shouldn't content producers, artists, programmers, and basically anyone producing something have a right to their work?
A loaded question. Of course they should have a right to their work - that is not the question. The real question is: should media content producers have the right to profit off the artificial scarcity of digital goods? When the cost to copy digital content is fixed, why should they have the right to charge for each digital copy as if it is a scarce item at many thousands of percent markup over the price to copy that item?
Your assuming that a decrease in price point won't increase sales, by a similar ratio. In other words if they cut the cost by 50% and the sales increase by a little over double( double would assume that the cost to them was 0 per copy), then the profit margin would not change.
That is only based on the assumption that only "they" can distribute the media - so we are back where we started - legislating artificial scarcity into the unlimited copies, fixed cost distribution medium so that only those who are allowed by law to distribute can profit - everyone else cannot benefit from the Internets innovation. In the "normal" scarce goods model, distributors (companies running trucks, boats...) all take their cut of the profits for moving the physical goods around (and employed people outside of big media in the process). Big Media does not need those distributors anymore, at least not like they needed them before to before move CD boxes around. However In the Internets fixed cost distribution medium *anyone* can distribute, and redistribute for fixed cost. Without ACTA and legislation there is no massive profit for moving bits and bytes around. The power to reach people goes back to the artist and is no longer solely in the hands of of a few big media companies who used to be the only ones who could facilitate the distribution of their artistic works to the masses. However the artist can't try and ride on the next to free fixed cost distribution but charge for artificial scarcity either - profit is no longer in distribution (without ACTA and strict laws forcing artificial scarcity into the internet, that is).
Seeing zero reporting on this in the media (apart from the excellent interviews professor Geist linked on his blog). Big media all for this. The majority of "big media" business models are based on artificial scarcity. That is, big media charge for the packaging and distribution of bits and bytes as a if these things are scarce commodity. Note that I am not talking about the actual artistic content creation, but only the packaging and distribution. Packaging and distribution are certainly value adding exercises, but when talking about digital media, the cost to reproduce and distribute is a fixed cost or as close to fixed as you can get (see wikipedia article reference - "duplicated billions of times over for a relatively cheap production price (an initial investment in a computer, an internet connection, and any power consumption costs; and these are already fixed costs in most environments)").
It is physically impossible to maintain the current (substantial) profit differential between charging for the packaging and distribution of each digital item as if it is a scarce commodity, while running that part of their operation at or very close to fixed cost (The most profitable and central part of big media). Any other business model that embraces the digital medium for what it is (a fixed cost medium for duplication/distribution), and not based on artificial scarcity simply could never maintain the same levels of profitability they currently enjoy.
They only have one choice if they wish to maintain their currently profit levels: Legislate scarcity into the digital medium (hence we see secret ACTA treaties and other morally questionable political clout being thrown about in favor of this goal)
If we actually talk about the artistic content creation part of the business model, that could be considered and entirely different issue. Big media obviously pay artists to produce content. The interesting "moral high ground" issue that both sides of the debate are claiming revolves around the question of if Big Media should also be allowed by society to charge for artificial scarcity well into the future (even well beyond the original artists death!) because they also happened to contract the artists to create the work to begin with. Big Medias defense so far seems to me to be a "muddy the debate" tactic, ignoring the artificial scarcity issue entirely and just shouting "your damaging the artists" in an effort to maintain the moral high ground.
James Murdoch criticized the BBC for providing 'free news' on the internet, making it 'incredibly hard for private news organizations to ask people to pay for their news.'
Little James Murdoch recently also said that the BBC is killing Democracy. Funny, here I was thinking that the BBC is the only big media organization with the balls to stand up and support the democratic process, while the scholarly literature into corporate controlled media showing exact opposite. Little Dr James Murdoch must be confused... or not?
At first glance you may think that the US invasion will be a good thing for Somalia... but then the horrific details of the methods used might give pause to that romanticized "It'll be good for 'em" notion of war and invasion.
I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class thug for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.
If they can find a way to wean themselves off their business model
The majority of "big media" business models are based on artificial scarcity. That is, big media charge for the packaging and distribution of bits and bytes as a if these things are scarce commodity. Note that I am not talking about the actual artistic content creation, but only the packaging and distribution. Packaging and distribution are certainly value adding exercises, but when talking about digital media, the cost to reproduce and distribute is a fixed cost or as close to fixed as you can get (see wikipedia article reference - "duplicated billions of times over for a relatively cheap production price (an initial investment in a computer, an internet connection, and any power consumption costs; and these are already fixed costs in most environments)").
...without taking huge hits to their profitability, I'm sure they would at least investigate it.
Nice, but there is not need to investigate - it is not going to happen for a very fundamental reason. It is physically impossible to maintain the current (substantial) profit differential between charging for the packaging and distribution of each digital item as if it is a scarce commodity, while running that part of their operation at or very close to fixed cost (The most profitable and central part of big media). Any other business model that embraces the digital medium for what it is (a fixed cost medium for duplication/distribution), and not based on artificial scarcity simply could never maintain the same levels of profitability they currently enjoy.
No, Big Media only have one choice if they wish to maintain their currently profit levels: Legislate scarcity into the digital medium (hence we see secret ACTA treaties and other morally questionable political clout being thrown about in favor of this goal)
If we actually talk about the artistic content creation part of the business model, that could be considered and entirely different issue. Big media obviously pay artists to produce content. The interesting "moral high ground" issue that both sides of the debate are claiming revolves around the question of if Big Media should also be allowed by society to charge for artificial scarcity well into the future (even well beyond the original artists death!) because they also happened to contract the artists to create the work to begin with. Big Medias defense so far seems to me to be a "muddy the debate" tactic, ignoring the artificial scarcity issue entirely and just shouting "your damaging the artists" in an effort to maintain the moral high ground.
As an American, I feel it's quite certain that USA politicians are against transparency; a lot of their funding comes from the people that want it passed. However, trying to reach that conclusion from the article is moronic.
I agree that the article itself is short on details, but luckily we don't have to look very far at the "official" evidence we are permitted to see to find their priorities and aims that paint a pretty damning picture that US lobby groups (i.e. the IIPA - International Intellectual Property Alliance) and their bought and paid for US politicians are the main instigators behind ACTA. Given the official data we do have, It would be very naive indeed to start give them any benefit of the doubt on the secret speculative ACTA treaty, especially since they are making every effort to keep it out of the public eye.
If France and Italy haven't actually stated that they fear U.S. retaliation, then that's just speculation.
Yeah, just like everything else we know about ACTA - it is ALL speculation and no "official" information. However we don't have to look very far at the "official" evidence we are permitted to see to find their priorities and aims that paint a pretty damning picture that US lobby groups (i.e. the IIPA - International Intellectual Property Alliance) and their bought and paid for US politicians are the main instigators behind ACTA. Given the official data we do have, It would be very naive indeed to start give them any benefit of the doubt on the secret speculative ACTA treaty, especially since they are making every effort to keep it out of the public eye.
IDG covers the latest Dutch leak that reveals the transparency position of many ACTA participants. Particularly telling is the view that both France and Italy favour greater transparency, but fear U.S. retaliation.
IDG covers the latest Dutch leak that reveals the transparency position of many ACTA participants. Particularly telling is the view that both France and Italy favour greater transparency, but fear U.S. retaliation.
The panelists were obsessing over whether they had enough authority to do something
"obsessing over whether they had enough authority" was no mistake - it was the whole point of this test from the very beginning. We can already see that "lack of authority" and recommending new powers be granted to the president is the main focus being driven home in the aftermath of this exercise in propaganda. The real aim of course being to garner support for enacting laws giving enough authority to do "something" about this problem of people communicating over the internet. The people behind this test are not stupid or clueless, they merely know which fear buttons to press in order to get what they want.
Sad but true. On the bright side (For those controlling the reigns that is), all those unemployed poor people sure do make great soldiers for the war machine. Willing ti sign up too, since they have little hope to do anything else. No surprise that military recruitment officers are overwhelmingly in the poor zones of America.
which finds itself at war with a powerful state isn't cowardly for refusing to follow rules designed to ensure its defeat; it's intelligent.
Indeed. A Chinese guy wrote a book about it around 500BC after defeating a vastly superior force - and also makes a good case towards US defeat in Afghanistan and Iran as being only a matter of time - technological superiority not withstanding. His book is still widely read by many managers/CEO's amongst others for it's insight into war.
The fallacy here is that this measure will do nothing.
I wish I could say otherwise, but you're wrong about that. It will do nothing to stop the production or spread of child pornography, but it will constitute another erosion of freedom of speech or information.
I wish I could say otherwise, but even this is not entirely correct. The measure will actually HELP the spread of child pornography.
It's pretty simple really:
1) Net censorship will eventually of course mean less access to "illegal" information. For example access to information deemed illegal at sites like Wikileaks.
2) Without widespread access to "illegal" information such as the illegal ACTA leaks, there will be little to no organized resistance to the ever-tightening Copyright and IP laws and treaties being signed (ACTA, GATS, TRIPS etc)
3) Strict IP and copyright laws keep third world countries poor [1]. The majority of Child Pornography stems from human trafficking from third world countries, an unfortunate risk of growing up in a third world country [2]. ...
If the French Government really cared about Child Pornography, it would be taking studies like [1] below seriously and not playing cloak and dagger with treaties like ACTA.
[1]
Commission on Intellectual Property Rights declared the internationally-mandated expansion of intellectual property (IP) rights unlikely to generate significant benefits for most developing countries and likely to impose costs, such as higher priced medicines or seeds. This makes poverty reduction more difficult. The intensively researched, 180-page report is entitled Integrating Intellectual Property Rights and Development Policy. It is the culmination of much study and follows on more than a dozen meetings and workshops, 17 working papers, an exhaustive literature review of the field, visits to several developed and developing nations and a major conference. The report makes some 50 recommendations aimed at aligning IP protection with the goal of reducing poverty in developing nations. Topics include IP and health; agriculture; traditional knowledge; copyrights, software and the Internet; and the role of WTO and WIPO in advancing developing country interests. The Commission is an independent international body made up of Commissioners from both developed and developing countries with expertise in science, law, ethics and economics. The Commissioners come from industry, government and academia* (see list of Commissioners below). "Developed countries often proceed on the assumption that what is good for them is likely to be good for developing countries," said Professor John Barton, Commission Chair and George E. Osborne Professor of Law, Stanford University. "But, in the case of developing countries, more and stronger protection is not necessarily better. Developing countries should not be encouraged or coerced into adopting stronger IP rights without regard to the impact this has on their development and poor people. They should be allowed to adopt appropriate rights regimes, not necessarily the most protective ones."
Today due to climate changes effects on the ocean currents, El Ninyo could quite possibly become permanent rather than a periodic event - which if happens, will freeze eastern Australia in a permanent drought conditions (and South America in permanent flooding conditions). A bit of drought in half of Australia and a few major floods in South America would be the very least of the worlds worries though... climate change screwing up the ocean current system is implicated in the Anoxic event which eventually led to the death of 90% of life on earth
>Climate change is a farce. im a sydneysider, this is the worst duststorm we've had in 70 years No worries mate, the planet will be just fine. Nothing we can do to the planet short of complete nuclear Armageddon that Mother earth can't recover from in a few million years. Its not the planet we have to worry about... its our survival on it as a destructive, greedy, self serving species - and that's just a random sampling of our "elected" leaders
People seem to be ignoring that if news gathering becomes a volunteer-only effort, we're going to get crappy, slanted news -- far worse than anything we see today. Anyone with an agenda is going to put "reporters" on the scene who will deliver precisely the message they want you to hear, dressed up as "news".
Anyone with 5 minutes, a major historical news story and google news archive can demonstrate the fallacy in your argument. You have described _exactly_ the state of mainstream news today - crappy, slanted news delivering the message they want you to hear (i.e. profitable to special interest groups). Pick any of the most significant events in the last decade where powerful special interest groups had a firm position, and the mainstream news has rolled over to shaft their viewer/readers with exactly the wrong message to suit their corporate masters position, flooding the media echo chamber with the deceptive message in the process. Check it for yourself in the archives.
Pre-Iraq war - news message: weapons of mass destruction ("we must invade, there is no other choice"). Special Interest Group: The MIC..
Financial Crisis pre-2008 - news message: Money supply increases, what money supply increase? M3 discontinued, its not important... move along nothing is broken here as reflected in the total absence of mainstream news coverage
The majority of news sources that told it how it turned out (in retrospect), were non-mainstream news sources - and thanks to services like google news archive it can easily be demonstrated. You did not hear significant anti-war positions from the mainstream news cool-aid stand, which remained completely silent. You also could have also known well in advance that inflation was heading for the moon, and where and why to best place your hard earned savings for the coming economic storm from independent professionals not driven by increasing the bottom line, but instead in delivering accurate high quality news.
Publishers of mainstream news can't cut it on the internet, because they cannot compete with free high quality alternatives from motivated professionals.
Some advancements at odds with large well financed corporate business models are buried before they get off the ground. Others are bought out and ripped up for competing. Where the cat is already out of the bag, war is waged against the advancement to try and control the damage (*IAA Vs the Internet). These anti-competitive practices have only got worse as the decades roles by and as we can see from all the *IAA lawyers in the DOJ, appear to have the full backing of government, regardless of who is in power (a vote for anti-progress perhaps?).
It's business and usual... because it is profitable to do these things, and so fulfilling MS obligations to their shareholders. Users of the OS are secondary, as long as they keep buying it of course.
They certainly aren't trying to _actually_ clean up the air, since worse offenders than the USA already exist and won't be affected by this law at all. In fact, I would speculate that these countries are simply going to grow and gobble up whatever materials we're no longer able to use under this law, and completely take over what little markets American products still have a place in.
From watching him in various public speeches, I begin to suspect that this Pommie wanna-be Aussie Senator Conroy actually believes he is doing the right thing and genuinely believes he is fighting for the good of the children, and that's all mate.
Ignorant, naive, incompetent, complacent or actively plotting (take your pick - nobody knows but him) that the tools he is pushing for will become powerful weapons of political and corporate-profit maintaining control later on down that long track.
"I would use this ring from a desire to do good... But through me, it would wield a power too great and terrible to imagine"... If only Senator Conroy could be so wise.
I do not disagree with your points on the role of greed in a population, but I do think your missing my point...
So, I put to you this question: are you willing to give up your sense of self, all of your individuality, and all of your personal freedom, in order to live in this greed-free society?
If so, you would make a very good communist, and I wish you the best of luck.
Its not about curing individual greed - impossible goal and as you point out, has serious beneficial side effects (in addition to being a great motivator). Nor did my point have anything to do with giving up the individuals sense of self. Its also as far from Communism as you can get - competition is a powerful and in most cases, efficient, resource allocation system. One that communism can't come close to. Let put it another way: Are you willing to accept corporate/state sponsored greed, operating on a much higher level than individual greed, if it guarantees creating another financial crisis down the road where many will lose their life savings (again). How about moving forward drilling for oil in protected nature sanctuaries within arctic limits even while scientific community is coming to a consensus on the terrible repercussions to us all of following this line of corporate profit. What about war for profit's sake?
Going by your post and if I jumped to conclusions, I might get the impression that your comfortable with these particular side effects, accept them as a given, or feel we do not have the intelligence as a society to recognize them as a "not good thing" side-effect. If it's the latter case, I think your right.
Slashdot Mirror
shouldn't content producers, artists, programmers, and basically anyone producing something have a right to their work?
A loaded question. Of course they should have a right to their work - that is not the question. The real question is: should media content producers have the right to profit off the artificial scarcity of digital goods?
When the cost to copy digital content is fixed, why should they have the right to charge for each digital copy as if it is a scarce item at many thousands of percent markup over the price to copy that item?
Your assuming that a decrease in price point won't increase sales, by a similar ratio. In other words if they cut the cost by 50% and the sales increase by a little over double( double would assume that the cost to them was 0 per copy), then the profit margin would not change.
That is only based on the assumption that only "they" can distribute the media - so we are back where we started - legislating artificial scarcity into the unlimited copies, fixed cost distribution medium so that only those who are allowed by law to distribute can profit - everyone else cannot benefit from the Internets innovation. In the "normal" scarce goods model, distributors (companies running trucks, boats...) all take their cut of the profits for moving the physical goods around (and employed people outside of big media in the process). Big Media does not need those distributors anymore, at least not like they needed them before to before move CD boxes around. However In the Internets fixed cost distribution medium *anyone* can distribute, and redistribute for fixed cost. Without ACTA and legislation there is no massive profit for moving bits and bytes around. The power to reach people goes back to the artist and is no longer solely in the hands of of a few big media companies who used to be the only ones who could facilitate the distribution of their artistic works to the masses. However the artist can't try and ride on the next to free fixed cost distribution but charge for artificial scarcity either - profit is no longer in distribution (without ACTA and strict laws forcing artificial scarcity into the internet, that is).
Seeing zero reporting on this in the media (apart from the excellent interviews professor Geist linked on his blog). Big media all for this. The majority of "big media" business models are based on artificial scarcity. That is, big media charge for the packaging and distribution of bits and bytes as a if these things are scarce commodity. Note that I am not talking about the actual artistic content creation, but only the packaging and distribution. Packaging and distribution are certainly value adding exercises, but when talking about digital media, the cost to reproduce and distribute is a fixed cost or as close to fixed as you can get (see wikipedia article reference - "duplicated billions of times over for a relatively cheap production price (an initial investment in a computer, an internet connection, and any power consumption costs; and these are already fixed costs in most environments)").
It is physically impossible to maintain the current (substantial) profit differential between charging for the packaging and distribution of each digital item as if it is a scarce commodity, while running that part of their operation at or very close to fixed cost (The most profitable and central part of big media). Any other business model that embraces the digital medium for what it is (a fixed cost medium for duplication/distribution), and not based on artificial scarcity simply could never maintain the same levels of profitability they currently enjoy.
They only have one choice if they wish to maintain their currently profit levels: Legislate scarcity into the digital medium (hence we see secret ACTA treaties and other morally questionable political clout being thrown about in favor of this goal)
If we actually talk about the artistic content creation part of the business model, that could be considered and entirely different issue. Big media obviously pay artists to produce content. The interesting "moral high ground" issue that both sides of the debate are claiming revolves around the question of if Big Media should also be allowed by society to charge for artificial scarcity well into the future (even well beyond the original artists death!) because they also happened to contract the artists to create the work to begin with. Big Medias defense so far seems to me to be a "muddy the debate" tactic, ignoring the artificial scarcity issue entirely and just shouting "your damaging the artists" in an effort to maintain the moral high ground.
James Murdoch criticized the BBC for providing 'free news' on the internet, making it 'incredibly hard for private news organizations to ask people to pay for their news.'
Little James Murdoch recently also said that the BBC is killing Democracy. Funny, here I was thinking that the BBC is the only big media organization with the balls to stand up and support the democratic process, while the scholarly literature into corporate controlled media showing exact opposite. Little Dr James Murdoch must be confused... or not?
After Somalia's former government collapsed, it didn't take long for warlords to consolidate power
sigh. You do realize that the worlds biggest warlord was behind the Somali gov "collapse" and for several years now has been illegally invading the country on the sly.
At first glance you may think that the US invasion will be a good thing for Somalia... but then the horrific details of the methods used might give pause to that romanticized "It'll be good for 'em" notion of war and invasion.
. Of course, It's all about oil, again. Won't someone invent a replacement already.
I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class thug for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.
If they can find a way to wean themselves off their business model
The majority of "big media" business models are based on artificial scarcity. That is, big media charge for the packaging and distribution of bits and bytes as a if these things are scarce commodity. Note that I am not talking about the actual artistic content creation, but only the packaging and distribution. Packaging and distribution are certainly value adding exercises, but when talking about digital media, the cost to reproduce and distribute is a fixed cost or as close to fixed as you can get (see wikipedia article reference - "duplicated billions of times over for a relatively cheap production price (an initial investment in a computer, an internet connection, and any power consumption costs; and these are already fixed costs in most environments)").
...without taking huge hits to their profitability, I'm sure they would at least investigate it.
Nice, but there is not need to investigate - it is not going to happen for a very fundamental reason. It is physically impossible to maintain the current (substantial) profit differential between charging for the packaging and distribution of each digital item as if it is a scarce commodity, while running that part of their operation at or very close to fixed cost (The most profitable and central part of big media). Any other business model that embraces the digital medium for what it is (a fixed cost medium for duplication/distribution), and not based on artificial scarcity simply could never maintain the same levels of profitability they currently enjoy.
No, Big Media only have one choice if they wish to maintain their currently profit levels: Legislate scarcity into the digital medium (hence we see secret ACTA treaties and other morally questionable political clout being thrown about in favor of this goal)
If we actually talk about the artistic content creation part of the business model, that could be considered and entirely different issue. Big media obviously pay artists to produce content. The interesting "moral high ground" issue that both sides of the debate are claiming revolves around the question of if Big Media should also be allowed by society to charge for artificial scarcity well into the future (even well beyond the original artists death!) because they also happened to contract the artists to create the work to begin with. Big Medias defense so far seems to me to be a "muddy the debate" tactic, ignoring the artificial scarcity issue entirely and just shouting "your damaging the artists" in an effort to maintain the moral high ground.
As an American, I feel it's quite certain that USA politicians are against transparency; a lot of their funding comes from the people that want it passed. However, trying to reach that conclusion from the article is moronic.
I agree that the article itself is short on details, but luckily we don't have to look very far at the "official" evidence we are permitted to see to find their priorities and aims that paint a pretty damning picture that US lobby groups (i.e. the IIPA - International Intellectual Property Alliance) and their bought and paid for US politicians are the main instigators behind ACTA. Given the official data we do have, It would be very naive indeed to start give them any benefit of the doubt on the secret speculative ACTA treaty, especially since they are making every effort to keep it out of the public eye.
If France and Italy haven't actually stated that they fear U.S. retaliation, then that's just speculation.
Yeah, just like everything else we know about ACTA - it is ALL speculation and no "official" information. However we don't have to look very far at the "official" evidence we are permitted to see to find their priorities and aims that paint a pretty damning picture that US lobby groups (i.e. the IIPA - International Intellectual Property Alliance) and their bought and paid for US politicians are the main instigators behind ACTA. Given the official data we do have, It would be very naive indeed to start give them any benefit of the doubt on the secret speculative ACTA treaty, especially since they are making every effort to keep it out of the public eye.
The liberal party (the opposion in Australia) believe in non-manditory filtering should be available to those who want it, but not manditory.
It IS TRUE... they are very pro-filtering, despite what their election promise^H lie machine may be trying to spin you.
Here's an important block of text... Moreover, the U.S. has remained silent on the issue.
This is a more telling block of text :
IDG covers the latest Dutch leak that reveals the transparency position of many ACTA participants. Particularly telling is the view that both France and Italy favour greater transparency, but fear U.S. retaliation.
IDG covers the latest Dutch leak that reveals the transparency position of many ACTA participants. Particularly telling is the view that both France and Italy favour greater transparency, but fear U.S. retaliation.
The panelists were obsessing over whether they had enough authority to do something
"obsessing over whether they had enough authority" was no mistake - it was the whole point of this test from the very beginning. We can already see that "lack of authority" and recommending new powers be granted to the president is the main focus being driven home in the aftermath of this exercise in propaganda. The real aim of course being to garner support for enacting laws giving enough authority to do "something" about this problem of people communicating over the internet. The people behind this test are not stupid or clueless, they merely know which fear buttons to press in order to get what they want.
Sad but true. On the bright side (For those controlling the reigns that is), all those unemployed poor people sure do make great soldiers for the war machine. Willing ti sign up too, since they have little hope to do anything else. No surprise that military recruitment officers are overwhelmingly in the poor zones of America.
which finds itself at war with a powerful state isn't cowardly for refusing to follow rules designed to ensure its defeat; it's intelligent.
Indeed. A Chinese guy wrote a book about it around 500BC after defeating a vastly superior force - and also makes a good case towards US defeat in Afghanistan and Iran as being only a matter of time - technological superiority not withstanding. His book is still widely read by many managers/CEO's amongst others for it's insight into war.
The fallacy here is that this measure will do nothing.
I wish I could say otherwise, but you're wrong about that. It will do nothing to stop the production or spread of child pornography, but it will constitute another erosion of freedom of speech or information.
I wish I could say otherwise, but even this is not entirely correct. The measure will actually HELP the spread of child pornography.
...
It's pretty simple really:
1) Net censorship will eventually of course mean less access to "illegal" information. For example access to information deemed illegal at sites like Wikileaks.
2) Without widespread access to "illegal" information such as the illegal ACTA leaks, there will be little to no organized resistance to the ever-tightening Copyright and IP laws and treaties being signed (ACTA, GATS, TRIPS etc)
3) Strict IP and copyright laws keep third world countries poor [1]. The majority of Child Pornography stems from human trafficking from third world countries, an unfortunate risk of growing up in a third world country [2].
If the French Government really cared about Child Pornography, it would be taking studies like [1] below seriously and not playing cloak and dagger with treaties like ACTA.
[1]
Commission on Intellectual Property Rights declared the internationally-mandated expansion of intellectual property (IP) rights unlikely to generate significant benefits for most developing countries and likely to impose costs, such as higher priced medicines or seeds. This makes poverty reduction more difficult. The intensively researched, 180-page report is entitled Integrating Intellectual Property Rights and Development Policy. It is the culmination of much study and follows on more than a dozen meetings and workshops, 17 working papers, an exhaustive literature review of the field, visits to several developed and developing nations and a major conference. The report makes some 50 recommendations aimed at aligning IP protection with the goal of reducing poverty in developing nations. Topics include IP and health; agriculture; traditional knowledge; copyrights, software and the Internet; and the role of WTO and WIPO in advancing developing country interests. The Commission is an independent international body made up of Commissioners from both developed and developing countries with expertise in science, law, ethics and economics. The Commissioners come from industry, government and academia* (see list of Commissioners below). "Developed countries often proceed on the assumption that what is good for them is likely to be good for developing countries," said Professor John Barton, Commission Chair and George E. Osborne Professor of Law, Stanford University. "But, in the case of developing countries, more and stronger protection is not necessarily better. Developing countries should not be encouraged or coerced into adopting stronger IP rights without regard to the impact this has on their development and poor people. They should be allowed to adopt appropriate rights regimes, not necessarily the most protective ones."
http://www.biotech-info.net/independent_commission.html
[2] Third world are the major "Source Countries" of child pornography and other human trafficking related crimes.
Why do you hate America so much?
Think of the inter-tubes!
70 years ago the Rabbit plague was in full swing (until the Myxoma Virus was introduced in 1950's). Rabbits combined with overgrazing it amplified El Ninyos drying effect on Australia (Learning from history: land and pasture degradation episodes in Australiaâ(TM)s rangelands).
Today due to climate changes effects on the ocean currents, El Ninyo could quite possibly become permanent rather than a periodic event - which if happens, will freeze eastern Australia in a permanent drought conditions (and South America in permanent flooding conditions). A bit of drought in half of Australia and a few major floods in South America would be the very least of the worlds worries though... climate change screwing up the ocean current system is implicated in the Anoxic event which eventually led to the death of 90% of life on earth
>Climate change is a farce. im a sydneysider, this is the worst duststorm we've had in 70 years
No worries mate, the planet will be just fine. Nothing we can do to the planet short of complete nuclear Armageddon that Mother earth can't recover from in a few million years. Its not the planet we have to worry about... its our survival on it as a destructive, greedy, self serving species - and that's just a random sampling of our "elected" leaders
People seem to be ignoring that if news gathering becomes a volunteer-only effort, we're going to get crappy, slanted news -- far worse than anything we see today. Anyone with an agenda is going to put "reporters" on the scene who will deliver precisely the message they want you to hear, dressed up as "news".
Anyone with 5 minutes, a major historical news story and google news archive can demonstrate the fallacy in your argument. You have described _exactly_ the state of mainstream news today - crappy, slanted news delivering the message they want you to hear (i.e. profitable to special interest groups). Pick any of the most significant events in the last decade where powerful special interest groups had a firm position, and the mainstream news has rolled over to shaft their viewer/readers with exactly the wrong message to suit their corporate masters position, flooding the media echo chamber with the deceptive message in the process. Check it for yourself in the archives.
Pre-Iraq war - news message: weapons of mass destruction ("we must invade, there is no other choice"). Special Interest Group: The MIC..
Financial Crisis pre-2008 - news message: Money supply increases, what money supply increase? M3 discontinued, its not important... move along nothing is broken here as reflected in the total absence of mainstream news coverage
The majority of news sources that told it how it turned out (in retrospect), were non-mainstream news sources - and thanks to services like google news archive it can easily be demonstrated. You did not hear significant anti-war positions from the mainstream news cool-aid stand, which remained completely silent. You also could have also known well in advance that inflation was heading for the moon, and where and why to best place your hard earned savings for the coming economic storm from independent professionals not driven by increasing the bottom line, but instead in delivering accurate high quality news.
Publishers of mainstream news can't cut it on the internet, because they cannot compete with free high quality alternatives from motivated professionals.
if conditions exist that favor making money through "immoral behavior" then that is what will happen.
Some point to (substantial) evidence that the playing field itself could be called as you say, "immoral": http://www.chrismartenson.com/crashcourse/chapter-15-bubbles (ch16 and 17 as well) and some related news: http://www.google.com/search?q=audit+the+fed
Some advancements at odds with large well financed corporate business models are buried before they get off the ground. Others are bought out and ripped up for competing. Where the cat is already out of the bag, war is waged against the advancement to try and control the damage (*IAA Vs the Internet). These anti-competitive practices have only got worse as the decades roles by and as we can see from all the *IAA lawyers in the DOJ, appear to have the full backing of government, regardless of who is in power (a vote for anti-progress perhaps?).
It's business and usual... because it is profitable to do these things, and so fulfilling MS obligations to their shareholders. Users of the OS are secondary, as long as they keep buying it of course.
They certainly aren't trying to _actually_ clean up the air, since worse offenders than the USA already exist and won't be affected by this law at all. In fact, I would speculate that these countries are simply going to grow and gobble up whatever materials we're no longer able to use under this law, and completely take over what little markets American products still have a place in.
Nice play on the FEAR card there. It looks like you have bought into the anti-action - inaction is our best option http://www.google.com/search?q=global+warming+inaction+disinformation+campaign++false+choice++developing+china+india>false choice disinformation campaign, hook line and sinker.
From watching him in various public speeches, I begin to suspect that this Pommie wanna-be Aussie Senator Conroy actually believes he is doing the right thing and genuinely believes he is fighting for the good of the children, and that's all mate. Ignorant, naive, incompetent, complacent or actively plotting (take your pick - nobody knows but him) that the tools he is pushing for will become powerful weapons of political and corporate-profit maintaining control later on down that long track. "I would use this ring from a desire to do good... But through me, it would wield a power too great and terrible to imagine"... If only Senator Conroy could be so wise.
I do not disagree with your points on the role of greed in a population, but I do think your missing my point...
So, I put to you this question: are you willing to give up your sense of self, all of your individuality, and all of your personal freedom, in order to live in this greed-free society?
If so, you would make a very good communist, and I wish you the best of luck.
Its not about curing individual greed - impossible goal and as you point out, has serious beneficial side effects (in addition to being a great motivator). Nor did my point have anything to do with giving up the individuals sense of self. Its also as far from Communism as you can get - competition is a powerful and in most cases, efficient, resource allocation system. One that communism can't come close to.
Let put it another way: Are you willing to accept corporate/state sponsored greed, operating on a much higher level than individual greed, if it guarantees creating another financial crisis down the road where many will lose their life savings (again). How about moving forward drilling for oil in protected nature sanctuaries within arctic limits even while scientific community is coming to a consensus on the terrible repercussions to us all of following this line of corporate profit. What about war for profit's sake?
Going by your post and if I jumped to conclusions, I might get the impression that your comfortable with these particular side effects, accept them as a given, or feel we do not have the intelligence as a society to recognize them as a "not good thing" side-effect. If it's the latter case, I think your right.