I seriously question whether you are correct. I create quite a lot of stuff really, and what I am seeing is this: the content-control industries are steadily changing the ground rules to over-ride my right to set MY OWN terms on the stuff I create. I'm looking at potential situations where I no longer have the right to authorize people to copy MY OWN stuff, or even where I am effectively blocked from distributing any 'created' stuff of my own to anyone else without going through content control cartels. Understandably, I am _dismayed_, though I don't know much else to do other than to charge ahead trying to create more stuff while I still have any right to do so at all, in hopes I'll be remembered when the hammer falls.
Re:What an incoherent posting. Don't waste your ti
on
Why Community Matters
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Hi Ayn. Check out the 'User #' on your user ID, and on mine.
It's just that capitalism mustn't be allowed to take precedence over the needs of society. If that's a commie viewpoint then so be it. Otherwise, it's like saying that because growing is good, cancer is better because it's super-cell-growth! It should be held up as an example for all cells! *metastasize*
Great points! I'd just like to emphasise the importance of Madison- everyone ought to check out Federalist #10, which he wrote.
The deal is, it's not just about _fear_ of power. In Federalist #10, Madison makes a compelling case that there can be no dominating, majority power that does not also step on smaller factions and cut off their air supply: the difference between this and the generic 'anarcho-capitalist' Objectivist viewpoint, is that Madison correctly sees this as a Bad Thing, because Madison is looking at the health of an entire society, not just isolated members of it.
The idea is as follows: yes, more powerful members of society can stomp on weaker ones, but where some would say 'good! give 'em hell!', Madison views this in historical perspective, drawing the conclusion that this unchecked, natural tendency inevitably leads towards feudalism, rebellion and upheaval. It's like cancer: having the meanest cells grow fastest has little to do with the true health of the organism, and could be a serious liability. In government, it sets up imbalances and tensions that eventually lead to warfare and revolution, and the thing is this is not theory- Europe had been trying out different sorts of government for centuries, since the Dark Ages, and giving the toughest factions their way NEVER WORKED. All it did was further feudalism and set up revolutions.
So, Madison made the compelling plea in Federalist #10 for support of the weak... something that flies in the face of a lot of 'modern' thinking, but it's made from a thoroughly practical view of history. If you see to it that a little faction, or a weak and unfit person, gets supported, they may possibly benefit society in some way. Or not- but they probably won't be throwing bombs or plotting revolution either. It's not so much a fixed intent to prop up the weak, either- it is more an acknowledgement that the strong will tend to stomp all over everyone else- and a mature and merciless judgement that this behavior is BAD for society, not good.
To Madison (and myself, obviously), if you are an 800 pound gorilla, you have to be extra damn careful where you sit- because you could squish somebody very easily. And if you won't be extra careful and take extra responsibility for your 800-poundness, then you are in the wrong: because society is not about you. Society is the interaction between you and others, and if you're just beating them up that does not count as interaction- that makes you a drain on society, because you're doing damage that you cannot correct.
There are one _hell_ of a lot of corporations out there being drains on society, right now- too damn many. And quite a few individuals at all economic levels doing the same. If it doesn't stop, society's gonna suffer more and more.
As Madison (or Franklin) might have said- what have you done lately for your fellow man? That is not a trick question... or a joke...
I'd be perfectly happy to see 'em totally censoring sex, if they also saw fit to censor violence. I happen to think consensual graphic depictions of "oral, anal, and animal sex" are quite harmless compared to graphic depictions of violence. (The reason I specify 'consensual' is that rape is a crime of violence, not comparable to sexual kinks.)
I don't see a legitimate rationale for not having sexual prurience on the air, unless it's part of a more general attempt to prohibit harmful behavior. As such, prohibiting depictions of violence would be _necessary_- and to my mind it would be perfectly legitimate to also prohibit depictions of cheating and stealing and conning and lying while you're at it.
If you're going to 'clean up' airwaves, do it for real or don't do it at all. If you're trying to purify society, do it for real or don't do it at all. It's positively insulting to be told that it's evil and corrupting to view two consenting people fucking each other, but it's peachy keen to watch them torturing each other to death or shooting each other in the head. That is _real_ moral corruption, and I personally don't feel I can stand for it.
Looks like we've out-twinked Australia here. Ye gods!
The one bright spot is, with a bit of luck Britney Spears will be made illegal:D but damn, that's too high a price to pay, to give up:
"Sit On My Face", Monty Python
"Pink Thing", XTC
"Young Lust", Pink Floyd
"The Lemon Song", Led Zeppelin
"Dr. Jimmy", The Who
"Pictures Of Lily", The Who
"Whole Lotta Love", Led Zeppelin
"Tempted", Squeeze
"Take Me I'm Yours", Squeeze
"Spirit In The Night", Bruce Springsteen
"Night Moves", Bob Seger
"Rosalita", Bruce Springsteen
"I'm On Fire", Bruce Springsteen
"Let It Bleed", The Rolling Stones
"Live With Me", The Rolling Stones
"Stray Cat Blues", The Rolling Stones
"Brown Sugar", The Rolling Stones
"The Bonny Black Hare", trad. arr. Fairport Convention
"Back Door Man", Willie Dixon
"Roadhouse Blues", The Doors
"Maggie McGill", The Doors
"Pump It Up", Elvis Costello
"Let's Spend The Night Together", The Rolling Stones
"Let Me Take You Home Tonight", Boston
"Why Don't We Do It In The Road", The Beatles
"I Want You (She's So Heavy)", The Beatles
"Gimme Some Lovin", Spencer Davis Group
"Moondance", Van Morrison
"Boogie On Reggae Woman", Stevie Wonder
"You Shook Me", Willie Dixon
"Carmina Burana", Carl Orff
Assuming the FCC is not simply joking... perhaps this is a sign of the approaching final death of broadcast radio? Not only are they playing only about 20 songs over and over and over, but they cannot be 'suggestive' and intentionally prurient through suggestiveness? But gangsta rap should be okay!:P
I guess the major thing is to make sure radio is not the ONLY way to disseminate information...
Yeah, sure. What makes them special? It's not like they are a _person_. They are a legal fiction and a very entrenched corporate culture and a bunch of developers, suits, lawyers, etc. They should be disbanded and all the people should go off and get other jobs, which wouldn't be too hard (especially for the marketroids- yiiii). This would produce a wild flurry of venture capital and startups, and IT would get interesting again, and it would begin to make sense for small companies to innovate (in the traditional sense of the word) again.
Sure, not all of the activity would be useful, but I don't mind saying I _miss_ the days when it seemed like there was some new Netscape plugin or image format popping up every five minutes. It took a great deal of 800-pound-gorillaing to stultify the industry to the point where basically nothing happens and the big noise is a concept as essentially hollow and meaningless as dotNET... I think it'd be great to break up the logjam and get things moving again.
So yes, absolutely, I want Microsoft out of business. Come on, there are lots of other companies out there that you might like. If you're so dead-set on corporate welfare and protecting Microsoft from darwinism, did you also lobby to protect Apple through all the past and present times it's done really stupid things? Can't have it both ways now.
Hey, I stick to stuff that I can do. Right now, that means Mastering Tools, and getting my CDs together on a new site (Ampcast). I have a bit of money- it goes toward _my_ stuff, some of which is Free software (Mastering Tools is not GPL by accident).
Why does this work for me and not for Indrema? Because I'm managing my cashflow better. I've been shoveling money into 24-bit digital mastering to go along with the Free mastering/dithering software I've written, and it is exactly the amount of money I can _afford_ to shovel if I can live on ramen and spaghettios. This means I get hit with delays because it's flat out not enough money to accomplish everything at once, but the _cashflow_ situation demands budgeting and accepting the limitations- the concept is to move step by step rather than to seek financing to move all at once.
There are some things that I hope are in my future that would require financing- but that's all the more reason to consider cashflow, and look at the breakeven point very conservatively. Dotcoms were freaks of nature... in the real world your job is not 'make lots of money by whatever means', your job is providing whatever good or service will get you paid enough to break even or better. People forget this very easily, which is why I think they get excited about financing, apparently on the assumption that if you can get someone to give you loads of money, you win, and you simply spend it on advertising and marketing to have more people give you money and so on.
If Indrema is really dead in 30 days it can only be because it tried to play this game and lost. Maybe the better course would have been for Indrema to develop just as an idea for years and skip the next couple generations of console products, developing in the form of a virtual machine on Linux boxen. I don't know- but a real Free project can't die, it can only stagnate and gather dust. If Indrema can die, it's not what I thought it was- and seems less worthy of a donation from me. I don't seem them donating anything _to_ me. And if that sounds like a wiseassed remark, note that I've now put three separate near-Nyquist dither algorithms into the GPLed sphere, which any Free gaming console could use to convert internal 24 bit or better audio to 16 bit audio output. If you tried to license POW-R it'd cost thousands- Apogee UV22 is likewise a commercial, proprietary product, and I don't see anyone _else_ doing Free high resolution audio development. I am, and because of that it's available to any Free game console project, with or without actively involving me. I'm not aware of anything Indrema's done that does _me_ any good the way this could do them good.
Maybe the next bunch will have better cash flow management. I know I can't give Indrema money- I'm scrabbling to pursue my own projects. Though they don't know it, I've given them some very high performance audio tweaks- various aspects of Mastering Tools could easily be transformed into a Free game console audio engine that's very competitive with the coming generation of consoles. But they have to keep their own boats afloat first. Really, how many of us are venture capitalists?
Speaking of TRUSTe, apparently IE 6 will include a little status bar icon showing if the site has a privacy policy. Not if the policy is at all acceptable or not, just if it is there. Of course all MS sites will show "Thumbs Up OK!", where visiting any normal site will produce "Oh No! Unknown! Scary!"
Very cute. Don't tell me- implemented by IE 6 checking against a special feature on IIS servers, so that only NT and W2K sites get the 'OK' and everything Apache is 'oh no, unknown, scary!'
Only for a brief period until the bug is fixed, of COURSE... it's just an OVERSIGHT...
Do you really believe Microsoft _wasn't_ completely aware of every detail of the legalese for the anchor-point of their new services which are getting their full attention?
I would add one concept that's sort of a personal bugbear, and is the primary reason I left mp3.com as a music hosting service:
Stability - if I'm in a legal agreement with some site, and they have a need to change the agreement that applies to me/my property, I see it as absolutely necessary that I sign off on the new terms or they don't take effect. It can be as simple as a clickthrough, and it's fine if most people don't read their TOSes, but for those of us that do, it's not acceptable to enter an agreement in which you have to monitor the other party because they get to do any changes they want to the agreement, and you tacitly consent BLINDLY to these changes and are bound by them unless you not only devote effort to checking up on them, but are willing to read, understand and act on a legal document in typically a very short time period, days.
Microsoft is still behaving entirely unacceptably in this regard, in that they have you agreeing in advance to any changes they make. That's a really awful situation that is begging to be abused.
Examples? I can cite examples from mp3.com of what _could_ happen. They started a program called 'back the band' in which you got to write derogatory things on other musician's web pages at mp3.com, which caused no small amount of upset and resentment. The TOS gives mp3.com complete control over their own pages so there was really no recourse, it was just a nasty surprise. You still had control of your tunes and DAM CDs, though you didn't keep full rights. Well, some time after mp3.com went to the 'auto-consent' form of contract, they slipped by a few changes, duly announced on the site as they said they would do. Notably, one change gives mp3.com unlimited powers to change, edit, alter etc. your _music_. What could this mean in practice? Three words: Back The Tune. The change clears the way for mp3.com to legally begin doing auctions for people to place their mp3ed advertisements IN your songs or ON your own CDs- or for that matter, to do auctions for people to make loud farting noises and proclaim you suck, IN your songs or ON your own CDs.
That's hypothetical- but legally, it would be totally within their rights under the new contract- and anyone still sticking around five days after the contract went up is subject to it, whether or not they've been made aware that there are new rules. Some seemingly minor wording can have very major effects: when Back The Band started, it's possible that mp3.com did _not_ expect it to become a lot of people posting nasty remarks and attacks on people's band pages, and yet that became a major problem, as well as ploys like "(artist name) loves (advertised other page name)!" which openly lie- it's like writing on someone else's page, "If you like my stuff you should go listen to (other act)!"- the assumption is going to be that the artist is speaking. And again, under the new rules, the way is open for _audio_ advertisements and/or abusive sound clips placed _in_ the victim's artworks. And the reason that situation exists is because under the mp3.com rules, they don't have to get you to sign off on legal changes- if you had to actively consent to such a change, many people would rightly balk at it.
And of course Microsoft is reserving the right for _it_ to come up with changes without its customers' active consent- and I think that it, too, should be avoided for that reason.
Be fair. $1 piece of plastic, $3 of posters and cardboard crap to put in music stores, $3 to all the various recording and producing people (possibly including the artist) and $10 worth of paying off the radio station DJs of top 40 radio that you never listen to anymore since it sucks!:D
It's how _major_ _label_ musicians and songwriters get paid. It's how RIAA gets money to stomp out everything that might compete with it. I actually take pains to try and teach people NOT to buy 'audio' CDRs- because pretty much 100% of the people I'm telling it to are indie electronic musicians trying to work out how to do THEIR OWN recordings. There is _no_ justification for taxing them for burning their own music- they are the players that can least afford this, even though it's not a huge percentage. It just doesn't apply to people who are burning exclusively their own stuff to CDR- and people should avoid the commercial music CD burners and players that require 'music' CDRs and stick to the ones that work on any CDR.
Interestingly, this says nothing about tangible objects like CDs or whatever- it's not suggesting that you can't sell _physical_ _music_ _stuff_, and people have always sold that. Some people believe that after computers and the Internet, nobody will ever want to buy physical music stuff, which is silly- that's like saying if you've ever _seen_ a sunset you'd never want a picture of one to hang on your wall. And maybe you wouldn't- but there are people who would- you can go in freaking Wal-Mart and find literally that, cheap pictures of sunsets in frames. And you're not expecting to continue to find physical _music_ media being sold in places like that?
The thing is, internet music is like an _idea_ of music. If (as a WILDLY HYPOTHETICAL example;) ) I'd never heard the vocoder effect on Cher's 'Believe', I could tune in the radio and listen to crap for hours hoping to both hear that and recognise it, perhaps have it identified. I could attempt to spend my very limited money on something that I _know_ from context isn't what I generally like, and will also be premium priced. Or, I could tune in the Napster Radio, and discover that the only 'station' playing that tune is some guy off somewhere who ripped it off a rotten CD-Rom with LOUD obnoxious CD skips and zaps, as if I was listening on shortwave, but it would be enough to check out _what_ the effect was, and go 'Huh. Fancy that'. And then delete the file and be well pleased that I'd educated myself a bit on what was out there in the world, and never think about Cher quite the same way again because she'd permitted something rather far-out to be done to her voice on a #1 single.
For the record, as of now I don't have Cher's "Believe" on my computer or any form of media... unless you count Napster etc. as a resource, in which case I have ALL MUSIC coming in as sputtery low-fi anytime I want. It's plainly not a physical media situation in a case like that- listening to something you'd never be seen buying in a store? What's up with that? It makes of the music an IDEA, and if I really flipped over the idea it would make perfect sense to go get the physical product- don't know about you, but I've had hard disks fail, and I've had 'licenses' I'd paid for delete themselves, and I just am not interested in playing around with blending the virtual and the actual. If I want a record or a CD I will _get_ it. Virtual is NOT the same- arguably it's not as good, but it sure is more fluid. Like fire it is expansible over all space without lessening its density at any point...
It's not a _sensible_ argument. It's a potential _lawyer_ argument. As such, I think it's intentional, and they do plan to be able to obfuscate things in that way, so it'd be well to be ready for it.
Speaking as someone who _does_ produce things, you can take free software away from me when you pry my cold dead fingers off it- when I write something it's _my_ choice how to license it, not yours, and it's simply comical to see you insisting that free software will go away. Not a freaking chance, Sparky. What have _you_ written besides Slashdot comments?
Very good point, and very revealing, too: sometimes you forget that to some people, the idea of cooperating and behaving socially is not only bizarre but frightening and possibly dangerous. I think the accepted term for this is 'sociopathic'.
Rather than have open source outlawed as being anti-American *g*, maybe it would be good to question everybody in the country, 'why would people do this?'. Anybody who literally did not understand why people cooperate and behave socially would be locked up as a sociopath, on the assumption that normal people can choose to behave socially or not, but people who don't even understand the concept are a danger to others:)
Colleges != public institutions that don't hoard IP.
I am afraid you are far too trusting. I'd want to see clearer language. And I'd want some more background. Is this cancer foundation a 501c3 nonprofit corporation? What kind of IP portfolio has Oxford been building, and what restrictions are being placed on their researchers? It's sad, but colleges are the _last_ place where you should look for public benefit these days. They will pick profit over social benefit just as quickly as any corporation...
Better yet- the next version of MS Word still has a spell checker, but saves disk space for you by keeping work file caches on a special Passport server...
One of the implications here just hit me- and I am _seriously_ impressed. GPL people and potential license infringement policers, listen up.
So- you're finally suing Microsoft. You found they used GPLed code in something- or you're not GPL but they used your code anyway- or for that matter you're an ambulance chaser and you're just suing them because you think you can get a jury to think they stole your code. Whatever. Your argument is, "This == my code, that == Microsoft's product, thus == pay me lots of money for stealing my IP."
Here is the Microsoft defense's response:
"PROVE you did not ever transmit this code over a Passport property!"
Chew on that one for a while. And remember, these are the people who forged evidence in Jackson's court despite a blaze of publicity and sharp government lawyers! Now, what would they need to buttress their case that you had at some point sent the code/art/property through Passport? A server log, a user name, a password. Now, attend closely: WHOSE servers are these that they would need to find this evidence on? Of course they are.
This is a _damned_ impressive potential legal roadblock to suing Microsoft over IP, and it emphatically addresses the open source problem: basically, no matter who you are, Microsoft can use your code in proprietary software and _if_ you figure it out and sue them, it becomes your problem to prove that you have never used Passport and sent the code over it: and who owns the servers that would contain the evidence you'd done just that? One guess. The Microsoft lawyers now have a terrific defense against any such charges: they'll make you the defendant. If you insist you never used Passport- "Well, then, do these server logs imply that you used our service CRIMINALLY, violating our terms of service?".
The possibilities here are so evil and cunning that even I am impressed, and they don't usually impress me- but then they don't usually manage anything with this degree of subtlety either.
Just be warned. The "You must have used Passport" defense needs to be taken into consideration.
That's fine for the 19th century where 'service' meant going out and getting your shoes shined or something, but what about the 21st, 'everything is a service' century? You used to be able to _buy_ hardware (toasters, hammers, cars) that was just hardware, and there were organisations like UL that saw to it that you wouldn't get sold a toaster that would electrocute you if you spilled coffee under it. Increasingly everything is a service. Communication is a service. Interacting with other people becomes a service. Hell, soon your car will be a service- you'll be buying a license to run its software (that will say AS IS on it). What then? What, after all non-service, non-computer-internet-based industries have dwindled to the point that, in order to live a normal life, you have to choose which grocery service and which bill-paying service and which credit-card service you want?
Slashdot Mirror
I seriously question whether you are correct. I create quite a lot of stuff really, and what I am seeing is this: the content-control industries are steadily changing the ground rules to over-ride my right to set MY OWN terms on the stuff I create. I'm looking at potential situations where I no longer have the right to authorize people to copy MY OWN stuff, or even where I am effectively blocked from distributing any 'created' stuff of my own to anyone else without going through content control cartels. Understandably, I am _dismayed_, though I don't know much else to do other than to charge ahead trying to create more stuff while I still have any right to do so at all, in hopes I'll be remembered when the hammer falls.
We socialist anarchists were here first! ;P :)
It's just that capitalism mustn't be allowed to take precedence over the needs of society. If that's a commie viewpoint then so be it. Otherwise, it's like saying that because growing is good, cancer is better because it's super-cell-growth! It should be held up as an example for all cells! *metastasize*
The deal is, it's not just about _fear_ of power. In Federalist #10, Madison makes a compelling case that there can be no dominating, majority power that does not also step on smaller factions and cut off their air supply: the difference between this and the generic 'anarcho-capitalist' Objectivist viewpoint, is that Madison correctly sees this as a Bad Thing, because Madison is looking at the health of an entire society, not just isolated members of it.
The idea is as follows: yes, more powerful members of society can stomp on weaker ones, but where some would say 'good! give 'em hell!', Madison views this in historical perspective, drawing the conclusion that this unchecked, natural tendency inevitably leads towards feudalism, rebellion and upheaval. It's like cancer: having the meanest cells grow fastest has little to do with the true health of the organism, and could be a serious liability. In government, it sets up imbalances and tensions that eventually lead to warfare and revolution, and the thing is this is not theory- Europe had been trying out different sorts of government for centuries, since the Dark Ages, and giving the toughest factions their way NEVER WORKED. All it did was further feudalism and set up revolutions.
So, Madison made the compelling plea in Federalist #10 for support of the weak... something that flies in the face of a lot of 'modern' thinking, but it's made from a thoroughly practical view of history. If you see to it that a little faction, or a weak and unfit person, gets supported, they may possibly benefit society in some way. Or not- but they probably won't be throwing bombs or plotting revolution either. It's not so much a fixed intent to prop up the weak, either- it is more an acknowledgement that the strong will tend to stomp all over everyone else- and a mature and merciless judgement that this behavior is BAD for society, not good.
To Madison (and myself, obviously), if you are an 800 pound gorilla, you have to be extra damn careful where you sit- because you could squish somebody very easily. And if you won't be extra careful and take extra responsibility for your 800-poundness, then you are in the wrong: because society is not about you. Society is the interaction between you and others, and if you're just beating them up that does not count as interaction- that makes you a drain on society, because you're doing damage that you cannot correct.
There are one _hell_ of a lot of corporations out there being drains on society, right now- too damn many. And quite a few individuals at all economic levels doing the same. If it doesn't stop, society's gonna suffer more and more.
As Madison (or Franklin) might have said- what have you done lately for your fellow man? That is not a trick question... or a joke...
They will say:
Thank you, Ministry of Historical Perspective!
I don't see a legitimate rationale for not having sexual prurience on the air, unless it's part of a more general attempt to prohibit harmful behavior. As such, prohibiting depictions of violence would be _necessary_- and to my mind it would be perfectly legitimate to also prohibit depictions of cheating and stealing and conning and lying while you're at it.
If you're going to 'clean up' airwaves, do it for real or don't do it at all. If you're trying to purify society, do it for real or don't do it at all. It's positively insulting to be told that it's evil and corrupting to view two consenting people fucking each other, but it's peachy keen to watch them torturing each other to death or shooting each other in the head. That is _real_ moral corruption, and I personally don't feel I can stand for it.
You've got a... limited view of what being human is. That's fine, but it doesn't qualify you to make rules or even suggestions...
The one bright spot is, with a bit of luck Britney Spears will be made illegal :D but damn, that's too high a price to pay, to give up:
Assuming the FCC is not simply joking... perhaps this is a sign of the approaching final death of broadcast radio? Not only are they playing only about 20 songs over and over and over, but they cannot be 'suggestive' and intentionally prurient through suggestiveness? But gangsta rap should be okay!
I guess the major thing is to make sure radio is not the ONLY way to disseminate information...
Sure, not all of the activity would be useful, but I don't mind saying I _miss_ the days when it seemed like there was some new Netscape plugin or image format popping up every five minutes. It took a great deal of 800-pound-gorillaing to stultify the industry to the point where basically nothing happens and the big noise is a concept as essentially hollow and meaningless as dotNET... I think it'd be great to break up the logjam and get things moving again.
So yes, absolutely, I want Microsoft out of business. Come on, there are lots of other companies out there that you might like. If you're so dead-set on corporate welfare and protecting Microsoft from darwinism, did you also lobby to protect Apple through all the past and present times it's done really stupid things? Can't have it both ways now.
Breathe! Take a breath... that's good... good boy. Apart from that, how's your freshman year going? :)
Why does this work for me and not for Indrema? Because I'm managing my cashflow better. I've been shoveling money into 24-bit digital mastering to go along with the Free mastering/dithering software I've written, and it is exactly the amount of money I can _afford_ to shovel if I can live on ramen and spaghettios. This means I get hit with delays because it's flat out not enough money to accomplish everything at once, but the _cashflow_ situation demands budgeting and accepting the limitations- the concept is to move step by step rather than to seek financing to move all at once.
There are some things that I hope are in my future that would require financing- but that's all the more reason to consider cashflow, and look at the breakeven point very conservatively. Dotcoms were freaks of nature... in the real world your job is not 'make lots of money by whatever means', your job is providing whatever good or service will get you paid enough to break even or better. People forget this very easily, which is why I think they get excited about financing, apparently on the assumption that if you can get someone to give you loads of money, you win, and you simply spend it on advertising and marketing to have more people give you money and so on.
If Indrema is really dead in 30 days it can only be because it tried to play this game and lost. Maybe the better course would have been for Indrema to develop just as an idea for years and skip the next couple generations of console products, developing in the form of a virtual machine on Linux boxen. I don't know- but a real Free project can't die, it can only stagnate and gather dust. If Indrema can die, it's not what I thought it was- and seems less worthy of a donation from me. I don't seem them donating anything _to_ me. And if that sounds like a wiseassed remark, note that I've now put three separate near-Nyquist dither algorithms into the GPLed sphere, which any Free gaming console could use to convert internal 24 bit or better audio to 16 bit audio output. If you tried to license POW-R it'd cost thousands- Apogee UV22 is likewise a commercial, proprietary product, and I don't see anyone _else_ doing Free high resolution audio development. I am, and because of that it's available to any Free game console project, with or without actively involving me. I'm not aware of anything Indrema's done that does _me_ any good the way this could do them good.
Maybe the next bunch will have better cash flow management. I know I can't give Indrema money- I'm scrabbling to pursue my own projects. Though they don't know it, I've given them some very high performance audio tweaks- various aspects of Mastering Tools could easily be transformed into a Free game console audio engine that's very competitive with the coming generation of consoles. But they have to keep their own boats afloat first. Really, how many of us are venture capitalists?
Very cute. Don't tell me- implemented by IE 6 checking against a special feature on IIS servers, so that only NT and W2K sites get the 'OK' and everything Apache is 'oh no, unknown, scary!'
Only for a brief period until the bug is fixed, of COURSE... it's just an OVERSIGHT...
Do you really believe Microsoft _wasn't_ completely aware of every detail of the legalese for the anchor-point of their new services which are getting their full attention?
Stability - if I'm in a legal agreement with some site, and they have a need to change the agreement that applies to me/my property, I see it as absolutely necessary that I sign off on the new terms or they don't take effect. It can be as simple as a clickthrough, and it's fine if most people don't read their TOSes, but for those of us that do, it's not acceptable to enter an agreement in which you have to monitor the other party because they get to do any changes they want to the agreement, and you tacitly consent BLINDLY to these changes and are bound by them unless you not only devote effort to checking up on them, but are willing to read, understand and act on a legal document in typically a very short time period, days.
Microsoft is still behaving entirely unacceptably in this regard, in that they have you agreeing in advance to any changes they make. That's a really awful situation that is begging to be abused.
Examples? I can cite examples from mp3.com of what _could_ happen. They started a program called 'back the band' in which you got to write derogatory things on other musician's web pages at mp3.com, which caused no small amount of upset and resentment. The TOS gives mp3.com complete control over their own pages so there was really no recourse, it was just a nasty surprise. You still had control of your tunes and DAM CDs, though you didn't keep full rights. Well, some time after mp3.com went to the 'auto-consent' form of contract, they slipped by a few changes, duly announced on the site as they said they would do. Notably, one change gives mp3.com unlimited powers to change, edit, alter etc. your _music_. What could this mean in practice? Three words: Back The Tune. The change clears the way for mp3.com to legally begin doing auctions for people to place their mp3ed advertisements IN your songs or ON your own CDs- or for that matter, to do auctions for people to make loud farting noises and proclaim you suck, IN your songs or ON your own CDs.
That's hypothetical- but legally, it would be totally within their rights under the new contract- and anyone still sticking around five days after the contract went up is subject to it, whether or not they've been made aware that there are new rules. Some seemingly minor wording can have very major effects: when Back The Band started, it's possible that mp3.com did _not_ expect it to become a lot of people posting nasty remarks and attacks on people's band pages, and yet that became a major problem, as well as ploys like "(artist name) loves (advertised other page name)!" which openly lie- it's like writing on someone else's page, "If you like my stuff you should go listen to (other act)!"- the assumption is going to be that the artist is speaking. And again, under the new rules, the way is open for _audio_ advertisements and/or abusive sound clips placed _in_ the victim's artworks. And the reason that situation exists is because under the mp3.com rules, they don't have to get you to sign off on legal changes- if you had to actively consent to such a change, many people would rightly balk at it.
And of course Microsoft is reserving the right for _it_ to come up with changes without its customers' active consent- and I think that it, too, should be avoided for that reason.
(and if you think I'm joking...)
It's how _major_ _label_ musicians and songwriters get paid. It's how RIAA gets money to stomp out everything that might compete with it. I actually take pains to try and teach people NOT to buy 'audio' CDRs- because pretty much 100% of the people I'm telling it to are indie electronic musicians trying to work out how to do THEIR OWN recordings. There is _no_ justification for taxing them for burning their own music- they are the players that can least afford this, even though it's not a huge percentage. It just doesn't apply to people who are burning exclusively their own stuff to CDR- and people should avoid the commercial music CD burners and players that require 'music' CDRs and stick to the ones that work on any CDR.
The thing is, internet music is like an _idea_ of music. If (as a WILDLY HYPOTHETICAL example ;) ) I'd never heard the vocoder effect on Cher's 'Believe', I could tune in the radio and listen to crap for hours hoping to both hear that and recognise it, perhaps have it identified. I could attempt to spend my very limited money on something that I _know_ from context isn't what I generally like, and will also be premium priced. Or, I could tune in the Napster Radio, and discover that the only 'station' playing that tune is some guy off somewhere who ripped it off a rotten CD-Rom with LOUD obnoxious CD skips and zaps, as if I was listening on shortwave, but it would be enough to check out _what_ the effect was, and go 'Huh. Fancy that'. And then delete the file and be well pleased that I'd educated myself a bit on what was out there in the world, and never think about Cher quite the same way again because she'd permitted something rather far-out to be done to her voice on a #1 single.
For the record, as of now I don't have Cher's "Believe" on my computer or any form of media... unless you count Napster etc. as a resource, in which case I have ALL MUSIC coming in as sputtery low-fi anytime I want. It's plainly not a physical media situation in a case like that- listening to something you'd never be seen buying in a store? What's up with that? It makes of the music an IDEA, and if I really flipped over the idea it would make perfect sense to go get the physical product- don't know about you, but I've had hard disks fail, and I've had 'licenses' I'd paid for delete themselves, and I just am not interested in playing around with blending the virtual and the actual. If I want a record or a CD I will _get_ it. Virtual is NOT the same- arguably it's not as good, but it sure is more fluid. Like fire it is expansible over all space without lessening its density at any point...
It's not a _sensible_ argument. It's a potential _lawyer_ argument. As such, I think it's intentional, and they do plan to be able to obfuscate things in that way, so it'd be well to be ready for it.
*ahem*
Speaking as someone who _does_ produce things, you can take free software away from me when you pry my cold dead fingers off it- when I write something it's _my_ choice how to license it, not yours, and it's simply comical to see you insisting that free software will go away. Not a freaking chance, Sparky. What have _you_ written besides Slashdot comments?
Rather than have open source outlawed as being anti-American *g*, maybe it would be good to question everybody in the country, 'why would people do this?'. Anybody who literally did not understand why people cooperate and behave socially would be locked up as a sociopath, on the assumption that normal people can choose to behave socially or not, but people who don't even understand the concept are a danger to others :)
Colleges != public institutions that don't hoard IP.
I am afraid you are far too trusting. I'd want to see clearer language. And I'd want some more background. Is this cancer foundation a 501c3 nonprofit corporation? What kind of IP portfolio has Oxford been building, and what restrictions are being placed on their researchers? It's sad, but colleges are the _last_ place where you should look for public benefit these days. They will pick profit over social benefit just as quickly as any corporation...
Better yet- the next version of MS Word still has a spell checker, but saves disk space for you by keeping work file caches on a special Passport server...
"Surprise! Outlook Express has automatically upgraded you to a full Passport membership!"
So- you're finally suing Microsoft. You found they used GPLed code in something- or you're not GPL but they used your code anyway- or for that matter you're an ambulance chaser and you're just suing them because you think you can get a jury to think they stole your code. Whatever. Your argument is, "This == my code, that == Microsoft's product, thus == pay me lots of money for stealing my IP."
Here is the Microsoft defense's response:
"PROVE you did not ever transmit this code over a Passport property!"
Chew on that one for a while. And remember, these are the people who forged evidence in Jackson's court despite a blaze of publicity and sharp government lawyers! Now, what would they need to buttress their case that you had at some point sent the code/art/property through Passport? A server log, a user name, a password. Now, attend closely: WHOSE servers are these that they would need to find this evidence on? Of course they are.
This is a _damned_ impressive potential legal roadblock to suing Microsoft over IP, and it emphatically addresses the open source problem: basically, no matter who you are, Microsoft can use your code in proprietary software and _if_ you figure it out and sue them, it becomes your problem to prove that you have never used Passport and sent the code over it: and who owns the servers that would contain the evidence you'd done just that? One guess. The Microsoft lawyers now have a terrific defense against any such charges: they'll make you the defendant. If you insist you never used Passport- "Well, then, do these server logs imply that you used our service CRIMINALLY, violating our terms of service?".
The possibilities here are so evil and cunning that even I am impressed, and they don't usually impress me- but then they don't usually manage anything with this degree of subtlety either.
Just be warned. The "You must have used Passport" defense needs to be taken into consideration.
That's fine for the 19th century where 'service' meant going out and getting your shoes shined or something, but what about the 21st, 'everything is a service' century? You used to be able to _buy_ hardware (toasters, hammers, cars) that was just hardware, and there were organisations like UL that saw to it that you wouldn't get sold a toaster that would electrocute you if you spilled coffee under it. Increasingly everything is a service. Communication is a service. Interacting with other people becomes a service. Hell, soon your car will be a service- you'll be buying a license to run its software (that will say AS IS on it). What then? What, after all non-service, non-computer-internet-based industries have dwindled to the point that, in order to live a normal life, you have to choose which grocery service and which bill-paying service and which credit-card service you want?