The real question is: Is your example really an unreasonable objection? And further, would we really be making more progress if we stuck to "defending the defensible"? I agree, Cringely's suggestions are outlandish and unfeasible, but when 99% of people don't care, and legislators aren't being honest when they pass laws based on who gave them money, what other recourse do we have? I think the only way out of this mess is for more people to have access to broadband, and to commit these "copyright violations," and to understand what's at stake. Sorry, but you can't blur the line between entertainment and education. Is it wrong for someone to borrow a book from the library? I don't think it's wrong for someone to want to see movies, listen to music, or read books they wouldn't have otherwise paid for.
Of course, the real problem is: there's no way to determine exactly who is and isn't willing to pay for these movies/songs/books. That's what 10 year copyright is for.
If the DMCA were around, but copyrights were only 10 or 14 years, it wouldn't be so bad. This is about the fundamental rights of man to an education, to culture, to knowledge. It is about why libraries were ever established in this country, and why we're not freeing millions of works to the public, only to let it be locked up forever. I don't know if you realize what a profound effect changing copyright laws would have on the world. Imagine a world where copyright is only 10 years. Not only that, there is a public infrastructure for serving these files digitally, much like the public library infrastructure, but since these works can be duplicated infinitely, there are no needs for returns. A world like this would be a lot richer for everyone. Maybe in your eyes this isn't important, but I bet that one day, long ago, the idea of freedom of speech wasn't so important either.
I can easily picture a society that values "freedom of reading", freedom of knowledge, freedom of culture as much as we value freedom of speech. I'm not saying there should be no copyright at all, since that wouldn't be a great alternative. But don't try to diminish this issue. There is a lot more at stake than you realize.
Don't recommend software with spyware. Recommend Kazaa lite. The fact of the matter is, I've never even tried gnucleus. I've just never had any good experience with a gnutella client. I'll go check it out now, but my hopes aren't too high.
What you're saying about football and hockey, etc. is true, I hadn't considered that.
But still. Have you ever tried to remember something, and you weren't sure if it were a dream or something that really happened to you? I wonder if one day, when you have total realism in videogames/VR that sometimes you might be confuse, if even for just a second, between reality and fantasy. And if you can forget for just a second, there might be people who will forget for more than a second.
But I don't think that matters. Maybe (even though I don't think so) it makes people more violent. Tough shit.
While I agree with what you're saying, you say it as if it HAS to be right. Videogames differ from all other media in that it's INTERACTIVE. What if human nature were such that interactive violence actually made people more violent? Would you be prepared to admit it?
I think there will be a time when videogames/(VR) will be so realistic that it will be indistinguishable from the real world. When that happens, people really will sometimes confuse the real world with the fantasy world, if for even a split second. And of course, there will be some more unstable people who will completely lose their mind, and not see the boundary between fantasy and reality, from these hyperrealistic videogames. What will you say then?
A bundled memory card would NOT have accomplished the same thing. First of all, let's just ignore Xbox live for a second, which needs a hard drive. We'll ignore it because not everyone needs or will use Xbox live. But let's actually look at the games.
The hard drive really changes a lot. In halo, if you die, it loads instantly when you go back to your checkpoint. No wait. Every gun is in the exact same spot, so it's not like you come back and there are no weapons any more. And not just in the exact same spot as in the default locations. I mean, if you kill a bunch of aliens, and they drop weapons, the spots where they drop will be saved. If you save your game, turn it off, go to sleep and come back the next day, the weapons will still be there, in the exact same spot.
Xbox may very well just die, but there's no good reason for that. Xbox is a superior console, and the only reason for playstation to do better is because of marketing/brand recognition, momentum. And I know there's more to a console than just the hardware, but that *is* what you were complaining about.
And Xbox Live has so much over the other console's online gaming plans, and it even has many advantages of PC online gaming. I'm not going to make any predictions about how well it's going to do, but like TiVo, success in the marketplace isn't necessarily indicative of it's value as a product.
Xbox has a harddrive for good reason, and it makes good use of it. Not only that, the price is still competitive. So why should it bother you? I can understand if it bothers you about the mac, but with Xbox, you are getting *more* hardware, for the same price. What's your problem exactly?
And even if a bundled memory card was used instead of a hard drive, do you think the console would be any cheaper? No, they only have to be as cheap as the competition. They are already selling at a loss.
I strongly suspect you haven't played xbox much. People who are casual or non-gamers tend to have your reaction to the Xbox. They think that because they haven't heard anything about it in the past few months, that it must've disappeared or something. The Xbox is alive and well. And I'm not really concerned about whether microsoft makes a profit or not. As long as the good games keep coming out. Which they are.
Actually, even though I was the original poster, I do see the difference. I understand, and admire, those who make a point about their beliefs, especially in this specific matter. I was only trying to say that any gnutella client isn't really a viable alternative to kazaa, at least not yet. If anything, gnutella will only turn off casual users from open source software.
I totally agree with you that this is just history repeating itself. But I think all these claims come from the fact that a guy who uses a P4 2.2 and goes back to a PentiumIII 667 will not actually complain. Many people believe, rightly, that he probably won't notice much of a difference. The real problem is lack of software to use those spare cycles. And even stuff like video encoding, which I do a lot of, is of little interest/use to most people so far.
I think history shows that there will definitely be new applications to take advantage of spare cycles. But the reason there are so many people saying there's no use for such speed is because there really is very little that truly takes advantage of it (yet).
The fact that I can imagine fully real holodeck style VR, which would require incredible calculation speeds, shows that eventually, we will take advantage of those spare cycles. And since there is a middle ground between what we have now, and the VR I'm talking about, we'll definitely find ways to take advantage of those cycles.
But the fact remains that most people today use a computer for things like word processing, web browsing, listening to music. For simple applications like that, they really are right: we have more than enough speed. But the point is that in the future we will have new advanced uses for computers that are just not feasible yet.
Stop being a fool. The pharmaceutical companies make 18% return on investment (That's *after* "the cost of many, many failures"). In any other industry, that is considered OBSCENE. The only reason it doesn't happen in other industries is that other industries are competitive. The only "competition" in the pharmaceutical industry is competing to make a better product. But once they have that product, they can charge whatever they want. In terms of economics, that is not "competitive".
And if that 18% figure ever changes, it'll most likely be because of cannibalistic advertising practices.
Sorry, but the mirror of other "prohibitions" don't work out so beautifully. People have been flaunting the marijuana laws for many years now, and the laws are still in place. I wish it were as simple as you make it.
People often use the word realistic and plausible interchangably. But I agree, he has no real way to determine precisely what actually is plausible. Though, I'm sure you'll agree, we all have a certain intuition about what is plausible and what's not.
Yeah, I was waiting a really long time to get a pvr, because I wanted a replaytv, but it was too expensive, and nonupgradeable, so I couldn't decide. I ended up getting a tivo very recently, and it's really great. Just get it, you won't regret it.
You're retarded. Do you know what the resolution is on an HDTV? Maximum of 1920x1080 interlaced, which is really more like 1920x540, but with the proper aspect ratio.
OK. We get it! You're a girl. Your userid is Ellen Ripley. You sign your posts "Ellen". Your sig also says "Ellen Ripley" in it. We get it. You're a girl. You're on slashdot. Do you want a medal?
Slashdot Mirror
The real question is: Is your example really an unreasonable objection? And further, would we really be making more progress if we stuck to "defending the defensible"? I agree, Cringely's suggestions are outlandish and unfeasible, but when 99% of people don't care, and legislators aren't being honest when they pass laws based on who gave them money, what other recourse do we have? I think the only way out of this mess is for more people to have access to broadband, and to commit these "copyright violations," and to understand what's at stake. Sorry, but you can't blur the line between entertainment and education. Is it wrong for someone to borrow a book from the library? I don't think it's wrong for someone to want to see movies, listen to music, or read books they wouldn't have otherwise paid for.
Of course, the real problem is: there's no way to determine exactly who is and isn't willing to pay for these movies/songs/books. That's what 10 year copyright is for.
If the DMCA were around, but copyrights were only 10 or 14 years, it wouldn't be so bad. This is about the fundamental rights of man to an education, to culture, to knowledge. It is about why libraries were ever established in this country, and why we're not freeing millions of works to the public, only to let it be locked up forever. I don't know if you realize what a profound effect changing copyright laws would have on the world. Imagine a world where copyright is only 10 years. Not only that, there is a public infrastructure for serving these files digitally, much like the public library infrastructure, but since these works can be duplicated infinitely, there are no needs for returns. A world like this would be a lot richer for everyone. Maybe in your eyes this isn't important, but I bet that one day, long ago, the idea of freedom of speech wasn't so important either.
I can easily picture a society that values "freedom of reading", freedom of knowledge, freedom of culture as much as we value freedom of speech. I'm not saying there should be no copyright at all, since that wouldn't be a great alternative. But don't try to diminish this issue. There is a lot more at stake than you realize.
Don't recommend software with spyware. Recommend Kazaa lite. The fact of the matter is, I've never even tried gnucleus. I've just never had any good experience with a gnutella client. I'll go check it out now, but my hopes aren't too high.
Oh, I meant to include that a perfect illustration of this (and how I came to understand it) is from the movie existenz
What you're saying about football and hockey, etc. is true, I hadn't considered that.
But still. Have you ever tried to remember something, and you weren't sure if it were a dream or something that really happened to you? I wonder if one day, when you have total realism in videogames/VR that sometimes you might be confuse, if even for just a second, between reality and fantasy. And if you can forget for just a second, there might be people who will forget for more than a second.
But I don't think that matters. Maybe (even though I don't think so) it makes people more violent. Tough shit.
While I agree with what you're saying, you say it as if it HAS to be right. Videogames differ from all other media in that it's INTERACTIVE. What if human nature were such that interactive violence actually made people more violent? Would you be prepared to admit it?
I think there will be a time when videogames/(VR) will be so realistic that it will be indistinguishable from the real world. When that happens, people really will sometimes confuse the real world with the fantasy world, if for even a split second. And of course, there will be some more unstable people who will completely lose their mind, and not see the boundary between fantasy and reality, from these hyperrealistic videogames. What will you say then?
I think you need to update your sig.
A bundled memory card would NOT have accomplished the same thing. First of all, let's just ignore Xbox live for a second, which needs a hard drive. We'll ignore it because not everyone needs or will use Xbox live. But let's actually look at the games.
The hard drive really changes a lot. In halo, if you die, it loads instantly when you go back to your checkpoint. No wait. Every gun is in the exact same spot, so it's not like you come back and there are no weapons any more. And not just in the exact same spot as in the default locations. I mean, if you kill a bunch of aliens, and they drop weapons, the spots where they drop will be saved. If you save your game, turn it off, go to sleep and come back the next day, the weapons will still be there, in the exact same spot.
Xbox may very well just die, but there's no good reason for that. Xbox is a superior console, and the only reason for playstation to do better is because of marketing/brand recognition, momentum. And I know there's more to a console than just the hardware, but that *is* what you were complaining about.
And Xbox Live has so much over the other console's online gaming plans, and it even has many advantages of PC online gaming. I'm not going to make any predictions about how well it's going to do, but like TiVo, success in the marketplace isn't necessarily indicative of it's value as a product.
Xbox has a harddrive for good reason, and it makes good use of it. Not only that, the price is still competitive. So why should it bother you? I can understand if it bothers you about the mac, but with Xbox, you are getting *more* hardware, for the same price. What's your problem exactly?
And even if a bundled memory card was used instead of a hard drive, do you think the console would be any cheaper? No, they only have to be as cheap as the competition. They are already selling at a loss.
I strongly suspect you haven't played xbox much. People who are casual or non-gamers tend to have your reaction to the Xbox. They think that because they haven't heard anything about it in the past few months, that it must've disappeared or something. The Xbox is alive and well. And I'm not really concerned about whether microsoft makes a profit or not. As long as the good games keep coming out. Which they are.
Actually, even though I was the original poster, I do see the difference. I understand, and admire, those who make a point about their beliefs, especially in this specific matter. I was only trying to say that any gnutella client isn't really a viable alternative to kazaa, at least not yet. If anything, gnutella will only turn off casual users from open source software.
Yeah, or you can get Kazaa Lite, so you can be REALLY sure that your p2p client will actually find decent files for you.
When you take your signature into account, there's actually no reason to use these people :)
I totally agree with you that this is just history repeating itself. But I think all these claims come from the fact that a guy who uses a P4 2.2 and goes back to a PentiumIII 667 will not actually complain. Many people believe, rightly, that he probably won't notice much of a difference. The real problem is lack of software to use those spare cycles. And even stuff like video encoding, which I do a lot of, is of little interest/use to most people so far.
I think history shows that there will definitely be new applications to take advantage of spare cycles. But the reason there are so many people saying there's no use for such speed is because there really is very little that truly takes advantage of it (yet).
The fact that I can imagine fully real holodeck style VR, which would require incredible calculation speeds, shows that eventually, we will take advantage of those spare cycles. And since there is a middle ground between what we have now, and the VR I'm talking about, we'll definitely find ways to take advantage of those cycles.
But the fact remains that most people today use a computer for things like word processing, web browsing, listening to music. For simple applications like that, they really are right: we have more than enough speed. But the point is that in the future we will have new advanced uses for computers that are just not feasible yet.
Stop being a fool. The pharmaceutical companies make 18% return on investment (That's *after* "the cost of many, many failures"). In any other industry, that is considered OBSCENE. The only reason it doesn't happen in other industries is that other industries are competitive. The only "competition" in the pharmaceutical industry is competing to make a better product. But once they have that product, they can charge whatever they want. In terms of economics, that is not "competitive".
And if that 18% figure ever changes, it'll most likely be because of cannibalistic advertising practices.
Sorry, but the mirror of other "prohibitions" don't work out so beautifully. People have been flaunting the marijuana laws for many years now, and the laws are still in place. I wish it were as simple as you make it.
48 minutes, hah, I wish. Try 40.
hobgoblin
ralph waldo emerson
Why would you bump enterprise off your tivo season pass list? Do they air at the same time or something?
People often use the word realistic and plausible interchangably. But I agree, he has no real way to determine precisely what actually is plausible. Though, I'm sure you'll agree, we all have a certain intuition about what is plausible and what's not.
Yeah, I was waiting a really long time to get a pvr, because I wanted a replaytv, but it was too expensive, and nonupgradeable, so I couldn't decide. I ended up getting a tivo very recently, and it's really great. Just get it, you won't regret it.
And I also bet they have a 100 times more data on how many G's a rhesus monkey can endure. Also, how much gamma radiation they can endure.
mmm freedos. sounds like a crunchy, crispy, cheesy snack.
You should see One Hour Photo (good movie). That guy at the local SavMart (Walmart) was great!
That was an overclocking joke. Get it?
You're retarded. Do you know what the resolution is on an HDTV? Maximum of 1920x1080 interlaced, which is really more like 1920x540, but with the proper aspect ratio.
OK. We get it! You're a girl. Your userid is Ellen Ripley. You sign your posts "Ellen". Your sig also says "Ellen Ripley" in it. We get it. You're a girl. You're on slashdot. Do you want a medal?