In any case, copying a newspaper article (as noted by the judge here) for non-commercial and informational use may be a fair use under the multi-part fair use factor test.
I'd question that, under the amount and substantiality test. And given the existence and ubiquity of hyperlinking, it's not necessary to copy an entire article for informational use.
As for the business model, I agree it's not a particularly nice one, but the problem is with the large statutory damages that US copyright law allows. Reduce those, and allow the judge to set common-sense damages on a case-by-case basis, and this business model rapidly becomes uneconomic. Trying to allow exceptions where you don't like the business model just makes copyright law more broken.
There's a difference between placing a link (not covered by copyright) and a summary (covered by fair use in the US) on your site, and copying the entire article.
The link and summary are actually a net benefit to the website being linked, as it may help drive traffic and increase advertising revenue.
By copying the entire article, you're allowing others to read the article without being shown the advertising that would go with it.
Even if the 'share' feature of the website did allow you to copy the entire text of the article, it's to a limited number of sites. It's reasonable to assume that the newspaper has given permission to copy to those sites, but that's no reason to assume that that permission is extended to your own web server.
I think the judge is right to stop and question the wording used with the share function, but otherwise this seems like an open and shut case of copyright infringement and not at all an abuse of copyright law.
One of the main things I've noticed is that "apps" developed for apple products are so basic and lacking in any real features they're more of a novelty than a serious education / work / anything tool.
On average, yes, but that's because there are so many basic applications in Apple's store. I'd like to know how exhaustive your study of the respective app stores was.
As other posters have stated, one of the many other tablets that are a fraction of the price using Android OS seem like a much better choice.
As far as I was aware, the Samsung Galaxy Tab is the first serious Android-based contender to the iPad, and it's not due out until next month. And it won't come with an OS designed for a tablet form factor. I'd categorise it as a very risky investment right now. In contrast, the iPad market has had a little more time to mature.
I've had this problem before. When I'm home and waiting for a delivery and the weather is good, I've taken to just leaving my door open, which is a good indication that I'm in.
Now this is what I don't get. The Copyright and Related Rights Regulations 2003 is the UK's implementation of the EU Copyright Directive and therefore our equivalent of the DMCA. It refers to 'effective technological measures', which I'm assuming is an attempt to deal with situations such as the one you are describing.
But isn't an encryption system that has been cracked, by definition, ineffective?
Does anybody know if any prosecutions have ever been made in the UK based on the anti-circumvention part of these regulations?
With a Vodafone SIM card I can send an SMS to anybody with a phone number. All I have to do is stick it in my phone, and I'm all set up.
If I wanted to be able to IM all my friends I'd have to sign up for AIM, MSN Messenger and Facebook IM, and I'd have to configure each one on my phone. And I'd have to hope that my friends had their phones configured too.
IM networks are incompatible with each other, and they require the user to sign up and then configure. SMS is superior in these respects, and for that reason it is universal.
It depends what kind of plan you're on. I have 1200 texts a month included in my bundle, of which I only use a tiny fraction, so I never have to think about the cost of sending any particular text message.
The advantage that SMS has over email is that you can make a reasonable assumption that the message will arrive on the recipient's mobile phone within a few seconds to a couple of minutes. You can't make the same assumption with an email (unless it's a BlackBerry email address or you know how the recipient has their email set up). If it's checked on a phone at all, it might only be checked once an hour.
I've used IM on my phone, and the principle problem that I find is that I'm usually talking to somebody who's using a PC. A common pattern in IM use is that small chunks of text get fired off in rapid succession instead of being compiled into one message. This works on a PC because it means that conversations don't diverge when two people are typing at once. On a mobile, it's incredibly annoying, especially as you can't type as fast. With SMS, because it's not quite instant and has a notional cost, people tend to put as much information into a single message as they can, and tend to allow more time between messages.
IRC just doesn't fit the use case of a mobile phone at all. The apps are there to allow it, but it's ludicrous to think that it could ever be a primary feature of a phone.
If these features are to become more frequently used on mobiles, then they need to work out of the box, either BlackBerry style or with the configuration details embedded on the SIM card. If they have to be set up by the user then they will never be primary features.
Oh, and 160 characters hasn't been a hard limit for a long time. I'd be shocked if there was a single phone on the market today that didn't support concatenated SMS.
Why would a Chrome OS app be unable to do anything without a net connection? You can run web apps without a net connection already, in current browsers, either through the Gears plugin or where the browser supports HTML 5 local storage.
I can't speak for Australia, but in the UK there's generally no sanction for voting against your party unless a three-line whip is issued.
I think most votes are covered by single-line whips, where the party line is spelled out but you don't have to vote that way, vote at all or even attend. The Public Whip logs the incidence of rebellion for each MP.
The fact is that most MPs vote with their party of their own free will, rather than under duress.
And the connector is being imposed on manufacturers, not carriers.
BlackBerry and Nokia phones are already coming with MicroUSB charging capability. I've tried both with a MicroUSB to USB-A cable and an Apple USB charger. The BlackBerry charges but the Nokia doesn't.
The Nokia (E72) implementation is a bit weird actually. I seems to need a connection to whatever it's connected to over USB before it will start charging. Switching from off-but-charging to on-and-charging briefly stops the charge cycle, and in very low battery situations this is enough to drain the battery again.
So the whole thing is a bit mixed. I'm not convinced that we'll be in a situation where one charger works for all phones for a long time. On the other hand, it pretty much guarantees that you can charge your phone by plugging it in to your computer - that's been true of pretty much all phones for a long time though, with the exception of Nokia.
I can't speak for other supermarkets, but Tesco are sneaky about it. A lot of the time, two equivalent products sitting next to each other on a shelf will have the cost per weight/volume in different units - one might show cost per litre whereas the other shows cost per 100 ml.
It's not the world's most difficult task to convert (thank fuck for the EU-mandated metric system), but you do have to engage your brain in order to make a direct comparison.
The article starts off by talking about taxi drivers, which reminded me of this incident.
This isn't just a software issue; it applies to any tool that has replaced a skill. You could say the same about matches replacing firelighting skills.
Back before web browsing on a phone became a relatively painless experience, I would have loved to have a desktop/netbook combo - the desktop for when I was at home, and I wanted something expandable relatively powerful with good ergonomics, and a netbook for taking to uni or visiting my parents, when I wanted web, email and music with me.
My biggest issue with this setup was that there was no easy way to sync data from the desktop to the netbook and back again. I've never seen any netbook that was designed to act as a client to another machine, which is a shame as I think it's an essential feature. The iPad, on the other hand, acts as a client, and although document sync leaves something to be desired, music sync has had time to mature.
I would have definitely considered a desktop/iPad combo... but it's too late now. I've stopped playing PC games and smartphones have improved, so a 13" laptop and an iPhone suit me fine.
From what you're saying this is probably an iOS 4 feature (and so will probably appear on the iPad in the next couple of months), but on my iPhone when I open a PDF in the web browser, an 'Open in iBooks' button appears at the top. Hopefully this means that your biggest issue with the iPad will be fixed soon.
And cycle lanes are for bikes, but cars will still park in them.
Worse is the total lack of planning that goes into cycle lanes in the first place. Often footpaths and busy roads are still more appropriate for cyclists than the available cycle paths.
It depends on where you live, how ridiculous nanny-statism is. In the US it's daft.
In countries where there is a public healthcare system, I can sort of see the point, even if I don't completely agree with it. In the UK, taxes on tobacco pay for a decent chunk of the NHS, because smoking-related illnesses take up so much of the NHS's resources. I could easily see why the government might want to reduce instances of 'self-inflicted' injury or illness, in order to reduce the amount of 'non-essential' work the NHS has to do.
Slashdot Mirror
I'd question that, under the amount and substantiality test. And given the existence and ubiquity of hyperlinking, it's not necessary to copy an entire article for informational use.
As for the business model, I agree it's not a particularly nice one, but the problem is with the large statutory damages that US copyright law allows. Reduce those, and allow the judge to set common-sense damages on a case-by-case basis, and this business model rapidly becomes uneconomic. Trying to allow exceptions where you don't like the business model just makes copyright law more broken.
There's a difference between placing a link (not covered by copyright) and a summary (covered by fair use in the US) on your site, and copying the entire article.
The link and summary are actually a net benefit to the website being linked, as it may help drive traffic and increase advertising revenue.
By copying the entire article, you're allowing others to read the article without being shown the advertising that would go with it.
Even if the 'share' feature of the website did allow you to copy the entire text of the article, it's to a limited number of sites. It's reasonable to assume that the newspaper has given permission to copy to those sites, but that's no reason to assume that that permission is extended to your own web server.
I think the judge is right to stop and question the wording used with the share function, but otherwise this seems like an open and shut case of copyright infringement and not at all an abuse of copyright law.
It depresses me that, on Slashdot of all places, this even needs to be said.
On average, yes, but that's because there are so many basic applications in Apple's store. I'd like to know how exhaustive your study of the respective app stores was.
As far as I was aware, the Samsung Galaxy Tab is the first serious Android-based contender to the iPad, and it's not due out until next month. And it won't come with an OS designed for a tablet form factor. I'd categorise it as a very risky investment right now. In contrast, the iPad market has had a little more time to mature.
Short Circuit.
I've had this problem before. When I'm home and waiting for a delivery and the weather is good, I've taken to just leaving my door open, which is a good indication that I'm in.
Now this is what I don't get. The Copyright and Related Rights Regulations 2003 is the UK's implementation of the EU Copyright Directive and therefore our equivalent of the DMCA. It refers to 'effective technological measures', which I'm assuming is an attempt to deal with situations such as the one you are describing.
But isn't an encryption system that has been cracked, by definition, ineffective?
Does anybody know if any prosecutions have ever been made in the UK based on the anti-circumvention part of these regulations?
With a Vodafone SIM card I can send an SMS to anybody with a phone number. All I have to do is stick it in my phone, and I'm all set up.
If I wanted to be able to IM all my friends I'd have to sign up for AIM, MSN Messenger and Facebook IM, and I'd have to configure each one on my phone. And I'd have to hope that my friends had their phones configured too.
IM networks are incompatible with each other, and they require the user to sign up and then configure. SMS is superior in these respects, and for that reason it is universal.
It depends what kind of plan you're on. I have 1200 texts a month included in my bundle, of which I only use a tiny fraction, so I never have to think about the cost of sending any particular text message.
The advantage that SMS has over email is that you can make a reasonable assumption that the message will arrive on the recipient's mobile phone within a few seconds to a couple of minutes. You can't make the same assumption with an email (unless it's a BlackBerry email address or you know how the recipient has their email set up). If it's checked on a phone at all, it might only be checked once an hour.
I've used IM on my phone, and the principle problem that I find is that I'm usually talking to somebody who's using a PC. A common pattern in IM use is that small chunks of text get fired off in rapid succession instead of being compiled into one message. This works on a PC because it means that conversations don't diverge when two people are typing at once. On a mobile, it's incredibly annoying, especially as you can't type as fast. With SMS, because it's not quite instant and has a notional cost, people tend to put as much information into a single message as they can, and tend to allow more time between messages.
IRC just doesn't fit the use case of a mobile phone at all. The apps are there to allow it, but it's ludicrous to think that it could ever be a primary feature of a phone.
If these features are to become more frequently used on mobiles, then they need to work out of the box, either BlackBerry style or with the configuration details embedded on the SIM card. If they have to be set up by the user then they will never be primary features.
Oh, and 160 characters hasn't been a hard limit for a long time. I'd be shocked if there was a single phone on the market today that didn't support concatenated SMS.
Don't they also have a much higher road fatality rate than other developed countries?
Samsung's specs say 169ppi. Values of 'close' may differ, I guess.
Why would a Chrome OS app be unable to do anything without a net connection? You can run web apps without a net connection already, in current browsers, either through the Gears plugin or where the browser supports HTML 5 local storage.
Are you trying to say that faith-based politics and gun ownership are mutually exclusive? Because I can think of a few notable exceptions.
I can't speak for Australia, but in the UK there's generally no sanction for voting against your party unless a three-line whip is issued.
I think most votes are covered by single-line whips, where the party line is spelled out but you don't have to vote that way, vote at all or even attend. The Public Whip logs the incidence of rebellion for each MP.
The fact is that most MPs vote with their party of their own free will, rather than under duress.
With an adapter, allegedly.
And the connector is being imposed on manufacturers, not carriers.
BlackBerry and Nokia phones are already coming with MicroUSB charging capability. I've tried both with a MicroUSB to USB-A cable and an Apple USB charger. The BlackBerry charges but the Nokia doesn't.
The Nokia (E72) implementation is a bit weird actually. I seems to need a connection to whatever it's connected to over USB before it will start charging. Switching from off-but-charging to on-and-charging briefly stops the charge cycle, and in very low battery situations this is enough to drain the battery again.
So the whole thing is a bit mixed. I'm not convinced that we'll be in a situation where one charger works for all phones for a long time. On the other hand, it pretty much guarantees that you can charge your phone by plugging it in to your computer - that's been true of pretty much all phones for a long time though, with the exception of Nokia.
What if he (or she) is caught trying to claim it on parliamentary expenses?
I can't speak for other supermarkets, but Tesco are sneaky about it. A lot of the time, two equivalent products sitting next to each other on a shelf will have the cost per weight/volume in different units - one might show cost per litre whereas the other shows cost per 100 ml.
It's not the world's most difficult task to convert (thank fuck for the EU-mandated metric system), but you do have to engage your brain in order to make a direct comparison.
The article starts off by talking about taxi drivers, which reminded me of this incident.
This isn't just a software issue; it applies to any tool that has replaced a skill. You could say the same about matches replacing firelighting skills.
Yeah, but not at the time of American independence. Formal union between Great Britain and Ireland didn't happen until 1800.
Back before web browsing on a phone became a relatively painless experience, I would have loved to have a desktop/netbook combo - the desktop for when I was at home, and I wanted something expandable relatively powerful with good ergonomics, and a netbook for taking to uni or visiting my parents, when I wanted web, email and music with me.
My biggest issue with this setup was that there was no easy way to sync data from the desktop to the netbook and back again. I've never seen any netbook that was designed to act as a client to another machine, which is a shame as I think it's an essential feature. The iPad, on the other hand, acts as a client, and although document sync leaves something to be desired, music sync has had time to mature.
I would have definitely considered a desktop/iPad combo... but it's too late now. I've stopped playing PC games and smartphones have improved, so a 13" laptop and an iPhone suit me fine.
From what you're saying this is probably an iOS 4 feature (and so will probably appear on the iPad in the next couple of months), but on my iPhone when I open a PDF in the web browser, an 'Open in iBooks' button appears at the top. Hopefully this means that your biggest issue with the iPad will be fixed soon.
In Soviet Russia, phone jailbreaks you!
...would have been a really good joke if it had been anywhere other than bloody Afghanistan.
And cycle lanes are for bikes, but cars will still park in them.
Worse is the total lack of planning that goes into cycle lanes in the first place. Often footpaths and busy roads are still more appropriate for cyclists than the available cycle paths.
It depends on where you live, how ridiculous nanny-statism is. In the US it's daft.
In countries where there is a public healthcare system, I can sort of see the point, even if I don't completely agree with it. In the UK, taxes on tobacco pay for a decent chunk of the NHS, because smoking-related illnesses take up so much of the NHS's resources. I could easily see why the government might want to reduce instances of 'self-inflicted' injury or illness, in order to reduce the amount of 'non-essential' work the NHS has to do.
Rick Dangerous. I had the Atari ST version, and hitting the space bar at the title screen would switch it to black-and-white mode.