This is just more proof of the reducing costs of producing professional quality audio, and more evidence of price fixing and extortion of the major record labels.
Furthermore, I was under the impression the FTC had the authority to regulate interstate commerce. Telemarketing sure seems like interstate commerce to me, calling people up at home to order (trade money for goods) various items and services.
This just comes off as another push to show industry has more power over the government than the people it's supposed to be for, by, and of.
As far as I know, upon bootup, the contents of the BIOS are decompressed to RAM to begin operation of the components. Naturally, upon power off, the contents of the RAM are cleared. If MRAM were implemented, even if only for BIOS functions, the entire decompression/hardware detection (IDE devices, kb/mouse, etc) would become null, considering how many hardware changes occur in the average computer between power cycles.
If precedent is already set as per online advertising through a competitor (think Gator, where it was deemed legal to show pop-ups of a competing company when visiting certain sites, or sites with certain keywords), how would something like this hold up, where it is the user's fault for mis-spelling the intended domain?
If it's legal to pop up competing websites without consent, then surely it's legal to redirect to a competing website when there is indirect consent (e.g. the user types in the erronous address).
Not that it's a desireable thing, just based on past precedent it seems the direction the legal system is heading.
I just thank my lucky stars I don't get redirected to some obscure/spyware infested search engine when I misspell slashdot- just a simple page informing me I've misspelled it, with a convenient number of how many others are afflicted with the same travesty.
At my brother's campus, they distributed CD's with the necessary patches and scripts to remove the Blaster worm. A number of CDs were dispatched to each dorm with instructions to install, patch up, and pass on. Once this was done, a netadmin would come by to ensure everything was applied properly, and once checked off, internet access would be authorized for that MAC address.
Ultimately, whether you are a fan of Linux or Windows, you benefit. A Good Thing.
I'm throwing a mod point used in this discussion away, but it must be said.
Yes, this is a good thing, but only for the large OEMs (Dell, HP, etc). However, it may be a critical strike to already struggling mom n' pop shops who still essentially pay full price for windows licenses, even for OEM. My company ships around 30-40 PC's per month, custom built for each customer. Naturally, the customers (mainly home users) wish the latest version of Windows. Unfortunately, our cost for an OEM version of Windows XP is substantially more than what the bigger names are getting it for. If to HP, XP home is worth +/- $52, why must we pay $89 to Redmond for the same product for the same purpose? I know they have volume licensing plans, but if by offering Linux, they sweeten their cost per license, where would that leave the independant shops who pay essentially retail price for an OEM product? Suddenly HP is offering sub-$400 machines with Windows, while that is the cost of components alone for an independant shop of similar configuration.
Unfortunately software development on the corporate level goes beyond an engineer's ability to say "when it's done."
Rather, it's the executives telling investors "oh yeah, it'll be done in a year and a half," then turning to the engineers saying "alright, you have to get this done in a year and a half or we loose a LOT of money, and YOU may loose your JOB if that happens."
It's good to see Microsoft delaying a release date rather than rushing the engineers to do things sub-par to meet a quota or deadline.
But according to IDC's Gillen, there are other possible reasons for the delay, including the fact that Microsoft's ability to rapidly introduce change into its products is becoming increasingly difficult.
Maybe the "ability to rapidly introduce changes" can be read "ability to patch." I hope they use the extra time to test the security and operability extensively, to patch holes and problems before they reach the consumer.
It's general knowledge that one should not introduce a broken product to market, nevermind try to cover it with patches. Lets hope they release a fully stitched quilt, rather than rely on customers to make a run to the local fabric store.
I was the IT manager of a small engineering firm for a while. Naturally, the place was all PC (around 20-30 some odd people). While growing, one of the new design engineers was a die-hard mac fan. When I came around to install SolidWorks for him, he presented his Wallstreet G3 laptop running Virtual PC to me. Everything the company needed to run ran perfectly fine under Virtual PC. Therefore, your 98% number is a bit out of touch with reality given the nature of both, the intended software and platform in question. Particularly with midrange applications.
Granted, high end apps won't take Virtual PC well, but for the sake of business apps, it will do a darn good job.
Wouldn't a more elegant solution be to attempt to fix the issue? Rather than hand out cash to disgruntled customers (who will probably make copies of the OSX cd's before returning them), why not invest the money in developing a patch to allow the older Rage cards to function properly?
If there are only 100,000 CDs avaliable in this library (assuming only one copy of each), and millions of susbscribers, wouldn't the library run out of materials rather quickly?
Same concept if only one user is allowed to stream/download/listen to the music at a time.
Does that mean if the music is downloaded to the local machine, must it be played through a proprietary program that would notify the database which songs are being played to maintain the fair use argument?
What do you think is the biggest hinderance to open source adoption at this point? Is it the lack of a central structure for support (e.g. people seeking support for Microsoft products go to Microsoft, a single solid entity as opposed to numerous communities and organizations of open source), or is it simply because there are too many choices out there? Do you think open source will eventually become organized enough to have a single representation, such that there is one massive repository of information for all to use?
What I find interesting is how methods to prevent fair use are clearly written and identified in law (DMCA), yet fair use itself has become a gray shadow in it's wake.
While O'Leary mentions the Fair Use doctrine was written into law in 1976, he also states it's meaning and interpretation has been greyed to an "instance specific" interpretation. Meanwhile, the DMCA is very clear about preventing technologies which would allow Fair Use copying, in that if a CD comes with copy protection, how can I make a backup copy in the event the original gets scratched or broken (as is the case with many of my CDs).
That is more than likely true- Any generic firewall or port monitoring software can show all incoming and outbound connections to a host. Technically, all the RIAA would have to do is initiate a download from someone, pop open the port monitor, and shibby, they have an IP address.
At this point however, they are probably only refering to usernames@kazaa for privacy purposes (like it matters to them anyway), such that they don't come off as "bad guys" posting names and IP addresses publicly.
how a company who's main consumer level homepage (msn.com) defaults the text cursor to their search bar upon loading the page comes up with such ways to slander the good name of google.
Seems like what they call a rise in popularity may in effect be those users of IE who still use the default homepage of MSN.com While with the intention of typing a URL in the address bar, since the cursor defaults to the search bar, the text ends up in the search bar. Thereby, instead of the page you were looking for, the MSN search results are in front of you. This has only happened recently (within the past month or 2, I've never seen it prior), and I'm sure is responsible for the better part of the increase of use.
Even I've fallen upon the trap while working with various customer computers who's default homepages are still MSN. Pop open IE, click the address bar before the page loads, start typing a URL. If the page finishes loading while you were typing, you'll find half of what you typed in MSN's search bar, and instincively hitting enter will only aid MSN's search conquest.
I was going to moderate here, but I feel this must be said:
What about those CDs which are protected from playing in computer CD-ROM drives?
http://www.macrovision.com/solutions/audio/syste m. php3
Macrovision's CDS-100 system has been established to prevent CDs from being played or read by computer CD-ROM drives. Similarly, the next evolution, CDS-200, allows playback through a proprietary player but prevents copying to the hard drives.
I know it's possible just to run the audio output from a standard CD player to the audio input of a sound card to record, but the conversion to analog and back again results in considerable background noise and a far from digital quality signal. That aside, 90% of consumers out there have no idea how to do that. If Joe Bob has a DRM encoded CD and wants to copy it to his MP3 player, what choice would he have? Try to figure out how to hook up his cd player to his computer to record a sub-digital quality recording, or simply grab it from P2P?
Of course, the attempt at circumvention would fall under DMCA violation anyway, yet at the same time, be covered by already established fair use to make a copy for his own personal use, as stated in most license agreements.
Therefore your argument falls apart, since more and more CDs are coming with this and other forms of DRM built in, completely restricting the digital encoding of the content, despite the right to fair use. Even at that, if you succeed in creating the copy/encoding for your own personal use, you're guilty of DMCA violation, and are screwed either way.
Re:Small enough...?
on
RFID Explained
·
· Score: 0, Troll
Yeah, that would only work for a few hours though, unless Ashcroft plans on tracking your shit.
At least it shows they still offer support for older products, rather than completely abandoning like with 3.1, 95, and 98. Although with the advent of new EULAs, activation, and the repealment of stand-alone IE one must wonder if there will be an SP5, or will it simply say "Oh, I'm sorry, Windows 2000 is now obsolete. Give us $200 and we'll give you XP"
Not trying to troll, but it's happened in the past, and given the circumstances surrounding current versions of Windows and Microsoft's business model, it seems more likely than not.
Slashdot Mirror
This is just more proof of the reducing costs of producing professional quality audio, and more evidence of price fixing and extortion of the major record labels.
Furthermore, I was under the impression the FTC had the authority to regulate interstate commerce. Telemarketing sure seems like interstate commerce to me, calling people up at home to order (trade money for goods) various items and services.
This just comes off as another push to show industry has more power over the government than the people it's supposed to be for, by, and of.
I had a customer in my store purchase a 200gb hard drive.
It's maximum capacity in Disk Management reports 186gb.
Considering this hard drive is soon to be full of video for editing, 14 gb is pretty significant.
As far as I know, upon bootup, the contents of the BIOS are decompressed to RAM to begin operation of the components. Naturally, upon power off, the contents of the RAM are cleared. If MRAM were implemented, even if only for BIOS functions, the entire decompression/hardware detection (IDE devices, kb/mouse, etc) would become null, considering how many hardware changes occur in the average computer between power cycles.
If precedent is already set as per online advertising through a competitor (think Gator, where it was deemed legal to show pop-ups of a competing company when visiting certain sites, or sites with certain keywords), how would something like this hold up, where it is the user's fault for mis-spelling the intended domain?
If it's legal to pop up competing websites without consent, then surely it's legal to redirect to a competing website when there is indirect consent (e.g. the user types in the erronous address).
Not that it's a desireable thing, just based on past precedent it seems the direction the legal system is heading.
I just thank my lucky stars I don't get redirected to some obscure/spyware infested search engine when I misspell slashdot- just a simple page informing me I've misspelled it, with a convenient number of how many others are afflicted with the same travesty.
At my brother's campus, they distributed CD's with the necessary patches and scripts to remove the Blaster worm. A number of CDs were dispatched to each dorm with instructions to install, patch up, and pass on. Once this was done, a netadmin would come by to ensure everything was applied properly, and once checked off, internet access would be authorized for that MAC address.
Ultimately, whether you are a fan of Linux or Windows, you benefit. A Good Thing.
I'm throwing a mod point used in this discussion away, but it must be said.
Yes, this is a good thing, but only for the large OEMs (Dell, HP, etc). However, it may be a critical strike to already struggling mom n' pop shops who still essentially pay full price for windows licenses, even for OEM. My company ships around 30-40 PC's per month, custom built for each customer. Naturally, the customers (mainly home users) wish the latest version of Windows. Unfortunately, our cost for an OEM version of Windows XP is substantially more than what the bigger names are getting it for. If to HP, XP home is worth +/- $52, why must we pay $89 to Redmond for the same product for the same purpose? I know they have volume licensing plans, but if by offering Linux, they sweeten their cost per license, where would that leave the independant shops who pay essentially retail price for an OEM product? Suddenly HP is offering sub-$400 machines with Windows, while that is the cost of components alone for an independant shop of similar configuration.
Unfortunately software development on the corporate level goes beyond an engineer's ability to say "when it's done."
Rather, it's the executives telling investors "oh yeah, it'll be done in a year and a half," then turning to the engineers saying "alright, you have to get this done in a year and a half or we loose a LOT of money, and YOU may loose your JOB if that happens."
It's good to see Microsoft delaying a release date rather than rushing the engineers to do things sub-par to meet a quota or deadline.
But according to IDC's Gillen, there are other possible reasons for the delay, including the fact that Microsoft's ability to rapidly introduce change into its products is becoming increasingly difficult.
Maybe the "ability to rapidly introduce changes" can be read "ability to patch." I hope they use the extra time to test the security and operability extensively, to patch holes and problems before they reach the consumer.
It's general knowledge that one should not introduce a broken product to market, nevermind try to cover it with patches. Lets hope they release a fully stitched quilt, rather than rely on customers to make a run to the local fabric store.
I forgot to add:
Needless to say, it was one of the few machines I rarely had to repair.
I was the IT manager of a small engineering firm for a while. Naturally, the place was all PC (around 20-30 some odd people). While growing, one of the new design engineers was a die-hard mac fan. When I came around to install SolidWorks for him, he presented his Wallstreet G3 laptop running Virtual PC to me. Everything the company needed to run ran perfectly fine under Virtual PC. Therefore, your 98% number is a bit out of touch with reality given the nature of both, the intended software and platform in question. Particularly with midrange applications.
Granted, high end apps won't take Virtual PC well, but for the sake of business apps, it will do a darn good job.
Remind me not to save my importand documents to C:\My Documents\Porn\Annual Budget Report.doc anymore.
Wouldn't a more elegant solution be to attempt to fix the issue? Rather than hand out cash to disgruntled customers (who will probably make copies of the OSX cd's before returning them), why not invest the money in developing a patch to allow the older Rage cards to function properly?
Er, yeah... I was online with my cell phone and laptop as soon as power shut down. Even with no power and a patch, I still can't be protected.
If there are only 100,000 CDs avaliable in this library (assuming only one copy of each), and millions of susbscribers, wouldn't the library run out of materials rather quickly?
Same concept if only one user is allowed to stream/download/listen to the music at a time.
Does that mean if the music is downloaded to the local machine, must it be played through a proprietary program that would notify the database which songs are being played to maintain the fair use argument?
What do you think is the biggest hinderance to open source adoption at this point? Is it the lack of a central structure for support (e.g. people seeking support for Microsoft products go to Microsoft, a single solid entity as opposed to numerous communities and organizations of open source), or is it simply because there are too many choices out there? Do you think open source will eventually become organized enough to have a single representation, such that there is one massive repository of information for all to use?
What I find interesting is how methods to prevent fair use are clearly written and identified in law (DMCA), yet fair use itself has become a gray shadow in it's wake.
While O'Leary mentions the Fair Use doctrine was written into law in 1976, he also states it's meaning and interpretation has been greyed to an "instance specific" interpretation. Meanwhile, the DMCA is very clear about preventing technologies which would allow Fair Use copying, in that if a CD comes with copy protection, how can I make a backup copy in the event the original gets scratched or broken (as is the case with many of my CDs).
That is more than likely true- Any generic firewall or port monitoring software can show all incoming and outbound connections to a host. Technically, all the RIAA would have to do is initiate a download from someone, pop open the port monitor, and shibby, they have an IP address.
At this point however, they are probably only refering to usernames@kazaa for privacy purposes (like it matters to them anyway), such that they don't come off as "bad guys" posting names and IP addresses publicly.
..a Microsoft vulnerability? Who'da thunk.
Well, I'll just go build my own internet... with blackjack and hookers. In fact, forget the internet.
Why build your own? Isn't that what the internet is today, plus or minus a few porn sites?
how a company who's main consumer level homepage (msn.com) defaults the text cursor to their search bar upon loading the page comes up with such ways to slander the good name of google.
Seems like what they call a rise in popularity may in effect be those users of IE who still use the default homepage of MSN.com While with the intention of typing a URL in the address bar, since the cursor defaults to the search bar, the text ends up in the search bar. Thereby, instead of the page you were looking for, the MSN search results are in front of you. This has only happened recently (within the past month or 2, I've never seen it prior), and I'm sure is responsible for the better part of the increase of use.
Even I've fallen upon the trap while working with various customer computers who's default homepages are still MSN. Pop open IE, click the address bar before the page loads, start typing a URL. If the page finishes loading while you were typing, you'll find half of what you typed in MSN's search bar, and instincively hitting enter will only aid MSN's search conquest.
I was going to moderate here, but I feel this must be said:
e m. php3
What about those CDs which are protected from playing in computer CD-ROM drives?
http://www.macrovision.com/solutions/audio/syst
Macrovision's CDS-100 system has been established to prevent CDs from being played or read by computer CD-ROM drives. Similarly, the next evolution, CDS-200, allows playback through a proprietary player but prevents copying to the hard drives.
I know it's possible just to run the audio output from a standard CD player to the audio input of a sound card to record, but the conversion to analog and back again results in considerable background noise and a far from digital quality signal. That aside, 90% of consumers out there have no idea how to do that. If Joe Bob has a DRM encoded CD and wants to copy it to his MP3 player, what choice would he have? Try to figure out how to hook up his cd player to his computer to record a sub-digital quality recording, or simply grab it from P2P?
Of course, the attempt at circumvention would fall under DMCA violation anyway, yet at the same time, be covered by already established fair use to make a copy for his own personal use, as stated in most license agreements.
Therefore your argument falls apart, since more and more CDs are coming with this and other forms of DRM built in, completely restricting the digital encoding of the content, despite the right to fair use. Even at that, if you succeed in creating the copy/encoding for your own personal use, you're guilty of DMCA violation, and are screwed either way.
Yeah, that would only work for a few hours though, unless Ashcroft plans on tracking your shit.
At least it shows they still offer support for older products, rather than completely abandoning like with 3.1, 95, and 98. Although with the advent of new EULAs, activation, and the repealment of stand-alone IE one must wonder if there will be an SP5, or will it simply say "Oh, I'm sorry, Windows 2000 is now obsolete. Give us $200 and we'll give you XP"
Not trying to troll, but it's happened in the past, and given the circumstances surrounding current versions of Windows and Microsoft's business model, it seems more likely than not.
Doh! I RTFA and realized the obvious.
That said, it's a ad thing, but what I said above would be a good thing.