Just about the only Gnutella shared files with licenses are bogus pop songs and bogus porn, both of which are in Windows Media format and take you (via IE) to a malware infested website to activate (infest) the content. Soon the only use of Limewire will be for the Russian Mafia, Chinese gangs, and what-not to deliver malicious payloads to unsecure windoze boxes operated by teenagers.
One must ask, does Limewire know who's gonna benefit from this? Do we need more zombie boxes, spam bots, sniffer networks, etc. out there? Qui bono, as they say -- who benefits? Is Limewire innocently turning into a purpose-built malware distribution network, or do they somehow benefit as well?
If it's stated explicity and up front, then I guess it's not hard to understand. However, if I only learn after I sign up -- I guess I don't know how to "understand" something I hadn't heard already. You know, you just sometimes get a really good rebate deal -- I once got a stack of CD-ROMs for free (after rebate). It's obviously worth something. Surely it's not hard to understand that I should expect to give the Best Buy buy a handjob next time I'm in the store. Guess I should be glad I passed on the free Crisco.
A few more options if you wanna think a little further out of the box . . .
1. TV shows downloaded from P2P networks.
2. No PVR. Just watch regular cable, satellite, or off-the-air TV.
3. No TV. There are things better than even really good TV.
When I moved 2 years ago, I didn't have time to install a new phone jack where I needed it for TiVo. So I didn't bother to plug in the TV for about 4 months. It wasn't that bad, really.
I believe collection agencies are commission based.
They are, which is why it's hard to get them to go after something as small as $150. When I worked at an independent long distance company, the collection agencies usually wouldn't help us out, since most of our bad debt was in that range of less then one or two-hundred dollars. We were pretty much on our own to send threatening letters, etc.
Depending on how you paid your monthly fee, Tivo probably just bills your credit card or drafts your bank account the $150. You might be wise to take 'evasive action' (alerting your bank or credit card of fraud or whatever) before cancelling your Tivo to avoid the fee. Then just tell TiVo you changed the terms -- didn't you see my webiste? It was right there for you to look at.
This show, more than anything else, caused me to pursue a career in engineering. The whole idea that science and engineering could restore a man who lost two legs, an arm and an eye to full function convinced me that the way for me to make a difference in the world was to learn how to design electronics and robotics. I'll admit that 30 years later, we still haven't created technology equal to that depicted on the show, but that doesn't change my opinion that the only way to improve the human condition is through intelligent application of engineering.
So, disagreeing with you is "whining", eh? Very effective, and used by far too many Statists to supress any dissent. Just call your opponents "whiners" and suddenly you don't even have to defend your position. You're the calm voice of reason and maturity, after all. Wanna change the law? Whiner. Want redress for your grievances? Whiner. Want to stand up for your rights? Whiner.
I'm not sure about that. You may be attributing to age what can be explained by malice. There are always people of every age and in every age who enjoy repeating the "it's a privilege not a right" phrase. This is really just code for "I'm the Man, and you're not", and a person of any age can be succeptible to this egocentrism -- it's just that older folks with this mindset are more likely to be in positions that enable them to wield their ill-gotten power.
I disagree. If money is (or should be) the ultimate form of free expression, then, by definition, the rich have (and should have) more free speech than the poor. I'll admit that it's easier to have freedom of the press if you own a "press" (or radio station, or whatever), but I disagree that it is desirable to codify the principle that Money = Expression. To do that takes us a step closer to recognizing the "One Dollar, One Vote" principle. Therefore, I must disagree with the Money = Expression = Speech thesis.
I think in a representative form of government, a citizen's opinion should not be valued by the citizen's net worth. Particularly when expressing one's opinion to one's representative, a representative should listen to each citizen without regard to how much that citizen pays for the privilege. Having one's voice heard should not be dependent on bribes. For this reason, I believe that campaign donations should be strictly limited. Making a campaign donation is not an "expression" of your political opinion, it is a bribe. That's all it is. Money is money. Expression is expression.
One last note: revoke the "citizenship" of non-persons. This means corporations. Corporations should not have the same rights and privileges of real human beings. Yes, I know that corps employ people. Yes, I know that corps are (often) owned by people. That doesn't make them people. Draw a Venn diagram if you have to. A set is not equal to the sum of its members.
Giving aid and comfort to the DRM mob may not be sufficient for you to "get steamed" at TiVo, but it is sufficient to make me consider another option for my PVR. They can consider themselves victims, fine. Now, how are they gonna stop letting themselves be victimized and go after my money again?
They raise your rates 3 months in a row? And still would try to collect the "disconnect fee"? Amazing, the entitlements they feel they are due.
In some parts of my town, we have competing phone/cable/internet providers. It's eye opening how much better phone and cable rates folks there get even if they stick with the old monopoly. It'll probably be while before they come to my neighborhood. Since the new guys are not a monopoly, they get to do some "cherry picking" when choosing where to offer service.
Somewhat lower tech than a card writer: get a strong permanent magnet and mess with the magstripe until it no longer unlocks the door. But why they'd encode this info on a keycard excapes me. It definitely makes my bogus detector tingle.
OK, this question seems to keep coming up. Probability, statistics and risk analysis are what engineers of every type (except "software" or "Microsoft Certified") do all the time. These principles have been used in design and construction of literally everything. Bridges, roads, buildings, cars, planes, nuclear reactors, pacemakers, everything you see, everything you touch.
"Why don't you just build it completely safe?" OK, just hand me $Infinity, and I'll get started. It is amazing how difficult it is to explain this to a non-engineer. You're average person turns into "Pointy Haired Boss" pretty quickly.
I can make it as safe as you're willing to pay for, just understand that with finite resources, you have to make trade-offs. Making one thing safer may take time and money away from something else, making that other thing less safe. It may also cost you the opportunity of doing something with a potentially tremendous reward.
This isn't Sophie's Choice, it's just trying to minimize overall risk while maximizing potential reward given your budget. Not black magic. Nothing is risk free, including avoiding risk.
Please, everyone, you owe it to yourself, your fellow citizens, your country and your world to familiarize yourself with a basic understanding of risk. There are over 29000 titles on "Statistics" at Amazon, probably dozens at your local library. Please read one today.
I think this post's observation/question is perhaps the answer to why there are still "whole-life" insurance policies and extended service plans sold. "How can you possibly measure risk?" Well, you start by remaining awake in Probability and Statistics class.
There are mostly 3 ty[p]es of "Intellectual Properties"
1) Patents
2) Copyrights
3) Trademarks
4) Trade Secrets
Amongst our types of "Intellectual Properties" are such diverse elements as . . . Patents, Copyrights, Trademarks, Trade Secrets, and an almost fanatical devotion to Hilary Rosen.
That's a good point. Anyone accepting your cash should have certain restrictions placed on how they use it. It is only fair . . . after all, no one's making them accept your money. Just put the cash user agreement somewhere on your website so an interested party can look it up, and it's all nice and above-board.
It's like cell-phone companies (to use your example) locking a phone to one service - users have figured out how to unlock many phones, or activate features the carriers do not want you do have.
And the phone carriers aren't supposed to have an issue with that?
Since this is the slow class . . .
First. I buy a cellphone. Not rent, lease, or recieve as part of service, but buy. Purchase. Exchange money for. Not a subsidised purchase, an outright sale. Am I clear enough?
Second, my service agreement with the carrier expires, lapses, ceases to be in effect, and I decide to shop around for new service.
Now, I find another carrier with service compatible with the instrument that I own, you know, hold title to, legally possess. I decide to use this new carrier's service with my instrument. Is my old carrier supposed to have an issue with that? Maybe, but I don't care. It's my instrument. If they try to prevent me from using my instrument with another carrier, then perhaps they need to be investigated under the RICO act (in US). Get it? Or do I need to "dumb it down a shade"?
Crap, I forgot where I put my clue-bat. Probably not worth the effort it would take to hit you with it anyway.
I'm glad this hasn't affected my TiVo (and therefore me), probably becuase it's too old for version 7. I'm on version 3.something.
OTOH, this will affect the TiVo company. When time comes for me to get an HDTV PVR, I'll have to take TiVo's commitment to the customer vs. their commitment to big money into account. Sure, they're within their rights to suck up to media producers, but I'm within my rights not to buy another TiVo product.
Is the signature on the back of the credit card really for security? Could it be that the whole idea of verifying your signature with the one on the card was imagined by bored or over-zealous clerks just to fill in a vacuum of information, which nature abhors? Are retail clerks actually trained in the art of forgery detection?
I've never been caught using someone else's credit card, yet I've been "caught" on several occasions using my own, signing my own name. Each time this happens, the clerk claims to be "really good" at spotting fake signatures.
I think the only way to save the public domain is for serious reform - be it soapbox, ballot box, or revolution - to take place sooner rather than later.
I'm afraid that with Congress and the president in the pockets of big business, that the soapbox and ballot box are not really valid options. As long as we view corporations like Disney as "citizens" with all the rights of actual people (aka natural persons), we will have this problem.
How can a regular human, with tens of thousands of dollars and a life span of decades defend his interests against a business-citizen, with a potentially limitless lifetime and billions of dollars? He can't, as long as business is left to do as it pleases.
I just don't see much hope for orderly change anymore.
Slashdot Mirror
One must ask, does Limewire know who's gonna benefit from this? Do we need more zombie boxes, spam bots, sniffer networks, etc. out there? Qui bono, as they say -- who benefits? Is Limewire innocently turning into a purpose-built malware distribution network, or do they somehow benefit as well?
If it's stated explicity and up front, then I guess it's not hard to understand. However, if I only learn after I sign up -- I guess I don't know how to "understand" something I hadn't heard already. You know, you just sometimes get a really good rebate deal -- I once got a stack of CD-ROMs for free (after rebate). It's obviously worth something. Surely it's not hard to understand that I should expect to give the Best Buy buy a handjob next time I'm in the store. Guess I should be glad I passed on the free Crisco.
1. TV shows downloaded from P2P networks.
2. No PVR. Just watch regular cable, satellite, or off-the-air TV.
3. No TV. There are things better than even really good TV.
When I moved 2 years ago, I didn't have time to install a new phone jack where I needed it for TiVo. So I didn't bother to plug in the TV for about 4 months. It wasn't that bad, really.
They are, which is why it's hard to get them to go after something as small as $150. When I worked at an independent long distance company, the collection agencies usually wouldn't help us out, since most of our bad debt was in that range of less then one or two-hundred dollars. We were pretty much on our own to send threatening letters, etc.
Depending on how you paid your monthly fee, Tivo probably just bills your credit card or drafts your bank account the $150. You might be wise to take 'evasive action' (alerting your bank or credit card of fraud or whatever) before cancelling your Tivo to avoid the fee. Then just tell TiVo you changed the terms -- didn't you see my webiste? It was right there for you to look at.
This show, more than anything else, caused me to pursue a career in engineering. The whole idea that science and engineering could restore a man who lost two legs, an arm and an eye to full function convinced me that the way for me to make a difference in the world was to learn how to design electronics and robotics. I'll admit that 30 years later, we still haven't created technology equal to that depicted on the show, but that doesn't change my opinion that the only way to improve the human condition is through intelligent application of engineering.
So, disagreeing with you is "whining", eh? Very effective, and used by far too many Statists to supress any dissent. Just call your opponents "whiners" and suddenly you don't even have to defend your position. You're the calm voice of reason and maturity, after all. Wanna change the law? Whiner. Want redress for your grievances? Whiner. Want to stand up for your rights? Whiner.
I'm not sure about that. You may be attributing to age what can be explained by malice. There are always people of every age and in every age who enjoy repeating the "it's a privilege not a right" phrase. This is really just code for "I'm the Man, and you're not", and a person of any age can be succeptible to this egocentrism -- it's just that older folks with this mindset are more likely to be in positions that enable them to wield their ill-gotten power.
I think in a representative form of government, a citizen's opinion should not be valued by the citizen's net worth. Particularly when expressing one's opinion to one's representative, a representative should listen to each citizen without regard to how much that citizen pays for the privilege. Having one's voice heard should not be dependent on bribes. For this reason, I believe that campaign donations should be strictly limited. Making a campaign donation is not an "expression" of your political opinion, it is a bribe. That's all it is. Money is money. Expression is expression.
One last note: revoke the "citizenship" of non-persons. This means corporations. Corporations should not have the same rights and privileges of real human beings. Yes, I know that corps employ people. Yes, I know that corps are (often) owned by people. That doesn't make them people. Draw a Venn diagram if you have to. A set is not equal to the sum of its members.
Giving aid and comfort to the DRM mob may not be sufficient for you to "get steamed" at TiVo, but it is sufficient to make me consider another option for my PVR. They can consider themselves victims, fine. Now, how are they gonna stop letting themselves be victimized and go after my money again?
http://smarthome.com/6120.html
I wouldn't want to live in a world with an anit-computer-aimed-airsot-booby-trap law.
In some parts of my town, we have competing phone/cable/internet providers. It's eye opening how much better phone and cable rates folks there get even if they stick with the old monopoly. It'll probably be while before they come to my neighborhood. Since the new guys are not a monopoly, they get to do some "cherry picking" when choosing where to offer service.
Here's the link: http://www.snopes.com/crime/warnings/hotelkey.asp
Somewhat lower tech than a card writer: get a strong permanent magnet and mess with the magstripe until it no longer unlocks the door. But why they'd encode this info on a keycard excapes me. It definitely makes my bogus detector tingle.
"Why don't you just build it completely safe?" OK, just hand me $Infinity, and I'll get started. It is amazing how difficult it is to explain this to a non-engineer. You're average person turns into "Pointy Haired Boss" pretty quickly.
I can make it as safe as you're willing to pay for, just understand that with finite resources, you have to make trade-offs. Making one thing safer may take time and money away from something else, making that other thing less safe. It may also cost you the opportunity of doing something with a potentially tremendous reward.
This isn't Sophie's Choice, it's just trying to minimize overall risk while maximizing potential reward given your budget. Not black magic. Nothing is risk free, including avoiding risk. Please, everyone, you owe it to yourself, your fellow citizens, your country and your world to familiarize yourself with a basic understanding of risk. There are over 29000 titles on "Statistics" at Amazon, probably dozens at your local library. Please read one today.
I think this post's observation/question is perhaps the answer to why there are still "whole-life" insurance policies and extended service plans sold. "How can you possibly measure risk?" Well, you start by remaining awake in Probability and Statistics class.
Also a good time to try out that C=64 TCP/IP adapter: http://www.dunkels.com/adam/tfe/
The "Windows users" hadn't been invented yet, now those were the days.
1) Patents
2) Copyrights
3) Trademarks
4) Trade Secrets
Amongst our types of "Intellectual Properties" are such diverse elements as . . . Patents, Copyrights, Trademarks, Trade Secrets, and an almost fanatical devotion to Hilary Rosen.
That's a good point. Anyone accepting your cash should have certain restrictions placed on how they use it. It is only fair . . . after all, no one's making them accept your money. Just put the cash user agreement somewhere on your website so an interested party can look it up, and it's all nice and above-board.
They had me at "heavy helping of spectral prostitutes"
And the phone carriers aren't supposed to have an issue with that?
Since this is the slow class . . .
First. I buy a cellphone. Not rent, lease, or recieve as part of service, but buy. Purchase. Exchange money for. Not a subsidised purchase, an outright sale. Am I clear enough?
Second, my service agreement with the carrier expires, lapses, ceases to be in effect, and I decide to shop around for new service.
Now, I find another carrier with service compatible with the instrument that I own, you know, hold title to, legally possess. I decide to use this new carrier's service with my instrument. Is my old carrier supposed to have an issue with that? Maybe, but I don't care. It's my instrument. If they try to prevent me from using my instrument with another carrier, then perhaps they need to be investigated under the RICO act (in US). Get it? Or do I need to "dumb it down a shade"?
I'm glad this hasn't affected my TiVo (and therefore me), probably becuase it's too old for version 7. I'm on version 3.something.
OTOH, this will affect the TiVo company. When time comes for me to get an HDTV PVR, I'll have to take TiVo's commitment to the customer vs. their commitment to big money into account. Sure, they're within their rights to suck up to media producers, but I'm within my rights not to buy another TiVo product.
I've never been caught using someone else's credit card, yet I've been "caught" on several occasions using my own, signing my own name. Each time this happens, the clerk claims to be "really good" at spotting fake signatures.
I'm afraid that with Congress and the president in the pockets of big business, that the soapbox and ballot box are not really valid options. As long as we view corporations like Disney as "citizens" with all the rights of actual people (aka natural persons), we will have this problem.
How can a regular human, with tens of thousands of dollars and a life span of decades defend his interests against a business-citizen, with a potentially limitless lifetime and billions of dollars? He can't, as long as business is left to do as it pleases.
I just don't see much hope for orderly change anymore.