i'm all for the free content myself, but take things from their point (admittedly rather hazy) POV: they paid for the stories (and i'd be amused if they didn't); and they gain revenue (and the cash to buy/write/serve more stories) through advertising.
That's their current business model; you can't fault them for trying to prove its (questionable) effectiveness.
Everything is about sharing, but you must be willing to share something back. This applies for economic sense as much as it does for p2p as much as it does for, well anything.
no such thing as a free lunch blah blah blah etc; but I can agree that ads (antiquated, one-way, old-info-distro cultural thinking) are not the best way to gain revenue.
But at the end of the line, there is someone out there doing the work, checking the facts and writing the articles for a living. I can respect that, and their desire to get paid for it.
haven't these people heard of subscription services? that at least would enable them to know some of the clients they are distributing to, and maybe even make things a little more tailored to the clients requirements.
And then, I thought that copyrights laws dealt with this already (Thou Shalt Not Publically Publish This Elsewhere Without Ye Express Permission etc). its dumb.
My cheap DSL line is subsidised by higher paying customers of my ISP. As these are mostly large-scale business users, bandwidth useage is high during the day and next to nothing at night. Fair enough.
In addition to this, although I have DSL this (512 kbps) line is shared (at the switch) with 50 other users - known as a 50/1 contention ration. Therefore, when other people are using this line the speed drops. The most I have got out of it is about 50kbps - which is fair enough, considering it is not metered by the second or the Byte, but by the month. So, the only difference between this and dialup is I can leave it on as much as I want, and I am guaranteed 50 kbps - something rather rare with dialup.
As soon as they install caps on these, I'm moving to an ISP that doesn't. Failing that, I would stop altogether and use my (infinitely quicker) university connection for this.
----
Will extra bandwith help the ISPs in being able to provide to more customers at a lower overall cost? Possibly. Will this mean I get more out of my connection? Probably not! but then, I'm a contented fellow.
chances are, it's somewhere in the contract. RTFC, before you sign. If you don't like the idea of *your usage of *somebody else's bandwidth being monitored, then don't sign
I have worked for companies that have had no monitoring - in one situation, net access was not neccessary, with the exception of 1. email and 2. two or three related company sites (it was an loan application firm). controls could have been set to block all else (fair enough IMO), but they didn't, leading to certain (but not all) individuals going to pr0n sites half the day and pulling up sex4a/offensive videos. This pissed me off since it was mostly offensive to see someone in a higher position than me jerking around when they should have been doing what was expected of them at that level (i left shortly after)
I would recommend anyone that doubts the effects of net access on the small minded to drop in at my university course. Most of the classes are in computer labs where the tutor can't see the screens. Of course most people (including myself sometimes), rather than go to java.sun.com|whatever, mess about at hotmail/newgrounds/etc. After two years, we now have 25% of the students we started with (bad grades etc). Therefore net misuse can be seen as an *rough indicator of that employees effectiveness.
I have myself been busted for misuse of email, (which I only viewed during my lunch breaks - god knows I had a lot of work to get through each day) and fired as a result (it was a cynical humor mailing list). Somewhat amusingly, rumor got around that the content was sexual (untrue), and via chinese whispers this led to a rather puzzling phone call:
boss:they also said that a lot of it was about homosexuality me:well, it was a unfiltered HUMOR mailing list. and only a small proportion of it mentioned that anyway. it's hardly indicative of the material I was recieving. You haven't seen the emails have you? boss:yeah, but some of it was gay me:I said it was a humor mailing list. it is bound to touch on that subject at some point. I don't think its possible for anyone in their right mind to consider them salacious or derogatory, either. boss:(ignoring me completely) Are you gay? me:whaaat? boss:Are you gay? me:(dumbfounded that they are asking such a question)um, what? boss:Are you gay? this went on and on until i realised i really didn't want to be working for these people (i'm not gay, incidentally);
me:uh, whatever.. yeah, i'm gay.. boss:you will recieve your final paycheque nextweek, minus the estimated* cost of your misuse of the email account.
I admit I was stupid to get caught in the first place (i was quite young then), but what really pissed me off (and still does) was the amount of money that they valued email at - so 356 kb of bandwith managed to cost me 4/5ths of my monthly paycheck. =). niiiiiiiice.
oh, and none of this was in the contract either, never mind that in-work recreational net use was rampant there amongst other staff during work hours.
</RANT>
I remember when I first started to use a WIMP system (Acorn Archimedes). I had not the slightest clue what I was doing.
Since then, I have found that what I have learned is not just how to do things, but 50% of it is how to deal with unexpected/confusing circumstances. I think sometimes thats the real reason I can use one - I'm not scared out of my wits about what is going on. I know it, its my environment, and I understand the (in)significance of various popups/error messages, actions, etc.
I suppose I really went on a steep learning curve because the software wasn't aimed at any specific user type; rather, it is aimed at everyone, specifically those with prior experience.
But there seems to be less Training given in the basics of operating a computer (filing, security, etc), than there are in using a computer to perform a small set of tasks (MS Office XP course, anyone?).
I have also noticed that once new user has worked out only what they want to do (not what they *can do), they will in general stick to that small range of skills but not branch out any further - wether that be through fear or laziness. A lot of the training for applications is quite mollycoddling in that way - the trainers know the users limitations - and they just want to show them how to use "mail merge" and get out of there, rather than increase the user's confidence in using a computer, overall.
*That*, ultimately, is why it is so hard for people to use new Software. Most of the time, it's not the software - it's that the users are pissed off that they have to relearn everything, for the same tasks they could do before. (as I said, its a heck of a lot easier with prior experience of a variety of other apps)
Of course manufacturers could remedy this by having every tool look and operate the same way (albeit near impossibly), but in the long run it would make more sense to teach people how to explore and deal with their overall environment. Its only natural that this ability and confidence spreads into the other areas.
any kind of response is damaging, especially responses of the "please do not send me unsolicited email" sort, as that indicates that you have an active email account - thus raising your addresses' resale value by quite a bit.
and if I see one more mailing list using the To: or CC: fields for *all* the blinking addresses..
yes, i accept that not selecting "HTML Formatted" after entering html to denote quote (see ) was a particularly idiotic thing to do.
I felt it was a fair point to say that it is still possible to start from scratch and get oneself to a decent commanding position through hard work and intelligence. Plenty of people have done it, and still do. And I also think it's fair to say that many people are unfairly resigning themselves to feeling downtrodden and unambitious.
So you leave this school and get a 30k job (as if) - it's nothing more than slavery. You're just working to make the guys at the top a shitload of money.
<BR>and did you ever consider how some of those people managed to get to that position *without* their daddy's chequebook? <BR> <BR>VOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOM! <BR>(the sound of ambition being thrown out of the window at 300 mph)
Last week AOL Time Warner, a colossal empire whose products vary from Harry Potter films to Now magazine, reported it had made a loss of $99bn in 2002
and
Now AOL is taking drastic action to reduce its $27bn debt, first spinning off the cable division. There is speculation the book publishing and music divisions might be sold off to raise money, and even Time magazine could be on the block. The new chairman, Dick Parsons, must be fuming about the potential loss of these media gems, sacrificed to solve a problem aggravated by internet silliness.
Didn't the words "Don't", "Put", "Eggs", "All", "One" and "Basket" ever occur to them?
No-one ever found stability by cooking the books and following the twisted whims of their investors. Say no to gambling, kids.
Correct Caption> Gollum: Give it to us raw and wiggling. Translation > Gollum: i am ooh i made so much or does it make more sense in a before-and-after context?
For the most part however, they weren't that funny. A couple of gems ("pussy face to my ass" etc) there, sure, but that don't mean mistaking "toss" for "toast" or "Sméagol" for "Smeedle" is anything to get worked up about.
Am I right in thinking our standards for humor are slipping? I'd expect Fark to make this kind of hoohah, not/.
I apologise beforehand for continuing the offtopic parent topic.
as many a man before me has noted: if signal degradation is undetectable, and that signal can be put through some device that only picks up on the important parts (in your case, the sound and vision) then it may be copied in some way.
I also suspect that macrovision is only in place by default on videotape X, not because a company has noticed large quantities pirate of videotape X appearing. As soon as they bring in a new standard, it gets cracked and anti-piracy bodies are none the wiser until they commission a study many or so more years down the line.
The same thing applies to digital works (albeit in a slightly more convoluted manner)
And ultimately, what's the real point? Is it just so no pirate can *pretend* they are Blockbuster Video? (so to speak).
I think it's obvious to the end-user that their copy of Product X is pirated: it didn't cost them as much as it would thru official channels. And that's the real reason why piracy thrives.
(in http://www.pong-story.com/inventor.htm) The fact that Willy Higinbotham's physics program (as Baer puts it) could actually be played by two people at once, using 2 paddles to bounce a dot towards the other. The name? "Tennis for Two".
Mr Baer also prefers not to call Higinbotham any kind of "Father" (his quote marks) by this bizarre logic:
all games are Video Games Video Games are called that because of the display Higinbotham used an Oscilloscope screen Therefore, "Tennis for Two" (or as Baer puts it, physics program) is not a Video Game, and Willy Higinbotham cannot be considered an early creator of Video Games.
Maybe they should put stickers on Plasma/TFT screens like "Does not support Video Game Systems".:P
It really makes me angry when people use the nicities of the english language and omit important details to present something in a false manner - all to their personal advantage.
Oh yeah, and Higinbotham never filed for a patent either. I think that is saying something.
Then what will you choose as a computing platform?.. An integrated Windows/hardware/software secure system that you pay through the teeth for, or a less restrictive but equally friendly, cost-effect Linux desktop system?
my thoughts exactly.
(Depending on how immediate MS would like a user-bases platform transition,) I have a feeling this could either break or make MS.
something as integral as this could seriouly undermine its share in the home computing market: free/uncostly/pirated media and applications are exactly what people buy computers for.
Everyone will know the limitations before it is launched.. the only place I can see it taking off is in the Business Sector (as a compulsory part of a software licencing agreement).
Even by then it will remain to be seen how many companies consider MS platforms to be the most cost-effective and cheap to maintain. Not many, I'll wager.
I would think it would take a lot less than a decade to arrive at a UI as user-friendly and integrated than Windows or Mac.
what is most amusing is that this might have had a chance to gain "popularity" with users if it had been brought onto the market before the maturation of mass filesharing and open-source. (not that i'm going to confuse the two)
that, and somehow convincing Apple to use the same Hardware architecture =)
in dancing games
that focus on the hands and waist
you move like a lady
the totally serious-looking feller I saw in the arcades the other night, playing PPP, had no idea of the huge crowd clustered behind him, trying incredibly hard not to laugh.
of course, there is an alternative to doing all these silly gimmicks in the pursuit of health..
calisthenesia psychosis.
there are plenty of independant, free, not-exactly-ameteurish musicians and music-networks that would be more than happy to supply Geraldi's (and others) with cds.
they could even simply check for clearly non-copyrighted, non-material material; burn it to a cd; and bingo, problem solved. (unless Geraldi will listen to nothing but what's in the charts.)
as a matter of fact, a certain music sharing network is currently putting together a project of - freely distributable original music - specifically for restaraunts and other public places. this will be burnt to cd, and available to the public over mail order. all is needed is awareness.
robots can give birth already, if you consider a mechanised assembly line.
the idea of 'soul' in mechanisms is nothing new. many far eastern religions append a spiritual value to things, like rocks, sand, water, metals.
and in fiction, robots have had personalites since, oh - frankenstein or talos (of greek fable) or maybe even earlier.
Metropolis:
the character designs and story were based around Miyazaki's original manga characters, (except for Rock), and as such they tried to remain faithful.
after all, he's they guy that made 'the mighty atom'... in other words, the daddy.
i think it works overall. but then i saw the subbed version.
You just have to take the film out of a modern context (a world where the matrix, ghost in the shell, star wars, and akira haven't happened), and it works.
Slashdot Mirror
horrible things happen to certain fabrics at the wrong temperatures, so it's a bit daft to expect to be able to wash everything in hot water.
..it's not as if alcoholics wash their clothes anyway.
as I'm writing this from my zanussi-debian refridgerator.
i'm all for the free content myself, but take things from their point (admittedly rather hazy) POV: they paid for the stories (and i'd be amused if they didn't); and they gain revenue (and the cash to buy/write/serve more stories) through advertising.
That's their current business model; you can't fault them for trying to prove its (questionable) effectiveness.
Everything is about sharing, but you must be willing to share something back. This applies for economic sense as much as it does for p2p as much as it does for, well anything.
no such thing as a free lunch blah blah blah etc;
but I can agree that ads (antiquated, one-way, old-info-distro cultural thinking) are not the best way to gain revenue.
But at the end of the line, there is someone out there doing the work, checking the facts and writing the articles for a living. I can respect that, and their desire to get paid for it.
haven't these people heard of subscription services? that at least would enable them to know some of the clients they are distributing to, and maybe even make things a little more tailored to the clients requirements.
And then, I thought that copyrights laws dealt with this already (Thou Shalt Not Publically Publish This Elsewhere Without Ye Express Permission etc).
its dumb.
this may be a good illlustration of my situation:
My cheap DSL line is subsidised by higher paying customers of my ISP. As these are mostly large-scale business users, bandwidth useage is high during the day and next to nothing at night. Fair enough.
In addition to this, although I have DSL this (512 kbps) line is shared (at the switch) with 50 other users - known as a 50/1 contention ration. Therefore, when other people are using this line the speed drops.
The most I have got out of it is about 50kbps - which is fair enough, considering it is not metered by the second or the Byte, but by the month.
So, the only difference between this and dialup is I can leave it on as much as I want, and I am guaranteed 50 kbps - something rather rare with dialup.
As soon as they install caps on these, I'm moving to an ISP that doesn't. Failing that, I would stop altogether and use my (infinitely quicker) university connection for this.
----
Will extra bandwith help the ISPs in being able to provide to more customers at a lower overall cost? Possibly.
Will this mean I get more out of my connection? Probably not! but then, I'm a contented fellow.
boss: they also said that a lot of it was about homosexuality
me: well, it was a unfiltered HUMOR mailing list. and only a small proportion of it mentioned that anyway. it's hardly indicative of the material I was recieving. You haven't seen the emails have you?
boss: yeah, but some of it was gay
me: I said it was a humor mailing list. it is bound to touch on that subject at some point. I don't think its possible for anyone in their right mind to consider them salacious or derogatory, either.
boss:(ignoring me completely) Are you gay?
me: whaaat?
boss: Are you gay?
me:(dumbfounded that they are asking such a question)um, what?
boss: Are you gay?
this went on and on until i realised i really didn't want to be working for these people (i'm not gay, incidentally);
me: uh, whatever.. yeah, i'm gay..
boss: you will recieve your final paycheque nextweek, minus the estimated* cost of your misuse of the email account.
I admit I was stupid to get caught in the first place (i was quite young then), but what really pissed me off (and still does) was the amount of money that they valued email at - so 356 kb of bandwith managed to cost me 4/5ths of my monthly paycheck. =). niiiiiiiice.
oh, and none of this was in the contract either, never mind that in-work recreational net use was rampant there amongst other staff during work hours.
</RANT>
I remember when I first started to use a WIMP system (Acorn Archimedes). I had not the slightest clue what I was doing.
Since then, I have found that what I have learned is not just how to do things, but 50% of it is how to deal with unexpected/confusing circumstances.
I think sometimes thats the real reason I can use one - I'm not scared out of my wits about what is going on. I know it, its my environment, and I understand the (in)significance of various popups/error messages, actions, etc.
I suppose I really went on a steep learning curve because the software wasn't aimed at any specific user type; rather, it is aimed at everyone, specifically those with prior experience.
But there seems to be less Training given in the basics of operating a computer (filing, security, etc), than there are in using a computer to perform a small set of tasks (MS Office XP course, anyone?).
I have also noticed that once new user has worked out only what they want to do (not what they *can do), they will in general stick to that small range of skills but not branch out any further - wether that be through fear or laziness. A lot of the training for applications is quite mollycoddling in that way - the trainers know the users limitations - and they just want to show them how to use "mail merge" and get out of there, rather than increase the user's confidence in using a computer, overall.
*That*, ultimately, is why it is so hard for people to use new Software. Most of the time, it's not the software - it's that the users are pissed off that they have to relearn everything, for the same tasks they could do before. (as I said, its a heck of a lot easier with prior experience of a variety of other apps)
Of course manufacturers could remedy this by having every tool look and operate the same way (albeit near impossibly), but in the long run it would make more sense to teach people how to explore and deal with their overall environment. Its only natural that this ability and confidence spreads into the other areas.
any kind of response is damaging, especially responses of the "please do not send me unsolicited email" sort, as that indicates that you have an active email account - thus raising your addresses' resale value by quite a bit.
and if I see one more mailing list using the To: or CC: fields for *all* the blinking addresses..
yes, i accept that not selecting "HTML Formatted" after entering html to denote quote (see ) was a particularly idiotic thing to do.
I felt it was a fair point to say that it is still possible to start from scratch and get oneself to a decent commanding position through hard work and intelligence. Plenty of people have done it, and still do.
And I also think it's fair to say that many people are unfairly resigning themselves to feeling downtrodden and unambitious.
just my $0.02
So you leave this school and get a 30k job (as if) - it's nothing more than slavery. You're just working to make the guys at the top a shitload of money.
O OOOOOM!
<BR>and did you ever consider how some of those people managed to get to that position *without* their daddy's chequebook?
<BR>
<BR>VOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
<BR>(the sound of ambition being thrown out of the window at 300 mph)
..of geek parents into Greensboro.
That is, if geeks ever get the opportunity to become parents (I know I don't).
Didn't the words "Don't", "Put", "Eggs", "All", "One" and "Basket" ever occur to them?
No-one ever found stability by cooking the books and following the twisted whims of their investors. Say no to gambling, kids.
Correct Caption> Gollum: Give it to us raw and wiggling.
Translation > Gollum: i am ooh i made so much
or does it make more sense in a before-and-after context?
For the most part however, they weren't that funny. A couple of gems ("pussy face to my ass" etc) there, sure, but that don't mean mistaking "toss" for "toast" or "Sméagol" for "Smeedle" is anything to get worked up about.
Am I right in thinking our standards for humor are slipping? I'd expect Fark to make this kind of hoohah, not
Get thee to a comedy club!
electrocuting your weiner can kill anyone.
Unless you're female, in which case it's someone else's.
but then, how many stupid people that like explosives do you see walking around with all limbs intact?
I apologise beforehand for continuing the offtopic parent topic.
as many a man before me has noted: if signal degradation is undetectable, and that signal can be put through some device that only picks up on the important parts (in your case, the sound and vision) then it may be copied in some way.
I also suspect that macrovision is only in place by default on videotape X, not because a company has noticed large quantities pirate of videotape X appearing. As soon as they bring in a new standard, it gets cracked and anti-piracy bodies are none the wiser until they commission a study many or so more years down the line.
The same thing applies to digital works (albeit in a slightly more convoluted manner)
And ultimately, what's the real point? Is it just so no pirate can *pretend* they are Blockbuster Video? (so to speak).
I think it's obvious to the end-user that their copy of Product X is pirated: it didn't cost them as much as it would thru official channels. And that's the real reason why piracy thrives.
(in http://www.pong-story.com/inventor.htm)
:P
The fact that Willy Higinbotham's physics program (as Baer puts it) could actually be played by two people at once, using 2 paddles to bounce a dot towards the other.
The name? "Tennis for Two".
Mr Baer also prefers not to call Higinbotham any kind of "Father" (his quote marks) by this bizarre logic:
all games are Video Games
Video Games are called that because of the display
Higinbotham used an Oscilloscope screen
Therefore, "Tennis for Two" (or as Baer puts it, physics program) is not a Video Game, and Willy Higinbotham cannot be considered an early creator of Video Games.
Maybe they should put stickers on Plasma/TFT screens like "Does not support Video Game Systems".
It really makes me angry when people use the nicities of the english language and omit important details to present something in a false manner - all to their personal advantage.
Oh yeah, and Higinbotham never filed for a patent either. I think that is saying something.
my thoughts exactly.
(Depending on how immediate MS would like a user-bases platform transition,) I have a feeling this could either break or make MS.
something as integral as this could seriouly undermine its share in the home computing market: free/uncostly/pirated media and applications are exactly what people buy computers for.
Everyone will know the limitations before it is launched.. the only place I can see it taking off is in the Business Sector (as a compulsory part of a software licencing agreement).
Even by then it will remain to be seen how many companies consider MS platforms to be the most cost-effective and cheap to maintain. Not many, I'll wager.
I would think it would take a lot less than a decade to arrive at a UI as user-friendly and integrated than Windows or Mac.what is most amusing is that this might have had a chance to gain "popularity" with users if it had been brought onto the market before the maturation of mass filesharing and open-source. (not that i'm going to confuse the two)
that, and somehow convincing Apple to use the same Hardware architecture =)
beefcake rides again #14
scene 6
INT. BEDROOM. NIGHT.
BEEFCAKE (OFFCAMERA): oh - that's good, that's so good
THE BIMBO: ah, oh
BEEFCAKE (OFFCAMERA): uh, uh
in dancing games that focus on the hands and waist you move like a lady the totally serious-looking feller I saw in the arcades the other night, playing PPP, had no idea of the huge crowd clustered behind him, trying incredibly hard not to laugh. of course, there is an alternative to doing all these silly gimmicks in the pursuit of health.. calisthenesia psychosis.
..as to why i won't make my girlfriend a compilation tape
"sorry hun but i can't let myself drag you any further into the criminal underworld"
mix tapes are to be found in many other cultures
therefore there is just as much chance of the RIAA going after, say your local techno music emporium.
however, a lot of music on these tapes are from underground record labels - i.e. non-riaa-members.
and even then there is the task of identifying tiny snippets of music used in the 'mix'.
there are plenty of independant, free, not-exactly-ameteurish musicians and music-networks that would be more than happy to supply Geraldi's (and others) with cds.
they could even simply check for clearly non-copyrighted, non-material material;
burn it to a cd;
and bingo, problem solved.
(unless Geraldi will listen to nothing but what's in the charts.)
as a matter of fact, a certain music sharing network is currently putting together a project of - freely distributable original music - specifically for restaraunts and other public places. this will be burnt to cd, and available to the public over mail order.
all is needed is awareness.
robots can give birth already, if you consider a mechanised assembly line. the idea of 'soul' in mechanisms is nothing new. many far eastern religions append a spiritual value to things, like rocks, sand, water, metals. and in fiction, robots have had personalites since, oh - frankenstein or talos (of greek fable) or maybe even earlier. Metropolis: the character designs and story were based around Miyazaki's original manga characters, (except for Rock), and as such they tried to remain faithful. after all, he's they guy that made 'the mighty atom'... in other words, the daddy. i think it works overall. but then i saw the subbed version. You just have to take the film out of a modern context (a world where the matrix, ghost in the shell, star wars, and akira haven't happened), and it works.