Sorry, didn't meant to imply that the DMCA provision that I referred to was in any way relevant to Megaupload.com. I'm just saying that is the reason it has such a rotten reputation around here - even getting blamed when it doesn't deserve it.
You also rightly point out that charges can be trumped up to just about any law. It's worth noting that Geohot never was convicted of anything.
Don't knock the CFAA - it's at least partially responsible for giving us the EFF:)
the only people who complain about the 'draconian DMCA' are fucktards who never actually create or build anything themselves.
Actually, they usually are objecting to the criminalization of hacking encryption schemes.... that is the part that gives the whole law a "piece of legal shit" rap.
The part of the DCMA that you mention is not the part that I object to - it is the lack of ability to crack encryption that gets folks around here riled up.
Politicians being bribed by industries? Is this news?
No, it's not. It's not even surprising or particularly offensive.
But Dodd is an enemy and Dodd made a mistake. Time to capitalize, even if all it does is embarrass him and marginalize his message somewhat. The more toxic he is to other politicians, the less effective he is as a lobbyist and the better our position.
This brings up a very good point - to have a truly free market you need to have free movement of goods, free movement of capital, and free movement of labor.
Until Chinese peasants are allowed to travel freely to the US to find employment, we're fooling ourselves with the idea that trade can be "free".
Thanks for being moderate on this topic - it seems more and more people are at one extreme or another when it comes to these things. I can't see how you can be "anti-union" after learning about the history of labor in the US, and at the same time I can't see how modern labor's protection of it's weakest members does them any good. The laws probably do need to be revised, but scrapping organized labor altogether won't suddenly make US manufacturing competitive with China.
It WOULD weaken the Democratic party, though - which is why I suspect people get so wound up about it. I do have to say that it seems wrong to let the labor unions both "close" a shop and then use the mandatory dues to back politicians. That definitely is depriving people of their voice in a roundabout way.
Not that I disagree with your post, but comparisons with retailers like Walmart aren't very useful. A retailer's biggest risk is inventory - their capital investment is mostly shelving and trucks and warehouses... all stuff with a lot of value if things ever went wrong. In other words, their capital is all tied up in fairly safe investments.
A manufacturer has capital costs that are much higher-risk - specialized tooling, custom parts in inventory, customized factory space, etc. If things go wrong, most of that money is just gone. The risk to capital is much higher.
Investors are willing to take lower returns on lower risk - why would you invest in Kodak if they were getting the same returns as Walmart, even if revenue and profits were the same?
LOL, do you have some personal stake in Kodak? Their consumer and pro-level cameras failed in the marketplace - I did not make this up, this is just what happened. You "fail to see" what the point of not being able to command a premium means? OK, I'll spell it out - it means their margins sucked because their COGS was too high and their selling price too low. They could have improved this somewhat by being a more efficient company, but it sure would have been nice to have some headroom on price. Instead they were undifferentiated in a commodity market.
You're parroting crap you've read elsewhere in leading you to make the error or believing that being a parrot equates to knowing what you're talking about.
I'm not going to pretend to be an expert on Kodak, but I have read things written by people who profess to be. I'll happily read more if you'd like to point me in the right direction.
I don't mean to say that Kodak has a single cause of failure... it's incredibly complicated with many different factors - we're mostly commenting now on a little slice of a post I made countering an assertion that Apple is similar to Kodak. That said:
That would be why Kodak was an early entrant into the digital market, with a huge market presence (especially in the professional segment).
Yes, they did well in the pro market (meaning industrial and medical applications, not professional photographers). But by the time they decided to enter the consumer digital camera market, they had: (a) completely or almost completely lost all capacity to manufacture consumer cameras and (b) lost brand recognition.
They most certainly did not have much in the way to offer professional photographers - all of their DSLRs were converted Canon or Nikon products except for one short-lived model right before they divested the camera division.
It is true that they were pioneers in consumer digital cameras - but that was rather meaningless as they weren't yet practical. Once digital cameras were actually practical, they were cheap and so then bloated Kodak couldn't compete in commodities. Their cameras were not regarded highly enough to command a premium.
They also did try to make those horrid "Advantix" film cameras - but again that was way too late to develop a camera business.
Kodak invented the digital camera, so it is a bit false to claim that they had no expertise in the field.
They had (and have!) plenty of experience making CCDs. But they gave up their consumer camera business at least a decade before digital cameras were feasible. Then, when they realized that they needed to make cameras again, they had no manufacturing infrastructure, no experience designing consumer cameras, no experience making consumer lenses.
If a longer vision had prevailed at Kodak, people with Nikon and Canon cameras might be wistfully longing that they could afford one of the big boy Kodak cameras.
It is certainly possible. They could have re-introduced their consumer cameras in the late 80s/early 90s when they were going gangbusters and adopted digital when it became cost effective.
Kodak didn't die because they stopped innovating... they died because they removed themselves from the camera-making business. Then, when it became clear that people wanted digital, they had no expertise or market presence in cameras. Why would someone buy a Kodak camera when they could buy a Nikon or Canon, or even a Pentax or Vivitar... anyone who had been making cameras already.
Apple is at the complete opposite side of things - they are a hardware company first and foremost. If the smart phone market goes away, along with the tablet and PC markets, then yeah Apple is screwed. If they fail to stay state-of-the-art, then yeah they are screwed. But they are not a big producer of consumables like Kodak was - Kodak is more like Gillette than Apple.
General high school is a complete waste of time for a large portion of the population. There are smart kids who could skip it, dumb kids who it won't help, and people who know exactly what they want to do. Education is important. Proms and homecomings and hall passes and lockers are not the only way to get there.
That's ridiculous. Not every person can follow some ancient Greek ideal of higher thought.
There were plenty of doofuses that spent high school throwing a pencil at the kid in front of them. Trade school is good for them.
And back on topic, just because someone is good with computers does not make them automatically wired to go through the traditional liberal arts education routine. Some kids will thrive in a targeted environment like this.
And freak food that is genetically modified in an unbridled fashion ! what more can one ask.........
With an attitude like that, you sound like the stem-cell opponents. Seems like an even trade - let the Europeans have the stem cell research and the Americans can have the crop research.
The only reason it is not racist is because it is being told by a blank man.
Presuming you meant "black".
It is not racist, it is history. Most of the "MLK" streets are in what were predominantly black neighborhoods in the 60s and 70s. This makes sense - that is where the blacks that were demanding it lived, and at least some of the whites didn't care what the streets were named in those areas. In some cities (Philadelphia), the whites resisted naming any street after MLK until about 5 years ago. To Philly's credit, it's actually a very nice street.
Yeah, that makes sense. I mean, radon is a heavier-than-air gas, and the only reason it is a problem is that people inhale it... It's pretty trivial to just put a fan down low and blow it out. The cesium is causing trouble from deep inside the foundation. Unless you shield it, it's going to be a problem. Probably cheaper to just demo the place - though depending on the structure they might be able to lift it and replace the foundation.
But you don't arrest people because they are statistically likely to be criminals, you arrest people for crimes they actually commit. The crimes for simple possession in Japan are far higher than they are even in the US. Hell, marijuana possession in the US is a misdemeanor in many places under a certain amount. In Japan you can't possess even a tenth of a gram.
We have "hard labor" in the US as well, but I wouldn't hold the US up as a shining star of a justice system. Hard labor has an uncomfortable resemblance to slavery - especially if the "criminal" didn't actually hurt anyone. In the US after the Civil War, blacks were often arrested on bogus or inflated charges just so that they could be used for cheap labor.
I was commenting on their quantity, both numerically and as a population rate, not their quality.
Yeah, it is quite low. The US is ridiculously high. Good point. I'm just saying that drug penalties are ridiculous in Asia in general. The low incarceration rate may be as much culture as "system"... of course the two are intertwined, but that makes it even harder to look to another culture's system as a model.
Yes, a disproportionate number of inmates in the US are black.
Look at the punishment meted out for possession of crack cocaine vs. powder cocaine. Answering the question of "why" will probably explain a lot. Racism isn't dead yet. Better, but not dead.
Slashdot Mirror
Sorry, didn't meant to imply that the DMCA provision that I referred to was in any way relevant to Megaupload.com. I'm just saying that is the reason it has such a rotten reputation around here - even getting blamed when it doesn't deserve it.
You also rightly point out that charges can be trumped up to just about any law. It's worth noting that Geohot never was convicted of anything.
Don't knock the CFAA - it's at least partially responsible for giving us the EFF :)
the only people who complain about the 'draconian DMCA' are fucktards who never actually create or build anything themselves.
Actually, they usually are objecting to the criminalization of hacking encryption schemes.... that is the part that gives the whole law a "piece of legal shit" rap.
The part of the DCMA that you mention is not the part that I object to - it is the lack of ability to crack encryption that gets folks around here riled up.
Politicians being bribed by industries? Is this news?
No, it's not. It's not even surprising or particularly offensive.
But Dodd is an enemy and Dodd made a mistake. Time to capitalize, even if all it does is embarrass him and marginalize his message somewhat. The more toxic he is to other politicians, the less effective he is as a lobbyist and the better our position.
Do you really want the Venn diagram for our political representatives to include a circle that says "People Willing to Appear on a Reality Show"?
This brings up a very good point - to have a truly free market you need to have free movement of goods, free movement of capital, and free movement of labor.
Until Chinese peasants are allowed to travel freely to the US to find employment, we're fooling ourselves with the idea that trade can be "free".
Thanks for being moderate on this topic - it seems more and more people are at one extreme or another when it comes to these things. I can't see how you can be "anti-union" after learning about the history of labor in the US, and at the same time I can't see how modern labor's protection of it's weakest members does them any good. The laws probably do need to be revised, but scrapping organized labor altogether won't suddenly make US manufacturing competitive with China.
It WOULD weaken the Democratic party, though - which is why I suspect people get so wound up about it. I do have to say that it seems wrong to let the labor unions both "close" a shop and then use the mandatory dues to back politicians. That definitely is depriving people of their voice in a roundabout way.
Not that I disagree with your post, but comparisons with retailers like Walmart aren't very useful. A retailer's biggest risk is inventory - their capital investment is mostly shelving and trucks and warehouses... all stuff with a lot of value if things ever went wrong. In other words, their capital is all tied up in fairly safe investments.
A manufacturer has capital costs that are much higher-risk - specialized tooling, custom parts in inventory, customized factory space, etc. If things go wrong, most of that money is just gone. The risk to capital is much higher.
Investors are willing to take lower returns on lower risk - why would you invest in Kodak if they were getting the same returns as Walmart, even if revenue and profits were the same?
LOL, do you have some personal stake in Kodak? Their consumer and pro-level cameras failed in the marketplace - I did not make this up, this is just what happened. You "fail to see" what the point of not being able to command a premium means? OK, I'll spell it out - it means their margins sucked because their COGS was too high and their selling price too low. They could have improved this somewhat by being a more efficient company, but it sure would have been nice to have some headroom on price. Instead they were undifferentiated in a commodity market.
You're parroting crap you've read elsewhere in leading you to make the error or believing that being a parrot equates to knowing what you're talking about.
I'm not going to pretend to be an expert on Kodak, but I have read things written by people who profess to be. I'll happily read more if you'd like to point me in the right direction.
I don't mean to say that Kodak has a single cause of failure... it's incredibly complicated with many different factors - we're mostly commenting now on a little slice of a post I made countering an assertion that Apple is similar to Kodak. That said:
That would be why Kodak was an early entrant into the digital market, with a huge market presence (especially in the professional segment).
Yes, they did well in the pro market (meaning industrial and medical applications, not professional photographers). But by the time they decided to enter the consumer digital camera market, they had: (a) completely or almost completely lost all capacity to manufacture consumer cameras and (b) lost brand recognition.
They most certainly did not have much in the way to offer professional photographers - all of their DSLRs were converted Canon or Nikon products except for one short-lived model right before they divested the camera division.
It is true that they were pioneers in consumer digital cameras - but that was rather meaningless as they weren't yet practical. Once digital cameras were actually practical, they were cheap and so then bloated Kodak couldn't compete in commodities. Their cameras were not regarded highly enough to command a premium.
They also did try to make those horrid "Advantix" film cameras - but again that was way too late to develop a camera business.
Kodak invented the digital camera, so it is a bit false to claim that they had no expertise in the field.
They had (and have!) plenty of experience making CCDs. But they gave up their consumer camera business at least a decade before digital cameras were feasible. Then, when they realized that they needed to make cameras again, they had no manufacturing infrastructure, no experience designing consumer cameras, no experience making consumer lenses.
If a longer vision had prevailed at Kodak, people with Nikon and Canon cameras might be wistfully longing that they could afford one of the big boy Kodak cameras.
It is certainly possible. They could have re-introduced their consumer cameras in the late 80s/early 90s when they were going gangbusters and adopted digital when it became cost effective.
Kodak didn't die because they stopped innovating... they died because they removed themselves from the camera-making business. Then, when it became clear that people wanted digital, they had no expertise or market presence in cameras. Why would someone buy a Kodak camera when they could buy a Nikon or Canon, or even a Pentax or Vivitar... anyone who had been making cameras already.
Apple is at the complete opposite side of things - they are a hardware company first and foremost. If the smart phone market goes away, along with the tablet and PC markets, then yeah Apple is screwed. If they fail to stay state-of-the-art, then yeah they are screwed. But they are not a big producer of consumables like Kodak was - Kodak is more like Gillette than Apple.
I think that's the first time I've seen a Caddyshack reference on Slashdot... golf clap :)
Prison is a great place, or adult day care, or pumping gasoline, or McDonalds...
Or the unemployment line. We do need to find work for people, even if they suck.
General high school is a complete waste of time for a large portion of the population. There are smart kids who could skip it, dumb kids who it won't help, and people who know exactly what they want to do. Education is important. Proms and homecomings and hall passes and lockers are not the only way to get there.
Now, that's highly unfair.
Didn't mean to come across as rigidly grouping people together... in fact meant to go in the completely opposite direction. Sorry :)
but I tend to think a broad education until you're about 16 is a good idea.
OK, but is that really so far removed from someone saying that the age is 14?
That's ridiculous. Not every person can follow some ancient Greek ideal of higher thought.
There were plenty of doofuses that spent high school throwing a pencil at the kid in front of them. Trade school is good for them.
And back on topic, just because someone is good with computers does not make them automatically wired to go through the traditional liberal arts education routine. Some kids will thrive in a targeted environment like this.
And freak food that is genetically modified in an unbridled fashion ! what more can one ask .........
With an attitude like that, you sound like the stem-cell opponents. Seems like an even trade - let the Europeans have the stem cell research and the Americans can have the crop research.
The only reason it is not racist is because it is being told by a blank man.
Presuming you meant "black".
It is not racist, it is history. Most of the "MLK" streets are in what were predominantly black neighborhoods in the 60s and 70s. This makes sense - that is where the blacks that were demanding it lived, and at least some of the whites didn't care what the streets were named in those areas. In some cities (Philadelphia), the whites resisted naming any street after MLK until about 5 years ago. To Philly's credit, it's actually a very nice street.
Yeah, that makes sense. I mean, radon is a heavier-than-air gas, and the only reason it is a problem is that people inhale it... It's pretty trivial to just put a fan down low and blow it out. The cesium is causing trouble from deep inside the foundation. Unless you shield it, it's going to be a problem. Probably cheaper to just demo the place - though depending on the structure they might be able to lift it and replace the foundation.
But you don't arrest people because they are statistically likely to be criminals, you arrest people for crimes they actually commit. The crimes for simple possession in Japan are far higher than they are even in the US. Hell, marijuana possession in the US is a misdemeanor in many places under a certain amount. In Japan you can't possess even a tenth of a gram.
We have "hard labor" in the US as well, but I wouldn't hold the US up as a shining star of a justice system. Hard labor has an uncomfortable resemblance to slavery - especially if the "criminal" didn't actually hurt anyone. In the US after the Civil War, blacks were often arrested on bogus or inflated charges just so that they could be used for cheap labor.
I was commenting on their quantity, both numerically and as a population rate, not their quality.
Yeah, it is quite low. The US is ridiculously high. Good point. I'm just saying that drug penalties are ridiculous in Asia in general. The low incarceration rate may be as much culture as "system"... of course the two are intertwined, but that makes it even harder to look to another culture's system as a model.
Happy MLK to you, too.
Yes, a disproportionate number of inmates in the US are black.
Look at the punishment meted out for possession of crack cocaine vs. powder cocaine. Answering the question of "why" will probably explain a lot. Racism isn't dead yet. Better, but not dead.