But then you're saying the government shouldn't get involved in cases such as libel or slander, right (for instance)?
Does that mean that I can start telling egregious lies about you, and there's no repercussion? What if I post an article in the local newspaper saying that your store is a front for the mafia, and I make up tons of proof about it.
Sure, you might be able to disprove it, but only after considerable damage is done to your business. I haven't gone anywhere near your property. How will you respond?
And, even we accept that government has the limited role of securing our property rights, how will they do it? They need money, correct? And how else does the government get money but by levying taxes? How do they levy taxes? Right. By passing laws.
Your idea of a government is one that has no ability to do anything. You would prefer that we all live on our own little plots of land and never interact.
take a guy working on a 33MHz 486 running DOS, and give him a WinXP/P4 GHz+ box. I'll bet you anything he'll want his old box back at the end of the day. He knows what it does, and he's aware of all its ins and outs. Give him Windows XP, and Office XP, and Clippy XP and he'll go nuts. He'll be hiding under his desk before you can say "click-through."
You know, I think I'd gladly pay *insert-small-sum-of-money* for a single track that I liked (per the whole "micropayments" idea). Actually, it'd would be cool to just pay X cents for a track, and then maybe (#tracks)*X - (some-small-discount) for buying the whole album.
I don't think the RIAA would be opposed to this form of sale, but they insist on slapping all kinds of controls on it, to prevent copying.
Now, I'll argue that there's a threshold (at least under the current system) at which copying becomes bad. I don't mind paying for music, but I still want the ability to make backups, share with friends, etc. At the same time, I believe it can be easily argued that distributing an entire CD to 2000 people is wrong.
What it sounds like, is that the companies think "guilty unless you force X to be innocent," which is contrary to how society (in theory) operates. Maybe that's part of the problem.
I guess the big crux of the matter for me, is that I feel that I should be able to do something like burn a mix of mp3's on CD, or just a plain old music CD and say "hey, friend, check this out." I mean, that's pretty common place. At the same time, I can also see the company's point of view in saying, "people just download entire albums, and never pay for them." Now, I'll agree that not everyone does this, but I do know people who do. I mean, I know people with stacks of movies burned to disc, that they have no intention of ever buying. I also know people with stacks of paid-for DVD's.
So, the companies like to reduce everybody to a lowest common denominator (thief), and your average person (who we'll say follows the "Pay As You Can"-theory) resents being treated as a criminal.
The real barrier to a solution here is that each side wants a solution that requires no thought on its part. i.e. the record companies (movie companies, etc) want to clamp down on their IP so people will just buy their product - guaranteed profit. "Average Person," just wants to kick back and enjoy music, occasionally make some copies or a backup, burn a mixtape (cd, whatever), sample some new music.
Actually, wouldn't the price of producing a faithful reproduction of a newspaper include the cost of a printing press? and paper?
Part of what makes CD copying so attractive is the fact that you can get perfect reproductions for asscheap. You have the initial large expenditure for the burner, but then CD's are what? quarters?
You do make a good point though: if music cds were cheaper, there'd be less of an incentive to copy them. How cheap can you get though? At the very least, you have to take into account cost of the blank disc, shipping, retail markup, packaging (which you mentioned). We haven't even gotten to royalties for the band, payment for the recording studio, other equipment, hookers, advertising, etc. I haven't actually seen a cost breakdown of all those, but I bet they could come up with something less than $19.99 for a CD (again, in agreement with you).
I think the real question is: if the CD was $10 would that make you less likely to burn it? $5? $3? $2? $1? At what point is it cheap enough? And is that point lower than what the record companies can afford. I mean, I wouldn't need to copy CD's if I could buy them for $0.50, but can they afford to sell them at that price?
They're going to charge developers to access microsoft run.net services such as calendars, wallet, and doc. storage services.
.Net My Services defines a range of services available to consumers, from online calendar and contact-list access, to document storage and electronic-wallet services. Developers can choose to support some or all of those in the applications they develop and will be charged accordingly.
That's a good point. I think the point people are missing is that the U.S. has pointedly stated, on numerous occasions, that it will not give in to terrorist demands. Why do they think this will be any different? If anything, this will set us more in our ways even if it's just the dubious claim that "we didn't give in to terrorists." Honestly, I can't say that's wrong. If someone thought that this would make us rethink our unstinting israeli support, I think they're wrong. If anything, we'll support the Israelis more.
Good point. I think what I was trying to get accross was the fact that sometimes, I wouldn't want to tell somebody something. There are times when it's appropriate to not give out information. I think that information's freedom should be secondary to my freedom.
Definitely a good analogy, btw! And me without any cookies in the apartment!:-)
What about my mother's secret chocolate-chip cookie recipe? I mean, those cookies are good. She might stop making them for me if I start giving out her recipe!:-)
On a slightly more serious note, consider this: You say "Information wants to be free." There are many types of information. I'm going to classify software as a type of information (a veritable namshub, if you've read Snowcrash). Software is really just a set of instructions telling a computer to do something. So, software wants to be free. That's not an overly large stretch. The FSF holds this view. I'm not entirely sure I agree, but that's not really the point.
What other types of information are there, though? Let's wax ridiculous for a second. I just bought a great birthday present for my mother (the one who makes those fantastic cookies I'm not going to give you the recipe for). I'd rather keep it as a surprise, but "information wants to be free." This is an overly extreme case. But what about other secrets? What if I've fallen in love with this girl, but I don't think my mother is quite ready to deal with this, and in fact might disown me (and stop giving me chocolate-chip cookies - the horror! -). Should I tell her because "information wants to be free?" This is most certainly a piece of information, and it does affect her.
Lets wander back to the slightly more normal (but never away from cookies!). I don't think "information wants to be free." Or even if it does, I'm not sure I care. Information isn't a person. I don't want to restrict a person's rights to maintain information's rights. I would rather hold on to the freedom to choose my freedoms. If I choose to use a proprietary operating system that limits my freedom, that's my choice. Let me make it. If I choose to hold onto that freedom, that's just a different choice regarding the same freedom.
He's not anti-Gore, he's anti-stupid. "Elderly people are... not as sharp." I agree that the elderly in general need more attention than the rest of us, but that's not the issue. Being old is no excuse for not reading the ballot. Have you seen the ballot? There are very clear arrows showing which candidate goes with which bubble. Heck, here's a link to it:
I haven't seen anything on the news stating that. Everything I've seen states (from cnn) "Hundreds of people left the ballot box and became hysterical in the parking lots when they realized they had probably voted for Pat Buchanan." That says nothing about not being allowed a new ballot page.
at the same time, I think that companies should be responsible for alerting us to what's in their products so we are aware that we have to dispose of it properly. We can't be held accountable for not knowing if they don't take steps to make us aware of the dangers.
check out the
cuecat.com webpage by digital convergence:
they say: "We've made it super easy to get your new:CRQ system, including the:CueCat reader, absolutely FREE"
Even Digital Convergence's ownpage says "Digital:Convergence will distribute more than 10 million of its new:CueCat(TM) devices and:CRQ(TM) software free to consumers by the end of this year."
Even more interesting is who runs Digital Convergence (see link above): "The company's management team includes a roster of industry veterans from Time Warner, AT&T, GE, ING Barings and Disney."
It would seem that they're not idiots. They're just dumb
To raise funds for filing patent applications in 31 foreign countries, Mr. Pool sold an old car, an 18-foot boat and some land he had been hoping to use for a corporate headquarters.
Umm.. it would seem that much more than america is thinking of patenting this./. is a bit america centered, mostly because, well, it's in the states.
And what if canada is one of those 31 countries? "Damn canadians.. trying to regulate the rest of the world's trade."
Slashdot Mirror
But then you're saying the government shouldn't get involved in cases such as libel or slander, right (for instance)?
Does that mean that I can start telling egregious lies about you, and there's no repercussion? What if I post an article in the local newspaper saying that your store is a front for the mafia, and I make up tons of proof about it.
Sure, you might be able to disprove it, but only after considerable damage is done to your business. I haven't gone anywhere near your property. How will you respond?
And, even we accept that government has the limited role of securing our property rights, how will they do it? They need money, correct? And how else does the government get money but by levying taxes? How do they levy taxes? Right. By passing laws.
Your idea of a government is one that has no ability to do anything. You would prefer that we all live on our own little plots of land and never interact.
take a guy working on a 33MHz 486 running DOS, and give him a WinXP/P4 GHz+ box. I'll bet you anything he'll want his old box back at the end of the day. He knows what it does, and he's aware of all its ins and outs. Give him Windows XP, and Office XP, and Clippy XP and he'll go nuts. He'll be hiding under his desk before you can say "click-through."
actually: yeah there is.
start->settings->control panel->add/remove programs
WiMP is indeed in there.
I could see all the ladies sitting around now "Oh, that microscope is so cute! and that diamond! I haven't seen one that small!"
do you think rms would be pissed if people started using HURD, but kept calling it linux?
You know, I think I'd gladly pay *insert-small-sum-of-money* for a single track that I liked (per the whole "micropayments" idea). Actually, it'd would be cool to just pay X cents for a track, and then maybe (#tracks)*X - (some-small-discount) for buying the whole album.
I don't think the RIAA would be opposed to this form of sale, but they insist on slapping all kinds of controls on it, to prevent copying.
Now, I'll argue that there's a threshold (at least under the current system) at which copying becomes bad. I don't mind paying for music, but I still want the ability to make backups, share with friends, etc. At the same time, I believe it can be easily argued that distributing an entire CD to 2000 people is wrong.
What it sounds like, is that the companies think "guilty unless you force X to be innocent," which is contrary to how society (in theory) operates. Maybe that's part of the problem.
I guess the big crux of the matter for me, is that I feel that I should be able to do something like burn a mix of mp3's on CD, or just a plain old music CD and say "hey, friend, check this out." I mean, that's pretty common place. At the same time, I can also see the company's point of view in saying, "people just download entire albums, and never pay for them." Now, I'll agree that not everyone does this, but I do know people who do. I mean, I know people with stacks of movies burned to disc, that they have no intention of ever buying. I also know people with stacks of paid-for DVD's.
So, the companies like to reduce everybody to a lowest common denominator (thief), and your average person (who we'll say follows the "Pay As You Can"-theory) resents being treated as a criminal.
The real barrier to a solution here is that each side wants a solution that requires no thought on its part. i.e. the record companies (movie companies, etc) want to clamp down on their IP so people will just buy their product - guaranteed profit. "Average Person," just wants to kick back and enjoy music, occasionally make some copies or a backup, burn a mixtape (cd, whatever), sample some new music.
Actually, wouldn't the price of producing a faithful reproduction of a newspaper include the cost of a printing press? and paper?
Part of what makes CD copying so attractive is the fact that you can get perfect reproductions for asscheap. You have the initial large expenditure for the burner, but then CD's are what? quarters?
You do make a good point though: if music cds were cheaper, there'd be less of an incentive to copy them. How cheap can you get though? At the very least, you have to take into account cost of the blank disc, shipping, retail markup, packaging (which you mentioned). We haven't even gotten to royalties for the band, payment for the recording studio, other equipment, hookers, advertising, etc. I haven't actually seen a cost breakdown of all those, but I bet they could come up with something less than $19.99 for a CD (again, in agreement with you).
I think the real question is: if the CD was $10 would that make you less likely to burn it? $5? $3? $2? $1? At what point is it cheap enough? And is that point lower than what the record companies can afford. I mean, I wouldn't need to copy CD's if I could buy them for $0.50, but can they afford to sell them at that price?
Wow. I think I'm rambling.
Time and time again, psychology studies show that people dont want to be freeloaders.
Can you point me at one of those studies? I'm willing to believe that, but have never seen a study confirming it.
I do agree though, that no one "intrinsically deserves a Jaguar."
Hee!
I like your comments. They make me laugh. That, and they have a decent level of "common sense" in them.
No, you misread.
They're going to charge developers to access microsoft run .net services such as calendars, wallet, and doc. storage services.
That's a good point. I think the point people are missing is that the U.S. has pointedly stated, on numerous occasions, that it will not give in to terrorist demands. Why do they think this will be any different? If anything, this will set us more in our ways even if it's just the dubious claim that "we didn't give in to terrorists." Honestly, I can't say that's wrong. If someone thought that this would make us rethink our unstinting israeli support, I think they're wrong. If anything, we'll support the Israelis more.
Good point. I think what I was trying to get accross was the fact that sometimes, I wouldn't want to tell somebody something. There are times when it's appropriate to not give out information. I think that information's freedom should be secondary to my freedom.
Definitely a good analogy, btw! And me without any cookies in the apartment! :-)
I think his point was that the "open source" software decreases the value of his "closed source" software.
What about my mother's secret chocolate-chip cookie recipe? I mean, those cookies are good. She might stop making them for me if I start giving out her recipe! :-)
On a slightly more serious note, consider this: You say "Information wants to be free." There are many types of information. I'm going to classify software as a type of information (a veritable namshub, if you've read Snowcrash). Software is really just a set of instructions telling a computer to do something. So, software wants to be free. That's not an overly large stretch. The FSF holds this view. I'm not entirely sure I agree, but that's not really the point.
What other types of information are there, though? Let's wax ridiculous for a second. I just bought a great birthday present for my mother (the one who makes those fantastic cookies I'm not going to give you the recipe for). I'd rather keep it as a surprise, but "information wants to be free." This is an overly extreme case. But what about other secrets? What if I've fallen in love with this girl, but I don't think my mother is quite ready to deal with this, and in fact might disown me (and stop giving me chocolate-chip cookies - the horror! -). Should I tell her because "information wants to be free?" This is most certainly a piece of information, and it does affect her.
Lets wander back to the slightly more normal (but never away from cookies!). I don't think "information wants to be free." Or even if it does, I'm not sure I care. Information isn't a person. I don't want to restrict a person's rights to maintain information's rights. I would rather hold on to the freedom to choose my freedoms. If I choose to use a proprietary operating system that limits my freedom, that's my choice. Let me make it. If I choose to hold onto that freedom, that's just a different choice regarding the same freedom.
Do you have debug information we don't have that shows it was microsoft software that caused your browser to crash and not quicktime?
Umm.. Outlook2k does that. I regularly read messages as it's downloading and filtering, and I have a motherload of filters running.
-\/
No, the one I link to is (I believe), the actual ballot.
-\/
He's not anti-Gore, he's anti-stupid. "Elderly people are... not as sharp." I agree that the elderly in general need more attention than the rest of us, but that's not the issue. Being old is no excuse for not reading the ballot. Have you seen the ballot? There are very clear arrows showing which candidate goes with which bubble. Heck, here's a link to it:
Palm Beach Ballot
-\/
I haven't seen anything on the news stating that. Everything I've seen states (from cnn) "Hundreds of people left the ballot box and became hysterical in the parking lots when they realized they had probably voted for Pat Buchanan." That says nothing about not being allowed a new ballot page.
-\/
I fully agree.
at the same time, I think that companies should be responsible for alerting us to what's in their products so we are aware that we have to dispose of it properly. We can't be held accountable for not knowing if they don't take steps to make us aware of the dangers.
-V
check out the cuecat.com webpage by digital convergence:
they say: "We've made it super easy to get your new :CRQ system, including the :CueCat reader, absolutely FREE"
Even Digital Convergence's own page says "Digital:Convergence will distribute more than 10 million of its new :CueCat(TM) devices and :CRQ(TM) software free to consumers by the end of this year."
Even more interesting is who runs Digital Convergence (see link above): "The company's management team includes a roster of industry veterans from Time Warner, AT&T, GE, ING Barings and Disney."
It would seem that they're not idiots. They're just dumb
-V
Umm.. it would seem that much more than america is thinking of patenting this. /. is a bit america centered, mostly because, well, it's in the states.
And what if canada is one of those 31 countries? "Damn canadians.. trying to regulate the rest of the world's trade."
Right.
-V
But your opinions don't make any sense.
I mean, all you said was canada's cool, the states isn't? I wouldn't even mind that if you actually have some kind of reasoning behind it.
You haven't even said why you think C# is so bad and useless.
I'm not tryin to slam you, I'm just trying to figure out exactly why you believe what you believe.
-V
His point seems to be that you can write a class and it's it's own particular file.
that reminds me a lot of java, where you just og ahead and write the .java files and import whatever other classes you need.
-V