I consider myself to be somewhat of a music fanatic, and while my CD collection isn't big, it's not *that* small, either, at about 300 to 400 individual CDs. The number of CDs I bought this year? Two. There simply isn't enough good stuff on the market, and that which *is* good is overpriced, so one of those CDs was bought used on eBay.
Given the behaviour of the music industry, I'm not surprised they find it hard to sell their crap. Screwing over customers big time (see the recent Sony debacle), treating them as criminals, charging ridiculous amounts for a single album, filling albums with crap so that out of 12 songs, there are maybe two that are really worth listening to, shutting down good and useful services like mp3.com, undermining fair use rights, screwing over bands, suing single mothers and 12-year olds, and artificially narrowing the market to a few "top acts" (not even "bands" anymore!) that all give you the same mass-produced, soulless crap... those are all just symptoms of a fundamental attitude problem that the music industry has, symptoms of a kind of hubris that's pretty much unheard of in any other industry.
Are they *really* surprised that customers aren't willing to put up with all that crap forever? Contrary to what they're saying, I don't think so; they're just looking for an easy scapegoat, so they just scream "piracy! boohoo!" everytime they lose more customers. But it doesn't matter: until they actually change, they will continue to lose, and unless they eventually change, they will ultimately disappear.
When I bought my last CD, I got it directly from the band, who were selling their stuff after a concert. I got it signed by all the band members, and I had a nice chit-chat with the singer, too. It still was cheaper than most "mainstream" CDs; I like pretty much every song on it, and I listen to it regularly, as it's clear that the band are not just in it for the money - they are pouring their souls into their music, and it shows.
When was the last time you could say *that* about the latest Bitchney Spears CD you got for an outrageous sum at the local Wal*Mart?
Harrison wrote the song as a tribute to his friend Eric Clapton's chocolate addiction, and indeed he derived the title and many of the lyrics from a box of Mackintosh Good News chocolates.
So... it may not be a fungus, but you could drop chocolate truffles into a blender with the rest, too.:)
I really shouldn't reply to trolls, I think, but let me point out one thing: Wikipedia perfectly well knows what it is, namely, an encyclopedia, one that's free (as in freedom) and based on collaborative editing (that is, the bazaar approach instead of the cathedral).
I don't know. Livejournal, at least, has paid accounts, too - and what's more, there is absolutely no advertising on the site (other than what some users might post, of course), so it's not as if anyone else is paying for the service through ads, either. Those with paid accounts at least *are* paying for the site on LJ.
But of course, LJ is only used by pseudo-emo and -goth teenagers who post about how dark and tortured they are, right? I kinda anticipate responses of this kind, so let me just say that it ain't so - LJ is a blogging service like any other. And in fact, there are some very high-profile people on LJ, too (Dave Jones of Linux kernel fame comes to mind, for example. Look him up; his username on there is "kernelslacker").
I'm sorry if this comes across as a troll or flamebait post (it's not intended as either; it's honest criticism), but I've unfortunately got to say it shows in Mozilla. Many of the higher-ups don't seem to know or care much about the code at all. Mitchell Baker is just one example of an incompetent person with a high-up position in the Mozilla organisation; Asa Dotzler is another, as is David Baron. Now, the latter two may actually have contributed code (I think David has, at least; not sure about Asa), but both have shown that they ultimately care more about marketing than about code quality; and the founding of a for-profit (!) company that takes over from the non-profit we had until now shows what it's all about really: making money for a few while those who actually do the grunt work and wrote the code don't get a dime.
And that's not just theory, either: I use Mozilla (1.7.12) daily, and have for years, so I know what I'm talking about. The 1.7 series is supposed to be in deep maintenance mode - supposed to have been for a long time, in fact -, but still, it crashes or locks up on me daily — literally. There is not a single day where I don't have to kill Mozilla from the task manager or where it does not crash.
Quality is something different.
And it's not like I haven't tried to get these things fixed. I once tracked down a lock-up to specific conditions that triggered it and reported them on Bugzilla; the only thing that happened was that a few months later, I got an email telling me that there had not been any activity on the bug and that it would be closed automatically if there wouldn't be any in the future, either. Think about that: nobody confirmed the bug, nobody looked into it, nobody asked questions - nothing at all. And that's a lock-up — just as bad as a crash, and with the exception of a security hole, the worst kind of bug there is. But nobody cared enough to even look at it.
I'm still using Mozilla, but quite honestly, there is exactly one reason left why I still do: AdBlock. As soon as something similar for Opera pops up (sorry for the pun), I'll switch, and I will *never* go back.
Hear that, Mozilla people? You have lost me. And you not only have lost me for your current products; the incompetence, ignorance and arrogance you have shown means that you've lost me for good. As soon as I can, I will abandon your products, and I will never touch them again. And I will tell my story to everyone who's interested in it so they'll be able to see through the marketing and the hype, too, which seems to be all that you are focussing on these days.
I second that. The real problem with eBay is that it has no real competitors - there's noone else that you could turn to if you want to buy or sell stuff online really (not counting some special cases like putting used books/CDs on amazon), so eBay can get away with pretty much everything. Considering that most users actually *are* honest, they really don't have to do anything - the fraudsters will still be few and far between even if they do nothing, or at least few and far between enough to not totally ruin eBay's own reputation.
It's high time for Google Auctions. Remember how webmail quality suddenly rose significantly when GMail was introduced? (Let me just say "2 MB of storage on hotmail"...) The same thing would be true here, too, or at least I hope so: quality would rise and prices would fall when there's competition.
Remember, kids: capitalism is good, but it only works if there's competition. If there's none, it degenerates into a system where one company extracts all the money they can from everyone by doing pretty much nothing at all.
Money. A high market penetration allows them to convince web developers to use stuff like ActiveX etc. more easily, which in turn allows them to sell products to facilitate developing these things.
Re:Is the court's suggestion technically feasible?
on
Kazaa Owners Risk Jail
·
· Score: 1
Regarding the two-year duration, the Slashdot summary is wrong: the duration is *up to* two years, and the exact amount is up to the member states. Several states have chosen to implement a duration of six months only, which (IIRC) is the minimum that's allowed.
As far as Linus is concerned (I won't comment on the KDE vs. Gnome thing)... well, I'm not sure which Linus you have looked at, but the idea that "early humility" changed to "hubris" over the course of a "three year period" is pretty bizarre. Linus has always had strong opinions on stuff, and he's never been afraid to voice them (remember his discussion with Tanenbaum about the merits of monolithic kernels in general and Linux in particular? That was in early 1992, almost 14 years ago.
Really, the only thing that has changed is how people perceive Linus. He used to be just another guy; nowadays, he's a celebrity of sorts, and he's going through all the same phases that all celebrities go through: first, there is a horde of fanboys who religiously follow everything he says, but at a certain point, it becomes en vogue to religiously bash him and everything he says instead. This is the transition you're observing (and, for that matter, that you seem to be part of), but it's important to realise that it has nothing to with Linus or his opinions as such. (I predict that later on, things will slowly return to normal after bashing him is not the "hot new thing" anymore; and then, he will be idolised again, until the whole cycle repeats itself.)
If you actually read what Linus says - not just on this topic, but in general -, you'll notice one thing: he himself doesn't care. What he *does* care about is technical superiority and the like, but not politics; as such, he never has been afraid to speak his opinion, and he isn't right now, either, and - maybe most important! - he doesn't expect people to take it as anything except for the opinion of one guy.
You should do the same thing. If Gnome works for you and your wife - fine! More power to you. And if Gnome does not work for Linus - fine! More power to him! It's OK to have a discussion about the technical merits (and if you read what Linus said, you'll find that he actually bases his opinions on technical merit pretty much all the time, and certainly in this issue, too), but the kind of celebrity-bashing you're exhibiting here is just as bad as the celebrity-adoring that you mourn in others. Make up your own mind based on what you need; and discuss technical merits, but leave it at that, and respect the fact that others don't agree with you.
Or how about.. amiwm all the way! Seriously - do give it a try. It's a neat little thing that does what you want (or what I want, anyway) without getting in your way.
You really hope for a world where people will have to say "I have to be careful what I say", even if it is "just" on the Internet? Have you actually thought about the statement you're making there?
With freedom comes the ability to be disruptive; there's no way around that. Modify the world until there's no way to be disruptive and do things that are "wrong" (in whatever sense) anymore, and you'll find that it has no freedom in it anymore, either.
Things like anonymous speech etc. are good things. Like any tool, they can be abused, but you shouldn't blame the tool for that, especially if it's one that's so - well, not just important, but outright crucial for a functioning democratic society.
For those occasions where you're restricted to a text mode terminal, do give Joe a try - it's quite nifty really. And if you (like me) have a Wordstar background, you'll find it very intuitive to use, too.
It doesn't actually mean anything. "You may not rewrite this article" seems to be a weasel-worded way of trying to say "you may not report this news using your own words after seeing it here", but it's just that: weasel-words.
You are not allowed to copy the article verbatim, of course; that's covered by copyright law, although quoting parts of it would most likely be fair use. And of course, you're not allowed to copy the article and make small changes to it, either (creating a derivative work), but that's also covered by copyright already, so what AP is probably trying to say is "you're not allowed to write about whatever we're reporting here on Wikinews".
Which is stupid, of course, but people *are* falling for that kind of crap, so you probably can't blame them for trying.
That's non-standard analysis, though. If you do standard analysis, "infinity" is not a real number, so you can't take its inverse. (You might, on occasion, use a definition like "1/\infty = 0", but that's just a convenience thing really.)
In standard analysis, 0.999... equals 1 for the same reason that \sum_{i=0}^\infty 1/2^i converges against 2, for example - and that already shows why it's actually a good thing that 0.999...=1, too. Non-standard analysis is an interesting topic, too, of course, but it's important to realise that it's a different thing form standard analysis (hence the name) and will thus give different results, too.
I think the whole point is that when you don't have to worry about legal fees in a situation where you'll win the lawsuit, you won't get to a point where you run out of money and cannot afford to defend yourself anymore.
And yes, the IP addresses of (anonymous) people doing page edits are logged and publicised; but that still doesn't mean that people can be held accountable. If all you know is that whoever wrote a particular sentence in an article that's considered libellous or something else is that they edited from an AOL IP three years ago... good luck finding that person.
The big difference that Jimbo points out and that makes sense is that articles written by other users are likely on someone's watchlist, so that person would see the edit and check it out - I know I do that with articles on my watchlist, especially if the edits are by anonymous contributors or people I don't know. A malevolent user could still sign up for an account, of course, and get around the restriction that way, but I'd think it's safe to say that at least some trolls are gonna be deterred by that (although it's probably the low-level trolls who write things like "XYZ is a dumbass" in new articles instead of the high-level ones that write articles that look reasonable but are wrong in subtle but important ways); and if the problem persists, the system could just as well be expanded to people who have just signed up five minutes ago or who have not edited any existing articles yet etc. (Of course, that's just an idea of my own, and I'm not speaking for Jimbo, Wikipedia editors in general, the Wikimedia Foundation or anyone here.)
In the end, the lesson is probably that freedom also always means that people will be able to do bad things.
But look at it like this - even though there's almost a million articles in the English Wikipedia already, and even though Wikipedia is among the top 40 most popular sites on the entire Internet, as determined by Alexa, these are about the only examples of real controversy surrounding Wikipedia yet. I'd say we've been pretty successful at showing that the Wiki model *does* work - if the naysayers had been right, the whole site would've collapsed a long, long time ago. But it hasn't, not at all.
Slashdot Mirror
Absolutely.
I consider myself to be somewhat of a music fanatic, and while my CD collection isn't big, it's not *that* small, either, at about 300 to 400 individual CDs. The number of CDs I bought this year? Two. There simply isn't enough good stuff on the market, and that which *is* good is overpriced, so one of those CDs was bought used on eBay.
Given the behaviour of the music industry, I'm not surprised they find it hard to sell their crap. Screwing over customers big time (see the recent Sony debacle), treating them as criminals, charging ridiculous amounts for a single album, filling albums with crap so that out of 12 songs, there are maybe two that are really worth listening to, shutting down good and useful services like mp3.com, undermining fair use rights, screwing over bands, suing single mothers and 12-year olds, and artificially narrowing the market to a few "top acts" (not even "bands" anymore!) that all give you the same mass-produced, soulless crap... those are all just symptoms of a fundamental attitude problem that the music industry has, symptoms of a kind of hubris that's pretty much unheard of in any other industry.
Are they *really* surprised that customers aren't willing to put up with all that crap forever? Contrary to what they're saying, I don't think so; they're just looking for an easy scapegoat, so they just scream "piracy! boohoo!" everytime they lose more customers. But it doesn't matter: until they actually change, they will continue to lose, and unless they eventually change, they will ultimately disappear.
When I bought my last CD, I got it directly from the band, who were selling their stuff after a concert. I got it signed by all the band members, and I had a nice chit-chat with the singer, too. It still was cheaper than most "mainstream" CDs; I like pretty much every song on it, and I listen to it regularly, as it's clear that the band are not just in it for the money - they are pouring their souls into their music, and it shows.
When was the last time you could say *that* about the latest Bitchney Spears CD you got for an outrageous sum at the local Wal*Mart?
From Wikipedia:
So... it may not be a fungus, but you could drop chocolate truffles into a blender with the rest, too. :)
I really shouldn't reply to trolls, I think, but let me point out one thing: Wikipedia perfectly well knows what it is, namely, an encyclopedia, one that's free (as in freedom) and based on collaborative editing (that is, the bazaar approach instead of the cathedral).
I don't know. Livejournal, at least, has paid accounts, too - and what's more, there is absolutely no advertising on the site (other than what some users might post, of course), so it's not as if anyone else is paying for the service through ads, either. Those with paid accounts at least *are* paying for the site on LJ.
But of course, LJ is only used by pseudo-emo and -goth teenagers who post about how dark and tortured they are, right? I kinda anticipate responses of this kind, so let me just say that it ain't so - LJ is a blogging service like any other. And in fact, there are some very high-profile people on LJ, too (Dave Jones of Linux kernel fame comes to mind, for example. Look him up; his username on there is "kernelslacker").
I'm sorry if this comes across as a troll or flamebait post (it's not intended as either; it's honest criticism), but I've unfortunately got to say it shows in Mozilla. Many of the higher-ups don't seem to know or care much about the code at all. Mitchell Baker is just one example of an incompetent person with a high-up position in the Mozilla organisation; Asa Dotzler is another, as is David Baron. Now, the latter two may actually have contributed code (I think David has, at least; not sure about Asa), but both have shown that they ultimately care more about marketing than about code quality; and the founding of a for-profit (!) company that takes over from the non-profit we had until now shows what it's all about really: making money for a few while those who actually do the grunt work and wrote the code don't get a dime.
And that's not just theory, either: I use Mozilla (1.7.12) daily, and have for years, so I know what I'm talking about. The 1.7 series is supposed to be in deep maintenance mode - supposed to have been for a long time, in fact -, but still, it crashes or locks up on me daily — literally. There is not a single day where I don't have to kill Mozilla from the task manager or where it does not crash.
Quality is something different.
And it's not like I haven't tried to get these things fixed. I once tracked down a lock-up to specific conditions that triggered it and reported them on Bugzilla; the only thing that happened was that a few months later, I got an email telling me that there had not been any activity on the bug and that it would be closed automatically if there wouldn't be any in the future, either. Think about that: nobody confirmed the bug, nobody looked into it, nobody asked questions - nothing at all. And that's a lock-up — just as bad as a crash, and with the exception of a security hole, the worst kind of bug there is. But nobody cared enough to even look at it.
I'm still using Mozilla, but quite honestly, there is exactly one reason left why I still do: AdBlock. As soon as something similar for Opera pops up (sorry for the pun), I'll switch, and I will *never* go back.
Hear that, Mozilla people? You have lost me. And you not only have lost me for your current products; the incompetence, ignorance and arrogance you have shown means that you've lost me for good. As soon as I can, I will abandon your products, and I will never touch them again. And I will tell my story to everyone who's interested in it so they'll be able to see through the marketing and the hype, too, which seems to be all that you are focussing on these days.
I second that. The real problem with eBay is that it has no real competitors - there's noone else that you could turn to if you want to buy or sell stuff online really (not counting some special cases like putting used books/CDs on amazon), so eBay can get away with pretty much everything. Considering that most users actually *are* honest, they really don't have to do anything - the fraudsters will still be few and far between even if they do nothing, or at least few and far between enough to not totally ruin eBay's own reputation.
It's high time for Google Auctions. Remember how webmail quality suddenly rose significantly when GMail was introduced? (Let me just say "2 MB of storage on hotmail"...) The same thing would be true here, too, or at least I hope so: quality would rise and prices would fall when there's competition.
Remember, kids: capitalism is good, but it only works if there's competition. If there's none, it degenerates into a system where one company extracts all the money they can from everyone by doing pretty much nothing at all.
Flashing stuff on boxes all over the supermarket? That's got to be a nightmare for those suffering from epilepsy.
Money. A high market penetration allows them to convince web developers to use stuff like ActiveX etc. more easily, which in turn allows them to sell products to facilitate developing these things.
Kazaa is based on FastTrack, not Gnutella.
Hmm. In the words of the comic book guy: Worst. Codename. Ever. :)
Easterbunny?
Regarding the two-year duration, the Slashdot summary is wrong: the duration is *up to* two years, and the exact amount is up to the member states. Several states have chosen to implement a duration of six months only, which (IIRC) is the minimum that's allowed.
Actually, while we're talking math... let me point out that that's 3.5 cents per call, not 35 cents.
As far as Linus is concerned (I won't comment on the KDE vs. Gnome thing)... well, I'm not sure which Linus you have looked at, but the idea that "early humility" changed to "hubris" over the course of a "three year period" is pretty bizarre. Linus has always had strong opinions on stuff, and he's never been afraid to voice them (remember his discussion with Tanenbaum about the merits of monolithic kernels in general and Linux in particular? That was in early 1992, almost 14 years ago.
Really, the only thing that has changed is how people perceive Linus. He used to be just another guy; nowadays, he's a celebrity of sorts, and he's going through all the same phases that all celebrities go through: first, there is a horde of fanboys who religiously follow everything he says, but at a certain point, it becomes en vogue to religiously bash him and everything he says instead. This is the transition you're observing (and, for that matter, that you seem to be part of), but it's important to realise that it has nothing to with Linus or his opinions as such. (I predict that later on, things will slowly return to normal after bashing him is not the "hot new thing" anymore; and then, he will be idolised again, until the whole cycle repeats itself.)
If you actually read what Linus says - not just on this topic, but in general -, you'll notice one thing: he himself doesn't care. What he *does* care about is technical superiority and the like, but not politics; as such, he never has been afraid to speak his opinion, and he isn't right now, either, and - maybe most important! - he doesn't expect people to take it as anything except for the opinion of one guy.
You should do the same thing. If Gnome works for you and your wife - fine! More power to you. And if Gnome does not work for Linus - fine! More power to him! It's OK to have a discussion about the technical merits (and if you read what Linus said, you'll find that he actually bases his opinions on technical merit pretty much all the time, and certainly in this issue, too), but the kind of celebrity-bashing you're exhibiting here is just as bad as the celebrity-adoring that you mourn in others. Make up your own mind based on what you need; and discuss technical merits, but leave it at that, and respect the fact that others don't agree with you.
Or how about.. amiwm all the way! Seriously - do give it a try. It's a neat little thing that does what you want (or what I want, anyway) without getting in your way.
You really hope for a world where people will have to say "I have to be careful what I say", even if it is "just" on the Internet? Have you actually thought about the statement you're making there?
With freedom comes the ability to be disruptive; there's no way around that. Modify the world until there's no way to be disruptive and do things that are "wrong" (in whatever sense) anymore, and you'll find that it has no freedom in it anymore, either.
Things like anonymous speech etc. are good things. Like any tool, they can be abused, but you shouldn't blame the tool for that, especially if it's one that's so - well, not just important, but outright crucial for a functioning democratic society.
Be careful what you wish for.
For those occasions where you're restricted to a text mode terminal, do give Joe a try - it's quite nifty really. And if you (like me) have a Wordstar background, you'll find it very intuitive to use, too.
Well, what's the point of Wikipedia? It's just a bunch of people repackaging what they learnt from other pages they found through Google... right?
:)
Clearly, there's a flaw in that argument, and it's the same flaw that as the one in your reasoning. Think about it.
It doesn't actually mean anything. "You may not rewrite this article" seems to be a weasel-worded way of trying to say "you may not report this news using your own words after seeing it here", but it's just that: weasel-words.
You are not allowed to copy the article verbatim, of course; that's covered by copyright law, although quoting parts of it would most likely be fair use. And of course, you're not allowed to copy the article and make small changes to it, either (creating a derivative work), but that's also covered by copyright already, so what AP is probably trying to say is "you're not allowed to write about whatever we're reporting here on Wikinews".
Which is stupid, of course, but people *are* falling for that kind of crap, so you probably can't blame them for trying.
It's about graphic violence, not violence per se.
That's non-standard analysis, though. If you do standard analysis, "infinity" is not a real number, so you can't take its inverse. (You might, on occasion, use a definition like "1/\infty = 0", but that's just a convenience thing really.)
In standard analysis, 0.999... equals 1 for the same reason that \sum_{i=0}^\infty 1/2^i converges against 2, for example - and that already shows why it's actually a good thing that 0.999...=1, too. Non-standard analysis is an interesting topic, too, of course, but it's important to realise that it's a different thing form standard analysis (hence the name) and will thus give different results, too.
Which?
I think the whole point is that when you don't have to worry about legal fees in a situation where you'll win the lawsuit, you won't get to a point where you run out of money and cannot afford to defend yourself anymore.
(Disclaimer: I'm a relatively active editor on Wikipedia, although under a different name than this.)
.
The article in question is right here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Seigenthaler_Sr
And yes, the IP addresses of (anonymous) people doing page edits are logged and publicised; but that still doesn't mean that people can be held accountable. If all you know is that whoever wrote a particular sentence in an article that's considered libellous or something else is that they edited from an AOL IP three years ago... good luck finding that person.
The big difference that Jimbo points out and that makes sense is that articles written by other users are likely on someone's watchlist, so that person would see the edit and check it out - I know I do that with articles on my watchlist, especially if the edits are by anonymous contributors or people I don't know. A malevolent user could still sign up for an account, of course, and get around the restriction that way, but I'd think it's safe to say that at least some trolls are gonna be deterred by that (although it's probably the low-level trolls who write things like "XYZ is a dumbass" in new articles instead of the high-level ones that write articles that look reasonable but are wrong in subtle but important ways); and if the problem persists, the system could just as well be expanded to people who have just signed up five minutes ago or who have not edited any existing articles yet etc. (Of course, that's just an idea of my own, and I'm not speaking for Jimbo, Wikipedia editors in general, the Wikimedia Foundation or anyone here.)
In the end, the lesson is probably that freedom also always means that people will be able to do bad things.
But look at it like this - even though there's almost a million articles in the English Wikipedia already, and even though Wikipedia is among the top 40 most popular sites on the entire Internet, as determined by Alexa, these are about the only examples of real controversy surrounding Wikipedia yet. I'd say we've been pretty successful at showing that the Wiki model *does* work - if the naysayers had been right, the whole site would've collapsed a long, long time ago. But it hasn't, not at all.
So we must be doing something right.
Actually... anyone with half a brain would realise that this is a case of fraud, not stealing. :) Or, even more precisely, attempted fraud.