Given that I have had police threaten me because I took photos of a hit and run that they were trying to cover up at the mayor's direction, I fear these kinds of laws. This one doesn't affect me because I am in the U.S., but I suspect that the police in Canada are similar to ours.
I agree, but let me be the the voice of middle ground. While theaters NEED ushers to keep it quite. It would not be hard for theaters to install quite rooms. You know, a room behind glass in the back of the theater that anyone with babies, or wanting to make noise can go. I understand that many churches have these, and they work quite well.
I don't want to stop other people from being noisy. I just won't go to movies if I have to hear them. Theis means that the theaters need to either choose between me and the crying babies, OR figure out a way that they can be noisy while I don't here it.
Honestly, crying babies save me a fair amount of money in lost ticket sales.
Bzzzzt. Wrong. ReplayTV (Still being sold) has had monthly plans the same as Tivo for a long time. Heck, they are even giving discount's on the monthly plan for multiple units in a household.
I have seen ReplayTVs for as little as $50, and the monthly fee is $15 for the first unit. At this price you would think that people would snap them up. The reason they don't? The MPAA scared Denon into removing the commercial advance and internet show sharing features. That's right. The current 5500 series has LESS features than the previous 5000 series. Those two features (and the ability to run a DVArchive server) were the key features that made replay better than the competition.
And the satellite company charges you to keep your privacy. Just look at your bill. If you don't plug in your phone line, they charge you $5 per reciever.
How about through advertising. It is trivial to have a gateway make every address point to a perticular server that serves up a page of ads, then start sending traffic to the real address once "Click Here" has been clicked. I have seen this in hotels.
"returns (an educated guess is that it's about 10% in the record industry)"
Where is it that you are returning CDs? I have yet to find a store that will allow returns. And 10%?!?!?! Are you saying that these few mythical stores that allow returns on CDs are somehow taking enough returns to account for 10% of all sales?
Perhaps you are saying that returns COST 10% of the gross CD sales. That would require even MORE returns. I call BS.
With the return numbers so obviously made up, none of your other numbers can be considered even remotely likely.
Hate to be blunt, but every one of you that says that "Video games arn't just for kids anymore" is an idiot. Video games have NEVER been just for kids. Do you think that Custer's Revenge was designed for kids? It was way worse than anything in GTA:SA.
And for those of you that whine about parents not looking at the Rating...Have you thought that maybe a huge number of them understand that ratings bodies are designed for the lowest common denominator. Being 36, and having the 20/20 hindsight of over 20 years, I can say with confidence that by somewhere between 10 and 13 there was absolutly no content that I was not able to deal with.
It is popular today to retard our children. Historically 13 was a full adult. These "Children" built nations, ruled nations, fought wars, married, had children, ran farms and businesses. Maybe your genetic line has degraded into mush in the last 100 years, but mine has not.
And before anyone spouts off about how 'we live in more complicated times', I will call BS on that. We live in the safest, easiest, most gentle time in history. Not once have I ever had to fear that the hords were coming to rape our women and steal our crops because the weather was good. I've never had worry that me and my family were going to die because we had a bad season for our crops. (except during a brief period during a bathroom remodel) I have always had indoor plumbing, and all I had to do to get rid of my shit was to pull a little handle. The fact is, even if you have no job, and are homeless, SOMEONE will feed you. I know this is the case here in the US, and I have good reason to believe that it applies to any country that has wide distribution of video game systems.
Calling parents that don't follow the ratings 'bad' is just plain hypocritical. If anything that is in any game currently availible is going to damage your child, it is already too late, and you have already failed as a parent.
Well, I do have a kid, and I find the idea that speech should be censored to be vulgar. I don't want him growing up in an evironment where saying things like 'tit' and 'ass' in a public forum is illegal. I will not explain to him that 'pronography' is bad because it is not. I will explain to him that jerks who think it is their right to criminalize speech while praising free speech are hypocrates, and that hypocracy is bad.
Of course Google has now give CNet a blank check on sensationalism. Cnet can ask Google if their CEO is a child molester. If Google keeps their we don't talk to CNet stance, the headline could read:
Google CEO does not deny involvment in child molestation! CNet, concerned about the safety of America's children requested a comment from Google CEO concerning involvement in child molestation. To date, Google has refused to responed.
Of course this would be unethical, but being true, would make it legal. Obviously this is an exagerated case, but given that by a large portion of the population, CNet is considered a major, legitimate news source, many would believe that the Google CEO is in fact involved in naughty things.
I just wish that There was a way to put the CD ID into the CD's I burn from FLAC. While the audio is perfect, I want to put the CD in a player, and have the CDDB recognize it. This and the lack of gem case inserts is what keeps me away from distributers like www.magnatunes.com
On that note, I think any idea that is indepentently developed by more than one person is obviously and obvious idea and not elegible for patent. Including retroactively removing existing patent.
My son got his first laptop at 16 months. I upgraded to a new laptop, and the old one would intermittently fail to boot. This meant it had no resale value. If he breaks it, no big deal. He loves it.
This also helps keep him off of my computer. Being 17 months old, he is very likely to screw up settings on my PC, so I would rather he play on a machine that can just be reformatted.
And in case anyone is wondering, yes, it is running linux.
Per Cingular, there is a techinical problem. They are replacing equipment on towers that is incompatible with phones using 32MB SIM cards.
This means that the "technical problem" is created on purpose. The obvious reason to "subsidize" new phones to the AT&T customers is to raise rates, and restart contracts. If Cingular were to send you a notice saying that you are still only 9 months into your 2 year contract, but they were going to start charging you more every month, most people would realise they are being ripped off. You would quickly see a class action lawsuit.
Instead what they do is rely on the customers expectation that cell phone coverage is spotty, and start screwing up their reception. This way they can tell you that they are doing you a favor. Yes, you will have to pay for a new phone, yes you will have to pay more each month, and yes your ability to 'vote with your wallet' will be removed for a longer period of time, but they will ALLOW you to sign a new contract to use equipment that they have not broken.
Most people will not realize that Cingular broke their phone.
Hell, you want an example of rip offs, Cingular has knowing been refusing to fulfill their end of the AT&T contracts they bought.
If you were an AT&T customers, and you've noticed drop outs, your phone not connecting to the network, lack of reception in areas that you used to get reception, you are being ripped off. Cingular modified their towers in such a way that many phones no longer perform correctly. Two seperate Cingular employees confirmed this.
Their offered solution is to buy a new phone, pay a higher price, and enter a new contract with them. I did get them to verbally agree to let me out of my contract, but I have yet to get it in writting as they told me I would get.
It was made absolutly clear that they will NOT be honoring their contract, and it took a good deal of discussion to get to the point that they would stop demanding money from me.
You aren't a soldier. So if you want to comment about battle field conditions, your word is as good as mine. Comment on the war as much as you like, but until you've fought in it, you don't know the details of the device. Most slashdoters make judgements on the iPod without ever using or touching one.
By that logic soldiers have no say either. Only on their specific role in a specific battle. Anything beyond that and they are no better off than you. The fact is, if you have to actually do something to figure out whether it sucks or not, you are not too bright, and are a danger to yourself and others. Knowing that a $300 device that wears out in a year or two because of a known, intentional design flaw, sucks, isn't rocket science.
You're not an African American. Racism is terrible, and I have experienced it, being half African American myself. Any judgement you render can't possibly make up for the feelings of having bottles thrown at you, being beaten up simply because you are of a different race. Maybe you should be a little more considerate.
You sir, ARE A RACIST. Your statement makes it clear that you believe black Americans have some kind of exclusivity on being descriminated against. Well let me tell you, having been a white kid in a predomenently black school, you do not. Try having bottles thrown at you, getting beaten up simply because you are a different race, AND THEN BEING TOLD THAT IT IS YOUR FAULT just because of the color of your skin. Racists like you should take a long hard look at yourself. I don't judge you by of the color of your skin, but by the quality of your character. Clearly you cannot say the same. And, you have come up lacking.
You don't own an American car, so how the hell would you know about their quality? Your quality judgements are based on stereotypes and second hand information, even if you've gotten your information from refutable sources like Consumer Reports.
Well, you could tell by all the cars you see broken down by the side of the road...Really, if you cannot use reliable second hand information, then you cannot comment at all. The only thing you could talk about is YOUR specific vehicle, and since you might have gotten the oddball defect (maybe even twice), obviously whether you have owned american cars or not, you still have no idea about their quality.
You don't use Windows, and assuming you never have, you simply can't comment on the features.
Same as above.
You've never been in a terrorist attack, so you simply can't tell how a terrorist attack would affect you as a person. Comment on terrorism all you like, but until you've lived in it, you can't honestly render an opinion on how terrible it is.
By that logic, you can't honestly render an opinion on being a suicide bomber unless you've done it, so if you say it is wrong, you are being a hypocrate.
You've never ate rat poison, though I wish you would have.
We can all take this that in fact you DO know that you don't have to do or own something to make a judgement about it.
You've seen this type of argument before simply because it's a good argument.
No, it is a terrible argument. It assumes that the only way to gain knowledge is through personally experienced imperical evidence. Do you really deny e=mc^2? Or that China exists?
I own an Apple iPod, I'm commenting that the fact that the battery will eventually die is a non-issue to me. Don't like it? Don't buy one. And leave those of us who want a good, quality music player alone.
It may be a non-issue to you, but having talked to a dozon or so iPod owners, most of them did not realize the design flaw, and were not happy about it. May of us can use simple logic to figure out that in fact we don't like it, and thus we haven't bought one. Who has done anything to you because of your purchase? Are people picketing your home? Destroying your property? If your telling people not to discuss obvious design flaws in products, you need a better reason than "I own an Apple iPod".
Opinions are subject, and will change based on who is making the statement. Both of thes comments are statements of fact, and are either correct or not correct. Whether windows will or will not get hacked does not change based one who made the statement. Thus, they are not opinion.
Being incompetent doesn't make you a victim. Notes is insanely easy to install and administer. It is extreamly easy to make SECURE online/offline (at the same time) applications in very short amounts of time.
It's the online features that may make this the last generation I own. When Origin first announced UO, thought that this take gaming to the next level. It didn't. Playing games with a bunch of people you don't know stinks.
Warcraft, Starcraft, Doom, Warlords....These games were fun because you got a bunch of people together that you knew, and that you liked to play games with.
Now with MS talking about selling partial games and Nickle & Diming us for the rest, (Oh, they will call them add ons, or special features) I just may be out. I hope the idea fails. I WANT to buy new systems and games, but the heyday of gaming may just be over.
I still develope in Notes. While the pre-R5 UI was not great, the vast majority of problems people have with Notes are incompetent developers and incompetent admins. While I believe that the company I work for has solved the dev problem (me). Their admin is still a problem. The administrator knows MS software, and basically only MS software. This is common in Admins these days. The administrator that they had before this one was a construction worker that didn't really know much at all about computers. I see this all the time.
The vast majority of developers out there were the first secretary to use the system, and thus was declared "Programmer". I have found few people who can code, willing to work in Notes. It's just not cool enough.
The consulting company that I used to work for used to as a general practice go into companies that had projects being built, often in VB. They would sell our development services as a 'temporary' solution. We would develop the application in 3-6 months, and the company would be running fine. When the "real" software would get to be a year or two overdue, the companies would cancel the projects and stick with ours. That is why a lot of companies stick with Notes.
I have seen hundreds of computers in homes. None of them have set up seperate accounts for seperate users. That may work for businesses with policies about logging off when you walk away from your computer, but not in the home.
How does the mouse know when it is a beginner or advanced user that is using it. This isn't a wallet that you stick in your pocket when you walk away. It is a computer. This means that others in your (well, maybe not yours, but in many) households, and occasionally guests are going to want to use the computer. This mouse is definitly 'not ready for the desktop'.
You really take an Atari 2600 hand held, a Genesis hand held, a NES hand held, and a TG16 hand held on the plane with you? With all those carts? And I have to ask...Where did you find the Vectrex and Amiga hand helds?!?!?!?
Slashdot Mirror
"because there's no scarcity of broadcast bandwidth (as is the case with radio spectrum)."
Uh, They could just make laws to solve that. That is the whole reason for copyright.
Given that I have had police threaten me because I took photos of a hit and run that they were trying to cover up at the mayor's direction, I fear these kinds of laws. This one doesn't affect me because I am in the U.S., but I suspect that the police in Canada are similar to ours.
So, 'Metal Health' really will drive you mad!
I agree, but let me be the the voice of middle ground. While theaters NEED ushers to keep it quite. It would not be hard for theaters to install quite rooms. You know, a room behind glass in the back of the theater that anyone with babies, or wanting to make noise can go. I understand that many churches have these, and they work quite well.
I don't want to stop other people from being noisy. I just won't go to movies if I have to hear them. Theis means that the theaters need to either choose between me and the crying babies, OR figure out a way that they can be noisy while I don't here it.
Honestly, crying babies save me a fair amount of money in lost ticket sales.
Bzzzzt. Wrong. ReplayTV (Still being sold) has had monthly plans the same as Tivo for a long time. Heck, they are even giving discount's on the monthly plan for multiple units in a household.
I have seen ReplayTVs for as little as $50, and the monthly fee is $15 for the first unit. At this price you would think that people would snap them up. The reason they don't? The MPAA scared Denon into removing the commercial advance and internet show sharing features. That's right. The current 5500 series has LESS features than the previous 5000 series. Those two features (and the ability to run a DVArchive server) were the key features that made replay better than the competition.
And the satellite company charges you to keep your privacy. Just look at your bill. If you don't plug in your phone line, they charge you $5 per reciever.
How about through advertising. It is trivial to have a gateway make every address point to a perticular server that serves up a page of ads, then start sending traffic to the real address once "Click Here" has been clicked. I have seen this in hotels.
"returns (an educated guess is that it's about 10% in the record industry)"
Where is it that you are returning CDs? I have yet to find a store that will allow returns. And 10%?!?!?! Are you saying that these few mythical stores that allow returns on CDs are somehow taking enough returns to account for 10% of all sales?
Perhaps you are saying that returns COST 10% of the gross CD sales. That would require even MORE returns. I call BS.
With the return numbers so obviously made up, none of your other numbers can be considered even remotely likely.
Hate to be blunt, but every one of you that says that "Video games arn't just for kids anymore" is an idiot. Video games have NEVER been just for kids. Do you think that Custer's Revenge was designed for kids? It was way worse than anything in GTA:SA.
And for those of you that whine about parents not looking at the Rating...Have you thought that maybe a huge number of them understand that ratings bodies are designed for the lowest common denominator. Being 36, and having the 20/20 hindsight of over 20 years, I can say with confidence that by somewhere between 10 and 13 there was absolutly no content that I was not able to deal with.
It is popular today to retard our children. Historically 13 was a full adult. These "Children" built nations, ruled nations, fought wars, married, had children, ran farms and businesses. Maybe your genetic line has degraded into mush in the last 100 years, but mine has not.
And before anyone spouts off about how 'we live in more complicated times', I will call BS on that. We live in the safest, easiest, most gentle time in history. Not once have I ever had to fear that the hords were coming to rape our women and steal our crops because the weather was good. I've never had worry that me and my family were going to die because we had a bad season for our crops. (except during a brief period during a bathroom remodel) I have always had indoor plumbing, and all I had to do to get rid of my shit was to pull a little handle. The fact is, even if you have no job, and are homeless, SOMEONE will feed you. I know this is the case here in the US, and I have good reason to believe that it applies to any country that has wide distribution of video game systems.
Calling parents that don't follow the ratings 'bad' is just plain hypocritical. If anything that is in any game currently availible is going to damage your child, it is already too late, and you have already failed as a parent.
Well, I do have a kid, and I find the idea that speech should be censored to be vulgar. I don't want him growing up in an evironment where saying things like 'tit' and 'ass' in a public forum is illegal. I will not explain to him that 'pronography' is bad because it is not. I will explain to him that jerks who think it is their right to criminalize speech while praising free speech are hypocrates, and that hypocracy is bad.
Of course this would be unethical, but being true, would make it legal. Obviously this is an exagerated case, but given that by a large portion of the population, CNet is considered a major, legitimate news source, many would believe that the Google CEO is in fact involved in naughty things.
I just wish that There was a way to put the CD ID into the CD's I burn from FLAC. While the audio is perfect, I want to put the CD in a player, and have the CDDB recognize it. This and the lack of gem case inserts is what keeps me away from distributers like www.magnatunes.com
I'm thinking that this will hand a "legitimate use" excuse to the mod chip makers.
On that note, I think any idea that is indepentently developed by more than one person is obviously and obvious idea and not elegible for patent. Including retroactively removing existing patent.
My son got his first laptop at 16 months. I upgraded to a new laptop, and the old one would intermittently fail to boot. This meant it had no resale value. If he breaks it, no big deal. He loves it.
This also helps keep him off of my computer. Being 17 months old, he is very likely to screw up settings on my PC, so I would rather he play on a machine that can just be reformatted.
And in case anyone is wondering, yes, it is running linux.
Per Cingular, there is a techinical problem. They are replacing equipment on towers that is incompatible with phones using 32MB SIM cards.
This means that the "technical problem" is created on purpose. The obvious reason to "subsidize" new phones to the AT&T customers is to raise rates, and restart contracts. If Cingular were to send you a notice saying that you are still only 9 months into your 2 year contract, but they were going to start charging you more every month, most people would realise they are being ripped off. You would quickly see a class action lawsuit.
Instead what they do is rely on the customers expectation that cell phone coverage is spotty, and start screwing up their reception. This way they can tell you that they are doing you a favor. Yes, you will have to pay for a new phone, yes you will have to pay more each month, and yes your ability to 'vote with your wallet' will be removed for a longer period of time, but they will ALLOW you to sign a new contract to use equipment that they have not broken.
Most people will not realize that Cingular broke their phone.
Hell, you want an example of rip offs, Cingular has knowing been refusing to fulfill their end of the AT&T contracts they bought.
If you were an AT&T customers, and you've noticed drop outs, your phone not connecting to the network, lack of reception in areas that you used to get reception, you are being ripped off. Cingular modified their towers in such a way that many phones no longer perform correctly. Two seperate Cingular employees confirmed this.
Their offered solution is to buy a new phone, pay a higher price, and enter a new contract with them. I did get them to verbally agree to let me out of my contract, but I have yet to get it in writting as they told me I would get.
It was made absolutly clear that they will NOT be honoring their contract, and it took a good deal of discussion to get to the point that they would stop demanding money from me.
You aren't a soldier. So if you want to comment about battle field conditions, your word is as good as mine. Comment on the war as much as you like, but until you've fought in it, you don't know the details of the device. Most slashdoters make judgements on the iPod without ever using or touching one.
By that logic soldiers have no say either. Only on their specific role in a specific battle. Anything beyond that and they are no better off than you. The fact is, if you have to actually do something to figure out whether it sucks or not, you are not too bright, and are a danger to yourself and others. Knowing that a $300 device that wears out in a year or two because of a known, intentional design flaw, sucks, isn't rocket science.
You're not an African American. Racism is terrible, and I have experienced it, being half African American myself. Any judgement you render can't possibly make up for the feelings of having bottles thrown at you, being beaten up simply because you are of a different race. Maybe you should be a little more considerate.
You sir, ARE A RACIST. Your statement makes it clear that you believe black Americans have some kind of exclusivity on being descriminated against. Well let me tell you, having been a white kid in a predomenently black school, you do not. Try having bottles thrown at you, getting beaten up simply because you are a different race, AND THEN BEING TOLD THAT IT IS YOUR FAULT just because of the color of your skin. Racists like you should take a long hard look at yourself. I don't judge you by of the color of your skin, but by the quality of your character. Clearly you cannot say the same. And, you have come up lacking.
You don't own an American car, so how the hell would you know about their quality? Your quality judgements are based on stereotypes and second hand information, even if you've gotten your information from refutable sources like Consumer Reports.
Well, you could tell by all the cars you see broken down by the side of the road...Really, if you cannot use reliable second hand information, then you cannot comment at all. The only thing you could talk about is YOUR specific vehicle, and since you might have gotten the oddball defect (maybe even twice), obviously whether you have owned american cars or not, you still have no idea about their quality.
You don't use Windows, and assuming you never have, you simply can't comment on the features.
Same as above.
You've never been in a terrorist attack, so you simply can't tell how a terrorist attack would affect you as a person. Comment on terrorism all you like, but until you've lived in it, you can't honestly render an opinion on how terrible it is.
By that logic, you can't honestly render an opinion on being a suicide bomber unless you've done it, so if you say it is wrong, you are being a hypocrate.
You've never ate rat poison, though I wish you would have.
We can all take this that in fact you DO know that you don't have to do or own something to make a judgement about it.
You've seen this type of argument before simply because it's a good argument.
No, it is a terrible argument. It assumes that the only way to gain knowledge is through personally experienced imperical evidence. Do you really deny e=mc^2? Or that China exists?
I own an Apple iPod, I'm commenting that the fact that the battery will eventually die is a non-issue to me. Don't like it? Don't buy one. And leave those of us who want a good, quality music player alone.
It may be a non-issue to you, but having talked to a dozon or so iPod owners, most of them did not realize the design flaw, and were not happy about it. May of us can use simple logic to figure out that in fact we don't like it, and thus we haven't bought one. Who has done anything to you because of your purchase? Are people picketing your home? Destroying your property? If your telling people not to discuss obvious design flaws in products, you need a better reason than "I own an Apple iPod".
Opinions are subject, and will change based on who is making the statement. Both of thes comments are statements of fact, and are either correct or not correct. Whether windows will or will not get hacked does not change based one who made the statement. Thus, they are not opinion.
Being incompetent doesn't make you a victim. Notes is insanely easy to install and administer. It is extreamly easy to make SECURE online/offline (at the same time) applications in very short amounts of time.
It's the online features that may make this the last generation I own. When Origin first announced UO, thought that this take gaming to the next level. It didn't. Playing games with a bunch of people you don't know stinks.
Warcraft, Starcraft, Doom, Warlords....These games were fun because you got a bunch of people together that you knew, and that you liked to play games with.
Now with MS talking about selling partial games and Nickle & Diming us for the rest, (Oh, they will call them add ons, or special features) I just may be out. I hope the idea fails. I WANT to buy new systems and games, but the heyday of gaming may just be over.
I still develope in Notes. While the pre-R5 UI was not great, the vast majority of problems people have with Notes are incompetent developers and incompetent admins. While I believe that the company I work for has solved the dev problem (me). Their admin is still a problem. The administrator knows MS software, and basically only MS software. This is common in Admins these days. The administrator that they had before this one was a construction worker that didn't really know much at all about computers. I see this all the time.
The vast majority of developers out there were the first secretary to use the system, and thus was declared "Programmer". I have found few people who can code, willing to work in Notes. It's just not cool enough.
The consulting company that I used to work for used to as a general practice go into companies that had projects being built, often in VB. They would sell our development services as a 'temporary' solution. We would develop the application in 3-6 months, and the company would be running fine. When the "real" software would get to be a year or two overdue, the companies would cancel the projects and stick with ours. That is why a lot of companies stick with Notes.
I have seen hundreds of computers in homes. None of them have set up seperate accounts for seperate users. That may work for businesses with policies about logging off when you walk away from your computer, but not in the home.
How does the mouse know when it is a beginner or advanced user that is using it. This isn't a wallet that you stick in your pocket when you walk away. It is a computer. This means that others in your (well, maybe not yours, but in many) households, and occasionally guests are going to want to use the computer. This mouse is definitly 'not ready for the desktop'.
You really take an Atari 2600 hand held, a Genesis hand held, a NES hand held, and a TG16 hand held on the plane with you? With all those carts? And I have to ask...Where did you find the Vectrex and Amiga hand helds?!?!?!?
Ohhhhh!!!! Your a troll!!!!! I see.