For more on how the government is in collusion with large corporations on trying to maintain the status quo while at the same time whittling away at Constitutional rights using vehicles like the SSSCA, I refer you to Stupid White Men by Michael Moore. I submitted the publication of his book as a slashdot story (thinking it might be as newsworthy as some minor kernel change - guess I was wrong), only to have it rejected. Here's the excerpt for folks who want to know more about the SSSCA, the government, and related legislation:
Michael Moore, who some slackers might remember from TV Nation fame, has finally managed to get his book Stupid White Men published - no small feat when the men in question run the White House and America seems to be willing to forgive them even scandals like Enron. Quite a change from just a couple of years ago when a cigar and some oral hanky-panky could get a president impeached, eh? You can buy the book from from a number of different online stores, and if you're lucky you just might find it in a regular brick-and-mortar store as well. Bush-lovers and right-wingers be warned: this isn't your bedtime reading material of choice.
- an exact count of the mod points handed out that day and who got them.
- a page that shows what posts were modded by which slashdot editors.
- the ability to refuse editorial mods in an effort to avoid idiots like Michael Sims.
- the ability to actual mod, since this seems to have been stripped from me right from the beginning.
Just a few things that might be worth $5. Finding out what the editors are doing would be enough on curiosity alone.
Max
Re:Compromise or be ignored - it's the only option
on
SSSCA Hearing
·
· Score: 2
Yes, I'm saying explicitly that compromise encourages evil because it shows evil that it can win - not in big, overbearing steps that might panic the herd, but in small incremental ones that keep most of the sheep from looking too hard at what's going on.
If you compromise in this fashion then you're complicit. The powers that be *want* you to compromise; they want *you* to make the suggestion - which they agree to, of course, at least for now - making themselves look reasonable for granting *your* request.
You play right into their hands. You're a tool, nothing more. And a pathetic, embarrassing tool at that.
My approach is predicated on the idea that playing within the system is a fool's game, that those who abide by the rules have already lost. It's time to break the rules and encourage outright defiance. All that's left is the facade, and the facade only makes it easier for the wolves to tighten the noose around the sheep.
The sooner things get nasty the sooner the herd will figure out that the shepherds aren't here to protect them but rather to turn them into mutton. If this revelation takes place in time perhaps the sheep will trample the shepherds into the dirt. While they still can.
Nobody with an ounce of sense would rely on a forum like Slashdot - mainly a place for people to bitch about their favorite hot buttons - to be a solid source for news. Hell, the editors can't even spell a great deal of the time, much less recognize proper grammar; hardly the recommendation for any sort of serious news provider. And how many times has slashdot been completely fucked on little things like facts and details?
That said, the fact that Slashdot pretty much just repackages the efforts of other sites when it comes to news means that the $20/year they're thinking about isn't to cover journalistic efforts (there being no such thing) but to allow people to rant on their favorite forum sans ads. That's all it is.
Will it work? I doubt it. As you said, this sort of business model just doesn't cut it on the internet. But hey, if that's what someone wants to do then more power to them. If my refusal to subscribe means that Slashdot goes under or I get booted, well, them's the breaks. I like Slashdot, but not enough to put money down on this horse.
I really don't see why you want window-management facility from your applications
Personal preference. You want to do things by switching desktops, I'd rather do it from inside the app. Neither method is inherently superior to the other.
I found this a good test of sites I didn't want to see in the first place. If all they offered was some shitty Java-based ad optimized for IE, then that was a site I could do without.
Especially if all it did was demonstrate just what a piss-poor programmer the whack on the other end was. It's like an advertisement - "our company is too stupid to hire a real programmer, but I'm sure you still want to buy from us...."
Max
Re:Compromise or be ignored - it's the only option
on
SSSCA Hearing
·
· Score: 2
The most effective way to help the situation is for technologists to sit down and try to work with Hollywood to create an acceptable DRM model for all parties.
You clearly haven't worked for any large corporation, or the government. Or if you have, you've managed to remain willfully ignorant the entire time of your employement.
Both government and big business have but a single goal: to accrue power. Neither kind of entity gives a flying fuck about rights, ethics, or morals of any kind. The best you can hope for is that they'll be pressured into paying lip-service to some ideal, temporarily putting the brakes on the accrual of power while they wait for the heat to die down.
The industry isn't interested in a compromise. It will never be interested in a compromise. That is the nature of power-hungry organizations. Even if such a thing is temporarily agreed to, it will just be used as a stepping stone to further restrictions in the future.
This is self-evident. Only a madman or an ignoramus would think, even for a moment, that large power structures care about anything other than becoming larger and more powerful. Or that compromise is something they'll honestly live with if any opportunity presents itself to circumvent that compromise.
What we have here is the 20th century equivalent of a buggy-whip manufacturer realizing that it can't compete in the 21st century. In fact, if subjected to market forces the RIAA would be torn to pieces and tossed by the wayside in the ensuing shakeout. But rather than take pride in our notion of capitalism and let the buggy-whip makers fall into history, we sit idly by while they buy the laws required to not only keep the buggy-whip in use, but to prevent any technology developed from replacing the buggy-whip in the future.
Note that I have no such protections. If technology comes along that makes my job or business obsolete, my only option is to go out, learn a new skill, and get a new goddamned job. No one in Congress is going to try to roll back the country to the 20th century to appease me.
The future is here. The paradigms and organizations of the 20th century are no more suited to the 'now' than those of the 19th century were suited to the 20th. If the RIAA can't make it in the marketplace they should be replaced, not allowed to legislate the crippling of the new millennium. But that ain't gonna happen when the only credible force around for putting a halt to this shit is in bed with them.
I say don't compromise. Don't buy DRM hardware. Break the law. The fact is is that the law is contrary not only to principles embodied in our Constitution, but also to the fundamental assumptions of the free market. This protection racket is nothing more than the panicked response of an outdated industry to hold on to the power and wealth it accumulated despite the fact that the future - now the present - no longer needs or wants them.
If you negotiate then all you do is set yourself up for future compromises that erode more and more of your rights as time goes on. This is evident in the very legal system of the U.S. right now; people keep compromising in response to this threat or that, throwing away right after right in the name of reaching a 'good middle-ground solution'.
Compromise is for fools who think that the government or corporations really do have ethics. Time to wake up and smell the coffee; to these entities you're food, nothing more, and food doesn't get to protest being eaten. If it does, you pick up a big stick and whack it on the head until it stops.
Yeah, but in the state I live in we call it something more than a social intrustion. The legal label is 'stalking'.
Y'know, when ol' pasty-face shows up again and again outside your building because he just *knows* from his little database that you and he would be the perfect match!
ooooh, 21st century stalking made easy! If you want to make someone's life a living hell and have more time left over for personal pursuits, this is the device for you!
Of course, if we could program the information that'd come up, maybe those bloody door-to-door Christians would leave me alone. BEEP! "Resident is fond of slasher movies, has been known to sacrifice goats to Satan, and was heard to have commented last week that he needed a fresh human heart for purposes unknown and was on a deadline for finding one."
Ever since the switch I have problems with sudden drop-outs; the service just seems to 'forget' that I'm hooked up and refuses all requests. Sometimes it clears up after a few minutes, sometimes I have to reset the modem. A real pain in the ass.
With @home I left my network up and running for months with no problems whatsoever. Never a cutout of any kind. The ATT situation can be real annoying when I need to fetch files from home via ftp, only to find that my computer has dropped out and the only way to fix the problem is to drive home and reset the modem.
Doom taught me everything I need to know about getting ahead in the modern work place. Accept the fact that your coworkers are zombies out to shoot you in the back the first chance they get, and that problems with your boss are best dealt with using a chainsaw, and life becomes much, much simpler....
Tonight I ran into my first defective CD. It was the newly-released Alanis Morissette album (you have your tastes, I have mine). My wife and I bought this along with the new release from Pink, came home and popped it into one of our computers while we made dinner.
After a minute or two I noticed that the speakers remained mysteriously quiet, and that no music puntuated the sounds of rattling dishes in the kitchen. Ambling over to the computer I popped open Windows Explorer (my wife had booted into Windows on her computer to play a game and hadn't booted back to Linux) and noticed...
...nothing.
Well, not quite nothing. There was a 'special media presentation' on the CD just begging for our attention, but other than that *no tracks* appeared on the CD. Wisely expressing my confusion with the words "what the fuck?" I popped the disc back in...and still there were no tracks.
Just that goddamned media thingy trying to get my attention. I didn't buy the damned CD for any bloody commercial, I bought it for *music*. Fuck the damned commercial, where the hell was my MUSIC???
With growing horror I realized I'd just been given the RIAA shaft up the ass for the first time. Here I was, with a CD I legally purchased, unable to play it in my - goddamnit - CD player.
Quickly I scanned the case and the plastic wrap the CD came in, thinking I'd missed some disclaimer like 'won't play on a computer, you mp3-ripping pirate asshole'. But no. Even the tiny print on the back said nothing of the sort. There was no warning of any kind to indicate that the CD was intentionally defective.
With something akin to a cry of rage, echoed by my incredibly pissed-off wife, I transferred the cd to my computer - which was running Linux - and fired up the burning software to see if it could find the tracks. It did without any problem whatsoever. Put it back into the machine running windows - the tracks were gone. Rebooted my machine to windows - no tracks. Booted my wife's computer to Linux and ran the ripping software - the tracks were there.
Yep, no doubt about it, the CD was crippled with 'copy protection'. I'd heard about CDs that Windows couldn't play but that Linux could, but I'd never actually seen them before. This was my first.
So here I am, ripping the Alanis Morissette cd so that I can copy the tracks back onto one of my own blank cds, in the hopes that the protection is on the cd itself and not incorporated into the tracks. If I'm right I'll soon have an Alanis Morissette CD that'll play in Windows as well as Linux - which is what I goddamned well paid for when I went to the store in the first place.
It's one thing to hear about this shit and express outrage over another persons misfortune, and quite another to find out you've been fucked yourself. I work for my money and I bloody well expect value when I plunk down my cash; if they're going to cripple the CD then the motherfuckers had better goddamn well label the shitty product so I can avoid it in the first place.
Until now I've downloaded music off of Napster, Bearshare, Gnutella, etc. to 'try before I buy' - just like everyone else I know. Our CD collection has quadrupled in the last two years because we've discovered artists we'd never in a million years consider seriously if we hadn't been able to hear the album first. Alanis was one of those artists and we now own everything she's put out.
But I have to ask myself now: if the music industry is going to deliberately sell me defective products, why on God's green earth should I waste the money I work hard for on fucked-up CDs? In this case it looks as if I can rip the songs to the computer and burn them back to a blank CD; but why should I have to do this? I didn't consent to buy a defective product, nor was I informed of the defect before purchase. I was more than willing to hand over $16 bucks to the RIAA bloodsuckers to buy Alanis's new album - and they screwed me anyway.
Assholes. Please tell me - how is this supposed to encourage a generally honest joe like myself to remain honest and buy CDs of songs I've downloaded and liked? If I know I stand a chance of being reamed, with the potential battle of trying to return the CD for a refund to the tight-fisted music store bastards that own my town, what incentive do I have to buy? All this is going to do is encourage piracy, not contain it.
privacy zealot = anyone who doesn't want to be stalked by his neighbors, business, or the government.
anti-privacy zealot = those bugshit morons who think they have a god-given right to spy on you, either personally or through their the actions of their government. Fans of the "Enquirer" and The Oprah Winfrey Show. Typified by extremely low IQs.
So in your pitiful little fantasy world the Black Hats are either the government or the corporations, but not both? Your imagination is small, kimosabe, and your libertarian asscheeks fit only to be pounded by corporate dogs.
Well, given that more than a million people have downloaded and installed the Linux version of Opera, and several million Windows users have done the same, I'd say that Opera isn't doomed.
Fact is, it looks like at least some people are willing to pay for a quality browser over the free Internet Explorer. The company that makes Opera has had one steady income rise ever since they released the first version. Now, if IE *weren't* bundled with Windows how many more folks would decide on Opera over IE?
And while you're at it, could all Anonymous Cowards post in the same place? So if you get modded up we can easily ignore anything you might have to say? Thanks much!
As I was told by my parents, life is what you make of it. There is no one to blame but yourself if you find yourself in a place you are unhappy being.
And when I'm in Africa, face-to-face with children starving to death through no fault of their own or their parents, I say "hey! life is what you make of it! suck it up son! you wouldn't be starving if you just had a better attitude!"
Life is what you make of it, plus one hellaciously huge dose of luck, good or bad. Regardless of what the Yuppies croon, sometimes shit happens and you're fucked no matter how righteous you are. That is how things really work.
A number of people have claimed that the market won't accept crippled devices and that people will simply buy the uncrippled ones. I ask: given that the RIAA and MPAA are more than willing to pass Draconian laws to protect their oligopoly on entertainment media, what on God's green earth makes you think they won't go further and outlaw all devices *not* approved by them? It's silly to believe that 'the market' will take care of the problem when the folks vested in the old way of doing business are capable of buying legislators and laws to make any alternative a felony.
Furthermore, others have stated that different ways of doing things will put the RIAA/MPAA out of business, e.g., more and more bands selling their cds directly using the internet as cheap advertisement. Let's wise up a bit, shall we? If this becomes a popular way of doing business - cutting the RIAA out of the picture altogether - do you really think the powers that be will stand aside and let this model edge them out of the market? Hell no, they'll once again buy the laws needed to make the sale of music cds via the internet, or without RIAA approval, or both, a crime.
As ridiculous as this sounds the loons that run the music business (and now the movie business) have shown themselves to be quite capable of backing Orwellian laws and buying the support required to pass them. They'll do anything to retain their power even if that means imprisoning anyone who defies them, using the U.S. government as their tool.
What's more than a bit ironic here is that if a new technology comes along that eliminates my business and my job, I don't get to go crying to Congress to set up a protection racket for me. I have to learn new skills for a new job at a new business - that's called 'capitalism'. The RIAA, however, if presented with a market that makes their way of doing things obsolete, simply buys the legislation required to outlaw the technology that threatens their favored status. Now that's fair, American style!
3.6 billion songs a month? 350,000 movies a month? Excuse me, but where the fuck do they get their numbers? As anyone with even a smidgeon of technical savvy should note, it's impossible to *even estimate* what percentage of net traffic is devoted to these kinds of downloads. The numbers could be off by a couple of orders of magnitude and no one would know.
violation of licensing agreement should be enforced the same whether it is MS's EULA.
The MS EULA isn't a valid licensing agreement. It doesn't even meet the basic requirements of contract law. No court has upheld a EULA as a valid form of contract.
Well, I'll be goddamned. I posted a rather lengthy response to this and it was deleted. It showed when I submitted, but here I am four hours later and now it's gone. No message, nothing - just gone.
Well, let's not let a little thing like that stand in the way of pig-headed persistence. Once again into the breach.
Well, feel free to save toilet paper by using Kinsey.
Please post a link to an empirical study published in an accredited, peer-reviewed journal which definitively refutes the numbers presented by Kinsey, and all who came after him confirming those numbers. Keep in mind the words "empirical", "accredited", and "peer-reviewed" when considering which link is best suited to support your assertion that when it comes to the ratio of bisexuals to homosexuals, the man and his team had their heads up their asses.
If this was the case, it would still be a defect.
Your definition of 'defect' goes far beyond the traditional definition used in biology and genetics. In fact, it seems to encompass anything which you, personally, don't particularly care for.
In order for a trait to be a defect - as defined by the biological sciences - it must in some fashion reduce the organisms chances of survival or probability of successfully reproducing. Bisexuality does neither; bisexuals aren't less likely to survive nor are they less likely to reproduce. There is no defect here, at least so far as the word is defined in the traditional scientific sense.
my gut feeling is that most bisexuality is psychological.
Your gut feeling and two bucks will get you a cup of coffee.
That is, most people who are bisexual override their natural inclination by wanting to try "something different".
My own experiences are purely anecdotal but rather wide-ranging, primarily because I am bisexual and I've had contact with hundreds of bisexuals over the course of my lifetime. Their accounts concerning their bisexuality directly contradict your 'gut feeling'. As you have no evidence whatsoever to support your rather whimsical claims, I'll take the word of several hundred bisexuals - people in a position to know what motivates them - over your 'gut feeling' any day of the week.
The point is that any genetic flaws that cause the attraction mechanism to not work in a way that encourages reproduction is most likely a defect.
If you're of the opinion that sex is only useful for procreation and that the development of social ties through sex is of no survival value, I suggest you educate yourself on the topic before speaking further. This is a fundamental given of the social sciences, so clearly apparent that it isn't disputed. Claims to the contrary demonstrate nothing more than base ignorance, willful or otherwise.
And once again this isn't the definition of defect used in the biological sciences.
But even if we were silly enough to adopt your definition, I could claim that bisexuality gives an individual a survival advantage in that this person not only has the same chance of reproducing as a heterosexual, but that the bisexual would also be capable of strengthening social ties through sexual contact with members of the same gender in a way that heterosexuals couldn't duplicate. Since no serious social scientist would attempt to refute the claim that members of a group with strong social ties are more likely to survive and reproduce than members with weaker ties, it's apparent that in this case the bisexual has a better chance of survival than the heterosexual as long as all other members in the group aren't just heterosexual. And we already know that heterosexuality isn't universal.
By your own definition the bisexual has a survival advantage over the heterosexual. In comparison to the bisexual, heterosexuality could actually be viewed as a defect.
Which only goes to show just how silly your claims actually are.
Slashdot Mirror
the only way we can get there is for all of us to make our voices heard, and to use the system to fight the system. as many have said before,
Or if you think that the system is fundamentally broken you could just decide to emulate our forefathers and shoot all the sons of bitches. I'm game.
Max
For more on how the government is in collusion with large corporations on trying to maintain the status quo while at the same time whittling away at Constitutional rights using vehicles like the SSSCA, I refer you to Stupid White Men by Michael Moore. I submitted the publication of his book as a slashdot story (thinking it might be as newsworthy as some minor kernel change - guess I was wrong), only to have it rejected. Here's the excerpt for folks who want to know more about the SSSCA, the government, and related legislation:
Michael Moore, who some slackers might remember from TV Nation fame, has finally managed to get his book Stupid White Men published - no small feat when the men in question run the White House and America seems to be willing to forgive them even scandals like Enron. Quite a change from just a couple of years ago when a cigar and some oral hanky-panky could get a president impeached, eh? You can buy the book from from a number of different online stores, and if you're lucky you just might find it in a regular brick-and-mortar store as well. Bush-lovers and right-wingers be warned: this isn't your bedtime reading material of choice.
Max
Hey, now I can not only retain some of my basic human rights - but I can get a job too! Just how hard is it to become a Canadian citizen, eh?
Max
A few things that might be worth $5:
- an exact count of the mod points handed out that day and who got them.
- a page that shows what posts were modded by which slashdot editors.
- the ability to refuse editorial mods in an effort to avoid idiots like Michael Sims.
- the ability to actual mod, since this seems to have been stripped from me right from the beginning.
Just a few things that might be worth $5. Finding out what the editors are doing would be enough on curiosity alone.
Max
Yes, I'm saying explicitly that compromise encourages evil because it shows evil that it can win - not in big, overbearing steps that might panic the herd, but in small incremental ones that keep most of the sheep from looking too hard at what's going on.
If you compromise in this fashion then you're complicit. The powers that be *want* you to compromise; they want *you* to make the suggestion - which they agree to, of course, at least for now - making themselves look reasonable for granting *your* request.
You play right into their hands. You're a tool, nothing more. And a pathetic, embarrassing tool at that.
My approach is predicated on the idea that playing within the system is a fool's game, that those who abide by the rules have already lost. It's time to break the rules and encourage outright defiance. All that's left is the facade, and the facade only makes it easier for the wolves to tighten the noose around the sheep.
The sooner things get nasty the sooner the herd will figure out that the shepherds aren't here to protect them but rather to turn them into mutton. If this revelation takes place in time perhaps the sheep will trample the shepherds into the dirt. While they still can.
Max
Nobody with an ounce of sense would rely on a forum like Slashdot - mainly a place for people to bitch about their favorite hot buttons - to be a solid source for news. Hell, the editors can't even spell a great deal of the time, much less recognize proper grammar; hardly the recommendation for any sort of serious news provider. And how many times has slashdot been completely fucked on little things like facts and details?
That said, the fact that Slashdot pretty much just repackages the efforts of other sites when it comes to news means that the $20/year they're thinking about isn't to cover journalistic efforts (there being no such thing) but to allow people to rant on their favorite forum sans ads. That's all it is.
Will it work? I doubt it. As you said, this sort of business model just doesn't cut it on the internet. But hey, if that's what someone wants to do then more power to them. If my refusal to subscribe means that Slashdot goes under or I get booted, well, them's the breaks. I like Slashdot, but not enough to put money down on this horse.
Max
I really don't see why you want window-management facility from your applications
Personal preference. You want to do things by switching desktops, I'd rather do it from inside the app. Neither method is inherently superior to the other.
Max
You could also spend the measly $39 bucks to buy Opera. No more ad worries.
Max
I found this a good test of sites I didn't want to see in the first place. If all they offered was some shitty Java-based ad optimized for IE, then that was a site I could do without.
Especially if all it did was demonstrate just what a piss-poor programmer the whack on the other end was. It's like an advertisement - "our company is too stupid to hire a real programmer, but I'm sure you still want to buy from us...."
Max
The most effective way to help the situation is for technologists to sit down and try to work with Hollywood to create an acceptable DRM model for all parties.
You clearly haven't worked for any large corporation, or the government. Or if you have, you've managed to remain willfully ignorant the entire time of your employement.
Both government and big business have but a single goal: to accrue power. Neither kind of entity gives a flying fuck about rights, ethics, or morals of any kind. The best you can hope for is that they'll be pressured into paying lip-service to some ideal, temporarily putting the brakes on the accrual of power while they wait for the heat to die down.
The industry isn't interested in a compromise. It will never be interested in a compromise. That is the nature of power-hungry organizations. Even if such a thing is temporarily agreed to, it will just be used as a stepping stone to further restrictions in the future.
This is self-evident. Only a madman or an ignoramus would think, even for a moment, that large power structures care about anything other than becoming larger and more powerful. Or that compromise is something they'll honestly live with if any opportunity presents itself to circumvent that compromise.
What we have here is the 20th century equivalent of a buggy-whip manufacturer realizing that it can't compete in the 21st century. In fact, if subjected to market forces the RIAA would be torn to pieces and tossed by the wayside in the ensuing shakeout. But rather than take pride in our notion of capitalism and let the buggy-whip makers fall into history, we sit idly by while they buy the laws required to not only keep the buggy-whip in use, but to prevent any technology developed from replacing the buggy-whip in the future.
Note that I have no such protections. If technology comes along that makes my job or business obsolete, my only option is to go out, learn a new skill, and get a new goddamned job. No one in Congress is going to try to roll back the country to the 20th century to appease me.
The future is here. The paradigms and organizations of the 20th century are no more suited to the 'now' than those of the 19th century were suited to the 20th. If the RIAA can't make it in the marketplace they should be replaced, not allowed to legislate the crippling of the new millennium. But that ain't gonna happen when the only credible force around for putting a halt to this shit is in bed with them.
I say don't compromise. Don't buy DRM hardware. Break the law. The fact is is that the law is contrary not only to principles embodied in our Constitution, but also to the fundamental assumptions of the free market. This protection racket is nothing more than the panicked response of an outdated industry to hold on to the power and wealth it accumulated despite the fact that the future - now the present - no longer needs or wants them.
If you negotiate then all you do is set yourself up for future compromises that erode more and more of your rights as time goes on. This is evident in the very legal system of the U.S. right now; people keep compromising in response to this threat or that, throwing away right after right in the name of reaching a 'good middle-ground solution'.
Compromise is for fools who think that the government or corporations really do have ethics. Time to wake up and smell the coffee; to these entities you're food, nothing more, and food doesn't get to protest being eaten. If it does, you pick up a big stick and whack it on the head until it stops.
Max
Yeah, but in the state I live in we call it something more than a social intrustion. The legal label is 'stalking'.
Y'know, when ol' pasty-face shows up again and again outside your building because he just *knows* from his little database that you and he would be the perfect match!
Uh huh. And size doesn't matter.
Max
ooooh, 21st century stalking made easy! If you want to make someone's life a living hell and have more time left over for personal pursuits, this is the device for you!
Of course, if we could program the information that'd come up, maybe those bloody door-to-door Christians would leave me alone. BEEP! "Resident is fond of slasher movies, has been known to sacrifice goats to Satan, and was heard to have commented last week that he needed a fresh human heart for purposes unknown and was on a deadline for finding one."
Max
Ever since the switch I have problems with sudden drop-outs; the service just seems to 'forget' that I'm hooked up and refuses all requests. Sometimes it clears up after a few minutes, sometimes I have to reset the modem. A real pain in the ass.
With @home I left my network up and running for months with no problems whatsoever. Never a cutout of any kind. The ATT situation can be real annoying when I need to fetch files from home via ftp, only to find that my computer has dropped out and the only way to fix the problem is to drive home and reset the modem.
Max
Doom taught me everything I need to know about getting ahead in the modern work place. Accept the fact that your coworkers are zombies out to shoot you in the back the first chance they get, and that problems with your boss are best dealt with using a chainsaw, and life becomes much, much simpler....
Max
Tonight I ran into my first defective CD. It was the newly-released Alanis Morissette album (you have your tastes, I have mine). My wife and I bought this along with the new release from Pink, came home and popped it into one of our computers while we made dinner.
After a minute or two I noticed that the speakers remained mysteriously quiet, and that no music puntuated the sounds of rattling dishes in the kitchen. Ambling over to the computer I popped open Windows Explorer (my wife had booted into Windows on her computer to play a game and hadn't booted back to Linux) and noticed...
...nothing.
Well, not quite nothing. There was a 'special media presentation' on the CD just begging for our attention, but other than that *no tracks* appeared on the CD. Wisely expressing my confusion with the words "what the fuck?" I popped the disc back in...and still there were no tracks.
Just that goddamned media thingy trying to get my attention. I didn't buy the damned CD for any bloody commercial, I bought it for *music*. Fuck the damned commercial, where the hell was my MUSIC???
With growing horror I realized I'd just been given the RIAA shaft up the ass for the first time. Here I was, with a CD I legally purchased, unable to play it in my - goddamnit - CD player.
Quickly I scanned the case and the plastic wrap the CD came in, thinking I'd missed some disclaimer like 'won't play on a computer, you mp3-ripping pirate asshole'. But no. Even the tiny print on the back said nothing of the sort. There was no warning of any kind to indicate that the CD was intentionally defective.
With something akin to a cry of rage, echoed by my incredibly pissed-off wife, I transferred the cd to my computer - which was running Linux - and fired up the burning software to see if it could find the tracks. It did without any problem whatsoever. Put it back into the machine running windows - the tracks were gone. Rebooted my machine to windows - no tracks. Booted my wife's computer to Linux and ran the ripping software - the tracks were there.
Yep, no doubt about it, the CD was crippled with 'copy protection'. I'd heard about CDs that Windows couldn't play but that Linux could, but I'd never actually seen them before. This was my first.
So here I am, ripping the Alanis Morissette cd so that I can copy the tracks back onto one of my own blank cds, in the hopes that the protection is on the cd itself and not incorporated into the tracks. If I'm right I'll soon have an Alanis Morissette CD that'll play in Windows as well as Linux - which is what I goddamned well paid for when I went to the store in the first place.
It's one thing to hear about this shit and express outrage over another persons misfortune, and quite another to find out you've been fucked yourself. I work for my money and I bloody well expect value when I plunk down my cash; if they're going to cripple the CD then the motherfuckers had better goddamn well label the shitty product so I can avoid it in the first place.
Until now I've downloaded music off of Napster, Bearshare, Gnutella, etc. to 'try before I buy' - just like everyone else I know. Our CD collection has quadrupled in the last two years because we've discovered artists we'd never in a million years consider seriously if we hadn't been able to hear the album first. Alanis was one of those artists and we now own everything she's put out.
But I have to ask myself now: if the music industry is going to deliberately sell me defective products, why on God's green earth should I waste the money I work hard for on fucked-up CDs? In this case it looks as if I can rip the songs to the computer and burn them back to a blank CD; but why should I have to do this? I didn't consent to buy a defective product, nor was I informed of the defect before purchase. I was more than willing to hand over $16 bucks to the RIAA bloodsuckers to buy Alanis's new album - and they screwed me anyway.
Assholes. Please tell me - how is this supposed to encourage a generally honest joe like myself to remain honest and buy CDs of songs I've downloaded and liked? If I know I stand a chance of being reamed, with the potential battle of trying to return the CD for a refund to the tight-fisted music store bastards that own my town, what incentive do I have to buy? All this is going to do is encourage piracy, not contain it.
Well, at least the Pink CD works like it should.
Max
privacy zealot = anyone who doesn't want to be stalked by his neighbors, business, or the government.
anti-privacy zealot = those bugshit morons who think they have a god-given right to spy on you, either personally or through their the actions of their government. Fans of the "Enquirer" and The Oprah Winfrey Show. Typified by extremely low IQs.
Max
So in your pitiful little fantasy world the Black Hats are either the government or the corporations, but not both? Your imagination is small, kimosabe, and your libertarian asscheeks fit only to be pounded by corporate dogs.
Max
Well, given that more than a million people have downloaded and installed the Linux version of Opera, and several million Windows users have done the same, I'd say that Opera isn't doomed.
Fact is, it looks like at least some people are willing to pay for a quality browser over the free Internet Explorer. The company that makes Opera has had one steady income rise ever since they released the first version. Now, if IE *weren't* bundled with Windows how many more folks would decide on Opera over IE?
(posted from Opera, by the way).
Max
And while you're at it, could all Anonymous Cowards post in the same place? So if you get modded up we can easily ignore anything you might have to say? Thanks much!
Max
As I was told by my parents, life is what you make of it. There is no one to blame but yourself if you find yourself in a place you are unhappy being.
And when I'm in Africa, face-to-face with children starving to death through no fault of their own or their parents, I say "hey! life is what you make of it! suck it up son! you wouldn't be starving if you just had a better attitude!"
Life is what you make of it, plus one hellaciously huge dose of luck, good or bad. Regardless of what the Yuppies croon, sometimes shit happens and you're fucked no matter how righteous you are. That is how things really work.
Max
A number of people have claimed that the market won't accept crippled devices and that people will simply buy the uncrippled ones. I ask: given that the RIAA and MPAA are more than willing to pass Draconian laws to protect their oligopoly on entertainment media, what on God's green earth makes you think they won't go further and outlaw all devices *not* approved by them? It's silly to believe that 'the market' will take care of the problem when the folks vested in the old way of doing business are capable of buying legislators and laws to make any alternative a felony.
Furthermore, others have stated that different ways of doing things will put the RIAA/MPAA out of business, e.g., more and more bands selling their cds directly using the internet as cheap advertisement. Let's wise up a bit, shall we? If this becomes a popular way of doing business - cutting the RIAA out of the picture altogether - do you really think the powers that be will stand aside and let this model edge them out of the market? Hell no, they'll once again buy the laws needed to make the sale of music cds via the internet, or without RIAA approval, or both, a crime.
As ridiculous as this sounds the loons that run the music business (and now the movie business) have shown themselves to be quite capable of backing Orwellian laws and buying the support required to pass them. They'll do anything to retain their power even if that means imprisoning anyone who defies them, using the U.S. government as their tool.
What's more than a bit ironic here is that if a new technology comes along that eliminates my business and my job, I don't get to go crying to Congress to set up a protection racket for me. I have to learn new skills for a new job at a new business - that's called 'capitalism'. The RIAA, however, if presented with a market that makes their way of doing things obsolete, simply buys the legislation required to outlaw the technology that threatens their favored status. Now that's fair, American style!
Max
3.6 billion songs a month? 350,000 movies a month? Excuse me, but where the fuck do they get their numbers? As anyone with even a smidgeon of technical savvy should note, it's impossible to *even estimate* what percentage of net traffic is devoted to these kinds of downloads. The numbers could be off by a couple of orders of magnitude and no one would know.
Christ, what alarmist propagandizing bastards.
Max
Oh lord. Luke Perry. Do ya think Jenny Garth will show up as a potential love interest?
Max
violation of licensing agreement should be enforced the same whether it is MS's EULA.
The MS EULA isn't a valid licensing agreement. It doesn't even meet the basic requirements of contract law. No court has upheld a EULA as a valid form of contract.
Max
Well, I'll be goddamned. I posted a rather lengthy response to this and it was deleted. It showed when I submitted, but here I am four hours later and now it's gone. No message, nothing - just gone.
Well, let's not let a little thing like that stand in the way of pig-headed persistence. Once again into the breach.
Well, feel free to save toilet paper by using Kinsey.
Please post a link to an empirical study published in an accredited, peer-reviewed journal which definitively refutes the numbers presented by Kinsey, and all who came after him confirming those numbers. Keep in mind the words "empirical", "accredited", and "peer-reviewed" when considering which link is best suited to support your assertion that when it comes to the ratio of bisexuals to homosexuals, the man and his team had their heads up their asses.
If this was the case, it would still be a defect.
Your definition of 'defect' goes far beyond the traditional definition used in biology and genetics. In fact, it seems to encompass anything which you, personally, don't particularly care for.
In order for a trait to be a defect - as defined by the biological sciences - it must in some fashion reduce the organisms chances of survival or probability of successfully reproducing. Bisexuality does neither; bisexuals aren't less likely to survive nor are they less likely to reproduce. There is no defect here, at least so far as the word is defined in the traditional scientific sense.
my gut feeling is that most bisexuality is psychological.
Your gut feeling and two bucks will get you a cup of coffee.
That is, most people who are bisexual override their natural inclination by wanting to try "something different".
My own experiences are purely anecdotal but rather wide-ranging, primarily because I am bisexual and I've had contact with hundreds of bisexuals over the course of my lifetime. Their accounts concerning their bisexuality directly contradict your 'gut feeling'. As you have no evidence whatsoever to support your rather whimsical claims, I'll take the word of several hundred bisexuals - people in a position to know what motivates them - over your 'gut feeling' any day of the week.
The point is that any genetic flaws that cause the attraction mechanism to not work in a way that encourages reproduction is most likely a defect.
If you're of the opinion that sex is only useful for procreation and that the development of social ties through sex is of no survival value, I suggest you educate yourself on the topic before speaking further. This is a fundamental given of the social sciences, so clearly apparent that it isn't disputed. Claims to the contrary demonstrate nothing more than base ignorance, willful or otherwise.
And once again this isn't the definition of defect used in the biological sciences.
But even if we were silly enough to adopt your definition, I could claim that bisexuality gives an individual a survival advantage in that this person not only has the same chance of reproducing as a heterosexual, but that the bisexual would also be capable of strengthening social ties through sexual contact with members of the same gender in a way that heterosexuals couldn't duplicate. Since no serious social scientist would attempt to refute the claim that members of a group with strong social ties are more likely to survive and reproduce than members with weaker ties, it's apparent that in this case the bisexual has a better chance of survival than the heterosexual as long as all other members in the group aren't just heterosexual. And we already know that heterosexuality isn't universal.
By your own definition the bisexual has a survival advantage over the heterosexual. In comparison to the bisexual, heterosexuality could actually be viewed as a defect.
Which only goes to show just how silly your claims actually are.
Max