"I'm sorry moderators, but the posting calling Edison a jerk is right on the money."
Somewhere between what one side believes and what the other side believes lies the truth. You're both right and you're both wrong. I sincerely hope nobody's making decisions based on what you guys are saying today until they've gotten some more objective info.
"So explain to me how your old laptop can do more than a DRM enabled laptop, when the old one can't play DRM files at all. Or do you plan on obtaining a cracked viewer to use these files."
I'd answer that if I understood what you were really getting at.
"Keep your skirt on. The other half of this story is that the hardware manufacturers have agreed to make DRM hardware. Get ready to stock up on the last remaining DRM-free hardware in the near future."
Dell is going to have a real hard time selling me a new laptop in a couple of years if my old one can do more.
"As more people steal music (or in their opinions stop paying outrageous prices for music without any money going to the artists), their power will diminish."
If people are using P2P to steal music as you put it, then how come there aren't very many games there? It's not the file size, DVD's get traded way more than games do. So what's the deal?
I'll tell you what the deal is, people aren't opposed to spending money. With games, they can download the demo and try it out legitimately. There's no way to do that with music or videos. Once you open that CD or DVD, it's yours. Satisfaction is not guaranteed.
Call it 'thievery' if you like, I call it ensuring customer satisfaction. Don't believe me? Then explain to me why the RIAA was at their peak while Napster was?
I've done quite a bit of searching for MP3s in my time, and what I have found (Note: this is not a scientific analysis, just an observation) that few people had complete albums. Just about everybody had one or two songs from a given album. That pattern is suggestive of people hunting around for new music to try, not somebody out to save a few bucks.
The funny thing is that all this happened at absolutely 0 cost to the RIAA. Free advertising. They should have looked the other way. Go fig.
"If they stop the push to legislate for business, the push to legislate for consumers lessens and they can do whatever they want since there are no laws against it."
In light of that, would I be correct in declaring that/. helped win a battle for the little guy?
... what sparked this change of heart. Is the RIAA afraid of Intel and other big companies entering the legal battle? Do they finally realize that they could make money by making internet specific products with these people as allies? Have they figured out that by getting the laws passed, the consumers out there would be made aware of the RIAA's attempts to mess with their rights?
I can't help but think there's a juicy story behind this decision.
"I for one hope that google lasts - I would even pay a small amount if it would help keep them going"
Gotta wonder what it would take to dethrone Google, thouogh.
Personally, I think their image search is great. If they'd beef that up a bit, I'd be seriously considering a subscription not unlike the kind Slashdot has. $5 for 1,000 image searches or something like that. The catch is that it'd have to be better than the one today. Perhaps if they had a rewards system where you could earn searches by taking pics around the web and logging meta-data for them or something.
'Linked' or not my point still stands. Seeing as how the state gets the money back one way or another anyway, I don't see why we're having this convo. The dude was being an idiot.
"Yeah, you're right. The governor of Missouri has NO IDEA what he's talking about:"
Okay, let's point out a few interesting things about this fruitless debate:
1.) Brought to you by the gubner of Missouri. Incidentally, the dude's talking strictly about Missouri, not the rest of the country. Gee, MO's in the shits. What about the rest of the country?
2.) We are left with the choice of cutting programs that help citizens."
So what's the solution here? Give them the bill they need? Okay. How does that help them balance their budget? It doesn't. It buys them a year. Their budget problems are their problems. I don't mean to be insensitive to the issues here, but the problem is they need more people making more money paying more taxes. His shortfalls will always be a problem until that happens.
So yes, the Gov. of MO has no idea what he's talking about.
"Someone doesn't realize how much of state funding is federal grants, or how much is spent on unfunded federal mandates (which could be funded, for example, if you didn't have the $674 Billion Tax Cut)."
Heh. So let me get this straight, the federal mandates that are unfunded today could be funded if if the taxes weren't cut? That's an informed rebuttal?
Where do states get their money? Taxpayers. How do states get more money? Taxpayers spend more money. How do you get taxpayers to spend more money? Give them money to spend.
Whether or not that'll work is speculative and irrelevant. Parent poster was, at best, trolling. $600 bill is not enough to solve everybody's problems, at best it'd be a catalyst to spur growth. Though I suppose we could have it your way and have this problem resurface again within two years.
.. but don't make it terribly complicated. Wish I had something more insightful to say than that, but I don't. Every time I hear this topic brought up, everybody and their mother wants to make it more and more complicated just to make it more fair. Personally, I don't care what the diffrence between 5% and 7% is, and I don't care which state it goes to. Hell, make it a flat tax and let me choose which state the taxes go to.:P
I guess I could have been redundant and covered that in this post too just to save you from finding it funny. If my comment displayed sort of fault, I might.
I had an accomplice once. I was racing with my friend's little brother. Unfortunately, the house was a bit rickety so occasionally the thumping we caused would knock something over, thus earning the wrath of mom. So while I was racing, my 'accomplice' intentionally knocked over something in the living room. My opponent stopped with an "Oh shit, I'm in trouble look" on his face while I raced to victory.
"You aren't a gamer until you've dropped to your knees and pounded the living shit out a of nintendo power pad. We used to quickly stand up and do knee-drops for the log hurdles. Good times."
Ever let your friend's little brothers play, then yank it out from under them? Heh.
"And playing a game that requires you to barely lift your feet (more like shuffling), is not exercise."
Um, it's a little more than just 'barely lifting your feet'. People who get into that game rarely stop without breaking a sweat. It'd certainly do me more good than the exercise bicycle that's covered in a protective layer of dust.
Slashdot Mirror
"I'm sorry moderators, but the posting calling Edison a jerk is right on the money."
Somewhere between what one side believes and what the other side believes lies the truth. You're both right and you're both wrong. I sincerely hope nobody's making decisions based on what you guys are saying today until they've gotten some more objective info.
"What if your laptop's hard drive dies, and none of the hard drives available at your local computer store are compatible with your laptop? "
Not likely to happen soon. Unless you're referring to hardware-enabled DRM, in that case problems might arise.
That's not really a discussion we can have until companies start launching these things.
"So explain to me how your old laptop can do more than a DRM enabled laptop, when the old one can't play DRM files at all. Or do you plan on obtaining a cracked viewer to use these files."
I'd answer that if I understood what you were really getting at.
"Keep your skirt on. The other half of this story is that the hardware manufacturers have agreed to make DRM hardware. Get ready to stock up on the last remaining DRM-free hardware in the near future."
Dell is going to have a real hard time selling me a new laptop in a couple of years if my old one can do more.
"As more people steal music (or in their opinions stop paying outrageous prices for music without any money going to the artists), their power will diminish."
If people are using P2P to steal music as you put it, then how come there aren't very many games there? It's not the file size, DVD's get traded way more than games do. So what's the deal?
I'll tell you what the deal is, people aren't opposed to spending money. With games, they can download the demo and try it out legitimately. There's no way to do that with music or videos. Once you open that CD or DVD, it's yours. Satisfaction is not guaranteed.
Call it 'thievery' if you like, I call it ensuring customer satisfaction. Don't believe me? Then explain to me why the RIAA was at their peak while Napster was?
I've done quite a bit of searching for MP3s in my time, and what I have found (Note: this is not a scientific analysis, just an observation) that few people had complete albums. Just about everybody had one or two songs from a given album. That pattern is suggestive of people hunting around for new music to try, not somebody out to save a few bucks.
The funny thing is that all this happened at absolutely 0 cost to the RIAA. Free advertising. They should have looked the other way. Go fig.
"If they stop the push to legislate for business, the push to legislate for consumers lessens and they can do whatever they want since there are no laws against it."
/. helped win a battle for the little guy?
In light of that, would I be correct in declaring that
... what sparked this change of heart. Is the RIAA afraid of Intel and other big companies entering the legal battle? Do they finally realize that they could make money by making internet specific products with these people as allies? Have they figured out that by getting the laws passed, the consumers out there would be made aware of the RIAA's attempts to mess with their rights?
I can't help but think there's a juicy story behind this decision.
"I for one hope that google lasts - I would even pay a small amount if it would help keep them going"
Gotta wonder what it would take to dethrone Google, thouogh.
Personally, I think their image search is great. If they'd beef that up a bit, I'd be seriously considering a subscription not unlike the kind Slashdot has. $5 for 1,000 image searches or something like that. The catch is that it'd have to be better than the one today. Perhaps if they had a rewards system where you could earn searches by taking pics around the web and logging meta-data for them or something.
"err ... do you really need that much CPU power for a webserver ?"
Ask one of Slashdot's victims when they come back on-line.
I understand your view better now. I think I was really reacting to the over-simplification of the situation rather than rationale.
Thanks for taking the time to explain, I got stuff to think about.
G'nite.
'Linked' or not my point still stands. Seeing as how the state gets the money back one way or another anyway, I don't see why we're having this convo. The dude was being an idiot.
"Yeah, you're right. The governor of Missouri has NO IDEA what he's talking about:"
Okay, let's point out a few interesting things about this fruitless debate:
1.) Brought to you by the gubner of Missouri. Incidentally, the dude's talking strictly about Missouri, not the rest of the country. Gee, MO's in the shits. What about the rest of the country?
2.) We are left with the choice of cutting programs that help citizens."
So what's the solution here? Give them the bill they need? Okay. How does that help them balance their budget? It doesn't. It buys them a year. Their budget problems are their problems. I don't mean to be insensitive to the issues here, but the problem is they need more people making more money paying more taxes. His shortfalls will always be a problem until that happens.
So yes, the Gov. of MO has no idea what he's talking about.
"Someone doesn't realize how much of state funding is federal grants, or how much is spent on unfunded federal mandates (which could be funded, for example, if you didn't have the $674 Billion Tax Cut)."
Heh. So let me get this straight, the federal mandates that are unfunded today could be funded if if the taxes weren't cut? That's an informed rebuttal?
Where do states get their money? Taxpayers. How do states get more money? Taxpayers spend more money. How do you get taxpayers to spend more money? Give them money to spend.
Whether or not that'll work is speculative and irrelevant. Parent poster was, at best, trolling. $600 bill is not enough to solve everybody's problems, at best it'd be a catalyst to spur growth. Though I suppose we could have it your way and have this problem resurface again within two years.
"Do you know how to read? [sacbee.com]"
You're debating with me using somebody else's opinion as fact? Heh. Hint: Factual documents don't use the term "difficult to forecast".
I'd go into more detail, but that's not even close to what I was talking about. Perhaps if you spent more time understanding than arguing?
Yeah... you're right. Now that I think about it, I should have at least pointed out my previous post in that reply. Heh.
Oh well. Cheers!
"Internet Taxation May Be Imminent"
So... if it may be imminent, then it's not imminent, right? Heh.
"Maybe they wouldn't need to tax internet sales if Bush weren't pushing a $674 Billion Tax Cut [216.239.33.100]."
Um. This is insightful? Somebody doesn't know the difference between state and federal taxes, but that's okay because they made an anti-Bush joke?
.. but don't make it terribly complicated. Wish I had something more insightful to say than that, but I don't. Every time I hear this topic brought up, everybody and their mother wants to make it more and more complicated just to make it more fair. Personally, I don't care what the diffrence between 5% and 7% is, and I don't care which state it goes to. Hell, make it a flat tax and let me choose which state the taxes go to. :P
"Bug Report 1823: When movie-controller BSODs, evidently the pressure system gets locked on "Maximum". ..."
Bug Report 1824: Somebody hacked in and is now sending pictures of AnonV Jr. around the net with a mustache painted on it.
"I can't help noticing that you also don't mention why you think it's stupid. That's funny."
0 76 695
Sorry, don't see why it's funny. I was responding to his post.
Since you're going to troll, though, I suggest you look here at this post I made. You'll notice it's on of the early comments:
http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=50556&cid=5
I guess I could have been redundant and covered that in this post too just to save you from finding it funny. If my comment displayed sort of fault, I might.
"Some porn, one of those plastic vaginas, and 1 million geeks will lose weight."
Damn I wanna be a beta tester.
Hah!
I had an accomplice once. I was racing with my friend's little brother. Unfortunately, the house was a bit rickety so occasionally the thumping we caused would knock something over, thus earning the wrath of mom. So while I was racing, my 'accomplice' intentionally knocked over something in the living room. My opponent stopped with an "Oh shit, I'm in trouble look" on his face while I raced to victory.
Heh. Only worked the first time, though.
"stay lazy playing video games or burn calories? The choice was never more easy than now."
Just wait until they come out with an interactive chin-up bar!
"You aren't a gamer until you've dropped to your knees and pounded the living shit out a of nintendo power pad. We used to quickly stand up and do knee-drops for the log hurdles. Good times."
Ever let your friend's little brothers play, then yank it out from under them? Heh.
"And playing a game that requires you to barely lift your feet (more like shuffling), is not exercise."
Um, it's a little more than just 'barely lifting your feet'. People who get into that game rarely stop without breaking a sweat. It'd certainly do me more good than the exercise bicycle that's covered in a protective layer of dust.