Most authors want their readers to value the work they're reading. It's a sad but true fact that people don't value what they get for free.
I value Linux. I value a lot of the free newspapers I read online. I don't value them by paying money necessarily, but there's more to value than just money.
As an author I want as many people as possible to read my work. But I'd like to get something in return. Not to "profit hugely" but maybe a buck so I can buy a cup of coffee for having given someone a few hours worth of entertainment - which I don't think is unreasonable.
So, you'd be happy getting say $0.59 per book, then? Fine, that's a fine price to me.
Without any kind of IP system (and I'm not saying the existing one works very well) then creative endeavours are relegated to being hobbies, and the quantity and quality of the output will be significantly reduced.
Considering you just want a cup of coffee, it sounds like book writing would have to be a hobby. Without being relatively successful, you can't begin to hope to live off of $0.59/book. In fact, simple math shows you'd have to sell at least 50,000 books just to make $30,000 (which should be enough to live off of).
However, this argument about IP laws sounds just like what pharmaceutical companies keep saying: keep paying whatever we tell you or you might just not get another miracle drug. That's now how economics is supposed to work. IP creates monopolies which authors can use to possible take hostage current or future intellectual works. There's no innate right to IP of any sort, and there's no reason why that sort of conjectured threat should lead to current or future protection for the bearer.
It's the author who's screwed having spent a year of his/her life writing a well crafted piece of fiction only to find there are copies available for free over [insert p2p of choice here] without any recognition going to the author for writing the piece in the first place.
Ignoring that not all copyrighted works are "well crafted", unless people are changing the author's name on the book, the author is getting recognition. It's not money, admittedly. Maybe this same person wrote the best book in the world, but people still overlooked it. Creating creative works is a lot like a lottery: except for the direct results from writing it (feeling better, feeling you've expressed oneself, or whatever other direct justification for writing is), everything else is just luck. Would you want copyright owners to be able to sue publishers over money the expect even though no one's reading it (free or otherwise) because it's crap, but the author thinks it's the best thing since sliced bread? All these hypothetical points try to get around the core issue of whether copyright is doing its job by sugar coating it with the image that authors should be well paid.
The truth is, maybe they should and maybe they shouldn't be well paid. Maybe the result of less anal copyright laws will be less creative works, but copyright is designed as a trade off in free speech for some advancement in the arts and sciences. There's no proof that the extended copyright or even most of IP laws as they stand are increasing the quality of creative works, just the quantity (since more things inherently qualify, and there's a motive to make more of the same stuff that sells). IP laws might cover plagiarism, but then one could claim fraud laws do too (or could be spelled out to be made to). It'd be nice to get more than just conjecture that swings from coffee drinks to something that's a full time job.
Is there a reason you substituted author for publisher? You do realize that it's the author who actually writes the books. Most authors want people to read their books first, profit hugely from them second. It's the publishers that are screwed when they make 10,000 books and no one buys them because of free copying online, not the author. It's the publishers who front the investment, and it's the publishers who are bitching so much about IP laws being violated because it ruins their monopoly.
1) So, include one (obvious protected by leaving it under a specific user account (like portage))
2) portage
3) portage + SLOTs
4) qpkg for everything but config files, and then you're rather screwed with config files on tracking without altering all programs to use a registry of some sort
5) portage, except for config files (see 4)
6) emerge -u world
No reason why./configure && make && make install can't be just as scripted as configure, make, and make install are already.
Animal Crossing does just this. You play on the GC, can play another expansion on the GBA called Animal Island. And finally, you can trade stuff with people online with passwords. You can even travel between towns if your friend brings their game cart over. Of course, real online play might be interesting, but where Animal Crossing really excels is independent and unique development where friends only get short glimpses into what makes your town (or your house decor).
I don't know of any other GC-GBA linkup that's worth it. More platforms will probably just mean buying more games with cheesy tie-ins (the Metroid Prime/Fusion link was hardly worth it just to play the original Metroid again..especially since they could have just given you playing Metroid for free..there was no real integration). So, the theory is nice, but in reality independent RPG development on a handheld probably won't mean a lot unless there's a sweet bundle (GC-GBA cable + gba cart + gc game + broadband adapter (since the online factor is really what can suck people in)) to make it actually work, and I don't see people jumping over themselves to spend $80+ on such a bundle. Maybe if the PSP's media is dirt cheap and PSP allows free connection to PS2...
> This guy's written a closed emulator, and has taken preorders for it.
Go capitalism.
> He advertises with screenshots without mentioning any standard way of interfacing gameboy games into the platform his software runs on.
Like how magazines do screenshots? Or Nintendo does pre-release screenshots?
> Of course Nintendo's pissed, he's selling tools to pirate games.
Is Nintendo pissed about the GBA which allows for pirating games? What about Nintendo selling rather expensive development tools that allow the same? I know I'd be pissed.
> The illegal distribution of copyrighted materials, regardless of location, affects the creator of those materials.
Uh, by definition no. Copyright covers the embodiment of an idea. Others copying that idea does not diminish the actual idea. Any "lost sales" are a legally created effect of piracy. Distributing copyrighted materials has no more real effect than the example of chewing gum. But, in both instances, allowing large scale production (by monopolizing the embodiment of an idea or not banning gum) does have an overall effect on society. That's true for basically anything (banning the drink of insect blood probably wouldn't have much of an effect..).
> By confusing average folk with technical data, you're lying to them just as much as you are by using performance ratings
You're confusing lying with deception. Lying is telling an untruth while being deceptive. The worry is Intel might be deceptive about its model numbering (there's nothing true or false about a symbolic label, but labeling can create the deception of one thing being 2x better than another). Politicians are really well known for this last fact. Talk about something entirely unrelated, then proceed to move ahead with your unrelated plans.
The fact is, if anyone who knows something about the field then they'll realize the issue and possibly speak up. I agree, being deceptive is bad because it makes the people in the marketplace uninformed. While just issuing a symbolic label (P4) with incomplete information (3.2Ghz) is far from useful to even the technically minded, switching to a completely symbolic name would be worse. The fact is, computers shouldn't be being sold like used cars, where salesmen just try to sell the most expensive one and claim that it's necessary. I don't think anything anytime soon will solve the used salesman or computer illiterate crouds. AMD's hack of model numbering is a poor band-aid which needs a much more solid solution for which I don't think Intel is going to provide.
I was speaking of all of Bung's copiers as well as all of Doctor 's copiers. Granted, none of the above are for the GBA. And since the SNES, N64, etc (though not the GB, as far as I am aware) include a copy protection chip, there could be also claim that making an image without copying the chip as well in backup is somehow circumventing a copy protection scheme. I am 100% sure that the GBA doesn't have any copy protection (having a trademark header in ROMs doesn't count since copying that to get a game to work is covered under Sega vs Activision (though in that case, Activision lost not because of copying a trademark to get games to work but needlessly displaying it on screen (something you can't get around on a GBA, which is Nintendo's fault)).
So, seeing as the SNES, N64, and GB backup devices were injunctioned prior to the DMCA (well, Bung happened afterwards, but I don't think the DMCA was the reason), my understanding was Nintendo's case was centered around what might happen with a copy from a backup device and how cartridges are a hard good not needing a backup. A quick check of your link just reaffirms that that defense has been used in the past and upheld there too. Now, all of this means to me that the law needs spelled out to cover fair use of software on any device one wants to (which, to me, is very comparable to bablefish). From all the cases issuing injunctions, though, I wouldn't assume that backups *are* legal as of current.
>OK - we both know the USPTO is bad at researching prior art. I'm sure Nintendo knows that too and use it to full effect.
>What I'm saying here is don't blame Nintendo for doing this, blame the USPTO.:)
I don't quite get the logic of this. An analogy would be that Nintendo was going around shooting people to protect its market and USPTO is the one that gave them the gun. Now, Nintendo is the one who requested the gun in the first place. So, while it was wrong of the USPTO to give Nintendo a gun, the fundamental reason seems to be that Nintendo is so deranged that it isn't safe to give them a gun. By that logic, shouldn't Nintendo be locked up instead of simply not giving them a gun? Nintendo should be punished for abusing a fucked up system, and the fucked up system needs fixed. It doesn't make sense to try to remove blame from either party.
Well, the fact is that most copiers have been injunctioned against sale in the US. It's been stated, though I can't seem to find an actual link to an official court document to verify this, that all backup devices for cartridge based systems are in fact illegal and that the image produced is also inherently illegal. The basic claim for all of this is that cartridge based systems are covered under the hard goods exception in copyright law which doesn't provide for backups. Of course, it'd be nice to have a clear court case where Nintendo couldn't financial smash the defendant so we'd possibly get an actual answer out of this.
> aren't consumers allowed to make backup copies of their electronic media?
You're allowed to make backups, but backup devices are illegal and any image created from said backup device is illegal. I think it's the same logic as the whole DMCA thing.
Because with more and more data becoming available to law enforcement, automating the detection of social network structures makes it a lot easier to track down suppliers for drugs, illegal porn, zombie rings, or all the paranoid/. users who are in a club. Things like well known plays offer a good method of testing the accuracy of such tools.
> Five year lifetime for apps? Bwahahaha! Let me clue you in to something: Software can have lifetimes that far exceed the manufacturer's expectations.
He was talking about the OS, not apps. And yes, a Windows OS hypothetically lasts for five years or more. The problem comes into new apps requiring a newer Windows OS or worse, a new security vulnerability is announced in your now end-of-lined Windows OS that can't be patched and the affected component can't be disconnected from the net. So, you now have to either disconnect all those computers to prevent being potentially hacked to death or you have to set up a firewall and hope that's sufficient to protect you. Of course, you have to trust everyone internal to the firewall then..ignoring that 60%+ of incursions are normally disgruntled employees.
Sorry, as someone pointed out, prices for all consoles has been pretty level at $50 since the NES (possibly the Atari days, but I didn't look at prices back then).
Your argument about more content doesn't seem to fly, either. Saturn games sold for the same price as N64 games, while Saturn games had 10x the storage capacity (this obviously ignores that 1/3-2/3 of a CD might be raw pcm music). Even assuming that 1/2 of the CD is wasted to overly inflated audio (compared to the sampled music of the N64), that only leaves a 6x (64MB vs 433MB) to 13x (32MB to 433MB) increase in possible content. Of that, most of that difference is having more uncompressed gfx. On the newest game, a large bulk of the space is taken up by not having to downgrade the gfx for textures much. The actual amount of programming involved hasn't remotely increased by 6x to 13x. Less texture correction during downgrading means *less* work for programmers and slightly more time for artists.
Now, I'm not claiming that the sort of programming going on now isn't more complex but 3D was on both the N64 and Saturn, so the actual effort to program both isn't very different. The largest part about having more storage is possibly cutting out less of the game or extending to *maybe* two or three times what would otherwise be allowed. Even then, the majority of that work is regurgitating the skill necessary to make the other 1/2 or 1/3 of the game. So, while more time is required, the actual effort required is pretty linearly fixed under a bound 3x what a smaller storage media provides.
So, that means the production costs might triple, but the distribution costs went from $10/cart (not sure how accurate that value is) to $0.50/CD. If anything, this means that even with more production going on, a moderately successful game will show a much larger revenue at the same price. Now, this also means that selling a game that doesn't sell well but follows the same production cost increase will make the company worse off (production costs). So, in that mixed bag it seems like the switch should be good for consumers. I think one major issue pointed out throughout all of this should be that if you don't make the game any bigger, then the crappy games will give the company more revenue.
Copyright is about *distribution* control. That's where the copy part comes from. Why you believe you have to agree to a usage license to use software while First Sale Doctrine clearly struck that out when book sellers were trying to do the same thing is beyond me. Use the software but don't agree to the license. It's that simple. And copyright will prevent you from distribution unless you can gain distribution rights from the owner or a valid license.
> Yet there *are* many examples of Christian parents taking their kids to see this movie without having seen it before themselves. This is totally irresponsible and I feel an extremely hypocritical action on behalf of those parents.
The obvious answer is to force your children to watch porn. Then, try to ban them reading the Bible. I'm sure that'll just make them read all the porn and violence in the Bible instead of going off to jerk off to various pornos.
Seriously, I don't think it anymore hypocritical to vividly describe (by simply reading) Christ's execution as it is to watch it presented from a small group's interpretation. Of course, if half way through the film it turned into a porno, maybe they could let the kids stay anyways...
>>N+C programmers vs N programmers checking the code means the N+C is of at least equal footing.
>This is not true. Simply having more people look at something isn't "better", is it simply "more people looking at something". Those doing the looking need to be qualified to evaluate what they're looking at, otherwise, what's the point?
I didn't say better. I said equal footing. It's possible, though, for N+C to be better than N, for C >= 1. It isn't possible for N to be better than N+C, for C >= 0.
> Would _you_ be willing to forego a potential life-saving procedure simply because you read through the source code of a piece of medical equipment and thought you saw a problem -- even without knowing the specifics of the architecture and micro-controller it was running on?
The question is too ambiguous. If I thought I saw a problem, that would mean I had a rudementary enough understanding of the language to know that something is fishy. Given that, the problem could be something small or something rather nefarious. But, given the choice of death or a procedure (assuming it's the only one, and I can't modify the code to resolve said problem (which further assumes its serious enough for me to want to bother modifying the code)) which can possibly safe my life or just kill me sooner, I'd obviously take the procedure. Given the same situation without the code being open, I'd still take the procedure because I've got nothing to lose. That doesn't mean I wouldn't prefer the open source option, if available.
> By the way, I don't believe that crap about "with enough eyes, all bugs are shallow", for this very reason... Most people simply aren't qualified to judge the code they're reading...
What does it take to be qualified to be a programmer? What beyond simply being a programmer does it take to find logical errors? Given that no company owns all the intelligence in the universe, I cannot understand how you can claim the intelligence of a company's staff plus the intelligence of outsiders would make a product worse off from a purely functionality standpoint. At worse case, no one outside the company is interested and the product just doesn't advance any further. I fail to understand how this is a worse position for me, the user.
>>>Is this the basic open-source "it's free software, so don't complain if it doesn't work" attitude?
You are equating things, then asking if someone fits the equation. Open source means that source code is included with a program. Open source doesn't mean you have distribution rights to the source or that you didn't have to pay for the source. It was standard practice until around the 80s that source code was included either free or for a price with the purchase of a program. Jumping from open source to the rest of the question is a stretch.
>>I'd most trust my life to software I can read >Oh really? And you base this statement on what?
I base this statement on two things. First, I myself am a programmer. As such, I should be able to understand source code. Secondly, software is equivalent to a turing language. As such, all software that I rely on with my life are not checkable with a generic function, unlike a FSA.
>The blind ideal that code you can see is better than code you can't? Or on the fact that _you_ have more experience writing control software for medical devices than the programmers that actually wrote the code?
The code isn't better or worse simply because I can see it. However, code I can see I have an ability to attempt to verify. My "experience" with writing control software for medical devices isn't relevant. N+C programmers vs N programmers checking the code means the N+C is of at least equal footing. Since C is at least one because I am checking the code, N+C is possibly at advantage.
> Do you really trust your abilities that much? Or are you just spouting some idealistic nonsense that makes you feel superior to the unwashed masses that can't read computer code?
It has nothing to do with trust. Logically, I should *most* desire the situation that best advantages me. With open source, I am at equal or best advantage.
Is there some reason you assume the poster is talking about open source software? Freeware, shareware, and public domain works all fall into the same category. Someone wrote something useful for themselves, thought someone else might have a use for it, and then started distributing it to others. If they think they'll make money, they might go shareware or commercial. Would I trust my life to freeware, shareware, or public domain software? I'd most trust my life to software I can read. Barring that, I'd prefer a finite state automaton to software. In the end, though, what makes you think that paying for something means you won't be killed by software? How most EULAs go, the software maker isn't liable.
That's what the RIAA wanted of Napster, though. Napster quite clearly stated that they couldn't do that. So, the judge ordered Napster to block things the RIAA signed off on as being copyrighted. Napster did that, and then there was the whole pig latin and other attempts to retitle songs to pass the filter.
Now, this new filtering system might actually fulfill the role necessary to block songs the RIAA passes off to the p2p network, but the only way to guarantee that people don't just write their own compatible client is to either encrypt all traffic and track down authors of clients who interoperate for violating the DMCA (though, the whole interoperate part would logically nullify the DMCA as a "valid" cover) or make everything pass through main servers which validate each song before passing it along.
The issue with Napster was they proved that at the time, it was impossible logistically to block content their main servers. So, Napster could be found guilty of contributing to a problem and be shut down. P2p networks that would move to main server designs would fall into the same trap, so I don't see how any p2p network would go for such an offer. Finally, even if they were to go for such an offer, actually d/ling and then processing each song, then doing a lookup just to let a song go through would be horribly bandwidth and cpu intensive which would make such a network not only scale horribly but it undoubtedly wouldn't be used with alternative forms of transfer available.
Slashdot Mirror
Most authors want their readers to value the work they're reading. It's a sad but true fact that people don't value what they get for free.
I value Linux. I value a lot of the free newspapers I read online. I don't value them by paying money necessarily, but there's more to value than just money.
As an author I want as many people as possible to read my work. But I'd like to get something in return. Not to "profit hugely" but maybe a buck so I can buy a cup of coffee for having given someone a few hours worth of entertainment - which I don't think is unreasonable.
So, you'd be happy getting say $0.59 per book, then? Fine, that's a fine price to me.
Without any kind of IP system (and I'm not saying the existing one works very well) then creative endeavours are relegated to being hobbies, and the quantity and quality of the output will be significantly reduced.
Considering you just want a cup of coffee, it sounds like book writing would have to be a hobby. Without being relatively successful, you can't begin to hope to live off of $0.59/book. In fact, simple math shows you'd have to sell at least 50,000 books just to make $30,000 (which should be enough to live off of).
However, this argument about IP laws sounds just like what pharmaceutical companies keep saying: keep paying whatever we tell you or you might just not get another miracle drug. That's now how economics is supposed to work. IP creates monopolies which authors can use to possible take hostage current or future intellectual works. There's no innate right to IP of any sort, and there's no reason why that sort of conjectured threat should lead to current or future protection for the bearer.
It's the author who's screwed having spent a year of his/her life writing a well crafted piece of fiction only to find there are copies available for free over [insert p2p of choice here] without any recognition going to the author for writing the piece in the first place.
Ignoring that not all copyrighted works are "well crafted", unless people are changing the author's name on the book, the author is getting recognition. It's not money, admittedly. Maybe this same person wrote the best book in the world, but people still overlooked it. Creating creative works is a lot like a lottery: except for the direct results from writing it (feeling better, feeling you've expressed oneself, or whatever other direct justification for writing is), everything else is just luck. Would you want copyright owners to be able to sue publishers over money the expect even though no one's reading it (free or otherwise) because it's crap, but the author thinks it's the best thing since sliced bread? All these hypothetical points try to get around the core issue of whether copyright is doing its job by sugar coating it with the image that authors should be well paid.
The truth is, maybe they should and maybe they shouldn't be well paid. Maybe the result of less anal copyright laws will be less creative works, but copyright is designed as a trade off in free speech for some advancement in the arts and sciences. There's no proof that the extended copyright or even most of IP laws as they stand are increasing the quality of creative works, just the quantity (since more things inherently qualify, and there's a motive to make more of the same stuff that sells). IP laws might cover plagiarism, but then one could claim fraud laws do too (or could be spelled out to be made to). It'd be nice to get more than just conjecture that swings from coffee drinks to something that's a full time job.
Is there a reason you substituted author for publisher? You do realize that it's the author who actually writes the books. Most authors want people to read their books first, profit hugely from them second. It's the publishers that are screwed when they make 10,000 books and no one buys them because of free copying online, not the author. It's the publishers who front the investment, and it's the publishers who are bitching so much about IP laws being violated because it ruins their monopoly.
1) So, include one (obvious protected by leaving it under a specific user account (like portage))
./configure && make && make install can't be just as scripted as configure, make, and make install are already.
2) portage
3) portage + SLOTs
4) qpkg for everything but config files, and then you're rather screwed with config files on tracking without altering all programs to use a registry of some sort
5) portage, except for config files (see 4)
6) emerge -u world
No reason why
You're confusing the stick up their ass with an inability to push stuff out of said ass.
Animal Crossing does just this. You play on the GC, can play another expansion on the GBA called Animal Island. And finally, you can trade stuff with people online with passwords. You can even travel between towns if your friend brings their game cart over. Of course, real online play might be interesting, but where Animal Crossing really excels is independent and unique development where friends only get short glimpses into what makes your town (or your house decor).
I don't know of any other GC-GBA linkup that's worth it. More platforms will probably just mean buying more games with cheesy tie-ins (the Metroid Prime/Fusion link was hardly worth it just to play the original Metroid again..especially since they could have just given you playing Metroid for free..there was no real integration). So, the theory is nice, but in reality independent RPG development on a handheld probably won't mean a lot unless there's a sweet bundle (GC-GBA cable + gba cart + gc game + broadband adapter (since the online factor is really what can suck people in)) to make it actually work, and I don't see people jumping over themselves to spend $80+ on such a bundle. Maybe if the PSP's media is dirt cheap and PSP allows free connection to PS2...
> This guy's written a closed emulator, and has taken preorders for it.
Go capitalism.
> He advertises with screenshots without mentioning any standard way of interfacing gameboy games into the platform his software runs on.
Like how magazines do screenshots? Or Nintendo does pre-release screenshots?
> Of course Nintendo's pissed, he's selling tools to pirate games.
Is Nintendo pissed about the GBA which allows for pirating games? What about Nintendo selling rather expensive development tools that allow the same? I know I'd be pissed.
> The illegal distribution of copyrighted materials, regardless of location, affects the creator of those materials.
Uh, by definition no. Copyright covers the embodiment of an idea. Others copying that idea does not diminish the actual idea. Any "lost sales" are a legally created effect of piracy. Distributing copyrighted materials has no more real effect than the example of chewing gum. But, in both instances, allowing large scale production (by monopolizing the embodiment of an idea or not banning gum) does have an overall effect on society. That's true for basically anything (banning the drink of insect blood probably wouldn't have much of an effect..).
> By confusing average folk with technical data, you're lying to them just as much as you are by using performance ratings
You're confusing lying with deception. Lying is telling an untruth while being deceptive. The worry is Intel might be deceptive about its model numbering (there's nothing true or false about a symbolic label, but labeling can create the deception of one thing being 2x better than another). Politicians are really well known for this last fact. Talk about something entirely unrelated, then proceed to move ahead with your unrelated plans.
The fact is, if anyone who knows something about the field then they'll realize the issue and possibly speak up. I agree, being deceptive is bad because it makes the people in the marketplace uninformed. While just issuing a symbolic label (P4) with incomplete information (3.2Ghz) is far from useful to even the technically minded, switching to a completely symbolic name would be worse. The fact is, computers shouldn't be being sold like used cars, where salesmen just try to sell the most expensive one and claim that it's necessary. I don't think anything anytime soon will solve the used salesman or computer illiterate crouds. AMD's hack of model numbering is a poor band-aid which needs a much more solid solution for which I don't think Intel is going to provide.
I was speaking of all of Bung's copiers as well as all of Doctor 's copiers. Granted, none of the above are for the GBA. And since the SNES, N64, etc (though not the GB, as far as I am aware) include a copy protection chip, there could be also claim that making an image without copying the chip as well in backup is somehow circumventing a copy protection scheme. I am 100% sure that the GBA doesn't have any copy protection (having a trademark header in ROMs doesn't count since copying that to get a game to work is covered under Sega vs Activision (though in that case, Activision lost not because of copying a trademark to get games to work but needlessly displaying it on screen (something you can't get around on a GBA, which is Nintendo's fault)).
So, seeing as the SNES, N64, and GB backup devices were injunctioned prior to the DMCA (well, Bung happened afterwards, but I don't think the DMCA was the reason), my understanding was Nintendo's case was centered around what might happen with a copy from a backup device and how cartridges are a hard good not needing a backup. A quick check of your link just reaffirms that that defense has been used in the past and upheld there too. Now, all of this means to me that the law needs spelled out to cover fair use of software on any device one wants to (which, to me, is very comparable to bablefish). From all the cases issuing injunctions, though, I wouldn't assume that backups *are* legal as of current.
>OK - we both know the USPTO is bad at researching prior art. I'm sure Nintendo knows that too and use it to full effect.
:)
>What I'm saying here is don't blame Nintendo for doing this, blame the USPTO.
I don't quite get the logic of this. An analogy would be that Nintendo was going around shooting people to protect its market and USPTO is the one that gave them the gun. Now, Nintendo is the one who requested the gun in the first place. So, while it was wrong of the USPTO to give Nintendo a gun, the fundamental reason seems to be that Nintendo is so deranged that it isn't safe to give them a gun. By that logic, shouldn't Nintendo be locked up instead of simply not giving them a gun? Nintendo should be punished for abusing a fucked up system, and the fucked up system needs fixed. It doesn't make sense to try to remove blame from either party.
Well, the fact is that most copiers have been injunctioned against sale in the US. It's been stated, though I can't seem to find an actual link to an official court document to verify this, that all backup devices for cartridge based systems are in fact illegal and that the image produced is also inherently illegal. The basic claim for all of this is that cartridge based systems are covered under the hard goods exception in copyright law which doesn't provide for backups. Of course, it'd be nice to have a clear court case where Nintendo couldn't financial smash the defendant so we'd possibly get an actual answer out of this.
Given the Slashdot title, I'd say yes. Too busy posting to even read that?
> aren't consumers allowed to make backup copies of their electronic media?
You're allowed to make backups, but backup devices are illegal and any image created from said backup device is illegal. I think it's the same logic as the whole DMCA thing.
Because with more and more data becoming available to law enforcement, automating the detection of social network structures makes it a lot easier to track down suppliers for drugs, illegal porn, zombie rings, or all the paranoid /. users who are in a club. Things like well known plays offer a good method of testing the accuracy of such tools.
> Five year lifetime for apps? Bwahahaha! Let me clue you in to something: Software can have lifetimes that far exceed the manufacturer's expectations.
He was talking about the OS, not apps. And yes, a Windows OS hypothetically lasts for five years or more. The problem comes into new apps requiring a newer Windows OS or worse, a new security vulnerability is announced in your now end-of-lined Windows OS that can't be patched and the affected component can't be disconnected from the net. So, you now have to either disconnect all those computers to prevent being potentially hacked to death or you have to set up a firewall and hope that's sufficient to protect you. Of course, you have to trust everyone internal to the firewall then..ignoring that 60%+ of incursions are normally disgruntled employees.
> But, adjusting for inflation...
Sorry, as someone pointed out, prices for all consoles has been pretty level at $50 since the NES (possibly the Atari days, but I didn't look at prices back then).
Your argument about more content doesn't seem to fly, either. Saturn games sold for the same price as N64 games, while Saturn games had 10x the storage capacity (this obviously ignores that 1/3-2/3 of a CD might be raw pcm music). Even assuming that 1/2 of the CD is wasted to overly inflated audio (compared to the sampled music of the N64), that only leaves a 6x (64MB vs 433MB) to 13x (32MB to 433MB) increase in possible content. Of that, most of that difference is having more uncompressed gfx. On the newest game, a large bulk of the space is taken up by not having to downgrade the gfx for textures much. The actual amount of programming involved hasn't remotely increased by 6x to 13x. Less texture correction during downgrading means *less* work for programmers and slightly more time for artists.
Now, I'm not claiming that the sort of programming going on now isn't more complex but 3D was on both the N64 and Saturn, so the actual effort to program both isn't very different. The largest part about having more storage is possibly cutting out less of the game or extending to *maybe* two or three times what would otherwise be allowed. Even then, the majority of that work is regurgitating the skill necessary to make the other 1/2 or 1/3 of the game. So, while more time is required, the actual effort required is pretty linearly fixed under a bound 3x what a smaller storage media provides.
So, that means the production costs might triple, but the distribution costs went from $10/cart (not sure how accurate that value is) to $0.50/CD. If anything, this means that even with more production going on, a moderately successful game will show a much larger revenue at the same price. Now, this also means that selling a game that doesn't sell well but follows the same production cost increase will make the company worse off (production costs). So, in that mixed bag it seems like the switch should be good for consumers. I think one major issue pointed out throughout all of this should be that if you don't make the game any bigger, then the crappy games will give the company more revenue.
Copyright is about *distribution* control. That's where the copy part comes from. Why you believe you have to agree to a usage license to use software while First Sale Doctrine clearly struck that out when book sellers were trying to do the same thing is beyond me. Use the software but don't agree to the license. It's that simple. And copyright will prevent you from distribution unless you can gain distribution rights from the owner or a valid license.
>Neither is...a backup tool, a disk defragmenter
We're talking about Windows, right? I think both tools are pretty necessary.
PS - cp is a backup tool
> Yet there *are* many examples of Christian parents taking their kids to see this movie without having seen it before themselves. This is totally irresponsible and I feel an extremely hypocritical action on behalf of those parents.
The obvious answer is to force your children to watch porn. Then, try to ban them reading the Bible. I'm sure that'll just make them read all the porn and violence in the Bible instead of going off to jerk off to various pornos.
Seriously, I don't think it anymore hypocritical to vividly describe (by simply reading) Christ's execution as it is to watch it presented from a small group's interpretation. Of course, if half way through the film it turned into a porno, maybe they could let the kids stay anyways...
"No, sir, you can not buy that computer without also buying the Windows OS."
"No, sir, you can not buy Windows OS without also buying Internet Explorer."
What was that about no other market doing forced bundling?
>>N+C programmers vs N programmers checking the code means the N+C is of at least equal footing.
>This is not true. Simply having more people look at something isn't "better", is it simply "more people looking at something". Those doing the looking need to be qualified to evaluate what they're looking at, otherwise, what's the point?
I didn't say better. I said equal footing. It's possible, though, for N+C to be better than N, for C >= 1. It isn't possible for N to be better than N+C, for C >= 0.
> Would _you_ be willing to forego a potential life-saving procedure simply because you read through the source code of a piece of medical equipment and thought you saw a problem -- even without knowing the specifics of the architecture and micro-controller it was running on?
The question is too ambiguous. If I thought I saw a problem, that would mean I had a rudementary enough understanding of the language to know that something is fishy. Given that, the problem could be something small or something rather nefarious. But, given the choice of death or a procedure (assuming it's the only one, and I can't modify the code to resolve said problem (which further assumes its serious enough for me to want to bother modifying the code)) which can possibly safe my life or just kill me sooner, I'd obviously take the procedure. Given the same situation without the code being open, I'd still take the procedure because I've got nothing to lose. That doesn't mean I wouldn't prefer the open source option, if available.
> By the way, I don't believe that crap about "with enough eyes, all bugs are shallow", for this very reason... Most people simply aren't qualified to judge the code they're reading...
What does it take to be qualified to be a programmer? What beyond simply being a programmer does it take to find logical errors? Given that no company owns all the intelligence in the universe, I cannot understand how you can claim the intelligence of a company's staff plus the intelligence of outsiders would make a product worse off from a purely functionality standpoint. At worse case, no one outside the company is interested and the product just doesn't advance any further. I fail to understand how this is a worse position for me, the user.
>>>Is this the basic open-source "it's free software, so don't complain if it doesn't work" attitude?
You are equating things, then asking if someone fits the equation. Open source means that source code is included with a program. Open source doesn't mean you have distribution rights to the source or that you didn't have to pay for the source. It was standard practice until around the 80s that source code was included either free or for a price with the purchase of a program. Jumping from open source to the rest of the question is a stretch.
>>I'd most trust my life to software I can read
>Oh really? And you base this statement on what?
I base this statement on two things. First, I myself am a programmer. As such, I should be able to understand source code. Secondly, software is equivalent to a turing language. As such, all software that I rely on with my life are not checkable with a generic function, unlike a FSA.
>The blind ideal that code you can see is better than code you can't? Or on the fact that _you_ have more experience writing control software for medical devices than the programmers that actually wrote the code?
The code isn't better or worse simply because I can see it. However, code I can see I have an ability to attempt to verify. My "experience" with writing control software for medical devices isn't relevant. N+C programmers vs N programmers checking the code means the N+C is of at least equal footing. Since C is at least one because I am checking the code, N+C is possibly at advantage.
> Do you really trust your abilities that much? Or are you just spouting some idealistic nonsense that makes you feel superior to the unwashed masses that can't read computer code?
It has nothing to do with trust. Logically, I should *most* desire the situation that best advantages me. With open source, I am at equal or best advantage.
Is there some reason you assume the poster is talking about open source software? Freeware, shareware, and public domain works all fall into the same category. Someone wrote something useful for themselves, thought someone else might have a use for it, and then started distributing it to others. If they think they'll make money, they might go shareware or commercial. Would I trust my life to freeware, shareware, or public domain software? I'd most trust my life to software I can read. Barring that, I'd prefer a finite state automaton to software. In the end, though, what makes you think that paying for something means you won't be killed by software? How most EULAs go, the software maker isn't liable.
Didn't you know that that's extortion?
That's what the RIAA wanted of Napster, though. Napster quite clearly stated that they couldn't do that. So, the judge ordered Napster to block things the RIAA signed off on as being copyrighted. Napster did that, and then there was the whole pig latin and other attempts to retitle songs to pass the filter.
Now, this new filtering system might actually fulfill the role necessary to block songs the RIAA passes off to the p2p network, but the only way to guarantee that people don't just write their own compatible client is to either encrypt all traffic and track down authors of clients who interoperate for violating the DMCA (though, the whole interoperate part would logically nullify the DMCA as a "valid" cover) or make everything pass through main servers which validate each song before passing it along.
The issue with Napster was they proved that at the time, it was impossible logistically to block content their main servers. So, Napster could be found guilty of contributing to a problem and be shut down. P2p networks that would move to main server designs would fall into the same trap, so I don't see how any p2p network would go for such an offer. Finally, even if they were to go for such an offer, actually d/ling and then processing each song, then doing a lookup just to let a song go through would be horribly bandwidth and cpu intensive which would make such a network not only scale horribly but it undoubtedly wouldn't be used with alternative forms of transfer available.