Not to mention this is the same administration that had MS by the short hairs and could have forced them to implement some real security changes, but let them off with a slap on the wrist.
>Mail fraud is a federal offense because it misuses a FEDERAL SERVICE.
So? Try attempting some fraud through privately-owned UPS or FedEx. If it crosses state lines its a federal offense and probably a state one too. If it doesn't then its a state offense.
PCs didn't really get cheap until the internet boom of the mid-90's. Considering the hottest browser at the time was Netscape, shouldn't they be credited with bringing PCs to the masses and the masses credited with lowering prices through demand?
Just about any OS can run a browser, so what did MS do? I mean other than bundle a free browser with their OS. PCs may be 1/4 the price but Microsoft's software sure isn't.
Read the article, this isn't just text but video and graphics. ASCII isn't going to cut it, and if was just text you'd think we could spring for unicode.
Regardless, the problem mentality is pretty well represented in your post. The assumption in the 80s was to make the discs like the book - make them last forever. The trick with digital is to assume the media and format will expire, become obselete, etc. To preserve the data they should have planned for this (migrating data, etc) instead of keeping the old book mentality of preserving a relic forever.
>If these new licenses become routinely ignored, so will the GPL, possibly to the point of all open source licenses losing legal strength as well as practical credibility.
Talk about your non-realistic slipperly slope arguments. "Your honor, this home user ignored the vegan license so all licenses must be invalid." Why just open licenses? Is there something magical about commercial licenses? They're all licenses. They're not going away because of some rider you don't like.
> worry that "evil" licenses will also become legally binding and increasingly common; only allowing corporate use, forbidding any political use, certain speech restrictions, etc.
These already exist. Ever see free for home, but not free for business use? Its called being selective, not "evil."
The creator of any work should have the right to distribute it as he or she feels especially within the confines of the law. Your paranoia and slipperly slope aregument does not suddenly take that right away nor are they realistic expections of adding riders to licenses.
I'm starting to get "Christmas requests" at work and frankly I don't want to do any of it, but people do ask who to buy from. I just tell them to goto Dell or even CDW as that's who I use for corporate, but they aren't necessarily the best deals nor the best option for the home buyer and I'd hate to point them to Best Buy or some other retail nightmare. By retail nightmare I mean a selection of only Compaqs starting at much more than what they're worth, $40 USB and parallel cables, pushy saleskids pushing worthless 'extended warranties', etc.
So who to recommend? I'd like to point people towards a company or two who excel in price and service. It doesn't matter if they're a multi-national or some local/web only shop, but the latter would be nice. So what retailers would you recommend for technophobes in need of a windows machine that'll do the basics?
What about "The Joy of Sex?" Almost every library has that book. If there was a "perfect filter" it still would not be able to cope with social changes. "The Joy of Sex" caused (and still causes in some places) a stir when it was released but in the end it was deemed library worthy.
So your local library doesn't stock Penthouse. Well, that's their perogative, but that doesn't mean it couldn't happen. Ideally, the library is about free access to information and what is considered approriate is always in flux.
>Does anyone know of any other efforts to produce true 'grassroots' commercials like this?
Commercials like you mention get made all the time, but what is most often the case is that the networks don't want to run the ads regardless of how much money you offer them. Usually issues like pro-legalization are dismissed instantly because a network doesn't want to be associated with the message. A television network has no requirement to play what you offer them, even if it is over our airwaves. If they want to pander to the usual right and not upset middle-america with alternative viewpoints then they will and there's little you can do about it other than get published in more independant outlets.
>Personally, I would love to see a grassroots commercial that advocates re-opening the Federal case against MS.
Okay so they run it, then MS never advertised with them again. They'll tell you to keep your $5,000 because MS's advertising is worth much more. Or better yet they'll call MS and see what kind of deal they can cut now that they have someone willing to pay to air a commercial like that. Corporate media is only good x amount of things and freedom of speech and diverse viewpoints ain't one of them.
>but it won't get you very far if you're trying to work for a company that uses MS software, as most do.
Nonsense, the decision to hire someone has a lot more to do with than what software they're famaliar with. I know that sounds crazy to some geeks, but if you're doing hiring based soley on whether Jane knows Outlook, Notes, Pine or just Hotmail then your company is in deeper trouble than any commercial software package can fix. Your post also ignores the fact that most office software can be learned in an afternoon and the user can be brought up to the level of intermediate user if not expert in a couple weeks of real use.
You can't have it both ways. Either commercial software is easier to use than OSS thus making learning easier or you're admitting that commercial software has no real benefits over OSS.
Secondly, being exposed to a typical office app or a browser regardless of brand is more than enough to teach someone "computers." If you can use Moz you can use IE. If you can use Open Office you can use any office software.
Your post sounds like another justification to do whatever the market is doing regardless of costs. "So what if we have to cut the arts and science budget, people are using MS!!" There are priorities in education and teaching the latest and greatest and most expensive is simply unrealistic.
Even in CS this problem is pretty non-existant. A school can teach new CS students Java for nothing or they can open their pockets, raise tution, etc and buy a copy of VB for everyone. If you know Java then learning VB is cake.
First off, there are more unsigned and indie artists out there than there are mainstream acts. That means you're comparing a small group of very well funded artists against a legion of non-funded artists and coming to the conclusion that 99% of non-mainstream artists must suck.
I really don't know where to begin with this. If you find Eminem "perceptive" then I guess you've found your proper niche. In the meantime I'll enjoy indie and local music which I think is far superior to top 40 in most instances. 99% is a pretty serious number. I can't honestly see how someone can think a large indie label like Bloodshot records or Matador *might* have one decent artist. I find that mainstream labels have much worse odds.
I have a dual tuner "directivo" with DirecTv and my Tivo has little or nothing to do with the current Tivo service. DT now sends the Tivo its programming schedule through a nightly broadcast instead of my Tivo calling uunet and downloading it. In fact, DT is now collecting the data Tivo would collect on me if I didn't opt-out. Yeah, I need to opt-out again, but that's a minor inconvienence. Not to mentiont I'm paying 5.95 a month for "Tivo" service while everyone else pays 13.95 (12.95?).
As others have pointed out, Tivo is a software company and its good software. As long as they don't price themselves out of this new market then they probably have a long and profitable life ahead of them. I'd pay extra for the TivOS and from what I've seen from the tuner boxes DT sells for its service they couldn't make a good, easy to navigate interface to save their lives.
No, we win. When the feds bust down my door and see all my legally owned indie label mp3s on my various players they can quietly walk out after giving me a written fucking apology.
There are many resources to discover not only non-RIAA music but GOOD music. Webcasters, college radio, epitonic.com (one of my favorites and they stream 128kbs), USENET, the music listings in your local paper, etc. The information and easy access to it is there, the question is whether the RIAA complainers will use it or just continue to copy and trade top-40 music thinking they're sticking it to the man.
Re:Fritz Hollings out as commerce committee chair!
on
Indecision 2002
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· Score: 2
So you're willing to get into bed with anti-first amendment politicans to fight DRM tech which is anti-first amendment in itself? Not to mention the GOP did not put up any organized fight against any of the bills listed.
>not caving into commercial interests.
Business is constituency too. What matters is if the laws overstep their boundries or promote some and hurt others. COPA obviously over-stepped its powers and there's little reason the believe the GOP would suddenly care about writing geek friendly legislation like the parent post suggests. If anything the GOP is infamous for "caving into commercial interests."
Re:Fritz Hollings out as commerce committee chair!
on
Indecision 2002
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· Score: 3, Informative
> No matter what your party affiliation is, you have to be encouraged by the growing possibility of Republicans taking back control of the Senate.
Umm, no. The worse anti-technology legislators are Republicans. List from the Worst Coders in Washington article: http://www.aotc.info/archives/000152.html
See all those little R's?
The Lawmakers These lawmakers in the House of Representatives and the Senate wrote more anti-technology legal code than any of their co-legislators.
1. Rep. Charles (Chip) Pickering (R-MS 3rd district) 3 bills $230,900
DMCA, COPA, CIPA
2. Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX 21st district) 2 bills $87,112
P2P Piracy Prevention Bill, COPA
3. Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK ) 2 bills $375,339
CBDTPA, CIPA
4. Rep. Bill Paxon (R-NY 27th district) 2 bills $200,938
DMCA, COPA
5. Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-CA 26th district) 2 bills $212,991
DMCA, P2P Piracy Prevention Bill
6. Rep. Michael G. Oxley (R-OH 4th district) 2 bills $184,998
COPA, CIPA
7. Rep. Howard Coble (R-NC 6th district) 2 bills $114,747
DMCA, P2P Piracy Prevention Bill
8. Sen. Ernest F. Hollings (D-SC ) 2 bills $532,980
CBDTPA, CIPA
9. Rep. Bob Franks (R-NJ 7th district) 2 bills $661,784
COPA, CIPA
10. Rep. Asa Hutchinson (R-AR 3rd district) 1 bill $99,350
COPA
11. Sen. John McCain (R-AZ ) 1 bill $1,050,321
CIPA
12. Rep. Roscoe G. Bartlett (R-MD 6th district) 1 bill $50,500
COPA
13. Rep. Jack Metcalf (R-WA 2nd district) 1 bill $185,377
COPA
14. Rep. Barbara Cubin (R-WY 1st district) 1 bill $115,980
COPA
15. Rep. Dan Schaefer (R-CO 6th district) 1 bill $145,162
COPA
16. Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R-IL 6th district) 1 bill $83,500
DMCA
17. Rep. Paul E. Gillmor (R-OH 5th district) 1 bill $107,849
COPA
18. Rep. Dave Weldon (R-FL 15th district) 1 bill $139,759
COPA
19. Rep. John R. Kasich (R-OH 12th district) 1 bill $235,185
COPA
20. Sen. Conrad R. Burns (R-MT ) 1 bill $506,126
CIPA
21. Rep. Roy Blunt (R-MO 7th district) 1 bill $175,636
COPA
22. Rep. Mark W. Neumann (R-WI 1st district) 1 bill $167,765
COPA
23. Rep. John T. Doolittle (R-CA 4th district) 1 bill $78,765
COPA
24. Rep. Vince Snowbarger (R-KS 3rd district) 1 bill $106,774
COPA
25. Rep. James C. Greenwood (R-PA 8th district) 1 bill $98,185
COPA
26. Rep. Heather Wilson (R-NM 1st district) 1 bill $232,960
COPA
27. Sen. J. James Exon (D-NE ) 1 bill $0
CDA
28. Rep. Steve Largent (R-OK 1st district) 1 bill $98,852
COPA
29. Rep. Stephen E. Buyer (R-IN 5th district) 1 bill $115,160
COPA
30. Rep. Collin C. Peterson (D-MN 7th district) 1 bill $126,499
COPA
31. Rep. Mary Bono (R-CA 44th district) 1 bill $76,604
DMCA
32. Rep. Jon D. Fox (R-PA 13th district) 1 bill $200,834
COPA
33. Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL 6th district) 1 bill $92,743
COPA
34. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA ) 1 bill $389,544
CBDTPA
35. Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-MI 3rd district) 1 bill $47,719
COPA
36. Rep. Ronnie Shows (D-MS 4th district) 1 bill $210,650
CIPA
37. Rep. Robert B. Aderholt (R-AL 4th district) 1 bill $266,944
COPA
38. Rep. John M. McHugh (R-NY 24th district) 1 bill $92,380
COPA
39. Rep. Jon Christensen (R-NE 2nd district) 1 bill $230,552
COPA
40. Rep. Max Sandlin (D-TX 1st district) 1 bill $215,450
COPA
41. Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA 4th district) 1 bill $55,500
DMCA
42. Rep. Greg Ganske (R-IA 4th district) 1 bill $177,885
COPA
43. Rep. J. C. Jr. Watts (R-OK 4th district) 1 bill $135,705
COPA
44. Rep. Nancy L. Johnson (R-CT 6th district) 1 bill $279,554
COPA
45. Sen. Christopher S. Bond (R-MO ) 1 bill $477,360
CIPA
46. Rep. Michael Bilirakis (R-FL 9th district) 1 bill $92,011
COPA
47. Rep. Jr. Nethercutt, George R. (R-WA 5th district) 1 bill $142,127
COPA
48. Rep. Nathan Deal (R-GA 9th district) 1 bill $106,339
COPA
49. Rep. Linda Smith (R-WA 3rd district) 1 bill $52,494
COPA
50. Rep. Bart Gordon (D-TN 6th district) 1 bill $248,500
COPA
51. Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-KY 1st district) 1 bill $169,715
COPA
52. Rep. Tim Johnson (R-IL 15th district) 1 bill $383,959
CDA
53. Rep. Jay Kim (R-CA 41st district) 1 bill $116,574
COPA
54. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX ) 1 bill $422,932
CIPA
55. Rep. Dan Burton (R-IN 6th district) 1 bill $145,282
COPA
56. Rep. Michael Pappas (R-NJ 12th district) 1 bill $80,749
COPA
57. Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL 16th district) 1 bill $106,699
COPA
58. Rep. Mark E. Souder (R-IL 4th district) 1 bill $75,534
COPA
59. Sen. John B. Breaux (D-LA ) 1 bill $343,769
CBDTPA
60. Rep. David L. Hobson (R-OH 7th district) 1 bill $104,922
COPA
61. Rep. Bobby L. Rush (D-IL 1st district) 1 bill $177,481
CIPA
62. Rep. Thomas J. Manton (D-NY 7th district) 1 bill $118,494
COPA
63. Rep. Ken Calvert (R-CA 43th district) 1 bill $127,625
COPA
64. Rep. Joseph R. Pitts (R-PA 16th district) 1 bill $103,800
COPA
65. Rep. John Jr. Conyers (D-MI 14th district) 1 bill $99,110
DMCA
66. Rep. Elizabeth Furse (D-OR 1st district) 1 bill $248,322
COPA
67. Rep. Fred Upton (R-MI 6th district) 1 bill $121,673
COPA
68. Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL ) 1 bill $442,151
CBDTPA
69. Rep. Jr. Istook, Ernest J. (R-OK 5th district) 1 bill $93,284
COPA
70. Sen. Spencer Abraham (R-MI ) 1 bill $732,850
CIPA
71. Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX 6th district) 1 bill $162,944
COPA
72. Rep. Sue Myrick (R-NC 9th district) 1 bill $147,741
COPA
73. Rep. Pat Danner (D-MO 6th district) 1 bill $112,950
COPA
74. Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX 5th district) 1 bill $207,111
COPA
75. Rep. Bill McCollum (R-FL 8th district) 1 bill $326,487
DMCA
76. Rep. Benjamin A. Gilman (R-NY 20th district) 1 bill $149,306
COPA
77. Rep. Jerry Weller (R-IL 11th district) 1 bill $200,075
COPA
78. Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL 19th district) 1 bill $107,500
P2P Piracy Prevention Bill
79. Rep. Sue W. Kelly (R-NY 19th district) 1 bill $168,550
COPA
80. Sen. Jesse Helms (R-NC ) 1 bill $386,450
CIPA
81. Rep. Richard Burr (R-NC 5th district) 1 bill $118,275
COPA
82. Rep. Charlie Norwood (R-GA 10th district) 1 bill $185,621
COPA
83. Rep. Phil English (R-PA 21st district) 1 bill $163,562
COPA
84. Rep. Gerald B. H. Solomon (R-NY 22nd district) 1 bill $164,098
COPA
85. Rep. Ralph M. Hall (D-OH 3rd district) 1 bill $94,000
COPA
86. Rep. Gary Miller (R-CA 41st district) 1 bill $148,450
CIPA
87. Sen. Slade Gorton (R-WA ) 1 bill $376,525
CDA
88. Rep. Rick Lazio (R-NY 2nd district) 1 bill $214,076
COPA
89. Rep. Sonny Callahan (R-AL 1th district) 1 bill $109,835
COPA
90. Rep. John E. Peterson (R-PA 5th district) 1 bill $60,556
COPA
91. Rep. Sonny Bono (R-CA 44th district) 1 bill $0
DMCA
92. Rep. Charles H. Taylor (R-NC 11th district) 1 bill $90,864
COPA
93. Sen. Daniel K. Inouye (D-HI ) 1 bill $247,429
CBDTPA
>You must be new around here. The problem is that many with the worst records (Hollings) are democrats.
You must be newer. The "Worst coders in Washington" story lists the lawmakers behind the bills slashdot tends to complain about and its something like 90% Republican.
Source: http://www.aotc.info/archives/000152.html
>They would rather ignore one or 2 issues for the "greater good" of keeping the democrats in power.
Remember to turn down your radio before you call Rush Limbaugh.
When I had pcAnywhere installed on my old machine it was pretty simple to fire it up on the old @home network and suddenly finding myself on a password-less PC. I also ran notepad but wrote, "Put a damn password on your pcAnywhere!"
That's the nice thing about the open VNC apps, you can't run them without some password and if you try to brute force it (at least in tightVNC) it locks you out for x amount of time. Not to mention its free. Yes, I know there's no built in encryption, but that's besides the point.
>any government regulation of industry is bad and damages free markets
Nonsense, Mr Gates. All sorts of things fall into the category of regulation like anti-trust laws, environmental laws, labor laws, etc. It would behoove the pie-in-the-sky libertarians and other lassiez faire types to acknowledge that free markets do a poor job of remaining free and also consolidate power in a way which defeats the purpose of a market to begin with. Regulation should be judged individually, not generalized as being bad because it counters what your conservative professor told you in Economics 101.
>along with any sensitive corporate disclosures that could prove embarrassing.
Embarrassing? I'm sorry, but if my bank has an incompetent IT department, uses crappy software, has a poor security policy, etc then I should find about it in the paper alongside the police blotter which lists every drunk, domestic fight, and pot possession in the county.
The meat packing industry is the same way. They can recall tons of dangerous product without telling the press who the meat was sent out to. For instance it was all sent to McDonalds or Subway then those companies have the choice to tell you. Your safety, and life in some cases, is second to their PR.
Government is supposed to protect all interests without giving in to one side. Sadly, those with the resources get what they want and there isn't even a popular opposition party to call BS on laws like this.
For the record the downloads are priced at $4 American, its 7.30 Australian. Four bucks ain't expensive.
For the sake of objectivity I'll list some Pros:
-700 megs if encoded properly should be somewhere between VHS and Satellite TV quality. -You don't have to drive to the videostore to return it. -The possibility for a huge selection. How many Blockbusters carry that foreign or hard-to-find film you've been dying to see? -The 24 limitation isn't bad if you consider that this is "on demand" with some serious lag. You simply download it the night you want to watch it.
A few people have discussed quality already but I think you make the best criticism here with:
>-that you can watch on your home theater and not on your 17" computer screen
Exactly. Watching this on a monitor will only make its lack of quality more obvious, the sound will be poor unless you have a kickass sound card and speaker system, you can't crowd around it like you can the TV in the living room, etc.
What this is lacking is a internet/TV convergence device that lets people (especially non-techies) transfer the download to their TV. The lower resolution of a television compared to a monitor will help to cover up the artifacts and other low-quality issues. Sitting 8+ feet from the TV helps too. If WB leased a webtv-like broadband device with a HD big enough to hold a couple movies along then I'd be all over it.
> SCSI is expensive for the same reason that diamonds are.
Not at all. Diamonds are a controlled cartel and price-fixing is par for the course. SCSI in mass production anywhere near how much IDE stuff gets made will drop the price to the point where it would be affordable to sell it to the home market. Or so the theory goes.
If diamonds weren't price-controled they would be incredibly cheap. Read about it here: http://www.professionaljeweler.com/archives/news/2 000/020300story.html
True, so logically the best way to go about getting music on your terms is to disconnect yourself from their artists.
I'm listening to epitonic's webcast right now at 128kbs and will buy a couple albums just from hearing the tracks on this channel and also from the free downloads available at epitonic. InSound.com does the same thing, but their webcast isn't as nice as the hundreds (if not thousands) of tracks available at epitonic.
RIAA alternatives have existed for a long time and will continue to thrive regardless of the games the RIAA keeps playing.
Autism isn't fatal, but it can have a troubling effect on one's social life.
I don't think you're witnessing autism at all. What's most likely going on is an anxiety or social disorder (agoraphobia) than autism. The problem I see here is that autism has gained this false reputation for being some kind of mind-expanding/genius disease and frankly that's a load of BS. Autistics in general simply cannot function well enough to finish a college application let alone a CS degree.
Buying into this romaticised notion of autism is probably an assumption that will hurt one in the long run. If someone in need of therapy for what is most likely an anxiety or social disorder decides against such treatment because "hey I'm an autistic geek, I read it on slashdot" then they're only harming and fooling themselves.
10 years is plenty of time for any work to make a profit; if something's going to make a profit, 99.9% of that profit is going to be made in the first 10 years. The only people who have something to worry about are people like Disney who have an interest in maintaining ownership over some stupid fucking cartoon character.
I disagree, there are so many cases on authors sitting on their works for years, if not decades, before they can get a publisher to print them its not even funny.
In the 80s Kurt Vonneget's work quickly moved from the fringe and into academia. Many of his novels and short stories were decades old, if copyright lasted only 10 years he probably would not have seen a dime of his 2nd wave (or first depending on your POV) of popularity. That's seems pretty wrong to me.
Any proposal that doesn't address the right to own work within your lifetime or at least for most of your lifetime is simply too extreme on the 'public interest' end as the current system is too extreme on the 'business interest' end. Just because Hollywood can make 99% of its money in ten years doesnt mean that those without Hollywood's incredible promotional resources can.
Slashdot Mirror
Not to mention this is the same administration that had MS by the short hairs and could have forced them to implement some real security changes, but let them off with a slap on the wrist.
Spyware database: http://www.surasoft.com/cgi-bin/spysearch/spydb.cg i?search=direct+connect&header=Software
>Mail fraud is a federal offense because it misuses a FEDERAL SERVICE.
So? Try attempting some fraud through privately-owned UPS or FedEx. If it crosses state lines its a federal offense and probably a state one too. If it doesn't then its a state offense.
I'm guessing the little kid, or kids, are going to be alien/human hybrids. Lets hope this series has more originality than this.
PCs didn't really get cheap until the internet boom of the mid-90's. Considering the hottest browser at the time was Netscape, shouldn't they be credited with bringing PCs to the masses and the masses credited with lowering prices through demand?
Just about any OS can run a browser, so what did MS do? I mean other than bundle a free browser with their OS. PCs may be 1/4 the price but Microsoft's software sure isn't.
Read the article, this isn't just text but video and graphics. ASCII isn't going to cut it, and if was just text you'd think we could spring for unicode.
Regardless, the problem mentality is pretty well represented in your post. The assumption in the 80s was to make the discs like the book - make them last forever. The trick with digital is to assume the media and format will expire, become obselete, etc. To preserve the data they should have planned for this (migrating data, etc) instead of keeping the old book mentality of preserving a relic forever.
>If these new licenses become routinely ignored, so will the GPL, possibly to the point of all open source licenses losing legal strength as well as practical credibility.
Talk about your non-realistic slipperly slope arguments. "Your honor, this home user ignored the vegan license so all licenses must be invalid." Why just open licenses? Is there something magical about commercial licenses? They're all licenses. They're not going away because of some rider you don't like.
> worry that "evil" licenses will also become legally binding and increasingly common; only allowing corporate use, forbidding any political use, certain speech restrictions, etc.
These already exist. Ever see free for home, but not free for business use? Its called being selective, not "evil."
The creator of any work should have the right to distribute it as he or she feels especially within the confines of the law. Your paranoia and slipperly slope aregument does not suddenly take that right away nor are they realistic expections of adding riders to licenses.
I'm starting to get "Christmas requests" at work and frankly I don't want to do any of it, but people do ask who to buy from. I just tell them to goto Dell or even CDW as that's who I use for corporate, but they aren't necessarily the best deals nor the best option for the home buyer and I'd hate to point them to Best Buy or some other retail nightmare. By retail nightmare I mean a selection of only Compaqs starting at much more than what they're worth, $40 USB and parallel cables, pushy saleskids pushing worthless 'extended warranties', etc.
So who to recommend? I'd like to point people towards a company or two who excel in price and service. It doesn't matter if they're a multi-national or some local/web only shop, but the latter would be nice. So what retailers would you recommend for technophobes in need of a windows machine that'll do the basics?
What about "The Joy of Sex?" Almost every library has that book. If there was a "perfect filter" it still would not be able to cope with social changes. "The Joy of Sex" caused (and still causes in some places) a stir when it was released but in the end it was deemed library worthy.
So your local library doesn't stock Penthouse. Well, that's their perogative, but that doesn't mean it couldn't happen. Ideally, the library is about free access to information and what is considered approriate is always in flux.
>Does anyone know of any other efforts to produce true 'grassroots' commercials like this?
Commercials like you mention get made all the time, but what is most often the case is that the networks don't want to run the ads regardless of how much money you offer them. Usually issues like pro-legalization are dismissed instantly because a network doesn't want to be associated with the message. A television network has no requirement to play what you offer them, even if it is over our airwaves. If they want to pander to the usual right and not upset middle-america with alternative viewpoints then they will and there's little you can do about it other than get published in more independant outlets.
>Personally, I would love to see a grassroots commercial that advocates re-opening the Federal case against MS.
Okay so they run it, then MS never advertised with them again. They'll tell you to keep your $5,000 because MS's advertising is worth much more. Or better yet they'll call MS and see what kind of deal they can cut now that they have someone willing to pay to air a commercial like that. Corporate media is only good x amount of things and freedom of speech and diverse viewpoints ain't one of them.
>but it won't get you very far if you're trying to work for a company that uses MS software, as most do.
Nonsense, the decision to hire someone has a lot more to do with than what software they're famaliar with. I know that sounds crazy to some geeks, but if you're doing hiring based soley on whether Jane knows Outlook, Notes, Pine or just Hotmail then your company is in deeper trouble than any commercial software package can fix. Your post also ignores the fact that most office software can be learned in an afternoon and the user can be brought up to the level of intermediate user if not expert in a couple weeks of real use.
You can't have it both ways. Either commercial software is easier to use than OSS thus making learning easier or you're admitting that commercial software has no real benefits over OSS.
Secondly, being exposed to a typical office app or a browser regardless of brand is more than enough to teach someone "computers." If you can use Moz you can use IE. If you can use Open Office you can use any office software.
Your post sounds like another justification to do whatever the market is doing regardless of costs. "So what if we have to cut the arts and science budget, people are using MS!!" There are priorities in education and teaching the latest and greatest and most expensive is simply unrealistic.
Even in CS this problem is pretty non-existant. A school can teach new CS students Java for nothing or they can open their pockets, raise tution, etc and buy a copy of VB for everyone. If you know Java then learning VB is cake.
First off, there are more unsigned and indie artists out there than there are mainstream acts. That means you're comparing a small group of very well funded artists against a legion of non-funded artists and coming to the conclusion that 99% of non-mainstream artists must suck.
I really don't know where to begin with this. If you find Eminem "perceptive" then I guess you've found your proper niche. In the meantime I'll enjoy indie and local music which I think is far superior to top 40 in most instances. 99% is a pretty serious number. I can't honestly see how someone can think a large indie label like Bloodshot records or Matador *might* have one decent artist. I find that mainstream labels have much worse odds.
Obligatory epitonic.com mention.
I have a dual tuner "directivo" with DirecTv and my Tivo has little or nothing to do with the current Tivo service. DT now sends the Tivo its programming schedule through a nightly broadcast instead of my Tivo calling uunet and downloading it. In fact, DT is now collecting the data Tivo would collect on me if I didn't opt-out. Yeah, I need to opt-out again, but that's a minor inconvienence. Not to mentiont I'm paying 5.95 a month for "Tivo" service while everyone else pays 13.95 (12.95?).
As others have pointed out, Tivo is a software company and its good software. As long as they don't price themselves out of this new market then they probably have a long and profitable life ahead of them. I'd pay extra for the TivOS and from what I've seen from the tuner boxes DT sells for its service they couldn't make a good, easy to navigate interface to save their lives.
No, we win. When the feds bust down my door and see all my legally owned indie label mp3s on my various players they can quietly walk out after giving me a written fucking apology.
There are many resources to discover not only non-RIAA music but GOOD music. Webcasters, college radio, epitonic.com (one of my favorites and they stream 128kbs), USENET, the music listings in your local paper, etc. The information and easy access to it is there, the question is whether the RIAA complainers will use it or just continue to copy and trade top-40 music thinking they're sticking it to the man.
So you're willing to get into bed with anti-first amendment politicans to fight DRM tech which is anti-first amendment in itself? Not to mention the GOP did not put up any organized fight against any of the bills listed.
>not caving into commercial interests.
Business is constituency too. What matters is if the laws overstep their boundries or promote some and hurt others. COPA obviously over-stepped its powers and there's little reason the believe the GOP would suddenly care about writing geek friendly legislation like the parent post suggests. If anything the GOP is infamous for "caving into commercial interests."
> No matter what your party affiliation is, you have to be encouraged by the growing possibility of Republicans taking back control of the Senate.
Umm, no. The worse anti-technology legislators are Republicans. List from the Worst Coders in Washington article: http://www.aotc.info/archives/000152.html
See all those little R's?
The Lawmakers
These lawmakers in the House of Representatives and the Senate wrote more anti-technology legal code than any of their co-legislators.
1. Rep. Charles (Chip) Pickering (R-MS 3rd district) 3 bills $230,900
DMCA, COPA, CIPA
2. Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX 21st district) 2 bills $87,112
P2P Piracy Prevention Bill, COPA
3. Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK ) 2 bills $375,339
CBDTPA, CIPA
4. Rep. Bill Paxon (R-NY 27th district) 2 bills $200,938
DMCA, COPA
5. Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-CA 26th district) 2 bills $212,991
DMCA, P2P Piracy Prevention Bill
6. Rep. Michael G. Oxley (R-OH 4th district) 2 bills $184,998
COPA, CIPA
7. Rep. Howard Coble (R-NC 6th district) 2 bills $114,747
DMCA, P2P Piracy Prevention Bill
8. Sen. Ernest F. Hollings (D-SC ) 2 bills $532,980
CBDTPA, CIPA
9. Rep. Bob Franks (R-NJ 7th district) 2 bills $661,784
COPA, CIPA
10. Rep. Asa Hutchinson (R-AR 3rd district) 1 bill $99,350
COPA
11. Sen. John McCain (R-AZ ) 1 bill $1,050,321
CIPA
12. Rep. Roscoe G. Bartlett (R-MD 6th district) 1 bill $50,500
COPA
13. Rep. Jack Metcalf (R-WA 2nd district) 1 bill $185,377
COPA
14. Rep. Barbara Cubin (R-WY 1st district) 1 bill $115,980
COPA
15. Rep. Dan Schaefer (R-CO 6th district) 1 bill $145,162
COPA
16. Rep. Henry J. Hyde (R-IL 6th district) 1 bill $83,500
DMCA
17. Rep. Paul E. Gillmor (R-OH 5th district) 1 bill $107,849
COPA
18. Rep. Dave Weldon (R-FL 15th district) 1 bill $139,759
COPA
19. Rep. John R. Kasich (R-OH 12th district) 1 bill $235,185
COPA
20. Sen. Conrad R. Burns (R-MT ) 1 bill $506,126
CIPA
21. Rep. Roy Blunt (R-MO 7th district) 1 bill $175,636
COPA
22. Rep. Mark W. Neumann (R-WI 1st district) 1 bill $167,765
COPA
23. Rep. John T. Doolittle (R-CA 4th district) 1 bill $78,765
COPA
24. Rep. Vince Snowbarger (R-KS 3rd district) 1 bill $106,774
COPA
25. Rep. James C. Greenwood (R-PA 8th district) 1 bill $98,185
COPA
26. Rep. Heather Wilson (R-NM 1st district) 1 bill $232,960
COPA
27. Sen. J. James Exon (D-NE ) 1 bill $0
CDA
28. Rep. Steve Largent (R-OK 1st district) 1 bill $98,852
COPA
29. Rep. Stephen E. Buyer (R-IN 5th district) 1 bill $115,160
COPA
30. Rep. Collin C. Peterson (D-MN 7th district) 1 bill $126,499
COPA
31. Rep. Mary Bono (R-CA 44th district) 1 bill $76,604
DMCA
32. Rep. Jon D. Fox (R-PA 13th district) 1 bill $200,834
COPA
33. Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL 6th district) 1 bill $92,743
COPA
34. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA ) 1 bill $389,544
CBDTPA
35. Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-MI 3rd district) 1 bill $47,719
COPA
36. Rep. Ronnie Shows (D-MS 4th district) 1 bill $210,650
CIPA
37. Rep. Robert B. Aderholt (R-AL 4th district) 1 bill $266,944
COPA
38. Rep. John M. McHugh (R-NY 24th district) 1 bill $92,380
COPA
39. Rep. Jon Christensen (R-NE 2nd district) 1 bill $230,552
COPA
40. Rep. Max Sandlin (D-TX 1st district) 1 bill $215,450
COPA
41. Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA 4th district) 1 bill $55,500
DMCA
42. Rep. Greg Ganske (R-IA 4th district) 1 bill $177,885
COPA
43. Rep. J. C. Jr. Watts (R-OK 4th district) 1 bill $135,705
COPA
44. Rep. Nancy L. Johnson (R-CT 6th district) 1 bill $279,554
COPA
45. Sen. Christopher S. Bond (R-MO ) 1 bill $477,360
CIPA
46. Rep. Michael Bilirakis (R-FL 9th district) 1 bill $92,011
COPA
47. Rep. Jr. Nethercutt, George R. (R-WA 5th district) 1 bill $142,127
COPA
48. Rep. Nathan Deal (R-GA 9th district) 1 bill $106,339
COPA
49. Rep. Linda Smith (R-WA 3rd district) 1 bill $52,494
COPA
50. Rep. Bart Gordon (D-TN 6th district) 1 bill $248,500
COPA
51. Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-KY 1st district) 1 bill $169,715
COPA
52. Rep. Tim Johnson (R-IL 15th district) 1 bill $383,959
CDA
53. Rep. Jay Kim (R-CA 41st district) 1 bill $116,574
COPA
54. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX ) 1 bill $422,932
CIPA
55. Rep. Dan Burton (R-IN 6th district) 1 bill $145,282
COPA
56. Rep. Michael Pappas (R-NJ 12th district) 1 bill $80,749
COPA
57. Rep. Mark Foley (R-FL 16th district) 1 bill $106,699
COPA
58. Rep. Mark E. Souder (R-IL 4th district) 1 bill $75,534
COPA
59. Sen. John B. Breaux (D-LA ) 1 bill $343,769
CBDTPA
60. Rep. David L. Hobson (R-OH 7th district) 1 bill $104,922
COPA
61. Rep. Bobby L. Rush (D-IL 1st district) 1 bill $177,481
CIPA
62. Rep. Thomas J. Manton (D-NY 7th district) 1 bill $118,494
COPA
63. Rep. Ken Calvert (R-CA 43th district) 1 bill $127,625
COPA
64. Rep. Joseph R. Pitts (R-PA 16th district) 1 bill $103,800
COPA
65. Rep. John Jr. Conyers (D-MI 14th district) 1 bill $99,110
DMCA
66. Rep. Elizabeth Furse (D-OR 1st district) 1 bill $248,322
COPA
67. Rep. Fred Upton (R-MI 6th district) 1 bill $121,673
COPA
68. Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL ) 1 bill $442,151
CBDTPA
69. Rep. Jr. Istook, Ernest J. (R-OK 5th district) 1 bill $93,284
COPA
70. Sen. Spencer Abraham (R-MI ) 1 bill $732,850
CIPA
71. Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX 6th district) 1 bill $162,944
COPA
72. Rep. Sue Myrick (R-NC 9th district) 1 bill $147,741
COPA
73. Rep. Pat Danner (D-MO 6th district) 1 bill $112,950
COPA
74. Rep. Pete Sessions (R-TX 5th district) 1 bill $207,111
COPA
75. Rep. Bill McCollum (R-FL 8th district) 1 bill $326,487
DMCA
76. Rep. Benjamin A. Gilman (R-NY 20th district) 1 bill $149,306
COPA
77. Rep. Jerry Weller (R-IL 11th district) 1 bill $200,075
COPA
78. Rep. Robert Wexler (D-FL 19th district) 1 bill $107,500
P2P Piracy Prevention Bill
79. Rep. Sue W. Kelly (R-NY 19th district) 1 bill $168,550
COPA
80. Sen. Jesse Helms (R-NC ) 1 bill $386,450
CIPA
81. Rep. Richard Burr (R-NC 5th district) 1 bill $118,275
COPA
82. Rep. Charlie Norwood (R-GA 10th district) 1 bill $185,621
COPA
83. Rep. Phil English (R-PA 21st district) 1 bill $163,562
COPA
84. Rep. Gerald B. H. Solomon (R-NY 22nd district) 1 bill $164,098
COPA
85. Rep. Ralph M. Hall (D-OH 3rd district) 1 bill $94,000
COPA
86. Rep. Gary Miller (R-CA 41st district) 1 bill $148,450
CIPA
87. Sen. Slade Gorton (R-WA ) 1 bill $376,525
CDA
88. Rep. Rick Lazio (R-NY 2nd district) 1 bill $214,076
COPA
89. Rep. Sonny Callahan (R-AL 1th district) 1 bill $109,835
COPA
90. Rep. John E. Peterson (R-PA 5th district) 1 bill $60,556
COPA
91. Rep. Sonny Bono (R-CA 44th district) 1 bill $0
DMCA
92. Rep. Charles H. Taylor (R-NC 11th district) 1 bill $90,864
COPA
93. Sen. Daniel K. Inouye (D-HI ) 1 bill $247,429
CBDTPA
>You must be new around here. The problem is that many with the worst records (Hollings) are democrats.
You must be newer. The "Worst coders in Washington" story lists the lawmakers behind the bills slashdot tends to complain about and its something like 90% Republican.
Source: http://www.aotc.info/archives/000152.html
>They would rather ignore one or 2 issues for the "greater good" of keeping the democrats in power.
Remember to turn down your radio before you call Rush Limbaugh.
When I had pcAnywhere installed on my old machine it was pretty simple to fire it up on the old @home network and suddenly finding myself on a password-less PC. I also ran notepad but wrote, "Put a damn password on your pcAnywhere!"
That's the nice thing about the open VNC apps, you can't run them without some password and if you try to brute force it (at least in tightVNC) it locks you out for x amount of time. Not to mention its free. Yes, I know there's no built in encryption, but that's besides the point.
>any government regulation of industry is bad and damages free markets
Nonsense, Mr Gates. All sorts of things fall into the category of regulation like anti-trust laws, environmental laws, labor laws, etc. It would behoove the pie-in-the-sky libertarians and other lassiez faire types to acknowledge that free markets do a poor job of remaining free and also consolidate power in a way which defeats the purpose of a market to begin with. Regulation should be judged individually, not generalized as being bad because it counters what your conservative professor told you in Economics 101.
at the cost of consumers of course.
>along with any sensitive corporate disclosures that could prove embarrassing.
Embarrassing? I'm sorry, but if my bank has an incompetent IT department, uses crappy software, has a poor security policy, etc then I should find about it in the paper alongside the police blotter which lists every drunk, domestic fight, and pot possession in the county.
The meat packing industry is the same way. They can recall tons of dangerous product without telling the press who the meat was sent out to. For instance it was all sent to McDonalds or Subway then those companies have the choice to tell you. Your safety, and life in some cases, is second to their PR.
Government is supposed to protect all interests without giving in to one side. Sadly, those with the resources get what they want and there isn't even a popular opposition party to call BS on laws like this.
For the record the downloads are priced at $4 American, its 7.30 Australian. Four bucks ain't expensive.
For the sake of objectivity I'll list some Pros:
-700 megs if encoded properly should be somewhere
between VHS and Satellite TV quality.
-You don't have to drive to the videostore to return it.
-The possibility for a huge selection. How many Blockbusters carry that foreign or hard-to-find film you've been dying to see?
-The 24 limitation isn't bad if you consider that this is "on demand" with some serious lag. You simply download it the night you want to watch it.
A few people have discussed quality already but I think you make the best criticism here with:
>-that you can watch on your home theater and not on your 17" computer screen
Exactly. Watching this on a monitor will only make its lack of quality more obvious, the sound will be poor unless you have a kickass sound card and speaker system, you can't crowd around it like you can the TV in the living room, etc.
What this is lacking is a internet/TV convergence device that lets people (especially non-techies) transfer the download to their TV. The lower resolution of a television compared to a monitor will help to cover up the artifacts and other low-quality issues. Sitting 8+ feet from the TV helps too. If WB leased a webtv-like broadband device with a HD big enough to hold a couple movies along then I'd be all over it.
> SCSI is expensive for the same reason that diamonds are.
2 000/020300story.html
Not at all. Diamonds are a controlled cartel and price-fixing is par for the course. SCSI in mass production anywhere near how much IDE stuff gets made will drop the price to the point where it would be affordable to sell it to the home market. Or so the theory goes.
If diamonds weren't price-controled they would be incredibly cheap. Read about it here: http://www.professionaljeweler.com/archives/news/
> The RIAA only cares about its own music
True, so logically the best way to go about getting music on your terms is to disconnect yourself from their artists.
I'm listening to epitonic's webcast right now at 128kbs and will buy a couple albums just from hearing the tracks on this channel and also from the free downloads available at epitonic. InSound.com does the same thing, but their webcast isn't as nice as the hundreds (if not thousands) of tracks available at epitonic.
RIAA alternatives have existed for a long time and will continue to thrive regardless of the games the RIAA keeps playing.
Autism isn't fatal, but it can have a troubling effect on one's social life.
I don't think you're witnessing autism at all. What's most likely going on is an anxiety or social disorder (agoraphobia) than autism. The problem I see here is that autism has gained this false reputation for being some kind of mind-expanding/genius disease and frankly that's a load of BS. Autistics in general simply cannot function well enough to finish a college application let alone a CS degree.
Buying into this romaticised notion of autism is probably an assumption that will hurt one in the long run. If someone in need of therapy for what is most likely an anxiety or social disorder decides against such treatment because "hey I'm an autistic geek, I read it on slashdot" then they're only harming and fooling themselves.
I disagree, there are so many cases on authors sitting on their works for years, if not decades, before they can get a publisher to print them its not even funny.
In the 80s Kurt Vonneget's work quickly moved from the fringe and into academia. Many of his novels and short stories were decades old, if copyright lasted only 10 years he probably would not have seen a dime of his 2nd wave (or first depending on your POV) of popularity. That's seems pretty wrong to me.
Any proposal that doesn't address the right to own work within your lifetime or at least for most of your lifetime is simply too extreme on the 'public interest' end as the current system is too extreme on the 'business interest' end. Just because Hollywood can make 99% of its money in ten years doesnt mean that those without Hollywood's incredible promotional resources can.