...is it even technically possible? Assuming you had a VERY high-resolution scanner AND the mad coding skillz needed to decode the information, is it feasible to get music from the scanned in record grooves?
Pardon my ignorance, as always.
But eventually, new people who download Winamp won't be able to use mp3s. And then other companies who can't pay the bills by offering software for free can't offer their players for free.
So eventually you get a bunch of "veteran" mp3 users, whose numbers constantly dwindle to zero, while new people are automatically diverted to whatever new format comes down the pike.
yeah, you can keep your mp3 collection all the way to your grave, but if no one else has mp3s, what good is it?
I didn't realize immediately that winamp is affected by this. Hopefully Nullsoft's parent company (AOLTImeWarnerTurnerOmniCorpKellogMotorGeneralFord ChevyMicroSunSoftSystems Ltd. Inc.) will absorb the cost for them. Otherwise, mp3 proliferation will collapse. Or we'll start seeing alot more advertisements in Winamp. Sigh.
i wonder how much money they're pulling in from mp3-related things? Anyone got a rough estimate?
And wouldn't this hurt the proliferation of mp3 encoders running around, thereby possibly limiting the amount of mp3s that are available to the general public? Maybe we just need to use.ogg?:)
Again, this doesn't use anything vaguely Quake-related, other than lifted textures. It uses the Adobe Atmosphere engine, which is woefully underpowered compared to an FPS game.
Activeworlds is the only one I know of. "> It's even free if you just want to walk around. Being able to build your own stuff costs 20 dollars a year, and I'd say it's worth it (although I haven't visited since 1999... all my stuff is still built though:).
Hosting your own world is almost prohibitively expensive, although I doubt anyone would want to bother, unless you REALLY want to build an entire world. The main world thing you start on is big enough for all your building desires.
A quake-engine metaverse would be a wonderful idea! IIRC, the original design spec for Quake was for it to be like an RPG, and the servers would be inter-connected, ala NeverWinter Nights. One imagines that it wouldn't be too hard to set up a NWN-like server connection in-game. But then again, I'm not a programmer.
Don't want to be flamebait here or anything, but really... this stuff has been going on for years. Like Activeworlds has been doing since like 1997. You can even build your own stuff (landscaping, buildings, even entire cities -- I did so when I was 14) in real-time. Sure, you can't shoot people in the face, but do you really want to all the time?
I suppose this is News For Nerds because Counter-strike is l33t or something. Frankly, I wouldn't want to chat with most of the CS community... I might get accused of cheating using a Chatbot:)
But seriously, this has been around for years. I fail to see why this is important. Must be a slow news day.
Wouldn't the value of the product continue to be diminished, though? As you can freely duplicate the product (a file) with little effort, it would only be a matter of time before it's perceived "value" would diminish, simply by sheer volume.
Pardon the possible ignorance, it just seems like supply and demand to me... the reason Gold is so expensive is because there's relatively little of it to go around (compared to, say, copper).
Actually, I would assume that the "average slashdotter" is a lot more intelligent than the "average American"; most of us have college degrees or their equivalent (or is working towards one), have rather high-paying jobs (or the potential for one), and is more in-tune with the issues concerning them.
Meanwhile, the "average American" has about 2 years of college, 40,000 bucks a year salary, and is mired in middle-management. Not to mention completely apathetic to politics and other items of importance.
1) We're not at war. Congress never declared war. Congress MUST declare an act of war against a country in order to be in a state of war. Simply saying ad nauseum in speech rhetoric about the "war on terrorism" does not make the nation at war.
2) Ashcroft is quite possibly the scariest person alive, in my opinion. He might be grandstanding, but his actions since taking office has shown to me that he would rather just throw away the Constitution; makes his life easier.
3) American troops have been in "combat" for like the past 20 years, doing "peacekeeping" missions. That doesn't change the fact that the PATRIOT bill infringes upon your privacy hardcore.
I'm really quite sick of people saying that "dammit, we're in a war, stop badmouthing the government or else." Who are we fighting, exactly?
Too bad everyone's too busy following the government's lead to really do anything.
*reads post over*
Man, I sound like a conspiracy theorist at 8 in the morning:)
...doesn't seem like a wise idea on Apple's part. Why would you restrict access at ALL to a Mac convention? You could do that if you had an overpowering presence in the computing world... but seeing as Apple hasn't had that since 1984 , it just seems bogus to me.
Restricting access for your own fans and users just seems like a daffy idea to me.
Lordfly
I can see this only being a factor in the regular "radio play" stuff that hits the top 40 stations. Otherwise, it's pointless to loop an entire cd. It would be more effective for them to only loopback the top 40 hit songs, thereby hitting more people.
Strangely enough (and I know I'm making a blanket statement here), most tech-oriented people (read: slashdot users) don't like top40 stuff. They prefer indie labels, songs by bands that don't hit the radio waves, underground stuff, live bootlegs, and the like. Some sleazebag company looping Britney Spears' new bland corporate single won't affect us.
Who it WILL effect is the casual pirate without broadband, which is what I think the RIAA is going for on this one. If Joe Average is using his spyware-laden program, and can't find a decent copy of the new Ricky Martin mp3, he'll eventually give up after 2 or 3 tries. Then it's back to the store for another 20 dollar piece of plastic...
Frankly, this looping campaign is easily defeated by my broadband connection and my persistance... if there are multiple copies of the song, I click on a bunch of them, and delete the looped ones. This shotgun approach works wonders. You should all try it.
It is good to know where the songs are coming from, though... perhaps you could blacklist the ip addresses at the source? The company has to introduce it into the sharing network at some point... logic dictates it would be either from their offices or from their homes, either of which should have a decent connection (if they're to spread the file efficiently). Killing the ips with some sort of filtering by the programs themselves (in future p2p programs, I'd imagine) would be a possible, if temporary, countermeasure.
But it shouldn't be an inevitable result that anything big and ambitious will undoubtably kill someone. Steps should still be taken for the safety of everyone, as opposed to saving a few bucks.
The Moon is magnitudes closer... why not send up a proposal that outlines a semi-permanent base on our satellite? Perhaps cheaper, as well. It would also get alot of press coverage, seeing as the media could hark back to "RETURN TO THE MOON" on the front page.
But where's the joy of finally reaching Mars first at the cost of a couple hundred lives? To say, indeed, "we were first?" Only to have the US or a private firm land next to them a week later, with no casulties, and win the accolades anyway?
At least with the expensive American model, our astronauts have a better chance of returning in one piece...
What possible motivation would any capitalistic society have for going to Mars? It would cost an extreme amount and would be a logical nightmare... and it's not exactly high up on the priority list for any nation.
Private companies, as technology improves, could use the planet for mining operations, resorts, tourism, terraforming, experiments, research, and so on... the tech just isn't there yet. I'm talking far off in the distance, like 100-200 years from now.
As for the spelling error, it's late and I should be in bed. I usually spell things rather well, or try to.
Valid point. But, towards its end, it was jury-rigged together, endangering the lives of the people who went there.
If it was lasting beyond its expected lifespan SAFELY, well, that's one thing... being supported by duct tape and a prayer is hardly worth the lives of cosmonauts and our own astronauts.
Lordfly
Cough *International Space Station* Cough...
I think a space station would be a better candidate than landing on a planet a couple billion miles a way to unite the nations for Space's Sake.
Lordfly
1) The Russian space agency isn't exactly a leading space innovator anymore. Since the breakup of the USSR, hasn't it been on rather shaky ground?
2) Their track record of late has been less than stellar (no pun intended); didn't the US and other countries have to bail out Russia's contributions to the ISS so far? Also, look at Mir: Fires, computer crashes, collisions in space... and they want to go to Mars? I think they need to take a driving test first...
3) With the faltering Russian economy and shaky government structure, I would think the last thing they should be worrying about is jettisoning money into space to get to a planet that has little to offer with today's technology (no mining, and so on.)
Leave it to private entreapaneurs to get to Mars first. Government agencies can't do it anymore.
Aside from the rather hefty price tag (for the supposed "third-world" userbase it's aiming for), where would one buy batteries for this thing? Where, exactly, is the Radio Shack in Ethiopia?:)
I'm a poor college student... am I third-world? Because I don't really see myself plopping down 200 bucks for a PDA, no matter how cool it is. Perhaps once I get out of college...
Lordfly
Slashdot Mirror
...is it even technically possible? Assuming you had a VERY high-resolution scanner AND the mad coding skillz needed to decode the information, is it feasible to get music from the scanned in record grooves? Pardon my ignorance, as always.
But eventually, new people who download Winamp won't be able to use mp3s. And then other companies who can't pay the bills by offering software for free can't offer their players for free.
So eventually you get a bunch of "veteran" mp3 users, whose numbers constantly dwindle to zero, while new people are automatically diverted to whatever new format comes down the pike.
yeah, you can keep your mp3 collection all the way to your grave, but if no one else has mp3s, what good is it?
Lordfly
I didn't realize immediately that winamp is affected by this. Hopefully Nullsoft's parent company (AOLTImeWarnerTurnerOmniCorpKellogMotorGeneralFord ChevyMicroSunSoftSystems Ltd. Inc.) will absorb the cost for them. Otherwise, mp3 proliferation will collapse. Or we'll start seeing alot more advertisements in Winamp. Sigh.
Lordfly
i wonder how much money they're pulling in from mp3-related things? Anyone got a rough estimate?
.ogg? :)
And wouldn't this hurt the proliferation of mp3 encoders running around, thereby possibly limiting the amount of mp3s that are available to the general public? Maybe we just need to use
Lordfly
Again, this doesn't use anything vaguely Quake-related, other than lifted textures. It uses the Adobe Atmosphere engine, which is woefully underpowered compared to an FPS game.
Lordfly
Activeworlds is the only one I know of. "> It's even free if you just want to walk around. Being able to build your own stuff costs 20 dollars a year, and I'd say it's worth it (although I haven't visited since 1999... all my stuff is still built though :).
Hosting your own world is almost prohibitively expensive, although I doubt anyone would want to bother, unless you REALLY want to build an entire world. The main world thing you start on is big enough for all your building desires.
Lordfly
A quake-engine metaverse would be a wonderful idea! IIRC, the original design spec for Quake was for it to be like an RPG, and the servers would be inter-connected, ala NeverWinter Nights. One imagines that it wouldn't be too hard to set up a NWN-like server connection in-game. But then again, I'm not a programmer.
It doesn't even use the same engine; it uses a Plugin that nobody uses by Adobe.
/. posting... as it is right now, I fail to be impressed.
Now if they made it using the Half-Life engine, that would warrant a
Lordfly
How is this relevant at all?
Don't want to be flamebait here or anything, but really... this stuff has been going on for years. Like Activeworlds has been doing since like 1997. You can even build your own stuff (landscaping, buildings, even entire cities -- I did so when I was 14) in real-time. Sure, you can't shoot people in the face, but do you really want to all the time?
I suppose this is News For Nerds because Counter-strike is l33t or something. Frankly, I wouldn't want to chat with most of the CS community... I might get accused of cheating using a Chatbot :)
But seriously, this has been around for years. I fail to see why this is important. Must be a slow news day.
Lordfly
Wouldn't the value of the product continue to be diminished, though? As you can freely duplicate the product (a file) with little effort, it would only be a matter of time before it's perceived "value" would diminish, simply by sheer volume.
Pardon the possible ignorance, it just seems like supply and demand to me... the reason Gold is so expensive is because there's relatively little of it to go around (compared to, say, copper).
Lordfly
Actually, I would assume that the "average slashdotter" is a lot more intelligent than the "average American"; most of us have college degrees or their equivalent (or is working towards one), have rather high-paying jobs (or the potential for one), and is more in-tune with the issues concerning them.
Meanwhile, the "average American" has about 2 years of college, 40,000 bucks a year salary, and is mired in middle-management. Not to mention completely apathetic to politics and other items of importance.
Lordfly
1) We're not at war. Congress never declared war. Congress MUST declare an act of war against a country in order to be in a state of war. Simply saying ad nauseum in speech rhetoric about the "war on terrorism" does not make the nation at war.
:)
2) Ashcroft is quite possibly the scariest person alive, in my opinion. He might be grandstanding, but his actions since taking office has shown to me that he would rather just throw away the Constitution; makes his life easier.
3) American troops have been in "combat" for like the past 20 years, doing "peacekeeping" missions. That doesn't change the fact that the PATRIOT bill infringes upon your privacy hardcore.
I'm really quite sick of people saying that "dammit, we're in a war, stop badmouthing the government or else." Who are we fighting, exactly?
Too bad everyone's too busy following the government's lead to really do anything.
*reads post over*
Man, I sound like a conspiracy theorist at 8 in the morning
Lordfly
...doesn't seem like a wise idea on Apple's part. Why would you restrict access at ALL to a Mac convention? You could do that if you had an overpowering presence in the computing world... but seeing as Apple hasn't had that since 1984 , it just seems bogus to me. Restricting access for your own fans and users just seems like a daffy idea to me. Lordfly
I can see this only being a factor in the regular "radio play" stuff that hits the top 40 stations. Otherwise, it's pointless to loop an entire cd. It would be more effective for them to only loopback the top 40 hit songs, thereby hitting more people.
Strangely enough (and I know I'm making a blanket statement here), most tech-oriented people (read: slashdot users) don't like top40 stuff. They prefer indie labels, songs by bands that don't hit the radio waves, underground stuff, live bootlegs, and the like. Some sleazebag company looping Britney Spears' new bland corporate single won't affect us.
Who it WILL effect is the casual pirate without broadband, which is what I think the RIAA is going for on this one. If Joe Average is using his spyware-laden program, and can't find a decent copy of the new Ricky Martin mp3, he'll eventually give up after 2 or 3 tries. Then it's back to the store for another 20 dollar piece of plastic...
Frankly, this looping campaign is easily defeated by my broadband connection and my persistance... if there are multiple copies of the song, I click on a bunch of them, and delete the looped ones. This shotgun approach works wonders. You should all try it.
It is good to know where the songs are coming from, though... perhaps you could blacklist the ip addresses at the source? The company has to introduce it into the sharing network at some point... logic dictates it would be either from their offices or from their homes, either of which should have a decent connection (if they're to spread the file efficiently). Killing the ips with some sort of filtering by the programs themselves (in future p2p programs, I'd imagine) would be a possible, if temporary, countermeasure.
Lordfly
But it shouldn't be an inevitable result that anything big and ambitious will undoubtably kill someone. Steps should still be taken for the safety of everyone, as opposed to saving a few bucks.
Lordfly
Perhaps he heard about the exciting night life in Mars' nightclubs...
The Moon is magnitudes closer... why not send up a proposal that outlines a semi-permanent base on our satellite? Perhaps cheaper, as well. It would also get alot of press coverage, seeing as the media could hark back to "RETURN TO THE MOON" on the front page.
Lordfly
From a non-sympathetic standpoint, this works...
But where's the joy of finally reaching Mars first at the cost of a couple hundred lives? To say, indeed, "we were first?" Only to have the US or a private firm land next to them a week later, with no casulties, and win the accolades anyway?
At least with the expensive American model, our astronauts have a better chance of returning in one piece...
Lordfly
What possible motivation would any capitalistic society have for going to Mars? It would cost an extreme amount and would be a logical nightmare... and it's not exactly high up on the priority list for any nation.
Private companies, as technology improves, could use the planet for mining operations, resorts, tourism, terraforming, experiments, research, and so on... the tech just isn't there yet. I'm talking far off in the distance, like 100-200 years from now.
As for the spelling error, it's late and I should be in bed. I usually spell things rather well, or try to.
Lordfly
Valid point. But, towards its end, it was jury-rigged together, endangering the lives of the people who went there. If it was lasting beyond its expected lifespan SAFELY, well, that's one thing... being supported by duct tape and a prayer is hardly worth the lives of cosmonauts and our own astronauts. Lordfly
*does some calcuations in his head*
So we should see some profound impacts from a mission to Mars by 2350 or so? Just in time for Star Trek... where's my remote?
Lordfly
Cough *International Space Station* Cough... I think a space station would be a better candidate than landing on a planet a couple billion miles a way to unite the nations for Space's Sake. Lordfly
1) The Russian space agency isn't exactly a leading space innovator anymore. Since the breakup of the USSR, hasn't it been on rather shaky ground?
2) Their track record of late has been less than stellar (no pun intended); didn't the US and other countries have to bail out Russia's contributions to the ISS so far? Also, look at Mir: Fires, computer crashes, collisions in space... and they want to go to Mars? I think they need to take a driving test first...
3) With the faltering Russian economy and shaky government structure, I would think the last thing they should be worrying about is jettisoning money into space to get to a planet that has little to offer with today's technology (no mining, and so on.)
Leave it to private entreapaneurs to get to Mars first. Government agencies can't do it anymore.
Lordfly
Aside from the rather hefty price tag (for the supposed "third-world" userbase it's aiming for), where would one buy batteries for this thing? Where, exactly, is the Radio Shack in Ethiopia? :)
I'm a poor college student... am I third-world? Because I don't really see myself plopping down 200 bucks for a PDA, no matter how cool it is. Perhaps once I get out of college...
Lordfly