"When difficulties arise and the authorities want sweeping powers to 'protect' the citizens, should the citizens give up important civil liberties for what is probably just an illusion of safety? When are you ever safe enough in these times? Maybe the citizens should stop and ask themselves how much they really value their civil liberties - just how far should you go?"
You don't have liberty without security, so what's the point of talking about preserving all your civil liberties when you're not free anyway? In reality compromises must be made to maximise freedom.
" "The terrorists will never succeed in taking away our freedoms and civil liberties!"
Well, technically, they're using our own politicians to accomplish that, if that is indeed their goal. Now that is a feat: getting your enemy to obtain your goal for you."
There's always some person who says something like this and gets modded up as insightful. It's more complicated than that, however. By threatening your life, the terrorists have already taken away your freedom. Security is necessary to have freedom. So reasonable politicians (not just the Bush admin.), including both Democrat and Republican senators, are trying to strike a balance to gain back some of the freedom lost trhough loss of security, as the expense of some other freedoms.
The attempted bombing in London today shows terrorists can strike at will, even in a place they just attacked. The British govt. has not made the subway any more secure in the last two weeks, despite all the rhetoric. I won't be surpirsed if they enact more PATRIOT act laws as well.
Make the Beatles song free, and I'll download that too. The Beethoven recordings don't sound half bad. The full collection on cd costs quite a bit of cash. Thanks everyone who contributes money to the BBC for the free music. BTW, if the BBC wants to continue this trend, it would be nice to get recordings of Dvorak's symphonies.
"It is unethical to take over things that you're contractually signed against doing. But the company should devise a method to stop me that doesn't result in me being out of work. "
Yes, you can choose to work for someone who is not a direct competitor in your field for the year or two required.
" That's right. Because capitalism benefits when companies keep secrets."
Yes. Your sarcasm aside, investors aren't going to spend money developing IP if your competitor gets all that knowledge for free (as in beer). That is the basis for the patent system. You agree to discose your secrets, but your competitors can't use them without paying you royalties for a period of time. It keeps people from reverse engineering products to take advantage of another company's IP.
" Maybe that's because Microsoft has demonstrated that a technology company doesn't have to engage in any original work at all in order to be wildly successful, at least in the current US legal climate..."
Yes, MS demonstrated that all some company has to do is claim they were working on product x, but couldn't compete because of the MS monopoly, and collect a big paycheck at MS's expense. That's the American way.
" I want to focus on giving people broadband, but only you two can do it. Anyone who isn't currently making money off of this technology will not be able to make money off of it in the future - that will be the government's job. Sincerly FCC F%$kwit"
No one is going to spend money on infrastructure if they're forced to then rent it out to competitors. Therefore, taking away the leech option will result in more investment to give more access to people who currently don't have a broadband option. You really shouldn't call someone a "F%$kwit" when you don't understand what he's saying.
"Communication companies' bottomlines could, for example, be increased dramatically if the infrastrusture was there for each and every sucker in the US to have access to $50/mth broadband. And that could happen if, for example, they lobbied the FCC to let them do that..."
That's what telcon companies thought during the dot boom. They spent a ton of money on laying fiber, and then people were still ok with dial-up. Worst telcom downturn ever followed.
Requirements to share lines decreases the incentive to invest in new infrastructure, because other companies can leech off of your investment. Therefore, if you want to provide incentives for companies to add broadband support to new communities, you need stop forcing other companies to leech off of their capital investments. This is the goal of the FCC, so the move makes sense.
"There is, sort of. If the wires are shorter, they have less resistance end-to-end assuming they have the same thickness, are made from the same material, etc etc. Less resistance means less heat (and maybe core voltage could be lowered slightly too, since there would be less of a voltage drop). However, I honestly don't know how much heat comes from the actual junctions versus circuit pathways."
I don't think people are worried about the heat dissipated in the actual wire. High resistance wires require you to use additional buffers to generate signals with acceptable rise/fall times due to rc charging effects. This costs more power.
According to this article, voters approved a 125 million dollar bond for the project. Since the population is only 116,000, that's over $1000 per resident.
There's no reason you can't license WMV, and write a software player under linux, unless linux developers refuse to support the hardware technology. The player couldn't be open source because of licensing issues and circumvention issues. It may be circumventable in linux anyway, unless the video stream to the monitor is encrypted, but there's nothing the content providers can do if someone is really determined to crack the security anyway, even with proprietary OSs.
People who refuse to run anything but OSS or free as in beer software are SOL, but not all Linux users need be left out.
according to this article, you can get a PC from HP with decent performance for as low as $250? 1 option includes Athlon 3000+, 256MB RAM, 40GB drive, Win XP home, integrated video and sound, and a keyboard and mouse.
Does their cost cutting measures allow them to sell cheaper pcs? Is support for these machines going to suffer?
"The sad thing is that the cable companies and telephone companies are trying to protect these markets by suing the cities rather than rolling out the services that they want. Their philosophy is "you'll get it when we get around to you, and if your government tries to provide services in the meantime (or invite in alternative service providers), we'll try to prevent it". This is wrong and arrogant. It treats consumers like a resource these companies have some sort of divine right to exploit, rather than a market which can and should be able to vote with its ballots and pocketbooks."
No, companies treat customers like a market. They no fiber is too expensive and no one would pay for it in a market where cable and twisted pair are available. So now everyone's forced to pay for something that will be of real benefit to only a small minority in the near term.
"In a free market, if you ignore a market segment, you should not have a legal way to prevent others from coming in and serving it."
Govt. is not a market force. Govt. intervention means, by definition, that the market is not free.
"The availability of broadband is an economic growth factor and an economic indicator. No single corporation should have the power to determine the timeline when such a powerful tool comes to a community. "
It is local govt. who have set this artificial monopoly. No local govt. just lets anyone string cable, fiber, etc. Companies are at the mercy of govt. regulation, not the other way around.
Isn't Apple going to design their own box with their own proprietary DRM video scheme, like they do now with music? At least anyone can licens WMV. No one can even license fairplay.
from the article "Everyone's going to say, 'hang on - if they've got it already, why are they going to buy the record?' But what we find is actually, people really like buying the records."
I'm glad someone thinks the album format isn't dead yet, given the popularity of buying single tracks from iTMS. I prefer listening to albums, rather than some mix of greatest hits by various bands.
" You may not be able to buy a "general purpose computer" anymore. They will all have this specialized DRM crap and who knows what else. All built into the chips, so it will be difficult if not impossible to avoid it."
What you really meant is you can't do anything you want with data you received from soneone else, such as a record label. If you make your own content, or someone decides to provide you content in a different format, then it doesn't matter what DRM capabilities are built into the hardware.
"Do I stay honorable and defend the public, or do I get insanely wealthy by selling out to the corporations? Well, I think I'll sell out!"
The Soviet Union sold out corporations to defend the public. Look how that turned out. Liberals in the US routinely sell out corporations for labor union cash. Trial lawyers get insanely wealthy extracting money from doctors over frivolous lawsuits. It cuts both ways.
"So, in your world one must either agree with everything the government does or disagree with everything it does?
Perhaps someone could believe in the enforcement of fair trade and the maintenance of a level playing field (one aspect of government) while still being in favor of curtailing the government's ability to intrude upon a person's privacy. You seem like an intelligent person though so I won't go on, suffice it to say that people's actions wouldn't seem as arbitrary if you took a minute to understand their motivations and beliefs."
I think his point was it's a bit hypocritical to complain that the govt. is restricting your freedom via DMCA, but then support restricting the freedom of MS executives through anti-trust laws.
In the end,/.ers in general aren't interested in freedom or fairness. They are only interested in what benefits them the most. Just look at support for GPL enforcement but hatred towards RIAA for their copyright enforcement.
"What prevents OEMS from installing Firefox much like Sony and others did with NS? Granted MS would love to charge those companies more, but wouldn't those companies save in support costs?"
There would probably be no savings in support costs. For every exploited secuirty problem with IE, there would be at least 1 complaint about firefox not working because the site doesn't support it.
"Apple's DRM gets out of your way (at least, I haven't butted up against it, and I use the iTunes Music Store frequently, and own an iPod.)"
If you owned any other mp3 player, Apple's DRM would get in your way. Apple uses their DRM to raise the barrier to entry for competing products, a monopoly tactic.
Slashdot Mirror
"When difficulties arise and the authorities want sweeping powers to 'protect' the citizens, should the citizens give up important civil liberties for what is probably just an illusion of safety? When are you ever safe enough in these times? Maybe the citizens should stop and ask themselves how much they really value their civil liberties - just how far should you go?"
You don't have liberty without security, so what's the point of talking about preserving all your civil liberties when you're not free anyway? In reality compromises must be made to maximise freedom.
" "The terrorists will never succeed in taking away our freedoms and civil liberties!"
Well, technically, they're using our own politicians to accomplish that, if that is indeed their goal. Now that is a feat: getting your enemy to obtain your goal for you."
There's always some person who says something like this and gets modded up as insightful. It's more complicated than that, however. By threatening your life, the terrorists have already taken away your freedom. Security is necessary to have freedom. So reasonable politicians (not just the Bush admin.), including both Democrat and Republican senators, are trying to strike a balance to gain back some of the freedom lost trhough loss of security, as the expense of some other freedoms.
The attempted bombing in London today shows terrorists can strike at will, even in a place they just attacked. The British govt. has not made the subway any more secure in the last two weeks, despite all the rhetoric. I won't be surpirsed if they enact more PATRIOT act laws as well.
Make the Beatles song free, and I'll download that too. The Beethoven recordings don't sound half bad. The full collection on cd costs quite a bit of cash. Thanks everyone who contributes money to the BBC for the free music. BTW, if the BBC wants to continue this trend, it would be nice to get recordings of Dvorak's symphonies.
"It is unethical to take over things that you're contractually signed against doing. But the company should devise a method to stop me that doesn't result in me being out of work.
"
Yes, you can choose to work for someone who is not a direct competitor in your field for the year or two required.
" That's right. Because capitalism benefits when companies keep secrets."
Yes. Your sarcasm aside, investors aren't going to spend money developing IP if your competitor gets all that knowledge for free (as in beer). That is the basis for the patent system. You agree to discose your secrets, but your competitors can't use them without paying you royalties for a period of time. It keeps people from reverse engineering products to take advantage of another company's IP.
" Maybe that's because Microsoft has demonstrated that a technology company doesn't have to engage in any original work at all in order to be wildly successful, at least in the current US legal climate..."
Yes, MS demonstrated that all some company has to do is claim they were working on product x, but couldn't compete because of the MS monopoly, and collect a big paycheck at MS's expense. That's the American way.
" I want to focus on giving people broadband, but only you two can do it. Anyone who isn't currently making money off of this technology will not be able to make money off of it in the future - that will be the government's job. Sincerly FCC F%$kwit"
No one is going to spend money on infrastructure if they're forced to then rent it out to competitors. Therefore, taking away the leech option will result in more investment to give more access to people who currently don't have a broadband option. You really shouldn't call someone a "F%$kwit" when you don't understand what he's saying.
"Communication companies' bottomlines could, for example, be increased dramatically if the infrastrusture was there for each and every sucker in the US to have access to $50/mth broadband. And that could happen if, for example, they lobbied the FCC to let them do that..."
That's what telcon companies thought during the dot boom. They spent a ton of money on laying fiber, and then people were still ok with dial-up. Worst telcom downturn ever followed.
Requirements to share lines decreases the incentive to invest in new infrastructure, because other companies can leech off of your investment. Therefore, if you want to provide incentives for companies to add broadband support to new communities, you need stop forcing other companies to leech off of their capital investments. This is the goal of the FCC, so the move makes sense.
"Allow municipal wifi."
Muni wifi is technically a poor solution and only a govt. agency would be stupid enough to waste money on such a venture.
See here.
"There is, sort of. If the wires are shorter, they have less resistance end-to-end assuming they have the same thickness, are made from the same material, etc etc. Less resistance means less heat (and maybe core voltage could be lowered slightly too, since there would be less of a voltage drop). However, I honestly don't know how much heat comes from the actual junctions versus circuit pathways."
I don't think people are worried about the heat dissipated in the actual wire. High resistance wires require you to use additional buffers to generate signals with acceptable rise/fall times due to rc charging effects. This costs more power.
According to this article, voters approved a 125 million dollar bond for the project. Since the population is only 116,000, that's over $1000 per resident.
see here.
There's no reason you can't license WMV, and write a software player under linux, unless linux developers refuse to support the hardware technology. The player couldn't be open source because of licensing issues and circumvention issues. It may be circumventable in linux anyway, unless the video stream to the monitor is encrypted, but there's nothing the content providers can do if someone is really determined to crack the security anyway, even with proprietary OSs.
People who refuse to run anything but OSS or free as in beer software are SOL, but not all Linux users need be left out.
according to this article, you can get a PC from HP with decent performance for as low as $250? 1 option includes Athlon 3000+, 256MB RAM, 40GB drive, Win XP home, integrated video and sound, and a keyboard and mouse.
Does their cost cutting measures allow them to sell cheaper pcs? Is support for these machines going to suffer?
"The sad thing is that the cable companies and telephone companies are trying to protect these markets by suing the cities rather than rolling out the services that they want. Their philosophy is "you'll get it when we get around to you, and if your government tries to provide services in the meantime (or invite in alternative service providers), we'll try to prevent it". This is wrong and arrogant. It treats consumers like a resource these companies have some sort of divine right to exploit, rather than a market which can and should be able to vote with its ballots and pocketbooks."
No, companies treat customers like a market. They no fiber is too expensive and no one would pay for it in a market where cable and twisted pair are available. So now everyone's forced to pay for something that will be of real benefit to only a small minority in the near term.
"In a free market, if you ignore a market segment, you should not have a legal way to prevent others from coming in and serving it."
Govt. is not a market force. Govt. intervention means, by definition, that the market is not free.
"The availability of broadband is an economic growth factor and an economic indicator. No single corporation should have the power to determine the timeline when such a powerful tool comes to a community. "
It is local govt. who have set this artificial monopoly. No local govt. just lets anyone string cable, fiber, etc. Companies are at the mercy of govt. regulation, not the other way around.
"Hewlett and Packard would be astonished at what their company is doing today."
The company Hewlett and Packard founded is now called Agilent. What HP does now has nothing to do with what they did originally.
Isn't Apple going to design their own box with their own proprietary DRM video scheme, like they do now with music? At least anyone can licens WMV. No one can even license fairplay.
from the article
"Everyone's going to say, 'hang on - if they've got it already, why are they going to buy the record?' But what we find is actually, people really like buying the records."
I'm glad someone thinks the album format isn't dead yet, given the popularity of buying single tracks from iTMS. I prefer listening to albums, rather than some mix of greatest hits by various bands.
" You may not be able to buy a "general purpose computer" anymore. They will all have this specialized DRM crap and who knows what else. All built into the chips, so it will be difficult if not impossible to avoid it."
What you really meant is you can't do anything you want with data you received from soneone else, such as a record label. If you make your own content, or someone decides to provide you content in a different format, then it doesn't matter what DRM capabilities are built into the hardware.
"Do I stay honorable and defend the public, or do I get insanely wealthy by selling out to the corporations? Well, I think I'll sell out!"
The Soviet Union sold out corporations to defend the public. Look how that turned out. Liberals in the US routinely sell out corporations for labor union cash. Trial lawyers get insanely wealthy extracting money from doctors over frivolous lawsuits. It cuts both ways.
"So, in your world one must either agree with everything the government does or disagree with everything it does?
/.ers in general aren't interested in freedom or fairness. They are only interested in what benefits them the most. Just look at support for GPL enforcement but hatred towards RIAA for their copyright enforcement.
Perhaps someone could believe in the enforcement of fair trade and the maintenance of a level playing field (one aspect of government) while still being in favor of curtailing the government's ability to intrude upon a person's privacy. You seem like an intelligent person though so I won't go on, suffice it to say that people's actions wouldn't seem as arbitrary if you took a minute to understand their motivations and beliefs."
I think his point was it's a bit hypocritical to complain that the govt. is restricting your freedom via DMCA, but then support restricting the freedom of MS executives through anti-trust laws.
In the end,
"What prevents OEMS from installing Firefox much like Sony and others did with NS? Granted MS would love to charge those companies more, but wouldn't those companies save in support costs?"
There would probably be no savings in support costs. For every exploited secuirty problem with IE, there would be at least 1 complaint about firefox not working because the site doesn't support it.
"Apple's DRM gets out of your way (at least, I haven't butted up against it, and I use the iTunes Music Store frequently, and own an iPod.)"
If you owned any other mp3 player, Apple's DRM would get in your way. Apple uses their DRM to raise the barrier to entry for competing products, a monopoly tactic.