Re:What a lot of Nonsense (Score:4, Interesting) by ravenousbugblatter (682061) on Thursday July 24, @08:55AM (#6520256) You're probably right to a large degree, but the work place isn't the only place where meditation or even just sitting quietly for fifteen minutes has yielded improvements -- I saw a piece on an urban school in chicago or something that was a complete disaster. The school had rowdy kids, poor attendance, and poor grades, and horrible test scores. A new principal there instituted a mandatory meditation period of fifteen minutes for all students. Within months attendance had increased, grades and test scores had increased, and attitude was significantly improved.
There's a famous study done in the 1930's at a manufacturing plant in Chicago. Management installed brighter lights as a result of employee complaints over lighting - productivity went up. Lights made even brighter - productivity went up. Then - lights dimmed - productivity went up again. The conlusions wer epaying attention to workers increases their productivity - independent of the way you let them know you are interested in them.
I would not be surprised if the the Hawthorne effect (as it came to be called) is at play here as well aas when companies introduce Yoga, meditiation, etc. Of course, proponents of these systems like to infur causation from a correlation - since it means $$$ to them.
Not that a relaxation break is a bad idea - but much the same effect could be done for far less money. Of course, as a consultant, I realize that an idea only has value when you are paying multiple hundreds of dollars an hour for someone who is often stating the obvious.
Around here, Kroger was the first to introduce these things.
And to get it you HAVE to give them name, address, phone number, date of birth, sex, etc. Which they have of me, just not the correct ones;)
No, you have to give them a name,name, address, phone number, date of birth, sex,etc.
After I went through the Great Dictators of History (tm) series (all of whom seemed to move to the US and by cheap beer at Krogers - except for the African ones, who buy expensive beer with the millions they have after people on the internet help get the cash out of Africa), I began on the dead Presidents series ( I often forget my card and get a new one at the store.)
Their data collection, if users properly game the system, is more garbage in, garbage out.
But you might not know how the spammer gets paid? Again I do know because I used to work for these people. There are three different contracts a client can make with a spammer.
The second contract type is page views. You know the spam with the pretty graphics. Under this contract type, each time you open one of these emails the spammer gets paid. And just how does the spammer know you opened one of his/her email? The images come from the spammer's web servers and logs you image request. It is a little more complicated than that but you get the picture.
We'll, I don't know about the other two ways, but it seems one way to beat this is to raise the hit count up to the point that the cost to the client is far greater than the actual revnue from sales. You could create honey pot email address for teh sole purpose of requesting th egraphic (multiple times if that ups the payment)
It may not stop spam, but at least the fools that use it would feel some pain.
1) As others have pointed out, you do not license the software on the Xbox. That software is copyrighted, so you cannot legally duplicate it, but there is no agreement between the owner and Microsoft prohibiting the user from running any damn software they please, if they can figure out how to get it to run.
Actually, the manual states the software is licensed and may not be reverse engineered except as permitted by law.
Whether or not that license is enforcable is another argument. I contend that such licenses should be binding (at long as they are reasonable) and companies should be required to take back unopened software if a consumer refuses the license terms, or print the license on the box, so people can review it prior to purchase. If a license is not a legally binding contract unless you sign something, then things/.'s like, such as the GPL, become little more than a random collection of 0's an 1's.
4) Microsoft won't so much as acknowledge this group's existance, let alone comply with their demands. They know that a) few of their customers will bother using this information should it get out, and b) this information will get out even if they do release a signed Linux bootloader.
MS also has rhe resources to hunt them down and make their life miserable via court battles as well.
So anytime you buy something, you've signed an invisible contract? Get real.
Well, I never said everything you buy comes with an invisible contract. However, if it comes with a license agreement and you use the product, then I'd say you entered into a contract whether or not you signed anything. For example, nobody signs anything when they d/l GPL's software, but the license is pretty clear about rights granted and limitations on use *if* they use the software.
EULA stands for "End User License Agreement." When you install Microsoft software, you are often forced to click on "Ok". Some people claim that this is entering into an agreement.
However, when you buy an Xbox, you do not sign anything, click anything, or interact with Microsoft in any way whatsoever. You put your money down on the counter, and the nice clerk at the store sells you an Xbox from the store's inventory. The store bought the Xbox from Microsoft, or some other intermediate dealer. Your transaction with the store is complete when the salesperson closes the cash drawer.
Considering you've recieved something of value (an XBox) in exchange for money, I'd say you probably entered into a contract with MS when you made the purchase.
If *I* buy it, *I* obtain the right to modify it (as long as I don't try to *steal* anything (and I am definitily *not* doing that when I'm trying to install another OS onto *anything* I bought)) to my liking.
Well, first, I'd make sure MS EULA for the software on the XBox doesn't prevent you from modifying it. That's a contract - you may not like it, it may be unfair, but you choose to enter into it when (if) you bought an XBox. Don't like the EULA - don't buy an XBox. (Yes, I know there are various limitations on EULA/contract terms)
You can still modify the hardware (paint the case, glue on decorations), which you own, vs the software, which you license.
To prohibit *any* adaptation by the buyer (of the device) would like trying to prohibit buyers to add a country or football-specific-flag to their cars : It does not change anyting to the cost or income of the company that suplied the device (nor to their rights to whatever software that is executed on it), but does infringe the freedom of choice of their customers.
If you're saying a software license infringes on your freedom of choice, OK, but what about the rights of the software developer? Which are paramount?
Before you answer, consider this - the GPL is a license which requires releasing changes back to the community (except for some specific cases) - does that infringe on my freedom of choice to chose to use the code to create a product and not share the changes? I'm prevented from using something in any way I see fit by the copyright holders - even when my doing so does not change the income or costs to those copyright holders.
In short : The company does not loose *anything*, unles it calculated their income on selling the device cheap, and recovering that cost by selling aditionally requerements (like software:-) at an elevated cost.
welcome to the world of marketting - give them a razor so you can sell them the blades every month.
It's closer to a dollar a CD. Just keep in mind that out of that dollar the band has to pay for paying back it's advance from the label, pay back all recording costs, and pay for any and all touring they do. I don't know any other business where the employees get fucked over so much.
Try virtually every company in the world. Companies make money based on the productivity of their employees - and pay the cost of doing business out of that revnue.
The costs they pay in training, equipment, facilities, benefits, etc. are reflected your salary - you only see what they pay you, but their total cost is higher. They in effect subtract that and come up with a salary - which you get. Now, you may feel you don't get paid enough based on what the company makes off off you, but that is a different issue. In the end, employees pay for all the costs of producing the product because they get less money than the company takes in for their work (unless its a 90's.com, where revenue, benefits and salary have no relationship to each other or reality, which is one reason the invisible hand slapped them)
Musicians could become salaried employees (much as actors once were), but I bet they'd be unwilling to do so and give up the chance to hit it big. It's no different than an investment banker who is willing to work 100 plus hours a week starting out, for less money than they could make elsewhere, because they want the million plus paycheck a partner gets, and everyone knows they will make partner (even if less than 10% really do).
Well, I'm not sure of there exact legal argument, but the basic reasoning was that various courts have upheld restictions in the resale of legitimately acquired copies of copyrighted works, which means you have no absolute right to resell the. Of course, I wrote the article in 1997, in response to an attempt to prohibt students from reselling casebooks (photocopies of articles/case studies/etc.) that typically cost $100+ to other students at the end of a term. I believe the USSC ruled on the ability of copyright owners to limit import of goods (grey market) in 1998 - that may have cleared the air for the example I was researching. OTOH, censoring video may be a derivative work - and you may buy the actual media, but not own the work for purposes of modification.
I don't know, and IANAL, so take what I say with a grain of salt.
While i think it should be alright to sell your copy of any copyrighted work you buy as long as you don't keep a copy, and be free to censor it in any way you see fit before viewing it, I've also found what I'd like the law to allow and what a judge may decide it means is not always one and the same.
To sum up, their point was courts have allowed copyright owners to place restrictions on redistribution, whether or not that will be ultimately found OK is hard to tell.
This should be protected by the first sale principle of the copyright law.
OK, IANAL, but a while back I researched the "first sale" concept for an article I wrote. Basically, the lawyers I contacted said it was not clear cut - i.e. you have no iron-clad right to resell any copyrighted work you purchased, nor do the copyright owners have an iron-clad right to stop you from doing so. They expalined that case law varies from state to state, and, in general, as much as they'd like to shutdown used bookstores / CD stores, etc., it's not worth the $$ or uncertainty.
Right now, I'd guess the MPAA is more worried about Blockbuster than Cleanflics, which is driving down new DVD prices by releasing used ones into the market weeks after the movie is first released and buying the DVDs they rent outright without paying a rental cut (as they did with VHS tapes - which is why BB pushed people to switch to DVDs); both of which severely cut into the studio's profits.
Rent rent rent. This is the current plan, when the customer stops paying - *ZIP!* they're screwed
That's nothing hew - people use the same model for housing, cars, movies - all things they could buy if they want to, but the total rental cost is less than a purchase for the amount of use they expect, so they don't buy.
Why, Microsoft, if you wanted to get into the online music business, was it not YOU that took the risk of being first, why was it not YOUR money on the line opening a new market to users, why was it not YOUR reputation in the balance of a high profile gamble???
Becasue MS is to smart to do that - there is no real advantage to being first, so they can wait and see how it works and then jump in if it looks profitable. They're in this to make money for their shareholders, not carve new trails and go bust.
Look at some of the trailblazers - AMPEX, Wright, Bomar? Where are they today?
Actually, he said he got $12 per lead for lonas - lets see - a hundred friends, 1200 split 2 ways is $600 for almost no work (except maybe listening to a sales pitch). Looks like asking about loas could be more lucrative than spamming.
What we need now is a vertical marketing (i.e pyramid scheme) company to sell responses through a network,...
Now if I could only get the morons who deliver those door-to-door advertisements to read the sign that says "DO NOT LEAVE ADVERTISING MATERIALS. NO TRESSPASSING" I'd be set...
You might be able to under local anti-littering laws. The police where I live suggested filling a littering complaint. What usually happnes is the contact the company whose ad it is with the complaint and fine them - not the delivery folks. If enough people do his, the word gets out not to leave those little mailbox stickies or toss flyers on driveways in certain neighborhoods.
But replication is probably the cheapest step of the CD-making process. Next on the list is the actual studio time spent recording the CD. But the real money-burner is promotion and distribution. Thousands, hundreds of thousands are spent on replication and distribution and marketing just so regular people (including the non net-savvy) can hear about new music. So I think $12.99 is more than fair. Even $14.99.
So if I start selling french fries for 15 US$ per portion you consider this fair because I ran ads during prime time TV, making each my french fries so expensive. And furthermore it's fair to send have some agency claim that my competitor that didn't run the ads is pirating as he sells them for less?
Production costs do not determine selling price - demand does. If someone is willing to pay $20 for a Cd, and there's more profit in selling x copies at that price than X+Y at $15, then companies will (and should) sell at $20.
Or more simply:
revenue - cost = profit so a company needs to minimize costs and maximize revenue - and to mximize revenue you balance the sales volume and price. If you can't charge enough to cover your costs, you lose money.
Do I think the RIAA is wrong and making some pretty outregeous statements - yes, but they're an industry shill and I expect them to do that.
Of course he can't sell my fries, but charging more than what consumers think is a fair price is bad business and there being punished by lower sales. If you're prices are to high because of the costs: reduce costs!
Exactly - if you don't like a product's price, don't buy it. If enough people stop buying, the price drops or the product dissappears from the marketplace.
Try landware's FinCalc - a decent calc that does RPN and some scientific calcs. I used it on my PalmPilot Pro in B-school. (along with my HP48g and 11c.). I got the 48g for $20 as a demo unit, so it repalced my 41cv, which repalced my 45. Still have them all, even the plastic box and leather case for my 45. Ah, the memories...
The problem is that after a point, they've made back their money, and they're just gouging.
Gouging - hardly. It's called making a profit - something most companies try to do. That's like saying a programmer is gouging a client if he or she reuses code - they've already made their money, so the next company should get it at cost - i.e. free.
A comparable situation is the contract requirements with mobile phones. They rig them in a way that makes them back the subsidy they've given you on the phone, BUT they don't tie you there after they've made their money back.
It's called by a new printer whenever you want to - you're not even locked into a time period, as with a cell phone.
The DMCA is being used to restrict product usage and as a barrier to entry of competitors.
Why are you surprised? Companies have been doing that (using laws to erect barriers to entry) for centuries, dating back at least to the European guild system. An economist even got a Nobel for explaining that.
You are so ready to assert that Dell has the right to make their money back. Guess what? No one said they couldn't. What you miss is that they are preventing others from making money too.
Two thoughts:
DELL (or anyone else) has no obligation to make it easy for anyone to make money off of their products. If the marketplace choses to not by printers with proprietary cartridges, then Dell loses.
Anyone is welcome to make their own printer with open source cartridges - Dell isn't stopping that. But guess what - most users see &69 for teh printer and buy it over our $200 OSC (Open Source Cartridge one) because they see what they spend today, not the cost of cartridges over the life of the printer. As a result, Dell has to try to make money someway.
Should teh DCMa be a tool to prevent copying cartridges - no, but it looks like it can. Until we convince Congress that it needs to be changed, stand by for even more DCMA related bad outcomes. Our best hope is for some big company to get whacked with a clue by four when a product off theirs gets into DCMA trouble.
we always had some EC130Q's airborne, flying in large circles over the ocean the. Trailing a long antenna, their mission was to transmit launch orders, via morse code, to our SSBNs (missile submarines) in the event of nuclear war. Even if the Soviets manged to take out our normal means of communications with our SSBNs, the EC130Q's could get the message through, especially since they just used loads of power to cut through any interference, even that caused by nuclear blasts.
They didn't refuel, ratehr one would be on station until its relief showed up.
That's an urban legend. To qoute from snopes (full article at http://www.snopes.com/business/genius/spacepen.htm ):
NASA never asked Paul C. Fisher to produce a pen. When the astronauts began to fly, like the Russians, they used pencils, but the leads sometimes broke and became a hazard by floating in the [capsule's] atmosphere where there was no gravity.
As a side note, another problem with pencils is they smudge, rendering text unreadable. That's why, amongst other reasons, Navy logs are done in pen (ballpoint.)
Electric Cooperatives (EMCs - an outgrowth of the rural electrication act passed mid-early last century designed to get electricity to areas utilities wouldn't service since they couldn't get the desired return on their investment) have been providing utility service to their areas for years, and have branched out into telco, gas, and internet access quite a while ago. Despite what some people think, they really do provide services at non-profit pricing to their customers (who, as part of a cooperative, are also the owners). City utilities often offer similar service/pricing models, they they are not co-ops since the city owns them, not the customers.
One interetsing point, not in the article, is how many "Rural" co-ops are no longer rural, since many are now suburbs of major metropolitan areas, such as the EMCs surrounding Atlanta GA; areas taht private companies would gladly serve, if the EMC would only go away. That won't happen, given the political clout of the customers.
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Re:What a lot of Nonsense (Score:4, Interesting)
by ravenousbugblatter (682061) on Thursday July 24, @08:55AM (#6520256)
You're probably right to a large degree, but the work place isn't the only place where meditation or even just sitting quietly for fifteen minutes has yielded improvements -- I saw a piece on an urban school in chicago or something that was a complete disaster. The school had rowdy kids, poor attendance, and poor grades, and horrible test scores. A new principal there instituted a mandatory meditation period of fifteen minutes for all students. Within months attendance had increased, grades and test scores had increased, and attitude was significantly improved.
There's a famous study done in the 1930's at a manufacturing plant in Chicago. Management installed brighter lights as a result of employee complaints over lighting - productivity went up. Lights made even brighter - productivity went up. Then - lights dimmed - productivity went up again. The conlusions wer epaying attention to workers increases their productivity - independent of the way you let them know you are interested in them.
I would not be surprised if the the Hawthorne effect (as it came to be called) is at play here as well aas when companies introduce Yoga, meditiation, etc. Of course, proponents of these systems like to infur causation from a correlation - since it means $$$ to them.
Not that a relaxation break is a bad idea - but much the same effect could be done for far less money. Of course, as a consultant, I realize that an idea only has value when you are paying multiple hundreds of dollars an hour for someone who is often stating the obvious.
Give away the code; sell the manual! In this case I think the sales would probably go up, not down.
Until someone decides that documentation should be free as well and starts an OS manual.
Around here, Kroger was the first to introduce these things.
;)
And to get it you HAVE to give them name, address, phone number, date of birth, sex, etc. Which they have of me, just not the correct ones
No, you have to give them a name,name, address, phone number, date of birth, sex,etc.
After I went through the Great Dictators of History (tm) series (all of whom seemed to move to the US and by cheap beer at Krogers - except for the African ones, who buy expensive beer with the millions they have after people on the internet help get the cash out of Africa), I began on the dead Presidents series ( I often forget my card and get a new one at the store.)
Their data collection, if users properly game the system, is more garbage in, garbage out.
But you might not know how the spammer gets paid? Again I do know because I used to work for these people. There are three different contracts a client can make with a spammer.
The second contract type is page views. You know the spam with the pretty graphics. Under this contract type, each time you open one of these emails the spammer gets paid. And just how does the spammer know you opened one of his/her email? The images come from the spammer's web servers and logs you image request. It is a little more complicated than that but you get the picture.
We'll, I don't know about the other two ways, but it seems one way to beat this is to raise the hit count up to the point that the cost to the client is far greater than the actual revnue from sales.
You could create honey pot email address for teh sole purpose of requesting th egraphic (multiple times if that ups the payment)
It may not stop spam, but at least the fools that use it would feel some pain.
1) As others have pointed out, you do not license the software on the Xbox. That software is copyrighted, so you cannot legally duplicate it, but there is no agreement between the owner and Microsoft prohibiting the user from running any damn software they please, if they can figure out how to get it to run.
/.'s like, such as the GPL, become little more than a random collection of 0's an 1's.
Actually, the manual states the software is licensed and may not be reverse engineered except as permitted by law.
Whether or not that license is enforcable is another argument. I contend that such licenses should be binding (at long as they are reasonable) and companies should be required to take back unopened software if a consumer refuses the license terms, or print the license on the box, so people can review it prior to purchase. If a license is not a legally binding contract unless you sign something, then things
4) Microsoft won't so much as acknowledge this group's existance, let alone comply with their demands. They know that a) few of their customers will bother using this information should it get out, and b) this information will get out even if they do release a signed Linux bootloader.
MS also has rhe resources to hunt them down and make their life miserable via court battles as well.
So anytime you buy something, you've signed an invisible contract? Get real.
Well, I never said everything you buy comes with an invisible contract. However, if it comes with a license agreement and you use the product, then I'd say you entered into a contract whether or not you signed anything. For example, nobody signs anything when they d/l GPL's software, but the license is pretty clear about rights granted and limitations on use *if* they use the software.
EULA stands for "End User License Agreement." When you install Microsoft software, you are often forced to click on "Ok". Some people claim that this is entering into an agreement.
However, when you buy an Xbox, you do not sign anything, click anything, or interact with Microsoft in any way whatsoever. You put your money down on the counter, and the nice clerk at the store sells you an Xbox from the store's inventory. The store bought the Xbox from Microsoft, or some other intermediate dealer. Your transaction with the store is complete when the salesperson closes the cash drawer.
Considering you've recieved something of value (an XBox) in exchange for money, I'd say you probably entered into a contract with MS when you made the purchase.
If *I* buy it, *I* obtain the right to modify it (as long as I don't try to *steal* anything (and I am definitily *not* doing that when I'm trying to install another OS onto *anything* I bought)) to my liking.
:-) at an elevated cost.
Well, first, I'd make sure MS EULA for the software on the XBox doesn't prevent you from modifying it. That's a contract - you may not like it, it may be unfair, but you choose to enter into it when (if) you bought an XBox. Don't like the EULA - don't buy an XBox. (Yes, I know there are various limitations on EULA/contract terms)
You can still modify the hardware (paint the case, glue on decorations), which you own, vs the software, which you license.
To prohibit *any* adaptation by the buyer (of the device) would like trying to prohibit buyers to add a country or football-specific-flag to their cars : It does not change anyting to the cost or income of the company that suplied the device (nor to their rights to whatever software that is executed on it), but does infringe the freedom of choice of their customers.
If you're saying a software license infringes on your freedom of choice, OK, but what about the rights of the software developer? Which are paramount?
Before you answer, consider this - the GPL is a license which requires releasing changes back to the community (except for some specific cases) - does that infringe on my freedom of choice to chose to use the code to create a product and not share the changes? I'm prevented from using something in any way I see fit by the copyright holders - even when my doing so does not change the income or costs to those copyright holders.
In short : The company does not loose *anything*, unles it calculated their income on selling the device cheap, and recovering that cost by selling aditionally requerements (like software
welcome to the world of marketting - give them a razor so you can sell them the blades every month.
It's closer to a dollar a CD. Just keep in mind that out of that dollar the band has to pay for paying back it's advance from the label, pay back all recording costs, and pay for any and all touring they do. I don't know any other business where the employees get fucked over so much.
.com, where revenue, benefits and salary have no relationship to each other or reality, which is one reason the invisible hand slapped them)
Try virtually every company in the world. Companies make money based on the productivity of their employees - and pay the cost of doing business out of that revnue.
The costs they pay in training, equipment, facilities, benefits, etc. are reflected your salary - you only see what they pay you, but their total cost is higher. They in effect subtract that and come up with a salary - which you get. Now, you may feel you don't get paid enough based on what the company makes off off you, but that is a different issue. In the end, employees pay for all the costs of producing the product because they get less money than the company takes in for their work (unless its a 90's
Musicians could become salaried employees (much as actors once were), but I bet they'd be unwilling to do so and give up the chance to hit it big. It's no different than an investment banker who is willing to work 100 plus hours a week starting out, for less money than they could make elsewhere, because they want the million plus paycheck a partner gets, and everyone knows they will make partner (even if less than 10% really do).
Well, I'm not sure of there exact legal argument, but the basic reasoning was that various courts have upheld restictions in the resale of legitimately acquired copies of copyrighted works, which means you have no absolute right to resell the. Of course, I wrote the article in 1997, in response to an attempt to prohibt students from reselling casebooks (photocopies of articles/case studies/etc.) that typically cost $100+ to other students at the end of a term. I believe the USSC ruled on the ability of copyright owners to limit import of goods (grey market) in 1998 - that may have cleared the air for the example I was researching.
OTOH, censoring video may be a derivative work - and you may buy the actual media, but not own the work for purposes of modification.
I don't know, and IANAL, so take what I say with a grain of salt.
While i think it should be alright to sell your copy of any copyrighted work you buy as long as you don't keep a copy, and be free to censor it in any way you see fit before viewing it, I've also found what I'd like the law to allow and what a judge may decide it means is not always one and the same.
To sum up, their point was courts have allowed copyright owners to place restrictions on redistribution, whether or not that will be ultimately found OK is hard to tell.
Any real lawyers have some insights?
This should be protected by the first sale principle of the copyright law.
OK, IANAL, but a while back I researched the "first sale" concept for an article I wrote. Basically, the lawyers I contacted said it was not clear cut - i.e. you have no iron-clad right to resell any copyrighted work you purchased, nor do the copyright owners have an iron-clad right to stop you from doing so. They expalined that case law varies from state to state, and, in general, as much as they'd like to shutdown used bookstores / CD stores, etc., it's not worth the $$ or uncertainty.
Right now, I'd guess the MPAA is more worried about Blockbuster than Cleanflics, which is driving down new DVD prices by releasing used ones into the market weeks after the movie is first released and buying the DVDs they rent outright without paying a rental cut (as they did with VHS tapes - which is why BB pushed people to switch to DVDs); both of which severely cut into the studio's profits.
Getting an ISO wouldn't be impossible - the real problem is that you have to rig your 'Cube to read it, as GCN discs spin *backwards*.
Only in the southern hemisphere...
What happened to the "it's not patents, but licensing" arguement?
Rent rent rent. This is the current plan, when the customer stops paying - *ZIP!* they're screwed
That's nothing hew - people use the same model for housing, cars, movies - all things they could buy if they want to, but the total rental cost is less than a purchase for the amount of use they expect, so they don't buy.
Why, Microsoft, if you wanted to get into the online music business, was it not YOU that took the risk of being first, why was it not YOUR money on the line opening a new market to users, why was it not YOUR reputation in the balance of a high profile gamble???
Becasue MS is to smart to do that - there is no real advantage to being first, so they can wait and see how it works and then jump in if it looks profitable. They're in this to make money for their shareholders, not carve new trails and go bust.
Look at some of the trailblazers - AMPEX, Wright, Bomar? Where are they today?
Actually, he said he got $12 per lead for lonas - lets see - a hundred friends, 1200 split 2 ways is $600 for almost no work (except maybe listening to a sales pitch). Looks like asking about loas could be more lucrative than spamming.
What we need now is a vertical marketing (i.e pyramid scheme) company to sell responses through a network,...
Now if I could only get the morons who deliver those door-to-door advertisements to read the sign that says "DO NOT LEAVE ADVERTISING MATERIALS. NO TRESSPASSING" I'd be set...
You might be able to under local anti-littering laws. The police where I live suggested filling a littering complaint. What usually happnes is the contact the company whose ad it is with the complaint and fine them - not the delivery folks. If enough people do his, the word gets out not to leave those little mailbox stickies or toss flyers on driveways in certain neighborhoods.
But replication is probably the cheapest step of the CD-making process. Next on the list is the actual studio time spent recording the CD. But the real money-burner is promotion and distribution. Thousands, hundreds of thousands are spent on replication and distribution and marketing just so regular people (including the non net-savvy) can hear about new music. So I think $12.99 is more than fair. Even $14.99.
So if I start selling french fries for 15 US$ per portion you consider this fair because I ran ads during prime time TV, making each my french fries so expensive. And furthermore it's fair to send have some agency claim that my competitor that didn't run the ads is pirating as he sells them for less?
Production costs do not determine selling price - demand does. If someone is willing to pay $20 for a Cd, and there's more profit in selling x copies at that price than X+Y at $15, then companies will (and should) sell at $20.
Or more simply:
revenue - cost = profit
so a company needs to minimize costs and maximize revenue - and to mximize revenue you balance the sales volume and price. If you can't charge enough to cover your costs, you lose money.
Do I think the RIAA is wrong and making some pretty outregeous statements - yes, but they're an industry shill and I expect them to do that.
Of course he can't sell my fries, but charging more than what consumers think is a fair price is bad business and there being punished by lower sales. If you're prices are to high because of the costs: reduce costs!
Exactly - if you don't like a product's price, don't buy it. If enough people stop buying, the price drops or the product dissappears from the marketplace.
Try landware's FinCalc - a decent calc that does RPN and some scientific calcs. I used it on my PalmPilot Pro in B-school. (along with my HP48g and 11c.). I got the 48g for $20 as a demo unit, so it repalced my 41cv, which repalced my 45. Still have them all, even the plastic box and leather case for my 45. Ah, the memories...
The problem is that after a point, they've made back their money, and they're just gouging.
Gouging - hardly. It's called making a profit - something most companies try to do. That's like saying a programmer is gouging a client if he or she reuses code - they've already made their money, so the next company should get it at cost - i.e. free.
A comparable situation is the contract requirements with mobile phones. They rig them in a way that makes them back the subsidy they've given you on the phone, BUT they don't tie you there after they've made their money back.
It's called by a new printer whenever you want to - you're not even locked into a time period, as with a cell phone.
The DMCA is being used to restrict product usage and as a barrier to entry of competitors.
Why are you surprised? Companies have been doing that (using laws to erect barriers to entry) for centuries, dating back at least to the European guild system. An economist even got a Nobel for explaining that.
You are so ready to assert that Dell has the right to make their money back. Guess what? No one said they couldn't. What you miss is that they are preventing others from making money too.
Two thoughts:
DELL (or anyone else) has no obligation to make it easy for anyone to make money off of their products. If the marketplace choses to not by printers with proprietary cartridges, then Dell loses.
Anyone is welcome to make their own printer with open source cartridges - Dell isn't stopping that. But guess what - most users see &69 for teh printer and buy it over our $200 OSC (Open Source Cartridge one) because they see what they spend today, not the cost of cartridges over the life of the printer. As a result, Dell has to try to make money someway.
Should teh DCMa be a tool to prevent copying cartridges - no, but it looks like it can. Until we convince Congress that it needs to be changed, stand by for even more DCMA related bad outcomes. Our best hope is for some big company to get whacked with a clue by four when a product off theirs gets into DCMA trouble.
we always had some EC130Q's airborne, flying in large circles over the ocean the. Trailing a long antenna, their mission was to transmit launch orders, via morse code, to our SSBNs (missile submarines) in the event of nuclear war. Even if the Soviets manged to take out our normal means of communications with our SSBNs, the EC130Q's could get the message through, especially since they just used loads of power to cut through any interference, even that caused by nuclear blasts.
They didn't refuel, ratehr one would be on station until its relief showed up.
That's an urban legend. To qoute from snopes (full article at http://www.snopes.com/business/genius/spacepen.htm ):
NASA never asked Paul C. Fisher to produce a pen. When the astronauts began to fly, like the Russians, they used pencils, but the leads sometimes broke and became a hazard by floating in the [capsule's] atmosphere where there was no gravity.
As a side note, another problem with pencils is they smudge, rendering text unreadable. That's why, amongst other reasons, Navy logs are done in pen (ballpoint.)
1. Win Loebner Prize
2. Adapt it to answer telemarketing calls
3. Fun and maybe Profit
We call them "governments" when they stand around the commons with guns and tell everyone what they can and cannot do.
When they arise spontaneously out of agreements between those who rely on the commons, we call them "free markets".
Then when those who rely on the commons take up arms to keep out people who want to use them differently, what do we call them?
Electric Cooperatives (EMCs - an outgrowth of the rural electrication act passed mid-early last century designed to get electricity to areas utilities wouldn't service since they couldn't get the desired return on their investment) have been providing utility service to their areas for years, and have branched out into telco, gas, and internet access quite a while ago. Despite what some people think, they really do provide services at non-profit pricing to their customers (who, as part of a cooperative, are also the owners). City utilities often offer similar service/pricing models, they they are not co-ops since the city owns them, not the customers.
One interetsing point, not in the article, is how many "Rural" co-ops are no longer rural, since many are now suburbs of major metropolitan areas, such as the EMCs surrounding Atlanta GA; areas taht private companies would gladly serve, if the EMC would only go away. That won't happen, given the political clout of the customers.
If you really want more info, visit:
http://www.touchstoneenergy.com