"Why not?" led to the U.S. nuking Hiroshima and Nagasaki. "Why not?" led to the creation of antibiotics to cure minor ailments and inadvertently caused the surviving microbes to become super resistant, to the point where we probably won't be able to synthesize an antibiotic against many of them.
"Why not" led to our life expectancies doubling... "Why not" led to a man on the moon.
Malcolm from Jurassic Park was wrong when he said: "What you call discovery, I call the rape of the natural world." Why? Discovery is, in and of itself, a blank slate... It is neither Good nor Bad by default. It is what we make of discoveries - how we decide to use this knowlege that creates either a moon-walk or an A-bomb. The "rape of the natural world" is, unforunately, a symptom of human nature - not a by-product of discovery.
Second - The whole JP notion that "nature will always find a way to break free" should we ever bring back extinct creatures is plainly false. Nature, though immensly powerful, needs time to work its "magic." Putting a T-Rex (or a Mammoth, or a Thylacine, etc) in a cage and charging visitors 100 bucks a pop is not an inherinitely dangerous situation from a "nature breaking loose" standpoint.
Again, JP is a great movie (and better book) but do not go to it for valid science and/or an ethics lesson. We could *easily* have a live Mammoth to study and the natural world would in no way be upset, so long as we do not start breeding them and introducing them into natural environments, etc.
There are three things that the Radeon 9700 Pro can offer at this point: 1) The highest performance in current and future games.
2) The ability to play at 1600x1200 in just about any game currently available or soon to be made available, and
3) The ability to play virtually any game at 1024x768 with 4X AA and 16X anisotropic filtering enabled at smooth frame rates.
Heheh after submitting that post it dawned on me that spammers would either 1. not follow the convention, or 2. be excempt from it (because they are overseas, etc)
Are there other methods of "forcing" compliance? I am admittedly ignorant on a lot of this stuff - this is why I am asking... Is it possible for mail servers, or perhaps even Internet backbones, to "notice" when many emails are rapidly being sent out from a few sources, and automatically tag them in some way? That is why I would think something other than a "ADV" tag would work... Perhaps more along the lines of a "mass emailing" tag of some sort...
Ahhh the more I think about it, the more I think we will be getting spam forever...;)
This would require legislation obviously, but I think it would work... Just make a law that any automated email (IOW, any email not written by hand) must have any easily detected keyword in the subject...perhaps followed by the domain of the sender. This would have to effect both legitimate businesses *and* spammers, so there would have to be a way to differentiate between them.
So, if Barnes&Noble is sending out emails to customers, it would look like "Free shipping till December! [AUTO:bn.com]"
This way, you could easily implement filters in email programs to filter out all emails with the keyword in the subject to some "automated" folder, and could browse this folder at your leisure to read any of them that you would find useful...
terrorists even use games such as Flight Simulator and Quake III to train themselves for the acts of violence they commit!
Yeah, last time I checked Flight Simulator was incredibly violent... Newsflash: Do you know who else uses flight simulators? Pilots... So if you outlaw simulators, you are hurting the very people who fly you to your weekly moron-meetings.
Also, for the record terrorists do not "train" with Quake3.. The have *real life* training camps with *real life* weapons... Shooting a bunch of aliens with wildly unrealistic physics and weapons damage would not help them in their struggle... Also, I find it hard to believe that any mouse-keyboard skills picked up on a local Q3-DM would translate well into a real-life battle situation. If it did than I might as well join the Marines because I must be roughly as dangerous as Rambo.
It's a well-established fact that religion causes violent behavior. Yet, somehow, we're still horrified and shocked by the recent string of child abductions, by schoolyard shootings, and by the wars in the Middle East.
*sigh*
Look - Religion is not without fault for some of these problems, but it does not inherintly cause violence... You are grossly over-simplifying the situation. My next-door neighboors are extremely religious and would not hurt a fly... Your "well-established fact" is easily defeated.
I think you will find that most of these "religious wars" are in fact caused by other factors, most often the control-of-land and poverty. Even the greatest "religious war" of all time - the Crusades - were in fact about reclaiming a conquered territory... Both sides (Christian and Muslim) hired mercenaries from the opposition to fight on their side... (look it up). Its nice to think that religion causes wars and that we are somehow putting all of this in the past, so I understand why people say these things.
What role does religion play in wars you ask? Control. It gives people with "motives" control over people, and also supresses their ability to question the acts of the leaders. Why should you fight for me? Because God wants us to take back the Holy Land, thats why - end of story. It also gives a suffering/poor people a reason to live - or so they believe.
To use your example of the wars in the Middle East... Think about it - If it was really a war of two opposing religions, how come the Muslims do not wage war on the buddhist monks, or against the voodoo pactictioners and witches? I am sure eskimos have an opposing religious view as well, yet they are probably not on Osama Bin Ladin's radar. - They are fighting over the land, plain and simple... If you moved the entire population of Isreal into Alaska, do you think the Muslims would follow and launch attacks up there? The funny thing is that Osama Bin Ladin himself has even told why he fights the US: our soldiers stationed in Saudi Arabia, and our biased support for Isreal.... Then, after saying this, he turns right around and tells his own people that its a "Muslim vs Christian" conflict to rile them up for his cause.
This is a good point... I couldn't really put my finger on why talking on a cell while driving was a lot more distracting than talking to someone in the passenger seat, though I just *knew* intrinsically that it was (having done both many times).
You can't seriously look at IE 5 or 6 and say that their dominance of the market is due only to unfair business practices on the part of Microsoft. Those two versions of IE are the best browsers running, plain and simple.
I agree wholeheartedly that IE is way better than the old Nescape browsers (as I believe I said in my last post). I am sure that anyone running the Windows operating system who tested IE and Netscape against each other would have come out with IE on top. IE had every reason to beat Netscape based on merits alone.
Your average Joe and Jane Citizen do not test browsers against each other, however... They used IE because the computer they bought (which, of course, comes with Windows pre-loaded) has blue "E"s all over it which now has become synonimous with "Internet." Whenever they clicked on a link in an Email or in a seperate application, it opened up the IE browser automatically... Everytime they clicked the Start Bar, they were presented with their IE "Favorites" for easy launching... Hell, IE is now integrated into the file-manager. It would be naive to think that M$'s desktop monopoly did not play a huge role in IE's dominance.
Imagine if you will that tonight there was a "magical update" of sorts... While everyone was sleeping, the IE on their computer was replaced with Mozilla... So now there are little blue "M"s everywhere... Their Mozilla bookmarks are right in the Start Bar, and Mozilla was now integrated into the File-Manager... Also, Mozilla was given "behind the scenes" access to the Operating System, which allows them to load files on boot-up to increase the speed of the browser launch time, so that everyone thinks this browser is just inherintly faster... You think this might have an effect on the number of people who use Mozilla?:) How many of these Joe and Jane Citizens do you think would find their way over to some obscure http://www.ie.org website to download an arguably better browser?
For the record - I think its too bad that your experience with Mozilla has turned you off to the point that you flat out say "it doesnt work"... Everyone I know who has tried it has not looked back since, myself included:) Its great - tabbed browsing, pop-up suppression, cool looking skins, and full standards compliance.:) The difference between us, however, is that I am not trying to take your choice of IE away from you... I just want to retain the ability to make a choice of my own.
Every company has an agenda: use our products or services instead of our competitors'. That was true of Netscape as well.
No one in their right mind would stick up for the Netscape-of-old... Netscape sucked incredibly much.:) IE blew Netscape out of the water, and for that matter, was much more standards-compliant than Netscape... Nobody misses Netscape, ok? Just remember - Mozilla is not the same thing as Netscape.
You're trying to call the limited use of a graphics file format a harm? That's a stretch. Who cares if the graphics are PNGs...
Honestly I am not passionate about whether or not PNG files are common on the web... but think about it this way: What if PNG offered some useful/neato advantage over some other image formats, and people would benefit from their use.... Wouldnt you find it unfortunate that a company could tell you not to use them on the web? This is the sort of control that we do not want to fall into M$'s (or anyone else's for that matter) hands.
You have a browser which is used by (let's just say for argument) virtually everybody. After the browser has already reached almost total market penetration, somebody comes along a develops a standard. The standard calls for browsers to work differently from how the absurdly popular browser does things.
:) Cute example, except for the fact that the standards were there BEFORE the absurdly-popular-browser. Look, I dont know how familiar you are with MS's overall strategy, but here is a crash course:
Its called "embrace and extend"... This means that they "embrace" existing popular standards (e.g. W3C) - then "extend" them to offer "features" not found in the standard. - Now, this in and of itself is not an Evil or Bad thing... After all, as you mentioned the Netscape-of-old did the same thing and no one wanted their head on a stick, right?:) The key difference here is that MS is a monopoly... So when MS does it, their "take" on the matter is easily pushed out and very quickly becomes the *new* de-facto standard. If a non-MS company does these same tactics, its inherintly not as dangerous because people can always choose something else if they do not like their changes to the standard... When MS does it, they have just taken over a whole new market in the blink of an eye.
Why is this a bad thing? Because now you have one company controlling what used to be an open and free standard. Why do you want to be limited to only one choice? Competition can only benefit you.
You believe compliance with standards is an absolute good, and therefore any browser that complies with standards is prima facie better than any browser that doesn't. I think that's wrong. Browsers, like many things, derive value from utility.
You obviously have no qualms with running MS software... That is a perfectly acceptable choice, and I wish you only the best in your computing experience. However, you are probably unaware (or indifferent) of the fact that you are being hijacked of any choice in the matter should you ever change your mind. Would you object if one car company bought out ALLL the other car companies, and only produced one "standard car"? Would the fact most people use this car (utility) make it somehow ok that we no longer have any choice what we drive, or who we give our money to?
If the standard doesn't reflect reality, it should be ignored.
This is true - but the standard *would* reflect reality if it wasn't for a monopoly (which, by the way, are illegal in the US) saying otherwise;)
... there is absolutely nothing intrinsically good about following W3C standards.
I would (and will;) take argument with that statement... There *is* intrinsic good in following the recommendations of a 3rd-party and widely agreed upon standards body, as opposed to following a proprietary one. If M$ had its way, the entire web would only be readable with MS software, defeating the entire purpose of the web in the first place (as a standards-defined, accessible to everyone "superhighway" of information, yadda yadda yadda)
Now in this case, the standards body happens to be W3C... If you want to make a seperate argument that they in particular are not doing a good job at creating a Standard - go ahead... that is a topic for another day. However, the fact remains that we are in FAR greater hands with the W3C than if M$ was in charge... Keep in mind - If M$ has "innovations" to offer, they are perfectly capable of working with the W3C to implement them in the standard... They, time and time again, choose not to go this route, and instead opt for a proprietary one... (another example is diverting from the openGL standard with Direct3D).
I think a better question to ask is: What is the intrinsic Good in having one company control the Internet?
So ownership (aka copyright in the IP world) characterized capatilism.
Again, I dont mind that someone owns their products... The problem comes into play when I am forced to use certain products whether I like it or not.
'mainly by competition in a free market' that is mainly not wholely,
Heheh come on, don't you think you are sweeping from "mainly/not-wholely" to "absolutely none" a little too easily? Monopolies have been broken up or simply prevented in the past... Whats so different now?
You could also consider Buying the government as part of the free market and democracy.
You vote for Jimmy, The Smith coperation 'owns' Jimmy, Jimmy passes bill that The Smith coperation believes will aid it's capatil indevors.
Don't even get me started on politicians - this is a whole seperate topic altogether;)... You are right - the DMCA/RIAA only exist because they are tied up into the whole political "lie" they have created for themselves... That is the only reason why they have not been "broken up" - they are part of the "lie." Similarly, anyone who buys into the two-party system - anyone who votes either Republican or Democrat - is buying into the lie, and perpetuating the system.... again, this is a whole different topic for a different day.
It is ofcorse true that capatilism is a self defeating system, where the idea of the game is to own everything and become a corporate dictatorship.
I guess in some ways this is correct... The free-market certainly encourages people/companies to be successful, to grow, etc... And I think in 99% of cases this is a perfectly acceptable thing... In rare cases when a company gets so big that it is controlling the market (monopoly) it is the government's job to correct the situation... What is the problem exactly? If, say, there were three car manufacturers, and they all got together and formed the AIA (auto industry of america) and began to arbitrarily set prices - I would have a problem with this too.
I understand that they are claiming "ownership" over their content... This is no different than Honda "owning" the Accord.
However, the key difference between the two is found right in your definition of capitalism: "prices/production/distribution determined mainly by competition in a free market." That most decidedly does NOT sound like the DMCA/RIAA... They have virtually nothing to do with competition at all. In this regard, they fall much more in-line with a government institution.. Think about it... They set prices arbitrarily because they have no competition, and they even "pass legislation" on fair use of their products.
To go back to my car example: Honda can own the Accord and do with it what they will... I am content with this because I know I can always go to Toyota/Volkswagan/Ford/etc/etc/etc if I do not like what Honda is up to, or if they aren't giving me substantial value for my buck. This is capitalism in action! Who can I turn to if I do not like the DMCA/RIAA I ask?
Umm, yah, flowers that are given away are bought from nurseries, heh.
Heheh yes yes I know...:) I still dont get it though... I feel the same way about Christmas trees. They, too, are "farmed" but it still feels weird cutting down a beautiful tree and putting it in a living room for a few weeks until it dies... Just feels so wasteful to me... I believe Marla in the "Fight Club" movie said it better (not to mention a lot more harsh);)
Someone loved it intensely for one day, and then tossed it. Like a Christmas tree. So special. Then, bam, it's on the side of the road. Tinsel still clinging to it. Like a sex crime victim. Underwear inside out. Bound with electrical tape.
Sometimes I just think people lose sight that things are much more beautiful in a natural setting as opposed to an artificial one (e.g. Xmas tree, the rose garden, a tiger in a cage at the zoo, etc) Ok ok I have officially taken this silly conversation too far... though it does fit in quite nicely with the parent topic.;) Its late - need sleepy.
... , and they are a wonderful symbol of life itself.
Thats just it - I tend to associate flowers with death in most cases... Its weird how people can take something so elegant, cut it down, put it in a jar, and watch it die for a few days.
If you like flowers so much, dont you think people/the-city should plant them around at various places - and then just leave them there??? Ahhh to each their own I suppose...
Unfortunately, there are other reasons to only support IE such as a reliance on the Windows Media platform... Our online radios use WMP (we used to offer multiple formats, but had to consolidate... for better or for worse, WMP came out on top)
The problem comes into play when you want to script against the embedded player... Many different browser versions (e.g. Gecko, even Mac-IE) do not have the ability to script against the player... And MS does not seem too inclined to fix the situation anytime soon. The result - If you need to use WMP for anything more than very simple actions, the Windows/IE combination is required. As a decent programmer and Mozilla fan, it kills me to have to turn away all other platforms simply because the higher-ups chose WMP.
But the IMDB is owned and controlled by a sub corporation of the MPAA, and they fake most if not all of the movie reviews on there, so how can you hope to get good information out of it?
Is this a contest to see who can blurt out the most factually incorrect statements possible? Let me give it a shot!!!
Well spoken, but ultimately you must remember that there is no (reasonable) limit to the number of websites and/or sources of information out there... I personally do not feel that US culture or values are Good or Bad neccessarily - I read some "big corporate" websites everyday, but avoid other popular ones altogether. This is simply a decision that I have made for myself. Fortunately, everyone else on the Internet is entitled to an opinion and choice of their own. Some common rants:
Think CNN is a tool of the government to brain-wash the masses? Solution: Read Reuters or the BBC-News or any other news site you find suitable. Better yet - read from several/many different sources.
Think Hollywood is controlling what the masses see and hear? Solution: Check out IMDB... Read reviews from hundreds of individuals like yourself, and formulate your own opinions.... See and watch only what you choose to.
I can certainly understand why the author feels as he does - It must be frustrating for other cultures to see what must be an obviously American influence on so much of what they read and watch... but no one is forcing them to do so day after day. Everytime they type in "www.abcnews.com" or tune into the Sopranos, I think its only fair for them to take responsibility for the fact that they are about to get information/entertainment from an American source - and should keep that in mind before their fragile minds are corrupted by the big conglomerates lurked inside those sources.
... Sorry, didn't mean to get sarcastic at the end there... I just think this whole "seperate european internet" idea is kind of silly, and the very definition of "unneccessary."
I realize that you took a very objective viewpoint in your post, so not all of this is aimed at you;)
Slashdot Mirror
"Why not?" led to the U.S. nuking Hiroshima and Nagasaki. "Why not?" led to the creation of antibiotics to cure minor ailments and inadvertently caused the surviving microbes to become super resistant, to the point where we probably won't be able to synthesize an antibiotic against many of them.
"Why not" led to our life expectancies doubling... "Why not" led to a man on the moon.
Malcolm from Jurassic Park was wrong when he said: "What you call discovery, I call the rape of the natural world." Why? Discovery is, in and of itself, a blank slate... It is neither Good nor Bad by default. It is what we make of discoveries - how we decide to use this knowlege that creates either a moon-walk or an A-bomb. The "rape of the natural world" is, unforunately, a symptom of human nature - not a by-product of discovery.
Second - The whole JP notion that "nature will always find a way to break free" should we ever bring back extinct creatures is plainly false. Nature, though immensly powerful, needs time to work its "magic." Putting a T-Rex (or a Mammoth, or a Thylacine, etc) in a cage and charging visitors 100 bucks a pop is not an inherinitely dangerous situation from a "nature breaking loose" standpoint.
Again, JP is a great movie (and better book) but do not go to it for valid science and/or an ethics lesson. We could *easily* have a live Mammoth to study and the natural world would in no way be upset, so long as we do not start breeding them and introducing them into natural environments, etc.
There are three things that the Radeon 9700 Pro can offer at this point:
... you had me at "0x1200."
1) The highest performance in current and future games.
2) The ability to play at 1600x1200 in just about any game currently available or soon to be made available, and
3) The ability to play virtually any game at 1024x768 with 4X AA and 16X anisotropic filtering enabled at smooth frame rates.
Heheh after submitting that post it dawned on me that spammers would either 1. not follow the convention, or 2. be excempt from it (because they are overseas, etc)
;)
Are there other methods of "forcing" compliance? I am admittedly ignorant on a lot of this stuff - this is why I am asking... Is it possible for mail servers, or perhaps even Internet backbones, to "notice" when many emails are rapidly being sent out from a few sources, and automatically tag them in some way? That is why I would think something other than a "ADV" tag would work... Perhaps more along the lines of a "mass emailing" tag of some sort...
Ahhh the more I think about it, the more I think we will be getting spam forever...
you have obviously never been to montreal...
This would require legislation obviously, but I think it would work... Just make a law that any automated email (IOW, any email not written by hand) must have any easily detected keyword in the subject...perhaps followed by the domain of the sender. This would have to effect both legitimate businesses *and* spammers, so there would have to be a way to differentiate between them.
So, if Barnes&Noble is sending out emails to customers, it would look like "Free shipping till December! [AUTO:bn.com]"
This way, you could easily implement filters in email programs to filter out all emails with the keyword in the subject to some "automated" folder, and could browse this folder at your leisure to read any of them that you would find useful...
I will google search for the answer as soon as I boot up my l33t boxen.
... have you broke the news to them?
Greetings Troll.
terrorists even use games such as Flight Simulator and Quake III to train themselves for the acts of violence they commit!
Yeah, last time I checked Flight Simulator was incredibly violent... Newsflash: Do you know who else uses flight simulators? Pilots... So if you outlaw simulators, you are hurting the very people who fly you to your weekly moron-meetings.
Also, for the record terrorists do not "train" with Quake3.. The have *real life* training camps with *real life* weapons... Shooting a bunch of aliens with wildly unrealistic physics and weapons damage would not help them in their struggle... Also, I find it hard to believe that any mouse-keyboard skills picked up on a local Q3-DM would translate well into a real-life battle situation. If it did than I might as well join the Marines because I must be roughly as dangerous as Rambo.
It's a well-established fact that religion causes violent behavior. Yet, somehow, we're still horrified and shocked by the recent string of child abductions, by schoolyard shootings, and by the wars in the Middle East.
*sigh*
Look - Religion is not without fault for some of these problems, but it does not inherintly cause violence... You are grossly over-simplifying the situation. My next-door neighboors are extremely religious and would not hurt a fly... Your "well-established fact" is easily defeated.
I think you will find that most of these "religious wars" are in fact caused by other factors, most often the control-of-land and poverty. Even the greatest "religious war" of all time - the Crusades - were in fact about reclaiming a conquered territory... Both sides (Christian and Muslim) hired mercenaries from the opposition to fight on their side... (look it up). Its nice to think that religion causes wars and that we are somehow putting all of this in the past, so I understand why people say these things.
What role does religion play in wars you ask? Control. It gives people with "motives" control over people, and also supresses their ability to question the acts of the leaders. Why should you fight for me? Because God wants us to take back the Holy Land, thats why - end of story. It also gives a suffering/poor people a reason to live - or so they believe.
To use your example of the wars in the Middle East... Think about it - If it was really a war of two opposing religions, how come the Muslims do not wage war on the buddhist monks, or against the voodoo pactictioners and witches? I am sure eskimos have an opposing religious view as well, yet they are probably not on Osama Bin Ladin's radar. - They are fighting over the land, plain and simple... If you moved the entire population of Isreal into Alaska, do you think the Muslims would follow and launch attacks up there? The funny thing is that Osama Bin Ladin himself has even told why he fights the US: our soldiers stationed in Saudi Arabia, and our biased support for Isreal.... Then, after saying this, he turns right around and tells his own people that its a "Muslim vs Christian" conflict to rile them up for his cause.
Parts of it were good... until you got to that wacky-pinball-DisneyLand-outOfThisWorld part... I lost interest realllll quick.
This is a good point... I couldn't really put my finger on why talking on a cell while driving was a lot more distracting than talking to someone in the passenger seat, though I just *knew* intrinsically that it was (having done both many times).
You can't seriously look at IE 5 or 6 and say that their dominance of the market is due only to unfair business practices on the part of Microsoft. Those two versions of IE are the best browsers running, plain and simple.
:) How many of these Joe and Jane Citizens do you think would find their way over to some obscure http://www.ie.org website to download an arguably better browser?
:) Its great - tabbed browsing, pop-up suppression, cool looking skins, and full standards compliance. :) The difference between us, however, is that I am not trying to take your choice of IE away from you... I just want to retain the ability to make a choice of my own.
I agree wholeheartedly that IE is way better than the old Nescape browsers (as I believe I said in my last post). I am sure that anyone running the Windows operating system who tested IE and Netscape against each other would have come out with IE on top. IE had every reason to beat Netscape based on merits alone.
Your average Joe and Jane Citizen do not test browsers against each other, however... They used IE because the computer they bought (which, of course, comes with Windows pre-loaded) has blue "E"s all over it which now has become synonimous with "Internet." Whenever they clicked on a link in an Email or in a seperate application, it opened up the IE browser automatically... Everytime they clicked the Start Bar, they were presented with their IE "Favorites" for easy launching... Hell, IE is now integrated into the file-manager. It would be naive to think that M$'s desktop monopoly did not play a huge role in IE's dominance.
Imagine if you will that tonight there was a "magical update" of sorts... While everyone was sleeping, the IE on their computer was replaced with Mozilla... So now there are little blue "M"s everywhere... Their Mozilla bookmarks are right in the Start Bar, and Mozilla was now integrated into the File-Manager... Also, Mozilla was given "behind the scenes" access to the Operating System, which allows them to load files on boot-up to increase the speed of the browser launch time, so that everyone thinks this browser is just inherintly faster... You think this might have an effect on the number of people who use Mozilla?
For the record - I think its too bad that your experience with Mozilla has turned you off to the point that you flat out say "it doesnt work"... Everyone I know who has tried it has not looked back since, myself included
Every company has an agenda: use our products or services instead of our competitors'. That was true of Netscape as well.
:) IE blew Netscape out of the water, and for that matter, was much more standards-compliant than Netscape... Nobody misses Netscape, ok? Just remember - Mozilla is not the same thing as Netscape.
...
:) Cute example, except for the fact that the standards were there BEFORE the absurdly-popular-browser. Look, I dont know how familiar you are with MS's overall strategy, but here is a crash course:
:) The key difference here is that MS is a monopoly... So when MS does it, their "take" on the matter is easily pushed out and very quickly becomes the *new* de-facto standard. If a non-MS company does these same tactics, its inherintly not as dangerous because people can always choose something else if they do not like their changes to the standard... When MS does it, they have just taken over a whole new market in the blink of an eye.
;)
No one in their right mind would stick up for the Netscape-of-old... Netscape sucked incredibly much.
You're trying to call the limited use of a graphics file format a harm? That's a stretch. Who cares if the graphics are PNGs
Honestly I am not passionate about whether or not PNG files are common on the web... but think about it this way: What if PNG offered some useful/neato advantage over some other image formats, and people would benefit from their use.... Wouldnt you find it unfortunate that a company could tell you not to use them on the web? This is the sort of control that we do not want to fall into M$'s (or anyone else's for that matter) hands.
You have a browser which is used by (let's just say for argument) virtually everybody. After the browser has already reached almost total market penetration, somebody comes along a develops a standard. The standard calls for browsers to work differently from how the absurdly popular browser does things.
Its called "embrace and extend"... This means that they "embrace" existing popular standards (e.g. W3C) - then "extend" them to offer "features" not found in the standard. - Now, this in and of itself is not an Evil or Bad thing... After all, as you mentioned the Netscape-of-old did the same thing and no one wanted their head on a stick, right?
Why is this a bad thing? Because now you have one company controlling what used to be an open and free standard. Why do you want to be limited to only one choice? Competition can only benefit you.
You believe compliance with standards is an absolute good, and therefore any browser that complies with standards is prima facie better than any browser that doesn't. I think that's wrong. Browsers, like many things, derive value from utility.
You obviously have no qualms with running MS software... That is a perfectly acceptable choice, and I wish you only the best in your computing experience. However, you are probably unaware (or indifferent) of the fact that you are being hijacked of any choice in the matter should you ever change your mind. Would you object if one car company bought out ALLL the other car companies, and only produced one "standard car"? Would the fact most people use this car (utility) make it somehow ok that we no longer have any choice what we drive, or who we give our money to?
If the standard doesn't reflect reality, it should be ignored.
This is true - but the standard *would* reflect reality if it wasn't for a monopoly (which, by the way, are illegal in the US) saying otherwise
... there is absolutely nothing intrinsically good about following W3C standards.
;) take argument with that statement... There *is* intrinsic good in following the recommendations of a 3rd-party and widely agreed upon standards body, as opposed to following a proprietary one. If M$ had its way, the entire web would only be readable with MS software, defeating the entire purpose of the web in the first place (as a standards-defined, accessible to everyone "superhighway" of information, yadda yadda yadda)
I would (and will
Now in this case, the standards body happens to be W3C... If you want to make a seperate argument that they in particular are not doing a good job at creating a Standard - go ahead... that is a topic for another day. However, the fact remains that we are in FAR greater hands with the W3C than if M$ was in charge... Keep in mind - If M$ has "innovations" to offer, they are perfectly capable of working with the W3C to implement them in the standard... They, time and time again, choose not to go this route, and instead opt for a proprietary one... (another example is diverting from the openGL standard with Direct3D).
I think a better question to ask is: What is the intrinsic Good in having one company control the Internet?
So ownership (aka copyright in the IP world) characterized capatilism.
;) ... You are right - the DMCA/RIAA only exist because they are tied up into the whole political "lie" they have created for themselves... That is the only reason why they have not been "broken up" - they are part of the "lie." Similarly, anyone who buys into the two-party system - anyone who votes either Republican or Democrat - is buying into the lie, and perpetuating the system.... again, this is a whole different topic for a different day.
Again, I dont mind that someone owns their products... The problem comes into play when I am forced to use certain products whether I like it or not.
'mainly by competition in a free market' that is mainly not wholely,
Heheh come on, don't you think you are sweeping from "mainly/not-wholely" to "absolutely none" a little too easily? Monopolies have been broken up or simply prevented in the past... Whats so different now?
You could also consider Buying the government as part of the free market and democracy. You vote for Jimmy, The Smith coperation 'owns' Jimmy, Jimmy passes bill that The Smith coperation believes will aid it's capatil indevors.
Don't even get me started on politicians - this is a whole seperate topic altogether
It is ofcorse true that capatilism is a self defeating system, where the idea of the game is to own everything and become a corporate dictatorship.
I guess in some ways this is correct... The free-market certainly encourages people/companies to be successful, to grow, etc... And I think in 99% of cases this is a perfectly acceptable thing... In rare cases when a company gets so big that it is controlling the market (monopoly) it is the government's job to correct the situation... What is the problem exactly? If, say, there were three car manufacturers, and they all got together and formed the AIA (auto industry of america) and began to arbitrarily set prices - I would have a problem with this too.
I understand that they are claiming "ownership" over their content... This is no different than Honda "owning" the Accord.
However, the key difference between the two is found right in your definition of capitalism: "prices/production/distribution determined mainly by competition in a free market." That most decidedly does NOT sound like the DMCA/RIAA... They have virtually nothing to do with competition at all. In this regard, they fall much more in-line with a government institution.. Think about it... They set prices arbitrarily because they have no competition, and they even "pass legislation" on fair use of their products.
To go back to my car example: Honda can own the Accord and do with it what they will... I am content with this because I know I can always go to Toyota/Volkswagan/Ford/etc/etc/etc if I do not like what Honda is up to, or if they aren't giving me substantial value for my buck. This is capitalism in action! Who can I turn to if I do not like the DMCA/RIAA I ask?
Your right... the parent message is not flamebait - yours is.
You could not be more wrong about your association of the DMCA/RIAA with capitalism.
Heheh yes yes I know...
Sometimes I just think people lose sight that things are much more beautiful in a natural setting as opposed to an artificial one (e.g. Xmas tree, the rose garden, a tiger in a cage at the zoo, etc) Ok ok I have officially taken this silly conversation too far... though it does fit in quite nicely with the parent topic.
... , and they are a wonderful symbol of life itself.
Thats just it - I tend to associate flowers with death in most cases... Its weird how people can take something so elegant, cut it down, put it in a jar, and watch it die for a few days.
If you like flowers so much, dont you think people/the-city should plant them around at various places - and then just leave them there??? Ahhh to each their own I suppose...
Unfortunately, there are other reasons to only support IE such as a reliance on the Windows Media platform... Our online radios use WMP (we used to offer multiple formats, but had to consolidate... for better or for worse, WMP came out on top)
The problem comes into play when you want to script against the embedded player... Many different browser versions (e.g. Gecko, even Mac-IE) do not have the ability to script against the player... And MS does not seem too inclined to fix the situation anytime soon. The result - If you need to use WMP for anything more than very simple actions, the Windows/IE combination is required. As a decent programmer and Mozilla fan, it kills me to have to turn away all other platforms simply because the higher-ups chose WMP.
Encode it with Rot13 and pray.
But the IMDB is owned and controlled by a sub corporation of the MPAA, and they fake most if not all of the movie reviews on there, so how can you hope to get good information out of it?
Is this a contest to see who can blurt out the most factually incorrect statements possible? Let me give it a shot!!!
You are smart.
Well spoken, but ultimately you must remember that there is no (reasonable) limit to the number of websites and/or sources of information out there... I personally do not feel that US culture or values are Good or Bad neccessarily - I read some "big corporate" websites everyday, but avoid other popular ones altogether. This is simply a decision that I have made for myself. Fortunately, everyone else on the Internet is entitled to an opinion and choice of their own. Some common rants:
Think CNN is a tool of the government to brain-wash the masses?
Solution: Read Reuters or the BBC-News or any other news site you find suitable. Better yet - read from several/many different sources.
Think Hollywood is controlling what the masses see and hear?
Solution: Check out IMDB... Read reviews from hundreds of individuals like yourself, and formulate your own opinions.... See and watch only what you choose to.
I can certainly understand why the author feels as he does - It must be frustrating for other cultures to see what must be an obviously American influence on so much of what they read and watch... but no one is forcing them to do so day after day. Everytime they type in "www.abcnews.com" or tune into the Sopranos, I think its only fair for them to take responsibility for the fact that they are about to get information/entertainment from an American source - and should keep that in mind before their fragile minds are corrupted by the big conglomerates lurked inside those sources.
I realize that you took a very objective viewpoint in your post, so not all of this is aimed at you
Officer: are they coming for tea?
:)
Trooper: No Sir.. I think its worse than that.. they have a FLAG.. (and saws)
Eddie Izzard?? He simply rules
Trooper: Sir, small green AT-ATs approaching!
... Its that loud "lawn-mower" sound... Kind of like a trash-compacter...
Rebel Officer: Damn! Are you sure?
Trooper: Yes, can't you hear it?
Rebel Officer: Oh yes... Whats the ETA?
Trooper: Well, given their current rate of speed, I would say 2... no make that 3 weeks.
Rebel Officer: Good work Trooper - We had best begin to pack up the base and move out by no later than... noon tomorrow.
Trooper: Roger roger.