While on the one hand it is nice to see this pressure to get rid of DRM for "purchased" tracks, it is pretty disappointing to see that the move will also come with an increase in price. They gave us something we didn't want in the first place, and now they're using the taking away of it to justify a higher price? WTF?
Hmmm, it's worse than that. I think Steve and the vermin that run the music industry still have no fundamental idea of the economics of this - well, I'm sure Steve actually does but is just playing the game for the time being.
See, here's the thing... you make it easier to pirate, and you give a stronger incentive to do so by raising the price. No, that isn't going to work. Possibly the fundamental principle of removing the DRM is a good thing - after all it's a cost center for the Labels and simply inconveniences the untechnical, or turns the technical into criminals. It's pointless.
What they actually need to do is remove the DRM and lower the price - that would increase sales and reduce piracy.
In the meantime, the advice as always - buy music direct from the artist, or second hand. Do NOT give the Labels any more money.
this is not about humanity. the only reason this drug even exists is becuase money was able to be spent on R&D to create or discover the compound. Brazil has just put another nail in the coffin of innovation by this move: if a company cannot make money from a discovery or invention the amount of both will decline.
No. You are wrong. Although Brazil is very far from an humanitarian country, in this case this is actually is a good thing for humanity. Have you ever been inside a drug company's offices or production facilities? I have. One thing they have in common is that they are very far from poor.
They can make money. Sure, maybe only bucketfulls as opposed to truckloads, but still plenty of it. They deserve this patent to be broken, they've been fleecing poorer countries left right and center. Brazil may be a very scary country, but they did a good thing with this.
Flash is, for my 2 cents, The Worst web app out there. It breaks usability - it's totally client side and screw the user. It's resource hogging and 98% of the time it's being used where it need never be - it's only the other 2% that's valid legitimate use.
Shockwave is much the same - although mercifully less used and abused than Flash.
Please understand that, in all seriousness, I value Flashblock / Firefox as the singular most valuable software combination currently available on Earth. I love those Flashblock guys, they gave me the web back.
Home based servers currently have none of the above, and until we get cheap at home clustering and easy ability to host apps on home adsl we still wont.
I think you probably mean home T1 - home adsl isn't going to be very useful for most us for hosting our own servers.
TFA is nonsense on so many levels. I like the parent's posts about Writely and do share them. Google and Apple are some of the least stupid companies currently around in the tech market. I'm pretty sure they'll figure something out in 10 years. This also assumes that someone is going to develop server software that's "one-click" enough for the average home user.
Hands up everyone that's helped a friend, relative, neighbor set up their wireless LAN. How do you feel about getting the call to help them set up their server? Not so much? Exactly how I feel about it.
For that reason alone, we are very far away from a home server set up for most poeple.
Try looking it up in a dictionary and considering why it might be an appropriate name. It's actually a fairly witty choice, just apparently outside the working vocabulary of most slashdotters.
Also handy for beating The Vulture Squadron - Dick Dastardly over at Yahoo, Muttley at AOL, Zilly at Skype, and Klunk at MS.
Since TFA is now firmly slashdotted, I'm making the assumption (based on the mention of copyright etc) that these are 12 rules for American bloggers.
Not sure how much these apply to anywhere else - although from what I can piece together from comments, there does seems to be some general good advice in TFA.
Obviously if you are in, for example; China, Turkey, Russia or Thailand, you need 12 very different rules - or your life may be in danger. But Copyright? Nah, if you are not in the US, you need not worry much about this. It's unlikely you'll get a cease and desist, and if you do, depending on your own country and host you may not need to do anything even then.
Yes, very insightful. That's where this all falls down.
It's great that (as in this case) Google sends the Blackhats in to Google hell, although it still doesn't actually do it as successfully as many would like.
But since Google rankings are somewhat esoteric, it's hard for Whitehats to stay white. And in the parent's example - even if you are doing everything honestly there's nothing to stop a competitor killing your business in exactly the way described.
I see three real problems here:
1. Search is still not good enough to meet people's needs - very little tech advance in the past 10 years in fact.
2. Google has too much power.
3. No ability to appeal Google's decisions.
No.1 is obviously very hard to solve. No.2 Depends entirely on No.1 - or on Google losing brand power due to a number of factors (being evil not one of them - doesn't stop Yahoo or MS) - not likely any time soon. But No.3 should be possible for a company of Google's size and stature to address.
Technology is fallible, humans are fallible, weird things happen - it should be possible to have someone at Google address these issues in person. If Google's algorithms are right most of the time, then that appeals dept is going to be very underworked. If however, they are not getting it right, then at least the appeals dept can address this directly.
It's only fair, not evil, and win/win all round really.
Except that they can't do much. Sure, the U.S. government can impose economic sanctions on non-compliant countries, but that only takes you so far.
True, and certainly in China's case - who will this hurt exactly? What percentage of US goods are in fact manufactured in China? Quite a large one I'll bet, certainly a significant one. Similarly, Turkey doesn't really need the US, but the US really does need Turkey as a base.
The fact is, speaking as a European, nobody outside the US gives a damn about US laws. In fact, we find attempts like this to assert themselves legally, to be rather lame and sad. It's just hot air and rhetoric for the voters back home I guess
Anyway, in the highly improbable event that any of these countries paid any attention the the US on piracy and actually stopped it, there's still be many other countries to which pirates could easily and successfully move to. There's also plenty of piracy from within US borders too.
The only way to beat piracy is to include fair use in copyright - assuming copyright needs to exist at all.
The *IAA needs to develop new business models or simply die - those are the only two choices available.
But... Flash is against everything browsing stands for too - closed source, breaks the back button, invasive, bloated, not available to all. So, I actually do appreciate anything that stands up and fights Flash - it is good for everyone that there is competition in this market. It would be better that there were a genuine open source alternative, however.
Should anyone from the Flashblock team be reading this, can you start working on a sliverlight block too please? I think I'm going to need one of them too.
Since the beginning of the web, I think that's the first time I've ever come across an autoprint link.
What unfettered arrogance on behalf of the publication that's hosting it in believing that their hack paragraph on a minor tech story is worth a piece of tree - presumably they have a deal going with HP to use up as much ink as possible.
Techworld - a website I will never, at any time, ever visit again. Makes Flash, or its MS competitor, look positively non-invasive.
Yes. It's a TV expression. It usually refers to the point in a TV shows run where it began to go down hill. Or where the studio introduced characters or plot lines that are preposterous, to garner ratings - invariably resulting in the alienation of all previous fans.
Vis a vis - the point in Happy Days where The Fonz jumped a Shark on waterskis.
Sadly, it has no reference to laser beams - because a few aimed at TV execs wouldn't be a bad thing.(especially Fox ones - Firefly, Drive etc...)
In the context of this article, I think that it does not mean exactly quite what the submitter thinks it does. I suspect he is jumping the metaphor.
For the most part, the UK population is close to a polling station - usually the local school. In the Islands and the North of Scotland, nowhere is near to anywhere - but we are talking a tiny fraction of the UK population. There are very few people indeed who have any excuse not to visit a polling station in person, or use a postal vote if too infirm, or otherwise unable to vote in person.
So yes, technically, you are correct, but semantically not so much - noteveryone but in fact, almost everyone.
It's worth noting who commissioned the survey, and who responded. NTL customers are, generally speaking, Joe and Demi-Jade Sixpack and their brood of shell-suited and bizarrely-named chav offspring (from several fathers, natch).
I think it's fine letting them vote online. Assuming that the webform just dumps the info. Keeps them quiet and prevents their influence - they'll never be smart enough to figure out their being ignored. Seems win-win to me.
Seriously though, these are not Alpha demographic respondents - that should be borne in mind before potentially annihilating democracy.
Your summary really does help. It's not just the different colors. It was one of the most impenetrable articles I've read here in a while. Perhaps not surprisingly, since I assume that the submitter is in fact a lawyer and has very little experience writing plain English.
The submitter may also want to hold off on TFA-linking world record attempt too. This is Slashdot, we seldom read one linked FA. Asking us to read, like 10 of them, just isn't going to happen.
In any case, a bound on complexity was already achieved when we figured out we were made out of atoms, and how many of them.
Not necessarily - without meaning to get too metaphysical. Cells replenish themselves using atoms from external sources (ultimately). The human body replenishes its cells regularly, such that every seven or so years you are a completely different being - in a sense.
This is of course very simplified, and the whole process is much more elaborate and not entirely understood. That's a lot of variables. To say that we've reached any kind of bound on complexity is, I think, naive and inaccurate.
I think that "rethinking" is not a good word to use. The implication is that they are thinking again. Which further implies that they were thinking in the first place.
Slashdot Mirror
See, here's the thing... you make it easier to pirate, and you give a stronger incentive to do so by raising the price. No, that isn't going to work. Possibly the fundamental principle of removing the DRM is a good thing - after all it's a cost center for the Labels and simply inconveniences the untechnical, or turns the technical into criminals. It's pointless.
What they actually need to do is remove the DRM and lower the price - that would increase sales and reduce piracy.
In the meantime, the advice as always - buy music direct from the artist, or second hand. Do NOT give the Labels any more money.
My eyes, the goggles, zey do nothing...
They can make money. Sure, maybe only bucketfulls as opposed to truckloads, but still plenty of it. They deserve this patent to be broken, they've been fleecing poorer countries left right and center. Brazil may be a very scary country, but they did a good thing with this.
doh - I meant Flash is server side, not client side - I've not had enough caffeine...
I'm with you apart from number 4 and 5.
Flash is, for my 2 cents, The Worst web app out there. It breaks usability - it's totally client side and screw the user. It's resource hogging and 98% of the time it's being used where it need never be - it's only the other 2% that's valid legitimate use.
Shockwave is much the same - although mercifully less used and abused than Flash.
Please understand that, in all seriousness, I value Flashblock / Firefox as the singular most valuable software combination currently available on Earth. I love those Flashblock guys, they gave me the web back.
His eBay feedback reads. Buyer Out Of This World!!!! A+++++
TFA is nonsense on so many levels. I like the parent's posts about Writely and do share them. Google and Apple are some of the least stupid companies currently around in the tech market. I'm pretty sure they'll figure something out in 10 years. This also assumes that someone is going to develop server software that's "one-click" enough for the average home user.
Hands up everyone that's helped a friend, relative, neighbor set up their wireless LAN. How do you feel about getting the call to help them set up their server? Not so much? Exactly how I feel about it.
For that reason alone, we are very far away from a home server set up for most poeple.
BMG (Sony BMG) is Bertelsmann. A German company that committed Nazi atrocities in the 1930s and 40's. Info HERE
Just in case anyone actually needed another reason to hate the RIAA, or enjoy their failure.
Only buy music directly from the artist, or second hand.
Since TFA is now firmly slashdotted, I'm making the assumption (based on the mention of copyright etc) that these are 12 rules for American bloggers.
Not sure how much these apply to anywhere else - although from what I can piece together from comments, there does seems to be some general good advice in TFA.
Obviously if you are in, for example; China, Turkey, Russia or Thailand, you need 12 very different rules - or your life may be in danger. But Copyright? Nah, if you are not in the US, you need not worry much about this. It's unlikely you'll get a cease and desist, and if you do, depending on your own country and host you may not need to do anything even then.
This negative review - of course - has nothing, nothing whatsoever to do with CNET owning mp3.com does it?
I mean why would it? Must be a coincidence, surely...
It's great that (as in this case) Google sends the Blackhats in to Google hell, although it still doesn't actually do it as successfully as many would like.
But since Google rankings are somewhat esoteric, it's hard for Whitehats to stay white. And in the parent's example - even if you are doing everything honestly there's nothing to stop a competitor killing your business in exactly the way described.
I see three real problems here:
- 1. Search is still not good enough to meet people's needs - very little tech advance in the past 10 years in fact.
- 2. Google has too much power.
- 3. No ability to appeal Google's decisions.
No.1 is obviously very hard to solve. No.2 Depends entirely on No.1 - or on Google losing brand power due to a number of factors (being evil not one of them - doesn't stop Yahoo or MS) - not likely any time soon. But No.3 should be possible for a company of Google's size and stature to address.Technology is fallible, humans are fallible, weird things happen - it should be possible to have someone at Google address these issues in person. If Google's algorithms are right most of the time, then that appeals dept is going to be very underworked. If however, they are not getting it right, then at least the appeals dept can address this directly.
It's only fair, not evil, and win/win all round really.
The fact is, speaking as a European, nobody outside the US gives a damn about US laws. In fact, we find attempts like this to assert themselves legally, to be rather lame and sad. It's just hot air and rhetoric for the voters back home I guess
Anyway, in the highly improbable event that any of these countries paid any attention the the US on piracy and actually stopped it, there's still be many other countries to which pirates could easily and successfully move to. There's also plenty of piracy from within US borders too.
The only way to beat piracy is to include fair use in copyright - assuming copyright needs to exist at all.
The *IAA needs to develop new business models or simply die - those are the only two choices available.
Has to be said, sorry - in Korea, only old people use HTML
Yes, that is mostly true.
But... Flash is against everything browsing stands for too - closed source, breaks the back button, invasive, bloated, not available to all. So, I actually do appreciate anything that stands up and fights Flash - it is good for everyone that there is competition in this market. It would be better that there were a genuine open source alternative, however.
Should anyone from the Flashblock team be reading this, can you start working on a sliverlight block too please? I think I'm going to need one of them too.
Since the beginning of the web, I think that's the first time I've ever come across an autoprint link.
What unfettered arrogance on behalf of the publication that's hosting it in believing that their hack paragraph on a minor tech story is worth a piece of tree - presumably they have a deal going with HP to use up as much ink as possible.
Techworld - a website I will never, at any time, ever visit again. Makes Flash, or its MS competitor, look positively non-invasive.
Yes. It's a TV expression. It usually refers to the point in a TV shows run where it began to go down hill. Or where the studio introduced characters or plot lines that are preposterous, to garner ratings - invariably resulting in the alienation of all previous fans.
Vis a vis - the point in Happy Days where The Fonz jumped a Shark on waterskis.
Sadly, it has no reference to laser beams - because a few aimed at TV execs wouldn't be a bad thing.(especially Fox ones - Firefly, Drive etc...)
In the context of this article, I think that it does not mean exactly quite what the submitter thinks it does. I suspect he is jumping the metaphor.
Third party add-ons...
.ani thing? People getting new ribbon.exe attachments in mails etc etc etc...
Isn't this just screaming "pwn me" - like the
For the most part, the UK population is close to a polling station - usually the local school. In the Islands and the North of Scotland, nowhere is near to anywhere - but we are talking a tiny fraction of the UK population. There are very few people indeed who have any excuse not to visit a polling station in person, or use a postal vote if too infirm, or otherwise unable to vote in person.
So yes, technically, you are correct, but semantically not so much - not everyone but in fact, almost everyone.
It's worth noting who commissioned the survey, and who responded. NTL customers are, generally speaking, Joe and Demi-Jade Sixpack and their brood of shell-suited and bizarrely-named chav offspring (from several fathers, natch).
I think it's fine letting them vote online. Assuming that the webform just dumps the info. Keeps them quiet and prevents their influence - they'll never be smart enough to figure out their being ignored. Seems win-win to me.
Seriously though, these are not Alpha demographic respondents - that should be borne in mind before potentially annihilating democracy.
Your summary really does help. It's not just the different colors. It was one of the most impenetrable articles I've read here in a while. Perhaps not surprisingly, since I assume that the submitter is in fact a lawyer and has very little experience writing plain English.
The submitter may also want to hold off on TFA-linking world record attempt too. This is Slashdot, we seldom read one linked FA. Asking us to read, like 10 of them, just isn't going to happen.
This is of course very simplified, and the whole process is much more elaborate and not entirely understood. That's a lot of variables. To say that we've reached any kind of bound on complexity is, I think, naive and inaccurate.
I think that "rethinking" is not a good word to use. The implication is that they are thinking again. Which further implies that they were thinking in the first place.
True. I guess I never expected to see the words "Sony" and "sharing" in the same sentence.