So perhaps there needs to be some way to gauge the support for netflix on Linux? If there are 10,000 people who support it, is that enough potential customers? How about 100,000?
There's a facebook page with about 1600 "likes." Perhaps if enough people who use FB can "like it" they can get 10k or more and garner enough publicity to push for a client? http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Bring-Netflix-To-Linux/
Which Linux guys are those? After more than a decade as a Linux/Unix sysadmin and desktop user, I'd say I'm a "Linux Guy." Many of my friends are the same. We DON'T hate DRM, though we do hate certain types of DRM.
For example, the crap that EA pulls with "authentication servers" etc really annoys a lot of people.
Steam, on the other hand, is very nice. I - and many who are pro-FOSS that I know - love it. Unless it goes down and my games go bye-bye (at this point it's been good enough that most can have faith in it), I see no problem with it. Yes, it's DRM. In a few ways it takes some things away, but it gives a lot back too (never having to hoard jewel-cases with CD keys, for example).
Games may be similarly locked to one's account similar to EA's/Blizzard's DRM, but the number of decent bargains (discount, buy-one-get-one-for-a-friend etc) on Steam makes it a rather lovable platform (and EA still makes me keep those bloody CD-keys).
A lot of us would LOVE for Steam to come to Linux, DRM or no. A lot of us would LOVE for netflix to come to Linux, DRM or no.
DRM that prevents us from hacking our own devices/hardware, or prevents usability, is often a PITA, and gets a bad rep with pro-FOSS people. However, there are plenty of people who are willing to make room for *REASONABLE* uses of DRM, and plenty of "Linux Guys" (heck, how about all the guys here clamoring for Netflix on Linux) that would love it too.
I think the connotation is that many businesses BENEFIT from the use of Open-Source but then turn their back on some of the most common uses of Open-Source.
It's like the guy whose life is saved due to chemotherapy who then says "what? donate to cancer research!? why would I do that?"
A VM is a lot more overhead than just a binary app, requires a fair bit more coding, and still wouldn't be any more compatible with various architectures etc.
A binary that works on i386/AMD64 compatible machines would work just fine, and they could keep their DRM intact so long as it doesn't fall afoul of any GPL'ed modules they're using.
Ummm... but that already applied. I'm in Canada. I once had a laptop produced for the U.S. market (my sister won it for high sales at work, in a U.S. chain that had storefronts in Canada). The warranty for the laptop - as written - applied only to the product within the U.S. That's why there are lots of laptops that have an "international" warranty now, so that if you take your laptop with you overseas and it breaks, it can be fixed in the country you are in. If not, you'll have to find somebody back in your home country to ship the laptop to, and have them handle the warranty work then ship it back to you.
It's not just the cost/level of support, it's the business presence and shipping costs. Fast-shipping a product replacement/repair from USA->USA is a bit different than from USA->Country X, and I've always just accepted it as such. If I needed an international warranty, I bought a product which stipulated it had one.
I see no reason why I couldn't resell my laptop from "country X" in the USA or Canada or whatever, so long as I'm not misrepresenting that the warranty applies in my own country, and there's nothing in the product itself that would be illegal in my own country. A bigger issue with that last one might be that different countries have different emissions, toxicity, and other such laws. A wifi card for certain countries may have an output level that's illegal in others, and a cosmetic product may contain levels of materials that aren't legal in some places. The solution I could see for that is that whomever sells it IN the USA had better be sure that it's a legal product for the USA...
This is a little bit like your local ISP discovering that you are selling WiFi to all your neighbours for a quarter miles around
Except that most (smart) ISP's I've dealt with have a clause that basically prohibits reselling bandwidth. My understanding from the supplied email is that there was no existing clause, but instead they ditched SimplyCDN and are subsequently updating their TOS to have it.
Ditching a paying customer without forewarning and *THEN* updating your policy seems like pretty shady business to me, if that's what actually happened here.
Except that the iDevice walled garden has been broken already, and some of the newer exploits are actually browser-based. In many cases they're used as an easy way to jailbreak, but could likely be used for malware as well.
"Walled gardens" are not immune to exploits. They may have extra layers of protections, but an initial exploit followed with a privilege-escalation bump and they're done for. They may also be harder to "clean" in that regard as well.
On top of that, there's also the issue of data-protection and malicious apps. It's not like Apple-et-al actually goes line-by-line through the code of every app, and there have already been malicious apps in the iPhone Store, Android store, etc. IMHO blackberry seems to do the best at dealing with this as it asks *when an app tries to do something* whether to permit it (no, just now, or forever).
The scary thing about smart-devices and the "walled garden" is the path to obsolescence. iPhones are a bit better in the "keeps on trucking" aspect of things, but there are *plenty* of Android-based devices that will never see a current-gen OS and may be harbouring unpatched vulnerabilities.
Well, a bunch of perverts posting "I want mooooore" might create a market, whether or not a financial transaction takes place. I wonder if that would/should in law create a contrast between the "quiet collector" VS somebody who is actively advocating the creation of criminal activity (aiding/abetting?)
Keep in mind that not everyone does "bad things" for profit. Some people get off on attention. While not as common in real-life, there's often the cliche of detective shows where the murderer taunts the police because he/she gets thrills from the attention and the chase.
So if it's some pervert who's abusing a relative or whatever, it's most likely he/she is doing it to satisfy their own sick sexual/power needs. HOWEVER, from what I've read of CP rings being busted, some of these people trade pics/videos like pokemon cards. That DOES create an incentive for the creation of new material, if not necessarily a financial "market" for one.
I think it depends on the medium. I may be wrong, but I believe it's illegal to distribute - and possibly posses - "snuff films" (in which an actor/person is killed on camera). Actual existence of such films is often the stuff of urban legend, however
Similarly, pictures that may depict nudity of underage individuals ARE legal in some situations, just not as porn. A famous example would be the picture of "Phan Th Kim Phúc", a Vietnamese child who was wounded and had her clothes burned off during the Vietnam war. That particular picture - despite having a naked child - is definitely NOT kiddy porn, and has been shown in many articles etc including reader's digest.
... and this wouldn't have *ANYTHING* to do with the way the governments and media have been pumping up the "terrorist threat." Terrorists in our airports, in our monuments, in our transit. There *COULD* be a terrorist living right next-door to you, or beside you on the bus.
TERRORISTS TERRORISTS TERRORISTS!
Before that (and continuing on), it was pedos. In the mall, in the playground, in the internet, hiding under the bed, etc. Before that, I suppose it was the commies.
Joe and Jane average respond to the input that is given to them.
And heaven help you if Reader's Digest ever gets your personal info. I had a subscription one year. I moved and had to call to ensure they wouldn't auto-resubscribe me. When they asked for my new address for my last few mags, I told them I'd rather not get the mags then have to submit to their mail-spam again!
So you're making extra work for yourself to avoid the scammy tactics of a known scammy merchant...? Why not just buy from somewhere that doesn't use scammy tactics?
Seriously, it's an arms race, and there's only so much time the average or even geeky type person has to find ways in blocking such crappitude while still having their machine able to work normally.
And when the server gets bushwhacked instead of the domain, and they move to a new host - but you're still getting the old IP from your hosts file - then what? How about if - rather than an FBI warning or whatever - the site is replaced by a clone that sniffs your info or installs trojans?
One thing about Amazon that I noticed is that their "Black Friday" sale seems more scammy than most. The average paperback novel (in Canada) goes for about $8-10. Yet in the "sales" the price - after discount - tends to be $11-15. The price listed as before discount is upwards of $25 or more. That same book at Chapters, with no special Black Friday crap, is on for a regular $9.99
Now I don't shop at Amazon that often, but I've never seen them selling regular ol' paperbacks for $15, and certainly not for $25. So it seems quite a scam to me, and I don't believe that it's quite legal to jack up a price and then "sale" it for more than the regular prices either...
*The above is based on my personal observations and opinion, IANAL etc
There are a lot of areas where having a story is important or lends to the game, the big trick is not to make the rest of the game SUCK. RPG's - to me - seem to be dying because they *lack* a good plot. Look at the fairly recent Final Fantasy XIII... scanty uniforms, flashy effects, and otherwise very, very lame. The given plot could have had promise if they hadn't been too busy with their angsty teenage personas, super-duper-background-rendering, and big boobs. That series is not pretty much dead to me.
Most RTS's I've played don't need a storyline to be fun, but it can add to the game. For the most-part though I've always enjoyed multi-player RTS the most, so no story needed.
FPS often seem to be a drone of "same ol' same ol'", however I will add a few exemptions. Half Life 2 does an EXCELLENT job of integrating a story, and elements of a physics puzzler to the RTS. Doom3, which got bogged down in repetitive gameplay, actually had a semi-decent take on the story as well.
Gameplay counts, but don't discount the value of a good story. I'd certainly rather have a good story (AND gameplay) then more flashy explosions, laser FX, and females in tight lycra uniforms.
There are, of course, some after-effects. Despite its popularity with others during that era, the "Hitler 'stache" is pretty much considered bad taste to have nowadays in many places.
Mortgages often come with an option known as "porting." If you sell your house before your mortgage commitment period is up, you can end up facing some pretty severe penalties (I think mine were about $7k, but for bigger mortgages those go up a lot more).
When you move, you often have the often to port within a few months. That means getting a new place with a mortgage that's the same a before. Then the mortgage moves to the new place, and you continue on for the rest of your term after paying a few fees for the paperwork.
So take a scenario: * Buy house at 175k * Move years later, sell house, keep some equity (especially if the value went up) * Buy a new house shortly after moving, put equity into a new house possibly valued a bit higher * Lose job, lose house, and all the equity that you had previously built
Of course if you get *screwed* in your new job, end up unemployed, that doesn't work out so well. Then you're back to the big fees for breaking the mortgage early, or not being able to sell at all and losing the house in general.
It's (generally) easier to hide an SD card (or better yet, a MicroSD card inside an SD adaptor) than it is a full roll of film. So if you wanted to snap something and then hide the evidence, a digital would be the way to go...
Take pictures, pull card and hide it somewhere, swap in a used card with less interesting pictures. "what sensitive pictures? All I've got here are pictures of puppies and my grandma's birthday"
A completely blank roll of film might be more suspicious (and it's hard to re-use an existing roll in comparison to an SD card), and film in a light-enclosed canister might also be harder to hide. Mind you it could possibly be hidden unrolled in a pocket etc if it's a few pics.
Just out of curiosity, how did they get their "evidence." If a retailer handed over my purchase info and tipped them off, I'd be pretty pissed (and imagine it might have violated some consumer privacy laws as well)
A concert isn't quite the same thing as a flight. A flight is usually part of a bigger event for most people I know (a holiday, a wedding, etc), and involves a fair bit of pre-planning.
A concert can be a bit less so. I just bought tickets to a concert and a play occurring next year on the assumption/hopes that my GF will be able to attend with me. Since it's an Xmas thing, we won't be able to plan that until next month. If she can't go, I'll either have to bring another friend, or sell off both tickets to an interested party.
Also, the whole "valid ID" requirements for a flight are a bit more of a PITA for a concert. There are plenty of teens or other people who don't necessarily have a driver's license or a passport, etc.
Most concerts etc I've been to have doors sales up towards the last minute. If there are unsold tickets, they'll be available at the door. No need for scalpers at all.
Slashdot Mirror
So perhaps there needs to be some way to gauge the support for netflix on Linux? If there are 10,000 people who support it, is that enough potential customers? How about 100,000?
There's a facebook page with about 1600 "likes." Perhaps if enough people who use FB can "like it" they can get 10k or more and garner enough publicity to push for a client?
http://www.facebook.com/#!/pages/Bring-Netflix-To-Linux/
Linux guys hate DRM with a purple passion
Which Linux guys are those? After more than a decade as a Linux/Unix sysadmin and desktop user, I'd say I'm a "Linux Guy." Many of my friends are the same. We DON'T hate DRM, though we do hate certain types of DRM.
For example, the crap that EA pulls with "authentication servers" etc really annoys a lot of people.
Steam, on the other hand, is very nice. I - and many who are pro-FOSS that I know - love it. Unless it goes down and my games go bye-bye (at this point it's been good enough that most can have faith in it), I see no problem with it. Yes, it's DRM. In a few ways it takes some things away, but it gives a lot back too (never having to hoard jewel-cases with CD keys, for example).
Games may be similarly locked to one's account similar to EA's/Blizzard's DRM, but the number of decent bargains (discount, buy-one-get-one-for-a-friend etc) on Steam makes it a rather lovable platform (and EA still makes me keep those bloody CD-keys).
A lot of us would LOVE for Steam to come to Linux, DRM or no. A lot of us would LOVE for netflix to come to Linux, DRM or no.
DRM that prevents us from hacking our own devices/hardware, or prevents usability, is often a PITA, and gets a bad rep with pro-FOSS people. However, there are plenty of people who are willing to make room for *REASONABLE* uses of DRM, and plenty of "Linux Guys" (heck, how about all the guys here clamoring for Netflix on Linux) that would love it too.
I think the connotation is that many businesses BENEFIT from the use of Open-Source but then turn their back on some of the most common uses of Open-Source.
It's like the guy whose life is saved due to chemotherapy who then says "what? donate to cancer research!? why would I do that?"
It's a bit hypocritical in ways, but ah well.
A VM is a lot more overhead than just a binary app, requires a fair bit more coding, and still wouldn't be any more compatible with various architectures etc.
A binary that works on i386/AMD64 compatible machines would work just fine, and they could keep their DRM intact so long as it doesn't fall afoul of any GPL'ed modules they're using.
Canada does the recycled bottle thing too, doesn't the US?
Often homeless people scrounge the bins etc for recyclables that can be returned for cash. It's not much, but I suppose it adds up after volume.
Ummm... but that already applied. I'm in Canada. I once had a laptop produced for the U.S. market (my sister won it for high sales at work, in a U.S. chain that had storefronts in Canada). The warranty for the laptop - as written - applied only to the product within the U.S. That's why there are lots of laptops that have an "international" warranty now, so that if you take your laptop with you overseas and it breaks, it can be fixed in the country you are in. If not, you'll have to find somebody back in your home country to ship the laptop to, and have them handle the warranty work then ship it back to you.
It's not just the cost/level of support, it's the business presence and shipping costs. Fast-shipping a product replacement/repair from USA->USA is a bit different than from USA->Country X, and I've always just accepted it as such. If I needed an international warranty, I bought a product which stipulated it had one.
I see no reason why I couldn't resell my laptop from "country X" in the USA or Canada or whatever, so long as I'm not misrepresenting that the warranty applies in my own country, and there's nothing in the product itself that would be illegal in my own country. A bigger issue with that last one might be that different countries have different emissions, toxicity, and other such laws. A wifi card for certain countries may have an output level that's illegal in others, and a cosmetic product may contain levels of materials that aren't legal in some places. The solution I could see for that is that whomever sells it IN the USA had better be sure that it's a legal product for the USA...
This is a little bit like your local ISP discovering that you are selling WiFi to all your neighbours for a quarter miles around
Except that most (smart) ISP's I've dealt with have a clause that basically prohibits reselling bandwidth. My understanding from the supplied email is that there was no existing clause, but instead they ditched SimplyCDN and are subsequently updating their TOS to have it.
Ditching a paying customer without forewarning and *THEN* updating your policy seems like pretty shady business to me, if that's what actually happened here.
Except that the iDevice walled garden has been broken already, and some of the newer exploits are actually browser-based. In many cases they're used as an easy way to jailbreak, but could likely be used for malware as well.
"Walled gardens" are not immune to exploits. They may have extra layers of protections, but an initial exploit followed with a privilege-escalation bump and they're done for. They may also be harder to "clean" in that regard as well.
On top of that, there's also the issue of data-protection and malicious apps. It's not like Apple-et-al actually goes line-by-line through the code of every app, and there have already been malicious apps in the iPhone Store, Android store, etc. IMHO blackberry seems to do the best at dealing with this as it asks *when an app tries to do something* whether to permit it (no, just now, or forever).
The scary thing about smart-devices and the "walled garden" is the path to obsolescence. iPhones are a bit better in the "keeps on trucking" aspect of things, but there are *plenty* of Android-based devices that will never see a current-gen OS and may be harbouring unpatched vulnerabilities.
Well, a bunch of perverts posting "I want mooooore" might create a market, whether or not a financial transaction takes place. I wonder if that would/should in law create a contrast between the "quiet collector" VS somebody who is actively advocating the creation of criminal activity (aiding/abetting?)
Keep in mind that not everyone does "bad things" for profit. Some people get off on attention. While not as common in real-life, there's often the cliche of detective shows where the murderer taunts the police because he/she gets thrills from the attention and the chase.
So if it's some pervert who's abusing a relative or whatever, it's most likely he/she is doing it to satisfy their own sick sexual/power needs. HOWEVER, from what I've read of CP rings being busted, some of these people trade pics/videos like pokemon cards. That DOES create an incentive for the creation of new material, if not necessarily a financial "market" for one.
I think it depends on the medium. I may be wrong, but I believe it's illegal to distribute - and possibly posses - "snuff films" (in which an actor/person is killed on camera). Actual existence of such films is often the stuff of urban legend, however
Similarly, pictures that may depict nudity of underage individuals ARE legal in some situations, just not as porn. A famous example would be the picture of "Phan Th Kim Phúc", a Vietnamese child who was wounded and had her clothes burned off during the Vietnam war. That particular picture - despite having a naked child - is definitely NOT kiddy porn, and has been shown in many articles etc including reader's digest.
... and this wouldn't have *ANYTHING* to do with the way the governments and media have been pumping up the "terrorist threat." Terrorists in our airports, in our monuments, in our transit. There *COULD* be a terrorist living right next-door to you, or beside you on the bus.
TERRORISTS TERRORISTS TERRORISTS!
Before that (and continuing on), it was pedos. In the mall, in the playground, in the internet, hiding under the bed, etc. Before that, I suppose it was the commies.
Joe and Jane average respond to the input that is given to them.
And heaven help you if Reader's Digest ever gets your personal info.
I had a subscription one year. I moved and had to call to ensure they wouldn't auto-resubscribe me. When they asked for my new address for my last few mags, I told them I'd rather not get the mags then have to submit to their mail-spam again!
So you're making extra work for yourself to avoid the scammy tactics of a known scammy merchant...?
Why not just buy from somewhere that doesn't use scammy tactics?
... can do little about.
Seriously, it's an arms race, and there's only so much time the average or even geeky type person has to find ways in blocking such crappitude while still having their machine able to work normally.
And when the server gets bushwhacked instead of the domain, and they move to a new host - but you're still getting the old IP from your hosts file - then what? How about if - rather than an FBI warning or whatever - the site is replaced by a clone that sniffs your info or installs trojans?
One thing about Amazon that I noticed is that their "Black Friday" sale seems more scammy than most. The average paperback novel (in Canada) goes for about $8-10. Yet in the "sales" the price - after discount - tends to be $11-15. The price listed as before discount is upwards of $25 or more. That same book at Chapters, with no special Black Friday crap, is on for a regular $9.99
Now I don't shop at Amazon that often, but I've never seen them selling regular ol' paperbacks for $15, and certainly not for $25. So it seems quite a scam to me, and I don't believe that it's quite legal to jack up a price and then "sale" it for more than the regular prices either...
*The above is based on my personal observations and opinion, IANAL etc
There are a lot of areas where having a story is important or lends to the game, the big trick is not to make the rest of the game SUCK.
RPG's - to me - seem to be dying because they *lack* a good plot. Look at the fairly recent Final Fantasy XIII... scanty uniforms, flashy effects, and otherwise very, very lame. The given plot could have had promise if they hadn't been too busy with their angsty teenage personas, super-duper-background-rendering, and big boobs. That series is not pretty much dead to me.
Most RTS's I've played don't need a storyline to be fun, but it can add to the game. For the most-part though I've always enjoyed multi-player RTS the most, so no story needed.
FPS often seem to be a drone of "same ol' same ol'", however I will add a few exemptions. Half Life 2 does an EXCELLENT job of integrating a story, and elements of a physics puzzler to the RTS. Doom3, which got bogged down in repetitive gameplay, actually had a semi-decent take on the story as well.
Gameplay counts, but don't discount the value of a good story. I'd certainly rather have a good story (AND gameplay) then more flashy explosions, laser FX, and females in tight lycra uniforms.
There are, of course, some after-effects. Despite its popularity with others during that era, the "Hitler 'stache" is pretty much considered bad taste to have nowadays in many places.
Also, imagine the cumulative radiation for people who take the train every day. That's a whole lot more than the odd plane-flight...
Mortgages often come with an option known as "porting." If you sell your house before your mortgage commitment period is up, you can end up facing some pretty severe penalties (I think mine were about $7k, but for bigger mortgages those go up a lot more).
When you move, you often have the often to port within a few months. That means getting a new place with a mortgage that's the same a before. Then the mortgage moves to the new place, and you continue on for the rest of your term after paying a few fees for the paperwork.
So take a scenario:
* Buy house at 175k
* Move years later, sell house, keep some equity (especially if the value went up)
* Buy a new house shortly after moving, put equity into a new house possibly valued a bit higher
* Lose job, lose house, and all the equity that you had previously built
Of course if you get *screwed* in your new job, end up unemployed, that doesn't work out so well. Then you're back to the big fees for breaking the mortgage early, or not being able to sell at all and losing the house in general.
It's (generally) easier to hide an SD card (or better yet, a MicroSD card inside an SD adaptor) than it is a full roll of film. So if you wanted to snap something and then hide the evidence, a digital would be the way to go...
Take pictures, pull card and hide it somewhere, swap in a used card with less interesting pictures.
"what sensitive pictures? All I've got here are pictures of puppies and my grandma's birthday"
A completely blank roll of film might be more suspicious (and it's hard to re-use an existing roll in comparison to an SD card), and film in a light-enclosed canister might also be harder to hide. Mind you it could possibly be hidden unrolled in a pocket etc if it's a few pics.
Just out of curiosity, how did they get their "evidence." If a retailer handed over my purchase info and tipped them off, I'd be pretty pissed (and imagine it might have violated some consumer privacy laws as well)
Sounds more like a "server farm" than a botnet to me...
A concert isn't quite the same thing as a flight. A flight is usually part of a bigger event for most people I know (a holiday, a wedding, etc), and involves a fair bit of pre-planning.
A concert can be a bit less so. I just bought tickets to a concert and a play occurring next year on the assumption/hopes that my GF will be able to attend with me. Since it's an Xmas thing, we won't be able to plan that until next month. If she can't go, I'll either have to bring another friend, or sell off both tickets to an interested party.
Also, the whole "valid ID" requirements for a flight are a bit more of a PITA for a concert. There are plenty of teens or other people who don't necessarily have a driver's license or a passport, etc.
Most concerts etc I've been to have doors sales up towards the last minute. If there are unsold tickets, they'll be available at the door. No need for scalpers at all.