Growing up I never heard of a gun being used in self-defense in my neighborhood. I *did* hear of three incidents of guns being stolen out of people's houses during routine burglaries. The US DOJ puts the number of handgun thefts at 400,000 per year.
Whatever your position is, we can all agree that the safest defense is still A: visible surveilence of your property, B: an audible alarm system that scares away attackers before things rise to the level of direct confrontation, C: an effective police system that can catch criminals from the surveilence video, and D: an economic system that provides sufficient opportunity such as to reduce the attractiveness of crime. A: and B: are within the individual's hands, and C: can be facilitated by having better surveilence. D: is up to us all in that annoyingly touchy-feely sense, which basically means until we're all better people there just isn't much we can do about it.
In the grand scheme of things, I'd rather have a motion triggered floodlight system combined with cheap but reliable server-reporting cameras and a monitored break-in detection system than a gun. In the former situation, protection is automatic. The latter misses cases where I'm not home, I'm too asleep to notice, or the criminal is armed and more on the jump than I am.
The *reason* you get copyright protection for some time is *because* you are willing to allow it to become a public common at some future time. If you are not willing to the the latter, you are not entitled to the former, because society and culture as a whole, is more important than YOU. And that is the whole point of copyright law.
This is an important point. Copyright is not a "right" like free speech. Copyright is a restriction upon the freedom of others. It is a restriction that was put in place specifically for the encouragement of the development of cultural artifacts.
In other words, the common good. If you take away the common good justification, you lose the basis for restricting the freedoms of others.
So you're paying a 150% markup for seeing balls bounce around which is cute but it also seems to last a lot less time than normal video games too.
Normal arcade games only last a minute or two as well. And they're dying out too. The only thing keeping arcade games in development is cheaply spinning them off of home versions. Most arcade machines these days are redemption / gambling machines, or arcade machines from the late 90's. House of the Dead 2? San Francisco Rush?
an ATM needs to protect the physical money inside. This is a mechanical problem.
A voting machine need only verify the integrity of the data contained therein. This is a software problem, and one which has been solved many times over the years.
Bill Gates sees this as wrong, but somehow doesn't see that not being able to get the source code for windows, add a few lines, and sell it as a new os is the same damned thing
This would require server-side scripting, but what if each account kept a phone number on file? If the person uses the correct password, keep them out but text message them a single-use password. They can now log-in with the single-use password.
Now the system requires something you know (your password) and something you have (your phone).
This is exactly what fair use is about. Fair Use (which is a bit nebulous but very real) already covers 1. Making Backups. 2. Shifting music between formats to play them.
This pretty much exactly describes MP3Tunes' service. It's not sharing or giving copies away. It is making copies for personal use amongst digital devices... similar to using Windows Media Center to stream a movie from your computer to your TV.
In the US "fair use" actually covers quite a bit of ground, including making copies for your car and shifting from CD to MP3 player.
The way our legal system is supposed to work, is that Side A lays out an obviously BS interpretation of the rules, Side B lays out a similar but diametrically opposed BS interpretation, and the courts try to find a middle ground. So far in the US, it has been that Side A lays out an obviously BS interpretation, then buys a ton of lobbyist time to get that codified into law. Side B, being a single mother of four, rolls over to avoid her family funds being completely sucked dry. And the courts hardly ever get to actually make a ruling.
Hopefully at some point our government will catch up with reality and clickthrough / tearthrough licenses will go the way of prohibition and paid indulgences.
This is a fine example of "academic" research dollars at work.
As opposed to the pragmatic issues of industry, this long-term thinking is actually is the sort of problem that academia is supposed to tackle, because it sometimes gives the major breakthroughs which revolutionize life. Like, for example, some sort of giant computer system which would survive a nuclear attack... in case you really need those trajectory tables calculated remotely during nuclear winter.
And it does have pragmatic uses. It is a large, redundant disk array which uses clever algorithms to only activate HDD's at worst 5% of the time. Not only that, but by their estimates a 10 PB backup system could be created for 5 grand with only 50 dollars per year in power and cooling costs.
At that rate, even if the system only lasts for 100 years, it is still by far the best long-term storage option we've currently got.
Emusic. The #2 US retailer of downloadable music has no DRM. It does have an annoyingly complex pricing model, but it is still amazingly cheap. Last month I discovered an artist I liked, and I downloaded every track they ever made for around 20 dollars.
You don't need 1,000 patents on every aspect of what you do. You need 10 key patents which prevent anyone else from doing it too.
I seriously doubt that this means Microsoft is reducing their patent load by 80%. It sounds more to me like 80% of Microsoft's server protocols are ripped off BSD... err... unpatentable.
For that matter, how would they snoop on Google chat conversations, which happen over the encrypted Jabber network. Will there need to be AU-only versions of popular applications to support non-cryption? Or will these simply be out of use in Austrailia?
ISO certification means that Microsoft Word is just as open as ODF or ASCII for purposes of government and business contracts.
If you continue to have to submit resumes in "Microsoft Word Format," there is no way that anyone else can get a toehold in the market. There is also no way that in 30 years we're going to be able to read the documents that we generate today.
Grandparent was arguing that we'll soon see people trying to pull this sort of thing with purchased physical media, like CD's. I noted that in my industry we actually already do this. This is why Gamestop can resell console games, but not PC games. Currently used software sales exist in a legal mire, which is why you don't see it done in the states. I believe the reasoning is that copying into memory for sake of using the software is considered a copy, hence they can apply an additional arbitrary license layer on top. (Maybe a lawyer can chime in?) There is no reason why this flawed reasoning cannot similarly be applied to caching on CD or DVD players.
This is very much related for first sale doctrine, which basically states that as a purchaser of a legally acquired copy you can pass / sell that copy on to other people. Thanks to technicalities of digital media, we're very close to removing that pesky provision entirely through gratuitous additional mandatory licensing.
They do this with software. You can buy a copy of a program, but first-sale doctorine does not necessarily apply. The company "owns" the right to the media and the program, and you're simply buying a "license" to use it. Which is strange since "using" software is not actually a delineated right that one can reserve.
Nearly all software media like this says that "This disk owned by X, and must be returned upon demand." Of course, no court has outlined the company's obligations to the consumer when their disk is scratched.
TFA said the typically-used plastic on these printers is PLA, polylactose acid, which is made from lactose, an ingredient in milk, human muscles, and various other biological sources, not petroleum.
RepRap is made out of people. They're making themselves out of people!
Watch This. I challenge you to watch the whole thing without skipping. Yes, that includes the part where they recap the current scene twice.
Now realize that this is probably the *best* scene in the movie, mainly because it isn't filled with lines like "Guys, check out this book. Looks pretty old, maybe it'll help us!" and "We finally got to the boat but it wasn't there."
Slashdot Mirror
Others have suggested scaling cost with number of domains owned.
Ah, listed under penal codes 286, 288, 289. Thank you.
Oral Copulation, Sodomy, and Dildoes are listed as inherently dangerous felonies in California? In California?
California?
Does anyone know if they've adapted CRT-style Tempest viewing to LCDs? Or if such a thing is even feasible?
Growing up I never heard of a gun being used in self-defense in my neighborhood. I *did* hear of three incidents of guns being stolen out of people's houses during routine burglaries. The US DOJ puts the number of handgun thefts at 400,000 per year.
Whatever your position is, we can all agree that the safest defense is still A: visible surveilence of your property, B: an audible alarm system that scares away attackers before things rise to the level of direct confrontation, C: an effective police system that can catch criminals from the surveilence video, and D: an economic system that provides sufficient opportunity such as to reduce the attractiveness of crime. A: and B: are within the individual's hands, and C: can be facilitated by having better surveilence. D: is up to us all in that annoyingly touchy-feely sense, which basically means until we're all better people there just isn't much we can do about it.
In the grand scheme of things, I'd rather have a motion triggered floodlight system combined with cheap but reliable server-reporting cameras and a monitored break-in detection system than a gun. In the former situation, protection is automatic. The latter misses cases where I'm not home, I'm too asleep to notice, or the criminal is armed and more on the jump than I am.
The *reason* you get copyright protection for some time is *because* you are willing to allow it to become a public common at some future time. If you are not willing to the the latter, you are not entitled to the former, because society and culture as a whole, is more important than YOU. And that is the whole point of copyright law.
This is an important point. Copyright is not a "right" like free speech. Copyright is a restriction upon the freedom of others. It is a restriction that was put in place specifically for the encouragement of the development of cultural artifacts.
In other words, the common good. If you take away the common good justification, you lose the basis for restricting the freedoms of others.
So you're paying a 150% markup for seeing balls bounce around which is cute but it also seems to last a lot less time than normal video games too.
Normal arcade games only last a minute or two as well. And they're dying out too. The only thing keeping arcade games in development is cheaply spinning them off of home versions. Most arcade machines these days are redemption / gambling machines, or arcade machines from the late 90's. House of the Dead 2? San Francisco Rush?
an ATM needs to protect the physical money inside. This is a mechanical problem.
A voting machine need only verify the integrity of the data contained therein. This is a software problem, and one which has been solved many times over the years.
Bill Gates sees this as wrong, but somehow doesn't see that not being able to get the source code for windows, add a few lines, and sell it as a new os is the same damned thing
No copying Microsoft's business plan!
Perhaps the telcos would be more trusting of your wiretap requests if you didn't have a history of making illegal ones?
One of many reasons why overreaction to security incidents ultimately reduces our overall security.
This would require server-side scripting, but what if each account kept a phone number on file? If the person uses the correct password, keep them out but text message them a single-use password. They can now log-in with the single-use password.
Now the system requires something you know (your password) and something you have (your phone).
+5 insightful?
This is exactly what fair use is about. Fair Use (which is a bit nebulous but very real) already covers
1. Making Backups.
2. Shifting music between formats to play them.
This pretty much exactly describes MP3Tunes' service. It's not sharing or giving copies away. It is making copies for personal use amongst digital devices... similar to using Windows Media Center to stream a movie from your computer to your TV.
Don't be so quick to throw away your rights.
In the US "fair use" actually covers quite a bit of ground, including making copies for your car and shifting from CD to MP3 player.
The way our legal system is supposed to work, is that Side A lays out an obviously BS interpretation of the rules, Side B lays out a similar but diametrically opposed BS interpretation, and the courts try to find a middle ground. So far in the US, it has been that Side A lays out an obviously BS interpretation, then buys a ton of lobbyist time to get that codified into law. Side B, being a single mother of four, rolls over to avoid her family funds being completely sucked dry. And the courts hardly ever get to actually make a ruling.
Hopefully at some point our government will catch up with reality and clickthrough / tearthrough licenses will go the way of prohibition and paid indulgences.
This is a fine example of "academic" research dollars at work.
As opposed to the pragmatic issues of industry, this long-term thinking is actually is the sort of problem that academia is supposed to tackle, because it sometimes gives the major breakthroughs which revolutionize life. Like, for example, some sort of giant computer system which would survive a nuclear attack... in case you really need those trajectory tables calculated remotely during nuclear winter.
And it does have pragmatic uses. It is a large, redundant disk array which uses clever algorithms to only activate HDD's at worst 5% of the time. Not only that, but by their estimates a 10 PB backup system could be created for 5 grand with only 50 dollars per year in power and cooling costs.
At that rate, even if the system only lasts for 100 years, it is still by far the best long-term storage option we've currently got.
Emusic. The #2 US retailer of downloadable music has no DRM. It does have an annoyingly complex pricing model, but it is still amazingly cheap. Last month I discovered an artist I liked, and I downloaded every track they ever made for around 20 dollars.
Indies only, of course. Amazon.com for Mariah Carey. Emusic for The Pinker Tones and a lot of other great bands.
They're way ahead of you.
You don't need 1,000 patents on every aspect of what you do. You need 10 key patents which prevent anyone else from doing it too.
I seriously doubt that this means Microsoft is reducing their patent load by 80%. It sounds more to me like 80% of Microsoft's server protocols are ripped off BSD... err... unpatentable.
Open Source Software has brought 60 billion dollars in efficiency to the market.
It took me ten minutes to figure out how to view previous comics. Navigation, at least, is screwed up.
Plus, showing 3 panels of an 8-panel comic is just fundamentally dumb, and destroys the flow.
For that matter, how would they snoop on Google chat conversations, which happen over the encrypted Jabber network. Will there need to be AU-only versions of popular applications to support non-cryption? Or will these simply be out of use in Austrailia?
ISO certification means that Microsoft Word is just as open as ODF or ASCII for purposes of government and business contracts.
If you continue to have to submit resumes in "Microsoft Word Format," there is no way that anyone else can get a toehold in the market. There is also no way that in 30 years we're going to be able to read the documents that we generate today.
Grandparent was arguing that we'll soon see people trying to pull this sort of thing with purchased physical media, like CD's. I noted that in my industry we actually already do this. This is why Gamestop can resell console games, but not PC games. Currently used software sales exist in a legal mire, which is why you don't see it done in the states. I believe the reasoning is that copying into memory for sake of using the software is considered a copy, hence they can apply an additional arbitrary license layer on top. (Maybe a lawyer can chime in?) There is no reason why this flawed reasoning cannot similarly be applied to caching on CD or DVD players.
This is very much related for first sale doctrine, which basically states that as a purchaser of a legally acquired copy you can pass / sell that copy on to other people. Thanks to technicalities of digital media, we're very close to removing that pesky provision entirely through gratuitous additional mandatory licensing.
They do this with software. You can buy a copy of a program, but first-sale doctorine does not necessarily apply. The company "owns" the right to the media and the program, and you're simply buying a "license" to use it. Which is strange since "using" software is not actually a delineated right that one can reserve.
Nearly all software media like this says that "This disk owned by X, and must be returned upon demand." Of course, no court has outlined the company's obligations to the consumer when their disk is scratched.
TFA said the typically-used plastic on these printers is PLA, polylactose acid, which is made from lactose, an ingredient in milk, human muscles, and various other biological sources, not petroleum.
RepRap is made out of people. They're making themselves out of people!
Watch This. I challenge you to watch the whole thing without skipping. Yes, that includes the part where they recap the current scene twice.
Now realize that this is probably the *best* scene in the movie, mainly because it isn't filled with lines like "Guys, check out this book. Looks pretty old, maybe it'll help us!" and "We finally got to the boat but it wasn't there."
Avoid at all costs.