Do you honestly believe that the benifit of a faster search is enough incentive to rewrite such a major part of the OS
Umm, no, but I do believe that releasing an OS that introduces incompatibilities with older versions of Office and Outlook will "encourage" the last holdouts against software-as-a-service to hand over their credit card numbers and jump on the bandwagon.
I'd expect to see the new OS provide goodies for those getting.NET Office and Outlook upgrades along with it, and to retain backwards compatibility for standard Win32 API apps, but with reduced speed and reliability. They'll just annoy us into upgrading those pesky old apps that we very selfishly bought unlimited time licenses for. Damn us and our luddite 20th century ways.
I believe it's just general low grade evil rather than anything more sinister. I do agree that a DRM mechanism will appear at the Windows OS level sooner or later, regardless of whether the SSSCA sneaks through or not, but I think that's a separate issue.
Oh, is that what they're supposed to be doing? I thought it was a show about the dreadful curse of epilepsy: long petit mal staring contests with empty space, punctuated by bouts of random spastic motion.
Seriously, what's the big loss? The censored english dub Dragonball anime is already pre-digested kiddie fare with very little to recommend it. In fact, the only way they could make it worse is have "837 hit combo!" float up the screen, or the Mortal Kombat Voice Guy say "Flawless victory! Fatality!".
Mmm, actually, that might even make it better...
I know in this manga/anime era it's old fashioned to care about US comic books, but if you want something to chew over, how about the upcoming live action Daredevil? The casting is credible, but the director's only previous credit is a film that only got positive feedback from "People Who Capitalize Every Word" and the "all of God's chosen" brigade. Uh oh. Danger, Will Robinson.
Sony music, I believe, grosses 4 billion dollars a year, while Sony Electronics, makers of mp3 players, etc grosses 40 billion dollars. In this case, I wonder which part of the company will win out
Senator Kickback: So, what can you guys offer me?
Recoring Exec:A roofied teenage pop starlet, a sack full of crack, and a job in marketing for your idiot waster nephew.
Electronics Exec: Uh, I dunno, how about a really neat watch that turns into a robot dinosaur?
Consider that internally these departments are knifing each other with merry abandon. Want to bet they can't lobby separately? Then it comes down to who's the more corrupt and ruthless. I know who my money's on.
There are currently 2,000 Mandrake Club members. If they can get 8,000 more, they're fine
Hmm, and if my employer could increase its loyal customer base by 400%, I could retire off my stock options tomorrow.
Don't get your troll sticks out, I'm a (paying) SuSE Linux user. But that's rather my point. SuSE Linux. See also Debian, Red Hat, and all the other flavours.
Diversity is great and all, and it would be lovely if there was enough money around to support this number of companies. However, I do get the definitely feeling that there are simply too many distros fighting for too small a share of the paying customers.
Here's my question: As a SuSE user, should I shed a tear if Mandrake vanishes and some of those 2,000 club members start giving money to SuSE? What exactly are the benefits to me of Mandrake staying afloat?
...I find myself once again having my hunch confirmed that you should never work for someone who sounds like they should be a minor celebrity. It's uncanny, but "Scott Draeker" - like "John Romero" - begs to be prepended with "Guest starring" or "Our special correspondant", while "Kayt Draeker" is a perfect name for a trashy fantasy novellist catering to the market that likes a lot of apostophes and random weird letters in their chara'kters.
Folks who run companies and end up screwing the folks that made their business work deserve whatever hell that's dished out for them.
Well, by that point, they've become the sort of person who can assrape someone while smiling and chatting about reengineering their excretive functionality as part of a long term win-win scenario. This qualifies them perfectly for a career in marketing with a larger company.
Joke? Hardly. I slithered out from under the assraping, but some friends weren't so lucky. I have yet to hear of anyone at the project manager level or above in a games company who ended up in a lower paid job after running a project onto the rocks. All experience is good experience, for management.
This isn't news to me. I'm a novellist looking to get a first novel published, and have been hearing the same things. Publishers have realised that they can sign up more books than they can actually sell, and then keep some of them as perpetual bankers to fill slack spots. It's not really anything sinister, it's just that commissioning editors are more keen to justify their existence by signing up books than marketing managers are to dilute their budget stuffing the channel with no-namers. It's simple supply and demand: book buyers make their decision mostly based on the author name, then in decreasing order of importance, the cover art, the title, the cover quotes (from authors in the same stable, naturally), then the cover blurb and finally the author bio. Consider the shelves groaning under the weight of Koontz, King, McCaffrey and Pratchett, and anything featuring Josh Kirbyesque artwork for that matter.
I have been advised that my options for a first novel are:
Give - and I do mean give - it to a publisher under terms that make it a no brainer for them to publish, i.e. forget about royalties and perhaps even an advance in return for their investment in putting me on shelves. This is achievable, as I've got a good nine to five job and I don't actually need the income from writing, but I'm not exactly taken with the idea of writing !!! FREE BOOK !!! SAVE $$$ !!! on the manuscript.
Try and get it accepted (with major modifications) as a ghostwritten or genre piece by a publisher looking to fill a gap in a series. This is very close to work-for-hire, and it doesn't appeal at all.
Write at least three books up front, and expect to agree to give first-refusal rights for another three to a publisher.
Self publish. No, only joking. You can't even give books to retailers, as shelf space costs money, and unknown authors without a slick jacket and marketing campaign just don't move books, see above.
Sell on the 'net. Apparently the Easter Bunny delivers your money.
I'm going for the multi-book option. If publishers want to sell trilogies, a trilogy they shall get (with outlines for five more). I stopped book the first a little prematurely at 90,000 words, and am 30,000 into book the second. I've pretty much accepted that I have to write another 120,000 words or so before I can approach a publisher from anything like a position of strength. As I said, this isn't a problem for me, writing is a hobby at the moment, and the long term payoff will be better. But this would be impossible for someone wanting to write for a living.
This is quite apart from the problem of stopping your work from going straight off the top of the slush pile into the outgoing mail (or the round file). What's making that situation worse is that many publishers are looking for The Next Harry Potter, which means they're prepared to throw their slender resources at promoting a very few new "personality" authors in the hope of making it big, while treating the majority of their current stable as shelf padders and rejecting the rest of the new authors out of hand. Publishers don't accept books any more, they accept authors and series. A slush pile submission really has to be accompanied by a colourful and illustrated biography; you're not submitting a well written novel, but an attractive sales pitch for an ongoing cash cow.
Bear in mind that I'm still optimistic enough to believe that if I put in the work up front, I can be one of those lucky breakthrough authors. Get back to me in a few years, and I might have even more reservations about the whole process.;-)
The settlement can not have as its purpose "punishment" of Microsoft
Mmm, OK, some of us are jumping the gun. I for example, am assuming that the terms of the settlement are largely irrelevant, because Microsoft won't comply with them. Given their past history, this is practically a given.
What I'm thinking is that five years down the line, they'll be back in court for failing to comply, and then it does become a question of punative measures. Setting out the penalties for non-compliance now will save us some time later.
If, as the article suggests, this is a reaction to the vulnerability felt after the attacks of 9/11, then it is a poorly thought-out one.
I don't think so. It's the inevitable response, given the tack we took.
A lot of people in the world hate the USA, and not all of them are insane. A lot of them quite rationally detest US foreign policy, because every time the USA steps in to a third party conflict, it makes a friend and an enemy (remember, in any conflict, both sides view themselves as the Good Guys, or the justified victims, or the Chosen of God). Making enemies is the cost of getting involved. Before this once again gets interpreted as justifying September 11th, take a clue check. The murderers who did that were stone cold evil motherfuckers. But just because they're Bad Guys doesn't automatically make us the Good Guys. That's kiddie matinee morality.
After September 11th, we had two choices. We could have said "Sorry for taking lives to save lives, we won't get involved again,", or we could have done what we did and said (effectively) "No more Mr Nice Guy. You will fear us more than you hate us."
When your foreign policies kill (or are perceived to have killed) all of someone's family, you have very little leverage left over them. You can't personally threaten a suicide attacker, nor can you enter a rational dialogue and explain why their family had to die to preserve Freedom. You can either humble yourself and say sorry, again and again and again, or you can escalate and say "Rain of fire on your entire nation, buddy. Just try us." and you have to keep escalating, in word and deed until it is quite clear what the consequences of fucking with you are.
Personally, I think we've taken the easy way, and the wrong way. Spending trillions of dollars on defence means never having to say you're sorry. Is saying sorry that high a price to pay?
Who here has been locked in jail or harassed or abused by AOL or the authorities because of what they typed into their netscape 6 search bar? Hm, nobody? Okay, nothing to see here
Ah, it's so clear now. Anyone who wants privacy must be guilty of something! So, can I interest you in some glass walls, or perhaps a stylish subcutaneous lojack?
Legitimate users were able to get authorization as many times as necessary (before company closure on January 12, 2002). Now MightyWords does not perform authorization anymore, so it would seem that legitimate users of MightyWords eMatter are now out of luck, unless they have access to a "backdoor" to restore access to the purchased titles.
MightyWords is due kudos for implementing a system that was easier to use then to crack, but their withdrawal from the market highlights the fundamental flaw in any DRM system.
The best analogy I've come up with for DRM content (any DRM including DVD) is that the content is in a safe with a little window in the side. Both the safe and the window have combination locks on them. If you have the right window code, you (personally) can peer through the window and view the content in a limited way. eMatter has a pretty big window, but you still have to go to them to get the combination. When the copyright on the content expires, or if you want to make fair use copies of parts of it, you are allowed to open the safe, take out the content, and manipulate it directly.
Only, you aren't. When the inevitable happens and the code holder goes titsup, you are boned. Specifically, if you want to make use of the content in any way - even perfectly legal uses - you are absolutely required to break the law.
As we've seen in the DeCSS case, the DMCA trumps fair use. You're still allowed to use fair use as a post facto defence for the act of copying the content, but not as a pre facto justification for obtaining the tools that let you do it. In other words, obtaining or possessing a safe cracking kit is illegal regardless of the use you put it to. Cracking the safe is actually legal, but obtaining (or creating) the tool to do it is not. Astonishing, but that's exactly what the DMCA says.
The SSSCA will just make this worse, as it will mandate hardware that will only look through the little window. Even if you break the law to obtain tools to open the safe and get at the content (quite legally if the copyright is expired), you won't (legally) be able to obtain hardware that will touch that content.
Again, eMatter is one of the best attempts at DRM I've seen, but it still demonstrates how fundamentally flawed DRM is, because it requires you to prove your innocence while giving no guarantees that you will be able to continue to do so. It illustrates the vital distinction that you are not buying content, you are licensing a limited and revokable right to access content. There's a big difference, both in theory, and as the collapse of MightyWords now shows, in practice.
...Is that Lucasarts keep trying to move away from ep 4-6 merchandise now that ep1 is out and ep2 looms on the horizon. And yet the demand for 4-6 vintage continues, as these guitars clearly demonstrate. Where's the Jar Jar axe?
Oh, and they've definitely said there will be no more ep 4-6 games. Several times, if I remember correctly, the first after X Wing: Alliance. Uh, right. I love how Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds headline art is episode 1, but most of the content is ep 4-6 vintage. Characters, art, storylines, it even opens with that explosive and unforgettable John Williams Ep 4 theme, and Ep 4 art on the menu.
Despite all Lucas's attempts to convince us to the contrary, eps 4-6 are still more evocative and enduring. Hum the famous theme from ep 4 (DAAA-da, da-da da-daaah daah). Now the Imperial March (dum dum dum, dumdy dum, dumdy dum). Now - even though the music was still by John Williams - try to recall any tune from Ep 1. Anything at all. Any luck? Anything?
Picture a rebel trooper from the start of Episode 4. Easy, right? Now picture a Naboo Imperial Guardsman. I've got a vague impression of a coppery helmet or something. Maybe. Did they have cloaks, or were they long coats? Any ideas?
I'm sure I'm wide open to accusations of cognitive dissonance, that I watched Eps 4-6 as a child, and that Ep 1 is equally as memorable to the children that watched it. Mmm, OK, if you like. Let's wait another 20 years and see which characters are still selling them.
If more "real" people gave a bit of money -- keep in mind that the per-candidate and total limits restrict how much any one company can contribute -- then Congressmen would be more free to ignore industry contributions
By the same argument, we should pay thieves to persuade them not to steal. After all, there's such a thing as having too much money, right? I mean, once you've bought an island for yourself, and one for all of your family and friends, and that guy you met on the street, you stop aquiring wealth, right? Right?
Re:NASA's troubles
on
Hack in Space
·
· Score: 4, Interesting
to people bemoaning the absense of mars missions and moon bases. Why go?
Now, I'm a pretty cynical old bastard, but those words, nearly forty years on, still choke me up. To me, the defining quality of humanity is that our reach can exceed our grasp.
It's impossible (I think) to justify space exploration in any rational or economic terms. But if "because it's there" isn't justification enough, then that's a sad indicator we have become society of navel gazers and bean counters. And history shows us that societies only go one way once they've reached that stage.
You're right that the space race was based on competition. But I believe that still applies, and if we no longer want to compete, sooner or later we will be superceded by a society that does.
Please mod the parent up. You have to read some of Gilmore's own words to believe how aggressively and unreasonably stubborn he is on this issue. Gilmore has done some wonderful things, but he flat out refuses to ignore the changing realities of living on the 'net, calling anti-spammers "extortionists", "thugs", "blackmailers", and asserting that this is an "antitrust" issue. Regarding spam itself, Gilmore says: "I don't even want a "tyranny of the majority", if the majority happens
to prefer to smash spammers (and suspected spam-sympathizers). I
don't want a rerun of Joe McCarthy's witch- hunt, with spammers in place of
Communists. I want to have everyone's right to communicate with each
other protected, whether or not they disagree with the majority."
Which is all well and good. Gilmore argues that any censorship is reprehensible. OK, then why did Gilmore voluntarily censor mail passing through his gateway in a token attempt to appease Verio? He argues on a point of principle, then breaks that principle quite cynically so as to create an appearance of having offered a reasonable compromise (when the real solution is much simpler: authorisation). He is a very jolly, persuasive and genial old hypocrite. Harsh comment, but judge him by his actions, not his protestations.
Gilmore is an extremely confused man, well intentioned, but in severe denial that the world has changed around him. He has found a cause to fight (using EFF lawyers) and is enjoying playing hardball on an issue of principle (while breaking that principle himself) when there's good grounds for believing that the real issue is that he's just pissed at Verio for buying up the ISP he founded and imposing terms of usage on him. Any terms. Gilmore is pro-free speech in the shouting-fire-in-a-crowded-theatre-is-OK way. Information doesn't just want to be free, it wants to be thrown out of the door and helped along with a cattle prod. While he's done a lot of good in his life, I believe that this extremist stance actually damages the EFF and the free-speech lobby.
Before you judge him, go and read his specific thoughts on this issue, and decide for yourself whether he deserves contempt or pity. I'm rather leaning towards the latter.
In the US at least there is the fair use clause of the copyright laws.
Largely irrelevant. The Audio Home recording act 1992 and the Digital Millenium Copyright Act 1998 between them tie fair use rights up in a Gordian knot, where you are technically allowed fair usage, but you are technologically prevented from doing it, if you see what I mean.
Case law - not confused and contraditory copyright law and fair use defence - has held that burning MP3's is explicitely fair use, see RIAA versus Rio 1999
However, fair use (as another poster asserts) is a post facto defence. If you can make a copy, then fair use allows you to do so in many cases. It does not give leverage to demand copyable media. In fact, the 1992 Audio Home Recording act actually mandates copy prevention technology, it's just that RIAA vs Rio rules that computers and the Rio aren't "digital audio recorders"; the computer is a general purpose device, the Rio doesn't actually make the copy from the original source, it receives the pre-copied data from the computer. That was a contraversial technical ruling though, and it could be ignored in future.
But really, your opinion can be countered with one word: Macrovision.
Expiring copyrights prior to the life of the artist is, IMHO, unfair. Even when you're talking about code -- if a person or company owns the code, they should choose what to do with it.
I was going to point out the huge flaw in your first sentence, but you've very kindly done it for me.
Something else to consider, given the mentality of most record labels -- if copyrights expired after a shorter period, how many labels would just sit on material waiting for the rights to expire before exploiting it so they didn't have to share any royalties
I'm sorry, but you fail the clue check. The vast majority of people involved in song creation are now doing work-for-hire. The concept of an "artist" is the exception, not the rule. The labels already own the right to the song. Any royalties that they choose to pay to the people involved (to the creators of the lyrics or music, or to the meat puppet miming to them, for example) are a purely contractual matter. When the rights expire, it's the label that loses out, because they can't stop other labels or you or me copying or creating derivative works without restriction.
The same applies even in the unusual case of an artist retaining rights and licensing them to a label. If the label chooses not to exercise their right to copy and distribute the work, they lose out as well when the creator's rights expire, because then their license become worthless.
What you really illusatrate is how badly understood copyright laws are, and that what we need more than anything else is a single, coherent way of dealing with copyright and intellectual property. "Author's life plus some" is both relatively recent, and already obsolete!
Consider that the majority of content that you and I experience on a day to day basis is done as work for hire. Songs, TV, film, some reference books; they are created by individuals, but the rights are owned by corporations. In this case, the expiry of the rights is based not on the creator's life, but on a fixed term. (And considering that that terms keeps getting extended on demand, I mean "fixed" largely in the sense of fraudulent).
There's also a misconception that individual rights can only be licensed and not sold. Guess again. Once created, rights can be sold lock, stock and barrrel. No, this doesn't mean that you pretend that OmniMegaHyperCorp created the work or caused it to be created, you just sign a contract that says you give them all rights in perpetuity and without restriction, and (as if by magic) it happens. It's not part of copyright law, it's contract law, but it's de facto and supported by case law.
But in this case, how long should the rights last? Lifetime of the creator? Fixed term? If the individual signs them over after fifty years, does that reset the clock on the fixed term ownership by the corporation? Or what if the creator dies two minutes after signing them over? Does that start the "death plus some" expiry? What if one individual sells rights to another individual? Or what if an individual doing work-for-hire for a corporation buys the rights to the work that they created some time after the fact? What if they then sell those rights back again? Most of these questions have yet to be answered by case law, because we keep changing and extending terms so often that most work is essentially worthless and not fighting over before the issue comes up. Where there's an exception, like early Disney work, Congress is happy to extend the duration of their copyright to avoid the issue.
The whole issue of expiry is a big kludgy minefield. The only solution that makes any kind of sense is the original solution before we confused it by tying it to a lifetime: a fixed term associated with the creation of the work. It doesn't matter who caused the work to be created, or owns the rights, or how often the rights are bought or sold. The clock starts ticking the instant the work is created, and the bell rings after a fixed period, regardless of where the rights are in the pass-the-parcel world of modern IP.
That's the way it used to work, and it was a damn shame that we "fixed" it, because it wasn't broke.
defends this viewpoint in a strong tone, and is contemptuous of other viewpoints offered by slashdot readers
Or, actually followed, read and dissected the references given. The references quoted in response actually contradicted the statements made, and basically supported my point. Sorry, but they did, and I couldn't let that bluff slip past unchallenged... just as you quite rightly challenge my assertions. On the other hand, I did feel so bad about being all fierce and nasty that I even helped the respondant out by torpedoing my own assertion with salient quotes from the Betamax Decision, which is what I was rather hoping someone else would do for me to demonstrate that this isn't just a forum for skimmers and ranters. Hey ho.
Previous case law has held that the following are fair uses of copyrighted materials:
Making personal backups of software.
Time-shifting television programs.
Format-shifting.
Compilation creation ("mix tapes")
Rebroadcasting radio in a business.
Ok, I've read the reference (very interesting, thanks), and the only one that I see confirmed is time-shifting publically broadcast television for a single viewing, from the Betamax Decision, which I already mentioned. None of the other cases appear to deal with personal/friends/family use, nor with the uses you quote. Sorry if I'm being dense, but can you actually explain which cases you're referring to? Oh, and off the top of my head, don't you need a public performance license to rebroadcast radio in a workplace?
I fess up, I'm being deliberately provocative. The very simple reason for that is that the DMCA and the nascent SSSCA make me deeply concerned for the future of P2P in specific and the whole concept of fair use in general. You must be aware that every time this issue rolls around, there's a flurry of posts about how personal non-for-profit use is fair, so neener neener Mr Government. I simply don't believe that is the case, and given the number of people that take what they read on Slashdot as gospel, I think that it's important to give an emphatic "No!" to that to balance the complacent "Yes!" posts.
You'll notice that we both referenced the EFF. I'd point out their extremely inflamatory - and highly inaccurate - language about the Felten case: "Judge Denies Scientists' Free Speech Rights". You just know they wanted to add a slew of !!bangs!! there. Looking at the actual ruling, the judge dismissed the case because the case - as brought - was no longer there to be answered. The language of the EFF's initial releases clearly - and completely falsely - implied that the ruling was anti-constitutional, when their actual gripe was simply that the case was dismissed before it became a constitutional issue. They clearly feel that sometimes it's more important to keep it simple, stupid than to provide a balanced view. And sometimes I find myself agreeing with them.
I'm also here to learn, and the first thing I learned on Slashdot is never trust anything. Don't trust what people say here. Don't trust them if they provide a plausible looking link. Follow the link, read the references, consider the sources, and verify them. Which is why I am questioning your (very interesting) link, and suggesting that you are - perhaps - making assumptions about what's in those cases. Feel free to let me know if I'm wrong, but be sure to quote the specific cases that support your fair use examples, because I'm not seeing them.
Can we agree on this?
Judges are evolutionary, not revolutionary whenever possible.
Peer 2 Peer sharing involves making permanent format-shifted copies of non-broadcast material and distributing these permanent copies in a potentially large scale but non commercial way outside of the home.
There is no case law precedent for this situation, but there is for one that is a close evolution away from it. Specifically, for-profit copying and selling of content.
Pure P2P (not a Napster/Kazaa client/server hybrid) is going to go to a judgement sooner or later. The defence will be that it's fair use. In all honesty, I do agree that any unbiased court will consider that defence rather than dismissing it out of hand, but - and again, please quote specific case examples if I'm wrong - I don't see the case law that even remotely supports that assertion. In fact, it's more likely that a court will start from the very close example of commercial piracy, and spot that the only material difference is the not-for-profit nature. Oh, except for Morpheus. They're for profit. So there's no difference that I can see.
Or, in skimmer language: I'd expect P2P to be assumed guilty until proven innocent, and not the other way around.
Got a reference to a case that's a small evolution away that indicates otherwise? I suspect not.
In a 1996-97 survey [...] 53 percent of the students admitted to pirating software - meaning the true number likely was considerably higher, Chiang said
Translation: the numbers didn't match our agenda or preconceptions, so we assumed they were lying.
in 2000-2001 [...] the number of students using pirated software dropped to about 40 percent
Oh, but these students are telling the truth....
It's unfair to speculate without seeing the full reports, but heck, this is Slashdot, right?;-)
Here's a speculation. Ask 100 students if they're pirated software. What's the answer?
1996: This is anonymous, right? Er, I suppose so then. [ticks yes]
Might I suggest that the yardstick of lower copying isn't fewer students saying that they do, but higher sales? There's vague mention of sales incentives, but no actual data on increased figures.
if MS stripped Windows down until it was just the OS itself. Bye-bye, calc, notepad, wordpad, solitaire, ftp, telnet, minesweeper, icons, windows, menus
Yes, yes, very insightful. Unfortunately, if you actually read the proposal, it asks for extra versions to be made available specified middleware stripped.
Microsoft still gets to sell the full distro, they just have to provide stripped down versions to resellers who want to add their own apps.
And if stripped Windows is as unstable as they claim, then they should have no problen persuading people to keep taking the full distro, right?
The question is not whether they can provide an OS without a browser embedded - it's whether it is reasonable to modify their current OS's to that end.
I understand what you're saying, but that's not what Allchin's saying. The way the conversation should have gone is this:
Court: Can you unbundle IE?
Allchin: Yes.
Court:: How much would it cost?
Allchin: A million billion trillion dollars and the collapse of the free world.
Instead, it went like this:
Court: Can you unbundle IE?
Allchin: Absolutely not. No way. It's not possible. It can't be done. It breaks the laws of physics. It requires time travel. God Himself could not do it.
There's a small difference. In the first case, Allchin doesn't dumb down his answer for the benefit of that dumb old judge, and the necessity for him to lie is postponed.
In other words: Microsoft must not be allowed to give shortcut answers to technical questions based on what they view as being a reasonable implementation. That's for the court to decide. The mistake the court made was to even let the technicalities be an issue, they should have just asked how much it would cost, and if the answer was "too much", then appointed an expert to cost it. Which they have done, belatedly, after being stonewalled for years.
As most everyone here will point out, and that courts have determined, time-shifting or media-shifting is most certainly allowable under the fair-use doctrine
Ah, ya got me. But look, the point is that in all of these judgements, the court was very careful to restrict itself to specific cases.
VCR's, for example. The allowable use in that case was very specifically making a recording of publically broadcast content, watching it once, then erasing it. Sony had to go to some lengths to demonstrate that users were not creating libraries, or trading tapes. Rio got off on the technicality that it makes copies from computers, not directly from the original digital music recording (so the infringement is done on the PC, not on the Rio).
The danger is that we get complacent about Gnutella or open source sharing networks in general. There is nothing in case law that supports the view that sharing copies is fair use, nor even that ripping a CD to mp3 is fair use. Note tht past statements of personal opinion by executives do not constitute case law, nor are they immune from historical revisionism, nor arguments that the ballgame has changed since they were made.
Here's what I'm saying: assume all P2P networks are infringing until we prove otherwise. We'll have to fight long and hard to prove it. I honestly don't think we can do it. If you believe otherwise, find some case law to back that up. I don't think you will.
[personal/friends/family copies] may not be fair use, but it may also not be copyright infringement. In fact, it's a grey area
It absolutely is not, and none of your references even suggest otherwise. I'll just assert that flat out, because I doubt that most readers will bother reading either of our references, and it bothers me to see this fantasy reenforced here yet again, because it gives a false sense of security, that our personal activities are protected and sacrosanct.
So it could be argued that limited copying for personal use provides negligible impact on the overall market, and is therefore fair use
Look, I'll spell it out again, shall I? There is no clause in fair use, there never has been one, that allows fair use for anything other than: (1) criticism and comment, (2) parody and satire, (3) scholarship and research, (4) news reporting and (5) teaching. To qualify for consideration under the fair use defence, your use must fall into these categories. You don't even get to argue the "negligible impact" until you've shown that you qualify. There is no case zero. There is no case six. Personal/friends/family use is not one of the five cases.
A reasonable discussion of Fair Use, with considerably more thought and insight than the parent post is available here
Betting nobody would read it, huh? This is a very brief document that deals with protection of existing library fair use, which is firmly in the realm of "scholarship and research" and/or "teaching". But enough from me, let's quote verbatim from your reference, with no editing:
"The fair use provision of the Copyright Act allows reproduction and other uses of copyrighted works under certain conditions for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching(including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship or research. Additional provisions of the law allow uses specifically permitted by Congress to further educational and library activities"
OK, thanks for making my point. No mention of personal use. Personal use, friends and family copies, this is fiction, not fact.
"The respondents and Sony both conducted surveys of the way the Betamax machine was used by several hundred owners during a sample period in 1978. Although there were some differences in the surveys, they both showed that the primary use of the machine for most owners was "time-shifting" -- the practice of recording a program to view it once at a later time, and thereafter erasing it. [...] The District Court concluded that noncommercial home use recording of material broadcast over the
public airwaves was a fair use of copyrighted works and did not constitute copyright infringement. It emphasized the fact that the material was broadcast free to the public at large, the noncommercial character of the use, and the private character of the activity conducted entirely within the home.
Moreover, the court found that the purpose of this use served the public interest in increasing access to television programming, an interest that "is consistent with the First Amendment policy of providing the fullest possible access to information through the public airwaves. Columbia Broadcasting System, Inc. v.
Democratic National Committee, 412 U.S. 94, 102." "
OK, your turn. Find a case that extends the defence of a single and temporary copy, entirely within the home, to make it even remotely relevant to making permanent copies for the use of friends and family, or even for personal use. You can't, because no such source exists, no matter how hard you wish for it, and however hard you wish that future judgements are going to be based on the wish list of libraries, the fact is that future judgements will be based on past judgements. Find the case law that supports making permanent copies of non-broadcast material for yourself, or for friends or family.
Incidentally, this is very much On Topic. If it comes to the crunch, Gnutella - rather Gnutella developers - are just as boned as Kazaa, because neither of them can (I contend) show that they even qualify for consideration for fair use protection. The financial argument is irrelevant, because they won't be able to show grounds for even making it.
Kazaa BV was able to change settings stored deep inside Morpheus users' computers as they logged on to the file-trading network. "
Isn't this a case of intrusion into the user's computer
At the risk of Karma Death through Redundancy, this is pure FUD. What's happening is that Morpheus client is connecting to the Kazaa authentication servers. The server says "Go away". The client sets a flag that says "I've been told to go away".
That's factually the same as what Morpheus are saying. They're just spinning it as some sinister Dark Side plot, with you as the victim and Kazaa as the bad guys. Consider the source, huh?
I don't like the idea that they used a back-door to change user settings.
It's OK, it's only an idea, not an actual fact. All Kazaa are doing is refusing to authenticate Morpheus clients. The "setting deep in your machine" that gets set is the flag in the client that reminds it that it's been told to get lost.
Always consider the source. Morpheus is a for-profit organisation that's (allegedly but credibly) refused to honour its contract with Kazaa. There's a perfect innoculous translation of their rant against Kazaa that matches the facts. You don't have to buy their FUD, unless you really, really want to.
Slashdot Mirror
Umm, no, but I do believe that releasing an OS that introduces incompatibilities with older versions of Office and Outlook will "encourage" the last holdouts against software-as-a-service to hand over their credit card numbers and jump on the bandwagon.
I'd expect to see the new OS provide goodies for those getting .NET Office and Outlook upgrades along with it, and to retain backwards compatibility for standard Win32 API apps, but with reduced speed and reliability. They'll just annoy us into upgrading those pesky old apps that we very selfishly bought unlimited time licenses for. Damn us and our luddite 20th century ways.
I believe it's just general low grade evil rather than anything more sinister. I do agree that a DRM mechanism will appear at the Windows OS level sooner or later, regardless of whether the SSSCA sneaks through or not, but I think that's a separate issue.
Oh, is that what they're supposed to be doing? I thought it was a show about the dreadful curse of epilepsy: long petit mal staring contests with empty space, punctuated by bouts of random spastic motion.
Seriously, what's the big loss? The censored english dub Dragonball anime is already pre-digested kiddie fare with very little to recommend it. In fact, the only way they could make it worse is have "837 hit combo!" float up the screen, or the Mortal Kombat Voice Guy say "Flawless victory! Fatality!".
Mmm, actually, that might even make it better...
I know in this manga/anime era it's old fashioned to care about US comic books, but if you want something to chew over, how about the upcoming live action Daredevil? The casting is credible, but the director's only previous credit is a film that only got positive feedback from "People Who Capitalize Every Word" and the "all of God's chosen" brigade. Uh oh. Danger, Will Robinson.
Senator Kickback: So, what can you guys offer me?
Recoring Exec:A roofied teenage pop starlet, a sack full of crack, and a job in marketing for your idiot waster nephew.
Electronics Exec: Uh, I dunno, how about a really neat watch that turns into a robot dinosaur?
Consider that internally these departments are knifing each other with merry abandon. Want to bet they can't lobby separately? Then it comes down to who's the more corrupt and ruthless. I know who my money's on.
Hmm, and if my employer could increase its loyal customer base by 400%, I could retire off my stock options tomorrow.
Don't get your troll sticks out, I'm a (paying) SuSE Linux user. But that's rather my point. SuSE Linux. See also Debian, Red Hat, and all the other flavours.
Diversity is great and all, and it would be lovely if there was enough money around to support this number of companies. However, I do get the definitely feeling that there are simply too many distros fighting for too small a share of the paying customers.
Here's my question: As a SuSE user, should I shed a tear if Mandrake vanishes and some of those 2,000 club members start giving money to SuSE? What exactly are the benefits to me of Mandrake staying afloat?
...I find myself once again having my hunch confirmed that you should never work for someone who sounds like they should be a minor celebrity. It's uncanny, but "Scott Draeker" - like "John Romero" - begs to be prepended with "Guest starring" or "Our special correspondant", while "Kayt Draeker" is a perfect name for a trashy fantasy novellist catering to the market that likes a lot of apostophes and random weird letters in their chara'kters.
Well, by that point, they've become the sort of person who can assrape someone while smiling and chatting about reengineering their excretive functionality as part of a long term win-win scenario. This qualifies them perfectly for a career in marketing with a larger company.
Joke? Hardly. I slithered out from under the assraping, but some friends weren't so lucky. I have yet to hear of anyone at the project manager level or above in a games company who ended up in a lower paid job after running a project onto the rocks. All experience is good experience, for management.
This isn't news to me. I'm a novellist looking to get a first novel published, and have been hearing the same things. Publishers have realised that they can sign up more books than they can actually sell, and then keep some of them as perpetual bankers to fill slack spots. It's not really anything sinister, it's just that commissioning editors are more keen to justify their existence by signing up books than marketing managers are to dilute their budget stuffing the channel with no-namers. It's simple supply and demand: book buyers make their decision mostly based on the author name, then in decreasing order of importance, the cover art, the title, the cover quotes (from authors in the same stable, naturally), then the cover blurb and finally the author bio. Consider the shelves groaning under the weight of Koontz, King, McCaffrey and Pratchett, and anything featuring Josh Kirbyesque artwork for that matter.
I have been advised that my options for a first novel are:
I'm going for the multi-book option. If publishers want to sell trilogies, a trilogy they shall get (with outlines for five more). I stopped book the first a little prematurely at 90,000 words, and am 30,000 into book the second. I've pretty much accepted that I have to write another 120,000 words or so before I can approach a publisher from anything like a position of strength. As I said, this isn't a problem for me, writing is a hobby at the moment, and the long term payoff will be better. But this would be impossible for someone wanting to write for a living.
This is quite apart from the problem of stopping your work from going straight off the top of the slush pile into the outgoing mail (or the round file). What's making that situation worse is that many publishers are looking for The Next Harry Potter, which means they're prepared to throw their slender resources at promoting a very few new "personality" authors in the hope of making it big, while treating the majority of their current stable as shelf padders and rejecting the rest of the new authors out of hand. Publishers don't accept books any more, they accept authors and series. A slush pile submission really has to be accompanied by a colourful and illustrated biography; you're not submitting a well written novel, but an attractive sales pitch for an ongoing cash cow.
Bear in mind that I'm still optimistic enough to believe that if I put in the work up front, I can be one of those lucky breakthrough authors. Get back to me in a few years, and I might have even more reservations about the whole process. ;-)
Mmm, OK, some of us are jumping the gun. I for example, am assuming that the terms of the settlement are largely irrelevant, because Microsoft won't comply with them. Given their past history, this is practically a given.
What I'm thinking is that five years down the line, they'll be back in court for failing to comply, and then it does become a question of punative measures. Setting out the penalties for non-compliance now will save us some time later.
I don't think so. It's the inevitable response, given the tack we took.
A lot of people in the world hate the USA, and not all of them are insane. A lot of them quite rationally detest US foreign policy, because every time the USA steps in to a third party conflict, it makes a friend and an enemy (remember, in any conflict, both sides view themselves as the Good Guys, or the justified victims, or the Chosen of God). Making enemies is the cost of getting involved. Before this once again gets interpreted as justifying September 11th, take a clue check. The murderers who did that were stone cold evil motherfuckers. But just because they're Bad Guys doesn't automatically make us the Good Guys. That's kiddie matinee morality.
After September 11th, we had two choices. We could have said "Sorry for taking lives to save lives, we won't get involved again,", or we could have done what we did and said (effectively) "No more Mr Nice Guy. You will fear us more than you hate us."
When your foreign policies kill (or are perceived to have killed) all of someone's family, you have very little leverage left over them. You can't personally threaten a suicide attacker, nor can you enter a rational dialogue and explain why their family had to die to preserve Freedom. You can either humble yourself and say sorry, again and again and again, or you can escalate and say "Rain of fire on your entire nation, buddy. Just try us." and you have to keep escalating, in word and deed until it is quite clear what the consequences of fucking with you are.
Personally, I think we've taken the easy way, and the wrong way. Spending trillions of dollars on defence means never having to say you're sorry. Is saying sorry that high a price to pay?
Ah, it's so clear now. Anyone who wants privacy must be guilty of something! So, can I interest you in some glass walls, or perhaps a stylish subcutaneous lojack?
MightyWords is due kudos for implementing a system that was easier to use then to crack, but their withdrawal from the market highlights the fundamental flaw in any DRM system.
The best analogy I've come up with for DRM content (any DRM including DVD) is that the content is in a safe with a little window in the side. Both the safe and the window have combination locks on them. If you have the right window code, you (personally) can peer through the window and view the content in a limited way. eMatter has a pretty big window, but you still have to go to them to get the combination. When the copyright on the content expires, or if you want to make fair use copies of parts of it, you are allowed to open the safe, take out the content, and manipulate it directly.
Only, you aren't. When the inevitable happens and the code holder goes titsup, you are boned. Specifically, if you want to make use of the content in any way - even perfectly legal uses - you are absolutely required to break the law.
As we've seen in the DeCSS case, the DMCA trumps fair use. You're still allowed to use fair use as a post facto defence for the act of copying the content, but not as a pre facto justification for obtaining the tools that let you do it. In other words, obtaining or possessing a safe cracking kit is illegal regardless of the use you put it to. Cracking the safe is actually legal, but obtaining (or creating) the tool to do it is not. Astonishing, but that's exactly what the DMCA says.
The SSSCA will just make this worse, as it will mandate hardware that will only look through the little window. Even if you break the law to obtain tools to open the safe and get at the content (quite legally if the copyright is expired), you won't (legally) be able to obtain hardware that will touch that content.
Again, eMatter is one of the best attempts at DRM I've seen, but it still demonstrates how fundamentally flawed DRM is, because it requires you to prove your innocence while giving no guarantees that you will be able to continue to do so. It illustrates the vital distinction that you are not buying content, you are licensing a limited and revokable right to access content. There's a big difference, both in theory, and as the collapse of MightyWords now shows, in practice.
...Is that Lucasarts keep trying to move away from ep 4-6 merchandise now that ep1 is out and ep2 looms on the horizon. And yet the demand for 4-6 vintage continues, as these guitars clearly demonstrate. Where's the Jar Jar axe?
Oh, and they've definitely said there will be no more ep 4-6 games. Several times, if I remember correctly, the first after X Wing: Alliance. Uh, right. I love how Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds headline art is episode 1, but most of the content is ep 4-6 vintage. Characters, art, storylines, it even opens with that explosive and unforgettable John Williams Ep 4 theme, and Ep 4 art on the menu.
Despite all Lucas's attempts to convince us to the contrary, eps 4-6 are still more evocative and enduring. Hum the famous theme from ep 4 (DAAA-da, da-da da-daaah daah). Now the Imperial March (dum dum dum, dumdy dum, dumdy dum). Now - even though the music was still by John Williams - try to recall any tune from Ep 1. Anything at all. Any luck? Anything?
Picture a rebel trooper from the start of Episode 4. Easy, right? Now picture a Naboo Imperial Guardsman. I've got a vague impression of a coppery helmet or something. Maybe. Did they have cloaks, or were they long coats? Any ideas?
I'm sure I'm wide open to accusations of cognitive dissonance, that I watched Eps 4-6 as a child, and that Ep 1 is equally as memorable to the children that watched it. Mmm, OK, if you like. Let's wait another 20 years and see which characters are still selling them.
By the same argument, we should pay thieves to persuade them not to steal. After all, there's such a thing as having too much money, right? I mean, once you've bought an island for yourself, and one for all of your family and friends, and that guy you met on the street, you stop aquiring wealth, right? Right?
We choose to go to the moon. We choose to go to the moon. . . . Not because it is easy, but because it is hard. . . . Because there is new knowledge to be gained. We shall send to the moon--240,000 miles away--from the control station in Houston, a giant rocket more than 300 feet tall, made of new metal alloys, some of which have not yet been invented . . . on an untried mission . . . on the greatest adventure.
Now, I'm a pretty cynical old bastard, but those words, nearly forty years on, still choke me up. To me, the defining quality of humanity is that our reach can exceed our grasp.
It's impossible (I think) to justify space exploration in any rational or economic terms. But if "because it's there" isn't justification enough, then that's a sad indicator we have become society of navel gazers and bean counters. And history shows us that societies only go one way once they've reached that stage.
You're right that the space race was based on competition. But I believe that still applies, and if we no longer want to compete, sooner or later we will be superceded by a society that does.
Please mod the parent up. You have to read some of Gilmore's own words to believe how aggressively and unreasonably stubborn he is on this issue. Gilmore has done some wonderful things, but he flat out refuses to ignore the changing realities of living on the 'net, calling anti-spammers "extortionists", "thugs", "blackmailers", and asserting that this is an "antitrust" issue. Regarding spam itself, Gilmore says: "I don't even want a "tyranny of the majority", if the majority happens to prefer to smash spammers (and suspected spam-sympathizers). I don't want a rerun of Joe McCarthy's witch- hunt, with spammers in place of Communists. I want to have everyone's right to communicate with each other protected, whether or not they disagree with the majority."
Which is all well and good. Gilmore argues that any censorship is reprehensible. OK, then why did Gilmore voluntarily censor mail passing through his gateway in a token attempt to appease Verio? He argues on a point of principle, then breaks that principle quite cynically so as to create an appearance of having offered a reasonable compromise (when the real solution is much simpler: authorisation). He is a very jolly, persuasive and genial old hypocrite. Harsh comment, but judge him by his actions, not his protestations.
Gilmore is an extremely confused man, well intentioned, but in severe denial that the world has changed around him. He has found a cause to fight (using EFF lawyers) and is enjoying playing hardball on an issue of principle (while breaking that principle himself) when there's good grounds for believing that the real issue is that he's just pissed at Verio for buying up the ISP he founded and imposing terms of usage on him. Any terms. Gilmore is pro-free speech in the shouting-fire-in-a-crowded-theatre-is-OK way. Information doesn't just want to be free, it wants to be thrown out of the door and helped along with a cattle prod. While he's done a lot of good in his life, I believe that this extremist stance actually damages the EFF and the free-speech lobby.
Before you judge him, go and read his specific thoughts on this issue, and decide for yourself whether he deserves contempt or pity. I'm rather leaning towards the latter.
Largely irrelevant. The Audio Home recording act 1992 and the Digital Millenium Copyright Act 1998 between them tie fair use rights up in a Gordian knot, where you are technically allowed fair usage, but you are technologically prevented from doing it, if you see what I mean.
Case law - not confused and contraditory copyright law and fair use defence - has held that burning MP3's is explicitely fair use, see RIAA versus Rio 1999
However, fair use (as another poster asserts) is a post facto defence. If you can make a copy, then fair use allows you to do so in many cases. It does not give leverage to demand copyable media. In fact, the 1992 Audio Home Recording act actually mandates copy prevention technology, it's just that RIAA vs Rio rules that computers and the Rio aren't "digital audio recorders"; the computer is a general purpose device, the Rio doesn't actually make the copy from the original source, it receives the pre-copied data from the computer. That was a contraversial technical ruling though, and it could be ignored in future.
But really, your opinion can be countered with one word: Macrovision.
I was going to point out the huge flaw in your first sentence, but you've very kindly done it for me.
I'm sorry, but you fail the clue check. The vast majority of people involved in song creation are now doing work-for-hire. The concept of an "artist" is the exception, not the rule. The labels already own the right to the song. Any royalties that they choose to pay to the people involved (to the creators of the lyrics or music, or to the meat puppet miming to them, for example) are a purely contractual matter. When the rights expire, it's the label that loses out, because they can't stop other labels or you or me copying or creating derivative works without restriction.
The same applies even in the unusual case of an artist retaining rights and licensing them to a label. If the label chooses not to exercise their right to copy and distribute the work, they lose out as well when the creator's rights expire, because then their license become worthless.
What you really illusatrate is how badly understood copyright laws are, and that what we need more than anything else is a single, coherent way of dealing with copyright and intellectual property. "Author's life plus some" is both relatively recent, and already obsolete!
Consider that the majority of content that you and I experience on a day to day basis is done as work for hire. Songs, TV, film, some reference books; they are created by individuals, but the rights are owned by corporations. In this case, the expiry of the rights is based not on the creator's life, but on a fixed term. (And considering that that terms keeps getting extended on demand, I mean "fixed" largely in the sense of fraudulent).
There's also a misconception that individual rights can only be licensed and not sold. Guess again. Once created, rights can be sold lock, stock and barrrel. No, this doesn't mean that you pretend that OmniMegaHyperCorp created the work or caused it to be created, you just sign a contract that says you give them all rights in perpetuity and without restriction, and (as if by magic) it happens. It's not part of copyright law, it's contract law, but it's de facto and supported by case law.
But in this case, how long should the rights last? Lifetime of the creator? Fixed term? If the individual signs them over after fifty years, does that reset the clock on the fixed term ownership by the corporation? Or what if the creator dies two minutes after signing them over? Does that start the "death plus some" expiry? What if one individual sells rights to another individual? Or what if an individual doing work-for-hire for a corporation buys the rights to the work that they created some time after the fact? What if they then sell those rights back again? Most of these questions have yet to be answered by case law, because we keep changing and extending terms so often that most work is essentially worthless and not fighting over before the issue comes up. Where there's an exception, like early Disney work, Congress is happy to extend the duration of their copyright to avoid the issue.
The whole issue of expiry is a big kludgy minefield. The only solution that makes any kind of sense is the original solution before we confused it by tying it to a lifetime: a fixed term associated with the creation of the work. It doesn't matter who caused the work to be created, or owns the rights, or how often the rights are bought or sold. The clock starts ticking the instant the work is created, and the bell rings after a fixed period, regardless of where the rights are in the pass-the-parcel world of modern IP.
That's the way it used to work, and it was a damn shame that we "fixed" it, because it wasn't broke.
Or, actually followed, read and dissected the references given. The references quoted in response actually contradicted the statements made, and basically supported my point. Sorry, but they did, and I couldn't let that bluff slip past unchallenged... just as you quite rightly challenge my assertions. On the other hand, I did feel so bad about being all fierce and nasty that I even helped the respondant out by torpedoing my own assertion with salient quotes from the Betamax Decision, which is what I was rather hoping someone else would do for me to demonstrate that this isn't just a forum for skimmers and ranters. Hey ho.
Ok, I've read the reference (very interesting, thanks), and the only one that I see confirmed is time-shifting publically broadcast television for a single viewing, from the Betamax Decision, which I already mentioned. None of the other cases appear to deal with personal/friends/family use, nor with the uses you quote. Sorry if I'm being dense, but can you actually explain which cases you're referring to? Oh, and off the top of my head, don't you need a public performance license to rebroadcast radio in a workplace?
I fess up, I'm being deliberately provocative. The very simple reason for that is that the DMCA and the nascent SSSCA make me deeply concerned for the future of P2P in specific and the whole concept of fair use in general. You must be aware that every time this issue rolls around, there's a flurry of posts about how personal non-for-profit use is fair, so neener neener Mr Government. I simply don't believe that is the case, and given the number of people that take what they read on Slashdot as gospel, I think that it's important to give an emphatic "No!" to that to balance the complacent "Yes!" posts.
You'll notice that we both referenced the EFF. I'd point out their extremely inflamatory - and highly inaccurate - language about the Felten case: "Judge Denies Scientists' Free Speech Rights". You just know they wanted to add a slew of !!bangs!! there. Looking at the actual ruling, the judge dismissed the case because the case - as brought - was no longer there to be answered. The language of the EFF's initial releases clearly - and completely falsely - implied that the ruling was anti-constitutional, when their actual gripe was simply that the case was dismissed before it became a constitutional issue. They clearly feel that sometimes it's more important to keep it simple, stupid than to provide a balanced view. And sometimes I find myself agreeing with them.
I'm also here to learn, and the first thing I learned on Slashdot is never trust anything. Don't trust what people say here. Don't trust them if they provide a plausible looking link. Follow the link, read the references, consider the sources, and verify them. Which is why I am questioning your (very interesting) link, and suggesting that you are - perhaps - making assumptions about what's in those cases. Feel free to let me know if I'm wrong, but be sure to quote the specific cases that support your fair use examples, because I'm not seeing them.
Can we agree on this?
Pure P2P (not a Napster/Kazaa client/server hybrid) is going to go to a judgement sooner or later. The defence will be that it's fair use. In all honesty, I do agree that any unbiased court will consider that defence rather than dismissing it out of hand, but - and again, please quote specific case examples if I'm wrong - I don't see the case law that even remotely supports that assertion. In fact, it's more likely that a court will start from the very close example of commercial piracy, and spot that the only material difference is the not-for-profit nature. Oh, except for Morpheus. They're for profit. So there's no difference that I can see.
Or, in skimmer language: I'd expect P2P to be assumed guilty until proven innocent, and not the other way around.
Got a reference to a case that's a small evolution away that indicates otherwise? I suspect not.
Translation: the numbers didn't match our agenda or preconceptions, so we assumed they were lying.
Oh, but these students are telling the truth....
It's unfair to speculate without seeing the full reports, but heck, this is Slashdot, right? ;-)
Here's a speculation. Ask 100 students if they're pirated software. What's the answer?
Might I suggest that the yardstick of lower copying isn't fewer students saying that they do, but higher sales? There's vague mention of sales incentives, but no actual data on increased figures.
Yes, yes, very insightful. Unfortunately, if you actually read the proposal, it asks for extra versions to be made available specified middleware stripped.
Microsoft still gets to sell the full distro, they just have to provide stripped down versions to resellers who want to add their own apps.
And if stripped Windows is as unstable as they claim, then they should have no problen persuading people to keep taking the full distro, right?
I understand what you're saying, but that's not what Allchin's saying. The way the conversation should have gone is this:
Instead, it went like this:
There's a small difference. In the first case, Allchin doesn't dumb down his answer for the benefit of that dumb old judge, and the necessity for him to lie is postponed.
In other words: Microsoft must not be allowed to give shortcut answers to technical questions based on what they view as being a reasonable implementation. That's for the court to decide. The mistake the court made was to even let the technicalities be an issue, they should have just asked how much it would cost, and if the answer was "too much", then appointed an expert to cost it. Which they have done, belatedly, after being stonewalled for years.
Ah, ya got me. But look, the point is that in all of these judgements, the court was very careful to restrict itself to specific cases.
VCR's, for example. The allowable use in that case was very specifically making a recording of publically broadcast content, watching it once, then erasing it. Sony had to go to some lengths to demonstrate that users were not creating libraries, or trading tapes. Rio got off on the technicality that it makes copies from computers, not directly from the original digital music recording (so the infringement is done on the PC, not on the Rio).
The danger is that we get complacent about Gnutella or open source sharing networks in general. There is nothing in case law that supports the view that sharing copies is fair use, nor even that ripping a CD to mp3 is fair use. Note tht past statements of personal opinion by executives do not constitute case law, nor are they immune from historical revisionism, nor arguments that the ballgame has changed since they were made.
Here's what I'm saying: assume all P2P networks are infringing until we prove otherwise. We'll have to fight long and hard to prove it. I honestly don't think we can do it. If you believe otherwise, find some case law to back that up. I don't think you will.
It absolutely is not, and none of your references even suggest otherwise. I'll just assert that flat out, because I doubt that most readers will bother reading either of our references, and it bothers me to see this fantasy reenforced here yet again, because it gives a false sense of security, that our personal activities are protected and sacrosanct.
Look, I'll spell it out again, shall I? There is no clause in fair use, there never has been one, that allows fair use for anything other than: (1) criticism and comment, (2) parody and satire, (3) scholarship and research, (4) news reporting and (5) teaching. To qualify for consideration under the fair use defence, your use must fall into these categories. You don't even get to argue the "negligible impact" until you've shown that you qualify. There is no case zero. There is no case six. Personal/friends/family use is not one of the five cases.
Betting nobody would read it, huh? This is a very brief document that deals with protection of existing library fair use, which is firmly in the realm of "scholarship and research" and/or "teaching". But enough from me, let's quote verbatim from your reference, with no editing:
OK, thanks for making my point. No mention of personal use. Personal use, friends and family copies, this is fiction, not fact.
If you're going to argue legalities, you have to learn to quote case law. I'm going to help you out a bit by posting a synopsis of the Supreme Court decision in Sony v. Universal Studios 464 U.S. 417 (1984), a.k.a. "the Betamax case" aka the "Sony Decision" judgement. Note that it contradicts my black and white stance a little, but note also that it qualifies that very carefully, and that it references earlier case law:
OK, your turn. Find a case that extends the defence of a single and temporary copy, entirely within the home, to make it even remotely relevant to making permanent copies for the use of friends and family, or even for personal use. You can't, because no such source exists, no matter how hard you wish for it, and however hard you wish that future judgements are going to be based on the wish list of libraries, the fact is that future judgements will be based on past judgements. Find the case law that supports making permanent copies of non-broadcast material for yourself, or for friends or family.
Incidentally, this is very much On Topic. If it comes to the crunch, Gnutella - rather Gnutella developers - are just as boned as Kazaa, because neither of them can (I contend) show that they even qualify for consideration for fair use protection. The financial argument is irrelevant, because they won't be able to show grounds for even making it.
- Kazaa BV was able to change settings stored deep inside Morpheus users' computers as they logged on to the file-trading network. "
Isn't this a case of intrusion into the user's computerAt the risk of Karma Death through Redundancy, this is pure FUD. What's happening is that Morpheus client is connecting to the Kazaa authentication servers. The server says "Go away". The client sets a flag that says "I've been told to go away".
That's factually the same as what Morpheus are saying. They're just spinning it as some sinister Dark Side plot, with you as the victim and Kazaa as the bad guys. Consider the source, huh?
It's OK, it's only an idea, not an actual fact. All Kazaa are doing is refusing to authenticate Morpheus clients. The "setting deep in your machine" that gets set is the flag in the client that reminds it that it's been told to get lost.
Always consider the source. Morpheus is a for-profit organisation that's (allegedly but credibly) refused to honour its contract with Kazaa. There's a perfect innoculous translation of their rant against Kazaa that matches the facts. You don't have to buy their FUD, unless you really, really want to.