Who are you talking to? The person who modded me troll? Because that was not my list of the most obscure bands I can think of. In fact, most of them I discovered by listening to the radio. My point was, these are the bands I like, if a music for ads service starts up with bands like them (not just them, I have most of their music anyways, but stuff in that vein so I can find new music) then I'll be interested, but none of the Universal bands look appealing to me.
Seriously, I looked through the whole wikipedia list, and there's not a single band I like.
Man, what do you listen to? Barry Manilow?
I like Snow Patrol, Moth, Utada, Subways, Relient K, Ani Difranco, etc. This whole music for ads thing sounds interesting, but wake me when they have some good music.
I know that was one of the big differences between Myst and Riven. When they did Riven they really tried to put enought clues to solve the game in there. Where the Orignial had some very random puzzles, with missing logic, Riven was completely solveable with the in game hints.. you had to find them in the right order, but that's part of the game!
No way. I beat Myst without a strategy guide. The puzzles made sense. Riven, however, does not. I never beat that game because I was sick of having go back to the strategy guide every 4 seconds. Also, switching disks every 4 seconds because they decided to spread the game out over 5 disks just because they like the number 5 was annoying. Riven sucked, I'll take Myst instead any day.
If I buy some iTunes music, or a DVD, or whatever, I should have the right to listen, or watch, or whatever, that media.
Certainly, but I don't buy an XBox 360 game when all I own is a Playstation, or a CD when all I have is a cassette deck.
The difference is that you would need to do some serious modding in order to listen to a CD in a cassette deck or play a 360 game in a Playstation, whereas I can just slide my DVD into my computer and it plays, but for some reason that's illegal. Anyways, would it really be the end of the world if someone modded their cassette player to take CDs? Does that kind of thing have to be illegal?
The old bedsheet analogy again. Oh, wait. This is definitely the first time I've heard it. What about this: I want to play my old Abba 8-track tapes on my CD player. An equally horrible analogy, but one that supports the other side of the argument.
I don't see how that supports the other side. If you were able to modify your cd player to take your 8-track tapes and play them, them why should that be illegal? It's not very likely that you'll be able to, but why shouldn't you be allowed to?
I don't want the right to free use of others' hard work if they don't agree to it (I do appreciate free/open source software, but I don't think everything should be required to be free). What I would like is for me to be able to legally watch the Friends DVDs that I've bought on my computer. I'm not asking to share them with all my friends, hell, I'm not even asking for backup copies. I just want to sit on my bed and watch the DVDs that I've bought without breaking the law.
This is not like you crashing on my bed without my permission; this is like me wanting to put my bedsheets on my couch and sleep there, but for some reason the bedsheet makers only want me to put bedsheets on a bed, so it's illegal. Why would people not want me to put my bedsheets on my couch? I don't know, I guess for the same reasons they don't want me to play my DVDs in my computer...
This is where copyright law goes too far. If I buy some iTunes music, or a DVD, or whatever, I should have the right to listen, or watch, or whatever, that media. I mean, why would I buy it if I don't have the right to use it? Should I just pirate all the music and movies I want, since it's illegal for me to watch it anyways? Well, it would save me money, but no. I'm going to continue to buy music and movies, and I will continue to break any DRM that prevents me from playing it. The law is stupid, and I do not follow laws that are that stupid.
And if mousetraps were software, Small Research Shop would build a better mousetrap, but then get their asses sued off because Big Corp has patented mousetraps, leaving no one able to make better ones because mousetraps as a whole are patented. That's what patenting something as broad as "speech recognition software" is.
Thus ignoring the only point I was trying to make, or perhaps it was just poor explanation on my part. All I'm saying is I think your interpretation of how patents encourage innovation is mistaken... THis isn't to say that broad patents can't restrict innovation, because they clearly can.
No, I got your point, and I agree with you that a limited monopoly does encourage innovation. However, my point is that software patents are too broad. Your example using speech recognition software is a clear example of that. You should have protection (copyright or patent, whatever) on the speech recognition software you write, but you should not be able to prevent others from making their own speech recognition software. Copyrights protect software in the same vein that patents are supposed to, without the treat of being too broad and covering things it shouldn't (though lasting 80 years after death and being illegal to break copyright protection to view legally purchased material is excessive, but that's a whole 'nother topic). Copyrights work better for software than patents, so we should just use copyrights and not have stupid shit like double clicking be patented.
What's really frustrating is that the same thing happens if you take an.odt and open it in both KWord and OOWriter. Then you can't even blame proprietary evilness.
Of course, I can't really be mad at OO and the K people, because everything has this problem (or I could just be mad at everyone?). Even PDFs look different between Adobe, KPDF, and Foxit. *sigh*
I have Office 2007 on my work computer. It's very very pretty. I like using it. But, it doesn't do anything that Office 2003 doesn't, nor do I do anything with it that I can't do in KOffice. All it has over the other office suites is prettiness. Are pretty graphics worth the $100+ price tag? Not to me.
Wireless is all about having the right card. I used to have this cheap-ass unsupported Belkin crap and trying to get it to work under linux was a nightmare. NDISwrapper, install this tool, that tool, blah. So I went to the wiki for my distro (Ubuntu) found the list of supported cards, bought one, and yay autodetection. No more wires under the door for me!:)
Every camera and music player I've ever used has automatically mounted as an external drive. Have I been abnormally lucky?
Picasa (Google's photo manager) is available on Linux, along with a number of open source photo managers. I think we're doing pretty good on the photo managing front.
With it, the small research shop would invent a better mouse trap, and Big Corp has to license that idea from them in order to produce it -- thus rewarding the innovator. Without it, the small research shop invents the better mouse trap, and Big Corp sees it for sale in limited number, and mass-produces a copy for less money. Small Research Shop not only has not been rewarded, they are quite likely now out of business.
And if mousetraps were software, Small Research Shop would build a better mousetrap, but then get their asses sued off because Big Corp has patented mousetraps, leaving no one able to make better ones because mousetraps as a whole are patented. That's what patenting something as broad as "speech recognition software" is.
If your new kind of rubber includes my rubber, I can compell you to pay licensing fees. Same for the voice recognition software. There is absolutely no difference.
But my voice recognition software does not include your voice recognition software (if it did, it would violate copyrights), it just is used for the same thing as yours. If I make a material that can be used for the same thing as your rubber but is made in a different way, then I do not violate patents. So why is it that if I make a software program that doesn't use any of your code and is even written in a different language than yours, that violates patents?
Is this the same Nintendo that was charging $20 for GBA ports of ExciteBike, Ice Climbers and the NES version of Xevious?
Oddly enough, that was after they sold those same games for $5 each for the e-reader (guess they were mad at us for not buying their $40 dongle). They also sold games like Metroid and Dr. Mario that were previously released with other GBA games (Metroid: Zero Mission and WarioWare) that were much more deserving of $20 or $30. I never really understood the whole NES on GBA thing. Though I did get Zelda when it dropped to $10. That was cool. But I wish Nintendo did a "Dawn of Souls"* type remake of Zelda and Zelda II. That would have been sweet, and worth the $30.
*Squeenix's Final Fantasy I+II GBA remake, with better graphics, sound, and added dungeons and stuff
If I'm the first person to design voice recognition software, why would that be any less patentable than a new kind of rubber? The point (theoretically, at least) is to reward hard work and innovation. Why should software engineers be any less entitled to that kind of reward?
If you patent your rubber, I can work on a new, better type of rubber. If you patent voice recognition software, can I work on a new, better type of voice recognition software? Patenting voice recognition software would be like patenting all rubber; it's way too broad. Most software patents are way too broad, and thus stifle creativity instead of encourage it like patents are meant to do. Software copyrights, however, cover the implementation of software (not the vague concepts), so I am not allow to copy your voice recognition technology but I am allowed to work on new, better ways of voice recognition. Copyright law isn't perfect, but for software it is better than patents, at least the way the system is currently.
Civil cases have a different burden of proof than criminal cases. In a criminal case, the prosecutor has to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant did the crime. In civil cases, the plantiff just has to prove it is likely based on the evidence that the defendant cased the plantiff monetary loses.
I'm still impressed by what can be considered copyright infringement under the US law, and how exaggerately high the compensation for damages can be. If they were to be fair, I think they should charge with $1 for each Mp3, since that's what it would cost her to buy them through iTunes (or maybe $2, or $10, since she could make copies, but nothing near $150,000), and the costs of the trial.
Though with most filesharing software you automatically share the files with everyone else. She could have had thousands of songs, and thousands of people could have downloaded from her. It's not hard to imagine that if she and everyone who downloaded from her had bought every song from iTunes that they could have spent over $150,000.
..but video games were still around when I was a kid. Being grounded to my room included the removal of anything that I could enjoy doing. I don't understand why they don't just take his computer away..
When I was a kid, what I enjoyed was books. Since my parents couldn't bring themselves to stop me from reading, they really couldn't punish me by sending me to my room. Even if kids don't like reading, I sure they could find something fun in their rooms to do, so I never really understood that punishment. Taking away a computer from a kid spammer makes sense, but once that's away I don't see the difference between him being bored in his room and him being bored in the living room.
So your experiment expect people to not apply any Windows patches, but at the same time expect people to install a 3rd party personal firewall??? Is it just me in thinking that there is a very remote probability of this situation actually occuring?
It's not uncommon for a more tech-savvy person to install a firewall and tell the user to update, but then the user ignores the updates and clicks "yes" when the firewall asks "Do you want to let evil_trojan access the internet?" Well, at least that's how it works at my company, were I install firewalls, antivirus, etc, on laptops, ship them out to employees all over the country, and then get bitched at because they downloaded some viruses. *sigh*
Every game you want might not be for PC, either. Final Fantasy XII isn't going to be for PC. Even if you computer is upgraded enough to not worry about the specs, there's stil a lot of games you can't play because they're for a different platform (PS2, XBox, GC, or, to a lesser extent, Mac or Linux). So I don't see how having a PC helps any when it comes to whether or not a game will play on your system, in fact, having a PS2 would give you more games to play than a PC (except for cheap puzzle games, but I don't think you bought your gaming rig to play Zuma). Also, as far as recentness goes, consoles last much longer than PCs. My 6 year old PS2 still has major games coming out that I'm very excited for, while my 6 year old PC plays the games that came with Ubuntu. Granted, there won't be more new games for my PS2 for much longer, but it's been a long time since my old computer had a new game on it.
I think we're thinking of PC games differently - you see it as a seperate "world" from console games, I see the PC as just another system. You complain that you couldn't play Halo on a PS2 if you had one, you'd have to get an XBox, but you'd still want a PS2 for Final Fantasy and a Cube for Zelda, and that's expensive. I agree, but I can't play any of those games on a PC. On the other hand, Civ IV is only for PC. So, in the end, I see the PC (upgraded, new ones, not the old ones I run Linux on) as just another game system. Buy the one that has the most games you like that you can afford. Buy another if you have the money. But buying a PC instead of a console because you can't play Final Fantasy on an XBox is just silly.
I kinda like my Linux distro coming with all sorts of different programs. I wouldn't mind if Windows did the same thing. Of course, I still wouldn't buy it, so I guess that doesn't matter much.
Games and a console for $35 is a good deal even if you don't get anymore games for it afterwards. Who it's bad for is the people who bought the Dreamcast for $200 (or was it $300?) the day it came out, expecting 5 years of games to be made for it. That's why I'm not an early adopter. But if there's no early adopters then there would be no consoles. Hmm. Now I've confused myself, what was my point again?
Competition is go because it allows creative designs like the DS and the Wii.
Anyway, how hard is it? Flip the package over and compare specs with your system.
So you complain that you have to make sure that your console game is for your console, but there's nothing hard about matching up all your system specs? Making sure your game says "Playstation 2" in big letters is clearly easier than matching up your hardware specs, so if the latter is trivial, then there isn't anyway you can complain about the former.
I hate to say it, but the Windows monoculture has its advantages -- if I buy a computer game these days, chances are very good that it will play on a Windows PC. If I buy a console game, I have a one in four shot of it playing on a popular console.
If you buy a computer game, you have to look through the system specs and make sure your hardware is supported. If you buy a console game, you just look for the big letters that say the name of your console. It's a lot easier to make sure your game will play in your console than to make sure your game will play on your computer hardware.
Slashdot Mirror
Seriously, I looked through the whole wikipedia list, and there's not a single band I like.
I like Snow Patrol, Moth, Utada, Subways, Relient K, Ani Difranco, etc. This whole music for ads thing sounds interesting, but wake me when they have some good music.
I don't want the right to free use of others' hard work if they don't agree to it (I do appreciate free/open source software, but I don't think everything should be required to be free). What I would like is for me to be able to legally watch the Friends DVDs that I've bought on my computer. I'm not asking to share them with all my friends, hell, I'm not even asking for backup copies. I just want to sit on my bed and watch the DVDs that I've bought without breaking the law.
This is not like you crashing on my bed without my permission; this is like me wanting to put my bedsheets on my couch and sleep there, but for some reason the bedsheet makers only want me to put bedsheets on a bed, so it's illegal. Why would people not want me to put my bedsheets on my couch? I don't know, I guess for the same reasons they don't want me to play my DVDs in my computer...
This is where copyright law goes too far. If I buy some iTunes music, or a DVD, or whatever, I should have the right to listen, or watch, or whatever, that media. I mean, why would I buy it if I don't have the right to use it? Should I just pirate all the music and movies I want, since it's illegal for me to watch it anyways? Well, it would save me money, but no. I'm going to continue to buy music and movies, and I will continue to break any DRM that prevents me from playing it. The law is stupid, and I do not follow laws that are that stupid.
What's really frustrating is that the same thing happens if you take an .odt and open it in both KWord and OOWriter. Then you can't even blame proprietary evilness.
Of course, I can't really be mad at OO and the K people, because everything has this problem (or I could just be mad at everyone?). Even PDFs look different between Adobe, KPDF, and Foxit. *sigh*
I have Office 2007 on my work computer. It's very very pretty. I like using it. But, it doesn't do anything that Office 2003 doesn't, nor do I do anything with it that I can't do in KOffice. All it has over the other office suites is prettiness. Are pretty graphics worth the $100+ price tag? Not to me.
Wireless is all about having the right card. I used to have this cheap-ass unsupported Belkin crap and trying to get it to work under linux was a nightmare. NDISwrapper, install this tool, that tool, blah. So I went to the wiki for my distro (Ubuntu) found the list of supported cards, bought one, and yay autodetection. No more wires under the door for me! :)
Every camera and music player I've ever used has automatically mounted as an external drive. Have I been abnormally lucky?
Picasa (Google's photo manager) is available on Linux, along with a number of open source photo managers. I think we're doing pretty good on the photo managing front.
*Squeenix's Final Fantasy I+II GBA remake, with better graphics, sound, and added dungeons and stuff
Civil cases have a different burden of proof than criminal cases. In a criminal case, the prosecutor has to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant did the crime. In civil cases, the plantiff just has to prove it is likely based on the evidence that the defendant cased the plantiff monetary loses.
Every game you want might not be for PC, either. Final Fantasy XII isn't going to be for PC. Even if you computer is upgraded enough to not worry about the specs, there's stil a lot of games you can't play because they're for a different platform (PS2, XBox, GC, or, to a lesser extent, Mac or Linux). So I don't see how having a PC helps any when it comes to whether or not a game will play on your system, in fact, having a PS2 would give you more games to play than a PC (except for cheap puzzle games, but I don't think you bought your gaming rig to play Zuma). Also, as far as recentness goes, consoles last much longer than PCs. My 6 year old PS2 still has major games coming out that I'm very excited for, while my 6 year old PC plays the games that came with Ubuntu. Granted, there won't be more new games for my PS2 for much longer, but it's been a long time since my old computer had a new game on it.
I think we're thinking of PC games differently - you see it as a seperate "world" from console games, I see the PC as just another system. You complain that you couldn't play Halo on a PS2 if you had one, you'd have to get an XBox, but you'd still want a PS2 for Final Fantasy and a Cube for Zelda, and that's expensive. I agree, but I can't play any of those games on a PC. On the other hand, Civ IV is only for PC. So, in the end, I see the PC (upgraded, new ones, not the old ones I run Linux on) as just another game system. Buy the one that has the most games you like that you can afford. Buy another if you have the money. But buying a PC instead of a console because you can't play Final Fantasy on an XBox is just silly.
I kinda like my Linux distro coming with all sorts of different programs. I wouldn't mind if Windows did the same thing. Of course, I still wouldn't buy it, so I guess that doesn't matter much.
Games and a console for $35 is a good deal even if you don't get anymore games for it afterwards. Who it's bad for is the people who bought the Dreamcast for $200 (or was it $300?) the day it came out, expecting 5 years of games to be made for it. That's why I'm not an early adopter. But if there's no early adopters then there would be no consoles. Hmm. Now I've confused myself, what was my point again?
Competition is go because it allows creative designs like the DS and the Wii.