Google has 1000+ employees, most (maybe all) of whom have stock options. This is why the media knows they have to start filing.
If 10% of the company is in the hands of non-Larry & Sergei employees, it means they would have to pay $2B in cash to those employees (assuming a $20B post-IPO company value that everyone could agree on).
It is estimated that Google made $250M in profit in 2003, combine this with 50M in venture funding and you are still about 1.7B short of being able to buy out your employees.
So are they catching people who leave the source shared on their machine, anyone who searches for "windows 2000", or can they tell if someone actually downloaded (assuming they instantly moved it to a non-shared directory).
I've been under the impression that the last of those 3 isn't possible (unless Microsoft is the one who uploaded it to you). Have they written letters to people who only searched?
The beauty of the Family Guy was it was so unapologetically low brow.
(Chris and Peter are looking at a whale)
Chris: Dad, what's a blowhole for?
Peter: I'll tell you what it's NOT for, and then you'll know why I can never go back to Sea World.
There are avenues for backlash if people get fed up with price discrimination.
If you've ever been to Southwest Airlines website, you can see what fares are available and what fares you could have paid. Because it is well known that Southwest sells these fares out on a first-come-first-served basis, people that end up with the higher fares know they have no one to blame but themselves (for not getting in earlier).
People therefore view Southwest as a discount airline. But here's what'll bake your noodle, Southwest gets more revenue per passenger/mile than premium airline United. People will pay more to be treated "fairly".
If only 450,000 tech jobs (8% of current) go overseas in 12 years, I would consider that a good thing. That means that the tech industry only has to grow 0.7% per year to be even at the end of 12 (and that assumes all 450,000 jobs disappear tomorrow).
Yes, more development will be done overseas. Yes the tax laws are messed up (overseas coding work should be taxed as an import). But is 0.7% growth too much to ask of the innovative tech industry?
I don't think North Carolina law supercedes, but this is a good way for someone to challenge the seemingly unlimited scope of DMCA.
IANAL, but copyright seems to be a pretense for what they want to do, which is have a monopoly on the aftermarket. I believe there was an earlier story about how this was banned in the autoparts industry via anti-trust law.
As a side note, the "printer as loss leader" model seems to have come about because Wall Street likes the "razor and razor blade" model so much. However, as a many have pointed out, the difficult engineering for razors is in the blade, not the holder (look how cheap Bic disposables are). For printers it's the reverse, the machine is a lot more technically differentiated than the ink. Thus the business model does not make sense, but is in place so Wall Street feels comfortable.
Re:What about the remote users?
on
150 Mbit/s DSL.
·
· Score: 1
This is a good point. Telcos want to keep their bandwidth costs down and their prices up. Providing near-in customers (who likely have the option of cable) with superfast connections is not the way to do this.
My previous apartment I was 24K wire feet from the CO and I couldn't get a cable modem. I paid the $80/mo for IDSL and was happy to have it.
It seems to me they should spend more time developing DSL technologies for long-loops and noisy lines. Most of these customers won't have cable and would love a reliable 384K or 768K service.
They'll serve more customers, especially ones with no other option, and these customers less likely to use huge amounts of bandwidth.
Re:Dang it, there goes my stomach lining...
on
I, Spammer
·
· Score: 1
> If they can trace a spammer they can trace activists, dissidents, anybody who might be a terrorist, they can trace anybody.
I would argue that they already have the technology to trace anybody. A federal SWAT team would respond to complaints (AOL hands them sample spams and network logs) and the feds track them down. How is this different from receiving harassing phone calls and reporting it to the police who then track down the harasser.
As has been said many times, spam violates many existing laws (false advertising, fraud, telemarketing laws). Why should someone be able to send me a message and lie about who they are for commercial gain? Enforcement steps thus need to be taken such as having police trained specifically in finding spammers.
It may not be radio, but consider this: in the 1950's there was only CBS, ABC, and NBC. Our news looked the same. With cable TV there are many more news sources, but it can be argued that our news sources still look the same. My point is that diversity of opinion is not directly linked with number of players.
While there is less and less variation of content on radio, I think you misunderstand the problem. A post on Slashdot a while back said it best about advertising supported media "you're not the customer, you're the product". If you want to listen to the music you like in the car, expect to pay for it, either by buying satellite radio or via your own CDs. The content homogenization problem is structural to ad supported content, and I don't think it can be fixed.
That said, I agree with the guy at the end of the ClearChannel article, these are the public's airwaves. Either ClearChannel should have to bid on a lease for them at auction (like cellphone airwaves) or they should be put to better public use. Getting a public resource for free and being able to use it for private profit is a perversion of capitalism.
One reason to allow incoming connections is for games without a central server (I'm thinking of Quake here). It may not be a particularly edifying use, but I wouldn't call it abuse.
You forget the '89 quake where many freeways collapsed, but the BART train was up and running the whole time. Much of BART's current political strength can be ascribed to this success.
For those who don't know BART is Bay Area Rapid Transit and it runs a third rail style train system from San Francisco to Oakland the the eastern suburbs. It crosses the SF Bay in the highly earthquake resistant "Transbay Tube"
If you get DirectTV, it only costs $4.95 a month. Furthermore, the Tivo Series2 (for DirecTV), will not offer anymore storage or other features, it will simply be cheaper. I think Tivo knows they need to lower their price.
Slashdot Mirror
Google has 1000+ employees, most (maybe all) of whom have stock options. This is why the media knows they have to start filing.
If 10% of the company is in the hands of non-Larry & Sergei employees, it means they would have to pay $2B in cash to those employees (assuming a $20B post-IPO company value that everyone could agree on).
It is estimated that Google made $250M in profit in 2003, combine this with 50M in venture funding and you are still about 1.7B short of being able to buy out your employees.
Forgot URL
Here's another one
John Muir's 1897 phone number: 63
So are they catching people who leave the source shared on their machine, anyone who searches for "windows 2000", or can they tell if someone actually downloaded (assuming they instantly moved it to a non-shared directory).
I've been under the impression that the last of those 3 isn't possible (unless Microsoft is the one who uploaded it to you). Have they written letters to people who only searched?
It's not all Tivo's fault. The DirecTivo isn't usable in Canada because DirecTv isn't legal in Canada.
The stated reason is that the Canadian government doesn't want Canadians to become to "Americanized" by watching American TV.
It's for your own good, trust them.
The beauty of the Family Guy was it was so unapologetically low brow. (Chris and Peter are looking at a whale) Chris: Dad, what's a blowhole for? Peter: I'll tell you what it's NOT for, and then you'll know why I can never go back to Sea World.
There are avenues for backlash if people get fed up with price discrimination.
If you've ever been to Southwest Airlines website, you can see what fares are available and what fares you could have paid. Because it is well known that Southwest sells these fares out on a first-come-first-served basis, people that end up with the higher fares know they have no one to blame but themselves (for not getting in earlier).
People therefore view Southwest as a discount airline. But here's what'll bake your noodle, Southwest gets more revenue per passenger/mile than premium airline United. People will pay more to be treated "fairly".
If only 450,000 tech jobs (8% of current) go overseas in 12 years, I would consider that a good thing. That means that the tech industry only has to grow 0.7% per year to be even at the end of 12 (and that assumes all 450,000 jobs disappear tomorrow).
Yes, more development will be done overseas. Yes the tax laws are messed up (overseas coding work should be taxed as an import). But is 0.7% growth too much to ask of the innovative tech industry?
I don't think North Carolina law supercedes, but this is a good way for someone to challenge the seemingly unlimited scope of DMCA.
IANAL, but copyright seems to be a pretense for what they want to do, which is have a monopoly on the aftermarket. I believe there was an earlier story about how this was banned in the autoparts industry via anti-trust law.
As a side note, the "printer as loss leader" model seems to have come about because Wall Street likes the "razor and razor blade" model so much. However, as a many have pointed out, the difficult engineering for razors is in the blade, not the holder (look how cheap Bic disposables are). For printers it's the reverse, the machine is a lot more technically differentiated than the ink. Thus the business model does not make sense, but is in place so Wall Street feels comfortable.
This is a good point. Telcos want to keep their bandwidth costs down and their prices up. Providing near-in customers (who likely have the option of cable) with superfast connections is not the way to do this.
My previous apartment I was 24K wire feet from the CO and I couldn't get a cable modem. I paid the $80/mo for IDSL and was happy to have it.
It seems to me they should spend more time developing DSL technologies for long-loops and noisy lines. Most of these customers won't have cable and would love a reliable 384K or 768K service.
They'll serve more customers, especially ones with no other option, and these customers less likely to use huge amounts of bandwidth.
> If they can trace a spammer they can trace activists, dissidents, anybody who might be a terrorist, they can trace anybody.
I would argue that they already have the technology to trace anybody. A federal SWAT team would respond to complaints (AOL hands them sample spams and network logs) and the feds track them down. How is this different from receiving harassing phone calls and reporting it to the police who then track down the harasser.
As has been said many times, spam violates many existing laws (false advertising, fraud, telemarketing laws). Why should someone be able to send me a message and lie about who they are for commercial gain? Enforcement steps thus need to be taken such as having police trained specifically in finding spammers.
FWIW this story wasn't buried. When I submitted this to Slashdot on Friday, it was on the MSNBC site here.
It was also in the Wall Street Journal on Friday here. [paid subscription]. It appeared in the print version too.
It may not be radio, but consider this: in the 1950's there was only CBS, ABC, and NBC. Our news looked the same. With cable TV there are many more news sources, but it can be argued that our news sources still look the same. My point is that diversity of opinion is not directly linked with number of players.
While there is less and less variation of content on radio, I think you misunderstand the problem. A post on Slashdot a while back said it best about advertising supported media "you're not the customer, you're the product". If you want to listen to the music you like in the car, expect to pay for it, either by buying satellite radio or via your own CDs. The content homogenization problem is structural to ad supported content, and I don't think it can be fixed.
That said, I agree with the guy at the end of the ClearChannel article, these are the public's airwaves. Either ClearChannel should have to bid on a lease for them at auction (like cellphone airwaves) or they should be put to better public use. Getting a public resource for free and being able to use it for private profit is a perversion of capitalism.
One reason to allow incoming connections is for games without a central server (I'm thinking of Quake here). It may not be a particularly edifying use, but I wouldn't call it abuse.
-John
You forget the '89 quake where many freeways collapsed, but the BART train was up and running the whole time. Much of BART's current political strength can be ascribed to this success. For those who don't know BART is Bay Area Rapid Transit and it runs a third rail style train system from San Francisco to Oakland the the eastern suburbs. It crosses the SF Bay in the highly earthquake resistant "Transbay Tube"
If you get DirectTV, it only costs $4.95 a month. Furthermore, the Tivo Series2 (for DirecTV), will not offer anymore storage or other features, it will simply be cheaper. I think Tivo knows they need to lower their price.