This story should have been submitted with the 'foot' icon! I would have to have gone crazy to do all of the following:
1) Use Microsoft Messenger 2) Trust an anonymous source IM'ing me with a "You just won $1000! Please go to http://www.microsoft.messenger.winner.com/ to claim it! (We must have all your info to claim the prize, btw)" 3) Actually follow said spam message to the site (We all know that just clicking on a malicious website and letting ActiveX controls and other such nonsense run in the background in IE is BEGGING for a complete computer hijacking)
Oh wait, Microsoft must be testing out a new business plan:
10 Spam 20 Collect more email addresses 30 Spam some more! 40 ? 50 GOTO 40 60 Profit!
I'm sorry, but a doped up druggie running over a pedestrian with a car does not equate to me copying an mp3 to listen to off of a p2p service. The artist isn't DEAD after I "load up."
I realize your comment was meant in jest, and while it was "SNL" funny it's also ridiculously lame at the same time.
There are laws against killing people you know. Just because they are evil people who don't give a rat's ass about their fellow man, doesn't justify you killing them.....But I guess that's delving into the whole capital punishment debate, so I'll drop it.
Streaming audio! And make it high quality, but don't allow stream-rippers. (If that's even possible, I honestly don't know) If I can listen to the songs first to judge how much I like/dislike certain ones, but I'm not forced to buy an entire CD full of crap for the one semi-cool song I like, trust me, I'll be buying dozens of songs (NOT albums) from your site. And everyone else is correct, make CD-quality (320- and 192-bit) mp3's available for sale, not just that 128-bit encoded junk... some of it is noticeably bad, especially when there is a lot of activity going on in the song. Put it all in.mp3 AND.ogg format for "choice", and I'll think you'll have a winner of a website!
This would be interesting if it weren't for some trolls I've seen you post on slashdot before in other stories...
Sorry, can't remember where I saw it, but it was pretty pathetic.
Besides, if I'm a scientist, why in the world would I publish scientific findings to a no-name, not-well-established, not peer-reviewable media source like Kazaa instead of New Scientist or the like? Maybe it's because your colleagues are undergrad students publishing their hijacked copies of term papers to Kazaa???
Having said that, I'm an avid defender of P2P, but just wanted to point out that you're full of shit to the slashdot newbies.
It's interesting that you tie the DMCA to this "argument" abour RFID tags. (I put the word argument in quotes, because it's really an argument between consumers, and big business, as I think most all of us on slashdot would agree RFID tags are a "bad idea")
I was recently visiting Colorado and found a store, Whole Foods Market, that tries to concentrate on fresh, organic, healthy, tasty foods and very clearly marks nearly all the items in their store as either guaranteed organically grown, or potentially GM-processed foods. Not only did this store have a TON of delicious stuff, it was packed with people from the moment it opened at 8AM on a weekday. Now many of you have probably heard of this store, as it's all across the west, southwest, and southeast, but up here in Ohio, they're just now working on putting in a store in Cleveland, so I had never heard of it.
What is interesting to me is that a store like this is apparently doing outstanding business. (read their website, they've captured a spot in the "Fortune 100 Best Companies to work for" category 6 years in a row, plus they're growing like crazy) Indie artists are doing outstanding business. Yet, the major grocery stores are trying desperately to understand their customers better through using those damn swipe cards (which offer little to no savings over supermarkets without "the card"). The RIAA and MPAA are mortally afraid of P2P and customer "file-sharing" of music, and blame us for their drop in sales.
All of this is so funny, because ultimately, we're seeing a recurrence of what has happened time and time again in this world: change. Technology is changing the way we keep ourselves entertained, how we feed ourselves, how we communicate, etc. Apparently some get it and are profitting from it (Whole Foods Market, a few Internet companies, Kazaa, etc.) and some do not (Kroger, Giant Eagle, RIAA, RFID companies).
Truly, the only thing we should be worrying about, is which side we want to associate ourselves with. The losing side or the winning side.
Debian aimed at the server? Yes. Not at the desktop? WRONG!
Yes, I grew up using Windows 3.1 -> Win2k (which I still use today) but I've grown extremely tired of the constant "reinstall yearly to maintain Windows" ideology from Microsoft. It really really REALLY sucks to try and back up 30Gb of data every year from multiple install locations, directories, files, etc. in Windows. I installed Debian on my server (through all the pain and headache of getting it working) to check out how Debian would do as my Linux distro. Guess what? I LOVE IT! Debian is most definitely getting installed on my Windows 2000 machine in a dual-boot configuration when I find the time (and patience) to wrestle with the Debian installer again.
Debian is very much desktop friendly! Who needs a computer that is brought to it's knees on a yearly basis because of sloppy software programming by Microsoft? I like my desktop computer to not completely crap out on me because Winamp playing in the background doesn't like competing for system resources and memory from Mozilla. No, there's many software applications that have not been refined (or even created) for Linux yet, but the Linux OS itself is far more powerful than any Microsoft Windows OS is. Far more stable too!
And when Microsoft can produce Help files that are half as helpful as 'man' pages and all the volumes of Linux "how-to" documents that are freely available online, maybe then Microsoft can take back some market share from Linux. As another person commented on this forum, the freedom of Debian is why I chose it in the first place. I like to have the freedom to do whatever I want with my computer, not what Microsoft tells me to do with it through endless EULA's. Honestly, the ONLY thing that keeps me stuck in a Windows world at home is my gaming habits. I love to play computer games!
Unfortunately, Freeciv and all the other 'free' Linux games just aren't up to snuff with most of their non-free relatives in the Windows world. If HL2 gets ported to Linux and Freeciv gets some more AI work done on it soon, I may just consider wiping out my Windows 2000 partition completely! Oh what liberation that would be...
Well, this all started 'cause the "Hollywood artists" (i.e. money-grubbing film producers, directors, and distributors) complained that the Clean Flicks company was illegally ruining their "artwork."
Think about that though. Isn't that a rather ridiculous argument when it is made that simple? I mean, if I purchased a Van Gough (sp?) painting, cut out a bunch of colors I didn't like, and then resold the painting to someone who was still willing to buy it because they also didn't like the colors I cut out of the canvas and liked the version I had "edited", how the hell would Van Gough (assuming he was still alive) be able to sue me?! Seriously, if it was a one-of-a-kind print and he didn't want me to 'edit' it, don't sell it to me!
And a movie on DVD is NOT a one-of-a-kind copy, so it doesn't even come close to matching my painting analogy. In most cases, it's an EXACT duplicate of the original work, so no one is destroying your precious original work!
Let's face it, the MPAA and RIAA and those who think like them are just upset because they weren't smart enough to think of "it" ("it" being new technologies) first, and somehow they think that because these new technologies affect their stuff that they're somehow entitled to control all the new ideas and technology that others thought up. It's completely absurd!
That's what I was just thinking. While Microsoft may have improved the stability of their system quite a bit from the Win95 days, they have gone BACKWARDS in their "Help" and "Search for..." functionalities. Seriously, I would uninstall all MS Help files and and Search functions if it were possible, as they are completely useless to me.
Anyone here ever used Minitab? If you have, you know that their Help system IS VERY useable on Windows, so it can be done, MS just chooses not to do it well. If they plan on tackling Google, they'd better start hiring some good corporate espionage spies to gain the tech leap on Google, 'cause it's not going to come out of Redmond!
No, no, no! It's not "worth it", "it" here being the cost of $11.99 for this particular CD. Because there is a more accessible, more direct route of getting the exact same content, the $11.99/CD price should COME DOWN, however it hasn't. In fact, CD prices have never come down in price! You would think they would, considering it takes much more now for me to want an entire CD, when I can download just the few songs I want off of most albums these days. In any other market, when a new technology makes your old way of doing business obsolete, you lead, follow, or get out of the way! Not the entertainment distribution industry. The business models in those markets equate to this: new technology = not fair, whine to Congress and those in power with no regard to your consumers, then fsck the consumer with more price bullying claiming you're providing an invaluable service. Yeah, right. I heard the new Kelly Clarkson song on MTV this morning as I worked out, along with some rap song that sucked hardcore. If that's the content that the entertainment distribution magnates claim are necessary for their survival, good luck! I'd rather read Scientology books than listen to that crap!
My wife and I were at Best Buy this weekend and I asked her if I could buy this CD that I really wanted (yes, I already downloaded the mp3's and really like this particular band, so I figured it was worth the $11.99 to get the full CD). She told me, and I quote: "No. We download, we don't buy. It's not worth it." Whoa! I was blown away, being that I'm normally the cheapskate in the house. I guess all my going on and on about DRM, the DMCA, and all my other gripes about modern technology related law matters got through to her.
And yes, she fully comprehends and knows that the RIAA, MPAA, and SCO claim that this kind of "sharing" is 100% evil and illegal and robbing them of massive profits. Guess what, my wife doesn't think you're "entitled" to ridiculous profits, and neither do 90% of Americans (the ones with brains anyways).
I respect the SCO exec's for their incredibly large brass balls that they're displaying in this whole lawsuit mess. I agree with your comments, and here's why:
Yes, it's logically ridiculous that SCO is claiming that because Linux and SCO have something almost identical in operation within their Operating Systems that somehow SCO thought of it first and is therefore entitled to oodles of money from nearly everyone and their mother for IP "infringement." However, what we really have here is a major test of the patent system. SCO exec's keep seeing company after company getting rich on patenting things like "one click shopping" ala Amazon.com and want their "fair share" of the pie. They're just pushing the envelope as far as they can.
Reminds me of Dr. Evil: "My father would make outrageous claims that he invented the question mark..." (paraphrased as best I could remember;) )
SCO won't sue everyone all at once, and they'll definitely not accuse other companies using AIX as "infringing" parties, merely pawns that IBM used in IBM's tricky little games. Therefore, shouldn't IBM be forced to pay them "one.. hundred... billion dollars!?"
It must take incredible balls to go after IBM like that, but I can see this wrecking IBM pretty significantly if it gets held up in court. I'd even wager that Microsoft will continue to front SCO the legal fees through more "license purchases" as long as SCO can whittle away at IBM and further Microcrap's dominance in the market.
CF Cards are fine I suppose, but they're oddly shaped for the traveler. I have a Sony 3.1Mp Digital Camera, and it obviously uses the Sony Memory sticks. Now I know it would run several hundreds of dollars to buy up a bunch of those Sony 128MB memsticks, however they're half the size of a stick of gum. If I were going all over the world by backpack, I'd just make sure to have some "pockets" in which to sew the memsticks into so that they're guaranteed not to fall out. Tightly wrap them in a couple layers of plastic and you'll probably be ok. Maybe send some home every couple months through priority registered Fedex out of the major cities worldwide, and confirm their receipt by checking in with friends/family back home before leaving that major city (you're site seeing in some of the major cities aren't you?).
Having backpacked through some really sopping wet conditions, I know those cheap Kodak one-time cameras stand up fine to the heat, wetness, and humidity (90% humidity in 90 degree heat with all-day downpour soaking me to the bone) well enough when properly wrapped up in plastic. Unfortunately, not having a digital camera meant I took some really crappy pictures that ended up being rather worthless once I was back home. And the previous poster was dead-on. Digital is FAR cheaper and easier to backpack with (weight is a consideration) than a bunch of disposable cameras or 35mm film. Just be careful with your equipment and you'll be fine.
Kicking butt? Really? Someone forgot to inform me of that. I purchased a 1.33GHz AMD Athlon about 1yr ago specifically because it was every bit as fast as most of the Intel P4's that were out then (AND worked perfectly fine with my existing mobo).
Somehow spending $500+ on RDRAM and new mobo and a P4 2.4GHz didn't make as much sense to me as spending the $145 for an Athlon 1.33GHz CPU w/ a new PC133 512MB stick. It all runs my favorite games, and being married and a busy full-time worker and part-time student doesn't leave much time for buying and playing all the newest games out there. You 22yr olds have fun with that new-fangled stuff tho, k?
Well, I know almost everyone else on/. will feel the same way, but I got bored of the corporate BS about 2 questions into the discussion. Lessig made some great points, even if I don't agree with all of his fundamental standpoints (I've read part of one of his books).
Matt Openheimer is a corporate whore... err... lawyer. ROFL!! Yes, yes, not all lawyers are bad, and I do know quite a few who are really really cool, nice, smart, caring people. It's that 5% that abuses their knowledge of the law (i.e. Matt Openheimer) that disgusts us all.
Does he even care how this might affect society, his neighbor, or his own children one day?! Banning tools that provide people the world round with nearly instant access to all sorts of entertainment, news, and other software tools is just ridiculous! It's potentially one of the best times in the world's history (yes, there are always wars going on in the world... and shutup u PETA freaks), and the RIAA is concerned about their declining revenues?!!?! It's called a FREE MARKET you assmunches! Yes, a $24.99 DVD with movie in 3 languages, cut scenes, different formats, and in crystal clear clarity is worth my hard-earned $24.99! The latest Britney Boobs CD for $17.99 IS NOT worth my hard-earned money. All Matt O. has to do is ask my law-student wife how his bending of those statistics and his faking 'correlations' between P2P apps and music sales would earn him a big fat F- in ANY statistics class.
Hell, even in my own corporate world, such flagrant abuse of statistical measures like that would earn me a pay decrease, not land me a fat job as a corporate lawyer at the top of the food chain. People see through that kind of BS VERY easily, Matt. It's no wonder sales are down... everyone knows you and your bosses are running a rotten business!
I couldn't agree more. I use Excel and Access every single day in my current job, and the PivotTable/PivotChart functions in Excel work, OpenOffice doesn't. Access makes building small databases and reports (thousands up to tens of thousands of rows) easy. OpenOffice doesn't even have this capability.
I do however much prefer the formatting and flexibility of the HTML and Writer programs in OpenOffice - VERY tight usage of HTML and XML markup languages where MS Word fails miserably.
Unfortunately for me, if there was a more powerful Excel spreadsheet application, I could and would switch to OpenOffice for business use. Until then, I'm stuck in an MS world with that damn Clippy and even more shitty "Help" system!
I never signed up to receive pr0n in my home mailbox, so I have no clue why it's not illegal to be dropping off that filth in my email inbox!
Yes, kids run out to get the paper mail from time to time, and yes, kids have email inboxes too. So of course pr0n in email inboxes is a ridiculous concept! Just because we have the right to free speech, doesn't give anyone the right to abuse it horrendously! Now some of you probably love the porn, but I don't.
More power to all of you who have bombed those spammers with a bunch of catalogues and other useless snail mail! It may not be legal, but until the spammers quit sending their illegal shit, I say give 'em a taste of their own medicine. In about 5 years our legal system will catch up with the new technology and this junk will be *mostly* a thing of the past, and all of you anti-spammers will be able to spend your time in other pursuits of freedom and happiness.
Slashdot Mirror
You could drop by Cleveland, OH too...
But then again, maybe you don't want to be near the 13th FATTEST FREAKIN CITY IN THE US!!!
I would think that a "report" from you today on this topic would be appropriate for once.
" A simple thing you could do is go for a quick job during your lunch break."
[queue bad British accent]
Personally, when I'm on the job *thrusts*, I like to give my undercarriage a bit of a how's your father.
I don't think MS will be using your business plan, as they'll never get to the all-important line 60: Profit! They'll just stay at ? indefinitely.
That was my point. Isn't that where they have been for the past 5 years?
This story should have been submitted with the 'foot' icon! I would have to have gone crazy to do all of the following:
1) Use Microsoft Messenger
2) Trust an anonymous source IM'ing me with a "You just won $1000! Please go to http://www.microsoft.messenger.winner.com/ to claim it! (We must have all your info to claim the prize, btw)"
3) Actually follow said spam message to the site (We all know that just clicking on a malicious website and letting ActiveX controls and other such nonsense run in the background in IE is BEGGING for a complete computer hijacking)
Oh wait, Microsoft must be testing out a new business plan:
10 Spam
20 Collect more email addresses
30 Spam some more!
40 ?
50 GOTO 40
60 Profit!
I am teh suX0r.
I'm sorry, but a doped up druggie running over a pedestrian with a car does not equate to me copying an mp3 to listen to off of a p2p service. The artist isn't DEAD after I "load up."
I realize your comment was meant in jest, and while it was "SNL" funny it's also ridiculously lame at the same time.
There are laws against killing people you know. Just because they are evil people who don't give a rat's ass about their fellow man, doesn't justify you killing them... ..But I guess that's delving into the whole capital punishment debate, so I'll drop it.
Streaming audio! And make it high quality, but don't allow stream-rippers. (If that's even possible, I honestly don't know) If I can listen to the songs first to judge how much I like/dislike certain ones, but I'm not forced to buy an entire CD full of crap for the one semi-cool song I like, trust me, I'll be buying dozens of songs (NOT albums) from your site. And everyone else is correct, make CD-quality (320- and 192-bit) mp3's available for sale, not just that 128-bit encoded junk... some of it is noticeably bad, especially when there is a lot of activity going on in the song. Put it all in .mp3 AND .ogg format for "choice", and I'll think you'll have a winner of a website!
This would be interesting if it weren't for some trolls I've seen you post on slashdot before in other stories...
Sorry, can't remember where I saw it, but it was pretty pathetic.
Besides, if I'm a scientist, why in the world would I publish scientific findings to a no-name, not-well-established, not peer-reviewable media source like Kazaa instead of New Scientist or the like? Maybe it's because your colleagues are undergrad students publishing their hijacked copies of term papers to Kazaa???
Having said that, I'm an avid defender of P2P, but just wanted to point out that you're full of shit to the slashdot newbies.
You must be in management...
"Tell me, how much time per week do you actually spend looking at those TPS reports?"
"...Yeaaah..."
It's interesting that you tie the DMCA to this "argument" abour RFID tags. (I put the word argument in quotes, because it's really an argument between consumers, and big business, as I think most all of us on slashdot would agree RFID tags are a "bad idea")
I was recently visiting Colorado and found a store, Whole Foods Market, that tries to concentrate on fresh, organic, healthy, tasty foods and very clearly marks nearly all the items in their store as either guaranteed organically grown, or potentially GM-processed foods. Not only did this store have a TON of delicious stuff, it was packed with people from the moment it opened at 8AM on a weekday. Now many of you have probably heard of this store, as it's all across the west, southwest, and southeast, but up here in Ohio, they're just now working on putting in a store in Cleveland, so I had never heard of it.
What is interesting to me is that a store like this is apparently doing outstanding business. (read their website, they've captured a spot in the "Fortune 100 Best Companies to work for" category 6 years in a row, plus they're growing like crazy) Indie artists are doing outstanding business. Yet, the major grocery stores are trying desperately to understand their customers better through using those damn swipe cards (which offer little to no savings over supermarkets without "the card"). The RIAA and MPAA are mortally afraid of P2P and customer "file-sharing" of music, and blame us for their drop in sales.
All of this is so funny, because ultimately, we're seeing a recurrence of what has happened time and time again in this world: change. Technology is changing the way we keep ourselves entertained, how we feed ourselves, how we communicate, etc. Apparently some get it and are profitting from it (Whole Foods Market, a few Internet companies, Kazaa, etc.) and some do not (Kroger, Giant Eagle, RIAA, RFID companies).
Truly, the only thing we should be worrying about, is which side we want to associate ourselves with. The losing side or the winning side.
Debian aimed at the server? Yes. Not at the desktop? WRONG!
Yes, I grew up using Windows 3.1 -> Win2k (which I still use today) but I've grown extremely tired of the constant "reinstall yearly to maintain Windows" ideology from Microsoft. It really really REALLY sucks to try and back up 30Gb of data every year from multiple install locations, directories, files, etc. in Windows. I installed Debian on my server (through all the pain and headache of getting it working) to check out how Debian would do as my Linux distro. Guess what? I LOVE IT! Debian is most definitely getting installed on my Windows 2000 machine in a dual-boot configuration when I find the time (and patience) to wrestle with the Debian installer again.
Debian is very much desktop friendly! Who needs a computer that is brought to it's knees on a yearly basis because of sloppy software programming by Microsoft? I like my desktop computer to not completely crap out on me because Winamp playing in the background doesn't like competing for system resources and memory from Mozilla. No, there's many software applications that have not been refined (or even created) for Linux yet, but the Linux OS itself is far more powerful than any Microsoft Windows OS is. Far more stable too!
And when Microsoft can produce Help files that are half as helpful as 'man' pages and all the volumes of Linux "how-to" documents that are freely available online, maybe then Microsoft can take back some market share from Linux. As another person commented on this forum, the freedom of Debian is why I chose it in the first place. I like to have the freedom to do whatever I want with my computer, not what Microsoft tells me to do with it through endless EULA's. Honestly, the ONLY thing that keeps me stuck in a Windows world at home is my gaming habits. I love to play computer games!
Unfortunately, Freeciv and all the other 'free' Linux games just aren't up to snuff with most of their non-free relatives in the Windows world. If HL2 gets ported to Linux and Freeciv gets some more AI work done on it soon, I may just consider wiping out my Windows 2000 partition completely! Oh what liberation that would be...
Well, this all started 'cause the "Hollywood artists" (i.e. money-grubbing film producers, directors, and distributors) complained that the Clean Flicks company was illegally ruining their "artwork."
Think about that though. Isn't that a rather ridiculous argument when it is made that simple? I mean, if I purchased a Van Gough (sp?) painting, cut out a bunch of colors I didn't like, and then resold the painting to someone who was still willing to buy it because they also didn't like the colors I cut out of the canvas and liked the version I had "edited", how the hell would Van Gough (assuming he was still alive) be able to sue me?! Seriously, if it was a one-of-a-kind print and he didn't want me to 'edit' it, don't sell it to me!
And a movie on DVD is NOT a one-of-a-kind copy, so it doesn't even come close to matching my painting analogy. In most cases, it's an EXACT duplicate of the original work, so no one is destroying your precious original work!
Let's face it, the MPAA and RIAA and those who think like them are just upset because they weren't smart enough to think of "it" ("it" being new technologies) first, and somehow they think that because these new technologies affect their stuff that they're somehow entitled to control all the new ideas and technology that others thought up. It's completely absurd!
That's what I was just thinking. While Microsoft may have improved the stability of their system quite a bit from the Win95 days, they have gone BACKWARDS in their "Help" and "Search for ..." functionalities. Seriously, I would uninstall all MS Help files and and Search functions if it were possible, as they are completely useless to me.
Anyone here ever used Minitab? If you have, you know that their Help system IS VERY useable on Windows, so it can be done, MS just chooses not to do it well. If they plan on tackling Google, they'd better start hiring some good corporate espionage spies to gain the tech leap on Google, 'cause it's not going to come out of Redmond!
DO NOT CLICK THAT LINK (Score:0)
by Anonymous Coward on 06-18-03 16:49 (#6236803)
GOOD GOD WTF IS THAT? lol
You must be new to the Internet...
No, no, no! It's not "worth it", "it" here being the cost of $11.99 for this particular CD. Because there is a more accessible, more direct route of getting the exact same content, the $11.99/CD price should COME DOWN, however it hasn't. In fact, CD prices have never come down in price! You would think they would, considering it takes much more now for me to want an entire CD, when I can download just the few songs I want off of most albums these days. In any other market, when a new technology makes your old way of doing business obsolete, you lead, follow, or get out of the way! Not the entertainment distribution industry. The business models in those markets equate to this: new technology = not fair, whine to Congress and those in power with no regard to your consumers, then fsck the consumer with more price bullying claiming you're providing an invaluable service. Yeah, right. I heard the new Kelly Clarkson song on MTV this morning as I worked out, along with some rap song that sucked hardcore. If that's the content that the entertainment distribution magnates claim are necessary for their survival, good luck! I'd rather read Scientology books than listen to that crap!
My wife and I were at Best Buy this weekend and I asked her if I could buy this CD that I really wanted (yes, I already downloaded the mp3's and really like this particular band, so I figured it was worth the $11.99 to get the full CD). She told me, and I quote: "No. We download, we don't buy. It's not worth it." Whoa! I was blown away, being that I'm normally the cheapskate in the house. I guess all my going on and on about DRM, the DMCA, and all my other gripes about modern technology related law matters got through to her.
And yes, she fully comprehends and knows that the RIAA, MPAA, and SCO claim that this kind of "sharing" is 100% evil and illegal and robbing them of massive profits. Guess what, my wife doesn't think you're "entitled" to ridiculous profits, and neither do 90% of Americans (the ones with brains anyways).
I respect the SCO exec's for their incredibly large brass balls that they're displaying in this whole lawsuit mess. I agree with your comments, and here's why:
;) )
Yes, it's logically ridiculous that SCO is claiming that because Linux and SCO have something almost identical in operation within their Operating Systems that somehow SCO thought of it first and is therefore entitled to oodles of money from nearly everyone and their mother for IP "infringement." However, what we really have here is a major test of the patent system. SCO exec's keep seeing company after company getting rich on patenting things like "one click shopping" ala Amazon.com and want their "fair share" of the pie. They're just pushing the envelope as far as they can.
Reminds me of Dr. Evil: "My father would make outrageous claims that he invented the question mark..." (paraphrased as best I could remember
SCO won't sue everyone all at once, and they'll definitely not accuse other companies using AIX as "infringing" parties, merely pawns that IBM used in IBM's tricky little games. Therefore, shouldn't IBM be forced to pay them "one.. hundred... billion dollars!?"
It must take incredible balls to go after IBM like that, but I can see this wrecking IBM pretty significantly if it gets held up in court. I'd even wager that Microsoft will continue to front SCO the legal fees through more "license purchases" as long as SCO can whittle away at IBM and further Microcrap's dominance in the market.
CF Cards are fine I suppose, but they're oddly shaped for the traveler. I have a Sony 3.1Mp Digital Camera, and it obviously uses the Sony Memory sticks. Now I know it would run several hundreds of dollars to buy up a bunch of those Sony 128MB memsticks, however they're half the size of a stick of gum. If I were going all over the world by backpack, I'd just make sure to have some "pockets" in which to sew the memsticks into so that they're guaranteed not to fall out. Tightly wrap them in a couple layers of plastic and you'll probably be ok. Maybe send some home every couple months through priority registered Fedex out of the major cities worldwide, and confirm their receipt by checking in with friends/family back home before leaving that major city (you're site seeing in some of the major cities aren't you?).
Having backpacked through some really sopping wet conditions, I know those cheap Kodak one-time cameras stand up fine to the heat, wetness, and humidity (90% humidity in 90 degree heat with all-day downpour soaking me to the bone) well enough when properly wrapped up in plastic. Unfortunately, not having a digital camera meant I took some really crappy pictures that ended up being rather worthless once I was back home. And the previous poster was dead-on. Digital is FAR cheaper and easier to backpack with (weight is a consideration) than a bunch of disposable cameras or 35mm film. Just be careful with your equipment and you'll be fine.
Kicking butt? Really? Someone forgot to inform me of that. I purchased a 1.33GHz AMD Athlon about 1yr ago specifically because it was every bit as fast as most of the Intel P4's that were out then (AND worked perfectly fine with my existing mobo).
Somehow spending $500+ on RDRAM and new mobo and a P4 2.4GHz didn't make as much sense to me as spending the $145 for an Athlon 1.33GHz CPU w/ a new PC133 512MB stick. It all runs my favorite games, and being married and a busy full-time worker and part-time student doesn't leave much time for buying and playing all the newest games out there. You 22yr olds have fun with that new-fangled stuff tho, k?
Well, I know almost everyone else on /. will feel the same way, but I got bored of the corporate BS about 2 questions into the discussion. Lessig made some great points, even if I don't agree with all of his fundamental standpoints (I've read part of one of his books).
Matt Openheimer is a corporate whore... err... lawyer. ROFL!! Yes, yes, not all lawyers are bad, and I do know quite a few who are really really cool, nice, smart, caring people. It's that 5% that abuses their knowledge of the law (i.e. Matt Openheimer) that disgusts us all.
Does he even care how this might affect society, his neighbor, or his own children one day?! Banning tools that provide people the world round with nearly instant access to all sorts of entertainment, news, and other software tools is just ridiculous! It's potentially one of the best times in the world's history (yes, there are always wars going on in the world... and shutup u PETA freaks), and the RIAA is concerned about their declining revenues?!!?! It's called a FREE MARKET you assmunches! Yes, a $24.99 DVD with movie in 3 languages, cut scenes, different formats, and in crystal clear clarity is worth my hard-earned $24.99! The latest Britney Boobs CD for $17.99 IS NOT worth my hard-earned money. All Matt O. has to do is ask my law-student wife how his bending of those statistics and his faking 'correlations' between P2P apps and music sales would earn him a big fat F- in ANY statistics class.
Hell, even in my own corporate world, such flagrant abuse of statistical measures like that would earn me a pay decrease, not land me a fat job as a corporate lawyer at the top of the food chain. People see through that kind of BS VERY easily, Matt. It's no wonder sales are down... everyone knows you and your bosses are running a rotten business!
I couldn't agree more. I use Excel and Access every single day in my current job, and the PivotTable/PivotChart functions in Excel work, OpenOffice doesn't. Access makes building small databases and reports (thousands up to tens of thousands of rows) easy. OpenOffice doesn't even have this capability.
I do however much prefer the formatting and flexibility of the HTML and Writer programs in OpenOffice - VERY tight usage of HTML and XML markup languages where MS Word fails miserably.
Unfortunately for me, if there was a more powerful Excel spreadsheet application, I could and would switch to OpenOffice for business use. Until then, I'm stuck in an MS world with that damn Clippy and even more shitty "Help" system!
In the words of Harry Dunne:
"You can't triple stamp a double stamp!"
I never signed up to receive pr0n in my home mailbox, so I have no clue why it's not illegal to be dropping off that filth in my email inbox!
Yes, kids run out to get the paper mail from time to time, and yes, kids have email inboxes too. So of course pr0n in email inboxes is a ridiculous concept! Just because we have the right to free speech, doesn't give anyone the right to abuse it horrendously! Now some of you probably love the porn, but I don't.
More power to all of you who have bombed those spammers with a bunch of catalogues and other useless snail mail! It may not be legal, but until the spammers quit sending their illegal shit, I say give 'em a taste of their own medicine. In about 5 years our legal system will catch up with the new technology and this junk will be *mostly* a thing of the past, and all of you anti-spammers will be able to spend your time in other pursuits of freedom and happiness.