It doesn't seem ridiculous or asinine - just plain stupid, the non-exciting kind of stupid.
How would this be different from taking a DNA sequence and markup, prininting it out and claming copyright as a visual work of art? or just copyrighting that same text as a novel?
I am sure laws exist to prevent that sort of idiocy, right? right?
That's a really good point - yet another aspect of digital media that current IP laws just don't take into consideration.
If the underlying data is the same (and it kinda has to be for this to work) then no, you have the same "work" it just has a few extra bytes such as file headers for whatever format it is in. I'd say this is more analogous to putting a painting in a new frame - is it a derivative work then? Of course the perseption of it is always as something completely different and serving a different purpose (which is something that no painting analogy can show).
A specific DNA sequence is never patented - what's patented is a sequence plus markup, identifying variations (that occur between different people, or peoples for that matter), such as insertions, deletions and SNPs.
So no, it's not your DNA, nor is it anyone else's.
And yeah, patents are supposed to protect inventions, but then the MPAA and RIAA are supposed to entertain us, rather than intefere with the computer industry through asinine laws (while producing absolute shit in the meantime).
This reminds me of that whole DeCSS prime number debacle that The Reg ran a while back; where they (don't remember who actually did it) took the decimal equivalent of a binary representation of the DeCSS code and derived a prime number from it by some ononistic mathematical technique - and voila, they had the first illegal prime number.
All I know is that the last two winters in Montreal were piss - almost no snow and barely even below -20C - argue with that!
We don't seem to be the target audience here...
on
Linux On Big Iron
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· Score: 2, Insightful
"In other words, Linux has come a long way from being Linus Torvalds' student computer project.
"
Oh shit, it has? I better get on that there Linux thing then! Is it just me, or did that whole article have the "this isn't going to teach me anything new" feel to it?
Yeah, I would say that was sarcasm. No need to get all excited. (Besides, "smarttags" aren't idiotic, they are intrusive, underhanded and evil, but the idea is very smart)
Re:Cost of Mandrake Club & StarOffice 6 when i
on
Sizing Up StarOffice 6.0
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· Score: 3, Insightful
Because you want to support Mandrake? If it was all about StarOffice, it would be called "Buy StarOffice from the Mandrake store" not "Join Mandrake Club"
If the code you are referring to is a new version of Duke Nukem or some silly number game then I may agree.
That's why I specified a LIMS (or, a Laboratory Information Management System), mainly because it's kind of what I do, and also because I see it as something having use (the exact opposite of a Duke Nukem game) - it helps research, it helps find new cures for diseases, is eventually helps save lives (hypothetically).
I wasn't actually just talking about weight loss (and if think if you read the thing you know that's not what it was about, either), whatever a person can lose in two weeks, they can gain back in two days. I was talking more about attitude, about realizing that staying in good shape (however subjective that may be, I am not talking 5% bodyfat here) is not only necessary but is also enjoyable. And it sounds to me, at least, that the two weeks that guy described, is just the kind of kick in the pants that would get a lot of people on their way.
The coding binges must be a subjective thing - I, for one, enjoy them; I do what I like, and I see immediate results from doing it. Certainly it's mentaly and sometimes even physically tiring, but I have a definite goal in front of me, that I am good at accomplishing. If I didn't like it, I very much doubt I'd be doing it.
To neglect and abuse it perhaps the greatest sin man can commit.
Talk of "sin" and "given" and such nonsense aside - I would've agreed with you before, but recently I am finding more and more that neglecting and abusing your body is really not any less depressing of the two.
I think this is meant for the "common person" to understand. Of course the "common person" has a really good idea of how a novel, or even a giganovel compares to digital content such as web-pages. So I really think the point of the comparison was to have a Big Number.:)
Actually, though technically a terrabit should be 10^12 bit, I think they mean the binary power closest to one trillion - 2^40 (or whatever it is). I believe that's technically called a Tebbibit or somesuch nonsense, that never caught on so everyone just calls it a terrabit (except for HD manufacturers who try to use this to pass off their products as having more space than the really do)
That instructor may seem like a tough guy, but in reality, how does his efforts make the world a better place?
I'd say even just the one two week course that may improve the fitness level (or even just attitude) of 20 or so people is more important than any LIMS I may code.
What's the point of doing our "improve the standards of living" geeky shit if we are just watching the counry slip further and futher into the abyss of obesety that it surely is heading to?
In any case, doing hard things that you like, is easy. It really is, precisely because you are so dedicated to it, is it possible to stay up for 3 days coding and not think of it as "hard." It's doing things that you don't like, and which are hard, that's difficult.
That's not what I've understood so far - you'll be allowed to make a copy with the purpose of time-shifting and you'll be allowed to watch it once. After all, with modern technology they are finally able to achieve the long standing dream of making you pay for each and every single time you watch or listen to something. And they are right, that is the best way to make the most money.
This whole debacle has made me realize how glad I am to not care in the least about any of their content - otherwise it looks like they'd have me by the balls.
You don't need remote app execution foolery to be able to use any computer for your work (if the need arises). Even though I am realizing that most apps I use are java now (NetBeans, ArgoUML, Komodo, etc) I wouldn't run them on anything other than my 1.3GHz/.5GB PC - it would just be painful.
What I do, is store in CVS (not just development code, but school work and such), which I run off of my development server (along with all the app servers I use). Then it's just a matter of opening 80, and 2401 in the firewall and installing ViewCVS and I can access anything I need from anywhere.
Another added advantage is that since I constantly have an up to date copy checked out on my main PC, I have a "hot backup" in case either machine dies on me.
It also helps to use a computer and ISP independed email account (like Yahoo), so you can access your mail from anywhere.
It really does help quite a bit to things like this, but I can't see a use for "virtual remote desktops" - your software belongs on the PC which runs it (until you are paying a subscription fee for it, of course), it's your data that's important to get to.
Larger and larger parts of movies are now computer animated, and there are more and more completely computer animated movies as well; home hardware will only be getting more powerful (I know because I've read that in some prediction lists), so it should be just a matter of time, until someone (probably an indie movie maker) starts releasing the "source code" to their movies? i.e. whatever pre-rendered format the movie is in which can be modified to produce the movie you like.
This probably won't be technologically possible for a few years yet, and it would need a commonly accessible (likely open source or free - speech and beer) 3D platform, which will eventually emerge (I would think). Right now these movies are still voiced by actors, but certainly text to speech software, with some sort of "intonation markup" that's good enough for a movie isn't far behind the visuals?
Think about it, this actually has uses beyond making all the women in the movie naked all the time (though that will undoubtedly be the most popular) - let's say after the movie enjoys it's theatrical run, and makes the money it was going to make, the creators release all the characters, both the models and the voice "engines" (whatever shape that make take), the objects and the environments for it - sure it will be a few hundred gigs, but we are talking several years from now, hell they could even stick it on the DVD5 (or whatever it is by then) rental disk. And voila - you can have the Episode I without Jar Jar and with an actual plot - your imagination is the only limit.
I know none of the studios would ever go for anything like this, but that's not what I am rambling about here (besides, by that time they've either evolved with the times, or they already have all our money and own our children anyway). But it's not hard to see movies being created in our familiar sort of "community process" You could think of the traditional movie sequels as the major versions of commercial software, and the "free" movies would be constantly "patched" and evolve with time. Wouldn't it be cool for your favorite movies to be slightly different each time you rewatch them?
Anyway, I've been up for like 30 hours, needed a good ramble.
Slashdot Mirror
Oh, and while we are on the subject - where the hell is my flying car?
How would this be different from taking a DNA sequence and markup, prininting it out and claming copyright as a visual work of art? or just copyrighting that same text as a novel?
I am sure laws exist to prevent that sort of idiocy, right? right?
If the underlying data is the same (and it kinda has to be for this to work) then no, you have the same "work" it just has a few extra bytes such as file headers for whatever format it is in. I'd say this is more analogous to putting a painting in a new frame - is it a derivative work then? Of course the perseption of it is always as something completely different and serving a different purpose (which is something that no painting analogy can show).
So no, it's not your DNA, nor is it anyone else's.
And yeah, patents are supposed to protect inventions, but then the MPAA and RIAA are supposed to entertain us, rather than intefere with the computer industry through asinine laws (while producing absolute shit in the meantime).
This reminds me of that whole DeCSS prime number debacle that The Reg ran a while back; where they (don't remember who actually did it) took the decimal equivalent of a binary representation of the DeCSS code and derived a prime number from it by some ononistic mathematical technique - and voila, they had the first illegal prime number.
b) Thank you for explaining to me why I cannot base claims of global warming on two winters. I feel really, really silly for thinking that I could.
All I know is that the last two winters in Montreal were piss - almost no snow and barely even below -20C - argue with that!
Oh shit, it has? I better get on that there Linux thing then! Is it just me, or did that whole article have the "this isn't going to teach me anything new" feel to it?
Linux is not UNIX? What the bloody hell is it then, Windows?
I've been growing a beard for exactly that reason - I think I can get more money with it.
Yeah, I would say that was sarcasm. No need to get all excited. (Besides, "smarttags" aren't idiotic, they are intrusive, underhanded and evil, but the idea is very smart)
Because you want to support Mandrake? If it was all about StarOffice, it would be called "Buy StarOffice from the Mandrake store" not "Join Mandrake Club"
That's why I specified a LIMS (or, a Laboratory Information Management System), mainly because it's kind of what I do, and also because I see it as something having use (the exact opposite of a Duke Nukem game) - it helps research, it helps find new cures for diseases, is eventually helps save lives (hypothetically).
I wasn't actually just talking about weight loss (and if think if you read the thing you know that's not what it was about, either), whatever a person can lose in two weeks, they can gain back in two days. I was talking more about attitude, about realizing that staying in good shape (however subjective that may be, I am not talking 5% bodyfat here) is not only necessary but is also enjoyable. And it sounds to me, at least, that the two weeks that guy described, is just the kind of kick in the pants that would get a lot of people on their way.
The coding binges must be a subjective thing - I, for one, enjoy them; I do what I like, and I see immediate results from doing it. Certainly it's mentaly and sometimes even physically tiring, but I have a definite goal in front of me, that I am good at accomplishing. If I didn't like it, I very much doubt I'd be doing it.
To neglect and abuse it perhaps the greatest sin man can commit.
Talk of "sin" and "given" and such nonsense aside - I would've agreed with you before, but recently I am finding more and more that neglecting and abusing your body is really not any less depressing of the two.
I think this is meant for the "common person" to understand. Of course the "common person" has a really good idea of how a novel, or even a giganovel compares to digital content such as web-pages. So I really think the point of the comparison was to have a Big Number. :)
um, I don't think this thing is meant as a "consumer" kind of service.
I could be just plain wrong - that's been known to happen.
being trite and obvious has never been harder...
or whatever number of r's it has
Actually, though technically a terrabit should be 10^12 bit, I think they mean the binary power closest to one trillion - 2^40 (or whatever it is). I believe that's technically called a Tebbibit or somesuch nonsense, that never caught on so everyone just calls it a terrabit (except for HD manufacturers who try to use this to pass off their products as having more space than the really do)
Question's like "who needs this much bandwidth/disk space/ram/cpu power" seem rather silly - don't worry, we'll catch up :)
I'd say even just the one two week course that may improve the fitness level (or even just attitude) of 20 or so people is more important than any LIMS I may code.
What's the point of doing our "improve the standards of living" geeky shit if we are just watching the counry slip further and futher into the abyss of obesety that it surely is heading to?
In any case, doing hard things that you like, is easy. It really is, precisely because you are so dedicated to it, is it possible to stay up for 3 days coding and not think of it as "hard." It's doing things that you don't like, and which are hard, that's difficult.
That's not what I've understood so far - you'll be allowed to make a copy with the purpose of time-shifting and you'll be allowed to watch it once. After all, with modern technology they are finally able to achieve the long standing dream of making you pay for each and every single time you watch or listen to something. And they are right, that is the best way to make the most money.
This whole debacle has made me realize how glad I am to not care in the least about any of their content - otherwise it looks like they'd have me by the balls.
What I do, is store in CVS (not just development code, but school work and such), which I run off of my development server (along with all the app servers I use). Then it's just a matter of opening 80, and 2401 in the firewall and installing ViewCVS and I can access anything I need from anywhere.
Another added advantage is that since I constantly have an up to date copy checked out on my main PC, I have a "hot backup" in case either machine dies on me.
It also helps to use a computer and ISP independed email account (like Yahoo), so you can access your mail from anywhere.
It really does help quite a bit to things like this, but I can't see a use for "virtual remote desktops" - your software belongs on the PC which runs it (until you are paying a subscription fee for it, of course), it's your data that's important to get to.
use the water to water your grape vinces, press out the juice from the grapes, store the juice in wooden barrels for a while - voila, water to wine!
This probably won't be technologically possible for a few years yet, and it would need a commonly accessible (likely open source or free - speech and beer) 3D platform, which will eventually emerge (I would think). Right now these movies are still voiced by actors, but certainly text to speech software, with some sort of "intonation markup" that's good enough for a movie isn't far behind the visuals?
Think about it, this actually has uses beyond making all the women in the movie naked all the time (though that will undoubtedly be the most popular) - let's say after the movie enjoys it's theatrical run, and makes the money it was going to make, the creators release all the characters, both the models and the voice "engines" (whatever shape that make take), the objects and the environments for it - sure it will be a few hundred gigs, but we are talking several years from now, hell they could even stick it on the DVD5 (or whatever it is by then) rental disk. And voila - you can have the Episode I without Jar Jar and with an actual plot - your imagination is the only limit.
I know none of the studios would ever go for anything like this, but that's not what I am rambling about here (besides, by that time they've either evolved with the times, or they already have all our money and own our children anyway). But it's not hard to see movies being created in our familiar sort of "community process" You could think of the traditional movie sequels as the major versions of commercial software, and the "free" movies would be constantly "patched" and evolve with time. Wouldn't it be cool for your favorite movies to be slightly different each time you rewatch them?
Anyway, I've been up for like 30 hours, needed a good ramble.