Now, don't think I am trying to defend neo-nazis or anything.
Not to worry. It is clear that you are not doing that.
I think that the person that picked a victim out of a phonebook and decided to intimidate them and destroy their property should get the same sentence.
Equal punishment for equal crime. That assumes, of course, that the crimes are in fact equal. Do you believe that setting an unshaped fire on some random lawn is equal to making a flaming swastika on a jewish person's lawn, or burning a cross on a black person's lawn? Is the harm the same? Is the intent the same? (Notice that I said "intent", not "motive".).
It seems to me that they are not equal at all. The latter bear a message of ill-will, and an implied threat of future harm or harrassment. The latter can stir racial and/or cultural tensions, possibly even inciting violence if existing tensions are present. The latter can cause fear for a family or a neighborhood, fundamentally damaging their lifestyle (no more kids walking anywhere without a chaperone, or playing freely outdoors). This can last well beyond the more tangible effects of the act, and can affect more people than just the ones targeted. I don't believe that this would be at all equivalent to a random act of vandalism that can be repaired with bit of yard work.
No one should sit in jail because of their beliefs. Even if I think their beliefs are vile.
I agree with that. But the difference between ambushing a guy exiting a gay bar to make an example of him, and just randomly beating someone up, is more than just the attacker's beliefs. Both the intended and actual harm are fundamentally different.
The point is not that everyone should become a scientist, but simply that they not believe themselves dunces. The surest way to fail is to not try. And the surest way to not try is to believe yourself incapable.
Have you ever watched a small child learn? It's really quite amazing. And it is not only the exceptional ones that are amazing. It's a shame that the momentum is so often lost. I understand that the sponge-like absorption of language in early childhood is a developmental phase and can't reasonably be expected to go on forever or to readily transfer to other kinds of learning. But the fact that children do perform much better in some environments than in others shows that there is indeed some momentum that doesn't have to be lost. I'm convinced that there is a great deal of unrealized human potential in the world to such an extent that 'unrealized' describes nearly all of it. It's easy to talk about how 'dumb' the 'average person' is. But I believe that this dumbness is much more learned than innate. And I believe that when viewed as what they potentially could become, rather than what they often do become, an 'average person' is really a quite astounding thing.
Stop the profitablility of such activity by going after the people making money in the process, but, especially on the internet, this only servers to inhibit legal providers of porn.
A side effect that may not be unintended. If that pesky "free speech" thing makes it impossible to attack something directly, then its opponents will instead attack it indirectly. And what better way to do that than as collateral damage in the fight against something really heinous, so that few will dare oppose the fighting method for fear of being marked as a supporter of the heinous thing?
And can I pay to have my competitor's service not accelerated?
No. But large and wealthy content providers can collectively pay to have smaller and poorer content providers get degraded service. That's what happens when a priveleged group gets a disproportionate share of a finite resource.
And you can be sure that if this catches on, the resource will be very finite indeed. For the first time, ISP's would actually have a financial incentive to ensure that there isn't enough bandwidth to go around. This is just the sort of thing that can flourish in a monopolized market, or one in which there are only a few large competitors. Let's just hope that there's enough competition left to stall this.
Anything that had been deprecated to zero for federal purposes was taxed at 10% of it's purchase price.
What happens to obsolete software that you have a license for, but just don't use any more? At what point does it cease to be property? By destroying physical copies maybe? And how do you prove that to the tax collector? What if you had long ago purchased, for example, 50 licensed copies, but now have only a single installable copy that's been installed on 5 machines? Would you be taxed based on the 50 licenses that you can legally use, the 5 licenses that you actually use, or the 1 installable physical copy? If it's the 50 licenses, then how can you rid yourself of those 45 pieces of taxable property that you neither need nor want?
I can see this thing being an enormous nightmare, even outside of the free software, in-house software, and remote hosted software issues that others have already brought up.
Makes sense to me, since that's how it works with oher properties that you don't own but merely pay to use. Real-estate property tax is applied to homeowners and landlords, but not to renters since that would be taxing the same property twice.
Of cours, they'd surely meet some substantial resistance if they tried to assess a property tax on software publishers outside of Tennessee, since neither the property owner nor the property is in Tennessee.
If I was a small business owner in Tennessee I would definitely see a big benefit to open source (other than performance, innovation, etc.) by not having to pay additional taxes on it.
If you were a business owner of any size in Tennessee, you might also see an increased benefit in outsourcing your operations that require expensive software, putting some of the local folk out of work.
- Would you outlaw the supernatural from science if it does in fact exist? How do you then expect science to accurately describe the universe?
Yes, I absolutely would "outlaw the supernatural from science if it does in fact exist". Science deals only with natural phenomena and natural causes because only natural phenomena and causes can be tested and explored via the scientific method. If supernatural causes do in fact exist, then that would mean that science only explores a subset of what exists. And that is perfectly fine, because that subset is what it is good at. The supernatural, whether it exists or not, is opaque to the methods of science. If some natural phenomena have supernatural causes, then it will leave those causes as an eternal mystery because it simply does not have the ability to test them.
And to the second question above, science needs only to describe the natural aspects of the universe. That's what it's for. If you're looking for explanations that include the supernatural, then you need to look to something else because science is the wrong tool for that job. And to force the supernatural into science, is to render it a tool unfit for any job.
I'm reasonably convinced that Congressman Conyers can be counted among the good guys. But regardless of his thoughtfulness on these matters and probable good intentions, I am not at all convinced that this bill and other related ones are anything but heinous.
I hear from lots of people that artists don't care about piracy. While it is true that some artists struggling to make it into the business don't mind file sharing because it exposes their songs to a wider audience, many - many - artists have come directly to me saying that piracy is threatening their ability to make a living. I have heard similar complaints from animators, writers, grips, and cameramen, who have seen job opportunities diminish in part because of piracy.
I see no reason to challenge that claim in itself, but I don't see it as a valid justification for this legislation. Why should we protect the interests of commercially established artists and companies to the detriment of new, niche, or non-commercial ones?
I believe that doing so raises the bar to entry for new artists, and increase the media companies' stranglehold over not just an industry or a market, but even our culture.
We are engaged in a debate about whether similar technology that recognizes limitation imposed by the copyright owner should be required in other devices. My cosponsorship of this bill is intended to start that debate, not end it.
My biggest problem with all of this is that it doesn't stop at limiting what people do with other people's creative works. It also limits what people can do with their own creative works.
It also limits what people can do with things like news reports, political debates, speeches etc. Why is this important? Because this limits our ability to fully participate in our own democracy and protect ourselves against those in power who might seek to corrupt it. It is not so easy for the powers that be to perpetrate the lie that "Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia" to a populace that posesses and can distribute recordings of those same powers saying otherwise. Perhaps there would be some provision so that such things would contain an identifier that enables recording and redistribution. But the potential for abuse would still be present.
I really don't think it is possible to create any truly effective combination of DRM technology and laws that would not have a great potential for abuse, or at worst be inherently abusive. Because to be at all effective at limiting piracy, you'd have to tightly close the analog hole, the digital hole, and the privacy hole. That last one is so you can catch anyone who somehow manages to slip through any gaps in the first two, which will inevitably happen. To deal with all the existing technology that leaves all of those holes wide open, a non-technological solution is required. And that means laws. Laws that severely restrict the uses of such equipment, or even criminalize the mere posession of it. Laws with broad (and therefore, expensive) enforcement, and with penalties far exceeding the crime (otherwise it won't scare anyone into compliance). Laws that will destroy a great many livelyhoods and break many families before they seep far enough into the public consciousness to be effective.
I'm quite sure that the above is not at all where Congressman Conyers is heading. But anything less will not significantly impact piracy because it takes only one successfully unprotected and de-watermarked copy to feed that supply chain. But legitimate uses can be siginificantly impacted with far less draconian measures. Those uses cannot be served by a small number of law-breaking technical wizards. Those uses require ready and legal useability by ordinary people.
With all of the wonderful potential for individual expression and participatory democracy that these new technologies offer, I believe that we would be far better served by legislation that does exactly the opposite of these forced DRM and anti-ci
I think what he meant by "hardware firewall" is a dedicated machine, either purchased as an appliance or built as you describe, as opposed to firewall software running on individual users' computers.
I will support this law only if the owner of the VIEL patent agrees, indefinitely, to not only waive all royalties but to in-fact pay manufactures a royalty for every single unit they have to produce with this system in it.
I can't claim to know about every portable tape player ever invented, but of all the ones that have so far been presented as possible prior art, I see two very important characteristics that distinguish the Walkman-style players.
These are:
1. Speakerless. This yielded a smaller, lighter, less fragile, and lower power package.
2. Good quality stereo playback.
While one might make a case for obviousness, I don't think that any of the earlier players that I'm aware of would reasonably qualify as prior art, at least not in regards to the above two features. The old style portable cassette units were pretty popular. But in its time, the Walkman was a cultural phenomenon rivaling the ipod of today. It most definitely WAS something special.
"'Clinton never lied to the people...'...never? I seem to recall he lied about several things...blow job ring a bell?"
You are misrepresenting my statement. I said "Clinton never lied about the reasons for the US to go to war in Kosovo. You are a Clinton-basher and you do a bad job of disguising it. It really comes out later when you cry about being "sick and tired of arguing with angry Democrats".
When I first read your post, I noticed the potential for exactly that misrepresentation. I just wasn't sure if any would risk using a tactic so transparently dishonest.
Lots of people using the last bit of their vacation time to supplement their holiday time. Can't expect high posting on slashdot when so many aren't at work, now can we?
Uh huh. What's the pressure in a typical car tires? Usually around 30psi, right? And as it turns out, the air pressure in the tire is about the same as the pressure between the tire surface and the ground it touches. The tire spreads out until it has enough square inches in contact with the ground that the 30psi x the number of i^2 equals the weight of the car. It MUST be that way, because it's impossible for the air in the tire to exert more pressure on the contact region than it does on the rest of the tire, and the rigidity of the sidewalls is not enough to contribute significant support.
So the fabric withstood 30psi. And not supporting that pressure in free air like the tire has to do, but simply squeezed against a supporting surface. "Extreme pressure" my ass.
As to your church teaching ID - that's where it belongs.
If a church gives anything more than mere lip service to the ideal of honesty, then ID does not belong there any more than it belongs in a science class.
Viewed as science, ID is false and corrupt. Viewed as religion, ID is false and corrupt. The only institutions in which it truly belongs, are those that are false and corrupt.
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It seems to me that they are not equal at all. The latter bear a message of ill-will, and an implied threat of future harm or harrassment. The latter can stir racial and/or cultural tensions, possibly even inciting violence if existing tensions are present. The latter can cause fear for a family or a neighborhood, fundamentally damaging their lifestyle (no more kids walking anywhere without a chaperone, or playing freely outdoors). This can last well beyond the more tangible effects of the act, and can affect more people than just the ones targeted. I don't believe that this would be at all equivalent to a random act of vandalism that can be repaired with bit of yard work. I agree with that. But the difference between ambushing a guy exiting a gay bar to make an example of him, and just randomly beating someone up, is more than just the attacker's beliefs. Both the intended and actual harm are fundamentally different.
The point is not that everyone should become a scientist, but simply that they not believe themselves dunces. The surest way to fail is to not try. And the surest way to not try is to believe yourself incapable.
Have you ever watched a small child learn? It's really quite amazing. And it is not only the exceptional ones that are amazing. It's a shame that the momentum is so often lost. I understand that the sponge-like absorption of language in early childhood is a developmental phase and can't reasonably be expected to go on forever or to readily transfer to other kinds of learning. But the fact that children do perform much better in some environments than in others shows that there is indeed some momentum that doesn't have to be lost. I'm convinced that there is a great deal of unrealized human potential in the world to such an extent that 'unrealized' describes nearly all of it. It's easy to talk about how 'dumb' the 'average person' is. But I believe that this dumbness is much more learned than innate. And I believe that when viewed as what they potentially could become, rather than what they often do become, an 'average person' is really a quite astounding thing.
We should be teaching children that scientists are really brainy people, just like them.
And you can be sure that if this catches on, the resource will be very finite indeed. For the first time, ISP's would actually have a financial incentive to ensure that there isn't enough bandwidth to go around. This is just the sort of thing that can flourish in a monopolized market, or one in which there are only a few large competitors. Let's just hope that there's enough competition left to stall this.
or
4.) Recognized the flaw, but consciously chose to ignore it for the sake of compatibility. (bug-for-bug, and all that).
But I agree that your choice #1 still seems the most likely.
"Artist" in this context means "media corporations", and "lose" means "fail to gain".
I can see this thing being an enormous nightmare, even outside of the free software, in-house software, and remote hosted software issues that others have already brought up.
Makes sense to me, since that's how it works with oher properties that you don't own but merely pay to use. Real-estate property tax is applied to homeowners and landlords, but not to renters since that would be taxing the same property twice.
Of cours, they'd surely meet some substantial resistance if they tried to assess a property tax on software publishers outside of Tennessee, since neither the property owner nor the property is in Tennessee.
And to the second question above, science needs only to describe the natural aspects of the universe. That's what it's for. If you're looking for explanations that include the supernatural, then you need to look to something else because science is the wrong tool for that job. And to force the supernatural into science, is to render it a tool unfit for any job.
I see no reason to challenge that claim in itself, but I don't see it as a valid justification for this legislation. Why should we protect the interests of commercially established artists and companies to the detriment of new, niche, or non-commercial ones? I believe that doing so raises the bar to entry for new artists, and increase the media companies' stranglehold over not just an industry or a market, but even our culture.
My biggest problem with all of this is that it doesn't stop at limiting what people do with other people's creative works. It also limits what people can do with their own creative works.
It also limits what people can do with things like news reports, political debates, speeches etc. Why is this important? Because this limits our ability to fully participate in our own democracy and protect ourselves against those in power who might seek to corrupt it. It is not so easy for the powers that be to perpetrate the lie that "Oceania has always been at war with Eurasia" to a populace that posesses and can distribute recordings of those same powers saying otherwise. Perhaps there would be some provision so that such things would contain an identifier that enables recording and redistribution. But the potential for abuse would still be present.
I really don't think it is possible to create any truly effective combination of DRM technology and laws that would not have a great potential for abuse, or at worst be inherently abusive. Because to be at all effective at limiting piracy, you'd have to tightly close the analog hole, the digital hole, and the privacy hole. That last one is so you can catch anyone who somehow manages to slip through any gaps in the first two, which will inevitably happen. To deal with all the existing technology that leaves all of those holes wide open, a non-technological solution is required. And that means laws. Laws that severely restrict the uses of such equipment, or even criminalize the mere posession of it. Laws with broad (and therefore, expensive) enforcement, and with penalties far exceeding the crime (otherwise it won't scare anyone into compliance). Laws that will destroy a great many livelyhoods and break many families before they seep far enough into the public consciousness to be effective.
I'm quite sure that the above is not at all where Congressman Conyers is heading. But anything less will not significantly impact piracy because it takes only one successfully unprotected and de-watermarked copy to feed that supply chain. But legitimate uses can be siginificantly impacted with far less draconian measures. Those uses cannot be served by a small number of law-breaking technical wizards. Those uses require ready and legal useability by ordinary people.
With all of the wonderful potential for individual expression and participatory democracy that these new technologies offer, I believe that we would be far better served by legislation that does exactly the opposite of these forced DRM and anti-ci
I think what he meant by "hardware firewall" is a dedicated machine, either purchased as an appliance or built as you describe, as opposed to firewall software running on individual users' computers.
I can't claim to know about every portable tape player ever invented, but of all the ones that have so far been presented as possible prior art, I see two very important characteristics that distinguish the Walkman-style players.
These are:
1. Speakerless. This yielded a smaller, lighter, less fragile, and lower power package.
2. Good quality stereo playback.
While one might make a case for obviousness, I don't think that any of the earlier players that I'm aware of would reasonably qualify as prior art, at least not in regards to the above two features. The old style portable cassette units were pretty popular. But in its time, the Walkman was a cultural phenomenon rivaling the ipod of today. It most definitely WAS something special.
It's been done before. And with more digits.
Lots of people using the last bit of their vacation time to supplement their holiday time. Can't expect high posting on slashdot when so many aren't at work, now can we?
Sony need not worry. I'm sure Intel will happily sell vendors of such "legitimate" software a key to the system. It's you and me that needs to worry.
More and more, hackers and pirates are looking like a lesser threat than those who claim to want to protect us from them.
Here's the banner:
WARNING!
Your computer may be infected with SPYWARE!
Click here for a FREE fix!
Uh huh. What's the pressure in a typical car tires? Usually around 30psi, right? And as it turns out, the air pressure in the tire is about the same as the pressure between the tire surface and the ground it touches. The tire spreads out until it has enough square inches in contact with the ground that the 30psi x the number of i^2 equals the weight of the car. It MUST be that way, because it's impossible for the air in the tire to exert more pressure on the contact region than it does on the rest of the tire, and the rigidity of the sidewalls is not enough to contribute significant support.
So the fabric withstood 30psi. And not supporting that pressure in free air like the tire has to do, but simply squeezed against a supporting surface. "Extreme pressure" my ass.
Viewed as science, ID is false and corrupt. Viewed as religion, ID is false and corrupt. The only institutions in which it truly belongs, are those that are false and corrupt.