Yeah, I'll start buying airplane engines from ma & pa shops. Or relational database packages. Or my AIDS medicine. Or only see movies that cost as much to make as "Blair Witch" did. Or take that cruise on Ma & Pa Cruise Lines. Or buy DVD players made by Ma & Pa Consumer Electronics. And my routers? Oh yeah, they're made by Ma & Pa. Same thing with my CPU. Ma & Pa got their EE degrees and are totally down with L1/L2 caches and branch prediction, as well as having a wafer fab set up in their garage.
That's asinine, and just as (if not more) idealistic than Communism. Government frequently plays a beneficial role in regulating the market. Deal with it. I prefer that to having Exxon-Mobil-Chevron-Texaco-BP-Amoco having carte blanche to do as they will. Fuck that.
Uh, if you're going to post this, why not post something balanced, or at least post something comparable about the dirty tricks of the other side? Both major parties constantly participate in this kind of crap. The Republicans are harping on Gore's misstatements, the Dems are harping on Bush's misstatements. It's been going on for a long time, and both sides are guilty. How long did we have to hear about Qualye's "potatoe"?
Because the media's stance against Gore and for Bush has been extremely prevalent and incredibly consistent. This seems to me to be a perfect example of an "Emperor Wears No Clothes" kind of event: the media is by and large conservative, not liberal, and this campaign season only serves to prove this. Yes, there have been attacks from both sides. But by and large Bush has gotten off the hook on several major issues (such as the death penalty and other problems with the Texas judicial system, irregularities in his financial history [where did that jet come from again, Dubya?], and the powerlessness of the Texas governorship.) The conventional wisdom is that Gore is a liar, facts be damned, and this portrait keeps getting reinforced by the media. Meanwhile, GWB's own misstatements and/or lies get almost wholly ignored.
The "I invented the Internet" meme is a perfect example. Gore never said this, and taken contextually what he did say was wholly correct. But it has been repeated ad nauseum by pundits, reporters, and partisans until the general population believes that he did say this. Meanwhile, Bush's statement "...insurance - that's a Washington term" gets little if any discussion. This is amazing because that statement to me is absolutely incredible in its banality. Time and time again Bush says something that is just out and out moronic: "The woman who knew that I had dyslexia--I never interviewed her." Nevertheless, the media treats him like a god worthy of admiration, not someone's who intelligence should be seriously and thoroughly questioned.
This wouldn't bother me so much except that the gaffe count seems to be so lopsided. Gore makes misstatements that are, upon further investigation, honest mistakes. Ex: Travelling to Texas with the FEMA director; he mistook the exact date. But Gore's mistakes are much fewer than Bush's, and they are at least in grammatically correct English. But Bush... His list of moronic statements has its own lengthy page dedicated to them. Are these generally questioned? No. Instead we hear about what his policy advisors have cooked up with regarding prescription drugs whatever politically moderate group they happen to be courting this week.
Questioning Bush's intelligence is something that has gotten way, way too little attention, IMHO.
The following quote from E2 sums this up perfectly:
"And throughout it all, the United States: Rich, prosperous, myopic, magnificient in aggregate and petty in specifics, unwilling -- always, always -- to accord respect to the mind. To good fortune, to luck, to rugged individualism, to faith in God, to patriotism, to beauty, to spunk or pluck or grit or git, but never to complex intellegence and complex thought."
-- from Beggars in Spain by Nancy Kress
Of course the big problems with virtual machines are that you get a performance hit, and your code will only run on those platforms which have an implementation of the machine.
This is what I imagine happening: based upon this report, the media will give this issue increased focus, especially in light of recent "backlash" against the Internet. Primetime Live and/or 20/20 will do a "story" on the drug culture and how bad it is, focusing on the minority who are stupid enough to stick needles in their arms, etc. The talking heads will go in to full sanctimonious mode, bemoaning the decline of modern culture and the need for tougher law enforcement. "Experts" will be interviewing talking about trends in drug use, socioeconomic status, and so on.
Absolutely no attention will be paid to the civil liberty aspect of drug use, nor the inability of the Cult of Prohibition to fix the so-called problem. Focus on geeks will subtly shift from their hacking activities to their personal drug use. A new characteristic will be added to the stereotype of "hacker": that of an acid or pot head, dirty and even more criminal.
Fuck all of 'em. I make $78k/yr and smoke pot. I have a family, and a house, and I'm a clean freak. The idiotic and sheeplike masses might buy into you're anti-drug propaganda, but I am an evolved being. I *know* it's all lies.
And if the public doesn't want it, then they have a right to not have it.
This is absolutely not true. The public does not have the right to say what is and what is not acceptable speech. The Bill of Rights was specifically established to prevent this "tyranny of the masses." There are forms of this speech that are reprehensible, and continuing to bring up the bugbear of child pornography leads me to believe your case is somewhat weak. Speech is anything that can be communicated, like it or no.
- Rev.
Things like instructions for making drugs, race hate literature and pornography are not "speech", and should not benefit from the protections built into Freenet.
I do not know what country you are from, but in the US these things definately are considered speech, and therefore are protected by the First Amendment. The First Amendment was set up specifically to protect politically unpopular speech, such as those listed. The Supreme Court has consistently held that First Amendment protections do cover these areas. There are limitations to the 1A, however, such as libel, issues of "national security", and such. But it is more than likely that anything that will be posted to Freenet is protected by the Constitution.
I know this annoys some people. This annoyance makes me happy.
What if I wanted to shoot smack? Should the University allow that as part of the pursuit of freedom of inquiry? It's arguably less infringing on the rights of others than stealing intellectual property since it really is a victimless crime.
Yes! Truths are frequently arrived at when visionaries take the "road less travelled". Universties are (obstensibly) about teaching and seeking Truth. However improbable, it is nevertheless possible that "shooting smack" could give rise to a new way of understanding the mind.
Similarly, using Napster could bring us closer to a new paradigm of intellectual property law. I hate to sound like Katz here, but this is a real possibility.
I don't care how fast a connection you have, what length key you have, or how distributed your organization is. There will come a time and place where you, a living breathing human bein', will be subject to somebody putting a gun in your face. Cyber-nations would be more feasable if we had "Ghost in the Shell" type legally-recognized spirits floating around on the Internet. But since I don't see that happening any time soon, I am extremely pessimistic as to the predicitons made above.
That, and the fact that the authors seem to focus on economic interests being the primary motivators of these "cyber-states". Fuck that. I'm tired of being a consumer. I'm a CITIZEN, goddammit. I read, I think, and I like to vote. I buy shit sometimes, but that is not the focus of my being and I resent being considered otherwise, no matter how efficacious it is for marketing-types and Alan Greenspan to classify me thusly.
I guess the point is, the copyright laws were pretty much created to combat the problems the new technology generated. Do you think now that there is new technology that makes it even easier to copy books or music the laws will not be strengthened rather than removed?
Well, I hope they will be changed rather than strengthened. As far as I can tell, the RIAA and their allies are primarily--almost exclusively--concerned with maintaining distributive control over works they hold under copyright. This is in their best financial interest, and is wholly understandable, both economically and legally.
The huge wrench in the works here is the existence of systems which take away their ability to control distribution. There are trends that lead me to believe that this sharing will only become more widespread:
Spread of higher-speed lines such as DSL, cable, and satellite broadband
Popularization of "traceless" peer-to-peer sytems such as Freenet and Publius. (It is fascinating to note that the latter was produced by AT&T Labs)
Widespread and increasing dissatisfaction, both from artists and consumers, with the music industry for various reasons
Commonplace availability of MP3 rippers, encoders, and players.
Karma [unprovable]
It is interesting to note that even with millions of people out there swapping terabytes of MP3s everyday for over a year now, the memebers of the RIAA continue to report increased sales and profits. This further serves to undermine any argument that these systems are causing them financial harm.
You know, I would really like to see some discussions from IAAL types on what can be done to change IP law so that situations like this do not arise again. IMHO, the economic model which has given rise to the RIAA is outdated. This is not a Katzism, it is simply a fact. Peer-to-peer sharing is here to stay, and without totalitarian rule overseeing every file transfer, it cannot be stopped. This leads to only one conclusion, as far as I can tell: fundamentally changing IP law. This would involve pain, certainly.
The analogy to buggy whip manufacturers in the early days of automobiles is apt here, I think. I fear their lobbying power, however. Should they be vindicated in the halls of Congress, it will be to our collective injury and a further erosion of our liberties in the name of profits and corporate self-interests, which are not, again IMHO, all that important in the long run. Should the members of the RIAA go belly-up five years from now, the economy and the Republic will continue to thrive.
Ummm, am I mistaken in remembering that a black hole has infitine mass? So does this black hole have a value of infinite that is greater than other black holes? This humbles me. Every time I think I have most stuff pretty solidly nailed down, something like this comes along.
So somebody answer me this: Do black holes have infitinte gravity, but not an infinite mass? What's the skinny?
Obviously you are well versed with psychedelic drugs. I applaud this. Dinosaurs in space! Yeah! I bet they had some mega-gargantu-astro ships, too, man. Can you imagine a fleet of ships to carry around the Brontosaurus Empire? Oh yeah, that's what I'm talkin about. That pussy Darth Vader & his quote-unquote Super Star Destroyer would be put meekly to shame.
- Rev.
Give me moderator points so that the previous post may be better positionied to smite the heathen Xians right in their heavily occluded Third Nostril. Verily, yay.
Why would Project Gutenburg, a not for profit project that makes available public domain (due to copyright expiration in the most part) texts available to the world, want to help out a comcercial entity whose business is to help music pirates?
a) Napster was not started as a business. It was started as a better file-sharing system. That's it.
b) Gnutella, Freenet, Napster, et al were started because there is a fundamental belief that technology not only CAN change policy but that it SHOULD. There was/is no profit motive involved, just a belief that the record companies are too powerful, that the governmental representatives that could correct this problem are in the pockets of the record companies, and that technology can be used to circumvent the political process to the benefit of the People.
This press release isn't about MP3 or digital music. Its about stopping a major source of piracy. That is all.
But therein lies the rub. The RIAA sees MP3 swapping as pirating. The MP3 community sees it as sharing something in order to fight what amounts to a corporate monopoly. Also, press releases are 99% lies, deception, and marketing-speak. Do not believe them.
First, most of the FBI agents I've met seem like reasonable guys and I rather doubt they'd break the law. Second, even if they did it wouldn't do them any good -- any evidence obtained in consequence would be inadmissible in court:
I really do not mean to be derogatory, but you are being very naive in this case. A typical situation goes like this: The LEA suspects that a person is doing something illegal. They use some sort of unconstitutional method to find this out. They then backtrack to find "clues" that would have led them to that conclusion, but this time the clues are constitutional.
Example: FBI suspects John Smith of selling marijuana. They tap his cell phone, sure enough he's selling some amount to Joe Slashdot. The cell phone tap was illegal; they didn't have a warrant. So they get a local cop to pull him over on a routine traffic stop, search his car, and whoo-HOO what do we have here Mr. Smith?
Badda bing, badda boom. The original means used to determine that Smith was selling pot were unconstitutional. But they busted him anyway just by coincindentally having a local cop help them out.
I guess I have always been under the impression that governments are instituted to protect the general welfare of the citizens. Imprisonment, while necessary, is done for the good of the person being imprisoned as well as for the good of society. The death penalty only serves as a vehicle for societal revenge, not for rehabilitation. And allow me to repeat my salient point: I do not trust the government with my money, why should I trust them with my life?
IF YOU DON'T LIKE THE LAWS IN THIS COUNTRY (oh yeah, the freedoms, benefits, etc too) MOVE AWAY.
Ummm, no.
See, I believe that in order for a democracy to be effective, it's citizens must be active participants. Where they see shortcomings in the law, they should petition their representatives for redress. They should not up and move away en masse simply because they think some laws should be changed, even if those laws are a fundamental part of the fabric of government such as the Bill of Rights. There is this concept of a "marketplace of ideas" that has always appealed to me; the protesters in this case are simply placing themselves firmly in that marketplace.
By the way: As much as I personally disagree with the protester in question on some of his issues, I still applaud him for energetically injecting himself into the debate. Most people just play Diablo 2 or watch their favorite TV show. Distractions abound. The real world continues, and those in power like apathetic citizens.
A careful consideration of the facts in the case, as well as the legal precedents set forth beforehand can lead to only one reasonable reaction to this decision by the states:
BWAAAAAHAHAHAAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHA!!
You fucking greedy bastards! We knew it all the time! You have absolutely no moral authority to tell Napster users what to do when you're criminals in your own right! Take a long walk off a short cliff, you RIAA scum!
Wow, that was totally juvenile. But I feel SO much better.
And its not like the Liberals aren't hypocritcal either. I consider the first amendment (freedom of speech, religion, press, etc) and the second (right to bear arms) to be the exact same issue. While liberals will (rightly so) viscously protect the first amendment, they are completely against the second. It is the same issue--power of the government to control your life and actions. It is interesting that the ACLU will back you if any of your right granted in the Bill of Rights except the second ammendment.
There is, I'm sure you will agree, a certain level of disagreement over what the Founder's original intentions were in regards to the Second Amendment. Compared to the other items in the Bill of Rights, this Amendment is maddingly open for varying interpretations, depending upon where you choose to put your focus. When compared against the unambiguous prohibitions listed in the First Amendment, the Second leaves something to be desired insofar as clarity is concerned.
My point is only this: Different groups hold different views on how best to interpret this Amendment. This does not necessarily mean they are being hypocritical. They have a different interpretation of the Constitution. The ACLU is not a libertarian institution. They are for civil liberties, but are not generally considered libertarians.
No such luck here, I'm Canadian. 11 bucks for the last pitcher of beer I had while in university.
That would cause me to take up arms against my oppressors! 11 bucks? For a pitcher? Holy christ! They're not that expensive at titty bars around here! And I'm talking the medium grade beer, too, not the cheap Milwaukee's Beast or Lone Star. Stuff like Bass or Shiner. Yeah.
Actually, I bet most of you haven't heard of Shiner... It's a Texas brew...
Rev.
Re:Why do you guys make such a big deal about this
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Mozilla M17 Is Out
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We who can think for ourselves believe in the open projects developments and as it has our interest, we surely give it the worthy attention, as this is a project for everyone, you included albeit you have no clue yet. I have a dream of a useful browsing platform for all systems, mozilla is the closest thing, ie is the opponent. It basically is a war between good and evil.
Oh my god. Religious tones to a discussion about browsers? Come ON man, it's a fucking piece of SOFTWARE. Lighten UP. I know you find this hard to believe, but Netscape is not "good" because they are open source. They're still a corporation, owned, I'll remind you, by AOL/Time-Warner. They are in it for the profit, not for any overarching battle of good vs. evil.
Here's some advice: Go home, smoke a joint and RELAX. Do this and I assure you you'll realize that it just doesn't fucking matter at all in the bigger scheme of thigns. It really is not worth getting that worked up over, my bruthah. I haven't seen rhetoric like that since I went to a Baptist Church a few months ago. Oy. But they were talking about gays, not browsers. The tone was the same, though.
Umm, I dunno. The capital-L libertarians are way to out there for me, man. I'm stickin with Nader. Yeah, I know, property rights, legalize drugs. Ok, I'm for that. But I do *not* think the state should be ransacked. I'm not a Randian, k? There are governmental agencies that do good things, occasionally, and there are cases (especially with regards to the environment and labor laws) where the government is needed to step in.
Well, let's see. What's the difference between CT's opinion of Microsoft and GWB? Nothing, unless you consider that this is a technology web site, not a political one. I can stand someone's opinion of a technology, I don't read/. for a political opnion though.
So unless someone is an "expert" in politics, they shouldn't air their opinions?
See, that's the thing about a democracy. We're ALL experts. Even Rush Limbaugh [!]. I have an idea: As soon as you can get a web site that is as successful as/., you can feel free to NOT voice your political opinions.
Opinions are like assholes. Everyone has one and they all stink.
And do try to rise above tired cliches. Really. They're so demeaning.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, I'll start buying airplane engines from ma & pa shops. Or relational database packages. Or my AIDS medicine. Or only see movies that cost as much to make as "Blair Witch" did. Or take that cruise on Ma & Pa Cruise Lines. Or buy DVD players made by Ma & Pa Consumer Electronics. And my routers? Oh yeah, they're made by Ma & Pa. Same thing with my CPU. Ma & Pa got their EE degrees and are totally down with L1/L2 caches and branch prediction, as well as having a wafer fab set up in their garage.
That's asinine, and just as (if not more) idealistic than Communism. Government frequently plays a beneficial role in regulating the market. Deal with it. I prefer that to having Exxon-Mobil-Chevron-Texaco-BP-Amoco having carte blanche to do as they will. Fuck that.
- Rev.Uh, if you're going to post this, why not post something balanced, or at least post something comparable about the dirty tricks of the other side? Both major parties constantly participate in this kind of crap. The Republicans are harping on Gore's misstatements, the Dems are harping on Bush's misstatements. It's been going on for a long time, and both sides are guilty. How long did we have to hear about Qualye's "potatoe"?
Because the media's stance against Gore and for Bush has been extremely prevalent and incredibly consistent. This seems to me to be a perfect example of an "Emperor Wears No Clothes" kind of event: the media is by and large conservative, not liberal, and this campaign season only serves to prove this. Yes, there have been attacks from both sides. But by and large Bush has gotten off the hook on several major issues (such as the death penalty and other problems with the Texas judicial system, irregularities in his financial history [where did that jet come from again, Dubya?], and the powerlessness of the Texas governorship.) The conventional wisdom is that Gore is a liar, facts be damned, and this portrait keeps getting reinforced by the media. Meanwhile, GWB's own misstatements and/or lies get almost wholly ignored.
The "I invented the Internet" meme is a perfect example. Gore never said this, and taken contextually what he did say was wholly correct. But it has been repeated ad nauseum by pundits, reporters, and partisans until the general population believes that he did say this. Meanwhile, Bush's statement "...insurance - that's a Washington term" gets little if any discussion. This is amazing because that statement to me is absolutely incredible in its banality. Time and time again Bush says something that is just out and out moronic: "The woman who knew that I had dyslexia--I never interviewed her." Nevertheless, the media treats him like a god worthy of admiration, not someone's who intelligence should be seriously and thoroughly questioned.
This wouldn't bother me so much except that the gaffe count seems to be so lopsided. Gore makes misstatements that are, upon further investigation, honest mistakes. Ex: Travelling to Texas with the FEMA director; he mistook the exact date. But Gore's mistakes are much fewer than Bush's, and they are at least in grammatically correct English. But Bush... His list of moronic statements has its own lengthy page dedicated to them. Are these generally questioned? No. Instead we hear about what his policy advisors have cooked up with regarding prescription drugs whatever politically moderate group they happen to be courting this week.
Questioning Bush's intelligence is something that has gotten way, way too little attention, IMHO.
The following quote from E2 sums this up perfectly:
"And throughout it all, the United States: Rich, prosperous, myopic, magnificient in aggregate and petty in specifics, unwilling -- always, always -- to accord respect to the mind. To good fortune, to luck, to rugged individualism, to faith in God, to patriotism, to beauty, to spunk or pluck or grit or git, but never to complex intellegence and complex thought."
- Rev.-- from Beggars in Spain by Nancy Kress
Jesus Christ, I SWEAR I previewed that before posting. I SWEAR!
- Rev.
Of course the big problems with virtual machines are that you get a performance hit, and your code will only run on those platforms which have an implementation of the machine.
This is only partially true. In a seperate interview on MSDN (no url, sorry I looked but is close) one of the .Net developers explained that .Net applications will only run slower the first time they are run; the assemblies will be compiled into the intermediate language at runtime. Because the compilation into the IL will take into account any special instructions the CPU (or video card, etc.) has, subsequent executions will therefore be faster.
- Rev.Here we go again.
This is what I imagine happening: based upon this report, the media will give this issue increased focus, especially in light of recent "backlash" against the Internet. Primetime Live and/or 20/20 will do a "story" on the drug culture and how bad it is, focusing on the minority who are stupid enough to stick needles in their arms, etc. The talking heads will go in to full sanctimonious mode, bemoaning the decline of modern culture and the need for tougher law enforcement. "Experts" will be interviewing talking about trends in drug use, socioeconomic status, and so on.
Absolutely no attention will be paid to the civil liberty aspect of drug use, nor the inability of the Cult of Prohibition to fix the so-called problem. Focus on geeks will subtly shift from their hacking activities to their personal drug use. A new characteristic will be added to the stereotype of "hacker": that of an acid or pot head, dirty and even more criminal.
Fuck all of 'em. I make $78k/yr and smoke pot. I have a family, and a house, and I'm a clean freak. The idiotic and sheeplike masses might buy into you're anti-drug propaganda, but I am an evolved being. I *know* it's all lies.
- Rev.And if the public doesn't want it, then they have a right to not have it.
This is absolutely not true. The public does not have the right to say what is and what is not acceptable speech. The Bill of Rights was specifically established to prevent this "tyranny of the masses." There are forms of this speech that are reprehensible, and continuing to bring up the bugbear of child pornography leads me to believe your case is somewhat weak. Speech is anything that can be communicated, like it or no. - Rev.Things like instructions for making drugs, race hate literature and pornography are not "speech", and should not benefit from the protections built into Freenet.
I do not know what country you are from, but in the US these things definately are considered speech, and therefore are protected by the First Amendment. The First Amendment was set up specifically to protect politically unpopular speech, such as those listed. The Supreme Court has consistently held that First Amendment protections do cover these areas. There are limitations to the 1A, however, such as libel, issues of "national security", and such. But it is more than likely that anything that will be posted to Freenet is protected by the Constitution.
I know this annoys some people. This annoyance makes me happy.
- Rev.What if I wanted to shoot smack? Should the University allow that as part of the pursuit of freedom of inquiry? It's arguably less infringing on the rights of others than stealing intellectual property since it really is a victimless crime.
Yes! Truths are frequently arrived at when visionaries take the "road less travelled". Universties are (obstensibly) about teaching and seeking Truth. However improbable, it is nevertheless possible that "shooting smack" could give rise to a new way of understanding the mind.
Similarly, using Napster could bring us closer to a new paradigm of intellectual property law. I hate to sound like Katz here, but this is a real possibility.
- Rev.I don't care how fast a connection you have, what length key you have, or how distributed your organization is. There will come a time and place where you, a living breathing human bein', will be subject to somebody putting a gun in your face. Cyber-nations would be more feasable if we had "Ghost in the Shell" type legally-recognized spirits floating around on the Internet. But since I don't see that happening any time soon, I am extremely pessimistic as to the predicitons made above.
That, and the fact that the authors seem to focus on economic interests being the primary motivators of these "cyber-states". Fuck that. I'm tired of being a consumer. I'm a CITIZEN, goddammit. I read, I think, and I like to vote. I buy shit sometimes, but that is not the focus of my being and I resent being considered otherwise, no matter how efficacious it is for marketing-types and Alan Greenspan to classify me thusly.
I guess the point is, the copyright laws were pretty much created to combat the problems the new technology generated. Do you think now that there is new technology that makes it even easier to copy books or music the laws will not be strengthened rather than removed?
Well, I hope they will be changed rather than strengthened. As far as I can tell, the RIAA and their allies are primarily--almost exclusively--concerned with maintaining distributive control over works they hold under copyright. This is in their best financial interest, and is wholly understandable, both economically and legally.
The huge wrench in the works here is the existence of systems which take away their ability to control distribution. There are trends that lead me to believe that this sharing will only become more widespread:
Spread of higher-speed lines such as DSL, cable, and satellite broadband
Popularization of "traceless" peer-to-peer sytems such as Freenet and Publius. (It is fascinating to note that the latter was produced by AT&T Labs)
Widespread and increasing dissatisfaction, both from artists and consumers, with the music industry for various reasons
Commonplace availability of MP3 rippers, encoders, and players.
Karma [unprovable]
It is interesting to note that even with millions of people out there swapping terabytes of MP3s everyday for over a year now, the memebers of the RIAA continue to report increased sales and profits. This further serves to undermine any argument that these systems are causing them financial harm.
-Rev.You know, I would really like to see some discussions from IAAL types on what can be done to change IP law so that situations like this do not arise again. IMHO, the economic model which has given rise to the RIAA is outdated. This is not a Katzism, it is simply a fact. Peer-to-peer sharing is here to stay, and without totalitarian rule overseeing every file transfer, it cannot be stopped. This leads to only one conclusion, as far as I can tell: fundamentally changing IP law. This would involve pain, certainly.
The analogy to buggy whip manufacturers in the early days of automobiles is apt here, I think. I fear their lobbying power, however. Should they be vindicated in the halls of Congress, it will be to our collective injury and a further erosion of our liberties in the name of profits and corporate self-interests, which are not, again IMHO, all that important in the long run. Should the members of the RIAA go belly-up five years from now, the economy and the Republic will continue to thrive.
- Rev.Ummm, am I mistaken in remembering that a black hole has infitine mass? So does this black hole have a value of infinite that is greater than other black holes? This humbles me. Every time I think I have most stuff pretty solidly nailed down, something like this comes along.
So somebody answer me this: Do black holes have infitinte gravity, but not an infinite mass? What's the skinny?
- Rev.Obviously you are well versed with psychedelic drugs. I applaud this. Dinosaurs in space! Yeah! I bet they had some mega-gargantu-astro ships, too, man. Can you imagine a fleet of ships to carry around the Brontosaurus Empire? Oh yeah, that's what I'm talkin about. That pussy Darth Vader & his quote-unquote Super Star Destroyer would be put meekly to shame. - Rev.
Give me moderator points so that the previous post may be better positionied to smite the heathen Xians right in their heavily occluded Third Nostril. Verily, yay.
- Rev.
Why would Project Gutenburg, a not for profit project that makes available public domain (due to copyright expiration in the most part) texts available to the world, want to help out a comcercial entity whose business is to help music pirates?
a) Napster was not started as a business. It was started as a better file-sharing system. That's it.
b) Gnutella, Freenet, Napster, et al were started because there is a fundamental belief that technology not only CAN change policy but that it SHOULD. There was/is no profit motive involved, just a belief that the record companies are too powerful, that the governmental representatives that could correct this problem are in the pockets of the record companies, and that technology can be used to circumvent the political process to the benefit of the People.
This press release isn't about MP3 or digital music. Its about stopping a major source of piracy. That is all.
But therein lies the rub. The RIAA sees MP3 swapping as pirating. The MP3 community sees it as sharing something in order to fight what amounts to a corporate monopoly. Also, press releases are 99% lies, deception, and marketing-speak. Do not believe them.
- Rev.First, most of the FBI agents I've met seem like reasonable guys and I rather doubt they'd break the law. Second, even if they did it wouldn't do them any good -- any evidence obtained in consequence would be inadmissible in court:
I really do not mean to be derogatory, but you are being very naive in this case. A typical situation goes like this: The LEA suspects that a person is doing something illegal. They use some sort of unconstitutional method to find this out. They then backtrack to find "clues" that would have led them to that conclusion, but this time the clues are constitutional.
Example: FBI suspects John Smith of selling marijuana. They tap his cell phone, sure enough he's selling some amount to Joe Slashdot. The cell phone tap was illegal; they didn't have a warrant. So they get a local cop to pull him over on a routine traffic stop, search his car, and whoo-HOO what do we have here Mr. Smith?
Badda bing, badda boom. The original means used to determine that Smith was selling pot were unconstitutional. But they busted him anyway just by coincindentally having a local cop help them out.
- Rev.I guess I have always been under the impression that governments are instituted to protect the general welfare of the citizens. Imprisonment, while necessary, is done for the good of the person being imprisoned as well as for the good of society. The death penalty only serves as a vehicle for societal revenge, not for rehabilitation. And allow me to repeat my salient point: I do not trust the government with my money, why should I trust them with my life?
- Rev.
Ahh, a Bill Hicks fan are we? Not that I mind..
- Rev.
IF YOU DON'T LIKE THE LAWS IN THIS COUNTRY (oh yeah, the freedoms, benefits, etc too) MOVE AWAY.
Ummm, no.
See, I believe that in order for a democracy to be effective, it's citizens must be active participants. Where they see shortcomings in the law, they should petition their representatives for redress. They should not up and move away en masse simply because they think some laws should be changed, even if those laws are a fundamental part of the fabric of government such as the Bill of Rights. There is this concept of a "marketplace of ideas" that has always appealed to me; the protesters in this case are simply placing themselves firmly in that marketplace.
By the way: As much as I personally disagree with the protester in question on some of his issues, I still applaud him for energetically injecting himself into the debate. Most people just play Diablo 2 or watch their favorite TV show. Distractions abound. The real world continues, and those in power like apathetic citizens.
- Rev.A careful consideration of the facts in the case, as well as the legal precedents set forth beforehand can lead to only one reasonable reaction to this decision by the states:
BWAAAAAHAHAHAAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHA!!
You fucking greedy bastards! We knew it all the time! You have absolutely no moral authority to tell Napster users what to do when you're criminals in your own right! Take a long walk off a short cliff, you RIAA scum!
Wow, that was totally juvenile. But I feel SO much better.
- Rev.And its not like the Liberals aren't hypocritcal either. I consider the first amendment (freedom of speech, religion, press, etc) and the second (right to bear arms) to be the exact same issue. While liberals will (rightly so) viscously protect the first amendment, they are completely against the second. It is the same issue--power of the government to control your life and actions. It is interesting that the ACLU will back you if any of your right granted in the Bill of Rights except the second ammendment.
There is, I'm sure you will agree, a certain level of disagreement over what the Founder's original intentions were in regards to the Second Amendment. Compared to the other items in the Bill of Rights, this Amendment is maddingly open for varying interpretations, depending upon where you choose to put your focus. When compared against the unambiguous prohibitions listed in the First Amendment, the Second leaves something to be desired insofar as clarity is concerned.
My point is only this: Different groups hold different views on how best to interpret this Amendment. This does not necessarily mean they are being hypocritical. They have a different interpretation of the Constitution. The ACLU is not a libertarian institution. They are for civil liberties, but are not generally considered libertarians.
- Rev.No such luck here, I'm Canadian. 11 bucks for the last pitcher of beer I had while in university.
That would cause me to take up arms against my oppressors! 11 bucks? For a pitcher? Holy christ! They're not that expensive at titty bars around here! And I'm talking the medium grade beer, too, not the cheap Milwaukee's Beast or Lone Star. Stuff like Bass or Shiner. Yeah.Actually, I bet most of you haven't heard of Shiner... It's a Texas brew...
Rev.We who can think for ourselves believe in the open projects developments and as it has our interest, we surely give it the worthy attention, as this is a project for everyone, you included albeit you have no clue yet. I have a dream of a useful browsing platform for all systems, mozilla is the closest thing, ie is the opponent. It basically is a war between good and evil.
Oh my god. Religious tones to a discussion about browsers? Come ON man, it's a fucking piece of SOFTWARE. Lighten UP. I know you find this hard to believe, but Netscape is not "good" because they are open source. They're still a corporation, owned, I'll remind you, by AOL/Time-Warner. They are in it for the profit, not for any overarching battle of good vs. evil.
Here's some advice: Go home, smoke a joint and RELAX. Do this and I assure you you'll realize that it just doesn't fucking matter at all in the bigger scheme of thigns. It really is not worth getting that worked up over, my bruthah. I haven't seen rhetoric like that since I went to a Baptist Church a few months ago. Oy. But they were talking about gays, not browsers. The tone was the same, though.
- Rev.Umm, I dunno. The capital-L libertarians are way to out there for me, man. I'm stickin with Nader. Yeah, I know, property rights, legalize drugs. Ok, I'm for that. But I do *not* think the state should be ransacked. I'm not a Randian, k? There are governmental agencies that do good things, occasionally, and there are cases (especially with regards to the environment and labor laws) where the government is needed to step in.
- Rev
Well, let's see. What's the difference between CT's opinion of Microsoft and GWB? Nothing, unless you consider that this is a technology web site, not a political one. I can stand someone's opinion of a technology, I don't read /. for a political opnion though.
So unless someone is an "expert" in politics, they shouldn't air their opinions?
See, that's the thing about a democracy. We're ALL experts. Even Rush Limbaugh [!]. I have an idea: As soon as you can get a web site that is as successful as /., you can feel free to NOT voice your political opinions.
Opinions are like assholes. Everyone has one and they all stink.
And do try to rise above tired cliches. Really. They're so demeaning.
- Rev.