MISTER PROSSER: I’m afraid you’re going have to accept it! This bypass has got to be built and it is going to be built. Nothing you can say or do -
ARTHUR DENT: Why has it got to be built?
MISTER PROSSER: Wha - what do you mean, “why has it got to be built?” It is a bypass! You’ve got to build bypasses!
ARTHUR DENT: Didn’t anyone consider the alternatives?
MISTER PROSSER: There aren’t any alternatives! But you are quite entitled to make any suggestions or protests at the appropriate time!
ARTHUR DENT: Appropriate time?
MISTER PROSSER: Yes.
ARTHUR DENT: The first I knew about it was when a workmen arrived at the door yesterday.
MISTER PROSSER: T- oh!
ARTHUR DENT: I asked him if he’d come to clean the windows and he said he’d come to demolish the house! He didn’t tell me straight away of course. Oh no. First he wiped a couple of windows and charged me a fiver. Then he told me.
MISTER PROSSER: But Mister Dent the plans have been available in the planning office for the last nine months!
ARTHUR DENT: Yes! I went round to find them yesterday afternoon. You’d hadn’t exactly gone out of your way to pull much attention to them have you? I mean, like actually telling anybody or anything.
MISTER PROSSER: The plans were on display.
ARTHUR DENT: Ah! And how many members of the public are in the habit of casually dropping around the local planning office of an evening?
MISTER PROSSER: Er - ah!
ARTHUR DENT: It’s not exactly a noted social venue is it? And even if you had popped in on the off chance that some raving bureaucrat wanted to knock your house down, the plans weren’t immediately obvious to the eye were they?
MISTER PROSSER: That depends where you were looking.
ARTHUR DENT: I eventually had to go down to the cellar!
MISTER PROSSER: That’s the display department.
ARTHUR DENT: With a torch!
MISTER PROSSER: The lights, had probably gone.
ARTHUR DENT: So had the stairs!
MISTER PROSSER: Well you found the notice didn’t you?
ARTHUR DENT: Yes. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet, stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying “Beware of the Leopard”. Ever thought of going into advertising?
MISTER PROSSER: It’s not as if it is a particularly nice house anyway.
ARTHUR DENT: I happen rather to like it!
MISTER PROSSER: Mister Dent!
ARTHUR DENT: Yes. Hello.
MISTER PROSSER: Have you any idea how much damage that bulldozer would suffer if I just let it roll straight over you?
If you make them exclusive, you give them the best loophole they could possibly want.
Copyright = 14 (or 20) years of protection. After that the works go into the public domain. That's the original idea of copyrights and that's a fair case of artists profits vs the public domain.
DRM = it's illegal to break it, there's no time limit on the protection, the works never enter the public domain, you lose control over where and how you can access the works. The perfect solution for the MPAA/RIAA/etc because they get everything and we get nothing.
Well, let's take the original 14 years and be extremely generous and give them an extra 6 years, which is nearly 43% more than what copyrights intended in the first place. After all 20 years is a nice round number but it's still a lot better than the mess we're in right now.
If you can't make profits in the first 20 years, you won't make any after that either. And just to be sure, let's make breaking DRM legal on works 20 years old or more. Let's also make it an obligation to release the DRM encryption method for those works.
The size of CompactFlash isn't really a problem if you compare it to Memory Stick. What bugs me is that SD, Memory Stick and all the others weren't even able to see a decade forward and they had to introduce half a dozen variations to both formats (SD-HC, MS Pro, MS Pro Duo... etc). The only one that seems to have stayed the same (and kept up with capacities) is CompactFlash.
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MISTER PROSSER: I’m afraid you’re going have to accept it! This bypass has got to be built and it is going to be built. Nothing you can say or do -
ARTHUR DENT: Why has it got to be built?
MISTER PROSSER: Wha - what do you mean, “why has it got to be built?” It is a bypass! You’ve got to build bypasses!
ARTHUR DENT: Didn’t anyone consider the alternatives?
MISTER PROSSER: There aren’t any alternatives! But you are quite entitled to make any suggestions or protests at the appropriate time!
ARTHUR DENT: Appropriate time?
MISTER PROSSER: Yes.
ARTHUR DENT: The first I knew about it was when a workmen arrived at the door yesterday.
MISTER PROSSER: T- oh!
ARTHUR DENT: I asked him if he’d come to clean the windows and he said he’d come to demolish the house! He didn’t tell me straight away of course. Oh no. First he wiped a couple of windows and charged me a fiver. Then he told me.
MISTER PROSSER: But Mister Dent the plans have been available in the planning office for the last nine months!
ARTHUR DENT: Yes! I went round to find them yesterday afternoon. You’d hadn’t exactly gone out of your way to pull much attention to them have you? I mean, like actually telling anybody or anything.
MISTER PROSSER: The plans were on display.
ARTHUR DENT: Ah! And how many members of the public are in the habit of casually dropping around the local planning office of an evening?
MISTER PROSSER: Er - ah!
ARTHUR DENT: It’s not exactly a noted social venue is it? And even if you had popped in on the off chance that some raving bureaucrat wanted to knock your house down, the plans weren’t immediately obvious to the eye were they?
MISTER PROSSER: That depends where you were looking.
ARTHUR DENT: I eventually had to go down to the cellar!
MISTER PROSSER: That’s the display department.
ARTHUR DENT: With a torch!
MISTER PROSSER: The lights, had probably gone.
ARTHUR DENT: So had the stairs!
MISTER PROSSER: Well you found the notice didn’t you?
ARTHUR DENT: Yes. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet, stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying “Beware of the Leopard”. Ever thought of going into advertising?
MISTER PROSSER: It’s not as if it is a particularly nice house anyway.
ARTHUR DENT: I happen rather to like it!
MISTER PROSSER: Mister Dent!
ARTHUR DENT: Yes. Hello.
MISTER PROSSER: Have you any idea how much damage that bulldozer would suffer if I just let it roll straight over you?
ARTHUR DENT: How much?
MISTER PROSSER: None at all!
If you make them exclusive, you give them the best loophole they could possibly want.
Copyright = 14 (or 20) years of protection. After that the works go into the public domain. That's the original idea of copyrights and that's a fair case of artists profits vs the public domain.
DRM = it's illegal to break it, there's no time limit on the protection, the works never enter the public domain, you lose control over where and how you can access the works. The perfect solution for the MPAA/RIAA/etc because they get everything and we get nothing.
Microsoft?
Well, let's take the original 14 years and be extremely generous and give them an extra 6 years, which is nearly 43% more than what copyrights intended in the first place. After all 20 years is a nice round number but it's still a lot better than the mess we're in right now.
If you can't make profits in the first 20 years, you won't make any after that either. And just to be sure, let's make breaking DRM legal on works 20 years old or more. Let's also make it an obligation to release the DRM encryption method for those works.
And I've got DNA.
Only idiots would buy speakers that "fell off the back of a truck", though I did once buy a truck that detached itself from speakers.
Kip Drordy has a Slashdot account?
Hey, don't laugh. It took Apple almost 75 minutes to reach the milestone of half a million iPhone users.
Slashdot ate the link for some reason. Maybe it's hungry.
http://www.sparkfun.com/commerce/news.php?id=350
Some company in China sold ATmega328 slugs to SparkFun.
Anyone else getting redirects to http://frodocomeon.net/ since this morning?
(such as http://frodocomeon.net/in.cgi?12 which loads a fake virus-scanning page, Windows XP style)
P.S. to moderators: yes this is off-topic but please don't mod down so people can see the post and reply.
But the multitouch screen understands pinching! That would be a waste!
Are you saying that the Chinese own Slashdot or that we're all viruses?
Wait, don't answer that...
How is that supposed to be a bad analogy, guy?
Since it's a development unit, it would be interesting to see Gizmodo pay for the R&D costs of the next iPhone.
Nuke him from orbit?
Yes there was! Over 9000!
And according to the RIAA, 9000 songs at 0.99$ each equals 5 billions in damages and 3000 years of prison!
From what I've heard you need to eat one every day. No wonder people say apples are expensive!
No I have not! What is this "Apple" you speak of?
Take the blue pill. The story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe.
Well, I was on the 14th floor...
Don't turn your back. Don't look away. And don't Blink. Good Luck.
I sure hope he's not talking about sending physical letters. I've tried it once and the lag was incredibly high.
The size of CompactFlash isn't really a problem if you compare it to Memory Stick. What bugs me is that SD, Memory Stick and all the others weren't even able to see a decade forward and they had to introduce half a dozen variations to both formats (SD-HC, MS Pro, MS Pro Duo... etc). The only one that seems to have stayed the same (and kept up with capacities) is CompactFlash.
The aliens are addicted to videogames, remember?