But the only copyrightable part about fonts is the "software" that creates them, namely, the postscript/etc code that defines the font.
Irrelevant semantics. Typefaces aren't copyrightable, but they are subject to "design patents", which are essentially copyrights with a different name, wider applicability, and quicker expiration.
Don't confuse design patents with the software patents that exist on a few aspects of font file formats. Design patents are how Apple is able to project the graphic appearance of it's OS X "Trash Can", for example.
So in the sense that the code itself is the only thing copyrightable, the GPL should be able to be used.
Because typefaces are patentable instead of copyrightable, it is even more important not to use the copyright-focused GPL with them.
and we know there is a great demand for game related content (Videos, Mods, Patches, Etc) Since that market is being overloaded by a not so nice company or two; Why doesn't someone make a Torrent site for all of it?
However, note that placing some game demos on torrents is a technical violation of copyright laws. Although the idea of game demos is that they are widely distributed to everyone, often the lawyers slap the same licenses on them as for every other proprietary release. Unfortunately, just because you got a download for free doesn't give you permission to distribute it to others for the same cost. Maybe it should, but it doesn't.
Trusted Computing currently defeats the GPL and makes the source code effectively useless.
Actually it doesn't. The GPL is simply incompatible with trusted computing. (However, several famous programmers including Linus Torvalds don't know this).
The GPL requires that end-users are provided with the "source code" for programs, which is all of the inputs needed to reproduce the working program (not including compilers and such tools, if they are normally available elsewhere).
Part of the source code is the private key needed to sign the software and convince the Trusted framework to run it with priviledges. How do I know the private key is part of the source code? Because (as you pointed out) a functioning executable can't be reproduced without it! Without the signed hash key, the program won't work nearly as extensively as intented.
Therefore, GPL software can only ever run in the UnTrusted ghetto of a TC computer. Although a programmer could audit the GPLed program and find that it obeys DRM rules and would be safe to elevate to Trusted status, he can't publish a signed hash token marking the program as trusted. That token would be a derived work of the program, so it must be published under the GPL, meaning any recipient could demand the private key used to do the signing.
And once that private key is out there, of course, the program can be modified to no longer obey DRM rules, and the whole system falls apart.
Note that this interpretation depends upon the program's hash being a non-fair-use derived work, which it is, if you evaluate it using all four fair use criteria.
Summary: GPL requires all source code is published. TC requires some source code is hidden. Therefore, they can never be combined.
May include yyy which is (c)2005 by blah blah and distributed under the terms of the Apache License 2.0.
Unless the word "May" really means "Doesn't", then you are criminally infringing copyright. Lawyers from both the FSF and Apache foundation have already published evaluations finding that the GPL and Apache licenses are incompatible. Mixing GPL and Apache code is an infringement of the terms of the GPL- therefore, you no longer have permission to redistribute your project at all.
(The exception would be if your project consists of multiple programs each using different licenses, in which case you shouldn't have composed a combined copyright statement for all of them, since it is inaccurate)
Proprietary software developers do this all the time,
Yes, because they pay each other large bags of cash in exchange for permission to distribute their code in your project. If you don't abide by the library author's terms, then you can't use the code.
and despite what Stallman may imply, there's nothing stopping you from doing this too
There is the text of the GPL, which doesn't give you permission to modify and distribute the work without obeying some conditions. If you don't abide by the library author's terms, then you can't use the code.
whether I have the legal ability to do so without declaring the document itself GPL (which isn't really a document license)
Thus, this problem shouldn't have come up at all. As you say, the GPL isn't a document license- because it's a software license. But, the GPL also is not a font license- again, because it's a software license.
A font is more like a document than like software. After all, a font is basically a vectored graphic image. When we think of someone building a font, we don't consider it similar to writing a program.
If font artists persist in using the inappropriate GPL to release their works, then those artists should apply a specific exception allowing the font to be embedded in text documents, if they wish.
So there's nothing in the GPL forbiding you to use the later version,
That's not what was asked. Optionally using a later version is not the same as switching to a newer version!
Inevitably, GPLv3 will be more restrictive in some ways than GPLv2 was (although it also might be looser in other ways). Switching the license will remove some old permissions included in v2, possibly including some effective loophole. If the end-users are still given the option of GPLv2, then the software effectively hasn't really switched to GPLv3 at all.
"v2 or later" is basically a superset of "v3 or later"
That IS the problem. (Consider that the BSD license is basically a superset of the GPL).
If the authors actually want to change to GPLv3, it'll probably be because it closes some loophole existing in GPLv2- meaning the new version is MORE restrictive. But the "v2 or later" clause doesn't allow them to close loopholes that way.
If you kill somebody, you don't get any advantage for your online character.
Killing someone gets you money, allowing you to purchase better guns and armor for the next match. And, more importantly, killing the enemy team is the only way to defend from your own death, which would seriously disadvantage your character.
with some GPL'd portions replaced or rewritten to maintain compliance.
That'd be pointless. If SFU is already GPL compliant (either because it doesn't use GPL code, or because source code is available for all GPL portions), then including it in Windows Vista won't alter that compliance.
Grep the GPL for "mere aggeregation". Microsoft could include GPL programs on their installer disks just like Linspire mixes proprietary and GPL apps on their own CD-ROMs.
That's a much older idea. Thousands of persons in the IT industry have thought of it, as it's an obviously good concept, but nobody pursues it because the prerequisites aren't in place yet.
First, we need a widely accepted micropayment system. Then, we need people to start renting out their unused nighttime CPU cycles via an anonymous, automated auction (like SETI@home, but greedier). Once those two things are in place (and there are groups pushing for both of them), then automated bandwidth trading will naturally follow after (obseleting much of Akamai's business model).
Of course, it may require ISPs to revise their TOSs, but if micropayments are working by then, this won't be a problem. (Of course, micropayments don't look like they'll arrive soon, or even ever, but hey)
I'm assuming you're referring to the fact that BitTorrent doesn't actually work at all well with TCP's congestion control methods?
Probably she actually means that BitTorrent excaberates a longstanding economic externality regarding bandwidth pricing: users typically pay a flat rate for bandwidth, even though the ISP serving them is paying by the gigabyte.
This problem could arise with ANY application that leads the user to run a program that wants as much outbound BW as it can get, such as HTTP hosting a page which is slashdotted. But BT (or other P2P) is the most likely way most users might find themselves in that position.
(The real-world analogy involves "All-You-Can-Eat" restaurants, and how they'd respond if customers started to arrive who could ingest 200 kg at one meal. The only safe response is to switch to itemized pricing)
Basically, TCP is not the ideal protocol for BitTorrent. It is designed for passing around data which both needs to have a guaranteed arrival, and must arrive in order.
You could say the same thing about FTP or HTTP, or even SMTP- they also don't usually need the content to actually arrive in order, as long as it all get theres. In fact, academic CS papers have been published on this very subject. It has been shown that FTP over UDP has superior transfer-rate, without necessarily being worse for congestion fairness.
However, that line of work is insufficient to solve the bittorrent problem. I don't know of a complete answer yet, but greater transparency in ISP pricing (including prioritized "premium packets") is likely part of it.
Congestion management then needs to be done both across individual UDP connections,
The most elegant and efficient implementation would be a new internet RFC to allow a 3rd option beyond TCP/IP and UDP/IP. Call it, say, GDP/IP. UDP gives no guarantees about a packet, GDP add assurance that the packet will arrive (but might be out of order), while TCP further ensures that the each packet is recieved in the order it was sent.
(Obviously, the problem of getting OS TCP/IP stacks augmented with a new protocol would be insurmountable, unless it had great backward compatibility)
Does bittorrent allow for DRM'd trackers/torrents? Or would this require adding to the protocol?
The concept of a "DRM'd tracker/torrent" is nonsensical, like "Does Windows Longhorn support DRM'd voltage?". If you wish, you can send a DRM'd file via bittorrent, just the same as you can send the file over HTTP or HTTPS. The DRM in the file itself takes care of any security needs, meaning the BitTorrent protocol doesn't need to be changed at all.
Any good DRM scheme includes strong encryption, meaning you may as well scatter DVDs of the latest movie from airplanes, if they are DRM'd anyway.
Torrents aren't really very usefull until a whole bunch of people are hosting the files.
No. Torrents become useful as soon as many people are downloading the file. And if not, then only a few people are trying to download, and the original server presumably has adequate bandwidth to handle them on its own.
Even then, until a WHOLE BUNCH of people volunteer to host a popular program,
That's simply not how they work. BitTorrent is essentially a transparent optimization to HTTP downloading.
the downloads will be unreliable and slow
Traditional HTTP servers are both reliable and fast, except when they're overloaded, which is when BitTorrent becomes important.
Would it hurt people to be that obvious sometimes?
Yes. People don't like ads, unless they are attracted by sex, action, humor, or in this case, mystery.
The faster a viewer can learn what the ad is for, the quicker he can tune it out because he doesn't care. By concealing the product for as long as possible, the advertiser maximizes total time spent paying attention. Many of the most famous ad campaigns have used this technique, including 1984, Infiniti, and the recent Geico ones.
It's just when you download ROMs that you don't own in cart form that you're breaking copyright laws.
No. As the successful lawsuit against (the old) mp3.com demonstrated, just because you have one legal copy of a work doesn't entitle you to get other copies from other sources. To extract a ROM image from a cartridge you possess is fine, but to download it from elsewhere is illegal. Equally illegal as if you had downloaded without owning the cart at all!
Possession of authorized copy entitles you to convert that copy into other forms, but not to recieve new copies already in other formats.
They openly want to control what you see and hear, and that includes violence as well as sex.
No, it doesn't attempt to control those things openly. As just explained, GTA:SA already portrayed extreme levels of violence and criminality. To call the protagonist a "drug-peddling serial-killer" is putting it lightly. Yet all of that deserves a lower rating than a single scene of softcore, consensual heterosexual intercourse.
When the game was only ludicrously ultra-violent, it was allowed in stores. But when it also was noticed to contain a realistic amount of normal sex, it was pulled from the shelves.
It isn't a newsflash that the USA senslessly treats media-sex as worse than media-violence, but it also doesn't hurt any to repeatedly point this out.
Retrieving satelites and returning them to earth for repair was supposed to be one of the shuttle's functions.
But, it turned out not to be. Aside from oddball exceptions like Hubble, repairing satellites is not useful. Strangely, they are like lightbulbs or CPUs: cheaper to replace with a whole new part than try to fix the existing unit, especially when labor and delivery costs are factored in. It's like spending $50 shipping each way to repair a $6.99 calculator.
The Shuttle doesn't run those kinds of missions today, so a replacement won't have be found for that (non) job.
actively pursue a manned program with the specific intention of gathering medical information about the effects of a low/zero gravity environment upon the human body, so as to further the longer-term goals of manned long-range exploration, and eventually extraterrestrial colonization at some future date is the modern equivalent of
No, it isn't equivalent at all. We've already seen how humans can survive 2 years in zero gravity, and that's frankly all we need to know. The personnel will degrade, which is an acceptable loss. If it were important to test humans in zero gravity for more than the current 430 day record, we could already have left a man on the ISS for 2,000 days. But no one did, because it's not a useful or important question.
The costs of lengthy rehabilitation and chronic disability for a score of brave volunteers are minute compared to all the money still poured into STS and ISS operations, which might someday maybe do research on human survival in space. Instead, when the first Mars Expedition happens, we can label it a simultaneous medical experiment on prolonged low-gravity. There will be abundant volunteers regardless of personal risk- and the data from that trip can be used to plan medical improvements to any later ones.
What it comes down to is: Do you, or do you not want to see a Mars colony in your lifetime?
Gee, Ferdinand, we shouldn't be funding those crazy sailing expeditions.
If there's an analogy to the 1491 expedition, it would be "Sorry Columbus, we won't fund you a super-boat to go to 'India', we've got the International Boat Station to think of. Those two brave men must be continually supplied with fresh water so we can further study the effects of prolonged sea-sickness, and there's just no money left for a risky 'ocean-crossing' vessel. Let's 'orbit' this place for another 40 years, and reconsider it then"
Take the long view. It's easier on the blood pressure.
It is BECAUSE we care about the long view that we dislike manned spaceflight. It's a continuous squandering of resources for entertaining adventure that could better go into sensible R&D.
We're like cranky step-dads haranguing teenagers to stop partying and study "so you can make something of yourself one day". That's the long view. Buck Rogers circling this planet again and again and again isn't part of it.
There is no verses. We do BOTH.
"I didn't take ALL your money; therefore I took NONE of it!" (Look up "versus" in a dictionary... careful not to be distracted by "verses")
A successful unmanned flight? (something US shuttles aren't capable of!)
That is feature. NASA's Shuttles could be capable of fully-automated missions, including autopilot touchdown, but that would shatter the illusion that the astronauts flying the thing are doing an important job and deserve to be treated like heros.
If a computer were seen running the whole sequence, it would raise uncomfortable questions about the amount of money put towards recovering fragile humans from orbit, instead of launching many more robots on one-way trips. It's mostly the same motivation that lead to a spaceplane in the first place.
Furthermore, I have found no refrence to fingernail scoring in carbon-carbon in the CAIB report.
Just read any of the current articles on NASA's plans for a spacewalk to clear dangling "gap filler" from beneath the Discovery. There is real concern that Robinson might accidentally crush a tile if he bumps into it with a tool or his suit, which would certainly be worse than the risk presented by the current damage.
Those things are fragile, but they're not foam- in fact, they're more vulnerable than most foam, which can generally bend instead of shattering.
Is the whole design of the shuttle overly fragile?
Yes, because unlike every previous (and subquesent) operational space-vehicle, it's also an airplane. That means it must be lightweight and have long thin wings to catch air. Imagine a low-speed collision between the strongest airplane (the A-10) and an average tank (like the M1A2)- there is no question about which will survive that crash.
Good, safe landers have the areodynamic qualities of a rock: difficult to damage, but impossible to manuver. The parachute landing will be somewhat random, and you'll just have to cope with a long walk back. On the other hand, the Shuttle was (for distorted reasons) built with opposite charactistics: it can be steered to any landing spot you wish, but is so fragile that any small mistake will mean complete destruction.
I'm sorry, but what kind of 'expirement' was ever a failure?
For examples, see the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment, or any project with Josef Mengele listed as a researcher. In a gentler vein, the Stanford Prison Experiment was nearly a failure, but it was halted in time to preserve the team's reputations. If the point of an experiment to learn, then anything which is both costly and doesn't produce new knowledge is a failure.
The shortcomings of the spaceplane concept had already been demonstrated by 1985, which would've concluded a responsible experiment. The "failure" is that it thoughtlessly continued long past that point, wasting several lives, $50,000,000,000, and 20 years of NASA's time.
Slashdot Mirror
But the only copyrightable part about fonts is the "software" that creates them, namely, the postscript/etc code that defines the font.
Irrelevant semantics. Typefaces aren't copyrightable, but they are subject to "design patents", which are essentially copyrights with a different name, wider applicability, and quicker expiration.
Don't confuse design patents with the software patents that exist on a few aspects of font file formats. Design patents are how Apple is able to project the graphic appearance of it's OS X "Trash Can", for example.
So in the sense that the code itself is the only thing copyrightable, the GPL should be able to be used.
Because typefaces are patentable instead of copyrightable, it is even more important not to use the copyright-focused GPL with them.
and we know there is a great demand for game related content (Videos, Mods, Patches, Etc) Since that market is being overloaded by a not so nice company or two; Why doesn't someone make a Torrent site for all of it?
A great idea. You could even call it FileRush.com, for example.
However, note that placing some game demos on torrents is a technical violation of copyright laws. Although the idea of game demos is that they are widely distributed to everyone, often the lawyers slap the same licenses on them as for every other proprietary release. Unfortunately, just because you got a download for free doesn't give you permission to distribute it to others for the same cost. Maybe it should, but it doesn't.
Trusted Computing currently defeats the GPL and makes the source code effectively useless.
Actually it doesn't. The GPL is simply incompatible with trusted computing. (However, several famous programmers including Linus Torvalds don't know this).
The GPL requires that end-users are provided with the "source code" for programs, which is all of the inputs needed to reproduce the working program (not including compilers and such tools, if they are normally available elsewhere).
Part of the source code is the private key needed to sign the software and convince the Trusted framework to run it with priviledges. How do I know the private key is part of the source code? Because (as you pointed out) a functioning executable can't be reproduced without it! Without the signed hash key, the program won't work nearly as extensively as intented.
Therefore, GPL software can only ever run in the UnTrusted ghetto of a TC computer. Although a programmer could audit the GPLed program and find that it obeys DRM rules and would be safe to elevate to Trusted status, he can't publish a signed hash token marking the program as trusted. That token would be a derived work of the program, so it must be published under the GPL, meaning any recipient could demand the private key used to do the signing.
And once that private key is out there, of course, the program can be modified to no longer obey DRM rules, and the whole system falls apart.
Note that this interpretation depends upon the program's hash being a non-fair-use derived work, which it is, if you evaluate it using all four fair use criteria.
Summary: GPL requires all source code is published.
TC requires some source code is hidden.
Therefore, they can never be combined.
May include yyy which is (c)2005 by blah blah and distributed under the terms of the Apache License 2.0.
Unless the word "May" really means "Doesn't", then you are criminally infringing copyright. Lawyers from both the FSF and Apache foundation have already published evaluations finding that the GPL and Apache licenses are incompatible. Mixing GPL and Apache code is an infringement of the terms of the GPL- therefore, you no longer have permission to redistribute your project at all.
(The exception would be if your project consists of multiple programs each using different licenses, in which case you shouldn't have composed a combined copyright statement for all of them, since it is inaccurate)
Proprietary software developers do this all the time,
Yes, because they pay each other large bags of cash in exchange for permission to distribute their code in your project. If you don't abide by the library author's terms, then you can't use the code.
and despite what Stallman may imply, there's nothing stopping you from doing this too
There is the text of the GPL, which doesn't give you permission to modify and distribute the work without obeying some conditions. If you don't abide by the library author's terms, then you can't use the code.
whether I have the legal ability to do so without declaring the document itself GPL (which isn't really a document license)
Thus, this problem shouldn't have come up at all. As you say, the GPL isn't a document license- because it's a software license. But, the GPL also is not a font license- again, because it's a software license.
A font is more like a document than like software. After all, a font is basically a vectored graphic image. When we think of someone building a font, we don't consider it similar to writing a program.
If font artists persist in using the inappropriate GPL to release their works, then those artists should apply a specific exception allowing the font to be embedded in text documents, if they wish.
So there's nothing in the GPL forbiding you to use the later version,
That's not what was asked. Optionally using a later version is not the same as switching to a newer version!
Inevitably, GPLv3 will be more restrictive in some ways than GPLv2 was (although it also might be looser in other ways). Switching the license will remove some old permissions included in v2, possibly including some effective loophole. If the end-users are still given the option of GPLv2, then the software effectively hasn't really switched to GPLv3 at all.
"v2 or later" is basically a superset of "v3 or later"
That IS the problem. (Consider that the BSD license is basically a superset of the GPL).
If the authors actually want to change to GPLv3, it'll probably be because it closes some loophole existing in GPLv2- meaning the new version is MORE restrictive. But the "v2 or later" clause doesn't allow them to close loopholes that way.
If you kill somebody, you don't get any advantage for your online character.
Killing someone gets you money, allowing you to purchase better guns and armor for the next match. And, more importantly, killing the enemy team is the only way to defend from your own death, which would seriously disadvantage your character.
with some GPL'd portions replaced or rewritten to maintain compliance.
That'd be pointless. If SFU is already GPL compliant (either because it doesn't use GPL code, or because source code is available for all GPL portions), then including it in Windows Vista won't alter that compliance.
Grep the GPL for "mere aggeregation". Microsoft could include GPL programs on their installer disks just like Linspire mixes proprietary and GPL apps on their own CD-ROMs.
you could have easily chosen bunnies or kitties or something which is further from the "spoon fed satire"
A mention of killing kittens would further blur the intent, as that implies divine retaliation for onanism.
I came up with this idea a year or two ago,
That's a much older idea. Thousands of persons in the IT industry have thought of it, as it's an obviously good concept, but nobody pursues it because the prerequisites aren't in place yet.
First, we need a widely accepted micropayment system. Then, we need people to start renting out their unused nighttime CPU cycles via an anonymous, automated auction (like SETI@home, but greedier). Once those two things are in place (and there are groups pushing for both of them), then automated bandwidth trading will naturally follow after (obseleting much of Akamai's business model).
Of course, it may require ISPs to revise their TOSs, but if micropayments are working by then, this won't be a problem. (Of course, micropayments don't look like they'll arrive soon, or even ever, but hey)
I'm assuming you're referring to the fact that BitTorrent doesn't actually work at all well with TCP's congestion control methods?
Probably she actually means that BitTorrent excaberates a longstanding economic externality regarding bandwidth pricing: users typically pay a flat rate for bandwidth, even though the ISP serving them is paying by the gigabyte.
This problem could arise with ANY application that leads the user to run a program that wants as much outbound BW as it can get, such as HTTP hosting a page which is slashdotted. But BT (or other P2P) is the most likely way most users might find themselves in that position.
(The real-world analogy involves "All-You-Can-Eat" restaurants, and how they'd respond if customers started to arrive who could ingest 200 kg at one meal. The only safe response is to switch to itemized pricing)
Basically, TCP is not the ideal protocol for BitTorrent. It is designed for passing around data which both needs to have a guaranteed arrival, and must arrive in order.
You could say the same thing about FTP or HTTP, or even SMTP- they also don't usually need the content to actually arrive in order, as long as it all get theres. In fact, academic CS papers have been published on this very subject. It has been shown that FTP over UDP has superior transfer-rate, without necessarily being worse for congestion fairness.
However, that line of work is insufficient to solve the bittorrent problem. I don't know of a complete answer yet, but greater transparency in ISP pricing (including prioritized "premium packets") is likely part of it.
Congestion management then needs to be done both across individual UDP connections,
The most elegant and efficient implementation would be a new internet RFC to allow a 3rd option beyond TCP/IP and UDP/IP. Call it, say, GDP/IP. UDP gives no guarantees about a packet, GDP add assurance that the packet will arrive (but might be out of order), while TCP further ensures that the each packet is recieved in the order it was sent.
(Obviously, the problem of getting OS TCP/IP stacks augmented with a new protocol would be insurmountable, unless it had great backward compatibility)
Does bittorrent allow for DRM'd trackers/torrents? Or would this require adding to the protocol?
The concept of a "DRM'd tracker/torrent" is nonsensical, like "Does Windows Longhorn support DRM'd voltage?". If you wish, you can send a DRM'd file via bittorrent, just the same as you can send the file over HTTP or HTTPS. The DRM in the file itself takes care of any security needs, meaning the BitTorrent protocol doesn't need to be changed at all.
Any good DRM scheme includes strong encryption, meaning you may as well scatter DVDs of the latest movie from airplanes, if they are DRM'd anyway.
Hmm, I decided to try out bit torrents via Azureus as I had a few apps to download. The applications were Inkscape, Scribus and Audacity.
Hmm, I decided to try out airliners via TWA as I had a few places to go. The destinations were school, Burger King, and the library.
Couldn't find any flights to use.
It might be excellent if you're after lengthy business trips or vacations, but I was surprised I couldn't find flights for these places in town.
Oh well. Prehaps I'll try again when the new Starbucks opens.
Torrents aren't really very usefull until a whole bunch of people are hosting the files.
No. Torrents become useful as soon as many people are downloading the file. And if not, then only a few people are trying to download, and the original server presumably has adequate bandwidth to handle them on its own.
Even then, until a WHOLE BUNCH of people volunteer to host a popular program,
That's simply not how they work. BitTorrent is essentially a transparent optimization to HTTP downloading.
the downloads will be unreliable and slow
Traditional HTTP servers are both reliable and fast, except when they're overloaded, which is when BitTorrent becomes important.
Would it hurt people to be that obvious sometimes?
Yes. People don't like ads, unless they are attracted by sex, action, humor, or in this case, mystery.
The faster a viewer can learn what the ad is for, the quicker he can tune it out because he doesn't care. By concealing the product for as long as possible, the advertiser maximizes total time spent paying attention. Many of the most famous ad campaigns have used this technique, including 1984, Infiniti, and the recent Geico ones.
It's just when you download ROMs that you don't own in cart form that you're breaking copyright laws.
No. As the successful lawsuit against (the old) mp3.com demonstrated, just because you have one legal copy of a work doesn't entitle you to get other copies from other sources. To extract a ROM image from a cartridge you possess is fine, but to download it from elsewhere is illegal. Equally illegal as if you had downloaded without owning the cart at all!
Possession of authorized copy entitles you to convert that copy into other forms, but not to recieve new copies already in other formats.
They openly want to control what you see and hear, and that includes violence as well as sex.
No, it doesn't attempt to control those things openly. As just explained, GTA:SA already portrayed extreme levels of violence and criminality. To call the protagonist a "drug-peddling serial-killer" is putting it lightly. Yet all of that deserves a lower rating than a single scene of softcore, consensual heterosexual intercourse.
When the game was only ludicrously ultra-violent, it was allowed in stores. But when it also was noticed to contain a realistic amount of normal sex, it was pulled from the shelves.
It isn't a newsflash that the USA senslessly treats media-sex as worse than media-violence, but it also doesn't hurt any to repeatedly point this out.
Retrieving satelites and returning them to earth for repair was supposed to be one of the shuttle's functions.
But, it turned out not to be. Aside from oddball exceptions like Hubble, repairing satellites is not useful. Strangely, they are like lightbulbs or CPUs: cheaper to replace with a whole new part than try to fix the existing unit, especially when labor and delivery costs are factored in. It's like spending $50 shipping each way to repair a $6.99 calculator.
The Shuttle doesn't run those kinds of missions today, so a replacement won't have be found for that (non) job.
actively pursue a manned program with the specific intention of gathering medical information about the effects of a low/zero gravity environment upon the human body, so as to further the longer-term goals of manned long-range exploration, and eventually extraterrestrial colonization at some future date is the modern equivalent of
No, it isn't equivalent at all. We've already seen how humans can survive 2 years in zero gravity, and that's frankly all we need to know. The personnel will degrade, which is an acceptable loss. If it were important to test humans in zero gravity for more than the current 430 day record, we could already have left a man on the ISS for 2,000 days. But no one did, because it's not a useful or important question.
The costs of lengthy rehabilitation and chronic disability for a score of brave volunteers are minute compared to all the money still poured into STS and ISS operations, which might someday maybe do research on human survival in space. Instead, when the first Mars Expedition happens, we can label it a simultaneous medical experiment on prolonged low-gravity. There will be abundant volunteers regardless of personal risk- and the data from that trip can be used to plan medical improvements to any later ones.
What it comes down to is: Do you, or do you not want to see a Mars colony in your lifetime?
Gee, Ferdinand, we shouldn't be funding those crazy sailing expeditions.
If there's an analogy to the 1491 expedition, it would be
"Sorry Columbus, we won't fund you a super-boat to go to 'India', we've got the International Boat Station to think of. Those two brave men must be continually supplied with fresh water so we can further study the effects of prolonged sea-sickness, and there's just no money left for a risky 'ocean-crossing' vessel. Let's 'orbit' this place for another 40 years, and reconsider it then"
Take the long view. It's easier on the blood pressure.
It is BECAUSE we care about the long view that we dislike manned spaceflight. It's a continuous squandering of resources for entertaining adventure that could better go into sensible R&D.
We're like cranky step-dads haranguing teenagers to stop partying and study "so you can make something of yourself one day". That's the long view. Buck Rogers circling this planet again and again and again isn't part of it.
There is no verses. We do BOTH.
"I didn't take ALL your money; therefore I took NONE of it!" (Look up "versus" in a dictionary... careful not to be distracted by "verses")
A successful unmanned flight? (something US shuttles aren't capable of!)
That is feature. NASA's Shuttles could be capable of fully-automated missions, including autopilot touchdown, but that would shatter the illusion that the astronauts flying the thing are doing an important job and deserve to be treated like heros.
If a computer were seen running the whole sequence, it would raise uncomfortable questions about the amount of money put towards recovering fragile humans from orbit, instead of launching many more robots on one-way trips. It's mostly the same motivation that lead to a spaceplane in the first place.
Furthermore, I have found no refrence to fingernail scoring in carbon-carbon in the CAIB report.
Just read any of the current articles on NASA's plans for a spacewalk to clear dangling "gap filler" from beneath the Discovery. There is real concern that Robinson might accidentally crush a tile if he bumps into it with a tool or his suit, which would certainly be worse than the risk presented by the current damage.
Those things are fragile, but they're not foam- in fact, they're more vulnerable than most foam, which can generally bend instead of shattering.
Is the whole design of the shuttle overly fragile?
Yes, because unlike every previous (and subquesent) operational space-vehicle, it's also an airplane. That means it must be lightweight and have long thin wings to catch air. Imagine a low-speed collision between the strongest airplane (the A-10) and an average tank (like the M1A2)- there is no question about which will survive that crash.
Good, safe landers have the areodynamic qualities of a rock: difficult to damage, but impossible to manuver. The parachute landing will be somewhat random, and you'll just have to cope with a long walk back. On the other hand, the Shuttle was (for distorted reasons) built with opposite charactistics: it can be steered to any landing spot you wish, but is so fragile that any small mistake will mean complete destruction.
Wisely, the proposed shuttle replacement will give up on steerable re-entry, regaining the durability of 1960s-era craft.
I'm sorry, but what kind of 'expirement' was ever a failure?
For examples, see the Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment, or any project with Josef Mengele listed as a researcher. In a gentler vein, the Stanford Prison Experiment was nearly a failure, but it was halted in time to preserve the team's reputations. If the point of an experiment to learn, then anything which is both costly and doesn't produce new knowledge is a failure.
The shortcomings of the spaceplane concept had already been demonstrated by 1985, which would've concluded a responsible experiment. The "failure" is that it thoughtlessly continued long past that point, wasting several lives, $50,000,000,000, and 20 years of NASA's time.