File extensions seem to me to be a safer way to manage filetypes - on any Mac OS prior to X all you had to do to fool a user into running a spoofed program was to change the filename extension and icon (say, make an application with a.jpg extension and a quicktime image file icon). The os runs the file based on the actual file type and creator codes when it is double-clicked, and those codes are typically invisible to the user, so someone could very easily open a malicious program instead of, say, some downloaded pr0n.
At least with file extensions as the absolute identification of file type you can't be tricked (ignoring the method discussed in this article), and a.jpg will always be opened as a.jpg, even if its just a renamed.exe
I predict it will be like the original Playsation all over again, first to market does better even in the face of superior consoles that follow, through sheer numbers of available titles.
Umm, the original playstation was not first to market in that period's 3-company competition. Sure, it came out quite a bit before N64 (almost a full year if I recall), but the Sega Saturn came out several months before the psx. Also, Saturn arguably had better hardware, but it was more difficult to write games for (4 processors I think - I could definately see that being troublesome)
So at that time, the (arguably) superior console with more games which came out earlier did much worse. Maybe it was because the controllers weren't as easy to use. (shrug)
Actually, the Serious Sam engine supports all the gravity strangeness that would be required to create a map that duplicates Relativity by Escher. There are only a few (mostly hidden) bits in the game that show off the engine's gravity capabilities, but you can get a *real* good sense of what those tricks can accomplish by opening a couple of the tutorial maps that come with the tools package. Very cool stuff. People on the SS Mapping forums have already been discussing making Escher maps.
When I first came across the hidden "fun with dynamic gravity" areas in the game, I literally shrieked with delight, as this was something I had always wanted to see in a game, but didn't expect to see for a while.
For a very effective use of camera angles to induce mood, try out the beginning of Silent Hill for psx. Quite early on there is an overhead shot in an alley that I'm sure most horror movie directors will love to be able to pull off in the real world.
Did you read the article? nVidia isn't being sued because they're making infringing fans, but because they're buying fans from a company (ADDA) that is allegedly infringing another company's patent (Sunonwealth).
I really don't understand how it is that nVidia and Creative can be held liable - the court has not yet found in the plaintiff's favor, so the two companies buying the allegedly infringing fans aren't breaking any laws. Using bad judgement maybe, but that's all. Can the people who *use* cards with allegedly infringing fans also be sued? I don't see how nVidia is sue-able any more than I am for having a card that uses the fan.
While I don't necessarily think virtual child porn should exist, I don't see why it would be illegal. Actual murder is illegal, but look at all the virtual forms of that we accept - video games, movies, television, etc etc. Why should the argument about virtual child porn be any different?
When will people learn? When talking amongst geeks, monty python is NEVER an obscure reference. Quoting an obnoxious hit sitcom would be a more obscure reference in the context of a/. post than monty python could ever be.
By your argument isn't linux, as it is a free alternative to Windows etc, undermining commercial OS's? And if you're supporting linux doing this, then you *must* (by your rationale with the parent of this thread) also support MS making IE free to undermind netscape... so you are also a "closetted Microsoft-supporter."
A company has every right to offer a free alternative to something their competitor makes. They can also lower their prices to drive competitors out of business (Barnes and Noble?)... Its immoral as hell, and I don't approve of companies doing it, but is it *illegal*?
I found Jesus once. He was hiding behind the couch. I said "Ha! Found you Jesus!" and he said "Yay, the time has come for the Lord to seek. Go forth my child, and hide in such a way as to make it difficult for Me to find you." So I went and hid, but he never came looking. He didn't even try! Why Jesus? WHY?!?!?!
I have, since high school, become acquianted with at *least* 40 different people who play D&D on a semi-regular to regular basis. Not a single one of these has ever shown any symptoms like those you spoke of.
Those who were devout Christians before they started playing remain devout Christians today. Those who had no interest in any religion still don't - they didn't turn to wicca or anything like that because D&D convinced them to.
Someone else who posted a response to the main topic included a link to a movie called "Summoner Geeks" or something along those lines. Go watch it. The video was a recent addition to an older audio-only clip which started off with a rant a bit like yours ("Dungeons and Dragons... a game which corrupts the minds of young people around the country... come with us as we observe a typical session of this demonic game" or something like that), and then proceeded to show a typical session. And it really is a typical session (more or less). Go watch that video.
D&D is absolutely NOT in any way corrupting. It's something entertaining that quite a few people enjoy. I would argue that playing D&D is a MUCH better influence on kids than football is - you actually have to talk to each other, you have to act as a team when in a party or as a leader when acting as the DM, you have to think on your feet to solve problems... whereas football (american-style that is) teaches you to hit the other guy as hard as you can to win. Hmm...
I think I understand why so many people in the late 70's (when D&D first appeared) were so quick to judge it as evil. Look back a few hundred years- church used to be the ONLY source of entertainment a common person had available to them. Whenever any other sort of entertainment came out (radio, tv, video games, etc etc) there have been some reactionary christians who shouted "It's EVIL!" - not out of a real belief that its evil, but because they knew it would take away from church attendance as people found more interesting things to do. Why should people go to church every week anyway? If you understand what the bible was meant to teach and live by it, you're a good christian. Being reminded of it every week regardless would be like going to driver's ed once a week even if you're a good driver - it just doesn't make sense. Remember that the church makes money by encouraging people who (needlessly) attend every sunday to pay a certain percentage of their income... if less people come, the church takes in less revenue. Of course D&D is evil for anyone thinking from this perspective - people might find something better to do than waste their time being told things they already know!
Don't get me wrong, I'm not a D&D player (I've only ever role-played two or three times... just not my thing), and I'm not some sort of radical anti-religious nut. I just get annoyed by the fact that people can take something they know nothing about and brand it as evil simply *because* they know nothing about it.
Oh, to be a bit more on-topic: I saw the D&D movie last night, and it is pretty much trash. There is little to no redeeming value in that film. A few parts were funny, but only accidentally.
Didn't mean to make such a long post... I'm just feeling too lazy to do anything truly productive today;)
Juse look at that fourth screenshot... I think we all know that tigers without stars on their foreheads are WAY cooler than tigers *with* stars on their foreheads.
OTOH, why would Guiness claim that they suck? It's unreasonable.
Maybe they're referencing the classic KMFDM song "sucks," in which the lyrics clearly state that "no doubt about it KMFDM sucks!" Self-degredation is very cool these days. Isn't it possible that someone visiting guinessreallyreallysucks.com would think that its actually a brilliant marketing ploy, and that they're appealing to fans of early-to-mid-90's German industrial?
Well, no, probably not.
As for reverse engineering being theft: it is. You have to consider that the products they ship are intended to be "black boxes" and may contain trade secrets, which are legally protected.
Actually, no. Trade secrets are just that - secrets. If someone is able to look at your product and figure out what its secrets are, tough. The legal protection they have is generally in the form of employee contracts/ non-disclosure agreements. If a company makes a product, and chooses to try to keep parts of it a trade secret, they will have their employees/ associates sign some form of contract stating that should they be found giving out information, they will be sued. If someone without inside information learns a secret through reverse engineering etc, they haven't broken any laws. If a company *really* wants their products protected, they PATENT them. The reason something is kept a trade secret is because patents run out, and sometimes it's worth taking the risk that an outsider will learn the secret if there's a good chance no one ever will.
Coke is a great example of this. Coke *could* have patented their recipe, but because food items are so hard to "reverse engineer," they chose to keep it a secret instead. If someone working at Pepsi figures out what the recipe to Coke is (without insider information), they wouldn't be in a position to be sued. Patents and trade secrets were originally designed to be beneficial to society - no company can maintain a legal stranglehold on a product/ idea indefinately, but are afforded a legal option (patents) to protect a product/ idea temporarily.
A bad comparison. To say that
800 number charge:phone ordering::infrastructure usage charge:online ordering
isn't right. The money paid by the online merchant for their internet connection (if they are of any significant size this is NOT cheap) is more the equivalent to an 800 number charge.
Now, imagine company X had an 800 number through AT&T (I have no idea how 800 numbers work, but just suppose). You as a consumer call them from your home, which is serviced locally by US West. Imagine US West trying to charge you and the company you order from because you used their phone lines to call the AT&T 800 number. This would obviously be a load of crap.
Nah, just start using web-based email from a.uk (or whatever) domain... I'd love to see the US gov't try to tax email that doesn't even go through US servers:)
However, no candidate for any position would ever support (openly) any sort of tax increase, unless it only affected the wealthy. They might very well support it after they're elected, but never while *trying* to get elected.
Oh come on, there are quite a few bad Square games. Lets look at the list (and these are just off the top of my head):
Saga Frontier (ugh)
Legend of Mana (I *loved* secret, but Legend was just BAD)
FF Mystic Quest (hahahahahahaha...)
The translated FF5 on the anthology disc... wow was that a bad translation.
(Parasite Eve? Can't remember if that was Square...)
This is by no means a diss on Square. For the most part, they make GREAT games, but they are not perfect.
Erm, actually it isn't late... I had a relative who had been working on it for a while, and it had been slated for a 2001 release since the first time I heard about it, which I believe was in 1997.
And so what if its a "few million" over budget? How many movies *don't* go over budget, and on a big-name release like this, whats another 2 or 3 million? Not a whole lot really. I have no doubt AT ALL that this movie will earn back the money put into it, with a huge amount of profit.
Actually, the Quicktime server software *is* free. Also, in going with Quicktime, you can get in on the Akamai action... anyone with a good connection probably notices how insanely fast a quicktime movie transfers even after its been slashdotted. Granted, it really would be nice if a truly open, cross-platform format became *the* standard for online video, but it just isn't the case yet. MPEG-2 is nice, but I believe it tends to be a larger file size in general (please correct me if I'm mistaken on this).
I *might* agree with this idea, except for the fact that x-box isn't solely a Microsoft thing - NVidia and a whole slew of game developers (John Carmack comes to mind) have been giving a whole lot of positive lip service to this gizmo. Have you ever heard of NVidia promoting anything that ended up being vaporware? Sure, they may exaggerate the performance of their upcoming cards from time to time, but they don't spew straight up bs. And why should a game developer post a press release about the fact that they're working on games for a new console? Interviews and.plan updates and such are a much better forum for this. Press releases are generally used to announce new products or services - not as updates to what an individual/ company is currently working on.
Why should we be expecting to see prototypes already anyway? XBox isn't due out until sometime in 2001 (don't recall which quarter), and I saw my first official ps2 pics towards the beginning of 2000, or late 1999 at earliest... Just because it isn't finalized a year before its due out, doesn't mean it won't come to exist.
Sorry if this sounds like a pro-MS rant (I find myself amazed that I'm defending them to any degree over anything), but what theBSOD posted is just as much FUD as the best MS press and marketing goons spew out on a regular basis. XBox isn't a "new innovative OS" or anything like that, its *HARDWARE*, and you have to admit that MS is pretty good about hardware (mice anyone?)... add to this the generally respected names associated with it outside of the redmond campus, and this stops bearing any resemblance to vaporware.
no damnit, its "right on, right on to all them mmm... english girls named cherise." The "mmm..." bit came about because he was saying things off the top of his head and got stuck for a second;)
Man, these guys just can't get it right. This seems (to me anyway) like MS getting a little ansy about Mac OS X's uber-smooth look. Trouble is, MS has *never* had creative graphics artists working for them - look at the default desktop patterns in win98 fer chrissakes! Not a single one is anything less than painful to look at!
And what's going on in the control panels? Why would I want huge buttons and massive text? I would hope they at least have the insight to make this appearance a configurable thing... Or simply dump the weird bits (practically all of screenshots really) and go back to something more like the more traditional windows look. They need to be consistant anyway.
then again, i'm very tired and pissed off in general about windows at the moment (you try using a beautiful icq clone for 18 months and then be forced to use the latest "real" icq client and try to keep a cheerful demeanor)
What can possibly be gained by banning mp3 hardware? Think about it logically...
1) The software exists. There is no way mp3 encoding/playing software is going to go away.
2) The hardware exists. Plenty of mp3 players have been sold, and continue to be sold. There's no basis for a lawsuit against hardware manufacturers, as there's nothing remotely illegal about playing or creating mp3s.
3) Consumers *love* mp3. Isn't the whole point of business (and by extension, trade shows) to create, market, and sell products and services that consumers want?
This seems to indicate that either the CeBit organizers or some MAJOR participants had a very good motive to get mp3 devices off the floor. Bribery or stock deals (really just another form of bribery) wouldn't surprise me. Perhaps one of the exhibitors will be showing off some new audio encoding technology and use the fact that they're the only thing being shown to impress people?
Slashdot Mirror
File extensions seem to me to be a safer way to manage filetypes - on any Mac OS prior to X all you had to do to fool a user into running a spoofed program was to change the filename extension and icon (say, make an application with a .jpg extension and a quicktime image file icon). The os runs the file based on the actual file type and creator codes when it is double-clicked, and those codes are typically invisible to the user, so someone could very easily open a malicious program instead of, say, some downloaded pr0n.
.jpg will always be opened as a .jpg, even if its just a renamed .exe
At least with file extensions as the absolute identification of file type you can't be tricked (ignoring the method discussed in this article), and a
I predict it will be like the original Playsation all over again, first to market does better even in the face of superior consoles that follow, through sheer numbers of available titles.
Umm, the original playstation was not first to market in that period's 3-company competition. Sure, it came out quite a bit before N64 (almost a full year if I recall), but the Sega Saturn came out several months before the psx. Also, Saturn arguably had better hardware, but it was more difficult to write games for (4 processors I think - I could definately see that being troublesome)
So at that time, the (arguably) superior console with more games which came out earlier did much worse. Maybe it was because the controllers weren't as easy to use. (shrug)
Actually, the Serious Sam engine supports all the gravity strangeness that would be required to create a map that duplicates Relativity by Escher. There are only a few (mostly hidden) bits in the game that show off the engine's gravity capabilities, but you can get a *real* good sense of what those tricks can accomplish by opening a couple of the tutorial maps that come with the tools package. Very cool stuff. People on the SS Mapping forums have already been discussing making Escher maps.
When I first came across the hidden "fun with dynamic gravity" areas in the game, I literally shrieked with delight, as this was something I had always wanted to see in a game, but didn't expect to see for a while.
For a very effective use of camera angles to induce mood, try out the beginning of Silent Hill for psx. Quite early on there is an overhead shot in an alley that I'm sure most horror movie directors will love to be able to pull off in the real world.
Vegetarian, not vegan. She was only *considering* becoming a vegan. Totally outclassed by that blonde guy she met who was vegan level 5.
Did you read the article? nVidia isn't being sued because they're making infringing fans, but because they're buying fans from a company (ADDA) that is allegedly infringing another company's patent (Sunonwealth).
I really don't understand how it is that nVidia and Creative can be held liable - the court has not yet found in the plaintiff's favor, so the two companies buying the allegedly infringing fans aren't breaking any laws. Using bad judgement maybe, but that's all. Can the people who *use* cards with allegedly infringing fans also be sued? I don't see how nVidia is sue-able any more than I am for having a card that uses the fan.
While I don't necessarily think virtual child porn should exist, I don't see why it would be illegal. Actual murder is illegal, but look at all the virtual forms of that we accept - video games, movies, television, etc etc. Why should the argument about virtual child porn be any different?
-MoonSammy
When will people learn? When talking amongst geeks, monty python is NEVER an obscure reference. Quoting an obnoxious hit sitcom would be a more obscure reference in the context of a /. post than monty python could ever be.
Sure, but is there anything *illegal* about it?
By your argument isn't linux, as it is a free alternative to Windows etc, undermining commercial OS's? And if you're supporting linux doing this, then you *must* (by your rationale with the parent of this thread) also support MS making IE free to undermind netscape... so you are also a "closetted Microsoft-supporter."
A company has every right to offer a free alternative to something their competitor makes. They can also lower their prices to drive competitors out of business (Barnes and Noble?)... Its immoral as hell, and I don't approve of companies doing it, but is it *illegal*?
I found Jesus once. He was hiding behind the couch. I said "Ha! Found you Jesus!" and he said "Yay, the time has come for the Lord to seek. Go forth my child, and hide in such a way as to make it difficult for Me to find you." So I went and hid, but he never came looking. He didn't even try! Why Jesus? WHY?!?!?!
"- a Wayans brother
'nuff said."
Go see Requiem for a Dream. It has a Wayans brother in it who does a REALLY good job. I'm not kidding!
-MoonSammy
I have, since high school, become acquianted with at *least* 40 different people who play D&D on a semi-regular to regular basis. Not a single one of these has ever shown any symptoms like those you spoke of.
;)
Those who were devout Christians before they started playing remain devout Christians today. Those who had no interest in any religion still don't - they didn't turn to wicca or anything like that because D&D convinced them to.
Someone else who posted a response to the main topic included a link to a movie called "Summoner Geeks" or something along those lines. Go watch it. The video was a recent addition to an older audio-only clip which started off with a rant a bit like yours ("Dungeons and Dragons... a game which corrupts the minds of young people around the country... come with us as we observe a typical session of this demonic game" or something like that), and then proceeded to show a typical session. And it really is a typical session (more or less). Go watch that video.
D&D is absolutely NOT in any way corrupting. It's something entertaining that quite a few people enjoy. I would argue that playing D&D is a MUCH better influence on kids than football is - you actually have to talk to each other, you have to act as a team when in a party or as a leader when acting as the DM, you have to think on your feet to solve problems... whereas football (american-style that is) teaches you to hit the other guy as hard as you can to win. Hmm...
I think I understand why so many people in the late 70's (when D&D first appeared) were so quick to judge it as evil. Look back a few hundred years- church used to be the ONLY source of entertainment a common person had available to them. Whenever any other sort of entertainment came out (radio, tv, video games, etc etc) there have been some reactionary christians who shouted "It's EVIL!" - not out of a real belief that its evil, but because they knew it would take away from church attendance as people found more interesting things to do. Why should people go to church every week anyway? If you understand what the bible was meant to teach and live by it, you're a good christian. Being reminded of it every week regardless would be like going to driver's ed once a week even if you're a good driver - it just doesn't make sense. Remember that the church makes money by encouraging people who (needlessly) attend every sunday to pay a certain percentage of their income... if less people come, the church takes in less revenue. Of course D&D is evil for anyone thinking from this perspective - people might find something better to do than waste their time being told things they already know!
Don't get me wrong, I'm not a D&D player (I've only ever role-played two or three times... just not my thing), and I'm not some sort of radical anti-religious nut. I just get annoyed by the fact that people can take something they know nothing about and brand it as evil simply *because* they know nothing about it.
Oh, to be a bit more on-topic: I saw the D&D movie last night, and it is pretty much trash. There is little to no redeeming value in that film. A few parts were funny, but only accidentally.
Didn't mean to make such a long post... I'm just feeling too lazy to do anything truly productive today
-MoonSammy
Juse look at that fourth screenshot... I think we all know that tigers without stars on their foreheads are WAY cooler than tigers *with* stars on their foreheads.
-MoonSammy
OTOH, why would Guiness claim that they suck? It's unreasonable.
Maybe they're referencing the classic KMFDM song "sucks," in which the lyrics clearly state that "no doubt about it KMFDM sucks!" Self-degredation is very cool these days. Isn't it possible that someone visiting guinessreallyreallysucks.com would think that its actually a brilliant marketing ploy, and that they're appealing to fans of early-to-mid-90's German industrial?
Well, no, probably not.
Can anyone see the day when we have one company to entertain us?
We've already been there - in the dark ages, the only entertainment people had was church. We saw how well THAT worked.
As for reverse engineering being theft: it is. You have to consider that the products they ship are intended to be "black boxes" and may contain trade secrets, which are legally protected.
Actually, no. Trade secrets are just that - secrets. If someone is able to look at your product and figure out what its secrets are, tough. The legal protection they have is generally in the form of employee contracts/ non-disclosure agreements. If a company makes a product, and chooses to try to keep parts of it a trade secret, they will have their employees/ associates sign some form of contract stating that should they be found giving out information, they will be sued. If someone without inside information learns a secret through reverse engineering etc, they haven't broken any laws. If a company *really* wants their products protected, they PATENT them. The reason something is kept a trade secret is because patents run out, and sometimes it's worth taking the risk that an outsider will learn the secret if there's a good chance no one ever will.
Coke is a great example of this. Coke *could* have patented their recipe, but because food items are so hard to "reverse engineer," they chose to keep it a secret instead. If someone working at Pepsi figures out what the recipe to Coke is (without insider information), they wouldn't be in a position to be sued. Patents and trade secrets were originally designed to be beneficial to society - no company can maintain a legal stranglehold on a product/ idea indefinately, but are afforded a legal option (patents) to protect a product/ idea temporarily.
A bad comparison. To say that
800 number charge:phone ordering::infrastructure usage charge:online ordering
isn't right. The money paid by the online merchant for their internet connection (if they are of any significant size this is NOT cheap) is more the equivalent to an 800 number charge.
Now, imagine company X had an 800 number through AT&T (I have no idea how 800 numbers work, but just suppose). You as a consumer call them from your home, which is serviced locally by US West. Imagine US West trying to charge you and the company you order from because you used their phone lines to call the AT&T 800 number. This would obviously be a load of crap.
-Bah. sigs. who needs em?
Nah, just start using web-based email from a .uk (or whatever) domain... I'd love to see the US gov't try to tax email that doesn't even go through US servers :)
However, no candidate for any position would ever support (openly) any sort of tax increase, unless it only affected the wealthy. They might very well support it after they're elected, but never while *trying* to get elected.
Oh come on, there are quite a few bad Square games. Lets look at the list (and these are just off the top of my head):
Saga Frontier (ugh)
Legend of Mana (I *loved* secret, but Legend was just BAD)
FF Mystic Quest (hahahahahahaha...)
The translated FF5 on the anthology disc... wow was that a bad translation.
(Parasite Eve? Can't remember if that was Square...)
This is by no means a diss on Square. For the most part, they make GREAT games, but they are not perfect.
Erm, actually it isn't late... I had a relative who had been working on it for a while, and it had been slated for a 2001 release since the first time I heard about it, which I believe was in 1997.
And so what if its a "few million" over budget? How many movies *don't* go over budget, and on a big-name release like this, whats another 2 or 3 million? Not a whole lot really. I have no doubt AT ALL that this movie will earn back the money put into it, with a huge amount of profit.
Actually, the Quicktime server software *is* free. Also, in going with Quicktime, you can get in on the Akamai action... anyone with a good connection probably notices how insanely fast a quicktime movie transfers even after its been slashdotted. Granted, it really would be nice if a truly open, cross-platform format became *the* standard for online video, but it just isn't the case yet. MPEG-2 is nice, but I believe it tends to be a larger file size in general (please correct me if I'm mistaken on this).
I *might* agree with this idea, except for the fact that x-box isn't solely a Microsoft thing - NVidia and a whole slew of game developers (John Carmack comes to mind) have been giving a whole lot of positive lip service to this gizmo. Have you ever heard of NVidia promoting anything that ended up being vaporware? Sure, they may exaggerate the performance of their upcoming cards from time to time, but they don't spew straight up bs. And why should a game developer post a press release about the fact that they're working on games for a new console? Interviews and .plan updates and such are a much better forum for this. Press releases are generally used to announce new products or services - not as updates to what an individual/ company is currently working on.
Why should we be expecting to see prototypes already anyway? XBox isn't due out until sometime in 2001 (don't recall which quarter), and I saw my first official ps2 pics towards the beginning of 2000, or late 1999 at earliest... Just because it isn't finalized a year before its due out, doesn't mean it won't come to exist.
Sorry if this sounds like a pro-MS rant (I find myself amazed that I'm defending them to any degree over anything), but what theBSOD posted is just as much FUD as the best MS press and marketing goons spew out on a regular basis. XBox isn't a "new innovative OS" or anything like that, its *HARDWARE*, and you have to admit that MS is pretty good about hardware (mice anyone?)... add to this the generally respected names associated with it outside of the redmond campus, and this stops bearing any resemblance to vaporware.
no damnit, its "right on, right on to all them mmm... english girls named cherise." The "mmm..." bit came about because he was saying things off the top of his head and got stuck for a second ;)
-MoonSammy
Man, these guys just can't get it right. This seems (to me anyway) like MS getting a little ansy about Mac OS X's uber-smooth look. Trouble is, MS has *never* had creative graphics artists working for them - look at the default desktop patterns in win98 fer chrissakes! Not a single one is anything less than painful to look at!
And what's going on in the control panels? Why would I want huge buttons and massive text? I would hope they at least have the insight to make this appearance a configurable thing... Or simply dump the weird bits (practically all of screenshots really) and go back to something more like the more traditional windows look. They need to be consistant anyway.
then again, i'm very tired and pissed off in general about windows at the moment (you try using a beautiful icq clone for 18 months and then be forced to use the latest "real" icq client and try to keep a cheerful demeanor)
What can possibly be gained by banning mp3 hardware? Think about it logically...
1) The software exists. There is no way mp3 encoding/playing software is going to go away.
2) The hardware exists. Plenty of mp3 players have been sold, and continue to be sold. There's no basis for a lawsuit against hardware manufacturers, as there's nothing remotely illegal about playing or creating mp3s.
3) Consumers *love* mp3. Isn't the whole point of business (and by extension, trade shows) to create, market, and sell products and services that consumers want?
This seems to indicate that either the CeBit organizers or some MAJOR participants had a very good motive to get mp3 devices off the floor. Bribery or stock deals (really just another form of bribery) wouldn't surprise me. Perhaps one of the exhibitors will be showing off some new audio encoding technology and use the fact that they're the only thing being shown to impress people?