The other thing is: why would anyone working on anything important want to do that important work on the web - on someone else's data storage facility? Maybe there are facts not yet in evidence, but anything that needs to remain proprietary or confidential probably cannot be worked on via publicaly distributed software on the internet.
I can see how it could be done in a non-intrusive way, but I can easily the opposite method too - where everything you are doing is being spied upon.
Well, it's not like the RIAA has a magic crystal ball that can determine exactly how many songs a particular person has transferred over their IP. But they can detect IPs that have shared music.
Listen, Genius -- all they have to do is prove that a given person ACTUALLY shared some music over the internet. Of course, this raises all kinds of subset issues: does the person have exclusive control of the machine, were they aware of the music sharing, what specific music files were shared, were any music files actually downloaded by someone else via the shared directory, etc.
I don't care if that's all very hard to prove - that's what they must do.
In the current case they haven't even been able to claim that any files were actually shared - they claim instead that some number of music files were available for sharing, and that's quite a different matter.
As it turns out many of those subset issues would actually be fairly hard to prove even to a preponderance of the evidence. Like I care...
That's why what the RIAA is doing is abusive of process - the intent is actually to settle out of court purely on the basis of instilling fear into their victims and by way of cost v benefit (in terms of atty costs and so on for their victims). So yeah, it quite the "racket". Jeebus, the RIAA can't even prove they properly represent all the parties they claim to represent. Really, it's all quite mad.
So please, get over yourself.
Copyright as we know it is dead. The street has its own uses for things.
Yeah, but "RIAA sucks" is a good soundbite whereas you would seem to want to have a multi-layered nuanced conversation about the real issues. Guess what? You can't.
And that's the same reason as to why political progressives almost always lose their elections - in case you ever wondered, but I digress...
People don't have the time or desire to have a complex conversation about legal matters, they just want to cut to the chase and be told a good story. Who are the guys in the white hats? Who are the guys in black hats. Cool. Who won?
We are probably of the same mind on the other issues as you indicated your opinions, but that won't stop copyrights from becoming roadkill. Technology has already done that, now we have to figure out what to do about it, but the solution is not to go nuts in the obscenely pro-corporate manner the government has taken of late. And I think you would agree with me on that point.
The fact is that the cat is out of the bag and there is no way of getting it back in there.
Your whole post is no more than a "straw man" style argument in which you misrepresent Slashdot's supposed editorial stands on the various issues presented so that you can more easily attack them. Well, I 'll just make a few points and then leave you to continue your trolling in peace...
"Despite Slashdot calling for the RIAA to go after individual infringers back during the Napster lawsuit, Slashdot has done a 180 and is against that now, using anti-capitalist rhetoric to avoid discussing the issues of music piracy."
The point was that suing and in any way bothering ISPs with these RIAA lawsuits was a bogus approach because ISPs should have "common carrier" status. Just as people can carry out illegal activities on phone lines while the phone companies are held to be legally without liability, so too should it be the case for ISPs who are mere carriers for the information being sent and retrieved by their customers.
No one advocated bogus lawsuits against individuals. No one suggested abuse of process (because this is more a scare campaign than anything else, let's face it). No one supported the RIAA going after people without even the ability to state a valid claim. In this case (the one under discussion) they weren't able to state an actual damage, just the potential of one - and even that might have been based on erroneous information.
Seriously, get your shit together first before coming here to talk utter nonsense.
BTW, you know who cares about Music Piracy? Maybe the RIAA and no one else. Why should our government be wasting resources for the benefit of so few? Why even discuss it? If someone infringes your rights and you can claim a damage - Great! Sue them in court. Leave everyone else alone. The courts are not there for the exclusive use of the RIAA and all of their thousands of bullshit lawsuits.
"This is the kicker. "Average organized crime syndicate" is so blatantly over the top that the obvious intent is to stir the hornet's next of pro-piracy advocates on Slashdot (which has become P2P piracy central in the past couple of years) to generate page hits."
Um...okay. May I ask if you even know what RICO stands for? It's an acronym for: "Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations." The history of RICO law in the U.S. follows closely with government attempts to squash the activities of organized criminal organizations (i.e. the Mafia, gangs, etc). So yeah, if it happens to be the case that you can hit an organization with a RICO lawsuit chances are at least even money that they are on the same legal footing as mobsters or your "Average organized crime syndicate." And you have a problem with that why? If it's proven out in court, the RIAA will be seen to have been using the courts to pursue an illegal agenda that was abusive of court processes and infringing upon the rights of individuals to boot. I can't condone that.
It seems to me that whomever modded your comment as insightful is as ignorant as you are. Your comments are barely coherent and you appear to be poorly informed.
The reason I went to the movie and saw the series on DVD before seeing the movie was at the recommendation of a female friend. So I can't agree here.
And I saw plenty of gals in my theater too, no worries on that count.
So while this may be a geek/nerd cultural event, it's not exclusively that - or there are way more women in those categories than we realized previously.
Your problem isn't really what you pay, it's how they squander it away.
My attitude is simply that if we are going to act like socialists (which we do), and pay taxes like socialists (which we do), then I want plenty of socialist programs (like universal healthcare) as enjoyed by other western countries.
It would make the states more competitive in terms of cost of labor, I can tell you that.
> It would probably be a gross overestimation to ascribe to any significant proportion of filesharers any kind of truly well-concieved ethical stance, though.
And here you would be dead wrong. There is a giant fucking 800 pound gorilla of a problem that no one wants to talk about when it comes to copyrights and patents or any kind of "intellectual property" scheme:
WHEN YOU GRANT COPYRIGHTS AND PATENTS TO THE PRIVATE SECTOR, YOU TAKE FROM THE COMMONS.
There, now it's been stated so that it can be understood. These kinds of legally created rights just do not exist by any other means except as a creation of law. The Founding Fathers of the U.S. had all kinds of reservations about creating such laws and did so under very limited conditions. If you think these rights are somehow inherent, or deserved, or should be extended - then you are just drinking the corporate kool-aid that dictates that "what is good for [corporate name here] is good for the U.S." - and that's just utter bullshit.
Y'all realize that patents and copyrights are intended as legally created benefits for creative and inventive INDIVIDUALS and not corporations, right? And then, such rights were intended to be limited so that a creator could have the exclusive monetary gain from an invention for a short period of time (not his whole life or during the existence of his surviving estate, btw) and that then the "intellectual property" would lapse into the commons for the benefit of all - to keep the market of ideas lively.
Destroying the commons effects both the marketplaces of ideas and commerce. Neither ideas nor money should ever be consolidated into the hands of the too few. Ultimately, you own nothing and are just passing through anyway - why not give back to the society that made your wealth in ideas and money possible in the first place?
This is exactly correct. The filing is saying that the RIAA is not making any actual claims, just noting the potential for claims - there is a difference. When you claim a damage you have to be very specific, right down to the penny.
Where? What? When? Why? etc...
And finally: what can the court do to help you recover?
You must state a claim AND a proposed resolution in settlement of the claim.
You fail to take into account that very nearly the only reason to purchase the Apple MP3 player in most cases is as a fashion accessory. When people make purchasing decisions based on perceived quality the item better look sharp for a long time, otherwise it's like having a Rolex with a hideous scratch on the crystal - and who wants to pay a premium for that?
For reasons of price, usability, and a whole host of other criteria I recommended my nephew purchase a Samsung YP-T7Z instead. He hasn't complained of any problems with it so far. It operates mainly like a thumb drive until you want to use it as an MP3 player. It's tiny (matchbox sized), has a color monitor, and thanks to it's joystick driven interface I was working the device with my ginormous hands within seconds. Perfect in every regard.
So why buy Apple unless you are after the social cachet that goes with it?
> Most people have 'home cinema' setups these days anyway.
I don't disagree with your comment overall, but what makes you think this above comment is true? I don't have a "home cinema" setup - I have a 27" TV, DVD and VHS players, and a stereo system. I like my stuff, but I wouldn't say it was a "cinema" experience exactly.
I don't know, it just seems to me that you might be the kind of person that says things like: "Let them eat cake" because you have no sense of reality. I would say you were wrong about "most people" in the United States and I would say you were dead wrong if we were taking in the whole world in looking at this issue.
Many people in the world barely have enough to eat much less worry about home cinema systems. I think it'd be nice if you tried to see the world situation beyond your own fat ass sitting in an easy chair in front of your big screen plasma TV, surrounded no doubt by your 7.1 speaker system. I bet it's nice having Jeeves there to make you popcorn on demand too.
IIRC, RICO can be exercised as an ordinary civil suit, you just have to be able to state a claim for damages. In this case I would think that Anderson would have a claim for the stress factor this RIAA BS is causing her.
I hope she's reading this, more money for her and her attorney.
BTW, this is why you NEVER want to limit what attorneys or you can recover in lawsuits - because sometimes regular attys have to do the hard work that govt. either will not do, or when govt. is acting against you (as in criminalizing "copyright infringement" as if it were *SO IMPORTANT* to the whole of society instead of just some big wigs at the record and movie companies).
Not every piece of recorded music one could hope to own is actually available online. I routinely search for things I cannot find via amazon, ebay, half, and a host of other independent music sources. Some items are just NOT available.
With the extension of copyrights over periods of time that are increasingly untenable it really does behoove the copyright holder to make the products they own available or to relinquish the copyright as commercially unviable. When we grant copyright right, we take from the commons - and surely there should actually be some kind of compromise. The alternative is the destruction of the commons, the raising of a media elite monopoly, and utter control of available media in the hands of the few. That's pretty ridiculous.
BTW, I am unwilling to purchase media files that are lesser in quality than a VBR LAME MP3 recorded at the level of "alt preset standard." Some are unwilling to purchase any form of lossy media. And that's fair too.
Just because you can find it doesn't mean it's what the RIAA will end up being satisfied with. Before they are done I am sure they are going to try and shut down any open sources of media available - even used records and CDS. The whole point of their industry is to keep selling you the same shit in a new package. At one point does the consumer have a right to at least a legally accepted "licensed" copy of a song?
I have long wondered why I am not allowed to trade in my vinyl albums for those new CDs if I want to. If all they want to sell is a license, then the media shouldn't matter, right? If I can prove ownership of a license don't they owe me a usable copy if the playable media gets lost or damaged in some way? If not, why not?
Does it all end up being a fight between who can pay the most for legally created rights? In that case real campaign finance reform should cut the RIAA off not just above their knees, but above their balls.
Of course the sheep just bleat and nothing ever happens...
I agree with this in spirit. It's not impossible that the Chief Justice was not a Bush II type Republican - which people really do need to understand is different than what has generally been considered a Republican before the last 10-15 years. Bush II represents the unconcealed face of the plutocracy. If it were otherwise, the National Guard would be here at home taking care of disaster victims instead of protecting the oil interests of Bush II's buddies.
And when it comes to individual rights, the Democrats are now the conservatives.
I said that gold was better than paper money in only one way. My point is basically that the idea of money is a kind of con, but at least with gold it's a very stable, non-elastic con.
But inflation is clearly an even bigger con. One which people like you seem interested in perpetuating I assume due to enormous ignorance.
Bread can be baked. Petrol only works as a means of exchange on a much larger scale than what it costs to buy daily needs like bread. That's why gold and silver have always been used as the means of exchange - they are portable property. Because they are elements - and therefore cannot be broken down further and are not themselves constructed from other constituent elements - they are pretty much as "intrinsic" as it gets. Maybe you should look that word up or something?
I found your post interesting for its digression on DRMed money. Frankly, how is money not DRMed already?
I am having a Morpheus (from The Matrix) moment: Do you think that's gold in your pockets?
Any time they wish to devalue the money in your pockets they can print more of it. It has no intrinsic value of its own. We believe in money the same way we believe in God - it's all faith based until the music ends and you get stuck holding a wallet or checkbook notations of worthless paper.
Our whole economy is based on this idea - attenuated barter based on the exchange of items having no intrinsic value of their own (paper money and non-precious metal coins). It is because of the very elastic (inflationary) nature of the money that they can steal from you.
Gold is only better than paper money in one way - it is not very elastic and there is real scarcity. As gold is an element, unless you can solve the question confounding alchemists through the centuries you will find that the supply is indeed finite. You can discover more, but you can't just make more (via printing), and that's why it makes a better means of exchange. And interestingly, gold really does have many unique and interesting properties that make it valuable in itself - intrinsically.
Now what's better than gold? Real estate. That's how smart people "store" their money for safe keeping unless they are using it in other types of investments. Sadly, even the value of real estate is largely theoretical because they have ways to appropriate that too - they call it property taxes but it has the effect of converting the real property that you might own into something that you "lease" via continual payment of a property tax. When you fail to pay the tax, they just come and take your very real property away from you. Remarkable! And so few complain...
So I don't know about your "wicked idea" but I think they already thought of it before you, then they built up a way to continually set up the marks for the big con - we call it "government." They sold it to us via Art. I, sect. 10 of the Constitution - but they played bait and switch on us too. It's not gold, it's paper - and it's worthless. And it's not really real estate if they are just treating you like a serf on the land belonging to the banks/fedual lords.
Okay, I am done with playing Morpheus and trying to tell you how the world really works.
Yeah, but your personal experience doesn't mean shit to me either.
I recently saw "Batman Begins" at a midnight show, opening night. Some twit in the seat directly in front of me spent the whole movie texting on his cell phone. And man, was that thing ever bright and distracting in a dark theater. And what - he came to the opening night midnight showing so that he could ignore the movie for some reason? What about simple consideration for those of us nearest him? No one said anything because the ettiquette of the situation is a noman's land - no clear right and wrong has been established.
Mid-way through the movie the projector light failed and we missed a few minutes and had some down time while the light was replaced. Free tickets for next time were avialable upon exiting the theater.
Overall it was hard to complain, but I don't for one minute doubt what others have been saying in this thread. These cultural shifts in what is minimally considerate to others occur over night sometimes. With the advent of texting and cell phones there are no actual precedents.
Last Xmas my brother, my nephew and I sat down to watch the classic "A Christmas Story" - yup, my nephew wanted to spend the movie texting the whole time. At one point I said: "Can that conversation really not wait 90 minutes? Why don't you just call your girlfriend after the show?"
Amazing.
And how is texting better than a voice over the phone? Why is typing more fun? All I can think about is the information lost from what is only words on a screen. What ever happened to meeting for a drink and some conservation? Is there a good reason not to try for some face time with the girl in question?
Kids of today do not exist in their own present world, they are in "cyberspace" in one way or another. And by cyberspace I just mean some headspace that is not part of the world around them. I find it pretty weird and not hugely useful.
Technology should enhance your world, not distract you to a point of absurdity.
I doubt anyone will step up and admit it, but you are conversing with people in their 20s that think life is grand and everything is coming up roses. The wages you can't accept (because of mortgage etc) are the wages for which they are willing to do regular 40 and OT besides. These young wanks just haven't been slammed down yet.
Corporations eat these kids for breakfast.
Single? Sexless? Childless? Geek? Great! We have sysadmin work for you nights and weekends...
[Wait until that first baby. Wait until the first time you tell your boss that you can't stay late because "Um...it's my wedding anniversary tonight and my wife and I have reservations." Yeah, your boss will make a mental note to shit-can your ass.]
The other people you are talking to are mid-level wanks that have made the corporate gig work so far. Well, just wait until the corporations start off-shoring the whole corporation - it can and will happen if the profit incentive is there. The only people you really need "in country" are what you might call asset managers - but maybe you don't even need that. Maybe there is no real reason to remain "in country" at all - offshore the whole deal and reduce your tax liabilities besides...
Slashdot Mirror
Me too! I totally agree here.
The other thing is: why would anyone working on anything important want to do that important work on the web - on someone else's data storage facility? Maybe there are facts not yet in evidence, but anything that needs to remain proprietary or confidential probably cannot be worked on via publicaly distributed software on the internet.
I can see how it could be done in a non-intrusive way, but I can easily the opposite method too - where everything you are doing is being spied upon.
No thanks. The trust is just not there.
Well, it's not like the RIAA has a magic crystal ball that can determine exactly how many songs a particular person has transferred over their IP. But they can detect IPs that have shared music.
Listen, Genius -- all they have to do is prove that a given person ACTUALLY shared some music over the internet. Of course, this raises all kinds of subset issues: does the person have exclusive control of the machine, were they aware of the music sharing, what specific music files were shared, were any music files actually downloaded by someone else via the shared directory, etc.
I don't care if that's all very hard to prove - that's what they must do.
In the current case they haven't even been able to claim that any files were actually shared - they claim instead that some number of music files were available for sharing, and that's quite a different matter.
As it turns out many of those subset issues would actually be fairly hard to prove even to a preponderance of the evidence. Like I care...
That's why what the RIAA is doing is abusive of process - the intent is actually to settle out of court purely on the basis of instilling fear into their victims and by way of cost v benefit (in terms of atty costs and so on for their victims). So yeah, it quite the "racket". Jeebus, the RIAA can't even prove they properly represent all the parties they claim to represent. Really, it's all quite mad.
So please, get over yourself.
Copyright as we know it is dead. The street has its own uses for things.
Yeah, but "RIAA sucks" is a good soundbite whereas you would seem to want to have a multi-layered nuanced conversation about the real issues. Guess what? You can't.
And that's the same reason as to why political progressives almost always lose their elections - in case you ever wondered, but I digress...
People don't have the time or desire to have a complex conversation about legal matters, they just want to cut to the chase and be told a good story. Who are the guys in the white hats? Who are the guys in black hats. Cool. Who won?
We are probably of the same mind on the other issues as you indicated your opinions, but that won't stop copyrights from becoming roadkill. Technology has already done that, now we have to figure out what to do about it, but the solution is not to go nuts in the obscenely pro-corporate manner the government has taken of late. And I think you would agree with me on that point.
The fact is that the cat is out of the bag and there is no way of getting it back in there.
Your whole post is no more than a "straw man" style argument in which you misrepresent Slashdot's supposed editorial stands on the various issues presented so that you can more easily attack them. Well, I 'll just make a few points and then leave you to continue your trolling in peace...
d =13592078
"Despite Slashdot calling for the RIAA to go after individual infringers back during the Napster lawsuit, Slashdot has done a 180 and is against that now, using anti-capitalist rhetoric to avoid discussing the issues of music piracy."
The point was that suing and in any way bothering ISPs with these RIAA lawsuits was a bogus approach because ISPs should have "common carrier" status. Just as people can carry out illegal activities on phone lines while the phone companies are held to be legally without liability, so too should it be the case for ISPs who are mere carriers for the information being sent and retrieved by their customers.
No one advocated bogus lawsuits against individuals. No one suggested abuse of process (because this is more a scare campaign than anything else, let's face it). No one supported the RIAA going after people without even the ability to state a valid claim. In this case (the one under discussion) they weren't able to state an actual damage, just the potential of one - and even that might have been based on erroneous information.
Seriously, get your shit together first before coming here to talk utter nonsense.
BTW, you know who cares about Music Piracy? Maybe the RIAA and no one else. Why should our government be wasting resources for the benefit of so few? Why even discuss it? If someone infringes your rights and you can claim a damage - Great! Sue them in court. Leave everyone else alone. The courts are not there for the exclusive use of the RIAA and all of their thousands of bullshit lawsuits.
"This is the kicker. "Average organized crime syndicate" is so blatantly over the top that the obvious intent is to stir the hornet's next of pro-piracy advocates on Slashdot (which has become P2P piracy central in the past couple of years) to generate page hits."
Um...okay. May I ask if you even know what RICO stands for? It's an acronym for: "Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations." The history of RICO law in the U.S. follows closely with government attempts to squash the activities of organized criminal organizations (i.e. the Mafia, gangs, etc). So yeah, if it happens to be the case that you can hit an organization with a RICO lawsuit chances are at least even money that they are on the same legal footing as mobsters or your "Average organized crime syndicate." And you have a problem with that why? If it's proven out in court, the RIAA will be seen to have been using the courts to pursue an illegal agenda that was abusive of court processes and infringing upon the rights of individuals to boot. I can't condone that.
It seems to me that whomever modded your comment as insightful is as ignorant as you are. Your comments are barely coherent and you appear to be poorly informed.
FWIW, I guess it's kinda cool how I predicted this RICO move a couple of weeks back: http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=162628&ci
The reason I went to the movie and saw the series on DVD before seeing the movie was at the recommendation of a female friend. So I can't agree here.
And I saw plenty of gals in my theater too, no worries on that count.
So while this may be a geek/nerd cultural event, it's not exclusively that - or there are way more women in those categories than we realized previously.
Your problem isn't really what you pay, it's how they squander it away.
My attitude is simply that if we are going to act like socialists (which we do), and pay taxes like socialists (which we do), then I want plenty of socialist programs (like universal healthcare) as enjoyed by other western countries.
It would make the states more competitive in terms of cost of labor, I can tell you that.
> It would probably be a gross overestimation to ascribe to any significant proportion of filesharers any kind of truly well-concieved ethical stance, though.
And here you would be dead wrong. There is a giant fucking 800 pound gorilla of a problem that no one wants to talk about when it comes to copyrights and patents or any kind of "intellectual property" scheme:
WHEN YOU GRANT COPYRIGHTS AND PATENTS TO THE PRIVATE SECTOR,
YOU TAKE FROM THE COMMONS.
There, now it's been stated so that it can be understood. These kinds of legally created rights just do not exist by any other means except as a creation of law. The Founding Fathers of the U.S. had all kinds of reservations about creating such laws and did so under very limited conditions. If you think these rights are somehow inherent, or deserved, or should be extended - then you are just drinking the corporate kool-aid that dictates that "what is good for [corporate name here] is good for the U.S." - and that's just utter bullshit.
Y'all realize that patents and copyrights are intended as legally created benefits for creative and inventive INDIVIDUALS and not corporations, right? And then, such rights were intended to be limited so that a creator could have the exclusive monetary gain from an invention for a short period of time (not his whole life or during the existence of his surviving estate, btw) and that then the "intellectual property" would lapse into the commons for the benefit of all - to keep the market of ideas lively.
Destroying the commons effects both the marketplaces of ideas and commerce. Neither ideas nor money should ever be consolidated into the hands of the too few. Ultimately, you own nothing and are just passing through anyway - why not give back to the society that made your wealth in ideas and money possible in the first place?
This is exactly correct. The filing is saying that the RIAA is not making any actual claims, just noting the potential for claims - there is a difference. When you claim a damage you have to be very specific, right down to the penny.
Where? What? When? Why? etc...
And finally: what can the court do to help you recover?
You must state a claim AND a proposed resolution in settlement of the claim.
Great! You just don't want to do your homework - well, I won't do it for you either.
Last I heard Apple was trying to purchase up some technologies from Samsung for their MP3 player line. So keep telling me how Samsung sucks.
What gives?
You fail to take into account that very nearly the only reason to purchase the Apple MP3 player in most cases is as a fashion accessory. When people make purchasing decisions based on perceived quality the item better look sharp for a long time, otherwise it's like having a Rolex with a hideous scratch on the crystal - and who wants to pay a premium for that?
For reasons of price, usability, and a whole host of other criteria I recommended my nephew purchase a Samsung YP-T7Z instead. He hasn't complained of any problems with it so far. It operates mainly like a thumb drive until you want to use it as an MP3 player. It's tiny (matchbox sized), has a color monitor, and thanks to it's joystick driven interface I was working the device with my ginormous hands within seconds. Perfect in every regard.
So why buy Apple unless you are after the social cachet that goes with it?
> Most people have 'home cinema' setups these days anyway.
I don't disagree with your comment overall, but what makes you think this above comment is true? I don't have a "home cinema" setup - I have a 27" TV, DVD and VHS players, and a stereo system. I like my stuff, but I wouldn't say it was a "cinema" experience exactly.
I don't know, it just seems to me that you might be the kind of person that says things like: "Let them eat cake" because you have no sense of reality. I would say you were wrong about "most people" in the United States and I would say you were dead wrong if we were taking in the whole world in looking at this issue.
Many people in the world barely have enough to eat much less worry about home cinema systems. I think it'd be nice if you tried to see the world situation beyond your own fat ass sitting in an easy chair in front of your big screen plasma TV, surrounded no doubt by your 7.1 speaker system. I bet it's nice having Jeeves there to make you popcorn on demand too.
Knock, knock - reality calling!
Another bleeding commercial...
What a crock of shit. Just what we need: another illiterate asshole that cannot fucking read the article.
These people are claiming innocence.
IIRC, RICO can be exercised as an ordinary civil suit, you just have to be able to state a claim for damages. In this case I would think that Anderson would have a claim for the stress factor this RIAA BS is causing her.
I hope she's reading this, more money for her and her attorney.
BTW, this is why you NEVER want to limit what attorneys or you can recover in lawsuits - because sometimes regular attys have to do the hard work that govt. either will not do, or when govt. is acting against you (as in criminalizing "copyright infringement" as if it were *SO IMPORTANT* to the whole of society instead of just some big wigs at the record and movie companies).
I can't believe this is considered insightful.
Not every piece of recorded music one could hope to own is actually available online. I routinely search for things I cannot find via amazon, ebay, half, and a host of other independent music sources. Some items are just NOT available.
With the extension of copyrights over periods of time that are increasingly untenable it really does behoove the copyright holder to make the products they own available or to relinquish the copyright as commercially unviable. When we grant copyright right, we take from the commons - and surely there should actually be some kind of compromise. The alternative is the destruction of the commons, the raising of a media elite monopoly, and utter control of available media in the hands of the few. That's pretty ridiculous.
BTW, I am unwilling to purchase media files that are lesser in quality than a VBR LAME MP3 recorded at the level of "alt preset standard." Some are unwilling to purchase any form of lossy media. And that's fair too.
Just because you can find it doesn't mean it's what the RIAA will end up being satisfied with. Before they are done I am sure they are going to try and shut down any open sources of media available - even used records and CDS. The whole point of their industry is to keep selling you the same shit in a new package. At one point does the consumer have a right to at least a legally accepted "licensed" copy of a song?
I have long wondered why I am not allowed to trade in my vinyl albums for those new CDs if I want to. If all they want to sell is a license, then the media shouldn't matter, right? If I can prove ownership of a license don't they owe me a usable copy if the playable media gets lost or damaged in some way? If not, why not?
Does it all end up being a fight between who can pay the most for legally created rights? In that case real campaign finance reform should cut the RIAA off not just above their knees, but above their balls.
Of course the sheep just bleat and nothing ever happens...
Best advice ever. My claim has always been that the computer is used only for confirmation purposes - I already know the code is good.
Most code I figure out in my head and usually while taking a shower for some reason.
Just edit/re-edit your google page with the feed mentioned above.
The google default slashdot feed was not working for me either.
Capitalism = your god is money.
Socialism = the social well-being of all.
I agree with this in spirit. It's not impossible that the Chief Justice was not a Bush II type Republican - which people really do need to understand is different than what has generally been considered a Republican before the last 10-15 years. Bush II represents the unconcealed face of the plutocracy. If it were otherwise, the National Guard would be here at home taking care of disaster victims instead of protecting the oil interests of Bush II's buddies.
And when it comes to individual rights, the Democrats are now the conservatives.
Basically, everything is fucked up and inverted.
Apparently you missed my point also...
I said that gold was better than paper money in only one way. My point is basically that the idea of money is a kind of con, but at least with gold it's a very stable, non-elastic con.
But inflation is clearly an even bigger con. One which people like you seem interested in perpetuating I assume due to enormous ignorance.
Enjoy your bread.
You really missed the point didn't you?
Bread can be baked. Petrol only works as a means of exchange on a much larger scale than what it costs to buy daily needs like bread. That's why gold and silver have always been used as the means of exchange - they are portable property. Because they are elements - and therefore cannot be broken down further and are not themselves constructed from other constituent elements - they are pretty much as "intrinsic" as it gets. Maybe you should look that word up or something?
I found your post interesting for its digression on DRMed money. Frankly, how is money not DRMed already?
I am having a Morpheus (from The Matrix) moment: Do you think that's gold in your pockets?
Any time they wish to devalue the money in your pockets they can print more of it. It has no intrinsic value of its own. We believe in money the same way we believe in God - it's all faith based until the music ends and you get stuck holding a wallet or checkbook notations of worthless paper.
Our whole economy is based on this idea - attenuated barter based on the exchange of items having no intrinsic value of their own (paper money and non-precious metal coins). It is because of the very elastic (inflationary) nature of the money that they can steal from you.
Gold is only better than paper money in one way - it is not very elastic and there is real scarcity. As gold is an element, unless you can solve the question confounding alchemists through the centuries you will find that the supply is indeed finite. You can discover more, but you can't just make more (via printing), and that's why it makes a better means of exchange. And interestingly, gold really does have many unique and interesting properties that make it valuable in itself - intrinsically.
Now what's better than gold? Real estate. That's how smart people "store" their money for safe keeping unless they are using it in other types of investments. Sadly, even the value of real estate is largely theoretical because they have ways to appropriate that too - they call it property taxes but it has the effect of converting the real property that you might own into something that you "lease" via continual payment of a property tax. When you fail to pay the tax, they just come and take your very real property away from you. Remarkable! And so few complain...
So I don't know about your "wicked idea" but I think they already thought of it before you, then they built up a way to continually set up the marks for the big con - we call it "government." They sold it to us via Art. I, sect. 10 of the Constitution - but they played bait and switch on us too. It's not gold, it's paper - and it's worthless. And it's not really real estate if they are just treating you like a serf on the land belonging to the banks/fedual lords.
Okay, I am done with playing Morpheus and trying to tell you how the world really works.
Yeah, but your personal experience doesn't mean shit to me either.
I recently saw "Batman Begins" at a midnight show, opening night. Some twit in the seat directly in front of me spent the whole movie texting on his cell phone. And man, was that thing ever bright and distracting in a dark theater. And what - he came to the opening night midnight showing so that he could ignore the movie for some reason? What about simple consideration for those of us nearest him? No one said anything because the ettiquette of the situation is a noman's land - no clear right and wrong has been established.
Mid-way through the movie the projector light failed and we missed a few minutes and had some down time while the light was replaced. Free tickets for next time were avialable upon exiting the theater.
Overall it was hard to complain, but I don't for one minute doubt what others have been saying in this thread. These cultural shifts in what is minimally considerate to others occur over night sometimes. With the advent of texting and cell phones there are no actual precedents.
Last Xmas my brother, my nephew and I sat down to watch the classic "A Christmas Story" - yup, my nephew wanted to spend the movie texting the whole time. At one point I said: "Can that conversation really not wait 90 minutes? Why don't you just call your girlfriend after the show?"
Amazing.
And how is texting better than a voice over the phone? Why is typing more fun? All I can think about is the information lost from what is only words on a screen. What ever happened to meeting for a drink and some conservation? Is there a good reason not to try for some face time with the girl in question?
Kids of today do not exist in their own present world, they are in "cyberspace" in one way or another. And by cyberspace I just mean some headspace that is not part of the world around them. I find it pretty weird and not hugely useful.
Technology should enhance your world, not distract you to a point of absurdity.
I doubt anyone will step up and admit it, but you are conversing with people in their 20s that think life is grand and everything is coming up roses. The wages you can't accept (because of mortgage etc) are the wages for which they are willing to do regular 40 and OT besides. These young wanks just haven't been slammed down yet.
Corporations eat these kids for breakfast.
Single? Sexless? Childless? Geek? Great! We have sysadmin work for you nights and weekends...
[Wait until that first baby. Wait until the first time you tell your boss that you can't stay late because "Um...it's my wedding anniversary tonight and my wife and I have reservations." Yeah, your boss will make a mental note to shit-can your ass.]
The other people you are talking to are mid-level wanks that have made the corporate gig work so far. Well, just wait until the corporations start off-shoring the whole corporation - it can and will happen if the profit incentive is there. The only people you really need "in country" are what you might call asset managers - but maybe you don't even need that. Maybe there is no real reason to remain "in country" at all - offshore the whole deal and reduce your tax liabilities besides...