For the same reason that someone who signs a contract without reading it and/or insisting on changes, deserves to be screwed.
Just out of interest, how long do you think it would take the average person to read in full, understand, and if necessary seek legal advice on every binding agreement they enter into during their lifetime?
There is a reason that legal systems recognise concepts like unequal bargaining power, contracts of adhesion, and unconscionable terms: they do it because if the legal system took the same naive view that you propose, the world would grind to a halt.
User interface design 101: a UI should be intuitive for users and not contain surprises.
Strange, Apple's UI people are usually pretty good. But if you really can have a phone that looks like it's switched off but isn't, and it really does require a counter-intuitive and confusing alternative action by the user to switch it off fully, then they dropped the ball big time on this one and the user is quite right to feel aggrieved at the small fortune in costs he has personally incurred as a result.
AFAIK, you have never had the right to format shift in the US. Fair use is an affirmative defence, not a legal right. (Translation: If you can do it, they can't do you for copyright infringement, but there's nothing that says they can't try to prevent you doing it in the first place.)
Problem is, there are just millions and millions of (windows) users who don't bother with the most basic security.
And the solution is for ISPs to cut off any machine that appears to have been compromised, and for ISPs to collectively isolate and cut off other ISPs that allow significant amounts of bad traffic out of their networks.
I'm all for due process, but in cases like this, a real-time response is required and there isn't much doubt whether a machine/network is emitting significant amounts of bad traffic or not. You just have to make people get their own house in order, and if they don't, kick them off the Internet until they do.
I can agree with much of what you wrote there. So, if I'm not mistaken, do the folks at the Beeb who are working on this, particularly the long tail stuff. I'm pretty sure I've seen comments to the effect that where they can release material without restriction, their eventual goal is to do so. It's just that they prefer to focus on the most popular material first, and that is also the area where the legal issues tend to get in the way. (This is all from memory of various past discussions, so apologies that I can't provide a link to a source.)
On the economic side, you're quite right that the BBC doesn't need to be profit-making as such, but remember there is a balance between raising revenues from selling rights to its own productions and being able to pay the asking price to buy in good content from outside sources. While I don't think you or I have any illusions about what DRM does and doesn't gain, the people the BBC are dealing with in both directions still do. This is what I mean when I see I think we need a culture shift within the industry before the BBC will be able to get away from the DRM mess. I think that shift is starting to happen, as Big Media catches on only a decade or so after everyone else that DRM basically isn't helping them much in practice and is alienating the very people who would otherwise support them. It's only a matter of time until the house of cards comes down, but until then, while I don't think the BBC's approach is ideal, I prefer not to criticise them for going with the flow rather than going out on a limb that can only isolate them right at this moment.
I have yet to see any reasonable explanation as to why content delivered over IP needs to be DRM'd whilst the same content delivered over PAL, DVB-T, DVB-C and DVB-S can be delivered unencrypted (and the BBC have actively pushed for this).
Here's a simple reason: because copying and redistributing open content delivered over IP is trivial and software to do it is in widespread use, while copying and redistributing content delivered over the air requires a bit more work and isn't practically automatic for millions of people. This isn't an issue of principle, it's an issue of pragmatism.
No, you're right, I don't access all the BBC's content. However, I *could* if I wanted, without being required to buy specific software to do so.
That's a pretty fine line to walk. Their web content isn't available to people without a computer and Internet connection. Their radio content isn't available to people without something that receives radio. Their television broadcasts aren't available without a receiver and TV or similar. Technically what you usually have to pay for is the hardware, but you certainly can't access all of the BBC's content without paying something for something.
it's not your licence fee that is paying for the content. Licence fees represent a surprisingly small part of the BBC's income.
In that case the BBC won't mind if we abolish the licence fee.
(Note: I'm actually pro-licence fee, but if you're going to claim my licence fee doesn't pay for anything then there seems to be no reason for me to pay it)
I've never said the licence fee doesn't pay for anything. I said the licence fee is enough to fulfil the BBC's basic public service remit. That's a very important function that I wholeheartedly support. But the licence fee isn't really what's paying for the new series of Doctor Who or Strictly Come Dancing or whatever other popular show you choose.
Noone is discussing copyright here. The discussion is regarding DRM. If you have DRM you don't need copyright and if you have copyright you don't need DRM.
In an ideal world, no you don't. But right now, for all that people here bitch about the unfairness of copyright and all that, the simple fact is that vast numbers of people infringe it all the time and pay no penalty. If you had copyright and the infringers were a small minority who could be effectively penalised, then no, you wouldn't need DRM. But copyright is a subtle economic concept, and as many a Slashdot discussion has shown, a lot of people just don't get the background, see infringement as a victimless crime, and can therefore reason away their responsibility for breaking the law. As long as you have a significant minority of people doing that, the big content providers are going to fight back, and if they can't do it through the courts because it's too difficult to go after minor infringement, they'll do it technologically as long as they're allowed to.
Once again, I will note that I do not believe this is in any way the best system we could have, nor am I a supporter of current DRM trends. However, neither do I condone blatant copyright infringement by freeloaders. We need to move to a more sensible system from both perspectives before this sort of conversation will become a quaint historical note. (And I believe we should make that move, but it will take time.)
How about the content producers not trying to screw over the consumers all the time. At the moment, illegally copied material is _higher quality_ than the legitimately paid for material, because you don't have to deal with DRM, region controls, unskippable content accusing you of being a criminal, etc. Is it any wonder people infringe the copyright?
No it's not, but which came first, the widespread copying or the annoying no-skip Copyright announcements on
I didn't explain my point very well in my first posts, probably not helped by the fact that the OP and I appear to have misunderstood what each other meant by "open" in this context. Please read the detailed comment I just made here, where I've tried to explain in detail the link I see between open formats, current economics, the current culture around content restriction that the BBC doesn't control, and why the combination can't work today using the sort of alternative players you and others have described. If you still think my position is unclear, inconsistent, or defeated by trivial arguments about Ogg, licence fees or whatever, then come on back and we'll talk.
OK, I see we're talking at cross-purposes, and in any case this is an interesting subject so I'm going to expand a lot of my earlier comments here.
When I say I have no problem with open formats, I mean I have no problem in principle with using documented, standardised formats for which anyone with the programming knowledge may write a player.
However, this comes into conflict with another requirement here, which is that the BBC's other commitments mean it can't just stick Ogg files of all its programmes on a web site for anyone to download. This is just the way things are right now, and the choices appear to be some people having the content with some restrictions, or no-one having anything more than today at all. The option many here would no doubt prefer — everyone getting the content without restriction — doesn't appear to be on the table at this time. And here's why:
It seems a pretty straightforward question to me. They are using open formats on their other broadcasts (PAL, DVB-T, DVB-S, DVB-C, DAB, FM, AM) which has allowed a large market of receivers to develop. Why must content delivered over IP be treated so differently?
Because broadcasts within the UK are, give or take, restricted to the UK community who are paying for the material. They do not impact significantly on the ability to sell BBC productions to foreign markets, nor dramatically increase the price the BBC must pay to show productions it buys in.
If you make the material available to everyone, everywhere — and let's be fair, an unrestricted download in an open format is doing exactly that — then suddenly the BBC gets into all sorts of licensing difficulties buying in content (basically, everything it buys in has to be excluded from the on-line facility) and it dramatically reduces the market for BBC shows abroad. Given that these correspond to two relatively large numbers on the BBC's accounts sheet, that just isn't going to happen any time soon, and for reasons the BBC don't have much control over.
If you don't yet appreciate the significance of this, please Google for one of the discussions where someone works out the impact on the licence fee to support this fully open approach in the current economic climate. It's pretty much game over at that point.
I am a licence fee payer, and yet they have imposed artificial technical measures for no good reason which prevent me from accessing this service, that my licence fee has paid for. Since the BBC has a mandate to be platform agnostic, why are they allowed to spend my licence fee in this way? Why can't I get a discount since they are intentionally locking me out of the service?
That is a straw man argument, for several reasons.
Firstly, you already pay the licence fee for the existing facilities. It's not going up significantly to support the new offerings, so you're not losing out.
Secondly, even if you do, it's not intentional. The BBC distributes vast amounts of content in many media, and almost no-one benefits from all of it. Where do you draw the line on how far they must go to be making a reasonable attempt to allow access to those entitled to it?
Thirdly — and this is the thing many in this discussion don't seem to appreciate — it's not your licence fee that is paying for the content. Licence fees represent a surprisingly small part of the BBC's income. It's enough to meet the BBC's primary mandate as a public service broadcaster, but a lot of the really popular (and really expensive) content is actually paid for using other sources, such as selling those foreign rights to the BBC's own productions. If you significantly undermine that revenue stream, we won't need to have this conversation in five years, because the BBC won't be showing much content that people want to download — or view live, for that matter. You can't beat the economics, copyright exists for a reason, and until the world'
I somehow knew someone would bring up Ogg before long.
Given that it is economically and legally implausible that the BBC distribute content in a completely unrestricted format to completely unrestricted viewers any time in the near future — and regardless of anyone's view on the ethics or long-term credibility of this approach, pretending otherwise right now is just fantasizing — how can the BBC use Ogg (or any similar format) to support their goal of distributing content on-line where they can?
Thanks, I hadn't noticed that little discrepancy. In fact, I was under the impression that the one exemption that member states weren't allowed to limit under the EUCD was the transient copying part that applies here (Article 5, clause 1 of the EUCD). Note that the subsequent clauses begin "Member States may provide for exceptions or limitations to...", but this one does not.
I don't see how one could argue the exception that has appeared in the UK law is permitted under the EUCD, unless perhaps you take the rather weak position that such an exemption would somehow be prejudicial to the legitimate rights of the rightholder (Article 5, clause 5). Personally, I don't accept that being able to enforce a licence agreement imposing all sorts of one-sided conditions not otherwise supported by copyright law is a legitimate right of the rightholder!
I do think it's important... how would using an open format prevent everyday people from using the material?
Using an open format wouldn't. But using a format for which a player is not available on the platforms used by everyday people would. I don't object to using an open format, I object to your implication that doing so automatically means players will be available for people to listen/view material in that format.
From the knee-jerk reactions and Troll mod I got, it's obvious that some people didn't understand this, but that doesn't make it any less true. Where do you draw the lines? Should the BBC provide the content in a format for which players are available for at least Windows? Windows and Mac? Windows, Mac and Linux? Windows, Mac, Linux and FreeBSD? All of the above and a 10-year-old system running OS/2? If players aren't already available for all of the important platforms, should the BBC invest money in developing the missing ones? And if so, how many legitimate listeners/viewers need to be using a platform before it becomes important?
My point is simply that this is not a straightforward question, and a flippant but oh-so-Slashdot assumption that if we just use a free format then all the problems will go away is naive.
Sadly, that "weasel" reasoning is the law in the UK. Sony won their modchip case by arguing that the transient copies made while playing out-of-region games hadn't been authorized. And the judge bought it.
In Europe, a relatively little-known law from a few years ago explicitly made it legal to make any copies necessary for the normal operation of things like software. There's an interesting position paper floating around on the web, IIRC written by a real lawyer, which makes a pretty solid argument that since that European law took effect, EULAs have been rendered impotent here. It's just that since there haven't been many high-profile cases yet, most people haven't noticed the implications. (Sorry, I don't have the link bookmarked on this computer.)
Possibly that failure to notice was relevant in the mod-chip case you mentioned, but I have a feeling that that case (assuming you're talking about the PS2 case back around 2001–2002) slightly predates the relevant European law taking effect in the UK. Obviously the case won't set much of a precedent if it's directly contradicted by subsequent statute law.
I will say, from a non-lawyer point of view, I'd say the distinction doesn't make much difference because of the established court decisions.
Perhaps you're right to date and in your jurisdiction. However, it seems to me that the difference between fair use being a consumer right and an affirmative defence is a simple principle: in one case, it would be against the rules for them to try to stop you, while in the other, they can try but it's OK if you succeed anyway. This is pretty significant when it comes to issues like DRM. (It's arguably off-topic here, but a similar principle might apply when considering what is known in some places as the doctrine of first sale, and how that matches up to on-line product activation.)
The sad thing is, I suspect that in this case, the copyright lobby guy is actually correct. I believe that the law should be changed so certain provisions of fair use/fair dealing/whatever your jurisdiction calls it are given the status of consumer rights, such that actively undermining them is against the law. For example, if you want to DRM your product because you believe this will help to protect your business interests, that would be OK, but only if you provided alternative means for people to exercise what wound then be their fair use rights. (Again, the parallel is that you could require on-line activation as an anti-piracy device if you chose to make that business decision, but only if you provided the means for people to resell a legitimate copy of your software under the doctrine of first sale without the new owner finding they couldn't use it effectively, and a means for someone to activate the software if they had to restore from a back-up after your original on-line activation scheme had shut down.)
Sorry, but I just don't follow your logic. If you're talking about changing names in interfaces, then sure, you have to be careful about that just as with changing parameters, return values, exception policies, etc. But most code is not part of an externally visible interface.
Any widespread change in a code base also has to be worth any potential trouble it causes down the line with diffs in your source control system. However, any change that justifies renaming something may well be that big, so this isn't necessarily a problem.
Apart from those concerns, I don't see why you should ever have a problem. If you need to notify more than a small number of fellow developers who may be working in the same areas, then it sounds more like either your design or your project management is broken than anything else.
However, the other thing you're missing is that your case is largely irrelevant. Names should be accurately picked during the analysis and design phases. Why you're even re-naming things more significant than a class level private variable while programming, I don't know.
Ah, so you're the guy who works on the project that gets developed in isolation according to a strict waterfall model, with no external influences such as changing requirements or new features being added to new versions of the software. I kept hearing about this person from naive managers and academics, but I never met him until now.
While the great Java Development Plugin made Eclipse famous, the C/C++ Tools are now in a state that make Eclipse one of the best C++ IDEs around.
Speaking as someone who has used most of the major C and C++ IDEs around, on Windows or otherwise, including several versions of CDT including fairly recent ones, I find that unlikely. CDT used with the GNU tool chain is usable but unspectacular. CDT used with any other tool chain I've tried isn't even usable.
What possible features could you be using that require 4 gigs of RAM? I'm not going to pretend Eclipse is lightweight, but I find that it's memory footprint has been under 300 megs.
Does anyone else find it disturbing that we're talking about glorified text editors running in "under 300 megs" as if this were some sort of praise?
If ever there was any doubt that the current trend towards prioritising developer productivity over performance of the resulting product was damaging the software business, and the idea that "the hardware will get faster to make up for it" was nonsense, modern IDEs are it. Sure, they do more than just display text these days, but not that much more. A lot of this, I suspect, is down to these modular, plug-in-friendly, VM-based architectures, which seem to be so over-engineered and generic that it might actually have been faster just to write several different, specialist tools, with the use of common libraries as appropriate.
This is not just Eclipse bashing, BTW. VS2005 loading my current project at work also requires nearly 300MB and runs like a dog. The total size of all the source code in the project is less than 1/10 of that.
What is perhaps most disturbing is that VC++ 6 offered me much the same useful functionality in the IDE, except that in those days, Intellisense usually found what I was looking for, help came up almost instantly and was on the page I wanted 99% of the time, it didn't pause for several seconds every time I opened the Tools->Options dialog, etc. Oh, and it was running on a machine less than 10% as powerful as what's on my desk today.
Which would be funny, except that for the languages supported by Visual Studio, the correct version is Visual Studio >> Eclipse.
Eclipse does fine on its home territory as a Java IDE, but the plug-in system is way too disorganised and underpowered for serious development in, say, C++ or C#. Even if you use CDT for C++ work, it's basically hopeless unless you're combining it with GNU tools, and things like the debugging tools aren't even close to the power of VS.
Slashdot Mirror
When you shut your phone, does it turn off?
Er... Yes, actually. And so it has been with every mobile I've ever owned.
People know they have to press something to really turn "off" a phone, as per every other phone ever made.
Apparently you are mistaken on both counts.
After all, how is a phone supposed to receive calls if it's really off?
It's not! If I wanted to receive calls, I wouldn't have turned my phone off, would I?
There needs to be a difference between a sleep mode and off, and this is obvious on the iPhone.
Apparently you are mistaken on that one, too.
For the same reason that someone who signs a contract without reading it and/or insisting on changes, deserves to be screwed.
Just out of interest, how long do you think it would take the average person to read in full, understand, and if necessary seek legal advice on every binding agreement they enter into during their lifetime?
There is a reason that legal systems recognise concepts like unequal bargaining power, contracts of adhesion, and unconscionable terms: they do it because if the legal system took the same naive view that you propose, the world would grind to a halt.
User interface design 101: a UI should be intuitive for users and not contain surprises.
Strange, Apple's UI people are usually pretty good. But if you really can have a phone that looks like it's switched off but isn't, and it really does require a counter-intuitive and confusing alternative action by the user to switch it off fully, then they dropped the ball big time on this one and the user is quite right to feel aggrieved at the small fortune in costs he has personally incurred as a result.
AFAIK, you have never had the right to format shift in the US. Fair use is an affirmative defence, not a legal right. (Translation: If you can do it, they can't do you for copyright infringement, but there's nothing that says they can't try to prevent you doing it in the first place.)
Problem is, there are just millions and millions of (windows) users who don't bother with the most basic security.
And the solution is for ISPs to cut off any machine that appears to have been compromised, and for ISPs to collectively isolate and cut off other ISPs that allow significant amounts of bad traffic out of their networks.
I'm all for due process, but in cases like this, a real-time response is required and there isn't much doubt whether a machine/network is emitting significant amounts of bad traffic or not. You just have to make people get their own house in order, and if they don't, kick them off the Internet until they do.
What on earth makes you think people like Microsoft and Google don't get hit by these people?
I have no data you don't, but I'd be amazed if no-one has ever threatened the richest IT companies in the world with outages if they don't pay up.
Ah, a plan with no drawbacks... :-)
I can agree with much of what you wrote there. So, if I'm not mistaken, do the folks at the Beeb who are working on this, particularly the long tail stuff. I'm pretty sure I've seen comments to the effect that where they can release material without restriction, their eventual goal is to do so. It's just that they prefer to focus on the most popular material first, and that is also the area where the legal issues tend to get in the way. (This is all from memory of various past discussions, so apologies that I can't provide a link to a source.)
On the economic side, you're quite right that the BBC doesn't need to be profit-making as such, but remember there is a balance between raising revenues from selling rights to its own productions and being able to pay the asking price to buy in good content from outside sources. While I don't think you or I have any illusions about what DRM does and doesn't gain, the people the BBC are dealing with in both directions still do. This is what I mean when I see I think we need a culture shift within the industry before the BBC will be able to get away from the DRM mess. I think that shift is starting to happen, as Big Media catches on only a decade or so after everyone else that DRM basically isn't helping them much in practice and is alienating the very people who would otherwise support them. It's only a matter of time until the house of cards comes down, but until then, while I don't think the BBC's approach is ideal, I prefer not to criticise them for going with the flow rather than going out on a limb that can only isolate them right at this moment.
I have yet to see any reasonable explanation as to why content delivered over IP needs to be DRM'd whilst the same content delivered over PAL, DVB-T, DVB-C and DVB-S can be delivered unencrypted (and the BBC have actively pushed for this).
Here's a simple reason: because copying and redistributing open content delivered over IP is trivial and software to do it is in widespread use, while copying and redistributing content delivered over the air requires a bit more work and isn't practically automatic for millions of people. This isn't an issue of principle, it's an issue of pragmatism.
No, you're right, I don't access all the BBC's content. However, I *could* if I wanted, without being required to buy specific software to do so.
That's a pretty fine line to walk. Their web content isn't available to people without a computer and Internet connection. Their radio content isn't available to people without something that receives radio. Their television broadcasts aren't available without a receiver and TV or similar. Technically what you usually have to pay for is the hardware, but you certainly can't access all of the BBC's content without paying something for something.
it's not your licence fee that is paying for the content. Licence fees represent a surprisingly small part of the BBC's income.
In that case the BBC won't mind if we abolish the licence fee.
(Note: I'm actually pro-licence fee, but if you're going to claim my licence fee doesn't pay for anything then there seems to be no reason for me to pay it)
I've never said the licence fee doesn't pay for anything. I said the licence fee is enough to fulfil the BBC's basic public service remit. That's a very important function that I wholeheartedly support. But the licence fee isn't really what's paying for the new series of Doctor Who or Strictly Come Dancing or whatever other popular show you choose.
Noone is discussing copyright here. The discussion is regarding DRM. If you have DRM you don't need copyright and if you have copyright you don't need DRM.
In an ideal world, no you don't. But right now, for all that people here bitch about the unfairness of copyright and all that, the simple fact is that vast numbers of people infringe it all the time and pay no penalty. If you had copyright and the infringers were a small minority who could be effectively penalised, then no, you wouldn't need DRM. But copyright is a subtle economic concept, and as many a Slashdot discussion has shown, a lot of people just don't get the background, see infringement as a victimless crime, and can therefore reason away their responsibility for breaking the law. As long as you have a significant minority of people doing that, the big content providers are going to fight back, and if they can't do it through the courts because it's too difficult to go after minor infringement, they'll do it technologically as long as they're allowed to.
Once again, I will note that I do not believe this is in any way the best system we could have, nor am I a supporter of current DRM trends. However, neither do I condone blatant copyright infringement by freeloaders. We need to move to a more sensible system from both perspectives before this sort of conversation will become a quaint historical note. (And I believe we should make that move, but it will take time.)
How about the content producers not trying to screw over the consumers all the time. At the moment, illegally copied material is _higher quality_ than the legitimately paid for material, because you don't have to deal with DRM, region controls, unskippable content accusing you of being a criminal, etc. Is it any wonder people infringe the copyright?
No it's not, but which came first, the widespread copying or the annoying no-skip Copyright announcements on
I didn't explain my point very well in my first posts, probably not helped by the fact that the OP and I appear to have misunderstood what each other meant by "open" in this context. Please read the detailed comment I just made here, where I've tried to explain in detail the link I see between open formats, current economics, the current culture around content restriction that the BBC doesn't control, and why the combination can't work today using the sort of alternative players you and others have described. If you still think my position is unclear, inconsistent, or defeated by trivial arguments about Ogg, licence fees or whatever, then come on back and we'll talk.
OK, I see we're talking at cross-purposes, and in any case this is an interesting subject so I'm going to expand a lot of my earlier comments here.
When I say I have no problem with open formats, I mean I have no problem in principle with using documented, standardised formats for which anyone with the programming knowledge may write a player.
However, this comes into conflict with another requirement here, which is that the BBC's other commitments mean it can't just stick Ogg files of all its programmes on a web site for anyone to download. This is just the way things are right now, and the choices appear to be some people having the content with some restrictions, or no-one having anything more than today at all. The option many here would no doubt prefer — everyone getting the content without restriction — doesn't appear to be on the table at this time. And here's why:
It seems a pretty straightforward question to me. They are using open formats on their other broadcasts (PAL, DVB-T, DVB-S, DVB-C, DAB, FM, AM) which has allowed a large market of receivers to develop. Why must content delivered over IP be treated so differently?
Because broadcasts within the UK are, give or take, restricted to the UK community who are paying for the material. They do not impact significantly on the ability to sell BBC productions to foreign markets, nor dramatically increase the price the BBC must pay to show productions it buys in.
If you make the material available to everyone, everywhere — and let's be fair, an unrestricted download in an open format is doing exactly that — then suddenly the BBC gets into all sorts of licensing difficulties buying in content (basically, everything it buys in has to be excluded from the on-line facility) and it dramatically reduces the market for BBC shows abroad. Given that these correspond to two relatively large numbers on the BBC's accounts sheet, that just isn't going to happen any time soon, and for reasons the BBC don't have much control over.
If you don't yet appreciate the significance of this, please Google for one of the discussions where someone works out the impact on the licence fee to support this fully open approach in the current economic climate. It's pretty much game over at that point.
I am a licence fee payer, and yet they have imposed artificial technical measures for no good reason which prevent me from accessing this service, that my licence fee has paid for. Since the BBC has a mandate to be platform agnostic, why are they allowed to spend my licence fee in this way? Why can't I get a discount since they are intentionally locking me out of the service?
That is a straw man argument, for several reasons.
Firstly, you already pay the licence fee for the existing facilities. It's not going up significantly to support the new offerings, so you're not losing out.
Secondly, even if you do, it's not intentional. The BBC distributes vast amounts of content in many media, and almost no-one benefits from all of it. Where do you draw the line on how far they must go to be making a reasonable attempt to allow access to those entitled to it?
Thirdly — and this is the thing many in this discussion don't seem to appreciate — it's not your licence fee that is paying for the content. Licence fees represent a surprisingly small part of the BBC's income. It's enough to meet the BBC's primary mandate as a public service broadcaster, but a lot of the really popular (and really expensive) content is actually paid for using other sources, such as selling those foreign rights to the BBC's own productions. If you significantly undermine that revenue stream, we won't need to have this conversation in five years, because the BBC won't be showing much content that people want to download — or view live, for that matter. You can't beat the economics, copyright exists for a reason, and until the world'
I somehow knew someone would bring up Ogg before long.
Given that it is economically and legally implausible that the BBC distribute content in a completely unrestricted format to completely unrestricted viewers any time in the near future — and regardless of anyone's view on the ethics or long-term credibility of this approach, pretending otherwise right now is just fantasizing — how can the BBC use Ogg (or any similar format) to support their goal of distributing content on-line where they can?
Thanks, I hadn't noticed that little discrepancy. In fact, I was under the impression that the one exemption that member states weren't allowed to limit under the EUCD was the transient copying part that applies here (Article 5, clause 1 of the EUCD). Note that the subsequent clauses begin "Member States may provide for exceptions or limitations to ...", but this one does not.
I don't see how one could argue the exception that has appeared in the UK law is permitted under the EUCD, unless perhaps you take the rather weak position that such an exemption would somehow be prejudicial to the legitimate rights of the rightholder (Article 5, clause 5). Personally, I don't accept that being able to enforce a licence agreement imposing all sorts of one-sided conditions not otherwise supported by copyright law is a legitimate right of the rightholder!
I do think it's important... how would using an open format prevent everyday people from using the material?
Using an open format wouldn't. But using a format for which a player is not available on the platforms used by everyday people would. I don't object to using an open format, I object to your implication that doing so automatically means players will be available for people to listen/view material in that format.
From the knee-jerk reactions and Troll mod I got, it's obvious that some people didn't understand this, but that doesn't make it any less true. Where do you draw the lines? Should the BBC provide the content in a format for which players are available for at least Windows? Windows and Mac? Windows, Mac and Linux? Windows, Mac, Linux and FreeBSD? All of the above and a 10-year-old system running OS/2? If players aren't already available for all of the important platforms, should the BBC invest money in developing the missing ones? And if so, how many legitimate listeners/viewers need to be using a platform before it becomes important?
My point is simply that this is not a straightforward question, and a flippant but oh-so-Slashdot assumption that if we just use a free format then all the problems will go away is naive.
Blockquoth the AC:
Sadly, that "weasel" reasoning is the law in the UK. Sony won their modchip case by arguing that the transient copies made while playing out-of-region games hadn't been authorized. And the judge bought it.
In Europe, a relatively little-known law from a few years ago explicitly made it legal to make any copies necessary for the normal operation of things like software. There's an interesting position paper floating around on the web, IIRC written by a real lawyer, which makes a pretty solid argument that since that European law took effect, EULAs have been rendered impotent here. It's just that since there haven't been many high-profile cases yet, most people haven't noticed the implications. (Sorry, I don't have the link bookmarked on this computer.)
Possibly that failure to notice was relevant in the mod-chip case you mentioned, but I have a feeling that that case (assuming you're talking about the PS2 case back around 2001–2002) slightly predates the relevant European law taking effect in the UK. Obviously the case won't set much of a precedent if it's directly contradicted by subsequent statute law.
I will say, from a non-lawyer point of view, I'd say the distinction doesn't make much difference because of the established court decisions.
Perhaps you're right to date and in your jurisdiction. However, it seems to me that the difference between fair use being a consumer right and an affirmative defence is a simple principle: in one case, it would be against the rules for them to try to stop you, while in the other, they can try but it's OK if you succeed anyway. This is pretty significant when it comes to issues like DRM. (It's arguably off-topic here, but a similar principle might apply when considering what is known in some places as the doctrine of first sale, and how that matches up to on-line product activation.)
The sad thing is, I suspect that in this case, the copyright lobby guy is actually correct. I believe that the law should be changed so certain provisions of fair use/fair dealing/whatever your jurisdiction calls it are given the status of consumer rights, such that actively undermining them is against the law. For example, if you want to DRM your product because you believe this will help to protect your business interests, that would be OK, but only if you provided alternative means for people to exercise what wound then be their fair use rights. (Again, the parallel is that you could require on-line activation as an anti-piracy device if you chose to make that business decision, but only if you provided the means for people to resell a legitimate copy of your software under the doctrine of first sale without the new owner finding they couldn't use it effectively, and a means for someone to activate the software if they had to restore from a back-up after your original on-line activation scheme had shut down.)
If they used an open format for the system, producing a "iplayer" application for each OS wouldn't be important.
You don't think it's important that everyday people can actually listen/watch the material? How strange.
Sorry, but I just don't follow your logic. If you're talking about changing names in interfaces, then sure, you have to be careful about that just as with changing parameters, return values, exception policies, etc. But most code is not part of an externally visible interface.
Any widespread change in a code base also has to be worth any potential trouble it causes down the line with diffs in your source control system. However, any change that justifies renaming something may well be that big, so this isn't necessarily a problem.
Apart from those concerns, I don't see why you should ever have a problem. If you need to notify more than a small number of fellow developers who may be working in the same areas, then it sounds more like either your design or your project management is broken than anything else.
However, the other thing you're missing is that your case is largely irrelevant. Names should be accurately picked during the analysis and design phases. Why you're even re-naming things more significant than a class level private variable while programming, I don't know.
Ah, so you're the guy who works on the project that gets developed in isolation according to a strict waterfall model, with no external influences such as changing requirements or new features being added to new versions of the software. I kept hearing about this person from naive managers and academics, but I never met him until now.
And what does that do in Visual C++?
While the great Java Development Plugin made Eclipse famous, the C/C++ Tools are now in a state that make Eclipse one of the best C++ IDEs around.
Speaking as someone who has used most of the major C and C++ IDEs around, on Windows or otherwise, including several versions of CDT including fairly recent ones, I find that unlikely. CDT used with the GNU tool chain is usable but unspectacular. CDT used with any other tool chain I've tried isn't even usable.
What possible features could you be using that require 4 gigs of RAM? I'm not going to pretend Eclipse is lightweight, but I find that it's memory footprint has been under 300 megs.
Does anyone else find it disturbing that we're talking about glorified text editors running in "under 300 megs" as if this were some sort of praise?
If ever there was any doubt that the current trend towards prioritising developer productivity over performance of the resulting product was damaging the software business, and the idea that "the hardware will get faster to make up for it" was nonsense, modern IDEs are it. Sure, they do more than just display text these days, but not that much more. A lot of this, I suspect, is down to these modular, plug-in-friendly, VM-based architectures, which seem to be so over-engineered and generic that it might actually have been faster just to write several different, specialist tools, with the use of common libraries as appropriate.
This is not just Eclipse bashing, BTW. VS2005 loading my current project at work also requires nearly 300MB and runs like a dog. The total size of all the source code in the project is less than 1/10 of that.
What is perhaps most disturbing is that VC++ 6 offered me much the same useful functionality in the IDE, except that in those days, Intellisense usually found what I was looking for, help came up almost instantly and was on the page I wanted 99% of the time, it didn't pause for several seconds every time I opened the Tools->Options dialog, etc. Oh, and it was running on a machine less than 10% as powerful as what's on my desk today.
i don't know a single developer thats used both who doesn't recognise visual studio to be a vastly inferior product.
Hi. I'm a developer, I've used both, and I don't recognise Visual Studio to be a vastly inferior product. There, now you know one. :-)
Eclipse>Visual Studio
Which would be funny, except that for the languages supported by Visual Studio, the correct version is Visual Studio >> Eclipse.
Eclipse does fine on its home territory as a Java IDE, but the plug-in system is way too disorganised and underpowered for serious development in, say, C++ or C#. Even if you use CDT for C++ work, it's basically hopeless unless you're combining it with GNU tools, and things like the debugging tools aren't even close to the power of VS.
I think you're being a little too clever. If you're talking about an axiomatic system, it's pretty objective to state the axioms, for example...