My favorite quote of all this was from an EFF attorney; to paraphrase: if someone steals your iPod, the thief would have the name and email address of the rightful owner!
No kidding! I've seen people complaining about this in blog posts that include their email address. I've heard some people even voluntarily share their email address with other people.
I just have a really hard time imagining a global plot to steal iPods as part of an email harvesting scheme.
Notice I said, "multiple hardware devices", not "multiple iPods". I have an iPod, 3 Macs, 3 Linux PC's, 1 Palm Treo and 1 DVD player. 4 of these hardware devices are supported by FairPlay, 5 are not.
Prior to iTunes 7, jHymn could losslessly convert iTunes tracks to play on all of them using iTunes 5 protocols. Apple disabled this with the release of iTunes 7. OK, I understand your decision, but I think your comment was a little misleading. Apple didn't remove functionality after iTunes 5. Without getting into a discussion of whether DRM is good or bad, it's no secret that the iTunes purchases are wrapped in DRM and it's unreasonable to imagine that Apple wouldn't makes updates to address jHymn's crack. Whether we're happy with it or not, this was nothing more than a software fix.
WB legally sells the same movies we pay $20 dollars for for $2.49 in china.
It was widely reported in the media last year.
Oh, that. What you're referring to is a test that Warner Brothers did in China, releasing 125 movies on the cheap as a response to piracy. I think we can argue chicken vs. egg on the logic -- I think it was less that the Chinese couldn't afford $20 than the fact that there's already a robust pirate market selling these movies for a buck.
Regardless, it's not standard practice. Far East pilot programs notwithstanding, I'll stick by my original statement -- I've bought CDs and DVDs in several European countries and they tend to run double what we pay here in the United States.
At that point one could no longer purchase music from Apple and play it on multiple hardware devices. That's when I stopped buying.
I'm not sure I understand this -- I have iTunes music that I play on multiple computers and sync to multiple iPods under iTunes 7.0. Could you explain what changed?
They sell these same songs and movies in other countries (on CD and DVD) for a lot less. You are competing for work with people who are paying $2 for a CD and $2.50 for a DVD. Why should they get a cheaper prices than you?
Because they're pirated? I'm not certain where you're getting your comparative pricing, but I've always found prices ludicrously high (by already too expensive U.S. standards) in the UK, France and the Netherlands.
Where are all these cheap DVDs you're talking about?
"I would like to see a mac mini with TiVo-killer hardware and software, but I doubt it will exist as long as Apple is selling TV shows in their store."
You mean this one? Apple demo'd it back in September 2006.
Um, no. I'd say not that one. The iTV as demo'd has no DVR capability. There are no inputs for video signal. Personally, if Apple's adds DVR software, CableCard support and video in, I'll buy one in a heartbeat. Until then, I think the iTV is a loser -- it just streams media from all your machines, with the inherent assumption that everything you watch has come from the iTunes Store.
I suppose there's always the possibility that Jobs has something up his sleeve, like a mega-subscription model that allows you to stream anything on the iTunes Store for a monthly fee. I hate the cable company almost as much as I hate the phone company, so I'd certainly take a look at something like that as a cable replacement. But I'm not holding my breath.
If you're going to take that point of view then why is this news? Thunderbird already exists.
I don't quite understand your point. I was responding to the idea that you'd call someone an idiot because he referred to Outlook and Outlook Express together in a discussion of UI. It appears (from other posts) that the OP was interpreted differently by me and the person to whom I was responding.
But given that this is/. and is not comprised of your typical end users -- a popular mail client going way back in Internet history is changing its codebase and going open source? Yeah, of course that's news.
The poster was trying to argue a point about Outlook, by usining Outlook Express as an example.
I thought it was obvious that he'd left out a "/" in "Outlook Outlook Express and that he was saying that the two apps haven't changed much. But I can understand how you might have interpreted it as you did.
I still think his point is valid -- there have been tweaks to both programs' interfaces, but to say that the UI has been radically redesigned every release as the OP did is pretty far out there.
Well, you're an idiot then. Outlook Express is a completely different program to Outlook. They don't share a common codebase, they're programmed by different developers.
Wipe the froth from your mouth, boy. In case you hadn't noticed, end users don't give a fuck about the codebase or the developers' names. They're just a couple mail clients from Microsoft, one with more functionality than the other.
Vista and Office 2007 won't be big sellers outside the Microsoft enthusiast groups
If by "Microsoft enthusiast groups" you mean the majority of corporate America, I agree with you 100%. I'm not happy about it, mind you, but I think that's the reality that many of the more rabid MS detractor around here fail to accept.
Who exactly determines when I erased the contents of my HDD? The article makes it seem as if they 'just kinda knew' that the deletion happened as a response to being served, but how would they know that? Who carries the burden of proof here?
No, it doesn't seem as if they just kinda knew. If you read the actual court decision, the plaintiff's expert testified to exact dates that data was deleted. And the defendant didn't argue against this, instead claiming that it was caused by an automated disk defrag program -- despite a weird 4 day, 4 hour and 30 minute interval.
I don't know how they claim to have identified when deletion occurred, but as I said before: Straightforward set of facts -- plaintiff had expert testify to when data was deleted (which was clearly after the hard drive was required to be turned over), defendent stipulated that data had been deleted and made a weak excuse for it.
So as a serious legal question out there to people who are in the know, what if the RIAA or MPAA logged my IP address last month and are in the process of subpenoing my ISP? That process can take over 6 months. Are they going to say "He erased his hard drives, so he must be guilty." They can't determine when I erased them, so are they going to claim that I destroyed evidence after I get the letter in 5 months? Can a guy really have a change of heart and do the right thing, only to get more severely punished than if he had kept up the offensive action?
OK, it's Slashdot, so obviously I'm going to answer even though IANAL. I have, however, had work product subpoenaed in cases involving my clients in the past. There is a lot of misinformation in this thread, and confusion about being served, receiving a "court order" and being subpoenaed. Service is a generic term that applies to the process of delivering court documents to a party in the action. It could be the lawsuit itself, it could be a subpoena to appear in court, or it could be something related to document production.
The key here is the subpoena or an anticipated subpoena. A subpoena for document production will specify exactly what you are being asked to provide. Once you've received the subpoena, you are clearly obligated not to destroy any of the requested documents if you have them. You haven't been subpoenaed, so you're clear in this respect. There is a grey area where you aren't permitted to destroy documents when you know there's an investigation. This was a key element in the DoJ's lawsuit against Arthur Andersen for shredding Enron documents -- that they knew that an investigation was being performed and that their responsibility to not destroy documents existed prior to their receipt of the subpoena.
(In case you don't know the whole story -- Arthur Andersen started shredding documents when informed by Enron that the SEC had initiated an investigation and stopped shredding documents the second they received a subpoena. They were convicted of obstruction charges. Those charges were overturned by the Supreme Court on the basis of improper jury instructions. The Supreme Court left open the question of when a company has a duty not to destroy documents. It is safe to say that this obligation pre-dates the issuance of a subpoena in some cases.)
There is nothing illegal about routinely shredding business documents you are no longer using. There is nothing wrong with some guy deleting files from his computer that he is no longer using. The case in this article is about someone maliciously destroying files they knew were relevent to a court proceeding with the intent of obstructing their prosecution. It's a pretty straightforward set of facts and not at all similar to what you've done.
To not seem like the snobby CEO that always is granted an exception, he put himself in the queue; it will get installed when IT gets around to his turn.
I'm sure that's the explanation. I heard that, in order not to seem like a snobby CEO, he's also assigned every Microsoft employee their own personal staff to read and summarize their email for them.
I shouldn't expect better, but I really wish people would RTFA. The summary has a lot of anti-Republican spin, but the article seems reasonably neutral and perhaps a little in favor of the Republicans' position on the issue.
So to numerous posters in this thread: Move along, there's no liberal media here. Liberal Slashdot editorializing during article submission, however, is going strong.
Remember, though, from your Accouning 101 class, that this has benefits for the firm that buys the product as well.
You should have continued on to Accounting 102.;-)
If they just commit to licensing Vista, that's only a purchase commitment that is not recorded as an expense until they receive the product. Even if they have to actually pay in advance, that's a prepaid expense that would be booked on their balance sheet. Either way, the company buying Vista wouldn't recognize the expense until they get software in hand.
I have completed the full 1040 for four tax years, including accounting for capital losses and miscellaneous income and interest, and it's just NOT THAT HARD to do your own taxes.
Try throwing in mortgage interest deduction, AMT and six state returns. Ugh. I still do my own, but I certainly don't enjoy it.
But to your point -- yeah, H&R Block is the bottom of the barrel. I think everyone who can do basic math should go out and volunteer with their nearest low-income tax prep service.
But the biggest attraction for me is the adventure aspect of the game, which differentiates it in a good way from real-life shooters like paint ball.
Paintball doesn't have an adventure aspect to it? You'd have to define "adventure aspect" for me. I've seen the small paintball parks that were just a field with some obstacles to hide behind, but I've also been to a paintball park with huge game areas, streams to ford, small villages to invade/defend, etc.
That record of the email wouldn't be admissible in court.
I'd say that this court order directly contradicts what you're saying. The judge has ordered that all emails, including deleted messages, be handed over. Where do you presume those will come from, if not from a backup somewhere?
In court, it's likely admissable if someone can verify its authenticity. And, of course, opposing counsel can challenge that authenticity.
I NEVER sign my checks before depositing them in the PNC Bank ATMs. There's no need to sign them. No one from the bank ever complains.
They won't complain. It's common practice now that the account terms include your authorization to accept those deposits without an endorsement. Your signature should still be required for a check you write, but those will also slip through pretty easily.
What, a machine opened the letter, recognized it was an application (and not, say, other junkmail that got stuffed into the nearest bulk reply envelope), fed it into a scanner, then trashed the hard copy? At no point in the process does a human see it? Sounds like bullshit.
I'd guess yes, at no point in the process does a human see it.
Here's one vendor -- OPEX. This one does opening and extraction but isn't particularly fast at 17,000/hr. They have a scanning solution as well -- significantly slower but the mail goes straight from envelope to scan.
This is just what I've found in a quick search because I knew something like it existed; I'm not that familiar with the high-speed mail processing industry. I'd imagine that the technology would surprise most people.
You can't patent ideas and concepts after all, patents are for tangible things.
Oh, the good old days. Concepts have been fair game for years and things just got worse last September. The courts have said you can't patent abstract ideas, but business method patents have been patentable for years.
Recently, the patent office issued a ruling that removed the so-called "technological arts" requirement. For many years, business method patents have been limited by this requirement -- essentially, if a business method doesn't involve a technology component, then it doesn't qualify. In September, the appeals board voted in favor of a compensation method that can worked out with pencil and paper. This opens the door for even more business method patents.
If the current system existed back in the 40s, the only drive-thru in the country might be Red's Giant Hamburgs.
Interesting. So there should be no criminal penalties for leaking any top secret information?
But this new bill doesn't specify any secret classification whatsoever. And it's not talking about leaking (where someone with access violates the information classification and disseminates it) but about any retransmittal.
So, yes, there should be criminal penalties for leaking top secret information. Laws currently exist to address that. This bill really isn't the same thing at all.
Of course, they may, as you suggest, stay the same and keep the savings. Then again, if they're fronting the costs of the upgrades...
No, you're absolutely right, there is enormous potential for change. As you point out, having a digital file on a theater server allows instant re-shuffling of the movie schedule. Unexpected hit selling out? Push a button and it's now showing on 4 screens instead of 2. That's good.
But specifically addressing the complaints of the OP: I think it's unlikely that ticket and concessions prices will improve (for us, the consumers, that is) precisely because the studios are footing the bill to upgrade theaters. The current pricing structure serves the studios very well.
Ticket/concession prices are high because the distribution deals leave very little profit from ticket sales for the theaters, especially in the first few weeks of release. After forking over hundreds of millions to upgrade theaters, I can't see the studios then agreeing to also share more of the ticket receipts with the theater owners. All the things you mention will definitely allow the studios to react better when a movie does well and to squeeze more profit out of a film, but I think the theater owners will still be left with a dime out of every dollar in week one. And still making up for that with expensive tickets and $4 sodas.
It would seem to me that there's an allocation process only because the studios have to decide in advance how well the movie will do, and correspondingly, how many prints to make.
That's an interesting point. But I think the allocation process also serves to guarantee studios more screen time than they might otherwise get. When they're getting 90% of the box office, a so-so performer is doing way better for the studio than it is for the movie theater. There's enormous incentive for the theater to dump a film pulling in mediocre box office -- unless they're contractually obligated to keep showing it. I also believe that the studios use the allocation process to ensure screens for films will low interest -- I'm not certain, but I believe they may package Blockbuster A with Unheard Of Film B. So I think they'll still make theaters compete for the right to show a given movie.
Price everything reasonably, and you'll get more volume.
Unfortunately, that's easier said than done. You have to understand the economics of film distribution to understand the terrible position movie theaters are in.
In a major studio release, the split for the first week of release is normally 90/10. The studio gets 90% of the receipts taken in by the theater. The split slowly moves in favor of the theater in subsequent weeks. So you go to a first run movie, pay $10 and sit in a room with 40 other people -- the theater is going to make a whopping $40 for that entire showing from ticket sales.
The allocation process doesn't encourage theaters to try for a bigger cut, either. The studios decide how many theaters they'll release a film in for a given market, then the films are allocated to the theaters by bidding. The theaters bid on the split and the number of weeks they promise to run the movie.
The only way digital distribution is going to have any impact on overall prices at the theater will be if the distribution agreements themselves also change. How likely do you think that is? Personally, I expect the studios to take the money and run.
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No kidding! I've seen people complaining about this in blog posts that include their email address. I've heard some people even voluntarily share their email address with other people.
I just have a really hard time imagining a global plot to steal iPods as part of an email harvesting scheme.
"Yes you could, but it is called REINVENTING THE WHEEL and leads to a million other problems..."
I hate this idiom. Sometimes you have to reinvent the wheel. Otherwise, we'd all be driving Flintstone cars on four big rocks.
Prior to iTunes 7, jHymn could losslessly convert iTunes tracks to play on all of them using iTunes 5 protocols. Apple disabled this with the release of iTunes 7. OK, I understand your decision, but I think your comment was a little misleading. Apple didn't remove functionality after iTunes 5. Without getting into a discussion of whether DRM is good or bad, it's no secret that the iTunes purchases are wrapped in DRM and it's unreasonable to imagine that Apple wouldn't makes updates to address jHymn's crack. Whether we're happy with it or not, this was nothing more than a software fix.
Oh, that. What you're referring to is a test that Warner Brothers did in China, releasing 125 movies on the cheap as a response to piracy. I think we can argue chicken vs. egg on the logic -- I think it was less that the Chinese couldn't afford $20 than the fact that there's already a robust pirate market selling these movies for a buck.
Regardless, it's not standard practice. Far East pilot programs notwithstanding, I'll stick by my original statement -- I've bought CDs and DVDs in several European countries and they tend to run double what we pay here in the United States.
Because they're pirated? I'm not certain where you're getting your comparative pricing, but I've always found prices ludicrously high (by already too expensive U.S. standards) in the UK, France and the Netherlands.
Where are all these cheap DVDs you're talking about?Um, no. I'd say not that one. The iTV as demo'd has no DVR capability. There are no inputs for video signal. Personally, if Apple's adds DVR software, CableCard support and video in, I'll buy one in a heartbeat. Until then, I think the iTV is a loser -- it just streams media from all your machines, with the inherent assumption that everything you watch has come from the iTunes Store.
I suppose there's always the possibility that Jobs has something up his sleeve, like a mega-subscription model that allows you to stream anything on the iTunes Store for a monthly fee. I hate the cable company almost as much as I hate the phone company, so I'd certainly take a look at something like that as a cable replacement. But I'm not holding my breath.
If you're going to take that point of view then why is this news? Thunderbird already exists.
/. and is not comprised of your typical end users -- a popular mail client going way back in Internet history is changing its codebase and going open source? Yeah, of course that's news.
I don't quite understand your point. I was responding to the idea that you'd call someone an idiot because he referred to Outlook and Outlook Express together in a discussion of UI. It appears (from other posts) that the OP was interpreted differently by me and the person to whom I was responding.
But given that this is
The poster was trying to argue a point about Outlook, by usining Outlook Express as an example.
I thought it was obvious that he'd left out a "/" in "Outlook Outlook Express and that he was saying that the two apps haven't changed much. But I can understand how you might have interpreted it as you did.
I still think his point is valid -- there have been tweaks to both programs' interfaces, but to say that the UI has been radically redesigned every release as the OP did is pretty far out there.
Well, you're an idiot then. Outlook Express is a completely different program to Outlook. They don't share a common codebase, they're programmed by different developers.
Wipe the froth from your mouth, boy. In case you hadn't noticed, end users don't give a fuck about the codebase or the developers' names. They're just a couple mail clients from Microsoft, one with more functionality than the other.
Vista and Office 2007 won't be big sellers outside the Microsoft enthusiast groups
If by "Microsoft enthusiast groups" you mean the majority of corporate America, I agree with you 100%. I'm not happy about it, mind you, but I think that's the reality that many of the more rabid MS detractor around here fail to accept.
Who exactly determines when I erased the contents of my HDD? The article makes it seem as if they 'just kinda knew' that the deletion happened as a response to being served, but how would they know that? Who carries the burden of proof here?
No, it doesn't seem as if they just kinda knew. If you read the actual court decision, the plaintiff's expert testified to exact dates that data was deleted. And the defendant didn't argue against this, instead claiming that it was caused by an automated disk defrag program -- despite a weird 4 day, 4 hour and 30 minute interval.
I don't know how they claim to have identified when deletion occurred, but as I said before: Straightforward set of facts -- plaintiff had expert testify to when data was deleted (which was clearly after the hard drive was required to be turned over), defendent stipulated that data had been deleted and made a weak excuse for it.
So as a serious legal question out there to people who are in the know, what if the RIAA or MPAA logged my IP address last month and are in the process of subpenoing my ISP? That process can take over 6 months. Are they going to say "He erased his hard drives, so he must be guilty." They can't determine when I erased them, so are they going to claim that I destroyed evidence after I get the letter in 5 months? Can a guy really have a change of heart and do the right thing, only to get more severely punished than if he had kept up the offensive action?
OK, it's Slashdot, so obviously I'm going to answer even though IANAL. I have, however, had work product subpoenaed in cases involving my clients in the past. There is a lot of misinformation in this thread, and confusion about being served, receiving a "court order" and being subpoenaed. Service is a generic term that applies to the process of delivering court documents to a party in the action. It could be the lawsuit itself, it could be a subpoena to appear in court, or it could be something related to document production.
The key here is the subpoena or an anticipated subpoena. A subpoena for document production will specify exactly what you are being asked to provide. Once you've received the subpoena, you are clearly obligated not to destroy any of the requested documents if you have them. You haven't been subpoenaed, so you're clear in this respect. There is a grey area where you aren't permitted to destroy documents when you know there's an investigation. This was a key element in the DoJ's lawsuit against Arthur Andersen for shredding Enron documents -- that they knew that an investigation was being performed and that their responsibility to not destroy documents existed prior to their receipt of the subpoena.
(In case you don't know the whole story -- Arthur Andersen started shredding documents when informed by Enron that the SEC had initiated an investigation and stopped shredding documents the second they received a subpoena. They were convicted of obstruction charges. Those charges were overturned by the Supreme Court on the basis of improper jury instructions. The Supreme Court left open the question of when a company has a duty not to destroy documents. It is safe to say that this obligation pre-dates the issuance of a subpoena in some cases.)
There is nothing illegal about routinely shredding business documents you are no longer using. There is nothing wrong with some guy deleting files from his computer that he is no longer using. The case in this article is about someone maliciously destroying files they knew were relevent to a court proceeding with the intent of obstructing their prosecution. It's a pretty straightforward set of facts and not at all similar to what you've done.
I'm sure that's the explanation. I heard that, in order not to seem like a snobby CEO, he's also assigned every Microsoft employee their own personal staff to read and summarize their email for them.
So to numerous posters in this thread: Move along, there's no liberal media here. Liberal Slashdot editorializing during article submission, however, is going strong.
You should have continued on to Accounting 102. ;-)
If they just commit to licensing Vista, that's only a purchase commitment that is not recorded as an expense until they receive the product. Even if they have to actually pay in advance, that's a prepaid expense that would be booked on their balance sheet. Either way, the company buying Vista wouldn't recognize the expense until they get software in hand.
Try throwing in mortgage interest deduction, AMT and six state returns. Ugh. I still do my own, but I certainly don't enjoy it.
But to your point -- yeah, H&R Block is the bottom of the barrel. I think everyone who can do basic math should go out and volunteer with their nearest low-income tax prep service.
Paintball doesn't have an adventure aspect to it? You'd have to define "adventure aspect" for me. I've seen the small paintball parks that were just a field with some obstacles to hide behind, but I've also been to a paintball park with huge game areas, streams to ford, small villages to invade/defend, etc.
I'd say that this court order directly contradicts what you're saying. The judge has ordered that all emails, including deleted messages, be handed over. Where do you presume those will come from, if not from a backup somewhere?
In court, it's likely admissable if someone can verify its authenticity. And, of course, opposing counsel can challenge that authenticity.
They won't complain. It's common practice now that the account terms include your authorization to accept those deposits without an endorsement. Your signature should still be required for a check you write, but those will also slip through pretty easily.
I'd guess yes, at no point in the process does a human see it.
Here's one vendor -- OPEX. This one does opening and extraction but isn't particularly fast at 17,000/hr. They have a scanning solution as well -- significantly slower but the mail goes straight from envelope to scan.
This is just what I've found in a quick search because I knew something like it existed; I'm not that familiar with the high-speed mail processing industry. I'd imagine that the technology would surprise most people.
Oh, the good old days. Concepts have been fair game for years and things just got worse last September. The courts have said you can't patent abstract ideas, but business method patents have been patentable for years.
Recently, the patent office issued a ruling that removed the so-called "technological arts" requirement. For many years, business method patents have been limited by this requirement -- essentially, if a business method doesn't involve a technology component, then it doesn't qualify. In September, the appeals board voted in favor of a compensation method that can worked out with pencil and paper. This opens the door for even more business method patents.
If the current system existed back in the 40s, the only drive-thru in the country might be Red's Giant Hamburgs.
But this new bill doesn't specify any secret classification whatsoever. And it's not talking about leaking (where someone with access violates the information classification and disseminates it) but about any retransmittal.
So, yes, there should be criminal penalties for leaking top secret information. Laws currently exist to address that. This bill really isn't the same thing at all.
No, you're absolutely right, there is enormous potential for change. As you point out, having a digital file on a theater server allows instant re-shuffling of the movie schedule. Unexpected hit selling out? Push a button and it's now showing on 4 screens instead of 2. That's good.
But specifically addressing the complaints of the OP: I think it's unlikely that ticket and concessions prices will improve (for us, the consumers, that is) precisely because the studios are footing the bill to upgrade theaters. The current pricing structure serves the studios very well.
Ticket/concession prices are high because the distribution deals leave very little profit from ticket sales for the theaters, especially in the first few weeks of release. After forking over hundreds of millions to upgrade theaters, I can't see the studios then agreeing to also share more of the ticket receipts with the theater owners. All the things you mention will definitely allow the studios to react better when a movie does well and to squeeze more profit out of a film, but I think the theater owners will still be left with a dime out of every dollar in week one. And still making up for that with expensive tickets and $4 sodas.
It would seem to me that there's an allocation process only because the studios have to decide in advance how well the movie will do, and correspondingly, how many prints to make.
That's an interesting point. But I think the allocation process also serves to guarantee studios more screen time than they might otherwise get. When they're getting 90% of the box office, a so-so performer is doing way better for the studio than it is for the movie theater. There's enormous incentive for the theater to dump a film pulling in mediocre box office -- unless they're contractually obligated to keep showing it. I also believe that the studios use the allocation process to ensure screens for films will low interest -- I'm not certain, but I believe they may package Blockbuster A with Unheard Of Film B. So I think they'll still make theaters compete for the right to show a given movie.
Unfortunately, that's easier said than done. You have to understand the economics of film distribution to understand the terrible position movie theaters are in.
In a major studio release, the split for the first week of release is normally 90/10. The studio gets 90% of the receipts taken in by the theater. The split slowly moves in favor of the theater in subsequent weeks. So you go to a first run movie, pay $10 and sit in a room with 40 other people -- the theater is going to make a whopping $40 for that entire showing from ticket sales.
The allocation process doesn't encourage theaters to try for a bigger cut, either. The studios decide how many theaters they'll release a film in for a given market, then the films are allocated to the theaters by bidding. The theaters bid on the split and the number of weeks they promise to run the movie.
The only way digital distribution is going to have any impact on overall prices at the theater will be if the distribution agreements themselves also change. How likely do you think that is? Personally, I expect the studios to take the money and run.