Point A could be legitimate user space programs stored in a physical location on a memory chip, point B could be the legitimate PCI bus holding the network card. Wouldn't spyware, from an electronics viewpoint, be between Points A and B?
Just because you sign a policy agreeing to slavery doesn't make it legal or ethical.
Every single person who uses the excuse "I can play God because you signed the policy agreement" should be bludgeoned to a pulp with wet noodles.
Why wet noodles? It'll take longer to achieve the pulp stage and sting more.
Re:Couch Potatoes Deserve to be Kept Down
on
Free Culture
·
· Score: 1
----- The real smart ones stay on and become graduate students and the smarter ones again become TFs ----- You're ignoring the financial aspect. The "real smart ones" that don't have enough financial backing to shield them from the demands of modern life go on to get boring jobs.
Oh wait. If you're at an Ivy League school you're inundated with yuppie brats who don't need to worry about the financial backing that it takes to tread water in everyday life.
Okay. Your point about couch potatoes is probably 99.998% true in your environment.
----- My favorite anecdote, if one could be said to stand out, comes from a film maker documenting an opera company. When the camera caught a snippet of the stagehands watching the Simpsons with the sound turned down, the director wanted to add a four-second clip to the movie. Matt Groening said "Yes." The lawyers said it was clearly fair use. But Fox's executives responded with the kind of obscenity that doesn't upset the FCC: pay us $10,000. The clip didn't make the film because the director couldn't afford to go head-to-head with the Fox legal department -----
And that, folks, is just how it's going to be done.
----- but aren't Windows APIs something that you use when writing code to run on Windows? ----- That's what I'm afraid that the lawyers will gloss over when presenting their case to judges who don't know a transistor from a hole in the head.
I'm afraid that Windows APIs will come to encompass anything written to work _with_ Windows, not just on Windows. This will probably come to include file formats and transmission protocols. In the most extreme court case I can almost see Windows claiming ownership of TCP/IP.
----- Oh, and Samba doesn't _use_ any Windows API's. It uses the SMB protocol, and I've not seen anyone claim that Microsoft's protocols will have to be opened - the equivelent here would be the protocols that cover WMP to server negotiations, I think. ----- Once Windows starts licensing their API for NetBEUI (Samba) filesharing it'll only be a matter of time until the lawyers argue that any filesharing which uses the SMB protocol is making use of the Microsoft filesharing API.
Chicken-egg argument? Absolutely. In court, however, Microsoft can afford to pay more lawyers to claim ownership of the chicken. Anyone who manufactures eggs must pay royalties to use the chicken API.
----- then they wouldn't be able to sell their wares in EU countries anymore ----- I doubt that the EU is going to be able to enforce this ruling. Distributors and retailers are still going to sell MS product. The EU can't put Guidos on every shipping dock.
Like the ruling about DVD copying. Best Buy still sells the DVD copying software.
It won't affect the Samba team but when MS braces it's monopoly to standardize a completely different file sharing API it will provide an avenue to sue the crap out of anyone that reverse engineers the new protocol because they will not have properly paid for the API specs.
Think about the DeCSS guy. He didn't use the actual code published in the patents but simply reversed engineered the "API" of DeCSS. Under this new EU ruling he wouldn't be guilty of infringing on DVD encryption but rather guilty of making use of something that wasn't properly licensed.
Perhaps that isn't a perfect example but, if you're thinking with a big corporate mentality, it's easy enough to see how this can be used to quash all competition.
----- then I guess someone will have to come up with something better than Samba and make it work with Windows ----- But it will only be legal if they have properly paid MS for the use of the filesystem API.
I also see this as a problem. Microsoft is considered anti-competive for withholding API specifications. The logical thing to do is to allow MS to charge for API specs?
So to avoid monopoly, MS will spin off "Windows Media Player Corp." (like Mozilla and Netscape) and develop two trees of code. The API specs for the media player will be set to be prohibitively expensive. Windows Media Player Corp will qualify for some ridiculous cut rate price on the API spec due to preexisting intellectual property or some such bull. Windows Media Player Corp. will be owned primarily by shareholders who also own controlling shares in Microsoft.
By allowing MS to charge for the API specs they will negate any competition by setting the price prohibitively high. By spinning off Windows Media Player Corp. they will be avoiding the "monopoly". By simple ownership MS will keep all the profit.
This changes the MS monopoly system how??? If anything it illustrates the existence of a collaborative monopoly... commonly referred to by the ignorant fools as a conspiracy theory.
Wow. You're an angry customer. You also think of the world in very simple terms defined by narrow lines which can never be crossed.
I never said that MS owned any part of Apple. I only said that MS loaned Apple some money. You're saying it was a payoff to drop patent infringement suits. In your world the patent infringement lawyers, and the monopoly lawyers, and the business practice lawyers all sit in their individual little cubes and don't talk to each other. In your world public relations people never leave out important details. In your world the reasons for CEOs to approve deals are always the same reasons that the local newspaper publishes.
If the real world were as simple as your world you wouldn't be so angry.
This explains much. I see counseling and thorazine, perhaps an aneurysm, in your future.
I'm going to be a devil's advocate. I agree that MS business practices are reprehensible but let's consider what it is about the US system of justice that makes it all work:
We can't sue Microsoft for theft of intellectual property unless the material was patented/copyrighted and MS used patented/copyrighted material in the production of their own products. Microsoft as a corporation can't steal a document. Only a person can steal a document. Those documents were obviously found in a filing cabinet which was used in the spare cubicle for newly hired employees. A vast majority of those people never stay for longer than two or three months. It's impossible to track where those documents came from. While Microsoft may have been housing questionable documents on their premises the presence of two or three questionable documents hardly tarnishes their reputation as a productive and valuable company.
Besides... if Go is already dead then it can't file any lawsuit against Microsoft. No public defender is going to stick up for a dead company. Case dismissed.
The people who run things now will need to adapt to account for the internet factor. Since the major backbones and ISPs all pay taxes and hold government issued business licenses I don't really see the internet changing much.
Apparently it gave Howard Rheingold an little bit of gratuitous fellatio. He got interviewed by businessweek. More back slapping for him around the office but meaningless for the average American.
The real impact will be the arguments that arise from those naive fools who are convinced that internet politics gives them any real voice and those enlightened fatalists who realize that it changes nothing. With a few poster children to maintain the illusion the debate could get to be pretty intense.
If so many ISPs may be moving towards TCPA compliant routers why don't we, the open source community, do the same thing in the opposite direction?
I would work on systems which support an ISP which supports only open source users. There is no customer support for anything but an open source OS. Your network connection fails and you use Windows? Too bad. Your network connection fails and you're using Linux? Check ifconfig and route. That's customer support. After that you're on your own. It's open source. Figure it out.
Sure the service itself wouldn't save each user much (maybe $2-$3 less per month) but think what it does to the network as a whole. No longer will ISPs be able to support a clueless user base by relying on the monthly tithe from the competent users. No longer will ISPs be able to afford the latest TCPA enabled hardware by leeching from the open source users. No longer will ISPs be able to sign overpriced agreements with MS support by using open source dollars.
All the better reason for us to begin starting Linux (and open source) focused ISPs now. If a competent business based on Linux users can be established early then the major backbone providers will begin to rely on open source compatibility to remain financially viable. As long as the open source dollars are mixed with Windows dollars we're really do nothing more than contributing to this sort of closed source spookshow junk.
Right now when Windows users cry for security the only option is to give it to them. If we can pull the Open Source dollars away from Windows users then Windows oriented ISPs will be forced to take a hardline approach to their users that cry. Linux oriented ISPs will have a lower bottom line because the open source users tend to be less vulnerable to long term exploits. I've seen many more Linux users willing to zero and reinstall their system based upon suspicious syslogs and odd system behavior. Windows users will happily use an ailing zombie box for years until it flat-out refuses to boot.
Perhaps they were successful as a QBASIC manufacturer but their Windows operating system never would've gotten the required boost if it weren't for lucrative government contracts.
I don't think anyone who was even remotely involved with signing the bottom line for the contracts ever deemed DOS to be useful product. The contract requirement was to have an OS on the hard drives. It was merely a matter of social connection to determine which OS manufacturer was gifted with the privelege.
If you value your hard earned tax dollars you should be concerned that this sort of thing happens. The positive aspect is that if you can cozy up to the politicians writing commode contracts then you can make lots of money on this sort of system. The negative aspect is that the politicians writing commode contracts don't typically cozy up with people unless they can afford expensive dinners and good vacation deals. It's this sort of thing that caused the 90s stock market boom and bust.
Build it up, milk it for all it's worth, and then leave the taxpayers/401k/social security contributors/average stock investor holding the steaming bag of poop.
A good portion of the startup capital for Microsoft came from large government contracts for hard drives which needed an installed OS. MS was subcontracted to license an OS for the drives. Large amounts of taxpayer dollars were funnelled into the MS coffers. If those hard drives had been fitted with VMS or *nix or OS/2 then MS might never have been given the startup capital to become the empire they are today.
Maybe it's an effort to isolate the OS community from the rest of the world. If linux users can't use the usual trusted computing networks then someone will set up an ISP which we can connect to. But they'll have less corporate support, and less money, and their network will be slower, and it will be plagued by script-kiddies running hacked Win systems and setting up DDoS attacks.
Isolate and destroy. It's the tactic used in the American office every day.
But is it really illegal? As others have touched on, is Intel required to fund Go just because Microsoft officials tell them not to in order to avoid a monopoly lawsuit? That seems to have been the point of Microsoft lending money to keep Apple up and running. It helps to have a competitor if one is trying to prove there's no monopoly.
Really the whole thing is silly. The gov't here in the US has a habit of doing this sort of thing: building up an industry empire and then tearing it down. To most of us it looks like a horrible cycle. To the people who know what company is next on the government launch list, however, it's a great way to invest and make millions.
If only I had known that AT&T would be propped up, and then known when it would be torn down. If only I had known that Bell would be propped up, and then known when it would be torn down. If only I had known that Microsoft and Intel would be propped up, and then known when they were going to be torn down.
There are lawmakers making deals with Wall Street people who _do_ know these things. They're the ones who are holding all of your 401k money.
----- Could you show me hard data that demonstrates your point? ----- There is no such thing as a free lunch. There is no such thing as free materials for a discount card. There is no such thing as a free receipt printer. There is no such thing as free coupon paper.
Yes. I do have the full picture. A store sells stuff, people complain about prices, store offers a discount program to assuage the customers. From a business standpoint it's nothing short of childish naivete to think that the discount program actually solves the price problem. It's a bandaid to get people to believe that their concerns have been solved.
The fact that it's become an institution only shows how gullible Americans are.
----- While our market is not completely free, it is telling that you feel that retailers should be forced to sell a thing for a specific cost regardless of customer. ----- I don't feel that way at all.
What bothers me is that the prices of the goods and services that I want are inflated to cover for all the neat and trendy gadgets, discount cards, targeted coupons, and useless bells and whistles that draw everyone elses attention.
People just don't get it. Every water-cooler yuppie likes to say,"If you were a member then you could have this neat little card which would allow you to save 5%." My point is, if water-cooler yuppies wouldn't set up their membership scams to assuage their psychological dysfunction brought about by their need for Viagra, then the products would all be 15% cheaper and we wouldn't have to pay the overhead that it takes to conduct the database maintenance to run the membership club.
I don't expect you to get it. If you're like the even the above average American mathematical systems which involve more than one system are beyond your grasp.
----- So it's okay for these entities to continuously rip people off, lie, cheat, but when it's done to them it's suddenly wrong? That's not how it works. ----- Unfortunately, yes, that _is_ how it works. It's not moral, ethical, or even legally right.
The fact of the matter is that people in powerful position protect each other and look out for each other's interests. The consumer always takes a load on the chin.
----- Sorry, but if the RIAA ever fuckin sued me, I wouldn't change my tune and go "Wow, I'll start buying CDs." ----- Obfuscate and blend. Tone the language down and let the energy flow into the posts. Don't explode. As long as the corporate execs and the dirty politicians can get an emotional response from you they can always be able to portray _you_ as the problem. Learn to relax.
You're right. The system is dirty and we are being taken advantage of. You're right. There are many many people even here on/. who will troll you for expressing your outrage at the inequities of those who've been elected to protect your rights. You're right. There is something horribly wrong with our society.
My privacy is worth more than the discounts? ----- No. I am not yet convinced that saving $0.05 per pound of peanuts is worth my time and effort to fill out the paperwork coupled with the possibility of a hidden scam. Additionally I _know_ that they will use my shopping habits to try and market coupons and new products to me. I don't want them to waste their time, money, or resources on that kind of research or the ink or the receipt printer capable of printing both sides because I'm perfectly capable of finding and choosing my own new products and preferred products. In that sense I'm self-reliant and the discount card is indeed trying to buy my self-reliance with an extra $0.45 off a gallon of milk (which I buy once every two months). And if I pay $0.50 more for a 12-pack of Charmin Ultra because I didn't sign up for their discount card then the only thing I'm losing out on is the water-cooler conversation of "I saved this on this and this and this and this and that."
My privacy is worth less than the cost of self-reliance? ----- Your pithy saying doesn't even make sense here. As I become more self-reliant I preserve my privacy. There is no need to sell privacy in order to obtain self-reliance. As I've shown above discount cards are infringing on both privacy and self-reliance at the same time. Comparison shopping is self-reliance. My current level of self-reliance with respect to beer, vegetables, tobacco, wine, and liquor has nothing to do with privacy. It's inhibited by inept politicians who've made it a FREEDOM vs. self-reliance issue. If I choose to be more self-reliant and brew my own beer I risk losing my freedom if I make too much.
I don't see how any of this is affected by better choices about where I live. Where I live isn't my choice when 99% of it is dictated by finances. Which comes back around to the self-reliance aspect. I would be in a much better position to increase my personal financial health if legilators hadn't made a freedom issue out of it. Privacy isn't even a factor here.
Don't blame capitalism. The same thing happens under communism or even in a barter and trade society.
I really have no problem with businesses being able to charge anyone anything at anytime. The problem that I have is with the government using taxpayer dollars to selectively fund ventures which benefit only a small segment of the population. No, I can't prove it, and no, I don't have the budgeting account numbers for you but yes, the majority of the tax dollars from a majority of the people are going to fund lucrative businesses which benefit a significant minority.
Unless you count communism as a form of heavily regulated capitalism with carefully controlled distribution, our system is certainly NOT capitalism.
Slashdot Mirror
Legal disclaimers do not preempt basic human rights and ethics.
Well... okay... in today's America they do. Let me rephrase that.
Legal disclaims SHOULDN'T preempt basic human rights and ethics.
Point A could be legitimate user space programs stored in a physical location on a memory chip, point B could be the legitimate PCI bus holding the network card. Wouldn't spyware, from an electronics viewpoint, be between Points A and B?
Just because you sign a policy agreeing to slavery doesn't make it legal or ethical.
Every single person who uses the excuse "I can play God because you signed the policy agreement" should be bludgeoned to a pulp with wet noodles.
Why wet noodles? It'll take longer to achieve the pulp stage and sting more.
-----
The real smart ones stay on and become graduate students and the smarter ones again become TFs
-----
You're ignoring the financial aspect. The "real smart ones" that don't have enough financial backing to shield them from the demands of modern life go on to get boring jobs.
Oh wait. If you're at an Ivy League school you're inundated with yuppie brats who don't need to worry about the financial backing that it takes to tread water in everyday life.
Okay. Your point about couch potatoes is probably 99.998% true in your environment.
-----
My favorite anecdote, if one could be said to stand out, comes from a film maker documenting an opera company. When the camera caught a snippet of the stagehands watching the Simpsons with the sound turned down, the director wanted to add a four-second clip to the movie. Matt Groening said "Yes." The lawyers said it was clearly fair use. But Fox's executives responded with the kind of obscenity that doesn't upset the FCC: pay us $10,000. The clip didn't make the film because the director couldn't afford to go head-to-head with the Fox legal department
-----
And that, folks, is just how it's going to be done.
-----
but aren't Windows APIs something that you use when writing code to run on Windows?
-----
That's what I'm afraid that the lawyers will gloss over when presenting their case to judges who don't know a transistor from a hole in the head.
I'm afraid that Windows APIs will come to encompass anything written to work _with_ Windows, not just on Windows. This will probably come to include file formats and transmission protocols. In the most extreme court case I can almost see Windows claiming ownership of TCP/IP.
-----
Oh, and Samba doesn't _use_ any Windows API's. It uses the SMB protocol, and I've not seen anyone claim that Microsoft's protocols will have to be opened - the equivelent here would be the protocols that cover WMP to server negotiations, I think.
-----
Once Windows starts licensing their API for NetBEUI (Samba) filesharing it'll only be a matter of time until the lawyers argue that any filesharing which uses the SMB protocol is making use of the Microsoft filesharing API.
Chicken-egg argument? Absolutely. In court, however, Microsoft can afford to pay more lawyers to claim ownership of the chicken. Anyone who manufactures eggs must pay royalties to use the chicken API.
-----
then they wouldn't be able to sell their wares in EU countries anymore
-----
I doubt that the EU is going to be able to enforce this ruling. Distributors and retailers are still going to sell MS product. The EU can't put Guidos on every shipping dock.
Like the ruling about DVD copying. Best Buy still sells the DVD copying software.
It won't affect the Samba team but when MS braces it's monopoly to standardize a completely different file sharing API it will provide an avenue to sue the crap out of anyone that reverse engineers the new protocol because they will not have properly paid for the API specs.
Think about the DeCSS guy. He didn't use the actual code published in the patents but simply reversed engineered the "API" of DeCSS. Under this new EU ruling he wouldn't be guilty of infringing on DVD encryption but rather guilty of making use of something that wasn't properly licensed.
Perhaps that isn't a perfect example but, if you're thinking with a big corporate mentality, it's easy enough to see how this can be used to quash all competition.
-----
then I guess someone will have to come up with something better than Samba and make it work with Windows
-----
But it will only be legal if they have properly paid MS for the use of the filesystem API.
We're screwed.
I also see this as a problem. Microsoft is considered anti-competive for withholding API specifications. The logical thing to do is to allow MS to charge for API specs?
So to avoid monopoly, MS will spin off "Windows Media Player Corp." (like Mozilla and Netscape) and develop two trees of code. The API specs for the media player will be set to be prohibitively expensive. Windows Media Player Corp will qualify for some ridiculous cut rate price on the API spec due to preexisting intellectual property or some such bull. Windows Media Player Corp. will be owned primarily by shareholders who also own controlling shares in Microsoft.
By allowing MS to charge for the API specs they will negate any competition by setting the price prohibitively high. By spinning off Windows Media Player Corp. they will be avoiding the "monopoly". By simple ownership MS will keep all the profit.
This changes the MS monopoly system how??? If anything it illustrates the existence of a collaborative monopoly... commonly referred to by the ignorant fools as a conspiracy theory.
Wow. You're an angry customer. You also think of the world in very simple terms defined by narrow lines which can never be crossed.
I never said that MS owned any part of Apple. I only said that MS loaned Apple some money. You're saying it was a payoff to drop patent infringement suits. In your world the patent infringement lawyers, and the monopoly lawyers, and the business practice lawyers all sit in their individual little cubes and don't talk to each other. In your world public relations people never leave out important details. In your world the reasons for CEOs to approve deals are always the same reasons that the local newspaper publishes.
If the real world were as simple as your world you wouldn't be so angry.
This explains much. I see counseling and thorazine, perhaps an aneurysm, in your future.
I'm going to be a devil's advocate. I agree that MS business practices are reprehensible but let's consider what it is about the US system of justice that makes it all work:
We can't sue Microsoft for theft of intellectual property unless the material was patented/copyrighted and MS used patented/copyrighted material in the production of their own products. Microsoft as a corporation can't steal a document. Only a person can steal a document. Those documents were obviously found in a filing cabinet which was used in the spare cubicle for newly hired employees. A vast majority of those people never stay for longer than two or three months. It's impossible to track where those documents came from. While Microsoft may have been housing questionable documents on their premises the presence of two or three questionable documents hardly tarnishes their reputation as a productive and valuable company.
Besides... if Go is already dead then it can't file any lawsuit against Microsoft. No public defender is going to stick up for a dead company. Case dismissed.
The people who run things now will need to adapt to account for the internet factor. Since the major backbones and ISPs all pay taxes and hold government issued business licenses I don't really see the internet changing much.
Apparently it gave Howard Rheingold an little bit of gratuitous fellatio. He got interviewed by businessweek. More back slapping for him around the office but meaningless for the average American.
The real impact will be the arguments that arise from those naive fools who are convinced that internet politics gives them any real voice and those enlightened fatalists who realize that it changes nothing. With a few poster children to maintain the illusion the debate could get to be pretty intense.
If so many ISPs may be moving towards TCPA compliant routers why don't we, the open source community, do the same thing in the opposite direction?
I would work on systems which support an ISP which supports only open source users. There is no customer support for anything but an open source OS. Your network connection fails and you use Windows? Too bad. Your network connection fails and you're using Linux? Check ifconfig and route. That's customer support. After that you're on your own. It's open source. Figure it out.
Sure the service itself wouldn't save each user much (maybe $2-$3 less per month) but think what it does to the network as a whole. No longer will ISPs be able to support a clueless user base by relying on the monthly tithe from the competent users. No longer will ISPs be able to afford the latest TCPA enabled hardware by leeching from the open source users. No longer will ISPs be able to sign overpriced agreements with MS support by using open source dollars.
And one could have email@opensourcenetwork.net
All the better reason for us to begin starting Linux (and open source) focused ISPs now. If a competent business based on Linux users can be established early then the major backbone providers will begin to rely on open source compatibility to remain financially viable. As long as the open source dollars are mixed with Windows dollars we're really do nothing more than contributing to this sort of closed source spookshow junk.
Right now when Windows users cry for security the only option is to give it to them. If we can pull the Open Source dollars away from Windows users then Windows oriented ISPs will be forced to take a hardline approach to their users that cry. Linux oriented ISPs will have a lower bottom line because the open source users tend to be less vulnerable to long term exploits. I've seen many more Linux users willing to zero and reinstall their system based upon suspicious syslogs and odd system behavior. Windows users will happily use an ailing zombie box for years until it flat-out refuses to boot.
Perhaps they were successful as a QBASIC manufacturer but their Windows operating system never would've gotten the required boost if it weren't for lucrative government contracts.
I don't think anyone who was even remotely involved with signing the bottom line for the contracts ever deemed DOS to be useful product. The contract requirement was to have an OS on the hard drives. It was merely a matter of social connection to determine which OS manufacturer was gifted with the privelege.
If you value your hard earned tax dollars you should be concerned that this sort of thing happens. The positive aspect is that if you can cozy up to the politicians writing commode contracts then you can make lots of money on this sort of system. The negative aspect is that the politicians writing commode contracts don't typically cozy up with people unless they can afford expensive dinners and good vacation deals. It's this sort of thing that caused the 90s stock market boom and bust.
Build it up, milk it for all it's worth, and then leave the taxpayers/401k/social security contributors/average stock investor holding the steaming bag of poop.
You really don't think much, do you?
A good portion of the startup capital for Microsoft came from large government contracts for hard drives which needed an installed OS. MS was subcontracted to license an OS for the drives. Large amounts of taxpayer dollars were funnelled into the MS coffers. If those hard drives had been fitted with VMS or *nix or OS/2 then MS might never have been given the startup capital to become the empire they are today.
Maybe it's an effort to isolate the OS community from the rest of the world. If linux users can't use the usual trusted computing networks then someone will set up an ISP which we can connect to. But they'll have less corporate support, and less money, and their network will be slower, and it will be plagued by script-kiddies running hacked Win systems and setting up DDoS attacks.
Isolate and destroy. It's the tactic used in the American office every day.
It certainly is anticompetitive behavior.
But is it really illegal? As others have touched on, is Intel required to fund Go just because Microsoft officials tell them not to in order to avoid a monopoly lawsuit? That seems to have been the point of Microsoft lending money to keep Apple up and running. It helps to have a competitor if one is trying to prove there's no monopoly.
Really the whole thing is silly. The gov't here in the US has a habit of doing this sort of thing: building up an industry empire and then tearing it down. To most of us it looks like a horrible cycle. To the people who know what company is next on the government launch list, however, it's a great way to invest and make millions.
If only I had known that AT&T would be propped up, and then known when it would be torn down.
If only I had known that Bell would be propped up, and then known when it would be torn down.
If only I had known that Microsoft and Intel would be propped up, and then known when they were going to be torn down.
There are lawmakers making deals with Wall Street people who _do_ know these things. They're the ones who are holding all of your 401k money.
-----
Could you show me hard data that demonstrates your point?
-----
There is no such thing as a free lunch.
There is no such thing as free materials for a discount card.
There is no such thing as a free receipt printer.
There is no such thing as free coupon paper.
Yes. I do have the full picture. A store sells stuff, people complain about prices, store offers a discount program to assuage the customers. From a business standpoint it's nothing short of childish naivete to think that the discount program actually solves the price problem. It's a bandaid to get people to believe that their concerns have been solved.
The fact that it's become an institution only shows how gullible Americans are.
-----
While our market is not completely free, it is telling that you feel that retailers should be forced to sell a thing for a specific cost regardless of customer.
-----
I don't feel that way at all.
What bothers me is that the prices of the goods and services that I want are inflated to cover for all the neat and trendy gadgets, discount cards, targeted coupons, and useless bells and whistles that draw everyone elses attention.
People just don't get it. Every water-cooler yuppie likes to say,"If you were a member then you could have this neat little card which would allow you to save 5%." My point is, if water-cooler yuppies wouldn't set up their membership scams to assuage their psychological dysfunction brought about by their need for Viagra, then the products would all be 15% cheaper and we wouldn't have to pay the overhead that it takes to conduct the database maintenance to run the membership club.
I don't expect you to get it. If you're like the even the above average American mathematical systems which involve more than one system are beyond your grasp.
-----
/. who will troll you for expressing your outrage at the inequities of those who've been elected to protect your rights. You're right. There is something horribly wrong with our society.
So it's okay for these entities to continuously rip people off, lie, cheat, but when it's done to them it's suddenly wrong? That's not how it works.
-----
Unfortunately, yes, that _is_ how it works. It's not moral, ethical, or even legally right.
The fact of the matter is that people in powerful position protect each other and look out for each other's interests. The consumer always takes a load on the chin.
-----
Sorry, but if the RIAA ever fuckin sued me, I wouldn't change my tune and go "Wow, I'll start buying CDs."
-----
Obfuscate and blend. Tone the language down and let the energy flow into the posts. Don't explode. As long as the corporate execs and the dirty politicians can get an emotional response from you they can always be able to portray _you_ as the problem. Learn to relax.
You're right. The system is dirty and we are being taken advantage of. You're right. There are many many people even here on
Stay low and wait for opportunity.
A pithy saying proves nothing.
My privacy is worth more than the discounts?
-----
No. I am not yet convinced that saving $0.05 per pound of peanuts is worth my time and effort to fill out the paperwork coupled with the possibility of a hidden scam. Additionally I _know_ that they will use my shopping habits to try and market coupons and new products to me. I don't want them to waste their time, money, or resources on that kind of research or the ink or the receipt printer capable of printing both sides because I'm perfectly capable of finding and choosing my own new products and preferred products. In that sense I'm self-reliant and the discount card is indeed trying to buy my self-reliance with an extra $0.45 off a gallon of milk (which I buy once every two months). And if I pay $0.50 more for a 12-pack of Charmin Ultra because I didn't sign up for their discount card then the only thing I'm losing out on is the water-cooler conversation of "I saved this on this and this and this and this and that."
My privacy is worth less than the cost of self-reliance?
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Your pithy saying doesn't even make sense here. As I become more self-reliant I preserve my privacy. There is no need to sell privacy in order to obtain self-reliance. As I've shown above discount cards are infringing on both privacy and self-reliance at the same time. Comparison shopping is self-reliance. My current level of self-reliance with respect to beer, vegetables, tobacco, wine, and liquor has nothing to do with privacy. It's inhibited by inept politicians who've made it a FREEDOM vs. self-reliance issue. If I choose to be more self-reliant and brew my own beer I risk losing my freedom if I make too much.
I don't see how any of this is affected by better choices about where I live. Where I live isn't my choice when 99% of it is dictated by finances. Which comes back around to the self-reliance aspect. I would be in a much better position to increase my personal financial health if legilators hadn't made a freedom issue out of it. Privacy isn't even a factor here.
Don't blame capitalism. The same thing happens under communism or even in a barter and trade society.
I really have no problem with businesses being able to charge anyone anything at anytime. The problem that I have is with the government using taxpayer dollars to selectively fund ventures which benefit only a small segment of the population. No, I can't prove it, and no, I don't have the budgeting account numbers for you but yes, the majority of the tax dollars from a majority of the people are going to fund lucrative businesses which benefit a significant minority.
Unless you count communism as a form of heavily regulated capitalism with carefully controlled distribution, our system is certainly NOT capitalism.