Also this guy used to be in the Justice department until the changing of the guard in 2001. I wonder if the RIAA was as worried about hiring a firm that employed a pro-civil-rights lawyer, as alarmists are now that he's back in the Justice department...
Under the rules they already had, they can actually apply for a warrant up to (I think) 48 hours after they perform the wire tap. And the success rate in asking for a warrant is somewhere around 100%. Warrantless wiretapping is about being terrified of ever letting even a Federal judge know what's going on, even after the wiretap has been performed.
I'm pretty sure there are more varieties of mudkips in Spore, than there are varieties of real amphibians on earth;) And btw my mudkip is the best, a random person said so in my comments page!
The tool he mentions isn't online activation, it is patent trolling. MS loves it. They published the spec for FAT and encouraged everybody to use it, and waited over a decade, mere months before it would expire, before going out and suing everybody because FAT was patented. And I do hope they bury Blizzard next, after Blizzard got a ruling that, contrary to the wording of the Copyright Act, it is illegal for your computer to copy a binary from HD to memory without a license, and therefore if you violate their EULA, running the program is copyright violation.
Not true! ARPANET was designed as it was because there were only a few super computing sites at the time, and they were separated by quite a bit. The redundancy comes in to play only because they didn't want to lose important access if a router broke somewhere, as they are wont to do. All it was designed for was to survive a single point of failure. But even that is distorted. Just because ARPANET was designed that way decades ago, doesn't mean that large corporations decided to keep with that philosophy when they took over!
They are not appropriated, they are licensed. Since it's not an exclusive license, the only thing preventing you from getting one yourself is the reluctance of the publishers to let others use their precious IP. Though since they agreed to this license with google, they may not be so reluctant after all.
You mean just scanning 7 million of them and putting them online, then getting sued, and throwing enough lawyers at all the publishers to get a settlement where you don't allow in-print works to be accessed, and in exchange they grant you a license for all out-of-print works? That "same way that Google did"?
No, the implication is that Google has an exclusive right to these books now. And they don't, depending on how you turn the phrase. In the sense that nobody else is ever allowed to get a license, no, it's not exclusive. In the sense that nobody else DOES have one, then yes, it's exclusive. There is something stopping another entity from creating their own anthology: The fact that Google has a license now, and nobody else does.;) Google threw a lot of lawyers and money at the publishers to get this settlement package. Not everybody can do that to a team of large corporations.
You misunderstand. Google started scanning all sorts of books, out of print and otherwise, and making them searchable. Publishers sued. Rather than go to court, Google settled. Part of the settlement package is that Google gets rights to all of these publishers orphaned works, and I think in exchange they don't let you search in-print text, or at least, they don't let you see the surrounding text, just give you a line and page number? What's preventing others from doing the same is that first you have to scan millions of books BEFORE YOU GET THE LICENSE, then get sued, then throw enough lawyers at the publisher to get them to settle and give you a blanket license to all of their out of print works...
I'm not attacking religion, I'm attacking evolution as understood by fools. Nothing says a mutation has to be beneficial. You think the C gene is somehow harmful. Rodents have it. But they still have to eat more than their entire body weight per day of most kinds of fruit and berries, before it builds up to kidney harming levels. (I say most because rose hips contain a hell of a lot, 20 times what you'll find in a guava, and 40 times that of an orange). Ethics prevents them from testing this on people, of course, but there's no reason to believe our kidneys are more vulnerable to strain from vitamin C, than a rat's.
You see, the OP said that people who dislike creationism just haven't read the literature. I have. It says that evolutionary steps can only happen if a gene is beneficial. You misread my snark, apparently. Your point is exactly correct. It doesn't SEEM beneficial now. It was before, or at least, it wasn't harmful when it happened and became widespread. (I still doubt it was actually beneficial). Sickle cell anemia is a harmful genetic mutation. It cuts life expectancy in half. Because so what if you die before you're 50, you aren't still breeding by 50 anyway. It has other complications, too. None are particularly terrible, from an evolutionary point of view. Certainly bad to live with, but not so bad for the species. So it causes little harm in an evolutionary sense, since you're fit enough to survive still, and live more than long enough to have children. And anybody who has only one of the two alleles won't have any problems, since its recessive, and have the added benefit of being resistant to malaria, something that's still useful now! Vitamin C is a good example of neutral drift. Sickle cell anemia is an example of a beneficial gene with side effects people don't like, but overall increases the viability of the species in malaria prone areas, even if it sucks for people who get two copies of the gene.
The issue is people have turned it into a religious debate. It's mostly because people who claim to be evolutionists, don't understand evolution at all, and they have turned it into a religion of their own. They think evolution is some kind of divine force that makes organisms better, or something. That is what I mean by divine evolution. Not what creationists believe, but what their apparent opponents believe. This is actually the best way to reconcile evolution and religion, actually. By saying that evolution is the mechanism through which God guides creation. And if it's not always apparently useful, that's because you cannot truly comprehend God's will. BUT! That's not science. I don't object to religious people giving religious reasons for science. After all, science is about finding out what the rules of the universe are. Religion and philosophy are about explaining why the rules are, and why the universe is. Neither should try to do the other's job. And ID is about religion trying to do science's job. Teachers are trying to say that science has shown the universe is 10,000 years old, and that evolution is impossible. That's not religion being religion, its religion pretending to be science.
Yeah, always like that. In interviews he talked about how your Creature in B&W would observe you, and learn behavior. It actually "learns" like a Furby learns. It has a preprogrammed progression. It sees you cast a spell, now it knows it and uses it in a pre-programmed way. If you cast rain just to make it rain on some dude for fun, your creature will NEVER do that, it will ONLY use it to put out fires. Just a couple of binary flags turning on pre-programmed behaviors, and he acted like it was revolutionary AI and actually able to learn from you and mimic your actions.
They were actually wearing bras and panties in the picture in question, so not even nudity is required. However, should the pose in a bikini for a swimwear catalog, even though they may be equally or even less clothed, that would be fine, because a pink spandex bra with a floral print is less sexual than a white cotton bra. On the other hand, go rent The Secret Garden. There's a nude prepubescent girl in there, being bathed by an ADULT. Easily 4 times as "child porney" as this picture of some girls in underwear, but its considered a classic film! Oh, don't forget to turn yourself in after renting it though. If the feds are browsing your renting habits and see child porn, you'll get a jackbooted raid, and no guarantee everybody in your household will survive. Mistakes are made when angry yelling guys with automatic rifles kick in your door without prior warning and point their guns at your children.
Naw, a judge has already ruled that a hacker from across state lines could break into your computer, so even possession gives the Feds jurisdiction. Thus, mere possession == distribution across state lines. In Florida two 16 year olds were tried as adults and convicted of distribution of child porn, even though it never left their computers, because it COULD have.
Actually, that's the only reason. It's illegal to protect children from abuse. That's why the Supreme Court tossed out laws against fake child porn, because no child was harmed. It would only be illegal for you to distribute them because showboating DAs want to show off how hard they are on pedophiles by executing you for having pictures of yourself naked. It's actually extraordinarily contrary to the laws as written, which fall all over themselves saying how these laws are there to protect children from being abused.
It's not a chance, it's a certainty. It already happened in Florida. A teenage couple both were tried as adults and convicted. Of distribution, not just possession. The judge ruled that although they were on their computers only, a hacker could break in and steal the pictures, and therefore not distributing them is no defense against a distribution charge. Charges against 16 year olds will often end up sealed. A showboating DA up for reelection can't use them to show how hard on evildoers he is, so he absolutely will try them as adults. And while he's trying them as adults "due to the heinous nature of child abuse", he will simultaneously be saying that you have to give a 10 year sentence to children, and put them on a sex offender list for life, otherwise they'll think they can just take nude pics of themselves, and never realize it can ruin their lives. Thus, he has the moral obligation, however distasteful, of ruining their lives utterly, as a warning to others. I'm sure if these were pictures of girls having sex (thus showing two way mutual rape) rather than just pictures of 16 year olds wearing towels or bras, he'd be pushing for them all to be executed (since child rape is a capital offense, at least in some states). The Florida DA LITERALLY said that teens taking nude pics could have their camera stolen, then their pics on the internet, then later in a job interview they could not get the job because the interviewer saw them naked on the internet. And that's why he HAD to push for a 10 year sentance and putting them on the sex offender list for life, to protect them from such hardships later in life. This way, once they are out of jail in 2016, they'll have no problem getting a job unless their prospective employer sees that 10 year stint in prison, or sees the fact that they are a registered sex offender! But he won't have seen them naked, so they're still better off.
Yes I've read their jokes they (and YOU) think are science. They amount to proof by lack of example. They essentially boil down to "2 is not the square root of nine, therefore 9 has no square root". Some fool said some things cannot evolve because he can't think of a useful intermediate step. This is hilarious for two reasons. First, because basically all creationists are putting absolute faith in this persons godlike infallibility. And second, because nothing MAKES mutations that survive and propagate be beneficial. Consider Vitamin C. You may know it from orange juice. People can't make it. Primates in general can't make it! Cats can, those smug little bastards. But, people are more advanced, so we should have everything a cat does, right? Wrong! In general anyways, but not in this case, because humans, like all primates, DO have the gene to create vitmain C right here inside our very own bodies. But a random mutation broke that gene. You can see the gene sitting right there, just like it does in cats. But its all broked. It's weird, right? DIVINE EVOLUTION should not have allowed it to break, since its a beneficial gene to have! Only nothing makes stuff happen, it just happens. Primates eat fucking FRUIT all day. Not a single primate got sick when some weird mutant monkey started spreading his broken vitamin C gene around, because they all got plenty from Bananans and berries and such! In fact, maybe their kidneys were happy about it. A creationists favorite example is the mouse trap. They like to parrot their infallible and omnipotent leader (he must be since the whole argument is that since he can't think of a way, no way can exist). He says a modern mouse trap cannot have evolved from a more simple version. As I've said, no rule says that every evolutionary step must be an improvement. Steps backwards are even allowed, if they are not completely fatal prior to breeding age. Even using his stupid rules of only improvements allowed, you can in fact evolve a modern mouse trap from a primitive cartoon mousetrap consisting of a box with cheese in it, held up by a stick with a string tied to it. Step 1. Stick stick to cheese. No string needed anymore, and its now automated. Step 2, but it on a base with lips so the box can't move once closed (harder to escape now). Step 3, hinge the box and base, so the box always lands square. Step 4. Replace the stick directly holding the box up, with a stick holding a latch. That way the stick is more easily disturbed, since it doesn't have a weight on it. Step 5, replace the stick with a pressure plate, so the mouse is more likely to pull the latch free when eating. Step 6, put a spring in the hinge so the box closes much faster. Step 7, replace the box with a single plank that squishes the mouse dead. Step 7, replace the plank with a wire hammer, so all the force is applied to a much smaller surface area of the mouse. Ta da!
Not in this case, but in Florida two teens were both tried as adults and convicted of producing child pornography, distributing child pornography, and possession of child pornography. They were tried as adults because child porn is such a heinous crime. This was many years ago. They're still in prison. When they get out, they are both on the sex offenders list as pedophiles. Yes, the court ruled that having the pictures on your computer is distribution, because a hacker could break in to your computer and steal them.
That's actually an awesome ruling. It said that because a hacker can break into their email accounts and copy the photos, they have no expectation of privacy. Essentially, they ruled that there is no such thing as private information. Is your credit card information private? Hell no, a hacker could break into your bank, or any store you've patronized, and steal your number there. Thus, its not private information, and this no crime has been committed in obtaining it!
Sounds like it works in a fairly simple way. The game and the Impulse stuff is encrypted. Its probably encrypted using a key unique to that copy. When you run it, it checks your registry for a decryption key. If its not there, you have to enter your e-mail address and register it with them. Once you have done so, your computer can decrypt and play the game. So you can fake this step, but without the key, what good does it do you? None! Of course, you can spread that key around with the copy, but they'll know whose it is! And it might take some effort, so only dedicated pirates would do it in the first place.
I think this plan is great, if it works.
DRM annoys people for several reasons. First, it forces you to be online for offline games. This doesn't totally negate that concern, but you only need it for like 30 seconds when you first install the game. Balanced against the fact that you don't need the CD in to play, unlike almost all other games, its a fair tradeoff. Few people not only don't have internet, but also don't know anybody with internet. Plus it sounds like this scheme is mostly for games downloaded online, so since you have to have internet to buy it, this is a completely moot point anyways. The second concern is that it doesn't let you make backup copies, or install it on multiple systems. (See Spore, etc.) Again, this problem is negated. You can install using this system, on any number of systems. You just need your e-mail address and password. If its like their existing Impulse stuff, you can just copy the folder and the registry keys, and don't even need to re-register it online to play. So backups are easy also. The third issue with game DRM is that you can't sell a game when you get bored with it. Again, this is not the case here. They say you can unregister your e-mail, so its no longer associated with that game's serial number. Now when you sell it, the new owner can register online just like it was newly purchased. In fact, since you can have multiple copies, and they never go online after the initial registration, you can probably sell your copy and still play the copies you installed already! You won't be able to submit scores online, or download patches, but you can still play. (This is illegal btw, the Copyright Act states you must destroy all backups and installed copies of software once you transfer ownership of the original). The only way they could get around this is if you have to go to each machine and deactivate each copy, before it is fully deregistered. This would be impossible if you ever had a HD crash or a laptop stolen, so I doubt they'd do this! The final issue is that if the company goes under, you can't play your old games anymore. The article is vague about that, but seems to imply that registration happens through whichever service you buy the game from, but can use any service that uses this scheme. So if you buy it from iTunes new games section, that goes under, it would still be able to authenticae through Stardock, or Amazon, or Steam, or Direct2Drive (assuming they sell games using this scheme). If Stardock goes under? I dunno. I'd hope that all those places would still support it. As long as one still exists, it sounds like this will continue to function, though I'm not sure how it could work if its not centralized in some way...
But you're right, you could share your serial number and decryption key around when you distribute your pirate copy. It'll trace back to your e-mail, and probably stop there. Stardock knows this, I'm sure. Because, like us, they know you can't stop pirates. If it runs, it will be pirated. Even if it always phones home, you can patch that out and fake the phone home. So they aren't bothering. They're stopping casual pirates. Dedicated pirate teams will easily get around this and there will be pirate copies galore. Since this is true regardless of how draconian a scheme they come up with, they aren't bothering at all. On the other hand, without a valid e-mail and serial #, you can'
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Also this guy used to be in the Justice department until the changing of the guard in 2001. I wonder if the RIAA was as worried about hiring a firm that employed a pro-civil-rights lawyer, as alarmists are now that he's back in the Justice department...
Under the rules they already had, they can actually apply for a warrant up to (I think) 48 hours after they perform the wire tap. And the success rate in asking for a warrant is somewhere around 100%. Warrantless wiretapping is about being terrified of ever letting even a Federal judge know what's going on, even after the wiretap has been performed.
I'm pretty sure there are more varieties of mudkips in Spore, than there are varieties of real amphibians on earth ;) And btw my mudkip is the best, a random person said so in my comments page!
The tool he mentions isn't online activation, it is patent trolling. MS loves it. They published the spec for FAT and encouraged everybody to use it, and waited over a decade, mere months before it would expire, before going out and suing everybody because FAT was patented. And I do hope they bury Blizzard next, after Blizzard got a ruling that, contrary to the wording of the Copyright Act, it is illegal for your computer to copy a binary from HD to memory without a license, and therefore if you violate their EULA, running the program is copyright violation.
Not true! ARPANET was designed as it was because there were only a few super computing sites at the time, and they were separated by quite a bit. The redundancy comes in to play only because they didn't want to lose important access if a router broke somewhere, as they are wont to do. All it was designed for was to survive a single point of failure. But even that is distorted. Just because ARPANET was designed that way decades ago, doesn't mean that large corporations decided to keep with that philosophy when they took over!
They are not appropriated, they are licensed. Since it's not an exclusive license, the only thing preventing you from getting one yourself is the reluctance of the publishers to let others use their precious IP. Though since they agreed to this license with google, they may not be so reluctant after all.
You mean just scanning 7 million of them and putting them online, then getting sued, and throwing enough lawyers at all the publishers to get a settlement where you don't allow in-print works to be accessed, and in exchange they grant you a license for all out-of-print works? That "same way that Google did"?
No, the implication is that Google has an exclusive right to these books now. And they don't, depending on how you turn the phrase. In the sense that nobody else is ever allowed to get a license, no, it's not exclusive. In the sense that nobody else DOES have one, then yes, it's exclusive. There is something stopping another entity from creating their own anthology: The fact that Google has a license now, and nobody else does. ;) Google threw a lot of lawyers and money at the publishers to get this settlement package. Not everybody can do that to a team of large corporations.
You misunderstand. Google started scanning all sorts of books, out of print and otherwise, and making them searchable. Publishers sued. Rather than go to court, Google settled. Part of the settlement package is that Google gets rights to all of these publishers orphaned works, and I think in exchange they don't let you search in-print text, or at least, they don't let you see the surrounding text, just give you a line and page number? What's preventing others from doing the same is that first you have to scan millions of books BEFORE YOU GET THE LICENSE, then get sued, then throw enough lawyers at the publisher to get them to settle and give you a blanket license to all of their out of print works...
I'm not attacking religion, I'm attacking evolution as understood by fools. Nothing says a mutation has to be beneficial. You think the C gene is somehow harmful. Rodents have it. But they still have to eat more than their entire body weight per day of most kinds of fruit and berries, before it builds up to kidney harming levels. (I say most because rose hips contain a hell of a lot, 20 times what you'll find in a guava, and 40 times that of an orange). Ethics prevents them from testing this on people, of course, but there's no reason to believe our kidneys are more vulnerable to strain from vitamin C, than a rat's.
You see, the OP said that people who dislike creationism just haven't read the literature. I have. It says that evolutionary steps can only happen if a gene is beneficial. You misread my snark, apparently. Your point is exactly correct. It doesn't SEEM beneficial now. It was before, or at least, it wasn't harmful when it happened and became widespread. (I still doubt it was actually beneficial). Sickle cell anemia is a harmful genetic mutation. It cuts life expectancy in half. Because so what if you die before you're 50, you aren't still breeding by 50 anyway. It has other complications, too. None are particularly terrible, from an evolutionary point of view. Certainly bad to live with, but not so bad for the species. So it causes little harm in an evolutionary sense, since you're fit enough to survive still, and live more than long enough to have children. And anybody who has only one of the two alleles won't have any problems, since its recessive, and have the added benefit of being resistant to malaria, something that's still useful now! Vitamin C is a good example of neutral drift. Sickle cell anemia is an example of a beneficial gene with side effects people don't like, but overall increases the viability of the species in malaria prone areas, even if it sucks for people who get two copies of the gene.
The issue is people have turned it into a religious debate. It's mostly because people who claim to be evolutionists, don't understand evolution at all, and they have turned it into a religion of their own. They think evolution is some kind of divine force that makes organisms better, or something. That is what I mean by divine evolution. Not what creationists believe, but what their apparent opponents believe. This is actually the best way to reconcile evolution and religion, actually. By saying that evolution is the mechanism through which God guides creation. And if it's not always apparently useful, that's because you cannot truly comprehend God's will. BUT! That's not science. I don't object to religious people giving religious reasons for science. After all, science is about finding out what the rules of the universe are. Religion and philosophy are about explaining why the rules are, and why the universe is. Neither should try to do the other's job. And ID is about religion trying to do science's job. Teachers are trying to say that science has shown the universe is 10,000 years old, and that evolution is impossible. That's not religion being religion, its religion pretending to be science.
I thought he sounded positive. He was bragging about how you can get all the top 10 movies in seconds, and not have to even go outside ;)
So if I post reviews on by blog, I'm allowed to pirate anything I want? I just have to review it?
But the MPAA said pirates and terrorists are the same thing!
Yeah, always like that. In interviews he talked about how your Creature in B&W would observe you, and learn behavior. It actually "learns" like a Furby learns. It has a preprogrammed progression. It sees you cast a spell, now it knows it and uses it in a pre-programmed way. If you cast rain just to make it rain on some dude for fun, your creature will NEVER do that, it will ONLY use it to put out fires. Just a couple of binary flags turning on pre-programmed behaviors, and he acted like it was revolutionary AI and actually able to learn from you and mimic your actions.
The author accidentally a whole adjective, is this dangerous?
"...entirely new analysis..." makes sense to me.
They were actually wearing bras and panties in the picture in question, so not even nudity is required. However, should the pose in a bikini for a swimwear catalog, even though they may be equally or even less clothed, that would be fine, because a pink spandex bra with a floral print is less sexual than a white cotton bra. On the other hand, go rent The Secret Garden. There's a nude prepubescent girl in there, being bathed by an ADULT. Easily 4 times as "child porney" as this picture of some girls in underwear, but its considered a classic film! Oh, don't forget to turn yourself in after renting it though. If the feds are browsing your renting habits and see child porn, you'll get a jackbooted raid, and no guarantee everybody in your household will survive. Mistakes are made when angry yelling guys with automatic rifles kick in your door without prior warning and point their guns at your children.
Naw, a judge has already ruled that a hacker from across state lines could break into your computer, so even possession gives the Feds jurisdiction. Thus, mere possession == distribution across state lines. In Florida two 16 year olds were tried as adults and convicted of distribution of child porn, even though it never left their computers, because it COULD have.
They aren't actually nude, they are wearing bras.
Actually, that's the only reason. It's illegal to protect children from abuse. That's why the Supreme Court tossed out laws against fake child porn, because no child was harmed. It would only be illegal for you to distribute them because showboating DAs want to show off how hard they are on pedophiles by executing you for having pictures of yourself naked. It's actually extraordinarily contrary to the laws as written, which fall all over themselves saying how these laws are there to protect children from being abused.
It's not a chance, it's a certainty. It already happened in Florida. A teenage couple both were tried as adults and convicted. Of distribution, not just possession. The judge ruled that although they were on their computers only, a hacker could break in and steal the pictures, and therefore not distributing them is no defense against a distribution charge. Charges against 16 year olds will often end up sealed. A showboating DA up for reelection can't use them to show how hard on evildoers he is, so he absolutely will try them as adults. And while he's trying them as adults "due to the heinous nature of child abuse", he will simultaneously be saying that you have to give a 10 year sentence to children, and put them on a sex offender list for life, otherwise they'll think they can just take nude pics of themselves, and never realize it can ruin their lives. Thus, he has the moral obligation, however distasteful, of ruining their lives utterly, as a warning to others. I'm sure if these were pictures of girls having sex (thus showing two way mutual rape) rather than just pictures of 16 year olds wearing towels or bras, he'd be pushing for them all to be executed (since child rape is a capital offense, at least in some states). The Florida DA LITERALLY said that teens taking nude pics could have their camera stolen, then their pics on the internet, then later in a job interview they could not get the job because the interviewer saw them naked on the internet. And that's why he HAD to push for a 10 year sentance and putting them on the sex offender list for life, to protect them from such hardships later in life. This way, once they are out of jail in 2016, they'll have no problem getting a job unless their prospective employer sees that 10 year stint in prison, or sees the fact that they are a registered sex offender! But he won't have seen them naked, so they're still better off.
Yes I've read their jokes they (and YOU) think are science. They amount to proof by lack of example. They essentially boil down to "2 is not the square root of nine, therefore 9 has no square root". Some fool said some things cannot evolve because he can't think of a useful intermediate step. This is hilarious for two reasons. First, because basically all creationists are putting absolute faith in this persons godlike infallibility. And second, because nothing MAKES mutations that survive and propagate be beneficial. Consider Vitamin C. You may know it from orange juice. People can't make it. Primates in general can't make it! Cats can, those smug little bastards. But, people are more advanced, so we should have everything a cat does, right? Wrong! In general anyways, but not in this case, because humans, like all primates, DO have the gene to create vitmain C right here inside our very own bodies. But a random mutation broke that gene. You can see the gene sitting right there, just like it does in cats. But its all broked. It's weird, right? DIVINE EVOLUTION should not have allowed it to break, since its a beneficial gene to have! Only nothing makes stuff happen, it just happens. Primates eat fucking FRUIT all day. Not a single primate got sick when some weird mutant monkey started spreading his broken vitamin C gene around, because they all got plenty from Bananans and berries and such! In fact, maybe their kidneys were happy about it. A creationists favorite example is the mouse trap. They like to parrot their infallible and omnipotent leader (he must be since the whole argument is that since he can't think of a way, no way can exist). He says a modern mouse trap cannot have evolved from a more simple version. As I've said, no rule says that every evolutionary step must be an improvement. Steps backwards are even allowed, if they are not completely fatal prior to breeding age. Even using his stupid rules of only improvements allowed, you can in fact evolve a modern mouse trap from a primitive cartoon mousetrap consisting of a box with cheese in it, held up by a stick with a string tied to it. Step 1. Stick stick to cheese. No string needed anymore, and its now automated. Step 2, but it on a base with lips so the box can't move once closed (harder to escape now). Step 3, hinge the box and base, so the box always lands square. Step 4. Replace the stick directly holding the box up, with a stick holding a latch. That way the stick is more easily disturbed, since it doesn't have a weight on it. Step 5, replace the stick with a pressure plate, so the mouse is more likely to pull the latch free when eating. Step 6, put a spring in the hinge so the box closes much faster. Step 7, replace the box with a single plank that squishes the mouse dead. Step 7, replace the plank with a wire hammer, so all the force is applied to a much smaller surface area of the mouse. Ta da!
Not in this case, but in Florida two teens were both tried as adults and convicted of producing child pornography, distributing child pornography, and possession of child pornography. They were tried as adults because child porn is such a heinous crime. This was many years ago. They're still in prison. When they get out, they are both on the sex offenders list as pedophiles. Yes, the court ruled that having the pictures on your computer is distribution, because a hacker could break in to your computer and steal them.
That's actually an awesome ruling. It said that because a hacker can break into their email accounts and copy the photos, they have no expectation of privacy. Essentially, they ruled that there is no such thing as private information. Is your credit card information private? Hell no, a hacker could break into your bank, or any store you've patronized, and steal your number there. Thus, its not private information, and this no crime has been committed in obtaining it!
Human stupidity is staying steady. What's on the increase is the ability of the average human to share their stupidity with others.
Sounds like it works in a fairly simple way. The game and the Impulse stuff is encrypted. Its probably encrypted using a key unique to that copy. When you run it, it checks your registry for a decryption key. If its not there, you have to enter your e-mail address and register it with them. Once you have done so, your computer can decrypt and play the game. So you can fake this step, but without the key, what good does it do you? None! Of course, you can spread that key around with the copy, but they'll know whose it is! And it might take some effort, so only dedicated pirates would do it in the first place.
I think this plan is great, if it works. DRM annoys people for several reasons. First, it forces you to be online for offline games. This doesn't totally negate that concern, but you only need it for like 30 seconds when you first install the game. Balanced against the fact that you don't need the CD in to play, unlike almost all other games, its a fair tradeoff. Few people not only don't have internet, but also don't know anybody with internet. Plus it sounds like this scheme is mostly for games downloaded online, so since you have to have internet to buy it, this is a completely moot point anyways. The second concern is that it doesn't let you make backup copies, or install it on multiple systems. (See Spore, etc.) Again, this problem is negated. You can install using this system, on any number of systems. You just need your e-mail address and password. If its like their existing Impulse stuff, you can just copy the folder and the registry keys, and don't even need to re-register it online to play. So backups are easy also. The third issue with game DRM is that you can't sell a game when you get bored with it. Again, this is not the case here. They say you can unregister your e-mail, so its no longer associated with that game's serial number. Now when you sell it, the new owner can register online just like it was newly purchased. In fact, since you can have multiple copies, and they never go online after the initial registration, you can probably sell your copy and still play the copies you installed already! You won't be able to submit scores online, or download patches, but you can still play. (This is illegal btw, the Copyright Act states you must destroy all backups and installed copies of software once you transfer ownership of the original). The only way they could get around this is if you have to go to each machine and deactivate each copy, before it is fully deregistered. This would be impossible if you ever had a HD crash or a laptop stolen, so I doubt they'd do this! The final issue is that if the company goes under, you can't play your old games anymore. The article is vague about that, but seems to imply that registration happens through whichever service you buy the game from, but can use any service that uses this scheme. So if you buy it from iTunes new games section, that goes under, it would still be able to authenticae through Stardock, or Amazon, or Steam, or Direct2Drive (assuming they sell games using this scheme). If Stardock goes under? I dunno. I'd hope that all those places would still support it. As long as one still exists, it sounds like this will continue to function, though I'm not sure how it could work if its not centralized in some way...
But you're right, you could share your serial number and decryption key around when you distribute your pirate copy. It'll trace back to your e-mail, and probably stop there. Stardock knows this, I'm sure. Because, like us, they know you can't stop pirates. If it runs, it will be pirated. Even if it always phones home, you can patch that out and fake the phone home. So they aren't bothering. They're stopping casual pirates. Dedicated pirate teams will easily get around this and there will be pirate copies galore. Since this is true regardless of how draconian a scheme they come up with, they aren't bothering at all. On the other hand, without a valid e-mail and serial #, you can'