Well, just the fact there's been a leak of the first episode is sufficiently big news that I've now heard about the new series (which I hadn't up to now). I'm not a huge Dr Who fan, but given the lack of decent TV these days, I'm willing to give it a shot.
Now I know when it's going to be broadcast, and I may well see the first episode before it airs - and mythtv the series as a result.
So this is one set of eyeballs that they probably wouldn't have got simply because of the extra advertising about the new series, because of the leak.
I know of at least three other people who'd probably be interested, but may also may well not have heard about the new series. They've not exactly been advertising it so far...
Actually, webDAV has been really handy for us, at a school. I'm using it to share users homefolders to the internet via an apache server (technically WebDAVs as I'm using ssl).
Apache authenticates against the domain accounts with a plugin, and they can read and save their files from home with the simple network folder support built into windows, and it's fully supported on linux and OSX too. Far simpler than a VPN for people who don't need that level of access, so it's been a huge hit.
As you say, the EPO has allowed a very large number of software patents, but they are unenforceable at the european level because indeed, they aren't actually legal.
Individual nations have validated software patents; but that's a matter for national governments at this stage.
The problem I have with any directive, is that 'harmonization' has been used as a code word by the pro-patent part of the EU bodies to mean allowing the existing patents and new patents to become enforceable EU-wide.
My fear is that even with a directive that specifically outlaws software patents, someone will find a loophole and manage to get 'computer-implemented inventions' to cover software, and that would now work in all directive implementing countries. After all, if the EPO is effectively ignoring it's own rules now, why won't it carry on doing so?
Directives from the EU need to (generally) be a joint agreement between the directly elected european parliament, and the national government appointed council of ministers, with the unelected comission helping negotiate the difference and provide the legislation they discuss in the first place.
The friction at the moment is because the parliament opposes software patents, while the council first had a slim majority for patents, while now they have a slim majority against (partly because people pressured their national governments to oppose them, such as poland and denmark). The comission is definitely pro-patents, unfortunately, which is why they're refusing the restart, and still pushing the pro-patent version the council first agreed.
Yes, the EU isn't very democratic, especially given the size of the region for each elected Member of the European Parliament (MEP). It wouldn't be truly democratic until the parliament alone decides on legislation, and the comission is made up of elected MEP's, but that would remove all power from national governments, and would truly create a federal europe. Such a step is not likely to happen, instead we'll stay stuck with an institution that slowly accumulates power without it even being fully accountable.
Yes, but it requires an absolute majority of the parliament to do so. And given they didn't kill it when it had the first reading, and it was easier to do so, it's far from certain they will do so. Some of the MEP's are pro-patents too...
If the parliament had made no amendments to the original directive on it's first reading, we would then be at step 5, and this A-list item would indeed be the final stage.
Heres a (very detailed) link to the differences between the the parliament's and council's versions.
This is a better diagram of our current status. So all is not yet lost, even if the council does pass the may 2004 agreed version (their amended version of the parliament amended version), as it will have to go a second reading in the parliament, because of their changes. However, it's much harder for the parliament to introduce new amendments at the 2nd reading, making it basically a vote to kill the directive entirely, or pass the council version. Plus of course, it puts us one step closer to software patentability. Here is a link detailing the process. Note the hefty requirements the parliament have to meet in order to modify or kill the bill at it's second reading - and even if *that* succeeds, the council still has to agree to those changes.
After the Council of the European Union has sent its common position to the European Parliament, a time period of 3 months starts to run. If the Parliament does nothing within this time frame, the common position enters into force as directive.
The Parliament can extend this time by one month if it decides so.
If the European Parliament does not agree, is has to adopt changes to the common position or reject the common position, the latter would end the codecision procedure at this point.
To change or reject the text in 2nd reading, the parliament needs an absolute majority of the 732 Members for a yes on an amendment - for each change.
Of course, if the council have a complete change of heart, and pass the parliament sept 2003 version, it goes into law - but we're ok, as that version blocks software patents. But that would require reopening discussion, which the Commission has so far put pressure on to block, both in the council, and as a total restart.
Just FYI, the parliament did make significant amendments to the directive, effectively keeping the status quo and keeping software patents invalid, back in September 2003, but in the process made some parts of the directive contradict itself.
However, the working party that reworked the directive for the Council removed the bulk of the parliament's amendments, while promising that they had put in additional protections against software patents, when in fact the protections were meaningless.
It was this theoretically neutered directive that the Council agreed to in May 2004 by a slim majority. Now that members have realised what they've done (agree a directive that allows patents), some are now trying to prevent this directive from being rubber-stamped as an A-list item, as you mentioned, despite the pressure of the Commission to force through the may 2004 version. I believe this is the 'common position' stage, step 9.
If it goes onto its second reading, the EP can still amend or block the directive, but it's a lot harder to do so, given the absolute majority required.
Here's hoping sufficient people in the Council can block the directive as an A-list item, and either force a restart or at least knock it back to a B-list item again for further discussion.
I'll ignore the legal liability of the VoIP network for calls over their network (I've no idea whether they do in fact have common carrier status, or something like it, and I'm certainly not qualified to comment on that)
My understanding of the common carrier status of the provider though, is that they do not look at what they transport, so cannot be held liable for the contents. So if they're port blocking a competing service, that means they're intefering, and thus ignoring the very fact that makes them common carriers in the process.
The customer is paying the provider for bandwidth. Who they connect to with it, even if it's a VoIP service, is none of the business of the common carrier by definition.
They very likely weren't blocking VoIP with the agreement of the end customer (via service contact) as the customers were businesses. They were blocking it on their own initiative to preserve their landline business. That is anti-competitive, and if a provider under the purview of the FCC is breaking it's own common carrier status, then the FCC not only has the right to act, it has the duty to do so.
If the FCC didn't prevent this, then that allows providers to block whatever they want, without putting it in the service contract. Next up, you'd have the RIAA and the police to expect this provider to start port blocking P2P services, and scanning for child porn passing across their network, as they would no longer be common carriers.
For a start, it's only one idea amongst several that were mooted on how to fund the BBC in 2017, when their licence comes up for renewal. One of the other ideas was indeed a per-content or subscription scheme.
Remember, the BBC is planning to put as much of it's archive content online as possible, but restricted to the UK through peering agreements with UK broadband ISP's. Such a system could also be used to play the 'live' broadcast content they do now via TV.
Under such a system, you'd be able to get the BBC without paying a TV licence fee. This currently is paid by any household (once, not per device) that has equipment capable of receiving BBC channels, i.e. has a tuner, is attached to an aerial, and has the local channels tuned in. They work on the basis everyone has a TV, and they might send an inspector to check you don't if you decline to pay the fee.
If you don't have a aerial, but do have a broadband-connected PC that can access the online archive and broadcasts (which they think will be a majority of people in 2017) you wouldn't have to pay the fee. They're just brainstorming ways to get people to pay in that circumstance, rather than focussing only on TV sets. A PC licence would be one way, but very hard to enforce.
It's also worth pointing out that Rupert Murdock, owner of Fox News, Sky TV and the Times (amongst other media) rather dislikes the competition from the BBC, and his outlets regularly slam the BBC as being unfair competition, a rip off etc in a bid to knock them out. After all, wouldn't the british all be better off paying £300 a year to watch his totally unbiased Fox News, rather than £120 a year to watch BBC News?
Eh? I regularly watch BBC TV or listen to BBC radio on my nava-t digital tuner card in my gentoo box, and before that I used to use the helix-based realplayer to listen to BBC radio.
I also understand realplayer is available for both OSX and older macs.
Admittedly, realplayer is still somewhat of a pain in the neck, and I'd much prefer vorbis streams, but which content particularly isn't available for non-windows platforms?
Are you referring to the broadband streamed versions of BBC 'broadcasts' that they assume will be common by 2017? (As opposed to the handful of realplayer clips they currently make available on BBC broadband)
If so, don't worry. The BBC has stated in the past that the main reason they use realplayer is because it's cross platform. Given their public-sector remit, they are certain to ensure that it won't be some windows-only service in future.
"In the UK, the iTunes Music Store charges customers £0.79 (EUR 1.09, $1.44) to download a single track. The same song costs EUR 0.99 when it's downloaded from Apple's other European music shops."
Apple has argued that the reason for the price difference is because of national licencing bodies. However, Apple has its own cross-border store, "which takes in customers from the Netherlands, Spain, Italy and other territories. If it can smooth pricing across these countries, why not across the EU as a whole?"
"The EC itself last year called on Europe's music licensing agencies to develop a common framework and pricing structure - or risk having one imposed upon it. Certainly, the EC fears that the various licensing regimes are themselves in violation of EU law."
Basically, it's not that all items have to cost the same across all EU countries, simply that free trade laws say that customers can purchase their goods from anywhere within the EU, and pay local prices and taxes. This is commonly done with cigarettes, alcohol, cars and CDs, all of which are generally cheaper on the continent. It's a bit similar to people shopping out of state in order to get cheaper prices in the US.
By restricting UK purchasers to the UK store only, Apple and quite possibly their suppliers are in breach of EU law. It's also worth noting that the EU price of EUR 0.99 is about $1.31, so even if the UK do end being able to buy from European iTunes stores, we're still being ripped off compared to the Americans.
This change just doesn't affect them - and importantly - until it does, please don't expect any mass migration to other operating systems. Microsoft rightly identified an exploit that pirates are using to rip them off- why shouldn't they patch it up? It really bothers me that so many people play this out as a big bad beast cracking knuckles again - it just isn't. Since when did support piracy become so acceptable to so many people?
Because this will have no impact on copyright infringement whatsoever. People who were nicking OEM keys (or double selling them) will just switch to fake or stolen volume licence keys, which most infringers use anyway, or even copies with activation disabled.
The people it WILL impact will be people like me, a computer repair guy. Say I reinstall a copy of windows for a customer that's been crippled by spyware. I use the OEM key on the sticker on the bottom. Instead of a few seconds activation through the LAN (which is irritating, but not significantly so) I now have to sit on hold with microsoft, then probably read my key to a machine, then explain to an operative why I'm reinstalling.
I've done this in the past, and it's no fun whatsoever. Now imagine I have to spend 10 minutes on this for every machine I fix. Now imagine they ask questions about the OEM computer, where they bought it, how old it is etc. Now _I_ can't register the computer, I have to sit down with the customer and walk them through it at handover.
This is going to be a massive pain in the bum for legitimate users and small businesses, while having zero impact on copyright infringement. That's why we're pissed off.
But google manages to cache sites just fine. As long as slashdot respected requests to remove caches/mirrors, as google does, I don't see them having a problem.
You could just as easily argue that slashdot could be sued for aiding and abetting DDOS attacks.
Even of the small percentage of the population (about 15% I think) who can watch Sky
I'd be amazed if the percentage is that small; do you have a source for that figure? (I'm genuinely curious)
It was from a discussion on the BBC (newsnight, I think) regarding Sky's purchasing of sports rights a year or two ago for pay-per-view channels.
By the 15% I meant people who have Sky, and could have watched Battlestar Galactica on original broadcast, not that only 15% of the population can actually put in equipment to watch Sky. That I'm sure is much higher!
The number of people who have Sky may also have increased in that period, but it does match roughly with the percentage of people I know who have Sky.
If you're having multiple drive failures in one or two cases, I'd really recommend looking at the power supplies.
I have a case that killed a drive every few months until I twigged and replaced the PSU with an antec 350W. If the power rails are 'dirty' with fluctuating voltage, they can slowly kill a drive. This is a known problem with cheap PSU's, and it can be cheaper to spend a bit more on a quality supply than keep swapping drives.
One cute result you get (apart from the light, and the heat, and the screaming if you try it at home) is molten iron. I've seen video of railway engineers using the thermite reaction in a shaped 'bucket' to weld railway tracks together.
Because Battlestar Galactica was aired on Sky 1, a satellite channel. The minimum subscription, last I checked, was £13.50 a month ($25) for the most basic package which includes it.
In addition, there's plenty of places that can't install a satellite dish (or install cable), such as rental properties or blocks of flats under tenancy agreements.
Even of the small percentage of the population (about 15% I think) who can watch Sky, some people may not have been around when it was broadcast, and downloading it is better than using tape, and simpler than ripping the ads yourself.
Why leave the adverts in? I'm in the UK, and if I were to download a tv torrent of a show that aired in the US (which is by far the most common for us), then I'm certainly not a pair of eyeballs the broadcaster or advertiser expected; at least not for a year or two. Some good shows never air in the UK at all, so I'm hardly part of their target demographic.
So for them, they don't even lose something they expected to get by me seeing it. In fact, I'm more likely to see the show when it does finally hit our shores, or even buy the DVD, when it drops to a sane price, such as I did with firefly, because I know now it's good.
The best thing they could possibly do is make the files available for download themselves, after they air. Since the vast majority of people who download them couldn't watch the original broadcast because of timing or location, and *wouldn't have seen the ads anyway*, they will reach a bigger audience.
They could even offer multiple versions; free with the ads in, and an ad-free one for a cheaper fee than the DVD (no manufacturing, shipping or cash tied up in unsold stock). They could do season passes.
It would be a small market to start with, but make it DRM-lite and people could use it with their media centres. People want media how they want and when they want, (tivo, anyone?) not at the dictates of the broadcasters anymore. Time they realised that, and started taking advantage of it.
I've just thought of a varient on 2) that's nasty:
Secretly hack a software download site, such as distro mirrors or windows update:). Upload modified files that have had keyloggers/spyware added to them, but give the same SHA-1 hash.
Even systems which check the hashes of downloads (or certificate signed ones, maybe), and would install the modified files and be none the wiser; and if the break-in isn't discovered quickly, the software could get pretty widely spread.
I'd agree with you on that; which is why you'd include other extraneous material in the original contract file, such as graphic logos, hidden comments or other meta-data which would give you enough 'secret' collision space to work with, to counteract the changes you wanted to make.
Still, it would take a rediculous amount of time and money to pull it off, even with this known weakness. Thing is, that cost will drop over the next few years, and there's always a possibility that further weaknesses will be found in SHA-1 after this one, making that cost drop even faster.
SHA-1 isn't dead yet; but it will be in the forseeable future, as MD5 alone is already (for important hashes, anyway). One solution is to switch to SGA-256, whirlpool, or some other hash algorithm, or use multiple different hashes at once.
Re:Break only affects carefully constructed messag
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More on Newly Broken SHA-1
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· Score: 4, Informative
Yes, but say someone creates a document (such as a contract) for you to digitally sign.
If they're prepared to spend a realistic level of time on it they could create two of them that hash to the same thing, with a small but effective change to the second.
You sign the first with SHA-1, but your signature also matches on the second, putting you in a weak position when you try and claim "I didn't sign _that_!"
The time/money requirements to do this aren't really practical yet, but they will be soon.
As the sub says, time to start shifting off SHA-1.
Ok, I'm far from an expert, but this is what I know (largely culled from europa.eu.int).
The EU is not, yet, the government of europe. Each member state (UK, France, Poland etc) has their own internal government. Which powers the national governments have delegated in whole or in part to the EU is governed by a series of treaties. These treaties include managing the euro, human rights, environmental law, regional development and trade regulation, off the top of my head. Foreign policy and national taxation are not yet under the EU's purview.
There are five EU institutions, each playing a specific role: European Parliament (elected by the peoples of the Member States);
Council of the European Union (representing the governments of the Member States);
European Commission (driving force and executive body);
Court of Justice (ensuring compliance with the law);
Court of Auditors (controlling sound and lawful management of the EU budget).
There are also a number of committees that make recommendations on various specifc areas.
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Parliament has three main roles:
It shares with the Council the power to legislate.
It exercises democratic supervision over all EU institutions, and in particular the Commission. It has the power to approve or reject the nomination of Commissioners, and it has the right to censure the Commission as a whole.
It shares with the Council authority over the EU budget and can therefore influence EU spending. At the end of the procedure, it adopts or rejects the budget in its entirety.
The most common procedure for adopting (i.e. passing) EU legislation is "co-decision" (which is what is being used in this software patents case). This places the European Parliament and the Council on an equal footing and the laws passed using this procedure are joint acts of the Council and Parliament. It applies to legislation in a wide range of fields.
On a range of other proposals Parliament must be consulted, and its approval is required for certain important political or institutional decisions.
Parliament also provides impetus for new legislation by examining the Commission's annual work programme, considering what new laws would be appropriate and asking the Commission to put forward proposals.
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The full details of all forms of passing legislation is too large to cut-n-paste, so you might want to check here for the gory details.
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regarding software patents, this is the FFII's take on the matter:
"While the EU Parliament has proposed a clear exclusion of software patents, the Commission and Council have ignored the Parliament's proposal and reinstated the most uncompromisingly pro-patent text in May 2004. However this text does not enjoy the support of a qualified majority of member states. Yet the Council has refused to renegotiate, and is still trying to push the text through. Meanwhile the European Parliament has asked for a restart of the procedure."
Basically, the parliament has already agreed the text of the first draft of this directive in september 2003, but with amendments that effectively blocked software patentability, despite the original draft by the Legal Affairs Committee (JURI) that was heavily pro-patents.
In may 2004, the council were conned into narrowly passing a 'compromise' version of the bill by a pro-patents working party (made up of patent office administrators!) which stripped out the parliament's amendments, and added some meaningless 'protections' that will do nothing.
However, the council's decision is not technically final until it is an A item on their agenda, and is passed. As a B item, it can be amended. Given that several council members have changed their position since may 2004 (changes in government, pressure from national parliaments etc) the pro-patent lobby and commission have so far failed to get the item through a
There was a time before you downloaded everything off the internet.
If microsoft were forced to release a browserless windows (oh please! please!) then OEM's could put their own browser (probably branded firefox) on the desktop.
Failing that, you'd grab a handy ISP cd and install a browser from that, just like a few years ago when IE wasn't mandatory on windows, or grab one from a mate. Using your logic, you could argue that it's impossible for a newb to sign up for any ISP that isn't bundled in windows, as they've no way to get to register an account online...
Having windows with IE as an optional component wouldn't make life impossible for newbs, it didn't in the past. It would however allow people to make their boxes much, much more secure by really getting rid of the vulnerable components, not just hiding them. It might also have the side effect of making microsoft compete on features and security to get IE back on the desktop, not just rely on their existing monopoly.
First you ought to pick a valid comparison. No car manufacturer has a monopoly on cars, so the same rules/problems do not apply.
With windows having a 90% monopoly on the desktop, by bunding IE and WMP they do make it very hard for alternative providers to compete, because there's already a player on there. Worse, I can't remove it even I want to. Let's say I want to improve the security on my windows server by uninstalling IE and WMP. I can't. I'm stuck with the included vulnerable libraries and processes.
Because up till now, all windows machines came with windows media player and the WMP codecs, they could go to online media providers and say "Don't use realplayer, quicktime, or ogg-vorbis files - they all need your customers to download some software. Instead use our bundled DRM codecs, they're already on there!"
Assuming media providers do take the easy way out (which isn't hard, given how many WMP streams and videos I see out there now compared to a few years ago) then that makes it much harder for non-windows users to use the WWW for music and video, as it's all in a locked up proprietry format that's only legally usable in software patent countries on windows.
There is a similar problem with IE and activex or broken css websites; Microsoft have tried very hard to make people code to their default, and lock people into windows.
Personally, I would have like to have seen microsoft forced to allow people to really uninstall WMP and IE from standard XP, but the EU action will have the same effect:
Media providers cannot assume that every customer has windows media player and it's codecs, thus they have more of a reason to use more open and cross platform formats. Plus it gives the OEM builders much more reason to bundle alternative players that are better and don't have DRM turned on by default.
Yes, customers might have to undergo a little pain to choose a media player rather than have a non-removable default one forced upon them; but it will hopefully have the longer term effect of keeping media files available to all users, not just windows users. And making it easier for people to switch platforms benefits everyone in the end, as microsoft will be forced to innovate to compete, not just rely on their desktop monopoly.
And speaking personally, I will be installing this at my school. Getting rid of WMP and replacing it with a player that doesn't have bundled browser+adverts+unfiltered search engine will be much easier with WRME. I'd get rid of IE too, if I could.
Slashdot Mirror
Well, just the fact there's been a leak of the first episode is sufficiently big news that I've now heard about the new series (which I hadn't up to now). I'm not a huge Dr Who fan, but given the lack of decent TV these days, I'm willing to give it a shot.
Now I know when it's going to be broadcast, and I may well see the first episode before it airs - and mythtv the series as a result.
So this is one set of eyeballs that they probably wouldn't have got simply because of the extra advertising about the new series, because of the leak.
I know of at least three other people who'd probably be interested, but may also may well not have heard about the new series. They've not exactly been advertising it so far...
Actually, webDAV has been really handy for us, at a school. I'm using it to share users homefolders to the internet via an apache server (technically WebDAVs as I'm using ssl).
Apache authenticates against the domain accounts with a plugin, and they can read and save their files from home with the simple network folder support built into windows, and it's fully supported on linux and OSX too. Far simpler than a VPN for people who don't need that level of access, so it's been a huge hit.
As you say, the EPO has allowed a very large number of software patents, but they are unenforceable at the european level because indeed, they aren't actually legal.
Individual nations have validated software patents; but that's a matter for national governments at this stage.
The problem I have with any directive, is that 'harmonization' has been used as a code word by the pro-patent part of the EU bodies to mean allowing the existing patents and new patents to become enforceable EU-wide.
My fear is that even with a directive that specifically outlaws software patents, someone will find a loophole and manage to get 'computer-implemented inventions' to cover software, and that would now work in all directive implementing countries. After all, if the EPO is effectively ignoring it's own rules now, why won't it carry on doing so?
Better the devil you know, I guess.
Directives from the EU need to (generally) be a joint agreement between the directly elected european parliament, and the national government appointed council of ministers, with the unelected comission helping negotiate the difference and provide the legislation they discuss in the first place.
The friction at the moment is because the parliament opposes software patents, while the council first had a slim majority for patents, while now they have a slim majority against (partly because people pressured their national governments to oppose them, such as poland and denmark). The comission is definitely pro-patents, unfortunately, which is why they're refusing the restart, and still pushing the pro-patent version the council first agreed.
Yes, the EU isn't very democratic, especially given the size of the region for each elected Member of the European Parliament (MEP). It wouldn't be truly democratic until the parliament alone decides on legislation, and the comission is made up of elected MEP's, but that would remove all power from national governments, and would truly create a federal europe. Such a step is not likely to happen, instead we'll stay stuck with an institution that slowly accumulates power without it even being fully accountable.
Yes, but it requires an absolute majority of the parliament to do so. And given they didn't kill it when it had the first reading, and it was easier to do so, it's far from certain they will do so. Some of the MEP's are pro-patents too...
If the parliament had made no amendments to the original directive on it's first reading, we would then be at step 5, and this A-list item would indeed be the final stage.
Heres a (very detailed) link to the differences between the the parliament's and council's versions.
This is a better diagram of our current status. So all is not yet lost, even if the council does pass the may 2004 agreed version (their amended version of the parliament amended version), as it will have to go a second reading in the parliament, because of their changes. However, it's much harder for the parliament to introduce new amendments at the 2nd reading, making it basically a vote to kill the directive entirely, or pass the council version. Plus of course, it puts us one step closer to software patentability. Here is a link detailing the process. Note the hefty requirements the parliament have to meet in order to modify or kill the bill at it's second reading - and even if *that* succeeds, the council still has to agree to those changes.
After the Council of the European Union has sent its common position to the European Parliament, a time period of 3 months starts to run. If the Parliament does nothing within this time frame, the common position enters into force as directive.
The Parliament can extend this time by one month if it decides so.
If the European Parliament does not agree, is has to adopt changes to the common position or reject the common position, the latter would end the codecision procedure at this point.
To change or reject the text in 2nd reading, the parliament needs an absolute majority of the 732 Members for a yes on an amendment - for each change.
Of course, if the council have a complete change of heart, and pass the parliament sept 2003 version, it goes into law - but we're ok, as that version blocks software patents. But that would require reopening discussion, which the Commission has so far put pressure on to block, both in the council, and as a total restart.
Just FYI, the parliament did make significant amendments to the directive, effectively keeping the status quo and keeping software patents invalid, back in September 2003, but in the process made some parts of the directive contradict itself.
However, the working party that reworked the directive for the Council removed the bulk of the parliament's amendments, while promising that they had put in additional protections against software patents, when in fact the protections were meaningless.
It was this theoretically neutered directive that the Council agreed to in May 2004 by a slim majority. Now that members have realised what they've done (agree a directive that allows patents), some are now trying to prevent this directive from being rubber-stamped as an A-list item, as you mentioned, despite the pressure of the Commission to force through the may 2004 version. I believe this is the 'common position' stage, step 9.
If it goes onto its second reading, the EP can still amend or block the directive, but it's a lot harder to do so, given the absolute majority required.
Here's hoping sufficient people in the Council can block the directive as an A-list item, and either force a restart or at least knock it back to a B-list item again for further discussion.
I'll ignore the legal liability of the VoIP network for calls over their network (I've no idea whether they do in fact have common carrier status, or something like it, and I'm certainly not qualified to comment on that)
My understanding of the common carrier status of the provider though, is that they do not look at what they transport, so cannot be held liable for the contents. So if they're port blocking a competing service, that means they're intefering, and thus ignoring the very fact that makes them common carriers in the process.
The customer is paying the provider for bandwidth. Who they connect to with it, even if it's a VoIP service, is none of the business of the common carrier by definition.
They very likely weren't blocking VoIP with the agreement of the end customer (via service contact) as the customers were businesses. They were blocking it on their own initiative to preserve their landline business. That is anti-competitive, and if a provider under the purview of the FCC is breaking it's own common carrier status, then the FCC not only has the right to act, it has the duty to do so.
If the FCC didn't prevent this, then that allows providers to block whatever they want, without putting it in the service contract. Next up, you'd have the RIAA and the police to expect this provider to start port blocking P2P services, and scanning for child porn passing across their network, as they would no longer be common carriers.
For a start, it's only one idea amongst several that were mooted on how to fund the BBC in 2017, when their licence comes up for renewal. One of the other ideas was indeed a per-content or subscription scheme.
Remember, the BBC is planning to put as much of it's archive content online as possible, but restricted to the UK through peering agreements with UK broadband ISP's. Such a system could also be used to play the 'live' broadcast content they do now via TV.
Under such a system, you'd be able to get the BBC without paying a TV licence fee. This currently is paid by any household (once, not per device) that has equipment capable of receiving BBC channels, i.e. has a tuner, is attached to an aerial, and has the local channels tuned in. They work on the basis everyone has a TV, and they might send an inspector to check you don't if you decline to pay the fee.
If you don't have a aerial, but do have a broadband-connected PC that can access the online archive and broadcasts (which they think will be a majority of people in 2017) you wouldn't have to pay the fee.
They're just brainstorming ways to get people to pay in that circumstance, rather than focussing only on TV sets. A PC licence would be one way, but very hard to enforce.
It's also worth pointing out that Rupert Murdock, owner of Fox News, Sky TV and the Times (amongst other media) rather dislikes the competition from the BBC, and his outlets regularly slam the BBC as being unfair competition, a rip off etc in a bid to knock them out. After all, wouldn't the british all be better off paying £300 a year to watch his totally unbiased Fox News, rather than £120 a year to watch BBC News?
Eh? I regularly watch BBC TV or listen to BBC radio on my nava-t digital tuner card in my gentoo box, and before that I used to use the helix-based realplayer to listen to BBC radio.
I also understand realplayer is available for both OSX and older macs.
Admittedly, realplayer is still somewhat of a pain in the neck, and I'd much prefer vorbis streams, but which content particularly isn't available for non-windows platforms?
Are you referring to the broadband streamed versions of BBC 'broadcasts' that they assume will be common by 2017? (As opposed to the handful of realplayer clips they currently make available on BBC broadband)
If so, don't worry. The BBC has stated in the past that the main reason they use realplayer is because it's cross platform. Given their public-sector remit, they are certain to ensure that it won't be some windows-only service in future.
It's not really about the UK being outside the Euro. (All currency conversions done just now on Yahoo)
Quoting liberally from The Register -
"In the UK, the iTunes Music Store charges customers £0.79 (EUR 1.09, $1.44) to download a single track. The same song costs EUR 0.99 when it's downloaded from Apple's other European music shops."
Apple has argued that the reason for the price difference is because of national licencing bodies. However, Apple has its own cross-border store, "which takes in customers from the Netherlands, Spain, Italy and other territories. If it can smooth pricing across these countries, why not across the EU as a whole?"
"The EC itself last year called on Europe's music licensing agencies to develop a common framework and pricing structure - or risk having one imposed upon it. Certainly, the EC fears that the various licensing regimes are themselves in violation of EU law."
Basically, it's not that all items have to cost the same across all EU countries, simply that free trade laws say that customers can purchase their goods from anywhere within the EU, and pay local prices and taxes. This is commonly done with cigarettes, alcohol, cars and CDs, all of which are generally cheaper on the continent. It's a bit similar to people shopping out of state in order to get cheaper prices in the US.
By restricting UK purchasers to the UK store only, Apple and quite possibly their suppliers are in breach of EU law. It's also worth noting that the EU price of EUR 0.99 is about $1.31, so even if the UK do end being able to buy from European iTunes stores, we're still being ripped off compared to the Americans.
This change just doesn't affect them - and importantly - until it does, please don't expect any mass migration to other operating systems. Microsoft rightly identified an exploit that pirates are using to rip them off- why shouldn't they patch it up? It really bothers me that so many people play this out as a big bad beast cracking knuckles again - it just isn't. Since when did support piracy become so acceptable to so many people?
Because this will have no impact on copyright infringement whatsoever. People who were nicking OEM keys (or double selling them) will just switch to fake or stolen volume licence keys, which most infringers use anyway, or even copies with activation disabled.
The people it WILL impact will be people like me, a computer repair guy. Say I reinstall a copy of windows for a customer that's been crippled by spyware. I use the OEM key on the sticker on the bottom. Instead of a few seconds activation through the LAN (which is irritating, but not significantly so) I now have to sit on hold with microsoft, then probably read my key to a machine, then explain to an operative why I'm reinstalling.
I've done this in the past, and it's no fun whatsoever. Now imagine I have to spend 10 minutes on this for every machine I fix. Now imagine they ask questions about the OEM computer, where they bought it, how old it is etc. Now _I_ can't register the computer, I have to sit down with the customer and walk them through it at handover.
This is going to be a massive pain in the bum for legitimate users and small businesses, while having zero impact on copyright infringement. That's why we're pissed off.
But google manages to cache sites just fine. As long as slashdot respected requests to remove caches/mirrors, as google does, I don't see them having a problem.
You could just as easily argue that slashdot could be sued for aiding and abetting DDOS attacks.
Even of the small percentage of the population (about 15% I think) who can watch Sky
I'd be amazed if the percentage is that small; do you have a source for that figure? (I'm genuinely curious)
It was from a discussion on the BBC (newsnight, I think) regarding Sky's purchasing of sports rights a year or two ago for pay-per-view channels.
By the 15% I meant people who have Sky, and could have watched Battlestar Galactica on original broadcast, not that only 15% of the population can actually put in equipment to watch Sky. That I'm sure is much higher!
The number of people who have Sky may also have increased in that period, but it does match roughly with the percentage of people I know who have Sky.
Sorry for any confusion.
about £20-£30 a month. Thing is, brodband is useful for all sorts of things. Sky 1, not so much ;)
If you're having multiple drive failures in one or two cases, I'd really recommend looking at the power supplies.
I have a case that killed a drive every few months until I twigged and replaced the PSU with an antec 350W. If the power rails are 'dirty' with fluctuating voltage, they can slowly kill a drive. This is a known problem with cheap PSU's, and it can be cheaper to spend a bit more on a quality supply than keep swapping drives.
One cute result you get (apart from the light, and the heat, and the screaming if you try it at home) is molten iron. I've seen video of railway engineers using the thermite reaction in a shaped 'bucket' to weld railway tracks together.
Because Battlestar Galactica was aired on Sky 1, a satellite channel. The minimum subscription, last I checked, was £13.50 a month ($25) for the most basic package which includes it.
In addition, there's plenty of places that can't install a satellite dish (or install cable), such as rental properties or blocks of flats under tenancy agreements.
Even of the small percentage of the population (about 15% I think) who can watch Sky, some people may not have been around when it was broadcast, and downloading it is better than using tape, and simpler than ripping the ads yourself.
Why leave the adverts in? I'm in the UK, and if I were to download a tv torrent of a show that aired in the US (which is by far the most common for us), then I'm certainly not a pair of eyeballs the broadcaster or advertiser expected; at least not for a year or two. Some good shows never air in the UK at all, so I'm hardly part of their target demographic.
So for them, they don't even lose something they expected to get by me seeing it. In fact, I'm more likely to see the show when it does finally hit our shores, or even buy the DVD, when it drops to a sane price, such as I did with firefly, because I know now it's good.
The best thing they could possibly do is make the files available for download themselves, after they air. Since the vast majority of people who download them couldn't watch the original broadcast because of timing or location, and *wouldn't have seen the ads anyway*, they will reach a bigger audience.
They could even offer multiple versions; free with the ads in, and an ad-free one for a cheaper fee than the DVD (no manufacturing, shipping or cash tied up in unsold stock). They could do season passes.
It would be a small market to start with, but make it DRM-lite and people could use it with their media centres. People want media how they want and when they want, (tivo, anyone?) not at the dictates of the broadcasters anymore. Time they realised that, and started taking advantage of it.
I've just thought of a varient on 2) that's nasty:
:). Upload modified files that have had keyloggers/spyware added to them, but give the same SHA-1 hash.
Secretly hack a software download site, such as distro mirrors or windows update
Even systems which check the hashes of downloads (or certificate signed ones, maybe), and would install the modified files and be none the wiser; and if the break-in isn't discovered quickly, the software could get pretty widely spread.
I'd agree with you on that; which is why you'd include other extraneous material in the original contract file, such as graphic logos, hidden comments or other meta-data which would give you enough 'secret' collision space to work with, to counteract the changes you wanted to make.
Still, it would take a rediculous amount of time and money to pull it off, even with this known weakness. Thing is, that cost will drop over the next few years, and there's always a possibility that further weaknesses will be found in SHA-1 after this one, making that cost drop even faster.
SHA-1 isn't dead yet; but it will be in the forseeable future, as MD5 alone is already (for important hashes, anyway). One solution is to switch to SGA-256, whirlpool, or some other hash algorithm, or use multiple different hashes at once.
Yes, but say someone creates a document (such as a contract) for you to digitally sign.
If they're prepared to spend a realistic level of time on it they could create two of them that hash to the same thing, with a small but effective change to the second.
You sign the first with SHA-1, but your signature also matches on the second, putting you in a weak position when you try and claim "I didn't sign _that_!"
The time/money requirements to do this aren't really practical yet, but they will be soon.
As the sub says, time to start shifting off SHA-1.
Ok, I'm far from an expert, but this is what I know (largely culled from europa.eu.int).
The EU is not, yet, the government of europe. Each member state (UK, France, Poland etc) has their own internal government. Which powers the national governments have delegated in whole or in part to the EU is governed by a series of treaties. These treaties include managing the euro, human rights, environmental law, regional development and trade regulation, off the top of my head. Foreign policy and national taxation are not yet under the EU's purview.
There are five EU institutions, each playing a specific role:
European Parliament (elected by the peoples of the Member States);
Council of the European Union (representing the governments of the Member States);
European Commission (driving force and executive body);
Court of Justice (ensuring compliance with the law);
Court of Auditors (controlling sound and lawful management of the EU budget).
There are also a number of committees that make recommendations on various specifc areas.
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Parliament has three main roles:
It shares with the Council the power to legislate.
It exercises democratic supervision over all EU institutions, and in particular the Commission. It has the power to approve or reject the nomination of Commissioners, and it has the right to censure the Commission as a whole.
It shares with the Council authority over the EU budget and can therefore influence EU spending. At the end of the procedure, it adopts or rejects the budget in its entirety.
The most common procedure for adopting (i.e. passing) EU legislation is "co-decision" (which is what is being used in this software patents case). This places the European Parliament and the Council on an equal footing and the laws passed using this procedure are joint acts of the Council and Parliament. It applies to legislation in a wide range of fields.
On a range of other proposals Parliament must be consulted, and its approval is required for certain important political or institutional decisions.
Parliament also provides impetus for new legislation by examining the Commission's annual work programme, considering what new laws would be appropriate and asking the Commission to put forward proposals.
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The full details of all forms of passing legislation is too large to cut-n-paste, so you might want to check here for the gory details.
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regarding software patents, this is the FFII's take on the matter:
"While the EU Parliament has proposed a clear exclusion of software patents, the Commission and Council have ignored the Parliament's proposal and reinstated the most uncompromisingly pro-patent text in May 2004. However this text does not enjoy the support of a qualified majority of member states. Yet the Council has refused to renegotiate, and is still trying to push the text through. Meanwhile the European Parliament has asked for a restart of the procedure."
Basically, the parliament has already agreed the text of the first draft of this directive in september 2003, but with amendments that effectively blocked software patentability, despite the original draft by the Legal Affairs Committee (JURI) that was heavily pro-patents.
In may 2004, the council were conned into narrowly passing a 'compromise' version of the bill by a pro-patents working party (made up of patent office administrators!) which stripped out the parliament's amendments, and added some meaningless 'protections' that will do nothing.
However, the council's decision is not technically final until it is an A item on their agenda, and is passed. As a B item, it can be amended. Given that several council members have changed their position since may 2004 (changes in government, pressure from national parliaments etc) the pro-patent lobby and commission have so far failed to get the item through a
There was a time before you downloaded everything off the internet.
If microsoft were forced to release a browserless windows (oh please! please!) then OEM's could put their own browser (probably branded firefox) on the desktop.
Failing that, you'd grab a handy ISP cd and install a browser from that, just like a few years ago when IE wasn't mandatory on windows, or grab one from a mate. Using your logic, you could argue that it's impossible for a newb to sign up for any ISP that isn't bundled in windows, as they've no way to get to register an account online...
Having windows with IE as an optional component wouldn't make life impossible for newbs, it didn't in the past. It would however allow people to make their boxes much, much more secure by really getting rid of the vulnerable components, not just hiding them. It might also have the side effect of making microsoft compete on features and security to get IE back on the desktop, not just rely on their existing monopoly.
First you ought to pick a valid comparison. No car manufacturer has a monopoly on cars, so the same rules/problems do not apply.
With windows having a 90% monopoly on the desktop, by bunding IE and WMP they do make it very hard for alternative providers to compete, because there's already a player on there. Worse, I can't remove it even I want to. Let's say I want to improve the security on my windows server by uninstalling IE and WMP. I can't. I'm stuck with the included vulnerable libraries and processes.
Because up till now, all windows machines came with windows media player and the WMP codecs, they could go to online media providers and say "Don't use realplayer, quicktime, or ogg-vorbis files - they all need your customers to download some software. Instead use our bundled DRM codecs, they're already on there!"
Assuming media providers do take the easy way out (which isn't hard, given how many WMP streams and videos I see out there now compared to a few years ago) then that makes it much harder for non-windows users to use the WWW for music and video, as it's all in a locked up proprietry format that's only legally usable in software patent countries on windows.
There is a similar problem with IE and activex or broken css websites; Microsoft have tried very hard to make people code to their default, and lock people into windows.
Personally, I would have like to have seen microsoft forced to allow people to really uninstall WMP and IE from standard XP, but the EU action will have the same effect:
Media providers cannot assume that every customer has windows media player and it's codecs, thus they have more of a reason to use more open and cross platform formats. Plus it gives the OEM builders much more reason to bundle alternative players that are better and don't have DRM turned on by default.
Yes, customers might have to undergo a little pain to choose a media player rather than have a non-removable default one forced upon them; but it will hopefully have the longer term effect of keeping media files available to all users, not just windows users. And making it easier for people to switch platforms benefits everyone in the end, as microsoft will be forced to innovate to compete, not just rely on their desktop monopoly.
And speaking personally, I will be installing this at my school. Getting rid of WMP and replacing it with a player that doesn't have bundled browser+adverts+unfiltered search engine will be much easier with WRME. I'd get rid of IE too, if I could.