You forget something... cars that go Vroom Vroom also tend to go "Thump Thump Thump THUMP Thump Thump THUMPTHUMPTHUMP..." I doubt that noise is going away any time soon.
If I stopped distributing the software I've made, would you notice?
Now, if I stopped distributing the software I've made, would those who are currently using it notice?
Answer: eventually, but not right now, and not all at once. The only way they would would be if I suddenly did a big media blitz saying that their software is now unsupported.
MS pulling out is not going to make the millions of copies of Windows 2000 and Office 97 suddenly vanish -- only the products that have tie-ins to the mothership (read: MS pulls the plug, products stop working as advertised, like XBox Live) will suddenly stop working.
Or to put it another way: when was the last time you used something other than MS's website (available to all) or a local tech support company/store to fix a problem with MS software/hardware?
The only issue I really see is if Windows XP suddenly stops working for anyone who registered it in Europe.
So I guess the next step would be to attach tailpipes to tanks in the back of cars, with a solar panel on top. Then the pollutants can be captured yet again, and used to power the power plants!
Something tells me that the resulting biodiesel will be used to power the power plants' turbines, not automobiles.
It is important to note that OS X will never have the marketshare of Windows.
OK, I'm taking this out of context, but I just have to point out that in the future, all current and past operating systems and computer platforms will have equal marketshare. That share is precisely 0%.
And this differs from OS X, Linux, and BSD how exactly? I've had my OS X apps broken with every major update; worst part is, when I recompile, the new version isn't backwards-compatible with the older OS revisions. Don't get me started with deb and rpm dependencies. At least the end user has the option to modify and recompile here. Of course, most platforms other than Windows don't break the APIs between major revisions. Thank goodness for small blessings.
Using your same logic, If Walmart sells the song for $.89, I could argue in court that they enabled all of the people that bought from them to get the song for $.10 cheaper than the iTunes store and are therefore liable for the rest of the money. This does not add up.
You're forgetting about the fact that both iTMS and WalMart have licensing agreements with the copyright holder. You might buy the song for 0.10 less, but that doesn't mean that the copyright holder, who has every right to sell to different customers for different prices, is making 0.10 less of each song.
Under this kind of argument, it should be Apple and Walmart suing, as their profits are being damaged, not the copyright holder's.
The issue here is incentive to create. In popular western society, money is considered the highest incentive to create, but there are others. Copyright lets the copyright holder be the one in charge of how their work is used (for a limited time). The problem is not with free distribution, but with someone other than the copyright holder determining how the work is distributed. This is what really decreases incentive to create.
No, if you created a search engine that happened to index the page with the linnk to DeCSS code, you wouldn't be successfully sued. The search engine indiscriminately references all road signs it finds.
You people are definitely experiencing the wrong part of the country. West Coast: it's news if it snows in the winter; Victoria's even south of the 49th parallel, got rid of all their snow plows years ago, and is on an island, just south of a temperate rainforest.
Thank you for the very coherent and informative reply. I stand corrected; I haven't read the US copyright act in a few years, and it appears things have changed (and also more case law has been added). IANAL:)
Does this mean that all software that leaves information in the Windows Registry when it uninstalls (so it can check and see if it's been installed before the next time you install it) is now illegal? How about programs that update a DLL and then don't revert your system to the previous version when they uninstall? Is MS Office now illegal spyware (it also tracks you without telling you in hidden parts of its Word documents)?
You seem to have missed the point; downloading is not copying; it is receiving an already copied work. The server is doing the copying, not the client. The violator is the person doing the copying.
Copyright is about distribution, not about reception. All a copyright holder can do to a person who illegally receives a copy of their work is inform them that the person they received it from did not have the right to distribute, and ask them to return/destroy it.
The person illegally receiving the work does not legally have to do what they ask. Morally is a different issue. It could be argued that the person receiving the work was a party to the copying, if they intentionally asked the distributor to make the copy, in full knowledge that it would be an illegal copy. However, this argument is extremely tenuous.
See my illustration above about singing/listening to music.
The violator is the person copying the music. It is true that it doesn't matter who it is; if you don't personally have permission from the copyright holder, you are committing copyright infringement. If you are receiving the work, you are not receiving stolen goods; you are receiving information, which cannot be classified as "stolen" as your posession of it does not keep others from having it.
Let's use yet one more illustration. Company X makes a certain brand of carbonated sugar water. Company Y sneaks in and copies their recipe, and then distributes it to anyone who asks for a copy. Who is in breach of copyright law? Company Y, who made the copies. Anyone else found with a copy is not in violation unless they too made and distributed copies.
Where it gets sticky is this next step. What happens when the those who received illegal copies of the recipe decide to "perform" it? The common way to do this would be by producing an identical drink, and serving it to the public. Copyright law states that this is also a violation. However, using the recipe for personal consumption of the drink is legal, as is posessing a copy of said recipe.
Taking this illustration back to the digital world, the following activities are copyright infringement:
giving someone a copy of a song/movie/piece of software/other electronic document (web page etc.) without the permission of the creator or current copyright holder*
showing/performing an interpretation of a song/movie/piece of software/other electronic document (web page etc.) without the permission of the creator or current copyright holder*
*other than prescribed by Fair Use rights, which allow for parodies, personal (family) use (no external distribution), educational research and a few other exceptions (such as specific types of archiving), which are generally on a situation-by-situation basis.
Actual implementation of copyright law is not as cut and dried as I've laid it out here; there are other exceptions and interpretations, but this is much closer to reality than what the general public has been convinced of by the corporate US.
Remember that every time you view a copy of a news release someone has pasted into a Slashdot comment, the original poster and Slashdot are both guilty of the same copyright infringement that covers MP3s -- and in the same way, you are not guilty of copyright infringement just because you read it here.
I should add: the RIAA can sue for either of those things; they'd be as likely to win either lawsuit, as neither action is illegal in a court where the RIAA has significance.
For clarification: we're talking about copyright violations here. Downloading is receiving an already copied piece of work from the one doing the copying (uploading being making a copy of information you currently have).
While there might be additional laws in some countries regarding downloading someone else's intellectual property, copyright law covers only the act of copying the property, whether through digital means, live performance, transcription of the musical score, or some other means.
What I've always wondered is this: copyright allows for quoting from works. Using a modified BitTorrent client/server, shouldn't it be possible quote only up to the legal portion of a piece of property to any given IP address?
If the RIAA can sue someone for downloading a song, then they can also sue everyone who listens to an unauthorized live performance of that song.
No; the day is coming when you will pay one company one bill at around the same cost for all the functionality of those various services. And you will only have one company in your area providing those services.
This ignores corporatization -- because individuals are not companies, a company can be incorporated, make money for individuals, and then fold before having to deal with clean up costs. This market leaves room for companies specializing in clean up as it is absolutely required -- and demand for said companies becomes insanely high, raising costs further.
The problem is that any market doesn't factor in all external consequences of all actions within the market.
This whole thing has got me thinking... is it possible that Apple is trying to give the DRM supporters a taste of their own medicine? Right now, they're basicly saying, "If you want to compete with our music store, you can't use DRM on your music."
The result is that Apple hardware and distribution continues to dominate the digital music market, and now the RIAA members PLUS the software and hardware manufacturers have to play Apple's game if they want to control consumer actions via DRM. Must leave a bit of a bitter taste in their collective mouths.
Why not use red, green, and blue lasers in sequence? Seems to me that if it works for our monitors, it should work for the scanning beam. As for depth, I thought the whole idea of this was that it enabled the camera to read the depth of the scene, as it now has two viewing angles available to it. Add in a second light source in sequence, and you get an even more accurate depth reading.
What it can't do is accurately image any scene that contains uncontrolled light sources; this means that, short of using it in the dark with controlled light sources, this method is useless in a natural environment.
That doesn't mean that this technique, when used in tandem with other imaging techniques, can't produce some very useful results in the lab.
Just out of curiosity: Why doesn't Congress ever cross out tacked-on portions of bills, and sign the rest through? Seems to work well at every other level of bureaucracy.
The trick is that the web site would use the WinZip trick; the elements would be placed in random locations; after all, it's the data they need; the placement of the form elements doesn't really matter. If the phisher tried to re-create the mouse movements at a later date, they'd have a very low chance of clicking on the same radio button.
What is different is that Google is already a content aggregator, and makes money by selling targeted ads. I think your ISP would jeopardize its common carrier status if it tried to do either of those things with the data it logs.
As a side note, the Mac platform has never been known for a wide range of shrink-wrapped software; the main place to find software has always been "online", even before the internet was popular, and people got their software from BBSes.
Slashdot Mirror
Hello! This is the year 2005 calling! How is 1996?
You forget something... cars that go Vroom Vroom also tend to go "Thump Thump Thump THUMP Thump Thump THUMPTHUMPTHUMP..." I doubt that noise is going away any time soon.
Now, if I stopped distributing the software I've made, would those who are currently using it notice?
Answer: eventually, but not right now, and not all at once. The only way they would would be if I suddenly did a big media blitz saying that their software is now unsupported.
MS pulling out is not going to make the millions of copies of Windows 2000 and Office 97 suddenly vanish -- only the products that have tie-ins to the mothership (read: MS pulls the plug, products stop working as advertised, like XBox Live) will suddenly stop working.
Or to put it another way: when was the last time you used something other than MS's website (available to all) or a local tech support company/store to fix a problem with MS software/hardware?
The only issue I really see is if Windows XP suddenly stops working for anyone who registered it in Europe.
Something tells me that the resulting biodiesel will be used to power the power plants' turbines, not automobiles.
OK, I'm taking this out of context, but I just have to point out that in the future, all current and past operating systems and computer platforms will have equal marketshare. That share is precisely 0%.
And this differs from OS X, Linux, and BSD how exactly? I've had my OS X apps broken with every major update; worst part is, when I recompile, the new version isn't backwards-compatible with the older OS revisions. Don't get me started with deb and rpm dependencies. At least the end user has the option to modify and recompile here. Of course, most platforms other than Windows don't break the APIs between major revisions. Thank goodness for small blessings.
You're forgetting about the fact that both iTMS and WalMart have licensing agreements with the copyright holder. You might buy the song for 0.10 less, but that doesn't mean that the copyright holder, who has every right to sell to different customers for different prices, is making 0.10 less of each song.
Under this kind of argument, it should be Apple and Walmart suing, as their profits are being damaged, not the copyright holder's.
The issue here is incentive to create. In popular western society, money is considered the highest incentive to create, but there are others. Copyright lets the copyright holder be the one in charge of how their work is used (for a limited time). The problem is not with free distribution, but with someone other than the copyright holder determining how the work is distributed. This is what really decreases incentive to create.
No, if you created a search engine that happened to index the page with the linnk to DeCSS code, you wouldn't be successfully sued. The search engine indiscriminately references all road signs it finds.
You people are definitely experiencing the wrong part of the country. West Coast: it's news if it snows in the winter; Victoria's even south of the 49th parallel, got rid of all their snow plows years ago, and is on an island, just south of a temperate rainforest.
Thank you for the very coherent and informative reply. I stand corrected; I haven't read the US copyright act in a few years, and it appears things have changed (and also more case law has been added). IANAL :)
Does this mean that all software that leaves information in the Windows Registry when it uninstalls (so it can check and see if it's been installed before the next time you install it) is now illegal? How about programs that update a DLL and then don't revert your system to the previous version when they uninstall? Is MS Office now illegal spyware (it also tracks you without telling you in hidden parts of its Word documents)?
Copyright is about distribution, not about reception. All a copyright holder can do to a person who illegally receives a copy of their work is inform them that the person they received it from did not have the right to distribute, and ask them to return/destroy it.
The person illegally receiving the work does not legally have to do what they ask. Morally is a different issue. It could be argued that the person receiving the work was a party to the copying, if they intentionally asked the distributor to make the copy, in full knowledge that it would be an illegal copy. However, this argument is extremely tenuous.
See my illustration above about singing/listening to music.
The violator is the person copying the music. It is true that it doesn't matter who it is; if you don't personally have permission from the copyright holder, you are committing copyright infringement. If you are receiving the work, you are not receiving stolen goods; you are receiving information, which cannot be classified as "stolen" as your posession of it does not keep others from having it.
Let's use yet one more illustration. Company X makes a certain brand of carbonated sugar water. Company Y sneaks in and copies their recipe, and then distributes it to anyone who asks for a copy. Who is in breach of copyright law? Company Y, who made the copies. Anyone else found with a copy is not in violation unless they too made and distributed copies.
Where it gets sticky is this next step. What happens when the those who received illegal copies of the recipe decide to "perform" it? The common way to do this would be by producing an identical drink, and serving it to the public. Copyright law states that this is also a violation. However, using the recipe for personal consumption of the drink is legal, as is posessing a copy of said recipe.
Taking this illustration back to the digital world, the following activities are copyright infringement:
*other than prescribed by Fair Use rights, which allow for parodies, personal (family) use (no external distribution), educational research and a few other exceptions (such as specific types of archiving), which are generally on a situation-by-situation basis.
Actual implementation of copyright law is not as cut and dried as I've laid it out here; there are other exceptions and interpretations, but this is much closer to reality than what the general public has been convinced of by the corporate US.
Remember that every time you view a copy of a news release someone has pasted into a Slashdot comment, the original poster and Slashdot are both guilty of the same copyright infringement that covers MP3s -- and in the same way, you are not guilty of copyright infringement just because you read it here.
I should add: the RIAA can sue for either of those things; they'd be as likely to win either lawsuit, as neither action is illegal in a court where the RIAA has significance.
While there might be additional laws in some countries regarding downloading someone else's intellectual property, copyright law covers only the act of copying the property, whether through digital means, live performance, transcription of the musical score, or some other means.
What I've always wondered is this: copyright allows for quoting from works. Using a modified BitTorrent client/server, shouldn't it be possible quote only up to the legal portion of a piece of property to any given IP address?
If the RIAA can sue someone for downloading a song, then they can also sue everyone who listens to an unauthorized live performance of that song.
No; the day is coming when you will pay one company one bill at around the same cost for all the functionality of those various services. And you will only have one company in your area providing those services.
The problem is that any market doesn't factor in all external consequences of all actions within the market.
The result is that Apple hardware and distribution continues to dominate the digital music market, and now the RIAA members PLUS the software and hardware manufacturers have to play Apple's game if they want to control consumer actions via DRM. Must leave a bit of a bitter taste in their collective mouths.
Good point; I wonder what result they'd get with a known oscillating focus on the projector? Then they could scan a larger depth of field.
What it can't do is accurately image any scene that contains uncontrolled light sources; this means that, short of using it in the dark with controlled light sources, this method is useless in a natural environment.
That doesn't mean that this technique, when used in tandem with other imaging techniques, can't produce some very useful results in the lab.
Just out of curiosity: Why doesn't Congress ever cross out tacked-on portions of bills, and sign the rest through? Seems to work well at every other level of bureaucracy.
The trick is that the web site would use the WinZip trick; the elements would be placed in random locations; after all, it's the data they need; the placement of the form elements doesn't really matter. If the phisher tried to re-create the mouse movements at a later date, they'd have a very low chance of clicking on the same radio button.
What is different is that Google is already a content aggregator, and makes money by selling targeted ads. I think your ISP would jeopardize its common carrier status if it tried to do either of those things with the data it logs.
Also might want to check out:
http://www.pangeasoft.net/index2.html
http://www.udevgames.com/
http://www.apple.com/games/
http://www.versiontracker.com/macosx/cat/games
http://www.macupdate.com/games.php
As a side note, the Mac platform has never been known for a wide range of shrink-wrapped software; the main place to find software has always been "online", even before the internet was popular, and people got their software from BBSes.
Expansion of "Yoda" by Weird Al, to the tune of "Lola," for those who don't know.
Visited here lately?