For your information, Linux *is* pretty immune to viruses.
A virus spreads because of applications running on a large population of machines share the same security hole. Bearing in mind the sheer number of different Linux distros there are, running different kernels, desktops and daemon applications, there really are very few applications that are common to a lot of machines that would also be capable of propogating a virus.
Additionally, the tendency for users to run programs at root level on Linux machines is much less than users running programs with administrator priveliges on Windows - this is because the security model on Linux is much simpler, without complexities of things like the registry, such that the only files a normal user can damage (on a properly configured Linux system) are their own ones.
Before I am accused of being a fanboy, the vulnerabilities in Linux (or any UNIX-like OS) are from buffer overflow attacks that cause a running daemon to drop to a (root) shell prompt allowing access to the system. However, these types of attacks are very directed against specific machines because they only work against specific versions of, say, FTP or Telnet on the system. Nowadays, of course, the tendency is to avoid using these daemons on the public internet anyway, instead opting to use secure services like SSH, SFTP & SCP.
I work in OS security and whether you run Windows or UNIX, you can never view any system as being completely secure or invulnerable to viruses. But being aware of what those vulnerabilities are likely to be means that you are more likely to defend against those attacks when they occur.
I'd be more than happy to give a couple of hours a week free support to a charity that was using FOSS software - I'm sure there's a few more people like me also, it wouldn't take too much organisation to create a pool of people willing to pool their resources for supporting FOSS in charity organisations.
I don't really care how much money private businesses pump into Microsoft for software but I'd really like to think that any government department that's financed by my taxes or any charity are doing their utmost to cut costs on any sort of infrastructure spending when cheaper ot free alternatives are available.
Linux is *not* user friendly, and until it is linux will stay with >1% marketshare.
I assumed you meant "less than 1%" in which case it should have been "
Which means you'd better stay away from Linux anyway because you'll be absolutely rubbish at redirecting STDIN, STDOUT and STEDERR at the command line...
Whistler and Blackcomb are the names of two mountains popular with the powderhounds, while nestled at the foot of Whistler is the Longhorn Saloon and Grill. Thus, Longhorn was considered a place where you stop, take a break and refresh after Whistler, before you tackle Blackcomb.
If a "dopefiend" is somebody who smokes a lot of cannabis, is a "powderhound" someone who takes a lot of cocaine?
Does this therefore mean that before tackling Whistler and Blackcomb, you need to out of your skull on drugs? With Longhorn being an intervening stop to take a sh*t and snort up another line?
In which case, I fail to see what this has to do with the world's favourite operating system... oh wait...
...if they weren't queuing outside, they'd be indoors for 7 days playing on their consoles. At least they're getting some sun and fresh air for a few days!
I really don't understand your issue with stopping these guys doing what they are doing.
Don't get me wrong, I won't queue more than two minutes for a coffee in Starbucks, let alone seven days for a games console. Likewise buying a console for $600 and selling it on eBay for $1500 would not be worth anywhere near a week's worth of my time.
But if someone is prepared to pay 2.5 times the price for it on eBay, then what's the problem? They're just taking advantage of the fact that there are some people with more money than sense for whom it worth paying more than twice the price to be "first on the block" to get a PS3.
Good luck to them - if anything, the guys selling them on eBay probably have more sense than those who are queuing a week beforehand to get one for themselves...
Call it "theft", "sharing", whatever you like... the fact of the matter is that as an honest music lover, it's an activity that means my right to fair usage is lessened.
Please don't twist my words into something they are not - someone stealing £5 from a little old lady has committed a far more heinous crime than some teenager downloading several thousand songs at the expense of some fat record company.
The point I am trying to make is that music thieves think they are doing us all a favour in the belief that they are fighting against corporate oppression when, in reality, they just make it far more difficult and expensive for honest music lovers like me. That's why they are criminals, just like the RIAA, MPAA, etc.
You know that you don't own any of your music? It is merely licensed to you.
I can buy a CD, listen to it when I like on whatever player I like for as long as I like. Plus I can rip it into a format suitable for another device, lend it to a friend or make an ashtray out of it. So what if I don't "own" it, I get enough "fair use" of it to justify buying it.
How can you steal something that isn't in your possession?
"Owning" and "in possession of" are two different things. I can be "in possession of" a rental video from Blockbuster but I don't "own" it. You're arguing semantics.
And what about the people who 'share' music?
I "share" music. I play my CDs in the car when other people are present, I let friends borrow CDs. Again, semantics.
Wow, they must be losing so much money as the music is being 'stolen' from them, right?
Why do I care? Honestly. All I want to do is buy good quality music at a reasonable price and get fair use from it. As an honest user, I don't want DRM inflicted upon me because I am not a thief.
I mean, that's the source. If I came to your house and took one of YOUR music CDs, it is exactly equivalent, right? Exactly equivalent?!
No, it isn't equivalent. If you took one of my CDs, I would care about that. If you steal music and that theft of music has no impact on my fair use or on the price I pay for it, I wouldn't give a damn. But it does, so I do.
If you really cared about the law, crime and your rights you would be talking about justice.
Erm, what about *MY* justice??? What about my right to being treated like a law-abiding citizen *UNTIL* I break the law??? What about my right to get fair use from something I buy without having restrictions forced upon me because some people choose not to pay for their music???
How much money goes to the artist every time you discerningly purchase a CD? Seriously, answer me that.
Again, why do I care? It's up to the artist to work out the terms and conditions of his/her contract with the record company. I just want to buy good music at a fair price. At least because I do *PAY* for my music, the artist gets something from me.
Oh, BTW, next time you put on a pair of jeans or trainers, will you care how much a teenager was paid in a third-world sweatshop to make those items for you? It's the same thing...
It isn't stealing! It's not. Oh wait, well, maybe it is in 'newspeak' but I lost my dictionary, can I borrow yours, comrade?
It depends on how you define "stealing" - again, semantics.
Plus how much money is actually being lost? I mean, really. Go here, and then talk to me about stealing.
Like I said, I don't care. All I care about is getting good quality music at a reasonable price without any rights restrictions because I like music and am happy to continue buying it. If they DRM it, then I won't buy it - but I won't steal it either because I make a much stronger point by not handing over my money than I would by stealing music.
You people who pirate are *NOI* music lovers - you're just into hoarding lots and lots of songs to impress your peers, nothing more than that. You cannot possibly *appreciate* that music you steal because it's all so "throwaway" to you - just delete it when it becomes unfashionable and download a whole heap more.
When you own pieces of music that you've listened to for 10, 20 or 30 years, then maybe you'll understand.
I'm fortunate enough to earn enough money to live very comfortably and to buy a lot more comfort items than I actually do. But I have had enough of being ripped off with crap music CDs, buggy software and poor quality movies, for example.
Additionally, I don't see any one of those things as being vital to my existence - yep, it's a great buzz listening to a piece of good music, playing an excellent game or seeing a masterpiece movie but it's just entertainment.
So I don't consider *anything* as being a "must have" - if it's good enough and cheap enough, I'll buy it, otherwise I'll leave it.
I read lots of reviews, preview as much as I can and, as a result, I feel I get good value from anything I do actually buy now and actually spend much less than I ever did.
And as for "usage rights", if I can't use a product in the way I expect to, I won't buy it. It's that simple and no amount of marketing or hype will convince me otherwise.
And if a lot more people took my attitude, overpriced products and DRM would mean commercial suicide for any media company or software house. Now *REALLY IS* the time for the consumer to take back the power into his own hands and just be a little more discerning...
Please stop with the "Well, that's just the way it is so I'll have to live with it" arguments of futility.
I've never spent anywhere near $1000 for a piece of software but, if I was going to, I'd probably insist on a demonstration and something to evaluate first; and if I didn't get those things, then I just wouldn't buy it and tell the producer why I wasn't buying it.
Ultimately, it's the consumer who should dictate the way things should be, not the producer. Blame the lilly-livered, weak-minded consumers who have allowed software companies to get away with acting in this fashion up until now - and the thieves who have given them the justification to act that way.
How can you be a victim of "extortion" when you have freedom of choice to buy or not buy the product in question?
Perhaps "us" should act a bit more intelligently and not fall for the barrage of media hype that brainwashes them into believing that they cannot live without those products.
Rest assured that if the RIAA or MPAA were to catch fire today, I would not waste any bodily fluids trying to extinguish the flames.
However, please do not consider yourself as some kind of "Robin Hood" type figure purely because you "fight the establishment" and copy CDs. Morons like you give morons like the **AA the justification they feel they need to restrict what I, an honest discerning music lover, can and cannot do with the music I buy.
If you *REALLY* care about the law, crime and your rights, you don't copy *AND* don't buy the products. You take the time, like me, to research what you plan to buy and decide for yourself if it is worth the money or not. Then you go find the cheapest retailer and buy the stuff you know will be worth the money.
No, you're not a criminal in the same way a murderer or rapist would be, but you are still just a common thief. So stop with the "Jolly Roger Bottle Of Rum Pirate" glamourising and get used to it.
So you just agreed that DRM can be used for non evil purposes.
I don't believe I was arguing it either way, to be honest. I was actually correcting some invalid statements and comparisons in the previous post.
But, in my opinion, DRM is evil - which is why I will *NEVER* buy or rent any product that utilises it. (And no, I don't own an iPod before you ask.) However, if the DRM rental model suits some people, then let them have it.
Completely different. Access control is simply about allowing or denying specific individuals to something, DRM is about telling those individuals what they can and cannot do with something once you've let them have it.
DRM in my opinion is ONLY evil if it's on files you own.
Why would you ever need to consider DRM on files that you own? Access control means that only the right people get to look at those files, and there is a perfectly good legal system to deal with everything else. For example, imagine you had written a book and asked someone to read it for their opinion on it before you started looking at getting it published. So you'd let a few trusted people read it - if one of those people decided to claim the work as their own and publish it themselves, then you have legal protection for that.
That would be equivalent to purchasing a file that only gives me read access.
What's wrong with purchasing, say, the PDF version of a book? Aren't books, CDs or DVDs all things with "read access" only?
It might even have a side effect of only working on computers running a particular OS with specific hardware.
What if that file is an important piece of public information but in a proprietary format that I cannot read purely because I do not run the most popular operating system?
If it's a file that I don't own, then if someone gives me limited rights to it, then what's the problem?
Absolutely none. Provided that the owner of the file makes it very clear that you do have limited rights to it. After all, doesn't copyright law cover this anyway? In which case, why do you need DRM?
I mean if I have an http server and gave people read access to an audio file, I can easily revoked anyone's read permission to it through access control.
Yes, but that's access control and security - kind of the same thing as expecting your bank to only let you, and not anyone else, access your bank account online. It's not the same as DRM.
One place I can see DRM work is for a rental system. You do not own the content that you rent so I can see DRM working perfectly fine in that scenario by revoking your access after x # of days.
If people want this type of rental product then let them have it. Again, as long as the rental company make it clear that you can use the product in a very limited fashion, so be it. On the other hand, as an honest buyer of CDs and DVDs, why should I lie down and accept artificial restrictions on something I have legally purchased. It's my CD, why can't I convert it to MP3 to put on my player? It's my DVD, why can't I rip it to DivX so I myself can watch it while on the move?
Of course there's a bunch of side effects of DRM, such as limiting which players can play it, but DRM's purpose to to give certain permissions to a user on a particular file (just like access control).
Rubbish. Access control says who can and who can't have it. DRM dictates how you use it once you have it. Entirely different.
Maybe the media giants like the side effects, but as DRM goes, it's purpose is NOT to limit you on specific devices.
No, it's purpose is to make a lot more money for some already overly fat and rich corporations. If, say, Microsoft's DRM protocols go into some hardware, then they get a license fee for each item of hardware sold. And the media giants like Sony, for example, get a lot more money through selling you the same stuff in different formats (because DRM stops you conveting it yourself).
Another similar system is MMS or RTSP, which allows streaming of video, but won't let you save it.
Actually, they are *JUST* protocols for communication between devices - it's the client software you use that decides whether or not you can save the stuff. If the protocol is proprietary and closed, it's nigh on impossible to write software to deal with the protocols in the way you wa
I'd even go one stage further - hold the ISP accountable for allowing botnets from their users to connect to the Internet, they in turn will disable the Internet accounts of users who are unknowingly running botnets and the users, in turn, will have to either get off their backsides and learn a bit more about how to run a PC properly (in the same way they took the time to probably learn how to drive their car) or pay someone some money (like me) to fix their PC for them.
Millions of 13-year-olds will no longer be able to spread plastic, manufactured "build-a-songs" puked from the mouths of talentless indivduals elevated to stardom by millions of brainless Pop Idol fans...
I'm not qualified to comment of WoW or those people that play it - personally, I don't think it's worth the money but a few friends of mine do play it and pretty much enjoy it. Both "camps" are happy and that's all that matters.
But please do NOT treat Blizzard (or Apple, Google, Microsoft, [INSERT COMPANY NAME HERE]) as a "benevolent charity" that primarily gives a damn about what you do or do not think is right or fair. All they care about is selling one or more products that as many people as possible will spend as much money on as possible so that pension funds, shareholders and a few fat cats get lots of money.
If you're happy paying money for those products, then good luck to you. But once you've paid that money, please accept that those same companies will try to leverage a bit more money from you - this is no different to going into a store and getting the second item you pick up at half-price. It is JUST capitalism, nothing more.
I have absolutely no idea what these cards do except that they sound like they give a small "boost" within WoW to those people who cannot be bothered to spend the time and energy to do it the "hard way" - so why has nobody complained about games companies running premium rate telephone lines for games cheats and hints for years? Surely it's the same thing and surely you can make a decision about whether or not to pay for those things.
Some of you people SERIOUSLY need to stop getting so damned fanatical and blinkered about what is essentially just a past-time or a hobby - enjoy things for what they are and enjoy spending your hard-earned money. But sometimes just stop for a moment and remind yourself that in some parts of the world, people have enough of a problem finding money for food or for a roof over their heads.
And just allow that fact to put a little perspective on what it is that you're moaning about.
Slashdot Mirror
A virus spreads because of applications running on a large population of machines share the same security hole. Bearing in mind the sheer number of different Linux distros there are, running different kernels, desktops and daemon applications, there really are very few applications that are common to a lot of machines that would also be capable of propogating a virus.
Additionally, the tendency for users to run programs at root level on Linux machines is much less than users running programs with administrator priveliges on Windows - this is because the security model on Linux is much simpler, without complexities of things like the registry, such that the only files a normal user can damage (on a properly configured Linux system) are their own ones.
Before I am accused of being a fanboy, the vulnerabilities in Linux (or any UNIX-like OS) are from buffer overflow attacks that cause a running daemon to drop to a (root) shell prompt allowing access to the system. However, these types of attacks are very directed against specific machines because they only work against specific versions of, say, FTP or Telnet on the system. Nowadays, of course, the tendency is to avoid using these daemons on the public internet anyway, instead opting to use secure services like SSH, SFTP & SCP.
I work in OS security and whether you run Windows or UNIX, you can never view any system as being completely secure or invulnerable to viruses. But being aware of what those vulnerabilities are likely to be means that you are more likely to defend against those attacks when they occur.
I don't really care how much money private businesses pump into Microsoft for software but I'd really like to think that any government department that's financed by my taxes or any charity are doing their utmost to cut costs on any sort of infrastructure spending when cheaper ot free alternatives are available.
That's how Michael Jackson avoided being arrested for fiddling with the kiddies...
I assumed you meant "less than 1%" in which case it should have been " Which means you'd better stay away from Linux anyway because you'll be absolutely rubbish at redirecting STDIN, STDOUT and STEDERR at the command line...
...George Michael was arrested for playing "Come Together" on a pink oboe in a public lavatory.
"Widows Fister" brings up completely different stuff...
We take you lot seriously when you talk about tractors or next year's cabbage harvest, not operating systems. :-)
If a "dopefiend" is somebody who smokes a lot of cannabis, is a "powderhound" someone who takes a lot of cocaine?
Does this therefore mean that before tackling Whistler and Blackcomb, you need to out of your skull on drugs? With Longhorn being an intervening stop to take a sh*t and snort up another line?
In which case, I fail to see what this has to do with the world's favourite operating system... oh wait...
...if they weren't queuing outside, they'd be indoors for 7 days playing on their consoles. At least they're getting some sun and fresh air for a few days!
Like I said, I DON'T download any music, let alone illegal stuff.
Don't get me wrong, I won't queue more than two minutes for a coffee in Starbucks, let alone seven days for a games console. Likewise buying a console for $600 and selling it on eBay for $1500 would not be worth anywhere near a week's worth of my time.
But if someone is prepared to pay 2.5 times the price for it on eBay, then what's the problem? They're just taking advantage of the fact that there are some people with more money than sense for whom it worth paying more than twice the price to be "first on the block" to get a PS3.
Good luck to them - if anything, the guys selling them on eBay probably have more sense than those who are queuing a week beforehand to get one for themselves...
Please do not try to justify your theft by calling it something else.
Regards
An Honest Person
Call it "theft", "sharing", whatever you like... the fact of the matter is that as an honest music lover, it's an activity that means my right to fair usage is lessened.
The point I am trying to make is that music thieves think they are doing us all a favour in the belief that they are fighting against corporate oppression when, in reality, they just make it far more difficult and expensive for honest music lovers like me. That's why they are criminals, just like the RIAA, MPAA, etc.
I can buy a CD, listen to it when I like on whatever player I like for as long as I like. Plus I can rip it into a format suitable for another device, lend it to a friend or make an ashtray out of it. So what if I don't "own" it, I get enough "fair use" of it to justify buying it.
How can you steal something that isn't in your possession?
"Owning" and "in possession of" are two different things. I can be "in possession of" a rental video from Blockbuster but I don't "own" it. You're arguing semantics.
And what about the people who 'share' music?
I "share" music. I play my CDs in the car when other people are present, I let friends borrow CDs. Again, semantics.
Wow, they must be losing so much money as the music is being 'stolen' from them, right?
Why do I care? Honestly. All I want to do is buy good quality music at a reasonable price and get fair use from it. As an honest user, I don't want DRM inflicted upon me because I am not a thief.
I mean, that's the source. If I came to your house and took one of YOUR music CDs, it is exactly equivalent, right? Exactly equivalent?!
No, it isn't equivalent. If you took one of my CDs, I would care about that. If you steal music and that theft of music has no impact on my fair use or on the price I pay for it, I wouldn't give a damn. But it does, so I do.
If you really cared about the law, crime and your rights you would be talking about justice.
Erm, what about *MY* justice??? What about my right to being treated like a law-abiding citizen *UNTIL* I break the law??? What about my right to get fair use from something I buy without having restrictions forced upon me because some people choose not to pay for their music???
How much money goes to the artist every time you discerningly purchase a CD? Seriously, answer me that.
Again, why do I care? It's up to the artist to work out the terms and conditions of his/her contract with the record company. I just want to buy good music at a fair price. At least because I do *PAY* for my music, the artist gets something from me.
Oh, BTW, next time you put on a pair of jeans or trainers, will you care how much a teenager was paid in a third-world sweatshop to make those items for you? It's the same thing...
It isn't stealing! It's not. Oh wait, well, maybe it is in 'newspeak' but I lost my dictionary, can I borrow yours, comrade?
It depends on how you define "stealing" - again, semantics.
Plus how much money is actually being lost? I mean, really. Go here, and then talk to me about stealing.
Like I said, I don't care. All I care about is getting good quality music at a reasonable price without any rights restrictions because I like music and am happy to continue buying it. If they DRM it, then I won't buy it - but I won't steal it either because I make a much stronger point by not handing over my money than I would by stealing music.
You people who pirate are *NOI* music lovers - you're just into hoarding lots and lots of songs to impress your peers, nothing more than that. You cannot possibly *appreciate* that music you steal because it's all so "throwaway" to you - just delete it when it becomes unfashionable and download a whole heap more.
When you own pieces of music that you've listened to for 10, 20 or 30 years, then maybe you'll understand.
I'm fortunate enough to earn enough money to live very comfortably and to buy a lot more comfort items than I actually do. But I have had enough of being ripped off with crap music CDs, buggy software and poor quality movies, for example.
Additionally, I don't see any one of those things as being vital to my existence - yep, it's a great buzz listening to a piece of good music, playing an excellent game or seeing a masterpiece movie but it's just entertainment.
So I don't consider *anything* as being a "must have" - if it's good enough and cheap enough, I'll buy it, otherwise I'll leave it.
I read lots of reviews, preview as much as I can and, as a result, I feel I get good value from anything I do actually buy now and actually spend much less than I ever did.
And as for "usage rights", if I can't use a product in the way I expect to, I won't buy it. It's that simple and no amount of marketing or hype will convince me otherwise.
And if a lot more people took my attitude, overpriced products and DRM would mean commercial suicide for any media company or software house. Now *REALLY IS* the time for the consumer to take back the power into his own hands and just be a little more discerning...
I've never spent anywhere near $1000 for a piece of software but, if I was going to, I'd probably insist on a demonstration and something to evaluate first; and if I didn't get those things, then I just wouldn't buy it and tell the producer why I wasn't buying it.
Ultimately, it's the consumer who should dictate the way things should be, not the producer. Blame the lilly-livered, weak-minded consumers who have allowed software companies to get away with acting in this fashion up until now - and the thieves who have given them the justification to act that way.
How can you be a victim of "extortion" when you have freedom of choice to buy or not buy the product in question?
Perhaps "us" should act a bit more intelligently and not fall for the barrage of media hype that brainwashes them into believing that they cannot live without those products.
Rest assured that if the RIAA or MPAA were to catch fire today, I would not waste any bodily fluids trying to extinguish the flames.
However, please do not consider yourself as some kind of "Robin Hood" type figure purely because you "fight the establishment" and copy CDs. Morons like you give morons like the **AA the justification they feel they need to restrict what I, an honest discerning music lover, can and cannot do with the music I buy.
If you *REALLY* care about the law, crime and your rights, you don't copy *AND* don't buy the products. You take the time, like me, to research what you plan to buy and decide for yourself if it is worth the money or not. Then you go find the cheapest retailer and buy the stuff you know will be worth the money.
No, you're not a criminal in the same way a murderer or rapist would be, but you are still just a common thief. So stop with the "Jolly Roger Bottle Of Rum Pirate" glamourising and get used to it.
Kindest Regards
An Honest Person
I don't believe I was arguing it either way, to be honest. I was actually correcting some invalid statements and comparisons in the previous post.
But, in my opinion, DRM is evil - which is why I will *NEVER* buy or rent any product that utilises it. (And no, I don't own an iPod before you ask.) However, if the DRM rental model suits some people, then let them have it.
Completely different. Access control is simply about allowing or denying specific individuals to something, DRM is about telling those individuals what they can and cannot do with something once you've let them have it.
DRM in my opinion is ONLY evil if it's on files you own.
Why would you ever need to consider DRM on files that you own? Access control means that only the right people get to look at those files, and there is a perfectly good legal system to deal with everything else. For example, imagine you had written a book and asked someone to read it for their opinion on it before you started looking at getting it published. So you'd let a few trusted people read it - if one of those people decided to claim the work as their own and publish it themselves, then you have legal protection for that.
That would be equivalent to purchasing a file that only gives me read access.
What's wrong with purchasing, say, the PDF version of a book? Aren't books, CDs or DVDs all things with "read access" only?
It might even have a side effect of only working on computers running a particular OS with specific hardware.
What if that file is an important piece of public information but in a proprietary format that I cannot read purely because I do not run the most popular operating system?
If it's a file that I don't own, then if someone gives me limited rights to it, then what's the problem?
Absolutely none. Provided that the owner of the file makes it very clear that you do have limited rights to it. After all, doesn't copyright law cover this anyway? In which case, why do you need DRM?
I mean if I have an http server and gave people read access to an audio file, I can easily revoked anyone's read permission to it through access control.
Yes, but that's access control and security - kind of the same thing as expecting your bank to only let you, and not anyone else, access your bank account online. It's not the same as DRM.
One place I can see DRM work is for a rental system. You do not own the content that you rent so I can see DRM working perfectly fine in that scenario by revoking your access after x # of days.
If people want this type of rental product then let them have it. Again, as long as the rental company make it clear that you can use the product in a very limited fashion, so be it. On the other hand, as an honest buyer of CDs and DVDs, why should I lie down and accept artificial restrictions on something I have legally purchased. It's my CD, why can't I convert it to MP3 to put on my player? It's my DVD, why can't I rip it to DivX so I myself can watch it while on the move?
Of course there's a bunch of side effects of DRM, such as limiting which players can play it, but DRM's purpose to to give certain permissions to a user on a particular file (just like access control).
Rubbish. Access control says who can and who can't have it. DRM dictates how you use it once you have it. Entirely different.
Maybe the media giants like the side effects, but as DRM goes, it's purpose is NOT to limit you on specific devices.
No, it's purpose is to make a lot more money for some already overly fat and rich corporations. If, say, Microsoft's DRM protocols go into some hardware, then they get a license fee for each item of hardware sold. And the media giants like Sony, for example, get a lot more money through selling you the same stuff in different formats (because DRM stops you conveting it yourself).
Another similar system is MMS or RTSP, which allows streaming of video, but won't let you save it.
Actually, they are *JUST* protocols for communication between devices - it's the client software you use that decides whether or not you can save the stuff. If the protocol is proprietary and closed, it's nigh on impossible to write software to deal with the protocols in the way you wa
I'd even go one stage further - hold the ISP accountable for allowing botnets from their users to connect to the Internet, they in turn will disable the Internet accounts of users who are unknowingly running botnets and the users, in turn, will have to either get off their backsides and learn a bit more about how to run a PC properly (in the same way they took the time to probably learn how to drive their car) or pay someone some money (like me) to fix their PC for them.
Windows XP running on Apple machines...
Encrypted binaries....
I'll never be able to sleep soundly again!
But please do NOT treat Blizzard (or Apple, Google, Microsoft, [INSERT COMPANY NAME HERE]) as a "benevolent charity" that primarily gives a damn about what you do or do not think is right or fair. All they care about is selling one or more products that as many people as possible will spend as much money on as possible so that pension funds, shareholders and a few fat cats get lots of money.
If you're happy paying money for those products, then good luck to you. But once you've paid that money, please accept that those same companies will try to leverage a bit more money from you - this is no different to going into a store and getting the second item you pick up at half-price. It is JUST capitalism, nothing more.
I have absolutely no idea what these cards do except that they sound like they give a small "boost" within WoW to those people who cannot be bothered to spend the time and energy to do it the "hard way" - so why has nobody complained about games companies running premium rate telephone lines for games cheats and hints for years? Surely it's the same thing and surely you can make a decision about whether or not to pay for those things.
Some of you people SERIOUSLY need to stop getting so damned fanatical and blinkered about what is essentially just a past-time or a hobby - enjoy things for what they are and enjoy spending your hard-earned money. But sometimes just stop for a moment and remind yourself that in some parts of the world, people have enough of a problem finding money for food or for a roof over their heads.
And just allow that fact to put a little perspective on what it is that you're moaning about.