So take a laptop filled with misinformation, science fiction, and totally bogus stuff. If enough people do this, your adversary will bankrupt himself trying to figure it all out. Extra points for the size of the server farms you can get trying to decrypt output from/dev/random.
I don't have my DSM handy right now, but I think the addiction you are referring to is Greed, i.e. the excessive love of money, the root of all evil. (Greed might be a form of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, but it might also be caused by other disorders. Hm, Financial Dismorphic Disorder, where no matter how much money you have, you think you need more)
Yes, greed has throughout the centuries compelled people to do unethical things. Nothing new here.
Well, yeah, if only there were. The RIAA represents "The Industry", i.e. the big players. Yes, they give lip service to being for the artists, but really they represent the interest of the record companies
Trying to get a group of artists of any type to agree on *lunch* is hard enough. Getting them together to form an organization that would properly represent them would be near impossible. If you did get one started, it would last until the drummers decided to sue the lead singers. (Phil Collins and Don Henley's head would explode at this) There have been attempts, but no group has nearly the clout of the RIAA/MPAA
They *should* be afraid to modify it. Even a bug fix can adversely affect some customers. They may have worked around and come to depend on a particular bug, and "fixing" it would adversely affect them. Even a code speedup can cause problems in the real world.
If the paying customers are happy with the code, leaving it alone is a sound business decision. If you want to fix it, create a new version (or even a new product) that fixes all the known problems with the current code. After most of the customers of a code base are gone, and it's not worth maintaining it, open source it. (Although, if you are efficient enough, maintaining a code base for exactly one remaining customer shouldn't be to hard.)
Since his bonus is only a part of the current sales, perhaps that part of the code shouldn't be rewritten.
Instead of spending your time rewriting code that is making paying customers happy, start with the current codebase and make a new product that will make you a large bonus. Re-invent the wheel only to get new customers. If you mess with the existing product, you might impact current customers, even if you make it better. The are many instances where a customer is dependent on a "bug", has worked around it, and would rather live with it vs. something unknown.
If it's decided at all, it will be bad for the record companies. So far, they maintained that sales are a license when it suits them, and a sale also if that's better for them. (I imagine a single purchase has multiple licenses and sales)
It's time for the legislature to actually work this out. Given the current state of things, I don't expect anything to happen on that front, so companies and artists will try new business models, then let the courts decide if those are going to work. If Sister Sledge gets their way, I suspect all the still living artists of that era will start their lawsuit engines.
"The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, but that's how the smart money bets."
- Damon Runyon
A lawyer once told me that lawsuits are about 90% facts & law and 10% luck. No mater how good your case, there's always a chance you'll lose. That 10% is what keeps the other side going. (SCO was shooting for the 10%)
I found that longevity is a good metric. Code that doesn't need to be touched again because it just works is good code.
Quick, patent your process.
This sounds like a great idea that you could even base bonuses on. You get a point for every line of code that is still in production. After the points are added up, the bonuses are based on the relative percentage of all points.
Question: Do you care if you have someone that has amassed so many points that he doesn't have to work anymore?
If bonuses are based on a percent of sales, then consider the end case where you've got a profitable product that none of your coders have touched in years. Do you care? If sales fall, so will bonuses, providing an incentive to invent something new.
Under this system, newbies would have to code new apps that provide additional revenue.
Software Developers/Programmers do the job that computers cannot do. So it is difficult to use computers to monitor their performance just because their work is a lot less calculated.
I've often argued this with managers w.r.t. time estimates. If I know how long something will take, it's because I understand it and have done it before. If that's true, most likely, I can automate it so that it takes almost no time at all, i.e. scp foobar user@newmachine:/opt/productname/foobar
If I don't understand something yet, and I've never done it before, then right now, my estimate is infinite time, because there's a chance the current system won't handle the new specs using the available resources. I've even had exchanges like this:
Manager: How long will it take?
Me: ASAP
Manager: I need to know if I will have to put additional resources on the project.
Another thing that scares the record companies with this, is that you could set up a closed P2P system with your friends so that the music is being traded around. There'd never be more than N paid for copies at a time, and it would be legal, but your group would have to purchase many fewer copies that if you all bought all the CDs that represented your library.
Now, imagine that the "Group" was most of the world. Your system would purchase several thousand copies of a given song, then no more, ever. As long as the song didn't exist on more than that many devices at once, it would be legal. If you could show that a given device had died, you could even restore the song it had to the rotation. It's a grand vision, song immortality, no song even need die every again.
And our radars can detect a shell-sized object now (that's what counterbattery radar is for, after all), so you have a minute or more to change your projected position by 200 meters - you can manage that without even turning, just speed up/down as needed
The key would be the rep rate. If the rail gun can only launch every minute or so, it's not much better than current gunpower big guns.
On the other hand, if the rep rate is multiple rounds per second, a ship would have a hard time evading a swarm of projectiles. Even a big ship would have trouble with dozens of 5" slugs hitting the engine room.
Anyway, you'd first send in your jets to pulverize the rail gun before you got into its range.
The Fleet won't be obsolete if you can use some other weapon system to knock out their rail gun before you get in range. Then your fleet brings in the troops and other heavy equipment.
Or, you make sure your floating rail guns are the biggest on the planet.
Obviously each person will have their own preferences, but hotness is mostly a few attributes. Clear skin, symmetric and smooth features. (Men are more angular) This gives cartoon women definite advantages as long as they stay away from the uncanny valley.
Think about how you would take a photo of a woman and clean it up with Photoshop. First remove blemishes and irregularities. Absolute size is less important than all that.
Page 27, lines 3 - 12. Mr Mandel for plaintiff:
"If you make a copy and then put it up somewhere else in order to distribute it, it isn't that particular copy anymore that you're distributing. And that is basically the whole essence of the first sale doctrine is that it didn't include the right to reproduction any more than if I had a book or CD that I could photocopy, give the copy to my friend, and then decide I don't want this book anymore, I'm going to throw the book in the garbage. That wouldn't be covered by the first sale doctrine, and neither is this. It's logically no different. "
In order to use a digital work, the work must be copied into computer memory, and if compressed or DRMed must be manipulated by the device before it can be listen to or viewed. (Even if only a little at a time)
The courts have decided that if you pay for a work, you get to do what is necessary to use it. You can even make a copy in the form of a backup to prepare for an accident.
Since a small amount of copying is necessary to use an iTunes download, it's not much of a stretch for the courts to allow a small amount of copying in order to sell it.
I don't know exactly how ReDigi does their magic, but it's not impossible for them to render a tune unplayable on your iPod before it becomes playable on the buyer's iPod, so there's no chance that both of you could be playing that tune at the same time. As long as both the seller and buyer are playing by the rules, ReDigi is ok. The courts shouldn't shut down used record stores just because the original owner might have taped the disk before selling it.
I work in the industry and have seen coworkers fired for taking unauthorized, but profitable, risks. There's no criminal prosecution in those cases of course, but the consequence of dismissal was at least there. I have also seen such cases with small losses where the guy was fired but not prosecuted.
Not prosecuted, but also not publicized in both cases.
Why did your coworkers take the unauthorized risk in the first place, seeing as they would get fired, profit or loss? Seems more a case of stupidity, rather than malicious action.
Some criminal could easily have this thought process:
"Life sucks. I could kill myself, or rob a bank. Might as well die, robbing a bank."
Also, there are certain mental states that make it impossible to consider getting caught. Remember Bill Clinton. "I may be the most powerful person in the world, but I'd give it all away to have sex with a moderately attractive big-haired intern". Bill was so narcissistic and powerful that he literally could not imagine being caught for that.
All the time. Ignore the cases where there was insider trading or other fraud, and try to find a single case where a trader is prosecuted for taking unjustified risk and making too much money. Usually though, when that happens the trader doesn't cover up his initial behavior, but even if he did, who would investigate?
Here are the possibilities:
Take unjustified risk, lose loads of money, notify management, get fired.
Take unjustified risk, lose loads of money, hid the loss, ???
Take unjustified risk, make loads of money, get promoted.
People often say that money buys elections, but it doesn't. Money buys voters, who decide elections. It's just that it can be very difficult to influence voters, so if someone offers a politician money, he takes it. If you can truly offer that politician, voters, he'll drop the money people without a second thought.
The trick is to get enough voters on your side, then convince the politician that you actually speak for that group, and they will actually vote your way. Much, much easier to write a check.
My insurance company has a contracted pharmacy. If you want a maintenance drug, you have to have the Dr. fill out a 90 day prescription, and only CVS is allowed to fill it. Amazingly, they seem to have the worst service. I've been told that some insurance companies make you go to mail order for maintenance drugs.
Check out just about any court decision involving US treaties with Native Americans. Money talk almost always wins. Doesn't get it's way 100%, but close enough.
The current GPO candidates all want to repeal "Obamacare", but when quizzed about exactly which parts they would scrap, all they'll mention is the individual mandate. That wasn't even a desired part of the plan, but a compromise with the insurance companies. There's no way the army of insurance lobbyists will let Congress drop the individual mandate without coverage limits, and what Congressperson wants to vote to take coverage away from "Tiny Tim", either to let him die, or make the hospitals pick up the tab thru indigent care.
Slashdot Mirror
So take a laptop filled with misinformation, science fiction, and totally bogus stuff. If enough people do this, your adversary will bankrupt himself trying to figure it all out. Extra points for the size of the server farms you can get trying to decrypt output from /dev/random.
I don't have my DSM handy right now, but I think the addiction you are referring to is Greed, i.e. the excessive love of money, the root of all evil. (Greed might be a form of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, but it might also be caused by other disorders. Hm, Financial Dismorphic Disorder, where no matter how much money you have, you think you need more)
Yes, greed has throughout the centuries compelled people to do unethical things. Nothing new here.
Well, yeah, if only there were. The RIAA represents "The Industry", i.e. the big players. Yes, they give lip service to being for the artists, but really they represent the interest of the record companies
Trying to get a group of artists of any type to agree on *lunch* is hard enough. Getting them together to form an organization that would properly represent them would be near impossible. If you did get one started, it would last until the drummers decided to sue the lead singers. (Phil Collins and Don Henley's head would explode at this) There have been attempts, but no group has nearly the clout of the RIAA/MPAA
Bear in mind that lawyers are wrong half the time.
So true, but I'd love to see a case where the Judge threw both lawyers out of his courtroom for incompetence. (I'm sure it's happened at least once)
They *should* be afraid to modify it. Even a bug fix can adversely affect some customers. They may have worked around and come to depend on a particular bug, and "fixing" it would adversely affect them. Even a code speedup can cause problems in the real world.
If the paying customers are happy with the code, leaving it alone is a sound business decision. If you want to fix it, create a new version (or even a new product) that fixes all the known problems with the current code. After most of the customers of a code base are gone, and it's not worth maintaining it, open source it. (Although, if you are efficient enough, maintaining a code base for exactly one remaining customer shouldn't be to hard.)
Since his bonus is only a part of the current sales, perhaps that part of the code shouldn't be rewritten.
Instead of spending your time rewriting code that is making paying customers happy, start with the current codebase and make a new product that will make you a large bonus. Re-invent the wheel only to get new customers. If you mess with the existing product, you might impact current customers, even if you make it better. The are many instances where a customer is dependent on a "bug", has worked around it, and would rather live with it vs. something unknown.
If it's decided at all, it will be bad for the record companies. So far, they maintained that sales are a license when it suits them, and a sale also if that's better for them. (I imagine a single purchase has multiple licenses and sales)
It's time for the legislature to actually work this out. Given the current state of things, I don't expect anything to happen on that front, so companies and artists will try new business models, then let the courts decide if those are going to work. If Sister Sledge gets their way, I suspect all the still living artists of that era will start their lawsuit engines.
"The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, but that's how the smart money bets."
- Damon Runyon
A lawyer once told me that lawsuits are about 90% facts & law and 10% luck. No mater how good your case, there's always a chance you'll lose. That 10% is what keeps the other side going. (SCO was shooting for the 10%)
I found that longevity is a good metric. Code that doesn't need to be touched again because it just works is good code.
Quick, patent your process.
This sounds like a great idea that you could even base bonuses on. You get a point for every line of code that is still in production. After the points are added up, the bonuses are based on the relative percentage of all points.
Question: Do you care if you have someone that has amassed so many points that he doesn't have to work anymore?
If bonuses are based on a percent of sales, then consider the end case where you've got a profitable product that none of your coders have touched in years. Do you care? If sales fall, so will bonuses, providing an incentive to invent something new.
Under this system, newbies would have to code new apps that provide additional revenue.
Software Developers/Programmers do the job that computers cannot do. So it is difficult to use computers to monitor their performance just because their work is a lot less calculated.
I've often argued this with managers w.r.t. time estimates. If I know how long something will take, it's because I understand it and have done it before. If that's true, most likely, I can automate it so that it takes almost no time at all, i.e. scp foobar user@newmachine:/opt/productname/foobar
If I don't understand something yet, and I've never done it before, then right now, my estimate is infinite time, because there's a chance the current system won't handle the new specs using the available resources. I've even had exchanges like this:
Another thing that scares the record companies with this, is that you could set up a closed P2P system with your friends so that the music is being traded around. There'd never be more than N paid for copies at a time, and it would be legal, but your group would have to purchase many fewer copies that if you all bought all the CDs that represented your library.
Now, imagine that the "Group" was most of the world. Your system would purchase several thousand copies of a given song, then no more, ever. As long as the song didn't exist on more than that many devices at once, it would be legal. If you could show that a given device had died, you could even restore the song it had to the rotation. It's a grand vision, song immortality, no song even need die every again.
You could do that with books. Buy books and loan them to each of your friends, a few at a time. You could even call yourself a "Library".
So, yes.
And our radars can detect a shell-sized object now (that's what counterbattery radar is for, after all), so you have a minute or more to change your projected position by 200 meters - you can manage that without even turning, just speed up/down as needed
The key would be the rep rate. If the rail gun can only launch every minute or so, it's not much better than current gunpower big guns.
On the other hand, if the rep rate is multiple rounds per second, a ship would have a hard time evading a swarm of projectiles. Even a big ship would have trouble with dozens of 5" slugs hitting the engine room.
Anyway, you'd first send in your jets to pulverize the rail gun before you got into its range.
The Fleet won't be obsolete if you can use some other weapon system to knock out their rail gun before you get in range. Then your fleet brings in the troops and other heavy equipment.
Or, you make sure your floating rail guns are the biggest on the planet.
Obviously each person will have their own preferences, but hotness is mostly a few attributes. Clear skin, symmetric and smooth features. (Men are more angular) This gives cartoon women definite advantages as long as they stay away from the uncanny valley.
Think about how you would take a photo of a woman and clean it up with Photoshop. First remove blemishes and irregularities. Absolute size is less important than all that.
Watch just about any sitcom from a few years ago. Fat guy with hot chick. (King of Queens, Family Guy, The Flintstones, The Honeymooners)
It's actually getting better. Ray Romano and Tim Allen seem to be matched with an actresses of equal "hotness".
Page 27, lines 3 - 12. Mr Mandel for plaintiff: "If you make a copy and then put it up somewhere else in order to distribute it, it isn't that particular copy anymore that you're distributing. And that is basically the whole essence of the first sale doctrine is that it didn't include the right to reproduction any more than if I had a book or CD that I could photocopy, give the copy to my friend, and then decide I don't want this book anymore, I'm going to throw the book in the garbage. That wouldn't be covered by the first sale doctrine, and neither is this. It's logically no different. "
In order to use a digital work, the work must be copied into computer memory, and if compressed or DRMed must be manipulated by the device before it can be listen to or viewed. (Even if only a little at a time)
The courts have decided that if you pay for a work, you get to do what is necessary to use it. You can even make a copy in the form of a backup to prepare for an accident.
Since a small amount of copying is necessary to use an iTunes download, it's not much of a stretch for the courts to allow a small amount of copying in order to sell it.
I don't know exactly how ReDigi does their magic, but it's not impossible for them to render a tune unplayable on your iPod before it becomes playable on the buyer's iPod, so there's no chance that both of you could be playing that tune at the same time. As long as both the seller and buyer are playing by the rules, ReDigi is ok. The courts shouldn't shut down used record stores just because the original owner might have taped the disk before selling it.
I work in the industry and have seen coworkers fired for taking unauthorized, but profitable, risks. There's no criminal prosecution in those cases of course, but the consequence of dismissal was at least there. I have also seen such cases with small losses where the guy was fired but not prosecuted.
Not prosecuted, but also not publicized in both cases.
Why did your coworkers take the unauthorized risk in the first place, seeing as they would get fired, profit or loss? Seems more a case of stupidity, rather than malicious action.
You are ignoring the suicidal.
Some criminal could easily have this thought process:
"Life sucks. I could kill myself, or rob a bank. Might as well die, robbing a bank."
Also, there are certain mental states that make it impossible to consider getting caught. Remember Bill Clinton. "I may be the most powerful person in the world, but I'd give it all away to have sex with a moderately attractive big-haired intern". Bill was so narcissistic and powerful that he literally could not imagine being caught for that.
Here are the possibilities:
People often say that money buys elections, but it doesn't. Money buys voters, who decide elections. It's just that it can be very difficult to influence voters, so if someone offers a politician money, he takes it. If you can truly offer that politician, voters, he'll drop the money people without a second thought.
The trick is to get enough voters on your side, then convince the politician that you actually speak for that group, and they will actually vote your way. Much, much easier to write a check.
My insurance company has a contracted pharmacy. If you want a maintenance drug, you have to have the Dr. fill out a 90 day prescription, and only CVS is allowed to fill it. Amazingly, they seem to have the worst service. I've been told that some insurance companies make you go to mail order for maintenance drugs.
Real lawyers can clarify, but AFAIK, two separate courts in separate decisions can decide that A is true, and that A is not true.
Is there any law or principle that the "system" has to resolve logical errors like this?
Check out just about any court decision involving US treaties with Native Americans. Money talk almost always wins. Doesn't get it's way 100%, but close enough.
The current GPO candidates all want to repeal "Obamacare", but when quizzed about exactly which parts they would scrap, all they'll mention is the individual mandate. That wasn't even a desired part of the plan, but a compromise with the insurance companies. There's no way the army of insurance lobbyists will let Congress drop the individual mandate without coverage limits, and what Congressperson wants to vote to take coverage away from "Tiny Tim", either to let him die, or make the hospitals pick up the tab thru indigent care.