I completely agree with your post. I have a 400 minute plan right now and I typically use only about half of it. What I need is for us to go in the other direction. I want cheap per minute access. There's no reason I should have to pay for so much service when I don't really need it. $50 is definitely the most I would ever want to go. If that changes I might have to find a wireless symbian/skype enabled phone like one of those nokias.
When I've got a PC that crashes and burns, I strip out any useful parts and put it by the curb. Some idiot will always take the thing home thinking it might work.
Awhile ago my dad put his old 8088 PC onto the curb, and someone took it. It still worked too. We used to play Hack 103 on that thing. Ah, memories.
That there is still one free country in North America.
Letting a small part of their laws expire doesn't necessarily make them "free". I'm sure there are lots of other laws in Canada that restrict people's freedom in completely un-necessary and intrusive ways.
So in fact your work right now relies on centuries of government funded scientific research.
Yeah, it does. I won't try to pretend that my work wouldn't be drastically different. For me it's a question of whether it is morally ok to take money from people and use it on science just because it benefits us.
I apologize for the tone of my response... I do get a little worked up sometimes about people using my taxes for anything under the sun. For the record, yes I do work in technology.
Please tell me this: why should I allow this research to take place on my nickel, when most likely me or my community will not see much of a return for the money? Most government funded research is simply welfare for scientists. Do you really think people will all of a sudden stop being interested in discovery if they weren't forced to fund it? I find that laughable at best. If you think science is important, there would be nothing to stop you from funding it with your own goddamn time and money. Thank you.
I feel about the same way about Sirius. I was a subscriber for a couple of years, until recently when I sold my car and purchased a newer one. Even with so many choices, I found the music to be rather hit and miss. I like stuff from many different genres, but I am picky within those genres. So I found myslef only really enjoying a portion of the content from each station. Even the opera and classical stations weren't that consistent for me, since I like some opera but not definitely not all. I do carry around an Ipod, but I can fit all of my music on it. So I don't have the problem you mention of leaving anything home. I listen to it at work and on the road. I create playlists from my own music of stuff I know I will like. And I have so much music that it will take me a long time to listen to it all. I usually glance at new releases for anything interesting coming out, so I don't need satellite radio to discover new stuff either. All in all, it's just not worth it.
Actually, it's kind of the same way how I feel about cable TV as well. Since I have been subscribing to netflix, I am really tempted to just cancel the cable and get my entertainment from DVDs. I usually don't watch TV enough to even surpass 2 or 3 DVDs a week. And for any interesting shows, I can be patient and wait for them to come out on DVD too. The only real reason I've been hanging onto it is for HD sports events. You can't really beat the superbowl and Cavs games in HD. But even that has limited entertainment value for me as well, so I guess the jury really is out.
Though I work as a web developer right now, I have a long past of involvement with music. I will definitely start back up with it at one point or another. I'm sure when I do, stuff like this will be really useful. My hats off to the developers on this project. I'll definitely check it out when the linked page is no longer dead.
The government is, supposedly, run by the people. What's the alternative to government enforced contracts, hiring mercenaries?
The government is run by rich moneyed interests. The alternative is mutually agreeable private arbitration.
a violent bloody revolt after a period of long-term, widespread poverty and suffering, where the company owners are murdered and their wealth taken back by the people. That's not exactly a recipe for stability or optimal standards of living.
Are you talking about monopolies here or government? Why don't we compare the number of violent, bloody revolts against governments in history and the number of violent bloody revolts against companies. That alone should speak for itself. The government is the one who gave MS the monopoly in the first place. We wouldn't be having this problem if MS wasn't able to use our tax dollars to protect their source code from being copied.
If I sneak into your house and steal all your clothes I didn't force you at gunpoint to hand them over. Does that somehow make it more ethical or legal to steal or to illegally leverage a monopoly?
I would be very hard pressed to equate a software monopoly with theft. So, how exactly did Bill steal from me? Specific example please.
It's interesting that you insist monopolies are bad, yet advocate a complete government monopoly over contract enforcement. Monpolies that abuse their position are typically a short lived feature of true capitalism. MS will be no different in the long run. Bill never forced you at gunpoint to purchase a copy of windows.
They don't understand abusing a monopoly position in the market because most people don't even truly understand what a monopoly is, or what a market is, or what would constitute abuse and why.
You are right, people do not understand how monopolies and markets work together. Unlike most people, I do not necessarily view monopolies in a free market as a bad thing. If you have a monopoly and wish to continue to do business, you damn well better be providing a valuable service to the community, because if you don't people will have a huge incentive to come up with better alternatives. I really doubt Linux would have much of a following if it weren't for MS's perceived injustices and shoddy products.
Payola is illegal under the Clayton Act and Sherman Antitrust Act. It is a criminal act. You are misinformed.
Do you have a reference for this, or do you just expect me to take your word for it? Even if it is illegal, should it be? I'm not convinced it should.
You can see the confusion right here. There is no such thing as "IP theft."
Exactly. So what's your point?
Lying in court, under oath, should not be illegal?
I do not view the US govt as a legitimate organization. Therefore I don't have any moral problems with lying to them.
MS is organized (by definition since they're a corporation). They have been convicted of breaking the law. Ergo, they are organized crime.
Which laws have they broken, and are they just laws created by a just organization? This seems to be the main issue for me.
Should I go on? Msft really is organized crime. As a libertarian, I can assue you is not just anti-capitalists who have low regard for msft.
I'm not really sure any of that stuff makes them organized crime per se, especially compared to the legal systems they have used to get ahead. They aren't taking a gun to people's head to force them to buy software. Unlike the mafia, who outright extort and launder people's money and threaten them with physical harm if they don't pay for protection services. Payola is not a criminal act. I'm not convinced that IP theft should be a criminal act. Same with lying to the US government.
To be sure, some respondents still complain that Microsoft bullies its competitors and unfairly monopolizes the software business. But such criticism is less biting and less pervasive than it was just a few years ago.'"
People can complain all they want, but it doesn't make it so. It just happens to be an easy target for anti competition, anti capitalist folks. As much as I can't stand certain aspects of using Windows, there is no doubt what MS has done for the tech industry, and the charity world. Windows domination of the marketplace won't last forever. Complacency at the top of the market is what will kill you. As will releasing ho-hum products like Vista. As people begin to move towards better and lower cost alternatives, their market share will definitely decline. Instead of focusing on such criticism as stated above, and trying to tear them down, we should continue working to unseat them with better (free) products.
Taking the words at face value, a true believer. A brainwashed zealot. His mind is made up, don't confuse him with the facts. Truthiness! He feels it's true, with his gut. So don't waste time trying to convince the head with logic or example or reasoning. Digestive by-products would be more effective.
Right... and I would presume that your version of truthiness is that elected public officials really care about your current state of well being. After all, that's what they teach in public school textbooks, so it must be correct.
I disagree - take a look here.
Now, without "enforcement of law and public order, protection of property, economic infrastructure (roads, legal tender, enforcement of contracts, etc.), education systems, health care systems" would you be able to work?
Yes, you would be able to work. Everything provided by taxes can be done better and more efficiently with markets. Now I know that most people will respond to this with accusations that markets fail. But if you study it more closely, you will see that market failure is a myth. Most often it is the result of grave incompetence with the interventionists.
http://www.ronpaul.org/
This is the libertarian that actually has a chance... because he's running as a Republican!
I really hope Ron Paul decides to try for the nomination. He is the only thing that would get me off my couch to vote on election day. I doubt he has much of a chance, but it would still be nice to see the effort.
So you're saying that rather than contribute a little bit for someone that was rushed into the hospital via ambulance and doesn't have insurance, you'd say "No thanks, I'd rather keep my 1/100 of a penny; tough shit, I guess little Jimmy will have to die today."
Giving money to the government does next to nothing in saving little Jimmies. Most of it goes into the pockets of well connected and wealthy supporters of politicians. Moreover, the government uses that money to kill millions of little Jimmies around the world. So your statement is not only not true, but is actually the opposite of what really happens.
I should point out that Gates is rich *on paper*. I imagine if MSFT stock instantly folded he wouldn't be a happy camper.
I'm sure he has converted enough of this paper to tangible assets by now, so he could live very comfortably should this happen. As any person with half a brain would.
I pay $11 to sit through 5 tv commercials followed by 6 trailer commercials as well as about 8 studio commercials. Then i sit through a commercial telling me that piracy is illegal and that i could go to jail. This delightful process then takes up 30 minutes of my life that i PAID FOR. This isn't entertainment, this is crap that I don't want and am pissed of by it.
Uh, nobody is forcing you to sit through all that crap. If you don't like it, send them a message and stop going. That's what I did, because I've come to the conclusion that viewing movies in a theatre is a blatant rip-off on many levels. I am quite happy to watch DVDs in the privacy of my apartment on my widescreen HDTV. If you can't afford the nice TV right now, take that $11/movie and save up for one. You'll have enough in no time. If you decide you can't do without that theatre experience or whatever, stop complaining and shell out for it.
Those who study economics have to realize something here too: all of our really serious depressions in the past have been resolved by wars. War creates jobs. War stirs the economy, makes individuals wealthy. Morality aside, each time we've gotten into a bind, a war has bailed us out. This may very well be the first time that *while* at war, this is happening. A war won't bail us out this time (or at least, we'd all best pray it doesn't, because if it does, it means we as a country p*ssed off the rest of the world and they come here to set us straight).
Wars do not create jobs. They misallocate what would otherwise be productive economic activity into the military industrial complex. They wreak economic havoc on any countries who are involved. It takes years to rebuild regions that have been destroyed, just to get it back up to the same economic level where it was before. Trade and commerce have always been more productive and profitable than war overall, and always will be.
The reason the US goes to war now is to protect overseas markets for the dollar in unfriendly nations. It props up demand and prices for our currency in general. Otherwise, dollars would crash due to the massive amount of debt owed by the US government. It's ultimately not sustainable, and the economic damage to the economy it will wreak when this collapses won't be a picnic.
Of course, the government can make you turn them in and give 50 cents for fifty of them. Then they turn around and melt them down and sell them for $2.50. Maybe that's part of the new deficit reduction plan going through congress?
This is modded funny? It's exactly the same thing that happened when the government confiscated everyone's gold. They paid people something like $20 for it and then sold it on foreign markets for $35.
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I completely agree with your post. I have a 400 minute plan right now and I typically use only about half of it. What I need is for us to go in the other direction. I want cheap per minute access. There's no reason I should have to pay for so much service when I don't really need it. $50 is definitely the most I would ever want to go. If that changes I might have to find a wireless symbian/skype enabled phone like one of those nokias.
I apologize for the tone of my response... I do get a little worked up sometimes about people using my taxes for anything under the sun. For the record, yes I do work in technology.
Please tell me this: why should I allow this research to take place on my nickel, when most likely me or my community will not see much of a return for the money? Most government funded research is simply welfare for scientists. Do you really think people will all of a sudden stop being interested in discovery if they weren't forced to fund it? I find that laughable at best. If you think science is important, there would be nothing to stop you from funding it with your own goddamn time and money. Thank you.
Sweet! Can I be a volunteer on your study? I promise I will be as impartial as possible.
I feel about the same way about Sirius. I was a subscriber for a couple of years, until recently when I sold my car and purchased a newer one. Even with so many choices, I found the music to be rather hit and miss. I like stuff from many different genres, but I am picky within those genres. So I found myslef only really enjoying a portion of the content from each station. Even the opera and classical stations weren't that consistent for me, since I like some opera but not definitely not all. I do carry around an Ipod, but I can fit all of my music on it. So I don't have the problem you mention of leaving anything home. I listen to it at work and on the road. I create playlists from my own music of stuff I know I will like. And I have so much music that it will take me a long time to listen to it all. I usually glance at new releases for anything interesting coming out, so I don't need satellite radio to discover new stuff either. All in all, it's just not worth it.
Actually, it's kind of the same way how I feel about cable TV as well. Since I have been subscribing to netflix, I am really tempted to just cancel the cable and get my entertainment from DVDs. I usually don't watch TV enough to even surpass 2 or 3 DVDs a week. And for any interesting shows, I can be patient and wait for them to come out on DVD too. The only real reason I've been hanging onto it is for HD sports events. You can't really beat the superbowl and Cavs games in HD. But even that has limited entertainment value for me as well, so I guess the jury really is out.
Though I work as a web developer right now, I have a long past of involvement with music. I will definitely start back up with it at one point or another. I'm sure when I do, stuff like this will be really useful. My hats off to the developers on this project. I'll definitely check it out when the linked page is no longer dead.
Perhaps people who run these contests should also offer to pay the taxes on them. At least until we can work to repeal them.
It's interesting that you insist monopolies are bad, yet advocate a complete government monopoly over contract enforcement. Monpolies that abuse their position are typically a short lived feature of true capitalism. MS will be no different in the long run. Bill never forced you at gunpoint to purchase a copy of windows.
Wars do not create jobs. They misallocate what would otherwise be productive economic activity into the military industrial complex. They wreak economic havoc on any countries who are involved. It takes years to rebuild regions that have been destroyed, just to get it back up to the same economic level where it was before. Trade and commerce have always been more productive and profitable than war overall, and always will be.
The reason the US goes to war now is to protect overseas markets for the dollar in unfriendly nations. It props up demand and prices for our currency in general. Otherwise, dollars would crash due to the massive amount of debt owed by the US government. It's ultimately not sustainable, and the economic damage to the economy it will wreak when this collapses won't be a picnic.