From an engineering/technical side, you are flat out wrong here. The CSS "controls access" has absolutely nothing to do with region enforcement, but has everything to do with the ability to "copy" a bit stream from a DVD disc.
My reference: The DVD-Video specifications, Parts 1-7, versions 0.9-1.2
Before you start spouting a "fact" of this nature, make sure you can back that up.
Macrovision was originally set up for use on VHS video tapes, and the system was continued onto DVD players. The point is that the company, Macrovision, places into the video and audio signals an extra low noise pattern that can be detected by other video recording equipment that also uses the Macrovision filters to make sure that generational losses occur... even with digitial recording equipment. Eventually, all you will end up with if you keep makings copies of the copies is a bunch of white noise. In theory, once a video recording device picks up the Macrovision signal from another device, it is supposed to completely block the signal from getting onto the recording medium.
For the above reasons and more, many "purists" don't understand why some companies want to deliberately destroy the video and audio signals coming from their equipment, and there are many other detractors and critics of the Macrovision process. This has absolutely nothing to do with the region encoding process on DVD discs.
Oh, there is region encoding, and that is something that many DVD discs have employed, but is a part of the DVD-Video standard itself. And the standard specifications require enforcement of the region code according to the licensing process that allows the device manufacturers to use the "DVD-Video" logo or even claim that it is compatable with DVD discs at all. The actual region code is but a single byte in the VIDEO_TS.IFO file that is a bit field for each region of the world (the 8th bit is ignored as "reserved"). It is up to the content producers themselves to decide if they want to restrict what they make to only one region, or allow it to be seen everywhere in the world.
Some DVD players are multi regional (especially outside of North America), but that is technically a violation of contract rights. And any software DVD players that don't employ the region coding may have to face a patent license violation (again... a contract tort issue, not a criminal violation) or some other contract violation. And it is impossible to create a valid open source software package that does not violate patent laws of some sort. It is impossible completely to maintain the terms of GPL and legitimately create a DVD-Video player. Anybody who has tried is in a state of delusion and denial, and has not read the GPL but is presuming that because they live in some obscure country (aka not EU or USA) that these sort of patent laws don't apply to them.
But Macrovision was not a part of determining the region code, nor does any of their equipment have any impact on device manufacturer for video playback machines. Except perhaps some minor code to help manufacturers comply with the DVD Forum's contract and patent licensing requirements that is non-exclusive and can be done by others.
Movie studios have every right to make copying video discs difficult. They're not obligated to sell unencrypted data; they sell bits and we voluntarily buy bits. But it must not be made illegal for purchasers to circumvent that copy protection if they are able.
You nailed this one straight. Attempts by the federal government to prohibit me from building a RF receiver device (aka satellite dish) and "descrambling" the sequence of photons that are being sprayed onto my backyard makes no sense what so ever. Or to take a data feed sent through a common carrier or a piece of plastic that has been coated with a thin piece of metal and trying to figure out what the pattern of nearly invisible dots really represents.
People who make this content can complicate the process to the point of absurdity, but if these attempts at copy protection stay out of the court room, these studios will eventually discover what software developers have known for decades: Copy protection is just a huge technological arms race that the "hackers" and "pirates" will eventually win anyway. A team of 20-2000 engineers can't possibly compete against the brightest 0.001% of a populations of 6 billion people who are likely smarter than that original team of developers who created the copy protection in the first place... especially on a mass produced product. And just like mass-produced software, any copy protection scheme (including "dongles" and other such nonsense) must eventually allow the "software" (including music and movies) to "run" on the devices. Otherwise nobody will buy it.
I don't have a sure-fire solution, but quite a bit more could be done to shut down those who are encouraging and promoting blatant copyright violations, and are engaging in large scale duplication efforts. Unfortunately, I don't see the major media companies doing much to stop that, but are instead focusing on trying to make FUD for individual consumers regarding what are even legitimate reasons to be able to copy copyrighted content.
I guess you missed the part that this is built on top of Squeak and using the Squeak VM as the script interpreter. All they have done here is to design a nice GUI on top of it, and proclaiming it a new language so they aren't tied down to slavishly implementing every feature of Squeak, and giving them an opportunity to implement new language features that go in new directions from the mainline Squeak development.
So yeah, there are legitimate reasons to link a comparison can be made here. It is mentioned on the website and documentation, but you have to dig a little deeper before you read about that little tidbit.
I am certainly interested in the idea of incorporating some of this project and concepts into another little project that I'm working on. If this truly becomes open source, I am very much interested in taking this into other directions than has been the case so far.
The idea of adding extensions onto Scratch is appealing as is my technical capability of being able to make them, and this project is something that has certainly triggered some ideas on the use and implementation of this language. While the graphical "drag and drop" is a gimmick that certainly could be done just as well with a more traditional text editor, this does have appeal with younger individuals who are very much used to mouse actions but don't really feel comfortable around text editors, and it virtually eliminates all syntax errors.... a very common source of frustration for beginning programmers.
It sounds as though you don't have a clue as to how the GPS system works in the first place to make a conjecture like this. Sure, you can reduce civilian mode GPS for a given region of the world, but that also impacts American interests for the most part as well. Including American flagged civilian shipping and mineral exploration.
In addition, the skewing factor isn't off by that much, but it may give you inaccuracies on the order of a few dozen meters, which is sufficient to kill precision bombs (like a rigged car bomb in front of an important building relying on GPS signals), but it won't kill most reasonable applications even with this sort of precision.
It is impossible to shut off GPS to North Korea without having similar adverse effects on South Korea, for example. Or to Japan for that matter. The political fallout of such a move would have substantial political consequences. This is what I mean by regional selectivity, and perhaps if the USA was initiating a war in the region it would be something to worry about, but otherwise it isn't something to seriously make an issue over. My advise to getting caught in/near a warzone: run like hell unless you want to die gloriously for your country.
It is interesting in the dissenting opinion of Eldred vs. Ashcroft this argument you are making here was reinforced. Justice Breyer in the dissenting opinion suggested that the constitution was explicit about the limited time clause and believed that Congress had stepped too far with the nearly perpetual copyright extensions. This opinion is one of the most reasoned judicial or legal arguments I have ever read that touches these issues, and certainly was much better than Lawence Lessig (even though Lessig did argue the case in chamber).
There was a hint in this and some of the testimony by other justices that this issue could be revisited again if copyright was extended yet again by Congress. Essentially, all that was really said was that the current copyright terms are acceptable but also served notice that members of the public were being harmed substantially by any further extentions.
Certainly this legal case together with a very different attitude toward copyright by those who were born after the baby boomers may make this a significant legal issue if legislation ever comes up again to extend or modify copyright.
My point was that mandatory copyright was the law of the USA for nearly 190 years. The unusual situation is for the "everything is copyrighted" situation to exist. The terms of the original copyright law were also surprisingly short (17 years)
If what you write is considered valuable enough, you should be able to go through the steps of actually registering the content and placing it explicitly under copyright protection.
One other thing that mandatory copyright does is that content where the author can't be traced (abandonware, etc.) quickly goes out of copyright. The need for copyright renewals allows the author to provide fresh contact information for licensing and explicit permissions for reproduction of the copyrighted material.
I don't deny that some sort of implicit copyright for a very short period of time (a year or two, for example) may be a good thing in terms of allowing somebody to control their words (like in a blog) without having the content being taken out of context. And perhaps the strengthening of concepts like plagurism and source citation working their way into copyright law as well, allowing for lawsuits where content is used out of context without citing the original author. Or claiming work which you did not write as your own to be an illegal practice, even for "public domain" work. I have seen content which is currently in the public domain with copyright assertions and claims of authorship which are clearly not ethical, which current copyright law does not prevent.
Besides, I highly doubt most people in the blogosphere would really care about the copyright of their words, or even give a thought that their words are even under any copyright protection. I certainly don't care to have my words copyrighted for life + 75 years, which seems absolutely bizzare, as my grandkids aren't going to really be making any money off of any of my/. posts from copyright royalties. Perhaps I may be mistaken, but it seems very unlikely.
For myself, I would prefer a manditory registration (with some marginal protection if somebody is "in the process" of registration) with the option to "renew" copyright after a modest amount of time. And perhaps substantially escalated registration prices for continued renewal in the case of something very valuable (aka the Disney movies, for example.... let Disney keep copyright if they are paying millions of dollars in registration fees). Renewal terms of only 10 years being reasonable.
I saw much earlier here on/. an interesting proposal to charge $1 for the first registration and a 10x price increase every 10 years. This would be $10 after 10 years, $100 for 20 years, $1000 for 30 years and so forth. Paying $1,000,000 for 60 years and $100,000,000 for 80 years may be something George Lucas might be willing to pay for the Star Wars franchise. But even here most copyright registration would eventually become ridiculous that even major stake holders would give up and stop copyright renewal.
The point of all this is that for most practical copyright applications, all you need is copyright for a very limited period of time, meaning a decade or two. And it is arguable that copyright for even that length of time is of minimal value as most copyrighted material is only valuable for just a year or two. Sometimes a copyright book is used for fundraising purposes for a lengthy period of time (such the Great Ormond Street Hospital receiving royalties for the Peter Pan books), but such examples are very unusual. They can also be dealt with explicitly as exceptions if those legislators wish to grant some unusual provisions for projects like this.
As far as patent law is concerned, that is indeed a completely seperate issue. And not only do I think software patents are horrible (they do absolutely nothing positive and copyright law can do 95% of what patent law claims to do for most software patents), but I also fail to see many redeeming features for patents as applied to mechanical engineering... the typical and traditional form of patents. Far too much of those involved with issuing and applying for patents are part of a group that really is trying to suck money from those who are dreamers and wish for better times by "inventing" something cool and being able to "sell" the idea through a patent. Unfortnately, the number of individuals who actually succeed are so few compared to those who are ripped off through the patent process (when patents are used to "protect" these independent and lone inventors), that they are justifiably considered remarkable success stories, not something which is considered typical or normal.
And don't even get me going on traditional corporate use of patents, which is not to protect ideas but to keep from getting burned by this same scam game and those who abuse the patent process.
Bush will be gone in two years, regardless of if you love the guy or hate him to his core. The U.S. Constitution has spoken, and it is unlikely that he will ever run for public office again in his lifetime. Some former presidents have become senators or in one case a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, but most end up like Bill Clinton or G.H.W. Bush.... elder statesmen who occasionally get sent as "official representatives" to state funerals (aka Yeltsin most recently) or speak out about "humanitarian" causes (both elder Bush and Clinton were involved with the Indian Ocean tsunami relief as well as Katrina relief efforts).
It amazes me that some current presidential candidates are writing up their campaign platforms to be "anti-Bush" as the guy isn't even running. Even those of the same political party as Bush come from positions very much outside of the current political clique that is running the U.S. government at the moment, so it should be obvious in a couple of years that a very new political philosophy is going to be taking charge regardless of who actually wins the presidential election.
As far as complaints about the destruction of the American political system, you may wish for this to happen, but the current government (speaking broadly here) is very much in charge. I would dare you to find any major government in the world that has so successfully killed any internal domestic groups advocating rebellion and revolution as throughally as the U.S. government has. And to do so with a willing population supporting such moves. Groups like the SLA (Symbonese Liberation Army), Al-Queida, Hell's Angles, "The Mafia", or even weird attempts to spark a coup in America like the "American Liberty League" have all been effectively eliminated from within the borders of the USA. Even groups like the "militia organizations" which advocate extreme interpretations of the 2nd Amendment ("right to bear arms") have been neutralized in such a way they pose no real threat.
This isn't to say that unlike international perception, that the USA is living in a police state. We aren't. Political opposition does happen, and it is possible to say that you think the current president is a stupid pompous ass and needs to be thrown out with the trash, and to do so right in front of his official residence. If you tried to do that in China, you would likely end up in prison, or would quietly "disappear". Legitimate opposition political movements are tolerated (you just can't advocate armed rebellion) and even encouraged. If you think this is what a fascist dictatorship really means, I would strongly suggest you crack open history books and read a little more on Hitler and Mussolini to see what such dictatorships really were like. This does not exist in America.
Hardly difficult to find, nor all that unusual when the reason for parking it a block away may have other explainations. This factoid is taken completely out of context here.
If Hans had really cared to "dispose" of the car, he would have driven it to his father's house in Atlanta, Georgia. Or to a dozen other locations much further from his house. Driving it into San Francisco Bay or the Pacific Ocean would have been a very good (and relatively easy to do) task if that really was a goal. Not within a mile of his house parked on a street that could be found by a casual search in less than five minute with a police car.
There is also no other evidence besides traces of Nina's blood was found inside of the car. And there are numerous other scenarios that can be used to explain perhaps how that blood got there in the first place without having to resort to the transportation of a bloody corpse. Nina and Hans jointly owned that vehicle for several years, so it isn't even in dispute that Nina had been in the vehicle on at least a few other previous occasions.
This is about the best physical evidence that the police have on Hans, however.
There is no reason to suspect that she is dead. You can't prove anything other than she is not in Oakland, California, and likely not in the USA if she is alive.
Nina did have other "enemies" besides just those who have spoken up, and trust me when I say this case is going to get far more weird before this is over than has been displayed so far. I can't say just how weird, but I wouldn't even count this whole thing getting settled down until well after the jury has done their deliberation and the judge as said his piece on this issue as well.
The real tragedy that will be nearly permanent is how the State of California let the children of Hans and Nina leave the USA, where it will be very unlikely that Russia will ever let these kids return back to the USA. Keep in mind that they are U.S. citizens by virtue of being born in the USA to two American citizens (Nina was a naturalized citizen). Even so, Russia is claiming that these children are Russian citizens by virtue of having a Russian mother. Even if Hans is aquitted, he will never be able to see his children again, and may face legal problems regarding Nina if he ever goes to Russia to try and get them.
I hope that Nina can be found in some fashion, dead or alive (preferably alive). Or at least some strong evidence that Nina was alive sometime well after Hans was arrested. Unfortunately it appears as though her life is in significant peril if she ever does show up alive, as there are many individuals with a significant stake right now in the situation that would be ruined if she were to show up suddenly.
I also don't believe that Hans had the time or the skills necessary to effectively hide Nina's body without some substantial evidence trail also being found. Hans is a smart guy, and perhaps he could think up "the perfect murder". But it seems much more likely that somebody acting in an act of passion and killing somebody very close to them (as is alleged by the prosecution) would miss critical elements that would clearly show not only that he killed her, but where she is actually at. Dumping Nina's body into San Francisco Bay or burying her somewhere that couldn't be tracked by the police seems to be a difficult task at best, and seems also very likely that somebody (Silicon Valley is hardly what could be called "sparsely populated") would have seen Hans trying to dispose of a body in some way.
Isolation simulations are fairly commonplace, including simulators that attempt to mimic the surface of Mars.
Certainly experiences that have come from those working at the South Pole research station have been documented and are being used as a baseline for issues that will eventually come up when dealing with any eventual research station on Mars. Since the history of this base is entirely in the 20th Century and very well documented, and the remoteness of the base together with the very harsh environment that the people working there have to experience, comparisons to space travel are very common.
All of the issues including gender balance, social order, isolation (nobody can go in or out during the Antarctic "winter" except under exceptional conditions... aircraft simply stop functioning at the temperatures at that time of the year) and even highly motivated people with egos on the line due to the "staff" mainly being scientists have all been examined.
While not necessarily the complete isolation you are describing, most NASA astronaut teams are formed even now many years in advance, where they are working and training together for many years before their mission and learn about the strengths and weaknesses of each team member well before they go up into space. I have heard about some training exercises that do involve underwater activity in terms of team management exercises and being able to perform complex tasks together in a harsh environment. Florida is particular useful in term of building an underwater manned laboratory where a group would have an extended stay that is akin to living in a space station. It also seems to help out in terms of getting use to "neutral buoyancy" that is similar to weightlessness and the need for constant monitoring of your "space suit". Operating such an underwater station is also much cheaper than trying to operate a submarine.
I had a roommate who on the very day he was graduating with a degree in computer science (he was even wearing his graduation robes at the time) asked me on how to format a floppy disc for an assignment he needed to hand into one of his professors.
It wasn't just "I don't know what the switch is to get this disc format for this older system", but rather "I don't understand why I can't get this disc to work.... I need to format it but I don't know how to even start."
It is possible to graduate with a degree knowing quite a bit about "computer science" but never really getting the practical knowledge on how to develop software systems, including the use of breakpoints, debuggers, and proper software engineering practices. Your story here doesn't surprise me in this aspect as well, even though I feel sorry that such individuals have avoided practical education with their academic learning until they get into the "real world".
I've seen this done before... or at least something that could be interpreted along these lines.
In fact, the "software hook" that is referred to here I've also seen a software interrupt added into compiled code that during normal operations would simply have an IRET (interrupt return) op code on the ISR (interrupt service routine). But you could also have an independent debugger also run simutaneously doing all manner of evaluations on the software execution and performance evaluation. Or even evaluate CPU registers and perhaps even variables and other aspects of memory management. "Parameter passing" isn't even unusual even for interrupts.
I will agree that debugging multi-threaded applications can be a near nightmare due to the race conditions and timing issues, it doesn't have to be nearly so big of a deal as this patent seems to indicate.
This patent seems to imply that the tools which a competent software developer commonly uses are relatively unknown. It sounds here like this particular individual re-invented the wheel thinking he/she was very clever for having done something that their computer science professors never talked about when they were in school. This isn't that original, but trying to convince a non-programmer that it isn't may be a little harder.
Instead, this individual should have patented something truly remarkable and non-obvious like assigning the value zero to a memory cell.
If this is the patent, even this narrow definition has incredibly ancient (for computer software development) practice. I personally used such "software breakpoints" in software on an Apple ][ computer, back in 1977. And on other computer systems as well.
This sort of breakpoint wasn't even new then, or something novel. In short, the complaints about this sort of patent as simply covering existing practices is valid, and yet another example of how the USPTO is royally screwing up in their understanding of software development practices.
Of course, I very strongly believe that software should never be patented in any form in any situation, but even if you accept the bizzare concept of a software patent it should cover something new and innovative. Certainly not 40 year old concepts. Perhaps even 60 year old concepts, or even something Ada Lovelace came up with in the 19th Century.
I'm certain that Adm. Hooper is spinning in her grave over claims of originality for some of these patents, and in particular this one. It wouldn't surprise me if she implemented this idea into some of the compilers which she wrote back elsewhen.
The U.S. Navy doesn't send submarines out for 3-year deployments, although 1-year deployments have been done.
And it should be noted that pregnancy is an issue with the U.S. Navy, although in practice the number of women who get pregnant is similar (and proportional) to the number of men who go nuts and have to be sent to the brig on a semi-permanent basis due to discipline problems like assaulting a superior officer or other violent crimes.
Also one other issue that a submarine does have the option of doing, is to occasionally surface and come into port and exchange mail, take on fresh supplies (like fruit and fresh meat), and to exchange classified items which simply can't be sent cryptographically over supposedly secure telecommunications links. Somebody who is pregnant in such a situation is certainly going to be able to get out in such an exchange. Maybe not easily, but it can be done. An isolated group on Mars simply won't have that option at all.
I think you have your history of NASA off by a bit.
NASA was originally started by Woodrow Wilson in 1915 (under the name NACA - National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics) to help provide basic R&D into military aviation for WWI -- that is right, the first World War.
NASA with its more modern incarnation and name in regards to manned and unmanned spaceflight goes back to the Dwight Eisenhower administration when it was formally established by an act of Congress in 1957. JFK's involvement at this point was as a senator who actually voted against the proposal.
While I would agree that JFK did help push the effort toward manned spaceflight forward, and that many of his proposals were "rubber stamped" after his death (including the Vietnam War, and the Civil Rights Act of 1965) with not as much thought regarding any true direction of those proposals.
I would also strongly disagree that the "easy goals" have all been reached. Going to the Moon was hardly an easy goal, and some incredible research has been done by NASA in regards to aircraft safety and means of propulsion for interplanetary spacecraft in recent years. Unfortunately, the prime focus of NASA (and the largest portion of its budget) is a huge mess: The Space Shuttle Program/International Space Station. And this problem I do blame on the Nixon administration and accelerated by Jimmy Carter to create the current mess that we have.
Not that George W. Bush has been all that clear about setting goals for NASA either, but at least the "Moon, Mars, and Beyond" is something that is now a rough part of the NASA culture, even if the actual implementation of the concept won't happen until well after Geroge W. is long gone and in retirement.
At the current rate of progress for NASA, however, CNN will be reporting live from Mars when NASA finally shows up with their first astronauts, with those astrouants being treated to a barbeque hosted by Bigelow aerospace. If this is what you mean by NASA being "lost in space", I couldn't agree more. I just don't see NASA being the agency that will provide all of the cool gizmos and spacecraft that will be legitimately used for significant increases in human exploration of our Solar System.
Rather than complaining here on/. about "censorship" on Wikipedia, you can appeal in various talk pages about the topic.
I think the main issue is that the number you are referring to here is not really a legitimate article name, and that a proper encyclopedia article about this topic can be done in a number of ways that doesn't necessarily use this number as the name of the article. Still, I don't see why it is a big deal to use the number in a redirect.
This number is not being "censored" in the same way the Digg was doing it, and it certainly is not controvercial on Wikipedia at the moment, other than perhaps a couple of over-zealous admins. I think you are making a mountain out of a molehill here in your attempt to attack Wikipedia.
Make a real article about this topic, and don't just complain about censorship when you can't write English worth a damn. If you think you can string two or more words together in a coherent fashion, and can dig up some legitimate sources for what the whole controversy is about (the/. posts about this have several useful links for such an article), I can't see that the article would be rejected. Or that its removal would be as controversial as you are making it out to be.
There is another aspect to your evaluation here to consider:
The "low demand density" type of businesses may be hyper-specialists: They produce something that is so unique that while few people will buy it, those that do need it are willing to pay very good prices for that sort of product.
Armoured cars are an example of a product like this. An average person is not going to buy one of these products, and it is likely that you will only find a very small number of businesses who even sell these kind of vehicles, which are all custom manufactured as well.
Or to be highly specalized, a manufacturer of aviation-grade O-rings. If you have developed a process that improves the operating environment that these products can work in, you have something that is indeed very valuable.
The problem as illustrated in this article is that the businessman who is the focus of the article does not sell a product which is on the leading edge of technology, nor is it unique from the thousands of jewelry stores that you can find in small towns. While gemstones and jewelry have enough value that shipping these items anywhere in the world is trivial compared to the cost, the competition for such a product is so large that there really isn't any substantial value gained by going with any particular jeweler, especially for an on-line purchase.
This is exactly why he ended up in Google's "link hell". There is nothing that he is doing which is unique.
If this jewelry business specalized in something which is of a regional flavor, such as south-western USA jewelry (heavy in silver and turquoise) or set up some legitimate information pages that would add value for somebody coming to visit his website, such as original content describing the process of making jewelry and obtaining the gemstones, there may be some reason to have people link to this website. And push up the rankings in a legitimate fashion. But as just another place to buy gemstones and jewelry, there is nothing remarkable that can't be done directly by DeBeers or genuine gemstone wholesalers.
This businessman was also ripped off by this so-called internet consultant who tried to game the system without doing any real good to the content of the website. The $35,000 that was spent on the consultant could have been better spent in so many ways that it boggles the mind. Hiring a recent college graduate with an English degree (aka somebody who supposedly can actually write reasonable prose, and not some geek who can't use grammar worth a damn) to do some genuine scholarly research and fill up a website full of content about the jewelry industry would have been something very worth while. There are so many things that can be done to enhance a website to legitimately improve page rankings and make you stand out that you have to wonder why people engage in spamlinking at all.
Keep in mind here I was trying to note other examples of copyrighted works (not "generic IP") where it would be considered absurd to follow a similar practice. I don't see why recorded music has such a special exception to copyright law when other items covered under the exact same statute simply don't apply.
There have been numerous attempts by many people to get the Walt Disney Corporation to release "The Song of the South" on VHS or DVD in the USA. It has been released in Europe (and subsequently pulled), but never in America. And through some "pirate" video connections. If compulsory licensing were available for the motion picture industry, this is clearly one movie that would have many people willing to pay the fee and get the movie over the objections of Disney... and one of the reasons why such a licensing scheme will never happen for movies.
This is also one way surprisingly that the MPAA and the RIAA are going in different directions, even though there are many similarities between the two organizations.
I know this is contradictory. That is the point I'm trying to make here, is that this is an absurd claim that somebody who releases recorded music (which they originally wrote, to avoid problems with composer copyright issues) under a copyleft licensing arrangement and then have the RIAA demand payments for "broadcasting" that music either "on-air" or via "internet radio" stations.
This legal mess would get a little more complicated under typical RIAA contracts where this same artist who had previously released the content under a copyleft license and then subsequently signed with a major studio, putting their music under the RIAA umbrella.
I was trying to illustrate how absurd this all can get, and mentioning a specific instance where the RIAA (via SoundExchange) simply can't collect royalties except through a legal system so throughally corrupt and in such an obvious manner that some judicial or legislative oversight is likely to step in and fix the system, or corrupt the system to the point that ordinary voters would take notice of the absurdity of the situation.
I was also trying to note that the use of the EFF or FSF as organizations who could generate quite a bit of public interest, and could set up such a "internet radio" site that would be impossible for the RIAA to ignore, as opposed to some indy music guy who is so obscure that the RIAA doesn't care to bother. A couple of very prominent network radio sites that clearly didn't require royalties for their use or even rebroadcast might even get some congressmen to take notice and point out the absurdities of some of the RIAA practicies.
What I'm talking about here is the equivalent of somebody who has written a really useful software utility (let's take the ReiserFS as an example) and then the company or author who wrote that software which was released under the GPL earlier is then sold (with copyright assignment) to a company like Microsoft, who subsequently is insisting that the GPL no longer applies and any use of this utility without payment of some kind is a copyright violation.
So again, how do you revoke the GPL? I don't see how it can be done without having a judge simply rule that the GPL is an unconstitutional contract, whatever that really means. SCO tried that tactic and failed miserably. Or perhaps to demonstrate that the author was coerced into releasing their software under terms of the GPL through some sort of fraud or intimidation. That seems to be very unlikely, and would be something I would argue more about RIAA contracts than something typical of GPL'd software.
In other words, if they refuse to negotiate with individual licence holders, and you want them to play your music, the only way to achieve this is to submit the music under the compulsory licence? If so, the word "compulsory" is misleading - the copyright holder *had* the option of licensing it under another arrangement, but this was rejected by the broadcaster.
I think you understand this concept completely. Imagine if this philosophy were applied to other areas of copyright:
A significant issue with computer software is "abandonware", with software that can be found (even with documentation) but the copyright holder can't be found. Or perhaps you need for some reason an earlier version of the software due to specialized hardware requirements (i.e. Microsoft Windows 3.1 on a 1 meg RAM single board computer). Using this philosophy that is being applied here with music, you ought to be able to simply pay a fee to an organization (such as the Business Software Alliance:) that would take the money and keep it in escrow for companies when they can be found.
Or perhaps with the book publishing industry, where you could do a similar kind of application where a book which has been out of print can be reproduced (while it is still under copyright) by paying a simple copyright license fee to some other similar publishing body. This is done BTW in a limited context for academic purposes (called the "Copyright Clearance Center")
I don't have a problem with a group of recording studios (and record labels) cross-licensing in an industry group as a central clearing house for copyright licensing. I do object to some of the "standard" RIAA recording contracts that are very one-sided to favor the record labels and tend to screw over the recording artists, and that the distribution of licensing fees is very lopsided and favors the major artists and studios at the expense of smaller independent artists. But all of that objection aside, where does the RIAA get off by collecting fees for and in behalf of "non-members"? This is IMHO equivalent to a church collecting "tithing" from non-believers. BTW, in Germany tithing is collected from non-believers, so it isn't that far fetched of an idea either.
In regards to GPL'd/GFDL'd/CCL'd music, those are non-statutory licenses. The terms are already laid out. No need to negotiate. As longer as your agree to and follow the terms of the license, your use the music. And you can tell SoundExchance to go F... themselves.
That is the beauty of taking this approach to the issue and boldly advertising that "internet radio" stations using this approach to music distribution. I'm talking about being blunt and obvious that this is something that the RIAA can't possible touch.
The problem here is that I don't see the RIAA/ASCAP/SoundExchange interpreting this in the way you are talking about. Sure, you or I would agree that the rights have already been negotiated here, but SoundExchange is claming rights to license all music which is distributed via "internet radio" channels. And backed up by the Library of Congress. The point of the original article posting here is that non-RIAA members (which can include musical artists who have released their music under the Creative Commons licenses) are being forced by statutory authority to have royalties paid to SoundExchange, regardless of the terms, conditions, or licenses that were granted by the artists in the first place. They are using this as a way to force smaller recording artists or even groups that want to create an alternative scheme to the RIAA methodology to having to stick with this one approach and only use the SoundExchange system.
The point of using copyleft approaches here is that it would force the issue out of a copyright violation issue into the patently obvious RIAA taxation authority by a for profit group of corporations. If music which is simply placed into the public domain can be "taxed" in this manner, why not GPL'd music? Of course this isn't the only bizzare tax on public goods that goes to supporting for-profit corporations, but this would force such an issue into the realm of public debate for exactly what it really is.
This is also why this move by the RIAA is so awful and needs to be challenged as forcefully as possible, or at the very least legitimate alternatives need to be publicized in such a way that this monopoly can be broken. I think it would be through copyleft content distribution that you can make this stick.
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From an engineering/technical side, you are flat out wrong here. The CSS "controls access" has absolutely nothing to do with region enforcement, but has everything to do with the ability to "copy" a bit stream from a DVD disc.
My reference: The DVD-Video specifications, Parts 1-7, versions 0.9-1.2
Before you start spouting a "fact" of this nature, make sure you can back that up.
Macrovision was originally set up for use on VHS video tapes, and the system was continued onto DVD players. The point is that the company, Macrovision, places into the video and audio signals an extra low noise pattern that can be detected by other video recording equipment that also uses the Macrovision filters to make sure that generational losses occur... even with digitial recording equipment. Eventually, all you will end up with if you keep makings copies of the copies is a bunch of white noise. In theory, once a video recording device picks up the Macrovision signal from another device, it is supposed to completely block the signal from getting onto the recording medium.
For the above reasons and more, many "purists" don't understand why some companies want to deliberately destroy the video and audio signals coming from their equipment, and there are many other detractors and critics of the Macrovision process. This has absolutely nothing to do with the region encoding process on DVD discs.
Oh, there is region encoding, and that is something that many DVD discs have employed, but is a part of the DVD-Video standard itself. And the standard specifications require enforcement of the region code according to the licensing process that allows the device manufacturers to use the "DVD-Video" logo or even claim that it is compatable with DVD discs at all. The actual region code is but a single byte in the VIDEO_TS.IFO file that is a bit field for each region of the world (the 8th bit is ignored as "reserved"). It is up to the content producers themselves to decide if they want to restrict what they make to only one region, or allow it to be seen everywhere in the world.
Some DVD players are multi regional (especially outside of North America), but that is technically a violation of contract rights. And any software DVD players that don't employ the region coding may have to face a patent license violation (again... a contract tort issue, not a criminal violation) or some other contract violation. And it is impossible to create a valid open source software package that does not violate patent laws of some sort. It is impossible completely to maintain the terms of GPL and legitimately create a DVD-Video player. Anybody who has tried is in a state of delusion and denial, and has not read the GPL but is presuming that because they live in some obscure country (aka not EU or USA) that these sort of patent laws don't apply to them.
But Macrovision was not a part of determining the region code, nor does any of their equipment have any impact on device manufacturer for video playback machines. Except perhaps some minor code to help manufacturers comply with the DVD Forum's contract and patent licensing requirements that is non-exclusive and can be done by others.
You nailed this one straight. Attempts by the federal government to prohibit me from building a RF receiver device (aka satellite dish) and "descrambling" the sequence of photons that are being sprayed onto my backyard makes no sense what so ever. Or to take a data feed sent through a common carrier or a piece of plastic that has been coated with a thin piece of metal and trying to figure out what the pattern of nearly invisible dots really represents.
People who make this content can complicate the process to the point of absurdity, but if these attempts at copy protection stay out of the court room, these studios will eventually discover what software developers have known for decades: Copy protection is just a huge technological arms race that the "hackers" and "pirates" will eventually win anyway. A team of 20-2000 engineers can't possibly compete against the brightest 0.001% of a populations of 6 billion people who are likely smarter than that original team of developers who created the copy protection in the first place... especially on a mass produced product. And just like mass-produced software, any copy protection scheme (including "dongles" and other such nonsense) must eventually allow the "software" (including music and movies) to "run" on the devices. Otherwise nobody will buy it.
I don't have a sure-fire solution, but quite a bit more could be done to shut down those who are encouraging and promoting blatant copyright violations, and are engaging in large scale duplication efforts. Unfortunately, I don't see the major media companies doing much to stop that, but are instead focusing on trying to make FUD for individual consumers regarding what are even legitimate reasons to be able to copy copyrighted content.
I guess you missed the part that this is built on top of Squeak and using the Squeak VM as the script interpreter. All they have done here is to design a nice GUI on top of it, and proclaiming it a new language so they aren't tied down to slavishly implementing every feature of Squeak, and giving them an opportunity to implement new language features that go in new directions from the mainline Squeak development.
So yeah, there are legitimate reasons to link a comparison can be made here. It is mentioned on the website and documentation, but you have to dig a little deeper before you read about that little tidbit.
I am certainly interested in the idea of incorporating some of this project and concepts into another little project that I'm working on. If this truly becomes open source, I am very much interested in taking this into other directions than has been the case so far.
The idea of adding extensions onto Scratch is appealing as is my technical capability of being able to make them, and this project is something that has certainly triggered some ideas on the use and implementation of this language. While the graphical "drag and drop" is a gimmick that certainly could be done just as well with a more traditional text editor, this does have appeal with younger individuals who are very much used to mouse actions but don't really feel comfortable around text editors, and it virtually eliminates all syntax errors.... a very common source of frustration for beginning programmers.
How much "locally" are you talking about?
It sounds as though you don't have a clue as to how the GPS system works in the first place to make a conjecture like this. Sure, you can reduce civilian mode GPS for a given region of the world, but that also impacts American interests for the most part as well. Including American flagged civilian shipping and mineral exploration.
In addition, the skewing factor isn't off by that much, but it may give you inaccuracies on the order of a few dozen meters, which is sufficient to kill precision bombs (like a rigged car bomb in front of an important building relying on GPS signals), but it won't kill most reasonable applications even with this sort of precision.
It is impossible to shut off GPS to North Korea without having similar adverse effects on South Korea, for example. Or to Japan for that matter. The political fallout of such a move would have substantial political consequences. This is what I mean by regional selectivity, and perhaps if the USA was initiating a war in the region it would be something to worry about, but otherwise it isn't something to seriously make an issue over. My advise to getting caught in/near a warzone: run like hell unless you want to die gloriously for your country.
It is interesting in the dissenting opinion of Eldred vs. Ashcroft this argument you are making here was reinforced. Justice Breyer in the dissenting opinion suggested that the constitution was explicit about the limited time clause and believed that Congress had stepped too far with the nearly perpetual copyright extensions. This opinion is one of the most reasoned judicial or legal arguments I have ever read that touches these issues, and certainly was much better than Lawence Lessig (even though Lessig did argue the case in chamber).
There was a hint in this and some of the testimony by other justices that this issue could be revisited again if copyright was extended yet again by Congress. Essentially, all that was really said was that the current copyright terms are acceptable but also served notice that members of the public were being harmed substantially by any further extentions.
Certainly this legal case together with a very different attitude toward copyright by those who were born after the baby boomers may make this a significant legal issue if legislation ever comes up again to extend or modify copyright.
My point was that mandatory copyright was the law of the USA for nearly 190 years. The unusual situation is for the "everything is copyrighted" situation to exist. The terms of the original copyright law were also surprisingly short (17 years)
/. posts from copyright royalties. Perhaps I may be mistaken, but it seems very unlikely.
If what you write is considered valuable enough, you should be able to go through the steps of actually registering the content and placing it explicitly under copyright protection.
One other thing that mandatory copyright does is that content where the author can't be traced (abandonware, etc.) quickly goes out of copyright. The need for copyright renewals allows the author to provide fresh contact information for licensing and explicit permissions for reproduction of the copyrighted material.
I don't deny that some sort of implicit copyright for a very short period of time (a year or two, for example) may be a good thing in terms of allowing somebody to control their words (like in a blog) without having the content being taken out of context. And perhaps the strengthening of concepts like plagurism and source citation working their way into copyright law as well, allowing for lawsuits where content is used out of context without citing the original author. Or claiming work which you did not write as your own to be an illegal practice, even for "public domain" work. I have seen content which is currently in the public domain with copyright assertions and claims of authorship which are clearly not ethical, which current copyright law does not prevent.
Besides, I highly doubt most people in the blogosphere would really care about the copyright of their words, or even give a thought that their words are even under any copyright protection. I certainly don't care to have my words copyrighted for life + 75 years, which seems absolutely bizzare, as my grandkids aren't going to really be making any money off of any of my
For myself, I would prefer a manditory registration (with some marginal protection if somebody is "in the process" of registration) with the option to "renew" copyright after a modest amount of time. And perhaps substantially escalated registration prices for continued renewal in the case of something very valuable (aka the Disney movies, for example.... let Disney keep copyright if they are paying millions of dollars in registration fees). Renewal terms of only 10 years being reasonable.
/. an interesting proposal to charge $1 for the first registration and a 10x price increase every 10 years. This would be $10 after 10 years, $100 for 20 years, $1000 for 30 years and so forth. Paying $1,000,000 for 60 years and $100,000,000 for 80 years may be something George Lucas might be willing to pay for the Star Wars franchise. But even here most copyright registration would eventually become ridiculous that even major stake holders would give up and stop copyright renewal.
I saw much earlier here on
The point of all this is that for most practical copyright applications, all you need is copyright for a very limited period of time, meaning a decade or two. And it is arguable that copyright for even that length of time is of minimal value as most copyrighted material is only valuable for just a year or two. Sometimes a copyright book is used for fundraising purposes for a lengthy period of time (such the Great Ormond Street Hospital receiving royalties for the Peter Pan books), but such examples are very unusual. They can also be dealt with explicitly as exceptions if those legislators wish to grant some unusual provisions for projects like this.
As far as patent law is concerned, that is indeed a completely seperate issue. And not only do I think software patents are horrible (they do absolutely nothing positive and copyright law can do 95% of what patent law claims to do for most software patents), but I also fail to see many redeeming features for patents as applied to mechanical engineering... the typical and traditional form of patents. Far too much of those involved with issuing and applying for patents are part of a group that really is trying to suck money from those who are dreamers and wish for better times by "inventing" something cool and being able to "sell" the idea through a patent. Unfortnately, the number of individuals who actually succeed are so few compared to those who are ripped off through the patent process (when patents are used to "protect" these independent and lone inventors), that they are justifiably considered remarkable success stories, not something which is considered typical or normal.
And don't even get me going on traditional corporate use of patents, which is not to protect ideas but to keep from getting burned by this same scam game and those who abuse the patent process.
Bush will be gone in two years, regardless of if you love the guy or hate him to his core. The U.S. Constitution has spoken, and it is unlikely that he will ever run for public office again in his lifetime. Some former presidents have become senators or in one case a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, but most end up like Bill Clinton or G.H.W. Bush.... elder statesmen who occasionally get sent as "official representatives" to state funerals (aka Yeltsin most recently) or speak out about "humanitarian" causes (both elder Bush and Clinton were involved with the Indian Ocean tsunami relief as well as Katrina relief efforts).
It amazes me that some current presidential candidates are writing up their campaign platforms to be "anti-Bush" as the guy isn't even running. Even those of the same political party as Bush come from positions very much outside of the current political clique that is running the U.S. government at the moment, so it should be obvious in a couple of years that a very new political philosophy is going to be taking charge regardless of who actually wins the presidential election.
As far as complaints about the destruction of the American political system, you may wish for this to happen, but the current government (speaking broadly here) is very much in charge. I would dare you to find any major government in the world that has so successfully killed any internal domestic groups advocating rebellion and revolution as throughally as the U.S. government has. And to do so with a willing population supporting such moves. Groups like the SLA (Symbonese Liberation Army), Al-Queida, Hell's Angles, "The Mafia", or even weird attempts to spark a coup in America like the "American Liberty League" have all been effectively eliminated from within the borders of the USA. Even groups like the "militia organizations" which advocate extreme interpretations of the 2nd Amendment ("right to bear arms") have been neutralized in such a way they pose no real threat.
This isn't to say that unlike international perception, that the USA is living in a police state. We aren't. Political opposition does happen, and it is possible to say that you think the current president is a stupid pompous ass and needs to be thrown out with the trash, and to do so right in front of his official residence. If you tried to do that in China, you would likely end up in prison, or would quietly "disappear". Legitimate opposition political movements are tolerated (you just can't advocate armed rebellion) and even encouraged. If you think this is what a fascist dictatorship really means, I would strongly suggest you crack open history books and read a little more on Hitler and Mussolini to see what such dictatorships really were like. This does not exist in America.
Hardly difficult to find, nor all that unusual when the reason for parking it a block away may have other explainations. This factoid is taken completely out of context here.
If Hans had really cared to "dispose" of the car, he would have driven it to his father's house in Atlanta, Georgia. Or to a dozen other locations much further from his house. Driving it into San Francisco Bay or the Pacific Ocean would have been a very good (and relatively easy to do) task if that really was a goal. Not within a mile of his house parked on a street that could be found by a casual search in less than five minute with a police car.
There is also no other evidence besides traces of Nina's blood was found inside of the car. And there are numerous other scenarios that can be used to explain perhaps how that blood got there in the first place without having to resort to the transportation of a bloody corpse. Nina and Hans jointly owned that vehicle for several years, so it isn't even in dispute that Nina had been in the vehicle on at least a few other previous occasions.
This is about the best physical evidence that the police have on Hans, however.
There is no reason to suspect that she is dead. You can't prove anything other than she is not in Oakland, California, and likely not in the USA if she is alive.
Nina did have other "enemies" besides just those who have spoken up, and trust me when I say this case is going to get far more weird before this is over than has been displayed so far. I can't say just how weird, but I wouldn't even count this whole thing getting settled down until well after the jury has done their deliberation and the judge as said his piece on this issue as well.
The real tragedy that will be nearly permanent is how the State of California let the children of Hans and Nina leave the USA, where it will be very unlikely that Russia will ever let these kids return back to the USA. Keep in mind that they are U.S. citizens by virtue of being born in the USA to two American citizens (Nina was a naturalized citizen). Even so, Russia is claiming that these children are Russian citizens by virtue of having a Russian mother. Even if Hans is aquitted, he will never be able to see his children again, and may face legal problems regarding Nina if he ever goes to Russia to try and get them.
I hope that Nina can be found in some fashion, dead or alive (preferably alive). Or at least some strong evidence that Nina was alive sometime well after Hans was arrested. Unfortunately it appears as though her life is in significant peril if she ever does show up alive, as there are many individuals with a significant stake right now in the situation that would be ruined if she were to show up suddenly.
I also don't believe that Hans had the time or the skills necessary to effectively hide Nina's body without some substantial evidence trail also being found. Hans is a smart guy, and perhaps he could think up "the perfect murder". But it seems much more likely that somebody acting in an act of passion and killing somebody very close to them (as is alleged by the prosecution) would miss critical elements that would clearly show not only that he killed her, but where she is actually at. Dumping Nina's body into San Francisco Bay or burying her somewhere that couldn't be tracked by the police seems to be a difficult task at best, and seems also very likely that somebody (Silicon Valley is hardly what could be called "sparsely populated") would have seen Hans trying to dispose of a body in some way.
Isolation simulations are fairly commonplace, including simulators that attempt to mimic the surface of Mars.
Certainly experiences that have come from those working at the South Pole research station have been documented and are being used as a baseline for issues that will eventually come up when dealing with any eventual research station on Mars. Since the history of this base is entirely in the 20th Century and very well documented, and the remoteness of the base together with the very harsh environment that the people working there have to experience, comparisons to space travel are very common.
All of the issues including gender balance, social order, isolation (nobody can go in or out during the Antarctic "winter" except under exceptional conditions... aircraft simply stop functioning at the temperatures at that time of the year) and even highly motivated people with egos on the line due to the "staff" mainly being scientists have all been examined.
While not necessarily the complete isolation you are describing, most NASA astronaut teams are formed even now many years in advance, where they are working and training together for many years before their mission and learn about the strengths and weaknesses of each team member well before they go up into space. I have heard about some training exercises that do involve underwater activity in terms of team management exercises and being able to perform complex tasks together in a harsh environment. Florida is particular useful in term of building an underwater manned laboratory where a group would have an extended stay that is akin to living in a space station. It also seems to help out in terms of getting use to "neutral buoyancy" that is similar to weightlessness and the need for constant monitoring of your "space suit". Operating such an underwater station is also much cheaper than trying to operate a submarine.
I had a roommate who on the very day he was graduating with a degree in computer science (he was even wearing his graduation robes at the time) asked me on how to format a floppy disc for an assignment he needed to hand into one of his professors.
It wasn't just "I don't know what the switch is to get this disc format for this older system", but rather "I don't understand why I can't get this disc to work.... I need to format it but I don't know how to even start."
It is possible to graduate with a degree knowing quite a bit about "computer science" but never really getting the practical knowledge on how to develop software systems, including the use of breakpoints, debuggers, and proper software engineering practices. Your story here doesn't surprise me in this aspect as well, even though I feel sorry that such individuals have avoided practical education with their academic learning until they get into the "real world".
I've seen this done before... or at least something that could be interpreted along these lines.
In fact, the "software hook" that is referred to here I've also seen a software interrupt added into compiled code that during normal operations would simply have an IRET (interrupt return) op code on the ISR (interrupt service routine). But you could also have an independent debugger also run simutaneously doing all manner of evaluations on the software execution and performance evaluation. Or even evaluate CPU registers and perhaps even variables and other aspects of memory management. "Parameter passing" isn't even unusual even for interrupts.
I will agree that debugging multi-threaded applications can be a near nightmare due to the race conditions and timing issues, it doesn't have to be nearly so big of a deal as this patent seems to indicate.
This patent seems to imply that the tools which a competent software developer commonly uses are relatively unknown. It sounds here like this particular individual re-invented the wheel thinking he/she was very clever for having done something that their computer science professors never talked about when they were in school. This isn't that original, but trying to convince a non-programmer that it isn't may be a little harder.
Instead, this individual should have patented something truly remarkable and non-obvious like assigning the value zero to a memory cell.
If this is the patent, even this narrow definition has incredibly ancient (for computer software development) practice. I personally used such "software breakpoints" in software on an Apple ][ computer, back in 1977. And on other computer systems as well.
This sort of breakpoint wasn't even new then, or something novel. In short, the complaints about this sort of patent as simply covering existing practices is valid, and yet another example of how the USPTO is royally screwing up in their understanding of software development practices.
Of course, I very strongly believe that software should never be patented in any form in any situation, but even if you accept the bizzare concept of a software patent it should cover something new and innovative. Certainly not 40 year old concepts. Perhaps even 60 year old concepts, or even something Ada Lovelace came up with in the 19th Century.
I'm certain that Adm. Hooper is spinning in her grave over claims of originality for some of these patents, and in particular this one. It wouldn't surprise me if she implemented this idea into some of the compilers which she wrote back elsewhen.
The U.S. Navy doesn't send submarines out for 3-year deployments, although 1-year deployments have been done.
And it should be noted that pregnancy is an issue with the U.S. Navy, although in practice the number of women who get pregnant is similar (and proportional) to the number of men who go nuts and have to be sent to the brig on a semi-permanent basis due to discipline problems like assaulting a superior officer or other violent crimes.
Also one other issue that a submarine does have the option of doing, is to occasionally surface and come into port and exchange mail, take on fresh supplies (like fruit and fresh meat), and to exchange classified items which simply can't be sent cryptographically over supposedly secure telecommunications links. Somebody who is pregnant in such a situation is certainly going to be able to get out in such an exchange. Maybe not easily, but it can be done. An isolated group on Mars simply won't have that option at all.
I think you have your history of NASA off by a bit.
NASA was originally started by Woodrow Wilson in 1915 (under the name NACA - National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics) to help provide basic R&D into military aviation for WWI -- that is right, the first World War.
NASA with its more modern incarnation and name in regards to manned and unmanned spaceflight goes back to the Dwight Eisenhower administration when it was formally established by an act of Congress in 1957. JFK's involvement at this point was as a senator who actually voted against the proposal.
While I would agree that JFK did help push the effort toward manned spaceflight forward, and that many of his proposals were "rubber stamped" after his death (including the Vietnam War, and the Civil Rights Act of 1965) with not as much thought regarding any true direction of those proposals.
I would also strongly disagree that the "easy goals" have all been reached. Going to the Moon was hardly an easy goal, and some incredible research has been done by NASA in regards to aircraft safety and means of propulsion for interplanetary spacecraft in recent years. Unfortunately, the prime focus of NASA (and the largest portion of its budget) is a huge mess: The Space Shuttle Program/International Space Station. And this problem I do blame on the Nixon administration and accelerated by Jimmy Carter to create the current mess that we have.
Not that George W. Bush has been all that clear about setting goals for NASA either, but at least the "Moon, Mars, and Beyond" is something that is now a rough part of the NASA culture, even if the actual implementation of the concept won't happen until well after Geroge W. is long gone and in retirement.
At the current rate of progress for NASA, however, CNN will be reporting live from Mars when NASA finally shows up with their first astronauts, with those astrouants being treated to a barbeque hosted by Bigelow aerospace. If this is what you mean by NASA being "lost in space", I couldn't agree more. I just don't see NASA being the agency that will provide all of the cool gizmos and spacecraft that will be legitimately used for significant increases in human exploration of our Solar System.
Rather than complaining here on /. about "censorship" on Wikipedia, you can appeal in various talk pages about the topic.
/. posts about this have several useful links for such an article), I can't see that the article would be rejected. Or that its removal would be as controversial as you are making it out to be.
I think the main issue is that the number you are referring to here is not really a legitimate article name, and that a proper encyclopedia article about this topic can be done in a number of ways that doesn't necessarily use this number as the name of the article. Still, I don't see why it is a big deal to use the number in a redirect.
This number is not being "censored" in the same way the Digg was doing it, and it certainly is not controvercial on Wikipedia at the moment, other than perhaps a couple of over-zealous admins. I think you are making a mountain out of a molehill here in your attempt to attack Wikipedia.
Make a real article about this topic, and don't just complain about censorship when you can't write English worth a damn. If you think you can string two or more words together in a coherent fashion, and can dig up some legitimate sources for what the whole controversy is about (the
There is another aspect to your evaluation here to consider:
The "low demand density" type of businesses may be hyper-specialists: They produce something that is so unique that while few people will buy it, those that do need it are willing to pay very good prices for that sort of product.
Armoured cars are an example of a product like this. An average person is not going to buy one of these products, and it is likely that you will only find a very small number of businesses who even sell these kind of vehicles, which are all custom manufactured as well.
Or to be highly specalized, a manufacturer of aviation-grade O-rings. If you have developed a process that improves the operating environment that these products can work in, you have something that is indeed very valuable.
The problem as illustrated in this article is that the businessman who is the focus of the article does not sell a product which is on the leading edge of technology, nor is it unique from the thousands of jewelry stores that you can find in small towns. While gemstones and jewelry have enough value that shipping these items anywhere in the world is trivial compared to the cost, the competition for such a product is so large that there really isn't any substantial value gained by going with any particular jeweler, especially for an on-line purchase.
This is exactly why he ended up in Google's "link hell". There is nothing that he is doing which is unique.
If this jewelry business specalized in something which is of a regional flavor, such as south-western USA jewelry (heavy in silver and turquoise) or set up some legitimate information pages that would add value for somebody coming to visit his website, such as original content describing the process of making jewelry and obtaining the gemstones, there may be some reason to have people link to this website. And push up the rankings in a legitimate fashion. But as just another place to buy gemstones and jewelry, there is nothing remarkable that can't be done directly by DeBeers or genuine gemstone wholesalers.
This businessman was also ripped off by this so-called internet consultant who tried to game the system without doing any real good to the content of the website. The $35,000 that was spent on the consultant could have been better spent in so many ways that it boggles the mind. Hiring a recent college graduate with an English degree (aka somebody who supposedly can actually write reasonable prose, and not some geek who can't use grammar worth a damn) to do some genuine scholarly research and fill up a website full of content about the jewelry industry would have been something very worth while. There are so many things that can be done to enhance a website to legitimately improve page rankings and make you stand out that you have to wonder why people engage in spamlinking at all.
Keep in mind here I was trying to note other examples of copyrighted works (not "generic IP") where it would be considered absurd to follow a similar practice. I don't see why recorded music has such a special exception to copyright law when other items covered under the exact same statute simply don't apply.
There have been numerous attempts by many people to get the Walt Disney Corporation to release "The Song of the South" on VHS or DVD in the USA. It has been released in Europe (and subsequently pulled), but never in America. And through some "pirate" video connections. If compulsory licensing were available for the motion picture industry, this is clearly one movie that would have many people willing to pay the fee and get the movie over the objections of Disney... and one of the reasons why such a licensing scheme will never happen for movies.
This is also one way surprisingly that the MPAA and the RIAA are going in different directions, even though there are many similarities between the two organizations.
I know this is contradictory. That is the point I'm trying to make here, is that this is an absurd claim that somebody who releases recorded music (which they originally wrote, to avoid problems with composer copyright issues) under a copyleft licensing arrangement and then have the RIAA demand payments for "broadcasting" that music either "on-air" or via "internet radio" stations.
This legal mess would get a little more complicated under typical RIAA contracts where this same artist who had previously released the content under a copyleft license and then subsequently signed with a major studio, putting their music under the RIAA umbrella.
I was trying to illustrate how absurd this all can get, and mentioning a specific instance where the RIAA (via SoundExchange) simply can't collect royalties except through a legal system so throughally corrupt and in such an obvious manner that some judicial or legislative oversight is likely to step in and fix the system, or corrupt the system to the point that ordinary voters would take notice of the absurdity of the situation.
I was also trying to note that the use of the EFF or FSF as organizations who could generate quite a bit of public interest, and could set up such a "internet radio" site that would be impossible for the RIAA to ignore, as opposed to some indy music guy who is so obscure that the RIAA doesn't care to bother. A couple of very prominent network radio sites that clearly didn't require royalties for their use or even rebroadcast might even get some congressmen to take notice and point out the absurdities of some of the RIAA practicies.
So how do you revoke the GPL?
What I'm talking about here is the equivalent of somebody who has written a really useful software utility (let's take the ReiserFS as an example) and then the company or author who wrote that software which was released under the GPL earlier is then sold (with copyright assignment) to a company like Microsoft, who subsequently is insisting that the GPL no longer applies and any use of this utility without payment of some kind is a copyright violation.
So again, how do you revoke the GPL? I don't see how it can be done without having a judge simply rule that the GPL is an unconstitutional contract, whatever that really means. SCO tried that tactic and failed miserably. Or perhaps to demonstrate that the author was coerced into releasing their software under terms of the GPL through some sort of fraud or intimidation. That seems to be very unlikely, and would be something I would argue more about RIAA contracts than something typical of GPL'd software.
I think you understand this concept completely. Imagine if this philosophy were applied to other areas of copyright:
A significant issue with computer software is "abandonware", with software that can be found (even with documentation) but the copyright holder can't be found. Or perhaps you need for some reason an earlier version of the software due to specialized hardware requirements (i.e. Microsoft Windows 3.1 on a 1 meg RAM single board computer). Using this philosophy that is being applied here with music, you ought to be able to simply pay a fee to an organization (such as the Business Software Alliance
Or perhaps with the book publishing industry, where you could do a similar kind of application where a book which has been out of print can be reproduced (while it is still under copyright) by paying a simple copyright license fee to some other similar publishing body. This is done BTW in a limited context for academic purposes (called the "Copyright Clearance Center")
I don't have a problem with a group of recording studios (and record labels) cross-licensing in an industry group as a central clearing house for copyright licensing. I do object to some of the "standard" RIAA recording contracts that are very one-sided to favor the record labels and tend to screw over the recording artists, and that the distribution of licensing fees is very lopsided and favors the major artists and studios at the expense of smaller independent artists. But all of that objection aside, where does the RIAA get off by collecting fees for and in behalf of "non-members"? This is IMHO equivalent to a church collecting "tithing" from non-believers. BTW, in Germany tithing is collected from non-believers, so it isn't that far fetched of an idea either.
That is the beauty of taking this approach to the issue and boldly advertising that "internet radio" stations using this approach to music distribution. I'm talking about being blunt and obvious that this is something that the RIAA can't possible touch.
The problem here is that I don't see the RIAA/ASCAP/SoundExchange interpreting this in the way you are talking about. Sure, you or I would agree that the rights have already been negotiated here, but SoundExchange is claming rights to license all music which is distributed via "internet radio" channels. And backed up by the Library of Congress. The point of the original article posting here is that non-RIAA members (which can include musical artists who have released their music under the Creative Commons licenses) are being forced by statutory authority to have royalties paid to SoundExchange, regardless of the terms, conditions, or licenses that were granted by the artists in the first place. They are using this as a way to force smaller recording artists or even groups that want to create an alternative scheme to the RIAA methodology to having to stick with this one approach and only use the SoundExchange system.
The point of using copyleft approaches here is that it would force the issue out of a copyright violation issue into the patently obvious RIAA taxation authority by a for profit group of corporations. If music which is simply placed into the public domain can be "taxed" in this manner, why not GPL'd music? Of course this isn't the only bizzare tax on public goods that goes to supporting for-profit corporations, but this would force such an issue into the realm of public debate for exactly what it really is.
This is also why this move by the RIAA is so awful and needs to be challenged as forcefully as possible, or at the very least legitimate alternatives need to be publicized in such a way that this monopoly can be broken. I think it would be through copyleft content distribution that you can make this stick.