This is enough. It's time to stop pissing about with diplomacy and concessions and appeasement. It's time to realise that peace with fanatics is impossible. It's time to round up all male Muslims and kill them. Start with Osama bin Laden, Yasser Arafat, Saddam Hussein, and Qaddafi.
While I am not a constituent of yours, I deem it necessary to write to you regarding the Security Systems Standards and Certification Act. According to Slashdot and Wired, you are this bill's sponsor.
As a writer and a programmer, I understand and respect the rights of creators to hold copyright on and profit from their intellectual property. However, as an individual who values his freedom, I find the SSSCA frightening. I think that you are taking good intentions and valid concerns too far.
According to the Wired article, the SSSCA requires users of computers connected to the Internet to install "copy protection". Not only is this provision almost unenforcable and a violation of individuals' property rights, it is immoral. I do not think that the federal government has the moral right to tell an individual what software he or she must install on their own computers.
If you cannot find the time to allay my concerns regarding the SSSCA, at least take time to consider the consequences of this bill's passage, and its possible effects on the rights of individuals to use their property as they see fit.
It's one thing to sell CDs that require that the user identify themselves. However, if you're going to make such demands of the customers, at least have the decency to warn them before they purchase your product. What ever happened to the concept of informed consent and truth in advertising?
Instead of ending a human to do a human's job and spending tax dollars on legitimate expenses like national defense, law enforcement, and public health, the Federal Government, through NASA, is making more new toys.
This sort of nonsense has got to stop. The government has got to stop funding science and stick to the responsibilities delegated to it by the Constitution.
Since I run my own website, with my own address, I make it clear to my friends/family that I am NOT at anybody's beck and call simply because I have a working modem.
I check my email ONCE a day. I filter everything. If a message does not come from somebody I know, it goes right to/dev/null. If a message is nonsense, I tell the sender not to waste my time.
My friends know that I answer emails when and if I choose to. They know that I answer IMs when and if I choose to. They know that the first rule one must follow in a relationship with me is:
GaAs chips running up to 40x faster than straight silicon? What good is a CPU that can run at 30-40GHz to a computer that still uses slow IDE hard drives?
Perhaps the computer makers should push for faster, cheaper disk/memory tech instead of ever-faster CPUs.
I don't buy eBooks either. Treeware books are easier to read in bed. As for broadband -- I don't need it. All I want from the web is text and sometimes graphics. No audio, no video, no Shockwave.
I can get the content I want over a 56K, and use wget to download the software I need.
Dr. Kothari is right: the content on Usenet is a depraved joke. Spam of all varieties, skanky pr0n, willful ignorance, blatant stupidity -- you can find it all on Usenet.
It seems that Usenet has degenerated to the level of an AOL chatroom
Pay to download music? To Hell with that. I won't even download it for free. Music downloads are a waste of bandwidth, especially when you're using a 56K dialup.
Not to mention the fact that your downloaded music is only as permanent as the filesystem it lives on. Switch from ext2 to ReiserFS or from ReiserFS to ext3, and kiss your downloaded music goodbye unless you backed up to tape or CD-R.
Frankly, you're better off buying CDs and ripping them, if you want digital music on your hard drive.
Isn't the assignment/registration of domain names ICANN's sole responsibility? If ICANN strays from this responsibility to exert influence on other areas, then ICANN is abusing its power and must be opposed.
The moment the Internet becomes the 21st century's version of TV is the moment I rip out my modem and throw it away. I won't watch television, and I won't tolerate an Internet that works like television.
Of course you have to be careful of static electricity. Anybody who's taken a rudimentary hardware course and paid attention knows that computer hardware is susceptible to static electricity
Anybody who uses a computer without knowing how it works deserves whatever evil befalls him.
Would the RIAA like knowledgeable computer users to go back to using expensive and bulky tape drives? Better brush up on the man page for tar, ladies and gentlemen.
Slashdot Mirror
This is enough. It's time to stop pissing about with diplomacy and concessions and appeasement. It's time to realise that peace with fanatics is impossible. It's time to round up all male Muslims and kill them. Start with Osama bin Laden, Yasser Arafat, Saddam Hussein, and Qaddafi.
While I am not a constituent of yours, I deem it necessary to write to you regarding the Security Systems Standards and Certification Act. According to Slashdot and Wired, you are this bill's sponsor.
As a writer and a programmer, I understand and respect the rights of creators to hold copyright on and profit from their intellectual property. However, as an individual who values his freedom, I find the SSSCA frightening. I think that you are taking good intentions and valid concerns too far.
According to the Wired article, the SSSCA requires users of computers connected to the Internet to install "copy protection". Not only is this provision almost unenforcable and a violation of individuals' property rights, it is immoral. I do not think that the federal government has the moral right to tell an individual what software he or she must install on their own computers.
If you cannot find the time to allay my concerns regarding the SSSCA, at least take time to consider the consequences of this bill's passage, and its possible effects on the rights of individuals to use their property as they see fit.
Sincerely,
Matthew Lovelace Graybosch
It's one thing to sell CDs that require that the user identify themselves. However, if you're going to make such demands of the customers, at least have the decency to warn them before they purchase your product. What ever happened to the concept of informed consent and truth in advertising?
This is the best news I've had all week: justice was served for once. Now all we need to do is free Dmitry and overturn that damnable law.
Then again, we also have to make Linux so good that ordinary people would be insane to keep Windows, and shatter the RIAA and MPAA.
Tell that to the grunts, Kronus.
It's WAR. When you're fighting a WAR, you're supposed to DESTROY things. Widespread destruction is the primary objective of war.
:)
Just remember, the fastest way to achieve peace is to nuke both sides. Try it in Israel and see what happens.
I want to use Ogg Vorbis.
Boycott MP3. Boycott MTV. Boycott Christianity.
Fuck... let's go nuts and boycott everything.
>^..^
Stop wasting brains on useless toys and give use cheap SCSI!!
Instead of ending a human to do a human's job and spending tax dollars on legitimate expenses like national defense, law enforcement, and public health, the Federal Government, through NASA, is making more new toys.
This sort of nonsense has got to stop. The government has got to stop funding science and stick to the responsibilities delegated to it by the Constitution.
How about holographic storage? >^..^
...and if they want to blow it on toys like this, more power to them. After all... new toys for rich boys make new jobs for working slobs.
Just a few -- and they're even less tolerant of bullshit than I am.
Serial ATA sounds like an interesting technology. For now, though, I get acceptable performance from my UltraWide SCSI.
I guess you haven't had to deal with Microsoft's brain damaged approach to virtual memory lately.
Since I run my own website, with my own address, I make it clear to my friends/family that I am NOT at anybody's beck and call simply because I have a working modem.
/dev/null. If a message is nonsense, I tell the sender not to waste my time.
I check my email ONCE a day. I filter everything. If a message does not come from somebody I know, it goes right to
My friends know that I answer emails when and if I choose to. They know that I answer IMs when and if I choose to. They know that the first rule one must follow in a relationship with me is:
Don't call me. I'll call you.
GaAs chips running up to 40x faster than straight silicon? What good is a CPU that can run at 30-40GHz to a computer that still uses slow IDE hard drives?
Perhaps the computer makers should push for faster, cheaper disk/memory tech instead of ever-faster CPUs.
Cheap SCSI, anyone?
I don't buy eBooks either. Treeware books are easier to read in bed. As for broadband -- I don't need it. All I want from the web is text and sometimes graphics. No audio, no video, no Shockwave.
I can get the content I want over a 56K, and use wget to download the software I need.
Dr. Kothari is right: the content on Usenet is a depraved joke. Spam of all varieties, skanky pr0n, willful ignorance, blatant stupidity -- you can find it all on Usenet.
It seems that Usenet has degenerated to the level of an AOL chatroom
Pay to download music? To Hell with that. I won't even download it for free. Music downloads are a waste of bandwidth, especially when you're using a 56K dialup.
Not to mention the fact that your downloaded music is only as permanent as the filesystem it lives on. Switch from ext2 to ReiserFS or from ReiserFS to ext3, and kiss your downloaded music goodbye unless you backed up to tape or CD-R.
Frankly, you're better off buying CDs and ripping them, if you want digital music on your hard drive.
Isn't the assignment/registration of domain names ICANN's sole responsibility? If ICANN strays from this responsibility to exert influence on other areas, then ICANN is abusing its power and must be opposed.
The moment the Internet becomes the 21st century's version of TV is the moment I rip out my modem and throw it away. I won't watch television, and I won't tolerate an Internet that works like television.
Anybody who uses a computer without knowing how it works deserves whatever evil befalls him.
Another mediocrity bites the dust. Praise Arioch and break out the Hawkwind records.
Would the RIAA like knowledgeable computer users to go back to using expensive and bulky tape drives? Better brush up on the man page for tar, ladies and gentlemen.
I love the smell of Astroturf in the morning!