After the sheer number of horrors that came out of there - both PR and game - I'd expected Romero's time to be limited. Daikatana was, I think, just the final blow. Most of their games were either fatally flawed or just out of date.
The result was machines in sealed boxes, guilds where the methods of manufacture were kept secret by draconian contract, and licenses or contracts prohibiting the reverse engineering of goods sold.
Ah. So we're seeing one giant step BACKWARDS the past few years, then.
----
He was a man, take him for all in all,
I shall not look upon his like again.
--William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), "Hamlet", Act 1 scene 2
I think, friends, this is a sad day for humanity. One of us hairless apes who could really see the absurdity of our entire condition has passed on, and left us without someone to gently point it out.
"Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so."
-- Douglas Adams
I suggest you read the original that Rob refer to in the 'from' section. It was by the Jonathan Swift, who also wrote Gulliver's Travels, equally as savage a social satire in the day. It wasn't a kid's book then, it was a savaging of the social strata.
For those that cannot spare the time, the essay concerns his suggestion that, in 1729, when famine, overpopulation and poverty were in staggering proportion in Ireland, that the Irish eat their own children. The point being that the Irish had to do something about their problems, because the BRITISH certainly weren't going to help... ----
Two friends of mine got married near Syracuse, NY.
The Bride was registered at CompUSA.
The Groom was registered at Crazy Egor's Game Shop.
It was an interesting wedding. ----
The Church of Scamitology has been, for quite a while, trying to control information on themselves on the Net in order to suppress anyone who might say anything bad about them. Their online attacks have included spamming newsgroups and the first set of Cease and Desist letters sent to people for web and Usenet postings (of the infamous top-level Scientology secrets).
They've also been known to use private investigators to gather information on the individuals they consider enemies; burglary of places containing information they need removed from the public view; threats towards cult enemies. There is even an official document from Hubbard which declares any enemy of the cult to be, basically, free target for any Scamitologist that wants to wipe them.
This has to do with your rights online and offline. They'll do anything they feel is right to stop anyone from leaking information about their cult. All someone has to do is make a bad noise about them on the net, and if they think its worth their while, they'll try to destroy them. This case is one of them. There's been others. Go look for yourself. You have a brain. Use it. ----
Thank you for your submission for immigration from the Earth. We have, at this time, detemined the Ravenous Giant Space Goat is approaching quickly, and have placed you on the 'B' Ark. Your cutting-edge legal department has earned you this exciting place on the first Ark to be launched!
Please report to the launch site in Indonesia near Krakatoa (see map) no later than March 1, 2001, for in order to be properly processed and boarded.
We thank you for your submission and are certain that you and your other people on the 'B' Ark will help make New Earth a success!
Regards, The Society For The Preservation Of Earth. ----
Re:What control of web viewing means...
on
Clever Girl Bess
·
· Score: 2
The software should also cache whose account the content went to, and then the student can be held accountable for his own actions
Oh, come on. This is the USA. NO ONE is accountable for their own actions anymore. It doesn't matter what the hell happens, there's always some way for some idiot to get around it. Booze, pills, LACK of pills, my mother was mean to me this morning, there's a funny man walking by outside, it's raining, it's NOT raining, it's sunny, it's cloudy...
See, your idea makes SENSE. So of course it would be ignored by the mainstream, because they don't want to take responsibility for anything. Parents think their children are little angels, and if a teacher tries to say otherwise, they organize a group of people and get RID of the teacher.
And then, four years later, another Columbine. Because the people that were willing to listen or actually listened were chased away. ----
To a hardcore geek, "Open" and "Source" are like the nipples on the breasts of Jennifer Love Hewitt.
I disagree. There's nothing like the breasts of Jennifer Love Hewitt. Not that I know from personal experience, but I will say that they do look very nice in her movies. And I find them much more enjoyable to look at than 99% of the code I stare at on a regular basis. (The other 1% in enjoyable in a "What in the name of God was this maniac thinking?" sort of way.)
----
These hardsuits were built as promotional tools for the original Bubblegum Crisis series. If you watch some of the promos on the BGC tapes or DVDs, there's scenes of the voice actresses for the Knight Sabres wearing them. Three of them were given or sold (depending on who you talk to) to the head of AnimEigo, Robert "I helped write Wizardry" Woodhead. The suits are reasonably articulated - you get to see, in one of the promos, Oomori Kinuko (the voice actress for Priss) wearing one and at least on a motorcycle, if not driving it.
The Nene and Linna are being sold. Woodhead is keeping the Priss suit. No one's sure where the Sylia suit is anymore.
So this isn't a cosplay sort of thing. This is promo stuff and literally one-of-a-kind. ----
I'd say that BT was stupid here, but if you read The Register, you'd know that they're stupid just about EVERYWHERE.
I think we need to get the BOFH a job there., He'd sort them out... ----
Any electronic surveillance involves balancing needs for effective enforcement of the criminal laws and protection of national security against threats of invasion of privacy. It is appropriate for the public to be concerned about how this balance is struck.
In the past, the FBI and the other groups in the Federal Government have tried to shove the balance completely to their own side. This has given us a significant amount of distrust in their motives. From the CDAs to Operation Sundevil, they have shown a lack of comprehension of the issue they have to deal with, instead avoiding the hard questions for the easy ones. And more and more often, they've gotten slapped down, and I think that's starting to make them very very cranky. And they want something that'll move the balance the way they want, and that no one can take away from them. And they think Carnivore is it.
The Internet community appropriately has been concerned about technological developments that may affect the balance, including restrictions on encryption, development of new telecommunication systems that facilitate or hamper electronic eavesdropping and devices such as Carnivore.
The FBI has, in every case, tried to push to have back-doors put into encryption methods that they can access. Into IPsec. Let's not forget Clipper all those years ago. While I can understand there are potentially pressing reasons for these restrictions in the name of National Security, what's going to keep these people who would use encryption from snagging a half-dozen comp-sci majors from India and having them write a half-dozen different quick-and-dirty encrypts that you can use once or twice and then throw away. Even if it takes 24 hours to crack, some of these drug shipments will be done by then if they time it right and get it on the way. And they won't have the back-doors. Even if they use something like DES, they still need to figure the key for it... Which is something that hasn't been put forth. One-shot encryption is possible for the big criminal cartels, because they can afford to pay some people for it in order to make a profit in an illegal business.
In this respect, interest in Carnivore and a certain amount of controversy over it is healthy.
On the other hand, conspiracy theories suggesting that no one with present or past associations with the Federal Government shares constitutional values or can be trusted to review new systems for their compliance with the law are overblown.
I'm going to go out on a limb here and think this means that he feels that our desire for a completely objective peer review by individuals who have no connection with the Federal administrative process is a bad thing. I'm not sure there's really anyone available who meets the criteria:
Not having performed any work for the Federal government on a for-pay basis
Having the technical expertise that the FBI would have see as the 'minimum' for their review.
Would Lawrence Lessig? He's testified in a number of trials, and the fact that he's been mostly against the Federal requests may be a big red mark. Can anyone think of someone who's got the technical chops AND managed to avoid either annoying the Feds OR working for them?
----
I just bought myself a new machine, and it had the option for 'no OS, just format hard drive', as well as Win98, Win2K and WinME. (No Linux installs, interestingly enough - but there's also no Linux drivers for the Radeon yet that I know of.)
Now, what, they're going to demand that all hard drives come with a copy of Windows, because installing a hard drive might cause an installation of an infringing copy of Windows? I think that WD and Maxtor will display the Half Peace Sign to Microsoft in that situation - they don't roll over very much that I've seen.
What IS an 'infringement' anyway? If I take the HD out of my P2-266 running Win98 in a partition and ghost it over to that partition on my new HD, is that an infringement if the P2-266 no longer is running? Or, according to MicroSoftDoubleThink(1), should I have gone to get a totally completely brand new copy of Win98 and gotten on my knees and thanked Bill Gates for the glory of his taking my money from me?
I invite Bill Gates to bite my wide pale white-boy ass.
(1) MicroSoftDoubleThink is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation. What Do You Want To Think Today? We'll Tell You. Don't Worry. Be Happy. Love Big Brother Bill. ----
Can you give us your first impressions of the concept of the Carnivore concept when you initially heard about it?
Can you give us your initial feelings as to the legal standings under the Fourth Amendment that allows Carnivore to be used for the purposes stated, which it would appear technically violates the Electronic Communications Privacy Act?
What is your impression of the amount of interest the Internet community at large is taking in the entire Carnivore concept? Do you feel there is too much paranoid fantasy going on, or do you feel there is some justification? ----
Theoretically, you can't use real trademarks in parodies. So, for example, using the Nike Swoosh or the Apple Rainbowapple in a parody ad isn't allowable under trademark law... which has very little fair use provision built in.
Now, if you were to parody the LOGO in some way, as well, you'd be all right. So if you had an iFruit ad, that's fine. It's got the reference that people can get without being a complete copy.
In its way, trademark law makes copyright laws look completely free. It's almost frightening. ----
President appoints cabinet, including Attorney General.
President tells Attorney General to do x, y, and z.
Attorney General does x, y and z, as well as u and v for personal agenda.
And the Microsoft Monopoly Trial may very well be defined as 'x'. That's why Gates wants to see the election. If he gets Bush the Corporate Muppet, the possibility of the penalties being carried out is probably as good as dead.
----
Who stands to gain the most from the case going to the apellate courts? DOES Microsoft really have that sort of good vibe coming from the possible next administration, or will someone try to block the DoJ from dropping this?
IANAL, so I'm hoping one of the readers is: if you drop a case during the appeal, does the other side automatically 'win'? Is it possible to drop in mid-appeal?
Will the educational process that was in the first case be allowed in the appeal? That is, both sides educated the judge on the issues, which resulted in an informed opinion.
What's the track record on monopoly remedies being reversed on appeal?
Anyone got the answers? I don't, but would like to know. ----
Especially since, in general, the ratings for the Olympic broadcasts have been getting steadily worse for the past two decades. It's quite possible that NBC will not make ANY money off of the Olympic broadcasts this time around. Add to the sheer level of botching they've had with the release of information and the display of the events, and you can see why this is not looking good for their shareholders this time.
Unfortunately, the diaries of the Olympians are just the sort of thing that would bring a lot of interest to the Games. Knowing what some of them were thinking, doing, planning... who in the competition they really thought were tough and who they didn't think were actual competition.
The IOC has, more and more, lost the concept of the fact that the Games are not just national spectacle, but also tales of achievement, and they're cutting off one of the really great ways to show that sort of ethic off.
But this is the same bunch where they fired half of the main committee for bribery a few years back, so I'd bet that the media companies (NBC, et al.) also paid to have a clause in the contract that NO ONE ELSE can have the coverage. With that sort of patronage/corruption in place, the mediots could then dictate that any 'diaries' are violations of that clause, as it takes away from their 'exclusive coverage', as well as taking away from the deep insights of Bob "Jack Handley" Costas.
----
Mainly because you are. As opposed to these imbeciles who refuse to.
There's a report of the 'most killer' breed of dogs on MSNBC. Rottweilers - killed 27 people last year. 19 of them children. According to the survey, most of it is because of people too busy to train their dogs and teach their children.
Let's pull out a Bushism (CLassic George Bush, not Episode I George Bush):
The best filtering of publicly available material for a Christian is his or her own sense of accountability to what he or she believes.
Sir, I salute you for your clarity of thought. I think you may have cut through to the core of the problem. These people don't trust THEMSELVES to not have prurient interests, so we can't trust anyone to not have them... or acting on them. Because, after all, none of us have any self-control at all...
Truly, a group of people who collectively have their, as JMS said, "head so thoroughly up his ass as to have blipped into an entirely new intestinally-based reality and desperately needs to get a wider frame of reference."
----
If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind. Were an opinion a personal possession of no value except to the owner; if to be obstructed in the enjoyment of it were simply a private injury, it would make some difference whether the injury was inflicted only on a few persons or on many. But the peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error. -- On Liberty, John Stuart Mill
[F]reedom to differ is not limited to things that do not matter much. That would be a mere shadow of freedom. The test of its substance is the right to differ as to things that touch the heart of the existing order. -- Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson, West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624 (1943)
Every man -- in the development of his own personality -- has the right to form his own beliefs and opinions. Hence, suppression of belief, opinion and expression is an affront to the dignity of man, a negation of man's essential nature. -- Toward a General Theory of the First Amendment, Thomas Emerson
Indeed, perhaps we do the minors of this country harm if First Amendment protections, which they will with age inherit fully, are chipped away in the name of their protection. -- Judge Lowell A. Reed, Jr., American Civil Liberties Union, et al. v. Janet Reno (No. 98-5591)
A skillful leader does not use force.
A skillful fighter does not feel anger.
A skillful master does not engage the opponent.
A skillful employer remains low.
Tao Te Ching
Anger and venom cannot stop these attempts. Only reasoning in the proper manner can.
----
Start with a Handspring Visor. Take a Springboard cart and put the books on it in ROM and use the PalmOS's ability to make things non-transferrable to lock it in. Stick some programs in there for utility purposes - a dice roller and a character record maint function.
Boom. Niche filled.
I think the best way to deal with an e-book is to give something to add value to it. Like this idea, where you not only have the book, you also have something that'll be more useful for day-to-day (or game-to-game) situations. You can't just rely on the WOW! An E-Book!! factor anymore, you need something else to get people to buy it.
Most of these companies are missing it. Give something more. Put some Star Wars novels on a cart... and a Star Wars-based game. Things like that. ----
Slashdot Mirror
After the sheer number of horrors that came out of there - both PR and game - I'd expected Romero's time to be limited. Daikatana was, I think, just the final blow. Most of their games were either fatally flawed or just out of date.
The only think you can really say is:
Reality just made John Romero its Bitch.
----
Can be found here. Hot Soup got it funnier than PA did, I think....
----
ESPN2 has broadcast the Magic tournaments. I don't think EQ-as-sport is THAT far away from that concept.....
----
Ah. So we're seeing one giant step BACKWARDS the past few years, then.
----
----
I suggest you read the original that Rob refer to in the 'from' section. It was by the Jonathan Swift, who also wrote Gulliver's Travels, equally as savage a social satire in the day. It wasn't a kid's book then, it was a savaging of the social strata.
At any rate you can read A Modest Proposal here.
For those that cannot spare the time, the essay concerns his suggestion that, in 1729, when famine, overpopulation and poverty were in staggering proportion in Ireland, that the Irish eat their own children. The point being that the Irish had to do something about their problems, because the BRITISH certainly weren't going to help...
----
Two friends of mine got married near Syracuse, NY. The Bride was registered at CompUSA. The Groom was registered at Crazy Egor's Game Shop. It was an interesting wedding.
----
The Church of Scamitology has been, for quite a while, trying to control information on themselves on the Net in order to suppress anyone who might say anything bad about them. Their online attacks have included spamming newsgroups and the first set of Cease and Desist letters sent to people for web and Usenet postings (of the infamous top-level Scientology secrets).
They've also been known to use private investigators to gather information on the individuals they consider enemies; burglary of places containing information they need removed from the public view; threats towards cult enemies. There is even an official document from Hubbard which declares any enemy of the cult to be, basically, free target for any Scamitologist that wants to wipe them.
This has to do with your rights online and offline. They'll do anything they feel is right to stop anyone from leaking information about their cult. All someone has to do is make a bad noise about them on the net, and if they think its worth their while, they'll try to destroy them. This case is one of them. There's been others. Go look for yourself. You have a brain. Use it.
----
Thank you for your submission for immigration from the Earth. We have, at this time, detemined the Ravenous Giant Space Goat is approaching quickly, and have placed you on the 'B' Ark. Your cutting-edge legal department has earned you this exciting place on the first Ark to be launched!
Please report to the launch site in Indonesia near Krakatoa (see map) no later than March 1, 2001, for in order to be properly processed and boarded.
We thank you for your submission and are certain that you and your other people on the 'B' Ark will help make New Earth a success!
Regards, The Society For The Preservation Of Earth.
----
Oh, come on. This is the USA. NO ONE is accountable for their own actions anymore. It doesn't matter what the hell happens, there's always some way for some idiot to get around it. Booze, pills, LACK of pills, my mother was mean to me this morning, there's a funny man walking by outside, it's raining, it's NOT raining, it's sunny, it's cloudy...
See, your idea makes SENSE. So of course it would be ignored by the mainstream, because they don't want to take responsibility for anything. Parents think their children are little angels, and if a teacher tries to say otherwise, they organize a group of people and get RID of the teacher.
And then, four years later, another Columbine. Because the people that were willing to listen or actually listened were chased away.
----
I disagree. There's nothing like the breasts of Jennifer Love Hewitt. Not that I know from personal experience, but I will say that they do look very nice in her movies. And I find them much more enjoyable to look at than 99% of the code I stare at on a regular basis. (The other 1% in enjoyable in a "What in the name of God was this maniac thinking?" sort of way.)
----
These hardsuits were built as promotional tools for the original Bubblegum Crisis series. If you watch some of the promos on the BGC tapes or DVDs, there's scenes of the voice actresses for the Knight Sabres wearing them. Three of them were given or sold (depending on who you talk to) to the head of AnimEigo, Robert "I helped write Wizardry" Woodhead. The suits are reasonably articulated - you get to see, in one of the promos, Oomori Kinuko (the voice actress for Priss) wearing one and at least on a motorcycle, if not driving it.
The Nene and Linna are being sold. Woodhead is keeping the Priss suit. No one's sure where the Sylia suit is anymore.
So this isn't a cosplay sort of thing. This is promo stuff and literally one-of-a-kind.
----
I'd say that BT was stupid here, but if you read The Register, you'd know that they're stupid just about EVERYWHERE. I think we need to get the BOFH a job there., He'd sort them out...
----
In the past, the FBI and the other groups in the Federal Government have tried to shove the balance completely to their own side. This has given us a significant amount of distrust in their motives. From the CDAs to Operation Sundevil, they have shown a lack of comprehension of the issue they have to deal with, instead avoiding the hard questions for the easy ones. And more and more often, they've gotten slapped down, and I think that's starting to make them very very cranky. And they want something that'll move the balance the way they want, and that no one can take away from them. And they think Carnivore is it.
The FBI has, in every case, tried to push to have back-doors put into encryption methods that they can access. Into IPsec. Let's not forget Clipper all those years ago. While I can understand there are potentially pressing reasons for these restrictions in the name of National Security, what's going to keep these people who would use encryption from snagging a half-dozen comp-sci majors from India and having them write a half-dozen different quick-and-dirty encrypts that you can use once or twice and then throw away. Even if it takes 24 hours to crack, some of these drug shipments will be done by then if they time it right and get it on the way. And they won't have the back-doors. Even if they use something like DES, they still need to figure the key for it... Which is something that hasn't been put forth. One-shot encryption is possible for the big criminal cartels, because they can afford to pay some people for it in order to make a profit in an illegal business.I'm going to go out on a limb here and think this means that he feels that our desire for a completely objective peer review by individuals who have no connection with the Federal administrative process is a bad thing. I'm not sure there's really anyone available who meets the criteria:
Would Lawrence Lessig? He's testified in a number of trials, and the fact that he's been mostly against the Federal requests may be a big red mark. Can anyone think of someone who's got the technical chops AND managed to avoid either annoying the Feds OR working for them?
----
I just bought myself a new machine, and it had the option for 'no OS, just format hard drive', as well as Win98, Win2K and WinME. (No Linux installs, interestingly enough - but there's also no Linux drivers for the Radeon yet that I know of.)
Now, what, they're going to demand that all hard drives come with a copy of Windows, because installing a hard drive might cause an installation of an infringing copy of Windows? I think that WD and Maxtor will display the Half Peace Sign to Microsoft in that situation - they don't roll over very much that I've seen.
What IS an 'infringement' anyway? If I take the HD out of my P2-266 running Win98 in a partition and ghost it over to that partition on my new HD, is that an infringement if the P2-266 no longer is running? Or, according to MicroSoftDoubleThink(1), should I have gone to get a totally completely brand new copy of Win98 and gotten on my knees and thanked Bill Gates for the glory of his taking my money from me?
I invite Bill Gates to bite my wide pale white-boy ass.
(1) MicroSoftDoubleThink is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation. What Do You Want To Think Today? We'll Tell You. Don't Worry. Be Happy. Love Big Brother Bill.
----
Can you give us your first impressions of the concept of the Carnivore concept when you initially heard about it?
Can you give us your initial feelings as to the legal standings under the Fourth Amendment that allows Carnivore to be used for the purposes stated, which it would appear technically violates the Electronic Communications Privacy Act?
What is your impression of the amount of interest the Internet community at large is taking in the entire Carnivore concept? Do you feel there is too much paranoid fantasy going on, or do you feel there is some justification?
----
And damned proud of it.
----
Theoretically, you can't use real trademarks in parodies. So, for example, using the Nike Swoosh or the Apple Rainbowapple in a parody ad isn't allowable under trademark law... which has very little fair use provision built in.
Now, if you were to parody the LOGO in some way, as well, you'd be all right. So if you had an iFruit ad, that's fine. It's got the reference that people can get without being a complete copy.
In its way, trademark law makes copyright laws look completely free. It's almost frightening.
----
Let's follow the trail:
And the Microsoft Monopoly Trial may very well be defined as 'x'. That's why Gates wants to see the election. If he gets Bush the Corporate Muppet, the possibility of the penalties being carried out is probably as good as dead.
----
Anyone got the answers? I don't, but would like to know.
----
Especially since, in general, the ratings for the Olympic broadcasts have been getting steadily worse for the past two decades. It's quite possible that NBC will not make ANY money off of the Olympic broadcasts this time around. Add to the sheer level of botching they've had with the release of information and the display of the events, and you can see why this is not looking good for their shareholders this time.
Unfortunately, the diaries of the Olympians are just the sort of thing that would bring a lot of interest to the Games. Knowing what some of them were thinking, doing, planning... who in the competition they really thought were tough and who they didn't think were actual competition.
The IOC has, more and more, lost the concept of the fact that the Games are not just national spectacle, but also tales of achievement, and they're cutting off one of the really great ways to show that sort of ethic off.
But this is the same bunch where they fired half of the main committee for bribery a few years back, so I'd bet that the media companies (NBC, et al.) also paid to have a clause in the contract that NO ONE ELSE can have the coverage. With that sort of patronage/corruption in place, the mediots could then dictate that any 'diaries' are violations of that clause, as it takes away from their 'exclusive coverage', as well as taking away from the deep insights of Bob "Jack Handley" Costas.
----
Mainly because you are. As opposed to these imbeciles who refuse to.
There's a report of the 'most killer' breed of dogs on MSNBC. Rottweilers - killed 27 people last year. 19 of them children. According to the survey, most of it is because of people too busy to train their dogs and teach their children.
Let's pull out a Bushism (CLassic George Bush, not Episode I George Bush):
IT'S THE PARENTS, STUPID!
----
Sir, I salute you for your clarity of thought. I think you may have cut through to the core of the problem. These people don't trust THEMSELVES to not have prurient interests, so we can't trust anyone to not have them... or acting on them. Because, after all, none of us have any self-control at all...
Truly, a group of people who collectively have their, as JMS said, "head so thoroughly up his ass as to have blipped into an entirely new intestinally-based reality and desperately needs to get a wider frame of reference."
----
If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind. Were an opinion a personal possession of no value except to the owner; if to be obstructed in the enjoyment of it were simply a private injury, it would make some difference whether the injury was inflicted only on a few persons or on many. But the peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.
-- On Liberty, John Stuart Mill
[F]reedom to differ is not limited to things that do not matter much. That would be a mere shadow of freedom. The test of its substance is the right to differ as to things that touch the heart of the existing order.
-- Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson, West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, 319 U.S. 624 (1943)
Every man -- in the development of his own personality -- has the right to form his own beliefs and opinions. Hence, suppression of belief, opinion and expression is an affront to the dignity of man, a negation of man's essential nature.
-- Toward a General Theory of the First Amendment, Thomas Emerson
Indeed, perhaps we do the minors of this country harm if First Amendment protections, which they will with age inherit fully, are chipped away in the name of their protection.
-- Judge Lowell A. Reed, Jr., American Civil Liberties Union, et al. v. Janet Reno (No. 98-5591)
A skillful leader does not use force.
A skillful fighter does not feel anger.
A skillful master does not engage the opponent.
A skillful employer remains low.
Tao Te Ching
Anger and venom cannot stop these attempts. Only reasoning in the proper manner can.
----
Basically, for a niche market. Gamers.
Start with a Handspring Visor. Take a Springboard cart and put the books on it in ROM and use the PalmOS's ability to make things non-transferrable to lock it in. Stick some programs in there for utility purposes - a dice roller and a character record maint function.
Boom. Niche filled.
I think the best way to deal with an e-book is to give something to add value to it. Like this idea, where you not only have the book, you also have something that'll be more useful for day-to-day (or game-to-game) situations. You can't just rely on the WOW! An E-Book!! factor anymore, you need something else to get people to buy it.
Most of these companies are missing it. Give something more. Put some Star Wars novels on a cart... and a Star Wars-based game. Things like that.
----