Wireless phones are encrypted (at least new ones) which gives the expectation of privacy validity.
Also, just to play devils advocate, legally speaking ignorance is no defence. So if you have no expectation of privacy, but you THINK you do, that's your problem.
All in all, I think that the real problem is lack of education, both on the user side, and on the legal side. I'd say it was lack of documentation, but I don't think ANYONE really reads that stuff...;)
Aside from all the comparisons, accurate and otherwise, that are being drawn to the situation, there is a legal precident that can be applied here. It's an oldie, but a goodie.
Expectation of Privacy.
Ok, IANAL, but here's the rough version as I understand it; if you have a conversation on the phone, it's private, and can't be recorded, etc. If you're on a speaker phone, in a public place, there's no expectation of privacy, so you can record whatever you want, use it as evidence later, etc.
So, if you have your unsecured wireless device hanging out there in public, there's no expectation of it remaining private. Which makes "listening in" or hopping on the system, perfectly legal.
It's silly, and quite obviously so, that this guy got charged. Then again, it's the florida government. They can't even count properly. </cheap shot>
Re:Artist missed the "art" portion of the project.
on
The Neuron Drive
·
· Score: 1
Wow, you call me narrow minded, yet you catagorically assume that things must either be purely funny, or deffinitively serious. Being funny, or ironic does not make something art by itself. Humour can be a part of art, and art can be clever. It's not an all or nothing, black or white situation.
Then again, if my post is "ironically elitist" I suppose it fits within the perview of your definition of art. Yay me!
Re:Artist missed the "art" portion of the project.
on
The Neuron Drive
·
· Score: 1
That's funny, not art. Unless funny = art. "Art" is one of those things that is defined and redefined based on the artist and the observer. Some say the guy who throws his feces at canvas is making art. I don't. I don't think inverted urinals are art. I don't think taking a picture of yourself spitting is art. And a hard drive pasted to what appears to simply be a "partially blue canvas" isn't art. I don't care how clever a name you come up with.
But hey, maybe I don't know art, but I do know what I hate.
But DLO is in the right. It's the same product, in function anyway. That's exactly what patents are for. It's not like dvforge is seling an ipod to coffee maker adapter, or something else vastly different from DLO's product. Heck, if DLO's implementation was hardwired instead of FM, or didn't do the re-charging, I'd say fine, they're using "strongarm tactics against a superior product", but they're not. They're using legal tactics against an infringing product.
Ok, I have a metric assload of problems with this whole concept.
First and foremost, photographers are paid to take really good pictures, and maybe do some prints. I still think the digital version belongs to the person who's wedding/whatever it is. Yes, the photographer needs to be paid, but he gets paid. And quite well too. What is it, a grand or two for a days work?
Second, if there are legitimately copywrited photos printed by someone who doesn't own them, it's the person who had them printed who is liable. Not the printer. Otherwise it's like suing maytag because someone washed your dry-clean only sweater.
It seems legal battles are now just big finger pointing contests, and copyright is about who you can sue. I think the whole process needs a reality check, because the spirit of copyright and other laws has been completely lost.
I know it's not actually relavent to the space program, but I honestly thought the next space craft after the shuttle would be more... asthetically pleasing.
Then again I also thought it would be much better, completely re-useable, one piece... maybe have some phasers or something...
Lots of people are criticizing comments with the point of view that the study is BS, as they have drawn conclusions before the study is published. I'd like to point out that the article in question does exactly the same thing, draws the conclusion before the study is published.
Aside from that, it's not unreasonable to bash the study before we see it, because we've seen it before. We see one about every six months, and they're all the same. They use some "new math" snake oil test or benchmark that says Windows is faster, safer, more secure, less communist, and/or lowers your cholesterol. I'll bet you dollars to doughnuts this one's the same. We'll see in 30 days.
And finally, never mind that Red Hat isn't linux. Just remember that out of all the distros RH was the least secure. And my favorite, Slackware (shameless plug, deal with it) was the most secure. This was a while ago, but I'm sure not much has changed, as it's a result of the philosophy behind the distros. Slack is cautious, and uses packages that are known to be very stable, RedHat always grabs the latest and greatest, without the same scrutiny. There are merits to both, decide what works for you. Again, this is going on out of the box configuration, so you can tweak any distro to be as secure as you want, but I always like sane defaults.
Ok, so, there's copyrighted stuff available illegally through various P2P clients. There's 3 types of people involved:
1) People with copyrighted content, illegally aquired and/or being shared.
2) People with copyrighted content, legally aquired, and not being shared.
3) People/agencies that opperate public communications that can be used for legal and illegal purposes.
People in group 1) are breaking the law, and should be held accountable(within reason, not for inflated damages). However, prosecuting the offenders should not be any easier than prosecuting people in the non-virtual world. If someone decides they think I'm pirating music or videos, and goes to some law enforcement agency, my PC goes bye-bye, without any proof. No good. Further, privacy rights must still be upheld. It might prevent some pirates from being caught, but it's the same for drug dealers, and murderers. "Innocent until PROVEN guilty." "Due process." Why should the entertainment industry be above these concepts?
Group 2) needs to be protected by very clear fair use laws, or they'll always be vulnerable to the entertainment industries definition of "fair".
Group 3) includes P2P programs. It also includes ISPs. It also includes the phone company (for those pirating over dial up). Funny how no one's tried to sue Bell or AOL yet. They're "just as guilty" as Kazaa et all, which is to say, they're NOT responsible.
To draw a tired parrallel, we don't hold firearm manufacturers accountable for gun murders, so why is p2p software accountable for piracy?
Look on the bright side, you can show up much later to movies and still make them on time. And with today's ticket prices, the theaters are almost never full, so you can still get a decent seat 30 minutes into the... er... commercials...
Seriously though, I can't believe it's gotten this bad. And nealy 15$ for a ticket. I've paid less for DVDs. I don't think piracy is the problem here...
It's the data retrieval system that matters
on
Digital Packrats
·
· Score: 1
I know several people who believe all data should be preserved always. They attempt to archive anything, and everything that they ever come across, and are always serching for better ways to store, search, and retrieve said data.
I don't think "digital packratting" is a bad thing, but I don't lose sleep over emptying my recycling bin either. That being said, I think there needs to be a major change in the way we archive all of our shiny shiny files, and perhapse in the way we treat data in general. (no I don't have any earth shattering suggestions just yet)
Isn't every moment of human existance going to be archived someday anyway?
Well, here's my advice to the RIAA/MPAA in regards to how they _should_ act.
First on the list of steps toward prevention is; "Remove the temptation." Fair prices, convenient licensing, fair use, etc etc. If a movie or an album is priced appropriately, it will lessen piracy. Although I believe the "I'm pirating it 'cause it's too expensive" excuse is overused.
Second, "Don't play dirty pool.", it only weakens your case in the consumer's eye. There's comercials comparing piracy to theft of material goods. There is a very distinct difference, and while it's technically stealing, it's simply not the same. There's "statistics" saying that there are huge losses where none exist. (This article even has a glaring hole, where Glickman states "there are losses" when presented with the fact that the sales have never been higher) And, my favorite, a comercial I often see at the movies, where a poor helpless stunt man is pleading with people not to steal movies, 'cause he blows himself up for us. (Runner up is the kid who steals a chocolate bar then says "But dad, you steal cable") I think it's sick really.
Third, don't try to "Put the genie back in the bottle". Law suits like the CSS fiasco are rediculous. It's broken, you should have spent more time developing something useful. Mp3s exist, don't fight them, use them. Hard drives are bigger, DVD burners are cheap, audio CDs are easily copied.... DEAL! You can't go back, don't cry over spilt milk... yadda yadda... The sooner you move on, the less money you fritter away (apparently you're all starving remember) and the sooner you can concentrate on adapting instead of fighting the inevitable.
It's painfully obvious that Windows was originally designed without any thought to security. There are a lot of really good features Windows has, that allow for great usability, flexability and customization. This all comes at a price though, because these features allow too much access to the System by 3rd party apps. The onus is on the OS to provide a secure environment against attacks of any kind, even from local users or applications(as much as possible anyway).
That having been said, I require a few 3rd party apps just to keep it running. Anti virus software, adware/spybot removal, popup blockers, etc. And to tell me that going to a web page that hijacks your browser via the MS implementation of javascript is installing 3rd party software is just asinine.
I think Bill needs to have the old saying, "The first step toward fixing a problem, is admitting it exists.", impressed upon him.
Sort of... your pricing's a bit off. Not because of the cost of the song itself, but the cost of the infrastructure you're suggesting replacing labels with will still require money, although far less than the greedy monopoly represented by the RIAA. All the ISPs who host nodes, etc., will require a slice of the pie. Again, a small one, a cent or two on the download (pro-rated for fractional downloads due to the decentralized nature of course). Then the software would need to be developed (or at least maintained) by some company. There are a bunch of, "hidden costs" I don't think you've concidered. Not only that, but there will still be a market for companies that get airtime for your band(But they'll work for you, not you for them, and you still own your songs, life, integrity, and soul). Although that's more of an artist's expense than part of your suggested system. I think songs would still cost between 25 and 50 cents. Artists would probably get ~50%.
Ok, so the story's talking about a switch that happened 2+ years ago. Fine, Linux has made a few markable improvements in that time. HOWEVER, if you look at the site, it's REALLY basic. I ran this kinda thing on 486s, within the past 2 years no less. (Obligatory "try to run 2003 server on a 486" comment) The biggest problem this company seemed to have is 1) having a lousy site designer/coder, and 2) having a really small/poor(incompitent?) ISP. So OBVIOUSLY linux sucks.
On the flip side, Oracle can be pretty pricey, especially if you are talked into purchasing a larger package than you need. Perhaps that's where the percieved TCO comes from. The spokes person(s) are obviously not particularly savvy.
It sounds to me like you simply want to provide casual access to coffee shop patrons. With this in mind, you need only 2 things. The router, and a net connection.
You don't need to manage quotas or anything, just block everything but the ports you expect most frequent use on. Web, e-mail, maybe ssh for those working on remote systems, and a couple other low bandwidth ports. You don't need to help people build their Mp3 collections, they can do that at home.
I recommend 802.11b even if you can afford G. Here's why:
802.11a is very nich/expensive/who the hell came up with that anyway. 802.11g is pretty cheap, but you're providing casual access, and the net connection will be 3Mbit/s if you're feeling generous, which is still slower than 802.11b.
Which leaves your cost at about $100 or less, plus $100 or less a month. If you can make $4 a day, you cover your costs, and there's virtually no maintenance. Just keep it all on a separate network from your internal network, if you have one.
This seems exactly like the sort of thing microsoft would push to quash competitors MTAs. Major ISPs will need to push far more than 8000 messages a day (even if that's a per box quantity), and will need to find a solution for that. One I'm sure microsoft will provide. Some kind of "e-mail hash co-processer", or something. Something spammers could buy too of course... basically, I don't think it's a good idea, and I think Microsoft's going to be using it to their own profit, not the benefit of anyone. No surprises I'm sure.
Microsoft's solution to a problem is always crippling the service, or using something proprietary, and additionally involves creating tertiary problems.
"If You're Not A Part Of The Solution, There's Good Money To Be Made In Prolonging The Problem."
I think it has less to do with copyright and intellectual property, so much as integrity of the characters and the original stories.
The problem with just anyone writing a Harry Potter story, is that they can make him do all sorts of things that the author would never have the character do, and effectively spoil the character. The author puts so much effort in creating believable people, with definable personalities, etc. They could tell you how their characters will react to any given situation as well as you could say how your friends react. Creating real, life-like characters is a labour of love, and something that any author would hate th see spoiled.
Thus far Harry Potter has been a fairly politically correct non-biased kind of book. Throw in war, or religious figures, and that ruins the neutrality of a children's story. An even more extreme example of how stories and characters can be spoiled would be someone writing an "adult" Harry Potter story.
Authors must be equipped to deal with situations that compromise the creations that they have put so much time and effort into.
As I read it in the EULA (too lazy to cut 'n paste, but if you care you've probably already installed it anyway), the idea behind this cute little app is "Patent Pending". Maybe I'm reading it wrong, but assuming I'm right, isn't that yet another crappy patent app?
I mean I think it's a great idea, and I hope the company does well, but I think people should be allowed to make their own clients etc. (which is specifically naughty under the EULA).
I don't even know where the line between patentable and not is anymore(officially as opposed to what we've seen in practise in recent years).
Ok, look, first off, the RIAA isn't very smart. So on one hand, they might try to do something like this, on the other hand, they'd use the stupidest possible method. Second, they can't do math(just look at their CD sale/revenue calculations), so 95% would = maybe 20 computers. Third, they're not comming up roses 100% of the time legally, and getting squashed by the DMCA(which would happen, I'm sure the EFF will back me up) would set a disturbing precident for them.
Conclusion: this will generate a nice bout of publicity, to what end I'm not sure.
Slashdot Mirror
Wireless phones are encrypted (at least new ones) which gives the expectation of privacy validity.
;)
Also, just to play devils advocate, legally speaking ignorance is no defence. So if you have no expectation of privacy, but you THINK you do, that's your problem.
All in all, I think that the real problem is lack of education, both on the user side, and on the legal side. I'd say it was lack of documentation, but I don't think ANYONE really reads that stuff...
Aside from all the comparisons, accurate and otherwise, that are being drawn to the situation, there is a legal precident that can be applied here. It's an oldie, but a goodie.
Expectation of Privacy.
Ok, IANAL, but here's the rough version as I understand it; if you have a conversation on the phone, it's private, and can't be recorded, etc. If you're on a speaker phone, in a public place, there's no expectation of privacy, so you can record whatever you want, use it as evidence later, etc.
So, if you have your unsecured wireless device hanging out there in public, there's no expectation of it remaining private. Which makes "listening in" or hopping on the system, perfectly legal.
It's silly, and quite obviously so, that this guy got charged. Then again, it's the florida government. They can't even count properly. </cheap shot>
Wow, you call me narrow minded, yet you catagorically assume that things must either be purely funny, or deffinitively serious. Being funny, or ironic does not make something art by itself. Humour can be a part of art, and art can be clever. It's not an all or nothing, black or white situation.
Then again, if my post is "ironically elitist" I suppose it fits within the perview of your definition of art. Yay me!
That's funny, not art. Unless funny = art. "Art" is one of those things that is defined and redefined based on the artist and the observer. Some say the guy who throws his feces at canvas is making art. I don't. I don't think inverted urinals are art. I don't think taking a picture of yourself spitting is art. And a hard drive pasted to what appears to simply be a "partially blue canvas" isn't art. I don't care how clever a name you come up with.
But hey, maybe I don't know art, but I do know what I hate.
But DLO is in the right. It's the same product, in function anyway. That's exactly what patents are for. It's not like dvforge is seling an ipod to coffee maker adapter, or something else vastly different from DLO's product. Heck, if DLO's implementation was hardwired instead of FM, or didn't do the re-charging, I'd say fine, they're using "strongarm tactics against a superior product", but they're not. They're using legal tactics against an infringing product.
Ok, I have a metric assload of problems with this whole concept.
First and foremost, photographers are paid to take really good pictures, and maybe do some prints. I still think the digital version belongs to the person who's wedding/whatever it is. Yes, the photographer needs to be paid, but he gets paid. And quite well too. What is it, a grand or two for a days work?
Second, if there are legitimately copywrited photos printed by someone who doesn't own them, it's the person who had them printed who is liable. Not the printer. Otherwise it's like suing maytag because someone washed your dry-clean only sweater.
It seems legal battles are now just big finger pointing contests, and copyright is about who you can sue. I think the whole process needs a reality check, because the spirit of copyright and other laws has been completely lost.
I know it's not actually relavent to the space program, but I honestly thought the next space craft after the shuttle would be more... asthetically pleasing.
Then again I also thought it would be much better, completely re-useable, one piece... maybe have some phasers or something...
C'mon, you all thought the same thing!
Lots of people are criticizing comments with the point of view that the study is BS, as they have drawn conclusions before the study is published. I'd like to point out that the article in question does exactly the same thing, draws the conclusion before the study is published.
Aside from that, it's not unreasonable to bash the study before we see it, because we've seen it before. We see one about every six months, and they're all the same. They use some "new math" snake oil test or benchmark that says Windows is faster, safer, more secure, less communist, and/or lowers your cholesterol. I'll bet you dollars to doughnuts this one's the same. We'll see in 30 days.
And finally, never mind that Red Hat isn't linux. Just remember that out of all the distros RH was the least secure. And my favorite, Slackware (shameless plug, deal with it) was the most secure. This was a while ago, but I'm sure not much has changed, as it's a result of the philosophy behind the distros. Slack is cautious, and uses packages that are known to be very stable, RedHat always grabs the latest and greatest, without the same scrutiny. There are merits to both, decide what works for you. Again, this is going on out of the box configuration, so you can tweak any distro to be as secure as you want, but I always like sane defaults.
If there's one thing I hate more than distribution zealots... it's people who don't use Slackware! ;P
...well sorta.)
(Yes, that's a joke!
Ok, so, there's copyrighted stuff available illegally through various P2P clients. There's 3 types of people involved:
1) People with copyrighted content, illegally aquired and/or being shared.
2) People with copyrighted content, legally aquired, and not being shared.
3) People/agencies that opperate public communications that can be used for legal and illegal purposes.
People in group 1) are breaking the law, and should be held accountable(within reason, not for inflated damages). However, prosecuting the offenders should not be any easier than prosecuting people in the non-virtual world. If someone decides they think I'm pirating music or videos, and goes to some law enforcement agency, my PC goes bye-bye, without any proof. No good. Further, privacy rights must still be upheld. It might prevent some pirates from being caught, but it's the same for drug dealers, and murderers. "Innocent until PROVEN guilty." "Due process." Why should the entertainment industry be above these concepts?
Group 2) needs to be protected by very clear fair use laws, or they'll always be vulnerable to the entertainment industries definition of "fair".
Group 3) includes P2P programs. It also includes ISPs. It also includes the phone company (for those pirating over dial up). Funny how no one's tried to sue Bell or AOL yet. They're "just as guilty" as Kazaa et all, which is to say, they're NOT responsible.
To draw a tired parrallel, we don't hold firearm manufacturers accountable for gun murders, so why is p2p software accountable for piracy?
Look on the bright side, you can show up much later to movies and still make them on time. And with today's ticket prices, the theaters are almost never full, so you can still get a decent seat 30 minutes into the... er... commercials...
Seriously though, I can't believe it's gotten this bad. And nealy 15$ for a ticket. I've paid less for DVDs. I don't think piracy is the problem here...
I know several people who believe all data should be preserved always. They attempt to archive anything, and everything that they ever come across, and are always serching for better ways to store, search, and retrieve said data.
I don't think "digital packratting" is a bad thing, but I don't lose sleep over emptying my recycling bin either. That being said, I think there needs to be a major change in the way we archive all of our shiny shiny files, and perhapse in the way we treat data in general. (no I don't have any earth shattering suggestions just yet)
Isn't every moment of human existance going to be archived someday anyway?
Well, here's my advice to the RIAA/MPAA in regards to how they _should_ act.
First on the list of steps toward prevention is; "Remove the temptation." Fair prices, convenient licensing, fair use, etc etc. If a movie or an album is priced appropriately, it will lessen piracy. Although I believe the "I'm pirating it 'cause it's too expensive" excuse is overused.
Second, "Don't play dirty pool.", it only weakens your case in the consumer's eye. There's comercials comparing piracy to theft of material goods. There is a very distinct difference, and while it's technically stealing, it's simply not the same. There's "statistics" saying that there are huge losses where none exist. (This article even has a glaring hole, where Glickman states "there are losses" when presented with the fact that the sales have never been higher) And, my favorite, a comercial I often see at the movies, where a poor helpless stunt man is pleading with people not to steal movies, 'cause he blows himself up for us. (Runner up is the kid who steals a chocolate bar then says "But dad, you steal cable") I think it's sick really.
Third, don't try to "Put the genie back in the bottle". Law suits like the CSS fiasco are rediculous. It's broken, you should have spent more time developing something useful. Mp3s exist, don't fight them, use them. Hard drives are bigger, DVD burners are cheap, audio CDs are easily copied.... DEAL! You can't go back, don't cry over spilt milk... yadda yadda... The sooner you move on, the less money you fritter away (apparently you're all starving remember) and the sooner you can concentrate on adapting instead of fighting the inevitable.
It's painfully obvious that Windows was originally designed without any thought to security. There are a lot of really good features Windows has, that allow for great usability, flexability and customization. This all comes at a price though, because these features allow too much access to the System by 3rd party apps. The onus is on the OS to provide a secure environment against attacks of any kind, even from local users or applications(as much as possible anyway).
That having been said, I require a few 3rd party apps just to keep it running. Anti virus software, adware/spybot removal, popup blockers, etc. And to tell me that going to a web page that hijacks your browser via the MS implementation of javascript is installing 3rd party software is just asinine.
I think Bill needs to have the old saying, "The first step toward fixing a problem, is admitting it exists.", impressed upon him.
Sort of... your pricing's a bit off. Not because of the cost of the song itself, but the cost of the infrastructure you're suggesting replacing labels with will still require money, although far less than the greedy monopoly represented by the RIAA. All the ISPs who host nodes, etc., will require a slice of the pie. Again, a small one, a cent or two on the download (pro-rated for fractional downloads due to the decentralized nature of course). Then the software would need to be developed (or at least maintained) by some company. There are a bunch of, "hidden costs" I don't think you've concidered. Not only that, but there will still be a market for companies that get airtime for your band(But they'll work for you, not you for them, and you still own your songs, life, integrity, and soul). Although that's more of an artist's expense than part of your suggested system. I think songs would still cost between 25 and 50 cents. Artists would probably get ~50%.
Ok, so the story's talking about a switch that happened 2+ years ago. Fine, Linux has made a few markable improvements in that time. HOWEVER, if you look at the site, it's REALLY basic. I ran this kinda thing on 486s, within the past 2 years no less. (Obligatory "try to run 2003 server on a 486" comment) The biggest problem this company seemed to have is 1) having a lousy site designer/coder, and 2) having a really small/poor(incompitent?) ISP. So OBVIOUSLY linux sucks.
On the flip side, Oracle can be pretty pricey, especially if you are talked into purchasing a larger package than you need. Perhaps that's where the percieved TCO comes from. The spokes person(s) are obviously not particularly savvy.
It sounds to me like you simply want to provide casual access to coffee shop patrons. With this in mind, you need only 2 things. The router, and a net connection.
You don't need to manage quotas or anything, just block everything but the ports you expect most frequent use on. Web, e-mail, maybe ssh for those working on remote systems, and a couple other low bandwidth ports. You don't need to help people build their Mp3 collections, they can do that at home.
I recommend 802.11b even if you can afford G. Here's why:
802.11a is very nich/expensive/who the hell came up with that anyway. 802.11g is pretty cheap, but you're providing casual access, and the net connection will be 3Mbit/s if you're feeling generous, which is still slower than 802.11b.
Which leaves your cost at about $100 or less, plus $100 or less a month. If you can make $4 a day, you cover your costs, and there's virtually no maintenance. Just keep it all on a separate network from your internal network, if you have one.
Keep It Simple. Should be a piece of cake.
You scare me.
This seems exactly like the sort of thing microsoft would push to quash competitors MTAs. Major ISPs will need to push far more than 8000 messages a day (even if that's a per box quantity), and will need to find a solution for that. One I'm sure microsoft will provide. Some kind of "e-mail hash co-processer", or something. Something spammers could buy too of course... basically, I don't think it's a good idea, and I think Microsoft's going to be using it to their own profit, not the benefit of anyone. No surprises I'm sure.
Microsoft's solution to a problem is always crippling the service, or using something proprietary, and additionally involves creating tertiary problems.
"If You're Not A Part Of The Solution, There's Good Money To Be Made In Prolonging The Problem."
I knew sending all the telephone sanetizers to another planet was a bad idea! Where's our superior intellect now?
That's how I lost my last job. Switched everything to linux. "Everything works now, thanks. Here have a hero cookie and a pink slip."
I think it has less to do with copyright and intellectual property, so much as integrity of the characters and the original stories.
The problem with just anyone writing a Harry Potter story, is that they can make him do all sorts of things that the author would never have the character do, and effectively spoil the character. The author puts so much effort in creating believable people, with definable personalities, etc. They could tell you how their characters will react to any given situation as well as you could say how your friends react. Creating real, life-like characters is a labour of love, and something that any author would hate th see spoiled.
Thus far Harry Potter has been a fairly politically correct non-biased kind of book. Throw in war, or religious figures, and that ruins the neutrality of a children's story. An even more extreme example of how stories and characters can be spoiled would be someone writing an "adult" Harry Potter story.
Authors must be equipped to deal with situations that compromise the creations that they have put so much time and effort into.
As I read it in the EULA (too lazy to cut 'n paste, but if you care you've probably already installed it anyway), the idea behind this cute little app is "Patent Pending". Maybe I'm reading it wrong, but assuming I'm right, isn't that yet another crappy patent app?
I mean I think it's a great idea, and I hope the company does well, but I think people should be allowed to make their own clients etc. (which is specifically naughty under the EULA).
I don't even know where the line between patentable and not is anymore(officially as opposed to what we've seen in practise in recent years).
Ok, look, first off, the RIAA isn't very smart. So on one hand, they might try to do something like this, on the other hand, they'd use the stupidest possible method. Second, they can't do math(just look at their CD sale/revenue calculations), so 95% would = maybe 20 computers. Third, they're not comming up roses 100% of the time legally, and getting squashed by the DMCA(which would happen, I'm sure the EFF will back me up) would set a disturbing precident for them.
Conclusion: this will generate a nice bout of publicity, to what end I'm not sure.
Sorry, couldn't resist...