Here's a different thought. Why should society honor Lexmark's wishes that nobody else sell cartriges for their printers?
The only real answer is that an unintended effect of a law says they can. It's a stupid answer. This is a problem created by a law which can be fixed by ammending the law. It's not so hard.
Sure, in an ideal market full of consumers with infinite free time to completely research every little purchase it might not matter. Back in the real world, there is nothing to gain by legally honoring Lexmark's little trick.
Our GDP is $10e12, theirs is $6e12, i.e. they make 60%. But wait a minute, scientists and engineers dont make six figures in China, do they? Figuring rougly $100K for scientists and engineers of the required calibre in the US, China can afford the same number at $60K, or twice as many at $30K. Considering US graduate schools are full of Chinese students, their talent is or will soon be at least as good as ours.
Most people already aren't buying, that doesn't protect them. State-wide do not call lists, on the other hand, have proven highly effective. The market didn't "take care of it," the new law will.
I really think Micropayments might revamp the Web if they caught on. The profit motive is strong!
But having dozens of companies try to do it on their own has failed. None is universal enough to be worth the bother.
The govt should step in and institute a micropayment system for all transactions over 5 cents, and handle transactions, for free. (Okay, included in your annual tax bill to be precise). This would avoid the lack of trust, conflicting standards, and huge advertising costs that have caused other attempts to fail. And a centralized system prevents multiple spending, paving the way for anonymous e-cash. Once a standard interface to micropayments exists, it will quickly be integrated with browsers to increase convenience.
Yes, it would cost money to get it going, and to run it. But so does printing cash and stamps, and running the Secret Service and SEC. We need new ideas and new markets to revamp our ailing economy, and this seems almost like a no-brainer. Establishing common currency is a good way for govt to facilitate trade.
Interesting... could you clarify what sort of componentized browser you're after? We certainly can't go with Active-X, it's tied to windows and the security is next to nonexistent. Java seems to have a very good security record, but maybe it's not quite what you mean? How about the component architecture of Mozilla? That's supposed to be pretty cool.
Personally I'm a bit down on components and more "up" on open source. A stock component is never quite what you want and binary components require a lot of infrastructore. Given open source and dynamic linking, components don't seem to offer a whole lot more.
Correct. Other than the Shuttle program itself (which is aging but still a marvel of human engineering) and all of the science that has resulted from it, the Voyager missions to explore the outer solar system, the Viking and Pathfinder missions to Mars (the latter of which involved JPL actually driving a rover around on the surface of the planet) and the resulting hundredfold increase in mankind's knowledge of Mars, the Galileo mission that spent years studying and providing unprecedented amounts of information on the Jovian (that's Jupiter) system, the Cassini mission that will do the same in the Saturnian system, the Deep Space 1 mission that involved an actual rendezvous with comet Borrelly, numerous Earth science projects that enable us to map this planet, monitor resources, respond to disasters, and deal with everything from famine to forest fires, the International Space Station, and the Chandra X-ray Observatory. Oh, and then there's that Hubble thing, which has expanded mankind's knowledge of the universe more than any other instrument in history. And I'm sure I'm forgetting several prominent projects (sorry, fellas.)
And oddly enough the two items in that list related to manned space flight (the Shuttle and the ISS) are the two most expensive and least producing.
And don't count the Hubble. The Shuttle is so expensive it would have been better to simply deorbit the defective Hubble and make another one.
Common sense aside, I would think the blind and others with relatively common disabilities are on pretty sound legal footing under the ADA and other similar laws.
On top of problems for the handicapped, I am troubled by the prospect of intentionally hobbling electronic access to information. The information is obfuscated not just to spammers (and the blind), but to everybody else. Want to make a software Web Agent? Sorry, you can't. Archive the information? Don't worry, it's only 10x larger in obfuscated form.... oh, and you'll never be able to search it! Tying information down to its "intended use" has lots of unforseen effects, mostly bad I would argue.
We're intentionally degrading information exchange and why? To protect spam?
I think not. The whole economy of spam is based on extremely low yeild, but even more extreemly cheap messaging. Even one cent per spam would drastically change the whole issue.
Rumor has it the military has quite a few other technologies that would also be inappropriate for domestic use, such as:
Nuclear Warheads
Cruise Missiles
Stealth Bombers
.. and the list goes on. In fact of all military technologies studied, only the Nuclear Submarine showed little potential for deployment within the continental US.
But seriously, this just shows that the existence of a technology doesn't mean the police have to posess it. It is up to the general public to say, "sorry cops, that's one toy you won't be getting for Christmas."
The extra 3 lbs is bad, but let's not hold Apple's 17" laptop up the ideal. I've seen it, it's a monster. Not really Apple's fault, but a 17" "laptop" will always be a specialty item, even when 17" screens are virtually free.
I have several computers running, and I don't even remember when I did the "original" install. To put it on a new machine each time I restore a tarfile backup of some other machine, then tailor what needs tailoring. Works for me.
Their only stated motivation for not just releasing the exploit is that it would open the door not just to Linux but also to game piracy, and they don't want to be tainted with that. I can't think of another motivation that makes sense.
Meanwhile, the slashdot conventional wisdom is that they'd be justified (though maybe breaking a law) to just release the exploit, and I agree with that.
MS would like nothing more than to portray this as an act of terrorism, and to discredit DRM exploits in general. For whatever reason, the story was written up in exactly that way, leading the herd to charges of blackmail. I don't see where your accusation of anti-X (box?) rhetoric comes from; it seems in this case the slashdot mob is forming up in favor of the IP holder.
My first thought was pretty similar - if this leads to finding e.g. bacteria fossils, how exciting is that? Is mars far enough from earth that this would indicate life is probably "all over" the universe, or might that mars life have a common source with our own?
But so many copyrights aren't actively maintained at all. After 50 years, most of the individuals with copyrights will be dead, for pete's sake. And the reason this idea stands even a 1% chance is because it will make no difference to e.g. disney.
It's not about smart, it's about money.
The "good guys" generally don't have the money to take on the "bad guys". The "bad guys" are "bad" because they have money - LOTS of money. The "good guys" are "good", generally, because they don't.
legal battles are enormously expensive, but ususally when I see how much a congressman has been paid by a business, it's a fairly small amount, like $20K, and I think, is that all it takes?
That's only enough to employ an engineer for about a month. I don't there's a reason why techies couldn't form a PAC.
If Kazaa plans on making money from using other people's bandwidth, isn't that going to be in violation of some ISP's service agreements? I know my ISP prohibts "commercial" use, so if I share files and for which I am paid in some form, wouldn't that in violation of that agreement?
Uhh, somehow I don't you're the one who's going to get paid.
Granted, they don't seem to mind p2p right now unless they get a notice from the RIAA/MPAA, but if Kazaa goes legit I could see them demanding a piece of the pie too.
Yes, the wouldn't propose this if there were nothing in it for them. But that's no more a "commercial" use of the service than buying something on ebay.
I don't know how fair that is when most x86 executables were built with Visual C, but I do like it, because it might motivate Intel to give gcc a boost.
So goes the conventional wisdom. But in the past 10 years I've lived in 2 cities that widened their freeways, and I have to say in both cases it was a really nice improvement and rush hour traffic is much faster now.
Slashdot Mirror
The only real answer is that an unintended effect of a law says they can. It's a stupid answer. This is a problem created by a law which can be fixed by ammending the law. It's not so hard.
Sure, in an ideal market full of consumers with infinite free time to completely research every little purchase it might not matter. Back in the real world, there is nothing to gain by legally honoring Lexmark's little trick.
Our GDP is $10e12, theirs is $6e12, i.e. they make 60%. But wait a minute, scientists and engineers dont make six figures in China, do they? Figuring rougly $100K for scientists and engineers of the required calibre in the US, China can afford the same number at $60K, or twice as many at $30K. Considering US graduate schools are full of Chinese students, their talent is or will soon be at least as good as ours.
Most people already aren't buying, that doesn't protect them. State-wide do not call lists, on the other hand, have proven highly effective. The market didn't "take care of it," the new law will.
But having dozens of companies try to do it on their own has failed. None is universal enough to be worth the bother.
The govt should step in and institute a micropayment system for all transactions over 5 cents, and handle transactions, for free. (Okay, included in your annual tax bill to be precise). This would avoid the lack of trust, conflicting standards, and huge advertising costs that have caused other attempts to fail. And a centralized system prevents multiple spending, paving the way for anonymous e-cash. Once a standard interface to micropayments exists, it will quickly be integrated with browsers to increase convenience.
Yes, it would cost money to get it going, and to run it. But so does printing cash and stamps, and running the Secret Service and SEC. We need new ideas and new markets to revamp our ailing economy, and this seems almost like a no-brainer. Establishing common currency is a good way for govt to facilitate trade.
Personally I'm a bit down on components and more "up" on open source. A stock component is never quite what you want and binary components require a lot of infrastructore. Given open source and dynamic linking, components don't seem to offer a whole lot more.
And don't count the Hubble. The Shuttle is so expensive it would have been better to simply deorbit the defective Hubble and make another one.
And if it's true this would be a trillion dollar program, how many ICBMs with conventional warheads could we make for that kind of cash?
On top of problems for the handicapped, I am troubled by the prospect of intentionally hobbling electronic access to information. The information is obfuscated not just to spammers (and the blind), but to everybody else. Want to make a software Web Agent? Sorry, you can't. Archive the information? Don't worry, it's only 10x larger in obfuscated form.... oh, and you'll never be able to search it! Tying information down to its "intended use" has lots of unforseen effects, mostly bad I would argue.
We're intentionally degrading information exchange and why? To protect spam?
I think not. The whole economy of spam is based on extremely low yeild, but even more extreemly cheap messaging. Even one cent per spam would drastically change the whole issue.
But seriously, this just shows that the existence of a technology doesn't mean the police have to posess it. It is up to the general public to say, "sorry cops, that's one toy you won't be getting for Christmas."
I'ts silly to compare the apple to this thing directly when none of the performance specs are the same.
The extra 3 lbs is bad, but let's not hold Apple's 17" laptop up the ideal. I've seen it, it's a monster. Not really Apple's fault, but a 17" "laptop" will always be a specialty item, even when 17" screens are virtually free.
In some sense, that would just be redeveloping Quake 1, so why bother?
What I look for as a consumer is this - a head-to-head comparison of several generations of cards. That's where you can find the sweet spot.
I have several computers running, and I don't even remember when I did the "original" install. To put it on a new machine each time I restore a tarfile backup of some other machine, then tailor what needs tailoring. Works for me.
Meanwhile, the slashdot conventional wisdom is that they'd be justified (though maybe breaking a law) to just release the exploit, and I agree with that.
MS would like nothing more than to portray this as an act of terrorism, and to discredit DRM exploits in general. For whatever reason, the story was written up in exactly that way, leading the herd to charges of blackmail. I don't see where your accusation of anti-X (box?) rhetoric comes from; it seems in this case the slashdot mob is forming up in favor of the IP holder.
Good luck persuading the two sides of the abortion debate to call themselves "Anti-Choice" and "Anti-Life."
My first thought was pretty similar - if this leads to finding e.g. bacteria fossils, how exciting is that? Is mars far enough from earth that this would indicate life is probably "all over" the universe, or might that mars life have a common source with our own?
But so many copyrights aren't actively maintained at all. After 50 years, most of the individuals with copyrights will be dead, for pete's sake. And the reason this idea stands even a 1% chance is because it will make no difference to e.g. disney.
I don't know how fair that is when most x86 executables were built with Visual C, but I do like it, because it might motivate Intel to give gcc a boost.