Their content licenses only last for so long and have to be renewed. Sometimes the content company won't do it. It happens.
That's a fair point. But from my perspective as an end user, I don't care about Netflix's licensing terms. What's more, they haven't done much to explain these issues to users and make us aware -- a big icon overlaying no-longer-available content that says "This Studio Has Pulled This Content! Email [some_address@studio] to complain!" (well, probably minus the "complain" part in any more realistic view) would help deflect user ire away from Netflix.
So he's whining about raising the price, and then saying on top of that netflix is going to be losing money when he pays the lower price.
I'll agree that TFA's author's argument is a bit odd here at best.
But that's not my beef. My issue is that I'll have to pay more to get the same level of service that I've had for some time now.
Mailed DVDs really are only good for the post office
...unless whatever it is you'd like to watch just isn't available for streaming. If it's on DVD, the only barriers to being able to offer it up for streaming are 1) hardware, which they should have mostly covered already, and 2) BS, frankly -- greedy studios insisting on unreasonable terms. But inasmuch as the movie studios are not likely to give up their gravy trains without considerable more wailing, gnashing of teeth, and paid-for legislation, I don't expect that Netflix will be able to offer everything for streaming that they should technologically be able to -- and that's where the DVDs-by-mail are actually quite nice to have.
Perhaps my post was in error in equating Netflix's rate hike to a bald profit grab -- but then again, the company's own blog post does nothing to deflect this criticism, either.
Netflix is constantly adding things to their streaming side of things, so it isn't like they are charging more and offering less.
As noted elsewhere in this thread, Netflix also pulls content out of rotation, so that things that were previously available for streaming are suddenly gone, and sometimes without warning. Then a few weeks later that same content will be back again, but something else will be missing.
I rather wonder if some beancounter isn't being overly stingy in their hardware budget, and they have to cycle content out of rotation to make room on their servers.
This is why I've been sending back 3 DVDs in one mailer. I now have several hundred empty envelopes which I will promptly insert a slice of balogna into each and drop them into the mailbox. Statement made.
I love it! You could provide a whole deli-by-mail service -- a slice of bologna in one, cheese in another, mayo in a third, and perhaps a slice apiece of nice garlicky bread in a couple more.
Mm, mm! I'm'a have me some of that! Especially after going through all that US Postal Service machinery. Yum!
Just recently, all of the Star Trek TV series came on Instant (There goes my free time).
A little while back we were watching an episode of Doc Martin and had to stop partway through. The next morning, we try to open up the same episode to resume watching, only to find that that particular season was no longer viewable on Instant. We called tech support, and were told that content gets pulled out of rotation from time to time. Their recommended recourse -- wait a couple weeks and check again.
So sure, Star Trek came on Instant. But what else went away instead?
Finally, keep in mind this is a price decrease for those not interested in streaming at all, and $16 is WAY cheaper than my previous $50 cable bill
But for those of us who had happily been using the service as we'd signed up for it, using both Instant and DVDs-by-mail for $9.99 a month, this new pricing is not exactly a bargain.
I can't agree more. An increase in the number of golf matches and accelerated round-robin tournament configuration would go a long way to keeping those pesky bank officials occupied on the links and safely out of their offices. The Florida Professional Golfers' Association will benefit while also helping protect our nation's assets from executive malfeasance.
You're right, not the comment I thought I was linking to, sorry for the confusion. The argument dgatwood seems to be making is that compelling someone to divulge a decryption key (as opposed to a physical key) would be forbidden.
As dgatwood pointed out over here, apparently compelling the accused to either open a safe or decrypt a volume could both amount to compelled self-incrimination, which seems to be what the 5th amendment was intended to prevent.
Nope. Requiring the accused to decrypt the hard disk is exactly equal to asking him/her to open an office safe to show its contents when a search warrant is served.
You might be in agreement and I'm just missing that in your comment above, but other posters in this thread like dgatwood in this comment point out that compelling the accused to open a safe or decrypt a volume both equate to compelled self-incrimination, which is generally in contravention of the 5th amendment. If the accused agrees, that's one thing, but compelling is apparently a no-no.
It's almost as if the 5th amendment was written before computer encryption was even invented.
Ignoring the less-serious parts of your post, it's worth pointing out that encryption itself is quite old indeed. Is there legal precedent for forcing someone to decrypt encoded text in their possession in order to prosecute them? The only difference here is the much-derided "with a computer" bit that has been such a bugaboo for patents.
Instead of just spouting vituperative nonsense like a few others have, thank you for writing something useful and relevant. This key argument makes sense.
The prosecutor in the case has insisted that the defendant would not be forced to disclose her passphrase, but only to enter the passphrase into a computer to decrypt the drive."
That would still seem to violate the 5th amendment. The relevant text is bolded below:
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
This is because almost anybody can learn English faster than Chinese. This is the reason why children begin communicating at an earlier age in the west than their equivalent Chinese counterparts.
This claim is wildly at odds with what I have seen -- spending time with both native-English and native-Chinese families, I saw zero appreciable difference in the ages at which children began communicating.
Besides which, the vagaries of English (verbs inflect for person and tense, tenses are varied and inconsistent, nouns inflect for number and gender, comparatives are inconsistent, articles exist and can be either definite or indefinite in hard-to-define ways, etc) that are not shared by Chinese would suggest that English would be the harder language to learn.
Do you have any references to back up either of these arguments? If so, I'd be quite interested in reading them.
The problem with Chinese is just it's such an awful language, with a bizarre and retarded method of writing it down which just makes it incredibly hard to learn.
What makes it "awful"? I find it quite lovely to listen to, at least when spoken clearly as it is in the soundtrack of the movie Hero. The use of aspect markers instead of tense and the way that verbs do not conjugate, as well as the way that nouns have no plural, gender, or case distinctions, all make Chinese much easier to learn.
And when it comes to writing, anyone writing in English has no grounds for complaint -- both Chinese and English are written using a limited number of graphic elements (radicals vs. letters) combined in specific ways to form specific words. Both writing systems require years of study before they can be used productively (though less study just to read -- this is one example of the difference between passive use [reading] and active, productive use [writing]). Both writing systems contain obscure elements/words that are best left to specialists or arcana buffs. Basic texts in both writing systems make repeated use of the same elements/words.
Written English has the benefit of purveying sound information, but with notable lacunae and complications -- the word chough is a good example (apparently pronounced chuff), or perhaps slough would be better (I've heard slow, slue, and sluff, depending on region and context). Meanwhile, written Chinese has the benefit of purveying meaning, regardless of pronunciation -- allowing its use to write down very different languages, including all of the Chinese dialects, Vietnamese, Korean, and Japanese. (Bonus points for folks who are at least passingly aware of CJKV text processing issues.)
I suspect the Chinese will end up learning English, not English speakers learning Chinese.
This I agree with, though for different reasons -- I think this will happen because (1) most native English speakers in the US (and possibly in other countries?) tend to exhibit a certain sense of entitlement (and ensuing complacency and hubris) from the long years of being near or at the top of the geopolitical dog pile, and (2) people on the rise and trying to make something of themselves tend to have the ambition and drive to get in and get to work.
I know the value of learning languages you'll never use again: very very small.
As with most things having to do with language, it depends on the context. (<-- a linguist's way of saying YMMV.)
I'm a Japanese-English translator with an interest in Japanese word formation patterns, archaeology, and human migration patterns. I'm currently studying Navajo of all things, simply out of curiosity and because I love a good puzzle. I have zero opportunity to use it in speaking, and a very limited opportunity to use it in written form, primarily by puzzling out articles on the Navajo Wikipedia.
Despite the apparent sheer uselessness to me of studying Navajo, I have still found it helpful in nudging my brain this way or that with regard to looking at Japanese word formation. Note that I am in no way arguing that Navajo and Japanese are somehow related -- any relation would have to be so distant and so long ago as to be of dubious utility anyway. But I *have* found that studying the language has prompted new productive lines of thought in my study of Japanese.
So, from my point of view at least, the value of learning languages you'll never use again can be quite large indeed -- depending on your specific circumstances.
Wait. Americans start the first foreign language in 7th grade? Thats ridiculous. I think 10y should be the latest point to start, after that language is more or less hardwired.
FWIW, I started studying Japanese in 9th grade at the age of 14. Had it in high school for two years, then the program was dropped for lack of students, and I took once-weekly night classes for the next two years (because I'm a geek). I didn't take any my first year of college (choosing instead to take intensive Spanish and a semester of Chinese), and got back into it in my second year. Spent 6 months living with a host family in northern Japan between my sophomore and junior years.
When last I was living in Japan, I could fool folks on the phone (you know, where they couldn't see me) into thinking I was Japanese.
Mind you, I'm a decent mimic anyway, with an ear for accents. Always have been, so far as I can remember. And time spent living in the language and culture is hard to beat, and not something that most second-language-learners in the US ever really get around to doing.
That aside, the basic premise that language is hardwired after some age in the early teens is, frankly, bupkus. The main age-related issue regarding language acquisition has vastly more to do with social awareness -- part of learning any language is experimenting with making the sounds until you can sound like a native, and playing around with words until you have a solid grasp of valid syntax and grammar. For example, I can guarantee you that a 5-year-old will have far fewer compunctions about going "ba ba ba flub bla bla" on the bus than anyone who has gotten as far as puberty.
Though the common stereotype is for R / L confusion with speakers of Chinese, the Chinese language (Beijing dialect for sure, Cantonese most probably, others probably too) has a clear L sound and something close to an R sound, making it very unlikely that Chinese speakers would get those two mixed up when speaking English. FWIW, I've never heard a native Chinese speaker goof those up when speaking English.
Meanwhile, Japanese has no close analogs for the English L or R sounds, the closest being what's called a "flap" sound, most commonly pronounced a bit like a Spanish R that's not trilled (like the R in pero but not in perro). Some Japanese dialects pronounce this more closely to the English L (from what I've heard, old folks in the far north), but most Japanese speakers pronounce it as a flap. Most native Japanese speakers that I've heard speaking English have trouble distinguishing the English L and R sounds at some point during the learning process.
Though probably apocryphal, there's a story from the later years of the Occupation period when rumors abounded that MacArthur would run for US President. He was quite popular in Japan, and the story goes that some public pro-MacArthur demonstration unfolded a banner reading:
Slashdot Mirror
Cheers, I haven't had a TV in so long that I've missed out on a lot of Simpsons / Futurama / etc. Mark one under "Missed References"... :)
Their content licenses only last for so long and have to be renewed. Sometimes the content company won't do it. It happens.
That's a fair point. But from my perspective as an end user, I don't care about Netflix's licensing terms. What's more, they haven't done much to explain these issues to users and make us aware -- a big icon overlaying no-longer-available content that says "This Studio Has Pulled This Content! Email [some_address@studio] to complain!" (well, probably minus the "complain" part in any more realistic view) would help deflect user ire away from Netflix.
Cheers,
So he's whining about raising the price, and then saying on top of that netflix is going to be losing money when he pays the lower price.
I'll agree that TFA's author's argument is a bit odd here at best.
But that's not my beef. My issue is that I'll have to pay more to get the same level of service that I've had for some time now.
Mailed DVDs really are only good for the post office
...unless whatever it is you'd like to watch just isn't available for streaming. If it's on DVD, the only barriers to being able to offer it up for streaming are 1) hardware, which they should have mostly covered already, and 2) BS, frankly -- greedy studios insisting on unreasonable terms. But inasmuch as the movie studios are not likely to give up their gravy trains without considerable more wailing, gnashing of teeth, and paid-for legislation, I don't expect that Netflix will be able to offer everything for streaming that they should technologically be able to -- and that's where the DVDs-by-mail are actually quite nice to have.
Perhaps my post was in error in equating Netflix's rate hike to a bald profit grab -- but then again, the company's own blog post does nothing to deflect this criticism, either.
Cheers,
You just about cost me a new keyboard today, thanks for that! How's that new diet working out? High in fibers, I'd imagine. :-D
I put on my Pedant Hat...
I think the word you want is irony. Choice Blackadder quote:
Blackadder: Baldrick, do you know what irony is?
Baldrick: Yeah, it's like goldy or bronzey, only it's made of iron.
Cheers,
Netflix is constantly adding things to their streaming side of things, so it isn't like they are charging more and offering less.
As noted elsewhere in this thread, Netflix also pulls content out of rotation, so that things that were previously available for streaming are suddenly gone, and sometimes without warning. Then a few weeks later that same content will be back again, but something else will be missing.
I rather wonder if some beancounter isn't being overly stingy in their hardware budget, and they have to cycle content out of rotation to make room on their servers.
Cheers,
This is why I've been sending back 3 DVDs in one mailer. I now have several hundred empty envelopes which I will promptly insert a slice of balogna into each and drop them into the mailbox. Statement made.
I love it! You could provide a whole deli-by-mail service -- a slice of bologna in one, cheese in another, mayo in a third, and perhaps a slice apiece of nice garlicky bread in a couple more.
Mm, mm! I'm'a have me some of that! Especially after going through all that US Postal Service machinery. Yum!
Just recently, all of the Star Trek TV series came on Instant (There goes my free time).
A little while back we were watching an episode of Doc Martin and had to stop partway through. The next morning, we try to open up the same episode to resume watching, only to find that that particular season was no longer viewable on Instant. We called tech support, and were told that content gets pulled out of rotation from time to time. Their recommended recourse -- wait a couple weeks and check again.
So sure, Star Trek came on Instant. But what else went away instead?
Finally, keep in mind this is a price decrease for those not interested in streaming at all, and $16 is WAY cheaper than my previous $50 cable bill
But for those of us who had happily been using the service as we'd signed up for it, using both Instant and DVDs-by-mail for $9.99 a month, this new pricing is not exactly a bargain.
Cheers,
With regard to the bottom line, of course. :-P
What, you thought customers mattered? How quaint.
Cynically,
$89.6 quadrillion
*** "mathematical modeling" means "we pulled some big numbers out of our posteriors."
They've gotta have some huge posteriors!
Cheers,
That will fix our banking system for sure!
I can't agree more. An increase in the number of golf matches and accelerated round-robin tournament configuration would go a long way to keeping those pesky bank officials occupied on the links and safely out of their offices. The Florida Professional Golfers' Association will benefit while also helping protect our nation's assets from executive malfeasance.
...
Wait a minute, what are we talking about here?
Cheers,
You're right, not the comment I thought I was linking to, sorry for the confusion. The argument dgatwood seems to be making is that compelling someone to divulge a decryption key (as opposed to a physical key) would be forbidden.
Cheers,
Completely OT minor quibble, but...
Grammar-wise, the last line of your sig should read, E pluribus sanguinem, making sanguis the direct object of the sentence.
And now I doff my Pedant Hat. :)
Cheers,
Thanks for a well-reasoned comment. :)
As dgatwood pointed out over here, apparently compelling the accused to either open a safe or decrypt a volume could both amount to compelled self-incrimination, which seems to be what the 5th amendment was intended to prevent.
Cheers,
Nope. Requiring the accused to decrypt the hard disk is exactly equal to asking him/her to open an office safe to show its contents when a search warrant is served.
You might be in agreement and I'm just missing that in your comment above, but other posters in this thread like dgatwood in this comment point out that compelling the accused to open a safe or decrypt a volume both equate to compelled self-incrimination, which is generally in contravention of the 5th amendment. If the accused agrees, that's one thing, but compelling is apparently a no-no.
Cheers,
Thank you, this jives with comments by others such as this one by dgatwood.
Cheers,
It's almost as if the 5th amendment was written before computer encryption was even invented.
Ignoring the less-serious parts of your post, it's worth pointing out that encryption itself is quite old indeed. Is there legal precedent for forcing someone to decrypt encoded text in their possession in order to prosecute them? The only difference here is the much-derided "with a computer" bit that has been such a bugaboo for patents.
Cheers,
This makes sense, thank you for this.
Cheers,
Instead of just spouting vituperative nonsense like a few others have, thank you for writing something useful and relevant. This key argument makes sense.
Cheers,
The prosecutor in the case has insisted that the defendant would not be forced to disclose her passphrase, but only to enter the passphrase into a computer to decrypt the drive."
That would still seem to violate the 5th amendment. The relevant text is bolded below:
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
Anyone of more legal background care to comment?
Cheers,
This is because almost anybody can learn English faster than Chinese. This is the reason why children begin communicating at an earlier age in the west than their equivalent Chinese counterparts.
This claim is wildly at odds with what I have seen -- spending time with both native-English and native-Chinese families, I saw zero appreciable difference in the ages at which children began communicating.
Besides which, the vagaries of English (verbs inflect for person and tense, tenses are varied and inconsistent, nouns inflect for number and gender, comparatives are inconsistent, articles exist and can be either definite or indefinite in hard-to-define ways, etc) that are not shared by Chinese would suggest that English would be the harder language to learn.
Do you have any references to back up either of these arguments? If so, I'd be quite interested in reading them.
Cheers,
The problem with Chinese is just it's such an awful language, with a bizarre and retarded method of writing it down which just makes it incredibly hard to learn.
What makes it "awful"? I find it quite lovely to listen to, at least when spoken clearly as it is in the soundtrack of the movie Hero. The use of aspect markers instead of tense and the way that verbs do not conjugate, as well as the way that nouns have no plural, gender, or case distinctions, all make Chinese much easier to learn.
And when it comes to writing, anyone writing in English has no grounds for complaint -- both Chinese and English are written using a limited number of graphic elements (radicals vs. letters) combined in specific ways to form specific words. Both writing systems require years of study before they can be used productively (though less study just to read -- this is one example of the difference between passive use [reading] and active, productive use [writing]). Both writing systems contain obscure elements/words that are best left to specialists or arcana buffs. Basic texts in both writing systems make repeated use of the same elements/words.
Written English has the benefit of purveying sound information, but with notable lacunae and complications -- the word chough is a good example (apparently pronounced chuff), or perhaps slough would be better (I've heard slow, slue, and sluff, depending on region and context). Meanwhile, written Chinese has the benefit of purveying meaning, regardless of pronunciation -- allowing its use to write down very different languages, including all of the Chinese dialects, Vietnamese, Korean, and Japanese. (Bonus points for folks who are at least passingly aware of CJKV text processing issues.)
I suspect the Chinese will end up learning English, not English speakers learning Chinese.
This I agree with, though for different reasons -- I think this will happen because (1) most native English speakers in the US (and possibly in other countries?) tend to exhibit a certain sense of entitlement (and ensuing complacency and hubris) from the long years of being near or at the top of the geopolitical dog pile, and (2) people on the rise and trying to make something of themselves tend to have the ambition and drive to get in and get to work.
Cheers,
I know the value of learning languages you'll never use again: very very small.
As with most things having to do with language, it depends on the context. (<-- a linguist's way of saying YMMV.)
I'm a Japanese-English translator with an interest in Japanese word formation patterns, archaeology, and human migration patterns. I'm currently studying Navajo of all things, simply out of curiosity and because I love a good puzzle. I have zero opportunity to use it in speaking, and a very limited opportunity to use it in written form, primarily by puzzling out articles on the Navajo Wikipedia.
Despite the apparent sheer uselessness to me of studying Navajo, I have still found it helpful in nudging my brain this way or that with regard to looking at Japanese word formation. Note that I am in no way arguing that Navajo and Japanese are somehow related -- any relation would have to be so distant and so long ago as to be of dubious utility anyway. But I *have* found that studying the language has prompted new productive lines of thought in my study of Japanese.
So, from my point of view at least, the value of learning languages you'll never use again can be quite large indeed -- depending on your specific circumstances.
Cheers,
Wait. Americans start the first foreign language in 7th grade? Thats ridiculous. I think 10y should be the latest point to start, after that language is more or less hardwired.
FWIW, I started studying Japanese in 9th grade at the age of 14. Had it in high school for two years, then the program was dropped for lack of students, and I took once-weekly night classes for the next two years (because I'm a geek). I didn't take any my first year of college (choosing instead to take intensive Spanish and a semester of Chinese), and got back into it in my second year. Spent 6 months living with a host family in northern Japan between my sophomore and junior years.
When last I was living in Japan, I could fool folks on the phone (you know, where they couldn't see me) into thinking I was Japanese.
Mind you, I'm a decent mimic anyway, with an ear for accents. Always have been, so far as I can remember. And time spent living in the language and culture is hard to beat, and not something that most second-language-learners in the US ever really get around to doing.
That aside, the basic premise that language is hardwired after some age in the early teens is, frankly, bupkus. The main age-related issue regarding language acquisition has vastly more to do with social awareness -- part of learning any language is experimenting with making the sounds until you can sound like a native, and playing around with words until you have a solid grasp of valid syntax and grammar. For example, I can guarantee you that a 5-year-old will have far fewer compunctions about going "ba ba ba flub bla bla" on the bus than anyone who has gotten as far as puberty.
Cheers,
Seriously? You dont know? FUCKING PEOPLE WILLINGLY INSTALL THIS SHIT.
So clearly the abstinent are safe! We have found a solution! :)
Cheers,
Pedantic Hat on:
Though the common stereotype is for R / L confusion with speakers of Chinese, the Chinese language (Beijing dialect for sure, Cantonese most probably, others probably too) has a clear L sound and something close to an R sound, making it very unlikely that Chinese speakers would get those two mixed up when speaking English. FWIW, I've never heard a native Chinese speaker goof those up when speaking English.
Meanwhile, Japanese has no close analogs for the English L or R sounds, the closest being what's called a "flap" sound, most commonly pronounced a bit like a Spanish R that's not trilled (like the R in pero but not in perro). Some Japanese dialects pronounce this more closely to the English L (from what I've heard, old folks in the far north), but most Japanese speakers pronounce it as a flap. Most native Japanese speakers that I've heard speaking English have trouble distinguishing the English L and R sounds at some point during the learning process.
Though probably apocryphal, there's a story from the later years of the Occupation period when rumors abounded that MacArthur would run for US President. He was quite popular in Japan, and the story goes that some public pro-MacArthur demonstration unfolded a banner reading:
We Play For MacArthur's Erection
Pedantic Hat off again. Cheers,