I'm not a code-hacker any more. I'm a law student. (Don't run away, I'm on your side.) People look at my laptop and see OpenOffice and ask what it is. "It's a free office suite that does everything MS Office does." They drool. The only reason I'm not running Linux on that laptop is that my wireless NIC doesn't play nice with 128-bit WEP.
My point, though, is that I make a point to flaunt the fact that I can do everything that my friends are doing using tools that are freely available. They're spending 150 bucks for an Office upgrade; I download mine for free (when it comes out... what's up with OpenOffice???). They look at their steadily-decreasing student loan balances, and suddenly the free alternatives look mighty nice. Even for a bunch of Luddite lawyers.
The niggling problems start to occur mainly when some little tiny thing doesn't work the way they're used to. And then they wail about how "it's just sooo different!" and run back to the security of Windows.
You're absolutely right. This is a battle of security blankets. People need to see that there is a whole world out there that may not be exactly the same, but is just as comfortable. Kind of like leaving Atlanta to visit Rio.:) Or something.
Re:good luck
on
Ark Linux
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· Score: 5, Insightful
That's just not true. You're confusing the paradigm with the method of implementing it. What's so wrong with having a coherent system of sharing system resources such as a clipboard, fonts, UI widgets, etc? Nothing. A computer should be easy to use. That may, of course, include "easy to customize."
The fact that Microsoft has been alternately lazy and incoherent in implementing its model of "ease of use" shouldn't sway other developers from trying to accomplish the same goal in a more effective manner.
Hell, I've installed a number of Linux distributions. I've tweaked them. I've fiddled with them. But not one has even approached the ease with whick I can accomplish tasks using Win2k. Perhaps on a technical level, Linux is more stable, more customizable, and more secure than Windows, and certainly the open-source ideal is admirable, but when you consider task-based computing where the main focus is on getting work done (which is all that matters to most end users), the mishmash of current Linux builds is just a pain.
I am NOT trashing Linux. It's an amazing accomplishment, and the improvements in UI and functionality (both at the command line and in the UI) over the last few years are encouraging. But there's work to be done.
The problem is one of incentive. What incentive do the RIAA have to engage in such a compromise? They're not really losing an absurd amount in profits, because millions of people all over the world are still buying good ol' CDs, merchandise, and all the other tools of RIAA's profits. The RIAA isn't suing p2p services to restore lost profits, but to protect the distribution scheme in which they've invested a tremendous amount of money. Your idea that they should "get with the times" is noble, but it doesn't address the fact that the RIAA and its affiliated companies need to get a return on their investment in the business model that millions of folks are still participating in.
Add to that the fact that the "artists" are an absolute non-factor. Those who provide content to the RIAA's member companies already have a separate contract with RIAA which provides them with royalties, advances, and so forth. While it is true that those royalties depend on album sales, the royalties themselves are not, generally, substantial as compared to the revenue that RIAA (et al) retains from those sales. Further, and again, album sales have not decreased to critical levels. (I'd challenge anybody to prove to me that the decrease in album sales in the last few years is the result of p2p activities and not a foreseeable decrease resulting from bad product and the bad economy.) So, the RIAA is clearly not pursuing these lawsuits to protect the interests of the artists, who only detract from the RIAA's profits in the short term.
What we really need is a revolution in the music distribution system by aggressive labels not affiliated with the RIAA, perhaps a label that is, like Southwest Airlines, owned entirely by the participating artists. In order to have such a revolutionary change be successful, those artists have to pump out compelling product that will compete with what the RIAA's companies offer. So far, no label or collection of artists have managed to usurp the corporate-art of Britney, Christina, etc.
I wish the RIAA would just disappear. But they have enough of a market to make their business model tenable. Until that market is disrupted in a real way, RIAA is going to keep doing what they're doing, and they're going to win.
If you want a change, don't just download MP3s of RIAA artists. Support non-RIAA artists and labels. Find artists who sell their music directly to the consumer. That's how to fight the RIAA.
You know, I've spent a lot of time thinking about the proliferation of languages. We have Assembly. We have C. We have C++. We have Java. We have Cold Fusion, PHP, and ASP.NET. We even have iHTML or whatever that bastard offspring of HTML was called.
What's the purpose of creating entirely new languages? Is a new language even entirely new, or is it an evolution of older languages incorporating new concepts and methodologies? Or is the creation of a new language just a way of leaving a mark? Or, even worse, is it a manifestation of that damnable desire to start from scratch every time? (I'm afflicted by it... most coders I know are afflicted by it...)
Here's what I'd like to know, in my limited knowledge of languages: What languages out there are truly modular? Are there any languages that encompass basic logic principles and which are then able to be augmented by blackboxed modules? So, if you had a language that needed string concatenation, you could whip up a string concatenation module that would then become part of the language.
Now, I'm walking a semantic line here, because you can presumably do all that by writing header files, includes, classes, etc. that contain new logic within the structure of the language. But what I mean is a language that by its nature is abstracted and modular, even to the point where the syntax of, say, control structures could be modified in a module?
And, if the answer to my question is "Well, hell, you can do that in C!" then why do we need to bother writing a new language? Is it just to keep things fresh and interesting?
It just seems that with all the many languages I've learned and used, there's very little that I can think of that one language can do that another language can't. Where doing something in one language is harder than in another because the structure of the language makes it awkward, maybe that points to a language that needs to be made obsolete.
I guess the root question I'm asking is: Are there any truly novel languages out there, or are they all just variations on a common theme, with shared shortcomings and much duplication of effort?
Which presents an interesting legal problem of corporate presence. If passively allowing downloads constitutes a presence for the purposes of establishing personal jurisdiction, does, say, having a published phone number that can be accessed from another jurisdiction mean that a non-Internet company then has a "presence" for such purposes?
It's a pickle. And it's why law is both fun and necessary.
Are you a lawyer? (if you'd like to answer off-line where the/. goons can't get at you:) , I can be reached at parabaraba-at-yahoo.com)
Let's hear it for the 9th Circuit! If it weren't for them, the Supreme Court would have nothing to do but play golf. Besides, someone's got to be worse than the 4th....
Only remotely on topic, there was a bit on NPR the other day about a Picasso stolen from a Jewish family by Nazis during WWII. Aside from the cameo of Nazis, it was like reliving O'Keefe from my first semester of property. *shudder*
Wouldn't it be nice if musical artists actually owned their works so that theft of their works could proceed like O'Keefe? (It was a case in which a few of Georgia O'Keefe's paintings were stolen. NY decided that, effectively, "finders keepers" didn't kick in until she knew where they were. The decision lamented that there was no "paintings registry" where artists could report stolen paintings.) Yes, theft of music is distinguishable because it's non-tangible and represents more removal of potential profits than theft of actual value, but a man can dream...
I didn't say they'd win. In fact, I said they'd lose. And they'd probably lose badly. And with good reason.
And, yes, I know International Shoe. But, I have a question about that. To what extent were agents of Kazaa operating in California? To what extent, in fact, was there any corporate presence by Kazaa in California? Does the presence of revenue generating adware on users' computers qualify?
And, just to play devil's advocate, is what they're doing really "facially copright infringement"? (I believe it is, but I'm still curious, because while the RIAA is technically in the right, I just don't like them very much....):)
Maybe/. could start offering a prepackaged "Port 80 Flood Kit - Get the pride of being slashdotted without having to work for it." Say $1000 a pop. It's better than spending the money on advertising.
Geek 1: Hey, guys, I got slashdotted! Geek 2: Woah! No way! Geek 1: Yep. *smug* Chick: He's so dreamy...
Since I can't see the trailer, I have to make it up.
In this one, Dorfo and Samdumb go frolicking west across Amerrycah in their K-Y delivery van, lubing their way from adventure to adventure in their quest to destroy the Wrinngius Unus which was stolen from the Great Lord Mauron after a battle in which Mauron was defeated by a band of singing barbers. The movie climaxes when, at a Mauron's resort in Misted Mountains of Kallorahdoe, Samdumb gets his tongue stuck to a conveniently-placed ski-lift, and in order to unstick him, Dorfo engages in rough butt love to heat him up.
The passionate Nhobbit Love opens up a HUGE CRACK in the earth, into which an alert but orgasmic Dorfo tosses the Wringius Unus, thereby destroying it and Mauron...... thereby leaving the world unprotected from the resurrected band of singing barbers.
Celine Dion writes the title song, My Hardon Will Go On.
That's right, and criminal sanctions are usually imposed on things that society deems to be so wrong that ordinary civil sanctions are insufficient to deter and punish. Or, in other words, criminal sanctions represent the feeling of "the people" that "the people" have a vested interest in preventing the wrong, whereas civil sanctions are imposed only where the civil plaintiff's vested interests are violated.
Maybe the RIAA is worried that the only interests being violated are their own and that society doesn't care a rat's ass about their plight.
Thank God you threw the smiley in... I was sniffing around for a way to sue your ass for slander.
But you're probably just an irresponsible, smelly, unemployed coder, so I couldn't get any money out of you anyway.
*moves along to find a more lucrative target*:)
Actually, this presents a fascinating question. Why the hell doesn't the RIAA "report" Kazaa to the California Attorney General with evidence of criminal wrongdoing? Why all this fiddling around in civil courts when the practical effects of a civil verdict (an injunction that will likely be ignored or avoided, a money damages award that would probably go unpaid) are so much less than criminal sanctions?
I can't decide what the RIAA and MPAA are up to. Are they just looking for exposure? Are they trying to generate some cash? Are they trying to establish civil precedents that will allow them to sue OTHER CONTENT PROVIDERS that have nothing to do with MP3 distribution and which could provide them with a much larger payoff? Are they trying to establish a chain of civil verdicts that will allow them to go to Congresscritters and "encourage" them to pass laws specifically targetting p2p?
Or are they just stupid? (In the un-troll sense. I literally mean, do they honestly think they're going to win anything substantive?)
If they wanted to get rid of Kazaa, they'd sic the criminal prosecutors on them... or are RIAA and MPAA afraid that what Kazaa is doing isn't wrong enough to be considered "criminal"?
That's right. l4wy3rx0rs... the 0r1g1n4l h4x0rz...
for what it's worth, I agree with most lawyer bashing. There are a lot of dickheads in this profession. I know you're still going to think I'm evil now that I've revealed myself, but oh well. I can sleep at night knowing I'm on your side.
Hehe, and you're advertising yourself as a racist.:)
What if I were the type of lawyer that defends people in free-speech cases? Hmm? Or maybe does pro-bono work to defend coders wrongfully subjected to lawsuits for their work?
It's not the profession, my friend, it's the person.
Just don't respond to the lawsuit. Ignore it. They'll lose by default, of course, but it's a civil suit. The court awards RIAA millions of dollars in damages.
But then who enforces that decision?
Feh, I'm soon to be a lawyer, but in this case, Kazaa shouldn't subject itself to the costs of defending itself in this sort of suit if they don't have the resources to make it a good fight. This is terrible legal advice, but it's good practical advice. If RIAA can't enforce a verdict, any victory they have will merely be symbolic. And it won't matter a hill of beans as far as precedent is concerned because a) there's plenty of precedent that what Kazaa is doing is wrong and b) the precedent would only have true practical effect for a Kazaa-like company based in the United States.
Now, if this were a criminal case, it would be a completely different matter, because then there would be a rigorous enforcement system in place.
But Kazaa could reasonably just ignore this suit, take the loss, and stick up their collective middle finger at it.
I'd mod you up if I could.:) Of course my post sounds holier than thou. It was. I feel very strongly that 99% of what's on TV is absolute rubbish, and I think it's better to find my entertainment in other sources. When I think about spending Thursday nights in college watching hours of Must See TV, I shudder. It disgusts me that I would sit on a couch and stare at a television for that long. I find sitting and watching TV distasteful, so, yes, I'll generally tend to look down on TV watching. Sorry.
Now for the humungous disclaimer. There really is good TV out there. I think some shows like CSI, Buffy, Sopranos, etc. are genuinely good and valuable entertainment. If I had TIME to watch TV (I'm a law student - and former software developer and database admin, so don't eat me - so I don't have much) I would love to watch some of the good stuff on TV.
But I have to sacrifice those good shows and find my entertainment elsewhere (yes, occasionally in movies, but those are getting so ad-saturated and, frankly, uninteresting that I don't go to them much now) because of an almost monastic self-denial. I guess it's a discipline thing: I can't watch TV a little bit for fear that I'll get sucked into the crap that I currently hate.
Nah, I don't look down on any person for watching TV... I guess I'm not really holier than thou... I suppose it's more that I see how much more we can be doing with our time.
It's not a disjunctive "or"... it's a conjunctive "and"... so you can't choose either.
Which sucks, because this thing would be fun to spin around the block... er, over the block...
But at least with marriage you get to test drive it first... unless you're from down here in the Bible Belt where everybody buys sight unseen. *sigh*
Wouldn't it be funny if the high bidder's from West Virginia? Ooo, it could be that guy who just won Powerball...
Let's look at this in the abstract. People love TiVo because it gives them the ability to watch entertainment they enjoy free from the distraction of intrusions they do not enjoy, and at a time that is convenient for them. Content owners do not like TiVo for precisely the same reasons. And it has absolutely nothing to do with the shows themselves.
Content owners (TV studios, "Hollywood") probably couldn't care less if people time-shift television. Why? Because for broadcast at least, the TV shows are almost the precise definition of a loss leader. If you time-shift your show, the local station or cable provider that is playing it has still paid the license fee to run the show. There is no change in the net income from the show. The show generates no more or no less revenue than it did before. If the show is a money-losing venture in itself - which most of them probably are - the the show is no MORE of a money-loser because it's been moved out of its time slot.
(Now, there is the possible exception that time-shifting screws up the studios' ability to generate statistics about viewing habits, etc., which could impact relationships with advertisers, but, well, keep reading.)
So, if a television show's movement through time has no impact or minimal impact on its revenue generating capacity for the studio which creates it (please note, the actors don't care because they've already been paid), why are the studios upset?
Advertising moolah.
This is not a revolutionary observation. I'm aware of that. But they're so angry about you time-shifting because you want to get rid of exactly the thing that gives them the profit motive to make the show in the first place. They can try product placement and inline ads as partial replacements for traditional block advertising, but the 30-second ad spot is still the cash cow.
And you're getting in the cash cow's way.
So the studio is upset. But let's take a step back and look at what the combat really means. (This is where this post gets flamable, so if you liked it before, stop reading.) TiVo owners are demanding a right, and spending their hard-earned money, to time-shift... television shows?
What value are they to anybody? The studios don't care because they don't represent any real revenue. They will only make good shows if they think those shows will attract eyes to see ads crammed into the spaces between show segments.
And do they represent any real value to you? Eh, you might chuckle or cry or gasp or cower when watching, but after the 30 minute sitcom is over, what have you gained? A new skill? Truly reduced stress? Enlightenment? Not likely.
In fact, and paradoxically, the only benefit to the viewer in a usual TV watching session is in the ADS. It's like the old advice on how to pick up women: "Just walk up to one and ask her if she wants to f***. Nine times out of ten you'll get slapped, but that tenth time.. wowee..." That's how the advertisers see you. And with good reason: because 1 time out of 10, you're going to see an ad and think "Hey, that's neat..." And you might go buy it. If you ignore the ad the other 9 times, the advertisers don't really care, because there are 280 million other people out there deciding whether "Can you hear me now?" is going to provoke them to get or keep Verizon phones.
So, you actually derive more tangible benefit from that one time you actually are moved by an ad than you do from all the sitcom watching in the world, except in those instances where the sitcoms are so insidious as to be indistinguishable from the ads themselves.
My solution? No tv. I don't have to pay the cable company $520 a year for television I don't watch. I don't have to pay $400-6,000 dollars to replace my ten-year-old TV when it finally dies. I don't have to spend hours upon hours sitting in front of the brain control box, um, TV soaking up advertising. And I don't have to spend money to fight the advertising by buying a TiVo. I lose some entertainment, sure, but I have books, family, the Internet, and even my own imagination.
I'm not passing judgment on anybody, except the advertisers who attempt to monopolize your mind. But do me a favor, you Slashdot people I don't even know... Try going without TV (and TiVo) for a month. Completely without TV.
And place an ever-increasing burden on rear-area support troops who will now be forced not only to maintain 70-ton tanks that are relatively easy to find, but exoskeletons on troops scattered all over the battle area.
Just playing devil's advocate to point out - and to stay on topic - every change fundamentally impacts the ability of support infrastructures to deal with them, often in unexpected cascading ways.
Slashdot Mirror
Oh, yeh, and because he might inject some business sense into that unfathomable catastrophe of a company.
My point, though, is that I make a point to flaunt the fact that I can do everything that my friends are doing using tools that are freely available. They're spending 150 bucks for an Office upgrade; I download mine for free (when it comes out... what's up with OpenOffice???). They look at their steadily-decreasing student loan balances, and suddenly the free alternatives look mighty nice. Even for a bunch of Luddite lawyers.
The niggling problems start to occur mainly when some little tiny thing doesn't work the way they're used to. And then they wail about how "it's just sooo different!" and run back to the security of Windows.
You're absolutely right. This is a battle of security blankets. People need to see that there is a whole world out there that may not be exactly the same, but is just as comfortable. Kind of like leaving Atlanta to visit Rio. :) Or something.
The fact that Microsoft has been alternately lazy and incoherent in implementing its model of "ease of use" shouldn't sway other developers from trying to accomplish the same goal in a more effective manner.
Hell, I've installed a number of Linux distributions. I've tweaked them. I've fiddled with them. But not one has even approached the ease with whick I can accomplish tasks using Win2k. Perhaps on a technical level, Linux is more stable, more customizable, and more secure than Windows, and certainly the open-source ideal is admirable, but when you consider task-based computing where the main focus is on getting work done (which is all that matters to most end users), the mishmash of current Linux builds is just a pain.
I am NOT trashing Linux. It's an amazing accomplishment, and the improvements in UI and functionality (both at the command line and in the UI) over the last few years are encouraging. But there's work to be done.
Add to that the fact that the "artists" are an absolute non-factor. Those who provide content to the RIAA's member companies already have a separate contract with RIAA which provides them with royalties, advances, and so forth. While it is true that those royalties depend on album sales, the royalties themselves are not, generally, substantial as compared to the revenue that RIAA (et al) retains from those sales. Further, and again, album sales have not decreased to critical levels. (I'd challenge anybody to prove to me that the decrease in album sales in the last few years is the result of p2p activities and not a foreseeable decrease resulting from bad product and the bad economy.) So, the RIAA is clearly not pursuing these lawsuits to protect the interests of the artists, who only detract from the RIAA's profits in the short term.
What we really need is a revolution in the music distribution system by aggressive labels not affiliated with the RIAA, perhaps a label that is, like Southwest Airlines, owned entirely by the participating artists. In order to have such a revolutionary change be successful, those artists have to pump out compelling product that will compete with what the RIAA's companies offer. So far, no label or collection of artists have managed to usurp the corporate-art of Britney, Christina, etc.
I wish the RIAA would just disappear. But they have enough of a market to make their business model tenable. Until that market is disrupted in a real way, RIAA is going to keep doing what they're doing, and they're going to win.
If you want a change, don't just download MP3s of RIAA artists. Support non-RIAA artists and labels. Find artists who sell their music directly to the consumer. That's how to fight the RIAA.
What's the purpose of creating entirely new languages? Is a new language even entirely new, or is it an evolution of older languages incorporating new concepts and methodologies? Or is the creation of a new language just a way of leaving a mark? Or, even worse, is it a manifestation of that damnable desire to start from scratch every time? (I'm afflicted by it... most coders I know are afflicted by it...)
Here's what I'd like to know, in my limited knowledge of languages: What languages out there are truly modular? Are there any languages that encompass basic logic principles and which are then able to be augmented by blackboxed modules? So, if you had a language that needed string concatenation, you could whip up a string concatenation module that would then become part of the language.
Now, I'm walking a semantic line here, because you can presumably do all that by writing header files, includes, classes, etc. that contain new logic within the structure of the language. But what I mean is a language that by its nature is abstracted and modular, even to the point where the syntax of, say, control structures could be modified in a module?
And, if the answer to my question is "Well, hell, you can do that in C!" then why do we need to bother writing a new language? Is it just to keep things fresh and interesting?
It just seems that with all the many languages I've learned and used, there's very little that I can think of that one language can do that another language can't. Where doing something in one language is harder than in another because the structure of the language makes it awkward, maybe that points to a language that needs to be made obsolete.
I guess the root question I'm asking is: Are there any truly novel languages out there, or are they all just variations on a common theme, with shared shortcomings and much duplication of effort?
Be gentle. :)
Which presents an interesting legal problem of corporate presence. If passively allowing downloads constitutes a presence for the purposes of establishing personal jurisdiction, does, say, having a published phone number that can be accessed from another jurisdiction mean that a non-Internet company then has a "presence" for such purposes?
/. goons can't get at you :) , I can be reached at parabaraba-at-yahoo.com)
It's a pickle. And it's why law is both fun and necessary.
Are you a lawyer? (if you'd like to answer off-line where the
Let's hear it for the 9th Circuit! If it weren't for them, the Supreme Court would have nothing to do but play golf. Besides, someone's got to be worse than the 4th....
Only remotely on topic, there was a bit on NPR the other day about a Picasso stolen from a Jewish family by Nazis during WWII. Aside from the cameo of Nazis, it was like reliving O'Keefe from my first semester of property. *shudder*
Wouldn't it be nice if musical artists actually owned their works so that theft of their works could proceed like O'Keefe? (It was a case in which a few of Georgia O'Keefe's paintings were stolen. NY decided that, effectively, "finders keepers" didn't kick in until she knew where they were. The decision lamented that there was no "paintings registry" where artists could report stolen paintings.) Yes, theft of music is distinguishable because it's non-tangible and represents more removal of potential profits than theft of actual value, but a man can dream...
I didn't say they'd win. In fact, I said they'd lose. And they'd probably lose badly. And with good reason.
:)
And, yes, I know International Shoe. But, I have a question about that. To what extent were agents of Kazaa operating in California? To what extent, in fact, was there any corporate presence by Kazaa in California? Does the presence of revenue generating adware on users' computers qualify?
And, just to play devil's advocate, is what they're doing really "facially copright infringement"? (I believe it is, but I'm still curious, because while the RIAA is technically in the right, I just don't like them very much....)
Maybe /. could start offering a prepackaged "Port 80 Flood Kit - Get the pride of being slashdotted without having to work for it." Say $1000 a pop. It's better than spending the money on advertising.
Geek 1: Hey, guys, I got slashdotted!
Geek 2: Woah! No way!
Geek 1: Yep. *smug*
Chick: He's so dreamy...
Flamebait? Jeez, that'll teach me never to make fun of fantasy again.
Since I can't see the trailer, I have to make it up.
... thereby leaving the world unprotected from the resurrected band of singing barbers.
In this one, Dorfo and Samdumb go frolicking west across Amerrycah in their K-Y delivery van, lubing their way from adventure to adventure in their quest to destroy the Wrinngius Unus which was stolen from the Great Lord Mauron after a battle in which Mauron was defeated by a band of singing barbers. The movie climaxes when, at a Mauron's resort in Misted Mountains of Kallorahdoe, Samdumb gets his tongue stuck to a conveniently-placed ski-lift, and in order to unstick him, Dorfo engages in rough butt love to heat him up.
The passionate Nhobbit Love opens up a HUGE CRACK in the earth, into which an alert but orgasmic Dorfo tosses the Wringius Unus, thereby destroying it and Mauron...
Celine Dion writes the title song, My Hardon Will Go On.
That's right, and criminal sanctions are usually imposed on things that society deems to be so wrong that ordinary civil sanctions are insufficient to deter and punish. Or, in other words, criminal sanctions represent the feeling of "the people" that "the people" have a vested interest in preventing the wrong, whereas civil sanctions are imposed only where the civil plaintiff's vested interests are violated.
Maybe the RIAA is worried that the only interests being violated are their own and that society doesn't care a rat's ass about their plight.
And then RIAA gets nailed under Anti-Racketeering Influenced Corrupt Organizations (RICO) or maybe anti-trust. That would be wonderful. Bring 'em on.
Thank God you threw the smiley in... I was sniffing around for a way to sue your ass for slander. But you're probably just an irresponsible, smelly, unemployed coder, so I couldn't get any money out of you anyway. *moves along to find a more lucrative target* :)
Actually, this presents a fascinating question. Why the hell doesn't the RIAA "report" Kazaa to the California Attorney General with evidence of criminal wrongdoing? Why all this fiddling around in civil courts when the practical effects of a civil verdict (an injunction that will likely be ignored or avoided, a money damages award that would probably go unpaid) are so much less than criminal sanctions?
I can't decide what the RIAA and MPAA are up to. Are they just looking for exposure? Are they trying to generate some cash? Are they trying to establish civil precedents that will allow them to sue OTHER CONTENT PROVIDERS that have nothing to do with MP3 distribution and which could provide them with a much larger payoff? Are they trying to establish a chain of civil verdicts that will allow them to go to Congresscritters and "encourage" them to pass laws specifically targetting p2p?
Or are they just stupid? (In the un-troll sense. I literally mean, do they honestly think they're going to win anything substantive?)
If they wanted to get rid of Kazaa, they'd sic the criminal prosecutors on them... or are RIAA and MPAA afraid that what Kazaa is doing isn't wrong enough to be considered "criminal"?
That's right. l4wy3rx0rs... the 0r1g1n4l h4x0rz...
for what it's worth, I agree with most lawyer bashing. There are a lot of dickheads in this profession. I know you're still going to think I'm evil now that I've revealed myself, but oh well. I can sleep at night knowing I'm on your side.
Hehe, and you're advertising yourself as a racist. :)
What if I were the type of lawyer that defends people in free-speech cases? Hmm? Or maybe does pro-bono work to defend coders wrongfully subjected to lawsuits for their work?
It's not the profession, my friend, it's the person.
Just don't respond to the lawsuit. Ignore it. They'll lose by default, of course, but it's a civil suit. The court awards RIAA millions of dollars in damages.
But then who enforces that decision?
Feh, I'm soon to be a lawyer, but in this case, Kazaa shouldn't subject itself to the costs of defending itself in this sort of suit if they don't have the resources to make it a good fight. This is terrible legal advice, but it's good practical advice. If RIAA can't enforce a verdict, any victory they have will merely be symbolic. And it won't matter a hill of beans as far as precedent is concerned because a) there's plenty of precedent that what Kazaa is doing is wrong and b) the precedent would only have true practical effect for a Kazaa-like company based in the United States.
Now, if this were a criminal case, it would be a completely different matter, because then there would be a rigorous enforcement system in place.
But Kazaa could reasonably just ignore this suit, take the loss, and stick up their collective middle finger at it.
I'd mod you up if I could. :) Of course my post sounds holier than thou. It was. I feel very strongly that 99% of what's on TV is absolute rubbish, and I think it's better to find my entertainment in other sources. When I think about spending Thursday nights in college watching hours of Must See TV, I shudder. It disgusts me that I would sit on a couch and stare at a television for that long. I find sitting and watching TV distasteful, so, yes, I'll generally tend to look down on TV watching. Sorry.
:)
Now for the humungous disclaimer. There really is good TV out there. I think some shows like CSI, Buffy, Sopranos, etc. are genuinely good and valuable entertainment. If I had TIME to watch TV (I'm a law student - and former software developer and database admin, so don't eat me - so I don't have much) I would love to watch some of the good stuff on TV.
But I have to sacrifice those good shows and find my entertainment elsewhere (yes, occasionally in movies, but those are getting so ad-saturated and, frankly, uninteresting that I don't go to them much now) because of an almost monastic self-denial. I guess it's a discipline thing: I can't watch TV a little bit for fear that I'll get sucked into the crap that I currently hate.
Nah, I don't look down on any person for watching TV... I guess I'm not really holier than thou... I suppose it's more that I see how much more we can be doing with our time.
Go build a house or something...
It's not a disjunctive "or"... it's a conjunctive "and"... so you can't choose either. Which sucks, because this thing would be fun to spin around the block... er, over the block...
But at least with marriage you get to test drive it first... unless you're from down here in the Bible Belt where everybody buys sight unseen. *sigh* Wouldn't it be funny if the high bidder's from West Virginia? Ooo, it could be that guy who just won Powerball...
"Preliminary Specifications and Predicted Performance"
It's not even a prototype yet. They just took a picture of a GI Joe Cobra Hover-Hiss or some damn thing and made up performance numbers.
Though, heh, it would be neat. No roofs for me, though... mine's slanted.
At least the auction has pictures of the actual thing actually flying. Well, unless it's all wire-fu. *sniff*
Except if this was developed by the military, she wouldn't be doing any flying, so, in fact, he will be using the strap-on
On other's he's...
Which makes you wonder...
Don't ask, don't tell, just fly me away, baby. Sir.
Oh, and, Off-topic. *snicker*
Let's look at this in the abstract. People love TiVo because it gives them the ability to watch entertainment they enjoy free from the distraction of intrusions they do not enjoy, and at a time that is convenient for them. Content owners do not like TiVo for precisely the same reasons. And it has absolutely nothing to do with the shows themselves.
... television shows?
Content owners (TV studios, "Hollywood") probably couldn't care less if people time-shift television. Why? Because for broadcast at least, the TV shows are almost the precise definition of a loss leader. If you time-shift your show, the local station or cable provider that is playing it has still paid the license fee to run the show. There is no change in the net income from the show. The show generates no more or no less revenue than it did before. If the show is a money-losing venture in itself - which most of them probably are - the the show is no MORE of a money-loser because it's been moved out of its time slot.
(Now, there is the possible exception that time-shifting screws up the studios' ability to generate statistics about viewing habits, etc., which could impact relationships with advertisers, but, well, keep reading.)
So, if a television show's movement through time has no impact or minimal impact on its revenue generating capacity for the studio which creates it (please note, the actors don't care because they've already been paid), why are the studios upset?
Advertising moolah.
This is not a revolutionary observation. I'm aware of that. But they're so angry about you time-shifting because you want to get rid of exactly the thing that gives them the profit motive to make the show in the first place. They can try product placement and inline ads as partial replacements for traditional block advertising, but the 30-second ad spot is still the cash cow.
And you're getting in the cash cow's way.
So the studio is upset. But let's take a step back and look at what the combat really means. (This is where this post gets flamable, so if you liked it before, stop reading.) TiVo owners are demanding a right, and spending their hard-earned money, to time-shift
What value are they to anybody? The studios don't care because they don't represent any real revenue. They will only make good shows if they think those shows will attract eyes to see ads crammed into the spaces between show segments.
And do they represent any real value to you? Eh, you might chuckle or cry or gasp or cower when watching, but after the 30 minute sitcom is over, what have you gained? A new skill? Truly reduced stress? Enlightenment? Not likely.
In fact, and paradoxically, the only benefit to the viewer in a usual TV watching session is in the ADS. It's like the old advice on how to pick up women: "Just walk up to one and ask her if she wants to f***. Nine times out of ten you'll get slapped, but that tenth time.. wowee..." That's how the advertisers see you. And with good reason: because 1 time out of 10, you're going to see an ad and think "Hey, that's neat..." And you might go buy it. If you ignore the ad the other 9 times, the advertisers don't really care, because there are 280 million other people out there deciding whether "Can you hear me now?" is going to provoke them to get or keep Verizon phones.
So, you actually derive more tangible benefit from that one time you actually are moved by an ad than you do from all the sitcom watching in the world, except in those instances where the sitcoms are so insidious as to be indistinguishable from the ads themselves.
My solution? No tv. I don't have to pay the cable company $520 a year for television I don't watch. I don't have to pay $400-6,000 dollars to replace my ten-year-old TV when it finally dies. I don't have to spend hours upon hours sitting in front of the brain control box, um, TV soaking up advertising. And I don't have to spend money to fight the advertising by buying a TiVo. I lose some entertainment, sure, but I have books, family, the Internet, and even my own imagination.
I'm not passing judgment on anybody, except the advertisers who attempt to monopolize your mind. But do me a favor, you Slashdot people I don't even know... Try going without TV (and TiVo) for a month. Completely without TV.
See if you really miss it.
And place an ever-increasing burden on rear-area support troops who will now be forced not only to maintain 70-ton tanks that are relatively easy to find, but exoskeletons on troops scattered all over the battle area.
Just playing devil's advocate to point out - and to stay on topic - every change fundamentally impacts the ability of support infrastructures to deal with them, often in unexpected cascading ways.