The FCC decided not to choose a standard and let the marketplace decide between C-QUAM and the Kahn system. The result was two competing systems that hampered adoption of the technology. Eventually, C-QUAM won out in the marketplace, and Congress finally mandated it as the AM stereo standard, but by then it was too late. If the FCC had just made a decision and picked a system, AM radio might have had a better shot at survival. I'm not saying it would have, but the situation wasn't helped by the Commission's inaction.
I don't think we should fall into the trap of thinking that our lives would be better without regulation per se. Without stupid, arbitrary regulation, yes, but regulations in and of themselves aren't all bad. If the telephone network had been allowed to grow based on market forces alone, rural areas wouldn't have received service when they did, and some places still might not have it, or they may only have it at exorbitant prices. And let's not even get into the broadband mess. No one regulates it, so if you get bad service or no service at all, you have no one to help you. I'm not necessarily saying we should impose rules, but there are pros and cons to everything.
Slashdot Mirror
It's the Tennessee Valley Authority, a huge federally-owned power company.
You can visit its Web site at http://www.tva.gov
I agree with you. It's going to be tough to please everyone, but I think that all the good episodes had one thing in common: excellent writing. Styles changed, the level of special effects changed from almost nonexistent to horribly cheesy, but the writing was always intelligent and witty. I watched the show up until the very end (at least as much as was possible by scrounging it off of whatever PBS station I could get at the time), and I think the thing that killed it was a shift in the focus in the writing to cater to kids and/or a less sophisticated audience. I also saw the 1996 TV movie, and I think it got too caught up in trying to carry the show along with special effects, and that just won't work for Dr. Who. The fact of the matter is that we Americans...well, at least American television studios...have no business getting involved in a show like this. Some independent film/video people could probably pull it off, but the big studios are too fixated on laser beams, explosions, and whatever other special effects they can cram into a production. This may work for Star Trek, but it won't work here.
And now to veer off on a tangent. One thing that I've always wondered about is the play on words in The Doctor and The Master. Was this a subtle joke? I mean, in academics, at least in the United States, the highest degree you can attain is a doctorate, and the second highest is a master's degree. So, does this imply that The Master may be good at what he does (evil, that is), but The Doctor will always prevail?
A much "lower-tech" version of this was tried on cable over 20 years ago. I can remember the ads. You paid a subscription fee and got a special game console that connected to the cable system. I never knew anyone who ever tried it, so I have no idea how good it was, but I guess that's the point: Very few tried it.
I can't see how this will succeed any more than pay-per-view has. Some people will use it, but I find that most people evaluate games by seeing them on their friends' computers, then go out and buy the game if they like it. And if none of their friends have the game, they download a demo. Considering that most games cost in the $30-$40 range, renting the game more than once or twice gets rather expensive relative to the retail price. I'd imagine that the hard-core gamers will prefer to buy, and casual gamers will only rent once or twice a month. And with broadband stilll only used by a minority of Net users, their potential market is going to be limited for a while.
And, as others have already stated, this thing is going to be hacked. Then the race between the cracks and the security patches begins. If they can't keep the system reasonably secure, game publishers aren't going to make their titles available, and the only way this has a chance of succeeding is if it has a massive library of games to choose from.
FYI, the information I was "spoon fed" was from church-history classes at a Catholic high school, so I doubt they'd have any reason to make things sound any worse than they were. And nowhere did I say that most people were put to death, but getting convicted of heresy by an ecclesiastical court was for all intents and purposes the end of your life, even if they didn't kill you. There was no separation of church and state. In the Papal States in central Italy, the Church was the state, period.
But to return to my point, you had an organization that, although it was not technically a government, had enough influence that it had many of the powers of governments. It was multinational, it was rich, it could make or break politicians almost at will, and it was accountable to no one. In short, it could make the rules, either directly or indirectly. And it controlled information. If you weanted a book copied, you didn't take it to the local Kinko's, you had to use monks, and they were pretty picky about what they copied. But I'm not writing this to beat up on the Church; I'm writing it to illustrate the parallels we face today. Look at the power that the multinational corps have. Did the DMCA or the Telecom Act of 1996 become law because of a groundswell of public support for them? Of course not! They were bought and paid for by the companies who stand to gain from them. Money talks, and these companies have so much of it that it's almost impossible for the average person to have an impact. If you don't believe me, call the White House and ask to have lunch with President Bush next week. Tell whoever you speak to that you'd like to discuss the DMCA with the president. Do you think you'll get that lunch date? Now suppose that Rupert Murdoch, Steve Case, Jack Valenti, or Hillary Rosen made that call. Need I say more? The same goes for having a meeting with your Congressman or Senator. You won't even get in the door, but these folks can practically hand over a draft of a bill and get it introduced in Congress, and if they have enough meetings with enough politicians, they might even get it passed.
And to touch on control of the mass media, consider spectrum auctions. Want to get a chunk of frequencies? Unless you can outbid the big telecom companies for it, forget it. The whole thing is justified by saying that it avoids companies freeloading off of the public airwaves, since they have to pay for their frequencies, but what it does in reality is ensure that only the richest companies get to use them. Once again, money talks. Even the regulations that we used to have restricting how much one broadcaster can own have been almost completely thrown out. The big fish eat the little fish, people are exposed to fewer and fewer voices, and we're told it's a good thing. Except in the mass media, where most people still turn for information. The mass media says nothing, nothing about the dangers of the DMCA, nothing about fair use, nothing about concentrated media ownership; in short, nothing that will make people question the status quo. The public gets its daily dose of sex scandals, Hollywood gossip, and puff pieces promoting the latest movie of CD, a product that may even be produced by the same company that produced and aired the "informative news story". And everyone is happy, the money keeps rolling in, and anyone who makes trouble is quietly crushed.
Somebody mod this guy up. This is an excellent point. In the Middle Ages, the Church had reached a status that essentially put it above the law. In fact, it had its own laws and "justice system". Get out of line, and you were dead...literally. It was an international entity that was beyond the regulatory reach of any nation-state. In fact, any political figure who dared to oppose it did so at grave peril. We can see the same lines developing with the multinational corporations.
It's also worth noting that this dark time lasted for centuries, and there were many setbacks to breaking the Church's grip on power. Let us not forget that Gallileo was forced to recant his theories. We can look back now and say that his ideas prevailed in the end, but I bet he didn't see it that way at the time. We're in this for the long haul, and we will face setbacks along the way, but the important thing is to never give up. I should also point out that one of the biggest achievements in the fight against Church power was the Protestant Reformation. Martin Luther gave the people an alternative to the Church, and that opened the floodgates of pent-up frustration and dissatisfaction. Suddenly, there were choices that had never existed before. In the same way, we can't forget that the big entertainment companies don't own our lives. There is alternative content, and we need to expose as many people as possible to it. And there's even an alternative to that: Go outside, play ball, have a conversation with someone. IOW, take control of your leisure time and take it out of the hands of the corps. The less money we give them, the less money they'll have to buy the tools to control our lives. And no, this isn't an easy chore. For the past 50 years at least, our entire culture has been built around mass-produced entertainment, and to turn away from that is to remake ourselves. Couch potatoes all over the land will howl in protest, but we have to try to break this addiction and bring the corporate dealers to heel.Agreed! This man is an unrepentant spammer, and anyone who monitors the net-abuse newsgroups knows it. If you're going to ask him anything, don't forget to bring this up.
If we keep this up, will the next person /. chooses to interview be Sam Khuri, the infamous Benchmark Print Supply spammer? We could ask him about all those judgements against him and how he manages to keep going after getting sued so many times. Or, I don't know, maybe we could get the University Diplomas spammer(s) on here to discuss nontraditional education. Sheesh!
Well, you have to use a public IP because, if you don't, there's no way for your traffic to get routed, since others have to know your IP in order to send and receive data to/from you. You could set up your network to use all private IPs, but you'd only be able to talk to your local machines.
OTOH, if what you're asking is why we have things like ICANN and why the Commerce Department is involved, you have to trace the history of the Net back to its beginnings, when it was dominated by the military and universities, but that's too long a discussion for me to get into here. But what it boils down to is that you don't have to use the root servers and DNS infrastructure that ICANN is taking control of if you don't want to. In fact, there's been some discussion on /. about bailing out on ICANN. If enough site admins decided to do it, then it'd happen.
But what it comes down to is this: Being a common carrier is a legal definition, so if you want to know whether or not the Internet is or isn't (it most certainly isn't), you can look up the Telecommunications Act of 1996, or, if you don't want to do that, give the FCC a call and ask them, since they regulate all common carriers in this country. You can reach the FCC Consumer Information Bureau at 1-888-225-5322 or the FCC's main switchboard at 202-418-0190.
The Internet is a collection of private networks, not a common carrier. Therefore, anyone connected to the Internet, whether it is an office LAN, an ISP or a backbone provider, can block traffic from any part of the Internet it chooses. Anyone who doesn't like the policies of their upstream can find another connection point.
Yes, that sounds harsh, but consider the alternative. If the Internet was a common carrier, the whole concept of self-policing goes out the window. If you're a service provider, you can't block any traffic entering or leaving your network. Forget about filtering spam, and forget about refusing to sell a connection to that guy you know is going to use it to send spam. Forget about cutting him off if he's already connected, unless sending spam happens to be illegal in your jurisdiction. You have to serve anyone who can pay and who don't have some legal impediment to getting service, and you have to allow all traffic to enter and leave your network, whether you want it or not.
Well, they aren't shipping with receivers now, so either they aren't required to, or that decision hasn't been made yet. However, HDTV receivers are already out there (the DISH Network 6000 comes to mind, plus broadcast tuners and possibly also one or more DirecTV boxes), so if the standard was changed to allow only encryption-enabled tuners to connect, then that'll break every unit already shipped. Granted, it's still early in the game, but I have a feeling that any company that's already selling tuners is going to be pretty pissed about their units suddenly becoming obsolete. They could redesign them, but that would mean they'd have to stop production for several months at least. If this came to pass, I could easily see Charlie Ergen (DISH's CEO) filing a lawsuit. Anyone who's kept up with DISH knows that they don't take kindly to anything they see as collusion or restraint of trade. Since they design and manufacture their own equipment, they'd be in a world of hurt if something like this happened, so they'd most likely fight it rather than stopping production and redesigning their boxes.
Sorry to follow up on myself. I meant to day "encrypted or unencrypted."
Sometimes, even previewing isn't perfect. :)
Over-the-air streams can be unencrypted or unencrypted, but if they're encrypted, the broadcasters have to pay fees for the spectrum, at least that's the way I understand it. The article mentioned the unencrypted nature of broadcast streams as an impediment to the copy-protection system. It pointed out that cable would be easier, since those streams can be encrypted without penalty.
So, even if some broadcasters encrypted, the monitor would have to accept unencrypted data, or you wouldn't be able to watch anything that wasn't encrypted.
I agree with you about the problems of lots of users trying to grab streams at the same time, but I don't think adoption would be that quick, so hopefully by the time you got 10% adoption, we'll have more bandwidth available. Two years ago, almost no one had DSL or cable, and look how far they've come in that time. I'm not absolutely sure that bandwidth will keep pace, but I'd be willing to bet that we'd see improvements.
You're right about using off-the-shelf boxes, but you're also right about the proprietary software, and that's the problem. For this to work, we need something as open as possible so that programmers couldn't be excluded because they're using the wrong kind of stream. For this reason, Realvideo, Windows Media, and Quicktime are out, but I wouldn't see a problem allowing them to have access to the box if the software vendors that owned them wanted to create plugins.
And about the digital interface to the TV, I certainly hope you're wrong, but I'll admit that anything's possible these days. I still believe that you have a huge lawsuit if the electronics makers and media companies got together and developed a closed standard. It'd be similar to a scenario in which Microsoft would get together with PC manufacturers and devise a way to allow only Windows and Microsoft or Microsoft-approved software to be installed on computers.
I'm not saying that the average person out there would produce his own stuff (although he could if he wanted to). I'm talking about things like independent films (Star Wars parodies, short films such as those on iFilm, etc.), streaming audio (KPIG, Radio Paradise, SkyFM), and possibly issue-oriented programs (could you imagine Slashdot TV?).
Here's my basic argument. Right now, we have three primary modes of live video delivery systems: broadcast, cable, and DBS. There are others, but these account for most all of the ways we get TV, and they're almost completely controlled by the large media companies. Couple that with the fact that there's effectively no way for anyone not in the "club" to gain entry. You can't get into anything that resembles a major broadcast market because all the frequencies are already taken, you can't get on most cable systems because the cable companies prefer to carry channels either partly or totally owned by their parent companies, and you can't get on DBS because these services want major programmers, and their signals are overcompressed as it is because they're already carrying more channels than they ought to. Many people here and elsewhere are bemoaning the monopoly held by the big media companies, but you're never, and I repeat never, going to break that monopoly until you find an alternate distribution method. The Internet is the best choice we have right now, and in fact, it works fairly well, especially for radio. In fact, as I write this, I'm listening to a high-quality feed of KPIG. Problem is, most people, including myself, don't want to sit in front of a computer in order to enjoy this content. I'd rather be able to go out into my living room and sit on my couch to watch and listen. I have a neat little gadget from X10 that will let me transmit the content out there, and it works pretty well. However, this is a bit of a kludge. What would be ideal is a box that I could hook up to my entertainment system to do all this, and that's what I'm talking about. Look, the big media companies are in a pretty good position right now. They're going to squeeze consumers as hard as they can because they can. Right now, the listener or viewer has no real alternative, at least not unless he's willing to sit in front of a computer. If you can get that content out into the living room, where most folks are used to getting it, you'll open up a new world of possibilities. And I'll say one more thing about programming. There are scores of cable and satellite channels that have failed over the years because they couldn't get carriage on satellite and cable systems. If you devise an alternative distribution method, programmers will use it. Yes, you'll get crap, but you'll also get good stuff. And you'll finally give people options and give the media companies much-needed competition.I have a feeling that digital TVs are still going to have analog interfaces for quite a while, so you can still get in that way. Besides, I'm not talking about streaming HDTV content--there isn't enough available bandwidth to do that into the home yet. Good old NTSC will be fine for now. And even if you choose to use the digital interface, I would imagine that if the set manufacturers built the interface so that only approved content could get through (as opposed to encrypted/watermarked content that you weren't authorized to watch), they'd have the mother of all antitrust suits on their hands. Besides, it wouldn't make sense to do that from a technical standpoint because people are going to have things like camcorders that they'll want to hook up to watch their videos, and these are already using digital interfaces in some cases. Not to mention all the locally-produced TV programming, such as local newscasts and public-access channels on cable systems. I really don't think the idea will be to exclude non-encrypted/watermarked signals. There would be too many technical and legal pitfalls to doing that.
But back to the media box I'm talking about. All it would have to be is a computer with NTSC output capability and a remote, but with no monitor, keyboard, or mouse, at least not in the standard package. Build it with off-the-shelf components and load it up with open-source software and audio/video codecs, then publish the specs for it online so anyone could build it. That way, anyone from Dell to your local computer store to an end user could put these things together. The main challenges would be to make it as cheap as possible and very easy to use, so all the owner would have to do is turn it on and choose what channel he wanted to watch (or hear, in the case of radio) from an on-screen menu. There'd have to be some way to automatically update the channel list as new ones came on, as well as updating software as needed, but this ought to be possible.
But, as I've said several times before, this has nothing to do with piracy. It doesn't even have anything to do with stopping the technically-inclined from finding a way around it. What is is intended to do is stop the average consumer from exercising their fair use rights so the media companies can sell those rights back. You want that program you just saw? It'll cost you. It's all about maximizing profits. The broadcasters tried to stop time-shifting when VCRs first appeared. Now they're going to try again, and the DMCA makes it illegal even to try to reassert your fair use rights. Beautiful, ain't it? I don't think I could have thought of a better way to screw consumers.
I will point out, however, that no one is forcing us to consume this mass-produced junk. People can turn it off and go outside to play ball, or at the very least, we can come up with alternative programming. I'm still convinced that an open-source (so anyone can build it), easy to use (and I can't stress that enough) set-top box with an Ethernet jack plugged into a broadband Net connection could allow Internet TV channels to be streamed onto a standard television. Can you imagine the possibilities? Anyone with a fat enough pipe could launch their own channel, and if you can build a box to let the average Joe watch it on his TV, you'll have the chance to break the video stranglehold of the media companies. You wouldn't even need slick programming. Many people would try it just for the novelty.
No, no, no. For this setup, you use rats. They're used to crawling around in small spaces, and besides, NYC has millions of 'em. Of course, you'd better use the small ones because I doubt the regular sized ones could fit through the tubes. And the nice thing about using rats is that the only kind of DoS attack that could possibly be used against them is a bunch of cats, but you'd need some really tough felines to stop New York rats.
Strange. I used paragraph tags, and it looks fine from here. Not sure why you're only seeing one big block of text.
You bet it was their intent. You see, all the things you say you want to do with your movies are things that can become profit centers for the media companies. You want to be able to watch a movie on your laptop, perhaps while you're on a plane? Sure, we can help you with that. Just plug your laptop into this Ethernet port here, key your credit card number into the seatback terminal, and you'll have your choice of hundreds of movies, all for one low price, to watch while you fly. Did your DVD get damaged? Oh, sorry about that, but don't worry, they're cheap, so you can just buy another one. Do you need excerpts of this film for a presentation? No problem. For a small licensing fee, we can supply you with a package of pre-selected promotional clips. It's the same story for any other form of media. All this furor over piracy is just an attempt to make sure content is locked down, not from pirates, but from anyone who might want to use it in other than the strictly prescribed way. The media companies know full well that this won't stop pirates. All it will do is limit what everyone else can do with media content, providing the companies the opportunity to sell those rights back to consumers. Don't believe for a second that these guys are stupid. They aren't. They know that if they lay out all their reasons for locking down content, it would become clear that they're trampling all over people's fair use rights, so they hide behind the piracy argument. Not only does this obscure their true motives, it facilitates a heavy-handed crackdown on anyone who gets in the way. It's all about the money. For every way you might use media content, there is an opportunity for profit, if the media companies can erect an electronic toll booth. The more of these toll booths they can set up, the more money they can extract from you. DivX was one attempt to do this, but it failed because there was an alternative: DVDs. Sony's plan to authenticate PS2 games and lock them to one machine will be another. Restrictions on when and where you can play SDMI-protected music files will be another, as will the concept of limited-time-use books on CD-ROM. I'll even dust off my crystal ball and predict some others: PPV movies will be un-recordable, unless you pay a higher fee. Actually, SkyPix, a failed DBS venture in the early 1990s, was going to do this using Macrovision. If you paid a lower fee, Macrovision would prevent you from recording the movie. For a higher fee, the Macrovision would be turned off. For anyone who's wondering, this was done by sending instructions to the customer's receiver. You'll become unable to fast-forward through commercials recorded on your PVR. The networks have hated the fact that viewers could zap commercials on taped shows. Now, they finally have a way to stop it. How will they manage it? My guess is they'll say that their schedules are copyrighted material and demand that if the PVR makers want to use them, they'll have to meet their demands. Some shows will, like PPV, become un-recordable. The technology to do this has already been mandated for digital set-top boxes by the FCC. This will let the content owners sell copies of these programs to consumers who would otherwise just tape the shows. Music fans will be given the "opportunity" to buy different listening rights for their favorite songs. For one amount, you can listen on your home computer/stereo system, for a small additional fee, you can copy tracks to your car's audio system, and for yet another small fee, you can download songs into a portable player. But forget about sharing your tunes with your friends. These songs will only play on devices licensed to you. The fees won't be any lower than what you pay for standard CDs, even though the music companies' distribution cost will decrease dramatically, but that's OK because you're paying for the "convenience" of instantly downloading albums from the Internet. Electronic books won't be sold to you; they'll be leased. Are you in college? All you have to do is pay a subscription fee to whichever publisher your school has selected, and you'll always have access to its most up-to-date texts. But don't forget to get that payment in on time, or all your textbooks will suddenly disappear. Oh, and about those used textbooks, it was always a pain to go back to the bookstore and sell them at the end of the semester, wasn't it? Well, don't worry, that's no longer a problem, since you have nothing to resell anymore. Now repeat this aloud three times: "It isn't about piracy--it's about maximizing profits." Careful, though, because I believe that fact is a trade secret, so you might get sued if you say it too loudly.
Agreed! I've said this before, and I'll say it again. The only way to stop the destruction of our fair use rights, as well as the patent and IP madness, is to make a stand. Get out there and fight like hell. Bring the battle to the forefront of the news as often as possible, and turn up the heat on the greedy corporations whenever possible. Speaking of copyrights, The New York Times has a column by Lawrence Lessig on just that subject. I strongly suggest everyone here go and read it. And after you're done, write a letter to the editor on this subject and mail it in. The Times is an influential newspaper, and any issue that can get traction within its pages is going to find its way into other media sooner or later. Here's the opening. Anyone care to take advantage of it?
...to accommodate penguins, since they can't fly. They can swim, but I don't think the paper and duct tape will hold up too well under water.
I'm not sure if they'd pull the plug or not, but it would be a public relations coup for the alternate domain owners if they did. Can you imagine how much of a black eye the backbone providers would get if they did this? But I can't see them doing this. Why should they care what root servers their customers are pointing to? Now, if you mean that management at the various ISPs would pull the plug on this if they found out their admins were doing it, yes, they probably would, and I'm not sure I'd object to that. If I owned an ISP, and I found out that my employees were doing something without my permission, I'd be pretty pissed off about it, especially something as fundamental as redirecting DNS traffic. But the question becomes how to do this without causing mass confusion. IOW, what exactly are you wanting to do? Create new TLDs? Rewrite the rules for existing TLDs? Both? Overthrow ICANN and replace it with something else? Personally, I think that the main danger is that'd we'd end up with a splintered domain naming system and the chaos that would go along with it. Therefore, overthrowing ICANN would probably be the wisest course of action. If we went that route, then the first step is to set up a rival organization. Get some well-respected folks on board and write a charter that Internet users and admins can support. Build the organization up from a grass-roots level and make no bones about what its goal is: to replace ICANN with or without ICANN's support. And don't be shy about what will happen after that. If the new organization intends to repudiate the agreements that ICANN has made with Network Solutions, then say so. If it intends to throw out the current domain name dispute resolution policy, then make that crystal clear. IMHO, these are all things that people hate about the current situation we find ourselves in. Capitalize on that anger. Point out all the things we've grown to hate about ICANN, then put forward an organization that'll fix these problems. Don't go the "underground" route with this. Let everyone know what your intent is. But above all, keep the new organization unified. The one thing that will scare the hell out of people is the possibility that all you're doing is creating chaos.
I'm not blaming anyone outside of the U.S., since no one is forcing our government to sign these treaties. I may have been unclear as to who is doing what in my earlier post, but I understand perfectly well that many of these things are heavily influenced by our own government. That's what I was talking about when I referred to government agencies doing this to get powers they can't normally get. What I mean is that they do this because it's easier to get the Senate to ratify a treaty than for a bill to go through Congress. Then, once the treaty is ratified, its proponents will use it as a rationale for passing whatever pieces of legislation they can cook up. But don't hold everyone but us Americans blameless for everything. The latest stir over the cybercrime treaty involves European nations lobbying for a ban on racist speech, something that's clearly unconstitutional here in the U.S. but part of the laws in other countries. As I said earlier, that's fine for them, and there's nothing wrong with harmonizing laws across national boundaries, but this can only be taken so far. And FWIW, the post was not intended as flamebait for whoever modded it as such. Treaties are treated as sacred things in many instances, things that we must do whatever it takes to live up to, no matter how much it turns our stomachs to do so, and the people who draft them know this. Perhaps that outlook should change. If a treaty turns out to have bad consequences for us as a nation, then it should get dumped just like a bad law.
If this is true (and I did read the follow-up post disputing this), then maybe we should bail out of the WIPO treaty. I'm usually a pretty easygoing guy, but I'm getting sick and tired of treaties that conflict with our tradition of free speech being rammed down our throats. As an example, look at the cybercrime treaty being drafted by the Council of Europe. I realize that different countries have different sensibilities on these issues, and that's fine with me. If these nations like these agreements, then they can sign them all they want, but it seems to me that these things are being shoved down our throats with the reason given that we must have them to promote free trade, law enforcement, whatever. And is it any surprise that the average person is never the beneficiary of these agreements. No, it's usually some multinational corporation looking to increase its profits or a government agency that's looking for a way to more easily keep tabs on the population and who couldn't get these powers through the normal legislative process. BTW, if any of this sounded like things Pat Buchanan might say, please know that it's purely coincidental and agreeing with him on anything was definitely not my intention.
And how are consumers supposed to know what drugs have and have not been tested? And how are they supposed to know the test results? Should drug companies be required to provide that information? If you answer yes, then you must admit that there are cases when regulation is necessary. If you answer no, then drug companies are under no obligation to provide that information, and consumers will not be able to make the informed choices that you claim they will make. Look at the drug commercials on TV these days. The manufacturers aren't telling you about possible side effects out of the goodness of their hearts. They're doing it because they're required to do so. Ditto for the warning labels on cigarettes. The tobacco companies have known the dangers of their products for decades, and they've fought like hell to keep that fact away from the public. It's the same for any industry. No one is going to do any more than they are legally required to do. It's true of individuals, too. How many people do you know who let their dogs relieve themselves on their neighbors' lawns? That's one of the reasons we have leash laws and requirements for dogs to be kept in enclosed areas. It's the same with any kind of regulation. Without laws and regulations, we would descend into anarchy, and only the strong would prevail. The real question is what we want our society to look like. That's how we decide what kinds of boundaries we set. We can argue all day about what rules are and are not needed (I have a definite libertarian streak, myself), but several thousand years of history have pretty much shown us that some order must be imposed. Maybe we'll one day evolve into a civilization where everyone respects each other, gets along, and treats others fairly out of the kindness of their hearts, but we aren't there yet.
Well, this depends on how broadly you want to look at this. Let's see. If we got rid of the FDA, new drugs would get to market a lot faster, as would genetically-engineered foods. This is a double-edged sword, though. We might get new medicines faster, but we'd also have more dangerous drugs reaching consumers when they shouldn't. And coming from the perspective of a farmer's son, I can tell you that if the EPA wasn't around, we'd have much better pesticides and herbicides. Of course, we'd still probably have DDT and all the proplems it's caused. Getting back to telecom, one could argue that less regulation is better, but a lack of regulation has killed technologies as well. Look at the AM stereo fiasco. The FCC decided not to choose a standard and let the marketplace decide between C-QUAM and the Kahn system. The result was two competing systems that hampered adoption of the technology. Eventually, C-QUAM won out in the marketplace, and Congress finally mandated it as the AM stereo standard, but by then it was too late. If the FCC had just made a decision and picked a system, AM radio might have had a better shot at survival. I'm not saying it would have, but the situation wasn't helped by the Commission's inaction. I don't think we should fall into the trap of thinking that our lives would be better without regulation per se. Without stupid, arbitrary regulation, yes, but regulations in and of themselves aren't all bad. If the telephone network had been allowed to grow based on market forces alone, rural areas wouldn't have received service when they did, and some places still might not have it, or they may only have it at exorbitant prices. And let's not even get into the broadband mess. No one regulates it, so if you get bad service or no service at all, you have no one to help you. I'm not necessarily saying we should impose rules, but there are pros and cons to everything.