it doesn't make much sense for you to ask how long it took to get there.
<attempt at "Funny +1"> Okay, let's imagine the two participants in the race are Subject A and Subject B.
Subject A has a time machine that runs on diesel. It's good, but it takes its merry time working through the gears until its flux capacitator is sufficiently charged.
From the point the engine is started until he arrives at 13:00 tomorrow is 10 minutes.
Subject B has a steam system ala The Time Machine (the original book by Wells, thank you very much). Burning the wood to create the steam takes 20 minutes. Pushing that energy through the system until it reaches the flux capacitor with sufficient force to work takes 2 hours.
From the point the engine is started until he arrives at 13:00 tomorrow is 2 hours, 20 minutes:)
I unfortunately agree. The MPAA does have a case, considering the police were already called about potential stalking, and with this serving as evidence in that potential lawsuit, I can't help but agree this should be possible, to protect the innocent in this situation.
Even if the police were called regarding stalking and even if there was evidence on the DVD that could be used as evidence, the correct thing (IANAL etc) would be for the police to seize the original DVD, NOT for the MPAA to arbitrarialy decide what could and could not be used as evidence in a potential criminal case.
Which raises another interesting question. Given that these were copies made without the agreement of the copyright holder, and without - presumably - proper forensic procedures having taken place; would they be admissible anyway? My guess would be "no" because you can't prove you've not tampered with them.
PlaysForSure -- doesn't play AT ALL on the most popular music player on the market.
Because Apple refuses to license FairPlay to anyone, and refuses to license anyone elses DRM software on the iPod, to force you to use iTunes Music Service if you want to play DRM protected (i.e. downloaded) music on you iPod.
The fact is that you can't run an on-line music service with the backing of the RIAA members without using copy-protection of some description. And if you own an iPod you have to use iTMS. Because that's the way Apple want it. You can't blame Microsoft for Apple's business strategy!
Pricing for the Lapboard is still to be finalised, but assuming it's priced inline with other wireless keyboard and mouse combos it could well become.....vapourware.
I wonder if the Phantom console's investors ever envisaged that their money would be spent releasing a bluetooth keyboard an mouse.
but the one things that's indisputable is that the entire community broke out into a firestorm over the killing of two characters, Wash and to a lesser extent Book.... There were a variety or other problems Firefly fans had with the movie (eg turning River into "River the Reaver Slayer")
I think you've probably got your gripes the wrong way round. Killing off Book was - if anything - more of a problem than killing off Wash. The series made Book and River enigmas. The film revealed River in a way that was consistent with the way the character was being developed. Remeber "No power in the verse can stop me" in "War Stories" - killing three people in cover with three shots despite, apparently, never having used a gun before? And her slashing Jayne in "Ariel"? The girl was clearly being shown to be a calculated killing machine.
Book is a different matter. The end of Book made no sense in Serenity. In "Safe" they take him to the alliance ship for medical attention, he's given an exceptional reception only after the feds see his ID. Along with other questions (how is a shepherd he able to determine precisely the type of gun used in "War Stories"? Why does the assassin in "Objects in Space" say 'He ain't no shepherd'?). So why do they then raise his farm to the ground in Serenity? The killing of Book in the film means that the question of who he really was will never be answered.
Killing Wash leaves no such questions unanswered.
The defence of the killings, of course, is that if a new FireFly series was going to be made, it had to have something to kick-start the new series. They leave the end of the show with no hideouts and few living contacts. A new series, then, would be kick-started by them a) finding a new pilot, which b) means they have to find places they can safely go. Of course, the question has to be asked as to what a crew will do with a mathematical-genius-killing-machine on board; but you can easily imagine a revenge plot where they go Reaver hunting!
If you do not agree to these terms and conditions, promptly return or, if received electronically, certify destruction of the Game Software within ten (10) calendar days after receipt of the Game Software and receive a full refund of any license fee paid if you: (a) Do not use the Game Software, and (B) return it with proof of payment to the location from which it was obtained.
But this raises an interesting question with EULA's.
I don't know whether your software is available via distributors/retailers, or whether you only sell direct; but let's say that - as well as selling on-line - you also sell to distributors who then resell the software on to retailers, who then resell your software on to customers.
You can't tell your distributors what mark-up they may or may not place on the product for their profit, and they - I suspect (IANAL etc) - cannot set the final retail price. You can suggest a recommended retail price, but you can't dictate this.
However, your EULA only allows the user to re-claim the license fee.
Let's imagine that a user buys your product from a retailer at - say - twice your RRP; either because there was some local reason that your software was more expensive, or because the user had been given bad advice. They see your EULA and actually - astonishingly - read it. The user decides that one or two clauses in the agreement are so bad that they decide that they do not want to use it, so they return the product to you - uninstalled - and demand a refund of twice the RRP.
The question, then, is: how much are you obligated - by law - to refund the customer, given that the EULA only promises to return the license fee, not any profit from the retailer or distributor. The user can't (at least in the UK - again, IANAL) demand a refund from the retailer as they have sold a product fit for purporse. They can't claim against the distributor because they have no contract or agreement with them. Their only claim is against you. But your EULA - like many others - does not specify what the license cost is. So I make a claim for my money back to your company, but your lawyer could then say "well, the license fee is x, the RRP is y, but the customer paid y*2, so we'll only give him y".
If this is the case (even is y is only x *.001, if the price is high enough) the user - the customer - still looses out because they've bought a product that they - normally - do not know what agreement they are expected to enter into for the amount of money being exchanged. So the agreement - in this case - is not a contract; the user cannot opt out of the contract without financial loss because they cannot - normally - view their full rights and obligations of the agreement without exchanging money, and they have no guarantee that they will ever get all their money back.
Retailers and distributors are clearly able to set their own profit margin. One only needs to look at the price of games in local PC shops compared to the same product in a large chain to see this. So what do you - and other software companies - mean by the licence fee!
Close, but the problem with the riddle - and why I agree that this is a hoax riddle that's been made up - or very poorly expressed - is that the king can flip the chalice (0..k) times. Knowing k is useless information. The chalice cannot provide information because the king may flip it just once, or not at all.
The "only two people have ever solved it" seems nonsense to me too. If this is genuinely the case, and the solution is as hideously complex as the OP seems to take such glee in stating, either the OP is claiming he is a genius of Einsteinian proportions, or he was not in any position to credibly examine the solutions given to him.
Adding a random value between 0..k to the prisoner's warden riddle does not make a genuinely new solvable riddle.
It's like the 'GRY' riddle; if it's misstated it's impossible to solve and ceases to become a riddle. If you start out the riddle:
"There are three words in the English language that end in GRY. Two are HUNGRY and ANGRY. The third one everyone uses every day and knows what it stands for. If you listened carefully, I already told you what the word is."
the riddle is un-solvable within the constraints provided by the riddle "I already told you what the word is". If, however, you start the riddle correctly:
"Think of words ending in -GRY. Angry and hungry are two of them. There are only three words in the English language. What is the third word? The word is something that everyone uses every day. If you have listened carefully, I have already told you what it is."
The answer becomes self-evident.
There may indeed be two or three people who know another word ending in GRY, but that does not solve the riddle. There may also be two or three people who believe they can provide a solution to the prisoner and warden riddle with an added 0...k random number, but I doubt that it's valid.
You say Fascist, I say Communist. You say "brutal", I say "brutal". Once a government gets to a certain point semantics doesn't really help the oppressed. Shall we just agree on the term "brutal and oppressive" ?
Well, to be fair, Australia and the Americas didn't really have much use to us British, except as Penal Colonies. I propose that we set up a Moon Penal colony. Let's face it, there's nowhere they could run to. What would they do? Throw rocks at us?
Okay I grant you that Heinlein came up with the idea first, but he didn't patent it, did he:-)
Who did you bribe to get a +1 Informative? Four sentences in to your link we see "the self- taught engineer". Do you not think that there is a reason that educated engineers are - generally - more highly regarded than uneducated one's?
Perhaps this should have given you a clue: "The cameras had no white meters", because film cameras don't have white meters.
And, incidentally, as a British amateur photographer, this was very amusing "Award winning British photographer David Persey ". The problem, of course, is that no-one appears to know who David Persey is...
For Russia, a man on the moon is no longer either a political imperative or an economic viability, whereas China now has both.
China is now a serious economic power, a declared nuclear power, a "space-faring" nation (since it put a man in orbit) and a major political force. Unless I'm greatly mistaken it has already has a stated aim of putting a man on the moon.
For China, this is - much like the American landing was - a political move: a show of power and technology as much intended as a show of power to the populous as a "tacit threat" to its political opposition.
Remember: China is a brutal communist regime; a man on the moon would boost its international stance, and help silence critics at home. And they're not playing directly against America in a Cold War "winner takes all" game which makes it much easier, as they don't have to "get there first" they just have to get there.
MD5 should not be used as a signing method period! MD5 is a one-way hash, not an authentication mechanism. Even if you add a secret salt to an image before hashing, it's still not a good idea when more secure systems are available.
What you ought to be doing if you want secure authentication - and an expert witness testify that it is a secure authentication mechanism - is have an HSM contain your system's private key and sign every image with an RSA signature. Only a machine with access to the HSM can then sign the images with your private key.
I do wonder what made the manufacturers of the cameras think that a hash was a good way to authenticate images...
In order to get the pictures off the camera she has to find the right wire, make sure its connected in the right socket, makes sure the camera is on (this always confuses her) and then has to eject the camera before she can disconnect it.
Are you seriously suggesting that putting a cable into the only socket on the camera that will take it is a difficult and challenging task that is beyond the ability of "norms" (a somewhat derogatory way of describing people..) If this is really a gripe that is so difficult to resolve, then do your girlfriend and her mother a favour and buy them a card reader! Then all you do is take the card out of the camera and put it into the reader, which you ensure is permanently attached to the computer.
As for your opening question: "How are people who are buying digital cameras from Dixons using digital cameras?" - the same as those people who buy them from camera shops, PC World and Amazon. Point the viewfinder in the direction of the picture and click a button.
In this respect a digital compact is a lot simpler to use than a 35mm compact! Have you seen someone who is inexperienced in the art trying to put a standard 35mm cartridge into a compact camera? Some of them are truly awful at picking up the leading tab - far more awkward than putting a cable into a socket.
Add to this that the viewfinders on most 35mm compacts are almost worthless, the ability to see precisely what the lens is seeing on a clear LCD screen without worrying about parallax problems that plague compacts and you have a much simpler camera to use.
It's not the "norms" that are funny... Buying a digital compact is a sensible move for the vast majority of people buying them.
It should be noted that Dixon principally sell compact cameras, and I think in respect to compacts they're right. Nobody is going to put something like Fuji Velvia into a compact camera, they're going to put the ISO 400 print film made by Boots. There is no advantage to using film on a compact camera over using a modern CCD, and the total running cost for digital - in that market - is significantly smaller.
Of course, the argument over whether this is true for SLR's is a different matter. I recently traded my old Minolta SLR film kit for a Canon 300D (thanks to Canon bringing out the 350D, the 300D dramatically dropped in price). It's great - but not when using a non-digital lens (chromatic aberation and all that jazz) - and until that problem is solved there will always be a huge market for file SLRs.
Like bands don't exist unless they have massive media hype, a video on MTV, and a shamelessly promoted 'world tour'.
'The Buggles' said it best:
"Video killed the radio star."
It's hard to find good music these days by listening to the radio, because they're just playing the tracks that look good on television. Flashy women or six-packed men appeal to the audience that the MTV or HMV bosses can make money from; but they can't play well, and they can't sing well. Hell, even Robbie Williams is a second rate singer, both as part of "Take That" and as a solo singer.
"You can't see tits on the radio", but that won't stop people buying Kylie Minogue, or whoever is the latest fashion in pop, because that's what it is: Music is fashion. Gucci, Niki, et al make a fortune selling tat, but they make money because they're "fashionable".
French Connection get away with selling - in the UK - t-shirts saying "FCUK - you" to 10 year old kids, because it's fashionable.
No one cares about music, no one even cares what ten year old kids have plastered to their chests, so long as it's fashionable.
How do you stop it being fashionable? That is the question. A few thousand people not buying the 'Crazy Frog' single won't make one iota of difference so long as it remains fashionable. Stop the RIAA, and the BPA's records, and their stars being fashionable, and perhaps you have a chance.
Which is why you can implement procedures so that the total damage from such a typo is limited. With rm, you can force it to confirm or restrict your rights and that of other users.
With the banking systems I work on there's always at least one authorisation stage, sometimes two, so that not only can typos like this be spotted before it's sent for processing, but also to spot fraudulent transactions.
I couldn't comment on what the U.S Supreme Court is supposed to do, and what is should or should not comment on. I live in the UK, and - to be honest - I thought the same thing when I heard the outcome: Why on Earth did the US Supreme Court agree to hear this case? I thought it dealt with matters of the US constitution.
I can only imagine, then, that it acts much more like the UK's High Court, and Appeal Courts than I'd previously thought.
Here, I agree that the Court shouldn't have rewritten copyright law in order to dispose of this case. But my view is that they didn't answer the question before them, which is: "Should P2P software companies be liable for copyright-infringing acts by their users?"
For the simple reason: they weren't asked it. They were asked the question, "should Grokster be liable for promoting copyright-infringing acts by their users". The question, then, isn't "Is Grokster liable for copyright-infringing acts", nor is it "Is P2P software promoting copyright-infringement". The question, more specifically, is:
"Did the makers of Grokster actively promote the copyright infringement uses of it's software, and - if it did - should it be liable to the infringements that occur".
If I may suggest a change in emphasis in your original post:
How does this: they said "making a piece of software that's marketed as a vehicle for copyright infringement is illegal."
Differ from this they said "making a piece of software that's marketed as a vehicle for copyright infringement is illegal."
Grokster were found to be liable not because they wrote software that could be used to violate copyright (FTP or HTTP clients and servers can do that too, but you don't see the Apache Foundation or Microsoft's IIS team being taken to court) but because they promoted it as such.
When you see members of the W3C being taken to court because the internet protocols they've helped establish can be used to violate copyright law; then you can be worried.
Note the remark about the preview 10.4.1? On which machine are you supposed to run it when Mac mini x86 is not yet available?
Seek, and ye shall find:
Apple also announced the availability of a Developer Transition Kit, consisting of an Intel-based Mac development system along with preview versions of Apple's software, which will allow developers to prepare versions of their applications which will run on both PowerPC and Intel-based Macs.
Apple already appear to have intel-based kits available. Doesn't say that they're PC's, just that they have pentium chips.
As a mac user who bought a single-processor G5 a month before Apple dropped it from their line, and a 2nd Gen. iPod two months before they released the 3rd Gen, this for me is the last straw. I couldn't care less if the hardware is PC-derived, an Apple-branded PC, or some proprietery Pentium system. Once my current G5 has outlived it's useful life, I'm unlikely to buy Apple again.
Slashdot Mirror
it doesn't make much sense for you to ask how long it took to get there.
:)
<attempt at "Funny +1">
Okay, let's imagine the two participants in the race are Subject A and Subject B.
Subject A has a time machine that runs on diesel. It's good, but it takes its merry time working through the gears until its flux capacitator is sufficiently charged.
From the point the engine is started until he arrives at 13:00 tomorrow is 10 minutes.
Subject B has a steam system ala The Time Machine (the original book by Wells, thank you very much). Burning the wood to create the steam takes 20 minutes. Pushing that energy through the system until it reaches the flux capacitor with sufficient force to work takes 2 hours.
From the point the engine is started until he arrives at 13:00 tomorrow is 2 hours, 20 minutes
</attempt at "Funny +1">
I unfortunately agree. The MPAA does have a case, considering the police were already called about potential stalking, and with this serving as evidence in that potential lawsuit, I can't help but agree this should be possible, to protect the innocent in this situation .
Even if the police were called regarding stalking and even if there was evidence on the DVD that could be used as evidence, the correct thing (IANAL etc) would be for the police to seize the original DVD, NOT for the MPAA to arbitrarialy decide what could and could not be used as evidence in a potential criminal case.
Which raises another interesting question. Given that these were copies made without the agreement of the copyright holder, and without - presumably - proper forensic procedures having taken place; would they be admissible anyway? My guess would be "no" because you can't prove you've not tampered with them.
PlaysForSure -- doesn't play AT ALL on the most popular music player on the market.
Because Apple refuses to license FairPlay to anyone, and refuses to license anyone elses DRM software on the iPod, to force you to use iTunes Music Service if you want to play DRM protected (i.e. downloaded) music on you iPod.
The fact is that you can't run an on-line music service with the backing of the RIAA members without using copy-protection of some description. And if you own an iPod you have to use iTMS. Because that's the way Apple want it. You can't blame Microsoft for Apple's business strategy!
Pricing for the Lapboard is still to be finalised, but assuming it's priced inline with other wireless keyboard and mouse combos it could well become... ..vapourware.
I wonder if the Phantom console's investors ever envisaged that their money would be spent releasing a bluetooth keyboard an mouse.
but the one things that's indisputable is that the entire community broke out into a firestorm over the killing of two characters, Wash and to a lesser extent Book. ...
There were a variety or other problems Firefly fans had with the movie (eg turning River into "River the Reaver Slayer")
I think you've probably got your gripes the wrong way round. Killing off Book was - if anything - more of a problem than killing off Wash. The series made Book and River enigmas. The film revealed River in a way that was consistent with the way the character was being developed. Remeber "No power in the verse can stop me" in "War Stories" - killing three people in cover with three shots despite, apparently, never having used a gun before? And her slashing Jayne in "Ariel"? The girl was clearly being shown to be a calculated killing machine.
Book is a different matter. The end of Book made no sense in Serenity. In "Safe" they take him to the alliance ship for medical attention, he's given an exceptional reception only after the feds see his ID. Along with other questions (how is a shepherd he able to determine precisely the type of gun used in "War Stories"? Why does the assassin in "Objects in Space" say 'He ain't no shepherd'?). So why do they then raise his farm to the ground in Serenity? The killing of Book in the film means that the question of who he really was will never be answered.
Killing Wash leaves no such questions unanswered.
The defence of the killings, of course, is that if a new FireFly series was going to be made, it had to have something to kick-start the new series. They leave the end of the show with no hideouts and few living contacts. A new series, then, would be kick-started by them a) finding a new pilot, which b) means they have to find places they can safely go. Of course, the question has to be asked as to what a crew will do with a mathematical-genius-killing-machine on board; but you can easily imagine a revenge plot where they go Reaver hunting!
If you do not agree to these terms and conditions, promptly return or, if received electronically, certify destruction of the Game Software within ten (10) calendar days after receipt of the Game Software and receive a full refund of any license fee paid if you: (a) Do not use the Game Software, and (B) return it with proof of payment to the location from which it was obtained.
.001, if the price is high enough) the user - the customer - still looses out because they've bought a product that they - normally - do not know what agreement they are expected to enter into for the amount of money being exchanged. So the agreement - in this case - is not a contract; the user cannot opt out of the contract without financial loss because they cannot - normally - view their full rights and obligations of the agreement without exchanging money, and they have no guarantee that they will ever get all their money back.
But this raises an interesting question with EULA's.
I don't know whether your software is available via distributors/retailers, or whether you only sell direct; but let's say that - as well as selling on-line - you also sell to distributors who then resell the software on to retailers, who then resell your software on to customers.
You can't tell your distributors what mark-up they may or may not place on the product for their profit, and they - I suspect (IANAL etc) - cannot set the final retail price. You can suggest a recommended retail price, but you can't dictate this.
However, your EULA only allows the user to re-claim the license fee.
Let's imagine that a user buys your product from a retailer at - say - twice your RRP; either because there was some local reason that your software was more expensive, or because the user had been given bad advice. They see your EULA and actually - astonishingly - read it. The user decides that one or two clauses in the agreement are so bad that they decide that they do not want to use it, so they return the product to you - uninstalled - and demand a refund of twice the RRP.
The question, then, is: how much are you obligated - by law - to refund the customer, given that the EULA only promises to return the license fee, not any profit from the retailer or distributor. The user can't (at least in the UK - again, IANAL) demand a refund from the retailer as they have sold a product fit for purporse. They can't claim against the distributor because they have no contract or agreement with them. Their only claim is against you. But your EULA - like many others - does not specify what the license cost is. So I make a claim for my money back to your company, but your lawyer could then say "well, the license fee is x, the RRP is y, but the customer paid y*2, so we'll only give him y".
If this is the case (even is y is only x *
Retailers and distributors are clearly able to set their own profit margin. One only needs to look at the price of games in local PC shops compared to the same product in a large chain to see this. So what do you - and other software companies - mean by the licence fee!
I solved it after the first roll. Here's how I did it:
I'm not sure that's how you're supposed to solve it, but Hey - worked for me
Close, but the problem with the riddle - and why I agree that this is a hoax riddle that's been made up - or very poorly expressed - is that the king can flip the chalice (0..k) times. Knowing k is useless information. The chalice cannot provide information because the king may flip it just once, or not at all.
The "only two people have ever solved it" seems nonsense to me too. If this is genuinely the case, and the solution is as hideously complex as the OP seems to take such glee in stating, either the OP is claiming he is a genius of Einsteinian proportions, or he was not in any position to credibly examine the solutions given to him.
Adding a random value between 0..k to the prisoner's warden riddle does not make a genuinely new solvable riddle.
It's like the 'GRY' riddle; if it's misstated it's impossible to solve and ceases to become a riddle. If you start out the riddle:
"There are three words in the English language that end in GRY. Two are HUNGRY and ANGRY. The third one everyone uses every day and knows what it stands for. If you listened carefully, I already told you what the word is."
the riddle is un-solvable within the constraints provided by the riddle "I already told you what the word is". If, however, you start the riddle correctly:
"Think of words ending in -GRY. Angry and hungry are two of them. There are only three words in the English language. What is the third word? The word is something that everyone uses every day. If you have listened carefully, I have already told you what it is."
The answer becomes self-evident.
There may indeed be two or three people who know another word ending in GRY, but that does not solve the riddle. There may also be two or three people who believe they can provide a solution to the prisoner and warden riddle with an added 0...k random number, but I doubt that it's valid.
You say Fascist, I say Communist. You say "brutal", I say "brutal". Once a government gets to a certain point semantics doesn't really help the oppressed. Shall we just agree on the term "brutal and oppressive" ?
Well, to be fair, Australia and the Americas didn't really have much use to us British, except as Penal Colonies. I propose that we set up a Moon Penal colony. Let's face it, there's nowhere they could run to. What would they do? Throw rocks at us?
:-)
Okay I grant you that Heinlein came up with the idea first, but he didn't patent it, did he
Who did you bribe to get a +1 Informative? Four sentences in to your link we see "the self- taught engineer". Do you not think that there is a reason that educated engineers are - generally - more highly regarded than uneducated one's?
Perhaps this should have given you a clue: "The cameras had no white meters", because film cameras don't have white meters.
And, incidentally, as a British amateur photographer, this was very amusing "Award winning British photographer David Persey ". The problem, of course, is that no-one appears to know who David Persey is...
This is just in the first few sentences....
For Russia, a man on the moon is no longer either a political imperative or an economic viability, whereas China now has both.
China is now a serious economic power, a declared nuclear power, a "space-faring" nation (since it put a man in orbit) and a major political force. Unless I'm greatly mistaken it has already has a stated aim of putting a man on the moon.
For China, this is - much like the American landing was - a political move: a show of power and technology as much intended as a show of power to the populous as a "tacit threat" to its political opposition.
Remember: China is a brutal communist regime; a man on the moon would boost its international stance, and help silence critics at home. And they're not playing directly against America in a Cold War "winner takes all" game which makes it much easier, as they don't have to "get there first" they just have to get there.
MD5 should not be used as a signing method period! MD5 is a one-way hash, not an authentication mechanism. Even if you add a secret salt to an image before hashing, it's still not a good idea when more secure systems are available.
What you ought to be doing if you want secure authentication - and an expert witness testify that it is a secure authentication mechanism - is have an HSM contain your system's private key and sign every image with an RSA signature. Only a machine with access to the HSM can then sign the images with your private key.
I do wonder what made the manufacturers of the cameras think that a hash was a good way to authenticate images...
In order to get the pictures off the camera she has to find the right wire, make sure its connected in the right socket, makes sure the camera is on (this always confuses her) and then has to eject the camera before she can disconnect it.
Are you seriously suggesting that putting a cable into the only socket on the camera that will take it is a difficult and challenging task that is beyond the ability of "norms" (a somewhat derogatory way of describing people..) If this is really a gripe that is so difficult to resolve, then do your girlfriend and her mother a favour and buy them a card reader! Then all you do is take the card out of the camera and put it into the reader, which you ensure is permanently attached to the computer.
As for your opening question: "How are people who are buying digital cameras from Dixons using digital cameras?" - the same as those people who buy them from camera shops, PC World and Amazon. Point the viewfinder in the direction of the picture and click a button.
In this respect a digital compact is a lot simpler to use than a 35mm compact! Have you seen someone who is inexperienced in the art trying to put a standard 35mm cartridge into a compact camera? Some of them are truly awful at picking up the leading tab - far more awkward than putting a cable into a socket.
Add to this that the viewfinders on most 35mm compacts are almost worthless, the ability to see precisely what the lens is seeing on a clear LCD screen without worrying about parallax problems that plague compacts and you have a much simpler camera to use.
It's not the "norms" that are funny... Buying a digital compact is a sensible move for the vast majority of people buying them.
It should be noted that Dixon principally sell compact cameras, and I think in respect to compacts they're right. Nobody is going to put something like Fuji Velvia into a compact camera, they're going to put the ISO 400 print film made by Boots. There is no advantage to using film on a compact camera over using a modern CCD, and the total running cost for digital - in that market - is significantly smaller.
Of course, the argument over whether this is true for SLR's is a different matter. I recently traded my old Minolta SLR film kit for a Canon 300D (thanks to Canon bringing out the 350D, the 300D dramatically dropped in price). It's great - but not when using a non-digital lens (chromatic aberation and all that jazz) - and until that problem is solved there will always be a huge market for file SLRs.
be? be?! Bet!
"According to the results, Shellphish won"
Who wants to be that Shellphish hacked the results...
Like bands don't exist unless they have massive media hype, a video on MTV, and a shamelessly promoted 'world tour'.
'The Buggles' said it best:
"Video killed the radio star."
It's hard to find good music these days by listening to the radio, because they're just playing the tracks that look good on television. Flashy women or six-packed men appeal to the audience that the MTV or HMV bosses can make money from; but they can't play well, and they can't sing well. Hell, even Robbie Williams is a second rate singer, both as part of "Take That" and as a solo singer.
"You can't see tits on the radio", but that won't stop people buying Kylie Minogue, or whoever is the latest fashion in pop, because that's what it is: Music is fashion. Gucci, Niki, et al make a fortune selling tat, but they make money because they're "fashionable".
French Connection get away with selling - in the UK - t-shirts saying "FCUK - you" to 10 year old kids, because it's fashionable.
No one cares about music, no one even cares what ten year old kids have plastered to their chests, so long as it's fashionable.
How do you stop it being fashionable? That is the question. A few thousand people not buying the 'Crazy Frog' single won't make one iota of difference so long as it remains fashionable. Stop the RIAA, and the BPA's records, and their stars being fashionable, and perhaps you have a chance.
But how do you do that?
Which is why you can implement procedures so that the total damage from such a typo is limited. With rm, you can force it to confirm or restrict your rights and that of other users.
With the banking systems I work on there's always at least one authorisation stage, sometimes two, so that not only can typos like this be spotted before it's sent for processing, but also to spot fraudulent transactions.
I couldn't comment on what the U.S Supreme Court is supposed to do, and what is should or should not comment on. I live in the UK, and - to be honest - I thought the same thing when I heard the outcome: Why on Earth did the US Supreme Court agree to hear this case? I thought it dealt with matters of the US constitution.
I can only imagine, then, that it acts much more like the UK's High Court, and Appeal Courts than I'd previously thought.
Here, I agree that the Court shouldn't have rewritten copyright law in order to dispose of this case. But my view is that they didn't answer the question before them, which is: "Should P2P software companies be liable for copyright-infringing acts by their users?"
For the simple reason: they weren't asked it. They were asked the question, "should Grokster be liable for promoting copyright-infringing acts by their users". The question, then, isn't "Is Grokster liable for copyright-infringing acts", nor is it "Is P2P software promoting copyright-infringement". The question, more specifically, is:
"Did the makers of Grokster actively promote the copyright infringement uses of it's software, and - if it did - should it be liable to the infringements that occur".
If I may suggest a change in emphasis in your original post:
How does this:
they said "making a piece of software that's marketed as a vehicle for copyright infringement is illegal."
Differ from this
they said "making a piece of software that's marketed as a vehicle for copyright infringement is illegal."
Grokster were found to be liable not because they wrote software that could be used to violate copyright (FTP or HTTP clients and servers can do that too, but you don't see the Apache Foundation or Microsoft's IIS team being taken to court) but because they promoted it as such.
When you see members of the W3C being taken to court because the internet protocols they've helped establish can be used to violate copyright law; then you can be worried.
Donald Rumsfeld apparently disagrees with you.
To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts
I wonder if they would have considered Mickey Mouse, or Eminem to be "useful Arts"...
Seek, and ye shall find:
Apple also announced the availability of a Developer Transition Kit, consisting of an Intel-based Mac development system along with preview versions of Apple's software, which will allow developers to prepare versions of their applications which will run on both PowerPC and Intel-based Macs.
Apple already appear to have intel-based kits available. Doesn't say that they're PC's, just that they have pentium chips.
As a mac user who bought a single-processor G5 a month before Apple dropped it from their line, and a 2nd Gen. iPod two months before they released the 3rd Gen, this for me is the last straw. I couldn't care less if the hardware is PC-derived, an Apple-branded PC, or some proprietery Pentium system. Once my current G5 has outlived it's useful life, I'm unlikely to buy Apple again.