I'd be interested in hearing what ethical vegetarians think about eating cruelty-free meat.
Your labels need refining. There are "ethical vegetarians" who don't eat meat because they are concerned about the unethical treatment of the animals. Most of these people have no problem eating meat raised on a traditional farm and slaughtered humanely or wild game killed in an ethical fashion. I don't see why they would have any problem eating this type of meat.
There are people who have an ethical problem with the killing of animals that trust them, or the killing of animals who trust their slaughterers on their behalf. These people are usually willing to eat wild game, or animals raised in a way in which the animals are not taught to trust the farmers. I imagine they would have no problem eating this meat.
There are people who have an ethical problem with the killing of higher life forms as defined at some arbitrary point. (For example some will eat fish, but no mammals.) These people most likely would not have a problem with this type of meat, although depending upon its origins some might.
There are some people who object to the killing of any living animal. Some or those people will likely not have a problem with this meat and some will (since it does originate from an animal) but most will probably be fine with it.
Finally there are people who believe meat is evil. These people will likely refuse to eat this meat.
On a slightly different note, I read a study last week that said 1 in 5 high schoolers thought beef came from pigs. I don't imagine this will do anything to alleviate this educational problem.
but at least I can complain about the slant they put on this, and how strong a conclusion they seem to derive.
Did you RTFA? Their conclusion is based upon their results which was the best they could do without access to the systems and with limited resources. And what is the conclusion that you complain about the spin on? The conclusion is that yahoo's claim is suspicious. I'd say that is a pretty solid claim. Yahoo's assertions are suspicious and while they could be true, are worth questioning in light of a sampling the results of both engines.
It seems to me that when Slashdot publishes an article that is favourable to Google, that was submitted by a Google staff member, one might question whether someone involved has a conflict of interest.
It just so happens that a lot of the news about a given company comes to the attention of the people in that company. Should Slashdot not allow submissions from posters that regard products or services they are working on? So long as it is news and affiliations are disclosed what's the problem?
It might be an ad (or more correctly, a press release) masquerading as news.
Were articles about Taco Bell putting a big target in the ocean for the space station to hit ads or press releases? They were certainly helping Taco Bell's business and that was the intention of Taco Bell. But if the article is not written by them, then it is not a press release, just a story that might help their sales.
So here's the thing. This is news a lot of people here are interested in reading. Slashdot editors did not post the Yahoo claim because they wanted to help Yahoo and they did not publish this story to help Google. It is just a story of interest to the readers. Most stories have some spin on them these days. Knowing the authors/editors/publishers is important. Knowing that the person who submitted it to this news site works for Google is being excessively upfront.
I wonder if the article would have been published had it been submitted anonymously
Anonymous submissions are less likely to be published. I bet it would have been published if a random author submitted it though.
Marathon shipped in 94, Doom II in late 94, and marathon 2 in 95. I can't say I ever played "Pathways into Darkness."
Almost all the best games from 1990 through to the present
Well now, that's a pretty subjective term isn't it? I guess it depends on what you consider the best games. All of Blizzard's games, for example ship for the mac at the same time, and are often better on that platform. Bungie games shipped for the Mac first, until Microsoft bought them. How about Myth, it was one of the most popular games of all time? It all depends upon what you call the best.
Of course while not all good games are ported from the pc to the mac, not all the good games from the mac are ported to the pc either. Back in the day I knew people who installed mac emulators and even bought whole machines just to play Realmz.
My original point stands and that is, the mac was not an inherently inferior platform for creating games then and nor is it now. Apple's technology decisions did not stop gaming on the mac. Microsoft's business practices and their resulting market share is the reason why most gaming companies moved to the PC. Of course lately it has been shifting even more to consoles. There have been plenty of great mac first or mac only games.
The point is not to stop people from hacking OS X from running on commodity hardware. The point is to make it inconvenient enough so that the number who do so is small enough to not affect sales.
You and the 2000 other people who actually install OS's on their computers might buy it. Another couple thousand who would never have bought it anyway will pirate it. Some unknown number of people who would have bought a mac, will now buy a cheap PC and pirate it.
You want Apple to bet that you and those like you will buy enough copies to make up for the losses in OS and hardware sales they will suffer as a result. At the same time, you want them to risk gaining a reputation for being unreliable compared to Windows by allowing their OS to run on random hardware that ships with Windows drivers and was designed with Windows in mind, but is not intended to run with MacOS at all.
You want Apple to take a pretty big risk, so where is the potential reward? Sales to people like you who install a new OS after the fact are infinitesimal compared to sales of boxes with the OS already installed. Sure they might gain some more recognition and recommendations from users like you to friends and family, but they are risking gaining a bad reputation just as easily. Further the segment who installs their own OS's is one of long time computer users who have a lot of expectations about how their computer will work. I've seen plenty of Windows and Linux users get upset with OS X just because it does not do something the way Windows does, or the way Linux copied a feature from Windows.
It's not a good risk right now, in my opinion. As much as I would like it to happen (I'd buy a copy as well) I don't think it is a smart move for Apple. The day you can go to the store and buy an OSless computer and choose your OS when it boots is the day it will make sense for Apple to ship for hardware they don't sell.
Seeing as OSX will only run on macs that you have to buy from apple, and that apple makes their money off of hardware, not requiring software activation doesn't really say much.
The same could be said for Windows, it comes on all the machines already so why do they have it?
First, it is not just OS X, but quite a few of the for-sale applications Apple develops and all of their free applications. Second, It means they are more interested in giving their users an easy install experience than in trying to stop piracy. Third, it means that OS upgrade sales (the reason MS includes activation and a serial) are not as important to Apple and they would rather a dishonest person who is unwilling to pay for a new version pirates it than use and old version.
This is one of those cases where I would gladly pay to run OSX on my PC.
You and a number of other people, but not enough to make business sense for Apple. They would be cutting the throat of a good chunk of hardware sales, to reach a small number of users who install OS's on their existing box. At the same time they would be opening themselves up to a huge piracy problem.
People don't buy OS's off the shelf. There is already one installed on their computer and most people never touch it. You're in a small minority that right now is impossible to reach without dealing with a ton of headaches and lost sales elsewhere.
Maybe some day it will be the case that the average user can buy a computer, in the store, either without an OS, or with a choice of OS's. That day has not yet arrived.
any DRM he uses will be broken and people will run this on generic boxes.
Yup it sure will. But at the same time those breaking it will not make it easy to install, and it will probably take a BIOS hack or something similar. The percentage of people who will want to run OS X, will find a pirate copy, will be confident enough to run the hack, and will be willing to do so illegally at the risk of damaging their system will be so small that it will not make a blip in sales. Steve is the one who said DRM couldn't work, remember?
How many of those users would have purchased it given the option?
They are given the option to run it on Apple boxes. If Apple makes it run on generic hardware than they will have a serious piracy problem because it will be easy to install and run. Also, they will undercut their laptop/desktop sales, which is 50% of their profit. You want Apple to sell it for generic x86 boxes because it is best for you. They have to do what is best for Apple.
the RIAA/MPAA want to be compensated too as does microsoft
You name two cartels convicted of pice fixing and a monopoly convicted of illegally stifling competition. But lets go with your MPAA example. Suppose someone creates a movie and an MPAA member markets it for them. Do you think it is fair to take that movie for yourself and not compensate the creator? Heck, one of my main objections to the RIAA and MPAA is that they don't compensate the authors for their work (or compensate them very poorly while stopping their work from reaching the public if they don't comply).
if they want to be compensated, they need to change their business model.
So building a creative work, under copyright, and selling it is a flawed business model? What business model would you suggest for say, a fiction author? Should they just try to find a wealthy nobleman to sponsor their writing and then give it away for free? Do enlighten me.
This is a traditional copyright, being used in the traditional way, without an illegal monopoly or an illegal cartel stepping in between the author and the purchaser. I guess you're one of those people who thinks all copyright is bad and needs to be abolished. So what is your better solution then? How should traditional authors succeed? What is this "new business model" you propose?
Caution, anonymous coward calling other people trolls. If you have a point, or want clarification or a reference to back up any given fact, ask it. Otherwise you're the troll here. Anyone who looks at my posting history can see for themselves. Where's your history, coward?
I love how "you people" make assumptions and form opinions without actually reading up on the subject and educating yourselves.
I love how people lambast others for their ignorance while demonstrating they don't even know what the terms being used mean.
This is a new vulnerability in a service that had a vulnerability years ago.
So you're saying that If I install Win2k from my old CD on a system and don't install the patches, I won't be vulnerable to this exploit? If so, you're wrong. This vulnerability has existed for a long time, but was only recently published in mainstream security news.
For future reference:
Vulnerability - a security hole.
Exploit - code to take advantage of that security hole.
The point I made, and the person replying to my post made was that it is entirely likely that some people knew about this hole before it was patched and published (actually it is a certainty since someone found it in order for it to be fixed). It is also possible that this hole has been maliciously exploited in the past. This vulnerability has existed for years.
Sony wants to be free of Microsoft. Unfortunately, Sony and Apple are naturally competitors to one another. Gateway has a history of not liking Microsoft. HP, bitter that they do not get Dell's discount, does not like Microsoft either.
Well, they are losing money on their PC businesses. Maybe their boards will be willing to bet the whole shebang on Apple, but most likely they would not. Assuming you are running a multimillion dollar company, would you risk the whole thing on the chance that Apple software would sell at the same or higher levels of profit that your current Windows machines are? Would you bet your career on the upstart, especially given the incumbent is very rich and has already been caught breaking the law to win many times? It is a huge risk, and unlikely to be worth it in the long run.
If you read my previous post you'd note, most games sold are a few very popular ones that run on both platforms. Most people only buy a few games for their computer. Most Mac users have no problem finding a few games a year they like and playing them on their machines. Thus, Macs are fine for the average gamer. Note, we're talking computer gamer here, the market for people who play consoles is even larger.
People who are constantly buying new hardware and dozens of new games a year, and dedicate a lot of time to it are not your average gamer. They think they are, because only really dedicated gamers are on all the time, form relationships, participate regularly in forums, etc. Thus people who are dedicated or extreme gamers tend to associate a lot with those with a similar interest. Their opinion of what a normal gamer is thus very skewed.
On the high end, of course are people who live for games. They naturally have both a mac and a PC so they can play the really cool games unique to each platform.
The very idea that Mac users, by nature, are somehow more "trustworthy" or "less likely to pirate" than Windows PC users is just more elitist B.S. The reality is, there's not nearly as much software out there for a Mac - so there's much less "need" for piracy. It's financially possible to buy every single native Mac commerical app you'd ever really use with your computer!
Wow, what a ridiculous argument. First, people buy the software they are going to use, which is going to be about the same amount no matter what platform you run on. But just assuming in some alternate reality the average user did want to buy all the software available for the mac, there are about 3000 applications for sale, just on the Apple.com store. At about $30 each that comes to over eighty thousand dollars. I don't know many users who could afford to shell that out for software. Your theory is tripe.
I don't know that mac users are less likely to pirate, but I strongly suspect it because of the demographic of mac users. Mac users are people who can afford to buy Apple hardware. That means they are willing to spend more for what they perceive as added value. It weeds out a large chunk of the cheapskates right there. Then there are the foreign markets where you can actually buy PCs without OS's and where piracy is much more common. That is a lot of stolen software and pretty much a Windows only ecosystem. Thus, it is quite probably Windows users are more likely to pirate software. I'll leave the anecdotal evidence to anyone else who cares to chime in.
As you pointed out though, they've been in a position where it's a non-issue, because you pay for the OS in the purchase price of your Mac - and your Mac ultimately has to come from Apple.
Both Apple and Microsoft make OS's and both insure that they are bundled with hardware so they don't have to worry about piracy at that point. There is a difference though. Apple does not require a serial number and a connection to a server to install and Windows does. The reason for this is that Apple would rather people pirate an upgrade to the latest OS than not have it, while Microsoft would rather you have to pay no matter what. This fits in with each company's profit strategy, but it also has a lot of side benefits for Apple users.
locking up software !artificially! to check for certain hardware is not only childish, anti-customer, probably illegal
Actually it is perfectly legal so long as you are neither a monopoly trying to maintain or extend that monopoly via your established position or a cartel which is conspiring to do the same.
when you buy a copy (EULAs aren't contracts, it doesn't fit the definition) of any software, for example OS X, i have the right to use it on any platform i desire.
The people we were discussing haven't bought a copy of OS X though. So where exactly do they get the "right" to run it anywhere?
apple has NO business telling me where to run it.
True, you can run it on anything you want, but they also have no legal or ethical responsibility to make it (or even not artificially restrict it from) running on any given set of hardware. They are not a monopoly. Deal with it. If you don't like that aspect of their product, don't buy it. But don't pirate it and try to justify that by saying you don't like aspects of it. You can't steal BMWs just because you don't want to pay for them because you don't like the available color choices. You also can't honestly take a bunch of people's hard work and use it without compensating them because it is not just what you want.
When you buy a PC it comes with Windows on it. Only a tiny fraction are ever sold from a shelf at best buy. OS X will be on a shelf at Best Buy, but I doubt it will ever run on commodity PCs without hacking. Personally I think the argument that it is not for sale yet is not valid justification for not compensating authors for their hard work. Likewise I find the argument that something doesn't work the way you'd like to be a poor argument for the same. You can buy OS X today and run it on some PPC hardware. That is, to the best of my knowledge, the only way that fairly compensates the authors. If you take it and don't pay, you're screwing them over. You're taking their hard work and effort and giving them squat. An honest person would not do that.
I completely buy the "it's not available for sale" argument when you're talking about pirating a book, software, or other work, provided it has been released for sale or the copyright holder does not provide it for sale in any form. Traffic in pre-release copies or drafts of books without compensating the author, however, is another matter. Just freaking wait for it already. You have no right or entitlement to have it for free right now, and if you do think that, I doubt you'll be paying for a copy anyway.
They're going into direct competition with Microsoft.
Unless they can get some major OEMs to take a huge risk and give up Microsoft then they will be crushed like every other competitor. BeOS ran on X86 too and they could not even get a single major vendor to include them on PCs or market them, even for free as dual-boot systems. I think you're dead wrong.
Wouldn't it benefit Apple in the long run to get more of its software into the public's hands?
Not unless it lead to more sales, which there is no reason to believe it would.
So if the Apple OS became more popular, wouldn't more developers consider making a version of their game in the Apple OS flavor?
Probably 75% of PC game sales every year are restricted to a few dozen titles, almost all of which are released for the mac either simultaneously or within 6 months. Games on the mac are mostly a problem for a small, vocal minority of hardcore gamers who either can't wait a few months or need to play one of those few big titles that does not get ported. Contrast that with the number of really cool mac only games they've never heard of and, personally, I find gaming on the mac to be just as good, or better than on the PC. Of course I'm not a hard-core, constantly playing, must have it right now sort of a gamer. I have too much to do in the real world to play most of the huge time-suckers that are on top these days.
What that dishonest people will lie, violate their NDAs, illegally infringe upon his copyrights, and not pay him a red cent because they have some sense of entitlement? Not exactly model customers for a software company that (usually) prides itself on trusting its customers and does not even require an authentication code to install and run its OS and the majority of its commercial applications.
MS makes you pay when you buy the hardware and does not worry and just tries to annoy you when you pirate. Apple also has not worried about pirates and makes you pay when you buy the hardware. Apple running on commodity PCs would make this situation one where you pay MS when you buy your hardware and then pirate Apple's OS and pay them nothing. And you applaud pirates freely distributing this pirate copy?
I'm sure Jobs has learned a lesson all right, that being PC users are untrustworthy and if there is no DRM locking OS X onto Apple boxes they will all just pirate it without paying one penny.
whether or not Apple has the right to enforce the types of files that it allows on its iPods.
Actually, the easy to answer question is, "does Apple have the right to decide who, and under what conditions people may access it's authentication servers." Right now all users agree to a click through license that forbids them to connect (via itunes) and authenticate Real's music, but thus far they have not enforced the license, and most of their customers don't even know the Real music is causing them to violate the license. That part should be a slam dunk for Apple if it ever goes to court.
If you approach the potential case of Real getting sued by Apple about Rhapsody, it's the same concept: reverse engineering software (vs hardware) for purposes of interopability.
Not if Apple has an intelligent lawyer it's not. It's about Real selling music to people and including software attached to that music that (without informing them) violates a licensing agreement they have with Apple and makes use of Apple's servers (without authorization) to technologically enforce the terms of Real's license with it's customers in a for profit enterprise. They are open to criminal and civil charges for "unauthorized use of computing resources" and may fall afoul of many state laws designed to stop spyware, malware, and cracking.
Thus far Apple has ignored them, but it is certainly a liability and they are open to lawsuits from Apple, their customers, or even a criminal case
What Apple is doing is unfairly using this monopoly to sustain the monopoly, something MSFT is notorious for. If I buy a song from iTunes, I should be able to use it on any player. This is a basic sentiment of slashdot - freely using what is yours. Your dollar spent on that song should give you a license to use it however you want to, not a license to go out and buy a 300 dollar iPod just to listen to it.
First I don't buy your argument that Apple has a monopoly (virtual or otherwise) on digital music players. They have about a 70% share. Given that, you might say that Apple is unfairly using it's near monopoly to tie the itunes music store to the ipod and leverage that near monopoly. Now take a look at their competition. It is made up of a dozen manufacturers who are selling mp3/wma players all of which equally tie the user into using a different player, a player bundled with basically every computer sold due to a real monopoly (legally found to be such and legally found to be abusing that monopoly). Yeah, yeah two wrongs don't make a right, but you have to admit, Apple doesn't have a lot of choice if they want to survive in the market.
Finally, you claim that if you buy a song you should be able to play it on any player, not just the ipod. The thing is, you can. Apple's DRM has a legal way to export to cd, which then plays in any cd player and which can them be re-encoded into another format for another player. They make it annoying, but legal. Neither Real nor Microsoft have that same feature on their DRM, as far as I know.
Mind you this whole piece is FUD trying to gain sympathy for a dying company after Apple has basically ignored them and done nothing about their weird hack, even though it violates the license agreement each user has with apple and it has a competitor using Apple's own servers to authenticate a for-profit enterprise that competes with them. Apple has really taken the high road here and deserve some credit for it.
Slashdot Mirror
I'd be interested in hearing what ethical vegetarians think about eating cruelty-free meat.
Your labels need refining. There are "ethical vegetarians" who don't eat meat because they are concerned about the unethical treatment of the animals. Most of these people have no problem eating meat raised on a traditional farm and slaughtered humanely or wild game killed in an ethical fashion. I don't see why they would have any problem eating this type of meat.
There are people who have an ethical problem with the killing of animals that trust them, or the killing of animals who trust their slaughterers on their behalf. These people are usually willing to eat wild game, or animals raised in a way in which the animals are not taught to trust the farmers. I imagine they would have no problem eating this meat.
There are people who have an ethical problem with the killing of higher life forms as defined at some arbitrary point. (For example some will eat fish, but no mammals.) These people most likely would not have a problem with this type of meat, although depending upon its origins some might.
There are some people who object to the killing of any living animal. Some or those people will likely not have a problem with this meat and some will (since it does originate from an animal) but most will probably be fine with it.
Finally there are people who believe meat is evil. These people will likely refuse to eat this meat.
On a slightly different note, I read a study last week that said 1 in 5 high schoolers thought beef came from pigs. I don't imagine this will do anything to alleviate this educational problem.
but at least I can complain about the slant they put on this, and how strong a conclusion they seem to derive.
Did you RTFA? Their conclusion is based upon their results which was the best they could do without access to the systems and with limited resources. And what is the conclusion that you complain about the spin on? The conclusion is that yahoo's claim is suspicious. I'd say that is a pretty solid claim. Yahoo's assertions are suspicious and while they could be true, are worth questioning in light of a sampling the results of both engines.
It seems to me that when Slashdot publishes an article that is favourable to Google, that was submitted by a Google staff member, one might question whether someone involved has a conflict of interest.
It just so happens that a lot of the news about a given company comes to the attention of the people in that company. Should Slashdot not allow submissions from posters that regard products or services they are working on? So long as it is news and affiliations are disclosed what's the problem?
It might be an ad (or more correctly, a press release) masquerading as news.
Were articles about Taco Bell putting a big target in the ocean for the space station to hit ads or press releases? They were certainly helping Taco Bell's business and that was the intention of Taco Bell. But if the article is not written by them, then it is not a press release, just a story that might help their sales.
So here's the thing. This is news a lot of people here are interested in reading. Slashdot editors did not post the Yahoo claim because they wanted to help Yahoo and they did not publish this story to help Google. It is just a story of interest to the readers. Most stories have some spin on them these days. Knowing the authors/editors/publishers is important. Knowing that the person who submitted it to this news site works for Google is being excessively upfront.
I wonder if the article would have been published had it been submitted anonymously
Anonymous submissions are less likely to be published. I bet it would have been published if a random author submitted it though.
DOOM shipped in 93
Marathon shipped in 94, Doom II in late 94, and marathon 2 in 95. I can't say I ever played "Pathways into Darkness."
Almost all the best games from 1990 through to the present
Well now, that's a pretty subjective term isn't it? I guess it depends on what you consider the best games. All of Blizzard's games, for example ship for the mac at the same time, and are often better on that platform. Bungie games shipped for the Mac first, until Microsoft bought them. How about Myth, it was one of the most popular games of all time? It all depends upon what you call the best.
Of course while not all good games are ported from the pc to the mac, not all the good games from the mac are ported to the pc either. Back in the day I knew people who installed mac emulators and even bought whole machines just to play Realmz.
My original point stands and that is, the mac was not an inherently inferior platform for creating games then and nor is it now. Apple's technology decisions did not stop gaming on the mac. Microsoft's business practices and their resulting market share is the reason why most gaming companies moved to the PC. Of course lately it has been shifting even more to consoles. There have been plenty of great mac first or mac only games.
The point is not to stop people from hacking OS X from running on commodity hardware. The point is to make it inconvenient enough so that the number who do so is small enough to not affect sales.
You and the 2000 other people who actually install OS's on their computers might buy it. Another couple thousand who would never have bought it anyway will pirate it. Some unknown number of people who would have bought a mac, will now buy a cheap PC and pirate it.
You want Apple to bet that you and those like you will buy enough copies to make up for the losses in OS and hardware sales they will suffer as a result. At the same time, you want them to risk gaining a reputation for being unreliable compared to Windows by allowing their OS to run on random hardware that ships with Windows drivers and was designed with Windows in mind, but is not intended to run with MacOS at all.
You want Apple to take a pretty big risk, so where is the potential reward? Sales to people like you who install a new OS after the fact are infinitesimal compared to sales of boxes with the OS already installed. Sure they might gain some more recognition and recommendations from users like you to friends and family, but they are risking gaining a bad reputation just as easily. Further the segment who installs their own OS's is one of long time computer users who have a lot of expectations about how their computer will work. I've seen plenty of Windows and Linux users get upset with OS X just because it does not do something the way Windows does, or the way Linux copied a feature from Windows.
It's not a good risk right now, in my opinion. As much as I would like it to happen (I'd buy a copy as well) I don't think it is a smart move for Apple. The day you can go to the store and buy an OSless computer and choose your OS when it boots is the day it will make sense for Apple to ship for hardware they don't sell.
Seeing as OSX will only run on macs that you have to buy from apple, and that apple makes their money off of hardware, not requiring software activation doesn't really say much.
The same could be said for Windows, it comes on all the machines already so why do they have it?
First, it is not just OS X, but quite a few of the for-sale applications Apple develops and all of their free applications. Second, It means they are more interested in giving their users an easy install experience than in trying to stop piracy. Third, it means that OS upgrade sales (the reason MS includes activation and a serial) are not as important to Apple and they would rather a dishonest person who is unwilling to pay for a new version pirates it than use and old version.
This is one of those cases where I would gladly pay to run OSX on my PC.
You and a number of other people, but not enough to make business sense for Apple. They would be cutting the throat of a good chunk of hardware sales, to reach a small number of users who install OS's on their existing box. At the same time they would be opening themselves up to a huge piracy problem.
People don't buy OS's off the shelf. There is already one installed on their computer and most people never touch it. You're in a small minority that right now is impossible to reach without dealing with a ton of headaches and lost sales elsewhere.
Maybe some day it will be the case that the average user can buy a computer, in the store, either without an OS, or with a choice of OS's. That day has not yet arrived.
any DRM he uses will be broken and people will run this on generic boxes.
Yup it sure will. But at the same time those breaking it will not make it easy to install, and it will probably take a BIOS hack or something similar. The percentage of people who will want to run OS X, will find a pirate copy, will be confident enough to run the hack, and will be willing to do so illegally at the risk of damaging their system will be so small that it will not make a blip in sales. Steve is the one who said DRM couldn't work, remember?
How many of those users would have purchased it given the option?
They are given the option to run it on Apple boxes. If Apple makes it run on generic hardware than they will have a serious piracy problem because it will be easy to install and run. Also, they will undercut their laptop/desktop sales, which is 50% of their profit. You want Apple to sell it for generic x86 boxes because it is best for you. They have to do what is best for Apple.
the RIAA/MPAA want to be compensated too as does microsoft
You name two cartels convicted of pice fixing and a monopoly convicted of illegally stifling competition. But lets go with your MPAA example. Suppose someone creates a movie and an MPAA member markets it for them. Do you think it is fair to take that movie for yourself and not compensate the creator? Heck, one of my main objections to the RIAA and MPAA is that they don't compensate the authors for their work (or compensate them very poorly while stopping their work from reaching the public if they don't comply).
if they want to be compensated, they need to change their business model.
So building a creative work, under copyright, and selling it is a flawed business model? What business model would you suggest for say, a fiction author? Should they just try to find a wealthy nobleman to sponsor their writing and then give it away for free? Do enlighten me.
This is a traditional copyright, being used in the traditional way, without an illegal monopoly or an illegal cartel stepping in between the author and the purchaser. I guess you're one of those people who thinks all copyright is bad and needs to be abolished. So what is your better solution then? How should traditional authors succeed? What is this "new business model" you propose?
Caution, anonymous coward calling other people trolls. If you have a point, or want clarification or a reference to back up any given fact, ask it. Otherwise you're the troll here. Anyone who looks at my posting history can see for themselves. Where's your history, coward?
What are you having trouble verifying? I did not include any new facts that have not been discussed here on Slashdot many times before.
I love how "you people" make assumptions and form opinions without actually reading up on the subject and educating yourselves.
I love how people lambast others for their ignorance while demonstrating they don't even know what the terms being used mean.
This is a new vulnerability in a service that had a vulnerability years ago.
So you're saying that If I install Win2k from my old CD on a system and don't install the patches, I won't be vulnerable to this exploit? If so, you're wrong. This vulnerability has existed for a long time, but was only recently published in mainstream security news.
For future reference:
Vulnerability - a security hole.
Exploit - code to take advantage of that security hole.
The point I made, and the person replying to my post made was that it is entirely likely that some people knew about this hole before it was patched and published (actually it is a certainty since someone found it in order for it to be fixed). It is also possible that this hole has been maliciously exploited in the past. This vulnerability has existed for years.
Sony wants to be free of Microsoft. Unfortunately, Sony and Apple are naturally competitors to one another. Gateway has a history of not liking Microsoft. HP, bitter that they do not get Dell's discount, does not like Microsoft either.
Well, they are losing money on their PC businesses. Maybe their boards will be willing to bet the whole shebang on Apple, but most likely they would not. Assuming you are running a multimillion dollar company, would you risk the whole thing on the chance that Apple software would sell at the same or higher levels of profit that your current Windows machines are? Would you bet your career on the upstart, especially given the incumbent is very rich and has already been caught breaking the law to win many times? It is a huge risk, and unlikely to be worth it in the long run.
If you read my previous post you'd note, most games sold are a few very popular ones that run on both platforms. Most people only buy a few games for their computer. Most Mac users have no problem finding a few games a year they like and playing them on their machines. Thus, Macs are fine for the average gamer. Note, we're talking computer gamer here, the market for people who play consoles is even larger.
People who are constantly buying new hardware and dozens of new games a year, and dedicate a lot of time to it are not your average gamer. They think they are, because only really dedicated gamers are on all the time, form relationships, participate regularly in forums, etc. Thus people who are dedicated or extreme gamers tend to associate a lot with those with a similar interest. Their opinion of what a normal gamer is thus very skewed.
On the high end, of course are people who live for games. They naturally have both a mac and a PC so they can play the really cool games unique to each platform.
The very idea that Mac users, by nature, are somehow more "trustworthy" or "less likely to pirate" than Windows PC users is just more elitist B.S. The reality is, there's not nearly as much software out there for a Mac - so there's much less "need" for piracy. It's financially possible to buy every single native Mac commerical app you'd ever really use with your computer!
Wow, what a ridiculous argument. First, people buy the software they are going to use, which is going to be about the same amount no matter what platform you run on. But just assuming in some alternate reality the average user did want to buy all the software available for the mac, there are about 3000 applications for sale, just on the Apple.com store. At about $30 each that comes to over eighty thousand dollars. I don't know many users who could afford to shell that out for software. Your theory is tripe.
I don't know that mac users are less likely to pirate, but I strongly suspect it because of the demographic of mac users. Mac users are people who can afford to buy Apple hardware. That means they are willing to spend more for what they perceive as added value. It weeds out a large chunk of the cheapskates right there. Then there are the foreign markets where you can actually buy PCs without OS's and where piracy is much more common. That is a lot of stolen software and pretty much a Windows only ecosystem. Thus, it is quite probably Windows users are more likely to pirate software. I'll leave the anecdotal evidence to anyone else who cares to chime in.
As you pointed out though, they've been in a position where it's a non-issue, because you pay for the OS in the purchase price of your Mac - and your Mac ultimately has to come from Apple.
Both Apple and Microsoft make OS's and both insure that they are bundled with hardware so they don't have to worry about piracy at that point. There is a difference though. Apple does not require a serial number and a connection to a server to install and Windows does. The reason for this is that Apple would rather people pirate an upgrade to the latest OS than not have it, while Microsoft would rather you have to pay no matter what. This fits in with each company's profit strategy, but it also has a lot of side benefits for Apple users.
why is it that microsoft had to bail Apple out of bankruptcy.
How could anyone take you seriously after such a demonstration of ignorance.
locking up software !artificially! to check for certain hardware is not only childish, anti-customer, probably illegal
Actually it is perfectly legal so long as you are neither a monopoly trying to maintain or extend that monopoly via your established position or a cartel which is conspiring to do the same.
when you buy a copy (EULAs aren't contracts, it doesn't fit the definition) of any software, for example OS X, i have the right to use it on any platform i desire.
The people we were discussing haven't bought a copy of OS X though. So where exactly do they get the "right" to run it anywhere?
apple has NO business telling me where to run it.
True, you can run it on anything you want, but they also have no legal or ethical responsibility to make it (or even not artificially restrict it from) running on any given set of hardware. They are not a monopoly. Deal with it. If you don't like that aspect of their product, don't buy it. But don't pirate it and try to justify that by saying you don't like aspects of it. You can't steal BMWs just because you don't want to pay for them because you don't like the available color choices. You also can't honestly take a bunch of people's hard work and use it without compensating them because it is not just what you want.
When you buy a PC it comes with Windows on it. Only a tiny fraction are ever sold from a shelf at best buy. OS X will be on a shelf at Best Buy, but I doubt it will ever run on commodity PCs without hacking. Personally I think the argument that it is not for sale yet is not valid justification for not compensating authors for their hard work. Likewise I find the argument that something doesn't work the way you'd like to be a poor argument for the same. You can buy OS X today and run it on some PPC hardware. That is, to the best of my knowledge, the only way that fairly compensates the authors. If you take it and don't pay, you're screwing them over. You're taking their hard work and effort and giving them squat. An honest person would not do that.
I completely buy the "it's not available for sale" argument when you're talking about pirating a book, software, or other work, provided it has been released for sale or the copyright holder does not provide it for sale in any form. Traffic in pre-release copies or drafts of books without compensating the author, however, is another matter. Just freaking wait for it already. You have no right or entitlement to have it for free right now, and if you do think that, I doubt you'll be paying for a copy anyway.
They're going into direct competition with Microsoft.
Unless they can get some major OEMs to take a huge risk and give up Microsoft then they will be crushed like every other competitor. BeOS ran on X86 too and they could not even get a single major vendor to include them on PCs or market them, even for free as dual-boot systems. I think you're dead wrong.
Wouldn't it benefit Apple in the long run to get more of its software into the public's hands?
Not unless it lead to more sales, which there is no reason to believe it would.
So if the Apple OS became more popular, wouldn't more developers consider making a version of their game in the Apple OS flavor?
Probably 75% of PC game sales every year are restricted to a few dozen titles, almost all of which are released for the mac either simultaneously or within 6 months. Games on the mac are mostly a problem for a small, vocal minority of hardcore gamers who either can't wait a few months or need to play one of those few big titles that does not get ported. Contrast that with the number of really cool mac only games they've never heard of and, personally, I find gaming on the mac to be just as good, or better than on the PC. Of course I'm not a hard-core, constantly playing, must have it right now sort of a gamer. I have too much to do in the real world to play most of the huge time-suckers that are on top these days.
I hope Steve learns a lesson from this...
What that dishonest people will lie, violate their NDAs, illegally infringe upon his copyrights, and not pay him a red cent because they have some sense of entitlement? Not exactly model customers for a software company that (usually) prides itself on trusting its customers and does not even require an authentication code to install and run its OS and the majority of its commercial applications.
MS makes you pay when you buy the hardware and does not worry and just tries to annoy you when you pirate. Apple also has not worried about pirates and makes you pay when you buy the hardware. Apple running on commodity PCs would make this situation one where you pay MS when you buy your hardware and then pirate Apple's OS and pay them nothing. And you applaud pirates freely distributing this pirate copy?
I'm sure Jobs has learned a lesson all right, that being PC users are untrustworthy and if there is no DRM locking OS X onto Apple boxes they will all just pirate it without paying one penny.
whether or not Apple has the right to enforce the types of files that it allows on its iPods.
Actually, the easy to answer question is, "does Apple have the right to decide who, and under what conditions people may access it's authentication servers." Right now all users agree to a click through license that forbids them to connect (via itunes) and authenticate Real's music, but thus far they have not enforced the license, and most of their customers don't even know the Real music is causing them to violate the license. That part should be a slam dunk for Apple if it ever goes to court.
If you approach the potential case of Real getting sued by Apple about Rhapsody, it's the same concept: reverse engineering software (vs hardware) for purposes of interopability.
Not if Apple has an intelligent lawyer it's not. It's about Real selling music to people and including software attached to that music that (without informing them) violates a licensing agreement they have with Apple and makes use of Apple's servers (without authorization) to technologically enforce the terms of Real's license with it's customers in a for profit enterprise. They are open to criminal and civil charges for "unauthorized use of computing resources" and may fall afoul of many state laws designed to stop spyware, malware, and cracking.
Thus far Apple has ignored them, but it is certainly a liability and they are open to lawsuits from Apple, their customers, or even a criminal case
What Apple is doing is unfairly using this monopoly to sustain the monopoly, something MSFT is notorious for. If I buy a song from iTunes, I should be able to use it on any player. This is a basic sentiment of slashdot - freely using what is yours. Your dollar spent on that song should give you a license to use it however you want to, not a license to go out and buy a 300 dollar iPod just to listen to it.
First I don't buy your argument that Apple has a monopoly (virtual or otherwise) on digital music players. They have about a 70% share. Given that, you might say that Apple is unfairly using it's near monopoly to tie the itunes music store to the ipod and leverage that near monopoly. Now take a look at their competition. It is made up of a dozen manufacturers who are selling mp3/wma players all of which equally tie the user into using a different player, a player bundled with basically every computer sold due to a real monopoly (legally found to be such and legally found to be abusing that monopoly). Yeah, yeah two wrongs don't make a right, but you have to admit, Apple doesn't have a lot of choice if they want to survive in the market.
Finally, you claim that if you buy a song you should be able to play it on any player, not just the ipod. The thing is, you can. Apple's DRM has a legal way to export to cd, which then plays in any cd player and which can them be re-encoded into another format for another player. They make it annoying, but legal. Neither Real nor Microsoft have that same feature on their DRM, as far as I know.
Mind you this whole piece is FUD trying to gain sympathy for a dying company after Apple has basically ignored them and done nothing about their weird hack, even though it violates the license agreement each user has with apple and it has a competitor using Apple's own servers to authenticate a for-profit enterprise that competes with them. Apple has really taken the high road here and deserve some credit for it.