So, I can copyright the arrangement of colored blocks preschoolers play with?
Just a warning to all of you pirates:
Do NOT stack your colored blocks in this order from top to bottom or I'll sic my attorney on you:
Blue, Red, Red, Green, Blue, Yellow, Blue, Blue, Green.
You've been warned.
You're missing the point. The problem is no that a song, when digitized, might resemble "your favorite number."
The problem is that copyright disallows "unautohrized" uses of any number that when used in certain programs resembles a copyrighted idea.
So, let's say Metallica's song "For whom the bells toll", when encoded in a certain way, is the number 666. Do they own the copyright to that number? What about when you encode it differently and you have the number 537 instead? Do they also own the copyright to that number, as well?
Observing a crime does not make you guilty of it. Looking at child pornography pictures is illegal, but it is still not the same as actually raping a kid.
Honestly, I hope the **AAs don't do anything against these spyware companies profiting from illegal files. Not protecting their interests from those companies would weaken **AAs' case when trying to sue other people.
Compare the NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT 256MB, being at $295, and a comparable NVIDIA GeForce 6800 Ultra 256MB, at $419. For an incredible gain of 8.5 frames per second! That's %7 percent performance increase for only a %42 price increase.
Hey... if you have the money to waste, though... be my guest and waste it.
But thanks to the press and despite all the people that must have lost their jobs as scribes, we now have more books available, more information, more informed people, more demand for books, more jobs, more money. Mo' betta!
I could understand Sony suing for breach of contract, but they're not. They're suing for trademark infringement.
In this lawsuit, it is obvious that Sony has no other legal feet to stand on. I'm afraid that this will happen more often as more ridiculous intellectual "property" laws come into play.
Sony: "You're doing something we don't like with our product. You're not really breaking the law, either, but since we own the patent, trademark, and copyright to the PSP we'll use that instead."
This only goes to show how far this I"P" craze is going. It seems no one can actually own anything, nowadays. Everything is now simply being "licensed" and if you do something the "licenser" doesn't like, they'll sue you for some I"P" violation.
Why is the ratio of good/bad software any different in Mac? Doesn't make any sense.
You cannot tell me that software is simply better on Mac just because it's a Mac.
If the difficulty of opening up MS Word, typing up your letter, and clicking on the 'print' button is analogous with a launching a shuttle, I give this society a maximum of 12 years before it self-destructs.
Actually, you're correct. The people that were drafted to go to Vietnam actually deserve more than most of the people that have joined the armed forces in the US and the UK.
The great majority of the people joining the military, today, will get money for school, training, and experience.
1) They are NOT getting killed on my behalf. (Even if I were British)
2) They volunteer to get shot at.
3) They do get compensated for their job. Whether fairly, they agreed to it.
So, don't give me this old story of 'I lost a leg in 'Nam for you. The least I deserve is some love.'
Let me ask you something then:
If you get caught shoplifting at Wal-Mart. How much can Wal-Mart sue you for?
If it's an inordinate amount like the RIAA fines people, then whatever people are having to pay for illegaly trafficking music is fine.
If not, then why does the RIAA get to sue people for those incredible amounts?
You can't... err... shouldn't be able to sue someone for ridiculously high damages just to 'teach them a lesson.'
I imagine that the main reason they sue people for so much money is because they assume that if someone is sharing music, then, potentially, they could have lost a 'lot' of money due to possibly hundreds of thousands or millions of downloads.
Actually, this would be more like someone stealing your valet ticket out of your jacket, then using it to get your car. You're responsible for safeguarding your belongings not the valet service.
I don't know the reasons behind Blizzard's trying to prevent people from selling in-game content. However, I am a gamer and I understand perfectly why I do not want this to happen.
If left unchecked, people buying gold outside the game will be able to afford items that they normally wouldn't. As the number of people buying gold goes up, so do the prices as sellers start realizing that people will pay more for their items. Also, the same people selling the gold will start selling items at ridiculously high prices that will, again, drive the overall prices up.
This will continue until people new in the game will not be able to afford anything that they normally would because of the artificially inflated prices. The people who can't afford to buy gold offline, will not have the same advantages that the guys who can spend $400 per month on in-game items and gold.
I don't want to be in a position where I have to spend additional money or excessilvely more time than normal just to be able to afford in-game items.
Blizzard is not leasing anything. They're licensing their game and they already have a clause which clearly states that they do not allow the resale of the licensed material.
And what sort of people are they? The kind that label middle-aged men that say "Women lack natural ability in math" as potentially having a bias against women? Sounds like common sense to me.
Do you really not see the irony of your statement?
Then, you have obviously never worked anywhere else. EVERY job, requires discrimination at some level.
Examples at places where I've worked:
At some helpdesk job, our commercial accounts got first priority for technical support.
At a video store, people with bad credit and no credit card had to pay a deposit.
At another video store, we wouldn't hire people with bad credit.
Everywhere people are discriminated. It is a necessity for businesses. Insurance companies simply use statistics to discriminate instead of credit reports or medical records.
Don't act like discrimination is inherently a bad thing or exclusive to insurance companies.
Oh yea, Adobe just lost out on $600 (or however much Photoshop costs, nowadays) because I downloaded their program that I will NEVER buy.
Adobe didn't lose that sale because they can't lose what they've never had to begin with.
That's why IP "piracy" is not stealing.
This whole IP mess just reminds me of when I was a kid and my cousin would draw a dog. Then, my brother , seeing what my cousin was drawing, would also draw a dog. My cousin would go crying to his mom saying that my brother was copying him!
Regardless of how much people say that a nuclear blast would not be advisable because the same amount of matter would hit the earth with the same energy, I'm still not convinced.
If you blew up the asteroid, two things would happen:
1) The bits from the asteroids would have a significantly different vector from the original asteroid.
2) Dispersing the same amount of matter over a larger area DOES NOT have the same destructive effect as concentrating it in one spot.
Now, to expand on these ideas:
Assuming we hit the asteroid directly in front of its trajectory, several pieces of the asteroid will fly out back directly opposite from the asteroid original path, some will go sideways or at different angles, and even the ones that are still heading toward earth will have a significantly reduced speed and trajectory.
So, less of the asteroid will actually make it to earth, some of it will make it but much later, other will bounce off the atmosphere, and the rest will hit much slower.
Here's the analogy for #2:
You have a 400 people standing in a square and you drop a 1-ton block of lead on a random area from 20 feet. At least one or two people will probably die. Now, if you drop one ton worth of tiny lead balls over all 400 people from 20 feet, most likely no one will die even though it may hurt to have little lead balls pelting you on your head for a few seconds.
Also, no one seems to consider the destructive power of our atmosphere. One large asteroid can pass through the atmosphere and cause great damage despite some burn up during entry. Breaking up the asteroid into thousands of little rocks will increase the area of the asteroid and therefore burn up a larger portion of it upon entry into our atmospehere.
I didn't see anything about national databases or magnetic strips on driver's licenses (or driver's licenses, for that matter) in the Constitution, either. They don't have to lay out for everyone to see the precise mechanics of how they plan to carry out their agenda.
The job description of some of those people we put in power is simply to protect the public safety. How they do it is their discretion. We just have to be attentive, as citizens, to make sure this power we granted them is being used properly, is all.
You're right. They don't have to ask you for permission to put up a camera. Through elections we select who will represent the majority of the interests in the this country. We gave the government the power to do as it sees fit to protect national interests. Don't like what they're doing?
Soap, ballot, jury, ammo.
word game? Whatever...
At any rate, how do you jump from cameras in public areas to DNA profiling? I guess it's ther next logical step, right?
"Some chose to go down the road that have victims"?
Are you saying all victims of crime became so because they chose a road where they can be victimized?
Slashdot Mirror
So, I can copyright the arrangement of colored blocks preschoolers play with?
Just a warning to all of you pirates: Do NOT stack your colored blocks in this order from top to bottom or I'll sic my attorney on you: Blue, Red, Red, Green, Blue, Yellow, Blue, Blue, Green.
You've been warned.
You're missing the point. The problem is no that a song, when digitized, might resemble "your favorite number."
The problem is that copyright disallows "unautohrized" uses of any number that when used in certain programs resembles a copyrighted idea.
So, let's say Metallica's song "For whom the bells toll", when encoded in a certain way, is the number 666. Do they own the copyright to that number? What about when you encode it differently and you have the number 537 instead? Do they also own the copyright to that number, as well?
Observing a crime does not make you guilty of it. Looking at child pornography pictures is illegal, but it is still not the same as actually raping a kid.
Honestly, I hope the **AAs don't do anything against these spyware companies profiting from illegal files. Not protecting their interests from those companies would weaken **AAs' case when trying to sue other people.
One example of huge gains for a lot money:8 &p=3
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=227
Compare the NVIDIA GeForce 6800 GT 256MB, being at $295, and a comparable NVIDIA GeForce 6800 Ultra 256MB, at $419. For an incredible gain of 8.5 frames per second! That's %7 percent performance increase for only a %42 price increase.
Hey... if you have the money to waste, though... be my guest and waste it.
But thanks to the press and despite all the people that must have lost their jobs as scribes, we now have more books available, more information, more informed people, more demand for books, more jobs, more money. Mo' betta!
I could understand Sony suing for breach of contract, but they're not. They're suing for trademark infringement.
In this lawsuit, it is obvious that Sony has no other legal feet to stand on. I'm afraid that this will happen more often as more ridiculous intellectual "property" laws come into play.
Sony: "You're doing something we don't like with our product. You're not really breaking the law, either, but since we own the patent, trademark, and copyright to the PSP we'll use that instead."
This only goes to show how far this I"P" craze is going. It seems no one can actually own anything, nowadays. Everything is now simply being "licensed" and if you do something the "licenser" doesn't like, they'll sue you for some I"P" violation.
Why is the ratio of good/bad software any different in Mac? Doesn't make any sense.
You cannot tell me that software is simply better on Mac just because it's a Mac.
If the difficulty of opening up MS Word, typing up your letter, and clicking on the 'print' button is analogous with a launching a shuttle, I give this society a maximum of 12 years before it self-destructs.
Actually, you're correct. The people that were drafted to go to Vietnam actually deserve more than most of the people that have joined the armed forces in the US and the UK.
The great majority of the people joining the military, today, will get money for school, training, and experience.
That's a perk. A privilege.
And willingly risking their lives for Blair does not grant them immunity to limitations, rules, and regulations.
1) They are NOT getting killed on my behalf. (Even if I were British)
2) They volunteer to get shot at.
3) They do get compensated for their job. Whether fairly, they agreed to it.
So, don't give me this old story of 'I lost a leg in 'Nam for you. The least I deserve is some love.'
Let me ask you something then:
If you get caught shoplifting at Wal-Mart. How much can Wal-Mart sue you for?
If it's an inordinate amount like the RIAA fines people, then whatever people are having to pay for illegaly trafficking music is fine.
If not, then why does the RIAA get to sue people for those incredible amounts?
You can't... err... shouldn't be able to sue someone for ridiculously high damages just to 'teach them a lesson.'
I imagine that the main reason they sue people for so much money is because they assume that if someone is sharing music, then, potentially, they could have lost a 'lot' of money due to possibly hundreds of thousands or millions of downloads.
Actually, this would be more like someone stealing your valet ticket out of your jacket, then using it to get your car. You're responsible for safeguarding your belongings not the valet service.
I don't know the reasons behind Blizzard's trying to prevent people from selling in-game content. However, I am a gamer and I understand perfectly why I do not want this to happen.
If left unchecked, people buying gold outside the game will be able to afford items that they normally wouldn't. As the number of people buying gold goes up, so do the prices as sellers start realizing that people will pay more for their items. Also, the same people selling the gold will start selling items at ridiculously high prices that will, again, drive the overall prices up.
This will continue until people new in the game will not be able to afford anything that they normally would because of the artificially inflated prices. The people who can't afford to buy gold offline, will not have the same advantages that the guys who can spend $400 per month on in-game items and gold.
I don't want to be in a position where I have to spend additional money or excessilvely more time than normal just to be able to afford in-game items.
Blizzard is not leasing anything. They're licensing their game and they already have a clause which clearly states that they do not allow the resale of the licensed material.
And what sort of people are they? The kind that label middle-aged men that say "Women lack natural ability in math" as potentially having a bias against women? Sounds like common sense to me.
Do you really not see the irony of your statement?
Then, you have obviously never worked anywhere else. EVERY job, requires discrimination at some level.
Examples at places where I've worked:
At some helpdesk job, our commercial accounts got first priority for technical support.
At a video store, people with bad credit and no credit card had to pay a deposit.
At another video store, we wouldn't hire people with bad credit.
Everywhere people are discriminated. It is a necessity for businesses. Insurance companies simply use statistics to discriminate instead of credit reports or medical records.
Don't act like discrimination is inherently a bad thing or exclusive to insurance companies.
I'm still waiting for you to tell us what is in your modem's log.
Oh yea, Adobe just lost out on $600 (or however much Photoshop costs, nowadays) because I downloaded their program that I will NEVER buy.
Adobe didn't lose that sale because they can't lose what they've never had to begin with. That's why IP "piracy" is not stealing.
This whole IP mess just reminds me of when I was a kid and my cousin would draw a dog. Then, my brother , seeing what my cousin was drawing, would also draw a dog. My cousin would go crying to his mom saying that my brother was copying him!
I think it's time we grew up as a culture.
Regardless of how much people say that a nuclear blast would not be advisable because the same amount of matter would hit the earth with the same energy, I'm still not convinced.
If you blew up the asteroid, two things would happen:
1) The bits from the asteroids would have a significantly different vector from the original asteroid.
2) Dispersing the same amount of matter over a larger area DOES NOT have the same destructive effect as concentrating it in one spot.
Now, to expand on these ideas:
Assuming we hit the asteroid directly in front of its trajectory, several pieces of the asteroid will fly out back directly opposite from the asteroid original path, some will go sideways or at different angles, and even the ones that are still heading toward earth will have a significantly reduced speed and trajectory. So, less of the asteroid will actually make it to earth, some of it will make it but much later, other will bounce off the atmosphere, and the rest will hit much slower.
Here's the analogy for #2:
You have a 400 people standing in a square and you drop a 1-ton block of lead on a random area from 20 feet. At least one or two people will probably die. Now, if you drop one ton worth of tiny lead balls over all 400 people from 20 feet, most likely no one will die even though it may hurt to have little lead balls pelting you on your head for a few seconds.
Also, no one seems to consider the destructive power of our atmosphere. One large asteroid can pass through the atmosphere and cause great damage despite some burn up during entry. Breaking up the asteroid into thousands of little rocks will increase the area of the asteroid and therefore burn up a larger portion of it upon entry into our atmospehere.
I didn't see anything about national databases or magnetic strips on driver's licenses (or driver's licenses, for that matter) in the Constitution, either. They don't have to lay out for everyone to see the precise mechanics of how they plan to carry out their agenda.
The job description of some of those people we put in power is simply to protect the public safety. How they do it is their discretion. We just have to be attentive, as citizens, to make sure this power we granted them is being used properly, is all.
You're right. They don't have to ask you for permission to put up a camera. Through elections we select who will represent the majority of the interests in the this country. We gave the government the power to do as it sees fit to protect national interests. Don't like what they're doing?
Soap, ballot, jury, ammo.
word game? Whatever... At any rate, how do you jump from cameras in public areas to DNA profiling? I guess it's ther next logical step, right? "Some chose to go down the road that have victims"? Are you saying all victims of crime became so because they chose a road where they can be victimized?
But think of the demand for janitors and holodeck cleaners.