Please please please do it from Maryland! Then we can add the UCITA click-wrap licenses to the whole mess.
Re:You actually ELECT these people?
on
MPAA vs. Television
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
"Which is why people need to inform them of issues that should matter to them."
Why should this matter to them? Seriously. Have you ever tried to talk to average people about this stuff? I come from a fairly typical blue-collar community. I've tried explaining these types of things, using some of the most easy to comprehend methods around. The great majority still either do not get it or could care less. They just want tax breaks, decent schools and other public services, and health care. Recording TV shows is going to be about last on their list.
"Why do candidates always talk about a few key issues when they're up for office?"
Because thats what matters to voters, no matter how it starts, opinion poll research will still say campaign finance, abortion, etc. That's what matters to everyday Americans. And I can just imagine the first average person raising a ruckus about recording TV shows. His neighbors would quickly label him an idiot, since there are so many other, more compelling things to be concerned with, like better schools and health care.
This is _not_ a sexy issue. It will not be a big attention grabber. The average voter is not going to be the one fighting this, it will be the companies who stand to lose if it happens. VCR makers, TIVO, etc. Joe Sixpack just wants the potholes on his street fixed, a safe school for little Jimmy, and health care thats good enough so he can afford it if he takes ill. Frankly I can't blame him.
What matters to you and I is generally no one elses concern.
Re:You actually ELECT these people?
on
MPAA vs. Television
·
· Score: 3, Insightful
"The problem is that the minority of people who actually vote are uninformed and ignorant to the issues that really matter."
Actually, the problem is that to those who vote, these types of issues DON'T matter. I'd be willing to bet they have a laundry list of concerns before they get to stuff that the slashcrowd cares about.
Exactly. So what happens if a Palladium/DRM(P/DRM) scheme is widely implemented? Will Macs and P/DRM pc's have some issue accessing one anothers content? Gate's has been talking about altering internet protocols, how the hell does he plan to do that? Sounds like bad news if you ask me.
Having seen MacWorld NY and nifty little gizmos like a 20gig iPod that should have media corps coughing up hairballs in a matter of days, what of Palladium and DRM when it comes to Apple?
Now granted the **AA's would just love to have a very tight DRM system, and Palladium underneath it all would be like a market research holy grail(knowing the marketeers behavior), but thats all at this point a Windows thing.
Setting aside OSS for the moment, what about the few other players? Apple primarily, but there are a few others. And what if someone wants to truely innovate a new OS?
This is _way_ too controlling a system. I think the barrier to entry would effectively become a steel bulkhead (for any truely new OS).
And what exactly is Apple's position on all this? Especially since OS X. And sooner or later there will be a fairly usable Darwin for x86. If the hardware begins to limit the software as is predicted, them perhaps MS should just make its own hardware for its new OS's. Open up its abandon-ware for the rest of us and strike out along the path of Apple.
Frankly I think all of this is going to fail. And no system will be secure until we can get rid of the users =P
Agreed. Bombadil was more of a fixture of the land, something that was part of Middle Earth. The land had power itself, which was ignored in the movie. Case in point, Saruman did not prevent the party from taking the high pass over the mountains, the _mountain_ itself defeated them.
Sorry, wasn't really going for historical accuracy, just the "Hey, suddenly we (PTB) don't have control of the info anymore" aspect of the whole mess. This arena of history isn't my specialty, and I skipped alot (like typewriters =P).
I agree whole-heartedly that the confusion (copyright/property right) that is happening is very counterproductive. Copyright has outlived its usefulness and should be replaced or limited severely.
DATs? I miss DATs. There are plenty of instances of the gov't screwing with products and technologies, look at the timing on the patent for nylon as an example. Of, for and by the people? Doubt it.
"Pretty soon, we could be burning these shows onto DVDs with DVD-like quality and giving them to people."
Your point? So you can record at a higher quality, big deal. This is _EXACTLY_ like someone with cable taping a show from a broadcast network for a friend with crappy "rabbit-ears" reception. The video editing you speak of is already easy enough to do with todays (or last tuesdays) tech.
Media companies need to adapt their business models, not buy laws to prop up their outdated plans.
All of this is a total rehash of the printing press.
Years ago there was no mass publishing, information could be tightly controlled, accessable by only those with the books, or access to them, or those with the sizable sum necessary to pay a scribe to copy one.
Along comes Gutenberg and his printing press, all hell breaks loose. Suddenly the cost of reproducing data decreases, consequently it costs less to purchase as well, so there are more who can afford it. The Powers That Be (PTB) freak out completely, and begin to exert all manner of controls over the presses and the publishers.
After some time the PTB settle on a concept called copyright. Which was ok at the time, presses were still relatively rare and pricey, and it helped apease the small number of authors and scribes who were upset. But more importantly it allowed the PTB to control to some extent the dispersal of information.
Hop forward to today, now everyone it seems has their own press in the form of a PC, the PTB flip again, because their former solution is basically obsolete, no matter what the seem to try to adapt the system. Creators and publishers are up in arms again, but what can be done.
I haven't a clue where this will settle, but I do have a feeling that I'm not going to like it. Time to begin hoarding old hardware.
When I can go to Blockbuster and rent Photoshop for a weekend (just like a PS2 game) cuz I want to play around with some personal photos then there won't be a need to pirate it.
"a 'definitive' Star Wars game has not been forthcoming."
I'd have to disagree with that, Tie Fighter was pretty damn good, as were several of the other SW related offerings. But there hasn't been a definative SW RPG (for computer that is, West End Games original Star Wars Roleplaying Game was pretty good). These arent really RPG's either, just FPS's with a plotline. True RPG's (as in dice and paper) are great because you can totally derail the plotline if you want (SCREW YOU MISTER 10x10 FOOT STONE CORRIDOR!). MUDs and their successors are fairly good equivalents but I don't think I've seen a stand-alone game that comes anywhere near true RPG. Too limited in plot options.
"If everyone and his mother is camped out in the woods behind your house, using your cable connection, suddenly MY connection slows down as well."
Its not HIS problem that cable broadband is such a poor architecture. Cable performance degrades far too much based on your physical neighbors' usage. Good luck to you if you life in an area heavily populated by college students.
Has anyone noticed that the modern assumption is that every computer will be connected to the internet? While it may be looking that way I find the assumption a bit unnerving. When will it get to the point when it becomes a requirement?
Ad supported anything on the net is a bad idea I think. Hell, the only ads I pay attention to any more are radio or TV spots, and then only if the seem exceptionally creative or funny. The product is inconsequencial, I buy what fits my needs, and if I need something I go looking for it. Never understood advertising.
True, but there's another angle to this. Allowing Sealand to exist, essentially within UK territorial waters means no one can touch it without the UK's OK. So, if anyone (some UK intelligence service) wanted to run some cyber-ops off of Sealand-based equipment, then they would be blameless. Trace an intruder to Sealand, can't just roll up and grab the place, unless you want to take on the British navy. I don't know how this would work with any acceptable use policies and so forth, but an independant "nation" essentially within your own borders can be made into one hell of an asset.
Because they are designing something on a computer, to be used and displayed by a computer, thru various browsers/programs. Computers operate via code. Code is what people use to operate a computer, usually with an intermediary application or program of some kind. If the web designer doen't want to learn how the code that governs his/her creative work operates then let them go back to pencil and paper and then have someone who knows how to program translate their creation into something a machine will understand.
And as far as: "If, as many Slashdot readers regularly bang on about, the Web is an open environment that everyone can take part it, why is there such eliteism in terms of "Oh, this isn't programmed quite right - therefore they suck"."...thats why there are graduate level programs in Digital Design at art schools now. The web is an open environment, if all you want to do is put information out, you don't need alot of design skills, just basic HTML programming knowledge. If you want to get fancy or complex, then you do, just like everything else.
All I see is the huge pain in the neck caused by having to rebuild all these brand new WinXP systems into Win98 boxes because thats what our standard platform is, and will be, unless we want Peoplesoft to stop working. M$'s OS schemes are pretty costly to us, but mostly because management will only buy from big name OEM's (Dell) because users don't want anything that isn't carrying a big brand name.
M$ isn't considering that without 100% backward compatibility, they are putting alot of people in a bind, especially if they are using apps/systems that are tuned to specific OS's (like Win98)
Glad to see he made it all the way thru that without a single 9/11 reference, but I think I still need to go with Taco on this one, it was pretty weak compared to the original.
Slashdot Mirror
Heh.
More like within 30 minutes. And it'll be a high school kid.
Oh. My. God.
Please please please do it from Maryland! Then we can add the UCITA click-wrap licenses to the whole mess.
"Which is why people need to inform them of issues that should matter to them."
Why should this matter to them? Seriously. Have you ever tried to talk to average people about this stuff? I come from a fairly typical blue-collar community. I've tried explaining these types of things, using some of the most easy to comprehend methods around. The great majority still either do not get it or could care less. They just want tax breaks, decent schools and other public services, and health care. Recording TV shows is going to be about last on their list.
"Why do candidates always talk about a few key issues when they're up for office?"
Because thats what matters to voters, no matter how it starts, opinion poll research will still say campaign finance, abortion, etc. That's what matters to everyday Americans. And I can just imagine the first average person raising a ruckus about recording TV shows. His neighbors would quickly label him an idiot, since there are so many other, more compelling things to be concerned with, like better schools and health care.
This is _not_ a sexy issue. It will not be a big attention grabber. The average voter is not going to be the one fighting this, it will be the companies who stand to lose if it happens. VCR makers, TIVO, etc. Joe Sixpack just wants the potholes on his street fixed, a safe school for little Jimmy, and health care thats good enough so he can afford it if he takes ill. Frankly I can't blame him.
What matters to you and I is generally no one elses concern.
"The problem is that the minority of people who actually vote are uninformed and ignorant to the issues that really matter."
Actually, the problem is that to those who vote, these types of issues DON'T matter. I'd be willing to bet they have a laundry list of concerns before they get to stuff that the slashcrowd cares about.
As if there wasn't a fairly good chance that HDTV adoption was doomed before.
Exactly. So what happens if a Palladium/DRM(P/DRM) scheme is widely implemented? Will Macs and P/DRM pc's have some issue accessing one anothers content? Gate's has been talking about altering internet protocols, how the hell does he plan to do that? Sounds like bad news if you ask me.
Having seen MacWorld NY and nifty little gizmos like a 20gig iPod that should have media corps coughing up hairballs in a matter of days, what of Palladium and DRM when it comes to Apple?
Now granted the **AA's would just love to have a very tight DRM system, and Palladium underneath it all would be like a market research holy grail(knowing the marketeers behavior), but thats all at this point a Windows thing.
Setting aside OSS for the moment, what about the few other players? Apple primarily, but there are a few others. And what if someone wants to truely innovate a new OS?
This is _way_ too controlling a system. I think the barrier to entry would effectively become a steel bulkhead (for any truely new OS).
And what exactly is Apple's position on all this? Especially since OS X. And sooner or later there will be a fairly usable Darwin for x86. If the hardware begins to limit the software as is predicted, them perhaps MS should just make its own hardware for its new OS's. Open up its abandon-ware for the rest of us and strike out along the path of Apple.
Frankly I think all of this is going to fail. And no system will be secure until we can get rid of the users =P
Agreed. Bombadil was more of a fixture of the land, something that was part of Middle Earth. The land had power itself, which was ignored in the movie. Case in point, Saruman did not prevent the party from taking the high pass over the mountains, the _mountain_ itself defeated them.
I'm a little puzzled why Aragorn wasn't carrying the broken sword as in the book. If nothing else it's a support to his claim of the thrown of Gondor.
Sorry, wasn't really going for historical accuracy, just the "Hey, suddenly we (PTB) don't have control of the info anymore" aspect of the whole mess. This arena of history isn't my specialty, and I skipped alot (like typewriters =P).
I agree whole-heartedly that the confusion (copyright/property right) that is happening is very counterproductive. Copyright has outlived its usefulness and should be replaced or limited severely.
DATs? I miss DATs. There are plenty of instances of the gov't screwing with products and technologies, look at the timing on the patent for nylon as an example. Of, for and by the people? Doubt it.
"Pretty soon, we could be burning these shows onto DVDs with DVD-like quality and giving them to people."
Your point? So you can record at a higher quality, big deal. This is _EXACTLY_ like someone with cable taping a show from a broadcast network for a friend with crappy "rabbit-ears" reception. The video editing you speak of is already easy enough to do with todays (or last tuesdays) tech.
Media companies need to adapt their business models, not buy laws to prop up their outdated plans.
All of this is a total rehash of the printing press.
Years ago there was no mass publishing, information could be tightly controlled, accessable by only those with the books, or access to them, or those with the sizable sum necessary to pay a scribe to copy one.
Along comes Gutenberg and his printing press, all hell breaks loose. Suddenly the cost of reproducing data decreases, consequently it costs less to purchase as well, so there are more who can afford it. The Powers That Be (PTB) freak out completely, and begin to exert all manner of controls over the presses and the publishers.
After some time the PTB settle on a concept called copyright. Which was ok at the time, presses were still relatively rare and pricey, and it helped apease the small number of authors and scribes who were upset. But more importantly it allowed the PTB to control to some extent the dispersal of information.
Hop forward to today, now everyone it seems has their own press in the form of a PC, the PTB flip again, because their former solution is basically obsolete, no matter what the seem to try to adapt the system. Creators and publishers are up in arms again, but what can be done.
I haven't a clue where this will settle, but I do have a feeling that I'm not going to like it. Time to begin hoarding old hardware.
When I can go to Blockbuster and rent Photoshop for a weekend (just like a PS2 game) cuz I want to play around with some personal photos then there won't be a need to pirate it.
"a 'definitive' Star Wars game has not been forthcoming."
I'd have to disagree with that, Tie Fighter was pretty damn good, as were several of the other SW related offerings. But there hasn't been a definative SW RPG (for computer that is, West End Games original Star Wars Roleplaying Game was pretty good). These arent really RPG's either, just FPS's with a plotline. True RPG's (as in dice and paper) are great because you can totally derail the plotline if you want (SCREW YOU MISTER 10x10 FOOT STONE CORRIDOR!). MUDs and their successors are fairly good equivalents but I don't think I've seen a stand-alone game that comes anywhere near true RPG. Too limited in plot options.
" It's kind of hard to imagine anybody but Christopher Reeve as the Man of Steel"
True enough, but I vote Bruce Campbell. Its all in the chin, baby.
"If everyone and his mother is camped out in the woods behind your house, using your cable connection, suddenly MY connection slows down as well."
Its not HIS problem that cable broadband is such a poor architecture. Cable performance degrades far too much based on your physical neighbors' usage. Good luck to you if you life in an area heavily populated by college students.
Well, now you've done it, no free passes for you.
Has anyone noticed that the modern assumption is that every computer will be connected to the internet? While it may be looking that way I find the assumption a bit unnerving. When will it get to the point when it becomes a requirement?
Ad supported anything on the net is a bad idea I think. Hell, the only ads I pay attention to any more are radio or TV spots, and then only if the seem exceptionally creative or funny. The product is inconsequencial, I buy what fits my needs, and if I need something I go looking for it. Never understood advertising.
True, but there's another angle to this. Allowing Sealand to exist, essentially within UK territorial waters means no one can touch it without the UK's OK. So, if anyone (some UK intelligence service) wanted to run some cyber-ops off of Sealand-based equipment, then they would be blameless. Trace an intruder to Sealand, can't just roll up and grab the place, unless you want to take on the British navy. I don't know how this would work with any acceptable use policies and so forth, but an independant "nation" essentially within your own borders can be made into one hell of an asset.
Because they are designing something on a computer, to be used and displayed by a computer, thru various browsers/programs. Computers operate via code. Code is what people use to operate a computer, usually with an intermediary application or program of some kind. If the web designer doen't want to learn how the code that governs his/her creative work operates then let them go back to pencil and paper and then have someone who knows how to program translate their creation into something a machine will understand.
...thats why there are graduate level programs in Digital Design at art schools now. The web is an open environment, if all you want to do is put information out, you don't need alot of design skills, just basic HTML programming knowledge. If you want to get fancy or complex, then you do, just like everything else.
And as far as: "If, as many Slashdot readers regularly bang on about, the Web is an open environment that everyone can take part it, why is there such eliteism in terms of "Oh, this isn't programmed quite right - therefore they suck"."
...instead of just using Frontpage for everything, we wouldn't necessarily have this problem.
Oh, and what's the point really, of a Standards Body, if they can't to an extent enforce the standards? Just a thought.
All I see is the huge pain in the neck caused by having to rebuild all these brand new WinXP systems into Win98 boxes because thats what our standard platform is, and will be, unless we want Peoplesoft to stop working. M$'s OS schemes are pretty costly to us, but mostly because management will only buy from big name OEM's (Dell) because users don't want anything that isn't carrying a big brand name.
M$ isn't considering that without 100% backward compatibility, they are putting alot of people in a bind, especially if they are using apps/systems that are tuned to specific OS's (like Win98)
Agreed. And Guy Pearce is the only one who should play Constantine. Movie studios suck.
Glad to see he made it all the way thru that without a single 9/11 reference, but I think I still need to go with Taco on this one, it was pretty weak compared to the original.
I think all this mess can be traced back to the fact that everyone on earth seems to be an actor/waiter/web-designer.
So now it seems the inability to have skilled web design is somehow the fault of third parties who want to deep link?
Stupid. Now if you'll excuse me, I need to finish my 45 minute long Cold Fusion developer program.