What's wrong with this picture? Clearly she would have never spent that much on music...
I don't at all agree with the $80k per song thing, of course. But I have to object to your logic. You're basically saying that the only damages an artist, record label, publisher, etc., can have from pirating - whether actual pirating or not - is loss of sales to the pirate.
Let's put it in software terms, it's easier. I pirate a computer game. I copy it for all my friends that, for purpose of argument, would have bought it. I have 100 friends. Damage to publisher of said computer game would be 101xCostOfGame (all). Not 1xCostOfGame (mine).
Just because I wouldn't have spent that much doesn't mean I can't give it away enough to damage a publisher more than than what I would have spent.
Of course, we can argue all we want about who is really making money and that it's not fair to the artist either and boo on DRM and all that, but that's not the point of my post anyways:)
Continuing to support Jammie Thomas-Whateveritis only makes us look like stupid pirates.
Maybe some people are just stupid pirates?
Some people's attitudes going into it ("I don't care about law, it doesn't make sense to me so I'm going to download anything and everything I want. In fact, I'll download more than I can ever watch in my lifetime just because I can!") appear to come from a stupid pirate mentality...
Not to say I agree with RIAA, etc., but I don't think I can agree with the other side of stupidity, either.:)
Social conservatives everywhere will exclaim "what an excellent goal!"
Socially conservative != Machiavellian sort of ends-justifies-means. I think I'm "socially conservative," but I'm not stupid enough to think that a good goal = good actions.
I don't know what I'd do if I were revealed for the shallow, talentless hack that I am. I'd probably kick a puppy, and you wouldn't want that on your conscience.
Based on my, mmm, theological world views, I'm not sure I would very much mind revealing someone's true nature. I think if we were all more honest with ourselves, we would realize two things.
We are not as good as we think we are.
We are not altruistically good.
No, I don't want you to kick puppies... nor do I want myself to kick puppies. But I do want to realize who I really am, what my nature is really like, etc. Deluding myself about who and what I am and thinking that I am actually a good person when I'm not may make me have a better ego and may even make some people like me more... right now. When I die, things change, and my delusions will die with me. What happens after I die, if anything, is more important than my 80+ years of deluded thinking.
Not one of those things people like thinking about, though.
Regarding having "somebody," I almost agree. I think everyone "needs" someone who truly cares about them. Sometimes, that means telling the person you care about "Bob, you're being stupid," or even "Bob, you're deceiving yourself." It doesn't always make either person happy, but sometimes it's the most caring thing to do. Building a delusion and helping other people delude themselves just builds up for a crash.
But my beliefs and world view, especially in theology and the "afterlife," are not going to match with most of Slashdot...:)
I wasn't trying to say you can't have a blog and not be important, or (as another poster commented) necessarily have to think you're important to have a blog. My point was that that appears to be the way most bloggers are thinking.
And that's why you can get an article about a slump in blog readers. Which, to me, isn't really news... it's just people getting bored with what the blogger has to say, hehe.:) There will be some people that do have genuinely interesting blogs. Just like there are some people that are wealths of information... fun to talk/listen to.
I have a blog, too. Nobody reads it except my friends that want to read it because they, well, are my friends. Or family. And I don't write too much on it, and when I do, it's just because I wan to write on it and think maybe someone else wants to read it.
It seems the ideas behind twitter, facebook, and blogs are "my thoughts are so important that I'm almost obligated to allow everyone else to read them." Or in twitter's case, "my stream of consciousness is so important [or insert "funny," "witty," "cool," or whatever]..."
In my experience, while listening to people is definitely a Good Thing, I don't need to listen or read your every thought. For the most part, it gets fairly predictable after a few blog posts. And, frankly, for the most part, I don't really care. I don't care what someone's dog ate:)
The idea that my thoughts really SHOULD be read by other people seems to be an egotistical way to go about your life. And, incidentally, if most people have that attitude - which I think most do, it seems to be human nature to overinflate one's importance in one's own view - then reading other people's blogs won't be very consistent...
And of course, I'm posting this on slashdot because this comment is important and everyone should read it....:P
Benefit of the doubt would be "they've made lots of good products, therefore this one will be good.
This isn't benefit of the doubt, this is more guilt by association.
Saying that they historically have not done well thus they won't do well now is... well, not a very informed opinion, IMO. How's that for a compromise.
My main point is pretty simple - MS can, and has, produced some good products. If they work for you (or me, or whomever), good. Just because MS has produced some really bad products doesn't mean I should just presume all of them are bad (even if MOST of them are, or whatever your opinion are) and not even try it and see if it's a good thing.
It's the same attitude as the proverbial Apple fanboy, only the opposite. Instead of "Apple is awesome, all their products are better than any other product by another company," it's "Micro$oft is horrible, all their products are worse than any other product by another company!"
just that Apple right now doesn't face any coherent competition
You are apparently really just speaking of two of Apple's "products" though: iPhone and Music.
Great. What about hardware, operating systems/software...? I would think the idea behind predicting Apple's downfall is really just counting how many of their eggs are in one basket, and how close others are at taking that basket.
OTOH, I'm not a fan of "Apple stinks" or "Apple is going down hill fast now that Jobs is gone" comments, either. I also generally dislike the idea that Apple's iPhone is the greatest thing since MacOS... which usually comes from Apple-ite type people. Not to mention that the comments along the lines of "Microsoft cannot produce any quality products [therefore, this new one can't be good]."
Strange usag eof the word "occult." Since Christianity is one of those belief systems that typically includes no-abortion, and since you aren't referring to stem cells specifically here, I'd venture to say you're calling Christianity occult?
The word occult comes from the Latin word occultus (clandestine, hidden, secret), referring to "knowledge of the hidden"
And, of course, the word is typically used to describe a specific "occult" religion. Which Christianity is not... neither the Latin definition nor the religion.
Unless you're trying to say that the opinion (of not wanting fetuses aborted) comes from "hidden knowledge." As opposed to a purely scientific view, I suppose, which determines when human life begins by... ?
I have a variety of personal sites (that are public but nobody visits them, of course), including one for my culinary experiments, music (composition), computer science, a blog, hosting random stuff that I need from other computers or to give links to people, etc.
If you have no hobby, maybe a calendar app or to-do list that's easily integrated into "everything." Instead of using an online one that isn't. (unfortunately, I don't know of any such things... any ideas, anyone?)
Probably "off topic," but it's interesting that they promised quite a bit in order to be allowed to have the Olympics. Makes me wonder about other promises. Makes me glad to live in the US.:)
I've waited for years for a decent swordfighting game. That doesn't have to use a keyboard or controller that's obviously not suited for actually controlling the sword movements themselves. It would be awesome to be able to simply move your arm like you would a sword... or better yet, put a sword* in your hand and use that.
If it was based purely on "hasn't lived that life" then there is no need to mention a white male or a Latina woman.
Not to mention the actual full context of more than just the short sentence:
Whether born from experience or inherent physiological or cultural differences, a possibility I abhor less or discount less than my colleague Judge Cedarbaum, our gender and national origins may and will make a difference in our judging. Justice O'Connor has often been cited as saying that a wise old man and wise old woman will reach the same conclusion in deciding cases. I am not so sure Justice O'Connor is the author of that line since Professor Resnik attributes that line to Supreme Court Justice Coyle. I am also not so sure that I agree with the statement. First, as Professor Martha Minnow has noted, there can never be a universal definition of wise. Second, I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life.
It's not quite as blatant as most people are assuming from the one sentence at the end. However, she clearly pits a "Latina woman" against a "white male." That's a very interesting choice. To me, it demonstrates that she has a bit of a bone to pick with "white males." Why couldn't she have chosen, I dunno, an female Arab and a male Indian? Why did she choose her race/gender and the white male.
Secondly, she seems to think that "inherent physiological or cultural differences" come to play in decisions. I agree with what my definitions of those terms are, and my beliefs as to where they come from, but I don't know what her definitions of "physiological" and "cultural" and "inherent" are when used in the same phrase.... and later mentioning specific races.
All in all... it was, at the very least, an unwise thing to say. I don't think she she was acting the part of the "wise Latina woman" at the time she gave this particular speech, nor at the time she delivered her opinion on the firefighter thing... which, interestingly, seems to be directly related to her thoughts about "white males" and "inherent" qualities. If I put this speech and that decision together, I'd come up with something about white males being inherently racist and thus this firefighter promotion thing couldn't have been fair, because if it was fair, it would have to include more non-white males (and females?). Because non-white people come to better decisions with their inherent physiological and cultural differences, and the different lives that they lived.
Well, more often than not. Soften the blow a bit. Just more often than not. Or something.
But that doesn't quite make sense. Can you actually prove to me that, I don't know, that a force called gravity actually exists? I know I can see the effects of it. I know, old horse that's been beaten to death.
So, let's just take the basic claim "God exists." Can you prove to me (1) He doesn't? No... for that matter, it's extremely hard to prove any negative statement, scientifically, unless it can be mathematically proven.
Next question. (2) If I claim He does exist and give you some forms of evidence, why is it you would call me a liar? (or is that not one of the lies?) Now, I'm not saying you can try to convince me it "doesn't make sense" or that there are, I don't know, contradictions or something like that. But saying that it is a lie is implying two things. (1) Your position (in this hypothetical case, "God does not exist") is true, and (2) My position ("God does exist") is false and I know it is false.
My proposal for this hypothetical situation: by calling me a liar and implying those two things seems to more point to you being a liar than me being a liar. (1) Your position is just as improvable as mine, if not more so (easier to show something to exist than show it not to exist); (2) Presuming that you know what I am thinking is generally a dangerous assumption (that I know its false, thus that I am lying.. presuming "lying" implies a willful lie, and not a lie out of ignorance - which would better be termed a "mistake" I suppose?).
[...] so the only lies they tell are the ones that are not verifiably false.
That's an interesting definition of a lie. If it's not verifiably false, that would mean it could be true. So what you're saying is that the the beliefs that Christians lie about are the ones you think are false?
Hehe, failed artist. That would imply I had tried to succeed already.;)
And would also imply I am blaming copyright infringement for my failure. If I could point to illegal distribution of my work as lowering my income from those works, it'd imply I had works that were making money. Which I don't. And the fact that I don't has nothing to do with copyrights...
That assumes that I released it for the public. Or does simply writing it down constitute releasing for public?
As to it being part of our culture, that's fine. It can be part of our culture and still be owned by someone, just as tangible objects (cars, houses) are part of our culture but aren't owned by anyone. Unless, of course, you are trying to boil down a book to an "idea" - e.g., the idea of living in a house is cultural - but that doesn't work, since you can't print out copies of an idea, can you? Sure, a description of an idea you could. But a book isn't just a description of an idea. Nor is music, etc.
I guess I don't understand the public consumption == public domain... or, at least, I don't understand why that SHOULD be the case.
It's not a gut-level bias against anybody getting anything for free. It's a bias against having my creation distributed for free without my permission.
I'm a composer, and some of my sheet music is totally free, for various reasons. The only thing I don't want people to do is put their name on it and pretend its theirs. Short of that, I don't care if they make 10,000 copies and start recording it and making tons of money. That'd be awesome if they did that.
But there are some scores of mine that I DON'T offer for free and don't want freely distributed. I don't take much precaution against doing so... anyone can e-mail a PDF or print out more copies, so it's quite easy to "pirate" it.
The point is this. I want to be the one that says "This one is free" and "this one isn't." Maybe the free one took me 10 minutes and the non-free one took me 5 years.
It doesn't matter if you can show me that if I released it for free I would make more money... even if (and I'm not saying it isn't) that were true, that doesn't mean you should be able to force me to do that "for my own good."
And if you think the law shouldn't protect my works from being distributed without my permission simply because that's what you think... well, why should your opinion hold more weight than my opinion? Especially when it's my work and not yours.:) You can do what you want with yours.
That sounds "Mine! Mine!"-ish but isn't that the way the world works? It IS mine. I put tangible amounts of money and intangible amounts of effort and time into producing it. Why should you be allowed to control who gets to use/see/whatever it? You weren't the one who put effort, money, time, and whatever else, into it...
Slashdot Mirror
What's wrong with this picture? Clearly she would have never spent that much on music...
I don't at all agree with the $80k per song thing, of course. But I have to object to your logic. You're basically saying that the only damages an artist, record label, publisher, etc., can have from pirating - whether actual pirating or not - is loss of sales to the pirate.
Let's put it in software terms, it's easier. I pirate a computer game. I copy it for all my friends that, for purpose of argument, would have bought it. I have 100 friends. Damage to publisher of said computer game would be 101xCostOfGame (all). Not 1xCostOfGame (mine).
Just because I wouldn't have spent that much doesn't mean I can't give it away enough to damage a publisher more than than what I would have spent.
Of course, we can argue all we want about who is really making money and that it's not fair to the artist either and boo on DRM and all that, but that's not the point of my post anyways :)
Continuing to support Jammie Thomas-Whateveritis only makes us look like stupid pirates.
Maybe some people are just stupid pirates?
Some people's attitudes going into it ("I don't care about law, it doesn't make sense to me so I'm going to download anything and everything I want. In fact, I'll download more than I can ever watch in my lifetime just because I can!") appear to come from a stupid pirate mentality...
Not to say I agree with RIAA, etc., but I don't think I can agree with the other side of stupidity, either. :)
but still, it's a huge mess stiched together
As opposed to which OS? :)
Social conservatives everywhere will exclaim "what an excellent goal!"
Socially conservative != Machiavellian sort of ends-justifies-means. I think I'm "socially conservative," but I'm not stupid enough to think that a good goal = good actions.
This is OT, but oh well. :)
I don't know what I'd do if I were revealed for the shallow, talentless hack that I am. I'd probably kick a puppy, and you wouldn't want that on your conscience.
Based on my, mmm, theological world views, I'm not sure I would very much mind revealing someone's true nature. I think if we were all more honest with ourselves, we would realize two things.
No, I don't want you to kick puppies... nor do I want myself to kick puppies. But I do want to realize who I really am, what my nature is really like, etc. Deluding myself about who and what I am and thinking that I am actually a good person when I'm not may make me have a better ego and may even make some people like me more... right now. When I die, things change, and my delusions will die with me. What happens after I die, if anything, is more important than my 80+ years of deluded thinking.
Not one of those things people like thinking about, though.
Regarding having "somebody," I almost agree. I think everyone "needs" someone who truly cares about them. Sometimes, that means telling the person you care about "Bob, you're being stupid," or even "Bob, you're deceiving yourself." It doesn't always make either person happy, but sometimes it's the most caring thing to do. Building a delusion and helping other people delude themselves just builds up for a crash.
But my beliefs and world view, especially in theology and the "afterlife," are not going to match with most of Slashdot... :)
I wasn't trying to say you can't have a blog and not be important, or (as another poster commented) necessarily have to think you're important to have a blog. My point was that that appears to be the way most bloggers are thinking.
And that's why you can get an article about a slump in blog readers. Which, to me, isn't really news... it's just people getting bored with what the blogger has to say, hehe. :) There will be some people that do have genuinely interesting blogs. Just like there are some people that are wealths of information... fun to talk/listen to.
I have a blog, too. Nobody reads it except my friends that want to read it because they, well, are my friends. Or family. And I don't write too much on it, and when I do, it's just because I wan to write on it and think maybe someone else wants to read it.
It seems the ideas behind twitter, facebook, and blogs are "my thoughts are so important that I'm almost obligated to allow everyone else to read them." Or in twitter's case, "my stream of consciousness is so important [or insert "funny," "witty," "cool," or whatever] ..."
In my experience, while listening to people is definitely a Good Thing, I don't need to listen or read your every thought. For the most part, it gets fairly predictable after a few blog posts. And, frankly, for the most part, I don't really care. I don't care what someone's dog ate :)
The idea that my thoughts really SHOULD be read by other people seems to be an egotistical way to go about your life. And, incidentally, if most people have that attitude - which I think most do, it seems to be human nature to overinflate one's importance in one's own view - then reading other people's blogs won't be very consistent...
And of course, I'm posting this on slashdot because this comment is important and everyone should read it.... :P
Benefit of the doubt would be "they've made lots of good products, therefore this one will be good.
This isn't benefit of the doubt, this is more guilt by association.
Saying that they historically have not done well thus they won't do well now is... well, not a very informed opinion, IMO. How's that for a compromise.
My main point is pretty simple - MS can, and has, produced some good products. If they work for you (or me, or whomever), good. Just because MS has produced some really bad products doesn't mean I should just presume all of them are bad (even if MOST of them are, or whatever your opinion are) and not even try it and see if it's a good thing.
It's the same attitude as the proverbial Apple fanboy, only the opposite. Instead of "Apple is awesome, all their products are better than any other product by another company," it's "Micro$oft is horrible, all their products are worse than any other product by another company!"
Time != Expertise/"Innovation"/Good Design. :)
just that Apple right now doesn't face any coherent competition
You are apparently really just speaking of two of Apple's "products" though: iPhone and Music.
Great. What about hardware, operating systems/software...? I would think the idea behind predicting Apple's downfall is really just counting how many of their eggs are in one basket, and how close others are at taking that basket.
OTOH, I'm not a fan of "Apple stinks" or "Apple is going down hill fast now that Jobs is gone" comments, either. I also generally dislike the idea that Apple's iPhone is the greatest thing since MacOS... which usually comes from Apple-ite type people. Not to mention that the comments along the lines of "Microsoft cannot produce any quality products [therefore, this new one can't be good]."
/random
Yay. Someone got it. :)
Strange usag eof the word "occult." Since Christianity is one of those belief systems that typically includes no-abortion, and since you aren't referring to stem cells specifically here, I'd venture to say you're calling Christianity occult?
The word occult comes from the Latin word occultus (clandestine, hidden, secret), referring to "knowledge of the hidden"
And, of course, the word is typically used to describe a specific "occult" religion. Which Christianity is not... neither the Latin definition nor the religion.
Unless you're trying to say that the opinion (of not wanting fetuses aborted) comes from "hidden knowledge." As opposed to a purely scientific view, I suppose, which determines when human life begins by ... ?
I have a variety of personal sites (that are public but nobody visits them, of course), including one for my culinary experiments, music (composition), computer science, a blog, hosting random stuff that I need from other computers or to give links to people, etc.
If you have no hobby, maybe a calendar app or to-do list that's easily integrated into "everything." Instead of using an online one that isn't. (unfortunately, I don't know of any such things... any ideas, anyone?)
I had no idea example.com was reserved. +e insightful.
Probably "off topic," but it's interesting that they promised quite a bit in order to be allowed to have the Olympics. Makes me wonder about other promises. Makes me glad to live in the US. :)
I've waited for years for a decent swordfighting game. That doesn't have to use a keyboard or controller that's obviously not suited for actually controlling the sword movements themselves. It would be awesome to be able to simply move your arm like you would a sword... or better yet, put a sword* in your hand and use that.
* Not sharp, of course. Think of the children.
If it was based purely on "hasn't lived that life" then there is no need to mention a white male or a Latina woman.
Not to mention the actual full context of more than just the short sentence:
Whether born from experience or inherent physiological or cultural differences, a possibility I abhor less or discount less than my colleague Judge Cedarbaum, our gender and national origins may and will make a difference in our judging. Justice O'Connor has often been cited as saying that a wise old man and wise old woman will reach the same conclusion in deciding cases. I am not so sure Justice O'Connor is the author of that line since Professor Resnik attributes that line to Supreme Court Justice Coyle. I am also not so sure that I agree with the statement. First, as Professor Martha Minnow has noted, there can never be a universal definition of wise. Second, I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life.
It's not quite as blatant as most people are assuming from the one sentence at the end. However, she clearly pits a "Latina woman" against a "white male." That's a very interesting choice. To me, it demonstrates that she has a bit of a bone to pick with "white males." Why couldn't she have chosen, I dunno, an female Arab and a male Indian? Why did she choose her race/gender and the white male.
Secondly, she seems to think that "inherent physiological or cultural differences" come to play in decisions. I agree with what my definitions of those terms are, and my beliefs as to where they come from, but I don't know what her definitions of "physiological" and "cultural" and "inherent" are when used in the same phrase.... and later mentioning specific races.
All in all... it was, at the very least, an unwise thing to say. I don't think she she was acting the part of the "wise Latina woman" at the time she gave this particular speech, nor at the time she delivered her opinion on the firefighter thing... which, interestingly, seems to be directly related to her thoughts about "white males" and "inherent" qualities. If I put this speech and that decision together, I'd come up with something about white males being inherently racist and thus this firefighter promotion thing couldn't have been fair, because if it was fair, it would have to include more non-white males (and females?). Because non-white people come to better decisions with their inherent physiological and cultural differences, and the different lives that they lived.
Well, more often than not. Soften the blow a bit. Just more often than not. Or something.
But that doesn't quite make sense. Can you actually prove to me that, I don't know, that a force called gravity actually exists? I know I can see the effects of it. I know, old horse that's been beaten to death.
So, let's just take the basic claim "God exists." Can you prove to me (1) He doesn't? No... for that matter, it's extremely hard to prove any negative statement, scientifically, unless it can be mathematically proven.
Next question. (2) If I claim He does exist and give you some forms of evidence, why is it you would call me a liar? (or is that not one of the lies?) Now, I'm not saying you can try to convince me it "doesn't make sense" or that there are, I don't know, contradictions or something like that. But saying that it is a lie is implying two things. (1) Your position (in this hypothetical case, "God does not exist") is true, and (2) My position ("God does exist") is false and I know it is false.
My proposal for this hypothetical situation: by calling me a liar and implying those two things seems to more point to you being a liar than me being a liar. (1) Your position is just as improvable as mine, if not more so (easier to show something to exist than show it not to exist); (2) Presuming that you know what I am thinking is generally a dangerous assumption (that I know its false, thus that I am lying.. presuming "lying" implies a willful lie, and not a lie out of ignorance - which would better be termed a "mistake" I suppose?).
[...] so the only lies they tell are the ones that are not verifiably false.
That's an interesting definition of a lie. If it's not verifiably false, that would mean it could be true. So what you're saying is that the the beliefs that Christians lie about are the ones you think are false?
... two years poring over ...
Must have been quite the sweaty fellow. :)
Hehe, failed artist. That would imply I had tried to succeed already. ;)
And would also imply I am blaming copyright infringement for my failure. If I could point to illegal distribution of my work as lowering my income from those works, it'd imply I had works that were making money. Which I don't. And the fact that I don't has nothing to do with copyrights...
That assumes that I released it for the public. Or does simply writing it down constitute releasing for public?
As to it being part of our culture, that's fine. It can be part of our culture and still be owned by someone, just as tangible objects (cars, houses) are part of our culture but aren't owned by anyone. Unless, of course, you are trying to boil down a book to an "idea" - e.g., the idea of living in a house is cultural - but that doesn't work, since you can't print out copies of an idea, can you? Sure, a description of an idea you could. But a book isn't just a description of an idea. Nor is music, etc.
I guess I don't understand the public consumption == public domain... or, at least, I don't understand why that SHOULD be the case.
No, I'm not talking about forever. I mean probably just for part of my lifespan. Not life+75 or whatever.
Last I checked it was life+75 years, yes. I agree, that's silly.
It's not a gut-level bias against anybody getting anything for free. It's a bias against having my creation distributed for free without my permission.
I'm a composer, and some of my sheet music is totally free, for various reasons. The only thing I don't want people to do is put their name on it and pretend its theirs. Short of that, I don't care if they make 10,000 copies and start recording it and making tons of money. That'd be awesome if they did that.
But there are some scores of mine that I DON'T offer for free and don't want freely distributed. I don't take much precaution against doing so... anyone can e-mail a PDF or print out more copies, so it's quite easy to "pirate" it.
The point is this. I want to be the one that says "This one is free" and "this one isn't." Maybe the free one took me 10 minutes and the non-free one took me 5 years.
It doesn't matter if you can show me that if I released it for free I would make more money... even if (and I'm not saying it isn't) that were true, that doesn't mean you should be able to force me to do that "for my own good."
And if you think the law shouldn't protect my works from being distributed without my permission simply because that's what you think ... well, why should your opinion hold more weight than my opinion? Especially when it's my work and not yours. :) You can do what you want with yours.
That sounds "Mine! Mine!"-ish but isn't that the way the world works? It IS mine. I put tangible amounts of money and intangible amounts of effort and time into producing it. Why should you be allowed to control who gets to use/see/whatever it? You weren't the one who put effort, money, time, and whatever else, into it...