Which works just fine until you find that the person you've insulted er... wrote most of the program you're commenting from scratch when the company was a tenth of its current size, is still working at the same company and is a senior software architect in the same reporting line as you.
Well, it seems quite obvious to me that this levy was produced on the assumption that most of the blank CDs sold would be used to pirate audio.
It therefore makes sense that there's a government department somewhere which has the authority to give you a refund if you've used a CD for something else. Why don't you give them a call and see if they can help you?
I'm not actually a yank, TYVM. But all the same, I can just imagine some bloke who runs a business, is perhaps used to getting his own way being told to stuff it by Microsoft tech support.
Put it this way: I don't think my first reaction in such circumstances would be to nip out and buy another copy of Windows.
As far as Compaq's responsibility goes, my software warranty was 90 days, and my laptop is 3 years old. Do the math. All copies of Windows come with 2 free support incidents at Microsoft, however, and if I want the problem fixed, I can call Microsoft.
All of which is very true. But let's look at a possible real world scenario, given the following assumptions:
1. It is foolish to run a Windows OS connected to the Internet without keeping it up to date. 2. Microsoft routinely provide updates for legitimate users of Windows up to a certain version. 3. You're a legitimate user, but Microsoft refuse to recognise this.
Sounds like a good recipe for lawyer exercise to me.
Going to Linux is a small step, but there are a few apps (like video editing, graphics editing) where I just don't have the patience to spend a whole bunch of time learning Linux apps that are 'almost' there in terms of their UI.
Then don't.
I'll get modded to hell for saying this, but use whatever suits you best.
You'll know if/when the time is right for you to move entirely to an alternative platform such as Linux/MacOS. Windows will piss you off so much that you'll put up with any amount of temporary inconvenience to do it. Same thing happened with me - took a year or two before I finally decided "stuff it".
AFAIK, the basis of the legal action was trademark infringement; thus:
"Fred's Imports has no license to use the names Sony, PSP or the logos. They're all trademarks owned by us. We've asked them to stop using these names, they refuse. Please order them to stop, your honour."
Judgement for the plaintiff, now Fred has to sell his Sony PSPs without telling people what they are. And to really hammer it home, Sony consider "Fred's imports" shipping a box with Sony PSP on it a trademark infringement - and the court agreed.
Does this sound like an abuse of the system to you?
That's very nice for you. And when your source code is just part of a multi-million line project, and I want to use your software rather than develop it further, what then?
There's some debate as to whether or not the "patrolling vans" ever existed. Certainly today, they don't seem to bother - they simply assume every household in the country has a TV, then start harrassing any households without a license.
Now I think you can go into any store in Endland and most of the players are region free by default (someone please correct me if you still need to unlock them).
I'll assume you mean England.
Depends where you shop. Ironically, cheap Chinese players in supermarkets are more likely to ship unlocked than expensive ones in electronics stores like Dixons (though most generally say "Region 2" on the box). OTOH, Richer Sounds (cheap hifi warehouse) regularly advertise players as "region free". Sometimes they get in a job lot of a particular model, unlock the region on some of them and sell them at a £20 premium over the "region locked" version.
And if that didn't put the final nail in the coffin of DVD region coding, Amazon UK even put instructions on their website for "how to unlock your DVD player".
ICBW, but IIRC there's a list of "Vital Medications" held by the World Health organisation which have to be made available at a reasonable cost throughout the world under international law.
Given the AIDS epidemic in Africa, a cure would get on that list so fast.... bye bye charging £500/dose.
in The Netherlands for example there are 4 organisations you need to contact before you can even broadcast a CD legally
I wonder how those organisations (and those in other countries) are going to react to the prospect that most, if not all of them would become irrelevant in the face of a Europe-wide organisation?
That being said, record labels may like it at a very senior level - they could save a lot of money.
She may not know anything about infosec but is this an acceptable practice?
Maybe she doesn't have the formal training but she's hit the nail more-or-less on the head. If you want a secure system for a number of users, a common technique is to start out by working out exactly what each of those users needs in order to do their job. Differentiate between "would like to have" and "needs" - and playing Solitaire or browsing the web over lunch aren't necessary in order to do a job.
Then you take your computer (be it running Windows or Linux) and you nail it down so thoroughly it's no more than a screen you can move a mouse around on. This is quite doable with policies in a Windows domain.
Final stage, you go back to your "list of things the user needs to do" and you set up their account such that it can do those things and nothing more.
The difficult bit isn't the computer system. The difficult bit is explaining to someone why it is their computer won't let them access the internet, click this attachment or run this program a friend gave them. This can get particularly difficult when it's non-technical management you're explaining this to.
Of course, there's probably very few people around who know the language the system was originally written in. And even fewer who also know something a bit more modern - say, Java. And if any original design documentation even exists, you can bet it won't be object-oriented.
So your new system will have to be designed and built more-or-less from scratch, by people who don't fully understand the old one. And then you'll have to run it in parallel with the existing system for a few months to iron out any issues.
All of this costs money. Real money, not the colourful stuff you get £200 of every time you pass "Go". And it's risky - nobody in their right mind is going to claim that ripping out an entire system and replacing it is likely to be a smooth, trouble-free operation.
So if the existing system works efficiently and performs adequately, who cares that it's 20 years old? Works, doesn't it? In this context, business drives IT. The business neither needs nor particularly wants a new system, the business doesn't buy one.
Now Nick Leeson, this guy is going to have a hard time living down his adventure in derivatives:
Slightly OT, but Nick Leeson (according to his autobiography, "Rogue Trader") was trying to cover a mistake made by one of the people he was supervising. Rather than sack her and inform his bosses of the loss, he tried to make it up by trading stocks himself.
Needless to say, he didn't do a very good job of this.
Logically, once the first spammer is successfully prosecuted, the majority of bulk mailing software will probably evolve to allow a list of "email addresses not to spam under any circumstances". All I need to do then is figure out a way to get my email address onto that list...
My cable modem isn't a modem at all. Technically, it's a bridge. The computer (or in my case, firewall) on my side of it gets a real, routeable IP address. The cable modem doesn't even appear in a traceroute and only really has an IP address for management purposes. I suspect the same is true for most cable modems.
Similarly, there's a lot of USB DSL routers out there, and many ISPs don't support the ethernet port, if one exists. Guess what? They don't route at all. They're the DSL equivalent of good ol' POTS modems. The computer gets a real routeable IP address.
I agree that something more secure than a 16-digit number is certainly feasible and needed. But it shouldn't be something that needs to be passed through a third party. The card should be a smart card capable of signing a transaction, and only the signature should be transmitted
Many years ago, it was far more common to base timers in software on things like "when the graphics chip updates" or have other things hard-coded according to the speed of the host system.
In such cases, running on a modern machine can introduce all sorts of timing issues.
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20% insulting someone else or their code.
Which works just fine until you find that the person you've insulted er... wrote most of the program you're commenting from scratch when the company was a tenth of its current size, is still working at the same company and is a senior software architect in the same reporting line as you.
Well, it seems quite obvious to me that this levy was produced on the assumption that most of the blank CDs sold would be used to pirate audio.
It therefore makes sense that there's a government department somewhere which has the authority to give you a refund if you've used a CD for something else. Why don't you give them a call and see if they can help you?
I'm not actually a yank, TYVM. But all the same, I can just imagine some bloke who runs a business, is perhaps used to getting his own way being told to stuff it by Microsoft tech support.
Put it this way: I don't think my first reaction in such circumstances would be to nip out and buy another copy of Windows.
As far as Compaq's responsibility goes, my software warranty was 90 days, and my laptop is 3 years old. Do the math. All copies of Windows come with 2 free support incidents at Microsoft, however, and if I want the problem fixed, I can call Microsoft.
All of which is very true. But let's look at a possible real world scenario, given the following assumptions:
1. It is foolish to run a Windows OS connected to the Internet without keeping it up to date.
2. Microsoft routinely provide updates for legitimate users of Windows up to a certain version.
3. You're a legitimate user, but Microsoft refuse to recognise this.
Sounds like a good recipe for lawyer exercise to me.
You haven't, but only because (I assume) you're prepared to look into and install a crack.
Let's look at the average person who sees their computer as a glorified appliance, and isn't afraid to sue:
"What do you mean I've got an illegal copy? I can't update it? I paid for it! I'll sue ya!"
Sounds pretty reasonable to me.
Going to Linux is a small step, but there are a few apps (like video editing, graphics editing) where I just don't have the patience to spend a whole bunch of time learning Linux apps that are 'almost' there in terms of their UI.
Then don't.
I'll get modded to hell for saying this, but use whatever suits you best.
You'll know if/when the time is right for you to move entirely to an alternative platform such as Linux/MacOS. Windows will piss you off so much that you'll put up with any amount of temporary inconvenience to do it. Same thing happened with me - took a year or two before I finally decided "stuff it".
AFAIK, the basis of the legal action was trademark infringement; thus:
"Fred's Imports has no license to use the names Sony, PSP or the logos. They're all trademarks owned by us. We've asked them to stop using these names, they refuse. Please order them to stop, your honour."
Judgement for the plaintiff, now Fred has to sell his Sony PSPs without telling people what they are. And to really hammer it home, Sony consider "Fred's imports" shipping a box with Sony PSP on it a trademark infringement - and the court agreed.
Does this sound like an abuse of the system to you?
That's very nice for you. And when your source code is just part of a multi-million line project, and I want to use your software rather than develop it further, what then?
There's some debate as to whether or not the "patrolling vans" ever existed. Certainly today, they don't seem to bother - they simply assume every household in the country has a TV, then start harrassing any households without a license.
Now I think you can go into any store in Endland and most of the players are region free by default (someone please correct me if you still need to unlock them).
I'll assume you mean England.
Depends where you shop. Ironically, cheap Chinese players in supermarkets are more likely to ship unlocked than expensive ones in electronics stores like Dixons (though most generally say "Region 2" on the box). OTOH, Richer Sounds (cheap hifi warehouse) regularly advertise players as "region free". Sometimes they get in a job lot of a particular model, unlock the region on some of them and sell them at a £20 premium over the "region locked" version.
And if that didn't put the final nail in the coffin of DVD region coding, Amazon UK even put instructions on their website for "how to unlock your DVD player".
OK, I've not read the spec, but you've contradicted yourself there.
"Data protection is obligatory"
But the paragraph you quote:
"Content protection capability is recommended..... An HDMI compliant Source should protect all of the protected audiovisual data."
Doesn't sound like "obligatory" to me.
I use XP at work, my box is up for about 20 days now
These guys have been up since before XP was released. I'll bet there are lots of non-public facing boxes which have been up even longer.
Bit hard to maintain that argument if you're selling it on the open market in the developed world.
ICBW, but IIRC there's a list of "Vital Medications" held by the World Health organisation which have to be made available at a reasonable cost throughout the world under international law.
Given the AIDS epidemic in Africa, a cure would get on that list so fast.... bye bye charging £500/dose.
I was under the impression that the organisations were, for the most part, subdivisions of the record labels themselves.
However, ICBW. IANARL. (I am not a record label).
in The Netherlands for example there are 4 organisations you need to contact before you can even broadcast a CD legally
I wonder how those organisations (and those in other countries) are going to react to the prospect that most, if not all of them would become irrelevant in the face of a Europe-wide organisation?
That being said, record labels may like it at a very senior level - they could save a lot of money.
She may not know anything about infosec but is this an acceptable practice?
Maybe she doesn't have the formal training but she's hit the nail more-or-less on the head. If you want a secure system for a number of users, a common technique is to start out by working out exactly what each of those users needs in order to do their job. Differentiate between "would like to have" and "needs" - and playing Solitaire or browsing the web over lunch aren't necessary in order to do a job.
Then you take your computer (be it running Windows or Linux) and you nail it down so thoroughly it's no more than a screen you can move a mouse around on. This is quite doable with policies in a Windows domain.
Final stage, you go back to your "list of things the user needs to do" and you set up their account such that it can do those things and nothing more.
The difficult bit isn't the computer system. The difficult bit is explaining to someone why it is their computer won't let them access the internet, click this attachment or run this program a friend gave them. This can get particularly difficult when it's non-technical management you're explaining this to.
Of course, there's probably very few people around who know the language the system was originally written in. And even fewer who also know something a bit more modern - say, Java. And if any original design documentation even exists, you can bet it won't be object-oriented.
So your new system will have to be designed and built more-or-less from scratch, by people who don't fully understand the old one. And then you'll have to run it in parallel with the existing system for a few months to iron out any issues.
All of this costs money. Real money, not the colourful stuff you get £200 of every time you pass "Go". And it's risky - nobody in their right mind is going to claim that ripping out an entire system and replacing it is likely to be a smooth, trouble-free operation.
So if the existing system works efficiently and performs adequately, who cares that it's 20 years old? Works, doesn't it? In this context, business drives IT. The business neither needs nor particularly wants a new system, the business doesn't buy one.
Now Nick Leeson, this guy is going to have a hard time living down his adventure in derivatives :
Slightly OT, but Nick Leeson (according to his autobiography, "Rogue Trader") was trying to cover a mistake made by one of the people he was supervising. Rather than sack her and inform his bosses of the loss, he tried to make it up by trading stocks himself.
Needless to say, he didn't do a very good job of this.
I don't know. I can see some use coming of this.
Logically, once the first spammer is successfully prosecuted, the majority of bulk mailing software will probably evolve to allow a list of "email addresses not to spam under any circumstances". All I need to do then is figure out a way to get my email address onto that list...
My cable modem isn't a modem at all. Technically, it's a bridge. The computer (or in my case, firewall) on my side of it gets a real, routeable IP address. The cable modem doesn't even appear in a traceroute and only really has an IP address for management purposes. I suspect the same is true for most cable modems.
Similarly, there's a lot of USB DSL routers out there, and many ISPs don't support the ethernet port, if one exists. Guess what? They don't route at all. They're the DSL equivalent of good ol' POTS modems. The computer gets a real routeable IP address.
It's fairly unusual for houses in the UK to have basements.
Why is CardSystems Solutions still a processor for Visa and MasterCard?
Because the CEO's PA gives good head to visitors.
I agree that something more secure than a 16-digit number is certainly feasible and needed. But it shouldn't be something that needs to be passed through a third party. The card should be a smart card capable of signing a transaction, and only the signature should be transmitted
You mean like this?
Most retailers in the UK now have terminals where you punch in your PIN at point of sale. Has that made it across the pond yet?
Only problems I can see - I can see it resulting in an increase in ATM muggings, and I'm not sure how the elderly/disabled would handle it.
Many years ago, it was far more common to base timers in software on things like "when the graphics chip updates" or have other things hard-coded according to the speed of the host system.
In such cases, running on a modern machine can introduce all sorts of timing issues.