They're couting shipments of Linux, which totally misses out on all of the downloads.
I've set up a good 30 linux boxes in my time, and I've never purchased a single copy.
Once again, Linux doesn't fit into the normal boxes used to judge these things. The distribution model for it is entirely unheard of, and so they don't have any mechanisms for couting this massively popular means of obtaining linux.
Also, shipments of an operating system that can be installed a theoretically infinite number of times are obviously skewed when compared to OSs like NT, which are to be installed on a single server.
Another question: What if I make up really good fake pictures in Photoshop and send them to some Mac Fanatics web site. And suddenly it turns out that Apple is going to bring out a product which look almost like my fakes? Will I or the Mac web site be sued?
The American legal system is very strange.
Actually, in this case it's more like reality is very strange. The American legal system is supposed to encompass all of this strangeness.
It's quite a task, especially when technology goes screaming by us so very quickly these days.
Hanaho looks pretty cool, but someone needs to make a pre-fab cabinet like this that you can add your own monitor to... The price is $798 for the low-end box, but that's including a 19" monitor...
ideally it would be a box that would let you rotate your monitor 90 degrees so you could do the different orientation games realistically.
understood, i'm just doing a lot of work on the lan today and didn't have much time to explain.:]
they will do so when 1.0 comes out, but the ratio of real developers to curiosity seekers would, theoretically, be higher with early releases, since the interest level would more apply to them.
as for the "stealing your ideas" branch of things, the idea of building one-of-a-kind proprietary software with the open source model is new to me... i couldn't really tell you how it would work out.
If you release pre-beta code, you're essentially filtering out people who would download the code simply to run it for free. Not many people are eager to deal with the extremely buggy, pre-beta or even pre-alpha code.
Releasing early also gives you the advantage of having more eyes looking at your code early to spot any bad design decisions -- it's a lot easier to fix bad choices early in the project than it is when the code is more developed... You don't want to have to rewrite the entire foundation just because you made a seemingly good decision early on, which later turns out to cause issues.
It can't hurt to have extra experienced eyes running through your code at the early stages.
They have 10 days for their committee to put forth a plan that will say when they are planning to let us know the bits of information that they are comfortable sharing.
As soon as you think you're making progress with something in this country, you realize that there are policies and heierarchies in place to keep you from getting anywhere.
And if you don't particularly want to be a beta tester, maybe you shouldn't use a giant, unruly, insecure, slow, free e-mail account as your primary mail provider. Sheesh.
This is what has always killed me about the hotmail bitching.
People have screamed, stomped, and threatened to sue for losing important email, loss of business, etc....
Hotmail? For important business accounts? What kind of drugs are these people on?
Well, you also have artists signing because it beats flipping burgers or pumping gas, at least for a few years.
Does it beat g33king for a living? Hard to say. I'm in a fusion trio, and all of us are professional geeks. The majority of geeks I know are big fans of music, and a lot of them are musicians themselves.
One of the most exciting prospects of this whole digital music thing is that we can probably find a way to turn our geek knowledge into a living as a musician...
There are a few things that are scaring the crap out of the RIAA at the moment, but nothing scares them more than individually empowered musicians. If I can make a living pressing, marketing and selling my own CDs and live shows, they're screwed.
And nothing in the world would make me happier. Trust me, they'll be the first up against the wall when the revolution comes.:]
The whole piracy issue from my vantage point is legal right vs. moral right -- the RIAA has the legal right to ream the crap out of artists however they see fit, while my own personal support of the artist tends to circumvent the system of making the record companies wealthy.
If I can legally and morally be happy with a system of music distribution, whether it's through downloads or just pressing and selling my own CDs, then my goals are accomplished and I'm not giving scumbags like David Geffen another penny.
The major advantages to signing to a label are promotion, which doesn't exist 90% of the time, although it's usually an incentive to sign, and distribution.
The distribution chain that these large record companies have is phenomenal -- try getting a local band's CD sold in Tower Records or Strawberries nationwide. But what is the return on investment? Artists don't seem to think about that.
Selling a million copies of a CD and getting less than a penny from each of them gets you $10k. Selling only 1000 CDs at $10 apiece and keeping $9 from them gets you $9k. Which seems more realistic to you?
The remaining issue is marketing for live shows, which is where, up to this point, most bands make the majority of their money. This is usually the argument that I see remaining after people have refuted the idea of making money from signing with a major.
But really, how much marketing of live shows do you think is done by the larger record companies? It's usually minimal, if there is any effort at all. The effort is usually put in by the club you're playing at, whose interest it is to pack the place.
There are also growing communities like Jambands that are aiding immensely in marketing, and a lot of smaller management firms are growing rapidly and aiding smaller acts in getting national tours and recognition -- get a few gigs opening for the right bands and you're in. Hone your act, get in front of the right crowds and you're off and running.
So it's up to you and me, the individual bands/artists to take this fucker by the reins and ride. Innovate both musically and economically. Chase your dreams, kids.
Define 'normal' -- people have spent thousands of years trying to do so, and somehow the definitions tend to describe either a) people just like the describer or b) people far inferior to the describer. I have yet to hear a valid description of a 'normal' person because, of course, there is no such thing.
Apple knows their market. If they create boxes and devices that perform the functions that you like that already exist, then they've lost any edge they've got. That's a lesson they learned when Jobs came back and they started making multi-colored boxes that the rest of the computer industry thought was silly fluff.
Then they turned a profit -- again and again and again...
You're not their target market. Pretty much the entire/. crowd is not their target market, but really, the puling is interesting. Keep it up.
The thing is that there are handling/service fees for each transaction, so even if a band was doing distribution on their own without a record company this way, at say 75 cents per song they'd still lose most of it to fees, hosting, etc.
Personally, I'd have trouble purchasing an mp3 file, as I hate the sound quality. If I was paying the $$, I'd rather get an.shn or an actual CD.
I think it goes beyond a tad stale, I think it's another extremely redundant piece of crap.
All he has to do is call Napster "a website" and it could be the exact same piece of crap I've gotten from every local newscast every 5 minutes for the past 2 weeks.
Really, if a) you don't understand the issue or b) you have nothing new to say, just shut the fuck up.
We have enough non-news crap to wade through every day without more of this shit piling up.
Still, it is a very scratchy existence trying to survive as a musician.
It's funny, most religions don't even require a vow of celibacy for their ministers anymore, but everyone still expects musicians to take a vow of poverty.
Slashdot Mirror
yes, totally. but they're missing it. that's all I'm saying.
They're couting shipments of Linux, which totally misses out on all of the downloads.
I've set up a good 30 linux boxes in my time, and I've never purchased a single copy.
Once again, Linux doesn't fit into the normal boxes used to judge these things. The distribution model for it is entirely unheard of, and so they don't have any mechanisms for couting this massively popular means of obtaining linux.
Also, shipments of an operating system that can be installed a theoretically infinite number of times are obviously skewed when compared to OSs like NT, which are to be installed on a single server.
Another question: What if I make up really good fake pictures in Photoshop and send them to some Mac Fanatics web site. And suddenly it turns out that Apple is going to bring out a product which look almost like my fakes? Will I or the Mac web site be sued?
The American legal system is very strange.
Actually, in this case it's more like reality is very strange. The American legal system is supposed to encompass all of this strangeness.
It's quite a task, especially when technology goes screaming by us so very quickly these days.
Well, I've got a watch with a minute hand, millenium hand and an eon hand.
And when they meet, it's a happy land.
Powerful man....
This is true, but they were right with the bullet "Everything you do will be more fun!"
Now I even enjoy scooping the cat litter.
Thanks again, Windows.
Do yourself a favor: Buy an old Jamma Cabinet that needs some TLC(maybe $150 tops) and buy boards!
Where does one buy boards?
Hanaho looks pretty cool, but someone needs to make a pre-fab cabinet like this that you can add your own monitor to... The price is $798 for the low-end box, but that's including a 19" monitor...
ideally it would be a box that would let you rotate your monitor 90 degrees so you could do the different orientation games realistically.
Oh, MAN I want a Gorf machine.... with the big flightstick... mmmm......
understood, i'm just doing a lot of work on the lan today and didn't have much time to explain. :]
they will do so when 1.0 comes out, but the ratio of real developers to curiosity seekers would, theoretically, be higher with early releases, since the interest level would more apply to them.
as for the "stealing your ideas" branch of things, the idea of building one-of-a-kind proprietary software with the open source model is new to me... i couldn't really tell you how it would work out.
If you release pre-beta code, you're essentially filtering out people who would download the code simply to run it for free. Not many people are eager to deal with the extremely buggy, pre-beta or even pre-alpha code.
Releasing early also gives you the advantage of having more eyes looking at your code early to spot any bad design decisions -- it's a lot easier to fix bad choices early in the project than it is when the code is more developed... You don't want to have to rewrite the entire foundation just because you made a seemingly good decision early on, which later turns out to cause issues.
It can't hurt to have extra experienced eyes running through your code at the early stages.
They have 10 days for their committee to put forth a plan that will say when they are planning to let us know the bits of information that they are comfortable sharing.
As soon as you think you're making progress with something in this country, you realize that there are policies and heierarchies in place to keep you from getting anywhere.
DOS screenshots... God, they're beautiful.
And if you don't particularly want to be a beta tester, maybe you shouldn't use a giant, unruly, insecure, slow, free e-mail account as your primary mail provider. Sheesh.
This is what has always killed me about the hotmail bitching.
People have screamed, stomped, and threatened to sue for losing important email, loss of business, etc....
Hotmail? For important business accounts? What kind of drugs are these people on?
In band meta-discusion is not only unacceptable, it should be cause for immediate dekarmaization.
Bah! Wait, lemme say that again... Bah!
I couldn't give a shit about the karma, I've got karma to burn. But the "unacceptable" bit bugs me. So much so, in fact, that I'm doing it again.
DON'T MAKE ME LOAD THIS THREAD AGAIN! I'LL GET OUT THE BELT!
Well, you also have artists signing because it beats flipping burgers or pumping gas, at least for a few years.
:]
Does it beat g33king for a living? Hard to say. I'm in a fusion trio, and all of us are professional geeks. The majority of geeks I know are big fans of music, and a lot of them are musicians themselves.
One of the most exciting prospects of this whole digital music thing is that we can probably find a way to turn our geek knowledge into a living as a musician...
There are a few things that are scaring the crap out of the RIAA at the moment, but nothing scares them more than individually empowered musicians. If I can make a living pressing, marketing and selling my own CDs and live shows, they're screwed.
And nothing in the world would make me happier. Trust me, they'll be the first up against the wall when the revolution comes.
The whole piracy issue from my vantage point is legal right vs. moral right -- the RIAA has the legal right to ream the crap out of artists however they see fit, while my own personal support of the artist tends to circumvent the system of making the record companies wealthy.
If I can legally and morally be happy with a system of music distribution, whether it's through downloads or just pressing and selling my own CDs, then my goals are accomplished and I'm not giving scumbags like David Geffen another penny.
The major advantages to signing to a label are promotion, which doesn't exist 90% of the time, although it's usually an incentive to sign, and distribution.
The distribution chain that these large record companies have is phenomenal -- try getting a local band's CD sold in Tower Records or Strawberries nationwide. But what is the return on investment? Artists don't seem to think about that.
Selling a million copies of a CD and getting less than a penny from each of them gets you $10k. Selling only 1000 CDs at $10 apiece and keeping $9 from them gets you $9k. Which seems more realistic to you?
The remaining issue is marketing for live shows, which is where, up to this point, most bands make the majority of their money. This is usually the argument that I see remaining after people have refuted the idea of making money from signing with a major.
But really, how much marketing of live shows do you think is done by the larger record companies? It's usually minimal, if there is any effort at all. The effort is usually put in by the club you're playing at, whose interest it is to pack the place.
There are also growing communities like Jambands that are aiding immensely in marketing, and a lot of smaller management firms are growing rapidly and aiding smaller acts in getting national tours and recognition -- get a few gigs opening for the right bands and you're in. Hone your act, get in front of the right crowds and you're off and running.
So it's up to you and me, the individual bands/artists to take this fucker by the reins and ride. Innovate both musically and economically. Chase your dreams, kids.
What's really funny is that someone decided to mod DOWN the post where I said I thought it was funny.
Offtopic. Heh. Whatever.
neither I nor any 'normal' person
/. crowd is not their target market, but really, the puling is interesting. Keep it up.
Define 'normal' -- people have spent thousands of years trying to do so, and somehow the definitions tend to describe either a) people just like the describer or b) people far inferior to the describer. I have yet to hear a valid description of a 'normal' person because, of course, there is no such thing.
Apple knows their market. If they create boxes and devices that perform the functions that you like that already exist, then they've lost any edge they've got. That's a lesson they learned when Jobs came back and they started making multi-colored boxes that the rest of the computer industry thought was silly fluff.
Then they turned a profit -- again and again and again...
You're not their target market. Pretty much the entire
So what would be a decent price point for you?
.shn or an actual CD.
The thing is that there are handling/service fees for each transaction, so even if a band was doing distribution on their own without a record company this way, at say 75 cents per song they'd still lose most of it to fees, hosting, etc.
Personally, I'd have trouble purchasing an mp3 file, as I hate the sound quality. If I was paying the $$, I'd rather get an
I think it goes beyond a tad stale, I think it's another extremely redundant piece of crap.
All he has to do is call Napster "a website" and it could be the exact same piece of crap I've gotten from every local newscast every 5 minutes for the past 2 weeks.
Really, if a) you don't understand the issue or b) you have nothing new to say, just shut the fuck up.
We have enough non-news crap to wade through every day without more of this shit piling up.
Meet the New Media. Same as the Old Media.
Still, it is a very scratchy existence trying to survive as a musician.
It's funny, most religions don't even require a vow of celibacy for their ministers anymore, but everyone still expects musicians to take a vow of poverty.
Yeah I know, I just couldn't resist.
When Phish was playing their NYE show in Big Cypress, they were relasing a couple of tracks from the show every couple of hours as mp3s.
They used eLicense. Yes, it can be gotten around, but not by everyone.
Essentially, you downloaded an mp3 and could listen to it 3 times before purchasing. After the third listen it was $1 to purchase it.
A buck a song seems fair to me. Get some decent traffic through your websites posting mp3s and it could be a decent revenue stream.
actually, i modded it up, as funny. if you're worried about people generating karma, you should have better things to worry about.
it's probably the funniest post I've seen in days.
actually it's http://www.riaa.net/....
.com and .org are... if they're not the riaa we're talking about, I feel reeeeally sorry for them right about now.
Dunno what
heheheh... Napster and boycotts aside, there's nothing I'd like to see more than the RIAA crumble.
Burn, Hollywood, Burn.