The article never once mentions exactly which law it was that did that. Do you happen to know?
I couldn't find the link to the slashdot story specifically about the Pennsylvania bill - but, no, it's not overblown. Here is a muniwireless article about the bill (HB30) which really does ban municipalities in Pennsylvania from offering broadband to their citizens.
The real problem is that the pricing war between the ILECs and RBOCs has lowered rates so much that the phone companies can't afford to build any more infrastructure. The last-mile infrastructure in the U.S. is in much need of improvement, but the cost of fixing it far outweighs what the phone companies are willing to pay for the meager revenue it would generate.
I call bullshit. The real problem is that the shiftless bastards running the ILECs and RBOCs keep throwing money at congress to give them the kind of rules that allow them to maintain monopoly-level pricing and outrageous profit margins (for the stockholders of course). Witness the recent outlawing of government-sponsored broadband across Pennsylvania, and campaigns to stop it in other states.
The gist of it is that while competition works well in most markets, greed has utterly failed to produce results in the roll-out of broadband services. The fix for this is to build (or buy) infrastructure with taxpayer dollars and let everyone compete to offer services on it.
The only thing standing in the way of getting this fixed in the US is the phone company's mouth on the cock of congress.
I think he's more concerned about the degradation of the signal/noise ratio. By getting the good info out there first, one doesn't have to wade through nearly as much utter crap to be informed.
Too bad the full page of replies consisted of entirely of comments on how he managed to post something so thoughtful so quickly, and nothing at all on the actual contents of his post.
No I'm not. Inflation predicted that the expansion would be slowing by now, not accelerating. Calling the discovery of the acoustic peaks in the CMBR "good experimental support" for inflation is quite a stretch.
M-theory? Don't make me laugh. M-theory can produce about a billion different scenarios for the Big Bang...
Not ones that produce mathematically sound models.
If the CMBR spectrum and dark energy can be simultaneously described by introducing one simple new field (the inflaton), parsimony gives that the win over M-theory.
I call bullshit. Inflation IS inelegant. It doesn't provide any clue to the cause of the big bang, and the conditions that could cause inflation aren't explained.
I don't know why you would support such an untenable position and completely dismiss a theory that can produce such elegant models like described here.
My impression is that these guys are trying to preserve an old theory (inflation) that was recently discredited by adding a new, kludgy "unseen ripple" idea to the theory.
The latest perterbations of M-Theory have some elegant and intriguing explanations for the origins of the big bang, the behaviour of gravity, and don't really rely on dark energy (well, there are workable theories that explain the effect).
How much money do they want to "test" this crazy idea, anyway? Is this really a productive way to spend our research tax dollars?
Uh, no. WW2 started on April 9, 1940, and ended May 7, 1945. That's right. It only matters when the U.S. entered the war, not any other country in the whole world, only the U.S.
I don't know WTF these dates came from, but the US did not enter WW2 until December, 1941.
Why should they they have to pay to get the product so why bother reporting bugs. Microsoft should release the Beta Tests for Free and to a wide group of people thus allowing them and promise them a free copy of the release product if they report so many bugs.
Yea, right. MS knows that nobody cares and the important bugs only get reported by idiots trying to get real work done and willing to spend $260 per incident to help MS fix their bugs.
You've obviously never read the EULA that accompanies thier BETA releases. You are required as a condition of the license to report all the bugs you encounter. Not that anybody follows or even reads the EULA's, but it does give MS something else to beat you over the head with if they don't like something you say.
Whoever said blogs are supposed to be literary anyway. They're better compared to journalistic writing.
Journalism ain't creative writing, and it's not supposed to be. One of the first rules of journalism is that you should present the 5 W's (who, what, when, where, how) in the first paragraph of your article, if not the first sentence. In most cases, you also try to keep your grammar and vocabulary at the 6th-grade level (so most of your audience understands you).
Mr. Gorman could use some pointers in this area, because his ramblings are neither coherent nor well-organized. Finding the 5 W's in his article is quite a challenge. I guess the "who" is all bloggers, but the "what" is never very clear, nor is anything else. It sounds like a lot of random topics used for inserting insults.
Blame lawyers. All AV companies were sued for providing something for free, thus depriving shareholders of future income. You still get a year's free defs, then subscriptions after that are cheap.
I call bullshit.
Find an alternative to Symantec, because with their recent addition of "phone home" activation, and refusing to honor subscription renewals without software upgrades, they have become the worst choice you can make in AV software.
Check out the issues with their latest policies on The Gripelog if you need details. A sample of thier treatment of customers:
"I purchased NAV 2003 just over a year ago," wrote one reader. "Last month I paid for another year's subscription to the Live Update service, but NAV is refusing to download any new virus definitions. It keeps telling me I have to renew my subscription, even though I have done so. I wrote Symantec asking for help, and all they told me is that support for NAV 2003 has been discontinued... It's disgusting. I have an up-to-date subscription and a version of the software that I've had only a year. How can they refuse to help me?"
I don't think it's at all unreasonable to expect people to purchase the game (to cover the costs of development) as well as pay a monthly subscription (for the use of the servers).
No, of course not - because it's been proven that there are plenty of idiots that will pay it. And they'll even pay it to a bunch of litigious, greedy bastards like the ones at Blizzard.
I wish people would pay attention and stop supporting companies when they turn into fucktards like Blizzard seems to have done. It seems there is a pattern that a many software companies tend to follow, wherein they build up a certain number of loyal customers or market share, and then they start doing everything they can to gouge their customers and treat them like dogshit. Lawsuits against fans, bloggers, and others are common. And they tend to get away with it more often than not, when they should be bleeding customers left and right. I think Microsoft pretty much led this trend.
I'll give you a few examples. Companies that created excellent product, took good care of their customers, then turned evil when they got to the top of the heap:
Symantec (Norton)
Valve (steam???)
Intuit (check out Ed Foster's Blog)
Blizzard (case in point)
Macromedia (They're working on it)
Well, you have to look at the big picture. A lot of people blame Darl McBride and his ilk as the perpetrators, but they are just pawns is a bigger stakes game. The real architect behind the SCO lawsuits is Ralph Yarro, until recently the head of Canopy Group.
Ray Noorda, the guy who built Novell in the '80's and '90's, is the good guy in the battle. He got Yarro kicked out recently, because the guy was siphoning money out of the Canopy Group to the tune of $120 million dollars for himself and his cronies.
Noorda is suing to try to get the money back, and Yarro is counter-suing - get this - claiming Noorda is senile, and didn't know what he was doing when he fired him (Noorda is 80 years old now - his daughter has been fighting Yarro for years).
So SCO is just a toss-away for Yarro to build up his own personal wealth. Maybe he needs a few more vacation homes. He'll sacrafice another Canopy Group company when SCO has been crushed (if he can regain control).
Support Noorda in his effort to maintain control. When he takes control of SCO's litigation, he'll drop all of the customer suits right away (I can't see him supporting a policy of suing customers).
Yea, it's too bad about those city-money bastards with their peice-of-shit H2's coming out here ruining things for us stewards of the wilderness.
We try to teach them better. For instance, don't go looking for some corporate produced "job": those guys are just going to exploit you and the land, then pack up and leave when the trash gets too thick to deal with. Plus you just encourage them to build more strip malls and Walmarts.
Maybe some of them even believe in "the rapture" so they don't worry about whether there will be enough resources for the next generation.
I don't think those people are using very many resources...
It's all about POWER to the Religious Right.
"Be fruitful and multiply" anyone? So the members of their religion outnumber the members of competing religions, so that when the inevitable holy war comes, they'll have the numerical advantage...
This is the most rampantly paranoid load of crap I've ever seen. Congratulations.
...(which has paid off well for Red Staters - they've simply out-bred the Blue Staters...
Bzzzt! Dumb answer #1. Red (rural) states have grown faster then blue ones due to emigration from the cities to the rural areas.
...- and this is essentially WHY Israel isn't going to give voting rights to the Palestinians, because they know damn well they'll be out-bred in two generations).
Sort of. Israel is not going to cede "right of return" to Palestinians (and their offspring), because they ALREADY outnumber the Isralis, and will quickly vote the jews out of office, and set up a fundamentalist Islamic government.
In High School biology, we did this experiment, with growth media, yeast, and a sealed test tube. The population of the yeast did very well, and multiplied geometrically, and things looked good because they had plenty of growth media for the forseeable future.
Until they choked on their own filth, (alcohol) and they all died.
You must not remember the experiment right. Yeast can tolerate an ungodly amount of alcohol and they are doing so in the bucket sitting behind me right now. They will go dormant when they run out of sugar, or the temperature gets too low. I'll add a little sugar to the bottles at that time, and they will wake up long enough to carbonate the beer. Mmmm.
Yeast clearly aren't very smart.
Are human beings?
Maybe. They do eventually learn "don't shit where you eat", and follow it pretty well for the most part.
Which is why there are so many of them leaving all the filth behind in the big cities and moving somewhere where they can breath and not choke on it.
It's all about POWER to the Religious Right.
"Be fruitful and multiply" anyone? So the members of their religion outnumber the members of competing religions, so that when the inevitable holy war comes, they'll have the numerical advantage...
This is the most rampantly paranoid load of crap I've ever seen. Congratulations.
...(which has paid off well for Red Staters - they've simply out-bred the Blue Staters...
Bzzzt! Dumb answer #1. Red (rural) states have grown faster then blue ones due to emigration from the cities to the rural areas.
...- and this is essentially WHY Israel isn't going to give voting rights to the Palestinians, because they know damn well they'll be out-bred in two generations).
Sort of. Israel is not going to cede "right of return" to Palestinians (and their offspring), because they ALREADY outnumber the Isralis, and will quickly vote the jews out of office, and set up a fundamentalist Islamic government.
In High School biology, we did this experiment, with growth media, yeast, and a sealed test tube. The population of the yeast did very well, and multiplied geometrically, and things looked good because they had plenty of growth media for the forseeable future.
Until they choked on their own filth, (alcohol) and they all died.
You must not remember the experiment right. Yeast can tolerate an ungodly amount of alcohol and they are doing so in the bucket sitting behind me right now. They will go dormant when they run out of sugar, or the temperature gets too low. I'll add a little sugar to the bottles at that time, and they will wake up long enough to carbonate the beer. Mmmm.
Yeast clearly aren't very smart.
Are human beings?
Maybe. They do eventually learn "don't shit where you eat", and follow it pretty well for the most part.
Which is why there are so many of them leaving all the filth behind in the big cities and moving somewhere where they can breath and not choke on it.
Well, that's just inflamatory, and not helpful to a rational debate. The debate stems from a real moral delemma, it's not as clear-cut as both sides try to make out.
I think everyone agrees that abortion is regrettable, and should be avoided whenever possible. The problem is trying to get government and law enforcement involved in those decisions, because they have to choose sides: do you sanction murder, or slavery? Because you have to allow one or the other. Since a fetus cannot survive outside the mother's womb, outlawing abortion is a 9-month to 18 year sentence of indentured servitude on the pregnant woman.
And there are all kinds of ancillary consequences to the mother for carrying child. Aside from the emotional difficulty of trying to give up a child that the woman is poorly suited for caring for, they have now been subjected to multiple social issues that will inalterably change the course of their lives. High school girls that become pregnant are often not allowed to continue in the mainstream curriculum. Many women will lose their jobs. There are many health issues and possible complications associated with pregnancy, as well as the expectation for the mother to maintain a lifestyle that does not jeopardize the health of the child.
And what about the "unborn", "potential" child? The one that will be killed if the mother decides not to be a mother? We all hope for life. We hope for a better outcome for the mother and the child, and pregnant women these days can get lots of support from many avenues. We hope they will take advantage of them and make the right decisions for themselves and the child.
Still, sometimes a pregnant woman must decide to end a pregnancy. The government should not be involved in this decision, for the reasons stated above. People sometimes seem to forget that there are things in this world worse than death, and even though we love someone, we have to let them go rather than prolong their suffering.
The exit polls disagree with you. Christian/moral values were the reason most sited by bush voters.
I hate that people keep interpreting the poll results this way. It's a possible explanation, but still a significant leap.
The poll was multiple choice, for one thing. So, let's say I hate most of GW Bush's policies, and I think he's made some horrible decisions, but... I don't trust Kerry. His voting record is horrible and his character is more than questionable. His running mate made his fortune as an ambulance chaser, and these guys' most vocal supporters are folks like Michael Moore and Janeane Garofalo.
So... let's see... Why did I vote for Bush?
Taxes... no
Education... no
Iraq... not really, no
Terrorism... no
Economy/Jobs... um, no
Health care... what? no
Moral values... well, ok, I guess that's the best fit
Are you trying to imply that the RIAA is somehow not justified in its claims that downloaders on p2p services are hurting them?
I'll imply it. In fact, I'll come right out and say it: The RIAA is not justified in its claims that downloaders on p2p services are hurting them. Primarily this is because their claims are overblown and are used by RIAA as the SOLE culprit in their revenue loss, when in fact it is only a small portion of the blame.
Let me explain the simple math for you: if you have a choice between "paying" and "not paying" for music, which will you do?
Speak for yourself. Since you seem to have no regard for the law, I suppose you will do anything you can get away with. Personally, I don't care for the crap the RIAA label put out these days, and I don't buy it, and I don't listen to it (other than occasionally on radio and tv, or at a bar - I do have friends and family).
Artists (even bad ones) should have some way of being compensated, if that's what they care about. But the RIAA model of stealing from artists, controlling the broadcasters, and ripping off the public is old and dying and deserves no respect. And using the government to protect their dying business model is plain evil.
So yess[sic], the RIAA has 100% legit claims of financial ruin.
So, along with the airline industry, the auto industry, etc., etc., I suppose you think it's ok for MY tax dollars to be stolen from me (at gunpoint) to bail out the music industry? Well, then, fuck you.
Now, I certainly do not think fastfowarding past commercials should be illegal, but I do wonder how non-cable television will survive if no one watches the ads that pay for the free tv.
Who cares whether they survive or not? It is absolutely NOT the government's job to make sure that businesses do not fail (even though they do it all the time anyway).
With Comcast's digital cable, I now have "video on demand" (VOD). I can order a movie whenever I want, for a fee. If they did this for every show they offer, I would be perfectly happy (that is, if they drop the monthly gouging for the 400 channels of crap I don't want to see).
Now, I'm not going to pay $5 to see 1 episode of "Trading spaces", but I might pay.25, or.50 cents. Right now, I can pay ~ $10/month for HBO, and get not only ~ 12 HBO channels, but also "HBO on demand", and I can order any movie or episode of any series and watch it whenever I want, for no extra fee. Frankly, as little as I care about watching anything on HBO, they would probably get more money from me by offering a movie for a buck or 2, a series episode for.50 - $1, etc.
Now, there's a workable business model, and considering the time I spend watching or waiting through commercials, or even dealing with fast-forwarding through them, it would be cheaper for me to pay for each show I watch WITHOUT commercials, than to get the show for "free" with the embedded interruptions.
They don't make money from sloppy code updates, only from new-feature updates or complete code-base rewrites.
I call bullshit. There was at least 1 Windows upgrade that was MARKETED by Microsoft because it had X bug fixes (something like 5000). This was the primary reason to BUY the upgrade.
And if you check out the Visual Studio.NET updates, you'll see that bug fixes are not going into service packs or free updates, they are going into the next release. Check out some of the forums on.NET, developers find bugs, MS acknowledges them, and then promises to have the bug fix ready for the next release (Whidbey) *which you'll have to pay for* !!!
Slashdot Mirror
I couldn't find the link to the slashdot story specifically about the Pennsylvania bill - but, no, it's not overblown. Here is a muniwireless article about the bill (HB30) which really does ban municipalities in Pennsylvania from offering broadband to their citizens.
I call bullshit. The real problem is that the shiftless bastards running the ILECs and RBOCs keep throwing money at congress to give them the kind of rules that allow them to maintain monopoly-level pricing and outrageous profit margins (for the stockholders of course). Witness the recent outlawing of government-sponsored broadband across Pennsylvania, and campaigns to stop it in other states.
The gist of it is that while competition works well in most markets, greed has utterly failed to produce results in the roll-out of broadband services. The fix for this is to build (or buy) infrastructure with taxpayer dollars and let everyone compete to offer services on it.
The only thing standing in the way of getting this fixed in the US is the phone company's mouth on the cock of congress.
Carter tried that during the oil crisis of the 1970's. The biggest complaint, IIRC, was all the school kids having to go to school in the dark.
Too bad the full page of replies consisted of entirely of comments on how he managed to post something so thoughtful so quickly, and nothing at all on the actual contents of his post.
No I'm not. Inflation predicted that the expansion would be slowing by now, not accelerating. Calling the discovery of the acoustic peaks in the CMBR "good experimental support" for inflation is quite a stretch.
M-theory? Don't make me laugh. M-theory can produce about a billion different scenarios for the Big Bang...
Not ones that produce mathematically sound models.
If the CMBR spectrum and dark energy can be simultaneously described by introducing one simple new field (the inflaton), parsimony gives that the win over M-theory.
I call bullshit. Inflation IS inelegant. It doesn't provide any clue to the cause of the big bang, and the conditions that could cause inflation aren't explained.
I don't know why you would support such an untenable position and completely dismiss a theory that can produce such elegant models like described here.
The latest perterbations of M-Theory have some elegant and intriguing explanations for the origins of the big bang, the behaviour of gravity, and don't really rely on dark energy (well, there are workable theories that explain the effect).
How much money do they want to "test" this crazy idea, anyway? Is this really a productive way to spend our research tax dollars?
I don't know WTF these dates came from, but the US did not enter WW2 until December, 1941.
Hey, don't complain. At least it's better than the ubiquitous "Bush's ban on stem cell research" that usually accompanies any discussion.
Yea, right. MS knows that nobody cares and the important bugs only get reported by idiots trying to get real work done and willing to spend $260 per incident to help MS fix their bugs.
You've obviously never read the EULA that accompanies thier BETA releases. You are required as a condition of the license to report all the bugs you encounter. Not that anybody follows or even reads the EULA's, but it does give MS something else to beat you over the head with if they don't like something you say.
Journalism ain't creative writing, and it's not supposed to be. One of the first rules of journalism is that you should present the 5 W's (who, what, when, where, how) in the first paragraph of your article, if not the first sentence. In most cases, you also try to keep your grammar and vocabulary at the 6th-grade level (so most of your audience understands you).
Mr. Gorman could use some pointers in this area, because his ramblings are neither coherent nor well-organized. Finding the 5 W's in his article is quite a challenge. I guess the "who" is all bloggers, but the "what" is never very clear, nor is anything else. It sounds like a lot of random topics used for inserting insults.
I call bullshit.
Find an alternative to Symantec, because with their recent addition of "phone home" activation, and refusing to honor subscription renewals without software upgrades, they have become the worst choice you can make in AV software.
Check out the issues with their latest policies on The Gripelog if you need details. A sample of thier treatment of customers:
You were saying?
No, of course not - because it's been proven that there are plenty of idiots that will pay it. And they'll even pay it to a bunch of litigious, greedy bastards like the ones at Blizzard.
I wish people would pay attention and stop supporting companies when they turn into fucktards like Blizzard seems to have done. It seems there is a pattern that a many software companies tend to follow, wherein they build up a certain number of loyal customers or market share, and then they start doing everything they can to gouge their customers and treat them like dogshit. Lawsuits against fans, bloggers, and others are common. And they tend to get away with it more often than not, when they should be bleeding customers left and right. I think Microsoft pretty much led this trend.
I'll give you a few examples. Companies that created excellent product, took good care of their customers, then turned evil when they got to the top of the heap:
Symantec (Norton)
Valve (steam???)
Intuit (check out Ed Foster's Blog)
Blizzard (case in point)
Macromedia (They're working on it)
Hey, Martin, you were supposed to supposed to get a Slashdot login...
Ray Noorda, the guy who built Novell in the '80's and '90's, is the good guy in the battle. He got Yarro kicked out recently, because the guy was siphoning money out of the Canopy Group to the tune of $120 million dollars for himself and his cronies.
Noorda is suing to try to get the money back, and Yarro is counter-suing - get this - claiming Noorda is senile, and didn't know what he was doing when he fired him (Noorda is 80 years old now - his daughter has been fighting Yarro for years).
So SCO is just a toss-away for Yarro to build up his own personal wealth. Maybe he needs a few more vacation homes. He'll sacrafice another Canopy Group company when SCO has been crushed (if he can regain control).
Support Noorda in his effort to maintain control. When he takes control of SCO's litigation, he'll drop all of the customer suits right away (I can't see him supporting a policy of suing customers).
Cute opinion piece. Here's some facts for you: us census data report
Yea, it's too bad about those city-money bastards with their peice-of-shit H2's coming out here ruining things for us stewards of the wilderness.
We try to teach them better. For instance, don't go looking for some corporate produced "job": those guys are just going to exploit you and the land, then pack up and leave when the trash gets too thick to deal with. Plus you just encourage them to build more strip malls and Walmarts.
Maybe some of them even believe in "the rapture" so they don't worry about whether there will be enough resources for the next generation.
I don't think those people are using very many resources...
It's all about POWER to the Religious Right. "Be fruitful and multiply" anyone? So the members of their religion outnumber the members of competing religions, so that when the inevitable holy war comes, they'll have the numerical advantage ...
This is the most rampantly paranoid load of crap I've ever seen. Congratulations.
Bzzzt! Dumb answer #1. Red (rural) states have grown faster then blue ones due to emigration from the cities to the rural areas.
Sort of. Israel is not going to cede "right of return" to Palestinians (and their offspring), because they ALREADY outnumber the Isralis, and will quickly vote the jews out of office, and set up a fundamentalist Islamic government.
In High School biology, we did this experiment, with growth media, yeast, and a sealed test tube. The population of the yeast did very well, and multiplied geometrically, and things looked good because they had plenty of growth media for the forseeable future.
Until they choked on their own filth, (alcohol) and they all died.
You must not remember the experiment right. Yeast can tolerate an ungodly amount of alcohol and they are doing so in the bucket sitting behind me right now. They will go dormant when they run out of sugar, or the temperature gets too low. I'll add a little sugar to the bottles at that time, and they will wake up long enough to carbonate the beer. Mmmm.
Yeast clearly aren't very smart. Are human beings?
Maybe. They do eventually learn "don't shit where you eat", and follow it pretty well for the most part.
Which is why there are so many of them leaving all the filth behind in the big cities and moving somewhere where they can breath and not choke on it.
This is the most rampantly paranoid load of crap I've ever seen. Congratulations.
Bzzzt! Dumb answer #1. Red (rural) states have grown faster then blue ones due to emigration from the cities to the rural areas.
Sort of. Israel is not going to cede "right of return" to Palestinians (and their offspring), because they ALREADY outnumber the Isralis, and will quickly vote the jews out of office, and set up a fundamentalist Islamic government.
In High School biology, we did this experiment, with growth media, yeast, and a sealed test tube. The population of the yeast did very well, and multiplied geometrically, and things looked good because they had plenty of growth media for the forseeable future.
Until they choked on their own filth, (alcohol) and they all died.
You must not remember the experiment right. Yeast can tolerate an ungodly amount of alcohol and they are doing so in the bucket sitting behind me right now. They will go dormant when they run out of sugar, or the temperature gets too low. I'll add a little sugar to the bottles at that time, and they will wake up long enough to carbonate the beer. Mmmm.
Yeast clearly aren't very smart. Are human beings?
Maybe. They do eventually learn "don't shit where you eat", and follow it pretty well for the most part.
Which is why there are so many of them leaving all the filth behind in the big cities and moving somewhere where they can breath and not choke on it.
Well, that's just inflamatory, and not helpful to a rational debate. The debate stems from a real moral delemma, it's not as clear-cut as both sides try to make out.
I think everyone agrees that abortion is regrettable, and should be avoided whenever possible. The problem is trying to get government and law enforcement involved in those decisions, because they have to choose sides: do you sanction murder, or slavery? Because you have to allow one or the other. Since a fetus cannot survive outside the mother's womb, outlawing abortion is a 9-month to 18 year sentence of indentured servitude on the pregnant woman.
And there are all kinds of ancillary consequences to the mother for carrying child. Aside from the emotional difficulty of trying to give up a child that the woman is poorly suited for caring for, they have now been subjected to multiple social issues that will inalterably change the course of their lives. High school girls that become pregnant are often not allowed to continue in the mainstream curriculum. Many women will lose their jobs. There are many health issues and possible complications associated with pregnancy, as well as the expectation for the mother to maintain a lifestyle that does not jeopardize the health of the child.
And what about the "unborn", "potential" child? The one that will be killed if the mother decides not to be a mother? We all hope for life. We hope for a better outcome for the mother and the child, and pregnant women these days can get lots of support from many avenues. We hope they will take advantage of them and make the right decisions for themselves and the child.
Still, sometimes a pregnant woman must decide to end a pregnancy. The government should not be involved in this decision, for the reasons stated above. People sometimes seem to forget that there are things in this world worse than death, and even though we love someone, we have to let them go rather than prolong their suffering.
Good example.
I hate that people keep interpreting the poll results this way. It's a possible explanation, but still a significant leap.
The poll was multiple choice, for one thing. So, let's say I hate most of GW Bush's policies, and I think he's made some horrible decisions, but ... I don't trust Kerry. His voting record is horrible and his character is more than questionable. His running mate made his fortune as an ambulance chaser, and these guys' most vocal supporters are folks like Michael Moore and Janeane Garofalo.
So... let's see... Why did I vote for Bush?
Ok, yea, I'll say moral values, then, Bob.
I'll imply it. In fact, I'll come right out and say it: The RIAA is not justified in its claims that downloaders on p2p services are hurting them. Primarily this is because their claims are overblown and are used by RIAA as the SOLE culprit in their revenue loss, when in fact it is only a small portion of the blame.
Let me explain the simple math for you: if you have a choice between "paying" and "not paying" for music, which will you do? Speak for yourself. Since you seem to have no regard for the law, I suppose you will do anything you can get away with. Personally, I don't care for the crap the RIAA label put out these days, and I don't buy it, and I don't listen to it (other than occasionally on radio and tv, or at a bar - I do have friends and family).
Artists (even bad ones) should have some way of being compensated, if that's what they care about. But the RIAA model of stealing from artists, controlling the broadcasters, and ripping off the public is old and dying and deserves no respect. And using the government to protect their dying business model is plain evil.
So yess[sic], the RIAA has 100% legit claims of financial ruin.
So, along with the airline industry, the auto industry, etc., etc., I suppose you think it's ok for MY tax dollars to be stolen from me (at gunpoint) to bail out the music industry? Well, then, fuck you.
Who cares whether they survive or not? It is absolutely NOT the government's job to make sure that businesses do not fail (even though they do it all the time anyway).
With Comcast's digital cable, I now have "video on demand" (VOD). I can order a movie whenever I want, for a fee. If they did this for every show they offer, I would be perfectly happy (that is, if they drop the monthly gouging for the 400 channels of crap I don't want to see).
Now, I'm not going to pay $5 to see 1 episode of "Trading spaces", but I might pay .25, or .50 cents. Right now, I can pay ~ $10/month for HBO, and get not only ~ 12 HBO channels, but also "HBO on demand", and I can order any movie or episode of any series and watch it whenever I want, for no extra fee. Frankly, as little as I care about watching anything on HBO, they would probably get more money from me by offering a movie for a buck or 2, a series episode for .50 - $1, etc.
Now, there's a workable business model, and considering the time I spend watching or waiting through commercials, or even dealing with fast-forwarding through them, it would be cheaper for me to pay for each show I watch WITHOUT commercials, than to get the show for "free" with the embedded interruptions.
I call bullshit. There was at least 1 Windows upgrade that was MARKETED by Microsoft because it had X bug fixes (something like 5000). This was the primary reason to BUY the upgrade.
And if you check out the Visual Studio .NET updates, you'll see that bug fixes are not going into service packs or free updates, they are going into the next release. Check out some of the forums on .NET, developers find bugs, MS acknowledges them, and then promises to have the bug fix ready for the next release (Whidbey) *which you'll have to pay for* !!!