I entirely agree with you, but in the US, straight couples can enter into a legal contract that offers them far greater benefits than a gay couple can. If those benefits are brought into parity then the problem is solved. Big ones are death benefits, the ability to make medical decisions, insurance and legal protection against testifying against a spouse. There are many benefits to marriage.
"If I want to marry a person of the same sex, how does that affect you? If affects me because marraige is a social institution, by definition. If you & your partner were isolated on an island, the concept of 'marriage' would be mute. Other people (aka society) interacting with you forms part of the definition of 'marriage'. So, my answer is, of course you should be able to 'marry' any consenting adult, but you should not be able to force me to recognise your relationship as marriage."
The social recognition of marriage already exists for gays. Gays get married in ceremonies all the time and they don't really care whether all members of society recognize it or not. No one knows better than gays how to accept rejection.
Straight marriages typically consist of a ceremony and a marriage license. Gays get the ceremony but not the license. What gays want from marriage is the license and the the LEGAL benefits that brings. These benefits have nothing to to with marriage as a social institution but rather are benefits specifically granted to some members of society and denied others.
The proper solution to the gay marriage issue is to do away with legal marriage altogether. No need for the government to interfer in that matter. If couples wish to engage themselves in legal contracts, gay or straight, they can do so through a common means. Call it marriage or civil union, it is inevitable in a free and equal society.
If racial prejudice is a social institution (which it was and still is) does that make it right to legally discriminate against racial minorities?
So what you are saying is that all men and women have a subconcious desire to reproduce? I think you'd have a hard time proving that one, especially to me.
So you say "nearly all of the cases". I guess that disproves your point. What studies are these?
That's not the argument, regardless of the validity of the "several studies" you cite. In the animal world violence, rape, incest and homesexually aren't "wrong".
The argument is that homesexuality exists in nature outside humans. It's not simply a deviant choice that humans make.
"...why should society provide such advantages to behavior which it finds to be detrimental to it?"
Society hasn't found homosexual behavior to be "detrimental to it", it's nothing more than prejudice. Given that marriage is an artificial construct created by society, it should be obvious to you that homosexuals desire the same artificially constructed benefits of marrriage that others do and that were created by society for that very reason. Obvously, "all men created equal" means something different to you.
If marriage is an artificial construct of society, why does sex before marriage seem stupid to you? Did we need to create an artificial relationship before you could reproduce?
Homosexual sex for a gay person is a basic biological drive. That's why there ARE gay people. It's not a choice.
Yes, customers always pay. The cash always comes from those doing the buying.
That said, most sellers, especially smaller ones, aren't smart enough or diligent enough to raise their prices to compensate. Often it's not worth the trouble. How often do you see a seller set a cash price lower than the credit price? Unless that happens, it is the seller actually paying through lowered margins. One way or another, buyers pay the fees but not so matter-of-factly as you say.
On a large scale sellers will have to get certain margins to survive and prices will increase by 2% or so. That's unlikely to happen on a purchase-by-purchase basis.
Not sure where you get your math, but 720p has 3x the pixel count of 480p, not 1.5x. Furthermore, NTSC DVD is not 480p but rather 480i. 1080i, which the HD-DVD does do, has 6.75x the pixel count of NTSC DVD. Then there's the matter of what equipment is used to produce the content, but why you would choose a lower resolution mode to compare format resolutions I have no idea. Additionally, exactly what is HD sound (wrt video) and do you expect it to be included in your bittorrent downloads? Is current AC3/DTS inadequate or are you just counting bits?
It's nice that you believe "the market" will deliver a better product to your HTPC but what is "the market" you refer to? Content owners or bootleggers? The motion picture industry wants to sell you DRM'ed discs, not free downloads to your PC.
Another thing, assuming you pay for the disc OR the download, one benefit of the disc is it ADDS 25GB (in your example) to the capacity of your playback system. With the download, you pay perhaps 1/4 the cost for the HD space as you do for the disc, but the hard drive is not archival media, the download costs of your internet connection aren't included, and you still haven't paid for the movie. I guess your model makes sense if you intend to download for free via bittorrent/p2p, you have broadband, and the opportunity cost of tying up your connection is reasonable.
Would you be willing to pay $1 per GB for the movie, $0.35 for the non-archival storage space, and a monthly fee for broadband? I'd rather buy the disc and rip it.
It's not always theft when you say it is either. For example, I once loaned a car to a friend with the understanding that it would be returned in a week or so. Not only was it not returned but the guy skipped town with it and disconnected his cell phone. It was not theft because I allowed him to take the car in the first place. Took almost two months to get it back and it was wrecked and trashed. All the expense of that was on me since the guy couldn't pay.
Curiously, you make the point that the connection isn't simply received but is interactive. The shop operator, each an every time a message is passed, has the option to refuse the connection yet he does not. Seems to me that it's not theft at all because the shop owner, through his AP programming, willingly participates in the usage. The fact that the connection is two way doesn't alter that at all.
"This isn't just about RECEIVING a signal - it's about configuring your computer to receive it, and transmitting signals back as well."...and about the AP's choice to respond to your device and allow it access (which it does freely).
"...you were aware this "magical free wireless" connection was owned by someone..."...and that they were giving it away freely. The spectrum they are using is public property and that are providing coverage in a public place.
"...there is the TOS of the ISP serving bandwidth to the coffeeshop"...which is of no concern to me because I am not bound by that contract.
"Someone owns the device that's transmitting it, and someone pays for the connection to the internet that it's using."...and it's mighty generous of him to give it away freely to the public without restriction. If that's not his intention then he should use the tools built into his device to prevent it.
In Texas your daughter, and possibly you, would be guilty of a crime if she were indecent. In any event, the public has every right to look into your back yard. Put up a fence if you don't like it.
of course, you have to deal with the expensive 4x5 film, the relatively difficult large format equipment and the scanner which will be far more expensive than a couple thousand bucks.
While the Canon lenses you referred to may be some of the finest ever produced for 35mm format, they aren't the last word in what's possible when larger sensors are employed. Canon's wides are inferior to Nikon's as well so pushing the limit there isn't really saying anything. I owned a 1DS2 until recently BTW.
Otherwise, you're completely correct about the dynamic range of modern digital SLR's. I can't stand hearing the same uninformed comments made about the superiority of film over digital. 35mm film was surpassed quite a while ago.
Claiming that this is anyone's "fault" is also a personal opinion. Some, especially Apple, would consider it a feature and you can bet Apple never would have worked with the code to begin with had it been under the GPL. You aren't getting complete OS X source---it's the family jewels.
As if OS X on Apple runs "smooth". What exactly is that anyway?
I'm writing this on a MBP. It's already failed and required a new motherboard (which resulted in having my HD wiped my Apple, why's that?) and it crashes often enough. Perhaps not as often as my XP notebook but hardly "rock solid". My mac early-life failure rate is still 100% and i've owned 3 macs now. Pitiful.
Hardware lockin for OS X has nothing to do with "smoothness". It has to do with protecting the MacOS monopoly and minimizing ongoing support. Intel macs are the same hardware as Intel PC's without any special, Apple-engineered "smoothness" chip.
"Personally, I don't quite get it, but this move of Apples clearly should NOT offend BSD license advocates since that is exactly what they stand for."
Not exactly. BSD license advocates just don't stand against it. They stand against the additional restrictions of the GPL license.
You're right that it should not offend. It shouldn't offend anyone and it should have been expected.
The real mistake is thinking that Apple is a friend of open source to begin with. They sometimes contribute voluntarily, sometimes through license requirements, but always because it benefits their business. Nothing wrong with that. Apple's in business to make money, not friends.
Write a driver for a crypto device if you're a bomb designer: suspicious behavior. Write a driver for a crypto device if you're a driver writer and OS publisher: not suspicious at all. It's what they do.
yes, exactly. Anyone who wants access to such technical information would have a reason and intellectual curiosity wouldn't be it for very many. Obviously there's a principle at stake here but I don't think that the issue is as simple as that. Theo doesn't want to register and I doubt it's out of fear that the police are going to kick down his door.
Try comparing Turion to a real Intel notebook processor. The mobile P4 was never intended for true portable use and was the worst processor ever offered for notebooks wrt power consumption.
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13Hz is absolute worst case. Mine runs 30Hz and it's not a problem. The display is glorious for running photoshop.
Copyright isn't strictly for compensation. Copyright ensures that the holder retains control of his works.
You don't gain ownership of the content when you buy a movie. You get physical media and viewing license.
Hardware is another matter.
"Heck, I spend all of this money, and the things I buy aren't really mine!" Depending on your point of view, that's right.
I entirely agree with you, but in the US, straight couples can enter into a legal contract that offers them far greater benefits than a gay couple can. If those benefits are brought into parity then the problem is solved. Big ones are death benefits, the ability to make medical decisions, insurance and legal protection against testifying against a spouse. There are many benefits to marriage.
"If I want to marry a person of the same sex, how does that affect you?
If affects me because marraige is a social institution, by definition. If you & your partner were isolated on an island, the concept of 'marriage' would be mute. Other people (aka society) interacting with you forms part of the definition of 'marriage'.
So, my answer is, of course you should be able to 'marry' any consenting adult, but you should not be able to force me to recognise your relationship as marriage."
The social recognition of marriage already exists for gays. Gays get married in ceremonies all the time and they don't really care whether all members of society recognize it or not. No one knows better than gays how to accept rejection.
Straight marriages typically consist of a ceremony and a marriage license. Gays get the ceremony but not the license. What gays want from marriage is the license and the the LEGAL benefits that brings. These benefits have nothing to to with marriage as a social institution but rather are benefits specifically granted to some members of society and denied others.
The proper solution to the gay marriage issue is to do away with legal marriage altogether. No need for the government to interfer in that matter. If couples wish to engage themselves in legal contracts, gay or straight, they can do so through a common means. Call it marriage or civil union, it is inevitable in a free and equal society.
If racial prejudice is a social institution (which it was and still is) does that make it right to legally discriminate against racial minorities?
So what you are saying is that all men and women have a subconcious desire to reproduce? I think you'd have a hard time proving that one, especially to me.
So you say "nearly all of the cases". I guess that disproves your point. What studies are these?
That's not the argument, regardless of the validity of the "several studies" you cite. In the animal world violence, rape, incest and homesexually aren't "wrong".
The argument is that homesexuality exists in nature outside humans. It's not simply a deviant choice that humans make.
"...why should society provide such advantages to behavior which it finds to be detrimental to it?"
Society hasn't found homosexual behavior to be "detrimental to it", it's nothing more than prejudice. Given that marriage is an artificial construct created by society, it should be obvious to you that homosexuals desire the same artificially constructed benefits of marrriage that others do and that were created by society for that very reason. Obvously, "all men created equal" means something different to you.
If marriage is an artificial construct of society, why does sex before marriage seem stupid to you? Did we need to create an artificial relationship before you could reproduce?
Homosexual sex for a gay person is a basic biological drive. That's why there ARE gay people. It's not a choice.
Yes, customers always pay. The cash always comes from those doing the buying.
That said, most sellers, especially smaller ones, aren't smart enough or diligent enough to raise their prices to compensate. Often it's not worth the trouble. How often do you see a seller set a cash price lower than the credit price? Unless that happens, it is the seller actually paying through lowered margins. One way or another, buyers pay the fees but not so matter-of-factly as you say.
On a large scale sellers will have to get certain margins to survive and prices will increase by 2% or so. That's unlikely to happen on a purchase-by-purchase basis.
Whys is it hard to believe? Lots of vendors don't bother with fringe OS'es.
I remember DAT. A very successful format in pro markets. No one bought it for their homes but not for any reasons you mentioned. CD's worked there.
What? HD-DVD lost badly? sub-$1000 1080p TV's? DVD obsolete? BluRay replaced in a few years?
What are you smoking?
Not sure where you get your math, but 720p has 3x the pixel count of 480p, not 1.5x. Furthermore, NTSC DVD is not 480p but rather 480i. 1080i, which the HD-DVD does do, has 6.75x the pixel count of NTSC DVD. Then there's the matter of what equipment is used to produce the content, but why you would choose a lower resolution mode to compare format resolutions I have no idea. Additionally, exactly what is HD sound (wrt video) and do you expect it to be included in your bittorrent downloads? Is current AC3/DTS inadequate or are you just counting bits?
It's nice that you believe "the market" will deliver a better product to your HTPC but what is "the market" you refer to? Content owners or bootleggers? The motion picture industry wants to sell you DRM'ed discs, not free downloads to your PC.
Another thing, assuming you pay for the disc OR the download, one benefit of the disc is it ADDS 25GB (in your example) to the capacity of your playback system. With the download, you pay perhaps 1/4 the cost for the HD space as you do for the disc, but the hard drive is not archival media, the download costs of your internet connection aren't included, and you still haven't paid for the movie. I guess your model makes sense if you intend to download for free via bittorrent/p2p, you have broadband, and the opportunity cost of tying up your connection is reasonable.
Would you be willing to pay $1 per GB for the movie, $0.35 for the non-archival storage space, and a monthly fee for broadband? I'd rather buy the disc and rip it.
It's not always theft when you say it is either. For example, I once loaned a car to a friend with the understanding that it would be returned in a week or so. Not only was it not returned but the guy skipped town with it and disconnected his cell phone. It was not theft because I allowed him to take the car in the first place. Took almost two months to get it back and it was wrecked and trashed. All the expense of that was on me since the guy couldn't pay.
Curiously, you make the point that the connection isn't simply received but is interactive. The shop operator, each an every time a message is passed, has the option to refuse the connection yet he does not. Seems to me that it's not theft at all because the shop owner, through his AP programming, willingly participates in the usage. The fact that the connection is two way doesn't alter that at all.
What would it take for something to pan out for you?
I had to have my MBP battery AND motherboard replaced. They returned it with a wiped hard drive. So thoughtful of them.
if your daughter wasn't indecent in the back yard maybe your neighbor wouldn't be out so much.
"This isn't just about RECEIVING a signal - it's about configuring your computer to receive it, and transmitting signals back as well." ...and about the AP's choice to respond to your device and allow it access (which it does freely).
...and that they were giving it away freely. The spectrum they are using is public property and that are providing coverage in a public place.
...which is of no concern to me because I am not bound by that contract.
...and it's mighty generous of him to give it away freely to the public without restriction. If that's not his intention then he should use the tools built into his device to prevent it.
"...you were aware this "magical free wireless" connection was owned by someone..."
"...there is the TOS of the ISP serving bandwidth to the coffeeshop"
"Someone owns the device that's transmitting it, and someone pays for the connection to the internet that it's using."
In Texas your daughter, and possibly you, would be guilty of a crime if she were indecent. In any event, the public has every right to look into your back yard. Put up a fence if you don't like it.
of course, you have to deal with the expensive 4x5 film, the relatively difficult large format equipment and the scanner which will be far more expensive than a couple thousand bucks.
While the Canon lenses you referred to may be some of the finest ever produced for 35mm format, they aren't the last word in what's possible when larger sensors are employed. Canon's wides are inferior to Nikon's as well so pushing the limit there isn't really saying anything. I owned a 1DS2 until recently BTW.
Otherwise, you're completely correct about the dynamic range of modern digital SLR's. I can't stand hearing the same uninformed comments made about the superiority of film over digital. 35mm film was surpassed quite a while ago.
Claiming that this is anyone's "fault" is also a personal opinion. Some, especially Apple, would consider it a feature and you can bet Apple never would have worked with the code to begin with had it been under the GPL. You aren't getting complete OS X source---it's the family jewels.
As if OS X on Apple runs "smooth". What exactly is that anyway?
I'm writing this on a MBP. It's already failed and required a new motherboard (which resulted in having my HD wiped my Apple, why's that?) and it crashes often enough. Perhaps not as often as my XP notebook but hardly "rock solid". My mac early-life failure rate is still 100% and i've owned 3 macs now. Pitiful.
Hardware lockin for OS X has nothing to do with "smoothness". It has to do with protecting the MacOS monopoly and minimizing ongoing support. Intel macs are the same hardware as Intel PC's without any special, Apple-engineered "smoothness" chip.
"Personally, I don't quite get it, but this move of Apples clearly should NOT offend BSD license advocates since that is exactly what they stand for."
Not exactly. BSD license advocates just don't stand against it. They stand against the additional restrictions of the GPL license.
You're right that it should not offend. It shouldn't offend anyone and it should have been expected.
The real mistake is thinking that Apple is a friend of open source to begin with. They sometimes contribute voluntarily, sometimes through license requirements, but always because it benefits their business. Nothing wrong with that. Apple's in business to make money, not friends.
of course it does.
Write a driver for a crypto device if you're a bomb designer: suspicious behavior. Write a driver for a crypto device if you're a driver writer and OS publisher: not suspicious at all. It's what they do.
yes, exactly. Anyone who wants access to such technical information would have a reason and intellectual curiosity wouldn't be it for very many. Obviously there's a principle at stake here but I don't think that the issue is as simple as that. Theo doesn't want to register and I doubt it's out of fear that the police are going to kick down his door.
Try comparing Turion to a real Intel notebook processor. The mobile P4 was never intended for true portable use and was the worst processor ever offered for notebooks wrt power consumption.