Hypocrites are people who say one thing and do another, such as criticizing people in Texas for having poor grammar and word-selection skills.
Ummm... He doesn't criticize Texans for their grammar skills... He criticizes (some of) them for not knowing where Mexico is. I think that even a rocket scientist like yourself would have to agree that that is a valid criticism.
I'm in Texas (against my better judgement), and I'll put my grammar skills in my native tongue up against anybody on the planet.
Your grammar might be great, but I'd recommend not putting up your reading skills for a similar test, at least if this is accurate example.
OTOH, while this trial is up in the air, there's a degree of uncertainty about Lindows long term viability, which could affect both its sales and the ability to raise more investment capital to expand into larger markets.
I don't think this is as big of a deal as you say. In the (I believe unlikely) event that Lindows loses this case, the most likely remedy would simply be forcing them to change their name. Since Windows is a registered trademark, they would also be liable for any legal fees. Monetary damages are possible, but from what I understand, are not typical, and based on the strength of Lindows case, I would be surprised if they were awarded. Of course, IANAL, so caveat emptor. For more details, see Bitlaw.
While a loss would certainly have a negative impact on Lindows, the amount of free publicity this case is getting (and will continue to get after a loss) would likely help make up for any loss in name recognition sustained in the name-change.
"Exclusive" !+ "Excessive" Re-read the post. Except this time see what is there, rather than what you want to see.
Oops, you are correct. Of course, you are only correct that I misread a single word. As I said, however, the dictionary definition of the word has little to do with the legal definition. In legal terms, you do not need to have "exclusive control" to have a monopoly. In fact, market share is not a critically important factor to whether they are a monopoly or not. Antitrust law is not about market share, it is about behaviour. According to the FTC:
While it
is not illegal to have a monopoly position in a market, the antitrust laws make it unlawful to maintain or attempt to create a monopoly through tactics that either unreasonably exclude firms from the market or significantly impair their ability to compete. A single firm may commit a violation through its unilateral actions, or a violation may result if a group of firms work together to monopolize a market.
In other words, you could even have a minority share of the market, and still be guilty of Antitrust violations if you illegally attempt to create a monopoly.
The lack of a 100% market share is frequently cited as to as to why the MS lawsuit was unfair. Unfortunately, such a complaint only demonstrate the complainers ignorance. Microsoft's behavior is clearly in violation of the law. They were convicted of violating the law, and the appeals court upheld the ruling. Get over it.
Re:"Fake it 'til you make it" has *never* worked!
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Salon Asks for Help
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Bullshit. That "fake it 'til you make it" strategy has never worked.
But you're missing the point. The point is not that the strategy doesn't work in the long run. The point is that such a strategy, at least in the late 90's, -did- help companies get capital. Granted, in the long run, you'll almost always get burned this way, but in the 90's, people weren't interested in thinking that far ahead. Faulting Salon for that mentality is unfair considering that they are one of the very few (out of the very many) companies that are still around 3 years later. They may not be profitable, but at least they're still in existance.
DRM in Office docs is optional too. The DRM is only used if the author of the information turns it on.
And DRM is optional in PDF, but they still sued Skylarov. The only reason that I pointed out the fact that it was optional was in response to the person who said that the Adobe case was to protect the file format. As I pointed out, PDF is open, so their is nothing to protect. In this case, however, the file format is proprietary, so the DMCA could be used to attack any reverse engineering. As I pointed out, MS will have a tougher time with this case due to the clear interoperability uses such reverse-engineering will have. Nonetheless, since MS's legal pockets are considerably deeper then most of it's competitors, and certainly it's OSS competitors, the mere threat of legal action will likely have a chilling effect.
My problem with this statement is that you're assuming that Microsoft will do this. Just to screw up OSS.
Why not? They've broken numerous open standards before, for no reason other then defeating competing software (See the Halloween documents for examples).
First, what benefit would that action afford the customer? Why would they want plain documents level-0 encrypted? It'll break all their non-Office tools, like intranet search tools. It does not improve _any_ customer scenario relating to standard open Office data.
Since when has MS ever given a damn about their customers? MS introduces a new file format in every upgrade to Office, so they clearly aren't overly concerned about backwards compatibility. In fact, it's just the opposite. By making the new version incompatible with the old version, it forces everyone to upgrade.
Immediately assuming that MS will do *anything* that won't improve a customer scenario is paranoid, and deluded. It's like saying that MS's 50,000 employees are sitting around all day, trying to think up new ways of BF'ing their customers.
Of course their not thinking of ways to screw their customers. THeir thinking of ways to sell more copies of Office. The fact that both goals often have the same result is coincidental. 95% of MS Employees are likely fine. I live in Seattle, and know several employees myself. But MS has a demonstrated past of this sort of behaviour, so saying they won't do it just because it might hurt their customers is foolish. I am not saying that MS will pursue DMCA action against anyone who tries to break the DRM, just that it could happen, and therefore will likely have a chilling effect on development. This is a god thing from MS's point of view, and exactly why I think the DMCA is a bad law and probably unconstitutional.
If the DMCA truly allows reverse-engineering for purposes of interoperability, then whats the problem with DeCSS, and Linux DVD players that use it?
Good question. I wish I could give you an answer. Unfortunately, MPAA Lawyers don't seem to be bound by this trivial thing called "the law".
Ok, a more serious answer... The MPAA argues that the purpose of reverse engineering CSS was not for interoperability, but for piracy. Regardless of the numerous non-infringing uses, the courts have chosen to side with Hollywood on the issue & declared it illegal.
The same could ceratinly happen in the case of Office, so the interoperability clause could be useless. However, it would be a much bigger stretch to argue the same thing when you're dealing with office documents rather then movies.
You go into a store and buy a PC that contains a video card with an ATI chipset. nVidia later sues ATI for some obscure patent infringement not covered under their contract and wins. Can nVidia go after every customer who bought and are using the affected ATI cards? Are you, the customer, legally required to check every component in your computer at the time of purchase for any patent infringement? Are you also required to request a copy of an agreement between nVidia and ATI to make sure that their (private) agreement covers your use? Between AMD and Intel? Are you required to do so with every hardware and software component in your system?
The difference between the examples you site, and the case at hand is who violates the patent. In all of the cases you site, the manufacturer of the hardware violated the patent, so they are liable. In this case, Microsoft simply provided a tool that allowed end-users to violate the patent. MS had the appropriate liecnses, so they are not guilty of anything.
As a consumer, you don't really need to worry about infringing a patent. When you become a developer, on the other hand, you do need to pay attention.
I agree software patents suck, but until they are done away with, they are a reality that people need to deal with. The beauty of this decision is that it not only gives MS a great big black eye (much bigger then if they themselves had to pay the fines), but that it's backlash should help speed the end of software patents.
Everyone agrees that their actions were only illegal if they had a monopoly. The judge that decided they did in fact have a monopoly was just wrong...how can you have a monopoly in a market, when there are other products available in said market?
I take it you're not a lawyer, right? You don't actually have to have 100% of a market to be a monopoly. The dictionary definition of a word, and the legal definition are quite often different. Microsoft was the dominant player in the OS field, and they leveraged their dominance in that field to gain dominance in the browser field. This is clearly and obviously a violation of the antitrust law. (ironically, even your dictionary definition supports this, see 1) "excessive control". Excessive != 100%.)
MS will almost certainly lose on this one. The fact that they intentionally negotiated the terms so that their royalties would be lower, then actively told their customers that they were covered should outweigh any disclaimers. I fully expect that they will be facing a class-action lawsuit any day now. It will take several years, but this will probably end up costing them a fortune. Of course, I could be wrong...
The main question is, who is the "keeper of the keys"?
Good point.
If you consider that, the "protection" has exactly zero value for governments and corporations.
Ah, but here you lost me. This isn't designed to be national-security sort of protection. This level of DRM is not going to do anything more then prevent casual browsing of my files. If someone really is determined, it would almost ceratinly be possible to hack the software. But that level of security is still -very- useful to many people. It shouldn't be viewed as a replacement for high security systems, but it is a nice supplement to them.
Actually, it occurs to me that the DMCA specifically allows reverse-engineering for interoperability, so this may not be as bad as I'd originally thought. On the other hand, most Open Source projects don't have the money for Lawyers, so it will possibly have a stifling effect whether it is illegal or not.
Wasn't the Skylorav case persued under the DMCA because he broke Adobe's file format?
Not really. The PDF file format is an open format. Anyone can make PDF tools. Skylorav didn't crack the file format, he cracked the optional encryption that the file MAY contain.
There is a key difference: Microsoft has repeatedly tried to prevent other companies from being able to read/write their file formats. By including DRM in the file format, Microsoft could be setting up the chance to sue OpenOffice (for example) in the event they include Office interoperability.
The interesting thing (to me) is that until I read this post, I though that this was really not a big deal. I actually think Office is a good place for DRM. Having the ability to place some limitations on who can read my business documents is a good thing. If it weren't for the DMCA, I would say that this is a case of people overreacting just because MS is involved. Unfortunately, the DMCA changes all that. Microsoft will almost certainly use this as a tool to prevent interoperability, and there's probably not a thing anyone can do to stop them.
Typically, when government takes over a "problem" they tend to make it much worse. Traffic congestion? Roads are almost all owned by governments.
True, privately run roads might be better, but can you imagine how much the tols would be? And people scream about gas taxes now!
Pollution/environment?
Oh, yes, Before the government got involved, industry was just clamoring to fix the enviromental harm they've caused over the last two hundred years.
Post offices vs. the private Federal Express...
Hmmm... I can send a letter in two-three days for $3.85, picked up with your mail, delivered to any address in the US, or Fedex in two days for >$10.00 (depending on distance), but you have to drop it off & delivery to a residential address is extra. Sure, one is guaranteed, the other isn't, but for 99% of deliveries, do you really need a time guarantee? And before you say "but the post office loses (or damages) packages", ship packages daily as part of a previous job. We shipped probably 1000 packages during the time that I was there & never once had one lost or damaged (though we packed everything to prevent damage). Admittedly, that's not a huge sample, but it's big enough.
And, while I have less experience with Fedex, try comparing the service from the Post Office with that of Airborne Express (an equally valid comparison by your standard). I'll take the post office any day.
the examples could go on for hours.
And so could my responses. But since you're clearly an idiot, let's just drop it here, ok?
You're right, of course, but I'm operating under the assumption that the cards are somewhat disposable, so you will be able to have more then one card, one for your groceries, one for the porn shop. Once you use the one at the porn shop up, throw it away & get a new card.
Re:How am I suppose to put this...
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Cashless Society
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sure it may take some group a year or two to crack this, but once they do the amount of money they can get is HUGE. With cash, even if you know how it is difficult to counterfit (at least no 16 year old is going to do it).
You may be right, but I'm not terribly concerned about it. Look at it this way... Do you really think that any bank in the world would be using this technology if they weren't reasonably certain of it's security? Is the system hack-proof? Almost certainly not, but I'm willing to bet that there are safeguards in place to minimize the risk in case the system is hacked. Otherwise, the issuing bank would be out of business as soon as the first 15 year old did manage to hack it.
These are all good points, but you're assuming that these cards will -replace- cash. I don't think they will be doing that anytime soon. Instead, they will supplement cash. I use my debit card for probably 85% of my transactions, but I still try to always keep $20 bucks or so on me for those times when I want to buy a pop or whatever.
It seems that without.gov mandate it will be hard to get such a system off the ground.
Not really. If there's a compelling reason for merchants to provide the service, they will, just like they now accept credit & debit cards. It will take years before you get anything approaching 100% acceptance (and you'll probably never actually reach 100%), but you should be able to reach the critical density of acceptance pretty quickly, just as debit cards have become quite common over just a few years. The nature of this sort of system is that the more merchants use it, the more the merchants that don't use it are pressured to accept it as well. And you can always convert the balance of the card back to real cash at a neighboring merchant or ATM when you want to buy something from a merchant that doesn't accept the cards.
And you can be sure that the government will on some level have surveillance built in.
In America, you're probably right. In many other countries, though, this will probbaly be less of an issue.
Anonymous doesn't necessarily mean that the money is stored in the card, simply that the money isn't tied to a person. For security reasons, I would assume that the actual value of the card is stored (or at least mirrored) on a central server. In the event that the card was rendered unreadable, the presence of a serial number would allow you to retrieve the balance.
The anonymity comes in if you can add funds to the card from an anonymous source, ie. cash. Unfortunately, you are probably correct in assuming that the card is not truly anonymous if you fund it from an attributable source, ie. an ATM.
Re:How am I suppose to put this...
on
Cashless Society
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· Score: 1
And then counterfitting. Wow, if money is only a string of ones and zeros on a card WOO HOOO. So its digitally signed? great I just bought a 100 dollar card and did a bit by bit copy.
No problem... You still have only $100. Make a thousand copies, still just $100. See, the problem is that each card has a serial number. Use up the balance once, & all the copies also have a zero balance. Granted, I'm speculating on the actual mechanism, but it's fairly trivial to prevent simple copies. More advanced hacks are possible, but I wouldn't worry to much about simple things like this.
I cannot for the life of me understand how TiVo owners can buy into that line.
My Tivo was advertised as having 30 hours of record time. In fact it gives me slightly more then that, even with the reserved space otherwise allocated (Unfortunately, I can't be specific since I have upgraded my hard drive). If they were falsely advertising the systems, I could understand people being upset. Since they aren't, just deal with it.
I am never going to buy a tivo if they don't even admit my ownership over the hardware.
Oh, in that case, I'm sure they will immediately change the policy.
Actually, it's not a hoax. The article is 100% accurate. The article states that no more Tivo's will be manufactured for sale in the UK in the immediate future, but they will continue to be supported. That is absolutely true. If you read the FAQ that is mentioned in the reply ("New members read this"), you'll see a question "I just read TiVo is going to pull out of the UK - is this true?" which basically repeats what was said in the article.
spam is unsolicited advertising... are you trying to say this is solicited advertising?
Actually, it is solicited. When you sign up for Tivo, you agree to let them send these ads. And you can easily opt out-- just cancel your subscription.
I really don't see the big deal. The ads do not come out of the thirty (or whatever) hours that were advertised when you bought your system. True you might get an extra thirty minutes-- maybe even an hour-- if the space wasn't allocated, but as has previously been pointed out, the ads help subsidize the subscription, and every once in a while, contain something of interest.
Of course, I never owned one, but I'm sure that's the case.
Yep, it's true. You do get free listsings with the ATI All-in-Wonder. Unfortunately, the software is -terrible-. I mean -REALLY- bad. It's slow, clunky, ugly. It's also ad sponsored, so you give up a portion of your display for ads. I bought a AIW hoping to use it as a TiVo. Unfortunately, it's a complete piece of crap compared to a TiVo. It may have been improved recently, but last time I checked (9 months ago?), no upgrades were available.
Slashdot Mirror
Hypocrites are people who say one thing and do another, such as criticizing people in Texas for having poor grammar and word-selection skills.
Ummm... He doesn't criticize Texans for their grammar skills... He criticizes (some of) them for not knowing where Mexico is. I think that even a rocket scientist like yourself would have to agree that that is a valid criticism.
I'm in Texas (against my better judgement), and I'll put my grammar skills in my native tongue up against anybody on the planet.
Your grammar might be great, but I'd recommend not putting up your reading skills for a similar test, at least if this is accurate example.
OTOH, while this trial is up in the air, there's a degree of uncertainty about Lindows long term viability, which could affect both its sales and the ability to raise more investment capital to expand into larger markets.
I don't think this is as big of a deal as you say. In the (I believe unlikely) event that Lindows loses this case, the most likely remedy would simply be forcing them to change their name. Since Windows is a registered trademark, they would also be liable for any legal fees. Monetary damages are possible, but from what I understand, are not typical, and based on the strength of Lindows case, I would be surprised if they were awarded. Of course, IANAL, so caveat emptor. For more details, see Bitlaw.
While a loss would certainly have a negative impact on Lindows, the amount of free publicity this case is getting (and will continue to get after a loss) would likely help make up for any loss in name recognition sustained in the name-change.
I thought "bypassing technological blocks" was illegal under the DMCA?
Ummm... The DMCA is a copyright law. Unless they're calling your number to sell you pirated material, I don't think you have a case.
Oops, you are correct. Of course, you are only correct that I misread a single word. As I said, however, the dictionary definition of the word has little to do with the legal definition. In legal terms, you do not need to have "exclusive control" to have a monopoly. In fact, market share is not a critically important factor to whether they are a monopoly or not. Antitrust law is not about market share, it is about behaviour. According to the FTC:
In other words, you could even have a minority share of the market, and still be guilty of Antitrust violations if you illegally attempt to create a monopoly.
The lack of a 100% market share is frequently cited as to as to why the MS lawsuit was unfair. Unfortunately, such a complaint only demonstrate the complainers ignorance. Microsoft's behavior is clearly in violation of the law. They were convicted of violating the law, and the appeals court upheld the ruling. Get over it.
Bullshit. That "fake it 'til you make it" strategy has never worked.
But you're missing the point. The point is not that the strategy doesn't work in the long run. The point is that such a strategy, at least in the late 90's, -did- help companies get capital. Granted, in the long run, you'll almost always get burned this way, but in the 90's, people weren't interested in thinking that far ahead. Faulting Salon for that mentality is unfair considering that they are one of the very few (out of the very many) companies that are still around 3 years later. They may not be profitable, but at least they're still in existance.
DRM in Office docs is optional too. The DRM is only used if the author of the information turns it on.
And DRM is optional in PDF, but they still sued Skylarov. The only reason that I pointed out the fact that it was optional was in response to the person who said that the Adobe case was to protect the file format. As I pointed out, PDF is open, so their is nothing to protect. In this case, however, the file format is proprietary, so the DMCA could be used to attack any reverse engineering. As I pointed out, MS will have a tougher time with this case due to the clear interoperability uses such reverse-engineering will have. Nonetheless, since MS's legal pockets are considerably deeper then most of it's competitors, and certainly it's OSS competitors, the mere threat of legal action will likely have a chilling effect.
My problem with this statement is that you're assuming that Microsoft will do this. Just to screw up OSS.
Why not? They've broken numerous open standards before, for no reason other then defeating competing software (See the Halloween documents for examples).
First, what benefit would that action afford the customer? Why would they want plain documents level-0 encrypted? It'll break all their non-Office tools, like intranet search tools. It does not improve _any_ customer scenario relating to standard open Office data.
Since when has MS ever given a damn about their customers? MS introduces a new file format in every upgrade to Office, so they clearly aren't overly concerned about backwards compatibility. In fact, it's just the opposite. By making the new version incompatible with the old version, it forces everyone to upgrade.
Immediately assuming that MS will do *anything* that won't improve a customer scenario is paranoid, and deluded. It's like saying that MS's 50,000 employees are sitting around all day, trying to think up new ways of BF'ing their customers.
Of course their not thinking of ways to screw their customers. THeir thinking of ways to sell more copies of Office. The fact that both goals often have the same result is coincidental. 95% of MS Employees are likely fine. I live in Seattle, and know several employees myself. But MS has a demonstrated past of this sort of behaviour, so saying they won't do it just because it might hurt their customers is foolish. I am not saying that MS will pursue DMCA action against anyone who tries to break the DRM, just that it could happen, and therefore will likely have a chilling effect on development. This is a god thing from MS's point of view, and exactly why I think the DMCA is a bad law and probably unconstitutional.
If the DMCA truly allows reverse-engineering for purposes of interoperability, then whats the problem with DeCSS, and Linux DVD players that use it?
Good question. I wish I could give you an answer. Unfortunately, MPAA Lawyers don't seem to be bound by this trivial thing called "the law".
Ok, a more serious answer... The MPAA argues that the purpose of reverse engineering CSS was not for interoperability, but for piracy. Regardless of the numerous non-infringing uses, the courts have chosen to side with Hollywood on the issue & declared it illegal.
The same could ceratinly happen in the case of Office, so the interoperability clause could be useless. However, it would be a much bigger stretch to argue the same thing when you're dealing with office documents rather then movies.
You go into a store and buy a PC that contains a video card with an ATI chipset. nVidia later sues ATI for some obscure patent infringement not covered under their contract and wins. Can nVidia go after every customer who bought and are using the affected ATI cards? Are you, the customer, legally required to check every component in your computer at the time of purchase for any patent infringement? Are you also required to request a copy of an agreement between nVidia and ATI to make sure that their (private) agreement covers your use? Between AMD and Intel? Are you required to do so with every hardware and software component in your system?
The difference between the examples you site, and the case at hand is who violates the patent. In all of the cases you site, the manufacturer of the hardware violated the patent, so they are liable. In this case, Microsoft simply provided a tool that allowed end-users to violate the patent. MS had the appropriate liecnses, so they are not guilty of anything.
As a consumer, you don't really need to worry about infringing a patent. When you become a developer, on the other hand, you do need to pay attention.
I agree software patents suck, but until they are done away with, they are a reality that people need to deal with. The beauty of this decision is that it not only gives MS a great big black eye (much bigger then if they themselves had to pay the fines), but that it's backlash should help speed the end of software patents.
Everyone agrees that their actions were only illegal if they had a monopoly. The judge that decided they did in fact have a monopoly was just wrong...how can you have a monopoly in a market, when there are other products available in said market?
I take it you're not a lawyer, right? You don't actually have to have 100% of a market to be a monopoly. The dictionary definition of a word, and the legal definition are quite often different. Microsoft was the dominant player in the OS field, and they leveraged their dominance in that field to gain dominance in the browser field. This is clearly and obviously a violation of the antitrust law. (ironically, even your dictionary definition supports this, see 1) "excessive control". Excessive != 100%.)
MS will almost certainly lose on this one. The fact that they intentionally negotiated the terms so that their royalties would be lower, then actively told their customers that they were covered should outweigh any disclaimers. I fully expect that they will be facing a class-action lawsuit any day now. It will take several years, but this will probably end up costing them a fortune. Of course, I could be wrong...
The main question is, who is the "keeper of the keys"?
Good point.
If you consider that, the "protection" has exactly zero value for governments and corporations.
Ah, but here you lost me. This isn't designed to be national-security sort of protection. This level of DRM is not going to do anything more then prevent casual browsing of my files. If someone really is determined, it would almost ceratinly be possible to hack the software. But that level of security is still -very- useful to many people. It shouldn't be viewed as a replacement for high security systems, but it is a nice supplement to them.
Actually, it occurs to me that the DMCA specifically allows reverse-engineering for interoperability, so this may not be as bad as I'd originally thought. On the other hand, most Open Source projects don't have the money for Lawyers, so it will possibly have a stifling effect whether it is illegal or not.
Wasn't the Skylorav case persued under the DMCA because he broke Adobe's file format?
Not really. The PDF file format is an open format. Anyone can make PDF tools. Skylorav didn't crack the file format, he cracked the optional encryption that the file MAY contain.
There is a key difference: Microsoft has repeatedly tried to prevent other companies from being able to read/write their file formats. By including DRM in the file format, Microsoft could be setting up the chance to sue OpenOffice (for example) in the event they include Office interoperability.
The interesting thing (to me) is that until I read this post, I though that this was really not a big deal. I actually think Office is a good place for DRM. Having the ability to place some limitations on who can read my business documents is a good thing. If it weren't for the DMCA, I would say that this is a case of people overreacting just because MS is involved. Unfortunately, the DMCA changes all that. Microsoft will almost certainly use this as a tool to prevent interoperability, and there's probably not a thing anyone can do to stop them.
Typically, when government takes over a "problem" they tend to make it much worse. Traffic congestion? Roads are almost all owned by governments.
True, privately run roads might be better, but can you imagine how much the tols would be? And people scream about gas taxes now!
Pollution/environment?
Oh, yes, Before the government got involved, industry was just clamoring to fix the enviromental harm they've caused over the last two hundred years.
Post offices vs. the private Federal Express...
Hmmm... I can send a letter in two-three days for $3.85, picked up with your mail, delivered to any address in the US, or Fedex in two days for >$10.00 (depending on distance), but you have to drop it off & delivery to a residential address is extra. Sure, one is guaranteed, the other isn't, but for 99% of deliveries, do you really need a time guarantee? And before you say "but the post office loses (or damages) packages", ship packages daily as part of a previous job. We shipped probably 1000 packages during the time that I was there & never once had one lost or damaged (though we packed everything to prevent damage). Admittedly, that's not a huge sample, but it's big enough.
And, while I have less experience with Fedex, try comparing the service from the Post Office with that of Airborne Express (an equally valid comparison by your standard). I'll take the post office any day.
the examples could go on for hours.
And so could my responses. But since you're clearly an idiot, let's just drop it here, ok?
You're right, of course, but I'm operating under the assumption that the cards are somewhat disposable, so you will be able to have more then one card, one for your groceries, one for the porn shop. Once you use the one at the porn shop up, throw it away & get a new card.
sure it may take some group a year or two to crack this, but once they do the amount of money they can get is HUGE. With cash, even if you know how it is difficult to counterfit (at least no 16 year old is going to do it).
You may be right, but I'm not terribly concerned about it. Look at it this way... Do you really think that any bank in the world would be using this technology if they weren't reasonably certain of it's security? Is the system hack-proof? Almost certainly not, but I'm willing to bet that there are safeguards in place to minimize the risk in case the system is hacked. Otherwise, the issuing bank would be out of business as soon as the first 15 year old did manage to hack it.
These are all good points, but you're assuming that these cards will -replace- cash. I don't think they will be doing that anytime soon. Instead, they will supplement cash. I use my debit card for probably 85% of my transactions, but I still try to always keep $20 bucks or so on me for those times when I want to buy a pop or whatever.
It seems that without .gov mandate it will be hard to get such a system off the ground.
Not really. If there's a compelling reason for merchants to provide the service, they will, just like they now accept credit & debit cards. It will take years before you get anything approaching 100% acceptance (and you'll probably never actually reach 100%), but you should be able to reach the critical density of acceptance pretty quickly, just as debit cards have become quite common over just a few years. The nature of this sort of system is that the more merchants use it, the more the merchants that don't use it are pressured to accept it as well. And you can always convert the balance of the card back to real cash at a neighboring merchant or ATM when you want to buy something from a merchant that doesn't accept the cards.
And you can be sure that the government will on some level have surveillance built in.
In America, you're probably right. In many other countries, though, this will probbaly be less of an issue.
Anonymous doesn't necessarily mean that the money is stored in the card, simply that the money isn't tied to a person. For security reasons, I would assume that the actual value of the card is stored (or at least mirrored) on a central server. In the event that the card was rendered unreadable, the presence of a serial number would allow you to retrieve the balance.
The anonymity comes in if you can add funds to the card from an anonymous source, ie. cash. Unfortunately, you are probably correct in assuming that the card is not truly anonymous if you fund it from an attributable source, ie. an ATM.
And then counterfitting. Wow, if money is only a string of ones and zeros on a card WOO HOOO. So its digitally signed? great I just bought a 100 dollar card and did a bit by bit copy.
No problem... You still have only $100. Make a thousand copies, still just $100. See, the problem is that each card has a serial number. Use up the balance once, & all the copies also have a zero balance. Granted, I'm speculating on the actual mechanism, but it's fairly trivial to prevent simple copies. More advanced hacks are possible, but I wouldn't worry to much about simple things like this.
I cannot for the life of me understand how TiVo owners can buy into that line.
My Tivo was advertised as having 30 hours of record time. In fact it gives me slightly more then that, even with the reserved space otherwise allocated (Unfortunately, I can't be specific since I have upgraded my hard drive). If they were falsely advertising the systems, I could understand people being upset. Since they aren't, just deal with it.
I am never going to buy a tivo if they don't even admit my ownership over the hardware.
Oh, in that case, I'm sure they will immediately change the policy.
Actually, it's not a hoax. The article is 100% accurate. The article states that no more Tivo's will be manufactured for sale in the UK in the immediate future, but they will continue to be supported. That is absolutely true. If you read the FAQ that is mentioned in the reply ("New members read this"), you'll see a question "I just read TiVo is going to pull out of the UK - is this true?" which basically repeats what was said in the article.
spam is unsolicited advertising... are you trying to say this is solicited advertising?
Actually, it is solicited. When you sign up for Tivo, you agree to let them send these ads. And you can easily opt out-- just cancel your subscription.
I really don't see the big deal. The ads do not come out of the thirty (or whatever) hours that were advertised when you bought your system. True you might get an extra thirty minutes-- maybe even an hour-- if the space wasn't allocated, but as has previously been pointed out, the ads help subsidize the subscription, and every once in a while, contain something of interest.
Of course, I never owned one, but I'm sure that's the case.
Yep, it's true. You do get free listsings with the ATI All-in-Wonder. Unfortunately, the software is -terrible-. I mean -REALLY- bad. It's slow, clunky, ugly. It's also ad sponsored, so you give up a portion of your display for ads. I bought a AIW hoping to use it as a TiVo. Unfortunately, it's a complete piece of crap compared to a TiVo. It may have been improved recently, but last time I checked (9 months ago?), no upgrades were available.