But does that really make sense? I mean, what's the point of restricting the burning of really long tracks? Sure, it's only an issue for protected tracks, but I don't really see the motivation for restricting it in this manner.
Do you mean that it's related to DRM because it's related to Apple's implementation? That's certainly true. The question I'm asking is if this is by design, of if it's merely a coincidence resulting from their implementation scheme. I think it is more likely a coincidence, since there doesn't seem to be any reason to restrict burning in this manner. That's all I'm saying.
I've never heard this before, does this hack really work? It seems like a glaring omission on Apples part to allow this rather than supporting protected AAC's in iMovie.
I don't see any reason to believe that this related to DRM. It seems much more likely that Apple simply hasn't implemented the ability to split up protected tracks very well.
For example, I haven't heard it complained about much, but when fast user switching came out in OS X, you couldn't run iTunes in more than one active user. At first, I thought this was related to DRM, but in later versions of OS X 10.3 this is no longer a problem.
Perhaps this is just something that not enough people have complained about, so Apple hasn't gotten around to fixing it yet.
I wonder if that's what the commission is talking about when they say that they think private companies could do a better job. The governments had their chance and they've proven that all they can do is spin their wheels and waste money. Maybe it's better left to private industry.
Am I the only one who finds the lack of any smudging whatsoever suspicious? And what about that background? Somehow I don't think it's that easy to find a completely dark room with a brushed metal floor to set this thing on. And where's the power cord? How is it emitting light? Glowy plastic tubes and metal tubes are not easy to work with, and you'd never get them to turn out this well, and it'd take one heck of a work shop to bevel the edges of the case and get them smooth like that.
I'm afraid that these images are almost certainly computer generated.
I don't know why people don't realize that they should reply to comments they disagree with rather than mod them down. Really, that's not what the moderate button is for.
As for apple bullying people around, I don't think they've ever gone to court about something like this. I'd doubt they ever would, since it's bad PR, and they'd be suing the people who buy their products anyway.
Most websites put pictures like these on the internet with the understanding that they'll have to take them down in a day or so. It's kind of a game for them. They get the "secret" pictures, then put them up to show that they got them. The warning from Apple Legal is just the icing on the cake, reaffirming to them that they are uber-leet detectives living on the edge, always in danger of being shut down. Really it works out well for apple since it builds interest in their products.
"biodeisel is renewable and probably doesn't carry as many nasty political ramifications as fossil fuel"
Sure, until the price of food skyrockets because farmland that was once used for food is now being used to power cars, then it might become an issue.
Seriously, all the plants we farm in this country combined can't fix enough energy to supply our demand for oil. That means that as long as oil consumption remains what it is, biodeisel will never even come close to replacing petroleum. If it ever does, it'll only be because gas is so expensive that most of the people using it now can't afford it. So by the time it is largely adopted, biodeisell will many times more expensive than petroleum is today. This will also mean more expensive food.
This is completely untrue. Fusion has similar constraints to fission. Fusion requires an enoumous ammount of compression in order to increase the chances of neucli interaction. Fission is easily induced simply by sticking enough U235 or plutonium together. Of course, you could achieve fission with just a few grams of plutonium if you compressed it enough, the difference is that you don't have to. In order to achieve fusion just by sticking enough hydrogen together, you'd need a mass similar to the mass of the sun in order to achieve enough compression. That's a pretty big reactor core! So no, the main advantage of fusion is the abundance of fuel. Fusion even produces radioactive waste (though it is short lived).
In the end it makes no sense to pomote a far-off technology that has never been successfully implemented over an existing and proven technology that could be implemented now. Sure, fusion research should continue, but to do so to the exclusion of all other nuclear research is foolish at best.
This is only partly true for two reasons. Fisrt, assuming these would be replacing cars or motor cycles, they would consume less power in city driving due to their smaller mass. Second, since power can be produced in many ways, it can be produced from solar, hydo electric or nuclear power as well as from fossil fuels.
Moving away from internal combustion engines is generally good because it means more posilibities for power production. Of course, that doesn't necessilary mean that it's good for the environment.
That is a verry simplistic view of economics. In a free market, prices are set by supply and demand rather than by the acutal cost to produce an item. Companies try to set their prices at the optimum level which will maximize profits. If they charge more than this, the make less money because fewer people are buying their product. If they charge less than this, they make less money because people are willing to pay more.
The only reason microsoft can charge SO MUCH for their software is because they have a monoply. Office applications from other companies (when they were still around) cost about a fifth of what MS office costs. And don't say that people were more willing to by MS because of quality, we all know that isn't true.
So what it comes down to is this: these antitrust settlements aim to take the money microsoft has made illegally in this way, and give it back to the people it was stolen form. So if microsoft continues to manipulate the market, and raises prices even more, the ammount of the settlements will need to go up to compensate for the further illegeal market manipulation.
If you ask me, this company should be broken up to at least prevent it from using Windows to force microsofts other shitty software down peoples throats. This has happened many times before (Standard Oil, Bell) and is perfectlly reasonable and warranted.
"Americans in general have unjustified pride and arrogance based on past performance when it comes to technical expertise and quality in production"
I don't mean to sound cynical, but has our technical expertise and quality in production ever been that great? I mean, American made cars have always been lower quality than their German conuterparts, and our military machines are only great becasue we spend a varitable fuck load of money developing them.
America has always been strong because of our industrial might and our willingness to take chances on future innovation. If we are loosing our technilogical edge, it is only because we are becoming less and less willing to innovate.
So watching DVD's is an inalienable right now? I can't believe what a bunch of papmered whiners we've all become. I think there was a time where our inalienable rights were "life liberty and the persuit of happiness". Now that's extended to: we all have the right to break encryption. I think the people who wrote those words would be in tears if they know how you're using them.
"the Economist thinks it likely that Boeing will be out of the civil aviation business entirely in ten years time"
Well, certinally they will, because we all know that they aren't selling any planes right now, and it'd be impossible for them to develop any new planes out of composite materials with quieter engines. Oh yeah, there's no way things coule possibly turn around for them.
The whole point of using ICBM's is that it's practically impossible to stop them once they're inbound. Even if you could accurately target it, you'd need to vaporize a good portion of it to render it inoperable, and it isn't like they're are explosives inside that will take care of the job for you like in mortars or missials. Unless you've got a really powerfull laser, you're only hope is disabling it in the boost phase, or destroying it in orbit before reentry.
I believe that right now the military is developing all three, boost phase interceptors, sub-orbital "kill" vehicles, and frikin' powerfull lasers.
"the house has been constructed primarily from steel and concrete, which are hardly sustainable materials" That's an intresting way of looking at it, considering that those building materials last practically forever, where as wood most certinally does not. Would you propose that we build all of our houses out of paper and replace tehm every couple of years?
Why do you think that it requires more energy to make concrete than to make masonry? They're essentially the same thing (except that a few chemicals go into concrete), and masonry has to be fired in a furnace, so that probably makes up any energy differece there. As far as steel goes, yes it does take a lot of energy to produce it, but it lasts a LONG time, a lot longer than wood and masonry.
I hardly think it's fair to say that a house made of steel and concrete can't be eco-firendly. Personally, I'd rather see people start designing and using perminant structures and stop using wood alltogether.
P.S. I have some major problems with that first article you linked. It pretends to be all green and shit, but then it basically says that we sould use our forrests as though they were a gigantic tree farm. Am I the only environmentalists who thinks our natural forrests sould remain natural? Second of all right after it says steel and aluminum cost a lot to recycle, it says we'll run out of aluminum in 200 years, hello? aluminum and steel completly and endlessly recyclable, we'll never run out of them. Finally, I really object to them saying that wood siding is better than aluminum recycling. Basically aluminum siding lasts forever, wood siding starts looking really shitty and needs to be replavced every decade or so. And when you do, you can't recycle it because of all the paint and oil put into it over the years. Which is really better for thin environment? This site is jsut a bunch of loggers trying to tell you that they're going to turn the natural forrests into a farm, and it'll be good for the environment. A good clue that this is propaganda is that they list the R-values of metals to tell you that they're not energy efficient (metals are structural, you'd never use them for insulation).
It's kind of ironic, but right now the cheapest, and most energy efficient way to produce hydrogen is to make if from natural gas. There are other chemical ways as well as high temperature electrolosis being considered, (these might able to someday achieve 40% energy conversion). The easiest way is to jsut use cold electrolosis, but that's only about 20% efficient, so it costs more when you produce large quantities. Also, it requires sulfuric acid, which will eventually need to be replineshed (unless you reuse the water the fuel cells produce).
My university it #33. I don't have a laptop, but I know several people who do. In my experience, only the people who aren't paying for college with their own money can really afford a laptop.
That said, I wish students like me who can't afford a laptop didn't have to pay for the wireless network. After all, the university already spends a bunch of money on the computer labs, which are practically everywhere.
With the ammount that students at other univerisities pay, I can't really complaing about shelling out $3700/year, but when I started going here 4 years ago, it was only $2400. I wish the anministration would quite wasting money on new buildings and meaningless extravigance (like the wireless network, the new Rec Center, the new pool and whatnot) and spend the extra money I pay on maintining exixting structures. It's really frustrating that they're laying off teatures at the same time they're waisting millions of dollars on meaningless crap.
The last time I checked, wireless networks and rec centers didn't teach people. Maybe other people are here to party and dink around, but I'm here to learn.
"This also allows them to keep the vast majority of talented artists out of the distribution channels artificially keeping supply out of balance with demand and inflating their profits"
I don't think you understand the point of supply-demand optimization. Supply always (for whatever reason) matches demand. If it doesn't, there's a shortage or a surplus (which is bad). Of course, it isn't really possible to have a shortage or a surplus of music for a number of reasons.
As the price companies charge for music increses, the demand for music decreases. This means that there is an optimum price which will maximize profits. Companies employ doves of employees whose job it is to find the price that maximizes profits.
So, no they don't artifically inflate anything. If the price they carge is too high, or the selection is not good enough, people simply don't buy the music. It's differnt with essential services where there are limited choices, but in the music business artifical inflation is not possible.
As for the claim that DRM won't cause prices to rise, maybe yes, maybe no. It's really hard to tell how it will shift the demand curve. It might result in a higher optimum price, or it might result in a lower one. One thing is for certian, it will increase overall demand, and therefore increase their overall profits.
So the story is basically this: DRM might be good for the honest end user, or it might be bad for them, but it's definately good for the music industry.
I'm sorry that you're so bitter and cynical. It's really sad that you're so set in you own ways and beliefs that you're unwilling to even consider that better things might be possible. Of course, you're probably right that people will only bring their problems into space with them but I'd doubt that spending trillions of dollars on social programs will work either.
The real problem is that people get set in their ways and are unwilling to change and adapt. I think that space travel and manned space exploration has a great deal of potential to bring change. Anything that gives people something to strive for and work toward provides a positive benefit for society. Space travel is particularly beneficial because it so so high profile. It insights peoples imaginations about what might be possible, and leads them toward trying to build a better world for tomorrow.
Palanistians and Jews, on the other hand, have no bright future to work toward, so instead they focus on their differences, and squabble over petty, meaningless things. They're literally fighting and dying for some of the most infertile, resource free land on the planet.
I always think it's silly that legislate the complete elimination of certian materials. Escpecally with heavy metals (which are naturally occuring in varying concentrations depending on where you live) it it isn't really realistic to say "completly do away with this". There is always an acceptable limit of exposure, since you can never completly avoid exposure. This is less true of some complex organic molecules, but even so there is an acceptable safe limit.
People don't demand 100% reliablity from automibilles, computers or just about any thing you can think of. People reaize that it's unreasonable to demand a 100% reliability for anything, but for some reason, they don't understand that you can't have a 100% contaminant free environment, because the environment is not naturally free of toxic substances. They don't understant that it's impossible to refine a material to 100% purity (though they can get darned close). I think when it comes down to it, it's jsut that people don't know a lot about chemistry.
At any rate, it's hard to say that there's a good reason to demand the complete removal of lead from these products. What would be more resonable would be to say "you can't have more than this ammount of lead". Obviously there's a good reason to get rid of lead paint, since the exposure is greater, the ammount is larger, and the potential for environmental contamination is greater but for microprocessors, I'd doubt the reduction of lead is worth the effort. Other computer parts though, are a much larger problem.
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But does that really make sense? I mean, what's the point of restricting the burning of really long tracks? Sure, it's only an issue for protected tracks, but I don't really see the motivation for restricting it in this manner.
Do you mean that it's related to DRM because it's related to Apple's implementation? That's certainly true. The question I'm asking is if this is by design, of if it's merely a coincidence resulting from their implementation scheme. I think it is more likely a coincidence, since there doesn't seem to be any reason to restrict burning in this manner. That's all I'm saying.
~Bob
I've never heard this before, does this hack really work? It seems like a glaring omission on Apples part to allow this rather than supporting protected AAC's in iMovie.
I don't see any reason to believe that this related to DRM. It seems much more likely that Apple simply hasn't implemented the ability to split up protected tracks very well.
For example, I haven't heard it complained about much, but when fast user switching came out in OS X, you couldn't run iTunes in more than one active user. At first, I thought this was related to DRM, but in later versions of OS X 10.3 this is no longer a problem.
Perhaps this is just something that not enough people have complained about, so Apple hasn't gotten around to fixing it yet.
I wonder if that's what the commission is talking about when they say that they think private companies could do a better job. The governments had their chance and they've proven that all they can do is spin their wheels and waste money. Maybe it's better left to private industry.
You're right, I spoke before a saw more than just the first two pictures. This is quite real.
Am I the only one who finds the lack of any smudging whatsoever suspicious? And what about that background? Somehow I don't think it's that easy to find a completely dark room with a brushed metal floor to set this thing on. And where's the power cord? How is it emitting light? Glowy plastic tubes and metal tubes are not easy to work with, and you'd never get them to turn out this well, and it'd take one heck of a work shop to bevel the edges of the case and get them smooth like that.
I'm afraid that these images are almost certainly computer generated.
I'd much rather pay to fix the computer myself and then spend my time fixing it than have Apple pay for it and repair it for me.
Sound like you a genius to me.
"I realize that every dollar I spend can either make the world a better place or a worse one. I don't buy GM modified food"
That's funny, I DO buy GM food for that very same reason. Go figure...
I don't know why people don't realize that they should reply to comments they disagree with rather than mod them down. Really, that's not what the moderate button is for.
As for apple bullying people around, I don't think they've ever gone to court about something like this. I'd doubt they ever would, since it's bad PR, and they'd be suing the people who buy their products anyway.
Most websites put pictures like these on the internet with the understanding that they'll have to take them down in a day or so. It's kind of a game for them. They get the "secret" pictures, then put them up to show that they got them. The warning from Apple Legal is just the icing on the cake, reaffirming to them that they are uber-leet detectives living on the edge, always in danger of being shut down. Really it works out well for apple since it builds interest in their products.
"biodeisel is renewable and probably doesn't carry as many nasty political ramifications as fossil fuel"
Sure, until the price of food skyrockets because farmland that was once used for food is now being used to power cars, then it might become an issue.
Seriously, all the plants we farm in this country combined can't fix enough energy to supply our demand for oil. That means that as long as oil consumption remains what it is, biodeisel will never even come close to replacing petroleum. If it ever does, it'll only be because gas is so expensive that most of the people using it now can't afford it. So by the time it is largely adopted, biodeisell will many times more expensive than petroleum is today. This will also mean more expensive food.
Trolled! sucker. It's good to see that all his effort was not waisted.
This is completely untrue. Fusion has similar constraints to fission. Fusion requires an enoumous ammount of compression in order to increase the chances of neucli interaction. Fission is easily induced simply by sticking enough U235 or plutonium together. Of course, you could achieve fission with just a few grams of plutonium if you compressed it enough, the difference is that you don't have to. In order to achieve fusion just by sticking enough hydrogen together, you'd need a mass similar to the mass of the sun in order to achieve enough compression. That's a pretty big reactor core! So no, the main advantage of fusion is the abundance of fuel. Fusion even produces radioactive waste (though it is short lived).
In the end it makes no sense to pomote a far-off technology that has never been successfully implemented over an existing and proven technology that could be implemented now. Sure, fusion research should continue, but to do so to the exclusion of all other nuclear research is foolish at best.
This is only partly true for two reasons. Fisrt, assuming these would be replacing cars or motor cycles, they would consume less power in city driving due to their smaller mass. Second, since power can be produced in many ways, it can be produced from solar, hydo electric or nuclear power as well as from fossil fuels.
Moving away from internal combustion engines is generally good because it means more posilibities for power production. Of course, that doesn't necessilary mean that it's good for the environment.
That is a verry simplistic view of economics. In a free market, prices are set by supply and demand rather than by the acutal cost to produce an item. Companies try to set their prices at the optimum level which will maximize profits. If they charge more than this, the make less money because fewer people are buying their product. If they charge less than this, they make less money because people are willing to pay more.
The only reason microsoft can charge SO MUCH for their software is because they have a monoply. Office applications from other companies (when they were still around) cost about a fifth of what MS office costs. And don't say that people were more willing to by MS because of quality, we all know that isn't true.
So what it comes down to is this: these antitrust settlements aim to take the money microsoft has made illegally in this way, and give it back to the people it was stolen form. So if microsoft continues to manipulate the market, and raises prices even more, the ammount of the settlements will need to go up to compensate for the further illegeal market manipulation.
If you ask me, this company should be broken up to at least prevent it from using Windows to force microsofts other shitty software down peoples throats. This has happened many times before (Standard Oil, Bell) and is perfectlly reasonable and warranted.
"Americans in general have unjustified pride and arrogance based on past performance when it comes to technical expertise and quality in production"
I don't mean to sound cynical, but has our technical expertise and quality in production ever been that great? I mean, American made cars have always been lower quality than their German conuterparts, and our military machines are only great becasue we spend a varitable fuck load of money developing them.
America has always been strong because of our industrial might and our willingness to take chances on future innovation. If we are loosing our technilogical edge, it is only because we are becoming less and less willing to innovate.
So watching DVD's is an inalienable right now? I can't believe what a bunch of papmered whiners we've all become. I think there was a time where our inalienable rights were "life liberty and the persuit of happiness". Now that's extended to: we all have the right to break encryption. I think the people who wrote those words would be in tears if they know how you're using them.
"the Economist thinks it likely that Boeing will be out of the civil aviation business entirely in ten years time" Well, certinally they will, because we all know that they aren't selling any planes right now, and it'd be impossible for them to develop any new planes out of composite materials with quieter engines. Oh yeah, there's no way things coule possibly turn around for them.
The whole point of using ICBM's is that it's practically impossible to stop them once they're inbound. Even if you could accurately target it, you'd need to vaporize a good portion of it to render it inoperable, and it isn't like they're are explosives inside that will take care of the job for you like in mortars or missials. Unless you've got a really powerfull laser, you're only hope is disabling it in the boost phase, or destroying it in orbit before reentry.
I believe that right now the military is developing all three, boost phase interceptors, sub-orbital "kill" vehicles, and frikin' powerfull lasers.
"the house has been constructed primarily from steel and concrete, which are hardly sustainable materials" That's an intresting way of looking at it, considering that those building materials last practically forever, where as wood most certinally does not. Would you propose that we build all of our houses out of paper and replace tehm every couple of years?
Why do you think that it requires more energy to make concrete than to make masonry? They're essentially the same thing (except that a few chemicals go into concrete), and masonry has to be fired in a furnace, so that probably makes up any energy differece there. As far as steel goes, yes it does take a lot of energy to produce it, but it lasts a LONG time, a lot longer than wood and masonry.
I hardly think it's fair to say that a house made of steel and concrete can't be eco-firendly. Personally, I'd rather see people start designing and using perminant structures and stop using wood alltogether.
P.S. I have some major problems with that first article you linked. It pretends to be all green and shit, but then it basically says that we sould use our forrests as though they were a gigantic tree farm. Am I the only environmentalists who thinks our natural forrests sould remain natural? Second of all right after it says steel and aluminum cost a lot to recycle, it says we'll run out of aluminum in 200 years, hello? aluminum and steel completly and endlessly recyclable, we'll never run out of them. Finally, I really object to them saying that wood siding is better than aluminum recycling. Basically aluminum siding lasts forever, wood siding starts looking really shitty and needs to be replavced every decade or so. And when you do, you can't recycle it because of all the paint and oil put into it over the years. Which is really better for thin environment? This site is jsut a bunch of loggers trying to tell you that they're going to turn the natural forrests into a farm, and it'll be good for the environment. A good clue that this is propaganda is that they list the R-values of metals to tell you that they're not energy efficient (metals are structural, you'd never use them for insulation).
It's kind of ironic, but right now the cheapest, and most energy efficient way to produce hydrogen is to make if from natural gas. There are other chemical ways as well as high temperature electrolosis being considered, (these might able to someday achieve 40% energy conversion). The easiest way is to jsut use cold electrolosis, but that's only about 20% efficient, so it costs more when you produce large quantities. Also, it requires sulfuric acid, which will eventually need to be replineshed (unless you reuse the water the fuel cells produce).
That's right, they come from my student fees, which cost me $3700/year. The university isn't allowed to charge me tuition (since I'm in state).
My university it #33. I don't have a laptop, but I know several people who do. In my experience, only the people who aren't paying for college with their own money can really afford a laptop.
That said, I wish students like me who can't afford a laptop didn't have to pay for the wireless network. After all, the university already spends a bunch of money on the computer labs, which are practically everywhere.
With the ammount that students at other univerisities pay, I can't really complaing about shelling out $3700/year, but when I started going here 4 years ago, it was only $2400. I wish the anministration would quite wasting money on new buildings and meaningless extravigance (like the wireless network, the new Rec Center, the new pool and whatnot) and spend the extra money I pay on maintining exixting structures. It's really frustrating that they're laying off teatures at the same time they're waisting millions of dollars on meaningless crap.
The last time I checked, wireless networks and rec centers didn't teach people. Maybe other people are here to party and dink around, but I'm here to learn.
"This also allows them to keep the vast majority of talented artists out of the distribution channels artificially keeping supply out of balance with demand and inflating their profits"
I don't think you understand the point of supply-demand optimization. Supply always (for whatever reason) matches demand. If it doesn't, there's a shortage or a surplus (which is bad). Of course, it isn't really possible to have a shortage or a surplus of music for a number of reasons.
As the price companies charge for music increses, the demand for music decreases. This means that there is an optimum price which will maximize profits. Companies employ doves of employees whose job it is to find the price that maximizes profits.
So, no they don't artifically inflate anything. If the price they carge is too high, or the selection is not good enough, people simply don't buy the music. It's differnt with essential services where there are limited choices, but in the music business artifical inflation is not possible.
As for the claim that DRM won't cause prices to rise, maybe yes, maybe no. It's really hard to tell how it will shift the demand curve. It might result in a higher optimum price, or it might result in a lower one. One thing is for certian, it will increase overall demand, and therefore increase their overall profits.
So the story is basically this:
DRM might be good for the honest end user, or it might be bad for them, but it's definately good for the music industry.
I'm sorry that you're so bitter and cynical. It's really sad that you're so set in you own ways and beliefs that you're unwilling to even consider that better things might be possible. Of course, you're probably right that people will only bring their problems into space with them but I'd doubt that spending trillions of dollars on social programs will work either.
The real problem is that people get set in their ways and are unwilling to change and adapt. I think that space travel and manned space exploration has a great deal of potential to bring change. Anything that gives people something to strive for and work toward provides a positive benefit for society. Space travel is particularly beneficial because it so so high profile. It insights peoples imaginations about what might be possible, and leads them toward trying to build a better world for tomorrow.
Palanistians and Jews, on the other hand, have no bright future to work toward, so instead they focus on their differences, and squabble over petty, meaningless things. They're literally fighting and dying for some of the most infertile, resource free land on the planet.
I always think it's silly that legislate the complete elimination of certian materials. Escpecally with heavy metals (which are naturally occuring in varying concentrations depending on where you live) it it isn't really realistic to say "completly do away with this". There is always an acceptable limit of exposure, since you can never completly avoid exposure. This is less true of some complex organic molecules, but even so there is an acceptable safe limit.
People don't demand 100% reliablity from automibilles, computers or just about any thing you can think of. People reaize that it's unreasonable to demand a 100% reliability for anything, but for some reason, they don't understand that you can't have a 100% contaminant free environment, because the environment is not naturally free of toxic substances. They don't understant that it's impossible to refine a material to 100% purity (though they can get darned close). I think when it comes down to it, it's jsut that people don't know a lot about chemistry.
At any rate, it's hard to say that there's a good reason to demand the complete removal of lead from these products. What would be more resonable would be to say "you can't have more than this ammount of lead". Obviously there's a good reason to get rid of lead paint, since the exposure is greater, the ammount is larger, and the potential for environmental contamination is greater but for microprocessors, I'd doubt the reduction of lead is worth the effort. Other computer parts though, are a much larger problem.