"valuable patent" is a bad yardstick. A valuable patent can be something stupid, obvious, and having prior art, but if you cannot afford to fight it, remains a patent. Even if you can afford to fight it, it still takes time and money. Better that bad patents not be granted in the first place.
I have a DVD with public domain content on it (Private Snafu cartoons, if you care). The tool to circumvent the copy protection of the disc is illegal, yet the underlying content is free to copy.
To use your analogy, it is as if it were legal to shoot people, but guns (the tools) were illegal.
.kids.us is a better idea than.xxx. The US government could regulate content within the domain to its heart's content, and parents who want the government to raise their children for them could set their kids' firewall to only allow access to that domain. There would be no question of "who owns the TLD", like the current.com/.net/.org struggle, no worries about what people in other countries find kid-acceptable that would raise flags in the US (e.g., beach photos where mom is topless), restrictions and fines could be placed on all.kids.us operators for violations, and advertisers and others would be lining up to pay registration fees so as to be able to hit a target audience. And best of all, the politicians can claim that they are doing it all "for the children".
We don't let kids drive freely over real highways. Why are we letting them drive freely over the 'Information Superhighway'? Rather than forcing all drivers to 5 m.p.h., let us make a kid friendly bike-path.
.kids.us is a better idea than.xxx. The US government could regulate content within the domain to its heart's content, and parents who want the government to raise their children could set their kid's firewall to only allow access to that domain.
The industry needs to learn, remaking a good film or series is a losing proposition: at best, people will say "it was as good as the original". Sure, you DO get the brand recognition when the remake comes out, but if your version is not as good, many people will not bother, or go rent the original instead. And your odds of being not as good are high.
The proper thing to remake is the mediocre. Take the good parts, flush the bad parts, and you get something that is equal or better than the original. If I were a movie maker looking to do a remake, I would be scouring IMDB for things rated between around 5 to 6 1/2. Any better than that, you will run in to trouble, and much worse, it likely is not salvageable.
CBS - Westinghouse Fox - News Corp/Rupert Murdock CNN - Time-Warner ABC - Disney NBC - General Electric (GE) NY Times - the Sulzberger family Washington Post - the Graham family
My #1 feature request, for either Blu-Ray or HD-DVD: No non-skippable support. I want to be able to go straight to the menu/movie, enough with the non-skippable ads, logos, FBI warnings, etc.
New York County is the most densely populated state county in the United States, with a density of 25,849.9/km. In 1910, it reached a peak to 46,428.9/km.
As of the census of 2000, there are 1,537,195 people, 738,644 households, and 302,105 families residing in the county. The population density is 25,849.9/km (66,940.1/mi).
In my haste, I converted the metric number, not noticing the english system number they also list. Either it or the metric number is slightly off, as a conversion from metric gives an extra 10.8 people/sq mile.
$ units
2084 units, 71 prefixes, 32 nonlinear units
You have: 25849.9/km^2
You want:/mile^2
* 66950.934
/ 1.4936311e-05
If population density were #1 factor in cheap-high speed Internet, why are there not cheap fiber connections for everyone in NYC and NJ?
France has a population density of 284/square mile.
South Korea has 1275 people/square mile.
New Jersey has 1133 people/square mile.
New York County, which includes Manhattan, has 66950 people/square mile. No, that's not a typo.
Obviously, NYC and NJ have "a tremendous advanage regarding broadband penetration". So why don't we have cheap broadband?
Exactly. If all MPAA members were to absolutely refuse to license any of their content to broadcasters, out of fear of "piracy", it would be a bonanza for independent film companies, who would selling movie broadcast rights left and right.
No content == No viewers == No eyeballs to sell to advertisers == No revenue. They're not going to give up their income just because they can't have a broadcast flag, or if they do, someone else will by the TV station and make money with it.
Why not just email all that to yourself in a gmail account? Holds 2.5GB and counting, and you can get to it from anywhere. No need to worry about taking it along with you.
1. Most Unix operating systems ran on proprietary hardware only. NT could be installed on cheap hardware you could buy from a store.
2. The exception [to running on non-properietary hardware] was SCO Unix.
Not true. Of the Unixes the article lists:
Consensys - Ran on x86
Dell - Ran on x86
Interactive - Ran on x86
Microport - Ran on x86
UHC - Ran on x86
Univel - Ran on x86
And we are not talking propriatary x86, just standard 386/486 machines you get from the store.
Why do we keep maintaining and extending copyright law, then?
Imagine if we eliminated it. We'd lose less than 1% of our economy.
Imagine for a moment if we reduced it to five years. Five years would be enough for Hollywood to keep putting out movies, in both theaters and DVDs. It would be enough that $POPARTIST of the day (and the record company that owns him) could keep selling CDs. Magazines and books would still be made. We would lose less than that 0.7%. And think what we would gain! The ability to freely and openly copy, exchange, and build upon anything produced in the 20th century.
I would bet that the losses in the entertainment industry would more than be made up by the gains in the telecommunications industry, as people demanded more and faster broadband, and the storage industry, as people bought TB arrays to store things.
Ditto. Once this passes in.nz, we should talk to our elected officials about how we need to "harmonize" our anti-spam laws with theirs, and make ours tougher.
When calculating how old you are, do you figure from the point you were a viable foetus, or when you were actually born? Windows 2000 was not available to retail stores and the public until February 17, 2000.
Even if one were to count the start of manufacturing in December, it is currently August. We're still only at 5 years and change.
Slashdot Mirror
"valuable patent" is a bad yardstick. A valuable patent can be something stupid, obvious, and having prior art, but if you cannot afford to fight it, remains a patent. Even if you can afford to fight it, it still takes time and money. Better that bad patents not be granted in the first place.
So now, instead of getting spam for viagra, I get spam for v1agra, vi4gra, vyagra, viegra, etc.
Virus writers will just add mutational code to their virius, so each instance of infection will have a unique signature.
I have a DVD with public domain content on it (Private Snafu cartoons, if you care). The tool to circumvent the copy protection of the disc is illegal, yet the underlying content is free to copy.
To use your analogy, it is as if it were legal to shoot people, but guns (the tools) were illegal.
We don't let kids drive freely over real highways. Why are we letting them drive freely over the 'Information Superhighway'? Rather than forcing all drivers to 5 m.p.h., let us make a kid friendly bike-path.
Discover (discovercard.com) also offers one-time transaction numbers.
.kids.us is a better idea than .xxx. The US government could regulate content within the domain to its heart's content, and parents who want the government to raise their children could set their kid's firewall to only allow access to that domain.
The industry needs to learn, remaking a good film or series is a losing proposition: at best, people will say "it was as good as the original". Sure, you DO get the brand recognition when the remake comes out, but if your version is not as good, many people will not bother, or go rent the original instead. And your odds of being not as good are high.
The proper thing to remake is the mediocre. Take the good parts, flush the bad parts, and you get something that is equal or better than the original. If I were a movie maker looking to do a remake, I would be scouring IMDB for things rated between around 5 to 6 1/2. Any better than that, you will run in to trouble, and much worse, it likely is not salvageable.
The true bias of the networks:
CBS - Westinghouse
Fox - News Corp/Rupert Murdock
CNN - Time-Warner
ABC - Disney
NBC - General Electric (GE)
NY Times - the Sulzberger family
Washington Post - the Graham family
Microwaves? Forget that. Just use a giant parbolic solar mirror to melt the moon's surface where you want to settle.
How about offering him a 1% royalty on any treatments developed based on studying his immune system?
My #1 feature request, for either Blu-Ray or HD-DVD: No non-skippable support. I want to be able to go straight to the menu/movie, enough with the non-skippable ads, logos, FBI warnings, etc.
$ units /mile^2
2084 units, 71 prefixes, 32 nonlinear units
You have: 25849.9/km^2
You want:
* 66950.934
/ 1.4936311e-05
France has a population density of 284/square mile.
South Korea has 1275 people/square mile.
New Jersey has 1133 people/square mile.
New York County, which includes Manhattan, has 66950 people/square mile. No, that's not a typo.
Obviously, NYC and NJ have "a tremendous advanage regarding broadband penetration". So why don't we have cheap broadband?
Mallrats was just rehashing Larry Niven's Man of Steel, Woman of Kleenex.
Exactly. If all MPAA members were to absolutely refuse to license any of their content to broadcasters, out of fear of "piracy", it would be a bonanza for independent film companies, who would selling movie broadcast rights left and right.
No content == No viewers == No eyeballs to sell to advertisers == No revenue. They're not going to give up their income just because they can't have a broadcast flag, or if they do, someone else will by the TV station and make money with it.
They will not be able to control forums and IRC/IM -- but that's not the point. The point is it will give them yet another crime to charge you with.
Why not just email all that to yourself in a gmail account? Holds 2.5GB and counting, and you can get to it from anywhere. No need to worry about taking it along with you.
When U.S. works pass into the Public Domain is a good summary of the U.S. issues.
Me, I just want 14+14 back.
2. The exception [to running on non-properietary hardware] was SCO Unix.
Not true. Of the Unixes the article lists:
Consensys - Ran on x86
Dell - Ran on x86
Interactive - Ran on x86
Microport - Ran on x86
UHC - Ran on x86
Univel - Ran on x86
And we are not talking propriatary x86, just standard 386/486 machines you get from the store.
Why do we keep maintaining and extending copyright law, then?
Imagine if we eliminated it. We'd lose less than 1% of our economy.
Imagine for a moment if we reduced it to five years. Five years would be enough for Hollywood to keep putting out movies, in both theaters and DVDs. It would be enough that $POPARTIST of the day (and the record company that owns him) could keep selling CDs. Magazines and books would still be made. We would lose less than that 0.7%. And think what we would gain! The ability to freely and openly copy, exchange, and build upon anything produced in the 20th century.
I would bet that the losses in the entertainment industry would more than be made up by the gains in the telecommunications industry, as people demanded more and faster broadband, and the storage industry, as people bought TB arrays to store things.
Ditto. Once this passes in .nz, we should talk to our elected officials about how we need to "harmonize" our anti-spam laws with theirs, and make ours tougher.
Even if one were to count the start of manufacturing in December, it is currently August. We're still only at 5 years and change.
2005 (the current year) - 2000 (the year of Windows 2000's release) = 5, not 6.
You do not understand the MicroSoft definition of "interoperate":
"Making sure you cannot talk to us without giving us per-client money."