No. Apple doesn't say they can refuse to sell to the German customer. They say to comply with German law they must refuse to sell to the German customer. The license Apple negotiated with the record company in France only gives them the right to copy that song within France, not across the border and into Germany. Since Apple has the credit card issue country and the billing address for that card which are both German, Apple has reason to believe the customer is in Germany and their providing them with a download under the Spanish license is blatant copyright violation. German law makes it illegal to publish a copy for download without the record company providing a license within Germany, which is not the license in question.
Exactly. In other words, Apple is protecting itself by refusing to sell to the German customer I mentioned above. (I just summarized but I do understand the details you lay out so thanks for providing the additional background)
Apple is in a tough position here. On one hand, their retail customers "have the right" to purchase iTunes in any other EU country and pay the prices listed in that country. ie: a German customer can go to the French iTunes site and buy a song cheaper than he could in Germany, for example.
This is what the case is about. Apple says they can refuse to sell to that German customer because they'd like him to buy from the German store (that, presumably, has higher costs than it's French counterpart). The EU says they MUST sell those French iTunes to that German customer because of anti-trust.
All of this ignores the fact that the licensing for those songs is different in each country (ie: costs differ by country).
So, just like the California Electricity market a few years back -- they want Apple to, essentially, sell at one price while the wholesale costs (ie: licensing) vary. California declared bankruptcy because of this very issue. They froze retail electricity rates for consumers. But didn't freeze any wholesale rates. And the wholesale rates went crazy (note: not going to get into the market manipulation issues here - Enron, anyone?)
Nobody can stay in business in this situation. Its better to just leave the market all together than to be forced to sell songs at a loss (because of the varying wholesale costs). If you can not predict your costs, and you have to sell at a fixed price --- then you won't last very long in that business. Econ 101.
You see that a lot on mutual fund disclaimers - "past performance is no guarantee of future results". But it is an excellent indicator. Far more reliable than gut feelings and media hype.
but WAY less reliable than, I don't know....say, the earnings????? Companies (and stocks) are quantifiable on some level yet you act like there are no objective measures out there to figure out the right stock price. The data is right in front of you and it has nothing to do with buzz, marketing, or anything "special". It's all about how much money (and wealth) the company returns to shareholders. In short -- earnings. Everything you ever read about stocks are nothing more than "methods" to accurately assess what I just described.
A stock's price, over the long term, will accurately represent it's underlying company's fundamentals with respect to it's business and future prospects.
What you describe is called "pumping" a stock. It's illegal and usually done on pink sheet stocks with low volumes. And it is most certainly not what the stock market is "COMPLETELY" about. Not even close. If you don't know that, then you don't know shit about the stock market so quit talking. Stick with the Mac comments.
Imagine what you could do - if you were not limited - with all of the data MSFT could gather and combine it with the marketing/advertising data of DoubleClick.
Think operating systems, browser, and office "features" here, people. The features gather more and more information as time goes on. Its already been happening over the last 5-10 years so the trend is certainly in that direction. I mean, thus far, Mr. Softie has been pretty easy (all things considered) on how much data he sends back home but I am sure things could be configured differently to gather a whole new set of information. A much larger, complex, and more intrusive set of information. And then they can market based on that data (DoubleClick). Like Google, cept Google doesn't have an operating system sitting on every damn computer in the world.
It could get very very ugly. I can envision several nasty things that I would do and thats only thinking about it 5 min.
Access to customers (data) + Marketing/advertising = big revenues for the seller of marketing and advertising products. That's what we are talking about here -- selling ads.
I actually bought Yahoo Mail after using it for free since '97.
Guess what? For $20, it solved all of the problems you list. Well, except for the interface part but hey, that's subjective. $20 gets me 100MB attachments, last I checked. No tags either on anything outbound. I can also do POP3 if I wanted.
That's why I don't mind paying $20/year for it. In my mind, it lets me do what I should be able to do with email. And yes, I have gmail too.
It's simple: put your mailboxes on your own domain, and pay for hosting on that domain. You pay, but you have full control over the mailboxes, and you can put a site (or sites) up without extra cost.
Are you saying he should install his own e-mail servers on a hosted domain? If he did that, then he has to manage a mail server and form some kind of spam strategy. Have fun with that!
This is exactly why we use Yahoo for our domain. Both web and e-mail. Works great for my company and frees me from the hassel of an additional server. I'm not a fanboy but Yahoo has gotten the job done and is fairly easy to deal with for what we use them for (basic website + 100 email accts or so). I just forward a few DNS records and those services are handled by Yahoo -- but that fact is hidden from users.
Unless you have a "staff" I see no reason to do this yourself when others can do it better. (and keep in mind, I am talking from a business standpoint here where time is money. Of COURSE I run my own mail server at home to hack around on)
did you read my post? Outbound VPN ports are being blocked in a LOT of hotels. Yes, its counterintuitive -- but its going on in the name of protecting ppl from spam. I have no idea why they are blocking VPN's in the name of spam, but trust me, they are doing it. I run into it all the time and so have others.
Of course you can VPN and then hit your POP3 box through your own network. But what if outbound VPN port AND outbound port 25 are blocked on the hotel's network? What do you do then? Answer: nothing, you're screwed.
STOP BLOCKING OUTBOUND PORTS! This is not a good solution.
First, its the hotels and their blocking of the outbound VPN ports (Hampton Inn/Hilton -- I am looking at you!). Anymore, it's getting to be a crapshoot as to whether I can get on my company's VPN when I staying at a hotel. The Hilton group is just the worst offender but I have seen it at other hotels too.
And now, you want to close outbound port 25. So how do I send my e-mail? We use POP3.
I ask because there are a lot of stupid people implementing these "blocking" solutions and nobody is considering that business people use these things ALL the time while on the road. You can complain about how we are "behind" by using POP3 but until you are ready to come and migrate us to something else (for free), you don't get to decide what we use and don't use. POP3 is legal, technically allowed, standardized, and works.
(sidenote: we *can* use webmail, which helps mitigate this problem but seriously....its a real problem for anyone who does business on the road. Who wants to open their Outlook and "guess" why you can't check your e-mail? And trust me, the people at the hotels have NO idea what is and isn't blocked so they are no help either. Same for the tech support numbers at those hotels.)
I wasn't making a comment about torture, in general. I was making a comment about using 24 as somekind of blueprint for real-world actions by soldiers. It was implied that our soldiers would be affected by 24 so much so as to mimic the show in real life. If you read the post I replied to, you will see the example of a CO giving orders to a private under his command based on something he saw on 24.
The example is absurd. The military/DOD has professionals that do this. That was my point.
The thread is not about US or US policy on torture so I am not going to respond to the rest.
If there is too much risk in your child watching television, then I suggest, you utilize the two buttons on the television. One of them turns it off. And the other one changes the channel. You should just assume that EVERYTHING shown on TV is "bad", and therefore, too risky.
TV is not like walking down the street in your neighborhood. Television is a 100% voluntary action you and your kids engage in. You do not need it to survive and in fact, many people don't even own a television. Guess what? They still raise kids and they still survive quite nicely.
The idea that you should impart restrictions on what society can show on TV so your kid can "safely" watch TV, is ludicrous. You should not expect society to accommodate you so the TV can be your babysitter. If you think TV - as is, as well as whatever it becomes - is too risky for your child to view, then you should not participate. Just turn it off and assume that if you turn it back on, your child will burst into flames.
See how that works? You are happy because you have avoided risk. And we are happy because we get to see stuff blow up. If you do it the other way around, nobody is happy but you.
Your suggestion is absurd. For any substantial interrogation, there are "professionals" who do the interrogating. I don't know who they are or who they are with but I am certain the US Military/DOD has the foresight to look into the subject a train-up a few people to be experts in extracting useful information. I highly doubt they are influenced by 24. If anything, its the other way around.
Some private who finds a guy on the field and starts torturing him because his CO saw something cool on 24 and told him to -- is a crime. Nothing more, nothing less.
You got it backwards. Information Technology wasn't taken over by Biz School product. It was always a PART of the business school product. And an expensive part at that (hopefully, it paid for itself, otherwise, we are all out of jobs). If you think otherwise, you don't understand who feeds (pays) who here.
I get a little tired of the MBA/Biz school bashing here.
If/. types would learn the business skills necessary to run a business (and I mean the MBA level skills), then THEY could do the job better. Business and the business world is complex. It's easy to make fatal mistake and lots of people/companies do. Until you know to run your own business, you depend on them. Let me say that again - you depend on them (for jobs at least, and in the context of replying to the parent)
There is a naievete in your post that implies there is no value to business school and that simply, isn't true. The "World of Business" is just as complex and fraught with peril as ANY technical project or dream you can think of. In fact, the WoB almost always funds the technical projects we are speaking of (like IT). Personally, I have found that people who have the knowledge and education to understand what is going on, do the best in business. There are plenty of crazy professors working on projects in a garage. And that's great. I like to see that. But there are MANY more "business people" who are doing better than that. Why? Because they understand business.
When you have mastered financing, the banking system, money systems, derivatives, debt, interest, short-term cash management, long-term cash management, inventory, payroll (and associated HR issues), sales management, marketing, advertising, project management, facility management (perhaps, if you own your own place), accounting, taxes (state, local, and fed), inventory control, budgets, capital project allocation, risk/reward profile analysis, portfolio management, contract law, and anything else that might help you make money ---- then you can run the company and replace all the PHB's.
Remember, its about money. And business schools teach people how to make money. And to make lots of money, you need to know something about the above subjects so you can utilize them to your advantage.
(ps: I do agree with your comment that people stop learning. There is a lot of truth to that statement)
UID matters why? I guess I'd do the same if I didn't have a better response. I am certain I've been around long enough to talk intelligently about the subject matter, which, in case you forgot -- is suggesting the use of technological restriction laws in order to curb a sociological problem. I didn't see UID discussed in the article but maybe I missed it. And clearly it matters because nobody with a UID over 10000 could possibly say anything intelligent(/sarchasm). Oh wait, you're 15035. Make that 15036 and under.
And honestly, since you have a low UID and brought it up, I am surprised you would post something supporting techno use/restriction laws when most of/. can see the issues pretty clearly. You know, now that you mention it, it really does make me wonder if you understand the culture here.
Better than current state? Yes.
I hear what you are saying...but you're not getting it.
You assume that porn providers want to help. Maybe some do. But I am certain most do not. Hell, most are not even in the USA. Why would you think that a law in the US has any bearing on the behavior going on in another country? It doesn't. So you have to assume that most porn providers - at least - are not cooperative. I am not saying they are predatory or working against the US, I am just saying they couldn't care less about what we enact or don't enact here in the USA (porn-wise). They, simply, are indifferent.
So, exactly, how do you force ANY technical solution around the world when most of the world doesn't give a crap and continues to do things the way THEY want to do it'????
This is the reason that we here on/. bristle when societal issues are being solved by technical measures. Spam, pr0n, piracy, etc. Technical solutions to societal problems rarely work and usually wind up causing more problems than they solve. I hope you see that in this example of a really, really, bad idea for a law.
Like anything, it depends on what they want to charge me. If they want to charge me everytime I want to view the same video, then yes - yes, there is still a reason to "own" the media.
It's sad that is has to be that way, really. Because what you describe would be very very cool. They could become what you describe. But at this point, it's difficult to see how that can become reality.
Slashdot Mirror
No. Apple doesn't say they can refuse to sell to the German customer. They say to comply with German law they must refuse to sell to the German customer. The license Apple negotiated with the record company in France only gives them the right to copy that song within France, not across the border and into Germany. Since Apple has the credit card issue country and the billing address for that card which are both German, Apple has reason to believe the customer is in Germany and their providing them with a download under the Spanish license is blatant copyright violation. German law makes it illegal to publish a copy for download without the record company providing a license within Germany, which is not the license in question.
Exactly. In other words, Apple is protecting itself by refusing to sell to the German customer I mentioned above. (I just summarized but I do understand the details you lay out so thanks for providing the additional background)
Apple is in a tough position here. On one hand, their retail customers "have the right" to purchase iTunes in any other EU country and pay the prices listed in that country. ie: a German customer can go to the French iTunes site and buy a song cheaper than he could in Germany, for example.
This is what the case is about. Apple says they can refuse to sell to that German customer because they'd like him to buy from the German store (that, presumably, has higher costs than it's French counterpart). The EU says they MUST sell those French iTunes to that German customer because of anti-trust.
All of this ignores the fact that the licensing for those songs is different in each country (ie: costs differ by country).
So, just like the California Electricity market a few years back -- they want Apple to, essentially, sell at one price while the wholesale costs (ie: licensing) vary. California declared bankruptcy because of this very issue. They froze retail electricity rates for consumers. But didn't freeze any wholesale rates. And the wholesale rates went crazy (note: not going to get into the market manipulation issues here - Enron, anyone?)
Nobody can stay in business in this situation. Its better to just leave the market all together than to be forced to sell songs at a loss (because of the varying wholesale costs). If you can not predict your costs, and you have to sell at a fixed price --- then you won't last very long in that business. Econ 101.
I just submitted my card for return.
I hope it comes back with a new pony. OMG Poni3Z!!!!!!
You see that a lot on mutual fund disclaimers - "past performance is no guarantee of future results". But it is an excellent indicator. Far more reliable than gut feelings and media hype.
but WAY less reliable than, I don't know....say, the earnings????? Companies (and stocks) are quantifiable on some level yet you act like there are no objective measures out there to figure out the right stock price. The data is right in front of you and it has nothing to do with buzz, marketing, or anything "special". It's all about how much money (and wealth) the company returns to shareholders. In short -- earnings. Everything you ever read about stocks are nothing more than "methods" to accurately assess what I just described.
A stock's price, over the long term, will accurately represent it's underlying company's fundamentals with respect to it's business and future prospects.
It's about fundamentals. And yes, I know a lot about the stock market (MBA/Finance, not to brag, just to back it up).
In the short term, the stock market is a voting machine. In the long term, it is a weighing machine. .
This is a well known quote by both Ben Graham AND Warren Buffet.
What you describe is called "pumping" a stock. It's illegal and usually done on pink sheet stocks with low volumes. And it is most certainly not what the stock market is "COMPLETELY" about. Not even close. If you don't know that, then you don't know shit about the stock market so quit talking. Stick with the Mac comments.
Imagine what you could do - if you were not limited - with all of the data MSFT could gather and combine it with the marketing/advertising data of DoubleClick.
Think operating systems, browser, and office "features" here, people. The features gather more and more information as time goes on. Its already been happening over the last 5-10 years so the trend is certainly in that direction. I mean, thus far, Mr. Softie has been pretty easy (all things considered) on how much data he sends back home but I am sure things could be configured differently to gather a whole new set of information. A much larger, complex, and more intrusive set of information. And then they can market based on that data (DoubleClick). Like Google, cept Google doesn't have an operating system sitting on every damn computer in the world.
It could get very very ugly. I can envision several nasty things that I would do and thats only thinking about it 5 min.
Access to customers (data) + Marketing/advertising = big revenues for the seller of marketing and advertising products. That's what we are talking about here -- selling ads.
I like the new interface. It's almost like...Outlook (gasp!)
I actually bought Yahoo Mail after using it for free since '97.
Guess what? For $20, it solved all of the problems you list. Well, except for the interface part but hey, that's subjective. $20 gets me 100MB attachments, last I checked. No tags either on anything outbound. I can also do POP3 if I wanted.
That's why I don't mind paying $20/year for it. In my mind, it lets me do what I should be able to do with email. And yes, I have gmail too.
It's simple: put your mailboxes on your own domain, and pay for hosting on that domain. You pay, but you have full control over the mailboxes, and you can put a site (or sites) up without extra cost.
Are you saying he should install his own e-mail servers on a hosted domain? If he did that, then he has to manage a mail server and form some kind of spam strategy. Have fun with that!
This is exactly why we use Yahoo for our domain. Both web and e-mail. Works great for my company and frees me from the hassel of an additional server. I'm not a fanboy but Yahoo has gotten the job done and is fairly easy to deal with for what we use them for (basic website + 100 email accts or so). I just forward a few DNS records and those services are handled by Yahoo -- but that fact is hidden from users.
Unless you have a "staff" I see no reason to do this yourself when others can do it better. (and keep in mind, I am talking from a business standpoint here where time is money. Of COURSE I run my own mail server at home to hack around on)
Did I just read a capitalist viewpoint on /.? Maybe even supply-side in nature?
Bravo! Bout time someone figured out that all those "bad rich people" also SPEND and INVEST that money to the benefit of lots of other people.
see here.
:)
And yes, I realize I misspelled it.
did you read my post? Outbound VPN ports are being blocked in a LOT of hotels. Yes, its counterintuitive -- but its going on in the name of protecting ppl from spam. I have no idea why they are blocking VPN's in the name of spam, but trust me, they are doing it. I run into it all the time and so have others.
Of course you can VPN and then hit your POP3 box through your own network. But what if outbound VPN port AND outbound port 25 are blocked on the hotel's network? What do you do then? Answer: nothing, you're screwed.
STOP BLOCKING OUTBOUND PORTS! This is not a good solution.
First, its the hotels and their blocking of the outbound VPN ports (Hampton Inn/Hilton -- I am looking at you!). Anymore, it's getting to be a crapshoot as to whether I can get on my company's VPN when I staying at a hotel. The Hilton group is just the worst offender but I have seen it at other hotels too.
And now, you want to close outbound port 25. So how do I send my e-mail? We use POP3.
I ask because there are a lot of stupid people implementing these "blocking" solutions and nobody is considering that business people use these things ALL the time while on the road. You can complain about how we are "behind" by using POP3 but until you are ready to come and migrate us to something else (for free), you don't get to decide what we use and don't use. POP3 is legal, technically allowed, standardized, and works.
(sidenote: we *can* use webmail, which helps mitigate this problem but seriously....its a real problem for anyone who does business on the road. Who wants to open their Outlook and "guess" why you can't check your e-mail? And trust me, the people at the hotels have NO idea what is and isn't blocked so they are no help either. Same for the tech support numbers at those hotels.)
He wants line item veto.
Which gives him even more control over Congress.
I wasn't making a comment about torture, in general. I was making a comment about using 24 as somekind of blueprint for real-world actions by soldiers. It was implied that our soldiers would be affected by 24 so much so as to mimic the show in real life. If you read the post I replied to, you will see the example of a CO giving orders to a private under his command based on something he saw on 24.
The example is absurd. The military/DOD has professionals that do this. That was my point.
The thread is not about US or US policy on torture so I am not going to respond to the rest.
If there is too much risk in your child watching television, then I suggest, you utilize the two buttons on the television. One of them turns it off. And the other one changes the channel. You should just assume that EVERYTHING shown on TV is "bad", and therefore, too risky.
TV is not like walking down the street in your neighborhood. Television is a 100% voluntary action you and your kids engage in. You do not need it to survive and in fact, many people don't even own a television. Guess what? They still raise kids and they still survive quite nicely.
The idea that you should impart restrictions on what society can show on TV so your kid can "safely" watch TV, is ludicrous. You should not expect society to accommodate you so the TV can be your babysitter. If you think TV - as is, as well as whatever it becomes - is too risky for your child to view, then you should not participate. Just turn it off and assume that if you turn it back on, your child will burst into flames.
See how that works? You are happy because you have avoided risk. And we are happy because we get to see stuff blow up. If you do it the other way around, nobody is happy but you.
Your suggestion is absurd. For any substantial interrogation, there are "professionals" who do the interrogating. I don't know who they are or who they are with but I am certain the US Military/DOD has the foresight to look into the subject a train-up a few people to be experts in extracting useful information. I highly doubt they are influenced by 24. If anything, its the other way around.
Some private who finds a guy on the field and starts torturing him because his CO saw something cool on 24 and told him to -- is a crime. Nothing more, nothing less.
You got it backwards. Information Technology wasn't taken over by Biz School product. It was always a PART of the business school product. And an expensive part at that (hopefully, it paid for itself, otherwise, we are all out of jobs). If you think otherwise, you don't understand who feeds (pays) who here.
/. types would learn the business skills necessary to run a business (and I mean the MBA level skills), then THEY could do the job better. Business and the business world is complex. It's easy to make fatal mistake and lots of people/companies do. Until you know to run your own business, you depend on them. Let me say that again - you depend on them (for jobs at least, and in the context of replying to the parent)
I get a little tired of the MBA/Biz school bashing here.
If
There is a naievete in your post that implies there is no value to business school and that simply, isn't true. The "World of Business" is just as complex and fraught with peril as ANY technical project or dream you can think of. In fact, the WoB almost always funds the technical projects we are speaking of (like IT). Personally, I have found that people who have the knowledge and education to understand what is going on, do the best in business. There are plenty of crazy professors working on projects in a garage. And that's great. I like to see that. But there are MANY more "business people" who are doing better than that. Why? Because they understand business.
When you have mastered financing, the banking system, money systems, derivatives, debt, interest, short-term cash management, long-term cash management, inventory, payroll (and associated HR issues), sales management, marketing, advertising, project management, facility management (perhaps, if you own your own place), accounting, taxes (state, local, and fed), inventory control, budgets, capital project allocation, risk/reward profile analysis, portfolio management, contract law, and anything else that might help you make money ---- then you can run the company and replace all the PHB's.
Remember, its about money. And business schools teach people how to make money. And to make lots of money, you need to know something about the above subjects so you can utilize them to your advantage.
(ps: I do agree with your comment that people stop learning. There is a lot of truth to that statement)
UID matters why? I guess I'd do the same if I didn't have a better response. I am certain I've been around long enough to talk intelligently about the subject matter, which, in case you forgot -- is suggesting the use of technological restriction laws in order to curb a sociological problem. I didn't see UID discussed in the article but maybe I missed it. And clearly it matters because nobody with a UID over 10000 could possibly say anything intelligent(/sarchasm). Oh wait, you're 15035. Make that 15036 and under.
/. can see the issues pretty clearly. You know, now that you mention it, it really does make me wonder if you understand the culture here.
:)
And honestly, since you have a low UID and brought it up, I am surprised you would post something supporting techno use/restriction laws when most of
I still don't think you get it.
Frag off, skeeter.
Better than current state? Yes.
/. bristle when societal issues are being solved by technical measures. Spam, pr0n, piracy, etc. Technical solutions to societal problems rarely work and usually wind up causing more problems than they solve. I hope you see that in this example of a really, really, bad idea for a law.
I hear what you are saying...but you're not getting it.
You assume that porn providers want to help. Maybe some do. But I am certain most do not. Hell, most are not even in the USA. Why would you think that a law in the US has any bearing on the behavior going on in another country? It doesn't. So you have to assume that most porn providers - at least - are not cooperative. I am not saying they are predatory or working against the US, I am just saying they couldn't care less about what we enact or don't enact here in the USA (porn-wise). They, simply, are indifferent.
So, exactly, how do you force ANY technical solution around the world when most of the world doesn't give a crap and continues to do things the way THEY want to do it'????
This is the reason that we here on
Lets not forget, they also have the cameras...
That's important if you are a politician who has to get re-elected to keep your job.
The power you mention is at stock voltages. Many overclockers run their RAM at 2.0 and higher.
For them (and me), RAM created heat is a problem.
However, I just hung an old-school ghetto CPU fan over them. I'm not sure I need them water cooled.
Like anything, it depends on what they want to charge me. If they want to charge me everytime I want to view the same video, then yes - yes, there is still a reason to "own" the media.
It's sad that is has to be that way, really. Because what you describe would be very very cool. They could become what you describe. But at this point, it's difficult to see how that can become reality.
Why would anyone want to store more than they legally had to? All you have to do is read this.
And if you don't think they are hanging corporations (rightly and wrongly), you are kidding yourself.