I'm not sure I understand the difference between A) and B). In the case of C), wouldn't that become clear after the first experiment?
I'd probably do it after it had been tested for a long period of time. The way I see it, who I am is either made up of matter which we already know about (photons, quarks, etc), or there is an as yet observed factor, call it a soul, which makes up who we are. In either case I think it will become clear by making a test case. Whether or not it should be allowed to make such a test on a human being is something I'll leave as a whole separate argument, which I fortunately don't have to make an opinion about (since it isn't yet possible).
And the solution is just as easy. Don't travel to countries with draconian press laws that it forces upon internet publishers in other countries. At least not until your country bombs that other countries ass into rethinking its laws.
Re:The Force violates conservation of momentum
on
Physics in the Movies
·
· Score: 2
In reality you will not be able to hear the laser guns firing on another ship or the screech of its engines as it files by, and you will not be able to hear the death star explode.
Why are you assuming that the microphone is in the same place as the camera lens? The viewer of the story is clearly omnipresent.
The tax on Audio CD-R's in Canada is already several times the cost of the disc itself. The reasoning used to justify those taxes, insane though it may be, so very easily lends itself to taxing anything else available in a computer store.
You keep bringing up the tax on CD-Rs in Canada, but the tax on Audio CD-Rs in the United States is a much better analogy.
And given the choice between the other two, I'd rather the government didn't opt for some nutty "spread the punishment" law enforcement scheme. Sticking with what we've got is merely the lesser of two evils.
I don't know. I think it's dangerous to have criminal laws on the books which are not enforced. The fact of the matter is that running napster to distribute others' works is criminal. I think that leads to government oppression, through selective enforcement.
I think certain selective taxes on economic bads are useful in cases like this. Cigarettes are taxed, because they contribute to the public health problems. Gasoline is taxed, because the way most people use it pollutes the environment. Blank audio cassettes are taxed, because most people use them to copy copyrighted audio. Are you opposed to taxation of gasoline? Just because I have the gasoline doesn't mean I'm necessarily going to burn it.
If Microsoft products weren't filled with bugs, they wouldn't be Microsoft, now would they? Microsoft is supposed to be a source for buggy virus-filled software. If they sanded off all the rough edges, their products would cease being products that I would want to use. Microsoft has been running its company for how many years now? If you don't like their products, don't buy them! Life is too damn short to worry about bugs in Microsoft software!
Let's see, does the CBDTPA make distinctions between A/V equipment and electronics in general? Why no, it doesn't. Now where on earth could I have drawn the conclusion that, having failed once, the media industries will take a different tactic towards banning general purpose machines?
Because the CBDTPA is doomed to failure.
I'm suggesting that they actually enforce the laws they have on the books rather than just punish everyone because they're too lazy to go after the actual offenders.
And I suggest that they take those laws off the books, because it's ridiculously stupid to enforce them, and it's equally stupid to have laws on the books which aren't enforced. We've done it in the past, with the Audio Home Recording Act, and I think that law is about the only sane one we have on the books regarding copyright.
I sure hope we'll never need anything more than 100 or 200 GB, since nobody'll be able to afford the taxes on it.
This isn't a tax on all hard drives, only on ones attached to DVRs.
Kindly imagine what would have happened if they'd tried this when Napster started up. As I recall, 20GB was a good sized drive at the time, so to get an equivalent tax on a 100GB drive today, you'd have to tax $5 per gig.
I don't see why the tax would be any different then it is today - $1/gig. The idea is that the tax is based on the amount of copyrighted material that the drive holds.
And you don't need to point out that this tax is only on Tivo's and whatnot. It's only a matter of time before they try to apply this to computer storage in general.
Umm... That's a dumb argument.
Are you implying that this will never happen?
No. I was just pointing out that the fact that it will happen has nothing to do with Moore's Law.
Anyway, your suggestion that we do door-to-door FBI raids will cost the taxpayers much more money in the long run. As for your suggestion that we ignore the problem and let the companies go out of business, I can fully support that, but I was under the impression that the public supported government intervention in order to promote the progress of science and useful arts.
Music and movie conglomerates are not critical industries.
I was under the impression that the public thought otherwise. If you'd rather we drop copyright law altogether, I'd certainly be willing to support that.
How often are they going to adjust it to reflect the decreased cost of media, if at all?
It doesn't really make sense to decrease the cost due to decreased media costs.
So while it might be convenient today, it certainly won't be tomorrow.
What's the alternative? Misusing Moore's Law (which applies to transistors) for bandwidth as you did for hard drive storage, in 4 or 5 years we'll be able to download entire movies in minutes. Do we start door-to-door FBI raids? Do we hope people will just play fairly? Do we have the government subsidize media companies? Do we just let them go out of business?
Hopefully the media companies will come up with their own solution to the problem, one which doesn't rely on babysitting hundreds of millions of people, but if not, the government likely is going to be forced to do something.
It seems to me like neither side is being completely honest and fair. Yes, the RIAA is arguing that P2P costs them trillions of dollars, but the defense is arguing that P2P doesn't even have the potential to cost them anything. I think both arguments are silly, but I don't blame either side for making such arguments because that's just the way it works in the U.S.
Actually my first doubt would be that the quote was not in proper context in the news article you showed me. But perhaps it was. Bootlegging is a different crime from copyright infringement, so maybe the RIAA can somehow get involved in enforcing that law.
All I am certain of is that when I hear someone say "file sharing reduces sales" or someone say "file sharing increases sales" then that belief is more faith based than reason based unless they have been closely monitoring millions of individuals.
I agree with you there, and really with all of what you just said. Really that's what I thought keep_it_simple_stupi was getting at when he said that he was "sick and tired of people arguing that this doesn't hurt sales." That's how I interpreted it, anyway.
Take a downloaded MP3 burned to a CD. It has opportunity costs, since it takes me time to (a) find (b) download and (c) burn. It also has "will I get busted?" costs. It has loss of quality costs.
Don't you think that if napster had won the case against the RIAA that they would have addressed these issues? You admit yourself that napster was easier to use, so eliminating napster must have caused the costs of piracy to go up. This clearly would cause demand to go down, and the question is whether or not the increased publicity would cause demand to go up enough to exceed it.
Here your guess is as good as mine, and I don't think it makes sense arguing the point. If you say that you honestly believe that napster caused CD sales to go up, then I guess I have to take you for your word.
Speaking as someone with a degree in Physics (not that that makes me any more right of course)
to someone who just got his certificate to teach High School Physics.
I assume you are talking about relativity, in which case he had a phenomenal amount of data which he used before producing any theory.
He had data, mainly that the speed of light was measured to be the same in all inertial frames of reference. But he didn't have any data regarding gravitational lensing, time dilation, or nuclear fission.
I have a whole lot of data about the way humans act. They tend to not pay for something when they can get it for free unless they have a reasonable chance of getting caught and getting "in trouble". Yes, I will adapt my reasoning if I am presented with evidence that it is faulty, but I haven't been presented with any such evidence.
In any case, you haven't answered my question. Do you honestly believe that P2P networks cause people to buy more music? Or are you merely arguing that it's possible?
I just think that if napster had won its case against the RIAA, downloading albums would be as simple as typing in the name of the album, and burning them would be as simple as clicking a button.
MP3s are hard to find because decentralized systems are harder to make. CD-Rs are hard to burn because software which downloads MP3s from a P2P network and burns them for you is illegal.
You should have tried to get a raise first. That would have cleared a lot of things up. But that said, you didn't, so...
If you are an important asset to the company that can't be easily replaced, you like your job, and your company trusts you, you might be able to get away with staying. If not you should be very hesitant.
The problem is that you've already signalled to your company that you are thinking about leaving. If you're going to stay, you should assure them that money was the only problem, you made a mistake by not talking to them first, and you won't repeat that mistake in the future. Otherwise expect that they are going to start looking for your replacement immediately, and as soon as they find her that 50% increase will be meaningless.
Don't listen to anyone who tells you definitively one way or another what to do. Only you know your specific situation, and how trustworthy your boss is.
As far as I'm concerned, in order to pirate something, you have to be able to purchase it.
Contact ASCAP (or is it HFA?) to arrange for a statutory license for the digital audio transmission of the artist's song.
Before the RIAA decided that this whole 'Internet' thing was going to make them hire some more lawyers, they were busy sending out cease and desist letters to people trading analog tapes of live shows.
I highly doubt it since the RIAA almost never owns the rights to the live version of the song.
CD-Rs are much cheaper than CDs, and if you use an audio-CD-R then it's legal for you to burn the copy. As for the time and difficulty, sure, that's true, but it's only difficult and time-consuming because the RIAA has made it difficult and time-consuming by winning their lawsuits.
Re:OMG I wouldn't want to be hosting his email acc
on
P2P Roaming Chat
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
I'm under the impression that he will ge a lot more requests for download that he normally gets !!!
Put those together, and I think you have a more powerful impetus for buying CDs than the "people are honest" and "sample before you buy" theories represent.
And that's why the fight we have right now isn't going to be solved. The fact of the matter is that P2P networks have the potential to destroy the industry. If left unchecked, that's exactly what they'd do. But, because the RIAA et. al. sue out of existence anyone who tries to profit from these P2P networks, there is no incentive to build products which make filesharing simple and convenient for the masses.
So, yes, P2P filesharing likely does not have a significant negative impact on CD sales. But that's only because napster was sued out of existence, and others are afraid of following in napster's footsteps.
The RIAA realises this, and that's why they haven't sued small-time individual traders. They don't want to stop piracy, they just want to keep it controlled.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm not sure I understand the difference between A) and B). In the case of C), wouldn't that become clear after the first experiment?
I'd probably do it after it had been tested for a long period of time. The way I see it, who I am is either made up of matter which we already know about (photons, quarks, etc), or there is an as yet observed factor, call it a soul, which makes up who we are. In either case I think it will become clear by making a test case. Whether or not it should be allowed to make such a test on a human being is something I'll leave as a whole separate argument, which I fortunately don't have to make an opinion about (since it isn't yet possible).
How is this different from "teleporting" a sound wave by using a microphone and a speaker?
Sounds almost like the Dmitry Sklyarov case...
And the solution is just as easy. Don't travel to countries with draconian press laws that it forces upon internet publishers in other countries. At least not until your country bombs that other countries ass into rethinking its laws.
In reality you will not be able to hear the laser guns firing on another ship or the screech of its engines as it files by, and you will not be able to hear the death star explode.
Why are you assuming that the microphone is in the same place as the camera lens? The viewer of the story is clearly omnipresent.
The tax on Audio CD-R's in Canada is already several times the cost of the disc itself. The reasoning used to justify those taxes, insane though it may be, so very easily lends itself to taxing anything else available in a computer store.
You keep bringing up the tax on CD-Rs in Canada, but the tax on Audio CD-Rs in the United States is a much better analogy.
And given the choice between the other two, I'd rather the government didn't opt for some nutty "spread the punishment" law enforcement scheme. Sticking with what we've got is merely the lesser of two evils.
I don't know. I think it's dangerous to have criminal laws on the books which are not enforced. The fact of the matter is that running napster to distribute others' works is criminal. I think that leads to government oppression, through selective enforcement.
I think certain selective taxes on economic bads are useful in cases like this. Cigarettes are taxed, because they contribute to the public health problems. Gasoline is taxed, because the way most people use it pollutes the environment. Blank audio cassettes are taxed, because most people use them to copy copyrighted audio. Are you opposed to taxation of gasoline? Just because I have the gasoline doesn't mean I'm necessarily going to burn it.
No, I stole all my ideas from Taco.
If Microsoft products weren't filled with bugs, they wouldn't be Microsoft, now would they? Microsoft is supposed to be a source for buggy virus-filled software. If they sanded off all the rough edges, their products would cease being products that I would want to use. Microsoft has been running its company for how many years now? If you don't like their products, don't buy them! Life is too damn short to worry about bugs in Microsoft software!
Let's see, does the CBDTPA make distinctions between A/V equipment and electronics in general? Why no, it doesn't. Now where on earth could I have drawn the conclusion that, having failed once, the media industries will take a different tactic towards banning general purpose machines?
Because the CBDTPA is doomed to failure.
I'm suggesting that they actually enforce the laws they have on the books rather than just punish everyone because they're too lazy to go after the actual offenders.
And I suggest that they take those laws off the books, because it's ridiculously stupid to enforce them, and it's equally stupid to have laws on the books which aren't enforced. We've done it in the past, with the Audio Home Recording Act, and I think that law is about the only sane one we have on the books regarding copyright.
I sure hope we'll never need anything more than 100 or 200 GB, since nobody'll be able to afford the taxes on it.
This isn't a tax on all hard drives, only on ones attached to DVRs.
Kindly imagine what would have happened if they'd tried this when Napster started up. As I recall, 20GB was a good sized drive at the time, so to get an equivalent tax on a 100GB drive today, you'd have to tax $5 per gig.
I don't see why the tax would be any different then it is today - $1/gig. The idea is that the tax is based on the amount of copyrighted material that the drive holds.
And you don't need to point out that this tax is only on Tivo's and whatnot. It's only a matter of time before they try to apply this to computer storage in general.
Umm... That's a dumb argument.
Are you implying that this will never happen?
No. I was just pointing out that the fact that it will happen has nothing to do with Moore's Law.
They don't do it for any other product
Umm, wrong.
Anyway, your suggestion that we do door-to-door FBI raids will cost the taxpayers much more money in the long run. As for your suggestion that we ignore the problem and let the companies go out of business, I can fully support that, but I was under the impression that the public supported government intervention in order to promote the progress of science and useful arts.
Music and movie conglomerates are not critical industries.
I was under the impression that the public thought otherwise. If you'd rather we drop copyright law altogether, I'd certainly be willing to support that.
How often are they going to adjust it to reflect the decreased cost of media, if at all?
It doesn't really make sense to decrease the cost due to decreased media costs.
So while it might be convenient today, it certainly won't be tomorrow.
What's the alternative? Misusing Moore's Law (which applies to transistors) for bandwidth as you did for hard drive storage, in 4 or 5 years we'll be able to download entire movies in minutes. Do we start door-to-door FBI raids? Do we hope people will just play fairly? Do we have the government subsidize media companies? Do we just let them go out of business?
Hopefully the media companies will come up with their own solution to the problem, one which doesn't rely on babysitting hundreds of millions of people, but if not, the government likely is going to be forced to do something.
As long as citizens are given immunity from copyright lawsuits using hard drives, a la the Audio Home Recording Act
It seems to me like neither side is being completely honest and fair. Yes, the RIAA is arguing that P2P costs them trillions of dollars, but the defense is arguing that P2P doesn't even have the potential to cost them anything. I think both arguments are silly, but I don't blame either side for making such arguments because that's just the way it works in the U.S.
Never doubt the RIAA.
Actually my first doubt would be that the quote was not in proper context in the news article you showed me. But perhaps it was. Bootlegging is a different crime from copyright infringement, so maybe the RIAA can somehow get involved in enforcing that law.
All I am certain of is that when I hear someone say "file sharing reduces sales" or someone say "file sharing increases sales" then that belief is more faith based than reason based unless they have been closely monitoring millions of individuals.
I agree with you there, and really with all of what you just said. Really that's what I thought keep_it_simple_stupi was getting at when he said that he was "sick and tired of people arguing that this doesn't hurt sales." That's how I interpreted it, anyway.
I can tape the song off the radio just like I can download it off the Internet
And part of the cost of blank cassette tapes goes to the artists to offset that loss of revenue.
Take a downloaded MP3 burned to a CD. It has opportunity costs, since it takes me time to (a) find (b) download and (c) burn. It also has "will I get busted?" costs. It has loss of quality costs.
Don't you think that if napster had won the case against the RIAA that they would have addressed these issues? You admit yourself that napster was easier to use, so eliminating napster must have caused the costs of piracy to go up. This clearly would cause demand to go down, and the question is whether or not the increased publicity would cause demand to go up enough to exceed it.
Here your guess is as good as mine, and I don't think it makes sense arguing the point. If you say that you honestly believe that napster caused CD sales to go up, then I guess I have to take you for your word.
Yes, but if all the RIAA wanted was that, then they should be happy now, right?
Just because you have a straight flush doesn't mean you should start jumping up and down screaming.
It's because they want to go beyond that, beyond what I think is fair.
Maybe. Or maybe it's just like NYC traffic. You have to try to cut off the car in front of the car you actually want to get behind.
Speaking as someone with a degree in Physics (not that that makes me any more right of course)
to someone who just got his certificate to teach High School Physics.
I assume you are talking about relativity, in which case he had a phenomenal amount of data which he used before producing any theory.
He had data, mainly that the speed of light was measured to be the same in all inertial frames of reference. But he didn't have any data regarding gravitational lensing, time dilation, or nuclear fission.
I have a whole lot of data about the way humans act. They tend to not pay for something when they can get it for free unless they have a reasonable chance of getting caught and getting "in trouble". Yes, I will adapt my reasoning if I am presented with evidence that it is faulty, but I haven't been presented with any such evidence.
In any case, you haven't answered my question. Do you honestly believe that P2P networks cause people to buy more music? Or are you merely arguing that it's possible?
I just think that if napster had won its case against the RIAA, downloading albums would be as simple as typing in the name of the album, and burning them would be as simple as clicking a button.
MP3s are hard to find because decentralized systems are harder to make. CD-Rs are hard to burn because software which downloads MP3s from a P2P network and burns them for you is illegal.
You should have tried to get a raise first. That would have cleared a lot of things up. But that said, you didn't, so...
If you are an important asset to the company that can't be easily replaced, you like your job, and your company trusts you, you might be able to get away with staying. If not you should be very hesitant.
The problem is that you've already signalled to your company that you are thinking about leaving. If you're going to stay, you should assure them that money was the only problem, you made a mistake by not talking to them first, and you won't repeat that mistake in the future. Otherwise expect that they are going to start looking for your replacement immediately, and as soon as they find her that 50% increase will be meaningless.
Don't listen to anyone who tells you definitively one way or another what to do. Only you know your specific situation, and how trustworthy your boss is.
As far as I'm concerned, in order to pirate something, you have to be able to purchase it.
Contact ASCAP (or is it HFA?) to arrange for a statutory license for the digital audio transmission of the artist's song.
Before the RIAA decided that this whole 'Internet' thing was going to make them hire some more lawyers, they were busy sending out cease and desist letters to people trading analog tapes of live shows.
I highly doubt it since the RIAA almost never owns the rights to the live version of the song.
We can theorise all we like about what people _would_ do, but it doesn't prove anything.
Nothing can be proven. The only thing that matters is what makes sense, given the observations.
It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has data.
Worked for Einstein.
CD-Rs are much cheaper than CDs, and if you use an audio-CD-R then it's legal for you to burn the copy. As for the time and difficulty, sure, that's true, but it's only difficult and time-consuming because the RIAA has made it difficult and time-consuming by winning their lawsuits.
I'm under the impression that he will ge a lot more requests for download that he normally gets !!!
That or a lot more email addresses to spam.
Put those together, and I think you have a more powerful impetus for buying CDs than the "people are honest" and "sample before you buy" theories represent.
And that's why the fight we have right now isn't going to be solved. The fact of the matter is that P2P networks have the potential to destroy the industry. If left unchecked, that's exactly what they'd do. But, because the RIAA et. al. sue out of existence anyone who tries to profit from these P2P networks, there is no incentive to build products which make filesharing simple and convenient for the masses.
So, yes, P2P filesharing likely does not have a significant negative impact on CD sales. But that's only because napster was sued out of existence, and others are afraid of following in napster's footsteps.
The RIAA realises this, and that's why they haven't sued small-time individual traders. They don't want to stop piracy, they just want to keep it controlled.