Has there ever been a "Profound Lessons From Popular Movie / TV Show Book Series" that hasn't been completely stupid? The Tao of Pooh is probably the best of the lot, which isn't saying much.
When authors need to appropriate someone else's creation instead of coming up with their own, you can't expect much.
1) Talk to your corporate counsel. If they're not idiots (which isn't a given), they'll realize you're doing them a favor.
2) Don't sweat it. This is between you and your conscience. You may theoretically be liable for these violations, but nobody will be coming after you personally, especially if you have a paper trail covering your ass and super-especially if you've gone to your lawyers.
But, yeah, stuff liek this sucks, especially in a small company.
2) He doesn't really present any evidence for the problem other than hearsay from an official in Washington State. Neither of them presents any real numbers.
If this problem were really widespread, wouldn't we be hearing story after story from people being denied unemployment benefits because someone had already filed in their name? I agree -- this is pretty fishy.
Also, while IANAIT, it seems to me that screwing with credit card companies is safer than ripping off governments. The companies are in the business of assuming risk, writing off losses and passing them along to customers. It's governments who can pursue you without having to worry about the cost/benefit of doing so.
"...if one more person enters the building, it will be empty."
"No, but I know where I am."
"Yeah, her clothes probably wouldn't have fit you, anyway."
"Unix Airlines: You walk out to the runway and they give you a box of tools and some airplane parts. The passengers form into groups and start building twelve different planes."
Dude, it's not jargon. These are concepts in Economics, an established science. People have done lots of research and it does work this way.
Of course it works that way -- as I said, web sites are both excludable and rival, which is why there's a free-rider problem.
The guy to whom I responded used both the terminology and the theory inappropriately, which is why I proposed stepping outside the jargon and just thinking through a simple example.
Sorry, I still don't understand -- could you explain in more detail (to the degree that you can) what you're making and which parts need to be internationalized? And whether you're supporting two languages or twenty?
You're missing the point -- I'm not saying anything about "criminal", or even "wrong", necessarily. It's simply a question of money. Sites that depend on ad revenue won't be able to provide free content in the absence of revenue. Your or my personal righteousness has nothing to do with it.
That's a good point. But if operation of free sites with significant readership were to be limited to people who can subsidize them out of pocket or out of some other revenue stream, I'd call that a pretty serious change in the nature of web content, no?
If market forces don't work efficiently, then why will they take off the free content?
You have a good question buried under a lot of stupid, so let me explain...
Let's say you're willing to view ads to read this site for free, and so am I. Let's say the site can stay in business if only one of us view ads. But because we can both block ads, you do it and figure I'll view them and I block them and figure you'll view them. The site goes out of business, even though there was a more optimum alternative.
The freerider problem only applies to public goods that are excludable and rival. The Internet is neither excludable nor rival, and therefore is not a public good. And since it is not a public good, the freerider problem does not apply to it.
Whether or not "the Internet" is a public good (which may or may not be the case), free web content is most certainly excludable and rival. It's excludable in that access can easily be restricted and rival in that use costs the providers money to keep access available.
Forget the jargon and use some common sense. If all Slashdot readers stop viewing ads and their ad revenue disappears, Rob will or will not keep offering free access?
Blocking ads won't end free content on the Web. It will lead to innovation and new opportunities.
Perhaps, but requiring the creation of completely new forms and models of web content hardly contradicts Smith's point, does it?
Actually, free-rider situations like this are precisely where market forces don't work efficiently. Everyone reading this site while blocking ads is able to do so only because of people like me who do view them (and subscribers). And I free-ride at the expense of people who are willing to view pop-ups.
Bennie Smith is entirely correct -- if ad blocking becomes standard in popular browsers, that will be the end of free content on the web.
There's some charming irony in the choice of title for this rapturous ode to warez kiddiez -- a term cribbed from a group of Microsoft researchers and tossed around randomly by the author, in contempt of both its original meaning and any sort of sense. I guess I'm too old to appreciate "remix culture".
At any rate, while the reviewer may or may not be accurately representing the book, his description of the original paper as "shoveled dirt onto the coffin of DRM as a business model" is nonsensical.
...if the craft suffered "failure to enter orbit at all", presumably that means it hit space and kept going, right? I'd imagine someone would have noticed a Russian ICBM falling randomly out of the sky.
Furthermore, the average geek doesn't need to "count on forking over $297,000 a year on gifts, including Tiffany diamond earrings and necklaces for your lady friends."
But none of these articles bother to address whether the experiment was working up to the point of the vandalism. Sure the wikitorial was forked into a pro and con side, but were either of them any good?
I don't understand why you would use an editorial ("Wikitorial"? Yeesh...) as a first test for this model. Coverage of local issues seems a much more reasonable way to start, although that would first require the LAT to take an interest in local news.
Huh? The whole point of patents is to *force* disclosure, in exchange for short-term ownership of the invention. It's precisely to avoid the concern you mention.
(Not that I think business model patents are a good idea, just that his understanding of them is completely backwards...)
I understand the "How could anyone be stupid enough to fall for this?" response to Nigerian email scams. But phishing? Maybe you don't get the good ones, but it's next to impossible for even a relatively sophisticated user to distinguish them from authentic emails. I deal with phishing by deleting everything purporting to be from EBay or PayPal -- I sure as hell wouldn't trust my ability to safely follow links from any of them.
"What?" shriek the Slashbots, "If hot Brazilian chicks can't view the message HTML, traceroute the links and the redirects and WHOIS the resulting information, they shouldn't be allowed to use computers!" Perhaps, and perhaps me neither, but it doesn't surprise me that people get burned.
If the Harvard Business School types who descended like vultures on the former eastern bloc countries haven't worked so hard to savagely gut the social protection systems that were in place, there would not be so many criminals in those countries nowadays...
Uh, yeah, because under Ceausescu all these Romanian computer owners (with their free communications with the rest of the world) used their luxurious lifestyles for the betterment of the less fortunate...
Who said anything about "lazy"? My points were that a) you seemed to think that polymers as a class require particular concern about degradability and b) speculated that a) was driven by thinking of polymers primarily in terms of commercial plastics. (As opposed to, to give another example, collagen.)
I sincerely apologize if that came across as insulting, which I didn't intend. On the other hand, after reading your response, I don't think I was wrong about my original point.
Slashdot Mirror
When authors need to appropriate someone else's creation instead of coming up with their own, you can't expect much.
("NEC" here is the union's National Executive Committee, not Nippon Electric Company.)
We can disagree about the probability of the guy's getting screwed, but I think we agree that he'd be wise to take precautions against it.
1) Talk to your corporate counsel. If they're not idiots (which isn't a given), they'll realize you're doing them a favor.
2) Don't sweat it. This is between you and your conscience. You may theoretically be liable for these violations, but nobody will be coming after you personally, especially if you have a paper trail covering your ass and super-especially if you've gone to your lawyers.
But, yeah, stuff liek this sucks, especially in a small company.
If this problem were really widespread, wouldn't we be hearing story after story from people being denied unemployment benefits because someone had already filed in their name? I agree -- this is pretty fishy.
Also, while IANAIT, it seems to me that screwing with credit card companies is safer than ripping off governments. The companies are in the business of assuming risk, writing off losses and passing them along to customers. It's governments who can pursue you without having to worry about the cost/benefit of doing so.
That's what happens when one doubts the infallible wisdom of Steve...
"...but a talking frog is cool!"
"...if one more person enters the building, it will be empty."
"No, but I know where I am."
"Yeah, her clothes probably wouldn't have fit you, anyway."
"Unix Airlines: You walk out to the runway and they give you a box of tools and some airplane parts. The passengers form into groups and start building twelve different planes."
Have I missed anything?
Of course it works that way -- as I said, web sites are both excludable and rival, which is why there's a free-rider problem.
The guy to whom I responded used both the terminology and the theory inappropriately, which is why I proposed stepping outside the jargon and just thinking through a simple example.
Sorry, I still don't understand -- could you explain in more detail (to the degree that you can) what you're making and which parts need to be internationalized? And whether you're supporting two languages or twenty?
You're missing the point -- I'm not saying anything about "criminal", or even "wrong", necessarily. It's simply a question of money. Sites that depend on ad revenue won't be able to provide free content in the absence of revenue. Your or my personal righteousness has nothing to do with it.
I figured he's a horse...
That's a good point. But if operation of free sites with significant readership were to be limited to people who can subsidize them out of pocket or out of some other revenue stream, I'd call that a pretty serious change in the nature of web content, no?
You have a good question buried under a lot of stupid, so let me explain...
Let's say you're willing to view ads to read this site for free, and so am I. Let's say the site can stay in business if only one of us view ads. But because we can both block ads, you do it and figure I'll view them and I block them and figure you'll view them. The site goes out of business, even though there was a more optimum alternative.
Whether or not "the Internet" is a public good (which may or may not be the case), free web content is most certainly excludable and rival. It's excludable in that access can easily be restricted and rival in that use costs the providers money to keep access available.
Forget the jargon and use some common sense. If all Slashdot readers stop viewing ads and their ad revenue disappears, Rob will or will not keep offering free access?
Blocking ads won't end free content on the Web. It will lead to innovation and new opportunities.
Perhaps, but requiring the creation of completely new forms and models of web content hardly contradicts Smith's point, does it?
Actually, free-rider situations like this are precisely where market forces don't work efficiently. Everyone reading this site while blocking ads is able to do so only because of people like me who do view them (and subscribers). And I free-ride at the expense of people who are willing to view pop-ups.
Bennie Smith is entirely correct -- if ad blocking becomes standard in popular browsers, that will be the end of free content on the web.
At any rate, while the reviewer may or may not be accurately representing the book, his description of the original paper as "shoveled dirt onto the coffin of DRM as a business model" is nonsensical.
Sure, but at least they go over better than X11 apps!
...if the craft suffered "failure to enter orbit at all", presumably that means it hit space and kept going, right? I'd imagine someone would have noticed a Russian ICBM falling randomly out of the sky.
Furthermore, the average geek doesn't need to "count on forking over $297,000 a year on gifts, including Tiffany diamond earrings and necklaces for your lady friends."
I don't understand why you would use an editorial ("Wikitorial"? Yeesh...) as a first test for this model. Coverage of local issues seems a much more reasonable way to start, although that would first require the LAT to take an interest in local news.
(Not that I think business model patents are a good idea, just that his understanding of them is completely backwards...)
"What?" shriek the Slashbots, "If hot Brazilian chicks can't view the message HTML, traceroute the links and the redirects and WHOIS the resulting information, they shouldn't be allowed to use computers!" Perhaps, and perhaps me neither, but it doesn't surprise me that people get burned.
Uh, yeah, because under Ceausescu all these Romanian computer owners (with their free communications with the rest of the world) used their luxurious lifestyles for the betterment of the less fortunate...
I sincerely apologize if that came across as insulting, which I didn't intend. On the other hand, after reading your response, I don't think I was wrong about my original point.
My take on Nvu...