We have found you have shared 350 music files which are copyrighted by the RIAA, its members, or its members' musicians. Our list is attached.
If you don't pay us $3.5k within 20 days, we will sue you for digital copyright infringement.
The *minimum* fee for copyright infringement is $750 per copyrighted work. This comes to $262,500. [Of that, about $245 is compensatory to the RIAA. The wholesale price of a music file is estimated at $0.70. The rest is "punitive" and is also paid to the RIAA.] If you lose in court, you will/have/ to pay that settlement - the judge cannot reduce the damages.
If you win, you get back your own fees, but you don't get any compensation for your trouble. To get compensation, you have to file a countersuit.
You can call us on this toll-free number.
Thank you, The RIAA.
Does this seem fair to you, Anonymous Coward? (Woah, I'm replying to an AC!) How fair would it be if they added this to their letter? It's suggested by your brave new legal system!
PS We have already spent $1k in the discovery process, $2k in sending this letter to you, and we typically spend $50k to file suit and all the usual successive motions. An interview of an expert witness costs us $2k, and other motions may cost us other amounts. If you lose the case, you will not only pay $0.265m, you will also pay our legal fees. Our legal fees may change at any time without notice to you. If you lose, the court will send you our bill, and you will have to pay up, whatever it is.
PS2 We have previously spent as much as $2bn defending ourselves from a single countersuit. If you lose your countersuit, you will be bankrupt.
In Expose, Beryl, Compiz and Aero, each window is basically a 3D polygon. The texture of the polygon is the normal contents of the window. These systems take advantage of the fact that it's cheap (with a GPU) to change the on-screen size and perspective of a window.
That means expose could have live previews of windows if Apple wants it to. (They do want it to.) Aero's Flip3D also can, if Microsoft want it to. (They do.)
IMO, video should not play when in expose: you're trying to select a window, not watch a video. I haven't tried any of these systems for a significant amount of time so YMMV.
OLPC is dead cheap, but it's hand-powered (instead of some laptops coming up from hibernation or sleep while you take the register, imagine kids pulling ripcords for 6 minutes).
"The analogy was made up by some fucking idiot that knows nothing about computers."
The analogy was made up by some mastermind that wishes you knew nothing about computers. They are appealing to those who, after watching the advert, won't know anything about computers.
"Either you accept the blocking software with the understanding that some sites that should not be blocked get blocked anyway."
Some sites? At my school (Jews Free School, filtering run by the government under the name London Grid for Learning) about 30% of sites are blocked. Usually any incorrect blocking is "match making site" or "Sex Site" (where there are surely no keywords in the page to incite blocking). I find an (incorrectly) blocked website roughly every 5-10 minutes of browsing. Occasionally valid websites are also categorised as "hacking site".
Any forum, discussion site, comments area in a blog or chat room is blocked. Any social site is blocked. Any image search is blocked. Any secure websites are blocked (except from teachers and UCAS, the national university admissions system). Any.doc,.exe, other MS Office,.zip is blocked. Any.swf is blocked except from teachers. They once blocked.css for about a minute, presumably because they didn't know what it did. Javascript files are blocked, preventing most websites to be used as they are supposed to.
When I reach a blocked site, I (almost) always click on the submission link, and it says "Sent to NetSweeper". Still, it's just as inaccurate as it was when I entered the school 5 years ago.
There will always be some false positives, yes, but does it really have to be so bad? I'm pretty sure a more accurate system would not be difficult.
At the same time, you can visit Wikipedia and I suspect (although I haven't tried it) visit articles about sex positions, etc. Just have to make sure that nobody's reading Maddox...
They serve hypertext articles including transclusions, logic, running HTML Tidy, etc. The article text is compressed in the database. They serve images.
They accept 100+ edits a minute (English Wikipedia and others) to 12 servers (replicating).
They hold gigabytes of images.
They run 18 Squid caches, 158 Apache servers, and others.
They generate thousands of diffs a minute.
They use $60k a month on bandwidth alone. (Add on rackspace costs, etc...)
It isn't transparent in that I can't watch it on older devices, stream it across the house, edit it, sample it, connect it to old speakers, or hell, just give it to a friend. Of course people will crack it and of course it will be an annoyance.
Microsoft has managed to keep its secrets excellently while licensing to music stores, subscription services and manufacturers of WMA players. Why can't Apple do the same?
"'Not only is this not true for "any computer" (won't work on my Dell)..'
The fact that my mac OS disc won't install on your Dell is no more relevant to this discussion than the fact that your Windows disc won't install on my Mac."
No, the Windows disc is a technical problem (drivers and EFI support). Microsoft aren't deliberately withholding Windows from booting on Macs; they just can't be bothered to add EFI support because Macs are the only computers without the old BIOS and their marketshare is insignificant to Microsoft. (Also, Apple seem to be filling in Microsoft's work for them, with Boot Camp.)
Since the Intel switch, the mac disc has been deliberately withholding OS X from ordinary PCs. Apple knows that effectively every installation of OS X has already been paid for by the purchase of their wildly overpriced hardware. (No, don't argue about it; some models are more overpriced than others, but they're all overpriced, especially in Europe.) If OS X upgrades were a large revenue stream, Apple would introduce activation keys and suchlike "in a heartbeat" (ahaha).
I accept the reason for copies being model-specific.
Microsoft has managed to license out WMDRM for years now. None of the cracks were (apparently) made using insider information. There were no (public) leaks, even though a massive number of companies were involved. They've managed to keep all stores working whenever their DRM system changed. They've managed to roll out fixes (although they take advantage of Windows Update to provide "critical" updates - hey, could that be antitrust?).
I don't buy the "consistent user experience" crap, but I *do* believe that the record labels wouldn't allow Apple to sell DRM-free music - because they don't want people to buy independent instead of "big four".
Imagine what the labels would say if Apple sold independent music at a lower price.
If you have an iTunes installation authorised to play a file, you can get an unprotected version in the same amount of time as it takes you to play the song - without quality loss, and without moving to a different file format.
"Yes, it is better for him. See, when he hears a perfect recording, he not only enjoys the music, but also the recording itself, i.e. more enjoyment than you could perceive. The downside is with bad recordings, but really good music will cancel that out anyway."
A "perfect recording" means there are no artifacts. (Compression artifacts, clipping, distortion, overcompression etc).
A non-audiophile doesn't notice any of these artifacts. (Except, maybe, clipping.) That means that to them, the audio has no artifacts. So to them, it is a perfect recording.
My school also stores fingerprints in the library system. They used to stick barcodes onto our lunch cards (which are chip based) but apparently that took too long.
Our lunch cards are still just chip based, not fingerprint-based.
There's still optimisation at Google and other search engines. Speech recognition and synthesis at Microsoft. Handwriting recognition at Microsoft. Noise cancellation at Microsoft. Translation at Google.
CG at Pixar, Disney, nVidia and ATI. (I'm not sure how much software-based work there is at the last two, though...)
Plus all the technologies I mentioned are simultaneously being developed by many other companies!
...Yes, all that is true, but what the grandparent was actually disputing was the claim that "Xbox360 has been out for over a year longer than the Wii and has sold less consoles in that span" - which is blatantly false and an exaggeration of the Wii's lead against the Xbox360.
"and those so-funny-because-they're-true recordings of Gates & Co. demonstrating crapware that crashes and burns on them... they will basically live forever in all their inglorious splendor on the video clip websites."
As I understood it, those demonstrations are far more careful now.
My dad (an IT manager) went to a presentation selling SQL Server. They explained replication and its total reliability. They said "if we *were* to pull out the plug on this server you can see here [which is in replication with another server], everything would continue working normally." They didn't actually pull the plug.
Slashdot Mirror
Hello. This is the RIAA.
/have/ to pay that settlement - the judge cannot reduce the damages.
We have found you have shared 350 music files which are copyrighted by the RIAA, its members, or its members' musicians. Our list is attached.
If you don't pay us $3.5k within 20 days, we will sue you for digital copyright infringement.
The *minimum* fee for copyright infringement is $750 per copyrighted work. This comes to $262,500. [Of that, about $245 is compensatory to the RIAA. The wholesale price of a music file is estimated at $0.70. The rest is "punitive" and is also paid to the RIAA.] If you lose in court, you will
If you win, you get back your own fees, but you don't get any compensation for your trouble. To get compensation, you have to file a countersuit.
You can call us on this toll-free number.
Thank you,
The RIAA.
Does this seem fair to you, Anonymous Coward? (Woah, I'm replying to an AC!) How fair would it be if they added this to their letter? It's suggested by your brave new legal system!
PS We have already spent $1k in the discovery process, $2k in sending this letter to you, and we typically spend $50k to file suit and all the usual successive motions. An interview of an expert witness costs us $2k, and other motions may cost us other amounts. If you lose the case, you will not only pay $0.265m, you will also pay our legal fees. Our legal fees may change at any time without notice to you. If you lose, the court will send you our bill, and you will have to pay up, whatever it is.
PS2 We have previously spent as much as $2bn defending ourselves from a single countersuit. If you lose your countersuit, you will be bankrupt.
Here are some games which I would consider "art". I haven't played all of them.
Rez (PS1/DC)
Lumines (PSP/mobile phones etc)
Every Extend (freeware PC version/commercial PSP version)
Elebits (Wii)
Katamari Damacy (sp?) (PS2)
LOOM (DOS, Mac OS, Amiga, Atari ST, FM Towns, TG16)
I don't see any Nintendo games. Nintendo games are "good clean fun" as another poster said, but they aren't art.
In Expose, Beryl, Compiz and Aero, each window is basically a 3D polygon. The texture of the polygon is the normal contents of the window. These systems take advantage of the fact that it's cheap (with a GPU) to change the on-screen size and perspective of a window.
That means expose could have live previews of windows if Apple wants it to. (They do want it to.) Aero's Flip3D also can, if Microsoft want it to. (They do.)
IMO, video should not play when in expose: you're trying to select a window, not watch a video. I haven't tried any of these systems for a significant amount of time so YMMV.
OLPC is dead cheap, but it's hand-powered (instead of some laptops coming up from hibernation or sleep while you take the register, imagine kids pulling ripcords for 6 minutes).
The analogy was made up by some mastermind that wishes you knew nothing about computers. They are appealing to those who, after watching the advert, won't know anything about computers.
"Either you accept the blocking software with the understanding that some sites that should not be blocked get blocked anyway."
.doc, .exe, other MS Office, .zip is blocked. Any .swf is blocked except from teachers. They once blocked .css for about a minute, presumably because they didn't know what it did. Javascript files are blocked, preventing most websites to be used as they are supposed to.
Some sites? At my school (Jews Free School, filtering run by the government under the name London Grid for Learning) about 30% of sites are blocked. Usually any incorrect blocking is "match making site" or "Sex Site" (where there are surely no keywords in the page to incite blocking). I find an (incorrectly) blocked website roughly every 5-10 minutes of browsing. Occasionally valid websites are also categorised as "hacking site".
Any forum, discussion site, comments area in a blog or chat room is blocked. Any social site is blocked. Any image search is blocked. Any secure websites are blocked (except from teachers and UCAS, the national university admissions system). Any
When I reach a blocked site, I (almost) always click on the submission link, and it says "Sent to NetSweeper". Still, it's just as inaccurate as it was when I entered the school 5 years ago.
There will always be some false positives, yes, but does it really have to be so bad? I'm pretty sure a more accurate system would not be difficult.
At the same time, you can visit Wikipedia and I suspect (although I haven't tried it) visit articles about sex positions, etc. Just have to make sure that nobody's reading Maddox...
They serve hypertext articles including transclusions, logic, running HTML Tidy, etc. The article text is compressed in the database. They serve images.
They accept 100+ edits a minute (English Wikipedia and others) to 12 servers (replicating).
They hold gigabytes of images.
They run 18 Squid caches, 158 Apache servers, and others.
They generate thousands of diffs a minute.
They use $60k a month on bandwidth alone. (Add on rackspace costs, etc...)
It isn't transparent in that I can't watch it on older devices, stream it across the house, edit it, sample it, connect it to old speakers, or hell, just give it to a friend. Of course people will crack it and of course it will be an annoyance.
Microsoft has managed to keep its secrets excellently while licensing to music stores, subscription services and manufacturers of WMA players. Why can't Apple do the same?
I think they switched off "recommending" or "defaulting" to DRM on ripped CDs around WMP8 or WMP9. It certainly was brain-dead.
/one/ track before being pissed off.
At least when you only put DRM on content that's purchased online, customers will buy
"'Not only is this not true for "any computer" (won't work on my Dell)..'
The fact that my mac OS disc won't install on your Dell is no more relevant to this discussion than the fact that your Windows disc won't install on my Mac."
No, the Windows disc is a technical problem (drivers and EFI support). Microsoft aren't deliberately withholding Windows from booting on Macs; they just can't be bothered to add EFI support because Macs are the only computers without the old BIOS and their marketshare is insignificant to Microsoft. (Also, Apple seem to be filling in Microsoft's work for them, with Boot Camp.)
Since the Intel switch, the mac disc has been deliberately withholding OS X from ordinary PCs. Apple knows that effectively every installation of OS X has already been paid for by the purchase of their wildly overpriced hardware. (No, don't argue about it; some models are more overpriced than others, but they're all overpriced, especially in Europe.) If OS X upgrades were a large revenue stream, Apple would introduce activation keys and suchlike "in a heartbeat" (ahaha).
I accept the reason for copies being model-specific.
Microsoft has managed to license out WMDRM for years now. None of the cracks were (apparently) made using insider information. There were no (public) leaks, even though a massive number of companies were involved. They've managed to keep all stores working whenever their DRM system changed. They've managed to roll out fixes (although they take advantage of Windows Update to provide "critical" updates - hey, could that be antitrust?).
I don't buy the "consistent user experience" crap, but I *do* believe that the record labels wouldn't allow Apple to sell DRM-free music - because they don't want people to buy independent instead of "big four".
Imagine what the labels would say if Apple sold independent music at a lower price.
And plenty more posts pointing out that that was false.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/QTFairUse
If you have an iTunes installation authorised to play a file, you can get an unprotected version in the same amount of time as it takes you to play the song - without quality loss, and without moving to a different file format.
"Yes, it is better for him. See, when he hears a perfect recording, he not only enjoys the music, but also the recording itself, i.e. more enjoyment than you could perceive. The downside is with bad recordings, but really good music will cancel that out anyway."
A "perfect recording" means there are no artifacts. (Compression artifacts, clipping, distortion, overcompression etc).
A non-audiophile doesn't notice any of these artifacts. (Except, maybe, clipping.) That means that to them, the audio has no artifacts. So to them, it is a perfect recording.
I have to admit, I use random.org for my (rare) Diceware passwords.
My school also stores fingerprints in the library system. They used to stick barcodes onto our lunch cards (which are chip based) but apparently that took too long.
Our lunch cards are still just chip based, not fingerprint-based.
There's still optimisation at Google and other search engines. Speech recognition and synthesis at Microsoft. Handwriting recognition at Microsoft. Noise cancellation at Microsoft. Translation at Google.
CG at Pixar, Disney, nVidia and ATI. (I'm not sure how much software-based work there is at the last two, though...)
Plus all the technologies I mentioned are simultaneously being developed by many other companies!
"It is the algorithm which dictates the hardware requirements."
The algorithm and the data size.
Whatever amazing algorithm you use, the internet is so large that your hardware costs will dwarf your software development costs.
...Yes, all that is true, but what the grandparent was actually disputing was the claim that "Xbox360 has been out for over a year longer than the Wii and has sold less consoles in that span" - which is blatantly false and an exaggeration of the Wii's lead against the Xbox360.
Quicktime doesn't play videos full screen. I think that should put it in the "trialware" category.
"and those so-funny-because-they're-true recordings of Gates & Co. demonstrating crapware that crashes and burns on them... they will basically live forever in all their inglorious splendor on the video clip websites."
As I understood it, those demonstrations are far more careful now.
My dad (an IT manager) went to a presentation selling SQL Server. They explained replication and its total reliability. They said "if we *were* to pull out the plug on this server you can see here [which is in replication with another server], everything would continue working normally." They didn't actually pull the plug.
"there's a clip on YouTube where a CNN guy asks him about it as well, and Bill just pauses and reacts. It's funny."
If that's the clip I saw, he said "We have plenty of things Apple doesn't... [about 5 things] parental controls..."
I wish the reporter had caught that.
She didn't post his picture - that was found by a different website online.
After she found out that people had been sending death threats, she deleted his last name from her blog and deleted the comments that mentioned it.