"$150,000 per son IS excessive and IS cruel since it adds-up to millions of dollars and is, in effect, a life sentence. "
Like your brethren, go and RTFA. Next, reread my post. Now read both of them again, but this time, try to do so for comprehension and without moving your lips. It was $7.22 PER ALBUM. Each album was downloaded 17,281 times, which, doing the math (you can use your calculator if long multiplication is beyond your talents) TOTALS $124,769.
It is NOT $150,000 PER SONG. It never WAS $150,000 per song.
You need to stop visiting Quotes R' Us, stop dressing up as Thomas Paine, turn off your torrent server, get out of your parent's basement, and crack open an elementary math book. I'm not kidding.
"I mean should we be thankful we have the Afghan and Iraq war?"
Well... do you think that the idea that Afghanistan and Iraq would require a massive amount of military spending was overlooked by the powers that be?
It effectively dropped an trillion dollar stimulus program on the post internet-bubble economy, and while it was not THE reason to go to war... it certainly was one of them.
As opposed to, say, the greed of someone who wants all of their music for free?
Sounds to me like there are greedy bastards, thieves, and liars on both sides of the fence. But hey, at least you've managed to think up some pretty good rationalizations for your actions...
"Penalizing me or my countrymen 1-to-2 dollars for every song we download is fair."
Excuse me? When is a penalty for performing an illegal act supposed to be "fair"? First, charging the same price as a legitimate download definitely isn't fair, and actually is an INCENTIVE to steal.
What if you were caught attempting to steal a CD and they only charged you the price of the disk? Everyone would try to steal. Best case, you get away with it, and worst case, you pay no more than if you had paid the legitimate price. Where I live the fine for littering and dumping trash is $1,000. Is that "fair"? Don't know, but what I do know is that you don't see many people throwing trash out the windows of their cars. The risk simply isn't worth it.
And what's with the "tree of liberty" BS? Attempting to equate stealing a purely discretionary item that's available from plenty of legitimate sources with patriotism is simply laughable from one side, and an insult to those who died fighting for our liberty on the other.
Finally, try to RTFA for content. The article does NOT say anything about "Penalizing $150,000 for every [song] song..."
FTFA: "For example, the RIAA said that 183 albums were transferred through Dove's server 17,281 times, then multiplied that by the wholesale price of a digital album in 2005 ($7.22) to conclude that its member companies were owed almost $124,769 in restitution..."
That's $124K TOTAL, and not $150K PER SONG. (And charging a "fair" price per album, BTW.) Making up your own numbers doesn't help your argument, as it makes people wonder just what else you're lying about...
"Given that there is a greater than 90% chance that a person wanting to jump into Windows Mobile development will already have a machine capable of doing the development..."
Actually, you're correct that I already own a machine that can do Windows Mobile development. It's a 24" iMac that runs XP under Parallels.
And given that much "development" these days is for the web, you might be surprised at the number of developers who own Macs vs. Windows boxes. The 90% number is the general population as a whole, and has as a base quite a few Windows machines sitting on desks at work. Try visiting a college library these days.
Regardless, no matter what you do, you're going to need the tools for the job. Try being a commercial photographer these days without a $50,000 camera system with a 40MP digital back. $1,200 for a MacBook is one of the lowest barriers to entry of any new business out there.
As opposed to developing for Windows Mobile, where one can create applications just by thinking them into existence? Oh wait, I have to buy a PC to do WM development! Bummer.
"It costs about 50,000 miles worth of gasoline, at 25mpg average, to build a new car (energy cost)."
Even if that number is true, and not just copied from the post above (which provided no link as to proof), that's the EQUIVALENT of 50,000 miles worth of gasoline.
Seen that new Hyundai plant with the massive set of solar panels on it's roof? Or maybe the plant in KY is powered from TVA hydro. Or maybe some of the parts are coming from some supplier powered by the new wind farms I just noticed in Nebraska and Kansas. Or maybe the local power station is powered by natural gas which burns cleaner than gasoline and which isn't coming from some nation where we're fighting wars for fuel.
One thing we can be sure of, however, is that if you DON'T upgrade from your 25 mpg old car to a 50mpg hybrid, you will be burning more GASOLINE, driving up demand for GASOLINE, and collectively helping to keep GASOLINE prices high.
"...but their "top" car must be able to get at least 60mpg..."
Stupid idea. So what if they build a $100,000 car that gets 60MPG (e.g. Tesla). Who's going to buy one?
"...when we finally decide to buy a new car..."
Bingo. So when you DO decide to buy a new car, that 50,000 gallons of gas number isn't going to matter anyway, is it? But by providing a stimulus package now, some people may decide to buy now instead of later, and in the process helping to ensure that when you DO decide to buy a car that there are still US-based car companies to purchase them from...
"...the cassette is obviously of infinite precision and clarity due to the superior analogue storage..."
Right. Ah, perhaps you should go lookup a few terms like dynamic range, dropouts, signal-to-noise ratio, and noise floors. And then study sampling theory. Past a certain point, you're not gaining additional precision, but simply wasting space recording the same numbers over and over and over again.
"People decide they want to come in and buy more chips, or other things I offer."
As long as you're postulating a magical copy machine, then it stands to reason that if they can copy your chips then they can copy everything else as well. If enough people do so then both you and the chip makers are now out of business.
But hey, maybe you can convince a few people to buy a t-shirt, or make a donation, or some other equally unsustainable model...
"And finally even though I already own about 3/4 of the songs... The U.S. Supreme Court has stated consumers are allowed to make copies of their legal purchased CDs, games, or videos, and that is in essence what I'm doing."
In essence... and except for the other 25% that you DON'T own, of course.
God, I just LOVE the self-serving rationalizations people use...
"What the RIAA/MPAA are trying to spread is the notion that everything under a copyright is forbidden to make a copy of, which is clearly false..."
Clearly. Which is why it's not what they said. 95% of the content was downloaded illegally. That means commercial music, under copyright, downloaded without compensation and without the express consent of the owner.
It's amusing, and rather sad, how you tried to setup your own straw man in this case, just so you could knock him down.
"...worth a listen or two but not worth my money..."
Worth finding, sampling, downloading, cataloging and adding to your collection, and worth playing... several times... but not worth your money. Nice rationalization.
You could have at least said, "not worth what I was willing to pay" (which then conveniently ignores used CD stores, half.com, bargain bins, Amazon, and so on). That I might have believed.
Rewrite history much? The 8-track died because the damn things jammed and broke at each and every opportunity, and because of a little thing called the WalkMan, which let people take their music with them everywhere, not just when they were in their car.
DNA testing, like most things, is based on probabilities. I can't take a sample and prove conclusively that you are the one and only match (see the prosecutor's fallacy).
Depending upon the number of markers, however, it can be possible to prove conclusively that you're NOT a match.
The actual probability that 2 random persons have the same DNA (based on standard testing) is only 1 in 3 trillion.
However, if your girlfriend is murdered, and your DNA is found, and your car was parked in front of her house at the time of death, then any possibility of a DNA matching error error is outweighed by the preponderance of additional evidence.
"It's only fair if a piece of DNA can put me in jail I should be allowed to read the algorithm that was used to infer that my DNA matched the strand that was put into the machine."
Like 99.999% of the public would understand it. Besides, it's a lot more likely for a tech to grab the wrong sample, contaminate the sample, or simply have been given the wrong sample. Carried to its illogical extreme, one would also need the complete engineering blueprints for a given machine AND for its components, processor chips, and so on. After all, how do you know if THOSE are working or not?
A machine has either been tested and certified for use, within a given margin of error, or not.
Care to determine the impact of using a notebook to read/. vs...
Watching a 50" plasma TV? Buying and reading a library full of books, most printed and shipped in from China? Driving an SUV to the mall and paying to see a movie? Flying to Mexico for a vacation?
As a personal choice, this one is pretty benign, footprint-wise.
"If he has the means and wishes to spend *his* money on power for whatever he wants, that's *his* business, isn't it?"
The problem is that he, and you, and I, don't live on desert islands. If a lot of people over-consume a resource (power, gasoline, water), then demand climbs, prices climb, and everyone ELSE pays more for THEIR power or gasoline or water.
Example: According to the U.S. Department of Energy, we burn roughly 400 million gallons of gasoline day-in and day-out. And roughly 60% of all of the petroleum consumed was imported, with 13% coming from the middle east (shipping is easier from SA). Finally, from 2000 to 2007, the US new fleet fuel economy has averaged 23.1 mpg, with light trucks and SUVs making up about 40% of the vehicles on the road.
So, LTs and SUVs make up 40%, but since their mileage sucks they burn nearly 60% of the available fuel. Which means that if the SUV craze had never happened and if we were all driving much more efficient passenger cars then our oil "jones" wouldn't be half as bad as it is now. We'd be saving billions on oil imports, our economy and deficit wouldn't be nearly as bad, and a thinly-disguised "war for oil" would have been a much, much harder sell to the American public. And that's not even discussing pollution, global warming, etc..
And all because a bunch of people "chose" to spend "their" money how they wished.
It's not about Communism and Socialism, it's about the rights AND responsibilities of people living together in a society.
Slashdot Mirror
"$150,000 per son IS excessive and IS cruel since it adds-up to millions of dollars and is, in effect, a life sentence. "
Like your brethren, go and RTFA. Next, reread my post. Now read both of them again, but this time, try to do so for comprehension and without moving your lips. It was $7.22 PER ALBUM. Each album was downloaded 17,281 times, which, doing the math (you can use your calculator if long multiplication is beyond your talents) TOTALS $124,769.
It is NOT $150,000 PER SONG. It never WAS $150,000 per song.
You need to stop visiting Quotes R' Us, stop dressing up as Thomas Paine, turn off your torrent server, get out of your parent's basement, and crack open an elementary math book. I'm not kidding.
"I mean should we be thankful we have the Afghan and Iraq war?"
Well... do you think that the idea that Afghanistan and Iraq would require a massive amount of military spending was overlooked by the powers that be?
It effectively dropped an trillion dollar stimulus program on the post internet-bubble economy, and while it was not THE reason to go to war... it certainly was one of them.
"But the greed of the industry...."
As opposed to, say, the greed of someone who wants all of their music for free?
Sounds to me like there are greedy bastards, thieves, and liars on both sides of the fence. But hey, at least you've managed to think up some pretty good rationalizations for your actions...
"Penalizing me or my countrymen 1-to-2 dollars for every song we download is fair."
Excuse me? When is a penalty for performing an illegal act supposed to be "fair"? First, charging the same price as a legitimate download definitely isn't fair, and actually is an INCENTIVE to steal.
What if you were caught attempting to steal a CD and they only charged you the price of the disk? Everyone would try to steal. Best case, you get away with it, and worst case, you pay no more than if you had paid the legitimate price. Where I live the fine for littering and dumping trash is $1,000. Is that "fair"? Don't know, but what I do know is that you don't see many people throwing trash out the windows of their cars. The risk simply isn't worth it.
And what's with the "tree of liberty" BS? Attempting to equate stealing a purely discretionary item that's available from plenty of legitimate sources with patriotism is simply laughable from one side, and an insult to those who died fighting for our liberty on the other.
Finally, try to RTFA for content. The article does NOT say anything about "Penalizing $150,000 for every [song] song..."
FTFA: "For example, the RIAA said that 183 albums were transferred through Dove's server 17,281 times, then multiplied that by the wholesale price of a digital album in 2005 ($7.22) to conclude that its member companies were owed almost $124,769 in restitution..."
That's $124K TOTAL, and not $150K PER SONG. (And charging a "fair" price per album, BTW.) Making up your own numbers doesn't help your argument, as it makes people wonder just what else you're lying about...
First, netbooks may be the "fastest growing" segment, but that doesn't matter much when that segment is a pretty small niche.
Second, not all netbooks run Linux. Some (gasp) run Windows.
Third, it's not rhetoric, but actual IDC data.
"Given that there is a greater than 90% chance that a person wanting to jump into Windows Mobile development will already have a machine capable of doing the development..."
Actually, you're correct that I already own a machine that can do Windows Mobile development. It's a 24" iMac that runs XP under Parallels.
And given that much "development" these days is for the web, you might be surprised at the number of developers who own Macs vs. Windows boxes. The 90% number is the general population as a whole, and has as a base quite a few Windows machines sitting on desks at work. Try visiting a college library these days.
Regardless, no matter what you do, you're going to need the tools for the job. Try being a commercial photographer these days without a $50,000 camera system with a 40MP digital back. $1,200 for a MacBook is one of the lowest barriers to entry of any new business out there.
Dear Sir, Madam, or Troll;
If you don't care, then you're not our customer anyway. As such...
We don't care.
Sincerely,
Apple Legal
As opposed to developing for Windows Mobile, where one can create applications just by thinking them into existence? Oh wait, I have to buy a PC to do WM development! Bummer.
'Course, since no such machine exists, any analogies made concerning them are worth exactly... nothing.
Yet another reason why Linux has a 0.86% desktop market share... and dropping.
"It costs about 50,000 miles worth of gasoline, at 25mpg average, to build a new car (energy cost)."
Even if that number is true, and not just copied from the post above (which provided no link as to proof), that's the EQUIVALENT of 50,000 miles worth of gasoline.
Seen that new Hyundai plant with the massive set of solar panels on it's roof? Or maybe the plant in KY is powered from TVA hydro. Or maybe some of the parts are coming from some supplier powered by the new wind farms I just noticed in Nebraska and Kansas. Or maybe the local power station is powered by natural gas which burns cleaner than gasoline and which isn't coming from some nation where we're fighting wars for fuel.
One thing we can be sure of, however, is that if you DON'T upgrade from your 25 mpg old car to a 50mpg hybrid, you will be burning more GASOLINE, driving up demand for GASOLINE, and collectively helping to keep GASOLINE prices high.
"...but their "top" car must be able to get at least 60mpg..."
Stupid idea. So what if they build a $100,000 car that gets 60MPG (e.g. Tesla). Who's going to buy one?
"...when we finally decide to buy a new car..."
Bingo. So when you DO decide to buy a new car, that 50,000 gallons of gas number isn't going to matter anyway, is it? But by providing a stimulus package now, some people may decide to buy now instead of later, and in the process helping to ensure that when you DO decide to buy a car that there are still US-based car companies to purchase them from...
Right. That's why at any point in time the most common downloads are from Brittany Spears and 50-cent.
You'd have a better shot at convincing me that all of that bandwidth was devoted to downloading legitimate copies of Ubuntu...
"...the cassette is obviously of infinite precision and clarity due to the superior analogue storage..."
Right. Ah, perhaps you should go lookup a few terms like dynamic range, dropouts, signal-to-noise ratio, and noise floors. And then study sampling theory. Past a certain point, you're not gaining additional precision, but simply wasting space recording the same numbers over and over and over again.
"People decide they want to come in and buy more chips, or other things I offer."
As long as you're postulating a magical copy machine, then it stands to reason that if they can copy your chips then they can copy everything else as well. If enough people do so then both you and the chip makers are now out of business.
But hey, maybe you can convince a few people to buy a t-shirt, or make a donation, or some other equally unsustainable model...
"And finally even though I already own about 3/4 of the songs ... The U.S. Supreme Court has stated consumers are allowed to make copies of their legal purchased CDs, games, or videos, and that is in essence what I'm doing."
In essence... and except for the other 25% that you DON'T own, of course.
God, I just LOVE the self-serving rationalizations people use...
"What the RIAA/MPAA are trying to spread is the notion that everything under a copyright is forbidden to make a copy of, which is clearly false..."
Clearly. Which is why it's not what they said. 95% of the content was downloaded illegally. That means commercial music, under copyright, downloaded without compensation and without the express consent of the owner.
It's amusing, and rather sad, how you tried to setup your own straw man in this case, just so you could knock him down.
"...worth a listen or two but not worth my money..."
Worth finding, sampling, downloading, cataloging and adding to your collection, and worth playing... several times... but not worth your money. Nice rationalization.
You could have at least said, "not worth what I was willing to pay" (which then conveniently ignores used CD stores, half.com, bargain bins, Amazon, and so on). That I might have believed.
Rewrite history much? The 8-track died because the damn things jammed and broke at each and every opportunity, and because of a little thing called the WalkMan, which let people take their music with them everywhere, not just when they were in their car.
DNA testing, like most things, is based on probabilities. I can't take a sample and prove conclusively that you are the one and only match (see the prosecutor's fallacy).
Depending upon the number of markers, however, it can be possible to prove conclusively that you're NOT a match.
The actual probability that 2 random persons have the same DNA (based on standard testing) is only 1 in 3 trillion.
However, if your girlfriend is murdered, and your DNA is found, and your car was parked in front of her house at the time of death, then any possibility of a DNA matching error error is outweighed by the preponderance of additional evidence.
"It's only fair if a piece of DNA can put me in jail I should be allowed to read the algorithm that was used to infer that my DNA matched the strand that was put into the machine."
Like 99.999% of the public would understand it. Besides, it's a lot more likely for a tech to grab the wrong sample, contaminate the sample, or simply have been given the wrong sample. Carried to its illogical extreme, one would also need the complete engineering blueprints for a given machine AND for its components, processor chips, and so on. After all, how do you know if THOSE are working or not?
A machine has either been tested and certified for use, within a given margin of error, or not.
I've worked on quite a few sites where having valid information is considered the quid pro quo for access to the site's content.
Which is why on those sites any registration created with a mailinator-type account is automatically closed.
Care to determine the impact of using a notebook to read /. vs...
Watching a 50" plasma TV?
Buying and reading a library full of books, most printed and shipped in from China?
Driving an SUV to the mall and paying to see a movie?
Flying to Mexico for a vacation?
As a personal choice, this one is pretty benign, footprint-wise.
"But if I *still* wish to operate that vehicle *despite* the higher cost, then that's my damned business and none of yours."
If your "choice" means that I have to pay higher prices due to higher demand, then your "choice" impacts me and mine, and that makes it my business.
"If he has the means and wishes to spend *his* money on power for whatever he wants, that's *his* business, isn't it?"
The problem is that he, and you, and I, don't live on desert islands. If a lot of people over-consume a resource (power, gasoline, water), then demand climbs, prices climb, and everyone ELSE pays more for THEIR power or gasoline or water.
Example: According to the U.S. Department of Energy, we burn roughly 400 million gallons of gasoline day-in and day-out. And roughly 60% of all of the petroleum consumed was imported, with 13% coming from the middle east (shipping is easier from SA). Finally, from 2000 to 2007, the US new fleet fuel economy has averaged 23.1 mpg, with light trucks and SUVs making up about 40% of the vehicles on the road.
So, LTs and SUVs make up 40%, but since their mileage sucks they burn nearly 60% of the available fuel. Which means that if the SUV craze had never happened and if we were all driving much more efficient passenger cars then our oil "jones" wouldn't be half as bad as it is now. We'd be saving billions on oil imports, our economy and deficit wouldn't be nearly as bad, and a thinly-disguised "war for oil" would have been a much, much harder sell to the American public. And that's not even discussing pollution, global warming, etc..
And all because a bunch of people "chose" to spend "their" money how they wished.
It's not about Communism and Socialism, it's about the rights AND responsibilities of people living together in a society.