That's the "let them eat cake" solution. The RIAA would love that... "Don't like the army of restrictions we bought? Then perform the music yourself." (at which point ASCAP steps in and says "Make sure it isn't any of OURS. Or share any notes with ours, for that matter.")
It's not acceptable, any more than it would be for the major carmakers to decide to put restrictions on how you could use your car, and put you in jail if you violated them. "Build your own car" isn't a solution to that, nor is "buy from one of the few minor players who isn't in on the deal".
How frigging naive can you be? The Congress that passed the DMCA without opposition, that passed the "No Electronic Theft Act", the Congress which has been extending the scope and duration of copyright for decades, the Congress which is fully in the pocket of the xxAAs, THAT Congress is going to pass a new copyright law which protects the little guy?
No, Walt, that just ain't going to happen. When the other side suggests that the answer is just to follow the law and if you don't like it, get the law changed, I know that's just gloating over the power they have. When someone who opposes the status quo says it, and it's not credible that they are really that naive, I have to wonder what is going on. Are they so afraid to believe the system is broken that they cling to ineffective measures? At what point, Walt, will you say "To hell with it, the system's broke, raise the Jolly Roger and copy away"? Never? Then you may as well throw your lot in with the xxAAs.
If you don't like all of the restrictions on the use of digital content, the solution isn't to steal the stuff.
There's FOUR solutions:
1) Suffer loudly. Follow the restrictions and complain about them. Unless you're a major public figure, nobody gives a shit about your complaints, so if you do this, the xxAAs win.
2) Suffer in silence. Follow the restrictions and don't complain about them. This is the xxAAs favorite solution. Equivalent to 1 if you aren't somebody big.
3) Pirate loudly. Violate the restrictions openly and notoriously. Best case, you get what you want but otherwise nothing changes. Worst case, you lose your freedom and your life savings, and your name becomes a word to scare other would-be pirates with -- the xxAAs win with that. And no one who hears about it who matters supports your case -- civil disobedience does not work when the issue is esoteric, and even less so when your opponents are the media.
4) Pirate in silence. Violate the restrictions and try not to get caught. Same outcomes as 3) above, only the worst case is less likely.
The outcome where the copyright laws are changed for the better and those irritating digital restrictions go away? Sorry, that outcome is simply not available. No matter how many times Don Quixtote tilts at the windmill, the windmill still stands. The only way to get rid of the restrictions is self-help, and that means violating the law.
And as for "steal the stuff"? Just because they bought a law doesn't make it "stealing". I'll give them the term "piracy", because everyone knows the difference between piracy on the high seas and copyright violation. But calling it "stealing" isn't intended as metaphor; it's intended to actually blur the distinction.
Yes, copyright predates digital music. It's still out of the realm of Capitalism 101.
As for the "No part of this publication...." it's largely lawyer scare talk and always has been. That's not an agreement; it's an attempt to bully people (using the threat of the power of copyright, that is, government force) into thinking they need permission for acts which they do not need permission for.
If iTMS went away tomorrow, you could legally break the DRM (provided you didn't make any device to do it, mind you) under one of the exceptions the LoC granted. So the music companies better hope the much-predicted Death of Apple doesn't happen.
Except here the seller wants to sell his work and keep it too, and has the government firepower to make that so. That's what copyright is all about. Throws Capitalism 101 right out the window.
My anecdote: I used to play the "Daytona" arcade driving game a lot. After a session, I'd get in my Mazda Miata and start driving it the same way. It probably helped that the Miata handles similarly to the "Daytona" cars, only at about half the speed.
Sorry, I should have made that clearer -- they'll declare their pirated discs (whether pressed or burned, since the article says the dogs can't tell) as BLANK DVD-Rs, and put a few real blank ones on top.
If you want to be creative and/or independent, IT is the wrong function. The people who can be creative inside a business are marketing, R&D, graphic design, strategic planning, and management.
At a sufficiently Dilbertized company, you can subtract R&D -- they are supposed to do what marketing tells them, no matter how dumb. And sometimes you can add finance...
I think IT now is in the state manufacturing was in the 70s.
I've seen where that thinking leads. TQM. MDQ (IBM's version). ISO-900x. Reams and reams of irrelevant documentation, metrics which measure nothing of importance, demoralized techies, and pointy-haired bosses. In short, Dilbert. If your boss starts using terms like "quality management" and compares your work to manufacturing, it's time to start looking elsewhere.
The DMCA is badly drafted because the companies which wanted it -- content providers like Viacom -- deliberately had their lobbyists draft it that way. They expected to use the power of their corporate takedown-letter-writing department to shut down anything they didn't like. They didn't count on a service provider with the capacity to not only host enough content to give their takedown-letter department writer's cramp, but to actually be able to handle all those takedown letters without shutting down.
If push came to shove, I have doubts that C-Span would be able to successfully claim a copyright on any particular event they covered. There's still no "sweat of the brow" copyright in the US, and C-SPAN's original input to its footage is near-nonexistent. They could win based on editing and selection, but they could lose everything -- which is probably a large reason for this "liberalized" copyright policy. They don't want this to go to court, particularly not against politically powerful people with tough lawyers.
1) Rodney King was speeding. According to the cops, he was doing over 115mph in a Hyundai Excel. Oh, wait -- the Hyundai can't do 115mph. It can't even do 100mph. A cop lie.
2) Rodney King was probably high on PCP. Nope, the cops said so, but King subsequently tested negative for PCP.
3) Resisted arrest. They swarmed him -- without provocation, merely because he was a big scary black guy acting oddly but not violently -- and tased him twice, then accused him of resisting arrest because he stood up _after_ that.
4) Had to be beaten into submission: In the opinion of the cops, anyway.
Then they held the officers' trial in copland, which explains the verdict.
Please keep up your heavy-handed and insulting efforts to force Canada to change their laws. Where a gentler, more nuanced approach using the Canadian copyright interests might have succeeded, this sort of bullying is likely to inspire Canada to resist, and poisons the well for future lobbying attempts. May your tyranny always be tempered by incompetence.
Terrorists have causes or at least a predisposition of animosity towards their target fueled by fanatics. Take those causes away(or at least minimize them) and the terrorist count goes down.
Yeah. Ask Neville Chamberlain about that one.
News flash: The United States could declare open season on Israel, withdraw from all Middle Eastern bases and force all American oil companies out of the Middle East, and the terrorists would not only not quit, they'd take it as a sign that their tactics were working and they'd redouble their efforts.
I'm no fan of Bush or his policies, but despite their idiocy, they aren't nearly as stupid as appeasement.
Ah, but if you're not a mal-adjusted competition-driven asshole, you're likely to be driven into the ground by those who are. That's Social Darwinism for you.
No matter what, the money vanishes. The connection between an "earmarked" tax and the actual program it is supposed to sponsor is typically tenuous to nonexistent. This is just a way to get another tax in while sounding "green".
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If you want to break DRM, you need assembler! Microsoft ain't gonna give you their source, yaknow!!!!
That's the "let them eat cake" solution. The RIAA would love that... "Don't like the army of restrictions we bought? Then perform the music yourself." (at which point ASCAP steps in and says "Make sure it isn't any of OURS. Or share any notes with ours, for that matter.")
It's not acceptable, any more than it would be for the major carmakers to decide to put restrictions on how you could use your car, and put you in jail if you violated them. "Build your own car" isn't a solution to that, nor is "buy from one of the few minor players who isn't in on the deal".
How frigging naive can you be? The Congress that passed the DMCA without opposition, that passed the "No Electronic Theft Act", the Congress which has been extending the scope and duration of copyright for decades, the Congress which is fully in the pocket of the xxAAs, THAT Congress is going to pass a new copyright law which protects the little guy?
No, Walt, that just ain't going to happen. When the other side suggests that the answer is just to follow the law and if you don't like it, get the law changed, I know that's just gloating over the power they have. When someone who opposes the status quo says it, and it's not credible that they are really that naive, I have to wonder what is going on. Are they so afraid to believe the system is broken that they cling to ineffective measures? At what point, Walt, will you say "To hell with it, the system's broke, raise the Jolly Roger and copy away"? Never? Then you may as well throw your lot in with the xxAAs.
There's FOUR solutions:
1) Suffer loudly. Follow the restrictions and complain about them. Unless you're a major public figure, nobody gives a shit about your complaints, so if you do this, the xxAAs win.
2) Suffer in silence. Follow the restrictions and don't complain about them. This is the xxAAs favorite solution. Equivalent to 1 if you aren't somebody big.
3) Pirate loudly. Violate the restrictions openly and notoriously. Best case, you get what you want but otherwise nothing changes. Worst case, you lose your freedom and your life savings, and your name becomes a word to scare other would-be pirates with -- the xxAAs win with that. And no one who hears about it who matters supports your case -- civil disobedience does not work when the issue is esoteric, and even less so when your opponents are the media.
4) Pirate in silence. Violate the restrictions and try not to get caught. Same outcomes as 3) above, only the worst case is less likely.
The outcome where the copyright laws are changed for the better and those irritating digital restrictions go away? Sorry, that outcome is simply not available. No matter how many times Don Quixtote tilts at the windmill, the windmill still stands. The only way to get rid of the restrictions is self-help, and that means violating the law.
And as for "steal the stuff"? Just because they bought a law doesn't make it "stealing". I'll give them the term "piracy", because everyone knows the difference between piracy on the high seas and copyright violation. But calling it "stealing" isn't intended as metaphor; it's intended to actually blur the distinction.
Yes, copyright predates digital music. It's still out of the realm of Capitalism 101.
As for the "No part of this publication...." it's largely lawyer scare talk and always has been. That's not an agreement; it's an attempt to bully people (using the threat of the power of copyright, that is, government force) into thinking they need permission for acts which they do not need permission for.
If iTMS went away tomorrow, you could legally break the DRM (provided you didn't make any device to do it, mind you) under one of the exceptions the LoC granted. So the music companies better hope the much-predicted Death of Apple doesn't happen.
Except here the seller wants to sell his work and keep it too, and has the government firepower to make that so. That's what copyright is all about. Throws Capitalism 101 right out the window.
My anecdote: I used to play the "Daytona" arcade driving game a lot. After a session, I'd get in my Mazda Miata and start driving it the same way. It probably helped that the Miata handles similarly to the "Daytona" cars, only at about half the speed.
Sorry, I should have made that clearer -- they'll declare their pirated discs (whether pressed or burned, since the article says the dogs can't tell) as BLANK DVD-Rs, and put a few real blank ones on top.
So now the pirated discs will be declared as DVD-Rs or something, perhaps with a few real DVD-Rs on top to fool lazy customs inspectors.
For the non-premium-channel watching geek.
1) No subscription fee
2) Commercial Flagging
3) No ads, auto-recorded shows, or other similar nonsense.
On the down side, it WAS a pain in the ass to set up. And not cheap; I think I spent $800+ on my box (HTPC case, 1G memory, two HD tuner cards, etc).
As for CableCard, I'm considering dropping cable entirely. All the shows I watch are on over-the-air TV, and I've now got working antenna set up.
The DMCA is badly drafted because the companies which wanted it -- content providers like Viacom -- deliberately had their lobbyists draft it that way. They expected to use the power of their corporate takedown-letter-writing department to shut down anything they didn't like. They didn't count on a service provider with the capacity to not only host enough content to give their takedown-letter department writer's cramp, but to actually be able to handle all those takedown letters without shutting down.
An "insightful Rob Enderle" -- a contradiction in 3 words.
What next, a "brilliant John Dvorak"... oh, wait, that was last week.
If push came to shove, I have doubts that C-Span would be able to successfully claim a copyright on any particular event they covered. There's still no "sweat of the brow" copyright in the US, and C-SPAN's original input to its footage is near-nonexistent. They could win based on editing and selection, but they could lose everything -- which is probably a large reason for this "liberalized" copyright policy. They don't want this to go to court, particularly not against politically powerful people with tough lawyers.
1) Rodney King was speeding. According to the cops, he was doing over 115mph in a Hyundai Excel. Oh, wait -- the Hyundai can't do 115mph. It can't even do 100mph. A cop lie. 2) Rodney King was probably high on PCP. Nope, the cops said so, but King subsequently tested negative for PCP. 3) Resisted arrest. They swarmed him -- without provocation, merely because he was a big scary black guy acting oddly but not violently -- and tased him twice, then accused him of resisting arrest because he stood up _after_ that. 4) Had to be beaten into submission: In the opinion of the cops, anyway. Then they held the officers' trial in copland, which explains the verdict.
Please keep up your heavy-handed and insulting efforts to force Canada to change their laws. Where a gentler, more nuanced approach using the Canadian copyright interests might have succeeded, this sort of bullying is likely to inspire Canada to resist, and poisons the well for future lobbying attempts. May your tyranny always be tempered by incompetence.
Inspiron E1505: 1.42" x 14.02" x 10.45" 6.18 lbs
MacBook Pro 15": 1.0" x 14.1" x 9.6" 5.6 lbs
The "average common machine" is called an "iMac". There's no average common _headless_ machine.
Yeah. Ask Neville Chamberlain about that one.
News flash: The United States could declare open season on Israel, withdraw from all Middle Eastern bases and force all American oil companies out of the Middle East, and the terrorists would not only not quit, they'd take it as a sign that their tactics were working and they'd redouble their efforts.
I'm no fan of Bush or his policies, but despite their idiocy, they aren't nearly as stupid as appeasement.
BTW, Ben Franklin was never president.
Ah, but if you're not a mal-adjusted competition-driven asshole, you're likely to be driven into the ground by those who are. That's Social Darwinism for you.
Jobs said publicly he'd do it; if he's lying, all the music companies have to do to call his bluff is say "OK, go do it".
No matter what, the money vanishes. The connection between an "earmarked" tax and the actual program it is supposed to sponsor is typically tenuous to nonexistent. This is just a way to get another tax in while sounding "green".