The cube really was excellent. The academy doesn't go for movies that aren't widely released, however (I never saw cube in a theatre here). I think the budget was under 1 million...
It was one the rare sci-fi movies that actually made me think (the best kind of movie, IMO). It's too bad that most sci-fi movies these days are nothing more than action flicks. Oh well...nothing beats a book in the end.
I'd have to disagree that the other books in the series are bad, I think the problem is that the first book is simply too good to top. The second book would be the exception I think, that really did read like a book that he put together too quickly because of pressure from the publisher. Books 3 and 4, though, are pretty good (I'm working on book 4 right now). You get more of Herbert's philosophy which I always find interesting. And I certainly have not found the series to be getting boring. He adds enough twists and suprises to keep it interesting.
Being from Minneapolis I heard about this quite a while ago. One of the problems they've been having is actually a bit funny from my perspective but quite unfortunate for them.
Since there are a lot of people out there who frankly don't understand computers and the internet AT ALL, there are a number of people who call information (like 411) and ask for the amazon website/bookstore, not understanding that amazon.com is not an actual store somewhere. So of course the search that the 411 operator comes up with gives them this amazon bookstore in Minneapolis. Even if a very very tiny percent of the nation does this, it doesn't take much to get the phones ringing off the hook and overwhelming the staff at this small bookstore.
The WTO protests were pretty damn effective, I thought. The media might have put a negative spin on it, but the message got out. The media attention allowed the protesters to tell their side of the story, instead of the typical corporate line, or, even more powerful, the fact that people didn't even know what the WTO was or what it does! What percentage of americans do you think knew about the WTO before the protest?
It's unfortunate that a lot of people, yourself included, look down on protesting in the way you do. It's as if you'd prefer to just go with what the corporations say and keep your mouth shut, because thats the "repectable" life.
It's also unfortunate because this is exactly the kind of publicity we need: how many people even know about these bills? This is step one to get them overturned.
The truth is, corporations are scared of the Net. They're afraid that it'll kill off their precious profits. The fact is it won't, but corporations have to adapt, to be willing to throw the old rules out the window for a new set which fits the digital realm.
That is absolutely not a fact, currently it is only a possibility, specifically for any corporation who deals in "information" as you described early in your post. It all depends on what the consumers decide to do with their money, whether its against the current law or not. Here are three possible futures I just thought up, with varying amounts of corporate control:
1) The world slips into a "1984" style environment where the internet is heavily censored and run by corporations, and free flow of information is very limited (so you still have to pay lots of money for your one copy of some music).
2) The world stays similar to what is is today as far as control. A few new corporations figure out how to make money on the internet without imposing copyright protections on the information they distribute, at the cost of having to sell it for much less than the old music corporations would have charged. Most old music corporations die, a few survive by making the price concessions to consumers.
3) Society decides that it has had enough of this corporate bondage and fully supports open formats like mp3. Society also decides it will no longer accept the crap that is spoon fed to them, and becomes pro-active about which music they listen to. All music corporations die, as all music is now purchased directly from the artist at a very low fee that covers studio costs, bandwidth costs, and a bit of profit.
I would prefer to see number three happen, but since I'm usually pessemistic I'd say two or one is more likely. They all depend on what society decides to do (or doesn't do). The technology isn't the variable, it's what we decide to do with it. This is nothing new: technology can be used for good or evil.
Katz talks about how wonderful the Net is in allowing new artists to make it around the record industries selection procedures. The whopping majority of mp3s being traded, however, are the works of the bigshot celebs who have already made it. Sure the new kids have a chance to distribute their music, but it's not as though they've suddenly found an equal market. The primary purpose of mp3s is (and always has been) to steal the latest best-selling albums so that you don't have to fork out a couple bucks for it.
While you're mostly right, Katz has a point, and I'll use myself as an example. I am into techno music, which isn't all THAT popular in the US. Without my mp3's and irc channel, I wouldn't have found out about 80% of what I listen to, because it either isn't available in the US or isn't marketed here so I don't know about it anyway. Or, even worse, it might cost 25 - 30 dollars for an import copy. I'm not going to pay that much. Which leads me to a comment on point number 7:
It all comes down to theft. We want to steal music that other people have spent millions to produce, and they want us to pay for it instead. We're pissed off because they're coming ever closer to preventing us from illegally copying their works. We have no right to be as righteously indignant as Jon Katz has portrayed himself.
While there is a grain of truth in this argument I'm sick of hearing it, because it turns the issue into a right/wrong black/white with no grey area arguement, which it isn't. Record companies are not pure good, mp3 users are not pure bad.
I download illegal mp3's because I will not spend 16 dollars on a cd that cost them some absurd amount of money, like 10 cents. Sure, factor in recording/marketing costs and it goes up, but most of what I listen to isn't marketed anyway.
Record companies don't offer me the business model I want. Namely, downloadable cd's that cost under 5 dollars. This can be done. Actually, it can be done when the record companies, i.e. the middlemen, are out of the picture. While marketing is needed for sales today, I'd like to see an environment where the average citizen is a lot more proactive about what they listen to. I find lots of new music through mp3 sites, I download lots of new songs from artisits I've never heard of and I find out what I like. And (gasp) sometimes I even buy the cd's of these artisits I discovered through mp3's!!!
The whole idea of intellectual property will have to go through a major overhaul, both in law and how our culture views it from an ethics standpoint. Capitalism needs intellectual property rights in today's information age, but the internet throws it right out the window. Therefore I see the internet as being incompatible with capitalism.
The issue hasn't come to the breaking point yet, but I think corporations would agree with me, which is why you see bills passed like the DMCA. They must censor the internet to maintain their interests.
Something I don't often see pointed out is our culture's view of the whole situation. Pirating has been around as long as intellectual property, but keep in mind that "stealing" intellectual property is considered bad in our society.
For better or for worse, many people who share that view become hypocrites when there is something of value you can steal with little chance of being caught or punished.
However, bills like these pass with ease, and anyone who stands against it is painted as a pirate, similar to any other witchhunt in our history. While our vioce can be heard, and it needs to be, it's going to be very hard to change the environment (culture) that allows these bills to pass.
Some colleges seem to think they have a far greater stake in avoiding lawsuits than they do in confronting the real issues involved -- like promoting free expression and diversity in culture. And college students are selective in political issues. There is, for example, a broad-based anti-sweatshop movement on many U.S. campuses, but no equivalently passionate and nationally-organized movement to keep culture free.
Colleges and Universities have ALWAYS been this way. The leaders of change at any of these institutions have always been the students, and the administration and often faculty stand directly in opposion to them. The reason is simple: the people who run these insititutions are wealthy and powerful, and thus they generally stay with the status quo. Lawsuits are bad for PR. Bad PR means less funding. Less funding is less money.
As far as the students, this isn't a very "sexy" issue as far as what students typically take up. Most college students who are also activists don't understand technology well enough to argue this issue anyway. Frankly its very rare for engineering and computer science students to be involved with the community/civil rights/etc. This is very unfortunate.
OK, it's damn hard to predict the future. In fact, its pretty much impossible, anyone who predicts anything correctly has a lot of luck on their side.
So Bruce seems to be extrapolating our current cultural makeup: a cynical and increasingly hopeless and pessemistic society. And as such, while the world sucks and is boring, as he puts in a more elegant fashion, there isn't anything we can do about it.
I like his comments on the business cycle, but he seems to beleive that there isn't a "cultural cycle" as well. I haven't read any of his books (I will soon though, everyone bugs me about reading his books), but my limited studies of history have shown me that there is a cultural cycle as well.
By cultural cycle I refer to the lower class citizens (or whatever they were referred to at any point in time) coming out of the shadows to smack around the powerful every 30 or 40 years. In the early 1900's there was the labor movement, in the 50's and 60's we had civil and social movements. In general these things lead to a better society, even if it wasn't revolutionary. The time may be coming again soon.
Everytime the powerful try to roll back people's rights, things reach a breaking point where these movements seem to happen. People never lose all hope as Bruce seems to suggest. You can't have something without it's opposite being present as well. It's cyclical just like anything else.
That being said I'd have to label Bruce's article as "trendy" more than "insighful". Still, it was a good read.
The same is true of laptops, LCD screens consume lots of power. I don't have exact numbers, but I'd say the LCD takes over 50% of all the power consumed. Thus this isn't necessarily a big deal.
I'm sitting here trying to think this out logically. Why would microsoft do this? This would do several things that I can think of:
Gives linux even more mainstream exposure;
Gives linux credability (at least from those who don't know any better, think of your non-techie boss, etc);
Helps linux in an area where it has been arguably hurting;
Gives businesses another reason to switch to the cheaper and more stable linux: Almost no time re-training office workers who have been working with ms office for years.
Anyone have any idea WHY microsoft would want to do this? I shouldn't even be replying to rumor stories, I guess I'm just bored at work...
It's a pre-emptive rebuttal because it's happened 1000 times before. Especially on slashdot.
Christians fall on a broad spetrum of beliefs and how they live their lives, they are not all abortion clinic bombers or in-your-face preachers, even if this is what the 6 o clock news tells you.
The clergy of his time weren't dummies; they had their own "grand unified theory" of how things worked and how people should behave. If we have made progress since that era, we owe it less to our improved orthodoxies than to the way we've learned to _tap_ the creative energies of those who defy the intellectual status quo, instead of killing them. Slowly, often grudgingly, society discovered that there is something to value in the rancorous, difficult, blasphemous few who gleefully challenge authority. Those who rip away the set pieces of any conservative worldview to reveal disturbing truths that lie beneath and beyond. Such people, though irksome, are also responsible for much progress in the world.
We really need to be careful about patting ourselves on the back here. We might not be killing dissidents today, but they can be marginalized enough to prevent their voices from being heard by more than a handful of people.
Power structures will do anything to maintain their power, they never simply close up shop becuase they realize they aren't working anymore. Many years ago religious structures set the rules including their "absolute truths" and taboos (still true in some countries today). The institutions running things today might not be specifically religious, but they aren't necessarily acting any different.
We need to be especially careful today because of what technology allows us to do, from manipulating public opinion with mass media to the ability to track what people do without them knowing it.
Even the scientific community is guilty. They have their own absolute truths, and anyone who tries to cross them gets cut down until the evidence is too overwhelming to ignore.
Don't get me wrong, the human race has made a lot of progress, I just don't think we've made as much as everyone else seems to think we have.
Oh get over yourself. You said it yourself, record companies screw over artisits.
Technology has eliminated the need for this middleman, the record company. Therefore, I will bypass them because they are unneeded. They don't offer me the cost model that I want: Where the album costs at most 5 dollars and about 80% of the money goes to the artist. The technology isn't totally ready as far as bandwidth, but the record companies aren't exactly moving twords this model anyway.
I buy about 1 cd a month, usually AFTER I've heard it on mp3. So I end up screwing over some artists out of a few cents. Hopefully they'll realize that there are alternatives out there. Its limited as to whats out there, but all we need is one company willing to run the cost structure I just mentioned, and thats all it will take.
Record companies would rather push proprietary formats with SDMI, or even worse, a pay per play format!!
Record companies view new technology as a reason for prices to increase for the consumer, while driving their own costs down. This is COMPLETELY unacceptable, and I will not go with it.
How many CD's are worth 16 dollars? I'd say maybe 10% of my collection qualifies. Do you realize CD prices haven't changed in about 10 years? Am I the only one who is bothered by this?
The whole stealing argument is legitimate, but it isn't the end of it. Record companies are much more immoral than I could ever hope to be.
The redhat 6.1 install went great for me. I have a voodoo3, and an amd k6. No problems at all. Make sure you choose the correct monitor, though, as the other poster pointed out.
I write this because my last attempt at using linux was redhat 5.2, and I must say the 6.1 installer is FAR superior. It took me hours to get my mouse and monitor configured properly with 5.2, 6.1 did it for me.
Exactly. I'll believe it when I see it AND am able to afford it. This definatly isn't the first time we've seen crazy claims like this that claim they can leap a whole generation on the technology scale.
Also note their self-congratulatory article on their stock as well. hmph.
If you want to get a good turntable, you have to pay up around 500 dollars, for a deck like the technics 1200. This is the deck that almost all DJ's use. It is driven by magnets instead of a belt. It looks cool as hell too.
I have a cheap 120 dollar sony turntable. I bought it about 2 years ago and it works great. I use it for my small collection of techno that I have on vinyl. To me it sounds almost as good as my cd's. I got it at best buy as well, most larger electronics stores actually still keep 1 or 2 models in stock.
Basically you're looking at spending about 90 - 140 dollars for my cheap turntable which works well enough, or you have to spend at least 400 dollars to get a good DJ style turntable. There are also "audiophile" type decks for up to 10k, but you wouldn't want those....I think its funny that they even exist:)
Well, here comes my typical rant. You've been warned.
The article didn't say much that I haven't already heard but the author was correct in saying that we aren't going to win this case. The cards are stacked heavily in the plaintiff's favor.
Or, I should say, we can't win at this level. We have to go down a few levels, to where the plaintiff's power comes from.
I've always beleived that the average person has all the power there is if we act together, and that the average person is reasonable. However, people don't support us for a few reasons:
1) In school you are not taught to think for yourself, you are taught to submit to authority, not to ask questions, and not to try and change "the way things are" which leads to #2:
2) Most information channels are controlled by the same type of people who are the plaintiffs, they have the same agenda. With the assumption that the media is a factual source of knowledge, people aren't going to ask questions. Our community is discredited with one word, hackers. This is a very powerful ability. So even though we have all the power, we've already lost because of public opinion.
So what do we do? Organize, protest, and educate. This needs to include a lot more people that are in this community as well, because all facets of society contribute to the problems we have. Our gains might be small but at least we can get the spiral of society to move upward rather than downward. I'm not talking about organizing, portesting, and educating only on the level of this specific issue either. I mean society in general. As long as we have corporations, a government who supports them, and an apathetic population, (ALL 3, simply removing the government solves nothing) these kind of problems will never be solved without having to fight tooth and nail every time with little chance of success.
Fortunatly information channels have opened up a bit, I think the internet was a good part of the reason that DIVX failed, but I think it would have failed anyway. At any rate, it can be a big help, which is why this particular community needs to fight as hard as we can on all these issues.
We won't win the fight now, but the more we can educate, the more press we can get to hear our side, the better chances of succes we have in the future.
Well, I'm always looking for explanations. I don't use God as a universal excuse. Just keep in mind that religious people fall along a very broad spectrum as far as their thoughts on this issue, from pretty closed minded to very open minded (like the original poster amigiphory (sp?) ).
However: being closed minded doesn't mean you will try to force your beliefs on others, nor does it mean you can't be happy. It might be an "ignorance is bliss" kind of happy, but its still happiness. I know you didn't explicitly argue this, but it seemed this might be in the back of your mind.
I think pity is a pretty strong word...I'd feel sadness at best I think.
Some people find questions like these terrifying. An infinite mental abyss they teeter on the edge of. I find the edge both facinating and excilerating and pity those that use a curtain of religion to it hide behind.
I pity people who feel superior for this reason. Your arrogance doesn't impress me. Some people actually feel a spiritual aspect to their lives, and if you don't, thats fine, but don't tell me that all religious people are hiding behind a curtain. The whole debate has been polarized (actually its not even a debate anymore, only a shouting match) by immturity on both sides, extreme right-wingers, and scientists.
I beleive that some form of evolution occurs, that the big bang is the best theory for how the universe started. I'm always fascinated by advancements in physics, and contine to try to learn about them. This doesn't mean that I don't believe in a god, and in fact I do. Your opinion has placed you squarely at one end of the spectrum.
To me Katz is somewhat mediocre, but thats because he's a straight up journalist. His "gee whiz" view of technology and "geeks" doesn't really give him a lot of credability. You all know the rest of the substanciated complaints on him.
But you have to admit, when you compare him to the average journalist, even the average tech journalist, he pretty much blows them out of the water. His willingness to challege prevailing views gives his a certain amount of respect from me that I think others here aren't willing to give. Here I am referring to the columbine stories, his articles that challenge capitalism (to an extent) go beyond most of what I read anywhere else, for an author who I would consider "mainstream". He wouldn't go as far as most here, but, in todays world, you just can't if you want to be taken seriously by a lot of people. Change comes slowly, and it doesn't always move in the right direction.
In a way he helps us gain mainstream credability. I think he overstates his importance, especially with this new book in this area, but it's there. At least he attempts to connect the "geek world" to "mainstream society". His article in playboy clarified that for me a bit.
Katz does serve a purpose as I just stated above. If you don't want to read his articles, you don't have to. Even if he made it through the Katz filter.
Now I just hope my employer didn't notice I was viewing pages from playboy.com....
There is a World court, but since international news coverage is very weak in the US, you never hear about it. They've ruled against the US before (i'm tired, don't have any proof or issues on me) but they really have no power over the US, which is the main point. The same thing goes for the UN. Nobody f*cks with the US, for obvious reasons.
This is basically to draw publicity to what the US and UK are doing, and I'm all for it in that respect.
It doesn't suprise me that the media would start rumors like this, but in a way Lucas brought attention to himself because of the first three episodes seriously lacking minority actors.
I don't claim that Lucas is racist, but he does seem a bit "culturally sheltered" if you know what I mean. *shrug*
We'll be seeing more of these type of rumors I'm sure. This time around, not as many people will be listening after everyone saw the mediocre (at best) episode one.
The scary thing is that it really might be the whole story. This doesn't suprise me at all, knowing about this particular corporation. They've been going after people ever since the sick out started.
I've lived in Minneapolis all of my life so far, and since Northwest is based here, I know them all too well. This will sound like flamebait twords them, and, well, it probably is. All the things I state are from my recollection of news reports over a number of years, so my comments won't be 100% accurate, but you'll get the picture.
If you were to put all corporations out there on a scale from best to worst, as far as how they treat their employees, and their customer service, Northwest would be VERY close to the bottom. They are truly horrible. The people who run the company are arrogant bastards. They've proven this again and again.
They are at perpetual war with their unions. Now you could probably say that about any company who has unions, but I think the situation at Northwest is worse than it is at, say, the big 3 automakers. A strike by one of the mechanics unions in the summer of 98 shut them down for almost 2 months if I remember correctly. The flight attendants have had the worst situation of all the unions there the past year or two. I beleive they haven't had an official contract for three years. After years of watching the news, it became obvious how much seething anger the executives have for these damned peon workers who dare ask for a raise. If they didn't care about PR, this is what they'd be saying.
Here in Minneapolis they control about 90% of all the gates. The Metropolitan Airport Commision (I beleive) controls who gets which gates, and for some odd reason, they decided to give Northwest a near monopoly! Hmm, I wonder what kind of money was being passed under the table....
So of course, what happened to airline prices? They went up, up, up! If I compare a flight from Minneapolis to any given city, and a flight from Des Moines (few hundred miles away) and that same other city, the Des Moines flight will usually cost less.
They've used public money before for their own good as well. They're the largest employer in the state, so the government here always caves into them. In 1994 I believe, they were on the brink of bankruptcy. The government gave them something like 50 to 100 million of MY tax dollars. A few years later, they were highly profitable again. Did this money come back to us? Of course not.
While this makes me sick (I have venemous anger for the northwest executives because I know people who work for them) this isn't that suprising. It isn't that the people who run them are a lot more evil than everyone else, this could happen anywhere. It's the state of the world that allowed them to become what they are, just like microsoft or hitler, for that matter.
So like I always say, get out there and protest, becuase we don't have many other options...
If anyone else from Minneapolis has more accurate figures on what I've stated here, please reply.
Give me a break...protesting is how we got where we are. Theories about liberals running things? Do you know what theories have to do with reality? Little to none. Give anyone a computer, and he'll type out some theories for you. Rush Limbaugh types are a dime a dozen.
You analogy about carbon dioxide isn't looking at the whole picture. You're only concerning yourself within the box of capitalism.
Environmental concern has to be concern #1. If the environment gets ruined, we get ruined. Our method of getting and distributing scare resources has some connections to reality but is mostly artificial. When you look at the direction that technology takes (or is pushed in) products are developed that make money, not products that benefit man. They aren't developed with the environment in mind.
Things have always been this way, in our country for sure, as my knowledge of history is limited. Here is my simplified view:
There are two sources of pressure in our society (any "structured" society that ever existed really):
1. The pressure from those with power to take away the rights of the "common people". Or, more generally, to keep the population submissive and "out of trouble" to maintain the power they have over the common person. In modern societies, money becomes part of the equation, particularly over the past 100 years in which corporations have come to have real power.
2. The pressure from the common man for more rights, or a more egalitarian society. Basically the opposite of #1.
The pressure from #1 is nearly constant, from my knowledge anyway. #2 is the variable, and our rights tend to increase or decline depending on how high it is. The last big social movements in the 60's saw a large increase in rights, socially and politically. I think most would agree here that those rights have been sliding back since the early 70's.
Or should I practice civil disobedience - thumb my nose to the super-corporations, risk life and property and stand up and say simply "No more"?
I tend to think this is our only option. The institutions are run by those in power, so while you might get small gains out of them, you won't get fundamental change becuase they like the way things are (or they want it to move in the opposite direction). Our socity has been there before, of course you don't hear too much about this in school, they wouldn't want you going out and "causing trouble".
Civil disobediance is basically how we got all our rights. Not just on paper in the constitution, but actual enforcement. Civil rights for minorities and labor rights come to mind for the century that just ended. You can't just file a lawsuit, you have to get out there and protest or form unions to shut down the factories if you want them to listen. You might consider reading "A people's history of the united states" by Howard Zinn. Basically it's the story of our country from the point of view of the little guy who gets shoved around (indians, laborers, women, blacks, etc) and how their fights got us most of the rights we have today.
Slashdot Mirror
The cube really was excellent. The academy doesn't go for movies that aren't widely released, however (I never saw cube in a theatre here). I think the budget was under 1 million...
It was one the rare sci-fi movies that actually made me think (the best kind of movie, IMO). It's too bad that most sci-fi movies these days are nothing more than action flicks. Oh well...nothing beats a book in the end.
I'd have to disagree that the other books in the series are bad, I think the problem is that the first book is simply too good to top. The second book would be the exception I think, that really did read like a book that he put together too quickly because of pressure from the publisher. Books 3 and 4, though, are pretty good (I'm working on book 4 right now). You get more of Herbert's philosophy which I always find interesting. And I certainly have not found the series to be getting boring. He adds enough twists and suprises to keep it interesting.
Being from Minneapolis I heard about this quite a while ago. One of the problems they've been having is actually a bit funny from my perspective but quite unfortunate for them.
Since there are a lot of people out there who frankly don't understand computers and the internet AT ALL, there are a number of people who call information (like 411) and ask for the amazon website/bookstore, not understanding that amazon.com is not an actual store somewhere. So of course the search that the 411 operator comes up with gives them this amazon bookstore in Minneapolis. Even if a very very tiny percent of the nation does this, it doesn't take much to get the phones ringing off the hook and overwhelming the staff at this small bookstore.
The WTO protests were pretty damn effective, I thought. The media might have put a negative spin on it, but the message got out. The media attention allowed the protesters to tell their side of the story, instead of the typical corporate line, or, even more powerful, the fact that people didn't even know what the WTO was or what it does! What percentage of americans do you think knew about the WTO before the protest?
It's unfortunate that a lot of people, yourself included, look down on protesting in the way you do. It's as if you'd prefer to just go with what the corporations say and keep your mouth shut, because thats the "repectable" life.
It's also unfortunate because this is exactly the kind of publicity we need: how many people even know about these bills? This is step one to get them overturned.
The truth is, corporations are scared of the Net. They're afraid that it'll kill off their precious profits. The fact is it won't, but corporations have to adapt, to be willing to throw the old rules out the window for a new set which fits the digital realm.
That is absolutely not a fact, currently it is only a possibility, specifically for any corporation who deals in "information" as you described early in your post. It all depends on what the consumers decide to do with their money, whether its against the current law or not. Here are three possible futures I just thought up, with varying amounts of corporate control:
1)
The world slips into a "1984" style environment where the internet is heavily censored and run by corporations, and free flow of information is very limited (so you still have to pay lots of money for your one copy of some music).
2)
The world stays similar to what is is today as far as control. A few new corporations figure out how to make money on the internet without imposing copyright protections on the information they distribute, at the cost of having to sell it for much less than the old music corporations would have charged. Most old music corporations die, a few survive by making the price concessions to consumers.
3)
Society decides that it has had enough of this corporate bondage and fully supports open formats like mp3. Society also decides it will no longer accept the crap that is spoon fed to them, and becomes pro-active about which music they listen to. All music corporations die, as all music is now purchased directly from the artist at a very low fee that covers studio costs, bandwidth costs, and a bit of profit.
I would prefer to see number three happen, but since I'm usually pessemistic I'd say two or one is more likely. They all depend on what society decides to do (or doesn't do). The technology isn't the variable, it's what we decide to do with it. This is nothing new: technology can be used for good or evil.
Katz talks about how wonderful the Net is in allowing new artists to make it around the record industries selection procedures. The whopping majority of mp3s being traded, however, are the works of the bigshot celebs who have already made it. Sure the new kids have a chance to distribute their music, but it's not as though they've suddenly found an equal market. The primary purpose of mp3s is (and always has been) to steal the latest best-selling albums so that you don't have to fork out a couple bucks for it.
While you're mostly right, Katz has a point, and I'll use myself as an example. I am into techno music, which isn't all THAT popular in the US. Without my mp3's and irc channel, I wouldn't have found out about 80% of what I listen to, because it either isn't available in the US or isn't marketed here so I don't know about it anyway. Or, even worse, it might cost 25 - 30 dollars for an import copy. I'm not going to pay that much. Which leads me to a comment on point number 7:
It all comes down to theft. We want to steal music that other people have spent millions to produce, and they want us to pay for it instead. We're pissed off because they're coming ever closer to preventing us from illegally copying their works. We have no right to be as righteously indignant as Jon Katz has portrayed himself.
While there is a grain of truth in this argument I'm sick of hearing it, because it turns the issue into a right/wrong black/white with no grey area arguement, which it isn't. Record companies are not pure good, mp3 users are not pure bad.
I download illegal mp3's because I will not spend 16 dollars on a cd that cost them some absurd amount of money, like 10 cents. Sure, factor in recording/marketing costs and it goes up, but most of what I listen to isn't marketed anyway.
Record companies don't offer me the business model I want. Namely, downloadable cd's that cost under 5 dollars. This can be done. Actually, it can be done when the record companies, i.e. the middlemen, are out of the picture. While marketing is needed for sales today, I'd like to see an environment where the average citizen is a lot more proactive about what they listen to. I find lots of new music through mp3 sites, I download lots of new songs from artisits I've never heard of and I find out what I like. And (gasp) sometimes I even buy the cd's of these artisits I discovered through mp3's!!!
The whole idea of intellectual property will have to go through a major overhaul, both in law and how our culture views it from an ethics standpoint. Capitalism needs intellectual property rights in today's information age, but the internet throws it right out the window. Therefore I see the internet as being incompatible with capitalism.
The issue hasn't come to the breaking point yet, but I think corporations would agree with me, which is why you see bills passed like the DMCA. They must censor the internet to maintain their interests.
Something I don't often see pointed out is our culture's view of the whole situation. Pirating has been around as long as intellectual property, but keep in mind that "stealing" intellectual property is considered bad in our society.
For better or for worse, many people who share that view become hypocrites when there is something of value you can steal with little chance of being caught or punished.
However, bills like these pass with ease, and anyone who stands against it is painted as a pirate, similar to any other witchhunt in our history. While our vioce can be heard, and it needs to be, it's going to be very hard to change the environment (culture) that allows these bills to pass.
Some colleges seem to think they have a far greater stake in avoiding lawsuits than they do in confronting the real issues involved -- like promoting free expression and diversity in culture. And college students are selective in political issues. There is, for example, a broad-based anti-sweatshop movement on many U.S. campuses, but no equivalently passionate and nationally-organized movement to keep culture free.
Colleges and Universities have ALWAYS been this way. The leaders of change at any of these institutions have always been the students, and the administration and often faculty stand directly in opposion to them. The reason is simple: the people who run these insititutions are wealthy and powerful, and thus they generally stay with the status quo. Lawsuits are bad for PR. Bad PR means less funding. Less funding is less money.
As far as the students, this isn't a very "sexy" issue as far as what students typically take up. Most college students who are also activists don't understand technology well enough to argue this issue anyway. Frankly its very rare for engineering and computer science students to be involved with the community/civil rights/etc. This is very unfortunate.
OK, it's damn hard to predict the future. In fact, its pretty much impossible, anyone who predicts anything correctly has a lot of luck on their side.
So Bruce seems to be extrapolating our current cultural makeup: a cynical and increasingly hopeless and pessemistic society. And as such, while the world sucks and is boring, as he puts in a more elegant fashion, there isn't anything we can do about it.
I like his comments on the business cycle, but he seems to beleive that there isn't a "cultural cycle" as well. I haven't read any of his books (I will soon though, everyone bugs me about reading his books), but my limited studies of history have shown me that there is a cultural cycle as well.
By cultural cycle I refer to the lower class citizens (or whatever they were referred to at any point in time) coming out of the shadows to smack around the powerful every 30 or 40 years. In the early 1900's there was the labor movement, in the 50's and 60's we had civil and social movements. In general these things lead to a better society, even if it wasn't revolutionary. The time may be coming again soon.
Everytime the powerful try to roll back people's rights, things reach a breaking point where these movements seem to happen. People never lose all hope as Bruce seems to suggest. You can't have something without it's opposite being present as well. It's cyclical just like anything else.
That being said I'd have to label Bruce's article as "trendy" more than "insighful". Still, it was a good read.
The same is true of laptops, LCD screens consume lots of power. I don't have exact numbers, but I'd say the LCD takes over 50% of all the power consumed. Thus this isn't necessarily a big deal.
I'm sitting here trying to think this out logically. Why would microsoft do this? This would do several things that I can think of:
Gives linux even more mainstream exposure;
Gives linux credability (at least from those who don't know any better, think of your non-techie boss, etc);
Helps linux in an area where it has been arguably hurting;
Gives businesses another reason to switch to the cheaper and more stable linux: Almost no time re-training office workers who have been working with ms office for years.
Anyone have any idea WHY microsoft would want to do this? I shouldn't even be replying to rumor stories, I guess I'm just bored at work...
It's a pre-emptive rebuttal because it's happened 1000 times before. Especially on slashdot.
Christians fall on a broad spetrum of beliefs and how they live their lives, they are not all abortion clinic bombers or in-your-face preachers, even if this is what the 6 o clock news tells you.
The clergy of his time weren't dummies; they had their own "grand unified theory" of how things worked and how people should behave. If we have made progress since that era, we owe it less to our improved orthodoxies than to the way we've learned to _tap_ the creative energies of those who defy the intellectual status quo, instead of killing them. Slowly, often grudgingly, society discovered that there is something to value in the rancorous, difficult, blasphemous few who gleefully challenge authority. Those who rip away the set pieces of any conservative worldview to reveal disturbing truths that lie beneath and beyond. Such people, though irksome, are also responsible for much progress in the world.
We really need to be careful about patting ourselves on the back here. We might not be killing dissidents today, but they can be marginalized enough to prevent their voices from being heard by more than a handful of people.
Power structures will do anything to maintain their power, they never simply close up shop becuase they realize they aren't working anymore. Many years ago religious structures set the rules including their "absolute truths" and taboos (still true in some countries today). The institutions running things today might not be specifically religious, but they aren't necessarily acting any different.
We need to be especially careful today because of what technology allows us to do, from manipulating public opinion with mass media to the ability to track what people do without them knowing it.
Even the scientific community is guilty. They have their own absolute truths, and anyone who tries to cross them gets cut down until the evidence is too overwhelming to ignore.
Don't get me wrong, the human race has made a lot of progress, I just don't think we've made as much as everyone else seems to think we have.
Oh get over yourself. You said it yourself, record companies screw over artisits.
Technology has eliminated the need for this middleman, the record company. Therefore, I will bypass them because they are unneeded. They don't offer me the cost model that I want: Where the album costs at most 5 dollars and about 80% of the money goes to the artist. The technology isn't totally ready as far as bandwidth, but the record companies aren't exactly moving twords this model anyway.
I buy about 1 cd a month, usually AFTER I've heard it on mp3. So I end up screwing over some artists out of a few cents. Hopefully they'll realize that there are alternatives out there. Its limited as to whats out there, but all we need is one company willing to run the cost structure I just mentioned, and thats all it will take.
Record companies would rather push proprietary formats with SDMI, or even worse, a pay per play format!!
Record companies view new technology as a reason for prices to increase for the consumer, while driving their own costs down. This is COMPLETELY unacceptable, and I will not go with it.
How many CD's are worth 16 dollars? I'd say maybe 10% of my collection qualifies. Do you realize CD prices haven't changed in about 10 years? Am I the only one who is bothered by this?
The whole stealing argument is legitimate, but it isn't the end of it. Record companies are much more immoral than I could ever hope to be.
The redhat 6.1 install went great for me. I have a voodoo3, and an amd k6. No problems at all. Make sure you choose the correct monitor, though, as the other poster pointed out.
I write this because my last attempt at using linux was redhat 5.2, and I must say the 6.1 installer is FAR superior. It took me hours to get my mouse and monitor configured properly with 5.2, 6.1 did it for me.
Exactly. I'll believe it when I see it AND am able to afford it. This definatly isn't the first time we've seen crazy claims like this that claim they can leap a whole generation on the technology scale.
Also note their self-congratulatory article on their stock as well. hmph.
If you want to get a good turntable, you have to pay up around 500 dollars, for a deck like the technics 1200. This is the deck that almost all DJ's use. It is driven by magnets instead of a belt. It looks cool as hell too.
:)
I have a cheap 120 dollar sony turntable. I bought it about 2 years ago and it works great. I use it for my small collection of techno that I have on vinyl. To me it sounds almost as good as my cd's. I got it at best buy as well, most larger electronics stores actually still keep 1 or 2 models in stock.
Basically you're looking at spending about 90 - 140 dollars for my cheap turntable which works well enough, or you have to spend at least 400 dollars to get a good DJ style turntable. There are also "audiophile" type decks for up to 10k, but you wouldn't want those....I think its funny that they even exist
Well, here comes my typical rant. You've been warned.
The article didn't say much that I haven't already heard but the author was correct in saying that we aren't going to win this case. The cards are stacked heavily in the plaintiff's favor.
Or, I should say, we can't win at this level. We have to go down a few levels, to where the plaintiff's power comes from.
I've always beleived that the average person has all the power there is if we act together, and that the average person is reasonable. However, people don't support us for a few reasons:
1) In school you are not taught to think for yourself, you are taught to submit to authority, not to ask questions, and not to try and change "the way things are" which leads to #2:
2) Most information channels are controlled by the same type of people who are the plaintiffs, they have the same agenda. With the assumption that the media is a factual source of knowledge, people aren't going to ask questions. Our community is discredited with one word, hackers. This is a very powerful ability. So even though we have all the power, we've already lost because of public opinion.
So what do we do? Organize, protest, and educate. This needs to include a lot more people that are in this community as well, because all facets of society contribute to the problems we have. Our gains might be small but at least we can get the spiral of society to move upward rather than downward. I'm not talking about organizing, portesting, and educating only on the level of this specific issue either. I mean society in general. As long as we have corporations, a government who supports them, and an apathetic population, (ALL 3, simply removing the government solves nothing) these kind of problems will never be solved without having to fight tooth and nail every time with little chance of success.
Fortunatly information channels have opened up a bit, I think the internet was a good part of the reason that DIVX failed, but I think it would have failed anyway. At any rate, it can be a big help, which is why this particular community needs to fight as hard as we can on all these issues.
We won't win the fight now, but the more we can educate, the more press we can get to hear our side, the better chances of succes we have in the future.
Well, I'm always looking for explanations. I don't use God as a universal excuse. Just keep in mind that religious people fall along a very broad spectrum as far as their thoughts on this issue, from pretty closed minded to very open minded (like the original poster amigiphory (sp?) ).
However: being closed minded doesn't mean you will try to force your beliefs on others, nor does it mean you can't be happy. It might be an "ignorance is bliss" kind of happy, but its still happiness. I know you didn't explicitly argue this, but it seemed this might be in the back of your mind.
I think pity is a pretty strong word...I'd feel sadness at best I think.
Anyway. Back to work.
Some people find questions like these terrifying. An infinite mental abyss they teeter on the edge of. I find the edge both facinating and excilerating and pity those that use a curtain of religion to it hide behind.
I pity people who feel superior for this reason. Your arrogance doesn't impress me. Some people actually feel a spiritual aspect to their lives, and if you don't, thats fine, but don't tell me that all religious people are hiding behind a curtain. The whole debate has been polarized (actually its not even a debate anymore, only a shouting match) by immturity on both sides, extreme right-wingers, and scientists.
I beleive that some form of evolution occurs, that the big bang is the best theory for how the universe started. I'm always fascinated by advancements in physics, and contine to try to learn about them. This doesn't mean that I don't believe in a god, and in fact I do. Your opinion has placed you squarely at one end of the spectrum.
To me Katz is somewhat mediocre, but thats because he's a straight up journalist. His "gee whiz" view of technology and "geeks" doesn't really give him a lot of credability. You all know the rest of the substanciated complaints on him.
But you have to admit, when you compare him to the average journalist, even the average tech journalist, he pretty much blows them out of the water. His willingness to challege prevailing views gives his a certain amount of respect from me that I think others here aren't willing to give. Here I am referring to the columbine stories, his articles that challenge capitalism (to an extent) go beyond most of what I read anywhere else, for an author who I would consider "mainstream". He wouldn't go as far as most here, but, in todays world, you just can't if you want to be taken seriously by a lot of people. Change comes slowly, and it doesn't always move in the right direction.
In a way he helps us gain mainstream credability. I think he overstates his importance, especially with this new book in this area, but it's there. At least he attempts to connect the "geek world" to "mainstream society". His article in playboy clarified that for me a bit.
Katz does serve a purpose as I just stated above. If you don't want to read his articles, you don't have to. Even if he made it through the Katz filter.
Now I just hope my employer didn't notice I was viewing pages from playboy.com....
There is a World court, but since international news coverage is very weak in the US, you never hear about it. They've ruled against the US before (i'm tired, don't have any proof or issues on me) but they really have no power over the US, which is the main point. The same thing goes for the UN. Nobody f*cks with the US, for obvious reasons.
This is basically to draw publicity to what the US and UK are doing, and I'm all for it in that respect.
It doesn't suprise me that the media would start rumors like this, but in a way Lucas brought attention to himself because of the first three episodes seriously lacking minority actors.
I don't claim that Lucas is racist, but he does seem a bit "culturally sheltered" if you know what I mean. *shrug*
We'll be seeing more of these type of rumors I'm sure. This time around, not as many people will be listening after everyone saw the mediocre (at best) episode one.
The scary thing is that it really might be the whole story. This doesn't suprise me at all, knowing about this particular corporation. They've been going after people ever since the sick out started.
I've lived in Minneapolis all of my life so far, and since Northwest is based here, I know them all too well. This will sound like flamebait twords them, and, well, it probably is. All the things I state are from my recollection of news reports over a number of years, so my comments won't be 100% accurate, but you'll get the picture.
If you were to put all corporations out there on a scale from best to worst, as far as how they treat their employees, and their customer service, Northwest would be VERY close to the bottom. They are truly horrible. The people who run the company are arrogant bastards. They've proven this again and again.
They are at perpetual war with their unions. Now you could probably say that about any company who has unions, but I think the situation at Northwest is worse than it is at, say, the big 3 automakers. A strike by one of the mechanics unions in the summer of 98 shut them down for almost 2 months if I remember correctly. The flight attendants have had the worst situation of all the unions there the past year or two. I beleive they haven't had an official contract for three years. After years of watching the news, it became obvious how much seething anger the executives have for these damned peon workers who dare ask for a raise. If they didn't care about PR, this is what they'd be saying.
Here in Minneapolis they control about 90% of all the gates. The Metropolitan Airport Commision (I beleive) controls who gets which gates, and for some odd reason, they decided to give Northwest a near monopoly! Hmm, I wonder what kind of money was being passed under the table....
So of course, what happened to airline prices? They went up, up, up! If I compare a flight from Minneapolis to any given city, and a flight from Des Moines (few hundred miles away) and that same other city, the Des Moines flight will usually cost less.
They've used public money before for their own good as well. They're the largest employer in the state, so the government here always caves into them. In 1994 I believe, they were on the brink of bankruptcy. The government gave them something like 50 to 100 million of MY tax dollars. A few years later, they were highly profitable again. Did this money come back to us? Of course not.
While this makes me sick (I have venemous anger for the northwest executives because I know people who work for them) this isn't that suprising. It isn't that the people who run them are a lot more evil than everyone else, this could happen anywhere. It's the state of the world that allowed them to become what they are, just like microsoft or hitler, for that matter.
So like I always say, get out there and protest, becuase we don't have many other options...
If anyone else from Minneapolis has more accurate figures on what I've stated here, please reply.
Give me a break...protesting is how we got where we are. Theories about liberals running things? Do you know what theories have to do with reality? Little to none. Give anyone a computer, and he'll type out some theories for you. Rush Limbaugh types are a dime a dozen.
You analogy about carbon dioxide isn't looking at the whole picture. You're only concerning yourself within the box of capitalism.
Environmental concern has to be concern #1. If the environment gets ruined, we get ruined. Our method of getting and distributing scare resources has some connections to reality but is mostly artificial. When you look at the direction that technology takes (or is pushed in) products are developed that make money, not products that benefit man. They aren't developed with the environment in mind.
Things have always been this way, in our country for sure, as my knowledge of history is limited. Here is my simplified view:
There are two sources of pressure in our society (any "structured" society that ever existed really):
1. The pressure from those with power to take away the rights of the "common people". Or, more generally, to keep the population submissive and "out of trouble" to maintain the power they have over the common person. In modern societies, money becomes part of the equation, particularly over the past 100 years in which corporations have come to have real power.
2. The pressure from the common man for more rights, or a more egalitarian society. Basically the opposite of #1.
The pressure from #1 is nearly constant, from my knowledge anyway. #2 is the variable, and our rights tend to increase or decline depending on how high it is. The last big social movements in the 60's saw a large increase in rights, socially and politically. I think most would agree here that those rights have been sliding back since the early 70's.
Or should I practice civil disobedience - thumb my nose to the super-corporations, risk life and property and stand up and say simply "No more"?
I tend to think this is our only option. The institutions are run by those in power, so while you might get small gains out of them, you won't get fundamental change becuase they like the way things are (or they want it to move in the opposite direction). Our socity has been there before, of course you don't hear too much about this in school, they wouldn't want you going out and "causing trouble".
Civil disobediance is basically how we got all our rights. Not just on paper in the constitution, but actual enforcement. Civil rights for minorities and labor rights come to mind for the century that just ended. You can't just file a lawsuit, you have to get out there and protest or form unions to shut down the factories if you want them to listen. You might consider reading "A people's history of the united states" by Howard Zinn. Basically it's the story of our country from the point of view of the little guy who gets shoved around (indians, laborers, women, blacks, etc) and how their fights got us most of the rights we have today.