Except we're not talking about your ISP, but your ISP's ISP. Even if you switch to a cable company, odds are your traffic will still be running on Bell wires. BellSouth wouldn't be playing with this kind of extortion if they didn't already have the power to carry through on their threat.
"I wonder where our current creative interpretation that copyright trumps the 1st amendment came from?"
Looking at the examples of other repealed content in the Constitution, the First would either have to rewrite the offending content entirely (as was done with the Eleventh Amendment, the second section of the Fourteenth Amendment and the Seventeenth Amendment), or include explicit words like "is hereby repealed" (Twenty-First Amendment). Unless or until there's a new amendment that says something like "The Congress shall not have the power to secure for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries," the First Amendment and the Copyright Clause will have to coexist as far as the federal courts are concerned.
"Are you suggesting the Supreme Court did not have a Constitutional basis for its decision in the Betamax decision?"
It may have had a statutory basis, but that doesn't mean it's a constitutional basis.
"Congress is free to pass whatever law(s) it likes (even Bills of Attainder). But when the law(s) passed is/are unconstitutional, they aren't worth the paper they are written on"
But the Supreme Court has consistently ruled that the matter of copyright laws are a purely legislative field (i. e. a political question) and has kept a hands-off approach on all such matters. Betamax was considered fair use because the court felt it fell into the definitions provided by then-existing statute, but Congress has the power to change statutes. If Congress wants to grant "exclusive rights" in new and interesting ways, so long as everybody still has default rights over their own speech (at least before they sign a contract), there's little the courts will say about it.
Or would you rather see the federal courts get even more politicized?
"But over the long term, the music industry says, Congress should find a way to regulate these new digital radio networks so labels can get paid when consumers keep copies of songs, as is the case with iTunes."
So they want to be paid by both the broadcasters and the listeners? Paid twice for the same product? If that's the case, will the RIAA be charging broadcasters less money for broadcasting songs with the metaphorical broadcast flag set, or will the prices continue to remain as high as they are even though they'll also be seeing money from recorders?
"Isn't it considered "fair use" to record a broadcast for personal use? "
"Fair use" is based on the ol' Supreme Court Betamax decision. Unless and until you're able to find a constitutional basis for "fair use," however, Congress can pass a law overturning the court decision. Basically, the court saying "It's not against the law" leaves the door open for Congress to change what the law says.
"Some techies say PlayStation 3, which may debut by midyear and could end up in 100 million homes in five years, will usher in the next microchip revolution."
You mean the kind of microchip that phones home?
Between the rootkit and the newer, more draconian DRM that's sure to come with the Blu-Ray drive they're putting in every unit, I'm just a little more than wary about buying Sony's next console offering.
"Well, Sally, guess what? 17 year olds cannot go to certain movies. 17 year olds cannot buy Playboy. 17 year olds cannot buy the X-Channel."
You can't make claims like these without backing them up. Go look through your state's statutes and find out exactly where it is illegal to give a minor any of the content you just listed.
99.9% of the time, what you just listed is nothing more than store or theater policy, not law. The other 0.1% gets consistently struck down as unconstitutional. The only reason nobody hears about "saving the children" from any of them to the same degree as we hear it about video games is that all those other media forms are decades older and the battles have already been fought (and lost).
"That's not the point from Valve's perspective. If I was providing downloads of a popular TV show and inserting my own commercials in it, the producer of that show would expect compensation."
No, the producer of the show would demand compensation regardless. Once an affiliate has bought and paid for the rights to distribute a show, it is out of the producer's hands whether or not there is any advertising included or how much of it there is.
The only way the producer could control the way the content was distributed would be through a clause in the license. And unless the game's license says "you can distribute the maps you make with this software freely, so long as you don't put any advertising into it," I don't see how Valve can have a leg to stand on.
"Valve's Doug Lombardi: 'Advertising or any other commercial use of our games requires our written permission.'"
Translation: we want our cut!
I might feel sympathy if their stance was "There will be no advertising in our games," but as it stands now I couldn't care less. Let the lawyers deal with it.
"And the writer even bashes the wrong game with wrong game! You don't splat Ocarina of Time with MGS. Nope! You need Final Fantasy VII to splat that. Duh."
Except that OoT outsold Final Fantasy VII.
It's been years since OoT launched, and it continues to be the only game for which I stood in line before the store opened. I have never seen that kind of reaction for a game again.
Considering the fuel efficiencies possible with fusion, the real test is if you can forsake all those wires from the power company and instead set up Mr. Fusion in some corner of your own garage.
Slashdot Mirror
Except we're not talking about your ISP, but your ISP's ISP. Even if you switch to a cable company, odds are your traffic will still be running on Bell wires. BellSouth wouldn't be playing with this kind of extortion if they didn't already have the power to carry through on their threat.
"I was under the impression that the Japanese market wasn't a kind place to racing games."
Actually, driving games tend to do better in Japan than the United States, where people are far more likely to go out and drive a real car.
"The DS could definately benefit from a redesign: it needs more than just the traditional directional pad,"
Hey, I know what they could do! They could make one of the screens touch-sensitive!
"Dude. Sneaker Net is obsolete. Fucking transfer your data over the network."
People still have dial-up and, when it comes to sending 4.9 GB, I'll take the high-bandwidth/high-latency USPS WAN option over 56k any day.
"I wonder where our current creative interpretation that copyright trumps the 1st amendment came from?"
Looking at the examples of other repealed content in the Constitution, the First would either have to rewrite the offending content entirely (as was done with the Eleventh Amendment, the second section of the Fourteenth Amendment and the Seventeenth Amendment), or include explicit words like "is hereby repealed" (Twenty-First Amendment). Unless or until there's a new amendment that says something like "The Congress shall not have the power to secure for limited times to authors and inventors the exclusive right to their respective writings and discoveries," the First Amendment and the Copyright Clause will have to coexist as far as the federal courts are concerned.
"Are you suggesting the Supreme Court did not have a Constitutional basis for its decision in the Betamax decision?"
It may have had a statutory basis, but that doesn't mean it's a constitutional basis.
"Congress is free to pass whatever law(s) it likes (even Bills of Attainder). But when the law(s) passed is/are unconstitutional, they aren't worth the paper they are written on"
But the Supreme Court has consistently ruled that the matter of copyright laws are a purely legislative field (i. e. a political question) and has kept a hands-off approach on all such matters. Betamax was considered fair use because the court felt it fell into the definitions provided by then-existing statute, but Congress has the power to change statutes. If Congress wants to grant "exclusive rights" in new and interesting ways, so long as everybody still has default rights over their own speech (at least before they sign a contract), there's little the courts will say about it.
Or would you rather see the federal courts get even more politicized?
Surely an audiophile such as yourself would demand nothing less than vinyl!
"But over the long term, the music industry says, Congress should find a way to regulate these new digital radio networks so labels can get paid when consumers keep copies of songs, as is the case with iTunes."
So they want to be paid by both the broadcasters and the listeners? Paid twice for the same product? If that's the case, will the RIAA be charging broadcasters less money for broadcasting songs with the metaphorical broadcast flag set, or will the prices continue to remain as high as they are even though they'll also be seeing money from recorders?
The US has the best legislature money can buy!
"Isn't it considered "fair use" to record a broadcast for personal use? "
"Fair use" is based on the ol' Supreme Court Betamax decision. Unless and until you're able to find a constitutional basis for "fair use," however, Congress can pass a law overturning the court decision. Basically, the court saying "It's not against the law" leaves the door open for Congress to change what the law says.
Read the first paragraph of my post: find the law. Give me statutes, not hypotheticals.
"Some techies say PlayStation 3, which may debut by midyear and could end up in 100 million homes in five years, will usher in the next microchip revolution."
You mean the kind of microchip that phones home?
Between the rootkit and the newer, more draconian DRM that's sure to come with the Blu-Ray drive they're putting in every unit, I'm just a little more than wary about buying Sony's next console offering.
So is Microsoft, owners of Gator^WClaria. What's your point?
I don't feel so bad about wind power any more.
"Instead of this, why not get a real dog??"
Read two posts up.
When these two trolls cancel each other out, is there energy released?
"Well, Sally, guess what? 17 year olds cannot go to certain movies. 17 year olds cannot buy Playboy. 17 year olds cannot buy the X-Channel."
You can't make claims like these without backing them up. Go look through your state's statutes and find out exactly where it is illegal to give a minor any of the content you just listed.
99.9% of the time, what you just listed is nothing more than store or theater policy, not law. The other 0.1% gets consistently struck down as unconstitutional. The only reason nobody hears about "saving the children" from any of them to the same degree as we hear it about video games is that all those other media forms are decades older and the battles have already been fought (and lost).
"That's not the point from Valve's perspective. If I was providing downloads of a popular TV show and inserting my own commercials in it, the producer of that show would expect compensation."
No, the producer of the show would demand compensation regardless. Once an affiliate has bought and paid for the rights to distribute a show, it is out of the producer's hands whether or not there is any advertising included or how much of it there is.
The only way the producer could control the way the content was distributed would be through a clause in the license. And unless the game's license says "you can distribute the maps you make with this software freely, so long as you don't put any advertising into it," I don't see how Valve can have a leg to stand on.
"Valve's Doug Lombardi: 'Advertising or any other commercial use of our games requires our written permission.'"
Translation: we want our cut!
I might feel sympathy if their stance was "There will be no advertising in our games," but as it stands now I couldn't care less. Let the lawyers deal with it.
No, he's saying that it'd be better for you to go outside before you start to masturbate for 10 hours a day.
That's it! The patent is for a "braking system," but (so far) nobody holds a patent on a "breaking system!"
A game from a Japanese publisher focusing on an Italian character... I'm not so sure Mario would be playing the Normandy invasion on the winning side.
"AMD will deliver but not in the near future like the poster states."
Perhaps, but rest assured that, when AMD does deliver, the damned thing will be backwards compatible without software emulation.
"But personally i dont play fighting games for amazing rendered titties.
There's another reason?"
Of course: the amazing rendered booties!
"And the writer even bashes the wrong game with wrong game! You don't splat Ocarina of Time with MGS. Nope! You need Final Fantasy VII to splat that. Duh."
Except that OoT outsold Final Fantasy VII.
It's been years since OoT launched, and it continues to be the only game for which I stood in line before the store opened. I have never seen that kind of reaction for a game again.
Distribute a replacement disk.
Considering the fuel efficiencies possible with fusion, the real test is if you can forsake all those wires from the power company and instead set up Mr. Fusion in some corner of your own garage.