The "reasonable compensation" argument is simply window dressing. What this bill is really about is making copyright registration mandatory if you want to ever get paid for your works. Currently, all creations are copyright the moment they are completed. Registration is optional, but helps in seeking legal actions against infringers.
This one's been lurking through congress lately. Basically, it's so big media conglomerates can use things they find on the web and places like YouTube without having to pay for them. It's all about protections for them and none for artists and creators.
What's wrong with TV news? It receives Nielsen Ratings. That means they are not treated as informational, but rather as entertainment and require audience share (in the eyes of those who watch the "bottom line").
When Bush was "selected" back in November 2000, all of my friends were very depressed, moping around saying "Our country's progress has just been turned back 25 years."
eh, Tower killed themselves in a different manner. I grew up buying albums at Tower Records, back when they sold *records*!
But for well over a decade they were terrible. They never had any decent stock, their prices were getting higher by the week, and the stores were old and dingy.
Then, they started building new suiperstores, similar to Barnes & Noble or Borders, but usually multi-floor. Those stores were typically excellent, with good stock and prices. Unfortunately, the newer stores were few and far between and most older retail locations were never updated.
As an example, I grew up going to the Brea, CA, store. In the mid-90's they finally closed it, replacing it with a superstore about 2 miles away, in a redeveloped downtown area. That newer store was actually quite nice. I now live in Marin, CA, and the store that closed here last year was just like the old Brea store: crappy, expensive, and understocked.
As for how this compares to CompUSSR, I do find it unfortunate that they'll be closing, although it doesn't surprise me one bit. Carlos Slim wanted to turn CompUSSR into a competitor for Best Buy, but it wasn't a good market to be in and there was no reason to do it.
Yes, CompUSSR was typically expensive. But they carried items you wouldn't ever find in a Best Buy. It was a computer-centric chain, which Best Buy makes their money selling appliances.
Contracts must be a two way street to be legally binding. What do you get in return for signing this? More money? I'd guess not. If you want to see an interesting blank look on your boss' face, ask him what you're getting in return.
People have enough trouble driving a vehicle that only has X and Y axes. And some folks keep wondering when they'll be given the Z axis, too. I don't think it'll happen until computer control of cars, their navigation, and driving has occurred, and probably not until it is mandatory on all vehicles.
Yuppie housewives can't even navigate their ginormous Escalades; I don't want them to have flying versions!
Full control of DNS, yes. As far as I've seen, it's not a remote root exploit or anything. It just installs global DNS servers that cannot be easily removed or even noticed.
With all the crap we customers are putting up with (constant rate increases, lousy service, high prices, lack of privacy, ridiculous usage filtering), the only way Comcrap is going to lose customers is if there is some sort of competition.
Currently, they have, essentially, a monopoly in most areas. In my neighborhood, DSL only became available recently and really only through SBC (hiding behind the AT&T name). The "service" is an 1/8th of the speed for barely any less monthly rate.
Believe me, if there was any way to get decent internet without paying Comcrap for it, I'd be doing it. And I'm sure a LOT of other folks would, too.
What you fail to understand is how much fun putting together a $300 Star Destroyer is. I didn't expect to ever get one, but my fiancee bought it for me for X-mas a couple years ago. It took 3 solid days to assemble and is friggin' schweet!
$500 is pushing it, though, and I won't likely get the Falcon. I didn't do the Death Star, either, since I didn't feel $300 justified assembling a ball.:-)
First off, I don't really have a whole lot of sympathy for someone who buys an advanced gadget like the iPhone and cannot tell the difference between "off" and "sleep", nor can I feel bad for someone who apparently travels internationally, but does ZERO advanced inquiry into international phone/data costs.
But, worst of all is The Inquirer's terrible story and complete lack of investigation.
I am taking a trip to Norway next month and did some preliminary research already into my options for iPhone coverage while I'm abroad. I heard about AT&T's $24.95/mo plan that allows for 20 MB of D/L in a month, so I called AT&T to find out more. It turns out that AT&T does not include Norway in this plan, but even worse, the plan REQUIRES a 1-year contract, so it is useless to the occasional traveler (or vacationer). Did The Inquirer discover this? Hell no. They were just looking to publish something incendiary. They could have been even more effective had they done minimal research into their story.
All that aside, the person who got the ridiculous phone bill had several options:
* Put the iPhone into Airplane Mode, to prevent it from being on any network. (The drawback is that WiFi doesn't work then.)
* Call AT&T and block data access while abroad. Then call again upon return, to get it re-enabled. (I learned about this option when I called for info on the $24.95/mo plan.)
* Turn off automatic email checking. (But the iPhone could accidentally still utilize roaming data networks and rack up a several-hundred-dollar bill.)
* Pull the SIM card and be done with it. If you pull the SIM card, the phone cannot communicate with any cell phone network, but will still work just fine on WiFi. And you can put the SIM back in to make calls, if you so choose to pay the bills.
There are many ways to avoid being shocked. But one has to actually consider the fact that they are *leaving* their native area. Be aware of your world, people.
All the candidates who don't believe in evolution (Sam Brownback, Mike Huckabee, and Tom Tancredo) do not need the Bird Flu vaccine and should abstain from using it. After all, if there's no such thing as evolution, then the Bird Flu has been around for as long as we have and no human has ever caught it. And without evolution, it certainly couldn't mutate into something that would endanger us.
...as it barely mentioned the Order of the Phoenix.
The latest film has the same problem as all the other Harry Potter films:
They focus only on the epic tale of Harry versus Voldemort and not on the far more epic story of Harry's emotional journey to be ABLE to face (and presumably) defeat Voldemort.
If you see the film with someone who has never read the books, they tend not to care one iota bout any of it and the reason is all to clear: the characters never develop. They never change. They never become who they need to be in order to confront the horrible evil that is taking over their world.
The books are amazing because, while there is an epic story of good versus evil, the reader is brought along for the ride to grow alongside the main character. But the movies watch the action from a safe distance and only really focus on the parts that have action.
I had the honor of meeting Mr. Russell in NYC during the Audio Engineering Society's conference in 2003. He was an interesting person to speak with and was very understated. He sat next to my fiancee on the shuttle bus returning from the conference to Times Square and it was only after chatting with him for 10 minutes or so that he revealed (after much prodding) that he was at the conference as part of the AES Historical section and that he felt like it was a waste of effort to be present. He said that nobody was interested in meeting him.
At that, my fiancee turned to me and my other friends, sitting behind them, and introduced us.
We chatted for the remainder of the bus ride and he told us a little of what the invention process was like and how he hadn't even made a dime from something that we noted had changed the world. (He wasn't bitter, BTW.)
I got his autograph (as did several others) and a short line formed. I still have the CD I had him sign.
It's a vicious circle and it is caused essentially by one feature: shuffle mode.
Here's how the problem reveals itself:
Band A decides they want to have the "heaviest, loudest album ever made", so they tell the mastering engineer to make their master louder.
Band B is hears Band A's album and wants to be louder (or at least AS LOUD) as Band A. So they tell their mastering engineer to pump up the volume, too.
Assume the same thing happens with Bands C through L.
Now Band M comes along and they've had these other 12 albums playing on iTunes while they're mixing their album. Band M isn't so concerned with being "the loudest", but when the put their ref CD into iTunes and are listening in shuffle mode, their songs get completely drowned out by a factor of 6-12 dB of amplitude difference.
So Band M now asks their mastering engineer to make their master louder so they'll match up with everyone else's.
And Bands N-Z follow suit.
It's a very difficult domino knockdown to break out of, since no one wants to make the album that is super quiet and requires intervention with the volume knob. (Yes, I'm aware of the "Sound Check" feature in iTunes, but that's just a lousy attempt to solve the problem with technology.)
In 2005 I recorded an album for a Hawaiian band. It was gorgeous and I convinced the band to master the album at Universal because I knew the main mastering engineer and was adamant that he was the ONLY guy who could do the record justice. I was also adamant that the album did NOT need (and would avoid) any compression.
We only boosted the overall level of the album by 4 dB and that was purely using a limiter to ensure no overs.
I then sent the first ref CD to the band member who couldn't be present. He was thrilled with the mastering but had just one question: Do they make it louder when the CDs get pressed?
I told him that it was at the level I was recommending and that Mastering was the time to change levels, but that we really wanted it to sound good, not loud. His response? "Oh. But it's so much quieter than every other CD I own."
And he's right. Compared to every CD that has come out in the past 5 years, his album is seriously quiet. Possibly as much as 8 dB quieter than current albums. And maybe we did it TOO quiet. But it matches in amplitude to CDs that came out in 1989, back when some dynamic range was still an OK thing in music. Nowadays we don't like ANY dynamics.
So who is right? And can we go back?
I've been a HUGE advocate of dynamic range and NOT destroying our months of hard work at the last step in the process. But I can only do what my clients want. And I was really hoping we had a chance with DVD-Audio and other surround formats, but the over-compressors are winning out there, now, too. And it's a bigger problem on that format, since you are now forcing people to change levels between movies and surround music, when both are calibrated identically.
No, you're not. I don't have a cell fone and don't plan on getting one anytime soon. And certainly not while the members of the oligopoly are touting their "we suck slightly less than the other guys" sales pitch.
I run a recording studio and spend all day sitting next to a phone I can't even answer (so as to not disturb sessions), so why do I need another phone I cannot answer, and one that telcos have found so many creative ways to run up the charges with?
I went to sign up with a temp agency several years ago and they asked me to sign a release stating that I would submit to a drug test. I flat out refused (politely) because I don't use drugs and never have. If my word (and behavior) wasn't good enough, I don't need to work for them. I place my civil liberties as a much higher importance than working 3 days for some company I've never heard of. And unless they want me operating heavy machinery, there is no need for drug testing for brainless data entry.
The woman at the temp agency was floored. And the guy sitting across from me, who had just signed the form, was also stunned. It was as if they'd never seen anyone stand up for their civil rights before.
Needless to say, I never got any calls from this agency. And I was never disappointed about it. Another temp agency called me repeatedly, though. (They didn't require any ridiculous civil rights violations.)
Slashdot Mirror
Internet-ready modems.
...it's not an extortion case or anything.
The "reasonable compensation" argument is simply window dressing. What this bill is really about is making copyright registration mandatory if you want to ever get paid for your works. Currently, all creations are copyright the moment they are completed. Registration is optional, but helps in seeking legal actions against infringers.
This one's been lurking through congress lately. Basically, it's so big media conglomerates can use things they find on the web and places like YouTube without having to pay for them. It's all about protections for them and none for artists and creators.
More to read here.
I say something valid and I'm called a Troll? Wow.
...or that it has more than 0.1 dB of dynamic range? Vinyl can't have the amplitude smashed like digital.
That only matters if they can count the votes.
What's wrong with TV news? It receives Nielsen Ratings. That means they are not treated as informational, but rather as entertainment and require audience share (in the eyes of those who watch the "bottom line").
And I'm not the only one who thinks this. There are papers about this very subject.
She was was a founding member of the PMRC, which actively focused on censoring music, especially getting rid of that evil, evil rap music.
When Bush was "selected" back in November 2000, all of my friends were very depressed, moping around saying "Our country's progress has just been turned back 25 years."
I guess it's at least 32 years now.
eh, Tower killed themselves in a different manner. I grew up buying albums at Tower Records, back when they sold *records*!
But for well over a decade they were terrible. They never had any decent stock, their prices were getting higher by the week, and the stores were old and dingy.
Then, they started building new suiperstores, similar to Barnes & Noble or Borders, but usually multi-floor. Those stores were typically excellent, with good stock and prices. Unfortunately, the newer stores were few and far between and most older retail locations were never updated.
As an example, I grew up going to the Brea, CA, store. In the mid-90's they finally closed it, replacing it with a superstore about 2 miles away, in a redeveloped downtown area. That newer store was actually quite nice. I now live in Marin, CA, and the store that closed here last year was just like the old Brea store: crappy, expensive, and understocked.
As for how this compares to CompUSSR, I do find it unfortunate that they'll be closing, although it doesn't surprise me one bit. Carlos Slim wanted to turn CompUSSR into a competitor for Best Buy, but it wasn't a good market to be in and there was no reason to do it.
Yes, CompUSSR was typically expensive. But they carried items you wouldn't ever find in a Best Buy. It was a computer-centric chain, which Best Buy makes their money selling appliances.
My spam filter, in its daily logs, informs me that it is discovering approximately 8000 spams each day. In May of this year, it was 800 per day.
I'd say that's an INCREASE.
Contracts must be a two way street to be legally binding. What do you get in return for signing this? More money? I'd guess not. If you want to see an interesting blank look on your boss' face, ask him what you're getting in return.
In legal terms, this is referred to as a Bargained-for Exchange.
AFAIK, this merely adds "teeth" to the contract, but it can still likely be enforced without a bargained-for exchange.
IANAL
Enough acronyms?
People have enough trouble driving a vehicle that only has X and Y axes. And some folks keep wondering when they'll be given the Z axis, too. I don't think it'll happen until computer control of cars, their navigation, and driving has occurred, and probably not until it is mandatory on all vehicles.
Yuppie housewives can't even navigate their ginormous Escalades; I don't want them to have flying versions!
Full control of DNS, yes. As far as I've seen, it's not a remote root exploit or anything. It just installs global DNS servers that cannot be easily removed or even noticed.
It was a monopoly. Now it is a still-unregulated oligopoly. It's still bullshit, regardless of what term you use.
The key term here is unregulated.
With all the crap we customers are putting up with (constant rate increases, lousy service, high prices, lack of privacy, ridiculous usage filtering), the only way Comcrap is going to lose customers is if there is some sort of competition.
Currently, they have, essentially, a monopoly in most areas. In my neighborhood, DSL only became available recently and really only through SBC (hiding behind the AT&T name). The "service" is an 1/8th of the speed for barely any less monthly rate.
Believe me, if there was any way to get decent internet without paying Comcrap for it, I'd be doing it. And I'm sure a LOT of other folks would, too.
What you fail to understand is how much fun putting together a $300 Star Destroyer is. I didn't expect to ever get one, but my fiancee bought it for me for X-mas a couple years ago. It took 3 solid days to assemble and is friggin' schweet!
:-)
$500 is pushing it, though, and I won't likely get the Falcon. I didn't do the Death Star, either, since I didn't feel $300 justified assembling a ball.
First off, I don't really have a whole lot of sympathy for someone who buys an advanced gadget like the iPhone and cannot tell the difference between "off" and "sleep", nor can I feel bad for someone who apparently travels internationally, but does ZERO advanced inquiry into international phone/data costs.
But, worst of all is The Inquirer's terrible story and complete lack of investigation.
I am taking a trip to Norway next month and did some preliminary research already into my options for iPhone coverage while I'm abroad. I heard about AT&T's $24.95/mo plan that allows for 20 MB of D/L in a month, so I called AT&T to find out more. It turns out that AT&T does not include Norway in this plan, but even worse, the plan REQUIRES a 1-year contract, so it is useless to the occasional traveler (or vacationer). Did The Inquirer discover this? Hell no. They were just looking to publish something incendiary. They could have been even more effective had they done minimal research into their story.
All that aside, the person who got the ridiculous phone bill had several options:
* Put the iPhone into Airplane Mode, to prevent it from being on any network. (The drawback is that WiFi doesn't work then.)
* Call AT&T and block data access while abroad. Then call again upon return, to get it re-enabled. (I learned about this option when I called for info on the $24.95/mo plan.)
* Turn off automatic email checking. (But the iPhone could accidentally still utilize roaming data networks and rack up a several-hundred-dollar bill.)
* Pull the SIM card and be done with it. If you pull the SIM card, the phone cannot communicate with any cell phone network, but will still work just fine on WiFi. And you can put the SIM back in to make calls, if you so choose to pay the bills.
There are many ways to avoid being shocked. But one has to actually consider the fact that they are *leaving* their native area. Be aware of your world, people.
I think Roy Zimmerman said it well (at 3:07):
All the candidates who don't believe in evolution (Sam Brownback, Mike Huckabee, and Tom Tancredo) do not need the Bird Flu vaccine and should abstain from using it. After all, if there's no such thing as evolution, then the Bird Flu has been around for as long as we have and no human has ever caught it. And without evolution, it certainly couldn't mutate into something that would endanger us.
...as it barely mentioned the Order of the Phoenix.
The latest film has the same problem as all the other Harry Potter films:
They focus only on the epic tale of Harry versus Voldemort and not on the far more epic story of Harry's emotional journey to be ABLE to face (and presumably) defeat Voldemort.
If you see the film with someone who has never read the books, they tend not to care one iota bout any of it and the reason is all to clear: the characters never develop. They never change. They never become who they need to be in order to confront the horrible evil that is taking over their world.
The books are amazing because, while there is an epic story of good versus evil, the reader is brought along for the ride to grow alongside the main character. But the movies watch the action from a safe distance and only really focus on the parts that have action.
I had the honor of meeting Mr. Russell in NYC during the Audio Engineering Society's conference in 2003. He was an interesting person to speak with and was very understated. He sat next to my fiancee on the shuttle bus returning from the conference to Times Square and it was only after chatting with him for 10 minutes or so that he revealed (after much prodding) that he was at the conference as part of the AES Historical section and that he felt like it was a waste of effort to be present. He said that nobody was interested in meeting him.
At that, my fiancee turned to me and my other friends, sitting behind them, and introduced us.
We chatted for the remainder of the bus ride and he told us a little of what the invention process was like and how he hadn't even made a dime from something that we noted had changed the world. (He wasn't bitter, BTW.)
I got his autograph (as did several others) and a short line formed. I still have the CD I had him sign.
It's nice to see him getting some recognition.
WHY are albums mastered so damn loud?
It's a vicious circle and it is caused essentially by one feature: shuffle mode.
Here's how the problem reveals itself:
Band A decides they want to have the "heaviest, loudest album ever made", so they tell the mastering engineer to make their master louder.
Band B is hears Band A's album and wants to be louder (or at least AS LOUD) as Band A. So they tell their mastering engineer to pump up the volume, too.
Assume the same thing happens with Bands C through L.
Now Band M comes along and they've had these other 12 albums playing on iTunes while they're mixing their album. Band M isn't so concerned with being "the loudest", but when the put their ref CD into iTunes and are listening in shuffle mode, their songs get completely drowned out by a factor of 6-12 dB of amplitude difference.
So Band M now asks their mastering engineer to make their master louder so they'll match up with everyone else's.
And Bands N-Z follow suit.
It's a very difficult domino knockdown to break out of, since no one wants to make the album that is super quiet and requires intervention with the volume knob. (Yes, I'm aware of the "Sound Check" feature in iTunes, but that's just a lousy attempt to solve the problem with technology.)
In 2005 I recorded an album for a Hawaiian band. It was gorgeous and I convinced the band to master the album at Universal because I knew the main mastering engineer and was adamant that he was the ONLY guy who could do the record justice. I was also adamant that the album did NOT need (and would avoid) any compression.
We only boosted the overall level of the album by 4 dB and that was purely using a limiter to ensure no overs.
I then sent the first ref CD to the band member who couldn't be present. He was thrilled with the mastering but had just one question: Do they make it louder when the CDs get pressed?
I told him that it was at the level I was recommending and that Mastering was the time to change levels, but that we really wanted it to sound good, not loud. His response? "Oh. But it's so much quieter than every other CD I own."
And he's right. Compared to every CD that has come out in the past 5 years, his album is seriously quiet. Possibly as much as 8 dB quieter than current albums. And maybe we did it TOO quiet. But it matches in amplitude to CDs that came out in 1989, back when some dynamic range was still an OK thing in music. Nowadays we don't like ANY dynamics.
So who is right? And can we go back?
I've been a HUGE advocate of dynamic range and NOT destroying our months of hard work at the last step in the process. But I can only do what my clients want. And I was really hoping we had a chance with DVD-Audio and other surround formats, but the over-compressors are winning out there, now, too. And it's a bigger problem on that format, since you are now forcing people to change levels between movies and surround music, when both are calibrated identically.
No, you're not. I don't have a cell fone and don't plan on getting one anytime soon. And certainly not while the members of the oligopoly are touting their "we suck slightly less than the other guys" sales pitch.
I run a recording studio and spend all day sitting next to a phone I can't even answer (so as to not disturb sessions), so why do I need another phone I cannot answer, and one that telcos have found so many creative ways to run up the charges with?
I went to sign up with a temp agency several years ago and they asked me to sign a release stating that I would submit to a drug test. I flat out refused (politely) because I don't use drugs and never have. If my word (and behavior) wasn't good enough, I don't need to work for them. I place my civil liberties as a much higher importance than working 3 days for some company I've never heard of. And unless they want me operating heavy machinery, there is no need for drug testing for brainless data entry.
The woman at the temp agency was floored. And the guy sitting across from me, who had just signed the form, was also stunned. It was as if they'd never seen anyone stand up for their civil rights before.
Needless to say, I never got any calls from this agency. And I was never disappointed about it. Another temp agency called me repeatedly, though. (They didn't require any ridiculous civil rights violations.)