Due to the way the internet works and was set up to work, realworld analogies don't hold. By the very nature of having an unsecured wifi point, you broadcast to the world that they are allowed to use it. Many people actually do that expressely. It's the way the internet as a whole works (you connect to the network, you're part of the network and packets get routed over your bit).
Had there been ANY securing going on, then you'd've declared your part of the network private, and no defense would clear the man...but you didn't. If you don't understand that, well, tough...you need a license to drive a car, and the internet (or just computers in general) is many times more complex. Ignorance is no defense against the implied/agreed upon rules; an open network is meant to be used, or it would have been closed. The onus is upon the administrator. Especially in wifi, because many people do put up open wifi points so that the public can use them. If that was not what you wanted, you should have secured your network (a trivial thing to do). Fences and other real-word analogies have no bearing on this particular case.
"I should be able to leave my computer and network unprotected and have people assume that I don't allow access unless I give it."
As I've stated, the internet works on the reverse principle. Like it or don't use the internet.
Note btw that with securing I also mean token securing. I don't subscribe to the view that the security needs to be difficult or even unbreakable [as if there where such a thing]. Even a login stating something like "the owner has given you permission to use this wifi network Y/N" should suffice to determine authority to use the network. But the very nature of the internet means that if your network is open, you're giving express permission for others to use that bandwidth. Hell, that's how your packets get routed too.
"My property starts here [...] they're just not supposed to be on it"
But that just doesn't work for the internet. The internet works ONLY by the fact that it is open. Look at DNS servers: do you have 'permission' to use them? No...but you use them anyway; the internet would be broken without these kinda ad-hoc, sure you can use my resources, networks. Packet-routing (another key internet feature) works like this too; there is no express permission given, just assumed.
And so it is for your wifi network. It is just another piece of the internetwork infrastructure. In this case one you bought to make accessing the internet easier for you. But by the way the internet works (let alone just the physics of it...those waves travel through MY body when I'm in the neighbourhood!), from the getgo that piece of infrastructure has to be considered public. Of course, you can decide that (for whatever reason you care to give) you don't want anyone else to use it. No problem. But then you'll have to do what even the military (you know, ARPAnet decendant networks) does in that case: mark your network as private (which in the case of wifi is done by locking and passwording it).
See, the military accepts that if they don't do that, then that part of the network is used for routing packets and what have you. That's the way the internet is designed. And you'd be surprised how many packets get routed through universities and military networks. It's the way the system works. So by not securing your network, anyone who comes by has the right to assume that you actually meant for that network to be used. Many people actually do work like that and allow their networks to be used by teh public. Computers are much more complex than cars (which you have to get a licence for); if you don't know to secure your network and leave it wideopen, of course someone is going to use it...they rightly assume you meant for them to use it, otherwise you'd have secured it. So sueing someone for your lack of knowledge of how the internet works is the wrong thing to do...and I bet the judge in this case will say so.
I'll tell you one thing. It was about the turn of the millenium maybe, maybe 2001 at the latest, and I had a friend doing his thesis at the strategic center of KPN (dutch telecom, the one which had the monopoly). When I first told him about VoIP, and how I thought that a few hackers (in the old sence of the word) could kill the traditional telecoms by setting up a few (yeah, I know) Wifi nodes per city, using cable only for city-to-city and trans continental transmission, gues what his first response was.
First off, that department he was working in, which made strategic decisions for the company, had never heard of VoIP. But his first response was this: 'Well, isn't that illegal?' And he was serious. Even a slight monologue on the free part of the spectrum didn't convince him.
Ever since, I've been forwarding articles like this to him:P
And it's worse than that: patents aren't cheap. Especially in software, where often it's a single developer who implements his own idea (Bittorrent, for a good example), getting a patent is a hassle which costs time and money. And all that for something which you might not have developped yet.
But the best argument against patents is gained by looking at who wants software patents and who doesn't. It's the small guys, where true innovation nearly per definition happens, who are against these patents, for the reasons you've explained. And it's the large corporations who already have lots of money, and whose only innovation is throwing that money at a problem (usually by buying those innovative companies) who want software patents.
So if patents are supposed to foster innovation (their stated aim), and the past decades if not century has shown that they don't do that, the only conclusion is that software patents should not see the light of day.
Whatever happened to 'the time fits thecrime '? AKA comensurate punishment. Getting more jailtime for downloading a song, which is then still left on that server (so there is no loss of property, just copying) than an average rapist gets is really sending the wrong message.
Furthermore, if there is one thing so very fucked up about a justice system, it's one which sends 'messages' by 'making examples'. Whatever happened to that fundament of justice 'everyone is equal unto the law'? Making an example out of someone is per definition highly wrong, as you single out someone and give them a higher sentence compared to someone else, for the arbritrary reason that you 'want to set an example'. How the fuck is that justice?
Excuse my swearing, but judicial prejudice is something which flies in the face of justice and democracy in such a fundamental way that to ignore that basic axiomal principle is to turn your back on the whole idea of 'law'.
Yup, I do realise that. However, don't you think it would raise the level of debate if the politicians, knowing how bad it looks to have voted against "Feed the Orphans Act of 2003" would actually have to explain, on air/in print, why exactly they did so? They'd actualy be forced to do so....you know, speak on the actual issues? It might even stop politicians from clouding bills with irrelevant clauses by tacking on pork, if they knew that the next election, their opponents would [be forced to] explain to the public that they couldn't in good concience vote for "Feed the Orphans Act of 2003" due to the clause the other guy added which ordered a swimming pool to be created in his backyard with taxpayer money.
Now I know that such debate does, sometimes, go on...but most of the time it's character assasination which goes on in the mainstream media, and voting history and it's reasoning behind it is largely glossed over. And I don't get that they actually get away with that.
Ok....it's TLD soup now. With just a few TLD's, it was usefull to have them regulated. But by now there's just a couple too many of them (you gotta try [companyyou'retryingtoreach].com/net/org/biz/tv/in fo/xxx/tel/[countrycode] and hope you get the correct one). I think now it's gone far enough that arbitrary [maybe 3/4 character limited] TLD's wouldn't cloud the already clouded situation.
In this cluttered TLD-age, why not have www.[yourname].[surname]?
A better way would be for mandatory sending of voting-histories to voters. Second best would be to get the (local) newspapers to print those voting histories.
I'm actually surprised that the later isn't SOP...but then again, when was the last time the media was used to inform people?
"When the switch was made to 3D, the level of interaction basically started over. Same thing happened when text games went to 2D visuals. With Half-life 2's gravity gun, I felt like I could really interact with the environment in a meaningful way. As 3D games mature, I'm sure there will be more complex interaction."
But how many hours did you play HL2? About 12? Maybe 20, max?
I don't want to sound like the 'in my day, we had to walk b arefoot over snowy mountains to have some fun' kinda guy, but The Secret of Monkey Island, or the Space Quest games, or even Larry, took months to beat. And everyu moment (even the frustration! I can't say that for for example GTA:SA) was fun.
As for variety: since the 'golden age of gaming' (Elite to Civ1), only GTA3 and Katamari Damacy have added to the available genres. And even then, GTA3 is a '12 task of heracles' clone writ in 3D, and Katamari is 'marble madness' done with physics. Just as there are only 27 dramatic situations and a few (Dewey defined) genres of books, so there are only a few computer game genres.
The main difference is that than, the mayority of the budget was spent on gameplay and story...now at leats! 80% of the budget is spent on polygons and sound.
Nope. The games I play now are these: GTA: San Anderas, UT2k4, Crimson Skies, Freespace 2, Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri, Deus Ex 1 (never got 'round to playing that back in the day) and Fallout 2 (never finished that one, so I'm doing that now).
Halflife 2 was a few hours of my life. The original Civilisation was literally months worth of playing that game tens of hours a week.
Nostalgia my ass: longlevity/(still presenting me with new, unexpected, original cool shit) and actual gameplay is what these games I still play have in common.
Yeah, yeha...nice snark. But I think the parent post is talking about the golden age of gaming: right after the simple-ness of Pong got expanded to Elite, the Ultima series, all SCUMM games and Civilisation. Those games had enough graphics to evoke emotion, and had to use story and humour at the same time to make up for the not really great graphics. And because machines couldn't handle fancier gfx at that time, the money and effort actually did go into making the gameplay more enjoyable.
A cost analysis can easily bear this out: just have a lokk at what was spent then on gfx/sound compared to gameplay and story, and what is spent now on art verus gameplay. You'll find that the CD-ROM was the deathknell off real gaming, because at that point gfx/sound started to need much more money spent on them. I'd even hazzard a guess that then about even money was spent on gamecode and art, whilst now about 80% of a game's budget is spent on art compared to maybe 15% on the game designers (==gameplay/story).
Re:Then how is the production funded?
on
P2P and TV
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· Score: 2, Insightful
Oh, and one more thing:
"And, P2P aside, if it were that easy, it would already have been done."
Come on! That is such a nonargument! It's what wildly successfull movies/books heard as an excuse not to be made. Douglas Adams got told 'there is no interest in sci-fi comedy'...when he asked how they knew that, he got told 'because otherwise, someone would have done it before already'. Same goes for Star Wars.
Just because someone hasn't done it before only means that someone hasn't done it before. If someone had tried and failed, that would be a different matter...and couyld also mean that the guy who failed just didn't do it very well.
Re:Then how is the production funded?
on
P2P and TV
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· Score: 1
Man, you must work for the RIAA, or be a pshych mayor, misusing the numbers as you are. About 5% of people respond to surveys. So you can pretty much assume that those 'mere' 350 people represent at least 7000 people who like the show. And that's for a shopw which has only been available over bittorrent.
Now you or I don't know what a mayor show recieves in terms of fanmail/whatever. This guy does. He knows what the numbers of mails etc mean; and he's pretty exited. Coming from someone in the industry, that means a hell of a lot more than your (or my) uninformed view.
Re:Then how is the production funded?
on
P2P and TV
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· Score: 1
I don't think you're realising the importance here: it's nit just some fan shouting that internet distribution is good: it's one of the producers of content which is shouting this. It is the guy who funds the production of his show, then sells it to the networks. He is saying that this is a viable production/selling method.
Furthermore, I think the way Firefly DVD sales have been going through the roof (something this guy must know about, seeing as it's the industry he works in) show you that this model can work and do so profitably; the first show/pilot now just gauges the interest, and on that basis a DVD boxed set is made (or not). This show and Firefly are indicators of a radical change in the industry (finaly, a few years after the technology was there).
...this sounds like typical phone talk/standby times. And that's including the many Symbian phones out there, as well as the Treo's. Dunno what Hiptops do, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's in the same order.
"If the makers of TransPod had not had the incentive of a patent in developing their product, it may never have been developed"
And I think this is bollox: Transpod;s makers would have still made the product, because they think there's a market for their product, and that it would sell, and in doing so make them money. Having a patent would do nothing to disturb or promote that. The market in unpattantables (like caps, shoes, clothing, umbrella's, cars, cpu's, bookcases etc etc etc) proves this. And it's worse than that: I as a consumer have a near infinite variety of shoes or tables to choose from. These products are all unpatented (on the whole, unless we're talking about a new chair with a revolutionary new adjustment mechanism [in which case it is only that implementation of that specific adjustment mechanism which is patented])...and they sell so well that the owner of IKEA is the richest man on earth.
"On the other hand, if people come up with an idea independently - meaning one did not steal the idea from the other - then whoever gets to market first gets to market first. Whoever dominates.. dominates. That's all there is to it."
And that's the crux of the matter, right there. This kind of thing is happening more and more often, and it will continue to happen. The invention of the telephone, the invention of powered flight...these things happened a century ago, but they are famous for their parralel invention. Or what about the printing press/movable type? That was invented by two people, across the globe, nearly half a millenium ago! And with the increase in population, this type of thing is going to keep on happening, more and more often.
And that is why I advocate the abolishion of the whole patent/copywright concept. Since it's inception it has never worked how it should, has stiffled innovation and competition and only adds paperwork. I mean, it's not like patents/copywright is an ages old tradition. It's hardly even two hundred years old! And it has been failing all that time...it does not do what it is intented to do. So bin it.
But replace it with what? With a free-for-all. Devellop your concept and produce it. You already have first mover advantage: that is the only right you're 'entitled' to. If some small company then, after you're on the marketplace selling your thing, decides tyo copy your product...well, we are working in a system of capitalism, are we not? If you can't use your first-to-market-advantage to out sell your competitor...you suck at business and the marketplace has taken care of your lack of competitiveness. If, however, a large corporation steals your idea and develops it...charge them with theft or tresspassing. They would have had to physically or electronically enter your premises to steal the information. If they stole drawings, it's theft. If they copied your harddrive, it's tresspassing. Easy.
So let Bonno or something do this for the developiong world: get rid of patents/copywrights. It's a thorn in thirdworld countries side anyway. It would also mean that pharmaceutical companies would start developing drugs which didn't just counter symptoms but solved problems, as they'd get the same profit from both types of drugs...but at the moment fighting symptoms gets them more money due to the fact that long copyright/patents give them more money over the long run for their drugs...and the long run means symptomremoval instead of curing the disease, 'cause that's done just once.
...and that is the fact that, even if the movie bombs [as the article points out, but even moreso if the movie does well], it will send FOX the message that there's nothing [fiscally] wrong with totally buggering up the handling of a series.
"And if you don't like it, well, you don't have to use a school computer."
Unfortunately, it wouldn't work that way. It would be more like "you don't like it, so you buy a computer yourself. You then try to use this computer on the school network, only to find out that this is not allowed. The choice you have left is to either use a schoolcomputer and have your use of it monitored (ie no privacy; forget downloading porn, or writing scathing articles about the administration), or to use no computer at all. Too bad that you probably need to use a computer for certain school assignments...".
But there's the rub. This is a very Bush-ist thing to do: proclaim the greater good overrides the individual.
I find it very fishy that the split between the judges is so democrat-conservative. The traditional post9/11 world would have dictated that it were the republicans who whould be 'for' and the democrats who would be the dissenters.
I have no logical explanation...but considering the laws passed including and since the USA PATRIOT ACT make me suspect that somehow this is either misreported or this is the start of the republican re-frame, to enable them to maybe be a force in the next presidential election.
Yeah, I am cynical...wtf and why have these so called democrats done what they have done? It's doesn't make sense, and the proof of that is that everyone who hears of this ruling thinks the dissent went the other way (ie that the republicans where the ones who voted 'aye').
Slashdot Mirror
You know, this explains Zaphod's third arm :)
Due to the way the internet works and was set up to work, realworld analogies don't hold. By the very nature of having an unsecured wifi point, you broadcast to the world that they are allowed to use it. Many people actually do that expressely. It's the way the internet as a whole works (you connect to the network, you're part of the network and packets get routed over your bit).
Had there been ANY securing going on, then you'd've declared your part of the network private, and no defense would clear the man...but you didn't. If you don't understand that, well, tough...you need a license to drive a car, and the internet (or just computers in general) is many times more complex. Ignorance is no defense against the implied/agreed upon rules; an open network is meant to be used, or it would have been closed. The onus is upon the administrator. Especially in wifi, because many people do put up open wifi points so that the public can use them. If that was not what you wanted, you should have secured your network (a trivial thing to do). Fences and other real-word analogies have no bearing on this particular case.
"I should be able to leave my computer and network unprotected and have people assume that I don't allow access unless I give it."
As I've stated, the internet works on the reverse principle. Like it or don't use the internet.
Note btw that with securing I also mean token securing. I don't subscribe to the view that the security needs to be difficult or even unbreakable [as if there where such a thing]. Even a login stating something like "the owner has given you permission to use this wifi network Y/N" should suffice to determine authority to use the network. But the very nature of the internet means that if your network is open, you're giving express permission for others to use that bandwidth. Hell, that's how your packets get routed too.
"My property starts here [...] they're just not supposed to be on it"
But that just doesn't work for the internet. The internet works ONLY by the fact that it is open. Look at DNS servers: do you have 'permission' to use them? No...but you use them anyway; the internet would be broken without these kinda ad-hoc, sure you can use my resources, networks. Packet-routing (another key internet feature) works like this too; there is no express permission given, just assumed.
And so it is for your wifi network. It is just another piece of the internetwork infrastructure. In this case one you bought to make accessing the internet easier for you. But by the way the internet works (let alone just the physics of it...those waves travel through MY body when I'm in the neighbourhood!), from the getgo that piece of infrastructure has to be considered public.
Of course, you can decide that (for whatever reason you care to give) you don't want anyone else to use it. No problem. But then you'll have to do what even the military (you know, ARPAnet decendant networks) does in that case: mark your network as private (which in the case of wifi is done by locking and passwording it).
See, the military accepts that if they don't do that, then that part of the network is used for routing packets and what have you. That's the way the internet is designed. And you'd be surprised how many packets get routed through universities and military networks. It's the way the system works. So by not securing your network, anyone who comes by has the right to assume that you actually meant for that network to be used. Many people actually do work like that and allow their networks to be used by teh public.
Computers are much more complex than cars (which you have to get a licence for); if you don't know to secure your network and leave it wideopen, of course someone is going to use it...they rightly assume you meant for them to use it, otherwise you'd have secured it. So sueing someone for your lack of knowledge of how the internet works is the wrong thing to do...and I bet the judge in this case will say so.
I'll tell you one thing. It was about the turn of the millenium maybe, maybe 2001 at the latest, and I had a friend doing his thesis at the strategic center of KPN (dutch telecom, the one which had the monopoly). When I first told him about VoIP, and how I thought that a few hackers (in the old sence of the word) could kill the traditional telecoms by setting up a few (yeah, I know) Wifi nodes per city, using cable only for city-to-city and trans continental transmission, gues what his first response was.
:P
First off, that department he was working in, which made strategic decisions for the company, had never heard of VoIP. But his first response was this: 'Well, isn't that illegal?' And he was serious. Even a slight monologue on the free part of the spectrum didn't convince him.
Ever since, I've been forwarding articles like this to him
And it's worse than that: patents aren't cheap. Especially in software, where often it's a single developer who implements his own idea (Bittorrent, for a good example), getting a patent is a hassle which costs time and money. And all that for something which you might not have developped yet.
But the best argument against patents is gained by looking at who wants software patents and who doesn't. It's the small guys, where true innovation nearly per definition happens, who are against these patents, for the reasons you've explained. And it's the large corporations who already have lots of money, and whose only innovation is throwing that money at a problem (usually by buying those innovative companies) who want software patents.
So if patents are supposed to foster innovation (their stated aim), and the past decades if not century has shown that they don't do that, the only conclusion is that software patents should not see the light of day.
Whatever happened to 'the time fits thecrime '? AKA comensurate punishment. Getting more jailtime for downloading a song, which is then still left on that server (so there is no loss of property, just copying) than an average rapist gets is really sending the wrong message.
Furthermore, if there is one thing so very fucked up about a justice system, it's one which sends 'messages' by 'making examples'. Whatever happened to that fundament of justice 'everyone is equal unto the law'? Making an example out of someone is per definition highly wrong, as you single out someone and give them a higher sentence compared to someone else, for the arbritrary reason that you 'want to set an example'. How the fuck is that justice?
Excuse my swearing, but judicial prejudice is something which flies in the face of justice and democracy in such a fundamental way that to ignore that basic axiomal principle is to turn your back on the whole idea of 'law'.
Yup, I do realise that. However, don't you think it would raise the level of debate if the politicians, knowing how bad it looks to have voted against "Feed the Orphans Act of 2003" would actually have to explain, on air/in print, why exactly they did so? They'd actualy be forced to do so....you know, speak on the actual issues?
It might even stop politicians from clouding bills with irrelevant clauses by tacking on pork, if they knew that the next election, their opponents would [be forced to] explain to the public that they couldn't in good concience vote for "Feed the Orphans Act of 2003" due to the clause the other guy added which ordered a swimming pool to be created in his backyard with taxpayer money.
Now I know that such debate does, sometimes, go on...but most of the time it's character assasination which goes on in the mainstream media, and voting history and it's reasoning behind it is largely glossed over. And I don't get that they actually get away with that.
Ok....it's TLD soup now. With just a few TLD's, it was usefull to have them regulated. But by now there's just a couple too many of them (you gotta try [companyyou'retryingtoreach].com/net/org/biz/tv/in fo/xxx/tel/[countrycode] and hope you get the correct one). I think now it's gone far enough that arbitrary [maybe 3/4 character limited] TLD's wouldn't cloud the already clouded situation.
In this cluttered TLD-age, why not have www.[yourname].[surname]?
A better way would be for mandatory sending of voting-histories to voters. Second best would be to get the (local) newspapers to print those voting histories.
I'm actually surprised that the later isn't SOP...but then again, when was the last time the media was used to inform people?
"When the switch was made to 3D, the level of interaction basically started over. Same thing happened when text games went to 2D visuals. With Half-life 2's gravity gun, I felt like I could really interact with the environment in a meaningful way. As 3D games mature, I'm sure there will be more complex interaction."
But how many hours did you play HL2? About 12? Maybe 20, max?
I don't want to sound like the 'in my day, we had to walk b arefoot over snowy mountains to have some fun' kinda guy, but The Secret of Monkey Island, or the Space Quest games, or even Larry, took months to beat. And everyu moment (even the frustration! I can't say that for for example GTA:SA) was fun.
As for variety: since the 'golden age of gaming' (Elite to Civ1), only GTA3 and Katamari Damacy have added to the available genres. And even then, GTA3 is a '12 task of heracles' clone writ in 3D, and Katamari is 'marble madness' done with physics. Just as there are only 27 dramatic situations and a few (Dewey defined) genres of books, so there are only a few computer game genres.
The main difference is that than, the mayority of the budget was spent on gameplay and story...now at leats! 80% of the budget is spent on polygons and sound.
Dude, you grok gaming. Cheers :)
Nope. The games I play now are these: GTA: San Anderas, UT2k4, Crimson Skies, Freespace 2, Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri, Deus Ex 1 (never got 'round to playing that back in the day) and Fallout 2 (never finished that one, so I'm doing that now).
Halflife 2 was a few hours of my life. The original Civilisation was literally months worth of playing that game tens of hours a week.
Nostalgia my ass: longlevity/(still presenting me with new, unexpected, original cool shit) and actual gameplay is what these games I still play have in common.
Yeah, yeha...nice snark. But I think the parent post is talking about the golden age of gaming: right after the simple-ness of Pong got expanded to Elite, the Ultima series, all SCUMM games and Civilisation. Those games had enough graphics to evoke emotion, and had to use story and humour at the same time to make up for the not really great graphics. And because machines couldn't handle fancier gfx at that time, the money and effort actually did go into making the gameplay more enjoyable.
A cost analysis can easily bear this out: just have a lokk at what was spent then on gfx/sound compared to gameplay and story, and what is spent now on art verus gameplay. You'll find that the CD-ROM was the deathknell off real gaming, because at that point gfx/sound started to need much more money spent on them. I'd even hazzard a guess that then about even money was spent on gamecode and art, whilst now about 80% of a game's budget is spent on art compared to maybe 15% on the game designers (==gameplay/story).
Oh, and one more thing:
"And, P2P aside, if it were that easy, it would already have been done."
Come on! That is such a nonargument! It's what wildly successfull movies/books heard as an excuse not to be made. Douglas Adams got told 'there is no interest in sci-fi comedy'...when he asked how they knew that, he got told 'because otherwise, someone would have done it before already'. Same goes for Star Wars.
Just because someone hasn't done it before only means that someone hasn't done it before. If someone had tried and failed, that would be a different matter...and couyld also mean that the guy who failed just didn't do it very well.
Man, you must work for the RIAA, or be a pshych mayor, misusing the numbers as you are. About 5% of people respond to surveys. So you can pretty much assume that those 'mere' 350 people represent at least 7000 people who like the show. And that's for a shopw which has only been available over bittorrent.
Now you or I don't know what a mayor show recieves in terms of fanmail/whatever. This guy does. He knows what the numbers of mails etc mean; and he's pretty exited. Coming from someone in the industry, that means a hell of a lot more than your (or my) uninformed view.
I don't think you're realising the importance here: it's nit just some fan shouting that internet distribution is good: it's one of the producers of content which is shouting this. It is the guy who funds the production of his show, then sells it to the networks. He is saying that this is a viable production/selling method.
Furthermore, I think the way Firefly DVD sales have been going through the roof (something this guy must know about, seeing as it's the industry he works in) show you that this model can work and do so profitably; the first show/pilot now just gauges the interest, and on that basis a DVD boxed set is made (or not). This show and Firefly are indicators of a radical change in the industry (finaly, a few years after the technology was there).
...military OR police! I meant OR! Really! :(
I would. And so do all the gun manufacturers...when they're selling to the military of police.
...this sounds like typical phone talk/standby times. And that's including the many Symbian phones out there, as well as the Treo's. Dunno what Hiptops do, but I wouldn't be surprised if it's in the same order.
"If the makers of TransPod had not had the incentive of a patent in developing their product, it may never have been developed"
And I think this is bollox: Transpod;s makers would have still made the product, because they think there's a market for their product, and that it would sell, and in doing so make them money. Having a patent would do nothing to disturb or promote that. The market in unpattantables (like caps, shoes, clothing, umbrella's, cars, cpu's, bookcases etc etc etc) proves this.
And it's worse than that: I as a consumer have a near infinite variety of shoes or tables to choose from. These products are all unpatented (on the whole, unless we're talking about a new chair with a revolutionary new adjustment mechanism [in which case it is only that implementation of that specific adjustment mechanism which is patented])...and they sell so well that the owner of IKEA is the richest man on earth.
"On the other hand, if people come up with an idea independently - meaning one did not steal the idea from the other - then whoever gets to market first gets to market first. Whoever dominates.. dominates. That's all there is to it."
And that's the crux of the matter, right there. This kind of thing is happening more and more often, and it will continue to happen. The invention of the telephone, the invention of powered flight...these things happened a century ago, but they are famous for their parralel invention. Or what about the printing press/movable type? That was invented by two people, across the globe, nearly half a millenium ago! And with the increase in population, this type of thing is going to keep on happening, more and more often.
And that is why I advocate the abolishion of the whole patent/copywright concept. Since it's inception it has never worked how it should, has stiffled innovation and competition and only adds paperwork. I mean, it's not like patents/copywright is an ages old tradition. It's hardly even two hundred years old! And it has been failing all that time...it does not do what it is intented to do. So bin it.
But replace it with what? With a free-for-all. Devellop your concept and produce it. You already have first mover advantage: that is the only right you're 'entitled' to. If some small company then, after you're on the marketplace selling your thing, decides tyo copy your product...well, we are working in a system of capitalism, are we not? If you can't use your first-to-market-advantage to out sell your competitor...you suck at business and the marketplace has taken care of your lack of competitiveness.
If, however, a large corporation steals your idea and develops it...charge them with theft or tresspassing. They would have had to physically or electronically enter your premises to steal the information. If they stole drawings, it's theft. If they copied your harddrive, it's tresspassing. Easy.
So let Bonno or something do this for the developiong world: get rid of patents/copywrights. It's a thorn in thirdworld countries side anyway. It would also mean that pharmaceutical companies would start developing drugs which didn't just counter symptoms but solved problems, as they'd get the same profit from both types of drugs...but at the moment fighting symptoms gets them more money due to the fact that long copyright/patents give them more money over the long run for their drugs...and the long run means symptomremoval instead of curing the disease, 'cause that's done just once.
...and that is the fact that, even if the movie bombs [as the article points out, but even moreso if the movie does well], it will send FOX the message that there's nothing [fiscally] wrong with totally buggering up the handling of a series.
Too bad those scrolls had lousy ECC.
"And if you don't like it, well, you don't have to use a school computer."
Unfortunately, it wouldn't work that way. It would be more like "you don't like it, so you buy a computer yourself. You then try to use this computer on the school network, only to find out that this is not allowed. The choice you have left is to either use a schoolcomputer and have your use of it monitored (ie no privacy; forget downloading porn, or writing scathing articles about the administration), or to use no computer at all. Too bad that you probably need to use a computer for certain school assignments...".
But there's the rub. This is a very Bush-ist thing to do: proclaim the greater good overrides the individual.
I find it very fishy that the split between the judges is so democrat-conservative. The traditional post9/11 world would have dictated that it were the republicans who whould be 'for' and the democrats who would be the dissenters.
I have no logical explanation...but considering the laws passed including and since the USA PATRIOT ACT make me suspect that somehow this is either misreported or this is the start of the republican re-frame, to enable them to maybe be a force in the next presidential election.
Yeah, I am cynical...wtf and why have these so called democrats done what they have done? It's doesn't make sense, and the proof of that is that everyone who hears of this ruling thinks the dissent went the other way (ie that the republicans where the ones who voted 'aye').
Something is rotten in the USA.