I for one am excited by the potential for offloading complex calculations from my machine to online electricity grid like computing power that frees my lonely machine to be more responsive to the things I want it to do. And leave the slow boring lone-processor killing stuff to another.
This would mean that silly frivilous things like email apps etc would literally jump to attention regardless as to the size of the file I am working on, rather than as now everything slowly to treacle...
Question is paying for it. It would have to be cheap, built into the operating system and require fast broadband to transfer the data to the servers... Few year yet probably...
I think this is a diversion from where technology in user input design should be heading. I actually find it increasingly frustrating to get information into any kind of portable device using mini-keyboards. No matter how clever they are.
The future lies with Hand-writing recognition and good high resolution screens. We have used to pen for well over 2000 years and it is both comfortable, easy to understand and use and fits the requirements of being small and usable on the train/bus/airplane.
Yes it is possible to shrink a keyboard down to the size of a pin-head but our fingers are not getting any smaller...
A Glass Master is a process not an actual object. In CD manufacturing (music or otherwise) and glass master is the process the initial CD-R/DAT/etc goes through to end up as a standard pressed CD, the kind that you buy in a shop...
Musician's are forever asking pressing plants if they can have the Glass Master back in case they need it....;-)
The UK Parliament not so long ago debated the benefits of storage of Government documents and after heated arguments decided that digital was unproven and paper itself not good enough.. especially as they want records to last 500 years.
It shows that digital still has a long way to go compared to the current UK practice of printing on vellum... in other words goats skin !!!
Quote: "... we compare longevity of 250 or 500 years [of long-life paper] with the 1,500 years of vellum"
Petty actions like this can have unforeseen consequences on the entire technology sector as they can be a disincentive to try out new technologies and methods of making new products and services. I think it is reasonable to ask that *actual* harm is being caused by this linking.
Presumably all the company will do is add a clause to their terms and conditions that allows them to explicitly do this anyway.. But tying up every new attempt to use the technology in clauses and legalese is hardly going to free people to experiment...
Rheingold gives us more of his simplistic technological determinism and poorly researched and non-empirical ideas.
So what? A group of people read his work and then actually rush to be the first to wet their pants as he can name them as actually implementing his ideas!?! How lame is that?
Much more interesting would be a book that actually analysed how the media corporations will use this technology in embedding at a lower level than already shown in the Gulf War. This was perhaps the most potent demonstration of how technology allows us to see everything in real time, but as we are overwhelmed we don't critique, we don't listen and it becomes purely background entertainment.
For instance in the Gulf War lots was happening in Basra and on the Baghdad Rd, we knew that as there were so many Embeds. BUT what exactly were the US and Brits up to in Western Iraq and Northern Iraq where the Embeds were forbidden (or perhaps persuaded) not to go? We will never know as we were all so sick of footage from the 'media' bit of Iraq that we truly couldn't be bothered to find out...
That is the power of moblogs... Control through information overload... coming soon...
To be honest this really disgusts me. That a patent this wide has been granted is crazy. Applying affective research to processing user input is not new and the ethics of patenting ethics itself is really worrying.
Firstly there are many different types of ethical approaches, for instance: Deontological, Consequentialist (utilitarian), Ethical Egoism, Dialogical. And this man appears to have covered them all by one word - ETHICS.
Many of these ethical responses are contradictory and offer multiple possibilities for human action so why give him the whole lot when such completely different AI models, programming techniques and philosophical and psychological approaches will be needed!
Reading his patent application he appears to be applying a psychological Egoist motivational approach to affective processing but the language is so broad that it would be easy to claim that ALL ethical approaches are covered.
I think this patent uses ethics in a simplistic fashion and I sincerely hope that the patent office are sophisticated enough to realise this. This patent offers an attempt at affective processing based on either a motivational or consequentist ethical approach and therefore it should NOT be able to be used against competing ethical approaches.
Remember that really we are all doing 'Affective' processing when we take in user input (afterall users are rarely purely rational and always have an emotional human side - er... except maybe Eric Raymond;-)
I think it will be interesting when historians look back at this time and register it as the end of technological supremecy for the US and the start of EU/China/Japan who are all profiting from the massive transfer from the US of their advantage in technology, skills and people who can produce complex operating systems...
What will happen to these Open Source/Free software principles when war is declared? Everyone knows everybody elses secrets... and faults...
I think clearly there is some serious thinking going on in Government circles about Open Source and technology projects. Has anybody looked at the EU guidelines? They've even set up a special body to promote open and interoperable stuff across the EU... More stuff
What with all the media corporation merging, and merging more we are within spitting distance of a few truly huge global media companies that have the reach and power that is truly terrifying.
It worries me that it is getting harder and harder for small artists, musicians, television writers etc to get on the first rung due to the lack of competition. And this stifling of culture will be something that once done will be increasingly hard to undo... where are we going...?
I just wish that people cared about new culture and cutting edge performance and writing but it seems they are content to buy re-issued, committee-written comedy, music, drama and film.
It means in property terms there is a clear demarcation of property rights.
That is your backgraden
This is mine
It is not a moral rule at all. It does not mean they are good to one another... They will have a good relationship as they are less likely to argue over their respective backyards...
Thats like saying how do we solve the problem of cluster bomb removal without looking at the cause being the fact that they get dropped!
Spammers are a social ill, and an attempt at revenge is simply sending lots of post to them. If anything we should be asking about the issue of revenge and not the problem of individual attempts at revenge.
If someone shot him would you be asking about the abolition of guns? Or would you be trying to draw a causal link of what drives people to do these things?
Technologists look at things from funny angles....
the point of preventing an important mail getting through is banal in the most extreme...
The question is surely that this man has caused this social disturbance by his actions, and he should be hit where it hurts in his wallet...
Good fences make good neighbours means that if the property ownership rules and relationships are clear then if the matter comes to court then it is easy to resolve.
If on the other hand ownership and rights of usage are blurred and confused it will be difficult for courts to make a decision and will probably require legislation, ie a Political decision as to the rights and relationships.
Thats why nice clear broad rules are preferred in legislation and the microdecisions of individual cases are left to the court.
I think The Economist has the easiest and cheapest answer to the problem of spammers. Charge large emailers per send.. the economic disadvantage of sending out wasted emails would then help reduce the number and encourage targetted sending...
I think you make a very good point. However the line between idea and expression of idea is being blurred by the large multinational copyright holders. And who can blame them..
So there are many cases where people are being sued under copyright law just as a scare tactic because the copyright law allows them to defend their copyright. Additionally this closes down the potential for reuse, parody and so forth and an extra avenue for expression.
I think the public domain should be viewed as a sphere of original artistic creations that are now free for all to deconstruct, reuse and play with. That is a wonderful creative resource... and the over zeaous protection of unlimited copyright stops that from happening...
The problem is that the balance between copyright holder and user has become weighed down in legislation that is becoming increasingly technologised. So instead of broad rules that can be interpreted by the judges (and software developers) it seems that the rules are instead being read and written far too literally.
Good fences make good neighbours and the problems at the moment are certainly due to the nature of the business cycle in technology. Once case law has been built up significantly it will be clearer what the risks and responsibilities of innovation and law are.
Personally I think that the courts are the place to argue out the rules of innovation as if you believe in the idea strongly enough then you will be willing to fight, or raise finance to do so. If this forms part of your business proposal then that is right and good. Business decisions are implicitly risky and this will have to be bourne in mind.
However this is with the caveat that copyright should be limited and the public domain requires legislation to prevent unlimited monopoly of ideas for all time...
My experience is the best system is paired computers running in parallel that are balanced by another computer that watches for problems and switches the crashed system from Live to the other computer seamlessly. It then reboots the system with problems and allows it to recreate its dataset from its partner.
In effect this points the way to the importance of massive parallelism required for totally stable systems so that clusters form the virtual computer and we get away from the idea of a computer as a single machine.
Regardless of the wishes of the open source community to write off Microsoft, it is one thing having every part of their product range being available and usable o/s... it is quite another to have the status and prestige of a multinational to implement them.
Corporate buyers and technologists are notoriously conservative and things like long term longevity of the company, market capitalisation, project history, locked in technologies and pure tradition (ie we have always bought from Microsoft) have a massive impact on buying decisions.
As someone once remarked to me, "No-one gets sacked for buying Microsoft software"...
So I think they'll be around mighty longer than anyone anticipates (providing they don't make a huge technological miscalculation). And judging by their past aggressiveness and competitiveness I would say they can't be written off yet.
When pricing a firm there is much much more to it than saying that someone else sells everything they do.
Note that DAT and ADAT are completely different technologies, one is a mastering stereo mix and the other a professional quality 8-track recorder.
This looks like a challenge to the DAT but to keep the quality up and remain pro it will always remain out of the price range of consumers. When you can walk around with an iPod that has all the tracks and convenience why would you bother with a pro bit of kit that is designed for recording live sounds (and has the outputs to support it).
There are already lots of DAT's that allow you to disable all digital copying due to the needs of professional studios but you don't see anyone on the train with one do you?
The reality is consumer and pro equipment has different needs and different functions and very rarely is there a crossover. I don't think the RIAA will be getting too worried providing this remains a pro choice...
I work with others on a website called Digital Agora which is intended to work towards the democratisation of the Internet by creating an open forum of communication.
It soon becomes apparent though that merely creating a space is not enough. It is actually quite limiting communicating within the confines of the web. So personally I think ease of web use is not the be all.
I use Logic 6 professionally in a studio on a label that is dedicated to releasing Open Source music LOCA RECORDS and we have been waiting for something like this to come around...
It would be cool to make the whole process Open Source.. we dabbled in LINUX before but, jesus is it complex for the average user....
I remember reading a book that speculated about the kind of speeds that trains could reach for transatlantic deep tunnels to hop across the world in no time at all without the airplanes...
Unfortunately I think the heat these things generate would make the whole thing untenable... Plus of course the air pressure problems (though I seem to remember the tunnels being vacuums - with their own issues...)
This is the kind of computer that is needed in Music studios and for the life of me I can't understand why Apple G4's have to sound like a Tornado taking off.
You'd think that creatives would be the ones Apple would identify as wanting the quiet to think and contemplate.
However buying a PC feels like a real step backwards for me. I am totally socialised to using Mac's in music and now that Logic is no longer supported on the PC it is even harder to consider the switch.
The sooner PCs get silent (like the blessed iMacs) the better...
Slashdot Mirror
This would mean that silly frivilous things like email apps etc would literally jump to attention regardless as to the size of the file I am working on, rather than as now everything slowly to treacle...
Question is paying for it. It would have to be cheap, built into the operating system and require fast broadband to transfer the data to the servers... Few year yet probably...
Worth a read...
The future lies with Hand-writing recognition and good high resolution screens. We have used to pen for well over 2000 years and it is both comfortable, easy to understand and use and fits the requirements of being small and usable on the train/bus/airplane.
Yes it is possible to shrink a keyboard down to the size of a pin-head but our fingers are not getting any smaller...
Musician's are forever asking pressing plants if they can have the Glass Master back in case they need it.... ;-)
It shows that digital still has a long way to go compared to the current UK practice of printing on vellum... in other words goats skin !!!
Quote: "... we compare longevity of 250 or 500 years [of long-life paper] with the 1,500 years of vellum"
Presumably all the company will do is add a clause to their terms and conditions that allows them to explicitly do this anyway.. But tying up every new attempt to use the technology in clauses and legalese is hardly going to free people to experiment...
Rheingold gives us more of his simplistic technological determinism and poorly researched and non-empirical ideas.
So what? A group of people read his work and then actually rush to be the first to wet their pants as he can name them as actually implementing his ideas!?! How lame is that?
Much more interesting would be a book that actually analysed how the media corporations will use this technology in embedding at a lower level than already shown in the Gulf War. This was perhaps the most potent demonstration of how technology allows us to see everything in real time, but as we are overwhelmed we don't critique, we don't listen and it becomes purely background entertainment.
For instance in the Gulf War lots was happening in Basra and on the Baghdad Rd, we knew that as there were so many Embeds. BUT what exactly were the US and Brits up to in Western Iraq and Northern Iraq where the Embeds were forbidden (or perhaps persuaded) not to go? We will never know as we were all so sick of footage from the 'media' bit of Iraq that we truly couldn't be bothered to find out...
That is the power of moblogs... Control through information overload... coming soon...
To be honest this really disgusts me. That a patent this wide has been granted is crazy. Applying affective research to processing user input is not new and the ethics of patenting ethics itself is really worrying.
Firstly there are many different types of ethical approaches, for instance: Deontological, Consequentialist (utilitarian), Ethical Egoism, Dialogical. And this man appears to have covered them all by one word - ETHICS.
Many of these ethical responses are contradictory and offer multiple possibilities for human action so why give him the whole lot when such completely different AI models, programming techniques and philosophical and psychological approaches will be needed!
Reading his patent application he appears to be applying a psychological Egoist motivational approach to affective processing but the language is so broad that it would be easy to claim that ALL ethical approaches are covered.
I think this patent uses ethics in a simplistic fashion and I sincerely hope that the patent office are sophisticated enough to realise this. This patent offers an attempt at affective processing based on either a motivational or consequentist ethical approach and therefore it should NOT be able to be used against competing ethical approaches.
Remember that really we are all doing 'Affective' processing when we take in user input (afterall users are rarely purely rational and always have an emotional human side - er... except maybe Eric Raymond ;-)
What will happen to these Open Source/Free software principles when war is declared? Everyone knows everybody elses secrets... and faults...
I just hope they all stay friends....
I think clearly there is some serious thinking going on in Government circles about Open Source and technology projects. Has anybody looked at the EU guidelines? They've even set up a special body to promote open and interoperable stuff across the EU... More stuff
It worries me that it is getting harder and harder for small artists, musicians, television writers etc to get on the first rung due to the lack of competition. And this stifling of culture will be something that once done will be increasingly hard to undo... where are we going...?
I just wish that people cared about new culture and cutting edge performance and writing but it seems they are content to buy re-issued, committee-written comedy, music, drama and film.
Adorno was precient in his forecasts...
That is your backgraden
This is mine
It is not a moral rule at all. It does not mean they are good to one another... They will have a good relationship as they are less likely to argue over their respective backyards...
Thats like saying how do we solve the problem of cluster bomb removal without looking at the cause being the fact that they get dropped!
Spammers are a social ill, and an attempt at revenge is simply sending lots of post to them. If anything we should be asking about the issue of revenge and not the problem of individual attempts at revenge.
If someone shot him would you be asking about the abolition of guns? Or would you be trying to draw a causal link of what drives people to do these things?
Technologists look at things from funny angles....
the point of preventing an important mail getting through is banal in the most extreme...
The question is surely that this man has caused this social disturbance by his actions, and he should be hit where it hurts in his wallet...
Good fences make good neighbours means that if the property ownership rules and relationships are clear then if the matter comes to court then it is easy to resolve.
If on the other hand ownership and rights of usage are blurred and confused it will be difficult for courts to make a decision and will probably require legislation, ie a Political decision as to the rights and relationships.
Thats why nice clear broad rules are preferred in legislation and the microdecisions of individual cases are left to the court.
So there are many cases where people are being sued under copyright law just as a scare tactic because the copyright law allows them to defend their copyright. Additionally this closes down the potential for reuse, parody and so forth and an extra avenue for expression.
I think the public domain should be viewed as a sphere of original artistic creations that are now free for all to deconstruct, reuse and play with. That is a wonderful creative resource... and the over zeaous protection of unlimited copyright stops that from happening...
Good fences make good neighbours and the problems at the moment are certainly due to the nature of the business cycle in technology. Once case law has been built up significantly it will be clearer what the risks and responsibilities of innovation and law are.
Personally I think that the courts are the place to argue out the rules of innovation as if you believe in the idea strongly enough then you will be willing to fight, or raise finance to do so. If this forms part of your business proposal then that is right and good. Business decisions are implicitly risky and this will have to be bourne in mind.
However this is with the caveat that copyright should be limited and the public domain requires legislation to prevent unlimited monopoly of ideas for all time...
My experience is the best system is paired computers running in parallel that are balanced by another computer that watches for problems and switches the crashed system from Live to the other computer seamlessly. It then reboots the system with problems and allows it to recreate its dataset from its partner.
In effect this points the way to the importance of massive parallelism required for totally stable systems so that clusters form the virtual computer and we get away from the idea of a computer as a single machine.
Afterall individual computers suffer hardware failure too!
Corporate buyers and technologists are notoriously conservative and things like long term longevity of the company, market capitalisation, project history, locked in technologies and pure tradition (ie we have always bought from Microsoft) have a massive impact on buying decisions.
As someone once remarked to me, "No-one gets sacked for buying Microsoft software"...
So I think they'll be around mighty longer than anyone anticipates (providing they don't make a huge technological miscalculation). And judging by their past aggressiveness and competitiveness I would say they can't be written off yet.
When pricing a firm there is much much more to it than saying that someone else sells everything they do.
This looks like a challenge to the DAT but to keep the quality up and remain pro it will always remain out of the price range of consumers. When you can walk around with an iPod that has all the tracks and convenience why would you bother with a pro bit of kit that is designed for recording live sounds (and has the outputs to support it).
There are already lots of DAT's that allow you to disable all digital copying due to the needs of professional studios but you don't see anyone on the train with one do you?
The reality is consumer and pro equipment has different needs and different functions and very rarely is there a crossover. I don't think the RIAA will be getting too worried providing this remains a pro choice...
All the Ogg and MP3 tracks are located on the artist pages.. maybe not the most logical choice... hmmm.. maybe a slight redesign is needed...
It soon becomes apparent though that merely creating a space is not enough. It is actually quite limiting communicating within the confines of the web. So personally I think ease of web use is not the be all.
It would be cool to make the whole process Open Source.. we dabbled in LINUX before but, jesus is it complex for the average user....
Open Source music is soon very soon...
Unfortunately I think the heat these things generate would make the whole thing untenable... Plus of course the air pressure problems (though I seem to remember the tunnels being vacuums - with their own issues...)
You'd think that creatives would be the ones Apple would identify as wanting the quiet to think and contemplate.
However buying a PC feels like a real step backwards for me. I am totally socialised to using Mac's in music and now that Logic is no longer supported on the PC it is even harder to consider the switch.
The sooner PCs get silent (like the blessed iMacs) the better...