That's untrue, though. Have you ever seen how much merchandise there is for - for example - Spongebob Squarepants? It's an insane amount really, so don't tell us that the shows itself are entirely irrelevant and that the only money comes from advertising. It may be true for some shows, maybe even many (but that's hard to determine), but it certainly isn't for all of them.
Oh yeah, and don't forget shows that are made into movies - that's another source of income not related to advertising. Again, Spongebob is a good example...
Wow, thanks for making that clear. And here I was thinking "pirating" referred to sailing the seven seas, hunting down other ships, stealing treasures and brutally killing people.
How wrong I was - obviously, copying a show recorded on TV is much worse than that.
No need to do that: you can just go to http://download.wikimedia.org/ and download the whole database. Furthermore, I think an important difference here is that Wikipedia's content is actually licensed under the GFDL - i.e., it's free as in freedom, not just as in beer. Many people tend to not notice and/or care about things like that until it's too late, but it really means that the database cannot be "locked" - at least not unless you'd get each and every single contributor to agree in a legally binding fashion, which, considering that a) contributors are from all over the world and b) many contributions come from anonymous people, would be practically (and most likely even theoretically) impossible.
Again, RTFA. Nobody says Google has to do this or that; quite the opposite. Google is one of the parties telling people what to do - namely, to honour the TOS they agreed to.
The other party who's telling people what to do is the Brazilian police (and, thus, the Brazilian government), and as long as they're regulating what Brazilian people are allowed to do, it certainly is within their rights to do so.
Do you have any examples of racist comments on slashdot being modded up? I'm not saying it doesn't happen, but I'm not really sure about "many" - I can't say I've ever seen one myself really, and I do read (parts of) slashdot quite extensively.
True (although it might be for users from Brazil who indulge in racism like that).
That being said... are you sure that saying that in the USSR under Stalin's regime, more people were killed than in the Holocaust (which I guess is what you mean) would be illegal in the Netherlands? I'm not from there myself, and IANAL, but based on what I know about legislation in other countries (such as Germany), I'd be surprised. In Germany, for example, at least from what I know, it's only illegal to promote the idea that the Holocaust didn't happen - comparing it to other things or belittling what happened there won't get you into legal trouble as long as you don't deny the facts.
But, as I said, that's just Germany, and I may be wrong, too. I would be surprised if legislation in the Netherlands differed all that much, though - so, are you sure about that? (Thanks.:) I'd just be interested in hearing about it)
RTFA. Many of the offending users aren't from the USA (which is not a surprise considering the majority of Orkut users in general aren't), and many countries outside the USA (Brazil, many European countries and so on) *do* have legislation against hate speech.
Furthermore, as was already pointed out, it's also a violation of the TOS, so even in cases where there's no crime being committed, people are still abusing the service.
While I don't agree with the grandparent's implied point of view that it's necessarily OK to copy Photoshop (for example) just because you wouldn't buy it anyway, I also don't agree with the statement "it's only 99 dollars so you can afford it".
Maybe you can if you are a college kid with rich parents who will buy it for you if you tell them you need it for school. Maybe you can if you have a decent-paying job in the IT industry. Maybe you can if you're a middle-class US-american.
But not all people fall in that category, and 99 dollars is not an amount where I think it's justified to just *assume* that everyone can afford that, no matter what (even if you limit yourself to people who can afford a computer).
"Because of the wide-spread piracy the poor CEO of [insert name] studio won't be able to afford a Ferrari for his 16 year old daughter. Look what piracy has done! His daughter will be forced to drive a BMW now. How does that make you feel?"
Now that would actually be something I could understand. Nobody should be forced to drive a BMW, ever.
Isn't "monolithic server farm" a contradiction in terms? Either it's monolithic (i.e., a single big mainframe or something like that), or a farm of servers.
Hey, it's slashdot. You can't expect the editors to have advanced knowledge about the world outside of the usa, such as the fact that the USSR doesn't exist anymore and so on.
Additionally, the open source development approach encourages the creation of many permutations of the same type of software application, which could add implementation and testing overhead to interoperability efforts.
Translation: being interoperable is easiest when you don't have to interoperate with more than one implementation.
I don't know. To me, it sounds like he's saying "you're better off with a monopoly than with competition among different products", which clearly isn't true (unless he's talking about the monopoly's shareholders, of course).
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, but what if you have to choose between being a suit and being sued? (Sorry, that was a horrible pun, but I couldn't resist.)
The image caption talks about access to fast (broadband) lines, though, so an online game could actually be considered a relevant illustration.
That's untrue, though. Have you ever seen how much merchandise there is for - for example - Spongebob Squarepants? It's an insane amount really, so don't tell us that the shows itself are entirely irrelevant and that the only money comes from advertising. It may be true for some shows, maybe even many (but that's hard to determine), but it certainly isn't for all of them.
Oh yeah, and don't forget shows that are made into movies - that's another source of income not related to advertising. Again, Spongebob is a good example...
Wow, thanks for making that clear. And here I was thinking "pirating" referred to sailing the seven seas, hunting down other ships, stealing treasures and brutally killing people. How wrong I was - obviously, copying a show recorded on TV is much worse than that.
They did? Wow. There is a god after all, and he's listening to our prayers... :)
In a word: no.
No need to do that: you can just go to http://download.wikimedia.org/ and download the whole database. Furthermore, I think an important difference here is that Wikipedia's content is actually licensed under the GFDL - i.e., it's free as in freedom, not just as in beer. Many people tend to not notice and/or care about things like that until it's too late, but it really means that the database cannot be "locked" - at least not unless you'd get each and every single contributor to agree in a legally binding fashion, which, considering that a) contributors are from all over the world and b) many contributions come from anonymous people, would be practically (and most likely even theoretically) impossible.
Again, RTFA. Nobody says Google has to do this or that; quite the opposite. Google is one of the parties telling people what to do - namely, to honour the TOS they agreed to.
The other party who's telling people what to do is the Brazilian police (and, thus, the Brazilian government), and as long as they're regulating what Brazilian people are allowed to do, it certainly is within their rights to do so.
Do you have any examples of racist comments on slashdot being modded up? I'm not saying it doesn't happen, but I'm not really sure about "many" - I can't say I've ever seen one myself really, and I do read (parts of) slashdot quite extensively.
:)
Any examples would be appreciated.
There definitely are. If you yell "FIRE" in a crowded theatre, for example, you won't be able to invoke freedom of speech as a defense afterwards...
True (although it might be for users from Brazil who indulge in racism like that).
:) I'd just be interested in hearing about it)
That being said... are you sure that saying that in the USSR under Stalin's regime, more people were killed than in the Holocaust (which I guess is what you mean) would be illegal in the Netherlands? I'm not from there myself, and IANAL, but based on what I know about legislation in other countries (such as Germany), I'd be surprised. In Germany, for example, at least from what I know, it's only illegal to promote the idea that the Holocaust didn't happen - comparing it to other things or belittling what happened there won't get you into legal trouble as long as you don't deny the facts.
But, as I said, that's just Germany, and I may be wrong, too. I would be surprised if legislation in the Netherlands differed all that much, though - so, are you sure about that? (Thanks.
RTFA. Many of the offending users aren't from the USA (which is not a surprise considering the majority of Orkut users in general aren't), and many countries outside the USA (Brazil, many European countries and so on) *do* have legislation against hate speech.
Furthermore, as was already pointed out, it's also a violation of the TOS, so even in cases where there's no crime being committed, people are still abusing the service.
While I don't agree with the grandparent's implied point of view that it's necessarily OK to copy Photoshop (for example) just because you wouldn't buy it anyway, I also don't agree with the statement "it's only 99 dollars so you can afford it". Maybe you can if you are a college kid with rich parents who will buy it for you if you tell them you need it for school. Maybe you can if you have a decent-paying job in the IT industry. Maybe you can if you're a middle-class US-american. But not all people fall in that category, and 99 dollars is not an amount where I think it's justified to just *assume* that everyone can afford that, no matter what (even if you limit yourself to people who can afford a computer).
I'm not sure who holds the copyright to that material, but if you did refilm it and tried to sell it, I'm pretty sure you *would* get sued.
Now that would actually be something I could understand. Nobody should be forced to drive a BMW, ever.
That would be funnier if Wikipedia's traffic rank wasn't ten times as high as that of Slashdot. :)
Isn't "monolithic server farm" a contradiction in terms? Either it's monolithic (i.e., a single big mainframe or something like that), or a farm of servers.
Hey, it's slashdot. You can't expect the editors to have advanced knowledge about the world outside of the usa, such as the fact that the USSR doesn't exist anymore and so on.
Just what is the problem? That kind of quid pro quo is not exactly uncommon, and for a good reason, too.
Enlighten me: how can I sign up for slashdot instead of being an anonymous coward (with an emphasis on COWARD)?
That being said, it wasn't first post, and not intended to be, either.
Thanks. ^^
Enlighten me. What's MXF?
I don't know. To me, it sounds like he's saying "you're better off with a monopoly than with competition among different products", which clearly isn't true (unless he's talking about the monopoly's shareholders, of course).
You'd better register that before someone else does... it'll probably be worth thousands in a few years. :)
Roomba's Razor?