The RIAA predates the internet (and, indeed, easy access to recording equipment by the masses). As such, even if nobody 'stole' music and suchlike, the RIAA would still exist.
You may have forgotten, but originally the RIAA was an advocacy group for the promotion of recording artists and labels, created (as I recall) almost as a sort of union, in order to have more negotiation clout when dealing with distributors and media outlets.
However, this core mission has been long since lost since they took up this ill-conceived crusade against the "dangers of piracy"--as such, the public opinion (which does matter, given that said opinion can influence legislation, amongst other things) has, largely, turned against them, reducing them to a simple dichotomy of "Us Against The Pirates!" The RIAA has, by its own actions, essentially rendered itself next to useless.
A single file with no documentation would not be a big deal.
Normally, I would agree, but in this case I'm quite sure the RIAA would attempt a motion for summary dismissal of said suit (as having been made in bad faith) if they can find any evidence of what might possibly be called 'piracy'.
IANAL, of course, but it seems as though that'd be the first thing they'd look for.
Not to mention that the various kinds of.doc are often problematic, when one party has a newer version of office (and has saved in said format) while the other party has not upgraded.
The 'classics' are always best, anyway--because, frankly, if you need more formatting than some basic markup that would be covered by rtf or html, you ought be using something aimed more towards desktop publishing than word processing--and for that, you can use TeX or something.
These fancy-schmancy formats are just feature creep, really, in my opinion. If you need clip art to say it, then perhaps you don't need to say it at all.
Hopefully they don't get smart and restrict their iplayer stuff to British Empire IP addys only...I listen to BBC while I'm at work most days, and if I should lose my Dead Ringers and Museum of Everything access, I'd be very upset.
That may have been Apple's intent, but as usually happens in such cases, the end result is to encourage people to find out new ways around the 'protections' that have been inflicted.
I was just considering the implications of that, as a matter of fact...on one hand, yes, it does look like that'd be an amusing way to give a wrist smack to the gov't.
However, many jurisdictions have a 'clean hands' principle when it comes to lawsuits--that is to say, if you're engaged in doing something illegal when the alleged 'offense' against you occurs, then you lose any standing for said suit. For instance, if I slip on a toy truck while burglarizing your house and proceed to break my hip, I can't--or at least, shouldn't be able to--sue you and collect damages for a hazardous floor. Needless to say, this is a bit of very murky ground, and IANAL--and also am not cognizant of the specifics of said principle as applies to Canadian copyright law.
I think the moderation was meant to be funny, given my comment about politicians being clueless. ^^;
And according to the article, this DMCA version would outlaw any means of circumventing existing DRM, some of which "phones home"--and as such, by preventing it from making an outbound connection, you would be circumventing its intended function, ergo it would be illegal to block it at the firewall.
So as far as I understand it, blocking outbound connections at the firewall--a legitimate security tactic--would hence become illegal under the terms of this DMCA?
Another case of legislators not having the faintest clue what they're talking about...but then, that's a bit redundant to say that, isn't it?
Or you can always learn to read a map and find alternate routes. Between things like google maps and relatively cheap GPS handsets, there's no excuse not to know how to plan a route around congestion.
Actually, that'd work as a business idea for certain cities. You could semi-automate your route planning, and work around the congested areas that the local traffic stations report, then transfer the data to a GPS set in the car for folks when they're going to work, complete with suggestions for alternate routes. 'd be a fun job.
You can put up more towers and make the cell sizes smaller; you can go from analog to digital (like they're advertising for radio at the moment) and thus make more effective use of the same bandwidth, or any number of other possible solutions. No mistake, physical infrastructure is always very helpful--but it's also very expensive, and any means of minimizing the physical infrastructure will tend to make the solution less expensive than something that requires pulling more cables.
Use the cell tower model and piggyback on existing structures and existing infrastructure. Rent conduit/pole space from the telco to string a bit of fiber--expensive, sure, but a lot less costly than trying to run thousands of last-mile connections. It's not that it won't be expensive--it'll still cost a lot, but there will be significant savings over the traditional wired model.
Costs a lot less to toss up a couple of towers than it does to negotiate rights of way, dig trenches or erect poles, maintain a fleet of trucks and techs to go from residence to residence making connections, et al.
I mentioned in a comment down the page a bit that by the time they get a decent avionics package scaled for the thing, all that broadcast power research that folks keep talking about will have caught on, at least a little bit.
Or perhaps they could take a leaf from that UAV design that was in the news a while ago that would supposedly leech power from distribution lines--a similar idea, but scaled down to fly size. You wouldn't need more than a few microwatts to power a fly, I shouldn't think, and you could probably get that from induction by sitting on a lamp cord or something.
Keep in mind that another area of research that's getting attention at the moment is broadcast power--so you wouldn't have to have an onboard source, per se, but merely a collector to snag a couple microwatts from the local broadcast basestation. It'll probably take about as long for 'wireless' power like that to become popular as it'll take to develop an effective avionics package for the flybot, so that'll work out nicely.
An amusing notion, but keep in mind where the endpoint for this lies. There's two possible routes, as far as I can see:
First is the Diamond Age route, where the 'bots go smaller and smaller until they get to the nanoscale, and we end up with 'toner' everywhere.
The second is building a spider to catch the fly, building a bird to catch the spider, building a cat to catch the bird, et al., until you get up to the point where you're making little old ladies swallow equines to take care of a surveillance bug.
Slashdot Mirror
Ah, righto, I stand corrected. Completely forgot that bit.
The RIAA predates the internet (and, indeed, easy access to recording equipment by the masses). As such, even if nobody 'stole' music and suchlike, the RIAA would still exist.
You may have forgotten, but originally the RIAA was an advocacy group for the promotion of recording artists and labels, created (as I recall) almost as a sort of union, in order to have more negotiation clout when dealing with distributors and media outlets.
However, this core mission has been long since lost since they took up this ill-conceived crusade against the "dangers of piracy"--as such, the public opinion (which does matter, given that said opinion can influence legislation, amongst other things) has, largely, turned against them, reducing them to a simple dichotomy of "Us Against The Pirates!" The RIAA has, by its own actions, essentially rendered itself next to useless.
Normally, I would agree, but in this case I'm quite sure the RIAA would attempt a motion for summary dismissal of said suit (as having been made in bad faith) if they can find any evidence of what might possibly be called 'piracy'.
IANAL, of course, but it seems as though that'd be the first thing they'd look for.
If he's got a single audio file that doesn't have the proper paper trail back to an absolutely legit purchase, they're going to hang him out to dry...
Wish that I had shorted Microsoft stock, and look for the price of Apple to go up.
Not to mention that the various kinds of .doc are often problematic, when one party has a newer version of office (and has saved in said format) while the other party has not upgraded.
The 'classics' are always best, anyway--because, frankly, if you need more formatting than some basic markup that would be covered by rtf or html, you ought be using something aimed more towards desktop publishing than word processing--and for that, you can use TeX or something.
These fancy-schmancy formats are just feature creep, really, in my opinion. If you need clip art to say it, then perhaps you don't need to say it at all.
Hopefully they don't get smart and restrict their iplayer stuff to British Empire IP addys only...I listen to BBC while I'm at work most days, and if I should lose my Dead Ringers and Museum of Everything access, I'd be very upset.
And you missed this one:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/paulthewineguy/2162533383/in/set-72157603619920398/
;-p
LOLcats, no, not especially--but the Mona LOLsa is.
That may have been Apple's intent, but as usually happens in such cases, the end result is to encourage people to find out new ways around the 'protections' that have been inflicted.
The joy of open source--with that many brains working on a problem, odds are that someone already knows how to fix it.
Is only a second-order approximation, at best, for the real Tao.
In the pursuit of knowledge, every day something is added.
In the pursuit of understanding, every day something is removed.
So -that's- why the tundra's been melting...
I was just considering the implications of that, as a matter of fact...on one hand, yes, it does look like that'd be an amusing way to give a wrist smack to the gov't.
However, many jurisdictions have a 'clean hands' principle when it comes to lawsuits--that is to say, if you're engaged in doing something illegal when the alleged 'offense' against you occurs, then you lose any standing for said suit. For instance, if I slip on a toy truck while burglarizing your house and proceed to break my hip, I can't--or at least, shouldn't be able to--sue you and collect damages for a hazardous floor. Needless to say, this is a bit of very murky ground, and IANAL--and also am not cognizant of the specifics of said principle as applies to Canadian copyright law.
It -would- be fun to think about, though.
I think the moderation was meant to be funny, given my comment about politicians being clueless. ^^;
And according to the article, this DMCA version would outlaw any means of circumventing existing DRM, some of which "phones home"--and as such, by preventing it from making an outbound connection, you would be circumventing its intended function, ergo it would be illegal to block it at the firewall.
At least, that's how I read it.
Or, for that matter, reformatting a hard drive or any other form of data erasure...
So as far as I understand it, blocking outbound connections at the firewall--a legitimate security tactic--would hence become illegal under the terms of this DMCA?
Another case of legislators not having the faintest clue what they're talking about...but then, that's a bit redundant to say that, isn't it?
Or you can always learn to read a map and find alternate routes. Between things like google maps and relatively cheap GPS handsets, there's no excuse not to know how to plan a route around congestion.
Actually, that'd work as a business idea for certain cities. You could semi-automate your route planning, and work around the congested areas that the local traffic stations report, then transfer the data to a GPS set in the car for folks when they're going to work, complete with suggestions for alternate routes. 'd be a fun job.
You can put up more towers and make the cell sizes smaller; you can go from analog to digital (like they're advertising for radio at the moment) and thus make more effective use of the same bandwidth, or any number of other possible solutions. No mistake, physical infrastructure is always very helpful--but it's also very expensive, and any means of minimizing the physical infrastructure will tend to make the solution less expensive than something that requires pulling more cables.
Use the cell tower model and piggyback on existing structures and existing infrastructure. Rent conduit/pole space from the telco to string a bit of fiber--expensive, sure, but a lot less costly than trying to run thousands of last-mile connections. It's not that it won't be expensive--it'll still cost a lot, but there will be significant savings over the traditional wired model.
Costs a lot less to toss up a couple of towers than it does to negotiate rights of way, dig trenches or erect poles, maintain a fleet of trucks and techs to go from residence to residence making connections, et al.
I mentioned in a comment down the page a bit that by the time they get a decent avionics package scaled for the thing, all that broadcast power research that folks keep talking about will have caught on, at least a little bit.
Or perhaps they could take a leaf from that UAV design that was in the news a while ago that would supposedly leech power from distribution lines--a similar idea, but scaled down to fly size. You wouldn't need more than a few microwatts to power a fly, I shouldn't think, and you could probably get that from induction by sitting on a lamp cord or something.
Keep in mind that another area of research that's getting attention at the moment is broadcast power--so you wouldn't have to have an onboard source, per se, but merely a collector to snag a couple microwatts from the local broadcast basestation. It'll probably take about as long for 'wireless' power like that to become popular as it'll take to develop an effective avionics package for the flybot, so that'll work out nicely.
An amusing notion, but keep in mind where the endpoint for this lies. There's two possible routes, as far as I can see:
First is the Diamond Age route, where the 'bots go smaller and smaller until they get to the nanoscale, and we end up with 'toner' everywhere.
The second is building a spider to catch the fly, building a bird to catch the spider, building a cat to catch the bird, et al., until you get up to the point where you're making little old ladies swallow equines to take care of a surveillance bug.